Officials say a loud “boom” was heard across areas of northern Utah and was likely a meteor. Reports of the loud noise circulated at about 8:30 a.m. Saturday, with people from Orem to southern Idaho posting that they heard it. Utah Gov. Spencer Cox tweeted that his office confirmed it was not related to any seismic activity or Utah’s military installations. The National Weather Service’s Salt Lake City office wrote in a tweet that its lightning detection mapper likely picked up the meteor’s trail/flash, which officials said seemed to be confirmed by witness video in Roy.

At the 7th annual Basque Fry in Gardnerville, a lineup of GOP national heavyweights and local Nevada politicians fired up a crowd of 1,500 Republicans with a message of urgency. The midterm elections are in 80 days and will decide which party controls both the State House in Carson City and Congress in Washington D.C. Texas Sen. Ted Cruz called Nevada Republican Senate nominee Adam Laxalt’s race “the single best pickup opportunity for Republicans.” Lawmakers referenced a portion of the Inflation Reduction Act and gas prices as reasons why they're poised to take the Senate. Others criticized the FBI search of former President Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago home.

A major economic bill headed to the president has “game-changing” incentives for the nuclear energy industry, experts say, and those tax credits are even more substantial if a facility is sited in a community with a coal plant that's closing. Among the many things the transformative bill could do, nuclear energy experts say, is spur more nuclear reactor projects like one Bill Gates is planning in Kemmerer, Wyoming. Companies designing and building the next generation of nuclear reactors could pick one of two new tax credits available to carbon-free electricity generators. Both include a 10-percentage point bonus for facilities sited in fossil fuel communities.

Anshu Jain, a fomer co-CEO of Deutsche Bank, has died, according to a statement by his family on Saturday. He was 59. Jain died of duodenal cancer, which he was diagnosed with in 2017. Jain was Co-CEO of Deutsche Bank from 2012 to 2015, where he helped build the firm’s global capital markets business. As Co-CEO along with Jürgen Fitschen, he was the first ever non-European to lead the German bank. Before that, he ran the corporate and investment bank division from 2010. After leaving Deutsche Bank he served as president of Cantor Fitzgerald from 2017 until his death.

A developer has unearthed human remains that could be two centuries old while digging to lay the foundation of a new Nashville project not far from a Civil War fort and a cemetery dating back to 1822. In a court petition, AJ Capital Management noted the discovery occurred in the neighborhood near Fort Negley while the company was working on its Nashville Warehouse Co. mixed development, which will include apartments and business space. The company is asking a Nashville chancery judge for permission to move the remains to the Nashville City Cemetery. It's unclear whose remains the crews found. Enslaved as well as freed Black people were forced to build the fort for the Union, and hundreds died.

Three day-old lion cubs were on display in a cardboard box at a Gaza City zoo, a rare joyous sight for children and adults alike. The cubs were born just days after Israeli aircraft pounded the territory and Gaza militants fired hundreds of rockets at Israel. A veterinarian at the zoo said Saturday that he felt lucky the birth was successful despite the deafening sound of constant explosions during three days of fighting. Shocks from war aren’t the only threat to animals. A number of animals in makeshift zoos in impoverished, blockaded Gaza have starved to death or were killed in the conflict between Israel and Gaza militants.

The white woman whose accusations prompted the lynching of Emmett Till in 1955 talks in a memoir about getting preferential treatment from Mississippi authorities soon after the killing. Some wonder whether Carolyn Bryant Donham is still being protected decades later. A prosecutor says grand jurors recently looked at the evidence and decided against indicting the woman in Till's abduction and death. Critics contend the decision was wrong. And some say authorities have been careful to protect the white woman ever since the killing happened. It's unclear whether grand jurors will ever consider the case again. But a retired FBI agent says new evidence is still possible.

Shipping companies are preparing to halt the transport of goods on the Rhine as water levels in Germany’s biggest river near a critically low point. An ongoing drought affecting much of Europe has lowered the Rhine and prevented large ships with heavy loads from passing key waypoints. At one bottleneck on the Middle Rhine, an official gauge measured the water level at 37 centimeters (14.6 inches) on Saturday afternoon. While the depth of the shipping lane in Kaub was still about 150 centimeters (59 inches), experts say a reading below below 30 centimeters (11.8 inches) at the gauge mark is considered unpassable even for light or specially adapted cargo ships.

Salman Rushdie's agent says the writer is on a ventilator after being stabbed in the neck and abdomen on a western New York stage where he was about to give a lecture. The 75-year-old Rushdie was flown to a hospital and underwent surgery after Friday's stabbing at the Chautauqua Institution. His agent, Andrew Wylie, said the writer had a damaged liver, severed nerves in an arm and an eye he was likely to lose. Rushdie's novel “The Satanic Verses” drew death threats from Iran’s leader in the 1980s, Police arrested the man who attacked the writer and identified him as 24-year-old Hadi Matar of Fairview, New Jersey. Matar's lawyer declined to comment.

CNN legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin says he's leaving the network, nearly two years after the Zoom incident that derailed his career. Toobin had stepped away from CNN after exposing himself in a Zoom call with colleagues from The New Yorker magazine, which fired him. CNN kept him off the air for eight months, but he returned in 2021 to provide commentary on trials and court decisions. In a tweet on Friday, Toobin said he had decided to leave. He said he was glad to make his final appearance on the network with colleagues Wolf Blitzer, Anderson Cooper and Don Lemon.

Dozens of firefighters are battling a large wildfire in a rural area of Hawaii's Big Island. No homes are threatened. Gusts and arid conditions are making it difficult to contain the blaze. The fire started in the western reaches of the U.S. Army’s Pohakuloa Training Area, which is above the town of Waikoloa and between Mauna Loa and Mauna Kea volcanoes. The fire has burned more than 39 square miles as of Friday. Strong winds have been recorded across the area, some in excess of 30 mph.

Kansas’ elections director says the state will go along with a request for a hand recount of votes from every county after last week’s decisive statewide vote affirming abortion rights, even though there was a 165,000-vote difference and a recount won’t change the result. Melissa Leavitt, of Colby, declined to comment to reporters Friday evening about her request for a recount. Kansas law requires her to put up a bond to cover the cost. Also seeking a recount is state Sen. Caryn Tyson, who is trailing state Rep. Steven Johnson in the Republican primary for state treasurer by about 400 votes out of nearly 434,000 cast. She is asking for a hand recount in about half the state’s 105 counties.

Leaders of the Southern Baptist Convention say that several of their denomination’s major entities are under investigation by the U.S. Department of Justice. The SBC’s statement gave few details about the investigation, but indicated it dealt with sexual abuse. The SBC, the largest Protestant denomination in the U.S., has been plagued by problems related to clergy sex abuse in recent years. Earlier this year, an SBC task force released a blistering 288-page report from outside consultant, Guidepost Solutions. The firm’s seven-month independent investigation found disturbing details about how denominational leaders mishandled sex abuse claims and mistreated victims.

A pipeline carrying diesel has cracked open and spilled more than 45,000 gallons of fuel in a rural area of eastern Wyoming. The ruptured line is owned by a company that is being sued by federal prosecutors over previous spills in North Dakota and Montana. Joe Hunter with Wyoming's Department of Environmental Quality says that cleanup work is ongoing from the spill that was discovered July 27 on private ranch land near the small community of Sussex. The line is operated by Bridger Pipeline, a subsidiary of Casper, Wyoming-based True companies. Federal prosecutors have alleged in a pending federal court case that previous spills on the companies' lines violated environmental laws.

Officials in some parts of rural Nevada are vowing to bypass voting machines in favor of hand counting ballots this November and the Nevada secretary of state’s office is proposing statewide guidelines on how to do it. The communities pushing for hand-counting are in conservative rural parts of the state where election misinformation has grown. But four voting rights groups came out against the proposed rules Friday before the secretary of state holds a hearing seeking feedback. The groups, including the Brennan Center and ACLU Nevada, called on Nevada Secretary of State Barbara Cegavske to ban the practice outright.

A former Kentucky police detective intends to plead guilty to a civil rights charge stemming from the botched drug raid that led to Breonna Taylor's fatal shooting in 2020. Media outlets report that former Louisville Detective Kelly Goodlett is set to appear before a federal judge to enter her plea on Aug. 22. Goodlett's attorney didn't immediately return calls and emails seeking comment Friday. Taylor's death helped spark nationwide racial justice protests in 2020. The Courier Journal reports Goodlett will plead guilty to one count of conspiring to violate Taylor’s civil rights for helping falsify an affidavit for the police search of her apartment.

By chance, Associated Press reporter Joshua Goodman was at the venue in western New York when author Salman Rushdie was attacked on Friday. The Latin America correspondent based in Miami was vacationing with his family at the Chautauqua Institution, a renowned location for spiritual reflection and education. Equipped only with his mobile phone, he quickly went to work after Rushdie was stabbed. Goodman took pictures, video and told the story of an author who has been the subject of threats since the 1980s. Goodman has covered violent protests in Latin America for the AP, but said this was one of the worst things he's ever seen.

Newspaper publisher Gannett Co. confirmed Friday that it’s laying off some of its newsroom staff as part of a cost-cutting effort to lower its expenses as its revenue crumbles amid a downturn in ad sales and customer subscriptions. The McLean, Virginia-based company declined to provide details about the number of people who were losing their jobs. Gannett, which owns USA Today and more than 200 other daily U.S. newspapers with print editions, ended last year with more than 16,000 employees worldwide, according to the company's annual report. The payroll included including more than 4,200 reporters, editors and photographers.

A law enforcement official says a gunman who died in a shootout after trying to get inside the FBI’s Cincinnati office appeared to have posted calls on social media for FBI agents to be killed and for people to take up arms in the wake of the search at Donald Trump’s home. The official was not authorized to discuss the investigation publicly and spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity. The gunman has been identified as 42-year-old Ricky Shiffer. He was killed on Thursday. The official said investigators are examining whether he had ties to far-right extremist groups such as the Proud Boys.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom is proposing to extend the life of the state’s last operating nuclear power plant by at least five to 10 years to maintain reliable power supplies in the climate change era. A draft bill obtained Friday by The Associated Press said the plan would allow the plant to continue operating beyond a scheduled closing by 2025. The draft proposal also includes a possible loan for operator Pacific Gas & Electric for up to $1.4 billion. The proposal was confirmed by Newsom spokesman Anthony York. The draft was obtained ahead of a California Energy Commission meeting on the state’s energy needs.

Officials in Montenegro say a man went on a shooting rampage in the western city of Cetinje, killing 10 people, including two children, before being shot dead by a passerby. Montenegro's police chief says the 34-year-old gunman first shot and killed two children and their mother who lived as tenants in the attacker's house. He says the man then walked out on the street and randomly shot 13 more people, seven of them fatally.  A prosecutor coordinating crime scene investigation tells journalists the gunman was killed by a passerby.  Cetinje is 36 kilometers (22 miles) west of Podogrica, the capital of the small Balkan nation.

Stocks are closing higher on Wall Street, giving the S&P 500 its first 4-week winning streak since November. The benchmark index gained 1.7% Friday, and other indexes also rose. Technology stocks drove much the broad rally. Inflation cooled more than expected last month, sending stocks higher. Investors see a greater chance inflation may have peaked, allowing the Federal Reserve to be less aggressive with its rate hikes than it has been this year. Crude oil prices fell, while bond yields were mixed.

A respected snake researcher who’d been making significant discoveries about the species since childhood has died after being bitten by a timber rattler. William H. “Marty” Martin died Aug. 3 after being bitten by a captive snake on the property at his home in Harpers Ferry, West Virginia. Martin was 80 years old and continued to make arduous mountain hikes to document and count snake populations in remote sites. Snakebite fatalities are extremely rare; the Centers for Disease Control estimates that about five people die in the U.S. from snakebites each year.

Louisiana’s Supreme Court has rejected an appeal filed by plaintiffs in the ongoing legal battle over the state’s abortion ban. The rejection Friday means the state’s near-total abortion ban is still in effect as legal challenges to the law proceed. The ruling marked a major blow to abortion-rights advocates and providers, who had hoped the ban would be blocked for a third time, allowing the three clinics in the state to begin performing procedures again. Louisiana’s ban was designed to take effect when the U.S. Supreme Court overturned its 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling establishing nationwide abortion rights. The ban does not include exceptions for rape or incest.

Health officials say it is possible that hundreds of people in New York state have gotten polio and don’t know it. The pronouncement came Friday after they said the virus that causes the potentially deadly disease has been detected in New York City’s wastewater. Authorities say the presence of the virus in wastewater suggests that it is circulating locally. They are urging parents to get their children vaccinated. One person suffered paralysis weeks ago because of a polio infection north of the city. Most people infected with polio have no symptoms but can still give the virus to others for days or weeks.

The polio virus has been found in New York sewage, but officials are stressing that the highest risk is for people who haven't been vaccinated. U.S. children are still routinely vaccinated against polio and the shots are considered to be highly effective. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, about 93% of 2-year-olds had received at least three doses. And adults who were fully vaccinated as kids continue to have protective antibodies in their blood for decades. Most people who catch polio have no visible symptoms, but a rare few can be paralyzed by it. People who are unvaccinated or incompletely vaccinated are at greatest risk of that paralysis.

Paraguay Vice President Hugo Velázquez Moreno said he will resign next week shortly after he was included on a U.S. corruption list for his alleged involvement in offering bribes to a public official. The inclusion of Velázquez on the corruption list, delivered by U.S. Ambassador to Paraguay Marc Ostfield Friday morning, rocked Paraguay’s political world not only due to Moreno’s role in President Mario Abdo Benítez’s administration but also because he was seen as a leading contender to become a presidential candidate for the Colorado Party in next year’s elections.

Capping an extraordinary week in Donald Trump’s post-presidency, a New York judge ordered Friday that his company and its longtime finance chief stand trial in the fall on tax fraud charges stemming from a long-running criminal investigation into Trump’s business practices. Manhattan Judge Juan Manuel Merchan scheduled jury selection for Oct. 24 in the case, which involves allegations the Trump Organization gave CFO Allen Weisselberg more than $1.7 million in off-the-books compensation, including rent, car payments and school tuition. Weisselberg and the Trump Organization have pleaded not guilty. Weisselberg is the only Trump executive charged in the yearslong criminal investigation started by former Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr.

Last week, Kansas voters overwhelmingly rejected a ballot measure that would have allowed state lawmakers to tighten restrictions on abortion. An Associated Press analysis of the voting results found high turnout among Democratic and independent voters contributed to that result. But even in traditionally conservative Kansas — a state Donald Trump carried by double digits in 2020's presidential election — support for the abortion measure was lower in every single county than support for the former president had been two years ago. In other states, abortion-rights supporters and opponents alike are using the Kansas vote to drive their followers to the polls.

A spokesperson for Anne Heche says the actor is on life support after suffering a brain injury in a fiery crash a week ago and isn't expected to survive. The statement released on behalf of her family said she is being kept on life support to determine if she is a viable organ donor. Earlier Thursday, police said they are investigating Heche for driving under the influence of drugs. Heche crashed her car into a Los Angeles area house on Aug. 5. A police spokesman said Thursday that detectives with a search warrant took a blood sample from Heche, and it showed narcotics in her system. A spokeswoman for Heche declined comment on the investigation.

Jon Batiste, his career soaring after winning multiple Grammys, is leaving his perch as bandleader of “The Late Show” after a seven-year run backing up host Stephen Colbert. Louis Cato, who has served as interim bandleader this summer, will take over on a permanent basis when the show returns for its eighth season. He has been with the show since its launch. Colbert announced the exit Thursday during his show. The mutual respect Colbert and Batiste shared was obvious. The bandleader often cheered the comedian’s nightly monologue from the piano, appeared in segments and accompanied the musical guests. The multi-instrumentalist won five Grammys this year.

The Ford Foundation took the unprecedented step of issuing $1 billion in debt to help stabilize other nonprofits in June 2020. The move delighted investors and inspired several other large foundations to follow suit. Two years later, the foundations all stand by their decisions to take on long term debt. It allowed several to essentially double the amount they spent on grantmaking in response to what the MacArthur Foundation called the “twin pandemics” of COVID-19 and systemic racism. But the foundations say they are unlikely to repeat the bond issuance any time soon, even though they were attractive to investors who want more ESG investments.

New York has amended a series of state laws to remove the word “inmate” and replace it with “incarcerated person” when referring to people serving prison time. The changes, signed into law Monday by Gov. Kathy Hochul, are intended to reduce the stigma of being in jail. Prison reform advocates have said the term “inmate” has a dehumanizing effect. Republicans ridiculed the measure as coddling criminals. The change is the latest in the state legislature's history of amending terms in state law seen as outdated or offensive. Last month, Hochul signed legislation replacing the term “mentally retarded,” with “developmentally disabled” in state law.

The J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles is returning ancient sculptures and other works of art that were illegally exported from Italy. The museum announced Thursday that next month it will ship back a nearly life-size group of statues known as “Orpheus and the Sirens.” Four other pieces will follow at a later date, including a giant marble head, an incense burner, an ancient mold for making pendants and a 19th century painting. The museum says all are believed to have been illegally excavated or removed from Italy.