AP News Digest 3:15 a.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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TOP STORIES

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TEXAS SCHOOL-SHOOTING —Students trapped inside a classroom with a gunman repeatedly called 911 during this week’s attack on a Texas elementary school, including one who pleaded, “Please send the police now,” as officers waited more than an hour to breach the classroom after following the gunman into the building, authorities say. By Jim Vertuno and Elliot Spagat. SENT: 1,390 words, photos, videos.

GUN RIGHTS-NRA CONVENTION — Nearly 10 years ago, the slaughter of children at Sandy Hook Elementary School looked like it might break through the political stalemate on guns. That evaporated a week later when National Rifle Association CEO Wayne LaPierre gave a defiant speech. Now, Republicans are making similar points as the nation reels from another school massacre. By Lindsay Whitehurst, Brian Slodysko and Juan Lozano. SENT: 1,410 words, photos. With TEXAS SCHOOL SHOOTING-NRA — Donald Trump insists further restricting access to firearms is not the answer to preventing future tragedies. SENT: 1,220 words, photos, video; TEXAS SCHOOL SHOOTING-NRA-FACT CHECK — NRA speakers distort gun and crime statistics. SENT: 630 words, photos, video.

RUSSIA-UKRAINE-WAR — Moscow-backed separatists pounded eastern Ukraine’s industrial Donbas region Friday, claiming to capture a railway hub, as Ukrainian officials pleaded for the sophisticated Western weapons they say they need to stop the onslaught. The advance of Russian forces raised fears that cities in the region would undergo the same horrors inflicted on the people of the port city Mariupol in the weeks before it fell. By Yuras Karmanau and Elena Becatoros. SENT: 1,040 words, photos.

ALGERIA-DISSIDENTS — An Algerian military officer-turned-democracy activist has been deported from Spain and charged in Algeria in a case that human rights groups see as another sign of an ever-expanding crackdown on dissent. Algerian authorities say they are just trying to guarantee stability. Critics accuse authorities of using threats to national security to stifle speech and justify arrests — and further crush the hopes of a new era raised by the 2019 pro-democracy movement. By Elaine Ganley. SENT: 960 words, photos.

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MORE ON TEXAS SCHOOL SHOOTING

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TEXAS SCHOOL SHOOTING SCHOOL POLICE — The police official blamed for not sending officers in more quickly to stop the Uvalde, Texas, school shooting is the chief of the school system’s small police force, a unit dedicated ordinarily to building relationships with students and responding to the occasional fight. SENT: 690 words, photos.

TEXAS SCHOOL-SHOOTING-DIGITAL TIMELINE — State police shared more details of messages the shooter who killed 19 students and two teachers shared ahead of the massacre. SENT: 450 words.

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TRENDING NEWS

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CHINA-STORM — At least 15 people have died in torrential rains across southern China, state media reports. Eight died in two building collapses from landslides in Fujian province, near China’s east coast, the official Xinhua News Agency said, citing the Wuping county information office. SENT: 190 words, photo.

FOOTBALL-PLAYER-MURDER-CHARGE — A jury has acquitted a former Virginia Tech football player who had been accused of fatally beating a man he says he initially believed from a Tinder match to be a woman. SENT: 490 words, photos.

NEW ORLEANS HURRICANE PROTECTION — Seventeen years after Hurricane Katrina flooded New Orleans, the Army Corps of Engineers has completed an extensive system of floodgates, strengthened levees and other protections. SENT: 380 words, photos.

FLIGHT-ATTENDANT-PUNCHED — A California woman who punched a Southwest Airlines flight attendant in the face during a flight, breaking her teeth, has been sentenced to 15 months in federal prison. SENT: 360 words.

DAUGHTER-SMOTHERED — A Chicago woman smothered her daughter with a plastic bag on her eighth birthday while the girl screamed “Momma, stop,” because she believed her daughter didn’t love her anymore, prosecutors say. SENT: 280 words.

DECAPITATED MAN — A New Hampshire man convicted of killing his wife’s co-worker and forcing her to behead him was sentenced Friday to life in prison, plus 45 years. SENT: 405 words, photo.

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VIRUS OUTBREAK

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VIRUS OUTBREAK-WHISTLEBLOWER — There’s nothing to indicate the Florida Department of Health told an employee to falsify COVID-19 data and she wasn’t fired out of retaliation, according to a state investigator’s report released this month. SENT: 130 words.

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WASHINGTON/ POLITICS

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DEMOCRATIC HEADQUARTERS-BOMB PLOT — A jury has acquitted a former Virginia Tech football player who had been accused of fatally beating a man he says he initially believed from a Tinder match to be a woman. SENT: 370 words, photos.

MEDICAR-ALZHEIMER'S DRUG — Medicare recipients will get a premium reduction — but not until next year — reflecting what Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra said Friday was an overestimate in costs of covering an expensive and controversial new Alzheimer’s drug. SENT: 300 words, photos.

CAPITOL RIOT-TRIAL — A former U.S. Army reservist described by prosecutors as a Nazi sympathizer has been convicted of storming the U.S. Capitol to obstruct Congress from certifying President Joe Biden’s 2020 electoral victory. SENT: 670 words, photo.

GEORGIA-ELECTION-INVESTIGATION — Georgia’s secretary of state is expected to appear next week before a special grand jury in an investigation into whether former President Donald Trump and others illegally tried to meddle in the 2020 election in the state. SENT: 510 words, photo.

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NATIONAL

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SPRING-WILDFIRES — Two fires that merged to create the largest wildfire in New Mexico history have both been traced to planned burns set by U.S. forest managers as preventative measures, federal investigators announce. SENT: 860 words, photos.

STUDENT-GUN HOTLINE LAWSUIT — A high school honors student in Nevada said in federal court that he’s being bullied by students and harassed by campus administrators who search him for a gun every time someone identifies him on a state hotline that invites anonymous reports of school threats. SENT: 730 words.

CALIFORNIA-NEW-ZEALAND-CLIMATE — Top officials from California and New Zealand signed a pledge agreeing to help fight climate change by sharing ideas and best practices, including how to put millions more electric vehicles on the road. SENT; 650 words, photos, video.

SANFORD-INVESTIGATION — The South Dakota attorney general’s office has declined to file charges against billionaire T. Denny Sanford following an investigation into possible possession of child pornography, saying it found no “prosecutable offenses” within the state’s jurisdiction, according to a court document filed Friday. SENT: 580 words, photos.

ARIZONA-CATALYTIC CONVERTER THEFTS — An Arizona man was facing multiple theft charges Friday after detectives found more than 1,200 catalytic converters packed into a storage unit, a case that highlights a national surge in thefts of the pricy auto parts that play a critical role in reducing vehicle emissions. SENT: 570 words, photos, video.

BUILDING-COLLAPSE-FLORIDA — Attorneys for the families who lost relatives in last year’s collapse of a Florida condominium tower that killed 98 people reached a $1.02 billion settlement Friday, providing a speedy resolution to lawsuits that could have dragged on for years. SENT: 540 words, photos.

TRIBAL-WATER-SETTLEMENTS — Federal officials signed an agreement with leaders of the Navajo Nation on Friday that provides funding for clean drinking water infrastructure for reservation residents and resolves questions about longstanding Navajo claims to water rights in the drought-stricken U.S. West. SENT: 450 words, photos.

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INTERNATIONAL

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RUSSIA-UKRAINE-WAR-SLOW-EVACUATIONS — To a threatening soundtrack of air raid sirens and booming artillery, civilians are fleeing towns and cities in eastern Ukraine as Russian forces advance. Negotiating narrow apartment building staircases, volunteers carry the elderly and infirm in their arms, in stretchers or in wheelchairs to waiting minibuses, which then drive them to central staging areas and eventually to evacuation trains in other cities. SENT: 750 words, photos.

UNITED-NATIONS-MYANMAR — China and Russia blocked the U.N. Security Council from issuing a statement Friday expressing concern at the violence and serious humanitarian situation in Myanmar and the “limited progress” on implementing a regional plan to restore peace to the strife-torn Southeast Asian nation, diplomats say. SENT: 600 words.

MEXICO-GM-UNION — A new independent union at a Mexican auto plant that won a historic organizing vote last year has negotiated an 8.5% wage increase for unionized employees. Authorities say that workers at the GM transmission and pickup plants in the northern Mexico city of Silao voted overwhelmingly to approve the new contract, which also increases benefits by 2.5%. SENT: 430 words.

JAPAN-RED-ARMY-RELEASE — Fusako Shigenobu, who co-founded the terrorist group Japanese Red Army, has been released from prison after serving a 20-year sentence, and apologized for hurting innocent people. SENT: 270 words, photos.

MEXICO-DRUGS — Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador has said he wants to change the name of a notorious drug-producing area known as “the Golden Triangle” to “The Triangle of Good, Hard-Working People.” SENT: 260 words, phot

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ENTERTAINMENT

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CANNES-FRANCE-AWARDS — The 75th Cannes Film Festival wraps up with the presentation of the Palme d’Or and other awards selected by the nine-member jury headed by French actor Vincent Lindon. By Film Writer Jake Coyle. SENT: 290 words, photos.

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SPORTS

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BKN--HEAT-CELTICS — Jimmy Butler had 47 points, nine rebounds and eight assists and the Miami Heat forced the Eastern Conference finals to a decisive seventh game by beating the Boston Celtics 111-103. By Jimmy Golen. SENT: 840 words, photos.

HKN--AVALANCHE-BLUES — Darren Helm scored with 5.6 seconds left and Darcy Kuemper stopped 17 shots as the Colorado Avalanche finished off their second-round series with a 3-2 win over the St. Louis Blues in Game 6. SENT: 690 words, photos.

BKN—LAKERS-HAM — Darvin Ham, an assistant with the Milwaukee Bucks, has accepted an offer to be the next head coach of the Los Angeles Lakers, a person with knowledge of the decision tells the AP. The person spoke with The Associated Press on Friday on condition of anonymity because the deal has not been publicly announced. By Greg Beacham. SENT: 340 words, photos.

TEN--FRENCH OPEN — Rafael Nadal will see a familiar face in the opposite corner for his fourth-round match at the French Open. That’s because his uncle, Toni, who is also his former coach, is now working with Nadal’s next opponent, 21-year-old Felix Auger-Aliassime. By Tennis Writer Howard Fendrich. SENT: 830 words, photos. With TEN--French Open Glance (sent).

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HOW TO REACH US

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