WAILUKU, Hawaii (AP) — Nine months after the deadliest U.S. wildfire in more than a century struck Maui, Mayor Richard Bissen says the county will hire an outside expert to assess how its emergency management agency performed during the disaster.

The Aug. 8 wildfire killed 101 people and destroyed much of the historic town of Lahaina.

Maui’s police and fire departments have already conducted after-action reports. Bissen said in a statement Wednesday the county is inviting proposals from “qualified experts” to evaluate the performance of the emergency management agency to better prepare for future responses.

County officials didn’t immediately respond to an email from The Associated Press Thursday with questions, including why the request is being made now.

Many of the recommendations in the police preliminary after-action report released in February call for better equipment and updates to technology — from getting officers earpieces they can use when high winds make it hard to hear their radios to equipping patrol cars with breaching kits to remove downed trees or utility poles from roadways.

The fire department report released last month identifies challenges firefighters faced, including poorly stocked fire engines, a lack of mutual aid agreements between Hawaii counties and limited equipment.

Former President Donald Trump is limited in what he can publicly say as he fights charges that he made payments to a porn actor to illegally influence the 2016 election. But he’s getting help from some GOP allies who are glad to show up and talk.

U.S. Sen. Rick Scott of Florida was the latest surrogate to accompany Trump, joining him Thursday for the 14th day of his hush money trial in New York. Last week, it was Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton who joined the presumptive GOP presidential nominee.

The Republicans’ courtroom presence can help Trump connect with constituents while he’s stuck in court and feeling the pressure of a gag order placed on him by the judge. Both Scott and Paxton have been through legal troubles of their own, and have railed against what they call politically motivated prosecutions — a message that echoes Trump’s own. And while having friends by one’s side is a common practice encouraged by attorneys to show support for defendants in court, it’s also a chance for Trump’s friends to publicly demonstrate their loyalty to the leader of the GOP.

Scott started his day Thursday as the 6 a.m. guest on the morning show “Fox & Friends.” He later entered the courtroom behind Trump and witnessed the tense exchange between Stormy Daniels and Trump’s defense attorney as they were going over the alleged 2006 sexual encounter between the former president and the porn actor.

The senator filed into the first row of the courtroom gallery behind the defense table, joining Trump’s entourage, and spoke with Trump lawyer and spokesperson Alina Habba before taking a seat.

After an hour and a half, Scott left the courtroom and walked across the street to speak to news outlets. There, he commented on a a subject Trump has been ordered not to, bringing up Judge Juan Merchan’s daughter and saying she was a political operative who raises money for Democrats.

“This is just a bunch of Democrats saying we want to make sure that Donald Trump can’t talk,” Scott said. “Then they’ve got a gag order, so he can’t go campaign. They’ve got him holed up in a courtroom.”

The gag order prohibits Trump from making or directing others to make public statements about people connected to the case, including the judge’s family.

Scott denied his presence had anything to do with the gag order.

“No. I’m fed up,” he said. “This is just simply they don’t want this guy on the ballot.”

Paxton did not speak publicly when he joined Trump last week, but he gave interviews later to Fox Business and Newsmax about the trial, calling it “perversion of justice.”

“This is tyrannical, and to stop him from speaking out and defending himself and keep him from basically campaigning, I think is hard to believe and I hope the American people do not put up with this,” Paxton told Fox Business the day after.

David Weinstein, a legal analyst and former federal prosecutor, said Trump can’t directly or indirectly comment, adding that an indirect comment would include a friend saying something Trump shared or told. But surrogates like Scott are free to speak.

“They can say whatever they want to say. They are not bound by a gag order,” he said.

Weinstein said Trump is not only on trial for the crimes he is charged with, but he’s also before the court of opinion while trying to win an election.

“He can bring other people in, can show constituents of other states that he has the backing of other politicians,” he said. “This is a political and a public relations tactic. It’s got nothing to do with his defense.”

Trump’s attorneys have argued against the gag order, saying the former president should be allowed to respond to Daniels’ testimony. But Merchan on Thursday refused a request to modify it.

Gustavo Lage, a criminal defense attorney, said it is controversial as to what extent this gag order applies.

“I think the court would have a hard time saying that a third party can’t voice their opinion or their feelings about a trial,” Lage said.

As far as connecting with voters by bringing in surrogates and allies, Lage said that should not be relevant in court.

“I don’t think that is something the court could or should control as long as it doesn’t interfere with the administration of justice in the courtroom,” he said.

COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) — A bill that would have consolidated six South Carolina heath care agencies and was overwhelmingly passed by both chambers of the General Assembly died on the session’s final day Thursday in a procedural move by a member angry he was mocked by his colleagues.

Republican Rep. Josiah Magnuson has been against the bill from the start, saying it would create a health care czar who could take over like a dictator if there was another pandemic emergency like COVID-19.

So when the House needed unanimous support to take up the bill one last time minutes before the 5 p.m. Thursday end-of-session deadline, Magnuson objected and stood his ground even as bill sponsor Republican Sen. Tom Davis came over and held a heated conversation with other party members that had many in the chamber stopping to watch and security sergeants hovering nearby.

After the session ended, Magnuson said he was offended that he and his fellow Freedom Caucus members — roughly 15 of the most conservative House members — had been mocked all week.

Magnuson said one colleague had a puppet with bright red hair, just like Magnuson, wearing a tin hat with a Freedom Caucus sticker.

He said Davis has had nothing but insulting things to say about the group that often tries to use obstructing tactics to stall bills and social media posts that other Republicans say are ambiguous or misleading to achieve goals outside of what most Republicans in the House want.

“They have basically ridiculed me,” Magnuson said. “They have completely eradicated any credibly they have with me.”

The bill follows up last year’s breakup of the state Department of Health and Environmental Control that spun off the environmental functions.

The 2024 proposal would have created a new Executive Office of Health and Policy. It would have combined separate agencies that currently oversee South Carolina’s Medicaid program, help for older people and those with mental health problems, public health and drug and alcohol abuse programs. The consolidated agency would have come under the governor’s cabinet.

Republican Gov. Henry McMaster supported the bill in his State of the State speech. It was a pet project of Republican Senate Finance Committee Chairman Harvey Peeler and backed by Republican House Speaker Murrell Smith It passed the Senate on a 44-1 vote and the House on a 98-15 vote.

A stunned Davis stormed back in the chamber after the gavel fell and told Peeler what happened. Staffers in both chambers shook their heads.

“I’m interested in delivering good health care options for the people of South Carolina,” Davis said. “And we had some people over in the House today that failed the people of South Carolina over petty political differences.”

The bill had a tough slog at times. More conservative senators tried to tack proposals on that would prevent businesses from requiring employees to get vaccines that had not been approved by the federal government — a holdover complaint from the COVID-19 pandemic.

Others didn’t like their interpretation that the new director of the bigger health care agency could get nearly unlimited powers to quarantine, require vaccines or arrest people who didn’t follow orders in a health care emergency. Supporters of the bill said that couldn’t happen.

The death of the health care bill was considered a win by the Freedom Caucus, which often feels shut out of the best committee assignments and that their ideas get no traction in committee or the House floor.

Caucus Chairman Republican Rep. Adam Morgan said it was a bad bill from the start.

“Sometimes your bills die,” Morgan said. “You play stupid games, win stupid prizes.”

Smith said this kind of move by the Freedom Caucus doesn’t help their cause in a chamber where almost all progress comes from working together. He said the bill will continue to be a priority and that the General Assembly returns sooner than some might realize.

“It will be a six-month delay, but I don’t think that disrupts anything we are doing,” Smith said.

FORT WALTON BEACH, Fla. (AP) — Just two days before a sheriff’s deputy in Florida shot him dead, U.S. Air Force airman Roger Fortson called home to find out what his 10-year-old sister wanted for her birthday.

It was a typical gesture for the 23-year-old from Atlanta, who doted on the girl and was devoted to helping her, a younger brother and his mom prosper, his family says.

“He was trying to give me everything that I never could get for myself,” his mother, Chantemekki Fortson, said Thursday at a news conference in Fort Walton Beach, where her son was living when he was killed.

He was her “gift,” she said, the man who taught her to love and forgive and served as her co-worker and counselor.

An Okaloosa County sheriff’s deputy shot Fortson on May 3. Sheriff’s officials say he acted in self-defense while responding to a call of a disturbance in progress at the apartment complex. But civil rights attorney Ben Crump, who is representing the Fortson family, has accused the deputy of going to the wrong apartment and said the shooting was unjustified.

The Florida Department of Law Enforcement is investigating.

At Thursday’s news conference, Chantemekki Fortson held a large framed portrait of her son in dress uniform. He joined the Air Force in 2019, the same year he graduated from Ronald McNair — a majority Black high school in metro Atlanta’s DeKalb County where roughly half of students don’t graduate in four years.

Air Force service was a lifelong dream, and Fortson rose to the rank of senior airman. He was stationed at Hurlburt Field near Fort Walton Beach.

“Where we come from, we don’t end up where Roger ended up,” his mother said.

Fortson, a gunner aboard the AC-130J, earned an Air Medal with combat device, which is typically awarded after 20 flights in a combat zone or for conspicuous valor or achievement on a single mission. An Air Force official said Fortson’s award reflected both — completing flights in a combat zone and taking specific actions during one of the missions to address an in-flight emergency and allow the mission to continue. The official spoke on the condition of anonymity to provide additional details that had not been made public.

But his service, like almost everything else he did, had a larger purpose.

“He was trying to help his family have a better life,” Crump said Thursday.

That meant serving as a role model for his 16-year-old brother, his mom said, saving up to try to buy her a house, and getting her a new car. His nickname was “Mr. Make It Happen.”

Chantemekki Fortson recalled that her son, then in high school, accompanied her in an ambulance to the hospital when she was giving birth to her daughter and tried to tell the doctor how to deliver the baby.

The girl and his brother were always in his thoughts. Fortson was assigned to the 4th Special Operations Squadron as a special missions aviator, where one of his roles was to load the gunship’s 30mm and 105mm cannons.

Chantemekki Fortson said her son was injured while loading a plane and was in such severe pain he thought he would die. But he told his mom he had to push through for his brother and sister.

He was also by her side when she got into an accident a short time later and needed to go the emergency room.

“That’s the kind of gift he was,” she said. “They took something that can never be replaced.”

___

Thanawala reported from Atlanta. Associated Press writer Tara Copp in Washington contributed to this report.

A Chinese billionaire who pleaded guilty to funneling illegal straw donations to politicians’ campaigns in New York and Rhode Island was sentenced Thursday to time served and quickly left the country as part of his deal with prosecutors to forfeit his green card.

Hui Qin, 56, a Chinese film magnate with homes in Manhattan and Long Island, appeared in federal court in Central Islip, New York, and was sentenced to seven months in prison — matching the time he had served in pretrial detention since his arrest in October. He later was taken to an airport and boarded a plane to an undisclosed location, his lawyer said.

Qin pleaded guilty in March to illegally making campaign contributions in the names of others, immigration fraud and production of a false identification document. He admitted using his fortune to recruit and reimburse people who made political donations on his behalf, starting with a New York City race in 2021 — when Mayor Eric Adams was elected.

Federal prosecutors never named the politicians whose campaigns received the straw donations. U.S. Attorney Breon Peace’s office said they were a candidate for New York City political office, a U.S. representative on Long Island and a candidate for a Rhode Island congressional district seat.

Prosecutors said the straw donors contributed about $11,600 to the campaigns on Qin’s behalf without the campaigns’ knowledge.

“Qin’s brazen flouting of our political and immigration systems, and his defrauding government agencies resulted in a felony conviction, prison sentence and today, his removal from the United States,” Peace said in a statement.

Qin’s lawyer, Henry Mazurek, said Qin got on a plane to leave the country later in the day. He declined to say where Qin was going. He said his client looked forward to rebuilding his life.

“I have no doubts that he will soon regain prominence in international business, and he has a good future ahead of him,” Mazurek said in a phone interview. “And it is unfortunate that the U.S. government decides that he will have to build that career someplace else, because he has always been a philanthropist, a legitimate businessman who has done a lot of good here in Long Island and New York.”

Mazurek said Qin “just wanted to participate as a citizen could” in elections, but was not able to contribute to candidates he supported because he was not a citizen. He said the campaigns did not know about the straw donors scheme.

Qin was previously included on the Forbes list of billionaires, with an estimated net worth of $1.8 billion from his stake in film and entertainment companies, including the Honk Kong-based SMI Culture.

According to campaign finance records, Qin donated $2,000 to Adams in March 2021. Under the city’s campaign finance rules, green card-holders can contribute to races and participate in the city’s generous matching funds program, which caps donations at $2,100. A lawyer for Adams has said the mayor had no knowledge of the scheme.

Nine months after the donation to Adams, federal prosecutors said Qin began working “to find individuals to make more than $10,000 in straw donor contributions” to an unnamed New York City candidate.

At least one person donated $1,000 on Qin’s behalf on Dec. 9, according to prosecutors. The following day, Qin spoke with an unnamed co-conspirator, who told him they expected to be able to obtain up to $20,000 in straw donor contributions for the candidate.

Adams, a Democrat, is currently facing a federal investigation for his fundraising practices. He has said his campaign followed the law on fundraising.

Prosecutors say Qin engaged in two other straw donor schemes.

Federal Elections Commission records show Qin donated $2,900 in 2022 to the campaign of Allan Fung, a Republican former mayor who ran unsuccessfully for Congress in Rhode Island. Fung did not immediately return a phone message seeking comment Thursday.

Records also show that a man named Jonathan Chau, who provided Adams’ transition committee with $1,000 on December 9, 2021, gave $5,800 to a committee supporting Fung, and $2,900 to a committee backing Rep. Andrew Garbarino, a Long Island Republican. An email message seeking comment was sent to a Garbarino staffer.

Also as part of the case, Qin admitted to filing a false application for lawful permanent residency status in the U.S. in 2019 by falsely claiming he never used an alias, and fraudulently obtaining a Florida driver’s license when he lived in New York.

By David Shepardson and David Morgan

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -The U.S. Senate late on Thursday overwhelmingly passed a broad aviation bill to boost air traffic controller staffing, increase funding to avert runway close-call incidents and speed refunds for canceled flights.

The $105 billion, five-year measure reauthorizes the Federal Aviation Administration. The bill prohibits airlines from charging fees for families to sit together and requires airplanes to be equipped with 25-hour cockpit recording devices – up from the current two-hours – and directs the FAA to deploy advanced airport surface technology to help prevent collisions.

The bill adds five daily round-trip flights at busy Washington National Airport and requires airlines to accept vouchers and credits for at least five years.

Efforts to boost aviation safety in the United States have taken on new urgency after a series of near-miss incidents and the Jan. 5 Alaska Airlines Boeing 737 MAX 9 door plug mid-air emergency.

The bill, which is expected to get final approval next week from the U.S. House of Representatives, does not raise the mandatory pilot retirement age to 67 as lawmakers had sought to do last year.

Earlier this week, lawmakers agreed to revise language to ensure quick refunds for airline passengers whose flights are canceled who bought non-refundable tickets and who are not seeking alternative flights.

The bill raises maximum civil penalties for airline consumer violations from $25,000 per violation to $75,000 and aims to address a shortage of 3,000 air traffic controllers by directing the FAA to implement improved staffing standards and to hire more inspectors, engineers and technical specialists.

Congress will not establish minimum seat size requirements, leaving that instead to the FAA. The bill requires the Transportation Department to create a dashboard that shows consumers the minimum seat size for each U.S. airline.

Congress also rejected many other consumer provisions the Biden administration sought.

The bill also reauthorizes the National Transportation Safety Board and boosts staffing at the safety investigation agency. It also seeks to boost adoption of drones and flying air taxis into the national airspace and extends through Oct. 1 existing government counter-drone authority.

(Reporting by David Shepardson and David Morgan; Editing by Jamie Freed and Diane Craft)

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A bipartisan group of lawmakers unveiled a bill late Wednesday that would make it easier for the Biden administration to impose export controls on AI models, in a bid to safeguard the prized U.S. technology against foreign bad actors.

The bill, sponsored by House Republicans Michael McCaul, John Molenaar, Max Wise and Democrat Raja Krishnamoorthi, would also give the Commerce Department express authority to bar Americans from working with foreigners to develop AI systems that pose risks to U.S. national security.

The legislation aims to bulletproof any future AI export regulations from legal challenges. It comes as worries mount that U.S. adversaries could use the models, which mine vast amounts of text and images to summarize information and generate content, to wage aggressive cyber attacks or even create potent biological weapons.

Reuters reported on Wednesday that the United States is poised to open up a new front in its effort to safeguard U.S. AI from China and Russia with preliminary plans to impose export controls on the most advanced proprietary AI Models.

But under existing U.S. law, it is much more difficult for the Commerce Department, which oversees U.S. export policy, to regulate the export of open source AI models, which can be freely downloaded.

If approved, the measure would remove roadblocks to regulating the export of open source AI contained in the International Emergency Economic Powers Act and also give the Commerce Department express authority to regulate AI systems.

China has been heavily relying on many open source models developed in the West such as Meta Platforms’ “Llama” series.

In March, the Beijing Academy of Artificial Intelligence, a high-level research lab, was quoted by Chinese state media as stating that the majority of homegrown Chinese AI models were in fact built using Meta’s Llama models and that this posed a key challenge to China’s AI development.

In November 2023, 01.AI, one of the most high-profile AI unicorns in China founded by Google’s former executive Lee Kai-fu, faced a major backlash after some AI engineers found that its AI model Yi-34B was built on Meta’s Llama system.

It also comes after Microsoft (MSFT.O) announced it was investing $1.5 billion in United Arab Emirates-based artificial intelligence firm G42, giving G42 permission use to use Microsoft cloud services to run its AI applications.

The deal, which involved a security agreement inked with the U.S. and UAE governments, was unveiled despite growing concerns in the United States over deepening ties between China and the Gulf states, including the UAE.

(Reporting by Alexandra Alper; editing by Diane Craft)

WASHINGTON (AP) — The FBI is concerned that foreign adversaries could deploy artificial intelligence as a means to interfere in American elections and spread disinformation, a senior official said Thursday, describing the technology as an area “that’s probably going to see growth over the coming years.”

The threat is more than theoretical given the prevalence of AI deepfakes and robocalls and the way such technology has already surfaced in politics.

The official noted an episode in Slovakia early this year in which audio clips resembling the voice of the liberal party chief — purportedly capturing him talking about hiking beer prices and rigging the vote — were shared widely on social media just days before parliamentary elections. The clips were deepfakes.

An incident in the U.S. involved robocalls impersonating President Joe Biden that urged voters in New Hampshire to abstain from voting in January’s primary election. The robocalls were later traced to a political consultant who said he was trying to publicize the dangers of AI deepfakes.

AI technology is a challenge to law enforcement not only because it lowers the barrier of entry for people looking to make mischief but also because it adds to the arsenal of more sophisticated foreign governments that want to interfere in elections, said the official, who was one of several FBI officials to brief reporters on the topic of election security on the condition of anonymity under ground rules set by the FBI.

The three countries of most concern to the FBI in the current election year are Russia, Iran and China. Officials in the past have ascribed different motives and ambitions to the countries in terms of what they hope to achieve by influencing American elections.

In the case of Russia, intelligence officials in 2016 and 2020 have said Moscow had a clear preference for Republican Donald Trump and took steps designed to get him elected, including a sophisticated hack-and-leak operation of Democratic emails before he was elected eight years ago.

A recent intelligence community report assessed that, in the 2022 midterm election, Russia tried to denigrate the Democratic Party, with a goal of weakening U.S. support for Ukraine, and undermine confidence in the elections.

The report said China sought to influence a handful of races featuring candidates from both major political parties, focusing on those with anti-China views and covertly denigrating a U.S. senator. And it said that Iran conducted covert operations aimed at exploiting perceived social divisions.

In 2024, FBI officials said, China will likely continue its efforts to sow divisions, and the FBI is watching whether the Ukraine war will motivate Russia’s behavior.

DENVER (AP) — A Colorado abortion fund said Thursday it’s helped hundreds access abortion in the first months of 2024, many arriving from Texas where abortion is restricted, showing a steady increase in need each year since Roe v. Wade was overturned in 2022.

The U.S. Supreme Court’s decision left a patchwork of state bans, restrictions and protections across the country. In response, a national makeshift network of individuals and organizations help those seeking abortions in states where it’s restricted, including the Colorado-based Cobalt Abortion Fund.

Cobalt provides financial support for both practical expenses, such as travel and lodging, and abortion procedures, and they operate from the Democratic-led state that has staunchly protected access to abortion, including for nonresidents.

Cobalt’s aid has already jumped since Roe was overturned, from $212,00 in 2021 to $1.25 million by 2023. In Cobalt’s latest numbers, the group spent $500,000 in the first three months of 2024 and predict spending around $2.4 million by the end of the year to help people access abortions. That would nearly double last year’s support.

Over half of that 2024 spending went to some 350 people for practical support, not the procedure, and the vast majority of the clients were from Texas.

“There is this idea that the Dobbs decision and subsequent bans, due to trigger bans, created an increase in volume, and now maybe that volume has decreased or kind of stabilized. That is not the case,” said Melisa Hidalgo-Cuellar, Cobalt’s director.

“The volumes continue to increase every single month,” she said.

Hidalgo-Cuellar says the steady rise is partly due to more access to information on social media and new restrictions. Florida’s restriction went into effect last week and bans most abortions after six weeks of pregnancy, before many women even know they are pregnant.

Colorado has pulled in the opposite direction, becoming a haven for abortion in a region of largely conservative states. Last year, the state passed a law that shields those seeking abortions, and those providing them, from prosecution in other states where it’s restricted, such as Florida.

Now, antiabortion activists are testing the boundaries of those bans in court. That includes a Texas man who is petitioning a court to authorize an obscure legal action to find out who allegedly helped his former partner obtain an out-of-state abortion.

Those out-of-state abortions are in part why Cobalt’s funding for practical support — mainly travel expenses — exceeded it’s aid for the procedure itself.

___

Bedayn is a corps member for the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu have long managed a complicated relationship, but they’re running out of space to maneuver as their views on the Gaza war diverge and their political futures hang in the balance.

Their ties have hit a low point as Biden holds up the delivery of heavy bombs to Israel — and warns that the provision of artillery and other weaponry also could be suspended if Netanyahu moves forward with a widescale operation in the southern Gaza city of Rafah.

Netanyahu, for his part, is brushing off Biden’s warnings and vowing to press ahead, saying, “If we have to stand alone, we will stand alone.”

“If we need to, we will fight with our fingernails. But we have much more than fingernails,” he said.

Biden has long prided himself on being able to manage Netanyahu more with carrots than sticks. But the escalation of friction over the past seven months suggests that his approach may be long past its best-by date.

With both men balancing an explosive Mideast situation against their own domestic political problems, Netanyahu has grown increasingly resistant to Biden’s public charm offensives and private pleading, prompting the president’s more assertive pushback in the past several weeks.

“If they go into Rafah, I’m not supplying the weapons that have been used historically to deal with Rafah, to deal with the cities, that deal with that problem,” Biden said in a CNN interview Wednesday, laying bare his growing differences with Netanyahu.

Biden aides nonetheless insist the president is unwilling to allow the U.S.-Israel relationship to truly rupture on his watch. They cite not only the political imperative — a majority of Americans support Israel — but also Biden’s personal history with the country and his belief in its right to defend itself.

The president’s aides, watching how pro-Palestinian protests have roiled his party and the college campuses that have been breeding grounds for Democratic voters, have mused for months that Biden could be the last classically pro-Israel Democrat in the White House.

Their optimism about their ability to contain Netanyahu may be falling into the same trap that has vexed a long line of American presidents who have clashed with the Israeli leader over the decades.

White House national security spokesman John Kirby on Thursday declined to say whether Biden informed Netanyahu of his decision to suspend shipment of 3,500 bombs when the leaders spoke earlier this week. But he said Biden has been “direct and forthright” with Netanyahu about his concerns.

Biden and Netanyahu have known each other since Biden was a young senator and Netanyahu was a senior official in Israel’s embassy in Washington.

They’ve hit rough patches before.

There were differences over Israel building settlements in the West Bank during Barack Obama’s administration when Biden was vice president. Later, Netanyahu vehemently opposed Biden’s push to resurrect the Iran nuclear deal sealed by Obama and scrapped by Donald Trump. Netanyahu chafed at Biden prodding him to de-escalate tensions during Israel’s bloody 11-day war with Hamas in 2021.

The leaders went more than a month earlier this year without talking as Biden’s frustration with Netanyahu grew over the humanitarian crisis in Gaza.

The relationship remained workable despite such differences between the center-left Democrat and the leader of the most far-right coalition government in Israel’s history.

But with the Biden-Netanyahu relationship now coming under greater strain than ever before, it is unclear how the leaders will move forward.

Netanyahu is caught between public pressure for a hostage deal and hard-liners in his coalition who want him to expand the Rafah invasion, despite global alarm about the harm it could do to some 1.3 million Palestinians sheltering there. He’s made clear that he will push forward with a Rafah operation with or without a deal for hostages.

The Israeli leader vowed to destroy Hamas after its Oct. 7 rampage in southern Israel in which 1,200 people were killed and some 250 were captured and taken hostage. But his public standing has cratered since then, as he faces pressure to find a pathway to a truce that would bring home the remaining hostages and the remains of Israelis who have died in captivity.

He’s resisted an investigation into what led to the intelligence and military failures leading up to the Hamas attack. All the while, he’s still facing legal problems, including a long-running corruption trial in which he is charged with fraud and accepting bribes.

Netanyahu’s political survival may depend on the Rafah offensive. If he reaches a hostage deal that stops short of conquering Rafah, hardliners in his coalition have threatened to topple the government and trigger new elections at a time when opinion polls forecast he would lose.

“To keep his partners on board and prevent them from pre-empting an election, in which Likud will be decimated and he will be turned out of office, he needs to keep the ‘total victory’ myth alive – and that is only possible by avoiding a deal with Hamas,” wrote Anshel Pfeffer, a columnist and author of a Netanyahu biography, in the Haaretz daily.

Aviv Bushinsky, a former spokesman and chief of staff for Netanyahu, said the Israeli leader remains focused on the war’s primary goal – defeating Hamas – because of concerns about his image and legacy.

He said Netanyahu has spent his career branding himself as the “tough guy on terror.”

“He thinks this is how he will be remembered. He’s been promising for a decade to cream Hamas,” Bushinsky said. “If he doesn’t, in his mind he’ll be remembered as the worst prime minister of all time.”

Biden, meanwhile, faces mounting protests from young Americans, a segment of the electorate critical to his reelection. And he’s faced backlash from Muslim Americans, a key voting bloc in the battleground state of Michigan. Some have threatened to withhold their votes in November to protest his administration’s handling of the war.

Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, a Biden ally who has been frustrated by the administration’s handling of the war, said Thursday Biden should go further and suspend delivery of all offensive weaponry to Israel.

“The United States does and should stand by its allies, but our allies must also stand by the values and the laws of the United States of America,” Sanders said. “We must use all of our leverage to prevent the catastrophe in Gaza from becoming even worse.”

At the same time, Biden is facing bruising criticism from Republicans, including presumptive 2024 GOP presidential nominee Trump, who say that his decision to hold back weapons is a betrayal of an essential Mideast ally.

“What Biden is doing with respect to Israel is disgraceful. If any Jewish person voted for Joe Biden, they should be ashamed of themselves. He’s totally abandoned Israel,” Trump told reporters on Thursday.

Idaho Sen. Jim Risch, the top Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said Biden’s move is “simply a nod to the left flank” that is handing “a great victory to Hamas.”

Friction between the U.S. and Israeli leaders is not without precedent.

President George H.W. Bush and Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir’s relationship was strained as the Republican administration threatened to withhold $10 billion in aid to thwart new settlement activity in the West Bank. Obama and Netanyahu’s relationship was marked by mutual distrust over the Democrat’s effort to reignite the Middle East peace process and forge the Iran nuclear deal.

“There were always workarounds if the heads of government really don’t get along. We may get to that,” said Elliot Abrams, a senior national security official in the George W. Bush administration. “But of course, this may be a sort of problem that solves itself in that one or both of them may be gone from office” in a matter of months.

___

AP writers Mary Clare Jalonick in Washington and Adriana Gomez Licon in Miami contributed reporting. Frankel reported from Jerusalem.