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  • Pearl Jam bassist Ament highlights skateboarding’s impact in Indigenous communities in Tribeca film

    Raised in the rural Montana community of Big Sandy, Jeff Ament got hooked as a teenager on skateboarding at a time when not much more than only a handful of ramps were available in the state.

    Ament’s first love was a “terrible” clay wheel skateboard and his passion blossomed on a family trip to California, where he skateboarded and felt the g-forces on urethane wheels on paved asphalt streets and then poured through the pages of Skateboarder magazine on the 20-hour drive home to Montana.

    Ament found pictures of decks and ramps that he used as inspiration for designs that his dad, George, would help him build — like how to craft a kick tail and create the perfect tail radius — and took his skateboard to compete in larger contests around the state.

    “I think the idea that he was helping me build something was the most important thing to him,” Ament said. “He gave me a life skill.”

    Ament’s other major life skill, as bassist for the Pearl Jam band he co-founded, also has served him well and provided him with the means to help fund the creation of world-class skateboard parks in Montana. Many are in small, isolated communities, including at least one on every state Native American reservation by the end of the year. Construction starts in two weeks for one on the last reservation on the list, Northern Cheyenne.

    “I think a lot of people don’t understand artists,” Ament said on a Zoom with The Associated Press. “I think skateboarding is probably even more of an art than it is a sport.”

    Ament has found the parks can help kids survive and thrive outside of daily isolation, a message spread in the short documentary “Paving the Way.” Ament created original music for the film — which captures skateboarding’s power to foster creativity, challenge stereotypes and build community, spotlighting Indigenous youth on the Flathead Reservation — that premiers Sunday at the Tribeca Festival in New York.

    The film tells the story through skater and artist Alishon Kelly, who perseveres with her love of skateboarding even with a broken foot. “Paving the Way” is directed by Keelan Williams and was nominated for the Big Sky Award at the Big Sky Documentary Film Festival.

    “I think what he captures really well is just, when you have that thing inside of you, you just feel the need to be created,” Ament said. “I think it explains it really well, how cathartic it can be, how it helps you understand other aspects of your life.”

    At the film’s backbone is a partnership between Jeff’s Montana Pool Service — a nod to the large bowl at the center of a skate park — and the Confederated Salish & Kootenai Tribes, as five new skateparks rise across the Flathead Reservation.

    “We’re reminding people of our first peoples,” Ament said. “I think most people in this country have no idea that they even exist. I think there’s even been certain people in our government that are trying to kind of rewrite history, erase history. You even hear young people, say, younger people than me, talk about the Native people as if they’re immigrants.”

    The 63-year-old Ament delivered the commencement speech at MSU-Northern in Montana last month and touched on the importance for the graduates to be being open to getting out and seeing the world, even if they come from areas that can seem disconnected from their rural hometowns. He met with some of the students after the ceremony and found the experience “gave me hope. I think sometimes I don’t always see the best of the younger generation. They’re almost to a person, so gung-ho about getting out, getting after it.”

    There also are plans in the works to get “Paving the Way” out in the world — Ament hoped for distribution beyond Tribeca, where Pearl Jam singer Eddie Vedder was the focus of a film in the festival last year — now available on YouTube or PBS — but wanted to make sure the film is somehow available to those in Indigenous communities and to show them the hope, resilience and joy that can be found at the skateboarding parks.

    “These parks are where we come together and where we look out for each other,” said Terrence Lozeau, a skater featured in the film. “You see little kids watching the older ones and learning.”

    As for Ament’s day job, Pearl Jam returns in September to headline the Ohana festival in Dana Point, California, in its first performance since drummer Matt Cameron left the band in May after 27 years. The band has kept the identity of his replacement under wraps and will make it official at the Sept. 27 festival.

    “I think the big question is, if it’s going to work out that this is our future drummer,” Ament told the AP. “It’ll be the first show, so there’s a little bit of a trial happening. It’s exciting. It’s taken a little bit longer than we thought it would take. We’re not in any massive rush either.”

    Ament said the band has started writing new songs but would like to play a few dates with the new drummer before Pearl Jam hits the studio again next year.

    “I think we need to get out and play like 10, 15 shows with whoever our drummer is and just kind of get that part going before we make a record,” Ament said.

  • Pope Leo XIV acknowledges stiff competition with Bad Bunny in Spain and weighs in on soccer rivalry

    ABOARD THE PAPAL PLANE (AP) — Pope Leo XIV ackowledged Saturday he is competing for attention with another VIP in Madrid this weekend, and the pontiff declared his preference in Spain’s biggest soccer rivalry.

    Puerto Rican sensation Bad Bunny is performing two shows of his 10-concert Spanish tour in the capital.

    Speaking to reporters aboard the papal plane before his arrival in Madrid on Saturday morning, Leo acknowledged the appeal of Bad Bunny when he referred to anecdotal reports of a newfound spiritual awakening, especially among young people in Spain.

    The American pope said he understood that young adults are sensing a lack of meaning in their lives and mused that his visit might help “awaken” something in them.

    “If they are confronted with the question ‘Do you want to go see Bad Bunny or do you want to go to see the pope?’ I think many will see Bad Bunny,” Leo said. “But I think there will also be a few here to see the pope. And that says something, you know.”

    He’s wasn’t wrong: About 500,000 people, many of them young Spaniards, poured into a Madrid plaza for an evening prayer vigil on Saturday. They shouted “This is the youth of the pope!” as Leo zoomed around in his popemobile, and then jammed to a Spanish rendition of the 1970s American musical “Godspell.”

    Leo is opening a weeklong visit to Spain on Saturday. After Madrid, the trip will also take him to Barcelona and the Canary Islands. He’s hoping to bring a message of unity in a country polarized with political and church scandals.

    Leo was also asked about news that plans are moving ahead for his beloved Chicago Bears to move to Hammond, Indiana. The board of the team voted this week to move forward with a stadium development project in Hammond.

    Asked if he had any words of consolation for Illinois, the Chicago-born pope quipped: “That’s out of my pay (scale).”

    In other sporting comments, Leo confirmed that he would root for the United States in the upcoming World Cup, and showed his true team colors when asked about whether supports Real Madrid or the Barcelona soccer team: “That’s easy,” he said. “The pope is for all teams, but Prevost is Real Madrid,” he said, referring to his birth name.

    Pope recalls his father’s service on D-Day anniversary

    Leo fielded a host of questions as he greeted journalists traveling with him. He spoke about Ukraine and Lebanon and his recent proclamation that the Catholic Church’s “just war” doctrine — which establishes the criteria when war can be morally justified — was “outdated.”

    With Saturday marking the 82nd anniversary of the D-Day landings on June 6, 1944, Leo also told a French journalist that he would like one day to visit Normandy, France, as pope.

    “My father was there,” he said.

    It was a reference to Leo’s father, Louis Prevost, who served in the U.S. Navy during World War II and participated in the D-Day landings at Normandy as part of Operation Overlord, according to the Pentagon.

    Prevost also commanded an infantry landing craft, and after 15 months overseas, attained the rank of lieutenant junior grade, according to a note on the Pentagon website published soon after Leo’s election.

    After the war, Prevost became a teacher and school principal in Chicago, got married and he and his wife, Mildred, had three boys. The future pope, Robert Prevost, was the youngest, born on Sept. 14, 1955.

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    Associated Press religion coverage receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content.

  • Judge tosses Kennedy Center suit against musician who canceled Christmas Eve show

    Attorneys for musician Chuck Redd say a D.C. Superior Court judge dismissed a breach of contract lawsuit filed against Redd after he canceled a Christmas Eve performance at the Kennedy Center in protest of President Donald Trump’s influence over the venue.

    The dismissal on Friday was granted under Washington’s Anti-SLAPP laws, which are designed to prevent meritless lawsuits intended to silence opposing points of view on matters of public interest.

    Redd, a drummer and vibraphone player who has toured with everyone from Dizzy Gillespie to Ray Brown, had presided over holiday “Jazz Jams” at the Kennedy Center since 2006. He called off last year’s performance shortly after Trump’s handpicked board at the Kennedy Center voted to add the president’s name to the facility.

    “The Center sued Mr. Redd because he publicly and rightly objected to adding Donald Trump’s name to the Kennedy Center, a living memorial to former President John F. Kennedy,” Lisa J. Banks, one of Redd’s lawyers, said in a statement. “The lawsuit against Mr. Redd was political retribution, pure and simple, by the Trump Kennedy Center, and the Court correctly saw it as such in dismissing the case with prejudice.”

    Redd told The Associated Press in an email Saturday morning that he is “very pleased with the judge’s ruling.”

    The motion to dismiss, filed in March, argued that Redd wasn’t contractually obligated to perform. It included the contract provided by the Kennedy Center, which the artist never signed.

    Representatives for the Kennedy Center did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the suit’s dismissal.

  • Senior British royals gather as King Charles’ nephew marries nurse Harriet Sperling

    King Charles III and his wife Queen Camilla were among senior members of Britain’s royal family who donned elegant hats, tailcoats and dresses to attend the wedding of Charles’ nephew Peter Phillips on Saturday.

    Phillips, the son of Charles’ sister Princess Anne, wed Harriet Sperling, a nurse working for the National Health Service, in a church ceremony in the southwestern English village of Kemble.

    They were joined by more than 100 guests including Prince William, Princess Catherine, Princesses Eugenie and Beatrice and other royals.

    The bride wore a high-neck lace gown designed by Emilia Wickstead.

    Phillips, 48, is the son Anne and her first husband Mark Phillips. He is the late Queen Elizabeth II’s eldest grandson, and William and Prince Harry’s first cousin.

    Phillips split from his first wife Autumn Kelly, with whom he has two children. His engagement to Sperling was announced last year.

    Well-wishers cheered when the bride and royals arrived, and after the ceremony guests held umbrellas in heavy rain to throw rose petals over the couple as they left the church.

  • Fuel prices are shaping summer plans as US boaters get ready to hit the water

    DEXTER TOWNSHIP, Mich. (AP) — On the kind of warm, bright afternoon that Michigan boaters wait all year for, Malik Amine and his brother readied their family’s pontoon boat for the summer.

    The cover was off and Portage Lake sparkled in the sun. But before the brothers could leave a narrow wooden dock, they had a decision to make: how much gasoline to put in the pontoon’s 52-gallon engine.

    Recreational boaters, like motorists, are feeling a pinch from the Iran war. U.S. gas prices have come down in recent weeks, but a gallon of regular gas still cost an average of 34% more Friday than it did a year earlier, according to motor club AAA. The price of diesel fuel, which is also used by some boaters, is up 53% from last year.

    Ethanol-free gas, which many boaters, classic car owners and lawn mower users prefer, is anywhere from 20 cents to $1 per gallon more than regular fuel, according to the National Association of Convenience Stores, which also represents fuel retailers.

    One gas station near Portage Lake, which is 60 miles west of Detroit, is selling ethanol-free fuel for $7 per gallon. Amine said he didn’t plan to fill the boat’s tank ahead of Memorial Day weekend.

    “The cost is going to be a lot more than it was last year,” Amine said. “I think it’s probably a little bit smarter to do what you need and fill it as much as you need, because who knows when this conflict’s going to end.”

    The National Marine Manufacturers Association estimates that 100 million Americans go boating each year, contributing to an industry worth $230 billion annually. The trade group, which represents companies that make boats, marine engines, boating equipment and accessories, said its conversations with boaters indicate that most still plan to head out on the water this year, but in some cases, gas prices are curtailing their plans.

    “There were a number of people within that who said, ‘I am going to have to change my behavior’,” said Ellen Bradley, the association’s chief brand officer. “I may not go as far. I may not as fast. I may spend more time anchored and swimming. I may spend more time at the dock.”

    Neil and Kathleen Donohoe sold their home in Colorado and now live aboard a 50-foot, diesel-powered boat dubbed the Granuaile, which is the Gaelic name of Grace O’Malley, a 16th century sea captain known as Ireland’s pirate queen. They’ve spent the last seven years cruising up and down the East Coast and to the Bahamas.

    Maintenance on the boat – not fuel – is typically their greatest expense, Neil Donohoe said. But lately, the cost to fill up the boat — which can hold 1,500 gallons — is eye-popping. They talk to other boaters and use various marine apps to find the cheapest gas.

    “It’s not driving us not to cruise, but it’s making a difference,” he said.

    This summer, the couple plan to stick around the Chesapeake Bay area instead of heading further north. They’ve already been to Maine and to Canada, they reasoned, and they don’t feel the urge to go again while gas prices are so high.

    “It seems a little gross to spend that kind of money when so many people are struggling,” Kathleen Donohoe said.

    Gas prices are also impacting boating-related businesses. The Seattle Sailing Club, which offers lessons, chartered cruises and rentals, said its fuel bill has gone up 10.7% since the beginning of the war.

    Lindsey Brown, the club’s office manager, said its fleet of 30 boats usually rely on wind power, but they all have gas or diesel backup engines. In April, the marina where the boats are docked charged $6.50 per gallon for diesel, she said. By late May, that had risen to $7.99 per gallon.

    “We are just heading into our busy season, so we may see a more dramatic effect on our business if the price of fuel doesn’t change or continues to increase,” Brown said. Brown, who lives on a sailboat at the marina, said the service she uses to pump out wastewater just added a fuel surcharge to her bill.

    It’s also the busy season for Melissa Kunnert, who owns NautiMi On the River, an ice cream and gift shop near Portage Lake. She rents out a tiki-themed pontoon boat for parties and hosts three-hour evening cruises for $50 a person starting after Memorial Day.

    Kunnert decided not to raise her prices this summer even though it costs more to fill up the pontoon. She wonders if the higher gas prices affecting all forms of travel might benefit her business by keeping more potential customers closer to home.

    “I’m interested to see if we’ll have the same amount as previous years (or) if we will have more because people don’t want to use their gas, they want ours,” Kunnert said.

    In Traverse City, Michigan, a few hours north of Portage Lake, Robert Hinds decided to add a $50 fuel surcharge to the fishing trips he offers as the owner and operator of Central Coast Angling. He tows his 22-foot boat from port to port on Lake Michigan depending on where the fishing is best, so he has to fill up his truck in addition to his boat.

    Hinds said he’s had multiple cancellations as customers do their own math on gas prices. One regular customer from Nebraska didn’t make the trip this spring.

    “It’s really tough. People do want to get out and I still believe people will,” he said. “But everybody comes from different walks of life.”

    Hinds recently ruled out his own fishing trip to Wisconsin after figuring out it would cost him $400 in diesel fuel for the truck that tows his boat.

    “I can just stay home and fish here,” he said.

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    AP Video Journalist Mike Householder contributed to this report.

  • Donald Trump, Bernie Sanders and Sam Altman are all talking about public ownership in AI

    WASHINGTON (AP) — It was perhaps a surprising private overture from OpenAI CEO Sam Altman to Sen. Bernie Sanders.

    The meeting between the two had come just after the Vermont senator announced a plan for the public to take a 50% ownership stake in artificial intelligence companies such as OpenAI, using their stock to create a public wealth fund that would spread the fortune generated by AI behemoths.

    Altman told Sanders that he, too, wants the public to have equity in AI companies. Though the CEO said he couldn’t support Sanders’ threshold of 50%, he nonetheless wanted to work with him to advocate for the general idea, according to people with knowledge of the conversation.

    The nearly hourlong meeting in Sanders’ Senate office this week, held at Altman’s request, highlighted the inherent tension between AI powerhouses and policymakers as Americans are increasingly asked to accept the costs of the AI boom even as they remain unconvinced of its direct benefits. Yet it’s also creating odd political bedfellows fueled by populism as politicians from Sanders to President Donald Trump embrace giving the public a stake in AI’s growth.

    Speaking to reporters on Air Force One on Friday, Trump described a potential partnership “where the American people can benefit from the success of AI” and said executives from leading AI companies will visit the White House, “probably next week,” to discuss the idea.

    “There’s something very interesting about it, where it almost becomes a partnership with the American public,” Trump, a Republican, said Friday.

    When reporters noted to Trump that Sanders, a self-proclaimed democratic socialist, had proposed public ownership in AI companies, he pointed to similarities in their coalitions. The economic views of Trump voters and voters who supported Sanders for president, Trump said, “aren’t that far apart.”

    Trump has embraced government investment in private companies in his second term, scrambling his party’s politics. His administration last year secured a 10% stake in the struggling Silicon Valley company Intel, and it considered a government takeover of Spirit Airlines earlier this year, although the airline couldn’t reach a deal and ultimately closed.

    Public backlash is becoming harder to ignore

    The positioning of leading figures such as Trump and Sanders comes as concerns about AI are emerging far beyond Washington.

    In Michigan, Democrats recently clashed over Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s appearance with Altman at the site of a major data center. Candidates such as New York Democratic House hopeful Alex Bores have also made AI regulation a campaign issue by tapping into voters’ angst about the technology.

    “This is a real change to society,” Altman told reporters this week. “I think it’s possible both that people can use AI a lot and like using it and also have anxiety about what it’s going to do for the future.”

    Data center projects across the country have drawn opposition from residents concerned about electricity demand, water consumption and environmental impacts. Some states once eager to attract the facilities, including Ohio and Virginia, have moved to reconsider tax incentives.

    “We need to pass legislation right now that says there’s not going to be any further data center development until they agree to pay for their own electricity, build their own grids and pay for their own water supply,” Missouri Sen. Josh Hawley, a leading Republican skeptic of Big Tech, told The Associated Press.

    Before arriving in Washington, Altman stopped in Michigan on Monday to appear alongside Whitmer, a Democrat, at the building site of a 1.65 million-square-foot data center. Whitmer’s team claimed the project will create more than 2,500 union construction jobs.

    But it also drew criticism from local activists and some Democrats, including Michigan Rep. Rashida Tlaib, who called the project “disgusting.” She said she was “so disappointed” in Whitmer.

    “It’s a very controversial topic right now and it’s coming from the ground up,” Michigan Sen. Elissa Slotkin, a Democrat, said about the grassroots pushback. “People feel very strongly about it.”

    Whitmer, however, told reporters after the event that “one thing’s very clear, everyone has a cellphone in our pocket.”

    “We are all, more and more, consuming technology and data and these data centers are going to get built. So, my thought is if we can hold them to a high standard and do it in Michigan, that’s the best way to do it,” she said.

    The tensions extend beyond data centers. On college campuses, commencement speakers have been interrupted by boos when discussing artificial intelligence. About 70% of college students see AI as a threat to their job prospects, according to a 2025 poll by the Institute of Politics at the Harvard Kennedy School.

    Altman acknowledged those concerns. He said that while “the impact on jobs has been less than many people in our field expected,” he understands “that college students have a lot of anxiety about the future.”

    Washington searches for an AI bargain

    The idea that AI’s expansion is inevitable is increasingly shared by leaders across the political spectrum, even as they disagree sharply about how to manage it.

    That reality was at the center of Altman’s conversations in Washington. In addition to Sanders, Altman met with Trump administration officials such as Michael Kratsios, the White House’s chief science and technology adviser, and congressional leaders from both parties.

    Sanders’ team emphasized that the two did not reach an agreement on the main points that the senator made to Altman, including the 50% figure so the public has decision-making power. Sanders also expressed opposition to the growing election spending by the AI industry.

    “Unfortunately, Sam Altman did not commit to any of those,” said Sanders’ spokesperson Jeremy Slevin.

    Altman, in emerging from the conversation, described it as “great,” adding that the two “obviously don’t agree on everything.”

    Policy makers are also looking at how AI should be governed

    Congress this week released a bipartisan framework that would establish the first broad federal approach to AI regulation while temporarily preempting many state laws.

    Anthropic, one of OpenAI’s top competitors, has proposed mechanisms for coordinating pauses on advanced AI development if systems become too powerful.

    The Trump administration has also begun constructing its own oversight structure, signing an executive order to establish a process for reviewing national security risks posed by advanced AI systems before their public release.

    Sanders said he found the administration’s move notable after years of warnings that regulation could slow American innovation.

    “Even these guys are beginning to catch on that there are legitimate concerns that have to be dealt with,” Sanders said.

  • Stadium workers near Los Angeles vote to authorize a strike days before the World Cup begins

    INGLEWOOD, Calif. (AP) — Stadium workers near Los Angeles have voted to authorize a strike as the venue prepares to host the U.S. men’s soccer team’s opening World Cup match.

    It doesn’t guarantee that the 2,000 bartenders, servers, cooks and dishwashers at SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, California, will walk off the job. But it gives them the option to do so after contract talks have stalled with the stadium’s food service provider.

    The vote comes days before the stadium near Los Angeles will host the U.S. team’s opening World Cup match against Paraguay. Union member Yolanda Fierro said that unless a deal is reached workers could go on strike for the June 12 match.

    Fierro said workers are concerned about pay and security on the job amid ramped-up immigration enforcement under President Donald Trump’s administration. Los Angeles County Sheriff Robert Luna said this week the U.S. Department of Homeland Security told him federal authorities would be at the matches to assist with security but not civil immigration enforcement.

    “What good is the World Cup for Los Angeles when workers don’t earn enough to pay the rent and must choose between showing up and being kidnapped by ICE?” said Kurt Petersen, co-president of UNITE HERE Local 11. “If we’re forced to strike, those $100,000 FIFA suites will have nothing but bottled water and Doritos.”

    Legends Global, which handles hospitality at SoFi, said the company has a longstanding relationship with the union and is committed to reaching an agreement through contract negotiations.

    “We look forward to delivering an outstanding hospitality experience for fans at the FIFA World Cup matches at SoFi Stadium,” the company said in a statement Wednesday.

    Petersen said contract talks have been moving at a “glacial” pace. He said Legends has agreed to minimal wage increases for cooks and dishwashers and freezes for some suite attendants and bartenders even as the World Cup is expected to reel in ample revenue. The union is also asking Legends for protections from subcontracting and potential federal immigration raids.

    Cesar Zamora, a bartender at the stadium, said he is a lifelong soccer fan and is heartbroken to see his employer not making the needed changes before this major event.

    “The FIFA World Cup will generate enormous profits, but we are still fighting for basic respect and security,” he said in a statement. “We deserve better, and if that means going on strike, I’m ready.”

    Community groups in other World Cup host cities such as Atlanta and Miami also have called for a halt on U.S. immigration enforcement during the matches, fearing arrests near stadiums and watch parties could damp the festivities.

    The World Cup is expected to draw millions of fans to soccer games played in June and July in 11 U.S. host cities as well as in Canada and Mexico.

  • Corey Seager hits a 2-run homer in his Rangers return, snapping an 0-for-29 skid

    ARLINGTON, Texas (AP) — Corey Seager homered to end a career-worst 0-for-29 slump in the big leagues in his first game back with the Texas Rangers on Friday night after the five-time All-Star shortstop missed 19 games because of lower back inflammation.

    Seager’s two-run homer in the sixth inning against Cleveland rookie Parker Messick came right after a double by Wyatt Langford, who was also activated from the injured list before the game. Seager’s eighth homer of the season put Texas ahead 3-2.

    Langford, the left fielder, had missed 39 games since going on the injured list April 22 because of a right forearm strain. They batted 1-2 in the lineup against the Guardians and their consecutive extra-base hits came in their third at-bats of the game.

    Seager went into the series opener against Cleveland in an 0-for-27 slide that included 11 strikeouts. The two-time World Series MVP had been hitless in his previous seven games, also a career worst, since an RBI single on May 6 at Yankee Stadium after he hit a home run earlier in that game.

    “I’m excited to see, really for the first time in some time, our group together. Still missing (second baseman) Josh Smith, but beyond that, we have not had our group together in a long time,” Chris Young, the team’s president of baseball operations, said before the game.

    “Look at the past week, 10 days, and there have been a lot of positives with the way we’ve played,” Young said. “And now getting Corey and Wyatt back in this lineup, I think will be very big for us. I’m excited to see what that does for everybody.”

    Before a loss at St. Louis on Wednesday, the Rangers had a five-game winning streak that was their longest of the season.

    Utility man Cody Freeman and outfielder Alejandro Osuna were optioned to Triple-A Round Rock to make room on the roster. Utility player Sam Haggerty was designated for assignment after he was activated from the bereavement/family medial emergency list.

    Langford and Seager played in two rehab games together this week at Double-A Frisco. That was after Langford played two games with Round Rock.

    “Definitely feel great. I feel like I’m in a really good spot,” Langford said before the game.

    Seager, who wasn’t in the clubhouse pregame when it was open to reporters, hadn’t been in a big league game since May 13. At that point, the 32-year-old shortstop had started 42 of the Rangers’ first 43 games. He said then that physically he felt “completely fine” after playing all of their 24 games in a 27-day span.

    The Rangers had a day off after that and planned for Seager to get an extra break by sitting out the series opener at Houston. But he didn’t play at all in that series after waking up one morning with back spasms.

    When Seager went on the IL, he was hitting .179 with seven homers and 20 RBIs. His 50 strikeouts accounted for 27.5% of his 182 plate appearances. He was 6 for 61 (.098) with 23 K’s over his last 16 games.

    In his first rehab game Tuesday night, Seager went 1 for 2 with a single and fielded two groundballs while playing shortstop. He went 0 for 3 on Wednesday.

    Langford hit .238 with one homer and four RBIs in his 20 games for Texas before going on the injured list. He was 2 for 10 with five walks in four rehab games.

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    AP MLB: https://apnews.com/hub/mlb

  • China can build humanoids at scale. The hard part is finding enough buyers


    HONG KONG (AP) — Chinese-made humanoid robots are making waves with their ability to do backflips, direct traffic, and even make coffee as the companies developing them seek ways to expand and dominate the market.

    Robot makers in China say they have thousands of orders from both the government and private businesses for humanoids that can do such things as sort parcels at postal centers, as the country finds ways to cope with an aging population and rising labor costs. However, some experts believe demand for humanoids lags the capacity to build them.

    China and the United States dominate research for what Morgan Stanley estimates is a $5 trillion humanoid robots market.

    By some measures, the U.S. holds an upper hand in developing the artificial intelligence for such robots’ high-level computing power, or “brains.” But as the world’s factory floor, China leads in mass production capacity, supplies of hardware and harvesting of data for training robots.

    Robot makers say real-life demand is growing

    The Shanghai-based startup Matrix Robotics makes humanoid robots that employ AI. Its flagship humanoid robot, the “MATRIX-3,” stands nearly 5.6 feet (1.7 meters) tall and is equipped with hands able to make finely controlled movements. They are priced at around $99,000 per unit.

    Customers for the roughly 1,000 orders it has received include coffee chains and hotels, its founder and CEO Allen Zhang, who formerly worked for Tesla, said at a recent robotics expo in Macao.

    So far, Matrix has made only a few hundred of the robots, though it said it will be capable of delivering 5,000 units within this year, depending on the number of orders.

    EngineAI, a startup based in southern China’s Shenzhen, says its full-sized humanoid robots could be used as security guards and museum guides. They also perform, with dancing and boxing.

    A basic edition of its humanoid costs 180,000 yuan ($26,600). “The next step will be to move into more real-life scenarios,” said Issac Li, EngineAI’s head of brand and marketing.

    Demand for robots may lag behind

    Most humanoid robots are still performative rather than functional, falling short of working in messy, unpredictable environments, said Samm Sacks, a senior fellow at the New America think tank focused on Chinese technology.

    “The use cases of these robots are still so limited,” said Chibo Tang of the venture capital firm Gobi Partners, which invests in technology startups including robotics companies. “Without the demand and without that scale from the market, these companies are not able to really go into mass production.”

    China had more than 140 humanoid robot manufacturers and more than 330 models in 2025, according to the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology. Last year, the Chinese government even publicly warned about the risk of a bubble in the industry given the lagging state of commercialization and applications.

    Corporate and academic labs are buying humanoid robots for research. And in China, many of the more than 2 billion yuan ($295 million) worth of orders in 2025 came from state-owned enterprises for use in places such as power plants, data centers or for entertainment, Morgan Stanley said.

    “The economics are tough: humanoid robots remain expensive to produce, fragile in operation, and dependent on highly structured environments to function,” Sacks explained. There’s “a long way to go to get to a level of functionality where people will actually feel comfortable having them in their homes providing care for elderly or children,” she said.

    Still, compared to other countries, China is keen on humanoids

    The more viable commercial path will more likely be through industrial and logistics settings, Sacks said. But many factories in China and elsewhere already are equipped with non-humanoid robotic arms that perform repetitive single functions and may not need many humanoid robots.

    In Japan and in the U.S., humanoid robot startups are also struggling to find buyers in industrial and other work settings.

    Yet over the past year, real-world deployment of humanoid robots in China has accelerated.

    Chinese people are relatively “used to this rapid change in terms of technology,” said Ye Tian, an ex-Apple engineer and founder and CEO of the Chinese startup RoboScience, which focuses on developing the systems behind AI-powered robots.

    As the technology matures, humanoids could perform heavy-lifting and mundane tasks in warehouses, factories and ports, said Lian Jye Su, with the technology research group Omdia.

    Humanoid robots also can fill in gaps where work is dangerous or repetitive, Matrix’s Zhang said. There’s also a “very large household market” for handling chores in hundreds of millions of homes in China, he believes.

    In Beijing, freelance social media content creator Yang Ning recently tried out a cleaning service with a helper robot with mechanical arms and hands. It can do simple tasks like organizing shoes, folding clothes and changing garbage bags, but it’s accompanied by a human cleaner.

    Watching the robot sort shoes at her doorway was “amazing,” she said. Still, she thought the helper robot was not that efficient and was “a bit too big and difficult to move around in a small house.”

    China leads the global humanoid robots market

    Last year, Chinese humanoid robots accounted for around 85% globally, according to a recent research report by Barclays.

    Startups in China have the advantage of massive state support, in line with the ruling Communist Party’s 2026-2030 five-year plan targeting the frontiers of technology, including advancements of humanoid robots.

    Of the more than 13,000 humanoid robots shipped in 2025, AGIBOT and Unitree, two of China’s leading robotics companies, each shipped over 5,000, while U.S. rivals like Figure AI and Tesla each shipped a few hundred or less, according to Omdia.

    Morgan Stanley expects China’s humanoid sales to more than double this year to around 28,000 units. Omdia forecasts that annual shipments of advanced robots could surpass 1 million units by the early 2030s.

    Some robot makers say they are already profitable. Unitree said it made 1.7 billion yuan (around $250 million) in revenue last year, with a profit of over 278 million yuan ($41 million).

    Robot makers argue that as production of humanoid robots increases, costs will drop. Using more locally made parts also helped make Chinese robots 20% or more cheaper than foreign models on average, Morgan Stanley said. It estimates the average price could fall to about $21,000 by 2050, from $46,000 last year.

    Some humanoid robots in China were priced at below $6,000.

    Even so, cost remains an obstacle

    A report by the Mercator Institute for China Studies said while China’s humanoids are already cheaper than those made elsewhere, they are still “far too expensive for widespread deployment.”

    Another challenge for manufacturers is to accumulate enough good data to train more robots.

    Wang Xiaogang, co-founder of the Chinese AI software company SenseTime and chairman of ACE Robotics, said his company is collecting a lot of human-centric data from factories, retailing and offices settings that could guide advanced robots to perform complicated functions.

    For humanoid robots to learn more than single tasks, data from a wide variety of scenarios in public and private settings with a reasonable level of difficulty is needed, said Eric Guo, founder and CEO of Shenzhen-based AI² Robotics. But that could take years to massively scale up.

    “The mass production capability in (the) robotic area is still at the very early stage,” Guo said.

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    Associated Press video journalists Olivia Zhang and Wu Jia in Beijing contributed to this report.

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    This story was first published on June 6. It was updated on June 9 to correct the spelling of the first name of the CEO of Matrix Robotics to Allen.


  • FIFA to allow factory-sealed, disposable water bottles into World Cup stadiums

    FIFA announced on Friday that it will now allow fans to bring their own water bottles to some stadiums during the World Cup, adjusting a policy that had barred spectators from bringing refillable water bottles into the tournament’s 16 stadiums across North America, including some with limited or no shade from the sun.

    FIFA in a social media post said fans will be permitted to bring one, soft, plastic, 20-ounce (590 milliliter), factory-sealed, disposable water bottle into any match taking place in the United States or Canada.

    In a video released by FIFA, Chief Operating Officer Heimo Schirgi said fans will still not be permitted to bring in hard sided, reusable water bottles “due to safety and security reasons.”

    FIFA stated, “for the avoidance of doubt, reusable water bottles may not be brought into the stadium.”

    FIFA’s stadium rules had stated that fans could bring in a transparent, reusable bottle up to one liter, or 33.8 ounces capacity. On Thursday, the “Stadium Code of Conduct” update was criticized by an English fan group, which argued FIFA had given assurances on carrying empty plastic bottles to fill with freely available water at a tournament where heat and extreme weather are expected to be a factor.

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    AP World Cup coverage: https://apnews.com/hub/fifa-world-cup