By STEPHEN GROVES

WASHINGTON (AP) — Under questioning from Democrats Tuesday, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick acknowledged that he had met with Jeffrey Epstein twice after his 2008 conviction for soliciting prostitution from a child, reversing Lutnick’s previous claim that he had cut ties with the late financier after 2005.

Lutnick once again downplayed his relationship with the disgraced financier who was once his neighbor in New York City as he was questioned by Democrats during a subcommittee hearing of the Senate Appropriations Committee. He described their contact as a handful of emails and a pair of meetings that were years apart.

“I did not have any relationship with him. I barely had anything to do with him,” Lutnick told lawmakers.

But Lutnick is facing calls from several lawmakers for his resignation after the release of case files on Epstein contradicted Lutnick’s claims on a podcast last year that he had decided to “never be in the room” with Epstein again after a 2005 tour of Epstein’s home that disturbed Lutnick and his wife.

The commerce secretary said Tuesday that he and his family actually had lunch with Epstein on his private island in 2012 and he had another hour-long engagement at Epstein’s home in 2011. Lutnick, a member of President Donald Trump’s Cabinet, is the highest-profile U.S. official to face bipartisan calls for his resignation amid revelations of his ties to Epstein. His acknowledgement comes as lawmakers are grasping for what accountability looks like amid the revelations contained in what’s known as the Epstein files.

In countries like the United Kingdom, the Epstein files have triggered resignations and the stripping of royal privileges, but so far, U.S. officials have not met the same level of retribution.

Sen. Chris Van Hollen, the Democrat who questioned Lutnick, told him, “There’s not an indication that you yourself engaged in any wrongdoing with Jeffrey Epstein. It’s the fact that you believe that you misled the country and the Congress based on your earlier statements.”

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Meanwhile, House members who initiated the legislative effort to force the release of the files are calling for Lutnick to resign. Republican Rep. Thomas Massie of Kentucky called for that over the weekend after emails were released that alluded to the meetings between Lutnick and Epstein.

Rep. Ro Khanna, a California Democrat, joined Massie in pressuring Lutnick out of office on Monday.

“Based on the evidence, he should be out of the Cabinet,” Khanna said.

He added, “It’s not about any particular person. In this country, we have to make a decision. Are we going to allow the rich and powerful people who are friends and (had) no problem doing business and showing up with a pedophile who is raping underage girls, are we just going to allow them to skate?”

Waiting for a Mentor: Sara

Kids ‘n Kinship provides friendships and positive role models to children and youth ages 5-16 who are in need of an additional supportive relationship with an adult. Here’s one of the youth waiting for a mentor:

First name: Sara

Age: 6

Interests: Sara is a first-grader who likes to play with her older brother and sister. Her favorite toy is her Barbie. At school, she likes going to specialists — gym and art. If she gets frustrated, she likes to use the calming corner in the classroom.

Personality/Characteristics: Sara has a fun-loving and talkative personality. She likes to be silly, but she also says she is a good listener. Her guardian says she can be very independent but craves a lot of attention.

Goals/dreams: If she had a wish, she’d turn herself into a pony or a flower. Her guardian hopes having a mentor will help her navigate life and be another supportive adult in her life.

For more information: Sara is waiting for a mentor through Kids n’ Kinship in Dakota County. To learn more about this youth mentoring program and the 39+ youth waiting for a mentor, sign up for an Information Session, visit www.kidsnkinship.org or email programs@kidsnkinship.org. For more information about mentoring in the Twin Cities outside of Dakota County, contact MENTOR MN at mentor@mentormn.org or fill out a brief form at www.mentoring.org/take-action/become-a-mentor/#search.

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Mark Pavelich grappled with mental illness in the final years of his life, long after playing a big role in the “Miracle on Ice” in 1980. He was charged in 2019 with a felony for assaulting a neighbor he thought had spiked his beer, and experts diagnosed him with a mild neurocognitive disorder due to a traumatic brain injury that was likely related to repeated head injuries.

“I’m convinced it happened because of the number of hits he took, and also he had some real personal trauma in his life,” lifelong friend Ronn Tomassoni said. “It all caught up to him at the end.”

Mark Pavelich

Going to the Eagle’s Healing Nest in Sauk Centre, Minnesota, seemed to help. Sister Jean Pavelich Gevik felt she had her brother back. Neal Broten said he and other U.S. Olympic teammates didn’t realize how much pain Pavelich was feeling.

“He sounded fine. Everything was great,” 1980 U.S. captain Mike Eruzione recalled. “I thought he was very comfortable and in a great spot, in a great place. But when you have that kind of illness or sickness, you never know. And I don’t think anybody knew.”

Pavelich died by suicide on March 4, 2021, his death one of several linked to hits to the head from playing hockey, and his sister suggested CTE, or chronic traumatic encephalopathy, may have been a factor. Before taking his life, he wrote her a sizeable check to keep efforts going at The Ranch — Teammates for Life for athletes, veterans and first responders suffering from PTSD, substance abuse or mental distress associated with traumatic brain injury.

The Ranch had become a source of purpose for Pavelich, and the members of the country’s last gold-medal winning men’s hockey team have made it a point to raise money and awareness for it in his memory.

“He’s part of our family,” said Rob McClanahan, who also played with Pavelich in the NHL with the New York Rangers and roomed with him on the road. “It’s really important to know that we all struggle. I don’t want to get hugely philosophical, but life is hard and things like this bring it to the forefront.”

Who Mark Pavelich was

On the ice, Pavelich was a skilled forward whose talent was clear from a young age growing up in Eveleth, Minnesota. He starred at Minnesota Duluth and assisted on Eruzione’s game-winning goal when the underdog Americans beat the heavily favored Soviet Union 46 years ago.

Off the ice, “Pav” was soft-spoken and not much of a talker. Broten remembers Pavelich plucking his guitar and singing Neil Young songs on bus rides.

“He was just a quiet, sweet person,” Broten said. “He didn’t stay very much in the locker room. He didn’t say very much away from the locker room. Kept to himself. That’s Mark Pavelich.”

He also loved to hunt and fish, something Eruzione used as bait to get Pavelich to agree to a TV interview on the Rangers’ broadcast. It only materialized after Pavelich was offered a $1,000 gift certificate to a fishing store.

“He looks at me, he says, ‘How long is the interview going to take?’ ” Eruzione said. “We ended up doing it, but that’s the only way I could get him to come on the air.”

Getting to know The Ranch

Pavelich when he was first arrested spent time in a mental institution. With help from former teammate Barry Beck, retired goaltender Clint Malarchuk — who has been public about his own mental health struggles and suicide attempt — and founder Mel Butler, Pavelich got into the Eagle’s Healing Nest for military veterans and their families.

“Mark and I have a lot of the same issues, problems, lifeline almost,” Malarchuk said. “He died by suicide, and I almost died by suicide, so we can certainly relate to each other’s issues.”

When the veterans were asked if they’d accept Pavelich into their ranks despite not serving in the military, Tomassoni recalls them saying, “We think he and 19 other teammates served their country really well in 1980 when they lifted a whole country’s spirits when that country’s spirits needed to be lifted.”

Pavelich and Beck envisioned opening a mental wellness facility in a warm locale, but the Eagle’s Healing Nest gifted them a building and land for free. Hundreds of thousands of dollars were raised and invested to fix it up and open The Ranch, which has now had roughly 40 people go through it.

Retired player Dan Carcillo, who has been open about his history of traumatic brain injuries and opened Experience Onward, a psilocybin treatment center in Oregon, got better only after saying the death of close friend and former hockey player Steve Montador saved his life. He believes success stories and tragedies like Pavelich’s and Montador’s are both needed.

“It forced me into action — because I saw what the alternative was, and it was dying,” Carcillo said. “There’s unfortunate situations where people don’t make it out, and they’re never able to see the light and they’re never able to get better.”

Paying tribute to Mark Pavelich

Several 1980 alumni, Malarchuk and NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman and Deputy Commissioner Bill Daly were among those in attendance for the “Do You Still Believe in Miracles” Gala in New York in October that raised $1 million for The Ranch.

“It means a lot to do that, to get together for a great teammate of ours and somebody who had some things happen to him and that maybe didn’t want to recognize them himself,” Harrington said. “This is important for us, and it’s important for mental health and everything else that we show that it means something to us.”

Nearly five decades since the Olympics in Lake Placid made them national heroes, players from that team still cherish chances to get together. That includes honoring Pavelich.

“The team is still close,” Broten said. “Mark was such a big part of our team: a super quiet guy, a peaceful guy. It’s sad to talk about, but we still keep him in our hearts and move on with life, I guess.”

Eruzione said he and Jack O’Callahan, who has gotten involved with rescue dogs, named one in training Pav.

“The dog Pav is going continue to help somebody,” Eruzione said. “Even though Mark’s not with us, he’s still with us.”

Knowing full well that her brother set up Bill Baker’s tying goal with 27 seconds left against Sweden and Eruzione’s against the Russians, Jean Pavelich Gevik believes The Ranch will be his lasting legacy.

“I don’t want to downplay anything there,” she said. “But I feel like this is his greatest assist.”

The puck goes past the feet of U.S. goalie Jim Craig as a tight defense stops the Soviet attack in the first period of the USA vs. USSR ice hockey game, Friday, February 22, 1980, in Lake Placid. Players are, from left to right: Mark Pavelich, William Baker (partially hidden), James Craig, and Soviet player Helmut Balderis. (AP Photo)

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By DORANY PINEDA and SETH BORENSTEIN

A record snow drought with unprecedented heat is hitting most of the American West, depleting future water supplies, making it more vulnerable to wildfires and hurting winter tourism and recreation.

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Scientists say snow cover and snow depth are both at the lowest levels they’ve seen in decades, while at least 67 Western weather stations have measured their warmest December through early February on record. Normal snow cover this time of year should be about 460,000 square miles — about the size of California, Utah, Idaho and Montana — but this year it’s only California-sized, about 155,000 square miles, according to the National Snow and Ice Data Center.

“I have not seen a winter like this before,” said center director Mark Serreze, who has been in Colorado almost 40 years. “This pattern that we’re in is so darned persistent.”

The snowpack — measured by how much water is trapped inside — in Oregon is not only record low, but 30% lower than the previous record, said Jason Gerlich, regional drought early warning system coordinator for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

Much of the U.S. east of the Rockies is snowbound and enduring more than two weeks of bone-chilling abnormal cold, but in West Jordan, Utah, a suburb of Salt Lake City, Trevor Stephens went to the store last week in gym shorts and a T-shirt.

“Right now there’s no snow on the ground,” he said in a video interview, looking out his window and lamenting the lack of snowboarding opportunities. “I’d definitely rather have icy roads and snow than whatever is going on out here right now.”

Concerns over water supply and wildfires

Ski resorts had already been struggling through a difficult season, but the lack of snow has been persistent enough that concerns are growing about wider effects.

Oregon, Colorado and Utah have reported their lowest statewide snowpack since the early 1980s, as far back as records go.

A dry January has meant most states have received half their average precipitation or even less. Along with sunny days and higher-than-average temperatures, that’s meant little snow buildup in a month that historically gets a lot of snow accumulation across much of the Pacific Northwest and Northern Rockies. Because of heavy rains in December, California is in better shape than the other states, scientists said.

As of Monday, it had been 327 days since Salt Lake City International Airport got 1 inch of snow, making it the longest stretch since 1890-91, according to the National Weather Service.

The meager snow in Colorado and Utah has put the Upper Colorado River Basin at the heart of the snow drought, said Gerlich.

A robust mountain snowpack that slowly melts as winter warms to spring provides a steady flow of water into creeks and rivers. That helps ensure there’s enough water later in the year for agriculture, cities, hydropower electric systems and more.

But lack of snow or a too-fast melt means less water will replenish rivers like the Colorado later in the season.

“This is a pretty big problem for the Colorado basin,” said Daniel Swain of the University of California’s Water Resources Institute.

Experts said the snow drought could also kick-start an early wildfire season. Snow disappearing earlier than average leaves the ground exposed to warmer weather in the spring and summer that dries soils and vegetation quicker, said Daniel McEvoy, researcher with the Western Regional Climate Center.

Too warm to snow

While it’s been dry, the record-low snowpack is mostly due to how warm the West has been, which is connected to climate change from the burning of coal, oil and natural gas, several scientists said. Since Dec. 1, there have been more than 8,500 daily high temperature records broken or tied in the West, according to NOAA data.

Much of the precipitation that would normally fall as snow and stay in the mountains for months is instead falling as rain, which runs off quicker, Swain and other scientists said. It’s a problem scientists have warned about with climate change.

Going snowless happens from time to time, but it’s the warmth that has been so extreme, which is easier to tie to climate change, said Russ Schumacher, professor of atmospheric science at Colorado State University and Colorado State Climatologist.

“It was so warm, especially in December, that the snow was only falling at the highest parts of the mountains,” McEvoy said. “And then we moved into January and it got really dry almost everywhere for the last three to four weeks and stayed warm.”

Wetter, cooler weather is coming

Meteorologists expect wetter, cooler weather across the West this week with some snow so this may be the peak of the snow drought. But it’ll still be warmer than usual in many areas, and scientists aren’t optimistic the snow will be enough.

“I don’t think there’s any way we’re going to go back up to, you know, average or anywhere close to that,” said Schumacher. “But at least we can chip away at those deficits a little bit if it does get more active.”

The Associated Press receives support from the Walton Family Foundation for coverage of water and environmental policy. The AP is solely responsible for all content. For all of AP’s environmental coverage, visit https://apnews.com/hub/climate-and-environment