By ALI SWENSON, Associated Press

NEW YORK (AP) — YouTube will offer creators a way to rejoin the streaming platform if they were banned for violating COVID-19 and election misinformation policies that are no longer in effect, its parent company Alphabet said Tuesday.

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In a letter submitted in response to subpoenas from the House Judiciary Committee, attorneys for Alphabet said the decision to bring back banned accounts reflected the company’s commitment to free speech. It said the company values conservative voices on its platform and recognizes their reach and important role in civic discourse.

“No matter the political atmosphere, YouTube will continue to enable free expression on its platform, particularly as it relates to issues subject to political debate,” the letter read.

The move is the latest in a cascade of content moderation rollbacks from tech companies, who cracked down on false information during the pandemic and after the 2020 election but have since faced pressure from President Donald Trump and other conservatives who argue they unlawfully stifled right-wing voices in the process.

It comes as tech CEOs, including Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai, have sought a closer relationship with the Republican president, including through high-dollar donations to his campaign and attending events in Washington.

YouTube in 2023 phased out its policy to remove content that falsely claims the 2020 election, or other past U.S. presidential elections, were marred by “widespread fraud, errors or glitches.”

The platform in 2024 also retired its standalone COVID-19 content restrictions, allowing various treatments for the disease to be discussed. COVID-19 misinformation now falls under YouTube’s broader medical misinformation policy.

Among the creators who have been banned from YouTube under the now-expired policies are prominent conservative influencers, including Dan Bongino, who now serves as deputy director of the FBI. For people who make money on social media, access to monetization on YouTube can be significant, earning them large sums through ad revenue.

House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan and other congressional Republicans have pressured tech companies to reverse content moderation policies created under former President Joe Biden and accused Biden’s administration of unfairly wielding its power over the companies to chill lawful online speech.

In Tuesday’s letter, Alphabet’s lawyers said senior Biden administration officials “conducted repeated and sustained outreach” to coerce the company to remove pandemic-related YouTube videos that did not violate company policies.

“It is unacceptable and wrong when any government, including the Biden Administration, attempts to dictate how the Company moderates content, and the Company has consistently fought against those efforts on First Amendment grounds,” the letter said.

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg has also accused the Biden administration of pressuring employees to inappropriately censor content during the COVID-19 pandemic. Elon Musk, the owner of the social platform X, has accused the FBI of illegally coercing Twitter before his tenure to suppress a story about Hunter Biden.

The Supreme Court last year sided with former President Joe Biden’s administration in a dispute with Republican-led states over how far the federal government can go to combat controversial social media posts on topics including COVID-19 and election security.

Asked for more information about the reinstatement process, a spokesperson for YouTube did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Yes, really, for free. In honor of National Public Lands Day, all national parks will be free to visit on Saturday, Sept. 27.

This can save you as much as $50 entry fee at many places. However, they’re really popular, so I highly recommend you plan to arrive at dawn. It will be cooler and the crowds will still be waking up. When the park starts getting crowded, you can take a break and eat your picnic you’ve brought, or head on out.  Don’t forget to bring plenty of water!

Note that the freebies don’t include camping or special tours.  Personally, I like to head out to Joshua Tree on these free days and watch the sun come up over the drive. Don’t tell anyone, though, it will get more crowded.

Here are the nine national parks in California:

Channel Islands (boat ride is not free)
Death Valley
Joshua Tree
Lassen
Pinnacles
Redwood
Sequoia and Kings Canyon
Yosemite

The next national park holiday will be on Veterans Day, Nov. 11.

Related links

Fun things to do in Southern California that are always free
How to get into awesome museums for free with an EBT card
12 gorgeous botanical gardens you can visit for free
Here’s when you can visit all national parks for free in 2025
10 awesome places in the world you can see for free

 

 

 

 

By JESSICA DAMIANO

It goes without saying that seasonal gardening tasks should be performed at specific times of the year, mainly because of the weather. But many gardening practices are also best performed at certain times of the day to ensure the health of your plants.

For instance, early mornings are best for watering lawns and gardens, and there are several reasons for this.

The timing allows for water to work its way down to plant roots before the sun gets too strong. Midday watering often results in faster evaporation from the soil’s surface, which is not only wasteful but also unhelpful to plants.

Watering in the evening risks the opposite: Without sufficient sunlight for evaporation, excess moisture becomes trapped within and between plants, creating a perfect breeding ground for mold, mildew and fungal diseases.

Other tasks to tackle early in the day

Fertilizers, especially liquid formulations, are best applied in the morning, too, as they should be watered in to ensure deep distribution and avoid chemical burns. Fertilizing during morning hours helps avoid the evaporation risk of midday and helps prevent diseases that could develop overnight.

For the best flavor and aroma, harvest herbs in the morning, after the dew has dried but before the sun becomes too intense. This is the time when the plant’s oils are most concentrated. In my suburban New York garden, 10 a.m. is ideal.

The same timing is important for crispy, hydrated lettuces and other greens. Wait any longer and leaves are more likely to be wilted when overnight moisture evaporates and temperatures rise.

Morning is also best for cutting flowers. After building up moisture and recovering from the previous day’s heat, blooms are at their plumpest in the morning, just after the dew has dried.

End-of-day gardening tasks

Evening is best for garden chores that risk stressing plants. Relief from the sun, cooler temps and increased moisture will aid their recovery, whereas the blazing afternoon heat would further stress or even kill them.

So, save pruning (a form of surgery, if you think about it), deadheading, and even planting, dividing and transplanting for late afternoon or evening.

This Aug. 31, 2025, image provided by Jessica Damiano shows a pair of shears snipping parsley in a backyard herb garden on Long Island, N.Y. (Jessica Damiano via AP)

Early evening and mid-morning are ideal times to mow the lawn. Avoid the afternoon, when the heat and direct sunlight can increase the grass’ stress and slow its recovery.

Never mow wet grass, regardless of the time of day; doing so can stress the lawn, spread disease and clog the mower.

Wait until after rainfall to pull weeds, and the job will be a lot easier. But if the weeds must go and there’s no precipitation in the forecast, water the bed deeply the day before, and you’ll reap the same benefit.

Any time’s a good time to enjoy your garden

There are some garden activities that you can — and should — do throughout the day. These include admiring your handiwork, basking in the beauty you’ve co-created with nature and smelling the flowers.

Jessica Damiano writes weekly gardening columns for the AP and publishes the award-winning Weekly Dirt Newsletter. You can sign up here for weekly gardening tips and advice.

For more AP gardening stories, go to https://apnews.com/hub/gardening.

By AARON MORRISON and JAYLEN GREEN, Associated Press

How Charlie Kirk is being memorialized — with many conservatives and white Christians, particularly evangelicals, emphasizing his faith and labeling him a martyr — has sparked debate among Black clergy, who are trying to square a heroic view of the 31-year-old with insulting statements about people of color that were key to his political activism.

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“How you die does not redeem how you lived,” the Rev. Howard-John Wesley, of Alexandria, Virginia, said in a sermon in the aftermath of Kirk’s killing that has amassed tens of thousands of views online.

The reactions to Kirk’s death marked a notable split-screen moment in America’s racial divide, playing out at the same time on Sunday across the country.

From the pulpits of Black churches, pastors used their sermons to denounce what they called hateful rhetoric from Kirk that runs counter to the teachings of Jesus Christ and the Gospel. In a packed football stadium in Arizona, tens of thousands of people celebrated Kirk in a religious-themed memorial as a martyr and inspirational and principled conservative hero.

Kirk’s killing on a college campus in Utah captured in a graphic video that went viral, as well as the aftermath of his death have become the latest fault line in politics and race in America under President Donald Trump.

Many Black pastors in the largest African American Christian denominations linked the veneration of Kirk — who used his platform to discuss matters of race in America, including statements that denigrated Black people, immigrants, women, Muslims and LGBTQ+ people — to the history of weaponizing faith to justify colonialism, enslavement and bigotry.

“Christianity told itself that Black people were inferior and therefore enslaved us,” said the Rev. Jacqui Lewis, pastor of Middle Collegiate Church in New York City, adding that powerful voices have long controlled the microphone and used it to reshape Christianity to serve power, exclusion and hate.

“We can call it Christian-esque, but it’s white nationalism wrapped in talk of Jesus,” Lewis said in an interview this week. “And it’s not Christian. It’s just not.”

Now, Lewis and others said, Black pastors must speak boldly, looking to their tradition of speaking out against those who promote racism.

“We’re criticizing the way the world is because that’s our job,” she said.

‘Not for the Jesus I know’

The presence of tens of thousands of followers who nearly filled a professional football stadium in Arizona for a memorial service Sunday attended by Trump, Vice President JD Vance and MAGA movement supporters is a testament to the massive influence that Kirk accumulated in conservative America.

“It was part memorial service, but another part of it was more like a political rally,” said the Rev. Joel Bowman, pastor of Temple of Faith Baptist Church in Louisville, Kentucky. “The conflation of Christian symbolism and right-wing conservativism has really been a hallmark of the brand of Christian nationalism we have seen in the last eight, nine,10 years” since Trump has defined Republican politics.

Vice President JD Vance holds his fist up as he leaves the stage after speaking at a memorial for conservative activist Charlie Kirk, Sunday, Sept. 21, 2025, at State Farm Stadium in Glendale, Ariz. (AP Photo/John Locher)

“It was part memorial service, but another part of it was more like a political rally,” said the Rev. Joel Bowman, pastor of Temple of Faith Baptist Church in Louisville, Kentucky. “The conflation of Christian symbolism and right-wing conservativism has really been a hallmark of the brand of Christian nationalism we have seen in the last eight, nine,10 years” since Trump has defined Republican politics.

Many spoke of Kirk as a family man whose strong Christian faith, belief in the unfettered expression of ideas and ultraconservative values were part of his appeal.

“My friends, for Charlie, we must remember that he is a hero to the United States of America. And he is a martyr for the Christian faith,” Vance said.

The Rev. F. Bruce Williams, pastor of Bates Memorial Baptist Church in Louisville, Kentucky, had rejected the martyrdom assertion well before Vance addressed Kirk’s mourners in Arizona.

While emphasizing that Kirk’s “life was tragically taken by violence,” Williams said in a sermon shared more than 40,000 times on Facebook, “what is also tragic is they’re trying to make him a martyr of the faith.”

“Now, he did violently die, but he did not die for the faith. Not the faith that I know. Not for the Jesus I know.”

“Charlie Kirk did not deserve to be assassinated,” agreed Wesley, pastor of Alfred Street Baptist Church, in his online sermon. “But I am overwhelmed seeing the flags of the United States of America at half-staff, calling this nation to honor and venerate a man who was an unapologetic racist and spent all of his life sowing seeds of division and hate into this land.”

Clergy decry comparisons with Martin Luther King Jr.

Kirk once called the landmark civil rights law granting equal rights to people of color “a mistake,” and described civil rights icon the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. as “awful,” leading many Black church leaders to reject comparisons between Kirk’s killing and King’s 1968 assassination.

“How dare you compare him to Martin Luther King,” the Rev. Jamal Bryant, pastor of New Birth Missionary Baptist Church in Seacrest, Georgia, said in a sermon posted to his Instagram account.

FILE – Jamal Bryant, senior pastor of New Birth Missionary Baptist Church, speaks during the March on Washington, Aug. 28, 2020, on the 57th anniversary of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have A Dream” speech, at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin, Pool, File)

“The only thing they got in common is both of ‘em was killed by a white man. After that, they got nothin’ else in common.”

The Rev. Freddy Haynes III, pastor of Friendship West Baptist Church in Dallas, echoed Bryant in cautioning the Kirk-King comparison.

“Let me hasten to say, I’m anti-political violence. Kirk should still be alive.”

But, he added in a sermon posted to Instagram: “I don’t agree with anything Kirk said. What Kirk said was dangerous. What he said was racist. Rooted in white supremacy. Nasty and hate-filled. But he should still be alive.”

Some pastors emphasize Kirk’s faith and traditional values

Kirk’s conservatism does resonate with some Black pastors because they are themselves conservatives who subscribe to the evangelical political ideology that has been on the rise in the Trump era.

Patrick L. Wooden Sr., a pastor in Raleigh, North Carolina, celebrated Kirk for his promotion of conservative Christian values. He believes that liberal policies promoting diversity, equity and inclusion have left behind working class Black Americans in favor of other groups. He also agreed with Kirk’s statements against transgender individuals and others in the LGBTQ+ community.

FILE – Pastor Patrick Wooden Sr. is seen in the sanctuary of the Upper Room Church of God in Christ on Dec. 9, 2004, in Raleigh, N.C. (AP Photo/Gerry Broome, File)

“I pray that our country has not degenerated to the point that if you cannot overcome someone’s point of view, someone’s stated position … I hope the response isn’t that you shoot them with a gun,” said Wooden, who pastors the Upper Room Church of God in Christ and is an ordained bishop in the predominantly African American Pentecostal denomination.

AP writers Luis Andres Henao in New York and Peter Smith in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, contributed.