By MICHAEL R. BLOOD and TRÂN NGUYỄN

LOS ANGELES (AP) — The fight over California’s new congressional map designed to help Democrats flip congressional House seats will go to court Monday as a panel of federal judges considers whether the district boundaries approved by voters last month can be used in elections.

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The hearing in Los Angeles sets the stage for a high-stakes legal and political fight between the Trump administration and Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom, who’s been eyeing a 2028 presidential run. The lawsuit asks a three-judge panel to grant a temporary restraining order by Dec. 19 — the date candidates can take the first official steps to run in the 2026 election.

Voters approved California’s new U.S. House map in November through Proposition 50. It’s designed to help Democrats flip as many as five congressional House seats in the midterm elections next year. It was Newsom’s response to a Republican-led effort in Texas backed by President Donald Trump.

The redistricting showdown between the nation’s two most populous states has spread nationally, with efforts aiming to determine which party controls Congress for the second half of Trump’s term. Missouri, North Carolina and Ohio have adopted new district lines that could provide a partisan advantage.

Some plans are facing legal challenges, but the Supreme Court ruled earlier this month to allow Texas to use its new map for the 2026 election. The Justice Department has only sued California.

The U.S. Justice Department, joining a case brought by the California Republican Party, has accused California of gerrymandering its map in violation of the Constitution by using race as a factor to favor Hispanic voters. Republicans want the court to prohibit California from using the new map. Voters approved the map for the 2026, 2028 and 2030 elections. State Democrats said they’re confident the lawsuit will fail.

“In letting Texas use its gerrymandered maps, the Supreme Court noted that California’s maps, like Texas’s, were drawn for lawful reasons,” Newsom’s spokesperson Brandon Richards said in a statement. “That should be the beginning and the end of this Republican effort to silence the voters of California.”

New U.S. House maps are drawn across the country after the Census every 10 years. Some states like California rely on an independent commission to draw maps, while others like Texas let politicians draw them. The effort to create new maps in the middle of the decade is highly unusual.

Paul Mitchell, a redistricting consultant who drew the map for Democrats, is expected to offer testimony. The Justice Department alleges that Mitchell and state leaders admitted that they redrew some districts to have a Latino majority.

The lawsuit cites a news release from state Democrats that says the new map “retains and expands Voting Rights Act districts that empower Latino voters” while making no changes to Black majority districts in the Oakland and Los Angeles areas. The federal Voting Rights Act, passed in the 1960s, sets rules for drawing districts to ensure minority groups have adequate political power. The lawsuit also cites a Cal Poly Pomona and Caltech study that concludes the new map would increase Latino voting power.

“Race cannot be used as a proxy to advance political interests, but that is precisely what the California General Assembly did with Proposition 50 — the recent ballot initiative that junked California’s pre-existing electoral map in favor of a rush-job rejiggering of California’s congressional district lines,” the lawsuit said.

House Democrats need to gain just a handful of seats next year to take control of the chamber, which would imperil Trump’s agenda for the remainder of his term and open the way for congressional investigations into his administration. Republicans hold 219 seats, to Democrats’ 214.

Nguyễn reported from Sacramento.

STEWARTVILLE, Minn. — The man who shot and critically injured a student on Friday and then is believed to have taken his own life outside of Stewartville High School has been identified as 19-year-old Logan Moyer, a 2024 graduate of the school.

Officials from the Olmsted County Sheriff’s Office and Stewartville Public Schools spoke at a press conference about the investigation Monday morning.

The motive for the shooting remains unclear.

“We don’t know, and we might not ever know why,” Sheriff Kevin Torgerson said.

Authorities still are not releasing the name of the injured student, but he was a part of the Stewartville wrestling team, Torgerson said. As of Sunday night, he said, the student remains hospitalized in critical but stable condition.

Torgerson said Moyer was not a coach, volunteer or paid staff member of the wrestling program.

Although Moyer was a member of the school’s wrestling team when he was a Stewartville student himself, officials were not able to confirm whether he was on the team at the same time as the injured student.

Torgerson said the investigation will continue and that authorities will be reviewing video footage and relying on interviews, among other resources, as they move forward.

The shooting happened at about 5 a.m. Friday, Dec. 12, as the wrestling team was preparing to travel to Grand Forks, North Dakota, for a two-day wrestling meet. There were approximately 40 students and coaching staff at the school at the time.

“One of the teammates was walking in the parking lot when a gunshot was heard by others,” Torgerson said on Friday. “The victim was located on the ground in the parking lot by coaching staff. As other staff and students were looking around at that moment to see what had happened, they heard a second shot.”

An autopsy was performed Friday afternoon by the Southeastern Minnesota Medical Examiner’s Office. The results so far are consistent with suicide, Torgerson said.

When asked on Monday, Torgerson estimated that the shooting took place 100 to 200 yards away from the bus and the rest of the activity surrounding the trip.

Torgerson said he could not comment on the nature of the injuries for either Moyer or the student. However, he said the firearm found with Moyer was a .223 caliber, bolt-action “hunting-style” rifle.

It is unclear what the immediate plans for the school’s wrestling team are, but the team does plan to continue its season, said Superintendent Belinda Selfors. Classes resumed on Monday.

The district will be providing resources for the students including support from chaplains from the Olmsted County Sheriff’s Office, the Southeast Minnesota Crisis Team, Zumbro Valley Mental Health Services, as well as the district’s own counseling and social work staff.

“Several school districts in the area have offered to send their counseling staff to support us,” Selfors said. “We are well staffed in the area of providing support for our students and our staff.”

This is a developing story. Check back later for more updates.

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By MICHELLE L. PRICE

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump on Monday blamed Rob Reiner’s outspoken opposition to the president for the actor-director’s killing, delivering the unsubstantiated claim in a shocking post that seemed intent on decrying his opponents even in the face of a tragedy.

The statement, even for Trump, was a shocking comment that came as police were still investigating the deaths of the beloved director and his wife as an apparent homicide. The couple were found dead at their home Sunday in Los Angeles. Investigators believe they suffered stab wounds and the couple’s son Nick Reiner, was in police custody early Monday.

Trump has a long track record of inflammatory remarks, but his comments in a social media post were a drastic departure from the role presidents typically play in offering a message of consolation or tribute to the death of a public figure. His message also laid bare Trump’s unwillingness to rise above political grievance in moments of crisis.

Trump, in a post on his social media network, said that Reiner and his wife were killed “reportedly due to the anger he caused others through his massive, unyielding, and incurable affliction with a mind crippling disease known as TRUMP DERANGEMENT SYNDROME.”

He said Reiner “was known to have driven people CRAZY by his raging obsession of President Donald J. Trump, with his obvious paranoia reaching new heights as the Trump Administration surpassed all goals and expectations of greatness.”

Kentucky Republican Rep. Thomas Massie, who has bucked much of his party’s lockstep agreement with the president, criticized Trump for the comment.

“Regardless of how you felt about Rob Reiner, this is inappropriate and disrespectful discourse about a man who was just brutally murdered,” Massie wrote in a post on X. “I guess my elected GOP colleagues, the VP, and White House staff will just ignore it because they’re afraid? I challenge anyone to defend it.”

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, a Georgia Republican whom Trump branded a “traitor” for disagreeing with him, responded to Trump’s message by saying, “This is a family tragedy, not about politics or political enemies.”

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Reiner was one of the most active Democrats in the film industry, regularly campaigning on behalf of liberal causes and hosting fundraisers. He was a vocal critic of Trump, calling him in a 2017 interview with Variety “mentally unfit” to be president and “the single-most unqualified human being to ever assume the presidency of the United States.”

The unsympathetic message was the latest example of Trump’s unsparing prism through which he views those he perceives as enemies.

He made retribution against political enemies a prime focus of his campaign for the White House last year. And he has in the past made light of violence when it’s befallen those on the other side of the political aisle.

When Nancy Pelosi’s husband, Paul Pelosi, was attacked by an intruder looking for the former House speaker at the family’s San Francisco home in 2022 and beaten over the head with a hammer, Trump later mocked the attack.

That’s in despite of his comments after the assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk earlier this year. Trump said Kirk’s killing was “the tragic consequence of demonizing those with whom you disagree.”

His administration then sought consequences for people who were critical of Kirk or even celebrated his killing.

When Trump spoke at Kirk’s memorial service, he used his remarks to underline how he views his adversaries.

“I hate my opponent,” the president said.

By STEFANIE DAZIO and AAMER MADHANI

BERLIN (AP) — Russia has indicated it’s open to Ukraine joining the European Union as part of a potential peace deal aimed at ending Russia’s war on Ukraine, and there’s now consensus on about 90% of the U.S.-authored peace plan, U.S. officials said Monday.

The officials said that robust negotiations between President Donald Trump’s envoys, Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and his team led to progress on narrowing differences on security guarantees Kyiv said must be provided to Ukraine as well as the contentious issue on Moscow’s demand that Ukraine concede land in the eastern Donbas.

Kushner and Witkoff are expected to meet over dinner on Monday evening with Ukrainian as well British, German and French leaders for further talks. Trump, who has been briefed twice on the Berlin talks, plans to dial in to the dinner from Washington.

The negotiators and others involved in the peace talks will likely meet in Miami or elsewhere in the United States this weekend to continue their work, according to the U.S. officials.

The U.S. officials also said the administration plans to put forward the security guarantees agreement before the Senate for its approval, although they didn’t specify whether it would be ratified like a treaty, which needs two-thirds approval from the chamber.

The U.S. officials who briefed reporters after Witkoff and Kushner met with Zelenskyy and other European officials in Berlin over the last two days said that such an offer over Ukraine joining the EU would be a major concession by Moscow. But Russia has previously said it does not object to Ukraine joining the EU.

The U.S. officials, who were not authorized to comment publicly by the White House and spoke on the condition of anonymity, said that the U.S. has also agreed to provide unspecified security guarantees to Kyiv as part of the deal but that such an offer won’t be on the table “forever.”

The latest round of talks between Zelenskyy and U.S. envoys ended Monday as Kyiv faces Washington’s pressure to swiftly accept a U.S.-brokered peace deal while confronting an increasingly assertive Moscow.

Ukraine’s lead negotiator, Rustem Umerov, said on social media that “real progress” had been achieved at the talks in Berlin with President Donald Trump’s special envoy Witkoff and Trump’s son-in-law Kushner as well as European officials. The talks lasted roughly 90 minutes, after a five-hour session Sunday.

The U.S. government said in a social media post on Witkoff’s account after Sunday’s meeting that “a lot of progress was made.”

The search for possible compromises has run into major obstacles, including control of Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region, which is mostly occupied by Russian forces.

Zelenskyy has expressed readiness to drop Ukraine’s bid to join the NATO military alliance if the U.S. and other Western nations give Kyiv security guarantees similar to those offered to NATO members. But Ukraine’s preference remains NATO membership as the best security guarantee to prevent further Russian aggression however this option doesn’t currently have full backing from all allies.

Still, Ukraine has continued to reject the U.S. push for ceding territory to Russia. Russian President Vladimir Putin wants Ukraine to withdraw its forces from the part of Donetsk region still under its control as one of the key conditions for peace.

Zelenskyy’s itinerary on Monday also included meetings with German and other European leaders. French President Emmanuel Macron’s office confirmed he would travel to Berlin later Monday.

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“The issue of security in particular will ultimately determine whether this war actually comes to a standstill and whether it flares up again,” a spokesperson for German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, Stefan Kornelius, told reporters.

The Russian president has cast Ukraine’s bid to join NATO as a major threat to Moscow’s security and a reason for launching the full-scale invasion in February 2022. The Kremlin has demanded that Ukraine renounce the bid for alliance membership as part of any prospective peace settlement.

Zelenskyy emphasized that any Western security assurances would need to be legally binding and supported by the U.S. Congress.

The Kremlin said Monday it expected to be updated on the Berlin talks by the U.S. side.

Asked whether the negotiations could be over by Christmas, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said trying to predict a potential time frame for a peace deal was a “thankless task.”

“I can only speak for the Russian side, for President Putin,” Peskov said. “He is open to peace, to a serious peace and serious decisions. He is absolutely not open to any tricks aimed at stalling for time.”

Putin has denied plans to attack any European allies.

In London, meanwhile, the new head of the MI6 spy agency was set to warn on Monday how Putin’s determination to export chaos around the world is rewriting the rules of conflict and creating new security challenges.

Blaise Metreweli was using her first public speech as chief of the United Kingdom’s foreign intelligence service to say that Britain faces increasingly unpredictable and interconnected threats, with emphasis on “aggressive, expansionist” Russia.

Drone strikes continue

Russia fired 153 drones of various types at Ukraine overnight Sunday into Monday, according to Ukraine’s Air Force, which said 133 drones were neutralized, while 17 more hit their targets.

In Russia, the Defense Ministry on Monday said forces destroyed 130 Ukrainian drones overnight. An additional 16 drones were destroyed between 7 a.m. and 8 a.m. local time.

Eighteen drones were shot down over Moscow itself, the defense ministry said. Flights were temporarily halted at the city’s Domodedovo and Zhukovsky airports as part of safety measures, officials said.

Damage details and casualty figures were not immediately available.

Madhani reported from Washington. Seung Min Kim in Washington, Pietro De Cristofaro in Berlin, Illia Novikov in Kyiv, Ukraine, and Katie Marie Davies in Manchester, England, contributed to this report.