LEMOORE, Calif. (AP) — A pilot was safe after an F-35C fighter jet crashed near a central California naval installation on Wednesday, officials said.

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Authorities received a report that a military jet had crashed and was engulfed in flames around 6:40 p.m., the Fresno County Sheriff’s Office said in a social media post. Responding deputies, firefighters, California Highway Patrol officers and EMS personnel found the wreckage in a cotton field just north of Lemoore Naval Air Station. The pilot, who had ejected, was found with a parachute in a nearby field, the sheriff’s office said. He was flown to a hospital for evaluation and was expected to be OK.

Firefighters used a bulldozer to cut a path to the jet so fire engines could get close enough to extinguish the fire, the sheriff’s office said.

Naval Air Station Lemoore confirmed that the F-35C attached to the VFA-125 Rough Raiders went down near the installation. The pilot was safe after successfully ejecting and no other personnel were affected, the installation said in a statement posted on social media.

By PAUL WISEMAN, Associated Press Economics Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump has been getting his way on trade, strong-arming the European Union, Japan and other partners to accept once unthinkably high taxes on their exports to the United States.

But his radical overhaul of American trade policy, in which he’s bypassed Congress to slam big tariffs on most of the world’s economies, has not gone unchallenged. He’s facing at least seven lawsuits charging that he’s overstepped his authority. The plaintiffs want his biggest, boldest tariffs thrown out.

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And they won Round One.

In May, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of International Trade, a specialized federal court in New York, ruled that Trump exceeded his powers when he declared a national emergency to plaster taxes — tariffs — on imports from almost every country in the world. In reaching its decision, the court combined two challenges — one by five businesses and one by 12 U.S. states — into a single case.

Now it goes on to Round Two.

On Thursday, the 11 judges on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in Washington, which typically specializes in patent law, are scheduled to hear oral arguments from the Trump administration and from the states and businesses that want his sweeping import taxes struck down.

That court earlier allowed the federal government to continue collecting Trump’s tariffs as the case works its way through the judicial system.

The issues are so weighty — involving the president’s power to bypass Congress and impose taxes with huge economic consequences in the United States and abroad — that the case is widely expected to reach the U.S. Supreme Court, regardless of what the appeals court decides.

Trump is an unabashed fan of tariffs. He sees the import taxes as an all-purpose economic tool that can bring manufacturing back to the United States, protect American industries, raise revenue to pay for the massive tax cuts in his “One Big Beautiful Bill,’’ pressure countries into bending to his will, even end wars.

The U.S. Constitution gives the power to impose taxes — including tariffs — to Congress. But lawmakers have gradually relinquished power over trade policy to the White House. And Trump has made the most of the power vacuum, raising the average U.S. tariff to more than 18%, highest since 1934, according to the Budget Lab at Yale University.

At issue in the pending court case is Trump’s use of the 1977 International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) to impose sweeping tariffs without seeking congressional approval or conducting investigations first. Instead, he asserted the authority to declare a national emergency that justified his import taxes.

In February, he cited the illegal flow of drugs and immigrants across the U.S. border to slap tariffs on Canada, China and Mexico. Then on April 2 — “Liberation Day,’’ Trump called it — he invoked IEEPA to announce “reciprocal’’ tariffs of up to 50% on countries with which the United States ran trade deficits and a 10% “baseline’’ tariff on almost everybody else. The emergency he cited was America’s long-running trade deficit.

Trump later suspended the reciprocal tariffs, but they remain a threat: They could be imposed again Friday on countries that do not pre-empt them by reaching trade agreements with the United States or that receive letters from Trump setting their tariff rates himself.

FILE – President Donald Trump speaks during an event to announce new tariffs in the Rose Garden at the White House, on April 2, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein, File)

The plaintiffs argue that the emergency power laws does not authorize the use of tariffs. They also note that the trade deficit hardly meets the definition of an “unusual and extraordinary’’ threat that would justify declaring an emergency under the law. The United States, after all, has run trade deficits — in which it buys more from foreign countries than it sells them — for 49 straight years and in good times and bad.

The Trump administration argues that courts approved President Richard Nixon’s emergency use of tariffs in a 1971 economic crisis. The Nixon administration successfully cited its authority under the 1917 Trading With Enemy Act, which preceded and supplied some of the legal language used in IEEPA.

In May, the trade court rejected the argument, ruling that Trump’s Liberation Day tariffs “exceed any authority granted to the President’’ under the emergency powers law.

“The president doesn’t get to use open-ended grants of authority to do what he wants,’’ said Reilly Stephens, senior counsel at the Liberty Justice Center, a libertarian legal group that is representing businesses suing the Trump administration over the tariffs.

In the case of the drug trafficking and immigration tariffs on Canada, China and Mexico, the trade court ruled that the levies did not meet IEEPA’s requirement that they “deal with’’ the problem they were supposed to address.

The court challenge does not cover other Trump tariffs, including levies on foreign steel, aluminum and autos that the president imposed after Commerce Department investigations concluded that those imports were threats to U.S. national security.

Nor does it include tariffs that Trump imposed on China in his first term — and President Joe Biden kept — after a government investigation concluded that the Chinese used unfair practices to give their own technology firms an edge over rivals from the United States and other Western countries.

A Delta Air Lines flight from Salt Lake City to Amsterdam was hit by serious turbulence, injuring passengers and forcing the flight to divert to Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport, the airline said.

The flight landed around 7:45 p.m. Wednesday. The airport fire department and paramedics met the flight and 25 passengers were taken to hospitals for evaluation and treatment, the airline said.

Serious injuries from in-flight turbulence are rare, but scientists say they may be becoming more common as climate change alters the jet stream.

A man was killed when a Singapore Airlines flight hit severe turbulence in May 2024, the first person to die from turbulence on a major airline in several decades.

By KEVIN FREKING and LEAH ASKARINAM, Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — Imagine getting the day off work for Donald Trump’s birthday. Receiving a $100 bill with Trump’s portrait on it. Touching down at Donald J. Trump International Airport near the nation’s capital. And taking in a show at the Donald J. Trump Center for Performing Arts.

All would be possible under a flurry of bills Republican lawmakers have sponsored this year.

Trump is little more than six months into his second term, but some Republicans are ready to elevate him into the pantheon of American greats, proposing an ever-growing list of bills paying tribute well before his second term ends. One lawmaker even proposes carving his face into Mount Rushmore.

President Donald Trump listens at an event to promote his proposal to improve Americans’ access to their medical records in the East Room of the White House, Wednesday, July 30, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein)

It’s a legislative exercise that mixes flattery and politics, providing another stark reminder of the Republican Party’s transformation under Trump as lawmakers from red-leaning states and congressional districts look for ways to win the president’s good graces — and stay close to his supporters.

Doug Heye, a Republican strategist who served as communications director of the Republican National Committee, said the bills have an important audience despite their seeming frivolity.

“This is more about one person,” Heye said. “It’s not, ‘Hey, voters, look what I’m trying to do for Donald.’ It’s, ‘Hey, Donald, look what I’m trying to do for you.’”

No time to waste

House Republicans moved quickly to honor Trump after his second term began. The bill to rename Dulles International Airport in Virginia after Trump was introduced 72 hours after his swearing-in.

“Best president in my lifetime,” said the bill’s sponsor, Rep. Addison McDowell of North Carolina. “And I can’t think of a better way to honor somebody than to cement their place in history by naming an international airport in our nation’s capital after him.”

Rep. Brandon Gill of Texas waited a few more weeks before sponsoring his bill to put Trump’s picture on the $100 bill. His legislation stated no $100 bill printed after Dec. 31, 2028, could be printed without Trump’s portrait on the front, even though federal law bans living figures from being placed on U.S. currency. That law, enacted just after the Civil War, was intended to avoid the appearance of a monarchy.

FILE – The likeness of Benjamin Franklin is seen on a U.S. $100 bill, Feb. 22, 2023, in Marple Township, Pa. (AP Photo/Matt Slocum, File)

Another proposal from Rep. Greg Steube of Florida would rename Washington’s subway system the Trump Train. There’s also a bill from Rep. Claudia Tenney of New York combining Trump’s birthday with Flag Day to designate June 14 a federal holiday.

Perhaps the most daring idea comes from Rep. Anna Paulina Luna of Florida, who wants the Interior secretary to arrange for Trump’s likeness to be carved into Mount Rushmore alongside Washington, Lincoln, Thomas Jefferson and Teddy Roosevelt. She has two models of it in her office.

Luna said through two assassination attempts and a “sham impeachment,” Trump has “shown not just resiliency in character but also to have been able to do what no other president has been able to accomplish.”

Rep. Joe Wilson of South Carolina admits he wasn’t enamored with Trump at first. Now, Wilson carries a pamphlet he gives to colleagues asking them to sponsor a bill that would direct the Bureau of Printing and Engraving to design and print a $250 bill bearing Trump’s image. The honor would coincide with the 250th anniversary of the United States declaring its independence.

“I believe the president has served in a such a manner that he deserves it,” Wilson said.

It’s not just a few random Republicans taking part. In the GOP’s tax cut and immigration law, leadership changed the name of a new type of savings account for children from “MAGA accounts” to “Trump accounts.”

“Because Trump is a transformational leader and he advocated for them,” Rep. Jason Smith, the chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, said of the name change.

The Nobel Peace Prize

Several lawmakers are also talking Trump up as someone who should win the Nobel Peace Prize.

As a candidate, Trump promised he would end the Russia-Ukraine war on his first day in office before saying later as president he was joking. Solving that conflict and Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza has eluded Trump.

But Republicans — and at least one foreign leader, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu — are still proposing Trump receive the prize. Sen. Bernie Moreno of Ohio has called on the Senate to nominate Trump, while Sen. Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee asked her social media followers to share her post if they agree he deserves it.

Tenney recently wrote on X she has nominated Trump twice and will continue to do so until he’s awarded the prize.

Honoring Melania Trump, too

An appropriations bill making its way through the House includes an amendment from Rep. Mike Simpson of Idaho that would name the Opera House at the Kennedy Center for first lady Melania Trump.

Simpson said the White House didn’t know about the amendment until it was introduced. He said the effort is different from renaming Dulles Airport in Trump’s honor because the theater isn’t currently named after anyone.

“She’s just been a supporter of the arts, always has been, and we’re trying to keep the arts alive in this bill,” Simpson said. “So we thought it was the appropriate thing to do.”

Smart politics

For many Republicans, lauding Trump in legislation is simply smart politics. Trump’s endorsement helped catapult many lawmakers into elected office, and his support could be helpful as individual members try to get their priorities into law.

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Plus, Trump wields his endorsement aggressively to replace members he finds disloyal and reward allies. He’s already endorsed Gill and Luna for reelection in 2026, calling them “MAGA Warriors.”

But the power of a Trump endorsement extends beyond the primary, especially in the midterm elections.

“In the general election, they just send a signal to Trump voters to turn out, to trust somebody and vote for them,” said Steve Stivers, former chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee.

Democrats have taken note of the flurry of Trump tributes, seeing it as a chance to portray a pliant Republican majority as being focused on placating Trump rather than helping Americans.

“House Republicans continue to embarrass themselves,” said Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries of New York. “These people are sycophants.”