By ANNE D’INNOCENZIO and JONEL ALECCIA, Associated Press

NEW YORK (AP) — Walmart said Wednesday that it plans to remove synthetic food dyes and 30 other ingredients, including some preservatives, artificial sweeteners and fat substitutes, from its store brands sold in the United States by January 2027.

The move announced by the the nation’s largest retailer amounts to an acknowledgment that American consumers and the U.S. government under President Donald Trump are paying attention to what goes into packaged foods. Walmart said its goal would affect about 1,000 products, including salty snacks, baked goods, power drinks, salad dressings and frosting.

A customer walks past a display of Great Value brand cereal at a Walmart Neighborhood Market, Friday, Sept. 26, 2025, in Bentonville, Ark. (AP Photo/Charlie Riedel)

Several of the ingredients on Walmart’s removal list, however, already are banned, not widely used or have not been used in the U.S. food supply for decades. Others were included despite no known problems or have been targeted by the Trump administration for review and possible elimination as an approved food additive, according to food safety experts.

Walmart said the 14-month reformulation plan primarily would involve its largest private-label food brand, Great Value. Customers also can expect changes in Walmart’s Marketside and Freshness Guaranteed lines of prepared foods, and to some extent in its premium label Bettergoods products, the company said.

In recent months, major food companies such as Kraft Heinz, Nestle and Conagra Brands have pledged to eliminate petroleum-based synthetic dyes in coming years. Walmart took its news a step further by identifying other kinds of food additives in its phase-out timeline.

The chemicals and compounds the discount retailer intends to eliminate encompasses the breadth of food manufacturing. For example, Walmart’s list includes potassium nitrate, potassium nitrite and potassium bisulfite, which are used as preservatives in processed meats. It also plans to remove phthalates, a chemical used to make plastic flexible.

Health advocates have argued that phthalates in plastic wrap, plastic packaging and plastic bottles can end up in food and beverages. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has limited but not ended their use in items that come into contact with food.

But some of the 30 non-dyes listed by Walmart are already banned or no longer used. Simplesse, a fat substitute the company named, was phased out of the U.S. food market in 2023. Other banned additives on the list include synthetic trans fatty acids, or trans fats, which the FDA effectively phased out and then eliminated in 2023 by determining that partially hydrogenated oils no longer were recognized as safe.

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Walmart said the choice of banished additives reflected the availability of “viable and scalable alternatives” for maintaining product quality, taste and affordable pricing.

Some of the 11 artificial food dyes the company identified, such as Red No. 4, Red No. 3, Citrus Red No. 2 and Orange B, also are already banned or the subject or proposed bans, or haven’t been used in the U.S. for years.

In June, Walmart’s wholesale club division, Sam’s Club, said it would remove more than 40 ingredients, including artificial colors and the artificial sweetener aspartame, from its Member’s Mark products by the end of the year.

Walmart shoppers also are likely to see reformulated food items in the coming months, the company said. Among them: Great Value cheese dips made with paprika and annatto, a food coloring and spice that’s derived from the seeds of the achiote tree, in place of Yellow No. 5 and Yellow No. 6, Walmart said.

In the future, a new version of Great Value Fruit Spins Cereal will not get its colors from Red No. 40, Yellow No. 6 and Blue No. 2, but from beta carotene, annatto, blue-green spirulina and juice concentrates, according to Walmart.

Scott Morris, Walmart’s senior vice president of private brands food, consumables, and manufacturing, told The Associated Press that 90% of Walmart’s private label foods don’t contain synthetic dyes. He said Wednesday’s news marks the biggest food reformulation in Walmart’s history but also an acceleration of a process the company initiated in the last few years.

Customers have been asking Walmart to get rid of certain ingredients, but replacing them with more natural alternatives is complicated, Morris said. The performance of the substitutes can vary significantly depending on whether a product is shelf stable or needs to be refrigerated, he said. New versions need to be vigorously taste-tested with customers, he added.

“Every item’s a snowflake,” Morris said.

The main factor that prevented Walmart from overhauling its food shelves sooner was a limited availability of approved alternatives, but the market for those is increasing, he said.

“Now’s the right time to make our declaration and be more broad with our application of the natural ingredients,” Morris said.

The federal government is also giving artificial food dyes increased scrutiny,

Days before Trump returned to office, the FDA banned the dye called Red 3 from the nation’s food supply, nearly 35 years after it was barred from cosmetics because of potential cancer risk.

In April, Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and FDA Commissioner Marty Makary said the agency would take steps to eliminate synthetic dyes by the end of 2026, largely by relying on voluntary efforts from the food industry.

Aleccia reported from Southern California.

By MATTHIAS SCHRADER and STEFANIE DAZIO, Associated Press

MUNICH (AP) — German police closed the Oktoberfest fairgrounds Wednesday morning following a bomb threat from the suspected perpetrator of an explosion in northern Munich, city officials said.

At least one person’s death was believed to be connected to the explosion at a residential building early Wednesday, which Munich police said was deliberately set on fire and part of a domestic dispute.

It was not immediately clear whether the deceased was the suspected perpetrator or someone else. Another person, who was not considered to be a danger to the public, remained missing.

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Specialized teams were called to the scene to defuse booby traps in the building, police said. Photos from the area also showed a burned-out van.

Officials discovered the bomb threat to Oktoberfest in a letter from the alleged perpetrator. Police searched the fairgrounds for other explosive devices and asked workers to leave the area. Authorities said the festival will be closed at least until 5 p.m. local time Wednesday.

This year’s Oktoberfest began on Sept. 20 and ends Oct. 5. The world’s largest beer festival usually attracts up to 6 million visitors.

In 1980, Oktoberfest was the target of a deadly neo-Nazi attack. The bombing on the evening of Sept. 26, 1980, claimed 13 lives, including that of three children and the attacker, student Gundolf Koehler, a supporter of a banned far-right group. More than 200 people were wounded.

Dazio reported from Berlin.

By JOHN HANNA, Associated Press

A panel of federal judges will begin Wednesday to consider whether Texas can use a redrawn congressional map that boosts Republicans and has launched a widening redistricting battle ahead of the 2026 midterm elections.

The case in an El Paso courtroom is the first test of Texas’ new map, which was quickly redrawn this summer to give Republicans five more seats at the urging of President Donald Trump in an effort to preserve the slim Republican U.S. House majority.

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Civil rights groups and dozens of Black and Hispanic voters joined the lawsuit, saying the new map intentionally reduces minority voters’ influence. Their lawsuit argues that the new district lines represent racial gerrymandering prohibited by the landmark 1965 Voting Rights Act and the U.S. Constitution.

Texas Republican lawmakers and state leaders deny these claims, saying the map is a legal partisan gerrymander.

The hearing is expected to last more than a week. It is unclear how quickly the judges will issue a ruling.

The new map eliminated five of the state’s nine “coalition” districts, where no minority group has a majority but together they outnumber non-Hispanic white voters.

“Race and party have folded onto each other,” said Keith Gaddie, a Texas Christian University political science professor who has testified as an expert witness in redistricting cases over the past 25 years. “What could be seen as being racial gerrymandering could just be partisan gerrymandering.”

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 2019 that the U.S. Constitution does not prohibit partisan gerrymandering.

Texas says critics cloak partisan fears in rhetoric about race

The new Texas map is designed to give Republicans 30 of the state’s 38 House seats, up from 25 now.

FILE – Texas state Sen. Sarah Eckhardt, D-Austin, right, listens as Sen. Phil King, R-Weatherford, speaks in favor of a bill before a vote on a redrawn U.S. congressional map during a special session in the Senate Chamber at the Texas Capitol in Austin, Texas, Aug. 22, 2025. (AP Photo/Eric Gay, File)

The state’s attorneys argue that Texas officials’ persistent statements about their partisan motives show they weren’t engaged in illegal racial gerrymandering but were in a “political arms-race,” Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton’s office said in a recent court filing.

The move in Texas has subsequently led some other states — Republican-led as well as those led by Democrats — to respond with some redistricting plans of their own in a scramble to try to dominate the midterm elections.

California countered by putting a proposed map on the ballot in November to pick up five Democratic seats. Missouri redrew its lines last month to give the GOP an extra seat.

In court filings, Paxton’s office argued that Republicans are offsetting past Democratic gerrymanders, and the Texas map’s critics “seek to use race as a foil to kneecap Texas’s efforts to even the playing field.”

“Whenever they do not get what they want, they cry racism,” its filing said.

Making a case involves detailed election analysis

The case will be heard by a panel of three judges, one each appointed by Trump, and Presidents Barack Obama and Ronald Reagan.

Attorneys for groups and voters challenging the map aim to show that a trial is likely to prove the new lines deny minority voters opportunities to elect candidates of their choosing.

“States have to follow rules when they redistrict,” said Nina Perales, an attorney representing some the voters and groups, including the League of United Latin American Citizens. “They provide essentially the buffer guards to protect the democratic process.”

The judges are likely to hear a detailed analysis of voting patterns.

“The minority community has to be what’s called politically cohesive, which tends to mean that members of that community overwhelmingly tend to prefer the same candidates in elections,” said Richard Pildes, a constitutional law professor at New York University.

Critics see new, ‘sham’ minority districts

The new map decreased the total number of congressional districts in which minorities comprise a majority of voting-age citizens from 16 to 14.

Republicans argue the map is better for minority voters. While five “coalition” districts are eliminated, there’s a new, eighth Hispanic-majority district, and two new Black-majority districts.

Critics consider each of those new districts a “sham,” arguing that the majority is so slim that white voters, who tend to turn out in larger percentages, will control election results.

“There is growing animus against African-American and other communities who have historically been disenfranchised,” said Derrick Johnson, the NAACP’s national president. “This is consistent with the current climate and culture germinating from the White House.”

Critics also argued that the 2021 map itself didn’t have enough minority districts. For example, Perales said, Houston has enough Hispanic voters for two such districts, and the new map has one.

By QASSIM ABDUL-ZAHRA, Associated Press

BAGHDAD (AP) — The U.S. military has begun drawing down its mission in Iraq under an agreement inked with the Iraqi government last year, officials said Wednesday.

Washington and Baghdad agreed last year to wind down the military mission in Iraq of an American-led coalition fighting the Islamic State group by September 2025, with U.S. forces departing some bases where they have stationed troops during a two-decade-long military presence in the country.

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Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell said in a statement Wednesday that the U.S. “will reduce its military mission in Iraq,” reflecting “our combined success in fighting ISIS.”

The move “marks an effort to transition to a lasting U.S.-Iraq security partnership in accordance with U.S. national interests, the Iraqi Constitution, and the U.S.-Iraq Strategic Framework Agreement,” he said.

The statement added that Washington will maintain close coordination with Baghdad and coalition partners to ensure a “responsible transition.”

It did not give details on the number of troops that have withdrawn to date or when the drawdown would be completed.

A senior Iraqi security official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to comment publicly, said the U.S. withdrawal began weeks ago from Baghdad and from Ain al-Asad base in western Iraq.

“Only a very small number of advisers remain within the Joint Operations Command,” the official said.

He added that some forces have redeployed to the city of Irbil in the semi-autonomous Kurdish region in northern Iraq, while others have left the country entirely, and that there is no accurate count of those who have withdrawn yet.

The official said the drawdown is proceeding according to agreed-upon schedules.

Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani told The Associated Press in an interview in July that the U.S. and Iraq will meet by the end of the year to “arrange the bilateral security relationship” between the two countries.