By HOLLY RAMER, Associated Press

CONCORD, N.H. (AP) — A political consultant who sent voters artificial intelligence-generated robocalls mimicking former President Joe Biden last year goes on trial Thursday in New Hampshire, where jurors may be asked to consider not just his guilt or innocence but whether the state actually held its first-in-the-nation presidential primary.

Steven Kramer, who faces decades in prison if convicted of voter suppression and impersonating a candidate, has admitted orchestrating a message sent to thousands of voters two days before the Jan. 23, 2024, primary. The message played an AI-generated voice similar to the Democratic president’s that used his phrase “What a bunch of malarkey” and suggested that voting in the primary would preclude voters from casting ballots in November.

“It’s important that you save your vote for the November election,” voters were told. “Your votes make a difference in November, not this Tuesday.”

Kramer, who owns a firm specializing in get-out-the-vote projects, has said he wasn’t trying to influence the outcome of the primary election but rather wanted to send a wake-up call about the potential dangers of AI when he paid a New Orleans magician and self-described “digital nomad” $150 to create the recording.

FILE – Paul Carpenter, a New Orleans magician, performs card tricks during an interview in New Orleans, Feb. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Matthew Hinton, File)

“Maybe I’m a villain today, but I think in the end we get a better country and better democracy because of what I’ve done, deliberately,” Kramer told The Associated Press in February 2024.

Ahead of the trial in Belknap County Superior Court, state prosecutors sought to prevent Kramer from arguing that the primary was a meaningless straw poll because it wasn’t sanctioned by the Democratic National Committee. At Biden’s request, the DNC dislodged New Hampshire from its traditional early spot in the nominating calendar, but later dropped its threat not to seat the state’s national convention delegates. Biden did not put his name on the ballot or campaign there, but won as a write-in.

The state argued that such evidence was irrelevant and would risk confusing jurors, but Judge Elizabeth Leonard denied the motion in March, saying the DNC’s actions and Kramer’s understanding of them were relevant to his motive and intent in sending the calls. She did grant the prosecution’s request that the court accept as fact that the state held its presidential primary election as defined by law on Jan. 23, 2024. Jurors will be informed of that conclusion but won’t be required to accept it.

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Kramer faces 11 felony charges, each punishable by up to seven years in prison, alleging he attempted to prevent or deter someone from voting based on “fraudulent, deceptive, misleading or spurious grounds or information.” He also faces 11 misdemeanor charges that each carry a maximum sentence of a year in jail accusing him of falsely representing himself as a candidate by his own conduct or that of another person.

He also has been fined $6 million by the Federal Communications Commission, but it’s unclear whether he has paid it, and the FCC did not respond to a request for comment earlier this week.

The agency was developing AI-related rules when Donald Trump won the presidency, but has since shown signs of a possible shift toward loosening regulations. In April, it recommended that a telecom company be added back to an industry consortium just weeks after the agency had proposed fining the company for its role in illegal robocalls impersonating the FCC.

Half of all U.S. states have enacted legislation regulating AI deepfakes in political campaigns, according to the watchdog organization Public Citizen.

But House Republicans in Congress recently added a clause to their party’s signature “big beautiful” tax bill that would ban states and localities from regulating artificial intelligence for a decade, though it faces long odds in the Senate.

By MARY CLARE JALONICK, Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — Only six months into the job, Senate Majority Leader John Thune faces a massive challenge as he tries to quickly push President Donald Trump’s sprawling tax and spending cuts package to passage with the support of a divided GOP conference.

While most Republican senators are inclined to vote for the bill, Thune can stand to lose only four votes in the face of united Democratic opposition — and many more Republicans than that are critical of the version sent over by the House.

To get it done by July 4 — Trump’s deadline — Thune has to figure out how to balance the various, and sometimes conflicting, demands emerging from his members. And he has to do it in a way that doesn’t endanger Republican support in the House, which passed the legislation by only one vote last month after weeks of contentious negotiations.

It’s a complicated and risky undertaking, one that is likely to define the first year of Thune’s tenure and make or break his evolving relationship with Trump.

“This is when John’s leadership is going to be desperately needed,” said North Carolina Sen. Thom Tillis, one of the Republican holdouts who is pushing back on the bill’s quick phaseout of certain energy tax credits. “You can say no all you want, as long as you don’t say no to the wrong 51 people.”

Failure isn’t an option

So far, the well-liked South Dakota Republican is in a good place, both with colleagues and the White House. Thune has worked closely with Trump, despite a rockier relationship at the end of Trump’s first term. While acknowledging that the Senate will likely change the bill to address concerns about changes to Medicaid and other programs, Thune has repeatedly said that “failure is not an option.”

Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., flanked by Sen. John Barrasso, R-Wyo., left, to reporters following weekly policy luncheons on Capitol Hill in Washington, Tuesday, May 13, 2025. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)

“Individual pieces of it people don’t like,” Thune said Tuesday. “But in the end, we have to succeed.”

To get there, Thune has been meeting in his office with senators to hear them out, bringing in his colleagues individually and in small groups to discuss portions of the bill. Republican senators say the outreach is a stark change from his predecessor, Mitch McConnell, who was more feared than loved and kept a tight circle of advisers.

McConnell stepped down from the leadership post in January after almost two decades amid a series of health episodes and growing criticism from senators on the right flank, who felt that he consolidated power and ignored their concerns.

“It’s very much a change,” said North Dakota Sen. Kevin Cramer. Thune has “already made a lot of people happier by the listening part,” he said.

One happier senator is Florida Sen. Rick Scott, who sparred openly with McConnell and ran against Thune to replace him. Scott, who criticizes the bill as not doing enough to cut federal spending, has also met with the new leader.

“I’d be very surprised if anybody doesn’t believe he’s receptive to their ideas,” Scott said of Thune. And when people feel heard, Scott said, “there’s a greater chance they will go along with something.”

Thune and Trump haven’t always seen eye to eye

Thune has also carefully navigated his relationship with the president, after sharply criticizing Trump in 2020 for trying to overturn his election defeat.

Trump declined to endorse Thune’s reelection bid two years later. Thune endorsed South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott over Trump in the presidential primary before eventually endorsing Trump. The two made amends in the final months of Trump’s presidential campaign and have since forged a working relationship of mutual benefit. Thune has stayed in close touch with the White House, visiting Trump several times to discuss the bill, including on Wednesday.

While the collaborative approach has won favor from Trump and colleagues who were agitating for a change, Thune has a long way to go in a short time. Passing the legislation will require hard choices, and not every demand can be met.

‘Everybody wants to work with John’

Still, Thune’s South Dakota colleague, Republican Sen. Mike Rounds, says he has already proved himself a “winner” with Trump and the conference by quickly moving the president’s Cabinet nominations through the Senate mostly without controversy. The Senate also recently blocked California air regulations that Republicans have long opposed after Thune delayed the vote for weeks to assuage procedural concerns from GOP moderates like Maine Sen. Susan Collins.

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“Everybody wants to work with John,” Rounds said. “He’s not making anybody mad right now.”

Rounds says Thune has also learned how to crack down when he needs to. Since taking power, Thune has shortened Senate vote times that were sometimes stretching for hours to just 15 minutes, in most cases. It was a hard lesson for some senators, but it won him respect from Republicans and, privately, even some Democrats.

But as they were adjusting to the change, some senators unexpectedly missed votes because of Thune’s new policy, Rounds said.

“Did he get yelled at a little bit? Yeah,” he said. “But once they got cut off once or twice, pretty soon they realized, if you want to vote, make it on time.”

By MICHELLE CHAPMAN, Associated Press Business Writer

Procter & Gamble will cut up to 7,000 jobs, or approximately 6% of its global workforce, over the next two years as the maker of Tide detergent and Pampers diapers wrestles with tariff-related costs and customers who have grown anxious about the economy.

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The job cuts, announced at the Deutsche Bank Consumer Conference in Paris on Thursday, make up about 15% of its current non-manufacturing workforce, said Chief Financial Officer Andre Schulten.

“This restructuring program is an important step toward ensuring our ability to deliver our long-term algorithm over the coming two to three years,” Schulten said. “It does not, however, remove the near-term challenges that we currently face.”

Procter & Gamble, based in Cincinnati, had approximately 108,000 employees worldwide in June 2024.

The cuts are part of a broader restructuring program. Procter & Gamble will also end sales of some of its products in certain markets. Procter & Gamble said it will provide more details about that in July.

By LORNE COOK, Associated Press

BRUSSELS (AP) — NATO defense ministers are set Thursday to approve purchasing targets for stocking up on weapons and military equipment to better defend Europe, the Arctic and the North Atlantic, as part of a U.S. push to ramp up security spending.

The “capability targets” lay out goals for each of the 32 nations to purchase priority equipment like air defense systems, long-range missiles, artillery, ammunition, drones and “strategic enablers” such as air-to-air refueling, heavy air transport and logistics. Each nation’s plan is classified, so details are scarce.

“Today we decide on the capability targets. From there, we will assess the gaps we have, not only to be able to defend ourselves today, but also three, five, seven years from now,” NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte said.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, right, speaks with Norway’s Defense Minister Tore Sandvik during a meeting of NATO defense ministers at NATO headquarters in Brussels, Thursday, June 5, 2025. (AP Photo/Virginia Mayo)

“All these investments have to be financed,” he told reporters before chairing the meeting at NATO’s Brussels headquarters. U.S. President Donald Trump and his NATO counterparts will meet on June 24-25 to agree to new defense investment goals.

Spurred on by their own security concerns, European allies and Canada have already been ramping up military spending, including arms and ammunition purchases, since Russia launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

At the same time, some allies balk at U.S. demands to invest 5% of their gross domestic product in defense — 3.5% on core military spending and 1.5% on the roads, bridges, airfields and sea ports needed to deploy armies more quickly — when they have already struggled to grow their budgets to 2% of GDP.

Still, U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said that many appear on track to agree.

“The commitment is there. 5% on defense spending,” he told reporters after stepping out of the meeting.

“When you consider the threats that we face, the urgency in the world, it’s critical. We don’t need more flags. We need more fighting formations. We don’t need more conferences. We need more capabilities. Hard power.”

The new targets are assigned by NATO based on a blueprint agreed upon in 2023 — the military organization’s biggest planning shakeup since the Cold War — to defend its territory from an attack by Russia or another major adversary.

Under those plans, NATO would aim to have up to 300,000 troops ready to move to its eastern flank within 30 days, although experts suggest the allies would struggle to muster those kinds of numbers.

The member countries are assigned roles in defending NATO territory across three major zones — the high north and Atlantic area, a zone north of the Alps, and another in southern Europe.

NATO planners believe that the targets must be met within 5-10 years, given the speed at which Russia is building its armed forces now, and which would accelerate were any peace agreement reached to end its war on Ukraine.

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Some fear Russia might be ready to strike at a NATO country even sooner, especially if Western sanctions are eased and Europe has not prepared. “Are we going to gather here again and say ‘okay, we failed a bit,’ and then maybe we start learning Russian?” Lithuanian Defense Minister Dovilė Šakalienė said.

Swedish Defense Minister Pål Jonson also warned that while Russia is bogged down in Ukraine right now, things could quickly change.

“We also know after an armistice or a peace agreement, of course, Russia is going to allocate more forces closer to our vicinity. Therefore, it’s extremely important that the alliance use these couple of years now when Russia is still limited by its force posture in and around Ukraine,” Jonson said.

If the targets are respected, the member countries will need to spend at least 3% of GDP on defense.

Dutch Defense Minister Ruben Brekelmans said his country calculates in the medium term that “we should spend 3.5% at least on defense, which in the Netherlands means an additional 16 to 19 billion euro ($18-22 billion) addition to our current budget.”

The Netherlands is likely to buy more tanks, infantry fighting vehicles and long-range missile systems, including U.S.-made Patriots that can target aircraft, cruise missiles and shorter-range ballistic missiles.