By SETH BORENSTEIN

WASHINGTON (AP) — Researchers, doctors, their patients and supporters ventured out of labs, hospitals and offices Friday to stand up to what they call a blitz on life-saving science by the Trump administration.

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In the nation’s capital, a couple thousand gathered at the Stand Up for Science rally. Organizers said similar rallies were planned in more than 30 U.S. cities.

Politicians, scientists, musicians, doctors and their patients were expected to make the case that firings, budget and grant cuts in health, climate, science and other research government agencies in the Trump administration’s first 47 days in office are endangering not just the future but the present.

“Science is under attack in the United States,” said rally co-organizer Colette Delawalla, a doctoral student in clinical psychology. “We’re not just going to stand here and take it.”

“American scientific progress and forward movement is a public good and public good is coming to a screeching halt right now,” Delawalla said.

Health and science advances are happening faster than ever, said former National Institutes of Health Director Francis Collins, who helped map the human genome. The funding cuts put at risk progress on Alzheimer’s Disease, diabetes and cancer, he said.

“It’s a very bad time with all the promise and momentum,” said Collins.

“I’m very worried about my country right now,” Collins said before breaking out into an original song on his guitar.

Emily Whitehead, the first patient to get a certain new type of treatment for a rare cancer, told the crowd that at age 5 she was sent hospice to die, but CAR T-cell therapy “taught my immune system to beat cancer” and she’s been disease free for nearly 13 years.

“I stand up for science because science saved my life,” Whitehead said.

Friday’s rally in Washington was at the Lincoln Memorial, in the shadow of a statue of the president who created the National Academy of Sciences in 1863. Some of the expected speakers study giant colliding galaxies, the tiny genetic blueprint of life inside humans and the warming atmosphere.

“We’re looking at the most aggressively anti-science government the United States has ever had,” astronomer Phil Plait told the booing crowd that carried signs that were decidedly nerdy and attacking President Donald Trump, Elon Musk and Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

Signs included “Edit Elon out of USA’s DNA,” “In evidence we trust,” “science is the vaccine for ignorance” and “ticked off epidemiologist.”

Nobel Prize winning biologist Victor Ambros, Bill Nye The Science Guy, former NASA chief Bill Nelson and a host of other politicians, and patients — some with rare diseases — were scheduled to take the stage to talk about their work and the importance of scientific research.

From 7 million miles away from Earth, NASA proved science could divert potentially planet-killing asteroids, Nelson said. On his space shuttle flight nearly 40 years ago, he looked down to Earth and had a “sense of awe that you want to be a better steward of what we’ve been given,” he said.

The rallies were organized mostly by graduate students and early career scientists. Dozens of other protests were also planned around the world, including more than 30 in France, Delawalla said.

“The cuts in science funding affects the world,” she said.

Protestors gathered around City Hall in Philadelphia, home to prestigious, internationally-recognized health care institutions and where 1 in 6 doctors in the U.S. has received medical training.

“As a doctor, I’m standing up for all of my transgender, nonbinary patients who are also being targeted,” said Cedric Bien-Gund, an infectious disease doctor at the University of Pennsylvania. “There’s been a lot of fear and silencing, both among our patients and among all our staff. And it’s really disheartening to see.”

Isabella O’Malley contributed from Philadelphia.

Follow Seth Borenstein on X at @borenbears

Read more of AP’s climate coverage at http://www.apnews.com/climate-and-environment

The Associated Press’ climate and environmental coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.

By JAKE COYLE, Associated Press

In Carson Lund’s “Eephus,” two teams – the Riverdogs and Adler’s Paint – gather on a neighborhood field for a baseball game. The leaves are already starting to turn — “It’s getting late early,” as Yogi Berra said — and this is to be the final game for their adult rec league. The field is to be demolished.

No one would confuse them for all-stars. A suicide squeeze unfolds in creaky slow-motion. The rotund left fielder mutters “Mother McCree” under his breath when the ball is hit in the gap. But, regardless of skill level, they all care sincerely about the game.

This image released by Music Box Films shows, from left, Patrick Garrigan, Chris Goodwin, Peter Minkarah, Stephen Radochia, Ari Brisbon, Ray Hryb, and David Pridemore in a scene from “Eephus.” (Music Box Films via AP)

“Eephus,” as leisurely as a late-August double header, simply unfolds along with their game. Except to chase a foul ball or two, the movie stays within the lines of Soldier Field, the nondescript Massachusetts baseball field they’re playing on sometime in the 1990s. It spans nine innings, with dugout chatter and fading light. In this slow-pitch gem of a baseball movie — a middle-aged “Sandlot” — time is slipping away, but they’re going down swinging.

Money, analytics and whatever’s on ESPN can sometimes cloud what sports is to most people: A refuge. “Eephus,” in that way, is a change-up of a baseball movie, an elegiac ode to the humbler weekend warriors who are driven by nothing but genuine affection for the game. Richly detailed and mordantly deadpan, “Eephus” adopts their pace of play, soaking up all the sesame-seed flavor that goes along with it.

This image released by Music Box Films shows Cliff Blake in a scene from “Eephus.” (Music Box Films via AP)

The title comes from an unnaturally slow pitch not slung but lobbed toward home. When I was a kid pitching, I liked to uncork one from time to time, much to my coach’s dismay. The metaphor isn’t hard to grasp. One player describes it as a pitch you can get bored watching, even making you lose track of time.

Much of the same applies to “Eephus,” which drifts player to player, play to play, less as an ensemble piece than like a roving spectator. The guys, themselves, have no more than a handful of fans, including the diehard scorekeeper Fanny (Cliff Blake). Frederick Wiseman, the great documentarian whose films chronicle nothing so much as institutions kept alive over time, is the voice of the announcer.

This image released by Music Box Films shows, from left, Keith Poulson, Ari Brisbon, David Pridemore, and Chris Goodwin in a scene from “Eephus.” (Music Box Films via AP)

I earlier called Lund’s film an ode, but it’s not a sentimental movie. Time’s passage, which no ballgame or perfectly thrown eephus can halt, grows increasingly disquieting as the afternoon light gives way to nightfall. That, to finish the game, they play into near-total darkness, with only headlights to see the ball, is a sign of desperation as much as it is commitment. After all, one guy in the dugout is listening to a radio broadcast of a ballgame, from 1972.

What’s being lost? It’s not a strip mall the field is to be turned into but something harder to quibble with: a school. They could drive half an hour to another field, but that’s said to be half Little League, half farmer’s market. They aren’t a collection of pals, either. They don’t hang out away from the diamond. Things they don’t talk about: work, families, politics. Things they do: eyecare for the ump.

This image released by Music Box Films shows Keith William Richards, left, and Jack DiFonso “Eephus.” (Music Box Films via AP)

In the annals of baseball movies, “Eephus” doesn’t belong in the Hall of Fame with “Bull Durham” or “A League of Their Own.” The closest it gets to the big leagues is an appearance by Bill “Spaceman” Lee, the 1970s southpaw and eephus adherent.

But “Eephus” is just as deserving of a place in that hardball pantheon, only in some minor ball realm, well below single A. Here, they don’t throw “high cheese” but such meatballs that, as one player riffs, you could call it pasta primavera. To call this a field of dreams would be pushing it. But it’s a lovely way to pass some time.

“Eephus,” a Music Box release is not rated by the Motion Picture Association but contains coarse language. Running time: 98 minutes. Three stars out of four.

A former Olympic snowboarder from Canada, charged in a drug-trafficking operation for allegedly shipping hundreds of kilograms of cocaine and fentanyl through Southern California to elsewhere in the U.S. and to Canada, has been added to the FBI’s 10 Most Wanted list, authorities said on Thursday, March 6.

Ryan James Wedding, 43, was believed to be hiding out in Mexico under the protection of the Sinaloa drug cartel or in South or Central America, federal authorities said at a press conference.

Wedding represented Canada in the 2002 Olympics in Salt Lake City and was charged in the drug-trafficking operation in October. His partner, Andrew Clark, was arrested in Mexico last year and brought back to the United States this week, said Acting U.S. Attorney Joseph McNally.

Officials also announced a reward up to $10 million from the U.S. State Department for information leading to Wedding’s arrest and conviction. They said the drug ring’s co-leader should be considered armed and dangerous.

“This sends a strong message to individuals abroad that if you operate criminal organizations outside of the United States that harm us, we will be aggressive in pursuing you beyond our borders, and we will use our full resources to find you,” McNally said.

“This $10 million reward … reflects our efforts to wipe out these organizations so they cannot harm the United States,” he continued.

As part of the operation, the drugs would be shipped from Mexico to Los Angeles, where they would be stored in stash houses before being taken north by long-haul semi-trucks, according to an October indictment charging Wedding and 15 others with international cocaine trafficking and murder. The operation was run from at least January to August 2024, federal officials say.

The indictment says the group resorted to murder, with Wedding and Clark accused of ordering the Nov. 20, 2023, murders of two members of a family in Ontario, Canada in retaliation for a stolen drug shipment. They also allegedly ordered the murder of another victim on May 18 over a drug debt.

Clark and another defendant were charged with the April 1 murder of another victim in Ontario, Canada.

Wedding, also known by aliases “El Jefe,” “Giant,” and “Public Enemy,” is charged with eight felonies: two counts of conspiracy to distribute controlled substances, one count of conspiracy to export cocaine, one count of leading a continuing criminal enterprise, three counts of murder, and one count of attempt to commit.

“Wedding went from shredding powder on the slopes at the Olympics to distributing powder cocaine on the streets of U.S. cities and in his native Canada,” said Akil Davis, assistant director of the FBI’s Los Angeles Field Office. “The alleged murders of his competitors make Wedding a very dangerous man.”

Davis said Wedding’s addition to the Ten Most Wanted Fugitives list, along with the reward, “will make the public our partner so that we can catch up with him before he puts anyone else in danger.”

Authorities asked anyone with information on Wedding’s whereabouts to call the FBI at 424-495-0614.

Wedding is described as 6-feet, 3-inches tall and weighing 240 pounds, with brown hair and blue eyes. But on Thursday, officials said, he may have altered his appearance.

Groups have been set for the 2026 World Junior Championships, which will be played Dec. 26, 2025 through Jan. 5, 2026, at Xcel Energy Center and 3M Arena at Mariucci Arena.

Group A will feature Team USA and play all games at the X. The other teams will be Sweden, Slovakia, Switzerland and Germany. The U.S. is the two-time defending gold medalist. Group B will play at Mariucci on the University of Minnesota campus and feature Finland, Czechia, Canada, Latvia and Denmark.

Group A and Group B ticket packages, both which include medal-round tickets, will go on sale beginning Saturday at 10 a.m. CT at 2026.worldjunior.hockey.

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