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      Trump Floats I.V.F. Coverage Mandate While Campaigning in Michigan

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      The week after Democrats spent much of their national convention attacking him over his position on abortion rights and reproductive health, former President Donald J. Trump said on Thursday that he would require insurance companies or the federal government to pay for all costs associated with in vitro fertilization treatments if he is elected in November.Mr. Trump’s announcement — made in an NBC interview, a speech in Michigan and a town hall in Wisconsin — came with little detail about his proposal or how he might address its cost. For one cycle, the treatments can cost up to $20,000 or more. But he has been trying to rebrand himself to voters on reproductive access and abortion rights, issues that have cost Republicans at the ballot box.Mr. Trump, who often on the campaign trail has bragged about his role in appointing Supreme Court justices who voted to overturn Roe v. Wade, last week on social media declared that his administration “will be great for women and their reproductive rights,” a phrase used by abortion-rights advocates.The post appeared to be an effort by Mr. Trump to cast himself as more of a political moderate on abortion, an issue that could hurt him in November.On Thursday, Vice President Kamala Harris’s campaign accused Mr. Trump of trying to run from his record on abortion access.“Trump lies as much if not more than he breathes, but voters aren’t stupid,” Sarafina Chitika, a spokeswoman for the Harris campaign, said in a statement. “Because Trump overturned Roe v. Wade, I.V.F. is already under attack and women’s freedoms have been ripped away in states across the country.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Tim Walz and the Pull of Rural America

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      More from our inbox:A Rattled Donald TrumpCancer Screenings Save Lives and Are Worth the CostFrom Rust to Rescue HeroAn Olympic Transit Reality Check Abbie Parr/Associated PressTo the Editor:Re “Democrats Have Needed Someone Like Walz for Decades,” by Sarah Smarsh (Opinion guest essay, Aug. 9):Thank you for publishing Ms. Smarsh’s article, which so eloquently and succinctly illustrates how politicians, pundits and journalists have marginalized rural America by lumping us into a single category: red state.I am from a long line of early Indiana settlers: hard-working people who began as farmers and maintained honest lives while supporting democratic ideals and the Democratic Party. Reading this piece is a breath of fresh air, and I appreciate that Ms. Smarsh shares our appreciation for the honesty and direct communication of a fine person like Tim Walz. Thank you, Minnesota.Diana WannLebanon, Ind.To the Editor:Having grown up in a small town in Minnesota, I agree with Sarah Smarsh that Gov. Tim Walz brings back some essential elements into our politics.I am only a few generations removed from Norwegian immigrants who came to America and helped settle an area near the South Dakota border in the last decades of the 19th century.The effort to tame and harvest the prairie created a very pragmatic “let’s get it done and move on to other things” philosophy. Many of the older farmers I remember would describe today’s political rhetoric as “bells and whistles, but no engine.”Mr. Walz is not only a refreshing relief from much of the mindless political rhetoric we have to listen to today. He may very well also be putting the engine back on our national economy.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Four Arrested in Killing of ‘General Hospital’ Actor

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      The police said they arrested three men on murder charges in the fatal May 25 shooting of Johnny Wactor, 37, in Los Angeles. A fourth person was also charged.The authorities have arrested four men in the killing of “General Hospital” actor Johnny Wactor, who was shot dead in May as three men attempted to steal the catalytic converter from his vehicle in downtown Los Angeles.The Los Angeles Police Department on Thursday announced the arrests of Robert Barceleau, Leonel Gutierrez and Sergio Estrada. All three men are 18 and from Los Angeles County. They will face murder charges.They were arrested Thursday and were being held on $2 million bond, jail records show. A fourth man, Frank Olano, 22, was arrested on an accessory charge for helping at least one of the suspects evade the authorities.Mr. Wactor was gunned down at around 3:25 a.m. on May 25 when he returned to his parked vehicle after finishing a shift at a downtown Los Angeles bar where he worked. The 37-year-old came across three men who were in the middle of stealing his car’s catalytic converter.“When Wactor arrived at his vehicle, he was confronted by three individuals who had Wactor’s vehicle raised up with a floor jack and were in the process of stealing the catalytic converter,” the police said. “Without provocation, the victim was shot by one of the individuals.”The actor was walking with a co-worker and initially thought that his car was being towed, his mother, Scarlett Wactor, told ABC7 news.She added that one of the persons “looked up, he was wearing a mask, and opened fire.”Mr. Wactor was transported to the hospital by emergency workers where he was pronounced dead.The three men were able to get away in a stolen sedan, the police said in August.Mr. Wactor was known for appearing in more than 160 episodes of the soap opera “General Hospital” as the character Brando Corbin. He also appeared in other shows, including “Westworld” and in one episode of “Criminal Minds,” according to IMDb.Catalytic converter thefts have become more common across America in recent years.The emissions-control devices contain rare and expensive metals like palladium and rhodium, making them a hot target for thieves.In a Thursday evening phone call, Ms. Wactor said she was glad to hear that the arrests had been made and said she hoped the men are convicted.“It’s a great early birthday present for Johnny,” Ms. Wactor said.Her son, she said, would have been 38 on Aug. 31. More

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      Elon Musk Says Robotaxis Are Tesla’s Future. Experts Have Doubts.

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      Tesla says self-driving taxis will power its growth, but the company hasn’t said when such a service would be ready or how much it would increase profits.As sales of its electric cars have fallen, Tesla and its chief executive, Elon Musk, have sought to convince Wall Street that the company’s future lies not in the grinding business of making and selling cars but in the far more exciting world of artificial intelligence.In Mr. Musk’s telling, one of Tesla’s main A.I.-based businesses will be driverless taxis, or robotaxis, that can operate pretty much anywhere and in any condition. Tesla is very close to perfecting such vehicles and will easily secure regulatory approval to put them on roads, Mr. Musk said last week on a conference call to discuss the company’s second quarter results.Mr. Musk’s vision of autonomous vehicles, or A.V.s, is not limited to cars that drive themselves. He has also claimed that individuals who buy Teslas would be able to make money when they are asleep or at work by letting the company use their cars as robotaxis.The robotaxi service will, Mr. Musk has said, catapult Tesla’s stock market valuation, around $700 billion now, into the trillions of dollars.But first, a lot will have to go right.His idea would require major advances in technology and fundamental changes in the way people view cars. The experience of driverless taxi services like Waymo and Cruise in Phoenix, San Francisco and other cities raises questions about when such offerings will become profitable and how much money they will make.Tesla’s technology will face stiff competition from Waymo, a subsidiary of Alphabet, the parent company of Google; ride-hailing services like Uber and Lyft; and Amazon’s self-driving business Zoox. Carmakers including General Motors, which owns Cruise, are also pursuing autonomous driving, along with Chinese tech and auto companies like Baidu and BYD.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Automakers Sold Driver Data for Pennies, Senators Say

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      Ron Wyden and Edward Markey urged the F.T.C. to investigate how car companies handled the data from millions of car owners.If you drive a car made by General Motors and it has an internet connection, your car’s movements and exact location are being collected and shared anonymously with a data broker.This practice, disclosed in a letter sent by Senators Ron Wyden of Oregon and Edward J. Markey of Massachusetts to the Federal Trade Commission on Friday, is yet another way in which automakers are tracking drivers, often without their knowledge.Previous reporting in The New York Times, which the letter cited, revealed how automakers including G.M., Honda and Hyundai collected information about drivers’ behavior, such as how often they slammed on the brakes, accelerated rapidly and exceeded the speed limit. It was then sold to the insurance industry, which used it to help gauge individual drivers’ riskiness.The two Democratic senators, both known for privacy advocacy, zeroed in on G.M., Honda and Hyundai because all three had made deals, The Times reported, with Verisk, an analytics company that sold the data to insurers.In the letter, the senators urged the F.T.C.’s chairwoman, Lina Khan, to investigate how the auto industry collects and shares customers’ data.One of the surprising findings of an investigation by Mr. Wyden’s office was just how little the automakers made from selling driving data. According to the letter, Verisk paid Honda $25,920 over four years for information about 97,000 cars, or 26 cents per car. Hyundai was paid just over $1 million, or 61 cents per car, over six years.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      The F1 Season Is Not Turning Into a Red Bull Runaway

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      Max Verstappen is still firmly on top of the drivers’ championship, but McLaren is mounting a challenge for the team title.After Max Verstappen won four of the opening five Grands Prix this season, it appeared that he and Red Bull would again dominate.Last year, Red Bull and Verstappen rewrote the record books, defending their constructors’ and drivers’ titles. He also set the record for most wins in a season, 19 of 22 races.Following his fourth victory this year in the fifth race, in China, Verstappen ominously said that his car was “on rails” and that he “could do whatever I wanted to with it.”Since that race, the picture has changed. He has won three of eight Grands Prix. He has not won the last three, his longest winless drought since 2021, and there have been seven different winners.Over the team radio during the last race in Hungary, where he was fifth, Verstappen criticized the car and the strategy. He defended his anger, saying if people did not like his messages then “they can go home.”Verstappen criticized his racecar and the team strategy during the Hungarian Grand Prix.Tamas Kovacs/EPA, via ShutterstockWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Ohio Mother Killed Trying to Stop a Carjacking With Her Son Inside

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      The woman, 29, was struck by her own vehicle after the suspects began driving away, the police said.Detectives in Columbus, Ohio, this weekend were searching for two men as they investigated the death of a woman who was fatally struck by her own vehicle while trying to stop a carjacking that occurred with her 6-year-old son in the car. Alexa Stakley, 29, was carjacked shortly before 1:30 a.m. on Thursday while picking up her son at the home of a babysitter after wrapping up a shift waiting tables, according to the police. After putting the sleeping 6-year-old inside her 2022 silver Honda SUV, Ms. Stakley walked back toward the babysitter’s house to retrieve an item, according to a police report. As she turned back, Ms. Stakley saw her moving. She was seen “running toward her Honda and was heard screaming for her child,” the police report said. Moments later, Ms. Stakley was struck by the vehicle, suffering a fatal wound to the head. Shortly afterward, two men were seen running away from the area, abandoning the vehicle nearby, the police said. Police officers found the child inside the car unharmed. Carjackings have been called “an important public safety threat” by the Department of Justice, which earlier this year announced it had established 11 task forces to combat the crime in areas of particular concern, like Philadelphia, Chicago and Tampa, Fla. We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Two Dead After Being Struck By Pickup Truck in Downtown Manhattan

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      At least nine people were struck by the truck on the Lower East Side, the authorities said.Two people were killed and seven others were injured on Thursday night after being struck by a pickup truck near Water Street and Jackson Street in the Lower East Side, the authorities said.One person was taken into custody, and several of the injured were transported to hospitals, four of them in critical condition, the police said at a news conference on Thursday night. This is a developing story. More