May 27 (UPI) — Former President Joe Biden filed suit against the Department of Justice Tuesday to block the release of unredacted audio recordings and transcripts of his private conversations with the ghostwriter of his 2017 memoir.

In 2024, the Heritage Foundation filed a Freedom of Information Act to get Biden’s comments to Mark Zwonitzer while writing, Promise Me, Dad: A Year of Hope, Hardship, and Purpose.

Under the Biden administration, the Justice Department had withheld the materials. But when Trump took over the presidency, “the Department has reversed that position,” the suit said.

In February, Biden’s attorney Amy Jeffress wrote, “without any formal explanation for its about-face, the Department notified President Biden of its intention to release the audio recordings and transcripts to the plaintiffs in the FOIA Action.”

On May 5, “the Office of the Deputy Attorney General informed President Biden, through counsel, that the Department had made a final decision to release the materials, with limited redactions, to the Heritage Plaintiffs and to Congress on June 15,” the lawsuit says.

“Every American, including a sitting or former vice president, has a right to privacy in the personal conversations he has within his own home,” Jeffress wrote in the lawsuit. “And when the U.S. Department of Justice obtains that private information through a criminal investigation, the Department bears a particular responsibility to protect it from disclosure.”

The documents were from records that then-special counsel Robert Hur used to write some parts of a 2023 report on Biden’s handling of classified documents that described him as “painfully slow, with Mr. Biden struggling to remember events and straining at times to read and relay his own notebook entries.” Hur didn’t bring charges against Biden.

Redacted transcripts of those conversations have already been released to the public.

Rep. Jim Jordan, D-Ohio, chair of the House Judiciary Committee, said he wanted the tapes released.

“I think it’s just important for the American people to know exactly where the President of the United States was… . (W)e’d like to see all that information, I think, to underscore what the Democrats were trying to hide just a few years ago,” CNN reported Jordan said.

In the age of Ozempic, the buzziest hardcovers are getting smaller — and slip right into your Baggu. At Book Soup in West Hollywood, the bestselling hardcover fiction display is marked with laminated cards that denote the book’s place in the top 10, with each one cut snugly into the popular hardcover frame of 6-by-9 inches. But lately, more of the books rising to the top wear the placard noticeably looser.

I should know, I work at Book Soup so I spend a lot of time staring at this display and can tell you, the answer to this problem is definitely to print out smaller cards cut to the little sister “trim size” of 5-by-8 inches — or 5½-by-8¼ to be specific.

While the New York Times bestsellers from 2025 skew in favor of the 6-by-9 trim, the popularity of 5-by-8 books appears to be on the rise. Current utilizers of the smaller cut include the buzzy Vanderbilt heir Belle Burden’s “Strangers,” George Saunders’ darkly humorous “Vigil” Lena Dunham’s millennial-tinged tell-all “Famesick” and the infamously tablet-sized “Transcription” from Ben Lerner.

1/5

“Strangers: A Memoir of Marriage” by Belle Burden  (The Dial Press)

2/5

“Famesick: A Memoir” by Lena Dunham  (Random House)

3/5

“Vigil: A Novel” by George Saunders  (Random House)

4/5

“Transcription: A Novel” by Ben Lerner  (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)

5/5

“Lost Lambs” by author Madeline Cash  (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)

Gretchen Achilles is the director of interior design at Farrar, Straus and Giroux. Achilles recently implemented the 5-by-8 cut for one of this year’s breakout hits, “Lost Lambs” by Madeline Cash. “It’s a tone,” she says. “Smaller trim sizes have an intimacy. … You want to echo what’s going on in the text as an experience for the reader.”

According to Achilles, FSG frequently implements the 5-by-8 trim size. She said that length is the No. 1 factor when deciding to employ it, followed by genre. She listed literary fiction, memoir, biography, and essay collections as the defining genres of the smaller size books.

Caroline Mason is a writer in New York whose debut novel “An Endless Cycle of Evenings” from Hyperion Avenue is slated for 2027; she runs the Instagram account @literarycrushes. Mason described a 5-by-8 hardcover as shorthand for a specific book she seeks out when she is in a bookstore because it often signals a character-driven novel. “It’s my favorite kind of book,” Mason says. She adds that it’s also Instagram-friendly.

“Holding the book up to take a photo of it is easier,” she says with a laugh. “Although I do sometimes still drop it.”

Dahlia de la Vega is an L.A.-based Bookstagrammer who runs the page @ofpagesandprint. According to De la Vega, she finds the shrunken books more approachable. “When I sit down to read a small hardcover, it almost feels like I’m reading a journal,” she says. “Whereas when I read a large hardcover, it almost feels like I need a journal to jot down notes about what’s happening.”

Ethan Mann, my colleague and a supervisor at Book Soup, told me he remembers the place he was both mentally and physically when he purchased a 5-by-8 hardcover copy of “The Parade” by Dave Eggers. (Right before the pandemic struck at CSUN campus store at Cal-State Northridge). “It’s easier to attach relevance to the specific feel of [the book] because it seems one of a kind,” he says.

Mann adds that hardcovers are sometimes a tough sell on the floor. They are often derided for their cost, and customers declare they will wait till the paperback comes out. But the smaller hardcover has the benefit of fitting into nearly any bag.

Esther Margolis is a publishing veteran and the founder of Newmarket Press. She says that the 5-by-8 hardcover is nothing new. According to Margolis, the smaller trim size was previously the industry standard for U.S.-based publishing houses, and any fluctuation is due to the evolution of printing technology.

“Unlike for mass-market paperbacks, hardcover books were shelved, so it didn’t matter that the books were different sizes,” Margolis says. “They didn’t have to fit into a pocket.”

The popularity of the 5-by-8 hardcover is, at the very least, indicative of a shift in what I witness consumers at Book Soup seeking out. With social media making it easier than ever to connect over the act of reading, or looking like you are reading, cover design and presentation — and how it cuts through the noise of the attention economy— is perhaps a factor too.

“A small hardback is like a Labubu,” my co-worker Mann says. “ The feeling in your hands isn’t just about books — it’s about all cute things. … We like small things we can control.”

The success of the publishing industry could never rest on the tiny shoulders of the small hardcover. It may not even represent any changes in production. But on the bestsellers display at your favorite local indie, it represents the small pleasure of palming a near-pocket-size book in your hands.

And, yes, maybe Instagrammability too.

Messinger is a writer in L.A. who runs the Substack adumbmessinger.

Brayan Rayo Garzon was distraught. Detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement, he was on his fourth day of isolation in a Missouri jail as he battled the fevers and chills of COVID-19.

His request for mental health treatment had been put off, records show, and staff had forbidden Rayo from making his nightly call to his mother as a precaution intended to prevent the spread of illness.

He pleaded with his jailers in handwritten notes to arrange a conversation with her. “I feel in my heart that she’s very worried about me,” he wrote in Spanish.

A guard collected the note and walked away. Within an hour, jail records show, he was found unconscious in his cell. An autopsy determined he killed himself.

Rayo’s April 2025 death was the first suicide in a spike among ICE detainees that has alarmed public health officials and jail experts. They said the unprecedented number of suicide deaths is an indication that authorities are failing to properly oversee the detention of tens of thousands of immigrants swept up in the Trump administration’s aggressive deportation strategy.

An Associated Press investigation found that at least 10 detainees, all men, have died by suicide since President Trump took office in January 2025, a pace that far exceeds the growth in the detainee population, according to a review of ICE data, autopsy reports, coroners’ rulings and police records. Since October, seven deaths have been classified as suicides, a number that is already the most for any fiscal year in the agency’s history. ICE has usually recorded one or no such deaths annually.

“Something is going profoundly wrong from any kind of public health or mental health perspective,” said Dr. Sanjay Basu, a University of California-San Francisco epidemiologist who cowrote a study documenting the increase in mortality and suicide rates among ICE detainees. “This is one of those alarming, sudden increases.”

Nine of the deaths were of Hispanic men who had arrived in the U.S. from four countries, the AP found. One man was a Chinese citizen. Their average age was 32. While Trump has characterized those facing deportation as the “worst of the worst,” seven of the 10 had no record of violent crimes in the U.S.

The suicides account for nearly a fifth of the 51 deaths in ICE custody since January 2025. The majority of those deaths were from natural causes and experts say many of them would have been preventable with timely medical care.

Department of Homeland Security acting assistant secretary Lauren Bis said suicide deaths in ICE custody remain “extremely rare.”

Bis said detention staff follow protocols to protect detainees who show signs of self-harming and that ICE requires annual suicide prevention training. She said detainees receive comprehensive healthcare, including mental health services.

Reacting to AP’s investigation, Colombian President Gustavo Petro wrote Wednesday in a post on X that the country’s foreign ministry should issue a formal protest regarding Rayo’s death and that the U.S. government should “reflect on how its immigration policy is killing Americans and Latin Americans.”

Investigation finds violations of ICE detention standards

The reasons behind any suicide are complex, and each death often has multiple contributing factors, according to experts. ICE detainees report intense stress after being detained, fear of being returned to countries where their safety may be jeopardized, and frustration and loneliness over the inability to communicate due to language barriers.

Detainees can also feel helplessness because of the complexity surrounding immigration law. Unlike those in the criminal justice system, most detainees do not have lawyers and their detention on immigration violations is not meant to be punitive.

ICE becomes responsible for their well-being when they enter detention, and experts say well-run lockups should have few, if any, suicides. That’s because staff can take steps to mitigate the chances that detainees harm themselves by identifying those at risk, getting them care and monitoring them closely, the experts said.

AP’s investigation found that ICE detention centers have repeatedly fallen short in ways that violate ICE’s own standards.

An examination of the 10 suicide deaths found the men died across ICE’s detention network, including at centers long run by private contractors and county jails that recently became ICE partners. The AP found that staff in the facilities ignored signs of distress, delayed mental health treatment and failed to monitor detainees who were already deemed at risk. They also permitted detainees to have access to materials that could be used for self-harm, according to AP’s review of ICE inspection reports and death records.

In some cases, they jailed distressed detainees in isolation, which can exacerbate feelings of humiliation and helplessness, according to experts.

ICE has repeatedly asserted that it screens detainees within 12 hours of arrival for medical, dental and mental health conditions.

At least three of the nine facilities where ICE detainees died by suicide have struggled to meet that standard, according to ICE inspection reports and jail records.

Dr. Homer Venters, former chief medical officer of New York City jails who previously consulted with ICE on preventing detainee deaths, called the rise in suicides terrifying.

The increase “reflects failures in how the system’s being operated, and particularly failures in how the first stages of coming into detention are happening so that people aren’t being assessed adequately,” Venters said. “And then if that receiving screening picks up red flags, they’re not acted on in a way that reduces the risk of them having preventable death.”

From border crossing to detention

Among those who took their own lives was a 19-year-old from Mexico who had been detained following a misdemeanor traffic stop while riding his scooter.

Another was a 36-year-old restaurant worker who lost contact with his relatives in Nicaragua after ICE detained him in Minnesota and sent him to a crowded camp in Texas. A third was a 45-year-old who had repeatedly crossed the U.S.-Mexico border illegally and had a long criminal record.

Rayo, who took his own life after pleading to talk to his mother, was a veteran of the Colombian military who had worked as a street vendor in his home country. A week after he turned 26 in 2023, his family crossed the U.S. border in California. He was detained for three months before being permitted to settle with family in St. Louis, records and interviews show.

His mother, Adriana Garzon, said Rayo caught on quickly to life in the U.S., making friends easily and working as a housepainter and food delivery driver. He wanted to save money to hire a lawyer to help him stay in the country after a judge in 2024 ordered that he be sent back to Colombia, she said.

He was arrested in March 2025 by St. Louis police after being caught using a stolen credit card, which he had obtained from a friend, at a vape shop, court records show. ICE then took him into custody. An ICE record obtained by AP classified Rayo as a laborer who was a low risk to public safety.

ICE placed Rayo in the Phelps County jail in Rolla, Mo., about 100 miles from St. Louis.

Suicides reveal shortcomings across ICE’s detention network

The deaths have revealed holes in treatment and oversight across ICE’s system, where the detained population has spiked by 50% to 60,000 during Trump’s second term.

Five died in centers run by longtime ICE detention partners CoreCivic and the GEO Group. A sixth died at a camp operated by an inexperienced contractor that ICE has since replaced. Three died in jails run by sheriffs, and one at a federal prison.

“We are deeply saddened by and take very seriously the passing of any individual in our care,” CoreCivic spokesperson Brian Todd said.

GEO Group spokesperson Christopher Ferreira said the company trains staff on suicide prevention and seeks “to maintain a safe and secure environment in compliance with the standards and requirements set by the federal government.” Officials at the three jails either declined comment or didn’t return messages.

Leo Cruz Silva, a 34-year-old who had repeatedly illegally entered the country from Mexico, suffered an acute mental health crisis following his detention after an arrest for public intoxication last fall in a St. Louis suburb, records show.

For two nights in Missouri’s Ste. Genevieve County Jail, Cruz screamed, hid under his bed and reported hallucinations, according to an ICE report on his death. Yet he did not get help quickly.

A nurse ordered antipsychotic medications and planned to get him treatment the next week, the ICE report said.

On the third day, he was found dead in his cell.

Chaofeng Ge arrived in ICE custody last summer at a Pennsylvania facility run by the GEO Group in mental distress, having pleaded guilty to a minor gift card fraud and attempted suicide in state custody, said David Rankin, an attorney representing Ge’s family.

In five days at the facility, he did not get mental health treatment and was unable to communicate because no one spoke Mandarin, Rankin said. Ultimately, Ge went unmonitored before he was found hanged in a shower stall.

“It’s clear that ICE has taken very few steps to ensure the safety of these people,” Rankin said. “They appear to want to make this process as cruel and inhuman as possible. It’s completely unacceptable.”

At Camp East Montana in El Paso, Texas, 36-year-old Victor Diaz died by suicide in a medical holding room in January, according to an ICE report. He had been moved into isolation after reporting harassment by fellow detainees, the report said.

Days earlier at the same facility, Geraldo Lunas Campos died of asphyxia after ICE said guards restrained him following a suicide attempt. His death was ruled a homicide by a medical examiner and Trump administration officials said the FBI was investigating its circumstances.

ICE inspectors visited the facility in February, documenting 49 violations of detention standards at what was then ICE’s largest detention facility, according to their report.

The report found that staff did not record “required checks to prevent significant self-harm and suicide” while inspectors found tools and equipment unsecured and unaccounted for throughout the facility that could be used for harm. Calls to 911 show several other detainees had attempted suicide there.

At the time of the deaths and inspections, Acquisition Logistics was the contractor running the facility. ICE has since replaced Acquisition Logistics with another contractor. Acquisition Logistics did not return messages seeking comment.

Detainee spent final days sick and isolated

The Phelps County Jail had started taking ICE detainees a month before Rayo’s arrival. Sheriff Michael Kirn, a Republican in a county where voters overwhelmingly supported Trump’s reelection, told commissioners his department’s budget was hurting and partnering with ICE could generate millions in revenue.

Records show Rayo’s trouble started immediately. It took the jail 35 hours to conduct the initial medical screening ICE promises within 12 hours, according to jail records obtained by the AP under the open records law.

Rayo exhibited labored breathing and told a nurse he was anxious and wanted mental health treatment.

A nurse who didn’t speak Spanish used a “handheld translator” to assess Rayo, concluding he denied thoughts of suicide and depression, according to the documents compiled by the Missouri State Highway Patrol during an investigation into Rayo’s death.

She recommended him for the general population, listing his physical and mental condition as stable, records show. And she referred him for a routine mental health appointment.

Two days later, he reported head pain and body aches. Staff learned he was positive for exposure to tuberculosis bacteria. He was sent to a hospital, where he was diagnosed with COVID-19. He was returned to jail the following day.

The mental health appointment was scheduled but canceled due to “mental health clinic time and staff,” a jail record shows. Two days later, they again canceled his appointment, this time citing his coronavirus infection.

The delays violated an ICE standard requiring mental health treatment within a week of a referral.

Bis, the DHS spokesperson, said Rayo received “high-quality medical care during his time in ICE custody.”

To ease his anxiety, Rayo called his mother before bed to share a Catholic blessing. “I gave him strength,” said Garzon, whose first name, Adriana, was tattooed on her son’s arm.

As Rayo grew sicker with nausea, chills and aches, staff moved him into a cinderblock isolation cell with a surveillance camera overhead for closer monitoring and to prevent the spread of disease. He was not allowed to call his mother.

On his fourth day of isolation, Rayo passed two notes under his door, begging guards to let him talk to his mom. In one, which was reviewed by AP, he appealed to the guard’s humanity. “I know you have family, and you know that they worry about us,” he wrote in Spanish. “God bless you.”

The English-speaking guard used a colleague’s phone to translate the notes and wrote in a report that he planned to follow up.

Within an hour, guards found Rayo unconscious on his bed with a sheet around his neck.

Emergency responders tried to revive him, transporting him to a hospital. That’s when an official called Rayo’s mother — to let her know her son was in very bad shape and would be flown to a St. Louis medical center. At the hospital, a doctor gave her the devastating news: Her son was dead.

Foley, Biesecker and Lee write for the Associated Press.

In the NBA, it’s all: “Together, on three!” Or “family, on three!”

Or maybe, “Cancun, on three!”

But when the NBA braintrust breaks a huddle, it’s, “3-2-1, overreact!”

“3-2-1, obfuscate!”

“3-2-1, complicate!”

The NBA’s owners are expected to meet Thursday to approve new “anti-tanking draft reform” via a “3-2-1 lottery.” I just know they’re the type of people who love a good board game — one with rules that take a half-hour to explain, by which time their guests’ eyes have glazed over.

Think they’ll get the hint if someone asks, “Y’all got any CLUE instead?”

Actually, I’d prefer to turn on the basketball game, that nuanced, ever-evolving sport that’s beautiful for its simplicity: Make or miss.

What’s wild is that a league that brings together the world’s best shooters keeps missing so badly on draft reform — unless it’s actually their feet that they’re aiming at.

Still, this new reported proposal — which will expand the lottery from 14 teams to 16 and penalize the three worst teams with poorer draft lottery odds than teams with the fourth- through 10th-worst records — might benefit the … Lakers?

You know those first-round picks they’ve been holding onto so that, come draft night, they’ll have three to offer in a deal? To use as bargaining chips for either a big name like the Milwaukee Bucks’ Giannis Antetokounmpo or, better yet, to acquire important foundational pieces to retrofit the roster around Luka Doncic?

Well, those three first-rounders should be much more valuable if other teams are disincentivized to trade their first-rounders, seeing how even middle-of-the-pack teams will have a shot at winning the lottery.

And not only will first-round picks be a rare commodity on the trade market going forward, but the Lakers’ picks could prove more practically valuable than previously imagined.

Without this reform, no one would expect the Luka Lakers to be a lottery team. But under the new proposal, all it would take, say, would be their star missing 30 games and the Lakers sliding into the eighth seed, which would give the team holding that pick a 2.7% shot at the No. 1 overall selection.

And hold on, wait a minute: Will that give Lakers general manager Rob Pelinka and his growing cast of front-office colleagues pause this offseason? Imagine how it would look if they dealt away a pick that turns into one of the top guys in a future draft for a 3-and-D role player on a team that, for whatever reason, slips into eighth? It wouldn’t look good! It wouldn’t feel good.

But would it stop the Lakers from doing what they need to do this offseason? It shouldn’t. But it could! But it shouldn’t! No, really, it shouldn’t: Because after draft night, the Lakers’ next two tradable first-round picks will be in 2031 and 2033 — and, per ESPN, this week’s draft reform proposal will include a sunset provision that would allow it to expire after the 2029 draft.

At that point, if they’re smart, the owners would scrap it. Of course, they’ll probably make it even more onerous so they can feel smart?

No wonder the Lakers went and hired Rohan Ramadas — the guy with an astronautical engineering degree from USC — as an assistant general manager.

But what are we doing here? All this variance and randomness, all these rules on top of regulations, none of it is exactly arbitrary, but neither is it fair. Since the draft lottery odds were flattened in 2019, the team with the worst overall record has not once lucked into the No. 1 overall pick.

The NFL would never! Oh, that plucky little league. With its antiquated worst-picks-first draft system? Seems to be going OK.

The worst thing about what the NBA is up to is how much work they’ve made following along at home. You’ve heard of fan service? This league trades in fan disservice.

The league already ceded its regular season to the offseason, leaning into free agency drama as a driving source of year-round intrigue, letting team-building trump teamwork.

It already asked fans to bone up on contract law to be able to spell out the differences between the NTMLE (non-taxpayer mid-level salary exception) and RMLE (room mid-level salary exception).

Then the NBA introduced rules that incentivized stars to avoid free agency and to try, instead, to get traded — except then the league added a first and second apron to make it harder for teams to trade.

So the possibility of a dream sign-and-trade that has fans fired up? Odds are it won’t happen because it can’t; sign-and-trades are not permitted if the player acquired keeps a team above the first apron.

Perfectly clear? No?

Well, this won’t help: Let’s slather on another thick layer of basketball bureaucracy. To discourage tanking. (And encourage mere mediocrity! Middling is about to be the NBA’s new sweet spot.)

Let us proclaim that, oh, teams can’t land back-to-back No. 1 picks. Unless they can. Unless it’s Team A, by virtue of selecting first using Team B’s pick the previous season, that is eligible to pick first in consecutive seasons. Team B, though, it’s out of luck the next year, no matter what goes wrong.

Got it? Kinda? Sorta? No?

Moving on. Try to keep up.

Don’t forget, class, that some picks won’t be able to be protected. No, not the top few picks — there will be no protections on Nos. 12, 13, 14, or 15.

Yes, that appears actually to be a caveat of the proposed new system. Which, yes, is actually designed to sell Advil.

Fans can figure this stuff out, but at some point soon, they’re not going to feel like it. At some point, everyone’s eyes are going to glaze over and it’s going to be 3-2-1, turn the TV off!

Muslims around the world have begun celebrating Eid al-Adha, the “Festival of Sacrifice”, which falls on the 10th day of Dhul Hijjah, the 12th and final month of the Muslim lunar calendar.

One of the biggest holidays in the Muslim calendar, it coincides with the last day of the annual Hajj pilgrimage in Saudi Arabia.

In Gaza, where Israel’s months-long offensive has devastated neighbourhoods and displaced most of the population, many families are marking Eid in tents and crowded shelters, with little meat or festive clothing.

More than 1.7 million people are taking part in the Hajj this year, slightly up from 2025, even as a war pitting the United States and Israel against Iran casts a long shadow across the Middle East.

On Tuesday, pilgrims prayed on Mount Arafat, where Prophet Muhammad is believed to have delivered his final sermon. They then spent the night out in the open at Muzdalifah, halfway between Arafat and Mina, where they collected pebbles for the symbolic stoning of the devil.

After the stoning ceremony in Mina, pilgrims return to Mecca for a final circumambulation of the Kaaba, the cube-shaped building at the heart of the Grand Mosque towards which Muslims around the world face when they pray.

Eid al-Adha commemorates the Quranic story of Prophet Ibrahim’s willingness to sacrifice his son Ismail as an act of obedience to God. Islamic tradition holds that God spared the boy, replacing him with a ram.

The day is marked with the sacrifice of an animal – usually a sheep, goat or cow – and the distribution of its meat among family, neighbours and those in need, underlining the festival’s themes of faith, charity and community.

World number two Elena Rybakina suffered a surprise second-round defeat by world number 55 Yuliia Starodubtseva in the biggest French Open upset so far.

Despite winning the opening set, Rybakina looked far from her clinical best as Starodubtseva mounted an impressive comeback to win 3-6 6-1 7-6 (10-4).

Known for her big serve and precise hitting, reigning Australian Open champion Rybakina committed 71 unforced errors and landed just 53% of her first serves.

It is the first time Kazakhstan’s Rybakina has failed to reach the third round at Roland Garros since 2020.

Rybakina’s early exit also means Aryna Sabalenka will keep her world number one ranking regardless of her result at Roland Garros.

IT’S set to be the biggest celebrity bash of the decade, with a roll-call of global A-listers you’d usually only see at the Met Gala set to attend.

And while the favoured few who have bagged an invite to the multi-million dollar upcoming wedding of Taylor Swift to Superbowl hunk Travis Kelce will no doubt get seven-star service, music from huge stars, and lifelong stories, there could also be a lot of awkwardness, as several former lovers and stars with mutual exes are set to cross paths.

Likely to be front and centre on the guestlist is Taylor’s best mate Zoe Kravitz, who recently got engaged to Harry Styles – the man who famously broke Taylor’s heart more than a decade ago.

In 2012, Harry, then 18 and at the height of his One Direction fame, dated 22-year-old Taylor. While their whirlwind romance only lasted a few months, Harry was the muse for Taylor’s fan-favourite album, 1989, which cemented their status in pop culture history.

Fans hoping for a Haylor reunion may be disappointed, though. Harry will miss the New York nuptials as they clash with the Wembley dates of his Together Together tour.

But he’s a shoo-in for Travis and Taylor’s UK celebration at Chiltern Firehouse on the arm of fiancée Zoe.

The Sun previously revealed Taylor and Travis are planning a UK wedding party for 120 guests at the Marylebone celeb haunt, with a source revealing London “holds a huge place in Taylor’s heart.”

The UK party will no doubt be attended by Cara Delevingne, another former flame of Harry.

Taylor and Cara have been close since 2013, with the supermodel even moving into the Wildest Dream singer’s New York penthouse after a brutal break-up in 2016. Cara’s other celeb exes include singer Halsey, who dated another Swift muse, Matty Healy.

Meanwhile, Zoe, whose dad Lenny says “is like a sister to Taylor,” will cross paths with another of the Swift girl squad she shares an ex with.

The Batman actress, 37, dated Penn Badgley, 39, from 2011 to 2013, shortly after his break-up from Taylor’s other close pal, Blake Lively. The pair remain friends, with Penn calling the relationship “a real, true, earth-shattering love” that “transformed him”.

Blake, who will be attending fresh off her lawsuit with It Ends With Us co-star Justin Baldoni, dated her Gossip Girl co-star from 2007 to 2010 – before finding love with husband Ryan Reynolds. But there’s unlikely to be tension between Blake and Zoe – the pair have been pictured together previously at Taylor’s famous Rhode Island parties and are both happily in love.

Taylor is the godmother of Ryan and Blake’s children – and has even featured them in songs. The voice of the couple’s eldest daughter, James, 11, features on Taylor’s song Gorgeous from her 2017 album Reputation.

Meanwhile, James, Betty, and Inez are all named in her 2020 record-breaking album Folklore. The cover art for the project was also shot in the Lively-Reynold garden.

Meanwhile, Ryan will no doubt bump into Jack Antonoff, who was the high school sweetheart of Ryan’s ex-wife, Scarlett Johansson.

Jack is Taylor’s right-hand man and closest musical collaborator; she’s previously called him a “brother” and worked with him on 11 of her chart-topping albums.

He dated Scarlett while they were attending Professional Children’s School in Manhattan – and the pair went to prom together in 2002. Ryan was married to Scarlett from 2008 to 2010.

It’s unlikely there’ll be any bad blood between the superstar producer, who has also worked with Kendrick Lamar and Sabrina Carpenter, and Ryan, but Jack could find himself in another icy encounter with another ex, Lena Dunham.

Jack, who married actress Margaret Qualley in 2023, dated the writer and actress for five years at the height of her fame from 2012 to 2017.

While the break-up was thought to be amicable, this year Lena released her memoir Famesick, where she admitted to cheating on Jack and said she discovered “incriminating texts and emails” that suggested Jack had cheated on her with New Zealand pop star Lorde, who was just 18 at the time.

Fans had long speculated that something happened between Lorde and Jack, who were living together to produce Lorde’s sophomore album, Melodrama. Neither Jack nor Lorde, real name Ella Yelich-O’Connor, has commented on the memoir.

Lorde, who is performing close by in New York a few days after the wedding, is also a close pal of Taylor. Taylor has previously thrown Lorde birthday parties and brought her out on tour.

Another guaranteed front row seat at the wedding is Selena Gomez, who met Taylor when they were both teenagers in 2008. At the time, Selena was dating Nick Jonas, and Taylor was seeing his brother Joe.

Selena, who last year married music producer Benny Blanco, famously inspired many of The Weeknd’s songs after the pair dated for 10 months in 2017.

The relationship came just months after the Blinding Lights singer broke up with supermodel Bella Hadid, causing a long-standing feud between the pair, which saw them follow and unfollow each other on social media several times.

Last year, however, The Only Murders in the Building star posted a picture of Bella to Instagram, praising her looks – and hinting they’d made up.

And before Selena, Benny dated model and actress Elsie Hewitt, who recently split from Margaret Qualley’s ex, Pete Davidson.

But that’s not the only Hadid sister Selena may find tension with. Selena also had a brief sling with Zayn Malik, who shares daughter Khai, six, with Gigi – who is one of Taylor’s best friends.

Taylor is close to both Gigi and Bella, with the older Hadid sister starring in Taylor’s music video for Bad Blood and attending several stops on her Eras Tour last year.

Taylor first met Selena when she was dating Joe Jonas, and Selena was dating his brother Nick. Both couples broke up, and Joe later went on to marry Game of Thrones actress Sophie Turner. The pair divorced in 2024, and Sophie grew close to Taylor, despite their mutual ex, with Taylor even lending her New York home to Sophie and her two daughters.

Sophie is also expected on the guest list. After her split from Joe, Sophie was linked to Coldplay frontman Chris Martin, who dated Dakota Johnson for eight years following his split from Gwyneth Paltrow.

Dakota is another close pal of Taylor. Writing in Time magazine earlier this year, Taylor called Dakota “one of the most empathetic people I’ve ever known”.

And to add an extra layer of awkwardness, before Joe married Sophie, he also dated Gigi. She even directed the music video for Joe’s hit “Cake By the Ocean”. The split was said to be amicable.

And if Gigi brings her new beau, Bradley Cooper, he may be set for an awkward interaction, too.

Bradley’s ex, Suki Waterhouse, is friendly with Taylor and has often been spotted out for dinner with her. Suki, who dated the Hangover star from 2013 to 2015, has written cutting lyrics about the relationship on her recent albums – accusing the actor of treating her like a “trophy wife”.

While many of these relationships may be water under the bridge, there are more recent break-ups that could cause more tension.

Irish actor Paul Mescal is expected to come along, as he is currently dating Taylor’s pal and Eras Tour opener Gracie Abrams. This means he’ll likely cross paths with indie sensation Phoebe Bridgers, who also opened for a leg of the Eras tour and has collaborated with Taylor.

Paul dated Phoebe for two years between 2020 and 2022. Gracie also shares an ex with another Eras tour opening act, Sabrina Carpenter, a close pal of Taylor who will be attending.

Sabrina and Gracie both dated American actor Dylan O’Brien in 2022.

The Espresso hitmaker may also cross paths with another ex, Shawn Mendes, who has previously collaborated with Taylor and often spoken about his friendship with her.

Shawn, who features on Taylor’s 2020 song Lover, also dated Camilla Cabello, who opened for Taylor on her 2017 Reputation Tour.

Other likely attendees include Ed Sheeran, Graham Norton, the Haim sisters, Hayley Williams, and Emma Stone, as well as childhood best friend Abigail Anderson and influencer Ashley Avignone.

And if Taylor does invite her own exes along, Taylor Lautner is a shoo-in.

The Twilight star dated Taylor in 2009 after meeting on the set of Valentine’s Day. The pair are still close, and Lautner starred in Swift’s video for I Can See You in 2023.

On Travis’ side, his teammates Patrick Mahomes and his wife Britanny will join the guest list, as well as his NFL star brother Jason and his wife Kylie.

Taylor has been open about wanting an extravagant wedding and has even joked that “everyone she has ever spoken to” will be invited to avoid drama.

But in the incestuous circles of Hollywood, inviting everyone clearly brings its own repercussions.

PLANO, Texas — As it turned out, it would never be enough.

U.S. Sen. John Cornyn tried for more than a year to show President Trump and Texas Republicans that he and the president were on the same team.

Cornyn posted a photo of himself reading Trump’s “The Art of the Deal.” He proposed legislation to rename a stretch of interstate in Trump’s honor. Perhaps most glaringly, the Senate institutionalist who long supported the filibuster reversed his position in a failed effort to advance voting restrictions that are a priority for the president.

None of it worked. On Tuesday, Cornyn became the latest in a line of Republicans who lost their primaries after falling out of favor with a president with little tolerance for dissent and a seemingly insatiable appetite for retribution. The four-term senator lost by double digits to Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, who Trump endorsed last week as “a true MAGA Warrior.”

Cornyn, on the other hand, “was VERY disloyal to me,” Trump wrote on social media.

Trump’s intervention in the Texas runoff came after weeks of successfully backing primary challengers in Indiana, Louisiana and Kentucky as revenge against incumbents who broke with his agenda.

Cornyn’s attempt to avoid the same fate made even some of his supporters wince.

“You look at the positions he took to please the president and the groveling and whatever,” said former Sen. Jeff Flake of Arizona, a Republican and Trump critic who didn’t seek reelection during the president’s first midterm in 2018. “It was rather painful to watch.”

Trump took an uncommonly equanimous approach to Tuesday’s results the following morning.

“Congratulations to Ken Paxton on such a tremendous win, and to John Cornyn for having run a strong and powerful race but, more importantly, having had a truly great career,” he wrote on social media. “John will remain my friend for a long time to come, as we both watch Ken become a fantastic, common sense Senator, one who is respected by all.”

Cornyn started early with ad touting pro-Trump voting record

Cornyn’s loss wasn’t for a lack of political gymnastics and astronomical campaign spending.

His campaign began running an advertisement last summer — part of an astounding nearly-$100-million air war by the senator and allied groups — with Cornyn looking into the camera and saying, “I voted with President Trump 99% of the time.”

On Cornyn’s campaign homepage, Trump and Cornyn stand side-by-side with thumbs pointed upward in an image aimed at projecting solidarity. Deeper in the website, the category titled “The Trump-Cornyn Record” notes the senator’s role securing votes for Trump’s signature 2017 tax cut bill.

Cornyn has also been championing provisions in Trump’s signature tax-and-spending legislation to finance work on the U.S.-Mexico border wall.

The senator had dismissed the project as “naive” during Trump’s 2016 campaign. But in January, he stood along a section of completed wall in Texas’ Rio Grande Valley touting the measure’s $11 billion for Texas contractors’ work at “the direction of the president of the United States, to whom I am very grateful.”

Cornyn’s 2023 dismissal of Trump’s return glares in background

Cornyn’s praise for his party’s leader and president were not unusual, but they clash with a statement Cornyn made in May 2023, when Trump was mounting his presidential comeback campaign.

“Trump’s time has passed him by,” he told reporters. “I don’t think President Trump understands that when you run in a general election, you have to appeal to voters beyond your base.”

Trump would go on to easily win the nomination and carry every battleground state in the general election.

Cornyn would hew closely to the president for the first 16 months of his second administration, hoping at the outside chance of his endorsement or to keeping him from weighing in at all.

But Trump did not forget the past slights.

“John Cornyn is a good man, and I worked well with him, but he was not supportive of me when times were tough,” he wrote on social media while endorsing Paxton.

Smaller gestures, and one big one

Cornyn has playfully worked to promote Trump fandom, last year posting a picture on social media of himself thoughtfully peering into the pages of Trump’s 1987 memoir and business advice book, “The Art of the Deal.”

In a more obvious gesture, he proposed designating a section of a U.S. highway from the Texas Gulf Coast to Montana as “Interstate 47,” to honor a 47th president with a well-documented love of naming things after himself. In a news release about the proposal, filed just over two weeks before Tuesday’s runoff, Cornyn said it would be known as the “Trump Interstate.”

The more tectonic shift occurred in March, after Trump had teased a possible endorsement of either Cornyn or Paxton in the runoff.

Paxton swiftly said he would consider dropping his candidacy if the Republican-controlled Senate lifted the filibuster and passed the SAVE America Act, a series of voting restrictions that Trump has described as an essential part of his agenda.

The following week, Cornyn wrote an op-ed in the New York Post — Trump’s favorite hometown newspaper — backing away from his previous support of the filibuster. He vowed to “support whatever changes to Senate rules that may prove necessary” to get the bill “through the Senate and on the president’s desk for his signature.”

Flake watched with unease.

“I know John and his long-held positions on the filibuster and the Senate’s institutions,” he said. “No office is worth that.”

Beaumont and Bedayn write for the Associated Press. Bedayn reported from San Antonio. AP writer Mary Clare Jalonick in Washington contributed to this report.

UCLA softball coach Kelly Inouye-Perez expected sophomore Rylee Slimp to deliver under pressure.

Slimp earned first-team all-Big Ten honors as the leadoff hitter for a Bruins team that features slugging stars Megan Grant and Jordan Woolery. She leads a group of underclassmen who helped send UCLA to the Women’s College World Series.

“I have seen Rylee Slimp just play big from travel ball to big moments in high school, and she came here to play on this big stage,” Inouye-Perez said. “I think her biggest asset, besides the fact that she can hit a home run, is that she can hit to all areas of the field, and she has such a good eye.

“I think she wanted to be in this position this year. She wanted to be the leadoff and be an impact player.”

The Austin, Texas, native is hitting .428 with 16 home runs, 56 RBIs, and 94 runs. Slimp broke Natasha Watley’s UCLA single-season runs record of 75, set in 2001, with 94 runs so far this season.

The following interview with Slimp ahead of the Bruins’ WCWS opener against No. 1 seed Alabama on Thursday has been edited for length and clarity.

How do you feel about being recognized by national media, including ESPN, for your role in UCLA’s a lineup?

Slimp: It’s surreal. We’ve broken records and accomplished so much as an offense this year. I’m grateful to be the leadoff and for all of the publicity we’re receiving.

How did you get started playing softball?

Slimp: I played T-ball. My dad gave me lessons and stuff on hitting when I was four. My dad was the one who taught me everything from a young age and kind of grew with me through the sport, and as I got older.

What inspired you to continue to work at softball so that you can compete at UCLA?

Slimp: It was this dream I had when I was a little girl, just starting off playing. I always looked up to the girls playing in the College World Series, and I knew that was a dream of mine very early on.

What was your first contact with the UCLA coaching staff while you were in high school and how did that impact your decision to join the Bruins?

Slimp: Coach Lisa [Fernandez] saw me play at a tournament the summer of my sophomore year. It was right before Sept. 1st and all of that big recruiting stuff. So it happened pretty late in the process with UCLA for me. Coach Lisa saw me play a tournament, and then a few days later, I was out of camp and it kind of took off after that. … I canceled all the other [visits] that I had, and I was like, ‘Oh, I know that this is the place for me, like, I don’t want to be anywhere else.’

What has helped the younger players on this year’s team stay calm under pressure?

Slimp: We do have a new team. We have 10 returners and 10 new Bruins. So we are pretty young as a team. … I think the upperclassmen like Taylor [Tinsley] and Megan [Grant], the seniors, do a good job of sharing their wisdom and helping us grow.

What is something they have taught you?

Slimp: I think, honestly, that the game isn’t as deep as we make it. I think sometimes, as underclassmen, we can make it the end of the world if we go 0 for 3 in a game or we have a bad outing. … The game is meant to be fun, and you’re supposed to enjoy it.

What’s the story behind the Michael Jackson glove the team has been passing around the dugout and featuring on social media?

Slimp: We went and saw the [Michael Jackson] movie as a team. I think 12 of us went, something like that, and since then we’ve just been obsessed with all things Michael Jackson. … We got the gloves. We are doing the second base [celebrations.] We are all things Michael Jackson right now after that movie.

Who bought the glove?

Slimp: That’s a good question because I actually don’t know the answer. I think most of our props and stuff just pop up. I think the [stress ball in the shape of] butter started with [Tinsley] because she’s really into stress balls. … But the home run boxing gloves came from Coach Lisa [Fernandez] and her boxing analogy.

We have a team motto that we’re like boxers. … That’s been the vibe and motto of this team this year to symbolize that. … One of the girl’s sisters bedazzled them, so they are wearing bedazzled boxing gloves that we put around our necks, whoever hits a home run.

Being from Texas, do you have an opinion on what’s better — Whataburger or In-n-Out?

Slimp: I need to be careful how I answer this question because I need to know my audience here, but y’all take your In-N-Out very seriously. I do have to say, I do like In-N-Out more.

What about Texas tacos versus Los Angeles tacos?

Slimp: Oh, yeah, I can talk tacos. The tacos in Texas are definitely better because we have flour tortillas, and apparently, flour tortillas aren’t a thing in California.

What is your go-to taco?

Slimp: I love steak fajita with flour tortilla, of course, cheese, and guac. And honestly, that’s it. I’m pretty simple.

A POPULAR aquapark is reopening for the summer – and it’s coming with a brand new attraction.

Families will be able to enjoy the thrill-seeking ride alongside other water activities

Hangloose Adventure Bluewater, based at Bluewater Shopping Centre in Kent, has reopened for the summer season with a new towering attraction – a six-meter mega slide.

Named ‘El Jefe’ – the boss in Spanish- the super slide marks the latest addition to the park’s floating inflatable course.

Families can now navigate over 15 obstacles, climb balance beams, and complete the course on ‘El Jefe’, which will see them soar into the water below.

Described as an ‘exhilarating experience’ by the park, children as young as seven will be able to take part – as long as they reach the minimum height requirement of 1.2 meters.

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Alongside the relaunch of the aqua park, Hangloose Adventure is also introducing a Thursday-only zipline offer.

Those who book a zipline ride will be able to have a second ride for free on the same day, with the promotion running until June 25.

The water park operates for seven days a week during the summer season, from 10am to 5pm.

Located in The Domes, Greenhithe, the park has been highly rated online.

The area also features a host of big attractions, including England’s longest zipline, Europe’s biggest swing, and the UK’s only outdoor indoor skydive tunnel.

For your chance to try out ‘El Jefe’ in person, a day out at the waterpark costs just £67 for a family of four.

BRITS are guilty of packing the kitchen sink when going on holiday – but still forget essential items such as their underwear, glasses, contact lenses and wallet.

A study of 2,000 adults found 51 per cent typically pack more than they need for a staycation, with 44 per cent claiming they are ‘overpackers’.

It was found 23 per cent have packed so much they’ve hampered their ability to clearly see out of their car’s back window.

But they admit to often forgetting things like their charger (28 per cent), toiletries (20 per cent) and medication (13 per cent).

Organisation expert, Dilly Carter, has teamed up with Halfords to help staycationers pack smarter and get more out of their car space.

She said: “With no luggage limits, it’s easy to overpack – but a few simple tweaks can make all the difference especially when cramming what seems like every corner of your home into a bag.

“If you are packing for a trip you should think about your zones, putting things next to other bits that make sense, for example keeping all food in one place, and activities next to each other – this will help with quick unloading.

“Some cars aren’t fit to have too much kit packed in them, so it’s worth considering a roof box or bike rack to make sure you have enough room for the essentials.”

As examples of Brits’ overpacking ways, 26 per cent admit to bringing toilet paper with them, 18 per cent bring their own bedding – and 10 per cent will even pack their own spices.

For one in five (20 per cent), packing for a staycation causes them stress, with 67 per cent worrying they may forget something.

Although 52 per cent said the weather is the biggest cause of their packing anxiety because the weather is unpredictable.

On average, it takes Brits 50 minutes to pack their bags for a three-day (two night) staycation – although more than a quarter will take longer than an hour.

When travelling to a staycation 80 per cent will typically get to their destination by car, however 17 per cent will take to the road without carrying out safety checks like tyre pressure, fuel/battery level or washer fluid.

The OnePoll.com study found men will take control of packing the car (54 per cent), checking the car (54 per cent) and unpacking the car (34 per cent).

Whereas women will be in command of booking (55 per cent) and organising supplies (50 per cent).

Paul Ray at Halfords said: “We’ve all been there – wedging a third spare pillow into the back window, driving halfway down the M5, and suddenly realising the phone chargers are still sitting on the kitchen counter.

“With no airport luggage limits, staycations make it incredibly easy to overpack, but shoving the kitchen sink into the boot can actually change how your car handles.

“Teaming up with Dilly is all about helping families cut the holiday packing stress, get organised, and crucially, make sure that extra weight doesn’t compromise their safety on the road this summer.”

Mogadishu, Somalia- Muslims around the world celebrated Eid al-Adha, the Festival of Sacrifice, which marks the end of the Hajj pilgrimage period.

It is the second major holiday in the Islamic calendar after Eid al-Fitr, which follows the holy month of Ramadan.

In Somalia’s capital, Mogadishu, families and communities gathered across the city on Wednesday to celebrate the occasion.

The holiday is typically marked by communal prayers in the morning, family visits, festive meals and outings for children.

Popular locations for the city’s residents include Lido Beach, the Darus Salam Zoo, and Maka al-Mukarama Road, the central business district.

More broadly, Mogadishu has been tentatively emerging from the waves of violence that have rocked the city over recent decades.

Since 2006, the government has been battling al-Shabab, a local affiliate of al-Qaeda, for control of the country – a conflict that has made Mogadishu one of the world’s most dangerous capitals.

But improving security has led to a surge of investment in the city, alongside the emergence of new cafes, restaurants and other recreational spaces.

At an Eid speech at the Islamic Solidarity Mosque, Somalia’s President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud said, “We see the change that has happened in Mogadishu’s security,” and called on the public to protect the city’s peace. Ali Jimale Mosque, the country’s largest, usually draws the biggest crowds and serves as a gathering place for the city’s residents.

Central to Eid al-Adha is the ritual sacrifice of livestock, commemorating the Prophet Ibrahim’s willingness to sacrifice his son before God provided a ram in his place.

The meat is traditionally shared among relatives, neighbours and people in need, reflecting the festival’s emphasis on charity, community and devotion.

Costs for livestock have soared in recent months in Somalia due to failed rains and drought, with a United Nations hunger monitor warning of famine risk in parts of the country.

The Integrated Food Security Phase Classification has said 6.5 million people in Somalia are facing “high levels of acute food insecurity”, a crisis worsened by the country’s ongoing armed fighting and a political standoff that has persisted since the president’s term expired on May 15.

A funeral has been held for Mohammed Odeh, believed to be the leader of Hamas’s military wing, who Israel said was killed in a strike on a busy area in Gaza City on Tuesday. Odeh’s family has reportedly confirmed his death, despite no official comment from Hamas.

CELEBS Go Dating star Professor Green rushed his five-year-old son to hospital after a nasty accident on holiday.

The star – real name Stephen Manderson – shares son Slimane with his former partner Karima McAdams.

Taking to their respective Instagram Stories, the parents revealed Slimane had suffered an accident during the May half term holidays.

Stephen, 42, wrote: “first tooth lost, first arm fractured…happy holidays” over the top of a picture of his son on a hospital bed with Karima wrapping her arms around him.

Trying to make light of the horrible situation, the star then referred to the dark patches on the bottom of Slimane’s white socks and wrote: “state of his socks.”

Meanwhile Karima shared a snap of the three of them together, with her ex covering their son’s eyes.

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She captioned the snap: “So…he lost his front tooth yesterday trying to kiss everyone and getting it head butted out.

“Today for breakfast he fell off a zipwire with a suspected wrist fracture.

“A&E on holiday is an absolute classic. @professorgreen never a dull moment, ay?”

The pair clearly have an amicable relationship following their split in 2023 after seven years together and becoming engaged in 2021.

But during his appearance on the current series of Celebs Go Dating, Stephen admitted he had found their break up hard, especially with Slimane in their lives.

Becoming emotional, he explained: “Now that we’re co-parenting, and people don’t hear men talk about this, right?

“I never had a kid to not wake up to him. You know, my dad f*****g ran.

“I’m not running. Far from it. And it’s f*****g hard. It’s so hard to put your feelings to the side and go ‘I’m going to prioritise the well-being of my kid’.

“I can’t show him how upset I am all the time. It’s so important that he sees good example, because you have to lead by example… and it’s not easy.”

Celebs Go Dating airs on E4 and is available at Channel4.com.

The EU’s new car market maintained steady growth through the first four months of 2026, with nearly 3.8 million vehicles registered, up 4.2% from the same period in 2025. This is according to data published on Wednesday by the European Automobile Manufacturers’ Association (ACEA).

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The figures show a market increasingly dominated by electric and hybrid vehicles, helped by government incentives in major economies and growing competition from Chinese carmakers.

According to ACEA, between January and April 2026, battery-electric cars accounted for 19.7% of the EU market, up from 15.3% a year earlier. Growth was mainly driven by the bloc’s four largest markets, with Italy (+25.5%), Spain (+19.7%), Germany (+6.6%) and France (+2.3%) all recording gains.

In April alone, sales of battery electric vehicles were up by 37.7% in the EU from the same month last year, lifting their market share to 20.6% for the month.

Hybrid-electric vehicles remained the most popular single powertrain choice in April, up 12%, accounting for roughly 36.9% of the month’s sales.

Plug-in hybrids added 16.4%, capturing roughly a 9.8% share in April registrations.

On the other side of the ledger, petrol car registrations fell 16.3% to fewer than 218,500 units, while diesel dropped 17.1% to around 74,000.

Together, petrol and diesel cars accounted for less than 30% of vehicles sold across the EU in April.

European brands performance in 2026

Volkswagen Group retained its position as the bloc’s largest carmaker in the first four months of 2026, accounting for 26.7% of all new registrations, with just over one million units sold, up 2.9% year-on-year.

However, performance varied across the group. Skoda registrations rose 15.5%, and Audi gained 8.6%, while the core Volkswagen brand slipped 3.2%, losing ground across multiple segments.

Stellantis ranked second with a 17.1% market share and over 648,000 units, up a robust 7.8%, driven by a recovery at Fiat of over 32%, and strong gains at Opel and Vauxhall, which together rose 22% in registrations.

Renault Group was the weakest performer in the top three, declining 7.4% to around 384,250 units and accounting for a 10.1% market share, with Dacia registering a particularly sharp fall of more than 15%.

BMW Group and Mercedes-Benz posted gains of 3.9% and 3.8%, respectively, while Toyota and Hyundai Group both recorded modest declines of between 2.5% and 3.1%.

The Chinese surge

The most significant trend in April’s data was the continued rise of Chinese carmakers.

According to ACEA figures, BYD’s EU registrations more than doubled year-on-year in the first four months of 2026, surging 152.9% to more than 71,850 units.

Chery Automobile, through its Omoda, Jaecoo and Jetour brands, grew 267.1% to more than 48,350 units, while Leapmotor, distributing through its joint venture with Stellantis, soared 558.8% to over 28,700 units.

SAIC Motor, owner of the MG brand and the largest Chinese group by EU volume, added a further 10.4% to reach more than 77,000 units.

Combined, Chinese brands accounted for around 6% of EU car registrations between January and April 2026, compared with 3.2% in the same period a year earlier. Across the wider European market, including the UK and EFTA countries, Chinese brands accounted for a combined market share of roughly 7.3% over the same period, up from 3.7% a year earlier.

JOHANNESBURG — The government in South Africa and Afrikaner advocacy groups on Wednesday rejected the position of the Trump administration that there’s a humanitarian emergency affecting white people in South Africa.

The argument served as the rationale for raising the U.S. refugee cap, but only for white Afrikaners. The Trump administration said Tuesday that it will admit an additional 10,000 white South Africans into the U.S. as refugees this year, increasing its annual cap, but blocking people from other countries from entering through the program.

President Trump’s announcement on the Federal Register that he was increasing the refugee cap because of “an unforeseen emergency refugee situation.” He blamed the South African government for “recent increases in the incitement of racially motivated violence,” but Trump gave no specific information.

The South African government’s international relations department said Wednesday that accusations of systemic persecution of white Afrikaners are unfounded, pointing out that some beneficiaries of an immigration program have chosen to return to South Africa.

“This reality is further corroborated by the actions of individuals who, despite having availed themselves of this preferential immigration program, have since resolved to return home,” spokesman Chrispin Phiri said.

Afrikaner trade union, Solidariteit, argued that refugee status isn’t a viable solution for Afrikaners, who should thrive in South Africa instead. Spokesman Jaco Kleynhans said that the organization hadn’t discussed any “unforeseen emergency refugee situation” with the Trump administration, but respects the autonomy of U.S. refugee policy toward Afrikaners.

The union “is in no way aware of anything that the Trump administration could be referring to,” Kleynhans said.

AfriForum, a lobbying organization for the country’s white Afrikaner minority with more than 300,000 members, said it “does not have information” regarding the specific assertion that there’s an emergency refugee situation.

The organization’s CEO, Kallie Kriel, said the group’s focus is “fighting to create the circumstances in South Africa where there is no need for Afrikaners to leave.”

Trump suspended the U.S. refugee program on his first day in office and, since then, has turned it into a vehicle to allow Afrikaners — a group of white South Africans descended mainly from Dutch settlers — into the United States. Advocates say the decision to focus a decades-old program on one group has left people around the world fleeing war and strife stranded and with few options.

Refugee groups have questioned why white South Africans are being prioritized ahead of people from countries facing war and natural disasters. Vetting for refugee status in the U.S. often takes years.

The Trump administration’s preference for white Afrikaner refugee admissions, according to Dr. Bryony Fox, a social justice researcher at Stellenbosch University, raises questions about selective humanitarianism, inconsistent refugee protection and favoring privileged groups, while ignoring other refugee populations experiencing severe hardships.

“This risks politicizing refugee protection in a way that may ultimately weaken the legitimacy and universality of the refugee regime itself,” she said.

Gumede writes for the Associated Press.

Attention screenwriters, producers and agents: The Jonah Jeovany Vasquez story continues this weekend in Clovis, and it’s giving off Disney-like vibes.

The senior at Cathedral High is running in the 1,600 at the CIF state track and field championships on Friday at Buchanan High. He had never stepped on a “squishy” surface, otherwise known as a track, before this season.

“I never even knew what a track felt like,” he said. ”Everything was new to me.”

For three years, he attended Alliance Leichtman-Levine, a small Los Angeles charter school near his home in South Los Angeles. He ran cross country on his own with little coaching.

“They would hire a random coach off the street and we’d play flag football,” he said.

His training was jogging on a treadmill for two miles and maybe getting eight to 10 miles a week.

He finished third at the 2024 City Section Division V finals in 16:48 as the only representative from his school. In the state final, he finished 76th in Division V with a time of 16:58.60. That experience gave Vasquez motivation.

“Seeing so many people pass me bothered me,” he said. “I promised myself I was going to train hard so it wouldn’t happen again. I wanted to prove to myself I could run with the top guys.”

Jonah Jeovany Vasquez of Cathedral is on the podium after finishing second in the Division 3 1,600 at Moorpark.

(Cathedral)

He transferred to Cathedral last May, and coach Martin Farfan aggressively trained him to make up for lost time. Vasquez ran 15:35 on the state championship course in Fresno. But two weeks before the state championships, he was struck by an E-bike during a 10-mile workout running along the L.A. River. He went flying and had a gash on his knee.

“It was traumatic. I was at the peak of my power. I was super fit and faster than I had ever been,” he said.

He iced the knee and stopped training. He still ran in the CIF prelims. “I had no fitness,” he said. “I was like a deer in the headlights.”

Farfan started calling coaches telling them he had a talented runner but the recruiters were unimpressed. They took to the internet and couldn’t find a single track time for Vasquez. Farfan had a ringer about to try track for the first time.

Two weeks ago at the Southern Section divisional championships, he finished second in the Division 3 final in a personal-best 4:08.44.

Vasquez is healthy and eager to be the one passing runners with his late kick on Friday and Saturday night. He also has a scholarship waiting for him at Long Beach State.

“I’ve always had natural endurance,” he said. “I’ve been active since I was little. I honestly believe when I’m in college, I’m going to do some great things. I have that spark in me not every athlete has. I have the drive to be the best I can possibly be. Maybe not by my freshman year, but I will develop. I will not stop until reaching my goal. It’s all I want. When I sleep or do activities with my family, all I think about is running.”

His father immigrated from Nicaragua. His mother has family in Guatemala. They’ve supported Vasquez as running became his passion.

“I honestly believe I have a 4:04 or 4:05 in me,” he said.

Never doubt what can happen when a teenager finds something they love and devotes time and energy to achieving their dreams.

In a new update two massive walkouts are planned – with passengers to two European countries hit

Holidaymakers have been warned holiday flights are set to be hit after a massive strike was joined. Portugese media have today reported that cancellations will result after cabin crew and ground staff decided to walk out.

EasyJet has warned of flight disruptions, whilst TAP and SATA are allowing free rebooking. The general strike on June 3 against the labour reform is expected to have a major impact on airport services in Portugal. Reports suggest up to 500 flights could be scrapped, while trains, ferries, city metros and buses are all expected to face disruption.

It comes as holidaymakers heading to Italy were warned to brace for major disruption as a nationwide transport strike threatens chaos across the country. The 24-hour walkout is expected to hit rail services, airports, metro systems, buses and regional transport networks from 9pm on Thursday, May 28, until 9pm on Friday, May 29.

Several unions have confirmed industrial action involving major rail operators including Trenitalia, Trenord and Italo, sparking fears of cancellations and delays on some of Italy’s busiest routes. Long-distance rail services connecting major cities including Rome, Milan, Venice, Florence, Bologna and Naples are expected to be among the worst affected outside protected operating periods.

Italy’s Ministry of Transport has published lists of “guaranteed” services that must continue operating during protected commuter windows between 6am and 9am, and again between 6pm and 9pm. Italy’s Civil Aviation Authority, ENAC, confirmed flights are legally protected during guaranteed operating periods between 7am and 10am and 6pm and 9pm.

In Portugal TAP and the SATA group are even allowing their passengers to rebook flights scheduled for that date at no extra cost. The airlines have already posted notices on social media and are contacting passengers.

Unions in the sector were this week negotiating with the Directorate-General for Employment and Labour Relations regarding minimum services, and only then will it be known exactly how many flights will be cancelled. It is already certain, however, that there will be flight cancellations, not least because air traffic controllers will also be joining the strike.

READ MORE: EasyJet warning ahead of major national transport strike starting tomorrowREAD MORE: Portugal travel warning as up to 500 flights could be cancelled in June

“Like all airlines operating to and from the country, easyJet may experience some disruption to its flights. The airline is currently assessing the potential impact of this situation, and customers will be contacted directly if their flights are affected. easyJet assures us that it is doing everything in its power to minimise the impact of this strike,” an official source told Expresso.

The Civil Aviation Pilots’ Union (SPAC), unlike during the last general strike on December 11, will not be taking part this time. “We have decided to stand aside from this process for now,” said Hélder Santinhos, speaking to Lusa.

“The first general strike was timely. We took a stand, both pilots and workers across the country, against the labour package,” the SPAC president began by saying. Now, he said that next week’s strike “does not seem to be at the most appropriate time”, although he reserves the right to take further industrial action. This is because, he argued, “unfortunately, the changes made to the labour package do not seem sufficient for us to agree to them”.

This stance differs from that of the members of the National Union of Civil Aviation Flight Crew (SNPVAC), who approved participation in the general strike on May 19. Sitava, the largest union for ground staff and handling personnel, has also joined the strike.

The CGTP has served notice of a general strike for June 3 against the changes to the labour law, after negotiations with the Government ended without agreement.

The hospitality sector is deeply concerned about this strike. The Portuguese Hotel and Restaurant Association (AHRESP) stated on Tuesday that the general strike will exacerbate the sector’s losses, which are already being affected by the situation at border controls.

The association argues, as reported by Lusa, that “national airports are showing signs of operational collapse” and that the general strike on June 3 “could further exacerbate the losses”. It also calls for the European Union’s Entry/Exit System at border controls to be suspended with urgency until the end of September.

AHRESP said in a statement: “Portugal invests in international promotion as a destination of excellence, yet allows the visitor’s first experience to be hours spent queuing, a missed connection, a negative reaction on social media or a booking that is not repeated.”

On Tuesday, AHRESP called for the suspension of the EES (European Union Entry/Exit System) as a matter of urgency and until the end of September, which “would speed up passenger checks and reduce waiting times at airports”.

The association also calls for “negotiation and a sense of responsibility among all parties involved, in order to avoid a strike in aviation and airport services, which, were it to take place, would result in further damage to sectors that continue to face severe economic pressures”.

The Federation of Transport and Communications Unions has announced its support for the general strike. The strike notices cover workers at Lisbon Metro, Carris, Transtejo/Soflusa, Fertagus, Mondego Metro, Porto Metro, STCP and CP.

Unions representing teachers, architects, doctors, nurses and journalists have also announced their support for the protest, which promises to bring the country to a standstill.

May 27 (UPI) — The Israeli Defense Force said Wednesday that it has killed Mohammed Odeh, a senior commander in Hamas‘ military, during a strike in northern Gaza.

An airstrike in Gaza City hit a residential building Tuesday and also killed at least three Palestinians while injuring dozens more. It struck the upper three floors of the al-Kayali building above a busy shopping area in the center of the city.

The IDF claims the residential building was used by Odeh as a hideout.

The area of the strike was busy as shoppers prepared for Eid al-Adha, a Muslim holiday that began on Wednesday.

The IDF said Odeh was responsible for planning Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, terrorist attack in Israel.

“The commander of Hamas terror [organization’s] military arm number 4 in Gaza was eliminated yesterday and sent to meet his partners in the depths of hell,” Israel Katz, Israeli Defense Minister, posted on social media.

The IDF said it had been tracking Odeh for months leading to the airstrike.

More than 900 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza since Israel and Palestine reached a ceasefire agreement enacted on Oct. 11. The Gaza Ministry of Health reports that 72,803 Palestinians have been killed in the war since Oct. 7, 2023.

Both the US and Iran have recently signaled progress on efforts to reach a deal to end their conflict, though their accounts of its terms differ on some issues across respective media narratives, Anadolu reports.

US President Donald Trump on Saturday said an agreement with Iran to end the war was “largely negotiated” and awaited finalization.

On Sunday morning, Iran’s semi-official Tasnim news agency also published a report on the details of a potential agreement. However, certain aspects of what has been agreed seem to diverge.

Here is a comparison of the US and Iranian versions of the deal by key issues.

Strait of Hormuz

Citing a US official, Axios said the deal that Washington and Tehran are close to signing would extend a ceasefire by 60 days, during which the Strait of Hormuz would be reopened.

During the 60-day period, the Strait of Hormuz would be opened without any tolls, and Iran would remove the mines it has placed there to ensure unrestricted maritime passage.

In return, Washington would lift its blockade on Iranian ports, added the report.

The New York Times also said it was informed by three senior Iranian officials that Tehran had agreed to a memorandum of understanding to halt fighting and reopen the Strait of Hormuz.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio also said on Sunday that the agreement could, if successful, result in a “completely open” Strait of Hormuz, with no tolls or restrictions on passage.

“They don’t own it. It’s an international waterway,” Rubio told reporters of the strait, in remarks that came during his visit to India.

A report by Iran’s semi-official news agency Tasnim, however, said that the Strait of Hormuz will not fully return to its pre-war status if the agreement is reached.

Instead, the number of ships allowed to pass would be restored to pre-war levels within 30 days, the outlet added.

Tehran also demands an end to the US blockade on its ports, arguing that no changes will be made in the strait if the blockade remains in place.

For its part, the US argues that the quicker Iran removes the mines and allows shipping to resume, the sooner the blockade will be lifted.

READ: Iran ready to reassure world it is not pursuing nuclear weapons, president says

Sanctions relief and release of frozen Iranian assets

Iran was seeking the immediate unfreezing of funds and a permanent lifting of sanctions, but the US position indicates these measures would only be granted after Iran made concrete concessions, according to the Axios report.

As part of the proposed 60-day agreement, the US is offering temporary sanctions waivers that would allow Iran to sell its oil freely. These waivers are explicitly linked to Iran reopening the Strait of Hormuz, removing mines, and ending restrictions on maritime traffic. Once these steps are taken, Washington would also lift its naval blockade on Iranian ports.

Tehran, however, says no agreement will be reached unless at least a portion of the frozen Iranian assets is released immediately. Iranian media confirmed the discussion of temporary oil sanctions waivers in the latest US proposal but insisted on broader and more permanent sanctions relief.

Nuclear file

The Axios report said the draft deal includes commitments from Iran not to pursue nuclear weapons, along with provisions to negotiate a suspension of uranium enrichment and the removal of its stockpile of highly enriched uranium.

The Iranian media reports, however, indicate that Tehran has not yet accepted anything on its nuclear program.

A potential deal would involve a 60-day negotiation window on Iran’s nuclear program, according to Tasnim.

Extent of ceasefire

Both US and Iranian media reports suggest that the cessation of hostilities would mean a halt to fighting on all fronts, including Lebanon.

This was also highlighted by Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baqaei on Saturday, when he said Tehran was prioritizing an end to hostilities across all fronts, including Lebanon.

Context

Regional tensions have escalated since the US and Israel launched strikes against Iran in February. Tehran retaliated with strikes targeting Israel, as well as US allies in the Gulf, along with the closure of the Strait of Hormuz.

A ceasefire took effect on April 8 through Pakistani mediation and was later extended by Trump indefinitely. Washington and Tehran also held rare direct talks in the Pakistani capital Islamabad on April 11-12, but have failed to reach an agreement.

Trump’s Saturday remarks came after Pakistani army chief Asim Munir’s visit to Tehran. The visit was the second of its kind in recent weeks, as Munir is directly involved in Islamabad’s mediation efforts.

READ: Trump says Iran talks ‘constructive’ but blockade will remain until final deal is reached

PALM SPRINGS — Barry Manilow steers a golf cart to the end of a long driveway, pulls to a stop and flings a plush toy goose across a manicured lawn to the delight of his two Labrador retrievers.

“OK, where we doing this?” the 82-year-old singer asks about our interview. Dressed in a khaki shirt and slim-fitting rust-colored trousers, he’s got the look of a man prepared to undertake some très chic brush clearance; in reality, he’s motored down here merely to answer questions about his fabulous life and career.

Manilow and his husband and longtime manager, Garry Kief, moved to this sprawling desert estate from Los Angeles in the late 1990s. “We kept coming out, and it’s so beautiful that eventually we said, ‘Screw it — let’s just stay,’” he says. By then, Manilow had long since established himself as one of music’s premier showmen, with a Grammy Award, 11 Top 10 hits and a storied 15-night run at L.A.’s Greek Theatre under his belt.

So you might’ve taken Palm Springs as a sign that he was ready to slow down. Instead, he launched a residency at the Las Vegas Hilton in 2005 that eventually surpassed the length of Elvis Presley’s show there; in 2006, he released “The Greatest Songs of the Fifties,” which went platinum and spawned a series of successful follow-up albums.

Last month, Sabrina Carpenter interpolated a bit of Manilow’s iconic “Copacabana (At the Copa)” into her headlining set at Coachella just days before he was honored by the American Advertising Federation for his work writing commercial jingles. The range of those achievements said something about his blend of music-nerd craft and pop-star razzle-dazzle.

“Barry loves music as much as anyone I’ve ever known,” says Bette Midler, who hired Manilow as her pianist for the name-making gig she played at New York’s Continental Baths in the early 1970s. Performing, Midler adds, “isn’t a job with him — it’s a vocation, a calling.”

Yet now that calling faces a threat. In December, Manilow announced that he’d been diagnosed with lung cancer and that surgery would require him to postpone a number of concert dates; five months later, he has yet to return to the stage — the longest break, COVID-19 aside, he can remember taking in decades.

Fortunately for Manilow, he has a new album, “What a Time,” with which to occupy himself. Due June 5, it consists mostly of original material — his first such LP in nearly 15 years — though it opens with a sumptuous rendition of Peter Allen and Dean Pitchford’s “Once Before I Go.” Manilow notes proudly that the song, which was produced by Kenneth “Babyface” Edmonds, recently made Billboard’s adult contemporary chart, extending his run on that tally beyond the half-century mark.

Barry Manilow performs in Beverly Hills in 2025.

(Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)

Still, performing is clearly on his mind as he leads me into a tile-roofed gym equipped with weights, a treadmill and a massage table. Manilow has been working out here every morning, he says, to regain the strength needed for his show; he’s got Vegas dates on the books for July but admits he’s unsure whether they’ll happen or not. We settle into two leather club chairs, his dogs Jake and Abby at his feet.

“Please be brilliant,” he tells me. “Don’t be boring.”

What are you doing on a day you’re not working?
Working.

I see.
Since the surgery, I can’t go on the road. Ninety minutes of screaming in tune, which is what I do for a living — I’m not up for that yet. I will be, but it’s taking a long time to get my voice back. They warned me that I’d have to learn to breathe again. So these days, I get up, I go to my piano and I try to be creative. Before I know it, the afternoon’s over.

Was the diagnosis a shock?
Imagine your doctor saying, “You’ve got lung cancer.”

Fair enough.
I’ll tell you the story. I have terrible hips — bursitis and everything — and they hurt so bad that I thought maybe I broke a bone or something. So I asked my wonderful family doctor, I said, “Can you just do one of those MRIs and see?” Now, before that, I’d had two bad bouts of bronchitis, one after the next. Have you ever had bronchitis?

I have.
It stinks. So I asked him if he could check my hip, and he told the guys that were doing it, “Why don’t you check his lungs?” And I think he might have saved my life because they found a big black thing in my chest. One doctor said it was probably remnants of the bronchitis, the other doctor said it could be cancer. I voted for the bronchitis. But they went back in to see and it was a cancerous tumor.

How’d you react?
When they told me, I was on the road, and I just went back to sound check. What else could I do? I never thought cancer would get me — it wasn’t in the cards. They wanted to get rid of it as soon as possible, so we made a deal: I’d finish the couple of weeks of shows that I had, then I’d go to the hospital and they’d remove it. It was supposed to be a no-brainer — it hadn’t spread yet, thank goodness. But then my AFib kicked in and acid reflux kicked in and pneumonia kicked in. They rushed me to the ICU for seven days.

Barry Manilow with Dionne Warwick in Los Angeles in 1985.

(Paul Harris / Getty Images)

Sorry to be morbid, but were you close to death?
They said at one point — I didn’t hear them say this but I heard that they did say it — “We don’t want to lose him.” It’s all a total blur now. When they finally brought me back to my lovely room at the Eisenhower [medical center], I weighed 128 pounds.

How long you figure it had been since you weighed 128 pounds?
I don’t remember ever being 128.

You said you never thought cancer would get you. Why?
I’m too busy. Pretty stupid. What I realized is that I’ve always been the leader — leader of the band, leader of an audience — but I wasn’t the leader of this one. That was a big lesson for me. I had to rely on everybody else. Nurses, doctors, friends — you should see some of the notes people have sent.

What’s it been like to be offstage for so long?
Agony. Make an album, go on the road, come back, make an album, go on the road — that’s what my life’s been for years. And I like it. Now I just have to get better and do what the doctors are telling me. It’s the only way out.

Well, there’s one other way.
I’m not ready to croak. But I wasn’t ready to stop performing either, and it just went like that [snaps fingers]. The day before surgery, people are screaming, standing ovation, band sounds great. Next day I’m packing to go to the hospital.

Are you working with a vocal coach?
Yep. But I get winded just walking down the hallway. I turn on my old records and sing along, and three songs in I’m like [pants].

Could you do a show where you skip the uptempos? No “It’s a Miracle” or “Copacabana”?
I’m trying ballads too — my ballads end big.

Are you allowed to smoke or drink?
I stopped smoking many, many years ago. I vape but hardly — I just like holding it. I was a great smoker. Brooklyn in the ’50s? Please. I started smoking when I was 9. I got up to three packs of Pall Mall non-filters a day, and it never bothered me — never had any problem breathing. I was just a skinny piano player who smoked. That’s who I am. That’s who I was.

Before he was a skinny piano player, he was a skinny accordion player.

Manilow grew up poor in Brooklyn, the only son of a Jewish mother and an Irish father who split up right after he was born. As a kid he entertained his mom and his maternal grandparents by squeezing out the Jewish folk song “Hava Nagila”; later, his stepfather brought home records by Gerry Mulligan and Judy Garland that opened his mind to jazz and pop.

He says today that he never saw himself as a performer — he wanted to write, arrange, produce. His first success came with jingles for brands like State Farm — “Like a Good Neighbor” is his handiwork — and Band-Aid.

“My ideas were good for pop music because of the commercials,” he says. “The rules are pretty much the same — you need to grab the listener as soon as possible. For a commercial, you’ve got about five seconds. For a pop song, you’ve got 10.”

In 1971, Manilow got the job with Midler and ended up working on her million-selling debut, “The Divine Miss M,” which led to a deal of Manilow’s own with Clive Davis’ Arista Records. Despite Manilow’s insistence that he was a behind-the-scenes guy, he scored a No. 1 hit out of the box with the plaintive “Mandy,” then quickly followed that with another chart-topper, “I Write the Songs” — a pop-philosophical epic, as nobody’s tired of pointing out ever since, that Manilow didn’t actually write.

Barry Manilow at home in Palm Springs.

(Christina House / Los Angeles Times)

Bruce Johnston, who wrote “I Write the Songs” — and won a Grammy for song of the year thanks to Manilow’s recording — says the key to Manilow’s performance is that “he’s never too cool for school.” A Beach Boy for six decades until he retired from the band this year, Johnston adds that Manilow’s rendition of the song, which was also cut by Captain & Tennille and David Cassidy, “is the only one I care about, honestly. He really grabbed it — he’s just as real as he could be.”

After several more Manilow hits — “Tryin’ to Get the Feeling Again,” “Weekend in New England,” “Looks Like We Made It” — Davis asked the singer to produce a would-be comeback album by his latest Arista signing, Dionne Warwick. Warwick’s initial reaction to that idea: “Really?” she says with a laugh. “Did Barry Manilow really know anything about Dionne Warwick? As it turned out, he knew quite a bit,” adds Warwick, who recalls turning up for their first session to discover that Manilow had laid every one of her albums on his piano. “He was letting me know: I know you,” she says.

“Dionne,” the album they made together, went on to win a pair of Grammys and spun off silky hit singles including “Deja Vu” and “I’ll Never Love This Way Again” that reinvigorated Warwick’s career and helped solidify Manilow’s standing as a kind of soft-rock auteur.

Which isn’t to say that rock’s intelligentsia ever viewed him kindly. Though his best music finds an emotional truth in over-the-top theatrics, critics routinely dismissed Manilow as a lightweight or a schlockmeister; even now, he seems an unlikely candidate for the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, where he’s been eligible for induction for decades.

Manilow, who entered the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2002, insists the slights don’t bother him. “I’ve never been one of the guys,” he says. We’ve been talking for a while, and because of the bursitis, perhaps, he’s hoisted one of his legs over the arm of his chair. “I don’t think about awards and parties and stuff like that. I’m very lucky — I live in the most gorgeous place I’ve ever seen and I have the most wonderful partner that you can imagine. I’m grateful he’s chosen to share his life with me. We’ve been together for over 46 years, and we still laugh and we still love each other. That’s the greatest award I’ll ever get.”

Manilow and Kief married in 2014; the singer came out as gay three years later. (Manilow was briefly married to his high school girlfriend, Susan Deixler, in the mid-1960s.) Has he found that the world looks at him differently since he came out?

“It was a non-event. Nobody gave a s—,” he says. “They all knew. I never really hid it, but in the ’70s and ’80s, that would have killed the career, and I didn’t want to do that. So I just never talked about it.” He smiles.

“Garry and I are just two guys that live in a house on a hill with two dogs that we love.”

Like many of Manilow’s hits, “Once Before I Go” was Davis’ idea.

Allen, the late Australian entertainer portrayed by Hugh Jackman in Broadway’s Tony-winning “The Boy From Oz,” had played the tune for Manilow in the early ’80s. “And I loved it,” Manilow says now. “But I was too young to sing a song like that — that song needs age to be able to pull it off honestly.”

Davis first suggested that Manilow perform it in his set at the post-pandemic We Love NYC concert that Davis put on in Central Park in 2021. After the show, which was called off due to weather as Manilow sang “Can’t Smile Without You,” Davis repeatedly advised the singer to record it.

Clive Davis, left, with Barry Manilow at an Arista Records party in Los Angeles in 1989.

(Lester Cohen / Getty Images)

“I don’t know, he had a bug up his ass,” Manilow says. “He loved it, and he loved it for me. And I’m not even on his record label anymore — he’s just a friend at this point. But he was right once again.”

Given the cancer diagnosis, did Manilow worry that fans might interpret the song — a teary goodbye from a well-wishing lover — as a more permanent farewell?

“Not one time has anybody said, ‘Is he talking about dying?’”

You wouldn’t necessarily call “What a Time” a concept album, though many of the songs ponder the ways memory and history can shape a romance. Manilow knows he’s regarded as a singles act but says that putting together LPs is what he’s always enjoyed best. His favorite is 1984’s jazzy “2:00 AM Paradise Cafe,” on which he collaborated with Mulligan, Sarah Vaughan and Mel Tormé.

“That was one where the critics who’d been killing me, they didn’t know I was capable of doing something like that,” he says. “But frankly, I’d been surprised that I was capable of doing the pop stuff.”

You made records of hits from the ’50s, ’60s, ’70s and ’80s. Why’d you stop before “The Greatest Songs of the Nineties”?
Were there songs in the ’90s?

Barry.
Didn’t it start to go downhill?

I can think of a handful of classics by Whitney Houston alone.
You can’t touch those. I’m a good arranger, but you can’t top those records. Maybe four of those albums was enough. I was ready to go back to writing.

You’ve said the problem with modern pop is that there’s no melody anymore.
That’s what I miss. Clive’s been pushing me to do “The Great New American Songbook.”

Like he did with Johnny Mathis a few years ago.
So I’ve been studying the Top 20. The one I like is Lady Gaga and Bruno Mars.

“Die With a Smile.”
Love that. But the way they’re writing songs these days is not the way I know how to write songs. They don’t do a verse, a chorus, a bridge, a chorus, a big ending. To me, when I listen, the songs feel like run-on sentences.

Barry Manilow with his dog Abby.

(Christina House / Los Angeles Times)

I was trying to think of artists older than you who are still performing.
Name me one.

Willie Nelson.
Oh, yeah.

Johnny Mathis.
Mm-hmm.

Frankie Valli.
[Rolls eyes].

You’re invoking the widely held assumption that he lip syncs.
I loved Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons. Who didn’t?

Would you ever lip sync?
I’m terrible at it. I try now and again.

Do you find it morally objectionable?
Depends on the artist. I like being in the moment, not knowing what’s gonna happen in the next bar or at the ending. It’s exciting to me to see if I can make those high notes.

Would not being able to make them mean it’s time to hang it up?
Well, what’s happening right now, I’m on the verge. But I’m getting stronger, so maybe I don’t have to hang it up yet. I look fantastic, but I’m a hundred years old, right? I don’t know how that happened, by the way — I don’t get Botox or anything.

You’ve had no work done?
No! I must say: There was one time when we lived in L.A. that I did do a facelift. But after that it’s just been a little here, a little there.

Wait, I asked you —
“Work” is like a facelift, and I only had one of those. The rest of it — I see something falling down, sure, I’ll do that. I’m as vain as anybody else. One of my old friends, his mother said, “I always knew he was talented, but when did he get so handsome?”