AP Top News at 11:50 p.m. EST

NEW YORK (AP) — Hundreds of thousands of federal workers have been given little more than 48 hours to explain what they accomplished over the last week, sparking confusion across key agencies as billionaire Elon Musk expands his drive to slash the size of federal government. Musk, who serves as President Donald Trump's cost-cutting chief, telegraphed the extraordinary request Saturday on his social media network. “Consistent with President @realDonaldTrump’s instructions, all federal employees will shortly receive an email requesting to understand what they got done last week,” Musk posted on X, which he owns. “Failure to respond will be taken as a resignation.” Shortly afterward, federal employees — including some judges, court staff and federal prison officials — received a three-line email with this instruction: “Please reply to this email with approx.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration moved its fast-paced dismantling of the U.S. Agency for International Development toward what appeared to be its final phases, telling all but a fraction of staffers worldwide that they were on leave as of Monday and notifying at least 1,600 of the U.S.-based staffers they were being fired. The move was the latest and one of the biggest steps in what President Donald Trump and cost-cutting ally Elon Musk say is their goal of gutting the six-decade-old aid and development agency in a broader campaign to slash the size of the federal government. The move comes after a federal judge on Friday allowed the administration to move forward with its plan to pull thousands of USAID staffers off the job in the United States and around the world.

BERLIN (AP) — The opposition conservatives led by Friedrich Merz won a lackluster victory in Germany's election Sunday and Alternative for Germany doubled its support in the strongest showing for a far-right party since World War II, projections showed. Chancellor Olaf Scholz conceded defeat for his center-left Social Democrats after what he called “a bitter election result.” Projections for ARD and ZDF public television showed his party finishing in third place with its worst postwar result in a national parliamentary election. Merz said he hopes to put a coalition government together by Easter. But that's likely to be challenging. The election took place seven months earlier than planned after Scholz’s unpopular coalition collapsed in November, three years into a term that was increasingly marred by infighting.

ROME (AP) — Pope Francis remained in critical condition Sunday and blood tests showed early kidney failure but he remains alert, responsive and attended Mass, the Vatican said, as the 88-year-old pontiff battles pneumonia and a complex lung infection. In a late update, the Vatican said Francis hadn’t had any more respiratory crises since Saturday night but was still receiving high flows of supplemental oxygen. Some blood tests showed “initial, mild, kidney failure,” but doctors said it was under control. “The complexity of the clinical picture, and the necessary wait for drug therapies to provide some feedback, dictate that the prognosis remains guarded,” Francis' doctors concluded.

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — A contentious Trump administration proposal to give the U.S. $500 billion worth of profits from Ukraine's rare earth minerals as compensation for its wartime assistance to Kyiv has been taken off the table, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Sunday, indicating a more equitable deal is in the works. Zelenskyy had earlier declined a U.S. draft agreement on exploitation of his country's valuable minerals such as lithium used in the aerospace, defense and nuclear industries because it did not contain security guarantees and came with the $500 billion price tag. “The question of $500 billion is no longer there,” Zelenskyy told a news conference at a forum of government officials in Kyiv marking the three-year anniversary of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

UNITED NATIONS (AP) — The U.S. has pressured Ukraine to withdraw its European-backed U.N. resolution demanding an immediate withdrawal of Russian forces from Ukraine in favor of an American proposal that does not mention Moscow’s invasion, a U.S. official and a European diplomat said Sunday. But Ukraine refused to pull its draft resolution, and the U.N. General Assembly will vote on it Monday, the third anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, two European diplomats said. The 193-nation General Assembly then is expected to vote on the U.S. draft resolution, according to the diplomats and the U.S. official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because private negotiations are still ongoing.

JENIN, West Bank (AP) — Israeli tanks moved into the occupied West Bank on Sunday for the first time in decades in what Palestinian authorities called a “dangerous escalation,” after the defense minister said troops will remain in parts of the territory for a year and tens of thousands of Palestinians who have fled cannot return. Associated Press journalists saw several tanks move along unpaved tracks into Jenin, long a bastion of armed struggle against Israel. Israel is deepening its crackdown on the Palestinian territory and has said it is determined to stamp out militancy amid a rise in attacks. It launched the offensive in the northern West Bank on Jan.

YORK, Pa. (AP) — The man who authorities say entered a Pennsylvania hospital with zip ties and a pistol over the weekend had recent contact with the hospital's intensive care unit, where he took staff members hostage and was killed in a shootout that left a police officer dead and others injured. Investigators released no new information Sunday about a possible motive for the shooting at UPMC Memorial Hospital in York on Saturday, in which a doctor, nurse, custodian and two other officers were injured. But York County District Attorney Tim Barker said during a news conference Saturday that the man — identified as 49-year-old Diogenes Archangel-Ortiz — appeared to have had recent contact with the ICU “for a medical purpose involving another person.” He didn’t release any details or identify Archangel-Ortiz’s relationship to the person, citing privacy concerns.

OXON HILL, Md. (AP) — At an annual gathering of conservative activists, the signature red “ Make America Great Again ” hats popularized by President Donald Trump were interspersed with a noticeable number of the black “Dark MAGA” hats made popular by Elon Musk. It was just one sign of Musk's emerging influence and how the world's wealthiest man — who once backed Democrats Barack Obama and Joe Biden — has become a conservative power center in his own right due to his connections to Trump. “He is an authentic and unique individual. I am glad he is on the team,” said Whitney Mason, a 62-year-old real estate agent who was traveling from Seattle.

The papal thriller “Conclave” won best ensemble and Timothée Chalamet took best actor at the 31st Screen Actors Guild Awards on Sunday, a pair of twists that added a few final wrinkles to an unusually unpredictable awards season. In winning the guild’s top award, Edward Berger’s Vatican-set drama triumphed just as the Catholic Church was praying for the health of Pope Francis, who remained in critical condition Sunday after an asthmatic respiratory crisis. “Conclave” dramatizes the fictional election of a new pope. Earlier in the evening onstage, Isabella Rossellini shared the cast's best wishes for Pope Francis. All the momentum going into the SAG Awards was with Sean Baker’s “Anora,” which had won with the producers, directors and writers guilds.