Joey “Jaws” Chestnut, 40, has been competing since 2005 and hasn’t lost since 2015. At last year’s Nathan’s Famous Fourth of July hot dog eating contest he downed 62 franks and buns in 10 minutes.

But Major League Eating event organizer George Shea says Chestnut is moving away from the contest due to a contract dispute.

“We love him, the fans love him,” Shea said, adding that “He made the choice.”

Shea says Chestnut struck a deal with a competing brand — a red line for the Nathan’s-sponsored event — but did not elaborate. He said the dispute came down to exclusivity, not money.

“It would be like Michael Jordan saying to Nike, ‘I’m going to represent Adidas, too,’” Shea said.

Chestnut did not immediately respond to a request for comment made through his website.

Chestnut has long dominated the competition. Those vying for second place in the past might have renewed hope to swallow their way to first place this year, including international competitors on the eating circuit.

Last year’s 2nd place winner was Geoffrey Esper from Oxford, Massachusetts, who downed 49 dogs. Third place went to Australia’s James Webb with 47. That was far from Chestnut’s best effort: his record was 76 Nathan’s Famous hot dogs and buns in 10 minutes in 2021.

In 2010, Japanese eating champion Takeru Kobayashi, Chestnut’s then-rival, also stopped competing in the annual bun fight due to a contract dispute with Major League Eating. Kobayashi crashed the contest in a T-shirt reading “Free Kobi” and was arrested. He was sentenced to 6 months’ probation. Kobayashi announced his retirement from the sport last month.

NYPD officers acted after the school’s president said there was no other way to ensure safety and restore order on campus and sought help from the department. The occupied building had expanded the demonstrators’ reach from an encampment elsewhere on the Ivy League school’s grounds.

Law enforcement will be there through May 17, the end of the university’s commencement events.

Columbia’s protests began earlier this month and kicked off demonstrations that now span from California to Massachusetts. As May commencement ceremonies near, administrators face added pressure to clear protesters.

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. AP’s earlier story follows below.

NEW YORK (AP) — Hundreds of police officers swept into Columbia University on Tuesday night to end a pro-Palestinian occupation of an administration building and sweep away a protest encampment, acting after the school’s president said there was no other way to ensure safety and restore order on campus.

The scene unfolded shortly after 9 p.m. as police, wearing helmets and carrying zip ties and riot shields, massed at the Ivy League university’s entrance. Scores of officers climbed through a window to enter the occupied building, streaming in over a ramp raised from the top of a police vehicle to get inside. Multiple protesters were taken into custody and taken away from campus on buses.

The confrontation occurred more than 12 hours after the demonstrators took over Hamilton Hall shortly after midnight Tuesday, spreading their reach from an encampment elsewhere on the grounds that’s been there for nearly two weeks to protest the Israel-Hamas war. The police action happened on the 56th anniversary of a similar police action to quash an occupation of Hamilton Hall by students protesting racism and the Vietnam War.

The university, in a statement issued after the police entered the campus, described its decision to seek NYPD aid as a last resort. The police department had previously said officers wouldn’t enter the grounds without the college administration’s request or an imminent emergency. Now, law enforcement will be there through May 17, the end of the university’s commencement events.

“After the University learned overnight that Hamilton Hall had been occupied, vandalized, and blockaded, we were left with no choice,” the school’s statement said, adding that school public safety personnel were forced out of the building and one facilities worker was “threatened.”

“The decision to reach out to the NYPD was in response to the actions of the protesters, not the cause they are championing,” the statement said. “We have made it clear that the life of campus cannot be endlessly interrupted by protesters who violate the rules and the law.”

Columbia’s protests began earlier this month and kicked off demonstrations that now span from California to Massachusetts. As May commencement ceremonies near, administrators face added pressure to clear protesters.

More than 1,000 protesters have been arrested over the last two weeks on campuses in states including Texas, Utah, Virginia, North Carolina, New Mexico, Connecticut, Louisiana, California and New Jersey, some after confrontations with police in riot gear.

Tuesday’s police action at Columbia comes exactly 56 years after officers swept into Hamilton Hall to arrest protesters occupying the building in 1968. The students taken into custody on that April 30 had taken over the hall and other campus buildings for a week to protest racism and the Vietnam War.

Former President Donald Trump called into Sean Hannity’s show on Fox News Channel to comment on Columbia’s turmoil as live footage of police clearing Hamilton Hall aired. Trump praised the officers.

“But it should never have gotten to this,” he told Hannity. “And they should have done it a lot sooner than before they took over the building because it would have been a lot easier if they were in tents rather than a building. And tremendous damage done, too.”

In a letter to senior NYPD officials, Columbia President Minouche Shafik said the administration was making the request that police remove protesters from the occupied building and a nearby tent encampment “with the utmost regret.”

Earlier in the day, New York City Mayor Eric Adams advised the protesters to leave before police arrived.

“Walk away from this situation now and continue your advocacy through other means,” he said. “This must end now.”

Before officers arrived, the White House condemned the standoffs at Columbia and California State Polytechnic University, Humboldt, where protesters had occupied two buildings until officers with batons intervened overnight and arrested 25 people. Officials estimated the northern California campus’ total damage to be upwards of $1 million.

President Joe Biden believes students occupying an academic building is “absolutely the wrong approach,” and “not an example of peaceful protest,” said National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby.

Other colleges have sought to negotiate agreements with the demonstrators in the hopes of having peaceful commencement ceremonies. As cease-fire negotiations appeared to gain steam, it wasn’t clear whether those talks would inspire an easing of protests.

Northwestern University notched a rare win when officials said they reached a compromise with students and faculty who represent the majority of protesters on its campus near Chicago to allow peaceful demonstrations through the end of spring classes.

The nationwide campus protests began at Columbia in response to Israel’s offensive in Gaza after Hamas launched a deadly attack on southern Israel on Oct. 7. Militants killed about 1,200 people, most of them civilians, and took roughly 250 hostages. Vowing to stamp out Hamas, Israel has killed more than 34,000 Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, according to the local health ministry.

Israel and its supporters have branded the university protests as antisemitic, while Israel’s critics say it uses those allegations to silence opposition. Although some protesters have been caught on camera making antisemitic remarks or violent threats, organizers of the protests, some of whom are Jewish, say it is a peaceful movement aimed at defending Palestinian rights and protesting the war.

On Columbia’s campus, protesters locked arms early Tuesday and carried furniture and metal barricades to Hamilton Hall, among several buildings that were occupied during a 1968 civil rights and anti-Vietnam War protest. Demonstrators called the building Hind’s Hall, honoring a young girl who was killed in Gaza under Israeli fire.

The takeover came hours after protesters had shrugged off an earlier ultimatum to abandon a tent encampment Monday or be suspended — restricted from all academic and recreational spaces, allowed only to enter their residences, and, for seniors, ineligible to graduate.

Occupying protesters have insisted they will remain in Hamilton Hall until the university agrees to three demands — divestment, financial transparency and amnesty.

Students had defiantly set up tents again after police cleared an encampment at the university on April 18 and arrested more than 100 people. The students had been protesting on the Manhattan campus since the previous day, opposing Israeli military action in Gaza and demanding the school divest from companies they claim are profiting from the conflict.

The Columbia University Chapter of the American Association of University Professors said faculty’s efforts to help defuse the situation have been repeatedly ignored by the university’s administration despite school statutes that require consultation. The group warned of potential conflict between police officers nearby and protesters on campus.

“We hold University leadership responsible for the disastrous lapses of judgment that have gotten us to this point,” the chapter said in a statement late Tuesday. “The University President, her senior staff, and the Board of Trustees will bear responsibility for any injuries that may occur during any police action on our campus.”

Ilana Lewkovitch, a self-described “leftist Zionist” student at Columbia, said it’s been hard to concentrate on school for weeks, amid calls for Zionists to die or leave campus. Her exams have been punctuated with chants of “say it loud, say it clear, we want Zionists out of here” in the background, she said.

Lewkovitch, who identifies as Jewish and studied at Columbia’s Tel Aviv campus, said she wished the current pro-Palestinian protests were more open to people like her who criticize Israel’s war policies but believe there should be an Israeli state.

Adams claimed Tuesday that the Columbia protests have been “co-opted by professional outside agitators.” The mayor didn’t provide specific evidence to back up that contention, which was disputed by protest organizers and participants.

NYPD officials made similar claims about “outside agitators” during the huge, grassroots demonstrations against racial injustice that erupted across the city after the death of George Floyd in 2020. In some instances, top police officials falsely labeled peaceful marches organized by well-known neighborhood activists as the work of violent extremists.

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Mattise reported from Nashville, Tennessee. Associated Press journalists around the country contributed to this report, including Colleen Long, Karen Matthews, Jim Vertuno, Hannah Schoenbaum, Sarah Brumfield, Stefanie Dazio, Christopher Weber, Carolyn Thompson, Dave Collins, Makiya Seminera, Philip Marcelo and Corey Williams.

Protesters who returned to the University of Texas at Austin on Monday were quickly greeted by dozens of law enforcement officers, many in riot gear. Six protesters were quickly arrested and others were taken into custody one by one.

Republican Gov. Greg Abbott on social media reposted video of troopers arriving on the 50,000-student campus. “No encampments will be allowed. Instead, arrests are being made,” Abbott posted.

Just last week, hundreds of police — including some on horseback and holding batons — pushed into protesters at the university, sending some tumbling into the street. Officers made 34 arrests at the behest of the university and Abbott, according to the state Department of Public Safety.

In New York, Columbia activists defied the 2 p.m. deadline to respond to the ultimatum with chants, clapping and drumming from the encampment of more than 300 people. No officials appeared to enter the encampment, with at least 120 tents staying up as the deadline passed. Hundreds of protesters marched around the quad, weaving around piles of temporary flooring and green carpeting meant for graduation ceremonies. A handful of counter-demonstrators waved Israeli flags, and one held a sign reading, “Where are the anti-Hamas chants?”

The notice sent by the Ivy League university in Manhattan said that if protesters left by the deadline and signed a form committing to abide by university policies through June 2025 or an earlier graduation, they could finish the semester in good standing. If not, the letter said, they would be suspended, pending further investigation.

Early protests at Columbia, where demonstrators set up tents in the center of the campus, sparked the pro-Palestinian demonstrations across the country. Students and others have been sparring over the Israel-Hamas war and its mounting death toll. Many students are demanding their universities cut financial ties with Israel. The number of arrests at campuses nationwide is approaching 1,000. The protests have even spread to Europe, with French police removing dozens of students from the Sorbonne university after pro-Palestinian protesters occupied the main courtyard.

College classes are wrapping up for the semester, and campuses are preparing for graduation ceremonies, giving schools an extra incentive to clear encampments. The University of Southern California canceled its main graduation ceremony.

But students have dug in their heels at some high-profile universities, with standoffs also continuing at Harvard, the University of Pennsylvania, Yale and others.

Protesters at Yale set up a new camp with dozens of tents Sunday, nearly a week after police arrested nearly 50 and cleared a similar one nearby. They were notified by a Yale official that they could face discipline, including suspension, and possible arrest if they continued.

Yale said in a statement Monday that while it supports peaceful protests and freedom of speech, it does not tolerate policy violations such as the encampment. School officials said that the protest is near residential colleges where many students are studying for final exams, and that permission must be granted for groups to hold events and put up structures on campus.

At Brown University in Rhode Island, meanwhile, school President Christina H. Paxton offered protest leaders the chance to meet with officials to discuss their arguments for divestment from Israel-linked companies in exchange for ending an encampment.

In the letter to student protesters at Columbia, school officials noted that exams are beginning and graduation is upcoming.

“We urge you to remove the encampment so that we do not deprive your fellow students, their families and friends of this momentous occasion,” the letter said.

Under the terms spelled out in the letter, students who leave the encampment would be put on disciplinary probation through June 2025. Students who are already receiving discipline, or who face harassment or discrimination charges for actions in the encampment, are not eligible for the offer.

The demonstrations have led Columbia to hold remote classes. The school said in an email to students that bringing back police “at this time” would be counterproductive. The university said it will offer an alternative venue for the protests after exams and graduation.

Columbia’s handling of the protests has prompted federal complaints.

A class-action lawsuit on behalf of Jewish students alleges a breach of contract by Columbia, claiming the university failed to maintain a safe learning environment, despite policies and promises. It also challenges the move away from in-person classes and seeks quick court action requiring Columbia to provide security for the students.

Meanwhile, a legal group representing pro-Palestinian students is urging the U.S. Department of Education’s civil rights office to investigate Columbia’s compliance with the Civil Rights Act of 1964 for how they have been treated.

A university spokesperson declined to comment on the complaints.

The plight of students who have been arrested has become a central part of protests, with the students and a growing number of faculty demanding amnesty for protesters. At issue is whether the suspensions and legal records will follow students through their adult lives.

Demonstrators on other campuses, meanwhile, said they would stand firm. Jacob Ginn, a second-year University of North Carolina sociology graduate student, said he had been protesting at the encampment for four days, including negotiations with administrators Friday.

“We are prepared for everything and we will remain here until the university meets our demands and we will remain steadfast and strong in the face of any brutality and repression that they try to attack us with,” Ginn said in reference to a potential police sweep of the encampment.

Mattise reported from Nashville, Tennessee. Associated Press journalists around the country contributed to this report, including Jim Vertuno in Austin, Texas; Sarah Brumfield in Silver Spring, Maryland; Christopher Weber in Los Angeles; Carolyn Thompson in Buffalo, New York; David Collins in Hartford, Connecticut; and Makiya Seminera in Chapel Hill, North Carolina.

NEW YORK (AP) — More than 20 years after Run-D.M.C. star Jam Master Jay was brazenly gunned down in his recording studio, two men close to him were convicted Tuesday of murder, marking a long-awaited moment in one of the hip-hop world’s most elusive cases.

An anonymous Brooklyn federal jury found Karl Jordan Jr. and Ronald Washington guilty of killing the pioneering DJ in 2002 over what prosecutors characterized as revenge for a failed drug deal.

The musician, born Jason Mizell, worked the turntables in Run-D.M.C. as it helped hip-hop break into the pop music mainstream in the 1980s with such hits as “It’s Tricky” and a fresh take on Aerosmith’s “Walk This Way.”

Like the slayings of rap icons Tupac Shakur and the Notorious B.I.G. in the late 1990s, there were no arrests for years. Authorities were deluged with tips, rumors and theories but struggled to get witnesses to open up.

“It’s no mystery why it took years to indict and arrest the defendants,” Breon Peace, the top federal prosecutor in Brooklyn, told reporters after Tuesday’s verdict. He said key witnesses “were terrified that they would be retaliated against if they cooperated with law enforcement.”

“Their strength and resolve in testifying at this trial were a triumph of right over wrong and courage over fear,” Peace added.

Jordan, 40, was Mizell’s godson. Washington, 59, was an old friend who was bunking at the home of the DJ’s sister at the time of the shooting on Oct. 30, 2002. Both men were arrested in 2020 and pleaded not guilty.

“Y’all just killed two innocent people,” Washington yelled at jurors following the guilty verdict. Jordan’s supporters also erupted at the verdict, cursing the jury.

Defense lawyers said they asked the judge to set aside the verdict and acquit them.

“My client did not do this. And the jury heard testimony about the person who did,” one of Washington’s lawyers, Susan Kellman, told reporters.

The men’s names, or at least their nicknames, have been floated for decades in connection to the case. Authorities publicly named Washington as a suspect in 2007. He told Playboy magazine in 2003 he’d been outside the studio, heard the shots and saw “Little D” — one of Jordan’s monikers — racing out of the building.

Relatives of Mizell welcomed the verdict and lamented that his mother did not live to see it.

“I feel like I was carrying a 2,000-pound weight on my shoulders. And when that verdict came today, it lifted it off,” said Carlis Thompson, Mizell’s cousin, who wiped away tears after the verdict was read. “The wounds can start to heal now.”

Mizell had been part of Run-D.M.C.’s anti-drug message, delivered through a public service announcement and such lyrics as “we are not thugs / we don’t use drugs.” But according to prosecutors and trial testimony, he racked up debts after the group’s heyday and moonlighted as a cocaine middleman to cover his bills and habitual generosity to friends.

“He was a man who got involved in the drug game to take care of the people who depended on him,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Artie McConnell said in his summation.

Prosecution witnesses testified that in Mizell’s final months, he had a plan to acquire 10 kilograms of cocaine and sell it through Jordan, Washington and a Baltimore-based dealer. But the Baltimore connection refused to work with Washington, according to testimony.

Prosecutors said Washington and Jordan went after Mizell for the sake of vengeance, greed and jealousy.

Two eyewitnesses, former studio aide Uriel Rincon and former Mizell business manager Lydia High, testified that Washington blocked the door and ordered High to lie on the floor. She said he brandished a gun.

Rincon identified Jordan as the man who approached Mizell and exchanged a friendly greeting moments before shots rang out and one bullet wounded Rincon himself. Three other people, including a teenage singer who had just stopped by the studio to tout her demo tape, testified that they were in an adjoining room and heard but didn’t see what happened.

Other witnesses testified that Washington and Jordan made incriminating statements about the Mizell killing after it happened.

Neither Washington nor Jordan testified. Their lawyers questioned key prosecution witnesses’ credibility and their memories of the long-ago shooting, noting that some initially denied they could identify the attackers or had heard who they were.

“Virtually every witness changed their testimony 180 degrees,” Kellman told the judge during legal arguments.

The witnesses said they had been overwhelmed, loath to pass along secondhand information or scared for their lives.

The trial shed limited light on a third defendant, Jay Bryant, who was charged last year after prosecutors said his DNA was found on a hat at the scene. They assert that he slipped into the studio building and let Washington and Jordan in through fire door in the back so they could avoid buzzing up.

Bryant has pleaded not guilty and is headed toward a separate trial.

Testimony suggested that he knew someone in common with his co-defendants, but there’s no indication that Bryant was close with Mizell, if indeed they ever met.

Bryant’s uncle testified that his nephew told him he shot Mizell after the DJ reached for a gun, a scenario no other witnesses described.

McConnell said Bryant was “involved, but he’s not the killer.” Prosecutors’ theory doesn’t even place Bryant in the studio, though that’s where authorities found the hat with DNA from him and other people — but not the other defendants, according to court filings.

One of Jordan’s lawyers, Michael Hueston, said in his summation that Bryant “is literally reasonable doubt.”

The verdict comes a month before the 40th anniversary of Run-D.M.C.’s self-titled debut album, which included a track titled “Jam Master Jay,” Peace noted. The song lauded Mizell as “on his way / to be the best DJ in the US of A.”

The group — also featuring Darryl “DMC” McDaniels and Joseph Simmons, known as DJ Run and Rev. Run — became the first rappers with gold and platinum albums and was the first hip-hop outfit with a video in regular rotation on MTV.

While the case may complicate Mizell’s image, Syracuse University media professor J. Christopher Hamilton says it shouldn’t be blotted out.

If he was indeed involved in dealing drugs, “that doesn’t mean to say his achievements shouldn’t be lauded,” Hamilton said, arguing that acceptance from local underworld figures was a necessity for successful rappers of the ’80s and ’90s.

“You don’t get these individuals without them walking through the gauntlet of the street,” Hamilton said.

1-Políticos, líderes empresariales y economistas advirtieron que la medida impediría el ingreso de cargamentos de frutas y vegetales, televisores, dispositivos médicos y otros productos, además de que obstaculizaría el tránsito de personas hacia sus lugares de trabajo y escuelas, o de quienes ingresan al país para ir de compras.

“Esperemos que la amenaza no sea más que una mala broma”, dijo el economista Dan Grisworld, del Mercatus Center, de la Universidad George Mason, de Virginia. Señaló que la amenaza de Trump sería “totalmente descabellada” y resaltó que cada día cruzan la frontera un promedio de 15.000 camiones y 1.600 millones de dólares en productos.

“Si se interrumpe el comercio, los productores estadounidenses sufrirían agobiantes interrupciones en sus cadenas de abastecimiento, las familias estadounidenses verían un incremento en los precios de sus alimentos y vehículos, y los exportadores no contarían con su tercer mercado más grande”, destacó.

Trump habló el viernes de la posibilidad de cerrar los puertos de ingreso en la frontera sur y lo reiteró en Twitter durante el fin de semana, debido al incremento en el número de migrantes centroamericanos que solicitan asilo. Funcionarios del gobierno de Trump han dicho que la llegada de personas ha sobrecargado al sistema migratorio al punto del colapso.

2-Funcionarios electos de las comunidades fronterizas, desde San Diego hasta las ciudades de El Paso y Laredo en Texas, advirtieron de un caos en ambos lados del límite internacional en caso de que se cierren los puertos de ingreso. A ellos se les unió la Cámara de Comercio de Estados Unidos, que señaló que dicha medida infligiría un “severo daño económico”.

3-En Imperial Valley, California, del otro lado de la frontera con Mexicali, México, los granjeros dependen de que los trabajadores lleguen cada día desde México para cosechar lechuga, zanahoria, cebolla y otros vegetales. Los estacionamientos de los centros comerciales de la región están repletos de vehículos con matrículas mexicanas.

Más del 60% de los vegetales de temporada invernal que se producen en México y se consumen en Estados Unidos ingresan al país por Nogales, Arizona.

4-La temporada de cosecha invernal es particularmente activa en esta época, con la importación de sandía, uvas y calabaza mexicanas, dijo Lance Jungmeyer, presidente de la Fresh Produce Association of the Americas.

Señaló que entre 11,000 y 12.000 camiones comerciales cruzan a diario la frontera de Nogales, cargados con alrededor de 22.000 toneladas (50 millones de libras) de vegetales como berenjena, tomate, pimiento, lechuga, pepino y moras.

Indicó que cerrar la frontera significaría despidos inmediatos y resultaría en escasez e incrementos de precios en tiendas y restaurantes.

“Si esto sucede, y espero que no pase, no quisiera entrar a una tienda y ver cómo está cuatro o cinco días después”, dijo Jungmeyer.

5-El alcalde de Laredo Pete Saenz, presidente de la Coalición Fronteriza de Texas, dijo que un cierre de la frontera sería catastrófico.

“Cerrar la frontera provocaría una depresión inmediata en las comunidades de los estados fronterizos y, dependiendo de la duración, una recesión en el resto del país”, declaró.

“Nuestros negocios cerrarían”, dijo Marta Salas, empleada de una tienda de El Paso ubicada cerca de la frontera que vende flores de plástico que se utilizan en las tradicionales fiestas de XV años en México.

Salas dijo que toda su familia, incluyendo los que asisten a la Universidad de Texas en El Paso (UTEP), se vería afectada por un cierre de la frontera.

“Allá también viven estadounidenses. Tengo sobrinos que vienen a UTEP o la escuela primaria o la secundaria, todos los días”, comentó Salas.

6-El gobierno de Trump dijo el lunes que unos 2.000 inspectores federales que examinan vehículos y transportes de carga en los puertos de ingreso en la frontera sur podrían ser reasignados para ayudar a manejar el incremento en el número de migrantes. Actualmente, alrededor de 750 inspectores están siendo reasignados.

Eso también podría entorpecer el tránsito de camiones y personas a través de la frontera.

Los efectos quedaron en evidencia el lunes: Sergio Amaya, un ciudadano estadounidense de 24 años que vive en Ciudad Juárez, México, y estudia en UTEP, dijo que normalmente le toma dos minutos cruzar el puente. En esta ocasión le tomó una hora.

“El agente de la Patrulla Fronteriza dijo que va a empeorar”, comentó Amaya.

En lugar de garantizar el flujo de productos por la frontera, los inspectores están siendo asignados en el procesamiento de migrantes, recibiendo sus solicitudes de asilo y trasladándolos a centros de detención.

La secretaria de Seguridad Nacional Kirstjen Nielsen dijo que las reasignaciones son necesarias para ayudar a manejar el enorme ingreso que está agobiando el sistema.

“La crisis en nuestra frontera empeora, y el DHS hará todo lo que está en su poder para ponerle fin”, dijo Nielsen, usando las iniciales en inglés del Departamento de Seguridad Nacional.

Además de la reasignación de inspectores, Nielsen ha solicitado voluntarios de agencias no migratorias dependientes de su departamento, además de que envió una carta al Congreso para solicitar recursos y una mayor autoridad para acelerar la deportación de familias.

7-El gobierno también está incrementando sus esfuerzos para devolver a México a los solicitantes de asilo.

Las detenciones en la frontera sur se han incrementado en los últimos meses y los agentes fronterizos se perfilan a realizar 100.000 arrestos o rechazos de ingreso en marzo. Más de la mitad de esa cifra es de familias con hijos.