NEW YORK (AP) — Uber launched a feature Monday to allow both women riders and drivers across the U.S. to be matched with other women for trips, expanding a pilot program aimed at addressing concerns about the safety of its riding-hailing platform.

The new feature is being rolled out nationwide despite an ongoing class action lawsuit against the policy in California, filed by Uber drivers who argue that it is discriminatory against men. Rival ride-hailing company Lyft is also facing a discrimination lawsuit over a similar offering that it introduced nationwide in 2024.

The feature, announced in a blog post, allows women to request a female driver through an option on the app called “Women Drivers.” Passengers can opt for another ride if the wait for a woman is too long, and they can also reserve a trip with a woman driver in advance. A third option allows female users to set a preference for a woman driver in their app settings, which would increase the chances of being matched with a female driver, though it would not guarantee it. Uber is also allowing its teen account users to request women drivers.

Uber’s women drivers can set the app’s preferences to request trips with female riders, and they can turn off that preference at anytime.

Uber, based in San Francisco, says about one-fifth of its drivers in the U.S. are women, thought the ratio varies by city.

Two California Uber drivers filed a class-action lawsuit against Uber in November, arguing that its Women Preferences feature violates California’s Unruh Act, which prohibits sex discrimination by business enterprises. The lawsuit charges that the feature gives its minority female drivers access to the entire pool of passengers, while leaving its majority male drivers to compete for a smaller pool of passengers. The lawsuit also argues that Uber’s policy “reinforces the gender stereotype that men are more dangerous than women.”

Uber filed a motion to compel arbitration in the case, citing an agreement the plaintiffs signed when joining the app as drivers. In the motion, Uber disputed that its new feature violates the Unruh Act, saying it “serves a strong and recognized public policy interest in enhancing safety.”

“This feature is a common sense solution to a long-standing request from both women Drivers and Riders who told Uber they would feel more comfortable and safer if they could choose to ride with another woman,” the company said in the court filing.

Two Lyft drivers have filed a similar lawsuit against that company against its “Women+Connect” feature, which allows women and nonbinary riders to match with drivers of the same identification.

Uber piloted the “Women Preferences” feature in San Francisco, Los Angeles and Detroit last summer and expanded it to 26 U.S. cities in November. The company first launched a version of the feature in Saudi Arabia in 2019 following the country’s landmark law granting women the right to drive. It now offers similar options in 40 other countries, including Canada and Mexico.

Both Uber and Lyft have for years faced criticism over their safety records, including thousands of reports of sexual assaults from both passengers and drivers. In February, federal jury found Uber to be legally responsible in a 2023 case of sexual assault and the company was ordered to pay $8.5 million to an Arizona woman who said she was raped by one of its drivers.

Uber maintains that because its drivers are contractors and not employees, it’s not liable for their misconduct. But Uber says has taken multiple steps in efforts to improve safety, including teaming up with Lyft in 2021 to create a database of drivers ousted from their ride-hailing services for complaints over sexual assault and other crimes.

Uber says sexual assault reports have decreased over the years. According to reports from Uber, 5,981 incidents of sexual assault were reported in U.S. rides between 2017 and 2018 — compared to 2,717 between 2021 and 2022 (the latest years with data available), which the platform says represented 0.0001% of total trips nationwide.

The Associated Press’ women in the workforce and state government coverage receives financial support from Pivotal Ventures. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.

Ibraham Kayumi, 19, and Emir Balat, 18, were radicalized and bent on destruction,with two of the three devices linked to them containing the hallmark explosive seen in bombings around the world, NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch said at a Monday press conference at Gracie Mansion.

After his arrest, when law enforcement agents asked Balat if he had hoped to accomplish something akin to the Boston Marathon bombing, he replied, “No, even bigger. It was only three deaths.”

After being walked in handcuffs out of the 26th Precinct, the teens were hit with a slew of charges including use of a weapon of mass destruction and attempted provision of material support and resources to a designated foreign terrorist organization.

“I can confirm this morning that this is being investigated as an act of ISIS-inspired terrorism,” Tisch said.

According to federal prosecutors, Balat wrote on a piece of paper after his arrest a misspelled message that he “pledge allegience to the Islamic State.” Kayumi meanwhile allegedly told investigators he was affiliated with ISIS and watched the terror group’s propaganda on his phone.

As Kayumi was being placed inside an NYPD vehicle at the protest scene, a bystander yelled asking him why he did it. “ISIS,” Kayumi responded, according to the feds. The exchange was caught on an NYPD cop’s body-worn camera, according to  court papers.

Inside the cop car, Balat spontaneously offered an explanation for his actions, the feds say. “This isn’t a religion that just stands when people talk about the blessed name of the prophet,” he said, according to the criminal complaint. “We take action! We take action!”

“If I didn’t do it someone else will come and do it,” he allegedly added.

After he arrived at the precinct and waived his Miranda rights, Balat asked for a piece of paper and wrote, “All praise is due to Allah lord of all worlds! I pledge my allegience to the Islamic State. Die in your rage yu [sic] kuffar! Emir B.”

The complaint states “kuffar” refers to “non-believers” or “infidels,” and “Die in your rage” is an ISIS slogan based on a verse in the Quran.

The suspects were busted Saturday after allegedly hurling two improvised explosive devices during a contentious clash between right-wing agitator Jake Lang, who hates Muslims, and his supporters, and pro-Muslim counterprotestors.

The homemade explosives were packed with nails, bolts and triacetone triperoxide, or TATP. That substance, known informally as “Mother of Satan,” is easy to make and and been a hallmark of various suicide bomb attacks.

A third device found in the suspects’ car on East End Ave. Sunday was not an explosive, Tisch said.

Kayumi told investigators he hadn’t felt comfortable holding the devices and wouldn’t feel comfortable if they were in the interrogation room with him, according to the feds.

Balat had a Pennsylvania driver’s license and the parked car, which had New Jersey plates, was registered to one of his relatives, according to the criminal complaint. A license plate reader showed the vehicle crossed the George Washington Bridge into New York less than an hour before the botched bombing, the feds said.

Kayumi’s mother filed a missing person report at some point Saturday, saying she last saw her son at their Pennsylvania home around 10:30 a.m., the complaint says.

Inside the car, investigators found a coiled green material that appeared to be another hobby fuse and an empty metal can similar to the one inside the thrown IED, according to the feds.

Authorities also found a notebook with handwritten notes including the words, “TATP explosive, a list of chemical ingredients including “hydrogen peroxide,” “sulfuric acid,” and “acetone,” and a separate list of components and quantities, like “aluminum can x6,” and “a box of bolts ect [sic] 2x,” the complaint says.

Tisch noted that the last time an IED was used in the city was in 2017, when Akayed Ullah detonated a botched pipe bomb in a subway tunnel underneath the Port Authority Bus Terminal. Ullah is now serving life in prison.

“We were fortunate that the devices used this weekend did not cause the kind of harm that they were certainly capable of causing,” Tisch said.

“But luck is never a strategy. Devices like this have the potential to cause devastating harm, which is why the NYPD does counterterrorism investigations and treats every incident of its kind with the highest level of urgency — and it is why we remain vigiliant.”

Mayor Mamdani, who was at a museum in Brooklyn with his wife when the incident happened, said that while the city will not tolerate violence he will never waver in his support of any group, no matter the rhetoric, to protest.

“This was a vile protest rooted in white supremacy entitled ‘Stop the Muslim Takeover of New York City,'” Mamdani said. “I’m the first Muslim mayor of New York City. Anti-Muslim bigotry is nothing new to me nor is it anything new for the one million or so Muslim New Yorkers who know this city as our home.”

Oil prices continued to soar on Monday as the Iran war intensified, threatening production and shipping in the Middle East and straining energy supplies worldwide.

The price of Brent crude, the international benchmark, briefly surged to $119.50 per barrel on Monday — its highest level since the summer after Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022. West Texas Intermediate, which is produced in the United States, also soared to $119.48 per barrel at one point.

Those prices fell to just under the $100 later Monday. But barrels of Brent and U.S. crude are still 36% and 42% more expensive, respectively, than they were before the U.S. and Israel launched the war against Iran on Feb. 28.

The conflict, now in its second week, is ensnaring countries and infrastructure critical to the production and transportation of oil and gas worldwide. And there’s no end in sight. On Monday, Iran named Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei to succeed his late father as supreme leader — a new sign of defiance from the country’s leaders as the U.S. and Israel continue heavy bombardment.

Fears of attacks have all but stopped tanker traffic in the Strait of Hormuz, a narrow waterway off Iran’s coast where a fifth of the world’s oil sails through on a typical day. Major oil producers in the region like Iraq, Kuwait and the UAE have cut production due to export constraints because they are running out of storage space. Iran, Israel and the U.S. have all struck oil and gas facilities since the war started, worsening supply concerns.

“The first week the crisis was a transportation issue, which could conceivably be resolved quickly,” Jim Burkhard, vice president and global head of crude oil research at S&P Global Energy said in an analysis Monday. But production and storage concerns are increasingly piling up, he explained, and restoration “will be a massive technical exercise that could last weeks or more.”

The war’s toll on civilian targets and the energy sector grew over the weekend as oil depots in Tehran smoldered following Sunday strikes by Israel. Meanwhile, across the Persian Gulf, nearby Bahrain accused Iran of striking a desalination plant vital to drinking water supplies. Bahrain’s national oil company declared force majeure for its shipments after an Iranian attack set its refinery complex ablaze. The legal declaration releases the company of contractual obligations because of extraordinary circumstances.

The war has also disrupted critical supply chains. Roughly 15 million barrels of crude oil — about 20% of the world’s oil — typically are shipped every day through the Strait of Hormuz, according to independent research firm Rystad Energy. The threat of Iranian missile and drone attacks has all but stopped tankers carrying oil and gas from Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Iraq, Qatar, Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates and Iran from traveling through the strait.

Some energy experts warn all of this could contribute to higher oil prices in the near future. If the Strait of Hormuz, in particular, remains closed for only a few weeks oil and gas strategists at Macquarie Research said the price of crude could push to a $150 per barrel or higher. That would top previous peaks of around $147 reached just ahead of the 2008 financial crisis.

Others, however, expect disruptions to be more short-lived. Oxford Economics researchers predict prices will fall to an average of $80 a barrel for the quarter, but noted Monday that the “risk of a more prolonged crisis has clearly increased.”

In response to soaring prices, there has also been discussions of dipping into emergency oil stockpiles in the U.S. and elsewhere. But on Monday, the Group of Seven major industrialized powers said it had decided against using their strategic reserves, at least for now.

“We’re not there yet,” French Finance Minister Roland Lescure said after chairing a meeting of his G7 counterparts. Still, he told reporters in Brussels that the group was “ready to take necessary and coordinated steps in order to stabilize markets, such as strategic stockpiling.”

On Saturday, President Donald Trump downplayed the idea of turning to America’s Strategic Petroleum Reserve, maintaining U.S. supplies were ample and prices would soon fall.

Yet the surge in costs for oil and natural gas is still pushing fuel prices higher, cascading through a range of industries — and particularly travel and household energy spending for consumers. Experts like Burkhard note that Asian economies are especially vulnerable, due to the region’s heavy reliance on imports from the Middle East.

Iran exports roughly 1.6 million barrels of oil a day, mostly to China, which has called for an immediate end to the fighting. Beijing may need to look elsewhere for supply if Iran’s exports are disrupted, another factor that could increase energy prices. In a briefing Monday, Foreign Ministry spokesman Guo Jiakun said China would “take necessary measures to safeguard its own energy security.”

South Korean President Lee Jae Myung also warned Monday of strict penalties for refiners and gas stations caught hoarding or colluding on prices, saying it would be wise to find alternatives to supplies that must travel through the Strait of Hormuz.

Across Southeast Asia, the spike in prices has led to long lines outside filling stations.

But price hikes are spreading worldwide. Higher energy costs can push overall inflation higher, straining household budgets and denting the consumer spending that is the dominant engine behind some big economies, including the U.S. Those worries have spilled into financial markets, pulling share prices sharply lower since the war began.

The U.S. is now a net exporter of oil, so it will “suffer less from a rally in Brent and WTI above $100” than Europe or Asia, FxPro chief market analyst Alex Kuptsikevich noted Monday. Still, he stressed that past rapid surges in oil prices have contributed to U.S. recessions.

Gas prices have already climbed for American drivers. On Monday, the average U.S. price of a gallon of regular gasoline rose to $3.48, up nearly 50 cents from a week earlier, according to AAA motor club. Diesel, used heavily in shipping, sold for about $4.66 a gallon, a weekly increase of more than 80 cents.

Kurtenbach reported from Bangkok. Associated Press journalist John Leicester in Paris contributed.

Today in history:

On March 9, 1959, the Barbie doll was introduced at the American International Toy Fair in New York.

Also on this date:

In 1796, the future emperor of the French, Napoleon Bonaparte, married Josephine de Beauharnais.

In 1841, the U.S. Supreme Court, in United States v. The Amistad, ruled 7-1 in favor of a group of illegally enslaved Africans who were captured off the U.S. coast after seizing control of a Spanish schooner, La Amistad. The justices ruled that the Africans should be set free.

In 1862, during the American Civil War, the ironclad warships USS Monitor and CSS Virginia (formerly USS Merrimac) clashed for five hours to a draw at Hampton Roads, Virginia. The first engagement of ironclad warships opened a new era in naval warfare.

In 1916, more than 400 Mexican raiders led by Pancho Villa attacked Columbus, New Mexico, killing 18 Americans.

In 1945, during World War II, over 300 U.S. B-29 bombers began Operation Meetinghouse, a massive firebombing raid on Tokyo. The raid killed an estimated 100,000 civilians, left 1 million homeless and destroyed 16 square miles (41 square kilometers) of the city.

In 1964, the U.S. Supreme Court, in New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, raised the standard for public officials to prove they’d been libeled in their official capacity by news organizations.

In 1997, rapper The Notorious B.I.G. (Christopher Wallace) was killed in a still-unsolved drive-by shooting in Los Angeles at age 24.

In 2022, a Russian airstrike devastated a maternity hospital in the besieged Ukrainian port city of Mariupol, killing four people and wounding at least 17.

Today’s birthdays:

• Singer Jeffrey Osborne is 78.
• Actor Juliette Binoche is 62.
• Actor Emmanuel Lewis is 55.
• Actor Oscar Isaac is 47.
• Comedian Jordan Klepper (TV: “The Daily Show”) is 47.
• Rapper Chingy is 46.
• Actor Matthew Gray Gubler is 46.
• Retired soccer player Clint Dempsey is 43.
• Olympic skiing gold medalist Julia Mancuso is 42.
• Actor Brittany Snow is 40.
• Rapper Bow Wow is 39.
• Rapper YG is 36.
• Social media personality Khaby Lame is 26.
• Olympic gymnastics gold medalist Sunisa Lee is 23.

Today in history:

On March 8, 2014, Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370, a Boeing 777 with 239 people on board, vanished during a flight from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing, setting off a massive and ultimately unsuccessful search. The aircraft’s disappearance remains one of air travel’s major unsolved mysteries.

Also on this date:

In 1817, a constitution was adopted formally creating the New York Stock & Exchange Board, forerunner of the New York Stock Exchange. The constitution laid out rules for transactions and brokers initially gathered twice daily in a rented room on Wall Street to trade 30 stocks and bonds.

In 1917, protests against food rationing broke out in Petrograd (now St. Petersburg), triggering eight days of rioting that resulted in the abdication of Tsar Nicholas II and the end of the Russian monarchy.

In 1948, the Supreme Court, in McCollum v. Board of Education, struck down religious education classes during school hours in Champaign, Illinois, public schools, saying the program violated separation of church and state.

In 1965, the United States landed its first combat troops in South Vietnam as 3,500 Marines arrived to defend the U.S. air base at Da Nang.

In 1971, in the first of three fights between Muhammad Ali and Joe Frazier, Frazier defeated Ali by unanimous decision in what was billed as “The Fight of the Century” at Madison Square Garden in New York.

In 1983, in a speech to the National Association of Evangelicals convention in Orlando, Florida, President Ronald Reagan referred to the Soviet Union as an “evil empire.”

In 1988, 17 soldiers were killed when two Army helicopters from Fort Campbell, Kentucky, collided during a night training mission.

In 2008, President George W. Bush vetoed a bill that would have banned the CIA from using simulated drowning, or waterboarding, and other coercive interrogation methods to gain information from suspected terrorists.

In 2023, the U.S. Justice Department found that police in Louisville, Kentucky, had engaged in a pattern of violating constitutional rights and discrimination against the Black community following an investigation prompted by the fatal police shooting of an African American woman, Breonna Taylor.

Today’s birthdays:

• Author John McPhee is 95.
• Songwriter Carole Bayer Sager is 82.
• Actor-musician Micky Dolenz (The Monkees) is 81.
• Baseball Hall of Famer Jim Rice is 73.
• Singer Gary Numan is 68.
• TV journalist Lester Holt is 67.
• Actor Aidan Quinn is 67.
• Actor Camryn Manheim is 65.
• Actor Freddie Prinze Jr. is 50.
• Songwriter-producer Benny Blanco is 38.
• Actor Montana Jordan is 23.
• Actor Kit Connor is 22.
• Actor Samara Lee is 18.

Every time news articles or commentators mention the number of American citizens shot and killed by ICE agents in recent months, the death toll stops at two.

But their math is wrong.

Weeks before Renee Good and Alex Pretti were gunned down by federal immigration officers in separate incidents in Minnesota, a Los Angeles man, Keith Porter Jr., was shot and killed by an off-duty U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent under dubious circumstances.

Authorities said Porter was shot outside his apartment complex on New Year’s Eve after he fired several gunshots into the air.

Relatives and local activists said Porter, a 43-year-old father of two, was not threatening anyone, and was simply shooting into the air to ring in the new year.

A Homeland Security representative said the off-duty immigration officer was “forced to defensively use his weapon” while responding to an “active shooter.”

An attorney for the family, Jamal Tooson, conceded that the victim’s actions possibly merited arrest or a citation by the Los Angeles Police Department.

But the ICE agent, who was not charged with local law enforcement duties, instead subjected Porter to “a death sentence,” Tooson said.

“Forgive us, if we have skepticism of any claims of self-defense,” Tooson said a few weeks after the shooting.

The ICE agent in Los Angeles has not been charged with any crime, and police there said the shooting is still under investigation.

While the Porter case is not as cut and dried as the Minnesota shootings, it raises strong concerns about the role and presence of federal immigration officers in American cities, and is another ugly stain on Noem’s tenure at Homeland Security.

Authorities said Porter legally owned the gun he used in his celebration, but that still gave him no right to recklessly fire it in the air.

Likewise, the agent had no right to exceed his authority, especially if, as witnesses said, Porter wasn’t posing a threat.

Neighbors said the agent, who lived in the same building, went inside, put on his tactical gear, grabbed his ICE-issued firearm and stepped back outside before ending Porter’s life.

It sounds like he had time to call 911 instead of handling the situation himself.

The agent, identified as Brian Palacios, has been accused of making racist remarks about Black people and Latinos, court records show.

Unlike the Minnesota cases, there is no video of the shooting, which means less evidence to scrutinize Palacios’ actions.

When ICE agent Jonathan Ross gunned down Good, a 37-year-old mother of three, in her car, video challenged the claim that she was trying to run over officers.

On Jan. 24, when agents wrestled Pretti to the ground and shot him, video showed that Pretti, who was carrying a licensed gun, had already been disarmed,

Why Porter isn’t included in the ICE body count is anybody’s guess. Advocates tend to like their causes wrapped in neat little packages.

Truth be told, George Floyd and Rodney King were not ideal torch bearers. Neither was Claudette Colvin, a 15-year-old Black girl who refused to give up her seat on a Montgomery, Alabama, bus months before Rosa Parks.

Porter need not be martyred like Good and Pretti.

He just needs to be remembered — and acknowledged.

Today in history:

On March 7, 2010, filmmaker Kathryn Bigelow became the first woman to win the Academy Award for Best Director, taking the prize for “The Hurt Locker.”

Also on this date:

In 1876, Alexander Graham Bell received a U.S. patent for his telephone.

In 1936, Adolf Hitler ordered his troops to march into the demilitarized Rhineland, thereby breaking the Treaty of Versailles and the Locarno Treaties.

In 1965, a march by over 500 civil rights demonstrators was violently broken up at the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama; state troopers and a sheriff’s posse fired tear gas and beat marchers with batons in what became known as “Bloody Sunday.”

In 1975, the U.S. Senate revised its filibuster rule, allowing 60 senators to limit debate in most cases, instead of the previously required two-thirds of senators present.

In 1994, the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously ruled that a parody that pokes fun at an original work can be considered “fair use.” (The ruling concerned a parody of the Roy Orbison song “Oh, Pretty Woman” by the rap group 2 Live Crew.)

In 2024, movie armorer Hannah Gutierrez-Reed was found guilty of involuntary manslaughter in connection with the 2021 fatal shooting of a cinematographer by Alec Baldwin during a rehearsal on the set of the Western film “Rust.” (Gutierrez-Reed served an 18-month prison sentence and was released in 2025.)

Today’s birthdays:

• Hall of Fame auto racer Janet Guthrie is 88.
• Actor Daniel J. Travanti is 86.
• Entertainment executive Michael Eisner is 84.
• Football Hall of Famer Lynn Swann is 74.
• R&B musician Ernie Isley (The Isley Brothers) is 74.
• Actor Bryan Cranston is 70.
• Tennis Hall of Famer Ivan Lendl is 66.
• Singer Taylor Dayne is 64.
• Author Bret Easton Ellis is 62.
• Comedian Wanda Sykes is 62.
• Actor Rachel Weisz is 56.
• Actor Peter Sarsgaard is 55.
• Actor Jenna Fischer is 52.
• Actor Tobias Menzies is 52.
• Actor Laura Prepon is 46.
• Poet Amanda Gorman is 28.

Her brother announced on Facebook that his sister died Wednesday morning.

“I’m sad and sorry to see you, Victoria, my Sister go!” Donnie Mackenzie wrote.

Her cause of death wasn’t mentioned.

“I say sad for all of us whom loved Victoria so much, but we know she continues to live life with so much vigor, creativity and enthusiasm!” Mackenzie added. “I already miss you so much, but am so grateful for the impressions you left on me on how to design life with unlimited freedom; without limits or boundaries!”

Syracuse station CNY Central said MacKenzie-Childs and her husband Richard Mackenzie-Childs started their company in upstate Cayuga County back in 1983 before losing the business to bankruptcy in 2001.

The couple’s children, Heather and Niels, released a video on YouTube last month showing a boat named The Yankee Ferry that their parents turned into a well-appointed floating home and studio in 2004.

“She always loved New York with all the layers of texture and people and cultures coming together, but she couldn’t find how to be there with lots of space to work and had this idea of wanting to be on a boat,” Heather explains. “It was just an extraordinary way of living in Manhattan, but feeling almost like you’re, you know, out at sea.”

MacKenzie-Childs explained in an Instagram video that she spotted the boat — a former Ellis Island ferry — while rollerblading around Manhattan and checked it out.

“This gnarly guy came and he gave me a price and it was really cheap, so I said it’s a deal,” she recalled.

The Yankee Ferry was put on the real estate market last summer. It was docked in Staten Island at the time and listed for $1.25 million.

MacKenzie-Childs said her company employed 400 people before it was lost to an “unfair, powerful situation.”

“It’s time for Part Three of my lengthy musical career!” the 83-year-old singer and instrumentalist told Rolling Stone.

Johnston joined the California band in 1965, filling in for Beach Boys cofounder Brian Wilson during live shows. He first recorded with the group on the hit song “California Girls,” according to Pitchfork.

Wilson, who died in June of last year, started the band in 1961 with his two brothers, Carl and Dennis, cousin Love and childhood friend Al Jardine, who remains a member of the band but does not tour.

Johnston’s writing credits with the Beach Boys include “Tears in the Morning,” “Disney Girls” and “Surf’s Up.” He also penned  1974’s “Don’t Let the Sun Go Down on Me” for Elton John and “I Write the Songs” for Barry Manilow in 1975.

He assured that music fans will hear from him again and said he’s “forever grateful to be a part of the Beach Boys musical legacy.”

Johnston said his future plans include speaking engagements, solo appearances and more.

“I can write songs forever and wait until you hear what’s coming!” he teased.

Johnston is said to have played around 6,000 shows with the Beach Boys.

The remaining members have six concerts booked in Florida at the end of March. They’ll be in New Jersey for a May 29 performance in Atlantic City followed by a May 30 show in New Brunswick.

Johnston said he still plans to join his old bandmates on special occasions including a Hollywood Bowl gig celebrating the nation’s 250th birthday over the Fourth of July weekend.

“Change is always promised in life, today we find ourselves in a chapter of change, but not an end,” Love told Rolling Stone.