WASHINGTON — Nikki Haley has won the Republican primary in the District of Columbia, notching her first victory of the 2024 campaign.

Her victory Sunday at least temporarily halts Donald Trump’s sweep of the GOP voting contests, although the former president is bound to pick up several hundred more delegates in this week’s Super Tuesday races.

Despite her early losses, Haley has said she would remain in the race at least through those contests, although she has declined to name any primary she felt confident she would win. Following last week’s loss in her home state of South Carolina, Haley remained adamant that voters in the places that followed deserved an alternative to Trump despite his dominance thus far in the campaign.

The Associated Press declared Haley the winner Sunday night after D.C. Republican Party officials released the results. She won all 19 delegates at stake.

Washington, D.C., is one of the most heavily Democratic jurisdictions in the U.S., with about 23,000 registered Republicans. Democrat Joe Biden won the district in the 2020 general election with 92% of the vote.

Decision on Trump: A Supreme Court decision could come as soon as Monday in the case about whether former President Donald Trump can be kicked off the ballot over his efforts to undo his defeat in the 2020 election.

Trump is challenging a groundbreaking decision by the Colorado Supreme Court that said he is disqualified from being president again and ineligible for the state’s primary, which is Tuesday.

The resolution of the case on Monday, a day before Super Tuesday contests in 16 states, would remove uncertainty about whether votes for Trump, the leading Republican candidate for president, will ultimately count. Both sides had requested fast work by the court, which heard arguments Feb. 8

The Colorado court was the first to invoke a post-Civil War constitutional provision aimed at preventing those who “engaged in insurrection” from holding office.

Trump also has since been barred from primary ballot in Illinois and Maine, although both decisions, along with Colorado’s, are on hold pending the outcome of the Supreme Court case.

Haiti prison violence: Hundreds of inmates fled Haiti’s main prison after armed gangs stormed the facility late Saturday amid violence that engulfed much of the capital. At least five people were dead Sunday.

The jailbreak marked a new low in Haiti’s downward spiral of violence and came as gangs step up coordinated attacks in Port-au-Prince, while embattled Prime Minister Ariel Henry is abroad trying to salvage support for a United Nations-backed security force to stabilize the country.

Three bodies with gunshot wounds lay at the prison entrance, which was wide open, with no guards in sight.

Plastic sandals, clothing and electric fans were strewn across normally overcrowded concrete patios that were eerily empty Sunday.

Haiti’s government urged calm as it sought to find the killers, kidnappers and perpetrators of other violent crimes that it said escaped during the outbreak of violence.

Arnel Remy, a human rights attorney whose nonprofit works inside the prison, said on X, formerly Twitter, that fewer than 100 of the nearly 4,000 inmates remained behind bars.

Those choosing to stay included 18 former Colombian soldiers accused of working as mercenaries in the July 2021 assassination of Haitian President Jovenel Moïse.

On Saturday night, several of the Colombians shared a video pleading for their lives. In the absence of official information, inmates’ family members rushed to the prison to check on loved ones.

US budget bills: Congressional leaders came out with a package of six bills Sunday setting full-year spending levels for some federal agencies, a step forward in a long overdue funding process beset by sharp political divisions between the two parties as well as infighting among House Republicans.

The release of the text of legislation over the weekend was designed to meet the House’s rule to give lawmakers at least 72 hours to study a bill before voting.

And it’s a promising sign that lawmakers will avoid a partial shutdown that would kick in at 12:01 a.m. Saturday for those agencies covered under the bill, such as Veterans Affairs, Agriculture, Transportation and Justice.

Congressional leaders hope to complete votes on the package this week and continue negotiations on the remaining six annual spending bills to pass them before a March 22 deadline.

California blizzard: A major highway is closed again as the effects of a powerful blizzard continue to cause problems across the Sierra Nevada, and forecasters warned that more heavy snow is on the way for Northern California.

The highway patrol had no estimate Sunday for reopening sections of Interstate 80 to the west and north of Lake Tahoe.

A blizzard warning was in effect until midnight for areas above 6,500 feet, while lower elevations are under a winter storm warning, with 2 feet more of snow possible.

Several ski resorts are closed. Power has been restored to thousands who lost service Saturday.

The storm began barreling into the region Thursday. A widespread blizzard warning through Sunday morning covered a 300-mile stretch of the mountains. A second, weaker storm was forecast to bring additional rain and snow between Monday and Wednesday.

New search for plane: Malaysia’s government said Sunday that it may renew the hunt for missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 after a U.S. technology firm proposed a fresh search in the southern Indian Ocean where the plane is believed to have crashed in 2014, a decade ago.

Transport Minister Anthony Loke said Texas-based Ocean Infinity has proposed another “no find, no fee” basis to scour the seabeds, expanding from the site where it first searched in 2018.

He said he has invited the company to meet him to evaluate new scientific evidence it has to find the plane’s final resting place.

If the evidence is credible, he said, he will seek Cabinet approval to sign a new contract with Ocean Infinity to resume the search.

“The government is steadfast in our resolve to locate MH370,” Loke told a remembrance event to mark the 10th anniversary of the jet’s disappearance. “We really hope the search can find the plane and provide truth to the next of kin.”

The Boeing 777 plane carrying 239 people, mostly Chinese nationals, from Malaysia’s capital, Kuala Lumpur, to Beijing, vanished from radar shortly after taking off on March 8, 2014.