CHICAGO (AP) — With the Mega Millions lottery jackpot at a record $1.6 billion, people are snapping up tickets across the U.S.

The Powerball jackpot also has climbed. It’s up to an estimated $620 million for Wednesday’s drawing. That would make it the fifth-largest jackpot in U.S. history.

But much of the focus has been on Tuesday’s Mega Millions drawing and what would be the largest jackpot prize in U.S. history.

From San Diego to New York, people are dreaming of how they would spend the money should they beat the astronomical odds of winning.

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Little Rock, Arkansas, housekeeper LaCrystal White initially said her first order of business would be to pay off bills and student loans, then buy herself a house and car. But the 34-year-old quickly reconsidered.

“Well, first I’m going to give something back to charity. That’s what I’m going to do,” White said. “I am. I’m going to give back to charity and then I’m going to splurge. Put up college funds for my kids and just set myself up for the rest of my life.”

Then she told everyone who was at the gas station where she bought two Mega Millions tickets on Sunday that she would give them $1 million each if she won. She went on to add that she planned to buy more tickets later.

Arkansas is one of 44 states where the Mega Millions is played. It’s also played in Washington, D.C., and the U.S. Virgin Islands.

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Nathan Harrell was in downtown Chicago for work Saturday when he stopped in at a 7-Eleven and handed the clerk two $20 bills — one for 10 Powerball tickets at $2 each and the other for 10 Mega Millions at $2 each. It’s been a few years since he’s spent anything on the lottery.

“It’s gotta be in the news for me to think about it,” the 36-year-old, who works in finance and lives on the city’s North Side, said.

He said he and his wife have talked over the years about what they’d do if they won, and she said she’d keep working. “So she probably wouldn’t want me to quit my job,” he said.

Harrell said that as he rode the train to work, he had thought about what else he would do. He figures he’d set up a trust fund for his two children.

“We wouldn’t sweat the small stuff anymore,” he said. “Nothing crazy, but who knows.”

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In Phoenix, Tim Masterson, a 41-year-old scientist, ran into Kings Beer & Wine, an upscale convenience store and beer bar, to buy seven Mega Millions tickets while his family waited in the car outside.

Masterson paused when asked what he’d do with the money if he won. After looking at the wide variety of beers and ales on the shelves, he said: “I’d buy a brewery.”

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Nebraska mom Michelle Connaghan said she had mentioned the huge Mega Millions jackpot to her children, which led to a discussion of what the family would do with all that money.

“Other than paying off bills and taking care of family, I think I’d have the most fun going around and doing surprise good deeds for people,” said Connaghan, 48, as she picked up pizza for her family and a Mega Millions lottery ticket at an Omaha convenience store. “I think that would be wonderful, to have the ability to help somebody who really needs it.

“And I’m sure we’d take some pretty awesome vacations while we were going around doing our surprise good deeds.”

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In New York City’s financial district, Juan Ramirez, 69, said he would retire from at least one of his jobs. He works as a school maintenance worker and short order cook.

“I’d spend it carefully. I’d be prepared before I cash in, go see a financial adviser,” he said, saying he would invest the money.

“I’ve got two jobs. I’d retire from one, maybe two. When I win the billion dollars, I will decide which one to quit.

“I would donate some money to charity, think about the homeless, people with less than me. I would help somebody.”

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Guillermo Carrillo, 42, of San Diego, works as a roofer and as a dishwasher at a restaurant.

Carrillo, who was buying tickets in suburban National City, dreams of buying a house for his mother in his native Guatemala. Then he would give money to each of his five sisters — also in Guatemala — to spend however they like. His five brothers would get nothing, he said.

For himself, he would buy a house in the San Diego area and replace his old pickup with a new one in his preferred color, red. He would also travel. Tops on his list are Paris, Spain, the ruins in Machu Pichu, Peru, and, of course, Guatemala.

“It’s a lot of money and I hope we win,” he said.

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Dan Higgins isn’t typically a lottery player, but he decided to give it a try as he grabbed a coffee at a 7-Eleven in the Brighton neighborhood of Boston on Sunday.

“When it gets over a billion dollars it becomes compelling, so for $2 to potentially get $1.6 billion, that would be a pretty nice return on that investment,” said Higgins, 51, who lives in nearby Brookline.

First on his agenda, should he win: putting in his two weeks’ notice at his sales job. Other than that, he says he would take care of the education of his two kids, who will be entering college soon.

“That’s obviously an awful lot of money, so I would really just help out my family in any way I could and probably buy a big house on the ocean somewhere.”

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At an Exxon store in Nashville, Tennessee, clerk Quin Newsom said nearly everyone who comes in is buying a Mega Millions ticket — including herself.

Asked what she would do if she won, the 22-year-old said, “I would split it with my co-workers. We’re going to retire from here. And then I’d go to the Bahamas.”

Beyond that: “I would invest in something, to keep the money rolling in. … You gotta think with it.”

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Earl Howard, a lifelong New Yorker, said he plays the lottery “anytime it’s big,” even though he has never won anything. The odds of winning the Mega Millions grand prize are about one in 302 million.

“I’m still gonna do it. It doesn’t matter what the odds are. You got to be in it to win it, and if you don’t try you won’t succeed,” Howard said while shopping at a 7-Eleven in Brooklyn.

Asked what he would do with the money, Howard said: “Move out of New York. Take care of my mother and my kids and my wife. That’s it. Save the rest. Nobody won’t know I won.”

LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) — For nearly a decade, opposition to former President Barack Obama’s health care law has been a winning message for Nebraska Republicans.

It’s helped them win every statewide office, control the Legislature and hold all the state’s congressional seats. So it was something of a surprise for Bob Tatum when he set out to ask his fellow Nebraskans if they would back a ballot initiative to expand Medicaid, one of the pillars of Obama’s health overhaul.

“There seems to be a lot more support than I anticipated,” said Tatum, who lives in a remote town near the Colorado border.

It took him little more than a week to gather over 100 petition signatures in Perkins County, where roughly 70 percent of the 1,963 registered voters are Republicans. Tatum, 66, also is a Republican but differs from most of his party’s elected officials. He supports the Medicaid expansion because his job as an ambulance driver brings him into frequent contact with working people who can’t afford insurance but earn too much to qualify for regular Medicaid.

“When I was circulating petitions, pretty much everyone signed it without objection,” Tatum said. “I didn’t expect that to be the case in rural Nebraska.”

Nebraska isn’t the only conservative state where residents are bypassing a legislature that has refused to expand Medicaid.

Voters in two other Republican-dominated states, Idaho and Utah, also will decide in November whether to expand the health insurance program to more lower-income Americans. Another ballot initiative, in Montana, seeks to raise a tobacco tax to keep funding a Medicaid expansion that is set to expire.

It also has become a focal point in numerous governor’s races.

The election-year push in conservative-leaning states for one of the main aspects of Obama’s health care law has surprised many Republican lawmakers after they spent years attacking it.

Most GOP lawmakers in Idaho staunchly opposed expansion efforts there and cast it as a welfare program that would deepen the state’s reliance on the federal government. Supporters responded by gathering more than 75,000 petition signatures, far exceeding the minimum threshold to qualify for the ballot.

Expansion advocates launched a petition drive in Utah after continued resistance from the Republican-dominated Legislature. Utah lawmakers did expand coverage to about 6,000 of the state’s neediest residents last year and approved another expansion measure with work requirements, but the federal government hasn’t yet accepted that plan. Expansion advocates say it still leaves tens of thousands of people without insurance.

Other states have seen Medicaid expansion become a top issue in their governor’s race, with Democratic candidates forcing Republicans to defend their opposition.

In Tennessee, Democratic contender Karl Dean argues that the state already has lost out on $4 billion in federal money by refusing to participate.

“That money is being spent in other states,” Dean said in a recent debate. “We need to get our Medicaid dollars back here.”

Democrat Stacey Abrams is promoting expansion as a way to improve health care access in rural parts of Georgia where hospitals have closed, partly due to the expense of caring for the uninsured. Republican Brian Kemp said Abrams wants to “double down on big government programs that cost too much and fail to deliver.”

Medicaid expansion also has been in the spotlight in the Florida, Kansas and Wisconsin governor’s races.

About 12 million Americans have gained coverage under the expansion in the 33 states that opted for it under the Obama health care reforms. The program extends Medicaid to cover more low-income adults, including those with no children at home, and the federal government picks up most of the cost.

A government report released this past week found that lower-income people in states that did not broaden access to Medicaid were much more likely to skip needed medical care than people in states that did.

In Nebraska, Amanda Gershon is among those who went without.

As a single, childless adult, she wasn’t eligible for regular Medicaid after a series of autoimmune disorders in 2013 rendered her too sick to work. The Lincoln resident remained uninsured for two years before she qualified for Social Security disability benefits that allowed her to receive coverage. Even then, the enrollment process took nine months.

Without the prescription drugs, tests and surgeries that could have helped her earlier, Gershon said she suffered needlessly and wasn’t able to hold a job.

A co-sponsor of the petition drive to qualify the initiative, she said she grew frustrated with lawmakers who opposed the Medicaid expansion because none of them proposed alternatives that would have helped her.

“It’s hard to understand,” said Gershon, now 36. “They are there to represent the people, and it does seem like a majority of people see this as a good thing.”

Kathy Campbell is among the few Republicans who were not surprised by the citizen effort to circumvent the Legislature. As a state lawmaker, she had pushed repeatedly for Medicaid expansion before being termed out of office last year.

“People want good health care policy,” she said. “They’re much more informed about it than you might think. I think that’s why you had so many people sign the petition.”

Politicians who steadfastly opposed the Medicaid expansion in Nebraska say the initiative’s supporters don’t understand the consequences of implementing the program.

If passed, the measure would add about 90,000 Nebraskans to the Medicaid rolls.

Organizers with Insure the Good Life, a Nebraska group formed to back the expansion, said many of those people work in jobs with no health benefits, such as in hotels, restaurants and construction.

“Almost every single person in Nebraska probably knows somebody who’s directly affected by the unaffordability of health care,” said Meg Mandy, campaign manager for Insure the Good Life.

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump said today the U.S. would begin “cutting off, or substantially reducing” aid to three Central American nations over a migrant caravan heading to the U.S. southern border.

Trump tweeted: “Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador were not able to do the job of stopping people from leaving their country and coming illegally to the U.S.”

The three countries received a combined more than $500 million in funding from the U.S. in fiscal year 2017, though it was not immediately clear how much Trump is seeking to cut.

The morning tweets marked the latest escalation by the president, who is seeking to re-inject immigration politics into the national conversation in the closing weeks of the midterm elections.

On a three-day campaign swing to Western states last week, Trump raised alarm over thousands of migrants traveling through Mexico to the U.S. and threatened to seal off the U.S.-Mexico border if they weren’t stopped.

As the migrants continued their northward march about 900 miles from the U.S. border, Trump tweeted that, “Sadly, it looks like Mexico’s Police and Military are unable to stop the Caravan.

He added: “I have alerted Border Patrol and Military that this is a National Emergy.” White House officials could not immediately provide details.

A Pentagon spokesman, Army Lt. Col. Jamie Davis, said the Pentagon has received no new orders to provide troops for border security.