- Fixed #118052: nodeAffinity on pods can change prior to scheduling gates being removed even when podSpec.affinity is nil in the initial spec, this matches the 1.28 behavior to allow consistent integrators to be written. ([#118199](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/118199), [@aleskandro](https://github.com/aleskandro)) [SIG Apps, Scheduling and Testing]

release, SIG Apps moved the Kubernetes workloads API to the new apps/v1beta2 group and version. The DaemonSet, Deployment, ReplicaSet, and StatefulSet objects are affected by this change. The new apps/v1beta2 group and version provide a stable and consistent API surface for building applications in Kubernetes. For details about deprecations and behavioral changes, see [Notable Features](#notable-features). SIG Apps intends to promote this version to GA in a future release.

[SIG Apps]: ...

- Added `ConsistentListFromCache` feature gate that allows apiserver to serve consistent lists from cache. ([#118508](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/118508), [@serathius](https://github.com/serathius))

  The "audienceMatchPolicy" must be set to "MatchAny" when multiple audiences are specified in the "audiences" field. ([#123165](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/123165), [@aramase](https://github.com/aramase))
- Added consistent vanity import to files and provided tooling for verifying and updating them. ([#120642](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/120642), [@jcchavezs](https://github.com/jcchavezs))

- Component-base: make the validation logic about LeaderElectionConfiguration consistent between component-base and client-go ([#111758](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/111758), [@SataQiu](https://github.com/SataQiu)) [SIG API Machinery and Scheduling]