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  • Trump administration will expand travel ban to more than 30 countries, Noem says

    Trump administration will expand travel ban to more than 30 countries, Noem says

    WASHINGTON — The Trump administration will be expanding its ban on travel for citizens of certain countries to more than 30, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said, in the latest restriction to come since a man from Afghanistan was accused of shooting two National Guard members.

    The expansion would build on a travel ban already announced in June by the Republican administration, which barred travel to the U.S. for citizens from 12 countries and restricted access to the U.S. for people from seven others. In a social media post earlier this week, Noem had suggested more countries would be included.

    Noem, who spoke late Thursday in an interview with Fox News Channel host Laura Ingraham, would not provide further details, saying President Donald Trump was considering which countries would be included.

    In the wake of the National Guard shooting, the administration already ratcheted up restrictions on the 19 countries included in the initial travel ban, which include Afghanistan, Somalia, Iran and Haiti, among others.

    Ingraham asked Noem whether the travel ban was expanding to 32 countries and asked which countries would be added to the 19 announced earlier this year.

    “I won’t be specific on the number, but it’s over 30. And the president is continuing to evaluate countries,” Noem said.

    “If they don’t have a stable government there, if they don’t have a country that can sustain itself and tell us who those individuals are and help us vet them, why should we allow people from that country to come here to the United States?” Noem said.

    The Department of Homeland Security did not respond to requests for comment about when an updated travel ban might go into effect and which countries would be included in it.

    Additions to the June travel ban are the latest in what has been a rapidly unfolding series of immigration actions since the shooting Thanksgiving week of two National Guard troops in Washington.

    Rahmanullah Lakanwal, who emigrated to the U.S. from Afghanistan after the U.S. withdrawal, has been charged with first-degree murder after one of the two victims, West Virginia National Guard Specialist Sarah Beckstrom, died of wounds sustained in the Nov. 26 shooting. The second victim, Staff Sgt. Andrew Wolfe, was critically wounded. Lakanwal has pleaded not guilty.

    The Trump administration has argued that more vetting is needed to make sure people entering or already in the U.S. aren’t a threat. Critics say the administration is traumatizing people who’ve already gone through extensive vetting to get to the U.S. and say the new measures amount to collective punishment.

    Over the course of a little more than a week, the administration has halted asylum decisions, paused processing of immigration-related benefits for people in the U.S. from the 19 travel ban countries and halted visas for Afghans who assisted the U.S. war effort.

    On Thursday, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services announced it was reducing the time period that work permits are valid for certain applicants such as refugees and people with asylum so they have to reapply more often and go through vetting more frequently.

  • Trump’s security strategy slams European allies and asserts U.S. power in the Western Hemisphere

    Trump’s security strategy slams European allies and asserts U.S. power in the Western Hemisphere

    WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump’s administration has set forth a new national security strategy that paints European allies as weak and aims to reassert America’s dominance in the Western Hemisphere.

    The document released Friday by the White House is sure to roil long-standing U.S. allies in Europe for its scathing critiques of their migration and free speech policies, suggesting they face the “prospect of civilizational erasure” and raising doubts about their long-term reliability as American partners.

    At the same time the administration is sharply critical of its democratic allies in Europe and carrying out a pressure campaign of boat strikes in South America, it chides past U.S. efforts to shape or criticize Middle Eastern nations and seeks to discourage attempts for changes in those countries’ governments and policies.

    The strategy reinforces, in sometimes chilly and bellicose terms, Trump’s “America First” philosophy, which favors nonintervention overseas, questions decades of strategic relationships, and prioritizes U.S. interests.

    The U.S. strategy “is motivated above all by what works for America — or, in two words, ‘America First,’” the document said.

    This is the first national security strategy, a document the administration is required by law to release, since the Republican president’s return to office in January. It is a stark break from the course set by President Joe Biden’s Democratic administration, which sought to reinvigorate alliances after many were rattled in Trump’s first term and to check a more assertive Russia.

    Democratic Rep. Jason Crow of Colorado, who sits on House committees overseeing intelligence and the armed forces, called the strategy “catastrophic to America’s standing in the world and a retreat from our alliances and partnerships.”

    “The world will be a more dangerous place and Americans will be less safe if this plan moves forward,” Crow said.

    Criticism of Europe

    The United States is seeking to broker an end to Russia’s nearly four-year-old war in Ukraine, a goal that the national security strategy says is in America’s vital interests. But the document makes clear that the U.S. wants to improve its relationship with Russia after years of Moscow being treated as a global pariah and that ending the war is a core U.S. interest to “reestablish strategic stability with Russia.”

    The document also accuses America’s longstanding European allies, which have found themselves sometimes at odds with Trump’s shifting approaches to the Russia-Ukraine war, of facing not just domestic economic challenges but, according to the U.S., an existential crisis.

    Economic stagnation in Europe “is eclipsed by the real and more stark prospect of civilizational erasure,” the strategy document said.

    The U.S. suggests that Europe is being enfeebled by its immigration policies, declining birthrates, “censorship of free speech and suppression of political opposition” and a “loss of national identities and self-confidence.”

    “Should present trends continue, the continent will be unrecognizable in 20 years or less. As such, it is far from obvious whether certain European countries will have economies and militaries strong enough to remain reliable allies,” the document said.

    The document also gives a nod to the rise of far-right political parties in Europe, which have been outspoken in their opposition to illegal immigration and climate policies.

    “America encourages its political allies in Europe to promote this revival of spirit, and the growing influence of patriotic European parties indeed gives cause for great optimism,” the strategy said.

    German Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul acknowledged the U.S. is “our most important ally” in NATO but said questions about freedom of expression or “the organization of our free societies” are not part of alliance discussions.

    “We also don’t think that anyone needs to give us any advice on this,” Wadephul told reporters.

    Markus Frohnmaier, a lawmaker with the far-right, anti-immigration Alternative for Germany party, described the U.S. strategy as “a foreign policy reality check for Europe and particularly for Germany.”

    Setting sights on power in the Americas

    Despite Trump’s “America First” maxim, his administration has carried out a series of military strikes on alleged drug trafficking boats in the Caribbean Sea and the eastern Pacific Ocean while weighing possible military action in Venezuela to pressure President Nicolás Maduro.

    The moves are part of what the national security strategy lays out as “a ‘Trump Corollary’ to the Monroe Doctrine” to “restore American preeminence in the Western Hemisphere.” The 1823 Monroe Doctrine, formulated by President James Monroe, was originally aimed at opposing any European meddling in the Western Hemisphere and was used to justify U.S. military interventions in Latin America.

    Trump’s strategy document says it aims to combat drug trafficking and control migration. The U.S. also is reimagining its military footprint in the region even after building up the largest military presence there in generations.

    That means, for instance, “targeted deployments to secure the border and defeat cartels, including where necessary the use of lethal force to replace the failed law enforcement-only strategy of the last several decades,” it says.

    Shifting focus away from the Middle East

    With a shift to the Americas, the U.S. will seek a different approach in the Middle East.

    The U.S., according to the strategy, should abandon “America’s misguided experiment with hectoring” nations in the Middle East, especially monarchies in the Gulf, about their traditions and forms of government.

    Trump has bolstered ties with nations there and sees Middle Eastern countries as ripe for economic opportunities, and the Arab nations are “emerging as a place of partnership, friendship, and investment,” the document says.

    “We should encourage and applaud reform when and where it emerges organically, without trying to impose it,” it says.

    This year, Trump made his first major foreign trip to the Middle East, and his efforts to settle the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza has been a major focus. But the U.S. plans to shift its focus from the region, the administration says, as America is less dependent on its oil supply.

    ‘Rebalance’ of U.S. relationship with China

    Meanwhile, as the U.S. under Trump has overturned decades of free trade policies with his sweeping global tariffs, its ties with China have been a prime focus. America under Trump is seeking to “rebalance” the U.S.-China relationship while also countering Beijing’s aggressive stance toward Taiwan, according to the document.

    The Trump administration wants to prevent a war over Taiwan, the self-governing island that Beijing claims as its own and to which the U.S. is obligated by its own laws to give military support, by maintaining a military advantage over China.

    But the U.S. wants allies in the region to do more to push back against Chinese pressure and contribute more to their defense.

    “The American military cannot, and should not have to, do this alone,” the strategy says. “Our allies must step up and spend — and more importantly do — much more for collective defense.”

  • U.S. vaccine advisers say not all babies need a hepatitis B shot at birth

    U.S. vaccine advisers say not all babies need a hepatitis B shot at birth

    NEW YORK — A federal vaccine advisory committee voted on Friday to end the longstanding recommendation that all U.S. babies get the hepatitis B vaccine on the day they’re born.

    A loud chorus of medical and public health leaders decried the actions of the panel, whose current members were all appointed by U.S. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. — a leading anti-vaccine activist before this year becoming the nation’s top health official.

    “This is the group that can’t shoot straight,” said William Schaffner, a Vanderbilt University vaccine expert who for decades has been involved with ACIP and its work groups.

    Several medical societies and state health departments said they would continue to recommend them. While people may have to check their policies, the trade group AHIP, formerly known as America’s Health Insurance Plans, said its members still will cover the birth dose of the hepatitis B vaccine.

    For decades, the government has advised that all babies be vaccinated against the liver infection right after birth. The shots are widely considered to be a public health success for preventing thousands of illnesses.

    But Kennedy’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices decided to recommend the birth dose only for babies whose mothers test positive, and in cases where the mom wasn’t tested.

    For other babies, it will be up to the parents and their doctors to decide if a birth dose is appropriate. The committee voted 8-3 to suggest that when a family elects to wait, then the vaccination series should begin when the child is 2 months old.

    The acting director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Jim O’Neill, is expected to decide later whether to accept the committee’s recommendation.

    The decision marks a return to a health strategy abandoned more than three decades ago

    Asked why the newly appointed committee moved quickly to reexamine the recommendation, committee member Vicky Pebsworth on Thursday cited “pressure from stakeholder groups,” without naming them.

    Committee members said the risk of infection for most babies is very low and that earlier research that found the shots were safe for infants was inadequate.

    They also worried that in many cases, doctors and nurses don’t have full conversations with parents about the pros and cons of the birth-dose vaccination.

    The committee members voiced interest in hearing the input from public health and medical professionals, but chose to ignore the experts’ repeated pleas to leave the recommendations alone.

    The committee gives advice to the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on how approved vaccines should be used. CDC directors almost always adopted the committee’s recommendations, which were widely heeded by doctors and guide vaccination programs. But the agency currently has no director, leaving acting director O’Neill to decide.

    In June, Kennedy fired the entire 17-member panel earlier this year and replaced it with a group that includes several anti-vaccine voices.

    Hepatitis B and delaying birth doses

    Hepatitis B is a serious liver infection that, for most people, lasts less than six months. But for some, especially infants and children, it can become a long-lasting problem that can lead to liver failure, liver cancer and scarring called cirrhosis.

    In adults, the virus is spread through sex or through sharing needles during injection drug use. But it can also be passed from an infected mother to a baby.

    In 1991, the committee recommended an initial dose of hepatitis B vaccine at birth. Experts say quick immunization is crucial to prevent infection from taking root. And, indeed, cases in children have plummeted.

    Still, several members of Kennedy’s committee voiced discomfort with vaccinating all newborns. They argued that past safety studies of the vaccine in newborns were limited and it’s possible that larger, long-term studies could uncover a problem with the birth dose.

    But two members said they saw no documented evidence of harm from the birth doses and suggested concern was based on speculation.

    Three panel members asked about the scientific basis for saying that the first dose could be delayed for two months for many babies.

    “This is unconscionable,” said committee member Joseph Hibbeln, who repeatedly voiced opposition to the proposal during the sometimes-heated two-day meeting.

    The committee’s chair, Kirk Milhoan, said two months was chosen as a point where infants had matured beyond the neonatal stage. Hibbeln countered that there was no data presented that two months is an appropriate cut-off.

    Cody Meissner, a professor of pediatrics at the Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth, also questioned a second proposal — which passed 6-4 — that said parents consider talking to pediatricians about blood tests meant to measure whether hep B shots have created protective antibodies.

    Such testing is not standard pediatric practice after vaccination. Proponents said it could be a new way to see if fewer shots are adequate.

    A CDC hepatitis expert, Adam Langer, said results could vary from child to child and would be an erratic way to assess if fewer doses work. He also noted there’s no good evidence that three shots pose harm to kids.

    Meissner attacked the proposal, saying the language “is kind of making things up.”

    Health experts say this could ‘make America sicker’

    Health experts have noted Kennedy’s hand-picked committee is focused on the pros and cons of shots for the individual getting vaccinated, and has turned away from seeing vaccinations as a way to stop the spread of preventable diseases among the public.

    The second proposal “is right at the center of this paradox,” said committee member Robert Malone.

    Some observers criticized the meeting, noting recent changes in how they are conducted. CDC scientists no longer present vaccine safety and effectiveness data to the committee. Instead, people who have been prominent voices in anti-vaccine circles were given those slots.

    The committee “is no longer a legitimate scientific body,” said Elizabeth Jacobs, a member of Defend Public Health, an advocacy group of researchers and others that has opposed Trump administration health policies. She described the meeting this week as “an epidemiological crime scene.”

    Republican Sen. Bill Cassidy, a liver doctor who chairs the Senate health committee, called the committee’s vote on the hepatitis B vaccine “a mistake.”

    “This makes America sicker,” he said, in a post on social media.

    The committee heard a 90-minute presentation from Aaron Siri, a lawyer who has worked with Kennedy on vaccine litigation. He ended by saying that he believes there should no ACIP vaccine recommendations at all.

    In a lengthy response, Meissner said, “What you have said is a terrible, terrible distortion of all the facts.” He ended by saying Siri should not have been invited.

    The meeting’s organizers said they invited Siri as well a few vaccine researchers — who have been vocal defenders of immunizations — to discuss the vaccine schedule. They named two: Peter Hotez, who said he declined, and Paul Offit, who said he didn’t remember being asked but would have declined anyway. Offit is a nationally renowned vaccine expert and physician who leads Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia’s Vaccine Education Center.

    Hotez, of the Texas Children’s Hospital in Houston, declined to present before the group “because ACIP appears to have shifted its mission away from science and evidence-based medicine,” he said in an email to the Associated Press.

  • Zohran Mamdani and the Louvre make the list of most mispronounced words of 2025

    Zohran Mamdani and the Louvre make the list of most mispronounced words of 2025

    DALLAS — From the election of Zohran Mamdani to the intrigue surrounding the jewel heist at the Louvre, keeping up with this year’s news also left some Americans struggling with pronunciations. That’s put both the name of New York City’s incoming mayor and the famed Paris museum on a list of the most mispronounced words in 2025.

    The language-learning company Babbel and closed-captioning company The Captioning Group on Thursday released a list of the words that news anchors, politicians, and other public figures in the U.S. struggled with the most this year, giving an overview of the people and topics that had Americans talking.

    As Mamdani made his political rise, the democratic socialist’s name often was mangled. When he takes office in January, the 34-year-old will become the city’s first Muslim mayor, first born in Africa, and first of South Asian heritage. Babbel said his name — which should be pronounced zoh-RAHN mam-DAH-nee — was most commonly mispronounced when people swapped the “M” and “N” in his last name.

    Mamdani has said he doesn’t mind if someone tries to pronounce his name correctly and misses but that some mispronounce it intentionally. During one mayoral race debate, he chided former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s pronunciation of his name, telling his opponent: “The name is Mamdani. M-A-M-D-A-N-I.”

    The theft of France’s crown jewels from the Louvre in October had many people mispronouncing the name of the world’s most-visited museum. Babbel says the correct pronunciation is LOOV-ruh, with a very soft pronunciation on the “ruh,” which can be a challenge for English speakers.

    “A lot of these words come from different languages and so we have to adapt to a sound that we’ve never made before,” said Esteban Touma, a linguistic and cultural expert at Babbel.

    Other words and names on the list include:

    • Acetaminophen, the active ingredient in the Tylenol, is pronounced uh-SEE-tuh-MIH-nuh-fen. President Donald Trump gave comedians plenty of material when he stumbled over the word as he implored pregnant women to avoid taking the painkiller despite inconclusive evidence about whether too much could be linked to autism.
    • Alex Murdaugh, the prominent South Carolina attorney who was sentenced to life in prison for the 2021 fatal shootings of his wife and son, is pronounced AL-ick MUR-dock. This year the case was dramatized in a series on Hulu.
    • Mounjaro, pronounced mown-JAHR-OH, is part of a wave of diabetes and obesity medications that soared in popularity because of the weight people have lost while taking the injections.

    Several words on the U.S. list, including Louvre and Mounjaro, also made the list for the U.K., which was compiled by Babbel and the British Institute of Verbatim Reporters, an organization for subtitling professionals. Storm Éowyn, which battered Ireland, Northern Ireland and Scotland in January, put that name on the U.K. list. Babbel says the correct pronunciation is ay-OH-win, said with a three-beat pattern.

    Throughout the year, captioners note words that come up over and over as difficult to pronounce, spell or are newly emerging. Linguists at Babbel also track new pronunciation challenges they see.

    In a pronunciation surprise of the year, actor Denzel Washington told late-night talk show host Jimmy Kimmel that he was named after his father and their first names are actually pronounced DEN-zul. But, he said, that became confusing so his mother decided to pronounce her son’s name Den-ZELLE.

  • Could RoboCop be to Detroit what Rocky is to Philly?

    Could RoboCop be to Detroit what Rocky is to Philly?

    DETROIT — RoboCop has finally found a permanent home in Detroit.

    A statue looming 11 feet tall and weighing 3,500 pounds has been drawing fans since it began standing guard over the Motor City on Wednesday afternoon, after about 15 years in the making. Even in a snowstorm in the dark, people were driving by to see it, said Jim Toscano, co-owner of the FREE AGE film production company where the bronze-cast statue now stands bolted near the sidewalk.

    RoboCop hit theaters in 1987, portraying a near-future Detroit as crime-ridden and poorly protected by a beleaguered and outgunned police force, until actor Peter Weller appeared as a nearly invincible cyborg, created by a nefarious corporation bent on privatizing policing.

    There was a time when Detroit pushed back on anything pointing to its past reputation as an unsafe city, and the movie, which developed a cult following, spawning two sequels and a reboot, didn’t help its image.

    But things have changed. Violent crime has been trending down for years. Homicide numbers have dropped below mid-1960s levels. And city officials offered no objections to the statue’s installation, Toscano said.

    “I think there will be a lot more acceptance,” Toscano said. “Detroit has come a long way. You put in a little nostalgia and that helps.”

    The statue campaign appears to have started around 2010 when Detroit Mayor Dave Bing was tagged in a tweet that noted Philadelphia’s statue of boxer Rocky Balboa and said RoboCop would be a “GREAT ambassador for Detroit.”

    Bing tweeted back, saying there were no such plans. But some Detroiters ran with the idea, crowdfunding it through a 2012 Kickstarter campaign that raised more than $67,000 from more than 2,700 backers worldwide, and Detroit sculptor Giorgio Gikas finished the statue in 2017.

    Then, it got stuck, stored away from public view.

    The Michigan Science Center in Detroit ultimately nixed plans to host the sculpture in 2021, citing pressures from the coronavirus pandemic and the need to focus museum resources. Officials in Stevens Point, Wis., raised their hands, hoping to honor Weller, a native son of that city, by erecting it outside the police station or in a park.

    The search for a suitable home for RoboCop remained in limbo until about three years ago when Toscano’s company bought a building in Eastern Market, an open-air produce market, shopping and entertainment district just northeast of downtown. Toscano says he thought they were “kidding” when he was contacted by the creator of the statue idea and Eastern Market officials. But he and his business partner gladly came on board: “It’s too unusual, too unique, too cool not to do,” Toscano said.

    Toscano, 48, says he’s only viewed the first RoboCop movie.

    “It wasn’t a big film in our house,” he admitted. But if there is one iconic line uttered by RoboCop that fits this moment, Toscano said it would be “Thank you for your cooperation.”

    On Thursday, James Campbell approached the statue and told three picture-takers: “I own this. Do you guys know that?”

    Campbell said he donated $100 to the original Kickstarter campaign over a decade ago, which makes him a “.038% owner of this statue.”

    “I’m here to see this big, beautiful, bronze piece of art,” he said. “What a piece of cinematic history to represent the city of Detroit.”

    Asked why RoboCop is an appropriate symbol for the city, Campbell said: “He’s a cyborg crime fighter! In the movie, in the futuristic Detroit, he’s there to save the city. He’s a symbol of hope.”

  • Grand jury rejects new mortgage fraud indictment against New York Attorney General Letitia James

    Grand jury rejects new mortgage fraud indictment against New York Attorney General Letitia James

    NORFOLK, Va. — The Justice Department failed Thursday to secure a new indictment against New York Attorney General Letitia James after a judge dismissed the previous mortgage fraud prosecution encouraged by President Donald Trump, according to people familiar with the matter.

    Prosecutors went back to a grand jury in Virginia after a judge’s ruling halting the prosecution of James and another longtime Trump foe, former FBI Director James Comey, on the grounds that the U.S. attorney who presented the cases was illegally appointed. But grand jurors rejected prosecutors’ request to bring charges.

    It’s the latest setback for the Justice Department in its bid to prosecute the frequent political target of the Republican president.

    Prosecutors are expected to try again for an indictment, according to one person familiar with the matter who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to publicly discuss the case.

    James was initially charged with bank fraud and making false statements to a financial institution in connection with a home purchase in Norfolk, Va., in 2020. Lindsey Halligan, a former White House aide and Trump lawyer, personally presented the case to the grand jury in October after being installed as U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia amid pressure from Trump to charge Comey and James.

    James has denied any wrongdoing and accused the administration of using the justice system to seek revenge against Trump’s political opponents. In a statement Thursday, James said: “It is time for this unchecked weaponization of our justice system to stop.”

    “This should be the end of this case,” her attorney, Abbe Lowell, said in a statement. “If they continue, undeterred by a court ruling and a grand jury’s rejection of the charges, it will be a shocking assault on the rule of law and a devastating blow to the integrity of our justice system.”

    The allegations related to James’ purchase of a modest house in Norfolk, where she has family. During the sale, she signed a standard document called a “second home rider” in which she agreed to keep the property primarily for her “personal use and enjoyment for at least one year,” unless the lender agreed otherwise.

    Rather than using the home as a second residence, James rented it out to a family of three, allowing her to obtain favorable loan terms not available for investment properties, prosecutors alleged.

    It’s the latest example of pushback by grand jurors since the beginning of the second Trump administration. It’s so unusual for grand jurors to refuse to return an indictment that it was once said that prosecutors could persuade a grand jury to “indict a ham sandwich.” But the Justice Department has faced setbacks in front of grand juries in several recent cases.

    Even if the charges against James are resurrected, the Justice Department could face obstacles in securing a conviction against James.

    James’ lawyers separately argued the case was a vindictive prosecution brought to punish the Trump critic who spent years investigating and suing the Republican president and won a staggering judgment in a lawsuit alleging he defrauded banks by overstating the value of his real estate holdings on financial statements. The fine was later tossed out by a higher court, but both sides are appealing.

    The defense had also alleged “outrageous government conduct” preceding her indictment, which the defense argued warrants the case’s dismissal. The judge hadn’t ruled on the defense’s arguments on those matters before dismissing the case last month over the appointment of Lindsey Halligan as U.S. attorney.

    U.S. District Judge Cameron McGowan Currie took issue with the mechanism the Trump administration employed to appoint Halligan to lead one of the Justice Department’s most elite and important offices.

    Halligan was named as a replacement for Erik Siebert, a veteran prosecutor in the office and interim U.S. attorney who resigned in September amid Trump administration pressure to file charges against both Comey and James.

    The following night, Trump said he would be nominating Halligan to the role of interim U.S. attorney and publicly implored Attorney General Pam Bondi to take action against his political opponents, saying in a Truth Social post that, “We can’t delay any longer, it’s killing our reputation and credibility” and “JUSTICE MUST BE SERVED, NOW!!!”

    Comey was indicted three days after Halligan was sworn in by Bondi, and James was charged two weeks after that.

    The Justice Department had defended Halligan’s appointment but has also revealed that Bondi had given Halligan a separate position of “Special Attorney,” presumably as a way to protect the indictments from the possibility of collapse. But Currie said such a retroactive designation could not save the cases.

  • California activist gets jail time for taking chickens from Perdue Farms plant

    California activist gets jail time for taking chickens from Perdue Farms plant

    SANTA ROSA, Calif. — A California animal welfare activist who took four chickens from a major Perdue Farms poultry plant was sentenced to 90 days in jail after being convicted of felony conspiracy, trespassing and other charges.

    Zoe Rosenberg, 23, did not deny taking the animals from Petaluma Poultry but argued she wasn’t breaking the law because she was rescuing the birds from a cruel situation. A jury found her guilty in October after a seven-week trial in Sonoma County, an agricultural area of Northern California.

    Rosenberg was sentenced on Wednesday and ordered to report to the Sonoma County Jail on Dec. 10. She will serve the 90 days, but 60 of those may involve jail alternates, such as house arrest, the county’s district attorney’s office said. Rosenberg will also have two years of probation, and she is ordered to stay away from all Perdue facilities in the county.

    The activist with Direct Action Everywhere, or DxE, a Berkeley-based animal rights group, has said she does not regret what she did.

    “I will not apologize for taking sick, neglected animals to get medical care,” Rosenberg said following her conviction.

    The group named the birds — Poppy, Ivy, Aster, and Azalea — and placed them in an animal sanctuary.

    Petaluma Poultry has said that DxE is an extremist group that is intent on destroying the animal agriculture industry. The company maintains that the animals were not mistreated and said Wednesday’s sentencing upholds the rule of law.

    “We’re grateful that DxE has been held to account for its unlawful campaign –- training and paying staff to carry out dangerous, unauthorized intrusions onto private property,” Herb Frerichs, general counsel for Petaluma Poultry, said in a statement Thursday. “DxE’s actions show a reckless disregard for employee safety, animal welfare, and food security.”

    Rosenberg testified that she disguised herself as a Petaluma Poultry worker using a fake badge and earpiece to take the birds, and then posted a video of her actions on social media.

    Petaluma Poultry is a subsidiary of Perdue Farms — one of the United States’ largest poultry providers for major grocery chains.

    The co-founder of DxE was convicted two years ago for his role in factory farm protests in Petaluma.

  • Speaker Johnson pleads with Republicans to keep concerns private after tumultuous week

    Speaker Johnson pleads with Republicans to keep concerns private after tumultuous week

    WASHINGTON — House Speaker Mike Johnson is imploring his fellow Republicans to stop venting their frustrations in public and bring their complaints to him directly.

    “They’re going to get upset about things. That’s part of the process,” Johnson told reporters Thursday. “It doesn’t bother me. But when there is a conflict or concern, I always ask all members to come to me, don’t go to social media.”

    Increasingly, they’re ignoring him.

    Cracks inside the GOP conference were stark this week as a member of Johnson’s own leadership team openly accused him of lying, rank-and-file Republicans acted unilaterally to force votes and a leadership-backed bill faltered. It’s all underscored by growing worries that the party is on a path towards losing the majority next year.

    “I certainly think that the current leadership and specifically the speaker needs to change the way that he approaches the job,” GOP Rep. Kevin Kiley of California said on Thursday.

    Kiley, who has grown vocally critical of Johnson after the GOP’s nationwide redistricting campaign backfired in California, said that the speaker has been critical of rank-and-file Republicans, so “he needs to be prepared to accept any criticism that comes with the job.”

    “And I think, unfortunately, there’s been ample reason for criticism,” he added.

    ‘Why do we have to legislate by discharge petitions?’

    For the first part of 2025, Johnson held together his slim Republican majority in the House to pass a number of President Donald Trump’s priorities, including his massive spending and tax cut plan.

    But after Johnson kept members out of session for nearly two months during the government shutdown, they returned anxious to work on priorities that had been backlogged for months — and with the reality that their time in the majority may be running out.

    First was a high-profile discharge petition to force the vote on releasing the Jeffrey Epstein files, which succeeded after it reached the 218-signature threshold. Other lawmakers are launching more petitions, a step that used to be considered a major affront to party leadership.

    “The discharge petition, I think, always shows a bit of frustration,” said GOP Rep. Dusty Johnson.

    Another discharge petition on a bill that would repeal Trump’s executive order to end collective bargaining with federal labor unions reached the signature threshold last month, with support from seven Republicans.

    And this week, GOP Rep. Anna Paulina Luna of Florida brought a long-anticipated discharge petition for a bill to bar members of Congress from trading stock. A number of Republicans have already signed on, in addition to Democrats.

    “Anxious is what happens when you get nervous. I’m not nervous. I’m pissed,” Luna wrote on social media late Thursday, responding to leadership comments that she was overly anxious.

    GOP Rep. Nancy Mace of South Carolina signed both Luna’s petition and the one to release the Epstein files. She told reporters Thursday that she expressed her frustrations directly to Johnson in a phone call, and also in what she described as “a deeply personal, deeply passionate letter, that we are legislating by discharge petition.”

    “We have a very slim majority, but I want President Trump’s executive orders codified,” Mace said. “I want to see his agenda implemented. Why do we have to legislate by discharge petitions?”

    Johnson’s own leadership team going after him

    At the center of Johnson’s pleas for members to bring concerns to him privately instead of on social media is the chairwoman of House Republican leadership, New York Rep. Elise Stefanik.

    Angered that a provision she championed wasn’t included in a defense authorization bill, Stefanik blasted Johnson’s claims that he wasn’t aware of the provision as “more lies from the Speaker.” She conducted a series of media interviews criticizing Johnson, including one with The Wall Street Journal in which she said he was a “political novice” who wouldn’t be re-elected speaker if the vote were held today.

    Johnson told reporters Thursday that he had a “great talk” with Stefanik the night before.

    “I called her and I said, ‘why wouldn’t you just come to me, you know?’” Johnson said. “So we had some intense fellowship about that.”

    Asked if she had apologized for calling him a liar, Johnson said: “Um, you ask Elise about that.”

    Illinois GOP Rep. Mary Miller released a statement Thursday providing support for Johnson, saying that while there are differences among members “our mission is bigger than any one individual or headline.”

    Democrats, who have had leadership criticisms of their own, have reveled in the GOP’s disarray. House Republican leaders attempted to muscle through an NCAA-backed bill to regulate college sports after the White House endorsed it, before support within Republican ranks crumbled. Some GOP lawmakers pointedly said they had bigger priorities before the end of the year.

    “It’s not that Congress can’t legislate, it’s House Republicans that can’t legislate. It’s the gang that can’t legislate straight. They continue to take the ‘my way or the highway’ approach,” said House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries.

    Underlying GOP unease about 2026

    All eyes in the U.S. House were on a special election Tuesday night in a Tennessee district that a Republican had won in 2024 by nearly 21 percentage points, with Trump carrying the area by a similar margin.

    Republicans hoped the contest would help them regain momentum after losing several marquee races across the country in November. Democrats, meanwhile, argued that keeping the race close would signal strong political winds at their backs ahead of next year’s midterms, which will determine control of both chambers.

    Republican Matt Van Epps ultimately won by nearly 9 percentage points.

    “I do think to have that district that went by over 20 points a year ago be down to nine, it should be a wake up call,” said GOP Rep. Don Bacon of Nebraska.

    He argued that Republicans need “to get some economic progress, like immediately,” adding that “the president and his team have got to come to grips” that tariffs are not driving the economic growth Americans are feeling.

    “I just feel like they’re going to have to get out of their bubble,” Bacon said of the White House. “Get out of your bubble. The economy needs improving. Fix Ukraine and we do need a temporary health care fix.”

    Bacon is among a growing number of House Republicans who have announced they will retire after this term. Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene abruptly declared last month that she would resign in January, citing multiple reasons, including that “the legislature has been mostly sidelined” this year.

    Those retirements add to the GOP’s challenge in holding the House, as the party must now defend more open seats. Republicans have also seen a redistricting battle — sparked by Trump’s pressure on Texas Republicans and then more states — backfire in part. In November, California voters handed Democrats a victory by approving a new congressional map.

    “That’s living in a fantasy world if you think that this redistricting war is what’s going to save the majority,” said Kiley, now at risk of losing his seat after redistricting in California.

    He added: “I think what would make a lot bigger impact is if the House played a proactive role in actually putting forward legislation that matters.”

  • Immigration crackdown in New Orleans has a target of 5,000 arrests. Is that possible?

    Immigration crackdown in New Orleans has a target of 5,000 arrests. Is that possible?

    NEW ORLEANS — Trump administration officials overseeing the immigration crackdown launched this week in New Orleans are aiming to make 5,000 arrests with a focus on violent offenders, a target that some city leaders say is not realistic.

    It’s an ambitious goal that would surpass the number of arrests during a two-month enforcement blitz this fall around Chicago, a region with a much bigger immigrant population than New Orleans.

    In Los Angeles — the first major battleground in President Donald Trump’s aggressive immigration plan — roughly 5,000 people were arrested over the summer in an area where 10 million LA county residents are foreign-born.

    “There is no rational basis that a sweep of New Orleans, or the surrounding parishes, would ever yield anywhere near 5,000 criminals, let alone ones that are considered ‘violent’ by any definition,” New Orleans City Council President J.P. Morrell said Thursday.

    Census Bureau figures show the New Orleans metro area had a foreign-born population of almost 100,000 residents last year, and that just under 60% were not U.S. citizens.

    “The amount of violent crime attributed to illegal immigrants is negligible,” Morrell said, pointing out that crime in New Orleans is at historic lows.

    Violent crimes, including murders, rapes, and robberies, have fallen by 12% through October compared to a year ago, from a total of 2,167 violent crimes to 1,897 this year, according to New Orleans police statistics.

    A flood of messages about arrests

    Federal agents in marked and unmarked vehicles began spreading out across New Orleans and its suburbs Wednesday, making arrests in home improvement store parking lots and patrolling neighborhoods with large immigrant populations.

    Alejandra Vasquez, who runs a social media page in New Orleans that reports the whereabouts of federal agents, said she has received a flood of messages, photos and video since the operations began.

    “My heart is so broken,” Vasquez said. “They came here to take criminals and they are taking our working people. They are not here doing what they are supposed to do. They are taking families.”

    Several hundred agents from Customs and Border Protection and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement are participating in the two-month operation dubbed “Catahoula Crunch.”

    House Speaker Mike Johnson, who is from Louisiana, is among the state’s Republicans supporting the crackdown. “Democrats’ sanctuary city policies have failed — making our American communities dangerous. The people of our GREAT city deserve better, and help is now on the ground,” Johnson posted on social media.

    Operation is being met with resistance

    About two dozen protesters were removed from a New Orleans City Council meeting Thursday after chants of “Shame” broke out. Police officers ordered protesters to leave the building, with some pushed or physically carried out by officers.

    Planning documents obtained last month by The Associated Press show the crackdown is intended to cover southeast Louisiana and into Mississippi.

    Homeland Security Department spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin said agents are going after immigrants who were released after arrests for violent crimes.

    “In just 24 hours on the ground, our law enforcement officers have arrested violent criminals with rap sheets that include homicide, kidnapping, child abuse, robbery, theft, and assault,” McLaughlin said Thursday in a statement. Border Patrol and immigration officials have not responded to requests for details, including how many have been arrested so far.

    She told CNN on Wednesday that “we will continue whether that will be 5,000 arrests or beyond.”

    Immigration arrests go beyond violent criminals

    To come close to reaching their target numbers in New Orleans, immigrant rights group fear federal agents will set their sights on a much broader group.

    New Orleans City Councilmember Lesli Harris said “there are nowhere near 5,000 violent offenders in our region” whom Border Patrol could arrest.

    “What we’re seeing instead are mothers, teenagers, and workers being detained during routine check-ins, from their homes and places of work,” Harris said. “Immigration violations are civil matters, not criminal offenses, and sweeping up thousands of residents who pose no threat will destabilize families, harm our economy.”

    During the “Operation Midway Blitz” crackdown in Chicago that began in September, federal immigration agents arrested more than 4,000 people across the city and its many suburbs, dipping into Indiana.

    Homeland Security officials heralded efforts to nab violent criminals, posting dozens of pictures on social media of people appearing to have criminal histories and lacking legal permission to be in the U.S. But public records tracking the first weeks of the Chicago push show most arrestees didn’t have a criminal record.

    Of roughly 1,900 people arrested in the Chicago area from early September through the middle of October — the latest data available — nearly 300 or about 15% had criminal convictions on their records, according to ICE arrest data from the University of California Berkeley Deportation Data Project analyzed by The Associated Press.

    The vast majority of those convictions were for traffic offenses, misdemeanors or nonviolent felonies, the data showed.

    New Orleans, whose international flavor comes from its long history of French, Spanish, African, and Native American cultures, has seen a new wave of immigrants from places in Central and South America and Asia.

    Across all of Louisiana, there were more than 145,000 foreign-born noncitizens, according to the Census Bureau. While those numbers don’t break down how many residents of the state were in the country illegally, the Pew Research Center estimated the number at 110,000 people in 2023.

  • N.Y. attorney general challenges authority of acting U.S. attorney investigating her Trump lawsuits

    N.Y. attorney general challenges authority of acting U.S. attorney investigating her Trump lawsuits

    ALBANY, N.Y. — President Donald Trump’s effort to install political loyalists as top federal prosecutors has run into a legal buzz saw lately, with judges ruling that his handpicked U.S. attorneys for New Jersey, eastern Virginia, Nevada, and Los Angeles were all serving unlawfully.

    On Thursday, another federal judge heard an argument by New York Attorney General Letitia James that the administration also twisted the law to make John Sarcone the acting U.S. attorney for northern New York.

    James, a Democrat, is challenging Sarcone’s authority to oversee a Justice Department investigation into regulatory lawsuits she filed against Trump and the National Rifle Association. It’s one of several arguments she is making to block subpoenas issued as part of the probe, which her lawyers say is part of a campaign of baseless investigations and prosecutions of Trump’s perceived enemies.

    Her attorney Hailyn Chen argued in court that since Sarcone lacks legitimate authority to act as U.S. attorney, legal steps taken by him in that capacity — like the subpoenas — are unlawful. In response to a question from U.S. District Judge Lorna G. Schofield, Chen said Sarcone should be disqualified from the investigation and the office.

    “Sarcone exercised power that he did not lawfully possess,” Chen told the judge.

    Justice Department lawyers say Sarcone was appointed properly and the motion to block the subpoenas should be denied. Assistant U.S. Attorney Richard Belliss argued that disqualifying Sarcone would be “drastic and extreme.”

    “We don’t think that’s a proper remedy,” Belliss said.

    Schofield, after peppering both attorneys with questions, did not say when she would rule.

    The fight in New York and other states is largely over the legality of unorthodox strategies the Trump administration has adopted to appoint prosecutors seen as unlikely to get confirmed by the U.S. Senate.

    The hearing came a week after a federal judge in Virginia dismissed indictments brought there against James and former FBI Director James Comey. That judge concluded that the interim U.S. attorney who brought the charges, Lindsey Halligan, was unlawfully appointed. The Justice Department is expected to appeal.

    On Monday, a federal appeals court ruled that Alina Habba, Trump’s former personal lawyer, is disqualified from serving as New Jersey’s top federal prosecutor.

    Under federal law, the president’s nominees for U.S. attorney must be confirmed by the Senate. If a position is vacant, the U.S. attorney general can appoint someone temporarily, but that appointment expires after 120 days. If that time period elapses, judges in the district can either keep the interim U.S. attorney or appoint someone of their own choosing.

    Sarcone’s appointment didn’t follow that path.

    Trump hasn’t nominated anyone to serve as U.S. attorney for the Northern District of New York. U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi appointed Sarcone to serve as the interim U.S. attorney in March. When his 120-day term elapsed, judges in the district declined to keep him in the post.

    Bondi then took the unusual step of appointing Sarcone as a special attorney, then designated him first assistant U.S. attorney for the district, a maneuver federal officials say allows him to serve as an acting U.S. attorney.

    Chen called it an abuse of executive power.

    The New York subpoenas seek records related to a civil case James filed against Trump over alleged fraud in his personal business dealings and records from a lawsuit involving the National Rifle Association and two senior executives.

    Belliss argued in court that the U.S. attorney general has broad authority to appoint attorneys within her department and to delegate her functions to those attorneys. Belliss said that even if Sarcone is not properly holding the office of acting U.S. attorney, he can still conduct grand jury investigations as a special attorney.

    Sarcone was part of Trump’s legal team during the 2016 presidential campaign and worked for the U.S. General Services Administration as the regional administrator for the Northeast and Caribbean during Trump’s first term.

    Habba also served as an interim U.S. attorney. When her appointment expired, New Jersey judges replaced her with a career prosecutor who had served as her second-in-command. Bondi then fired that prosecutor and renamed Habba as acting U.S. attorney.

    A similar dynamic is playing out in Nevada, where a federal judge disqualified the Trump administration’s pick to be U.S. attorney there. And a federal judge in Los Angeles disqualified the acting U.S. attorney in Southern California from several cases after concluding he had stayed in the job longer than allowed by law.