SPRINGFIELD, Ill. — A former Illinois sheriff’s deputy was sentenced Thursday to 20 years in prison for fatally shooting Sonya Massey, who had dialed 911 to report a possible prowler outside her Springfield home.
Sean Grayson, 31, was convicted in October. Grayson, who is white, received the maximum possible sentence. He has been incarcerated since he was charged in the killing.
He apologized during the sentencing, saying he wished he could bring Massey back and spare her family the pain he caused.
“I made a lot of mistakes that night. There were points when I should’ve acted, and I didn’t. I froze,” he said. “I made terrible decisions that night. I’m sorry.”
But Massey’s parents and two children — who lobbied for the maximum sentence — said their lives had changed dramatically since the killing. Her two children said they had to grow up without a mother, while Massey’s mother said she lived in fear. They asked the judge to carry out justice in her name.
“Today, I’m afraid to call the police in fear that I might end up like Sonya,” her mother Donna Massey said.
When the judge read the sentence, the family reacted with a loud cheer: “Yes!” The judge admonished them.
After the hearing, Massey’s relatives thanked the public for the support and listening to their stories about Massey.
“Twenty years is not enough,” her daughter Summer told reporters.
In the early morning hours of July 6, 2024, Massey — who struggled with mental health issues — summoned emergency responders because she feared there was a prowler outside her Springfield home.
According to body camera footage, Grayson and sheriff’s Deputy Dawson Farley, who was not charged, searched Massey’s yard before meeting her at her door. Massey appeared confused and repeatedly said, “Please, God.”
The deputies entered her house, Grayson noticed the pot on the stove and ordered Farley to move it. Instead, Massey went to the stove, retrieved the pot and teased Grayson for moving away from “the hot, steaming water.”
From this moment, the exchange quickly escalated.
Massey said: “I rebuke you in the name of Jesus.”
Grayson drew his sidearm and yelled at her to drop the pan. She set the pot down and ducked behind a counter. But she appeared to pick it up again.
That’s when Grayson opened fire on the 36-year-old single mother, shooting her in the face. He testified that he feared Massey would scald him.
Grayson was charged with three counts of first-degree murder, which could have led to a life sentence, but a jury convicted him of the lesser charge. Illinois allows for a second-degree murder conviction if evidence shows the defendant honestly thought he was in danger, even if that fear was unreasonable.
Massey’s family was outraged by the jury’s decision.
“The justice system did exactly what it’s designed to do today. It’s not meant for us,” her cousin Sontae Massey said after the verdict.
The question: Does ginger really help an upset stomach?
The science: For more than 2,500 years, ginger has been used for its medicinal properties.
Ginger is stilloften recommended as a way to ease stomach upset.
Ginger, which is available at almost any grocery store and often used as a spice, looks like a root but is technically a rhizome — a modified, horizontal-growing stem of the Zingiber officinale plant.And it has properties that can relieve mild to moderate nausea, experts and studies say. However, it works better for some types of stomach trouble than others — and it matters how you take it.
“We live in a world where there’s this gigantic box of options for our patients and so many of them are costly and have side effects,” said Joshua Forman, a gastroenterologist at the University of Maryland St. Joseph Medical Center, who recommends ginger to his patients. “It’s interesting how sometimes the simplest things fly under the radar.”
What is ginger, and why does it work?
Ginger can be eaten raw or cooked, steeped in tea, or taken as lozenges, gummies, or chews. But when taken for medicinal purposes, Forman said, he advises his patients to take ginger root powder in capsule form, which offers more consistent dosing than most other variations, to ease symptoms of nausea, indigestion, and other symptoms.
Here’s why it works. Ginger contains compounds such as gingerol, shogaol, and zingerone that act on receptors in our gut and nerves that send signals to our central nervous system. One receptor, 5-HT3, regulates nausea, while another, TRPV1, triggers pain signals. By affecting these receptors, ginger may help ease nausea and discomfort, Forman said.
Additionally, these compounds can help the lower part of the stomach contract, which speeds up digestion and reduces fullness and bloating, he said.
Ginger also has anti-inflammatory and antioxidant properties, which may help protect against gastrointestinal irritation, said Keshab Paudel, an associate professor of pharmacology at Burrell College of Osteopathic Medicine in Florida, who studies ginger.
In a 2025 literature review on the pharmacological effects of ginger, Paudel and his colleagues found that ginger reduced nausea, particularly nausea related to pregnancy, but did not consistently relieve vomiting. Ginger also showed other potential benefits such as helping to reduce inflammation, oxidative stress, and blood glucose levels, said Paudel, who was the lead author of the study.
Additionally, some studies show that ginger may help with nausea and vomiting caused by chemotherapy, particularly when combined with antinausea medications. It may help ease nausea after surgery, though findings are mixed on postoperative vomiting. It may also help with nausea related to migraine pain.
There isn’t enough data, however, to suggest that ginger can curb nausea related to stomach viruses, hangovers, or chronic acid reflux, Paudel said.
How should I take ginger for a stomachache?
The amount of ginger used in studies to treat nausea varies from 500 to 1,500 milligrams divided throughout the day, with 1 to 3 grams daily at the upper end. More than that and itmay worsen reflux, heartburn, and other gastrointestinal symptoms. Forman said he recommends taking 500 mg twice per day.
If you like the taste, fresh ginger root works well in hot tea, though it’s harder to figure out what dose you are getting, Forman said.
Just boil freshly grated or sliced ginger in a pot of water and let it steep for at least 10 minutes, then strain out the ginger. Add a tea bag or loose tea leaves (which you would also strain out)and, if you’d like, honey and lemon.
Forman cautioned against using store-bought ginger tea drinks as they often contain sweeteners and other ingredients.
Don’t waste your time with most ginger ales,Forman said. Many contain ingredients such as high-fructose corn syrup and very little ginger, sometimes using artificial ginger flavoring. Ginger beers (which are generally nonalcoholic, despite the name) can sometimes contain more ginger than soda, but the amount can vary.
Who shouldn’t take ginger medicinally?
Although ginger is generally considered safe and is almost universally well-tolerated, it can lower blood sugar and impair blood platelet function when taken regularly at high doses, Forman said. If you have diabetes or take blood thinners, talk to your doctor before taking ginger supplements.
Additionally, there is limited clinical data on the use of ginger in young children, so before giving it to your child as a daily supplement, consult a pediatrician, Paudel said.
Ginger “should be viewed as a supportive, evidence-based complementary option, not a cure-all,” and people with persistent or severe gastrointestinal symptoms should seek medical care rather than trying to treat the condition on their own, he said.
What else you should know
There are various over-the-counter medications to treat nausea and vomiting such as dimenhydrinate (Dramamine), which is commonly used to combat motion sickness, and bismuth subsalicylate (Pepto-Bismol), which can help with nausea, indigestion, and diarrhea often related to stomach bugs.
If you prefer natural remedies, however, here are some ideas from experts:
Peppermint oil may relieve gastrointestinal discomfort and symptoms of irritable bowel syndrome. Although the evidence is not conclusive, some research suggests that enteric-coated peppermint oil capsules may reduce abdominal pain, bloating, and gas, Paudel said. (Enteric coating keeps the pill from dissolving in stomach acid so that the drug is released in the intestines, where it can be best absorbed.) But similar to ginger, “the effectiveness of these interventions largely depends on the underlying cause of the symptoms,” he said. In studies, peppermint oil appears safe for most people, but there isn’t much research on its medicinal use in women who are pregnant or breastfeeding, so consult your doctor before taking it.
Vitamin B6 may help with morning sickness — nausea and vomiting related to pregnancy, Paudel said. In some studies, doses have ranged from 10 mg to 25 mg, taken up to three times per day.
Chamomile tea also may help ease an upset stomach. A 2025 review found that chamomile was associated with reductions in sores and discomfort in the mucous membranes lining the digestive tract, suggesting it may have anti-inflammatory properties.
The bottom line: Ginger — whether taken in capsules or fresh, homemade tea — can ease mild to moderate nausea, but research doesn’t show that it consistently reduces vomiting. It also hasn’t been shown to help with nausea related to stomach viruses, hangovers or chronic acid reflux.
MINNEAPOLIS — President Donald Trump seemed to signal a willingness to ease tensions in Minneapolis after a second deadly shooting by federal immigration agents, but there was little evidence Wednesday of any significant changes following weeks of harsh rhetoric and clashes with protesters.
The strain was evident when Trump made a leadership change by sending his top border adviser to Minnesota to take charge of the immigration crackdown. That was followed by seemingly conciliatory remarks about the Democratic governor and mayor.
Trump said he and Gov. Tim Walz, whom he criticized for weeks, were on “a similar wavelength” following a phone call. After a conversation with Mayor Jacob Frey, the president praised the discussion and declared that “lots of progress is being made.”
But on city streets, there were few signs of a shift. Immigration enforcement operations and confrontations with activists continued Wednesday in Minneapolis and St. Paul.
A group of protesters blew whistles and pointed out federal officers in a vehicle on a north Minneapolis street. When the officers’ vehicle moved, a small convoy of activists followed in their cars for a few blocks until the officers stopped again.
When Associated Press journalists got out of their car to document the encounter, officers with the federal Bureau of Prisons pushed one of them, threatened them with arrest and told them to get back in their car despite the reporters’ identifying themselves as journalists. Officers from multiple federal agencies have been involved in the enforcement operations.
From their car, the AP journalists saw at least one person being pepper sprayed and one detained, though it was unclear if that person was the target of the operation or a protester. Agents also broke car windows.
Attorney General Pam Bondi, who is visiting Minnesota, said 16 people were arrested Wednesday on charges of assaulting, resisting or impeding law enforcement in the state. She said more arrests were expected.
“NOTHING will stop President Trump and this Department of Justice from enforcing the law,” Bondi said in a social media post.
Messages seeking comment were left with Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the Border Patrol.
Woman tells agents knocking on door: ‘They’re good neighbors’
On Wednesday afternoon in the Minneapolis suburb of Brooklyn Center, half a dozen agents went to a house in a small residential neighborhood.
One agent knocked on the door of the home repeatedly. Another told the AP they were seeking a man who had been twice deported and was convicted of domestic abuse. The agent said the man had run into the home and the agents lacked a judicial warrant to get inside.
Some federal immigration officers are asserting sweeping power to forcibly enter people’s homes without a judge’s warrant and instead are using a more narrow administrative warrant to arrest migrants considered illegally present or otherwise deportable. The key difference is whether agents can forcibly enter a private property to make an arrest, as they were captured on video doing in Minneapolis earlier this month.
A handful of activists blew whistles at the agents in Brooklyn Center. One agent said: “They’d rather call the police on us than to help us. Go figure.”
As the agents were preparing to leave, a woman called out to them saying, “You need to know they’re good neighbors.”
Kari Rod told the AP that she didn’t know these neighbors well, but they had come to her garage sale, kept their yard clean, and waved hello when she drove by. She didn’t believe enforcement agents to be speaking the truth about whom they arrest, including another neighbor whom she said was deported to Laos last summer.
“I don’t trust a single thing they said about who they are,” Rod said. “From my interactions, I know them way better than anyone else does, any one of those federal agents.”
Immigrants are ‘still very worried’
Many immigrant families are still fearful of leaving their homes, and Latino businesses are still closed, said Daniel Hernandez, who owns the Minneapolis grocery store Colonial Market. He also runs a popular Facebook page geared toward informing the Hispanic community in the Twin Cities.
While Colonial Market is open, all but one of the dozen immigrant-run businesses that rented space inside to sell clothes, jewelry, and toys have closed since late December, and none has plans to reopen, Hernandez said.
“The reality is the community is still very worried and afraid,” Hernandez said.
Hernandez referenced Border Patrol commander Gregory Bovino, who helped lead the administration’s crackdown in the Twin Cities and who has reportedly been assigned elsewhere.
Bovino “was removed, but the tactics so far are still the same,” Hernandez said. “Nobody now is trusting the government with those changes.”
Judge warns ICE about not complying with federal orders
In Minnesota federal court, the issue of ICE not complying with court orders came to the fore as Chief Judge Patrick Schiltz said the agency had violated 96 court orders in 74 cases since Jan. 1.
“This list should give pause to anyone — no matter his or her political beliefs — who cares about the rule of law,” he wrote. “ICE has likely violated more court orders in January 2026 than some federal agencies have violated in their entire existence.”
Schiltz earlier this week ordered ICE’s acting director to personally appear in his courtroom Friday after the agency failed to obey an order to release an Ecuadorian man from detention in Texas. The judge canceled the order after the agency freed the man.
The judge, who was appointed by President George W. Bush, warned ICE that future noncompliance may result in future orders requiring the personal appearances of Acting Director Todd Lyons or other government officials.
ICE didn’t immediately respond to an email seeking comment.
Vietnam War veteran Donnie McMillan places a sign that says “In remembrance of my angel” at a memorial set up at the location where VA nurse Alex Pretti was shot by federal agents in Minneapolis.
Veteran visits sidewalk memorial
Elsewhere on Wednesday, Donnie McMillan placed a cardboard sign reading “In remembrance of my angel” at the makeshift memorial where Alex Pretti was shot.
The Vietnam veteran knelt to pay his respects and saluted to honor the nurse whom he said he remembered seeing during his frequent visits to the VA hospital where Pretti worked.
“I feel like I’ve lost an angel right here,” McMillan, 71, said, pointing to the growing sidewalk memorial covered in flowers, candles, and signs.
“This is not the way we should operate,” McMillan said. “I respect everybody, but I respect my angel more, and now he’s no longer with us.”
Also Wednesday, the Department of Homeland Security said two federal agents involved in Pretti’s death have been on leave since Saturday, when the shooting happened.
“What is unfolding in our state is not accidental. It is part of a coordinated effort to target Black and brown, immigrant and Muslim communities through fear, racial profiling, and intimidation,” Omar said. ”This administration’s immigration agenda is not about law enforcement — it is about making people feel they do not belong.”
The Trump administration on Wednesday announced criminal charges against 16 people in Minneapolis whom it accused of assaulting officers or interfering with federal immigration enforcement operations as tensions in the city continue to escalate.
Attorney General Pam Bondi announced the Justice Department prosecutions in a social media post, naming those who were charged and indicating she expects more arrests.
“I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: NOTHING will stop President Trump and this Department of Justice from enforcing the law,” Bondi wrote on X, adding that she was in Minneapolis.
Already this month, federal prosecutors had charged 17 people in Minneapolis with crimes tied to protests or related to the administration’s surge in immigration enforcement.
Bondi’s defiant posture came despite what appeared to be a shift in tone from President Donald Trump and other senior aides amid widespread outrage over immigration officers’ fatal shootings of two U.S. citizens in the city this month. Authorities said the two federal agents who fired at Alex Pretti, 37, on Saturday have been placed on administrative leave, per standard agency protocol.
Those developments came a day after the Department of Homeland Security provided the first official timeline of the deadly encounter in a statement sent to some members of Congress. The document, which was based on preliminary review, made no mention of Pretti brandishing a weapon, contradicting Trump administration comments in the immediate aftermath of the shooting, when senior officials described Pretti as a direct threat to federal agents and officers.
The Trump administration has begun to back away from some of its inflammatory rhetoric about the shooting and replaced Greg Bovino, the Border Patrol commander who was overseeing the Minneapolis operation, with border czar Tom Homan.
“I think the whole thing is terrible,” Trump said Tuesday in an interview with Fox News when asked about events in Minnesota over the past week and Pretti’s killing. “I don’t like the fact that he was carrying a gun that was fully loaded. … Bottom line, it was terrible.”
The news that two immigration agents involved in Pretti’s shooting are on leave undercuts Bovino’s previous claim that “all agents that were involved in that scene are working, not in Minneapolis, but in other locations.”
The broader shift in the White House’s tone on Pretti’s killing comes as a growing number of Republicans challenge the Trump administration’s handling of the shooting and become more critical of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi L. Noem. It also reflects concern that without a significant course correction, Republicans are likely to lose control of Congress in November’s midterm elections.
Stephen Miller, Trump’s White House deputy chief of staff, called Pretti an “assassin” in the immediate aftermath of his killing. On Tuesday, Miller said the administration was evaluating whether Customs and Border Protection “may not have been following” official protocol before the shooting.
Noem also initially portrayed the circumstances surrounding the fatal shootings of both Pretti and Renée Good in Minneapolis as assaults on federal law enforcement, despite video evidence to the contrary.
A woman who said she filmed Pretti’s shooting rebutted DHS’s initial claims that Pretti had brandished a weapon or was acting in a threatening manner.
Speaking to CNN’s Anderson Cooper on Tuesday, Stella Carlson, who estimated she was no more than 10 feet from Pretti when he was shot, said he was filming immigration enforcement personnel and trying to direct traffic.
Carlson said she got out of her car and started filming Pretti, whom she had never met, as he directed traffic. She said that Pretti was acting “calm” and “definitely without threat,” and that she did not see him brandish a weapon. “If I had, I maybe wouldn’t have stayed so close” to him, she said.
Pretti’s death has prompted bipartisan calls for an independent investigation. Top Justice Department officials said previously that they saw no basis for a civil rights investigation into Good’s Jan. 7 shooting. The department, however, has sought to pursue an investigation into Good’s partner, the Washington Post has reported.
On Tuesday, Rep. Ilhan Omar (D., Minn.), a frequent target of the Trump administration, was attacked during a town-hall meeting and Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents tried to enter the Ecuadoran Consulate before being turned away.
A man used a syringe to spray an unknown liquid in Omar’s direction, police said, shortly after Omar called on Noem to “resign or face impeachment.” The man, later identified as 55-year-old Anthony Kazmierczak, was immediately tackled and arrested, and Omar later said she was “OK.”
A third round of “No Kings” protests is coming this spring, with organizers saying they are planning their largest demonstrations yet across the United States to oppose what they describe as authoritarianism under President Donald Trump.
Previous rallies have drawn millions of people, and organizers said they expect even greater numbers on March 28 in the wake of Trump’s immigration crackdown in Minneapolis, where violent clashes have led to the death of two people.
“We expect this to be the largest protest in American history,” Ezra Levin, co-executive director of the nonprofit Indivisible, told the Associated Press ahead of Wednesday’s announcement. He predicted that as many as 9 million people will turn out.
“No Kings” protests, which are organized by a constellation of groups around the country, have been a focal point for outrage over Trump’s attempts to consolidate and expand his power.
“This is in large part a response to a combination of the heinous attacks on our democracy and communities coming from the regime, and a sense that nobody’s coming to save us,” Levin said.
Last year, Trump said he felt attendees were “not representative of the people of our country,” and he insisted that “I’m not a king.”
‘No Kings’ shifts focus after Minneapolis deaths
The latest round of protests had been in the works before the crackdown in Minneapolis. However, the killing of two people by federal agents in recent weeks has refocused plans.
Levin said they want to show “support for Minnesota and immigrant communities all over” and oppose “the secret police force that is murdering Americans and infringing on their basic constitutional rights.”
“And what we know is, the only way to defend those rights is to exercise them, and you do that in nonviolent but forceful ways, and that’s what I expect to see in ‘No Kings’ three,” Levin said.
Trump has broadly defended his aggressive deportation campaign and blamed local officials for refusing to cooperate. However, he’s more recently signaled a shift in response to bipartisan concern over the killing of Alex Pretti in Minneapolis on Saturday.
Previous ‘No Kings’ protests have drawn millions across the U.S.
In June, the first “No Kings” rallies were organized in nearly 2,000 locations nationwide, including cities, towns and community spaces. Those protests followed unrest over federal immigration raids and Trump’s deployment of the National Guard and Marines to Los Angeles, where tensions escalated with protesters blocking a freeway and setting vehicles on fire.
They were organized also in large part to protest a military parade in the nation’s capital that marked the Army’s 250th anniversary and coincided with Trump’s birthday. “No Kings” organizers at the time called the parade a “coronation” that was symbolic of what they characterized as Trump’s growing authoritarian overreach.
In response, some conservative politicians condemned the protests as “Hate America” rallies.
During a second round of protests in October, organizers said demonstrations were held in about 2,700 cities and towns across the country. At the time, Levin pointed to Trump’s sweeping immigration crackdown, his unprecedented promises to use federal power to influence midterm elections, restrictions on press freedom and retribution against political opponents, steps he said cumulatively represented a direct threat to constitutionally protected rights.
On social media, both Trump and the official White House account mocked the protests, posting computer-generated images of the president wearing a crown.
The big protest days are headline-grabbing moments, but Levin said groups like his are determined to keep up steady trainings and intermediate-level organizing in hopes of growing sustainable resistance to the Trump administration’s actions.
“This isn’t about Democrats versus Republicans. This is about do we have a democracy at all, and what are we going to tell our kids and our grandkids about what we did in this moment?” Levin said. ”I think that demands the kind of persistent engagement. ”
ATLANTA — The FBI on Wednesday searched the election office of a Georgia county that has been central to right-wing conspiracy theories over President Donald Trump’s 2020 election loss, acting just one week after the Republican leader predicted prosecutions over a contest he has baselessly insisted was tainted by widespread fraud.
The search at Fulton County’s main election facility in Union City sought records related to the 2020 election, county spokesperson Jessica Corbitt-Dominguez said. It appeared to be the most public step by law enforcement to pursue Trump’s claims of a stolen election, grievances rejected time and again by courts and state and federal officials, who found no evidence of fraud that would have altered the outcome.
It also unfolds against the backdrop of FBI and Justice Department efforts to investigate perceived political enemies of Trump, including former FBI Director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James.
Trump has for years focused on Fulton, Georgia’s most populous county and a Democratic stronghold, as a key example of what he claims went wrong in the 2020 election. His pressure campaign there culminated in a sweeping state indictment accusing him and 18 others of illegally trying to overturn the vote.
An FBI spokesperson said agents were “executing a court authorized law enforcement action” at the county’s main election office in Union City, just south of Atlanta. The spokesperson declined to provide any further information, citing an ongoing matter.
Corbitt-Dominguez said a warrant “sought a number of records related to 2020 elections,” but declined to comment further because the search was still underway.
The Justice Department had no immediate comment.
Trump has long insisted that the 2020 election was stolen even though judges across the country and his own attorney general said they found no evidence of widespread fault that tipped the contest in Democrat Joe Biden’s favor.
The president has made Georgia, one of the battleground states he lost in 2020, a central target for his complaints about the election and memorably pushed its secretary of state to help “find” enough votes to overturn the contest.
Last week, in reference to the 2020 election, he asserted that “people will soon be prosecuted for what they did.” It was not clear what in particular he was referring to.
Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis in August 2023 obtained an indictment against Trump and 18 others, accusing them of participating in a wide-ranging scheme to illegally try to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election. That case was dismissed in November after courts barred Willis and her office from pursuing it because of an “appearance of impropriety” stemming from a romantic relationship she had with a prosecutor she had hired to lead the case.
The FBI last week moved to replace its top agent in Atlanta, Paul W. Brown, according to people familiar with the matter who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss a nonpublic personnel decision. It was not immediately clear why the move, which was not publicized by the FBI, was made.
The Department of Justice last month sued the clerk of the Fulton County superior and magistrate courts in federal court seeking access to documents from the 2020 election in the county. The lawsuit said the department sent a letter to the clerk, Che Alexander, but that she had failed to produce the requested documents.
Alexander has filed a motion to dismiss the suit. The Justice Department complaint says that the purpose of its request was “ascertaining Georgia’s compliance with various federal election laws.” It also says the attorney general is trying to help the State Election Board with its “transparency efforts under Georgia law.”
A three-person conservative majority on the State Election Board has repeatedly sought to reopen a case alleging wrongdoing by Fulton County during the 2020 election. It passed a resolution in July seeking assistance from the U.S. attorney general to access voting materials.
The state board sent subpoenas to the county board for various election documents last year and again on Oct. 6. The October subpoena requested “all used and void ballots, stubs of all ballots, signature envelopes, and corresponding envelope digital files from the 2020 General Election in Fulton County.” A fight over the state board’s efforts to enforce the 2024 subpoena is currently tied up in court.
The Justice Department sent a letter to the county election board Oct. 30 citing the federal Civil Rights Act and asking for all records responsive to the October subpoena from the State Election Board. Lawyers for the county election board responded about two weeks later, saying that the records are held by the county court clerk. They also attached a letter the clerk sent to the State Election Board saying that the records are under seal in accordance with state law and can’t be released without a court order.
The Justice Department said it then sent a letter to Alexander, the clerk, on Nov. 21 requesting the documents and that she failed to respond.
The department is asking a judge to declare that the clerk’s “refusal to provide the election records upon a demand by the Attorney General” violates the Civil Rights Act. It is also asking the judge to order Alexander to produce the requested records within five days of a court order.
The State Election Board in May 2024 heard a case that alleged documentation was missing for thousands of votes in the recount of the presidential contest in the 2020 election. After a presentation by a lawyer and an investigator for the secretary of state’s office, a response from the county and a lengthy discussion among the board members, the board voted to issue a letter of reprimand to the county.
Shortly after that vote, there was a shift in power on the board, and the newly cemented conservative majority sought to reopen the case. The lone Democrat on the board and the chair have repeatedly objected, arguing the case is closed and citing multiple reviews that have found that while the county’s 2020 elections were sloppy and poorly managed there was no evidence of intentional wrongdoing.
NEW YORK — One man was discovered under a layer of snow on a park bench in Queens. Another was found just steps from a Manhattan hospital. Yet another was pronounced dead on the ground beneath an elevated train line in the Bronx.
Each is among a growing number of people — at least 10, as of Tuesday — who died after being exposed to the bitter cold that has persisted in New York City since late last Friday.
Their causes of death are still under investigation, but some showed signs of having succumbed to hypothermia. Officials said several victims were believed to have been living on the streets. At least six of the fatalities came early Saturday, as the temperature in the city fell to 9 degrees.
With the frigid weather expected to continue, Mayor Zohran Mamdani said the city was adding homeless outreach workers, opening new warming centers, and instructing hospitals to limit discharges “to ensure that people who have nowhere to go are kept indoors.”
But the rising death toll has also prompted questions about whether Mamdani’s nascent administration could have done more to protect the city’s most vulnerable residents ahead of the Arctic blast and the snowstorm that hit early Sunday.
One of the victims, a 52-year-old man living in Queens, was found Sunday morning with discharge papers in his pocket showing he had been released from Elmhurst Hospital, a city-run facility, on Friday, according to State Senator Jessica Ramos.
By the time of his release, the city had already activated its Code Blue protocols, a set of extreme weather policies that include precautions meant to ensure homeless patients are not released back onto the street.
It was not immediately clear if the man, who is originally from Ecuador, had been living outside at the time of his death. Inquiries to City Hall, the Department of Homeless Services, and the city’s public hospital system were not returned.
The city has yet to release the names of any of those who died during the storm.
Studies have shown that around 15 people suffer from cold-related deaths in New York City each year. But homeless advocates said they could not remember another storm in recent memory that resulted in so many deaths outside in such a brief period.
“The fact that this many people have passed away shows the city needs to do a much better job of making people feel safe when they come inside,” said David Giffen, the executive director of the Coalition for the Homeless. “It’s not that most of the people on the streets are unaware of the shelter system, but that they’ve had experiences there that make them not want to return.”
In the lead-up to the storm, city-contracted outreach teams fanned out across the five boroughs, attempting to coax residents to accept placements in shelters, transitional housing or even heated buses. Mamdani and his deputies have repeatedly urged New Yorkers to look out for those in need of help.
“Extreme weather is not a personal failure, but it is a public responsibility,” Mamdani said on Tuesday. “We are mobilizing every resource at our disposal to ensure that New Yorkers are brought indoors during this potentially lethal weather event.”
The city’s social services commissioner, Molly Wasow Park, said at least 200 people have voluntarily accepted shelter since the storm began. She said the city has also moved to involuntarily hospitalize a handful of people, including those who were wet, inappropriately dressed or “unable to acknowledge that there are real dangers.”
Ramos said the man discovered on the park bench was wearing only a thin jacket. His body appeared to be frozen when it was found by police under a layer of snow on Sunday morning.
“It’s devastating to know the government could have done more and didn’t,” she said. “There are real questions here that demand answers.”
ROME — Italian Premier Giorgia Meloni visited a southern town in Sicily on Wednesday that has been left teetering on the edge of a cliff after days of heavy rains from a cyclone triggered a huge landslide that brought down properties and forced the evacuation of over 1,500 people.
The landslide in Niscemi, a town in the southwest of the island, spanned 2.5 miles. Images showed cars and structures that had fallen 20 yards off the newly formed cliff, while many other homes remain perched perilously on the cliff edge.
Civil protection crews have created a 150-meter wide “no go zone” in the town, which is just inland from the coastal city of Gela.
“The entire hill is collapsing onto the plain of Gela,” civil protection chief Fabio Ciciliano said. “To be honest, there are houses located on the edge of the landslide that obviously can no longer be inhabited, so we need to work with the mayor to find a permanent relocation for these families.”
Authorities have warned that residents with homes in the area will have to find long-term alternatives to moving back since the water-soaked ground was still shifting and too unstable to live.
The federal government included Niscemi in a state of emergency declaration on Monday for three southern regions hard hit by Cyclone Harry and set aside an initial 100 million euros ($120 million) to be divided among them. Sicilian regional officials estimated on Wednesday the overall damage to Sicily stood at 2 billion euros.
Meloni took a helicopter tour of the landslide area and met with local, regional, and civil protection officials at the town hall. She vowed that the initial emergency funding was just the first step in addressing the immediate financial needs of displaced residents and that more was coming.
In a statement, her office said the government was committed to helping residents find alternative housing and to restoring road access, utilities and school activities in town.
“The situation is complicated by the fact that, as long as the landslide remains active, it is impossible to identify the exact area to be treated and therefore to establish the methods of intervention,” it said.
Niscemi was built on a hill on layers of sand and clay that become particularly permeable in heavy rain and have shifted before, most recently in a major 1997 landslide that forced the evacuation of 400 people, geologists say.
“Today, the situation is repeating itself with even more significant characteristics: the landslide front extends for about 4 kilometers and directly affects the houses facing the slope,” warned Giovanna Pappalardo, professor of applied geology at the island’s University of Catania.
The latest landslide, which began on Sunday with Cyclone Harry thrashing southern Italy, has revived political mud-slinging about why construction was allowed on land which, because of its geological makeup, had a known high risk of landslides.
Renato Schifani, the center-right regional president of Sicily, acknowledged such questions were legitimate. But he noted he had only been in office for a few years and said the main issue was an institutional response to help residents immediately affected.
Elly Schlein, the opposition center-left Democratic Party leader, called on the government to reallocate 1 billion euros approved for its controversial bridge from Sicily to the Italian mainland and direct it toward storm-hit regions, since the bridge project is currently tied up in court challenges.
As Republican and Democratic members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee offered starkly different readings of the administration’s foreign policy, Rubio addressed Trump’s intentions and his often bellicose rhetoric that has alarmed U.S. allies in Europe and elsewhere, including demands to take over Greenland.
In the first public hearing since the Jan. 3 raid to depose Maduro, Rubio said Trump had acted to take out a major U.S. national security threat in the Western Hemisphere. Trump’s top diplomat said America was safer and more secure as a result and that the administration would work with interim authorities to stabilize the South American country.
“We’re not going to have this thing turn around overnight, but I think we’re making good and decent progress,” Rubio said. “We are certainly better off today in Venezuela than we were four weeks ago, and I think and hope and expect that we’ll be better off in three months and six months and nine months than we would have been had Maduro still been there.”
The former Florida senator said Venezuela’s current leaders are cooperating and would soon begin to see benefits. But he backed away from remarks prepared for the hearing that Washington would not hesitate to take further military action should those leaders not fully accept Trump’s demands.
“I can tell you right now with full certainty, we are not postured to nor do we intend or expect to have to take any military action in Venezuela at any time,” Rubio said. “I think it would require the emergence of an imminent threat of the kind that we do not anticipate at this time.”
He said Venezuela soon will be allowed to sell oil that is now subject to U.S. sanctions, and the revenue would be set aside to pay for basic government services such as policing and healthealthcare proceeds will be deposited in a U.S. Treasury-controlled account and released after the U.S. approves monthly budgets to be submitted by Venezuela, he said.
He said the uproar over Greenland within NATO is calming and that talks are underway about how to deal with Trump’s demands. The Republican president insists the U.S. needs Greenland to counter threats from Russia and China, but he recently backed away from a pledge to impose tariffs on several European countries that sent troops to the semiautonomous Danish territory in a show of solidarity.
“I think we’re going to get something positive done,” Rubio said.
“NATO needs to be reimagined,” Rubio said. “I just think this president complains about it louder than other presidents.”
He said China’s stated goal to reunify Taiwan with the mainland would not be affected by any other world event, including the Maduro operation.
“The situation on Taiwan is a legacy project” that Chinese President Xi Jinping has made ”very clear that that’s what he intends to do and that’s going to be irrespective anything that happens in the world,” Rubio said.
As Trump once more threatens Iran with military action, Rubio said there was no current plan to attack. Asked about the potential for a change of government in Tehran, Rubio said that would require “a lot of careful thinking” because it would be “far more complex” than ousting Maduro.
He noted that the increased military presence in the Middle East — an aircraft carrier and accompanying warships arrived this week — is “to defend against what could be an Iranian threat against our personnel.”
More details about the raid in Caracas
The Republican committee chairman, Idaho Sen. Jim Risch, offered new details on the operation in the Venezuelan capital, saying it involved “only about 200 troops” and a “firefight that lasted less than 27 minutes.”
“This military action was incredibly brief, targeted and successful,” Risch said, adding that the U.S. and other nations may have to assist Venezuela when it seeks to restore democratic elections.
”Venezuela may require U.S. and international oversight to ensure these elections are indeed free and fair,” he said.
Sen. Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire, the committee’s top Democrat, questioned whether that operation was worth it, considering most of Maduro’s top aides and lieutenants still run the Venezuela and the economic situation there remains bleak.
“We’ve traded one dictator for another, so it’s no wonder that so many of my constituents are asking, why is the president spending so much time focused on Venezuela instead of the cost of living and their kitchen table economic concerns?” she asked. “From Venezuela to Europe, the United States is spending more, risking more and achieving less.”
Call for eventual democratic elections in Venezuela
Rubio delivered his strongest statement yet of support for democracy in Venezuela, while concerns persist that the administration’s stabilization efforts are narrowly focused on oil and U.S. national security interests.
“What’s the end state? We want a Venezuela that has legitimate democratic elections,” said Rubio, who met Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado at the State Department after the hearing.
Machado reiterated her intention to return to Venezuela. “Dear Venezuelans, we are moving forward with firm steps,” she posted on X. “I will return to Venezuela very soon to work together on the transition and the building of an exceptional country.”
Before that, Rubio faced tough questioning from Sen. Cory Booker (D., N.J.) about cooperating with interim leaders who had been part of Maduro’s authoritarian government. Maduro’s vice president, Delcy Rodríguez, is now the acting president.
The U.S. has said its demands for Rodriguez include opening Venezuela’s energy sector to U.S. companies, providing preferential access to production, using oil revenue to purchase American goods, and ending subsidized oil exports to Cuba.
Neither Rodríguez nor her government’s press office immediately commented on Rubio’s remarks. She said Tuesday that her government and the U.S. “have established respectful and courteous channels of communication.” So far, she has appeared to acquiesce to Trump’s demands and to release prisoners jailed by the government under Maduro and his predecessor, Hugo Chávez.
In a key step to the restoration of diplomatic relations, the State Department said it intends to begin sending additional diplomatic and support personnel to Caracas to prepare for the possible reopening of the U.S. Embassy, which shuttered in 2019.
Fully normalizing ties, however, would require the U.S. to revoke its decision recognizing the Venezuelan parliament elected in 2015 as the country’s legitimate government.
WASHINGTON — A groundswell of voices have come to the same conclusion: Kristi Noem must go.
From Democratic Party leaders to the nation’s leading advocacy organizations to even the most centrist lawmakers in Congress, the calls are mounting for the Homeland Security secretary to step aside after the shooting deaths in Minneapolis of two people who protested deportation policy. At a defining moment in her tenure, few Republicans are rising to Noem’s defense.
“The country is disgusted by what the Department of Homeland Security has done,” top House Democratic Reps. Hakeem Jeffries of New York, Katherine Clark of Massachusetts, and Pete Aguilar of California said in a joint statement.
“Kristi Noem should be fired immediately,” the Democrats said, “or we will commence impeachment proceedings in the House of Representatives.”
Republicans and Democrats call for Noem to step down
What started as sharp criticism of the Homeland Security secretary, and a longshot move by Democratic lawmakers signing onto impeachment legislation in the Republican-controlled House, has morphed into an inflection point for Noem, who has been the high-profile face of the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement regime.
Noem’s brash leadership style and remarks in the aftermath of the shooting deaths of Alex Pretti and Renee Good — in which she suggested Pretti “attacked” officers and portrayed the events leading up to Good’s shooting an “act of domestic terrorism” — have been seen as doing irreparable damage, as events on the ground disputed her account. Her alliance with Border Patrol chief Greg Bovino, who was recalled from the Minnesota operation Monday as border czar Tom Homan took the lead, has left her isolated on Capitol Hill.
“What she’s done in Minnesota should be disqualifying. She should be out of a job,” Sen. Thom Tillis (R., N.C.) said.
“I think the President needs to look at who he has in place as a secretary of Homeland Security,” Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R., Alaska) said. ”It probably is time for her to step down.”
Trump stands by Noem and praises her work
President Donald Trump defended Noem on Wednesday at multiple junctures, strongly indicating her job does not appear to be in immediate jeopardy.
Asked by reporters as he left the White House on Tuesday for a trip to Iowa whether Noem is going to step down, Trump had a one-word answer: “No.”
Pressed later during an interview on Fox News if he had confidence in Noem, the president said, “I do.”
“Who closed up the border? She did,” Trump said, “with Tom Homan, with the whole group. I mean, they’ve closed up the border. The border is a tremendous success.”
As Democrats in Congress threaten to shut down the government as they demand restrictions on Trump’s mass deportation agenda, Noem’s future at the department faces serious questions and concerns.
The Republican leadership of the House and Senate committees that oversee Homeland Security have demanded that department officials appear before their panels to answer for the operations that have stunned the nation with their sheer force — including images of children, including a 5-year-old, being plucked from families.
“Obviously this is an inflection point and an opportunity to evaluate and to really assess the policies and procedures and how they are being implemented and put into practice,” said Senate Majority Leader John Thune, a Republican from South Dakota, where Noem had been the state’s House representative and governor before joining the administration.
Asked about his own confidence in Noem’s leadership, Thune said, “That’s the president’s judgment call to make.”
Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer called Noem a “liar” and said she must be fired.
The fight over funding
Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement that DHS enforces the laws from Congress, and if lawmakers don’t like those laws, they should change them.
“Too many politicians would rather defend criminals and attack the men and women who are enforcing our laws,” McLaughlin said. “It’s time they focus on protecting the American people, the work this Department is doing every day under Secretary Noem’s leadership.”
The ability of Congress to restrict Homeland Security funding is limited, in large part because the GOP majority already essentially doubled department funding under Trump’s big tax breaks and spending cuts law.
Instead, Democrats are seeking to impose restraints on Border Patrol and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement operations as part of a routine annual funding package for Homeland, Defense, Health, and other departments. Without action this week, those agencies would head toward a shutdown.
To be sure, Homeland Security still has strong defenders in the Congress.
The conservative House Freedom Caucus said Tuesday in a letter to Trump that he should invoke the Insurrection Act, if needed, to quell protests. The group said it would be “ready to take all steps necessary” to keep funds flowing for Trump’s immigration enforcement and removal operations.
On the job for a year, Noem has clashed at times with lawmakers on Capitol Hill, as Republicans and Democrats have sought greater oversight and accounting of the department’s spending and operations.
Noem has kept a low profile since the Saturday news conference following Pretti’s death, though she appeared Sunday on Fox News. She doubled down in that interview on criticism of Minnesota officials, but also expressed compassion for Pretti’s family.
“It grieves me to think about what his family is going through but it also grieves me what’s happening to these law enforcement officers every day out in the streets with the violence they face,” she said.
Once rare, impeachments now more common
Impeachment, once a far-flung tool brandished against administration officials, has become increasingly commonplace.
Two years ago, the Republican-led House impeached another Homeland Security secretary, Alejandro Mayorkas, in protest over the then-Biden administration’s border security and immigration policies that allowed millions of immigrants and asylum seekers to enter the U.S. The Senate dismissed the charges.
On Tuesday, Maryland Rep. Jamie Raskin, the top Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, said if the Republican chairman of the panel, Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio, does not launch an impeachment probe, he would.
Raskin said he would work with the top Democrats on the Homeland Security and Oversight committees to immediately launch an impeachment inquiry related to the Minnesota deaths and other “lawlessness and corruption that may involve treason, bribery or other high crimes and misdemeanors.”
More than 160 House Democrats have signed on to an impeachment resolution from Rep. Robin Kelly (D., Ill.).
