condition

California, other states sue Trump administration for ‘unlawful’ conditions on disaster grants

California Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta and other Democratic attorneys general are suing the Trump administration over imposing what they contend are “unlawful” conditions on federal grants intended to help states prepare and respond to disasters.

The lawsuit, filed in federal court in Rhode Island on Thursday, argues that the Department of Homeland Security and Federal Emergency Management Agency have been using their control over billions of dollars in federal grants to operate what the attorneys general see as an aggressive “campaign of coercion” to adopt the Trump administration’s preferred voting and immigration policies, according to the complaint.

“Congress never gave DHS or FEMA authority to rewrite state election law, require cooperation with federal immigration agents, or terminate federal funding streams at any time and for any reason,” the lawsuit stated. The legal action was filed by a coalition of 24 attorneys general and Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear and Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, both Democrats.

A spokesperson for the White House did not respond to a request for comment.

At the crux of their legal complaint are two federal programs: the Homeland Security Grant Program, which was established by Congress as a response to the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, and the Emergency Management Performance Grant Program, which helps states pay for emergency management staff who plan for and respond to natural disasters and mass casualty events, as well as software programs used by state emergency operations centers.

For the homeland security grant, the Trump administration has attached “radical” new terms based on Trump’s preferred policies, the states contend.

These terms include verifying the citizenship of all individuals in state voter databases, transitioning their voting systems to equipment that reads hand-marked paper ballots and conducting post-election audits “according to nonexistent guidelines to be set by the Secretary of Homeland Security,” according to the complaint.

And the Department of Homeland Security and FEMA have threatened to make states “promise to devote their scarce resources to the federal government’s own task of civil immigration enforcement” in order to receive both the homeland security and the emergency management grants, according to the complaint.

At a news conference Thursday, Bonta laid out the stakes.

“These grants help communities prepare for emergencies before disaster strikes,” he said. “They support emergency management personnel, strengthen disaster response capabilities, improve coordination among first responders, and help protect our residents when they need government the most.”

The Trump administration restrictions would mean “our communities would have fewer resources to prepare for wildfires, earthquakes, floods, terrorist threats, and other emergencies,” Bonta stated.

“Time after time, courts have told Trump’s corrupt administration that it can’t coerce California into doing its bidding by threatening to withhold public safety funding,” Gov. Gavin Newsom said in a statement. “Yet, they’re coming back for more. This time they’re demanding states rewrite their own election laws to access money that pays for public safety readiness and response, and that Congress already approved. We simply won’t allow it.”

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BBC Sewing Bee star opens up about ‘chronic’ health condition

The Great British Sewing Bee returned with 11 amateur sewers hoping to be crowned winner.

A contestant on The Great British Sewing Bee has opened up about her health condition.

The popular BBC competition has returned for its 12th season, with Esme Young and Patrick Grant reprising their roles as judges, whilst comedian Sophie Willan replaced Sara Pascoe as presenter.

As the new season aired its second week, the 11 remaining amateur sewers took part in three challenges.

First, they faced the Pattern Challenge, constructing a top with adaptive elements, then they faced a Transformation Challenge, where they had to convince the judges that their least favourite colours, brown and purple, could be transformed into attractive garments.

Finally, in the Made-to-Measure, the sewers had to use one colour to create an eye-catching outfit.

During the first task in the show, two contestants opened up about their passion to promote adaptive clothing.

Oxfordshire engineering PhD student Beth shared: “The adaptive side of it is really great because it’s quite a personal thing for me.

“My dad broke his neck in a motorbike accident. Very luckily, he’s still with us but he can’t feel with his hands.

“I’ve used really big buttons with quite large button holes so he can do them himself.”

Beth, 24, also shared how she creates clothes for her own needs, explaining: “I have scoliosis which is the curvature of the spine, and so being able to make dresses or tops that celebrate my back from all the lifting I do is quite an empowering thing.

“Without sewing that wouldn’t be possible for me.”

Not long later, another Sewing Bee star shared their health condition, after suffering from pain.

Contestant Rebecca, 27, revealed she made garments adjusted for her own needs.

She said: “Almost everything I make for myself is adaptive. I have chronic stomach pain, so for me, adaptive fashion is making sure there is nothing tight around my stomach.”

The chartered actuary from London was crowned winner of the first challenge, and celebrated: “I’m so thrilled to have specifically won the adaptive fashion challenge as an invisibly-disabled person.”

The Great British Sewing Bee airs Tuesdays at 8pm on BBC One and iPlayer.

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Lucy Schiller ‘Aging Out’ review: A millennial caregiver examines aging in America

Freelance writer and editor Lucy Schiller bumped up against the issues of aging, eldercare and loneliness through her grandmothers. When the family pulled her maternal grandmother, Mary Ann, from assisted living during the pandemic, Schiller became her primary caregiver. Her paternal grandmother, Anita, was less fortunate; she contracted COVID-19 from a home healthcare aide and died in a hospital.

Book Review

Aging Out: An Exploration of Caregiving, Community, and How Americans Grow Old

By Lucy Schiller
Flatiron Books: 272 pages, $30

If you buy books linked on our site, The Times may earn a commission from Bookshop.org, whose fees support independent bookstores.

As she relates in “Aging Out,” the shock of Anita’s death was a factor in Schiller’s abrupt relocation from a central New York college town to Pittsburgh, where she knew no one. Schiller calls the move “a half-desperate plan to simply change the background scenery of my life for the millionth time.”

While grieving, scrambling to make a living, taking long walks with her dog and wrestling with her chosen solitude, Schiller embarks on a quest to understand the institutions and attitudes that shape old age in America. “What was the relationship between personal fear of oldness and the ways in which oldness was structured in society?” she asks.

The resulting book, a deliberately meandering account of her Steel City sojourn, weds memoir, travelogue, philosophical rumination and journalistic investigation. Schiller, an MFA graduate of the University of Iowa and now an assistant professor of nonfiction at Texas Tech University, is a fluid writer. But most of what she covers is well-trod ground.

It’s worth asking whom she envisions as her audience. Most older readers know this territory; younger ones have other, more pressing concerns, including how to afford life in the here-and-now.

Perhaps Schiller, a millennial in her 30s, hopes they will identify with her personal struggles. But her loneliness seems largely self-imposed, perhaps compounded by what she describes as “a severe strain” of obsessive-compulsive disorder. “It turns out, laughably, that an interest in privacy, and staying quiet about internal feelings, are hallmarks of this condition,” she writes, offering a partial explanation for her wariness of company.

Pondering the American way of aging, Schiller initially adopts a posture of ignorance and naivete so extreme that it seems like a pose. She puzzles out the distinctions among nursing homes, assisted living facilities and continuing care retirement communities, as well as home healthcare. And she underlines the fact that, when it comes to long-term care in the United States, only the relatively well-off have good choices. This isn’t exactly news.

Another Schiller inquiry involves the familiar complexities of Medicare. She notes that, as a public program for seniors, it is so inadequate that it requires private options, such as Medigap and Medicare Advantage, to paper over coverage gaps. Picking the best plan for one’s needs can be a daunting option, requiring trained help or careful study. Schiller attends an informational seminar by a broker for Medicare Advantage plans and decides, unhelpfully, that they are neither “a solution or a problem.”

Schiller’s reporting methods rely, to some extent, on serendipity. “I tended toward … a kind of diffuse sallying through the world, staying open to the coincidence, digression, and movement,” she writes. She calls the method “antinarrative.”

All that sallying takes her down some unexpected byways. She returns to a western Pennsylvania town called Harmony, where she once had “a horrible, endless date over crepes,” to investigate a strike over pay and working conditions at a troubled nursing home. That leads to a long discussion of the use of restraints on the elderly.

At one point, Schiller finds a company called Papa that employs younger “Pals” to assist older adults. With the backing of health insurance companies, the Pals provide companionship, transportation, housecleaning services and more. Schiller tries something similar as a volunteer for a health insurance company, reaching out to an elderly Black woman by phone. They stumble over time into an unlikely friendship.

One problem with all these efforts to mitigate old-age loneliness, Schiller notes, is that the loneliest generation is actually Gen Z. And the loneliness surveys themselves, she suggests, may be suspect.

Schiller delves, inevitably, into the history of AARP, an organization that even in its earliest days was entangled with the health insurance industry. And consumer advocate Ralph Nader, for whom she does some editing work, tips her to the story of activist Maggie Kuhn, founder of the Gray Panthers.

Kuhn, Schiller writes, understood “the tension between the social so-called nothingness of old age and its vibrant realities.” Which brings Schiller to the intersection of aging and disability, and to Programs for All-Inclusive Care for the Elderly (PACE), which provide community-based care as an alternative to nursing homes.

In the end, Schiller has a go at parsing her own motivations. “I had descended into the strange subterranean structures of aging, almost as a way to avoid the contemporary world … ,” she writes. “Age … was a helpful distancing tool: older people’s vulnerabilities, including those of my own grandparents, helped to distract me from my own present and future. … I still did not know how to seal over the gaping wound of the pandemic, how to move forward.”

For all her verbiage, she can find no easy fix, nor even a complicated one. “It was not possible for me to imagine a solution to the level of fragmentation, pain, and dysfunction I saw,” she writes, leaving readers without much justification for having followed her rambling, idiosyncratic quest.

Klein, a cultural reporter and critic in Philadelphia, has been a three-time finalist for the National Book Critics Circle’s Nona Balakian Citation for Excellence in Reviewing.

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Trump administration orders ICE to suspend most vehicle stops after two deadly shootings, AP source says

Trump administration officials have told Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers to suspend most vehicle stops after two deadly shootings in little over a week, according to a person familiar with the matter.

The order came a day after an ICE officer shot and killed a Colombian man in Maine, renewing criticism of the agency’s tactics during enforcement operations.

The suspension is not absolute and there’s room for exceptions when executing a criminal warrant or working with partner agencies, according to a person who spoke Tuesday on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive law enforcement operations.

The Department of Homeland Security said an ICE officer, “fearing for public safety,” shot and killed the man Monday in the city of Biddeford while officers were watching the home of someone they believed was in the U.S. illegally and had a final order of removal from the country.

This is a developing story and will be updated.

Whittle, Brook and Sisak write for Associated Press.

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McConnell says a fall led to his hospitalization

Sen. Mitch McConnell on Sunday revealed for the first time that a fall led to his hospitalization, breaking the silence about his condition after weeks of speculation about the Kentucky Republican’s health.

McConnell, 84, said in a statement that he has undergone a battery of tests as doctors try to determine what led to his fall. He explained the long silence about his condition by saying that “folks of my generation often hesitate to share the vulnerability that comes with growing older.”

“Even in the public eye, I feel that same instinct — I can’t help it,” he said.

McConnell said he is now in a rehabilitation center and will not be returning to the Senate “quite yet.” He said he continues to work with his staff on Senate business in the meantime.

The statement included a smiling picture of the senator with his wife, Elaine Chao, a tacit response to speculation online that McConnell had died or was incapacitated.

It comes following his hospitalization on June 14. McConnell’s office for weeks provided little information, saying only that he was “receiving excellent care” and recovering.

As his hospital stay grew longer, speculation about his condition became so intense that Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear, a Democrat, took the extraordinary step of asking that McConnell update the public about his health in a “transparent manner.”

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Victor Wembanyama, Spurs agree on five-year contract extension

Victor Wembanyama has signed what will be the richest contract in San Antonio Spurs history, a five-year extension that could exceed $250 million if the player option in the final season is picked up, a person with knowledge of the negotiations said Friday.

The person spoke on condition of anonymity to The Associated Press because the financial figures were not disclosed by either side. The Spurs, who went to the NBA Finals this past season behind the All-NBA center and unanimous Defensive Player of the Year, announced that Wembanyama had signed, simply saying the sides agreed on “a multi-year contract extension.”

The agreement comes at a discount; Wembanyama could have agreed to a deal that topped $300 million — but chose a lesser amount to help give the Spurs flexibility going forward with their young core and in anticipation of the contracts some of those budding stars will be eligible for in coming years, the person said.

ESPN first reported the agreement.

Reynolds writes for the Associated Press.

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Vernon Kay says ‘I’ve got a massive issue’ as he opens up on health condition

Vernon Kay and close friend Paddy McGuinness appeared on Celebrity Gogglebox together on Friday night

A Celebrity Gogglebox star opened up about his health condition on Friday’s episode.

Vernon Kay revealed that he suffers from a foot condition that is a “massive issue” for him. The star opened up about his health condition during Friday’s (July 10) episode of the Channel 4 hit show as he returned to our TV screens alongside his close friend Paddy McGuinness.

Just moments before sharing their hilarious reactions to the week’s top TV shows and films, Vernon announced that he suffers from Morton’s neuroma, a nerve disorder that impacts the third and fourth toes.

According to the NHS, the condition involves a “thickening of tissue” surrounding a nerve in the foot. It typically causes a sharp, burning pain in the ball of the foot, often with tingling or numbness in the toes.

Some sufferers report feeling like they are constantly treading on a small pebble. Speaking to Paddy, he said: “I’ve got a massive issue with my left one [toe].”

The BBC Radio 2 presenter then revealed: “I’ve got Morton’s neuroma, I can’t feel my left toe. All the nerve endings on my toes – I can’t feel my toes.”

Paddy was in disbelief as he pointed to Vernon’s toe and asked: “What, that one?” Vernon lifted his leg and replied: “Yeah, squeeze as hard as you can.”

Paddy was keen to find out if Vernon really couldn’t feel pain in his feet as he squeezed Vernon’s toes as hard as he could.

Turning to his close pal Vernon, who didn’t flinch, Paddy asked: “You can’t feel that?” Vernon confirmed: “Nope. Nothing.”

While Morton’s neuroma can often be eased by resting or taking ibuprofen, some people may need to see their GP or a foot specialist. Vernon previously stumbled upon a foot specialist at a local service station by chance.

Speaking on his Radio 2 show, he revealed: “So yesterday I was at the services, I was charging the electric car, and I was struggling a little bit with the machine that actually does it, I was faffing around.

“There’s no instructions, it just assumes that you know how to do it, and I didn’t. I didn’t know how to pay, I didn’t know how to get it started.

“Anyway, we got there in the end and this gentleman who was parked in the bay next door to my car wound down his window and said, ‘Hi Vernon,’ I said, ‘How are you?’ We shook hands, he said, ‘You alright there? You struggling?’ I said, ‘A little bit, I think it’s working now’.

“When we said that it went [buzzing noise] and then it started to charge my car. We got chatting away, ‘Where you going? Blah blah blah.’ Said, ‘I’m going just down the road but I’ve run out of energy so I’m just topping up my car’. ‘Brilliant, what do you do for a living?’ ‘I’m a foot specialist’”.

Celebrity Gogglebox airs Friday nights from 9pm on Channel 4.

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Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear asks Sen. Mitch McConnell to give a public update on his condition

Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear is directly asking Sen. Mitch McConnell, the state’s most powerful figure in Congress, to disclose more about his condition after three weeks of silence from the 84-year-old since he was hospitalized in Washington.

The letter released Wednesday from Beshear, a Democrat who is considered a potential presidential candidate in 2028, to the former Senate Republican leader says “Kentuckians have grown increasingly concerned about the current state of your health and well-being, and ability to hold office.”

McConnell, whose physical condition has visibly declined in recent years, was hospitalized June 14. He has not released a public statement, photos or videos since. Aides have disclosed nothing specific about his condition, other than to say last week that McConnell “continues to improve, and is working closely with his staff on Kentucky and Senate matters while the Senate is out of session.”

That lack of detail has fueled rampant speculation about his prognosis and whether he will return to the Senate when it reconvenes next week. The firestorm was enough that Republican Senate leaders made public statements Tuesday saying they had talked to McConnell and that he was alert and discussing current events.

McConnell is retiring at the end of his term in January, and the campaign to elect his successor already is underway. Kentucky’s Senate succession law, which Republican legislators have twice changed during Beshear’s tenure, does not give the governor a role in picking a temporary successor should McConnell’s seat become vacant before his term ends.

Under the latest change in 2024, Beshear would call a special election if the seat became vacant. The winner of that election could take office after the result is certified. The general election winner would be sworn in as part of the new Congress in January. But there are unresolved questions about the timing of a special election under the untested law, and the seat could remain vacant until January.

Beshear ended the letter by wishing McConnell “a safe and speedy recovery.”

A look at what an absence from the Senate or a vacancy could mean.

What happens if McConnell isn’t able to return?

There is not much, if anything, that Beshear, Kentucky lawmakers or the Senate could do if McConnell remains in office but is unable to perform his duties between now and when the current Congress expires in January.

Senate rules do not allow proxy voting. But there have been extended Senate absences before, and the chamber has continued its business with however many senators are in attendance. Republicans currently hold a 53-47 advantage. Without McConnell, that means a maximum of 52 Republican votes are available.

McConnell had been among the senators blocking war powers resolutions that seek to limit President Trump’s military options in Iran. Without him, the administration has less of a buffer. On the other hand, McConnell had already been among the Republicans refusing to support Trump’s sweeping elections law overhaul.

Why wouldn’t Beshear have a say in filling any vacancy?

The 17th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution calls for Senate vacancies to be filled by popular elections. But it allows state legislatures to empower governors to appoint an interim senator to serve through those campaigns. Most states have taken this option, according to the Congressional Research Service.

Kentucky law allowed interim appointments until 2021, when McConnell and other state GOP leaders persuaded the Republican-run Legislature to make a change. They did not want Beshear to shift the partisan balance in Washington if he got the opportunity. They called for a committee of the previous senator’s state party to select three people from whom the governor could choose an interim senator. In this case, that would mean Beshear picking which Republican would fill a vacancy. Several states have this system.

Kentucky lawmakers changed the law again in 2024 to require a special election. The only role for the governor is to call that election.

Beshear vetoed the 2021 and 2024 changes, but Republican lawmakers overrode him.

How would a special election work?

The 2024 law says Beshear “shall” issue a proclamation for a special vote but it does not say when he should make that proclamation or what the election date must be. Separate laws require certain minimum windows between a proclamation and the election date, but not necessarily a maximum window.

Some officials have argued that any vacancy after Aug. 3 would mean a special election concurrent with the general. They have even speculated that at some point, it would be impractical to have a special election at all given the regular election already taking place.

The Kentucky secretary of state’s office declined to speculate on a hypothetical time frame.

If a special election was needed, the simplest option would be to hold it at the same time as the regular general election.

For the full Senate term that begins in 2027, Republicans nominated U.S. Rep. Andy Barr, and the Democratic nominee is former state lawmaker Charles Booker. Concurrent elections would be separate, requiring new nominations by the parties, though they could choose Barr and Booker. Regardless, in this scenario, voters would be electing the immediate replacement and the full-term lawmaker on the same Election Day.

Multiple vacant House seats have been filled that way with little national attention.

Yes. The 2024 law has never been tested. If a vacancy occurred, there could be different interests between parties and even among Republicans about special election timing and whether to hold one at all. That could create any number of legal questions and disputes that have to be settled by the courts.

Beshear’s office did not immediately respond to an inquiry about how he interprets the law.

Barrow writes for the Associated Press.

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Jailed Gaza hospital chief in life-threatening condition, rights group says | Crimes Against Humanity News

Elyas Abu Safia says his father can barely breathe or speak after more than 555 days in Israeli prison.

The son of a prominent Palestinian doctor abducted and held by Israel without charge has issued an urgent appeal for his father’s release, warning that his health has sharply deteriorated after more than 555 days in prison, as a rights group warned that his life was in danger.

Elyas Abu Safia, the son of Dr Hussam Abu Safia, said in a video message on Sunday that his father, the director of Kamal Adwan Hospital in northern Gaza, showed signs of severe abuse after Israeli authorities transferred him to solitary confinement in a maximum-security prison.

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“The day before yesterday, the lawyer Nasser Odeh managed to visit my father, where he told us painful details about this visit,” said Elyas, who is also a doctor.

“My father was unable to breathe. My father was unable to speak,” he said, adding: “His face was disfigured from the marks of torture and pain, and the blood he endured inside the prison, especially after the last court session held in Jerusalem.”

Israeli forces arrested Abu Safia at work on December 27, 2024, as they intensified their attacks on northern Gaza’s healthcare system as part of the genocidal war against Palestinians in Gaza. Two months earlier, an Israeli drone attack killed another of his sons, Ibrahim, at the entrance of the hospital where he worked.

Elyas accused Arab and Muslim leaders of abandoning his father.

“You deprived us even of your voices, your solidarity and your support, which should have been there from the start of the detention,” he said.

“But sadly, your silence is a betrayal and a crime, and complicity in torturing my father and the hostages inside Israeli prisons,” he added.

‘The most shocking testimony’

Physicians for Human Rights Israel warned that Abu Safiya’s life is in immediate danger after his transfer to the Rakefet section of Nitzan prison.

The group said lawyer Nasser Odeh visited Abu Safia on July 2 and documented severe injuries, signs of assault, difficulty breathing and repeated loss of consciousness. It said guards brought him into the visit with his hands and feet bound and surrounded him with masked officers.

Odeh also saw fresh bruises and injuries on Abu Safiya’s head, around his eyes, ears and neck. The wounds were so severe that the lawyer struggled to recognise him, the group said.

“The information we received raises serious and immediate concerns for Abu Safiya’s life. The lawyer’s testimony is among the most shocking we have heard since the beginning of the war: a man detained without charge tells his lawyer that he believes they will kill him, after he arrived for the visit injured, suffering from difficulty breathing, and on the verge of losing consciousness,” Naji Abbas, director of the Prisoners and Detainees Department at Physicians for Human Rights, told the official Palestinian news agency Wafa.

Israeli authorities have not filed charges against Abu Safia. They classified him as an “unlawful combatant”, a designation Israel has used to hold Palestinians for prolonged periods without trial.

Physicians for Human Rights has demanded his release, along with other imprisoned Palestinian doctors. In March, United Nations experts also called on Israel to free Abu Safia immediately and ensure he receives medical care.

He is one of 14 Palestinian doctors from Gaza currently held by Israel without charge.

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Frankie Bridge reveals she’s been diagnosed with life-changing condition after Loose Women co-star spotted symptoms

FRANKIE Bridge has revealed she’s been diagnosed with ADHD after her Loose Women co-star Denise Welch spotted the symptoms and urged her to get tested.

The 37-year-old has previously been open about her battle with depression and anxiety and now she believes she’s found the “last missing piece” with her attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder diagnosis.

Frankie Bridge has revealed she’s been diagnosed with ADHD Credit: Getty
She revealed she went and got tested after her Loose Women co-star Denise Welch spotted symptoms Credit: Shutterstock Editorial

Speaking on her latest YouTube vlog, the former Saturdays star told her viewers: “I found out today that I’ve got ADHD.

“Denise was like, ‘I got diagnosed with ADHD and it’s completely changed my life – my depression and my anxiety is so much better’.

She was like, ‘let me put you in touch with [a specialist]. You can just see’. I was a bit like, ‘yeah, I mean, I could be’.”

The mum-of-two continued: “I’ve been battling with [the diagnosis] all day. Part of me is like, what a relief, because it does make sense to me.

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“When I went on the call, I was not sure if this was going to really resonate with me. But by the end of it, I was like, ‘f***, it really does’.

“It’s kind of reassuring. Not that it makes excuses for it, but I can hopefully try and feel less guilt because I’m such a perfectionist, and all that is part of it.”

According to the NHS, those with ADHD are significantly more likely to experience depression and anxiety.

ADHD itself can cause emotional dysregulation, making individuals more prone to intense emotions and making it harder to soothe themselves when feeling down or worried.

The I’m A Celebrity star added: “Hopefully this is the last missing piece that is going to help.

“They do say with a lot of women, we’re not diagnosed ’til we’re a lot older, and by then, you’ve already dealt with depression and anxiety for a really long time.”

Her fans flocked to the comments section on YouTube to commend her on her bravery as some related to her diagnosis.

One penned: “I recently got diagnosed with adhd too and so much makes sense now.”

Frankie shared the news on her recent YouTube vlog Credit: YouTube/Frankie Bridge
She told her viewers that the diagnosis was a “relief” Credit: YouTube/Frankie Bridge

Another person said: “Awww love your vids. Love your vulnerability.”

While a third added: “Thanks for another great vlog and thanks for being you.”

Denise was diagnosed with ADHD herself in January 2023 after undergoing a series of intense tests.

Incidentally, Denise went to get tested after her Loose Women co-star Nadia Sawalha received her own diagnosis and saw similar traits in her.

Frankie has previously been open about her struggles with depression and anxiety Credit: Shutterstock Editorial
She often shares when she’s struggling Credit: YouTube/Frankie Bridge

Frankie has previously stated that she was “anxious from the womb” and experienced physical symptoms including stomach aches, night time panic and difficulty breathing.

Her depression began to manifest significantly when she was 15, coinciding with her first brush with fame in S Club Juniors.

In 2011, at the height of her success in The Saturdays, Frankie suffered a major mental health breakdown.

She voluntarily admitted herself into a private psychiatric hospital for treatment for one month.

It’s something the ITV star has continued to deal with on daily basis but has used her platform to help other people who are experiencing the same as her.

In March last year, she told her Instagram followers: “I have finally made it down to the gym. It’s taken me the whole day to actually get here.

What is ADHD?

ADHD, or attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, is a neurodevelopmental condition that affects how individuals focus, regulate their impulses, and manage their energy levels.

Symptoms depend on the type; inattention causes challenges with focusing, organisation and time management, hyperactivity causes excessive energy or restlessness, and impulsivity causes a person to act without thinking or struggle to wait their turn.

People can be predominately one type or a mix of the two and symptoms are varied and unique to individuals.

While living with ADHD is challenging, people often find unique strengths within their condition, such as the ability to hyperfocus on something they find interesting, problem-solving skills and creativity.

“My depression is absolutely kicking my a**e, and I’m so over it. You know when you just feel like you do all the things you’re told you’re meant to do, and then it just still always comes back? 

“I’m just so bored of myself. It is so boring. You know when you just think everyone around me must just be so bored of it as well, and I just I’m over it.” 

“But I’m here,” she added. “I’m going to try and do as much as I can in the gym, because I know it will make me feel better.

“Instead of just sitting around, eating s**t, which is what I’ve been doing all day, which only makes me feel worse and I know that, so I don’t know why I do it, but here we are back in the same old place.” 

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Supreme Court rules Trump may end legal protection for Haitians and Syrians

The Supreme Court ruled Thursday that the Trump administration may end the Temporary Protected Status granted to more than 350,000 Haitians and Syrians whose home countries remain unsafe.

In a 6-3 decision, the court’s conservative majority said Congress gave the administration, not judges, the power to cancel or renew this temporary protection for non-citizens who are living and working here.

In a second win Thursday for the Trump administration, the court also upheld the administration’s policy of blocking asylum seekers at the southern border.

By the same 6-3 vote, the court said migrants do not have a right to apply for asylum if they are not already in the United States.

The decision on Temporary Protected Status could affect up to 1.3 million non-citizens who are in the country.

In 1990, Congress authorized this emergency humanitarian relief for non-citizens whose home countries were wracked by armed conflict, natural disasters or other extraordinary disruptions.

Under the law, the Department of Homeland Security may grant this protection for 6, 12 or 18 months and either renew or extend it for a similar period.

But this legal authority has been under dispute since Trump returned to the White House last year and targeted the 1.3 million people with TPS from 17 countries who were living in the United States.

Trump’s lawyers said the law made clear there was “no judicial review” of the government’s decision to cancel the grant of temporary protection.

However, immigrant rights lawyers argued the government failed in its duty to consult the State Department and assess whether it was safe for migrants to return home.

Repeatedly, U.S. district judges agreed with the challengers and ruled the administration’s decisions were “arbitrary” and unreasonable. But in nearly every case, the Supreme Court granted emergency appeals from the administration and set aside those orders.

Since TPS was created, the government has ended the protected designation for citizens of 18 countries.

DHS under then-Secretary Kristi Noem ended TPS for Honduras, Nicaragua, Afghanistan and Venezuela. A spokesperson for the agency previously said the Haiti designation became “a de facto amnesty program” and that allowing Syrians to remain is contrary to national interest.

Advocates for the immigrants argue that the administration failed to conduct the required process to properly evaluate each country’s conditions and instead acted on political grounds driven by racial animus.

State Department travel advisories for both countries warn people against traveling to either because of the risk of terrorism, kidnapping and widespread violence. But Federal Register notices announcing the terminations said country conditions had improved enough.

Recently released internal documents show that DHS decided to terminate protections for Haitians without any input from the State Department.

Citing the documents, which were obtained by the National TPS Alliance in a separate lawsuit, lawyers for the Haitians asked the Supreme Court to dismiss the case and send it back to lower courts. They argued that the justices should first consider the communications before issuing a decision.

Internal emails show that homeland security officials sought a recommendation from the State Department in May 2025, ahead of Noem’s early June deadline on whether to extend protections for Haiti. But by the time Noem signed what appears to be a final decision memo, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services had not received input from the State Department, the emails show.

“State recommendation for Haiti TPS has not come in despite of many outreach,” a homeland security deputy assistant secretary wrote in a June 2, 2025, email. A recommendation “would be helpful to have,” the person added.

Eleven days later, a USCIS project manager wrote in an email that Noem “recently elected to terminate Haiti without country conditions from DOS.”

USCIS initially recommended automatically extending protections before Homeland Security decided to terminate them, earlier versions of the memo indicate.

The June decision was blocked by a federal judge. In November, DHS issued another notice terminating TPS protections for Haitians.

That time, according a previously publicized email, a homeland security senior counselor asked a State Department official for the agency’s views on the country conditions in Haiti. The official, Spencer Chretien, didn’t address the country conditions but responded that “there would be no foreign policy concerns.”

Lawyers for the Haitians argued that response didn’t meet the legal standard for a sufficient consultation, though the Trump administration disagreed.

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Nine left in critical condition after UK train collision that killed driver | Transport News

More than 80 people received treatment after the crash and 28 remain in hospital.

At least nine people remain in critical condition after two passenger trains crashed into each other and killed one driver near Bedford, about 56 miles (90km) north of London.

British Transport Police said on Saturday that more than 80 people had received hospital treatment on Friday night after the trains collided.

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“As of this morning, 28 remain in hospital, and nine are in a critical condition,” Chief Constable Lucy D’Orsi said.

She added that “specialist investigators from British Transport Police are working with colleagues at the Rail Accident Investigation Branch (RAIB) to gather the facts and determine what has happened”.

Moreover, Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander said that it was “too early to speculate” on the cause of the crash, and promised that “a thorough investigation … to ensure that lessons are learnt” would be launched.

Friday’s crash involved two London-bound trains on the same track, according to East Midlands Railway (EMR), which operates both services.

On Friday, police confirmed that the driver of one of the trains had died at the scene.

In a statement from Buckingham Palace, King Charles said he was “greatly saddened” by the incident and sent “his thoughts and sympathies” to the dead driver’s family and to those injured.

The East of England Ambulance Service said on Saturday that 11 people sustained “very serious” injuries, while a further 32 suffered serious wounds and 56 others had minor injuries.

EMR’s managing director, Will Rogers, also called the crash “a profoundly sad day for the railway community”.

“We are deeply saddened that our driver has tragically died, and a number of other people have suffered injuries,” he said, speaking at the scene alongside other officials.

He added that EMR was “fully supporting” the RAIB probe.

More than 20 ambulances, specialist hazardous area rescue teams and six air ambulances were dispatched to the scene of Friday’s crash.

While the investigation continues, officials have not said whether signalling issues played a role in the incident.

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U.S. will offer expedited visa interviews at select embassies for $750

The State Department will offer a “premium” expedited service for foreigners seeking business or tourist visas to come to the United States that will set applicants back $750 — on top of the initial fee of $185.

In a notice to be published in the Federal Register this week, the department will unveil a pilot program that will allow visa applicants to pay the $750 to schedule an appointment for an interview within 10 days of the payment at select U.S. embassies and consulates.

The pilot program will run from July 1 to Dec. 31, according to internal documents obtained by the Associated Press and a State Department official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the program has not yet been announced.

The move is a potential effort to ease conditions caused by the Trump administration’s push to make entering the United States more difficult. The administration has cracked down on most forms of migration for foreigners — demanding that bonds of up to $15,000 be paid for visa processing in some, mainly African, countries and requiring years of personal history, including social media accounts, to be vetted.

The new requirements have caused delays in visa processing around the world, prompting complaints.

Wait times for visa interviews for citizens of countries that are not part of the Visa Waiver Program can be several months if not longer. But paying the fee for the “optional premium add-on service” does not guarantee that a visa will be issued.

The embassies and consulates at which the expedited service will be available are to be announced before the program takes effect July 1. The pilot program will run through the end of the year but could be extended depending on demand.

Lee writes for the Associated Press.

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Conditions at California immigrant detention centers worse under Trump

A new report by the California Department of Justice found that conditions at immigrant detention facilities in the state have worsened as surging arrests under the Trump administration’s mass deportation campaign led to overcrowding and insufficient medical care.

For the 175-page report, which was released Friday, California Justice Department staff, along with correctional and healthcare experts, toured all seven facilities that existed in 2025 (an eighth facility, the Central Valley Annex in McFarland, began receiving detainees in April). The team analyzed internal documents and detainee records, and interviewed detention staff and 194 detainees.

“This is the federal government paying for-profit, private companies to run these detention centers, and they are running these detention centers with inhumane, cruel, and unacceptable conditions, “ California Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta said at a news conference Friday.

Department of Homeland Security spokesperson Lauren Bis, in a statement, defended the treatment of those held at detainment centers.

“No lawbreakers in the history of human civilization have been treated better than illegal aliens in the United States,” she said.

Bis added, “This is the best healthcare many aliens have received in their entire lives. Meals are certified by dietitians. Ensuring the safety, security, and well-being of individuals in our custody is a top priority at ICE.”

The inspections were possible because California enacted a law during the first Trump administration requiring state oversight and public reports detailing the conditions of immigrant detention facilities. Bonta said California is the only state in the country with such a law.

Such detailed reports have taken on outsized significance as the Trump administration has whittled down the Department of Homeland Security’s own oversight mechanisms.

The agency said it would respond later to a request for comment.

Christopher Ferreira, a spokesperson for The Geo Group, said the company’s services are monitored by DHS to ensure compliance with federal detention standards and contract requirements regarding detainees. The company oversees four facilities in California, including the Adelanto ICE Processing Center north of San Bernardino.

“The support services GEO provides include around-the-clock access to medical care, in-person and virtual legal and family visitation, general and legal library access, translation services, dietitian-approved meals, religious and specialty diets, recreational amenities, and opportunities to practice their religious beliefs,” Ferreira said.

He added that of the company’s immigration facilities are independently accredited by the American Correctional Assn. and the National Commission on Correctional Health Care.

CoreCivic operates the California City Detention Facility north of Lancaster and Otay Mesa Detention Center in San Diego. Spokesperson Ryan Gustin said the company had not been provided a copy of the report or reviewed its findings.

“The safety, health and well-being of the individuals entrusted to our care is our top priority,” Gustin said. He added that the company’s ICE-contracted facilities are “subject to multiple layers of oversight by our government partners” and auditors.

The report notes that CoreCivic did not make requested documents available to investigators, including records on use of force at the California City facility.

“The decision to deny Cal DOJ access to these files was remarkable in light of the serious legal claims that have been made against the facility, which allege that staff routinely engage in abusive behavior and unreasonable use of force against detainees, including deploying pepper spray, hitting a detainee with riot shields and holding him down with their knees on his back, and aggressively pushing a detainee,” the report states.

According to the report, the detainee population in California grew 162%, from 2,300 to more than 6,000 detainees, between site visits in 2023 and those in 2025. Most detainees had no criminal history and were classified as low-security.

Collectively, the facilities have the capacity to hold up to nearly 8,200 detainees.

Six people have died in ICE custody in California since the start of 2025 — four at Adelanto and two at Imperial Regional Detention Facility. In all of the Adelanto cases, family members alleged that the facility’s medical response was inadequate, the report said.

Inspectors found that staffing failed to keep pace with the growing numbers of detainees, particularly at Adelanto and at California City, where they saw “crisis-level healthcare understaffing.”

At Mesa Verde ICE Processing Center in Bakersfield, the report says, “Medical care delays, including specialty care and referrals, were widespread and appeared to be caused by delays in approvals by ICE Health Service Corps and canceled or dropped referrals due to transfers between facilities.”

The intake process for new detainees, which includes a medical and mental health screening, is supposed to take place within 12 hours of their arrival. But detainees at several facilities reported waiting days or weeks before receiving their housing assignment and medical screening, the report says. While waiting, some slept on the floor without access to water.

In its statement, the Department of Homeland Security said detainees undergo medical, dental, and mental health intake screening within 12 hours of arriving at each detention facility, a full health assessment within 14 days of entering ICE custody or arrival at a facility, and access to medical appointments and 24-hour emergency care.

Gustin, the CoreCivic spokesperson, said its facilities adhere to detention standards on staffing and medical care. Emergency care is available 24 hours a day, he said, and the facilities work closely with local hospitals and providers for specialized care.

Ferreira, the Geo Group spokesperson, said detainees have access to teams of medical professionals and off-site specialists, imaging facilities and emergency services.

At the Adelanto facility, detainees said water coolers remained empty for hours. Justice Department staff saw murky drinking water come out of the tap in the women’s housing unit.

At the Golden State Annex in McFarland and at Mesa Verde, detainees said they spent at least $50 per week on commissary items so they wouldn’t go hungry. Across most facilities, detainees reported undercooked food, a lack of dietary or allergy accommodations and irregular mealtimes.

Basic necessities are also an issue, according to the report. At the California City facility, detainees said they got so cold that they cut the ends off socks to make improvised sleeves and covered the air vents in their cells with sheets of paper.

According to the report, Otay Mesa is the only detention center in California with a policy requiring that detainees be strip searched after being visited by anyone other than their attorney. Detained women recounted being told strip in front of male officers, even when menstruating, the report said.

Gustin said CoreCivic follows federal detention standards regarding searches of detainees.

The report did highlight some improvements, including at the Imperial Regional Detention Facility in Calexico, which inspectors said appeared better staffed with medical and mental health care providers compared to their 2023 visit. Still, the review “identified concerns regarding the facility’s management of detainees with severe mental health issues, including two detainees who experienced extended stays in restrictive housing of over 200 days.”

Emily Lawhead, a spokesperson for Management & Training Corp., which oversees the Imperial facility, said the company takes the report seriously. She noted that the report also highlights prompt responses to sick-call requests, meaningful access to programming and recreation and expanded attorney access through 36 private phone booths.

But Lawhead said the company will examine the concerns raised in the report.

“If our review identifies gaps, delays, or missed standards, we will address them,” she said.

The state law requiring the detention facility inspections expires next year. A bill by state Sen. María Elena Durazo (D-Los Angeles) would make the inspections permanent. Another state bill, by Sen. Steve Padilla (D-San Diego), would prevent the excessive markup of products sold at detention center commissaries.

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Republican Sen. Susan Collins discloses her longtime tremor after scrutiny in Maine’s Senate race

Republican U.S. Sen. Susan Collins says she has a benign essential tremor, disclosing the longtime health condition for the first time in her decades-long political career as she seeks reelection in one of this year’s toughest Senate races.

Collins first confirmed the tremor to WCSH-TV in Maine on Wednesday after facing questions about her health from appearances in recent videos, including her campaign announcement video.

The condition causes trembling in Collins’ hands, head and voice, and she said she has had it for the entirety of her nearly three-decade Senate career. It affects millions of Americans over the age of 40 and “does not interfere” with work, Collins said in a Thursday statement to the Associated Press. She said it is not a neurodegenerative condition.

“The tremor is occasionally inconvenient, and sometimes the subject of cruel comments online, but it does not hinder my ability to work and, as I said, is something that I have lived with for decades,” the statement said.

Health issues and candidates’ ages have drawn increased scrutiny in high-profile elections following Democratic President Joe Biden’s decision not to seek reelection in 2024 at age 81. Those questions have only lingered with Republican President Trump, who’s 79 and in recent months has been seen with bruising on the back of his hand, sometimes concealed with makeup. The White House acknowledged last year that Trump was diagnosed with chronic venous insufficiency.

Collins is up for reelection in a seat Democrats need to flip to have a chance to take back the Senate. Her likely opponent is Democrat Graham Platner, an oyster farmer and combat veteran, after Democratic Gov. Janet Mills suspended her campaign last week. Age has been an issue in the contest, with Collins, 73, and Mills, 78, more than three decades older than Platner, 41.

Platner acknowledged early in his campaign his own health problems. He has spoken openly about chronic pain in his shoulder and knees stemming from combat service, and he has said he was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder after serving at war. Platner has said he has a 100% disability rating from the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs but continues to work as an oyster farmer.

“There are a lot of disabled combat veterans, or just disabled vets, at 100%, who still work,” Platner told WCSH last year. “It’s a very normal thing.”

Collins was first elected to the Senate in 1996 and said in her statement that she has had the condition for all of that time. Over the years, the condition has been noticeable in Collins’ debates and frequent public appearances.

As chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee, Collins has been at the forefront of the chamber’s many spending disputes this Congress, often leading the floor debate and providing the GOP’s closing arguments. She frequently engages with reporters in the hallways. Her streak of never missing a Senate vote is up to 9,966 and stands as the second-longest consecutive voting streak in the chamber’s history.

Tremors happen when nerves aren’t properly communicating with certain muscles. Essential tremor, sometimes called benign essential tremor, is one of the most common movement disorders, according to the National Institutes of Health.

The risk of developing it increases as people get older, but at least half of cases are inherited, meaning the tremor runs in the family, and those tend to begin at younger ages. It almost always involves shaky or trembling hands but also can affect the head, voice or lower limbs.

Whittle and Kruesi write for the Associated Press. Kruesi reported from Providence, R.I. AP writers Kevin Freking and Lauran Neergaard in Washington contributed to this report.

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Ex-NYC mayor, Trump ally Rudy Giuliani in critical condition

1 of 3 | Former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani is interviewed on the floor of the 2024 Republican National Convention at Fiserv Forum in Milwaukee, Wis., on July 16, 2024. Giuliani has been hospitalized in critical condition, his spokesman said Sunday. File Photo by Tannen Maury/UPI | License Photo

May 3 (UPI) — Former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani has been hospitalized and is in critical condition, his spokesman said Sunday.

Giuliani “is currently in the hospital, where he remains in critical but stable condition,” Ted Goodman said in a statement.

“Mayor Giuliani is a fighter who has faced every challenge in his life with unwavering strength, and he’s fighting with that same strength now. We do ask that you join us in prayer for America’s Mayor Rudy Giuliani.”

Goodman did not say why Giuliani, 81, was hospitalized.

The former mayor’s condition was also noted by President Donald Trump, who wrote on his Truth Social platform, “True Warrior, and the Best Mayor in the History of New York City, BY FAR.”

Trump also took the occasion to praise his political ally and former lawyer, who served as one of the key figures in the president’s baseless campaign attacking the results of his 2020 election loss to Joe Biden as “rigged.”

“They cheated on the Elections, fabricated hundreds of stories, did anything possible to destroy our Nation, and now, look at Rudy. So sad!” Trump wrote.

Trump in November pardoned Giuliani and 76 others tied to his efforts to overturn the 2020 election, including participation in what has become known as the fake electors scheme. The strategy involved the creation of false slates of pro-Trump electors in every battleground state that he lost to Biden, including Georgia.

The former mayor’s championing of Trump’s claims also resulted in his own financial troubles.

In September, he reached a confidential settlement with Dominion Voting Systems, which had filed a $1.3 billion defamation lawsuit against him for his allegations the company rigged the 2020 presidential election.

Giuliani was previously disbarred as a lawyer in New York and Washington, D.C.

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Supreme Court will hear Trump’s bid to end legal protection for up to 1.3 million immigrants

The Supreme Court will hear arguments this week over whether the Trump administration may revoke temporary protected status for about 350,000 Haitian and 6,100 Syrian immigrants.

TPS allows people who are already in the United States to legally reside and work here if they are unable to safely return to their home country because of a sudden emergency such as war or a natural disaster. The humanitarian program, enacted by Congress in 1990, has since been used by Republican and Democratic administrations alike.

Since President Trump returned to office last year, his administration has terminated such protections for immigrants from 13 countries. Court challenges on behalf of Haitians and Syrians have been consolidated into a single case, Mullin vs. Doe, which the justices will hear Wednesday.

The high court’s ruling could eventually have sweeping repercussions for all 1.3 million immigrants from the 17 countries that were designated for TPS at the start of this administration. That’s because the federal government is arguing that decisions regarding the program are almost entirely immune from review by courts.

“Temporary means temporary and the final word will not be from activist judges legislating from the bench,” a Department of Homeland Security spokesperson, who did not provide their name, wrote in response to a request for comment.

Lower courts have repeatedly deemed the administration’s actions improper.

“We’re seeing clear gamesmanship from government to insulate all TPS decision-making from any oversight,” said Emi MacLean, a senior staff attorney at the American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California, who is counsel in the case for Syrians and in other cases challenging five of the terminations. “They’ve created a farce of a process to justify the ends that they sought, which was to strip humanitarian protections from over a million people.”

In the Trump administration’s appeal, Solicitor Gen. D. John Sauer argued that Congress gave the Homeland Security secretary the power to grant or end the temporary protected status for troubled countries and barred judges from intervening.

He pointed to a provision that says: “There is no judicial review of any determination of the [secretary] with respect to the designation, or termination or extension of a designation, of a foreign state.”

Citing this hands-off provision, Trump’s lawyers won brief emergency orders last year that allowed the administration to strip legal protections from about 600,000 Venezuelans. In that case, then-Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem had quickly reversed an extension granted by the Biden administration three days before Trump was sworn in.

The circumstances surrounding the Syria and Haiti cases are different. Advocates for the immigrants argue that the administration failed to conduct the required process to properly evaluate each country’s conditions.

They point to emails in July from a Homeland Security official to a State Department official. The Homeland Security official listed TPS designations coming up for review — Syria, South Sudan, Myanmar and Ethiopia. In response, the State Department official wrote: “I confirm that State has no foreign policy concerns with ending these TPS designations.”

State Department travel advisories for both countries warn people against traveling to either because of the risk of terrorism, kidnapping and widespread violence. U.S. citizens are advised to prepare a will.

For Syria, the advisory cites active armed conflict since 2011. For Haiti, it says the country has been under a national state of emergency since March 2024.

But Federal Register notices announcing the terminations said country conditions had sufficiently improved. The notice for Syria, for example, says “the Secretary has determined that, while some sporadic and episodic violence occurs in Syria, the situation no longer meets the criteria for an ongoing armed conflict that poses a serious threat to the personal safety of returning Syrian nationals.”

If the government loses, Homeland Security officials would have to reevaluate the TPS decisions in consultation with the State Department and make a decision based entirely on the country conditions themselves.

The government could start over, in that case, and still find that TPS is no longer warranted — if the process bears that out.

In a friend-of-the-court brief led by immigration law scholars at Georgetown and Temple universities, they explained that before TPS existed, similar forms of humanitarian relief were determined by the executive branch “without reference to any statutory criteria or constraints, and with little if any explanation for why nationals of certain countries received protection while others did not.”

With TPS in 1990, Congress sought to end that “unfettered discretion,” they wrote. Instead, the statute requires the Homeland Security secretary to terminate TPS if the review finds that conditions justifying the designation no longer exist. Otherwise, the law states, it “is extended.”

“The point of the TPS statute was to depoliticize humanitarian decisions,” said MacLean, the ACLU attorney. “Secretary Noem in all of her TPS decisions has completely undermined that fundamental goal.”

Ahilan Arulanantham, who is arguing for the Syria case on Wednesday, added that if the government wins, “it also means they could probably grant TPS to countries that don’t deserve it.” Arulanantham, co-director of the Center for Immigration Law and Policy at UCLA, has represented the National TPS Alliance in separate litigation during this administration and Trump’s first.

Top Homeland Security and State Department officials from the George W. Bush, Obama, Trump and Biden administrations filed a brief arguing that the Trump administration’s terminations of TPS for Syria and Haiti were “not based on evidence and sharply departed from past inter-agency practices.”

Haiti was originally designated for TPS in 2010 after a massive earthquake devastated the country and redesignated because of subsequent natural disasters and gang violence. In November, Noem announced that she would terminate TPS for Haiti, effective Feb. 3. She wrote in the Federal Register that “there are no extraordinary and temporary conditions in Haiti” that prevent Haitians from safely returning.

But even if there were, she continued, “termination of Temporary Protected Status of Haiti is still required because it is contrary to the national interest of the United States.”

The Homeland Security spokesperson said TPS for Haiti “was never intended to be a de facto amnesty program, yet that’s how previous administrations have used it for decades.”

Syria, meanwhile, “has been a hotbed of terrorism and extremism for nearly two decades,” the spokesperson wrote, “and it is contrary to our national interest to allow Syrians to remain in our country.”

In the Federal Register notice for Syria, Noem added that maintaining its TPS designation would “complicate the administration’s broader diplomatic engagement with Syria’s transitional government” by undermining peace-building efforts.

The Supreme Court will take up the question of whether the Homeland Security secretary can use national interest as a reason to revoke TPS. Attorneys for the TPS holders believe any decision to revoke TPS must come down to the country conditions alone.

Syria and Haiti are among the countries for which the Trump administration has also paused processing all immigration benefits. If their TPS protections expire, those immigrants would become vulnerable to detention and deportation even if they are eligible for other forms of relief.

U.S. Solicitor Gen. D. John Sauer attends a press briefing at the White House.

U.S. Solicitor Gen. D. John Sauer argued that Congress gave the Homeland Security secretary the power to grant or end the temporary protected status for troubled countries and barred judges from intervening.

(Aaron Schwartz / Getty Images)

Attorneys for the TPS holders say the terminations were also driven by racial animus. They point to various statements by Trump over the years, including his false claim that Haitians were eating the pets of people in Springfield, Ohio, that they “probably have AIDS” and that Haiti is among the “shithole countries” from which he would permanently pause migration.

Among those affected is a 35-year-old Haitian woman who has lived in the U.S. since 2000 and is raising her four U.S. citizen children in a Southern state. The woman requested to be identified by her middle and last initials, B.B., out of concern for her immigration case.

After graduating high school, B.B. got into nursing school but couldn’t attend because she didn’t qualify for financial aid. She said later getting TPS allowed her to become a certified nursing assistant, and she now works as a medical coordinator while owning a nail salon and three real estate properties.

Though B.B.’s TPS remains active because of the court proceedings, her driver’s license expired Feb. 3 and she has since had to rely on friends and rideshares to get around while repeatedly requesting a renewal.

She said she worries most about her children. If she were deported back to Haiti, she said, she would leave them in the U.S. for their own safety.

“It’s like planning your death,” she said. “I’m 35 and I already have a will — not because I’m going to die but because of the situation.”

On a call with reporters, attorneys and advocates, a Syrian man said he earned his master’s degree in the U.S. and now works in the healthcare industry. The man, who was identified by a pseudonym, said he and his wife are afraid of what their future will look like.

“TPS gave us something we had not had in years: a place to settle and a moment to grieve,” he said, later adding that “telling Syrians to go back right now is not a policy — it’s abandonment.”

Among the public, there is broad support for TPS and other humanitarian programs. According to a poll conducted last month by the firm Equis Research, 68% of Latino and 65% of non-Latino voters support fighting to give back legal protection to those who have lost their temporary protected status or asylum protections as a result of the current administration’s actions.

Earlier this month, the House voted in favor of a bill that would require new Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin to redesignate Haiti for TPS. Among those who crossed the political aisle to support it were 10 Republicans and Rep. Kevin Kiley, an independent from Rocklin, Calif., who caucuses with Republicans. The measure faces an uphill battle in the Senate.

In an interview with The Times, Kiley said his vote was about common sense and being humane.

“It’s particularly dangerous for people that would be returning where the gangs that are ravaging the country are just lying in wait outside the airport in Port-au-Prince,” he said, referring to the Haitian capital.

And because most won’t return willingly, Kiley added, “really all you’d be doing is removing work authorization from 350,000-some people who are going to mostly remain in the country, who will not be able to work anymore and may end up being more reliant on public assistance in states where they’re eligible.”

At the same time, Kiley said, the TPS system hasn’t worked as intended because most so-called temporary designations drag on.

“The system needs to be reformed,” he said. “But that’s all separate and apart from what we do with the folks who were already given this designation.”

Times staff writer David G. Savage in Washington contributed to this report.

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