court

SHARON Osbourne has launched a High Court bid to remove her late hubby Ozzy’s long-term accountant as an executor of his will. 

Papers lodged yesterday show the rocker’s widow, 73, issued a claim against Colin Newman under a law used to remove or replace estate representatives. 

Ozzy died in July last year aged 76, weeks after a farewell gig with Black Sabbath in his home city of Birmingham.

His wife and two other executors, her niece Georgina Maszlin and assistant Melinda Varga, now want Mr Newman removed from administering his ex-client’s estimated £100million fortune.  

He had looked after the couple’s finances since before they married in 1982 and is one of the most senior money men in the UK music industry.  

Companies House records show he was a director of Ozzy’s main UK firm, Monowise Ltd, for years before quitting in April. 

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Sharon was appointed director last December, five months after Ozzy’s death, with the firm officially controlled by the “estate of John Michael Osbourne” — Ozzy’s real name.  

Judges can remove an executor for a variety of reasons, including if they have already been involved in the will but then later decide to step away.  

It is not clear if Mr Newman is contesting the application or if he has agreed to stand aside. 

He first met Sharon while working as a junior accountant for her father, notorious rock manager Don Arden.  

He is credited on several of Ozzy’s albums and they were long-term pals.  

The rocker is once said to have burst into his accountant’s Soho office swinging a dead rabbit and spraying blood on the walls.  

Ozzy also slept on a park bench opposite Mr Newman’s house in 1984 instead of going to the hospital where Sharon was about to give birth to their daughter Kelly. 

Mr Newman, 79, also acted as former X Factor judge Sharon’s literary agent. 

He and Sharon’s legal representatives were invited to comment. 

Sept. 8, 2026 3:02 PM PT

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Tuesday rebuffed an appeal from Missouri officials who wanted to use new congressional districts backed by President Trump in the November election, a defeat for Republicans who had hoped the new map could help them hold onto their slim House majority.

The justices let stand a decision by Missouri’s top court, which said the new districts were automatically suspended by a citizen petition demanding a statewide vote.

The ruling marks a rare setback for Republicans in a nationwide redistricting battle that Trump urged Republicans to launch last year.

Missouri’s new districts were used in the August primaries. But the Missouri Supreme Court ruled in September that the state must revert to districts adopted after the last census.

Republican state Atty. Gen. Catherine Hanaway, who appealed, had argued it would violate federal rights to switch districts for voters between the primary and general elections. She also said it would cause confusion.

Missouri currently is represented in the U.S. House by six Republicans and two Democrats who were elected under districts that Republican state officials approved in 2022.

But at Trump’s urging, Missouri Gov. Mike Kehoe called the Legislature into a special session last year to redraw congressional boundaries to their advantage ahead of the midterms.

The revised map targeted the 5th Congressional District, held by longtime Democratic Rep. Emanuel Cleaver of Kansas City. It reassigned portions of Kansas City to two neighboring districts represented by Republicans and stretched the remainder of Cleaver’s district far eastward into rural Republican areas.

Cleaver was unopposed in the Democratic primary. State Sen. Rick Brattin won the Republican primary in the reshaped district.

On the same day as the primary, Republican Secretary of State Denny Hoskins rejected a petition with thousands of signatures seeking to force a November referendum on the map. Hoskins asserted that Missouri’s Constitution doesn’t allow a referendum on congressional redistricting. A lower court agreed, but the state Supreme Court reversed Hoskins’ decision.

The state’s top court said the new districts were retroactively frozen in December, when the petition signatures were submitted, and thus never became law. Hoskins on Tuesday assigned the redistricting referendum as Proposition A on the November ballot, in compliance with the state court order.

The Missouri Constitution does not specifically say that a referendum can be used for congressional redistricting. But the state Supreme Court said a constitutional provision allowing a referendum on “any act” of the Legislature encompasses congressional redistricting legislation.

Missouri was the second Republican-led state, after Texas, to respond to Trump’s call last year to redraw congressional districts. Several other states followed. All told, Republicans had hoped to win as many as 16 additional seats from new House maps enacted in eight states — Texas, Missouri, North Carolina, Ohio, Florida, Tennessee, Louisiana and Alabama. Democrats, whose counterattack faced several setbacks, think they could win up to six additional seats from new districts in California and Utah.

It remains to be seen whether the redistricting works as intended for Republicans. The president’s party historically has lost congressional seats in the midterms, and Trump’s poor approval ratings could provide an extra hurdle for Republican candidates.

Whitehurst and Lieb write for the Associated Press.

Allegations of misconduct between two justices threaten to pull court into political battles ahead of upcoming election.

Brazilian Supreme Court Justice Andre Mendonca has ordered the suspension of federal police chief Andrei Rodrigues and the force’s intelligence chief Leandro Almada amid growing divisions that have tested the credibility of the country’s highest court.

The suspensions were announced on Tuesday. Mendonca, appointed by former right-wing President Jair Bolsonaro, has accused Rodrigues and Almada of producing six illegal reports on the activities of justices.

The move was backed by a majority on one of the high court’s five-member panels.

But it is likely to be challenged by the government, possibly pulling the administration of leftist President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva into a political battle ahead of October’s presidential election.

“Investigating possible evidence of crimes is correct,” Institutional Relations Minister Jose Guimaraes, a top aide to Lula, said in response to the decision on social media. “But this measure smells electoral to me. That cannot happen.”

Polls show Lula and Jair Bolsonaro’s eldest son, Senator Flavio Bolsonaro, in a tight race ahead of the first round of voting on October 4.

The Supreme Court has been roiled by mutual accusations of wrongdoing between Justice Alexandre de Moraes, appointed under centre-right President Michel Temer, and Mendonca, a Bolsonaro appointee.

De Moraes has become a prominent target of right-wing criticism, particularly after he oversaw the case against Jair Bolsonaro for plotting a coup after the 2022 election.

A report detailing possible links between de Moraes and disgraced banker Daniel Vorcaro was made public by Mendonca last week.

De Moraes, however, responded by accusing Mendonca of abusing his power, citing federal police intelligence reports and urging the court to investigate him. Mendonca has now challenged the legality of those reports.

The Vorcaro corruption scandal has widened to include powerful political figures on both the left and right.

Vorcaro was arrested in 2025 for allegedly overseeing one of the largest bank fraud schemes in the history of Brazil, leaving billions in owed money.

Flavio Bolsonaro has also faced scrutiny for his ties with Vorcaro, after he approached the banker for assistance in funding a film about his father. Jair Bolsonaro is currently serving a 27-year prison sentence.

The right-wing senator used Tuesday’s suspension to push his claim that the prosecution of his father was a political “witch-hunt”. The Federal Police had recommended charges be brought against the elder Bolsonaro in November 2024.

“Lula’s special group in the Federal Police officially unmasked,” Senator Bolsonaro wrote in a social media post. “May the honourable and glorious Federal Police regain its autonomy to go after criminals, and not Lula’s political adversaries.”

William Marcel Murad, the federal police’s executive director, released a statement saying that Rodrigues has the agency’s “full confidence” and that agents “will not be shaken by attacks”.

Mérida, September 7, 2026 (venezuelanalysis.com) – Defense attorneys representing Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and First Lady Cilia Flores have formally requested the dismissal of criminal charges against them in the United States, invoking head-of-state and diplomatic immunity under international law.

In a motion filed before the US District Court for the Southern District of New York on September 2, defense counsel argued that domestic courts lack jurisdiction to indict, prosecute, or detain sitting foreign leaders.

Maduro and Flores’ legal teams emphasized that international treaties and long-standing legal principles shield active heads of state and high-ranking government officials from foreign criminal jurisdiction, regardless of the status of bilateral relations between countries.

Lead defense attorney Barry Pollack asserted that the Justice Department’s indictment constitutes an unprecedented overreach of foreign judicial authority. 

“Under settled international law and long-standing diplomatic practice, foreign courts cannot exercise criminal jurisdiction over a sitting head of state,” he stated in court filings.

Pollack underscored that Maduro is facing charges for acts that would have been part of his official duties and that he “vehemently denies” the US prosecutors’ allegations.

The Venezuelan leader is facing charges of “narcoterrorism,” drug trafficking conspiracy, and weapons possession offenses. Flores has been accused of the same alleged crimes except “narcoterrorism.” Maduro and Flores were kidnapped by US special forces on January 3 following military strikes in Caracas and surrounding states.

Under the established trial schedule, federal prosecutors have several weeks to respond to the immunity case and the motion to dismiss.

Subsequently, US District Judge Alvin Hellerstein is expected to evaluate written arguments and hold an evidentiary hearing on November 17 to decide whether to grant the defense’s request or proceed to trial. In the latter case, the trial would begin in June 2027.

Legal analysts have argued that the sovereign immunity case is unlikely to succeed given the US judicial system’s tradition of deferring to the executive branch on foreign policy matters. Under the “one voice” doctrine, domestic courts follow the White House and the Department of State regarding which authorities are formally recognized as representing a foreign country.

The first Trump administration refused to recognize Maduro as Venezuela’s legitimate head of state following his 2018 reelection, instead backing the self-proclaimed “interim government” headed by Juan Guaidó. In 2023, Washington transferred its recognition to the defunct, opposition-majority parliament despite its term expiring two years earlier.

In March, the Trump administration recognized Delcy Rodríguez as Venezuela’s “sole leader.” As Maduro’s vice president, Rodríguez took over as acting president in January and has overhauled the Caribbean nation’s foreign policy in the months since. Caracas has reestablished diplomatic relations with Washington and strengthened ties with its global partners, including Israel, while distancing itself from historic allies such as China, Cuba, and Iran.

In his motion to dismiss, Pollack called it “incongruous” for the White House to recognize Rodríguez but not Maduro, who appointed her as vice president.

Venezuelan officials have not commented on the latest developments in Maduro and Flores’ case. After holding multiple rallies in the weeks following the January 3 kidnapping, Venezuelan authorities have significantly scaled back the public backing for the pair.

In a June interview, Rodríguez said that Maduro remains Venezuela’s legitimate president but stopped short of demanding his liberation, instead claiming that he has the right to “demonstrate the truth” before the US justice system.

In recent weeks, the Venezuelan government, through its official communications, as well as state-owned media channels, has increasingly dropped the “acting” label, referring to Rodríguez simply as “president.”

For their part, US-based international solidarity movements have staged monthly mobilizations demanding Maduro and Flores’ immediate release, including outside the federal detention center in Brooklyn where the pair is presently detained.

Edited by Ricardo Vaz in Caracas.

Sept. 6, 2026 8:33 AM PT

WASHINGTON — The Trump administration on Sunday renewed its appeal to the Supreme Court after a federal judge blocked new restrictions on mail ballots ahead of the midterms.

The filing came after U.S. District Court Judge Indira Talwani extended an order against the U.S. Postal Service enforcing President Trump’s executive order for the November elections.

The legal wrangling comes even as states start sending out mail ballots, leaving the administration little time to make big changes in mail ballot rules.

“Ballots have already begun to be mailed in North Carolina, and more States will begin the mailing process as the injunction remains in place — including Alabama on September 9 and at least five States the week of September 13,” Solicitor Gen. John Sauer said in the filing.

“Once those ballot envelopes enter the mailstream, there is no retrieving them. And while the injunction allows the Postal Service and the States to continue taking steps to ensure that their envelopes satisfy the Rule’s requirements … each day the injunction is in place risks sowing confusion and chaos because the injunction makes those preparatory steps voluntary, rather than mandatory.”

The appeal marks the third time the administration has asked the high court to intervene. The high court has allowed the plan to move forward but not ruled on whether it is legal.

The battle could have major ramifications for this year’s elections, when control of Congress is at stake. Nearly one-third of voters in the U.S. cast mail ballots. Mail ballots are sent to every California voter.

Democratic states and voting rights groups say the changes are unconstitutional and amount to voter suppression. Election officials contend that there isn’t enough time to revise their systems to comply with the new Postal Service directives.

The Trump administration has framed the restrictions as commonsense changes that are within its power to regulate the mail.

“Simply put, the best way to address respondents’ fears about inability to comply with the Rule is to grant an immediate administrative stay of the order, followed by a full stay pending further review,” Sauer said. “That will remove the improper cloud of uncertainty that the district court has cast over the Rule, making clear to all involved that compliance with the Rule is not optional and must start without further delay.”

Trump has long sought to limit mail voting, even though he himself often uses that method to cast his own ballot. He has falsely blamed mail balloting for his 2020 election loss to Democrat Joe Biden, spreading baseless claims of fraud. But so far, he has been unable to change the long-standing voting procedure.

Whitehurst and Fields write for the Associated Press.

The Los Angeles federal public defender’s office on Friday joined a renewed effort to oust Bill Essayli, the top federal prosecutor in Southern California, accusing the government of “playing shadow games with the most consequential powers a government can wield against its population.”

Citing a recent order from the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in United States v. Jackson, the public defender’s office renewed a motion seeking to disqualify Essayli from participating in or supervising the prosecution of their client, Jaime Ramirez.

The federal appellate court ruled last month that the Department of Justice cannot keep an official who has not been confirmed by the Senate in charge of a U.S. attorney’s office simply by giving that person a different title and the full powers of the job.

In their motion filed Friday, James Anglin Flynn and Ayah A. Sarsour, deputy federal public defenders, accused the government of asking them “to trust that there are some undisclosed limits on Essayli’s authority that render it valid.”

“The buck should stop here, and it should stop now,” they wrote.

The U.S. attorney’s office in L.A. did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

H. Dean Steward, a defense attorney, first kicked off the renewed effort last week, filing a motion asking Senior U.S. District Judge J. Michael Seabright to reconsider his prior ruling. Steward argued that Essayli should not be allowed to continue leading the office.

Seabright previously disqualified Essayli as acting U.S. attorney in October, finding he was “not lawfully serving” in the top role. But Seabright — who was appointed to the bench by President George W. Bush — said the court had “no basis to preclude Essayli from performing the lawful duties” of first assistant U.S. attorney, which left the door open for him to remain in charge.

Seabright scheduled a hearing for Oct. 13 on the latest motion. At a Zoom hearing on Aug. 28, Seabright appeared to signal which way he is leaning.

“I’m not sure if the government is just saying my decision was different from Jackson and therefore it stands. I’m not sure that passes muster given how the 9th Circuit ruled in Jackson,” Seabright said. “I think there’s going to have to be more in-depth briefing than the government has given me to date.”

The federal appellate court ruling stemmed from a challenge to the authority of Nevada’s top federal prosecutor, Sigal Chattah, whom the Justice Department had designated “first assistant” U.S. attorney. With no one above her in the office, Chattah has seemingly been calling the shots on federal prosecutions in the state, handling cases referred by the FBI, the Drug Enforcement Administration and other law enforcement agencies.

The Justice Department previously said it disagreed with the 9th Circuit’s decision and plans to appeal it to the Supreme Court. The agency did not respond to questions about what effect the ruling could have on Essayli.

The Trump administration has used a similar workaround to keep Essayli running the U.S. attorney’s office in L.A. without going through the Senate confirmation process, where he likely would have faced strong opposition from California’s elected representatives.

Essayli, 40, has continued leading the federal prosecutor’s office in the Central District of California as “first assistant” despite a federal judge’s ruling last year that said he was unlawfully serving as the acting U.S. attorney. The Justice Department did not appeal that ruling.

Instead, Essayli’s office has maintained that he can prosecute and supervise cases as first assistant. He also was appointed as a “special attorney” by the Trump administration, a title similarly held by Chattah in Nevada.

“To be sure, First Assistant Essayli may be the highest-ranking DOJ lawyer in the U.S. Attorney’s Office, and (like many in the office) he supervises others,” Assistant U.S. Atty. Alexander P. Robbins said in a filing last month. “But that cannot make him a “de facto” U.S. Attorney, and he does not purport to exercise “all of the functions of [that] office.”

Flynn and Sarsour pushed back on that claim in their motion, arguing that the government “is asking this Court to accept a theory that the Ninth Circuit rejected, nearly verbatim less than three weeks ago.” The government, they wrote, “appears to be asking this Court to consider and approve a hypothetical delegation to Essayli of some subset of the U.S. Attorney powers.”

“For over a year, this illegal exercise of prosecutorial powers has violated Mr. Ramirez’s constitutional rights and undermined the legitimacy of the criminal justice system in this district,” Flynn and Sarsour wrote. “In line with Jackson, two other Courts of Appeals have now affirmed the common-sense remedy that this illegality should be stopped.”

The deputy federal public defenders said a defense analysis identified invalid service as acting or de facto U.S. Attorneys in at least 16 districts across the country.

A former Republican member of the California state Assembly from Riverside, Essayli has used his position to act as one of Trump’s fiercest legal foot soldiers. He has pursued criminal charges against protesters, activists and immigrants while dropping cases involving administration allies and supporting lawsuits challenging transgender and environmental policies in California.

Essayli was sworn in as interim U.S. attorney in April 2025. Around the time he hit that role’s 120-day limit, he resigned from his interim role and was allowed to continue under his current titles by then-Atty. Gen. Pam Bondi.

Challenges to Essayli’s position were brought in several criminal cases, with defense lawyers arguing that charges filed under his watch are invalid and should be dismissed. The federal public defender’s office in L.A. had asked the judge to disqualify Essayli from participating in and supervising criminal prosecutions.

Actor and playwright Ellen McLaughlin, who originated the role of the Angel in Tony Kushner’s “Angels in America,” has put her own modern spin on ancient Greek dramas. Her “Helen,” a satirical reworking of Euripides’ tragicomedy and the eternal beauty myth, ought to be better known.

McLaughlin’s modern verse “translation” of Shakespeare’s “Pericles” is now receiving its West Coast premiere at Boston Court Pasadena. I’m traditionally more resistant to playwrights fiddling around with Shakespeare than I am with them updating Greek tragedy. Making Shakespeare’s plays accessible is a noble goal, but there are other ways to go about this beyond modernizing the text and diluting its lyrical beauty and nuance.

When actors understand what they’re saying, audiences tend to catch their characters’ drift while absorbing poetry that’s still at the root of the English language. But “Pericles” isn’t a play that should raise purist hackles. There is an authorship question. The first two acts and the final three may have been written by different writers. There’s an assumption that the second half is Shakespeare’s, but scholars continue to quarrel over attribution.

Julanne Chidi Hill, Desiree Mee Jung, Adam J. Smith, Joel Swetow (center), Rio Rasch, Nicole Javier and Alexander Matos in “Pericles” at Boston Court Pasadena.

(Brian Hashimoto)

Whatever the scholarly truth, it’s safe to say that “Pericles, Prince of Tyre,” to give this late romance its full title, is a patchwork. A strange epic yarn ignited by incest and attempted murder, the play is crammed with shipwrecks and miraculous rescues, devastating suffering and last-minute recoveries. I don’t think I’ve ever read the final act without shedding tears. That said, the play requires an extra-strength dose of willing suspension of disbelief.

McLaughlin’s most notable change concerns the frame of the play, which now unfolds in a disaster relief center. The conceit is that the worried and impatient evacuees amuse themselves with an impromptu performance of “Pericles,” of all unlikely theatrical works.

Outside, a monstrous storm rages. Inside, under flickering lights, a group of reluctant strangers is coaxed into acting out, in a converted gymnasium, a wild tale promising redemption from agonizing tragedy.

Randolph Thompson, Nicole Javier, Joel Swetow Adam J. Smith, Desiree Mee Jung and Rio Rasch in “Pericles” at Boston Court Pasadena.

(Brian Hashimoto)

The production, directed by Margaret Shigeko Starbuck, runs with the makeshift energy and comical freedom that this contextual shift allows. The characters aren’t professional actors, so it’s fine for them to wear their masks loosely. Flashlights illuminate darkened spaces. And props are improvised so that pool noodles are used for jousting and an earbud case serves as an engagement ring.

Joel Swetow, in the role of Gower, smoothly marshals the narrative, advancing the story from one delightful implausibility to the next, recapping what’s happened in the meantime and, when necessary, urging some of the more reluctant characters to stay with the performance. He also takes on the role of malevolent and benevolent kings, whom Pericles (an excellent Randolph Thompson) encounters on his tumultuous odyssey.

Most of the lead players lock into their roles once the performance of “Pericles,” the play within the adaptation, is underway. Thompson is particularly skilled at emotionally investing in his character’s plight even as the spontaneous production refuses to take itself too seriously.

Randolph Thompson, Joel Swetow and Nicole Javier in “Pericles” at Boston Court Pasadena.

(Brian Hashimoto)

A little meta-theatrical hamminess goes a long way, and actors in general have a tendency to overdo the joke. I appreciated the restraint that the cast imposes on itself without spoiling the fun. Nicole Javier who plays Thaisa, Pericles’ seemingly doomed wife, and Troy Leigh-Anne Johnson, who plays Marina, Pericles’ transcendentally good daughter born into sorrow, ensure that we care about the fate of a man who trails disaster behind him.

Julanne Chidi Hill, Desiree Mee Jung, Adam J. Smith and Alexander Matos adroitly flesh out the world of a play that sets virtue and vice in neon opposition. Their sporting way of differentiating their roles keep the staging brisk and lighthearted, qualities that are cleverly maintained by a design team that conjures ocean swells with a metallic-looking sheet, royal garb out of contemporary casual wear and a deadly threat from a pocket umbrella.

I missed the rhythms of Shakespeare’s music, though the most compelling poetic imagery in the adaptation is from the original. But the biggest sacrifice, one that is never fully restored unlike Pericles’ grievous losses, is the emotional weight of the play’s climax. It’s hard to allow yourself to fully believe in the incredible turn of events when the prevailing attitude is so emphatically tongue-in-cheek.

Adam J. Smith, Joel Swetow, Nicole Javier, Julanne Chidi Hill, Jamie Gallo, Randolph Thompson and Rio Rasch in “Pericles” at Boston Court Pasadena.

(Brian Hashimoto)

Johnson’s Marina performs with lovely gravitas, as do Javier’s Thaisa and Thompson’s Pericles. But the rollicking jollity that accompanies the final two acts, which includes the entrance of pirates and the abduction of Marina to a brothel, robs the ending of some of its pathos. A touch more solemnity would not have been amiss.

My eyes for once failed to moisten. But I was nonetheless relieved that Pericles’ happy ending is intact — a reassuring sight in our age of successive disasters.

A former ABC News employee is asking a court to drop CBS News chief correspondent Matt Gutman from her wrongful termination lawsuit, which claimed she was sexually harassed by him when they were colleagues.

Samira Said, a field producer for ABC News for four years, included the claims related to Gutman in a wrongful termination lawsuit filed Aug. 14 in Los Angeles County Superior Court against her former employer and its parent The Walt Disney Co.

Said’s lawyers filed a request with the court Friday to drop Gutman, who was named as a defendant. Lawyers for Said did not respond to an email asking why the request was made. ABC and Disney remain defendants in the suit.

The suit cited two incidents where Said claimed Gutman created a hostile work environment by making inappropriate sexual comments while on the job.

Gutman declined comment on the matter through a CBS News representative.

Said alleges she was wrongfully terminated from ABC News in 2025 after dealing with mental health issues. The suit accuses the company of violating California’s Fair Employment and Housing Act by not making accommodations for her. She is seeking compensatory and punitive damages along with her attorneys’ fees.

Gutman, 48, was the first high-profile talent hire by CBS News Editor-in-Chief Bari Weiss, who took charge of the division in October. He recently filled in as anchor of the “CBS Evening News” and scored higher ratings than Tony Dokoupil, the program’s regular anchor.

Gutman spent 17 years at ABC News, where he mostly reported from Los Angeles.

Sept. 4, 2026 7:12 PM PT

BUENOS AIRES — A long-lost Italian portrait looted from a prominent Jewish art dealer during World War II was set to be returned to his heir after an Argentine court on Friday approved a deal under which the daughter of a fugitive Nazi official agreed to give up her claim rather than face trial.

The agreement paves the way for the long-sought return of “ Portrait of a Lady ” to Marei von Saher, the sole surviving heir of Dutch-Jewish art dealer Jacques Goudstikker, whose celebrated collection was sold under duress to Nazi officials after Adolf Hitler’s Germany invaded the Netherlands in 1940.

Patricia Kadgien, the daughter of the late high-ranking Nazi official Friedrich Kadgien, and her husband, Juan Carlos Cortegoso, were charged with aggravated cover-up last year after authorities said they hid the 18th-century painting despite knowing it was being sought by Argentine and international investigators.

Under the agreement, a copy of which was obtained by the Associated Press, the couple agreed to give up any claim to the work and consent to its return to Von Saher in exchange for avoiding a criminal trial and spending two years under court supervision. During that time, they must make payments to a hospital in Argentina’s coastal city of Mar del Plata, where they live, and keep authorities informed of their whereabouts.

The deal ends a generations-long search for the missing portrait and a yearlong legal saga that began in August 2025. Dutch reporters investigating Friedrich Kadgien, a fugitive Nazi financial official who fled to Argentina after World War II, spotted “Portrait of a Lady” hanging above a green velvet couch in an online real estate listing for his daughter’s rustic home in Mar del Plata.

The listing disappeared within hours of the Rotterdam-based newspaper Algemeen Dagblad publishing its findings. Police raided the home several times but failed to find the painting. More than a week later, Kadgien’s lawyer turned it over to authorities.

For decades, the portrait had been identified as a work by the Italian Baroque painter Giuseppe Vittore Ghislandi. It appeared under that attribution in Goudstikker’s collection records and was exhibited as a Ghislandi in Amsterdam before the war. But a court-ordered examination by Argentina’s National Academy of Fine Arts reached a different conclusion, attributing the work to the Italian artist Giacomo Antonio Melchiorre Ceruti.

Experts authenticated the painting as part of Goudstikker’s collection and estimated its value at about $290,000.

Goudstikker was one of Europe’s leading art dealers before World War II, known for a collection that included works by Rembrandt and Vermeer. He died in a shipwreck while fleeing Amsterdam with his family as German forces swept into the Netherlands in May 1940.

An estimated 1,100 works from his collection were illegally sold to Hermann Göring, known as Hitler’s right-hand man, who amassed a vast art collection during the war. It remains unclear exactly how “Portrait of a Lady” came into the possession of Kadgien, Göring’s financial advisor, who handled foreign currency, precious metals and the sale of confiscated property for the Nazi regime.

Kadgien fled Europe after Germany’s defeat, first for Switzerland and later Argentina. He died in the South American country in 1978 without having been arrested or charged with war crimes.

Lawyers for Von Saher, who now lives in Greenwich, Conn., and spent decades trying to recover her family’s looted art, said she has agreed to let the painting be exhibited in Argentina before being returned to her.

During last year’s raids on homes owned by Kadgien and her sister in Mar del Plata, Argentine police also seized two 19th-century paintings, along with other prints and engravings. Authorities are still investigating whether any of them may also have been looted during World War II.

Farella and Calatrava write for the Associated Press. AP writer Isabel DeBre in Buenos Aires contributed to this report.

A federal judge again Friday blocked the U.S. Postal Service from enacting President Trump’s sweeping new mail ballot rules for the November election, finding that the Postal Service lacks such authority over elections and that neither it nor states such as California are capable of implementing the changes without causing chaos and disenfranchising voters.

U.S. District Judge Indira Talwani noted that election officials from across the country told the court that it is “likely impossible” to comply with the rules, which “makes disenfranchisement more than likely, if not probable” if the Postal Service were to proceed with them.

Talwani’s order — her latest of several halting the plan since this summer — came after a Postal Service whistleblower alleged the agency’s new computer systems for the project are fundamentally flawed; a top Postal Service official acknowledged a key online portal was unfinished; and the Trump administration filed an emergency petition asking the U.S. Supreme Court to allow the plans to proceed anyway.

All this unfolded this week as some of the first mail ballots of the election cycle started going out.

The new rules — which Trump required in a March executive order — would require states to submit complete voter lists to the Postal Service and to adopt new ballot envelopes with individualized voter bar codes designed by the Postal Service, and empower the Postal Service to reject any mail ballots that don’t match those lists.

Trump’s executive order also required the Department of Homeland Security to develop its own lists of eligible citizen voters, ostensibly to be compared against the state lists.

Trump has said the changes are necessary to combat widespread voter fraud, including by non-citizens, though independent election experts say there is no evidence that such fraud exists in large numbers.

Leading Democrats and elections officials in California and other states say the new rules constitute an unlawful federal overreach into state-run elections and a thinly veiled effort by the Trump administration to suppress the vote in a midterm election the GOP is poised to lose.

Talwani, an appointee of President Obama, agreed, finding that the states and voting rights groups are likely to succeed in their claims that the U.S. Constitution reserves the right to regulate elections to the states and Congress — not the executive branch.

Talwani issued her order after holding a contentious hearing in federal court in Boston on Thursday, where she questioned the Postal Service and the dozen conservative-led states supporting it on their ability to implement the changes in time for the Nov. 3 elections. She also heard from California, other liberal-led states and voting rights groups that it would be impossible.

California Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta, whose office is helping lead the states’ challenge, hailed Talwani’s order as a crucial reprieve.

“We’ve now secured longer-term relief that will keep the USPS changes blocked while our case moves forward,” Bonta said in a statement to The Times. “We will continue to take all steps to stop the Trump Administration from trampling on voting rights and restricting mail voting.”

Bonta’s office also criticized Department of Justice attorneys for rushing to the Supreme Court before Talwani could issue her order or the U.S. 1st Circuit Court of Appeals could weigh in on an appeal the department had already filed on the matter.

Walter Garcia, a Bonta spokesman, said the Justice Department had “flouted standard procedural rules” by approaching the high court before the lower courts had weighed in, despite the fact that the Postal Service acknowledged Thursday that it was not ready to launch its new portal.

“It defies common sense that they would seek emergency relief from the U.S. Supreme Court when USPS is unprepared to implement the rule now,” Garcia said.

State law requires that all registered voters be sent a ballot in the mail, and more than 80% of California voters have used those ballots to vote in recent elections.

In its emergency petition to the Supreme Court, the Trump administration argued that an earlier temporary restraining order by Talwani to halt the new rules from taking effect was “baseless” and would cause “serious irreparable harm” to the federal government, states and voting public.

“To forestall those harms and protect the public interest, this Court should grant an immediate stay, making clear to States that they should begin efforts to comply if they have not done so already,” wrote Solicitor Gen. D. John Sauer.

The swirl of litigation has created uncertainty around the Nov. 3 election. It also reflects the Trump administration’s desperate race to get the lower court orders lifted and the new rules implemented in time for that election — the rushed nature of which was a prime focus of the whistleblower.

The unidentified Postal Service employee alleged in a statement released Tuesday by congressional Democrats and submitted in court by Bonta’s office that the agency has been rushing to implement the changes — in defiance of an earlier court order — using “an entirely new and untested set of IT systems” that could cause “catastrophic problems” and disenfranchise millions of voters nationwide.

The Postal Service in a statement Friday said that while its system was developed on an “accelerated schedule,” quality and security standards “were not compromised,” and the agency stands behind “both the rigor of our process and the resulting system.”

At Thursday’s hearing, Talwani appeared frustrated when a Justice Department attorney was unable to tell her the status of the portal.

In a subsequent declaration hours later, Steven W. Monteith, the Postal Service’s chief customer and marketing officer, said officials were still making “refinements” to the portal, but anticipated being able to make it available “for voluntary use by sometime next week.”

Talwani previously issued an order blocking the Postal Service changes from being implemented in California and more than 20 other suing states in June. The Trump administration appealed that decision to the 1st Circuit, which declined to lift it, and then on an emergency basis to the U.S. Supreme Court. In early August, Talwani issued a second ruling for the League of Women Voters and other voting rights groups, blocking the changes nationwide.

On Aug. 24, the Supreme Court set aside Talwani’s order in the states’ case, finding that the states’ challenge was essentially premature because the Postal Service had yet to formally initiate the changes or require state compliance. However, the court explicitly noted that it was not reaching any conclusions as to the legality of the pending rules themselves. “On that score, time will tell,” it said.

The states and voting rights groups promptly filed new lawsuits challenging the legality of the rules, which the Postal Service formally issued Aug. 21. And it is in those cases that Talwani issued her ruling Friday.

She wrote that the voting rights groups had standing to challenge the Postal Service rules nationwide in part because the “chaos” created by the rules’ stiff deadlines significantly interfered with their mission to provide voters with accurate and reliable information about how to vote — and whether to use mail ballots to do so.

David Becker, executive director of the nonpartisan Center for Election Innovation & Research, said in remarks prior to Talwani’s Friday order that he was “very, very confident” that the Postal Service changes will be blocked for the upcoming elections, and that “mail voting is going to go forward as conveniently and securely as it always has.”

That’s in part because election officials nationwide are “telling the courts that even if they wanted to, they could not implement it,” he said — including in a legal filing Becker helped nearly 100 local elections officials from red and blue states file in separate litigation challenging the rules.

The Federal Communications Commission has asked a judge to toss out ABC’s 1st Amendment lawsuit, arguing that parent company Walt Disney Co. is wrongly attempting to short-circuit the agency’s review into whether the broadcaster has violated the law.

The commission, in court documents, maintains ABC’s lawsuit was premature because regulators simply were in the process of reviewing whether ABC has served the public interest in operating its eight television stations. No final determination has been reached, the FCC argued.

FCC Chairman Brendan Carr made the rare move last spring to call for an early review of ABC’s licenses as part of his yearlong look at whether Disney’s diversity and inclusion programs violate anti-discrimination laws.

The Disney-owned station licenses were not set to expire for several years. For example, the license for KABC-TV Channel 7 in Los Angeles extends to 2030.

But the FCC launched the probe a day after President Trump complained about ABC late night comedian Jimmy Kimmel over a joke that upset First Lady Melania Trump.

ABC has taken an aggressive stance, arguing the FCC is wielding its enforcement powers to punish the network after Trump repeatedly agitated to have ABC’s licenses revoked. ABC maintains the FCC’s enforcement action is an attempt to quell the network’s free speech, in violation of the 1st Amendment. It asked a federal judge to issue a temporary restraining order and injunction to halt the FCC’s early station review.

ABC also is fighting an FCC review into whether its daytime talk show, “The View,” should be entitled to an exemption from the so-called equal-time rule for political candidates who appear as guests.

Disney’s lawsuit has enormous 1st Amendment implications.

ABC is the first major broadcaster to challenge the FCC’s enforcement actions since Trump returned to power, joining a small handful of news organizations, including the Associated Press and the Wall Street Journal, that have pushed back against the president’s efforts to bully outlets he dislikes.

In late December, Trump wrote on social media: “If Network NEWSCASTS, and their Late Night Shows are almost 100% negative to President Donald J. Trump, MAGA, and the Republican Party, shouldn’t their very valuable Broadcast Licenses be terminated? I say YES!”

ABC, which did not comment Friday, argued the FCC’s review is “extraordinarily early” and “that timing underscores the Commission’s true purpose: coercing and retaliating against a network that refuses to bow to the Administration’s demands.”

The FCC has scoffed at the broadcaster’s arguments.

“Disney filed a meritless lawsuit in an effort to stop the FCC’s ongoing investigation into allegations that Disney violated the law,” an FCC spokesperson said in a statement. “The FCC has developed a voluminous record, and it will continue to follow the facts and the law wherever they lead.”

The government filed its motion Thursday in Washington. The 46-page document was filed by U.S. Atty. Jeanine Pirro and signed by Assistant U.S. Atty. Dimitar P. Georgiev on behalf of the FCC.

Disney was “not content to let the Commission’s ordinary investigative processes (and, if needed, ordinary processes of judicial review) run their course. They instead ask this Court to halt the license renewal proceeding in its tracks by issuing a preliminary injunction,” the FCC said.

U.S. District Judge Loren L. AliKhan has scheduled an Oct. 6 hearing.

Disney has argued the FCC has gone well beyond an examination of its internal hiring practices — the original purpose of the agency’s review.

But, in its motion, the FCC faulted Disney’s handling of the matter, saying “Disney’s responses to Commission information requests were deficient and nonresponsive,” prompting the agency to escalate the dispute.

In late April, Carr directed the FCC Media Bureau to force ABC to apply for renewal of their licenses early.

“The Commission’s Chairman has repeatedly emphasized that, although the allegations against Disney are serious, he and the agency remain ‘open-minded,’ have ‘not made a decision,’ and are ‘going to follow the facts and the law wherever they [lead],’ ” according to the motion.

The FCC also argued Disney picked the wrong court because Congress stipulated that any review of commission orders should be heard by an appeals court.

If ABC lost its licenses, it would hobble the network by forcing its largest stations off the air. Other ABC stations at risk include those in San Francisco, Fresno, Houston, Philadelphia and New York.

KABC-TV Channel 7 is owned by Disney in Glendale.

(Gina Ferazzi/Los Angeles Times)

Trump on Sunday called for the FCC to “rebuke or punish” NBC’s “Meet the Press” anchor Kristen Welker after she pointed out that the president has had mixed success in endorsing political candidates in this election season.

The FCC also has an open investigation against NBC owner Comcast, also looking at the Philadelphia company’s diversity and hiring practices. The FCC has not ruled out calling NBC-owned station licenses in for an early review as well.

Sept. 4 (UPI) — In a setback for Republicans, the Missouri Supreme Court ruled against the use of a GOP-favored congressional map in this year’s midterms, directing that a referendum on redistricting be put on November’s ballot.

The ruling came down Thursday, two months before the Nov. 3 midterm elections, and after Missouri already using the use of the now blocked maps.

GOP-led Missouri was seeking to use a state legislature-approved redrawn map that was expected to increase the number of Republican-held districts from its 6-2 majority to 7-1, but the state’s high court on Thursday ruled that the opposition had the the right to have the issue put to a referendum.

The state’s General Assembly passed the redistricting bill in September 2025. In December, organizers who submitted a referendum petition collected more than 300,000 signatures in support of the effort.

But then last month, an hour before the statutory deadline, Missouri Secretary of State Denny Hoskins issued a “Certificate of Insufficiency of Petition,” stating that the state’s Constitution “does not authorize a referendum on congressional redistricting plans passed by the General Assembly,” prompting Missouri voters to sue.

The state’s high court ruling on Thursday overturned a circuit court’s judgment, ordering Hoskins to issue a certificate of sufficiency as to the referendum petition to place it on the November general election ballot and enjoining him from implementing the General Assembly-approved map.

“The referendum petition was legal, sufficient and timely, and the secretary incorrectly concluded otherwise. HB 1 did not go into effect and will not go into effect unless and until approved by the voters,” Judge Ginger Gooch wrote in the ruling. “The congressional redistricting the General Assembly established in 2022 remains in full force and effect for the November 2026 general election.”

Missouri Attorney General Catherine Hanaway, a Republican, said the state will appeal to the conservative-leaning Supreme Court.

“Never before in American history has a court overturned a congressional map after a primary and before a general election. This unprecedented decision clearly violates federal law and has thrust our state into a full-fledged constitutional crisis,” she said in a statement.

“We are confident that the federal courts will not allow every Missouri voter to be disenfranchised — which is what today’s decision does.”

President Donald Trump also lambasted the decision on his Truth Social media platform.

“Not only was the ruling horrible, ridiculous and unConstitutional, but there won’t be enough time to change the map back with the Election coming up in a very short period of time,” he said in a statement.

“The Election Process, as usual, is being disturbed in America! Missouri must be able to use the map that was in effect just a couple of months ago, in the Primary. This is a Dark Day for ‘Justice’ in Missouri!”

The midterms have been a focus of Trump, who has warned Republicans that if they lose control of the House, Democrats will impeach him.

To improve their chances of holding on to the House, Trump has encouraged GOP-led states to conduct unorthodox mid-decade redistricting efforts, with Texas last summer being the first to redraw its maps to create additional GOP-favored districts. This kicked off a gerrymandering arms race, with Democratic-led states saying they would do likewise to counter the Republican efforts.

To date, 10 states — all but one being Republican-led — have changed their congressional maps, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures, though several others have tried or are in the process of redistricting.

Sept. 3 (UPI) — The Trump administration is asking the Supreme Court to permit enforcement of its mail-in voting restrictions, arguing it will suffer irreparable harm because two states will begin sending ballots to voters before the block is to expire next week.

Filed Thursday by Solicitor General D. John Sauer, the request for an immediate administrative stay of the district court’s temporary restraining order comes in protracted litigation over a Trump administration rule giving the U.S. Postal Service authority to screen outbound mail-in ballots for compliance with envelope standards and verify recipients have been entered on their state’s USPS Mail-In and Absentee Participation list.

Last week, U.S. District Judge Indira Talwani in Massachusetts sided with the League of Women Voters in Massachusetts, which has been fighting the rule it says is unlawful and violates federalism principles of the Constitution, issuing a 14-day block against enforcing its key provisions while she considers the request to impose a longer, more restrictive preliminary injunction.

In his filing Thursday, Sauer argued that the federal government will be irreparably harmed if the restraining order is not lifted before North Carolina and Alabama send out their mail-in ballots next week, saying a court decision would come too late for those ballots.

“With respect to the November 2026 election, the order thus partially nullifies the Postal Service’s efforts to address the risk that the federal mails will be used to perpetrate voter fraud,” he said.

Sauer continued that despite Talwani’s order allowing the Postal Service and states to take steps to ensure their envelopes meet the rule’s requirements, her block “risks sowing confusion and chaos because it makes those preparatory steps voluntary, rather than mandatory.

“Thus, if the order is eventually stayed and the rule takes effect for this year’s elections — as should occur — there is a grave risk that states may not have taken the necessary steps to comply due to the false sense of latitude created by the court’s improper order, potentially depriving those states’ citizens of the ability to vote by mail,” he said.

Despite using the mail to vote himself, Trump has long been a critic of mail-in ballots, claiming them to be a source of voting fraud, though studies have found no evidence that mail voting produces higher overall rates of voter fraud.

The USPS rule is one of several actions Trump and his administration have taken ahead of November’s midterm elections, which the president has become increasingly focused on as he has warned Republicans that losing the House to Democrats could lead to his impeachment as well as investigations. While the moves generally have widespread Republican support, Democrats and critics say they are efforts to rig the midterms.

The new USPS rule being litigated comes in response to an executive order Trump signed in March to expand federal control over mail-in ballots, including authorizing the USPS not to send them to voters unless certain conditions are met.

Two weeks ago, the high court lifted an injunction blocking Trump’s mail-voting executive order, stating the challenge to the USPS provisions was premature as the agency had yet to issue a final rule. After the final rule was published Aug. 26, two dozen Democratic-led states and the District of Columbia sued, resulting in the two-week block the Trump administration is now contesting.

The Missouri Supreme Court has unanimously blocked a congressional map backed by United States President Donald Trump ahead of November’s midterm elections, restoring the state’s previous districts.

Thursday’s ruling delivered a rare judicial rebuke to Trump in the national battle over redistricting. But it is unlikely to be the final word in the case, with Republican officials already pledging to appeal the ruling.

At the heart of the case is a congressional map signed into law in September 2025, designed to help Republicans win an extra seat in the US House of Representatives this year.

But the partisan redistricting effort prompted a popular backlash, with nearly 300,000 Missouri residents signing a petition to instead put the new map to a vote.

Missouri’s Secretary of State Denny Hoskins rejected the petition as legally insufficient. That set up the legal fight, which the Missouri Supreme Court decided on Thursday.

“The referendum petition was legal, sufficient, and timely, and the secretary incorrectly concluded otherwise,” the court wrote in its ruling.

It added that the Missouri Constitution has made such petitions legal, and “no exception applies”. The court is staffed by seven judges, five of whom are Republican-appointed.

The decision, however, places Missouri in a complicated position. Two months remain until the midterm elections, and ballots will soon be printed.

There are also outstanding legal questions over whether a state’s general election can use different congressional districts than its primaries did.

Missouri Attorney General Catherine Hanaway, a Republican, said she would immediately appeal the ruling to the US Supreme Court. She called Thursday’s decision a “full-fledged constitutional crisis”.

“Never before in American history has a court overturned a congressional map after a primary and before a general election,” she said in a statement.

Trump also denounced the ruling in a social media post, calling it “horrible, ridiculous, and unConstitutional”.

“The Missouri Supreme Court just ridiculously ruled in favor of changing the maps back to what they were a long time ago. It’s called, Ancient History,” he wrote.

Last year, Trump triggered the nationwide redistricting fight when he approached Texas state lawmakers to redraw their maps in a way that would give Republicans an advantage.

Normally, congressional maps are redrawn once every 10 years to reflect census results.

But Trump encouraged Republican-led states to issue new maps mid-decade, as a strategy to help the right-wing party maintain control over the House.

Some 10 states ultimately decided to redistrict, including Missouri. Most tilted in favour of Republicans. California, meanwhile, redrew its map to skew Democratic.

Prior to Thursday’s ruling, Missouri’s Supreme Court affirmed that the special legislative action to change the state’s congressional map was lawful. In the US, no federal law bars partisan redistricting, known as gerrymandering.

But Thursday’s decision upheld the legality of the petition campaign to put the map up for a vote.

The Missouri Supreme Court barred the 2025 map from being used in November’s midterm election or any future election until Missouri voters approve it first.

The group People Not Politicians spearheaded the referendum petition. In a statement on Thursday, it applauded the state court’s decision, which overturned a lower court ruling.

“Supreme Court of Missouri has ruled: Missourians will vote on politicians’ rigged map,” the group wrote on social media.

It also blamed Missouri’s secretary of state for any hurdles to restoring the old map.

“Hoskins had the power to prevent all this confusion months ago — and he chose not to,” the group said.

A day before the court’s ruling, hundreds of people rallied outside the state Supreme Court, chanting: “Let us vote!”

Grant Christensen, a resident of Jefferson City and referendum supporter, said he had signed the petition.

“Gerrymandering is the same as voter suppression,” Christensen said. “Cutting up districts in order to steer them to vote one way or the other is not fair.”

Missouri’s 2025 congressional map had already shaped the state’s primary elections. Critics, however, point out that Hoskins did not reject the referendum until August 4, the day of the party primaries.

The outcome of the legal battle is likely to be most pivotal for Missouri’s 5th congressional district, currently held by Democrat Emanuel Cleaver. His district, which encompasses parts of Kansas City, was reshaped to favour Republicans.

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. — The Missouri Supreme Court has unanimously blocked new congressional districts backed by President Trump from being used in the November election and ordered a statewide vote on whether to uphold or reject the new map.

The decision Thursday marks a rare setback for Republicans in a national redistricting battle. Republicans had hoped Missouri’s new gerrymandered congressional boundaries could help them win an additional seat and hold on to their slim House majority in the midterms.

Missouri Atty. Gen. Catherine Hanaway, a Republican, said she would appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court, asserting that the decision “has thrust our state into a full‑fledged constitutional crisis.”

Missouri’s new districts were used in the August primaries. But the state Supreme Court said they cannot be used in the November general election — or ever again, unless voters first uphold the new districts passed by the Republican-led Legislature.

The court ruled that the new districts were effectively placed on hold last December, when opponents submitted more than 300,000 petition signatures seeking to put the map to a vote of the people. Republican Secretary of State Denny Hoskins waited until primary election day in August to reject the petition. He asserted that the referendum process cannot be used for congressional redistricting. A lower court agreed, but the Supreme Court overturned Hoskins’ decision.

“The referendum petition was legal, sufficient, and timely, and the secretary incorrectly concluded otherwise,” the court said in its ruling. The legislation containing the new districts “did not go into effect and will not go into effect unless and until approved by the voters.” As a result, the congressional map adopted after the 2020 census “remains in full force and effect for the November 2026 general election.”

Hanaway, whose office represented Hoskins, called the ruling an unprecedented violation of federal law. So did Republican Gov. Mike Kehoe, who proposed the new congressional map to lawmakers to favor the GOP.

“Never before in American history has a court overturned a congressional map after a primary and before a general election,” Hanaway said in a statement.

Court ruling hinged on referendum rights

The Missouri Constitution does not specifically say a referendum petition can be used for a congressional redistricting law passed by the Legislature. But the Supreme Court ruled that a constitutional provision allowing a referendum on “any act” of the Legislature encompasses congressional redistricting.

It rejected assertions from Hanaway’s office that federal law prohibits referendum petitions on congressional redistricting.

“This is what democracy looks like,” said Richard von Glahn, executive director of People Not Politicians Missouri, which sponsored the referendum petition. “The people of Missouri demanded a voice, and the court just confirmed what we’ve been saying all along. People, not politicians, will have the final say.”

Hoskins, acknowledging the loss, vowed to continue “the war to preserve our constitutional republic.”

The ruling, which capped a year of political maneuvering and legal wrangling, was one of two to go against Republican officials Thursday. The Supreme Court also ruled that Hoskins had wrongly rejected a petition for a ballot proposal making it difficult for politicians to change measures enacted by voters through ballot initiatives. The court also ordered that measure to be placed on the November ballot.

Missouri redistricting targeted longtime Kansas City lawmaker

Missouri currently has six Republicans and two Democrats in the U.S. House.

After Trump urged Republicans to redraw congressional districts to their advantage, Kehoe called lawmakers into a special session last year to reconfigure the 5th Congressional District, held by Democrat Emanuel Cleaver.

Cleaver, who was unopposed in the August primary, has carried the Kansas City-based district with at least 60% of the vote in each of the last two elections.

Republican state Sen. Rick Brattin won an August primary in the gerrymandered 5th District, which had been stretched eastward to include rural Republican areas. About 59% of the district’s voters were new under the revised map, according to an Associated Press estimate.

Cleaver had not posted campaign signs in many of the new rural areas, explaining that he was waiting for the Missouri Supreme Court’s decision. But he had vowed to continue his reelection campaign regardless of the outcome.

“Despite the cynical and deeply shameful attempt to silence many of our neighbors, the people fought back and won,” Cleaver said in a social media post Thursday.

Brattin, a Marine veteran and founding member of the conservative Missouri Freedom Caucus in the state Legislature, said the decision disenfranchises thousands of primary voters who now will be shifted to different districts with candidates they didn’t get to choose.

The court “handed Democrats a decision they desperately needed in their effort to help national Democrats retake the U.S. House of Representatives,” Brattin said in a statement.

Redistricting battle spread to over a quarter of states

Congressional districts typically are redrawn at the start of each decade, based on new census data. But Trump’s quest for a midterm election advantage triggered an unusual mid-decade redistricting battle that spread to more than a dozen states, including California — and triggered a dozen lawsuits in Missouri alone.

The Missouri Supreme Court ruling was one of only a few nationally to go against Republicans’ redistricting efforts.

Prior to its latest ruling, Missouri’s top court already had rejected claims that the special session was illegal, mid-decade redistricting isn’t allowed and the new districts aren’t compact enough.

After the Supreme Court heard arguments Wednesday, a few hundred people chanted, “Let us vote!” while rallying outside the courthouse. Grant Christensen, of Jefferson City, said he had signed the referendum petition to put the map to a vote.

“Gerrymandering is the same as voter suppression,” Christensen said. “Cutting up districts in order to steer them to vote one way or the other is not fair.”

Lieb writes for the Associated Press.

Ousted Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro has urged a United States judge to dismiss the criminal drug trafficking charges against him, arguing he should be immune from prosecution as the head of a sovereign country.

Maduro’s lawyer, Barry Pollack, made the appeal in a Manhattan district court on Wednesday.

His legal team has petitioned District Judge Alvin Hellerstein to dismiss the case, which will test the willingness of US courts to apply international law to criminal cases.

Maduro was abducted and imprisoned on January 3, after US President Donald Trump authorised a military raid in Caracas. The former Venezuelan leader, who has been held in a Brooklyn federal jail, has pleaded not guilty and is scheduled to go on trial on June 1, 2027, if his effort to dismiss the case is unsuccessful.

The principle that sitting heads of state are immune from prosecution abroad is a longstanding tenet of international law, seen as fundamental to diplomacy.

Judge Hellerstein had given Pollack a Wednesday deadline to file his motion to dismiss the case.

Pollack has argued that Hellerstein lacks jurisdiction, both because sovereign heads of state enjoy complete immunity and because the acts that Maduro is accused of would have been part of his official duties.

“This unprecedented prosecution violates the absolute immunity from criminal jurisdiction to which heads of state and foreign officials acting in their official capacities have been entitled for hundreds of years,” Pollack wrote.

Pollack added that Maduro was falsely accused and “vehemently denies” the allegations.

A spokesperson for the Manhattan US Attorney’s office, which brought the charges, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Maduro faces uphill battle

Legal experts have told the Reuters news agency that Maduro faces an uphill battle.

Washington has not recognised Maduro as Venezuela’s president for years, due to disputed elections. Courts tend to defer to the US president and his cabinet in disputes over who is recognised as a foreign country’s leader.

US criminal cases involving heads of foreign states are extremely rare, but precedent offers little encouragement for Maduro. In 1990, a federal judge in Miami rejected former Panamanian military leader Manuel Noriega’s attempt to assert head-of-state immunity, in part because he never officially held the title of president.

The US stopped recognising Maduro in 2019, when he was inaugurated for a second time after a 2018 election that critics say was rigged. Washington also called his 2024 re-election fraudulent.

Maduro says both votes were fair and has long accused the US of seeking his ouster to gain control of the South American country’s oil wealth.

Pollack, however, wrote that Washington’s assessment that Maduro lacked legitimacy was not relevant.

“Unlike in Noriega, the Executive Branch does not dispute that Mr Maduro was Venezuela’s head of state, but instead merely claims that, after 2019, he did not occupy that position legitimately,” Pollack wrote.

Venezuela run by Maduro’s vice president

Since Maduro’s abduction, his former vice president and socialist ally, Delcy Rodriguez, has run Venezuela as its interim leader.

She has also increased cooperation with the Trump administration. Last month, the two countries reached an unprecedented deal that would see the US take over about one-fifth of Venezuela’s oil reserves.

Pollack wrote that it was “incongruous” for the US to recognise Rodriguez, who was appointed by Maduro, and not Maduro himself. He pointed to statements by Rodriguez and officials in her government, made in January and February, indicating that they still considered Maduro Venezuela’s legitimate head of state.

Rodriguez’s government has since gone silent on the matter. Some murals of Maduro in Caracas have been painted over in recent months.

Prosecutors have until October 2 to respond to Maduro’s motion to dismiss the indictment, and Hellerstein will hold a hearing on the dismissal effort on November 17.

Gov. George Deukmejian named on Monday Ventura County Superior Court Judge Kenneth R. Yegan to join the state 2nd District Court of Appeal, fulfilling the judge’s longtime dream of becoming an appeals court justice.

If a judicial review panel confirms Yegan’s nomination to the court’s 6th Division on Dec. 27, he will replace Justice Richard W. Abbe, who retired Nov. 28 after eight years on the three-member court.

“If I get confirmed on the 27th, I’ll take the oath right on the spot and hope to report to work the next day,” said Yegan, 43, of Westlake.

The review panel, composed of Supreme Court Justice Malcolm Lucas, Atty. Gen. John K. Van De Kamp and presiding 2nd District Court of Appeal Justice Lester Roth, is scheduled to meet next week in Los Angeles to discuss Yegan’s qualifications.

If confirmed, he will consider appeals cases from Ventura, Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo counties with Justices Steven J. Stone and Arthur Gilbert, who have served on the 6th Division bench since it was established in 1982.

“Without even thinking about it, I’m really ecstatic about the appointment,” said Gilbert, who has reviewed Yegan’s Superior Court opinions on appeal and worked with him when Yegan served as a temporary appeals justice in the summer of 1986.

“I think he’s as good as you can get. He’s just first-rate,” Gilbert said. “He supports his point of view with well-reasoned statements of decision on the Superior Court, and he did the same thing when he was here.”

Stone said Yegan has a reputation for being able to handle all levels of appeals work, from doing legal research to writing the final draft of opinions.

“I have a lot of respect for Ken and I think that he will work very well with us,” Stone said. “I’m looking forward to it.”

Yegan said that Deukmejian called him Friday to offer him the seat. He said the governor swore him to secrecy until Monday, but gave him permission to tell his family.

“My wife was home with my oldest daughter and she was screaming, and my daughter was screaming,” Yegan said. “After they calmed down a little bit she asked me if I could pick up my youngest daughter from ballet and asked if I could go to the store and pick up some things. . . .and that’s when I knew things hadn’t changed.”

The focus of Judge Yegan’s work has not changed much from his first days in law. He said he has been fascinated by appeals work ever since law school.

“I took all the courses I could in law school in appellate practice,” Yegan said. “It’s intellectually challenging and it’s very stimulating to figure out where the facts meet the law and. . . .which is the better-reasoned opinion.”

Yegan graduated in 1972 from the University of the Pacific’s McGeorge School of Law in Sacramento and began work as a deputy in the Ventura County public defender’s office, handling trials and appellate cases.

Beginning in 1975 he worked as a senior attorney in the appeals court’s 5th Division in Los Angeles, researching cases and helping justices write opinions. In January, 1983, Gov. Edmund G. Brown Jr. appointed him to the Ventura County Municipal Court.

Deukmejian elevated him to the Superior Court in July 1986, where he tried criminal, civil and cases appealed from Municipal Court.

In recent months, Yegan said, letters urging his nomination have flowed into the governor’s office from County Dist. Atty. Michael D. Bradbury, Sheriff John V. Gillespie, three Supreme Court justices and a variety of appeals court justices, trial court judges and lawyers.

Abbe said of Yegan’s appointment: “His work when he was. . . .here was excellent. He was knowledgeable, he was able to evaluate cases quickly and accurately and make sensible decisions.”

Sept. 2 (UPI) — A judge who vacated the conviction of former U.S. Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl in 2023 lacked the jurisdiction to do so, a federal appeals court ruled.

The case of Bergdahl, who walked off an Army base in Afghanistan in 2009 and was captured by the Taliban, has stretched for years. The ruling by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit on Tuesday reinstates Bergdahl’s dishonorable discharge from the military and other punishment.

“Obviously, we are disappointed by the outcome,” said Eugene R. Fidell, Bergdahl’s lawyer, The New York Times reported. “This entire controversy has lasted a very long time. But it continues to be an important case, not only for Sergeant Bergdahl but for the integrity of the military justice system.”

Fidell said Bergdahl can request a rehearing before the same panel or seek a review by the entire appeals court or the U.S. Supreme Court.

In the ruling Tuesday, the judges said the case “presents nuanced questions regarding jurisdiction and the evolving relationship between [federal district] courts and military courts.”

“Jurisdiction here turns on whether the remedy sought falls within a district court’s power to grant,” the ruling said. “Because Article III district courts lack jurisdiction on collateral review to vacate court-martial judgments, the District Court lacked jurisdiction over Bergdahl’s claims. Therefore, we remand the case to the District Court to dismiss for lack of jurisdiction.”

In July 2023, federal district court Judge Reggie Walton vacated all judgments against Bergdahl after Oct. 16, 2017.

That is the date Bergdahl pleaded guilty to desertion and misbehavior before the enemy for his actions in Afghanistan — and the date the military judge in that court martial, Jeffery Nance, applied to become an immigration judge during President Donald Trump‘s first term, Walton’s ruling said. The Justice Department later hired Nance.

During his first presidential campaign, Trump called Bergdahl “a dirty, rotten traitor” and called for him to be executed or returned to the Taliban.

Nance refused a defense request to dismiss the case against Bergdahl because of those remarks, saying he was “completely unaffected” by them and that Bergdahl would still have a fair sentencing hearing. That hearing took place at the end of October 2023.

Walton, in his 2023 ruling, said that based on Nance’s application as an immigration court judge, any reasonable person could conclude that Nance’s impartiality was jeopardized.

An Army investigation found in 2015 that Bergdahl intended to hike to another Army post and report issues in his unit when he left his base in Afghanistan in 2009. He was captured not long after leaving and held and tortured by the Taliban over five years. In 2014, President Barack Obama secured Bergdahl’s release in a prison exchange.

The decision replaces a temporary order issued earlier this month.

A divided United States Supreme Court has allowed the White House to continue construction on a $400m ballroom project as lawsuits play out, a win for President Donald Trump as he flexes unprecedented executive power and remakes the capital in his image.

The apparent 5-4 decision replaces a temporary order that allowed construction earlier this month, shortly before a court-ordered halt would have gone into effect.

The temporary order was signed by US Chief Justice John Roberts, assigned to handle appeals from the capital. But he publicly disagreed with the latest decision, writing a strong dissent that referenced historical figures and calling the project “likely unlawful” because it has not been approved by Congress.

“Today’s decision is no victory for the separation of powers.” Roberts wrote. The court’s three liberal-leaning justices agreed.

The majority did not decide the legality of the project, but found that a preservation group likely did not have the legal right to challenge it. The unsigned opinion also cited the national security concerns that the government says the project would address.

The lawsuit will return to lower courts, but documents say that key portions of the project could be complete within months – a quick timeline compared with a typical legal case.

The Trump administration asked the justices to intervene after federal courts found the project must halt because it did not have congressional approval.

The lawsuit from the National Trust for Historic Preservation argued that Trump has no unilateral authority to undertake the work, which has included demolishing the East Wing. The group’s lawyers accused the White House of trying to “outrun the courts” by accelerating construction.

In lower courts, the Trump administration has argued that the president has total authority to renovate the White House and other federal buildings. Government lawyers said the ballroom project must be completed due to national security concerns, though those were not an initial focus when Trump announced the work and said it would be funded by private donations.

“This case involves an extraordinary ⁠and unlawful injunction that will halt the ongoing construction of the integrated military complex, including a totally secure ballroom space, at the East Wing of the White House, which is vitally required by national security,” the lawyers wrote in an August 14 filing.

The administration has said that crews are working 20 hours a day on the planned 8,400 square metre (90,000 square foot) ballroom. The framework is expected to be completed in November, and much of the facade done by April, with full completion slated for August 2028, according to court documents.

US District Judge Richard Leon ordered a stop to aboveground construction of the planned ballroom in April, though the order would allow work on bunkers and military installations below ground to continue. Leon was nominated by former President George W Bush, a Republican.

The ruling was suspended but later upheld by a divided appeals court panel. Two judges appointed by Democratic presidents found the project was for Congress to decide and “not a matter for Executive self-help”. A third judge, appointed by Trump, found that the preservationist group that challenged the project had no legal right to sue.

Solicitor General D John Sauer also made that argument to the justices and said the decision halting the work was “extraordinary and unlawful”. He said the completion of the project was “vitally required by national security.”

The administration has scored a series of other victories on the high court’s emergency docket, though the justices have ruled against some of the president’s signature policies after fuller review.

The demolished East Wing housed the first lady’s offices and the White House movie theatre. It was originally built in 1902, during Theodore Roosevelt’s presidency, and greatly expanded in 1942, during Franklin Roosevelt’s presidency.

Aug. 31 (UPI) — The Supreme Court ruled Monday that President Donald Trump‘s massive, $400 million White House ballroom project can continue — over dissent from Chief Justice John Roberts and three other justices.

In the 5-4 ruling, the high court said the National Trust for Historical Preservation likely lacks the legal right to challenge the project and that national security reasons favor its continuation. This could give the Trump administration time to finish the project as lawsuits over it continue.

The court did not say if the project was legal. In a dissent, Roberts said that it likely is not, as the project was not approved by Congress.

“The White House is not just any building,” he wrote. “In failing to appreciate as much, the court misconceives the plaintiff’s injury, allowing the executive’s likely infringement of the legislature’s power of the purse and authority to regulate federal property in the District of Columbia to continue.”

Roberts called Monday’s decision “no victory for the separation of powers.”

The decision replaces a temporary court order from earlier August that allowed construction to continue.

Federal courts said earlier that the ballroom project needed to halt because it had not been approved by Congress. Administration lawyers had argued that Trump has total authority to renovate federal buildings and that the ballroom and connected security features are necessary.

The nearly 90,000-square-foot ballroom will be located on the former site of the East Wing, which Trump ordered demolished. The president initially said that it would be paid for by private donations, but The Washington Post has reported that the project (which it estimated will cost$600 million) will include $300 million in tax dollars.

WASHINGTON — A divided Supreme Court has cleared the way for President Trump to finish building his new White House ballroom with mostly private money and without approval from Congress.

By a 5-4 vote. the justices granted an emergency appeal from Trump and his lawyers on Monday and set aside a judge’s order that would stop the construction.

But Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. dissented, along with the court’s three liberals.

The outcome turned on standing.

The conservative majoritysaid the National Trust for Historic Preservation and its members were not personally injured by the White House ballroom project and therefore, did not have to standing to sue Trump or the National Park Service.

They also said Trump and his appointees had stressed the new ballroom was needed for national security and said the lower courts judges should not have interfered.

The decision in effect gives a green light to Trump’s go-it-alone approach which is in keeping with his history as a hotel builder. He believed the White House needed a grand ballroom that could seat hundreds of dignitaries. And he ordered the East Wing torn down in October to make room of his larger ballroom.

He also said most of the project would be paid for by $400 million in private donations.

But the Constitution gave Congress the power to manage property belonging to the United States. A 1912 law says new buildings “shall not erected…on public grounds within the District of Columbia without express authority of Congress.”

Trump chose to ignore the law and did not seek approval from Congress which is led by Republicans.

The National Trust for Historic Preservation sued in December, contending Trump was a “temporary tenant, not the owner” of the White House.

U.S. District Judge Richard Leon ruled Trump had no authority to build a new ballroom on the White House grounds without the approval of Congress, and he ordered a halt to the above-ground construction.

The D.C. Circuit Court affirmed his decision by a 2-1 vote.
“Congress has not ceded unfettered authority to the Executive Branch to dramatically redesign, reshape, and reconstruct the White House—the People’s House—to fit a particular President’s desires,” wrote Judge Patricia Millett for the appeals court.

Trump’s lawyers sent a fast-track appeal to the Supreme Court on Aug. 14.

The court’s majority allowed Trump to fend off the legal challenge by concluding the historic preservationists could not show they were harmed by a huge new ballroom that may dwarf the historic Executive Mansion.