U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., seen here at a hearing at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C. in September. He allegedly pushed now-former Former Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, or CDC, Director Susan Monarez to resign only a month after she was given the job. Photo by Bonnie Cash/UPI | License Photo
Sept. 10 (UPI) — Former Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Susan Monarez will testify before the Senate about the organization she briefly ran.
Monarez will appear on Sept. 17 before the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions, along with Deb Houry, the former Chief Medical Officer and Deputy Director for Program and Science at CDC. Houry resigned her position to protest Monarez’s termination.
The two are slated to discuss their time at the CDC to offer testimony regarding their take on the state of the agency.
“To protect children’s health, Americans need to know what has happened and is happening at the CDC,” said Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-La., chairperson of the HELP Committee, in a press release Tuesday. “They need to be reassured that their child’s health is given priority. Radical transparency is the only way to do that.”
“[Susan Monarez] is a public health expert with unimpeachable scientific credentials,” Kennedy had said of her at the beginning of August after she was sworn into her role. “I have full confidence in her ability to restore the [CDC’s] role as the most trusted authority in public health and to strengthen our nation’s readiness to confront infectious diseases and biosecurity threats.”
However, Monarez only held her position at the CDC for about four weeks, before allegedly being pushed out because she wouldn’t echo the agenda of U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. or remove scientists from the agency because of his plans.
“Susan Monarez is not aligned with the president’s agenda of Making America Healthy Again,” White House spokesperson Kush Desai said in a statement to media in regard to her being axed.
“Since Susan Monarez refused to resign despite informing HHS leadership of her intent to do so, the White House has terminated Monarez from her position with the CDC,” he added.
“Parents deserve a CDC they can trust to put children above politics, evidence above ideology and facts above fear,” wrote Monarez in an opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal last week. “I was fired for holding that line.”
Dr. Demetre Daskalakis, who formerly led the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases, and Dr. Daniel Jernigan, who headed the National Center for Emerging and Zoonotic Infectious Diseases, also quit the CDC as Kennedy has worked to reshape the vaccine advisory panel to meet his own vaccine policies.
Kennedy, who cancelled approximately $500 million in contracts for mRNA vaccines last month, changed the recommendations for healthy children and pregnant women to receive COVID-19 vaccinations and led the reduction of approval for updated COVID shots this fall to only cover people over 65, or younger Americans with underlying conditions, via the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, or FDA.
The security of former Vice President Kamala Harris, once the duty of the U.S. Secret Service, has been thrown into flux, again, days after President Trump canceled her federal protection.
My colleague Richard Winton broke the news Saturday morning that the Los Angeles Police Department, which was assisting the California Highway Patrol in providing security for Harris, has been pulled off the detail after internal criticism of the arrangement.
Let’s jump into what Winton wrote about this quickly-evolving story.
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What happened to Harris’ Secret Service protection?
Former vice presidents usually get Secret Service protection for six months after leaving office, while former presidents are given protection for life.
But before his term ended in January, President Joe Biden signed an order to extend Harris’ protection to July 2026.
Aides to Harris had asked Biden for the extension. Without it, her security detail would have ended last month, according to sources.
Trump ended that arrangement as of Monday.
How did the CHP and LAPD get involved?
Winton wrote Aug. 29 that California officials planned to utilize the CHP as her security detail. Gov. Gavin Newsom, who was required to sign off on such CHP protection, would not confirm the arrangement. “Our office does not comment on security arrangements,” said Izzy Gordon, a spokesperson for Newsom. “The safety of our public officials should never be subject to erratic, vindictive political impulses.”
Fox 11 broke the story of the use of LAPD officers earlier this week and got footage of the security detail outside Harris’ Brentwood home from one of its news helicopters.
The effort was described as “temporary” by Jennifer Forkish, L.A. police communications director.
Roughly a dozen or more officers have begun working to protect Harris.
Sources not authorized to discuss the details of the plan said the city would fund the security while Harris was hiring her own security in the near future.
Controversy ensued
The Los Angeles Police Protective League, the union that represents rank-and-file LAPD officers, lambasted the move.
The union did not address Harris as a former vice president, nor as California senator or state attorney general, in its official rebuke.
“Pulling police officers from protecting everyday Angelenos to protect a failed presidential candidate who also happens to be a multi-millionaire, with multiple homes and who can easily afford to pay for her own security, is nuts,” its board of directors said.
The statement continued: Mayor Karen Bass “should tell Governor Newsom that if he wants to curry favor with Ms. Harris and her donor base, then he should open up his own wallet because LA taxpayers should not be footing the bill for this ridiculousness.”
What’s next?
The CHP has not indicated how the LAPD’s move would alter its arrangement with the former vice president or said how long it will continue.
The curtailing of Secret Service protection comes as Harris is going to begin a book tour next month for her memoir, “107 Days.” The tour has 15 stops, which include visits to London and Toronto. The book title references the short length of her presidential campaign.
(Illustrations by Lindsey Made This; photograph by Hannah Pilkes)
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In a couple of months, California voters will have the opportunity to reshape our state’s political map and, perhaps, tilt the balance of power nationally from red to blue.
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Methodology behind the analysis
To get a sense of how the proposed maps might alter the balance of power in Congress, The Times used results from the 2024 presidential election to calculate the margin of victory between Democrats and Republicans in the redrawn districts.
In some cases, districts were split apart and stitched together with more liberal areas. In one area, lines have been redrawn with no overlap at all with their current boundary.
As a result, four formerly Republican-leaning swing districts would tilt slightly Democratic, and two others would shift more heavily toward the left. Four out of the five remaining Republican strongholds would become even darker red under the proposed map.
All told, the new maps could help Democrats earn six seats.
We’ll examine two Southern California districts from their list.
41st District: Rep. Ken Calvert (R-Corona)
Rep. Ken Calvert’s 41st District, long centered in the competitive western Inland Empire, would be eliminated and completely redrawn in Los Angeles County. The district would transform from a swinging GOP-leaning seat into one where Democrats would hold a 14-point advantage.
Parts of the new 41st would be carved out of the current 38th District, represented by Democrat Linda Sánchez. That change shifts some of Sánchez’s Democratic base into the new 41st district, making it more favorable to Democrats while leaving the 38th slightly less blue.
At the same time, the Latino share of the population would rise, further bolstering the Democrat‘s strength in the proposed district. The new 41st seat would become a majority-minority district. The redistricting proposal includes 16 majority-minority districts; the same number as the current map.
A section of the current 41st district would be added to Anaheim Hills’ Republican Young Kim’s 40th District. The reshaped 40th District would move 9.7 points to the right — the biggest rightward shift among Republican-held districts.
48th District: Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Bonsall)
In 2024, voters in the 48th District reelected Republican representative Darrel Issa by 19 points, while his district swung to Trump by 15 points.
But the proposed lines would shift Republican voters into a neighboring district in favor of bluer voters from the Coachella Valley, giving Democrats a new edge.
The district’s demographics would also change, with a larger share of Latino voters. As a result, a safe Republican seat would become a swing district, where Democrats would hold a narrow 3-point advantage.
The proposed 48th District includes Palm Springs, a liberal patch that was previously in the 41st District.
What the changes could mean
The analysis found the redistricting effort, which will go to voters on Nov. 4, could turn 41 Democratic-leaning congressional districts into 47.
Democrats currently hold 215 seats in the House, and Republicans have 220. The shift could be enough to threaten the GOP’s narrow majority.
Have a great weekend, from the Essential California team
Jim Rainey, staff writer Kevinisha Walker, multiplatform editor Andrew J. Campa, reporter Karim Doumar, head of newsletters Diamy Wang, homepage intern Izzy Nunes, audience intern
Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey said Friday that COVID-19 vaccines must be covered by insurance and available in drug stores. File Photo Amanda Sabga/EPA
Sept. 5 (UPI) — Massachusetts is the first state to force health insurance companies to cover vaccines recommended by the state’s department of public health.
“Massachusetts has the best health care in the world,” Gov. Maura Healey said in a statement Friday. “We won’t let Donald Trump and Robert Kennedy get between patients and their doctors. When the federal government fails to protect public health, Massachusetts will step up. The actions we are announcing today will make sure people can continue to get the vaccines they need and want in Massachusetts.”
On Wednesday, a group of states with Democrat governors — California, Oregon and Washington — announced plans to form a public health alliance to offer “evidence-based immunization guidance,” The Hill reported.
Healey said earlier this week that her state will join other Northeastern states to create a similar coalition to set vaccine policy.
Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts and the Massachusetts Association of Health Plans have said they support the action by Healey.
“Today’s action ensures that everyone who should get a vaccine will get one, and their insurance will cover it,” Insurance Commissioner Michael Caljouw said in a statement. “Our collective commitment — state government working with our health insurance companies — is important as we enter the fall season.”
The governor, in the press release, outlined a three-step plan:
The Division of Insurance and Department of Public Health issued a bulletin that requires insurance carriers in Massachusetts to continue to cover vaccines recommended by the Massachusetts Department of Public Health.
The governor has taken steps to ensure that Massachusetts residents who want the COVID vaccine can get it at pharmacies.
Massachusetts is leading efforts to create a public health collaboration with states in New England and across the Northeast committed to safeguarding public health.
Seniors in some parts of the country say they are being denied COVID-19 vaccinations amid an ongoing spike in cases, leading to rising frustration over new Trump administration policies that are making it harder to get the shots.
Matthew D’Amico, 67, of New York City, said a Walgreens declined to administer COVID-19 vaccines to him and his 75-year-old wife on Friday because they didn’t have a prescription. They’re trying to get vaccinated ahead of a trip.
“I can’t believe we can’t get” the vaccine, D’Amico said in an interview. “I’ve been inoculated a number of times and never had to get a prescription. And it’s just very frustrating that this is where we are.”
He’s not alone in his exasperation. Under the leadership of the vaccine skeptic Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., federal agencies have effectively made it more difficult to get vaccinated against COVID-19 this year. The Food and Drug Administration has only “approved” COVID-19 vaccines for those age 65 and up, as well as younger people with underlying health conditions.
That means across the country, people younger than 65 interested in getting the COVID-19 vaccine must now either consult with a healthcare provider or “attest” to a pharmacy that they have an underlying health condition. It’s a potential hurdle that can make getting the vaccine more difficult and, some health experts worry, prompt even more Americans to eschew getting vaccinated.
As D’Amico can attest, though, being part of a group for whom the COVID vaccine is “approved” doesn’t necessarily guarantee easy access.
“For me to go to my primary [healthcare provider] now and get a prescription, it’s just kind of ridiculous,” D’Amico said.
At least some people younger than 65 are encountering pharmacy staff asking probing questions about their medical conditions.
That happened Friday at a CVS in Orange County, according to 34-year-old Alex Benson, who takes medication that can suppress his immune system.
Besides just protecting himself, he wanted to get vaccinated as he has family members who are at high risk should they get COVID — his mother is immunocompromised, and his mother-in-law had open-heart surgery on Thursday night.
Benson said an employee asked why he thought he was eligible for the vaccine.
“They asked me for either a prescription or they wanted to know … why I felt I needed the vaccination,” Benson said. At one point, a staffer offered to call his doctor to get an authorization for the vaccine.
Benson said he was alarmed by the questions, and started to “feel kind of some desperation to plead my case to the pharmacist.” Another CVS staffer later came over and said further answers weren’t necessary and simply attesting he was eligible was good enough. He eventually got the vaccine.
Still, he felt the experience was dismaying.
“I think easy access should be the policy,” Benson said. “I tend not to get too political, but it seems just rather juxtaposed to me that an anti-regulation administration is using regulation in this way. They’re supposed to be removing barriers to healthcare.”
The vaccine chaos comes as COVID-19 is either increasing or starting to hit its late summer peak. According to data released Friday, there are now 14 states with “very high” levels of coronavirus detected in their wastewater — California, Texas, Florida, North Carolina, Indiana, South Carolina, Alabama, Louisiana, Connecticut, Utah, Nevada, Idaho, Hawaii and Alaska, as well as the District of Columbia.
Dr. Elizabeth Hudson, the regional physician chief of infectious diseases for Kaiser Permanente Southern California, said data continue to show an increase in coronavirus cases.
“Over this past week, we’ve seen an increase in the number of outpatient COVID cases, and even a smattering of inpatient cases,” Hudson said. “It appears that we may be nearing the top of the wave, but it may be another two weeks or so until we truly know if we’re there.”
The rate at which coronavirus lab tests are confirming infection also continues to rise statewide and in the Los Angeles area. For the week ending Aug. 30, California’s COVID test positivity rate was 12.83%, up from 7.05% for the week ending Aug. 2. In L.A. County, the positive test rate was 14.83%, up from 9.33%.
Other data, however, suggest some areas may have reached their summer COVID peak.
In Orange County, the COVID positive test rate was 13.1%. That’s below the prior week’s rate of 18%, but still higher than the rate for the week that ended Aug. 2, which was 10.8%.
In San Francisco, the test positivity rate has been hovering around 9% for the last week of reliable data available. It’s up from 7% a month earlier.
In addition, wastewater data in L.A. County show coronavirus levels declined slightly from the prior week.
“It’s too early to know if this decrease in wastewater viral concentrations is the first sign that COVID-19 activity is peaking or is regular variation typical of this data source,” the L.A. County Department of Public Health said.
COVID hospital admissions in California are increasing — with the latest rate of 3.93 admissions per 100,000 residents, up from 2.38.
But they remain relatively low statewide and in L.A. County. The number of L.A. County residents seeking care for COVID-related illness, or who have been hospitalized, “is quite a bit lower than during summer surges in 2023 and 2024,” the public health department said.
A relatively mild summer wave, however, could mean that the annual fall-and-winter COVID wave might be stronger. In July, the state Department of Public Health said that scientists anticipate California would see either a stronger summer COVID wave or a more significant winter wave.
The current confusion over federal COVID vaccine policy has been exacerbated by the chaos at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, where Kennedy earlier this year fired everyone on the influential Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, and orchestrated the firing of CDC Director Susan Monarez just 29 days after she was confirmed to the post by the Senate.
Some of Kennedy’s handpicked replacements on the ACIP have criticized vaccines and spread misinformation, according to the Associated Press. And the new interim CDC director — Jim O’Neill, a Kennedy deputy — is a critic of health regulations and has no training in medicine or healthcare, the AP reported.
The CDC hasn’t issued its own recommendations on who should get vaccinated, and that inaction has resulted in residents of a number of states needing to get prescriptions from a healthcare provider for at least the next couple of weeks. In some cases, that’s true even for seniors, as D’Amico found out.
As of Friday, CVS said people need a prescription to get a COVID-19 vaccine, sometimes depending on their age, in Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Maine, North Carolina, New Mexico, New York, Pennsylvania, Utah, Virginia and West Virginia, as well as the District of Columbia.
CVS couldn’t even offer the COVID-19 at its pharmacies in Nevada as of Friday; they were only available at the company’s MinuteClinic sites, according to spokesperson Amy Thibault.
CVS said it expects to offer COVID-19 vaccines without prescriptions at its pharmacies in New Mexico, Nevada, New York and Pennsylvania “soon,” due to recent regulatory changes in each state.
“Right now, all patients in all states need to attest to being eligible for the vaccine in order to schedule an appointment online,” Thibault said. If an adult says they have no underlying health conditions, but do have a prescription from a healthcare provider for “off-label” use of the vaccine, they can get the shot, Thibault confirmed.
On Thursday, Hawaii joined California, Washington and Oregon in launching the West Coast Health Alliance: an interstate compact meant to provide science-based immunization guidance as an alternative to the CDC.
“Together, these states will provide evidence-based immunization guidance rooted in safety, efficacy, and transparency — ensuring residents receive credible information free from political interference,” according to a statement from Gov. Gavin Newsom’s office.
The statement suggested that the Trump administration was essentially “dismantling” the CDC.
“The absence of consistent, science-based federal leadership poses a direct threat to our nation’s health security,” the statement said. “To protect the health of our communities, the West Coast Health Alliance will continue to ensure that our public health strategies are based on best available science.”
It was not immediately clear, however, whether the formation of the West Coast Health Alliance would make it easier for people to get COVID-19 vaccines at the nation’s largest pharmacy retailers, where many people get their shots.
Rep. Jerry Nadler, D-NY, speaks during a signing ceremony for The Respect for Marriage Act in the Rayburn Room of the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., on December 8, 2022. On Monday, Nadler announced in an interview with the New York Times that he would not seek re-election next year. File Photo by Bonnie Cash/UPI | License Photo
Sept. 1 (UPI) — Democratic Rep. Jerry Nadler, the longest-serving congressional member from New York, announced he has decided not to run for re-election next year in order to make room for a younger generation.
Nadler, 78, who serves New York’s 12th Congressional District — which includes Midtown and the Upper West and Upper East sides of New York City — told the New York Times in an interview published Monday that it is time, after 34 years, for a generational change.
“Watching the Biden thing really said something about the necessity for generational change in the party, and I think I want to respect that,” Nadler told The Times, adding that someone younger “can maybe do better, can maybe help us more.”
In December, Nadler said he was forced to step down as the leading Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee in favor of a younger colleague. He threw his support behind Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., as his replacement.
“It has been the greatest honor of my life to serve as chairman and ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee these past seven years,” Nadler wrote last year in a letter to his colleagues.
“I am grateful to have had the opportunity to help lead our party’s efforts to preserve the rule of law and to provide for a more just society that respects the civil rights and civil liberties of all Americans,” he said. Nadler served as chairman of the House Judiciary Committee from 2019 to 2023.
Nadler was also preparing to face a much younger primary challenger in next year’s election. Liam Elkind, 26, who created an organization during the COVID-19 pandemic to deliver food and medicine, said his election challenge was a way of “respectfully asking” Nadler to retire.
While Nadler did not discuss who might replace him, he urged other aging Democrats to follow his lead.
“I’m not saying we should change over the entire party,” Nadler said. “But I think a certain amount of change is very helpful, especially when we face the challenge of Trump and his incipient fascism.”
On Labor Day, Nadler honored “the generations of working people who built this country and the unions that won us safer workplaces, fair wages and the weekend.”
“I will always stand with workers and their unions. And I will continue fighting back against the Trump administration’s unprecedented attacks on labor, attacks on the right to organize, on workplace protections and on the dignity of work itself,” Nadler wrote Monday in a post on X.
“Because when organized labor is strong, America is strong.”
All the articles are worth a view. Here’s a small sample of what our writers covered.
(Stephanie Breijo / Los Angeles Times)
Cupid’s Hot Dogs (from the 65 favorite places to eat)
Colleague Stephanie Breijo wondered why Cupid’s is so quintessentially San Fernando Valley.
Maybe it’s the large “The VALLEY” mural in the Winnetka location’s parking lot — where carhop service and car shows can occasionally be found — or perhaps it’s that iconic heart-shaped signage that has stood over low-slung buildings and strip malls for nearly 80 years.
It’s probably the fact that the Walsh family has been slinging hot dogs across the Valley since 1946, with sisters Morgan and Kelly Walsh serving as third-generation stewards.
Whatever the case, their thin dogs still snap with each bite. The signature Cupid dog — a creation of their father’s in the 1980s — is punchy with mustard and onions, and the chili is so thick it’s practically a paste.
The flavors and generational influence collide here, a sort of trip through decades of family and Valley history in a single hot dog stand.
Canto VI (from the 24 best bars and coffee shops)
Restaurant critic Bill Addison wrote that Canto VI owner Brian Kalliel brought a high level of experience into his Chatsworth venture.
Kalliel previously worked as a sommelier at Augustine Wine Bar and Mélisse.
He sets his caliber for wines high, and delivers with an ever-changing selection through which he guides customers from behind the bar, engaging them in conversations on their tastes.
Wine flights, by-the-glass options, a few rarer bottles with some age for the nerds: Kalliel has his audience covered. The dining room — serving wine-friendly snacks, including nicely composed cheese and salumi boards, and Italian-leaning entrees from Chester Hastings, formerly chef at Joan’s on Third — has distinct supper club vibes.
Couples gravitate to the bar. Larger groups land at dimly lit tables. Ordering happens at the counter, which can be disorienting if the staff doesn’t make the process clear to first-timers. With a full house the place feels informal and occasionally a little chaotic and decidedly grown-up, largely due to Kalliel’s confident, hospitable ringleader presence.
(Brandon Ly / Los Angeles Times)
Where Kelly Kapowski grabs a burger
Senior Food Editor Danielle Dorsey tracked down celebrities, media members and politicians to ask about their hidden Valley gems.
Tiffani Thiessen, of “Saved by the Bell” and voice of She-Hulk in the “Lego Marvel Avengers: Mission Demolition,” gave us three.
“Bill’s Burgers [is] our [favorite] burger in the Valley,” Thiessen said. “Super casual setting for a quick bite with the best legendary old school burger.
“Oy Bar [is] one of our favorite date night spots [and the] food is always on point. Casa Vega [is a] nostalgic Mexican joint that has been a staple in the Valley for many years and [I] hope it continues.”
Hopefully readers will find their own San Fernando Valley staple. For more, check out the entire Guide to the 818.
The week’s biggest stories
(Joe Burbank / Associated Press)
Trump administration policies and push back
Labor Day travel and plans
Crime, courts and policing
Community struggles and issues
More big stories
This week’s must-reads
More great reads
For your weekend
(Illustrations by Lindsey Made This; photograph by HBO / David John Photography)
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Aug. 30 (UPI) — Spirit Airlines announced it filed for bankruptcy, less than six months after emerging from Chapter 11 reorganization.
The budget carrier said Friday it is “executing a comprehensive restructuring of the airline to position the business for long-term success.” The company filed voluntary petitions for Chapter 11 in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York.
After the filing, the South Florida-headquartered airline assured customers the carrier will continue service to most current locations.
“The most important thing to know is that Spirit continues to operate and offer high-value travel options,” Spirit said in a letter to all guests. “This means you can continue to book and travel with Spirit.
“Our flights continue to operate normally. You can use tickets, credits and loyalty points. You can continue to benefit from our Free Spirit loyalty program, Saver$ Club perks and credit card terms.”
Wages and benefits will continue for employees and contractors. Also, Spirit intends to pay vendors and suppliers for goods and services provided on or after the filing date.
“Our Team Members remain focused on offering you a safe journey, with excellent service and an elevated experience,” the airline told guests.
After emerging from bankruptcy the first time, Spirit said it planned to furlough about 270 pilots and downgrade some 140 captains to first officers between Oct. 1 and Nov. 1.
The total number of employees is 11,000.
Reorganization plans are focused on four areas:
Redesigning its network to “focus its flying on key markets to provide more destinations, frequencies and enhanced connectivity in its focus cities.” That includes ending service in certain markets.
Rightsizing fleet size “to match capacity with profitable demand in line with the redesigned network. This will significantly lower Spirit’s debt and lease obligations and is projected to generate hundreds of millions of dollars in annual operating savings.”
Addressing cost structure “to build on its industry-leading cost model by pursuing further efficiencies across the business.”
Offering three new travel options of Spirit First, Premium Economy and Value. “Spirit will take full advantage of its lower costs to offer consumers more of what they want — value at every price point,” the airline said.
In March, Spirit said it was “emerging as a stronger and more focused airline” after declaring bankruptcy on Nov. 18 after poor quarterly performances. Spirit had lost more than $2.5 billion since the start of 2020 with revenue severely affected by the COVID-19 pandemic.
After the first bankruptcy, the airline received a $350 million equity investment from existing investors to support Spirit’s future initiatives. The airline emerged from its financial restructuring, completing a transaction that equitizes approximately $795 million of funded debt.
Common shares will now be traded on the over-the-counter market and delisted from the NYSE American Stock Exchange.
After emerging from the first bankruptcy, Spirit said Ted Christie would remain as chief executive but two months later, David Davis, 58, was named president and CEO. He most recently worked as the chief financial officer and a board member of Sun Country Airlines.
“Since emerging from our previous restructuring, which was targeted exclusively on reducing Spirit’s funded debt and raising equity capital, it has become clear that there is much more work to be done and many more tools are available to best position Spirit for the future,” Davis said. “After thoroughly evaluating our options and considering recent events and the market pressures facing our industry, our Board of Directors decided that a court-supervised process is the best path forward to make the changes needed to ensure our long-term success.
“We have evaluated every corner of our business and are proceeding with a comprehensive approach in which we will be far more strategic about our fleet, markets and opportunities in order to best serve our Guests, Team Members and other stakeholders.”
After the airline released its quarterly report earlier this month, Spirit revealed that it had “substantial doubt” about its ability to stay in business over the next year, citing “adverse market conditions.” It reported a net loss of $245.8 million for the second quarter of 2025. Revenue was $1.02 billion, down 20% from the previous year.
The carrier rejected repeated acquisition proposals from rival discounter Frontier Airlines and in January 2024, JetBlue’s purchase plans of the rival airline were rejected by antitrust regulators.
Spirit has 550 daily flights to 77 destinations, through the United States, the Caribbean and South America.
In terms of market share, Spirit is 4.4%. Delta Airlines is No. 1 at 17.9%, followed by American Airlines at 17.3%, Southwest Airlines at 16.3% and United Airlines at 16.2%, according to the U.S. Bureau of Transportation statistics from June 2024 to May.
Spirit’s main hub is Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport. Its two other major hubs: Orlando International Airport and Detroit Metropolitan Wayne County Airport.
For college football fans, the tranquility and/or boredom of game-free weekends has officially ended.
Yes, the college football season is back today along with all of the game-day traditions: tailgating, plopping on the couch with a 60-inch screen, backyard barbecues and incessant complaining about traffic from residents near the Rose Bowl.
Hope is high for the USC and UCLA football programs, members of the Big 10 Conference (it still feels weird saying that!).
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Our L.A. Times sports team put together an amazing digital preview package for the upcoming season. The Trojans start first, hosting Missouri State at the Memorial Coliseum at 4:30 p.m. today while the Bruins welcome Utah to the Rose Bowl at 8 p.m.
Let’s sample some of that coverage and wish both teams the best of luck. And as an Alabama alumnus myself, may I add a very loud Roll Tide!
Expect a roller-coaster season from USC quarterback Jayden Maiava
My colleague and Trojans beat writer Ryan Kartje said the redshirt junior made a concerted effort over the summer to eliminate the back-breaking mistakes he struggled with last season.
Since last season, he dug deeper into head coach Lincoln Riley’s offense and worked on his mechanics with the experts at the 3DQB training academy in Huntington Beach.
But Maiava’s style has lent itself to high variance.
He loves to chuck it deep and too often throws it into coverage. That could yield some thrilling results. We’ll have to see if that will benefit USC or not.
But 4.3% of his passes last season were deemed turnover-worthy by Pro Football Focus. That was third-highest in the Big Ten and too high for USC’s offense to reach its potential.
UCLA’s defense will need big seasons from safety Key Lawrence and edge rusher Devin Aupiu.
My colleague and UCLA beat writer Ben Bolch said UCLA will look for leadership on defense.
Perhaps the most energetic player on the team, Lawrence, a Mississippi transfer, also boasts plenty of talent, speed and smarts.
Barring a setback from a minor right leg injury he sustained midway through training camp, Lawrence projects to be an opening-day starter.
He’ll need to anchor a secondary that’s replacing every starter.
As for Aupiu, UCLA’s pass rush was meh last season, generating 22 sacks to rank tied for No. 78 in the nation.
As a part-time starter, Aupiu made 4½ tackles for losses, including 1½ sacks — decent production given his limited playing time and easily the most among returning players. Getting into the backfield more often this season is a must for the redshirt senior.
Prediction time: The Bruins will be bowl-bound while the Trojans will split with their rivals.
Bolch is predicting a season full of surprises and a bowl berth for the Bruins. Does he think they’ll beat USC? You’ll have to read his preview.
Kartje is predicting a fast start for the Trojans, who will run into some bumps and bruises in the Big 10 before rallying with a flourish. Will USC topple UCLA and Notre Dame?
Have a great weekend, from the Essential California team
Jim Rainey, staff writer Kevinisha Walker, multiplatform editor Andrew J. Campa, reporter Karim Doumar, head of newsletters Diamy Wang, homepage intern Izzy Nunes, audience intern
Aug. 27 (UPI) — The federal government signed-off on the latest round of COVID-19 vaccines, but new limits were set on which Americans can get them after U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. fulfilled many of his promises to reshape U.S. vaccine policy.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration on Wednesday ended its authorization for the broad use of COVID-19 shots, clearing them only for patients at higher risk of severe illness, and those age 65 and older — or younger adults with at least one underlying health condition who would qualify.
“The emergency use authorizations for Covid vaccines, once used to justify broad mandates on the general public during the Biden administration, are now rescinded,” Kennedy stated early Wednesday afternoon in a post on X.
Kennedy said the American people “demanded science, safety and common sense,” and he claimed this new framework “delivers all three.”
But this new action is likely to complicate access, observers say, and prompts questions on insurance plan coverage.
According to Kennedy, vaccine shots still will be available for patients but only after they consult with a doctor.
On Wednesday, both Moderna and Pfizer confirmed its vaccines were approved for use in adults age 65 and older and those age 5 through 64 with at least one underlying condition.
However, it remains to be seen how easily it can be obtained for patients without higher risk health factors.
Previous U.S. vaccine policy suggested an annual COVID-19 shot for people age 6 months and older.
The American Academy of Pediatrics, the nation’s leading pediatrics association, recently recommended children as young as 6 months old be inoculated against COVID-19 in a departure with Trump administration guidelines.
The COVID-19 vaccine shots must be voted on by a panel of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Earlier this year Kennedy, a known skeptic of long-used and effective vaccines, gutted the CDC panel and named widely-known vaccine critics to sit in place.
On Wednesday the chief of America’s Frontline Doctors, a right-wing group known to spread false and unsubstantiated claims, cheered Kennedy’s actions on the U.S. coronavirus vaccine policy switch.
“Mandates are dead. Freedom wins,” Dr. Simone Gold, AFD’s president, said on social media.
However, a noted television medical analyst offered advice to those still on the fence on getting another COVID-19 shot.
“If you want to know if you or members of your family should get vaccinated, my recommendation is to solicit advice from your doctor, not the federal government,” Dr. Jonathan Reiner, a professor at the D.C.-based George Washington School of Medicine & Health Sciences and its director of Cardiac Catheterization Laboratories, stated on X.
Aug. 26 (UPI) — President Donald Trump‘s wish to end mail-in voting is only part of his grander vision for fundamentally changing the election process, experts say.
Mail-in voting has been the target of the president for years and it is again garnering his attention. As president he does not have a direct role in election administration but by sowing mistrust in the results he is still capable of ushering in change.
“The president has no role with respect to election administration or setting election rules of anything of that nature,” Jonathan Diaz, director of voting advocacy and partnerships with Campaign Legal Center, told UPI. “The Constitution is crystal clear that the primary responsibility for setting election rules lies with the states, subject to modifications from Congress.”
Trump alleges that mail-in voting is rife with fraud, a claim that has routinely been disproven by election audits and federal investigations, Diaz said.
“His own Department of Justice during his first term said there was no evidence of any widespread voter fraud in the 2020 election,” Diaz said. “Countless studies and investigations and attempts have turned up virtually nothing. Isolated incidents that haven’t affected the outcome of elections at most. There is no basis to support any of the president’s views on vote-by-mail or the integrity of our election system in general.”
About one-third of voters participated in the 2024 general election by casting mail-in ballots.
Universal vote-by-mail
When Trump takes to social media or the podium to air his grievances with voting by mail, he does so in broad terms. Charles Stewart, director of the MIT Election Lab and professor of political science, told UPI that Trump’s issue is actually with universal vote-by-mail.
Eight states and Washington, D.C., conduct universal vote-by-mail, meaning they send mail-in ballots to all registered voters without requests. Those states are California, Colorado, Hawaii, Nevada, Oregon, Vermont, Washington and Utah. Whether a voter intends to vote by mail or not, they still receive a ballot.
Universal vote-by-mail expanded to California, Vermont, Nevada, Hawaii and Washington, D.C., in 2020 or later. Stewart said some of the expansion was in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
“There ended up being a bit of a back-and-forth in the early days between Democratic activists and Republicans about whether everybody in America should be mailed a ballot,” Stewart said. “That has morphed over the years into this kind of partisan divide over this practice of mailing everybody a ballot.”
Utah, the only universal vote-by-mail state that leans Republican, passed a bill earlier this year to change its mail-in voting process. Voters will no longer automatically receive a ballot in the mail beginning in 2029. Instead, they must request one.
“Thus far, for all the political talk at the top about discouraging vote-by-mail, once voters have taken a bite of that apple, they like the apple,” Stewart said. “Once the candidates and their advisers, their campaign advisers, have learned to campaign with mail being a predominant part of the election they also have a hard time giving it up. In Utah they’re going to roll back mail voting but there’s still going to be a lot of mail voting.”
Challenges for administrators and voters
Whether Trump hopes to see an end to universal vote-by-mail or mail-in voting in general, he cannot achieve either through executive order. It would require an act by U.S. Congress.
Ending vote-by-mail in any fashion would be a major disruption for election administrators at the state level, Stewart said.
“It would certainly be a great reevaluation of how they administer things,” he said. “They would have to very quickly turn on a logistical dime to make it work. They did it in 2020 on the other side.”
Some of the logistical challenges that universal vote-by-mail states and states with heavy mail-in voting participation would face include finding additional poll workers and polling places, along with the costs associated with these additions. This would raise the costs of election administration for taxpayers.
“Many of these places will have some memory of doing elections in person but they will not have the tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of local voting locations that will be needed on Election Day,” Stewart said. “They will have to recruit and deploy on Election Day, so there will be a real, major scrambling to make this happen. They will have no choice in the matter but it will be very expensive and very disruptive.”
Losing access to the option to vote by mail would also be consequential for many voters who otherwise may not be able to participate in their elections.
Sophia Lin Lakin, director ACLU Voting Rights Project, told UPI that mail-in voting is crucial for people with disabilities and mobility issues, seniors and people who lack reliable access to transportation.
According to the U.S. Census Bureau, voters who are 65 and older voted by mail at the highest rate of any age group in the 2022 midterm elections. About 38% voted by mail.
Mail-in voting also levels the playing field of participation for voters across the socioeconomic spectrum. Voters with family incomes ranging between under $10,000 and more than $150,000 per year voted by mail at similar rates, between 24% and 36%.
“Many Americans juggle multiple jobs or irregular schedules and mail-in voting provides the flexibility needed for those voters to participate in democracy without sacrificing a paycheck,” Lakin said. “Ending it would disenfranchise many communities that already face systemic barriers to voting.”
Trump administration’s other election changes
The Trump administration has already taken other measures to change the election process in the United States while continuing the pattern of sowing doubt in the election he lost in 2020.
In March, Trump issued an executive order to restrict the acceptance of mail-in ballots received after Election Day and tighten the proof of citizenship requirements for voter eligibility. It also threatened to withhold federal funding from states that fail to comply.
A federal judge granted an injunction to stop the proof-of-citizenship requirement from taking effect.
Trump’s order charged the Department of Homeland Security and Department of Government Efficiency with scanning state voter registration rolls and federal immigration databases in an effort to identify foreign nationals.
The president has applied political pressure to lawmakers in Texas and other states to redraw their congressional maps to be more favorable for Republicans ahead of the 2026 midterm election.
Trump’s legislative agenda, passed in July, reduced funding for national cybersecurity, raising concern that U.S. elections, among other things, could be more vulnerable to interference from bad actors. The Trump administration has fired more than 100 employees from the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, the federal government’s chief cybersecurity arm.
Attorney General Pam Bondi has cut the leadership and many of the employees working in the voting section of the Civil Rights Division. The voting section enforces federal voting rights laws including parts of the Voting Rights Act, the National Voter Registration Act, Help America Vote and the Uniformed and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting Act.
The voting section has halted all investigations into potential Voting Rights Act violations.
Voting section
Pamela Karlan, professor of law at Stanford Law School, told UPI that the Trump administration’s overhaul of election law enforcement is unlike anything ever seen in American history.
Karlan served as the former principal deputy assistant attorney general under former President Joe Biden‘s administration.
“I don’t think there’s ever been a time where they just outright stopped enforcing the Voting Rights Act,” Karlan said. “There has been more vigorous enforcement during some administrations than others. That has not traditionally been a partisan issue. But I don’t think we’ve ever had an administration that was outright not committed to enforcing any part of the Voting Rights Act.”
“The idea that the voting section isn’t in the game is really troubling, because the voting section has brought and won some of the most important voting rights cases in our history,” she continued.
Reducing the staff in the voting section and its overall capabilities greatly puts overseas voters and deployed military service members at risk of not being able to participate in elections.
“Almost every election cycle the voting action has had to deal with problems of getting ballots to overseas voters and to military voters in a timely manner,” Karlan said. “Almost every federal election cycle, the department has a bunch of UOCAVA responsibilities and really nobody else is going to enforce that.”
Karlan sees little opportunity for recourse if the voting section does not enforce election laws or actively protect the rights of voters, short of action by Congress. She still expects most election administrators will follow the law but the small few who do not will present significant problems.
“For the most part, state and local jurisdictions comply with the law,” she said. “Prior to the enactment of the Voting Rights Act we had rampant violations of the Constitution when it came to voting rights. Massive disenfranchisement. Purposeful vote dilution and the like.”
“Most election officials want to comply with federal law,” she continued. “But when it comes to the outliers, the lack of any federal enforcement is deeply problematic.”
If you browse through social media, it’s easy to find commentary about canceling the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics.
There are Angelenos who lack confidence in the city and county’s ability to roll out the red carpet due to perceived failures during the Palisades and Altadena fires.
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One syndicated columnist pleaded with L.A. not to work with “a lawless U.S. regime,” while sportswriter and author Jeff Pearlman wondered if Latin American athletes would feel safe in the U.S. due to the Trump administration’s current deportations.
There are pushes from some, but how possible is it that the Games will be canceled?
Why is backing out difficult? We’re three years away
Host cities and host country national organizing committees (in this country, the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee) sign a host city contract (HCC) after the International Olympic Committee officially awards the Games.
The contract for the 2028 Games, signed by then-Mayor Eric Garcetti and then-City Council President Herb Wesson in September 2017, includes procedures for termination from the IOC’s perspective but doesn’t leave the same option for the host city or the national organizing committee.
“While one cannot foreclose all potential theories, it is hard to imagine a scenario where Los Angeles could terminate the HCC without facing substantial legal issues,” Nathan O’Malley, an international arbitration lawyer and a partner at Musick, Peeler & Garrett, wrote in an email. “Especially if the reason for ending the contract was a political disagreement between the federal, state and local branches of government.”
When even COVID-19 didn’t stop the Games
After an initial one-year delay of the Tokyo Games, medical professionals pleaded to cancel amid rising COVID-19 cases.
LA28 chairman Casey Wasserman has emphasized that he has assurances from the federal government that the United States will be open, despite recent travel bans and tighter scrutiny of international travelers arriving in the U.S.
Trump’s June proclamation includes exemptions for athletes, team personnel or immediate relatives entering the country for the FIFA World Cup, the Olympics or other major sporting event as determined by the Secretary of State.
If any city should be ready to host the biggest Olympics in history, it should be L.A. Not only because of the existing venues, but because of the unprecedented 11-year planning time after the IOC awarded the Games in 2017.
Now with less than three years remaining, relocating to a city that would likely have to build new venues would be unrealistic for the IOC.
“For Los Angeles, a city whose identity is partly predicated on staging the Olympics twice, and now having a third time,” said Mark Dyreson, a sports historian at Penn State University, “I think it would be really, really difficult for L.A. to give up the Olympics.”
(Illustrations by Lindsey Made This; photograph by Jamie-Lee B.)
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What Californians think about Gov. Gavin Newsom’s plan to temporarily redraw the state’s congressional districts has been a source of hot debate.
Republicans rallied around polling conducted by Politico last week that noted that California voters preferred an “independent line-drawing panel” determining seats to the House of Representatives versus giving that role to the state Legislature.
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The high-stakes fight over political boundaries could shape control of the U.S. House, where Republicans currently hold a narrow majority.
Texas’ plan creates five new Republican-leaning seats that could secure the GOP’s House majority. Texas is creating the new districts at the behest of President Trump to help Republicans keep control of the House in the midterm elections. California’s efforts are an attempt to temporarily cancel those gains. The new maps would be in place for the 2026, 2028 and 2030 congressional elections.
Newsom and Democratic leaders say California must match Texas’ partisan mapmaking to preserve balance in Congress.
New polling supports Californians fighting back
The UC Berkeley Institute of Governmental Studies poll, conducted for the Los Angeles Times, asked registered voters about the Newsom-backed redistricting push favoring California Democrats. This effort serves as a counterattack to President Trump and Texas Republicans reworking election maps to their advantage.
When voters were asked whether they agree with California’s redistricting maneuver, 46% said it was a good idea, and 36% said it was a bad idea.
Slightly more, 48%, said they would vote in favor of the temporary gerrymandering efforts if it appeared on the statewide special election ballot in November. Nearly a third said they would vote no, and 20% said they were undecided.
One interpretation of the data
“That’s not bad news,” said Mark DiCamillo, director of the Berkeley IGS Poll. “It could be better.”
DiCamillo added: “With ballot measures, you’d like to be comfortably above 50% because you got to get people to vote yes and when people are undecided or don’t know enough about initiatives, they tend to vote no just because it’s the safer vote.”
The strongest backers
Among voters who regularly cast ballots in statewide elections, overall support for redistricting jumped to 55%, compared with 34% opposed.
DiCamillo said that is significant.
“If I were to pick one subgroup where you would want to have an advantage, it would be that one,” he said.
Where to find the undecided votes
Winning in November, however, will require pushing undecided voters to back the redistricting plan.
Among Latino, Black and Asian voters, nearly 30% said they have yet to decide how they would vote on redistricting.
Women also have higher rates of being undecided compared with men, at 25% to 14%.
Younger voters are also more likely to be on the fence, with nearly a third of 18- to 29-year-olds saying they are unsure, compared with 11% of those older than 65.
The ever-growing divide
The partisan fight over election maps elicited deeply partisan results.
Nearly 7 in 10 Democratic voters said they would support the redistricting measure, and Republicans overwhelmingly panned the plan by about the same margin (72%).
California Republicans attempted to stall the process by filing an emergency petition at the state Supreme Court, arguing that Democrats violated the California Constitution by rushing the proposal through the Legislature.
The high court rejected the legal challenge Wednesday.
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1 of 2 | Former Sri Lankan President Ranil Wickremesinghe leaves the Commission to Investigate Allegations of Bribery or Corruption, after giving a statement related to an ongoing investigation under the Anti-Corruption Act, in Colombo, Sri Lanka, in April. He was arrested Friday on charges of misuse of public funds for travel he did while president. File Photo by Chamila Karunarathne/EPA
Aug. 22 (UPI) — Sri Lanka’s former president was arrested Friday for the alleged misuse of public funds, police said.
Ranil Wickremesinghe was arrested in Colombo, the Sri Lankan capitol, while giving a statement to the country’s Criminal Investigations Department. He’s been facing multiple government investigations into widespread bribery and corruption. The charge in his arrest was for using public funds for his personal travel.
Friday’s arrest was about a detour Wickremesinghe, 76, made to Britain in 2023 on his way back to Sri Lanka from an official visit to the United States. He made the stop to attend an awards ceremony for his wife, Maithree Wickremesinghe, who was awarded an honorary professorship from the University of Wolverhampton. The government alleged that it was a personal trip for which about $56,000 of public money was used.
Wickremesinghe was widely credited with helping put the country back on the road to economic recovery. He also served six separate terms as prime minister since the 1990s.
He made 23 foreign trips during his time as president, at a cost of more than $2 million, according to BBC Sinhala.
He served as president from 2022 to 2024, stepping into the role after the country’s worst ever economic crisis triggered a popular uprising that caused his predecessor Gotabaya Rajapaksa to flee.
Wickremesinghe’s arrest is the most high-profile case since the National People’s Power, a leftist coalition, won the presidential election in September. Its leader Anura Kumara Dissanayake became president. Dissanayake, 56, campaigned on a promise of weeding out corruption and prosecuting those who had misused public funds.
In 2019, Sri Lanka fell into a downward spiral, partly driven by poor policymaking by the government of Rajapaksa that depleted foreign reserves and eventually forced the country to default on its debt. Terrorist bombings in 2019 and the COVID-19 pandemic, which crushed tourism, also eroded the domestic economy.
By 2022, when Sri Lanka’s foreign exchange reserves ran so low that it couldn’t buy fuel, public anger led to protests and the ouster of Rajapaksa.
As president, Wickremesinghe helped secure an International Monetary Fund bailout in 2023. But the deal required austerity measures. Those unpopular policies, a growing sense among people that he was part of the old guard, and discomfort that he was close to Rajapaksa, led Sri Lankans to reject him during last year’s elections.
Aug. 21 (UPI) — Pew Research Center released on Thursday found that “unauthorized immigrants” in the United States hit a record high in 2023 of 14 million entering the country.
That 14 million included about 6 million who were protected from deportation via some other status, including victims of violent crime, Pew said in its report. These protections can be, and in some cases have been, removed by the federal government, sometimes with little notification.
The report only covers up to 2023, which is the latest year data were available.
The label “unauthorized immigrants” includes an array of statuses, including those who entered the United States illegally. The term groups together immigrants living in the country with impermanent, precarious statuses, Pew said.
The U.S. unauthorized immigrant population includes any immigrants who are not in these groups: Lawful permanent residents (green card holders), refugees formally admitted to the United States, people granted asylum, former unauthorized immigrants granted legal residence under the 1986 Immigration Reform and Control Act, naturalized U.S. citizens who entered under the prior four categoires as well as temporary legal residents under specific visa categories, such as those for foreign students, guest workers and intracompany transfers.
The report said that the rise in immigration came after the COVID-19 pandemic when U.S. immigration policy changed. Lawful admissions rose, as well as encounters between migrants and U.S. authorities at the U.S.-Mexico border
The 14 million number came after two years of record growth, according to a Pew estimate. The increase of 3.5 million in two years is the largest on record.
The number with temporary protections from deportations increased after 2021, following policy changes made by the President Joe Biden administration that allowed many immigrants to arrive in the U.S. with protected status and others to gain protection soon after arrival.
In 2023, unauthorized immigrants accounted for 27% of all U.S. immigrants, up from 22% in 2021. The group’s share of the U.S. population increased from 3.1% to 4.1%.
The six states with the largest unauthorized immigrant populations in 2023 were California with 2.3 million, Texas at 2.1 million, Florida with 1.6 million, 825,000 in New York, New Jersey with 600,000 and Illinois at 550,000.
These states have consistently had the most unauthorized immigrants since at least 1980. But in 2007, California had 1.2 million more unauthorized immigrants than Texas. Today, it has only about 200,000 more.
These populations grew in 32 states from 2021 to 2023. Florida saw the largest growth with an increase of 700,000, followed by Texas at 450,000, California with 425,000 and New York with an increase of 230,000.
Eight more states saw their unauthorized immigrant populations increase by 75,000 or more: New Jersey, Illinois, Georgia, North Carolina, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, Maryland and Ohio.
Aug. 20 (UPI) — Hundreds of staff from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services told Congress that HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is sharing false health info with the public and called on him to step up protection of public health professionals.
They accused Kennedy of complicity in “dismantling America’s public health infrastructure and endangering the nation’s health.”
More than 750 current and former HHS employees on Wednesday called on Kennedy to stop “spreading inaccurate health information” and prioritize the safety of public servants in the health sector in the wake of this month’s fatal shooting at the Atlanta headquarters of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
“The attack came amid growing mistrust in public institutions, driven by politicized rhetoric that has turned public health professionals from trusted experts into targets of villainization,” the letter to members of Congress read in part.
“And now, violence,” it added.
The “Save HHS” crew accused Kennedy, 71, of endangering the lives of his HHS employees with his own words and rhetoric, and pointed to multiple specific accusations in the letter of Kennedy doing so in the public square.
According to law enforcement, the alleged shooter was skeptical of the COVID-19 vaccine and assumed he was harmed by it. He fired hundreds of rounds with about 200 striking six different CDC facilities across its Atlanta campus.
CDC Director Susan Monarez told HHS staffers during a 10,000-person virtual call the danger of misinformation had “now led to deadly consequences.”
Kennedy met with Monarez two days after the shooting.
The HHS crew noted the recent CDC attack on Aug. 8, where DeKalb County police officer David Rosewas fatally shot was “not random.”
“If the very people that are supposed to be protecting Americans are not safe, then no American is safe,” Dr. Anne Schuchat, former principal deputy director of the CDC, said in a statement.
The letter also noted the HHS workforce wanted to honor Rose and his memory.
But it also pointed to fears of “retaliation” and issues of “personal safety.”
“We sign this declaration in our own personal capacities, on our personal time, and without the use of government equipment, as protected by our First Amendment rights,” they stated.
Health experts and other officials have rung alarm bells over Kennedy’s deployment of health data universally known as false for years, even before U.S. President Donald Trump nominated Kennedy to be the nation’s health chief.
Wednesday’s letter follows a similar letter to Congress in January signed by more than 17,000 U.S. doctors via the Chicago-based Committee to Protect Health Care, which stated Kennedy was a danger to America’s national healthcare system.
Qantas has been ordered to a nearly $60 million fine over mass layoffs during the COVID-19 pandemic. File Photo by Brent Winstone/EPA-EFE
Aug. 18 (UPI) — An Australian court on Monday fined national flag carrier Qantas nearly $60 million for illegally firing more than 1,800 ground workers and then outsourcing their jobs during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Australia’s Transport Workers Union said in a statement that it was the largest employer penalty in Australian corporate history.
“Against all odds, TWU members have sent a $90 million warning to corporate Australia: you can’t break the law and get away with it,” the union said, referring to the amount Qantas was fined in Australian dollars.
Federal Court Justice Michael Lee said a little more than half of the penalty should be paid to the TWU, while the recipients of the remaining sum will be decided at a later hearing, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation reported.
Lee said that while Qantas has expressed “genuine regrets” about the situation, he believes that “this more likely reflects the damage this case has done at the company rather than unique remorse for the damage done to the affected workers.”
He said that the airline “resisted until it could resist no more.”
Qantas said the Monday judgement holds the company “accountable for our actions.”
“We sincerely apologize to each and every one of the 1,820 ground handling employees and to their families who suffered as a result,” Qantas Group Chief Executive Officer Vanessa Hudson said in a statement.
“The decision to outsource five years ago, particularly during such an uncertain time, caused genuine hardship for many of our former team and their families. The impact was felt not only by those who lost their jobs, but our entire workforce.”
The ruling brings an end to a five-year fight by the TWU over Qantas’s firing of some 1,800 workers and then outsourcing their jobs in 2020.
Qantas appealed through the Australian court system, with the High Court affirming that the airline had acted illegally by outsourcing the employment.
The Monday fine is on top of the roughly $78 million that Qantas agreed to pay eligible workers in December, after its failed bid arguing that it should not have to offer workers compensation.
“Qantas was not sorry to workers when it illegally outsourced these workers, many finding out they’d lost their jobs over loudspeaker in the lunch room. It was not sorry when it dragged them all the way to the High Court, or when it argued it should have to pay them no compensation at all,” TWU National Secretary Michael Kaine said in a statement.
“Qantas is only sorrow now that it has to pay the larges penalty fine of any employer in Australian corporate history.”
The announcement comes about 14 months after Qantas reached a settlement with the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission to pay a multi-million-dollar fine for booking flights that had previously been canceled.
If you’re a Gen Xer or younger, there’s a good chance you’ve contemplated moving out of California.
The reasons are obvious. It’s expensive and difficult to raise a family, pay rent or even consider buying a home.
That struggle isn’t just on the mind of locals. Midwestern and Southern states have recognized an opportunity and are making their best pitches to frustrated Californians.
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So, is there a price Tulsa, Okla., could offer you to move? Are the incentives of cheaper gas, much shorter commutes and overall drive times enough of an appeal? I haven’t even mentioned the cost of living and a real chance of buying a home.
Rollins felt socially isolated working a remote job in Ocean Beach for a tech company, but still overwhelmed by the sheer volume of people around her.
Months earlier she read about a program, Tulsa Remote, that would pay remote workers to relocate to Oklahoma’s second-largest city for at least a year. She decided to give it a shot and visit.
“When I was [in California], I was so consumed with the process of day-to-day living — the traffic, getting places, scheduling things,” Rollins said. “Here there’s so much more space to think creatively about your life and to kind of set it up the way you want.”
After five months in Tulsa, Rollins met her significant other at a trivia night. Her partner, with whom she now lives, made the journey from California to Tulsa for school during the pandemic.
“He grew up in Santa Cruz and was living 10 minutes from me down the road in Pacifica, but we never met in California,” she said. “We met in Tulsa.”
What is Tulsa offering?
Tulsa Remote — funded by the George Kaiser Family Foundation — started in 2019, and has sought to recruit new residents to diversify the city’s workforce.
It decided to offer $10,000 to remote workers who would move to the state for at least a year.
The program also provides volunteer and socializing opportunities for new residents and grants them membership at a co-working space for 36 months.
What do the numbers say?
Tulsa Remote has attracted more than 3,600 remote workers since its inception.
More than 7,800 Californians have applied to the program and 539 have made the move, cementing California as the second-most popular origin state behind Texas.
Those numbers reflect something of a wider trend: From 2010 through 2023, about 9.2 million people moved from California to other states, while only 6.7 million people moved to California from other parts of the country, according to the American Community Survey.
A Public Policy Institute of California survey conducted in 2023 found that 34% of Californians have seriously considered leaving the state because of high housing costs.
Zach and Katie Meincke, former Westsiders
The lower cost of living was a huge bonus for the Meinckes when they moved three years ago.
They went from paying $2,400 in monthly rent on a two-bedroom, two-bathroom apartment in L.A.’s Westside to a five-bedroom, three-bathroom house in Tulsa for just a few hundred dollars more.
It ended up being fortuitous timing for the couple, who discovered they were expecting their first child — a daughter named Ruth — just weeks after they decided to move.
The couple are expecting their second child in December.
It’s a life milestone that Meincke says may not have happened in Los Angeles. In California, it costs nearly $300,000 to raise a child to 18. In Oklahoma, researchers estimate it costs about $241,000, according to a LendingTree study this year.
“There was no way we were going to move into a house in Los Angeles unless we had roommates, and that’s not an ideal situation,” Zach Meincke said. “We were 37 when we left Los Angeles and it felt like we were at a point that if we wanted to have all those other things in life — children, a house — we need to make that shift.”
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The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention headquarters in Atlanta was attacked by a gunman on Friday. File Photo by Erike S. Lesser/EPA
Aug. 13 (UPI) — The director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention told employees about the dangers of misinformation, four days after a suspected gunman shot at the agency’s headquarters in Atlanta, claiming the COVID-19 vaccine made him sick.
On Tuesday, Susan Monarez met with staffers virtually and then sent a note to all 10,000 employees nationwide, obtained by ABC News. Staffers at the headquarters have been working remotely since the attack on Friday.
“The dangers of misinformation and its promulgation has now led to deadly consequences,” she wrote. “I will work to restore trust in public health to those who have lost it — through science, evidence and clarity of purpose. I will need your help.”
The comments were slightly different than those during her staff meeting in which she said: “Public health should never be under attack. We know that misinformation can be dangerous.”
She said the health agency can rebuild trust with “rational evidence-based discourse” with “compassion and understanding.”
Dr. Paul Offit, the director of the Vaccine Education Center at Children’s Hospital of Pennsylvania, told NBC News: “The irony is her boss is the biggest spreader of misinformation.”
Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is secretary of the Health and Human Services, which oversees the CDC.
In 2021, during the pandemic, Kennedy described the shot as the “deadliest vaccine ever made” after he filed a citizens’ petition requesting that the Food and Drug Administration end emergency authorization.
Last week, Kennedy announced that HHS was moving to terminate $500 million in contracts to develop vaccines using mRNA technology, which was used to develop the COVID-19 vaccine in 2020.
“After reviewing the science and consulting top experts at NIH [National Institutes of Health] and FDA, HHS has determined that mRNA technology poses more risks than benefits for these respiratory viruses,”
The American Medical Association backs mRNA vaccine research and the CDC still says on its website: “During the COVID-19 pandemic, COVID-19 vaccines underwent the most intensive safety analysis in U.S. history.”
Health officials have denounced skepticism of the research, noting the COVID-19 vaccine saved millions of lives in the United States.
“The Covid pandemic showed us what’s possible when science moves fast,” Rick Bright, who directed the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development from 2016 to 2020, told NBC News. “Dismantling that momentum now is like disbanding the fire department because the fire’s out.”
As head of the HHS, he has updated COVID-19 vaccine recommendations for the fall to be restricted to older adults and those with underlying health conditions. He also doesn’t want children to get the shots.
On Monday, Kennedy toured the CDC campus in Atlanta and met with the widow of the one person slain in the attack, DeKalb County Police Officer David Rose. He toured with Monarez and HHS Deputy Secretary Jim O’Neill.
“He offered his deepest condolences and reaffirmed the agency’s commitment to honoring officer Rose’s bravery, sacrifice and service to the nation,” HHS said.
Today I traveled to Atlanta in the wake of the heartbreaking shooting at the CDC’s Roybal Campus that took the life of DeKalb County Police Officer David Rose. @POTUS and the entire administration are deeply saddened by this tragic loss. We stand with Officer Rose’s wife, his two… pic.twitter.com/PJyNJV2jUu— Secretary Kennedy (@SecKennedy) August 11, 2025
Since the attack, the union representing CDC workers condemned the lack of support from top officials.
“This leadership is critical in reinforcing public trust and ensuring that accurate, science-based information prevails,” the union said Sunday. “This condemnation is necessary to help prevent violence against scientists that may be incited by such disinformation.”
The American Federation of Government Employees Local 2883, which represents more than 2,000 CDC workers, said in a statement Sunday that the attack “was not random and it compounds months of mistreatment, neglect and vilification that CDC staff have endured.”
The union also said: “The deliberate targeting of CDC through this violent act is deeply disturbing, completely unacceptable and an attack on every public servant.”
The father of the suspected gunman, 30-year-old Patrick Joseph White, reportedly told authorities he targeted the CDC over health problems he blamed on the COVID-19 vaccine. He said the shot made him depressed and suicidal.
He was fatally shot by police after around 200 bullets struck the six buildings. Five firearms were recovered.
“All indications are that this was an isolated event involving one individual,” Jeff Williams, the deputy secretary of the CDC’s Office of Safety, Security and Asset Management, said during the staff meeting Tuesday.
WASHINGTON — Alana Voechting, a 27-year-old nursing student, had never heard of Klarna when she noticed its bright pink logo while checking out at Sephora.com with $165 in skin care products.
Mounting medical debts from chronic health conditions left Voechting with money problems, so she was thrilled to learn the app would allow her to break the purchase price into four installments over six weeks — with no interest, fees or credit inquiries to ding her already subpar credit score.
“It’s like your brain thinks, ‘Oh, I’m getting this product for cheap,’ because you really only look at that first payment, and after that you kind of forget about it,” she said. “So psychologically, it feels like you’re spending so much less when you’re not.”
Soon Voechting began regularly using not just Klarna but also similar services, including Quadpay and Affirm, to buy makeup, clothing, airline tickets and expensive lounge wear she acknowledged she “would not have purchased otherwise.”
Voechting is one of millions of young Americans with scant or subprime credit histories who are using so-called buy-now-pay-later apps every month.
The smartphone-based services are an updated version of the old layaway plan, except users can do it all on their phones and — most appealingly — get their purchase immediately rather than having to wait until they’ve paid for it.
The companies act as intermediaries between retailers and consumers, making most of their profit by charging merchants 2% to 8% of the purchase price, similar to the retailer fees levied by credit card companies.
The apps are taking off among millennials and Generation Z consumers attracted by the ability to bypass traditional credit cards and still delay payments with no interest.
Retailers such as Macy’s and H&M have jumped to partner with the services, which soared in popularity during the COVID-19 pandemic. Roughly 42% of Americans report using the apps at least once, according to a Credit Karma survey from February.
U.S. regulators are taking a wait-and-see approach, saying they don’t want to stifle a new financial product that could help consumers who might otherwise fall into predatory lending schemes.
But regulators in Europe and Australia, where many of the companies first launched, are increasingly concerned the apps are extending credit irresponsibly.
Using celebrities such as A$AP Rocky and Keke Palmer to portray the services as a hip alternative to the “gotcha” fine print of credit cards, the apps could promote overborrowing in a generation already struggling with high debt and poor credit, consumer advocates warn.
And despite claims that users’ credit ratings won’t be affected and that there are no hidden fees, experts say consumers can still face late charges, overdraft fees and debt collection. Some apps, such as Quadpay, charge a $1 transaction fee on every payment made, regardless of the amount.
“It sounds too good to be true, and it is, in many ways, because there are perils for people who use this,” said Jamie Court, president of Consumer Watchdog.
The apps offer different repayment options, but the most common links to a user’s debit card and makes automatic withdrawals every two weeks. Problems quickly arise when there is not enough money in the account, potentially resulting in charges by both the user’s bank and the app.
Voechting said that for the most part she has been able to control her spending and keep track of when her payments will be withdrawn, a challenge when dealing with multiple purchases and multiple apps.
But this year, she missed a payment with Quadpay on a $120 order from Beautycounter because she failed to change her payment information in the app after receiving a new debit card.
Sixty days later, she was informed the installment would go to collections unless she paid off the full remaining balance of $54, plus a $10 late fee. Voechting promptly gathered the money, fearing more damage to her credit.
Services boast that users’ activity and debt are not regularly reported to major credit bureaus. That’s appealing to consumers under pressure or already cut off from traditional lenders.
But not reporting on-time payments also means that users don’t see their credit scores increase as they demonstrate a track record of responsible borrowing, a crucial hurdle for younger consumers.
And the apps may report missed or late payments for some payment plans, which can hurt users’ credit scores, according to a clause buried deep in terms and conditions agreements for Quadpay, Affirm and Klarna.
The Credit Karma survey found about 38% of buy-now-pay-later customers had missed at least one payment, and 72% of those users reported seeing their credit score drop afterward, though many factors can cause fluctuations.
Buy-now-pay-later users also don’t benefit from many protections applied to credit cards.
For instance, if a credit card company refuses to offer credit to a potential customer, it must disclose why the application was declined. No such rules apply to the apps, which authorize every purchase on a case-by-case basis. That means users have no assurance a transaction will be approved.
“They don’t know what the issue is,” said Angela Hunt, 31, of Hampton, Va., part of a Facebook group devoted to Klarna, in which members frequently complain they are denied approval for purchases in a seemingly random manner.
App users also don’t enjoy the same billing-dispute protections they would with other payment methods, so returning merchandise, resolving fraudulent charges and requesting refunds can be difficult.
In January, Brittany Conn, 30, was moving into a new apartment in Melbourne, Fla., and used Klarna on Wayfair to buy a bed frame, headboard and bookcase for $450.
The bookcase never arrived, so she reached out to Klarna to get a partial refund. Multiple agents promised a supervisor would contact her, but the call never came. When she tried to publicly request help on Klarna’s Facebook page, she said, her comments were deleted.
If Conn had made her purchase with a credit card, the lender would have been forced to respond immediately, launch an investigation and explain its final determination within two billing cycles. During the process, she would be entitled to withhold payment on the disputed amount.
It took Conn, who works in customer service, nearly two months and many emails and online chats to get her money back. She filed a complaint with the Better Business Bureau.
“It was just an uphill battle, just email after email and chat after chat, and it got to a point where my chats weren’t being answered anymore,” she said.
According to the Better Business Bureau, Klarna — the largest buy-now-pay-later app in the U.S. with 15 million customers in 2020 — received 676 complaints in the last 12 months.
Quadpay received 979. Affirm had 227, and Afterpay and Sezzle saw more than 100 complaints each.
By comparison, Discover, a well-established credit card brand with more than 55 million customers, saw 532 complaints with the Better Business Bureau in the same period.
The rise in users — and complaints — has brought more scrutiny to the apps.
Credit card giant Capital One barred its customers worldwide last year from linking its cards to fund buy-now-pay-later purchases, citing the lack of consumer protections.
Class-action lawsuits in California, Connecticut and New York allege plaintiffs suffered from large bank overdraft fees due to automatic withdrawals, undisclosed late fees and deceptive marketing.
Consumer complaints prompted regulators in other countries to crack down. Sweden enacted a law last year that bans online checkout portals from making the apps the default payment option.
Australian financial experts wrote a report in November that found 20% of app users surveyed “cut back on or went without essentials” to make their payments on time. The United Kingdom released a nearly 70-page report in February concluding that “urgent and timely” regulatory changes were needed.
U.S. regulators say they are aware of the services but are exercising caution.
“We’re really interested in use cases of buy-now-pay-later where perhaps a consumer that would otherwise go to a payday lender and pay a very high cost for a loan might be able to use it,” said John McNamara, principal assistant director of markets at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.
In July, the CFPB released a blog post titled “Should you buy now and pay later?” warning consumers that the apps can charge late fees, report to credit bureaus and do not offer the same protections as other credit products.
Laura Udis, who manages installment loan programs at the CFPB, said the apps are subject to the Dodd-Frank act, passed in 2010 after the subprime mortgage crisis to prevent unfair, deceptive and abusive practices by lenders. She said the law “should be flexible enough to apply to any particular credit situation, including new innovations like buy-now-pay-later.”
But the services have found loopholes in regulation.
For instance, the Truth in Lending Act, which requires lenders disclose the terms and costs of services, states that payment plans of fewer than five installments are not subject to ad disclosure requirements as long as they avoid certain terms.
Consumer advocates say that explains why many apps are structured as four installments. And the companies help merchants avoid terminology that would trigger greater disclosures.
Affirm offers its merchant partners a guide. Quadpay has a variety of promotions for merchants to download that won’t trigger disclosures.
An advertisement for Afterpay and United Kingdom-based retailer Boohoo at a company-sponsored party.
(Caroline McCredie / Getty Images )
An Affirm spokesperson said the company provides information to users at checkout, including disclosures that would be required by the Truth in Lending Act, to ensure customers are informed. A Quadpay spokesperson said the company makes “every effort to help consumers by providing fair, flexible and transparent payment terms.”
Ira Rheingold, executive director of the National Assn. of Consumer Advocates, said it may take time for regulators to sort out how lending laws apply to the services, and whether new ones are needed.
“I think there are different ways that regulators can deal with them,” he said. “And I think that there’s some places where they’ll be far behind and some places where they won’t be.”
Lawmakers show no signs of getting involved. Spokespeople for multiple congressional committees said they were not considering regulating the apps.
California’s regulators are among the few U.S. watchdogs that have taken substantive actions against the services. In 2019, the state’s Department of Business Oversight, now the Department of Financial Protection and Innovation, sued Sezzle,Afterpay,Quadpay and Klarna for making illegal loans.
Each of the companies ultimately settled and had to get licensed, refund fees collected from Californians and pay fines.
“Today, the buy-now-pay-later companies we license in California are required to take into consideration a borrower’s ability to repay the loan and are subject to strict rate and fee caps,” department spokesperson Maria Luisa Cesar said.
As regulators and lawmakers determine how best to keep up with the growth of the apps, their popularity endures. Voechting, Hunt and Conn all said they will continue to use them.
“It’s kind of nice to be able to say, ‘Oh, you know, I can’t afford to buy this right upfront, but I can split it up into four payments and afford it that way,’” Conn said.
Before the apps, Conn would spend weeks saving money for special purchases. The apps allow her to get products immediately.
