Administration has sought to prematurely end status for 600,000 Venezuelans, leaving them vulnerable to deportation.
Published On 29 Aug 202529 Aug 2025
A federal appeals court has blocked an effort by the administration of President Donald Trump to end special protected status for hundreds of thousands of Venezuelans living in the United States.
On Friday, a three-judge panel of the 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a lower court’s ruling, which kept in place Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for Venezuelans. The status will remain in place as the legal challenges proceed through the courts.
Before leaving office, the Biden administration had extended TPS for about 600,000 Venezuelans through October 2026.
The Trump administration has sought to end the extension, meaning that the status would expire for approximately 350,000 Venezuelans, who were initially granted protection in 2023, in April of this year, and for approximately 250,000 Venezuelans, who were initially granted the status in 2021, by September.
US District Judge Edward Chen had previously ruled in March that plaintiffs challenging the end of the protection were likely to prevail on their claim that the administration overstepped its authority.
Lawyers for affected Venezuelans had argued the administration had been motivated by racial animus.
At the time, Chen ordered a freeze on the termination. However, the Supreme Court reversed the ruling in an emergency appeal, temporarily allowing the administration to move forward in cancelling the status.
TPS targeted
Congress created Temporary Protected Status as part of the Immigration Act of 1990.
It allows the secretary of the Department of Homeland Security to grant legal immigration status to individuals fleeing countries experiencing civil strife, environmental disasters, or other “extraordinary and temporary conditions” that prevent a safe return to their home country.
The Trump administration has increasingly targeted TPS recipients in its hardline approach to immigration, moving to terminate the programme for citizens of Haiti, Afghanistan, Cameroon, Honduras and Nicaragua.
While the administration has the authority to choose not to renew TPS, several courts have ruled against efforts to change already designated timelines.
In Friday’s ruling, the judges wrote: “In enacting the TPS statute, Congress designed a system of temporary status that was predictable, dependable, and insulated from electoral politics”.
“The essence of the challenge to the party is weakness,” Newsom said during an on-stage interview Wednesday at an event hosted by the news outlet Politico.
Newsom said some of his more combative messaging choices, including sitting for interviews with Fox News host Sean Hannity and debating Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, were efforts to break the cycle of Democrats responding to grievances ginned up by right-wing media, rather than setting their own agenda.
The same applies to his bombastic social media posts, posted by the governor’s media office, mocking Trump’s unhinged missives (complete with capital letters and exclamation points) and his new online store, called the Patriot Shop, that is peddling a tank top that says, “Trump is not hot,” among other not-to-subtle digs at the president. Newsom said he’s even toying with offering a “Trump corruption” crypto coin, a shot at the president’s own cryptocurrency, which the governor called a grift so great that it makes “dictators blush.”
Newsom said the problem with the Democrats, who are shut out of every branch of government in Washington, D.C., was best summed up by President Clinton after his party was shellacked in the 2002 midterm elections: American voters, given the choice, prefer “strong and wrong to weak and right.”
“Our party needs to wake up to that,” Newsom said. “We have to use every tool at our disposal to not only assert ourselves, but prove ourselves to the American people.”
Proposition 50, the redistricting measure that California voters will see on their ballot Nov. 4, is in the same combative vein, Newsom said.
At Newsom’s urging, leaders at the Capitol shoved the measure through the state Legislature and onto the ballot in record time last week. If voters approve the measure, California would scrap its independently drawn congressional lines for the 2026, 2028 and 2030 elections in favor of partisan districts that could help California Democrats win as many as five more seats in the U.S. House of Representatives, helping the party’s effort to win control and neutralize Trump’s far-right agenda.
Democrats have cast the effort as a way to counter the Texas GOP, which recently redrew the state’s congressional districts to help Republicans pick up five House seats.
SACRAMENTO — U.S. Sen. Alex Padilla (D-Calif.) on Wednesday brushed aside questions about whether he might jump into California’s 2026 governor’s race, but declined to rule out the idea.
Padilla instead said he was wholly focused on promoting the special election in November when voters will be asked to redraw California’s congressional districts to counter efforts by President Trump and other GOP leaders to keep Republicans in control of Congress.
“I’m focused and I’d encourage everybody to focus on this Nov. 4 special election,” Padilla said during an interview at a political summit in Sacramento sponsored by Politico.
The 52-year-old added that the effort to redraw congressional districts, championed by Gov. Gavin Newsom in response to similar efforts in GOP-led states, is not solely about the arcane process known as redistricting.
“My Republican colleagues and especially the White House know how unpopular and damaging what they’re doing is, from gutting Medicare, nutrition assistance programs, really all these other areas of budget cuts to underwrite tax breaks for billionaires,” Padilla said. “So their only hope of staying in power beyond next November is to rig the system.”
In recent days, Padilla’s name has emerged as a possible candidate to replace Newsom, who cannot run for another term. The field is unsettled, with independent polling conducted after former Vice President Kamala Harris opted not to run for governor showing large numbers of voters are undecided and with no clear front-runner.
Padilla pointed to his more than quarter-century history of serving Californians at every level of government when asked what might be appealing about the job.
“I love California, right?” he said. “And I’ve had the privilege and the honor of serving in so many different capacities.”
In 1999, the then-26-year-old was elected to Los Angeles City Council. At the time, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology grad still lived with his parents — a Mexican-born housekeeper and a short-order cook — in Pacoima.
Padilla continued his steady climb through the state’s political ranks in the decades that followed, serving in the state Senate and as California secretary of state. Newsom appointed him to fill Harris’ Senate seat in 2020, making him the first Latino to represent California in the Senate, and Padilla was elected to fill a full term in 2022. His current Senate term doesn’t end until 2029, meaning he wouldn’t have to risk his seat to run for governor.
WASHINGTON — Behind a White House effort to saddle President Trump’s political foes with accusations of mortgage fraud is a 37-year-old home construction executive with a deep partisan past.
Bill Pulte, a Florida native, rose in Trump’s orbit toward the end of his first term. After courting Trump for years on social media and through generous donations, he now runs the Federal Housing Finance Agency — a perch that has allowed him to target prominent figures who have crossed the president.
In the last five months, Pulte has referred three claims of mortgage fraud against Trump’s foes to the Justice Department, leveled against Letitia James, the attorney general of New York; Adam Schiff, the Democratic senator from California; and this week, Lisa Cook, a governor on the board of the Federal Reserve.
Each has denied wrongdoing. Trump announced on Monday night that he was moving to fire Cook.
It is an unusual role for a director of the FHFA, which regulates Fannie Mae — the nation’s largest company by assets — and Freddie Mac. The two mortgage financing organizations, which support nearly half of the U.S. residential mortgage market, were taken over by the FHFA during the 2008 economic crisis.
The grandson of one of Michigan’s wealthiest and most prolific homebuilders, Pulte made a name for himself on Twitter in 2019 with public cash giveaways to individuals in need. He dubbed himself the “inventor of Twitter philanthropy,” vowing to give two cars away in exchange for a Trump retweet that year, which he received. He subsequently built a following of over 3 million.
Records show Pulte donated substantially to Trump, the Republican National Committee and related super PACs leading up to the 2024 election.
Pulte’s letters to Atty. Gen. Pam Bondi have been tightly and cautiously written. But his social media posts, celebrating the targeted attacks, have not.
“Trump becomes the first president ever to remove a sitting Federal Reserve governor,” he wrote on X, between retweets of right-wing commentators praising the move. “Mortgage fraud can carry up to 30 years in prison.”
In another post on X, quoting a CNN headline, Pulte wrote that Trump’s firing of Cook was “escalating his battle against the central bank” — seeming to acknowledge that targeting Cook was motivated by Trump’s ongoing grievances with Fed leadership.
Cook’s firing is legally dubious, and her attorney, Abbe Lowell, said in a statement that Cook plans on suing the administration while continuing to perform her duties for the Fed. Lowell also represents James in her defense against the Justice Department case.
While the Supreme Court ruled in May that Trump may fire individuals from independent federal agencies, the justices singled out the Fed as an exception, calling it a “uniquely structured, quasi-private entity.” The Federal Reserve Act of 1913 states that the president may fire a member of its leadership only “for cause.”
But cause has not been definitively established to fire Cook, with Pulte writing in his letter to Bondi that the Fed governor had only “potentially” committed mortgage fraud, accusing her of falsifying bank documents and property records to acquire more favorable loan terms.
Pulte has accused Cook of listing two homes — in Ann Arbor, Mich., and in Atlanta — as her primary addresses within two weeks of purchasing them through financing. Cook said she would “take any questions about my financial history seriously” and was “gathering the accurate information to answer any legitimate questions and provide the facts.”
Pulte’s other accusations, against James and Schiff, have been similarly superficial, publicly accusing individuals of potential criminality before a full, independent investigation can take place.
And whether those investigations will be impartial is far from clear. Earlier this month, Bondi appointed Ed Martin, a conspiracy theorist who supported the “Stop the Steal” movement after Joe Biden’s election victory over Trump in 2020, as a special prosecutor to investigate the James and Schiff cases.
Pulte accused James — who successfully accused Trump of financial fraud in a civil suit last year — of falsifying bank statements and property records to secure more favorable loan terms for homes in Virginia and New York. He made similar claims weeks later about Schiff, who maintains residences in California and the suburbs of Washington, D.C.
Schiff, who led a House impeachment of Trump during the president’s first term and has remained one of his most vocal and forceful political adversaries since joining the Senate, dismissed the president’s claims as a “baseless attempt at political retribution.”
A spokesperson for Schiff said he has always been transparent about owning two homes, in part to be able to raise his children near him in Washington, and has always followed the law — and advice from House counsel — in arranging his mortgages.
In making his claims, Trump cited an investigation by the Fannie Mae “Financial Crimes Division” as his source.
A memorandum reviewed by The Times from Fannie Mae investigators to Pulte does not accuse Schiff of mortgage fraud. It noted that investigators had been asked by the FHFA inspector general’s office for loan files and “any related investigative or quality control documentation” for Schiff’s homes.
Investigators said they found that Schiff at various points identified both his home in Potomac, Md., and a Burbank unit he also owns as his primary residence. As a result, they concluded that Schiff and his wife, Eve, “engaged in a sustained pattern of possible occupancy misrepresentation” on their home loans between 2009 and 2020.
The investigators did not say they had concluded that a crime had been committed, nor did they mention the word “fraud” in the memo.
WASHINGTON — President Trump said Monday night that he’s firing Federal Reserve Gov. Lisa Cook, an unprecedented move that would constitute a sharp escalation in his battle to exert greater control over what has long been considered an institution independent from day-to-day politics.
Trump said in a letter posted on his Truth Social platform that he is removing Cook effective immediately because of allegations that she committed mortgage fraud. Bill Pulte, a Trump appointee to the agency that regulates mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, made the accusations last week.
Pulte alleged that Cook had claimed two primary residences — in Ann Arbor, Mich., and Atlanta — in 2021 to get better mortgage terms. Mortgage rates are often higher on second homes or those purchased to rent.
Trump’s move is likely to touch off an extensive legal battle that will probably go to the Supreme Court and could disrupt financial markets, potentially pushing interest rates higher.
The independence of the Fed is considered critical to its ability to fight inflation because it enables it to take unpopular steps such as raising interest rates. If bond investors start to lose faith that the Fed will be able to control inflation, they will demand higher rates to own bonds, pushing up borrowing costs for mortgages, car loans and business loans.
Legal scholars noted that the allegations are likely a pretext for the president to open up another seat on the seven-member board so he can appoint a loyalist to push for his long-stated goal of lower interest rates.
Fed governors vote on the central bank’s interest rate decisions and on issues of financial regulation. Although they are appointed by the president and confirmed by the Senate, they are not like Cabinet secretaries, who serve at the pleasure of the president. They serve 14-year terms that are staggered in an effort to insulate the Fed from political influence.
No president has sought to fire a Fed governor before. In recent decades, presidents of both parties have largely respected Fed independence, though Richard Nixon and Lyndon Johnson put heavy pressure on the Fed during their presidencies — mostly behind closed doors.
Still, that behind-the-scenes pressure to keep interest rates low, the same goal sought by Trump, has widely been blamed for touching off rampant inflation in the late 1960s and ‘70s.
The announcement came days after Cook said she wouldn’t leave despite Trump previously calling for her to resign. “I have no intention of being bullied to step down from my position because of some questions raised in a tweet,” Cook said in a previous statement issued by the Fed.
Senate Democrats had expressed support for Cook, who has not been charged with wrongdoing.
Another Fed governor, Adriana Kugler, stepped down unexpectedly Aug. 1, and Trump has nominated one of his economic advisors, Stephen Miran, to fill out the remainder of her term until January.
“The Federal Reserve has tremendous responsibility for setting interest rates and regulating reserve member banks. The American people must have the full confidence in the honesty of the members entrusted with setting policy and overseeing the Federal Reserve,” Trump wrote in a letter addressed to Cook, a copy of which he posted online. “In light of your deceitful and potentially criminal conduct in a financial matter, they cannot and I do not have such confidence in your integrity.”
Trump argued that firing Cook was constitutional, even if doing so will raise questions about control of the Fed as an independent entity.
“The executive power of the United States is vested to me as President and, as President, I have a solemn duty that the laws of the United States are faithfully enacted,” the president wrote in the letter to Cook. “I have determined that faithfully enacting the law requires your immediate removal from office.”
Among the unresolved legal questions are whether Cook could be allowed to remain in her seat while the case plays out. She may have to fight the legal battle herself, as the injured party, rather than the Fed.
In the meantime, Trump’s announcement drew swift rebuke from advocates and former Fed officials who worry that Trump is trying to exert too much power and control over the nation’s central bank.
“The President’s effort to fire a sitting Federal Reserve Governor is part of a concerted effort to transform the financial regulators from independent watchdogs into obedient lapdogs that do as they’re told. This could have real consequences for Americans feeling the squeeze from higher prices,” Rohit Chopra, former director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, said in a statement.
It is the latest effort by the administration to take control over one of the few remaining independent agencies in Washington. Trump has repeatedly attacked the Fed’s chair, Jerome H. Powell, for not cutting its short-term interest rate, and even threatened to fire him.
Forcing Cook off the Fed’s governing board would provide Trump an opportunity to appoint a loyalist. Trump has said he would appoint only officials who would support cutting rates.
Powell signaled last week that the Fed may cut rates soon even as inflation risks remain moderate. Meanwhile, Trump will be able to replace Powell in May 2026, when Powell’s term expires. However, 12 members of the Fed’s interest-rate-setting committee have a vote on whether to raise or lower interest rates, so even replacing the chair might not guarantee that Fed policy will shift the way Trump wants.
Rugaber and Weissert write for the Associated Press.
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.
You’re reading the Essential California newsletter
Our reporters guide you through the most important news, features and recommendations of the day.
You may occasionally receive promotional content from the Los Angeles Times.
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.)
Going out
Staying in
L.A. Affairs
Get wrapped up in tantalizing stories about dating, relationships and marriage.
Have a great weekend, from the Essential California team
Jim Rainey, staff writer Andrew J. Campa, reporter Kevinisha Walker, multiplatform editor Karim Doumar, head of newsletters Diamy Wang, homepage intern Izzy Nunes, audience intern
The Trump administration cannot deny funding to Los Angeles and 30 other cities and counties because of “sanctuary” policies that limit their cooperation with federal immigration agencies, a judge ruled late Friday.
The judge issued a preliminary injunction that expands restrictions the court handed down in April that blocked funding cuts to 16 cities and counties, including San Francisco and Santa Clara, after federal officials classified them as “sanctuary jurisdictions.”
U.S. District Judge William Orrick of the federal court in San Francisco ruled then that Trump’s executive order cutting funding was probably unconstitutional and violated the separation of powers doctrine.
Friday’s order added more than a dozen more jurisdictions to the preliminary injunction, including Los Angeles, Alameda County, Berkeley, Baltimore, Boston and Chicago.
Mayor Karen Bass’ office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
In a statement, a spokesperson for the White House said the Trump administration expected to ultimately win in its effort on appeal.
“The government — at all levels — has the duty to protect American citizens from harm,” Abigail Jackson, a spokesperson for the White House, said in a statement. “Sanctuary cities interfere with federal immigration enforcement at the expense and safety and security of American citizens. We look forward to ultimate vindication on the issue.”
The preliminary injunction is the latest chapter in an ongoing effort by the Trump administration to force “sanctuary cities” to assist and commit local resources to federal immigration enforcement efforts.
Earlier this month, the U.S. Department of Justice published a list of what it determined to be sanctuary jurisdictions, or local entities that have “policies, laws, or regulations that impede enforcement of federal immigration laws.”
“Sanctuary policies impede law enforcement and put American citizens at risk by design,” Atty. Gen. Pamela Bondi said in a statement accompanying the published list.
Several cities and counties across the country have adopted sanctuary city policies, but specifics as to what extent they’re willing — or unwilling — to do for federal immigration officials have varied.
The policies typically do not impede federal officials from conducting immigration enforcement activities, but largely keep local jurisdictions from committing resources to the efforts.
The policies also don’t prevent local agencies from enforcing judicial warrants, which are signed by a judge. Cooperation on “detainers” or holds on jailed suspects issued by federal agencies, along with enforcement of civil immigration matters, is typically limited by sanctuary policies.
Federal officials in the suit have so far referred to “sanctuary” jurisdictions as local governments that don’t honor immigration detainer requests, don’t assist with administrative warrants, don’t share immigration status information, or don’t allow local police to assist in immigration enforcement operations.
Orrick noted that the executive orders threatened to withhold all federal funding if the cities and counties in question did not adhere to the Trump administration’s requests.
In the order, the judge referred to the executive order as a “coercive threat” and said it was unconstitutional.
Orrick, who sits on the bench in the Northern District of California, was appointed by former President Obama.
The Trump administration has been ratcheting up efforts to force local jurisdictions to assist in immigration enforcement. The administration has filed lawsuits against cities and counties, vastly increased street operations and immigration detentions, and deployed National Guard troops to Los Angeles as it increased immigration operations.
The U.S. Department of Justice in June sued Los Angeles, and local officials, alleging its sanctuary city law is “illegal.”
The suit alleged that the city was looking to “thwart the will of the American people regarding deportations” by enacting sanctuary city policies.
AUSTIN, Texas — Texas Gov. Greg Abbott on Saturday promised to quickly sign off on a new, Republican-leaning congressional voting map gerrymandered to help the GOP maintain its slim majority in Congress.
“One Big Beautiful Map has passed the Senate and is on its way to my desk, where it will be swiftly signed into law,” Abbott said in a statement. The bill’s name is a nod to President Trump’s signature tax and spending bill, as Trump urged Abbott to redraw the congressional districts to favor Republicans.
Texas lawmakers approved the final plans just hours before, inflaming an already tense battle unfolding among states as governors from both parties pledge to redraw maps with the goal of giving their political candidates a leg up in the 2026 midterm elections.
In California, Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom has approved a special election in November for voters to decide whether to adopt a redrawn congressional map designed to help Democrats win five more House seats next year.
Meanwhile, Trump has pushed other Republican-controlled states, including Indiana and Missouri, to also revise their maps to add more winnable GOP seats. Ohio Republicans were also already scheduled to revise their maps to make them more partisan.
In Texas, the map includes five new districts that would favor Republicans.
Democrats vow to challenge it in court
The effort by Trump and Texas’ Republican-majority Legislature prompted state Democrats to hold a two-week walkout and kicked off a wave of redistricting efforts across the country.
Democrats had prepared for a final show of resistance, with plans to push the Senate vote into the early morning hours in a last-ditch attempt to delay passage. Yet Republicans blocked those efforts by citing a rule violation.
“What we have seen in this redistricting process has been maneuvers and mechanisms to shut down people’s voices,” said state Sen. Carol Alvarado, leader of the Senate Democratic caucus, on social media after the new map was finalized by the GOP-controlled Senate.
Democrats had already delayed the bill’s passage during hours of debate, pressing Republican Sen. Phil King, the measure’s sponsor, on the proposal’s legality, with many alleging that the redrawn districts violate the Voting Rights Act by diluting voters’ influence based on race.
King rejected that accusation, saying, “I had two goals in mind: That all maps would be legal and would be better for Republican congressional candidates in Texas.
“There is extreme risk the Republican majority will be lost” in the U.S. House of Representatives if the map does not pass, King said.
Battle for the House waged via redistricting
On a national level, the partisan makeup of existing districts puts Democrats within three seats of a majority. The incumbent president’s party usually loses seats in the midterms.
The Texas redraw is already reshaping the 2026 race, with Democratic Rep. Lloyd Doggett, the dean of the state’s congressional delegation, announcing Thursday that he will not seek reelection to his Austin-based seat if the new map takes effect. Under the proposed map, Doggett’s district would overlap with that of another Democratic incumbent, Rep. Greg Casar.
Redistricting typically occurs once a decade, immediately after a census. Though some states have their own limitations, there is no national impediment to a state trying to redraw districts in the middle of the decade.
The U.S. Supreme Court in 2019 ruled that the Constitution does not prohibit partisan gerrymandering to increase a party’s clout, only gerrymandering that’s explicitly done by race.
Other states
More Democratic-run states have commission systems like California’s or other redistricting limits than Republican ones do, leaving the GOP with a freer hand to swiftly redraw maps. New York, for example, cannot draw new maps until 2028, and even then only with voter approval.
Republicans and some Democrats championed a 2008 ballot measure that established California’s nonpartisan redistricting commission, along with a 2010 one that extended its role to drawing congressional maps.
Both sides have shown concern over what the redistricting war could lead to.
California Assemblyman James Gallagher, the Republican minority leader, said Trump was “wrong” to push for new Republican seats elsewhere. But he warned that Newsom’s approach, which the governor has said is an effort to “fight fire with fire,” is dangerous.
“You move forward fighting fire with fire, and what happens?” Gallagher asked. “You burn it all down.”
Vertuno, Cappelletti and Golden write for the Associated Press and reported from Austin, Washington and Seattle, respectively. AP writer Kimberlee Kruesi in Providence, R.I., contributed to this report.
Millions of dollars began flowing into campaigns supporting and opposing an effort to redraw California’s congressional districts on the November ballot, notably $10 million from independent redistricting champion Charles Munger Jr.
The checks, reported Friday in state campaign finance disclosures, were made on Thursday, the day the state Legislature and Gov. Gavin Newsom called a special election to replace the congressional districts drawn by an independent commission in 2021 with new districts that would boost the number of Democrats elected to Congress in next year’s midterm election.
Munger, a GOP donor and the son of a billionaire who was Warren Buffett’s right-hand man, bankrolled the 2010 ballot measure that created independent congressional redistricting in California. He donated $10 million to the “No on Prop. 50 – Protect Voters First” campaign,” which opposes the proposed redistricting.
“Charles Munger Jr. is making good on his promise to defend the reforms he passed,” said Amy Thoma, a spokesperson for the Voters First Coalition, which opposes the ballot measure and includes Munger.
A spokesperson for the campaign supporting the redrawing of congressional boundaries accused Munger of trying to boost the GOP under the guise of supporting independent redistricting.
“It’s no surprise that a billionaire who has given extensively to help Republicans take the house and [former Republican House Speaker] Kevin McCarthy would be joining forces to help Donald Trump steal five House seats and rig the 2026 midterm before a single American has voted,” said Hannah Milgrom, spokesperson for “Yes on 50: the Election Rigging Response Act.” “Prop 50 is America’s best chance to fight back – vote yes on November. 4.”
The campaign backing the ballot measure received $1 million on Thursday from a powerful labor group, SEIU’s state council; $300,000 from businessman Andrew Hauptman; and a flurry of other donations, according to the California secretary of state’s office. That is on top of the $5.8 million the campaign reported having in the bank as of July 30, including millions of dollars in contributions from House Majority PAC, which is focused on electing Democrats to Congress, and Newsom’s 2022 gubernatorial reelection campaign.
Redistricting typically happens once a decade after the U.S. census. Trump asked Texas lawmakers to redraw their congressional districts earlier this year, arguing that the GOP was entitled to five more members from the state. In response, California Democrats have pitched new district boundaries that could result in five more Democrats being elected to Congress.
Graffiti mars the crumbling walls of the main thermal baths in one of Europe’s oldest spa towns, Baile Herculane.
Yet after decades of neglect, a dedicated team of young architects is working to revive the picturesque Romanian resort that once drew emperors to its healing waters.
“Someone once said that if you drink water from the spring from Herculane, you never leave,” said 31-year-old architect Oana Chirila.
“I was struck by the beauty of the place,” she explained about the town in Romania’s southwest, nestled among mountains and bisected by a river. “And at the same time [I was] shocked by its condition,” she added, referring to the dilapidated state of the historic thermal baths.
Chirila first visited Baile Herculane eight years ago entirely by chance, she said.
Her group’s restoration project represents one of several recent civil society initiatives launched to safeguard Romania’s historic monuments.
Approximately 800 such monuments have deteriorated to an advanced state of decay or risk complete collapse. Some already pose significant public safety hazards.
Constructed in 1886, the Neptune Imperial Baths once welcomed distinguished guests seeking its warm sulphur treatments.
Among these illustrious visitors were Austria’s Emperor Franz Joseph and his wife Elisabeth, commonly known as Sisi. Franz Joseph himself described the town as Europe’s “most beautiful spa resort”.
Today, the baths stand closed, their interior walls defaced with graffiti, floors littered with debris, and rain seeping through the ceiling.
Despite the deterioration, tourists regularly pause to admire and photograph the long, rusted facade, with some attempting to glimpse the interior through broken windows.
Currently, Chirila and her volunteer team can only perform conservation work on the baths’ exterior structure. Full restoration remains impossible until legal conflicts between authorities and private owners are resolved, she explained, adding, “There’s always this fear that it might collapse.”
“Most of the historical monuments are in their current state – meaning constant decay – because they are legally blocked,” preventing utilisation of public or European funds for restoration.
For now, along one side of the riverbank, visitors can enjoy three sulphur water basins – what Chirila calls “little bathtubs”.
Her team refurbished these basins and constructed changing booths and wooden pavilions, one of several projects they have undertaken throughout the town.
In recent years, Baile Herculane, home to 3,800 residents, has experienced a steady increase in tourism, according to local officials. Some 160,000 tourists visited in 2024 – up from 90,000 in 2020 – many seeking spa treatments, but also hiking and climbing opportunities.
“The resort has changed,” Aura Zidarita, 50, a doctor, told the AFP news agency. She remained optimistic that it could reclaim its status as a “pearl of Europe”.
SACRAMENTO — Gov. Gavin Newsom’s plan to temporarily redraw California’s congressional districts has more support than opposition — but with many voters undecided, the measure’s prospects remain uncertain, a new poll found.
One thing, however, has become clear: Newsom’s standing with voters appears tethered to the fate of his high-stakes redistricting gamble.
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, which 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, while 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, while 20% said they were undecided.
“That’s not bad news,” said Mark DiCamillo, director of the Berkeley IGS Poll. “It could be better. 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.”
Among voters who regularly cast ballots in statewide elections, overall support for redistricting jumped to 55%, compared with 34% opposed.
That, DiCamillo said, is significant.
“If I were to pick one subgroup where you would want to have an advantage, it would be that one,” he said.
The high-stakes fight over political boundaries could shape control of the U.S. House, where Republicans currently hold a narrow majority. Newsom and Democratic leaders say California must match Texas’ partisan mapmaking move to preserve balance in Congress. Texas’ plan creates five new Republican-leaning seats that could secure the GOP’s majority in the House. California’s efforts are an attempt to cancel those gains — at least temporarily. The new maps would be in place for the 2026, 2028 and 2030 congressional elections.
However, critics say that the plan undermines the state’s voter-approved independent redistricting commission and that one power grab doesn’t negate another.
Share via
Not surprisingly, the partisan fight over election maps elicited deeply partisan results in the poll. Nearly 7 in 10 Democratic voters said they would support the redistricting measure , while Republicans overwhelmingly (72%) panned the plan.
The effort has by all accounts moved swiftly, with newly reworked maps released late last week and, by Monday, lawmakers introduced legislation to put it before voters. Lawmakers approved those bills Thursday, which secures the measure’s place on the ballot in November.
Newsom, who has become the face of California’s redistricting effort, has seen his once-stagnant approval ratings tick upward as he takes on Trump and Republican leaders. Beyond the high-profile push to reshape the state’s congressional districts, his office has drawn recent attention with a social media campaign that mimics Trump’s own idiosyncratic posts.
More voters now approve than disapprove of the governor’s job performance (51% to 43%), which represented a turnaround from April, when voters were split at 46% on each side. The poll, which surveyed 4,950 registered voters online in English and Spanish, was conducted from Aug. 11 to 17.
A majority of respondents — 59% — back Newsom’s combative stance toward Trump, while 29% want him to adopt a more cooperative approach. Younger voters were especially supportive of Newsom styling himself as Trump’s leading critic, with 71% of those between 18 and 29 years old backing the approach.
Matt Lesenyie, an assistant professor of political science at Cal State Long Beach, said having Newsom as the face of the redistricting campaign would have been more of a liability a month ago. But Newsom’s profile has been rising nationally during the spiraling fight over congressional maps and been buoyed by his prolific Trump trolling, which has struck a nerve with conservative commentators. That has opened up a lane for Newsom to spread the campaign’s message more broadly, he said.
“If he keeps this pace up, he’s right on a pressure point,” Lesenyie said.
Political scientist Eric Schickler, who is co-director of the Berkeley Institute that conducted the poll, said asking Californians to hand back control of redistricting to politicians — even temporarily — after voters made the process independent would normally be a tough sell.
“Voters don’t trust politicians,” Schickler said. “On the other hand, voters see Trump and don’t like what he’s doing. And so it was really a test to see which of those was more powerful and the results suggest, at least for now, Newsom’s winning that argument.”
Winning in November, however, will require pushing undecided voters over the finish line. 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.
Among Democrats, there are still some skeptics about the proposal. One in 5 polled said they were undecided. A quarter of voters with no party preference say they are undecided.
“That suggests there are a bunch of votes left on the table,” Schickler said. “While I wouldn’t be surprised if the margin narrows between now and November, this is a good place for the proposition to start.”
WASHINGTON — A year after being lauded for its plan to replace thousands of aging, gas-powered mail trucks with a mostly electric fleet, the U.S. Postal Service is facing congressional attempts to strip billions in federal EV funding.
In June, the Senate parliamentarian blocked a Republican proposal in President Trump’s massive tax-and-spending bill to sell off the agency’s new electric vehicles and infrastructure and revoke remaining federal money. But efforts to halt the fleet’s shift to clean energy continue in the name of cost savings.
Donald Maston, president of the National Rural Letter Carriers’ Assn., said canceling the program now would have the opposite effect, squandering millions of dollars.
“I think it would be shortsighted for Congress to now suddenly decide they’re going to try to go backwards and take the money away for the EVs or stop that process, because that’s just going to be a bunch of money on infrastructure that’s been wasted,” he said.
Beyond that, many in the scientific community fear the government could pass on an opportunity to reduce carbon emissions that contribute to global warming when urgent action is needed.
Reducing emissions
A 2022 University of Michigan study found the new electric postal vehicles could cut total greenhouse gas emissions by up to 20 million tons over the predicted, cumulative 20-year lifetime of the trucks. That’s a fraction of the more than 6 billion metric tons emitted annually in the United States, said Professor Gregory A. Keoleian, co-director of the university’s Center for Sustainable Systems. But he said the push toward electric vehicles is critical and needs to accelerate, given the intensifying effects of climate change.
“We’re already falling short of goals for reducing emissions,” Keoleian said. “We’ve been making progress, but the actions being taken or proposed will really reverse decarbonization progress that has been made to date.”
Many GOP lawmakers share Trump’s criticism of the Biden-era green energy push and say the Postal Service spending should focus only on delivering mail.
Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa) said that “it didn’t make sense for the Postal Service to invest so heavily in an all-electric force.” She said she will pursue legislation to rescind what is left of the $3 billion from the Inflation Reduction Act allocated to help cover the $10-billion cost of new postal vehicles.
Ernst has called the EV initiative a “boondoggle” and “a textbook example of waste,” citing delays, high costs and concerns over cold-weather performance.
“You always evaluate the programs, see if they are working. But the rate at which the company that’s providing those vehicles is able to produce them, they are so far behind schedule, they will never be able to fulfill that contract,” Ernst said during a recent appearance at the Iowa State Fair, referring to Wisconsin-based Oshkosh Defense.
“For now,” she added, “gas-powered vehicles — use some ethanol in them — I think is wonderful.”
Corn-based ethanol is a boon to Iowa’s farmers, but the effort to reverse course has other Republican support.
Rep. Michael Cloud (R-Texas), a co-sponsor of the rollback effort, has said the EV order should be canceled because the project “has delivered nothing but delays, defective trucks and skyrocketing costs.”
The Postal Service maintains that the production delay of the Next Generation Delivery Vehicles was “very modest” and not unexpected.
“The production quantity ramp-up was planned for and intended to be very gradual in the early months to allow time for potential modest production or supplier issues to be successfully resolved,” spokesperson Kim Frum said.
Modernization efforts
The independent, self-funded federal agency, which is paid for mostly by postage and product sales, is in the middle of a $40-billion, 10-year modernization and financial stabilization plan. The EV effort had the full backing of Democratic President Biden, who pledged to move toward an all-electric federal fleet of car and trucks.
The “Deliver for America” plan calls for modernizing the ground fleet, notably the Grumman Long Life Vehicle, which dates to 1987 and is very fuel-inefficient, at 9 mpg. The vehicles are well past their projected 24-year lifespan and are prone to breakdowns and even fires.
“Our mechanics are miracle workers,” said Mark Dimondstein, president of the American Postal Workers Union. “The parts are not available. They fabricate them. They do the best they can.”
The Postal Service announced in 2022 it would deploy at least 66,000 electric vehicles by 2028, including commercial off-the-shelf models, after years of deliberation and criticism it was moving too slowly to reduce emissions. By 2024, the agency was awarded a Presidential Sustainability Award for its efforts to electrify the largest fleet in the federal government.
Building new postal trucks
In 2021, Oshkosh Defense was awarded a contract for up to 165,000 battery electric and internal combustion engine Next Generation vehicles over 10 years.
The first of the odd-looking trucks, with hoods resembling a duck’s bill, began service in Georgia last year. Designed for greater package capacity, the trucks are equipped with airbags, blind-spot monitoring, collision sensors, 360-degree cameras and antilock brakes.
There’s also a new creature comfort: air-conditioning.
Douglas Lape, special assistant to the president of the National Assn. of Letter Carriers and a former carrier, is among numerous postal employees who have had a say in the new design. He marvels at how Oshkosh designed and built a new vehicle, transforming an old North Carolina warehouse into a factory along the way.
“I was in that building when it was nothing but shelving,” he said. “And now, being a completely functioning plant where everything is built in-house — they press the bodies in there, they do all of the assembly — it’s really amazing, in my opinion.”
Where things stand now
The agency has so far ordered 51,500 New Generation vehicles, including 35,000 battery-powered vehicles. To date, it has received 300 battery vehicles and 1,000 gas-powered ones.
Then-Postmaster General Louis DeJoy said in 2022 the agency expected to purchase chiefly zero-emissions delivery vehicles by 2026. It still needs some internal combustion engine vehicles that travel longer distances.
Frum, the Postal Service spokesperson, said the planned electric vehicle purchases were “carefully considered from a business perspective” and are being deployed to routes and facilities where they will save money.
The agency has also received more than 8,200 of 9,250 Ford E-Transit electric vehicles it has ordered, she said.
Ernst said it’s fine for the Postal Service to use EVs already purchased.
“But you know what? We need to be smart about the way we are providing services through the federal government,” she said. “And that was not a smart move.”
Maxwell Woody, lead author of the University of Michigan study, made the opposite case.
Postal vehicles, he said, have low average speeds and a high number of stops and starts that enable regenerative braking. Routes average under 30 miles and are known in advance, making planning easier.
“It’s the perfect application for an electric vehicle,” he said, “and it’s a particularly inefficient application for an internal combustion engine vehicle.”
Haigh writes for the Associated Press. AP writer Hannah Fingerhut in Des Moines contributed to this report.
Universal Music Group Chief Executive Lucian Grainge called Drake’s lawsuit over Kendrick Lamar’s hit diss track “Not Like Us” a “farcical” effort that’s “groundless and indeed ridiculous.”
In a declaration letter filed Thursday night in the Southern District of New York, Grainge said that Drake’s accusation that UMG (the parent label firm to both Drake and Lamar) defamed him and damaged his career “makes no sense due to the fact that the company that I run, Universal Music Group N.V., has invested hundreds of millions of dollars in Drake, including longstanding and critical financial support for his recording career, the purchase and ownership of the bulk of his recording catalog, and the purchase of his music publishing rights.”
Drake signed a new deal with UMG label Republic in 2022 for a reported $400 million, and he’s one of the bestselling artists of the last 20 years. Yet Interscope artist Lamar’s scathing “Not Like Us” famously capped a venomous battle between the two artists, which resulted in a pair of Grammy wins for Lamar, who performed the song at the Super Bowl halftime show.
Drake’s attorneys, in discovery, have recently tried to obtain UMG’s contract with Lamar and information about his personal life (Drake accused Lamar of beating his partner in the song “Family Matters”). Drake has accused UMG of both defamation and running a clandestine campaign to boost “Not Like Us” at the expense of his own reputation and career.
A notably exasperated Grainge wrote to the court that “Given my role, I am accustomed (and unfortunately largely resigned) to personal attacks, and I further recognize that a frequent strategy of UMG’s litigation opponents is to attempt to waste my and UMG’s time and resources with discovery of the sort that Drake is seeking here — either in an attempt to gain media attention or in an effort to force some kind of commercial renegotiation or financial concessions.”
Grainge also denied having any personal involvement in the rollout or marketing for “Not Like Us.”
“Whilst, as part of my role, I certainly have financial oversight of and responsibility for UMG’s global businesses,” he said, “the proposition that I was involved in, much less responsible for, reviewing and approving the content of ‘Not Like Us,’ its cover art or music video, or for determining or directing the promotion of those materials, is groundless and indeed ridiculous.”
In a separate letter to the court, UMG said that “The premise of Drake’s motion — that he could not have lost a rap battle unless it was the product of some imagined secret conspiracy going to the top of UMG’s corporate structure — is absurd.”
WASHINGTON — The Department of Homeland Security has walked back what lawyers called an illegal attempt to fast-track the deportation of a woman who has lived in the U.S. for nearly 30 years and to expel her without an immigration court hearing, her attorneys said.
Lawyers for Mirta Amarilis Co Tupul, 38, filed a lawsuit earlier this month to stop her imminent deportation to Guatemala. A U.S. district court judge in Arizona dismissed the case Wednesday after the federal government moved the woman to regular deportation proceedings and agreed in writing not to attempt expedited removal again, her lawyers said.
The judge had granted an emergency request to temporarily pause the deportation while the case played out in court.
The case highlighted broader concerns that the Trump administration is stretching immigration law to speed up deportations in its effort to remove as many immigrants as possible.
Federal law since 1996 holds that immigrants who have lived in the U.S. for fewer than two years can be placed in expedited removal proceedings which bypass the immigration court process. Longtime immigrants, however, cannot be removed until they’ve had a chance to plead their case before a judge.
In a sworn declaration, one of Co Tupul’s attorneys wrote that a deportation officer told her the agency had a “new policy” of placing immigrants in expedited removal proceedings after their first contact with immigration authorities.
“This appears to have been a test case in which the administration attempted to enforce a ‘new policy’ against Ms. Co Tupul,” Eric Lee, one of Co Tupul’s attorneys, said Thursday. “The district court quickly shut down this effort in no uncertain terms. Maybe this has slowed the government’s efforts to expand expedited removal, or maybe the government is waiting for another test case where the non-citizen lacks legal representation.”
Emails reviewed by The Times showed that Co Tupul’s lawyer provided extensive evidence of her longtime residence. Immigration officials told the lawyer that her client would remain in expedited removal proceedings anyway.
Assistant Homeland Security Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said that after Co Tupul’s lawyers provided documentation verifying she had lived in the U.S. for more than two years, “ICE followed the law and placed her in normal removal proceedings.”
“Any allegation that DHS is ‘testing out’ a new policy regarding illegal aliens who have been in the country for longer than two years into expedited removal is false,” McLaughlin added.
Co Tupul, a Phoenix resident, was pulled over as she drove to her job at a laundromat on July 22. She remains detained at Eloy Detention Center, about 65 miles southeast of Phoenix.
Governor Gavin Newsom takes combative stance against Trump, urges other Democratic leaders to ‘punch back’.
California Governor Gavin Newsom has said that the country’s most populous state will promote a partisan redistricting scheme aimed at countering controversial Republican-led redistricting efforts in Texas ahead of the United States’ 2026 midterm elections.
Speaking at a news conference on Thursday, Newsom took a combative stance against US President Donald Trump and said that Democrats must respond to what he said were conservative efforts to politicise the electoral process.
“Today is liberation day in the state of California,” Newsom said, appropriating a term used by Trump to refer to the imposition of tariffs on foreign countries.
Newsom and Trump have frequently sparred as the US president seeks to exert pressure on Democrat-led states that have pushed back against his political agenda on issues such as immigration enforcement.
During his remarks, Newsom said that masked immigration enforcement agents had gathered around the venue, which he depicted as a form of intimidation. Trump prompted outrage in California earlier in the year when he deployed the military and National Guard to Los Angeles during a round of aggressive immigration raids, and suggested at the time that Newsom should be arrested.
“Donald Trump, you have poked the bear, and we will punch back,” said Newsom, who is seen as a possible Democratic contender for the presidency in 2028.
Newsom said that the redistricting scheme, which would favour the Democrats and could net them five additional seats in the 2026 midterm elections, will go before voters in a special election on November 4.
The California governor said the scheme was a direct response to a similar redistricting effort in the Republican-led state of Texas, which would help secure five additional likely seats for the Republican Party.
He stressed that, unlike in Texas, it would be up to California voters to approve or shoot down the new maps, and that they would only go forward if Texas and other states move forward with their own partisan redistricting efforts.
He added that the planned maps, which are expected to be released on Friday, would be in effect until 2030.
Earlier this month, Democrat lawmakers in Texas fled the state to block a House vote on redistricting efforts that would create an additional five Republican-leaning districts.
On Thursday, the lawmakers moved closer to ending their nearly two-week walkout that has blocked the GOP’s redrawing of US House maps and put them under escalating threats by Republicans back home.
The Democrats announced they will return so long as Texas Republicans end a special session and California releases its own redrawn map proposal, both of which were expected to happen on Friday.
Democrats did not say what day they might return.
Newsom’s move underscores calls within the Democratic Party to take a stronger stance against Trump and the Republicans, including moves that violate previously held norms and rules that Democrats say the US right has long since abandoned.
“We cannot unilaterally disarm,” he said, calling on other Democrat-led states to join California.
“Other blue states need to stand up. We need to be firm,” he said.
Gov. Gavin Newsom, Democratic lawmakers and their allies on Thursday launched a special-election campaign to ask California voters to approve new congressional districts to decrease the size of the state’s Republican delegation — a move that could determine control of Congress next year and stymie President Trump’s agenda.
The effort is a response to GOP-led states, notably Texas, attempting to redraw their congressional maps to decrease Democratic ranks in the narrowly-divided U.S. House of Representatives at Trump’s behest.
Share via
Newsom, speaking to a fired-up partisan crowd at the Japanese American National Museum in downtown Los Angeles, said the effort by Republicans represented a desperate effort by a failed president to hold on to power by keeping Congress under Republican control.
“He doesn’t play by a different set of rules. He doesn’t believe in the rules,” Newsom said. “And as a consequence, we need to disabuse ourselves of the way things have been done. It’s not good enough to just hold hands, have a candlelight vigil and talk about the way the world should be. We have got to recognize the cards that have been dealt, and we have got to meet fire with fire.”
The governor was joined by Sens. Alex Padilla and Adam Schiff; Rep. Pete Aguilar, (D-San Bernardino), the chair of the House Democratic Caucus, and union leaders essential to providing the funding and volunteers to convince Californians to vote for the “Election Rigging Response Act.” The proposed California ballot measure would temporarily toss out the congressional districts enacted by the state’s voter-approved, independent redistricting commission.
“Our union stands in full support of this ballot initiative. We are ready to do whatever it takes to stop this power grab and fight back against any and all attacks on our democracy, on our students and on public education,” said Erica Jones, the secretary treasurer of the California Teachers Assn., which represents 310,000 public school teachers.
She said school children have suffered because of the Trump administration’s immigration raids, as well as cuts to healthcare funding, after school programs and teacher trainings.
“Our students deserve better,” she said. “The majority of Americans are not with him on these vicious attacks. So what does Trump want to do? Rig the next election and steal our right to fair representation? He wants to stack the deck to keep slashing public services to pad the pockets of his billionaire donors.”
Outside the political rally, Border Patrol agents gathered and arrested at least one person. Newsom told the crowd inside that he doubted it was a coincidence.
Supporters of the independent commission that currently draws California’s congressional maps criticized Democrats’ efforts to conduct a highly unusual mid-decade redistricting plan. For Newsom’s plant to work, the Democratic-led state Legislature must vote in favor of placing the measure on the ballot in a special election in November, and then the final decision will be up to California voters.
“Two wrongs do not make a right, and California shouldn’t stoop to the same tactics as Texas. Instead, we should push other states to adopt our independent, non-partisan commission model across the country,” said Amy Thoma, spokesperson for the Voters First Coalition, which includes Charles Munger Jr., the son of a billionaire who bankrolled the ballot measure that created the independent commission.
Munger will vigorously oppose any proposal to circumvent the independent commission, she said.
Since voters approved independent congressional redistricting in 2010, California’s districts have been drawn once per decade, following the U.S. Census, by a panel split between registered Democrats, registered Republicans and voters without a party preference.
The commission is not allowed to consider the partisan makeup of the districts, nor protecting incumbents, but instead looks at “communities of interest,” logical geographical boundaries and the Voting Rights Act.
The current map was drawn in 2021 and went into effect for the 2022 election.
Newsom is pushing to suspend those district lines and put a new map tailored to favor Democrats in front of voters on Nov. 4. That plan, he has said, would have a “trigger,” meaning a redrawn map would not take effect unless Texas or another GOP-led state moved forward with its own.
Sara Sadhwani, who served on the redistricting commission that approved the current congressional district boundaries, said that while she is deeply proud of the work she and her colleagues completed, she approved of Newsom’s effort to temporarily put the commission’s work aside because of the unprecedented threats to American democracy.
“These are extraordinary times, and extraordinary times call for extraordinary measures,” said Sadhwani, citing the immigration raids, the encouragement of political violence and the use of National Guard troops in American cities. “And if that wasn’t enough, we are watching executive overreach that no doubt is making our founding fathers turn in their graves, and we have to take action. These are the hallmarks of a democracy in peril.”
If voters approved the ballot measure, the new maps would be in effect until the independent commission redraws the congressional boundaries in 2031.
To meet Newsom’s ambitious deadline, the state Legislature would need to pass the ballot language by a two-thirds majority and send it to Newsom’s desk by Aug. 22. The governor’s office and legislative leaders are confident in their ability to meet this threshold in the state Assembly and state Senate, where Democrats have a supermajority.
Newsom first mentioned the idea in mid July, meaning the whole process could be done in about five weeks. Generally, redrawing the state’s electoral lines and certifying a measure to appear before voters on the ballot are processes that take months, if not more than a year.
Trump’s prodding of Texas Republicans to redraw their congressional maps to create five new GOP seats has kicked off redistricting battles across the nation.
That includes Florida, Ohio, Indiana and Missouri, where Republicans control the statehouse, and New York, Maryland, Illinois, New Jersey, Oregon and Washington, where Democrats are in power.
Democratic lawmakers in Texas fled the state to block the Republican-led legislature from approving a new map that would gerrymander congressional districts to favor of the GOP. The Democrats maneuver worked, since it prevented the legislature from have a quorum necessary to approve the measure. A second special session is expected to begin Friday. The absent lawmakers are facing threats of fines, civil arrest warrants and calls for being removed from office; Texas Gov. Greg Abbott has vowed to call repeated special sessions until the map is approved.
In California, the gerrymandering plan taking shape behind closed doors would increase the Democratic Party’s dominance in the state by making five House districts more favorable to Democrats, according to a draft map reviewed by The Times.
Those changes could reduce by more than half the number of Republicans representing California in Congress. The state has the nation’s largest congressional delegation, with 52 members. Nine are Republicans.
A Northern California district represented by Rep. Doug LaMalfa (R-Richvale) could shift to the south, shedding rural, conservative voters near the Oregon border and picking up left-leaning cities in Sonoma County. Sacramento-area Rep. Kevin Kiley (R-Rocklin) would see his district shift toward the bluer center of the city.
The plan would also add more Democrats to the Central Valley district represented by Rep. David Valadao (R-Hanford), who has been a perennial target for Democrats.
Southern California would see some of the biggest changes: Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Bonsall) would see his safely Republican district in San Diego County become more purple through the addition of liberal Palm Springs. And Reps. Young Kim (R-Anaheim Hills) and Ken Calvert (R-Corona) would be drawn into the same district, which could force the lawmakers to run against each other.
The plan would also shore up Democrats who represent swing districts, such as Reps. Dave Min (D-Irvine) and Derek Tran (D-Orange).
It could also add another district in southeast Los Angeles County, in the area that elected the first Latino member of Congress from California in modern history. A similar seat was eliminated during the 2021 redistricting.
Times staff writer Taryn Luna contributed to this report from Sacramento.
NEW YORK — As National Guard troops deploy across her city as part of President Trump’s efforts to clamp down on crime, D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser is responding with relative restraint.
She’s called Trump’s takeover of the city’s police department and his decision to activate 800 members of the guard “unsettling and unprecedented” and gone as far as to cast his efforts as part of an “authoritarian push.”
But Bowser has so far avoided the kind of biting rhetoric and personal attacks typical of other high-profile Democratic leaders, despite the unprecedented incursion into her city.
“While this action today is unsettling and unprecedented, I can’t say that, given some of the rhetoric of the past, that we’re totally surprised,” Bowser told reporters at a news conference responding to the efforts. She even suggested the surge in resources might benefit the city and noted that limited home rule allows the federal government “to intrude on our autonomy in many ways.”
“My tenor will be appropriate for what I think is important for the District,” said Bowser, who is in her third term as mayor. “And what’s important for the District is that we can take care of our citizens.”
The approach underscores the reality of Washington’s precarious position under the thumb of the federal government. Trump has repeatedly threatened an outright takeover of the overwhelmingly Democratic city, which is granted autonomy through a limited home rule agreement passed in 1973 that could be repealed by Congress. Republicans, who control both chambers, have already frozen more than $1 billion in local spending, slashing the city’s budget.
That puts her in a very different position from figures such as California Gov. Gavin Newsom or Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker, Democrats whose states depend on the federal government for disaster relief and other funding, but who have nonetheless relentlessly attacked the current administration as they lay the groundwork for potential 2028 presidential runs. Those efforts come amid deep frustrations from Democratic voters that their party has not been nearly aggressive enough in its efforts to counter Trump’s actions.
“Unfortunately she is in a very vulnerable position,” said Democratic strategist Nina Smith. “This is the sort of thing that can happen when you don’t have the powers that come with being a state. So that’s what we’re seeing right now, the mayor trying to navigate a very tough administration. Because this administration has shown no restraint when it comes to any kind of constitutional barriers or norms.”
A change from Trump’s first term
Bowser’s approach marks a departure from Trump’s first term, when she was far more antagonistic toward the president.
Then she routinely clashed with the administration, including having city workers paint giant yellow letters spelling out “Black Lives Matter” on a street near the White House during the George Floyd protests in 2020.
This time around, Bowser took a different tact from the start. She flew to Florida to meet with Trump at Mar-a-Lago after he won the election and has worked to avoid conflict and downplay points of contention, including tearing up the “Black Lives Matter” letters after he returned to Washington in response to pressure from Republicans in Congress.
The change reflects the new political dynamics at play, with Republicans in control of Congress and an emboldened Trump who has made clear he is willing to exert maximum power and push boundaries in unprecedented ways.
D.C. Councilmember Christina Henderson said she understands Bowser’s position, and largely agrees with her conclusion that a legal challenge to Trump’s moves would be a long shot. Trump invoked Section 740 of the District of Columbia Home Rule Act in his executive order, declaring a “crime emergency” so his administration could take over the city’s police force. The statute limits that control to 30 days unless he gets approval from Congress.
“The challenge would be on the question of ‘Is this actually an emergency?’” said Henderson, a former congressional staffer. “That’s really the only part you could challenge.”
Henderson believes the city would face dim prospects in a court fight, but thinks the D.C. government should challenge anyway, “just on the basis of precedent.”
Trump told reporters Wednesday that he believes he can extend the 30-day deadline by declaring a national emergency, but said “we expect to be before Congress very quickly.”
“We’re gonna be asking for extensions on that, long-term extensions, because you can’t have 30 days,” he said. “We’re gonna do this very quickly. But we’re gonna want extensions. I don’t want to call a national emergency. If I have to, I will.”
Limited legal options
Bowser’s response is a reflection of the reality of the situation, according to a person familiar with her thinking. As mayor of the District of Columbia, Bowser has a very different relationship with the president and federal government than other mayors or governors. The city is home to thousands of federal workers, and the mass layoffs under Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency have already had a major impact on the city’s economy.
Her strategy has been to focus on finding areas where she and the new administration can work together on shared priorities.
For now, Bowser appears set to stick with her approach, saying Wednesday that she is focused on “making sure the federal surge is useful to us.”
During a morning interview with Fox 5, she and the city’s police chief argued an influx of federal agents linked to Trump’s takeover would improve public safety, with more officers on patrol.
Police Chief Pamela Smith said the city’s police department is short almost 800 officers, so the extra police presence “is clearly going to impact us in a positive way.”
But Nina Smith, the Democratic strategist, said she believes Bowser needs a course correction.
“How many times is it going to take before she realizes this is not someone who has got the best interests of the city at heart?” she asked. “I think there may need to be time for her to get tough and push back.”
Despite Trump’s rhetoric, statistics published by Washington’s Metropolitan Police show violent crime has dropped in Washington since a post-pandemic peak in 2023. A recent Department of Justice report shows that violent crime is down 35% since 2023, reaching its lowest rate in 30 years.
Colvin writes for the Associated Press. AP writers Ashraf Khalil and Will Weissert in Washington contributed to this report.
MEXICO CITY — The U.S. Treasury Department imposed sanctions Wednesday on more than a dozen Mexican companies and four people it says worked with a powerful drug trafficking cartel to scam elderly Americans in a multimillion-dollar timeshare fraud.
The network of 13 businesses in areas near the seaside tourist destination of Puerto Vallarta were accused of working with the Jalisco New Generation Cartel, a group designated by the U.S. government as a foreign terrorist organization.
In a scheme dating back to 2012, four cartel associates are accused of defrauding American citizens of their life savings through elaborate rental and resale schemes, according to a Treasury statement. In the span of six months, officials said they were able to document $23.1 million sent from mostly people in the U.S. to scammers in Mexico.
The sanctions imposed by the administration of President Trump would prohibit Americans from doing business with the alleged cartel associates and block any of their assets in the U.S.
“We will continue our effort to completely eradicate the cartels’ ability to generate revenue, including their efforts to prey on elderly Americans through timeshare fraud,” U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said in a statement.
In past years, the administration of then-President Biden also sanctioned associates and accountants related to such schemes.
The Wednesday announcement was made amid an ongoing effort by the Trump administration and the Mexican government to crack down on cartels and their diverse sources of income.
The U.S. Treasury Department has slapped sanctions on a variety of people from a Mexican rapper who it accused of laundering cartel money to Mexican banks facilitating money transfers in sales of precursor chemicals used to produce fentanyl.
The announcement also came one day after Mexico sent 26 high-ranking cartel figures to the U.S. in the latest major deal with the Trump administration as Mexico tries to avoid threatened tariffs.
Critics argue President Trump has overstepped his constitutional authority by slashing congressionally approved aid.
A United States appeals court has ruled that President Donald Trump can proceed with efforts to slash foreign aid payments, despite such funds being designated by Congress.
The two-to-one ruling on Wednesday overturned a previous injunction that required the Department of State to resume the payments, including about $4bn for the US Agency for International Development (USAID) and $6bn for HIV and AIDS programmes.
But the majority opinion from the appeals court did not weigh the merits of whether Trump could nix congressionally approved funds.
Instead, it decided the case based on the idea that the plaintiffs did not meet the legal basis to qualify for a court injunction.
Writing for the majority, Circuit Judge Karen Henderson said the groups in question “lack a cause of action to press their claims”. They include the AIDS Vaccine Advocacy Coalition and the Journalism Development Network, both recipients of federal aid.
“The grantees have failed to satisfy the requirements for a preliminary injunction in any event,” wrote Henderson, who was appointed by former President George HW Bush.
She was joined in her decision by Gregory Katsas, a Trump appointee.
However, the panel’s third judge — Florence Pan, nominated under former President Joe Biden — issued a dissenting opinion that argued Trump should not be allowed to violate the separation of powers by cutting the aid.
“The court’s acquiescence in and facilitation of the Executive’s unlawful behaviour derails the carefully crafted system of checked and balanced power that serves as the greatest security against tyranny — the accumulation of excessive authority in a single Branch,” Pan wrote in her opinion.
The ruling hands a victory to the Trump administration, which has faced a series of legal challenges to Trump’s efforts to radically reshape the federal government.
That includes dramatic cuts to spending and government agencies like USAID, which was established by an act of Congress.
Almost immediately upon taking office, Trump announced a 90-day pause on all foreign aid.
By March, the Trump administration had announced it planned to fold USAID into the State Department, fundamentally dismantling the agency. That same month, Secretary of State Marco Rubio also said he had cancelled 83 percent of USAID’s contracts.
Part of Trump’s reasoning for these changes was to reduce “waste” and “bloat” in the government. He also sought to better align government programming with his “America First” agenda.
But critics say the executive branch does not have the power to tear down congressionally mandated agencies. They also argue that Congress has the power to designate funds for aid, framing Trump’s efforts as a push for extreme presidential power.
Republicans, however, control both houses of Congress, and in July, Congress passed the Rescission Act of 2025, allowing the government to claw back nearly $9bn in foreign aid and funding for public broadcasting.
US District Judge Amir Ali previously ruled that the Trump administration must pay its agreed-upon funds to humanitarian groups and other contractors that partnered with the government to distribute aid.
Administration officials in February estimated there was $2bn in outstanding aid payments due by the deadline Judge Ali set.
But the appeals court’s ruling has set back cases to restore the foreign aid to the contractors.
Attorney General Pam Bondi celebrated the decision on Wednesday, stating that the Department of Justice would “continue to successfully protect core Presidential authorities from judicial overreach”.
Convincing young Black people to become cops long been a tough sell at summer job fairs.
But in recent months the pool of recruits at the Los Angeles Police Department has shriveled to the point of running dry. The last two training academy classes haven’t included a single a Black graduate.
Despite offering generous pay and pensions, police agencies across the country have struggled since the pandemic with finding enough new officers regardless of race.
At the LAPD, the number of Black recruits — especially women — has been dropping for years, leaving the department far short of diversity goals put in place decades ago to counter discriminatory hiring practices.
Compounding matters is President Trump, who has embarked on a far-reaching campaign against diversity, equity and inclusion, or so-called DEI policies.
LAPD Chief Jim McDonnell quietly shut down the department’s DEI program during an administrative reshuffling this year. Massive cuts to federal agencies and university programs have some officials sounding alarms about a ripple effect in police hiring.
The Oscar Joel Bryant Assn., which represents the LAPD’s 700 or so Black officers, said conversations about responding to attacks on pro-diversity programs “do not need to wait for the future.”
“[T]hose concerns are here today for all groups,” Capt. Capt. Shannon Enox-White, the association’s president, said in a statement. “When we swore an oath to protect the Constitution and the organization’s very mission statement elevates DEI (diversity, equity and inclusion) principles, I do not see how we can step away from them now or ever.”
Privately, some Black department officials expressed frustration with recent promotions announced by McDonnell. Only one Black leader moved up in rank. Emada Tingirides, a finalist for the police chief job is now the first Black woman in the department’s long history to hold the rank of assistant chief.
Many of the department’s older Black officers — who joined the force during a hiring push in the 1980s and ‘90s — are now nearing retirement. Several high-ranking Black LAPD officials, including Tingirides and Deputy Chiefs Gerald Woodyard and Alan Hamilton, have already enrolled in the deferred retirement program, meaning they probably will exit before the 2028 Olympic Games in L.A.
The department’s percentage of Black officers has dipped slightly to roughly 8% of the force, just below the percentage of Black city residents.
Diversity issues aside, the LAPD has grappled with other issues when it comes to finding and retaining cops of the future. The hiring process typically takes 250 days to complete after the background check, polygraph screening and a series of tests that each applicant is required to undergo. LAPD officials have said some exasperated candidates have opted to pursue opportunities with other agencies where the wait isn’t nearly as long.
But for some already in the department, the most glaring problem is a lack of support for Black people in uniform. They point to the quiet closure of the DEI office, whose staff members were reassigned and duties absorbed by other units. Proponents considered it a crucial support system for younger Black cops.
Without such support, they say, Black officers will be less likely to receive the professional development or opportunities to work in specialized units that can lead to supervisory roles.
Others argue that stories about the internal mistreatment of Black officers keep people from applying. This year, an officer from the department’s recruitment unit filed a complaint alleging he had recorded racist, sexist and homophobic comments by colleagues, which McDonnell and other officials condemned and pledged to investigate.
Over the last decade, the department has paid out more than $10 million in settlements or jury awards for officers alleging that they were discriminated against based on their race.
Like the city it polices, the LAPD has seen its demographics change dramatically in recent decades. With the department prodded by lawsuits and consent decrees, more than half of the once mostly white force is now Latino. But the number of Black cops — especially women — hasn’t budged much.
Some police critics said that increasing diversity alone isn’t a fix for larger, systemic issues with policing.
But a succession of LAPD leaders have said that diversifying the agency’s ranks is a priority, arguing that doing so can counter generations of distrust of police by Black Angelenos. Still, progress has been slow. A 2022 study by UCLA researchers revealed strong resistance within the department toward efforts to hire more women and officers of color.
Since the start of his second term in office, Trump has called diversity hiring efforts “illegal,” encouraging federal agencies to investigate and withhold funds from institutions that promote DEI practices.
Ivonne Roman of the Center for Policing Equity, a nonprofit think tank based at Yale University, said the president’s anti-affirmative orders will undoubtedly undercut efforts to turn the tide on declining Black officer numbers nationwide.
Even though most local police departments aren’t as dependent on federal funding as, say, public universities, police executives may feel less pressure to diversify their agencies in the current social climate, she said.
Steps such as the dismissal of Biden-era civil rights lawsuits that accused police departments of hiring disparities could embolden discrimination, she said.
