emergency

Mental health burdens

Ramirez is among the advocates who say children are suffering under the uncertainty and widespread detentions taking place in El Salvador.

In 2025, El Salvador had the highest incarceration rate in the world, with approximately 1.7 percent of its population in prison — roughly twice the rate of the next highest country, Cuba.

According to human rights organisations such as MOVIR, El Salvador’s youth are among the most seriously impacted by the downstream effects of mass incarceration, especially when their caregivers are imprisoned.

“There is a very grave situation with children,” said Ramirez. “There are many children who have been left without their parents, so those who used to provide for their basic needs are not there any more.”

As a result, experts say the affected children are experiencing psychological issues.

“Anxiety issues in these children have increased,” said a psychologist with Azul Originario, a nonprofit youth organisation based in San Salvador.

The psychologist often works with children whose parents have been abducted. She asked to remain anonymous for fear of reprisals, as NGO workers and critical voices have been intimidated, surveilled and, in some cases, arrested under El Salvador’s state of exception.

“Sometimes they don’t want to do any physical activity or any studying,” she said.

“They don’t want to spend time with other children or go outside. They’re afraid of authorities, because some of them experienced the authorities taking their parents away.”

At a recent demonstration near San Salvador’s Cuscatlan Park, several families echoed those observations.

Among them was Fatima Gomez, 47, whose adult son was arrested in 2022. He left behind two daughters, ages 10 and three.

With their mother working full-time, Gomez has been taking care of the children. But she has noticed the eldest daughter seems traumatised.

“When she sees soldiers and police, she starts crying and runs inside,” Gomez said of the 10-year-old. “She says they are going to take all of us, too.”

Gomez had gathered with a crowd of men and women to demand the release of their loved ones.

Clutched in Gomez’s hands is a blue printed poster, emblazoned with her son’s face and a single word: “innocent”.

It flutters in a rush of wind from the passing traffic.

WASHINGTON — President Trump said Thursday he would sign an order instructing the Homeland Security secretary to immediately pay Transportation Security Administration agents as Congress struggled to reach a deal to end a budget impasse that has jammed airports and left workers without paychecks.

Trump announced his decision in a social media post saying he wanted to quickly stop the “Chaos at the Airports.”

“It is not an easy thing to do, but I am going to do it!” the president posted.

With pressure mounting, the White House had floated the extraordinary move of invoking a national emergency to pay TSA agents, while senators were reviewing a “last and final” offer from Republicans to Democrats to end the funding impasse at the Department of Homeland Security.

Details of the president’s plan were not immediately available, but a national emergency declaration would be politically fraught and almost certain to face legal challenges. Instead, the president may simply be shifting money from other sources.

Democrats have been refusing to fund Homeland Security as they seek changes to rein in Trump’s immigration enforcement operations. The Senate came to a standstill and senators, ready to leave town for their own spring break, had prepared to stay all night to reach a deal.

“The president is doing absolutely the right thing,” said Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.), the GOP whip. “The TSA agents are going to be paid.”

Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine), the chair of the Appropriations Committee, has said there is funding elsewhere that can be legally used to pay the TSA as well as the Coast Guard without declaring a national emergency.

The funding shutdown, now in its 41st day, has resulted in travel delays, missed paychecks and even warnings of airport closures. TSA workers are coming up on their second missed payday Friday, with thousands refusing to show up for work.

Multiple airports are experiencing greater than 40% callout rates of TSA workers and nearly 500 of its nearly 50,000 transportation security officers have now quit during the shutdown. Nationwide on Wednesday, more than 11% of the TSA employees on the schedule missed work, according to DHS. That is more than 3,120 callouts.

Trump, who has largely left the issue to Congress to resolve, had warned he was ready to take action, even threatening to send the National Guard to airports, in addition to his deployment of ICE agents who are now checking travelers’ IDs — a development drawing concerns. The White House has been considering a menu of options.

“They need to end this shutdown immediately or we’ll have to take drastic measures,” Trump said during a morning Cabinet meeting at the White House.

At George Bush Intercontinental Airport in Houston, Melissa Gates said she would not make her flight to Baton Rouge, Louisiana, after waiting more than 2½ hours and still not reaching the security checkpoint. She said no other flights were available until Friday.

“I should have just driven, right?” Gates said. “Five hours would have been hilarious next to this.”

A ‘last and final’ offer on the table

Earlier Thursday, Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) announced he had given the final offer to Democrats.

Thune did not disclose details of the new framework, but he said that it picked up on what had been the Republican offer over the weekend, before talks with the White House and Democrats had broken off.

“Enough is enough,” he said.

But as senators retreated to privately discuss the new plan, the action stalled out.

Democrats argue the GOP proposals have not gone far enough at putting guardrails on officers from ICE, Customs and Border Protection and other federal agencies that are engaged in the immigration sweeps, particularly after the deaths of two Americans protesting the actions in Minneapolis.

They want federal agents to wear identification, remove their face masks and refrain from conducting raids around schools, churches or other sensitive places. Democrats have also pushed for an end of administrative warrants, insisting that judges sign off before agents search people’s homes or private spaces.

Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer of New York said they needed to see real changes. “We’ve been talking about ICE reforms from day one,” he said.

Any deal will almost certainly need to involve a compromise as lawmakers on the left and right flanks revolt. Conservative Republicans have panned their own GOP proposals, demanding full funding for immigration operations and skeptical of the promise from leaders that they would address Trump’s proof-of-citizenship voting bill in a subsequent legislative package.

Republicans said after a private lunch meeting that there were other options to shift money than invoking the national emergency.

The GOP’s big tax cuts bill that Trump signed into law last year funneled billions to DHS, including $75 billion for ICE operations, ensuring the money is flowing for his immigration and deportation agenda even with the funding shutdown. ICE and other immigration officers are still being paid.

Republicans say the Trump administration has already made strides to meet Democrats’ demands, particularly after swearing in former Oklahoma Sen. Markwayne Mullin as the new homeland security secretary to replace Kristi Noem. He has given a nod to the need for the judicial warrants for searches.

Airport lines grow as TSA workers endure hardships

“This is a dire situation,” the acting TSA administrator, Ha Nguyen McNeill, testified at a House hearing Wednesday.

She described the multiple hardships facing unpaid TSA workers — piling-up bills and eviction notices, even plasma donations to make ends meet — and warned of potential airport closures if more employees refuse to come to work.

“At this point, we have to look at all options on the table,” she said.

McNeil also said TSA officers working at the nation’s airports had experienced a more than 500% increase in the frequency of assaults since the shutdown began.

“This is unacceptable,” McNeill said.

A U.S. Air Force F-35A fighter was forced to divert from a combat mission over Iran and make an emergency landing at an undisclosed U.S. airbase in the Middle East, the Pentagon has confirmed to TWZ. At this stage, details of the incident are very scarce, but there are meanwhile unconfirmed reports, and a video, suggesting that the jet was struck by Iranian fire. The video in question, if true, indicates a system was used that we have repeatedly highlighted as a top threat to allied aircraft, including stealthy ones, operating over Iran.

Capt. Tim Hawkins, a spokesperson for U.S. Central Command, told TWZ that the F-35 was “flying a combat mission over Iran” when it was forced to make an emergency landing.

“The aircraft landed safely, and the pilot is in stable condition,” Hawkins added. “This incident is under investigation.”

The U.S. Air Force has deployed F-35As from multiple units in support of Operation Epic Fury, while carrier-capable F-35C versions from the U.S. Marine Corps have been operating from the supercarrier USS Abraham Lincoln. Hawkins confirmed to us that a U.S. Air Force jet was involved.

The Israeli Air Force additionally operates a version of the jet, the F-35I Adir, which has also been used in combat against Iran.

According to a report from CNN, which cites two unnamed sources familiar with the matter, it is thought that the F-35 may have been hit by Iranian fire.

Hawkins declined to comment to TWZ about whether the aircraft was hit by hostile fire.

There have been reports that the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) released the video below, which claims to show the F-35 being hit over Iran, as seen through a forward-looking infrared (FLIR) system, but this cannot be independently verified.

Iran’s IRGC released a footage reportedly showing U.S. F-35 jet being hit over Iran.

Note that we can’t independently confirm the authenticity of the footage. pic.twitter.com/9N0ePd2LLf

— Clash Report (@clashreport) March 19, 2026

As far as we know, there have been no previous confirmed incidents of U.S. aircraft having been struck by Iranian air defenses since the conflict began at the end of last month. Three U.S. Air Force F-15E Strike Eagles were lost, but these fell to Kuwaiti friendly fire in an incident that remains puzzling. At the same time, some kind of friendly-fire incident cannot be ruled out on this occasion, too.

Meanwhile, a U.S. Air Force KC-135 Stratotanker that was taking part in Epic Fury crashed in Iraq, for reasons that remain unclear.

As we have discussed in our previous reporting, the skies of the Middle East are far from completely safe for U.S. and Israeli air operations.

An Israeli Air Force fighter was “almost shot down” over Iran, early on in the conflict, The Times of Israel has reported, citing the Israel Defense Forces (IDF).

According to the IDF, an attempt was made to shoot down the jet, and it was “close to being hit.”

The Israeli military further claims that the attempted shootdown “failed due to the alertness and professionalism of the pilot,” the military says, adding that the sortie “was completed successfully.”

For all the defense-suppression missions that have been flown, Iran still possesses road-mobile air defenses as well as more exotic types that can pop up virtually anywhere and give aircrews very little time to react. These systems can be easily hidden and will remain a threat on the battlefield long after static air defenses are destroyed. Beyond that, there are man-portable air defense systems (MANPADS), which, while less of a menace in terms of outright performance and engagement envelopes, are impossible to entirely remove from the battlespace.

The reality is that, even for the F-35, there are risks, especially as the air campaign moves more toward direct attacks, bringing aircraft closer to potential threats. While the U.S. has claimed air supremacy over Iran, it certainly does not yet possess it across the entire country.

Declarations of air superiority are relative. Iran has road mobile air defenses that can hide and pop up out of nowhere. They have exotic stuff like loitering SAMs too. Moving fighters in for direct attacks doesn’t mean they can operate freely without threat, especially in some…

— Tyler Rogoway (@Aviation_Intel) March 5, 2026

As we pointed out in our recent analysis:

Moving to a direct attack-focused campaign comes with new risks. This is especially true when it comes to facing road-mobile air defenses and more exotic types that can pop up virtually anywhere and give aircrews very little time to react. These systems can be hidden pretty much anywhere and will be present on the battlefield long after fixed air defenses are completely destroyed. Electro-optical and infrared (EO/IR) surface-to-air missile systems are especially vexing, as U.S. fourth-generation fighter aircraft would have no idea they were being attacked until they are struck, unless they visibly see the missile launch and head their way. These aircraft lack missile approach warning systems. The F-22 and F-35 benefit from different versions of this capability. EO/IR SAM systems are also not affected by radiofrequency jamming, unless they use a radar for initial targeting.

Speaking today, Gen. Dan ​Caine, ​the ⁠chairman of the Joint ​Chiefs of ​Staff, ⁠told reporters: “We’re flying further to the east now and penetrating deeper into Iranian airspace to hunt and kill one-way attack drone garrisons, destroying Iran’s ability to project power outside of its borders.”

Flying further east in Iran brings more threats, compared to the more-sanitized airspace in the west.

Again, as we warned in the past:

Underestimating Iran’s ability to target and destroy coalition aircraft would be a perilous move. Even the improvised systems cobbled together by Iranian-backed Houthi militants in Yemen, as well as their hodgepodge of other air defenses, have taken their toll on advanced fighter aircraft operated by Gulf Arab states and challenged even the most advanced fighters in the U.S. inventory. Iran’s capabilities, even in a deeply degraded state, far exceed those of the Houthis.

U.S.-operated F-35s have, at times, run the gauntlet against the relatively primitive air defense threat offered by the Iran-backed Houthi militia in Iran.

Last year, a U.S. official told TWZ that one of the stealth fighters had to take evasive maneuvers to avoid being hit by Houthi surface-to-air missiles. “They got close enough that the [F-35] had to maneuver,” the official said. Meanwhile, an Air Force F-16 pilot was awarded the Silver Star Medal after dodging multiple surface-to-air missiles during operations against the Houthi rebels. 

In fact, as you can read about here, the particular nature of Houthi air defenses appears to have prompted an increase in the use of stealthy aircraft like the F-35, in turn, exposing them to unconventional threats. If the same thing may now have happened in Iran, it should hardly come as a surprise.

Provided that the published video of the claimed shootdown is the real deal, that would point to the real possibility that the jet was targeted by a passive sensor, the same kind we repeatedly warned about. The footage looks very similar to that showing Houthi air defense equipment of this kind in action. As we noted in our analysis posted earlier in this story, passive systems can give off no radio emissions, making them especially hazardous to aircrew.

🇾🇪🇺🇸 | The Houthis show footage from the shootdown of another U.S. Air Force MQ-9 Reaper UCAV.

If I’m not mistaken, that would be the 20th MQ-9 downed by the Houthis from Yemen. pic.twitter.com/SCwRVLSs7s

— Status-6 (War & Military News) (@Archer83Able) April 18, 2025

It should be recalled that, at this point, we are still awaiting confirmation on exactly what led the F-35A to declare an emergency. TWZ continues to reach out to CENTCOM for more details about the incident.

We will continue to update this developing story.

Contact the author: thomas@thewarzone.com

Spotters in Greece have caught an especially good look at what very much appears to be a stealthy, long-range, high-altitude (HALE) intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance drone commonly referred to as the RQ-180, or an evolution of that design.

Pictures of the dark-colored, flying-wing type aircraft landing at Larissa National Airport, also known as Larissa Air Base, situated in the Greek city of the same name, were published earlier today by local news outlet onlarissa.gr.

“Those who were in the area near the 110th Fighter Wing [technically the 110th Combat Wing] in Larissa at the end of last week were left speechless when they saw an impressive plane in the sky, completely different in shape and appearance from everything we see daily in politics and the military air force,” according to a machine translation of onlarissa.gr’s piece, which misidentifies the aircraft as a B-2 bomber. “According to more recent information from military sources, this [aircraft] … reportedly parked at the Larissa military airport due to a breakdown and will remain there until it is repaired.”

TWZ cannot immediately confirm any of these latter details, but we have reached out to U.S. Air Forces in Europe (USAFE) and the Pentagon for more information.

What is clear is that this is not a B-2, which has a very distinctive saw-tooth trailing edge that is not visible here, among other features. In fact, the overall planform is highly reminiscent of the new B-21 Raider stealth bomber from Northrop Grumman, as well as past sightings of aircraft believed to be RQ-180s or progenitors of that design. The RQ-180 is widely understood to be a Northrop Grumman product, as well, and very likely played a significant role in risk reduction efforts as part of the development of the B-21, as we have posited for years.

There are also some very rough similarities to sightings of what is believed to be an Israeli drone called the RA-01, but with some distinct differences. The RA-01 shares a similar planform, but is a more svelte design that would be significantly smaller than what we are seeing here. Furthermore, it makes very little sense that an Israeli drone would be flying that far west for any reason. The American aircraft in question is likely quite large, sitting below the size of a B-21, but maybe by 25 percent, as a guess. It would be designed for extremely long-endurance, high altitude strategic reconnaissance missions.

B-21 Takeoff and Landing

The pictures from Larissa also offer a good look at the aircraft’s landing gear, which is very widely positioned. A gear configuration of that kind allows for the maximization of volume in between and underscores the sheer wingspan of the aircraft.

Whether the aircraft in question has been operating from Larissa, or simply diverted there due to an issue, is unknown. It is possible that it has been forward-deployed to the base, but still had to return to base unexpectedly, leading to it being spotted during the day rather than coming in discreetly at night.

Larissa is a Hellenic Air Force base, home to the 110th Combat Wing, which operates Block 52+ F-16C/D Viper fighters, as well as various types of drones. Since the late 2010s, the U.S. Air Force has also publicly used the base for MQ-9 Reaper drone operations over areas of Europe and Africa. That, in turn, has led to upgrades to Larissa’s infrastructure, especially along the south side of the base, where there are now hangars that could accommodate larger flying wing aircraft and that do not appear to be used to house MQ-9s.

By what we can surmise about the RQ-180 program, aircraft that are part of its lineage have likely been flying for roughly over a decade and a half. Yet in recent years, just as this platform was thought to be coming online in a grander operational sense, we have not seen the infrastructure that would be indicative of that. It’s even possible its scale has been reduced as the Pentagon looks to push its surveillance capabilities to space, and especially some of the kinds an ‘RQ-180’ could do.

Still, given that this aircraft is now likely a component of the Long Range Strike (LRS) family of systems, and will work in concert with and even possibly have some commonality with the B-21, it could share that same infrastructure and come online fully alongside the Raider in the next couple of years. That is if the program is still intended to be scaled-up as opposed to diverting funds to on-orbit surveillance capabilities.

Regardless, the aircraft has been spotted flying over secretive locales in America’s Southwest for many years now, with sightings over Area 51, and reports of it flying out of Palmdale and Edwards Air Force Base. A conflict with Iran would be a relevant fit for what it was designed to do, so it should be of no surprise that it is flying missions over the country, even if it still remains in something of a late developmental state.

In all of the years of the RQ-180’s rumored existence, multiple stealthy HALE drone designs have emerged in China, at least undergoing testing, and these are just the ones we know about.

We will have more analysis on all this in the near future.

Already, if nothing else, there are very strong signs that we’ve now gotten our best look ever at the drone referred to as the RQ-180 or a directly related design.

Contact the author: joe@twz.com

March 9 (UPI) — G7 finance ministers were set to hold an emergency meeting first thing Monday to discuss oil prices after Brent crude surged above $100 per barrel, with an option to release strategic reserves to calm the market on the table.

The virtual meeting, due to get underway at 8.30 EST, comes amid fears that disruption to oil and gas shipments from the Gulf via the Strait of Hormuz, which Iran has closed, could continue for some time, sending energy prices soaring and rattling financial markets.

The joint release of “emergency reserves,” if agreed, would be coordinated by the International Energy Agency, according to the Financial Times.

If G7 nations do release oil reserves, it would be the first time in four years since a crisis triggered by Russia’s full scale invasion of Ukraine triggered similar price shocks, although gas was hit the worst.

Exacerbated by escalating attacks on Gulf countries’ oil fields, refineries and storage plants — impacting their ability to produce and store product, as well as export it — Bent crude jumped more than 25% in Asian trade Monday, hitting a $119.50 per barrel high, before falling back with the price of West Texas Intermediate making similar moves.

Investors also reacted to fears that the crisis will push inflation and borrowing costs higher, with negative impacts for the global economy.

The key Nikkei 225 index in Japan slumped by more than 5% to end Monday down 2,892 points lower, with the jitters spilling over into Europe when the markets there opened.

At lunchtime Monday, the FTSE 100 in London was down 1.4%, Germany’s DAX was down 1.6% and the CAC 40 in Paris was off by more than 2.2%.

Former IEA head Neil Atkinson warned that unless there was a resolution to the situation in the Gulf and flows of oil resumed “very soon” the world faced a “potentially game-changing and unprecedented energy crisis,” even if the reserves were made available.

“Though there are oil stocks around the world, the point is that if this closure of the Strait persists, those oil stocks if they are deployed will be depleted and we are going to be in a situation where, with the oil production actually shut in, in Iraq and possibly in Kuwait and maybe even in time in Saudi Arabia, that we are going to be in a crisis the likes of which we have never seen before,” Atkinson told CNBC.

A SOUTHWEST Airlines flight has been diverted and forced to do an emergency landing after a mid-air security threat.

Flight 2094 from Nashville to Fort Lauderdale was forced to cut the journey short and land at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport at 9:06pm on Friday night.

While thousands of feet in the air, a security threat was reported which saw tactical cops storm the aircraft upon landing and detain a passenger.

A video allegedly taken on board the flight showed the moment a man was dragged off the flight by the Atlanta Police Department.

The clip shared on X showed terrified passengers with their hands raised above their heads as cops cuffed a passenger and took him off the aircraft.

The text on the clip claimed that there had been a bomb threat but this has not been commented on by the airline or police.

In a statement, Southwest said the diversion came due to a “possible security matter.”

“We appreciate the professionalism of our flight crew and sincerely apologize to our customers for the significant delay,” the spokesperson said.

“Nothing is more important to Southwest than the safety of its customers and employees.”

The Atlanta Police Department confirmed it worked with federal partners to attend to “last night’s incident” at the airport.

The nature of the security threat and if the passenger removed will face any charges remains unclear.

It is not known if the passenger is still in police detention.

Officials have not commented if any dangerous items were found onboard.

After the police activity, all passengers boarded another plane and continued their journey to Fort Lauderdale where they arrived safely just before 3:30am.

The airline has apologized to all affected passengers.

It comes as the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) remains on shutdown over funding disagreements which former Security Secretary Kristi Noem said is “endangering national security.”

The DHS has been shut down since February 14 which Noem said has negatively impacted and put huge pressure on TSA and border patrol.

In addition to this, Republicans have warned that the country is under an increased domestic terror threat due to the recent US-Israeli strikes on Iran.

“Now is the time to be vigilant at home and to ensure that all of our doors are locked, so to speak,” Speaker Mike Johnson, warned on Wednesday as he discussed the continued shutdown.

“Senate needs to fund the TSA. They’ve had them the Coast Guard, FEMA and Cybersecurity CISA on shut down for 3 weeks. We will surely see more of this,” one viewer of the footage from the diverted aircraft said.

“Unfortunately there’s going to be a lot more of this coming,” another said.

Sen. Alex Padilla (D-Calif.) is preparing for President Trump to declare a national emergency in order to seize control of this year’s midterm elections from the states, including by bracing his Senate colleagues for a vote in which they would be forced to either co-sign on the power grab or resist it.

In the wake of reporting last week that conservative activists with connections to the White House were circulating such an order, Padilla sent a letter to his Senate colleagues Friday stating that any such order would be “wildly illegal and unconstitutional,” and would no doubt face “extremely strict scrutiny” in the courts.

“Nevertheless, if the President does escalate his unprecedented assault on our democracy by declaring an election-related emergency, I will swiftly introduce a privileged resolution [and] force a vote in the Senate to terminate the fake emergency,” wrote Padilla, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Committee on Rules and Administration.

Padilla wrote that such an order — which could possibly “include banning mail-in voting, eliminating major voting registration methods, voter purges, and/or new document barriers for registering to vote and voting” — would clearly go beyond Trump’s authority.

“Put simply, no President has the power under the Constitution or any law to take over elections, and no declaration or order can create one out of thin air,” Padilla wrote.

The same day Padilla sent his letter, Trump was asked whether he was considering declaring a national emergency around the midterms. “Who told you that?” he asked — before saying he was not considering such an order.

The White House referred The Times to that exchange when asked Tuesday for comment on Padilla’s letter.

If Trump did declare such an emergency, a “privileged resolution,” as Padilla proposed, would require the full Senate to vote on the record on whether or not to terminate it — forcing any Senate allies of the president to own the policy politically, along with him.

Experts say there is no evidence that U.S. elections are significantly affected or swung by widespread fraud or foreign interference, despite robust efforts by Trump and his allies for years to find it.

Nonetheless, Trump has been emphatic that such fraud is occurring, particularly in blue states such as California that allow for mail-in ballots and do not have strict voter ID laws. He and others in his administration have asserted, again without evidence, that large numbers of noncitizen residents are casting votes and that others are “harvesting” ballots out of the mail and filling them out in bulk.

Soon after taking office, Trump issued an executive order purporting to require voters to show proof of U.S. citizenship before registering and barring the counting of mail-in ballots received after election day, but it was largely blocked by the courts.

Trump’s loyalist Justice Department sued red and blue states across the country for their full voter rolls, but those efforts also have largely been blocked, including in California. The FBI also raided an elections office in Georgia that has been the focus of Trump’s baseless claims that the 2020 presidential election was stolen from him.

Trump is also pushing for the passage of the Save America Act, a voter ID bill passed by the House, but it has stalled in the Senate.

In recent weeks, Trump has expressed frustration that his demands around voting security have not translated into changes in blue state policies ahead of the upcoming midterm elections, where his shrinking approval could translate into major gains for Democrats.

Last month, Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform, “I have searched the depths of Legal Arguments not yet articulated or vetted on this subject, and will be presenting an irrefutable one in the very near future. There will be Voter I.D. for the Midterm Elections, whether approved by Congress or not!”

Then, last week, the Washington Post reported that a draft executive order being circulated by activists with ties to Trump suggests that unproven claims of Chinese interference in the 2020 election could be used as a pretext to declare an elections emergency granting Trump sweeping authority to unilaterally institute the changes he wants to see in state-run elections.

Election experts said the Constitution is clear that states control and run elections, not with the executive branch.

Democrats have widely denounced any federal takeover of elections by Trump. And some Republicans have expressed similar concerns, including Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), who chairs the Senate rules committee.

In the Wall Street Journal last year, McConnell warned against Trump or any Republican president asserting sweeping authority to control elections, in part because Democrats would then be empowered to claim similar authority if and when they retake power.

McConnell’s office referred The Times to that Journal opinion piece when asked about the circulating emergency order and Padilla’s resolution.

Padilla’s office said his resolution would be introduced in response to an emergency declaration by Trump, but hoped it wouldn’t be necessary.

“Instead of trying to evade accountability at the ballot box,” Padilla wrote, “the President should focus on the needs of Americans struggling to pay for groceries, health care, housing and other everyday needs and put these illegal and unconstitutional election orders in the trash can where they belong.”