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CHICAGO — A judge on Tuesday ordered a senior U.S. Border Patrol official to meet her each evening to discuss the government’s immigration crackdown in the Chicago area, an extraordinary step following weeks of street confrontations, tear gas volleys and complaints of excessive force.

“Yes, ma’am,” responded Greg Bovino, who has become the face of the Trump administration’s immigration sweeps in America’s big cities.

Bovino got an earful from U.S. District Judge Sara Ellis as soon as he settled into the witness chair in his green uniform.

Ellis quickly expressed concerns about video and other images from an illegal immigration drive that has produced more than 1,800 arrests since September. The hearing is the latest in a lawsuit by news outlets and protesters who say agents have used too much force, including tear gas, during demonstrations.

“My role is not to tell you that you can or cannot enforce validly passed laws by Congress. … My role is simply to see that in the enforcement of those laws, the agents are acting in a manner that is consistent with the Constitution,” the judge said.

Bovino is chief of the Border Patrol sector in El Centro, Calif., one of nine sectors on the Mexican border.

The judge wants him to meet her in person daily at 6 p.m. “to hear about how the day went.”

“I suspect, that now knowing where we are and that he understands what I expect, I don’t know that we’re going to see a whole lot of tear gas deployed in the next week,” Ellis said.

Ellis zeroed in on reports that Border Patrol agents disrupted a children’s Halloween parade with tear gas on the city’s Northwest Side over the weekend. Neighbors had gathered in the street as someone was arrested.

“Those kids were tear-gassed on their way to celebrate Halloween in their local school parking lot,” Ellis said. “And I can only imagine how terrified they were. These kids, you can imagine, their sense of safety was shattered on Saturday. And it’s going to take a long time for that to come back, if ever.”

Ellis ordered Bovino to produce all use-of-force reports since Sept. 2 from agents involved in Operation Midway Blitz. She first demanded them by the end of Tuesday, but Bovino said it would be “physically impossible” because of the “sheer amount.”

Lawyers for the government have repeatedly defended the actions of agents, including those from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and told the judge that videos and other portrayals have been one-sided.

Besides his court appearance, Bovino still must sit for a deposition, an interview in private, with lawyers from both sides.

The judge has already ordered agents to wear badges, and she’s banned them from using certain riot control techniques against peaceful protesters and journalists. She subsequently required body cameras after the use of tear gas raised concerns that agents were not following her initial order.

Ellis set a Friday deadline for Bovino to get a camera and to complete training.

Attorneys representing a coalition of news outlets and protesters claim he violated the judge’s use-of-force order in Little Village, a Mexican enclave in Chicago, and they filed an image of him allegedly “throwing tear gas into a crowd without justification.”

Over the weekend, masked agents and unmarked SUVs were seen on Chicago’s wealthier, predominantly white North Side, where video showed chemical agents deployed in a street. Agents have been recorded using tear gas several times over the past few weeks.

Bovino also led the immigration operation in Los Angeles in recent months, leading to thousands of arrests. Agents smashed car windows, blew open a door to a house and patrolled MacArthur Park on horseback.

Fernando writes for the Associated Press.

WASHINGTON — An extraordinary new policy from the Defense Department that equates basic reporting methods to criminal activity has prompted a revolt among Pentagon journalists that could leave the nation’s largest agency and the world’s largest military without a press corps.

The new policy, from Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, is a dramatic departure from historic standards at the department, which previously required credentialed reporters to sign a simple, single-page document laying out safety protocols.

Replacing that document is a 21-page agreement that warns reporters against “soliciting” information, including unclassified material, without the Pentagon’s official authorization, characterizing individuals who do so as a “security risk.”

The policy would force journalists and media organizations to refrain from publishing any material that is not approved by the military — a clear violation of 1st Amendment protections to free speech, lawyers for media outlets said.

Major news organizations including the New York Times, Washington Post and Wall Street Journal, as well as right-leaning outlets such as Newsmax and the Washington Times, have refused to sign the document, with only one far-right outlet — the cable channel One American News — agreeing to do so.

The Los Angeles Times also will not agree to the policy, said Terry Tang, the paper’s executive editor.

In a rare joint statement, ABC, CBS, CNN, Fox News and NBC said that the policy “is without precedent and threatens core journalistic protections.”

“We will continue to cover the U.S. military as each of our organizations has done for many decades, upholding the principles of a free and independent press,” the news outlets said.

But Hegseth, who has aggressively pursued leaks and sources of unfavorable news stories since the start of his turbulent tenure as secretary, has doubled down in recent days, posting emojis on social media waving goodbye as media organizations have issued statements condemning the policy. Journalists were given a deadline of 2 p.m. PDT on Tuesday to either sign the document or relinquish their credentials.

It is unclear whether it will be viable for the Pentagon to maintain the policy, leaving the secretary without a traveling press corps to highlight his official duties or public events. And it is also uncertain whether President Trump approves of the extreme measure.

At a White House event Tuesday, Hegseth said that the policy was “common sense” and that he was “proud” of it. He said credentials should not be given to reporters who will try to get officials “to break the law by giving them classified information.”

Asked last month whether the Pentagon should control what reporters gather and write, Trump said “no.”

“I don’t think so,” Trump said, adding: “Nothing stops reporters.”

But Trump said Tuesday that he understands why Hegseth is pushing for the new policy.

“I think he finds the press to be very destructive in terms of world peace and maybe security for our nation,” Trump said. “The press is very dishonest.”

The widespread revolt has generated a show of solidarity from the White House and State Department correspondents associations, which characterized the Pentagon policy in a joint statement Monday as an attack on freedom of the press.

“Access inside the Pentagon has never been about convenience to reporters,” the statement reads. “The public has a right to know how the government is conducting the people’s business. Unfettered reporting on the U.S. military and its civilian leadership provides a service to those in uniform, veterans, their families and all Americans.”

Beyond the restrictions on media outlets, the Pentagon has taken a series of steps this year to try and identify officials who are deemed disloyal or who provide information to reporters.

In April, the Pentagon dismissed three top officials after an investigation into potential leaks related to military operational plans. That same month, Hegseth’s team began subjecting officials to random polygraph tests, a practice that was temporarily halted after the White House intervened, according to the Washington Post.

Then, in October, the Pentagon drafted plans to renew the use of polygraphs and to require thousands of personnel to sign strict nondisclosure agreements that would “prohibit the release of non-public information without approval or through a defined process.” The nondisclosure agreements include language that is similar to what reporters are being asked to sign by Tuesday.

Notably, many of Hegseth’s plans to target leaks have been leaked to news outlets, probably contributing to the Defense secretary’s suspicion about whom he can trust.

The timing of his efforts are also noteworthy, as they gained traction after he personally shared sensitive details about forthcoming strikes in Yemen in a private Signal group chat that mistakenly included a reporter from the Atlantic. Hegseth also shared information about the attacks in a separate Signal chat that included his wife, a former Fox News producer who is not a Defense Department employee.

Hegseth denied that any classified information was shared in the chat. Yet the situation led to an internal review of whether the disclosures were in violation of Defense Department policies.

The Pentagon has taken an even more aggressive approach to restricting reporters’ access than the White House, which months ago took control over press operations from the White House Correspondents Assn. — an independent group that had organized the White House press corps for decades.

Still, the White House has refrained from implementing changes to the briefing room seating chart, evicting outlets from workspaces within the White House complex or revoking press passes, after facing a legal challenge over an attempt to bar one major outlet — the Associated Press — from covering some presidential events at the beginning of Trump’s second term.

Trump, meanwhile, has continued to single out individual outlets he dislikes. On Tuesday, for example, the president refused to take questions from ABC News because he said he did not like how a news anchor had treated Vice President JD Vance.

“You’re ABC Fake News,” Trump said at a public appearance in the White House. “I don’t take questions from ABC Fake News!”

The U.S. Court of Appeals on Tuesday denied an appeal by the Associated Press for a hearing on its efforts to restore full access to cover presidential events, not ending its case but allowing the White House to continue its control over access to President Trump.

The news outlet wanted the court to overturn a three-judge panel’s June 6 ruling not to let AP back into the events until merits of the news organization’s lawsuit against Trump was decided. But the court on Tuesday declined to hear that appeal.

It all stems from Trump’s decision in February to keep AP journalists out of the Oval Office, Air Force One and other events too small for a full press corps, in retaliation for the news outlet’s decision not to follow his lead in changing the Gulf of Mexico’s name.

The AP sued in response. In April, a district court ruled that the administration could not exclude journalists based on their opinions. The Trump administration immediately turned to the U.S. Court of Appeals to successfully delay implementation of the ruling before the court could consider the full merits of the case.

Next up: This fall, the appeals court considers those full merits.

“We are disappointed by today’s procedural decision but remain focused on the strong district court opinion in support of free speech as we have our case heard,” said Patrick Maks, an AP spokesman. “As we’ve said throughout, the press and the public have a fundamental right to speak freely without government retaliation.”

The White House did not immediately return a request for comment.

Since the start of the case, the White House has instituted new rules for access to the limited-space events. AP photographers have been regularly permitted back, but its reporters only occasionally.

On Monday, the White House said it would not allow a reporter from the Wall Street Journal onto Air Force One to cover Trump’s weekend trip to Scotland because of the outlet’s “fake and defamatory conduct” in a story about the president and late financier Jeffrey Epstein.

Bauder writes for the Associated Press.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom is suing Fox News for defamation, alleging that the news outlet intentionally manipulated its coverage to give the appearance that the governor lied about a phone call with President Trump.

The governor’s demand for $787 million in punitive damages escalates his aggressive effort to challenge misinformation. The lawsuit, announced Friday, places Newsom at the forefront of the political proxy war between Democrats and Republicans over the press by calling out an outlet that many in his party despise.

“By disregarding basic journalistic ethics in favor of malicious propaganda, Fox continues to play a major role in the further erosion of the bedrock principles of informed representative government,” the suit states. “Setting the record straight and confronting Fox’s dishonest practices are critical to protecting democracy from being overrun by disinformation and lies.”

Newsom, a potential presidential candidate, said he decided to sue in part because Fox failed to change after admitting in a legal settlement two years ago to spreading falsehoods about the 2020 presidential election.

In response to Newsom’s lawsuit, Fox criticized the California governor, accusing him of undercutting the 1st Amendment.

“Gov. Newsom’s transparent publicity stunt is frivolous and designed to chill free speech critical of him. We will defend this case vigorously and look forward to it being dismissed,” Fox News said in a statement Friday morning.

The case stems from comments Trump made about a phone call with Newsom as tensions heated up between the two leaders over immigration raids and the president’s decision to deploy the National Guard to the streets of Los Angeles.

Trump told reporters on June 10 that he spoke with Newsom “a day ago.”

“Called him up to tell him, got to do a better job, he’s doing a bad job,” Trump said. “Causing a lot of death and a lot of potential death.”

Newsom immediately rejected Trump’s timeline on social media.

The governor had already spoken publicly about talking to Trump on the phone late in the night on June 6 in California, which was early June 7 for Trump on the East Coast. Newsom said the National Guard was never discussed during that call. They didn’t talk again, he said.

“There was no call,” Newsom posted on X. “Not even a voicemail. Americans should be alarmed that a President deploying Marines onto our streets doesn’t even know who he’s talking to.”

Newsom’s lawyers allege in the complaint that by making the call seem more recent, Trump could suggest they discussed the deployment of troops to Los Angeles, which they had not.

Trump attempted to fire back at Newsom through Fox and shared a screenshot of his call log with anchor John Roberts. The log showed that a phone call occurred on June 7 and provided no evidence of a call on June 9 as Trump claimed.

“It is impossible to know for certain whether President Trump’s distortion was intentionally deceptive or merely a result of his poor cognitive state, but Fox’s decision to cover up for the President’s false statement cannot be so easily dismissed,” the complaint states.

Newsom’s legal team said Roberts initially misrepresented the situation to viewers “to obscure President Trump’s false statement of fact.”

Then during an evening broadcast on June 10, Fox News host Jesse Watters showed a video of Trump’s comments about the phone call but omitted the president saying that it happened “a day ago.” The edit made it appear that Newsom alleged the two never spoke at all.

“Why would Newsom lie and claim Trump never called him? Why would he do that?” Watters then asked.

A banner at the bottom of the screen during the segment claimed “Gavin lied about Trump’s call.”

Newsom’s lawyers said Fox “willfully distorted the facts” and defamed Newsom to tens of millions of people.

“Fox advanced this lie about Governor Newsom out of a desire to harm him politically,” the complaint states.

Newsom is particularly attuned to his critics on Fox, a conservative-leaning television network that he describes as the epicenter of a right-wing media ecosystem that misleads the public to benefit Trump and his allies. Similar to reports of Trump watching CNN, the governor regularly follows Fox political coverage. He pays close attention to the outlet’s assessment of his leadership.

Fox commentators and opinion hosts, such as Watters, are given a wide berth to express their views, even when they contradict the reporting of its nonpartisan correspondents. They aggressively defend Trump and his policies, while often casting California as a failed state with incompetent leadership.

But Newsom has also benefited from Fox and used his appearances on the network to brandish his image as a brawler for Democrats and his standing as a potential future presidential candidate.

Fox hosted a much talked about debate between Newsom and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis in 2023. The California governor also participated in a sit-down interview with Sean Hannity, which drew praise from within and outside of his party.

During a talk on the social media website Substack on Friday, Newsom said he started going on Fox to disrupt propaganda and the network’s narrative about Democrats.

“I have a high threshold for the bulls— on Fox, is the point,” Newsom said. “I wouldn’t do this unless I felt they really did cross the line.”

The amount of the governor’s request for damages was a subtle dig at the outlet.

Fox agreed two years ago to pay Dominion Voting Systems $787 million to drop a lawsuit related to the network’s false claims that voting machines were manipulated to help President Biden win the 2020 election. The news organization settled the case rather than put its executives and on-air talent on the witness stand in a high-profile trial.

Fox faces a similar lawsuit from Smartmatic, a Boca Raton, Fla.-based voting machine company that claims its business had been hurt because of the network’s reporting.

The news outlet has maintained that reporting on Trump’s fraud claims was newsworthy and protected by the 1st Amendment. Barring a settlement, the case could go to trial next year.

In a letter to Fox, Newsom’s lawyers said they will voluntarily dismiss the governor’s suit if the outlet retracts its claims that he lied about speaking to Trump.

“We expect that you will give the same airtime in retracting these falsehoods as you spent presenting and amplifying them,” his lawyers stated. “Further, Mr. Watters and Fox News must issue a formal on-air apology for the lie you have spread about Governor Newsom.”

The governor said any damages he might receive from the lawsuit, punitive or otherwise, would go to charity.

Times staff writer Stephen Battaglio contributed to this report.