Unification Minister Chung Dong-young delivers a keynote speech during the Korean Peninsula Symposium 2026 in Seoul on Friday. Photo by Yonhap
Unification Minister Chung Dong-young called Friday for shifting away from an approach that sticks to denuclearization as the sole solution to the North Korean nuclear issue, saying such a precondition has been one of the reasons for stalled diplomacy with Pyongyang.
Chung made the remarks in a keynote speech at a forum, co-hosted by Yonhap News Agency, pointing out that the lack of progress in nuclear diplomacy has only helped the North bolster its nuclear and weapons capabilities for the past three decades.
“As the past 30 years have shown, whenever peace talks were halted by the denuclearization hurdle, North Korea used that time to further advance its nuclear capabilities,” Chung said at the Korean Peninsula Symposium.
“We must move away from the old notion that a peace regime can only be discussed after the North Korean nuclear issue is resolved … We need to pursue a phased and pragmatic solution. It is time for a paradigm shift,” he said.
Recalling major breakthroughs in nuclear diplomacy with Pyongyang in the past, Chung stressed the path toward peace opened up when relevant countries, including South Korea and the United States, sought to actively engage Pyongyang for dialogue.
Chung went on to highlight the need for a phased approach — halting and scaling down the North’s nuclear program before denuclearizing — as a solution to the nuclear issue.
“A step-by-step process toward peaceful coexistence and denuclearization should proceed in three stages — freeze, reduction and denuclearization,” he said. “China, too, has expressed support for this pragmatic approach.”
Chung said this phased approach must begin with dialogue between the U.S. and North Korea.
“As agreed in the 2018 Singapore summit between North Korea and the U.S., both sides should immediately resume talks to end mutual hostility and establish a new relationship,” he said.
“The resumption of U.S.-North Korea dialogue will serve as a powerful catalyst for opening four-party talks among the U.S., China and the two Koreas, who are the key stakeholders in achieving lasting peace on the Korean Peninsula,” Chung added.
Copyright (c) Yonhap News Agency prohibits its content from being redistributed or reprinted without consent, and forbids the content from being learned and used by artificial intelligence systems.
Former South Korean Minister of Unification Jeong Se-hyun speaks during International Convention for Peace and Prosperity in the Asia-Pacific, in Goyang, South Korea. Photo by YONHAP / EPA
June 22 (Asia Today) — Former South Korean unification ministers criticized President Lee Jae Myung’s North Korea policy Monday, arguing that his national security team is continuing some of the previous administration’s hard-line positions.
Chung Se-hyun, who served as unification minister under President Kim Dae-jung, delivered the criticism at the 2026 International Korean Peninsula Forum organized by the Unification Ministry in Seoul.
The forum was held under the theme “Peaceful Coexistence on the Korean Peninsula Built Together With Civil Society.”
Chung criticized a joint statement issued by South Korea and the European Union that condemned North Korea’s nuclear weapons program and its military cooperation with Russia.
“The Lee Jae Myung administration’s view of North Korea has returned to where the Yoon Suk Yeol administration stood in its final years,” Chung said.
He described the joint statement as “pouring concrete over a wall where we were trying to make even a pinhole” for progress in inter-Korean relations.
Chung accused Lee’s national security aides of steering the administration away from engagement.
“President Lee followed what his advisers wrote for him and ended up returning to a relationship of permanent hostility with North Korea,” Chung said. “Civil society must hold the president’s foreign and security policy advisers accountable.”
The former minister identified joint South Korea-U.S. military exercises, Seoul’s participation as a co-sponsor of a United Nations resolution on North Korean human rights and the South Korea-EU statement as policy mistakes.
“I believe the Lee government’s National Security Office is following the Yoon administration’s position on North Korea,” Chung said.
Chung is generally associated with a policy faction that favors resolving inter-Korean issues primarily through dialogue led by the two Koreas.
He has frequently criticized officials who place greater emphasis on the South Korea-U.S. alliance, multilateral diplomacy and international pressure in addressing North Korea’s nuclear program.
His recent criticism has included Wi Sung-lac, Lee’s national security adviser, who is viewed as a leading advocate of alliance-centered diplomacy.
The South Korea-EU statement issued during Lee’s June 10 summit in Brussels condemned North Korea’s nuclear and ballistic missile programs and called for the complete denuclearization of North Korea in accordance with U.N. Security Council resolutions.
It also condemned North Korea’s military cooperation with Russia.
Lee Jae-joung, who served as unification minister under President Roh Moo-hyun, also participated in Monday’s discussion.
Lee said the government should avoid placing North Korea’s complete denuclearization at the forefront of its peace policy.
“It would be more realistic to recognize the current situation and establish nuclear freezing and reduction as the basic direction of our policy,” Lee said.
He also called for a structural and institutional system that would give the Unification Ministry a central coordinating role in policies involving peace on the Korean Peninsula.
Unification Minister Chung Dong-young, meanwhile, said a recent social media post by U.S. President Donald Trump could indicate the possible revival of personal diplomacy between Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.
Trump posted a photograph showing himself walking with Kim during their 2018 summit in Singapore without providing a caption.
The unification minister cited an interpretation offered by Lee Jung-chul, a professor at Seoul National University, who suggested that Kim may have sent Trump a letter for the U.S. president’s birthday and that the photograph could have been Trump’s response.
“I found that interpretation impressive and plausible,” Chung Dong-young said.
No public evidence has confirmed that Kim recently sent Trump a letter.
Trump and Kim met three times during Trump’s first term, but nuclear negotiations stalled after their February 2019 summit in Hanoi ended without an agreement.
South Korea’s government has said its policy seeks peaceful coexistence and renewed dialogue with North Korea while maintaining international cooperation over Pyongyang’s nuclear weapons program.
President Donald Trump, pictured meeting with South African President Cyril Ramaphosa in May 2025, plans to end U.S. funding for HIV programs in South Africa over political differences, State Department officials said on Friday. File Photo by Jim Lo Scalzo/UPI | License Photo
June 19 (UPI) — The Trump administration plans to stop funding HIV programs in South Africa under the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief over policy differences.
The U.S. State Department is winding down the funds South Africa receives from PEPFAR to care for the roughly 8 million people there who are living with HIV, Semafor, Politico and The BBC reported.
PEPFAR was launched in 2003 by former President George W. Bush and, over the last two decades, has partnered with health authorities in more than 50 nations to save 25 million lives and prevent millions of new HIV infections, State Department figures show.
President Donald Trump in a February 2025 executive order accused South Africa of permitting discrimination against white Afrikaners and has slowly pulled back U.S. funding for its HIV programs over the last year.
“The United States has decided to initiate a phased drawdown of PEPFAR programming in South Africa following South Africa’s failure to make demonstrable progress on policy requests by the administration,” State Department officials told Semafor.
Upon retaking office in 2025, President Donald Trump took aim at the program as part of his administrations efforts to slash federal government spending, with specific attention paid to South Africa, which has the largest number of people living with HIV in the world.
Since 2003, more than $8 billion has been sent to South Africa to both care for people living with HIV and distribute medications that can prevent spread of the virus, though funds sent there have been halved in each of the last two years.
South African President Cyril Ramaphosa earlier this month announced that the country was working Gilead to launch the company’s twice-yearly HIV prevention drug Lenacapavir, generic versions of which are set to be manufactured and sold there.
Experts have raised concerns that ending support for PEPFAR programs could lead to millions more HIV infections globally, potentially canceling out 20 years of progress against the virus.
The Trump administration and some of its Republican allies in Congress have said, however, that the program was never meant to be permanent and should be wound down.
Israel may ‘symbolically’ pull back its troops from southern Lebanon after the US and Iran signed a peace deal which included an end to Israel’s war on Lebanon, according to analyst Rami Khouri. But he attests, real policy change will only happen when the US forces Israel’s hand.
Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi (L) and Mongolian Prime Minister Ukhnaa Khurelsukh shake hands during their meeting in Ulan Bator, Mongolia. Photo by BYAMBA-OCHIR / EPA
June 14 (Asia Today) — Mongolian President Ukhnaa Khurelsukh reaffirmed his country’s support for China’s position on Taiwan and said issues involving Hong Kong, Tibet and Xinjiang were China’s internal affairs during a meeting with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi.
Khurelsukh met Wang in Ulaanbaatar on Saturday and said maintaining friendly relations with China was one of the most important priorities of Mongolia’s foreign policy, according to Chinese state media.
“Mongolia understands and respects China’s positions and concerns and firmly adheres to the one-China principle,” Khurelsukh was quoted as saying.
He said Mongolia considers Taiwan an inseparable part of Chinese territory and does not support any form of Taiwanese independence.
Khurelsukh also said issues involving Hong Kong, the Tibet Autonomous Region and the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region were China’s internal affairs.
He said Mongolia would not take any action that harmed China’s interests because of its relations with other countries.
Khurelsukh said the two countries have consistently respected each other’s independence, sovereignty and territorial integrity while deepening mutually beneficial cooperation.
He predicted that bilateral trade would reach $20 billion this year.
Mongolia shares a roughly 2,900-mile border with China, the longest land border China has with any neighboring country.
Wang arrived in Mongolia on Saturday for a three-day visit after accompanying Chinese President Xi Jinping during Xi’s visit to North Korea on June 8 and 9.
Wang is a member of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China Central Committee, China’s foreign minister and director of the Office of the Central Commission for Foreign Affairs.
During his meeting with Khurelsukh, Wang said China has consistently placed its relationship with Mongolia in an important position within its diplomacy toward neighboring countries.
China is willing and able to serve as “a dependable neighbor, a trustworthy friend and a partner that helps accelerate Mongolia’s development,” Wang said.
He said China respects Mongolia’s independence, sovereignty and territorial integrity.
“A close neighbor is better than a distant relative,” Wang said.
He said Beijing highly valued Mongolia’s decision to treat the development of relations with China as a top foreign policy priority, describing the approach as consistent with Mongolia’s fundamental interests.
China regards Taiwan, Tibet and Xinjiang as matters involving its sovereignty and territorial integrity and routinely seeks public support for its positions from neighboring countries and diplomatic partners.
Mongolia has long maintained a one-China policy while balancing relations with China and Russia, its two immediate neighbors, and pursuing ties with other democratic countries.
WASHINGTON — A year after the Trump administration kicked off its aggressive immigration enforcement tour with military-style raids across greater Los Angeles, federal officials have veered toward a less flashy but broader strategy: making immigrants’ lives harder so they will leave.
The changes range in scale and scope, from disqualifying immigrants from certain jobs to indefinitely pausing the processing of visa applications. They target those lawfully present as well as the undocumented.
Since President Trump’s second term began, the administration has used executive orders and federal regulations to chip away at services or benefits, such as work permits and small business loans, that immigrants could obtain in the past.
Now, immigrants are finding that freedoms — the ones that once made the U.S. a desirable place to start over — are disappearing. Many are retreating back into the shadows as they fear previously routine tasks, such as traveling across states, filing taxes and seeking medical care.
“The priority is to force people to leave the country or not come, regardless of legal status or really any other criteria,” said David Bier, immigration studies director at the Libertarian think tank the Cato Institute. “They’re taking a sledgehammer to the system.”
Trump won the White House in part on his promise to clamp down on illegal immigration, but recent polling shows support for his agenda has waned, especially after immigration agents shot and killed two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis.
In a statement, White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson said Trump’s highest priority has always been the deportation of immigrants with criminal records. The Department of Homeland Security said Trump also prioritizes immigration that strengthens the country financially, socially and culturally.
President Trump displays the signed “Secure America Act” during a ceremony in the Oval Office on Wednesday. The act provides $70 billion for immigration enforcement and border-security agencies.
(Aaron Schwartz / CNP, Bloomberg)
The number of arrests by ICE agents has declined. On average, ICE arrested about 1,000 immigrants per day in early March, down from a peak average of just under 1,400 in mid-January, agency data show. And there are fewer detained immigrants — facilities across the country held about 60,000 detainees in April, compared to more than 70,000 in late January.
The downturns prompted some Trump loyalists to say the administration is failing to fulfill his signature promise, which is an assertion the administration rejects.
“ICE is NOT slowing down,” said Homeland Security spokesperson Lauren Bis. “Since Day One, DHS law enforcement has been delivering on President Trump’s promise to the American people to arrest and deport criminal illegal aliens.”
At a border security conference last month, Tom Homan, who leads border policy for the White House, suggested immigration agents would return to more muscular enforcement tactics.
“You ain’t seen s— yet,” he told the audience.
But along with focusing on deportations, the administration is deploying other tactics to deter illegal — and legal —immigration.
ICE agents confront protesters on June 8 as they gather outside the federal immigration center at Delaney Hall in Newark, New Jersey, where ICE is housing detained immigrants.
(Spencer Platt / Getty Images)
Curtailing visas
Last month, the Department of Homeland Security announced that “except in extraordinary circumstances,” immigrants seeking lawful permanent residency must leave the U.S. to complete the process. After a backlash, the administration defended the policy, saying it won’t prevent anyone who qualifies for a green card from getting one.
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, the agency in charge of processing immigration benefits, has upped security screening since Trump took office. The agency says that’s to root out fraud, but critics say all it does is unnecessarily slow down a system that already vets applicants vigorously.
The administration indefinitely banned people from 75 countries from receiving immigrant visas, which allow people to move permanently to the U.S.
In a similar move, the government halted the processing of immigration applications for people from 39 countries and who are already in the U.S. On June 5, a federal judge struck down the policy in a scathing ruling that said the administration “justifies its actions with pretextual concerns of ‘national security’ that mask anti-immigrant sentiments.”
Children of Guatemalan origin, from left, Areimy, Mariela and Enrique, arrive at Miami International Airport on Dec. 4, 2025, as they prepare to leave the United States to reunite with their recently deported parents in Guatemala.
(Chandan Khanna / AFP via Getty Images)
The judge’s ruling may offer relief, but for many immigrants, the effects of the policy are devastating. Armin, a 42-year-old from Iran, said he has racked up more than $15,000 in debt since the pause took effect in December. Armin asked The Times not to fully identify for fear of jeopardizing his immigration case.
The nutritional scientist came to the U.S. in 2019 on a student visa and has a pending green card application under a provision that allows certain highly skilled immigrants to apply for permanent residency without needing an employer to sponsor them.
After receiving his PhD and completing a postdoctoral program, Armin was in between jobs when he received a research grant in November. But with the processing of his work authorization halted, the university that issued the grant said it couldn’t hire him as a research associate. In February, he was turned down for another job.
Armin said he is confused about why the administration won’t differentiate between legal immigrants and those who should be deported.
“I can’t believe it,” he said. “I’m doing research and my research has national interest benefits. You expect support from the government. Unfortunately they don’t differentiate. They don’t care about your resume.”
Bier said the visa policies affect half of all legal immigrants coming from abroad. He published a report in April about how Trump has cut legal immigration far more than illegal immigration, noting that the administration’s policies have led to big drops in visas for international students, high-skilled workers and refugees.
“The legal immigration system is being used as a means to carry out the mass deportation agenda,” he said.
Alessandro Negrete, who lived most of his life in the U.S. undocumented, crosses into Mexico after deciding to leave.
(Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times)
Encouraging self-deportation
More than 90,000 immigrants have been granted voluntary departure since the start of the Trump administration, according to federal immigration court data through April that was analyzed by TRAC, a data research organization. Voluntary departure avoids official deportation and can leave open the possibility of an immigrant returning to the U.S. legally.
Homan, who declined to be interviewed for this story, has said self-deportations were part of the administration’s immigration plan all along.
“We knew if we surged unlimited ICE resources in the interior, and we do these operations, that that will force those that are here illegally to leave on their own,” he recently told the Washington Examiner.
Halting work permits
In the past, asylum seekers and others with deportation protections have had the ability to seek permits to work legally in the U.S. But work is now an administration target.
One proposed regulation would prevent asylum seekers from working legally in the U.S. Another proposal, published Friday, would further restrict access to work permits for other immigrants.
Under a rule that took effect last month, asylum seekers pay an annual $102 fee within 30 days of receiving a notice from U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. If the deadline is missed, their applications will be rejected — with no opportunity to appeal — and they could be placed in deportation proceedings. Those who apply for asylum with the agency have entered the U.S. legally, such as on a visa, and are not undocumented.
Asylum seekers rest at a Tijuana migrant shelter a day after President Trump began his second term in the White House.
(Robert Gauthier/Los Angeles Times)
Conchita Cruz, co-executive director of the Asylum Seeker Advocacy Project, said many asylum applicants have not received notice that the fee is due.
Cruz said she believes the Trump administration is using these changes as an excuse to dismiss people’s asylum claims. While the president has the power to decide whether to offer or rescind humanitarian programs, such as Temporary Protected Status, the right to seek asylum is enshrined in law.
“We’re worried this is a pretext for people to fall out of the asylum system and fall out of the workforce,” she said.
The processing of work permits has already been slowed, leaving many immigrants who still qualify for employment authorization unable to work.
During a House Homeland Security Committee hearing last week, Rep. Lou Correa (D-Santa Ana) asked Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin to help him speed up the work permit renewals for two police officers who were recently fired by agencies in his district because their DACA status expired.
Mullin said he would help but that Congress ultimately must pass a permanent solution for DACA recipients.
“These are police officers on Main Street, sir,” Correa responded.
“Not all of them are,” Mullin said. “I’m not just going to wave a magic wand and fix them all.”
“You have that magic wand — that’s your job,” Correa said.
It wasn’t just Democrats complaining about slow processing. Rep. Gabe Evans (R-Colo.) similarly asked Mullin for help because many of his constituents — “farm workers, youth ministers, nurses, grocery store business managers” — who have lived and worked in the U.S. legally for decades are now having trouble renewing their visas.
Secretary of Homeland Security Markwayne Mullin, left, and President Trump, center, walk to the motorcade after exiting Air Force One at Joint Base Andrews, Maryland, on May 20.
(Kent Nishimura / AFP via Getty Images)
Calls for mass deportations
Mullin, who took the reins in March after Trump fired his predecessor, Kristi Noem, rolled back some of Noem’s policies, including telling agents to stop entering homes without judicial warrants and canceling some contracts she had initiated.
But the changes and the downturn in arrests have drawn criticism from some fervent Trump supporters.
“Trump’s legacy is tied up in this,” said Mike Howell, a former DHS attorney who founded a group called the Mass Deportation Coalition. “It’s going to be hard to tell a younger voter to get excited to show up when one of their top issues is mass deportation and, a year and a half in, it doesn’t appear it’s going full-steam ahead.”
Howell said enforcement at work sites is critical to scaling up arrests and deportations. That more such operations haven’t happened, he said, is a political decision to appease wealthy donors and special interest groups who don’t want to see their workers deported.
The architect of Trump’s immigration agenda is Stephen Miller, a top White House aid who has called for a “moratorium on immigration from third-world countries,” demanded 3,000 arrests per day and said that immigrants and their descendants “recreate the conditions, and the terrors, of their broken homelands.”
Royce Bernstein Murray, a former Homeland Security official who worked on immigration policy under the Biden administration, said the winding down of flashy enforcement surges has given the administration more time to “focus on tearing down the legal immigration system.”
“This is Stephen Miller’s sweet spot,” she said. “He was never in enforcement — he’s a policy guy. This is really an opportunity for him to make good on all he has planned for years.”
While ICE has, in recent months, returned to its more conventional targeted enforcement tactics, Homan has sought to make clear that mass deportations are still a goal.
“For the people out there saying ‘President Trump’s getting weak on mass deportation,’ you don’t know what the hell you’re talking about,” Homan said at the border expo.
On Monday, Homan told Fox News that he had just reviewed plans for an ICE operation that would surge agents to New York City.
WASHINGTON — Dozens of House Democrats are asking the new director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement to roll back a policy that they say hinders their ability to speak with detainees during oversight visits.
The new policy requires that lawmakers identify detainees by name at least two business days before a visit and provide a signed consent form from each detainee. It’s the latest point of conflict in an ongoing battle over when and how lawmakers can inspect immigration facilities.
In a letter Thursday to acting ICE Director David Venturella, Rep. Mike Levin (D-San Juan Capistrano) and 77 other members of Congress, including two dozen from California, argued that they need to conduct constant oversight of immigration facilities because of historic levels of reports regarding the mistreatment of detainees, deaths in custody and substandard facility conditions.
“This Administration has enabled a revolving door of arbitrary policies, directives, and guidance on member access to facilities or on communication with detainees designed to hinder any productive oversight,” they wrote.
The letter was written in response to the new policy, which was outlined in a memo last month.
In the letter, Levin and the other members wrote that detainees have a hard time accessing the visitation form because it is at times unavailable at a detention center’s law library. They said it limits their ability to speak broadly with detainees, particularly those from vulnerable populations, such as the elderly.
Detainees previously used a sign-up sheet to meet with members of Congress or just started talking to detainees they encountered during facility tours.
In the memo outlining ICE’s new policy, then-acting director Todd Lyons said the increased visits by members of Congress have become a burden and a time suck. Homeland Security didn’t immediately reply to a request for comment, but previously said that the policy doesn’t prevent lawmakers from speaking with detainees.
Levin said the increase in visits was necessary because the agency slashed staffing of its oversight offices. The letter notes that for next fiscal year, the president requested additional cuts to the Homeland Security Office of Inspector General.
“These actions, coupled with the constant changes to policies surrounding member access to facilities, reveal a clear attack on the levers that ensure government transparency at every level,” the members wrote.
Democratic House members sued the Trump administration last July after they were repeatedly denied access to immigrant detention facilities in California and across the country.
Homeland Security officials previously implemented a policy requiring lawmakers to give seven days’ notice before a visit, but that policy was temporarily blocked in federal court.
This week, lawyers said a Belizean man who helped organize hunger strikes at the Adelanto ICE Processing Center was moved to facilities out of state and scheduled to be deported after he spoke to three members of Congress about conditions at the detention center in San Bernardino County.
The first serious legal challenge to the House settlement will come courtesy of a USC freshman linebacker.
Talanoa Ili, a top-100 recruit in the Trojans’ vaunted 2026 class, joins Stanford quarterback Charlie Mirer as one of two lead plaintiffs in a class-action lawsuit that takes aim at the system implemented since the settlement ushered in a new era of direct payment from universities to athletes. The suit, which was filed Tuesday, accuses the NCAA, the Power Four conferences and the enforcement arm they created — the College Sports Commission — of participating in a “conspiracy” by creating a system of policies that have “direct anti-competitive effects, including the suppression of [name, image and likeness] compensation below competitive levels.”
Those policies, their attorneys argue, violate state laws in California that prohibit restrictions on NIL rights, as well as federal antitrust statutes. They’re seeking monetary damages, as well as an injunction that would upend the enforcement structure created to determine whether individual NIL deals over $2,500 meet criteria, including whether they have “a valid business purpose” or fall within a reasonable range of market value.
The clearinghouse, NIL Go, was created with the hope of eliminating an influx of booster-funded NIL deals that were basically direct payments from donors to the program. But since its inception, the system has been more restrictive and worked less efficiently than some schools and athletes might have hoped. As of last month, according to Yahoo Sports, more than $125 million worth of NIL compensation that had been promised to athletes had been rejected by the clearinghouse or was still under review.
In Ili’s case, the complaint states that he received a “substantial multi-year offer” from USC’s House of Victory collective in 2024 that led him to commit to the Trojans, only to have the offer disappear after approval of the House settlement.
“Absent the NIL Restrictions on Direct Pay NIL Compensation, Ili would have received more for his NIL rights than he now receives,” the complaint states. “The Agreement has thus injured Ili.”
Mirer, meanwhile, claims that he has received no NIL compensation from Stanford’s collective or revenue-sharing money from the university since 2024 as a result of the settlement.
Stanford quarterback Charlie Mirer during a game last season.
(Godofredo A. Vásquez / Associated Press)
“The [CSC agreement] has suppressed, deterred, and effectively terminated the economic relationships that had produced his prior NIL compensation,” the lawsuit says.
Even the plaintiffs in the House settlement, which created the CSC, are in the process of challenging the current system. On Wednesday, plaintiff attorney Jeffrey Kessler will argue in a hearing that school-affiliated businesses such as multimedia rights holders or corporate sponsors, should not be subject to the CSC’s rigorous criteria for NIL deals. That decision could also open the floodgates, with schools using those entities to circumvent the cap.
Two U.S. senators are hoping to pass legislation they believe would bring more stability to college athletics and thwart legal challenges. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and Maria Cantwell (D-Texas) spoke with presidents and chancellors from the Big Ten Conference on Tuesday about a bipartisan bill, the Protect College Sports Act, which would codify some of the CSC’s policies into federal law.
Republican Steve Hilton, a former Fox News commentator, clinched one of the top spots in California’s gubernatorial primary on Tuesday, earning him the right to challenge veteran Democratic politician Xavier Becerra in the November election to determine the state’s next governor.
The contest offers voters two starkly different politicians. Hilton was endorsed by President Trump and has wooed his MAGA supporters, blaming Democratic policies for California’s homelessness crisis, high cost of living and other entrenched ills. Becerra campaigned as a battle-tested warrior against the Republican president and a champion of affordable healthcare. He could make history as the state’s first elected Latino governor.
Hilton’s victory was declared by the Associated Press on Tuesday, days after Becerra secured one of the top spots and a week after the June 2 election. Under California’s primary system, the two candidates who receive the most votes in the primary advance to the November general election, regardless of their party affiliation. According to the latest vote count, which is ongoing, Becerra has a slight edge over Hilton.
California Republican gubernatorial candidate Steve Hilton, center, flanked by lieutenant governor candidate Gloria Romero, left, and California Republican Party Chairwoman Corrin Rankin, right, hold a press conference to discuss election and voting reforms at the Los Angeles County Registrar-Recorder/County Clerk headquarters on Tuesday in Norwalk.
(Gary Coronado / For The Times)
Democrat Tom Steyer finished in third place. The hedge fund founder and environmental activist spent $216 million of his own money on his campaign, and now joins the legion of other high-profile, self-funding candidates rejected by California voters.
Becerra heads into the Nov. 3 election with a distinct advantage — Democratic voters in California outnumber Republicans by an almost 2-to-1 margin, a telltale reason why no GOP candidate has won a statewide race since 2006.
The contrast between Becerra and Hilton, both on policy and political personas, couldn’t be more pronounced.
A British immigrant and former political advisor to U.K. Prime Minister David Cameron, Hilton, 56, embraces traditional conservative ideals that have echoed across the country since the days of President Reagan — cutting taxes, weeding out government fraud and waste and promising to unbridle entrepreneurs and homebuilders from stifling state regulation.
But he’s also ventured into MAGA territory, declining to acknowledge that Trump lost the 2020 presidential election and promising to extradite California doctors who provide abortion pills to other states for prosecution.
Becerra, 68, came up in Los Angeles politics in the 1980s and has long supported policies to expand protections and resources for immigrants with or without legal status. Married to Harvard-educated OB-GYN Carolina Reyes, Becerra has also staunchly opposed abortion restrictions throughout his career.
In Congress and other positions, Becerra earned a reputation as a cerebral, analytical politician who would fully commit to his positions after taking time to mull them through.
A straight-laced family man with a Catholic upbringing, Becerra was more reserved during the debates — a quiet confidence that drew some voters to support him. He also faced criticism from his rivals for failing to offer detailed housing and healthcare policies.
Hilton, who cuts an unmistakable image with his bald crown and clipped English accent, proved himself as a polished communicator during the debates, skills honed by his years as a Fox News analyst.
Television hosts must translate complex issues into easily digestible sound bites, said Republican strategist Matt Klink. “Most voters want a CliffsNotes version of the issues,” Klink said.
Republican strategist Kevin Spillane credits Hilton’s TV show, “The Next Revolution,” which ran for six years, with boosting his profile, calling Fox News the most important media vehicle within the conservative and Republican framework.
Hilton “understands how politics and how communications work,” Spillane said.
He often appeared relaxed during the gubernatorial debates, at points even complimenting or joking with his rivals as they parried on stage.
At a CBS debate earlier this year, Becerra referred to President Trump, who endorsed Hilton, as the Republican candidate’s “daddy.” Hilton responded with a quip that quickly deflated the attack.
“It would be rather amazing,” said Hilton, at the possibility of being Trump’s son. “My daddy was the goalie for the Hungarian national ice hockey team.”
In an interview last week, before the election, Hilton said he enjoyed the debates. “In a weird way, I was sad when we had the last one,” he said. “I’m looking forward to debating whoever it is.”
As a former political advisor to Britain’s Conservative Party, Hilton helped usher in a green, socially liberal strain of conservatism.
He also infuriated colleagues in the coalition government, the British press reported, proposing a stream of unconventional ideas: scrapping maternity leave, abolishing job centers, even buying cloud-bursting technology so Britain would have more sunshine. In 2012, he moved full time to the Bay Area.
Hilton, who founded a nonprofit on California policies, was known for his frequent visits in the last couple of years to the state Capitol for discussions with legislators.
By contrast, Hilton presented himself as the “more cosmopolitan” candidate who “can talk to the hedge fund manager or the small-business owner or the Sacramento lobbyist,” said Klink said.
“Hilton was more energized at the end, when it mattered,” said Spillane, contrasting the two Republicans.
Past Republican candidates, including businessman John Cox in 2018 and former eBay CEO Meg Whitman in 2010, have self-financed their campaigns with their vast fortunes.
By contrast, Hilton spent just a few million dollars on media advertising, he said in an interview last week.
He said he ignored advice from consultants who told him to do a launch announcement and then unleash a wave of ads in the last month of the campaign.
“I just said, ‘I want to do it the old-fashioned way,’ and that’s what we’ve been doing,” said Hilton in the interview before the election. “We’ve been to nearly every single county…. stepped it up with our town halls.”
Nina Royal, 83, who lives in Los Angeles and is a community advocate for her Tujunga neighborhood, voted for Hilton, saying that he understands California’s problems.
“He’s a realist,” said Royal. “He has a clear view of what needs to be done.”
Times staff writer Jenny Jarvie contributed to this report.
New York Mayor Mamdani was among those critical of FIFA’s decision to ban water bottles at World Cup stadiums.
Published On 7 Jun 20267 Jun 2026
FIFA has made changes to its stadium policy, allowing fans to bring disposable water bottles into match stadiums after a ban earlier this week drew backlash from supporters and tournament host city officials.
FIFA’s initial policy permitted fans to carry empty, transparent, reusable plastic bottles up to 1 litre (34oz). However, the governing body made a U-turn on that policy on Thursday and banned fans from carrying reusable water bottles into venues due to safety concerns.
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The move essentially meant fans would have to buy water or soft drinks from concession stands in the stadium, where prices would “remain consistent with other events held at each stadium”, according to FIFA.
The backlash prompted FIFA to issue what it called a “clarification” on its stadium policy, saying: “All fans will be permitted to bring in one soft, plastic, 20-ounce (590ml), factory-sealed disposable water bottle into any FIFA World Cup 2026 match in the USA and Canada.
“Fans will not be permitted to bring in hard-sided, reusable water bottles due to safety and security reasons.”
The updated policy made no mention of the policy for stadiums in Mexico.
New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani was pleased with FIFA’s decision to reverse the water bottle ban.
“No one should have to fear being priced out of being hydrated, especially fans who are often waiting for hours before a game in extreme heat,” said football fanatic Mamdani, who has championed equitable prices for this World Cup in his home city. Last month, he made 1,000 tickets costing $50 available to city residents as match tickets reached well into four figures.
Forecasters have warned that fans could face health risks from extreme heat at open-air venues during the World Cup, which is being cohosted by the United States, Canada and Mexico from June 11 to July 19.
A report published by the World Weather Attribution research group last month estimated that 26 of 104 games at the World Cup are likely to be played in conditions where the Wet Bulb Global Temperature (WBGT) exceeds 26 degrees Celsius (78.8 degrees Fahrenheit).
WBGT is a measure of heat stress on the human body, which combines temperature, humidity, wind and sunlight.
At last year’s FIFA Club World Cup in the US, where fans complained of searing temperatures, supporters were also barred from bringing water bottles into venues.
FIFA has noted that misting stations, fans, hydration stations and cooling tents would be available in “the stadium footprint”.
Fans at the 2022 Qatar World Cup were also not permitted to bring reusable water bottles into stadiums.
A federal judge sided with California and other Democratic states on Friday in a preliminary injunction that blocked the Trump administration’s attempt to condition food benefits on compliance with the president’s policies on gender and immigration.
Twenty states and the District of Columbia filed a lawsuit in March against the Trump administration in U.S. District Court in Massachusetts, arguing that the “unlawful” and “unconstitutional” funding requirements are vague and designed to force policies on states.
Billions in federal funding are ultimately at stake, including money for school lunch programs that provide meals to 30 million children nationwide and food stamps that support about 40 million Americans living in low-income households.
“As the Trump Administration tries to use essential programs and billions in funding as leverage to advance their hateful, discriminatory agenda, California continues to fight to uphold the law and ensure that our communities can continue to access the funding they need to thrive,” said California Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta in a statement.
The policy shift from the United States Department of Agriculture marks another effort by the president to force left-leaning states to submit to his positions on hot-button political and cultural issues to receive government funding. California’s current budget relies on $174.5 billion in federal dollars, or roughly one-third of the overall state budget funds.
The funding conditions from the USDA relate to gender ideology, women and girls’ sports and immigration, according to the lawsuit.
States argue that the conditions do not explain what activities are prohibited for entities that receive grants. The USDA did not cite any law allowing the organization to impose anti-discrimination policies that go beyond federal law, the suit states.
The states that joined the lawsuit contend that they are left with the “unlawful” choice of adhering to the conditions or risk losing up to $74 billion in collective federal assistance from the USDA.
U.S. District Judge Myong Joun approved a preliminary injunction Friday and is expected to issue a memorandum later explaining the decision, according to the Associated Press.
BOSTON — A federal judge on Friday struck down a Trump administration policy enacted after the shooting of two National Guard members that made it harder for immigrants from dozens of countries to stay and enter the U.S.
In a ruling harshly criticizing the administration, U.S. District Chief Judge John McConnell Jr. said the policy “threw the lives of countless immigrants living in the United States into indeterminate legal limbo,” and he accused the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services of ignoring the law.
“In enacting its latest immigration policies, USCIS: claims statutory and regulatory authority that it does not possess; makes decisions without the reasoned explanations that it must provide; acts without regard for the reliance interests of applicants that it must consider; and justifies its actions with pretextual concerns of ‘national security’ that mask anti-immigrant sentiments that it is forbidden from letting influence its decision-making,” he wrote. “In legal terms that means USCIS’s actions are contrary to law and arbitrary and capricious.”
A spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The policies enacted after the National Guard shooting last year meant that immigrants from 39 African, Asian, Latin American and Middle Eastern countries have been “categorically barred” from receiving final decisions on, among other things, their asylum, work permit, green card and citizenship applications.
“This ruling reaffirms a basic principle: the federal government cannot shut down lawful immigration pathways or discriminate against people based on where they come from,” said Skye Perryman, president and CEO of Democracy Forward, which represented the plaintiffs in the case. “These unlawful policies caused enormous harm to families, workers, asylum-seekers, and communities across the country who were left in limbo, unable to work, access protections, or move forward with their lives.”
The policies apply to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, which approves applications for immigrants to work and become citizens. The agency, which is within the Homeland Security Department, often grants asylum, but only for those already in the United States when they apply. Immigration judges grant asylum to those who are stopped at the border; the ruling does not affect them, and neither do the policies that sparked the lawsuit.
It is part of an ongoing effort by the administration to tighten U.S. entry standards for travel and immigration, in what critics say unfairly prevents travel for people from a broad range of countries. The administration suggested it would expand the restrictions after the arrest of an Afghan national suspect in the shooting of two National Guard troops over Thanksgiving weekend.
In its motion to dismiss, which the court denied, the government argued that Congress gave the executive branch broad authority over immigration policy, including “the entry of aliens into the United States as well as discretion within the statutory scheme to confer as well as withdraw various discretionary benefits.”
“This case rests on a remarkable premise: that a federal court should prevent an agency from issuing the very policy guidance that provides government personnel with the guardrails necessary to ensure consistent, non-arbitrary, and individualized decisionmaking consistent with federal law,” the government wrote in its brief.
Immigration groups celebrated the ruling.
“This ruling sets a powerful precedent that the administration cannot ignore the law as laid down by Congress and cannot arbitrarily bar immigration benefits on the basis of national origin by fiat,” said Jamal Abdi, president at the National Iranian American Council. “Fortunately, this is still a nation of laws, and those who uphold America’s values have recourse to challenge and push back on such discriminatory, arbitrary policies.”
Shawn VanDiver, a Navy veteran who heads a coalition that supports Afghan resettlement efforts called #AfghanEvac, said the ruling was a “significant victory for the rule of law and for thousands of Afghan allies and other immigrants who followed every requirement asked of them.”
“Just this week in Dallas and Fort Worth, we met people who feared losing jobs because delayed work permit renewals threatened their livelihoods, families who postponed education, travel, and homeownership because they did not know when their cases would be resolved, and future Americans who had expected to become citizens only to see their applications stall without explanation,” VanDiver said.
Sonja Shaw — a Trump-aligned conservative Republican whose public profile rose as she became identified with culture-war causes, including banning transgender athletes from girls’ sports — has emerged as the leading vote-getter in the June primary for California’s superintendent of public instruction.
With more than 80% of precincts at least partially reporting, Shaw was well ahead of Democrat Richard Barrera, holding a lead that would be difficult to surmount.
Both Shaw and Barrera are school board presidents.
Shaw heads the elected Board of Education for Chino Valley Unified in San Bernardino County, a diverse but substantially conservative inland portion of Southern California.
Barrera heads the school board of San Diego Unified, the state’s second largest school district, serving an area with liberal leanings, but that is also politically diverse.
In the primary Shaw was greatly helped by a candidate field that included seven Democrats — most with a voter and financial base that would make them competitive. Incoming results show they divided votes among themselves.
Shaw managed to consolidate the Republican vote, which put her on top for the primary. A second Republican candidate finished far behind her.
On Tuesday night, Shaw sounded hopeful and confident that her campaign themes were resonating beyond her conservative roots.
“I am humbled and grateful that Californians from every corner of our state have rallied behind this campaign,” Shaw said in a statement. “What we’ve built is more than a campaign. It’s a diverse movement of communities who believe our schools can do better and who are determined to make that happen.”
Among its high-profile actions, the Chino Valley board majority put forward a policy that would require parents to be notified if their child expressed gender-identity issues at school. Shaw and her allies also approved a policy that allows parents to challenge the content of library books.
Positioned in a runoff against one Democrat — in a state where Democrats dominate — makes for a challenging campaign.
“Tonight is not the finish line,” Shaw said. “It’s the beginning of the final stretch.”
Barrera, who was not available for comment late Tuesday night, benefited immensely from a $5 million independent expenditure campaign from the California Teachers Assn., which, in the recent past, has seemed determined to spend whatever it takes to get an ally into the state superintendent’s office.
Barrera, besides his work as a longtime public official, has been a senior aide to current state Superintendent Tony Thurmond. Thurmond could not run again because of term limits and instead mounted an unsuccessful campaign for governor.
The state superintendent has limited authority over school districts, which are locally managed. The officeholder instead manages the California Department of Education. This agency guides local school districts and also provides partial oversight. The state superintendent also typically takes advantage of the bully pulpit on education issues.
The office has an uncertain future because Gov. Gavin Newsom is pushing a proposal to reimagine the office and redistribute some of its duties.
In recent years, the security strategy and foreign policy of the United States have witnessed a fundamental transformation in their main principles, as demonstrated by the second US-Israeli war against Iran, which this author refers to as the “Second Iran War” to distinguish it from the first military confrontation between these three parties in the summer of 2025, known as the “Twelve-Day War.”
The leadership factor, represented by President Donald Trump, has become an unprecedentedly broad influence on the decision-making process related to US foreign policy and national security, whether concerning the declaration and conclusion of war, or even in peacetime, particularly regarding Washington’s relations with its traditional allies in Europe and the Middle East.
This analysis focuses on the case of the “Second Iran War” as a clear example of the increasing role of the US president’s personal characteristics in shaping strategic decisions related to this war and managing Washington’s relations with its partners in the Arabian Gulf region.
This analysis is divided into two main sections, as follows:
First, the traditional determinants of US security strategy and foreign policy.
Second, the Trump administration and the growing role of the president in foreign policy and national security.
Third, the Second Iran War as a model for the increasing influence of the leadership factor in the US decision-making process.
First, the traditional determinants of US security strategy and foreign policy:
There is a set of traditional constraints governing decision-making in the United States, both in domestic and foreign policy. These constraints stem intrinsically from the nature of the American political system, the constitutional and societal environment within which it operates, and the historical development of the nation some 250 years ago.
In summary, these constraints can be divided into the following:
1. Constitutional and historical constraints, including the federal constitution and the practical actions of foreign and security policy-making institutions over the past decades.
2. Institutional determinants, which consist of the roles exercised by the legislative, executive, and judicial branches as defined by the Constitution, including: Congress (the House of Representatives and the Senate), and the federal departments and agencies concerned with U.S. foreign policy and national security (the Departments of State and Defense, the National Security Council, and the various intelligence agencies, most notably the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA)).
3. Political determinants, foremost among them the role played by the President of the United States in decision-making—what political literature calls the “leadership factor”—which is determined, broadly or narrowly, by a range of considerations, including: the President’s political experience, personal characteristics and interests, and ideological orientations, convictions, and personal preferences.
Traditionally, American historical experience indicates that constitutional and institutional constraints have a dominant influence on foreign policy and national security decision-making, compared to the limited influence of the president’s personal characteristics and psychological environment.
This has resulted in a near-consistency in the general direction of US foreign policy and security strategy across successive administrations, regardless of the president’s party affiliation (Democrat or Republican) or personality traits.
Second, the Trump administration and the growing role of the president in foreign policy and national security:
Unlike previous administrations, Republican President Donald Trump, since his first presidential term (2016-2020), has expanded his role in the decision-making process related to US foreign policy and its security strategy abroad, to the point of bypassing the federal institutions responsible for making this policy and strategy, or at the very least marginalizing the role of these institutions and failing to coordinate with them in advance in an unprecedented manner.
Trump’s interference in this regard, and his violation of institutional limits during his second presidential term, which began in January 2025, has increased to the point of causing great embarrassment to those in charge of American foreign and security policy-making institutions on the one hand, and on the other hand, it has led to pushing towards taking decisions – or at best adopting a declared political discourse – that has caused great damage to the foreign relations of the United States and posed a threat to its strategic interests as a superpower, whether with its immediate geographical neighborhood in the Americas (Canada, Mexico, Venezuela, and Cuba), or with its traditional transatlantic allies (Europe and NATO), and finally with important partners in the Middle East region.
Without going into detail about the reasons for this excessive interference by President Trump in American foreign policy and security strategy, in our estimation, this is largely due to the psychological and personal characteristics of the Republican president, whose political discourse and vocabulary indicate that he considers himself the “savior” of the United States and personally qualified to restore it to its glory, which he expresses in his election slogan “Make America Great Again.”
Third, the Second Iran War as a model for the increasing influence of the leadership factor in the US decision-making process:
The events of the second Iran-Iraq War, which began on February 28, 2016, provide a clear example of the growing influence of leadership dynamics, at the expense of constitutional and institutional constraints, in shaping and implementing American foreign policy and security strategy decisions under the Trump administration.
This assertion is supported by two key indicators, as follows:
1. Washington’s Decisions to Launch the War and the Negotiations Related to Ending It:
A close examination of Washington’s decision to launch the war against Iran on the morning of Saturday, February 28, 2026, reveals that President Trump based this decision on his personal convictions regarding the reliability of the reports and information provided to him by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu – with whom he has a friendly and politically harmonious relationship – concerning the threat posed by Tehran’s nuclear program and its ballistic missile capabilities to Israel, America, and the region. He believed that the opportunity was ripe to quickly eliminate the religious regime in Iran by launching a powerful and swift military strike that would lead to its downfall after instigating an internal uprising.
In contrast, Trump ignored warnings from US foreign policy, national security, and defense institutions about the risks and feasibility of a war against Iran from the perspective of vital US interests in the Middle East. The Republican president also disregarded the reservations of senior administration officials regarding this military strike, including Vice President J.D. Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, and Special Envoy for Middle East Peace Steve Wittkopf.
Further bolstering this claim are Trump’s attempts to deny that Israel pushed him into this war. He has asserted on more than one occasion that he made the decision himself, and even that he was the one who pushed Tel Aviv to engage in it. He has also emphasized on other occasions that the matter of negotiating and ending the war is solely his responsibility, and that Netanyahu is simply doing what he asks of him regarding the war with Iran.
According to the literature of political psychology and the principles of political communication, when politicians exaggerate their denial of something, or deny it without directly accusing them, it often confirms the accusation, not the other way around.
This claim is is further supported by reports in the US indicating that Trump sent the Israeli Prime Minister a draft memorandum of understanding between Washington and Tehran to end the war, as part of the US president’s consultations to reach a final decision on ending the conflict.
This means that Trump made his decision to wage war on Iran—and will most likely make his final decision regarding negotiations to end it—based on elements of his psychological environment and personality traits, and not on the factual data contained in the reports and recommendations of the foreign policy and national security agencies, which are based primarily on the strategic interests of the United States and its international and regional orientations.
2. The Harshness and Crudeness of US Presidential Rhetoric Towards Strategic Partners in the Arabian Gulf:
President Trump’s public political discourse since the start of the war has included statements characterized by an unprecedented level of harshness in American policy towards Washington’s strategic partners in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries.
For decades, the United States has maintained a balanced and rational approach to its relations with the Gulf states, a relationship cemented by strategic alliances and defense agreements since the 1991 Gulf War. This was true even during periods of open tension or simmering resentment between the US and some Gulf capitals.
In our estimation, this is explained by the fact that successive administrations and presidents in the White House have based their decisions, policies, and political discourse in general, and towards their allies and strategic partners in particular, on the constitutional and institutional parameters for drawing up and making Washington’s foreign policy and security strategy, especially in the vital geographical areas for national security and American strategic interests, as is the case with the Middle East region and at its heart the Arabian Gulf region.
However, in a departure from this approach and in an unprecedented move, the second Iran-Iraq War witnessed Trump’s political rhetoric, which included insults to some Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) states and belittling of others. He even went so far as to issue explicit and public threats against one of the Gulf Arab states, the Sultanate of Oman, in a surprising, shocking, and unprecedented act.
On May 28, 2016, Trump threatened Oman, saying he would “blow it up” if it cooperated with Iran on joint management of the Strait of Hormuz. The US Treasury Department also threatened to impose sanctions on Muscat if it proceeded with an agreement with Tehran to manage the strait, which Iran had used as a weapon of economic pressure during the war.
Conclusion:
The leadership factor, represented by the president’s personal characteristics, psychological environment, and political beliefs, has become the pivotal and most important factor in shaping US foreign policy and national security decisions during the administration of President Donald Trump, including the decision to go to war. This has come at the expense of the diminishing influence of other objective determinants, most notably constitutional and institutional ones.
This was clearly evident in Trump’s behavior and political rhetoric during the Second Iran War. This unprecedented development is likely to continue during the remaining two years of the Republican president’s term, until 2028.
The second Iran war demonstrated that such actions would negatively impact Washington’s future relations with its allies and strategic partners, or at the very least, erode trust in it as a reliable and credible international partner.
Furthermore, it would severely damage the prevailing image of the United States, both in the eyes of American and international public opinion, as an international superpower governed by institutions rather than individuals.
WASHINGTON — A Trump administration policy illegally banned transgender troops from military service, a divided panel of federal appeal court judges ruled on Monday.
The majority opinion by a three-judge panel from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia circuit largely upholds a March 2025 ruling by U.S. District Judge Ana Reyes in Washington, D.C. Reyes concluded that President Trump’s executive order to exclude transgender troops from military service likely violates their constitutional rights.
The administration appealed after Reyes issued a preliminary injunction requested by attorneys for six transgender people who are active-duty service members and two others seeking to join the military. The appeal court’s majority decided that the injunction should be narrowed to the plaintiffs currently serving in the military but not those seeking to join.
The ruling won’t immediately go into effect, allowing the administration time to ask the full appeals court to hear the case.
The U.S. Supreme Court allowed the transgender military ban to go into effect last year, as litigation continues to play out. Another lawsuit challenging the ban was filed in Washington state and led to a ruling in favor of the plaintiffs challenging the policy in that case.
In January 2025, Trump signed an executive order that claims the sexual identity of transgender service members “conflicts with a soldier’s commitment to an honorable, truthful, and disciplined lifestyle, even in one’s personal life” and is harmful to military readiness.
In response to the order, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth issued a policy that presumptively disqualifies people with gender dysphoria from military service. Gender dysphoria is the distress that a person feels because their assigned gender and gender identity don’t match. The medical condition has been linked to depression and suicidal thoughts.
The policy “appears to be driven by the bare desire to harm a politically unpopular group: persons who identify as transgender,” Judge Robert Wilkins wrote for the majority. Wilkins was nominated to the court by Democratic President Obama.
In a dissenting opinion, Judge Justin Walker said judges lack the power to second-guess the decision to exclude transgender troops.
“We have neither the expertise nor the authority to decide whether the military can exclude the plaintiffs from its ranks. The Constitution assigns that authority to Congress and the Commander in Chief,” wrote Walker, who was nominated by Trump, a Republican.
Judge Judith Rogers, who was nominated by Democratic President Clinton, joined Wilkins’ opinion but also partially dissented.
Kunzelman and Whitehurst write for the Associated Press.
The airline may now have to walk back its recently revised policy after significant backlash from some customers – it has been a point of contention for passengers online
Rachel Vickers-Price UK and World News Reporter
07:49, 29 May 2026Updated 07:50, 29 May 2026
(Image: Getty Images)
An airline that faced significant backlash for its controversial “customers of size” policy may now be forced to walk back on recent changes regarding plus-sized passengers.American commercial carrier Southwest Airlines changed its Customer of Size policy in January, when the airline moved to assigned seating. The updated guidelines require travellers who were unable to fit between lowered armrests to buy a second seat ahead of their journey. Passengers arriving without a prior reservation for an extra seat faced being rebooked if the flight reached capacity, or they were compelled to pay high same-day prices for the additional space.
But on Tuesday (May 26), one TikTok user reported to have been told “the best news ever” by a Southwest gate agent.
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In the short social media clip, the traveller claimed Southwest is “rescinding at least part of their new customer of size policy” that went into effect at the start of year. January. “They will be changing back to the original policy, at least in some form, where you can come into the airport and get an additional seat booked for you at no cost,” the woman in the video claimed. “You will no longer have to pre-purchase the seat.”But, as per a statement shared with Newsweek, the airline recently said: “On flights where seats are available, our agents at the airport are empowered to provide an additional seat at no extra cost to customers who require one.”
The statement added: “If another seat is not available., we will work to accommodate the customer on a later flight. We continue to encourage customers who need an additional seat to book it in advance to help alleviate any last-minute inconvenience at the airport.” The statement to Newsweek left several questions unanswered, specifically regarding the timeline for these implementations and whether passengers who choose to pre-purchase an additional seat would remain eligible for refunds.
President Trump’s administration is suing four states over their refusal to issue undercover license plates to federal agents, the latest front in the wider struggle between the White House and Democratic-led states over the Republican president’s immigration crackdown.
The Department of Justice alleges in separate lawsuits announced Thursday that Maine, Massachusetts, Oregon, and Washington state are imposing unconstitutional restrictions that it says impede law enforcement and threaten agents’ safety.
“By denying undercover license plates to DHS components, including ICE, while issuing them to their own state agencies, these governors are pursuing discriminatory and obstructionist policies against federal law enforcement,” said acting Atty. Gen. Todd Blanche in a statement.
“These actions undermine federal immigration enforcement, allow dangerous criminals to escape justice, and terrorize American communities,” Blanche added.
The Justice Department filed the suits on Wednesday in U.S. district courts in the respective states. The four state governments are accused of trying “to obstruct the Federal Government’s immigration enforcement efforts, even though control over immigration and the nation’s borders is an exclusive federal power.”
Additionally, the Justice Department argues in the suits that the U.S. Constitution’s Supremacy Clause bars state governments from regulating federal law enforcement.
Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows, who oversees her state’s plate program and is also a Democratic candidate for governor, said she’s confident her decisions will hold up in court.
“What ICE did in Maine and continues to do was terrorize our friends and neighbors,” Bellows said in an interview Thursday. “There are no secret police in a democracy and we will always stand up for our Mainers safety and freedom.”
A spokesperson for Massachusetts Atty. Gen. Joy Campbell said the state’s lawyers are “reviewing the complaint and will defend the RMV policy to the greatest extent possible.”
Officials in Washington and Oregon did not respond to a request for comment on the federal action.
Feds say agents are endangered when easily identified
The administration asserts that federal agents “frequently investigate and apprehend violent criminals, including cartel members, gang members, sex offenders, human traffickers, and other violent offenders” and says making those authorities easily identifiable subjects them to increased harassment and potential physical harm.
The lawsuit comes after a back-and-forth between the DOJ and some state officials. The administration previously sent state officials letters demanding they justify their policies.
Maine Atty. Gen. Aaron Frey answered the Justice Department last week, defending his state’s policy and disputing the DOJ’s contention that it has hampered federal enforcement actions.
“Rather, the program reflects a legitimate and constitutional policy choice by the SOS not to allow its resources to be commandeered by the federal government for use in civil immigration enforcement activities that have, in Maine and elsewhere, resulted in multiple incidents of abusive and unconstitutional conduct by DHS officials,” Frey wrote.
Bellows, in her role as secretary of state, announced a pause on confidential license plates in January, after federal authorities ramped up their immigration enforcement activities in the state. Bellows said at the time that the state wanted to be “assured that Maine plates will not be used for lawless purposes.”
The federal suit against Maine argues that the state “has issued confidential license plates to law enforcement agencies for many years” and that “such plates are explicitly authorized under Maine law.” The state’s review this year, the suit argues, resulted in unlawful state regulation of the federal government by requiring federal applicants for state license plates to attest that federal vehicles that obtained confidential plates would not be used for civil immigration enforcement. The suit also states that Maine did not impose commensurate requirements on state or local agencies applying for the plates, making the program discriminatory against the federal government.
Bellows has previously defended her decision.
“When ICE asked for confidential license plates, I said no” because “covert civil immigration enforcement is not something Maine will facilitate,” she said last week.
Arguments are similar to debate over agents’ masks
The Trump administration’s arguments on the license plates are similar to its defense of federal agents wearing masks on their deployments to American cities. That became a flashpoint in an extended government shutdown over Department of Homeland Security funding, as Democrats on Capitol Hill demanded key changes to how Trump’s mass deportation plans were carried out after masked federal agents killed two U.S. citizen protesters in Minnesota.
The White House and DHS have maintained the agency’s mask policy, and the administration already has won a federal court order blocking a California law that barred law enforcement officials from covering their faces in the state.
Additionally, the administration has been at odds with so-called sanctuary cities where local law enforcement does not assist federal authorities with immigration enforcement. And Blanche has instructed the Justice Department’s Civil Division to identify all state and local laws, policies, and practices that could impede what the administration describes as “lawful federal operations.”
Barrow and Whittle write for the Associated Press. Barrow reported from Atlanta. Whittle reported from Scarborough, Maine.
WASHINGTON — Republicans are unhappier with President Trump’s handling of the economy than they were a few months ago, but they’re largely continuing to stand behind him as the war with Iran continues, a new AP-NORC poll finds.
The poll comes as the Mideast war fuels higher gasoline prices, while the U.S. and Iran struggle to move toward a permanent ceasefire. Trump’s hold on the GOP remains strong, as he demonstrated Tuesday when his handpicked candidate defeated Rep. Thomas Massie, a critic of the president, in a primary election challenge. The findings highlight Trump’s continued strength within the Republican Party, even as economic frustration grows.
Ariel Gutierrez, a 55-year-old Republican in Wisconsin, usually requires his teenage children to pay for their own gas. But with spiking gas costs, he’s helping out his 15-year-old, who’s just learning to drive.
“The whole Iran issue has just exacerbated it,” he said. “Maybe we were seeing it in groceries before, but now — with this push on gas and travel and all that — that is how people want to live the leisure part of their lives … and it is directly impacting us there now. And yes, that is, I believe from Trump’s policies, not from his predecessors.”
Trump remains unpopular outside his base. Most Americans continue to disapprove of Trump’s approach to both Iran and foreign policy. His overall approval rating in the new poll stands at 37%, up slightly from 33% in April. Nearly all Democrats disapprove of his performance as president, as do about 7 in 10 independents.
The economy remains a struggle
About one-third of U.S. adults approve of how Trump is handling the economy. That’s in line with an AP-NORC poll conducted in late April, but down slightly from the start of his second term, when 40% of U.S. adults approved.
The economy was a strength for Trump in his first term, but he’s struggled with skepticism about his handling of the issue since his return to the White House last year, after repeatedly promising to bring prices down. His second-term economic approval has fallen among Republicans, in particular. While a majority, 63%, still approve, that’s down from 79% in February, a few weeks before the war with Iran began.
Richard Baumgartner, a 77-year-old Republican from Las Vegas, believes higher costs are a necessary side effect of the war, which he supports.
“Unfortunately, because of the war, the economy is a little bit off-kilter,” Baumgartner said. “I think it’ll fall back into place after things resolve over there. Temporary price increases — it’s unfortunate, but it’s something that has to be confronted in a situation like this where you have a very serious problem.”
Trump regains some strength on immigration
Although economic promises were pivotal to Trump’s reelection, so were his goals of stricter immigration enforcement — and this issue may be reemerging as an asset.
Immigration emerged as one of Trump’s strengths early in his second term, with about half of U.S. adults saying they liked his approach, but approval of his handling of the issue dipped to 38% in January and February, after months of aggressive immigration enforcement that led to the shooting deaths of two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis.
Now, just under half of U.S. adults, 45%, approve of how he is handling that issue.
Brenda Theiss, an independent from Cullman, Ala., doesn’t like everything Trump is doing. But she gives him credit for being willing to disrupt the status quo to reduce the flow of immigrants who are in the country illegally, compared with Democratic Presidents Obama and Biden.
“I liked Obama; I voted for Obama — but Trump was the only one that did something. All of the other presidents sat back and went, ‘Well, there’s nothing we can do,’” the 73-year-old said. “He’s closing the border. He did it. Biden didn’t do it. For that, I give him one hundred.”
Over the last few months, the Trump administration has appeared to recalibrate its approach on immigration, moving away from aggressive, public-facing tactics toward a quieter approach to enforcement.
Immigration remains one of Trump’s stronger issues among Republicans. About 8 in 10 approve of his handling of the issue, which is roughly 10 points higher than the share who say he’s doing a good job as president.
Few approve of Trump on Iran or issues abroad
Trump’s handling of the war with Iran remains unpopular.
Only about one-third of U.S. adults approve of how he is handling Iran. Roughly two-thirds of Republicans approve, though an AP-NORC poll conducted last month found that younger Republicans are more likely to disapprove of Trump’s performance on the issue than older ones.
Similarly, about one-third of Americans approve of Trump’s approach to foreign policy. Though Trump has zeroed in on a more aggressive international approach this year — including capturing the leader of Venezuela and threatening Cuba — Americans’ views of his overall handling of foreign policy have not shifted significantly in recent months.
Amanda Wylie, a 22-year-old who lives in Athens, Ga., says Iran is one of the few issues where Trump doesn’t have her support.
“I feel like we’re wasting resources over there at this point and not for the benefit of the American people,” said Wylie, who identifies as a Republican-leaning independent. “Especially if everyone is worried about gas prices and the ultimate goal of this is to prevent Iran from having a nuclear weapon. Yes, that’s important, but at what cost?”
Sanders and Thomson-Deveaux write for the Associated Press. The AP-NORC poll of 1,117 adults was conducted May 14-18 using a sample drawn from NORC’s probability-based AmeriSpeak Panel, which is designed to be representative of the U.S. population. The margin of sampling error for adults overall is plus or minus 3.8 percentage points.
Romero is a founding member of the Mano a Mano initiative. (Venezuelanalysis)
Liccia Romero is a prominent biologist and professor at the University of the Andes (ULA) in Mérida. Her academic and organizational work has been centered on the scientist-campesino alliance, in defense of food sovereignty and biodiversity in the páramo region, and in opposition to the logic of agribusiness.
In this interview, Romero discusses the challenges and achievements of the Mano a Mano (“Hand in Hand”) Agroecological Market, a grassroots initiative founded in 2010 that connects producers and consumers in Venezuela’s Andean region. She also talks about projects to expand agroecology, coordination with state institutions, and the importance of Venezuela’s Seed Law.
How have the producers at the Mano a Manomarket experienced the revival of this space given the pandemic and the economic blockade, and what strategies have they employed to adapt to Venezuela’s current reality?
The combination of the blockade and the pandemic beginning in 2020 brought about a shift in Mano a Mano’s dynamics. We had a biweekly delivery system organized around prepaid orders, with a production rhythm established after 10 years of uninterrupted work.
We never even stopped during the guarimbas [insurrectionary opposition protests]. We always organized ourselves to hold the market every other Saturday and make our deliveries. And then, suddenly, the pandemic interrupted our activity with the lockdown. Later, although mobility restrictions were gradually eased, there were fuel shortages. This forced producers to employ various strategies, such as starting to sell directly from their farms.
For a time, Mano a Mano had a four-wheel-drive vehicle, thanks to support from the Ministry of Science and Technology, which helped with our distribution. Producers from remote areas would bring their harvests to a common location. This made it possible to organize a more feasible distribution route.
Another important development was that producers began transforming farm products into processed foods, with a longer shelf life. In this way, they reduced their reliance on delivering fresh produce and began processing a portion of it using various techniques. This slightly altered the profile of the production units.
Several Mano a Mano producer families have ventured into this field with great success, even creating lines of processed products. What’s interesting is that they not only process what they produce but can also source from nearby production units.
These are the strategies that have allowed people to sustain themselves. In other cases, smaller producers began selling at markets near their plots. There were also some who retired, or left production to their children, who no longer followed the agroecological methodology.
When we resumed the distribution events last June, the producers were able to organize quickly and establish a monthly delivery system with a different model, no longer based on prepayment. We have not been able to reorganize that way because that prepayment model relies on a level of income that has disappeared in Venezuela and for which there are still no signs of recovery.
Nevertheless, we continue with these monthly deliveries, which are tailored to the preferences of a number of families who have always supported us and who returned when we relaunched the agroecological markets.
Small plot assigned to Mano a Mano as part of its collaboration with the Agriculture Ministry. (Mano a Mano)
What is the profile of the producers who make up the Mano a Mano network, and how does this initiative bridge the gap between rural and urban areas?
Since Mano a Mano defines itself as a local production and consumption network with the city of Mérida as its hub, most of the producers who bring their products to the market are located in the state’s coffee-growing and livestock-raising regions.
This is an area located between 1,000 and 1,800 meters above sea level, where agroforestry crops and some short-cycle crops typical of this environment predominate. For example, in the drier areas, bell peppers, onions, and tomatoes are grown. In wetter areas, we have agroforestry systems with coffee and bananas. There are also unconventional crops that are native to this region such as sacha inchi, yacon, and chachafruto. We are trying to introduce them in our distributions.
Some people have had great success producing yacon honey, primarily for consumers with medical conditions like diabetes. Flours, such as chachafruto flour, are also processed for those seeking gluten-free foods. Additionally, we have sacha inchi, an innovative food that can be used to create novel recipes by combining it with coffee and cacao.
We also have production units at greater altitudes dedicated to growing root vegetables, such as potatoes and carrots, as well as vegetables.
Producers who are part of agroecological circuits contact us, and we establish connections so that some of them can coordinate with various local producers, bring the products, and be present at the market. In this way, we minimize travel as much as possible. The idea is not to exceed a radius of 90 km [from Mérida city]. That is the distance we believe is most reasonable for everything to work well.
Previously, Mano a Mano was organized through in-person assemblies, but currently, these interactions take place mainly in digital spaces. We have a group with the producers registered in the organization, where we plan delivery dates, conditions, and prices. Not all producers can join this group. Rather, each member has undergone a verification process on their farms and agrees to regular visits to monitor their production process.
Our goal is to hold in-person meetings two or three times a year to make decisions, such as undertaking new projects. On the administrative side, we have a board of directors that is institutionally responsible for the agreements we enter into. For example, the one we currently have with the Ministry of Agriculture.
What agroecological and traditional campesino techniques do Mano a Mano producers use for planting, soil management, and pest control, and how do they maintain productivity and quality?
There are several basic principles. The main strategy is diversification. We must move as far away from monocultures as possible. The more diverse the system, the better. It will offer many advantages in the face of technical, production, and market challenges.
What is the basis of that diversification? Seed diversity –open-pollinated seeds. That is why, at Mano a Mano, we promote and are part of all movements in favor of open-pollinated seeds and against privatization. Free seeds, in the hands of campesino families, stand in opposition to all processes of seed control. These two strategies –open-source seeds and crop diversification –form the foundation.
Then there are specific techniques. For example, depending on the circumstances, intensive soil revitalization and recovery processes can be carried out using mountain microorganisms, or as some call them, efficient microorganisms.
There is also the use of organic fertilizers and the entire process of planning planting, management, and harvesting with a preventive approach to diseases and pests. The other strategy is consumer education,that is, teaching consumer families that their consumption should align with production cycles. Certain harvest times are more favorable for specific products.
On the other hand, depending on the circumstances, we have worked on implementing water-saving techniques in semi-arid areas and techniques to prevent erosion. We have also worked on the use of mulch and crop rotation as mechanisms to regenerate and protect soils. Depending on the area, we have used contour farming, minimum tillage, recycling, the use of crop residues, and on-site fertilizer production.
Liccia Romero (second from right) in a Mano a Mano distribution event. (Mano a Mano)
How does the recent support from the Ministry of Agriculture align with the autonomy and self-management nature of the Mano a Mano market, and what mechanisms have its members created to preserve their grassroots organization?
The question is interesting because we were the ones who sought that alliance, as we believe that the work we do should have an impact and win over those responsible for public policies.
One way to achieve this was to reach an agreement to occupy an office space and a garden at the Ministry, as well as to carry out joint activities: product exchange events, workshops, festivals, fairs, etc. Additionally, this is where the research projects supported by the Ministry of Science and Technology are carried out.
The most important thing right now is an initiative of participatory agroecological certification. We are developing a methodology to rigorously comply with this certification, so that we can issue seals endorsed by both government agencies and private entities.
Our collaboration with the Agriculture Ministry is based on mutual respect and collaboration. We focus on what we have in common, not on our differences.
We know that Mano a Mano is more than just a market. What other projects are currently underway?
Participatory agroecological certification is one of those projects that extends beyond Mano a Mano. Our idea is for this certification to serve as a tool for other agroecological hubs and campesino communities that want to establish sovereign certification processes.
In other words, we’re not interested in traditional corporate certification,which involves payments to companies or private certifiers,but rather in certifications that foster self-organization and self-management.
That is the methodology we are interested in, and we are now trying to establish links with other national organizations so that, once we have completed and submitted the respective reports to FONACIT [national science fund] and the Ministry of Science and Technology, we can democratize and share this proposal to begin transferring it to other spaces.
These are some of the things we promote: training programs in partnership with universities, the Institute of Environmental and Ecological Sciences, the graduate program in Agroecology at Simón Rodríguez University, etc.
Another initiative we carry out in partnership with other organizations is the Native Potato Ecofestival, an annual event now in its 14th year. This event takes place at the end of the year, in December, and not only celebrates the potato harvest but also showcases all the work done throughout the year, sharing it and promoting it on a national level.
We invite students, cooks, and farmers to create a space for community, but also for presentations, knowledge transfer, and seed distribution. It has the support of partner networks such as PROINPA, the universities I mentioned, and other local seed producers and agroecological organizations.
Native potato varieties from the Venezuelan Andes. (Archive)
Given the challenges small-scale campesinos face in a market dominated by agribusiness, does agroecologyrepresent a real alternative? What policies would be needed to make it viable in the current context?
I think we need a funding policy for agroecological initiatives, and there hasn’t been one for a long time. So it’s often said that agroecology only works on a small scale. It only works on a small scale because there is no large-scale support in agroecology.
If the available land isn’t the best, if people lack financing and have barely any access to basic resources like water and seeds, you can’t expect high yields. What we also need are policies that recognize the self-managed processes of agroecology as opposed to subjecting them to the savage capitalist market.
If a producer, after all the effort, rigor, and sacrifice, obtains a product but lacks a properly identified marketing and distribution channel, that product is lost. We must create conditions for these agroecological products, including health permits, because it makes no sense for contaminated products to have an easier ride.
We need these regulations and laws to be updated and adapted to our circumstances so that they become tools for progress rather than obstacles. The same applies to participatory agroecological certification: it is not a mechanism for control, but rather for promoting and facilitating the agroecological transition.
Furthermore, Venezuelan food policy and jurisprudence should begin to protect non-polluting agriculture that promotes resource conservation. Because it often happens that an agroecological area, or even an organic or biodynamic one, is surrounded by production units that use methods threatening that agroecological production, and Venezuelan jurisprudence and laws favor those who pollute over those trying to produce in a healthy way.
In fact, we are aware of cases where landowners who use agrochemicals intensively have sued families who have attempted to demand controls on the use of these chemicals. These lawsuits have been upheld by agricultural courts. In short, we need legislation that is consistent with the claim that Venezuela wants to conserve its resources by penalizing those who do not.
What is your current assessment of the issue of genetically modified foods in Venezuela, from seeds to imported foods?
In Venezuela, we are currently engaged in a battle in which we had made tremendous progress with the approval of the Seed Law in 2015. The law was very important because, first, it declares seeds to be a common good. In other words, it prevents their privatization. And second, it declares the promotion and reproduction of genetically modified seeds to be contrary to the national interest and the biodiverse functioning of our ecosystems.
Therefore, this is a landmark law for the ecosystemic logic of our country. Right now, there is a battle taking place amid all the contradictions we are facing as a country invaded by a nuclear power. So, we are at risk of losing that progress in this complex political moment, and we have done very poorly in the battle to educate about food.
There is great confusion among the population regarding the issue of genetically modified foods and their risks. This is a highly dangerous weapon for controlling a nation, jeopardizing its food security and food sovereignty. This technology represents a form of domination disguised as a production technique.
That is why the Venezuelan agroecological movement must ramp up an educational, advocacy, and training offensive so that our grassroots collectives, at least at the level of communes, producer organizations in rural areas, and consumer groups in cities, can be better informed about the risks. We still have time to capitalize on these comparative advantages of popular organization in the present and the future.
The law has succeeded in curbing the entry of GMOs. If it did not exist, we would face a clear invasion of genetically modified seeds. What we have failed to achieve above all is the grassroots organization needed to defend this achievement and advance it further. We need popular movements to take ownership of the Seed Law as valuable and sovereign tool at their disposal.
Fresh produce in a Mano a Mano market. (Mano a Mano)
The Los Angeles City Council on Wednesday voted in favor of new restrictions on so-called “pretextual” traffic stops, signaling a growing impatience with the Police Commission’s failure to rein in a controversial LAPD tactic that critics say enables racial discrimination.
The vote requests that the department’s all-civilian watchdog adopt new guidelines similar to San Francisco, which bars police officers from pulling people over for broken taillights and other minor equipment violations unless there is a safety threat.
“Board of Police Commissioners: Get this done; we’re watching, no excuses,” said Councilmember Imelda Padilla, who shared stories of her late father being stopped by police with no explanation. “This is what this generation wants.”
If the new policy were adopted, LAPD officers would be prohibited from stopping motorists, bicyclists or pedestrians for minor violations “except in cases where the violation poses a significant and imminent safety risk.”
The unanimous vote followed sometimes emotional testimony at a City Council meeting from Angelenos about how their lives had been shaken by discriminatory traffic stops and searches.
Several speakers pointed to a growing body of research showing that minor stops disproportionately affect Black and brown motorists and do little to combat violent crime while eroding public trust. In recent years, there have been several high-profile traffic stops that resulted in officers or drivers being killed.
The current LAPD policy, in place since 2022, requires officers to record themselves on their body-worn cameras stating the reasons for suspecting a more serious crime had occurred when making a stop for a minor infraction.
The measure passed Wednesday stops short of a categorical ban that some have sought, but was still met with cautious optimism by traffic safety reformers.
“It helps place the city of Los Angeles on a path of ending racial profiling by LAPD,” said Chauncee Smith, of Catalyst California, a group that advocates for racial justice.
Smith’s group recently released a report that said such stops have continued to disproportionately affect Black and Latino drivers.
Smith said the new policy advanced by the City Council represents “a more formal, explicit prohibition,” adding that he hopes the Police Commission will ultimately give officers even less discretion in deciding when to make stops.
In a brief statement after the vote, Mayor Karen Bass thanked Harris-Dawson for his “leadership and dedication in moving this updated policy forward.”
“I will work closely with the Police Commission and Chief [Jim] McDonnell to implement it and to provide officers with appropriate training,” Bass said.
Any changes to the policy will probably draw strong challenges from within the LAPD and the Los Angeles Police Protective League, the powerful union that represents the city’s rank-and-file officers.
McDonnell has publicly defended the stops as an essential law enforcement tool in the department’s fight against guns, gangs and drugs. He and some transportation safety advocates have argued that persistent traffic deaths — road fatalities have in recent years outpaced the number of homicides — indicate the city needs to crack down harder on reckless driving.
The proposed change comes against the backdrop of a broader effort by city leaders to wrest greater oversight of the LAPD from the Police Commission. A spokesperson for the civilian body said it would evaluate how to proceed.
“The Board intends to place this item on a forthcoming agenda to enable a full and transparent discussion of the Department’s pretextual stop policy, which will include the recommendations from the City Council,” the statement said.
McDonnell did not respond to a request for comment.
The vote was the latest move in a broader push to remove police officers from traffic enforcement. Some advocates have argued that more punitive approaches that prioritize arrests and traffic citations do little to keep city streets safe; instead, they argue the city should invest in unarmed civilian workers and speed bumps, roundabouts and other street modifications that could help curb unsafe driving.
Adrienna Wong, a senior attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union, said Wednesday’s vote showed city leaders taking action on an issue that was personal to them.
“I think what you saw today in council was the council members have lived experiences and are hearing from their constituents and are voting to represent their constituents in a way that the Police Commission has not,” she said.
WASHINGTON — White House economists estimate that President Trump’s deals with pharmaceutical companies to drop some of their U.S. prescription drug prices to what they charge in other countries could save $529 billion over the next 10 years.
The analysis obtained by the Associated Press includes the first economy-wide projections behind a policy at the core of Trump’s pitch to voters going into November’s midterm elections for control of the House and Senate. Democratic lawmakers have been doubtful about the savings claimed by Trump and these new numbers are likely to trigger additional questions about the data.
Cost-of-living issues are at the forefront of voters’ concerns and higher energy prices tied to the Iran war have deepened the public’s anxiety. Trump has tried in part to address affordability concerns by focusing on his efforts to cut deals with companies so that the cost of prescription drugs in the U.S. would no longer be dramatically higher than in other affluent nations.
“Now you have the lowest drug prices anywhere in the world,” Trump said at a Friday rally before a crowd of seniors in Florida. “And that alone should win us the midterms.”
The analysis was done by administration officials for the White House Council of Economic Advisers. They also estimated that federal and state governments could save a combined $64.3 billion on Medicaid during the next decade because of what Trump calls his “most favored nation” policy on drug prices.
Few of the details of the deals struck by the Trump administration and 17 leading pharmaceutical companies have been made public, making it hard to independently verify the projected savings. The White House analysis sought to estimate the prospective savings as more medications come onto the market and fall under Trump’s framework — with one model in the report tallying the possible savings at $733 billion over a decade.
Trump and his Department of Health and Human Services have touted his drug-pricing deals as transformative and urged Congress to codify their principles into law. Democratic lawmakers have challenged the administration’s claims of savings. Senate Finance Committee Ranking Member Ron Wyden, D-Ore., and 17 Senate Democrats in April proposed a measure requiring the administration to disclose the terms of the agreements signed by pharmaceutical companies.
“If these deals are so great, why is the Trump administration afraid of showing them to the public?” Wyden said when announcing the measure. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said his team would share details that didn’t include proprietary information or trade secrets.
The White House said it has not shared the text of the agreements because they include highly sensitive data that could move financial markets.
The potential savings estimated by the Trump administration would be substantial as Americans spent $467 billion on prescription drugs in 2024, according to the most recent government data available. The analysis is premised on the idea that foreign countries would also pay more for their prescription drugs, which would diversify drugmakers’ sources of revenue and preserve their ability to innovate with new treatments.
Outside economists have caveated that any savings might not flow directly to patients, many of whom already pay discounted prices for their drugs through their insurance coverage.
The Congressional Budget Office in October 2024 estimated that a plan similar to what Trump ended up adopting could reduce prescription drug prices by more than 5%, though the decrease “would probably diminish over time as manufacturers adjusted to the new policy by altering prices or distribution of drugs in other countries.”
The scope of the savings claimed by the Trump administration are likely to intensify the scrutiny by Democrats, who counter that any price reductions would be offset by higher costs for prescription drugs not covered by the “most favored nation” framework. One of their main critiques is that pharmaceutical companies have increased their profit margins while working with the administration.
In April, staff working for Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., released an analysis that looked at 15 of the companies that have agreed to this drug-pricing plan and found that their combined profits jumped 66% over the past year to $177 billion. The report noted that the tax cuts Trump signed into law last year “exempted or delayed many of the most expensive drugs” from price negotiations with Medicare.
The Trump administration has countered that they consider Sanders’ critique to be flawed, saying that it’s based on the list prices for pharmaceutical drugs instead of the actual price that patients pay.
WASHINGTON — President Clinton consulted congressional leaders Wednesday on his policy toward Bosnia but continued to avoid a firm commitment to seek congressional approval before deciding to send American forces there.
The 1973 War Powers Act requires the President to notify Congress in most cases before sending troops into areas of potential hostilities and requires that the troops be withdrawn within 60 days if Congress does not authorize their presence.
The law was enacted over President Richard Nixon’s veto. Each successive Administration has argued that it represents an unconstitutional infringement on the President’s powers as commander in chief.
During the last 12 years of Republican administrations, Democrats in Congress have made a major issue of support for the War Powers Act. That puts Clinton and his aides in a potentially difficult situation, which they have tried to avoid by evading questions about precisely where they stand.
Clinton continued that approach Wednesday. “Ask my lawyer, I don’t play lawyer,” he said when asked at a White House photo session whether he believes the law is constitutional. “I think it’s worked reasonably well.”
Later, White House Communications Director George Stephanopoulos said: “The President is reviewing the War Powers Act at this time. That is under review by the National Security Council and the counsel’s office.”
White House aides have fallen back on carefully worded pledges to consult with Congress in a manner that is “consistent with” the war powers law but not necessarily “pursuant to” it. Once Clinton decides on a course of action, he “will go to the Congress if it is required,” Stephanopoulos said.
President George Bush followed a somewhat similar path before the Persian Gulf War. Bush argued that he did not need congressional authorization before sending troops to the Gulf but urged Congress to pass a resolution authorizing the use of force against Iraq before the actual war began. Bush insisted, however, that he had the power to go ahead with the attack if Congress voted against him.
Clinton’s less clear-cut position appears to be acceptable to congressional leaders.
Although members of Congress have often touted the War Powers Act as an important safeguard against unbridled executive power, few over the last 20 years have relished the prospect of using it.
One indication of the weakness of the law came in the House on Wednesday when it finally got around to approving a resolution authorizing the sending of U.S. troops to Somalia. The authorization came five months after the troops were dispatched and the day after U.S. forces turned over control of the relief effort to the United Nations.
At a ceremony at the White House to honor troops returning from the African nation, Clinton linked their experiences with the events that may soon unfold in the former Yugoslav republics.
“Your successful return reminds us that other missions lie ahead for our nation,” he said. “You have proved again that our involvement in multilateral operations need not be open-ended or ill-defined, that we can go abroad and accomplish some distinct objectives and then come home again when the mission is accomplished.”
At a later White House ceremony, where he talked about the importance of rapid action on health care reform, Clinton defended his Administration against the charge that monitoring developments in Bosnia-Herzegovina has interfered with his other activities and that it has tried to do too many things at once.
“One of the most challenging things we have to do in this city at this time is to break a mind-set that we have one problem at a time and we’ll get on it and we’ll only think about that,” Clinton said.
