Politics

As Bolivia hurtles towards a hotly contested August 17 presidential election, two major shake-ups may shape the outcome of the race.

On Wednesday, incumbent President Luis Arce announced he would abandon his bid for re-election after a five-year term defined by turmoil.

“Today I firmly inform the Bolivian people of my decision to decline my candidacy for presidential re-election in the elections next August,” he wrote on social media.

“I do so with the clearest conviction that I will not be a factor in dividing the popular vote, much less facilitate the making of a fascist right-wing project that seeks to destroy the plurinational state.”

That same day, Bolivia’s constitutional court also ruled that Arce’s former political mentor, now rival, Evo Morales, could not run for another term as president, upholding a two-term limit.

But the left-wing Morales, the embattled former president who previously served three terms in office and attempted to claim a fourth, remained defiant on social media afterwards.

“Only the people can ask me to decline my candidacy,” Morales wrote. “We will obey the mandate of the people to save Bolivia, once again.”

The two announcements on Wednesday have added further uncertainty to an already tumultuous presidential race, where no clear frontrunner has emerged so far.

Arce’s decline

Since his election in 2020, Arce has led Bolivia, following a political crisis that saw Morales flee the country and a right-wing president briefly take his place.

But Arce’s tenure has been similarly mired in upheaval, as his relationship with Morales fractured and his government saw its popularity slip.

Both men are associated with a left-wing political party known as the Movement for Socialism (MAS), which Morales helped to found. Since its establishment three decades ago, the group has become one of the most prominent forces in Bolivian politics.

Still, in the lead-up to August’s election, Arce saw his poll numbers decline. Bolivia’s inflation over the past year has ballooned to its highest level in a decade, and the value of its currency has plummeted.

The country’s central bank has run low on its reserves of hard currency, and a black market has emerged where the value of the Bolivian currency is half its official exchange rate. And where once the country was an exporter of natural gas, it now relies on imports to address energy shortages.

While experts say some of these issues predate Arce’s term in office, public sentiment has nevertheless turned against his administration. That, in turn, has led some to speculate that Bolivia could be in store for a political shift this election year.

Arce himself has had to deal with the power of a rising right-wing movement in Bolivia. In 2022, for instance, his government’s decision to delay a countrywide census sparked deadly protests in areas like Santa Cruz, where some Christian conservative activists expected surveys to show growth.

That population increase was expected to lead to more government funds, and potentially boost the number of legislative seats assigned to the department.

Arce also faced opposition from within his own coalition, most notably from Morales, his former boss. He had previously served as an economy and finance minister under Morales.

The division between the two leaders translated into a schism in the MAS membership, with some identifying as Morales loyalists and others backing Arce.

That split came to a head in June 2024, when Arce’s hand-picked army general, Juan Jose Zuniga, led an unsuccessful coup d’etat against him. Zuniga publicly blamed Arce for Bolivia’s impoverishment, as well as mismanagement in the government.

Morales has seized upon the popular discontent to advance his own ambitions of seeking a fourth term as president. After the coup, he launched a protest march against his former political ally and tried to set an ultimatum to force changes.

After dropping out of the 2025 presidential race on Wednesday, Arce called for “the broadest unity” in Bolivia’s left-wing political movement. He said a show of strength behind a single candidate was necessary for “defeating the plunderers of Bolivia”.

“Only the united struggle of the people ensures the best future for Bolivia. Our vote will be united against the threat of the right and fascism,” he wrote on social media.

Morales continues to fight term limits

But a wild card remains on the left of Bolivia’s political spectrum: Morales himself.

Considered Bolivia’s first Indigenous president, Morales remains a relatively popular figure, though recent scandals have dented his broad appeal.

First elected as president in 2005, Morales was re-elected twice. But his attempts to remain in office culminated with the 2019 election and subsequent political crisis, which saw Morales resign and flee abroad amid accusations that his victory was the result of electoral fraud.

Morales has long sought a fourth term as president. In 2016, a referendum was put to Bolivia’s voters that would have scrapped presidential term limits, but it was rejected. Still, Morales appealed to Bolivia’s Constitutional Court, and in 2019, it allowed him to seek a fourth term.

That led to accusations that Morales had overturned the will of the voters in an anti-democratic power grab.

But the court has since walked back that precedent, reversing its decision four years later in 2023. It has since upheld that decision on term limits multiple times, most recently on Wednesday, effectively barring Morales from the upcoming August race.

Separately, last October, Morales faced charges of statutory rape for allegedly fathering a child with a 15-year-old girl while president. Morales has denied any wrongdoing and has sought to evade warrants issued for his arrest.

Media reports indicate he is holed up with supporters in the rural department of Cochabamba in the north of Bolivia.

Still, in February, Morales announced his bid for re-election. And on Wednesday, he denounced the Constitutional Court’s latest ruling upholding Bolivia’s two-term limit as a violation of his human rights. He also framed it as part of a broader pattern of foreign interference.

“It is a political and partisan ruling that obeys the orders of the eternal enemy of the people: the US empire,” he wrote on social media.

As President Trump parades through the Middle East this week, he will encounter a very different region than the one he experienced during his first term. True, the Israeli-Palestinian problem remains unresolved, as do the challenges emanating from Iran’s much-advanced nuclear program and the instability and dysfunction in Iraq, Lebanon, Libya, Syria and Yemen.

But this old wine is now packaged in new bottles. Beyond the garish headlines of Trump’s plan to accept a Boeing 747 as a gift from Qatar, new trends are emerging that will redefine the region, posing additional challenges for U.S. policy.

Of all the changes in the Middle East since Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel, perhaps the most striking is Israel’s emergence as a regional powerhouse. Aided by the administrations of Presidents Biden and Trump, and enabled by Arab regimes that do little to support Palestinians, Israel devastated Hamas and Hezbollah as military organizations, killing much of their senior leadership. With the support of the United States, Europe and friendly Arab states, it effectively countered two direct Iranian missile attacks on its territory.

Israel then delivered its own strike, reportedly destroying much of Iran’s ballistic missile production and air defenses. In short, Israel has achieved escalation dominance: the capacity to escalate (or not) as it sees fit, and to deter its adversaries from doing so. Israel has also redefined its concept of border security in Gaza, Lebanon, the West Bank and Syria by acting unilaterally to preempt and prevent threats to its territory.

Converting Israel’s military power into political arrangements, even peace accords, would seem like a reasonable next step. But the right-wing government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu seems uninterested in such options and is unlikely to be induced to change its outlook. Moreover, securing new, lasting agreements also depends on whether there are leaders among the Palestinians and key Arab states ready to take up the challenge, with all the political risks it entails.

But the Arab world remains in serious disarray. At least five Arab states are dealing with profound internal challenges, leaving them in various degrees of dysfunction and state failure. Amid this power vacuum, two alternative power centers have emerged. The first are the states of the Persian Gulf, especially Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar. Relatively unscathed by the Arab Spring and blessed with sovereign wealth funds, oil and natural gas, these stable authoritarian powers, particularly Saudi Arabia, have begun to play an outsize role in the region.

The second category comprises non-Arab states. Israel, Turkey and Iran are the only states in the region with the capacity to project significant military power beyond their borders. While each has suffered periods of internal unrest, they currently enjoy domestic stability. Each also boasts tremendous economic potential and significant security, military and intelligence capabilities, including the capability to manufacture weapons domestically.

One (Israel) is America’s closest regional ally, another (Turkey) is a member of NATO and a newfound power broker in Syria, and the third (Iran) retains considerable influence despite Israel’s mauling of its proxies Hamas and Hezbollah. Iran’s nuclear program keeps it relevant, even central, to both Israeli and American policymaking.

All three non-Arab states engender a good deal of suspicion and mistrust among Arab regimes but are nonetheless seen as key players whom no one wants to offend. All three are at odds — with each frustrating the others’ regional objectives — and all three are here to stay. Their influence will most likely only grow in the years to come, given the fractiousness of the Arab world.

In the immediate aftermath of the Oct. 7 Hamas attack, it seemed that the Palestinian issue was once again front and center, not just in the Arab world, but internationally. Those who claimed it had lost its resonance could point to the outpouring of sympathy and support for Gazan civilians as Israel’s war against Hamas led to a humanitarian catastrophe.

Moreover, the United Nations passed resolutions calling for an end to the war, many around the world condemned the war and Israel, the International Court of Justice took up the question of whether Israel is committing genocide, and the International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant for Netanyahu (as well as for Hamas’ military commander, later found to have been killed).

Nonetheless, it has become stunningly clear that, far from pushing the Palestinian issue to the top of the international agenda, the Oct. 7 attack has actually diminished its salience and left Palestinians isolated and without good options. Continued U.S. support for Israel’s war against Hamas, despite the exponential rise of Palestinian deaths, has protected Israel from negative consequences; key Arab regimes have done next to nothing to impose costs and consequences on Israel and the U.S. as Palestinian civilian deaths mount. The international community appears too fragmented, distracted and self-interested to act in any concerted way in defense of Palestine.

Meanwhile, the Palestinian national movement remains divided and dysfunctional, giving Palestinians an unpalatable choice between Hamas and the aging president of the Palestinian National Authority, Mahmoud Abbas. The prospects for anything resembling a two-state solution have never looked bleaker.

How the Trump administration will process these developments remains to be seen. Clearly, it has adopted a pro-Israel view, with Trump musing about turning Gaza into a Riviera-style resort. He has deployed his special envoy to the Middle East to secure the return of hostages taken by Hamas but has yet to invest in any postwar plan for the beleaguered enclave. Indeed, he has left the strategy for Gaza to Israel, which in turn has resumed its military campaign there. Trump has also acquiesced to Israel’s pursuit of aggressive border defenses against both Lebanon and Syria, while enabling Israel’s annexationist policies in the West Bank.

Yet Trump is nothing if not unpredictable. In April, he announced new U.S. negotiations with Iran in the presence of Netanyahu, who himself has tried to persuade the president that the only solution to Iran’s nuclear program is military action. But if U.S.-Iranian negotiations do advance, or if Trump’s interest in Israeli-Saudi normalization intensifies, he may find himself drawn into the Middle East negotiating bazaar, dealing with the intricacies of day-after planning in Gaza and a political horizon for Palestinians.

These paths are already fomenting tension between Trump, who will not be visiting Israel on his Middle East trip, and a recalcitrant Netanyahu. But given Trump’s absolute control over his party, Netanyahu will have few options to appeal to Republicans if the White House proposes policies that he opposes. As most U.S. allies have already learned, if Trump wants something, he’s not averse to using pressure to get it.

Aaron David Miller, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, is a former State Department Middle East analyst and negotiator in Republican and Democratic administrations and the author of “The End of Greatness: Why America Can’t Have (and Doesn’t Want) Another Great President.” Lauren Morganbesser is a junior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

The Los Angeles City Council voted Wednesday to approve a sweeping package of minimum wage increases for workers in the tourism industry, despite objections from business leaders who warned that the region is already facing a slowdown in international travel.

The proposal, billed by labor leaders as the highest minimum wage in the country, would require hotels with more than 60 rooms, as well as companies doing business at Los Angeles International Airport, to pay their workers $30 per hour by 2028.

That translates to a 48% hike in the minimum wage for hotel employees over three years. Airport workers would see a 56% increase.

On top of that, hotels and airport businesses would be required to provide $8.35 per hour for their workers’ health care by July 2026.

The package of increases was approved on a 12-3 vote, with Councilmembers John Lee, Traci Park and Monica Rodriguez opposed. Because the tally was not unanimous, a second vote will be required next week.

Rodriguez, who represents the northeast San Fernando Valley, told her colleagues that the proposal would cause hotels and airport businesses to cut back on staffing, resulting in job losses. The same thing is happening at City Hall, with elected officials considering staff cuts to cover the cost of employee raises, she said.

“We are right now facing 1,600 imminent layoffs because the revenue is just not matching our expenditures,” Rodriguez said. “The same will happen in the private sector.”

Councilmember Hugo Soto-Martínez, standing before a crowded of unionized workers after the vote, celebrated their victory.

“It’s been way too long, but finally, today, this building is working for the people, not the corporations,” said Soto-Martínez, a former organizer with the hotel and restaurant union Unite Here Local 11.

Hotel owners, business groups and airport concession companies predicted the wage increases will deal a fresh blow to an industry that never fully recovered from the COVID pandemic. They pointed to the recent drop-off in tourism from Canada and elsewhere that followed President Trump’s trade war and tightening of the U.S. border.

Adam Burke, president and chief executive of the Los Angeles Tourism and Convention Board, said Canada, France, Germany, Ireland, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom — nations that send a large number of visitors to Los Angeles — have issued formal advisories about visiting the U.S.

“The 2025 outlook is not encouraging,” Burke said.

Several hotel owners have warned that the higher wage will spur them to scale back their restaurant operations. A few flatly stated that hotel companies would steer clear of future investments in the city, which has long served as a global tourism destination.

Jackie Filla, president and chief executive of the Hotel Association of Los Angeles, said she believes that hotels will close restaurants or other small businesses on their premises — and in some cases, shut down entirely.

In the short term, she said, some will tear up their “room block” agreements, which set aside rooms for the 2028 Olympic and Paralympic Games.

“I don’t think anybody wants to do this,” Filla said. “Hotels are excited to host guests. They’re excited to be participating in the Olympics. But they can’t go into it losing money.”

Jessica Durrum, a policy director with the Los Angeles Alliance for a New Economy, a pro-union advocacy group, said business leaders also issued dire warnings about the economy when previous wage increases were approved — only to be proven wrong. Durrum, who is in charge of her group’s Tourism Workers Rising campaign, told the council that a higher wage would only benefit the region.

“People with more money in their pockets — they spend it,” she said.

Wednesday’s vote delivered a huge victory to Unite Here Local 11, a potent political force at City Hall. The union is known for knocking on doors for favored candidates, spending six figures in some cases to get them elected.

Unite Here Local 11 had billed the proposal as an “Olympic wage,” one that would ensure that its members have enough money to keep up with inflation. The union, working with airport workers represented by Service Employees International Union-United Service Workers West, also said that corporations should not be the only ones to benefit from the Olympic Games in 2028.

Workers from both of those unions testified about their struggles to pay for rising household costs, including rent, food and fuel. Some pleaded for better health care, while others spoke about having to work multiple jobs to support their families.

“We need these wages. Please do what’s right,” said Jovan Houston, a customer service agent at LAX. “Do this for workers. Do this for single families. Do this for parents like myself.”

Sonia Ceron, 38, a dishwasher at airline catering company Flying Food Group, said she has a second job cleaning houses in Beverly Hills for about 32 hours a week. Ceron lives in a small studio apartment in Inglewood, which has been difficult for her 12-year-old daughter.

“My daughter, like every kid, wants to have her own room, to be able to call her friends and have her privacy. Right now, that’s impossible,” Ceron said.

L.A.’s political leaders have enacted a number of wage laws over the last few decades. The hotel minimum wage, approved by the council in 2014, currently stands at $20.32 per hour. The minimum wage for private-sector employees at LAX is $25.23 per hour, once the required $5.95 hourly healthcare payment is included.

For nearly everyone else in L.A., the hourly minimum wage is $17.28, 78 cents higher than the state’s.

SACRAMENTO — One of the many traits that set California apart from other states is the way undocumented immigrants are woven into our communities.

Their economic impact is obvious, and the Golden State would be hard-pressed to keep our status as a world-competing financial power without their labor.

But most Californians know, and are OK with the reality, that at least some of our neighbors, our kids’ classmates, our co-workers, are without legal documents, or in blended-status families.

Gov. Gavin Newsom took a stand Wednesday for those undocumented Californians that seems to have gone largely unnoticed, but which probably will be a big fight in Congress and courts. In his bad news-filled budget presentation, Newsom committed to keeping state-funded health insurance for undocumented residents (with cuts, deep ones, which I’ll get to). Although some are disappointed by his rollbacks, many of which will hit citizens and noncitizens alike, standing by California’s expansion to cover all low income people is a statement of values.

“We’ve provided more support than any state in American history, and we’ll continue to provide more support than any state in American history,” he said.

Sticking with that promise is going to be tough, and likely costly.

This decision comes as Congress considers a Trump-led budget bill that would severely penalize states (there are 14 of them) that continue to provide health insurance to undocumented immigrants. California, of course, has the largest number of such folks on its Medi-Cal plan and would be the hardest hit if that penalty does indeed become the new law — to the tune of $27 billion over six years, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.

To put that in perspective, the governor is now estimating a nearly $12-billion budget shortfall this year. That federal cut would add at least $3 billion a year to our costs once it hits.

That federal cut, Newsom said, was “not anticipated in this budget,” which means we are ignoring it for the time being.

Federal programs aren’t open to noncitizens, and no federal dollars are used to support California’s expansion of healthcare to undocumented people.

But Congress is threatening an approximately 10% cut in reimbursements to states that insure undocumented people via the Medicaid expansion that was part of the Affordable Care Act. That expansion allows millions of Americans to have access to healthcare.

Those expansion funds are working in ways that many don’t know about. For example, as Newsom pointed out, behavioral health teams doing outreach to homeless people are funded by Medicaid dollars.

In all, about one-third of Californians rely on Medi-Cal, including millions of children, so this threat to cut federal funds is not an empty one, especially in a lean year.

Katherine Hempstead, a senior policy advisor for the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, which advocates for universal healthcare, said that the bill being debated by Congress is so full of cuts to healthcare that arguing against the provision penalizing coverage for undocumented people may not be a priority for most Democrats — making it more likely that the cut will get through.

“I don’t know if this is going to be a do-or-die issue,” she said.

Gov. Gavin Newsom presents his revised 2025-26 state budget during a news conference Wednesday in Sacramento.

(Rich Pedroncelli / Associated Press)

And indeed, the pressure by Republicans to kill off coverage entirely for undocumented folks was quick.

“Gov. Newsom has only partially repealed his disastrous policy,” Rep. Kevin Kiley (R-Rocklin) said in a statement. “ It needs to be reversed entirely, or Californians will continue to spend billions on coverage for illegal immigrants and our state will lose an even larger amount in federal Medicaid funding.”

Newsom has given economic reasons for sticking with the state’s coverage for all low-income residents, regardless of status. When people don’t have access to routine care, they end up in emergency rooms and that is extremely expensive. And also, Medicaid has to cover that emergency care, so taxpayers often end up spending more in the long run by skimping on upfront care.

“It’s definitely important to the people that get the coverage because they don’t really have an alternative,” Hempstead said.

But that care has been vastly more expensive than California expected, also to the tune of billions of dollars in unexpected costs, in part because so many people have signed up.

To the dismay of many, Newsom’s budget reflects both recent economic woes — a $16-billion revenue hit caused by what he’s dubbing the “Trump slump” — as well as the state vastly understimating the cost of covering those undocumented folks.

That shortfall may force cuts in the coverage that undocumented people qualify for if the Legislature goes along with Newsom’s plan, or even parts of it.

Most notably, it would cap enrollment for undocumented adults age 19 and over in 2026, effectively closing the program to new participants. That’s a huge hurt. His plan also calls for adding a $100 per month premium, and other cuts such as ending coverage for the extremely popular and expensive GLP-1 weight loss drugs for all participants.

“I don’t want to be in this position, but we are in this position,” Newsom said.

Amanda McAllister-Wallner, executive director of Health Access California, called those cuts “reckless and unconscionable” in a statement.

“This is a betrayal of the governor’s commitment to California immigrants, and an abandonment of his legacy, which brought California so close to universal healthcare,” she said.

I strongly believe in universal single-payer healthcare (basically opening up Medicare to everyone), so I don’t disagree with McAllister-Wallner’s point. In better days, I would hope to see enrollment reopen and benefits restored.

But also, we’re broke. This is going to be a year of painful choices for all involved.

Which makes Newsom’s, and California’s, commitment to keep insurance for undocumented people notable. The state could back down under this real federal pressure, could try to find a way to claw back the benefits we have already given.

But there’s a moral component to providing healthcare to our undocumented residents, who are such a valuable and vital part of our state.

Although the fiscal realities are ugly, it’s worth remembering that in providing the coverage, California is sticking with some of its most vulnerable residents, at a time when it would be easier to cut and run.

When a Los Angeles County judge resentenced Erik and Lyle Menendez on Tuesday, he offered the brothers a path to freedom for the first time since they were given life in prison for killing their parents with shotguns in 1989.

The latest development makes Lyle, 57, and Erik, 54, eligible for parole — but that is just one of three avenues that could enable them to walk free after 35 years behind bars.

In the coming months, several different judges, parole commissioners and even Gov. Gavin Newsom could still have a hand in the brothers’ fate.

When could they get parole?

Tuesday’s decision by L.A. County Superior Court Judge Michael Jesic modifies the brothers’ original sentence to 50 years to life. Under the state’s youthful offender law, both are immediately eligible for parole because the shootings happened before they turned 26.

A parole hearing probably will be scheduled before the end of the year, according to lawyers working with the Menendez defense team. At the hearing, a panel of commissioners could deem the brothers suitable for parole, but that decision is not final on its own. A 90-day review period would follow, and Newsom could block their release.

Nothing had been scheduled as of Wednesday. At a parole hearing, the brothers will have to take accountability for their crimes and argue to commissioners that they are unlikely to re-offend. In statements delivered in court on Tuesday, they appeared contrite and emotional when revisiting the murders.

“My actions were criminal, selfish, cruel and cowardly,” Erik Menendez said Tuesday. “I have no excuse, no justification for what I did. … I take full responsibility for my crimes.”

Lyle also said he made “no excuses” for felling his mother and father with shotgun blasts, and apologized to the nearly two dozen relatives who have spent years fighting for his release.

“I’m so sorry to each and every one of you,” Lyle told the court Tuesday. “I lied to you and forced you into a spotlight of public humiliation you never asked for.”

How else could they be released?

Before the resentencing process began, Erik and Lyle’s attorneys also filed an application for clemency with Newsom. If the governor grants clemency, their sentence would be commuted immediately and they could walk right out of the Richard J. Donovan Correctional Facility in San Diego, where they’ve been housed for years.

A remote clemency hearing is scheduled for June 13, with the brothers set to appear virtually before the parole board. On that day, the board can make a recommendation to Newsom on their suitability for release — which could also forecast their fortunes at an eventual parole hearing.

There is no timeline for Newsom to act on the clemency application, and he is not required to respond to it. The governor has already announced a potential change to statewide parole processes in connection with the case.

The brothers also have a pending petition for a new trial. In the motion, defense attorney Mark Geragos pointed to additional evidence of sexual abuse committed by Jose Menendez, including a fresh allegation from a member of the boy band Menudo.

The brothers have long argued they carried out their crime for fear their parents would kill them to cover up years of sexual abuse committed by Jose.

What’s next for the district attorney?

Los Angeles County Dist. Atty. Nathan Hochman thrust himself into the center of the Menendez case even before he was elected, attacking his predecessor’s decision to seek to have the brothers resentenced last year despite having no access to files on the case.

Hochman asserted that former Dist. Atty. George Gascón filed the petition only to save his failing reelection bid and promised to review the case after he was inaugurated.

In March, Hochman formally announced his opposition to their resentencing, saying the brothers still had not shown proper “insight” into their crimes by atoning for lies they told about their motives in the case and attempts to get witnesses to give fabricated testimony at their original trials.

Despite Jesic repeatedly warning prosecutors that those arguments weren’t legally appropriate for a resentencing hearing, Hochman’s team barreled ahead, ultimately ending in the most high-profile loss of Hochman’s early tenure as district attorney.

Hochman said Wednesday he still considered his opposition to their resentencing a success because it presented to the judge, parole board and governor — all of whom would have a say in the brothers’ fate — a “full record of the facts.”

Hochman maintained that he did not believe the brothers should be released and said prosecutors will “participate” in any future parole hearings.

Hochman could also potentially appeal Jesic’s ruling. The district attorney’s office did not immediately respond to an inquiry about that approach.

Times staff writers Richard Winton and Matthew Ormseth contributed to this report.

Gov. Gavin Newsom is proposing to accelerate his administration’s plan to build a $20-billion water tunnel beneath the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta by short-cutting permitting for the project and limiting avenues for legal challenges.

Newsom urged the Legislature on Wednesday to adopt his plan to “fast-track” the tunnel, called the Delta Conveyance Project, as part of his revised May budget proposal.

“For too long, attempts to modernize our critical water infrastructure have stalled in endless red tape, burdened with unnecessary delay. We’re done with barriers,” Newsom said. “Our state needs to complete this project as soon as possible, so that we can better store and manage water to prepare for a hotter, drier future. Let’s get this built.”

The tunnel would create a second route to transport water to the state’s pumping facilities on the south side of the Delta, where supplies enter the aqueducts of the State Water Project and are delivered to 27 million people and 750,000 acres of farmland.

Supporters of the plan, including water agencies in Southern California and Silicon Valley, say the state needs to build new infrastructure in the Delta to protect the water supply in the face of climate change and earthquake risks.

Opponents, including agencies in the Delta and environmental advocates, say the project is an expensive boondoggle that would harm the environment and communities, and that the state should pursue other alternatives.

“It’s a top-down push for an unaffordable, unnecessary tunnel that fails to solve the state’s real water challenges,” said Barbara Barrigan-Parrilla, executive director of the group Restore the Delta.

She said the governor “wants to bypass the legal and public processes because the project doesn’t pass the economic or environmental standards Californians expect.”

Newsom, who is set to serve through 2026 and then leave office, is pushing to lay the groundwork for the project.

Newsom said his proposal would: simplify permitting by eliminating certain deadlines from water rights permits; narrow legal review to avoid delays from legal challenges; confirm that the state has authority to issue bonds to pay for the project, which would be repaid by water agencies; and accelerate state efforts to acquire land for construction.

Announcing the proposal, the governor’s office said that “while the project has received some necessary permits, its path forward is burdened by complicated regulatory frameworks and bureaucratic delays.”

The State Water Resources Control Board is currently considering a petition by the Newsom administration to amend water rights permits so that flows could be diverted from new points on the Sacramento River where the intakes of the 45-mile tunnel would be built.

The governor’s latest proposal was praised by water agencies including the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California, which is currently spending about $142 million on the preliminary planning.

MWD General Manager Deven Upadhyay called Newsom’s proposal a “bold step” toward protecting water supplies, saying the approach would support completion of the planning work, reduce “regulatory and legal uncertainties,” and allow the MWD board to make an informed decision about whether to make a long-term investment to help foot the bill for construction.

Jennifer Pierre, general manager of the State Water Contractors, said the governor’s approach makes sense to address costly delays and upgrade essential infrastructure that is “in dire need of modernization.”

Environmental and fishing groups, however, called Newsom’s proposal a reckless attempt to bypass the existing legal process and make it harder for opponents to challenge the project over what they contend would be harmful effects on the Delta region and the environment.

Scott Artis, executive director of the Golden State Salmon Assn., a group that represents fishing communities, called Newsom’s proposal “an attack on the salmon fishing industry and the state’s biggest rivers.”

Commercial salmon fishing has been canceled for three consecutive years because of a decline in the Chinook salmon population. Artis said building the tunnel would represent a “nail in the coffin of California’s once mighty salmon runs.”

California is facing an additional $12-billion state budget shortfall next year, a deficit largely caused by overspending and that Gov. Gavin Newsom said was made worse by President Trump’s federal tariff policy.

“California is under assault,” Newsom said. “The United States of America, in many respects, is under assault because we have a president that’s been reckless.”

Newsom unveiled the forecast during a presentation Wednesday of his $321.9-billion revised spending plan that proposes walking back free healthcare for low-income undocumented immigrants, eliminating Medi-Cal benefits for expensive weight loss treatments and cutting back overtime hours for in-home supportive service workers, among dozens of other trims.

The new deficit comes in addition to $27.3 billion in fiscal remedies, including $16.1 billion in cuts and a $7.1-billion withdrawal from the state’s rainy day fund, that lawmakers and the governor already agreed to make in 2025-26.

The overall $39-billion shortfall marks the third year in a row that Newsom and lawmakers have been forced to reduce funding for state programs after dedicating more money than California has available to spend.

Newsom’s proposed cuts

Among the new cuts Newsom put on the table Wednesday is a call to cut back on his signature policy to provide free healthcare coverage to income-eligible undocumented immigrants.

Newsom is proposing freezing new Medi-Cal enrollment for undocumented adult immigrants as of Jan. 1 and requiring those over 18 to pay $100 monthly premiums to receive healthcare coverage through Medi-Cal.

The cost share will reduce the financial burden on the state and could lower the total number of people enrolled in the healthcare program if some immigrants cannot afford the new premiums. Freezing enrollment may prevent the price tag of the program from continuing to balloon after more people signed up for coverage than the state anticipated.

The changes offer minor savings of $116.5 million next year, with savings growing to $5.4 billion in 2028-29.

The governor is also following the federal government’s lead and cutting $85 million in benefits for Ozempic and other popular weight loss medications from all Medi-Cal coverage plans, while saving $333.3 million by eliminating long-term care benefits for some enrollees.

Newsom wants to cap overtime hours for in-home support service workers, according to his budget, to save $707.5 million next year.

The governor’s budget includes a controversial proposal to grab $1.3 billion in funding in 2025-26 from Proposition 35, a measure voters approved in November that dedicated the revenue from a tax on managed care organizations to primarily pay for increases to Medi-Cal provider rates. The decision is expected to draw pushback from a coalition of doctors, clinics, hospitals and other healthcare groups that supported the proposition, which nearly 68% of voters backed.

Under another cost-saving measure, the governor wants to shift $1.5 billion in funding for Cal Fire from the general fund. Instead, Newsom wants to provide that $1.5 billion from the greenhouse gas reduction fund paid for by proceeds of the state cap-and-trade program next year.

The governor’s budget proposes extending the cap-and-trade program — a first-of-its-kind initiative that sets limits on companies’ greenhouse gas emissions and allows them to buy additional credits at auction from the state, and he wants to dedicate at least $1 billion each year to high speed rail.

A spending deficit

The budget marks a continuation of years of overspending in California under the Newsom administration.

After predicting a lofty $100-billion surplus from federal COVID-19 stimulus funding and the resulting economic gains three years ago, Democrats have not reduced spending to match up with a return to normal after the pandemic.

Poor projections, the ballooning cost of Democratic policy promises and a reluctance to make long-term sweeping cuts have added to the deficit at a time when the governor regularly touts California’s place as the fourth largest economy in the world.

State revenues have exceeded expectations since April, but so has state spending.

Despite the shortfall, California has more money to spend than in the prior budget approved in June, and the governor and lawmakers still plan to take $7.1 billion from the state’s rainy day fund to cover the total 2025-26 deficit.

A “Trump Slump”

Though personal income tax and corporate tax receipts in the state came in $6.8 billion above projections through April, Newsom is predicting that overall revenues will be $16 billion lower than they could have been from January 2025 through June 2026 because of the economic impact of Trump’s tariffs.

The governor originally released the new information, which his team dubbed the “Trump Slump,” on the eve of the presentation of his revised 2025-26 state budget plan, seeking to blame the president for California’s expected revenue shortfall.

Trump in April implemented a series of tariffs on all imported goods, higher taxes on products from Mexico, Canada and China, and specific levies on products and materials such as autos and aluminum. The president has backed down from some of his tariffs, but Newsom alleges that the policies and economic uncertainty will lead to higher unemployment, inflation, lower GDP projections and less capital gains revenue for California.

California filed a lawsuit last month arguing that Trump lacks the authority to impose tariffs on his own. On Tuesday, the state said it will seek a preliminary injunction to freeze the tariffs in federal court.

WASHINGTON — A Democratic lawmaker is launching a renegade effort to impeach President Trump, pushing past party leaders on Wednesday with an attempt to force a procedural vote in the U.S. House that is expected to fail.

Rep. Shri Thanedar of Michigan announced his intention to charge ahead, saying that as an immigrant to America he wants to do all he can to protect its Constitution and institutions from Trump’s lawlessness. His resolution contains seven articles of impeachment against the Republican president.

“Donald J. Trump has been committing crimes since day one — bribery, corruption, taking power from Congress, creating an unlawful office in DOGE, violating 1st Amendment rights, ignoring due process,” the congressman said earlier from the House floor.

It would be the historic third time Trump has faced impeachment efforts after being twice impeached during his first term as president — first in 2019 on charges related to withholding military aid to Ukraine as it confronted Russia and later on a charge of inciting insurrection over the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol by a mob of his supporters. Trump was acquitted both times by the Senate.

Thanedar is not the only Democrat who has signaled impeachment efforts against Trump. But his decision to go it almost alone, without backing from party leadership, comes as he faces his own political challenges at home, with several primary opponents looking to unseat him in his Detroit-area congressional district.

Timing is also key. His resolution claiming Trump committed “high crimes and misdemeanors” comes as Trump is traveling in the Middle East in his first major trip abroad of his second term, violating a norm in American politics of not criticizing the president once he leaves the U.S.

But Thanedar said he was pressing ahead in part because of Trump’s trip abroad and the potential conflicts of interest as the president appears to be mixing his personal business dealings with his presidential duties and is considering accepting a lavish gift of an airplane from the Qatari government.

“My constituents want me to act,” Thanedar told the Associated Press late Tuesday.

“It’s time for us to stand up and speak. We can’t worry about, ‘Is this the right time?’ We can’t worry about, ‘Are we going to win this battle?’ It’s more about doing the right thing,” he said. “I took an oath to protect and defend the Constitution. So did Mr. Trump. He has violated his oath, and he’s doing unconstitutional activities. It’s time for someone to stand up and say that, and if that’s just me, then so be it.”

Thanedar is using a procedural tool to force a vote Wednesday on whether to proceed to the issue or shelve the matter.

One top Trump ally, Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, criticized Thanedar and dismissed the impeachment effort.

“It’s DOA,” she posted on social media.

Impeachment of a president or other U.S. officials, once rare, has become an increasingly common in Congress.

Republicans in the House opened an impeachment inquiry into then-President Biden, a Democrat, but stopped short of action. The Republicans in Congress did, however, impeach Biden’s Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas. The Senate dismissed two articles of impeachment against Mayorkas, ending his trial.

Thanedar, who’s from India, has said he came to the United States without many resources. He said he loves the U.S. and wants to defend its Constitution and institutions.

When he took over the Detroit congressional district, it was the first time in decades the city was left without a Black lawmaker in Congress.

Mascaro, Brown and Askarinam write for the Associated Press.

May 14 (UPI) — A Russian court on Wednesday sentenced well-known election watchdog Grigory Melkonyants to five years in prison after it found him guilty of allegedly working for a so-called “undesirable” organization.

“Don’t worry, I’m not despairing,” Melkonyants was quoted telling supporters after the sentence was handed down by Moscow’s Basmanny District Court in a latest blow to free speech in Russian President Vladimir Putin’s regime.

“You shouldn’t despair either!” he reportedly stated.

Melkonyants, who has been in custody since his August 2023 arrest, co-founded Russia’s most respected and prominent election monitoring group which in 2013 was designated as a “foreign agent” by Russian authorities.

The charge stems from alleged ties to the European Network of Election Monitoring Organizations, which was declared “undesirable” by the Russian state in 2021.

Melkonyants has denied the allegations.

Three years later, Golos — which means “vote” in Russian — was liquidated as a non-governmental organization but despite court orders, continued to publish reports on Russia’s local and national elections, which international experts contend were not free or fair.

“Grigory Melkonyants has committed no crime,” Marie Struthers, Amnesty International‘s director for Eastern Europe and Central Asia, said Wednesday in a statement in calling for his “unconditional” release.

Struthers says his only “offense” was “defending the right to free and fair elections,” and that Russian authorities “instigated this criminal case in order to silence one of the country’s most respected election observers.”

The election monitoring group was long-accused by Russian officials of multiple violations and for allegedly being tainted by money it received from the U.S.-based National Endowment for Democracy and the U.S. Agency for International Development.

“Golos gave rise to a massive election monitoring movement in Russia in 2011, then the protests began which gave Putin quite a scare,” according to Leonid Volkov, a close associate of late Russian political opposition leader Alexei Navalny.

“So many years have passed, and he still seeks revenge,” he wrote on social media.

Melkonyants expressed worry for the group’s 3,000 election monitors during Russia’s 2011 elections as it came under fire while Putin, then prime minister, was ultimately re-elected to succeed then-President Dmitry Medvedev for another term.

Meanwhile, the Britain-headquartered Amnesty International considers him a “prisoner of conscience” who was prosecuted and imprisoned solely for peaceful activism.

“The international community cannot remain silent,” Amnesty’s Struthers added Wednesday.

“Neither on this appalling verdict nor on the outrageous assault on civic space that is taking place in Russia.”

The Parliament of the Maldives has impeached two judges of the country’s Supreme Court, deepening a political crisis triggered by President Mohamed Muizzu’s push to amend the constitution and strip legislators of their seats if they switch political parties.

The Parliament, where the governing People’s National Congress holds a supermajority, voted on Wednesday to remove Justices Azmiralda Zahir and Mahaz Ali Zahir on allegations of abuse of power.

The vote, which passed 68 – 11, took place as dozens of opposition supporters rallied outside the Parliament House, calling for Muizzu’s resignation and an end to what they called the intimidation of judges.

The move comes more than two months after the judicial watchdog, dominated by Muizzu’s allies, suspended the two judges and their colleague, Justice Husnu al-Suood. At the time, the seven-member Supreme Court bench had been holding hearings into a petition challenging the anti-defection measures.

Suood later resigned from the top court, accusing Muizzu and Attorney General Ahmed Usham of intimidating all the judges of the Supreme Court to secure a judgement in their favour.

The president and his lawyer deny the charges.

“I do not interfere with the judiciary,” Muizzu told reporters during a 14-hour news conference on May 3. “I have never done so. I do not control the [the judicial watchdog].”

The crisis has paralysed the Maldives’s Supreme Court, halting hearings in all ongoing cases, including on the constitutional amendments. It has also raised fears of renewed instability in the Indian Ocean honeymoon destination, which held its first multiparty elections in 2008, but has been roiled by political turmoil since, including a coup d’etat, disputed elections, and the killings and jailing of dissidents.

‘Attack on judiciary’

Azmiralda and Mahaz denounced their impeachment on Wednesday.

“This is an attack on the Maldivian judiciary. It is no ordinary matter to bring the Maldives Supreme Court to a halt,” Azmiralda said in a statement. “My hope is that one day, when the rule of law is established in this country … all of the various officials who took part in destroying the Supreme Court are held accountable.”

The case against the two judges stems from the arrest of Azmiralda’s husband, Ismail Latheef, during a police raid on a spa where he was receiving a massage in the Maldivian capital, Male, on December 4 of last year.

The incident happened two weeks after Muizzu ratified the anti-defection measures.

The controversial amendments stipulate that legislators elected on a political party ticket would lose their seat if they switch parties, or if they resign or are expelled from their party. The provisions effectively allow Muizzu to maintain his supermajority in Parliament, where his party controls 79 of the chamber’s 93 seats.

The president has argued they are necessary to “improve political stability”, but opponents say they would destroy the country’s system of checks and balances.

At the time of Latheef’s arrest, a former member of parliament had filed a petition at the Supreme Court challenging the legality of the amendments, but the bench had yet to decide to take up the case.

Latheef was held overnight for more than 12 hours, on charges of soliciting a prostitute, but was released by a judge at the Criminal Court. In the ruling, the judge noted that the masseuse treating Latheef was fully clothed at the time of the raid, and that the room they were in was unlocked.

The prosecutor’s office later shelved the case against Latheef, citing a lack of evidence.

But after the Supreme Court began reviewing the constitutional amendments in February, the watchdog Judicial Services Commission (JSC) took up a separate case against Azmiralda and Mahaz, claiming the two judges had unlawfully lobbied lower court judges to secure Latheef’s release.

The JSC recommended that the Parliament impeach them last month.

‘No ulterior motives’

The judges have denied the charges, with lawyers for Azmiralda saying that the case was “manufactured by top government officials to suspend” them “in order to influence the outcome of the constitutional case before the Supreme Court”.

Usham, the Attorney General, has told Al Jazeera that the government “categorically denies these allegations”.

“There is absolutely no truth to the claim that the executive branch had any hand in the JSC’s [the judicial watchdog’s] decision,” he wrote in an email. “The suspension was pursuant to law and… any suggestion of ulterior motives is firmly rejected by the Government.”

The case, however, has drawn criticism from the United Nations and rights groups.

Margaret Satterthwaite, the UN’s special rapporteur on the independence of judges and lawyers, expressed grave concern last month over the action against the three judges, saying they appear to be aimed at undermining the Supreme Court’s judicial review of the anti-defection measures.

“The disciplinary proceedings brought against three of the Supreme Court’s Justices appear to violate the principle that judges can only be dismissed on serious grounds of misconduct or incompetence and in accordance with fair procedures guaranteeing objectivity and impartiality as provided for by the Constitution or the law,” she wrote. “The pressure of suspensions, disciplinary proceedings and investigations may amount to an interference in the independence of this institution.”

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia — President Trump met Wednesday with Syria’s new leader, praising him as a “young, attractive guy” and urging him to rid his country of “Palestinian terrorists.”

Trump also urged Syrian interim President Ahmad al-Sharaa to sign onto the historic Abraham Accords brokered during Trump’s first term.

The meeting in Riyadh came as Trump concluded the Saudi Arabian leg of his Middle Eastern trip and headed to Qatar, the second destination of what has so far been an opulence-heavy tour of the region.

The meeting with Al-Sharaa, which lasted roughly half an hour and was the first time in a quarter of a century that the leaders of the two nations have met, marks a significant victory for Al-Sharaa’s fledgling government, coming one day after Trump’s decision to lift long-standing sanctions from the war-ravaged country.

It also lends legitimacy to a leader whose past as an Al Qaeda-affiliated jihadi leader — Al-Sharaa severed ties with the group in 2016 — had made Western nations keep him at arm’s length.

The sanctions were imposed on Syria in 2011, when the now-deposed President Bashar Assad began a brutal crackdown to quell anti-government uprisings.

Al-Sharaa headed an Islamist rebel coalition that toppled Assad in December, but the Trump administration and other Western governments conditioned the lifting of sanctions on his government fulfilling certain conditions.

Yet as is his custom, Trump cut through protocol and relied on personal relations, lifting the sanctions at the urging of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, a long-time supporter of Syria’s rebellion, who joined the meeting via phone.

Speaking on Air Force One en route to Qatar, Trump described Al-Sharaa as a “young, attractive guy. Tough guy. Strong past. Very strong past. Fighter.”

“He’s got a real shot at holding it together,” Trump added. “I spoke with President Erdogan, who is very friendly with him. He feels he’s got a shot of doing a good job. It’s a torn-up country.”

According to a readout shared by White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt on X, Trump urged Al-Sharaa to sign onto the Abraham Accords, tell “foreign terrorists” to leave Syria and deport “Palestinian terrorists,” help the U.S. in preventing Islamic State’s resurgence and assume responsibility for detention centers in northeast Syria housing thousands of people affiliated with Islamic State.

The Abraham Accords were the centerpiece of Trump’s foreign policy achievements in his first term. Brokered in 2020, they established diplomatic relations between Israel and the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Morocco and Sudan — without conditioning them on Palestinian statehood or Israeli concessions to the Palestinians.

Under Assad, Syria maintained a decades-old truce with Israel, despite hosting several Palestinian factions and allowing Iran and affiliated groups to operate in the country.

MADISON, Wis. — A federal grand jury indicted a Wisconsin judge Tuesday on charges she helped a man in the country illegally evade U.S. immigration authorities looking to arrest him as he appeared before her in a local domestic abuse case.

Milwaukee County Circuit Judge Hannah Dugan’s arrest and ensuing indictment has escalated a clash between President Trump’s administration and local authorities over the Republican’s sweeping immigration crackdown. Democrats have accused the Trump administration of trying to make a national example of Dugan to chill judicial opposition to the crackdown.

Prosecutors charged Dugan in April via complaint with concealing an individual to prevent arrest and obstruction. In the federal criminal justice system, prosecutors can initiate charges against a defendant directly by filing a complaint or present evidence to a grand jury and let that body decide whether to issue charges.

A grand jury still reviews charges brought by complaint to determine whether enough probable cause exists to continue the case as a check on prosecutors’ power. If the grand jury determines there’s probable cause, it issues a written statement of the charges known as an indictment. That’s what happened in Dugan’s case.

Dugan faces up to six years in prison if she’s convicted on both counts. Her team of defense attorneys responded to the indictment with a one-sentence statement saying that she maintains her innocence and looks forward to being vindicated in court. She was scheduled to enter a plea on Thursday.

Kenneth Gales, a spokesperson for the U.S. attorney’s office in Milwaukee, declined to comment on the indictment Tuesday evening.

Dugan’s case is similar to one brought during the first Trump administration against a Massachusetts judge, who was accused of helping a man sneak out a courthouse back door to evade a waiting immigration enforcement agent. That case was eventually dismissed.

Prosecutors say Dugan escorted Eduardo Flores-Ruiz and his lawyer out of her courtroom through a back jury door on April 18 after learning that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents were in the courthouse seeking his arrest.

According to court documents, Flores-Ruiz illegally reentered the U.S. after being deported in 2013. Online state court records show he was charged with three counts of misdemeanor domestic abuse in Milwaukee County in March. He was in Dugan’s courtroom that morning of April 18 for a hearing.

Court documents suggest Dugan was alerted to the agents’ presence by her clerk, who was informed by an attorney that the agents appeared to be in the hallway. An affidavit says Dugan was visibly angry over the agents’ arrival and called the situation “absurd” before leaving the bench and retreating to her chambers. She and another judge later approached members of the arrest team in the courthouse with what witnesses described as a “confrontational, angry demeanor.”

After a back-and-forth with the agents over the warrant for Flores-Ruiz, Dugan demanded they speak with the chief judge and led them away from the courtroom, according to the affidavit.

She then returned to the courtroom and was heard saying words to the effect of “wait, come with me” and ushered Flores-Ruiz and his attorney out through a back jury door typically used only by deputies, jurors, court staff and in-custody defendants, according to the affidavit. Flores-Ruiz was free on a signature bond in the abuse case at the time, according to online state court records.

Federal agents ultimately captured him outside the courthouse after a foot chase.

The state Supreme Court suspended Dugan from the bench in late April, saying the move was necessary to preserve public confidence in the judiciary. A reserve judge is filling in for her.

Richmond writes for the Associated Press.

May 14 (UPI) — The House Ways and Means Committee approved the Republican tax package Wednesday, which followed an all-night hearing during which GOP members rejected attempts by Democrats to alter the plan.

The bill was approved on 26-19 party line, which will next move to the chamber’s Budget Committee, where it will be blended with legislation from other committees and presented as part of what President Donald Trump has dubbed the “One, Big, Beautiful Bill.”

“We are in hour 14 of a markup where Democrats are fighting tooth and nail,” posted Ways and Means Chairman Jason Smith, R- Mo. to X at 4:29 a.m. EDT Wednesday,” which followed previous update posts at 2:37 a.m. EDT Wednesday and 11:56 p.m. EDT Tuesday. The hearing began at 2:30 p.m. EDT Tuesday.

Democrats saw all their proposed amendments, which covered items like the expansion of health care coverage under the Affordable Care Act, and green energy, turned down, while also having stumped against the current tax plan, which it called a giveaway to the wealthy.

Democrats also put forth amendments that would have impacted Trump’s tariffs, blocked tax cuts for high earners and expanded child-care incentives among other suggestions, but none were adopted.

The entire package is projected to cost $3.8 trillion, but could still address state and local tax, or SALT, deductions. The Joint Committee on Taxation reported Tuesday that average earners would see their tax bills decrease by double-digit percentages in 2027 under the plan as it stands.

Democrats have also pointed out that under the plan, taxpayers who earn over $500,000 would see a cumulative tax cut of around $170 billion in 2027, while those who will earn between $30,000 and $80,000 that year would only see a collective $59 billion.

The bill is targeted to pass through the enter chamber by Memorial Day, then on to the Senate which is expected to combine the tax laws with the rest of Trump’s “Beautiful” bill, which together would both extend the life of previously set tax cuts and enable Trump’s financial requests.

When I think about the gleeful cruelty the Trump administration is showing toward illegal immigrants — including unlawfully deporting planeloads of them, seeking to suspend habeas corpus in order to kick out folks faster and wearing fancy Rolex watches while visiting a Salvadoran super prison — I think of Jose Toscano.

The Mexico City native came to Los Angeles as a 13-year-old and enrolled at St. Turibius School near the Fashion District, working at Magee’s Kitchen in the Farmers Market to pay his tuition, room and board. “I had this dream to come to the United States for education,” Toscano told The Times in May 1953. “Not for the dollars, not to work in the camps for 65 cents an hour.”

Why was The Times profiling a 16-year-old Mexican immigrant? Because he was about to get deported. Politicians, the press and private citizens had been railing against “illegal immigration” and pushing President Eisenhower for mass deportations. Officers received a tip that Toscano was in the country illegally.

This young migrant’s story struck a chord in Southern California in a way that’s unimaginable today

Newspaper accounts noted that immigration authorities — struck by Toscano’s pluck and drive — made sure that his deportation didn’t go on his record so he could legally return one day. A Van Nuys News and Valley Green Sheet columnist wrote, “We must have immigration laws — but they’re not designed for folks like Joe.”

Meanwhile, The Times’ editorial board — not exactly known back then for its kind attitude toward Mexican Americans — argued that Toscano shouldn’t be deported, making the case that laws “should perhaps be tempered a trifle in the face of principles and actions which are of such sterling worth as to be beyond the object of the law itself.”

Toscano legally returned to Los Angeles three months later, living with a white family in Whittier that sponsored him and enrolling at Cathedral High. “As I continue to study the history of your country in school,” he wrote to The Times that September, “I shall remember that what you did for me is one of the things that makes this country of yours so great.”

His story was such a feel-good tale that it appeared in Reader’s Digest and the local press checked in on Toscano for years. The Mirror, The Times’ afternoon sister paper, reported on his 1954 wedding, the same year that immigration officials deported over a million Mexican nationals under Operation Wetback, a program that President Trump and his supporters say they want to emulate today.

Two years later, The Times covered Toscano’s graduation from Fairfax High, where he told the crowd as the commencement speaker that he wanted to become an American citizen “so that I, too, can help build a greater America.”

After a three-year stint in the Marines, Toscano did just that in 1959, changing his legal name from Jose to Joseph because he felt “it’s more American that way,” he told the Mirror. He told the paper he had dreams of attending UCLA Law School, but life didn’t work out that way.

Lessons for today

The last clipping I found of Toscano in The Times is a 1980 Farmers Market ad, which noted that he was a widower with two daughters still working at Magee’s but had advanced from washing dishes to chief carver.

“He’s a happy man who likes his work,” the ad said, “and it shows.”

Rereading the clips about Toscano, I’m reminded of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, the Salvadoran national who established a life for himself in this country before he was deported in March despite a judge’s order that he be allowed to remain in the United States.

This time around, immigration officials and the Trump White House have insisted Abrego Garcia deserved his fate, sliming him as a terrorist and MS-13 member despite no evidence to back up their assertions.

Toscano’s story shows that the story can have a different ending — if only immigration officials have a heart.

Today’s top stories

People enjoy pleasant spring weather while sailing in Newport Harbor. Orange County is one of three SoCal counties where single earners with six-figure salaries could soon be considered “low income.”

(Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)

‘Low income’ but making $100,000 per year

Newsom walks back free healthcare for eligible undocumented immigrants

• The governor’s office said his spending plan, which will be released later this morning, calls for requiring all undocumented adults to pay $100 monthly premiums to receive Medi-Cal coverage and for blocking all new adult applications to the program as of Jan. 1.
• The cost of coverage for immigrants has exceeded state estimates by billions of dollars.

California joins another lawsuit against Trump

• California Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta filed two lawsuits Tuesday challenging a Trump administration policy that would deny the state billions of dollars in transportation grants unless it follows the administration’s lead on immigration enforcement.
• California sued Trump 15 times in his first 100 days in office. Here’s where those cases stand.

California’s ethnic studies mandate is at risk

• California became a national pioneer four years ago by passing a law to make ethnic studies a high school graduation requirement.
• But only months before the policy is to take effect, Gov. Gavin Newsom is withholding state funding — delaying the mandate as the course comes under renewed fire.

What else is going on

Commentary and opinions

• Four months into insurance claim delays and disputes, a new blow to fire victims: A rate hike, writes columnist Steve Lopez.
• My neighborhood, Skid Row, is not exactly what you think it is, argues guest columnist Amelia Rayno.
• The Endangered Species Act is facing its own existential threat, contributor Marcy Houle says.

This morning’s must reads

Other must reads

For your downtime

(Marie Doazan for The Times)

Going out

Staying in

A question for you: What is your go-to karaoke song?

Stephen says: “Anything by Jim Croce.”
Alan says: “‘In My Life’ by The Beatles.”

Email us at [email protected], and your response might appear in the newsletter this week.

And finally … your photo of the day

Alice Weddle, 88, poses for a portrait before the Queens Tour at Kia Forum on Sunday in Inglewood.

(Juliana Yamada / Los Angeles Times)

Today’s great photo is from Times photographer Juliana Yamada at the Kia Forum where fans flocked to see legendary singers Chaka Khan, Patti LaBelle, Stephanie Mills and Gladys Knight perform their greatest hits.

Have a great day, from the Essential California team

Gustavo Arellano, California columnist
Kevinisha Walker, multiplatform editor
Karim Doumar, head of newsletters

How can we make this newsletter more useful? Send comments to [email protected].

SACRAMENTO — Gov. Gavin Newsom’s 2025-26 revised budget proposal reneges on his signature policy to provide free healthcare coverage to all low-income undocumented immigrants as costs exceed expectations and the state anticipates challenging economic times ahead.

Newsom’s office said the governor’s spending plan, which will be released late Wednesday morning, calls for requiring all undocumented adults to pay $100 monthly premiums to receive Medi-Cal coverage and for blocking all new adult applications to the program as of Jan. 1.

The cost share will reduce the financial burden on the state and could lower the total number of people enrolled in the healthcare program if some immigrants cannot afford the new premiums. Freezing enrollment may prevent the price tag of the program from continuing to balloon after more people signed up for coverage than the state anticipated.

The governor’s office said the changes will save a combined $5.4 billion through 2028-29, but did not detail the cost savings in the upcoming fiscal year that begins July 1.

Newsom is expected Wednesday to project a deficit for California in the fiscal year ahead, which includes higher than expected Medi-Cal costs, and more significant shortfall estimates in the following years. In the current budget year, the governor and lawmakers approved a $2.8-billion appropriation and took out a separate $3.4-billion loan just to pay for extra expenses for Medi-Cal through June.

The rising costs have drawn criticism from Republicans and added pressure on Democrats to consider scaling back coverage for immigrants. A recent poll found strong support among California voters for offering free healthcare to undocumented children. Just over half of voters supported providing the healthcare to eligible immigrants 50 years old or above, and a plurality — 49% — favored providing the coverage to adults between the ages of 18 and 49.

Medi-Cal, the California offshoot of the federal Medicaid program, provides healthcare coverage to eligible low-income residents. After the Republican Congress this year passed a budget blueprint that includes billions of dollars in spending reductions, fears also persist that cuts to federal Medicaid funding may be looming.

California became the first state in the nation to offer healthcare to all income-eligible immigrants one year ago after the expansion was approved by Newsom and the Democratic-led Legislature.

Gov. Jerry Brown, a Democrat, signed a bill in 2015 that offered Medi-Cal coverage to all children younger than 19.

Newsom grew the Medi-Cal coverage pool to include all income-eligible immigrants in California under a multiyear expansion by age categories that began in 2020 and concluded in 2024.

California’s new budget shortfall comes in addition to $27.3 billion in financial remedies, including $16.1 billion in cuts and a $7.1-billion withdrawal from the state’s rainy day fund, that lawmakers and the governor already agreed to make in 2025-26.

The deficit marks the third year in a row that Newsom and lawmakers have been forced to reduce spending after dedicating more money to programs than the state has available to spend. Poor projections, the high price tag of Democratic policy promises and a reluctance to make long-term sweeping cuts have added to the deficit at a time when the governor regularly touts California’s place as the fourth-largest economy in the world.

On Tuesday afternoon, Newsom’s office said President Trump’s tariff policies have also hurt California’s financial standing and projected that the state will lose out on $16 billion in revenue from January 2025 through June 2026 because of the levies on imported goods and the effect of economic uncertainty on the stock market.

May 14 (UPI) — Democrat John Ewing Jr. defeated incumbent Republican Omaha Mayor Jean Stothert to become Omaha’s first Black mayor.

Ewing, a former Omaha deputy police chief and current Douglas County, Neb., treasurer, defeated Stothert by an unofficial margin of 48,693 to 37,758, as reported by the Douglas County Election Commission. The commission will canvass and make the election official on May 29.

Ewing will also be the first Democrat to serve as Omaha mayor since 2013. Stothert had won three consecutive terms before this loss. Stothert had been the first woman elected city mayor.

Democrats also won four of the seven City Council seats.

The mayor’s office is nonpartisan, but the candidates’ parties came into play as an ad from Stothert stated that “Ewing stands with radicals who want to allow boys in girls’ sports.” KETV-TV reported that Ewing said in response that “Nobody’s ever brought that question up. So I believe it’s a made-up issue by Jean Stothert and the Republican Party.”

Ewing ran an ad that connected Stothert to President Donald Trump, to which she told KETV that “Donald Trump does not call me and ask for advice.”

Omaha and its suburbs make up Nebraska’s 2nd Congressional District, and it carries a presidential electoral vote, which can be won by a party different than who may carry the state-wide election and its four electoral votes.

The state generally leans Republican, but Democrats have won the 2nd Congressional District with some regularity, as Kamala Harris did in 2024, Joe Biden in 2020 and Barack Obama in 2008. On the other hand, Republican Donald Trump won in 2016 and GOP member Mitt Romney took the vote in 2012.

When survivors from January’s wildfires in Los Angeles County apply to rebuild their homes, their first interaction might be with a robot.

Artificial intelligence will aid city and county building officials in reviewing permit requests, an effort to speed up a process already being criticized as too slow.

“The current pace of issuing permits locally is not meeting the magnitude of the challenge we face,” Gov. Gavin Newsom said when announcing the AI deal in late April.

Some 13,000 homes were lost or severely damaged in the Eaton and Palisades fires, and many families are eager to return as fast as they can. Just eight days after the fire began and while it was still burning, the city received its first home rebuilding application in Pacific Palisades.

Wildfire recovery foundations purchased the AI permitting software, developed by Australian tech firm Archistar, and donated it to the city and county. When property owners submit applications, the software first will examine them for basic compliance with zoning and building codes, suggest corrections and provide a standardized report on the submission for human plan checkers to review.

L.A. County officials hope the software — believed to be the first large-scale use of such permitting technology nationwide after a natural disaster — will slice the time its employees now spend performing menial tasks, such as measuring building heights, counting parking spaces and calculating setbacks, said Mitch Glaser, an assistant deputy director in the county’s planning department.

“We see our planners doing things that are more impactful for our fire survivors,” Glaser said.

Disaster relief and government technology experts said they’re encouraged by the initiative. Municipal permitting is the type of highly technical, repetitive and time-consuming process that AI software could make more efficient, they said, especially as residents are expected to flood local building departments with applications to rebuild.

Still, they warned that for the AI software to be effective, the city and county would have to integrate the technology into its existing systems and quickly correct any errors in implementation. If not, the software could add more bureaucratic hurdles or narrow property owners’ options through overly rigid or incorrect code interpretations.

“This could be fabulously successful and I hope it is,” said Andrew Rumbach, a senior fellow at the Washington-based Urban Institute, where he studies disaster response. “But experimenting with technology in the context of people who’ve lost a lot is risky.”

Immediately after the fires, leaders at all levels of government pledged to waive and streamline rules for property owners to rebuild, promising that regulatory processes wouldn’t hold up residents’ return. Noting the pace of ongoing debris removal, L.A. Mayor Karen Bass has called the region’s recovery “on track to be the fastest in modern California history.” A mayoral spokesperson said that the building department is completing initial permitting reviews twice as fast as before the fire.

More than 200 Pacific Palisades property owners have submitted applications to rebuild or repair their homes, according to a Times analysis of city permitting data, with 11% approved. Last week, 24 property owners submitted applications, the highest amount since the disaster, the analysis shows.

L.A. County, which is responsible for permitting in Altadena and other unincorporated areas, has a separate system for tracking permits which the Times has not been able to independently verify. On Monday, the county listed 476 applications for zoning reviews on its data dashboard, with eight building permits approved. By Tuesday, the number of zoning reviews listed had increased to 486 while the number of building permit approvals dropped to seven.

Besides Newsom, architects, builders and homeowners have grumbled about the permitting process, expressing frustrations at what they say are confusing and inconsistent interpretations of regulations. Last week, actress Mandy Moore, whose family had multiple homes damaged or destroyed in the Eaton fire, blasted the county for “nonsensical red tape” that is making it difficult for her to rebuild.

The wildfire recovery nonprofit Steadfast LA, started by developer and former mayoral candidate Rick Caruso, took the lead on securing the Archistar software and is covering much of the up to $2-million tab for its implementation. LA Rises, the foundation started by Newsom after the fires, will pay Archistar’s $200 fee per application.

Caruso, who declined an interview request from The Times, has said that turning to AI was a no-brainer.

“Bringing AI into permitting will allow us to rebuild faster and safer, reducing costs and turning a process that can take weeks and months into one that can happen in hours or days,” Caruso said in the news release announcing the deal.

Archistar’s AI permitting software has been in development since 2018. The company has contracts with municipalities in Australia and Canada and is expanding to the United States. In the fall, after a successful pilot program in Austin, Texas, Archistar signed an agreement with the city to perform initial assessments of building projects, similar to its intended use in Los Angeles. Austin has not implemented the software yet, but city officials said they believe it could cut preliminary reviews there to one business day from 15.

Once Archistar’s program is online in L.A. County, Glaser said, officials hope it will reduce the first analysis for rebuilding projects to two or three business days from five.

It could save additional time for projects by minimizing revisions and corrections, said Zach Seidl, a Bass spokesperson.

“The biggest potential for reducing permitting time comes from improving the quality of initial plans that homeowners submit to the city,” Seidl said.

Land use consultants and architects in Los Angeles said they were happy with any technology that could hasten approvals of their projects. But they said that AI wouldn’t ease the hardest parts of the permitting process.

Architect Ken Ungar, who is working with roughly two dozen Palisades property owners who are rebuilding, said his biggest headaches come from needing multiple city departments, such as those that oversee fire safety and utilities, to sign off on a project. Applications can get stuck, he said, and even worse sometimes one department requires changes that conflict with another’s rules.

Artificial intelligence, Ungar said, “sounds great. But unless the city of L.A. changes its whole M.O. on how you get building permits, it’s not super helpful.”

The state’s Archistar deal allows the city of Malibu, where the Palisades fire destroyed more than 1,000 homes, to receive the donated software as well. Malibu officials say they’re still deciding on it, noting that the community has specialized building codes addressing development on coastal, hillside and other environmentally sensitive habitats.

Governments are right to look to technology for help in speeding up disaster permitting, Rumbach said, but they also should ensure that human plan checkers provide oversight to account for nuances in zoning and building codes.

“I hope there are people more seasoned in communicating with disaster survivors who are the face of this,” he said. “A lot of people could be frustrated because they don’t want to deal with AI. They want to deal with a person.”

Although L.A. city and county might be the first to use AI for permitting after a major disaster, experts expect the technology to become mainstream soon.

“I’m confident there is no way back,” said Sara Bertran de Lis, director of research and analytics at Johns Hopkins University’s Bloomberg Center for Government Excellence.

L.A. County expects to implement the Archistar software within six weeks after programming and testing, Glaser said. At a recent disaster recovery panel, Bass said the city will do so “in the next couple of months.”

Syrians celebrated throughout the night after US President Donald Trump announced he would lift US sanctions on Syria during his visit to Saudi Arabia. Imran Khan breaks down what this means for the Syrian people.

In police circles, it’s known as the “LAPD lottery.”

Speaking at a city budget presentation this month, Police Chief Jim McDonnell said some officers have sought to “weaponize” the department’s disciplinary system to settle grievances, leaving city taxpayers on the hook for the legal bills.

Los Angeles has paid out at least $68.5 million over the last five years to resolve lawsuits filed by officers who claimed to be the victim of sexual harassment, racial discrimination or retaliation against whistleblowers, according to a Times analysis of payout data released by the city attorney’s office.

Skeptics inside the Los Angeles Police Department write off the claims as opportunistic officers trying to hit the jackpot, twisting paper trails created by the department’s much-maligned internal discipline system into the basis for lawsuits.

But the officers who sue and their labor attorneys argue the department’s continued failure to thoroughly investigate complaints or fix systemic issues leaves no other recourse.

Several recent civil trials have resulted in settlements or jury awards in the seven figures or more, including $11.5 million to a former K-9 officer who alleged colleagues spread false rumors about him and mocked his Samoan heritage. Dozens of other suits remain pending, likely leaving the city staring down more substantial payouts in the coming years.

The question of how to deal with the suits has emerged as one of the most pressing issues since McDonnell’s tenure as chief began in November. Mayor Karen Bass has said the city’s $1-billion budget deficit is at least partly driven by expensive legal payouts, as well as emergency response costs related to the Palisades fire and “downward national economic trends.”

Last year, the LAPD’s private fundraising arm gave $240,000 to hire an outside consultant to help the department analyze “the results of litigation to see if there are lessons to be learned from that.”

The consultant, Arif Alikhan, the department’s former director of constitutional policing, said he and his team are seeking to identify trends of risky behavior, improve tracking of problem employees and hold supervisors accountable for not addressing conduct that exposes the department to liability.

Part of the challenge, he said, is that cases take years to resolve, leading to lag time in awareness. “Then it kind of bubbles up and becomes a bigger issue and then you have multiple people suing.”

The city attorney’s office, which is responsible for defending the department against lawsuits, said in response to questions from The Times that cases are settled when “there could be a jury finding of liability, and when we can reach an agreement for a reasonable amount of money.”

“We will always do what is in the best interests of the city and continue to aggressively defend lawsuits—especially when plaintiffs’ attorneys try to make a fortune off of the City with unreasonable non-economic damages claims,” the city attorney’s office said in a statement. “Our office will aggressively defend against lawsuits that lack merit, as well as lawsuits in which the plaintiff’s attorney is making unreasonable demands for taxpayer dollars to resolve a case.”

The LAPD has long wrestled with costly litigation, and many claims by aggrieved officers are dismissed. But according to the data released to The Times, payouts for officer-driven lawsuits have increased recently: At least 13 verdicts or settlements worth $1 million or more have come since 2019, including nine in the last three years.

Beyond the cost to taxpayers, the public airing of workplace disputes can prove embarrassing to a department that has long fancied itself a spit-and-polish institution.

Take the Transit Services Division, where years of troubles and finger-pointing have led to a snarl of more than half a dozen lawsuits.

A former detective, Heather Rolland, received a $949,000 payout after she accused male colleagues of disparaging her for being injured on the job and of fostering a hostile work environment for women who worked in the division, which holds a lucrative contract with the county Metropolitan Transportation Authority to provide security on bus and train lines.

Among the male officials mentioned in her lawsuit is Randy Rangel, a former Transit Services sergeant, who filed his own claim against the city alleging he was retaliated against after reporting another officer for abusing his overtime pay. Last month, an L.A. County jury awarded him $4.5 million, which may still be challenged on appeal.

One of the witnesses who testified on Rangel’s behalf was his former captain, Brian Pratt, who also has a pending suit against the city. Pratt contends he was targeted with an anonymous personnel complaint after accusing a deputy chief of inappropriately using division staff to do nontransit work — a claim the city has denied in court filings.

The cycle of litigation continued with an internal affairs detective assigned to investigate Pratt. The detective alleged in a whistleblower claim that his bosses demanded unfavorable findings despite no evidence of wrongdoing. The lawsuit by Det. Hamilton Alvarenga also remains pending, with the city disputing his allegations.

Yet another Transit Services supervisor, Ashraf “Andy” Hanna, is pursuing legal action over what he alleged is a culture of anti-Arab discrimination. Hanna is also named as a defendant in several lawsuits, with co-workers accusing him of workplace hostility, which he disputes. One of his accusers, an officer named Natalie Bustamante, recently settled her sexual harassment lawsuit with the city for an undisclosed sum.

LAPD officers are supposed to report wrongdoing — or attempts to cover it up — to their supervisors, internal affairs or the Office of the Inspector General, which can investigate and potentially refer cases of misconduct to the chief for discipline. Those complaints are sealed from the public under state law, but the plaintiffs in several recent civil lawsuits alleged that the internal investigations tended to drag on unnecessarily and rarely led to punishment for the accused.

Attorney Matthew McNicholas, who has represented scores of officers in civil lawsuits, said he thinks that the growing payouts are a reflection of the city attorney’s hardball approach to civil litigation. This tough stance is costing taxpayers money by insisting on fighting cases even when it was clear they would lose in court, he said.

He pointed to the cases of Lou and Stacey Vince, a police couple who filed separate lawsuits against the department for retaliation and discrimination they faced while working in the San Fernando Valley. Lou Vince had alleged mistreatment after he returned from a work injury. In her claim, Stacey Vince said that after speaking up in her husband’s defense, she was denied a promotion and moved into a cramped office underneath the gym floor at the Police Academy with no furniture or Wi-Fi.

The couple, represented by McNicholas, received nearly $11 million in combined payouts.

“We tried to settle them both for low seven figures,” he said.

Joanna Schwartz, a UCLA law professor, said risk managers in L.A. and other cities should be looking for “policy changes or adjustments to staffing” after getting sued repeatedly.

“Best practices include internally investigating all allegations brought in lawsuits and then reviewing all the information that comes out during the course of discovery and trial,” Schwartz said.

The issue is not unique to the LAPD: Los Angeles County spent $150 million last year alone to defend the Sheriff’s Department from a slew of legal claims. And employment-related awards are only a fraction of the $358.8 million paid out in all LAPD lawsuits since 2019, including for traffic accidents, crackdowns on protesters and a botched fireworks detonation that leveled several city blocks and left dozens of residents displaced.

But the department’s handling of workplace complaints has drawn criticism on multiple fronts, including from the Los Angeles Police Protective League.

The union for rank-and-file officers, which sometimes helps members bring lawsuits, has cited the large verdicts as a sign senior LAPD officials are turning a blind eye to injustices in the workplace.

Last week, Jamie McBride, an outspoken union board member, filed a lawsuit in which he accused an assistant police chief of unfairly reprimanding him for speaking out about the LAPD’s grooming policy, the rules for how officers can keep their hair and mustaches.

McBride said in his suit that his remarks came during a union meeting in August 2023, when someone in the audience asked whether the department intended to change its rules to allow beards without a medical exemption, which is commonly granted to Black officers with skin conditions that make shaving painful.

McBride said he replied, “Well, I hope not ‘cause I think it looks like s—.”

He learned, according to his lawsuit, that that the department opened an investigation for what it deemed “racially discriminatory comments.”

McBride’s suit argues that his statement — “however controversial” — was made in the “context of protected union activity.”

The city has not yet filed a response in court to McBride’s claim. He didn’t respond to a message seeking comment.

McBride, who previously received $1.5 million after suing over alleged retaliation by his LAPD supervisors, is part of an internal work group looking at potential changes to the discipline system, along with Deputy Chief Michael Rimkunas, who runs the department’s professional standards bureau.

Rimkunas defended the department’s “thorough and comprehensive process” for addressing officer complaints, but said he is also pushing for “additional safeguards to be certain the complaint system is properly used.”

He said internal investigators are being more judicious about screening complaints before starting a formal inquiry. Cases involving apparent personality conflicts between employees are referred back to their supervisors for mediation “within weeks, even when the behavior may not have reached the level of misconduct,” he said.

It used to take up to a year, Rimkunas said, to “reach a point for potential intervention.”

The administration of United States President Donald Trump has slashed another $450m in grants from Harvard University, amid an ongoing feud over anti-Semitism, presidential control and the limits of academic freedom.

On Tuesday, a joint task force assembled under Trump accused Harvard, the country’s oldest university, of perpetrating a “long-standing policy and practice of discriminating on the basis of race”.

“Harvard’s campus, once a symbol of academic prestige, has become a breeding ground for virtue signaling and discrimination. This is not leadership; it is cowardice. And it’s not academic freedom; it’s institutional disenfranchisement,” the task force said in a statement.

“By prioritizing appeasement over accountability, institutional leaders have forfeited the school’s claim to taxpayer support.”

The elimination of another $450m in grants came in addition to the more than $2.2bn in federal funds that were already suspended last week, the task force added.

The feud between the president and Harvard – a prestigious Ivy League campus in Cambridge, Massachusetts – began in March, when Trump sought to impose new rules and regulations on top schools that had played host to pro-Palestinian protests over the last year.

Trump has called such protests “illegal” and accused participants of anti-Semitism. But student protest leaders have described their actions as a peaceful response to Israel’s war in Gaza, which has elicited concerns about human rights abuses, including genocide.

Columbia University was initially a centrepiece of the Trump administration’s efforts. The New York City school had seen the first major Palestine solidarity encampment rise on its lawn, which served as a blueprint for similar protests around the world. It also saw a series of mass arrests in the aftermath.

In March, one of Columbia’s protest leaders, Mahmoud Khalil, was the first foreign student to be arrested and have his legal immigration status revoked under Trump’s campaign to punish demonstrators. And when Trump threatened to yank $400m in grants and research contracts, the school agreed to submit to a list of demands to restore the funding.

The demands included adopting a formal definition of anti-Semitism, beefing up campus security and putting one of its academic departments – focused on Middle East, African and South Asian studies – under the supervision of an outside authority.

Free speech advocates called Columbia’s concessions a capitulation to Trump, who they say has sought to erode academic freedom and silence viewpoints he disagrees with.

On April 11, his administration issued another list of demands for Harvard that went even further. Under its terms, Harvard would have had to revamp its disciplinary system, eliminate its diversity initiatives and agree to an external audit of programmes deemed anti-Semitic.

The demands also required Harvard to agree to “structural and personnel changes” that would foster “viewpoint diversity” – a term left ambiguous. But critics argued it was a means for Trump to impose his values and priorities on the school by shaping its hiring and admissions practices.

Harvard has been at the centre of controversies surrounding its admissions in the past. In 2023, for instance, the Supreme Court ruled that Harvard’s consideration of race in student admissions – through a process called affirmative action – violated the Equal Protection Clause of the US Constitution.

Tuesday’s letter referenced that court decision in arguing that “Harvard University has repeatedly failed to confront the pervasive race discrimination and anti-Semitic harassment plaguing its campus”.

A pair of reports in April, created by Harvard University’s own task forces, also found that there were cases of anti-Muslim and anti-Jewish violence on campus in the wake of Israel’s war in Gaza, a divisive issue in US politics.

Ultimately, on April 14, Harvard’s president, Alan Garber, rejected the Trump administration’s demands, arguing they were evidence of government overreach.

“No government – regardless of which party is in power – should dictate what private universities can teach, whom they can admit and hire, and which areas of study and inquiry they can pursue,” Garber wrote in his response.

But Trump has continued to pressure the campus, including by threatening to revoke its tax-exempt status. Democrats and other critics have warned that it would be illegal for the president to influence the decisions of the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) with regard to individual taxpayers, like the university.

Under Trump, the Department of Homeland Security has also threatened to bar foreign students from enrolling at the university if Harvard did not hand over documents pertaining to the pro-Palestine protests.

On Monday, Garber, Harvard’s president, wrote a response to Trump’s secretary of education, Linda McMahon, defending his campus’s commitment to free speech while also addressing the spectre of anti-Semitism.

“We share common ground on a number of critical issues, including the importance of ending antisemitism and other bigotry on campus. Like you, I believe that Harvard must foster an academic environment that encourages freedom of thought and expression, and that we should embrace a multiplicity of viewpoints,” his letter read.

But, he added, Harvard’s efforts to create a more equitable learning environment were “undermined and threatened” by the Trump administration’s “overreach”.

“Harvard will not surrender its core, legally-protected principles out of fear of unfounded retaliation by the federal government,” Garber said.

“I must refute your claim that Harvard is a partisan institution. It is neither Republican nor Democratic. It is not an arm of any other political party or movement. Nor will it ever be.”