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April 22 (UPI) — A judge in rural Virginia on Wednesday blocked the results of Tuesday’s state referendum, barring lawmakers, at least temporarily, from implementing a new congressional map that favored Democrats in November’s midterm elections.

The five-page ruling by Judge Jack Hurley of the Tazewell County Circuit Court sided with the Republican National Committee, which was challenging the results of Tuesday’s special election.

On Tuesday, 51.4% of the more than 3 million Virginians who voted approved amending the state’s Constitution to permit a mid-decade congressional district map redraw, according to unofficial results from the Virginia Department of Elections.

The new map is expected to favor Democrats to win 10 of the state’s 11 congressional districts. The Democrats currently hold six of the state’s 11 congressional seats and Republicans hold five.

Hurley agreed with each of the RNC’s claims, including that the legislation supporting the map redraw violated General Assembly rules and that the question voters were asked — “Should the Constitution of Virginia be amended to allow the General Assembly to temporarily adopt new congressional districts to restore fairness in the upcoming elections” — was “a flagrantly misleading question to the voters, and because the ballot language did not accurately describe the proposed amendment as it was passed by the General Assembly.”

The order declares that all votes from the referendum are “ineffective,” and the state is enjoined from certifying them and instituting the new congressional district map.

“This ruling is a major victory for Virginians,” RNC Chair Joe Gruters said in a statement.

“Democrats attempted to force an unconstitutional scheme to tilt congressional maps in their favor, but the court recognized it for what it is — a blatant power grab.”

Virginia said it will immediately appeal the ruling.

“As I said last night, Virginia voters have spoken, and an activist judge should not have veto power over the people’s vote,” Virginia’s Democratic attorney general, Jay Jones, said in a statement.

“We look forward to defending the outcome of last night’s election in court.”

Virginia Democrats first moved for a mid-decade congressional map redraw in the fall after Texas, under pressure from President Donald Trump, approved a map expected to favor Republicans, kicking off a gerrymandering arms race. Four Republican-led states have approved new maps compared with two Democratic-led states, though several other states under majority leadership of each party are seeking to do likewise.

Trump — who has repeatedly warned Republicans that losing the House in November could lead to his impeachment — has taken several executive actions, including tightening voting regulations, that could affect November’s midterms and that Democrats and critics argue are unlawful measures that could help Republicans maintain their narrow House majority.

He has also repeatedly cast doubt on election legitimacy.

On Wednesday, Trump made unfounded claims that the Virginia referendum was “RIGGED,” citing mail-in voting, a common voting practice that the president has targeted as a vehicle for election fraud, though Trump himself has voted by mail in Florida.

“The Democrats eked out another Crooked Victory,” he said in a statement on his Truth Social media platform before Hurley’s ruling. “Let’s see if the Courts will fix this travesty of ‘Justice.'”

Hurley previously ruled to block the Democrats’ redistricting plan twice, though the Supreme Court of Virginia allowed the referendum to move forward amid litigation.

Democratic-led states California and Virginia pursued their redraws through voter-approved ballot measures, while GOP-led Texas, Missouri, Ohio and North Carolina passed actions through their Republican-controlled state institutions, without voter-approved measures.

April 22 (UPI) — More than 152 million people in the United States – about 44%– live in areas that have unhealthy levels of ozone or particle pollution, the American Lung Association said in the 2026 State of the Air report released Wednesday.

The report also noted that 44.6% of U.S. children live in counties that have failing grades for at least one measure of air pollution,while 10% of children live in counties with failing grades in all three measures. These measures include ground-level ozone (smog) and both short-term and year-round particle pollution (soot).

“Infants, children and teens are especially vulnerable to the health harms of breathing pollution,” the report said. “Their lungs are still developing, they breathe more air for their body size than adults and they frequently spend more time outdoors.”

The report showed that trends from last year’s edition continued and often grew worse, including extreme heat in many places that affected ozone levels and wildfires in Canada that affected ozone and particle pollution.

“Clean air is not something we can take for granted,” American Lung Association President Harold Wimmer said in announcing the report, the Washington Post reported. “For decades, people in the U.S. have breathed cleaner air thanks to the Clean Air Act. Unfortunately, that process is now at risk due to extreme heat and wildfires, fueled by climate change, and policy changes that are making the problem worse.”

The Clean Air Act became effective in 1963. This is the 27th edition of the State of the Air report, which was first released in 2000. The report has reflected the act’s successes over the years, but over the past decade, also the challenges of the changing climate, the American Lung Association said.

“Increases in high ozone days and spikes in particle pollution related to extreme heat, drought and wildfires are putting millions of people at risk and adding challenges to the work that states and cities are doing across the nation to clean up air pollution,” the report said.

The authors of the State of the Air report noted that levels of unhealthy air vary widely across the country and that people of color disproportionately live in areas with poor scores. A person of color is 2.42 times as likely as a white person to live in an area with poor scores for all three air pollution measures.

For the seventh year in a row, Bakersfield, Calif., was the metropolitan area with the worst level of year-round particle pollution. Fairbanks, Ala., moved to the worst spot for short-term particle pollution. Los Angeles remained the metropolitan area with the worst ozone pollution. It’s held that spot for 26 years of the report’s 27-year history.

Only one city – Bangor, Maine – had good marks in all three measures.

In county rankings, San Bernardino in California had the highest level of ozone pollution; the five worst counties in the country in this measure were all in California. In short-term particle pollution, Fairbanks North Star Borough in Alaska was ranked as the worst. In long-term particle pollution, Kern County in California held that spot.

Twenty counties throughout the United States had failing grades for all three measures of air pollution: Maricopa in Arizona; Fresno, Imperial, Kern, Kings, Los Angeles, Merced, Riverside, San Bernardino, Stanislaus and Tulare in California; Lake and Marion in Indiana; Wayne County in Michigan; Butler and Cuyahoga in Ohio; Allegheny, Dauphin and Philadelphia in Pennsylvania; and Bexar County in Texas.

April 22 (UPI) — On Wednesday, a U.S. District judge sentenced the man who stole a purse from former Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem to three years in prison for that theft and others in Washington, D.C.

Noem was eating with her family April 25 at a restaurant in the presence of Secret Service agents when Mario Bustamante Leiva took her Gucci purse from the floor, NBC News reported. Police later found the bag, which had credit cards and more than $3,000 in cash, in Bustamante Leiva’s room.

The U.S. attorney’s office said that Bustamante Leiva, 50, a native of Chili, did not recognize Noem when he took the purse. The theft was part of a string of similar incidents in which Bustamante Leiva stole bags that belonged to women at restaurants throughout the District of Columbia.

Police arrested Bustamante Leiva on April 26, 2025. He pleaded guilty in November to three counts of wire fraud and one count of first-degree theft. He will face deportation after his prison sentence, the U.S. attorney’s office said.

“Bustamante Leiva came to Washington illegally to prey on citizens of the district,” Jeanine Pirro, U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, said in a press release. “He methodically targeted women at restaurants, stealing their purses and monetizing the stolen cards within minutes. His pattern of theft ends here.”

Court records show that, in three cases last April, Bustamante Leiva took bags from women at district restaurants and used their cards to make purchases, including gift cards worth hundreds of dollars, soon afterward. The incidents took place April 12, 17 and 20, 2025, with the last involving Noem.

In the April 12 case, Bustamante Leiva worked with codefendant Cristian Montecino-Sanzana, the U.S. attorney’s office said. Montecino-Sanzana was sentenced March 13 to 13 months in prison and three years of supervised release. He also faces deportation after his sentence.

April 22 (UPI) — Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell‘s term is nearing its end and President Donald Trump is pushing for his replacement but an investigation into Powell may hold up the appointment of a new chair.

The Justice Department opened an investigation into Powell over the renovation of the Marriner S. Eccles Federal Reserve Board Building in Washington, D.C., which Trump claims has exceeded $3 billion. The renovation was not the beginning of Trump’s feud with Powell but it has added to his effort to oust the chairman before the end of his term.

Powell’s term as chairman of the Federal Reserve will end in May but he will remain on the Board of Governors until January 2028.

Typically when a Fed chair’s term ends, they resign. However, Powell said he plans to stay put until a replacement is appointed.

At least one lawmaker, Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., said he would not vote on a new chairman until the investigation into Powell is over.

The Justice Department alleges that Powell made false or misleading statements to Congress about the cost of the renovation project at the Federal Reserve headquarters during his testimony to the House Committee on Financial Services in June.

Powell’s testimony was part of his semiannual report to Congress on monetary policy.

Following the hearing, Rep. Anna Paulina Luna, R-Fla., submitted a request to then-Attorney General Pam Bondi for Powell to be investigated for perjury and making false statements. Luna said that Powell denied there would be “luxury features” included in the renovations, including a “VIP dining room, premium marble, water features and a roof terrace garden.”

Luna added that Powell “falsely claimed that the Eccles building ‘never had’ a serious renovation.” She notes that the building underwent renovations in 1999 and 2003.

“These are not minor misstatements,” Luna said. “Chairman Powell knowingly misled both Congress and executive branch officials about the true nature of a taxpayer-funded project. Lying under oath is a serious offense — especially from someone tasked with overseeing our monetary system and public trust.”

No charges have been formally filed against Powell. The challenge the Justice Department faces in convicting Powell of perjury or false statements is in proving that he willfully, knowingly made statements he knew to be false at the time.

Powell, who was Trump’s nominee for chairman in 2017, has said that the investigation into him and the Federal Reserve renovation is “pretext” to punish him for not following Trump’s direction to lower interest rates.

“No one, certainly not the chair of the Federal Reserve, is above the law, but this unprecedented action should be seen in the broader context of the administration’s threats and ongoing pressure,” Powell said in a video message in January. “This is about whether the Feed will be able to continue to set interest rates based on evidence and economic conditions — or whether instead monetary policy will be directed by political pressure or intimidation.”

Last month, federal prosecutor George A. Massucco-LaTaif told Chief U.S. District Judge James E. Boasberg that the Justice Department does not know of any evidence that a crime has been committed in the Federal Reserve renovation project.

“We do not know at this time,” Massucco-LaTaif said. “However, there are 1.2 billion reasons for us to look into it.”

The fissure between Powell and Trump began and has continued over the Federal Reserve’s decision to maintain elevated interest rates in response to inflation. Trump has repeatedly called on the Federal Reserve to lower interest rates, saying the United States should “have the lowest interest rate in the world.”

All along the Federal Reserve continues to hold an elevated interest rate, currently between 3.5% and 3.75%, in an effort to tame inflation. Its target rate of inflation is 2% on an annual basis.

Economic markers from the U.S. Bureau of Labor statistics show the rate of inflation remains at about 3%.

Trump has nominated Kevin Warsh to succeed Powell. Warsh served on the Fed’s board for five years after being appointed by President George W. Bush in 2006.

“I have known Kevin for a long period of time, and have no doubt that he will go down as one of the great Fed chairmen, maybe the best,” Trump posted on social media in January. “On top of everything else, he is ‘central casting,’ and he will never let you down.”

Warsh faced his first hearing on the path toward confirmation on Tuesday when he testified before the Senate Banking Committee. Questions by senators centered on the Federal Reserve’s independence, something Trump’s influence has called into question.

If appointed, Warsh would be the wealthiest person to lead the Federal Reserve.

Presidents have butted heads with the Federal Reserve throughout its history, as monetary policy can reflect on how the U.S. population views the president’s performance. A president has never tried to fire the chairman of the Federal Reserve.

The Federal Reserve is a non-partisan, independent agency made up of a board of governors posted in Washington, D.C., and 12 regional banks located across the United States.

Independence is key to the Federal Reserve’s function, keeping it from choosing policy based on the political goals of those occupying the White House and other branches of government.

Trump has not attempted to fire Powell yet but he did attempt to fire Fed board Gov. Lisa Cook. The attempt was unsuccessful as the U.S. Supreme Court intervened in October and ruled that she can remain at her post on an interim basis, at least for 2026.

The president does have some authority over choosing or designating a new Federal Reserve chair, Peter Shane, a constitutional law scholar in residence at NYU Law School, told UPI. However, a president must demonstrate a good reason for doing so.

There are two mechanisms in place that are meant to protect the independence of the Federal Reserve and its chair from political influence.

First, there is Supreme Court precedent. In 1935, the high court made a ruling in the landmark case Humphrey’s Executor vs. the United States. In this case, the court ruled that President Franklin D. Roosevelt could not fire the commissioner of the Federal Trade Commission, another independent agency, without cause.

The ruling affirmed that the authority to remove the head of any independent agency falls to Congress.

Second, there is the Federal Reserve Act. President Woodrow Wilson signed the Federal Reserve Act of 1913 to decentralize the control over monetary policy in the United States. This established the Federal Reserve and set its independence as a foundational feature of its existence.

The Federal Reserve Act makes the Federal Reserve independent in setting monetary policy without the influence of the president or Congress.

Congress has the ability to change the Federal Reserve Act. It did so in 1977 with the Federal Reserve Reform Act.

This amendment, signed into law by President Jimmy Carter, codified the objectives of the agency and established a requirement for the board of governors to report to Congress in hearings twice a year. It also added the requirement of Senate confirmation hearings for the chairman and vice chairman of the board of governors.

Last year, Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., introduced the Federal Reserve Board Abolition Act, calling for the board of governors of the Federal Reserve and all Federal Reserve banks to be abolished.

“Americans have suffered under crippling inflation and the Federal Reserve is to blame,” Massie said in a statement.

Since being introduced in March 2025 the bill has not progressed beyond being referred to the House Committee on Financial Services.

April 22 (UPI) — A U.S. appeals court has ruled that Texas can require schools to display a copy of the Ten Commandments, finding the legislation that mandates the Decalogue in classrooms does not require students to believe in the religious teachings.

The Tuesday ruling from the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals is a victory for Texas conservatives and Christians who have fought to further include religion in public spaces. The decision is expected to be appealed to the Supreme Court.

“This is a major victory for Texas and our moral values,” the state’s Republican attorney general, Ken Paxton, said in a statement.

“The Ten Commandments have had a profound impact on our nation, and it’s important that students learn from them every single day.”

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott signed Senate Bill 10 into law June 10, directing every classroom in all Texas public schools to display the Ten Commandments starting Sept. 1, but has been tied up in litigation since.

While proponents argue the Decalogue is foundational to American life, opponents state that mandating it in schools is an unconstitutional violation of the separation of church and state.

The American Civil Liberties Union, which represented multi-faith Texas families in the case, said it was “extremely disappointed” by the decision and expects the Supreme Court to reverse it.

“The court’s ruling goes against fundamental First Amendment principles and binding U.S. Supreme Court authority,” the ACLU of Texas said in a statement.

“The First Amendment safeguards the separation of church and state, and the freedom of families to choose how, when and if to provide their children with religious instruction. This decision tramples those rights.”

The appeals court on Tuesday ruled 9-7 to overturn a lower court’s preliminary injunction that found S.B. 10 likely unconstitutional.

In its ruling, the appeals court found S.B. 10 “looks nothing like a historical religious establishment.”

“S.B. 10 authorizes no religious instruction and gives teachers no license to contradict children’s religious beliefs (or their parents’). No child is made to recite the Commandments, believe them or affirm their divine origin,” the court said.

April 22 (UPI) — On this date in history:

In 1500, explorer Pedro Álvares Cabral arrived in South America, claiming what would later be known as Brazil for Portugal.

In 1889, about 20,000 homesteaders massed along the border of the Oklahoma Territory, awaiting the signal to start the Oklahoma land rush.

In 1914, U.S. forces took control of the Mexican port city of Veracruz during the fighting of the Mexican Revolution.

In 1915, during World War I, German forces became the first to use poison gas on the Western Front during the Second Battle of Ypres.

In 1954, the Army-McCarthy hearings began in which Sen. Joseph McCarthy, R-Wis., accused the Army go going soft on communism, while the Army said it was pressured to give a speedy commission to a McCarthy aide.

UPI File Photo

In 1970, Earth Day was first observed.

In 1972, Apollo 16 astronauts John Young and Charles Duke walked and rode on the surface of the moon for 7 hours, 23 minutes. Young, whose career with NASA began in 1962, would spend the next four decades as an astronaut, retiring in 2004 at the age of 74.

In 1985, Jose Sarney was sworn in as Brazil’s first civilian president in 21 years.

In 1992, more than 200 people died when a gas leak caused sewers in Guadalajara, Mexico, to explode.

In 1993, the Holocaust Memorial Museum was dedicated in Washington, D.C.

File Photo by Roger L. Wollenberg/UPI

In 1994, Richard Nixon, the 37th U.S. president and the only one to resign from the office, died four days after having a stroke. He was 81.

In 1997, a 126-day standoff at the Japanese Embassy in Lima ended after Peruvian commandos stormed the building and freed 72 hostages held by the Tupac Amaru Revolutionary Movement. All 14 rebels were killed.

In 2004, former NFL star Pat Tillman, who turned down a lucrative contract with the Arizona Cardinals to join the U.S. Army Rangers, was killed in Afghanistan. The U.S. military said later he was a victim of friendly fire.

In 2005, Zacarias Moussaoui, the only man charged in the United States in connection with the September 11, 2001, terror attacks, pleaded guilty and was sentenced to life in prison.

In 2006, Iraq’s Parliament ratified the selection of Nouri al-Maliki as prime minister, ending a four-month political deadlock.

In 2016, world leaders from 175 countries gathered in New York on Earth Day to sign the Paris Agreement, the first international accord that outlines steps to combat climate change and lower carbon levels by 2100.

In 2020, President Donald Trump signed an executive order to temporarily close U.S. borders to migrants during the COVID-19 pandemic.

File Photo by Michael Reynolds/UPI

Scarlett Johansson, Brie Larson attend ‘Avengers’ premiere

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April 22 (UPI) — Federal prosecutors Tuesday evening announced an 11-count indictment against the Southern Poverty Law Center, accusing the non-profit of defrauding donors by using their money to pay informants within hate groups they were monitoring.

Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche announced the indictment from a Montgomery, Ala., grand jury during a press conference, alleging that between 2014 and 2023, the SPLC paid more than $3 million to informants in hate groups the organization had vowed to dismantle.

“As the indictment described, the SPLC was not dismantling these groups, but it was instead manufacturing the extremism it purports to oppose by paying sources to stoke racial hatred,” he said, alongside FBI Director Kash Patel.

The indictment, which was returned by an Alabama grand jury just minutes before the press conference, details payments to informants in groups such as the neo-Nazi National Alliance and the Ku Klux Klan, but does not detail extensive evidence that the money was “used to fund the leaders and organizers of racist groups.”

Federal prosecutors allege that the SPLC obtained money via donations by making “‘materially false representations and omissions about” what the money would be used for and utilized bank accounts linked to “fictitious entities” to covertly pay their field sources.

One SPLC informant is described in the court document as a member of the online leadership chat group behind the 2017 Unite The Right protest in Charlottesville, Va., where one person was killed when a car rammed counterprotesters.

This informant was paid more than $270,000 between 2015 and 2023, according to the indictment, which alleges that they attended the Unite the Right event “at the direction of the SPLC,” made “racist postings under the supervision of the SPLC and helped coordinate transportation to the event for several attendees.

Another SPLC informant described by federal prosecutors as being affiliated with the neo-Nazi National Alliance organization stole 25 boxes of documents from the headquarters of a violent extremist group, copied the materials for the SPLC and returned the originals. The court document alleges that the SPLC paid the informant more than $1 million between 2014 and 2023.

Blanche told reporters during the press conference that the informants were paid via pre-paid cards with funds from donors that were moved from bank accounts that the SPLC created for five fictitious organizations in order to shield the source of the funds.

“They attempted to hide their criminal activity from our financial banking network,” Patel said.

“They set up shell companies and entities around America so that the financial system that we rely on as everyday Americans were deceived into believing that money is not coming from the Southern Poverty Law Center in the perpetration of this scheme and fraud but rather fictitious entities they stood up to perpetuate this ongoing fraud.”

The indictment charges the SPLC with six counts of wire fraud, four counts of bank fraud and one count of conspiracy to commit money laundering.

Ahead of the press conference, SPLC CEO Bryan Fair announced in a video statement that the organization and its employees were the target of a federal investigation focused on its use of informants, though they had yet to know all the details.

He defended the SPLC’s use of informants as necessary to protect themselves and the public after decades of being “engaged in unprecedented litigation to dismantle the Klan and other hate groups.”

Information the SPLC gained from the informants was frequently shared with local and federal law enforcement, including the FBI, he said, adding that they did not broadly share their use of informants to protect their identities.

“While we no longer work with paid informants, we continue to take their safety seriously. These individuals risked their lives to infiltrate and inform on the activities of our nation’s most radical and violent extremist groups,” he said, vowing to fight the allegations.

“We will not be intimidated into silence or contrition, and we will not abandon our mission or the communities we serve.”

The SPLC has long faced criticism from some Republicans and conservatives, who say the prominent anti-hate nonprofit has drifted from its mission of fighting extremism and White supremacy by labeling several right-wing organizations as hate groups.

In October, Patel announced that the FBI severed ties with the SPLC, accusing it of having “long abandoned civil rights work and turned into a partisan smear machine.”

Democrats, SPLC supporters and critics of the Trump administration lambasted the indictment as politically motivated, with the American Civil Liberties Union calling it “another example of the Trump administration’s extreme attempts to silence its critics.”

“Let’s be clear about what’s happening here. This administration is using the full weight of federal prosecution to target an organization whose mission is rooting out violent extremism,” Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., said online.

“This is part and parcel of Trump’s assault on free speech, on nonprofits and on anyone who dares to disagree with him.”

House Majority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., called the indictment “baseless and illegitimate.”

“These partisan hacks who continue to weaponize the criminal justice system against perceived opponents will never intimidate us,” he said.

WASHINGTON, April 22 (UPI) — The Supreme Court will hear arguments Wednesday whether immigration officers can place permanent residents charged with a crime on parole if they leave and then re-enter the country.

In immigration, parole is a temporary, discretionary permission granted by the Department of Homeland Security that allows a person to enter or remain in the United States, even though they are not formally admitted.

Parole does not cancel a person’s green card, but essentially gives the Department of Homeland Security time to decide whether the person should be admitted or deported based on how the issue is resolved.

The court is poised to hear oral arguments in Blanche vs. Lau, which would determine when immigration officers can demote a permanent resident’s status to parole, a temporary status that can be revoked and result in deportation.

Lau is Chinese immigrant Muk Lau, a permanent resident with a green card. Blanche is Todd Blanche, the acting U.S. attorney general and named defendant in the case.

Typically, permanent residents are allowed to leave and re-enter the United States as they wish, with a few exceptions. If these immigrants have committed certain kinds of crimes, for example, officers can have them placed on parole when they return to the country after going abroad.

The case stems from an event on June 15, 2012, when 69-year-old Lau, who had gained permanent residency five years earlier, landed in a New York-area airport after traveling to China.

He presented his green card and passport to border control. His entry triggered an FBI match because a month earlier, Lau was charged with third-degree trademark counterfeiting for selling nearly $300,000 of fake designer shorts.

“I was arrested at a warehouse that contained some merchandise I had stored there,” Lau told the Customs and Border Protection agent, according to court documents. “I went to the warehouse to retrieve the merchandise because I had not paid rent, and when I got there, the cops were there and arrested me.”

The agent declared Lau inadmissible as a returning permanent resident due to the crime exception, and decided to let him in on parole, instead. A year later, Lau pled guilty to the counterfeiting, and in 2014, the Department of Homeland Security began deportation proceedings against him.

At the time, the Customs and Border Patrol agent did not know whether Lau was guilty — just that he had been charged with a crime. The crux of Lau’s case is whether the CBP agent needed “clear and convincing” evidence of a crime when placing him on parole or whether just charges were enough without such evidence.

Immigrant advocates argue the agent erred.

“Mr. Lau was absolutely, unequivocally, at that time, admissible,” said Jonathan Weinberg, who worked on the American Immigration Lawyers Association’s brief to the court. “He just was. He hadn’t been convicted of a crime. There was nothing else that would render him inadmissible.”

After an immigration judge and the Board of Immigration Appeals sided with the government, Lau appealed to the U.S. 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals. The appellate court, agreeing with Weinberg’s reasoning, granted Lau’s petition in March 2025.

The Federation for American Immigration Reform, a nonprofit advocating for lower immigration rates, also submitted a brief to the court. It argued that the border patrol officer did the right thing by paroling Lau into the country, and that the clear and convincing standard was too high.

“If you’re going to say that the officer in an airport is supposed to have all this information, you’re assigning that individual with an impossible task,” FAIR spokesman Ira Mehlman said. “You have thousands of people coming through the airports every day, and these are decisions that have to be made on the spot.”

Mehlman also said that the decision “shouldn’t be a problem” for green-card holders without any criminal history.

“When you come to the United States as a non-citizen, you are here on a conditional basis,” Mehlman said. “Even if you’re a green card holder, you’re subject to removal if you violate the terms of your presence here in the United States.”

There are nearly 13 million legal permanent residents in the United States. Legal immigrants, including green card holders, commit crimes at lower rates than natural-born citizens, according to research by the Migration Policy Institute. However, Weinberg said the ultimate decision would impact all legal permanent residents, including those who have not been convicted of any crime.

“If the government can admit Lau on parole, then the government can basically admit any returning green card holder on parole if it chooses to,” Weinberg said.

Lau’s case joins several immigration-related issues, including birthright citizenship and temporary protected status, which have made their way to the Supreme Court this spring.

“The immigrant advocacy community is, I think, fighting an uphill battle,” Weinberg said. “But that doesn’t mean you don’t give it your best shot.”

April 21 (UPI) — Uncertainty over Iran peace talks put Vice President JD Vance’s trip to Pakistan on hold Tuesday, as Iranian officials were silent on whether they intend to take part in the talks at all.

The New York Times reported that talks could, however, restart at any time. Officials in Tehran were divided on whether to take part in negotiations while the United States held firm on its embargo on ports in Iran, Axios reported.

President Donald Trump said earlier in the day that he expects to reach a deal with Iran in negotiations to end the war on Tuesday, but if no deal is made, he is prepared to resume bombing.

The two-week cease-fire Trump agreed to is set to expire on Wednesday, with the Strait of Hormuz remaining a centerpiece to the conflict between the United States and Iran.

“What I think is that we’re going to end up with a great deal,” Trump said in an interview on CNBC on Tuesday. “I think they have no choice. We’ve taken out their navy. We’ve taken out their air force. We’ve taken out their leaders, frankly. It is regime change, no matter what you want to call it. Which is not something I said I was going to do but I’ve done, indirectly maybe, but I’ve done it.”

Trump said the United States’ blockade of the Strait of Hormuz has been a “tremendous success,” adding that “we totally control the strait.”

The president added that he does not want to extend the cease-fire, noting that negotiations will take place near the time the two-week cease-fire ends.

If a deal is not agreed to on Tuesday and Wednesday, Trump said, “I expect to be bombing,” and “we are raring to go.”

“We’re totally loaded up. We have so much of everything; much more powerful than it was four or five weeks ago,” Trump said. “We caught a ship yesterday that had some things on it, which wasn’t very nice. A gift from China perhaps, I don’t know.”

Trump claimed that Iran has executed 42,000 protesters in the last two months, a number that has not been verified, though former Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said thousands were killed earlier this year.

On social media, Trump shared a post saying the Islamic Republic is “preparing to hang eight women.” Trump called on Iranian leaders to release the women.

“I would greatly appreciate the release of these women,” Trump wrote. “I am sure that they will respect the fact that you did so. Please do them no harm! Would be a great start to our negotiations!”

April 21 (UPI) — Retail sales rose by 1.7% in March mostly due to high gas prices from the ongoing conflict with Iran, the Commerce Department announced Tuesday.

It was the fastest monthly change in three years, according to a release.

In February, sales rose 0.7%.

Retail sales are seasonally adjusted but not for inflation. In March inflation rose by 0.9%, which was three times the February rate, according to the latest Consumer Price Index.

The war between the United States, Israel and Iran has caused gas prices to spike. The Strait of Hormuz, a critical transportation route for oil, has been closed to most traffic throughout the fighting. It has dramatically affected the price of gas in the United States and abroad.

Gas station sales jumped in March by 15.5% from February. Without gas station sales, retail rose 0.6% in March, which was at 0.7% in February.

Some categories were stronger. Furniture and home furnishing sales were up 2.2% in March.

Electronics and building materials held up well, too.

Gary Schlossberg, global strategist at Wells Fargo Investment Institute, said in commentary to investors on Tuesday: “Pressure on household budgets is being cushioned, for now, by sizable increases in tax refunds tied to last year’s legislation.”

Consumers adjusted their spending in other areas. Apparel sales were flat, and restaurant sales rose only 0.1%.

Gas prices likely caused that, said Dan North, Allianz Trade senior economist for North America.

“Gasoline is a thing you love to hate, because you have to buy it; there’s really no substitute,” North told CNN in an interview.

Eventually, consumers will deplete savings and tax refunds, and for lower-income Americans, it could be a struggle, North said.

“If we can wind this up, so to speak, in the next few months, the damage to the consumer and economy might not be so bad,” North said. “If you start stretching it out for months and months and toward the end of the year, then consumers and the rest of the economy get in trouble.”

April 21 (UPI) — The Southern Poverty Law Center announced via YouTube Tuesday that it is now the target of an investigation by the Department of Justice.

“Although we don’t know all the details, the focus appears to be on the SPLC’s prior use of paid confidential informants to gather credible intelligence on extremely violent groups,” said CEO Bryan Fair in the video. “This use of informants was necessary because we are no stranger to threats of violence. In 1983, our offices were firebombed, and in the years since, there have been countless credible threats against our staff.”

The Southern Poverty Law Center is a nonprofit advocacy and litigation organization that tracks White supremacist and other hate groups in the United States. Republicans have criticized the nonprofit for acting as a far-left entity that they say targets conservative organizations and people. It was founded in 1971 by Morris Dees, Joseph Levin Jr. and Julian Bond as a civil rights law firm in Montgomery, Ala.

The case is being led by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Middle District of Alabama, CBS News reported.

Fair said the probe is targeting the organization and its employees.

“For decades, we engaged in unprecedented litigation to dismantle the Klan and other hate groups. In light of that work, we sought to protect the safety of our staff and the public,” Fair said in the video. “We frequently shared what we learned from informants with local and federal law enforcement, including the FBI. We did not, however, share our use of informants broadly with anyone, to protect the identity and safety of the informants and their families.

“And while we no longer work with paid informants, we continue to take their safety seriously. These individuals risked their lives to infiltrate and inform on the activities of our nation’s most radical and violent extremist groups,” Fair said.

Fair said the organization will fight the allegations.

“We stood in the vanguard then, and we stand in the vanguard today,” he said. “We will not be intimidated into silence or contrition, and we will not abandon our mission or the communities we serve.”

April 21 (UPI) — Voters are heading to the polls in Virginia on Tuesday to vote on a new congressional map drawn by state lawmakers.

Polls are open until 7 p.m. EST., with nearly 1.4 million early ballots already cast on a constitutional amendment to change the congressional map. The result of Tuesday’s vote could have significant implications for the midterm elections in November.

If the map, drawn by Democratic lawmakers, is approved by voters, Democrats would be favored to win 10 of the state’s 11 congressional districts. Democrats currently hold six of the state’s 11 congressional seats and Republicans hold five.

Virginia is just the latest state to weigh redrawing its congressional map mid-decade after Texas approved a map that will favor Republicans last year. Four Republican-led states have approved new congressional maps.

Democrats and Republicans outside of the state have lent their voices to campaigns for and against Virginia’s redistricting plan. President Donald Trump and House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., voiced their opposition to the plan, with Trump calling it “unfair.”

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., has joined Virginia lawmakers Sen. Mark Warner and Sen. Tim Kaine at rallies to support redistricting. Former President Barack Obama has also been involved, appearing in ad campaigns calling on voters to vote “yes.”

“We’re giving Virginians a chance to vote — which Republican states have not done — about whether they want to have a congressional delegation that will stand up against Donald Trump’s tyranny if he tries to interfere with our elections,” Kaine said in an appearance on Fox News on Sunday.

The Virginia Supreme Court allowed Tuesday’s election to move forward but may still weigh in on whether the new congressional map is legal or not.

April 20 (UPI) — A Southwest Airlines flight arriving at Nashville International Airport over the weekend was directed into the path of another Southwest flight that was taking off, causing them to pass within 500 vertical feet of each other.

A flight arriving from Myrtle Beach, S.C., on Saturday evening initiated a go-around before landing because it was facing “gusty winds” during it’s approach, but air traffic controllers directed the crew into the path of another flight, USA Today, WSMV and WTVF reported.

The other flight was departing NIA on a parallel runway, which caused the close call, and “both flight crews responded to onboard alerts” because the two aircraft were 500 feet apart, the Federal Aviation Administration said in a statement.

Five hundred feet is equivalent to 1 2/3 football fields, including the end zones, or two Boeing 747s lined up nose-to-tail, which is half the 1,000-foot distance the FAA requires aircraft to maintain.

The air traffic controller who gave the errant order recognized the mistake and corrected himself with both flight crews, who had already responded to alerts from their Traffic Collision Avoidance System, devices that are standard on all commercial aircraft.

“We are engaged with the FAA as part of the investigation,” Southwest said in a statement.

“Southwest appreciates the professionalism of its Pilots and Flights Crews in responding to the event,” the company said. “Nothing is more importing to Southwest than the Safety of our Customers and Employees.”

April 20 (UPI) — The Federal Aviation Administration grounded Blue Origin‘s New Glenn rocket after it botched the release of a satellite following its successful launch two hours earlier.

The third launch of New Glenn and second landing of its reusable booster stage “Never Tell Me The Odds” on a drone ship in the Atlantic Ocean was a success in those terms, but the spacecraft delivered AST SpaceMobile’s BlueBird 7 satellite to an orbit too low for it to operate properly.

Blue Origin said Monday that it is leading an investigation into one of New Glenn’s engines producing insufficient thrust to reach the mission’s target orbit.

“While we were pleased with the nominal booster recovery, we clearly didn’t deliver the mission our customer wanted, and our team expects,” Blue Origin CEO Dave Limp said in a post on X.

The FAA, NASA, the National Transportation Safety Board and the U.S. Space Force also have been monitoring the situation and will require Blue Origin to complete its investigation and report on the engine anomaly, the Orlando Sentinel reported.

“A return to flight is based on the FAA determining that any system, process or procedure related to the mishap does not affect public safety,” the FAA said in explaining why it grounded the rocket.

The New Glenn-3 rocket launched around 7:30 a.m. EDT on Sunday morning, nailing the flight and landing portion of its mission, and successfully released the BlueBird 7 satellite once it reached orbit.

Because one of the two BE-3U engines that power New Glenn’s upper stage didn’t produce sufficient thrust on its second engine burn, which is meant to boost the spacecraft to its target orbit above Earth, it never got there.

Although the satellite was released and powered on properly, the off-nominal orbit — which was too low for it to be useful — AST said it would be jettisoned.

BlueBird 7 is one of 45 satellites that AST SpaceMobile hopes to get in orbit by the end of 2026 as part of a satellite-based cellular network designed to operate with standard smartphones.

The satellite would have been the companies eighth to reach orbit, and it’s share price Feller by more than 6% on Monday, The BBC reported.

Limp said Blue Origin is analyzing data as it conducts the investigation and is “in steady communication with the team at AST SpaceMobile.”

“We appreciate their partnership, and we’re looking forward to many flights together,” Limp said.

April 20 (UPI) — Two people were killed Monday in a shooting near a North Carolina middle school where two children agreed to meet for a fight, police said.

Law enforcement officials were alerted to a fight at Leinbach Park on Robinhood Road near Jefferson Middle School in Winston-Salem, N.C., at 9:52 a.m. EST. As officers were on the way to the scene, the call was upgraded to a shooting.

The Winston-Salem Police Department posted on Facebook that “two young individuals” met at Leinbach Park for a “planned fight.” When those individuals arrived, “the situation escalated significantly, leading to multiple people exchanging gunfire.”

The police department didn’t say how many people were injured in the shooting, but used a hashtag for “mass shooting” in its post on X.

“Several individuals — both victims and suspects — have been identified and located,” the Winston-Salem Police Department posted on social media. “Due to the number of people involved, efforts are ongoing to account for everyone. At this time, some of those involved in the incident are juveniles.”

Police advised that nearby schools were operating on a normal schedule, but community members were urged to avoid the area to allow emergency responders to operate safely at the scene. The park and two nearby roads were closed as officers processed the scene.

“This is an isolated incident and remains under active investigation,” the police department said.

April 20 (UPI) — A mother and her six children, ranging from 3- to 11-years-old, died in a fire in Clinton County, Pa., when their home exploded.

On Sunday at about 8:42 a.m. EST., emergency response units from nearby Centre and Lycoming counties were alerted to a fire on Long Run Road in Lamar Township. The home of 34-year-old Sarah B. Stolzfus and her children was fully engulfed in flames when first responders arrived on the scene.

State police said the cause of the explosion is under investigation.

Stolzfus and her children, four boys ages 11, 10, 4 and 3, and two daughters, ages 8 and 6, were pronounced dead at the scene.

A propane leak inside the home is a potential cause for the explosion, state police said. There were propane tanks outside of the home that did not explode, nor were they involved in the fire.

April 20 (UPI) — The American Library Association released its list of the “Top 11 Most Challenged Books List of 2025,” including titles by John Green and Sarah J. Maas.

The list, part of the 2026 State of America’s Libraries Report, is based on data from the ALA’s Office for Intellectual Freedom, which tracked 4,235 unique titles challenged across 2025. The number was the second-highest ever documented by the ALA, after 4,240 books were challenged in 2023.

The 2025 challenges included 713 attempts to censor library materials and services through access restrictions, including 487 books.

The most challenged book of 2025 was Sold by Patricia McCormick, followed by The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky, Gender Queer: A Memoir by Maia Kobabe, and Empire of Storms by Sarah J. Maas.

There was a tie for fifth place between Last Night at the Telegraph Club by Malinda Lo and Tricks by Ellen Hopkins.

The seventh book on the list was A Court of Thorns and Roses by Sarah J. Maas, followed by a four-way tie between A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess, Identical by Ellen Hopkins, Looking for Alaska by John Green and Storm and Fury by Jennifer L. Armentrout.

The challenged titles of 2025 included 1,671 representing the lived experience of LGBTQ people and people of color — about 40% of the total challenges.

The report was released to coincide with National Library Week

“Libraries exist to make space for every story and every lived experience,” ALA President Sam Helmick said in a news release. “As we celebrate National Library Week, we reaffirm that libraries are places for knowledge, for access, and for all.”

The ALA said less than 3% of the challenges came from individual parents, with 92 percent of the challenges coming from government officials and political pressure groups.

“In 2025, book bans were not sparked by concerned parents, and they were not the result of local grassroots efforts,” said Sarah Lamdan, executive director of ALA’s Office for Intellectual Freedom. “They were part of a well-funded, politically-driven campaign to suppress the stories and lived experiences of LGBTQIA+ and BIPOC individuals and communities.”

A total 5,668 books were banned from American libraries in 2025, and 920 others were censored through access restrictions.

April 19 (UPI) — U.S. Customs and Border Protection is expected to launch a website on Monday to process refund requests for some Trump administration tariffs, although there are limits to which ones will be processed.

The first phase of tariff refunds comes after the Supreme Court ruled in February that President Donald Trump could not use the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) to generate revenue by imposing tariffs.

Although Trump decided to use Section 122 of the Trade Act of 1974 to justify new tariffs after the Court’s decision, the administration still is required to refund duties collected under the now-nullified tariffs.

CBP has estimated that it owes about $166 billion in refunds, with the agency’s announcement of phase 1 expected to take care of the vast majority of expected claims, NPR reported.

The website is specifically aimed at letting businesses request refunds, and experts have said that consumers are unlikely to be affected by the refunds, CBS News reported.

“[The Consolidated Administration and Processing of Entries] is being deployed in phases, and CBP will launch the first phase of CAPE on April 20,” the agency said in an update last week.

“Phase 1 is limited to certain unliquidated entries and certain entries within 80 days of liquidation,” the agency said.

The refunds are linked to lawsuits filed in December by Costco and other companies — more than 50 companies brought filed suit for refunds — asking for duties to be returned to them if the Supreme Court ruled against the administration.

In March, CBP raised concern in court that it could not immediately handle refunding the duties based on 53 million entries from 330,000 importers who had paid tariffs as of March 4.

April 19 (UPI) — Eight children were killed, and two more injured, in a mass shooting in Louisiana on Sunday morning that police said started as a domestic dispute.

The two survivors are both adult women, with one thought to have been in a relationship with the shooter, who was killed by police after stealing a car and leading them on a short chase, KSLA and NBC News reported.

Officials said they are still investigating the crime scenes to figure out what actually happened, as one of the two women has life-threatening injuries resulting from what is believed to have been a shot in the head.

Some of the children that were killed, who ranged in age from 1 year to 14 years, were related to the alleged shooter, police said.

“This is an extensive scene unlike anything most of us have ever seen,” Shreveport, La., Police Chief Wayne Smith told reporters.

Police responded to reports of a domestic disturbance on the 300 block of West 79th Street in Shreveport around 6 a.m. EDT to find the widespread crime scene.

The initial shooting, police said, occurred at two houses before the suspect attempted a carjacking around the block and then, after a chase, attempted to escape on foot but was shot and killed by police.

A fourth location, a house where one of the shooting victims ran to, is also part of the investigation.

“This is a tragic situation, maybe the worst tragic situation we’ve ever had in Shreveport,” the city’s mayor, Tom Arceneaux, told reporters.

A motive for the shooting remains undetermined, police said.

April 19 (UPI) — Blue Origin successfully launched its New Glenn rocket and landed its booster stage, but it delivered a communications satellite into an orbit too low to be useful.

New Glenn-3, the third launch of the company’s rocket, cleared the tower just before 7:30 a.m. EDT on Sunday morning and roughly six minutes later its first stage touched down on the “Jacklyn” drone ship in the Atlantic Ocean.

The fully reusable booster, called “Never Tell Me The Odds,” was making its second landing as the mission hit its second stage engine cutoff, entered orbit and released AST SpaceMobile’s BlueBird 7 satellite successfully.

The release was successful and the satellite powered up properly, but had been placed into “an off-nominal orbit,” Blue Origin said in a post on X.

“During the New Glenn 3 mission, BlueBird 7 was placed into a lower than planned orbit by the upper stage of the launch vehicle,” AST said in a press release.

“While the satellite separated from the launch vehicle and powered on, the altitude is too low to sustain operations with its on-board thruster technology and will de-orbited,” the company said. “The cost of the satellite is expected to be recovered under the company’s insurance policy.”

AST’s BlueBird 7 satellite is part of a space-based cellular broadband network the company is building that will be accessible using normal smartphones.

The satellite would have been the eighth the company has put in orbit for the network, has satellites number through 32 in production and expects BlueBird 8, BlueBird 9 and BlueBird 10 to be completed in the next month.

AST said that it plans to continue launching satellites roughly every other month for the rest 2026 using “multiple launch providers,” with a goal of 45 satellites in orbit by the end of the year.

Blue Origin, in addition to launching satellites for commercial and government entities, is also building a prototype MK1 “Endurance” lander as a test vehicle in an uncrewed moon landing later this year, Space.com reported.

The prototype is a test run for its MK2 lunar lander that will be used in NASA’s Artemis program to explore the moon and establish a permanent human presence there.

April 17 (UPI) — Nearly one-third of the United States — the northern-most third of the country — could be among areas the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said could see the aurora borealis in the sky.

The northern lights are expected to be most visible, for the second night in a row, across 18 states that fall within the expected viewline this evening, USA Today and Space.com reported.

The solar winds hitting Earth at up to 430 miles per second will cause geomagnetic storms that could be visible as far south in the United States as Illinois and Oregon, according to predictions.

NOAA can most closely forecast the aurora borealis within 30 to 90 minutes of the storm’s location and intensity, but offers maps on its website to help people who would like to see it.

“Aurora can often be observed somewhere on Earth from just after sunset or just before sunrise,” NOAA said in its forecast notes.

The northern lights are an indicator of geomagnetic conditions, NOAA said, and awareness of them matter for a number of essential human technologies, including HF radio communication, GPS satellite navigation and, sometimes, ground-induced currents that affect electric transmission.

The states that are most likely to see the aurora are Alaska, Idaho, Iowa, Illinois, Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, Montana, Nebraska, New Hampshire, New York, North Dakota, Oregon, South Dakota, Vermont, Washington, Wisconsin and Wyoming.

“For many people, the aurora is a beautiful nighttime phenomenon that is worth traveling to arctic regions just to observe,” NOAA said, noting the rarity that it could be visible as far south as it has been forecast.

“It is the only way for most people to actually experience space weather,” the agency said.

April 18 (UPI) — The Federal Aviation Administration is working with three bidders to develop artificial intelligence software to help air traffic controllers manage flights across the nation’s airspace.

Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy discussed the effort during a media event on Friday, and said the goal is to help anticipate schedule conflicts and improve planning for bottlenecks at busy airports.

“This software, as they look at the flight paths, won’t see [potential issues] 15 minutes before it happens .. a controller will get a notice that they could change one of the airplane’s flight paths slightly and they can deconflict it an hour and a half or two hours before the conflict even happens,” Duffy said during a media event hosted by Semafor.

The program is aimed at fundamentally changing how airspace in the United States operates, The Air Current reported, and is a major part of the agency’s efforts at modernization and redesign.

The FAA has mounted an effort to see how AI can improve the functionality and safety of the country’s air traffic control systems, especially amid a growing shortage of controllers, at least partially because political debates that have hampered the agency’s funding.

The system that the FAA is looking to develop — called SMART, which stands for Strategic Management of Airspace Routing Trajectories — is part of a $32.5 billion modernization program that includes replacing hundreds of radars and growing its air controller staff, The Next Web reported.

Development of the new system, which follows a series of issues at airports across the country that have seen near-misses and actual crashes that have raised concerns among experts and travelers alike, is being bid on by the companies Palantir, Thales and Air Space Intelligence.

The system could begin to be operational some time later this year, with an update on progress expected from the Department of Transportation and FAA on April 21.