u. s. department

California’s effort to restrict sales of handguns that can be converted into fully-automatic machine guns drew an immediate federal challenge Wednesday, with the Trump administration suing the state over its new “Glock ban” law just hours after it took effect.

The U.S. Department of Justice is seeking a court order to block the controversial state law that limits where most Glock and Glock-style pistols can be sold. The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court for the Central District of California, also aims to invalidate key parts of the state’s handgun roster — a list that dictates the types of firearms that Californians may legally purchase. In a statement Wednesday, acting Atty. Gen. Todd Blanche said that both policies “trample” the rights of law-abiding Californians.

“The Second Amendment is a sacred right belonging to all Americans, even those in California,” Blanche said. “California cannot ban the most popular type of handgun in America.”

California’s Assembly Bill 1127 does not explicitly name the Glock brand, but instead targets any handgun with a specific mechanism that can easily be converted by a black market device. These simple “Glock switches” convert semiautomatic handguns into a weapon capable of firing 20 rounds per second with a single squeeze of the trigger.

Advances in 3D printing have made the conversion devices widely available and cheap to produce. Federal authorities reported recovering 11,088 of them from crime scenes between 2019 and 2023. Switches have been used in several mass shootings, including one in Sacramento that resulted in six deaths and 12 injuries in 2022.

The new law does not prohibit the possession of affected handguns already owned by Californians, and includes exemptions for gun dealers, as well as law enforcement and military agencies.

Gov. Gavin Newsom signed the bill in October, and has maintained that firearm laws are responsible for California’s declining crime rates and gun deaths.

“The Trump administration is once again trying to dismantle California’s commonsense gun safety laws,” Diana Crofts-Pelayo, a spokesperson for the governor, said in a statement. “Our response is simple — these laws save lives.”

The federal government argues in its complaint that California can’t ban legal semiautomatic handguns simply because they could be illegally altered, adding that state and federal law already prohibit such pistol converters. The U.S. compared California’s approach to banning ordinary shotguns because they can be illegally shortened.

The lawsuit also challenges California’s decades-old handgun roster, which requires new handgun models to pass certain safety tests before they can be approved for retail sale. A federal judge tentatively blocked portions of the roster requirements in a separate 2023 case, which is being appealed before the 9th Circuit. That lawsuit was filed by the California Rifle & Pistol Assn. and other gun rights supporters following a landmark 2022 decision by the U.S. Supreme Court that set new standards for evaluating firearm restrictions.

Under those new guidelines, the Trump administration wants a judge to find that California’s gun restrictions violate the 2nd Amendment, and is seeking an order to bar the state from enforcing them.

The Trump administration is relying on a federal civil rights law typically used against police departments accused of repeated constitutional violations, arguing that California Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta and state Justice Department agents qualify as peace officers and therefore violate gun owners’ rights whenever they enforce handgun restrictions.

Bonta, who is named in the suit, has a winning court record over the Trump administration, and has secured at least 12 final court rulings and more than 35 preliminary injunctions or emergency orders.

“We won’t be intimidated by another politically motivated lawsuit,” said Crofts-Pelayo, Newsom’s spokesperson. “We’ll continue defending the laws that protect Californians and keep dangerous weapons off our streets.”

SAVANNAH, Ga. — An advocacy group has filed suit against the Trump administration over its decision to reinstate a near-ban on abortions for veterans and their family members who depend on the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs for healthcare.

The federal lawsuit filed Thursday says the rule finalized by the VA on Dec. 31 takes away limited abortion access that was “crucial for the health, autonomy, and equality of veterans and their family members.”

Attorneys for the group Minority Veterans of America want the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit to throw out the rule. They say the VA adopted the change without citing medical evidence or other justifications, violating the Administrative Procedures Act that governs federal rulemaking.

The VA did not include abortion in its coverage until 2022. President Biden’s administration added it months after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade and states’ abortion bans began taking effect.

Abortion access the VA provided under Biden was limited, applying only in cases when a pregnant woman’s life or health was at risk, or in cases of rape or incest.

The Biden change allowed the VA to provide abortion even in states where it was banned. And it brought the VA’s coverage into line with other federal healthcare plans — including Medicaid and TriCare coverage for active military members and their families — that allowed limited abortion access.

The VA announced its proposal to undo those changes last August, a few months after President Trump returned to the White House.

The VA had said it will still provide abortions in cases where a pregnant woman’s life is threatened. That’s something state laws allow, even in places where bans are in place.

However, the VA no longer allows exceptions for abortions in cases of rape, incest or to protect a pregnant woman’s health. Abortion counseling is also no longer allowed.

A VA spokesperson declined to comment, noting the agency typically doesn’t comment on pending litigation.

Minority Veterans of America says it represents more than 3,600 members across the U.S.

“Our community includes veterans with complex medical histories, those who have experienced pregnancy complications, and survivors of sexual violence and trauma, all of whom need access to abortion care and counseling to protect their health,” Lindsay Church, the group’s executive director, said in a statement.

In publishing its final rule in December, the VA said it was restoring the agency’s longstanding position that abortions were not “needed” under federal law and that “this determination did not prohibit providing life-saving care to pregnant veterans.”

The lawsuit says one of Minority Veteran of America’s members is a military veteran who just learned she was pregnant in early May. She suffers from chronic pain that has been exacerbated by the pregnancy, placing her health “at substantial risk,” says the lawsuit, which withheld the woman’s name to protect her privacy.

The lawsuit says the VA won’t allow the unnamed veteran to receive an abortion “even if her health is at risk, unless a provider determines an abortion is necessary to save her life.”

Bynum writes for the Associated Press.

PROVIDENCE, R.I. — A federal judge has blocked the Trump administration’s sweeping demands for confidential transgender patient information from Rhode Island’s largest hospital that provides gender-affirming care to minors.

U.S. District Judge Mary McElroy’s Wednesday ruling is the latest setback for the U.S. Department of Justice, where at least seven other federal courts have agreed to quash or limit the expansive civil subpoenas sent to more than 20 doctors and hospitals last summer.

McElroy’s decision also echoed similar concerns raised by judges surrounding the expansive scope of the subpoenas, describing the Justice Department as having “immense prosecutorial authority and discretion” but no longer trustworthy it will enforce its power fairly and honestly.

“DOJ has proven unworthy of this trust at every point in this case,” McElroy wrote.

A Justice Department spokesperson said Thursday that it would appeal and continue with its investigations.

“The Rhode Island court’s attack on the professionalism and integrity of DOJ attorneys is outrageous and unjustified,” the department said.

According to the subpoenas, the Justice Department had demanded Rhode Island Hospital hand over the birth dates, Social Security numbers and addresses of every patient who received transgender care over the past five years. It also included instructions to provide all documents detailing adverse side effects in minor patients who received gender-related care, assessments that formed the basis for prescribing puberty blockers or hormone therapy, as well as patient intake forms and guardian authorization.

The Justice Department has repeatedly argued that the information sought in the subpoenas is needed to investigate possible fraud or unlawful off-label promotion of drugs. Most recently during a hearing in Rhode Island, the DOJ said that the investigation was taking place in the Northern District of Texas, where the court’s chief judge ordered Rhode Island Hospital to comply with the subpoena before McElroy’s decision voided the subpoena.

Assistant U.S. Atty. Brantley Mayers told McElroy during the hearing that the Justice Department is investigating potential “misbranding” of drugs approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, such as puberty blockers for young people. While off-label prescribing is legal, Mayers said that the DOJ is concerned that pharmaceutical companies are providing “financial incentives” to Rhode Island doctors to prescribe the drugs.

The subpoenas were crucial in getting the names of children and their families so the Justice Department could interview them.

McElroy rejected that argument.

“The administration has publicly characterized gender-affirming care for minors as abuse, directed the DOJ to bring its practice to an end, and celebrated when hospitals curtailed such programs as a result of this subpoena campaign,” McElroy wrote.

The Rhode Island decision is the latest development in the fight over transgender youth health records. Earlier this week, 11 families filed a class-action lawsuit seeking to block the Justice Department from obtaining the documents. The lawsuit, filed in Maryland’s federal court, is backed by families with transgender children who have received care from hospitals across the U.S.

And separately, a New York hospital announced that it received a grand jury subpoena from federal prosecutors in Texas seeking information about children who received gender-affirming care and the medical providers who administered it.

NYU Langone is the first hospital system to publicly acknowledge receiving a subpoena for such records as part of a federal criminal investigation. But the institution said in its statement Tuesday it was one of several that received a subpoena out of the Northern District of Texas on May 7. It said it was deciding on how to respond.

“The government cannot use its subpoena power to intimidate families out of seeking lawful medical care. To trans and gender-diverse children and their families, we want you to know that you are valued, you are not alone,” Kevin Love Hubbard, an attorney with the Lawyers’ Committee of Rhode Island, who represented the plaintiffs in the case, said in a statement.

Gender-affirming care includes a range of medical and mental health services to support a person’s gender identity, including when it’s different from the sex they were assigned at birth. It may include counseling, medications that block puberty, hormone therapy to produce physical changes or surgeries to transform chests and genitals, although those are rare for minors.

Most major medical groups say access to the treatment is important for those with gender dysphoria and see gender as existing along a spectrum.

At least 27 states have adopted laws restricting or banning the care for minors, while several others have adopted laws or policies protecting access to transgender healthcare.

Kruesi writes for the Associated Press.

The U.S. Department of Education opened an investigation Monday into Smith College, an all-women’s institution in Massachusetts, for admitting transgender women.

The probe by the department’s Office of Civil Rights will look at whether the college violated Title IX, a 1972 law forbidding discrimination based on sex in education.

The move is the latest by the Trump administration — whose rhetoric has frequently included attacks on trans people — to limit transgender rights in the U.S. The administration has said that Title IX prevents trans women from participating in women’s sports, suing several states and launching investigations into schools for not complying.

Smith College, a private liberal arts school founded in 1871, has admitted trans women since 2015, along with many other elite women’s colleges.

The school’s admission policies drew attention and sparked on-campus activism in 2013, when a trans high school senior was denied acceptance because her gender identity did not match the one on her financial aid forms.

Its website now says that “any applicants who self-identify as women; cis, trans, and nonbinary women” are eligible to apply to the school. Advocates have supported the shift over the years, saying that women’s colleges were founded to educate those marginalized because of their gender.

The number of women’s colleges in the U.S. has declined from more than 200 to just 30 as of fall of 2023, according to the Women’s College Coalition.

A college spokesperson did not immediately respond to an emailed request for comment.

According to the Department of Education in a news release, Title IX contains an exception that allows colleges to be all-male or all-female, but it only applies “on the basis of biological sex difference, not subjective gender identity.”

The investigation into Smith College stems from a complaint filed with the Office of Civil Rights in June 2025 by the conservative legal group Defending Education.

“DE and its members oppose, among other things, discrimination on the basis of sex in America’s K-12 schools and institutions of higher education,” the organization said in a news release.

During the Biden administration, new Title IX regulations were issued to prevent discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity. However, those were struck down by a federal judge in January 2025 who decided the rules had legal shortcomings.

Ding writes for the Associated Press.

RALEIGH, N.C. — A U.S. special forces soldier who took part in the capture of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro will be released on bond on charges accusing him of using classified information about the operation to win more than $400,000 in an online prediction market, a federal magistrate said Friday.

The magistrate in North Carolina said he would allow Gannon Ken Van Dyke to be released and told him to report to a New York federal courthouse by Tuesday to continue his case there.

Bearded with arm tattoos, Van Dyke said little during the nearly hourlong hearing, during which he was appointed a federal public defender who declined to comment afterward. The $250,000 unsecured bond did not require Van Dyke to put up any money.

Federal prosecutors say Van Dyke used his access to classified information about the operation to capture Maduro in January to win money on the prediction market site Polymarket.

The sites allow people to trade on almost anything — from the Super Bowl to U.S. elections and even the winners of the TV reality shows.

Van Dyke, who is stationed at Fort Bragg near Fayetteville, N.C., was charged Thursday with the unlawful use of confidential government information for personal gain, theft of nonpublic government information, commodities fraud, wire fraud and making an unlawful monetary transaction.

He could face up to 10 years on four of the criminal counts, and up to 20 years on a fifth, the government said Friday. A publicly listed phone number listed for Van Dyke isn’t in service.

Van Dyke, 38, was involved for about a month in the planning and execution of capturing Maduro, according to the New York federal prosecutor’s office. He signed nondisclosure agreements promising to not divulge “any classified or sensitive information” related to the operations, but prosecutors say he used what he knew to make a series of bets related to Maduro being out of power by Jan. 31.

“This involved a U.S. soldier who allegedly took advantage of his position to profit off of a righteous military operation,” FBI Director Kash Patel said in a social media post.

Polymarket, one of the largest prediction markets, said it found someone trading on classified government information, alerted the Justice Department and “cooperated with their investigation.”

Massive profits from well-timed bets aroused public attention days after the raid in Venezuela and brought bipartisan calls for stricter regulation of the markets.

The sudden rise of these markets has led to growing scrutiny by Congress and state governments. Some lawmakers alarmed by highly specific, well-timed trades on the U.S. and Israel’s war against Iran and wagers on President Trump’s next moves have pushed for guardrails against insider trading.

The Trump administration has been supportive of the industry’s expansion. The president’s eldest son is an advisor for both Polymarket and its main competitor, Kalshi,, and is a Polymarket investor. Trump’s social media platform, Truth Social, is launching its own prediction market called Truth Predict.

The Commodity Futures Trading Commission, the federal agency that regulates prediction markets, announced Thursday that it had filed a parallel complaint against Van Dyke.

That complaint alleges that Van Dyke moved $35,000 from his personal bank account into a cryptocurrency exchange account on Dec. 26 — a little over a week before U.S. forces flew into Caracas and seized Maduro.

Van Dyke made a series of bets on when Maduro might be removed from power, according to the complaint. He placed those bets between Dec. 30 and Jan. 2, with the vast majority occurring the night of Jan. 2 — just hours before the first missiles struck Caracas.

The bets resulted in “more than $404,000 of profits,” the complaint says.

“The defendant was entrusted with confidential information about U.S. operations and yet took action that endangered U.S. national security and put the lives of American service members in harm’s way,” said Michael Selig, the commission’s chairman.

Robertson writes for the Associated Press. AP reporters Allen G. Breed in Raleigh and John Seewer in Toledo, Ohio, contributed to this report.

PARIS — French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot said an 85-year-old French widow of an American military veteran who was in immigration custody in the United States returned home on Friday.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents detained Marie-Thérèse Ross in Alabama on April 1 after she overstayed her 90-day visa, according to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

“She returned to France this morning, this is a satisfaction for us,” Barrot told reporters during a visit to the southern city of Montpellier on Friday.

Barrot said he would not comment on the specific case, but said some of ICE methods are “not in line” with French standards and “not acceptable to us.” Barrot referred to “violence that raised our concerns,” without elaborating.

Ross was being held at a federal immigration detention facility in Louisiana.

She was among the thousands of people targeted by the Trump administration’s mass deportation agenda that has detained the spouses of U.S. soldiers and military veterans who previously received greater leniency under scrapped policies.

Ross married Alabama resident William Ross in April last year, Calhoun County marriage records show. Ross died in January, according to an obituary from his family, which says he was a former captain in the U.S. Army.

NEW ORLEANS — The French government is pressing the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to release the 86-year-old French widow of a military veteran from immigration custody after she was detained this month.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents detained Marie-Therese Ross in Alabama on April 1 after she overstayed her 90-day visa, according to Homeland Security. Ross is now held at a federal immigration detention facility in Louisiana.

She is among the thousands of people targeted by the Trump administration’s mass deportation agenda that has led to the detentions of the spouses of U.S. troops and military veterans who previously received greater leniency under scrapped policies.

Rodolphe Sambou, the consul general of France in New Orleans, told the AP that the French government has “fully mobilized” to push for her release. He said he has visited her in detention twice so far.

“Given her age, we really want her to get out of this situation as soon as possible,” Sambou said. “We want to get her out of jail.”

Sambou said that he has been communicating frequently with Ross’ family and French officials in Washington, Atlanta and Paris to try and coordinate Ross’ release and ensure she has access to sufficient food and healthcare. He said the French government has also contacted Homeland Security.

He declined to comment on her legal status or other details of her case.

Ross married Alabama resident William Ross last April, Calhoun County marriage records show. Ross died in January, according to an obituary from his family, which says he was a former captain in the U.S. Army.

A lawyer who is representing Ross in a separate legal matter did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Ross’ family did not respond to requests for comment.

Brook writes for the Associated Press. AP writer Samuel Petrequin in France contributed to this report.