U.S.

June 26 (UPI) — The Transportation Security Administration on Friday said that it expects to screen roughly 18.7 million travelers at U.S. airports during the July Fourth holiday week that runs from June 30 to July 6.

The agency said it has prepared itself for the traditionally busy week of travel to be even busier, as this July 4 is America’s 250th birthday amid the FIFA World Cup, which has games in 11 U.S. cities next week.

AAA has projected that this year’s week of holiday travel is set to break records, with roughly 72.2 million Americans expected to travel at least 50 miles from their homes — an increase from the 71.8 million that traveled in 2025.

“TSA security checkpoints are fully staffed and prepared to welcome these travelers and handle the large passenger volumes expected during the Fourth of July holiday period,” Ha Nguyen McNeill, a senior TSA official who is performing the duties of the administrator, said in a press release.

“We’ve implemented significant technology enhancements at key airports for the historic FIFA World Cup 2026, as well as for America 250 celebrations across the country,” McNeill said. “TSA is working closely with federal, state and local partners to safeguard the traveling public and manage security for large-scale public events.”

TSA said it expects that Thursday, July 2, will be the busiest travel day next week, with more than 3 million people moving through U.S. airports.

The Top 10 domestic destinations for Americans during the holiday week for July 4 include Seattle, Orlando, Anchorage and Fairbanks in Alaska, New York City, Chicago, Fort Lauderdale, Denver and Boston,

TSA also has prepared for teams, team staffs and fans to travel to the 11 World Cup host cities in the United States.

The 11 cities have some cross-over with the locations most Americans are expected to travel, which include Atlanta, Boston, Dallas, Houston, Kansas City, Los Angeles, Miami, New York/New Jersey, Philadelphia, the San Francisco Bay Area and Seattle.

June 26 (UPI) — President Donald Trump said Friday that Iran has attacked ships in the Strait of Hormuz and that it’s a violation of the cease-fire between the United States and Iran.

A cargo ship in the strait was attacked Thursday, but it’s unclear if this is the attack about which the president was speaking.

“The Islamic Republic of Iran shot at least four One Way Attack Drones at Ships transversing the Strait of Hormuz. One of the Drones solidly hit the upper deck of a large and very expensive Cargo Carrying Ship. Damage was done, but the Ship was able to proceed on its way. We knocked down three other Drones. Obviously, this is a foolish violation of our Ceasefire Agreement. President DONALD J. TRUMP,” the post on Truth Social said.

Trump did not address the negotiations with Iran.

Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Kazem Gharibabadi posted a statement on X Friday emphasizing Iran’s control of the strait.

“Safe passage through the Strait of Hormuz, with ambiguous arrangements, parallel routes, or decision-making outside of Iran’s considerations as the coastal state, cannot be guaranteed. Any credible framework must be based on coordination with Iran and the provisions of paragraph five of the Islamabad Memorandum of Understanding. Otherwise, the outcome will be the suspension of the designated parallel route,” the post said.

The memorandum of understanding that Trump and Iran’s president signed on June 17 established the cease-fire and opened passage through the strait. In the fifth paragraph, it said Iran will use its “best efforts” to ensure the safe passage of commercial vessels with no charge for 60 days, The Hill reported.

On Thursday, the United States issued a joint statement with the Gulf Cooperation Council saying that “free, unconditional, and unrestricted navigation” through the strait is guaranteed under international law.

“The Ministers rejected any tolls, fees, or attempts to assert control over the strait,” the statement said. The council includes Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

How well do you remember your U.S. history class from high school or college? Did some of the key moments in America’s 250 years of existence involve Larry David playing a founding father? OK, maybe not, but it’s fun to imagine what that would be like. And that’s precisely what David and Jeff Schaffer have done with their new HBO series “Life, Larry and the Pursuit of Unhappiness.”

The series, premiering Friday, is a timely look at some of America’s big moments in history with a comedic twist that will remind viewers of “Curb Your Enthusiasm,” partly because it also features some cast members from the show. The series arrives on the cusp of the 250th anniversary of America’s founding, and offers an alternative history that’s still steeped in facts. Schaffer stopped by Guest Spot to talk about creating the series with David and what it was like to work with former President Obama.

Speaking of laughter, if you like yours with a whole lot of drama, FX dropped the final season of “The Bear” Thursday on Hulu. The series, which premiered in 2022 and made phrases like “cousin,” “yes, chef,” and “every second counts” memorable, ties up a lot of strings for its crew of chefs. Jeremy Allen White and Ayo Edebiri, the actors who were at the center of the show for five seasons, spoke to us about “The Bear” coming to a close, where their characters end up and what it feels like to leave them behind (be forewarned, the interview has lots of spoilers).

The finale feels like a fitting end to one of the best shows of the past decade (so far) — but we won’t say much more. Enjoy each episode like a multi-course meal at a fine-dining restaurant. You’ll want to savor each bite before it’s over.

Also in this week’s Screen Gab, our writers recommend an animated series with monsters and mystery and a documentary about one of America’s greatest bands. I’ll get my flags, fireworks and BBQ supplies ready in the meantime. — Maira Garcia

Turn on

Recommendations from the film and TV experts at The Times

Bobby and Romy in Disney+’s “The Doomies.”

(Disney)

“The Doomies” (Disney+)

If you’re missing “Widow’s Bay,” and like cartoons, here’s another tale of monsters loose in a coastal tourist town, with the difference that the town, called “Ouimpre,” is decidedly on the Atlantic coast of northwest France. (It’s a Franglais pun.) There are half-timbered buildings; what used to be a Camembert factory after it was a beret factory; a cafe that serves crepes, not pancakes; and boulangeries, not bakeries. (It’s a French production; Disney encouraged animator Andrés Fernandez to go local.) As in “Stranger Things,” which no one may be missing by now, the protagonists are kids — Romy, who is excitable and impulsive, and Bobby, who is neither — abetted by a formidable female teenage demon slayer and a lighthouse keeper with occult knowledge. The series is energetic, funny and character-driven — even the monsters. The action is well-staged and intense, the color palette moody and evocative, and the design not at all reminiscent of a hundred other cartoons, which makes the show refreshing as well as fun. — Robert Lloyd

Earth, Wind & Fire in HBO’s “Earth, Wind & Fire (To Be Celestial vs. That’s The Weight Of The World)”

(Jeffrey Mayer / HBO)

“Earth, Wind & Fire (To Be Celestial vs. That’s the Weight of the World)” (HBO Max)

Even if you think you don’t know Earth, Wind & Fire, chances are they’ve soundtracked a wedding, bar mitzvah, awkward office party or some other memorable celebration in your life. Somewhere between “Shining Star,” “Let’s Groove” and “September,” the band mastered the art of coaxing three or four generations of a family onto the same dance floor. Questlove’s new documentary explores how that happened. If his recent Sly Stone film examined how genius can curdle into self-destruction, this one asks a different question: How did Earth, Wind & Fire founder Maurice White build something that lasted? Abandoned by his mother as a child, White set out to create not just a band but a family, assembling a sprawling ensemble around a musical and spiritual vision. Questlove is too thoughtful a filmmaker to sand down the rough edges. White emerges as both inspiring and flawed: a gifted bandleader, spiritual seeker and demanding perfectionist whose drive sometimes came at a personal cost. Drawing on interviews with everyone from former bandmates to Stevie Wonder, Lionel Richie and Barack and Michelle Obama, Questlove builds a portrait of White that never shies away from his contradictions. In the process, he shows how White’s fascination with spirituality, Egyptology and the cosmic unknown shaped both the band’s music and mythology. You may occasionally wish the film lingered longer on the performances themselves (for a reminder of what made Earth, Wind & Fire such a formidable live act, start with the 1975 concert album “Gratitude”). But by the end, you have a deeper appreciation for the band’s unlikely feat: turning something so eccentric into something so universal. — Josh Rottenberg

Guest spot

A weekly chat with actors, writers, directors and more about what they’re working on — and what they’re watching

Larry David in “Life, Larry and the Pursuit of Unhappiness.”

(John Johnson / HBO)

Is Larry David about to be the most entertaining (and crankiest) history teacher America has ever had?

To celebrate the arrival of the nation’s semiquincentennial, the comedian teamed up with Barack and Michelle Obama’s Higher Ground Productions to revisit the truth of our history with some comedic chaos. The result is “Life, Larry and the Pursuit of Unhappiness,” a seven-episode sketch comedy series from the mind of David and his longtime “Curb Your Enthusiasm” collaborator Jeff Schaffer that pairs reenactments of seminal milestones from America’s past with David’s misanthropic humor — or, as its creators dub it, “‘Curb’ in costume.” Subtitled “An Almost History of America,” it features a star-studded roster of actors dressing up in period clothes alongside David, including “Curb’s” Jeff Garlin, J.B. Smoove and Susie Essman, as well as Bill Hader, Kathryn Hahn, Jon Hamm and Jerry Seinfeld. The first episode premieres Friday at 9 p.m. ET/PT on HBO and will stream on HBO Max.

Over a video call, Schaffer discussed the show’s genesis, former President Obama’s improv skills and the British TV series that has him entertained. — Yvonne Villarreal

Tell me about getting into business with the Obamas. Their production company approached Larry. How did it evolve into this?

Larry and President Obama know each other a little bit. They really enjoy each other’s company, or at least Larry enjoys needling Obama, and Obama really enjoys needling Larry. The moment that we all met together to have our first meeting, the first thing Obama does — I’ve never met the president [prior]— he starts just ragging on Larry’s golf game, and how he wears so much sunscreen on the golf course. And Larry just goes to President Obama, “Oh, I’m sorry, my dad’s not from Kenya.” And that’s how it started. They have a great rapport and they wanted to do something special for the 250th [anniversary]. Larry says no to everything — his best friend can be having a premiere of a movie, and Larry will go, “Where is it in Hollywood?” But Larry’s not going, that’s too far. When this came around, Larry was like, “Huh, that’s actually pretty interesting.” He responded right away to the historical nature of it because, as he would say, he’s an American history buff.

The genesis for Larry and I is that we had done a tiny test run of this with that FTX ad for the Super Bowl a few years back. I don’t know, whatever happened to those people — I’m sure they’re fine — but he remembered how much fun he had being in costume. And honestly, I think he forgot how much he hated being in a wig. It’s like childbirth, enough time had passed.

Given the sort of tenor of the times, why does this type of comedic look at America’s history feel like the appropriate way to mark this anniversary?

It’s the 250th and I get that celebrating the country right now may feel like throwing a birthday party for your friend who’s in rehab — he’s all f— up — but we still love him, right? There’s a way to look at the country’s history, warts and all, the two steps forward and the one step back. And I think one of the best ways to do that is through comedy.

Going back to President Obama — what are the negotiations to get him to appear in it? Or was that on the table from the beginning?

Once I saw the two of them interact together, that became my primary mission. We’ll write the sketches, and we’ll do the documentary stuff, we’ll make it all historical and fun, whatever, but we have to get you two on screen together. It was also sort of the promise of the show, too. When I originally talked to Amy Gravitt at HBO about it, I remember I said, “What if I could give you a show that brought together two people half of America loves?”

What was it like directing them in a scene together? He gives the opening remarks at the start of the show.

He is a truly inspiring, amazing human being who also happens to have great comedic timing. He and Larry get into a groove immediately, which is very fun, and it was honestly one of the coolest things I’ve ever done in my life, directing them. The president said, “I guess I like being annoyed by Larry. Once we get together, I start sounding like him.” It’s like Larry’s this black hole of negativity that sucked Obama in for these brief periods of time; it was just fun.

Is he good at improv then on the spot like that?

Yes, he is. He’s got some really funny stuff in the sketch they’re in together that is all him — 100% the president.

Do you have a favorite moment from this first episode — it features the Declaration of Independence, segregation and Rosa Parks.

There’s different things in each of them. The thing that I’m most excited about is when you don’t know what the next one’s going to be, and then when the narration for the little documentary section starts, and it starts talking about Rosa Parks, I can just see [viewers] going, “Oh no …” That’s a great “Curb” feeling. It’s a comedy horror film — “Oh no, don’t do that, oh no.” Then you get sucked in.

We tried really hard to make sure that production-wise, there’s historical accuracy, so it really felt like you were in this moment. Then Larry gets dropped in, and all hell breaks loose. Same thing with World War I — I got to shoot a whole bunch of World War I fighting — and there’s Larry pretending to be dead. One of the things that attracted us to it in the very beginning was the idea of the juxtaposition between these big dramatic moments and then Larry. History is writ large, and Larry writes so small and that dynamic is fun for us.

One of the great things about a show like this — or what’s come before, like “Drunk History” — are the lessons that can be learned. Is there something you learned while filming this series or a takeaway you had in looking back at our history?

There are things I did not know. One of the things that was also enjoyable is being able to talk about modern things in a historical context, even with that phone. We don’t write dialog — we write some, but it’s basically like doing “Curb.” Larry knew that people were going to ask some questions about the phone, but I just was peppering these people with questions about all of the modern stuff, and just watching Larry get angrier and angrier at these people. At a certain point, the membrane of actor, of character to real human being was breached. He was so mad at them, but that’s what making the show is. Actually, at the end of the our shoot, President Obama said to me, “I see how it works. Larry makes the world uncomfortable, and you make sure the world makes Larry uncomfortable.” That’s literally how we make the show.

Would this format work for current historical events? How do you think, 250 years from now, a reboot of this show would tackle something like telling the story of the UFC fight on the White House lawn?

That’s the problem — we’ve entered an era of America parodying itself. It’s insane. One of my good friends, Dave Mandel, used to do a “Veep” and he’s like, “What do you do now?” I think what we tried to do, and you’ll see as you go further into episodes, we try to address a lot of things that are happening right now through a historical lens. So we might be back in colonial times, and we might be back in the ‘50s, but we’re actually talking about something that’s happening right now.

Before I let you go, what is the TV show or movie out right now that you’re telling everyone to watch?

I just started watching “Steve and Alice” [Hulu, Disney+]. It’s so well done; it’s so dark and funny and really engaging.

What’s the comfort show or movie you return to again and again?

I can pretty much put on any “Lord of the Rings” [HBO Max] movie anywhere and not be able to get my butt off the seat.

ICYMI

Must-read stories you might have missed

June 26 (UPI) — South Korea’s leading mobile operator SK Telecom said Thursday that it would invest $481 million in a U.S. subsidiary of SK hynix as part of the group’s efforts to concentrate on the artificial intelligence strategy.

SK Telecom said that it agreed to purchase a 0.9% stake in SK hynix NAND Product Solutions, a company geared toward investing in innovative AI enterprises in North America.

“To secure synergies with our AI business, we are pursuing the acquisition of an equity stake in SK hynix NAND Product Solutions,” SK Telecom said in a regulatory filing.

This is not the first time that SK Group affiliates channel fresh funds into the U.S. unit. In March, SK Corp. and SK Innovation injected capital amounting to $250 million and $380 million, respectively.

In 2021, SK hynix spent around $9 billion to take over Intel’s NAND flash business and subsequently formed SK hynix NAND Product Solutions, which is now being restructured into an AI-focused investment company.

Earlier this January, SK hynix said that it would commit $10 billion to the company, with the funds to be deployed on a capital-call basis.

“The planned establishment of the AI company is aimed at securing opportunities in the emerging AI era,” SK hynix said in a statement at the time. “The company will continue to work closely with global partners while proactively creating value for customers.”

The share price of SK Telecom edged down 0.88% on the Seoul bourse on Friday, while that of SK hynix plunged 8.36%. The benchmark KOSPI declined 5.81%.

June 26 (UPI) — New York City’s rental board has approved Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s two-year rent-freeze proposal for nearly 1 million rent-stabilized apartments, fulfilling a major campaign promise.

New York City’s Rent Guidelines Board voted 7-1 to set a 0% increase for rent-stabilized one-year and two-year leases commencing on or after Oct. 1, and on or before Sept. 30, 2027.

Cheers erupted from the spectators assembled as it was announced that the motion passed.

“This is a historic victory for New York City tenants,” Mamdani said in a statement following the vote.

“After reviewing the data and hearing from New Yorkers across the city, the independent RGB has delivered a freeze on one-year leases, and the first-ever freeze on two-year leases in our city’s history. This is the relief that working people across our city deserve.”

Mamdani, a democratic socialist, campaigned heavily on making life more affordable for the average New Yorker, including by creating new affordable housing and freezing rents where legally permitted.

The mayor said he is grateful for the board members’ “thoughtful consideration of the data” before casting their votes.

“I’ll continue to deliver a more affordable city by building and preserving affordable housing, lowering building operating costs like insurance, and ensuring tenants know their rights,” he said.

According to a New York City housing survey from 2023, there were 996,600 rent-stabilized units, representing about 41% of all rental units across the city. Rent stabilization generally applies to buildings with six or more units built before 1974.

The only vote against the rent freeze came from Arpit Gupta, an associate professor of finance at New York University’s Stern School of Business.

In a statement published online following the vote, Gupta argued that the rent freeze will not solve the housing crisis while possibly making it worse and ultimately driving up rents. He also said the rent freeze could prevent building owners from considering improvements and renovations.

“Residents might continue to enjoy low rents but at the cost of being trapped in units that no longer fit their needs, and with few alternatives and steadily deteriorating conditions,” he said.

“A better option is to undertake the harder reforms needed to make housing more affordable and accessible — that is, build more of it.”

The vote was held following a series of hearings in which nearly 330 people participated and nearly 700 people submitted written, audio or video testimony about their experiences.

New York State Assembly Member Tony Simone said the rent freeze will impact about 2 million New Yorkers and is expected to save renters as much as $6.8 billion over Mamdani’s four-year term.

“This immediate action reflects the urgency needed to prevent more working-class New Yorkers from being priced out of our city,” he said in a statement, while stating that the structural factors that are driving up prices must be addressed.

“To truly address the housing crisis, we need to tackle its root cause: the housing shortage,” he continued.

“New York needs to build more housing units.”

June 25 (Asia Today) — South Korea launched a policy-finance framework Thursday to support $150 billion in shipbuilding cooperation with the United States, seeking to share early-stage investment risks with domestic companies expanding into the U.S. market.

The Korea-U.S. Strategic Investment Corporation, four state-backed financial institutions and three major South Korean shipbuilders signed a memorandum of understanding at the Export-Import Bank of Korea headquarters in Seoul.

The agreement is the first institutional step toward implementing the $150 billion shipbuilding cooperation package included in a bilateral strategic investment memorandum signed in November 2025.

The participating financial institutions are the Export-Import Bank of Korea, Korea Development Bank, Korea Trade Insurance Corp. and Korea Ocean Business Corp.

The three shipbuilders are HD Hyundai Heavy Industries, Samsung Heavy Industries and Hanwha Ocean.

Under the agreement, the participants will establish a Korea-U.S. Shipbuilding Cooperation Investment Council to identify U.S. investment projects, coordinate policy financing and jointly monitor their implementation.

The Export-Import Bank of Korea will serve as the council’s secretariat, coordinating communication among the institutions and overseeing the progress of individual projects.

South Korean Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance and Economy Koo Yun Cheol said shipbuilding cooperation is one of the two main pillars of strategic investment between South Korea and the United States.

Koo urged the investment corporation and policy lenders to develop financing measures that can provide companies with sufficient funding when it is needed.

“The government and policy-finance institutions must actively seek ways to share the risks and uncertainty of initial investments that individual companies cannot bear alone,” Koo said.

He said the initiative should help South Korean shipbuilders support the rebuilding of the U.S. shipbuilding industry while creating new contracts and markets across South Korea’s domestic shipbuilding supply chain.

The benefits should extend beyond large shipbuilders to small and midsize shipyards and marine equipment suppliers, he said.

“We must create a path for small and midsize shipbuilders and equipment suppliers to participate together as Team Korea,” Koo said.

The government plans to use the council to develop financing for investments in U.S. shipyards, naval vessel construction, maintenance, repair and overhaul services and commercial shipbuilding.

The policy-finance structure is intended to help companies manage the large capital requirements and financial risks associated with entering the U.S. market.

Financial Services Commission Vice Chairman Kwon Dae-young described the initiative as an opportunity for South Korea’s shipbuilding industry to demonstrate its capabilities in the global market.

“We will actively support the necessary financing through close cooperation among the newly established Korea-U.S. Strategic Investment Corporation, policy-finance institutions and private financial companies,” Kwon said.

Park Dong-il, deputy minister for industrial policy at the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Resources, said the Make American Shipbuilding Great Again initiative, or MASGA, represents the first strategic overseas expansion project in the history of South Korea’s shipbuilding industry.

Park said encouraging signs were emerging in the United States, including potential orders for South Korean companies.

He called on policy lenders to coordinate closely so shipbuilders can enter the U.S. market without delays.

“The signing ceremony is expected to provide initial momentum for the MASGA project and create a new opportunity for South Korea’s shipbuilding industry to advance,” Park said.

Shipbuilding companies also pledged to identify commercially viable projects with government financial support.

HD Hyundai Heavy Industries CEO Lee Sang-kyun said producing tangible results from the bilateral cooperation was the most important objective.

“This cooperation should develop into a system that simultaneously supports the growth of South Korea’s shipbuilding industry and the rebuilding of the U.S. shipbuilding base,” Lee said.

South Korean shipbuilders will identify investment opportunities that offer profitability and can be carried out effectively using their advanced technology, he said.

Lee also urged the government to prepare a broad range of support measures to help create a turning point in bilateral shipbuilding cooperation.

The government said it will use the agreement to begin full cooperation among the investment corporation, policy-finance institutions and shipbuilders.

It also plans to expand the Team Korea framework so small and midsize shipyards and marine equipment suppliers can participate in projects entering the U.S. market.

— Reported by Asia Today; translated by UPI

© Asia Today. Unauthorized reproduction or redistribution prohibited.

Original Korean report: https://www.asiatoday.co.kr/kn/view.php?key=20260625010008910

June 25 (UPI) — The U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday struck down a Hawaiian law that required people to ask permission to carry a concealed firearm onto a private property.

The Court’s majority, in a 6-3 ruling, said that Hawaii cannot block a properly licensed person from carrying a concealed weapon on private properties that are open to the public.

Hawaii was one of five states that enacted similar laws after the Court in a 2018 ruling said that states could not limit gun licenses to “exceptional cases” because it violated the 2nd Amendment right to carry a firearm.

The law required people who wanted to carry their firearm in places such as gas stations, restaurants, grocery and other stores, dry cleaners and other properties that are “open to the public” to get permission to carry their gun.

“Under the new Hawaii law, no one carrying a firearm may enter without the property owner’s express authorization,” Justice Samuel Alito wrote in the majority opinion.

“The effect of this new rule is to impose severe restrictions on the daily activities of residents who have satisfied the State’s rigorous requirements for the issuance of a carry permit,” Alito wrote.

In a dissenting opinion, Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson disagreed with the majority that the Hawaii law is an “attempt to end-run our Second Amendment precedents,” suggesting instead that it applies the first principle of property law, the right to exclude.

In addition to noting that Hawaii has a long history of restrictive gun laws, Brown Jackson said it enacted the permission law in order to prevent confusion among property owners that federal law had affected traditional expectations in the state.

“The public might well have an implied license to enter private property open to the public, and such permission might generally include the ability to enter armed,” she wrote in the dissent.

“But,” she wrote, “any such license is not a matter of right — a license is a creature of state law and custom, and it can vary accordingly.”

WASHINGTON — A Democratic U.S. senator warns the Trump administration is getting ready to round up 500 immigrant children in a hasty effort to remove them from the country, bypassing legal protections. It would be their second attempt after a federal court intervened last year in an overnight plan to fly out hundreds of children on Labor Day weekend.

Sen. Ron Wyden of Oregon wrote in a letter Wednesday to U.S. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., which oversees the Office of Refugee Resettlement caring for unaccompanied migrant children, that he had “credible information” that the Trump administration had a list of more than 500 migrant children it was targeting for a fast-track removal process and that the department was racing to act in days. He warned that the administration was abdicating “core humanitarian and child welfare mandates” and demanded an immediate halt to any plans to remove the children.

Wyden, who is the ranking member and senior Democrat of the Senate Finance Committee, which has jurisdiction over ORR, did not detail how he came by his information. His office declined to provide further details. ORR falls under the Department of Health and Human Services.

An HHS spokesperson denied any such plans.

“The new information I obtained leads me to believe that the Department is laying the groundwork for another lawless deportation effort, this time on a greater scale, across more countries of origin,” Wyden wrote.

“You have been entrusted with the care and safety of the children placed within the ORR network. Proceeding with this plan knowingly endangers their lives and violates your duty to these vulnerable children.”

Wyden also issued an early warning last August ahead of what eventually became a chaotic weekend of efforts by the Trump administration to remove Guatemalan children in its care and send them home.

HHS spokesperson Emily Hilliard said in “there are no plans to target these children,” calling Wyden’s claims ”irresponsible fearmongering.”

“The Trump Administration is working to identify the parents or legal guardians of unaccompanied alien children in our care because ensuring every child is placed with a properly vetted sponsor is our top priority,” she said.

Over the Labor Day weekend, dozens of migrant children either staying in government-supervised shelters or with foster families were taken from their homes and bused to airfields in Texas bound for Guatemala. A federal judge woken up in the middle of the night eventually stopped the planes. Lawyers for the children — many who had fled violence at home to come to the U.S. — later described how traumatic the middle-of-the-night removal effort was for them.

The administration insisted it was reuniting the Guatemalan children — at the Central American nation’s request — with parents or guardians who sought their return. Lawyers for at least some of the children said that wasn’t true and argued that in any event, authorities still would have to follow a legal process that they did not.

Migrant children traveling alone are usually entrusted to U.S. government care, and there are various legal protections designed to protect them once they’re in the U.S. and navigating the immigration system.

The Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act of 2008 is one of the key pieces of legislation designed to protect them. With some limited exceptions, it requires that children be placed in the “least restrictive setting possible,” which generally means that they can be released to a sponsor such as a relative in the U.S. while their immigration proceedings play out.

The children can apply for a specially protected status if they can’t return to their home country because of abuse or neglect and they can also apply for asylum.

The Trump administration has made it increasingly difficult for those children to be released to sponsors though. The administration says that they are doing due diligence to make sure that sponsors are thoroughly vetted and that in the past, children were released into dangerous situations.

But advocates say that the result has been children lingering for months in government shelters.

This time, Wyden said the children at risk of being removed come from various countries, potentially including Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador, and Afghanistan, and have been in U.S. custody — mainly in foster care — for at least 180 days. He said they were described as not having any “viable sponsor” who could come forward and take care of them in the U.S.

Not having an identified sponsor could mean the child’s parents are in their home countries, are deceased or are too afraid to claim their children after ICE started arresting some parents who are not in the country legally during their reunification efforts.

Gonzalez and Santana write for the Associated Press.

June 25 (UPI) — New York prosecutors will not retry disgraced film producer and convicted sex offender Harvey Weinstein on an unresolved rape charge related to actress Jessica Mann.

Prosecutors dropped the charges Thursday, more than six years after Mann, 40, first testified that Weinstein, 74, raped her in a Manhattan hotel room in 2013. Weinstein’s initial conviction for the charge was overturned in 2024, followed by two mistrials.

The D.A.’s office said Mann did not wish to go through a fourth trial.

“To be clear, we believe Ms. Mann’s account and her credibility as a witness,” Manhattan D.A. Alvin Bragg said in a statement. “This has been an extraordinarily taxing ordeal for her, and she has never wavered while testifying in front of two grand juries and three trial juries over the course of eight years. We thank her for her honesty and her tremendous bravery.”

In a statement to the court, Mann said it became clear to her during the latest trial, held this spring, that she “could no longer endure going through this any longer.”

“In my fight to see justice, it has nearly stolen a decade of my life and put me through more harm than good,” she added. “Justice now has moved away from the courts, solely into the hands of God.”

Weinstein is still awaiting sentencing after being convicted in 2025 of sexually assaulting former Project Runway production assistant Miriam Haley.

He has served less than half of his 16-year sentence in California for separate charges of rape and sexual assault. More than 100 women have accused Weinstein of sexual misconduct since 2017.

June 25 (UPI) — The U.S. Postal Service plans to refuse delivery of mail-in ballots in states that don’t turn over their voter lists to the federal government, the postmaster general told Congress.

Postmaster General David Steiner told the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee about the proposed rule on Wednesday.

“Yes or no — if a state refuses to turn their absentee voter list over to the federal government, will the Postal Service still mail their ballots under this proposed rule?” Sen. Gary Peters, D-Mich., asked Steiner.

“Under our proposed regulation, no. We would tell the state that we need the manifest,” Steiner said.

Steiner argued the policy is to make sure ballots are delivered “securely, efficiently, and accurately.” But President Donald Trump has repeatedly demanded states’ voter lists over the past year and has been suing states to get them.

The proposed rule says that states would have to give the Postal Service the names, addresses and ballot barcode numbers for the people who are to get ballots in the mail. The proposal follows Trump’s executive order from March 31 that requires the federal government to compile state citizenship lists and for the Postal Service to refuse to mail ballots to those the federal government has determined are ineligible to vote.

The proposed rule is posted on the Federal Register, and the public can comment until July 2.

Democrats have pushed back, arguing the rule shows that Trump is trying to federalize elections and said the Postal Service doesn’t have the authority to enforce that rule. The Constitution says states are responsible for running elections.

“Just because President Trump wants to do this does not make it law, doesn’t make it right, doesn’t make it constitutional. There is certainly a massive difference between general mail requirements and regulating elections,” Peters said.

Steiner admitted that his agency doesn’t have the authority to enforce elections but said the rule is a precaution to be sure that only eligible voters will get ballots.

“I would think that states would want the information to ensure that the ballots that they think they’re sending out are the ballots that are actually getting sent out,” Steiner said.

Sen. Elissa Slotkin, D-Mich., said the rule is part of a broader strategy.

“The U.S. Postal Service is now part of this bigger story of this president desperate to federalize our elections. He has tried every which way to say that if he and his party don’t win in these November elections, they were rigged.”

Slotkin asked Steiner directly to stop the plan.

“Please push back on being a pawn in this authoritarian playbook,” she said. “The Postal Service is one of the most important institutions in our country. Don’t taint it with the obsession of this one man.”

June 25 (UPI) — Korea Zinc said Thursday that Chairman Yun B. Choi visited Australia this week to meet with the country’s Prime Minister Anthony Albanese to discuss ways to strengthen collaboration on critical minerals.

During the bilateral meeting in Canberra on Wednesday, Albanese described U.S. Project Crucible as a valuable model, which the Australian government could benchmark, according to Korea Zinc.

The $7.4 billion initiative involves the construction of an integrated smelter in Clarksville, Tenn. Groundbreaking is scheduled for next year, with commercial production expected to begin in 2029. Toward that end, Korea Zinc cooperates with the U.S. government.

Once operational, the facility will produce base metals such as zinc and lead, along with strategic minerals including germanium and gallium, which are crucial for the semiconductor, defense, and other high-tech industries.

The prime minister also said that Korea Zinc’s business model closely aligns with the Australian government’s resource and energy policy objectives, particularly its efforts to beef up critical industries.

In response, Choi stated that Korea Zinc will keep trying to build a win-win partnership with the Australian government. The world’s largest non-ferrous metals manufacturer operates an Australian affiliate, Sun Metals Corporation.

“Over the past 30 years, we have been a partner that has contributed to Australia’s industries and local communities while expanding beyond smelting into renewable energy and green hydrogen,” he said.

“The synergy between Australia’s abundant resources and our technological prowess and diverse business portfolio will continue to bear fruit in the future,” he added.

The share price of Korea Zinc rose 1.09% on the Seoul bourse on Thursday, while the benchmark KOSPI gained 5.42%.

June 24 (UPI) — Democratic lawmakers accused the Trump administration Wednesday of seeking to push through a multimillion-dollar arms deal with Turkey by bypassing congressional review, the latest executive action critics say usurps the lawmakers’ authority.

Rep. Gregory Meeks, D-N.Y., ranking member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, said he was informed by the Trump administration late Tuesday that it would bypass congressional review of an arms sale to Turkey worth more than $700 million.

“The State Department did not even attempt to justify its decision,” Meeks said in a statement.

“It did not invoke any emergency authority, did not present a written rationale and for months refused to make a good-faith effort to brief me on implications of the sale for the U.S.-Turkey relationship, Turkey’s continued possession of the Russian S-400 system and other regional security concerns,” he continued.

“It simply informed my office that it would immediately proceed with a formal notification of the sale.”

Turkey is a U.S. ally and NATO member with a robust defense industry. However, it’s led by President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, an increasingly authoritarian leader who has maintained ties with Russia and whose government uses the Kremlin’s S-400 Triumph missile defense system.

The United States and NATO opposed Turkey’s adoption of the S-200 system, and Washington removed Turkey from the F-35 fighter program in 2019 during Trump’s first administration.

Meeks called the decision to bypass congressional review “yet another deeply troubling example of this administration’s open contempt for Congress’ oversight authority.

“There can be no pretense that this was urgent or unavoidable,” he said, stating the items will not be delivered to Turkey for years.

“This was a deliberate choice to shut Congress out and to treat legitimate oversight as an inconvenience to be brushed aside.”

Trump is scheduled to visit Turkey early next month. During a White House press conference alongside NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte on Tuesday, he praised Erdogan as “a great friend.”

Erdogan is known to be seeking to acquire U.S.-made fighter jets, including the F-35. Asked if he was planning to announce a potential deal when he visits Ankara, Trump replied: “I’m going to probably do something that’s going to make him very happy.”

It was unclear if jets were part of the arms deal.

UPI has contacted the State Department for comment and to detail the contents of the sale.

Democrats and other critics of President Donald Trump have repeatedly accused his administration of bypassing Congress through executive orders and unilateral decisions, particularly in its use of the military.

The Trump administration has faced staunch criticism from opponents for launching a war against Iran in late February without congressional authorization. Democrats have frequently argued that the Constitution gives Congress, not the president, the power to declare war.

Democrats have also criticized the administration’s use of the military to attack suspected drug-trafficking boats in the Pacific and Caribbean without congressional authorization.

June 24 (UPI) — The U.S. Justice Department announced charges Wednesday for 12 people it said used drones in a conspiracy to smuggle drugs, weapons and other items into multiple prisons.

The department said the conspiracy affected 10 federal prisons in eight states, including Georgia, Virginia, West Virginia, Kentucky, Tennessee, Louisiana and Mississippi, WAPT-TV reported.

U.S. Attorney William Keyes said the operation was based at a former daycare in Macon, Ga., and used multiple drones to deliver contraband to prisons by night.

Keyes said the indictment “charges the most sophisticated and sprawling criminal enterprise using drones to introduce contraband into the federal prison system ever charged by the Department of Justice,” CNN reported.

The drone deliveries allegedly took place between September 2023 and May 2026. Charges say the group used six drones to deliver contraband at least 38 times. This contraband included methamphetamine, marijuana, cocaine,other illegal drugs, tobacco, blades and cell phones.

The prosecutors said that people inside the prisons used phones to help guide the drone pilots. Prison authorities found some, but not all, of the drops, the indictment said.

“The allegations outlined in this indictment describe a coordinated criminal effort involving heavy payload drones to introduce dangerous contraband into federal prisons across multiple states,” William Marshall III, director of the federal Bureau of Prisons, said Wednesday, CNN reported. “Activity of this nature threatens the safety of everyone who lives and works inside our facilities and will not be tolerated.”

The bureau used drone detection systems to uncover the conspiracy, representatives said. A grand jury in Georgia handed down the indictment on charges including drug and firearms distribution on June 10.

Earlier in 2026, a group of state attorneys general launched a combined effort to combat the use of drones to deliver prison contraband.

June 24 (UPI) — A U.S. airstrike launched last week in northwest Syria killed a senior Islamic State leader, U.S. military officials announced Wednesday.

U.S. Central Command said the Friday attack killed Ali Husayn al-Ulaywi as “part of ongoing U.S. efforts to disrupt and eliminate terrorists seeking to attack Americans abroad or the U.S. homeland.”

The announcement comes a little more than a month after U.S. and Nigerian forces killed Abu-Bilal al-Minuki, believed at the time to be second-in-command for USUS.

U.S. forces have been battling ISIS and its predecessors for more than a decade in Iraq, Syria, Nigeria and other locations throughout the Middle East and Northern Africa. This fight was entwined with both the Iraq war and the Syrian civil war.

“CENTCOM and our partners remain committed to rooting out remaining remnants of ISIS to ensure its enduring defeat,” said Adm. Brad Cooper, CENTCOM commander.

June 24 (UPI) — Global aquaculture production reached a record high, while Chile maintained its position as the leading supplier of salmon to the United States and one of the sector’s top exporting powers, according to a report by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations.

According to the report The State of World Fisheries and Aquaculture, global fisheries and aquaculture production reached 235 million tons in 2024. For the first time, aquaculture production surpassed 100 million tons of aquatic animals, 89% of which is destined for human consumption and provides at least one-fifth of the animal protein consumed by 3.1 billion people.

The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations said Latin America and the Caribbean account for 15% of global aquatic product exports despite representing 9% of worldwide production, with a total of 13 million tons.

The region exported $27 billion worth of aquatic products, driven mainly by Chilean salmon, anchoveta from Peru and Chile, and Ecuadorian shrimp.

In this context, Chile ranks first in aquaculture production in Latin America, is the largest supplier of salmon to the United States and the world’s fifth-largest exporter of aquatic animal products.

Together with Norway, Chile accounts for nearly half of the value of global salmon and trout exports.

“The growth aquaculture has experienced in recent decades has not been accidental. Behind this progress lies significant work in research, innovation and technological development,” Valeska San Martín, an academic at the Coastal Research Center of the University of Atacama and a researcher at the Millennium Institute in Coastal Socio-Ecology, told UPI.

She said these advances have enabled the development of better feed for farmed species, more efficient genetic selection programs, increasingly precise environmental monitoring systems and automated tools that optimize feeding and health management.

“All of this has helped increase productivity and improve the efficient use of resources while at the same time reducing part of the costs associated with production,” she said.

San Martín added that Chile has been one of the most important players in global aquaculture development and is recognized by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations as one of the world’s 10 leading aquaculture producers.

“In 2024, it led global exports of frozen salmon and trout fillets, processed mussels, fishmeal and various algae-derived products, reaching more than 100 international markets, particularly the United States, Japan, Brazil, China and Europe,” she said.

Growth prospects remain positive, according to SalmonChile, the industry association representing salmon producers.

“Chilean salmon exports maintained a positive trend in 2026. During the first quarter, they reached $1.991 billion, representing growth of 8% in value and 19% in volume compared with the same period a year earlier,” the organization told UPI.

SalmonChile added that the record achieved by global aquaculture in 2024 confirms the growing prominence of aquaculture products in international trade and consolidates Chile’s position as one of the world’s leading salmon-producing powers.

June 24 (UPI) — Investment from the United States in Latin America and the Caribbean fell 11% in 2025, although the country remained the region’s leading source of foreign direct investment, the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean, or ECLAC, reported.

The organization presented its annual report, Foreign Direct Investment in Latin America and the Caribbean 2026: Navigating the New Global Context, in Santiago, Chile, on Tuesday. The report showed that the region received $194.233 billion in foreign direct investment in 2025, up 1.7% from the previous year.

ECLAC attributed the modest growth to an international environment marked by geopolitical tensions, technological rivalry among major powers and changes in U.S. trade policy.

The United States accounted for 35% of foreign investment with an identifiable origin entering the region, while Europe represented 32%.

ECLAC said the decline in U.S. investment flows and the increase in European investment significantly narrowed the gap between the two players.

The organization warned that recent changes in U.S. tariff policy could affect Latin American countries unevenly depending on their productive structures and their level of integration into regional value chains.

“In the current global context of weaponized interdependence, it is essential to understand the relationship between trade and foreign direct investment in order to design policies that allow us to advance toward more productive, inclusive and sustainable development,” ECLAC Executive Secretary José Manuel Salazar-Xirinachs said.

During the presentation of the report, Salazar-Xirinachs also said the world had moved from a period in which economic interdependence was viewed as a source of efficiency and even a guarantee of peace to one in which it is increasingly perceived as a source of vulnerability, according to statements reported by Xinhua.

Brazil remained the region’s leading destination for foreign investment, attracting $77.676 billion, equivalent to 40% of the regional total. Mexico received $43.221 billion, or 22% of the total, although it recorded a year-over-year decline. Together, the two countries accounted for 62% of all foreign investment received by Latin America and the Caribbean in 2025, according to ECLAC.

They were followed by Chile with 7% of regional flows, Peru and Colombia with 6% each, Guyana with 5%, and Costa Rica and Dominican Republic with 3%.

The sectoral composition also showed changes. Services attracted 53% of foreign investment received by the region and increased 19.5% from the previous year. Natural resources rose 7% and accounted for 16% of the total, while manufacturing declined 17.2% and represented 31% of investment flows.

The report also showed signs of caution among investors. During 2025, 1,326 new investment projects were announced with a combined value of $114.1 billion, a decline of 10.2% in the number of projects and 34.3% in value compared with 2024.

In response to this scenario, ECLAC recommended diversifying export markets and sources of investment, strengthening coordination between trade and investment policies, and expanding regional cooperation to reduce dependence on individual markets and increase economic resilience.

June 24 (UPI) — On July 1, student loan servicers will begin notifying borrowers enrolled in SAVE repayment plans that they must switch to a new plan and borrower advocates warn that what comes next will likely be an increase in defaults and delinquencies.

Not all borrowers will receive a notice on July 1. In fact, many will not. The notices will be staggered across the millions of people enrolled in the SAVE program over the coming months. Once a borrower receives their notice, the clock starts on a 90-day window for them to enroll in an eligible repayment plan.

If a SAVE enrollee fails to switch to another repayment plan, they will be automatically enrolled in a standard repayment plan, which will carry a higher monthly payment requirement. In many cases, that plan will not be their most affordable option.

Betsy Mayotte, president and founder of the Institute of Student Loan Advisors, told UPI that the borrowers her organization hears from are more frequently expressing confusion over which plan is best for them.

“We’ve seen borrowers whose SAVE payment was $40 and their next lowest payment on a new plan is $400,” Mayotte said.

For many borrowers, they will be able to switch plans directly on the Federal Student Aid website. In most cases, this will be the simplest way to switch, Mayotte said. However, in some cases, this can create problems with unduly high payment requirements due to a glitch in the Department of Education’s website.

People who are married with both spouses having student loans may be assigned double the payment when applying through the Federal Student Aid site, Mayotte said. What the partners would pay together is misapplied to each spouse, effectively doubling their required payments.

What is supposed to happen, Mayotte said, is that the spouses apply together and their payment is “portioned out” considering both of their loans and incomes. Instead, the glitch is causing the amount not to be portioned, requiring each spouse to make that full payment.

Mayotte added that this glitch is not obvious to the borrower when they go through the application process, meaning it can fly under their radar.

In these cases, borrowers are advised to discuss their repayment options directly with their student loan servicer.

Borrowers who do not have new student loans after July 1 will continue to have access to the old income-driven repayment plans until July 1, 2028, when those programs end.

July 1 also brings about the deadline for Parent PLUS loan borrowers to consolidate their loans to be eligible for enrollment in an Income-Driven Repayment plan. New Parent PLUS loans taken out after this deadline, or loans that are not consolidated before it, will not have access to Income-Driven Repayment plans.

For Parent PLUS loans that have been consolidated, borrowers must enroll in an Income-Driven Repayment plan by July 1, 2028, or they will forfeit their eligibility.

Beginning with the coming school year, Parent PLUS loans will be capped at $65,000 total per student with two parents. Each student will have a separate $65,000 cap.

With the SAVE plan’s end, Mayotte said she expects defaults and delinquencies to rise. She said the borrowers who have historically been least likely to default are those who have made 12 to 24 payments consecutively on time.

The COVID-19 pandemic took about 40 million people out of that habit, Mayotte said.

“We had 3 million default in the last quarter of 2025,” she said. “I think the SAVE transition is going to continue that trend because people have no plan they can afford.”

“There are two big factors,” Mayotte continued. “One is lifestyle creep. They haven’t had to pay for two years and lifestyle creep happens. The other thing that’s happened is they were told their payment was going to be ‘x’ on SAVE and they made other financial decisions around that. If you’re told your payment’s going to be $100 on SAVE and then you budget to buy a house — all of the sudden your payment is not $100 a month, it’s $400 a month, you can’t take back that mortgage.”

Meanwhile, the cost of living has increased on all fronts in the United States.

“Payments are resuming at a higher rate for borrowers at the same time health insurance has gone up, gas prices, groceries, produce has gone up like 43% in the last three months,” Mayotte said. “It’s like a perfect storm, especially for low-income and middle-class families as far as expenses go.”

Amy Czulada, senior adviser for outreach and engagement with the Student Borrower Protection Center, told UPI that the difference between the SAVE plan and the next most affordable plans available for enrollees is “astronomical.”

The Trump administration is launching the Repayment Assistance Plan on July 1. It is a new income-based repayment plan approved by Congress last summer. It and the Income-Based Repayment plan will be the only plans based on income available to borrowers starting July 1, 2028, and the only plans for borrowers with new loans after July 1 this year.

About 3 million borrowers are enrolled in income-driven repayment plans that will sunset in 2028.

In its analysis of the RAP plan, the Student Borrowers Protection Center estimates that the average borrower with a college degree will pay more than $4,000 per year more in student loan payments.

“The difference in payments is just beyond anything folks are able to handle at the moment,” Czulada said.

The Student Borrower Protection Center, a student loan borrower advocacy organization, warns that the deadline for borrowers to pick new plans threatens to push borrowers back into a “broken and corrupt servicing system.”

The organization published its report “Repeat Offenders” earlier this month, detailing allegedly illegal acts and practices carried out by student loan servicers that exploit borrowers. Practices such as deliberately long wait times on phone calls, not providing borrowers with all the relevant information they need to plan their payments, illegally denying applications for affordable payment plans and deceiving borrowers to collect maximum interest rate charges.

The report also highlights that student loans changing hands across servicers, along with shifts in the Department of Education, creates opportunities for borrowers to be taken advantage of, have applications lost, payment histories misapplied and other shortfalls in service to borrowers.

“Folks often think they are conversing directly with the Department of Education,” Czulada said. “So there’s a lot of white labeling going on where these contractors are the ones interfacing with, but folks don’t necessarily know or understand that.”

Federal management of student loans is currently being moved from the Department of Education to the U.S. Treasury Department.

“What that has led to is that there’s not really a functioning federal student aid office that can take complaints and really dive into what the issues are,” Czulada said. “Borrowers are left really susceptible to all these practices and limited oversight and accountability.”

In March, the Government Accountability Office issued its review of Federal Student Aid’s monitoring of student loan servicers. It found that the FSA had stopped reviewing the accuracy of servicers’ records in February 2025, because of a lack of staff.

The Department of Education and other government agencies reduced staff broadly in 2025 under recommendations by the Trump administration’s short-lived Department of Government Efficiency, led by the world’s first trillionaire Elon Musk.

Nelnet and Mohela are the largest loan servicers contracted with the Department of Education.

Nelnet manages more than 12 million accounts worth more than $480 billion. It has received $3.1 billion in payments from the department since 2009.

In 2024, a Senate investigation found that more than 1.4 million duplicate student loan records appeared on borrowers’ credit reports when loans were transferred from Mohela to Nelnet. Earlier that year, the company was fined $1.8 million by the attorney general of Massachusetts for failing to keep borrowers in affordable repayment plans, stopping them from progressing toward student loan forgiveness.

Czulada said during the pandemic student loan servicers notoriously allowed borrowers to defer payments or enter forbearance rather than informing them about repayment options that would have counted toward loan forgiveness.

Mohela manages more than 7 million student loan accounts worth more than $318 billion and has received $1.54 billion in payments from the Department of Education since 2011. At least 347,000 of its borrowers are at least three payments behind and more than 75,000 defaulted last year.

More than 41,000 complaints were issued against the company by borrowers last year.

Mohela is rated by FSA as the servicer with the longest wait times for borrowers calling its service lines. Borrowers wait for 13 minutes on average to connect with a representative at Mohela and about 14% abandon their calls before reaching someone.

When callers do get through, Czulada said they are often redirected to other representatives or sent to webpages that do not function.

The American Federation of Teachers filed a lawsuit against Mohela in 2024 and has amended its complaints as recently as January. It alleges that the servicer and five more of the biggest student loan services have engaged in a call deflection scheme and have systemically delivered poor service to customers trying to stay in compliance with loan repayments.

“These companies are just continuing to get more money from the Department of Education for giving us the same terrible service over time,” Czulada said. “This has been really harmful to a lot of people. Like millions of people. Nothing is better evidenced by that than having almost 10 million people in default right now and almost another million careening towards default. In 2020 we also had a record number of people in default before the pandemic began. Moving back to the status quo is also not really an option.”

June 24 (UPI) — The United States has sanctioned five Cuban state companies and the wife of Raul Castro‘s son, as the Trump administration continues to apply economic pressure on the Caribbean nation.

Three of the companies blacklisted by the State Department on Tuesday are associated with Grupo de Administracion Empresarial, which the United States initially sanctioned during the first Trump administration on accusations of being a Cuban military-controlled umbrella enterprise with interests sprawling throughout the island nation’s economy.

The two other entities hit are accused of operating in Cuba’s mining sector with foreign investment from Australia as well as working in collaboration with Russia.

Annalie Lilliam Rueda Cadero was sanctioned for being the wife of Alejandro Castro Espin, the son of Raul Castro, Cuba’s former head of state. Alejandro Castro was sanctioned by the Trump administration earlier this month.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in a social media statement that he was sanctioning GAESA network entities for diverting Cuba’s money and assets and the two other companies for exploiting its mineral and metal reserves.

“The situation in Cuba is devolving as the island’s corrupt, brutal and anti-American Communist regime continues to prioritize its own total control over the freedom, opportunity and basic well-being of the Cuban people,” he said.

Sanctions generally freeze U.S.-based property or interests in property under the control of those designated while threatening foreign businesses with secondary sanctions for doing business with them.

The United States has long imposed a blockade and sanctions on Cuba, but the economic punitive measures have starkly increased during the second Trump administration, exasperating the power and energy shortages in the country, causing blackouts. The supply shortages have forced more than 100,000 people, including 11,000 children, to wait for surgeries, according to the United Nations.

Tuesday’s designations come under an executive order Trump signed in May permitting the sanctioning of those operating in Cuba’s energy, defense, mining and financial services sectors, as well as those complicit in human rights abuses or corruption related to Cuba working or for providing services to the Havana government.

Trump has been increasing the political and economic pressure on Cuba since ousting Venezuela’s authoritarian leader in January, declaring a national emergency with respect to the island nation early this year.

Since signing the sanctions-related executive order in May, he has used it at least five times to designate Cuba-related entities and individuals.

Cuba’s foreign minister, Bruno Rodriguez, accused the Trump administration on Tuesday of increasing its sanctions regime against Havana, because Havana continues to prove it is “stronger, more capable and efficient than it expected.”

He accused the Trump administration of collectively punishing the Cuban people.

Ernesto Soberon, Cuba’s United Nations ambassador, accused the United States of lying about employing sanctions due to human rights abuses by Havana.

“No government, no person with even a shred of common sense — and certainly not the people of #Cuba, who are suffering the humanitarian impact of the U.S. economic war — can believe that the tightening of the blockade, the energy siege and the newly announced sanctions are intended to support the Cuban people,” he said on social media.

“Anyone who has doubts should ask the parents of the more than 12,000 children currently awaiting surgery in Cuba as a result of the U.S. government’s genocidal policy.”

June 24 (UPI) — Senate lawmakers have approved a war powers resolution directing President Donald Trump to halt U.S. hostilities with Iran or seek congressional authorization.

The Senate voted 50-48 on Tuesday, with four Republicans — Sens. Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Rand Paul of Kentucky — joining their Democratic colleagues in passing H.Con.Res. 86. Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa., was the only Democrat to vote against the measure.

The measure’s legal force was disputed. Though concurrent resolutions are non-binding, Democrats argue H.Con.Res. 86 is binding because it was adopted under the War Powers Resolution.

Either way, the measure shows the deepening fissure in support among Trump’s Republican Party for the war his administration unilaterally launched in late February.

Democrats have been forcing repeated war powers resolution votes for months, most of which have been stonewalled by Republicans. But GOP support for the war has waned as it has dragged on, culminating Tuesday when the Senate approved the measure that the House narrowly passed 215-208 earlier this month.

“Both chambers have now made clear that the president cannot continue this war of choice and must cease all hostilities against Iran,” Rep. Gregory Meeks, the resolution’s sponsor and ranking member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, said Tuesday after the vote.

“Regardless of what President Trump says, this measure is binding under the War Powers Resolution, and I will explore all legal avenues to ensure the Executive complies with the will of Congress.”

Democrats argue that the U.S. war with Iran — as well as other military actions taken by Trump, including attacks on suspected drug-trafficking boats in international waters — is illegal as Congress has not authorized war, a power the Constitution gives to Congress.

Trump has responded that he does not need authorization, and any war powers resolution is moot due to the fragile U.S.-Iran cease-fire that went into effect in early April.

Amid the cease-fire, Trump has been seeking an agreement to end the war, and his administration was actively negotiating terms with Iran when the vote was held Tuesday.

In a social media statement, Trump lambasted Congress over the vote, saying it was informing Iran that the United States does not support him while hee has “Iran on the ‘ropes,’ ready to go down for the fall.”

“Four Republican Losers voted with the Dumocrats,” he said, while calling the measure “poorly timed and meaningless.”

“These Senators have just made my job more difficult, but I will get it done, one way or the other, because I always get it done.”