By FERNANDA FIGUEROA

Authors, readers and publishing industry experts lament the underrepresentation of Hispanic stories in the mainstream world of books, but have found new ways to elevate the literature and resolve misunderstandings.

“The stories now are more diverse than they were ten years ago,” said Carmen Alvarez, a book influencer on Instagram and TikTok.

Some publishers, independent bookstores and book influencers are pushing past the perception of monolithic experience by making Hispanic stories more visible and discoverable for book lovers.

The rise of online book retailers and limited marketing budgets for stories about people of color have been major hurdles for increasing that representation, despite annual celebrations of Hispanic Heritage Month from Sept. 15 to Oct. 15 in the U.S. There’s been a push for ethnically authentic stories about Latinos, beyond the immigrant experience.

“I feel like we are getting away from the immigration story, the struggle story,” said Alvarez, who is best known as “tomesandtextiles” on bookstagram and booktok, the Instagram and TikTok social media communities. “I feel like my content is to push back against the lack of representation.”

Latinos in the publishing industry

Latinos currently make up roughly 20% of the U.S. population, according to Census data.

However, the National Hispanic Media Coalition estimates Latinos only represent 8% of employees in publishing, according to its Latino Representation in Publishing Coalition created in 2023.

Brenda Castillo, NHMC president and CEO, said the coalition works directly with publishing houses to highlight Latino voices and promote their existing Latino employees.

The publishing houses “are the ones that have the power to make the changes,” Castillo said.

Some Hispanic authors are creating spaces for their work to find interested readers. Award-winning children authors Mayra Cuevas and Alex Villasante co-founded a book festival and storytellers conference in 2024 to showcase writers and illustrators from their communities.

“We were very intentional in creating programming around upleveling craft and professional development,” Cuevas said. “And giving attendees access to the publishing industry, and most importantly, creating a space for community connection and belonging.”

Villasante said the festival and conference allowed them to sustain themselves within the publishing industry, while giving others a road map for success in an industry that isn’t always looking to mass produce their work.

“We are not getting the representation of ourselves,” Villasante said. “I believe that is changing, but it is a slow change so we have to continue to push for that change.”

Breaking into the mainstream

New York Times bestselling author Silvia Moreno-Garcia, a Mexican-Canadian novelist known for the novels “Mexican Gothic” and “The Daughter of Doctor Moreau,” is one of few Hispanic authors that has been able to break to mainstream. But she said it wasn’t easy.

Moreno-Garcia recalled one of her first publisher rejections: The editor complimented the quality of the story but said it would not sell because it was set in Mexico.

“There are systems built within publishing that make it very difficult to achieve the regular distributions that other books naturally have built into them,” Moreno-Garcia said. “There is sometimes resistance to sharing some of these books.”

Cynthia Pelayo, an award-winning author and poet, said the marketing campaign is often the difference maker in terms of a book’s success. Authors of color are often left wanting more promotional support from their publishers, she said.

“I’ve seen exceptional Latino novels that have not received nearly the amount of marketing, publicity that some of their white colleagues have received,” Pelayo said. “What happens in that situation (is) their books get put somewhere else in the bookstore when these white colleagues, their books will get put in the front.”

Hispanic Heritage Month, however, helps bring some attention to Hispanic authors, she added.

Independent bookstores

Independent bookstores remain persistent in elevating Hispanic stories. A 2024 report by the American Booksellers Association found that 60 of the 323 new independent bookstores were owned by people of color. According to Latinx in Publishing, a network of publishing industry professionals, there are 46 Hispanic-owned bookstores in the U.S.

Online book retailer Bookshop.org has highlighted Hispanic books and provided discounts for readers during Hispanic Heritage Month. A representative for the site, Ellington McKenzie, said the site has been able to provide financial support for about 70 Latino bookstores.

“People are always looking to support those minority owned bookstores which we are happy to be the liaison between them,” McKenzie said.

Chawa Magaña, the owner of Palabras Bilingual Bookstore in Phoenix, said she was inspired to open the store because of what she felt was a lack of diversity and representation in the books that are taught in Arizona schools.

“Growing up, I didn’t experience a lot of diversity in literature in schools.” Magaña said. “I wasn’t seeing myself in the stories that I was reading.”

Of the books for sale at Palabras Bilingual, between 30% to 40% of the books are Latino stories, she said.

Magaña said having heard people say they have never seen that much representation in a bookstore has made her cry.

“What has been the most fulfilling to me is able to see how it impacts other people’s lives,” she said. “What motivates me is seeing other people get inspired to do things, seeing people moved when they see the store itself having diverse books.”

The hiring of a new assessor in Clarkston has led to confusing communication with Independence Township in northern Oakland County over their intergovernmental agreements, which includes police and fire services in the city.

Clarkston City Manager Jonathan Smith told the city council on Tuesday night he received a text message from Independence Township Supervisor Chuck Phyle on Sept. 23 stating his intention to cancel the three-year agreement signed by the two municipalities in June.

It came one day after the council voted 7-0 to approve hiring Kim Fiegly Assessing for assessing services for Clarkston.

“Supervisor Phyle texted me to say that because we had selected Kim, the township would be canceling the police, fire, department of public works and Deer Lake Beach agreements,” said Smith. “He texted that to me.”

That text from Phyle was followed by “I will send official notice from (township attorney) Dan Kelly.”

In a statement to The Oakland Press on Wednesday, Phyle seemed to change his position.

“Independence Township is reviewing all intergovernmental contracts with the City of the Village of Clarkston to ensure fairness, compliance, and protection for residents of both communities,” Phyle said. “As township supervisor, I have both the authority and the responsibility to initiate these reviews when terms appear inconsistent with the township’s fiscal or legal obligations. Any final action to amend or terminate a contract will, as always, go before the full board for approval.”

Clarkston’s Smith told the council there was a meeting on Oct. 2 between Phyle, Kelly and Clarkston city attorney Jerry Fisher to discuss cancellation of the agreement.

“I was hoping it was just a big misunderstanding, but that was not the case,” said Smith, who was also in the meeting. “He suggested that the city could not afford to be a city anymore and we should consider folding into the township.”

Smith and Trustee Amanda Forte met informally with Phyle after a township meeting on Oct. 7 to find out what the problem was with the hiring of Fiegly, the former Independence Township director of assessing.

“He noted that Kim would not be able to work with their (Independence Township) building department due to the way she left things,” said Forte. “We asked if there was any major incident that happened and he said ‘no’ and we asked if she was fired and he said ‘no,’ so he did not give us any specifics on why that would be an issue.”

“He cannot provide any reason why we should not do business with someone who is completely independent from them,” Trustee Erica Jones said. “It is nothing that a publicly elected official should be doing.”

It turns out Fiegly left her position at the township because Phyle was on track to overload the assessing department in order to cover the townships assessing costs.

Back in April, the Oakland County Board of Commissioners approved a cost increase on assessing services done through the county, which led to several communities looking into bringing in their own assessors.

Assessing contracts with Oakland County drop by more than 50%

Fiegly said Phyle began talking with those communities about signing on with his department for their assessing services.

“Mr. Phyle was soliciting other governmental contracts for me to head up an assessing division for profit for Independence Township,” said Fiegly. “He was soliciting as many municipalities as he could that the county had alienated. He was trying to make money off of other municipalities to offset his own (assessing) costs.”

She said he had been in contact with Commerce, Springfield, Orion and Oxford townships, but knew the amount of work it would bring would overload her department.

“I agreed to take on one or two small units for him, but it blew up much larger to the point where we could not do it without compromising the quality of service,” she said. “It was in my best interest to bow out and leave.”

Fiegly resigned in April, opened up her own business and submitted one of four proposals for the Clarkston assessor position.

The three-year proposals were from: Kim Fiegly Assessing - $22 per parcel, AAS Assessing - $23.68 per parcel, WCA Assessing - $27.16 per parcel and Oakland County - $32.11 per parcel. Independence Township has since contracted with AAS for their services.

Clarkston would have paid Oakland County an average of $32.24 per parcel if they had agreed to a proposed three-year contract for county assessing services from 2026-28.

The threat of pulling police and emergency services from Clarkston due to her hiring did not dissuade Fiegly from signing the contracton Tuesday. She notified the state that her company is now the assessor of record for the city.

“I did a lot of soul searching with the city and I said, ‘I don’t want to bring harm to you,’  and they said this has nothing to do with you and you are the one we want for our assessor,” said Fiegly. “I grew up in this community. I have 40 years of real estate knowledge here and this is something I could give back to the village.”

By not going along with Phyle’s plan, she said their dynamic changed.

“(Phyle) went from advertising us as the greatest assessing office to me being incompetent,” said Fiegly. “He is retaliating and he is angry at me and he is taking it out on (Clarkston), but he has no authority to tell the village who they can hire.”

Fiegly drew nothing but praise from Clarkston Treasurer Greg Cote.

“Kim Fiegly is a startup company with Kim having 30 plus years of experience. Kim grew up in Independence Township and is quite capable of serving this community,” Cote said at the Sept. 22 where she earned board approval. “If a resident wants to talk to an assessor, Kim being born and raised in this community, indicated that she would come here to the office and sit down and explain rationale. So, I believe Kim is more than capable of performing the duties we are requesting.”

“She is highly regarded in the field and has nothing but the highest reputation,” said Smith.

Clarkston has three intergovernmental agreements with Independence Township for police services, fire services and building services (including building and code enforcement services).

The police agreement commits Clarkston to pay 2.7% of the township’s total cost for police services and a $300 a month administration fee.

The fire agreement commits the city to pay the township the same millage rate that the township charges its residents - 3.37-mills.

The city has been contracting with Code Enforcement Services, a division of Ann Arbor-based Carlisle- Wortman Associates ,for building services since 2017.

The Deer Lake Beach agreement committed Clarkston to lease the beach to the township for $1 per year with the Independence Township Parks and Recreation Department offering multiple services including swim lesson, a boat launch and open swimming for residents of both municipalities. The township would keep the collected fees to offset their costs.

Trustee Jones said it would impact Clarkston significantly if the agreement was canceled.

“It affects the actual emergency services that would be provided to our community,” she said. “(Phyle) is putting resident safety in jeopardy. This is basically a breach of contract. We signed a contract for those services in June and those contracts have gone into effect.”

Fiegly also recognizes the consequences of leaving the city without a fire department.

“When you start threatening to take away fire services in a historical district with homes from the 1800’s, that is some pretty major stuff,” she said.

Jones said the possibility of “folding” Clarkston into Independence Township was unrealistic.

“It legally cannot happen because of the way our charter is worded. A township cannot absorb a city,” she said. “(Phyle) wants the brand affinity of the Clarkston name for Independence Township.”

Oakland County loses more than half its assessing customer base

Looking to be entertained this weekend? There’s plenty of the usual fare — lots of music, movie openings, TV, etc. But if you feel like stepping out for something special, there are a few significant opportunities in the metro area over the next few days …

• The Detroit Institute of Arts celebrates the opening of its reimagined African American Art Galleries with a number of events during the weekend. A preview for members runs all day on Friday, Oct. 17, with the grand opening and member lecture taking place at 6 p.m. in the Detroit Film Theatre. A special gala opening will be held at 6 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 18, and the galleries open to the public at 10 a.m. Sunday, Oct. 19. 5200 Woodward Ave., Detroit. 313-833-9700 or dia.org.

• Comedian and actor John Mulaney is making himself at home this weekend. He wraps a two-night stand on his “Mister Whatever” tour at 7:30 p.m. Friday, Oct. 7, at the Fox Theatre, 2211 Woodward Ave., Detroit. 313-471-7000 or 313Presents.com. Mulaney then moves to the Fillmore Detroit for one more show on Saturday, Oct. 18. 2115 Woodward Ave. Doors at 7 p.m. 313-961-5451 or thefillmoredetroit.com.

• The Dance @ Detroit Opera season begins with performances by Stars of the American Ballet at 7:30 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 18 and 2:30 p.m. Sunday, Oct. 19 at the Detroit Opera House, 1526 Broadway St., Detroit. The company will salute iconic choreographers Jerome Robbins, Twyla Tharp, Gerald Arpino and George Balanchine. Daniel Ulbricht, artistic director, will speak an hour before each performance. 313-237-7464 or detroitopera.org.

• We often forget that “Steel Magnolias” was a stage play — in 1987, by Robert Harling — before it became a hit film two years later. You can see it at 7:30 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 18 and 2 p.m. Sunday, Oct. 19 at the Macomb Center, 44575 Garfield Road, Clinton Township. 586-286-2222 or macombcenter.com.

• “The Rocky Horror Picture Show” 50th Anniversary Spectacular Tour — featuring cast members Barry Bostwick (Brad Majors), Laura “Little Nell” Campbell (Columbia) and Patricia Quinn (Magenta) — stops Saturday, Oct. 18 at the Masonic Temple Theatre, 500 Temple St., Detroit. Doors at 7 p.m. 313-548-1320 or themasonic.com.

Barry Bostwick to appear with ‘Rocky Horror’ co-stars in Detroit to celebrate film’s 50th anniversary

By JULIE WATSON

When the corroded pipeline burst in 2015, inky crude spread along the Southern California coast, becoming the state’s worst oil spill in decades.

More than 140,000 gallons (3,300 barrels) of oil gushed out, blackening beaches for 150 miles from Santa Barbara to Los Angeles, polluting a biologically rich habitat for endangered whales and sea turtles, killing scores of pelicans, seals and dolphins, and decimating the fishing industry.

Plains All American Pipeline in 2022 agreed to a $230 million settlement with fishers and coastal property owners without admitting liability. Federal inspectors found that the Houston-based company failed to quickly detect the rupture and responded too slowly. It faced an uphill battle to build a new pipeline.

Three decades-old drilling platforms were subsequently shuttered, but another Texas-based fossil fuel company supported by the Trump administration purchased the operation and is intent on pumping oil through the pipeline again.

Sable Offshore Corp., headquartered in Houston, is facing a slew of legal challenges but is determined to restart production, even if that means confining it to federal waters, where state regulators have virtually no say. California controls the 3 miles nearest to shore. The platforms are 5 to 9 miles offshore.

The Trump administration has hailed Sable’s plans as the kind of project the president wants to increase U.S. energy production as the federal government removes regulatory barriers. President Donald Trump has directed Interior Secretary Doug Burgum to undo his predecessor’s ban on future offshore oil drilling on the East and West coasts.

Environmentalist sue to stop the project

“This project risks another environmental disaster in California at a time when demand for oil is going down and the climate crisis is escalating,” said Alex Katz, executive director of Environmental Defense Center, the Santa Barbara group formed in response to a massive spill in 1969.

The environmental organization is among several suing Sable.

“Our concern is that there is no way to make this pipeline safe and that this company has proven that it cannot be trusted to operate safely, responsibly or even legally,” he said.

Actor and activist Julia Louis-Dreyfus, who lives in the area, has implored officials to stop Sable, saying at a March protest: “I can smell a rat. And this project is a rat.”

The California Coastal Commission fined Sable a record $18 million for ignoring cease-and-desist orders over repair work it says was done without permits. Sable said it has permits from the previous owner, Exxon Mobil, and sued the commission while work continued on the pipeline. In June, a state judge ordered it to stop while the case proceeds through the court. The commission and Sable are due back in court Wednesday.

“This fly-by-night oil company has repeatedly abused the public’s trust, racking up millions of dollars in fines and causing environmental damage along the treasured Gaviota Coast,” a state park south of Santa Barbara, said Joshua Smith, the commission’s spokesman.

Sable keeps moving forward

So far, Sable is undeterred.

The California Attorney General’s office sued Sable this month, saying it illegally discharged waste into waterways, and disregarded state law requiring permits before work along the pipeline route that crosses sensitive wildlife habitat.

“Sable placed profits over environmental protection in its rush to get oil on the market,” the agency said in its lawsuit.

Last month, the Santa Barbara District Attorney filed felony criminal charges against Sable, also accusing it of polluting waterways and harming wildlife.

Sable said it has fully cooperated with local and state agencies, including the California Department of Fish and Wildlife, and called the district attorney’s allegation “inflammatory and extremely misleading.” It said a biologist and state fire marshal officials oversaw the work, and no wildlife was harmed.

The company is seeking $347 million for the delays, and says if the state blocks it from restarting the onshore pipeline system, it will use a floating facility that would keep its entire operation in federal waters and use tankers to transport the oil to markets outside California. In a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on Thursday, the company updated its plan to include the option.

Fulfilling the president’s energy promise

The U.S. Interior Department’s Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement said in July it was working with Sable to bring a second rig online.

“President Trump made it clear that American energy should come from American resources,” the agency’s deputy director Kenny Stevens said in a statement then, heralding the “comeback story for Pacific production.”

The agency said there are an estimated 190 million barrels (6 billion gallons) of recoverable oil reserves in the area, nearly 80% of residual Pacific reserves. It noted advancements in preventing and preparing for oil spills and said the failed pipeline has been rigorously tested.

“Continuous monitoring and improved technology significantly reduce the risk of a similar incident occurring in the future,” the agency said.

CEO says project could lower gas prices

On May 19 — the 10th anniversary of the disaster — CEO Jim Flores announced that Sable “is proud to have safely and responsibly achieved first production at the Santa Ynez Unit” — which includes three rigs in federal waters, offshore and onshore pipelines, and the Las Flores Canyon Processing Facility.

State officials countered that the company had only conducted testing and not commercial production. Sable’s stock price dropped and some investors sued, alleging they were misled.

Sable purchased the Santa Ynez Unit from Exxon Mobil in 2024 for nearly $650 million primarily with a loan from Exxon. Exxon sold the shuttered operation after losing a court battle in 2023 to truck the crude through central California while the pipeline system was rebuilt or repaired.

Flores said well tests at the Platform Harmony rig indicate there is much oil to be extracted and that it will relieve California’s gas prices — among the nation’s highest — by stabilizing supplies.

“Sable is very concerned about the crumbling energy complex in California,” Flores said in a statement to The Associated Press. “With the exit of two refineries last year and more shuttering soon, California’s economy cannot survive without the strong energy infrastructure it enjoyed for the last 150 years.”

California has been reducing the state’s production of fossil fuels in favor of clean energy for years. The movement has been spearheaded partly by Santa Barbara County, where elected officials voted in May to begin taking steps to phase out onshore oil and gas operations.

Associated Press writer Matthew Brown in Billings, Montana contributed to this report.

When the Oakland County’s board of commissioners meet Thursday evening, the agenda will include event-sponsorship requests, union contracts and grant applications among other items.

What the agenda doesn’t include, as of early Wednesday afternoon, are resolutions to update the county’s ethics rules and establish financial disclosure rules as well as whistleblower protections.

Earlier this month, County Executive Dave Coulter issued statements calling for ethics and financial-disclosure reforms for county officials and the creation of an ombudsperson to address related concerns and complaints.

So far this year, there have been ethical issues involving a county road commissioner found at fault for breaking workplace rules, an information technology staffing contract canceled over conflict-of-interest concerns involving a company created by a current county employee, and questions about whether County Commission Chairman Dave Woodward’s private business contracts and whether his lobbying efforts on behalf of the Sheetz convenience stories conflicted with his board position.

Two commissioners, Kristen Nelson, a Waterford Township Democrat, and Charlie Cavell, a Ferndale Democrat, have made repeated attempts to update the existing ethics guidelines, add protections for whistleblowers and institute financial-disclosure rules for county officials.

They introduced three resolutions in May, which the board referred to committees for review. Since then, Woodward said they were also being reviewed by the county’s legal team. Cavell and Nelson later brought the resolutions to the board bypassing the committee process but each failed to pass.

If the proposed ethics policy is adopted, elected and county officials would be required to disclose:

•  Earnings outside of their county roles and above a certain threshold.

•  Positions with businesses, nonprofits or other organizations.

•  Any gifts, travel costs or other reimbursements by organizations doing business with the county.

Spouses would also have to disclose any interests that could create a conflict with county business, according to the proposed policy.

The proposed financial-disclosure policy calls for training on what must be disclosed and penalties for violating the rules that include:

•  Public reprimands

•  Ineligibility for appointment to county boards

•  Referral to the appropriate ethics or legal authority

It’s unclear whether the commissioners will consider the existing proposed policies or updated versions.

The commissioners meet for Democrat and Republican caucuses at 5 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 16. These are not publicly livestreamed but are open to the public. These are followed by the commissioners meeting at 6 p.m. in the commission’s auditorium, 1200 N. Telegraph Road in Pontiac, which is livestreamed on YouTube at https://www.youtube.com/@OakGovBOC.

The meeting agenda and packet are online at https://oaklandcomi.portal.civicclerk.com/event/1301/files.

By Churchill Ndonwie, Miami Herald

Lawyers for the federal government say the government shutdown prevents them from working and are requesting that an appellate court pause a lawsuit over the controversial detention center in the Florida Everglades, the so-called Alligator Alcatraz.

In a filing Friday, Department of Justice lawyers asked the Atlanta-based 11th Circuit Court of Appeals to pause proceedings in the appeal filed by the administration of Gov. Ron DeSantis to overturn a lower-court decision siding with environmental groups who said the government had circumvented federal environmental regulations when building the makeshift facility.

“Absent an appropriation, Department of Justice attorneys are prohibited from working, even on a voluntary basis, except in very limited circumstances, including “emergencies involving the safety of human life or the protection of property,” the federal government lawyers stated.

The environmental groups disagreed with the request. They argued that if the appeals case is paused, the site’s operations and construction — which were allowed to continue after the appellate court overturned the lower court’s injunction — could cause more harm to the surrounding Everglades wetlands during the shutdown, the length of which is unknown.

“The balance of harms favors denying an indefinite stay in this case, which would cause Plaintiffs ongoing and irreversible harm,” the lawyers for the environmental group said. Any further construction and operation of the facility “imperils sensitive wetlands, endangered Species, and communities in the area,” they added.

The federal government shutdown has now added another obstacle to one of the multiple lawsuits challenging the legality of the tent detention facility built on the airstrip of the Dade-Collier Training and Transition Airport.

Environmental groups and the Miccosukee Tribe sued this summer, accusing the federal and state governments of failing to adhere to the National Environmental Policy Act, which requires a federal environmental impact assessment for large federal projects. A lower district judge agreed with the environmental groups and ordered the site effectively shut down within 60 days.

The state and federal governments argued that NEPA does not apply to the state, and the appellate court agreed with them, suspending the lower court’s decision pending arguments on the merits of the appeal and wresting the case from District Judge Kathleen Williams until the appeal is resolved.

The appellate court expedited the case, and the state’s opening brief was due to be filed on Oct. 24, with oral arguments scheduled for January.

The federal government lawyers told the court in their Friday filing that they would resume “as soon as Congress has appropriated funds for the Department.”

Lawyers for the environmental groups said, “It is indeed regrettable that the lapse in appropriations has disrupted the Department of Justice,” but maintained that there was an urgency to address the “irreversible harms” to the environment, given the ongoing construction at the facility.

On Tuesday, the environmental groups filed a related lawsuit against the Florida Division of Emergency Management for failing to disclose records regarding its agreements with the federal government to receive reimbursement from the Federal Emergency Management Agency for expenses related to Alligator Alcatraz.

On Sept. 30, FEMA approved the DeSantis administration’s $608 million grant request to cover the cost of operations at Alligator Alcatraz and other immigration detention facilities, including Deportation Depot.

The transfer of funds between the federal government and the state was a key point in the appeal judges’ decision to support the government’s claim that NEPA does not apply to states.

“When the Court of Appeals issued its order pausing the trial court’s order halting operations at the detention center, the Court of Appeals said more than once that the Florida Department of Emergency Management had not applied for federal funding,” Paul Schwiep of Coffey Burlington, the lawyer for the environmental groups, said in a statement.

“We now know this was wrong.”

©2025 Miami Herald. Visit miamiherald.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

By MARK KENNEDY, Associated Press

NEW YORK (AP) — Broadway is a tense place these days after two major labor unions authorized strike action amid ongoing contract negotiations with producers.

Actors’ Equity Association — which represents over 51,000 members, including singers, actors, dancers and stage managers — and American Federation of Musicians Local 802 — which represents 1,200 musicians — have voted in favor of a strike authorization, a strategic step ahead of any work stoppage. No strike has been called.

Members of both unions are currently working under expired contracts. The musicians’ contract expired on Aug. 31, and the Equity contract expired on Sept. 28.

Both unions want pay increases and higher contributions by producers toward employee health care costs, a key sticking point. Actors Equity also wants producers to hire more backup performers and stage managers, add protections for performers in the event of injury and put limits on how many performances in a row actors can be asked to do without a day off.

The health of Broadway — once very much in doubt due to the COVID-19 pandemic — is now very good, at least in terms of box office. The 2024-2025 season took in $1.9 billion, the highest-grossing season in recorded history, overtaking the pre-pandemic previous high of $1.8 billion during the 2018-2019 season. It has been a long road back from the days when theaters were shuttered and the future looked bleak.

The unions are pointing to the financial health of Broadway to argue that producers can afford to up pay and benefits for musicians and actors. Producers, represented by The Broadway League, counter that the health of Broadway could be endangered by increasing ticket prices.

“On the heels of the most successful season in history, the Broadway League wants the working musicians and artists who fueled that very success to accept wage cuts, threats to healthcare benefits, and potential job losses,” Local 802 President Bob Suttmann said in a statement Tuesday.

A strike would cripple most of Broadway, but some shows might continue. “Beetlejuice” and “Mamma Mia!” arrived as part of tours and so do not have a traditional Broadway contract. And shows playing at nonprofit theaters, such as the musical “Ragtime” at Lincoln Center Theater and the play “Punch” from the Manhattan Theatre Club, have separate labor agreements.

The most recent major strike on Broadway was in late 2007, when a 19-day walkout dimmed the lights on more than two dozen shows and cost producers and the city millions of dollars in lost revenue.

More than 30 members of Congress, including the entire New York delegation, have signed a letter urging all sides to bargain in good faith and avoid a strike.

“A disruption to Broadway will result in significant economic disruption to not just the New York metropolitan area but harm theater workers and patrons across the country and around the world,” the letter states.

A Pontiac teen recently acquitted of homicide is headed to prison for related convictions of armed robbery and using a firearm to commit the crime.

Sentenced Oct. 13 by Oakland County Circuit Judge Daniel O’Brien, Christian Harris, 19, will spend 13-50 years behind bars for the 2023 armed robbery of Armani Terrell Baker, 22, of Waterford.

As previously reported, a jury found Harris not guilty of first-degree homicide in the death of Baker, who was found fatally shot in the front seat of a Ford Fusion with the doors open, on Hammond Street in Pontiac.

Harris got an additional two years behind bars for felony firearm in connection with the armed robbery.

Harris was 17 years old at the time of the incident and charged as an adult. His first trial ended in a mistrial last year after the jury deliberated for three days and failed to reach a unanimous verdict. The retrial concluded this past Sept. 8.

The Oakland Press has reached out to the Oakland County Prosecutor’s Office and the Oakland County Sheriff’s Office with questions about any further legal activity or investigation regarding Baker’s homicide but hasn’t heard back yet.

The other man charged for related offenses, Jeremiah Rodriguez — age 18 at the time of the incident — made a deal with prosecutors and pleaded guilty in September to an added count of accessory after the fact. Charges of conspiracy to commit armed robbery and possession of a firearm in the commission of a felony were dismissed. Last month, O’Brien sentenced Rodriguez to 14 days in jail with credit for 14 days served, and three years probation.

Retrial ends for Waterford man’s slaying, robbery; another connected to incident sentenced in plea deal 

Detroit woman dead after being struck by vehicles in Auburn Hills

 

Recently fired Centers for Disease Control and Prevention employees on Tuesday called the Trump administration’s recent mass layoffs an “intentional attack” on the agency and Americans’ health.

More than 1,300 CDC employees were abruptly terminated Friday, with about half reinstated within 24 hours. About 600 staffers remain dismissed, according to internal estimates, fulfilling the administration’s threats to slash government jobs during the ongoing shutdown.

Unions and court filings over the weekend indicate that an estimated 4,200 federal workers across at least seven agencies began receiving reduction-in-force notices on Friday. In addition to the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), the CDC’s parent agency, which lost more than 1,100 staffers, the Environmental Protection Agency and the Education, Treasury, Commerce, Energy, and Homeland Security departments also faced significant cuts.

The Tuesday press briefing was hosted by the National Public Health Coalition, a group of terminated CDC workers and public health allies founded by former CDC public health adviser Abigail Tighe. During the briefing, an anonymous CDC scientist who was terminated Friday described the day’s events as stressful but unsurprising.

“It’s been emotionally and mentally and physically exhausting. It’s like being in a strange game where there’s no rules and we don’t know what’s going to happen next,” she said. “At this point … I’m pretty numb to it. I saw it coming. I wanted to stay as long as I could, but I knew they’d get me at some point.”

Tighe said many HHS employees were told the mass firing and rehiring stemmed from a technical coding error, but she and other former federal workers maintain that the terminations were deliberate. “These terminations were not a glitch,” she said. “It was not an innocent error.”

Former CDC officials John Brooks and Karen Remley warned that the cuts, especially to CDC, have eroded coordination between federal and state health departments, leaving the nation dangerously unprepared for future public health emergencies.

Tighe noted that about one-quarter of the agency’s workforce has been lost since the 2025 reduction-in-force process began, leaving few medical or public health professionals in leadership roles.

Among the CDC programs affected are the Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS), as well as the agency’s Washington office, human resources and library divisions.

Maryland impact, building on earlier cuts

The CDC division of the National Center for Health Statistics in Hyattsville, which runs the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES), lost all its staff on Friday, according to media reports. The office conducts research that guides public health policies on nutrition, oral health, and environmental risks.

NHANES is the nation’s main source of information on Americans’ health and nutrition, including birth and death rates, according to the National Library of Medicine. Brooks said it would be “very worrisome if these areas of vital statistics were lost.”

NCHS Director Brian Moyer did not respond to requests for comment. The National Public Health Coalition could not provide exact numbers of workers affected in this office or elsewhere in Maryland.

Remley warned that the local impact of cuts could be serious. “It has a significant ripple effect … you don’t know you need [public health] until you need it because it’s in the background,” she said. “All of those are eroded, and so I think at a state and local level, it’s very, very scary.”

Maryland had already lost about 12,700 federal jobs since the beginning of the second Trump administration, according to a state labor department spokesperson. HHS, which includes the CDC, accounted for the most layoffs in the first half of the year, primarily in Montgomery, Prince George’s and Baltimore counties, along with Baltimore City.

Have a news tip? Contact Mennatalla Ibrahim at mibrahim@baltsun.com.

The Texas National Guard sent home seven soldiers whose fitness levels seemingly “did not meet mission requirements” for their deployment to Illinois, a Texas Military Department spokesperson confirmed Tuesday.

In a statement provided to the Tribune, the spokesperson said the service members were replaced “during the pre-mission validation process” at the U.S. Army Reserve training center in suburban Elwood, where the troops have been garrisoned since last week.

“These service members were returned to home station,” according to the statement.

The decision comes after some soldiers were ridiculed on social media for their physical appearance upon their arrival in Illinois. Widely circulated media photographs showed heavier guardsmen at the Elwood base, prompting critics to question how the troops fit in with U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth insistence that all military members must meet height and weight standards.

Hegseth — who told top military leaders last month that it was “tiring” to see “fat troops” — signaled his support for the soldiers’ removal on social media Monday.

“Standards are back at The @DeptofWar,” he posted on X, along with a screenshot of a story about the Texas National Guard’s decision.

The Texas Military Department did not specify which standards the seven Guard members did not meet, but the statement said the department “echoes Secretary Hegseth’s message to the force: ‘Our standards will be high, uncompromising, and clear.’”

A federal judge in Chicago last week blocked the Trump administration from deploying National Guard troops to Chicago and the rest of Illinois as part of its ongoing immigration enforcement push. In response, the Trump administration requested an emergency stay of the order, which was denied by a federal appeals court in Chicago on Saturday.

The 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, however, did allow National Guard members already in Illinois to remain here during the appeal.

“Members of the National Guard do not need to return to their home states unless further ordered by a court to do so,” the court order said.

In her oral ruling from the bench, U.S. District Judge April Perry, an appointee of former President Joe Biden, said National Guard troops are “not trained in de-escalation or other extremely important law enforcement functions that would help to quell these problems,” and that allowing troops to come into Chicago “will only add fuel to the fire that the defendants themselves have started.”

The Department of Justice argued in a filing Friday night that Perry’s order “improperly impinges on the Commander in Chief’s supervision of military operations, countermands a military directive to officers in the field, and endangers federal personnel and property.”

There has been no visible presence of the Texas National Guard since last week’s ruling. Before the judge’s ruling, the troops were spotted at an Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention center in west suburban Broadview, but they did not interact with protesters.

The Pentagon has not clarified what the Guard members will be doing while the appeal plays out. Uniformed troops have been spotted a U.S. Army Reserve Center in recent days, with a few appearing to be carrying rifles as they walked around the 3,600-acre property about 50 miles southwest of Chicago.

ostevens@chicagotribune.com

DETROIT — Remember when reports surfaced late in September saying the Tigers and manager AJ Hinch were nearing an agreement on a contract extension?

“Those reports were baseless,” president of baseball operations Scott Harris said Monday with a wry smile.

They were baseless because Hinch and the Tigers agreed on a contract extension at midseason. They just didn’t announce it.

“I absolutely love working with AJ,” Harris said, during the team’s season-ending media conference at Comerica Park. “He’s one of the best managers in the game. We have now proactively extended him twice because we want him to be here as long as he willing to be here and I want to work with him as long as I possibly can.

“It was one of the easiest conversations I’ve had because he wants to be here and we’re both bullish on the future of this organization and we are proud of what we’ve done.”

The Tigers, as per organizational policy, don’t make public the contract terms for the manager or coaching staff.

Hinch, 51, ranks eighth on the Tigers’ all-time managerial wins list with 394 in five seasons. He’s guided the team to the playoffs and eight postseasons wins over the last two years.

“I love it here and I love working with Scott,” Hinch said. “This was the second time I was approached and asked for more and it’s an immediate yes for me. When you have an environment that both pushes you and satisfies you, I was thrilled.”

Once he got the OK from his wife and family, he signed the deal. With one stipulation: that it wouldn’t be made public during the season.

“It’s hard to look at where you are personally in the middle of the season,” he said. “Which is why my one request and Scott’s one request was that we just do it and not talk about it. It’s about the players during the season, it’s about winning and we had a lot of games left.

“We didn’t want to be a distraction.”

Hinch and his family have been growing roots in the Detroit area over the last three years, since Harris signed him to the first extension before the 2023 season.

“I can’t tell you how proud I am to be the manager of the Tigers,” he said. “It’s a rewarding place to be. We’ve bought a home here. We live here the majority of the year and we continue to become more and more Michiganders as a family.

“I am grateful for Chris (Ilitch, chairman and CEO), for Scott, for Jeff (Greenberg, general manager). All of us are on board to bring a World Series here. That’s why I want to be here.”

Hinch said there would be discussions later this week about his coaching staff. It’s possible there will be some changes.

“We evaluate every possibly way we can get better,” he said. “I think our staff answered a whole lot of the challenges we’ve been given and all of that is in a really good place. But we wouldn’t be doing our jobs if we didn’t debrief about our entire group.

“But I am really proud of this group of coaches and the culture we’ve created.”

By PATRICK WHITTLE

BOOTHBAY HARBOR, Maine (AP) — Republican lawmakers are targeting one of the U.S.’s longest standing pieces of environmental legislation, credited with helping save rare whales from extinction.

Conservative leaders feel they now have the political will to remove key pieces of the Marine Mammal Protection Act, enacted in 1972 to protect whales, seals, polar bears and other sea animals. The law also places restrictions on commercial fishermen, shippers and other marine industries.

A GOP-led bill in the works has support from fishermen in Maine who say the law makes lobster fishing more difficult, lobbyists for big-money species such as tuna in Hawaii and crab in Alaska, and marine manufacturers who see the law as antiquated.

Conservation groups adamantly oppose the changes and say weakening the law will erase years of hard-won gains for jeopardized species such as the vanishing North Atlantic right whale, of which there are less than 400, and is vulnerable to entanglement in fishing gear.

Here’s what to know about the protection act and the proposed changes.

Why does the 1970s law still matter

“The Marine Mammal Protection Act is important because it’s one of our bedrock laws that help us to base conservation measures on the best available science,” said Kathleen Collins, senior marine campaign manager with International Fund for Animal Welfare. “Species on the brink of extinction have been brought back.”

It was enacted the year before the Endangered Species Act, at a time when the movement to save whales from extinction was growing. Scientist Roger Payne had discovered that whales could sing in the late 1960s, and their voices soon appeared on record albums and throughout popular culture.

The law protects all marine mammals, and prohibits capturing or killing them in U.S. waters or by U.S. citizens on the high seas. It allowed for preventative measures to stop commercial fishing ships and other businesses from accidentally harming animals such as whales and seals. The animals can be harmed by entanglement in fishing gear, collisions with ships and other hazards at sea.

The law also prevents the hunting of marine mammals, including polar bears, with exceptions for Indigenous groups. Some of those animals can be legally hunted in other countries.

Changes to oil and gas operations — and whale safety

Republican Rep. Nick Begich of Alaska, a state with a large fishing industry, submitted a bill draft this summer that would roll back aspects of the law. The bill says the act has “unduly and unnecessarily constrained government, tribes and the regulated community” since its inception.

The proposal states that it would make changes such as lowering population goals for marine mammals from “maximum productivity” to the level needed to “support continued survival.” It would also ease rules on what constitutes harm to marine mammals.

For example, the law currently prevents harassment of sea mammals such as whales, and defines harassment as activities that have “the potential to injure a marine mammal.” The proposed changes would limit the definition to only activities that actually injure the animals. That change could have major implications for industries such as oil and gas exploration where rare whales live.

That poses an existential threat to the Rice’s whale, which numbers only in the dozens and lives in the Gulf of Mexico, conservationists said. And the proposal takes specific aim at the North Atlantic right whale protections with a clause that would delay rules designed to protect that declining whale population until 2035.

Begich and his staff did not return calls for comment on the bill, and his staff declined to provide an update about where it stands in Congress. Begich has said he wants “a bill that protects marine mammals and also works for the people who live and work alongside them, especially in Alaska.”

Fishing groups want restrictions loosened

A coalition of fishing groups from both coasts has come out in support of the proposed changes. Some of the same groups lauded a previous effort by the Trump administration to reduce regulatory burdens on commercial fishing.

The groups said in a July letter to House members that they feel Begich’s changes reflect “a positive and necessary step” for American fisheries’ success.

Restrictions imposed on lobster fishermen of Maine are designed to protect the right whale, but they often provide little protection for the animals while limiting one of America’s signature fisheries, Virginia Olsen, political director of the Maine Lobstering Union, said. The restrictions stipulate where lobstermen can fish and what kinds of gear they can use. The whales are vulnerable to lethal entanglement in heavy fishing rope.

Gathering more accurate data about right whales while revising the original law would help protect the animals, Olsen said.

“We do not want to see marine mammals harmed; we need a healthy, vibrant ocean and a plentiful marine habitat to continue Maine’s heritage fishery,” Olsen said.

Some members of other maritime industries have also called on Congress to update the law. The National Marine Manufacturers Association said in a statement that the rules have not kept pace with advancements in the marine industry, making innovation in the business difficult.

Environmentalists fight back

Numerous environmental groups have vowed to fight to save the protection act. They characterized the proposed changes as part of the Trump administration’s assault on environmental protections.

The act was instrumental in protecting the humpback whale, one of the species most beloved by whale watchers, said Gib Brogan, senior campaign director with Oceana. Along with other sea mammals, humpbacks would be in jeopardy without it, he said.

“The Marine Mammal Protection Act is flexible. It works. It’s effective. We don’t need to overhaul this law at this point,” Brogan said.

What does this mean for seafood imports

The original law makes it illegal to import marine mammal products without a permit, and allows the U.S. to impose import prohibitions on seafood products from foreign fisheries that don’t meet U.S. standards.

The import embargoes are a major sticking point because they punish American businesses, said Gavin Gibbons, chief strategy officer of the National Fisheries Institute, a Virginia-based seafood industry trade group. It’s critical to source seafood globally to be able to meet American demand for seafood, he said.

The National Fisheries Institute and a coalition of industry groups sued the federal government Thursday over what they described as unlawful implementation of the protection act. Gibbons said the groups don’t oppose the act, but want to see it responsibly implemented.

“Our fisheries are well regulated and appropriately fished to their maximum sustainable yield,” Gibbons said. “The men and women who work our waters are iconic and responsible. They can’t be expected to just fish more here to make up a deficit while jeopardizing the sustainability they’ve worked so hard to maintain.”

Some environmental groups said the Republican lawmakers’ proposed changes could weaken American seafood competitiveness by allowing imports from poorly regulated foreign fisheries.

This story was supported by funding from the Walton Family Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

By ALI SWENSON and JONEL ALECCIA

NEW YORK (AP) — Hundreds of federal employees working on mental health services, disease outbreaks and disaster preparedness were among those hit by the Trump administration’s mass firings over the weekend, current and laid-off workers said Monday, as the administration aimed to pressure Democratic lawmakers to give in and end the nearly two-week-long government shutdown.

The government-wide reduction-in-force initiative that began Friday roiled the massive U.S. Department of Health and Human Services just six months after it went through an earlier round of cuts and as many staffers already were disconnected from work because of the shutdown.

The situation turned even more chaotic over the weekend, when more than half of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention employees who’d gotten layoff notices learned they received them in error and were still employed with the agency.

HHS, through its agencies, is responsible for tracking health trends and disease outbreaks, conducting and funding medical research, and monitoring the safety of food and medicine, as well as for administering health insurance programs for nearly half the country. Among the HHS agencies facing staff cuts were the CDC, the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, or SAMHSA, and the Administration for Strategic Preparedness and Response, or ASPR, according to current and laid-off employees who spoke with The Associated Press.

Former staffers and health professionals said they were concerned the layoffs could have negative health impacts and make it difficult for HHS agencies to fulfill their obligations set by Congress.

HHS spokesperson Andrew Nixon said the laid off employees were deemed nonessential. He added the agency is working to “close wasteful and duplicative entities, including those that are at odds with the Trump administration’s Make America Healthy Again agenda.”

Nixon declined to share which HHS agencies saw layoffs or how many HHS employees were affected. However, a Friday court filing from the Trump administration gave an estimate, saying about 1,100 to 1,200 of the nearly 80,000 staffers at HHS were receiving dismissal notices.

CDC is hit with layoffs — and reversals

About 600 workers at the CDC remained fired Monday in conjunction with the federal government shutdown after hundreds more had originally been targeted, according to the American Federation of Government Employees Local 2883, which represents CDC employees in Atlanta.

Of more than 1,300 CDC employees who received reduction-in-force notices Friday, about 700 later received emails revoking their terminations, the union said.

The AFGE Local 2883 called the action a “politically-motivated stunt” to illegally fire agency workers.

“These reckless actions are disrupting and destroying the lives of everyday working people, who are constantly being used as bargaining chips,” AFGE President Yolanda Jacobs said in a statement Monday.

A federal health official who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the matter with the media said the incorrect RIF notices resulted from a glitch in the system.

Among those targeted for dismissal and then reinstated were the CDC’s Epidemic Intelligence Service officers, the “disease detectives” who are deployed to respond to outbreaks that threaten public health, said Dr. Anne Schuchat, former principal deputy director of the CDC, who said she was in touch with EIS officers in that situation.

“These are people who go into really scary places,” Schuchat said. “Usually you think it’s nature that’s going to be giving you a hard time, the viruses, not the government.”

Mental health services cut in sweeping dismissals at agency

SAMHSA, an agency within HHS devoted to addressing mental illness and addiction, also saw cuts, according to two employees of the agency with knowledge of the layoffs who weren’t authorized to speak publicly.

While the full scope of the firings wasn’t clear, some of the departments affected included the agency’s Office of Communications and the Center for Mental Health Services, where dozens were let go from multiple areas, according to one of the employees.

Within CMHS, one of two branches that oversaw millions of dollars in grants for community health clinics was mostly terminated, the employees said.

Dakota Jablon, a public health analyst and former employee of SAMHSA, said the loss of more staff at SAMHSA, primarily a grantmaking agency, would have “devastating ripple effects across the behavioral health field.”

“Even if the grants continue, the loss of experienced staff means those who remain will be stretched far too thin, often outside their areas of expertise,” she said.

Dr. Eric Rafla-Yuan, a psychiatrist and the chair of the Committee to Protect Public Mental Health, said staff cuts at SAMHSA could put state safety nets for people with mental illness at risk, because the agency provides significant funding and support to state programs.

Latest layoffs build on earlier cuts as HHS looks to restructure

The mass layoffs come six months after thousands of researchers, scientists, doctors, support staff and senior leaders were either laid off from HHS or took early retirement or volunteer separation offers.

The department’s staff was listed at just under 80,000 employees in a contingency plan before the government shutdown began, down more than 2,000 from its staffing level earlier in the year.

The cuts are part of Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s sweeping effort to remake the department by consolidating agencies that oversee billions of dollars for addiction services and community health centers under a new office called the Administration for a Healthy America. The plan has been delayed amid ongoing legislation and congressional pushback.

Aleccia reported from Southern California. AP medical writer Mike Stobbe contributed to this report.

CHICAGO (AP) — Latino leaders expressed dismay Saturday over recent immigration enforcement operations in Chicago that resulted in a fatal shooting during a traffic stop, the arrest of an immigrant at a barbershop and a tense standoff between protesters and agents at an immigration processing facility.

An Immigration, Customs and Enforcement officer fatally shot a man who tried to evade arrest Friday by driving his car at officers and dragging one of them, officials said. The man, Silverio Villegas-Gonzalez, was pronounced dead at a hospital.

On the same day, Willian Gimenez was pulled over while driving in Chicago’s Little Village neighborhood and detained by ICE agents. Kevin Herrera, Gimenez’s attorney, said he believes it was retaliation for his involvement in a lawsuit against Chicago leaders, Home Depot and an off-duty police officer for their actions toward immigrant workers.

Herrera said Gimenez has a work permit and is going through the process of pursuing an asylum claim.

In a statement Saturday, immigration authorities said Gimenez was arrested for being in the country illegally.

“No one is above the law. Gimenez Gonzalez is an illegal alien with charges for criminal trespassing and a history of not showing up to court, including when he failed to appear in immigration court in April of last year, after which an immigration judge ordered him removed from the country,” the statement said.

During a morning news conference outside an ICE facility in the Chicago suburb of Broadview, Rep. Chuy Garcia, a Democrat, said the incidents are troubling.

“These incidents make us all ask, if ICE can kill one of our neighbors in broad daylight … if they can arrest someone for joining a lawsuit or simply for being Latino, what’s to stop them from getting any one of us?” Garcia said.

A planned 12-hour protest Friday outside the facility included several clashes between participants and officers wearing face coverings, helmets and later gas masks. The facility has seen regular demonstrations in response to increased immigration enforcement.

Rep. Delia Ramirez, also a Democrat, said she will demand a thorough investigation of the traffic stop that led to Villegas-Gonzalez’s fatal shooting and called for community unity.

The Department of Homeland Security’s campaign, labeled “ Operation Midway Blitz,” targets so-called sanctuary laws in the state.

“This ICE operation will target the criminal illegal aliens who flocked to Chicago and Illinois because they knew Governor Pritzker and his sanctuary policies would protect them and allow them to roam free on American streets,” DHS said in a statement.

Democratic Gov. JB Pritzker has been one of the most vocal opponents of the Trump administration’s immigration operations in Chicago.

The recent incidents have also raised fears in immigrant-heavy neighborhoods about celebrations for Mexican Independence Day on Sept. 16.

By DAVID BAUDER

News organizations including The New York Times, The Associated Press and the conservative Newsmax television network said Monday they will not sign a Defense Department document about its new press rules, making it likely the Trump administration will evict their reporters from the Pentagon.

Those outlets say the policy threatens to punish them for routine news gathering protected by the First Amendment. The Washington Post and The Atlantic on Monday also publicly joined the group that says it will not be signing.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth reacted by posting the Times’ statement on X and adding a hand-waving emoji. His team has said that reporters who don’t acknowledge the policy in writing by Tuesday must turn in badges admitting them to the Pentagon and clear out their workspaces the next day.

The new rules bar journalist access to large swaths of the Pentagon without an escort and say Hegseth can revoke press access to reporters who ask anyone in the Defense Department for information — classified or otherwise — that he has not approved for release.

Newsmax, whose on-air journalists are generally supportive of President Donald Trump’s administration, said that “we believe the requirements are unnecessary and onerous and hope that the Pentagon will review the matter further.”

Chief Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell said the rules establish “common sense media procedures.”

“The policy does not ask for them to agree, just to acknowledge that they understand what our policy is,” Parnell said. “This has caused reporters to have a full blown meltdown, crying victim online. We stand by our policy because it’s what’s best for our troops and the national security of this country.”

Hegseth also reposted a question from a follower who asked, “Is this because they can’t roam the Pentagon freely? Do they believe they deserve unrestricted access to a highly classified military installation under the First Amendment?”

Hegseth answered, “yes.” Reporters say neither of those assertions is true.

Pentagon reporters say signing the statement amounts to admitting that reporting any information that hasn’t been government-approved is harming national security. “That’s simply not true,” said David Schulz, director of Yale University’s Media Freedom & Information Access Clinic.

Journalists have said they’ve long worn badges and don’t access classified areas, nor do they report information that risks putting any Americans in harm’s way.

“The Pentagon certainly has the right to make its own policies, within the constraints of the law,” the Pentagon Press Association said in a statement on Monday. “There is no need or justification, however, for it to require reporters to affirm their understanding of vague, likely unconstitutional policies as a precondition to reporting from Pentagon facilities.”

Noting that taxpayers pay nearly $1 trillion annually to the U.S. military, Times Washington bureau chief Richard Stevenson said “the public has a right to know how the government and military are operating.”

Trump has applied pressure on news organizations in several ways, with ABC News and CBS News settling lawsuits related to their coverage. Trump has also filed lawsuits against The New York Times and Wall Street Journal and moved to choke off funding for government-run services like the Voice of America and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty.

David Bauder writes about the media for the AP. Follow him at http://x.com/dbauder and https://bsky.app/profile/dbauder.bsky.social

NEW YORK (AP) — Detroit Lions safety Brian Branch was suspended for one game without pay by the NFL on Monday for unsportsmanlike conduct following a loss at Kansas City.

Branch punched Chiefs receiver JuJu Smith-Schuster on Sunday night, setting off a postgame melee.

“Your aggressive, non-football act was entirely unwarranted, posed a serious risk of injury, and clearly violated the standards of conduct and sportsmanship expected of NFL players,” Jon Runyan, league vice president of football operations, wrote in a letter to Branch. “Your conduct reflected poorly on the NFL and has no place in our game.”

Detroit (4-2) will host NFC South-leading Tampa Bay (5-1) without Branch, another blow for a team with a banged-up secondary.

Branch will be eligible to return to the active roster on Tuesday, Oct. 21, during the team’s bye week ahead of its home game against NFC North rival Minnesota on Nov. 2.

After Kansas City beat Detroit 30-17, quarterback Patrick Mahomes extended his hand toward Branch and the third-year pro walked past the superstar. Smith-Schuster then walked toward Branch. They exchanged a few words and Branch responded by throwing a right hook that knocked Smith-Schuster to the ground.

Smith-Schuster leapt to his feet and went after Branch. Chiefs running back Isiah Pacheco tried to get between them, but Branch ripped Smith-Schuster’s helmet off as a slew of players converged on the scrum.

Smith-Schuster came away with a bloody nose.

“I did a little childish thing, but I’m tired of people doing stuff in between the play and refs don’t catch it,” Branch said after the game. “They be trying to bully me out there and I don’t — I shouldn’t have did it. It was childish.”

Branch was fined $23,186 for facemask and unsportsmanlike-conduct penalties against Green Bay last month.

“I love Brian Branch, but what he did is inexcusable, and it’s not going to be accepted here,” Lions coach Dan Campbell said Sunday night. “It’s not what we do. It’s not what we’re about. I apologized to coach (Andy) Reid and the Chiefs, and Smith-Schuster. That’s not OK. That’s not what we do here. It’s not going to be OK. He knows it. Our team knows it. That’s not what we do.”

Detroit drafted Branch out of Alabama in the second round in 2023 and he has been one of the franchise’s top players during its recent run of success. He was a Pro Bowl player last season after finishing fifth in voting for AP Defensive Rookie of the Year.

By JEANNE KUANG/CalMatters

Gov. Gavin Newsom on Sunday signed a bill allowing a broad range of relatives to step in as children’s caregivers if their parents are deported, a measure that had provoked a firestorm of conservative criticism.

Assembly Bill 495 will also bar daycare providers from collecting immigration information about a child or their parents, and allow parents to nominate a temporary legal guardian for their child in family court.

“We are putting on record that we stand by our families and their right to keep their private information safe, maintain parental rights and help families prepare in case of emergencies,” Newsom said in a press release.

It was one of several measures the Democratic-dominated Legislature pushed this year in response to the Trump administration’s aggressive deportation crackdown in Los Angeles and across California. Newsom, a Democrat, signed several of those other bills — banning Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents from wearing masks in the state and requiring schools and hospitals to require warrants when officers show up — in a ceremony in L.A. last month.

He left AB 495 undecided for weeks, prompting a flurry of advocacy by immigrants’ rights groups to secure Newsom’s signature in the face of intense pushback from conservative activists. The governor announced his decision the day before his deadline to sign or veto the over 800 bills lawmakers sent to his desk last month.

The most controversial aspect of the bill concerns an obscure, decades-old form called a caregiver’s authorization affidavit. Relatives of a child whose parents are temporarily unavailable, and with whom the child is living, can attest to being the child’s caregiver; the designation allows the adult to enroll the child in school, take them to the doctor and consent to medical and dental care.

The new law will broaden who is allowed to sign the caregiver affidavit, from more traditional definitions of relatives to any adult in the family who is “related to the child by blood, adoption, or affinity within the fifth degree of kinship,” which includes people like great aunts or cousins. Parents can cancel the caregiver designation, which is intended to be a temporary arrangement and does not give that person custody.

Proponents said parents at risk of deportation should get to choose someone trusted to care for their children if ICE detains them. Expanding who is eligible for the caregiver form, they said, gives immigrant parents more options because they may not have close relatives in the country but benefit from strong ties with extended family or informal community networks.

The legislation was backed by immigrants’ rights groups and children’s advocates such as the Alliance for Children’s Rights and First 5 California.

“I introduced this bill so children do not have to wonder what will happen to them if their parents are not able to pick them up from school,” bill author Assemblymember Celeste Rodriguez, an Arleta Democrat, said at a recent press conference.

Critics claim strangers could get custody

But Republicans, the religious right and parental rights’ activists argued the bill would instead endanger children.

They claimed it would allow strangers to sign the affidavit and claim the child into their care. Hundreds of opponents showed up at the Capitol by busload to rally against the legislation, organized by Pastor Jack Hibbs of the Calvary Chapel Chino Hills megachurch, who called it “the most dangerous bill we’ve seen” in Sacramento. Some of the blowback stemmed from false claims that the bill would allow strangers to get custody of children to whom they’re not related.

Assemblymember Carl DeMaio, a San Diego Republican, called the legislation “a human trafficker’s dream.”

In an email, Greg Burton, vice president of the California Family Council, took issue with the fact that parents might not be there when the affidavit form is signed.

“What are parental rights?” he wrote. “These rights are nothing if someone else can claim them by simply signing a form.”

Over the summer Rodriguez narrowed the legislation to exclude “nonrelative extended family members” but it was not enough to quell the controversy. The legislation passed along party lines.

In comparison to a fairly progressive Legislature, the governor has often positioned himself as a moderating force on child custody and protection issues, which regularly galvanize conservative activists and put California Democrats on the defensive. In 2023 he vetoed a bill that would have required family court judges to consider a parent’s support of a child’s gender transition in custody disputes.

At a press conference last week where activists urged Newsom to sign the bill, Angelica Salas, executive director of the Coalition for Humane Immigrants’ Rights Los Angeles, asked the governor “to not listen to the lies, to not listen to all the other stuff that’s being said about this bill.”

Newsom, announcing his decision, quietly acknowledged the controversy in a press release. He included statements he said were “correcting the record” on mischaracterizations and said the new law does not change the fact that parental rights and legal guardianships must be decided by family court judges.

This story was originally published by CalMatters and distributed through a partnership with The Associated Press.

TORONTO (AP) — Mason Appleton scored the winner with 44.1 seconds left in regulation and Cam Talbot made 38 saves as the Detroit Red Wings survived a blown two-goal lead in the third period to defeat the Toronto Maple Leafs 3-2 on Monday.

Dylan Larkin and James van Riemsdyk had the other goals for Detroit, which picked up back-to-back victories over last season’s Atlantic Division champion.

Matthew Knies, with a goal and an assist, and Calle Jarnkrok replied for Toronto. Anthony Stolarz stopped 12 shots.

Detroit opened the scoring late in a sloppy first period when Larkin dug the puck out of a crowd and roofed a backhand on Stolarz just as a 5-on-3 power play expired. Van Riemsdyk then made it 2-0 early in the third on a partial breakaway, but Knies and Jarnkrok got Toronto back even before Appleton’s late heroics.

Fans at Scotiabank Arena were encouraged to stick around after the final buzzer to watch Game 2 of the American League Championship Series — happening just down the street at Rogers Centre — between the Blue Jays and Seattle Mariners on the videoboard above center ice.

Easton Cowan, selected 28th overall at the 2023 draft, made his NHL debut. He is viewed as the Leafs’ top prospect.

Up next

Red Wings: Host the Florida Panthers on Wednesday.

Maple Leafs: Host the Nashville Predators on Tuesday.

Sandy Alomar Sr., an All-Star infielder during his playing days in the 1960s and ’70s who went on to coach in the majors and manage in his native Puerto Rico, has died. He was 81.

A spokesperson for the Cleveland Guardians said Monday that the team was informed by Alomar’s family about his death. Sandy Alomar Jr., who along with Hall of Fame brother Roberto played for their father in winter ball and in the minors, is on the Guardians’ staff.

“Our thoughts are with the Alomar family today as the baseball community mourns his passing,” the Guardians said on social media.

Alomar broke into the big leagues in 1964 with the Milwaukee Braves, one of six teams he played for. He also spent time with the New York Mets, Chicago White Sox, California Angels, New York Yankees and Texas Rangers before calling it a career in 1978.

Known more for his speed and fielding than his hitting, Alomar batted .245 with 13 home runs and 282 RBIs in 1,481 regular-season games.

He was named an All-Star in 1970. He stole 227 bases, including a career-high 39 in 1971, when he led the American League with 689 at-bats and 739 plate appearances, and took part in one playoff series with the Yankees in ’76.

Alomar went into coaching in San Diego’s system in the ‘80s and was the Padres third-base coach from 1986-90. He coached for the Chicago Cubs, Colorado Rockies and the Mets in the 2000s.