The Trump administration continued to reshape U.S. health policy in recent days with several moves that could change what vaccines people can get to protect themselves from common illnesses.
Doctors’ groups have expressed alarm at the moves made by Kennedy, a longtime anti-vaccine activist, and his appointees, who at times have ignored well-established science. Nearly 80 medical groups, including the American Medical Association, issued a statement backing vaccines against common respiratory ailments as “among the best tools to protect the public.”
“We come together as physicians from every corner of medicine to reaffirm our commitment to these lifesaving vaccines,” the groups wrote.
Here’s what to know about some of the recent vaccine policy changes:
Flu shots and thimerosal
On Thursday, a vaccine advisory group handpicked by Kennedy recommended that just about every American get a flu shot this fall.
But the group also said people should avoid shots containing thimerosal, a preservative used only in large multi-dose vials that has been proven to be safe. The ingredient isn’t used in single-dose flu shots, the type of syringe used for about 95% of U.S. flu shots last season.
Status: Kennedy must sign off on the recommendations. Read more AP coverage here.
How to get a COVID-19 shot
Universal access to updated COVID-19 shots for the fall remains unclear, even after Kennedy’s vaccine advisers were shown data showing how well the vaccines are working.
Kennedy changed CDC guidance last month, saying the shots are no longer recommended for healthy children and pregnant women — even though doctors groups disagree. And the Food and Drug Administration has moved to limit COVID-19 vaccinations among healthy people under age 65.
Status: Upcoming advisory meetings, regulatory decisions and policies from insurers and employers are likely to influence access. Read more AP coverage here.
Expanded warnings on COVID-19 vaccine labels
At the request of the FDA, makers of the two leading COVID-19 vaccines on Wednesday expanded existing warnings about a rare heart side effect mainly seen in young men.
Prescribing information from both Pfizer and Moderna had already advised doctors about rare cases of myocarditis, a type of heart inflammation that is usually mild. The FDA had asked the drugmakers to add more detail about the problem and to cover a larger group of patients.
Status: Labels are being updated now. Read more AP coverage here.
Changes considered for the childhood vaccine schedule
On Wednesday, Kennedy’s vaccine advisers said they would be evaluating the “cumulative effect” of the children’s vaccine schedule — the list of immunizations given at different times throughout childhood.
The announcement reflected vaccine skeptics’ messaging: that too many shots may overwhelm kids’ immune systems. Scientists say those claims have been repeatedly investigated with no signs of concern.
The American Academy of Pediatrics said it would continue publishing its own vaccine schedule for children but now will do so independently of the government advisory panel, calling it “no longer a credible process.”
Status: The examination is in its early stages. Read more AP coverage here.
The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.
Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr., testifies during a House Energy and Commerce Committee, Tuesday, June 24, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Mariam Zuhaib)
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — California Gov. Gavin Newsom sued Fox News on Friday over alleged defamation, saying the network knowingly aired false information about a phone call he had with President Donald Trump around the time the National Guard was sent Los Angeles.
The lawsuit alleges Fox News anchor Jesse Watters edited out key information from a clip of Trump talking about calling Newsom, then used the edited video to assert that Newsom had lied about the two talking.
Newsom is asking for $787 million in punitive damages in his lawsuit filed in Delaware court where Fox is incorporated. That’s the same amount Fox agreed to pay in 2023 to settle a defamation lawsuit by Dominion Voting Systems. The company said Fox had repeatedly aired false allegations that its equipment had switched votes from Donald Trump to Joe Biden during the 2020 election, and the discovery process of the lawsuit revealed Fox’s efforts not to alienate conservatives in the network’s audience in the wake of Biden’s victory.
“If Fox News wants to lie to the American people on Donald Trump’s behalf, it should face consequences — just like it did in the Dominion case,” Newsom said in a statement. “I believe the American people should be able to trust the information they receive from a major news outlet.”
He asked a judge to order Fox News to stop broadcasting “the false, deceptive, and fraudulent video and accompanying statements” that Newsom said falsely say he lied about when he had spoken to Trump regarding the situation in Los Angeles, where protests erupted on June 6 over Trump’s immigration crackdown.
Fox News called the lawsuit “frivolous.”
“Gov. Newsom’s transparent publicity stunt is frivolous and designed to chill free speech critical of him. We will defend this case vigorously and look forward to it being dismissed,” the company said in a statement.
The law makes it difficult to prove defamation, but some cases result in settlements and, no matter the disposition, can tie up news outlets in expensive legal fights.
Particularly since taking office a second time, Trump has been aggressive in going after news organizations he feels has wronged him. He’s involved in settlement talks over his lawsuit against CBS News about a “60 Minutes” interview last fall with Democratic opponent Kamala Harris. This week, Trump’s lawyers threatened a lawsuit against CNN and The New York Times over their reporting of an initial assessment of damage to Iran’s nuclear program from a U.S. bombing.
Newsom’s lawsuit centers on the details of a phone call with the president.
Both Newsom and the White House have said the two spoke late at night on June 6 in California, which was already June 7 on the East Coast. Though the content of the call is not part of the lawsuit, Newsom has said the two never discussed Trump’s plan to deploy the National Guard, which he announced the next day. Trump said the deployment was necessary to protect federal buildings from people protesting increased immigration arrests.
On June 10, when 700 Marines arrived in the Los Angeles area, Trump told reporters he had spoken to Newsom “a day ago” about his decision to send troops. That day, Newsom posted on X that there had been no call.
“There was no call. Not even a voicemail,” Newsom wrote.
On the evening of June 10, the Watters Primetime show played a clip of Trump’s statement about his call with Newsom but removed Trump’s comment that the call was “a day ago,” the lawsuit said. Watters also referred to call logs another Fox News reporter had posted online showing the phone call the two had on June 6.
“Why would Newsom lie and claim Trump never called him? Why would he do that?” Watters asked on air, according to the lawsuit. The segment included text across the bottom of the screen that said “Gavin Lied About Trump’s Call.”
Newsom’s suit argues that by editing the material, Fox “maliciously lied as a means to sabotage informed national discussion.”
Precise details about when the call happened are important because the days when Trump deployed the Guard to Los Angeles despite Newsom’s opposition “represented an unprecedented moment,” Newsom’s lawyers wrote in a letter to Fox demanding a retraction and on-air apology.
“History was occurring in real time. It is precisely why reporters asked President Trump the very question that prompted this matter: when did he last speak with Governor Newsom,” the letter said.
Associated Press journalist David Bauder contributed to this report.
FILE – Gov. Gavin Newsom speaks after U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer granted an emergency temporary restraining order to stop President Trump’s deployment of the California National Guard, Thursday, June 12, 2025, at the California State Supreme Court building in San Francisco. (Santiago Mejia/San Francisco Chronicle via AP, File)
WASHINGTON (AP) — A divided Supreme Court on Friday ruled that individual judges lack the authority to grant nationwide injunctions, but the decision left unclear the fate of President Donald Trump’s restrictions on birthright citizenship.
The outcome was a victory for the Republican president, who has complained about individual judges throwing up obstacles to his agenda.
But a conservative majority left open the possibility that the birthright citizenship changes could remain blocked nationwide. Trump’s order would deny citizenship to U.S.-born children of people who are in the country illegally.
The cases now return to lower courts, where judges will have to decide how to tailor their orders to comply with the high court ruling, Justice Amy Coney Barrett wrote in the majority opinion. Enforcement of the policy can’t take place for another 30 days, Barrett wrote.
The justices agreed with the Trump administration, as well as President Joe Biden’s Democratic administration before it, that judges are overreaching by issuing orders that apply to everyone instead of just the parties before the court.
The president, making a rare appearance to hold a news conference in the White House briefing room, said that the decision was “amazing” and a “monumental victory for the Constitution,” the separation of powers and the rule of law.
In dissent, Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote, “The court’s decision is nothing less than an open invitation for the government to bypass the Constitution.” This is so, Sotomayor said, because the administration may be able to enforce a policy even when it has been challenged and found to be unconstitutional by a lower court.
Rights groups that sued over the policy filed new court documents following the high court ruling, taking up a suggestion from Justice Brett Kavanaugh that judges still may be able to reach anyone potentially affected by the birthright citizenship order by declaring them part of “putative nationwide class.” Kavanaugh was part of the court majority on Friday but wrote a separate concurring opinion.
States that also challenged the policy in court said they would try to show that the only way to effectively protect their interests was through a nationwide hold.
“We have every expectation we absolutely will be successful in keeping the 14th Amendment as the law of the land and of course birthright citizenship as well,” said Attorney General Andrea Campbell of Massachusetts.
In a notable Supreme Court decision from 1898, United States v. Wong Kim Ark, the court held that the only children who did not automatically receive U.S. citizenship upon being born on U.S. soil were the children of diplomats, who have allegiance to another government; enemies present in the U.S. during hostile occupation; those born on foreign ships; and those born to members of sovereign Native American tribes.
The U.S. is among about 30 countries where birthright citizenship — the principle of jus soli or “right of the soil” — is applied. Most are in the Americas, and Canada and Mexico are among them.
Trump and his supporters have argued that there should be tougher standards for becoming an American citizen, which he called “a priceless and profound gift” in the executive order he signed on his first day in office.
The Trump administration has asserted that children of noncitizens are not “subject to the jurisdiction” of the United States, a phrase used in the amendment, and therefore are not entitled to citizenship.
But states, immigrants and rights groups that have sued to block the executive order have accused the administration of trying to unsettle the broader understanding of birthright citizenship that has been accepted since the amendment’s adoption.
Judges have uniformly ruled against the administration.
The Justice Department had argued that individual judges lack the power to give nationwide effect to their rulings.
The Trump administration instead wanted the justices to allow Trump’s plan to go into effect for everyone except the handful of people and groups that sued. Failing that, the administration argued that the plan could remain blocked for now in the 22 states that sued. New Hampshire is covered by a separate order that is not at issue in this case.
The justice also agreed that the administration may make public announcements about how it plans to carry out the policy if it eventually is allowed to take effect.
The years-in-the-making plan would have created a federal tax credit supporting scholarships to help families send their children to private schools or other options beyond their local public schools. But in an overnight announcement, the Senate parliamentarian advised against including the proposal in President Donald Trump’s tax cut and spending bill.
It added to mounting problems for Republicans as key proposals were deemed ineligible for the filibuster-proof reconciliation package. The parliamentarian’s rulings are advisory but are rarely, if ever, ignored. It’s unclear if Republicans will try to rewrite the provisions or simply drop them from the bill.
Another education plan deemed ineligible for reconciliation would have exempted religious colleges from a federal endowment tax. The proposal sought to raise the tax rate on wealthier colleges’ endowments while carving out religious institutions like Hillsdale College, a conservative, Christian school in Michigan and an ally of the Trump administration.
Oregon Sen. Jeff Merkley, the top Democrat on the Senate Budget Committee, said, “We have been successful in removing parts of this bill that hurt families and workers, but the process is not over, and Democrats are continuing to make the case against every provision in this Big, Beautiful Betrayal of a bill that violates Senate rules.”
School voucher provision had been seen as a win for supporters
The school voucher provision was seen as a breakthrough victory for proponents who have been pushing the idea for years. A similar plan failed to gain support from Congress in 2019 when it was championed by Betsy DeVos, the education secretary during Trump’s first term. Campaigning for his second term, Trump again promised to deliver some form of “universal school choice.”
Under the reconciliation plan, donors who gave money or stock to K-12 scholarship programs would receive 100% of the contribution back in the form of a discount on their tax bills. It would allow stock holders to avoid paying taxes they would usually face if they donated or transferred their stock.
Nearly all families would qualify to receive scholarships except those making more than three times their area’s median income.
A House version of the bill allowed up to $5 billion in tax credits a year, running through 2029. The Senate version reduced it to $4 billion but included no end date.
Supporters said the proposal would expand education options for families across the country, offering alternatives to students in areas with lower-performing public schools. Opponents said it would siphon money from public schools and open the door for fraud and abuse.
Republican-led states have similar programs
Similar scholarship and voucher programs have proliferated in Republican-led states such as Texas, which recently passed a $1 billion program. States have increasingly offered vouchers to families beyond only the neediest ones, contributing to budget concerns as expenses rapidly pile up.
The Senate’s college endowment proposal sought to raise a tax on schools’ investment income, from 1.4% now to 4% or 8% depending on their wealth. It would apply only to colleges with endowments of at least $500,000 per student, and it excluded all religious institutions. It would have exempted a small number of colleges, including Hillsdale, which lobbied against it.
Some small colleges that would have been hit hard by the proposal are now hopeful that Republicans will carve out an exemption for all smaller schools.
“The religious schools exemption showed senators were concerned about the endowment tax hike’s impact on small colleges,” said Lori White, president of DePauw University, a private liberal arts school in Indiana. “After the parliamentarian’s rulings, the best way to protect those and other small institutions from that impact is now to exempt all colleges with fewer than 5,000 undergraduate students.”
The Associated Press’ education coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. The AP is solely responsible for all content. Find the AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.
The office of Senate Parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough is seen at the Capitol in Washington, Friday, June 27, 2025. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)
Weather experts are warning that hurricane forecasts will be severely hampered by the upcoming cutoff of key data from U.S. Department of Defense satellites, the latest Trump administration move with potential consequences for the quality of forecasting.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said it would discontinue the “ingest, processing and distribution” of data collected by three weather satellites that the agency jointly runs with the Defense Department. The data is used by scientists, researchers and forecasters, including at the National Hurricane Center.
It wasn’t immediately clear why the government planned to cut off the Defense Meteorological Satellite Program’s microwave data by Monday. The Defense Department referred questions to the Air Force, which referred them to the Navy, which did not immediately provide comment. NOAA did not immediately respond to a message.
Unlike traditional weather satellites, the microwave data helps peer under a regular image of a hurricane or a tropical cyclone to see what is going on inside the storm, and it is especially helpful at night.
The news is especially noteworthy during the ongoing hurricane season and as lesser storms have become more frequent, deadly and costly as climate change is worsened by the burning of fossil fuels.
Microwave imagery allows researchers and forecasters to see the center of the storm. Experts say that can help in detecting the rapid intensification of storms and in more accurately plotting the likely path of dangerous weather.
“If a hurricane, let’s say, is approaching the Gulf Coast, it’s a day away from making landfall, it’s nighttime,” said Union of Concerned Scientists science fellow Marc Alessi. “We will no longer be able to say, OK, this storm is definitely undergoing rapid intensification, we need to update our forecasts to reflect that.”
Other microwave data will be available but only roughly half as much, hurricane specialist Michael Lowry said in a blog post. He said that greatly increases the odds that forecasters will miss rapid intensification, underestimate intensity or misplace the storm.
That “will severely impede and degrade hurricane forecasts for this season and beyond, affecting tens of millions of Americans who live along its hurricane-prone shorelines,” he said.
University of Miami hurricane researcher Brian McNoldy called the loss of data “alarmingly bad news” in a post on Bluesky.
“Microwave data are already relatively sparse, so any loss — even gradual as satellites or instruments fail — is a big deal; but to abruptly end three active functioning satellites is insanity.”
NOAA and its National Weather Service office have been the target of several cuts and changes in President Donald Trump’s second term. The Department of Government Efficiency gutted the agency’s workforce, local field offices and funding.
“What happened this week is another attempt by the Trump administration to sabotage our weather and climate infrastructure,” Alessi said.
Alexa St. John is an Associated Press climate reporter. Follow her on X: @alexa_stjohn. Reach her at ast.john@ap.org.
The Associated Press’ climate and environmental coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.
FILE – A property owner, who preferred not to give his name, peers into the remains of the second floor unit where he lived with his wife while renting out the other units, on Manasota Key, in Englewood, Fla., following the passage of Hurricane Milton, Oct. 13, 2024. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell, File)
ENOLA, Pa. (AP) — Democratic Sen. John Fetterman of Pennsylvania isn’t even up for reelection until 2028, but already a one-time primary foe, former U.S. Rep. Conor Lamb, is crisscrossing Pennsylvania and social media, looking and sounding like he’s preparing to challenge Fetterman again.
At town hall after town hall across Pennsylvania, Democrats and allied progressive groups aren’t hearing from Fetterman in person — or Republicans who control Washington, for that matter.
But they are hearing from Lamb, a living reminder of the Democrat they could have elected instead of Fetterman. The former congressman has emerged as an in-demand town hall headliner, sometimes as a stand-in for Fetterman — who just might bash Fetterman.
“I thought I was going to play Senator Fetterman,” Lamb joked as he sat down in front of a central Pennsylvania crowd last Sunday.
Conor Lamb listens to a participant after he spoke to the crowd at a town hall-style event organized by progressive groups at Central Penn College, Sunday, June 22, 2025, in Enola, Pa. (AP Photo/Marc Levy)
Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa., left, and Sen. Dave McCormick, R-Pa., right, greet before participating in a debate moderated by Fox News anchor Shannon Bream, not shown, Monday, June 2, 2025, at the Edward M. Kennedy Institute for the United States Senate, Monday, June 2, 2025, in Boston, as livestreamed on Fox Nation. (AP Photo/Steven Senne)
Conor Lamb pauses while speaking to the crowd at a town hall-style event organized by progressive groups at Central Penn College, Sunday, June 22, 2025, in Enola, Pa. (AP Photo/Marc Levy)
Conor Lamb speaks to the crowd at a town hall-style event organized by progressive groups at Central Penn College, Sunday, June 22, 2025, in Enola, Pa. (AP Photo/Marc Levy)
Conor Lamb speaks to the crowd at a town hall-style event organized by progressive groups at Central Penn College, Sunday, June 22, 2025, in Enola, Pa. (AP Photo/Marc Levy)
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Conor Lamb listens to a participant after he spoke to the crowd at a town hall-style event organized by progressive groups at Central Penn College, Sunday, June 22, 2025, in Enola, Pa. (AP Photo/Marc Levy)
Lamb’s reemergence comes at an in-between moment, roughly halfway through Fetterman’s six-year term, and is helping define the struggle facing Democrats in swing-state Pennsylvania.
There, Democrats figure prominently in their national effort to push back on President Donald Trump, but also in their struggle to figure out what to do about Fetterman, who is under fire from rank-and-file Democrats for being willing to cooperate with Trump.
Frustration with Fetterman has been on display on social media, at the massive “ No Kings ” rally in Philadelphia and among the Democratic Party’s faithful. The steering committee of the progressive organization Indivisible PA last month asked Fetterman to resign.
It’s quite a turnabout for the hoodies-and-shorts-wearing Fetterman, elected in 2022 with an everyman persona and irreverent wit, who was unafraid to challenge convention.
For some progressives, frustration with Fetterman began with his staunch support for Israel’s punishing war against Hamas in Gaza, an issue that divides Democrats.
It’s moved beyond that since Trump took office. Now, some are wondering why he’s — as they see it — kissing up to Trump, why he’s chastising fellow Democrats for their anti-Trump resistance and whether he’s even committed to their causes at all.
Most recently, they question his support for Trump’s bombing of Iran.
“It hurts,” said John Abbott, who attended Sunday’s event in suburban Harrisburg.
Speaking at the flagship “No Kings” rally in Philadelphia, Indivisible co-founder Leah Greenberg name-checked Fetterman.
“We’re looking to the leaders who will fight for us, because even today there are folks among the Democratic Party who think we should roll over and play dead,” Greenberg said. “Anyone seen John Fetterman here today?”
The crowd booed.
Why is Conor Lamb crisscrossing Pennsylvania again?
In Pittsburgh, progressives trying to land an in-person town hall with Fetterman or first-term Republican Sen. David McCormick noticed when the two senators advertised an event together at a downtown restaurant to celebrate the release of McCormick’s new book.
Progressive groups organized to protest it and — after it got moved to a private location with a private invite list — went ahead with their own town hall. They invited Lamb and a local Democratic state representative instead.
More invitations for Lamb started rolling in.
By his count, he’s now attended at least a dozen town halls and party events, easily clocking more than 2,000 miles to appear in small towns, small cities and suburbs, often in conservative areas.
“Showing up matters and it really does make a difference,” said Dana Kellerman, a Pittsburgh-based progressive organizer. “Is that going to matter to John Fetterman? I really don’t know. I don’t know what he’s thinking. I don’t know if he’s always been this person or if he’s changed in the last two years.”
Fetterman has brushed off criticism, saying he’s a committed Democrat, insisting he was elected to engage with Republicans and — perhaps hypocritically — questioning why Democrats would criticize fellow Democrats.
At times, Fetterman has criticized Trump, questioning the move to “punch our allies in the mouth” with tariffs or the need for cuts to social-safety net programs in the GOP’s legislation to extend 2017’s tax cuts. Fetterman’s office didn’t respond to an inquiry about Lamb.
Is Conor Lamb running for Senate?
For his part, Lamb — a former U.S. Marine and federal prosecutor — says he isn’t running for anything right now, but he’ll do whatever he can to “stop this slide that we’re on toward a less democratic country and try to create one in which there’s more opportunity for people.”
To some Democrats, he sounds like a candidate.
“That he’s doing these town halls is a good indication that he’ll be running for something, so it’s a good thing,” said Janet Bargh, who attended the event in suburban Harrisburg.
Aside from the town halls, he spoke at the Unite for Veterans event on the National Mall. He has also been active on social media, doing local radio appearances and appearing on MSNBC, where he recently criticized the June 14 military parade ordered up by Trump.
Suddenly, Lamb was ascendant. Then he ran for Senate and lost handily — by more than two-to-one — to Fetterman in 2022’s primary.
People often ask Lamb if he’s going to challenge Fetterman again. Lamb said he reminds them that Fetterman has three years left in his term and pivots the conversation to what Democrats need to do to win elections in 2025 and 2026.
Still, Lamb is unafraid to criticize Fetterman publicly. And, he said, he’s a magnet for Democrats to air their unhappiness with Fetterman. What he hears, over and over, is frustration that Fetterman spends too much time attacking fellow Democrats and not enough time challenging Trump.
“And that is, I think, what’s driving the frustration more than any one particular issue,” Lamb said.
At the town hall, Lamb wasn’t afraid to admit he’d lost to Fetterman. But he turned it into an attack line.
“When I watch the person who beat me give up on every important issue that he campaigned on … the more I reasoned that the point of all of this in the first place is advocacy for what’s right and wrong,” Lamb told the crowd. “And advocacy for not just a particular party to win, but for the type of country where it matters if, when you stand up, you tell the truth.”
Conor Lamb speaks to the crowd at a town hall-style event organized by progressive groups at Central Penn College, Sunday, June 22, 2025, in Enola, Pa. (AP Photo/Marc Levy)
ASHLAND, Ky. (AP) — Pounding away on a prison typewriter, Chad Scott seemed worlds apart from President Donald Trump.
But when the disgraced narcotics agent wrote the White House seeking clemency for his corruption conviction, Scott sought to draw Trump’s attention to what they have in common.
Both men had survived a bullet wound to the ear, Scott wrote, and had been convicted of falsifying records. They were also each a victim of “political persecution,” the type of catchphrase the former agent hoped would resonate with a man who has long complained of witch hunts.
By helping him, Scott argued, Trump would be showing he had “the back of law enforcement.”
“Chad Scott is a hero in this country’s war on drugs,” his attorney wrote in a clemency petition reviewed by The Associated Press, adding it would be a “gross waste of taxpayer money” to house and feed the former U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration agent for six more years.
FILE – This booking photo provided by the St. Charles, La., Parish Sheriff’s Office shows former DEA agent Chad Scott. (St. Charles Parish Sheriff’s Office via AP, File)
This photo provided by his attorneys shows former U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration agent Chad Scott with a service dog he is training, named “Trump,” at the Federal Correctional Institution in Ashland, Ky., in December 2024. (Michelle Scott via AP)
FILE – Former DEA agent Chad Scott walks to the Hale Boggs Federal Building on the first day of a retrial regarding federal charges of obstruction of justice, perjury and falsification of government records in New Orleans, on Monday, Aug. 19, 2019. (Max Becherer/The Times-Picayune/The New Orleans Advocate via AP, File)
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FILE – This booking photo provided by the St. Charles, La., Parish Sheriff’s Office shows former DEA agent Chad Scott. (St. Charles Parish Sheriff’s Office via AP, File)
Scott’s application is hardly unique, according to prisoners, defense attorneys and officials. The White House and the Justice Department have received a wave of such requests — all carefully crafted to capture the attention and fancy of Trump or those who know his inclinations.
The flurry, legal experts said, has been sparked by Trump’s frequent and eyebrow-raising grants of clemency since retaking office in January. The Republican president has pardoned and commuted the sentences of more than 1,600 people, including many political allies, former GOP officeholders and hundreds charged or convicted in the 2021 Capitol riot. He even pardoned a pair of reality TV stars who were serving time for bank fraud and tax evasion.
In doing so, Trump has largely cast aside a process that historically has been overseen by nonpolitical personnel at the Justice Department who spent their days poring over clemency applications — thick packets filled with character references attesting to applicants’ atonement and good deeds. Only those meeting strict criteria were then passed along to the White House.
Those procedures appear to have been replaced by the caprice of a president known for his transactional approach to governance, his loyalty to supporters and his disdain for perceived enemies.
It’s created “a free-for-all” for those seeking clemency, said Liz Oyer, the Justice Department’s former pardon attorney, who was fired in March. “The traditional process and practices,” she told the AP, “all seem to have fallen by the wayside.”
Inmates believe Trump might hear them out
That has left an opening for prisoners like Eric Sanchez Chaparro, who is seeking a commutation for a drug and weapons conviction that carries a 19-year prison sentence. The optimism, he said, has never been higher for those behind bars.
“In many ways I feel like he has the same point of view that we’ve got,” Chaparro said in a telephone interview, noting that both he and the president were convicted of felonies. Trump was convicted last year on New York state charges of falsifying business records related to hush money payments to a porn star but was sentenced to no punishment.
“Even though people try to put him down,” Chaparro added, “he kept on pushing for his goal.”
FILE – This photo provided by the Santa Rose County Jail in Milton, Fla., shows Joseph Maldonado-Passage, also known as “Joe Exotic.” (Santa Rosa County Jail via AP, File)
The Trump administration did not disclose how many people have reached out to Trump or White House officials to seek clemency, though some have boasted of doing so in colorful ways. Last week, Joe Exotic, the former zookeeper known as the “Tiger King,” posted a song he said he wrote for Trump on social media, claiming he was “paying the time for a crime I didn’t do.” He’s serving a 21-year sentence for the failed murder-for-hire of an animal-welfare activist.
Wave of pardon applications lands at Justice Department
Since Trump retook office five months ago, his Justice Department has received more than 9,300 petitions seeking commutations of sentences or pardons. At that pace, the tally would blow past the approximately 15,000 petitions filed during the four years of President Joe Biden’s Democratic administration. The Justice Department received about 12,000 petitions in Trump’s first term.
Clemency is perhaps the most unchecked power enjoyed by a president, as actions cannot be undone by courts or other officials. Presidents can commute sentences — reducing or eliminating them — or bestow a pardon that wipes away convictions or criminal charges.
Trump is hardly the first president to generate controversy over how he has handled such powers. Biden prompted bipartisan outrage in December when he pardoned his son Hunter, sparing him a possible prison sentence for felony gun and tax convictions. And Biden was sharply criticized — mainly by Republicans — for issuing preemptive pardons to protect lawmakers, former officials and his family members from what he described as a potentially vindictive Trump administration.
Trump’s handling of pardons is unprecedented, experts say
Even so, legal scholars say, Trump’s approach to clemency has veered into unprecedented territory.
The president, for example, tapped a vociferous political supporter, Ed Martin Jr., to be the Justice Department’s pardon attorney. Martin is a former defense lawyer who represented Jan. 6 rioters and promoted false claims that the 2020 election had been stolen by Democrats. Trump gave Martin the post after pulling his nomination to be the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia in the face of bipartisan concerns over his divisive politics. Martin did not respond to requests for comment.
FILE – Ed Martin speaks at an event at the Capitol in Washington, on June 13, 2023. (AP Photo/Amanda Andrade-Rhoades, File)
Much of Trump’s mercy has gone to political allies, campaign donors and fraudsters who claimed they were victims of a “weaponized” Justice Department. The pardons that have drawn the most attention include one issued to a tax cheat whose mother raised millions of dollars for Republican causes.
There was the pardon of a prolific straw donor for foreign contributions who gave $900,000 to Trump’s first inaugural committee. Trump voided the conviction of Scott Jenkins, a Virginia sheriff and vocal Trump supporter, sentenced to 10 years for deputizing several businessmen in exchange for cash payments.
“What these pardons signal — together with everything else — is that all bets are now off,” said Frank Bowman, a legal historian and professor emeritus at the University of Missouri School of Law who is writing a book on pardons. “It’s a grotesque misuse of constitutional authority of a kind that has never been seen in American history.”
Administration officials say Trump decides on clemency requests after they’re vetted by the White House Counsel’s Office, the White House pardon czar and the Justice Department. Reviewers have been focusing on nonviolent, rehabilitated criminals with compelling references, the officials said. The White House is also considering petitions from those serving unjustified sentences and what the administration deems “over-prosecution.”
“President Trump doesn’t need lectures from Democrats about his use of pardons, especially from those who supported a president who pardoned his corrupt son, shielded Dr. Fauci from accountability for the millions who suffered under his failed COVID leadership and backed the infamous ‘kids-for-cash’ judge who profited from incarcerating children,” White House spokesperson Harrison Fields said in an email. “President Trump is using his pardon and commutation powers to right many wrongs, acting reasonably and responsibly within his constitutional authority.”
Felons say they have a kinship with Trump, a fellow felon
All the while, Trump’s approach has spread hope among lesser-connected prisoners who long ago exhausted their appeals, a half dozen federal prisoners told the AP in interviews.
A remedy long likened to winning the lottery seems more attainable in an administration that has dispensed with many of the traditional criteria considered in clemency, including remorse, the severity of the crime and the amount of time a prisoner has already served.
Jonathan E. Woods, an early Trump supporter and former Arkansas state senator, is serving an 18-year sentence for a bribery conviction.
The former legislator believes he has a legitimate shot at winning a commutation because, he wrote to the AP, “President Trump is viewed as someone as having a big heart, nonjudgmental and someone who has been put through hell by a very imperfect legal system.”
“Inmates view him as someone who will listen to them in hopes of going home early to their loved ones,” Woods added.
Woods, who is serving time in a prison in Texas, has also raised allegations he hopes will resonate with the president: evidence of misconduct by an FBI agent who investigated the former state senator. That agent pleaded guilty to “corruptly destroying” his government hard drive in Woods’ case.
Trump spent years blasting the FBI, particularly for how it investigated him over allegations of Russian interference in the 2016 campaign and its role in the Justice Department’s ill-fated prosecutions of Trump in the Capitol riot and his retention of classified documents at his Florida resort.
Pardon czar is playing a key role
Less political appeals have also been fruitful — thanks to the president’s advisers.
Those working to land pardons for Eddie and Joe Sotelo didn’t give up after Biden rejected their application. Instead, advocates turned to help from Alice Marie Johnson, whom Trump recently tapped as his pardon czar after commuting her sentence for federal drug and money laundering charges in 2018.
FILE – President Donald Trump holds up a full pardon for Alice Marie Johnson, left, in the Oval Office of the White House on Friday, Aug. 28, 2020. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci, File)
It was Johnson who intervened on behalf of the brothers, who had been serving life prison terms for a drug-trafficking conspiracy, said Brittany Barnett, founder of the Buried Alive Project, a nonprofit advocacy group that took up the Sotelos’ case. The brothers were freed late last month.
Johnson “knows firsthand the weight of a life sentence,” Barnett said. “These men were serving the same sentence as the Unabomber — on drug charges.”
Trump’s open-mindedness has sent “shock waves of hope through the prison walls for the thousands of people still serving extreme sentences,” Barnett said.
No commutation seems out of the question in prisons like FCI Ashland, the Kentucky lockup where Scott, the former DEA agent, has been held nearly four years.
Once hotshot DEA agent fell from grace
Scott, 57, was exercising in March with Brian Kelsey, when the former Tennessee state senator received word he had been pardoned just two weeks into a 21-month sentence for campaign finance fraud. Kelsey called his release a “victory for every American who believes in one impartial justice system for all.”
FILE – Former Republican state Sen. Brian Kelsey, center, arrives at federal court, Nov. 22, 2022, in Nashville, Tenn. (AP Photo/Mark Humphrey, File)
FILE – Cincinnati City Councilman P.G. Sittenfeld, center, speaks during a news conference in Cincinnati on Feb. 19, 2013. (AP Photo/Al Behrman, File)
FILE – The Federal Correctional Institution in Ashland, Ky., is seen Tuesday, Aug. 6, 2013. (AP Photo/John Flavell, File)
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FILE – Former Republican state Sen. Brian Kelsey, center, arrives at federal court, Nov. 22, 2022, in Nashville, Tenn. (AP Photo/Mark Humphrey, File)
Last month, the president pardoned another former Ashland prisoner, P.G. Sittenfeld, a former Cincinnati city councilman who not only won office as a Democrat but sharply criticized Trump. It is unclear why Trump pardoned Sittenfeld, who also seemed surprised by the grant of clemency. “I was as stunned as I suspect you were,” he wrote supporters this month, according to the Cincinnati Business Courier.
In his own application for a commutation, Scott sought to draw Trump’s attention not only to his ear wound — sustained in a shooting that predated his law enforcement career — but also the prosecutor who handled his case. That prosecutor went on to work for special counsel Jack Smith, whose team twice indicted Trump. The charges were dropped after Trump won the November election.
“Though I do not claim to be a saint, I DID NOT commit the crimes for which I have been convicted,” Scott wrote to the president, even using all caps like Trump does on social media.
Scott had been among the most prolific narcotics agents in the country during his 17-year career at the DEA and won several awards for his work.
His downfall began in 2016, when two members of his New Orleans-based task force were arrested for stealing and using drugs, prompting a yearslong FBI inquiry. A federal jury convicted Scott in 2019 of orchestrating false testimony against a trafficker. He also was found guilty of falsifying DEA paperwork to acquire a pickup truck and, following a separate trial, stealing money and property from suspects.
Scheduled for release in 2031, he has exhausted every possible appeal. Clemency from Trump, Scott told the AP, is his “last resort.”
By all accounts, Scott has been a model prisoner and has been awarded sought-after privileges. He spends his days as FCI Ashland’s “town driver,” chauffeuring newly released prisoners to bus stops, halfway houses, hospitals and doctors’ offices in nearby cities.
And he has participated in a program called Pawsibilities Unleashed, in which he raises and trains service and therapy dogs behind bars.
He named one of his most recent canines, a Labradane, Trump.
Camron Michael Amin, a professor of Middle East and Iranian diaspora studies at University of Michigan-Dearborn, says some people were not able to get in touch with their loved ones due to an internet outage in Iran.
“Communication seems to have improved over the course of the week, but many people couldn’t reach anybody starting sort of a week ago,” he said. “Sunday, it was hard to reach people, and that seems to have been largely driven by internet outages.”
Amin says many Iranian Americans are nervous about any escalations in the war, especially those with loved ones in Iran.
“I can’t speak for everybody, obviously, but generally speaking, Iranian Americans are nervous about and wary of anything that escalates and prolongs the war. However they feel about the Iranian government, however they feel about the issues between Iran and the United States… because they have people they know or people they care about in Iran that might be at risk they themselves visit when they can,” he said.
Amin says recent polling shows that Iranian Americans frequently keep in contact and travel to Iran as tourists or to visit family.
“So anything that makes that more dangerous or more fraught is unwelcome,” he said.
Amin says one concern is getting dual-national Iranian Americans out of Iran during the conflict.
“Certainly, dual nationals in Israel, from several countries, including the U.S., have ways to get out of that country during the fighting. And I think there’s a similar concern about dual nationals, who are Iranian Americans, who might be stuck in harm’s way during the fighting right now,” he said.
Amin says Iranian Americans are looking to policymakers and legislators to prioritize helping people stuck in Iran.
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Michigan lawmakers went home without passing a new budget for K-12 schools Thursday night. That’s despite, both meeting for hours and a statutory July 1 deadline for getting an entire state budget done.
It appears part of the holdup is how to handle earmarks for programs like free school lunches or mental health services. The Democratic-led Senate wants them maintained while the Republican-controlled House of Representatives wants to cut them in favor of giving districts more money per student.
House Speaker Matt Hall (R-Richland Twp) is also trying to get a road funding plan passed alongside the school budget.
Hall spoke to reporters Thursday night after spending hours negotiating with Senate leadership, the governor, and their teams. He said the leaders were leaving with “a roadmap” that will help them get a deal done next week.
“The House Republicans are committed to working through the weekend, working tomorrow, and working more tonight. Working over the weekend with our goal of still trying to get something done on roads and education by July 1,” Hall said.
Hall said he believed his Democratic counterparts worked better with added pressure from that deadline. He claimed the Senate adding more session days to its calendar for next week as a win.
The Senate had planned to take the first two weeks of July off.
All sides of the negotiating table say they’re optimistic about getting something done, acknowledging it would be difficult.
Reporters caught State Budget Director Jen Flood leaving the governor’s office at the state Capitol Thursday night. She said negotiators were “having great conversations,” when pressed for a comment.
Democrats, however, are still frustrated by the time crunch. They accuse House Republicans of delaying the process by waiting until a couple weeks ago to release their school budget proposal.
Rep. Alabas Farhat (D-Dearborn) is the ranking Democrat on the House Appropriations Committee.
“We are seeing a budget process that normally takes months to play out, playing out within a span of four to five days,” Farhat said. “We shouldn’t be in this spot right now where we’re five days before the [statutory] deadline contemplating whether or not we’ll have this budget. So school districts don’t have to keep wondering and teachers don’t have to keep wondering if they’re going to be pink slipped or not.”
Hall said he and House Republicans have been vocal about wanting to keep to the July 1 deadline for months. Democrats have as well, though some have raised doubts in recent weeks about that feasibility without having a complete budget proposal from the House.
The odds of passing a full state budget next week are dim.
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The United Auto Workers union announced last month it would be endorsing Rev. Solomon Kinloch Jr. in the Detroit mayoral race, calling him “a longtime advocate for working-class people.”
Kinloch, a senior pastor at Detroit’s Triumph Church, is the only candidate in the mayoral race who has not held an elected position. He is currently battling for second place in the race behind frontrunner Mary Sheffield — who continues to maintain a sizable lead. The top two vote getters in the Aug. 5 primary will face off in the November general election.
In Detroit, a political endorsement from the UAW has always carried considerable weight, but membership is down in recent decades, and there are shifting political views within.
Use the media player above to hear the full conversation.
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MIAMI (AP) — A Canadian man being held by immigration officials in South Florida has died in federal custody, officials said.
Johnny Noviello, 49, died Monday afternoon at the Bureau of Prisons Federal Detention Center in Miami, a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement press release said. The cause of death was under investigation.
Noviello was being detained pending removal from the U.S., officials said. He entered the U.S. in 1988 on a legal visa and became a lawful permanent resident in 1991. He was convicted of drug trafficking and other charges in 2023 and sentenced to a year in prison, officials said.
Noviello was picked up by ICE agents at his probation office last month and charged with removability because of his drug conviction, authorities said.
Seven other immigration detainees have died in federal custody this year, with 11 deaths reported in 2024.
FILE – The Federal Detention Center stands on Sept. 15, 2022, in Miami. (AP Photo/Wilfredo Lee, File)
NEW YORK (AP) — When the Trump family unveiled a new phone before a giant American flag at its headquarters earlier this month, the pitch was simple and succinct, packed with pure patriotism: “Made in the U.S.A.”
The Trumps are apparently having second thoughts.
How about “proudly American”?
Those are the two words that have replaced the “Made in the USA” pitch that just a few days ago appeared on the website where customers can pre-order the so-called T-1 gold-toned phones with an American flag etched on the back. Elsewhere on the site, other vague terms are now being used, describing the $499 phone as boasting an “American-Proud Design” and “brought to life right here in the U.S.A.”
The Federal Trade Commission requires that items labeled “Made in USA” be “all or virtually all” produced in the U.S. and several firms have been sued over misusing the term.
The Trump Organization has not explained the change and has not responded to a request for comment. Neither did an outside public relations firm handling the Trumps’ mobile phone business, including a request to confirm a statement made to another media outlet.
“T1 phones are proudly being made in America,” said Trump Mobile spokesman Chris Walker, according to USA Today. “Speculation to the contrary is simply inaccurate.”
The language change on the website was first reported by the news site The Verge.
An expert on cell phone technology, IDC analyst Francisco Jeronimo, said he’s not surprised the Trump family has dropped the “Made in the USA” label because it’s nearly impossible to build one here given the higher cost and lack of infrastructure to do so.
But, of course, you can claim to do it.
“Whether it is possible or not to build this phone in the US depends on what you consider ‘build,’” Jeronimo said. “If it’s a question of assembling components and targeting small volumes, I suppose it’s somehow possible. You can always get the components from China and assemble them by hand somewhere.”
“You’re going to have phones that are made right here in the United States of America,” said Trump’s son Eric to Fox News recently, adding, “It’s about time we bring products back to our great country.”
The Trump family has flown the American flag before with Trump-branded products of suspicious origin, including its “God Bless the USA” Bibles, which an Associated Press investigation last year showed were printed in China.
The Trump phone is part of a bigger family mobile business plan designed to tap into MAGA enthusiasm for the president. The two sons running the business, Eric and Don Jr., announced earlier this month that they would offer mobile phone plans for $47.45 a month, a reference to their father’s status as the 45th and 47th president. The call center, they said, will be in the U.S., too.
“You’re not calling up call centers in Bangladesh,” Eric Trump said on Fox News. “We’re doing it out of St. Louis, Missouri.”
The new service has been blasted by government ethics experts for a conflict of interest, given that President Donald Trump oversees the Federal Communications Commission that regulates the business and is investigating phone service companies that are now Trump Mobile rivals.
Trump has also threatened to punish cell phone maker Apple, now a direct competitor, threatening to slap 25% tariffs on devices because of its plans to make most of its U.S. iPhones in India.
Eric Trump, Don Hendrickson, Eric Thomas, Patrick O’Brien and Donald Trump Jr., left to right, participate in the announcement of Trump Mobile, in New York’s Trump Tower, Monday, June 16, 2025. (AP Photo/Richard Drew)
WASHINGTON (AP) — A few Republicans reacted with indignation Thursday after the Senate parliamentarian advised that some of the measures in their tax and immigration bill could not be included in the legislation.
Sen. Tommy Tuberville, R-Ala., tweeted on X that Senate Parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough should be fired, “ASAP.” Rep. Greg Steube, R-Fla., intimated that she was partisan, asking why an “unelected swamp bureaucrat, who was appointed by Harry Reid over a decade ago” gets to decide what’s in the bill?”
It’s hardly the first time the parliamentarian’s normally low-key and lawyerly role has drawn a blast of public criticism.
MacDonough also dashed Democratic plans over the years, advising in 2021 that they couldn’t include a minimum wage increase in their COVID-19 relief bill. Later that same year, she advised that Democrats needed to drop an effort to let millions of immigrants remain temporarily in the U.S. as part of their big climate bill.
But the attention falling on MacDonough’s rulings in recent years also reflects a broader change in Congress, with lawmakers increasingly trying to wedge their top policy priorities into bills that can’t be filibustered in the Senate. The process comes with special rules designed to deter provisions unrelated to spending or taxes — and that’s where the parliamentarian comes in, offering analysis of what does and doesn’t qualify.
Her latest round of decisions Thursday was a blow to the GOP’s efforts to wring hundreds of billions of dollars from Medicaid over the next decade. Senate Republicans could opt to try to override her recommendations, but they are unlikely to do so.
Here’s a closer look at what the Senate parliamentarian does and why lawmakers are so focused on her recommendations right now.
The crucial role of the parliamentarian
Both the House and Senate have a parliamentarian to provide assistance on that chamber’s rules and precedents. They are often seen advising whoever is presiding over the chamber on the proper procedures to be followed and the appropriate responses to a parliamentary inquiry.
They are also charged with providing information to lawmakers and their respective staff on a strictly nonpartisan and confidential basis.
The parliamentarians and their staff only offer advice. Their recommendations are not binding. In the case of the massive tax and spending bill now before both chambers, the parliamentarian plays a critical role in advising whether the reconciliation bill’s provisions remain focused on fiscal issues.
How MacDonough became the first woman in the job
MacDonough, an English literature major, is the Senate’s first woman to be parliamentarian and just the sixth person to hold the position since its creation in 1935.
She began her Senate career in its library before leaving to get a law degree at Vermont Law School. She worked briefly as a Justice Department trial attorney before returning to the Senate in 1999, this time as an assistant in the parliamentarian’s office. She was initially appointed parliamentarian in 2012 by Democrat Harry Reid of Nevada, Senate majority leader at the time. She was retained by Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., when he became majority leader in 2015.
She helped Chief Justice John Roberts preside over Trump’s 2020 Senate impeachment trial and was beside then-Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., for Trump’s second trial the following year. Trump was acquitted both times.
In this Jan. 6, 2021, photo, Senate Parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough, second from left, works beside Vice President Mike Pence during the certification of Electoral College ballots in the presidential election, in the House chamber at the Capitol in Washington. Shortly afterward, the Capitol was stormed by rioters determined to disrupt the certification. MacDonough has guided the Senate through two impeachment trials, vexed Democrats and Republicans alike with parliamentary opinions and helped rescue Electoral College certificates from a pro-Trump mob ransacking the Capitol. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)
When Trump supporters fought past police and into the Capitol in hopes of disrupting Congress’ certification of Joe Biden’s Electoral College victory, MacDonough and other staffers rescued those ballots and hustled mahogany boxes containing them to safety. MacDonough’s office, on the Capitol’s first floor, was ransacked and declared a crime scene.
Can the Senate ignore the parliamentarian’s advice?
Yes. The parliamentarian makes the recommendation, but it’s the presiding officer overseeing Senate proceedings who rules on provisions in the bill. If there is a dispute, it would be put to a vote.
Michael Thorning, director of structural democracy at the Bipartisan Policy Center, a think tank, said he doubts Republicans will want to go that route. And indeed, some Republican senators said as much Thursday.
“It’s the institutional integrity, even if I’m convinced 100% she’s wrong,” said Sen. Kevin Cramer, R-N.D.
Thorning said lawmakers from both parties view MacDonough as “very much an honest broker.”
“And the Senate relies on her,” Thorning said. “Sometimes, those decisions cut your way, and sometimes, they don’t. I also think members recognize that once you start treating the parliamentarian’s advice as just something that could be easily dismissed, then the rules start to matter less.”
Have parliamentarians been fired?
Majority leaders from both parties have replaced the parliamentarian. For more than three decades, the position alternated between Robert Dove and Alan Frumin depending upon which party was in the majority.
Thorning said the two parliamentarians weren’t far apart though, in how they interpreted the Senate’s rules and precedents.
MacDonough succeeded Frumin as parliamentarian. He said the small number of calls Thursday for her dismissal “tells you all people need to know about the current parliamentarian.”
“Senators know this isn’t somebody playing politics,” Thorning said.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., arrives to speak with reporters about the reconciliation process to advance President Donald Trump’s spending and tax bill, during a news conference at the Capitol in Washington, Tuesday, June 3, 2025. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (AP) — Florida Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis’ administration is racing ahead with construction of a makeshift immigration detention facility at an airstrip in the Everglades over the opposition of Native American leaders who consider the area their sacred ancestral homelands.
A string of portable generators and dump trucks loaded with fill dirt streamed into the site on Thursday, according to activist Jessica Namath, who witnessed the activity. The state is plowing ahead with building a compound of heavy-duty tents, trailers and other temporary buildings at the Miami Dade County-owned airfield located in the Big Cypress National Preserve, about 45 miles west of downtown Miami.
A spokesperson for the Florida Division of Emergency Management, which is helping lead the project, did not respond to requests for comment.
State officials have characterized the site as an ideal place to hold migrants, saying there’s “not much” there other than pythons and alligators.
Indigenous leaders dispute that and are condemning the state’s plans to build what’s been dubbed “ Alligator Alcatraz ” on their homelands. Native Americans can trace their roots to the area back thousands of years.
For generations, the sweeping wetlands of what is now South Florida have been home to Native peoples who today make up the Miccosukee Tribe of Indians of Florida and the Seminole Tribe of Florida, as well as the Seminole Nation of Oklahoma.
“Rather than Miccosukee homelands being an uninhabited wasteland for alligators and pythons, as some have suggested, the Big Cypress is the Tribe’s traditional homelands. The landscape has protected the Miccosukee and Seminole people for generations,” Miccosukee Chairman Talbert Cypress wrote in a statement on social media.
There are 15 remaining traditional Miccosukee and Seminole villages in Big Cypress, as well as ceremonial and burial grounds and other gathering sites, Cypress testified before Congress in 2024.
“We live here. Our ancestors fought and died here. They are buried here,” he said. “The Big Cypress is part of us, and we are a part of it.”
Garrett Stuart, who lives about 3 miles from the site, described the crystal clear waters, open prairies and lush tree islands of Big Cypress as teeming with life.
“Hearing the arguments of the frogs in the water, you know? And listen to the grunt of the alligator. You’re hearing the call of that osprey flying by and listening to the crows chatting,” he said. “It’s all just incredible.”
Critics have condemned the detention facility and what they call the state’s apparent reliance on alligators as a security measure as a cruel spectacle, while DeSantis and other state officials have defended it as part of Florida’s muscular efforts to carry out President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown.
“To have alligators and pythons be the security guards, only someone who’s never spent time in the swamp would ever say something like that,” Stuart said. “They’re afraid of human beings.”
The Florida National Guard is preparing to send up to 100 soldiers to the facility on July 1 to provide site security and staff augmentation, and other support “as directed.”
In this image from undated video released by the Office of Attorney General James Uthmeier shows an isolated Everglades airfield about 45 miles (72 kms.) west of Miami that Florida officials said an immigration detention facility dubbed “Alligator Alcatraz” is just days away from being operational. (Courtesy of the Office of Attorney General James Uthmeier via AP)
“We don’t have a set timeline for this mission due to the fluid nature of the situation, but we will stay on the ground for as long as we’re needed and at the direction of Governor DeSantis,” Guard spokesperson Brittianie Funderburk said in a statement.
Tribal leaders and environmentalists are urging the state to change course, noting billions of dollars in state and federal funds have been poured into Everglades restoration in recent years, an investment they say is jeopardized by plans to house some 1,000 migrants at the site for an undetermined amount of time.
Indigenous leaders and activists are planning to gather at the site again on Saturday to stage a demonstration highlighting why the area is “sacred” and should be “protected, not destroyed.”
“This place became our refuge in time of war. It provides us a place to continue our culture and traditions,” Miccosukee leader Betty Osceola wrote in a social media post announcing the demonstration.
“And we need to protect it for our future generations,” she added.
Kate Payne is a corps member for The Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.
This image grab from video shows activity at an immigration detention facility dubbed “Alligator Alcatraz” located at an isolated Everglades airfield. (WSVN via AP)
GUATEMALA CITY (AP) — Guatemala and Honduras have signed agreements with the United States to potentially offer refuge to people from other countries who otherwise would seek asylum in the United States, U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said Thursday at the conclusion of her Central America trip.
The agreements expand the Trump administration’s efforts to provide the U.S. government flexibility in returning migrants not only to their own countries, but also to third countries as it attempts to ramp up deportations.
Noem described it as a way to offer asylum-seekers options other than coming to the United States. She said the agreements had been in the works for months, with the U.S. government applying pressure on Honduras and Guatemala to get them done.
“Honduras and now Guatemala after today will be countries that will take those individuals and give them refugee status as well,” Noem said. “We’ve never believed that the United States should be the only option, that the guarantee for a refugee is that they go somewhere to be safe and to be protected from whatever threat they face in their country. It doesn’t necessarily have to be the United States.”
The U.S. has had such an agreement with Canada since 2002.
The practical challenge was that all three Central American countries at the time were seeing large numbers of their own citizens head to the U.S. to escape violence and a lack of economic opportunity. They also had extremely under-resourced asylum systems.
In February, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio signed deals with El Salvador and Guatemala that allowed the U.S. to send migrants from other nations there. But in Guatemala’s case it was to only be a point of transit for migrants who would then return to their homelands, not to apply for asylum there. And in El Salvador, it was broader, allowing the U.S. to send migrants to be imprisoned there.
Mexico President Claudia Sheinbaum said Tuesday that Mexico would not sign a third safe country agreement, but at the same time Mexico has accepted more than 5,000 migrants from other countries deported from the U.S. since Trump took office. She said Mexico accepted them for humanitarian reasons and helped them return to their home countries.
The U.S. also has agreements with Panama and Costa Rica to take migrants from other countries though so far the numbers sent have been relatively small. The Trump administration sent 299 to Panama in February and fewer than 200 to Costa Rica.
The agreements give U.S. authorities options, especially for migrants from countries where it is not easy for the U.S. to return them directly.
Sherman reported from Mexico City.
U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and President of Guatemala Bernardo Arévalo converse as they walk to a meeting at the Palacio Nacional de la Cultura, in Guatemala City, Thursday, June 26, 2025 . (Anna Moneymaker/Pool Photo via AP)
Michigan Democratic U.S. Sen. Elissa Slotkin on Thursday laid out an economic “war plan,” declaring the country’s shrinking middle class an existential threat to U.S. national security and calling on her party to go on the offense and “ruthlessly” focus on the economy.
In a speech in Washington billed as an alternative vision for the country’s future, the former Pentagon official and CIA officer urged her party to “face up” to what’s not working, change course and pursue “an economy that works for everyone.”
“Michigan is … a place where people feel like it’s harder and harder to get in and stay in the middle class. … This is the thing that many Democrats have, quite frankly, lost touch with. When you can’t provide for your kids, you feel anger, you feel shame, you lose your dignity, and you look for something or someone to blame,” the Holly Democrat said Thursday.
“That anger, that suspicion among Americans, that right there is what I mean by an existential threat. Because in a multi-racial, multi-ethnic democracy like ours, when people don’t feel like they can get ahead, when the system is rigged against them, they start blaming people who don’t look like them or who sound different, or who pray different. It’s how we begin to tear each other apart from the inside.”
Slotkin blamed “broken” government systems, failures by both parties and politicians distracted by special interests, their own reelections and niche issues ― compounded by “bitter fighting” daily between Democrats and Republicans.
Things aren’t “off” because Americans have stopped working hard, but because the government hasn’t lived up to its responsibility to set the conditions for success, Slotkin said.
“To me, those fundamentals are the following: Jobs that pay enough to save every month. Schools that prepare our kids for those jobs. A home you can call your own. Safety and security from fear. Energy to power our lives, and an environment to pass on to our kids. Health care you can actually afford,” Slotkin said.
“This economic war plan aims not just to ‘fix’ these systems or nibble at them around the margins ― but to rebuild them. And, as Democrat, if we have to slaughter some sacred cows to do it, then so be it.”
The three-term congresswoman was elected to the U.S. Senate last fall on the same ballot as President Donald Trump, a Republican, in battleground Michigan by nearly 2 percentage points.
Her speech on Thursday echoed themes of economic security from her winning campaign and from her high-profile rebuttal to Trump’s joint address to Congress on behalf of her party in March. Slotkin plans two other speeches later in the year ― one on security and another on democracy, she said.
Her remarks Thursday come as the Democratic Party debates its direction after taking a beating in the 2024 election and casts about for leaders. In a series of appearances this spring, Slotkin has had some “tough love” messages for her party, advising them to drop identity politics, stand up with a “muscular” defense to Trump’s actions and to unite behind a strategic plan in response to him.
Her choice of venue Thursday was notable for its intended audience: The Center for American Progress is a think tank in the heart of both downtown D.C. and the Democratic establishment, founded in 2003 as a progressive alternative to the conservative Heritage Foundation. Many of its staff have been influential thinkers or policymakers in both the Obama and Biden administrations.
“I wanted to come here, frankly, because we haven’t agreed on every single issue in the past,” Slotkin said.
Her remarks Thursday were followed by a conversation on stage with Neera Tanden, CEO of the Center for American Progress, who served as director of the White House Domestic Policy Council under President Joe Biden.
Slotkin told Tanden that Democrats have lost some of their “alpha energy” ― what she described as football coach “bravado”: “Sometimes people are not looking for a 13-page policy treatise on the website, but for you to show some fight,” she said, pounding her fist.
She suggested their alpha energy is partly why she and Trump both won Michigan on the same ballot.
Slotkin has described her “war plan” as a road map for not only going on “offense” to contain and defeat Trump and Republicans who control majorities in Congress but to detail what Democrats would do if they had control of the levers of power in Washington.
“No team in history ― on the field or in Washington, D.C. ― ever won a damn game without going on the offense,” she said. “We need to offer a different vision and demonstrate an affirmative, positive plan for the country.”
Since her election to Congress in 2018, Slotkin has cultivated a centrist brand, and she’s not shied from separating herself from the progressive wing of her party. In Thursday’s remarks, she contended that the shrinking middle class is a “core issue” that unites moderates, progressives “and everything in between.”
Some of her policy prescriptions would sound familiar to anyone who has followed her campaigns and policy proposals in recent years: Bringing home critical supply chains from overseas, an “all-of-the-above” approach to energy needs, the option of a nationwide public insurance plan and allowing Medicare to negotiate the price of prescription drugs.
Slotkin also repeats some long-sought reforms for Congress that she says would regain the public’s trust, like banning candidates from taking corporate political action committee money and barring lawmakers from trading stocks and cryptocurrencies so they aren’t “personally profiting from their access.”
But she also pitched newer ideas like banning cellphones in K-12 classrooms and declaring a housing emergency to spur the construction of 4 million homes to catch up with demand. “The single biggest thing holding us back is overlapping and outdated housing regulations,” she said.
The freshman senator has also called for “slaughtering” some of the Democrats’ sacred cows, targeting the party’s approach to climate change and regulation, saying she’s open to peeling back some environmental permitting rules that can drag out the approval process for major job-creating projects.
“The way some Democrats approach climate change is elitist. You’re either with us or against us,” Slotkin said. “People get that extreme weather is a pocketbook issue. Let’s start from there and try and bring as many Americans into the cause as we can.”
She also wants to take “a stick of dynamite” to the federal workforce training programs to blow them up, noting they’re found across 40 different programs in 14 different agencies. “We have to align all those programs around one goal, training and retraining people for a future economy,” Slotkin said.
In the speech, Slotkin said Congress needs to abandon the talking point of “comprehensive” immigration reform, blaming both parties for rejecting immigration deals for 20 years because they preferred to use the issue for political ammo or the bill wasn’t “perfect.” Incremental reforms are OK, including boosting the caps for every visa category, she said.
“Both parties have been a mess on this issue,” Slotkin said. “I will work with any adults I can find who are actually interested in making some kind of progress on immigration.”
She defended unions but challenged her party to quit “vilifying” corporate CEOs and others who employ a lot of people because it makes too many voters think the party is anti-business.
“Yes, we want everyone in America, including the president of the United States, to play by the same set of rules. Yes, we need a fair tax code to ensure all Americans are paying their fair share,” she said. “No matter who you are or where you come from, Black, White, Latino, first-generation, we want you to make as much money as possible.”
But the government shouldn’t give tax breaks to big companies and then have to pay again to keep their employees from going hungry, Slotkin asserted. Those companies should lose eligibility for tax incentives, she said.
“That’s double-dipping — it makes the taxpayer pay twice for corporate greed. And it’s got to stop,” she said.
U.S. Sen. Elissa Slotkin outlined her economic "war plan" during a speech Thursday, June 26, at The Center for American Progress, a progressive think tank in Washington, D.C.
Power plants and industrial facilities that emit carbon dioxide, the primary driver of global warming, are hopeful that Congress will keep tax credits for capturing the gas and storing it deep underground.
The process, called carbon capture and sequestration, is seen by many as an important way to reduce pollution during a transition to renewable energy.
But it faces criticism from some conservatives, who say it is expensive and unnecessary, and from environmentalists, who say it has consistently failed to capture as much pollution as promised and is simply a way for producers of fossil fuels like oil, gas and coal to continue their use.
Here’s a closer look:
How does the process work?
Carbon dioxide is a gas produced by burning of fossil fuels. It traps heat close to the ground when released to the atmosphere, where it persists for hundreds of years and raises global temperatures.
Industries and power plants can install equipment to separate carbon dioxide from other gases before it leaves the smokestack. The carbon then is compressed and shipped — usually through a pipeline — to a location where it’s injected deep underground for long-term storage.
BKV Carbon Ventures project manager Spencer Crouch explains how the carbon capture and sequestration process works at their facility in Bridgeport, Texas, Thursday, May 29, 2025. (AP Photo/LM Otero)
Carbon also can be captured directly from the atmosphere using giant vacuums. Once captured, it is dissolved by chemicals or trapped by solid material.
Lauren Read, a senior vice president at BKV Corp., which built a carbon capture facility in Texas, said the company injects carbon at high pressure, forcing it almost two miles below the surface and into geological formations that can hold it for thousands of years.
The carbon can be stored in deep saline or basalt formations and unmineable coal seams. But about three-fourths of captured carbon dioxide is pumped back into oil fields to build up pressure that helps extract harder-to-reach reserves — meaning it’s not stored permanently, according to the International Energy Agency and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
BKV Carbon Ventures senior facility engineer Laura Mamazza walks at a compression station at a carbon capture and sequestration facility in Bridgeport, Texas, Thursday, May 29, 2025. (AP Photo/LM Otero)
How much carbon dioxide is captured?
The most commonly used technology allows facilities to capture and store around 60% of their carbon dioxide emissions during the production process. Anything above that rate is much more difficult and expensive, according to the IEA.
Some companies have forecast carbon capture rates of 90% or more, “in practice, that has never happened,” said Alexandra Shaykevich, research manager at the Environmental Integrity Project’s Oil & Gas Watch.
That’s because it’s difficult to capture carbon dioxide from every point where it’s emitted, said Grant Hauber, a strategic adviser on energy and financial markets at the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis.
BKV Carbon Ventures project manager Spencer Crouch looks at a compression station that’s part of a carbon capture and sequestration facility in Bridgeport, Texas, Thursday, May 29, 2025. (AP Photo/LM Otero)
Environmentalists also cite potential problems keeping it in the ground. For example, last year, agribusiness company Archer-Daniels-Midland discovered a leak about a mile underground at its Illinois carbon capture and storage site, prompting the state legislature this year to ban carbon sequestration above or below the Mahomet Aquifer, an important source of drinking water for about a million people.
Carbon capture can be used to help reduce emissions from hard-to-abate industries like cement and steel, but many environmentalists contend it’s less helpful when it extends the use of coal, oil and gas.
A 2021 study also found the carbon capture process emits significant amounts of methane, a potent greenhouse gas that’s shorter-lived than carbon dioxide but traps over 80 times more heat. That happens through leaks when the gas is brought to the surface and transported to plants.
BKV Carbon Ventures senior facility engineer Laura Mamazza closes a gate on a carbon sequestration injection well pad site at a carbon capture and sequestration facility in Bridgeport, Texas, Thursday, May 29, 2025. (AP Photo/LM Otero)
About 45 carbon-capture facilities operated on a commercial scale last year, capturing a combined 50 million metric tons of carbon dioxide — a tiny fraction of the 37.8 gigatonnes of carbon dioxide emissions from the energy sector alone, according to the IEA.
It’s an even smaller share of all greenhouse gas emissions, which amounted to 53 gigatonnes for 2023, according to the latest report from the European Commission’s Emissions Database for Global Atmospheric Research.
The Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis says one of the world’s largest carbon capture utilization and storage projects, ExxonMobil’s Shute Creek facility in Wyoming, captures only about half its carbon dioxide, and most of that is sold to oil and gas companies to pump back into oil fields.
BKV Carbon Ventures senior facility engineer Laura Mamazza stands near part of a compression station at a carbon capture and sequestration facility in Bridgeport, Texas, Thursday, May 29, 2025. (AP Photo/LM Otero)
Future of US tax credits is unclear
Even so, carbon capture is an important tool to reduce carbon dioxide emissions, particularly in heavy industries, said Sangeet Nepal, a technology specialist at the Carbon Capture Coalition.
“It’s not a substitution for renewables … it’s just a complementary technology,” Nepal said. “It’s one piece of a puzzle in this broad fight against the climate change.”
Experts say many projects, including proposed ammonia and hydrogen plants on the U.S. Gulf Coast, likely won’t be built without the tax credits, which Carbon Capture Coalition Executive Director Jessie Stolark says already have driven significant investment and are crucial U.S. global competitiveness.
They remain in the Senate Finance Committee’s draft reconciliation bill, after another version passed the House, though the Carbon Capture Coalition said inflation has already slashed their value and could limit projects.
Associated Press reporter Jack Brook in New Orleans contributed to this report.
The Associated Press’ climate and environmental coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.
BKV Carbon Ventures health and safety advisor Adam Pope looks on at a compression station that is part of a carbon capture and sequestration process in Bridgeport, Texas, Thursday, May 29, 2025. (AP Photo/LM Otero)
A state House committee voted Wednesday to advance legislation to blunt the impact of a Michigan Supreme Court decision on automatic life-without-parole sentences for young adults.
The bills could allow for longer sentences for 19- and 20-year-olds convicted of first-degree and felony murder, among other serious crimes, and allow prosecutors more time to review cases for potential resentencing.
“Life without parole was not given out lightly to begin with,” said Rep. Sarah Lightner (R-Springport), who chairs the House Judiciary Committee and sponsored the bills. “You have to remember these people are murderers.”
The court ruling released in April struck down automatic life without parole for 19- and 20-year-olds convicted of first-degree and felony murder as unconstitutional cruel and unusual punishment. It followed a similar ruling applying to defendants 18 years old and younger.
Now, people who already got mandatory life sentences are being resentenced. Sometimes, that will be to multiple shorter prison terms. The current default in Michigan is for sentences to be served concurrently.
Lightner said concurrent prison terms are not tough enough. “There’s only justice given to the first victim,” she told Michigan Public Radio. “There’s nothing in law that says you have to stack the sentences consecutively, because we have concurrent sentencing.”
Consecutive years-long sentences would effectively be life in prison in some cases.
Deborah LaBelle, an attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union of Michigan said the Michigan Supreme Court decision is clear on young lifers. She said sentences of life with no chance of parole for young defendants should be rare.
“They should, when they have had the opportunity to mature and grow, be looked at again and determined whether in fact they have been rehabilitated and should be able to at some point rejoin the community,” she said.
LaBelle says the legislation would probably be found unconstitutional if signed into law because it would force consecutive sentences automatically without court hearings.
The bills, which now go to the House floor, were adopted on party-line votes.
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Democrats and Republicans on the Senate Appropriations Committee pushed back against the Trump administration’s bid tokill $9 billion in federal funding that Congress already has approved for public broadcasting and international aid programs.
In President Trump’s request to Congress, sent last month, he justified the cuts because the targeted foreign aid programs were “antithetical to American interests,” and because “[f]ederal spending on [the Corporation for Public Broadcasting] subsidizes a public media system that is politically biased and is an unnecessary expense to the taxpayer.”
In a hearing Wednesday, Maine Republican Sen. Susan Collins, who chairs the committee, noted in the case of public broadcasting that 70% of the federal dollars targeted for rescission support local programming and emergency communications. She acknowledged concerns about NPR’s news coverage, which she said “for years has had a discernibly partisan bent.”
“There are, however, more targeted approaches to addressing that bias [at NPR] than rescinding all funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting,” Collins said.
In response to a later question, Office of Management and Budget Director Russell Vought testified that emergency broadcasting services funded by CPB would be safe. He also argued that because the CPB rescission doesn’t apply to the current fiscal year, local stations would have “ample time to adjust” and “they should be more judicious” about whom they pay for content.
Upon further questioning by Alaska Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski, who has come out against the public broadcasting cuts, Vought committed to working with her on funding for rural stations. Yet he reiterated that Republicans have spent years trying to address public funding of content.
Murkowski later gave what she described as “a little bit of a bird’s eye view” of the public radio situation in Alaska, which includes rural stations that receive up to 70% of their funding from the federal government. She went on to detail the vital services the station supply. “[A]lmost to a number, they’re saying that they will go under if public broadcasting funds are no longer available to them,” she said.
The vast majority of the $9.4 billion in cuts requested by the White House are to foreign aid programs addressing global public health, international disaster assistance and hunger relief.
But the package also includes a cut of nearly $1.1 billion in funding for 2026 and 2027 for CPB. The private nonprofit sends most of that money to local public television and radio stations across the country. PBS receives about 15% of its annual revenue through CPB, while NPR gets about 1% directly. Indirectly, NPR also receives some of the money going to member stations, who pay the network to air its programs.
The rescissions measure narrowly passed the House earlier this month, 214 to 212, with two key Republican lawmakers switching their votes from “no” to “yes” at the last minute to get it over the finish line. The House held a hearing earlier this year at which many Republicans accused PBS and NPR of being woke and biased against conservative viewpoints.
On Wednesday, Sen. Patty Murray of Washington, the panel’s top Democrat, questioned the legality of the White House’s request. Under the 1974 Impoundment Control Act, both chambers of Congress must approve such a request by a simple majority within 45 days of its submission—in this case, by July 18.
The cuts to CPB would “rip away funding that supports over 1500 local public TV and radio stations,” Murray said.
“Rural communities will be the hardest hit, not to mention our kids,” she said, adding that the cuts threaten “free, high-quality programming that is thoughtfully developed to get our kids thinking and to grow their curiosity.”
NPR in a statement said: “There is no substitute for the direct support and nationwide infrastructure and services funded by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting that enable these noncommercial stations to serve their communities.” In a statement after the House vote this month, PBS President and CEO Paula Kerger said: “Our work is only possible because of the bipartisan support we have always received from Congress, support we have earned by providing services that cannot be replaced by commercial media.”
WDET strives to make our journalism accessible to everyone. As a public media institution, we maintain our journalistic integrity through independent support from readers like you. If you value WDET as your source of news, music and conversation, please make a gift today.
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