Prepared for the Office of Public Affairs (OPA)
U.S. Department of Homeland Security

Editorial Note: The DHS Daily Briefing is a collection of news articles related to Department’s mission. The inclusion of particular stories is not intended to reflect their importance, nor is it intended to endorse the political viewpoints or affiliations included in news coverage.

Bloomberg [4/10/2025 8:19 PM, Andrew Kreighbaum, 120K] reports a federal judge rejected a request by immigration advocacy organizations to block a Trump administration rule requiring millions of immigrants to register with the federal government. Judge Trevor N. McFadden of the US District Court for the District of Columbia found plaintiffs had failed to establish likelihood of standing to challenge the registry rule. The registry requirement, which goes into effect Friday, gives the Trump administration another tool to enact its mass deportation agenda. In a lawsuit filed last month, the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights and the United Farm Workers argued the Department of Homeland Security regulation violated notice-and-comment requirements under the Administrative Procedure Act. DHS issued the registry mandate as an interim final rule March 12, citing a World War II-era statute requiring certain immigrants to register or risk prosecution. McFadden, a Trump appointee, found that harms cited by plaintiffs were speculative. They “have failed to show that the mere requirement to abide by the law—even if true that the accompanying regulation flouted procedural requirements when enacted— constitutes a concrete injury for standing purposes,” he wrote in a memorandum order. In a speech at a border security conference Tuesday, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said the Trump administration would use any and all available laws to help officials carry out the president’s promised mass deportation plan, including the World War II-era Alien Registration Act. That law says immigrants in the country for more than 30 days without authorization must register with the federal government or be criminally charged, she said. “We can go in and take you out of your home and deport you out of this country,” Noem said. Anyone who fails to register will also face daily fines of up to $1,000, she added. The AP [4/10/2025 7:58 PM, Rebecca Santana, 48304K] reports McFadden’s ruling didn’t go into the substance of those arguments but rested largely on the technical issue of whether the groups pushing to stop the requirement had standing to pursue their claims. He ruled they didn’t. The requirement goes into effect Friday. Immediately after the ruling, Department of Homeland Security officials emphasized in a news release that the deadline to register for those who’ve already been in the country for 30 days or more is Friday and that going forward, the registration requirement would be enforced to the fullest. “President Trump and I have a clear message for those in our country illegally: leave now. If you leave now, you may have the opportunity to return and enjoy our freedom and live the American dream,” Secretary Kristi Noem said in the statement. “The Trump administration will enforce all our immigration laws — we will not pick and choose which laws we will enforce. We must know who is in our country for the safety and security of our homeland and all Americans.” The New York Post [4/10/2025 6:51 PM, Victor Nava, 54903K] reports that a handful of nonprofit organizations serving immigrant communities – the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights Los Angeles (CHIRLA), United Farmworkers of America, Make the Road New York and CASA – sued the Department of Homeland Security last month in an effort to block the registration requirement from going into effect. "Plaintiffs have not shown that they are likely to succeed on the merits," DC US District Court Judge Trevor McFadden ruled Thursday. "They have failed to demonstrate that they have standing to bring this suit.” McFadden, an appointee of President Trump, argued that the potential harms of the registry, as alleged by the advocacy groups, were "speculative" and the nonprofits "have not shown that any individual member possesses a concrete harm cognizable by an Article III court.” The judge noted that laws requiring non-citizens to register with the federal government date back to the Alien Registration Act of 1940, with the current requirement stemming from the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952. The Washington Examiner [4/10/2025 4:55 PM, Anna Giaritelli, 2296K] reports that the Department of Homeland Security is reminding all noncitizen residents who have been in the country for more than 30 days to register with the government by Friday to comply with the Alien Registration Act. The directive requires immigrants 14 or older who were not previously fingerprinted or registered when obtaining a visa or being released into the country from the border to do so now. Parents must also register children under 14, but they will not be fingerprinted. Immigrants will then be given registration cards, which they must always carry. The registry is part of an effort to compel "mass self-deportation" to take the pressure off law enforcement. DHS officials warned in the statement Thursday that "there will be no sanctuary for noncompliance."

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Roll Call [4/10/2025 8:02 PM, Michael Macagnone, 503K] reports the Supreme Court on Thursday ordered the Trump administration to try to return a wrongly deported immigrant from a high-security prison in El Salvador where he is being held. The unsigned, unanimous ruling said the Trump administration should try to have Maryland resident Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia returned from the Salvadorian prison known as CECOT so that he can have immigration proceedings. The Trump administration deported Abrego Garcia last month in what it acknowledged was an "administrative error" despite a court order that he not be sent to El Salvador. The Supreme Court decision Thursday upheld a lower-court order for Abrego Garcia to be brought back to the United States. "The order properly requires the Government to ‘facilitate’ Abrego Garcia’s release from custody in El Salvador and to ensure that his case is handled as it would have been had he not been improperly sent to El Salvador," the decision said. After Abrego Garcia’s family sued the Trump administration, Judge Paula Xinis for the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland ordered the Trump administration to return Abrego Garcia to the United States by Monday evening. Then on Monday, a unanimous three-judge decision from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit upheld that judge’s order to return Garcia to the United States. The Trump administration asked the justices to intervene and they granted a temporary stay before issuing Thursday’s order. Abrego Garcia’s case has gained prominence in reaction to Trump’s broad assertion of deportation powers, as Democratic members of Congress have demanded his return. On Thursday members of the Maryland congressional delegation held a rally with Abrego Garcia’s family. The Congressional Hispanic Caucus also sent a letter to the Trump administration about Abrego Garcia’s deportation. The Trump administration has alleged that Abrego Garcia, who has not been charged with a crime, was a member of MS-13 and eligible for deportation. Thursday’s Supreme Court decision noted that he has denied being a member of the gang. The case is Kristi Noem et al. v Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia et al. The New York Times [4/11/2025 2:53 AM, Adam Liptak, 145325K] reports that the case will now return to the trial court, and it is not clear whether and when Mr. Abrego Garcia will be returned to the United States. “The district court should clarify its directive, with due regard for the deference owed to the executive branch in the conduct of foreign affairs,” the Supreme Court’s ruling said. “For its part, the government should be prepared to share what it can concerning the steps it has taken and the prospect of further steps.” The ruling appeared to be unanimous. But Justice Sonia Sotomayor, joined by Justices Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson, issued a statement that was harshly critical of the government’s conduct and said she would have upheld every part of the trial judge’s order. “To this day,” Justice Sotomayor wrote, “the government has cited no basis in law for Abrego Garcia’s warrantless arrest, his removal to El Salvador or his confinement in a Salvadoran prison. Nor could it.” Justice Sotomayor urged the trial judge, Paula Xinis of the Federal District Court in Maryland, to “continue to ensure that the government lives up to its obligations to follow the law.” A Justice Department spokesman responded to the order by focusing on its reference to the executive branch. “As the Supreme Court correctly recognized, it is the exclusive prerogative of the president to conduct foreign affairs,” the spokesman said. “By directly noting the deference owed to the executive branch, this ruling once again illustrates that activist judges do not have the jurisdiction to seize control of the president’s authority to conduct foreign policy.” The AP [4/10/2025 8:44 PM, Mark Sherman, 34586K] reports the justices also said that her order must now be clarified to make sure it doesn’t intrude into executive branch power over foreign affairs, since Abrego Garcia is being held abroad. The court said the Trump administration should also be prepared to share what steps it has taken to try to get him back — and what more it could potentially do. The administration claims Abrego Garcia is a member of the MS-13 gang, though he has never been charged with or convicted of a crime. His attorneys said there is no evidence he was in MS-13. The administration has conceded that it made a mistake in sending him to El Salvador, but argued that it no longer could do anything about it. Breitbart [4/10/2025 9:33 PM, Staff, 2923K] reports that the US government argued that it no longer had jurisdiction to have Abrego Garcia released now that he is on Salvadoran soil, calling the lower courts’ orders "unprecedented and indefensible" and a "demand that the United States let a member of a foreign terrorist organization into America tonight.” "We’re confident that people that are (in CECOT) should be there, and they should stay there for the rest of their lives," Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said Wednesday, according to news site Axios.

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The Hill [4/10/2025 12:41 PM, Rebecca Beitsch, 12829K] reports that the Congressional Hispanic Caucus wrote to Salvadoran president Nayib Bukele demanding the release of a Maryland man mistakenly deported to one of the country’s most notorious prisons. The letter, spearheaded by Chair Rep. Adriano Espaillat (D-N.Y.), comes after the Justice Department said Kilmar Abrego Garcia was deported due to an “administrative error” despite a 2019 court order protecting him from removal. “Mr. President, when I joined your 2024 inauguration as part of a congressional delegation, you and I discussed your aspirations for the Salvadoran people. Mr. Abrego Garcia is a hardworking, law-abiding U.S. resident of Salvadoran descent, and a devoted caregiver to his wife and three children—all of whom are U.S. citizens,” Espaillat wrote in a letter from the caucus. “For the aforementioned reasons, Mr. Abrego Garcia’s detention is neither legal, ethical or beneficial to the interests of the peoples of the U.S. and El Salvador,” the New York Democrat added. The caucus held a press conference with the family of Abrego Garcia Wednesday. His wife Jennifer Vasquez Sura describing her husband as being “abducted and disappeared” by the Trump administration. Abrego Garcia is being held alongside more than 200 other men deported by the Trump administration in El Salvador’s Terrorism Confinement Center, known by its acronym in Spanish, CECOT. The Trump administration is paying El Salvador $6 million to house the men for the next year. In court, the Trump administration has fought efforts to release Abrego Garcia, saying they no longer have jurisdiction over him now that he is not on U.S. soil and has argued it may not be able to “entreat – or even cajole” El Salvador to secure his return.

AP [4/10/2025 9:22 PM, Ben Finley, 48304K] reports Kilmar Abrego Garcia’s story appeared as if it would begin and end in his native El Salvador. But the U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday ordered the Trump administration to facilitate his return to the U.S. from a notorious prison, rejecting the White House’s claim that it couldn’t retrieve the Salvadoran national after mistakenly deporting him. Abrego Garcia, 29, will come back to the country he’s lived in for roughly 14 years, during which he worked construction, got married and was raising three children with disabilities, according to court records. He’ll also get to face the allegations that prompted his expulsion: a 2019 accusation from local police in Maryland that he was an MS-13 gang member. Abrego Garcia denied the allegation and was never charged with a crime, his attorneys said. A U.S. immigration judge subsequently shielded him from deportation to El Salvador because he likely faced persecution there by local gangs that terrorized his family. The Trump administration deported him there last month anyway, later describing the mistake as “an administrative error” but insisting he was in MS-13.

ABC News [4/10/2025 6:09 PM, John Parkinson and Oren Oppenheim, 34586K] reports that in a vote on Thursday, the House of Representatives passed the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) Act, a bill Republicans have celebrated but that has drawn the ire of voting rights groups and most congressional Democrats. The bill passed with 220 votes in favor and 208 opposed. Four Democrats joined the Republican majority in the House to advance the bill. It now heads to the Senate, which did not act after the House passed the bill last July -- allowing it to expire at the end of the 118th Congress. Republicans will need Democratic support to overcome a 60-vote threshold to be able to pass the bill in the Senate. The measure would require states to obtain in-person "documentary" proof of citizenship before registering a person to vote for a federal election. The measure also would require states to remove noncitizens from existing voter rolls. Noncitizens are already prohibited from voting in federal and state elections, though some cities and localities allow noncitizens to vote in some local elections, and voter roll audits leading up to the 2024 elections found rare instances of noncitizen voting. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., posted Thursday that the bill is "dead on arrival" in the Senate. "The Republicans’ SAVE Act reads more like a how-to guide for voter suppression. It goes against the very foundations of our democracy," he added. "Mark my words: This will not pass the Senate.” Supporters of the bill have argued it will strengthen voting laws and confidence in elections and that it gives states flexibility to figure out how to allow people to register to vote if they have an issue or discrepancy with the documents. "Despite the ridiculous attacks and purposeful misinformation spread about the bill, I am pleased to see that the House of Representatives once again passed the SAVE Act on a bipartisan basis to ensure only U.S. citizens vote in federal elections," Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, the author of the legislation, said in a statement on Thursday. "In order to preserve this republic, we must uphold what it means to be able to vote in a U.S. election.” "You have to prove your identity because only U.S. citizens should vote and decide U.S. elections. It’s already in federal law, but there’s no mechanism currently to ensure that that law is always followed, and this measure, the SAVE act, will help make sure that it’s true," House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., told reporters after the bill passed. Opponents of the bill, including many voting rights organizations, have argued that the bill, if it becomes law, could disenfranchise voters who are citizens but do not have the eligible documents and that it will make it far tougher to register to vote. Some opponents of the SAVE Act have also raised concerns over challenges married women could face if their current last names do not match their birth certificates, if they have to use one as a qualifying document. Supporters have countered that states will have the flexibility to figure out solutions for those affected. CBS News [4/10/2025 12:20 PM, Caitlin Yilek and Kaia Hubbard, 51661K] reports Republican Rep. Chip Roy of Texas, who introduced the bill, said Thursday "there’s nothing controversial about saying that you should be able to ensure that only citizens vote." A 2023 study from the Brennan Center for Justice found that more than 21 million American citizens did not have easy access to documents that would prove their citizenship. Another 3.8 million did not have the documents at all, often because they had been lost, destroyed or stolen. The bill’s requirement to show proof of citizenship in person would affect millions more voters who do have the documentation but register by mail or online, the Brennan Center said. Critics also say it would pose a barrier for people who have changed their legal names through marriage. An estimated 69 million women and 4 million men do not have a last name that matches their birth certificate, according to the Center for American Progress. Roll Call [4/10/2025 11:53 AM, Justin Papp, 503K] reports that the measure passed, 220-208, with Republicans in favor joined by four Democrats: Reps. Ed Case of Hawaii, Jared Golden of Maine, Henry Cuellar of Texas, and Marie Gluesenkamp Perez of Washington.

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Blaze [4/10/2025 7:00 PM, Staff, 1668K] reports the Department of Government Efficiency has just uncovered what may go down as one of the largest scandals in American history — that not only did millions of illegal aliens get Social Security numbers under Biden, but they obtained voter IDs and voted in the 2024 election. "Of course, we had Antonio Gracias — who is, of course, a volunteer with DOGE — Elon Musk, and all of them, saying this is not just a loophole. It’s a deliberate system, actually. Noncitizens are filing for asylum, they’re getting work authorization, and then that’s automatically triggering a Social Security number," Sara Gonzales of "Sara Gonzales Unfiltered" explains. "So from there, driver’s licenses, voter rolls, benefits, and, of course, in some cases, voting," she adds. "One-point-three million of them are on Medicaid right now, and we looked at the voter rolls, and we found that thousands of them were registered to vote in a handful of states. I mean, it is shockingly bad, and this is the tip of the iceberg guys. We mapped the system from enumeration, that’s how you get your number, all the way to the end. Went to the offices and saw how the offices operate," Gracias explained in a clip from the "All-In" podcast. "And in that process, one of our engineers found this data called Enumeration Beyond Entry (EBE). It had this giant ram to it, and that just jumped out at us," he continued. "This program was designed for people that we want to let in.” "A legitimate program was abused. So they allowed people that were illegal at the border to come in legally," he said, adding, "If I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes, I wouldn’t have believed it. And this is the tip of the iceberg.”

Axios [4/10/2025 7:29 PM, Sareen Habeshian, 13163K] reports the Department of Homeland Security offered a brief two-page memo as its evidence in the case against Columbia University alumnus Mahmoud Khalil ahead of Friday’s hearing that will likely decide if the detained legal permanent resident is deported from the U.S. The memo from Secretary of State Marco Rubio leaned heavily on the U.S.’ right to remove noncitizens whose presence in the country would "compromise a compelling U.S. foreign policy interest." The memo obtained by Axios does not allege any criminal conduct by Khalil and he has not been charged with any crime. At the time of Khalil’s arrest, ICE informed him that his student visa was revoked, and upon learning he was a legal resident, they revoked his green card instead, his attorney told Axios after his arrest. In the memo, Rubio wrote that allowing Khalil to remain in the country would "undermine U.S. policy to combat anti-Semitism around the world and in the United States, in addition to efforts to protect Jewish students from harassment and violence in the United States." Khalil could be expelled for his participation and roles in "antisemitic protests and disruptive activities," Rubio’s letter states. CBS News [4/10/2025 5:43 PM, Katrina Kaufman, Graham Kates, 51661K] reports faced with a deadline to provide evidence in its deportation case against activist Mahmoud Khalil, lawyers for the federal government instead filed a memorandum by Secretary of State Marco Rubio to a Louisiana immigration court. In the memo, which was obtained by CBS News, Rubio wrote that Khalil’s role in protests on the campus of Columbia University is in conflict with American foreign policy objectives. Rubio did not cite specific evidence against Khalil. He stated that Khalil is deportable under a little-known statute in federal immigration law that provides the government is entitled to deport noncitizens whose presence in the U.S. damages national foreign policy interests. Assistant chief immigration Judge Jamee Comans on Tuesday said she would terminate the case unless the government showed evidence supporting the removal of the former Columbia student. Khalil’s attorney Marc Van Der Hout said at the hearing that he had "not received a single document" of evidence from the government. In response, the Department of Homeland Security submitted the two-page memo from Rubio, which includes references to Khalil and one other lawful permanent resident whose name was redacted. Comans has set a removability hearing for Khalil on Friday at 1 p.m., at which she could determine whether sufficient evidence has been provided to support the continuation of his immigration case. The AP [4/10/2025 8:23 PM, Jake Offenhartz, 5046K] reports Rubio wrote Khalil could be expelled for his beliefs. He said that while Khalil’s activities were "otherwise lawful," letting him remain in the country would undermine "U.S. policy to combat anti-Semitism around the world and in the United States, in addition to efforts to protect Jewish students from harassment and violence in the United States." "Condoning anti-Semitic conduct and disruptive protests in the United States would severely undermine that significant foreign policy objective," Rubio wrote in the undated memo. A Department of Homeland Security spokesperson, Tricia McLaughlin, did not respond to questions about whether it had additional evidence against Khalil, writing in an emailed statement, "DHS did file evidence, but immigration court dockets are not available to the public." NBC News [4/10/2025 4:46 PM, Chloe Atkins and Matt Lavietes, 44742K] reports [Rubio] cited an obscure provision of the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952 to justify Khalil’s removal from the U.S. Assistant Chief Immigration Judge Jamee Comans will decide at a hearing scheduled for Friday in Louisiana whether Khalil can be removed from the United States or should be released. If she rules that Khalil can be deported, his legal team can appeal.

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FOX News [4/10/2025 6:19 PM, Louis Casiano, 46189K] reports attorneys for anti-Israel protester Mahmoud Khalil criticized a two-page letter from Secretary of State Marco Rubio, saying the entire case against their client rests on shaky allegations. The letter, which was filed in an immigration court this week and published Thursday, said the Trump administration has the authority to expel noncitizens whose presence in the country damages U.S. foreign policy interests. The memo alleges that Khalil, a legal permanent U.S. resident and Columbia University graduate student who served as spokesperson for anti-Israel protesters during large demonstrations, participated in "antisemitic protests and disruptive activities." His presence in the U.S. would have "potentially serious adverse foreign consequences, and would compromise a compelling U.S. foreign policy interest.” "Two pages, that’s it," Marc Van Der Hout, one of Khalil’s lawyers, told reporters during a virtual news conference Thursday. "Yet this administration wants to silence Mahmoud, wants to silence people speaking out against the government of Israel or the government of the United States.” The Trump administration is attempting to deport Khalil over his activities at the Ivy League university last year. Federal Judge Jamee Comans said she will rule Friday on whether Khalil can be deported or if he must be freed. "I think the bigger picture here that we all need to keep focus on is that tomorrow’s hearing has momentous implications, whether the government can act in violation of the Constitution, to deport someone, is front and center, and our position is that it cannot," said Johnny Sinodis, another one of Khalil’s lawyers. The attorneys also accused the Trump administration of forum "shopping" in an effort to argue their case against Khalil in a friendly court.

New York Times [4/10/2025 9:29 PM, Jonah E. Bromwich, 145325K] reports lawyers for Mahmoud Khalil on Thursday said that they would seek testimony from Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who argues that though Mr. Khalil committed no crimes, his very presence in the United States enables antisemitism. Mr. Khalil, a Columbia University graduate who led pro-Palestinian demonstrations on the campus last year, has been detained by the government for more than a month. He has a hearing in immigration court in Louisiana on Friday where, his lawyers acknowledged, it is unlikely that the judge will grant their request to hear from Mr. Rubio. But they said that the lack of justification for Mr. Khalil’s detention other than Mr. Rubio’s assertion made it all the more essential that the secretary be compelled to answer questions in a deposition. “Mr. Khalil has the right under due process to confront the evidence against him, and that’s what we want to examine Secretary of State Rubio about,” said Marc Van Der Hout, one of his lawyers. The State Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The lawyers’ remarks came in a news briefing a day after the Department of Homeland Security submitted evidence in its case to deport Mr. Khalil. The case has raised major questions about free speech and due process during President Trump’s second term. Mr. Khalil’s lawyers said that the evidence that the department submitted — including an undated memo from Mr. Rubio — provided no additional justification for the Trump administration’s argument for Mr. Khalil’s deportation. The memo, first obtained by The Associated Press, did not accuse Mr. Khalil, a legal permanent resident who is Palestinian and married to an American citizen, of criminal conduct. Instead, as has been reported, the administration cited a seldom-used statute that allows the secretary of state to start deportation proceedings against anyone whom he can reasonably consider a threat to United States foreign policy, in this case a policy of combating antisemitism.

Washington Post [4/11/2025 5:00 AM, David Nakamura, 31735K] reports Columbia University student Mahmoud Khalil’s attorneys were stunned when an immigration judge in Jena, Louisiana, announced this week that she would rule on whether he should be deported on Friday — three days after his initial court appearance. “That is, in my opinion, contrary to every notion of due process,” Marc Van Der Hout, one of his attorneys, told reporters Thursday. He said the compressed schedule provides little time to review the Trump administration’s evidence, submitted to the court two days before the expected ruling, alleging the legal U.S. permanent resident is a national security threat for leading pro-Palestinian campus demonstrations at Columbia last year. The speed at which Khalil’s immigration proceedings are moving has alarmed immigrant rights advocates and his representatives, who are accusing the Trump administration of strategically isolating college students and professors at remote Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention centers in Louisiana and Texas with the intention of creating additional complications for their legal cases. The detention centers are within the jurisdiction of the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans, widely considered the nation’s most conservative circuit, making it potentially more difficult for noncitizens to win favorable rulings and speeding up their deportations. Though immigration judges are separate from the federal court system, legal experts and civil rights advocates fear those in conservative parts of the country are likely to be more receptive to the Trump administration’s agenda. “They are forum-shopping as to where they want the case decided,” Van Der Hout said. “That has been clear, certainly, in this case and others in which individuals have been shipped off to faraway locations.” Like Khalil, Rumeysa Ozturk, a graduate student at Tufts University in Medford, Massachusetts, is being held at the central ICE processing facility in Jena. Kseniia Petrova, an associate researcher at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts, is in Richwood, Louisiana. And Georgetown University researcher Badar Khan Suri, arrested near his home in Northern Virginia, has been detained in Alvarado, Texas. All are hundreds of miles from where they live and were arrested.

Los Angeles Times [4/10/2025 6:00 PM, Taryn Luna, 13342K] reports California Gov. Gavin Newsom sent a letter to Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem on Thursday requesting that the federal government bring Andry José Hernández Romero, a Venezuelan immigrant who was deported to a maximum security prison in El Salvador last month, to the U.S. for a judge to evaluate his case. Hernández Romero, a 31-year-old makeup artist who is gay, sought asylum legally due to persecution for his sexuality and opposition to Venezuela’s ruling party. The case has drawn national attention and criticism of the Trump administration over allegations that innocent immigrants who entered the U.S. legally have been detained and deported without due process in a campaign the president said is aimed at removing "terrorists" and gang members from the country under the Alien Enemies Act of 1798. In his letter to Noem, Newsom said he wrote to express his concerns that deporting people without due process is "a dangerous precedent that threatens to irreparably stain the reputation of the Department of Homeland Security and this country."

AP [4/10/2025 10:25 PM, Michael Casey, 48304K] reports a federal judge on Thursday will halt the Trump administration from ending a program that allowed hundreds of thousands of Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans and Venezuelans to temporarily live in the United States. U.S. District Judge Indira Talwani announced that she plans to issue a stay on the program, which was set to end later this month. The push to help more than 500,000 Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans and Venezuelans is part of a broader legal effort to protect nationals from Ukraine, Afghanistan and other countries who are here legally. During a hearing on the case, Talwani repeatedly questioned the government’s assertion for ending the program — namely that it has the power to do and that it was no longer serving its purpose. She argued that immigrants in the program who are here legally now face an option of "fleeing the country" or staying and "risk losing everything.” "The nub of the problem here is that the secretary, in cutting short the parole period afforded to these individuals, has to have a reasoned decision," Talwani said, adding that the explanation for ending the program was "based on an incorrect reading of the law.” "There was a deal and now that deal has been undercut," she added later in the hearing. Last month, the administration revoked legal protections for hundreds of thousands of Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans and Venezuelans, setting them up for potential deportation in 30 days. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said they will lose their legal status on April 24. They arrived with financial sponsors and were given two-year permits to live and work in the U.S. During that time, the beneficiaries needed to find other legal pathways if they wanted to stay in the U.S. Parole has been a temporary status. President Donald Trump has been ending legal pathways for immigrants to come to the U.S., implementing campaign promises to deport millions of people who are in the U.S. illegally.

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CBS News [4/10/2025 6:08 PM, Staff, 51661K]

The AP [4/10/2025 9:37 PM, Will Weissert and Fatima Hussein, 48304K] reports the Trump administration has moved to classify more than 6,000 living immigrants as dead, canceling their Social Security numbers and effectively wiping out their ability to work or receive benefits in an effort to get them to leave the country, according to two people familiar with the situation. The move will make it much harder for those affected to use banks or other basic services where Social Security numbers are required. It’s part of a broader effort by President Donald Trump to crack down on immigrants who were allowed to enter and remain temporarily in the United States under programs instituted by his predecessor, Joe Biden. The Trump administration is moving the immigrants’ names and legally obtained Social Security numbers to a database that federal officials normally use to track the deceased, according to the two people familiar with the moves and their ramifications. They spoke on condition of anonymity Thursday night because the plans had not yet been publicly detailed. The officials said stripping the immigrants of their Social Security numbers will cut them off from many financial services and encourage them to “self-deport” and abandon the U.S. for their birth countries. It wasn’t immediately clear how the 6,000-plus immigrants were chosen. But the Trump White House has targeted people in the country temporarily under Biden-era programs, including more than 900,000 immigrants who entered the U.S. using that administration’s CBP One app. On Monday, the Department of Homeland Security revoked the legal status of the immigrants who used that app. They had generally been allowed to remain in the U.S. for two years with work authorization under presidential parole authority during the Biden era, but are now expected to self-deport. CBS News [4/10/2025 9:27 PM, Aaron Navarro, 51661K] reports that the move essentially cancels an immigrant’s Social Security number and is equivalent to a financial death, as financial institutions rely on updated Social Security data to verify identities and deaths and may cut off access for these individuals. Three sources tell CBS News that in recent days, the SSA renamed their agency’s "death master file," which tracks the death of individuals to stop them from receiving Social Security benefits, to the "ineligible master file.” Under the new name, the SSA is classifying immigrants as dead with false dates, multiple sources said. This would essentially invalidate their Social Security number and access to government benefits. The agency wrote in March that an "erroneously reported" death will stop benefits, can cause "financial hardship" and is "long and challenging" to fix. This first group of immigrants moved to the ineligible list had criminal records or were immigrants who the Department of Homeland Security alleges have connections to terrorism, two sources said. But there is an expectation and concern among Social Security employees and experts that other immigrants with legal Social Security numbers, such as those who have legal work authorization and entered through the "Enumeration Beyond Entry" program, could be targeted next. The request to add the first 6,000 names to this list came from DHS, two sources said. There was also a memorandum of agreement about the move signed on Monday by DHS Secretary Kristi Noem and Acting SSA Commissioner Leland Dudek, according to one source familiar. The New York Times [4/10/2025 6:42 PM, Alexandra Berzon, Hamed Aleaziz, Nicholas Nehamas, Ryan Mac and Tara Siegel Bernard, 145325K] reports that the effort hinges on a surprising new tactic: repurposing Social Security’s “death master file,” which for years has been used to track dead people who should no longer receive benefits, to include the names of living people who the government believes should be treated as if they are dead. As a result of being added to the death database, they would be blacklisted from a coveted form of identity that allows them to make and spend money. The initial names are limited to people the administration says are convicted criminals and “suspected terrorists,” the documents show. But officials said the effort could broaden to include others in the country without authorization. In another previously unreported development, Mr. Dudek in February reached an agreement with the Department of Homeland Security that would provide the last known addresses of 98,000 people to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the federal agency responsible for deporting undocumented immigrants, other documents and interviews show.

Reported similarly:
Washington Post [4/10/2025 5:42 PM, Lisa Rein, Hannah Natanson and Maria Sacchetti, 31735K]
Reuters [4/10/2025 9:21 PM, Ted Hesson and Daniel Trotta, 41523K]

Washington Post [4/10/2025 8:05 PM, Marianne LeVine, Maria Sacchetti, Jeremy Roebuck, Carol D. Leonnig, and Ellen Nakashima, 31735K] reports the Department of Homeland Security has enlisted the FBI and other law enforcement agencies in recent weeks to conduct welfare checks on children and young people who came to the United States without their parents, alarming advocates who worry it’s an effort to target them for deportation or scare them. President Donald Trump has long accused his predecessor of losing more than 300,000 migrant children, claiming that they are now “slaves, sex slaves or dead,” though many also arrived during the president’s first term. Immigration experts have said that most of those children have been safely reunited with their parents or relatives in the United States. Trump administration officials confirmed they are doing the welfare checks, which have gained some attention on social media, prompting questions and concern. Law enforcement agents from the FBI, the Drug Enforcement Administration, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, and Homeland Security Investigations have been given a list of questions to ask the minors and their sponsors during the welfare checks, according to a document from the DHS Center for Countering Human Trafficking reviewed by The Washington Post. The form directs agents to question sponsors about who asked them to sponsor the child, if any payment was made during the sponsor process, what information they provided in their application, whether the sponsor has ever been arrested, where the sponsors do their banking and where the sponsor works. Authorities are also asking the sponsor if the minor is working to pay off the cost of smuggling them into the country. The questions for the minors include how they arrived in the United States; if they were hurt during the trip; if they go to school and where; if they work, where they work and what kind of work they do; information about their parents; and whom they currently live with. Task force members were instructed to contact Immigrations and Customs Enforcement if they found children who were in danger, according to one person briefed on the work who, like others interviewed, spoke on the condition of anonymity.

FOX News [4/10/2025 6:35 PM, Alec Schemmel, 46189K] reports during President Donald Trump’s second public meeting with his Cabinet at the White House on Thursday, he said there will soon be a deadline by which illegal immigrants must be gone from the U.S., or they will not be allowed to try to reenter legally. The president’s comments came as he expressed a willingness to work with undocumented immigrants "right from the beginning" to help them return to the country legally — that is, if they leave "in a nice way," the president added. "We’re going to work with people, so that if they go out in a nice way, and go back to their country, we’re going to work with them right from the beginning on trying to get them back in legally," Trump said following comments from Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem. "So it gives you real incentive, otherwise they’ll never come back — they’ll never be allowed once a certain period of time goes by, which is probably going to be 60 days.” The Trump administration is currently undergoing a massive voluntary removal effort, with federal officials encouraging immigrants residing illegally in the U.S. to self-deport through the administration’s CBP Home app. More than 5,000 immigrants self-deported over the last month, according to Department of Homeland Security (DHS) data. "It’s a very big self-deport operation that we’re starting," Noem said during Thursday’s Cabinet meeting. Noem pointed out that currently, under the Alien Registration Act and the president’s Executive Orders, if undocumented immigrants still have not registered their status with the federal government, they can be criminally charged, face fines of up to $1,000 per day "and they’ll never get the chance to come back to America.” She also added that the agency is working on securing the funding and resources to ensure deported immigrants land on their feet when they return to their home country, pointing to programs in places like Mexico, El Salvador and Colombia that are offering food and housing assistance.

Reuters [4/10/2025 6:38 PM, Nate Raymond, 41523K] reports a federal judge said she will block President Donald Trump’s administration on Thursday from revoking the temporary legal status of hundreds of thousands of Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans and Venezuelans in the United States. U.S. District Judge Indira Talwani in Boston said the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s decision to cut short a two-year parole granted to the migrants under Trump’s Democratic predecessor Joe Biden was based on an incorrect reading of the law. The judge, an appointee of Democratic President Barack Obama, said the administration wanted to expose about 450,000 people to expedited deportation effective April 24 based on a wrong interpretation of the statute governing the process. She said that law focused on people who illegally crossed the border and providing a means to remove them on an expedited basis, not individuals who were granted permission to enter the United States under a grant of parole.

Reuters [4/10/2025 4:27 PM, Nate Raymond, 41523K] reports a federal judge on Thursday expressed concern with what he called a "troublesome" new Trump administration policy that appears to allow authorities to rapidly deport hundreds of migrants to countries they had no notice they could be sent to before they can even raise a claim that they might be killed upon arrival. U.S. District Judge Brian Murphy during a hearing in Boston pressed a lawyer for the administration on how migrants subject to final deportation orders could be assured due process under guidance issued by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. That guidance was issued after Murphy on March 28 issued a temporary restraining order blocking President Donald Trump’s administration from deporting migrants to countries not raised in earlier immigration proceedings without giving them a chance to show they feared being persecuted or tortured there. In the fiscal year 2023, 1,769 people with final orders of removal were granted limited forms of protection against return to countries where their life or freedom would be threatened or where they faced a risk of torture. Under the new guidance, before a migrant can be deported to a different, newly identified country, the U.S. government needs to have received diplomatic assurances that they will not be persecuted or tortured there. If the United States has not received such assurances or does not believe them to be credible, authorities would need to provide the migrant notice and assess any fears they raise of torture before they can be removed. Murphy said he planned to rule on the injunction request within a week.

NewsNation [4/10/2025 7:51 AM, Tom Dempsey, 6866K] reports the Trump administration’s mass deportation plan has encountered legal resistance after judges in New York and Texas temporarily banned the removal of jailed Venezuelans under the Alien Enemies Act. The judges ruled detainees accused of gang affiliations must be granted a hearing to prove otherwise before being deported. As a result, certain Venezuelans currently detained in the southern district of New York — which includes the New York City boroughs of Manhattan and the Bronx, and six counties north of the city — and a detention center in South Texas will remain in the United States while their cases proceed through the courts. Both judges went beyond their cases, granting temporary protection from deportation for Venezuelan detainees in their jurisdictions from deportation under the act. Civil rights lawyers in the two states had sued to prevent the government from deporting five men who deny being part of the Tren de Aragua gang. Similar legal challenges are likely to follow in other areas in which Venezuelans have been detained. The American Civil Liberties Union is asking the judges in Texas and New York to decide whether the administration’s use of the Alien Enemies Act is lawful when the country is not at war. "We are hoping this doesn’t come down to hundreds and hundreds of individual cases of people having to prove they’re not gang members because we don’t think the act during peacetime can be used at all," said ACLU attorney Lee Gelernt. The rulings align with Monday’s U.S. Supreme Court decision to allow the administration to resume deportation flights under the Alien Enemies Act, but only if detainees are granted due process. President Donald Trump praised the ruling Wednesday, saying, "The Supreme Court just gave us numerous good rulings where we have to be able to get them out. You had other judges trying to take over the system. They want these people coming back, Tren de Aragua from the Venezuela jails.” In Texas, U.S. District Judge Fernando Rodriguez Jr. — who was appointed by Trump during his first presidential term — highlighted the case involving Kilmar Abrego Garcia, who was mistakenly deported to El Salvador due to an administrative error. Garcia’s wife, Jennifer Vasquez Sura, is pleading for his return. "Kilmar, if you can hear me, I’m still fighting for you. Your brother, your mother, our children are still fighting for you. We’re not going to give up hope," Sura said.

USA Today [4/10/2025 4:17 PM, Trevor Hughes, 75858K] reports the Trump administration’s increased scrutiny of pro-Palestinian protests, including social media screening and visa revocations, has dampened campus activism. Free speech experts and some activist groups are concerned about the chilling effect on student activism and the potential long-term implications for First Amendment rights. The Trump administration’s get-tough approach to pro-Palestinian protests on university campuses appears to have helped halt the encampments, marches and sometimes-violent confrontations seen a year ago. Experts say the moves by President Donald Trump and his allies in Congress prompted university administrators to clamp down on protests and warn students to mind their behavior. And now a Trump administration push to deport or eject international students over allegations they are aligned with Hamas has further chilled campus activism. In response, some activist groups have cautioned international students in particular to avoid being associated with any movements targeted by Trump. Free-speech experts worry about the long-term implications of silencing student protests.

FOX News [4/10/2025 10:28 AM, Emma Colton, 10702K] reports that President Donald Trump’s recent executive order blitz to "unleash" American energy by cutting red tape surrounding the coal industry also launched a "counterstrike" on left-wing legal efforts to derail energy growth within the U.S., experts told Fox Digital. "Democrats have long used and abused federal power to impose leftist policies on the states and the American people. It is refreshing to see a president use the federal power to promote economic freedom and the strength of the American economy, instead," said James Taylor, president of The Heartland Institute, a free-market think tank critical of restrictive climate policies. Trump signed four executive orders (EOs) on Tuesday, while surrounded by U.S. coal miners, that aim to revitalize the coal industry, including an EO that directs the Department of Justice to identify and end "unconstitutional" state policies targeting the coal industry. "I’m instructing the Department of Justice to identify and fight every single unconstitutional state or local regulation that’s putting our coal miners out of business. And we are withdrawing all of those objections from our government today. It’s all being withdrawn," Trump said on Tuesday during the signing event.

Blaze [4/10/2025 1:45 PM, Joseph Mackinnon, 1668K] reports that the No Rogue Rulings Act of 2025 passed the U.S. House in a 219-213 vote along party lines on Wednesday. The bill would amend chapter 85, title 8 of the U.S. Code to prohibit a U.S. district court from issuing an injunction unless the injunction applies only to the parties of the particular case before the court. Rep. Darrell Issa, the California Republican who introduced the legislation in February, noted that the Trump-endorsed bill "would impose important limits on nationwide injunctions, which activist Federal courts are weaponizing in an attempt to undermine President Trump’s legitimate powers under Article II of the Constitution.” While the legislation will likely fail in the U.S. Senate, where a handful of Democrats would have to come on board in order to reach the 60-vote threshold, the passage of the bill in Congress nevertheless signals mounting frustration with judicial overreach, particularly by Democrat-appointed district judges. The Congressional Research Service indicated in a March 28 report that the "Department of Justice had identified 12 nationwide injunctions issued during the presidency of George W. Bush, 19 issued during Barack Obama’s presidency, and 55 such injunctions issued during the first Trump administration" as of February 2020. The CRS said there had already been at least 17 cases of national injunctions during the second Trump administration between Jan. 20 and March 27.

Reported similarly:
Univision [4/10/2025 2:43 PM, Staff, 5325K]

The Washington Examiner [4/10/2025 10:33 AM, Jenny Goldsberry, 2296K] reports that President Donald Trump signed executive orders Wednesday targeting former Department of Homeland Security officials Chris Krebs and Miles Taylor, as well as law firm Susman Godfrey. The orders revoked security clearances for the officials who worked under DHS during Trump’s first term. The president also recommended Attorney General Pam Bondi and DHS Secretary Kristi Noem investigate Krebs and Taylor’s actions during their service to determine whether they engaged in the "unauthorized dissemination of classified information." Trump also hit Susman Godfrey with many of the same sanctions he has put on other law firms he has accused of "weaponizing the justice system." Some firms have negotiated to avoid punishment, while others have retaliated by suing the Trump administration. The Wednesday orders follow a long list of opponents from which Trump pulled security clearances, including former President Joe Biden, former Vice President Kamala Harris, former Rep. Liz Cheney, and New York Attorney General Letitia James, among others. The Daily Wire [4/10/2025 1:48 PM, Tim Pearce, 4672K] reports that the memos also strip Taylor, Krebs, and others of security clearances. Taylor gained fame in the media after revealing himself in public as the author of an anonymous op-ed in New York Times in which he claimed to be part of the "resistance" to Trump inside the administration. He later authored a book titled "Anonymous" about his time in the Trump administration. "Miles Taylor was entrusted with the solemn responsibility of Federal service, but instead prioritized his own ambition, personal notoriety, and monetary gain over fidelity to his constitutional oath," Trump’s White House memo states. "While serving as an administrative staff assistant at the Department of Homeland Security, Taylor stoked dissension by manufacturing sensationalist reports on the existence of a supposed ‘resistance’ within the Federal Government that ‘vowed’ to undermine and render ineffective a sitting President," it said. "He illegally published classified conversations to sell his book under the pseudonym ‘Anonymous,’ which is full of falsehoods and fabricated stories.” After the memo was released, Taylor said in a post on X that the United States was "headed down a dark path.” "I said this would happen. Dissent isn’t unlawful. It certainly isn’t treasonous. America is headed down a dark path," Taylor wrote. "Never has a man so inelegantly proved another man’s point.” Dissent isn’t unlawful. It certainly isn’t treasonous. America is headed down a dark path. Never has a man so inelegantly proved another man’s point. Blaze [4/10/2025 9:42 AM, Joseph Mackinnon, 1668K] reports "Krebs’ misconduct involved the censorship of disfavored speech implicating the 2020 election and COVID-19 pandemic," wrote Trump. Trump has tasked Attorney General Pam Bondi and Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem with determining whether Krebs in fact "did it right," directing them to "identify any instances where Krebs’ conduct appears to have been contrary to suitability standards for Federal employees, involved the unauthorized dissemination of classified information, or contrary to the purposes and policies identified in Executive Order 14149 of January 20, 2025 (Restoring Freedom of Speech and Ending Federal Censorship)."

Reported similarly:
NewsMax [4/10/2025 6:53 AM, Steve Holland, 4998K]

FOX News [4/10/2025 3:10 PM, Preston Mizell, 46189K] reports House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer, R-Ky., sent letters requesting testimony from "sanctuary governors" on Thursday as part of an ongoing committee investigation into sanctuary jurisdictions and their effects on public safety. Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker, and New York Gov. Kathy Hochul were called to testify at a May 15 hearing before the committee to discuss the controversial sanctuary laws that are designed to protect illegal immigrants.

The Wall Street Journal [4/10/2025 11:36 AM, Tarini Parti, 646K] reports President Trump said his administration is planning to withhold all federal funding from cities and states that have policies limiting law enforcement’s cooperation with federal immigration authorities. “No more Sanctuary Cities! They protect the Criminals, not the Victims. They are disgracing our Country, and are being mocked all over the World,” Trump wrote on social media on Thursday. “Working on papers to withhold all Federal Funding for any City or State that allows these Death Traps to exist!!!” he wrote. Sanctuary cities such as New York, Chicago, Boston and Denver bar officials from holding suspects beyond their release dates solely because they are suspected of being in the U.S. illegally. The Trump administration has been pushing city and state officials to hold suspects longer to transfer them to federal custody without the use of judicial warrants. Officials have been trying to increase U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement arrests and deportation numbers as they implement Trump’s promise of a mass-deportation campaign. In his post, Trump didn’t specify how broadly he would withhold federal funding. The White House didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment on the president’s post. Bloomberg [4/10/2025 11:55 AM, Sri Taylor, Hadriana Lowenkron, and Laura Nahmias, 5269K] reports that the president has long criticized sanctuary cities, which refer to jurisdictions with certain policies like allowing people who entered the US illegally to remain without fear of arrest because of their immigration status. Those practices, in place in some of the largest US cities, may mean restricting the flow of the information they share with federal officials and declining to require residents to provide their immigration status when accessing public services. The Center for Immigration Studies estimates that 13 states and more than 200 cities and counties have policies that limit compliance with federal immigration enforcement.

If Trump moves ahead with the action, it will likely be challenged in court. His first administration attempted a similar step which was blocked by federal judges. A separate action moved to block sanctuary cities from accessing a Department of Justice program that funds local law enforcement agencies.

Reported similarly:
Washington Examiner [4/10/2025 11:29 AM, Anna Giaritelli, 2296K]

Bloomberg Law [4/10/2025 12:40 PM, Tristan Navera, 120K] reports that the IRS’ agreement to share undocumented immigrants’ data with the Department of Homeland Security has the potential to broaden an exception to a ban on disclosing taxpayers’ sensitive personal information. Former government officials and plaintiffs in a lawsuit seeking to prevent the IRS from sharing noncitizen taxpayers’ information now fear a broad information-sharing campaign based on an exception that allows disclosure to aid criminal investigations, considering the Trump administration’s stance that all undocumented immigrants are criminals. "When you start giving the master key out to more people, you exponentially increase the risks," said Lily Batchelder, a professor of taxation at New York University School of Law and former assistant secretary for tax policy in the Biden administration. While information sharing isn’t new, the scope could be—IRS officials typically only give out information on a need-to-know basis—she said during an NYU panel discussion Wednesday. Allowing more opens the door to data leaks and raises the risk of identifying and pursuing the wrong taxpayer, Batchelder said. Undocumented immigrants likely also would be discouraged from filing taxes: Yale University’s Budget Lab recently estimated the deal would reduce tax revenue by $313 billion over the next decade because of fears their personal information could be used to deport them.

Reuters [4/10/2025 12:06 PM, Nathan Layne and Kanishka Singh, 75858K] reports that the acting head of the Internal Revenue Service and other top officials are quitting the tax-collecting agency after it struck a deal this week to share data with federal agents on migrants living illegally in the United States. A U.S. Treasury spokesperson confirmed the resignation of commissioner Melanie Krause in a statement on Tuesday night. The agency’s chief privacy, financial and risk officers are also resigning, according to two people familiar with the matter and posts made by the individuals on LinkedIn. The leadership exodus underscores the disruption that has engulfed the agency since Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency began targeting it weeks ago, ordering it to slash thousands of jobs and provide it with access to taxpayer data. Their departure also comes amid the busiest time of year for the IRS, with the filing deadline for most individual tax returns falling on April 15. On Monday, the Treasury Department, the IRS and the Department of Homeland Security finalized an agreement under which taxpayer data will be provided to federal immigration authorities to help them locate migrants. Officials with the Treasury Department, of which the IRS is a part, had largely bypassed Krause in recent days in forging the deal, which IRS attorneys warned likely violated privacy laws, the Washington Post reported.

Reported similarly:
USA Today [4/10/2025 8:27 AM, Nathan Layne and Kanishka Singh, 75858K]

Fortune [4/10/2025 11:52 AM, Staff, 22039K] reports that the turmoil at the IRS continues as the agency’s head, Acting Commissioner Melanie Krause, has announced she will resign. She will be the third IRS head to step down since Donald Trump’s inauguration. Krause is leaving, people familiar with the matter told The Washington Post, because the Treasury Department and the Department of Homeland Security did not include her when drafting an agreement to force the IRS to give taxpayer data to immigration officials. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem signed the agreement on Monday, April 7. Krause learned the agreement had been signed when it was reported on Fox News, the Washington Post said. The agreement would allow ICE to access undocumented immigrants’ tax data, including their addresses in some cases, to make it easier to find and deport them. IRS lawyers advised Bessent and Noem that the deal is likely illegal. Workers’ and immigrants’ rights groups have sued to block it. The agreement also violates what former Commissioner Lawrence Gibbs, speaking to the Wall Street Journal, called "bedrock belief at the IRS." The agency has long assured undocumented immigrants that their data won’t be used to prosecute them, in order to encourage them to file, and allows them to use special identification numbers in lieu of Social Security numbers to do so. "This is what encourages taxpayers to tell you their private and confidential information," Gibbs said.

Chicago Tribune [4/10/2025 11:34 AM, Augusta Saraiva, 5269K] reports that the Internal Revenue Service is projected to lose more than $313 billion in revenue in the coming decade as undocumented workers are poised to pay fewer taxes after the agency struck a deal to share data with US immigration authorities. The IRS is expected to lose $12 billion in revenue for the remainder of the fiscal year ending Sept. 30, according to a report out Tuesday by the Yale Budget Lab. The group estimates unauthorized workers paid about $66 billion in federal taxes in fiscal year 2023, with about two-thirds of that coming from payroll levies. The Treasury Department — which oversees the IRS — earlier this week reached a deal with the Department of Homeland Security to share taxpayer information in response to law enforcement requests related to migration. While federal officials say the agreement includes safeguards and applies only to criminal matters, it reverses longstanding IRS privacy policies. The report underscores the role undocumented workers play in paying into Social Security and Medicare benefit programs that they can’t draw from in retirement because of their immigration status. "The IRS has historically made clear to the undocumented immigrant population that their tax information is confidential and would not be used in such ways," the report said. Tax compliance could fall among that group "if they become concerned that filing taxes could expose their personal contact information to law enforcement and be used to facilitate their deportation."

ABC News [4/10/2025 11:48 AM, Alex maxmen, 34586K] reports that aggressive deportation tactics have terrorized farmworkers at the center of the nation’s bird flu strategy, public health workers say. Dairy and poultry workers have accounted for most cases of the bird flu in the U.S. -- and preventing and detecting cases among them is key to averting a pandemic. But public health specialists say they’re struggling to reach farmworkers because many are terrified to talk with strangers or to leave home. "People are very scared to go out, even to get groceries," said Rosa Yanez, an outreach worker at Strangers No Longer, a Detroit-based Catholic organization that supports immigrants and refugees in Michigan with legal and health problems, including the bird flu. "People are worried about losing their kids, or about their kids losing their parents." "I used to tell people about the bird flu, and workers were happy to have that information," Yanez said. "But now people just want to know their rights." Outreach workers who teach farmworkers about the bird flu, provide protective gear and connect them with tests say they noticed a dramatic shift -- first in California, the state hit hardest by the bird flu -- after immigration raids beginning on Jan. 7, the day after Congress certified President Donald Trump’s election victory. That’s when Border Patrol agents indiscriminately stopped about 200 Latino farmworkers and day laborers in California’s Central Valley, according to local reports cited in a lawsuit subsequently filed by the American Civil Liberties Union on behalf of the United Farm Workers union and several people who were stopped and detained. [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

(B) The National Report [4/10/2025 11:14 AM, Staff] reports that police in Columbia, South Carolina, have charged 24-year-old Rosali Fernandez Cruz with a hit and run death of a 21-year-old South Carolina college student Nate Baker. Fernandez Cruz is an illegal migrant who was arrested in December 2016 in Texas by US Border Patrol for entering the country illegally. He was issued a notice to appear in court. He did not show up and remained in the country illegally since. According to authorities, the suspect fled the scene and was later arrested. The tragic incident occurred on April 2nd. DHS Secretary Noem is aware of the Baker case.

NewsMax [4/10/2025 10:09 AM, Sandy Fitzgerald, 4998K] reports that South Carolina Attorney General Alan Wilson, who is leading the prosecution of an immigrant charged in the hit-and-run death of a University of South Carolina student, told Newsmax on Thursday that his office became involved as part of its ongoing investigation related to illegal immigration throughout the state. "We’ve been working with local law enforcement throughout the state," Wilson said on "Wake Up America." "This case is of particular importance because of our renewed focus on illegal immigration and a lot of the violent crimes that come with it." He added that his office has been engaged in "high-level investigations in the drug trafficking operations not related to this particular [case], but just related to Mexican drug cartels. Illegal gangs operating in South Carolina, many of whom crossed the border in the last four years, are now in South Carolina." Last week, the student, Nathaniel Baker, 21, died after a crash in a Columbia, South Carolina, intersection near the university after his motorcycle was hit by a truck driven by Rosali Fernandez-Cruz, 24, reported Mobile Alabama NBC affiliate WPMI. Fernandez-Cruz was charged with hit-and-run resulting in death after leaving the scene of the accident. Homeland Security Director Kristi Noem confirmed that he was in the United States illegally.

FOX News [4/10/2025 5:50 AM, Staff, 46189K] reports former federal prosecutor Neama Rahmani joins ‘Fox & Friends First’ to discuss why he believes Bryan Kohberger will be convicted quickly for the Idaho college murders and the DOJ’s push to drop a case against a suspected MS-13 gang leader. [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

Chicago Tribune [4/10/2025 3:44 PM, Alice Yin, A.D. Quig, and Dan Petrella, 5269K] reports Mayor Brandon Johnson sought to reassure Chicagoans on Thursday that his administration would defend itself against President Donald Trump’s latest threat to strip cities with sanctuary policies for immigrants of federal aid. In a statement, the mayor’s spokesperson Cassio Mendoza said the city "complies with all federal and state laws," while suggesting any attempt to jeopardize the roughly $3.5 billion Chicago receives in federal grant dollars would be unconstitutional. Earlier Thursday morning, the president posted on TruthSocial that he is working to "withhold all Federal Funding" for sanctuary cities, without naming which ones. It’s the latest salvo in the White House’s crackdown on immigration that has Chicago and other Democratic-led cities in its crosshairs, though it lacked details on implementation.

New York Post [4/10/2025 4:26 PM, Anthony Blair, 54903K] reports a Texas man charged with threatening to kill ICE agents and harm DHS Secretary Kristi Noem cried in court after a judge ordered him to stay in jail. Robert King, 35, wept after US Magistrate Judge Renee Toliver ruled he was a flight risk and a risk to the community during a Dallas hearing on Wednesday afternoon, Fox News reported. King was arrested in McKinney, Texas on March 29 after allegedly posting threats toward ICE agents and Noem on Facebook. He was charged with transmitting interstate threats and will remain in Kaufman County detention, despite his attorney arguing that he had no prior charges and no weapons. King was seeking treatment for mental health issues, including suicidal thoughts and depression at the time, his attorney said. His attorney’s bid to have him transferred to another center where he has access to mental health and other medications was rejected by the judge.

Arizona Republic [4/10/2025 9:36 PM, Richard Ruelas, 68K] reports while visiting metro Phoenix, Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem described joining immigration officers on raids to pick up "dirtbags" ― men she said were accused of trafficking drugs and humans. But those men are not facing charges for those types of crimes. Instead, the three men whose arrests Noem witnessed on April 8, including two whose conversations with Noem were recorded and shared on social media, were charged in Phoenix federal court with a more benign offense: entering the country illegally. While a felony, it is not the type of crime Noem described in her writings and on video. One of the men was wanted on a warrant for a murder. It was out of Mexico, according to court documents, not the U.S. Court documents show another of the men previously was convicted of a federal felony for entering the country illegally but did not mention any other crimes. The other man showed no criminal history. A spokesperson for Immigration and Customs Enforcement did not respond to a question about the charges against the men. Neither did a spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney’s Office.

FOX News [4/10/2025 2:05 PM, Greg Norman, 46189K] reports that a Mexican drug lord was released from custody after being convicted in the 1985 killing of Drug Enforcement Administration agent Enrique ‘Kiki’ Camarena. Ernesto "Don Neto" Fonseca Carrillo, one of the co-founders of the Guadalajara Cartel, was freed last weekend after completing his 40-year sentence, a federal agent confirmed to the Associated Press. Fonseca, 94, had been serving the remainder of his sentence under home confinement outside Mexico City since being moved from prison in 2016. The DEA did not immediately respond to a request for comment Thursday from Fox News Digital. Rafael Caro Quintero, another Guadalajara Cartel co-founder who also was convicted in the murder, was one of 29 cartel figures Mexico sent to the United States in February. It’s unclear if the U.S. is now looking to bring Fonseca into custody. At the time of his murder, the DEA and Camarena had been utilizing a series of wiretaps to make sizeable drug busts inside Mexico. In 2013, Caro Quintero walked free after serving 28 years in prison. He was released after a court overturned his 40-year sentence for the kidnapping and killing of Camarena. Caro Quintero was arrested again by Mexican forces in July 2022 after he allegedly returned to drug trafficking.

Reported similarly:
BorderReport [4/10/2025 6:35 PM, Julian Resendiz, 6866K] Video: HERE

NewsNation [4/10/2025 5:38 PM, Ali Bradley, 6866K] reports Mexico is warning against potential U.S. drone strikes on cartels in its country following an NBC report that the Trump administration is considering lethal action against the criminal groups as part of an effort to combat drug trafficking along the southern border. The president of Mexico, Claudia Sheinbaum, has been vowing to crack down on cartels. She’s responded to the potential of cartel drone strikes, saying Mexico is not subordinate and would reject any unilateral U.S. military action under any circumstances, warning that such measures "would not resolve anything." Republican Rep. Juan Ciscomani says they want to make sure the federal government is making moves in collaboration with Mexico. Ciscomani says he’s confident Mexico will step up and help combat the cartels but emphasized that the U.S. needs to use every tool available if its service members and employees are at risk.

New York Post [4/10/2025 8:15 AM, Emily Crane, 54903K] reports the treacherous Darien Gap migrant route to the United States has become a complete ghost town in the wake of the Trump administration’s fierce crackdown on illegal immigration, before-and-after-photos show. Recently snapped images show the small Panamanian river port of Lajas Blancas — overrun with a crush of migrants just a year ago — now essentially empty. Huge tents that were once packed with asylum-seeking families are now vacant, while a stretch of river where more than a thousand migrants would try and cross each day is also bare, according to the photos. The desertion comes after crossings through the 70-mile stretch of jungle — the only land bridge between South and Central America — surged to record highs in 2023 when more than 500,000 people attempted the grueling trek. The number of migrants traversing the treacherous route plummeted by 40% last year as Panama’s right-wing President José Raúl Mulino vowed to crack down. Now, in the few months since Trump took office, the route has essentially been eradicated. "Effectively, the border with Darien is closed. The problem we had in Lajas Blancas eliminated," Mulino declared last month.

New York Post [4/10/2025 5:25 PM, Jennie Taer, 5490K] reports Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Kristi Noem said illegal migrants the Trump administration sent to El Salvador’s notorious mega prison should be locked up there “for the rest of their lives,” according to Axios. The Trump administration has deported more than 200 suspected gangbangers to El Salvador’s brutal Center for Terrorism Confinement (CECOT) using the 18th Century Alien Enemies act, which allows migrants to be removed from the US without a trial. “We’re confident that people that are [imprisoned in El Salvador] should be there, and they should stay there for the rest of their lives,” Noem said after an Immigration and Customs Enforcement event Wednesday. Noem told The Post Tuesday after getting the green light, the Trump administration is prepared to send tens of thousands of additional criminal migrants to CECOT. “You’ll see us continuing to partner with El Salvador. CECOT has the capacity for 40,000 individuals, and [El Salvador President Nayib Bukele] has said they’ll take as many as we want to send,” Noem said after joining an ICE raid in Phoenix, where three convicted felon migrants were busted. “There’s 14,000 there now, and he said he plans to build another prison right next to it.”

FOX News [4/10/2025 2:36 PM, Danielle Wallace, 46189K] reports that the State Department upgraded the travel advisory for El Salvador on Tuesday, now ranking the Central American nation as safer than several European countries. Secretary of State Marco Rubio credited El Salvadorian President Nayib Bukele’s leadership as "crucial in improving the security of his country for foreign travelers." "Gang activity, violent crime, and murders in El Salvador have significantly dropped," Rubio wrote on X, announcing the U.S. travel advisory for El Salvador has been updated to "Level 1: Exercise Normal Precautions." The travel advisory says "gang activity has decreased over the last three years," and "this has caused a drop in violent crimes and murders." "Keeping Americans safe overseas is our highest priority," Rubio wrote. Many media users noted that the travel advisories for Germany, France, the United Kingdom, Spain, Italy, the Netherlands and Sweden all remain at "Level 2: Exercise Increased Caution." The State Department warns of the increased risk of "terrorism" in all countries. For France and Spain, "civil unrest" is also considered a concern for American travelers. "El Salvador just got the U.S. State Department’s travel gold star: Level 1: safest it gets," Bukele wrote. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem recently visited the Terrorism Confinement Center, abbreviated CECOT, in El Salvador, where the Trump administration so far has sent more than 200 people removed under the Alien Enemies Act of 1798.

Blaze [4/10/2025 11:30 AM, Joseph Mackinnon, 1668K] reports that new footage obtained by Anthony Rubin’s watchdog outfit, Muckraker, and published by the Oversight Project shows a Red Cross employee in the northwestern town of Necoclí, Colombia, providing aid to an individual whom he apparently believed to be yet another migrant headed north for the human trafficking corridor multitudes have transited to get to the United States. The footage also shows staff from MedGlobal — an NGO that, like the Red Cross, has received significant funding from the U.S. Agency for International Development — offering instruction and material aid to what was actually an undercover reporter, again working under the apparent assumption that he was a migrant planning to transit the Darién Gap. Mike Howell, president of the Oversight Project, told Blaze News, "The Red Cross is supposed to be keeping people safe. The idea that they’d coach illegal aliens to go through one of the most dangerous jungles on the planet on their way to breaking into the United States is absolutely upside down." Blaze News reached out to the Red Cross and to MedGlobal but did not immediately receive responses.

Houston Chronicle [4/10/2025 7:00 AM, Staff, 1769K] reports "How can I be under arrest? And in this manner?" Franz Kafka’s famous fictional character, Josef K, asks the two men who show up at his apartment early one morning. "We don’t answer such questions," the men tell him. "You’re going to have to answer them," K responds. "Here are my papers, now show me yours, starting with the arrest warrant.” Actually the two agents who have arrived at his door to take him away do not have to answer. And they don’t. In "The Trial," perhaps the most "Kafkaesque" of the celebrated Czech author’s early 20th-century novels, Josef K goes to his eventual death by execution without knowing how or why he got caught up in a bewildering bureaucratic nightmare. Neither does the reader. Kafka himself died a century ago, but in recent weeks he’s come back to life, so to speak. For that, we can thank President Donald Trump and his plans to carry out mass deportation. Designed by White House advisor and anti-immigration zealot Stephen Miller and implemented by Trump’s border czar, Tom Holman, who prefers the brutalist approach to immigration-law enforcement. "I don’t care what the judges think, I don’t care," Holman has said. Due process, as far as this trio is concerned, is pretty much an afterthought. Consider a real-life Josef K, a Salvadoran native living in Baltimore, legally, who on March 12 fell into the clutches of Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents. On a Wednesday afternoon, Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia, a sheet metal worker, left work as usual and drove to his mother-in-law’s house to pick up his 5-year-old son, an autistic child who has a hearing deficit and is unable to communicate effectively. On the way home, an unmarked vehicle pulled Abrego Garcia over. According to court documents, men identifying themselves as ICE agents with Homeland Security Investigations told him his "status has changed." Within minutes and without a warrant, he was handcuffed and detained in one of several ICE vehicles on the scene. The agents gave him 10 minutes to call his wife to collect the mute and terrified little boy watching everything from the backseat. Otherwise, they told him, his son would be handed over to Child Protective Services. She arrived to find her husband distraught and in tears. With no explanation for why or where he’d be taken, Abrego Garcia was promptly hauled away. Shuttled between detention centers from Maryland, to Louisiana to Texas, Abrego Garcia managed only a few disoriented calls to his wife, his confusion palpable. He was being accused of gang affiliations. Both Abrego Garcia and his wife pleaded with ICE, explaining that he had fled gang threats as a teenager, earned U.S. protection and had already disproven baseless accusations of ties to MS-13, the notorious Salvadoran gang. According to court filings, ICE repeatedly assured him he’d get his day in court.

The Hill [4/10/2025 8:00 AM, Nolan Rappaport, 12829K] reports the Alien Enemies Act has once again become a political point of contention in America. Presidents can invoke the act’s powers with a proclamation "whenever there shall be a declared war between the United States and any foreign nation or government, or any invasion or predatory incursion shall be perpetrated, attempted, or threatened against the territory of the United States, by any foreign nation or government.” The most recent invocation occurred on March 15, 2025, when President Trump issued a proclamation declaring that "all Venezuelan citizens 14 years of age or older who are members of [Tren de Aragua], are within the United States, and are not actually naturalized or lawful permanent residents of the United States are liable to be apprehended, restrained, secured, and removed as Alien Enemies.” His proclamation is based on a determination that Tren de Aragua gang members are "perpetrating, attempting, and threatening an invasion or predatory incursion against the territory of the United States … .at the direction, clandestine or otherwise, of the Maduro regime in Venezuela.” The Biden administration designated Tren de Aragua as a Transnational Criminal Organization to emphasize "the escalating threat it poses to American communities." The current administration added it to the State Department’s list of Foreign Terrorist Organizations a few months ago. This means that the State Department has concluded that the gang is: it engages in terrorist activity, or terrorism, or retains the capability and intent to engage in terrorist activity or terrorism; and its terrorist activity or terrorism threatens United States national security. Opponents of the proclamation have objected to the methods by which the administration is removing the Venezuelans. They claim this is a violation of due process because the people being deported are not being given a hearing at which they could rebut the claim that they are Tren de Aragua gang members.

New York Post [4/10/2025 6:16 PM, Mark Krikorian, 54903K] reports Joe Biden’s border crisis is over. It didn’t take new laws, just a new president. But it’s only a temporary reprieve. What happens next time we get a president — as we will — with Biden’s border philosophy? Nothing can completely Biden-proof the border (as it were). But one important change would make it much harder for a President Jasmine Crockett or President Gavin Newsom to illegally usher in millions more illegal aliens. After all, the Democrats’ rationale for admitting all those millions of illegal border-crossers was that they had a "right" to claim asylum, the legal protections offered to political or religious refugees. Many never even bothered to apply, but those who did produced an immigration-court backlog that may never be cleared. That means these illegal-alien applicants will get to stay (and work) here "legally" for years before their hearing dates arrive — having kids, buying homes, putting down roots. And when they lose, as most will, how are we supposed to find and remove them? A new Heritage Foundation report laid out several important ways to reform and restrict asylum. Such changes would be great first steps, but they don’t go nearly far enough. Asylum needs to be abolished altogether. Ending asylum in the United States will first require our withdrawal from the United Nations framework known as the 1951 Refugee Convention and the 1967 Protocol. To do so, President Donald Trump can simply give the UN Secretary-General one year’s notice — a move that the White House considered during Trump’s first term, but never followed through on.But that alone won’t be enough: Congress must also amend the 1980 Refugee Act, which incorporated the UN treaties’ asylum provisions into US law. The revised measure can eliminate any opportunity for an illegal alien to stay under any circumstances, by dismantling the asylum pipeline entirely.

The Hill [4/10/2025 11:30 AM, Andrew Morris, 12829K] reports that the Federal Emergency Management Agency appears to be on life support. According to recent news reports, Trump administration officials, including Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and acting administrator Cameron Hamilton, are poised to act on President Trump’s desire to drastically reduce the federal government’s role in responding to disasters and to downsize or eliminate FEMA altogether. This comes on the heels of the administration attempting to freeze over $100 billion in payments FEMA had promised to states for rebuilding and increasing disaster resiliency after Hurricane Helene, and for responding to the California wildfires and other disasters last year. Eradicating or gutting FEMA would be a disaster. The fact that the conversation is happening at all underscores that we are in a far different era of the politics of disaster than the one that FEMA emerged from during the 1960s and 1970s. FEMA itself has become shorthand for the larger policy shift of that era, where states, localities and nongovernmental agencies such as the American Red Cross were shuddering under the burden of increasingly costly disasters such as the Alaska Earthquake (1964), Hurricane Betsy (1965), Hurricane Camille (1969) and Hurricane Agnes (1972) — the latter in the same year as devastating floods in Noem’s home state of South Dakota. Most states aren’t eager to go back to pre-1960s arrangements, and neither, it seems, are Senate Republicans from disaster-prone states. Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) said there’s "no way Republicans and Democrats are supporting" eliminating FEMA. Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.) said that the federal government is still going to be "distributing disaster money. I mean, just as a practical matter, it has to be done." The congressional architects of modern disaster policy were proud of what they had achieved for their constituents. It is incumbent for their successors to remind the administration why we have a FEMA in the first place.

Washington Examiner [4/10/2025 6:00 AM, Barry Angeline and Dan McCabe, 2365K] reports diversity, equity, and inclusion can strengthen organizations when properly implemented. Diverse teams prevent groupthink and spark innovation. But when misused to justify unqualified appointments, DEI undermines the cause it claims to support. This is the case with the Federal Emergency Management Agency in Puerto Rico. The Washington Examiner previously published “FEMA’s DEI Problem,” which first exposed FEMA’s obsession with identity politics derailing recovery. A second story, “FEMA’s DEI Misadventure,” documented sabotage and reverse discrimination against our team of seven straight, older, white military veterans and corporate executives. Here, we reveal how FEMA’s machinery of legal offices, contracting officials, and Equal Employment Opportunity staff colluded to obstruct accountability. Their playbook? Deny, deflect, and depose.

The Hill [4/10/2025 11:00 AM, Tom Mockaitis, 12829K] reports that the firing of National Security Agency chief, Gen. Timothy Haugh and his deputy, Wendy Noble, has gone largely unnoticed amid the chaos over tariffs, even though it sets a dangerous precedent. The dismissals occurred after a White House meeting between the president and his staunch supporter, Laura Loomer, and appear to have been done at her request. "NSA Director Tim Haugh and his deputy Wendy Noble have been disloyal to President Trump," Loomer posted on X. "That is why they have been fired." The allegiance of military officers is to the country, not the president. As Trump has made abundantly clear, however, he values loyalty to him above all else. "We’re always going to let go of people — people we don’t like… or people that may have loyalties to someone else," the president said in reference to the dismissals. Haugh’s firing follows the dismissal of Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman CQ Brown, Jr., allegedly for supporting DEI in the military. Trump also removed two female admirals, Chief of Naval Operations Lisa Franchetti and Coast Guard Commandant Linda Fagan. He also fired the top judge advocate generals of the Army, Navy and Air Force. As commander-in-chief, the president does have the authority to replace generals and admirals, but this usually occurs during wartime as a result of command failures or disagreements over strategy.

FOX News [4/10/2025 7:30 AM, Rebekah Koffler, 46189K] reports President Donald Trump is in an all-out trade war with China, whose leaders accused the U.S. of "economic bullying" and declared Beijing’s readiness to "fight to the end" in "any type" of war" with America. Predictably, pundits, experts of all stripes and assorted members of the Washington commentariat are viciously attacking the president, predicting global economic Armageddon. What they don’t understand is that the tariff war is part of Trump’s sophisticated multipronged strategy aimed at reducing a much bigger threat that China poses to America. To execute this strategy, the self-proclaimed master of the art of the deal will be personally involved in trade negotiations, according to Trump’s right-hand man on economic deals, Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent. Trump is fighting a non-kinetic war with Beijing to avoid a kinetic one, which would surely be catastrophic for both the U.S. and China. Here’s what Trump understands about China and his rationale for the "strategic decoupling" doctrine Team Trump developed to tame our most dangerous adversary. China has been at war with the United States for years, using the "unrestricted warfare" doctrine developed by Chinese military strategists from the PLA in 1999. The goal is to fulfill China’s declared grand plan, which includes two parts – first, to become the dominant world power, replacing the United States, militarily and economically, and second, to secure control over Taiwan, through integration or by force, as part of its "One China" policy – all by 2049. "Unrestricted warfare" is designed to prevent the U.S. from interfering with China’s grand plan, by weakening America through various means – weaponizing fentanyl that kills Americans, eroding our industrial base, and developing our dependence on China in critical areas that underpin our civilian life and defense capabilities, among other things. Thus far, China has employed non-kinetic measures against our homeland. But Xi Jinping gave orders to his armed forces "to be ready by 2027," to conduct a successful invasion of Taiwan. China regularly conducts live-fire war-games, involving its army, navy and air force, practicing for an invasion. The most recent ones took place on April 1 and 2. The bold statement, that came from China’s embassy on March 3, demonstrates that Beijing feels ready for a kinetic confrontation today. "If war is what the U.S. wants, be it a tariff war, a trade war or any other type of war, we’re ready to fight till the end," it said.

Miami Herald [4/10/2025 4:59 PM, David Catanese, 3973K] reports Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said Thursday that while thousands of residents in the country illegally have chosen to self-deport during the last month, millions more should leave the country to have any chance at coming back. “You have 20 to 21 million people that need to go home,” Noem said during a Cabinet meeting, “because they’re here breaking our laws and we need to facilitate that.” President Trump said his administration would work with self-deportees to try to come back into the U.S., “if they go out in a nice way.” “So it gives you a real incentive, otherwise, they never come back, they’ll never be allowed, after a certain period of time goes by,” he said, floating a 60-day window to comply. It’s the latest pitch by a White House that has promised to deliver the largest deportation operation in history, but has encountered significant legal and operational challenges to achieving that goal. Last month, the Department of Homeland Security unveiled a new mobile phone app with a self-deportation feature called CBP Home — a reversal of a Biden administration app designed to expedite the process for individuals seeking entry into the country. CBP Home encourages immigrants who entered the country illegally to identify themselves as a “departing traveler” who submits their intent to leave the U.S. A photograph is required to verify the registrant’s identity along with biographical information. Migrants are asked if they need help purchasing plane tickets or obtaining proper travel documents, and Noem said she has had conversations with officials in El Salvador, Colombia and Mexico about offering programs to help support returning migrants with housing and food when they get home. “It’s a very big self-deport operation that we’re starting,” Trump said on Thursday. Coercing immigrants into acting on their own has become a central part of the Trump administration’s strategy to escalate deportations, which are proving much more difficult to orchestrate at the pace it had originally intended. The deportation of hundreds of alleged Venezuelan gang members to a prison in El Salvador using the Alien Enemies Act last month ensnared the administration in a multi-week court battle over the process it used to facilitate summary removals. On Wednesday, a federal judge in Texas halted deportations there to ensure detainees have an opportunity to challenge their removals. In a nod to the importance of immigrants to the nation’s $1.5 trillion agriculture industry, the president also said the administration would work with farmers to allow some number of undocumented workers to remain before forcing them through a legal process.

FOX News [4/11/2025 3:55 AM, Elizabeth Pritchett and Bill Melugin, 46189K] reports U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents across the country arrested multiple illegal aliens previously convicted of violent crimes, including ones of a sexual nature against children, this week. In an internal bulletin shared with Fox News, ICE highlighted five major arrests made on Wednesday in Houston, Los Angeles, Chicago and New Orleans. All five convicted criminals, which consist of four men and one woman, are citizens of Mexico and are in the U.S. illegally. In Chicago, ICE agents arrested 35-year-old Roberto Salvador-Casimiro, who was convicted of predatory criminal sexual assault of a child in Cook County, Illinois. ICE Houston made two major arrests in 23-year-old Jesus Guadalupe Salazar, who has convictions in Hidalgo County, Texas, for assaulting a pregnant woman and continuous violence against a family member, and 67-year-old Pedro Esparza Castellano, who was convicted in Tarrant County, Texas, of indecency with child contact. Pedro Contreras-Soto, 54, who has been convicted in San Jose, California, of rape of spouse by threat, sodomy with a child under 14 years old or with force, and kidnapping, was arrested by ICE Los Angeles agents. Lastly, ICE New Orleans arrested Ana Karen Zaragozaz Saenz, a 35-year-old woman who has been convicted in multiple U.S. states of possession of fraudulent documents, obstructing justice, larceny, felony assault, misdemeanor DUI, smuggling aliens and felony stolen property. The latest data provided by ICE to lawmakers in September 2024 showed there were 425,431 illegal immigrants convicted of crimes roaming the streets in the U.S. As of March 26, ICE reported there were 47,892 illegal immigrants convicted of a crime currently detained at a facility in the U.S.

NewsMax [4/10/2025 11:13 AM, Mark Swanson, 4998K] reports that the acting director of Immigration Customs Enforcement asserted that the deportation process of illegal migrants should be run more like a business, saying it should be "like [Amazon] Prime but with human beings," the Arizona Mirror reported. Todd Lyons made the remarks at the 2025 Border Security Expo in Phoenix on Tuesday. Border czar Tom Homan and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem also gave remarks at the two-day summit. Noem tapped Lyons as ICE acting director last month in an effort to boost lagging deportation numbers. "We need to get better at treating this like a business," Lyons said in his remarks, saying he wants to see a deportation process "like [Amazon] Prime, but with human beings," according to the report. In his keynote speech, Homan said the Trump administration is leaning on the private sector to help with mass deportations. "We need to buy more beds, we need more airplane flights and I know a lot of you are here for that reason," Homan told the assembly. "Let the badge and guns do the badge and gun stuff, everything else, let’s contract out," according to the report. Homan also defended use of the 1798 Alien Enemies Act to deport Venezuelan gang members to El Salvador. "That is a law enacted by Congress, and we are using that," Homan said, adding that it "bothers him" that lower court judges have issued injunctions against the policy, which the U.S. Supreme Court this week overruled.

FOX News [4/10/2025 5:02 PM, Michael Lee, 46189K] reports new U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency records show that more than 25,000 of the agency’s detainer requests were declined by sanctuary jurisdictions throughout the country over the last few years, resulting in the release of dozens of illegal immigrants convicted of homicide. A total of 72 criminal aliens with homicide convictions or charges were released from U.S. jails despite having ICE detainers between Oct. 1, 2022, and Feb. 6, 2025, according to ICE data provided to the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS), which tracks the immigration laws of states and local municipalities. Seventeen of those releases came from just three detention centers: the Illinois River Corrections Center and Santa Clara County jails, which released six, and the Stateville Correctional Center in Illinois, which released five. The data comes as debate over "sanctuary" jurisdictions, those that limit or ban local cooperation with federal immigration authorities, has intensified as President Donald Trump has doubled down on his campaign promise of mass deportations. Trump has hinted at federal action against the jurisdictions in recent weeks, including a Truth Social post Thursday in which the president threatened to withhold federal funding. Meanwhile, the ICE data provided insight into which jurisdictions were the least compliant with the agency’s detainer requests. Those numbers show that more than half (52%) of the declined detainer requests were from jails in California, which is considered a sanctuary state by CIS.

Breitbart [4/10/2025 4:17 PM, John Binder, 2923K] reports close to 400 local law enforcement agencies across the United States have signed up to work with the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) in turning over criminal illegal aliens to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents since President Trump was inaugurated in late January. The data, shared with the House Judiciary’s Immigration Subcommittee this week and compiled by the National Immigration Center for Enforcement (NICE), shows that since Trump was inaugurated, about 376 local law enforcement agencies have signed 287(g) agreements with ICE. In the last week, alone, 55 local law enforcement agencies have signed 287(g) agreements with ICE, which now has more than 510 local partners through the program — a 280% increase from the 134 local partners that had agreements in place before Trump’s inauguration.

ABC News [4/10/2025 9:51 AM, Peter Charalambous and Laura Romero, 34586K] reports that a federal judge in Boston said elements of the Trump administration’s policy of deporting migrants to countries other than their own without being able to raise concerns about their safety was "very troublesome" during a court hearing on Thursday. U.S. District Judge Brian Murphy said his recently issued temporary order blocking such removals would remain in effect for another week while he considers issuing a longer-lasting preliminary injunction, which has the potential to stall the frequently used deportation approach taken by the Trump administration. During a two-hour hearing on Thursday, a lawyer representing a group of noncitizens argued the policy "creates havoc" by using "a bait and switch" to send migrants to countries other than their place of origin, even if the migrant has reasonable concerns about their safety once relocated. Judge Murphy signaled misgivings about elements of the policy, suggesting the noncitizens lack a meaningful way to raise concerns about their safety when they are rushed onto deportation flights. Lawyers with the DOJ argued that the Department of Homeland Security has issued new guidance to protect the safety of the noncitizens once they are removed -- but Trina Realmuto, a lawyer for the noncitizens, described the new policy as inadequate because the migrants don’t have access to a lawyer, time to gather evidence, or the opportunity for judicial review. [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

CNN [4/10/2025 8:44 AM, Eric Levenson and Gloria Pazmino, 908K] reports that, when Georgetown University fellow Badar Khan Suri was arrested by federal officers outside his home in Arlington, Virginia, so began a multistate, week-long journey in custody that would end in a rural jail over 1,000 miles away. An Indian national working as a professor and studying in the US on a visa, Khan Suri was handcuffed on March 17 and taken to the Immigration and Customs Enforcement field office in Chantilly, Virginia, for fingerprinting, DNA swabs and paperwork, according to an amended complaint filed by his attorneys. He was moved to a detention center in Farmville, Virginia, in the middle of the night, and then to an ICE office in Richmond. Next, he was taken to an airport, shackled, and flown to a detention facility in Alexandria, Louisiana. On March 20, Khan Suri was told he’d be sent to New York the next day, but he was instead driven to the Prairieland Detention Center in Alvarado, Texas. He was housed in a common room with a TV playing 21 hours a day, given a thin plastic mattress for a bed, went without religious accommodations for several days and was given "used, dirty underclothing" to wear, according to the lawsuit. In all, he was transferred 1,300 miles away from home even though two Virginia detention facilities were not operating at capacity, according to the lawsuit. The transfers to Louisiana and Texas, his attorneys argued, were "not necessary.” Khan Suri’s whirlwind journey is not unique. Other detained immigrants, including Tufts University grad student Rümeysa Öztürk and former Columbia University grad student Mahmoud Khalil, were taken on similarly circuitous routes to faraway facilities. All three were arrested near their homes in urban East Coast areas and swiftly shipped off to detention facilities in rural Louisiana and Texas. These transfers underscore ICE’s power in deciding where to house detained migrants – a power that some immigration attorneys say the Trump administration is now using to move disfavored migrants far from their attorneys, families and support systems. "We’ve always seen transfers within the immigration system," explained Adriel D. Orozco, senior policy counsel at the American Immigration Council, an immigrant advocacy group. "I hadn’t seen such a drastic transfer system, in the sense of sending folks from the Northeast all the way down to the South. That seems to be more of a change under this Trump 2.0.” Khan Suri’s attorneys argued in their amended complaint that the moves represent a new government policy "to retaliate and punish noncitizens" like him who support Palestinian rights or are critical of Israeli policy. "DHS has issued a directive that all individuals who are subject to the policy be transferred to detention centers in the south of the United States to jurisdictions that Respondents perceive will be more favorable to them, and where they will be far away from their families and attorneys, and therefore unable to promptly challenge their detention," the filing states.

Washington Post [4/10/2025 2:09 PM, Kelsey Ables, 31735K] reports that President Donald Trump has repeatedly raised the idea of sending U.S. citizens who have been convicted of some crimes to prisons in other countries. On Sunday, the president told reporters on Air Force One that “we have some horrible criminals, American grown, born,” and that he’s “all for” sending them to prisons in El Salvador — where some Venezuelan migrants are already being detained. “I don’t know what the law says on that,” he said. White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt defended the comments Tuesday, telling reporters that in reference “to the president’s idea for American citizens to potentially be deported, these would be heinous, violent criminals who have broken our nation’s laws repeatedly.” While immigration experts say there is no legal way for a person with U.S. citizenship to be deported, Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor sounded a warning this month about the Trump administration’s stance on the matter in a dissenting opinion that referenced a case regarding the mistaken deportation of a Salvadoran immigrant in Maryland. “The implication of the Government’s position is that not only noncitizens but also United States citizens could be taken off the streets, forced onto planes, and confined to foreign prisons with no opportunity for redress if judicial review is denied unlawfully before removal,” she wrote.

Politico [4/10/2025 4:29 PM, Ali Bianco, 2100K] reports Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s job is to stop illegal ideas from crossing the U.S. border, according to a now-deleted social media post from the agency that drew condemnation on Thursday. In a promotional graphic on X, ICE said they enforce over 400 federal laws to “ensure public safety and national security,” with the picture showing ICE will stop the crossings of people, money, products — and ideas. The post directs people to visit the ICE website. The post by ICE comes a day after the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees the agency, announced it would be surveilling the social media of foreign students and immigrants applying for permanent status or other immigration benefits to the United States for alleged antisemitic activity, in a push to “protect the homeland from extremists” and “terrorist sympathizers.” ICE told POLITICO that the post was put up in error, and that it is drafting a new post that will include “intellectual property” — not ideas. “We regret any confusion that this error may have caused,” ICE spokesperson Mike Alvarez said. “Our number one goal is to provide accurate information to the public.” Newsweek [4/10/2025 4:07 PM, Dan Gooding, 52200K] reports that the post sparked confusion on X, formerly Twitter, with several immigration and law experts asking what counted as an "illegal idea", as it was reshared widely over the space of a few hours. The Department of Homeland Security told Newsweek the post was made in error. “That post was sent without proper approval and should not have been shared," Tricia McLaughlin, assistant secretary for public affairs, said in a statement. "‘Ideas’ should have said ‘intellectual property’."

Breitbart [4/10/2025 2:51 PM, Warner Todd Huston, 2923K] reports that four Chinese nationals have been sentenced for an identity theft scheme geared toward defrauding retailers out of more than $1.2 million. The scheme included the theft of the personal information of hundreds of Americans, which was then used to forge driver’s licenses and other IDs to create credit accounts at a series of national retailers, a press release from Immigration and Customs Enforcement reported. The retailers targeted for the fraud included Ulta Beauty, Sephora, Nordstrom, Macy’s, Kohl’s, Williams-Sonoma, Dillard’s and Saks Fifth Avenue. Those convicted include Kar Kee "Steven" Cheung, 36, Qian Guo, 37, Chongming "Ming" Wang, 28, and Jiaozhu "Yanny" Yan, 30. They were convicted on charges including credit card fraud, manufacturing false identification, fraud, device fraud and other crimes and were sentenced to from 42 months, and 12 months in prison. Two other suspects were also convicted in the scheme. Sizhen "Rachel" Liu, 35, had previously been sentenced to up to 50 months in federal prison on similar fraud charges and Hyun Woo "Scott" Jung, 30, will be sentenced on May 5. In a similar case, a Chinese national Donghui Liao, 32, was sentenced to 33 months in federal prison for possession of thousands of unauthorized access devices (gift cards), in a scheme in Florida meant to steal the money loaded onto them by gift card customers.

Breitbart [4/10/2025 1:17 PM, Warner Todd Huston, 2923K] reports that New York City has allowed Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to reopen its facilities on Rikers Island to deport illegal aliens from among the prison population. First Deputy Mayor Randy Mastro signed an order Tuesday to allow ICE to re-establish its office on Rikers to carry out criminal investigations into drug trafficking, organized violence, and migrant gang activity, according to Fox News. Trump immigration czar Tom Homan praised New York Mayor Eric Adams and his administration. "Thank you Mayor Adams and Deputy Mayor Mastro! This is a great first step in our continuing collaboration to make NYC even safer as President Trump has committed to. Promises Made. Promises Kept," Homan said. Deputy Mayor Mastro’s order insists that New York City is being threatened by gangs such as MS-13 and Tren de Aragua and it is critical that law enforcement share "real-time" information with federal law enforcement. But the order features some restrictions. The agreement does not allow ICE to carry out civil immigration enforcement and arrest people simply for being undocumented and only allows ICE detainers to be enforced in the prison if it is accompanied by a federal warrant signed by a judge.

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New York Post [4/10/2025 6:09 PM, Haley Brown and Matt Troutman, 54903K]
Washington Examiner [4/10/2025 2:03 PM, Chris Wade, 2296K]

New York Times [4/10/2025 10:08 AM, Luis Ferré-Sadurní, and Chelsia Rose Marcius, 153395K] reports for years, a handful of federal immigration agents worked out of a trailer office at the jail complex on Rikers Island in New York City. Their sole mission: to identify detainees who were undocumented so that they could be transferred to federal custody and deported. The practice, at times contentious, turned Rikers into a deportation pipeline for the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency, leading to the expulsion of thousands of undocumented immigrants, including many who were never convicted or had only minor violations. The city barred ICE from Rikers after passing sanctuary laws in 2014 that limited the city’s cooperation with the federal government and all but sealed the pipeline. But after a 10-year hiatus, ICE will soon reestablish a presence at the city’s largest jail after the administration of Mayor Eric Adams issued an executive order on Tuesday restoring its access. The mayor said that, this time around, ICE and other federal agencies will have a more limited presence at Rikers, with the agency’s work restricted to criminal investigations, such as tackling transnational gangs. Those assurances did little to tamp down concerns from civil rights groups and immigration lawyers. They said that the move violated the spirit of the city’s sanctuary laws and could give ICE a foothold to re-establish its deportation pipeline at Rikers.

New York Post [4/10/2025 5:56 PM, Joe Marino, Jennie Taer and Amanda Woods, 54903K] reports an illegal migrant with nine prior busts snuck into a Brooklyn high school this week and randomly groped a 16-year-old girl before a teacher gave him the boot, cops and law enforcement sources said. José Duran Enrique, 45, originally from Nicaragua, entered the High School of Telecommunication Arts and Technology on 67th Street near Fourth Avenue in Bay Ridge around 8 a.m. Tuesday and grabbed the buttocks of the teen student, a stranger to him, police said. Duran Enrique took off, but was not on the lam for long before cops caught up to him nearby around 10:30 a.m., cops said. He was arrested and charged with burglary, forcible touching, endangering the welfare of a child and harassment, authorities said. During his Wednesday arraignment, prosecutors requested that Duran Enrique be held on $25,000 cash bail or $50,000 bond, but a judge ultimately ordered him held on $1,000 bail or $5,000 bond, according to the Brooklyn District Attorney’s Office. Duran Enrique, of Queens, has nine prior arrests, the most recent on Jan. 20 of this year for trespassing in another person’s garage on 76th Street in his home borough, according to sources. Duran Enrique was originally apprehended by Customs and Border Protection back in 2022 in Eagle Pass, Texas, federal law enforcement sources said. He was released on parole into the United States, according to the sources.

Blaze [4/10/2025 4:40 PM, Julio Rosas, 1668K] reports U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Florida is about to get over 1,000 extra officers to help the federal government carry out mass deportations now that the southern border crisis is over. The Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles announced on Wednesday that Executive Director Dave Kerner was the first in the department to be sworn as an ICE Task Force Officer under the 287(g) program. The program allows state and local law enforcement to be certified and empowered to enforce federal immigration law during the course of their normal duties. Florida is the first in the nation to require law enforcement agencies to be part of the program. FLHSMV further revealed that almost 1,500 Florida Highway Patrol troopers will soon complete their 287(g) certification and will be carrying out those new authorities throughout the state.

Telemundo Amarillo [4/10/2025 1:40 PM, Staff, 2K] reports that a young man was arrested after he thought impersonating an immigration agent and detaining two people in a vehicle while wearing pajamas would be a good idea, authorities reported. The incident occurred early Thursday morning when the suspect, identified as 24-year-old José Juan López, posed as an ICE agent and conducted a traffic stop on a van containing two men. The two men immediately called 911 upon noticing the situation. A spokesperson for the Martin County Sheriff’s Office in Florida said, "When they called us, they said they were escaping from someone who had detained them and who claimed to be an ICE agent and was demanding immigration information or he would deport them." When the suspect was located and detained, according to police, he denied impersonating an immigration agent. "What he didn’t realize was that there was a video camera inside the truck he stopped, so when officers arrived, they clearly realized these two people were the victims, and we proceeded to arrest Mr. Lopez for impersonating a federal agent," authorities said. According to police, this suspect is known to them as he has been arrested in the past for drug possession, child abuse, and domestic violence.

Breitbart [4/10/2025 8:29 AM, Joel B. Pollak, 2923K] reports that two schools in the Los Angles Unified School District (LAUSD) refused entry to federal officials from the Department of Homeland Security this week, as part of an effort by state and local institutions to block immigration enforcement. The Los Angeles Times reported: On Monday, two individuals arrived at Lillian Street Elementary School’s main office and identified themselves as "representatives of a federal agency," according to a message school officials sent to parents and others. Individuals also showed up at Russell Elementary School. Both schools are located in South Los Angeles’ Florence-Graham neighborhood. On Wednesday, an LAUSD spokesperson confirmed the individuals were from the Homeland Security Investigations unit within the Department of Homeland Security, not agents from Immigration and Customs Enforcement. District officials did not say why the individuals were there or release additional details about the visit. "After following District protocols, school administrators denied entry to the individuals, and they left," school officials said in the statement to both school communities. "We want to reaffirm the District’s unwavering commitment to the well-being and education of all students." There is no evidence yet that the officials were enforcing immigration law in any way. Telemundo52 [4/10/2025 6:18 PM, Clara Ramirez, 101K] reports that a Department of Homeland Security spokesman confirmed that these DHS officers were in these schools carrying out welfare checks on children who arrived alone at the border. This had nothing to do with the implementation of the immigration law." The statement added that the DHS is leading efforts to carry out welfare checks on these children to ensure that they are safe and that they are not exploited, abused or victims of sex trafficking. Unlike the previous administration, President Trump and Secretary Noem take responsibility for protecting children very seriously and will continue to work with federal authorities to reunite them with their families. In less than 70 days, Secretary Noem and Secretary Kennedy have already brought together almost 5,000 unaccompanied children with a family member or safe guardian. During a press conference on Thursday, LAUSD Superintendent Alberto Carvalho said that "this is the first time federal agents have tried to take immigration action on our school campuses. We’ve had evidence of other incidents near our school campuses, but this is the first time federal agents have entered our schools trying to take action that we understand as federal actions with our children."

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NewsMax [4/10/2025 3:27 PM, Solange Reyner, 4998K]
Univision [4/10/2025 4:44 PM, Staff, 5325K]

Bloomberg [4/10/2025 10:05 AM, Staff, 13342K] reports that Trump administration officials have described the men deported to El Salvador prisons last month as "the worst of the worst," suggesting they were gang members involved in murder, rape and kidnapping. The reality is that of 238 migrants — mostly Venezuelan — that officials accused of belonging to the Tren de Aragua gang and expelled to the Central American country in mid-March, just a small fraction had ever been charged with serious crimes in the U.S. Hundreds of pages of U.S. legal records and American government statements reviewed by Bloomberg News found five men charged with or convicted of felony assault or firearms violations. Three men were charged with misdemeanors including harassment and petty theft. Two others were charged with human smuggling. For the rest of the men, there was no available information showing they committed any crime other than traffic or immigration violations in the U.S. The findings raise questions about how the Trump administration determined that the migrants sent to El Salvador were violent criminals. The U.S. maintains that all of the Venezuelans on the flights had committed a crime because they were in the country illegally, a senior official with the Department of Homeland Security said in an email. The official said many of the men who lacked U.S. records were nonetheless terrorists, human-rights abusers or gangsters.

Washington Post [4/10/2025 8:24 PM, Anumita Kaur and María Luisa Paúl, 31735K] reports U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services will begin screening immigrants’ social media accounts for antisemitic content as grounds to deny visa and green-card applications, the agency announced Wednesday — a move that immigration-law and free-speech experts said the government could use to target political speech it dislikes. The guidance, effective immediately, affects immigrants applying for lawful permanent residence, foreign students and immigrants “affiliated with educational institutions linked to antisemitic activity,” the agency said. Social media content that indicates an immigrant is “endorsing, espousing, promoting, or supporting antisemitic terrorism, antisemitic terrorist organizations, or other antisemitic activity” will negatively impact their immigration application. “There is no room in the United States for the rest of the world’s terrorist sympathizers, and we are under no obligation to admit them or let them stay here,” Tricia McLaughlin, the Department of Homeland Security’s assistant secretary for public affairs, said in a statement. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi L. Noem “has made it clear that anyone who thinks they can come to America and hide behind the First Amendment to advocate for anti-Semitic violence and terrorism — think again. You are not welcome here.” The announcement from U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, a subagency within DHS that oversees the country’s immigration and naturalization systems, raised concern among experts that the policy is too vague and would rely heavily on the personal opinions of officials. Homeland Security said in a statement that the new policy uses the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s working definition of antisemitism: “A certain perception of Jews, which may be expressed as hatred toward Jews. Rhetorical and physical manifestations of antisemitism are directed toward Jewish or non-Jewish individuals and/or their property, toward Jewish community institutions and religious facilities.”

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Breitbart [4/10/2025 5:00 AM, Paul Bois]
Axios [4/10/2025 5:00 PM, Rebecca Falconer and Russell Contreras]

The Hill [4/10/2025 3:03 PM, Rebecca Beitsch, 12829K] reports a Jewish civil rights group is asking the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) how it plans to evaluate migrants’ social media accounts after the agency said it would use antisemitic content as grounds for denying immigration benefits. The department said Wednesday it would "begin considering aliens’ antisemitic activity on social media" as it weighs whether to approve applications for green cards or student visas. But the Jewish Council for Public Affairs (JCPA), an 80-year-old nonpartisan Jewish advocacy group, asked the DHS how it plans to make that evaluation. The JCPA noted that the DHS said the new policy would be applied to those "affiliated with educational institutions linked to antisemitic activity." The group also asked about other forms of extremism and whether the DHS has plans to evaluate any applicant’s support for any neo-Nazi or white supremacist groups. The group sought more details about how the review would be carried out, asking what search tools would be used, who would be making the decision and if applicants from all countries would be screened. NewsMax [4/10/2025 4:33 PM, Staff, 4998K] reports that on Wednesday, the DHS announced it would begin reviewing social media accounts for traces of antisemitism as grounds for denying an applicant a green card or student visa. In justifying the new policy, Tricia McLaughlin, the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) assistant secretary for public affairs said, "There is no room in the United States for the rest of the world’s terrorist sympathizers, and we are under no obligation to admit them or let them stay here." Yet, civil rights leaders are concerned the policy is a backdoor to the erosions of freedom which would harm all communities. The group was skeptical as to how antisemitism would be defined and whether the agency would also seek other forms of discrimination.

NPR [4/11/2025 5:03 AM, Jasmine Garsd, Joel Rose, 29983K] reports Pro-Palestinian activist Mahmoud Khalil who was detained in early March by U.S. immigration officials, is facing possible deportation for actions the government alleges goes against American foreign interests. Khalil, a Columbia University graduate student, is a Green Card holder, married to a U.S. citizen. To justify his deportation, the government is invoking an obscure law that played a major role in shaping American immigration during the Cold War: the McCarran-Walter Act, or the Immigration Nationality Act of 1952. Since last year, some pro-Palestinian protestors have been accused of antisemitism and of supporting terrorist organizations. Protestors deny this, arguing that criticism of Israel’s actions in Gaza and U.S. support should not be equated with antisemitism. The Trump Administration has promised a crackdown. "We know there are more students at Columbia and other Universities across the country who have engaged in pro-terrorist, anti-Semitic, anti-American activity, and the Trump Administration will not tolerate it," President Trump posted on his social media last month. "We will find, apprehend, and deport these terrorist sympathizers from our country — never to return again.” The case of Mahmoud Khalil has raised the question of free speech rights for immigrants. The Trump administration argues that when it comes to non-citizens, there are limits to free speech. Pro-Palestinian protestors, they say, are supporting terrorism. "It is a privilege to be granted a visa to live & study in the United States of America," Homeland Security Sec. Kristi Noem posted on X last month. "When you advocate for violence and terrorism that privilege should be revoked and you should not be in this country.” The First Amendment to the Constitution does not distinguish between citizens and non-citizens, and the Supreme Court has in the past ruled that the First Amendment applies to noncitizens. But the federal government has almost total power over immigration, deciding who comes and stays in the U.S., and has in the past made that ruling based on whether or not it believes an ideology affects American foreign policy. Notably, in the 1950’s, during the Cold War, the Immigration and Nationality Act or the McCarran-Walter Act heavily monitored immigrants for communist ideology. Passed in 1952, the act states that the U.S. government may deport "an alien whose presence or activities in the United States the Secretary of State has reasonable ground to believe would have potentially serious adverse foreign policy consequences for the United States.” It was specifically designed to detain, deport and bar entry visas to communists. According to the U.S. Department of State, Pennsylvania Congressman Francis McCarren "expressed concerns that the United States could face communist infiltration through immigration and that unassimilated aliens could threaten the foundations of American life.” The Trump Administration is now calling back to that policy.

USA Today [4/10/2025 6:44 PM, Swapna Venugopal Ramaswamy, 75858K] reports the Statue of Liberty may soon need a new inscription: "Give us your rich, your wealthy, your high net-worth individuals yearning to breathe free.” Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick announced Thursday that the "gold card" visa, which gives wealthy foreigners a path to citizenship, would be available within a "week, week-and-a-half.” Lutnick, who was attending President Donald Trump’s cabinet meeting at the White House, gave the status update one week after the president showed off the physical card on Air Force One. The gold-colored card, emblazoned with a likeness of Trump’s face, offers a path to citizenship to foreigners after paying $5 million to the government. "I’m very excited that within a week-and-a-half we’re going to start with the gold card and the Trump card – it’s coming out, and we’re excited about that, and that’s coming soon," Lutnick said on Thursday. "We are going to be selling a gold card," Trump as he first floated the idea in February. "We are going to be putting a price on that card of about $5 million.” Trump said it would replace the "EB-5" immigrant investor green card visa program, which allows immigrant investors the option to invest between $800,000 and $1.05 million that help create or preserve U.S. jobs to become permanent residents. "Wealthy people will be coming into our country by buying this card," he said in February. "They’ll be wealthy, and they’ll be successful, and they’ll be spending a lot of money, and paying a lot of taxes and employing a lot of people.” Trump has said that he is not seeking approval from Congress as he is not providing them with citizenship but only a path to citizenship.

NewsNation [4/10/2025 5:49 PM, Jeff Arnold, 6866K] reports some U.S. couples could face a minimum of $3,000 in a "birth tax" under President Donald Trump’s executive order that seeks to end birthright citizenship, according to a cost analysis conducted by a non-partisan think tank. The National Foundation for American Policy used current government fee structures for proving U.S. citizenship to calculate the "tax." Nearly half of the costs ($1,385) would go toward completing the required 14-page Application for Certificate of Citizenship through U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, the group estimated. At least another $1,500 would go for legal fees associated with completing the government form — or one like it — if Trump’s executive order were to go into effect for children born in the United States, but to parents who are not Americans or legal permanent residents. The fees compiled by NFAP are contingent on the executive order clearing legal hurdles.

NewsMax [4/10/2025 8:45 PM, Mark Swanson, 4998K] reports Secretary of State Marco Rubio took aim at foreign students who come to the United States on a student visa only to do "crazy things" on campus, asserting that the administration continues to crack down on these "lunatics." Rubio said a student visa is not "some sort of birthright." Rubio made the remarks during President Donald Trump’s Cabinet meeting on Thursday. "If you come to this country as a student, we expect you to go to class and study and get a degree. If you come here to, like, vandalize a library, take over a campus, and do all kinds of crazy things, you know, we’re going to get rid of these people," Rubio said. "So when we identify lunatics like these, we take away their student visa." Rubio said late last month that the State Department had, at that point, revoked more than 300 student visas of foreign students who participate in actions such as "vandalizing universities, harassing students, taking over buildings, creating a ruckus," among other things, like voicing support for Hamas terrorists in Gaza or antisemitic speech. "No one’s entitled to a student visa. The press covers student visas like they’re some sort of birthright," Rubio added. "No, a student visa is like me inviting you into my home. If you come into my home and put all kinds of crap on my couch, I’m going to kick you out of my house." Rubio’s remarks come amid reports that 300 foreign students in recent days alone have had their student visas revoked. The White House defends the revocations under the 1952 Immigration and Nationality Act. "It’s a section of the Immigration and Nationality Act that basically states that, for whatever reason, that if we think you’re not compliant, we can make you deportable," immigration lawyer Jamie Barron told CBS News. "It could be, for example, an argument with a roommate, a fight, a DWI, a theft charge, or maybe they did a protest, which is freedom of speech, but they consider it may be harmful for the country."

NBC News [4/10/2025 10:16 AM, Kimmy Yam, 44742K] reports that Students from California to Ohio to North Carolina are losing their visas with no explanation, being taken off the street by plainclothes officers and finding themselves subject to accusations reserved for terrorists. As of Wednesday, authorities had revoked the visas of international students in at least 29 states — with officials largely citing a seldom-used 1952 foreign policy statute to take aim at their activism. Others’ visas have been terminated seemingly for past charges like DUIs. Attorneys and advocates say it seems as though people who have protested in support of Palestinians, those with previous arrests and those with certain political social media posts are the likeliest to have been swept up. The focus on international students is part of the Trump administration’s larger immigration crackdown and deportation machine, immigration attorneys and policy experts say, with immigrants of all statuses being scrutinized. “It’s just part of their whole plan about reducing immigration entirely,” said Jath Shao, a Cleveland-based immigration attorney who runs a virtual law firm and represents several international students, most of them Asian. “They come after the small and the weak — people who don’t have as many resources to defend themselves.” Immigration and Customs Enforcement didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

The Hill [4/10/2025 6:00 AM, Lexi Lonas Cochran, 12829K] reports hundreds of foreign students at dozens of colleges across the country have had their higher education experience turned upside down as the Trump administration has expanded its immigration crackdown beyond those involved in the pro-Palestinian protests. International students are seeing their visas revoked for infractions as minor as traffic violations, while colleges are having to check immigration databases to find out whether their students are still allowed to be in the country. Ivy League universities, state schools and community colleges have all been impacted as students decide whether to find legal counsel or leave the country before Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) comes for them. Exactly how many visas have been revoked is unknown because the State Department has declined requests to share numbers and some schools are too afraid to speak up. An Inside Higher Ed tracker has the number of colleges and universities affected by the visa revocations at more than 80, including public and private institutions in a wide range of locations and sizes. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said last month that more than 300 student visas have been revoked under the Trump administration, with more coming every day. "We don’t discuss individual visas because of the privacy issues involved," State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce said Tuesday. "We don’t go into statistics or numbers; we don’t go into the rationale for what happens with individual visas. What we can tell you is that the department revokes visas every day in order to secure our borders and to keep our community safe, and we’ll continue to do so.” The visa revocations began at big-name schools, such as Columbia University, and at least at first targeted students who were involved in pro-Palestinian protests. But it has expanded beyond that, with one University of Florida student detained by ICE after he was arrested for traffic violations. The American Council on Education, along with 16 other groups representing a broad swath of higher education institutions, wrote a letter on April 4 requesting a briefing with the State Department on these actions. "We seek clarity amidst reports that student visas are being revoked and records are being terminated in the Student Exchange Visitor Information System without additional.

FOX News [4/10/2025 7:47 AM, Michael Dorgan Fox, 46189K] reports a Chinese doctoral student at Dartmouth College is about to have his visa reinstated after it was revoked without explanation last week by Homeland Security. Xiaotian Liu, who is studying computer science at the Ivy League college, had his F-1 student status terminated on Friday, with his lawyers arguing in court documents that the move was done without prior notification and insisted he had not taken part in any of the student protests that swept the college last year. It comes as the Trump administration has begun a new wave of visa revocations for international students studying at American universities. Dartmouth officials said they discovered the termination independently while reviewing Student and Exchange Visitor Information System (SEVIS) records on Friday and informed Liu the same day, according to court documents viewed by Fox News Digital. A federal judge said Wednesday that she will order the federal government to re-instate the visa, according to The Dartmouth, a student newspaper at the college. His legal team argued that the revocation was unlawful under federal administrative law and a violation of due process under the Fifth Amendment of the Constitution. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and Acting Director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement Todd Lyons were named as plaintiffs. Dartmouth described the termination as "not standard or normal procedure." Liu’s lawyers insisted he had not committed a crime and had no disciplinary issues. "He has not committed any crime or even a traffic violation," his lawyers wrote in the court documents. "Nor has he shown any violence (or even participated in any protest) in the United States or elsewhere.” Liu came to the United States in 2016 to study computer science and obtained a G.P.A. of 4.0 out of 4.0 for his Masters program, they wrote. Assistant U.S. Attorney Raphael Katz, a lawyer for the federal government, did not have an explanation in court on Wednesday. "I don’t have the facts to explain why the change in status happened at this point," Katz said, per The Dartmouth. The outlet reports that one other international student at the college had their visa revoked. The forthcoming decision was welcomed by Gilles Bissonnette, the legal director of the ACLU of New Hampshire, who said that Liu can now continue studying and working computer science. "International students are a vital community in our state’s universities, and no administration should be allowed to circumvent the law to unilaterally strip students of status, disrupt their studies, and put them at risk of deportation," Bissonnette said. President Donald Trump has suspended federal funding to every Ivy League, besides Penn and Dartmouth, over investigations into anti-Israel protests that have taken place on their campuses since October 2023. Funding for dozens of other universities has also been impacted by investigations for the same reason. The Trump administration has promised to be more aggressive in ending campus antisemitism after saying President Joe Biden did not hold universities accountable for their violent protests. The administration has also made moves to detain and deport foreign students who participated in or orchestrated anti-Israel protests at American universities. Dartmouth, located in Hanover, New Hampshire, is one of the nine colonial colleges chartered before the American Revolution. Fox News Digital’s Greg Wehner and Elizabeth Pritchett as well as The Associated Press contributed to this report.

FOX News [4/10/2025 4:11 PM, Cameron Arcand, 46189K] reports the City of Newark and its Democratic mayor are facing pushback after filing a legal complaint against Immigration and Customs Enforcement for reopening a building to prep illegal immigrants for deportation without "following proper building safety protocols." Mayor Ras Baraka said in a statement that using the building, Delaney Hall, for processing people in the country illegally goes against state and local law, leading the city to file a lawsuit in the Essex County Superior Court at the end of March. New Jersey state laws on illegal immigrants have continued to spark pushback among Republicans, as state police were directed not to pay attention to warrants requested by the federal government for immigration enforcement purposes, according to an email obtained by Jack Ciattarelli’s gubernatorial campaign and reviewed by Fox News Digital.

Axios [4/10/2025 6:20 AM, Kristal Dixon, 13163K] reports a metro Atlanta DACA recipient is suing a credit union, alleging the financial institution denied her car loan application based on her resident status in the United States. People who fall under Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals status, often referred to as "Dreamers," came to the U.S. as undocumented immigrants when they were children and are authorized to live, work and drive here. The lawsuit, filed April 3 in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia, accuses the Credit Union of Georgia of following "a policy of denying full access to financial products to applicants who are not United States citizens or lawful permanent residents." The class-action lawsuit was filed on behalf of a Cherokee County resident by the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund and Atlanta-based law firm Eshman Begnaud, LLC. The complaint contends the credit union’s policy violates a federal civil rights law that bars discrimination based on race, ethnicity or color when making or enforcing contracts. The plaintiff, Carmen Belem Pimentel Alcocer, is a DACA recipient and has been in the U.S. since 1999 when she arrived from Mexico at the age of nine, Andrea Senteno, regional counsel for MALDEF, told Axios. Pimentel, who has a social security number and is authorized to work in the country, submitted a car loan application to the credit union in May 2024. A representative with the credit union asked Pimentel if she had a green card, the suit alleged. She said she didn’t but said she was a DACA recipient. The representative told Pimentel that the credit union changed its policies in January 2024 to only approve loans to people who are U.S. citizens or lawful permanent residents, according to the lawsuit. Senteno said her organization has filed 22 similar cases across the country since 2017. "We really do continue to see these instances where individuals are being denied ... on just the sole factor that they’re not a U.S. citizen and they’re not a green card holder," she said. The federal court docket doesn’t show an attorney or law firm that’s representing the Credit Union of Georgia. A message was left with the credit union’s president and CEO, but the call was not returned. There are about 3.6 million Dreamers who live in the U.S., but a fraction of them have sought legal protection, according to the National Immigration Forum. During his first term, President Trump’s administration tried to end the DACA program, Axios’ April Rubin previously reported. The Supreme Court ruled in 2020 that while the administration could end DACA, the method it used was illegal. Senteno told Axios no hearings have been scheduled because they are very early in the case, but they are "looking forward to litigating this issue."

Axios [4/10/2025 6:19 AM, Steph Solis, Joe Guillen, 13163K] reports the feds are expanding their revocation of student visas nationwide in unorthodox ways that conceal their rationale and sidestep due process rights, attorneys say. The Trump administration has moved beyond penalizing international students over pro-Palestinian activism and stripped scores of students’ visas without explanation, university officials and attorneys say. The federal government has revoked international students’ visas at U of M, Michigan State, Wayne State, Oakland University, Central Michigan and Grand Valley State University, the Detroit News reported U of M officials said yesterday that 22 students and recent graduates have had their visas or their right to remain in the country revoked. The federal government has not disclosed specific reasons for the terminations, a university statement reads. International students and their attorneys are scrambling to find out why their visas were revoked and how to avoid meeting the same fate as Tufts University student Rumeysa Öztürk, who was detained over pro-Palestinian activism, and others. If the widespread student visa revocations continue, universities that rely on high tuition fees from international students could suffer financially. An estimated 1 million international students generate more than $40 billion for American higher education each year, per a 2024 article by The World.

CBS News [4/10/2025 7:11 PM, Dawn White, 51661K] Video: HERE reports hundreds of student visas have been revoked across the United States, including almost 80 in North Texas. This comes as the Trump Administration announced new social media screenings for antisemitic activity by students seeking visas and those in the higher education system. Immigration lawyer Jamie Barron is working seven days a week, helping several university students who had their visas revoked. "It’s a really sad and stressful situation, and the government doesn’t tell us a lot of why it’s doing this," Barron said. The White House is defending its actions under a 1952 law. "It’s a section of the Immigration and Nationality Act that basically states that, for whatever reason, that if we think you’re not compliant, we can make you deportable," Barron said. "It could be, for example, an argument with a roommate, a fight, a DWI, a theft charge, or maybe they did a protest, which is freedom of speech, but they consider it may be harmful for the country.” A spokesperson at the University of Texas at Dallas confirms 19 students had their visas revoked, but didn’t give the reasons why. Pro-Palestinian protest at UTD caught national attention last May and resulted in 21 arrests. The University of North Texas and the University of Texas at Arlington confirm that 27 international students had visas revoked at each institution. Texas Woman’s University has six students affected. "Some are planning to depart the country. Some are planning to maybe go to school in Spain, England, other countries that are a little bit more welcoming right now, and it’s really sad because this is severely going to affect the U.S. economy," Barron said. Texas A&M International Student and Scholar Services has launched a new immigration policy update webpage and is coordinating question-and-answer sessions in light of the news. A spokesperson said this is an "unprecedented situation" affecting nearly all U.S. higher education institutions. "It creates fear for anybody who’s a foreigner," Barron said. "The vast majority are good people that want to follow or create the American dream for themselves.” Barron believes the government is targeting two groups of people. "It’s possibly minor offenses, even if they were found not guilty, or people that are of interest to the government that maybe participated in a protest that doesn’t make the government happy," Barron said. "That doesn’t make them terrorist or that they did anything illegal, but it’s being used against them.”

San Diego Union Tribune [4/10/2025 9:24 PM, Kristen Taketa, 1682K] reports four San Diego State University international students have had their visas revoked, the university said Thursday, as the Trump administration continues its immigration crackdown on hundreds of international students across the nation. Those revocations come in addition to five UC San Diego students who have also had their visas revoked. And one UCSD student was detained at the border and deported to their home country. It’s still unclear exactly why the State Department has revoked these visas. SDSU said it would not release details about the students due to privacy laws, and that all students had been notified. As of Thursday, 48 California State University students have had their visas revoked since the start of the year, according to the university system’s updates page. UC President Michael Drake said Wednesday the UC knows of 50 students and recent graduates who have had visas revoked. He said the federal government did not give advance warning and had indicated it terminated the visas for alleged violations. As of last fall, UCSD had more than 7,000 international students enrolled, and SDSU had nearly 1,000. Meanwhile the CSU system is warning all students, faculty and staff with plans to travel internationally to "proceed with extreme caution" and carefully weigh whether it’s necessary to travel internationally at this time, considering the recent spate of federal immigration enforcement actions as people try to reenter the U.S. San Diego State says it provides free immigration legal services for students, faculty and staff through a partnership with Jewish Family Service, which also provides services at other local colleges. The CSU system says it also provides such services through a contract with Immigrant Legal Defense. The increased enforcement against immigrants and visa-holders, as well as threats of cuts to universities that defy Trump administration demands, have created a climate of fear on campuses but also resistance. The University of San Diego joined more than 80 colleges across the country in filing an amicus curiae brief Wednesday in support of a lawsuit challenging the Trump administration’s arrests and deportations of students and faculty who have protested Israel’s war in Gaza. That brief is one of the first large-scale statements by higher education institutions to protest President Donald Trump’s policies targeting international students and immigrants. Its signatories included many Catholic universities, liberal arts colleges, other private universities and a few state universities. The colleges say the loss of international students, faculty and staff will hurt America’s colleges with reduced enrollment, tuition and scholars, and ultimately hurt American research, innovation and the economy. They warn of a "brain drain" of faculty and students who will instead flock to institutions in other countries. "The policy presumes that it will benefit the United States while harming only those non-citizens whom the administration dis-favors," the brief states. "In fact, in the long run, the policy will benefit other countries … and it will grievously harm the United States, by depriving this country of the many benefits that non-citizens at American colleges and universities provide and by diminishing American higher education.”

Daily Wire [4/10/2025 7:26 AM, Hank Berrien, 4672K] reports that on Wednesday, Republicans on the House Committee on Homeland Security advanced a number of bills to combat terrorism, strengthen security at the border, and counter the Chinese Communist Party’s efforts against America. "I am proud of this Committee’s work to advance legislation that protects Americans from growing threats to our homeland and our way of life," Chairman Mark Green (R-TN) stated. "For far too long, the CCP has tried to influence American higher education, target and harass dissidents on U.S. soil, and infiltrate our critical infrastructure and government networks. Today, this Committee stood up to China, advancing bills from Chairman Pfluger and Rep. Ogles to counter the real and growing threat they pose in our own backyard.” "We also will not forget the serious threats sparked by the Biden-Harris administration’s historic border crisis. That’s why Committee Republicans advanced bills from Reps. [Marjorie Taylor] Greene and [Clay] Higgins to demand transparency on the number of Special Interest Aliens encountered at our borders and enhance efforts to detect deadly drugs like fentanyl at our land ports of entry," he continued. "I look forward to working with my colleagues in the House to swiftly pass these bills to increase transparency and give Custom (sic) and Border Protection (CBP) more enforcement tools."

Washington Examiner [4/10/2025 8:55 AM, Brady Knox, 2296K] reports that the Trump administration is touting its success in halting the flow of unaccompanied minors into the United States, following scrutiny of the phenomenon under the Biden administration. In a Department of Homeland Security fact sheet exclusively shared with the Washington Examiner, the agency said it accomplished a record low number of encounters with Unaccompanied Alien Children (UACs) coming over the border. The trend of UACs was concerning due to the danger of their abuse and exploitation by cartels. According to the statistics, in March 2025, U.S. Border Patrol encountered just 631 UACs, compared to 18,716 in March 2021. This represents a 97% decrease from the equivalent period during former President Joe Biden’s tenure. The average number of monthly UAC encounters under Biden was 11,132, compared to less than 700 under Trump. The total number of encounters of illegal immigrants in March was lower than Biden’s UAC encounter average, at just 7,181. According to the DHS, Border Patrol encountered 473,145 UACs at the southwest border during the Biden administration, a number far exceeding that of any other administration. The handling of these children earned further criticism — a report from the Department of Homeland Security Office of Inspector General found that over 300,000 migrant children under the care of the Office of Refugee Resettlement effectively disappeared from official radar. The DHS also touted the work of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to put UACs in safe care. In 70 days, the agency said it reunited nearly 5000 UACs with a guardian or safe relative.

Washington Times [4/10/2025 6:02 PM, Stephen Dinan, 1814K] reports the Biden administration used its "parole" powers to admit at least 6,300 unauthorized migrants into the U.S. who have criminal records or appeared on the government’s terrorism watch list, the Department of Government Efficiency reported Thursday. Once here, many of them quickly signed up for taxpayer-funded benefits, DOGE said. Forty-one were collecting unemployment benefits, 22 got student loans and an as-yet undetermined number were collecting food stamps. More than 400 also got tax refunds in 2024, DOGE said. "Under the Biden administration, it was routine for Border Patrol to admit aliens into the United States with no legal status and minimal screening," DOGE said on social media. "So far, CBP identified a subset of 6.3k individuals paroled into the United States since 2023 on the FBI’s Terrorist Screening Center watch list or with criminal records. These paroles have since been terminated with immediate effect.” Parole became the Biden administration’s workaround to the regular immigration system. CBP used it to welcome at least 1 million people who lacked a legal visa to enter the U.S. Most were part of the CBP One app or the Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua, Venezuela programs. They were allowed to enter as long as they pre-scheduled their arrivals and, in the case of the CHNV program, arranged for people to promise to support them financially. The Biden administration justified it as a way of taking pressure off the Border Patrol, because the migrants were coming through border crossings or airports rather than trying to sneak in between crossings. Critics said that was a distortion of the law, which only allows parole in exceptional cases where there was an urgent humanitarian need or particular benefit to the U.S. Traditionally that had meant things like medical emergencies, or where U.S. authorities wanted someone here to help with a criminal investigation. Homeland Security had already announced it was terminating the parole status for those who came under CHNV, effective April 24. But a federal judge in Boston said Thursday that she would put that move on hold.

Breitbart [4/10/2025 4:09 PM, Christian K. Caruzo, 2923K] reports former Cuban judge Juana Orquídea Acanda was detained by U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agents and faces deportation for hiding her links to the Cuban Communist Party (PCC), Cuba-focused outlets reported on Wednesday. Acanda Rodríguez — a 62-year-old woman from Matanzas, Cuba — reportedly arrived at Miami International Airport on March 20 under an immigrant visa arranged by her son identified as a U.S. citizen. CBP reportedly detained Acanda Rodríguez upon her arrival and accused her of withholding key information during her immigration process — most notably, her communist affiliation and her three-decades-long career within the Castro regime’s judicial system. "This is not an isolated case. There are more and more frequent attempts of entry by former officials who, after decades of supporting a repressive model, now seek to benefit from the freedoms of the country that for years they vilified from public office," a federal source close to the case told Diario Las Americas on Wednesday.

Telemundo [4/10/2025 7:50 PM, Eduardo "Yusnaby" Rodriguez, 171K] reports Juana Orquídea Acanda Rodriguez, a 62-year-old former Cuban judge, was arrested at Miami International Airport on charges of immigration fraud. According to federal documents, the woman arrived on a flight from Varadero on March 20 and filed an immigrant IR-5 visa. However, Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agents found that he had lied in his application by stating that he had no previous employment or higher education. In fact, Acanda was a judge in Matanzas, Cuba, and a law graduate. During an interview with federal agents, the defendant confessed to hiding her professional history and membership of the Communist Party, fearing that this would affect her eligibility to emigrate. The woman was recognized by the official Cuban press in 2023 as a prominent figure in the judicial system and appeared on state television thanking the Revolution for its trajectory. He now faces federal charges for using fraudulently obtained immigration documents. His hearing on a change of sentence and sentence is scheduled for April 16 before Judge José E. Martinez. Sources from Telemundo 51 say Acanda no longer has family or housing in Cuba, which complicates a possible deportation process.

CBS News [4/10/2025 6:37 PM, Staff, 51661K] Video: HERE reports a civil rights attorney based in Michigan claims U.S. Customs and Border Patrol agents targeted him because he represented a pro-Palestine protester. Amir Makled says he was detained while returning from an international family vacation for roughly 90 minutes at the Detroit Metro Airport and pressured to turn over his cell phone. Makled joins "America Decides" to detail the experience.

FOX News [4/10/2025 9:35 PM, Julia Bonavita, 46189K] reports border patrol agents at the Texas-Mexico border made two interesting finds while searching vehicles last weekend, resulting in the arrests of three people in two separate incidents. A 20-year-old man and a 21-year-old woman, both U.S. citizens, were crossing into the United States through the Anzalduas International Bridge when their vehicle was flagged by CBP agents for a second inspection on Sunday. Upon investigation, officials discovered a spider monkey stowed inside a backpack in the vehicle. The two individuals were taken into custody and the monkey was transported to Gladys Porter Zoo in Brownsville. The Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora protects certain types of monkeys and their importation is regulated by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, according to CBP officials. However, monkeys are not permitted to be imported as pets. On the same day, CPB agents at the Hidalgo International Bridge stopped a 68-year-old Mexican citizen crossing into the U.S. for a second inspection. Agents discovered approximately 73 pounds of alleged cocaine stashed inside the man’s Fort Explorer. Authorities estimate the alleged narcotics have a street value of approximately $980,000. The man was taken into custody by Homeland Security and the cocaine was seized by CBP. The identities of the three suspects have not been released by authorities. "Our frontline CBP officers and agriculture specialists continue to remain vigilant as they conduct their inspections; their attention to detail and inspections experience led to an interception of an endangered species and a significant narcotics seizure in two separate enforcement events," Hidalgo Port Director Carlos Rodriguez said in a statement. "We remain committed to preventing the exploitation of protected animals and the spread of animal diseases. Seizures of narcotics also reinforce our continued commitment to our border security mission.” CBP did not immediately respond to Fox News Digital’s request for comment.

Houston Chronicle [4/10/2025 5:41 PM, Benjamin Wermund, 1769K] reports the Texas House on Thursday was poised to pour $6.5 billion more into Gov. Greg Abbott’s border security crackdown, even as crossings are at their lowest point in decades and the state is pulling back some elements of Operation Lone Star. The Republican-controlled chamber appeared ready to approve a two-year budget that would give the governor $2.8 billion to continue installing barriers along the Rio Grande and for grants for local border security. It would also direct $2.3 billion to the Texas Military Department and $1.2 billion to the Department of Public Safety to pay for personnel that patrol the border. The Senate has already approved the same funding.

FOX News [4/10/2025 12:09 PM, Peter D’Abrosca, 46189K] reports that a man who abducted his two children from their Los Angeles school and crossed the U.S. southern border with Mexico could ultimately be heading to Ukraine, according to the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD). "The suspect, Rodion Kolomoeits, is described as a 39-year-old male, White, with brown hair and gray eyes" LAPD said in a release announcing a manhunt for the children. "The suspect is a Ukrainian national and is believed to be making efforts to return to Ukraine with the children." According to the release, Kolomoeits is believed to have abducted his children, 9-year-old Avaora Kolomoeits and her 7-year-old brother, Hrant Kolomoeits from their school mid-morning on Tuesday. He had recently lost custody of the children. Later in the day, the Toyota Prius Kolomoeits is suspected of using in the kidnapping was seen crossing the border into Mexico at San Ysidro. The suspect and his children all speak Russian as their primary language. LAPD is asking for anyone with information about the missing children to contact them. Meanwhile, the war between Russia and Ukraine continues to escalate, as Russian airstrikes hit Kyiv on Sunday as part of the latest volley of attacks. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on social media that the attacks are a response to allied diplomacy efforts. "These attacks are (Russian President Vladimir) Putin’s response to all international diplomatic efforts. Each of our partners — the United States, all of Europe, the entire world — has seen that Russia intends to continue the war and the killing," Zelenskyy said.

FOX News [4/10/2025 1:01 PM, Pilar Arias, 10702K] reports that in less than a month, air travelers at U.S. airports and people entering some federal buildings must have a REAL ID. On Wednesday, the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) "reminded the public that starting Wednesday, May 7, 2025, every air traveler 18 years of age and older will need to have a REAL ID-compliant state-issued driver’s license, instruction permit or identification card or another acceptable form of ID to board a U.S. commercial aircraft," according to a media release. REAL IDs have a gold star in the upper right-hand corner, TSA said. "With the upcoming federal enforcement of REAL ID exactly four weeks away, I can’t stress enough the importance of travelers being prepared," TSA Federal Security Director Kc Wurtsbaugh said in a statement. "Take a few minutes now to determine what form of photo identification you will use to verify your identity the next time you travel by air," he continued. "Even if you don’t have plans to travel by air now, your plans could change. Now is the time to make a plan.” Once enforcement begins, the TSA said unprepared travelers arriving at TSA checkpoints should expect delays.

Washington Examiner [4/10/2025 7:00 AM, Jack Birle, 2296K] reports Real ID standards are set to go into effect nearly two decades after they were approved by Congress and countless delays in implementation, with the final rush coming as the deadline nears. As the May 7 deadline approaches, efforts to ensure the public is in compliance with the new standards for driver’s licenses and IDs have ramped up. Here is what to know about those efforts and Real ID. A Real ID is a form of identification that has met minimum federal requirements outlined by the Real ID Act. The minimum documentation needed to acquire a Real ID includes items showing a person’s full legal name, date of birth, Social Security number, two "Proofs of Address of Principal Residence," and lawful status, according to the Department of Homeland Security. The standard was created via the Real ID Act of 2005, which was signed into law by then-President George W. Bush. The original deadline was set for May 11, 2008, but was delayed multiple times. The current and seemingly final deadline is May 7, but the final rule published in the Federal Register in January does offer some flexibility for enforcement through May 2027.

Breitbart [4/10/2025 1:10 PM, Lucas Nolan, 2923K] reports that the FBI is leading an investigation into an act of domestic terrorism that caused an explosion and fire at a Tesla charging station in Lacey, Washington, this week. KOMO News reports that in the early hours of Tuesday, the Lacey Police Department received reports of a loud explosion at a Tesla charging station near a Target store. Upon arriving at the scene, officers discovered extensive damage to the charging station, with broken pieces scattered across the parking lot. The incident is being treated as a case of malicious mischief, and the FBI has taken over the investigation. While it remains unclear whether the explosion was caused by a fire or a bomb, authorities believe it to be a deliberate and targeted act like other domestic terror incidents at Tesla facilities. Fortunately, no injuries have been reported in connection with the incident. The FBI’s involvement suggests that the case is being taken seriously, and a thorough investigation is underway to identify the perpetrators and their motives. This incident is not an isolated one, as there have been several recent cases of vandalism and domestic terrorism targeting Tesla vehicles and infrastructure in Washington state. Last month, a Tesla was set on fire in Seattle’s Capitol Hill neighborhood, and just a few weeks prior, half a dozen Cybertrucks in the Lynnwood area were defaced with swastikas. A Tesla charging station in Centralia was also targeted with spray paint.

Washington Examiner [4/10/2025 6:00 AM, Barry Angeline and Dan McCabe, 2296K] reports diversity, equity, and inclusion can strengthen organizations when properly implemented. Diverse teams prevent groupthink and spark innovation. But when misused to justify unqualified appointments, DEI undermines the cause it claims to support. This is the case with the Federal Emergency Management Agency in Puerto Rico. The Washington Examiner previously published “FEMA’s DEI Problem,” which first exposed FEMA’s obsession with identity politics derailing recovery. A second story, “FEMA’s DEI Misadventure,” documented sabotage and reverse discrimination against our team of seven straight, older, white military veterans and corporate executives. Here, we reveal how FEMA’s machinery of legal offices, contracting officials, and Equal Employment Opportunity staff colluded to obstruct accountability. Their playbook? Deny, deflect, and depose. The term "Deep State" evokes SPECTRE from James Bond, an ominous cabal pulling the strings. But FEMA is no slick villain lair. It’s a bloated bureaucracy of bumbling buffoonery. We joked that if you gave FEMA leadership $50 for a Big Mac, they’d return with a kitten, pincushion, French horn, and no change. FEMA’s real competency is maintaining the status quo — disaster recovery is just a side hustle. FEMA’s Equal Employment Opportunity office didn’t investigate — it retaliated. In May 2019, we filed a discrimination complaint through ATCS, a Virginia-based civil engineering firm. ATCS alerted FEMA’s contracting officer, while we notified FEMA’s Continuous Improvement Program leader of our whistleblower status. Within days, ATCS, collaborating with FEMA, fired two team members. The contract was axed, and we filed five more complaints, all ignored by FEMA. Only after escalating to the Department of Homeland Security did FEMA respond. In January 2020, FEMA’s Equal Employment Opportunity office told us to file as a class. We complied, and mediation was scheduled for March. We didn’t ask for money or firings — just to return to Puerto Rico, finish our work, and have FEMA employees trained in Federal Acquisition Regulations and Equal Employment Opportunity rules. FEMA refused, and mediation failed.

MortgagePoint [4/10/2025 3:45 PM, Eric C. Peck, 8K] reports a contingent of Congressional Democrats have sent a letter to Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem demanding that she not follow through with the Trump administration’s plans to eliminate the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). Secretary Noem recently announced in a cabinet meeting “we’re going to eliminate FEMA” contrary to previously saying at her nomination hearing that she “will enhance our emergency preparedness and strengthen FEMA’s capabilities.” The letter—signed by a group including Committee on Financial Services Ranking Member Rep. Maxine Waters, Committee on Homeland Security Ranking Member Rep. Bennie G. Thompson, Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure Ranking Member Rep. Rick Larsen, Committee on Appropriations Ranking Member Rep. Rosa DeLauro, and Committee on Science, Space and Technology Ranking Member Rep. Zoe Lofgren—voiced concern over mounting reports of FEMA being dismantled and the ongoing steps being taken to fire employees and reduce funding from disaster recovery and preparedness grants. “The Trump administration’s plan to dismantle FEMA will make Americans less safe,” wrote the Democratic contingent in the letter. “Congress, in collaboration with stakeholders and informed by the lessons learned from large-scale disasters and emergencies like Hurricanes Andrew, Katrina, Sandy, and Maria, and the 9/11 terrorist attacks, has built a framework from which FEMA operates critical programs that serve as a lifeline to communities after disasters and emergencies. Any attempt by the Trump administration to dismantle FEMA will erode federal capabilities; leave states, locals, tribes, and territories vulnerable; and cause imminent danger to Americans, especially as we approach hurricane season.”

New York Post [4/10/2025 10:10 AM, Steven Yablonski, 54903K] reports that portions of the Midwest and Southeast recently slammed by a deadly barrage of powerful storms and flooding are continuing recovery efforts in the wake of the disaster, but now, as residents try to sift through the rubble, they’re facing a renewed risk of severe weather on Thursday. At least 25 people in seven states were killed due to the extreme weather, including deaths from tornadoes in Tennessee, Missouri, Indiana, Arkansas, and Mississippi and fatalities from flooding in Kentucky. The FOX Forecast Center said clusters of thunderstorms are expected to break out across portions of the mid- and Deep South and Tennessee Valley on Thursday, which are areas that were all heavily impacted by the extreme weather. However, while there is a renewed risk of powerful storms, the threat isn’t as high as it was ahead of last week’s deadly severe weather outbreak. More than 34 million people will be at risk of severe storms on Thursday. But NOAA’s Storm Prediction Center (SPC) placed nearly 14 million people in a Level 2 risk on its 5-point severe thunderstorm risk scale. This includes cities such as Memphis and Chattanooga in Tennessee, Birmingham and Huntsville in Alabama, and Atlanta in Georgia. President Trump approved emergency disaster declarations for Arkansas, Tennessee, and Kentucky, allowing the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) to provide additional support for communities grappling with the scope of the historic disaster. [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

USA Today [4/10/2025 2:21 PM, Doyle Rice, 75858K] reports that it’s been a deadly and violent start to the year for tornadoes in the United States. More than 470 tornadoes have been reported across the United States so far this year, which is nearly double the historical average for the year to date, according to a tabulation from AccuWeather. Since 2010, the only years that had more tornadoes than this year were 2023 with 530 and 2017 with 536. “This has been an extremely dangerous and destructive stretch of spring severe weather," said AccuWeather Senior Director of Forecasting Operations Dan DePodwin, in a news release. "Tornadoes have damaged or destroyed hundreds of homes and businesses across the central and southeastern U.S. The frequency and severity of extreme weather in America this year has been alarming." Tornadoes have killed over 30 Americans so far this year. On average, based on 30 years of weather data, 71 Americans are killed by tornadoes each year, according to the National Weather Service. Through the end of March, Mississippi was leading the nation for tornado reports, with 92 twisters reported. Mississippi, Missouri, Illinois, Alabama and Indiana are the top five states for tornadoes so far this year. Major flooding from a rare atmospheric river and a multiday severe weather outbreak that produced dozens of destructive tornadoes in early April caused $80 billion to $90 billion in total damage and economic loss, according to a preliminary estimate from AccuWeather.

(B) Good Morning America [4/10/2025 8:29 AM, Staff] reports that a Bridgton man is facing charges after he told an undercover Secret Service agent that he was going to shoot President Trump. 46-year-old Kevin Bell allegedly made the threat to the agent at a local restaurant on Saturday. Bell now faces up to 5 years in prison and up to $25,000 in fines. He is due in court next Wednesday.

AP [4/10/2025 1:00 PM, Stephany Matat] reports that a man already jailed on federal charges of attempting to assassinate then-presidential candidate Donald Trump as he golfed last fall will face additional state terrorism and attempted murder charges, Florida’s attorney general said Thursday. Ryan Routh tried to undermine the country’s political system and will face state attempted first-degree murder and terrorism charges, Attorney General James Uthmeier said. “Attempting to take the life of a former president and a leading presidential candidate isn’t just an attack on one man, this was a political attack against our Republican form of government and our shares American values,” Uthmeier said. Routh’s lead attorney, Kristy Militello, didn’t immediately respond to an email seeking comment. According to prosecutors, Routh plotted to kill Trump as Trump golfed at his West Palm Beach golf course in September. Secret Service officers spotted Routh before Trump came into view. Routh aimed his rifle at an agent, who opened fire, which led Routh to drop his weapon and flee without firing, they said. Uthmeier, a Republican, criticized the Biden administration, accusing it of trying to “frustrate our efforts” and “block” his office’s investigation. He lauded FBI Director Kash Patel and U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi for being willing to “work together to pursue justice.” Routh is jailed on federal charges of attempting to assassinate a major presidential candidate, possessing a firearm in furtherance of a crime of violence, assaulting a federal officer, being a felon in possession of a firearm and ammunition, and possessing a firearm with an obliterated serial number. He is due in court on the federal charges in September. The lag between his arrest and his next court date was granted to give his attorneys time to review hundreds of hours of footage from police body cameras and surveillance cameras, and to pore over material from Routh’s 17 cellphones and other electronic devices. Shortly after Routh’s arrest, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis said the state would conduct its own investigation and could bring charges that aren’t available at the federal level. If convicted of the attempted assassination charge, Routh could be sentenced to life in prison.

Reported similarly:
Breitbart [4/10/2025 4:06 PM, Alana Mastrangelo, 2923K]
CBS News [4/10/2025 2:06 PM, Staff, 51661K]
FOX News [4/10/2025 11:15 AM, Michael Dorgan, Sarah Rumpf-Whitten, Jake Gibson, 46189K]
Washington Examiner [4/10/2025 3:01 PM, Jenny Goldsberry, 2296K]
Daily Wire [4/10/2025 6:04 AM, Hank Berrien, 4672K]
Free Beacon [4/10/2025 3:00 PM, Matthew Xiao, 475K]

Federalist [4/10/2025 7:35 AM, Ken Silva, 1033K] reports that, after the April 19, 1995, Oklahoma City bombing, the FBI launched a massive manhunt for a mystery accomplice to Timothy McVeigh known as "John Doe 2"—only to later claim that he never existed, and that McVeigh acted largely alone. Nearly 30 years later, an attorney in Utah named Jesse Trentadue is still working to unearth the truth through his ongoing Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit for surveillance footage of the blast. According to FBI and Secret Service records, the footage shows McVeigh with another unidentified subject. Since McVeigh’s other known accomplice, Terry Nichols, was confirmed to have been in Kansas on April 19, John Doe 2’s identity remains a subject of debate. Credible researchers have made the case that he may have been an undercover informant, or even an agent. Trentadue’s nearly 17-year-old FOIA lawsuit hasn’t received much attention over the last decade, largely because it’s been litigated behind closed doors, with gag orders on all parties. That’s because a special master is continuing to investigate stunning allegations that the FBI intimidated an undercover informant involved in the case. With the OKC bombing anniversary next week, Trentadue recently moved to unseal the deposition he took of the FBI informant—a retired Marine named John Matthews, who allegedly saw McVeigh months before the bombing. However, one of the top officials in the Justice Department, Principal Acting Assistant Attorney General Yaakov Roth, is opposing his motion, according to a letter Trentadue wrote to Attorney General Pam Bondi—a copy of which this reporter obtained. "Mr. Roth appeared in that case in his official capacity and heads the Department of Justice’s vehement opposition to unsealing Matthews’ deposition," Trentadue told Bondi in a March 26 letter. "Why is the Department of Justice fighting so hard to prevent the unsealing of that deposition when it is contrary to everything the current administration has publicly stated about exposing and cleaning up the FBI lawlessness?". The contents of Matthews’s deposition are not publicly known. Trentadue said he wasn’t allowed to comment on the matter due to the court-imposed gag order. Judging by Matthews’s past public disclosures, his testimony likely reveals new information about some of the darkest scandals in the FBI’s history—including its coverup of others involved in the OKC bombing, which killed at least 168 people, including 19 children, in what remains the deadliest domestic terrorism attack in American history. Bondi’s office did not respond to messages seeking comment. Roth also did not respond to a message seeking comment.

SeaPower Magazine [4/10/2025 10:26 AM, Brett Daivs, 23K] reports the U.S. Coast Guard was pleased to hear of President Trump’s interest in acquiring as many as 40 new icebreakers, said Coast Guard Vice Admiral Tom Allan, the acting deputy commandant for operations. “Whenever your boss is interested in 40 icebreakers, you are very happy, right?” he said in response to a question during the April 7 panel on “Demanding Presence in the Poles: How a Good Arctic Strategy is Park of our National Security.” “I mean, this has been something that we’ve been trying to do for a long time, I’ll tell you that,” Allan said. They wouldn’t all need to be heavy icebreakers like the aging Polar Star, in service since the 1970s, he said, as studies have show the Coast Guard wouldn’t need more than eight or nine of those. There are smaller ships that could do icebreaking as part of their other functions, and some could be used on the Great Lakes. Adding those in, “you get up to that 40 number pretty quick,” Allan said,” because that’s what we need … to make sure that domestic operations continue and that we are poised to have that presence in the high Arctic and Antarctic. So, I’ll just say it’s very exciting to see your boss point towards a vision that we’ve had for a long time.” The United States and Canada must maintain a strong presence in the poles, especially as warming trends lead to more commercial activity, including shipping and mining, speakers from those nations said during the panel. Operating in the region is challenging, the panelists said, not only because of ice but also from wind and fog, which can hamper aviation. “So, having properly equipped vessels, training crews, and most importantly, [having] icebreakers is essential to giving the U.S. assured access to these critical areas,” Allan said.

SeaPower Magazine [4/10/2025 12:04 PM, Staff, 23K] reports during his March 4 joint address to Congress, President Donald Trump vowed to establish a new office of shipbuilding within the White House and “resurrect” America’s shipbuilding industry. Implementing that vision poses both opportunities and challenges, said military and shipbuilding leaders during the April 8 Sea-Air-Space Center for Maritime Strategy Breakfast session, “Navigating Tomorrow: Forging a New Era in Innovation and Shipbuilding.” U.S. Navy Admiral Daryl Caudle, commander of U.S. Fleet Forces Command, said one issue is there is a set of strategic assumptions regarding shipbuilding that most people take for granted, and those assumptions “limit intellectual honesty and our perspective about the size, scale and scope of our challenges.” Caudle said the largest assumption has to do with combat shipbuilding capacity. He said it’s commonly thought the attack on Pearl Harbor awoke a sleeping shipbuilding giant, but “the only reason we were able to achieve that level of production was because of the groundwork of two years earlier.” Caudle said there’s a tendency to focus on the decay of U.S. shipbuilding capacity since World War II, but before the war, the U.S. contributed a relatively small amount of global shipbuilding. “I bring these up to show we have faced the odds before,” he said, adding he’s quite confident solutions are available as long as people are open and honest about the problems, the scale of those problems, and are proactive in solving them without having to undergo a crisis like Pearl Harbor and 9/11. “Shipbuilding has taken on a prominence and importance we haven’t seen in a century. Coast Guard shipbuilding continues to move, but not move fast enough,” said U.S. Coast Guard Acting Commandant Admiral Kevin Lunday. He said America is demanding more of its Coast Guard, “but we are less ready than in any time in our history since World War II.”

NewsMax [4/10/2025 8:59 AM, Charlie McCarthy, 4998K] reports that President Donald Trump has tasked the Department of Government Efficiency to review the U.S. military’s shipbuilding processes. Trump on Wednesday signed an executive order that gives DOGE 90 days to begin a review of the Department of Defense and Department of Homeland Security vessel procurement processes. Elon Musk’s advisory group then will submit to Trump a proposal for improving the efficiency and effectiveness of the processes. DOGE’s review will coincide with a separate proposal for improved acquisition strategies processes from the secretaries of Defense, Commerce, Transportation, and Homeland Security, and the director of the National Science Foundation. The secretaries were given 45 days to conduct a review of shipbuilding for government use and submit a report "with recommendations to increase the number of participants and competitors within United States shipbuilding, and to reduce cost overruns and production delays for surface, subsurface, and unmanned programs." Separate itemized and prioritized lists of recommendations for the Army, Navy, and Coast Guard shall be included in a Maritime Action Plan (MAP), which is to be submitted to Trump within seven months.

New York Times [4/11/2025 2:01 AM, Andy Newman and Chelsia Rose Marcius, 153395K] reports a sightseeing helicopter tumbled out of the sky and plunged into the Hudson River across from Manhattan on Thursday afternoon, killing all six people aboard, including three children, officials said. Video footage showed the helicopter falling end over end and crashing into the water just off Jersey City, N.J., at high speed at about 3:15 p.m. Witnesses reported hearing a loud bang and seeing the helicopter hit the river without at least one of its rotor blades. Two adults and three children from Spain — Agustín Escobar, an executive with the technology company Siemens, and his family — were pulled from the helicopter or the frigid river but none survived, a senior law enforcement official said on condition of anonymity given the sensitivity of the crash. The pilot was also killed. Two of the passengers were alive when divers pulled them from the water but later died, New York City’s police commissioner, Jessica S. Tisch, said at a news conference. The helicopter, a Bell 206, was operated by New York Helicopter, which runs sightseeing tours for several hundred dollars a flight. The company’s chief executive, Michael Roth, said he did not know what had happened to the aircraft, which he had leased from a company in Louisiana. The National Transportation Safety Board was leading the investigation into the crash.

CNN [4/11/2025 1:11 AM, John Miller, Taylor Romine, Aaron Cooper, and Jeff Winter, 908K] reports a family’s afternoon sightseeing excursion above the misty shoreline of Manhattan ended in tragedy Thursday after the helicopter carrying them crashed off the New Jersey shoreline, killing them and the pilot. Spectators watched the helicopter as it dropped from the sky and slammed into the river upside down as fluttering debris landed in the water. The victims included Agustín Escobar, a Siemens executive, and his family, according to a law enforcement official. The family was visiting from Spain, New York Mayor Eric Adams said during a news conference Thursday. CNN has reached out to the New York Police Department and the US Coast Guard for more information on the victims. While not much is known about why the helicopter crashed, its staggering descent from the sky shocked witnesses as first responders did what they could to rescue the victims.

Asbury Park Press [4/10/2025 8:17 PM, Erik Larsen, 1800K] reports a 72-year-old man was rescued early Thursday morning in the area of the Oyster Creek Channel, after his daughter reported him overdue from a clamming trip in Barnegat Bay, according to the Coast Guard. John Mazzy, whose hometown was not provided, was found clinging to a channel marker and suffering from hypothermia-like symptoms, the Coast Guard said in a statement Thursday night. At 2:08 a.m. Thursday, an MH-65 Dolphin helicopter from Air Station Atlantic City located a 17-foot white Carolina skiff matching Mazzy’s vessel description. The helicopter crew directed a rescue crew from Station Barnegat Light and a commercial salvage boat crew that was in the area to the vessel, but no one was found aboard. A short time later, the helicopter crew spotted Mazzy clinging to a nearby dayboard and directed vessels to the location, according to the Coast Guard. Local authorities are investigating the circumstances that led to the emergency, all according to the Coast Guard.

NJ.com [4/10/2025 3:46 PM, Eric Conklin] reports three people were rescued from their vessel by a group of fishermen from New Jersey after their sailboat became inoperable in the Atlantic Ocean between the Garden State and Long Island, N.Y. on Tuesday, according to the U.S. Coast Guard. The vessel, a 32-foot sailboat named “Hot Chocolate,” was sailing between New Haven, Connecticut, and Ocracoke, North Carolina, an island community near Portsmouth Island, when it reported being disabled, Coast Guard Petty Officer 2nd Class Sydney Phoenix told NJ Advance Media Thursday. It was unclear when during the sailors’ journey the boat became unworkable. None of the sailboat’s occupants were injured, Phoenix said.

(B) Good Morning America [4/10/2025 9:57 AM, Staff] reports that a major drug bust operation by the US Coast Guard is being celebrated in south Florida. Attorney General Pam Bondi said over half $1 million of illegal drugs were seized. The Coast Guard intercepted about 45,000 pounds of cocaine and 4,000 pounds of marijuana. Bondi says two Mexican cartels are heavily tied to the shipments. The Coast Guard has seized over 59 metric tons of narcotics since February.

Breitbart [4/10/2025 12:11 PM, Randy Clark, 2900K] reports the crew of U.S. Coast Guard Cutter James offloaded approximately 48,000 pounds of illicit narcotics with a street value estimated to be worth more than $509 million at Port Everglades, Florida on Thursday. The offloaded contraband, a result of thirteen offshore interdictions in international waters, will involve 11 separate criminal cases. At a Wednesday morning press dockside conference, U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi told reporters, “We believe two cartels, CJNG and Sinaloa were heavily tied to these shipments, this is a major blow to their financial operations and their efforts to distribute drugs throughout our country.” Bondi was joined at the press conference by FBI Director Kash Patel, and Coast Guard Vice Admiral Nathan Moore. The seizures involved aircraft, unmanned aerial drones, and two U.S. Coast Guard cutters, the cutter James and the cutter Mohawk. The thwarted narcotics smuggling ventures took place off the coasts of Ecuador, Peru, and the Galapagos Islands. Bondi says the prosecution cases for defendants suspected of smuggling narcotics in international waters will take place in the Florida federal court system. Bondi noted the multi-law enforcement operation was an example of the Department of Justice working alongside other agencies to strike at the heart of the drug traffickers saying, ‘It’s an example of a prosecutor led, intelligence driven, approach to stopping these criminal enterprises in their tracks.”

Reported similarly:
CBS 5 Charleston [4/10/2025 3:51 PM, Colt Yeargin]
FOX 13 Tampa [4/10/2025 6:05 AM, Ryan Burkett]
Post and Courier [4/10/2025 12:53 PM, Caitlin Bell, 1000K]

Washington Examiner [4/10/2025 10:52 AM, Jenny Goldsberry, 2296K] reports that Sen. Ashley Moody (R-FL) celebrated the recent drug seizure in her state as combating the "number one crisis facing America right now." The U.S. Coast Guard seized 48,000 pounds of cocaine and marijuana, which were worth a combined $509 million. As a result, 34 drug traffickers were arrested in 11 interferences. According to the Coast Guard, the suspects were connected to Clan del Golfo, the Sinaloa Cartel, and Cartel Jalisco Nueva Generacion. "This was a great day for America, bad day for the cartels. It is great to see our strong law enforcement leaders, Pam Bondi and Kash Patel. So proud to support them as a new U.S. senator into their roles, going down and taking the time and showing that we are going to take this drug crisis seriously. This is the number one crisis facing America right now," Moody said on Fox News’s Fox & Friends first. "Absolutely not a doubt they are saving lives." Since Secretary of State Marco Rubio classified cartels as foreign terrorist organizations, those arrested are facing proportional charges from federal agencies. The Coast Guard implied their arrests could lead to "key intelligence for their total elimination." This latest effort is part of Operation Take Back America, an increased effort from the Department of Justice to target cartels.

Reported similarly:
FOX News [4/10/2025 6:59 AM, Staff, 46189K]

ABC 25 Tequesta [4/10/2025 6:09 PM, Jack Sears, 236K] reports the United States Coast Guard says it is pausing its search for a 32-year-old man who fell overboard on Wednesday. The agency stated that they had been searching an area located 17 miles southeast of the Lake Worth Inlet. In a statement, a Coast Guard spokesperson said, "Due to operational risks with the current sea state, the Coast Guard is continuing to radio an urgent marine information broadcast, but no active searches are being conducted at this time." The Coast Guard identified the missing man as Joshua Dimino. It is unclear what type of vessel the person may have fallen from. The Coast Guard’s Seventh District posted on X around 7 p.m. Wednesday, saying, "...air and surface assets are searching for a 32-year-old who reportedly fell overboard approximately 17 miles southeast of Lake Worth Inlet Wednesday evening. Partner agency aircrews are also assisting." The agency added that the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office was also assisting.

Reported similarly:
CBS 12 West Palm Beach [4/10/2025 9:40 AM, Sophie Pendrill]

Seattle Times [4/10/2025 4:12 PM, Amanda Zhou, 210K] reports pollution responders with the U.S. Coast Guard and the Washington State Department of Ecology are investigating a diesel spill that occurred in Lake Washington Ship Canal’s Salmon Bay Thursday morning. U.S. Coast Guard spokesperson Steve Strohmaier said the spill was reported between 7 a.m. and 8 a.m., when members of the Army Corps of Engineers at the Ballard Locks smelled diesel and started to see a sheen forming on the water. Strohmaier said Thursday afternoon that officials still did not know the source of the spill but that it did not appear to be an ongoing spill or a major spill that would require closing the waterway. The spill did not appear to be a "major concern to the marine life or the environment," he said. "It seems like it was a single one and done type situation," Strohmaier said.

Military.com [4/10/2025 11:44 AM, Patricia Kime, 420K] reports the Coast Guard has permanently relieved the commander of Coast Guard Sector San Diego following an investigation into allegations of a toxic work climate at the unit. Capt. James Spitler was temporarily reassigned in October along with the sector’s command master chief, Michael Dioquino, for "loss of confidence" in their leadership. According to the service, Spitler was relieved permanently on Tuesday, while Dioquino was permanently relieved in January. District Eleven Commander Rear Adm. Joseph Buzzella recommended the dismissal following an investigation into failures of "leadership, judgment and integrity," according to the service. Pacific Area Commander Vice Adm. Andrew Tiongson supported the dismissal, which was approved at the Coast Guard Headquarters level. In October, District Eleven public affairs officer Lt. SondraKay Kneen said leadership had received reports from personnel at the unit of unfair treatment and complaints regarding "actions against staff" that were "unfair and inappropriate" and "interfered with work performance or created an unwelcome work environment."

DVIDS [4/11/2025 12:01 AM, Chief Warrant Officer Sara Muir, 77K] reports from March 24 to April 4, 2025, maritime law enforcement and emergency responders from the Guam Port Authority and Guam Fire Department participated in two intensive training courses hosted at the Port and by Station Apra Harbor: the NASBLA Boat Crew Member Course (March 24–28) and the Boat Operator for Search and Rescue Course (BOSAR) (March 31–April 4). These courses, led by the U.S. Coast Guard in partnership with the National Association of State Boating Law Administrators (NASBLA), provided approximately 20 first responders with over 30 classroom hours and 35 underway hours of hands-on instruction. The training focused on building foundational skills critical for operating in the maritime environment, including boat handling and stability, piloting and navigation, crew efficiency, risk management, and search and rescue (SAR) operations, including towing and salvage. “This partnership with NASBLA and our local agencies is about creating a common standard that elevates our collective ability to respond on the water,” said Senior Chief Jeremy Jarvis, officer in charge of Station Apra Harbor, who spearheaded the effort. “By training together, we’re not just building skills—we’re building trust and operational synergy that benefits the entire community.”

NBC News [4/10/2025 7:37 PM, Kevin Collier, 44742K] reports the people tasked with keeping the country safe from foreign government hackers and cybercriminal gangs say they feel like they’re under attack, not from their usual adversaries but from the administration they work under. President Donald Trump’s Wednesday order calling for a Justice Department investigation into Chris Krebs, the former director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), has sent fresh shock waves through that agency’s hallways, according to five employees who spoke with NBC News. Each spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly. The order comes as the White House is downsizing the agency for at least the third time in three months. “It’s a really tough time for all of us right now,” said one employee. “Every day feels somehow more bizarre than the last. It is incredibly difficult to focus on our mission.” Trump’s moves on Krebs and CISA come as the U.S. faces mounting cybersecurity challenges, most notably from China, which has in just the last two years shown its capability to penetrate deep into sensitive U.S. infrastructure as well as government systems, federal officials say. For-profit hackers have also turned ransomware into a billion dollar criminal enterprise that shuts down hospitals, schools and many businesses. The Trump administration is also currently purging CISA’s workforce, according to emails to staff obtained by NBC News. The Department of Homeland Security, CISA’s parent agency, sent a memo Monday evening that encouraged employees to retire early or take a buyout package by Monday. A second email, sent by CISA acting director Bridget Bean, reiterated that offer. Trump has nominated a permanent director, Sean Plankey, who has yet to be confirmed by the Senate. A CISA spokesperson declined to comment. The White House didn’t respond to a request for comment. A DHS spokesperson declined to share how many employees it expected to cut, but said in an emailed statement: “Every dollar spent and position filled at DHS should be focused on our core mission of securing our homeland and keeping the American people safe.”

FOX News [4/10/2025 7:42 PM, Greg Wehner, 46189K] reports Chinese officials acknowledged behind closed doors at a December meeting that their government was responsible for a series of cyberattacks on U.S. infrastructure, according to a Wall Street Journal report based on information from people familiar with the matter. The news comes as the two countries continue to spar over tariffs imposed by President Donald Trump and reciprocated and upped by President Xi Jinping. In an exclusive, the Wall Street Journal reported that those who spoke on condition of anonymity claimed Chinese officials connected the cyberattacks on U.S. ports, airports, utilities and other important targets to America’s support for Taiwan. The report noted that Biden administration officials learned of the discovery first hand during a summit in Geneva, as their Chinese counterparts blamed the campaign, referred to as Volt Typhoon, on a criminal organization. Chinese officials also accused the U.S. of pointing blame at China based on their imagination. The White House and State Department did not respond to Fox News Digital’s request for comment on the matter. The Chinese Embassy told FOX Business News that China "firmly opposes" the smear attacks against it without any factual basis. "Cyberspace is characterized by strong virtuality, difficulty in tracing origins, and diverse actors, making the tracing of cyberattacks a complex technical issue," Embassy spokesperson Mr. Liu Pengyu said. "We hope that relevant parties will adopt a professional and responsible attitude when characterizing cyber incidents, basing their conclusions on sufficient evidence rather than unfounded speculation and accusations. "The US needs to stop using cybersecurity to smear and slander China, and stop spreading all kinds of disinformation about the so-called Chinese hacking threats," he added.

Reported similarly:
Wall Street Journal [4/10/2025 1:54 PM, Dustin Volz, 646K]
New York Post [4/10/2025 5:19 PM, Ronny Reyes, 54903K]
NewsMax [4/10/2025 5:17 PM, Jim Mishler, 4998K]

The Hill [4/10/2025 6:00 AM, Rebecca Beitsch, 12829K] reports the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the FBI are being pressed to explain numerous cuts to programs focused on combating domestic terrorism. Letters from Democrats in both chambers this week have asked why DHS dismantled a national database used to track domestic terrorism and hate crimes. Meanwhile, the FBI has reassigned staff from its Domestic Terrorism Operations Section. "As you know, data and intelligence should drive policy decisions, and the data and intelligence from your agencies is clear – domestic terrorism is a grave threat to Americans’ safety. Yet, your policy decisions indicate that you have decided to ignore the threat – risking American lives – in fear of running afoul of President Trump’s executive orders to disregard racism and racial inequities in America, which experts have warned fuel domestic terrorism," Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.) wrote in a letter obtained by The Hill. "Not only do these policy decisions make no sense given the threat picture, but some of them directly conflict with each other and the Trump Administration’s stated priorities," he added, noting the database also tracks antisemitic hate crimes, among other forms of domestic terrorism. The letter also asks whether the FBI is planning to "deprioritize domestic terrorism as an intelligence topic.” For the most recent year on record, the database tracked more than 1,800 domestic terrorism incidents, with Thompson noting that the majority were disrupted. The database tracked multiple types of extremism and ideologies. The latest in politics and policy. Direct to your inbox. By signing up, I agree to the Terms of Use, have reviewed the Privacy Policy, and to receive personalized offers and communications via email, on-site notifications, and targeted advertising using my email address from The Hill, Nexstar Media Inc., and its affiliates. In the Senate, Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) on Tuesday similarly asked about the database as well as the reassignments of FBI staff. "Taken together, these moves represent a broad institutional pullback from confronting the full scope of domestic terrorism threats at a time when experts continue to warn about intensifying danger, and the data points to the rising threat of attacks motivated by anti-government ideologies," he wrote. Trump administration officials have spent ample time in recent weeks discussing domestic terrorism, but those comments have been entirely focused on a rash of vandalism targeting Tesla cars and dealerships. "Let this be a warning: if you join this wave of domestic terrorism against Tesla properties, the Department of Justice will put you behind bars," Attorney General Pam Bondi said last month in announcing charges against three individuals charged in connection with throwing molotov cocktails at Tesla cars and charging stations. Both letters ask a series of questions of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and FBI Director Kash Patel, from how many FBI staff have been reassigned to what DHS plans to do with the partial data already collected for the Terrorism and Targeted Violence database and how they will track domestic terrorism going forward.

FOX News [4/10/2025 1:58 PM, Rachel Wolf, 46189K] reports that Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, is introducing legislation that would allow American victims of terror groups to hold the organizations that fund those groups accountable in a court of law. The Texas Republican is reintroducing the Limiting Immunity for Assisting Backers of Lethal Extremism (LIABLE) Act, which is similar to a bill he introduced during the last Congress. That version had the backing of then-Sen. Marco Rubio. As of now, Americans are able to sue foreign governments in specific cases outlined in the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act (FSIA), but they are unable to sue international organizations, which enjoy immunity under the International Organization Immunities Act (IOIA). However, the LIABLE Act would create an exception in the IOIA, allowing Americans to sue organizations that knowingly provide support or resources to terrorist groups. "UNRWA has knowingly provided salaries and materials to Hamas for decades. That support enabled Hamas to arm itself, create its vast underground terrorist infrastructure, and launch its October 7th atrocities on Israel," Cruz said in a statement on the original piece of legislation introduced in 2024. "That attack included the murder and kidnapping of dozens of Americans. The victims and their families deserve the ability to hold UNRWA accountable in court for its support of Hamas and for what happened on October 7th."

New York Post [4/10/2025 3:58 PM, Cecilia Catalini, 54903K] reports the New Yorker who joined ISIS nicknamed "Umm Nutella" was sentenced to nearly two decades in prison Wednesday — after the ISIS recruiter’s initial "shockingly low" 48-month sentence was tossed by an appeals court. Sinmyah Ceasar, 30, will now spend 19 years behind bars following the stiff sentence set by Brooklyn Federal Court Judge Kiyo Matsumoto — after she was infamously sentenced to just four years in prison by the late Judge Jack Weinstein in 2019. Weinstein had argued that the Brooklyn woman just needed education and mental health treatment to "save her as a human being" from her terrorism ties — but Ceasar "almost immediately" started reconnecting with ISIS after serving her light sentence while out on supervised release in July 2020, prosecutors have said. But Ceaser tried to make a run for it, blowing off a court-ordered appearance on Aug. 25, 2021, after the appeals decision — slicing off her ankle monitoring bracelet in an attempt to flee to Russia to avoid going back to prison, federal prosecutors have said. Prosecutors were seeking a sentence of 30 to 70 years in prison.

NewsMax [4/10/2025 7:34 PM, Michael Katz, 4998K] reports a U.S. citizen living in Brooklyn, New York, who pleaded guilty to a series of charges related to her support for the Islamic State terrorist group was resentenced Wednesday to 19 years in prison, far short of the 30 to 70 years federal prosecutors sought but nearly five times as long as what she first received. Sinmyah Amera Ceasar, 30, was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Kiyo Matsumoto on charges of providing material support and resources to ISIS, a foreign terrorist organization; obstructing justice while released on bail pending sentencing; and failing to appear for court when she attempted to flee the U.S., the Department of Justice said in a news release. Sue J. Bai, head of DOJ’s National Security Division, said in the news release the resentencing "marks the end of a righteous journey that began a decade ago.” "Terrorist organizations like ISIS rely on recruiters like Ceasar to attract, indoctrinate, and enlist new followers," Bai said. "The Department is committed to holding accountable those who seek to follow a similar path. Today was made possible by our prosecutors, staff, and members of the Joint Terrorism Task Force. We are grateful for their tireless pursuit of justice in this case.” Ceasar pleaded guilty to the material support charge in February 2017, to the obstruction of justice charge in March 2019, and to the failure to appear charge in October 2022. She had faced up to life in prison in 2019 on the providing material support to ISIS and obstruction of justice charges. But U.S. District Judge Jack Weinstein, who died in 2021, sentenced her in 2019 to four years in prison. Weinstein reportedly argued that Ceasar was "well on her way to rehabilitation," citing testimony from her psychologist, and that "this sentence will also save her as a human being." But Ceasar reconnected with ISIS after serving her sentence while out on supervised release in July 2020, DOJ said.

New York Times [4/11/2025 2:53 AM, Charlie Savage and Eric Schmitt, 330K] reports recent battlefield gains by an Islamist insurgency in Somalia have prompted some State Department officials to propose closing the U.S. embassy in Mogadishu and withdrawing most American personnel as a security precaution, according to officials familiar with internal deliberations. But other Trump administration officials, centered in the National Security Council, are worried that shutting the embassy could diminish confidence in Somalia’s central government and inadvertently incite a rapid collapse. Instead, they want to double down on U.S. operations in the war-torn country as it seeks to counter the militant group, Al Shabab, the officials said. The rival concerns are being fueled by memories of foreign policy debacles like the 2012 attack by Islamist militants who overran the U.S. mission in Benghazi, Libya, and the abrupt collapse of the Afghan government as American forces withdrew in 2021. They also underscore the broader dilemma for the Trump administration as it determines its strategy for Somalia, a chaotic and dysfunctional country fractured by complex clan dynamics, where the United States has waged a low-intensity counterterrorism war for some two decades with little progress. The considerations are appearing to pit President Trump’s top counterterrorism adviser, Sebastian Gorka, who has a hawkish approach to using force against militant Islamists, against more isolationist elements of Mr. Trump’s coalition. That group, sick of the “forever wars” that followed the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, does not see a major U.S. interest in Somalia. Last week, Mr. Gorka convened an interagency meeting at the White House to begin to grapple with an approach, according to officials briefed on its findings who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive deliberations. The meeting is said to have ended without any clear resolution. Under presidents of both parties, the United States has pursued a policy of propping up Somalia’s weak central government by training and equipping vetted units of its special forces, known as the Danab, and by using drone strikes to provide close air support to them as they battle Al Shabab, which has ties to Al Qaeda.

CNN [4/10/2025 8:40 AM, Katie Bo Lillis, Kylie Atwood and Zachary Cohen, 908K] reports the Trump administration has tightly restricted the number of people who have access to President Donald Trump’s highly classified daily intelligence report, five sources familiar with the move told CNN. Administration officials planned from the earliest days of Trump’s second term to cut access to the so-called President’s Daily Brief, or PDB — in part because during his first term, details from the report were sometimes leaked to the press, which contributed to the president’s sense that the intelligence community was trying to undermine him. Initially, White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles was personally approving who had access, one of the sources said. Now Tulsi Gabbard, who was sworn in as Trump’s director of national intelligence in February, oversees the document and has taken responsibility for who has access. It’s not unusual for new administrations to rejigger who has access to the PDB. And career intelligence officials responsible for putting it together typically approach a new administration to ask who should receive it and officials often move at first to limit access. But Trump, since he was first elected in 2016, has harbored a deep mistrust of the intelligence community, and in his second administration he has appointed officials who openly share his suspicions. Current and former officials say the move to limit access to the PDB comes against the backdrop of the president and his top officials’ determination to quash leaks and bring to heel what they see as subversive elements within the intelligence community — highlighting what one US official described as "ongoing large distrust issues.” That distrust — which reached its full expression in Trump’s sense that the FBI’s investigation into his 2016 campaign’s ties to Russia was a politically-motivated "witch hunt" and a "hoax" — continues to reverberate in the administration’s muscular approach to managing the intelligence community. Gabbard in particular has vowed publicly to "aggressively [pursue] recent leakers" and "clean house.” Former officials say shrinking access to the PDB is an equivocal move that might serve as a confidence-builder between the president and the community — but could also intensify divisions within the government and lead to a disorganized foreign policy, former officials familiar with the process said. "There’s a risk if you limit it too much you’re not operating off the same page and you have disagreement in the administration on key issues," one former intelligence official said. Hypothetically, "you don’t have (Secretary of State Marco) Rubio doing the same thing (special envoy to the Middle East Steve) Witkoff is doing.”

Federalist [4/10/2025 11:37 AM, Shawn Fleetwood, 1033K] reports that President Donald Trump signed an executive order on Wednesday that aims to strengthen America’s depleted shipbuilding industry and restore U.S. maritime dominance throughout the world. "The commercial shipbuilding capacity and maritime workforce of the United States has been weakened by decades of Government neglect, leading to the decline of a once strong industrial base while simultaneously empowering our adversaries and eroding United States national security," the president wrote. "It is the policy of the United States to revitalize and rebuild domestic maritime industries and workforce to promote national security and economic prosperity." Despite being the world’s leading superpower, America’s commercial and military shipbuilding industries have been in free fall for several decades, leading to a diminished naval force and allowing Red China to surpass the U.S. in overall ship production. A leaked 2023 briefing slide from the U.S. Office of Naval Intelligence, for instance, showed that "Chinese shipyards have a capacity of about 23.2 million tons compared to less than 100,000 tons in the U.S., making Chinese shipbuilding capacity more than 232 times greater than that of the U.S.," according to Fox News. Trump’s order seeks to reverse this alarming trend by instructing the assistant to the president for National Security Affairs (APNSA), in coordination with several cabinet secretaries and relevant agencies heads, to create and submit a "Maritime Action Plan (MAP)" within the next 210 days. This plan, according to the directive, will examine policies and actions designed to boost America’s maritime industrial capacity.

Reported similarly:
HS Today [4/10/2025 5:42 PM, Erin Caine, 38K]

AP [4/10/2025 4:50 PM, Lolita C. Baldor, 5046K] reports that the top U.S. commander in the Pacific warned senators Thursday that the military support that China and North Korea are giving Russia in its war on Ukraine is a security risk in his region as Moscow provides critical military assistance to both in return. Adm. Samuel Paparo, head of U.S. Indo-Pacific Command, told the Senate Armed Services Committee that China has provided 70% of the machine tools and 90% of the legacy chips to Russia to help Moscow "rebuild its war machine." In exchange, he said, China is potentially getting help in technologies to make its submarines move more quietly, along with other assistance. Senators pressed Paparo and Gen. Xavier Brunson, commander of U.S. Forces Korea, on China’s advances in the region, including threats to Taiwan. And they also questioned both on the U.S. military presence in South Korea, and whether it should be shielded from personnel cuts. Both said the current U.S. force there and across the Indo-Pacific is critical for both diplomacy in the region and America’s national security, as ties between Russia and China grow. The U.S. has 28,500 forces in South Korea. Paparo said North Korea is sending "thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands of artillery shells" and thousands of short-range missiles to Russia. The expectation, he said, is that Pyongyang will get air defense and surface-to-air missile support.

Bloomberg [4/10/2025 11:49 AM, Katrina Manson and Jamie Tarabay, 16228K] reports that OpenAI Chief Executive Officer Sam Altman said he would not rule out helping the Pentagon develop a new weapons platform, the latest sign of a shift in how artificial intelligence companies think about working with the defense sector. “I will never say never, because the world could get really weird,” Altman said on Thursday during remarks at the Vanderbilt Summit on Modern Conflict and Emerging Threats. However, Altman cautioned that he didn’t expect to work on such a platform for the Pentagon “in the foreseeable future,” unless it would be a trade-off among really bad options. “I don’t think most of the world wants AI making weapons decisions,” he said in the conversation with Paul Nakasone, former head of the National Security Agency and a current OpenAI board member. Defense contracts have historically been controversial with employees at consumer tech companies, including sparking significant protests inside Google in 2018. But the AI industry has recently shown more openness to such deals. OpenAI, in particular, has revised its policy on working in national security over the course of the past year, including announcing a strategic tie-up with defense-tech company Anduril Industries Inc. in December to work on anti-drone technology. Beyond defense, Altman said the government needs to start putting more effort into learning how to use and integrate AI tools.

Washington Examiner [4/10/2025 11:40 AM, Emily Hallas, 2296K] reports that White House National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett announced Thursday morning that trade deals are "moving fast" as nearly 20 countries sent in proposals. However, the realistic timeline of these deals could take years. Hassett’s update followed President Donald Trump’s 90-day pause on "reciprocal" tariffs he levied on dozens of countries last week. Trump imposed 10% universal baseline tariffs along with higher "reciprocal" tariffs on nearly every country due to trade practices he said put U.S. businesses and workers at a disadvantage. "There’s a big inventory of deals that are right close to the finish line," Hassett said during a CNBC interview Thursday, adding during another Fox & Friends appearance that the deals are "moving fast" as the United States has received offers "from more than 15 countries" and is "closing in" on 20 offers. "For sure, there’s a bunch of offers that are really sensible offers, and they’re coming from our top trading partners, and it’s some of the most progress in trade negotiation that I think probably the most progress that we’ve ever seen," he added. Hassett revealed that the president will hold discussions and a Cabinet meeting later Thursday to hash out details surrounding the deals.

Axios [4/10/2025 9:36 PM, Rebecca Falconer, 13163K] reports President Trump threatened Mexico with more tariffs and sanctions on Thursday over a water dispute at the southern border. What he’s saying: "Mexico OWES Texas 1.3 million acre-feet of water under the 1944 Water Treaty, but Mexico is unfortunately violating their Treaty obligation," Trump said in a Truth Social post, referring to a 1944 agreement that requires Mexico to deliver to the U.S. 1.75 million acre-feet of water over a five-year cycle. "This is very unfair, and it is hurting South Texas Farmers very badly. Last year, the only Sugar Mill in Texas CLOSED, because Mexico has been stealing the water from Texas Farmers," Trump said. "I will make sure Mexico doesn’t violate our Treaties, and doesn’t hurt our Texas Farmers. ... we will keep escalating consequences, including TARIFFS and, maybe even SANCTIONS, until Mexico honors the Treaty, and GIVES TEXAS THE WATER THEY ARE OWED!" he added. Context: By the end of last year, Mexico had only delivered 488,634 AF of water since Oct. 2020, per U.S. International Boundary and Water Commission data. The State Department’s Bureau of Western Hemisphere Affairs last month said on X Mexico’s "continued shortfalls in its water deliveries" were "decimating American agriculture," particularly farmers in the Rio Grande valley. "As a result ... for the first time, the U.S. will deny Mexico’s non-treaty request for a special delivery channel for Colorado River water to be delivered to Tijuana," it added. Mexican officials say extreme drought fueled by climate change was contributing to water shortages. The other side: Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum cited the three-year drought in a post to X addressing Trump’s complaints and said "to the extent water is available, Mexico has been complying" with the treaty. She said she had instructed government officials "to immediately contact" the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the State Department and she’s "confident that, as on other issues, an agreement will be reached."

Reported similarly:
New York Times [4/10/2025 9:45 PM, Chris Cameron and Emiliano Rodríguez Mega, 145325K]
Washington Examiner [4/10/2025 11:16 PM, Ross O’Keefe, 2296K]

New York Times [4/11/2025 2:53 AM, Nataliya Vasilyeva, 330K] reports an American citizen has been released from Russian custody in a prisoner swap, officials from the United States and Russia said on Thursday, amid a broader effort by the two countries to mend relations. The American, Ksenia Karelina, was serving a 12-year sentence in Russia after being convicted of treason for donating about $50 to a nonprofit group that sends assistance to Ukraine. She also holds Russian citizenship. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Thursday that Ms. Karelina, 33, was “on a plane back home to the United States.” “She was wrongfully detained by Russia for over a year and President Trump secured her release,” he wrote on X. Russia’s intelligence agency said that Ms. Karelina had been released after a presidential pardon in exchange for Artur Petrov, a citizen of Russia and Germany whom the Justice Department had charged with export control violations. The prisoner exchange highlighted how Moscow and Washington have been willing to engage in meaningful diplomacy even as talks led by the Trump administration about a potential cease-fire in Ukraine appear stalled. It came as U.S. and Russian diplomats met in Turkey to discuss practical measures to improve relations — like the resumption of direct flights and staffing levels at embassies. The C.I.A. said it had played a key role in the swap. It said in a statement that the exchange was negotiated with other partners, including the United Arab Emirates, and showed “the importance of keeping lines of communication open with Russia” despite challenges. “Today, President Trump brought home another wrongfully detained American from Russia,” the agency’s director, John Ratcliffe, said in a statement. “I’m proud of the C.I.A. officers who worked tirelessly to support this effort”

New York Times [4/11/2025 2:53 AM, Carlotta Gall, 330K] reports Turkey and Israel have started talks to prevent conflicts between their troops in Syria, as an Israeli military campaign and a growing rivalry for influence have raised tensions. The Turkish and Israeli governments said in statements that a meeting took place on Wednesday in Azerbaijan. The meeting between military and security officials was aimed at working out a way “to prevent undesired incidents in Syria,” a Turkish Defense Ministry statement said. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said the two sides had agreed to keep up a dialogue. The meeting came just ahead of a planned visit by Syria’s new leader, President Ahmed al-Shara, to Turkey on Friday to discuss security and military cooperation, Syrian television reported. A rebel coalition, led by Mr. al-Shara and backed by Turkey, overthrew President Bashar al-Assad in December, forcing Mr. Assad’s main allies, Russia and Iran, largely to withdraw. In the resulting power vacuum, Israel and Turkey have been competing for influence. The rivalry is adding to the instability in Syria, where the new government is struggling, under pressure from regional powers, to stabilize a country divided and wounded after 13 years of civil war. Turkey has long occupied parts of northern Syria in support of the opposition fighting the Assad regime, as well as to combat Kurdish rebels that it calls a terrorist threat to its own forces. Turkey recently offered to train a new Syrian army and to upgrade Syria’s army bases and airports, analysts say, though Syria has not publicly confirmed its acceptance of the offer. After the fall of Mr. al-Assad, Israel moved troops into a long-established buffer zone along the Golan Heights, and then beyond it, occupying parts of southern Syria and carrying out hundreds of bombing raids against Syrian military depots and bases. Syria’s new government under Mr. al-Shara has protested Israel’s strikes and incursions as an attempt to destabilize the country, and has announced a foreign policy of nonaggression with all its neighbors. It has said little publicly about the role it plans for Turkey to play. But the maneuvering of the two rivals escalated sharply last week as Israel bombed several bases, an attack that Syria said wounded dozens of soldiers and civilians. The bases were among those that Turkey had offered to use and upgrade, according to widespread media reports in Turkey and Syria.

The Hill [4/10/2025 6:00 AM, Laura Kelly, 12829K] reports President Trump is set to open direct talks with Iran this weekend in a high-stakes push for Tehran to give up its nuclear weapons ambitions, raising a chorus of questions and concerns from lawmakers in both parties. Iran on Monday said the "high-level talks," set to start in Oman on Saturday, would be indirect, seeming to contradict Trump, who said on Monday, "We’re having direct talks with Iran.” It’s also unclear if the president is looking to limit Iran’s nuclear capabilities — similar to the Obama-era agreement he trashed in 2018 — or demand the full destruction of its facilities. Rep. August Pfluger (R-Texas), chair of the influential Republican Study Committee, said anything short of a nuclear disbandment was unacceptable. "A full commitment that they, not just when Trump is president, but whoever follows President Trump is there, that there is a firm commitment, and we know, we can verify, and there’s a complete dismantlement of their nuclear enterprises," he told The Hill. The uncertainty over Trump’s endgame has strained relations with Israel, which is wary of any U.S. engagement with Iran, a sentiment shared by many on Capitol Hill. "I worry a little bit that this seems to be done, almost going around Israel," said Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.), the ranking member of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. "I just worry that with the complete disruption of most of our alliances, I think our negotiating position is weakened," he added. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called for the full dismantling of Iran’s nuclear program while sitting next to Trump in the Oval Office on Monday, saying he wants to see the "Libya model" applied to Israel’s top adversary. Trump has warned that "Iran is going to be in great danger" if the talks fail. And Netanyahu has long been mulling an assault on Iran’s nuclear facilities — though such a major move would be unlikely without some level of U.S. backing. The fact the talks are happening at all signals that pragmatic voices in Trump’s ear are winning out over Iran hawks, at least for the moment. Steve Witkoff, Trump’s special envoy for the Middle East and point person on talks with Russia over its war in Ukraine, is now taking on the Iranian file. In an interview with Tucker Carlson late last month, Witkoff called for a "verification program, so that nobody worries about weaponization" of nuclear material.

New York Times [4/10/2025 12:30 PM, Ana Swanson, 145325K] reports that the White House on Thursday clarified that China faced a minimum tariff rate of 145 percent on all imports to the United States. A day earlier, President Trump had said that he was increasing tariffs on China to 125 percent after Beijing retaliated against his previous levies. On Thursday, the White House explained that the 125 percent is on top of a 20 percent tariff the president had previously put on goods coming from China for its role in supplying fentanyl to the United States. That is a drastic increase on a country that supplies much of what Americans buy. China is the second largest source of imports for the United States and the primary global manufacturer of cellphones, toys, computers and other products. The 145 percent figure is also just a floor, not a ceiling. That amount is on top of other pre-existing levies that Mr. Trump already put in place including: 25 percent tariffs on steel, aluminum, cars and car parts. Tariffs of up to 25 percent on certain Chinese goods that Mr. Trump imposed during his first term. Tariffs of varying ranges on certain products in response to violating U.S. trade rules.

Washington Post [4/10/2025 7:24 PM, Michael Birnbaum, Natalie Allison and Cat Zakrzewski, 31735K] reports President Donald Trump and his top trade advisers on Thursday opened up the White House to trade negotiations with more than a dozen countries that one official vowed would bear results within weeks even as an escalating trade war with China showed no signs of abating. As countries scrambled to avoid the full blast of the heavy tariffs that Trump paused Wednesday, senior White House officials said they were satisfied with the first meetings they were taking, with countries offering to pull down trade barriers and make U.S. investments as they tried to understand what might save their businesses from the tax wallop. Several White House officials quoted in this article spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive internal considerations. Still, markets swooned, with the S&P 500 on Thursday shedding a third of its jump the previous day — the biggest since 2008 — as investors realized that the president is not backing away from a confrontation with Beijing. That fight escalated shortly after 11 a.m., when the White House said the tariffs on China now stand at 145 percent, not 125 percent as Trump had previously said. White House officials declined to detail a pathway out of the confrontation, with one senior official acknowledging that it was “sensitive.” As of Thursday, Trump viewed China as his top trade priority, though the president is expected to be involved in negotiations with other countries, according to a White House official. Investors are also facing the reality that the baseline 10 percent tariffs that Trump left in place Wednesday on most imports is the highest level in generations. But in a televised Cabinet meeting, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said that Trump’s disruptive approach to global trade would yield quick results for U.S. taxpayers. The president said his trade team was rushing to talk to the 75 countries his administration has said are banging on his doors.

CBS News [4/10/2025 6:59 AM, Haley Ott, 51661K] reports a spokesperson for China’s Commerce Ministry said Thursday that Beijing hoped the U.S. would work to de-escalate the trade war between the world’s two largest economies after President Trump announced a pause on higher tariffs he had imposed on many other countries. "China’s position is clear and consistent: the door to talks is open, but dialogue must be conducted on an equal basis with mutual respect," Commerce Ministry spokeswoman He Yongqian said. "China will stand by its position until the end. Pressuring, threatening, and blackmailing are not the correct ways to deal with China. We hope that the U.S. will work with China. Based on the principles of mutual respect, peaceful coexistence, and a win-win cooperation, we will properly resolve differences through dialogue and consultation." Mr. Trump announced a pause on the planned implementation of higher tariffs for almost all nations late Wednesday, leaving a 10% universal tariff in place, but said he was raising tariffs on China from 104% to 125%. The heightened levies took effect Thursday, at the same time as Beijing’s retaliatory tariffs of 84% took effect on U.S. imports to China. "I have reiterated China’s position many times, and it is very clear. We do not provoke trouble, nor do we fear trouble. The legitimate development rights of the Chinese people and the people of the world cannot be taken away. China’s and like all other countries’ sovereignty, security, and development interests should not be infringed upon," He said. China’s foreign ministry took a harsher stance, and vowed to fight on. "The U.S.’s reckless and unjust actions go against the will of the people and are doomed to fail in the end," Chinese Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Lin Jian said. "I want to reiterate that in a tariff war or trade war, there are no winners. China does not want a trade war, but we are not afraid of one. We will never stand by and watch the legitimate rights and interests of the Chinese people be undermined, nor will we allow international trade rules and the multilateral trading system to be trampled upon. If the United States insists on waging a tariff war or trade war, China will fight to the end." [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

FOX News [4/10/2025 2:17 PM, Elizabeth Elkind, 46189K] reports that a bipartisan duo of House lawmakers is moving to ensure the U.S. government is free from Chinese-made technology after President Donald Trump hiked tariffs against Beijing. Rep. Pat Fallon, R-Texas, is leading the Securing America’s Federal Equipment (SAFE) Supply Chains Act alongside Rep. Ro Khanna, D-Calif. It would impose new guardrails on the technology the U.S. government is able to purchase by forcing a federal agency or office to only purchase it from "original equipment manufacturers" or "authorized resellers," according to the bill text obtained by Fox News Digital. The bill targets U.S. government technology purchased through the "gray market," an alternative channel for purchasing and selling genuine goods without the authorization of the manufacturer. Fallon said his bill "dovetails" with Trump’s hawkish stance on China. "With the rising threat posed by Chinese aggression, not only in the Indo-Pacific, but here at home by means of artificial intelligence and cyberattacks, it’s critical that the Department of Defense secure its vital infrastructure," Fallon explained to Fox News Digital. "In order to do so, we must ensure that the U.S. military only purchases electronic equipment from approved vendors that are free from adversarial, particularly [Chinese Communist Party], influence." He praised Trump’s "bold leadership" in the U.S. "breaking its dependency on Communist China." "The SAFE Supply Chains Act dovetails with this endeavor and is in the best interest of U.S. national security," he said. The White House said Thursday it had imposed 145% in new tariffs on China, up from the 125% Trump announced the day before.

Breitbart [4/10/2025 2:04 PM, John Hayward, 2923K] reports that China’s updated "Unreliable Entity List" — a list of American companies banned from doing business in China in retaliation for President Donald Trump’s tariffs has grown to include eleven U.S. drone manufacturers. The drone industry is heavily reliant upon materials imported from China. The drone companies blacklisted by China include Brinc Drones, Domo Tactical Communications (DTC), Firestorm Labs, HavocAI, Insitu, Kratos Unmanned Aerial Systems, Neros Technologies, Rapid Flight, Red Six Solutions, Skydio, and Synexxus. China’s Ministry of Commerce (MOFCOM) said the banned companies "engage in activities that may endanger China’s national security and interests." More specifically, MOFCOM complained that the American firms "have either participated in arms sales to Taiwan or have undertaken so-called military technology cooperation with Taiwan, seriously harming China’s national sovereignty, security, and development interests." The regime in Beijing accompanied its blacklist with a white paper called "China’s Position on Some Issues Concerning China-U.S. Economic and Trade Relations," which purportedly made the case that "unilateralism and protectionism in the U.S. has significantly impeded the course of normal economic and trade cooperation between the two countries." The Chinese paper fumed against Trump’s "America First" policies as "a blatant infringement on the development rights of other nations" and "a selfish and short-sighted approach that will ultimately backfire."

The Hill [4/10/2025 6:00 AM, Julia Shapero, 12829K] reports President Trump’s new tariffs on China have thrown a wrench in efforts to negotiate a deal over TikTok’s divestment from its parent company ByteDance, as Washington and Beijing sink deeper into a trade war. After the White House finalized a deal on TikTok last week, Trump’s tariffs upended negotiations, prompting China to decline to approve the deal without further discussions on tariffs. Trump deepened his trade war with China on Wednesday, hiking tariffs on Chinese goods to a staggering 125 percent while easing them on nearly all other countries. As Trump goes to battle with China, he may be handing Beijing greater bargaining power, experts said. "This national security imperative to divest from ByteDance is now giving China leverage at the same time that Trump is trying to put the screws to them with tariffs," said Sarah Kreps, director of Cornell University’s Tech Policy Institute. The president signed an executive order Friday, once again delaying enforcement of a law that required ByteDance to divest from TikTok or face a ban on U.S. app stores and networks. After taking office, Trump gave TikTok an initial 75-day reprieve from the ban, which was set to expire Saturday. His latest executive order gives the app another 75 days to reach a deal and avert a ban. In his announcement Friday, Trump touted the "tremendous progress" his administration had made on a deal but said it "requires more work to ensure all necessary approvals are signed.” However, a source familiar with the negotiations told The Hill that a deal had been approved by existing investors, new investors, ByteDance and the U.S. government last Wednesday. The deal would have seen TikTok’s U.S. operations spun off into a new company owned and operated by a majority of American investors, while ByteDance would maintain a minority stake in the company.

Bloomberg [4/10/2025 1:53 PM, Josh Wingrove, 16228K] reports President Donald Trump said his tariffs may cause “transition problems” but expressed confidence in his plan, after the White House clarified US tariffs on China rose to 145%. “There’ll be a transition cost, and transition problems, but in the end it’s going to be a beautiful thing,” Trump said Thursday during a Cabinet meeting. “We’re in very good shape.” The staggering US tariffs on the world’s second largest economy have triggered a tit-for-tat trade war that has unnerved global financial markets. Trump is imposing a 125% charge designed to both counter America’s trade deficit with China and punish Beijing for retaliating against US import taxes. The number, published in a White House memo Thursday, comes in addition to a 20% levy put into place earlier this year over China’s role in fentanyl trafficking. Other Chinese imports, such as materials used in solar panels, are already subject to import taxes. Stocks fell on Thursday one day after the biggest buying spree in years. The S&P 500 Index sank more than 6%, before paring losses, as euphoria gave way to unease with investors bracing for more trade hostility. Trump pointed to Wednesday’s upswing after he announced a 90-day pause on higher tariffs on dozens of trading partners, saying “we had a big day yesterday.” He later told reporters he had not seen Thursday’s market numbers. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent cited lower oil prices, a successful bond sale and better-than-expected inflation figures, while dismissing the significance of Thursday’s selloff. “Look, the up two down one is not a bad ratio,” Bessent said, adding that he did not “see anything unusual today.” Trump told a reporter he thought the first deals are “very close” and voiced optimism that China would eventually come to the table. He also indicated willingness to be “flexible” on exemptions for companies or countries from the tariff regime, including on the 10% floor he’s established for all trading partners.

Reuters [4/11/2025 3:11 AM, Jeanny Kao and Ben Blanchard, 24727K] reports Taiwan is to be included in the first batch of trading partners to hold talks with Washington, President Lai Ching-te said on Friday, as his economy minister said the island could import over $200 billion worth of U.S. goods, much of it in energy. U.S. President Donald Trump said on Wednesday he would temporarily lower the hefty duties he had just imposed on dozens of countries while further ramping up pressure on China. Taiwan, a major semiconductor producer, was due to be hit with 32% tariffs. Countries around Asia have already said they have begun or are preparing to begin talks with Washington over the tariffs, and the White House has said nearly 70 countries have reached out to begin negotiations. "We are in the first batch of negotiations, and the government will be well prepared," Lai told business leaders in the central Taiwanese city of Taichung, in comments broadcast live by local media, without offering a timeframe. "Taiwan’s desire to strengthen economic and trade cooperation with the United States over the past years can be (fulfilled) by taking this opportunity," he added. The office of the United States Trade Representative did not immediately respond to a request for comment sent outside of office hours in Washington. Speaking to reporters at parliament in Taipei, Economy Minister Kuo Jyh-huei, who said on Thursday Taiwan could buy $200 billion more from the U.S. over 10 years and increase LNG imports as part of a trade deal, said it could be more than that amount. "This is just the part from the economy ministry," he said, adding much of the imports could be energy-related. Taiwan has not said when formal talks with the United States might start. But Foreign Minister Lin Chia-lung told reporters he hoped a consensus with the United States could be reached within 90 days. "Taiwan and the United States have been communicating smoothly and have continued to make arrangements for the tariff talks," he said.

Maritime Executive [4/10/2025 12:39 PM, Sophie Wushuang yi, 325K] reports that China’s People’s Liberation Army last week deployed the aircraft carrier Shandong alongside 19 warships in military exercises encircling Taiwan. Initially conducted without an official codename – a departure from previous practice – these drills were later designated "Strait Thunder-2025A", along with a signal of potential follow-up operations later this year. These exercises occurred against a backdrop of deteriorating cross-Strait relations. Taiwan’s Lai Ching-te last month labelled China a "foreign hostile force" and announced plans to re-establish Taiwan’s peacetime military court system, marking a significant rhetorical escalation. The PLA exercises featured live-fire drills, simulated blockade operations, and unprecedented aerial incursions, occurring around the anniversary of the 1979 Taiwan Relations Act, a key US policy milestone. The core of the issue is an unfinished civil war. China has consistently asserted that Taiwan is an integral part of its territory and views such military exercises as measures to safeguard its sovereignty and territorial integrity. What distinguishes this moment is the deliberate shift in presentation. Previously, major exercises including "Joint Sword" in 2023 were explicitly framed as exceptional responses to specific provocations. The eventual codename "Strait Thunder-2025A" given to the latest exercises suggests a transition from episodic responses to a more systematic approach to military pressure.

FOX News [4/10/2025 7:30 AM, Eryk Michael Smith, 46189K] reports Taiwanese President William Lai is struggling to contain both open hostility and private "wooing" by China. In late March, four Taiwanese soldiers, three of whom were part of a unit that provides security for Taiwan’s Presidential Office, were jailed for up to seven years after being convicted of selling pictures of sensitive information to China. The verdicts came after last month’s speech in which Lai condemned the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in the harshest terms used by a Taiwanese leader in modern history. In his remarks, the president said Taiwan will not be "bullied or manipulated" and promised repercussions against those who make "expressions of loyalty to the enemy.” Lai, aware of Beijing’s "carrot and stick" campaign, warned Taiwanese to be wary of China’s "United Front," a political strategy employed by the CCP in which they – with plenty of smiles and often "investment" capital – enter international organizations and various influential groups and plant agents who then build alliances with targeted individuals, political parties and other interests. But Taiwan’s government is swimming upstream against a very strong flow of Chinese covert actions backed by huge sums of Chinese money. Last week, Presidential Office consultant Wu Shang-yu, along with two others from the president’s ruling party, were reportedly detained on suspicion of spying for the CCP. For many Taiwanese, Lai’s enough-is-enough speech and subsequent actions by his government are a welcome change from a period of perceived vulnerability. Lai’s Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) insiders told Fox News Digital that they feel "Taiwan has been on the defensive for far too long" and that their voters "are tired of us being a punching bag.” The DPP government is also promising to take a harder stance against what it calls Chinese infiltration. Taiwanese citizens found to have Chinese identity cards have had their Taiwan nationality revoked because it is illegal to be a Taiwan/China dual citizen or dual ID holder.

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