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.

FOX News [7/22/2025 5:26 PM, Peter Pinedo, 46878K] Video: HERE reports the Department of Homeland Security released a statement Tuesday highlighting some of the "worst of the worst" offenders who have been arrested in the agency’s nationwide crackdown on criminal illegal aliens. According to the statement, 70% of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s arrests have been of illegal aliens convicted or charged with crimes. This comes as the agency is facing intense criticism for its enforcement of immigration laws and officers are dealing with an 830% increase in assaults. Some Democrats have accused ICE of targeting innocent, everyday immigrants. While the agency has said it will not back down from arresting any immigrants who are in the country illegally, the new DHS statement says that the vast majority of those arrested thus far have criminal charges or convictions. The illegals highlighted in the DHS statement include criminals charged with hit-and-run, aggravated assault, felony menacing, grand theft and drug possession. In the Tuesday statement, DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin commended President Donald Trump and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem for having "unleashed ICE to target the worst of the worst." The DailySignal [7/22/2025 9:45 AM, Virginia Allen, 558K] reports five illegal aliens with criminal convictions were arrested in cities across the U.S. over the weekend, the Department of Homeland Security announced Tuesday. The arrests, each carried out by Immigration and Customs Enforcement, is a fulfillment of DHS Secretary Kristi Noem and President Donald Trump’s pledge to "target the worst of the worst," according to Tricia McLaughlin, DHS assistant secretary. Since Trump returned to office on Jan. 20, the Trump administration has arrested nearly 300,000 illegal aliens and deported more than 239,000, according to DHS. ICE Denver has apprehended Federico Fong-Nunez, 53, an illegal alien from Mexico with 21 criminal convictions, including aggravated assault, burglary, and felony menacing. Luis Alberto Leonardo Cortes-Rivera is 34 and from Mexico. He has nine criminal convictions in Los Angeles, including burglary, grand theft, and tampering with a vehicle. ICE Dallas has arrested 46-year-old Honduran Rureiro Falkao, an illegal alien who has been convicted of possession of methamphetamine in Oklahoma City. Olinda Micaela Gonzalez-Ortiz, 21, is from Guatemala and has a criminal history that includes a conviction for a hit and run in Salisbury, Maryland. ICE Baltimore arrested her over the weekend. Jhon Jervis Chavez-De La Rosa, also 21, is from Venezuela. ICE Houston arrested him over the weekend. He has a criminal history that includes conviction of assault causing bodily injury.

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Breitbart [7/22/2025 1:14 PM, Hannah Knudsen, 3077K]

CNN [7/22/2025 1:07 PM, Haley Britzky and Priscilla Alvarez, 21433K] reports roughly 2,000 National Guard troops across multiple states are expected to be mobilized to help Immigration and Customs Enforcement at detention facilities, according to a US official and a source familiar with the planning. It’s unclear when the troops will be mobilized, though the US official said the move, which is still under deliberation, could come as soon as this week. Both sources said the troops will be placed on Title 32 status, which puts them under the command of their governors and not subject to the Posse Comitatus Act, which prohibits the use of the military for domestic law enforcement purposes. The Trump administration has ramped up immigration arrests nationwide, resulting in a dramatic increase of people in ICE custody. As of Tuesday, there were around 57,000 people in ICE custody, according to federal data obtained by CNN. Senior Trump officials are preparing to expand detention space nationwide in the coming weeks after receiving a historic amount of funding from Congress. The US official said the mobilization is expected to call up National Guard troops from as many as 20 states who will be tasked with some hands-on roles including conducting finger printing and mouth swabbing of detainees. National Guard forces have largely been used to provide administrative assistance to ICE thus far, though the US official said ICE has communicated the need for assistance in other areas. The Pentagon and Department of Homeland Security did not respond to requests for comment. The plans are in line with an earlier request from DHS to the Defense Department asking for thousands of National Guard personnel to assist with a range of tasks, including processing, transportation support and detention support. According to the request, obtained by CNN, up to 2,500 National Guard personnel were requested to support security at detention facilities, in-facility operations like meal distribution, processing and emergency response. A Senate aide said the expected move to put 2,000 Guardsmen on Title 32 status was significant and likely an indicator of the administration moving closer to the full request from DHS for thousands more Guardsmen to assist in immigration enforcement across the country. “If you’re plotting the points on a graph of the way the administration has taken one step at a time, you continue that trajectory and it’s going to look pretty similar to what DHS has been requesting, as far as 20,000 troops across the country performing what we’d consider to be immigration enforcement activities,” the aide said.

Washington Examiner [7/23/2025 1:21 AM, Staff, 1934K] reports the Department of Homeland Security arrested a second suspect in connection with the shooting and attempted armed robbery of an off-duty U.S. Customs and Border Protection officer in New York City on Saturday. Cristian Aybar Berroa, an illegal immigrant from the Dominican Republic, was arrested on Monday, DHS announced in a press release. Berroa and another illegal immigrant from the Dominican Republic, Miguel Francisco Mora Nunez, were arrested for their involvement in the attempted armed robbery of an off-duty Customs and Border Protection officer at Fort Washington Park under the George Washington Bridge on July 19. Nunez is believed to have been the one who fired the gun at the officer, shooting him in the right arm and left cheek, according to DHS. He was arrested on Sunday. "A witness of the attack stated that she and the victim were sitting on the rocks by the water when two subjects on a scooter drove up to them, dismounted the scooter and approached them with a firearm drawn," read a release from DHS. "The off-duty CBP officer responded by withdrawing his own firearm in self-defense.” "Thankfully, the officer is in stable condition at the hospital," noted the release. Both are accused of entering the country illegally and had many prior arrests for violent crimes, DHS highlighted. Berrora had four prior arrests between May 2023 and Feb. 2025, for multiple offenses, including 2nd degree reckless endangerment, reckless driving, 4th degree felony grand larceny and petit larceny, according to DHS. "A judge ordered Berroa a final order of removal on January 3, 2023," the DHS press release highlighted. Nunez had three prior arrests in New York City between Oct. 2023 and Nov. 2024 for a variety of offenses, including grand larceny, petit larceny, second-degree assault, and third-degree assault, according to DHS. In Feb. 2025, the Leominster Police Department in Massachusetts "issued a criminal warrant for Nunez for armed robbery with a firearm.” DHS noted that a judge issued a "final order of removal" for Nunez on Nov. 6, 2024. "These violent thugs have committed a smorgasbord of crimes and been arrested multiple times, and yet New York continued to release them, ignore an ICE detainer, and allow them to continue to prey on Americans and terrorize our streets," said Tricia McLaughlin, assistant secretary for public affairs at the Department of Homeland Security. "How many people have to die, how many lives have to be changed forever for Mayor Adams and his sanctuary politician ilk to end these performative politics?".

The Hill [7/22/2025 1:17 PM, Rob Taub, 18649K] reports that White House border czar Tom Homan is making one thing abundantly clear in the aftermath of an off-duty federal agent being shot — he’s had enough with these kinds of incidents. Homan, in a Monday appearance on "Elizabeth Vargas Reports," said everyone has seen videos of undocumented migrants in Times Square attacking NYPD officers and United States citizens. "It’s enough. I mean, criminal aliens have no place walking the streets of America, attacking American citizens," Homan said. He’s calling for ICE to "flood the zone" after an unnamed officer, 42, was shot in the face while sitting on a rock with a woman at Fort Washington Park in New York City just before midnight on July 19. Video released by the Department of Homeland Security showed two men on a moped approach the officer and his companion. The moped passenger tried to rob the off-duty officer but the officer pulled out his service gun, leading to a shootout. The officer was shot in the face and forearm, police said. Homan visited him at the hospital and said the officer remained sedated as of Monday night. He is expected to survive. One of the men was taken into custody after arriving at a Bronx hospital with gunshot wounds to the groin and leg. The alleged shooter, Miguel Francisco Mora Nunez, was caught at the Arizona border in 2023 when he crossed over illegally. Nunez also had an active deportation order, but was released on his own recognizance, according to Homan.

The New York Times [7/22/2025 6:06 PM, Frances Robles and Hamed Aleaziz, 138952K] reports the United States government publicly accused one of the wealthiest and most powerful figures in Haiti of a “campaign of violence and gang support” — for the first time blaming a prominent member of the nation’s elite for rampant violence there. Pierre Reginald Boulos, 69, a doctor who amassed extreme wealth through a chain of supermarkets and a car dealership, was arrested Thursday by the Homeland Security Investigations arm of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency in Palm Beach County, Fla., where he lives. The arrest is an important development in Haiti’s battle against violent gangs. Mr. Boulos was being held in ICE detention and could not be reached for comment. He renounced his U.S. citizenship before kicking off a bid to run for office in Haiti, because foreign citizenship would have prevented his candidacy. Mr. Boulous returned to the United States on a visa in 2021, and received a green card last year, according to internal government documents reviewed by The Times. But Secretary of State Marco Rubio decided Mr. Boulos could be deported because his continued presence in the country would “have potentially serious adverse foreign policy consequences for the United States because Boulos has engaged in a campaign of violence, gang support, and trafficking weapons and drugs that has contributed to Haiti’s destabilization,” the documents say. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement said in a statement on Tuesday that, when Mr. Boulous applied for residency, he failed to disclose that he had been involved in forming a political party in Haiti and had been referred for prosecution by the Haitian government for misusing loans. That provided grounds for deporting him based on fraud, the agency said. The AP [7/22/2025 10:35 AM, Dánica Coto, 31733K] reports that Boulos, arrested at his home in South Florida last week, is accused of being “engaged in a campaign of violence and gang support that contributed to Haiti’s destabilization,” the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement said in a statement late Monday. Boulos was born in the United States but renounced his citizenship to run for president of Haiti in recent years. He then obtained U.S residency last year under the administration of President Joe Biden. Boulos, who previously has denied a flurry of corruption allegations, is the most well-known Haitian arrested to date under an immigration crackdown by the administration of President Donald Trump. An attorney for Boulos could not be immediately reached for comment. ICE said in its statement that Boulos also had failed to disclose in his residency application his involvement in the formation of a political party or that Haiti’s government had referred him for prosecution for misusing loans. ICE said that the State Department “has determined that certain individuals with U.S. lawful permanent resident status have supported and collaborated with Haitian gang leaders connected to Viv Ansanm, a Haitian foreign terrorist organization.” “The United States will not allow individuals to enjoy the benefits of legal status in our country while they are facilitating the actions of violent organizations or supporting criminal terrorist organizations abroad,” the statement said. Boulos was being held at Krome North Service Processing Center in Miami, a detention center that Human Rights Watch said in a recent report is one of three in Florida that are grossly over capacity and “flagrantly violate international human rights standards.”

FOX News [7/22/2025 7:00 PM, Rachel del Guidice, 46878K] reports anti-Israel activist Mahmoud Khalil appeared to refuse to explicitly condemn the terrorist group Hamas and instead took issue with the "selective condemnation" of the plight of the Palestinian people during an interview on Tuesday. In response to a question from CNN’s Pamela Brown on whether he would "specifically condemn Hamas, a designated terrorist organization in the United States, not just for their actions on October 7th," Khalil appeared to try to avoid denouncing the terrorist organization. "I condemn the killing of all civilians, full stop," Khalil told Brown. Brown interjected during Khalil’s answer, asking him, "But do you condemn Hamas specifically?". "I’m very clear with condemning all civilians. I’m very straight in my position in that, in that part," Khalil said. "But it’s disingenuous to ask about condemning Hamas while Palestinians are the ones being starved now by Israel.". Khalil is a graduate student at Columbia University who was released on bail from an immigration detention center in June following an order by U.S. District Judge Michael Farbiarz, who said it was "highly, highly unusual" to keep a legal U.S. resident in custody who doesn’t have accusations of violent offenses or that he’s a possible flight risk. He was arrested in March at Columbia over his anti-Israel activism on campus, and an immigration judge ruled he could be removed from the country based on a memo from Secretary of State Marco Rubio that said his campus protests were not aligned with U.S. foreign policy interests. The Department of Homeland Security has also said that Khalil purposely did not reveal that he was employed by the Syrian office in the British Embassy in Beirut when he applied for permanent U.S. residency. Instead of condemning Hamas, Khalil talked about violence against Palestinians.

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New York Post [7/22/2025 9:33 PM, Anna Young, 49956K]

FOX News [7/22/2025 10:10 PM, Staff, 46878K] reports DHS Secretary Kristi Noem discusses Mahmoud Khalil’s refusal to condemn Hamas on ‘Hannity.’ [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

FOX News [7/22/2025 9:15 PM, Staff, 46878K] reports DHS assistant secretary for public affairs Tricia McLaughlin discusses Mahmoud Khalil’s release from I.C.E. custody and the legal proceedings he’s involved in on ‘The Bottom Line.’ [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

Wall Street Journal [7/22/2025 8:00 PM, Louise Radnofsky, 646K] reports President Trump’s immigration-enforcement tactics have been defined by a muscular use of executive power with little precedent. Now, a federal judge is tasked with deciding whether to curtail that approach against foreigners in the U.S. legally. U.S. District Judge William Young in Boston wrapped up a closely watched trial this week on the administration’s targeting of international students engaged in campus activism. Following a series of high-profile arrests of pro-Palestinian protesters, faculty groups are pressing a broad legal effort to head off similar future arrests. The litigation taps into rarely explored legal tensions between the government’s latitude to set the terms for foreigners living legally in the U.S. and the rights of those residents while they are here. Two weeks of testimony, including from government witnesses, offered a rare public window into the extraordinary measures the administration has taken against immigrants at elite universities. The challengers, led by the American Association of University Professors, say the administration’s efforts to revoke green cards and visas from pro-Palestinian campus activists amount to proof of a policy of “ideological deportation” that has terrified noncitizens in higher education and chilled their speech. “It is stifling dissent,” said Alexandra Conlon, a lawyer for the academics, in closing arguments on Monday. “That is the goal.” Lawyers for the administration say there is no such policy. They also say that the government has long held far-reaching power to order the removal of noncitizens to protect the foreign-policy interests of the U.S. and that Secretary of State Marco Rubio is using it lawfully now. Foreigners in the U.S. don’t have the same protections as Americans when it comes to protesting, the Justice Department says. “The answer to the question of whether aliens and citizens have equivalent rights under the First Amendment is no, they’re not equivalent,” Justice Department lawyer Ethan Kanter said in the government’s closing presentation.

New York Post [7/22/2025 12:19 PM, Ryan King, 49956K] reports Long Island Republican Rep. Andrew Garbarino is set to become the next chair of the powerful House Homeland Security Committee. The South Shore representative edged out fellow Congressmen Michael Guest (R-Miss.), Carlos Giménez (R-Fla.) and Clay Higgins (R-La.) in a committee vote Monday for the highly coveted role, which oversees the panel that deals with a portfolio of domestic security issues. "As a lifelong New Yorker and representative of a district shaped by 9/11, I understand the stakes of this responsibility. ‘Never forget’ is more than a slogan," Garbarino said in a statement. "It is a commitment I have carried with me throughout my entire adult life and one that will continue to drive my work. "We have serious work ahead of us. Securing the border, confronting terrorism, strengthening our cybersecurity, and hardening our national defenses are all critical to keeping Americans safe.". Garbarino will be succeeding former Chairman Mark Green (R-Tenn.), who has resigned from the House, shrinking the GOP’s razor-thin edge in the lower chamber. Green tendered his resignation after the passage of President Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act for a mysterious new job that reportedly involves business opportunities in Guyana. The retired rep drew headlines in September after his wife accused him of having an affair and filed for a divorce. He also previously served as an impeachment manager against former Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, who survived the effort by the GOP-led House to oust him.

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DailySignal [7/22/2025 12:20 PM, Jacob Adams, 558K]

FOX News [7/22/2025 10:57 AM, Staff, 46878K] reports Assistant DHS Sec. Tricia McLaughlin criticizes sanctuary city policies after Megan Bos’s body was discovered in a storage container at an illegal immigrant’s home in Illinois and two migrants attacked a CBP officer in New York City. [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

NewsMax [7/22/2025 12:38 PM, Jim Mishler, 4622K] reports that Attorney General Pam Bondi posted about a "major victory" on Tuesday and said that the Department of Justice had leveraged the city of Louisville, Kentucky, away from its sanctuary city policies. Bondi posted on X, "In a major victory for the Department of Justice, the city of Louisville is dropping its sanctuary city policies as a result of a strong written warning from my office.". Bondi said the action should be considered by all other cities and governmental units holding out to support sanctuary status. "This should set an example to other cities. Instead of forcing us to sue you — which we will, without hesitation — follow the law, get rid of sanctuary policies, and work with us to fix the illegal immigration crisis." Local WAVE in Louisville reported that Mayor Craig Greenburg announced the city acted after receiving a notice from the DOJ that Louisville was considered noncompliant with federal immigration policy since the city was not providing immigration enforcement with 48-hour immigrant holds for prisoners to be picked up by federal agents. Greenburg posted on the city’s website that the change did not affect general law enforcement in the town, only the immigrant detainer process. "I want to make it clear — this issue changes nothing with regards to [Louisville Metro Police Department] policy or practice. LMPD is not involved in enforcing federal immigration policy. This is only about inmates who are arrested for crimes, are booked in our jail, and are subject to deportation notices."

Daily Signal [7/22/2025 1:07 PM, Virginia Allen, 558K] reports New York City Mayor Eric Adams says he will “welcome” the help of border czar Tom Homan to arrest criminal illegal aliens like the ones who attacked a Customs and Border Protection officer in the city over the weekend. If Homan assists New York City in the apprehension of “dangerous people,” Adams told reporters, he will support it, adding that if the border czar is going “after everyday individuals who are trying to complete the path to be a citizen, then I don’t think we should do that.” Adams’ comments follow Homan’s pledge Monday morning to “flood the zone” of sanctuary cities, among them New York. “Sanctuary cities are now our priority,” the border czar said, adding that “sanctuary cities are sanctuaries for criminals. President [Donald] Trump is not going to tolerate it, and I’ll work every day with [Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem] to make sure we get as many bad guys, illegal aliens, out of this country that we can.” Homan’s comments came at a press conference less than 48 hours after two illegal aliens with criminal records attacked an off-duty CBP officer in a park in New York City. Despite criticism of ICE agents and operations, Trump administration officials are doubling down on their agenda to arrest and remove illegal aliens, especially criminal illegal aliens. “We will not allow sanctuary politicians, activist hacks, or rioters to stand in our way of protecting the American people,” said Tricia McLaughlin, DHS assistant secretary. “Our message is clear: Criminal illegal aliens are not welcome in the United States.”

The New York Times [7/22/2025 12:53 PM, Luis Ferré-Sadurní, 330K] reports for weeks, immigrants have complained about overcrowded and unsanitary conditions inside the holding cells of the federal immigration offices in New York City, drawing scrutiny from lawmakers and denials from the Trump administration. On Tuesday, new video footage offered the first glimpse inside one of the four cells on the 10th floor of 26 Federal Plaza in Lower Manhattan, where the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency has held hundreds of migrants for days at a time since ICE stepped up arrests this summer. Two videos, which were recorded by a migrant who was held there last week and sneaked in his cellphone, show more than a dozen men sprawled on the floor atop thin thermal blankets or sitting on benches built into the room’s white walls. In one video, the man, who recorded it near one of the room’s two metal toilets, is heard saying in Spanish that the migrants were being held “like dogs in here.” ICE had traditionally used the cells, which don’t have beds, to hold a small number of migrants for a few hours while they are processed and dispatched to detention centers outside the city. But the cells have become crowded since the agency scaled up arrests at its offices and in nearby immigration courthouses in May, forcing migrants to sleep on the floor or to sit upright, sometimes for several days. The video appeared to confirm some of those conditions, which had previously been described by migrants in interviews with The New York Times, and had been highlighted by activists and Democratic lawmakers, who have been denied access to inspect the cells. The video was obtained by the New York Immigration Coalition through a Queens assemblywoman, Catalina Cruz, and first reported by The City, a local news outlet. Tricia McLaughlin, a spokeswoman for the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees ICE, said that 26 Federal Plaza was not a detention center and that detainees were held there only “briefly.” “Any claim that there is overcrowding or subprime conditions at ICE facilities are categorically false,” she said. “All detainees are provided with proper meals, medical treatment and have opportunities to communicate with their family members and lawyers.” Complaints about overcrowding at detention centers have surged as the Trump administration has ramped up deportations, filling the facilities to capacity. The number of people in detention across the United States increased to nearly 57,000 earlier this month, up from just under 40,000 at the beginning of the year. Democratic members of Congress from New York have sought to conduct oversight of the 10th-floor cells as reports of unsanitary conditions have surfaced, citing congressional authority to make unannounced visits to inspect detention facilities. They have shown up at 26 Federal Plaza, staged rallies and sent a letter in June to Kristi Noem, the homeland security secretary, but the lawmakers’ efforts have been rebuffed. Ms. Noem’s agency has argued that the cells are processing centers outside the purview of Congress, even as senior ICE officials at the New York field office have acknowledged that people have had to sleep there overnight. The release of the videos came a day after Ms. Noem and Thomas Homan, President Trump’s top border adviser, appeared in New York to warn that ICE would step up enforcement in the city after the shooting of an off-duty customs officer on Saturday. Two men from the Dominican Republic who administration officials said had entered the country illegally were accused of ambushing the officer, who is expected to recover. CBS New York [7/23/2025 12:37 AM, Alice Gainer, Adi Guajardo, 51860K] reports that the video shows a group of men in a room with no furniture. Many appear to be laying or sitting on towels or foil blankets on the floor. There are two toilets behind half walls in the back of the room, but one toilet appears to be covered with a foil blanket. "In the video, you see over two dozen men, some sleeping on the floor, all having to share one bathroom," New York Immigration Coaliation President and CEO Murad Awawdeh said. Benjamin Remy, senior staff attorney with New York Legal Assistance Group, said that video was the first time he’s seen what the 10th floor of 26 Federal Plaza looks like. "What was your initial reaction when you saw that?" CBS News New York’s Alice Gainer asked. "I would like to say it was shock, but it wasn’t," Remy said. Immigration advocates say they’re familiar with these stories and these conditions. "They try to make conditions so terrible that people want to give up," said Ravi Ragbir, with New Sanctuary Coalition. One woman told CBS News her husband was detained and spent five or six days on the 10th floor before being transferred. "He said it was very bad. They treated them like animals, technically," she said. "They don’t give him enough food. Um, his liver is, you know, failing because he’s supposed to be on a specific diet and he’s supposed to be taking a specific medication. But no matter how much times he requested from the officers, they never gave it to him.” New York Congressman Dan Goldman is one of several representatives who was denied access to the facility, which ICE claims is not subject to congressional oversight because it’s not a detention center. Goldman said the video validated what he and immigration advocates already knew. Department of Homeland Security Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin sent CBS News New York a statement reading, in part: "Any claim that there is overcrowding or subprime conditions at ICE facilities are categorically false. All detainees are provided with proper meals, medical treatment, and have opportunities to communicate with their family members and lawyers. As we arrest and remove criminal illegal aliens and public safety threats from the U.S., ICE has worked diligently to obtain greater necessary detention space while avoiding overcrowding. Secretary Noem has called on states and local government to help with bed and detention space capacity. "Despite a historic number of injunctions, DHS is working rapidly overtime to remove these aliens from detentions centers to their final destination—home.” "We now know from video evidence that it’s a flat-out lie," Goldman said.

Politico [7/22/2025 4:23 PM, Emily Ngo, 2100K] reports A LOT IN A NAME: How the Trump administration classifies the Lower Manhattan space where migrants are being held is key to whether House members are permitted inside to conduct oversight. It’s a detention center, according to congressional Democrats, migrants and their advocates. It’s a processing center, say Department of Homeland Security officials. Reps. Nydia Velázquez, Adriano Espaillat, Dan Goldman and Jerry Nadler are considering their options for recourse after being repeatedly denied access to the 10th floor of 26 Federal Plaza. Those House Democrats are legally authorized as members of Congress to make unannounced inspections of “detention facilities holding individuals in federal immigration custody.” They want to confirm for themselves the reports of overcrowding and lack of meals for migrants awaiting deportation proceedings. Why stop them from visiting if there’s nothing to see, the lawmakers have argued. Their roadblock has been the Trump administration’s claim that the space isn’t a detention facility in the first place. Today, new videos surreptitiously captured what Espaillat has called the “notorious 10th floor.” They showed about two dozen migrants crowded into a room, some sleeping on the floor. The videos were released by the New York Immigration Coalition and first reported by THE CITY. “Since May, ICE has been snatching New Yorkers off the streets and out of immigration court and taking them to this floor,” Velázquez said in a statement. “They’ve claimed it’s not a detention facility, just a ‘processing center,’ to block members of Congress from exercising our legal right to conduct oversight.” DHS assistant secretary Tricia McLaughlin reiterated the distinction in a statement today and called reports of subprime conditions “categorically false.” “26 Federal Plaza is not a detention center,” she said. “It is (a) processing center where illegal aliens are briefly processed to be transferred to an ICE detention facility.”

FOX News [7/22/2025 12:23 PM, Ashley Oliver, 46878K] reports the mayor of Louisville, Kentucky, informed the Department of Justice (DOJ) on Monday that he is shifting the city’s more restrictive policy on federal immigration detainers after the government warned it would sue over it. Mayor Craig Greenberg, a Democrat, wrote in a letter obtained by Fox News Digital that the policy change was partly to avoid being targeted as a "sanctuary" city, a term used to describe jurisdictions with policies at odds with federal immigration enforcement. "My understanding is that, by returning to our pre-2017 practices and again honoring 48-hour detainers, thereby functionally extending the notice period to DHS from 5-12 hours to 48 hours, Louisville will no longer be considered a sanctuary jurisdiction and, as a result, will no longer be vulnerable to the negative consequences of this designation," Greenberg wrote to Assistant Attorney General Brett Shumate. "The city will, therefore, adjust its detainer policy to avoid litigation over DOJ’s allegations of federal preemption." The mayor’s reversal comes after the DOJ warned in a letter last month that Louisville’s detainer policy hindered the Trump administration’s ability to crack down on immigration there. The DOJ told Greenberg non-compliant states and cities have faced legal action and freezes on federal funding.

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(B) NBC News Daily [7/22/2025 1:52 PM, Staff]

Bloomberg [7/22/2025 11:22 AM, Sophie Alexander, Fola Akinnibi, and Rachel Adams-Heard, 19320K] reports the federal government has awarded a contract to build and operate a sprawling tent camp at Fort Bliss, an Army base in Texas, to serve as an immigrant detention center. In the Trump administration’s latest move to vastly expand space for such detention, the work would turn the base in El Paso, with more than 1 million acres and an airport, into a deportation hub with 5,000 beds, according to a US Department of Defense contract notice. That would make it the largest immigration detention facility in the country. The contract for Fort Bliss is worth $1.26 billion and was awarded to Virginia-based Acquisition Logistics Company through a special program that directs federal dollars to small businesses, according to two people familiar with the matter who asked to not be named discussing something that hasn’t been shared publicly. The Army is putting up $232 million for the work, the Defense Department notice says. The Wall Street Journal reported earlier that the contract had been awarded but did not include its value or the winning bidder. Ken Wagner, president and chief executive officer of Acquisition Logistics, declined to comment. The Fort Bliss contract is by far the biggest ever for Acquisition Logistics, which Wagner, a retired Naval flight officer, founded in 2008. It specializes in supply chain management and other technical services, particularly for the US military, according to Wagner’s LinkedIn profile. Acquisition Logistics has received contracts worth roughly $29 million from the Defense Department over the past five fiscal years, mainly for logistics support work, according to government records. Most of that was through set-asides for small businesses. The Fort Bliss contract’s reliance on tents for detention is concerning to immigrant advocates, who say such facilities are unlikely to meet federal standards. “All the reasons why you and I live not in tents but in homes are going to inevitably come up in a facility that doesn’t offer people walls and floors and insulation,” Emma Winger, deputy legal director at the American Immigration Council, said of tent detention in general. She points to basic needs that are significantly harder to meet with tents: protection from the elements, adequate medical facilities, safe and clean food preparation and storage. “It’s very hard to imagine how soft-sided facilities could satisfy even the low detention standards that are reflected in ICE’s most recent standards.” An official for US Immigration and Customs Enforcement said in an email that the agency “is indeed pursuing all available options to expand bedspace capacity. This process does include housing detainees at certain military bases.”

The New York Post [7/22/2025 8:43 AM, Emily Crane, 49956K] reports a Department of Justice staffer claims she was abruptly fired after it emerged that her husband was the brains behind a controversial anti-ICE app that warns users when the feds are closing in. Carolyn Feinstein, who worked as a DOJ forensic accountant in Austin, Texas, alleges she was terminated last Friday as "retribution" for her spouse’s radical alert system, in which she has minority shares. "This was retribution. I was fired because of the actions, or activism, of my husband," Feinstein told the Daily Beast on Monday. Feinstein’s tech husband, Joshua Aaron, recently sparked outrage after it emerged he’d created the ICEBlock app, which alerts users if Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents have been spotted within a five-mile radius of them. President Trump’s border czar Tom Homan and ICE Acting Director Tom Lyon quickly called on the DOJ to investigate after Feinstein’s hubby went on CNN last month to advertise the app — sparking immediate backlash. Feinstein claims she informed the DOJ of her ties to the app creator after he allegedly started receiving death threats. A DOJ spokesperson said it had been probing Feinstein’s connection to the app for "several weeks" after it emerged she had interests in the company. "ICEBlock is an app that illegal aliens use to evade capture while endangering the lives of ICE officers," the spokesperson said, adding that the department "will not tolerate threats against law enforcement or law enforcement officers." Feinstein, for her part, insisted that her role at the DOJ was "unbiased." NewsMax [7/22/2025 10:19 AM, Charlie McCarthy, 4622K] reports that the app, ICEBlock, was launched in early April by musician and developer Joshua Aaron, who told news outlets he wanted to do something "to fight back" against raids designed to arrest illegal migrants with criminal histories. The app sends alerts to users when ICE agents are within a 5-mile radius of their location, allowing targets to flee. Aaron’s wife, Carolyn Feinstein, told The Daily Beast her position was terminated in "retribution" against her husband’s work. She had been a DOJ forensic accountant for nearly a decade. "This was retribution. I was fired because of the actions, or activism, of my husband," Feinstein told the outlet. "It is insulting to me because I dedicated myself and my career to serving the people of the United States, and now the DOJ is claiming I was attempting to harm some of them. And that’s not true.". She added that her firing came "within 24 hours" of border czar Tom Homan telling Newsmax that "all [Aaron is] doing is giving a heads up to criminals.". Feinstein said she informed the DOJ of her relationship with Aaron after media first reported about the app three weeks ago. Attorney General Pam Bondi on June 30 warned Aaron that the doxxing of ICE officials and outing the location of federal officials is a serious offense. After CNN reported about the app, President Donald Trump and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem each said the administration was looking into whether it can prosecute the network over its reporting of both the ICEBlock app, and the recent bombings of Iran’s nuclear facilities. Todd Lyons, ICE acting director, criticized CNN, telling Newsmax’s Rob Schmitt promotion of the app was "disgusting" and warning that the platform puts law enforcement officers in danger.

FOX News [7/22/2025 10:54 PM, Peter D’Abrosca, 46878K] reports Trump border czar Tom Homan fired back Tuesday night at Hunter Biden for a recent profanity-laced rant against President Donald Trump’s policies on illegal immigration. "I don’t really care what the former first drug addict thinks," Homan told Laura Ingraham on "The Ingraham Angle." "I just thank God every morning I wake up we got President Trump in the Oval Office. And because of President Trump, in seven weeks we got the most secure border in this nation’s history. "And now we’re arresting public safety threats and national security threats every day across this country," he continued. "We’ve already arrested three times the number of criminals that Biden did in the same timeframe.” Biden recently sat down with "Channel 5" podcaster Andrew Callaghan for a wide-ranging discussion of his father’s presidency, his drug use and other topics. During the interview, he slammed Trump as a "f------ thug" and compared his deportation agenda to Nazi Germany. "There is a minority group that those in power, that came into power through democratically elected means, are going to target this minority group because they’re stealing all the jobs," Biden said. "And what we’re going to do is we’re going to send masked men to this marginalized group, and we are going to take them, put them on planes, put them on buses, put them on trains, and send them to a prison camp in a foreign country," he continued. "What am I describing right then? Am I describing Germany? Or am I just describing the United States right now? Because I will tell you what. You think that the prison in El Salvador is not a f---ing concentration camp, you’re out of your f---ing mind.” Biden infamously revealed to "CBS Sunday Morning" in 2021, that he would smoke "anything that even remotely resembled crack cocaine," including "more Parmesan cheese than anyone you know.” Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele also responded to Biden via a post on X, also referring to Biden’s history of drug use. "Is Hunter Biden sniffing powdered milk?" Bukele asked, adding a clip from the interview. [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

Reported similarly:
The Hill [7/22/2025 12:51 PM, Filip Timotija, 18649K]

Daily Caller [7/22/2025 10:17 AM, Jason Cohen, 1010K] reports White House deputy chief of staff for policy Stephen Miller rebuked Democrats on Monday after House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries lectured President Donald Trump’s administration on how to conduct immigration enforcement. Jeffries said at a Monday presser that Trump’s administration should prioritize "deporting violent felons," accusing the administration of instead "showing up at little league baseball games, churches, schools and hospitals." Miller expressed outrage on "The Ingraham Angle" that Democrats would have the nerve to scold the Trump administration on this issue after letting dangerous criminal illegal migrants into the United States. "Can you imagine getting a lecture on public safety from the party that has let child rapists and murderers into this country en masse!?" Miller said. "Do you have any idea how many little girls have been maimed and raped and killed by the illegal aliens that they let into our country — that they gleefully allowed into our nation!?" "And they want to lecture us on public safety!? They have destroyed the lives of countless thousands of Americans!" he continued. "And today, Democrats run sanctuary cities that protect and shield illegal aliens who have committed the most heinous crimes from deportation." Border czar Tom Homan also criticized sanctuary cities during a Monday press conference in New York City on the shooting. "Sanctuary cities are sanctuaries for criminals. President Trump is not going to tolerate it," Homan said. "And I’ll work every day with [Homeland Security] Secretary [Kristi] Noem to make sure we get as many bad guys — illegal aliens — out of this country that we can." Border Patrol agents released a total of zero illegal migrants into the U.S. in May. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) confirmed on July 15 that this trend continued in June, marking a stark contrast to former President Joe Biden’s administration.

FOX News [7/22/2025 2:07 PM, Ashley Oliver, 46878K] reports that interim U.S. Attorney Alina Habba’s future as the top prosecutor in the District of New Jersey was thrust into uncertainty Tuesday after district court judges voted against keeping her in the role. Habba’s 120-day term was set to expire, and after convening behind closed doors Monday to consider extending her term, the judges voted to replace her with Desiree Grace, a career attorney and Habba’s top assistant. Grace will take over the post temporarily beginning Tuesday, according to a court order. Habba, who served as President Donald Trump’s personal lawyer and legal spokeswoman during his campaign, stirred controversy soon after she ascended to U.S. attorney. She had Newark’s Democratic mayor, Ras Baraka, arrested in May for allegedly trespassing in an immigration detention facility. But Habba quickly dropped the charges, and a judge scolded her for the move, suggesting she was attempting to "satisfy public clamor." Baraka is now suing Habba for defamation. Trump made clear this month he wanted to keep Habba as U.S. attorney, nominating her for the full four-year position earlier this month. Habba also nabbed endorsements from several law enforcement groups, who praised her as a tough prosecutor who will prioritize street crime. But Habba has also been heavily criticized for having no prior prosecutorial experience and politicizing the role, including by saying on a right-wing podcast after she took the job that she hoped to help "turn New Jersey red."

Reported similarly:
AP [7/22/2025 2:31 PM, Mike Catalini, 56000K]

AP [7/22/2025 6:51 PM, Staff, 56000K] reports a U.S. appeals court on Tuesday struck down a New Jersey law that bans operators from contracting with the federal government to run immigration detention centers in the state. The 2-1 ruling means the private prison firm CoreCivic Corp. can continue to operate the Elizabeth Detention Center. The ruling marked a victory for President Donald Trump’s administration as it continues a crackdown on immigration around the country that has included efforts to expand a network of detention centers in a bid to ramp up deporations of certain immigrants. "Just as states cannot regulate the federal government itself, they cannot regulate private parties in a way that severely undercuts a federal function," U.S. Circuit Judge Stephanos Bibas, an appointee of President Trump, wrote. The law, he said, "interferes with the federal government’s core power to enforce immigration laws.". The 2021 law signed by New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy barred CoreCivic from renewing its contract with Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The company sued, and a district judge sided with the firm before the state appealed the ruling to the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court. Attorney General Matthew Platkin, in a social media post, called Tuesday’s ruling disappointing and said states have the right to protect people within their borders. He said the office is considering its next steps.

New York Times [7/22/2025 8:37 AM, Zach Montague, 153395K] reports the four veteran immigration agents who recently took the stand in federal court had at least two things in common. All were career law enforcement officials. And none could remember ever being asked to make arrests like the ones they carried out earlier this year. The men said they acted on orders handed down from Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s office in March to detain several noncitizen students, including a doctoral student from Tufts University whose arrest was captured on video and garnered significant attention. Mr. Rubio had abruptly revoked their legal status, which cleared them for detention by immigration agents, citing a rarely used law. The agents’ testimony — given as part of a trial that concluded in Boston on Monday over the Trump administration’s efforts to deport foreign students who espoused pro-Palestinian views — underscored a major theme of President Trump’s return to the White House. The administration’s tactics have no obvious parallel as Mr. Trump pushes the bounds of executive power and defies legal limits to carry out his agenda. Challenges to his policies are also, by necessity, treading new ground. The academic associations that sued over the highly publicized wave of arrests in March have said the government targeted those international students in violation of the First Amendment. In court over the past two weeks, lawyers for the associations argued that the Trump administration stretched Mr. Rubio’s narrow power to revoke visas and green cards in order to stifle the speech of the most vulnerable activists and chill political activity on campuses more broadly. The government dismissed the notion in its closing arguments on Monday, saying the idea of a coordinated policy targeting noncitizen activists is “the product of the imagination and creative conjuring.”

Washington Post [7/22/2025 5:38 PM, Frances Vinall, 32099K] reports the detention of two Italian nationals at “Alligator Alcatraz,” the new immigrant detention center in Florida’s Everglades, is sparking criticism from lawmakers in Italy, who are calling on their country’s conservative government to speak out. Gaetano Mirabella Costa and Fernando Artese are being held in “inhuman and degrading” conditions at the facility, Laura Boldrini, a lawmaker with the opposition Democratic Party, said on social media, pushing for the men to be repatriated. Angelo Bonelli of the Green Europe party said the two Italians had been “locked in cages, without access to a lawyer, deprived of dignity, water and decent food.” Former prime minister Matteo Renzi, now a senator who leads the Italia Viva party, accused Giorgia Meloni’s government of deference to President Donald Trump rather than acting to “defend the rights of an Italian citizen.” Meloni, Italy’s most right-wing leader in decades, has one of the better relationships with Trump among European leaders. A spokesperson for the Italian Foreign Ministry said Italian officials “have been following the case of compatriots Gaetano Mirabella Costa and Fernando Artese since the first report, keeping in constant contact with their families.” Tricia McLaughlin, a spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security, confirmed in an emailed statement that the two Italian nationals were being held at the facility. Florida officials and Republican lawmakers who have visited the facility have disputed reports of poor conditions there. “Under President Trump and Secretary Noem, if you break the law, you will face the consequences,” McLaughlin said, referring to Homeland Security Secretary Kristi L. Noem. “Criminal illegal aliens are not welcome in the U.S.” According to McLaughlin, Costa overstayed a B2 tourism visa for almost seven years. Artese entered the United States using the visa waiver program, which authorized a stay of about three months, but he remained in the country for about a decade, she said. DHS said both had been arrested over alleged criminal offenses but did not immediately respond to a request for clarification on whether either had been convicted of a crime.

Reported similarly:
Washington Examiner [7/22/2025 11:43 AM, David Zimmermann, 1934K]

NBC News [7/22/2025 6:51 PM, Nicole Acevedo, 44540K] reports legal advocates and relatives of immigrant detainees held in Florida’s notorious Alligator Alcatraz are demanding the closure of the state-run facility, as allegations of human rights violations there and at other immigration detention centers mount. Detainees in Alligator Alcatraz, a new facility in the Everglades, described what they called torturous conditions in cage-like units full of mosquitoes, where fluorescent lights shine bright on them at all times. Detainees here also called attention to unsanitary conditions, as well as lack of food and reliable medical treatment for their chronic conditions. "Detention conditions are unlivable," said Tessa Petit, executive director of the Florida Immigrant Coalition, during a news conference Tuesday outside the facility. The Trump administration’s push to quickly ramp up immigration arrests has led to overcrowding at Immigration and Customs Enforcement facilities. As of June 20, more than 56,000 people were spending the night in detention centers nationwide on any given day. That’s 40% more than in June 2024 and the highest detention population in U.S. history, according to a Human Rights Watch report. Nearly 72% of those detained have no criminal history. Concerns over detention conditions intensified this week after the HRW report, published Monday, documented "abusive practices" at three Florida immigration detention centers over the past six months. In addition, the New York Immigration Coalition released video showing dozens of men laying on foil sheets on the floor of a crowded immigration processing center in New York City. NBC News recently reported on similar allegations coming from immigration advocates and detainees held in detention centers across California, Texas, Louisiana, Washington and New Jersey. They described experiencing hunger, food shortages and sickness. In Tuesday’s news conference, Sonia Vichara held her mobile phone up to a microphone so her husband, Rafael Collado, could publicly describe from Alligator Alcatraz the conditions he has endured over the past two weeks. "It’s like a dog cage," Collado, who is Cuban, said in his native Spanish. He said that a combination of floodwater from recent storms, limited access to showers and poor sanitation have caused him to get fungus on his feet. As he was describing how detainees are stripped naked every time they are moved to a different cell and there’s not a set schedule to take his blood pressure medication, Collado was told by a guard to hang up, he said, ending the call. DHS spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin has denied all allegations of inhumane conditions at Alligator Alcatraz and at immigration detention centers across the nation, telling NBC News in an email Tuesday, "All detainees are provided with proper meals, medical treatment, and have opportunities to communicate with their family members and lawyers. Ensuring the safety, security, and well-being of individuals in our custody is a top priority.". McLaughlin also said that ICE "has worked diligently to obtain greater necessary detention space while avoiding overcrowding," adding that Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem "has called on states and local government to help with bed and detention space capacity.".

AP [7/22/2025 12:58 PM, Kate Payne, 4120K] reports that Gov. Ron DeSantis ‘ administration has already signed contracts to pay at least $245 million to set up and run the new immigration detention center in the Florida Everglades dubbed "Alligator Alcatraz," according to a public database. The amount — to be fronted by Florida taxpayers — is in line with the $450 million a year officials have estimated the facility will cost. It’s also a reminder of the public funding that DeSantis’ Republican administration is spending to help carry out President Donald Trump ‘s mass deportation agenda. Human rights advocates, faith leaders and environmentalists have condemned the detention center. So has Mark Morgan, a former acting director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement during Trump’s first term. Morgan wrote an opinion piece published by Fox News criticizing the facility as "built for headlines" and "ripe for failure, mismanagement and corruption.". A state database of government contracts shows that since Florida officials announced plans for the facility on June 19, the Executive Office of the Governor has awarded at least two dozen contracts totaling more than $245 million in taxpayer funds to build and manage the facility. It rose in a matter of days from a county-owned airstrip surrounded by swampland about 45 miles (72 kilometers) west of downtown Miami. State officials say at least some of the cost will be covered by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which is best known for responding to hurricanes and other natural disasters. But in court documents filed earlier this month, attorneys for the Department of Homeland Security stated that the federal government had yet to reimburse Florida for any of the costs. The department made clear that "Florida is constructing and operating the facility using state funds on state lands under state emergency authority."

Reported similarly:
Axios [7/22/2025 5:07 PM, Sommer Brugal, 13599K]

OutKick [7/22/2025 12:01 PM, Armando Salguero] reports we’ve gone soft as a society and the folks who are about to get deported for being illegal in the country have obviously assimilated in that respect because those being detained at Florida’s Alligator Alcatraz are complaining about the food. Florida Governor Ron DeSantis said on Tuesday the detainees have complained about the ham sandwiches. That’s right, the sandwiches. So what’s the problem? "They were mad the ham sandwiches weren’t toasted," DeSantis said. "Like, excuse me? Give me a break." There have been protests as well as rallies beyond the borders of the illegal immigrant holding facility situated on the property of an abandoned airfield in the Big Cypress National Preserve. Protesters say it’s inhumane to detain people in the Everglades surrounded by alligators and snakes. But that hasn’t stopped the complaints, including limited bathroom space and other things. And now the detainees are hating on white bread. "DHS required there to be certain things," DeSantis said. "I know the legal was a part of that. There is recreation. I know that people say there’s not and there is. I’m confident that whatever’s required will be provided." What is not required is to feed the detainees gourmet cuisine. "First of all, they’re fed the same as the staff is fed," DeSantis said. "It’s not a prison; it’s a deportation processing center, so it is different.

Daily Caller [7/22/2025 12:54 PM, Audrey Streb, 1010K] reports that environmentalists suing to stop the detention center for illegal migrants known as Alligator Alcatraz did so in the wrong venue, according to a top Florida official who asked a federal judge Monday to transfer or dismiss the case. The Trump administration previously authorized a plan led by Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier to build a migrant detention center in the Everglades, known as "Alligator Alcatraz," and the Center for Biological Diversity and Friends of the Everglades then filed a lawsuit in U.S. District Court on June 27 to stop its construction. Executive Director for the Florida Division of Emergency Management Kevin Guthrie argued in a court filing Monday that their lawsuit was filed in the wrong jurisdiction, as Alligator Alcatraz is located in a different county. "All the detention facilities, all the buildings, and all the paving at issue are sited in Collier County, not Miami-Dade," Guthrie wrote. "Plaintiffs concede this point in their own declarations, which state that all the facilities, pavement, and activity at the site are in Collier County. … No relevant decisionmaking is occurring in Miami-Dade County." Florida Dept Emergency Management Response Alligator Alcatraz by audreystreb on Scribd. Friends of the Everglades argues that Guthrie’s argument amounts to "judge-shopping," a practice in which litigants seek a judge that they consider to be more likely to rule in their favor. Guthrie is one of the several defendants in the case, along with Miami-Dade County, Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem and Acting Director of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Todd Lyons, according to the lawsuit.

Univision [7/22/2025 4:16 PM, Patricia Clarembaux, 4992K] reports Florida Democratic Representative Debbie Wasserman Schultz "could barely breathe" as she toured the detention center in the state’s swamps known as "Alligator Alcatraz" on July 12. It was "brutal," "overwhelming," "inescapable" heat, she recalls. The thermostat she held read 85 degrees Fahrenheit inside the tent where the immigrants were detained, 32 degrees for each of the eight barred cells she could see from a distance, from the door, because she was not allowed to enter or speak to them. In the cells, Wasserman recounted, there were people from one corner of the "cage"—as she called it—to the other. Standing at the door of the tent, she heard in the distance one of the detainees shouting that he was a U.S. citizen and another saying he spent four days in the hospital due to Clorox poisoning from the water they drank. But she couldn’t investigate further: the delegation of representatives was stopped by six guards who prevented them from entering. Meanwhile, what’s happening inside these facilities is revealed through brief calls from the detainees themselves and their lawyers.

Reuters [7/22/2025 11:36 PM, Natalia Siniawski, Ana Isabel Martinez, Adriana Barrera and Ted Hesson, 51390K] reports Mexico is seeking the repatriation of 14 nationals being held at the United States’ detention center known as "Alligator Alcatraz", President Claudia Sheinbaum said on Tuesday. "All arrangements are being made to ensure they are repatriated immediately," Sheinbaum told a daily press conference. The facility, about 37 miles (60 km) from Miami, sits in a subtropical wetland teeming with alligators, crocodiles and pythons, fearsome imagery the White House has leveraged to show its determination to purge migrants it says were wrongly allowed to stay in the United States under former President Joe Biden. Since President Donald Trump took office on Jan. 20, a total of 73,533 people have been returned to Mexico, mostly by air, including 67,008 Mexican nationals, Sheinbaum said in another daily briefing this month. Mexican father Martin Gonzalez told local radio station W that his sons, Carlos and Alejandro, were now held in the detention center. "It’s really bad. The facility is completely closed, not even sunlight gets in," Gonzalez said. "The lights are on 24-7, so they don’t even know if it’s day or night." He said they were sent there after Carlos, 26, was stopped by a state trooper while driving, adding that he was visiting the U.S. as a tourist and had a valid visa. The trooper asked for the car’s registration, which was missing. When his brother, Alejandro, arrived to provide the document, he too was detained, and both were sent to the facility, their father said. "Obviously my sons are desperate to get out of this situation," he said. U.S. Department of Homeland Security spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin confirmed the brothers had been detained during a traffic stop on July 7, adding Carlos had not registered his vehicle with the state and accumulated 212 toll violations. McLaughlin said Carlos was working illegally while on a tourist visa and Alejandro had overstayed his visa. Mexico’s consul in Orlando, Juan Sabines, said in a video shared on Monday alongside the men’s father that the two were in "legal limbo," because a lawyer appointed to their case did not have access to their file, and a judge had not been assigned.

Washington Post [7/22/2025 7:32 PM, Teo Armus, Samantha Schmidt and Arelis R. Hernández, 32099K] reports Julio González Jr. had agreed to be deported to Venezuela. When the 36-year-old office cleaner and house painter boarded the flight in Texas in March, he assumed it would take him back to his home country. Instead, the plane landed in El Salvador. “The horror movie started there,” González said Tuesday. Still shackled from the flight, González said, he and dozens of other migrants were shoved off the plane, pushed onto a bus, driven to a massive gray complex, and ordered to kneel there with their foreheads pressed against the ground as guards pointed guns directly at them. Welcome to El Salvador, you sons of b-----s, a hooded figure told them. They had arrived at El Salvador’s Terrorism Confinement Center, known as CECOT. The United States has paid the Salvadoran government of President Nayib Bukele $6 million to hold hundreds of migrants rounded up in President Donald Trump’s mass removals — many without ties to El Salvador, many without criminal charges — at the world’s largest prison. In the four months he spent there, González said, he was beaten repeatedly with wooden bats. Some guards would kick the detainees in the chest or stomach, he said. He was robbed of thousands of dollars, he said, and denied access to lawyers or a chance to call his family. Early Tuesday, González returned to his parents’ home in Caracas, one of 252 Venezuelans released from CECOT and returned to the South American country in a deal between the U.S. and Venezuelan governments. They arrived on two flights in exchange for the release of 10 American citizens and permanent U.S. residents imprisoned in Venezuela. Many of the former detainees began to reunite with their families in hometowns across Venezuela — communities that in some cases they left years ago. After 125 days denied contact with the outside world, some began to share details of their treatment. "I practically felt like an animal," González told Washington Post by telephone from his parents’ home. "The officials treated us like we were the most dangerous criminals on Earth. … They shaved our heads, they would insult us, they would take us around like dogs.". Asked to respond to González’s account, a spokeswoman for the Department of Homeland Security said the U.S. had deported "nearly 300 Tren de Aragua and MS-13 terrorists" to CECOT, "where they no longer pose a threat to the American people.". "Once again the media is falling all over themselves to defend criminal illegal gang members," Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement. "We hear far too much about gang members and criminals’ false sob stories and not enough about their victims.". González denies being a gang member or criminal. Neither the U.S. nor El Salvador has provided evidence that he is.

AP [7/22/2025 2:42 PM, Lea Skene, 3077K] reports that, despite a judge’s order calling for his return to the United States from El Salvador, a Venezuelan migrant was instead sent back to his home country in a prisoner exchange deal reached last week, an unexpected development that left his lawyers scrambling to locate him. It marks the latest wrinkle in yet another messy court battle over the Trump administration’s crackdown on illegal immigration, which has repeatedly challenged the power of federal courts. Attorneys for the Venezuelan native — identified only as Cristian in court papers — said during a court hearing Tuesday that they don’t know where he is or how to get in touch with him. After he was deported to a Salvadoran mega-prison in March, U.S. District Judge Stephanie Gallagher ordered the government to facilitate the his return to the U.S. She cited the case of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Maryland man who was mistakenly deported to the same notorious prison. Cristian is among a group of plaintiffs who entered the country as unaccompanied children seeking asylum. A 2019 settlement agreement said they couldn’t be deported until their asylum claims were adjudicated. Because his application is still pending, Gallagher said, the Trump administration violated that agreement in sending Cristian to a notorious prison known as the Terrorism Confinement Center, or CECOT, which was built to hold alleged gang members. And now he’s back in Venezuela, the country he escaped years ago because he feared persecution, his attorneys argued during Tuesday’s hearing in federal court in Baltimore. “They sent him back to the one country he’s actually seeking asylum from,” attorney Kevin DeJong told the court. “We were shocked to see that happen on Friday.” Cristian was released from CECOT along with 251 other Venezuelan migrants who had been imprisoned in El Salvador since March. President Donald Trump paid El Salvador $6 million to house them there after he issued a proclamation calling for the arrest and removal of Venezuelan gang members under the Alien Enemies Act, a 1798 wartime law. As part of the deal on Friday, Venezuela released 10 jailed U.S. citizens and permanent residents in exchange for getting back the 252 deportees. “Cristian was a pawn in this plan, I don’t know how else to say it,” DeJong said. “He was a pawn in this prisoner exchange deal.” DeJong said Cristian’s legal team hasn’t been able to get in touch with him since. Gallagher, who was nominated to the federal bench by Trump in 2019, told the government’s lawyers Tuesday to help provide contact information for Cristian. But Justice Department attorney Ruth Ann Mueller wasn’t able to confirm even where in Venezuela he ended up. “This is a fast-evolving situation,” she said.

Reuters [7/22/2025 5:05 PM, Efrain Otero, Tibisay Romero and Tathiana Ortiz, 51390K] reports a singer and a barber were among the former Venezuelan migrants who returned to their families on Tuesday, after spending months detained in a notorious prison in El Salvador before being sent back to Venezuela last week. Singer Arturo Suarez was greeted with hugs and tears in working-class El Valle, south of capital Caracas, by his sister, aunt and cousins. He later wiped away tears as he spoke to his wife and daughter, who live in Chile, via video call. "I’m free now, thank God, at last," said Suarez, who was arrested in February in North Carolina while filming a music video. He serenaded a crowd gathered in his family’s living room. "I still can’t believe it." The Venezuelans were sent to El Salvador from the United States in March, after U.S. President Donald Trump invoked the 1798 Alien Enemies Act to deport alleged members of the Tren de Aragua gang without normal immigration procedures. The deportations drew fierce criticism from human rights groups and a legal battle with the Trump administration. Families and lawyers of many of the men have denied they have gang ties. His wife has said Suarez had gone to the U.S. to boost his emerging music career and that he denied being a member of Tren de Aragua. "I thought of my daughter, I thought of my wife, of my siblings, of my family, I asked for strength to not give up, to not allow myself to die," Suarez told journalists about his detention. "I didn’t - because I’m tough, I’m a Venezuelan." Suarez and the other detainees deported to El Salvador from the U.S. were returned to Venezuela on Friday in a prisoner exchange. Since arriving, they have been undergoing medical checks and interviews with officials.

Breitbart [7/22/2025 6:43 PM, Staff, 3077K] reports tears of joy and relief flowed freely Tuesday as Venezuelan Maikel Olivera returned home to his mother’s embrace after four months of "hell" in a Salvadoran prison. The 37-year-old is one of 252 Venezuelan migrants flown home last Friday from a notorious "anti-terrorism" prison where they were sent by the United States in March in a fear-inducing crackdown on undocumented migrants. Family and friends waited impatiently for Olivera to be released by Venezuelan officials after days of medical tests and questioning, breaking out in tearful cheers and waving Venezuelan flags as they saw a police car finally approaching his family home Tuesday. "You’ve come back to life, my love!" Olivera’s mother Olivia Rojas exclaimed, hugging her son and lovingly stroking his face before taking a step back to look him up and down for any visible signs of distress. Cars honked in celebration and one person in the crowd wore a T-shirt with the slogan: "Migrating is not a crime.". When the clamor died down, Olivera described the CECOT prison he and his compatriots were held at as "real hell.". "There were beatings 24 hours a day," he told AFP of the experience. "They told us: ‘you will rot here, you will be imprisoned for 300 years.’ I thought I would never return to Venezuela again.". The CECOT was built by Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele to house dangerous criminals in a successful but much-criticized war on gangs. Bukele accepted payment of millions of dollars from Donald Trump’s administration to add migrants deported from the US to his prison population in a move widely denounced by human rights groups.

FOX News [7/22/2025 4:19 PM, Breanne Deppisch, 46878K] reports a federal judge in Baltimore cleared the way for potential contempt proceedings to be brought against the Trump administration on Tuesday after it failed to comply with a court order requiring it to return a deported Venezuelan migrant from El Salvador back to U.S. soil. The update from U.S. District Judge Stephanie Gallagher capped an extraordinary court hearing centered on the status and location of "Cristian," a 20-year-old Venezuelan migrant who was deported to El Salvador’s CECOT maximum-security prison in March, as part of the Trump administration’s early wave of Alien Enemies Act deportation flights. Gallagher told Cristian’s lawyers on Tuesday that the flurry of recent updates in the case could allow plaintiffs to potentially move on sanctions or possible contempt proceedings against the Trump administration, though she stressed she was not opining on whether the effort would be successful. She also stressed that, despite the procedural changes before the court, it does not mean they are "abandoning ship" in efforts to secure Cristian’s return to the U.S., though she acknowledged the situation on the ground had shifted significantly.

Daily Wire [7/22/2025 12:21 PM, Spencer Lindquist, 3816K] reports legal and illegal immigrants send approximately $200 billion out of the United States and back to their home countries every year, a new study on remittances finds. The report from the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) found that the whopping sum of money was exported out of the American economy in 2021 and sent to 134 different foreign countries across the globe. The organization points out that the amount of remittances —money sent out the America to foreign countries — has almost certainly increased in recent years alongside record levels of immigration into the United States and a ballooning percentage of the population that is foreign-born. "Remittances effectively represent a transfer payment of hundreds of billions of dollars from American workplaces and communities to people abroad. To compound the problem, many migrants who send remittances out of the U.S. earn so little that they qualify for public benefits," FAIR Executive Director Dale Wilcox explained. "The result is that American citizens subsidize social services and welfare benefits for aliens, legal and illegal, who send much of what they earn out of the country.". The five countries receiving the most remittances from the United States are Mexico, India, Guatemala, the Philippines, and China, the organization notes. The scale of remittances from the United States is so high that they "account for around 20 percent of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of multiple countries in Central America," FAIR points out. "Mexico benefits more than any other country from U.S. remittances. Mexican nationals living in the U.S. remit on average almost a fifth of their monthly incomes to Mexico," the FAIR report explains. "Remittances to Mexico represent more than a quarter of the money sent out of the U.S.". Conservative organizations and Republican politicians alike have advocated for a tax on remittances to recoup some of the money sent out of the American economy and throttle funding sent to criminal enterprises south of the border. "Placing a fee on remittances is crucial because the more money that is smuggled back into Mexico, the stronger the cartels become," FAIR Media Director Ira Mehlman told The Daily Wire. "Many illegal aliens are working off-the-books, and therefore, no payroll taxes have been collected. Taxing the money as it leaves the country would be a way to recoup some of that revenue loss.". A remittance tax of 5 percent was introduced in the original version of the Big Beautiful Bill, but the figure shrank to a meager 1 percent tax.

Washington Post [7/22/2025 7:30 AM, Elise Stefanik and Stephen Prince, 32099K] reports Cyberwar is no longer a future threat — it is today’s front line. Whether at the fingertips of Iran, Russia or, most concerningly, China, cyber conflict is now the continuation of war by other tools: malware, phishing campaigns, zero-day attacks and more. As the recent global hack of Microsoft servers showed, in this era, fire walls matter as much as firepower. To compete and win in this new arena, the U.S. must take a bold step and establish a national institution to train and deploy the next generation of digital defenders. We would call it the United States Advanced Technology Academy (USATA). Imagine a state-of-the-art campus along the Erie Canal in Upstate New York, an area that was once the nation’s industrial backbone and could now be the cradle of its digital defense. In one laboratory, USATA cadets delve into secure quantum encryption, while across the quad, others work on AI systems designed to detect biological threats. This academy would unlock opportunity for young Americans from all backgrounds, especially those from rural and working-class communities that are often left behind in today’s innovation economy. By opening a direct pipeline from high school to national service, USATA would restore a sense of purpose, upward mobility and civic pride in the digital age. In return for a tuition-free education, graduates would commit to five years of service in mission-critical, technology-driven roles across government. These graduates would enter agencies such as the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, the Energy Department, or the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, helping to build resilient digital infrastructure, accelerate breakthroughs in quantum computing and AI, and shape a new era of technological statecraft.

The Hill [7/22/2025 7:00 AM, Artem Kolisnichenko, 18649K] reports in July, U.S. immigration authorities quietly brought back one of their most controversial practices — denying detained migrants the right to seek release on bond. Under a new ICE guidance, those taken into custody have no right to a bond hearing, even if they have lived in the country for some time. The Supreme Court has so far declined to intervene in this policy. In 2025, it repeatedly refused to hear appeals challenging the restrictions on bond hearings, effectively leaving the new rules intact without judicial oversight. What we are seeing is a shift in legal power toward the executive branch, which now has more freedom to set detention rules without oversight.

Blaze [7/23/2025 3:30 AM, Daniel Horowitz, 1805K] reports conservatives face a “use it or lose it” moment on immigration enforcement and deportations. They’ve never had a stronger case — or more support, even as public opinion flags — for aggressive removals. They have the rationale, the electoral mandate, and now the federal funding. If they fail to act, the left — and even Donald Trump, who’s already flirting with amnesty for non-criminal aliens — will seize the opportunity. Their argument will go like this: “We tried your way. Mass deportation doesn’t work. Now we need a ‘legal pathway’ for those who haven’t committed serious crimes.” That’s the amnesty trap. To avoid it, conservatives must escalate interior enforcement — fast. Illegal immigration remains a policy problem, not a funding problem. Throwing money at it won’t solve anything if the rules stay broken. Congress could pour $1 trillion into ICE operations, but if every removal gets litigated case by case, Trump’s second term will end before we even scratch the surface of Biden’s four-year importation binge. Since February, ICE has averaged just 14,700 removals per month. That’s roughly 176,000 a year — or barely 700,000 over a full term. Even with increased arrests, that pace won’t clear the backlog of criminal aliens, let alone the 7.7 million undetained cases on ICE’s docket, the 8 to 10 million admitted under Biden, or the broader illegal population likely numbering in the tens of millions.

New York Times [7/23/2025 1:25 PM, Jeff Crisp, 153395K] reports in May, the United States flew a group of eight migrants to Djibouti, a small state in the Horn of Africa. For weeks, the men — who are from Cuba, Laos, Mexico, Myanmar, Vietnam and South Sudan — were detained in a converted shipping container on a U.S. military base. More than a month later, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the men, who had all been convicted of serious crimes, could be transferred to their final destination: South Sudan, a country on the brink of famine and civil war. Tom Homan, the border czar, acknowledged that he didn’t know what happened to them once they were released from U.S. custody. “As far as we’re concerned,” he said, “they’re free.” Deporting foreign nationals to countries other than their homeland has quickly become a centerpiece of the Trump administration’s immigration policy. Thousands of people have been sent to countries in the Western Hemisphere, including Costa Rica, El Salvador, Mexico and Panama. At a recent summit of West African leaders, President Trump pressed them to admit deportees from the United States, reportedly emphasizing that assisting in migration was essential to improving commercial ties with the United States. All told, administration officials have reached out to dozens of states to try to strike deals to accept deportees. The administration is making progress: Last week, it sent five men to the tiny, landlocked country of Eswatini in southern Africa after their home countries allegedly “refused to take them back,” according to an assistant homeland security secretary, Tricia McLaughlin. The terms of the deal were not disclosed. In some ways, this is nothing new. It has become increasingly common for the world’s most prosperous countries to relocate immigrants, asylum seekers and refugees to places with which they have little or no prior connection. Previous U.S. administrations from both parties have sought third-country detentions as easy fixes. In the 1990s, Presidents George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton both sent thousands of Haitian refugees to detention camps in Guantánamo Bay before forcibly repatriating most of them to Haiti. What is new about the Trump administration’s deportation efforts, unlike previous European or even past U.S. attempts, is their breadth and scale, effectively transforming migrant expulsions into a tool for international leverage. By deporting foreign nationals to often unstable third countries, the Trump administration is not only creating a novel class of exiles with little hope of returning to either the United States or their country of origin, but also explicitly using these vulnerable populations as bargaining chips in a wider strategy of diplomatic and geopolitical deal making.

Washington Examiner [7/22/2025 2:05 PM, Zachary Faria, 1934K] reports that the Black Lives Matter summer of 2020 spawned a series of hate crime hoaxes designed to make racism seem worse than it was. Now, we are seeing a surge in deportation hoaxes, as activists and politicians do all they can to keep criminal illegal immigrants from being deported. This new trend appears to have started in Los Angeles, with Yuriana Julia Pelaez Calderon. An attorney representing her family held a press conference on June 30 to declare that masked men had kidnapped Calderon in an unmarked van on her way to work. She was allegedly presented with self-deportation paperwork and then sent to a warehouse after demanding to speak to an attorney. Her family asked for $4,500 in a GoFundMe campaign. But a video from the location of the alleged kidnapping and phone records show this was "fabricated," according to the Justice Department. Investigators believe she went as far as to fake photos of her "rescue" from the kidnappers to explain why she was found at a shopping center in Bakersfield while "still purportedly missing." She faces up to five years in federal prison for each of her two charges. If you don’t recall, this hoax was promoted by none other than Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass. "No hearing. Just fear," Bass posted on X, endeavoring to delegitimize Immigration and Customs Enforcement operations in her city.

Los Angeles Times [7/22/2025 10:00 AM, Staff, 14672K] reports thirty-nine years ago, President Reagan stated in a news conference, "The nine most terrifying words in the English language are ‘I’m from the government and I’m here to help.’" Reagan was held in the highest regard by Republicans for decades. Last month, Republican Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said, "We are staying [in Los Angeles] to liberate this city from the socialists and the burdensome leadership that this governor and that this mayor have placed on this country, and what they have tried to insert into this city" ("After six months under Trump, California and L.A. are battlegrounds. Who benefits?," July 20). It’s amazing how the party of Lincoln would pivot to the party of being hypocritical. When it comes to state’s rights, President Trump has endorsed them when they work to his benefit. Meanwhile, we have local elections for mayors and governors. If we don’t like what our elected officials do, we can vote them out or recall them. And those who don’t like the results can move to a state that’s more to their liking. The system works when the federal government doesn’t interfere. Noem, pay attention to Reagan. Don’t help.

Breitbart [7/22/2025 6:52 PM, Warner Todd Huston, 3077K] reports Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) is highlighting a massive upswing in arrests of illegal migrants in locales across the country. In keeping with President Trump’s stated mission and campaign promises, the largest number of those arrested are already facing one charge, have deportation detainers filed against them, or have been convicted of crimes, officials say. In South Carolina, for example, ICE is reporting a 47 percent rise in apprehensions with 47 percent of those taken into custody facing at least one charge and another 41 percent having convictions. That means 88 percent of apprehensions have been of known criminals, and ICE is not going around scooping up unassuming grandmothers walking the streets. Other localities are seeing even greater percentages. Arrests in Colorado and Wyoming are now "almost FIVE TIMES as many" as during the same period under Joe Biden, officials say. The numbers in Grand Rapids, Michigan, have also seen a healthy rise. According to ICE, arrests are up 154 percent in the central Michigan town. Michigan’s increase doesn’t even hold a candle to the numbers in San Diego, California, which recorded a 400 percent increase in the arrests of illegals compared to a year ago during Joe Biden’s final year in office.

Federalist [7/22/2025 7:35 AM, Breccan F. Thies, 1142K] reports Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) is helping alleviate pressure on America’s emergency rooms because illegal aliens believe they might be arrested and deported if they use the emergency services. Illegal aliens are well-known to abuse such emergency services for non-emergencies, not pay, and leave the American people to pay for it. But the Los Angeles County Department of Health Services (LACDHS) confirmed to The Federalist that recent ICE activity is stopping many illegals from seeking emergency services as well as scheduled appointments. "We can confirm that our health system has in fact seen a decline in both Emergency room visits and in rates of patients showing up to scheduled health appointments," LACDHS told The Federalist. The department also claimed that "the fear caused by the aggressive approach of the ICE raids has left many in the LA County communities fearing for their safety. Regardless of immigration status, the patients we serve are expressing fear and anxiety."

NPR [7/22/2025 7:13 AM, Ximena Bustillo, and Sacha Pfeiffer, 37958K] Audio: HERE reports the Department of Homeland Security plans to use military bases in New Jersey and Indiana to detain immigrants amid its broader crackdown. [Editorial note: consult audio at source link]

FOX News [7/22/2025 3:24 PM, Staff, 46878K] Video: HERE reports acting ICE Director Todd Lyons explains how far-left groups are using "reverse technology" to reveal the identities of federal immigration officers. FOX News [7/22/2025 5:25 PM, Cameron Arcand, 46878K] reports far-left organizations could be using artificial intelligence and other technology to reveal the identity of Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents, acting ICE Director Todd Lyons told Fox News Digital in an interview. Lyons’ remarks come as Democrats in Congress recently proposed the VISIBLE Act, which would require clear identification of ICE agents and prevent masking of federal immigration authorities in public-facing circumstances. He added that the safety risk does require more resources when conducting arrests. ICE agents have faced an 830% increase in assaults since last year, according to DHS. However, proponents of the VISIBLE Act have said it’s necessary for accountability.

FOX News [7/22/2025 9:00 AM, Deirdre Heavey and Elizabeth Elkind, 46878K] Video: HERE reports President Donald Trump’s crackdown on illegal immigration and deportation rollout has ignited anti-Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) protests across the United States. House Republicans told Fox News Digital there is a parallel between Democrats’ rhetoric against federal immigration officers amid this crackdown and the surge in violence against ICE and Border Protection (CBP) officers. "The increasingly violent attacks against law enforcement are being egged on by irresponsible Democratic politicians," Rep. Tom McClintock, R-Calif., said in an exclusive interview. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Kristi Noem on Monday blamed Democrats’ "sanctuary city policies" for the shooting of an off-duty CBP officer in New York City. A second illegal immigrant has been apprehended in connection to the shooting of the CBP officer. He was reportedly struck in the face and forearm in Manhattan’s Riverside Park on Saturday night. Miguel Francisco Mora Nunez, a Dominican national who was caught by Border Patrol in April 2023, was taken into custody following the shooting. "Without enforcing our immigration laws, we have no immigration laws," McClintock continued. "Without immigration laws, we have no border, and without a border we have no country. And that’s what Americans suffered for four long years with the open borders policies of the Biden administration.". Democrat Sens. Alex Padilla and Cory Booker, two of the leading Capitol Hill critics of Trump’s illegal immigration crackdown, have introduced legislation that would require immigration enforcement officers to clearly identify themselves without masks. [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

FOX News [7/22/2025 4:13 PM, Preston Mizell, 46878K] reports Senator Ted Cruz, R-Texas, introduced legislation that would identify and penalize organizations and individuals who are allegedly funding and directing "violent" and "extreme" Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and antisemitic protests across the country. The Financial Underwriting of Nefarious Demonstrations and Extremist Riots (STOP FUNDERs) Act was introduced in the Senate Tuesday, which would allow the Department of Justice to use the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act to issue conspiracy charges, asset forfeiture, and enhanced criminal penalties to organizations or individuals who fund or coordinate violent interstate riots. As recently as June, thousands of rioters took to the streets of Los Angeles in protest of President Donald Trump’s fulfilled campaign promise to deport illegal immigrants and secure the border. Last week, the Department of Homeland Security revealed an 830% increase in assaults on ICE officers. The Anti-defamation league (ADL) reported 2,637 anti-Israel incidents of harassment, assault, protests and other attacks on college campuses from June 1, 2023, and May 31, 2024, a 628% increase from the same period in the previous year. These prominent protests have been speculated, though not confirmed, to receive funding and direction by outside groups linked to domestic nonprofits and some wealthy individuals.

Univision [7/22/2025 3:55 PM, Claudia Carrera, 4992K] reports Walmart must pay a $24.2 million fine after a federal appeals court found the company violated technical employment documentation requirements more than 11,000 times, particularly in its handling of Form I-9. This form is required to verify whether a worker is legally authorized to work in the United States. The ruling follows audits conducted by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in at least 20 Walmart stores across the country, as part of a more aggressive policy implemented during the Trump administration. Although the chain denies hiring unauthorized individuals, the sanctions are based on technical errors in completing forms, not on direct evidence of employment of undocumented immigrants. Walmart, meanwhile, maintains that it will continue to fight the sanction and has invested significant resources to improve its internal labor verification systems.

Reuters [7/22/2025 10:40 PM, Patricia Zengerle, 44540K] reports an Afghan who moved to the United States after working for the U.S. military in his home country was seized by armed, masked immigration agents, put in a van and taken out of state, attorneys and members of Congress said on Tuesday. Identified only as Zia by members of Congress and his attorney out of concern for his safety and that of his family, the man had worked as an interpreter for the U.S. military during the war in Afghanistan. He was in the United States legally and was arrested after an appointment in Connecticut related to his application for a green card under a program to protect people who worked for U.S. forces, according to human-rights advocates, his attorney and members of Congress. Since starting his second term in January, Republican President Donald Trump has pursued a broad crackdown on immigration. "What happened to him is the worst kind of abhorrent violation of basic decency," Democratic Senator Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut told reporters on a call with advocates to draw attention to the case of Zia and at least two other Afghans who worked for the U.S. and have been seized by Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE. "He actually worked and risked his life in Afghanistan to uphold the values and rights that are central to democracy," Blumenthal said. Blumenthal and two other Democrats, representatives Jahana Hayes, who serves Zia’s district in Connecticut, and Bill Keating, who represents the Massachusetts city where Zia is being held, all pledged to fight for his release. A judge has issued a temporary stay preventing Zia’s removal from the United States, but he remains in detention. Asked for comment, the Department of Homeland Security said the Afghan national entered the U.S. on October 8, 2024, and is under investigation for a "serious criminal allegation," adding, "All of his claims will be heard by a judge. Any Afghan who fears persecution is able to request relief." The emailed statement from DHS provided no further details.

CBS New York [7/22/2025 6:38 AM, Staff, 51860K] reports Homan’s statements come after the shooting of an off-duty Customs and Border Protection officer in Washington Heights. CBS News New York’s Christina Fan reports. [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

CBS News [7/22/2025 8:10 PM, Lilia Luciano, 51860K] Video: HERE reports video released Tuesday by the New York Immigration Coalition gives a first look inside some of the holding cells of New York City’s federal immigration offices. It shows men sleeping on the floor on thin thermal blankets. At one point, a man is heard saying, "Look how they have us ... like dogs in here." There are reports the lights are kept on around the clock and nearly 30 people share a single toilet. Joan Paul Alcivar De La Cruz was held at the facility for several days last month before being sent to Jackson Parish Correctional Center in Louisiana. His wife, Samara De La Cruz, told CBS News he was fed just a sandwich and bottle of water each day while at the New York facility. Department of Homeland Security spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin says detainees were "briefly" held at the New York City facility, and that "any claim that there is overcrowding or subprime conditions at ICE facilities are categorically false." Samara said her husband was fleeing persecution in Ecuador and it wouldn’t be safe for him to return there. She said he was detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement at his asylum hearing, a tactic ICE has been using amid the Trump administration’s crackdown on illegal immigration that is facing legal challeneges. "He did not deserve any of this. He did not. He made sure he followed all the laws. He went to all his immigration courts. He’s never been arrested. He’s never had any criminal record," Samara said.

Reuters [7/22/2025 2:37 PM, Daniel Wiessner, 51390K] reports that a U.S. appeals court on Tuesday said New Jersey cannot ban the detention of immigrants awaiting deportation within its borders, agreeing with private prison operator CoreCivic (CXW.N) that it "destroys the federal government’s marketplace" for detention facilities crucial to immigration enforcement. The 2-1 ruling by the Philadelphia-based 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upholds a judge’s decision in favor of CoreCivic, which operates about 70 U.S. detention centers nationwide. CoreCivic sued New Jersey after it passed a law in 2021 that threatened the renewal of a contract to operate a 300-bed facility near Newark Liberty International Airport. Privately run detention centers have come under renewed scrutiny as the administration of Republican President Donald Trump has filled existing centers to capacity amid an aggressive immigration enforcement campaign. The administration has restricted members of Congress and other officials from touring the facilities, where advocates say conditions can be cramped and inhumane. The 3rd Circuit on Tuesday said New Jersey’s law barring new contracts to operate immigrant detention centers violates the U.S. Constitution by interfering with the federal government’s enforcement of immigration laws. "Just as the federal government cannot control a state, so too a state cannot control the federal government," Circuit Judge Stephanos Bibas, a Trump appointee, wrote for the court.

National Review [7/22/2025 3:55 PM, Brittany Bernstein, 109K] reports a local Allentown, Pa., newspaper recently reported that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement “secretly deported” an 82-year-old Chilean grandfather to Guatemala. Now, DHS says the paper fell for a “hoax” perpetrated by the man’s family. In fact, the Trump administration says the man was never taken into ICE custody at all. “ICE never arrested or deported Luis Leon to Guatemala. Nor does ICE ‘disappear’ people — this is a categorical lie being peddled to demonize ICE agents who are already facing an 830 percent increase in assaults against them," DHS Assistant Press Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said.

AP [7/22/2025 2:07 PM, Kate Brumback, 56000K] reports a Spanish-language journalist who was arrested while covering a protest just outside Atlanta last month and is being held in a federal immigration jail felt a duty to help those whose voices often go unheard, his children said Tuesday. Police in DeKalb County arrested Mario Guevara while he was covering a protest on June 14, and he was turned over to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement a few days later. An immigration judge set a $7,500 bond for him earlier this month, but that ruling has been put on hold while the government appeals it. For now, Guevara is being held in an immigration detention center in Folkston, in southeast Georgia, near the Florida border and a five-hour drive from his family in suburban Atlanta. Katherine Guevara, 27, said that for more than 20 years she has watched her father’s "unwavering dedication and selfless commitment to serving the Hispanic community.". "He chased stories that mattered, stories that told the truth about immigration, injustice, about people who usually go ignored," she said during a news conference at the Georgia state Capitol. Guevara, 47, fled El Salvador two decades ago and drew a big audience as a journalist in the Atlanta area. He worked for Mundo Hispanico, a Spanish-language newspaper, for years before starting a digital news outlet called MG News a year ago. He was livestreaming video on social media from a "No Kings" rally protesting President Donald Trump’s administration when local police arrested him in DeKalb County. Guevara frequently arrives on the scene where ICE or other law enforcement agencies are active, often after getting tips from community members. He regularly livestreams what he’s seeing on social media. "Growing up, I didn’t always understand why my dad was so obsessed with his work, why he’d jump up and leave dinner to chase down a story. But now I do," said Oscar Guevara, 21, who now works as a photojournalist for MG News. Guevara’s children were joined at the news conference by members of civil rights and press freedom groups, as well as state lawmakers.

USA Today [7/22/2025 5:56 PM, Ana Goñi-Lessan, 75552K] reports Florida’s top prosecutor is encouraging victims of domestic violence, or anyone with an "ex" in the United States illegally, to call his office. Uthmeier said his office received a tip from someone whose abusive former partner overstayed a tourism visa. The alleged abuser is now in the process of being deported, he said. Only the federal government can deport individuals in the country illegally, but Florida has been working closely with the Trump administration and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. ICE already has a tip line that receives more than 15,000 calls a month, according to the agency. Staff collect information received from phone calls and turn over the information to specific programs within the Department of Homeland Security. The agency said it does not offer rewards for aiding in immigration enforcement.

DailySignal [7/22/2025 4:00 PM, Rebecca Downs, 558K] reports a Cincinnati man was arrested Saturday for allegedly making threats against Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents on social media. According to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Anthony Marcus Kelly, 38, faces federal charges, including threatening to assault, kidnap, or murder a United States official, as well as transmitting communications containing threats to kidnap or injure another person. The arrest comes as violence against agents is up 830%. However, this may be an undercounted figure. Law enforcement became aware of a social media user going by the name of ‘Slab’ after he allegedly made multiple social media posts calling for the killing of ICE officers and detailing his acquisition of firearms to carry out that threat. After an investigation, the user making these posts was identified as Kelly, who lives in the Cincinnati area. Lyons also took aim at politicians who are turning federal agents into targets. On the day of Kelly’s arrest, Assistant DHS Secretary Tricia McLaughlin posted screenshots of posts allegedly made by the suspect and thanked law enforcement.

FOX News [7/22/2025 2:06 PM, Greg Norman, 46878K] reports that ICE’s acting director is speaking out against an Ohio man who is facing federal charges for making "multiple threats online to shoot and kill ICE officers," calling his alleged posts "disgusting and completely unhinged." Anthony Kelly, 38, of Cincinnati, wrote "#RevolutionIsTheSolution #DestroyICE they’re rabid dogs that need to be put down. Including #KristiNoem" in one of his alleged social media posts, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement announced Tuesday. "Let me be crystal clear: Threatening to kill a federal officer is not protest — it’s terrorism," acting ICE Director Todd Lyons said in a statement. "Anthony Kelly’s violent threats, while disgusting and completely unhinged, are a symptom of a larger problem: Politicians are trying to turn our law enforcement officials into targets by scaring their constituents and whipping them into a frenzy in a fact-free vacuum. "This is what happens when anti-ICE activists don’t realize or care that we’re out there arresting rapists, murderers and child molesters who are in this country illegally. Enough is enough. Anyone who targets ICE personnel will be met with swift, unrelenting justice," he added. ICE said its Homeland Security Investigations and the FBI arrested Kelly on July 19. He was federally charged with threatening to assault, kidnap or murder a United States official, as well as transmitting communications containing threats to kidnap or injure another person.

Reuters [7/22/2025 12:48 PM, Kristina Cooke and Ted Hesson, 51390K] reports for 125 days in her immigration detention cell, Ingrid Mejia replayed in her head the day she was separated from her 3-year-old son. Mejia, a 25-year-old farmworker from Guatemala, had gone to court on February 25 on a charge of driving without a license. She didn’t have a lawyer - or child care. So she left Eliazar, a chubby-cheeked child with dark hair and eyes, waiting outside with the person who had given her a ride to court. She thought she would pay a fine and go home, just as she had four months earlier on the same charge. Instead, as this was her fourth such offense, municipal court judge Julie Monnin sentenced her to three days in Ohio’s Darke County jail. The brief sentence plunged Mejia into the dragnet of President Donald Trump’s aggressive immigration enforcement, landing her in immigration detention for more than four months and stranding her U.S. citizen son in foster care for even longer. Mejia began trying to get her son back on July 3, within hours of her release. She hoped it would happen in days. But at a July 15 custody hearing, child welfare officials said Eliazar had bonded with his foster family during her prolonged detention. They told the hearing a slow transition would be in the child’s best interest, Mejia said. "He’s my son. I just want him back now," Mejia said after the hearing. "I just want to hug him.". Trump was elected on a promise to deport millions of immigrants who are in the United States illegally, and has deported more than 239,000 people so far, according to Department of Homeland Security data. His administration has set arrest quotas for immigration enforcement officials of 3,000 a day - 10 times higher than average daily arrests the last year of President Joe Biden’s administration. It has also been releasing far fewer people from immigration detention on humanitarian grounds. Just 67 people were paroled in June by Immigration and Customs Enforcement, down from 5,159 in December, Biden’s last full month in office, government data show. When Mejia was booked into the county jail on February 25, her fingerprints were automatically shared with ICE. They showed a match for a person who had entered the United States seven years earlier and was in the country illegally. ICE issued a detainer request and on February 28, after Mejia had completed her unlicensed-driving sentence, immigration officers picked her up from jail and drove her 140 miles to a detention center in Tiffin, Ohio, according to jail records. "She has been arrested multiple times for driving illegally and admitted to law enforcement that she was in the country illegally," DHS spokeswoman Tricia McLaughlin told Reuters in a statement, in response to questions about Mejia and her child. McLaughlin said deportees are generally given the choice of taking U.S. citizen children with them or leaving them with friends or family in the United States.

FOX News [7/22/2025 8:12 AM, Michael Dorgan, Alexandra Koch, Bill Melugin, and Garrett Tenney, 46878K] Video HERE reports an Illinois coroner has refuted claims that a woman found dead in a storage container at the home of an illegal immigrant was decapitated. The Lake County Coroner’s Office released a statement Monday following its autopsy on Megan Bos, 37, saying a key finding contradicted media reports as well as a statement by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) that claimed she had been beheaded. Bos’ body was found by police in April in a container in a yard belonging to Jose Luis Mendoza-Gonzalez, 52, a Mexican illegal immigrant who was arrested and charged in the case but released after his first court appearance, sparking outrage. Bos’ mother has slammed Illinois Gov. Immigration authorities in Chicago arrested him last week. "This misinformation has caused unnecessary distress to the family and misrepresents the facts of this investigation." A DHS spokesperson told Fox News Digital that Bos’ body was found badly dismembered and in a bleach storage container, in response to the coroner’s statement. Mendoza-Gonzalez was arrested in April and charged with concealing a corpse, abusing a corpse and obstruction of justice but was ordered released by Lake County Judge Randie Bruno after his first court appearance. He was arrested again Saturday afternoon at a market in Chicago by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents and remains in ICE custody, according to DHS. "It is absolutely repulsive [that] this monster walked free on Illinois’ streets after allegedly committing such a heinous crime," a DHS spokesperson told Fox News previously. "Megan Bos and her family will have justice." [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

NBC News [7/22/2025 7:36 AM, Laura Strickler and Patrick Smith, 44540K] reports an investigation is underway after a Vietnamese national died in the hospital on Saturday while in Immigration and Customs Enforcement custody, according to an email seen by NBC News. Tien Xuan Phan, 55, had been in custody at the ICE Processing Center in Karnes County, Texas, for seven weeks. A representative for the family did not respond to a request for comment. According to the ICE email, Phan was taken to the local hospital, Otto Kaiser Memorial Hospital, on Friday for "evaluation due to seizures, vomiting, and unresponsiveness and was later airlifted to the Methodist Hospital Northeast for further evaluation." The cause of death was not stated and is now the subject of the investigation. ICE routinely conducts investigations into any detainee deaths and publishes them online after 90 days. Phan was ordered to be removed from the country by an immigration judge on April 2, 2012, but an ICE official says they "failed to leave the U.S. as ordered." Phan was then arrested in early June this year. NBC News contacted ICE and the Department of Homeland Security for further comment on whether Phan had a criminal record. So far this year, eight detainees have died while in ICE custody, according to the agency’s own figures, including one other from Vietnam. The rest were from Mexico, Haiti, Colombia, Ukraine, Ethiopia, Honduras and Guyana. In total, 12 detainees died in ICE custody in 2024, the figures show.

FOX News [7/22/2025 1:12 PM, Michael Dorgan and Brooke Taylor, 46878K] reports that chilling surveillance shows the moment an illegal migrant from Honduras carries a screaming Chinese migrant woman back to a Houston trailer home where she was allegedly being held captive for days as a sex slave. The terrifying footage shows illegal migrant Jose Armando Carcamo-Perdomo carrying the hysterical victim off her feet in a bear-hug style grip as she tries to kick and wrangle her way free. Authorities said she was held at the trailer home without food and water inside a closet. In the video, the women can be heard screaming frantically while a dog at a fence barks loudly at them. Police were alerted to the trailer home after a neighbor saw the woman running down the street before a man grabbed her and carried her back screaming. The Harris County Sheriff’s Office said that the woman was transported from New York to Texas on the promise of new masseuse job that paid more cash. But that hope descended into horror when she was instead held tied up for more than five days, had her Chinese passport taken and sexually assaulted several times. Carcamo-Perdomo was arrested on July 14 and has been charged with kidnapping and assault. He entered the country illegally in 2020 from Honduras was given a notice to appear after a traffic stop, according to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). But in 2023, an immigration judge decided to dismiss the case. "This heinous criminal illegal alien was freely roaming our interior and terrorizing American communities," DHS said in an X response to the incident. "Under the leadership of President Trump and Secretary Noem, ICE is working day and night to remove the MILLIONS of illegal aliens in our interior. LAW AND ORDER WILL PREVAIL!"

Reported similarly:
Blaze [7/22/2025 5:30 AM, Carlos Garcia, 1805K]

CBS News [7/22/2025 9:34 PM, Ken Molestina and S.E. Jenkins, 51860K] reports the mayor of Keller, who recently announced he will seek a state senate seat, said he’s ready to start helping ICE officials in arresting and deporting immigrants in the country illegally. It’s a controversial move that Armin Mizani is defending. In a recent announcement, Mizani made clear his intention to sign the city up for a program known as 287-g, a federal partnership with ICE. "That would make the city of Keller the first city in the county, the fourth city in the entire state, and the largest city in the entire state to do so," said Mizani. Under the 287-g agreement, Keller would participate in what is known as the jail model, where jailers at the Keller jail, which is also used by neighboring cities, would flag, detain, and hand over arrestees to ICE who are in the country illegally. Historically, the Keller community has not been one that has had a problem with illegal immigration. So, is there a problem with illegal immigration now? "I will just say this very simply," said Mizani. "In Keller, we have had nearly 2,000 people arrested and detained in our Keller jail each and every year... every year we have had roughly about 31 people. If you look at the last two years, the total has been 31 people who have actually been in the country illegally and were detained at the Keller jail. To me, that’s a staggering number.". Mizani said the move is about strengthening public safety. "Keep in mind, in Keller, we have been doing this now for two years," Mizani said. "We never formally opted into the program. So to me, public safety is something that is not negotiable, and at the end of the day, we are going to do what we can to strengthen that.".

NewsMax [7/22/2025 12:43 PM, Sandy Fitzgerald, 4622K] reports that the federal government has awarded a $1.26 billion contract to build and operate an immigrant detention center tent facility at the Fort Bliss U.S. Army base in Texas. According to a U.S. Department of Defense contract notice, the work will turn the base, located in El Paso, into a deportation hub that will include 5,000 beds, reports Bloomberg News on Tuesday. The base features more than 1 million acres of land and has an airport, and once completed, the detention center would be the largest in the United States. The contract for Fort Bliss has been awarded to Acquisition Logistics Company, based in Virginia. The project is being funded through a program directing federal dollars to small businesses, sources familiar with the plan told Bloomberg, while asking for anonymity to discuss a situation that had not yet been shared in public. According to the Defense Department’s notice, the Army will spend $232 million toward the project. The Wall Street Journal last week reported that the contract had been awarded, but did not include the cost of the contract or that Acquisition Logistics had won the project. Acquisitions Logistics CEO and President Ken Wagner declined to comment. The Fort Bliss project is reportedly the company’s largest ever. Wagner, a retired U.S. Navy flight officer, founded the firm in 2008. According to his LinkedIn profile, the company specializes in supply chain management and technical services, mainly for the military. Government records show that Acquisition Logistics has received roughly $29 million in defense contracts during the last five fiscal years, mainly for logistics support work.

AP [7/22/2025 8:34 PM, Colleen Slevin, 56000K] reports Colorado’s Democratic attorney general on Tuesday sued a sheriff’s deputy for allegedly helping federal immigration agents find and arrest a college student who had an expired visa. Attorney General Phil Weiser also disclosed that his office is investigating whether other law enforcement officers on a regional drug task force the deputy worked on have been sharing information to help federal agents make immigration arrests in violation of state law limiting cooperation in immigration enforcement. The federal government has sued Colorado over such laws. On June 5, Mesa County Deputy Alexander Zwinck allegedly shared the driver’s license, vehicle registration and insurance information of the 19-year-old nursing student in a Signal chat used by task force members, according to the lawsuit. The task force includes officers who work for federal Homeland Security Investigations, which can enforce immigration laws, the lawsuit said. After federal immigration officers told him in the chat that the student did not have a criminal history but had an expired visa, Zwinck allegedly provided them with their location and told her to wait with him in his patrol car for about five minutes, asking about her accent and where she was born. He let her go with a warning and gave federal agents a description of her vehicle and told her which direction she was headed so they could arrest her, the lawsuit said. When Zwinck was told of the arrest, the lawsuit said he congratulated the federal agents, saying “rgr, nice work.” The following day, one federal immigration agent praised Zwinck’s work in the chat, saying he should be named “interdictor of the year” for the removal division of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

Zwinck is also accused of violating the law again on June 10 by providing immigration officers with the photo of the license of another driver who had overstayed his visa, information about the person’s vehicle and directions to help them arrest the driver. After being told that immigration officers “would want him”, Zwinck replied that “We better get some bitchin (sic) Christmas baskets from you guys”, the lawsuit said.

Axios [7/22/2025 4:51 PM, Esteban L. Hernandez, 13599K] reports Colorado officials are intensifying their pushback against ICE, passing new measures to curb the agency’s power under President Trump. Attorney General Phil Weiser, a Democrat, on Tuesday said he’s suing a Mesa County sheriff’s deputy, alleging that he was working with federal immigration authorities. The suit alleges deputy Alexander Zwinck unlawfully detained a 19-year-old woman during a June 5 traffic stop and sent her license to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, leading to her detention. It’s the latest local rebuke of one of Trump’s signature policies, as Weiser’s lawsuit underscores how local officials are not just rejecting Trump-era immigration tactics in rhetoric but working to dismantle them. The case could put Colorado at the center of a broader national standoff over immigration authority, heightening the risk of political blowback from an administration prone to retaliation. Colorado Democrats — and at least one Republican — are ramping up pressure on ICE amid rising scrutiny over a surge in noncriminal arrests.

Breitbart [7/22/2025 4:20 PM, John Binder, 3077K] reports the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents have arrested an illegal alien with a lengthy rap sheet, totaling 21 prior criminal convictions. On Tuesday, Department of Homeland Security (DHS) officials announced the arrest of several illegal aliens, including 52-year-old Federico Fong-Nunez of Mexico. Fong-Nunez has been convicted of 21 different crimes in Boulder, Colorado, including burglary, aggravated assault, and felony menacing. "President Trump and Secretary Noem have unleashed ICE to target the worst of the worst. Our brave law enforcement is facing an 830% increase in assaults against them and yet they continue to arrest violent criminals and drug traffickers every single day," the Department of Homeland Security’s Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement.

Los Angeles Times [7/22/2025 6:00 AM, Nathan Solis, 14672K] reports Narciso Barranco, an undocumented landscaper in Orange County, instilled a sense of pride for his adopted country in his three American-born sons. All three boys joined the Marines, which they saw as a sound start for a better life in the United States. Then, in June, Barranco was grabbed by masked federal immigration agents while working on the job. His arrest went viral on social media, with some outraged at images of the agents beating Barranco. For the last month, his family waded through the federal immigration system under the Trump administration. Narciso, 48, was born in Morelos, Mexico, and arrived in the United States more than 30 years ago, where he married a U.S. citizen and three sons. Within hours of his arrest, his eldest son was talking to reporters and pushing for his release. The sons’ service in the U.S. military kept a media focus on his case, and thanks to a variety of interviews his eldest son provided, the case remained in the news cycle. Narciso Barranco was finally released on bond after spending 24 days in custody, but he still faced an uncertain future.

ABC News [7/22/2025 7:22 PM, Staff, 31733K] Video: HERE reports Narciso Barranco was detained by federal immigration agents while at his landscaping job in California last month. Barranco has since been released but is “still scared,” his son said.

ABC News [7/22/2025 5:35 PM, Ely Brown and Meredith Deliso, 31733K] reports a Marine veteran whose father was detained by federal immigration agents while at his landscaping job in California last month told Congress members on Tuesday that his father is "traumatized" by what happened and charged that the immigration system is "broken." Customs and Border Patrol agents arrested Narciso Barranco, who is undocumented, in Santa Ana on June 21, according to the Department of Homeland Security. Video of him being forcibly detained showed masked agents holding him down on the street and repeatedly punching him after he ran from agents. Narciso Barranco has since been released from custody bond but is "still scared," his son said. The Department of Homeland Security said following the arrest that Narciso Barranco tried to evade law enforcement, "swung a weed whacker directly at an agent’s face" and resisted commands. "The agents took appropriate action and followed their training to use the minimum amount of force necessary to resolve the situation in a manner that prioritizes the safety of the public and our officers," DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement at the time. Narciso Barranco was released from federal custody on July 15 and has an immigration status hearing in August, according to Orange City Council officials.

Los Angeles Times [7/22/2025 3:42 PM, Zurie Pope, 14672K] reports the neighborhoods targeted by federal agents for immigration raids were overwhelmingly Latino, according to data from a prominent immigrant rights group. A heat map produced by the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights documents 471 immigration enforcement actions reported to its Los Angeles Rapid Response Network between June 6 and July 20 in L.A. County. Cabrera suspects CHIRLA caught one-third of the enforcement activity that took place across the county. During the same period of time, CHIRLA claims to have received 1,677 calls of enforcement activities across the region that it could not confirm, with 1,500 of these reports mentioning armed agents being present, and 389 reports mentioning witnessing random arrests of community members. Of the five zip codes with the highest immigration enforcement numbers, a combined 76% of the population was Latino, CHIRLA’s analysis shows. DHS spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin pushed back on the profiling claims. "Any claims that individuals have been ‘targeted’ by law enforcement because of their skin color are disgusting and categorically FALSE," she wrote in a statement to the Times. "What makes someone a target of ICE is if they are illegally in the U.S.—NOT their skin color, race, or ethnicity." The CHIRLA analysis is not a full accounting of the raids conducted in Los Angeles. DHS has not released the number of enforcement actions or the locations. It has reported that from the time the operations began in June to early July, ICE and Border Patrol arrested 2,792 illegal aliens in the L.A. area.

Los Angeles Times [7/22/2025 6:00 AM, Brittny Mejia, 14672K] reports he was on his way to wash a car when he glanced up and saw co-workers sprinting off. A woman frantically motioned for him to flee. His heart raced as he tried to find the source of their alarm. Confused and frightened, Javier Diaz Santana jumped over the wall behind the car wash in the San Gabriel Valley.. He made it about a block. He saw two white SUVs on the street and realized what was unfolding. His workplace was being raided by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents, like so many other businesses and neighborhoods in Los Angeles over the past week. Breathless, Diaz stopped. One of the vehicles pulled over, blocking his way. Masked, armed men exited, yelling. He tried to understand. He couldn’t see a badge. One had a vest with the letters "HSI" — Homeland Security Investigations, an arm within ICE. One seemed to be demanding something. Diaz gestured at his ears. Diaz, 32, is deaf and mute. He thought that presenting his Real ID driver’s license would keep him safe. He has legal permission to be here. He came to the U.S. from Mexico when he was about 5 years old and had been granted permission to work more than a decade ago under the Obama-era Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program. He has no criminal history. He took his wallet from his pocket. An agent grabbed it and wouldn’t give it back. Diaz took out his phone so he could type a message about his disability. They took that too. Then they cuffed his hands and shoved him into the SUV. He had no way to communicate. And so began a surreal near month Diaz never could have imagined taking place in the United States. He was sent to an immigration detention center in El Paso, where he spent weeks unable to communicate with his attorney or his family. At times, Diaz received paperwork in Spanish — a language he cannot read. His experience raises serious questions, beyond whether people who are in this country with legal protection should be seized and detained by immigration agents. If ICE is going to apprehend people with disabilities, shouldn’t agents follow federal law and make the required accommodations available? In a statement, an unidentified senior Department of Homeland Security official said medical staff provided Diaz "with a communications board and an American Sign Language interpreter."

San Francisco Chronicle [7/22/2025 7:00 AM, Raheem Hosseini, 4120K] reports the Trump administration’s unrestrained assault on immigrants has battered California’s economy and driven down attendance at its schools, a pair of recent reports contend. Taken together, the studies by researchers at UC Merced and Stanford University assert that President Donald Trump’s mass deportation agenda is having cascading effects that extend beyond California’s under-siege immigrant communities. Examining monthly population totals from the U.S. Census Bureau, UC Merced found that nearly 465,000 California workers withdrew from the labor force the week of June 8, when federal immigration authorities descended on Los Angeles-area neighborhoods and work sites to arrest nearly 2,800 people. The drop in workers drove down private-sector employment by 3.1% from May. In the past four decades, only the COVID-19 pandemic and the Great Recession saw greater monthly declines in private-sector workers, said associate sociology professor Edward Orozco Flores, the report’s lead author and faculty director at UC Merced’s Community and Labor Center, a public research institution based in the San Joaquin Valley. The data can’t explicitly say which workers stayed home or were laid off and furloughed, and doesn’t indicate which industries experienced the greatest declines. But the effects were not limited to Southern California, Flores said.

Los Angeles Times [7/22/2025 7:00 AM, Kevin Baxter, 14672K] reports there are more important things than the results of a soccer game. Even when that soccer game is between bitter rivals whose supporters would rather bust one another’s heads than shake hands. The El Tráfico match between LAFC and the Galaxy is one of those proper rivalries. In just eight seasons, it has blossomed into the most intense, meaningful and emotional rivalry in MLS. And at times, especially in the derby’s early years, that emotion went largely unchecked, with some fans seeing their nights end in handcuffs or a hospital emergency room. Last Saturday was different. Well, at least it started differently before ending with the same wild raucousness that has come to define El Tráfico.

The AP [7/22/2025 3:47 PM, Sudhin Thanawala, 56000K] reports thousands of Afghans in the U.S. are no longer protected from deportation after a federal appeals court refused to postpone the Trump administration’s decision to end their legal status. A three-judge panel of the Fourth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Virginia said in a ruling late Monday there was "insufficient evidence to warrant the extraordinary remedy of a postponement" of the administration’s decision not to extend Temporary Protected Status for people from Afghanistan and Cameroon. TPS for Afghans ended July 14, but was briefly extended by the appeals court through July 21 while it considered an emergency request for a longer postponement. The Department of Homeland Security in May said it was ending Temporary Protected Status for 11,700 people from Afghanistan in 60 days. That status — in place since 2022 — had allowed them to work and meant the government couldn’t deport them. CASA, a nonprofit immigrant advocacy group, sued the administration over the TPS revocation for Afghans as well as for people from Cameroon — those expire August 4, saying the decisions were racially motivated. A federal judge allowed the lawsuit to go forward but didn’t grant CASA’s request to keep the protections in place while the lawsuit plays out. A phone message for CASA on Tuesday was not immediately returned. Without an extension, TPS holders face a "devastating choice -abandoning their homes, relinquishing their employment, and uprooting their lives to return to a country where they face the threat of severe physical harm or even death, or remaining in the United States in a state of legal uncertainty while they wait for other immigration processes to play out," CASA warned in court documents. The status, however, is inherently precarious because it is up to the Homeland Security secretary to renew the protections regularly — usually every 18 months. The Trump administration has pushed to remove Temporary Protected Status from people from seven countries, with Venezuela and Haiti making up the biggest chunk of the hundreds of thousands of people affected. At the time that Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem ended the temporary protected status for Afghans, the department wrote in the decision that the situation in their home country was getting better. The Daily Caller [7/22/2025 11:15 AM, Jason Hopkins, 1010K] reports that the Monday court ruling marks the latest victory in the Trump administration’s ongoing effort to keep TPS designations temporary. "This is another win for the American people and the safety of our communities," DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin stated Tuesday to the Daily Caller News Foundation. "TPS was never intended to be a de facto asylum program, yet it has been abused as one for decades.". "DHS records indicate that there are Afghan nationals who are TPS recipients who have been the subject of administrative investigations for fraud, public safety, and national security," McLaughlin continued. "This decision restores integrity in our immigration system and ensures that Temporary Protective Status is actually temporary."

Reported similarly:
The Hill [7/22/2025 9:08 AM, Rebecca Beitsch, 18649K]
(B) FOX 4 Morning News at 9A [7/22/2025 9:37 AM, Staff]

Daily Wire [7/22/2025 11:03 AM, Spencer Lindquist, 3816K] reports groups tied to the left-wing billionaire George Soros are rallying in support of a Republican congresswoman’s plan to give millions of illegal aliens legal status in the United States. Rep. Maria Salazar’s (R-FL) Dignity Act would allow illegal aliens to apply for a renewable, seven-year legal status, so long as they don’t have a criminal record beyond illegal entry. Illegal aliens who’ve been shielded from deportation under the Obama-era Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program would be allowed to gain permanent legal status. Conservatives have slammed the legislation as a handout to illegal aliens. But liberal groups, some with a history of supporting the legalization of all illegal aliens, are lining up behind the joint effort from Salazar and Rep. Veronica Escobar (D-TX). That includes several organizations with ties to George Soros, the leftist billionaire and Democrat donor who has bankrolled efforts across the country to encourage mass immigration and offer mass amnesty to illegal aliens before leveraging new immigrants as a Democratic voting bloc. One Soros-backed group tracked the demographics of key swing states and worked to naturalize immigrants to "sway the outcome of national, state, and local elections.". Another Soros-backed group, called United We Dream, raked in $700,000 from the far-left billionaire as it called for an amnesty for all illegal aliens, the closing of ICE detention facilities, and the defunding of ICE and Border Patrol. Now, Soros-aligned organizations are lining up behind the Dignity Act. One radical organization that advocates for an amnesty for all illegal aliens, FWD.us, came out in support of Salazar’s bill in a statement that also bashed President Donald Trump’s immigration policies and "attacks on immigrant communities.". "The bipartisan Dignity Act is a much-needed step forward. We thank Congresswomen Salazar and Escobar, along with the bill’s other co-sponsors, for reintroducing this important bipartisan legislation," the far-left group wrote.

Federalist [7/22/2025 11:23 AM, Brianna Lyman, 1142K] reports Rep. Maria Elvira Salazar, R-Fla., admitted in a recent interview that her DIGNITY Act could serve as a launchpad for eventually granting citizenship to hundreds of thousands of foreign nationals currently in the United States. The DIGNITY Act, according to a press release from Salazar’s office, "allows certain long-term undocumented immigrants to earn legal status, without amnesty or a path to citizenship" so that illegal aliens who broke the law can have an "opportunity." The bill would create a "7-year earned legal status program allowing" illegal aliens "to live and work legally, with renewable status based on good conduct and restitution." In a recent interview with ABC 10, Salazar said certain individuals living in the country under Temporary Protected Status (TPS), such as 500,000 Cubans, would also be "part of the DIGNITY program.". "We give them dignity, at some point in the future another legislator will write another law to give them a path to citizenship," Salazar continued. "Right now, what we need to do, is to buy peace for these people, allow them to stay, continue working, because they are needed.".

The Hill [7/22/2025 5:35 PM, Ashleigh Fields, 18649K] reports a group of 21 attorneys general filed a Monday lawsuit against the Trump administration over a February executive order that ousts migrants without legal status from social service programs. Under the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act (PRWORA), the U.S. departments of Health and Human Services, Education, Labor and Justice have reworked requirements to gain access to federal services effective July 10. Many programs, including Head Start, an early-education opportunity for low-income parents, will ensure participants are subject to immigration verification. New York Attorney General Letitia James (D) is leading the effort to combat new policies alongside colleagues from Wisconsin, Maine, Nevada, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota and New Mexico, in addition to other states. "These rules took effect immediately or with little notice, bypassing public input and ignoring real-world consequences. The policies apply not just to undocumented immigrants, but also to some people with legal status, including student visa holders, temporary workers, and exchange visitors," James’s office said in a Monday press release. "In addition, the attorneys general warn that even U.S. citizens and lawful residents could be denied services, as many low-income individuals lack government-issued identification," they added.

New York Times [7/22/2025 6:13 PM, Nia Decaille, 138952K] reports millions of foreign visitors to the United States, including travelers from Mexico, India, Brazil and China, will be subject to a new $250 visa fee as part of a spate of changes introduced by the Trump administration’s recently enacted domestic policy bill. The fee, which may be refundable, will apply to nonimmigrant visa categories, including foreign tourists, business travelers and students. It will not apply to most visitors from Canada or to visitors covered by the United States’ visa-waiver program, which includes much of Europe and a handful of countries in the Middle East, Asia and elsewhere. The tourism industry is bracing for the impact of the new fee. Even tourism leaders who supported the bill’s aims to shore up U.S. immigration rules balked at the fees as an unnecessary impediment to international travel. Concerns have also proliferated among international soccer fans in the run-up to the 2026 World Cup, which will be hosted by the United States, Canada and Mexico. The charge, called a “visa integrity fee,” will apply to any foreign national who requires a nonimmigrant visa to enter the United States. That includes business visitors, vacationers, temporary workers, students and medical tourists, among other categories. The $250 fee will be levied in addition to the $185 cost of the nonimmigrant visa itself. Visitors from countries that participate in the visa-waiver program, which includes most of Europe, as well as Australia, Chile, Israel, Japan, Qatar, South Korea and the United Kingdom, among other countries, will not be subject to the fee. Most Canadian visitors will also be unaffected. While the fee is required when applying for a nonimmigrant visa, travelers may be reimbursed after their trip as long as they comply with their visa’s restrictions. The bill does not stipulate how reimbursements will be processed.

NBC News [7/23/2025 5:00 AM, Lawrence Hurley, 44540K] reports immediately after Zohran Mamdani became the presumptive Democratic nominee for mayor of New York City last month, one Republican congressman had a provocative suggestion for the Trump administration: “He needs to be DEPORTED.” The Uganda-born Mamdani obtained U.S. citizenship in 2018 after moving to the United States with his parents as a child. But Rep. Andy Ogles, R-Tenn., argued in his post on X that the Justice Department should consider revoking it over rap lyrics that, he said, suggested support for Hamas. The Justice Department declined to comment on whether it has replied to Ogles’ letter, but White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said of his claims about Mamdani, “Surely if they are true, it’s something that should be investigated.” Trump himself has claimed without evidence that Mamdani is an illegal immigrant, and when erstwhile ally Elon Musk was asked about deporting another naturalized citizen, he suggested he would consider it. The congressman’s proposal dovetails with a priority of the Trump administration to ramp up efforts to strip citizenship from other naturalized Americans. The process, known as denaturalization, has been used by previous administrations to remove terrorists and, decades ago, Nazis and communists. But the Trump DOJ’s announcement last month that it would “prioritize and maximally pursue denaturalization proceedings” has sparked alarm among immigration lawyers and advocates, who fear the Trump administration could use denaturalization to target political opponents. Although past administrations have periodically pursued denaturalization cases, it is an area ripe for abuse, according to Elizabeth Taufa, a lawyer at the Immigrant Legal Resource Center.

Houston Chronicle [7/22/2025 7:00 AM, Julián Aguilar, 1982K] reports as the Trump administration intensifies its efforts to deport a record number of immigrants, Houston immigration lawyers are seeing an increase in the government’s efforts to resurrect cases that have been placed on hold, sometimes for several years. The legal maneuver to add an old case to a current docket isn’t new. But attorneys now think it’ll become commonplace as the Trump administration moves forward with its plans for mass deportations. Paul Pirela, a Houston immigration lawyer, said the government used to resurrect old immigration cases once or twice a year. He had one, in 2023, maybe two. Now, "it’s probably, I think, four or five in the last two weeks," he said. Readding the case to a judge’s calendar increases the risk of a judge issuing a deportation order, Pirela said. Such cases have been administratively closed by immigration judges. That doesn’t mean they’ve been fully adjudicated or dismissed. The cases are instead placed on hold, sometimes indefinitely, so judges can manage their workloads as they try to get through an ever-increasing backlog of cases. Low-priority cases are often backlogged using administrative closure. Placing cases on hold is also used to give immigrants time to adjust their legal status in other ways, like seeking a visa through family sponsorship or applying for a specialty visa like those sometimes given to victims of crimes who cooperate with law enforcement. The revived cases resurface after an attorney with Immigration and Customs Enforcement files what a "motion to recalendar" a case that has been administratively closed by an immigration judge. Adriel O. Orozco, a senior policy counsel at the Washington-based American Immigration Council, said that according to Department of Homeland Security data, nearly 80% of undocumented immigrants have been in the country for more than 10 years. Orozco added that once a case is recalendared, immigration judges can issue a deportation order if they think it’s taking too long for the immigrant to learn whether they’ve been granted another form of status through an application with United States Citizenship and Immigration Services. In February, the administration ended TPS for Venezuelans who received the benefit in 2023. The U.S. Supreme Court later upheld the cancellation while a lawsuit that seeks to keep the protection in place is argued on appeal. And last week, the administration said it was ending TPS for Hondurans and Nicaraguans after Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem determined that those countries were no longer too dangerous to return to.

Federalist [7/22/2025 2:45 PM, Shawn Fleetwood, 1142K] reports that Russia collusion hoaxer Marc Elias was dealt a major defeat on Tuesday when a federal judge tossed his group’s lawsuit challenging Wyoming’s proof of citizenship voting law. In his 17-page decision, U.S. District Judge Scott Skavdahl, an Obama appointee, ruled that the Equality State Policy Center lacked Article III standing to challenge HB 156. Enacted earlier this year, the statute mandates that prospective Wyoming voters provide documentary proof of citizenship and residency when registering to vote in the state. "Under Article III of the Constitution the exercise of judicial power is confined to Cases and Controversies, which requires Plaintiff to establish a personal stake in the outcome — standing," Skavdahl wrote. "Even accepting Plaintiff’s standing-related allegations as true and construing the record in its favor, Plaintiff has not adequately demonstrated its standing to sue on its own behalf or on behalf of others in this action. Absent Plaintiff’s showing of standing, the Court lacks subject matter jurisdiction over this lawsuit, and consequently it must be dismissed without prejudice." "The Court has not considered nor makes any comment on the merits of Plaintiff’s claims," he added.

Telemundo [7/22/2025 10:29 PM, Shelby Bremer, 37K] reports a DACA recipient is at risk of deportation after he missed the exit at the San Ysidro Freeway and accidentally crossed the border into Mexico, his lawyer said, just weeks before his U.S. citizen wife is due to give birth. The lawyer alleges that Customs and Border Protection officials asked her for a bribe to return to the United States. He said he filed a complaint with the FBI in hopes that he can be protected from deportation should he be asked to cooperate in a possible investigation. CBP has not responded to multiple requests for comment on this case or the corruption allegation. Erick Hernandez was brought to the U.S. from El Salvador 20 years ago when he was 14, his family said. His parents now have legal status in the U.S. and his wife Nancy Rivera said they began the process for him to obtain legal status after they married last fall. His family and lawyer say he has no criminal record. Rivera said they met during the pandemic, when she had two young daughters and was in school but didn’t know how to drive. A friend introduced her to Hernandez and said he could drive her to her classes. "He’s always been there for us," Rivera says. "He’s always been like a family man, so that’s what I like about him." "With him, everything changed," she added. The two had a daughter and are expecting a son in August. Hernandez’s parents say he works with his father in the air conditioning industry and as a carpool driver to earn some extra money. The entire family lives in East Los Angeles. On June 1, Hernandez was driving two people from Los Angeles to the border at San Ysidro, his family and lawyer explained. He wrote a statement saying he had missed the freeway exit and ended up crossing the border by accident. "And when that happened, he basically lost everything," said his attorney Valerie Sigamani, noting that anyone with DACA - Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals - needs prior approval to leave the United States. "He no longer has DACA. His attempt to come back to the United States and say, ‘This was a mistake. This was an accident. He wasn’t trying to leave the U.S.,’ was ignored," Sigamani said. Sigamani alleges that U.S. officials at the border asked him for a payment to return. "One of the officials told him, ‘Well, if you pay us $800, we’ll forgive everything and let you into the U.S. without any problems,’" Sigamani said. He said Hernandez thought it was a legal process, but he did not have the money with him.

NewsMax [7/22/2025 1:01 PM, Sudhin Thanawala, 4622K] reports that thousands of Afghans in the U.S. are no longer protected from deportation after a federal appeals court refused to postpone the Trump administration’s decision to end their legal status. A three-judge panel of the Fourth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Virginia said in a ruling late Monday there was "insufficient evidence to warrant the extraordinary remedy of a postponement" of the administration’s decision not to extend Temporary Protected Status for people from Afghanistan and Cameroon. TPS for Afghans ended July 14, but was briefly extended by the appeals court through July 21 while it considered an emergency request for a longer postponement. The Department of Homeland Security in May said it was ending Temporary Protected Status for 11,700 people from Afghanistan in 60 days. That status — in place since 2022 — had allowed them to work and meant the government couldn’t deport them. CASA, a nonprofit immigrant advocacy group, sued the administration over the TPS revocation for Afghans as well as for people from Cameroon — those expire August 4, saying the decisions were racially motivated. A federal judge allowed the lawsuit to go forward but didn’t grant CASA’s request to keep the protections in place while the lawsuit plays out.

Washington Post [7/22/2025 4:27 PM, Joshua Yang and Hannah Natanson, 32099K] reports the Trump administration is rolling back programs that were created to assist more than 250,000 Afghans with planned resettlement in the United States, according to interviews with current and former State Department officials and documents obtained by The Washington Post. The Afghans include: A woman whose husband the Taliban regime killed after he fought alongside the U.S. military. A man who worked with NATO in Afghanistan, then spent nearly a year living like a “prisoner” in Qatar. A woman in Pakistan whose young son was killed while she waited for the U.S. to process her asylum claim. They are among hundreds of thousands of Afghans waiting in limbo — in Afghanistan and 90 other countries — who were promised the possibility of a new life in the United States after they worked with U.S. forces, including as drivers or interpreters, often risking their lives, Americans who served alongside them say. Many now fear they will be sent back to Afghanistan, where they could face retribution from the ruling Taliban. Such repatriation efforts are already in motion in the United Arab Emirates, according to cables obtained by The Post, one of which was first reported by Reuters. Since President Donald Trump’s return to office, refugee processing and government funding for Afghans’ flights to the U.S. have been halted under two executive orders. And this month’s round of State Department layoffs dismantled the office dedicated to helping Afghans relocate, officials said. Going back to Afghanistan would be "my own death sentence," said one Afghan in the UAE. Like other Afghans interviewed, he spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of Taliban retaliation. "I am not insisting that I must be taken to the United States. My only wish is, please do not hand me over to my executioners.". "Wherever they end up, they end up" is the administration’s view, said one official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe internal deliberations. "They are now another country’s problem.". Asked for comment, the White House denied that the Trump administration does not care about the fate of Afghans who assisted U.S. troops. Over the weekend, Trump posted on Truth Social that he would "try to save" Afghans in the UAE facing repatriation. A senior administration official, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal policy decisions, said the changes to Afghan refugee processing are meant to ensure that the U.S. welcomes only those the government sees as deserving. The official noted that processing of the Afghan Special Immigrant Visa — or SIV — continues at a rate of 900 decisions a week.

NewsMax [7/22/2025 11:41 AM, Charlie McCarthy, 4622K] reports U.S. Border Patrol agents reportedly are venturing into the country to help apprehend illegal migrants with criminal histories. Tasked with patrolling the U.S.-Mexico and U.S.-Canada borders, and coastal waters surrounding the Florida Peninsula and the island of Puerto Rico, Border Patrol deploys most of its agents to work the roughly 2,000-mile stretch of southwest border spanning Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, and California. There, the agents focus on intercepting drugs and weapons, preventing human trafficking, and stopping people from trying to enter the country illegally. With illegal border crossings having plummeted to historic lows under the Trump administration, Border Patrol agents are assisting with arrests of aliens hundreds of miles from the southern border, The Washington Post reported Tuesday. Former Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, who served during the Obama administration, said the buildup of military personnel in border states has allowed Border Patrol to help Immigrations and Customs Enforcement officers in arresting illegal migrants. "As long as they’re [military personnel] there, and as long as numbers stay down, then I think they move Border Patrol agents to do more interior work," Napolitano told the Post. "When I was secretary, our focus was where the numbers were — and the numbers were on the southern border.". That’s not the case now. U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) last week announced that enforcement activities in June involved "zero illegal alien releases along [the] southwest border for the second consecutive month.". A 1946 statute establishing that the agency’s jurisdiction stretches within a "reasonable distance" of the border allows the use of the Border Patrol in major cities such as Los Angeles. The DOJ later set that boundary at 100 miles from any border, including coastlines. The Post reported Border Patrol asserts it has broad authority to search vehicles, including without probable cause or a warrant.

FOX News [7/22/2025 1:00 PM, Kurt Knutsson, 46878K] reports that Border Patrol is about to get a powerful new ally, and it doesn’t bark. A microwave-sized device called VaporID could soon replace drug-sniffing dogs at U.S. border crossings. Built to detect fentanyl, cocaine, methamphetamine, MDMA, ketamine, and even explosives, the tech is showing accuracy and speed that trained dogs simply can’t match. This portable air scanner, created at the Department of Energy’s Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL), is being brought to market by California-based instrument maker BaySpec. The device works by pulling in air and identifying molecules in real time using a miniature mass spectrometer. Unlike traditional swab tests that take five to thirty minutes, VaporID detects fentanyl in seconds, even at levels as low as six parts per trillion. That’s like spotting a single pine needle in an entire forest. For decades, trained canines have been the gold standard at ports of entry. But dogs have limits; they tire, need handlers, and can’t be reprogrammed with software updates. VaporID, on the other hand, never needs a nap. It can detect not only known drugs but also fentanyl analogs, lab-made variants designed to skirt detection. The system’s cutting-edge design includes an atmospheric flow tube that allows tiny drug molecules more time to interact with charged ions. That chemical dance dramatically boosts sensitivity, making it possible to detect even the most elusive threats. During a real-world field trial at the Nogales, Arizona border crossing, the device detected trace amounts of several drugs, including fentanyl and cocaine, within seconds inside a Customs and Border Protection lab.

NewsNation [7/22/2025 11:20 AM, Jorge Ventura, 5801K] reports a series of drug seizures from international air cargo is catching the attention of federal agents. U.S. Customs and Border Protection has seen a pattern of ketamine shipments being sent directly from Europe and Florida, bypassing traditional smuggling corridors. In the last six weeks, CBP officers in Philadelphia intercepted seven express mail shipments from Europe and seized a total of 130 pounds of ketamine hydrochloride. The drugs were concealed in fake packages labeled as everyday objects — including fishing rods, air filters and Mercedes-Benz headlights. Every package had the same destination: South Florida, specifically Broward County, home to Miami’s bustling club scene. Unlike fentanyl or meth— which often enter the U.S. across land borders — the use of international express mail and fake product labels makes this type of smuggling harder to catch. According to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, ketamine is a powerful anesthetic commonly used in veterinary medicine and sometimes in hospitals for pain relief. But on the streets, it goes by names like Special K, Donkey Dust, and Cat Killer. It’s often smoked, snorted or slipped into drinks — and authorities say it is sometimes combined with ecstasy or club drugs to intensify the high. The drug has also been linked to sexual assaults, where predators use it to incapacitate victims, the agency said.

Washington Examiner [7/23/2025 5:00 AM, Anna Giaritelli, 1934K] reports the state of Florida and Border Patrol are allowing illegal immigrants encountered during traffic stops to self-deport to their country of origin through an initiative funded by the state’s taxpayers, the Washington Examiner was first to learn. The Florida Highway Patrol and Florida Division of Emergency Management have partnered with Border Patrol’s Miami Sector to allow illegal immigrants in Border Patrol custody to voluntarily depart the country and bypass long-term detention. The program has not been publicly announced but has been in effect for several weeks and has seen early success, three federal and state officials told the Washington Examiner this week. “This is the first partnership of its kind across the nation between [the Department of Homeland Security] and a state government to focus on the voluntary, expeditious removal of illegal aliens,” said Jeffrey J. Dinise, chief patrol agent for Border Patrol’s Miami region. “The program allows illegal aliens that are noncriminal, that are apprehended by the Border Patrol and the state of Florida law enforcement officers that are 287(g)-trained, to choose whether they want to immediately return to their country of origin or remain in DHS custody pending an immigration hearing with an immigration judge,” Dinise said. While Florida declined to say how much it’s spending on commercial deportation flights or how many immigrants have left, state and federal officials said this pilot partnership between the Trump and DeSantis administrations could help speed up the mass deportation operation.

New York Post [7/22/2025 9:41 PM, Caitlin McCormack, 49956K] reports more than a dozen heavily armed Mexican soldiers accidentally crossed over the US border into New Mexico while searching for drug traffickers and gunrunners — and instead surrounded two American volunteers scouring the desert for lost migrants on Monday. Abbey Carpenter and James Holeman, volunteers for the humanitarian group Battalion Search and Rescue that aids in searching for migrants lost in the southern New Mexico desert, came across the 18 confounded soldiers with the Mexican army, according to Border Report. The soldiers had no idea they’d crossed the border. They told Carpenter and Holeman that they were looking for drug traffickers and gunrunners and asked what the pair was doing in Mexico, according to the outlet. Carpenter whipped out her phone to show them her GPS tracker, which confirmed that they were in the US. "I never felt threatened. When I got nervous was when I showed them that they were in the United States, and I had my phone out, and we were documenting they were where they shouldn’t be. That’s when I got nervous, like, ‘Oh, we shouldn’t have our phones out, taking pictures of them in US soil,’" she told Border Report. After realizing they’d grossly overshot their destination, the soldiers quickly pivoted south back toward the border, Carpenter said. The border in that part of New Mexico lacks proper delineation and is only marked by a simple wire fence that is easy to open, Coleman told the outlet. "We were like: ‘Ha-ha!’ ‘Take a picture with me?’ ‘Blah-blah.’ But that’s because we knew we were in the US. If we had encountered them in Mexico, it would have been a whole different thing. Threatened? I would say that, just because of our American thinking being on US soil. Nervous? Yeah, bro. We were definitely nervous," Holeman added. As an extra precaution, Carpenter recorded the encounter and captured multiple videos of the group, including one photo showing the armed soldiers keeping watch in a white pickup truck with "Guardia Nacional" pasted on the side. The soldiers’ uniforms also had badges of the Mexican flag on their arms alongside other military symbols. Holeman noted that he and Carpenter spotted two Mexico-plated vehicles littered with bullet holes near the Mexican border earlier during their search.

Los Angeles Times [7/22/2025 1:30 PM, Nathan Solis, 14672K] reports that Security officers at Los Angeles International Airport have found people smuggling goods through all kinds of ways. Beetles disguised as snacks. Drugs liquefied to look like dog shampoo. Even a suitcase full of clothes soaked in methamphetamine. Now they can add solar panels to the list. According to a post on X, officers with U.S. Customs and Border Protection at LAX recently discovered nearly 300 pounds of methamphetamine in solar panels. The panels were headed to New Zealand on July 8, according to the agency, and were flagged before they were exported. "We do this every day. These ‘criminal masterminds’ never stood a chance," the agency said in the social media post. The shipment originated from Mexico and there have been no arrests made in connection with the drug seizure, according to a Customs and Border Protection spokesperson, who added that there was no indication that the panels were fake, as initially reported. In April, customs officers found a little over 17 pounds of liquid methamphetamine disguised as dog shampoo. The colorful methamphetamine was hidden in a dozen plastic bottles at LAX that were in an air cargo shipment destined for Australia, the agency announced in a news release. Officers found a crystallized white substance on the bottles during an April 1 inspection that tested positive as methamphetamine. It’s unclear if there were any arrests made in connection with the seizure in the U.S. or Australia. The potential street value in Australia was estimated at $1.8 million, according to Customs and Border Protection.

Reported similarly:
The Hill [7/22/2025 11:49 AM, Lily Dallow, 18649K]

Telemundo [7/22/2025 6:41 PM, Daniel Andrade, 37K] reports customs agents are waiting for a response to their request to the Mexican Customs authorities for stricter control for people entering Mexico with vehicles from the United States whose intention is not to import them legally. They accuse some of them evading general foreign trade rules. They point to cases where cars are placed in Tijuana for clandestine sale or even sold in California and then delivered in Mexico. They indicate that in some situations the intention is to make use of a presidential decree to regularize them. The so-called "chocolate" cars. We present a proposal to reform three paragraphs to rule 3.4.8, in the general foreign trade rule, of 2025, which is basically to regulate the internment of vehicles to the border strip, the 20 kilometers for Baja California, American vehicles, which enter Mexico at any of the customs, said Arturo Pérez Behr, Customs Agent. And it is that, at present, he says that the rule is very simple. It is enough for the driver to prove the residence abroad and the registrations are in force. There is no control of the return of these vehicles, that is, they are introduced for some business issue or some tourist issue, how we control that that vehicle is going to return to the United States, finally the vehicle is a commodity like any other that is introduced to the country, we believe that rule 3.4.8 must have very punctual statements, as an example that the one who circulates the car is the owner, some direct family member or in the case of a company that has the authorization from the legal representative, added Pérez Behr. According to specialists in the formal sale of properly imported cars, this practice has been taking place for many years and goes against those who pay taxes to be able to place a car in Mexico from the United States. It is an issue that we have a long time asking customs to be stricter, we know that it is very difficult for the thousands of cars that enter, but that people who are abusing the crossing of vehicles, that come for sale, plates on puts, etc., to be stricter, explained Jorge Macías, president of the Specialized Auto Group in Canaco.

USA Today [7/22/2025 12:50 PM, Nathan Diller, 75552K] reports that military families have new perks at the airport, the Transportation Security Administration announced this month. Gold Star family members who have lost a loved one in U.S. military service can now enroll in TSA PreCheck, which offers expedited security screening, for free. Spouses of military and uniformed service members can also get a $25 discount on their enrollment fee. Those fees currently range from $76.75 to $85 depending on the enrollment provider travelers choose, according to TSA’s website. Eligible travelers can find enrollment instructions on TSA’s website. The agency also said military members "at select airports near larger military installations" can get expedited access in PreCheck lanes. "This Independence Day and beyond, TSA reaffirms its commitment to ease travel for the military community through its TSA PreCheck program by providing it free to Gold Star families, discounting it for military spouses and creating expedited lanes for service members," TSA Acting Administrator Ha Nguyen McNeill said in an early July news release. "By expanding access, easing enrollment and partnering with our TSA PreCheck enrollment providers and industry partners, we strive to honor those who serve and the families who stand beside them.".

FOX News [7/22/2025 12:12 PM, Ashley J. DiMella, 46878K] reports the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) will begin implementing the "One Stop Security" (OSS) on Tuesday, Fox News Digital has learned. The congressionally authorized pilot program allows passengers arriving in the U.S. from international airports with connecting flights to bypass TSA rescreening. Major U.S. airline carriers American Airlines and Delta Air Lines have partnered with TSA to launch the program from London’s Heathrow International Airport. American Airlines led the way with the first flight to Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport on Friday. Delta Air Lines will launch its One-Stop flight arriving at Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport by the end of July, according to TSA. TSA Deputy Administrator Adam Stahl, based in Washington, D.C., told Fox News Digital on Tuesday there will be more foreign airports added to the program in the month ahead. "It really is a commonsense security approach for us to streamline security from abroad to the United States," said Stahl. "It really underscores and piggybacks onto the president’s and the administration’s golden age of travel.". Stahl said TSA is carefully monitoring the OSS program by looking at improvements in the "turn time of the airport" and is expecting significant connecting time reduction. "We are going to do everything we can," he said. "[Secretary Noem] is going to do everything we can to bring in side-by-side partners, the private sector, public sector, airlines, airports and other stakeholders to really create an American travel and transportation security system that every single American is proud of.".

FOX News [7/22/2025 1:28 PM, Staff, 46878K] reports that Deputy TSA Administrator Adam Stahl told Fox News Digital the "One Stop Security" pilot program will begin on Tuesday, allowing passengers arriving in the U.S. from international airports with connecting flights to bypass rescreening. [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

USA Today [7/22/2025 10:04 AM, Eve Chen, 75552K] reports remember having to hunt for an electrical outlet at the airport? Now many boarding areas have USB ports built into their seats, but federal authorities urge travelers to avoid plugging in, at least directly. "Hackers can install malware at USB ports (we’ve been told that’s called "juice/port jacking")," the Transportation Safety Administration posted on Facebook this spring. "So, when you’re at an airport do not plug your phone directly into a USB port. Bring your TSA-compliant power brick or battery pack and plug in there.".

(B) NBC News Daily [7/22/2025 1:56 PM, Staff] reporst that the TSA says there is no plan right now to bring new family lanes to O’Hare and Midway. Last week, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said that Families on the Fly campaign has opened. That brings security lines for families who have small children and families can get a $15 discount at TSA PreCheck. The pilot program is underway in Orlando but could expand to other airports in the coming months.

The New York Times [7/22/2025 3:24 PM, Lisa Friedman, 138952K] reports the head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s urban search and rescue unit has resigned, telling colleagues he was frustrated by bureaucratic hurdles the Trump administration imposed that delayed the agency’s response to deadly flooding in Texas, according to three people familiar with his reasoning. Ken Pagurek, who worked with FEMA’s search and rescue branch for more than a decade and served as chief for the past year, told associates that his concerns had been mounting since the start of hurricane season and that the administration’s changes to the agency were causing “chaos.” He said he worried that a new policy that requires purchases of more than $100,000 be personally approved by Kristi Noem, the homeland security secretary, could hurt disaster response efforts that require speed and agility. Experts have said that responses during a disaster can quickly total billions of dollars, and that requiring personal approvals for expenses of $100,000 and above could easily create bottlenecks. Tricia McLaughlin, a spokeswoman for the Department of Homeland Security, said that FEMA did not experience any delays in deployments in Texas. “It is laughable that a career public employee, who claims to serve the American people, would choose to resign over our refusal to hastily approve a six-figure deployment contract without basic financial oversight,” she said referring to Mr. Pagurek. “We’re being responsible with taxpayer dollars, that’s our job,” she said. “Attempting to spin a personal career decision into some big scandal is ridiculous.” Axios [7/22/2025 6:38 PM, Josephine Walker, 13599K] reports Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem implemented a rule in June that requires every funding request over $100,000 have her personal sign-off before funds can be dispersed, which reportedly complicated the Texas response. Pagurek told colleagues that the bureaucratic red tape that delayed the response was what pushed him to resign, according to CNN. "This decision was not made lightly, and after much reflection and prayer, it is the right path for me at this time," Pagurek wrote in a resignation letter that didn’t mention the flood response. "We’re being responsible with taxpayer dollars, that’s our job," [Tricia McLaughlin] continued in the statement. "Attempting to spin a personal career decision into some big scandal is ridiculous." The DHS spokesperson also said "FEMA experienced no delays in deployment of assets" and that Texas officials have "applauded" the government’s response.

Reported similarly:
Houston Chronicle [7/22/2025 10:21 AM, Anusha Fathepure, 1982K]

NBC News [7/22/2025 4:18 PM, Curtis Bunn, 44540K] reports as contaminated Guadalupe River water receded following the deadly flooding in Kerrville, Texas, this month, residents returned to find their homes, vehicles and businesses destroyed. Shelled-shocked and in urgent need to rebuild, many turned to the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the embattled organization created to assist people in the aftermath of natural disasters. The responses they received ranged from "fantastic" to unhelpful to frustrating, residents told NBC News. Their experiences come as FEMA faces a future in which it may be dramatically reshaped or shuttered altogether at the direction of the Trump White House and Kristi Noem, the secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees the agency. The stark contrast in experiences with FEMA in Kerrville serves as a case study for the agency that President Donald Trump has said he wants "remade." DHS Secretary Noem has said the agency "should not exist" as is. On Monday, the head of urban search and rescue at FEMA, Ken Pagurek, announced he would step down amid sweeping changes at the agency, including the requirement that Noem approves contracts over $100,000. Meanwhile, despite some staff cuts, the agency plows ahead in Texas, where 132 people died. All of this comes as 20 states have announced a lawsuit against FEMA over the termination of a pre-disaster mitigation program that, over the last four years, provided nearly $4.5 billion in funding to 2,000 projects across the country.

Washington Post [7/23/2025 12:07 AM, Brianna Sacks, 32099K] reports that, earlier this month, sitting next to President Donald Trump at an event in the flood-ravaged Texas Hill Country, Gov. Greg Abbott (R) was quick to praise the administration’s rapid response to the deadly disaster that killed more than 130 people in his state. “This is the fastest that I’m aware of any administration responding so swiftly, so collaboratively, so coordinated,” Abbott said. Trump and the Federal Emergency Management Agency moved quickly to support Texas, approving Abbott’s disaster declaration the next day. But for an event of this magnitude, past presidents have verbally approved a governor’s request within minutes, said Michael Coen, a former chief of staff in the FEMA administrator’s office. And the robust response to the flooding in Texas contrasts sharply with delays faced by other states that have sustained deadly floods and other disasters this year, FEMA staff and state disaster officials say. Kentucky, Indiana, Michigan and West Virginia had been waiting since the spring for the federal government to approve their requests for assistance, with some governors continuously pushing the White House for answers. Then, in a flurry of Truth Social posts Tuesday evening, Trump announced he had signed disaster declarations for those four states, freeing up millions of dollars in federal aid. At least six states and two Native American tribes are still waiting for the president and FEMA to approve their requests for disaster response and recovery assistance. Critical services such as temporary housing, unemployment assistance, search-and-rescue crews and debris removal are also on hold because of bureaucratic obstacles at the Department of Homeland Security, according to FEMA staffers, state disaster declaration requests and internal agency data obtained by Washington Post. According to a FEMA official familiar with the declarations, the president only approved portions of the long-awaited requests: public assistance grants to help communities rebuild infrastructure. Some governors’ requests for other funds, such as individual assistance and hazard mitigation, are still in limbo. Shortly after the publication of this article, Oregon and New Mexico officially received their disaster declarations, according to documents seen by The Post. Oregon received a portion of its request, and the rest is under review. New Mexico is getting individual and public assistance. On May 15, Indiana, for example, requested just more than $22 million, according to documents obtained by The Post. On Tuesday, Trump announced that he was giving the state — “which I won BIG in 2016, 2020, and 2024” — $15.1 million. In her request in May, Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (D) initially calculated that her state suffered more than $137 million in damage. Trump said he was giving Michigan $50 million, adding, “It was my Honor to do so!”

CNN [7/23/2025 12:01 AM, Shimon Prokupecz, Matthew J. Friedman and Rachel Clarke, 21433K] reports the critical minutes and hours when deadly flash floods hurtled down the Guadalupe River washing away children’s camps and RVs will be scrutinized starting Wednesday at a special hearing in Texas. There’s already a split emerging about exactly what should be prioritized: the efficiency of those who tried to save lives once the water arrived or whether more should have been done before the storm. “We need to find out what happened. We need to know for us to go forward and make sure that we prevent the loss of life on the scale,” said José Menéndez, a Democrat state senator, who will be on the joint select committee on disaster preparedness and flooding. His Republican colleague on the committee, Wes Virdell, who is the state representative for Kerr county, the area hardest hit, urged more caution in a separate interview with CNN. “Government’s natural inclination is to overreact, and so I want to make sure that we don’t have that happening,” Virdell said. At least 135 people were killed in Texas during the historic July 4 flooding, more than 100 of them in Kerr County where children’s camps and RV parks sat on the banks of the Guadalupe. The area lies in the heart of “Flash Flood Alley,” but Kerr County has no network of sirens along the river to alert both residents and visitors when they should get to higher ground. Gov. Greg Abbott issued a proclamation for a special legislative session that began Monday to address flood warning systems, emergency communications, and relief funding for victims — as well as other issues that are more political in nature including redistricting. Wednesday’s hearing will include testimony from officials in charge of managing the rivers throughout Flash Flood Alley, as well as Chief Nim Kidd, head of the state’s Division of Emergency Management (TDEM), and members of the Department of Public Safety, the state’s police force. The agenda indicates lawmakers will seek information on disaster preparedness and response, flood planning and first responder communications. Members of the joint select committee have not received any briefing materials or confidential information in advance of the meeting in Austin, CNN has learned.

NPR [7/23/2025 5:01 AM, Sarah K. Grunau and Michel Martin, 37958K] reports The Texas Legislature will start discussions Wednesday on emergency preparedness and warning systems following the deadly floods on July 4 that killed at least 135 people. [Editorial note: consult audio at source link]

AP [7/22/2025 6:24 PM, Staff, 3077K] reports a look at megafires as an Oregon wildfire approaches the 100,000-acre mark. [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

New York Times [7/22/2025 9:30 PM, Orlando Mayorquín, 138952K] reports the death toll in the Los Angeles wildfires climbed to 31 on Tuesday after human remains were found in Altadena, Calif., more than six months after the Eaton fire burned thousands of homes there in January. Investigators with the office of the Los Angeles County medical examiner were called Monday to examine what appeared to be human remains at a home that had been destroyed by the fire. The medical examiner’s office verified that the remains were from a victim of the Eaton fire and added to the death toll. It was the first time since April that the medical examiner had determined that another person had died from the fires. The first 29 victims were confirmed in January. Officials on Tuesday did not identify the remains, but in May, the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department reported a missing 74-year-old man who lived on the same block as where the remains were discovered on Monday. He was last seen around 7 p.m. on the evening the Eaton fire broke out. Officials have announced that 19 people died in the Eaton fire, and 12 in the Palisades fire in the Pacific Palisades section of Los Angeles. The Sheriff’s Department did not immediately respond on Tuesday to a request for information on the remaining number of missing people or whether it was aware of additional reports of individuals who remained missing within the burn zones. With a combined death toll of 31, the Los Angeles wildfires in January were the second deadliest wildfire disaster in California history, behind only the Camp fire, which killed 85 people and devastated the town of Paradise, Calif., in 2018. Search and recovery efforts are often challenging for officials after natural disasters like wildfires. Little is left behind, making remains difficult to find and identify. After the Maui fire in August 2023, the death toll continued to rise almost a year later as officials discovered and identified additional remains. More than six months after the Los Angeles firestorm, little construction has begun in Pacific Palisades and Altadena. The charred ruins of some businesses remain, but much of the debris has been removed from private residential lots.

Chicago Tribune [7/22/2025 3:40 PM, William Tong, 3987K] reports the Dirksen U.S. Courthouse and other federal buildings were placed on lockdown Tuesday midday as FBI and other law enforcement personnel responded to a person in the Dirksen lobby who may have had a knife and was trying to hurt himself, according to reports. By about 11:30 a.m., the building, which houses the U.S. District, U.S. Bankruptcy and 7th Circuit Appeals courts, was locked down. Negotiators were on the scene, U.S. District Court spokesperson Julie Hodek said. Access to other facilities, including the Kluczynski Federal Building, was restricted as well. Police and Department of Homeland Security officers blocked off traffic on Dearborn Street, Jackson Boulevard, and Adams and Clark streets. Several federal employees and people doing business at the federal buildings were also required to leave.

NewsNation [7/22/2025 5:54 AM, Cameron Kiszla, 5801K] reports hundreds of U.S. Marines sent to Los Angeles amid immigration raids and protests are going home. The Pentagon confirmed Monday that the 700 Marines will be sent home after several weeks in Southern California. Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass had criticized the presence of the Marines and about 4,000 members of the California National Guard as a waste of taxpayer money, again calling for their withdrawal in a press conference Monday morning. Several hours later, it appears she got her wish, as the Marines are leaving and half of the National Guard members were said to be heading home in a previous announcement. "This is a victory. We have many more victories to go, because we need all of these raids to end," Bass said in a video posted to social media. The troops had largely been idle since their arrival in June with a mission to protect federal buildings. One Marine told the Los Angeles Times there’s "not much to do."

Roll Call [7/22/2025 9:16 AM, Justin Papp, 692K] reports the House is increasing the amount of money available to individual members for security purposes ahead of the August recess, the House Administration Committee announced Tuesday. Since one Minnesota state lawmaker was killed by a gunman in June and a second was critically injured, members of Congress have clamored for enhanced measures to keep them safe, particularly while they’re in their home districts. Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., and House Administration Chair Bryan Steil, R-Wis., unveiled the plan to the Republican conference on Tuesday morning. It doubles a per member allowance to boost at-home security systems while dramatically increasing a monthly allotment that lawmakers can now use to hire personal security. "The enhanced Member security framework aims to address security gaps and alleviate Members’ concerns while fulfilling their duties as elected officials, particularly in their districts and residences," a summary of the security changes circulated by the House Administration Committee stated. The new offerings increase the lifetime Residential Security Program limit to $20,000, up from $10,000. That program was established in 2022 through the House sergeant-at-arms to help pay for home security measures, but only 60 percent of House members were participating as of June, according to an official familiar with the numbers. Members will also have access to $5,000 a month for the rest of the fiscal year ending Sept. 30, a jump from $150. The monitoring and maintenance allotment can now be used to hire security personnel who can accompany lawmakers or guard their homes, according to the House Administration notice. The plan also directs the House sergeant-at-arms to work with Capitol Police to expand local law enforcement memorandums of understanding, which are meant to provide additional coverage for members away from the Capitol. The SAA will also ask Capitol Police Chief Michael Sullivan, who took over the department in late June, to send a letter to the National Association of Chiefs of Police requesting support in protecting members, according to the summary.

USA Today [7/22/2025 5:41 PM, Cybele Mayes-Osterman, 75552K] reports the Army spent $30 million on the massive 250th anniversary parade that rumbled down the streets of the nation’s capital for hours on June 14, coinciding with President Donald Trump’s birthday, Army officials told reporters on July 22. The cost of the military parade was initially estimated at $25 million to $45 million. The money covered the cost of hauling dozens of tanks and armored vehicles by train and truck from military bases in Texas to the nation’s capital. Approximately 7,000 soldiers also converged on Washington for the occasion, with some marching the route in historic costumes. Warplanes flew overhead, and Army parachutists sailed down from the skies before a crowd of thousands. The Army’s final tabulation does not include the cost of the parade’s significant security requirements, including for the Secret Service, Department of Homeland Security, FBI and local police personnel to secure a chunk of downtown Washington and monitor possible threats. The parade was designated as a "National Security Special Event," a category for large events that could be targets for terrorist attacks and thus require additional work for law enforcement.

Daily Caller [7/22/2025 1:50 PM, Regan Reese, 1010K] reports that President Donald Trump told reporters Tuesday that his FBI had concluded its investigation into Thomas Crooks and found nothing "abnormal" more than a year after the assassination attempt on his life. While Trump’s FBI said there was no "there there" while investigating the assassination attempt in March, the president told Fox News that he was having a hard time believing the official narrative surrounding the July 13 rally in Butler, Pennsylvania. Ten days out from the anniversary of the assassination attempt, Trump told the Daily Caller that he was "very satisfied" with what his administration turned up. A year after the assassination attempt, details on tragedy and 20-year-old Thomas Crooks remain limited. "I’m relying on my people to tell me what it is … The Secret Service, they tell me it’s fine. But it’s a little hard to believe," Trump said in March about what his FBI had turned up so far. Days after that interview, Deputy FBI Director Dan Bongino insisted that there was no conspiracy behind the assassination attempt on Trump’s life. "If there was a big, explosive ‘there’ there — given my history as a Secret Service agent, and my personal friendship, as a director does with the president, give me one logical, sensible reason we would not have — if you can think of one, there isn’t," Bongino said on Fox News.

CBS News [7/22/2025 11:18 AM, Briauna Brown, 51860K] reports that three men are facing several charges after officers uncovered a credit card skimmer operation inside a Dallas home, the Texas Department of Licensing & Regulation announced Tuesday. Authorities were alerted to the case on July 17 when a merchant contacted the Texas Financial Crimes Intelligence Center after finding a skimmer. By the next day, officers executed a search warrant on a home in Dallas, where 115 credit card skimmers, $50,000 in cash, 25 fake IDs and more than 300 payment cards that had been re-encoded with victims’ account numbers. Officials said three Romanian men, identified as Victor Marian Tecu, Triussa Gabrielle (aka Ionut Firan Alexandrau) and Gheorge Ciprian Hilitanu were arrested in connection with the bust. All three are charged with engaging in organized criminal activity, unlawful interception of electronic communications, tampering with a government document and fraudulent use or possession of credit card or debit card information, TDLR said in a news release. Several agencies assisted in the bust, including the Texas Department of Public Safety, North Texas TAG, Dallas Police Department, Euless Police Department and the U.S. Department of State Diplomatic Security Service. "Seizing the skimmers, the fake IDS and the payment cards prevented an estimated $23 million in additional potential fraud," according to FCIC analysts.

Bloomberg [7/22/2025 5:36 PM, Samantha Stewart and Rainier Harris, 19320K] reports Microsoft accused Chinese state-sponsored hackers of exploiting vulnerabilities in its SharePoint software in a campaign that has targeted businesses and government agencies around the world. The tech giant alleged that two groups—Linen Typhoon and Violet Typhoon—leveraged flaws on customers’ own networks, as opposed to in the cloud. The intrusion marks another public relations headache for a company trying to bolster its cyber defenses and reputation.

NBC News [7/22/2025 12:45 PM, Kevin Collier, 44540K] reports a newly discovered critical flaw in Microsoft’s SharePoint platform has spurred a mad frenzy from hackers — including some working for the Chinese government, Google and Microsoft say. The identities of which organizations have been hacked are still not public, but they are increasing and include multiple government agencies around the world, Charles Carmakal, the chief technology officer at Mandiant, Google’s cloud security service, told NBC News. SharePoint works as a shared version of Microsoft Office, letting people in the same organization directly collaborate. The flaw in the software — initially classified as a "zero day," because there was not a patch for victims to defend themselves when it was first discovered — lets hackers gain significant access to the computers of organizations that host SharePoint. Cloud customers were not affected. Microsoft announced Saturday that the flaw was being exploited but made a downloadable fix for it available only on Monday, prompting a scramble for organizations to patch it while capable hackers hurried to find additional victims who hadn’t protected themselves.

New York Times [7/23/2025 3:17 AM, Vivian Wang, 138952K] reports Microsoft said that Chinese state-sponsored actors were exploiting vulnerabilities in one of its popular collaboration software products, SharePoint, which is used by U.S. government agencies and many companies worldwide. Microsoft said in a notice on its security blog on Tuesday that it had identified at least two China-based groups linked to the Chinese government that it said had been taking advantage of security flaws in its SharePoint software. Such attacks aim to sneak into the computer systems of users. Those groups, called Linen Typhoon and Violet Typhoon, were ones that Microsoft said it had been tracking for years, and which it said had been targeting organizations and personnel related to government, defense, human rights, higher education, media, and financial and health services in the United States, Europe and East Asia. Microsoft said another actor, which it called Storm-2603, was also involved in the hacking campaign. It said it had “medium confidence” that Storm-2603 was a “China-based threat actor.” The U.S. government’s Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency issued a notice that said it was aware of the hacking attack on SharePoint. It added that it had notified “critical infrastructure organizations” that were affected. “While the scope and impact continue to be assessed,” the agency said, the vulnerabilities would enable “malicious actors to fully access SharePoint content, including file systems and internal configurations and execute code over the network.” A Microsoft spokesperson wrote in an emailed response that the company had been “coordinating closely” with the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, the Department of Defense’s Cyber Defense Command and “key cybersecurity partners globally throughout our response.” The Chinese Embassy in Washington did not immediately respond to a request for comment. China has routinely denied being behind cyberattacks and asserts that it is a victim of them. Microsoft said in its blog post that investigations into other actors also using these exploits were still ongoing.

CyberScoop [7/22/2025 11:48 AM, Matt Kapko] reports Microsoft said two China nation-state threat groups and a separate attacker based in China are exploiting the zero-day vulnerabilities that first caused havoc to SharePoint servers over the weekend. Linen Typhoon and Violet Typhoon — the Chinese government-affiliated threat groups — and an attacker Microsoft tracks as Storm-2603 are exploiting the pair of zero-day vulnerabilities affecting on-premises SharePoint servers, Microsoft Threat Intelligence said in a blog post Tuesday. The zero-days — CVE-2025-53770 and CVE-2025-53771 — have been exploited en masse to intrude hundreds of organizations globally, spanning multiple sectors, including government agencies, according to researchers. Both defects are variants of previously disclosed vulnerabilities that Microsoft had already addressed in its security update earlier this month. After discovering the new flaws, Microsoft scrambled to develop patches, releasing the updates for all versions of SharePoint by late Monday. The attack spree is ongoing and spreading.

Reuters [7/22/2025 5:29 PM, James Pearson, 51390K] reports a security patch released by Microsoft (MSFT.O) earlier this month failed to fully fix a critical flaw in the U.S. tech company’s SharePoint server software that had been identified at a hacking competition in May, opening the door to a sweeping global cyber espionage operation, according to a timeline of events reviewed by Reuters. A Microsoft spokesperson confirmed on Tuesday that its initial solution did not work. The spokesperson added that Microsoft had released further patches that fixed the issue. It remains unclear who is behind the ongoing operation, which targeted around 100 organisations over the weekend and is expected to escalate as other hackers join the fray. Microsoft said in a blog post that two allegedly Chinese hacking groups, dubbed "Linen Typhoon" and "Violet Typhoon," were exploiting the vulnerabilities, along with another China-based hacking group. Microsoft and Alphabet’s (GOOGL.O), Google have said that China-linked hackers were likely behind the first wave of hacks. Chinese government-linked operatives are regularly implicated in cyberattacks, but Beijing routinely denies carrying out hacking operations. In an emailed statement, the Chinese embassy in Washington said China opposes all forms of cyberattacks, and "smearing others without solid evidence." The vulnerability that facilitated the attack was first identified in May at a hacking competition, opens new tab in Berlin organised by cybersecurity firm Trend Micro (4704.T), which offered cash bounties for the discovery of computer bugs in popular software. It offered a $100,000 prize for "zero-day" exploits - which are called that because they leverage previously undisclosed digital weaknesses that could be used against SharePoint, Microsoft’s flagship document management and collaboration platform. In a statement, Trend Micro said it was the responsibility of vendors participating in its competition to patch and disclose security flaws in "an effective and timely manner." "Patches will occasionally fail. This has happened with SharePoint in the past," the statement said.

CyberScoop [7/22/2025 3:50 PM, Tim Starks] reports data from sensors that detect threats in critical infrastructure networks is sitting unanalyzed after a government contract expired this weekend, raising risks for operational technology, a program leader at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory told lawmakers Tuesday. That news arrived at a hearing of a House Homeland Security subcommittee on Stuxnet, the malware that was discovered 15 years ago after it afflicted Iran’s nuclear centrifuges. The hearing focused on operational technology (OT), used to monitor and control physical processes in things like manufacturing or energy plants. Amid a Department of Homeland Security review of contracts, the arrangement between the laboratory and DHS’s Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency to support the CyberSentry program expired Sunday, the laboratory program manager Nathaniel Gleason told lawmakers under questioning Tuesday. An agency official told CyberScoop later Tuesday that the program is still operational. CyberSentry is a voluntary program for critical infrastructure owners and operators to monitor threats in both their IT and OT networks. “We’re looking for threats that haven’t been seen before,” Gleason told California Rep. Eric Swalwell, the top Democrat on the Subcommittee on Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Protection. “We’re looking for threats that exist right now in our infrastructure. One of the great things about the CyberSentry program is that it takes the research and marries it with what is actually happening on the real networks. So we’re not just doing science projects. We’re deploying that technology out in the real world, detecting real threats.” But the lab can’t legally analyze the data from the CyberSentry sensors without funding from government agencies, and funding agreements were still making their way through DHS processes before the contract expired this weekend, he said. “One of the most important things is getting visibility into what’s happening on our OT networks,” Gleason said. “We don’t have enough of that. So losing this visibility through this program is a significant loss.”

StateScoop [7/22/2025 9:50 AM, Colin Wood] reports New York Gov. Kathy Hochul on Tuesday announced her state will soon begin holding its water and wastewater utilities to a more thorough set of cybersecurity standards. They’ll also have access to a new $2.5 million grant program to help cover the cost of meeting the new regulations, which are likely to be phased in within the next several months. A group that included members of the state’s health, environmental conservation and public service departments developed the regulations, and each has published new proposed rules for public review. Colin Ahern, the state’s chief cyber officer, said the governor directed the agencies to “harmonize” the regulations, which affect a sector naturally laden with broad health and environmental concerns. The new proposed regulations would require that all New York water and wastewater utilities serving more than 3,300 people adhere to a host of new cybersecurity measures, including conducting annual cybersecurity vulnerability analyses, establishing formal cybersecurity programs, creating incident response plans, following new incident reporting requirements and training staff on cybersecurity hygiene. Larger utilities, those serving more than 50,000 people, would additionally be required to designate a staff member who’s responsible for administering a cybersecurity program and monitoring and logging network activity. None of the requirements are unusual, but they are perhaps overdue.

CNN [7/22/2025 9:49 PM, Taylor Romine, 21433K] reports a 55-year-old man was indicted Tuesday after authorities say he created and placed at least seven improvised explosive devices in different areas of New York City, including subway track on the Williamsburg Bridge and on Manhattan residential apartment building rooftops, according to an indictment announced Tuesday. Michael Gann, who lives in Inwood, New York, ordered precursor chemicals, which can be combined to create an explosive mixture, online and formulated the seven IEDs, the indictment says. Gann is charged with one count of attempted destruction of property by means of explosives, one count of transportation of explosive materials and one count of unlawful possession of destructive devices. It is unclear if Gann, who was arrested June 5, has entered a plea. CNN has reached out to an attorney representing Gann but they didn’t immediately respond. He is currently detained pending trial, according to court documents. If convicted on all counts, Gann faces a maximum of 40 years in prison, the US Attorney’s office said in a news release. Prosecutors allege that on May 30, Gann ordered two pounds of potassium perchlorate, a pound of aluminum powder, over 200 cardboard tubes, over 50 feet of fuses, as well as other unspecified items. On June 4, after receiving the materials in Long Island, Gann mixed the potassium perchlorate with the aluminum powder and set off an explosion, the indictment says. It is not clear if the explosion caused damage. He brought the materials, including the mixed and unmixed precursor chemicals, to Manhattan, where he assembled the IEDs, the indictment says. Five IEDs, as well as the chemicals and at least four shotgun shells, were found on adjoining rooftops, where surveillance video captures Gann placing the items, the indictment says. "The pictured black IED contained approximately 30 grams of explosive powder, which is approximately 600 times the legal limit for consumer fireworks," the indictment says. A sixth IED was thrown onto the subway track on the Williamsburg Bridge, the indictment says, although prosecutors don’t specify when he allegedly placed it. Gann was arrested on June 5 "in the vicinity of the rooftops," where they recovered a seventh IED on his person, the indictment says. After his arrest, Gann lied and told law enforcement that he disposed of the chemicals and shotgun shells in a dumpster in the Chelsea neighborhood of Manhattan, the indictment says.

AP [7/22/2025 11:59 AM, Adrian Sainz, 56000K] reports a Tennessee judge on Tuesday set a February trial date for a man who faces the death penalty if convicted on charges of killing three people and wounding three others in a daylong series of shootings in Memphis that was livestreamed on social media. Shelby County Judge James Jones Jr. scheduled Ezekiel Kelly’s trial for Feb. 9 during a court hearing in Memphis. Kelly has pleaded not guilty to more than two dozen charges, including three counts of first-degree murder, in the September 2022 shooting rampage that led to a citywide shelter-in-place order and a frantic manhunt. Kelly’s trial had been set to begin July 14, but was delayed after his lawyers asked for more time to review evidence in the case, including investigating about 400 witnesses and more than 300 videos. Prosecutors have said they plan to seek the death penalty if he’s convicted of first-degree murder. He appeared in court Tuesday with his lawyer, about five months after he told a judge that he wanted to represent himself in the shootings. Kelly, 22, later reconsidered and his court-appointed lawyer, Michael Scholl, resumed serving as his primary representation. Scholl had been helping Kelly in an advisory capacity until Jones re-appointed him in March. Along with the killings of Dewayne Tunstall, Richard Clark and Allison Parker, Kelly also was charged with attempted murder, reckless endangerment with a deadly weapon and commission of an act of terrorism. Kelly has until Sept. 16 to change his plea. Scholl told reporters after Tuesday’s hearing that he plans to file a motion to bring in a jury from outside of Memphis to hear the case. Lawyers typically file such change-of-venue motions in cases where there has been extensive pre-trial publicity.

AP [7/22/2025 10:18 AM, Staff, 56000K] reports Omnilert, the innovation leader in AI-powered gun detection and emergency response technology, today announced the launch of the Safe Haven Grant Program, a new annual initiative created to provide school districts impacted by gun violence or limited funding with comprehensive, district-wide safety technology. The Uvalde Consolidated Independent School District (CISD) has been selected as the first recipient of the grant and will receive a three-year deployment of Omnilert’s visual AI gun detection platform across all of its schools. This solution will be implemented in partnership with BCD, a global leader in video surveillance infrastructure, which is providing the hardware and infrastructure required to support the deployment. “Our number one priority is to keep students and staff safe, which is why we have been looking to add Omnilert’s visual AI gun detection for all of our sites,” said Ashley Chohlis, Superintendent of Uvalde CISD. “Without the grant program, we would be unable to bring this life-saving technology into our schools, and we are grateful for the opportunity that Omnilert and BCD have given us to move forward with it district-wide.”

Reuters [7/22/2025 1:46 PM, David Shepardson, 51390K] reports U.S. officials told a Senate committee on Tuesday that there have been more than 3,000 drone events near American airports since 2021, including 11 aircraft this year that reported taking evasive action to avoid collisions. Those drone incidents have caused significant flight delays at times near major airports, said Steven Willoughby, a counter drone official with the Homeland Security Department, who told the Senate Judiciary Committee that in two instances drones collided with aircraft conducting critical response operations during emergencies in California and Texas this year. Officials also raised concerns about the intentional use of drones for attacks, and also at major sporting events. They also point to major upcoming events like the 2026 World Cup. Of around 90,000 special events annually where the FBI could have had counter drone protection, it was only used in about 0.05% of events, according to testimony from the Department of Justice and the FBI.

Reuters [7/22/2025 10:32 AM, Jarrett Renshaw and Alexandra Alper, 51390K] reports the White House intends to publish a plan on Wednesday that calls for the export of American AI technology abroad and a crackdown on state laws deemed too restrictive to let it flourish, a document seen by Reuters shows. According to a summary of the draft plan seen by Reuters, the White House will bar federal AI funding from going to states with tough AI rules and ask the Federal Communications Commission to assess whether state laws conflict with its mandate. It will also promote open source and open weight AI development and "export American AI technologies through full-stack deployment packages" and data center initiatives led by the Commerce Department. The plan will "focus on empowering American workers through AI-enabled job creation and industry breakthroughs," according to the document. Janet Egan, a fellow at The Center for a New American Security, said the plan, as described by Reuters, represents a market shift in strategy from "a primarily restrictive approach to AI" under Biden to a focus on answering the question "how do you start spreading the infrastructure and the technology that will underpin the globe?" Despite the focus on expansion, the plan does mention the importance of "defending against misuse and preparing for future AI-related risks," according to the summary. U.S. President Donald Trump ordered his administration in January to produce a plan that would make "America the world capital in artificial intelligence" and reduce regulatory barriers to its rapid expansion. That report, which includes input from the National Security Council, is due by Wednesday. Trump is set to mark that deadline with a major speech as part of an event titled “Winning the AI Race,” organized by White House AI and crypto czar David Sacks and his co-hosts on the All-In podcast. "The Plan will deliver a strong, specific, and actionable federal policy roadmap that goes beyond the details reported here and we look forward to releasing it soon,” White House Office of Science and Technology Policy spokeswoman Victoria LaCivita said in a statement.

NBC News [7/22/2025 2:55 PM, Michael Kosnar, et al., 44540K] reports Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche intends to meet with convicted sex trafficker and Jeffrey Epstein associate Ghislaine Maxwell in the next several days, Attorney General Pam Bondi said Tuesday morning. Maxwell was convicted of sex trafficking in 2021 for recruiting and grooming multiple teenage girls for over a decade to be sexually abused by Epstein. She was investigated and indicted during the first Trump administration and tried and convicted during the Biden administration. The meeting was confirmed by Maxwell’s attorney, David Oscar Markus, who has been requesting meetings with Trump administration officials and has argued that Maxwell did not receive a fair trial. "I can confirm that we are in discussions with the government and that Ghislaine will always testify truthfully," Markus said. "We are grateful to President Trump for his commitment to uncovering the truth in this case.". NBC News has reported that Maxwell did not ask for a plea agreement and was not offered one before her trial, according to statements made by federal prosecutors at the time. After being convicted in New York, she was sentenced to 20 years in federal prison. Blanche, in a statement on Tuesday on X posted by Bondi, said the Justice Department stood by its July 6 decision to release no further documents in the Epstein case, which sparked an uproar among Trump supporters that has proven to be one of the largest political challenges of Trump’s second term. The president has repeatedly called on his supporters to move on and focus on other topics, and at one point called them "stupid.". Trump supporters criticized the decision, citing repeated promises from Bondi that she would release documents related to the Epstein case. Multiple Republican members of Congress and right-wing influencers have also criticized Bondi, whom Trump has defended.

Reported similarly:
The Hill [7/22/2025 8:15 AM, Brett Samuels, 18649K]
Breitbart [7/22/2025 12:07 PM, Staff, 3077K]
Daily Caller [7/22/2025 10:01 AM, Hudson Crozier, 1010K]
Washington Examiner [7/22/2025 9:20 AM, Annabella Rosciglione, 1934K]

AP [7/22/2025 12:28 PM, Stephen Groves and Lisa Mascaro, 56000K] reports House Speaker Mike Johnson is rebuffing pressure to act on the investigation into Jeffrey Epstein, instead sending members home early for a month-long break from Washington after the week’s legislative agenda was upended by Republican members who are clamoring for a vote. Johnson, a Republican from Louisiana, said Tuesday morning that he wants to give the White House "space" to release the Epstein information on its own, despite the bipartisan push for legislation that would require more records to be released. "There’s no purpose for the Congress to push an administration to do something they’re already doing," Johnson said at his weekly press conference, his last before lawmakers depart Washington on Wednesday for their traditional August recess. Echoing President Donald Trump’s position, Johnson insisted he, too, wants the files released, but only those that are "credible.". The speaker’s stance seemed unlikely to satisfy many GOP members who are threatening to support a bipartisan bill meant to pry information from the Justice Department. Even before Johnson spoke, a Republican-controlled subcommittee of the powerful House Committee on Oversight was advancing a resolution to subpoena Epstein’s former girlfriend, Ghislaine Maxwell, for a deposition. The intra-party turmoil on Capitol Hill unfolded as many of Trump’s supporters have been outraged at how his administration has reneged on promises to publicly release a full accounting of the sex trafficking investigation into Epstein, who killed himself in his New York jail cell in 2019 while awaiting trial. Under pressure from right-wing online influencers, as well as voters back home, rank-and-file Republicans are demanding that the House intervene in the matter. "The public’s not going to let this die, and rightfully so," said Rep. Ralph Norman, a South Carolina Republican. Johnson decided to end the House’s legislative business early this week after he essentially lost control of the powerful House Rules Committee, which sends bills to the floor for debates and votes. Late Monday evening business on that panel ground to a halt when the Republicans on the House Rules Committee abruptly recessed proceedings rather than risk more proposals from Democrats pushing them to release Epstein files.

Washington Examiner [7/22/2025 12:06 PM, Jack Birle, 1934K] reports Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard claimed over the weekend that there is enough evidence to prosecute Obama administration officials over their false 2016 election narrative tying President Donald Trump to Russia, but it may be too late for the Justice Department to pursue the case. While Trump and his administration have released new documents and evidence, which they say show potentially criminal efforts by the Obama administration to fabricate a narrative of collusion between Russia and the 2016 Trump campaign, the statute of limitations on avenues for prosecution will likely severely limit the DOJ’s ability to build a case. Gabbard on Friday released declassified intelligence documents from late 2016 and early 2017 purporting to show a "treasonous conspiracy by officials at the highest levels of the Obama White House to subvert the will of the American people and try to usurp [Trump] from fulfilling his mandate." She also said she would hand over the documents to the Justice Department, which she did on Monday, one day after she claimed that Obama administration officials should be indicted for alleged crimes. "There must be indictments for those responsible, no matter how powerful they are and were at that time, no matter who was involved in creating this treasonous conspiracy against the American people, they all must be held accountable," Gabbard said on Fox News. Federal law limits the statute of limitations for most crimes to five years from the date the alleged crime was committed. Thus, alleged crimes committed in 2016 and 2017 would likely fall outside of prosecutors’ reach. Criminal charges with longer or no statutes of limitation, such as murder and certain acts of terrorism, are unlikely to apply to the false Trump-Russia narrative. One way to extend the statute of limitations for the alleged crimes would be to prosecute a continued conspiracy among the officials that stretched beyond the start of Trump’s first term, because the latest criminal action in a conspiracy becomes the point at which the statute of limitations applies. Neama Rahmani, a former federal prosecutor, told the Washington Examiner that the alleged activities would likely fall out of the statute of limitations even with the conspiracy alleged by Gabbard and other Trump officials.

AP [7/22/2025 9:12 PM, Eric Tucker and Chris Megerian, 56000K] reports that President Donald Trump rehashed longstanding grievances over the Russia investigation that shadowed much of his first term, lashing out Tuesday following a new report from his intelligence director aimed at casting doubt on long-established findings about Moscow’s interference in the 2016 election. “It’s time to go after people,” Trump said from the Oval Office as he repeated a baseless claim that former President Barack Obama and other officials had engaged in treason. Trump was not making his claims for the first time, but he delivered them when administration officials are harnessing the machinery of the federal government to investigate the targets of Trump’s derision, including key officials responsible for scrutinizing Russia’s attempts to intervene on Trump’s behalf in 2016. The backward-looking inquiries are taking place even as the Republican administration’s national security agencies are confronting global threats. But they have served as a rallying cry for Trump, who is trying to unify a political base at odds over the Jeffrey Epstein case, with some allies pressing to disclose more information despite the president’s push to turn the page. Trump’s attack prompted a rare response from Obama’s post-presidential office. “Our office does not normally dignify the constant nonsense and misinformation flowing out of this White House with a response,” said Patrick Rodenbush, an Obama spokesman. “But these claims are outrageous enough to merit one. These bizarre allegations are ridiculous and a weak attempt at distraction.”

Bloomberg [7/22/2025 5:05 PM, Mia Gindis, 19320K] reports the US is imposing sanctions on two individuals and five entities for allegedly delivering petroleum products to Yemen’s Houthi militants, just weeks after the group assaulted cargo vessels in the Red Sea. Muhammad Al-Sunaydar, one of the targeted individuals, manages a network of petroleum companies between Yemen and the United Arab Emirates, including the Arkan Mars Petroleum Company for Oil Products Imports, the Treasury Department said Tuesday in a statement. The department also linked sanctioned individual Yahya Mohammed Al Wazir to money laundering for the Iran-backed group, which is designated a terrorist organization by the US. The Treasury’s actions also cover Arkan Mars Petroleum DMCC and Arkan Mars Petroleum FZE, two UAE-based companies that it said are part of Al-Sunaydar’s network, as well as the Amran Cement Factory and Al-Saida Stone for Trading and Agencies. “The Houthis collaborate with opportunistic businessmen to reap enormous profits from the importation of petroleum products and to enable the group’s access to the international financial system,” Deputy Secretary of the Treasury Michael Faulkender said in the statement.

Reuters [7/22/2025 5:47 PM, David Lawder, Susan Heavey and Andrea Shalal, 51390K] reports U.S. and Chinese officials will meet in Stockholm next week to discuss an extension to the deadline for negotiating a trade deal, U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said on Tuesday as President Donald Trump announced a deal with the Philippines and released terms of a previous deal with Indonesia. "I think trade is in a very good place with China," Bessent told Fox Business Network’s Mornings With Maria program. He added that the meetings with his Chinese counterparts would take place next Monday and Tuesday with discussions over rebalancing the U.S.-China trade relationship. After Bessent announced the Stockholm meetings, Trump announced a new 19% tariff rate for goods from the Philippines following a visit to the White House by Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. Trump said there would be no Philippines tariffs on U.S. goods. Later, the Trump administration confirmed the same 19% tariff rate for Indonesia, down from an initial 32%, as it released terms of a deal reached last week that calls for Indonesia to eliminate tariff and non-tariff barriers on most U.S. goods. In a post on X, Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson welcomed the U.S.-China talks that his country will host next week, saying they were important for the global economy. "It is positive that both countries wish to meet in Sweden to seek mutual understanding," Kristersson said. A spokesperson for China’s embassy in Washington said Beijing and Washington had finalized implementation details for a consensus on trade reached by Trump and President Xi Jinping. "Please stay tuned for further developments," the spokesperson added, without elaborating.

Reuters [7/22/2025 4:54 PM, Kylie Madry, 51390K] reports Mexico is planning on compromising with the U.S. over sticking points on aviation, the nation’s president said on Tuesday, with one airline predicting that an agreement would come in the next few days. On Saturday, the U.S. Department of Transportation rolled out orders requiring Mexican airlines to submit flight schedules and threatening to reject requests if the Mexican government did not address U.S. concerns over flight changes in Mexico City. U.S. officials also proposed scrapping antitrust immunity for the joint venture between Delta Air Lines (DAL.N) and Aeromexico to address competitive issues. The two have requested an extension through September 2 to respond to the proposal. "We feel tremendously confident that the solution is going to be here in the next few days," low-cost carrier Volaris’ CEO, Enrique Beltranena, told analysts a day after meeting with Mexico’s transportation ministry. Mexico and the U.S. are beginning negotiations and some compromises could be made, Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum said on Tuesday. Washington "is making a set of particular requests," Sheinbaum said. "We’re analyzing them to see whether they can be addressed or whether an alternative can be proposed.". The U.S. has expressed concern about the decision by Mexico’s previous administration to move cargo flights from the main capital airport to a newer, farther-away site while also cutting passenger flight slots. Sheinbaum did not specify what the U.S. requests were. She said the new airport where flights were moved - the Felipe Angeles International Airport (AIFA) - was also a solution.

ABC News [7/22/2025 9:39 AM, Victoria Beaule and Bill Hutchinson, 31733K] reports the U.S. State Department confirmed on Tuesday that a U.S. citizen was killed in Syria after disturbing videos surfaced showing him among a group of men apparently being executed by Syrian government forces. "We offer condolences to the family on their loss and are providing consular assistance to them," the State Department said in a statement. "We are greatly concerned when any U.S. citizen is harmed overseas, wherever they are. The United States calls for accountability in all cases where U.S. citizens are harmed abroad." Family and friends confirmed to ABC News that one of the men executed was Hosam Saraya, an American citizen. The confirmation came after videos shared on social media last week showed eight men kneeling next to each other in civilian clothes, with a group of soldiers filming. In one video, the soldiers are seen talking to each other. Then, without warning, they open fire, shooting the unarmed, kneeling men dozens of times at close range. The videos were filmed in Tishreen Square, in southern Syria, on the afternoon of July 16 amid ongoing fighting there.

Blaze [7/22/2025 1:55 PM, Joseph MacKinnon, 1805K] reports that those who warned that the takeover of Damascus by Turkish-backed Islamic terrorists might bode poorly for Christians and other minorities in Syria have unfortunately been vindicated by the massacres, bombings, rapes, and kidnappings executed by Sunni radicals in recent days and months. According to the U.K.-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, as of Sunday, over 1,200 people had been killed in the brutal clashes that broke out on July 13 between Sunni Muslim Bedouin clans, which were aided at times by government forces, and Druze-linked militias in Syria’s southern Druze-majority Suwayda province. Among those slain in cold blood was Hosam Saraya, an American citizen and Oklahoman who Sens. Markwayne Mullin (R) and James Lankford (R) confirmed was executed alongside several members of his Druze family in Syria. An American relative of the deceased told CNN that Saraya had traveled to Syria to tend to his sick father. Footage reportedly taken on July 17 shows a group of what appear to be government troops marching eight unarmed men — one of whom was later identified as Saraya by an American relative — to a roundabout, where they lined them up and gunned them down. While slaughtering the captives, the militants shouted, "Allahu Akbar." One of the female survivors of the massacre said in a message to Saraya’s American relative, "Pray for us, they kidnapped the boys, they shot the house, they stole stuff."

FOX News [7/22/2025 6:00 AM, Ashley Carnahan, 46878K] Video HERE reports Iran’s foreign minister denied the Islamic Republic is trying to assassinate President Donald Trump and other top administration officials from his first term in an exclusive interview Monday on "Special Report." Abbas Araghchi also denied that Iran wants to wipe Israel "off the map" and downplayed calls for "Death to America" in his first appearance on the network since the U.S. struck three of Iran’s nuclear facilities in June. "You know, we have always said, the supreme leader and other officials in Iran have always said that ‘Death to America’ is, in fact, death to the, you know, hegemonic policies of the United States, not to the people of the United States," Araghchi claimed. "Yes, there are some, perhaps, radicals, persons or groups here and there in different places, inside, outside of Iran, who may say something like what you said, but that has never been our policy, and they will never be our policy in the future." The senior Iranian official told Fox News chief political anchor Bret Baier that it’s never been his country’s official position to try and assassinate Trump or previous administration officials following the 2020 killing of Gen. Qasem Soleimani, the former commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ (IRGC) elite Quds Force. "This is not our policy to kill anybody outside Iran, let alone the president of another country," Araghchi said. [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

Bloomberg [7/22/2025 8:11 AM, Hadriana Lowenkron, 19320K] reports the US ambassador to NATO said China needed to be “called out for their subsidizing” of Russia’s war in Ukraine as the Trump administration ratchets up its threat to impose tariffs if Moscow does not agree to a peace deal. “China thinks they’re fighting a proxy war through Russia, and we’re seeing in some statements by the Chinese government that they want to keep the United States and our allies occupied with this war, so that we can’t focus on our other strategic challenges,” NATO ambassador Matthew Whitaker said Tuesday on Fox Business. “China, I think, has miscalculated,” he added. “I think they need to be called out for their subsidizing this killing that is happening on the battlefields in Ukraine.” Whitaker’s comments come a week after US President Donald Trump threatened to impose tough economic penalties on Russia if it does not end its war on Ukraine within 50 days. Trump has said he would impose 100% tariffs, which officials have cast as secondary levies that would fall on countries who buy Russian exports such as oil. China’s imports of Russian oil have climbed since Russian President Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022. Washington and other capitals allied with Kyiv view such oil purchases as a form of tacit support for Russia, helping to bolster its economy and undercut sanctions. Russia’s crude exports hit a one-month high ahead of Trump’s tariff threat on buyers of Russian oil.

CBS News [7/22/2025 11:34 AM, Emmet Lyons, 51860K] Video: HERE reports a U.S. Department of Commerce employee has been restricted from leaving China by authorities in Beijing, a State Department spokesperson told CBS News on Monday. The unidentified government employee’s restricted travel was confirmed as Beijing revealed new information about a U.S.-based Wells Fargo banker who has also been subjected to an exit ban. "We can confirm that a U.S. Patent and Trademark Office employee, while traveling to China in a personal capacity, was made subject to an exit ban in China," the State Department spokesperson said Monday. "We are tracking this case very closely and are engaged with Chinese officials to resolve the situation as quickly as possible." The New York Times reported Monday that the employee in question is a U.S. citizen who has been prevented from leaving China since mid-April. The newspaper cited a State Department document it has obtained, adding that it shows Beijing officials seized the man’s passport, credit card, cellphone and iPad while he was in the city of Chengdu on April 14. The Times said, citing the document, that the man’s documents were returned on April 22, but that he was told he could not leave the country. At a news conference on Monday, a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson declined to comment on the case of the Department of Commerce employee beyond saying that Beijing "upholds the rule of law and handles entry and exit affairs in accordance with the law." But Foreign Ministry spokesperson Guo Jiaku did confirm that Wells Fargo banker Mao Chenyue has been restricted from leaving China and is facing criminal charges. [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

FOX News [7/22/2025 12:14 PM, Caitlin McFall, 46878K] reports China denied on Tuesday that it is doing anything wrong as it reportedly prevents "dozens" of Americans from leaving the country under an "exit ban" policy, including at least one U.S. government official. Reports emerged Monday afternoon that an American citizen, an employee of the Commerce Department, has been barred from leaving China and prevented from returning to the U.S. since his passport, credit card, cellphone and iPad were seized on April 14, reported The New York Times. The passport was reportedly returned to the individual one week later on April 22, though he was told he was not allowed to leave China. The identity of the government official remains unknown, though a spokesperson for the State Department confirmed to Fox News Digital that the individual is a U.S. Patent and Trademark Office employee and was traveling to China "in a personal capacity." While it is unclear if any other U.S. government officials have been barred from leaving China, a spokesperson for Beijing’s foreign ministry, Guo Jiakun, told reporters on Tuesday during a press briefing that he had no additional details to share. "China upholds the rule of law and handles entry and exit affairs in accordance with the law," he said.

Reuters [7/22/2025 7:19 PM, Andrea Shalal and Trevor Hunnicutt, 51390K] reports U.S. President Donald Trump announced on Tuesday a new 19% tariff rate for goods from the Philippines after what he called a "beautiful visit" by Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. to the White House, and said U.S. goods would pay zero tariffs. The new tariff rate is just below the 20% threatened by Trump earlier this month, but still above the 17% rate set in April when Trump announced what he called reciprocal tariff rates for dozens of countries. It matches the 19% rate announced for Indonesia and bests Vietnam’s slightly higher rate of 20%. Trump posted the news on his Truth Social media platform after meeting with Marcos in the Oval Office, where he had earlier signaled a deal could be reached during the visit. "It was a beautiful visit, and we concluded our Trade Deal, whereby The Philippines is going OPEN MARKET with the United States, and ZERO Tariffs. The Philippines will pay a 19% Tariff," Trump said, calling Marcos a "very good and tough negotiator." Trump said the two Pacific allies, who will celebrate 80 years of diplomatic relations next year, would also work together militarily but gave no details. Marcos, the first Southeast Asian leader to meet Trump in his second term, told reporters at the start of the meeting that the United States was his country’s "strongest, closest, most reliable ally."

Reported similarly:
New York Times [7/22/2025 4:30 PM, Luke Broadwater and Ana Swanson, 330K]

Axios [7/22/2025 8:33 PM, Courtenay Brown, 13599K] reports President Trump on Tuesday said the U.S. notched a trade agreement with Japan that would see 15% tariffs on all goods imported from one of the nation’s key trade partners. A U.S.-Japan trade deal would be the most significant since the White House threatened to impose sharply higher tariffs on much of the globe. "Japan will open their Country to Trade including Cars and Trucks, Rice and certain other Agricultural Products and other things," Trump said on Truth Social. He said that Japan would invest $550 billion in the U.S. "which will receive 90% of the Profits." Trump did not specify what form such an investment would take. The deal will include "reciprocal tariffs" of 15%, Trump added. That is lower than the 25% tariff rate that the White House threatened in a letter sent to Japanese officials earlier this month, which would have taken effect on Aug. 1 if no deal was reached. On April 2, Trump was set to impose a tariff of 24% on goods from the world’s fourth largest economy before postponing the so-called Liberation Day tariffs. Ryosei Akazawa, Japan’s top tariff negotiator, appeared to confirm the deal in a post to X that featured an image of his Tuesday White House visit. U.S.-listed shares of Japanese automakers including Toyota and Honda surged on the news. The U.S. is a massive buyer of Japanese cars and auto parts, which have been subject to a 25% tariff rate since the spring. Trump’s social media post did not specify how sector-specific tariffs would be treated under the deal. Any "deal that charges a lower tariff for Japanese imports with virtually no U.S. content than the tariff imposed on North American-built vehicles with high U.S. content is a bad deal for U.S. industry and US auto workers," said Matt Blunt, president of the American Automotive Policy Council that represents the Detroit Three automakers, in a statement to Reuters. Blunt, whose group represents General Motors, Ford and Chrysler-parent Stellantis, noted that tariffs on imports from Canada and Mexico were at 25%. U.S. goods imports from Japan last year were $148 billion, so 15% tariffs on Japan on its own would be good for $22 billion a year in revenue.

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