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.

Chicago Tribune [10/29/2025 4:57 PM, Maya Wilkins, 4829K] reports Kristi Noem, secretary for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, will be in Gary Thursday morning, the department announced in a Wednesday email. According to the email announcement, the Gary news conference will "discuss recent results of Operation Midway Blitz," the mass deportation mission that also includes Lake County. Noem’s news conference will be held at 11 a.m. and feature Gov. Mike Braun, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, Acting U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Director Todd Lyons, ICE Deputy Director Madison Sheahan and Indiana State Police Secretary Anthony Scott, according to the email announcement.

ABC News [10/29/2025 5:37 PM, Armando Garcia, 30493K] reports an appeals court has temporarily paused a federal judge’s order requiring U.S. Customs and Border Patrol commander-at-large Greg Bovino to appear in court daily and give updates on immigration enforcement activity in Chicago under the Trump administration’s "Operation Midway Blitz." The Department of Justice on Wednesday appealed U.S. District Court Judge Sara Ellis’ order, which mandated Bovino check in with her at 6 p.m. daily to ensure compliance with a temporary restraining order that restricted federal agents’ use of force in crowd-control tactics. The DOJ filed the appeal just hours before Bovino was slated to check in with the court for the first time. In its petition to the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals, the DOJ accused the district court of exceeding its powers and asked the appeals court to immediately pause the order and consider revoking it. Ellis’ order, issued on Tuesday, "only underscores the extent to which the district court has exceeded its judicial role by arrogating to itself the role of supervising and micromanaging the day-to-day operations of an Executive Branch law-enforcement agency,” the DOJ wrote. CNN [10/29/2025 5:39 PM, Devan Cole and Elizabeth Wolfe, 18595K] reports that the surprise order came just hours before Bovino was meant to brief US District Judge Sara Ellis, who had told him Tuesday he must be in court every weekday for the next week as she considers reports that federal agents were not following her early October order to limit aggressive tactics and warn protesters and journalists before using tear gas and less-lethal munitions. The Trump administration quickly pressed a federal appeals court to put her order on hold. In a Wednesday afternoon ruling, the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals granted their request, meaning Bovino will not make a Wednesday court appearance. The appeals court’s decision is intended to give the intermediate court time to review a request from the administration to completely scrap Ellis’ order. The Department of Homeland Security said in a statement it is "thrilled this act of judicial overreach has been paused.". It is unclear whether Bovino will need to appear in court Thursday. Ellis’ requirement, Department of Justice attorneys told the appeals court, "significantly interferes with the quintessentially executive function of ensuring the Nation’s immigration laws are properly enforced by waylaying a senior executive official critical to that mission on a daily basis.". Bovino having to appear would be "irreparably harming the government," Trump administration lawyers wrote in a court filing. As the Trump administration carries out targeted immigration enforcement in several major US cities, Bovino has emerged as the on-the-ground face of "Operation Midway Blitz" in Chicago. The targeted operation has resulted in more than 3,000 arrests since it began in September, according to DHS. But the operation has also drawn persistent protests outside the Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in Broadview, just outside Chicago. While federal agents say threatening protest activity has led them to intensify their crowd control tactics, demonstrators argue their response is often disproportionate. NBC News [10/29/2025 8:10 PM, Natasha Korecki, 34509K] reports Bovino is still scheduled to show up at the federal courthouse Thursday to submit to a deposition in the same lawsuit, filed by a group of media organizations and protesters who alleged various government acts of aggression since September. The 7th Circuit did not restrict any other of Ellis’ requirements in its brief order, including that he, as the head of “Operation Midway Blitz” in Chicago, be equipped with a body camera and receive training in how to use it. Bovino admitted on the stand that he was not wearing one even as he could be seen on video lobbing tear gas canisters onto a crowd in the Little Village neighborhood of the city last week. Ellis also ordered the government to turn over all incident reports, as well as corresponding video from immigration agents’ body cameras, by Friday. Bovino agreed in court to turn over the evidence under seal and had agreed, before the government appealed Wednesday, to appear in court to deliver daily reports to the judge. Ellis had also expressed distress over immigration agents’ actions after having seen reports of tear gas deployed in the Old Irving Park neighborhood of Chicago. It is a quiet, safer part of the city, where a confrontation involving police is a rarity. On Saturday, neighbors have said, immigration officers deployed tear gas at the same time young children were lining up for a Halloween parade. “Those kids were tear-gassed on their way to celebrate Halloween in their local school parking lot. ... That is why — one of the reasons why I’m having you in today is to ensure that as you go about enforcing the law that it’s done in a manner that is objectively reasonable and consistent with your obligations and the agents under you with the Fourth Amendment and the First Amendment,” she told Bovino, “so that kids in Little Village can feel safe walking to the store or walking to school and not worried about getting tear-gassed and not be terrified where they live. Because that’s not how any of us want to live.” A government attorney had expressed an objection in court to Ellis’ demands, including saying there were times when immigration agents needed to use chemical agents to tamp down unruly crowds.

Reported similarly:
Reuters [10/29/2025 8:34 PM, Diana Novak Jones, 36480K]
AP [10/29/2025 7:14 PM, Christine Fernando, 2218K]
NewsNation [10/29/2025 5:56 PM, Jeff Arnold, Ali Bradley, 8017K]
Chicago Tribune [10/29/2025 6:40 PM, Jason Meisner, 4829K]
NewsMax [10/29/2025 6:31 PM, Michael Katz, 4109K]
Daily Caller [10/29/2025 10:55 AM, Jason Hopkins, 835K]

CNN [10/29/2025 5:39 PM, Devan Cole, Elizabeth Wolfe, 606K] reports Border Patrol commander Gregory Bovino will not have to appear before a Chicago federal judge Wednesday evening, after an appeals court halted the judge’s order requiring Bovino to provide daily court briefings on his agents’ immigration enforcement tactics in the Chicago area. US District Judge Sara Ellis told Bovino on Tuesday that he must be in court every evening for the next week as she considers reports that federal agents were not following her early October order to limit aggressive tactics and warn protesters and journalists before using tear gas and less-lethal munitions. The Trump administration quickly pressed a federal appeals court to put her order on hold. In a Wednesday afternoon ruling, the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals granted their request, meaning Bovino will not make a Wednesday court appearance. The appeals court’s decision is intended to give the intermediate court time to review a request from the administration to completely scrap Ellis’ order. It is unclear whether Bovino will need to appear in court Thursday. Ellis’ requirement, Department of Justice attorneys told the appeals court, "significantly interferes with the quintessentially executive function of ensuring the Nation’s immigration laws are properly enforced by waylaying a senior executive official critical to that mission on a daily basis.” "Absent immediate relief from this court, Chief Bovino will be required to appear in district court starting this afternoon at 5:45 PM, irreparably harming the government," the government lawyers wrote in court papers before the appeals court halted the judge’s order.

FOX News [10/29/2025 5:08 PM, Madison Colombo, 40621K] reports Border Patrol Commander Gregory Bovino is firing back after Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson labeled him "barbaric," saying that kind of anti-police rhetoric is fueling real-world violence against immigration agents. The pushback comes after Bovino was ordered to testify in federal court by U.S. District Judge Sara Ellis, following accusations that he violated an order barring the use of riot-control weapons like tear gas during protests. After his appearance in court, Bovino was ordered to begin wearing a body camera and to report to the judge nightly. Johnson called Bovino "a barbaric individual" on Tuesday and said he hoped a federal judge would provide a "level of accountability." Bovino’s legal issues stem from clashes in Chicago’s Little Village neighborhood, where Border Patrol agents say they were attacked with rocks, bottles and fireworks. The incident remains under judicial review after video surfaced showing Bovino throwing tear gas at protesters. It comes after complaints of excessive force by officers and a judge’s restraining order limiting riot-control techniques against peaceful protesters and members of the press. In response, the Department of Homeland Security released its own video showing multiple projectiles striking Bovino. Chief Bovino says he will comply with the judge’s orders.

Daily Caller [10/29/2025 4:02 PM, Harold Hutchison, 835K] reports Chief Border Patrol Agent Greg Bovino told Fox News host Harris Faulkner Wednesday that he would be showing a federal judge videos of assaults suffered by United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents in the Chicago area. United States District Judge Sarah Ellis of the Northern District of Illinois, an Obama appointee, ordered Bovino to meet with her daily after attorneys for anti-ICE rioters claimed ICE violated her order barring the use of riot control tactics except in the case of a threat to agents. Bovino told Faulkner that he welcomed the chance to give Ellis "a very good first-hand look" at what ICE agents faced during their operations in Chicago.

FOX News [10/29/2025 12:47 PM, Staff, 40621K] reports that Fox News’ Mike Tobin reports on Border Patrol Commander Greg Bovino’s court appearance as protesters gather outside. Bovino also joined ‘The Faulkner Focus’ to respond directly to his critics. [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

FOX News [10/29/2025 2:50 PM, Michael Dorgan Fox, 40621K] reports the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has released footage that it says shows Border Patrol agents were justified in using tear gas to disperse a chaotic crowd — which at times shouted profanities and threw rocks and other items at officers — during a high-profile immigration raid in Chicago last week. During the Oct. 23 enforcement operation, Border Patrol Chief Gregory Bovino deployed a tear gas cannister — an action that prompted local media outlets and protest groups to file a lawsuit accusing him of violating a temporary restraining order. That order bars federal agents from using chemical agents on protesters without agents facing an imminent threat or giving two prior warnings. Bovino appeared in federal court Tuesday to face questions surrounding the incident and other tear-gas deployments in the city. The DHS footage, posted to X on Tuesday, appears to show Border Patrol agents under siege during an immigration raid in Chicago’s Little Village, a Southwest Side neighborhood often referred to as "La Villita" and home to one of the largest Mexican-American communities in the Midwest. The footage opens with an aerial drone shot of what the agency said were four suspected gang members who had boxed in a Border Patrol vehicle prior to the stop. DHS said the suspects fled down an alley, switched license plates and retrieved high-powered weapons. The DHS video shows an unknown liquid being thrown toward officers, followed by an object that strikes them. Moments later, a rock is hurled in Bovino’s direction. DHS said the object struck him on the head. One demonstrator can be heard responding, "No, this is my street," as another rock is thrown at officers before an agent warns, "Get back or you will be gassed.". Bovino then deploys tear gas and an aerial shot shows the crowd dispersing. "The use of chemical munitions was conducted in full accordance with CBP policy and was necessary to ensure the safety of both law enforcement and the public," DHS said. "Border Patrol agents repeated multiple warnings to back up and that chemical agents would be deployed if warnings were ignored.".

Breitbart [10/29/2025 1:31 PM, Jeff Poor, 2416K] reports that Tuesday, during an appearance on Fox News Channel’s "The Ingraham Angle," Trump border czar Tom Homan reacted to U.S. District Court Judge Sarah Ellis ordering Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials to seek her approval for law enforcement measures related to immigration. Ellis’ mandate was supported by Gov. J.B. Pritzker (D-IL), who Homan suggested should be required to wear a Border Patrol uniform to understand the challenges ICE agents face. "Tom, this judge issued a warning," host Laura Ingraham said. "And, by the way, welcome, Tom. Good to see you. Issued a warning that if agents are using this dispersant, they better be able to back it up. And if they can’t, they’ll lose that. What exactly could have happened if Bovino and those agents hadn’t dispersed that crowd as they did? You heard the threats. What could have happened, Tom? Homan replied, "Border Patrol agents could be hurt and they could be killed. Look, you know, first of all, it’s a radical decision made by a radical judge. DOJ will appeal it, and we’ll get beyond this. However, here’s what should happen. The judge, Governor Pritzker, Mayor Johnson, put a border patrol uniform on for one shift. Come out there and stand there with the men and women of the border patrol and ICE and see how you’re going to respond. Look, the border patrol agents are train very well on use of force continuum. They don’t go from zero hundred. They don’t — there’s no use of force on peaceful protesters, but when they impede them, when they threaten them, when they assault them, when they trespass, use of force is used. [To] make someone comply to the highest level as needed. The death, an action, a death threat or a serious bodily injury."

Daily Caller [10/29/2025 5:31 PM, Derek VanBuskirk, 835K] reports the Department of Justice (DOJ) announced the arrest Wednesday of 10 defendants accused of committing violence against law enforcement and property during anti-Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) demonstrations in Southern California earlier this year. The incidents are being investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF), according to a DOJ statement. Prosecutors charged Oxnard residents Virginia Reyes, 32, and Isai Carrillo, 31, with conspiracy to impede or injure a federal officer. They face as much as five years behind bars if convicted. Authorities apprehended Carrillo today while Reyes was alleged to be a fugitive from the law. In July, Department of Homeland Security (DHS) agents preparing to execute several search warrants discovered the operation had been compromised by social media posts, according to an affidavit. Protesters — alerted through networks monitoring DHS offices — gathered near the site, where they constructed a roadblock with farm equipment, authorities alleged. Federal officers attempted to leave via a dirt service road but were allegedly met with protestors, including people lobbing rocks at their vehicles. When agents tried an alternate route, they encountered a "chokepoint and ambush," according to the affidavit. At least four government vehicles suffered damage while at least one government contractor was hurt, authorities said. Nine additional defendants were charged with obstructing, impeding or interfering with law enforcement during a separate June civil disorder in downtown Los Angeles.

Los Angeles Times [10/29/2025 4:38 PM, James Queally and Brittny Mejia, 14862K] reports federal prosecutors announced charges Wednesday against 12 people who allegedly impeded officers or engaged in violence during demonstrations against the Trump administration’s immigration policies. The charges, some part of an effort dubbed "Operation Bridge Too Far" by federal authorities, largely centered on demonstrations that erupted on a freeway overpass near an immigration detention center in downtown Los Angeles on June 8, the first day the National Guard was deployed to the city. What started as a small, peaceful protest on Alameda Street exploded into a series of tense clashes between demonstrators and law enforcement. After National Guard members and U.S. Department of Homeland Security officials used tear gas and smoke bombs to try and disperse a crowd outside the detention center, more protesters flooded the area. A number of Waymo self-driving vehicles were set on fire near Olivera Street, and a group of California Highway Patrol officers on the 101 Freeway were pelted with items from protesters on the overpass above. At times, they returned fire with less-lethal rounds and tear gas. At least one protester had previously been charged in state court with throwing a flaming item at a CHP vehicle from the overpass. Authorities announced that 10 defendants charged in connection with the protests were in federal custody this week. Another is in state custody and expected to be handed over to federal authorities, and one remains a fugitive.

Daily Caller [10/29/2025 5:22 PM, Hailey Gomez, 835K] reports the Department of Justice announced Wednesday that officials arrested ten defendants on federal charges of violence against law enforcement, including two from a chaotic anti-U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) riot in California. Beginning in June, anti-ICE riots broke out across California as federal officials ramped up deportation efforts. According to a press release from the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Central District of California, ten defendants are in federal custody, while one awaits transfer to federal authorities and another is listed as a fugitive. Among the suspects, two were identified as Virginia Reyes, 32, and Isai Carrillo, 31, both from Oxnard, California. They were charged with "conspiracy to impede or injure a federal officer." According to officials, the complaint stems from a July 10 Department of Homeland Security (DHS) operation that included search warrants at several locations, including Glass House Farms in Camarillo, California.

Washington Post [10/29/2025 5:19 PM, Mark Berman, 24149K] reports the U.S. Supreme Court on Wednesday asked the Trump administration and Illinois officials for additional briefs on their dispute over whether President Donald Trump can send troops to Chicago, pushing a decision on the matter into mid-November at the earliest. The request means that Trump’s proposed troop deployment, which was initially halted by a federal judge on Oct. 9, would remain blocked for more than a month. After the Trump administration had asked the Supreme Court on Oct. 17 to allow the deployment to proceed, the court asked Illinois officials to respond within three days. The tight timeline suggested that the justices could have potentially intended to rule on the matter quickly. The new request for more information over a longer time period could signal that the justices are more split on the issue than they first appeared. The court asked for the briefs to be submitted by Nov. 17, which means any decision would come sometime after.

Reuters [10/29/2025 5:23 PM, Andrew Chung, 36480K] reports the U.S. Supreme Court signaled on Wednesday that it is actively debating how to interpret the wording of a law that limits when a president can use members of the National Guard in a challenge to President Donald Trump’s bid to dispatch troops to the Chicago area. The justices ordered the challengers - the state of Illinois and the City of Chicago - as well as Trump’s Justice Department, to file written briefs by November 10 answering the question of what the words "regular forces" in the law means. The law at issue lets a president deploy state National Guard troops to suppress a rebellion or if he is "unable with the regular forces to execute the laws of the United States." The Justice Department asked the court in an emergency filing on October 17 to lift Chicago-based U.S. District Judge April Perry’s decision to block the Guard deployment while litigation in the challenge continues. Perry ruled that Trump likely violated the law establishing preconditions for federalizing Guard troops, as well as the state’s rights under the U.S. Constitution’s 10th Amendment. The case has been characterized by starkly different portrayals of the protests against the administration’s aggressive immigration enforcement in and around Chicago.

Bloomberg [10/29/2025 2:24 PM, Erik Larson and Madin Mekelburg, 91K] reports that President Donald Trump’s effort to send troops to Democratic-led cities is facing its biggest legal test yet with a trial over the his power to deploy the National Guard to Portland, Oregon, to counter protests. A three-day trial began Wednesday in Portland to determine if protests that started in June justified Trump’s Sept. 27 order to send in troops, a move that was put on hold by the judge overseeing the lawsuit. In deciding the case, US District Judge Karin Immergut will directly address what level of unrest can justify the president bringing state troops under federal control and deploying them. The case filed Sept. 28 mirrors other lawsuits challenging Trump’s deployments in Los Angeles, Chicago and Washington, DC. While those cases have been making their way through the courts, none have yet answered whether Trump legally invoked a rarely used federal law to deploy the troops over objections from state and local officials. The administration claims the protests have been violent and have put federal property and personnel at risk, while often preventing immigration agents from performing their duties. State and local officials say Trump, who has called Portland "war torn," is wildly exaggerating the situation and that local law enforcement has been able to handle the protests without troops. The case is State of Oregon vs. Donald Trump, 3:25-cv-01756, US District Court, District of Oregon (Portland). FOX News [10/29/2025 9:01 AM, Greg Norman, 40621K] reports a federal court will rehear a case relating to President Donald Trump’s authority to send National Guard troops to Portland, Oregon. The decision from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit happened after U.S. District Judge Karen Immergut issued two back-to-back restraining orders blocking Trump from deploying California National Guard soldiers to Portland and blocking Trump from deploying any National Guard soldiers to Portland, respectively. The government appealed the first order, and a Ninth Circuit panel decided last week in a 2-1 decision to side with Trump in that matter. Then on Tuesday, the appeals court decided it would rehear the case over Trump’s authority with a larger panel of 11 judges and vacated the ruling from the three-judge panel that sided with the administration. "Upon the vote of a majority of nonrecused active judges, it is ordered that this case be reheard en banc pursuant to Federal Rule of Appellate Procedure 40(c)," the court said in a short order issued Tuesday. There is no immediate timetable when the "en banc" court – consisting of a random selection of 11 Ninth Circuit judges – will hear the case. Immergut, a Trump appointee, will preside over the trial in Portland set to begin Wednesday stemming from a lawsuit filed by the city and state against the Trump administration in a bid to block the troop deployment. During the trial, witnesses are expected to take the stand for both sides and face cross-examination. The federal defendants will call officials from U.S. Immigrationa and Customs Enforcment (ICE), the War Department and the Federal Protective Service, the agency that provides security for federal buildings.

The Hill [10/29/2025 2:19 PM, Ella Lee, 8017K] reports that the city of Portland, Ore., said Wednesday that President Trump’s bid to send in the National Guard was spurred by a "manufactured crisis" as a trial over Trump’s efforts to deploy the military on U.S. soil gets underway. Caroline Turco, a lawyer representing Portland, said during opening arguments that the evidence would show that the city does not need the National Guard. The judge must decide if the administration has been so impeded in its efforts to enforce immigration law that Trump should be allowed to "breach separation of powers to address the manufactured crisis," she said. "Are the protests in Portland so violent that the deployment of the National Guard is justified?" Turco asked. "The plaintiffs would submit to you, no." State and city officials are seeking to block the president’s efforts to send troops to patrol the city. They sued last month after Trump vowed to protect the "war-ravaged" city and its U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement offices, which he said were "under siege." The trial, which is expected to last three days, began Wednesday. The local officials’ first witness is Cmdr. Franz Schoening of the Portland Police Bureau. Department of Justice (DOJ) lawyer Eric Hamilton painted a different picture. He said that Department of Homeland Security (DHS) employees who work in Oregon have faced threats and actual violence for months and could not contain the threat themselves, prompting their request for additional assistance.

New York Times [10/29/2025 5:31 PM, Anna Griffin, 135475K] reports the Trump administration briefly deployed Oregon National Guard soldiers to Portland earlier this month, hours after a Federal District Court judge had ordered any such deployment blocked, the government revealed on Wednesday. The District Court judge, Karin Immergut, raised the possibility Wednesday that the deployment, however brief, had put the administration in contempt of court as she began a trial to determine whether to lift a temporary restraining order, or T.R.O., on troop deployments or make it permanent. Before the trial began Wednesday morning, a Justice Department lawyer, Jean Lin, told Judge Immergut that Oregon soldiers under federal control were sent to Portland between 11 p.m. on Oct. 4 and 2 a.m. on Oct. 5. Ms. Lin did not say how many soldiers were sent or what they did at the ICE building. A spokeswoman for the U.S. Northern Command, which oversees the federalized National Guard soldiers, said military officials were looking into news of the brief deployment. Emails submitted as evidence in the case show a nine-person advance team from the Oregon National Guard, part of 200 Guard troops federalized by the Department of Defense, reported working at the ICE facility after the temporary restraining order was filed. The issue marked the second time this week that the Justice Department had to come clean before judges considering Mr. Trump’s planned deployment in Portland. Federal lawyers have said the National Guard was needed in Portland because the federal government had exhausted existing resources, even after moving Federal Protective Service officers and other law enforcement agents with other federal agencies to Portland from other parts of the country. But in a filing to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit on Monday, U.S. attorneys acknowledged that they overstated the number of federal agents reassigned to Oregon.

Reuters [10/29/2025 3:40 PM, Jack Queen and Dietrich Knauth, 36480K] reports Portland police testified on Wednesday that President Donald Trump’s order to deploy National Guard troops in their city inflamed protests and increased violence, as a court held a trial over whether the troop deployment was legal. The Portland trial, before U.S. District Judge Karin Immergut, will be the first time a judge weighs evidence about whether protests at an immigration facility constituted a rebellion or prevented federal agents from enforcing the law in a way that justified a military deployment. The trial will not involve a jury. The deployment was a rare break with a centuries-old taboo against using troops on American soil. Portland police Commander Franz Schoening testified that protests were mild in September, but grew larger after Trump’s announcement that troops were headed to the city. Even with larger protests, little violence was directed at federal officers, who sometimes used excessive force to drive protests away from the Immigration and Customs Enforcement headquarters in the city, Schoening said.

CBS News [10/29/2025 12:16 PM, Staff, 39474K] reports two Illinois National Guard members told CBS News they would refuse to obey federal orders to deploy in Chicago as part of President Trump’s controversial immigration enforcement mission. "It’s disheartening to be forced to go against your community members and your neighbors," Staff Sgt. Demi Palecek said. [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

Wall Street Journal [10/29/2025 7:00 AM, Cameron McWhirter, 646K]
reports when President Trump pledged to send the National Guard to Democratic-led cities such as Washington, D.C., Chicago and Portland, Ore., he met condemnation, lawsuits and large protests. Then there is Memphis, where many have welcomed the roughly 150 National Guard troops that arrived this month, mobilized by Trump as part of a federal and state crackdown on crime in the city. “I’m looking for all the help I can get, I wish there was more,” said John Green, who manages a candy store on Main Street. “For Lease” signs hang in nearby storefronts, their windows boarded up. Business has been terrible this year, Green added, even during “Elvis Week,” the annual celebration of the city’s favorite son. “People just don’t want to come here anymore.” Downtown, where bluffs rise above the serpentine Mississippi River, George Campbell was walking his goldendoodle, Zac, when he spotted a group of National Guard soldiers in fatigues, handguns holstered at their hips. The 64-year-old psychologist said their presence had eased fears about crime. “It’s safe. What happened? Control is what happened,” he said. “It was out of control. This is necessary.” Trump has called Memphis “deeply troubled” and said he would “restore law and order.” The Memphis Police Department recently reported that overall crime had fallen to a 25-year low, but rates remain among the highest in the country. Forming a “Memphis Safe Task Force,” Trump dispatched more than a dozen federal agencies and departments—the Federal Bureau of Investigation, U.S. Marshals and others—and the Tennessee National Guard. The task force began operations in late September with the Guard patrols starting Oct. 10, according to the city. The troops are operating under the control of Republican Gov. Bill Lee. Memphis Mayor Paul Young, a Democrat, isn’t happy about the troops, a sentiment shared by some others in the predominantly Black city.

Wall Street Journal [10/29/2025 7:51 PM, Vera Bergengruen, Lara Seligman, and Dan Lyon, 646K] reports the Pentagon has ordered the National Guard to create “quick reaction” forces in every state and territory by January that are trained and equipped to respond to riots and civil unrest within the U.S., according to internal Defense Department memos. The riot control units are a major shift for the Pentagon, underscoring the Trump administration’s push to directly involve the military in responding to protests and other domestic missions that have been off-limits except in emergencies. As many as 500 soldiers in each state or territory National Guard organization will be assigned to deploy in the U.S. on short notice and receive nonlethal training in crowd control, handling of detainees and use of batons, stun guns and body shields, according to the Pentagon directives. President Trump directed Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth in August to set up the specialized units. The memos, which were sent to state Guard organizations as guidance for setting up the quick reaction forces, were reviewed by The Wall Street Journal. The Guardian previously reported the directives. They indicate that the Pentagon is carrying out Trump’s order on a large-scale and expedited timeline. “The Department of War will be prepared to immediately provide support to Federal, state and local law enforcement to address threats of civil disturbance,” Hegseth said in a Sept. 24 memo ordering the creation of the “National Guard Response Force” for “rapid mobilization as the circumstances require.”

The AP [10/29/2025 9:28 PM, Ben Finley and Lisa Mascaro, 2416K] reports Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth announced Wednesday that the U.S. military carried out another strike on a boat he said was carrying drugs in the eastern Pacific Ocean, killing all four people aboard, as the Trump administration pursues its divisive campaign against drug cartels in the waters off South America. Hegseth, who’s been traveling in Japan and Malaysia, said in a social media post that intelligence determined the craft was “transiting along a known narco-trafficking route, and carrying narcotics.” He said the strike was conducted in international waters and no U.S. forces were harmed. A video posted by Hegseth shows a boat exploding into flames and smoke. It was the 14th strike since the campaign began in early September, while the death toll has grown to at least 61. The Trump administration also has been building up an unusually large force of warships in the region, carrying Marines and aircraft. Their presence has fueled speculation that the moves are aimed at ousting Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, whom the U.S. has accused of narcoterrorism. President Donald Trump has justified the attacks on the boats as a necessary escalation to stem the flow of drugs into the United States. He has asserted the U.S. is engaged in an “armed conflict” with drug cartels, relying on the same legal authority used by the Bush administration when it declared a war on terrorism after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. But as the number of strikes has grown, a debate in Congress has escalated over the limits of the president’s power. The attacks have occurred without any legal investigation or a traditional declaration of war from Congress, and some lawmakers have raised questions about the lack of hard evidence to justify the killings. The Trump administration has shown no evidence to support its claims about the boats that have been attacked, their connection to drug cartels, or even the identity of the people killed in the strikes. Sen. Mark Warner, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, said Wednesday that the Trump administration has briefed Republicans — but not Democrats — on the boat strikes. The military briefing at the Capitol comes as the Senate is facing a potential vote on a war powers resolution that would prohibit strikes in or near Venezuela unless Congress approves the military action. “Shutting Democrats out of a briefing on U.S. military strikes and withholding the legal justification for those strikes from half the Senate is indefensible and dangerous,” Warner of Virginia said in a statement. “Decisions about the use of American military force are not campaign strategy sessions, and they are not the private property of one political party,” he said. The briefing was conducted by officials from the Defense and Justice departments for the GOP leadership and senators, according to a person familiar with the situation and granted anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss it. Warner demanded a similar briefing for the Democrats. The New York Times [10/29/2025 9:00 PM, Helene Cooper and Robert Jimison, 135475K] reports Mr. Hegseth said on social media that the strike took place in international waters and was directed at a boat that he said was operated by a “designated terrorist organization” in the eastern Pacific Ocean. Wednesday’s strike came two days after the deadliest known set of strikes since President Trump authorized the military to begin targeting people aboard boats in the seas of Latin America last month. On Monday, Mr. Hegseth said, 14 men were killed in three strikes on four boats. More than 60 people have been killed in the U.S. campaign in total. The president has named and targeted a number of drug cartels as “narco-terrorists” and maintains that they are now enemy combatants who can be killed at will. “The Western Hemisphere is no longer a safe haven for narco-terrorists bringing drugs to our shores to poison Americans,” Mr. Hegseth said in his social media post. He said the Pentagon would “continue to hunt them down and eliminate them wherever they operate.” The defense secretary’s announcement was accompanied by a 22-second video of a boat that was apparently struck and engulfed in flames. Mr. Hegseth did not provide geographic details, beyond saying the strike took place in the eastern Pacific. After launching a series of strikes in the Caribbean Sea near the coast of Venezuela, the Trump administration has more recently directed the U.S. military to strike boats in the eastern Pacific, off the coast of Colombia. A broad range of outside experts in laws governing the use of armed force have said the campaign is illegal because the military is not permitted to deliberately target civilians — even criminal suspects — who are not directly participating in armed hostilities. But the Trump administration has asserted that the president has the power to “determine,” without any authorization from Congress, that drug cartels and those who work for them are enemy combatants. Mr. Trump has falsely asserted that each destroyed boat saves 25,000 American lives. In reality, as many as 100,000 Americans die each year from drug overdoses, but most of those deaths are the result of fentanyl, which comes from labs in Mexico. South America produces cocaine. The latest strike came as a growing number of Republican senators have privately expressed unease about being left out of the administration’s deliberations. Some have signaled an openness to backing legislation that would require the administration to seek approval from Congress before continuing additional strikes. There is also increased concern among lawmakers that the administration may expand its campaign to include strikes on land targets in Venezuela. Seeking to address concerns about the expanding military campaign, national security officials held a briefing on Wednesday for Republican senators about recent strikes, drawing criticism from Democrats, who have repeatedly pressed for legal justification for the campaign. FOX News [10/29/2025 8:51 PM, Landon Mion, 40621K] reports that the Pentagon has refused to release the identities of those killed or evidence of drugs on board. The Trump administration has been scrutinized in recent weeks over the strikes, including by Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., who raised concerns about killing people without due process and the possibility of killing innocent people. Paul has cited Coast Guard statistics that show a significant percentage of boats boarded for suspicion of drug trafficking are innocent. The senator has also argued that if the administration plans to engage in a war with Venezuela, as it has targeted boats it claims are transporting drugs for the Venezuela-linked Tren de Aragua gang, it must seek a declaration of war from Congress. Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee also penned a letter on Wednesday demanding to review the legal justification behind the series of boat strikes they say appear to violate several laws. "Drug trafficking is a terrible crime that has had devastating impacts on American families and communities and should be prosecuted. Nonetheless, the President’s actions to hold alleged drug traffickers accountable must still conform with the law," the letter reads. [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

Reported similarly:
Breitbart [10/30/2025 1:28 AM, Staff, 2416K]

The Hill [10/29/2025 1:23 PM, Lindsey Granger, 12595K] reports that the United States just carried out more lethal strikes on boats in the Pacific Ocean — and if it feels like these stories are suddenly becoming routine, that’s because they are. This was the 11th time in recent months that the Trump administration has approved military action on alleged drug-running vessels. But here’s the part getting lost in the headlines: this is not a "drug bust." This is warfare — with no trial, no transparency and no real accountability. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth posted about the operation on X, writing: "Yesterday, at the direction of President Trump, the Department of War carried out three lethal kinetic strikes on four vessels operated by Designated Terrorist Organizations (DTO) trafficking narcotics in the Eastern Pacific." He went on to say, "A total of 14 narco-terrorists were killed during the three strikes, with one survivor. All strikes were in international waters with no U.S. forces harmed." In other words: no boardings, no seizures, no presentation of evidence — just immediate execution from the sky. Mexico says its authorities were the ones who handled the rescue of the lone survivor, but the Mexican government didn’t confirm whether that person is even in their custody. What they did make clear is that they’re not on board with this strategy. Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum said at a news conference, "We want all international treaties to be respected." She continued, "We do not agree with these kinds of attacks, so I have requested that, within the framework of the security agreement we have with the United States, the ambassador be called in and that this situation be reviewed."

Reuters [10/29/2025 7:05 PM, Staff, 36480K] reports six people, including a Democratic congressional candidate, were indicted Wednesday on charges of impeding a federal officer in connection with a September protest at an immigration detention facility in Broadview, Illinois. The suburban Chicago facility has been a flashpoint since U.S. President Donald Trump launched a stepped-up immigration enforcement operation in the area on September 8. Agents have responded to protests on multiple occasions by deploying tear gas and shooting pepper balls at demonstrators. In the indictment, prosecutors allege that on September 26, Kat Abughazaleh - a former journalist who is running for a U.S. House seat as a Democrat - and five other activists protesting at the Broadview site crowded around a government vehicle driven by a federal agent, intentionally hindering its progress as the agent tried to drive into the facility. According to prosecutors, the activists - Abughazaleh and Andre Martin, Michael Rabbitt, Catherine Sharp, Brian Straw and Joselyn Walsh - banged and pushed on the vehicle, scratched the word "pig" into its body, and broke a rear windshield wiper. Several attorneys for the protesters denied the accusations on Wednesday. Molly Armour, an attorney for Sharp, who is the chief of staff for Chicago alderperson Andre Vasquez, said the charges against Sharp are an "effort by the Trump administration to frighten people out of participating in protest and exercising their First Amendment rights.". Attorneys for Rabbitt and Walsh said their clients would plead not guilty to the charges. Abughazaleh told Reuters she would also plead not guilty. Straw, a member of the Village Board for Chicago suburb Oak Park, said in a statement the charges would not "deter me from fulfilling my oath of office.". FOX News [10/29/2025 6:32 PM, Bonny Chu, 40621K] reports Katherine "Kat" Abughazaleh, 26, who has branded herself a "Gen Z influencer" running for Congress in Illinois’s 9th District, is accused of conspiracy to impede or injure an ICE officer while on duty in Broadview, Illinois, Sept. 26, according to an indictment unsealed Wednesday. Abughazaleh had been expected to win the Democratic nomination to succeed Rep. Jan Schakowsky, D-Ill., 81, who is retiring. Five other protesters were also indicted with Abughazaleh, including one of her associates and two other political candidates. The defendants include Andre Martin, described in the indictment as an associate who worked for or with her; Michael Rabbit, a Democratic committee person in Chicago’s 45th Ward; Catherine Sharp, a candidate for the Cook County Board of Commissioners; and Brian Straw and Joselyn Walsh, who are listed as Illinois residents. According to the indictment, a group of individuals surrounded a government vehicle with "intent to hinder or impede" operations by "aggressively" banging and pushing the car. The protesters allegedly etched derogatory messages including the word "PIG" into the car, broke a side mirror and damaged a rear windshield wiper. The indictment also alleges that Abughazaleh moved to the front of the government vehicle during the confrontation, pressing her hands against the hood and using her body to block its path. "No one is above the law, and no one has the right to obstruct it," Todd Blanche, deputy attorney general, said in a statement Wednesday. "The Department of Justice will never tolerate such conduct and will continue to hold accountable anyone who seeks to impede lawful federal operations.". "All federal officials must be able to discharge the duties of their office without confronting force, intimidation or threats," Andrew S. Boutros, United States attorney for the Northern District of Illinois, added in a statement Wednesday.

Reported similarly:
New York Times [10/29/2025 6:44 PM, Mitch Smith, 135475K]
Washington Post [10/29/2025 7:04 PM, Brianna Tucker, 24149K]
National Review [10/29/2025 4:12 PM, Kamden Mulder, 109K]
USA Today [10/29/2025 6:18 PM, Michael Loria, 67103K]

Washington Post [10/29/2025 5:02 AM, Drew Harwell and Joyce Sohyun Lee, 24149K] reports the Department of Homeland Security posted a swaggering montage to social media in August declaring it had triumphed in its takeover of Washington, D.C. It showed footage of federal agents fighting what a DHS official called a “battle for the soul of our nation” and working “day and night to arrest, detain and deport vicious criminals from our nation’s capital.” There was one problem. Several of the clips had been recorded during unrelated operations months earlier, in Los Angeles and West Palm Beach, Florida. The official’s sound bite about deportations in D.C. played over a clip from May showing detainees on a Coast Guard boat off the coast of Nantucket, the Massachusetts island 400 miles away. Officials in President Donald Trump’s administration have used similarly misleading footage in at least six videos promoting its immigration agenda shared in the last three months, a Washington Post analysis found, muddying the reality of events in viral clips that have been viewed millions of times. Some videos that purported to show the fiery chaos of Trump-targeted cities included footage from completely different states. One that claimed to show dramatic examples of past administrations’ failures instead featured border crossings and smuggling boats recorded during Trump’s first term. The Post provided DHS a detailed list of videos featuring misleading footage. DHS spokeswoman Tricia McLaughlin did not dispute the errors or explain what had happened but said the videos were a small percentage of the more than 400 that the agency has posted this year. “Violence and rioting against law enforcement is unacceptable regardless of where it occurs,” she said.

The Hill [10/29/2025 2:57 PM, Tara Suter, 12595K] reports the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) attacked Washington Post over a report about footage of immigration operations the outlet characterized as misleading. The Post reported Wednesday that an August DHS post, in which a department staffer says that federal officers were on the job "day and night to arrest, detain and deport vicious criminals from our nation’s capital," featured multiple clips from operations months prior and outside the District of Columbia. "What a dishonest, slanted, and fundamentally inaccurate piece from @WashingtonPost," the DHS wrote in a post Wednesday on social platform X, featuring a screenshot of a report from the Post. "Brutal assaults, and attacks by antifa terrorists have surged against our officers for months now, and Washington Post has completely ignored them," the department added. Clips of operations, such as those used in the DHS video in question, have been used by administration officials in a minimum of six pro-President Trump immigration agenda videos put out within the last three months, according to the Post.

FOX News [10/29/2025 9:33 PM, Lindsay Kornick, 40621K] reports the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) pushed back Wednesday at a local NBC News affiliate’s report on an arrested illegal immigrant in California. On Saturday, NBC Bay Area reported that federal agents arrested 42-year-old Gerardo in San Jose as he was leaving for work. "According to the family’s Ring video, Gerardo was in his black truck at 7:45 a.m., about to head out to his construction job when multiple people, who appear to be federal officers, approached his truck and yelled for him to get out," the report read. It continued, "His wife, Idalia, who says she is a U.S citizen, ran to the truck to try to stop the arrest. She said a woman, not in uniform, hit her 22-year-old daughter with a baton - the incident, however, is not shown on the footage.” DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin, however, wrote on X that the local affiliate did not report the full details on the arrested suspect. "Of course @NBCNews refuses to tell the American public that this illegal alien from Mexico has a rap sheet that includes: lewd and lascivious acts with a CHILD, battery of a spouse, domestic battery, compensation for prostitution, felony reentry after removal," McLaughlin wrote. In a longer statement to Fox News Digital, McLaughlin confirmed that ICE officers arrested Gerardo Rojas-Leyva, an illegal immigrant from Mexico with a history of battery. McLaughlin said that Rojas-Leyva did not provide identification and resisted arrest, forcing an officer to deploy a taser and handcuff him. "Rojas-Leyva’s criminal history includes lewd and lascivious acts with child of 14-15 years old, battery of a spouse, inflicting corporal injury on a spouse/cohabitant, and proving compensation for prostitution," McLaughlin said. "Under President Trump and Secretary Noem, if you break the law, you will face the consequences. Criminal illegal aliens are not welcome in the U.S.” McLaughlin previously attacked NBC over a report that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents used a 5-year-old girl with autism to pressure her father, an illegal immigrant from Guatemala, to surrender. She called the report a "disgusting smear" of ICE agents. "Keep in mind, these men and women of ICE are fathers and mothers, and they are sons and daughters. These are people who just want to go home to their families at night and serve our great nation," McLaughlin said on "Fox & Friends." [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

CBS News [10/29/2025 12:52 PM, Kathryn Watson, 39474K] reports that President Trump told reporters Wednesday that he has the authority to send U.S. military forces beyond the National Guard into U.S. cities, claiming not even the courts could stop him, but said that hasn’t been necessary so far. Speaking to reporters aboard Air Force One during his trip to Asia, the president said he could send the "Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines," and "anybody I wanted" into U.S. cities, and would do so "if I thought it was necessary." Earlier in his trip, the president told U.S. troops at the Yokosuka naval base near Tokyo that he was prepared to send "more than the National Guard" into U.S. cities if needed. Asked whether he meant sending other branches of the military into U.S. cities, Mr. Trump said Wednesday, "You know if I want to enact a certain act, I’m allowed to do it routinely," an apparent reference to the Insurrection Act, which allows the military to act in a law enforcement capacity to suppress a rebellion or quell domestic violence. The authority that has not been invoked by a U.S. president in more than 30 years. "And I’d be allowed to do whatever I want," Mr. Trump added. "But we haven’t chosen to do that because we’re very well — we’re doing very well without it. But I’d be allowed to do that, you understand that, and the courts wouldn’t get involved, nobody would get involved, and I could send the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines, I can send anybody I wanted. But I haven’t done that because we’re doing so well without it."

Washington Examiner [10/29/2025 6:00 AM, Kaelan Deese, 1394K] reports Salvadoran migrant Kilmar Abrego Garcia will remain in the United States through at least late November, according to new court filings, as the Justice Department fights to avoid a subpoena for the testimony of its second-in-command, Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche. The extension marks the latest turn in a monthslong legal battle that has placed Abrego Garcia, 30, at the center of the Trump administration’s stepped-up immigration enforcement strategy. His case is unfolding on two fronts: a civil fight in Maryland over his removal and a criminal prosecution in Tennessee, with both courts now probing whether the government pursued charges against him as retaliation. U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis in Maryland, who blocked Abrego Garcia’s deportation in August, approved a new schedule Tuesday allowing him to remain in the country to participate in a two-day evidentiary hearing next week in Nashville. That hearing, ordered to take place next week by the federal court in Tennessee, will examine whether the DOJ engaged in "selective" or "vindictive" prosecution when it brought criminal charges stemming from a 2022 traffic stop. Xinis also ordered both sides to return to her courtroom before Thanksgiving for a motion hearing, which will, in part, consider the government’s motion to dissolve her injunction preventing the immediate deportation of Abrego Garcia. Meanwhile, in Tennessee, U.S. District Judge Waverly Crenshaw is weighing whether to compel Blanche, Trump’s former personal attorney and current second-in-line to the attorney general, to testify at the hearing. Abrego Garcia’s legal team argued that testimony from the DOJ’s No. 2 is necessary to determine who authorized the prosecution and why. Crenshaw has also ordered the DOJ to turn over internal communications tied to the decision to pursue the case, which resulted in two immigrant-smuggling charges returned by a grand jury in May. Separately, Crenshaw reprimanded Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and Bondi on Monday for recent public comments about the case, calling them "exaggerated if not simply inaccurate" and in violation of local court rules. He ordered prosecutors to formally remind all DOJ and DHS employees of the restrictions on public statements.

Reported similarly:
NewsMax [10/29/2025 9:27 AM, Sandy Fitzgerald, 4109K]

USA Today [10/30/2025 4:04 AM, Dace Potas, 75552K] reports President Donald Trump is ramping up his campaign against suspected Venezuelan drug boats. To date, the U.S. military has reported destroying about 15 vessels, killing 57 people and leaving several survivors. The administration has justified these strikes under suspicious pretenses, and Americans should worry about the expansion of presidential war powers that Trump’s actions signal. While I am favorable toward the use of overwhelming force against drug traffickers as a deterrent, Trump is likely violating the Constitution in executing supposed narcotics smugglers. All the while, Congress is idle, completely unwilling to reassert its authority in just about anything. Blowing up drug boats headed for the United States is awesome, and a policy that I would wholly endorse if it were done legally. What better deterrent can you come up with for drug runners than the possibility of fiery death from above? However, there are some serious questions about Trump’s air strikes off the coast of Venezuela. It’s unclear what the legal rationale for these strikes is.

USA Today [10/29/2025 11:30 AM, Rex Huppke, 67103K] reports if you’d like a gauge of how far basic human decency has fallen under the Trump administration, consider this quote from a federal judge addressing the guy spearheading a violent crackdown on immigrants in Chicago. "Kids dressed in Halloween costumes walking to a parade do not pose an immediate threat to the safety of a law enforcement officer," U.S. District Judge Sara Ellis said to Border Patrol chief Gregory Bovino during an Oct. 28 hearing. "They just don’t. And you can’t use riot-control weapons against them." That seems correct. I don’t think there are too many Americans out there who would be in favor of masked federal agents/goons using riot-control weapons on trick-or-treaters. You’ve got to really hate Halloween ‒ and children ‒ to pull that kind of crap. And yet … that crap has been pulled. On Oct. 25, Border Patrol agents turned a children’s Halloween parade in the city’s Old Irving Park neighborhood into chaos, conducting an immigration raid and tossing tear gas canisters without warning. "Tricia McLaughlin, assistant secretary for Public Affairs at the Department of Homeland Security, said neighbors provoked Bovino and other agents by throwing objects at them and setting off fireworks in their direction. Bovino was hit in his head with a rock, McLaughlin said. "McLaughlin said agents, including Bovino, issued multiple warnings before using tear gas on the crowd. "But the video does not show protesters throwing rocks or fireworks at agents, nor can agents be heard warning protesters before Bovino throws the canister at the crowd."

Bloomberg [10/29/2025 8:55 AM, Abby McCloskey, 18207K] reports you have to hand it to the Trump Administration. Illegal border crossings along the US–Mexico border are at their lowest since 1970. That’s a welcome change from the Biden Administration, when officials denied the obvious problems at the southern border. Turns out, Americans didn’t like the Democrats’ free-for-all. The vast majority of Americans (77%) believe that we are at a better place on illegal immigration relative to last year, according to polling by the center-left organization Third Way. But instead of announcing victory, the Administration keeps going. It has gone, and is going, too far — even according to those in the border states who presumably would feel the brunt of illegal immigration the most. Consider my home state of Texas. A recent University of Houston/Texas Southern University poll found that six in ten Texans support sending the US military to the Southern border. This makes sense, considering that without federal assistance, the state is on its own and has incurred considerable costs. But the same share of Texans — six in ten — disapprove of the Trump Administration’s suspension of most asylum claims, a process that’s supposed to protect individuals fleeing violence and persecution. This split spills over into other issues. For example, a plurality of Texans believe that Trump’s immigration actions will reduce crime (46%). But a similar share (47%) believe that Trump’s immigration policies will hurt the state’s economy. Put this all together and Texans are split 51%–49% on approving or disapproving of Trump’s actions on immigration. This, when border security should be a slam-dunk in a state with the longest border along Mexico. In a state Trump won a year ago by 13 points.

San Francisco Chronicle [10/29/2025 9:00 AM, Jeffrey Fields, 4722K] reports "I think we’re just going to kill people that are bringing drugs into our country. OK? We’re going to kill them. You know, they’re going to be, like, dead," President Donald Trump said in late October 2025 of U.S. military strikes on boats in the Caribbean Sea north of Venezuela. The Trump administration asserted without providing any evidence that the boats were carrying illegal drugs. Fourteen boats that the administration alleged were being operated by drug traffickers have been struck, killing 43 people. On Oct. 24, the administration began a substantial military buildup in the region. The Pentagon moved the aircraft carrier USS Gerald R. Ford and some of its strike group, along with several other naval ships, to the Caribbean and moved F-35 fighter jets to Puerto Rico. This is the largest U.S. naval deployment in the Caribbean Sea since the Cuban missile crisis in 1962. According to the White House, the naval buildup and strikes on boats in international waters are part of counternarcotics operations. The vessels targeted allegedly belonged to Venezuelan drug smugglers, though the administration has produced no evidence that there were drugs on the boats, or what type. Trump has named fentanyl as one of them. At times the president and some of his advisers have referred to the operators and occupants of the boats as "narco-terrorists." But they have offered no explanation why the people would be considered terrorists. The president and his advisers’ own words have also indicated that the larger intentions of the administration could be to topple the government of Nicolás Maduro in Venezuela. But as a former political-military analyst and former senior adviser at the Department of Defense, I find it hard to discern a coherent strategy or objective.

Wall Street Journal [20/29/25 1:34 PM, Jeanne Shaheen, 646K] reports as President Trump meets Xi Jinping in South Korea, I believe America’s China strategy needs a course correction—but not a knee-jerk reversion to a pre-Trump status quo. If we want to win the competition with China, we need to think well beyond the next election and even the next decade. We need to rebuild a durable bipartisan consensus over how to approach the world’s most consequential relationship. That will require a plan that avoids the big swings we’ve seen in our China strategy the past two decades. For nine months Mr. Trump has waged a damaging and unsustainable trade war with China that is raising costs for American families. The war hasn’t rebalanced trade, reduced the export of Chinese precursors for the fentanyl arriving in our cities, or held Beijing accountable for its aggressive gray-zone activities across the Indo-Pacific. At the same time, Mr. Trump has eroded many of the critical sources of strength we most need to compete with China—the collective economic leverage of our alliances, strategic foreign-aid programs, counter-disinformation tools, and the diplomatic infrastructure that advances American interests and influence globally. Meanwhile, China has benefited from the consistency and patient strategy that its autocratic system and entrenched leadership allow. Mr. Xi and his lieutenants plan for outcomes in decades, not election cycles. He has set a goal of 2049 for China to become a “modern socialist country” and, more ominously, of 2027 for readiness to invade Taiwan. America’s messy, imperfect democracy is among its greatest strengths. But as traditions of bipartisanship have eroded, especially in foreign policy, our global position has weakened. Adversaries have taken note. Huge foreign-policy swings in recent years have confused and weakened allies, damaged complex trading relationships, and created opportunities for enemies to seize advantage in the resulting chaos. That’s why the U.S. needs a long view that begins with a rebuilt bipartisan consensus around our approach to China and recognizes that neither a go-it-alone strategy nor a policy of accommodation has proved effective.

Blaze [10/29/2025 3:10 PM, Candace Hathaway, 1442K] reports the government shutdown has not hindered the Trump administration’s federal agents from continuing nationwide immigration enforcement. On Tuesday, Immigration and Customs Enforcement arrested more of the "worst of the worst" criminal illegal aliens, including pedophiles, abusers, and drug traffickers, according to a Department of Homeland Security press release exclusively obtained by Blaze News. "The Democrats’ government shutdown will not stop DHS law enforcement from arresting and removing the worst of the worst criminal illegal aliens from American communities. Just yesterday, ICE arrested pedophiles, abusers, violent assailants, and drug traffickers from America’s streets," DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin stated. "Nothing will slow us down from making America safe again — not even a government shutdown," McLaughlin added. The DHS highlighted five of those arrests.

AP [10/29/2025 7:29 PM, Jim Mustian and Jack Brook, 19051K] reports immigration authorities did not receive word of a court order blocking the removal of a man living in Alabama until after he had been deported to Laos, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security said Wednesday, dismissing claims that officials violated the order. Chanthila "Shawn" Souvannarath, 44, was deported on Friday, according to his attorneys, a day after a federal judge in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, told U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to keep him in the country so that he could present what the judge called a "substantial claim of U.S. citizenship.". Souvannarath was born in a refugee camp in Thailand but has lived most of his life in the U.S. DHS spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin said the judge’s order keeping him in the country "was not served" to ICE until after Souvannarath had been deported. "To the media’s chagrin, there was no mistake," McLaughlin said in a statement. DHS and ICE did not respond to questions from The Associated Press seeking additional details on the timeline and how officials receive federal court orders. The American Civil Liberties Union, which is representing Souvannarath, asked U.S. District Judge Shelly Dick to order his immediate return to the U.S., calling the deportation "unlawful.". "ICE has acted in direct opposition to a federal court order, which should disturb everyone," said Nora Ahmed, legal director of the ACLU of Louisiana. The deportation comes as Trump administration officials have repeatedly clashed with the courts over their attempts to deport large numbers of immigrants. There have been previous cases of U.S. citizens being deported, including U.S.-born children. McLaughlin said Souvannarath "lost his green card" and was ordered to be deported in 2006 following convictions for "heinous crimes" — assault and unlawful possession of a firearm — and "had no right to be in this country." It was not clear why Souvannarath was not previously taken into ICE custody.

FOX News [10/30/2025 4:26 AM, Elizabeth Pritchett, 40019K] reports U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers are facing a surge in death threats and violent attacks as they carry out the Trump administration’s crackdown on illegal immigration. Statistics released by the Department of Homeland Security on Wednesday show that ICE officers are experiencing an 8,000% increase in death threats targeting ICE officers. Assistant DHS Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said the threats come as officers "risk their lives every single day to remove the worst of the worst." "From bounties placed on their heads for their murders, threats to their families, stalking, and doxxing online, our officers are experiencing an unprecedented level of violence," she said, in part. McLaughlin also said "sanctuary politicians" have contributed to the surge "through their repeated vilification and demonization tactics, including gross comparisons to the Nazi Gestapo." She added that "this violence against law enforcement must end." DHS cited several recent instances of threats against ICE officers and their families — including some that offered money for their killings.

NewsMax [10/29/2025 12:46 PM, Sandy Fitzgerald, 4109K] reports that the government’s decision to transfer Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials in Phoenix and other major U.S. cities is being seen by some as a move to ramp up deportation efforts and a sign of internal strain within the Department of Homeland Security, a claim the agency denies. In Phoenix, John Cantu, the ICE officer overseeing deportation operations, has been removed — or is about to be removed — from his post, reports The Arizona Republic on Wednesday, quoting a top aide on Capitol Hill. The officials who have been removed, in addition to Cantu, are Denver Field Office Director Robert Guadian; San Diego Field Office Director Patrick Divver; Los Angeles Field Office Director Ernesto Santacruz; and Philadelphia’s acting Field Office Director Brian McShane. In Philadelphia, an ICE Homeland Security Investigations official — not a Border Patrol officer — will take over. One faction, led by Border Czar Tom Homan and ICE Director Todd Lyons, wants ICE to focus on immigrants with criminal records or final removal orders. Another faction, aligned with Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, senior adviser Corey Lewandowski, and Border Patrol Cmdr. Greg Bovino, favors highly visible raids to increase deportation numbers. An anonymous official suggested internal political dynamics may also be at play, telling the Washington Examiner: "I personally think this is being pushed by [Homeland Security Secretary Kristi] Noem and [Corey Lewandowski, DHS senior adviser] because they don’t like [White House Border Czar Tom Homan]. I think Tom would have said, ‘No way.’". DHS Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs Tricia McLaughlin has downplayed reports of a major shake-up. "Talk about sensationalism," she said. "Only the media would describe standard agency personnel changes as a ‘massive shake-up.’"

NPR [10/29/2025 2:51 PM, Jasmine Garsd, 28013K] reports that if you were to base your entire knowledge of American current events solely on the social media feeds of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), you could easily conclude that the U.S. is at war. Earlier this month, a recruitment video featured on the agency’s social media platforms urged viewers to join ICE, stating: "under the leadership of President Trump and Secretary Noem, we’ve reclaimed our border, secured our nation, and have begun to deport these foreign invaders. Equally important as the task of securing our borders is the task of defending our culture - and what it means to be an American." The video is part of a social media and advertising blitz to build public support for the current crackdown, and recruit new immigration agents. Homeland Security’s stated mission is law enforcement, immigration, travel security and cybersecurity. Its campaign calling for the protection of American culture from invaders has raised eyebrows, and prompted accusations by the Southern Poverty Law Center’s Hatewatch Project, of promoting a White, Christian nationalist agenda. NPR reached out multiple times to DHS Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs Tricia McLaughlin with detailed questions about their social media campaign. She did not respond. [Editorial note: consult audio at source link]

FOX News [10/29/2025 7:50 AM, Michael Dorgan Fox, 40621K] Video: HERE reports the top elected official in Nassau County on New York’s Long Island has pledged to hire more police and expand the county’s partnership with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) if Zohran Mamdani wins the New York City mayoral race next week. Nassau County Executive Bruce Blakeman, a Republican known for emphasizing public safety and fiscal restraint, made the pledge to appeal to New York City residents who may consider relocating to Long Island if the Democratic frontrunner takes City Hall, Blakeman’s spokesman told the New York Post. The move is part of Blakeman’s re-election strategy as he faces Democratic challenger Seth Koslow later this month, according to the outlet. "In the unfortunate event of a Mamdani win, [Blakeman] will hire more police officers, increase cooperation with [ICE], and actively encourage people and businesses to move to the safest county in America," Blakeman’s spokesman, Chris Boyle, told the Post. [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

AP [10/29/2025 2:15 PM, Maryclaire Dale, 31753K] Video: HERE reports after waiting more than four decades to clear his name in a friend’s 1980 killing, Subramanyam Vedam was set to walk free from a Pennsylvania prison this month. Vedam and Thomas Kinser were the 19-year-old children of Penn State University faculty. Vedam was the last person seen with Kinser and was twice convicted of killing him, despite a lack of witnesses or motive. In August, a judge threw out the conviction after Vedam’s lawyers found new ballistics evidence that prosecutors had never disclosed. As his sister prepared to bring him home on Oct. 3, the thin, white-haired Vedam was instead taken into federal custody over a 1999 deportation order. The 64-year-old, who legally came to the U.S. from India when he was 9 months old, now faces another daunting legal fight. Amid the Trump Administration’s focus on mass deportation, Vedam’s lawyers must persuade an immigration court that a 1980s drug conviction should be outweighed by the years he wrongly spent in prison. For a time, immigration law allowed people who had reformed their lives to seek such waivers. Vedam never pursued it then because of the murder conviction. "He was someone who’s suffered a profound injustice," said immigration lawyer Ava Benach. "(And) those 43 years aren’t a blank slate. He lived a remarkable experience in prison." His lawyers hope immigration judges will consider the totality of his case. The administration, in a brief filed Friday, opposes the effort. So Vedam remains at an 1,800-bed U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in central Pennsylvania. "Criminal illegal aliens are not welcome in the U.S," a Department of Homeland Security spokesperson said in an email about the case. [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

CBS New York [10/29/2025 5:26 PM, Staff, 39474K] Video: HERE reports United States Customs and Border Protection, along with other agents with the Department of Homeland Security, took dozens of people into custody at a warehouse in New Jersey on Wednesday. CBS News New York’s Christine Sloan reports from Woodbridge Township.

Breitbart [10/29/2025 12:11 PM, Bob Price, 2416K] reports during the Biden-era border crisis, Texas Governor Greg Abbott ordered the busing of illegal aliens to sanctuary cities, including more than 35,000 who were bused to the Chicago area. Now, Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials ordered 100 arrested illegal aliens to be bused to Texas — not for release, but for deportation processing. ICE officials posted a video on social media showing more than 100 arrested illegal aliens being loaded onto buses bound for a removal processing facility in Texas. Once removed, these illegal aliens will add to the more than 500,000 deportations carried out so far by the Trump administration. The more than 100 illegal aliens being bused from Illinois to Texas this week for removal processing will add to the more than 527,000 who have already been deported under the new administration’s aggressive removal policies. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) officials announced on October 27, that more than two million illegal aliens have left the country. This includes 1.6 million who used the CBP Home app for self deportation. "The Trump Administration is on pace to shatter historic records and deport nearly 600,000 illegal aliens by the end of President Donald Trump’s first year since returning to office. More than 2 million illegal aliens have left the U.S. including 1.6 million who have voluntarily self-deported and over 527,000 deportations," said Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin. "This is just the beginning. President Trump and Secretary Noem have jumpstarted an agency that was hamstrung and barred from doing its job for the last four years. In the face of a historic number of injunctions from activist judges and threats to law enforcement, DHS, ICE and CBP, have not just closed the border, but made historic strides to carry out President Trump’s promise of arresting and deporting illegal aliens who have invaded our country."

Chicago Tribune [10/29/2025 6:23 PM, Meredith Colias-Pete, 4829K] reports Arnoldo Carrillo and his sister Sarai said they were sleeping in from a church retreat that weekend when their father, Rosario Carrillo Lopez, took their 14-year-old brother to school on Oct. 13 at Gary Lighthouse Charter School. Court records show immigration agents were staking out their house and started tailing their father on the way to school. As he headed back, they tried to arrest him. U.S. Homeland Security agents said in sworn court filings that their father hit one of their vehicles trying to escape. His children say that is not true — that agents hit his mini GMC SUV trying to force him off the road to apprehend him. Days later, immigration agents raided their Gary home at around 6 a.m. Oct. 23. Their father is being held at the Hammond City Jail. Their mother, who was arrested while hiding in a basement closet and who spent thousands trying to renew an expired visa, is in an ICE detention facility in El Paso, Texas. Their 14-year-old brother, who is a U.S. citizen, is also still being held in Lake County Juvenile Detention Center, his family says.

FOX News [10/29/2025 6:49 PM, Adam Sabes, 40621K] reports two illegal immigrants were charged after a crash left a local Illinois county board member and his wife dead. Edwin Pacheco-Meza, 34, was allegedly driving a car under the influence when he caused a crash that left Coles County Board Member Michael Clayton and his wife, Gail Clayton, dead in Westfield, Illinois, according to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). DHS reported that ammunition, an extended magazine, drugs and an open container of alcohol were found inside Pacheco-Meza’s car that he allegedly crashed. Juan Morales-Martinez, an 18-year-old passenger inside the car Pacheco-Meza was driving, was also arrested. Pacheco-Meza was charged with reckless homicide and driving under the influence, while Morales-Martinez was charged with drug possession and a weapons offense. DHS said an ICE detainer was lodged after the two were taken to the Clark County Jail, adding officials didn’t cooperate with the request since Illinois has sanctuary policies. Morales-Martinez was arrested outside the Clark County Jail by federal agents. He entered the United States illegally in December 2023 and was released under the Biden administration. Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said the incident was preventable. "Two innocents were killed because this criminal illegal alien chose to drive under the influence," McLaughlin said. "President Trump and Secretary Noem have unleashed ICE and CBP in Illinois to restore law and order and remove criminal illegal aliens from our communities. Anyone who is in the U.S. illegally and thinks they can roam free while breaking our laws and harming Americans is in for a rude awakening. If you are in our country illegally and break our laws, we will find you, arrest you, remove you and you will never return.".

FOX 32 Chicago [10/29/2025 9:05 AM, Will Hager, 40019K] reports an Illinois man and his wife were killed in a crash last week involving a suspected drunk driver who federal officials said is in the country illegally. Authorities said 34-year-old Edwin Pacheco-Meza of Honduras was driving under the influence when he caused a crash that killed Coles County Board Member Michael Clayton and his wife, Gail, on Friday in Westfield, according to the Department of Homeland Security. Police reportedly found marijuana, ammunition, an extended magazine, and an open container in the vehicle. Pacheco-Meza was arrested along with his passenger, 18-year-old Juan Morales-Martinez of Guatemala. Pacheco-Meza was charged with two counts of aggravated driving under the influence and one count of reckless homicide. ICE said it placed an immigration detainer on both men at the Clark County Jail, which did not honor the request under Illinois’ "sanctuary policies." Federal agents later arrested Morales-Martinez outside the jail after his release on Monday, charging him with drug possession and a weapons offense. Both men entered the U.S. illegally and the DHS said they plan to pursue their removal from the country. "Two innocents were killed because this criminal illegal alien chose to drive under the influence," DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement. "President Trump and Secretary Noem have unleashed ICE and CBP in Illinois to restore law-and-order and remove criminal illegal aliens from our communities. Anyone who is in the U.S. illegally and thinks they can roam free while breaking our laws and harming Americans is in for a rude awakening. If you are in our country illegally and break our laws, we will find you, arrest you, remove you, and you will never return."

Chicago Tribune [10/29/2025 5:13 PM, Addison Wright, 4829K] reports Federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers detained several individuals in the Chicago Heights and Crete area Monday, according to several officials. ICE officers detained at least three people, including two customers and one employee, in the parking lot outside of Heights Fresh Market on Chicago Road at about 11 a.m. Monday, according to a store manager, who cited store footage. Yadira Banuelos, a store employee, said officers arrested her coworker as he arrived for his shift Monday. Another man who regularly sold Sabritsa chips outside the store was detained then released, according to a statement the market, posted on Facebook at 11:17 a.m. Tuesday. Banuelos said Wednesday the man left his chip stand after the activity and had not returned as of Wednesday afternoon. She and a few other employees said they heard he might not return to selling the chips there for a while. After the arrests Monday, Banuelos said a lot of customers called the store with questions, and business seemed slower than usual the rest of the day. Store management posted on social media after the arrests and encouraged customers to use caution and avoid the area if it was not necessary to be there. "Thank God they let him go," read the post. "Let’s take care of each other and share this information to keep us safe.". The Crete Police Department said multiple individuals from a construction crew near Berkshire and Stafford were detained Monday by federal immigration enforcement officers. The crew was drilling conduit to install surf internet, but construction was halted after the workers were arrested. Davis said his company, along with another company on the job, Evolve Telecom, brought in additional workers from their company’s Midwest branches to continue the work on Tuesday. Some workers lived locally and others had to travel into town, he said. Crete officials also said the Police Department was never contacted by ICE and did not have notice of or assist in this operation. They noted Illinois law enforcement agencies are prohibited by the Illinois Trust Act from conducting or assisting in immigration only enforcement. Crete police also said Illinois law enforcement can only assist ICE if a valid warrant exists, probable cause of a criminal act (other than immigration status) was committed or protection of ICE agents who are victims of crime.

Chicago Tribune [10/29/2025 12:47 PM, Jim Woods, 4829K] reports another accused participant in a theft ring involving six trailers of televisions from a Portage warehouse has been arrested, as U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents have also become involved in the case. Jasdeep Singh, 31, of Lathrop, California, has posted a $10,000 cash bond after he was picked up on a warrant for theft and conspiracy to theft, which are both Level 5 felonies. "We are in the process of rounding them up but I am not sure how far we will get because I have heard ICE is involved somehow in their cases," said Porter County Prosecutor Gary Germann in an email. There are six men with the last name Singh who are charged in Porter County with participating in the scheme. Two others, Lahkwant Singh, 27, and Manpreet Singh, 24, both of California, were arrested earlier. It is unknown if the men are related, as Singh is a common last name in India. Trucks from JSW Trans, Inc., owned by Harkirat Singh, picked up Vizio television sets from the UNIS Warehouse in Portage for delivery to Sam’s Club warehouses in late December 2024. Three of the deliveries were supposed to be made to Edwardsville, Illinois, two to Shakopee, Minnesota, and one to Oswego, Illinois. The television sets, valued at $594,754.16, never reached their destination, according to a probable cause statement. So far, investigators haven’t revealed where the hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of television sets ended up. In the case of Jasdeep Singh, he is accused of picking up a load of televisions valued at $82,266 from the UNIS warehouse on Dec. 26 for delivery to the Sam’s Club Warehouse in Shakopee, court records show. A Flock Safety license plate reading camera tracked the rig in the Higgins/River Road area of Rosemont, Illinois, later that day.

Daily Caller [10/29/2025 4:00 PM, Jason Hopkins, 835K] reports a federal grand jury on Wednesday indicted a Democratic congressional candidate and other protesters for allegedly impeding federal immigration enforcement. Kat Abughazaleh, a Democratic congressional candidate from the Chicago area, was among six individuals indicted in federal court for her alleged role in late September blocking law enforcement vehicles outside an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facility in Broadview, Illinois, according to court documents. The charges make Abughazaleh the latest Democrat to face legal consequences following a violent clash with federal immigration authorities. The indictment says Abughazaleh "physically hindered and impeded" a federal agent who was "forced to drive at an extremely slow rate of speed to avoid injuring any of the conspirators" during an incident on Sept. 26. Protesters Michael Rabbitt, Andre Martin, Catherine Sharp, Brian Straw and Joselyn Walsh were also named in the indictment alongside the congressional candidate.

CBS Chicago [10/29/2025 8:19 PM, Victor Jacobo, 39474K] reports community leaders in Chicago’s Little Village neighborhood are calling on Mayor Brandon Johnson to do more to enforce his executive order barring federal agents from using city-owned property for immigration enforcement operations, after a video surfaced allegedly showing vehicles with agents inside a parking lot of a Chicago public school. The video, taken Tuesday by a resident of the neighborhood, appears to show multiple vehicles with federal agents inside within the parking lot of Lázaro Cardenas Elementary School off 25th Street and Central Park Avenue. "They are using a CPS parking lot!" the woman who took the video is heard saying as she records the vehicles. At a news conference, the mother of a Cardenas Elementary student told reporters in Spanish that schools should be a safe place for children and added that parents and students were left upset and concerned at the reported presence of federal agents on school property. "This is shameful that they’re using these properties to attack our families," said Baltazar Enriquez, the president of the Little Village Community Council. "They’re using CPS properties to attack our families.". Enriquez said the incident at the school is just the latest case of federal agents allegedly violating an executive order signed by Mayor Johnson on Oct. 6 to prohibit the feds’ use of property owned by the city. "What we’re asking for is for actions," Enriquez said. "We want them to come and put a sign here and every school in Little Village that ICE agents cannot use CPS property.". A spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security criticized the mayor’s policy. "Mayor Johnson has shown time and time again he does not care about the safety of our federal law enforcement officers or Chicagoans," the statement from the spokesperson said.

Chicago Tribune [10/29/2025 5:40 PM, R. Christian Smith, 4829K] reports after area residents spoke for around an hour at a meeting on Tuesday about the impact heightened federal immigration enforcement actions are having on Aurora’s community and pushed for the city to take action, Mayor John Laesch said the city was looking into ordinances passed by others and will soon be formally proposing one of its own. The Aurora City Council on Tuesday evening had so many who wanted to speak, primarily about what federal agents have been doing within the city, that aldermen voted to suspend meeting rules to let residents continue to make their voices heard beyond the 30 minutes allowed during the public comment period. Those at the meeting talking about the federal immigration enforcement push, sometimes through tears, spoke of neighbors scared to leave their homes and what they said were warrantless arrests and the use of excessive force. Just after the meeting’s public comment period, Ald. Mike Saville, 6th Ward, asked Mayor Laesch what his plans were, as many people had come to the meeting to speak about an ordinance around immigration enforcement operations in the city. Laesch said the city was looking at ordinances passed by other municipalities and was trying to combine them into something that would work for the city of Aurora. Such an ordinance is set to go before the Aurora City Council’s Rules, Administration and Procedure Committee at an upcoming meeting, according to Laesch. The next meeting of that committee is on Nov. 4. Laesch told The Beacon-News on Wednesday that the ordinance is still being worked on, but it would probably be focused on city-owned property. As for enforcement, which he called the "real challenge," it might have to do with the accountability commission that Gov. JB Pritzker is putting together, he said.

New York Times [10/30/2025 3:00 AM, Luis Ferré-Sadurní and Hamed Aleaziz, 135475K] reports Alejandro Juarez stepped off a plane in Texas and stood on a bridge over the Rio Grande, staring at the same border that he had crossed illegally from Mexico 22 years earlier. As U.S. immigration officials unshackled restraints bound to his arms and legs, Mr. Juarez, 39, pleaded with them. He told them he was never given a chance to contest his deportation in front of an immigration judge after being detained in New York City five days before. The federal agents told him that they were just following orders. They handed him a small bag with his phone, belt and documents, and forced him to cross the bridge. He thought of the wife and four children, whom he was leaving behind. After a five-minute walk back to his homeland, a highway sign greeted him: “Bienvenidos.” “And that’s how my journey in the United States ended,” Mr. Juarez, who had worked for more than a decade at a Trump Organization golf club in New York, said through tears during a phone interview from Mexico. Back in the United States, officials at the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency were just beginning to realize the brewing problem on their hands: They had mistakenly expelled Mr. Juarez from the United States, placing him on the wrong plane and erroneously dispatching him across a port of entry to Mexico instead of sending him to a detention center in Arizona. Their actions probably violated federal immigration laws, which entitle most immigrants facing deportation to a hearing before a judge — a hearing Mr. Juarez never had. ICE officials raced to decipher his whereabouts, exchanging bewildered emails and contacting detention facilities to pinpoint his location, according to internal ICE documents obtained by New York Times. It is unclear how many other immigrants like Mr. Juarez have been erroneously removed, in part because ICE has not in the past tracked such cases. The sloppy handling of his case underscored the growing strain at an agency under mounting pressure from President Trump to accelerate the deportation of millions of undocumented immigrants. Critics warn that the missteps in his case could foreshadow mistakes poised to become more frequent as detentions expand.

NewsMax [10/29/2025 4:29 PM, Staff, 4109K] reports a Honduran man and an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer were hospitalized early Wednesday after a shooting during a vehicle stop on Interstate 17 in north Phoenix, authorities said. According to the Department of Homeland Security, ICE officers initiated a traffic stop at about 4 a.m. local time near Dove Valley Road after identifying the driver as Jose Garcia-Sorto, who officials said is in the U.S. illegally, KTAR-TV reported. Garcia-Sorto initially stopped, but as officers approached, he allegedly began driving away while one officer was in the path of the vehicle. Garcia-Sorto and the officer were taken to local hospitals. The agency said the suspect was in stable condition, and the officer was treated for a wound and also was in stable condition. The FBI is leading the investigation into the officer-involved shooting, which shut down the northbound I-17 off-ramp at Dove Valley Road for several hours during the morning commute, according to KTAR. The Arizona Department of Public Safety said its troopers assisted federal authorities at the scene.

Reported similarly:
Washington Examiner [10/29/2025 5:13 PM, David Zimmermann, 1394K]
Telemundo [10/29/2025 5:09 PM, Staff, 2218K]

Los Angeles Times [10/29/2025 6:00 AM, Claudia Boyd-Barrett, 14862K] reports in recent months, federal agents camped out in the lobby of a Southern California hospital, guarded detained patients — sometimes shackled — in hospital rooms, and chased an immigrant landscaper into a surgical center. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents also have shown up at community clinics. Health providers say officers tried to enter a parking lot hosting a mobile clinic, waved a machine gun in the faces of clinicians serving the homeless, and hauled a passerby into an unmarked car outside a community health center. In response to such immigration enforcement activity in and around clinics and hospitals, Gov. Gavin Newsom last month signed SB 81, which prohibits medical establishments from allowing federal agents without a valid search warrant or court order into private areas, including places where patients receive treatment or discuss health matters. But while the bill received broad support from medical groups, health care workers and immigrant rights advocates, legal experts say California can’t stop federal authorities from carrying out duties in public places like hospital lobbies and general waiting areas, parking lots and surrounding neighborhoods — places where recent ICE activities sparked outrage and fear. Previous federal restrictions on immigration enforcement in or near sensitive areas, including health care establishments, were rescinded by the Trump administration in January.

AP [10/29/2025 4:48 PM, Christopher Weber, 19051K] reports attorneys for Sami Hamdi, a British political commentator being held by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in California, are challenging his detention in court, his legal team said Wednesday. Hamdi, who is Muslim, was detained Sunday by ICE officers at San Francisco International Airport, according to federal officials. His lawyers say the arrest was triggered by his criticism of the Israeli government, while U.S. officials have pointed to comments he made after Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, attacks, which they claim celebrated the violence. The detention was the latest in broader efforts by the administration to identify and potentially expel thousands of foreigners in the United States who it says have either fomented or participated in unrest or publicly supported protests against Israel’s military operations in Gaza. Those enforcement actions have been criticized by civil rights groups as violations of constitutional protections for freedom of speech, which apply to anyone in the United States and not just to American citizens. Lawyers with the Council on American-Islamic Relations, who are representing Hamdi, on Tuesday filed a writ of habeas corpus demanding that the government justify why he is being held, the council said. "If the government can cancel a valid visa because it does not like what a person says, then anyone legally visiting, studying, or working in our country is in danger of politically motivated abduction," the group said in a statement. "This must end with Sami Hamdi.". The advocacy group said Hamdi, 35, was detained in response to his vocal criticism of the Israeli government during a U.S. speaking tour. On Saturday, he had addressed the annual gala for the group’s Sacramento, California, chapter. Hamdi was scheduled to speak at the group’s event in Florida on Sunday. Department of Homeland Security spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin called Hamdi’s court filings "a desperate Hail Mary attempt to keep an illegal alien and terrorist sympathizer" in the U.S. "Following the Oct. 7 terror attack, Sami Hamdi cheered on Hamas," McLaughlin said in a statement Wednesday. "Under President Trump, those who support terrorism and undermine American national security will not be allowed to work or visit this country. That’s just common sense.". In her statement, McLaughlin cited remarks Hamdi made in a video posted online shortly after the Hamas attacks in which he asked: "How many of you felt it in your hearts when you got the news that it happened? How many of you felt the euphoria? Allah Akbar." Hamdi said later his intent was not to praise the attacks but to suggest that the violence was "a natural consequence of the oppression that is being put on the Palestinians.".

Blaze [10/29/2025 12:55 PM, Julio Rosas, 1442K] reports that NBC News in the San Francisco Bay area got a brutal fact-check after publishing a story about an "undocumented father," identified only as Gerardo, being arrested by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement outside his home before going to work. While 42-year-old Gerardo was being arrested, Idalia, his wife and a U.S. citizen, ran out to try to stop the arrest, NBC Bay Area reported. She claimed a female agent hit her 22-year-old daughter with a baton but did not capture the moment on camera, nor is it seen on the Ring security camera. His ‘rap sheet’ includes lewd and lascivious acts with a child. Idalia said she immediately contacted the Mexican Consulate in San Jose and a hotline for immigration legal services. The Department of Homeland Security responded to the sob story, revealing that Gerardo has been accused of heinous crimes. "Of course [NBC News] refuses to tell the American public that this illegal alien from Mexico has a rap sheet," said Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs Tricia McLaughlin. At time of publishing, NBC Bay Area has not updated its story to include Gerardo. The Bay Area was expected to see a surge in federal immigration agents, but that deployment was put on pause. Despite the lack of extra agents, anti-DHS protesters blocked access to Coast Guard Island in Alameda. After most protesters had left, a driver allegedly attempted to use a U-Haul to ram the security checkpoint, forcing the Coast Guardsmen to fire upon the truck.

Bloomberg Law [10/29/2025 5:12 PM, Andrew Kreighbaum, 803K] reports the Trump administration is removing an automatic grace period for immigrants with pending work permit renewals, a move that will force out of the workforce many people stuck in worsening administrative backlogs. The Department of Homeland Security under the Biden administration adopted regulations giving immigrants with pending renewals of employment authorization documents an automatic extension of 540 days. They’d previously received an automatic extension period of 180 days. US Citizenship and Immigration Services, the DHS unit that administers immigration benefits, moved to limit extensions for work permits with a recent influx of asylum seekers in mind. The change comes amid broader efforts by the Trump administration to limit access to temporary humanitarian benefits, including terminating Temporary Protected Status and parole programs. Its also sought to clamp down on asylum at the border while GOP allies in Congress have imposed new fees on immigrants, including for asylum claims. But an interim final rule released Wednesday will affect a broad range of immigrants, including refugees, asylum seekers, and dependent visa holders of H-1B workers. Exceptions include extensions for immigrants with employment authorization through TPS and extensions provided by statute. The rule will take effect Oct. 30, meaning immigrants who file to renew work permits starting Thursday wouldn’t receive any grace period if their application is still pending when current employment documents expire. Immigrants with pending renewal claims have already been screened at least once—and sometimes multiple times—by the government if they’ve previously renewed work permits. But DHS said ending automatic extensions will allow for more frequent to better enable the government to detect fraud. USCIS Director Joseph Edlow said Wednesday that the Biden administration had “prioritized aliens’ convenience ahead of Americans’ safety and security.”

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Breitbart [10/29/2025 3:39 PM, John Binder, 2416K]
Telemundo [10/29/2025 4:05 PM, Staff, 2218K]
Univision [10/29/2025 5:36 PM, Patricia Clarembaux, 5004K]

CBS News [10/29/2025 1:13 PM, Natalie Brand, 39474K] reports that hospitals nationwide are urging the Trump administration to reconsider a steep new fee for hiring highly skilled workers from other countries. Many turn to medical professionals from abroad to fill the gaps, but the new $100,000 price tag for the popular H-1B visa is making that nearly impossible, particularly for midsize hospitals or smaller. "We need to stabilize," said Jamie White, the chief nursing officer at Frederick Health in Maryland. She also said, "We have had a continual desire to bring on about 100 nurses for the last three years." Frederick Health, like others nationwide, looked abroad to fill in the gaps, planning to sponsor up to 45 nurses on H-1B visas. Now, those plans are on hold, with a new $100,000 fee to obtain the visa and hire foreign employees. "We cannot afford that for even one individual," White said. The Trump administration announced the policy change in September, with President Trump saying it provides an incentive to hire American workers. The administration has since clarified that the fee is for new applicants living abroad, not those already here. White House spokeswoman Taylor Rogers called the administration’s actions a necessary reform. "President Trump promised to put American workers first, and this commonsense action does just that by discouraging companies from spamming the system and driving down American wages," Rogers said in a recent statement to CBS News. The Department of Homeland Security did not comment on the letter when contacted by CBS News.

Breitbart [10/30/2025 5:08 AM, Neil Munro, 2608K] reports the U.S. government is importing too many legal immigrants and too many H-1B visa workers, Vice President JD Vance told a cheering crowd of roughly 10,000 Turning Point supporters and students Thursday at the University of Mississippi. “What is the exact number of immigrants America should accept in the future?” he said in response to a question, adding: Right now, the answer is far less than we’ve been accepting. We have got to become a common [high trust] community again, and you can’t do that when you have such high numbers of [legal] immigration, which is one of the reasons why we have the immigration policy we do [have]. “We have got to get our overall numbers way, way down,” he said. The H-1B visa worker program is touted as a means to import a few genius graduates, but is actually used to import cheap white-collar labor for employers, Vance said: You want that super genius to stay in the United States of America and not go somewhere else. [But] what [the program] is actually used to do is hire an [foreign] accountant at a 50 percent discount to an American citizen. I don’t think that we should be hiring accountants from foreign countries when we’ve got accountants right here in the United States that would love to work for a good wage. The comments on H-1B outsourcing got a huge applause from the university students, many of whom recognize that their nascent careers and middle-class ambitions are being diverted to foreign H-1B and OPT workers and are being consumed by fast-developing Artificial Intelligence technology. Breitbart News has published more than 1,000 articles on H-1B migration and OPT hiring since 2015.

Reported similarly:
NBC News [10/30/2025 4:30 AM, Staff, 43603K]

New York Times [10/29/2025 6:41 PM, Elizabeth A. Harris, 135475K] reports the Nobel Prize-winning Nigerian author Wole Soyinka said Tuesday that the visa allowing him to visit the United States was revoked this month. In a letter, the U.S. consulate general in Lagos, Nigeria, did not cite a specific reason for the revocation, saying only that “additional information became available” after the visa was issued last spring. Soyinka, 91, said in a news conference on Tuesday that he had been instructed to appear at the consulate for an additional interview last month on Sept. 11. He refused to attend. Soyinka, who was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1986, has been a vocal critic of President Trump. After the 2016 election, he cut up his U.S. green card in protest. In a September interview with Nigerian news outlet PM News, he compared the president to Idi Amin, who ruled Uganda in a brutal dictatorship in the 1970s. The letter, dated Oct. 23 and provided to The Times by Soyinka’s literary agent, said that if Soyinka had plans to travel to the United States, he must apply for a new visa. The revoked visa was granted in April 2024, under the Biden administration. This summer, the State Department restricted the length of new visas for Nigerian citizens. In an email, a State Department spokesperson declined to discuss the details of Soyinka’s case and said visa records are generally confidential. “Visas are a privilege, not a right,” the email said. “Visas may be revoked at any time, at the discretion of the U.S. government, whenever circumstances warrant.”

Federalist [10/29/2025 5:10 PM, Breccan F. Thies, 785K] reports a group of higher education associations is trying to get special treatment from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) so they can bypass the new $100,000 H-1B visa application fee and import as many foreigners as they want to. In a letter to DHS Secretary Kristi Noem, the American Council on Education, American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education, American Association of Colleges and Universities, and the American Association of University Professors, along with nearly 30 others organizations, asked to be exempt from the Trump administration’s new $100,000 application fee, claiming the cost would stand as a major barrier to recruiting and retaining foreign faculty, researchers, and staff. "Given the fact that H-1B beneficiaries working at our institutions train and educate domestic students for these high-demand occupations, conduct essential research, provide critical patient care, and support the core infrastructure of our universities, we therefore ask that higher education be considered exempted from the $100,000 fee requirement," Ted Mitchell, president of the American Council on Education, wrote in the letter. "H-1B visa holders working for institutions of higher education are doing work that is crucial to the U.S. economy and national security.". In September, President Donald Trump signed an executive order putting the application fee on new applicants after Sept. 21, which must be paid when the petition for a visa is filed. Many conservatives said the move did not go nearly far enough. According to guidance from U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), the fee would not apply to those currently holding H-1B visas or renewals, even if they are outside the United States and trying to reenter — exceptions that dilute the effectiveness of the fee. As The Federalist reported, Americans are not content merely with deporting illegal immigrants. Many Americans want every illegal alien gone, no matter the circumstance, and a significant number of Americans want to cycle out the millions who have received various visas or been granted asylum on bogus claims, while denaturalizing those who posture themselves as enemies of the United States.

FedScoop [10/29/2025 2:35 PM, Matt Bracken, 56K] reports winning the artificial intelligence race against China will require expanded manufacturing fueled in no small part by legal immigration, the Republican co-chair of the Senate AI Caucus said Wednesday. Appearing at a Siemens-Widehall event in Washington, D.C., Sen. Mike Rounds said China has roughly four times more power production than the United States, a metric crucial for supporting AI data centers. If the U.S. has designs on catching up, the South Dakota Republican made the case that it can only be done with more investments in manufacturing and a labor force that includes more foreign-born workers. “Anybody that thinks that AI is going to take jobs away, I’m sorry, it will change the types of jobs, but you’re going to need more people here, and we will not fill those positions just with our natural-born workforce,” Rounds said. “Sometimes, [it’s] not popular to say it, but legal immigration is critical to the success of this country, long term. We’ve got to be able to bring in the best and the brightest who want to see the American dream. We’ve got to have a legal immigration system that allows that to happen.” Rounds’ position on immigration makes him an outlier in the current iteration of his party — he called it a “challenging subject” while discussing declining U.S. birth rates and the need for more young people to fill electrician, plumbing and manufacturing-related positions. But there also needs to be a commitment from industry, Rounds said, to make sure that young Americans have the proper training for AI jobs and aren’t shut out of the workforce — no small feat given some informed predictions that the technology could wipe out half of all entry-level white-collar jobs in the years ahead. “We’ve got to have a coordinated effort where businesses are recognizing their demand over the next” several years and partnering with institutions on training, Rounds said. Industry should be able to clearly inform those training partners what they need in terms of labor to ensure students aren’t working toward certificates or degrees in increasingly irrelevant disciplines, he added.

The Hill [10/29/2025 3:38 PM, Max Rego, 12595K] reports Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) on Wednesday directed the state’s board of governors to “crack down” on state universities hiring workers on H-1B visas. DeSantis called the H-1B program a “scam” that state universities are abusing, while speaking during a news conference at the University of South Florida (USF) in Tampa. The directive applies to the 12 universities within the Florida State University System, including USF, the University of Florida, Florida State University, the University of Central Florida, and Florida International University. FOX News [10/29/2025 3:36 PM, Greg Norman, 40621K] reports DeSantis’ office released a statement saying that, "Florida is requiring institutions to put American graduates first and ensure taxpayer-funded schools serve the American workforce, not to be used to import cheap foreign labor." DeSantis said at a news conference Wednesday that Florida looked at its universities and found people there on H1-B visas, including an assistant swim coach from Spain, according to Fox13 Tampa Bay. CBS Miami [10/29/2025 5:15 PM, Staff, 39474K] reports that during an appearance at the University of South Florida in Tampa, DeSantis questioned why state universities had staff members on H-1B visas, such as a public-policy professor from China, a psychologist and counselor from the United Kingdom, an athletics operations and communications coordinator from Trinidad and Tobago and an assistant swim coach from Spain. DeSantis gave the directive to the university system’s Board of Governors, which will meet next week at USF. The directive came after the Trump administration this month said it would require $100,000 fees for foreign-born people to obtain H-1B visas. DeSantis described many H-1B hires as "cheap labor" to save money. "We can do it with our residents in Florida or with Americans, and if we can’t do it, then, man, we need to really look deeply about what is going on with this situation," DeSantis said. University of Florida Interim President Donald Landry said he endorses the review of H-1B visa hires, adding "We are conducting our own now.". The New York Times [10/29/2025 5:00 PM, Vimal Patel and Alan Blinder, 135475K] reports that at a news conference at the University of South Florida in Tampa on Wednesday, Mr. DeSantis rattled off a list of jobs at the state’s colleges that he said should be filled by Americans: public policy professor from China, graphic designer from Canada, assistant swim coach from Spain. “Are you kidding me?” he said. “We can’t produce an assistant swim coach in this country?” The details of the plan were not immediately clear, including whether it would apply to current visa holders, or for future applications. H-1B visas are provided to educated foreign citizens applying to work in specialty occupations. About 400 H-1B visa applications were approved for the state system’s 12 universities this year through June, with the most, 156, at the University of Florida, according to Department of Homeland Security data. The governor’s comments are in line with the agenda of the Trump administration, which last month enacted a $100,000 fee for new H-1B visas. If Florida’s university system embraces Mr. DeSantis’s proposal, it will be at odds with many higher education leaders, who have spent recent weeks publicly and privately lobbying the White House and Congress against Mr. Trump’s proclamation. They have argued that H-1B visa holders fill critical teaching and research roles. “Limiting H-1B visas in Florida would threaten the public purpose of higher education in the state by undermining the ability to recruit and retain top international faculty, researchers and students,” said Lynn Pasquerella, president of the American Association of Colleges and Universities. She said that the Florida board does not have the authority to revoke or eliminate H-1B visas, since they are regulated by the federal government. But, she added, state boards can make policy changes to reduce or stop sponsoring such visas, a move that would most likely result in court challenges.

Washington Examiner [10/29/2025 12:46 PM, Anna Giaritelli, 1394K] reports that Border Patrol agents and Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers who have worked together side by side for two decades are increasingly at odds in a battle to see who can better carry out President Donald Trump’s deportation operation. Over the weekend, top Trump administration officials made the decision to purge high-ranking ICE officials and install Border Patrol managers in their place. In addition, Border Patrol Chief Mike Banks disclosed to the Washington Examiner in an exclusive interview this month that his agents are now deployed across at least 27 cities carrying out immigration enforcement. ICE employees are not happy about any of it, feeling replaced and exhausted from the past nine months. Meanwhile, Border Patrol agents are ecstatic, according to four sources. The first source, who has a keen sense of how the workforce is handling the changes, warned that morale among ICE’s 6,500 officers is declining due to the infusion of outside employees and leaders. A second person affiliated with ICE said Border Patrol agents are not going to have a major impact on arrests despite the Trump administration’s new reliance on them in an effort to increase arrests. Department of Homeland Security officials think "Border Patrol agents are going to come in there and make a difference," one source said. "That’s not the truth. Border Patrol just comes in more heavy-handed. They don’t make more arrests, but they make more headlines."

New York Post [10/29/2025 7:40 PM, Amanda Woods, 42219K] reports a federal Customs and Border Protection agent died by suicide in the Bronx early Wednesday when he turned a gun on himself in front of his girlfriend, sources said. The 29-year-old agent suffered a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head inside an apartment at Westchester Avenue and East 152nd Street in Melrose around 6:40 a.m., authorities and sources said. The man’s girlfriend — also a CBP agent — witnessed the moment her beau took his own life, the sources said. The NYPD descended on the scene after receiving a 911 call for help, cops said. The agent, whose name has not been released, was pronounced dead at the scene by EMS workers. "CBP will cooperate with the NYPD during their investigation of the tragic incident. All media queries should be deferred to the NYPD," a spokesperson for the agency said.

CBS News [10/29/2025 5:14 PM, Camilo Montoya-Galvez, 39474K] reports Border Patrol agents have carried out more arrests in the Chicago area than their counterparts at Immigration and Customs Enforcement, illustrating the expanded role they are playing far away from U.S. borders under the Trump administration, internal federal government data obtained by CBS News indicates. This week, arrests by Customs and Border Protection in the Chicago-area "Midway Blitz" operation surpassed those recorded by ICE, the agency that is, on paper, responsible for enforcing federal immigration laws in the interior of the country. Since Sept. 16, agents at CBP have recorded roughly 1,500 arrests in the Chicago region, compared to over 1,400 arrests carried out by ICE officers, according to the internal Department of Homeland Security figures. In mid-October, ICE’s arrest tally in the Chicago operation was higher, totaling around 1,000, compared to roughly 800 arrests recorded by CBP at the time. The government figures underscore the unprecedented way the second Trump administration has used Border Patrol agents, whose work has been historically limited to intercepting the illicit movement of people and drugs along the borders with Canada and Mexico, as well as some coastal sectors. As part of its nationwide mass deportation campaign, the Trump administration has dispatched teams of green-uniformed Border Patrol agents across the country, instructing them to arrest suspected unauthorized immigrants in major Democratic-led cities. That effort has been spearheaded by Gregory Bovino, an outspoken Border Patrol sector chief who has personally led arrest operations, first in Los Angeles and Sacramento over the summer, and most recently in Chicago. He has gained infamy among critics who denounce his agents’ tactics as heavy-handed and indiscriminate, as well as support among those who view him as an effective, no-nonsense enforcer of President Trump’s aggressive clampdown on illegal immigration.

Univision Chicago WGBO [10/29/2025 1:25 PM, Staff, 5004K] reports on the morning of Saturday, October 25, the Villegas brothers were working in the Old Irving Park neighborhood of Chicago, but it ended in chaos and pain for the Mexican family, due to the arrest of one of the brothers. A video shows the moment Luis Villegas was arrested by Border Patrol agents in the middle of a public road, and heartbroken cries can be heard in the video from his younger brother, Uriel, who is only 15 years old. Villegas is an immigrant who has lived in Chicago for almost his entire life; he arrived from Mexico at the age of 4. Beyond the impact on families, the federal operation sparked a strong reaction in the Old Irving Park community. Witnesses reported clashes between residents and officers, the use of tear gas, and scenes of violence amidst a children’s Halloween celebration. Elderly people and families with children were caught in the middle of the chaos. Luis remains detained in the state of Michigan, separated from his partner and their three children. For now, the Villegas family faces the legal costs of a defense that will take place in two states: Michigan and Illinois.

NewsNation [10/29/2025 3:16 PM, Mia Morales, 8017K] reports U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers arrested a driver who allegedly attempted to smuggle more than 160 species of reptiles and arthropods into Mexico. On Oct. 22, CBP officers at the Anzalduas International Bridge came across a silver Toyota leaving the U.S. to cross into Mexico. According to a news release from CBP, the vehicle was selected for secondary inspection. During the physical inspection, CBP officers found 163 reptiles and arthropods hidden within the vehicle. CBP officers seized the vehicle and Homeland Security Investigations special agents arrested the driver, initiating a criminal investigation. CBP did not identify the driver in the news release. The United States Fish and Wildlife Service took custody of the reptiles and spiders.

Reported similarly:
ABC News [10/29/2025 3:16 PM, Mason Leath, 30493K]

Los Angeles Times [10/29/2025 6:00 AM, Andrea Castillo and Rachel Uranga, 14862K] reports the Trump administration is initiating a leadership shakeup at a dozen or so offices of Immigration and Customs Enforcement to bring more aggressive enforcement operations across the U.S. Some of the outgoing field office directors at ICE are anticipated to be replaced with leaders from Customs and Border Protection, according to news reports. Among the leaders targeted for replacement are Los Angeles Field Office Director Ernesto Santacruz and San Diego Field Office Director Patrick Divver, the Washington Examiner reported Monday. The stepped up role of Border Patrol leaders in interior enforcement — which has historically been ICE territory — marks an evolution of tactics that originated in California. Tricia McLaughlin, assistant public affairs secretary for the Homeland Security department, didn’t confirm or deny the changes but described immigration officials as united. “Talk about sensationalism,” she said. “Only the media would describe standard agency personnel changes as a ‘massive shakeup.’ If and when we have specific personnel moves to announce, we’ll do that.” White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson said, “The President’s entire team is working in lockstep to implement the President’s policy agenda, and the tremendous results from securing the border to deporting criminal illegal aliens speak for themselves.” On Fox News on Tuesday, Trump’s border czar Tom Homan said the administration is dedicated to achieving record deportations of primarily immigrants with criminal records.

Daily Caller [10/29/2025 6:03 PM, Andi Shae Napier, 835K] reports a 75-minute ground stop was issued at Newark Liberty International Airport on Wednesday due to "staffing issues" spurred by the federal government shutdown. Departing flights were grounded from 3 p.m. to 4:15 p.m. at the New Jersey airport and flights were delayed 40 minutes after the ground stop ended, NBC 4 New York first reported . Roughly 13,000 air traffic controllers and 50,000 Transportation Security Administration (TSA) officers missed their first full paychecks on Tuesday, placing strain on an already understaffed Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), which has been stretched thin for decades, especially following the COVID-19 pandemic. Three other FAA air traffic advisories were issued Wednesday due to insufficient staffing, including Philadelphia Terminal Radar Approach Control Area C, the New York Air Route Traffic Control Center (ARTCC) Area D and the Indianapolis ARTCC Area 5, Forbes reported. Philadelphia’s approach control oversees sequencing and separation of planes at Newark, New York’s control center controls flights enroute over parts of Pennsylvania, and Indianapolis’ runs flights over Midwestern states. The FAA also flagged a potential ground stop Wednesday at John F. Kennedy Airport in New York after 4 p.m., and until 10 p.m. for Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport and Ronald Reagan National Airport in Washington D.C.

CNN [10/29/2025 6:00 AM, Gabe Cohen, 18595K] reports in the final month of the 2024 presidential campaign, Donald Trump put his critique of FEMA’s response to Hurricane Helene front and center, making false claims that funding was stolen for illegal migrants and the agency ignored requests for help. One particular claim had legs – that Republican residents were not getting the aid they needed because of their political affiliation. An investigation that began under then-President Joe Biden and carried over into the Trump administration ultimately cleared the Federal Emergency Management Agency, finding no evidence of a systemic effort to deny aid based on politics while singling out one supervisor’s actions as illegal and improper. But at the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees FEMA, leadership including Secretary Kristi Noem weren’t satisfied, three former senior FEMA officials told CNN. Within weeks, leaders ordered a new investigation that came to a much different conclusion.

Reported similarly:
(B) CNN News Central [10/29/2025 1:31 PM, Staff]

AP [10/29/2025 4:44 PM, Matthew Lee, 19051K] reports the United States is deploying several dozen disaster relief workers, including urban search and rescue teams, to Caribbean island nations as they deal with devastation caused by Hurricane Melissa. Disaster Assistance Response Team personnel from Washington and regional hubs in Miami and Costa Rica as well as the urban search and rescue crews from Los Angeles County, California, and Fairfax County, Virginia, are en route to the region, three State Department officials said Wednesday. They are expected to arrive in the next 24 to 48 hours and join up with local staff in Jamaica, the Bahamas and the Dominican Republic, where they will be based to offer help in neighboring Haiti, according to the officials, who spoke to reporters on condition of anonymity because the teams were not yet on the ground. Hurricane Melissa has left dozens of people dead and widespread destruction across Cuba, Haiti and Jamaica. The monster storm made landfall Tuesday in Jamaica as one of the strongest Atlantic hurricanes on record before weakening and moving on to Cuba. The State Department officials said they expected the U.S. response to the hurricane to be "robust," "efficient" and "effective." They dismissed concerns that the dismantling of the U.S. Agency for International Development, which had previously overseen relief operations, would hinder the work. The U.S. government shutdown also was not a factor, the officials said, and the people needed for the operation had been exempted from the furloughs that have affected all federal agencies. It was not immediately clear if the DART team members would be paid immediately for their work, but the search and rescue teams are employed by their localities and their services are covered by long-term existing contracts. The officials said anticipated needs include supplies like hygiene kits, temporary housing, sanitation equipment and food, which will be drawn from warehouses in Miami and from local stockpiles maintained by aid groups. The officials and the U.S. military’s Tampa-based Southern Command said the Pentagon could play a role in transporting personnel and supplies to remote areas in the affected countries but that a decision on the scale of such involvement had not yet been made.

FOX News [10/29/2025 2:29 PM, Diana Stancy Fox, 40621K] reports the State Department is deploying teams that are expected to arrive in the Caribbean as early as Thursday to support disaster response after Hurricane Melissa struck Jamaica Tuesday. The State Department announced it would deploy a regional disaster assistance response team (DART) and had activated U.S.-based urban search and rescue (USAR) teams to support response efforts in the region following Hurricane Melissa. A senior State Department official told Fox News Digital Wednesday that these teams are expected to arrive in Jamaica Thursday since the airport hasn’t suffered too much damage, but plans are in place to coordinate with the Department of War for a potential airlift in case commercial operations are not available. Likewise, the State Department also has requested the Department of War provide airlift support to provide food, water and other nutritional supplies to those in need throughout the island. Additionally, the State Department has signed off on nearly $1 million to go toward administering food and other resources, pulling from predesignated supplies housed in 12 different warehouses across the region. This includes six warehouses based in Haiti, one in the Dominican Republic, another in Barbados and one in Miami. "We have stood up resources to assist our American citizens who are on the ground, in addition to deploying Disaster Assistance Response Teams who will help provide critical coordination in overseeing U.S. assistance," State Department spokesman Tommy Pigott said in a statement to Fox News Digital.

Washington Post [10/29/2025 7:59 AM, John Muyskens, Naema Ahmed, Ruby Mellen and Ben Noll, 24149K] reports the storm blew through the Caribbean island’s southwestern coast, fueled by what experts said were prime conditions to create a monster tempest the likes of which have never before been witnessed in this part of the world so late in the year. Melissa’s power was undeniable as it brought torrential rain and deafening squalls to Jamaicans who were urged by their government to seek shelter. It intensified faster than most storms on record. The storm’s landfall wind speed of 185 mph ties the record for strongest winds at landfall in the Atlantic Ocean with the Labor Day Hurricane of 1935 and Hurricane Dorian of 2019. But storm intensities are subject to review by the National Hurricane Center and could change. Meteorologist Andy Hazelton reviewed data that suggested Melissa might have been even stronger, besting Hurricane Allen’s record-high 190-mph winds in 1980. “It should be noted that while Melissa’s landfall intensity is among the strongest ever recorded in the Atlantic basin, it will take extensive post-analysis to determine exactly where it ranks among landfalling Atlantic hurricanes,” the Hurricane Center wrote.

New York Times [10/29/2025 12:34 PM, Alan Gerard, 135475K] reports before Hurricane Melissa, the most damaging hurricane to hit Jamaica was Gilbert, which struck the island in September 1988. Gilbert was a Category 4 hurricane when it made landfall and caused tremendous damage from intense winds, storm surge and flooding. Tens of thousands were left homeless, and 49 people were killed. At the time, I was working as a meteorology intern at a television station in St. Louis. I got most of my information about the storm from John Hope, a former National Hurricane Center forecaster who was the Weather Channel’s first hurricane expert (and one of its first meteorological stars). Back then, global warming was just beginning to become a focus of people who studied the atmosphere and the weather. Forty years later, when I look at satellite imagery and other data on hurricanes and extreme weather, I often cannot believe my eyes. Most of these mind-boggling events have a potential link to climate change. For Hurricane Melissa, the moment of disbelief came in stages. The first was the satellite images of the storm’s incredibly clear and warm eye in the center of a swirling mass of intense thunderstorms. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s automated satellite algorithm that estimates the intensity of tropical storms and hurricanes had essentially maxed out, reaching values seen on rare occasions in the Pacific Ocean, but never in the Atlantic. By the time Melissa made landfall midday on Tuesday along the southwest coast of Jamaica, the storm was the most intense hurricane I have seen make landfall in my decades of watching the Atlantic tropics. (Hurricane experts say it was one of the three most intense hurricanes to hit land on record, stronger even than Katrina.) Intense hurricanes need very warm ocean water for fuel, but they also tend to churn up colder ocean water from below, a process known as upwelling. Typically, very slow-moving, powerful hurricanes like Melissa will upwell so much chilly water that there won’t be enough warm water to maintain intensity. In this case, though, the water south of Jamaica was not only unusually warm — about 2.5 degrees Fahrenheit above normal — it was also abnormally warm to a great depth, which meant Melissa continued to intensify as it reached land, despite moving slowly. According to Federal Reserve and World Bank records, the population of Jamaica has grown by more than 20 percent in the years since Gilbert hit the country, now totaling more than 2.8 million. I have little doubt that climate change is contributing to more significant meteorological events, and in what’s known as the expanding bull’s-eye effect, more people in harm’s way contribute to enormous disasters.

New York Times [10/29/2025 5:29 PM, Max Bearak and Lisa Friedman, 135475K] reports the nightmare scenario unfolded in the Caribbean this week. Hurricane Melissa hit Jamaica late Tuesday as one of the strongest Category 5 storms on record, at one point packing winds of almost 298 kilometers per hour (185 m.p.h.). A Jamaican government minister called the damage reports “catastrophic.” Nearly three-quarters of the country is without power, and more than a third of the population was directly affected by the storm. Then Melissa moved on to Cuba, where the damage was also extensive, and to Haiti, where at least 20 people have died. It is expected to “remain a powerful hurricane” as it moves across the Bahamas later Wednesday and near Bermuda on Thursday night. We still don’t know the full scope of the catastrophe, or whether this storm was intensified by climate change, but we do know that greenhouse gas emissions have fueled warmer seas and bigger storms. The island countries understood that a day like this would come. The world’s poorest countries are suffering the most from climate change, despite being least responsible for the greenhouse gas emissions that cause it. Island states around the world have been pleading for more help for years, warning that they face impending disaster. But rich countries have repeatedly failed to meet their pledges to fund adaptation efforts. Since Donald Trump was elected president, the United States has stopped providing nearly any funding for preparedness and recovery to other countries. Hurricanes have inflicted tens of billions of dollars of damage on Caribbean nations in recent years. Reconstruction efforts have contributed to enormous piles of debt. Jamaica, the Bahamas, Barbados, and Antigua and Barbuda, all recently hit by major hurricanes, have debts that are nearly equal to their entire economies. Countries go further in debt after disasters to provide for people’s basic needs and to cover economic losses. But the need to repay those debts also makes it harder to build the protections that could limit damage from future disasters. The International Monetary Fund has said the region needs to invest about $100 billion in this kind of climate resilience. “Our countries don’t have the luxury to become more resilient to climate change,” said Michai Robertson, a senior adviser to the Alliance of Small Island States.

New York Times [10/29/2025 9:13 PM, Nazaneen Ghaffar, André Paultre, Jovan Johnson and Michael Levenson, 135475K] reports Hurricane Melissa blasted Cuba and Haiti with torrential rain and howling winds on Wednesday, inflicting even more damage just hours after it devastated parts of Jamaica, ripping the roofs off homes and hospitals, flooding villages and littering roadways with trees and electrical poles. In both Haiti and Jamaica, the authorities began to tally the dead. Around 20 people, including children, died in a Haitian community where swollen rivers spilled into homes, and five bodies were found in St. Elizabeth, a hard-hit parish in southwestern Jamaica, where Melissa struck the island as a Category 5 hurricane. In that parish, the storm left a “complete disaster,” said Floyd Green, the agricultural minister. “Entire buildings have collapsed,” he said, adding that he had heard reports of villages where “every single house is without a roof.” The dead in St. Elizabeth Parish included four men and a woman, said Superintendent Coleridge Minto, the head of the St. Elizabeth Parish police. The parish’s church, tax office, council office, supermarket and bakery were also badly damaged, he said. “Everything has been washed away by floodwaters, and so the situation is, in fact, very bad,” he said, adding that there was “an urgent need for support.” Communication problems and power outages were hampering the authorities’ ability to assess the full scope of the devastation. Nearly 80 percent of the country was without electricity on Wednesday morning, said Dana Morris Dixon, Jamaica’s information minister. “I know so many people have said they cannot reach their families in western Jamaica. That’s because of damage to the telecoms infrastructure,” she said at a news conference. About 25,000 Jamaicans were staying in shelters, and officials warned that many might not be able to return to homes that had been destroyed or damaged. Some may also not have enough food because farms in St. Elizabeth, known as Jamaica’s breadbasket, were devastated, Dennis Zulu, a United Nations relief coordinator in Jamaica, said at a news conference. Andrew Holness, Jamaica’s prime minister, said in a statement to Jamaicans, especially those in the hard-hit west, that the government was racing to help them. “We know many of you are hurting, uncertain, and anxious after Hurricane Melissa, but please know that you are not alone,” he said. “Our teams are on the ground working tirelessly to rescue, restore, and bring relief where it’s needed most.” The eastern parts of Jamaica, including the capital, Kingston, were mostly unscathed, officials said. All the roughly 25,000 tourists who were in Jamaica were accounted for and in good health, Edmund Bartlett, Jamaica’s tourism minister, said in an interview on Wednesday. And Desmond McKenzie, a Jamaican minister who has been coordinating the emergency response, said three babies were born during the storm. “Despite our challenges, we rise to the occasion,” he said in a news conference.

AP [10/30/2025 1:58 AM, Staff, 31753K] reports Haitians in the capital Port-au-Prince, already facing the challenges of displacement, were burdened further Wednesday after Hurricane Melissa brought heavy rains which flooded makeshift tents and homes. [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

New York Times [10/29/2025 4:43 PM, Farnaz Fassihi, 135475K] reports Hurricane Melissa has devastated Jamaica to levels never seen before, the United Nations resident coordinator for the island nation said on Wednesday. More than one million people, a third of the population, were directly affected by the storm, he said. The resident coordinator, Dennis Zulu, who briefed reporters virtually from his base in Kingston, the Jamaican capital, said, “There has been tremendous unprecedented devastation of infrastructure, of property, road network connectivity, energy has been lost.” What was unique in Jamaica, he added, is that the effects of the hurricane were “spread across the country.” He said, “The grid is down in a substantial part of the country.” Many roads were destroyed or cut off, hindering the United Nation’s ability to conduct initial assessments of the damage, so it was relying on drones and satellite imagery. Mr. Zulu said the United Nations was working in partnership with officials on the island and other partners to plan a response. He added that the U.N.’s most immediate action would focus on aid like water and food. The U.N. secretary general, António Guterres, said in a statement on Wednesday that the agency had teams and staff members positioned in nearby countries ready to be deployed, and that it had allocated $4 million each for Haiti and Cuba from its emergency funds. The statement did not address whether any funds had been set aside for Jamaica. “The United Nations has offered its full support to countries across the region,” Mr. Guterres said in the statement. “In close coordination with affected nations, the U.N. will also explore launching appeals to respond to the humanitarian needs triggered by Hurricane Melissa.”

The Washington Post [10/29/2025 4:06 PM, Salvador Rizzo, 24149K] reports a former Coast Guard lieutenant who called for President Donald Trump’s assassination on social media was acquitted by a federal jury Tuesday after his attorneys argued the posts were protected speech under the First Amendment. Federal prosecutors in Virginia argued that Peter A. Stinson, who received sharpshooting awards during his 33-year career as a Coast Guard officer, “seriously, specifically and repeatedly called for someone to assassinate the President” in online messages dating to 2020. Stinson’s public defenders argued that the posts were not specific enough to overcome the First Amendment’s protection on speech that advocates violence. The posts on Bluesky came amid a wave of rising violence and threats against public officials. Stinson ramped up his online rhetoric after a shooter attempted to kill Trump at a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, last year, prosecutors said. Stinson was initially charged with one count of making threats against the president, which is punishable by up to five years in prison. Prosecutors then obtained a superseding indictment charging Stinson with a more serious offense, soliciting Trump’s assassination, for which the maximum sentence would have been two decades in prison. NewsMax [10/29/2025 11:36 PM, James Morley III, 4109K] reports that according to court filings, Stinson suggested in one social media post that he would "pull the trigger" to get rid of Trump or would be the "driver" for someone else willing to assassinate him. Stinson had also offered to "serve in a support capacity" or raise money for a "contract hit," according to documents. "I would do it. I would take the fall to save America. Too bad I don’t have the operational skills to pull it off," Stinson wrote in another post, according to a government court filing. "I am willing to serve in a support capacity for someone else with the skills to take care of things.” Stinson, who had over 3,000 followers on Bluesky, made posts calling for violence against Trump and labeled him a fascist. He was banned from Bluesky shortly after his arrest, and prosecutors noted he also made similar threats on X and Reddit. University of Maryland professor Jen Golbeck, who studies extreme rhetoric online, told the outlet she was surprised Stinson was charged for posting what is a very common online theme. "There’s a lot of people online rooting for Trump to die, and in that context, what he posted is so common that it feels like an alternate universe that he would be charged with anything, let alone solicitation of murder," said Golbeck. The judge informed the jury that the First Amendment protects "speech that merely, without more, encourages or advocates that others should engage in violence – even violence against political figures or the government – at some indefinite point in the future.”

Blaze [10/29/2025 6:00 AM, Joseph M. Hanneman and Steve Baker, 1442K] reports an 8 ½-minute FBI video on the Jan. 6 pipe bombs, released last week, omits key new evidence, relies on likely manipulated, low-quality footage, and excludes crucial hours of security video that could clarify the most persistent questions that surround the languishing investigation. The bureau released the video to revive public interest in a case that has gone unsolved for nearly five years. Its timing comes just two weeks after a video sleuth briefed congressional investigators, alleging serious flaws in the FBI’s account of the pipe bombs. Despite those claims — including apparent video manipulation and ignored public tips — the bureau has stuck to its original story. The new footage also offers no hint that the FBI considered publicly acknowledging another theory: that the pipe bombs were part of a poorly timed training exercise. FBI sources told Blaze News weeks ago about rumors the bureau had been preparing to report that several federal agencies took part in a training exercise that diverted police resources from the Capitol as thousands of protesters breached its barricades at 12:53 p.m. Those same sources said that once word of this alleged new theory leaked, the FBI abandoned it. The latest video reflects that retreat, repeating the same facts and framing first presented in 2021.

New York Times [10/30/2025 4:25 AM, Francesca Regalado, 153395K] reports Prosecutors in Illinois said on Wednesday that they had charged a man with threatening to kill President Trump on social media, even after federal agents spoke with him about the threatening language he posted online. Derek S. Lopez, 27, of El Paso, Ill., posted threats against Mr. Trump on at least two social media accounts, Special Agent Jerome Smith of the Federal Bureau of Investigation said in an affidavit. Mr. Smith was among the F.B.I. agents who interviewed Mr. Lopez in early October, and warned him of the differences between First Amendment-protected speech and threats, according to the affidavit. The F.B.I. learned of Mr. Lopez’s online statements in mid-September from an anonymous tip through the National Threats Operation Center, Mr. Smith wrote. Mr. Lopez was arrested on Tuesday, the F.B.I. said on Wednesday. If convicted, Mr. Lopez could serve as many as five years in prison, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Central District of Illinois said in a statement on Wednesday.

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FOX News [10/29/2025 4:51 PM, Peter D’Abrosca, 40621K]

USNI News [10/29/2025 2:45 PM, Heather Mongilio] reports he White House officially nominated Adm. Kevin Lunday as the next Coast Guard commandant, according to the Senate, which received the nomination last week. The Senate received Lunday’s nomination Thursday along with Vice Adm. Thomas Allan, who was nominated as vice commandant as well as a promotion to admiral. Both nominations, and 10 other Coast Guard nominations, were forwarded to the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation. Lunday has been acting commandant of the Coast Guard since Jan. 21, following the Trump administration’s removal of Adm. Linda Fagan from the position. He previously served as vice commandant. The White House nominated Rear Adm. Douglas Schofield as the next Coast Guard chief of staff, as well as a promotion to vice admiral. Schofield currently is the acting deputy commandant for operations, a position he’s held since July 30. Prior to assuming the role, he served as the commander of the Coast Guard Southeast District. The White House also nominated Vice Adm. Nathan Moore as deputy commandant of operations. He is currently serving as the commander of Coast Guard Atlantic Area, a post he assumed in May 2024. Rear Adm. Jo-Ann Burdian, currently serving as the director of the Joint Interagency Task Force South, and Rear Adm. Joseph Buzzella Jr., commander of Coast Guard Pacific, were nominated for promotion to vice admiral. The Senate notification did not say which positions for which the two received nominations. Additionally, seven rear admiral lower halves were nominated to the rank of rear admiral, including: Michael Campbell, Russell Dash, Amy Grable, Matthew Lake, Ralph Little, Jeffrey Randall and Wilborne Watson.

Reuters [10/29/2025 6:10 PM, A.J. Vicens, 36480K] reports that Hackers working for an unnamed nation-state breached networks at Ribbon Communications (RBBN.O), a key U.S. telecommunications services company, and remained within the firm’s systems for nearly a year without being detected, a company spokesperson confirmed in a statement on Wednesday. Ribbon Communications, a Texas-based company that provides technology to facilitate voice and data communications between separate tech platforms and environments, said in its October 23 10-Q filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission that the company learned early last month that people "reportedly associated with a nation-state actor" gained access to the company’s IT network, with initial access dating to early December 2024. The hack has not been previously reported. It is perhaps the latest example of technology companies that play a critical role in the global telecommunications ecosystem being targeted as part of nation-state hacking campaigns. Ribbon did not identify the nation-state actor, or disclose which of its customers were affected by the breach, but told Reuters in the statement that its investigation has so far revealed three "smaller customers" impacted. There is no evidence to date that the incident would give hackers access to customer systems and the company was not aware of any government customers being impacted, the spokesperson said.

CyberScoop [10/29/2025 2:30 PM, Greg Otto, 122K] reports an ex-L3 Harris executive pleaded guilty to two counts of theft of trade secrets Wednesday, admitting to selling eight zero-day exploits to a Russian broker in exchange for millions of dollars. Peter Williams, 39, pleaded guilty in the District Court of the District of Columbia to two counts of theft of trade secrets. Court records show that over three years, Williams exploited his access at Trenchant, a subsidiary of L3 Harris, to steal at least eight exploits. The software materials, officials said, were designed for exclusive use by the U.S. government and trusted allies. Authorities said Williams sold the stolen cyber-exploit components to a Russian entity advertising itself as a reseller of hacking tools. The broker, according to statements in court, caters to multiple clients including the Russian government. According to information revealed during the plea hearing, Williams, who also formerly served as a member of the Australian Signals Directorate, entered into several contracts with the Russian broker, exchanging the trade secrets for millions of dollars in cryptocurrency. Officials said he subsequently used the proceeds to purchase luxury items. The transactions, which took place from 2022 up until this year, were allegedly facilitated using encrypted communications channels. While the government only referred to the broker as “Company 3,” details read in court pointed to the broker as Operation Zero, which categorizes itself on its website as the “only official Russian zero-day purchase platform.” During the hearing, Assistant U.S. Attorney Tejpal Chawla read a social media post tied to Company 3, advertising millions for exploits tied to iOS and Android, further stating that “As always, the end user is a non-NATO country.” That language points to a post on X made in 2023 by Operation Zero.

CBS News [10/29/2025 5:45 PM, Dan Raby, 39474K] reports a federal judge has denied bond for the Georgia man arrested after his family told police that he was planning a shooting at the Atlanta airport. Billy Joe Cagle, 49, made his first appearance in an Atlanta federal courtroom on Wednesday afternoon. Cagle’s court appearance comes more than a week after federal prosecutors charged him with attempted violence at an international airport, interstate communications containing threats, and possession of a firearm as a felon. In court, a grand jury indicted Cagle on the three charges he had been arrested on. These charges are in addition to the local charges he’s facing, which include terroristic threats, criminal attempt to commit aggravated assault, possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony, and more. Investigators say Cagle is a convicted felon, and the FBI is working to learn how he obtained the rifle that he allegedly brought with him to Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport.

Blaze [10/29/2025 12:15 PM, Joseph MacKinnon, 1442K] reports that a trans-identifying teen accused of plotting a Valentine’s Day massacre at an Indiana high school reportedly has agreed to plead guilty to conspiracy to commit murder. Trinity Shockley — an 18-year-old female who identifies as a male — was arrested Feb. 12 after someone notified an FBI tip line that an acquaintance was planning a school shooting, had access to an AR-15 rifle, and had just ordered a bulletproof vest. The FBI — which ultimately alerted the Mooresville Metropolitan Police Department about the possible shooting plot — investigated Shockley’s accounts on the Discord instant messaging app and Snapchat and found multiple correspondences in which the suspect appeared to confirm she had it in mind to shoot up her school, according to the probable cause affidavit. In one conversation on Discord, Shockley allegedly said she had been planning a "Parkland part two" for at least a year, referring to the Feb. 14, 2018, mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida. The affidavit indicated that Shockley confided in her school counselor on Feb. 11 that she was sexually infatuated with Nikolas Cruz — the convicted shooter who murdered 17 people at Parkland — wanted to have his children, and had written to him several times since his incarceration. During a search of Shockley’s family home, police indicated they found what appeared to be a framed photo of Dylann Roof — the white identitarian responsible for the 2015 mass shooting at the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, South Carolina — in the student’s bedroom along with other images of mass shooters, including Cruz.

FOX News [10/29/2025 3:10 PM, Rachel Wolf and Jennifer Griffin, 40621K] reports the U.S. is scaling back its military presence in Romania as Eastern Europe continues to grapple with the ongoing Russia-Ukraine war. Some have expressed concern that this could mean American troops withdrawing from Europe, something the Pentagon denies. U.S. Army Europe and Africa announced on Wednesday that the 2nd Infantry Brigade Combat Team of the 101st Airborne Division would redeploy to their Kentucky-based home unit without replacement. The statement explained that this was part of Secretary of War Pete Hegseth’s "deliberate process to ensure a balanced U.S. military force posture.". "This is not an American withdrawal from Europe or a signal of lessened commitment to NATO and Article 5. Rather this is a positive sign of increased European capability and responsibility," U.S. Army Europe and Africa said in the statement. "Our NATO allies are meeting President Trump’s call to take primary responsibility for the conventional defense of Europe. This force posture adjustment will not change the security environment in Europe.". However, NATO allies and some Republican lawmakers do not see the move as a sign of trust. Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Roger Wicker, R-Miss., and House Armed Services Committee Chairman Mike Rogers, R-Ala., issued a joint statement rebuking the move. "We strongly oppose the decision not to maintain the rotational U.S. brigade in Romania and the Pentagon’s process for its ongoing force posture review that may result in further drawdowns of U.S. forces from Eastern Europe," Wicker and Rogers’ statement read. The lawmakers said the move goes against their March 19 declaration that they would not accept significant changes to the U.S.’s military structure "without a rigorous interagency process, coordination with combatant commanders and the Joint Staff, and collaboration with Congress.". President Donald Trump told reporters earlier this month that the U.S. was not planning on withdrawing troops, but that "we may move some around a little bit.".

Reuters [10/29/2025 12:50 PM, Staff, 36480K] reports the United States plans to cut the number of troops present on Europe’s eastern flank, including soldiers who were to be stationed at Romania’s Mihail Kogalniceanu air base, Romania’s defence ministry said on Wednesday. The ministry said the decision was expected given changes in Washington’s priorities, and that roughly 1,000 U.S. troops would continue to be stationed in Romania. Between 1,000 and 1,200 U.S. troops rotated out a month ago and will not be replaced, it said in a statement. Washington’s European allies have been told previously by the administration of President Donald Trump that they will need to take more responsibility for their own security as the United States focuses more on its own borders and on the Indo-Pacific region. "The American decision is to stop the rotation in Europe of a brigade that had elements in several NATO countries," the defence ministry said. The U.S. military said the decision not to replace departing American troops in Romania was not "an American withdrawal from Europe or a signal of lessened commitment to NATO". But in a rare move, the top U.S. Republican lawmakers on the Senate and House Armed Services Committees slammed the move. "We strongly oppose the decision not to maintain the rotational U.S. brigade in Romania," the joint statement said, adding that the lawmakers were seeking clarification from the Pentagon. Defence Minister Ionut Mosteanu told a news conference that the brigade had troops in Romania, Bulgaria, Hungary and Slovakia.

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Washington Post [10/29/2025 5:19 PM, Ellen Francis and Noah Robertson, 24149K]

Reuters [10/29/2025 4:48 AM, Trevor Hunnicutt, Ismail Shakil and Kanishka Singh, 36480K] reports U.S. President Donald Trump ordered the U.S. military on Thursday to immediately resume testing nuclear weapons after a gap of 33 years, minutes before beginning a meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping. Trump made the surprise announcement on Truth Social while he was aboard his Marine One helicopter flying to meet Xi for a trade negotiating session in Busan, South Korea. He said he was instructing the Pentagon to test the U.S. nuclear arsenal on an "equal basis" with other nuclear powers. "Because of other countries testing programs, I have instructed the Department of War to start testing our Nuclear Weapons on an equal basis. That process will begin immediately," Trump posted. "Russia is second, and China is a distant third, but will be even within 5 years.” Later, on his way back to Washington, Trump said testing was needed to ensure Washington keeps up with its rival nuclear powers. "With others doing testing, I think it’s appropriate that we do also," Trump said aboard Air Force One, adding that nuclear test sites would be determined later. Asked whether the world was entering a more risky phase around nuclear weapons, Trump dismissed the threat, saying U.S. stocks were "well locked up" before adding he would welcome denuclearisation. "I’d like to see a denuclearisation because we have so many and Russia’s second and China’s third and China will catch up within four or five years," he said. "We are actually talking to Russia about that and China would be added to that if we do something.” It was not immediately clear whether Trump was referring to nuclear-explosive testing, which would be carried out by the National Nuclear Safety Administration, or flight testing of nuclear-capable missiles. Trump’s decision to restart nuclear weapons testing follows a rapid expansion by China of its nuclear stockpile in recent years, and came just after Russia announced what it called a successful test of a nuclear-powered and nuclear-capable cruise missile as well as a nuclear-powered torpedo. Trump addressed the Russian moves aboard Air Force One earlier this week, telling reporters that President Vladimir Putin should be working to end the war in Ukraine "instead of testing missiles.” Beijing has more than doubled the size of its arsenal to an estimated 600 nuclear weapons in 2025 from 300 weapons in 2020, according to the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington-based think tank. It said U.S. military officials estimate that China will have over 1,000 nuclear weapons by 2030. A Victory Day parade in September revealed five nuclear capabilities that can all reach the continental United States, CSIS said. The Washington-based Arms Control Association says the United States has a stockpile of 5,225 nuclear warheads and Russia has 5,580.

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Washington Post [10/30/2025 4:18 AM, Natalie Allison, Cat Zakrzewski, Katrina Northrop and Adam Taylor, 24149K]
USA Today [10/29/2025 3:17 AM, Davis Winkie and Swapna Venugopal Ramaswamy, 67103K]

ABC News [10/29/2025 5:51 PM, Selina Wang, et al., 30493K] reports President Donald Trump said he approves of South Korea building a nuclear-powered submarine -- a permission that comes after he and President Lee Jae Myung reached a trade agreement during a bilateral meeting on Wednesday. Trump said during the meeting several economic promises were made on the part of South Korea. "Our Military Alliance is stronger than ever before and, based on that, I have given them approval to build a Nuclear Powered Submarine, rather than the old fashioned, and far less nimble, diesel powered Submarines that they have now. A great trip, with a great Prime Minister!" Trump posted on his social media platform on Wednesday. Trump added that the submarine will be built in the U.S. The Philly Shipyard, where Trump said construction will take place, is located in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and was acquired last year by the Korean company Hanwha Group. The economic agreements that Trump said were made during the meeting Wednesday include South Korea paying the U.S. $350 billion in exchange for the Trump administration granting the country a lower tariff rate. Currently in South Korea meeting with the country’s leaders during the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum, Trump also said that South Korea agreed to buy U.S. oil and gas in "vast quantities," with those investments that will "exceed" $600 billion. After the meeting, President Lee’s chief of staff said the tariffs the U.S. imposes on automobile exports will be lowered to 15% from 25%. The framework deal from July lowered the reciprocal rate to 15% and that will be maintained.

The Hill [10/29/2025 6:43 PM, Julia Manchester, 12595K] reports President Trump announced that South Korea will construct its nuclear-powered submarine in Philadelphia shipyards as a part of the new trade deal between the two countries. "South Korea will be building its Nuclear Powered Submarine in the Philadelphia Shipyards, right here in the good ol’ U.S.A. Shipbuilding in our Country will soon be making a BIG COMEBACK," Trump wrote. The announcement will likely be received well in the U.S. manufacturing sector, which the president has pledged to bolster in his administration. Trump made headlines on Tuesday when he told U.S. troops to " go and buy a Toyota" during a visit to a U.S. naval base in Japan, saying that the Japanese automaker has plans to build plants in the U.S. In an effort to ease trade tensions, the Japanese government has floated purchasing Ford F-150 trucks. Trump praised the effort while speaking to reporters on Air Force One. On Wednesday, Trump announced that the U.S. and South Korea reached a trade deal in which South Korea would pay the U.S. $350 billion in exchange for lower tariffs. The president also said South Korea agreed to purchase U.S. oil and gas in "vast quantities." Trump said South Korea agreed to investments in the U.S. by South Korean companies and businesses that will exceed $600 billion.

FOX News [10/29/2025 11:13 AM, Efrat Lachter and Ander Hagstrom, 40621K] reports that Russian President Vladimir Putin announced Wednesday that Russia had a "huge success" testing its Poseidon nuclear-capable underwater drone, describing the system as a major step in the country’s strategic weapons program, according to Reuters. "For the first time, we managed not only to launch it with a launch engine from a carrier submarine, but also to launch the nuclear power unit on which this device passed a certain amount of time," Putin said. "There is nothing like this." "The Poseidon’s power significantly exceeds the power of even our most promising Sarmat intercontinental-range missile," he said, referring to Russia’s SATAN II model. The Poseidon, first unveiled in 2018, is designed to travel across oceans at high speeds using nuclear propulsion and carry a massive warhead. Russian officials claim it can create destructive radioactive waves capable of striking coastal targets, though its operational status has not been independently verified. Putin also cited progress on other strategic systems, including the Burevestnik nuclear-powered cruise missile, which Moscow says can fly indefinitely and evade missile defenses. Russian officials reported a successful test flight of the Burevestnik earlier in the week as part of a broader demonstration of nuclear readiness. The successful Burevestnik test traveled over 8,700 miles, Russia said, raising some eyebrows in the West.

NBC News [10/29/2025 7:18 AM, Chantal Da Silva, 34509K] reports Israel said Wednesday that the ceasefire in the Gaza Strip was back on after it carried out intense strikes across the Palestinian enclave that killed 100 people, including children, according to local health officials. The Israeli military said it had "begun the renewed enforcement" of the fragile ceasefire after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ordered "powerful" strikes on the territory as Israel and Hamas traded accusations of ceasefire violations. Dozens of targets were struck in the attack, it said, the most serious threat yet to the truce partly brokered by President Donald Trump. Dr. Khalil Al-Daqran, a spokesperson for the Palestinian Health Ministry in Gaza, told NBC News that more than 104 people had been killed, including more than 40 children and 20 women, since Tuesday night in the deadly strikes. He said more than 250 people, including more than 70 children, were also injured. Dr. Muhammad Abu Salmiya, director of Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, reported the same death toll. [Editorial note: consult video at source link] The Washington Examiner [10/29/2025 9:02 AM, Brady Knox, 1394K] reports that the death toll was exacerbated by a lack of medical supplies, which have trickled in at a quantity smaller than hoped for due to tensions over the ceasefire. Among those killed was a Palestinian journalist, Mohammed al Munirawi, and his wife, who were killed while sheltering in a tent. Also among the dead were 18 members of a single family, sources told Al Jazeera. Israel said it conducted the strikes in response to a Hamas attack against Israel Defense Forces soldiers in Rafah, which resulted in one death. The killed soldier was identified as Sgt. Yona Feldbaum, 37, of the Gaza Division’s Combat Engineering Corps. Hamas denied any involvement in the shooting death of Feldbaum. It said it would delay the return of a hostage’s remains in response to the ceasefire violation.

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Reuters [10/29/2025 2:56 PM, Jana Choukeir, Emily Rose, and Nidal Al-Mughrabi, 36480K]

ABC News [10/30/2025 1:26 AM, Jack Moore and David Brennan, 30493K] Video: HERE reports President Donald Trump said he is reducing some tariffs on Chinese imports following a meeting in South Korea with Chinese President Xi Jinping, citing a commitment from the Chinese leader to take steps to stop the flow of fentanyl. Speaking to reporters aboard Air Force One following the meeting with Xi, which lasted about 1 hour and 45 minutes, Trump said the 20% tariffs on China related to fentanyl were being reduced to 10% bringing the total amount of duties imposed on Chinese imports from 57% to 47%. Trump also said the U.S. had reached a one-year agreement with China ensuring Beijing would not impose dramatic restrictions on rare earth minerals -- materials key for producing computer chips that are needed for everything including smartphones, AI systems and defense technology. That takes the threat of and additional 100% tariffs on China off the table. "We have a deal now," Trump told reporters. "Every year we’ll renegotiate the deal, but I think the deal will go on for a long time, long beyond the year. We’ll negotiate at the end of the year. But all of the rare earth has been settled, and that’s for the world.” Trump said he agreed to reduce the tariff rate because China had agreed to "work very hard to stop the flow" of fentanyl. The president said the meeting touched on most key bilateral issues. "A lot of decisions were made to there wasn’t too, too much left out there," he said. Trump said he thinks the one-year deal will be "routinely" extended. Overall, Trump said the meeting with Xi in South Korea was "amazing," and on a scale of 1 to 10 gave it a 12. "He’s a great leader, great leader of a very powerful, very strong country, China, and we, what can I say? We have -- it was an outstanding group of decisions, I think that was made," Trump said. The two leaders agreed that Trump will visit China in April, the president said, with Xi then visiting the U.S. "sometime after that.” Trump said China would begin purchasing U.S. soybeans "immediately" as part of the new deal. The Chinese pause on purchasing Americans soybeans had been a major part of the ongoing trade war and had deeply affected American farmers. "We’re in agreement on so many elements, large amounts, tremendous amounts of the soybeans and other farm products are going to be purchased immediately, starting immediately," Trump said. Trump also said that he discussed computer chips with Xi, claiming China said they would speak with U.S. chipmaker Nvidia and some others about purchasing products from America.

Telemundo [10/30/2025 2:15 AM, Staff, 182K] reports President Donald Trump announced Thursday, after holding an "incredible" meeting with his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping, in South Korea, that he will reduce tariffs on the Asian giant from 20% to 10%, tariffs he imposed in retaliation for fentanyl trafficking. On board Air Force One on the return trip to Washington, Trump said Xi pledged to strengthen controls on this opioid, which the United States says is produced by Mexican cartels using chemical precursors obtained in China. By lowering that section of the tariffs, the total duties that the United States maintains on China fall from 57% to 47%, Trump pointed out. The Republican leader also mentioned an agreement for China to resume buying soybeans from the United States, which had been suspended last May due to the trade war that Trump launched with his escalating tariffs. Trump, who said he will meet with Xi again in April of next year in China, also revealed that they did not discuss the issue of Taiwan, a self-governed island that Beijing considers a renegade province. Thursday’s face-to-face meeting, the first since the Republican returned to power, took place at Gimhae Air Base in the South Korean city of Busan. After the meeting, which lasted almost two hours, the Chinese leader left the airport for the South Korean city of Gyeongju, the venue for the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit, while Trump departed for Washington aboard Air Force One. This was the first time they had met since the G20 summit in Osaka, Japan, in 2019, during Trump’s first term, and they were scheduled to discuss a broad agenda that included, in addition to tariffs, the future of TikTok in the US and the situation in Taiwan, among other issues.

Reuters [10/30/2025 3:01 AM, Trevor Hunnicutt and Eduardo Baptista, 19051K] reports U.S. President Donald Trump may have teased that he could discuss Nvidia’s (NVDA.O) state-of-the-art artificial intelligence Blackwell chips with Chinese President Xi Jinping, but in the end, he said the topic didn’t come up. After meeting with Xi in South Korea on Thursday, Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One that semiconductors had been discussed and that China is "going to be talking to Nvidia and others about taking chips," but added: "We’re not talking about the Blackwell." A day earlier, Trump had praised the Blackwell chip as "super-duper", adding he might speak to Xi about that - comments that likely helped Nvidia make history as the first company to reach a $5 trillion valuation. The extent to which China has access to Nvidia’s chips has been a key point of friction between the U.S. and China. Washington currently imposes export controls on sales of Nvidia’s most advanced AI chips to China, seeking to limit its tech progress, particularly in any applications that could help its military. Nvidia has been working on a new chip for China based on its latest Blackwell architecture that will be more powerful than the H20 model it is currently allowed to sell there, sources have previously said. But while private Chinese companies are believed to be very much interested in purchasing such a chip, the Chinese government has turned cool towards Nvidia and is instead promoting domestic chip manufacturers like Huawei(HWT.UL). Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang said earlier this week that his company had not applied for U.S. export licenses to send its newest chips to China because of the Chinese position. "They’ve made it very clear that they don’t want Nvidia to be there right now," he said during the company’s developers’ event, adding it needs access to the China market to fund U.S.-based research and development. A range of U.S. lawmakers, both Democratic and Republican, have also expressed their opposition to giving China more access to advanced chips like Nvidia’s Blackwell. On Thursday at least, Trump did not appear to want to get into the thick of the issue. "I said (to Xi) that’s really between you and Nvidia, but we’re sort of the arbitrator or the referee," he said.

AP [10/30/2025 4:36 AM, Barbara Ortutay, 31753K] reports President Donald Trump’s meeting Thursday with China’s top leader Xi Jinping produced a raft of decisions to help dial back trade tensions, but no agreement on TikTok’s ownership. “China will work with the U.S. to properly resolve issues related to TikTok,” China’s Commerce Ministry said after the meeting. It gave no details on any progress toward ending uncertainty about the fate of the popular video-sharing platform in the U.S. The Trump administration had been signaling that it may have finally reached a deal with Beijing to keep TikTok running in the U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent had said on CBS’s “Face the Nation” on Sunday that the two leaders will “consummate that transaction on Thursday in Korea.” Wide bipartisan majorities in Congress passed — and President Joe Biden signed — a law that would ban TikTok in the U.S. if it did not find a new owner to replace China’s ByteDance. The platform went dark briefly on a January deadline but on his first day in office, Trump signed an executive order to keep it running while his administration tries to reach an agreement for the sale of the company. Three more executive orders followed, as Trump, without a clear legal basis, extended deadlines for a TikTok deal. The second was in April, when White House officials believed they were nearing a deal to spin off TikTok into a new company with U.S. ownership. That fell apart when China backed out after Trump announced sharply higher tariffs on Chinese products. Deadlines in June and September passed, with Trump saying he would allow TikTok to continue operating in the United States in a way that meets national security concerns.

Bloomberg [10/30/2025 1:34 AM, Staff, 18207K] reports one of US President Donald Trump’s first actions against China following his re-election was to impose a 10% tariff on Chinese imports, punishing Beijing for what he described as its failure to curb illegal exports of fentanyl and the chemicals used to make it. Fentanyl — a powerful and highly addictive synthetic opioid — is often legally prescribed by doctors to treat post-surgery or chronic pain. But the drug, which is relatively cheap and easy to produce, is also found on the black market and its illicit versions have contributed to a rise in overdose deaths in the US over the past decade. In March, a month after the original tariff was introduced, Trump doubled down, increasing the levy to 20%, prompting China to retaliate with its own tariffs of between 10% and 15% on a range of US agricultural products. Tit-for-tat tariffs continued for months before both sides signaled a pause in their trade war. On Oct. 30, following a meeting between the US leader and China’s President Xi Jinping in South Korea, Trump announced the US would halve fentanyl-related tariffs on Chinese goods immediately. Trump’s February executive order on fentanyl said China’s ruling Communist Party had “subsidized and otherwise incentivized PRC [People’s Republic of China] chemical companies to export fentanyl and related precursor chemicals that are used to produce synthetic opioids sold illicitly in the United States.” It also accused the Chinese government of providing a “safe haven” for transnational criminal organizations laundering the proceeds of fentanyl sales. It wasn’t the first time that Trump had accused China’s leaders of failing to uphold past commitments to fight the drug trade. In late 2023, he posted on his social media platform Truth Social that Xi had backtracked on what Trump claimed was a promise in 2018 to impose the death penalty on drug dealers. In response, an official from China’s Foreign Ministry said Beijing had forcefully cracked down on the fentanyl trade and that Washington should have offered a “big thank you” instead of slapping levies on Chinese imports. He also called on the Trump administration to keep dialogue open on trade and expressed willingness to continue working with the US. According to a 2021 report by the US-China Economic and Security Review Commission, China, which has a large chemical industry, remains “the primary country of origin for illicit fentanyl and fentanyl-related substances trafficked into the United States.” However, the nature of China’s role in the fentanyl supply train has shifted. The US Drug Enforcement Administration reports that, since 2019, Chinese traffickers have largely shifted from manufacturing finished fentanyl to instead mostly exporting precursor chemicals to Mexican cartels, which make and deliver the finished product. In 2018, after Trump and Xi met at the Group of 20 summit in Argentina, China vowed to tighten supervision and revise rules around fentanyl production. Its leadership allowed US law enforcement authorities to take a bigger role in investigating smuggling rings within China. Following through on its promises, China in 2019 closed a loophole that had hindered efforts to crack down on the laboratories that had made the country the world’s largest exporter of fentanyl. That year, China also sentenced three Chinese nationals to maximum punishments for smuggling fentanyl to the US, giving one a suspended death sentence and the other two life sentences. But bilateral cooperation stalled when US-China relations became strained over disagreements related to Taiwan and the Covid-19 pandemic. In August 2022, China officially announced that it had suspended all counternarcotics and law enforcement cooperation with the US. Cooperation was restored late in Joe Biden’s presidency.

NBC News [10/29/2025 5:10 PM, Janis Mackey Frayer and Alexander Smith, 34509K] reports NBC News got exclusive access to the headquarters of Yichang Humanwell Pharmaceutical, the largest producer of the drug in China, and indeed Asia, at its sprawling complex in the central city of Yichang. Humanwell says that it only supplies fentanyl for use in hospitals and that it does not export any medication to the United States, Mexico or Canada. In 51 years of operating, "we have never had a single incident of a drug going missing — not a single dose has ever been lost," its president, Du Wentao, said in an interview inside his factory, which is surrounded by high fences wrapped in concertina wire and electric sensors. Trump says fentanyl will be the subject of the "first question" he asks when he meets with Xi in South Korea, the last stop of his three-country Asian tour. American officials say the Chinese government hasn’t done enough to stem the illicit international flow of precursor chemicals for fentanyl, which are then processed into the highly addictive opioid in Mexican labs and smuggled across the border to the United States. Though deaths appear to be declining in the U.S., fentanyl and other synthetic opioids have killed hundreds of thousands of Americans in recent years, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Trump, who cited fentanyl as the reason for imposing the first 20% in tariffs on China since retaking office in January, said Wednesday that he believed China is "going to help us with the fentanyl situation" and that tariffs would be lowered accordingly. China has defended its anti-fentanyl efforts and says unrelenting American demand for the drug is to blame for the crisis.

Free Beacon [10/29/2025 5:00 AM, Jessica Costescu, 411K] reports an even more potent replacement for fentanyl is emerging in the United States, and experts say China is behind its rise. Nitazenes, a class of synthetic opioids that can be up to 43 times stronger than fentanyl, were first developed in the 1950s as a painkiller, but their extreme addictiveness led drugmakers to keep them off the shelves. Now, their black market presence is increasing. The Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) logged zero reported nitazene discoveries from 2005 to 2019. Since then, the agency has logged nearly 7,000 such reports and linked the drugs to roughly 2,000 deaths. That’s a drop in the bucket compared to last year’s 48,000 fentanyl-related deaths. It’s also an alarming rise, drug experts say—and likely an undercount. "We’re seeing the extreme potency of these new drugs that are coming out, and they’re so extreme that the tools we have … are incapable of dealing with them," Luke Niforatos, executive vice president of Smart Approaches to Marijuana, told the Washington Free Beacon. Drug traffickers seek out nitazenes because, like fentanyl, they are inexpensive to produce, highly addictive, and extremely potent, making them easier to smuggle because only small quantities are needed to produce a high. The drugs have another similarity to fentanyl: Their top supplier is China, according to Niforatos and former DEA supervisory special agent Brian Townsend, who served in the agency for 23 years before retiring in 2022. "China is the number one source, not even a close second," Townsend told the Free Beacon. "Everything I’ve seen, it’s all been finished product coming from there and other places," including India and Myanmar.

AP [10/29/2025 9:00 AM, Garance Burke, Dake Kang, and Byron Tau, 31753K] reports U.S. lawmakers have tried four times since September last year to close what they called a glaring loophole: China is getting around export bans on the sale of powerful American AI chips by renting them through U.S. cloud services instead. But the proposals prompted a flurry of activity from more than 100 lobbyists from tech companies and their trade associations trying to weigh in, according to disclosure reports. The result: All four times, the proposal failed, including just last month. As leaders Donald Trump and Xi Jinping prepare for a long-heralded meeting Thursday, the sale of U.S. technology to China is among the thorniest issues the U.S. faces, with billions of dollars and the future of tech dominance at stake. But the tough talk about China obscures a deeper story: Even while warning about national security and human rights abuse, the U.S. government across five Republican and Democratic administrations has repeatedly allowed and even actively helped American firms to sell technology to Chinese police, government agencies and surveillance companies, an Associated Press investigation has found.

Reuters [10/29/2025 4:35 PM, Staff, 36480K] reports a group of Senate Democrats led by Chuck Schumer on Wednesday urged President Donald Trump not to lift national security restrictions on China in pursuit of a trade deal. "America’s export controls, investment safeguards, and our longstanding security partnerships must not be on the negotiating table," the senators wrote, also calling on Trump not to limits efforts by the Treasury Department’s Outbound Investment Security Program, which aims to ensure U.S. firms do not contribute to the development of sensitive technologies in countries like China.

AP [10/29/2025 5:22 AM, Mari Yamaguchi, 31753K] reports U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on Wednesday welcomed Japan’s determination to accelerate its ongoing military buildup and defense spending. During a visit to Japan, Hegseth said he hopes to see those pledges implemented as soon as possible, noting China’s increasingly assertive military activity. "The threats we face are real, and they are urgent. China’s unprecedented military buildup and its aggressive military actions speak for themselves," he said. "Make no mistake about it, our alliance is critical to deterring Chinese military aggression, to responding to regional contingencies, and keeping our countries safe.". Hegseth said he was "glad" to see Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi — speaking alongside U.S. President Donald Trump this week — make a commitment to increase Japan’s defense spending, calling it "wonderful." He said the U.S. government had not demanded Japan’s spending increase.

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