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.

The New York Times [4/28/2026 5:58 AM, Ernesto Londoño and Billy Witz, 148038K] reports federal agents on Tuesday searched businesses in the Minneapolis area, including day care centers, as part of a fraud investigation, the Department of Homeland Security said. The operation was among the boldest moves since the White House launched a task force to combat fraud in social services programs last month, led by Vice President JD Vance. A law enforcement official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss a continuing investigation, said agents from the F.B.I. and the Department of Homeland Security had obtained 22 search warrants. State investigators were involved in the inquiries that led to the searches on Tuesday, according to the office of Gov. Tim Walz, and state agents took part in the operation. “The task force and the DOJ will be relentless in exposing these fraudsters wherever they may be hiding,” Mr. Vance said on social media, referring to the Department of Justice. Fraud in safety net programs has roiled Minnesota and captured the attention of the Trump administration. Federal prosecutors have charged scores of people with defrauding programs designed to feed low-income children, treat minors with autism and help people avoid homelessness. Federal prosecutors have described the fraud as staggering. They say business owners have stolen several billion dollars in recent years by submitting claims for services that were not rendered. The Washington Examiner [4/28/2026 11:34 AM, Emily Hallas, 1147K] reports that the Department of Homeland Security said its investigations unit was also involved in carrying out the raid "in cooperation with our law enforcement partners." DHS said it "executed criminal search warrants in Minneapolis relating to the rampant fraud of U.S. taxpayers’ dollars," sparking praise from Republicans such as Vice President JD Vance and House Majority Whip Tom Emmer (R-MN). "The American people deserve to know how their taxpayer money was abused," DHS wrote in a post to X. "No stone will be left unturned." CNN [4/28/2026 7:51 PM, Andy Rose, et al., 612K] reports that twenty-two federal search warrants were executed in Minnesota, including raids at daycares, businesses and homes, a federal official told CNN. The raids dealt with allegations of fraud, the Department of Homeland Security said. The operation involved the FBI, other federal agencies and state and local law enforcement, a Justice Department spokesperson said. Five sites related to four businesses served with warrants are connected to a state program designed to assist children with autism spectrum disorder, and the state’s Medicaid fraud control unit assisted in the operation for those businesses, the Minnesota attorney general’s office told CNN. The office didn’t participate in the execution of other search warrants as “those sites do not involve Medicaid funding,” it said in a news release. Tuesday’s raids come amid longstanding allegations that some Minnesota businesses, including those run by people of Somali descent, have fraudulently used federal funding – accusations that have been the subject of a federal investigation and a fiery congressional hearing last month. Gov. Tim Walz dropped his reelection campaign in response to the scandal. Tuesday’s raids were not connected to immigration, the federal official who spoke to CNN said, but Homeland Security Investigations posted on social media that it was part of the operation. HSI is a unit within Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The FBI’s Minneapolis office said on social media it “conducted court-authorized law enforcement activity as part of an ongoing federal criminal investigation” with the assistance of other federal, state and local law enforcement. Minnesota’s Bureau of Criminal Apprehension also confirmed its involvement, telling CNN its agents “partnered with federal law enforcement to execute multiple warrants across the Twin Cities Metro Area.” “We remain committed to identifying criminal activity and holding those responsible accountable,” the agency said.

Reported similarly:
Washington Post [4/28/2026 2:52 PM, Sheila Regan, et al., 24826K]
New York Post [4/28/2026 5:23 PM, Steven Nelson, Chris Nesi, and Steven Vago, 40934K]
Breitbart [4/28/2026 10:55 AM, Amy Furr, 2238K]
ABC News [4/28/2026 3:38 PM, Luke Barr, 34146K]
CBS News [4/28/2026 11:49 AM, Jonah Kaplan, 51110K]
NBC News [4/28/2026 4:51 PM, Michael Kosnar and Rebecca Cohen, 42967K]
FOX News [4/28/2026 8:40 AM, Bill Melugin and Stephen Sorace, 37576K] Video: HERE
NewsMax [4/28/2026 10:53 AM, Brian Freeman, 3760K]
DailySignal [4/28/2026 12:01 PM, Elizabeth Troutman Mitchell, 474K]

The Hill [4/28/2026 5:51 PM, Tara Suter, 18170K] reports Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin went after Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz (D) over recent raids targeting fraud of federal agencies in Minnesota, telling the governor that “you have *zero* credibility on this issue.” Law enforcement agencies on Tuesday executed multiple search warrants in Minnesota related to alleged fraud in the state, federal officials said. Walz, the 2024 Democratic vice presidential nominee, said the raids came about because state agencies had spotted suspicious behavior. “Today’s raids by state and federal law enforcement happened because our state agencies caught irregular behavior and reported it,” Walz said in a post on the social platform X on Tuesday. “That’s how the system is supposed to work, and our agencies will keep at it as long as there are fraudsters around to put behind bars,” he added. In response to Walz’s post, Mullin said “you have *zero* credibility on this issue.” “@GovTimWalz, you have willingly ignored and downplayed the rampant fraud and abuse in Minnesota. This crackdown on fraud has come thanks to the leadership of President Trump. We will hold those who steal from Americans accountable,” he added.

AP [4/29/2026 12:02 AM, Lisa Mascaro, 35287K] reports the White House is warning Congress that funding to pay Department of Homeland Security personnel will "soon run out," sparking new threats of airport disruptions and national security concerns as the House slow-walks legislation to end what has been the longest-ever lapse in agency funding. In a memo late Tuesday to lawmakers, the Office of Management and Budget said money that President Donald Trump tapped to pay Transportation Security Administration and other workers through executive actions will be exhausted by May. It called on the House to quickly approve the budget resolution senators approved in an all-night session last week that would pave the way for full funding for the department. "DHS will soon run out of critical operating funds, placing essential personnel and operations at risk," the memo said. The pressure from the Trump administration could help House Speaker Mike Johnson, whose narrow Republican majority has been stalled out, tangled in internal party disputes on a range of pending issues, including the Homeland Security funding. They have left the chamber at a virtual standstill. The House is expected to vote as soon as Wednesday on the Senate budget resolution that is designed to unlock a multi-step process to eventually fund the department, and the administration warned GOP lawmakers off making changes that could prolong passage.

New York Times [4/28/2026 9:48 PM, Michael Gold, 148038K] reports the White House on Tuesday urged the House to immediately pass a stalled bipartisan spending bill to reopen the Department of Homeland Security, which Republicans have refused to take up since the Senate passed it nearly a month ago. The request, in a memo sent to members of Congress by the White House’s budget office, amounted to a rebuke of Speaker Mike Johnson, who has delayed action on the measure even as the homeland security shutdown has dragged into its 10th week. It came a day after he suggested that he wanted to make modifications to the measure that could further slow its path to enactment. In the memo, a copy of which was viewed by New York Times, the Trump administration appeared to dismiss Mr. Johnson’s idea, calling for the “immediate passage” of the measure “as passed by the Senate.” That bill contains no funding for immigration enforcement after Democrats refused to support that without restrictions on federal agents’ tactics and conduct, which the G.O.P. would not agree to. The White House also directed the House to quickly approve a Republican budget blueprint that would pave the way for a filibuster-proof bill that would establish a $70-billion multiyear fund for immigration enforcement, which Republicans view as a key component of ending the shutdown. The memo, first reported by Punchbowl News, came as the House was paralyzed by Republican infighting that kept Mr. Johnson from bringing the budget plan — or any of the other major policy items he had scheduled for the week — to the floor. House leaders canceled planned votes on Tuesday afternoon, as it was unclear whether they had enough support to clear a key procedural hurdle to bring up several bills. That inaction threatened to prolong the shutdown of the Department of Homeland Security, even as Mr. Johnson and Senator John Thune of South Dakota, the Republican majority leader, jointly endorsed a two-step plan weeks ago to end it. On April 1, Mr. Johnson and Mr. Thune vowed to pass a spending bill to fund the department except for the agencies carrying out the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown. They would then begin work on a separate bill to fund ICE and Border Patrol through the end of Mr. Trump’s second term using a special budget process, known as reconciliation, that could skirt a Democratic filibuster. Mr. Trump backed the plan, and Mr. Thune passed the spending bill quickly, with no objection from either party. House Democrats also said they would back it. Yet with the House scheduled to leave Washington on Thursday for a 12-day recess, Mr. Johnson has faced increasing pressure from rank-and-file House members and senators of both parties to bring the shutdown to an end.

CNN [4/28/2026 10:58 PM, Sarah Ferris, 612K] reports President Donald Trump’s budget office sent a memo to Capitol Hill on Tuesday evening urging House Republicans to agree to partly reopen the Department of Homeland Security – even without new cash for immigration enforcement. The existence of the memo, which was confirmed by a person familiar with its contents, could amount to a major development in the monthslong impasse around DHS funding. Trump officials are now telling House Republicans to accept a compromise measure from the Senate, which does not include money for ICE or border patrol, to ensure that workers do not go unpaid. Many House Republicans have so far refused to pass any DHS funding without simultaneously approving another funding bill for ICE. The pressure from the White House comes as House Speaker Mike Johnson has refused to say whether he will put that partial, Senate-passed DHS funding bill on the floor this week before the House leaves for a weeklong recess. The party is bitterly split with conservatives furious that Senate Majority Leader John Thune agreed to Democratic demands to only partially fund the department. In response, House Republicans are scrambling to pass a separate – and legislatively complex – package focused on funding immigration enforcement and border patrol without Democratic support. The memo from the budget office, which Punchbowl News first reported, comes as the delay in funding has raised concerns with some of the GOP’s national security hawks, who worry that the Department of Homeland Security will out of money within days. (The White House had temporarily paid some key staff, including the Transportation Security Administration, using a rainy day fund, but that is almost dry.). Those Republicans have warned that the House needs to act on the Senate-passed bill as soon as possible – and certainly before the chamber leaves next week for recess. But even if Johnson were to bring the bill to the floor, it could still face steep odds. A senior House Republican told CNN on Tuesday that the votes simply don’t exist to partly end the DHS shutdown this week without having money "in hand" for federal immigration enforcement. "No one is going to vote to fund Homeland without money for ICE and CBP," said Rep. Jodey Arrington of Texas, who leads the House Budget Committee. The remarks from Arrington — a retiring Republican who is respected among the party’s ultraconservative wing — signify the massive road block that Congress is facing to end the shutdown.

DailySignal [4/28/2026 12:58 PM, George Caldwell, 474K] reports that the House of Representatives’ attempt to pass legislation on foreign surveillance, homeland security funding, and agricultural policy on a tight deadline has already screeched to a halt, with Republican intraparty disagreement on all fronts. The House rules committee, a leadership-controlled panel which determines the conditions of debate for bills on the floor, went into recess Tuesday morning after failing to agree on a "rule" which would set up consideration of multiple bills. The federal government’s authority to monitor foreigners without a warrant under Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) will expire Thursday. Meanwhile, Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin has said that emergency funding to pay department staff will run out in early May, prompting congressional leadership to pass a funding measure this week. Leadership and conservative hardliners had not settled on a framework for extending the government’s surveillance authority. A faction of conservatives has opposed the long-term extension of the FISA program without major reforms, citing past abuses that have resulted in the surveillance of American citizens. However, Speaker of the House Mike Johnson, R-La., and House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, have argued the program is vital for national security and already includes significant reforms to prevent its abuse. Given the controversy that has surrounded FISA for several years, it could be an uphill battle to resolve Congress’s major disagreements this week. This bundle included a Senate-passed framework for a party line budget bill to fund immigration enforcement. Having failed to get Democrats on board, who requested reforms as a condition of funding, the Senate has opted to use a process known as "reconciliation" to fund Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) as well as Customs and Border Protection (CBP) without needing Democrat votes.

Reported similarly:
The Hill [4/28/2026 9:29 AM, Emily Brooks and Sudiksha Kochi, 18170K] r

Bloomberg Law [4/29/2026 4:45 AM, Angélica Franganillo Diaz, 49K] reports Republicans have offered few details on how they’ll oversee billions of dollars planned for immigration enforcement, even as some in their party have pushed for more accountability measures. A budget resolution the Senate advanced last week would provide roughly $70 billion for US Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the Border Patrol, boosting resources for the agencies leading the Trump administration’s deportation campaign. [Editorial note: Consult source link for extended commentary]

The Hill [4/28/2026 6:00 AM, Alexander Bolton, 18170K] reports tensions between Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) and Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) are escalating after Saturday’s shooting at the Washington Hilton put new focus on a stalled Homeland Security funding bill passed by the Senate last month. Members of the Senate Republican leadership team said the assassination attempt against President Trump should spur House Republicans to immediately pass a Senate-approved bill to fund most of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), including the Secret Service, whose officers stopped an armed assailant within a few feet of the Hilton’s ballroom. “I think it was incumbent on them well before this even happened” to pass the Senate bill “with the threat assessment at a very high level given the [conflict] with Iran,” Sen. Steve Daines (R-Mont.) said when asked if the shooting puts pressure on House Republicans to act. “Frankly, it’s ridiculous we haven’t got this resolved,” he said. USA Today [4/28/2026 11:03 AM, Melina Khan, 70643K] reports the fate of the record-long Department of Homeland Security partial shutdown still hangs in the balance in Congress. House Speaker Mike Johnson indicated on April 27 that there could be delays with a bill to fund most of DHS, despite the proposed legislation having already passed in the Senate. The partial shutdown has stretched on for more than 70 days since the DHS’s annual budget failed to pass in mid-February. Lawmakers have been at odds over funding for Immigration and Customs Enforcement in the wake of the killings of two U.S. citizens by federal agents in Minnesota earlier this year. Over a month into the impasse, President Donald Trump signed an order on March 27 to reroute federal dollars to pay DHS employees. But that money is running out, officials have said, making the situation more urgent for Congress. Here’s the latest. Despite some progress in Congress at times over the last few months, lawmakers have so far failed to strike a bipartisan deal to fund DHS. The Senate has twice voted to send a DHS funding bill to the House for consideration, to no avail. The newly-appointed DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin warned that the emergency funds approved by Trump to pay the agency’s workers could run out as soon as the first week of May. "I’ve got one payroll left and there (are) no more emergency funds, so the president can’t do another executive order because there’s no more money there," Mullin said on "Fox and Friends" on April 21. Without a funding deal, tens of thousands of Transportation Security Administration agents could go without pay again, potentially leading to more delays at airports around the country.

Washington Examiner [4/28/2026 1:15 PM, Hailey Bullis and Lauren Green, 1147K] reports strife within the House Republican conference is once again on public display, derailing Speaker Mike Johnson’s (R-LA) plans to pass three major pieces of legislation this week. The House Rules Committee was set to meet at 8 a.m. after having to reschedule its meeting Monday night to consider a rule for an extension of section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, the farm bill, and a party-line budget resolution to fund parts of the Department of Homeland Security. But the committee was forced to postpone its meeting as internal strife over FISA, immigration enforcement funding, and provisions in the farm bill derailed consideration of a rule. Rep. Chip Roy (R-TX), a member of the rules panel, told reporters on Monday that he had issues with all three pieces of legislation. Roy’s concerns include language in the farm bill that would block states and local governments from requiring warning labels on pesticides beyond what the Environmental Protection Agency approves, which conservatives argue would impede states’ rights. Roy also said he had issues with isolating Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Border Patrol in the party-line reconciliation plan, and still wants a ban on central bank digital currency in the FISA program extension.

FOX Business [4/28/2026 8:24 AM, Staff, 7946K] reports Rep. Riley Moore, R-W. Va., joins ‘Mornings with Maria’ to warn of a DHS funding standoff after a Secret Service agent was shot, push reconciliation to fund ICE and CBP and highlight risks as the FISA deadline nears. [Editorial note: consult audio at source link]

The Hill [4/28/2026 8:08 PM, Ashleigh Fields, 18170K] reports Secret Service Director Sean Curran on Tuesday said the agents who responded to the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner did a “great job” reacting to the unexpected intruder. “My agents did a great job,” Curran told CBS News’s Nikole Killion, while appearing for a briefing before the Senate Judiciary Committee. Killion also asked if the dinner should become a national security or a national special security event going forward. Curran said, “I’ll tell you what. We’ll assess every event and see if that deserves the designation. But we’ll do it by case-by-case basis.” The Secret Service director said there was a classified “reason” the security perimeter surrounding the Washington Hilton was not further out. Killion did not share further details on the protocol around securing the hotel’s entry and exit points, but said he’d come back to the Hill for additional briefings. Investigators say the alleged shooter had a manifesto that touted anti-Trump and anti-Christian rhetoric. Cole Allen, 31, was apprehended after allegedly firing shots at the Washington Hilton on Saturday and appeared in court on Monday for arraignment. Allen has been charged with one count of attempting to assassinate the president of the United States, transportation of a firearm and ammunition in interstate commerce with intent to commit a felony in addition to discharge of a firearm during a crime of violence.

CBS News [4/28/2026 1:38 PM, Staff, 51110K] reports that Sean M. Curran, director of the Secret Service, defended his agency’s response to Saturday’s shooting at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner on Tuesday. CBS News’ Nikole Killion and Sam Vinograd have the latest on the attack. [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

CNN [4/29/2026 5:01 AM, Jeremy Herb, Jamie Gangel, Whitney Wild, Josh Campbell, and Betsy Klein, 19874K] reports President Donald Trump, the acting attorney general and other top administration officials all publicly say the Secret Service responded as intended when a gunman tried to force his way into the White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner. But behind the scenes, the incident at the Washington Hilton on Saturday night — in which the gunman sprinted through a security checkpoint before he fell and was subdued by law enforcement — has renewed questions about the long-simmering challenges facing the Secret Service, including staffing shortages, strain on agents and burnout. Current and former Secret Service officials tell CNN personnel issues have plagued the agency for years, despite promises to address the problems. "We have limited resources, and we use them as best we can," one high-ranking former official told CNN. "The reality is we are stretched thin, and the agency is constantly playing catch up." Law enforcement experts and lawmakers raised concerns to CNN about vulnerabilities that the incident exposed. They included the security challenges of the hotel itself, as well as whether there should have been a larger security perimeter or additional agents on site for an event where the president, vice president and most of the Cabinet were all gathered. "Having attended a lot of events — and certainly having attended events with the president and Cabinet — (security was) woefully insufficient when you’re talking about that many people getting into a room of that size," Rep. Mike Lawler, a New York Republican, told CNN’s Manu Raju on Sunday. "And the Secret Service did their job when they encountered him, and they were able to stop him and detain him. But it shouldn’t even have come to that," Lawler added. "He shouldn’t have been anywhere in that vicinity to begin with." Since Saturday’s shooting, top Trump law enforcement officials, including acting Attorney General Todd Blanche and Secret Service Director Sean Curran, have dismissed concerns about possible security lapses.

FOX News [4/28/2026 6:00 AM, Alex Miller and Adam Pack, 37576K] reports Republicans want swift action to fund the Secret Service after it foiled a third apparent assassination attempt on President Donald Trump’s life. The federal policing force, along with many other agencies, has not been funded for 74 days amid the record-breaking Department of Homeland Security (DHS) shutdown. While the shutdown began over Democrats’ refusal to fund immigration operations, it has now shifted to House Republicans to resolve it. A bill to fund most of the department has been languishing in the House after clearing the upper chamber in March. That legislation would fund the Secret Service, too. House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., has yet to put the bill on the floor over concerns that the legislation carves out funding for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and Border Protection (CBP). But the apparent assassination attempt appeared to nudge Johnson from that position. "We have to move DHS funding because it’s urgent. As the secretary of Homeland has said, we’re out of money. He’s out of money at the end of this week," Johnson told reporters Monday. "It’s very dangerous, as demonstrated Saturday night. We’ve got to get the job done." Some House Republicans are urging Johnson to bring the Senate bill to the floor.

USA Today [4/28/2026 8:05 PM, Josh Meyer, 70643K] reports a federal review of witness and agent statements about last weekend’s shootout at the White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner is consistent with the suspected gunman being the one who shot a Secret Service agent, according to a law enforcement official briefed on the investigation. Evidence thus far indicates the only Secret Service agent who actually fired their weapon was the one who was injured as he tried to prevent what prosecutors say was an attempt to assassinate President Donald Trump and other administration officials. That agent, who has not been identified, fired five times while trying to stop suspect Cole Tomas Allen after he breached an initial security barrier at the event at the Washington Hilton hotel, Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche said at an April 27 news briefing. The weapons of all of the other Secret Service agents at the scene were checked, and were never fired, according to the law enforcement source, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss an ongoing investigation that is being conducted by the FBI and Secret Service. The findings appear to undercut recent speculation by online observers who have pored over video of the shootout and saw numerous agents training their weapons on Allen from different angles. The law enforcement official said that based on the information gathered to date, Secret Service officials have largely ruled out friendly fire as the cause of the agent’s potential injuries, although he cautioned that an FBI ballistics and forensic investigation is still underway. When asked whose bullets hit the agent at a news conference April 27, Blanche said, "We want to get that right, so we’re still looking at that.” Allen, Blanche told reporters, "ran through the magnetometer, holding a long gun. As he did so, U.S. Secret Service personnel assigned to the checkpoint heard a loud gunshot. One Secret Service officer was shot in the chest, but was wearing a ballistic vest that worked.” "This heroic officer, who was hit, fired five times at Allen, who was not shot but fell to the ground and was promptly arrested," Blanche said. A check of Allen’s shotgun showed that he discharged the weapon, Blanche said. The ballroom where the 2,500-person event was underway is one floor below where the incident occurred at about 8:30 p.m. on April 25. MS NOW reported April 26 that the FBI, which is the lead investigative agency on the shooting, has not found the bullet fragment that hit the Secret Service officer’s bulletproof vest, "leaving investigators unable to say for certain whether the armed attacker shot the officer or how he was injured," citing two people briefed on the probe. The FBI is conducting its own investigation into the shooting to gather evidence about Allen, who was charged Monday with attempting to assassinate the president. That probe includes not only the ballistics and forensic analysis to determine who shot the agent, but also whether the agent’s discharge of his own weapon during the incident was done according to policy, the law enforcement official familiar with the probes told USA TODAY.

CBS News [4/28/2026 8:04 PM, Jennifer Jacobs, et al., 51110K] Video: HERE reports the alleged gunman was running at full speed as he raced past the magnetometers on the second floor of the Hilton hotel in Washington, D.C. He discharged his shotgun, likely hitting the cellphone tucked inside the pocket of the bulletproof vest worn by the officer who fired five shots at him, according to two sources familiar with the investigation of the incident Saturday night at the White House Correspondent’s Dinner. Officials investigating the incident said they estimated 31-year-old Cole Tomas Allen was running at about 9 miles per hour when he sprinted through and discharged the shotgun he had with him. Officials are still conducting ballistics testing to confirm whether it was the shot he fired that hit the officer wearing the bulletproof vest in the chest, sources said. Allen tripped and fell to the ground, and officers immediately jumped on him, stripping him of his weapons and shirt to ensure he didn’t have explosives on him, law enforcement sources told CBS News. Meanwhile, one flight down in the ballroom, President Trump, first lady Melania Trump, the majority of the Cabinet and their spouses, and more than 2,000 journalists and guests were told to take cover. Some towards the back of the ballroom heard the gunshots and smelled the gunpowder, likely from the discharge of the shotgun. Those closer to the front where Mr. Trump was sitting didn’t necessarily hear the shots but quickly became aware of the disturbance. Most climbed underneath their tables for cover as Secret Service agents whisked the president and first lady away. Allen was charged with attempting to assassinate the president of the United States and discharging a firearm during a crime of violence. He travelled to Washington from his home state of California by train, carrying two firearms and several knives, officials said. He is also charged with transportation of a firearm and ammunition with the intent to commit a felony. Officials tell CBS News that Allen was able to get so close to the event because he’d booked a room in the hotel and took an unguarded back stairwell from his hotel room 10 floors up. U.S. Secret Service Director Sean Curran told CBS News that the hotel, which is open to the public, and the ballroom were two separate locations and that the ballroom was secure. In a statement released to the public late Saturday night, Curran said, "Tonight we saw exactly what our brave men and women do each and every day.”

FOX News [4/28/2026 5:01 PM, Madison Colombo, 37576K] reports witnesses inside the ballroom described a scene of chaos as the Secret Service rushed to get President Donald Trump and other high-ranking officials to safety during the shooting at the White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner. Cole Allen, 31, is accused of opening fire at the Washington Hilton hotel over the weekend. He is facing three federal charges, including attempting to assassinate the president, transporting firearms across state lines and discharging a firearm during a crime of violence. This was the first time Trump attended the White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner as president during either term. In televised comments from the White House briefing room after the shooting, Trump vowed that the event will be rescheduled. U.S. Attorney for Washington, D.C., Jeanine Pirro told Fox News’ Laura Ingraham that she feels federal prosecutors have a "solid case" against the suspect, adding, "It’s very clear what his intent was… it was to kill the president."

CBS News [4/28/2026 11:33 AM, Katrina Kaufman, 51110K] Video: HERE reports when shots rang out at the Washington Hilton as President Trump sat in the ballroom for the White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner on Saturday night, there were echoes of the hotel’s storied presidential history. On March 30, 1981, President Ronald Reagan nearly died after John Hinckley Jr. pulled out a .22 caliber revolver and unleashed six shots in 1.7 seconds, from a mere 15 feet away, as the president was leaving the hotel. He had come from addressing union members of the AFL-CIO in the ballroom, ending his remarks with a familiar line: "Together we’ll make America great again." Lead U.S. Secret Service agent Jerry Parr — who was inspired at 9 years old to become an agent after seeing Reagan play one in a film — acted quickly to throw Reagan in the limousine, according to Del Wilbur, author of "Rawhide Down." Rawhide was Reagan’s Secret Service code name. "It’s important to remember how close he came to dying," said Tevi Troy, a presidential historian and senior fellow at the Reagan Institute, recalling how the president insisted on walking into the hospital despite his grave condition, then collapsed inside. "He rallied so the nation wouldn’t panic and think he was dying." The assassination attempt was a pivotal moment for the Washington Hilton — and for presidential security. [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

FOX Business [4/28/2026 9:04 AM, Staff, 7946K] reports Rep. Brian Mast, R-Fla., joins ‘Mornings with Maria’ to react to the White House shooting, push for DHS funding as Secret Service faces a pay crisis, and weigh in on Iran pressure and China’s role in AI. [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

Washington Examiner [4/28/2026 7:00 AM, Anna Giaritelli, 1147K] reports the Secret Service once again finds itself playing defense, this time over how it planned and carried out security measures for senior government officials who attended the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner on Saturday following a shooting that targeted President Donald Trump. The Department of Homeland Security agency faced criticism from lawmakers and national security experts Monday in the aftermath of the incident at the Washington Hilton on April 25. Although the alleged gunman, identified as 31-year-old Cole Tomas Allen, failed to carry out his attack against Trump, his ability to breach the security checkpoint inside the hotel has renewed concerns about the Secret Service’s ability to adequately secure campaign, private, and government events. However, Secret Service Director Sean Curran and acting Attorney General Todd Blanche have each maintained that the agency’s multilayered security approach did result in the alleged gunman not being able to breach the ballroom, where approximately 2,600 guests were gathered inside. Lawmakers have chimed in over the past 48 hours to question how the hotel handled preparations and overnight guests, if invitations were checked, whether security was adequate, and if too many guests were allowed at the event, among other concerns. Trump has admitted that the Washington Hilton was "not particularly secure" and cheered on the construction of the White House ballroom for these types of events in the future. Sen. John Fetterman (D-PA) suggested that the Washington hotel "wasn’t built to accommodate an event" of that size, particularly in a secure enough manner given the number of high-profile guests from the U.S. government’s line of succession.

ABC News [4/28/2026 11:12 AM, Lucien Bruggeman and Emily Kohlberg, 34146K] reports Cole Allen, the suspect in the White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner shooting, appears to have been a highly intelligent person, albeit shy, and was at one point a devoted Christian, according to conversations with individuals from his past. The California native was tackled by law enforcement after the gunfire Saturday night inside the Washington, D.C., Hilton hotel, where thousands of journalists as well as President Donald Trump and members of his Cabinet were gathered for the annual dinner. Allen did not reach the ballroom, where the dinner was underway. A Secret Service member was shot during the incident, but the bullet hit the agent’s protective vest, officials said. Allen, 31, faces three felony counts of attempted assassination of the President of the United States, transportation of a firearm and ammunition over state lines with the intent to commit a felony and discharge of a firearm during a crime of violence. Allen’s former pastor, Rev. Movses Janbazian, struggled to square the man described by federal officials as an aspiring killer with the hard-working student who attended sermons each week at Pasadena United Reformed Church in South Pasadena. "Nice, gentle, smart young man," Janbazian told ABC News. "It’s obviously very surprising to hear his name appear in the news in this way."

NPR [4/28/2026 5:05 PM, Odette Yousef, 28764K] Audio: HERE reports Monday’s arraignment of 31-year old Cole Tomas Allen, a California man who is charged with attempting to assassinate President Trump over the weekend, opened legal proceedings that many extremism experts will be watching closely. Allen, a high school tutor with a background in mechanical engineering and computer science, allegedly attempted to storm the annual White House Correspondents Association Dinner on Saturday night, where Trump and other high-level administration officials were gathered with the Washington press corps. He was stopped by federal law enforcement officers before getting close to his presumed targets. According to a White House official, Allen’s sister told the Secret Service and local law enforcement that her brother was known to make "radical" statements. The official was not authorized to speak publicly and NPR has not confirmed this with Allen’s family members. But this characterization has puzzled some experts who track extremism, who say that it does not align with writings and social media activity that are believed to link to the defendant. An affidavit filed by an FBI agent in support of the charges claims that Allen sent an email to members of his family moments before initiating the attack. The email specifies some grievances against Trump administration officials and policies.

Breitbart [4/28/2026 10:38 AM, Jerome Hudson, 2238K] reports ABC’s late-night host Jimmy Kimmel, on Monday, repeated the joke he made last week saying First Lady Melania Trump looks like an "expectant widow." Kimmel was defiant, defending himself after Mrs. Trump and President Donald Trump called on Disney to fire him following the assassination attempt on the president’s life at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner. "There was no big reaction to it until this morning, when I faced yet another Twitter vomit storm and calls to fire me from our first lady," Kimmel said on Monday during his opening monologue, saying the quip was about Melania Trump’s "age difference and the look of joy we see on her face" whenever she and Trump are together. Kimmel’s ten-minute monologue meant aired just days before 31-year-old Cole Allen of Torrance, California, charged through a metal detector and shot at a Secret Service agent before being tackled to the ground and taken into custody. First Lady Melania Trump issued her own response to Kimmel’s comments writing: "Kimmel’s hateful and violent rhetoric is intended to divide our country. His monologue about my family isn’t comedy — his words are corrosive and deepens the political sickness within America." She added, "People like Kimmel shouldn’t have the opportunity to enter our homes each evening to spread hate," and said, "Enough is enough. It is time for ABC to take a stand. How many times will ABC’s leadership enable Kimmel’s atrocious behavior at the expense of our community."

NewsMax [4/28/2026 12:50 PM, Charlie McCarthy, 3760K] reports that the Department of Homeland Security says Secretary Markwayne Mullin’s quieter approach to implementing the Trump administration’s immigration policies should not be seen as caving to Democrats’ demands. A month into his tenure, Mullin is facing pressure from some conservative groups who worry the administration may be easing off its promise of mass deportations, according to The Washington Post. But DHS officials reject that narrative, arguing the strategy is shifting, not weakening, as the administration works to deliver results while avoiding the kind of public backlash that marked earlier enforcement efforts. Mullin has emphasized a "more quiet way" of conducting operations, signaling a move away from highly visible raids that drew criticism after deadly incidents in Minneapolis. That change in tone has sparked concern among some activists, including the Heritage Foundation-backed Mass Deportation Coalition, which says deportation numbers have fallen short of expectations. Yet DHS maintains the broader picture tells a different story. Officials say roughly 3 million illegal migrants have left the country since President Donald Trump returned to office, a figure that includes both deportations and voluntary departures. The administration has increasingly leaned into encouraging self-deportation as a cost-effective alternative to mass arrests. "We’re not slowing down," Mullin said in a recent interview, stressing that enforcement remains a priority while acknowledging the financial burden of large-scale operations.

Univision Chicago WGBO [4/28/2026 12:26 PM, Staff, 4937K] reports on Monday, April 27, the third of four hearings organized by the Illinois Accountability Commission, created in October 2015 at the request of Governor JB Pritzker, to investigate Operation Midway Blitz, took place. During the session, which lasted for more than two hours, body camera videos, witness recordings, and testimonies were presented documenting what happened during Operation "Midway Blitz," as well as possible violations committed by federal agents. Despite being summoned, former Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and former Border Patrol Commander Gregory Bovino did not attend the hearing. Illinois Governor JB Pritzker explained that through these hearings they seek to gather as much information as possible in order to "hold ICE and Border Patrol agents accountable." During the hearing, questions arose about the real impact of the investigation on families affected by deportations and separations. The commission anticipates that the final report, which will be published on Thursday, could influence congressional decisions on funding and lead to changes in state legislation. The investigation includes 16 analyzed cases, more than 60 interviews and hundreds of hours of video, in an effort to document what happened during the Midway Blitz operation and its consequences in the communities of Illinois.

NPR [4/28/2026 5:11 PM, Alejandra Marquez Janse, Patrick Jarenwattananon, Scott Detrow, 28764K] Audio: HERE reports NPR’s Scott Detrow speaks with Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker regarding the public hearings of the Illinois Accountability Commission investigating federal immigration enforcement in Chicago.

CBS News [4/28/2026 6:13 PM, Staff, 51110K] Video: HERE reports Illinois officials held a second day of hearings on Tuesday as part of their investigation into last fall’s Operation Midway Blitz, an ICE immigration crackdown the Trump administration orchestrated. Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker joins "The Takeout" to discuss.

NPR [4/28/2026 6:15 PM, Staff, 28764K] Audio: HERE reports the Illinois state government has been investigating the United States government. Specifically, a panel called the Illinois Accountability Commission has been conducting interviews and reviewing footage from last year’s federal immigration enforcement crackdown in Chicago, known as Operation Midway Blitz. Illinois Governor JB Pritzker established the commission late last year to create a public record of the weeks-long immigration crackdown throughout the Chicago area.

Breitbart [4/28/2026 10:42 PM, Pam Key, 2238K] reports that, Tuesday on MS NOW’s “Deadline,” Gov. JB Pritzker (D-IL) said President Donald Trump’s immigration enforcement is turning the United States of America into a “banana republic.” Pritzker said, “I’m so proud of the people of Illinois who really wrote the playbook. They’re the ones who went out and bought whistles and people in neighborhoods all across the state, because it wasn’t just Chicago. They attacked all across the state. People came out of their homes when they saw these unmarked vehicles, these masked men jumping out of cars, attacking people. He added, “They didn’t even know if they were U.S. citizens or if they were undocumented. They just grabbed anybody that looked like they were brown or black, spoke with an accent, demanded proof of citizenship. I don’t know about you, but I don’t have proof of citizenship on me. I don’t carry it around every day. And most people in the United States don’t. But, you know, what bothers me about all of this is that it was done under the pretext of they’re going after the worst of the worst. They’re going to take those people off our streets. Please take the worst of the worst off the streets. I don’t want people who’ve committed violent crimes on the streets of Illinois. And we work every day, by the way, with DEA, FBI and ATF to do exactly that. But now under Trump, what he’s done is use ICE and CBP as an excuse to go after people when it has nothing to do with crime, nothing. 81%, by their own admission, ICE, CBP, 81% of the people they detained were not people who had committed any crimes. And, that it just disturbs me to no end that we have seen this happen in the United States of America. It’s become like a banana republic when you’ve got this kind of attack going on in American cities. [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

Houston Chronicle [4/28/2026 7:00 AM, Claire Partain and Elizabeth Sander,, 2493K] reports at Aldine’s La Promesa bilingual school, word spread among families that some students had been stopped by law enforcement while walking to school. It prompted some families to keep their children home out of fear even as district and campus leaders have assured them that “school is the safest place to be.” The absences reflect a broader shift across the Houston area: districts have lost as many as one in five immigrant students since last year, according to an analysis by the Houston Chronicle. Overall, 20 of the region’s public school districts have lost nearly 8,300 immigrant students and nearly 18,000 emergent bilingual students. Experts link the decline to increased federal immigration enforcement. “I get questions from my daughter … ‘Why didn’t my friend come back?’” said Cinthia Lopez, who once was a newcomer student herself and is now a parent in Aldine. “It’s hard for them. They don’t understand it.” The district with the steepest decline, Humble ISD, lost 25% of its immigrant students, while overall enrollment decreased only by 1%, according to Texas Education Agency data. Some districts saw declines in immigrant students even as their overall enrollment remained flat or increased, such as Channelview and Cleveland ISDs. They lost 24% and 20% of their immigrant student population this year, respectively.

Univision19 [4/28/2026 1:42 PM, Staff, 4937K] reports the letter arrived in March and changed the routine of an immigrant mother who says she has lived in fear ever since. In the document, she recounts, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) notified her of a debt exceeding one million dollars linked to an old deportation order. Since that day, she says she goes out to work not knowing if she will return home, she fears for her belongings and thinks about the future of her two children, both students. The woman claims the case dates back to 2008. She says she sought to regularize her immigration status at that time, hoping to remain legally in the United States. She also received a voluntary departure order, a legal mechanism that allows individuals to leave the country voluntarily within a certain timeframe to avoid formal deportation. However, she explains that she did not leave, and over time that decision resulted in a deportation order. For years she received no further official communications related to that case. Until March 2026, when she says she received a new notification about the immigration order. Days later, she received another letter: a debt exceeding one million dollars.

Bloomberg Tax [4/28/2026 10:28 AM, Andrew Kreighbaum, 50K] reports new immigration filing fees created in a sweeping GOP tax and spending package will be codified in Department of Homeland Security regulations. An interim final rule released Tuesday includes consequences for failure to pay a $100 annual asylum application fee as well as a $100 fee for each calendar year an asylum claim is pending. It also adds a $24 charge for I-94 arrival and departure records for noncitizens, as well as new limits on employment authorization for some immigrants. [Editorial note: Consult source link for extended commentary]

Los Angeles Times [4/28/2026 12:57 PM, Khari Johnson and Wendy Fry, 12718K] reports that California is preparing to share with an outside organization detailed information about driver’s license holders, including immigrants who do not have legal authorization to live in the United States. That breaks a promise the state made a decade ago when it began issuing licenses to unauthorized immigrants, advocates say, and it means more than 1 million people may face higher risk of deportation. But if state officials don’t turn over the data, the Department of Homeland Security may refuse to accept California licenses and IDs at airports, the advocates believe, following a briefing with the California Department of Motor Vehicles and the office of Gov. Gavin Newsom earlier this month. State authorities confirmed they plan to share the data to comply with the Real ID Act of 2005, which set requirements for accepting state identification at federal facilities such as airports. Representatives from four advocacy groups who participated in the briefing told CalMatters the shared information will show whether a person has a Social Security number, meaning it could be used to identify people in the country without authorization. The state plans to provide the information to the American Assn. of Motor Vehicle Administrators, a nonprofit organization whose governing board is made up of DMV officials from across the country.

Daily Wire [4/28/2026 3:44 PM, Matt Walsh, 2314K] reports after Saturday’s attempted assassination at the White House Correspondents’ dinner, we’re now at the point where it’s truly challenging to keep track of all the serious attempts on Donald Trump’s life. You might think that’s an overstatement, or you might think you can name all of these assassination attempts from memory. But I’m willing to bet that’s not true at all. So here’s a test: What happened on September 6, 2017, during Trump’s first term as president? He was in North Dakota to give a speech at a refinery. And while he was in transit, a 42-year-old man from North Dakota stole a forklift, drove it into Trump’s motorcade route, with the intent — according to the state’s attorney — of “flipping the limo” and “killing the president.” The plan — as creative as it was — was foiled when the forklift got stuck on a fence. In the end, it was basically a Temu Killdozer. Ultimately the attacker settled for lighting a few buildings on fire. For all this, he received an extremely light sentence — time served — because, according to his public defenders, he suffered from Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder. Yes, his excuse was ADHD. And it worked. You see, ADHD is a disorder that can explain literally everything away — from getting bad grades to trying to kill the president. If ADHD had been invented in the 1860, maybe John Wilkes Booth could have saved himself the trouble of running away and getting shot. In addition to the forklift attack, by my count, Trump has faced five other serious attempts on his life. There was Michael Sandford in 2016, who tried to grab a police officer’s gun to shoot Trump in Las Vegas; Thomas Crooks on the infamous sloped roof in Butler; Ryan Routh with the sniper’s nest at the golf course; Austin Tucker Martin with the shotgun at Mar-a-Lago; and now the attack at the dinner on Saturday. And that excludes all the people who sent Trump ricin in the mail. These are all cases in which assassins moved well beyond making threats or planning an attack. They went out in the world, ready to throw their lives away, with the goal of murdering Donald Trump. No other president in the history of this country has been directly targeted this many times, by serious assailants. That’s a straightforward, uncontested fact. Gerald Ford had two serious assassination attempts. Truman had one. Reagan had one. Andrew Jackson had one. FDR had one. If you go looking up assassination attempts on, say, Barack Obama — who, we were told, was the first black president, and therefore he’d be hunted relentlessly by white supremacists — you’ll find just one incident that’s remotely on the level of the Trump attacks. That incident involved a guy named “Ortega-Hernandez” who fired rounds at the White House from a quarter-mile away when Obama wasn’t there. Beyond that, there’s nothing. If you pull up the Wikipedia page for “Security Incidents Involving Barack Obama,” the very first entry reads, “North Carolina Waffle House threats.” So that should give you some idea of the quantity and severity of the threats Obama was facing.

Washington Examiner [4/28/2026 6:00 AM, John Roberts, 1147K] reports my Monday morning Wall Street Journal chapped my hide. Specifically, an article by Sadie Gurman, C. Ryan Barber, and Isabella Simonetti headlined "The Simple Security Flaws That Exposed Trump to Another Gunman." It rehashed the same mindless criticisms of the Secret xService’s performance at the aborted White House Correspondents’ Association dinner that have been floating around the internet since Saturday night. As anyone who read my columns on the Butler and Mar-a-Lago assassination attempts knows, I can be very tough on the Secret Service. But criticism in this case is unwarranted. There was no security flaw or failure that exposed President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump to an assassin Saturday night. Cole Tomas Allen never made it inside the ballroom where the president, first lady, and Cabinet members were present. He was stopped outside the secure perimeter by numerous fast-acting Secret Service agents. Trump was right to praise the Secret Service in his Saturday press appearance. I say this authoritatively because I worked alongside the Secret Service designing events and rallies for President Ronald Reagan. Because of my television background, I’ve also attended multiple White House Correspondents’ Association dinners. I know a Secret Service failure when I see it, and there was no failure Saturday night.

Blaze [4/28/2026 11:04 AM, William Holmes, 1556K] reports this isn’t the first time someone tried to assassinate President Trump. In the seven months since Charlie Kirk was gunned down, the violent rhetoric from the left has only gotten worse. I resigned from the New Jersey Attorney General’s Office after Kirk’s murder in order to warn the public about the violent consequences of the inflammatory rhetoric promoted by Democrats and amplified by the media. Before almost every prior assassination attempt, that same toxic rhetoric was deployed. After almost every attempt, Democrat leaders and media figures issued predictable calls for calm and unity. Yet shortly thereafter, the rhetoric resumed, and another attempt followed. One of them succeeded. The public has largely forgotten the earliest attempts on Trump’s life. On June 18, 2016, Michael Steven Sandford tried to grab a police officer’s pistol during a Trump speech at the Treasure Island Hotel and Casino in order to shoot him. On September 6, 2017, Gregory Lee Leingang stole a forklift from an oil refinery and tried to ram Trump’s motorcade. In both cases, the attempts were preceded by heated rhetoric. Former Democrat presidential candidate and Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley labeled Trump a "fascist demagogue." After the Charlottesville incident, allegedly partially funded by the SPLC, MSNBC commentator Nicolle Wallace stated that Trump was giving "safe harbor to Nazis" and "white supremacists." These early failures did not deter the pattern. The rhetoric continued, and more attempts followed.

AP [4/28/2026 6:51 PM, Rebecca Boone, 35287K] reports a federal appeals court ruled Tuesday that President Donald Trump’s administration cannot jail immigrants without bail, citing “serious constitutional issues” related to what would otherwise be the broader bailless mass detention mandate in the country’s history for millions of non-citizens, he said. The unanimous ruling, issued by a panel of the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals in New York City, paves the way for a possible appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court. This is because 8th and 5th circuit court panels have already backed the policy implemented by the Trump administration last July. “Today, while we disagree with two other circuits that have addressed this issue, we join the overwhelming majority of federal judges across the country who have considered it and conclude that the government’s new interpretation of immigration law contradicts its text,” Judge Joseph F wrote. Bianco on behalf of the panel, also composed of Judges Alison J. Nathan and Jose A. Cabranes. According to the policy, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has denied bail hearings to immigrants arrested nationwide, including those who have lived in the United States for years without a criminal record. This is a change from the practice in previous governments, when most non-citizens with no criminal records who were detained away from the border had the opportunity to request a bail hearing while their cases were advancing in immigration court. In such cases, bail was often granted to persons who did not pose a risk of escape, and compulsory detention was limited to those who had just entered the country. The new approach has strained federal courts, and judges across the country face more than 30,000 lawsuits from immigrants jailed in the framework of the Trump administration’s mass deportation campaign. Having no way to apply for bail in immigration court, many immigrants have turned to federal courts, asking for bail through a process known as habeas corpus petition. Lawyers for the Trump administration argue that mandatory detention policy is legal under the Illegal Immigration and Immigrant Responsibility Reform Act, passed in 1996. That law streamlined the process of deporting people who recently arrived in the United States without permission, but immigrants who were already in the country were still allowed to apply for bail before an immigration judge under another law.

Reported similarly:
Reuters [4/28/2026 1:02 PM, Nate Raymond, 38315K]
CBS News [4/28/2026 3:02 PM, Camilo Montoya-Galvez, 51110K]

Politico [4/28/2026 1:42 PM, Kyle Cheney, 21784K] reports a federal appeals court has rejected the Trump administration’s bid to lock up the majority of people it is seeking to deport without an opportunity for release on bond — even if they have no criminal records and have resided in the country for decades. In a 3-0 ruling, a panel of the New York-based 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals found that ICE’s policy was based on a flawed, implausible and unprecedented interpretation of decades-old laws. But more fundamentally, the panel said the Trump administration’s position would raise acute constitutional concerns by instituting “the broadest mass detention-without-bond mandate in our Nation’s history for millions of noncitizens.” “The government’s interpretation … would send a seismic shock through our immigration detention system and society, straining our already overcrowded detention infrastructure, incarcerating millions, separating families, and disrupting communities,” Judge Joseph Bianco, a Trump appointee, wrote for the panel. “If Congress meant to achieve such a radical break from the past, it would not have done so in such an indirect and ambiguous way.” Bianco was joined by Clinton appointee Jose Cabranes and Biden appointee Alison Nathan. It’s the first appellate court ruling rejecting the Trump administration’s view, even though district court judges across the country have widely concluded that ICE’s policy is illegal and unconstitutional. The ruling also puts the 2nd Circuit at odds with the Louisiana-based 5th Circuit and the Missouri-based 8th Circuit, which sided with the Trump administration’s view, a split that could put the long-simmering dispute on a trajectory to the Supreme Court. Both circuit panels were divided 2-1 in favor of the administration. The 2nd Circuit decision is an inflection point in a raging legal brawl playing out across the country, deluging courts with tens of thousands of emergency lawsuits brought by people abruptly detained by ICE despite living in the U.S. for years without incident. Many were paroled into the country by prior administrations and established roots in the country, including U.S. citizen spouses and children. The fight traces to a 1996 immigration law meant to streamline the deportation process and set up an expedited system to remove people who recently crossed the border. That law requires immigration authorities to detain — without bond — anyone who crosses the border and is “seeking admission” to the U.S. without authorization. For decades, administrations of both parties applied this mandate to people who had newly arrived in the country, perhaps by crossing the southern border. Those residing in the country’s interior, often for years, were categorized under a different statute that allowed them to seek a bond hearing before an immigration judge before ICE could lock them up. But in July, ICE Director Todd Lyons adopted a new interpretation of the law, declaring that anyone targeted for deportation by ICE would be treated as an “applicant for admission,” subjecting them to mandatory detention. That decision was backed up in September by the Board of Immigration Appeals, a panel of immigration judges who set national policy for executive branch-run immigration courts that handle deportation proceedings.

NewsMax [4/28/2026 9:52 AM, Staff, 3760K] reports the Trump administration is shifting course on its plan to convert warehouses into immigrant detention centers by conducting environmental reviews in the wake of mounting legal challenges. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has purchased commercial warehouses nationwide to expand detention capacity and support higher deportation rates, but the effort faces potential delays as courts and state officials challenge the projects under federal environmental law, The New York Times reported Monday. The agency is holding about 58,000 immigrants in custody, well below its goal of reaching 100,000 beds, a shortfall that has driven the push to acquire and retrofit additional facilities. The plan has drawn resistance from residents and officials in communities where the sites are located, as well as lawsuits in New Jersey, Michigan, Maryland, and Arizona alleging the administration failed to comply with the National Environmental Policy Act. In court filings, ICE officials said the warehouse projects were exempt from such reviews, citing factors including existing development at the sites and distance from environmentally sensitive areas. Homeland Security officials said the agency had complied with federal law and accused political opponents of using environmental challenges to delay the administration’s deportation efforts. The warehouse initiative is also intended to reduce reliance on private contractors and state-run facilities by increasing government-owned detention space. However, a senior U.S. official said Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin has expressed skepticism about expanding warehouse purchases. Todd Lyons, acting head of ICE, told the House Appropriations Committee that Mullin is reviewing the agency’s broader detention strategy.

Breitbart [4/28/2026 4:04 PM, John Binder, 2238K] reports Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has arrested illegal aliens convicted of crimes like murder, child sexual abuse, and drug dealing. "Yesterday, ICE arrested murderers, pedophiles, and drug dealers from our communities," the Department of Homeland Security’s Lauren Bis said in a statement. "Our nice ICE officers will continue to risk their lives to protect our communities from criminal illegal aliens. ICE is NICE."

Univision [4/28/2026 12:28 PM, Jorge Cancino, 4937K] reports that President Donald Trump’s administration is pushing for "measures" to accelerate the deportation of unaccompanied minors (UACs) currently in government custody—a new step aimed at sidestepping the protections established by the 1997 *Flores* Settlement Agreement. CNN reported this development on Tuesday. Citing officials and attorneys familiar with the plan, the network confirmed the existence of "pressure" from the White House to ensure that these minors are processed swiftly and expelled from the United States. On February 11, a group of 11 Democratic senators issued a statement denouncing the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) for their alleged intent to "detain and expel unaccompanied children" without regard for their constitutional or statutory protections—a plan that forms part of Trump’s "zero tolerance" immigration policy. In a letter addressed to then-Attorney General Pam Bondi, then-DHS Secretary Kristi Noem, then-Acting ICE Director Todd Lyons, Immigration Court Director Daren K. Margolin, and the Secretary of Health and Human Services, Robert Kennedy, the lawmakers urged the administration to "halt enforcement measures (deportations) against unaccompanied minors and develop policies to protect them." However, according to a CNN report, the request made by Democrats in February was dismissed, and the DHS proceeded with its expulsion plan. According to the DHS, "many of the children who crossed the border unaccompanied were allowed to be placed with sponsors who were, in reality, smugglers and sex traffickers." The agency further claimed that, as of that date, the administration had located "13,000 of these children."

New York Post [4/28/2026 4:59 PM, Caitlin McCormack, 40934K] reports fifteen giant agricultural drones stolen from a shipping and logistics company in New Jersey in late March were found inside a warehouse in the state. A phony delivery driver made off with the fleet of Ceres Air C31 drones on March 24 — sparking immediate concerns of a doomsday threat if the chemical-spraying tech fell into the wrong hands. The New Jersey State Police confirmed that all 15 drones were found at Prudent Corporation, a trucking company based in Dover. Homeland Security Investigations, an agency within Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and US Customs and Border Protection are still investigating the theft. The thief, who is still at large, duped CAC International with a counterfeit bill of lading and a fake confirmation email. The company thought both documents were legitimate, according to The High Side substack. The FBI was reportedly monitoring the fleets disappearance. One retired agent even warned to the outlet that the drones could easily be turned into "biological and chemical weapons" with the right resources.

Breitbart [4/28/2026 3:57 PM, John Binder, 2238K] reports President Donald Trump’s Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has re-added an illegal alien, wanted for two decades for allegedly killing 20-year-old Blake Zieto in a hit-and-run in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, to the Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) Most Wanted List. The illegal alien, along with many others, had been removed from ICE’s Most Wanted List in 2021 by the Biden administration. This week, DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin announced the re-addition of illegal alien Jesus Maltos-Chacon of Mexico, accused of killing Blake Zieto in 2006 in a horrific hit-and-run crash. The crash, which occurred on November 18, 2006, saw Blake driving his motorcycle to meet a friend when Maltos-Chacon allegedly swerved into his lane and stuck the 20-year-old head-on. Blake was trapped under Maltos-Chacon’s truck as it burst into flames. Meanwhile, Maltos-Chacon exited his truck and has been on the run since. Blake died at a nearby hospital and his family was forced to have a closed-casket funeral because his body was so badly burned. For an unknown reason, the Biden administration removed Maltos-Chacon from ICE’s Most Wanted List, along with many other illegal aliens accused of killing Americans. DHS officials are asking the public for assistance in locating Maltos-Chacon. A recent tip from November of last year suggested that he was living in Denham Springs, Louisiana.

FOX News [4/28/2026 4:55 PM, Alec Schemmel, 37576K] reports a woman from Illinois is pleading guilty after paying thousands of dollars to have others make so-called "animal crush videos," which included depictions of adult and baby monkeys being mutilated and tortured for users in a deranged online chat group. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) sent out a press release Monday indicating Amanda Leigh Fourez, a U.S. citizen from Illinois, pleaded guilty earlier this month to distributing and conspiracy to create and distribute these sorts of videos. Fourez was a member of several online chat groups and private payment groups dedicated to making, distributing and discussing "animal crush videos" and others of the same violent nature, according to ICE. Another member of these groups, Joseph Garrett Buckland, of Mount Pleasant, Pennsylvania, also pleaded guilty a few weeks ago to one count of conspiracy to create and distribute animal crush videos. Buckland was charged Feb. 26 with violating a federal animal crushing statute, according to the Department of Justice. A bill was passed in Congress in 2010 banning videos depicting acts of animal cruelty to satisfy a sexual fetish, and the law was updated in 2019 to ban the act itself. ICE Homeland Security Investigations’ New Orleans Cyber and Human Exploitation Investigations and the FBI investigated the case against Fourez. ICE enforces over 400 federal laws and statutes, including cybercrimes. Fourez faces a maximum penalty of five years in prison for the conspiracy charge and a maximum penalty of seven years in prison for the distribution charge and a fine of up to $500,000.

FOX News [4/28/2026 7:17 PM, Peter Pinedo, 37576K] reports the Department of Homeland Security called out the legacy media for characterizing the perpetrator of a recent Wisconsin machete attack as a "Green Bay man" when he is actually an illegal alien from Nicaragua. Fox News Digital has learned that David Joel Herrera-Garcia, 24, who is charged with two counts of attempted murder, aggravated assault and armed burglary, is an illegal immigrant who was marked as a "non-enforcement priority" by the Biden administration, according to DHS. Herrera-Garcia’s charges stem from an alleged break-in and machete attack at the home of his ex-girlfriend. Citing local reports, DHS said the Green Bay police responding to an emergency call discovered bloodied female and male victims in the early morning of April 20. The agency said that police on the scene found blood "all over the concrete" leading up to the house. The woman, Herrera-Garcia’s 23-year-old ex-girlfriend, identified him as the attacker, and he was arrested later that morning. DHS has lodged an immigration detainer for Herrera-Garcia for the Brown County Jail to turn him over to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) for possible deportation. The agency commented that "despite the legacy media calling Herrera-Garcia a ‘Green Bay man,’ he is in fact an illegal alien from Nicaragua.” "Yet again, legacy media has gone to bat for a vicious criminal illegal alien allowed by the Biden administration to roam our streets and prey upon innocent people," remarked Acting Assistant Secretary Lauren Bis in a statement shared with Fox News Digital. The agency said that Herrera-Garcia allegedly used a key to enter his ex-girlfriend’s home before proceeding to beat her and repeatedly stab her and a man with a machete. According to DHS, Herrera-Garcia entered the country illegally in Texas as a minor with his father in 2019. He was given a final order of removal in 2022 after he failed to appear at his immigration hearings. However, the agency said that in the final days of the Biden administration, ICE used its prosecutorial discretion to label Herrera-Garcia as a "non-enforcement priority." The agency said that ICE under former President Joe Biden chose not to take him into custody following an arrest by local law enforcement on charges of driving without a license. "The Biden administration marked this criminal illegal alien as a non-enforcement priority," said Bis. "This is not a ‘Green Bay man.’ This is a criminal illegal alien from Nicaragua who barbarically attacked two people with a machete," she added. "Under President Trump’s leadership, ICE lodged an arrest detainer with our local authorities to ensure this monster is never released back into our communities.” Bis has previously slammed sanctuary politicians, saying that "at every step on the way to make America safe again," they "have tried to slow ICE down and chosen to release criminals from their jails into our communities to perpetrate more crimes and create more victims.”

Telemundo 48 El Paso [4/28/2026 2:40 PM, Staff, 19K] reports country artist Kacey Musgraves will perform in three concerts, beginning May 3, alongside three young Mexican mariachis from South Texas who were detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) last March. Brothers Antonio, Caleb, and Joshua Gámez-Cuéllar were held captive in two ICE migrant detention centers in Texas, a situation that sparked a wave of criticism led by both Democratic and Republican politicians, as well as activists and members of the community in the southern part of the state, where the family had been based since 2023. The family, originally from San Luis Potosí in Mexico, was arrested during a routine ICE check-in and released after a pressure campaign by Congressmen Joaquín Castro and Mónica de La Cruz. The Gámez-Cuéllar family entered the US through the CBP One app, a program of the government of Democrat Joe Biden (2021-2025), which allowed migrants to request an appointment to appear at the US border and begin their process to request asylum.

Daily Wire [4/28/2026 3:10 PM, Jennie Taer, 2314K] reports sanctuary authorities in Oregon cut an illegal immigrant truck driver loose after he allegedly killed a newlywed couple in a tragic collision, leading federal officers to track him down, The Daily Wire has learned. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) lodged a detainer with local authorities after Indian national Rajinder Kumar jackknifed his semi-truck and trailer in November. Kumar’s disabled big rig blocked both lanes of a major highway in Deschutes County, Oregon, allegedly causing the deaths of William Micah Carter and his wife, Jennifer Lynn Lower, after their vehicle “struck the trailer at highway speeds,” according to local reports. Despite facing local charges, along with having an ICE detainer, Kumar was released from a local jail on April 2, according to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). ICE was left to hunt him down in the streets, nabbing him on April 22. It appears Kumar was released after posting $25,000, a portion of his $250,000 bond, before federal authorities caught up to him, according to Lookout Eugene-Springfield. Kumar crossed the border illegally into Lukeville, Arizona, in 2022 and was subsequently released into the country, according to DHS. He received a work permit in 2023, along with a California Commercial Driver’s License (CDL). Acting Assistant Homeland Security Secretary Lauren Bis pinned the blame on Democratic California Governor Gavin Newsom, along with sanctuary authorities in Oregon, for opening doors for Kumar throughout his time in the United States.

Kumar is now locked up at the Northwest ICE Processing Center in Tacoma, Washington, where he will face deportation proceedings before an immigration judge. The illegal immigrant pleaded not guilty to manslaughter and reckless endangerment charges in March.

FOX News [4/28/2026 10:58 PM, Michael Sinkewicz, 37576K] reports an illegal immigrant from India accused of causing a crash that killed a newlywed couple in Oregon has been arrested by federal immigration authorities after being released from jail, officials said. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said Tuesday that Rajinder Kumar, 32, was taken into custody by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) after being released by what the agency called "Oregon sanctuary politicians.” Kumar allegedly jackknifed his semi-truck and trailer, blocking both lanes of U.S. Highway 20 in Deschutes County on Nov. 24, according to Fox 12 Oregon. A Subaru Outback then collided with the truck, killing driver William Micah Carter and passenger Jennifer Lynn Lower, DHS said. The couple had been married for just 16 days. DHS said Oregon officials declined to cooperate with ICE and released Kumar on April 2. ICE agents arrested him April 22 and he is now being held at the Northwest ICE Processing Center in Tacoma pending deportation proceedings. Kumar has been charged with criminally negligent homicide and reckless endangerment, DHS said. According to DHS, Kumar entered the U.S. illegally near Lukeville, Arizona, in November 2022 and was later released into the country by the Biden administration. He was granted work authorization in 2023 and obtained a commercial driver’s license in California. Acting Assistant Secretary Lauren Bis blamed California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s administration for issuing the license. "This illegal alien was issued a CDL by Gavin Newsom’s California," Bis said in a statement. "He then went on to recklessly drive a truck on America’s highways and KILL two honeymooners.” "Instead of cooperating with ICE law enforcement, Oregon sanctuary politicians RELEASED him from jail back into American communities," she added. Bis said sanctuary policies endanger public safety. "Every time sanctuary politicians release a dangerous criminal illegal alien back into our communities, they are gambling with American lives," Bis added. "We are grateful to our ICE law enforcement officers who tracked this killer down to ensure he’s permanently removed from America’s highways and can never harm another American family again.” Fox News Digital has reached out to Newsom’s office for comment and DHS for clarification on Oregon officials’ level of cooperation. [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

Reported similarly:
New York Post [4/28/2026 9:36 PM, Daniel Farr, 40934K]

AP [4/28/2026 9:19 PM, Staff, 35287K] reports Washington state on Tuesday asked a federal judge to force private prison operator The Geo Group to allow health inspectors into its for-profit immigration detention center in Tacoma, which has been the subject of thousands of complaints from detainees in recent years. Inspectors with the Washington Department of Health have repeatedly been denied entry to the Northwest ICE Processing Center, where Geo Group detains immigrants under a contract with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Gov. Bob Ferguson told a news conference outside the facility Tuesday. The detention center holds up to about 1,600 people pending their deportation cases. In 2023, Washington passed a law asserting its "broad authority to enforce generally applicable health and safety laws against contractors operating private detention facilities." Geo sued to challenge it, but the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the law; Geo has until June 11 to appeal the ruling to the U.S. Supreme Court. "Despite the mandate of the court and the seriousness of the problem, The Geo Group continues to defy our law by refusing to admit DOH inspectors," Washington Attorney General Nick Brown told the news conference. "In my view, this is not just a legal obligation. It is a moral obligation.”

Los Angeles Times [4/28/2026 1:16 PM, Wendy Fry, 12718K] reports that Immigration and Customs Enforcement again has expanded in California’s Central Valley, activating a new 700-bed detention facility operated by the for-profit prison company Geo Group. Advocates say the agency began transferring immigrant detainees to the McFarland facility last week. The facility, called Central Valley Annex, brings the total number of active detention centers in California to eight, up from six at the beginning of 2025. They are all operated by private companies and they have a total capacity of nearly 10,000 beds. Both of the detention centers that opened since President Trump took office had been used as private prisons until California’s incarcerated population fell to a level that allowed the Newsom administration to end those contracts. The latest figures show an average of about 5,337 people are being held in California immigration detention facilities, according to DetentionReports.com. That number is up 72% from the average daily population of about 3,104 individuals being held in California in April 2025. This newest facility is part of a cluster of detention centers in Kern County, which includes the Golden State Annex in McFarland. It is unclear if Geo obtained conditional use permits or business licenses from the city of McFarland to start detaining immigrants at Central Valley Annex. Advocates for detained immigrants said they did not have an opportunity to raise their concerns at public hearings before ICE began using the new site.

Washington Times [4/28/2026 3:08 PM, Staff, 1323K] reports a man accused of leading a major transnational cocaine trafficking organization in Central America was arrested in San Diego and made his initial federal court appearance Friday, April 24, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of California. Eugenio Dario Molina-Lopez, 61, known as "Don Dario," is alleged to be the leader of Los Huistas, a transnational drug trafficking organization based in the Huehuetenango region of northwestern Guatemala along the Mexican border. He pleaded not guilty at Friday’s hearing. A motion hearing and trial setting is scheduled for May 11, 2026, at 9 a.m. before U.S. District Judge Dana M. Sabraw. Molina-Lopez was charged as part of Operation Guerrilla Unit, a multi-year investigation led by Homeland Security Investigations, HSI’s attaché offices in Guatemala City and Mexico City, and the U.S. Attorney’s Office in San Diego. The probe targeted Molina-Lopez, the Los Huistas organization and its suppliers, and involved multiple law enforcement agencies across several countries and federal districts. HSI Acting Special Agent in Charge Kevin Murphy said the operation demonstrated the effectiveness of the Homeland Security Task Force and its partnerships across the United States and Guatemala in dismantling transnational criminal organizations.

Daily Caller [4/28/2026 9:04 AM, Hudson Crozier, 803K] reports a pro-illegal immigrant group received more than $8.7 million from taxpayers in the year that it helped spark destructive protests, but despite outcry and probes from Washington, it faces no consequences. The Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights (CHIRLA) reported the government grants in its latest tax filing covering July 2024 through June 2025, the month that Los Angeles, California, was set ablaze by anti-deportation rioters. The chaos kicked off in June 2025 after CHIRLA created an anti-ICE network that led to a union leader’s arrest and encouraged supporters to arrive at a federal building for a rally that turned violent, the Daily Caller News Foundation previously reported. CHIRLA defended the mob as rioting against deportations spread across central California for days and caused damages somewhere between $32 million and $1 billion, according to local and federal agencies. House and Senate lawmakers responded by announcing investigations into CHIRLA that have produced no findings or legislative reforms as leftists use the tax-exempt nonprofit system to fund radical causes. The House Judiciary Committee and Republican Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri sent CHIRLA letters in June demanding records of its finances and internal communications. There have been no reports of CHIRLA handing over the information, and lawmakers have announced no further action. The House Judiciary Committee did not threaten a subpoena if CHIRLA ignored its requests, while Hawley threatened "potential referral for criminal investigation." The IRS and First Assistant U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli did not respond to the requests for comment about a probe they announced last year into the anti-ICE riots, while the FBI’s Los Angeles office declined to comment.

Los Angeles Times [4/28/2026 3:01 PM, Richard Winton, 12718K] reports federal prosecutors seized $2 million from a Pasadena clinic suspected of billing Medicare millions for skin grafts patients never received, with the facility accused of collecting $34 million in fraudulent reimbursements. Working with Department of Homeland Security Investigations, First Assistant U.S. Atty. Bill Essayli revealed that Expert Wound Care, which does business as St. Victoria Home Health Care, is the target of a federal inquiry. The Pasadena-based clinic is accused of fraud, according to a seizure warrant affidavit that federal prosecutors filed Monday and that a federal magistrate in Los Angeles approved. The clinic received more than $34 million in federal payouts, with claims involving a single patient totaling more than $6 million, according to a U.S. Secret Service agent affidavit in the investigation. Expert Wound Care and its principals could be immediately reached for comment on Tuesday. No charges have been filed against the clinic’s principals and the investigation remains ongoing. The seizure is part of larger investigation into Medicare-funded wound care by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, or CMS. Dr. Mehmet Oz, administrator of the federal agency, told The Times in an interview early this year that his agency was tackling a massive fraud issue in the skin graft and wound care industry, with the agency was paying tens of thousands of dollars per square centimeter of treatment, and in some cases even for fake treatments.

AP [4/29/2026 12:19 AM, Lindsay Whitehurst, 35287K] reports the Supreme Court will hear arguments Wednesday over the Trump administration’s push to end legal protections for migrants fleeing war and natural disaster, one in a series of immigration cases the high court is considering against the backdrop of the president’s far-reaching immigration crackdown. The government is appealing lower court orders that blocked the Department of Homeland Security from quickly ending temporary protected status for people from Haiti and Syria. If the justices agree with the Trump administration, authorities could potentially strip protections from up to 1.3 million people from 17 countries, exposing them to possible deportation. The court has sided with the administration before and allowed the end of the program for people from Venezuela as lawsuits continue to play out, though the justices did not detail their reasoning. The Justice Department argues that the Homeland Security secretary has the power to end the program known as TPS, and the way the law is written bars judges from questioning those decisions. "‘No judicial review’ means no judicial review," federal attorneys wrote in court documents. But lawyers for about 350,000 migrants from Haiti and 6,000 from Syria say judges can consider whether authorities followed all the steps laid out in the law. They contend that in both cases, the government short-circuited the process. Since the start of President Donald Trump’s second administration, Homeland Security has ended the protections for 13 countries. Some people who have lived and worked in the U.S. legally for more than a decade have lost jobs and housing in a matter of weeks, attorneys said. Going back to Haiti and Syria is out of the question for many people because those countries remain wracked with violence and instability, said Sejal Zota, co-founder and legal director of Just Futures Law. "This really is life or death," she said. Four Haitian women who were deported from the U.S. in February were found beheaded and dumped in a river several months later, lawyers said in court documents. The Trump administration appealed to the high court after judges in New York and Washington, D.C., agreed to delay the end of protections. One found that "hostility to nonwhite immigrants" likely played a role in the decision to end protections for Haitians. During his presidential campaign, Trump amplified false rumors that Haitian immigrants were abducting and eating dogs and cats. Federal authorities have denied racial animus played any role in the TPS decisions.

Reported similarly:
New York Times [4/28/2026 5:01 AM, Jazmine Ulloa and Miriam Jordan, 148038K]
Washington Post [4/28/2026 8:51 AM, Julian Mark, 24826K]
Los Angeles Times [4/28/2026 6:00 AM, Andrea Castillo, 12718K]
Roll Call [4/28/2026 12:04 PM, Michael Macagnone, 673K]
CBS News [4/28/2026 9:23 AM, Melissa Quinn, 51110K]

CNN [4/29/2026 12:01 AM, Hira Humayun, 612K] reports Ysmael is already feeling the squeeze of rising prices in Haiti. "Everything has gone up," she says in a World Food Programme video, from the fare for a ride on a "tap-tap" bus to the cost of putting dinner on the table, all due to fuel price hikes linked to the Iran war. But those who managed to leave the violence-wracked, impoverished nation, making a life for themselves in the United States, are helping people back home stay afloat. That money has been a lifeline for many, in one of the most remittance-dependent countries in the world. That could come to a grinding halt if the US Supreme Court allows the Trump administration to end Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for more than 350,000 Haitians – a status that lets them legally live and work in the US. In February, the US Supreme Court paused the administration’s termination of TPS – an immigration status granted to people from certain countries where conditions temporarily prevent their nationals from safely returning. On Wednesday, the court will start to hear oral arguments after the Trump administration appealed the decision. Ahead of the anticipated termination earlier this year, the Department of Homeland Security said the program for Haiti "was never intended to be a de facto asylum program, yet that’s how previous administrations have used it for decades.” If the Supreme Court rules in favor of the administration, opening the door for hundreds of thousands of Haitians to be deported, "it would be like having the rug pulled out from under you," says Amnesty International USA’s Director of Refugee and Migrant Rights, Amy Fischer. "We know that people simply cannot be deported safely to Haiti," says Fischer. Gang attacks continue to shake the nation, with a spate of deadly assaults in Haiti’s Artibonite region last month. Dozens were killed and thousands fled their homes, pushing Haiti’s existing displacement crisis closer to the brink. And earlier this month, armed attacks on a police station in the commune of Marigot in the country’s south left at least six dead, according to police. Haitian rights groups like Defenders Plus, say the violence is even reaching areas that were once seen as "havens of peace." Armed groups who block roads and key supply routes have made access to necessities near impossible in some cases.

Reuters [4/28/2026 8:34 PM, Ted Hesson and Kanishka Singh, 38315K] reports President Donald Trump’s administration has mandated what it calls "enhanced" security checks for immigration applicants, according to internal guidance sent to the employees of the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, which ‌is part of the Department of Homeland Security. Internal guidance by USCIS directed officers to refrain from approving any pending cases that have not undergone the expanded background checks. The guidance was first reported by CBS News. "Effective April 27, 2026, USCIS will begin receiving enhanced criminal history record information (CHRI) for all fingerprint-based ⁠background checks submitted to the FBI’s Next Generation Identification system," said an internal USCIS email from last week seen by Reuters. The email was sent to USCIS’ Refugee, Asylum and International Operations Directorate staff. Since taking office in early 2025, Trump has pursued an immigration crackdown that his administration says is necessary to improve domestic security and cut illegal immigration. Human rights advocates, civil rights groups and religious leaders have condemned the crackdown, saying it has violated due process and free speech rights, and created an ‌unsafe ⁠environment, particularly for ethnic minorities. The latest guidance follows an executive order Trump signed in February which directed that "DHS immigration authorities must access criminal history record information (CHRI) in the custody of federal criminal justice agencies to the maximum extent permitted by law." The enhanced checks will affect pending ⁠applications for which immigrants submit fingerprints, like applications for permanent U.S. residency or green cards and naturalization. USCIS officers were directed to resubmit fingerprints for pending cases if the FBI information for ⁠those cases was received prior to April 27, the internal guidance said. In a statement to U.S. media, a USCIS spokesman said the agency "has implemented new security checks ⁠to strengthen the vetting and screening of applicants through expanded access to federal criminal databases." USCIS said that "any delay in decision issuance should be brief and resolved shortly."

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CBS News [4/28/2026 6:12 PM, Camilo Montoya-Galvez, 51110K]

Washington Post [4/28/2026 11:46 AM, Adam Taylor, 24826K] reports the Trump administration on Tuesday issued new rules for visa applications that could limit asylum claims in the United States, ordering diplomatic missions to ask applicants for nonimmigrant visas if they fear returning home to their country — and to refuse U.S. travel documents for those who say yes, according to a cable reviewed by The Washington Post. The directive comes after a federal appeals court ruled late last week that President Donald Trump’s declaration of an “invasion” at the U.S.-Mexico border to restrict entry from asylum seekers was illegal, effectively clearing the way to reopen the country to migrants fleeing persecution in their own countries. It was not clear when asylum processing would resume, and the Trump administration has indicated its intent to challenge the decision on appeal. The diplomatic cable, outlined in a message from the office of Secretary of State Marco Rubio, said that effective immediately, all consular officers “should request that a nonimmigrant visa applicant affirm that he or she does not fear harm or mistreatment in returning to his or her country of nationality or former habitual residence, and document the response in case notes.”

Breitbart [4/28/2026 4:00 PM, John Binder, 2238K] reports Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR) is calling on the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to look into the U visa program, which he describes as "de facto amnesty" for thousands of illegal aliens who have gamed the system. In a letter to DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin, Cotton says the U visa program — meant for violent crime victims who fear being deported after reporting a crime to police — is being used by many illegal aliens to secure a visa by staging crimes. Cotton notes in the letter that as of June of last year, more than 400,000 U visa petitions are pending with the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) as 10,000 visas are allotted each year. Likewise, Cotton says current policies allow illegal alien U visa applicants, who have fraudulent claims, to get work permits and deferred action from deportation. Cotton asks Mullin what Congress and DHS can do to close such loopholes to prevent the U visa program from being gamed by illegal aliens.

ABC News [4/28/2026 5:03 AM, Laura Romero and Peter Charalambous, 34146K] reports Marlene Noble, 35, has lived more than 30 years of her life in the United States. After being abandoned by her biological family after a hurricane hit her home country of Haiti, she was brought by Catholic Charities to the United States, where she was later adopted. But when she turned 18, she learned that her adoptive family had not properly submitted the adoption and immigration paperwork, leaving her in legal limbo. She spent years trying to fix her status -- including filing for citizenship on her own in her mid‑20s and consulting multiple lawyers -- before eventually applying in 2020 for Temporary Protected Status, which she was granted in 2023. But now, Noble finds herself again facing uncertainty as the Trump administration’s move to end TPS -- which provides work authorization and protection from deportation to people whose home countries are deemed unsafe -- faces a high‑stakes test at the Supreme Court amid the administration’s immigration crackdown. "America is my home, and it has been for 31 years," Noble told ABC News. "It took three years for me to get granted TPS. So a lot of hard work went into this, just to have it potentially ripped away from me ... It’s kind of cruel and inhumane to rip that away from us.” Noble says she is "scared" about Wednesday’s Supreme Court hearing, where the justices will consider whether the administration acted unlawfully in seeking to terminate TPS for Haitians and other groups. The outcome could directly affect the futures of tens of thousands of TPS holders from Haiti and Syria.

Telemundo51 [4/28/2026 4:39 PM, Maylin Legañoa, 162K] reports immigration lawyer Rosaly Chaviano explains that “due to the pause that the government announced, we are not seeing any residency approvals.” An analysis by the Cato Institute, based on data from USCIS and ICE, reveals that between the end of 2024 and the beginning of 2026, permanent residency approvals decreased by 99.8%. In January 2025 alone, more than 7,000 applications for a "green card" were submitted, but only 15 people received it, while thousands of cases remain stalled. For many migrants, the consequences have been immediate. According to lawyer Chaviano, part of the delay is due to a stricter policy that has put certain cases on hold, including those of Cuban citizens. Meanwhile, immigration pressure has also increased. According to the same report, ICE arrests increased by 463% during that same period.

Univision [4/29/2026 2:12 AM, Staff, 4937K] reports USCIS has begun penalizing those who fail to pay the $100 annual fee: asylum cases could be closed, and work permits could also be denied. An attorney recommends keeping proof of payment, monitoring the status of your application, and reporting any change of address. Payment must be made online within 30 days. [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

Telemundo 48 - Area de la Bahia [4/28/2026 12:09 PM, Staff, 26K] reports that the Department of Justice determined on Friday that the DACA program does not provide absolute protection against deportation, thereby sparking fear and uncertainty among beneficiaries. "I’m afraid—afraid that something really might happen to me," asserted César, a DACA beneficiary. Andrew Newcomb, an immigration attorney, explained what this signifies. "What the Court of Appeals stated is that DACA itself does not constitute absolute protection against deportation," Newcomb affirmed. The ruling stems from the deportation case of beneficiary Catalina Xochilt Santiago, who was detained last year before boarding a domestic flight in Texas. Attorneys warned that this new ruling could influence similar cases in the future. "Since last year, the federal government has urged DACA beneficiaries to self-deport, arguing that the program does not grant automatic legal status," Newcomb noted. For this reason, Newcomb advised against air travel during the current administration—with the exception of international flights undertaken with a special "Advance Parole" permit, which guarantees legal re-entry into the country for those who do not otherwise possess it. "I highly recommend it because, once someone legally re-enters using an Advance Parole permit linked to their DACA status, the moment they marry a U.S. citizen or their child turns 21, they immediately have a clear pathway to adjusting their immigration status," Newcomb explained.

Blaze [4/28/2026 1:30 PM, Staff, 1556K] reports that the controversial Trump-backed Gold Card visa program not only claimed to offer immigrants "residency in record time," but promised up to $1 trillion toward reducing national debt. However, during a heated congressional hearing, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick has revealed that only one applicant has been approved so far. "The process was recently resolved with DHS who runs the program, and they do a $15,000, the most serious vetting and analysis of any potential applicant in the history of the government. Usually it was $600. These pay $15,000 for an extraordinary vet," Lutnick explained. "So they have approved recently one person, and there are hundreds in the queue that are going through the process, but this is a new program, and they’ve just set it up, and they wanted to make sure they did it perfectly, and so we’ve worked through that," he added. "Sounds pretty rigorous if only one person has been OK’d for this," BlazeTV host Pat Gray comments, shocked. "I mean, no matter what you think of the program, that’s a failure, right?" he continues. "And I think the program would have been pretty good if we could have raised a trillion dollars." "Maybe it’s because DHS was closed and couldn’t do anything," Jeff Fisher chimes in, adding, "But again, I’m OK with no one coming in."

NewsMax [4/28/2026 10:11 PM, Jim Thomas, 3760K] reports the North Carolina State Board of Elections said Monday it has identified roughly 34,000 deceased people on the state’s voter rolls after running more than 7.3 million voter records through a federal immigration-status database, a finding the board’s executive director called higher than expected and that has reopened debate over how aggressively states must scrub registration lists. The matches surfaced as a byproduct of a citizenship-verification effort, not a dedicated audit of dead registrants. On April 17, the board submitted 7,397,734 voter records to the federal Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements, or SAVE, database, run by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. The check uses each voter’s name, date of birth, and the last four digits of their Social Security number, with USCIS cross-referencing the Social Security Administration. "This number of cases is higher than expected," said Sam Hayes, the board’s executive director. He added that the cross-state and federal database checks let the agency uncover issues like this and pledged to use every available legal tool to keep the rolls accurate. However, the 34,000 figure does not establish that any fraudulent ballots were cast. The board said the result instead points to the limits of its existing list-maintenance pipeline, which receives weekly death notifications from the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services at the county level. That state-only feed misses people who registered in North Carolina, moved away, and died in another state. The new federal cross-check is designed to catch that gap. Removal will not be automatic. The board said it will verify each record and work with county boards to remove deceased voters from the rolls under state and federal law, a process that includes additional database checks and due process steps before any name is removed. The development arrives in an altered governance landscape. Under a recent statutory change, State Auditor Dave Boliek now appoints members of the State Board of Elections and chairs of county boards of elections. Boliek, in his own statement Monday, called the announcement "another positive step" toward secure elections.

Reported similarly:
FOX News [4/29/2026 4:19 AM, Alec Schemmel, 37576K]

Telemundo [4/29/2026 12:07 AM, Staff, 56K] reports a woman from Southern California claims that the Department of Homeland Security has fined her more than $1.8 million—an amount that accrues for every day she remains in the United States without legal status—despite her 13-year effort to become a legal permanent resident. The woman, who asked NBC 7 not to identify her out of fear for her safety, said she received a letter in the mail on Friday informing her of the fine. “It was a shock,” she said. “When I started reading and saw the amount—$1,820,000—it seemed crazy to me.” She said she came to the United States from Mexico decades ago, when she was around 13 years old. She is undocumented, and a judge issued a voluntary departure order—requiring her to leave the United States—in 2003. But she claimed she was unaware of that order for a decade, until immigration agents found her in 2013, at which point, she said, she began the process to regularize her status. “I’ve been fighting for my case ever since,” she said. “I’ve been fighting for this for too many years, to do the right thing.” “She has no criminal record or issues,” said her immigration attorney, William Menard, regarding her case. “She’s been trying to resolve this for a long time.” Menard said that the woman’s father and her three adult children are all U.S. citizens and that she is in the process of applying for her green card, filing the petition through her family. “It takes time to resolve these things,” Menard said. “The application she’s currently submitting requires several waivers, and each of those takes several years to be processed by the government; they’re simply pending for years.” In June, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) announced an update to its policies, making it easier to impose fines on people who have been ordered deported and increasing the fine amount: up to $998 per day, for each day they remain in the United States after such an order has been issued. “A pending application for permanent residence does not grant a person legal status to remain in our country,” a Department of Homeland Security (DHS) spokesperson said in a statement Tuesday. “The Trump administration will not disregard the rule of law.” From the time President Donald Trump took office in January 2025 until mid-March of this year, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) reported that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) issued 65,101 of these fines totaling more than $36 billion. “Our message is clear: undocumented immigrants who are in the country illegally must leave now or face consequences,” the statement continues. “DHS urges undocumented immigrants to voluntarily leave using the CBP Home app, which allows them to fly home for free and receive a $2,600 stipend, while retaining the option to return legally. Undocumented immigrants who do not leave will face fines of $1,000 per day, as well as arrest and deportation without the possibility of return.” Menard stated that her client’s original voluntary departure order, issued in 2003, stipulated a maximum penalty of $5,000. She added that, since then, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has granted her permission to remain in the United States while her case proceeds through the overburdened immigration system, and noted that she has contacted Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) every year while she waits. “He’s not hiding. The government knows perfectly well who he is, where he is, and what he’s doing,” Menard said. “He’s been doing this for years, and suddenly they decided to fine him now.”

CBS News [4/28/2026 6:16 PM, Megan Cerullo, 51110K] reports roughly 15% of tariff refund requests have been rejected since a government reimbursement portal launched on April 20, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP). As of April 26, the federal agency had received more than 75,000 refund requests from U.S. businesses and other importers. More than 47,000 claims encompassing some 11 million tariff payments were properly filed, CBP official Brandon Lord said in a filing with the Court of International Trade on Tuesday. The agency launched the Consolidated Administration and Processing of Entries tariff refund system, known as CAPE, to comply with an order issued following the Supreme Court’s February ruling striking down emergency levies imposed by President Trump. Additionally, businesses may only seek refunds for tariffs imposed by the Trump administration under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act. Apart from some glitches when CAPE launched last week, the portal is running smoothly, according to CBP.

CBS News [4/28/2026 12:39 PM, Emily Mae Czachor, 51110K] reports that authorities at the United States-Mexico border seized a shipment of suspected methamphetamine, which had an estimated street value of $8.1 million, the U.S. Customs and Border Protection said Tuesday. The shipment was disguised as tiles, the agency said. Border patrol officers found the narcotics inside a commercial tractor trailer that crossed the Pharr International Bridge from from Reynosa, Mexico into Texas on April 21. Once it was inspected and screened by a team of drug detection dogs, officers discovered that pallets masquerading as tiles in the back of the cargo vehicle actually contained packages of white powder. Overall, they seized 200 packages weighing more than 900 pounds, along with the trailer itself, CBP said. Homeland Security Investigation agents have opened a criminal probe into the seizure, according to the agency. CBP said the powder "tested positive for the properties of methamphetamine," a synthetic stimulant that is considered highly addictive. Although there is an FDA-approved version of it that is very rarely prescribed for specific medical conditions, methamphetamine largely exists in the U.S. illegally, according to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Association. "As this significant seizure aptly illustrates, CBP officers work tirelessly to ensure that commerce flows and hard narcotics are stopped in their tracks," said Carlos Rodriguez, director of the border complex in Texas’ Rio Grande Valley that includes ports of entry at Hidalgo, Pharr and Anzalduas, in a statement.

Reported similarly:
FOX News [4/28/2026 5:11 AM, Leo Briceno, 37576K]

AP [4/28/2026 8:26 PM, Staff, 35287K] reports a Mexican man in the United States has pleaded guilty to impersonating a Border Patrol agent and following federal immigration officers to divert them while they were out on immigration enforcement missions in Southern California. Jamie Ernesto Alvarez-Gonzalez admitted to following a Border Patrol agent on Jan. 8 while he was driving in a neighborhood in San Diego, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of California. Prosecutors said Alvarez-Gonzalez’s black Ford F-150, a model also used by undercover federal officers, had a license plate with federal truck written on the frame in small letters, though the word federal was misspelled. He put a Border Patrol sticker in the windshield and non-working radio communications antennae on the roof, according to the complaint. Handcuffs were hung from the rearview mirror. The agent aborted his mission when he saw Alvarez-Gonzalez following him, falsely believing other agents were responding, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office.

New York Post [4/28/2026 8:53 PM, Ben Chapman, 40934K] reports a Mexican man living in the US donned outrageous disguises to disrupt deportation missions near the southern border, newly released court documents show. Jaime Ernesto Alvarez-Gonzalez, 53, pled guilty in San Diego federal court Tuesday to one count of impersonating a federal agent and three counts of illegally possessing firearms. He overstayed his tourist visa decades ago, according to prosecutors. In one Jan. 8 caper, Alvarez-Gonzalez closely followed an actual Border Patrol agent while both were driving black, Ford F-150 trucks. Alvarez-Gonzalez’s truck appeared to be undercover Border Patrol, with a Border Patrol windshield sticker, fake radio antennae, a lightbar, a license plate frame marked "FERDERAL TRUCK," and handcuffs dangling from the rearview, prosecutors said. He wore a face mask and thin green line baseball cap of the kind worn by Border Patrol supporters — and made a recording in which he said he was actively looking for federal law enforcement involved in deportation missions. The real agent who was being followed by Alvarez-Gonzalez bought his schtick and pulled away from his mission in order to let Alvarez-Gonzalez finish the job. When confronted by agents, Alvarez-Gonzalez shouted obscenities at them and demanded they leave the community of Linda Vista. At some point, three additional vehicles drove to the agents’ location and began harassing the departing agents, chasing them on the highway. Alvarez-Gonzalez crowed about the incident on video and bragged to have brought in his "reinforcements.” When ICE agents finally arrested Alvarez-Gonzalez on Jan. 16, he carried a phony FBI badge bearing the words "special agent," prosecutors charge. Investigators later tied Alvarez-Gonzalez to three illegal firearms including a Glock pistol, an AR-style rifle, and a Kalashnikov-style pistol. The government also seized ammunition from his business. Photos collected by prosecutors showed that Alvarez-Gonzalez traveled to Texas to shoot the firearms and pose with them at a gun range in Houston. One pic of Alvarez-Gonzalez with his Kalashnikov bore the legend "PANCHO VILLA EN USA.” Other photos obtained by prosecutors showed Alvarez-Gonzalez posing in front of a real Border Patrol truck on one occasion and standing before a "NO TRESPASSING" sign at a fortified section of the US-Mexico border while wearing a vest and a badge in another. He faces up to three years in prison for the false personation of a federal officer and up to 15 years in prison for the weapons charges.

Reported similarly:
San Diego Union Tribune [4/28/2026 8:48 PM, Alex Riggins, 1257K]

FOX News [4/28/2026 9:15 AM, Greg Norman-Diamond, 37576K] reports the State Department warned Americans to avoid a city in Mexico just over the border from Texas after receiving reports of "violent criminal activity.” The U.S. Embassy and Consulates in Mexico said U.S. government employees have been ordered to stay away from the area of Reynosa, a city of about 700,000 residents located near McAllen, Texas. "U.S. Consulate Matamoros has received reports of violent criminal activity including roadblocks in Reynosa," it said in the advisory, urging any Americans there to "be aware of your surroundings," maintain "a high level of vigilance" and to "keep a low profile." The McAllen-Hidalgo International Bridge links Reynosa to Texas. The State Department has issued a "Level 2 - Exercise increased caution" for all of Mexico, but in Tamaulipas state – where Reynosa is located – that risk is elevated to "Level: 4 - Do not travel," due to "terrorism, crime and kidnapping." "There is a risk of violence in the state from terrorist groups, cartels, gangs and criminal organizations," the State Department said. "Organized crime activity is common along the northern border and in Ciudad Victoria. It includes gun battles, murder, armed robbery, carjacking, kidnapping, forced disappearances, extortion, and sexual assault," it added.

The Hill [4/28/2026 11:41 AM, Max Rego, 18170K] reports more than 1,000 Transportation Security Administration (TSA) officers have departed amid the ongoing shutdown of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), the department said this week. DHS wrote Monday on the social platform X that more than 1,000 TSA officers “have been forced to leave the force” since the shutdown began in mid-February. “Ahead of the FIFA World Cup and summer travel, this loss has SIGNIFICANTLY decreased TSA’s ability to meet passenger demand and left critical gaps in staffing, as each new recruit requires 4-6 MONTHS of training,” DHS added. The U.S., along with Canada and Mexico, is hosting the men’s World Cup starting in June. Earlier this month, the U.S. Travel Association warned that while the event could “deliver major economic gains” for the country, safety has “emerged as a top concern among potential visitors.”

Reported similarly:
Washington Examiner [4/28/2026 8:24 AM, David Zimmermann, 1147K]

Houston Chronicle [4/28/2026 12:38 PM, Sondra Hernandez, 2493K] reports that following hourslong waits at Transportation Security Administration checkpoints in March, Houston travelers have a new option to move swiftly through TSA PreCheck lines. Houston Airport System has launched TSA PreCheck Touchless ID at George Bush Intercontinental Airport and William P. Hobby Airport. "TSA PreCheck Touchless ID enhances security screening by using facial comparison technology to verify identity faster and more efficiently," according to information from the TSA. "The program is designed to improve both efficiency and security." Travelers enrolled in TSA PreCheck and flying on participating airlines can move through dedicated lanes at Bush and at Hobby TSA checkpoints in Terminal A-North, Terminal C-North and Terminal E. Participating airlines at Bush include Alaska Airlines, American Airlines, Delta Air Lines and United Airlines. American Airlines, Delta Air Lines and Southwest Airlines offer the service at Hobby, according to a news release from the airport system. The images captured are deleted within 24 hours after departure and are not used for law enforcement or surveillance purposes, according to the airport system. Security screening wait times have eased at Houston’s airports in April, but March was a tumultuous time to fly out of the city. An ongoing partial government shutdown that began in mid-February related to Department of Homeland Security funding impacted TSA agents at Houston airports.

HS Today [4/28/2026 5:20 AM, Staff, 38K] reports the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s (FEMA’s) Individual Assistance helps survivors of major disasters cover necessary expenses and serious needs that insurance or low-interest loans do not cover. This may include reimbursing survivors for temporary lodging or providing assistance with rental housing and home repairs. In response to Hurricanes Helene and Milton, the 2025 Los Angeles (LA) wildfires, and the 2025 Texas floods, FEMA provided over $3 billion to 1.2 million individuals and households, according to agency data. FEMA has made changes to improve the implementation of its assistance to survivors. For example, FEMA has simplified application requirements and increased eligibility for certain assistance. However, GAO found that survivors continued to face challenges communicating with FEMA and securing post-disaster housing.

Telemundo [4/28/2026 7:12 PM, Staff, 78K] reports King Charles and Queen Camila of England were formally greeted at the White House on Tuesday, continuing their historic visit to Washington D.C. The trip aims to reaffirm the unity between these two allies, despite the deep divisions that emerged by the war with Iran. After meeting with President Donald Trump in the Oval Office, the king gave a speech to a joint session of Congress, in which he spoke about unity with the United States and the need to defend democratic values. The king’s next stop will be New York City on Wednesday, and no doubt the security measures will be strict. Although there are no new specific threats to the city, security for Wednesday’s events will be strengthened as a precaution. If you’re traveling Wednesday, expect major road closures in downtown and Midtown. Hundreds of Secret Service agents, along with FBI, NYPD and Port Authority agents, will work to ensure the safety of the royal family in a high-risk setting.

AP [4/28/2026 3:42 PM, Russ Bynum] reports officials battling two large wildfires that have destroyed dozens of homes in southern Georgia warned Tuesday that firefighters are bracing for a prolonged battle even after weekend rains gave a big boost to containment efforts. A fire that has burned roughly 35 square miles (90 square kilometers) and destroyed more than 80 homes in rural Brantley County was 32% contained, the command team overseeing the fire response said Tuesday. That’s up from just 6% containment reported Monday. Rains on Sunday slowed the fire enough to give crews an opening to widen containment lines along the perimeter and to snuff out some smoldering pockets, said Johnny Sabo, director of the Georgia Forestry Commission. A larger wildfire in sparsely populated Clinch and Echols counties has charred more than 50 square miles (130 square kilometers) at the Georgia-Florida line. Sabo said crews have held that fire to roughly the same footprint for four days. It was considered 23% contained Tuesday. One home and several dozen sheds and other smaller structures were destroyed, said Don Thomas, a Georgia Forestry Commission spokesperson. An unusually large number of wildfires are burning this spring across the Southeast. Scientists say the threat of fire has been amplified by a combination of extreme drought, gusty winds, climate change and dead trees and other vegetation. No fire injuries or deaths have been reported in Georgia. A volunteer firefighter in Nassau County, Florida, died last week after suffering an unspecified medical emergency while suppressing a brush fire.

CBS News [4/28/2026 6:15 PM, Staff, 51110K] Video: HERE reports with wildfires scorching over 32,000 acres near the Florida border, Governor Brian Kemp visited hard-hit South Georgia counties to assess the damage and support evacuees. Low humidity and drought have fueled the flames, forcing more than 100 residents to leave their homes. As Senator Raphael Warnock urges federal help, local volunteers have turned a UGA Extension office into a relief center for families in need.

NBC News [4/28/2026 9:46 AM, Rebecca Cohen and Kathryn Prociv, 42967K] reports at least one person is dead after severe weather battered the Midwest, with millions more under warnings for more severe weather Tuesday. On Monday evening in Michigan, a Kent County man was killed after a tree fell on him during a passing thunderstorm in the area, the Kent County Sheriff’s Office said in a statement. Responders found the 39-year-old man from Solon Township at the scene and said he had been hit by the fallen tree. He was pronounced dead at the scene, the sheriff’s office said. According to the sheriff’s office, the man was outside with friends when strong winds from the passing thunderstorm hit, causing several nearby trees to fall. The man reportedly told others to move out of the way just before the tree fell, which the people said likely prevented more of them from being hit. The sheriff’s office is continuing to investigate.

Bloomberg [4/28/2026 5:15 PM, Brian K. Sullivan, 18082K] reports a powerful band of thunderstorms threatening softball-sized hail, tornadoes and dangerous winds are menacing Dallas and the US South, grounding hundreds of flights and knocking out power to thousands. As of 3:45 p.m. local time, 278 flights were canceled at Dallas Fort Worth International Airport with dozens of others grounded in Chicago and Atlanta as the storms send ripples through US air traffic, according to FlightAware, an airline tracking service. Tornado watches stretch from northeast Texas to western Tennessee, and there are at least four reports of possible twisters moving across the region, according to the National Weather Service. In addition to powerful winds, there is a high risk of damaging and dangerous hail. Across the South and Midwest 111,650 homes and businesses were without power, according to PowerOutage.com

CBS News [4/28/2026 6:33 PM, Jake Rosen, 51110K] reports a federal grand jury indicted former FBI Director James Comey on Tuesday for allegedly making threats against the president, marking the second time he will be prosecuted by President Trump’s Justice Department. The indictment charges Comey with two counts: knowingly and willfully making a threat to take the life of — and to inflict bodily harm on — the president, and second, knowingly and willfully transmitting in interstate commerce a threat to kill the president. CBS News reported that Comey was facing charges again hours before the indictment was issued. The charges stem from an image he briefly shared to Instagram last year that showed seashells arranged in the sand to form the numbers "86 47," sources had previously told CBS News. The indictment states that a "reasonable recipient who is familiar with the circumstances" would interpret the depiction of the shells in the photo "as a serious expression of an intent to do harm to President Trump.” He was indicted in the Eastern District of North Carolina. The indictment is signed by Assistant U.S. Attorney Matthew Petracca, and the case is assigned to Judge Louise Wood Flanagan. A warrant for his arrest was also issued. "Threatening the life of anybody is dangerous and potentially a crime," Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche said of the indictment during a press conference Tuesday. "Threatening the life of the president of the United States will never be tolerated by the Department of Justice.” Comey — a frequent Trump critic with whom the president has clashed for years — pushed back on the charges in a video posted to Substack shortly after the indictment was made public, saying, "this is not who we are as a country" and "this is not what the Department of Justice is supposed to be.” "I’m still innocent, I’m still not afraid and I still believe in the independent federal judiciary. So, let’s go," he said. Comey was interviewed last May by Secret Service agents about the post. Then-Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said at the time that the former FBI leader had "just called for the assassination" of the president and said the Secret Service would investigate and "respond appropriately.”

Reported similarly:
New York Times [4/28/2026 5:50 PM, Devlin Barrett and Tyler Pager, 148038K]
Roll Call [4/28/2026 4:56 PM, Michael Macagnone, 673K]

FOX News [4/28/2026 7:46 PM, Alexandra Koch, 37576K] reports a security breach near the White House led to an arrest Tuesday as King Charles III and Queen Camilla toured Washington, D.C., amid heightened security days after a gunman opened fire at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner. A U.S. Secret Service spokesperson told Fox News Digital a suspect was detained and arrested by the agency after bypassing a security barrier near The Ellipse, often referred to as President’s Park South. Criminal charges are pending, the spokesperson said. The suspect’s identity and motivation have not yet been released. It is unclear if there were any weapons involved in the breach. The Secret Service said enhanced security postures remain in effect on and around the White House complex due to the state visit. King Charles and Queen Camilla arrived in the nation’s capital on Monday, less than 48 hours after an armed gunman opened fire at the Washington Hilton Hotel during the White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner. Immediately after the shooting, President Donald Trump was whisked away from the venue by Secret Service agents along with first lady Melania Trump and other high-level Cabinet officials. The alleged gunman, identified as Cole Allen, 31, of Torrance, California, is facing charges including attempting to assassinate the president of the United States, transporting a gun across state lines and discharging a gun during a crime of violence. King Charles delivered a joint address to Congress Tuesday and will later travel to New York City and Virginia. [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

Stars and Stripes [4/28/2026 3:20 PM, Svetlana Shkolnikova, 1300K] reports Coast Guard leaders on Tuesday urged lawmakers to end an unprecedented 74-day Department of Homeland Security shutdown as funding for paychecks dwindles and the risk of widespread utility shutoffs rises. “The reality today is the Coast Guard is operating in a crisis,” said Adm. Kevin Lunday, the service’s commandant. “This is needlessly harming our people and hollowing out our readiness.” In testimony to a House Transportation and Infrastructure subcommittee overseeing the service, Lunday described the wide-ranging consequences of the lapse in federal funding in stark terms. More than 6,000 Coast Guard units and homes are in danger of having their electricity, water and other utilities shut off, he said, with the service already suffering some shutoffs last week. “Each day we’re begging frustrated service providers to keep that power and water going and we’re destroying the trust of the local businesses — many of them small businesses — that are providing those critical services,” he said. The processing backlog of merchant mariner credentials has grown to 18,000 and the ability of the service to suspend or revoke the credentials of mariners engaging in sexual assault has been frozen, Lunday told lawmakers. Thousands of military personnel moving stations this summer are not receiving advance allowances, forcing them to take on debt, take out loans or deplete personal savings, he said. Some service members are delaying medical treatments due to the uncertainty over pay. “My greatest concern is the toll this is taking on our people and their families, the severe hardship and uncertainty not knowing whether they will be paid after this week,” said Lunday.

New York Times [4/28/2026 12:11 PM, Eric Schmitt, 148038K] reports that the U.S. military has ramped up attacks against boats in the Caribbean Sea and eastern Pacific Ocean this month, flying more attack aircraft than ever before in its campaign to kill people the Trump administration accuses of smuggling drugs at sea, according to a U.S. military official and a person briefed on the strikes. The latest attack on Sunday, which the Pentagon said killed three people in the eastern Pacific, was the seventh this month and 54th overall since the campaign started in September. The strikes have accelerated particularly in the past two weeks, and Sunday’s attack raised the death toll to at least 185. In the past few weeks, the military has without public notice increased the number of secret fixed-wing attack aircraft and armed MQ-9 Reaper drones operating from bases in El Salvador and Puerto Rico, allowing the military to accelerate the strikes, the two people said, speaking on condition of anonymity to discussion operational matters. The precise number and type of aircraft involved remain classified — as does so much of the boat strike campaign — and the two people declined to quantify the increase in aircraft other than to say there were now sufficient planes and drones based in the Caribbean and the eastern Pacific without having to move aircraft between the two regions. Before the increase in aircraft, a suspected drug boat might have had a 50 percent chance of evading the military, the military official said. Now that is down to about 25 percent, said the official, who declined to describe how the military determines which boats to sink and which to allow the Coast Guard to board and seize — as it has done for decades with drug traffickers.

CyberScoop [4/28/2026 6:10 PM, Tim Starks, 122K] reports Illinois Rep. Delia Ramirez is taking over as the top Democrat on the House Homeland Security panel’s cybersecurity subcommittee, replacing former Rep. Eric Swalwell after his resignation. Committee Democrats approved the change Tuesday at a meeting prior to a “shadow hearing” without the GOP majority, focused on protecting elections from Trump administration interference. Ramirez first won election to Congress in 2022 and was reelected in 2024. She has served as the vice ranking member of the committee since 2023. She is now the ranking member of the Subcommittee on Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Protection. She has leveled criticisms during committee hearings about the Trump administration’s personnel cutbacks at the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, and was critical of how data was secured under the administration’s Department of Government Efficiency initiative led by Elon Musk. “Under a Musk and Trump presidency, it’s clear that the security of Americans’ information is not a priority. I mean, a private civilian with no security clearance bullied his way into the Treasury, set up private servers, and stole sensitive information from an agency. If that isn’t a national security crisis, a cybersecurity crisis –then I don’t know what is,” Ramirez said at an early 2025 hearing. “The true threat to our homeland security is ‘fElon’ Musk, Trump, and their blatant misuse of power to steal information and coerce employees to leave agencies.”

NewsMax [4/28/2026 4:59 PM, Staff, 3760K] reports Iran-linked hackers have targeted hundreds of U.S. service members and officials in recent cyberattacks, with one group claiming to have published personal data on more than 2,000 Marines, according to a Wall Street Journal report and U.S. officials. The Pentagon is investigating the breach, and early indications suggest at least some of the leaked information is authentic, officials said. The cyber intrusions come as U.S. officials warn of broader Iranian pressure tactics spanning digital operations, diplomacy, and financial warfare. President Donald Trump and his national security team are skeptical of an Iranian proposal to halt attacks on shipping in the Strait of Hormuz in exchange for an end to the conflict, according to officials familiar with the discussions. Officials say the offer is being viewed with deep caution amid continued distrust and ongoing hostilities. The Treasury Department on Tuesday announced new sanctions targeting dozens of individuals and entities tied to Iran’s shadow banking networks, which Washington says are used to move restricted funds through the global financial system.

Daily Wire [4/28/2026 3:30 AM, Leif Le Mahieu, 2314K] reports a Chinese computer hacker who stole research from the United States on COVID has been arrested, FBI Director Kash Patel has announced. Patel said in a social media post early Tuesday morning that 34-year-old Chinese national Xu Zewei had been extradited to the United States to face charges for stealing research from American scientists and participating in a hacking campaign targeting thousands of United States organizations. "The FBI and our great partners have arrested Xu Zewei — a PRC national and state-sponsored hacker — allegedly responsible for a massive cyber intrusion campaign in 2020 and 2021 stealing COVID-19 research from American institutions," Patel posted on X. "During 2020 and 2021, at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, Xu and his co-conspirators allegedly targeted and hacked U.S. based universities, immunologists, and virologists conducting COVID-19 research – including key treatment and vaccines — accessing email accounts and more," Patel added.

AP [4/28/2026 6:02 PM, Michael Kunzelman, 35287K] reports an alleged Islamic State militant falsely confessed to helping plan a deadly suicide bombing at a Kabul airport during the U.S. military’s chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021, a defense lawyer told jurors Tuesday at the close of the man’s trial in Virginia. The jury began deliberating after hearing attorneys’ closing arguments in the federal trial of Mohammad Sharifullah, whose capture was heralded by President Donald Trump as he addressed a joint session of Congress last year. Jurors deliberated for roughly five hours without reaching a verdict and are scheduled to resume Wednesday. Approximately 160 Afghans and 13 U.S. service members were killed in the attack on Aug. 26, 2021, when a lone suicide bomber detonated an improvised explosive device near an airport entry point known as Abbey Gate. Defense attorney Lauren Rosen argued that prosecutors failed to present any evidence tying Sharifullah to the bombing besides his own words to FBI agents during hours of interrogation. She said her client lied about scouting a route for the suicide bomber to the airport, where U.S. troops were conducting an evacuation operation after the longest war in American history. Rosen said Sharifullah told FBI agents what he thought they wanted to hear, possibly because he was afraid of being tortured in Pakistani custody before he was brought to the U.S. "The problem was, he didn’t know much about what actually happened that day," Rosen told jurors. "The government has told you nothing about how this attack actually happened.” Justice Department prosecutor Ryan White said Sharifullah played a crucial role in planning the Abbey Gate bombing and was involved in several other attacks by an Islamic State regional branch known as ISIS-K, including its March 2024 attack at a Moscow concert hall that killed roughly 140 people. "The defendant thought nothing of killing," White said. "For him, it was just another day at the office.”

USA Today [4/29/2026 12:16 AM, Thao Nguyen, 70643K] reports a U.S. Army soldier has been arrested and charged after allegedly threatening to walk into a synagogue with an assault rifle and "kill every single Jew," federal prosecutors announced on April 27. Jakob Marcoulier, 22, a soldier stationed at Fort Polk Army base in west-central Louisiana, was charged with transmitting a threat in interstate commerce, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Western District of Louisiana. Online inmate records show that Marcoulier was arrested on April 23 and booked into the Rapides Parish Detention Center in Alexandria, Louisiana. Prosecutors accused Marcoulier of telling people through voice messages on Discord, an online messaging platform, about his plans to "kill Jewish people in a synagogue." The FBI’s National Threat Operations Center received an online tip in February about a Discord user who had made threats, and the agency obtained audio recordings from the platform, according to court documents. The Discord user, who was later identified as Marcoulier, could be heard saying in the audio recordings that after his deployment, "if the Jews still have reign over our government, I am going to walk into a synagogue with my AK" and "kill every single Jew I know inside of that synagogue," prosecutors said. Marcoulier allegedly told people on Discord that his plan to attack a synagogue was his "goal in life," according to court documents. Prosecutors said Marcoulier also emphasized the seriousness of his threats by telling people on the Discord chat that he needed to kill Jewish people "in order to make sure the white youth is... secured.” "You guys will never do anything about but I will. I just have to finish this, I have to go back overseas and do what I have to do. And then you’ll see me in the news. I promise you," Marcoulier allegedly said in the audio recordings, according to prosecutors. If convicted, Marcoulier faces up to five years in federal prison, the U.S. Attorney’s Office said in a news release. "Threats against synagogues and Jewish Americans are threats to the religious freedom promised to every single one of us, and this Office and our law enforcement partners are committed to protecting those freedoms," U.S. Attorney Zachary Keller said in a statement on April 27. "This case demonstrates the FBI’s vigilance and swift action in identifying and taking action against those who perpetrate these threats, and our Office looks forward to seeing justice done in this case," Keller added.

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New York Post [4/28/2026 6:50 PM, Zoe Hussain, 40934K]

New York Post [4/28/2026 11:59 AM, Zain Khan, 40934K] reports an alleged drug boss with a $10 million bounty on his head was arrested in San Diego after being on the run, according to authorities. "Cartel leaders don’t get to write the end of their stories — we do," said US Attorney Adam Gordon in a news release. "And once again, the final chapter for a man alleged to be one of the world’s most notorious and prolific cocaine traffickers is here in the Southern District of California." Eugenio Dario Molina-Lopez, 61, who also goes by "Don Adario," is facing federal charges related to the distribution of cocaine. He was indicted eight years ago, in 2019, when he was allegedly leading Los Huistas, based in a region along the Guatemala-Mexico border, NBC4 reported.

AP [4/28/2026 10:27 AM, Fabiola Sanchez, 1257K] reports that the Jalisco New Generation Cartel, Mexico’s most powerful criminal enterprise, suffered another blow Monday when the Mexican military captured one of its top leaders in the northwest of the country, two months after the cartel’s leader was killed. Audias Flores Silva, also known as “El Jardinero,” or The Gardener, was seen as a possible successor to the killed leader and the United States had a $5 million reward out for information leading to his arrest. The CJNG regional commander was captured while he was hiding in a roadside ditch near the community of El Mirador in the state of Nayarit, Mexican officials said Monday. No one was killed or injured during his arrest, according to Mexico’s government. Flores Silva was seen as a possible successor to Nemesio Oseguera Cervantes, or “El Mencho,” who was killed in a dramatic military operation in February. The killing of “El Mencho” led to a surge of cartel violence with a wave of attacks on businesses by cartel gunmen, vehicle burnings and road blockades that killed more than 70 people, including 25 National Guard members. Despite the violence, Oseguera Cervantes’ killing was seen as a victory for Mexico’s government at a time when Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum is cracking down on cartels with a heavier hand than her predecessors in an effort to offset threats of intervention by U.S. President Donald Trump. Last year, Trump designated the Jalisco New Generation Cartel and five other Mexican cartels as foreign terrorist organizations.

Reported similarly:
CBS News [4/28/2026 9:20 AM, Staff, 51110K] Video: HERE

CNN [4/29/2026 12:01 AM, Rocío Muñoz-Ledo, Uriel Blanco, Mauricio Torres, 19874K] reports Mexican federal forces have arrested one of the alleged commanders of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG), Audias Flores Silva, who was considered a possible successor to Nemesio "El Mencho" Oseguera Cervantes, the CJNG leader who died after a military operation to capture him in February. At the time of his capture, Flores Silva – aka El Jardinero ("The Gardener") – had an arrest warrant against him in Mexico and was wanted by the United States for drug-related crimes. CNN has contacted the Attorney General’s Office of Mexico to find out the details of the current charge against him and whether he has legal representation. The arrest – which took place alongside the detention of another suspected CJNG operative, known as El Güero Conta – comes at a sensitive moment for Mexico. The country is facing questions about security ahead of the World Cup and US pressure to take tougher action against cartels. Mexican security forces surrounded a cabin in the Nayarit community of El Mirador – about 20 kilometers (12 miles) north of the tourist city of Puerto Vallarta, in the neighboring state of Jalisco – where Flores Silva was being protected by a security detail made up of around 30 trucks and more than 60 armed men, according to the Mexican Navy. Audias Flores Silva or "El Jardinero," a top commander in the Jalisco New Generation Cartel and a potential successor to "El Mencho," was arrested by Mexican Navy special forces, officials say. Flores Silva’s bodyguards dispersed as a diversionary tactic, but he was found while trying to hide in a drainage pipe. "The operation was carried out surgically, without the need to fire a single shot, with no deaths, injuries, or collateral damage," the Navy said. Videos shared on social media by Mexican Security Secretary Omar García Harfuch show aerial shots of the arrest, with helicopters flying over the area during the deployment. The Mexican Navy indicated that the operation was the result of 19 months of surveillance and involved more than 500 personnel, six helicopters, and intelligence and reconnaissance aircraft. Raymundo Pedro Morales Ángeles, Mexico’s Secretary of the Navy, said the operation began in October 2024, "when the Mexican Navy activated intelligence efforts focused on a priority target (Flores Silva) linked to one of the country’s main criminal organizations (the CJNG). From that moment on, a discreet and sustained systematic follow-up was carried out, based on field intelligence, intelligence gathering, and international cooperation.”

USA Today [4/28/2026 10:22 PM, Drew Pittock, 70643K] reports Mexican special forces have arrested a senior commander of the powerful Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG) who was widely viewed as a potential successor to its slain leader, according to the country’s security minister, Omar García Harfuch. Audias Flores, known as "El Jardinero" or "The Gardener," was taken into custody Monday, April 28 in the western state of Nayarit, García Harfuch said. Mexican officials say Flores oversaw major drug laboratories, trafficking routes and U.S. distribution networks for the cartel. The arrest comes just weeks after CJNG leader Nemesio "El Mencho" Oseguera was killed during a security operation in February, making it the second significant hit to the cartel’s leadership in as many months. In a press release, Mexico’s navy detailed the operation at Flores’ compound in El Mirador, roughly 12 miles away from the tourist town of Puerto Vallarta. Following 19 months of surveillance, more than 500 troops, six helicopters, and several planes descended on the facility, which was being protected by a perimeter of roughly 30 pickup trucks and over 60 gunmen. Despite their attempts to create a diversion, Flores was ultimately found hiding in a ditch, where he was captured. In a post on X, Mexico’s navy said the operation was "carried out with surgical precision, without the need to fire a single shot, with no fatalities or injuries.” Following Flores’ arrest, officials also announced the capture of one of his key money launderers, César Alejandro N., known as "El Güero Conta.” It was not immediately clear whether Flores would face charges in Mexico. García Harfuch said the cartel commander is wanted for extradition by U.S. authorities, who have offered a $5 million reward for information leading to his arrest. In 2021, the U.S. Treasury Department designated Flores a "significant foreign narcotics trafficker." That same year, a U.S. grand jury charged him with multiple crimes, including conspiracy to distribute cocaine and heroin. "Monday’s arrest of a key leader of the violent CJNG represents a significant step forward in the fight against those who profit from fentanyl and fuel violence in our communities," U.S. Ambassador to Mexico Ronald Johnson said on social media. Flores’ arrest comes as Mexico has stepped up security efforts amid ongoing pressure from U.S. President Donald Trump, who has repeatedly threatened unilateral action if Mexico does not do more to fight drug cartels.

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Breitbart [4/28/2026 12:02 PM, Ildefonso Ortiz, Brandon Darby, 2238K]
Daily Caller [4/28/2026 12:20 PM, Mark Tanos, 803K]

HS Today [4/28/2026 10:15 AM, Sean Dilallo, 38K] reports during the Mexico: Cartels as Terror/Transnational Threats panel at Homeland Security Today’s 2026 Counterterrorism Summit, Peter Reuter, Evan Ellis, and Jake Braun discussed the current trends in Latin American-based transnational criminal organizations. These include the shifts in Mexican Cartels, increased U.S. anti-narcotics efforts, and how criminal organizations have evolved in response to U.S. efforts. Despite considerable counter-narcotic successes, criminal organizations have proven to be resilient and innovative in responding to law enforcement efforts. To address these threats, the United States, along with regional allies and partners, needs to adopt a holistic approach. This includes addressing the domestic demand, criminal groups, drug production, supporting infrastructure, and corruption that form the drug trade.  The panel highlighted recent developments concerning Mexican cartels and their implications. The ongoing civil war in the Sinaloa Cartel (CDS) has fractured what was once the most powerful criminal organization in Mexico. CDS’s traditional federative structure has amplified the civil war’s impact, as no single leader or faction has been strong enough to keep the organization together following the arrest of Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada. Additionally, as Reuter pointed out, CDS’s corporate-like culture meant that individual factions might be inclined to work for another organization rather than keeping CDS together. While the Mayito Flaco faction has gained the upper hand in the conflict, it remains to be seen what will be left of the CDS. In contrast, the Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG) has proved its resilience following the death of its leader, Nemesio Rubén Oseguera Cervantes, aka “El Mencho.” Juan Carlos Valencia González “El 03” has reportedly been appointed the new leader of the organization. CJNG’s ability to survive the death of its leader and founder demonstrated institutional strength, making the organization difficult to dismantle.

Reuters [4/28/2026 10:04 AM, Staff, 38315K] reports the United States and U.S. companies signed deals worth billions of dollars with Balkan countries on Tuesday, boosting Washington’s energy presence in the region and backing AI development. The U.S. is seeking to deepen ties and counter ‌the influence of Russian oil and gas in southern Europe, having signed a long-term deal last year to export liquefied natural gas to Greece. "President Trump is opening a new era of cooperation with southern, and central and eastern Europe," U.S. Energy Secretary Chris Wright told reporters at the Three Seas Initiative business forum in Dubrovnik, Croatia.

Telemundo [4/28/2026 9:55 PM, Staff, 56K] reports President Claudia Sheinbaum highlighted on Tuesday the "very relevant" arrests of "El Jardinero," identified by authorities as one of the main leaders of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG), and of his financial operator by the Armed Forces, in separate operations that she linked to the "progress" in the fight against organized crime. "Yesterday there were two very, very important arrests (...) It has to do with the progress of intelligence and investigation in the country, which is one of our main focuses, and the results that are being achieved," the president declared in her daily press conference from Mexico City. On the eve of the arrest, the Mexican Navy detained in the western state of Nayarit Audías Flores Silva, alias "El Jardinero", one of the leaders of the CJNG and identified as a possible successor to " El Mencho ", who was killed in a federal operation two months ago and considered one of the most wanted drug lords in the world. Hours later, special forces from the Mexican Army and the National Guard captured César Alejandro ‘N’, alias "El Güero Conta", Flores Silva’s alleged financial operator. Regarding this, Sheinbaum indicated that the Security Cabinet will offer more details at a later press conference, but affirmed that these operations against organized crime demonstrate the "coordination" between public security institutions. "Because it’s not just about arresting a figure in organized crime ("The Gardener"), a suspected major criminal. It’s about what this person represented in terms of extortion, robbery, and drug trafficking, but also what he meant to the people in terms of extortion and other crimes," the president added. Sheinbaum recalled that these operations were carried out by Mexican military personnel, amid questions about the presence of US agents in the field, following the recent death of two US officials, allegedly from the CIA , after a drug raid in Chihuahua, northern Mexico. "There may be information provided by some institution of the United States government, but it must necessarily be within the framework of the understanding that exists, and not from the ground operation with elements of any of the investigative agencies (...) All Mexicans are jealous of our independence. All of us," the head of state declared. The Mexican government reported that there were no military casualties in these arrests and that they had been tracking these individuals for months, and that their arrest was based on intelligence provided by the U.S. government. In the case of "El Jardinero," for whom the United States offered a $5 million reward, his arrest caused several road blockades with burning vehicles and attacks on commercial establishments in Nayarit, although federal authorities minimized the impact of these events, much smaller than those recorded after the fall of "El Mencho" at the end of last February.

AP [4/28/2026 6:20 PM, Stephen Groves, 34146K] reports Senate Republicans rejected legislation from Democrats on Tuesday that would have required President Donald Trump to end the U.S. energy blockade on Cuba unless he receives approval from Congress. The vote on the war powers resolution showed how Republicans continue to stand behind Trump as he acts unilaterally to exert American force in a range of global conflicts, including Venezuela, Iran and Cuba — one of the U.S.’s closest neighbors yet a longtime adversary. Democrats have repeatedly forced votes on legislation to put a check on the president’s ability to deploy military force in those conflicts, but none have succeeded. Tuesday’s vote was the first pertaining to Cuba and would have forced the president to get approval from Congress before launching any attacks on the island nation. To dismiss the resolution, Republicans said that it was out of order because the U.S. is not engaged in outright hostilities with Cuba. Their maneuver to dismiss the legislation succeeded on a 51-47 tally. Sen. John Fetterman of Pennsylvania was the only Democrat who voted to dismiss the resolution, while Sens. Susan Collins of Maine and Rand Paul of Kentucky were the only Republicans to support it. The Caribbean island is suffering from water and power outages as the U.S. imposes sanctions and interrupts oil shipments from Venezuela. The Trump administration is pressing Cuba’s leadership to end political repression, release political prisoners and liberalize its ailing economy. Sen. Tim Kaine, a Virginia Democrat who introduced the war powers resolution, said the blockade had caused "humanitarian crises across Cuba," including disrupting medical care, leaving millions of people without clean water and spiking food prices. "My argument is that under the terms of the resolution we are already engaged in hostilities with Cuba because we are using American force, primarily the Coast Guard, but other assets as well, to engage in a very devastating economic blockade of the nation," Kaine said. Trump has said that after the war with Iran, he will turn his attention to Cuba. He pledged "a new dawn for Cuba" during a speech at a Turning Points USA event last week. Democrats argued that the war powers resolution was also necessary to head off the potential for Trump to launch a military campaign against the nation. "The United States and Cuba need to find a way to peacefully coexist," said Sen. Peter Welch, a Vermont Democrat.

ABC News [4/28/2026 7:42 AM, Staff, 34146K] reports President Donald Trump met with his national security team on a new Iran proposal, but nine weeks into the war, the Strait of Hormuz remained blocked as talks appeared stalled. [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

FOX Business [4/28/2026 9:36 PM, Edward Lawrence, Brittany Miller, 7946K] reports the U.S. Treasury Department has frozen more than $344 million in cryptocurrency tied to Iran and is ramping up efforts to choke off the regime’s access to global revenue streams as part of an ongoing pressure campaign, officials said. The actions are part of Operation Economic Fury, a broader campaign aimed at squeezing Iran’s economy by limiting its ability to sell oil abroad. The campaign is part of the administration’s broader "maximum pressure" strategy targeting Iran’s economy and oil exports. A Treasury official said the department has disrupted billions of dollars in projected oil revenue in recent days while freezing hundreds of millions in crypto assets linked to the regime. In a statement to FOX Business, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent warned that Iran’s key oil export hub is nearing a breaking point, with mounting financial losses expected to escalate. "Kharg Island, Iran’s primary oil export terminal, is soon nearing storage capacity, which will force the regime to reduce oil production," he said. He noted that the resulting logjam will drain an additional $170 million per day in lost revenue and cause "permanent damage to Iran’s oil infrastructure.” "Treasury will continue to exert maximum pressure," he added. "Any person, vessel, or entity facilitating illicit flows to Tehran risks exposure to U.S. sanctions.” Officials say the pressure campaign is aimed at cutting off funding streams tied to terrorism and destabilizing activity in the region. Bessent said the Treasury has specifically targeted Iran’s international shadow banking infrastructure, weapons procurement networks, and the "shadow fleet" of tankers used to hide oil origins. "These actions have disrupted tens of billions of dollars in revenue that would be used to fund terrorism," he said, adding that the U.S. is also zeroing in on independent Chinese "teapot" refineries that support the trade. A senior administration official said the U.S. is also increasing scrutiny on foreign entities and financial institutions accused of facilitating Iran’s illicit trade. Treasury has shared information with governments, including China, Hong Kong, the United Arab Emirates and Oman, identifying banks that have allegedly enabled Iranian activity and warning that continued cooperation could trigger secondary sanctions. Officials also flagged independent "teapot" refineries in China, particularly in Shandong Province, as ongoing buyers of Iranian crude oil, raising the risk of further enforcement actions.

Reuters [4/28/2026 2:20 PM, Andrea Shalal and Timothy Gardner, 38315K] reports that the U.S. government ratcheted up pressure on Tehran on Tuesday, imposing sanctions on 35 entities and individuals for their roles in Iran’s shadow banking sector, and threatened sanctions against banks doing business with Chinese "teapot" refineries that it ‌said are paying tolls for shipments to cross the Strait of Hormuz. The Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control said the designated individuals and firms had facilitated the movement of the equivalent of tens of billions of dollars tied to sanctions evasion and what it called Iran’s sponsorship of terrorism. OFAC separately warned banks against doing business with any firm paying the Iranian government or the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps for passage through the strait, saying they faced the risk of significant sanctions. It singled out independent Chinese teapot refineries, primarily in Shandong province, given their role in importing and refining Iranian oil, noting that some had used the U.S. financial system to conduct dollar-denominated transactions and procure U.S. goods. China has said it opposes "illegal" unilateral sanctions. Efforts to ⁠end the two-month Iran war remained at an impasse on Tuesday, with U.S. President Donald Trump unhappy at the latest plan from Tehran that proposed setting aside discussion of its nuclear program until the conflict ​was concluded and shipping disputes were resolved.

NewsMax [4/28/2026 10:53 PM, Jim Thomas, 3760K] reports Rep. Debbie Dingell, D-Mich., and 73 other House Democrats sent President Donald Trump a letter urging him to keep Chinese automakers out of the U.S. market and warning that any concession at his planned mid-May summit with Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing would threaten American manufacturing, workers, and national security. The letter, led by Dingell and Rep. Ro Khanna of California, the ranking Democrat on the House Select Committee on China, asks Trump to maintain tariffs, block Chinese-owned manufacturing on U.S. soil, and bar vehicles built by Chinese-controlled entities in Canada or Mexico from qualifying for benefits under the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement. The signers also press the administration to expand restrictions on Chinese-connected vehicle technologies and to coordinate with allies against Beijing’s state-driven auto strategy. The Democrats frame the issue as both an economic and a security policy issue, citing an industry that supports roughly 10 million U.S. jobs and accounts for about 5% of gross domestic product. They argue that state subsidies, below-market financing, and labor practices, including what the letter calls credible reports of forced labor, give Chinese automakers an edge that no U.S. company operating under fair labor standards can match. To show the scale, the letter says Chinese brands now hold roughly 62% of the global electric vehicle market and that China exported more than 8 million vehicles in 2025, expanding into South America, the Middle East, and Europe. The political backdrop is direct. In January at the Detroit Economic Club, Trump signaled openness to Chinese carmakers building plants in the United States, telling the audience, "If they want to come in and build a plant and hire you and hire your friends and your neighbors, that’s great, I love that.” The letter opens by objecting to those remarks and tells Trump the issue "must remain a firm and non-negotiable priority" before the Beijing meeting. The lawmakers point to North America as the pressure point, citing a sharp rise in Chinese vehicle imports into Mexico from 2021 to 2025 and a Canadian shift this past January that lowered tariffs on Chinese electric vehicles in exchange for Beijing easing duties on Canadian farm products, including canola seeds, with the new quota potentially reaching 70,000 vehicles a year by 2030. The operative U.S. restriction is a Commerce Department rule finalized under President Joe Biden on Jan. 16, 2025, and effective March 17, 2025, that bars the import and sale of passenger connected vehicles with hardware or software tied to China or Russia, with software prohibitions phasing in for model year 2027 and hardware for model year 2030. The Dingell letter asks Trump to broaden those limits across all vehicle classes.

Reuters [4/28/2026 12:53 PM, Karen Freifeld, 38315K] reports that the U.S. Department of Commerce last week ordered multiple chip equipment companies to halt certain tool shipments to China’s second-largest chipmaker, Hua Hong, its latest action to slow the country’s development ‌of advanced chips, according to two people familiar with the matter. The department sent letters to at least a handful of companies informing them of the new restrictions on tools and other materials destined for two Hua Hong (688347.SS) facilities that U.S. officials believe may make China’s most sophisticated chips, the people said. Top U.S. chip equipment companies Lam Research (LRCX.O), Applied Materials (AMAT.O) and KLA (KLAC.O), each of which has significant business supplying China, were among those believed to have received a letter, the sources added. Reuters exclusively reported in March that Hua Hong Group had developed advanced chip manufacturing technologies that could be used to produce artificial intelligence chips, a milestone in Beijing’s efforts to boost tech self-sufficiency. The group’s contract chipmaking business, Huali Microelectronics, was preparing a 7-nanometer chipmaking process ⁠at its Shanghai plant, sources said. SMIC, China’s largest contract chipmaker, is the only domestic company that can currently make chips with 7-nm technologies, the report said. The letters from the Commerce Department also aim to prevent shipments to Huali, sources said. Shares of Lam Research closed down 3.1% on Tuesday, while KLA fell 4.7% and Applied Materials fell 5.8%.

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