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 AP [2/19/2026 8:05 PM, Audrey McAvoy and Rebecca Boone, 31753K] reports authorities in Idaho were searching Thursday for a suspect who they said stole an ambulance outside a hospital, poured an accelerant over it and drove it into a nearby building that houses U.S. Department of Homeland Security offices. Meridian Police Chief Tracy Basterrechea didn’t identify the substance poured on the inside and outside of the ambulance. “It appears the suspect was unable to ignite the accelerant before being scared off by responding agencies,” he said in a statement. The incident occurred at about 11:10 p.m. Wednesday in the Boise suburb of Meridian, police said. The suspect took the ambulance from St. Luke’s hospital and drove it north through a parking lot, Basterrechea said. The suspect then retrieved gas cans from nearby vegetation, he said. FOX News [2/19/2026 5:17 PM, Alexandra Koch, 37576K] reports that officials said that although the suspect has not been identified or located, there is no indication of an ongoing threat to the broader community. The Meridian Police Department is leading the investigation in coordination with the FBI, ATF, DHS, Idaho State Police and other regional law enforcement partners. The Washington Examiner [2/20/2026 3:52 AM, Staff, 1147K] reports Meridian Police Chief Tracy Basterrechea released a statement after the ambulance was rammed into the office building, describing the events based on the MPD’s preliminary investigation during a brief press conference on Thursday morning. “Last night at approximately 11:10 p.m., officers from the Meridian Police Department … responded to a 9-1-1 call reporting that a Canyon County paramedic’s ambulance had been stolen from the ambulance bay at St. Luke’s West,” said Basterrechea. “Preliminary investigation indicates the suspect drove the ambulance north through the parking lot and retrieved gas cans that had been staged in nearby vegetation.

Reported similarly:
Daily Wire [2/19/2026 2:01 PM, Tim Pearce, 2314K]

CNN [2/19/2026 2:38 PM, Matthew Rehbein, 19874K] reports the Department of Homeland Security is broadening federal immigration authorities’ ability to detain legal refugees who have not yet obtained green cards, citing national security concerns and the need to ensure refugees undergo additional screening, according to a DHS memo obtained by CNN. Immigration officers may "arrest and detain" refugees "who have failed to adjust" to lawful permanent resident status one year after being admitted to the US, according to the Wednesday memo, which was submitted by Justice Department attorneys as part of a federal court filing. "When a refugee is admitted to the United States, the admission is conditional and subject to a mandatory review after one year," the memo reads, noting refugees who are detained may remain in custody "for the duration of the inspection and examination process.” The memo, issued by US Citizenship and Immigration Services Director Joseph Edlow and Acting US Immigration and Customs Enforcement Director Todd Lyons, rescinds previous government policy regarding refugees who have been in the country for one year. Failure to obtain a green card after one year was not grounds for detention or removal from the US under previous policy, and refugees who were arrested had to either be released within 48 hours or the DHS was required to initiate removal proceedings. "Refugees may be considered to have voluntarily returned to custody" by submitting application paperwork and appearing at scheduled appointments with immigration services, according to the new memo. The New York Times [2/19/2026 2:35 PM, Madeleine Ngo, 148038K] reports that refugees would be “inspected and examined for admission to the United States” after being detained, according to the memo, which was issued on Wednesday by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. It was unclear how long refugees could be kept in detention. According to the memo, they would be confined for “the reasonable length of time it takes” to re-examine their cases. The memo is part of the Trump administration’s broad effort to target refugees and tighten pathways for immigrants to legally enter or remain in the United States. Last month, the Homeland Security Department announced that it would review thousands of refugee cases in Minnesota, requiring them to submit to new interviews and background checks amid a surge of federal immigration enforcement in the state. The NPR [2/19/2026 10:10 AM, Ximena Bustillo, 28764K] reports that the administration last year set the lowest-ever cap for refugees it would admit into the U.S. And USCIS later announced that it would re-review the status of everyone who had been admitted into the U.S. as a refugee under the Biden administration, essentially reopening those cases and risking the loss of legal refugee status. "This policy is a transparent effort to detain and potentially deport thousands of people who are legally present in this country, people the U.S. government itself welcomed after years of extreme vetting," said Beth Oppenheim, CEO of HIAS, one of the resettlement organizations. "They were promised safety and the chance to rebuild their lives. Instead, DHS is now threatening them with arrest and indefinite detention." The memo was filed as a part of documents submitted in a federal court case tied to refugees who were arrested in Minnesota. In it, USCIS Director Joseph Edlow and ICE acting Director Todd Lyons direct their agencies to "detain and inspect" refugees who do not "voluntarily return to DHS custody for inspection and examination" to be a legal permanent resident at the one-year mark of being in the country.

Reported similarly:
Washington Times [2/19/2026 6:13 PM, Stephen Dinan, 1323K]
Univision [2/19/2026 11:33 AM, Staff, 4937K]

FOX News [2/19/2026 9:47 PM, Staff, 37576K] reports DHS Secretary Kristi Noem discusses the partial government shutdown as it hits day 6 on ‘Hannity.’ [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

NPR [2/19/2026 10:42 AM, Jennifer Ludden, 28764K] reports that the Department of Housing and Urban Development wants to ban families with any member who is undocumented from living in federally subsidized housing. A proposed rule also would require local housing authorities to report any tenant not eligible for rental aid to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. It’s part of a broader Trump administration crackdown on immigration, and in an opinion column in the Washington Post Thursday HUD Secretary Scott Turner called for "ending the era of illegal aliens and other ineligible noncitizens exploiting public housing resources." Undocumented immigrants do not get federal rental aid, but they can live with family members who do, including many U.S.-born children. In his column, Turner said roughly 24,000 such residents in are in HUD-subsidized housing. He and some other conservatives argue that is unfair, given limited funding and long waitlists for HUD housing. Most non-citizens with permanent legal status are eligible for housing aid. If the rule becomes law, housing authorities in large cities with lots of immigrants, like New York and Los Angeles, would see the biggest impact. "Trump’s proposal runs contrary to federal law and is designed to instill fear and hardship on immigrant families," Shamus Roller, executive director of the National Housing Law Project, said in a statement. "His administration deflects blame for the housing crisis onto immigrants so they can continue dismantling HUD’s hallmark and lifesaving housing programs." Bloomberg Law [2/19/2026 11:13 AM, Andrew Kreighbaum, 50K] reports that the proposed rule released by the agency Thursday would require verification of US citizenship or eligible immigration status for all household members to receive public assistance, regardless of age. The rule would also prorate housing assistance until eligibility status of all family members is verified. Longstanding regulations allow for assistance to be prorated indefinitely for eligible family members. The proposal would deny benefits even to US citizens in mixed-status households. The HUD proposal is part of larger efforts by the Trump administration to restrict benefits to immigrants and noncitizens, including healthcare and in-state tuition at state universities. The agency said the proposal aligns with a White House executive order issued last year targeting taxpayer benefits for immigrants and requiring tougher eligibility verification measures. A similar proposal was released and ultimately withdrawn during the first Trump administration. HUD acknowledged in the rule that the policy change would adversely affect tenants from mixed families, but said it “believes that this cost is adequately offset by the reallocation of HUD funds to the intended recipients.”

Reported similarly:
Breitbart [2/19/2026 4:54 PM, John Binder, 2238K]
Reuters [2/19/2026 3:29 PM, Jasper Ward, 38315K]

Washington Examiner [2/19/2026 4:31 PM, Jack Birle, 1147K] reports another federal appeals court could hand President Donald Trump a victory in his legal war over mandatory detention for illegal immigration, as a panel on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 8th Circuit appeared friendly to the administration’s stance during arguments on Thursday. The Trump administration won a key legal victory in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit earlier this month, when the appeals court upheld the Trump administration’s illegal immigrant mandatory detention policy, rejecting claims by opponents of the administration that bond hearings are required for illegal immigrants. The ruling was the first time an appeals court had upheld the policy, after the administration faced hundreds of losses in federal district courts, as the problem inches closer to the Supreme Court. On Thursday, a three-judge panel on the 8th Circuit, which comprises mostly Republican-appointed judges, appeared skeptical of the arguments from Michael Tan, a lawyer representing an illegal immigrant detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement, that federal immigration law requires a bond hearing for illegal immigrants detained in the interior of the country. Tan and DOJ lawyer Drew Ensign offered differing opinions on what the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act, a 1996 law outlining immigration detention procedures, states about Trump’s mandatory detention policy. If the 8th Circuit rules against the administration on mandatory detention, counter to the 5th Circuit’s ruling, it would create a circuit split between the appeals courts and make the issue more likely to be taken up by the Supreme Court. Even if the 8th Circuit does not create a split on the issue, the matter is making its way through other appeals courts, and a split between the circuits appears inevitable.

Reported similarly:
Bloomberg [2/19/2026 12:52 PM, Beth Wang, 50K]

FOX News [2/19/2026 3:24 PM, Louis Casiano, Bill Mears, 37576K] reports a federal judge in California on Thursday tossed out a lower court ruling that supported broad detention powers of migrants by the Trump administration. Judge Sunshine Sykes, a Biden bench appointee, said the government’s claim it was taking the "worst of the worst" criminal illegal immigrants for deportation was "inaccurate." The ruling could block mass deportations and guarantee bond hearings for many non-criminal migrant detainees. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has been allowed to deny bond hearings to those arrested by federal immigration authorities who had been in the United States for years. Recent migrant arrivals have traditionally not been guaranteed an immediate bond hearing. Sykes said the administration’s policies swept too broadly. The AP [2/19/2026 3:05 PM, Sudhin Thanawala, 2238K] reports that, citing the deaths of Renee Good and Alex Pretti in Minnesota, the judge said that the White House had also "extended its violence on its own citizens.” "The threats posed by the executive branch cannot be viewed in isolation," U.S. District Judge Sunshine Sykes in Riverside, California said in her scathing decision issued late Wednesday. Sykes ordered the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to provide detained immigrants around the country with notice of her earlier decisions that they may be eligible to seek release on bond. Sykes, who was nominated by President Joe Biden, a Democrat, ruled in November and again in December that the change violated the law and extended her decision to immigrants nationwide. The Republican administration, however, has continued denying bond hearings. That has prompted thousands of immigrants to file separate petitions in federal court seeking their release. More than 20,000 habeas corpus cases have been filed since Trump’s inauguration, according to federal court records analyzed by the AP. The New York Times [2/19/2026 3:20 PM, Mattathias Schwartz, 148038K] reports in a fiery ruling that accused the government of widespread noncompliance with judicial orders, a federal judge ordered the Homeland Security Department to provide thousands of immigrants detained nationwide with notice that they can join a lawsuit against the government and get either a hearing or be immediately released. If put in place, the 22-page order issued on Wednesday from Judge Sunshine S. Sykes of the Federal District Court for the Central District of California would create a major procedural roadblock for the Trump administration’s mass deportation effort. The order comes as district court judges across the country whose dockets are swamped with petitions from immigrants challenging their detention have been increasingly muscular in their response to the executive branch disregarding their orders, compiling lists of violations and in one instance holding a Justice Department lawyer in civil contempt of court. Judge Sykes, who was appointed by President Joseph R. Biden Jr., criticized the executive branch in strong terms, referring to its “terror against noncitizens,” “unlawful, wanton acts,” and “violence on its own citizens” in killing two Minnesota residents. A Homeland Security Department spokesman responded to the ruling by criticizing “judicial activists.” In a statement, the spokesman said that Immigration and Customs Enforcement “has the law and the facts on its side” and that “it adheres to all court decisions until it ultimately gets them shot down by the highest court in the land.” The ruling was praised by Matt Adams, legal director for Northwest Immigrant Rights Project and one of the attorneys representing the petitioners in the case. He said the ruling “appropriately calls out the D.O.J. for defying the court’s prior orders,” adding that he hoped that the petitioners and other detainees who could benefit from the suit “will now finally receive the bond hearings they are entitled to.” A spokeswoman for the Justice Department declined to comment.

NewsMax [2/19/2026 11:06 PM, Staff, 3760K] reports White House border czar Tom Homan told Newsmax on Thursday that inflammatory rhetoric from leftist commentators — including calls for "Nuremberg trials" — is dangerous and fuels violence against federal immigration officers. "It’s hateful rhetoric. It does nothing but inflame those percentage of the left that is looking for an excuse to attack ICE officers," Homan said on "Greg Kelly Reports," referring to Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents. Homan was responding to commentators on MS NOW and some lawmakers who have called for Nuremberg-style trials to hold Trump administration officials accountable for enforcing federal immigration laws. "And look, Nuremberg trial? I’ll be looking forward to sitting next to members of Congress, because we’re enforcing the laws that Congress enacted," he added. "So if we’re racist for enforcing the law, what does it make them? They wrote it.” Homan argued that when lawmakers compare ICE officers to Nazis or secret police, it emboldens unstable people to act against federal agents. "I said back in March, if the rhetoric doesn’t stop — the hateful rhetoric comparing ICE and Nazis and secret police — there will be bloodshed. And unfortunately, I’ve been right," he said. [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

FOX News [2/19/2026 11:15 AM, Rachel Wolf Fox, 37576K] reports a Justice Department attorney has been ordered to pay a $500 daily fine after a federal judge found him in civil contempt of court. On Wednesday, Judge Laura Provinzino, who was appointed by former President Joe Biden, found Special Assistant U.S. Attorney Matthew Isihara in civil contempt, hitting him with a daily fine. The judge reportedly said that her goal was to ensure the government complies with her orders regarding Rigoberto Soto Jimenez, a detained Mexican immigrant living in Big Lake, Minn., KMSP-TV reported. Soto Jimenez has reportedly lived in the U.S. since 2018 and has no criminal history or final orders of removal, according to KMSP-TV. Additionally, the outlet noted that Soto Jimenez’s attorney stated that he is "years into the process of obtaining lawful immigration status.” Soto Jimenez was arrested by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) personnel on Jan. 14, and as of a Feb. 9 order, was not given "a warrant that justifies his detention," according to the judge’s order. Soto Jimenez was also allegedly denied a bond hearing, something the judge demanded be held. Additionally, Provinzino ordered that Soto Jimenez be released from custody by 5:00 p.m. on Feb. 13. ICE met the release deadline, but let Soto Jimenez out of detention without any of his identification paperwork, according to KMSP-TV. This appeared to violate Provinzino’s Feb. 9 order, which said that the government was ordered to release Soto Jimenez "without imposing any conditions of release and to return all property to him.”

Reported similarly:
CNN [2/19/2026 1:05 PM, Devan Cole and Tierney Sneed, 612K]

CNN [2/19/2026 2:46 PM, Michael Williams and Alex Leeds Matthews, 19874K] reports that the Department of Homeland Security admitted that its website featuring what it calls the "worst of the worst" arrested immigrants was rife with errors and changed the site this week after receiving questions from CNN about it. DHS created the website in December and the agency, its secretary Kristi Noem and the White House have all heavily promoted it on social media as the Trump administration has sought to justify its aggressive and heavily scrutinized immigration enforcement operations. The website currently lists about 25,000 people, along with the crimes the agency says they were arrested for or convicted of — including many who were initially linked only to relatively minor offenses. But DHS this week conceded its website was filled with inaccuracies. After receiving questions about a CNN analysis of the website, a DHS spokesperson admitted on Tuesday that the charges against hundreds of immigrants listed on the website were described incorrectly by the agency. The spokesperson attributed the inaccuracies to a "glitch" that they said DHS worked to remedy. The spokesperson said on Wednesday that the glitch had been "resolved." A DHS spokesperson said in a statement: "All of these individuals have been arrested by ICE and placed in removal proceedings." "Under President Trump and Secretary Noem, we are not going to allow criminals to be released from jails and back into our communities," the spokesperson said.

NBC News [2/19/2026 2:32 PM, Daniella Silva, 42967K] reports that the Department of Homeland Security committed to spending more than $144 million on guns, ammunition and other weapons during the first year of the Trump administration in a "drastic increase" in resources, according to a report released Thursday by Sen. Adam Schiff, D-Calif. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s spending commitment on weapons increased fourfold in 2025 from the previous year, while Customs and Border Protection’s contracts on weapons doubled when compared with 2024, according to the report, which looked at publicly available government contracting data. "Just in 2025, ICE and CBP have together placed orders to purchase thousands of new high-powered lethal weapons at taxpayer expense," the report said. The administration has faced heavy criticism over its use of force during immigration enforcement operations in Democratic-led cities. Images and videos flooded social media of immigration law enforcement’s violent encounters with protesters, including shooting rubber bullets, spraying chemical agents at close range and smashing car windows. Pushback against DHS’ tactics came to a head after immigration agents fatally shot two U.S. citizens, Renee Good and Alex Pretti, in Minneapolis in January. Their deaths sparked calls for investigation from both Democrats and Republicans. Border czar Tom Homan announced an end to DHS’ immigration operation in Minnesota in the weeks following Pretti’s death, with hundreds of agents leaving.

Reported similarly:
NewsMax [2/19/2026 5:07 PM, Theodore Bunker, 3760K]

NBC News [2/19/2026 5:00 AM, Julia Ainsley, 42967K] reports that an executive jet the Department of Homeland Security has told the White House’s Office of Management and Budget it needs for immigrant deportation flights and Cabinet officials’ travel features a bedroom with a queen bed, showers, a kitchen, four large flat-screen TVs and even a bar, according to images of the aircraft obtained by NBC News. DHS recently began leasing the Boeing 737 Max 8, which DHS officials have described as a luxury jet, but now Immigration and Customs Enforcement is seeking approval from OMB to purchase it for $70 million, according to two DHS officials involved in the request. ICE told OMB that it would be used for deportations and travel for Cabinet officials, the two officials said. A DHS spokesperson said "at least one of the bedrooms is currently being converted for seating to prepare the aircraft to meet the demands of its deportation mission set" when asked how the plane would be used for deportations. Some officials at ICE, which is under DHS, initially deemed the aircraft too luxurious in the way it was outfitted to be used for immigrant deportations, according to one of the officials. The request to purchase the jet has prompted some DHS officials to privately question whether it is a necessary expense to support President Donald Trump’s mass deportations policy. The spokesperson for DHS said the plane is intended to save taxpayer money.

NBC News [2/19/2026 6:57 PM, Julia Ainsley, 42967K] reports U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement is waiting on the green light to buy a luxury Boeing jet currently being leased by Secretary Kristi Noem. [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

CNN [2/19/2026 2:48 PM, Priscilla Alvarez and Tierney Sneed, 19874K] reports that the Department of Homeland Security is doubling down on the administration’s ongoing investigations into potential voter fraud — reviewing cases involving US citizens and whether they registered to vote, or voted, prior to being naturalized, according to an internal memo reviewed by CNN. The request, stemming from President Donald Trump’s March executive order on voting, marks one of the latest initiatives by his administration to amplify allegations of voter fraud and pursue the denaturalization of US citizens. The memo, distributed to leadership last week, states that Homeland Security Investigations’ Identity and Benefit Fraud Unit is overseeing the initiative "designed to identify, investigate, and disrupt activities that undermine the integrity of federal, state, and local elections, and to ensure compliance with applicable election laws.” It also requested that HSI offices "review all open and closed voter fraud cases… and identify any person(s) who registered to vote, and/or voted in any federal, state, or local election, and subsequently became naturalized United States citizens." CNN reached out to the Department of Homeland Security for comment. The initiative was first reported by MSNOW.

FOX News [2/19/2026 11:53 AM, Staff, 37576K] Video: HERE reports Rep. Bryan Steil, R-Wis., weighs in as White House and Republicans criticize Democrats for opposing the SAVE Act for election integrity, which includes voter ID.

The Hill [2/19/2026 6:00 AM, Al Weaver, 18170K] reports that discussions between the White House and Democratic leaders on funding the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) have hit a wall as administration officials publicly slammed the minority party for refusing to make concessions. Ever since Democrats sent the White House legislative text of their demands to reform how the administration carries out immigration enforcement on Feb. 7, negotiators have largely kept mum the details of the proposals and counterproposals that followed in the hopes of reaching an agreement. That began to change Tuesday when the White House slammed Democrats in a series of public comments, accusing them of not being willing to make concessions as the funding impasse nears a full week. “They’re saying right now, OK, we’re going to close DHS until you basically stop enforcing immigration law in this country. We’re not going to do that,” White House deputy chief of staff James Blair said in a TV appearance Tuesday. “This is just the Democrats’ grandstanding,” he added. Two GOP sources familiar with negotiations told The Hill that Democratic negotiators largely “recycled” their first proposal in their latest offer Monday night.

Breitbart [2/19/2026 5:43 AM, Ian Hanchett, 2238K] reports during an interview with ABC on Wednesday, Sen. Ruben Gallego (D-AZ) responded to a question on federal workers who are working without pay due to the DHS shutdown by stating that "we know for a fact that ICE, Border Patrol, and other agencies within DHS have enough money for them to continue their operations." And we should keep funding the Coast Guard, FEMA, and the TSA. Host Perry Russom asked, “So what is your message to the federal workers who are working right now without pay?” Gallego responded, “Well, look, we know for a fact that ICE, Border Patrol, and other agencies within DHS have enough money for them to continue their operations. They have enough money, as a matter of fact, more than the United States Marine Corps. Let’s just agree that we should continue to fund the Coast Guard, FEMA, TSA, for them to continue to do their work, because it is nonpartisan and it is aligned with the goals and the understanding of what the American [public wants]. But what’s happening with ICE right now, the fact that they’re running amok among our cities, not respecting U.S. citizens, racially profiling, killing American citizens, now they’re opening up detention warehouses all over the country without any input from localities. This is a federal agency that is running amok.” [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

NewsMax [2/19/2026 9:52 AM, Nicole Weatherholtz, 3760K] reports that Rep. Mark Alford, R-Mo., did not mince words Thursday on Newsmax, calling the ongoing Department of Homeland Security shutdown the "stupidest" in American history. He blamed Democrats for what he described as a manufactured crisis. "Look, this is the stupidest shutdown in U.S. history," Alford told "Wake Up America." "I thought the one back in November, the longest shutdown in U.S. history, was dumb. "This one is even dumber." He argued Democrats are driving the standoff because they "have no message, no vision, no leader," and are "trying to grasp at straws to create subject matter for the midterms, to get the public on their side.” Alford said the real dispute centers on immigration enforcement under President Donald Trump, which he noted was a key campaign promise. "Seventy-four million Americans voted for this platform — this plank in this platform — to deport illegal aliens, especially criminal illegal aliens," he said. "They don’t like the way that ICE [Immigration and Customs Enforcement] is going about that, and so, they have decided to shut down the government.” Alford said ICE funding itself is not in question, noting Republicans have already secured resources for the agency through 2028.

NewsMax [2/19/2026 9:43 AM, Theodore Bunker, 3760K] reports that Rep. Michael Cloud, R-Texas, told Newsmax on Thursday that the ongoing partial federal government shutdown is unlikely to last much longer as lawmakers prepare to return to Washington, focusing renewed attention on disputed Department of Homeland Security funding. The partial shutdown, largely confined to the Department of Homeland Security after lawmakers left town without passing a spending bill, disrupted several agencies, including the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the Secret Service, and the Transportation Security Administration, as key funding expired, while Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection continue operating under prior funding authorizations. Cloud, a member of the House Oversight and Reform Committee, told Newsmax’s "Wake Up America" that he does not expect the partial government shutdown to continue for long. He said the standoff "doesn’t really make any sense," noting that Democrats "say this is over ICE" but "ICE is already funded." Cloud said, "What’s being defunded here is FEMA, [the] Secret Service... cybersecurity, those kinds of things that are very important to protecting our homeland." The congressman sharply criticized Democrats for making immigration and related reforms central to the debate, calling the issue a "political football" that has stalled progress and threatened essential homeland security functions.

CNN [2/20/2026 5:01 AM, Annie Grayer, Gabe Cohen, and Evan Perez, 19874K] reports lawmakers who oversee the Department of Homeland Security say the agency has repeatedly stymied their requests for information in recent months, with even some Republicans alleging they’ve had phone calls go unanswered and data requests left to languish. As the Department of Homeland Security has found itself embroiled in controversies across the country over high-profile killings by immigration agents and the resulting bitter policy disputes, lawmakers say they’ve stepped up their efforts to try to get answers for the public. But they’ve often been met with resistance, they said — thwarting their ability to hold anyone accountable. “I’m not going to sit here on bended knee hoping to God that somebody returns the call,” GOP Rep. Mark Amodei, the Republican who oversees the DHS budget in the House told CNN, after his request to speak with White House Border Czar Tom Homan went unanswered for days. One Republican staffer told CNN that the stonewalling extends beyond just thorny policy questions about immigration enforcement. Requests to the Federal Emergency Management Agency on the status of federal disaster funding and questions over potential crimes committed by those detained by federal officers have also been met with silence or evasiveness, the staffer said. The result, the staffer said, is not only that GOP lawmakers can’t properly oversee the agency, they can’t help blunt possibly unfair attacks from their Democratic counterparts. “It’s really a shame that DHS has taken such an adversarial posture on sharing data. In some areas, like on immigration and the border they have a great story to tell, and we could be helping them tell that story,” the staffer explained. “In other areas where the story is not so good, like FEMA, we could also help. But they choose to go at it alone, so it’s on them to defend, which is hard to do when no one believes a word they say or a number they put out. There is no trust and there is no way to verify.” Democrats, meanwhile, say they have received virtually no response from their inquiries to DHS. At least 15 letters sent by members of the party to the department have either been ghosted, received a cursory acknowledgement or were given a non-answer, a Homeland Security Committee Democratic aide told CNN. Another Democratic staffer told CNN that when they’ve asked for specific FEMA updates, whether it’s on mitigation projects, staffing plans or briefings on various press releases, they’ve gotten no response. A DHS spokesperson told CNN the department works through “official channels” and would “not be litigating our relationship” with Capitol Hill through the press. But they also dismissed claims they’ve not engaged with members of Congress.

Washington Post [2/19/2026 6:11 PM, Maegan Vazquez, Liam Scott and Scott Nover, 24826K] reports four journalists, including three working for the Associated Press, were detained in Cameroon on Tuesday while reporting from a facility where migrants deported by the Trump administration are held, according to one of the detained journalists and two lawyers advocating for the deportees. Awah Joseph Fru, a lawyer representing deported migrants, was detained alongside the journalists. About 15 migrants who are not from Cameroon have been sent to the country by the United States since January, according to Alma David, one of the attorneys advocating for the deportees. The deportations to Cameroon happened amid broader efforts by the Trump administration to pressure foreign nations into signing onto secretive third-country deportation agreements, which allow the federal government to remove migrants from the U.S. and send them to places other than their country of origin. Fru and freelance journalist Randy Joe Sa’ah said that they and the three AP journalists were detained for about five hours before they were all released Tuesday evening, and that the journalists’ devices — including laptops, phones and cameras — were confiscated by law enforcement. Fru said he saw that one of the journalists displayed bruises upon their release.

ABC News [2/19/2026 7:54 AM, Staff, 34146K] Video: HERE reports the FBI has opened up another investigative avenue by contacting Mexican authorities across the border as the reward doubled after an anonymous donation.

FOX News [2/19/2026 1:18 PM, Charles Creitz, 37576K] reports that one year after critics warned President Donald Trump’s mass deportation push would spark bloodshed in America’s largest sanctuary cities, new data from a leading progressive police-reform group shows police-involved killings actually declined — the first drop in five years. Lawmakers and activists from Los Angeles to New York predicted that Trump’s surge into largely sanctuary-city communities would lead to more violence against innocent residents, which recently reached a fever pitch with the shootings of Alex Pretti and Renee Good in Minneapolis. However, data from progressive advocacy project Mapping Police Violence, a subsidiary of the Harlem-based Campaign Zero police reform group, found that police-involved killings actually went down in that timespan. In its police violence report for 2025, the 1,314 police-involved killings marked a decline for the first time in five years. In 2024, that figure was 1,382, reportedly a record high, and in 2023, 1,362 people died at the hands of police, whether justified or otherwise. "If they are so violent, why did police kill 68 fewer people in 2025 than 2024? Certainly, that’s not what I expected to happen," wrote columnist David Mastio in the Kansas City Star. "These facts complicate the political narrative that Trump has unleashed ‘violent and sometimes deadly tactics… by federal immigration officers in communities across the country.’"

CNN [2/19/2026 10:00 AM, Lauren Mascarenhas, 612K] reports as the Trump administration continues its immigration crackdown across the US, health care providers warn the impact of federal agents in health care settings – and the looming threat of immigration enforcement they’ve instilled nationwide – is presenting a barrier to care that could have a lasting impact on the health of communities. With many people unable or afraid to access care, some providers say they are seeing a decline in patient numbers they haven’t seen since the Covid-19 pandemic – this time providing care while potentially dealing with federal agents in tactical gear. Doctors are already seeing the impact on appointments, vaccination numbers and even basic nutrition, and they’re worried the long-term health consequences could be serious. In the Twin Cities, which saw a huge influx of federal immigration agents this year that sent the region into a state of chaos and resistance, armed ICE agents have been seen lining the hallways, accompanying patients in their custody, a senior physician at a large hospital in the Twin Cities told CNN. The doctor asked to remain anonymous out of concern that he or his hospital would be targeted. "As doctors, I think our job is to take care of the patient in front of us, and we’re not involved in immigration enforcement," the doctor said. "Until last month, that had never been a part of my job description.” But then, patients began entering his hospital under the custody of federal immigration agents. In January, the Trump administration rescinded a Biden-era policy that banned immigration enforcement actions in "sensitive areas," like schools, places of worship and hospitals. "The Trump Administration will not tie the hands of our brave law enforcement, and instead trusts them to use common sense," a Department of Homeland Security spokesperson said in a statement at the time. "ICE does not conduct enforcement at hospitals—period. We would only go into a hospital if there were an active danger to public safety," DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin told CNN in a statement. "Of course, if we have a detainee we need to take to the hospital for medical care, we have officers accompany them for their monitoring, safety of the staff, and the public. This is standard procedure for all law enforcement agencies.” But doctors say that the presence of these agents in health care settings can be disruptive and intimidating.

CNN [2/19/2026 6:00 AM, Isabelle Chapman, et al., 19874K] reports a pair of federal immigration agents clad in camouflage and masks approached Ryan Ecklund’s car on a snowy Minnesota street last month with a stark warning. "You will not be following us anymore," one agent told him, "or you will be arrested.” When Ecklund continued tailing the agents’ beige SUV and recording them, he quickly found his status as a US citizen didn’t protect him from being pulled from his car and handcuffed. The agents drove him to an Immigration and Customs Enforcement office in Minneapolis and checked him into detention at a table labeled with a handwritten sign: "USC 111.” As Ecklund later learned, the sign was a reference to a once-obscure federal statute, 18 US Code 111, that has become a key tool used by immigration agents to detain American citizens. As residents have sought to protest and document arrests in Minneapolis, Chicago and other cities by blowing whistles, blocking streets and recording agents, immigration officers have increasingly responded by arresting people for "impeding" their operations – claiming that those actions violate the law. A CNN review of federal court records found that the Trump administration has dramatically expanded the use of the statute. Federal prosecutors in areas that have seen intense protests – the four districts covering Minneapolis, Chicago, Los Angeles, and Portland – charged about 12 times as many people under the statute in the first year of the Trump administration as they did in the last year of the Biden administration. But these charges have often fallen apart under scrutiny, CNN found. In Minneapolis, dozens of people – including Ecklund – have been arrested and detained for hours but never charged, according to attorneys working on the cases and court files. Several of the cases filed in recent weeks have already been dropped by prosecutors or reduced from felonies to misdemeanors. Dozens of cellphone and body camera videos reviewed by CNN show that immigration agents are routinely threatening to arrest people who follow or film videos of them, sometimes specifically citing the statute. That’s despite senior Trump administration officials, including acting ICE chief Todd Lyons, acknowledging to Congress last week that recording agents in public and yelling at officers does not violate federal law. Legal experts say the court records and videos show that the administration is often abusing the law to target activities protected by the First Amendment, rather than using it to defend federal officers. The Department of Homeland Security cited an increase in assaults on federal law enforcement officers to explain the rise in arrests and charges under the law. "It should come as no surprise that there’s an increase in referrals under 18 U.S.C. 111 as there’s been a massive increase in violence and threats against federal law enforcement," a DHS spokesperson said in a statement.

NewsMax [2/19/2026 8:42 PM, Mark Swanson, 3760K] reports remarks by Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., on Wednesday signal that national Democrats are pursuing sweeping changes that extend far beyond abolishing ICE, Breitbart reported. During a town hall, Omar said Democrats are not only discussing eliminating Immigration and Customs Enforcement, but are also engaged in conversations about dismantling the Department of Homeland Security altogether. "What I will say is that there is an easier conversation happening today than six, seven years ago when I got to Congress, about what we need to do with ICE, which is to abolish it," Omar told attendees in Golden Valley, Minnesota. She added, "There is a lot of conversation about what the dismantlement of the Department of Homeland Security should look like." Omar’s remarks come as Democrats continue to protest federal immigration enforcement operations under President Donald Trump. ICE, which was established in 2003 under DHS, has carried out immigration enforcement actions for more than two decades. Thursday marked the sixth day of a federal shutdown forced by congressional Democrats over their demands to reform ICE. Democrats are pushing a series of new restrictions on ICE operations, including banning agents from wearing face masks and requiring judicial warrants before making arrests. They are also calling for a mandate that ICE agents wear body cameras — something the Trump administration is already moving toward. In addition, Democrats are seeking to prohibit immigration enforcement actions at what they describe as sensitive locations, including hospitals, schools, and polling sites — a proposal Republicans have flagged, noting that noncitizens are prohibited from voting in U.S. elections under federal law. [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

Reported similarly:
Breitbart [2/19/2026 1:26 PM, Alana Mastrangelo, 2238K]
Daily Wire [2/19/2026 8:14 AM, Hank Berrien, 2314K]

Chicago Tribune [2/19/2026 4:13 PM, Madeline Buckley and Jake Sheridan, 5209K] reports that the Cook County state’s attorney’s office on Thursday released a protocol outlining the steps for filing charges against federal immigration agents, marking the first official policy from the office on the topic amid uproar over agents’ conduct in the Chicago area and a public feud between the mayor and State’s Attorney Eileen O’Neill Burke. The policy document provides a legal analysis of the rare and complex scenario that would involve an on-duty federal agent being charged by a state prosecutor and is meant to guide law enforcement investigating potential offenses and line prosecutors reviewing the cases. "No one is above the law — including both ICE agents and prosecutors," Burke said in a news release announcing the policy. "If a federal law enforcement agent commits a crime, my office will not hesitate to act, in accordance with state law. This protocol establishes clear, legally sound guidelines to ensure we have a responsible and effective path to pursue accountability." The document, though, notes that prosecutors must consider federal immunity — which is not absolute but offers some protection for agents — among other factors. The U.S. Supreme Court established decades ago that, in general, a federal officer cannot be held on a state criminal charge where the alleged crime arose during the performance of his federal duties, though charges can be brought if the officer’s actions were so egregious they could not have reasonably believed it was in accordance with their official duties.

CNN [2/19/2026 1:37 PM, Dana Bash, 19874K] reports that Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt and North Carolina Gov. Josh Stein want Congress to get out of the way on immigration. Stitt told CNN’s Dana Bash, “[The] federal government can’t do anything, they’re waiting till the midterms.” And Stein said, “The challenge is Congress, Congress had a deal right on the table.” [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

New York Times [2/20/2026 5:07 AM, Katrina Miller, 148038K] reports Michael Silevitch: SENTRY is a center funded by the Department of Homeland Security to protect soft targets across the country, like mom-and-pop grocery stores, sports arenas, schools and places of worship. There are two major events this summer that we were actively working on: the 2026 World Cup final in New Jersey and America 250, the nation’s 250th birthday celebration. We were working with NJ Transit to control crowds arriving at its stations during the World Cup. And America 250 celebrations will be in every state; they’re ripe venues for drone attacks. We’ve been researching how to best deploy resources for crowd flow in case of an emergency evacuation. Think about a stampede or an active shooter: What we’re trying to do is figure out how to calm a panicked crowd, to guide them and minimize harm they might cause while evacuating. We have the ability to create a digital twin of a venue and ask these questions in a simulation. Other work by our center included the development of a sensor that detects chemical and biological threats, such as anthrax. The sensor is portable, lightweight and more sensitive than a dog’s nose, and was ready to be tested.We were also developing real-time command centers for soft targets with video, radar and other inputs that could provide decision makers with enough information to thwart an attack. Our research explored what kind of sensors and protocols were needed, and even how architectural design could protect against threats. How could you change the exits or stairways to maximize the ability of a crowd to get out in case of disaster? Our funding termination occurred last April. I was devastated. A number of tools that were ready to go were just nipped in the bud. As soon as we got the termination, we had to stop work. Students were let go. Faculty had to find other sources of support. Staff was reduced significantly. It’s almost too late to prepare for the World Cup and America 250. It’s frustrating because we know we can help, but it’s not possible without funding. We’ve looked to industry to provide us with some support, and I provided discretionary funds to see our students through the end of June last year. We’ve pivoted our research focus in an effort to secure funding, but our hope is still that we will be reinstated.

FOX News [2/19/2026 9:00 AM, Shelley Moore Capito, 37576K] reports as the debate over the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) funding bill continues, one truth is becoming increasingly clear: Democrats are refusing to stand with the very law enforcement officers tasked with protecting our communities. My Democratic colleagues are attempting to strip DHS enforcement authority, diminish operational capacity, and restrict cooperation with state and local law enforcement. At a time when border security and interior enforcement are critical to public safety, they are choosing politics over protection. I refuse to accept that. I stand firmly with the courageous men and women of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). These professionals carry out a difficult and often dangerous mission to safeguard our communities. They deserve our respect, our gratitude and the resources necessary to do their jobs effectively. The DHS bill before us reflects those priorities. This is the same bill that both Republicans and Democrats negotiated in a bipartisan manner, and the same bill Republicans were ready to pass to ensure full-year funding for the department. Instead of supporting DHS and ICE in carrying out their mission, Democrats are pursuing a dangerous crusade to weaken enforcement and undermine the rule of law. The bill, as it stands now, provides the tools required for interior enforcement, enabling ICE agents to identify, detain and remove individuals who break our laws and pose risks to the public. But it’s important to understand that this legislation goes far beyond immigration enforcement. It includes vital funding for the various missions carried out every day by agencies like FEMA, TSA, Secret Service, the U.S. Coast Guard and so many more. The 260,000 individuals who work to counter cyberattacks, secure our borders and coastlines, and protect critical infrastructure—just to name a few.

Blaze [2/19/2026 8:00 AM, Mike Howell, 1556K] reports everyone in America has an opinion on what has gone right or wrong at the Department of Homeland Security and its component agencies, particularly Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection. To answer the Talking Heads lyric "Well, how did I get here?" would yield a thousand different answers. I have a pretty good sense of what happened. Even before President Trump returned to the White House, I argued that meeting his bold deportation goals would require very different enforcement tactics than the ones the administration chose. That debate makes for great fodder for finger-pointing. But a better question is: Where do we go next? To answer it, some of the nation’s leading immigration policy and legal experts, former senior and rank-and-file law enforcement officials, and advocates are coming together to devise a way forward. Details will be announced in the days to come, but the goal is straightforward: President Trump can and will meet his core campaign promise to "carry out the largest deportation operation in American history.” Last year, Immigration and Customs Enforcement deported about 230,000 illegal aliens from the interior of the United States. That is a far cry from the 1 million figure some administration officials floated as a projection — and far below other totals the administration has suggested at various points. Making analysis harder, the Department of Homeland Security stopped releasing enforcement data for the first time in decades. President Trump promised to exceed the deportation efforts of President Dwight D. Eisenhower, who, by the most conservative estimates, removed about one-third of the illegal population in 1954. Any way you cut the data, even using the lowest-end estimates of the total illegal population in 2025, the administration is not on pace.

The Hill [2/19/2026 9:00 AM, Nolan Rappaport, 18170K] reports that a February poll indicates that 65 percent of people in the U.S. think the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement measures go “too far.” Are they right? Or is the administration just faithfully executing the law as required by the “take care” provision in the U.S. Constitution? Certainly, the current administration is doing a better job than the previous one of executing the provisions in the Immigration and Nationality Act. Joe Biden’s enforcement policy was based on the assumption that the majority of deportable aliens in the U.S. are “contributing members of our communities.” According to its Guidelines for the Enforcement of Civil Immigration Law, “The fact an individual is a removable noncitizen therefore should not alone be the basis of an enforcement action against them.” Enforcement measures under Biden were restricted to deportable aliens “who pose a threat to national security, public safety, and border security and thus threaten America’ s well-being.” In other words, the previous administration restricted deportations to the illegal immigrants they thought should be deported. The current administration is being criticized for going in the other direction, pursuing all deportable immigrants — noncriminal as well as criminal. That executes the mandate that Congress created in federal law with its classes of deportable aliens list, which specifies the grounds under which “any alien… be removed.”

Houston Chronicle [2/19/2026 11:30 AM, Chelsie Kramer, 2493K] reports that if the federal government were truly serious about reducing undocumented immigration or its impact on the American workforce, the crackdowns wouldn’t be focused on Minneapolis or Chicago. They’d be focused on Houston. Harris County alone is estimated to be home to roughly 600,000 undocumented immigrants — more than four times as many as are estimated to live in the entire state of Minnesota. Yet Houston is conspicuously absent from calls for mass deportation, and unlike other U.S. cities, it’s rarely described as “overrun.” What gives? I think it’s this: National immigration policy is being driven by party politics. And those politics run counter to Texas values. A Quinnipiac University poll found that 57% of voters disapprove of how ICE enforces immigration laws. While Gallup reports that a record 45% of Americans identify as political independents, signaling a rejection of tribal politics.

Immigrants are deeply embedded in the industries Texans rely on most. In health care, immigrants account for nearly one-third of physicians and pharmacists. In energy, they support 32.5% of engineering roles critical to the state’s growth. In construction, 40% of workers are immigrants, with even higher shares among laborers. Go to the doctor, flip on the lights or walk into a new building in Houston, and you’re seeing immigrant work in action.

Bloomberg [2/19/2026 6:10 PM, Sophie Alexander, Fola Akinnibi, and Alicia A. Caldwell, 18082K] reports Immigration and Customs Enforcement plans to shrink its network of more than 200 detention facilities — most of them privately operated — to just 34 government-owned sites, according to local officials briefed this week on the plan, a move that would affect longtime private prison giants like GEO Group and CoreCivic Inc. If carried out, the shift would replace the current patchwork of local jails and privately run prisons with a centralized system of larger facilities, most of them industrial warehouses, owned by the Department of Homeland Security. The majority of people currently in ICE custody are in facilities run by GEO or CoreCivic. David Keener, the mayor of Social Circle, Georgia, City Manager Eric Taylor and City Attorney Jay Crowley said they were told of the 34-facility plan during a meeting this week with a DHS delegation led by Tim Kaiser, deputy chief of staff at US Citizenship and Immigration Services. The meeting focused on the federal government’s proposal to convert a large warehouse in the city, about 45 miles east of Atlanta, into an immigration detention center that residents and city leaders oppose. DHS did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the details shared in the meeting. A person familiar with the administration’s plan confirmed that ICE will now rely primarily on government-owned facilities but that private companies will maintain a role, which may include providing services such as medical care and security. Rival companies are already competing for the contracts to convert and operate the warehouses DHS has purchased.

Washington Examiner [2/19/2026 7:00 AM, Anna Giaritelli, 1147K] reports that state and local officials have found a new way to stop President Donald Trump’s mass deportation operation — and so far, it is working. Elected officials and residents in communities nationwide have been largely successful in recent weeks in sabotaging the Trump administration’s efforts to buy and convert warehouses into detention centers for illegal immigrants in federal custody. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has faced pushback for the past month as it tries to purchase large, empty buildings on the outskirts of a number of major U.S. cities. That has complicated the federal agency’s search for space and created a new way for local communities to hold up Trump’s deportation operation. A former senior ICE official familiar with the Trump administration’s plans to convert the warehouses into additional detention centers said the pushback is a problem, but does not expect it to ultimately prevent the agency from acquiring 10 warehouses. "Honestly, the government will just go somewhere else. They’re going to find people that want to sell property," the official said in a phone call, adding that the government is offering "top dollar" for buildings that are "sitting unused.” Kansas City, Missouri, Mayor Quinton Lucas, a Democrat, issued a statement last week celebrating how the purchase of a warehouse on the city’s south side had fallen through amid pushback from some residents.

Roll Call [2/19/2026 7:00 AM, Chris Johnson, 673K] reports that local officials in Kansas City celebrated when a development company abandoned plans last week to sell a warehouse to the U.S. government for the purpose of becoming a 7,500-bed immigration detention center — including Reps. Sharice Davids of Kansas and Emanuel Cleaver II of Missouri. The Democrats had raised concerns in letters to the Department of Homeland Security about the deal and are among the members of Congress from at least 10 states who have written letters or taken other action to try to halt immigration detention facilities that would affect their constituents. "Community voices matter," Davids said after the announcement. "This site was intended to support economic development and job creation — not to house a massive ICE detention facility that would strain infrastructure, divert resources from local law enforcement, and undermine public safety." DHS got $45 billion in last year’s reconciliation law specifically to expand immigration detention centers, as the Trump administration to seeks to increase the number of migrants it detains under its aggressive approach to immigration enforcement. A spokesperson said Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem aims to work with officials "on both sides of the aisle" for the centers to help Immigration and Customs Enforcement "carry out the largest deportation effort in American history."

Axios [2/19/2026 8:39 AM, Russell Contreras, 17364K] reports a Border Patrol agent slipping on ice in Minneapolis wasn’t just a meme. It became a symbol of how viral videos are reshaping public perceptions of ICE and Border Patrol. The clips — agents falling on frozen pavement, failing to catch suspects and retreating in vehicles with flat tires as crowds jeer — are being used online to question the training, preparedness and legitimacy of federal immigration enforcement amid a mass deportation plan. Alongside videos of deadly shootings of Alex Pretti and Renee Good, the short clips have been shared millions of times with captions mocking federal agents’ coordination and crowd control while questioning tactics. "Folks, that’s bush league policing," Cumberland County Sheriff Kevin Joyce in Maine said after cellphone video showing ICE agents detaining one of his corrections officer recruits and leaving his car running. Homeland Security Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin told Axios in a statement before her departure that agents are facing "a coordinated campaign of violence" against them. "How gross to mock law enforcement officers as they put their lives on the line to arrest the worst of the worst including murderers, pedophiles, rapists, gang members, and terrorists." She shared images of agents with cuts, head injuries and damaged vehicles that she suggested were inflicted by protesters.

FOX News [2/19/2026 6:00 AM, Leo Briceno, 37576K] reports as Democrats continue to withhold funding for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), former agency leaders argue their demands for new guardrails would mark the most direct congressional intervention in the agency’s operations — a turn for a post-9/11 agency that has largely defined its own operations. John Sandweg, a former acting director of Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and a former general counsel for DHS, said Congress has occasionally given ICE instruction but stayed away from managing its operations. "There had been some congressional mandates, some of them through appropriations, some through authorizing statutes that compelled the creation of this system," Sandweg said. Sarah Saldaña, former director of ICE from 2014 to 2017, believes it’s unusual for Congress to get into the weeds of how any agency carries out its mission. "Congress has a legitimate role in oversight in the expenditure of any taxpayer funds, including ICE’s expenditure, whether it’s proper or not. It has nothing to do with dictating specific operations or tactics," Saldaña said, while noting she’s not surprised by the attention the agency’s recent tactics have received from lawmakers. "But Congress doesn’t operate anything. They pass statutes.” ICE’s operational autonomy has led to its enforcement looking different through the years since its founding in 2003. Especially at its outset, this allowed the agency to wander from its focus, according to Sandweg. But it’s also that flexibility that he believes has allowed President Donald Trump to aggressively push its immigration enforcement operations. In response to Trump’s ICE crackdown and two deadly encounters between immigration enforcement and civilians, Democratic demands include an end to roving patrols, a ban on mask use and visible identification for agents. Democrats say they won’t vote to fund DHS, which includes ICE, until those changes are made.

NPR [2/19/2026 5:02 AM, Jude Joffe-Block, 28764K] reports that the use of automatic license plate readers has exploded across the country in recent years. The cameras on roads and freeways that take images of the back of passing cars are popular with police for solving crimes. But as President Trump’s immigration enforcement crackdown has escalated in recent months, residents of various American cities are urging local leaders to stop using these cameras, citing fears of mass surveillance and concerns that local data could be aiding a federal deportation dragnet. Many of the grassroots campaigns have targeted cameras made by Flock Safety, an Atlanta-based company that has contracts with more than 5,000 law enforcement agencies across the country. Some cities have grappled with the issue and decided to keep their cameras due to public safety, but in a number of places, the pressure has worked. The liberal college towns of Flagstaff, Ariz., Cambridge, Mass., Eugene, Ore. and Santa Cruz, Calif., are among a list of at least 30 localities that have either deactivated their Flock cameras or canceled their contracts since the beginning of 2025 – with much of the activity happening in just the last three months.

Univision [2/19/2026 3:58 PM, Staff, 4937K] reports Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) operations continue in New Jersey, after a man was arrested on Wednesday morning, February 18, while walking in the middle of a public road in West New York. The videos show how the officers, identified as part of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), get out of several vehicles, surround the person, knock him down, subdue him, and then take him away from the place. So far, federal authorities have not reported whether the detainee had a criminal record, whether there was an arrest warrant against them, or the specific reason for the operation. The local mayor has condemned the action.

Daily Caller [2/19/2026 1:21 PM, Harold Hutchison, 803K] reports that a principal at Wilson High School in Spring Township, Pennsylvania, ordered students who walked out of class to protest Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to return to class. Across the country, students have walked out of school to protest ICE, especially since Department of Homeland Security (DHS) officers were involved in the fatal shootings of Alex Pretti and Renee Nicole Good in January. Principal Daniel Weber addressed the students in a video posted on TikTok by a user known as othersideofanalia. "We go back to class and we’re good. If you stay out here, we will get your names, you will be suspended, OK? That is your option at this point because you are operating outside the bounds of what was granted," Weber told the students. "That event was canceled. You left school without, you left school without permission. Your rights do not supersede the school. So if you understand that, that is your option." Students ditch class for a commie protest, and the principal drops the hammer: "Back to class or suspended." "If you wish to return, Doctor Damiani will let you in that door over there," Weber continued. "If not, I will be getting your names. You will be suspended, OK? Those are your options, all right? Your rights do not exceed that of the school.” The school district considered allowing an anti-ICE protest and had discussed the matter with students, but the event was cancelled, WFMZ TV, a TV station based in Allentown, Pennsylvania, reported. Roughly 60 students walked out of class to carry out the protest, according to WFMZ. [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

Telemundo Washington DC [2/19/2026 3:15 PM, Rosbelis Quiñonez and Juliana Valencia, 120K] reports federal and local lawmakers from Prince George’s County led a march in Hyattsville to protest the proposed ICE facility. Ivey, Senator Angela Alsobrooks, and Senator Chris Van Hollen sent a letter to Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem and Acting ICE Director Todd Lyons, requesting that DHS and ICE provide details about the size of the facility, whether it would house law enforcement operations, and whether it would include detention areas. They also inquired about the terms and duration of the lease and the total estimated cost to taxpayers. Local and federal lawmakers requested a written response from DHS and ICE no later than February 27.

New York Post [2/19/2026 11:58 PM, Anna Young, 40934K] reports a Virginia high school suspended more than 300 teens who ditched class and stormed off campus during a student-led anti-ICE walkout last week, according to reports. Woodbridge High School handed three-day suspensions to 303 students who walked out of class last Friday to "express their views" and protest federal immigration enforcement, principal Dr. Heather Abney told parents in a letter obtained by 7 News. The demonstration, which was not backed by Prince William County Public Schools, eventually spilled off school grounds and onto the streets, forcing local police to manage traffic and oversee the hundreds of rebel students involved. In the letter, Abney noted that while walkouts allow students to voice their opinions on issues "important to them," leaving campus without permission during school hours violates district rules. Some students reportedly went home after the protest, others headed to a nearby shopping center, and several returned to campus — where a few caused a disturbance. "We appreciate your partnership as we continue to prioritize student safety while maintaining clear expectations for appropriate conduct during the school day," she wrote, Fox News Digital reported. Despite the suspensions, students across the district are planning another walkout Friday, according to a student-led Instagram page focused on efforts to "abolish" US Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

Univision [2/19/2026 3:20 PM, Staff, 4937K] reports a warehouse in Social Circle, Georgia, will be converted into one of eight ICE mega-detention centers scheduled to open nationwide in 2026, housing up to 10,000 people, Department of Homeland Security (DHS) officials confirmed. The Social Circle Detention Center and the other seven mega-centers will open this year, 2026. In their statement, Social Circle officials reported that the center could begin operating between May and June of 2026. In addition, DHS officials provided details of their plans for this and the other seven mega-detention centers that are expected to be operational by November 30, 2026. Information provided by Social Circle and ICE documents also reveals that the federal government plans to reduce the number of detention centers nationwide from 300 to 34 by the end of fiscal year 2026. The goal of the new model is to increase the national detention capacity to 92,600. Currently, it stands at 41,500 beds. In their statement, Social Circle officials said they remain dismayed that they cannot absorb the increased consumption of services such as drinking water and sewage. In addition, DHS indicated that it conducted an economic impact study related to the project. However, Social Circle officials say they have not yet received a copy of that study.

AP [2/19/2026 4:35 PM, Russ Bynum] reports the kindergarten and first grade students in Linda Davis’ classes sobbed and shed tears after being told their teacher, who greeted them most mornings with an infectious smile, wouldn’t be coming back. Davis, 52, was killed during her morning commute Monday, less than a half mile (0.8 kilometers) from the school where she taught students with special needs. Local and federal authorities say a Guatemalan man crashed his pickup truck into Davis’ car as he was fleeing a traffic stop by immigration officers. Savannah Mayor Van Johnson and Chester Ellis, chairman of the Chatham County Board of Commissioners, have questioned whether the pursuit that ended in Davis’ death was necessary. A spokesperson for U.S. Customs and Immigration Enforcement, Lindsay Williams, said the fleeing driver had no criminal history but was in the U.S. illegally. Authorities identified the driver of the truck as Oscar Vasquez Lopez, 38. He suffered minor injuries, according to police, and has been jailed on charges including vehicular homicide and driving without a valid license. ICE officers pulled over Lopez to enforce an immigration judge’s 2024 deportation order, Williams said, and Lopez drove away as the officers approached his vehicle. ICE said in a news release that Lopez crashed into Davis’ car after making a U-turn and running a stop light.

FOX News [2/19/2026 2:04 PM, Ashley Carnahan, 37576K] reports that a Navy reservist on active duty accused of murdering his wife in Virginia is believed to have fled to Hong Kong, according to a federal affidavit filed by the FBI. Investigators said 38-year-old David Varela left the country on or about Feb. 5, the same day police discovered his wife’s body inside a kitchen freezer at their Norfolk home in the 300 block of East Main Street. Lina Maria Guerra Echavarria, 39, had been reported missing by her brother after he had not heard from her for more than two weeks. Detectives had also been unable to reach Varela, and his Navy supervisor told police it was unusual for him not to return calls. An autopsy conducted by the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner on Feb. 10 ruled Echavarria’s death a homicide. Following their investigation, Virginia authorities issued two arrest warrants charging Varela with concealing a dead body to prevent detection and first-degree murder. Homeland Security Investigations determined the Navy reservist took a flight to Hong Kong, and emergency disclosure requests from WhatsApp showed location information originating from there. A spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security also confirmed they were working with local law enforcement.

FOX News [2/19/2026 4:47 PM, Bonny Chu, 37576K] reports the two men arrested in an atrocious North Carolina home invasion last week have been identified as criminal illegal aliens from Mexico who allegedly terrorized a male victim by sodomizing and beating him and ripping out his fingernails, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) told Fox News Digital on Thursday. The overnight ambush, which Pitt County authorities said involved at least three male suspects, occurred in a quiet Greenville suburb last Wednesday. The two undocumented immigrants were identified as 21-year-old Chapel Hill resident Zaid Mayen and 20-year-old Jonathan David Garcia-Larios, a homeless man who was previously deported from the U.S. in 2024. They were arrested last Friday with the assistance of the U.S. Marshals and local law enforcement. Authorities noted that the suspects entered the U.S. at an unknown date and time. DHS added that the "two sexual perverts and violent thugs" unleashed a series of horrific attacks despite having no known criminal record in the U.S. The unnamed victim was transported to a local hospital for treatment of injuries and "thankfully survived," DHS said.

Univision [2/19/2026 3:05 PM, Staff, 4937K] reports the death of Linda Davis, an American teacher, sparked controversy after the car accident that occurred on Monday, February 16, 2026 in Savannah, Georgia. The case involves agents from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and a Guatemalan immigrant identified as Óscar Vásquez López. According to the agency, the accident occurred during a vehicle pursuit initiated by ICE agents and culminated in a multiple collision in which Davis was seriously injured. According to the local news outlet Savannah Morning News, Óscar Vásquez López survived the crash and was arrested for first-degree vehicular homicide. Following the accident, both drivers were transported to Memorial Health University Medical Clinic. Authorities reported that Davis died from his injuries. The investigations continue under the coordination of local and federal authorities, while the full circumstances of the operation and pursuit that resulted in the fatal accident are clarified.

The Hill [2/19/2026 6:44 PM, Ashleigh Fields, 18170K] reports Former Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan (R) on Thursday said local police will “ignore” a new law signed by Gov. Wes Moore (D) that prevents them from working with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). “Yesterday in my state they just passed a bill, Gov. Moore signed an emergency bill to prohibit local law enforcement from cooperating with ICE. And, you know, all the local law enforcement officers are saying, ‘We’re going to ignore that because we’re required to work with them,’” Hogan said during remarks at Politico Live’s “Governors Summit.” “So I get the whole, you know, overreach and overstep and doing the wrong things, but, you know, when they have violent criminals that they’re holding in jail that ICE wants to be detained, they, you know, they shouldn’t be let back on the street. So there’s two sides to this argument,” he added. Hogan’s comments follow Moore’s decision to ban 287(g) agreements in the state, which allow ICE to deputize local law enforcement officers to carry out immigration enforcement. “We will continue to coordinate on shared public safety, priorities, including the lawful removal of noncitizen offenders who pose a risk to the public,” Moore said at the ceremony ahead of signing the bill, according to The Baltimore Sun. “We want ICE to be focused on violent criminals and people who are doing true harm to our society, as was promised by the Trump-Vance administration,” he added. Moore and other Democrats have accused ICE agents of breaking the law in recent months, citing an excessive use of force and racial discrimination.

CBS Miami [2/19/2026 3:46 PM, Staff, 51110K] reports the State Board of Immigration Enforcement (SBIE) is set to approve another $53 million in awards for local law enforcement agencies. About half of those funds are being allocated to only one county. While $14 million of the funds are for new awards, the other $39 million is for 12 law enforcement agencies that are amending their original budgets with additional requests – most of which is for equipment. All of the requests have been approved by the SBIE Executive Director, Anthony Coker, who stepped into the position in October 2025, and will need board approval at the next Florida Cabinet meeting on Tuesday. The board, comprised of Gov. Ron DeSantis, Attorney General James Uthmeier, Chief Financial Officer Blaise Ingoglia and Agriculture Commissioner Wilton Simpson, has not yet denied a funding request since its creation last year. Lee, Polk and Escambia are the three counties with the largest requests.

Blaze [2/19/2026 7:15 PM, Landon Pfile, 1556K] reports a minor was reportedly struck by a vehicle Monday afternoon during a student-led protest against U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Palm Beach County, as hundreds of high school students walked out of class and took to nearby streets. According to the West Palm Beach Police Department, officers responded around 12:30 p.m. to a pedestrian-vehicle crash near South Wind Plaza on North Military Trail. Authorities said the minor — believed to have been participating in the protest — was transported to the hospital with non-life-threatening injuries. The driver reportedly remained at the scene and cooperated with law enforcement. The incident unfolded amid coordinated walkouts involving students from at least four Palm Beach County high schools: Lake Worth Beach High School, John I. Leonard High School, Royal Palm Beach High School, and Palm Beach Lakes High School.

FOX News [2/19/2026 1:05 PM, Staff, 37576K] reports that a truck driver arrested Wednesday for allegedly running a red light and causing a fatal crash in Indiana is an illegal alien from India, multiple federal law enforcement sources confirmed to Fox News. [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

Bloomberg Law [2/19/2026 12:22 PM, Mary Anne Pazanowski, 50K] reports new guidelines for investigating and prosecuting federal immigration enforcement officers involved in acts of violence, including deaths, were released by the Cook County, Ill., State’s Attorney’s Office Thursday. The "protocol establishes clear, legally sound guidelines to ensure we have a responsible and effective path to pursue accountability" if a federal immigration officer commits a crime, Cook County State’s Attorney Eileen O’Neill Burke said in a press release. It authorizes Burke’s office to support law enforcement agencies in investigating officers’ use of excessive force and to conduct an independent review of the evidence to decide if prosecution is warranted.

Univision Chicago WGBO [2/19/2026 2:35 PM, Staff, 4937K] reports the Cook County State’s Attorney’s Office (CCSAO) announced the implementation of a protocol outlining the steps to be taken if a federal immigration agent, such as those from ICE or the Border Patrol, engages in “conduct that could constitute a felony while on duty.” The new document, called ‘Federal Immigration Enforcement Action Response Protocol’, was designed to prepare the county for a rare situation: filing state charges against a federal agent for actions that occurred during their work. The decision comes after months of legal analysis, driven by state attorney Eileen O’Neill Burke, following the events that occurred during ICE operations in Minneapolis, where two civilians died after being shot by federal agents.

FOX News [2/19/2026 6:30 AM, Rachel del Guidice, 37576K] reports that a university in Illinois announced it is moving some classes online after learning that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) is renting office space in the same building as one of its locations. "Lewis University was recently alerted that the U.S. General Services Administration (GSA) is leasing office space within the building where we operate our Oak Brook location at 1111 W. 22nd Street, Oak Brook, Illinois, and that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) is utilizing space for its administrative offices," the university said in an announcement published Sunday. "Lewis is one of several tenants in the property and does not have control over leasing decisions involving other occupants," the announcement continued. "In light of social media attention referencing the potential for protests at the site, and the community’s concerns regarding ICE, we are taking precautionary steps to support a safe, productive, and welcoming learning environment for all." According to the announcement, all in-person classes at the university’s Oak Brook location from Feb. 16 to 21 will "transition to online delivery where possible." "This adjustment is one of several measures being implemented to ensure continuity of instruction while prioritizing the safety and well-being of our students, faculty, and staff. We are communicating directly with property management and will provide updates as additional information becomes available," the university said in their statement.

Reuters [2/19/2026 10:48 AM, Heather Schlitz, 38315K] reports that for the first time in six years, two priests and a nun escorted by police have walked past barbed wire and concrete barriers to enter a Chicago-area immigration facility to give communion and ashes to detainees after a judge ordered faith leaders be allowed inside. Catholic priest Paul Keller recounted the shocked and tear-stained faces of the immigrants at the facility on Ash Wednesday. His hands stained black from distributing ashes, Keller described it as a bittersweet moment after a months-long court battle to gain access to the facility in order to minister to detainees. Clergy had not entered the Broadview facility west of Chicago since the coronavirus pandemic began in 2020, according to the Coalition for Spiritual and Public Leadership. "We’re dealing with what should be a very non-controversial issue, which is praying with people who are detained and providing them some comfort," Keller told Reuters. "It’s unfortunate that it’s happening because of a lawsuit." Agents tear-gassed residential neighborhoods, arrested protesters, used Tasers on people during violent detentions, pointed guns at residents and shot two people, including one fatally. Many of the more than 4,200 people who the Department of Homeland Security said were detained were packed into the Broadview facility for processing, sometimes sleeping on the floor amid overflowing toilets, plaintiffs said in a lawsuit.

Breitbart [2/19/2026 5:35 PM, John Binder, 2238K] reports a sanctuary jurisdiction in North Carolina is responsible for releasing from jail an illegal alien accused of raping a child under 15 years old, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials reveal. This month, law enforcement in Mecklenburg County, a sanctuary jurisdiction that refuses to cooperate with ICE, arrested Arnol De Jesus Guevara-Lopez and charged him with statutory rape of a child under 15 years old and indecent liberties with a child. Although ICE agents asked Mecklenburg County law enforcement to transfer Guevara-Lopez into federal custody, they refused, releasing him back into the community. The illegal alien was re-arrested after his release from jail for failing to meet his bond conditions. ICE agents have since lodged another detainer on Guevara-Lopez so that he is not released again into the community.

Chicago Tribune [2/19/2026 10:35 AM, Tess Kenny, 5209K] reports the Rev. Paul Keller walked out of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in west suburban Broadview Wednesday afternoon with his palms coated in ash. His hands stood as a testament to a moment months in the making. Father Paul Keller walked out of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in west suburban Broadview Wednesday afternoon with his palms coated in ash. His hands stood as a testament to a moment months in the making. After clergy had repeatedly been denied access inside the facility, Keller alongside two other local religious leaders were allowed into the building to pray with and provide religious services to detainees and staff for Ash Wednesday. The access was the result of a recent court order that ruled Roman Catholic clergy members be allowed to minister to detainees at the Broadview facility on the day of prayer, which marks the start of Lent — the most penitential season of the year for Catholics and many other Christians. "This is not a protest," Keller, Provincial for the Claretian Missionaries, said to reporters outside the facility after four detainees and three staff members received Ash Wednesday services. "This is not a symbolic action.” For months now, religious leaders had been trying to provide pastoral care at the facility, something they say they’d been granted access to do for years but in the months leading up to and since Operation Midway Blitz — the Trump administration’s mass deportation in Chicago last fall and early winter — has been denied. In November, the Coalition for Spiritual and Public Leadership, a Chicago-based Catholic advocacy group, filed a lawsuit against the federal government seeking resumed access to the facility. Defense attorneys, according to subsequent court filings, argued in turn that visitation denials in October and November were "pursuant to a neutral and temporary suspension of all visitors," which they said was "necessary due to a dramatic influx" of Midway Blitz detainees. With the influx, the facility lacked the personnel required to facilitate visitation safely, they said. Gettleman last week ruled that with "reasonable notice and communication, addressing legitimate security and safety concerns, allowing plaintiffs to provide pastoral care to migrants and detainees does not pose any under hardship on the government.” While the injunction specifically allowed access on Ash Wednesday, it also called on the Department of Homeland Security to confer with the coalition over how religious ministry could continue at the facility going forward. Gettleman set a status hearing in the case for next week.

New York Times [2/19/2026 7:00 PM, Nicholas Bogel-Burroughs, 148038K] reports the police in St. Paul, Minn., say they are investigating an immigration arrest last month that left a man with a fractured skull and bleeding in his brain. Immigration agents have claimed the injuries were a result of the man running into a wall, but he has said that the agents beat him. The arrest of Alberto Castañeda Mondragón on Jan. 8 left him with severe head injuries, according to a federal judge, who concluded that Immigrations and Customs Enforcement agents had “largely refused to provide information” about how Mr. Castañeda Mondragón had been injured. The judge, Donovan W. Frank, who ordered Mr. Castañeda Mondragón to be freed from detention last month, said in his ruling that the agents had suggested that the injured man ran headfirst into a brick wall. The Department of Homeland Security, which includes ICE, did not respond to requests for comment. Tensions have been high for weeks between local and federal law enforcement agencies over the behavior of immigration agents during the Trump administration’s surge in the Twin Cities region. Federal prosecutors say they are investigating false statements by agents about the circumstances of a nonfatal shooting of a man in Minneapolis, and the Justice Department’s civil rights division is investigating the fatal shooting by agents of Alex Pretti, a U.S. citizen who was a nurse. And after Renee Good, another U.S. citizen, was fatally shot by an agent, federal officials refused to provide evidence to state investigators. In Mr. Castañeda Mondragón’s case, The Associated Press reported last month that hospital employees quickly doubted descriptions by ICE agents about how he had gotten hurt, and this week reported that the F.B.I. was investigating the arrest, as were the St. Paul police. A spokeswoman for the Minneapolis field office of the F.B.I. did not respond to requests for comment. John J. Choi, the prosecutor in Ramsey County, which includes St. Paul, has said that he expects to investigate “allegations of criminal conduct by federal agents” and would “hold accountable anyone who has violated Minnesota law.”

Breitbart [2/19/2026 4:44 PM, Elizabeth Weibel, 2238K] reports the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) announced the arrest of a Liberian national who was in the United States illegally, and who was working as a Minnesota correctional officer. In a press release, DHS announced that as a result of "joint efforts" of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services’ (USCIS) and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) under Operation Twin Shield, 45-year-old Morris Brown was arrested on January 15. Brown reportedly originally entered the United States in 2014 "on a non-immigrant student visa that was terminated" the following year because he didn’t take "a full course of study." Brown went on to join the Pennsylvania Army National Guard the same year that he entered the U.S. and went AWOL in 2015. Brown, who "applied for a Green Card in 2020 under the Liberian Refugee Immigration Fairness program," was also reportedly "apprehended" and went on to be "discharged from the military under other than honorable conditions in 2022," according to the press release. Under the operation, officials "looking into Brown’s application for citizenship found evidence of marriage fraud," and previous cases in which he had "falsely claimed to be a U.S. citizen," according to the press release. Brown was also discovered to be "working as a corrections officer for the state of Minnesota," despite him not being in the U.S. legally.

FOX News [2/19/2026 6:00 PM, Madison Colombo, 37576K] reports the lead pastor of a Minnesota church is recounting the chilling moment anti-ICE activists stormed a Sunday service, describing the harrowing invasion as an act of "malevolent darkness" meant to terrorize families. In January, a group of protesters interrupted a worship service at a church in St. Paul, Minnesota, over claims the church was affiliated with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents. He explained that a woman accused the church of "harboring" a federal agent connected to ICE. The incident occurred as the Department of Homeland Security faced heightened scrutiny following the shooting death of Renee Nicole Good during a confrontation with agents.

NBC News [2/19/2026 2:50 PM, Mike Hixenbaugh, 42967K] reports that a family of Russian asylum-seekers was released from a South Texas immigrant detention center on Wednesday after more than four months in custody — an ordeal they say left the children anxious, sickened and afraid. Nikita, his wife, Oksana, and their three children had been held since October at the Dilley Immigration Processing Center, where they said they endured worms and mold in their food, hourslong waits for medicine and restless nights under lights that never fully dimmed. “Thank God,” Nikita said, speaking to a reporter in Russian after learning the news. “We’re ready.” They were freed about a week after their attorney wrote a letter seeking their release on medical grounds and five days after NBC News published an article detailing what the family described as their nightmare in detention. Last week, the Department of Homeland Security had told NBC News it was required by law to hold the family in custody until their asylum claims were heard. DHS did not immediately respond to questions about what prompted the reversal. Before leaving Dilley and boarding a flight to California, the family gathered for a final video call with their lawyer and a reporter. The couple asked to be identified only by their first names because they fear retaliation if deported to Russia.

CBS News [2/19/2026 10:35 AM, Steven Rosenbaum and Kelsy Mittauer, 51110K] reports a high-profile trial that was over before it began is set for a do-over next week in Fort Worth. Federal District Judge Mark Pittman ordered a retrial of nine defendants accused in an alleged attack at a U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement detention center in Alvarado, Texas to begin on Monday, Feb. 23. Jury selection will start at 9 a.m., with opening arguments after 14 jurors and alternates are empaneled. The rules for the new trial are more restrictive than the first. Neither side will be allowed to question prospective jurors during voir dire; instead they will submit questions to the court and the judge will ask them. In the first trial, each defense team had ten minutes for opening statements. That has been reduced to eight minutes. Each of their closing arguments can last no more than 12 minutes. The government is allowed 30 minutes for opening statements and 45 minutes for closing arguments. Pittman said that he is exercising his right to limit those times "in order to prevent unnecessary expense or delay." When declaring the mistrial on Tuesday, he said the proceedings had already cost hundreds of thousands of tax dollars. Jury selection was underway in the case on Tuesday, when Pittman abruptly sent prospective jurors out of the courtroom. He had noticed that defense attorney MarQuetta Clayton was wearing a T-shirt under her blazer with images of protesters on it. Pittman said he saw no choice but to declare a mistrial because there was no way to know how many of the potential jurors had noticed the shirt or had been prejudiced by the shirt. When the judge returned from a short recess, he said he had gone over caselaw to see how to rule. He had received word that one of the defense counsel or staff was wearing an anti-ICE lapel pin. No one came forward to admit that.

Breitbart.com [2/19/2026 9:37 AM, Randy Clark, 2238K] reports the investigation into anti‑ICE student walkouts widened on Monday, with three additional Texas school districts added to a growing probe examining whether officials coordinated or encouraged students to join the January 30 protests. Three school districts have been added to an investigation underway by the Texas Attorney General’s Office for their role in facilitating anti-Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) protests in late January. The investigation now involves dozens of schools in Austin, Dallas, and San Antonio. The investigation, which began earlier this month, focuses on whether school administrators and faculty orchestrated or facilitated the students’ attendance at protests held as part of the National Shutdown movement on January 30. Investigators claim school officials were aware of the planned walkouts and, in some instances, coordinated the departure from campuses. On Monday, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton announced the investigation will expand to include the North East Independent School District in San Antonio, the Dallas Independent School District, and the Manor Independent School District near Austin. The AG commented on the addition of the three districts, saying, "I will not allow Texas schools to become breeding grounds for the radical Left’s open borders agenda. Let this serve as a warning to any public school official or employee who unlawfully facilitates student participation in protests targeting our heroic law enforcement officers: my office will use every legal tool available to hold you accountable.” The AG ordered each of the three school districts to submit information on policies regarding student leave from campus, excused absence policies, security protocols, and internal communications related to the protests on January 30. The investigation will also focus on the use of public funds and any laws that may have been violated.

NewsMax [2/19/2026 10:31 AM, Sandy Fitzgerald, 3760K] reports that Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt is commending one of the state’s school districts for suspending more than 100 students who participated in a walkout protesting U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement last week. Officials at the Mustang, Oklahoma, public school district confirmed that a number of students received in-school suspensions for truancy after several students took part in the protest, reports ABC affiliate KOCO 5. The district did not say how many students were affected, but Stitt, in a social media post, said that he applauded "Mustang Superintendent Dr. Charles Bradley for suspending 122 students who walked out of class to protest." Stitt, a Republican, continued, "Young Oklahomans: Free speech is sacred, but truancy robs your future. Stay in school, build skills, and make your voice heard responsibly." Mustang Public Schools students joined peers from other districts across Oklahoma in walkout protests during school hours, leading state leaders to discuss the impact of the demonstrations and their legality. The school district said that it notified parents about the planned student-led walkout and said that the district did not sponsor or approve of it. Students were expected to attend class, the district told parents, asking them to "reinforce those expectations at home." Students who walked out were given in-school suspensions for their unexcused absences, which resulted in missed instruction time, but they were not disciplined for their speech or viewpoint, the district said.

The New York Post [2/20/2026 12:18 AM, Katie Jerkovich, 40934K] reports the Department of Justice has successfully blocked Gavin Newsom from forcing ICE agents to remove their masks while operating in California. US Attorney General Pam Bondi revealed on Thursday the US court for the 9th circuit issued a full stay blocking the Golden State governor’s plan. Bondi wrote on X: "The 9th Circuit has now issued a FULL stay blocking California’s ban on masks for federal law enforcement agents. "Law enforcement officers risk their lives for us, only to be doxxed by radical anti-police activists. Unacceptable. "This crucial ruling protects our brave men and women in the field. We will not stop fighting bad laws like these in California and across the country." LA’s top federal prosecutor also celebrated the win, blasting the state for attempting to regulate what agents can and cannot do. Univision [2/19/2026 5:50 PM, Staff, 4937K] reports California had enacted a law in September that prevented most federal agents from wearing masks, following the controversy over immigration raids by agencies such as Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) or the Border Patrol, in immigration operations in that state in mid-2025. Bondi called the measure "protecting law enforcement," and asserted that officers "risk their lives for us, only to be exposed by radical anti-police activists. Unacceptable."

Bloomberg Industry Group Bloomberg Law [2/19/2026 9:31 PM, Maia Spoto, 763K] reports the Los Angeles case challenging "roving patrols" of federal immigration officers and ICE detainees’ difficulty contacting attorneys will proceed, a federal judge ruled. With no sign the federal government will change its enforcement tactics, plaintiffs are likely to keep dealing with unlawful stops, Judge Maame Ewusi-Mensah Frimpong said in a Thursday order in the US District Court for the Central District of California. And access to counsel issues appear to persist at the downtown LA immigration processing center known as B-18, Frimpong said. She denied the federal government’s motions to dismiss all but one claim of the plaintiffs’ amended complaint. Because three named plaintiffs have been released from detention, Frimpong dismissed a claim seeking their release as moot. The lawsuit was first brought in July after widespread immigration raids rocked Los Angeles, with agents wearing masks descending on car washes, farms, and Home Depot parking lots to stop and arrest swaths of people. Frimpong’s temporary order barring agents from making arrests based on factors such as ethnicity and occupation was lifted by the US Supreme Court in September. Justice Brett Kavanaugh wrote that perceived ethnicity can be a "relevant factor" when federal agents make immigration arrests and said US citizens and residents with legal status may be stopped as a result but would be "free to go after the brief encounter.”

Telemundo 20 [2/19/2026 1:05 PM, Staff, 56K] reports that a contract in place since 2014 between the Escondido Police Department and the Department of Homeland Security has once again become the focus of public debate. The agreement allows federal agents to use the city’s shooting range, a situation that has drawn criticism from residents and local political leaders. The discussion will return to the City Council next week amid growing community division. The petition was spearheaded by Mari von Wilpert, a current San Diego City Council member and Democratic candidate for the 48th Congressional District. The document has garnered more than 2,000 signatures, including at least 1,500 from Escondido residents, who are requesting the complete cancellation of the contract between the city and the federal agency. During the delivery of the petition, Von Wilpert stated, "It’s time to cancel this contract and stop allowing ICE to use city-funded property for firearms training." Frustration and discontent among some community members have been evident in recent City Council meetings. "I consider it completely unethical and lacking in common sense. This is a horrible thing," one resident expressed during public comments. The issue will be reviewed again by the Council on Wednesday, February 25.

Newsmax [2/19/2026 4:29 PM, James Morley III, 3760K] reports U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement said Thursday that it deported 170 Cuban nationals on Feb. 9, marking the first ICE Air flight to Cuba in 2026. The agency said those removed included individuals convicted of serious crimes such as murder, rape, kidnapping, aggravated assault, burglary, and drug trafficking. ICE described the flight as part of an increase in repatriation efforts under President Donald Trump, stating that while deportation flights to Cuba have occurred for years, the Cuban government had previously been reluctant to accept large numbers of deportees. The agency said such flights are now taking place in record numbers. The latest flight suggests increased cooperation from Havana or stronger diplomatic pressure from Washington as the Trump administration continues to emphasize the removal of noncitizens with criminal convictions as a central component of its immigration enforcement strategy. Breitbart [2/19/2026 12:19 PM, Christian K. Caruzo, 2238K] reports Cuba’s communist Castro regime, for the first time in decades, accepted a mass deportation flight containing at least six Cuban nationals convicted of serious crimes, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) revealed on Wednesday. The Madrid-based outlet Diario de Cuba explained on Thursday that, for decades, the Castro regime refused to accept Cubans convicted of grave criminal offenses who were deported from the United States, leading to the deportees being sent to third countries. At least four such Cubans were deported to Africa during 2025 in light of the Cuban regime’s refusal to receive the deportees at their own home country. ICE explained in a social media post that the Castro regime has maintained a reluctant stance in accepting mass deportation flights of Cubans but that, under the administration of President Donald Trump, said flights are occurring in record numbers. The first Cuba-bound mass deportation flight of 2026 occurred on February 9 and saw the repatriation of 170 Cuban nationals, some of which had been convicted of murder, kidnapping, rape, drug trafficking and other offenses — ending a decades’ long streak of continued refusal by the nation’s communist authorities. ICE provided details of the six deported convicted men in a series of follow-up posts. One of the men identified by ICE is Yondeivis Wong Den-Hernandez, who was convicted of second-degree murder in Florida and aiding and abetting improper entry by an alien in Texas. The second deported man was identified as Raul Duquenzne-Batista, a member of the Los Habaneros gang who was convicted in Kansas of aggravated assault, rape, aggravated kidnapping, aggravated battery, aggravated burglary, and criminal use of weapons. ICE detailed that, in addition to his multiple convictions, Duquenzne-Batista admitted to serving 20 years in prison in Cuba for robbery and breaking and entering. ICE explained that another Cuban man identified as Alexander Padron-Marten was arrested at large in a targeted operation in Philadelphia. The man had been convicted of controlled substance trafficking. ICE also listed Orlando Sanchez-Sarria, a man who, after receiving a grand theft conviction in the sanctuary city of Los Angeles, moved to Philadelphia to "continue preying on law-abiding citizens." Sanchez-Sarria was also convicted of controlled substance trafficking, conspiracy to commit kidnapping, conspiracy to distribute cocaine, possessing a firearm by a convict, receiving stolen property, use of a firearm during a drug trafficking crime.

Reported similarly:
Telemundo 51 [2/19/2026 12:10 PM, Staff, 162K]

Bloomberg [2/19/2026 2:42 PM, Hadriana Lowenkron and Alicia A. Caldwell, 18082K] reports that the Trump administration is seeking to detain legal refugees who have been in the US for a year and haven’t obtained permanent resident status, a policy shift that would threaten thousands with long-term detention and possible deportation. Refugees must already apply for a green card after being in the US for a year. Under the policy change, they could now face arrest for not applying on time, being in the country without a green card or while their applications are pending, the Department of Homeland Security said in a memo reviewed by Bloomberg News, citing national security and public safety concerns. The changes outlined in the document, which was filed in a federal court case in Minnesota challenging the arrests of refugees, upend a policy dating back to 2010 under which a failure to obtain a green card wasn’t grounds for detention or removal. The previous policy also stated that if a refugee without a green card was arrested, federal officials were required within 48 hours to either release the person or initiate removal proceedings. A DHS spokesperson accused the media of sensationalizing the contents of the memo and said the agency was merely implementing the law as written by Congress.

The memo drew immediate backlash from advocates for refugees, who said they are already thoroughly vetted.

Axios [2/19/2026 4:23 PM, Brittany Gibson, 17364K] reports refugees who haven’t yet received green cards can be arrested and detained by ICE, according to a new policy memo ICE and U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services filed in court. Refugees are required to adjust their status with the Homeland Security Department after being in the country for one year, and at that point apply for a green card. The memo, dated Feb. 18, states that people who don’t yet have their green cards should now be detained by ICE while their status is reviewed. There were more than 96,500 pending adjustment applications at USCIS as of last October, according to a report to Congress. USCIS Director Joseph Edlow issued another memo in November pausing case decisions on refugees’ applications. The November memo also says that the agency plans to review and possibly re-interview all of the refugees were entered the country under former President Biden. This is roughly 200,000 people. Roughly 5,600 refugees without green cards in Minnesota have been targeted for arrest and re-vetting under Operation PARRIS, which stands for Post-Admission Refugee Reverification and Integrity Strengthening. A lawsuit challenging the detention policy in Minnesota argues that people are being arrested and sent to detention centers out of state, far from their families and potential legal support. The Feb. 18 policy memo, filed by the government in this case, reveals that this operation isn’t limited to Minneapolis, which has been the center of immigration enforcement in 2026. A second memo filed in the case shows the policy has been in effect since December after rescinding a 2010 directive that said refugees who failed to apply for green cards by the deadline could only be detained for 48 hours for inspection.

Daily Wire [2/19/2026 3:40 PM, Jennie Taer, 2314K] reports the Trump administration arrested an illegal immigrant who pretended to be a United States citizen to become a corrections officer in Minnesota. The alleged "serial immigration fraudster," 45-year-old Morris Brown of Liberia, was captured on January 15 after going AWOL from the Pennsylvania Army National Guard, according to United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS). Federal authorities said the "serial fraudster was identified as part of the major enforcement operation that targeted suspected immigration fraud in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area last fall," and had "multiple violations of U.S. immigration law, including overstaying his student visa and making false claims to U.S. citizenship.” While the Trump administration recently ended its massive immigration sweeps in Minnesota, dubbed "Operation Metro Surge," officials have made clear that they will not pull federal officers investigating fraud from the North Star State. "Operation Twin Shield continues to deliver results as the Department of Homeland Security relentlessly pursues those who seek to cheat our immigration system," USCIS Director Joseph Edlow said in a statement Wednesday. "This alien tried every trick in the book to remain in the United States after losing legal status. We will use every tool at our disposal to ensure he faces justice for his many violations of the law," Edlow added.

NewsNation [2/20/2026 3:09 AM, Sandra Sanchez, 4464K] reports migrant encounters along the Southwest border were down again in January and were again led by the U.S. Border Patrol’s Rio Grande Valley Sector, newly released U.S. Customs and Border Protection data shows. U.S. Border Patrol agents encountered 6,070 people between ports of entry in January. That’s down 6.2% from 6,472 in December. In the Rio Grande Valley of South Texas, there were 1,271 encounters, down 7% from 1,365 in December. “For the ninth consecutive month, CBP has delivered historic results,” CBP Commissioner Rodney Scott said. The El Paso Sector saw 1,039 encounters in January, followed by 1,015 in the Tucson Sector, the data shows. Most of the encounters in January were single adults — a total of 5,443. And the Office of Field Operations, part of CBP, also arrested 3,243 single adults, CBP data says. There were 447 unaccompanied minors picked up by U.S. Border Patrol agents in January — that’s down from 544 in December, and from 831 in October. “This historic reduction reflects the dedication of our agents and officers to securing our borders, protecting our communities, and upholding the rule of law,” Scott says. Nationwide, border agents encountered 7,877 in January. The Trump administration has no one was released on parole.

New York Post [2/19/2026 4:52 PM, Emily Goodin, 40934K] reports there is a staffing crisis at the country’s northern border that has diminished officials’ ability to monitor illegal crossings and sparked concern about the US Customs and Border Patrol’s effectiveness, a government report found. CBP has not met its staffing goals when it comes to protecting the nearly 4,000 miles of land and maritime borders between the U.S. and Canada, according to a Government Accountability Office report released last week, despite the agency’s recent hiring surge. And the "reduced agent staffing has affected its operations." U.S. Border Patrol pushed back, saying it has more staff on board than it’s had in the past four years and that it continues to hire new agents. The report found other flaws, however, including a lack of resources and the cold-weather failures of certain equipment, all of which challenged patrol and monitoring efforts.

San Francisco Chronicle [2/19/2026 7:00 AM, Sophia Bollag, 3833K] reports that Customs and Border Protection has requested information on every parcel in San Diego County, including who owns each one, an official with the agency that handles the county’s property data confirmed to the Chronicle on Wednesday. CBP did not say why it was seeking the information, but told county officials it was not for enforcement, said Tod Chee of the San Diego Geographic Information Source, which maintains property data for the county. A spokesperson for CBP did not respond to questions from the Chronicle about why the agency had requested the information and whether it sought similar records from other counties. The request from CBP isn’t the first attempt by the Trump administration to gather detailed data about California residents. Last month, a federal judge blocked an effort by the federal government to obtain personal information on California voters, including their driver’s license and Social Security numbers. This month, a federal judge said she would block an effort by the U.S. Department of Agriculture to force California and 21 other states to hand over personal information about food aid recipients. Gov. Gavin Newsom and California legislators approved a law last year that forbids cities and counties from publicly posting home addresses, phone numbers and parcel information for public officials. But in the vast majority of cases, parcel owner information is generally public under California law.

CBS Miami [2/19/2026 1:47 PM, Staff, 51110K] reports that new technology aimed at keeping travelers safe was tested at Miami International Airport on Wednesday. The Florida International University Forensics Team, which ran the test, deployed a police K-9, a robot dog and new state-of-the-art UV Laser Raman Technology that was developed by Alakai Defense Systems in Largo. The robot dog can detect things like explosives, and the laser can identify harmful chemicals. During the test, the crew simulated a scenario where a real K-9 dog, the robot dog and laser all worked together to locate an explosive inside a parked car. "Looking at dogs and sensors and combining the two different technologies," FIU Executive Director of Global Forensics and Justice Center Dr. Ken Furton said "People think of them in silos, and what we’ve found is that they really are complimentary." The goal was to help law enforcement find threats quickly and diffuse them safely.

The Hill [2/19/2026 2:11 PM, Rachel Frazin, 4464K] reports that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is halting at least some disaster-related travel at the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) as the Trump administration tussles with Democratic lawmakers over funding, according to an internal email reviewed by The Hill. “DHS has issued a stop-travel order for all DHS funded travel… for the duration of the lapse in appropriation. Currently, this DOES include disaster travel,” the email states. A spokesperson for FEMA, however, said the order is more limited and does not impact travel related to “active disasters.” “FEMA travel related to active disasters is not cancelled. Due to the lapse in federal funding caused by the congressional Democrats, DHS issued guidance restricting travel and certain operational activities,” said the spokesperson, who emailed The Hill from a general press email account and did not sign their name. “These limitations are not a choice but are necessary to comply with federal law. FEMA continues to coordinate closely with DHS to ensure effective disaster response under these circumstances,” the spokesperson said. Asked whether there was a difference between active disaster travel and other disaster travel, FEMA referred The Hill to a post that reiterated its initial statement. The FEMA statement noted that, “While some non-essential activities will be paused or scaled back, FEMA remains committed to supporting communities and responding to incidents like Hurricane Helene,” as recovery in states like North Carolina is ongoing from that disaster.

Reported similarly:
NewsMax [2/19/2026 10:11 AM, Mark Swanson, 3760K]
ABC News [2/19/2026 12:24 PM, Staff, 34146K] Video: HERE
Washington Examiner [2/19/2026 5:57 AM, Staff, 1147K]

Bloomberg [2/19/2026 10:51 AM, Lauren Rosenthal, 18082K] reports a fast-moving wildfire on Oklahoma’s panhandle has doubled in size as it presses into Kansas, as firefighters contend with days of dry heat and gusting winds across the Great Plains. The Ranger Road Fire had consumed more than 280,000 acres as of Wednesday evening, nearly 20 times the size of the island of Manhattan. In all, more than 300,000 acres have burned in Oklahoma this week as temperatures soar roughly 15F (8C) above average. State officials have received 33 reports of fires and hotspots spanning nearly two dozen counties. Oklahoma’s Department of Agriculture, Food & Forestry warned that Thursday will bring new challenges for fire crews, as winds change direction and potentially cause new flare-ups. “Established wildfires today will have potential to exhibit very rapid rates of spread and problematic fire behavior,” the department said in an update, adding that fires could easily spread from the ground to groups of trees. That raises the likelihood of releasing embers, which can be carried away in the wind and spark new blazes. Emergency shelters in Oklahoma were closed Thursday, but officials warned they could reopen if new evacuations become necessary. A dense web of pipelines converge in Oklahoma, a center of US oil infrastructure. Roughly 25 million barrels of crude are stored in Cushing, in north-central Oklahoma — the nation’s largest onshore storage hub and the delivery point for benchmark US crude futures.

USA Today [2/19/2026 12:57 PM, Brandi D. Addison, Mateo Rosiles, Michale Cuviello, and Cheyenne Derksen, 70643K] reports that several wildfires continued burning Feb. 19 across the Texas and Oklahoma panhandles as red flag warnings and high wind advisories stretched from eastern New Mexico into parts of Missouri, placing much of the southern and central Plains under elevated fire danger. In Oklahoma’s Panhandle, fires have scorched nearly 300,000 acres, while blazes in the Texas Panhandle have burned just under 20,000 acres. Although some progress was made for smaller fires on Feb. 18, forecasters warned that conditions could worsen again, with a forecast return of high winds. Nearly all of Oklahoma is under a red flag warning Thursday with sustained winds of 20 to 25 mph across the state and gusts peaking around 40 mph, according to the National Weather Service in Norman. A red flag warning also remains in effect for all 26 counties in the Texas Panhandle through 7 p.m., according to the National Weather Service office in Amarillo, which cautioned that “critical fire weather conditions” would persist through the evening. Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt has declared a State of Emergency in three counties after multiple destructive wildfires in the state damaged property and prompted evacuations in the northwest part of the state. The order covers Beaver, Texas and Woodward counties and will remain in effect for 30 days. [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

Washington Examiner [2/19/2026 9:25 AM, Molly Parks, 1147K] reports that Washington, D.C., Mayor Muriel Bowser requested federal emergency assistance from President Donald Trump’s administration in response to the massive sewer collapse in the Potomac River. Bowser made her first public move on the issue this week, declaring the now-largest sewage spill in U.S. history a “local public emergency” on Wednesday evening. Bowser then sent a letter to Trump and D.C.’s regional Federal Emergency Management Agency administrator requesting federal help and declaring the situation a federal “major disaster.” "I am also seeking 100% reimbursement for costs incurred by the District and the District of Columbia Water and Sewer Authority (DC Water), such that emergency response, repair, and remediation costs are not incurred by ratepayers in any impacted state or the District," Bowser wrote. Bowser’s public emergency declaration and federal request came one month after the Potomac Interceptor sewer line initially collapsed in the Potomac River at a point near Cabin John, Maryland. The spill has allowed over 243 million gallons of raw sewage to flow into the Potomac, skyrocketing levels of E. coli bacteria in the water to numbers where the river is unsafe to touch. Her request for assistance came just one day after Trump told local officials to "immediately" start fixing the problem or ask him "politely" to bring in federal aid to fix the issue.

NBC News [2/19/2026 2:49 PM, Gary Grumbach, 42967K] reports that since Jan. 19, residents of a Maryland county just outside of Washington, D.C., have been dealing with a broken sewer pipe that so far has pumped more than 240 million gallons of raw sewage into the Potomac River. The smell is so pungent that "you can taste it when you’re talking," according to NBC Washington reporter Mark Segraves, who has been at the site of the spill. The fire and rescue squad for Montgomery County, where the spill occurred, has warned its first responders to wear personal protective equipment for any assignments near the area. The University of Maryland is calling it one of the largest sewage spills in U.S. history. The Environmental Protection Agency says it’s an ecological disaster of "historic proportion." Washington, D.C. officials declared a public emergency late Tuesday, and are asking the White House for a presidential emergency disaster declaration, which would open up funding for the repair and cleanup — expected to cost millions of dollars. Maryland has yet to do the same. When asked why it took D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser a month to request this assistance, an official with her administration said the mayor makes decisions "based upon her assessment of the situation."

Washington Post [2/19/2026 10:05 PM, Liam Scott, Sammy Westfall, and Jenny Gathright, 24826K] reports protesters calling for the release of political prisoners in Azerbaijan said they were attacked Thursday afternoon by bodyguards protecting Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev outside the Waldorf Astoria hotel on Washington’s Pennsylvania Avenue, a few blocks from the White House. Rahim Yagublu, 27, an Uber driver whose father is imprisoned in Azerbaijan, said he was protesting outside the hotel early Thursday afternoon when Aliyev’s bodyguards began beating him, striking him in the jaw and kicking him in the stomach. Adil Amrakhly, 35, another protester, said that he injured his leg while running from the guards and that at least four others, including Yagublu, were injured. Aliyev, who has presided for decades over an autocratic crackdown on dissent in Azerbaijan, was in Washington, along with other leaders and top officials from around the world, for the inaugural meeting of President Donald Trump’s Board of Peace. D.C. police spokesman Tom Lynch said members of the department’s special operations division and U.S. Secret Service officers were at the scene of the incident, “which involved Azerbaijan security guards.” He did not say whether police had stepped in or whether the guards in question remained in the United States on Thursday night. The matter had been referred to the State Department, he said.

Washington Examiner [2/19/2026 12:09 PM, Emily Hallas, 1147K] reports that a key panel on Thursday advanced President Donald Trump’s plans to build a new ballroom in the White House. The U.S. Commission of Fine Arts approved Trump’s proposal for the ballroom, which is expected to cost up to $400 million. The commission is comprised of Trump appointees, including Chamberlain Harris, a longtime executive assistant. Every member of the commission approved the proposal except for one abstention. "The White House commends the U.S. Commission of Fine Arts’ decision to unanimously (sic) approve President Trump’s historic vision to build a much-needed ballroom at the White House. We look forward to seeing the completion of this project on time and under budget," White House spokesman Davis Ingle told the Washington Examiner. The fine arts panel is one of at least two committees expected to review Trump’s ballroom and other construction projects, such as the proposed "Independence Arch" in Washington. The National Capital Planning Commission is set to discuss the ballroom at a March 5 meeting and hold a public hearing on the project the same day it is set to vote on it. The White House has said it hopes to begin above-ground construction as soon as April. It is expected to be completed long before the end of" Trump’s second term, according to officials.

FOX News [2/19/2026 10:58 AM, Jessica Mekles, 37576K] reports a cruise ship experienced an emergency scare off the coast of Greece this past weekend — requiring help from Greek authorities, according to the local Coast Guard. One passenger took to Reddit to describe a chaotic scene aboard the Celebrity Infinity cruise ship on Sunday, Feb. 15. "Lost power off the coast of Piraeus (Athens) at 3 a.m.," the Reddit user wrote. "Saw multiple tugboats coming over. No air con (rooms are super stuffy), no lights, no running water, no flushing toilets, no hot water/coffee, no elevators," the person continued on social media. "No ETA on fix. Heard ‘bravo, bravo, bravo’ over the announcements.” "Bravo, Bravo, Bravo" (or "Code Bravo") is a common emergency code used on cruise ships to signal a fire or another serious emergency. The Hellenic Coast Guard’s Joint Search and Rescue Coordination Center told Port Authorities of Piraeus and Keratsini about "the loss of control of a cruise ship… due to a malfunction in the electrical distribution panels, in the sea area outside the port of Piraeus," according to a translated press release.

CBS News [2/19/2026 9:52 AM, Kerry Breen, 51110K] reports the U.S. Coast Guard seized over 2,000 pounds of cocaine while attempting to intercept a boat that was trafficking drugs, the agency said Wednesday. The air crew of a Coast Guard HC-144 Ocean Sentry aircraft sighted a "go-fast" boat about 100 nautical miles north of Camuy, Puerto Rico, on Friday, the agency said in a news release. It was carrying "multiple bales and fuel containers," the Coast Guard said. The Coast Guard Cutter Joseph Napier was diverted to interdict the vessel, whose crew "began evasive maneuvers" before throwing their cargo overboard and fleeing, the Coast Guard said. The crew of the Joseph Napier recovered 29 bales from the water. The packages later tested positive for cocaine, the Coast Guard said. The illicit drugs were transferred to Homeland Security agents in San Juan, Puerto Rico, and weighed a combined 2,083 pounds — worth about $13.3 million.

FOX News [2/19/2026 11:25 AM, Charles Creitz, 37576K] reports Republican lawmakers tasked with oversight of the Coast Guard said the lone military branch not under Pentagon authority is being wrongly hurt by Democrats holding up funding for the Department of Homeland Security. Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., is demanding "three basic objectives" to come back to the table, according to CBS News: prohibiting ICE agents from certain properties, unmasking agents in public while mandating bodycams, and addressing use-of-force concerns. However, ICE and other immigration-related agencies within DHS remain funded through the One Big Beautiful Bill Act and other appropriations, leaving FEMA, the Merchant Marine, the Coast Guard and other agencies in the lurch, Republicans say. "Many young Coast Guard families and personnel live paycheck to paycheck. Asking them to continue protecting our waters without the stability they deserve places a real burden on the very people who keep Alaska safe," said Rep. Mark Begich, R-Alaska, who serves on the House Transportation Subcommittee overseeing maritime and Coast Guard operations. "I have stood with the Coast Guard, and I will continue to stand with them.” Begich said the guard should never be treated as "collateral damage in Washington’s political fights.” Both he and fellow Last Frontier lawmaker Dan Sullivan told Fox News Digital the USCG is on the front lines of protecting America’s north from ongoing Chinese and Russian aggression. Sullivan warned of foreign military traffic near Alaska climbing sharply, a trend he says has gone largely unnoticed outside the region even as Moscow and Beijing coordinate more closely. "Let’s just say the world’s largest fleet of oceanographic survey ships wasn’t off the coast of Alaska to ‘save the whales,’" Sullivan told Fox News Digital in a recent interview. Begich noted Alaska itself comprises half the nation’s entire coastline mileage and three-fifths of its seafood fisheries — both of which interests rely on the Coast Guard.

Reuters [2/19/2026 12:17 PM, Staff, 16072K] reports that the ⁠Mexican ⁠navy intercepted a submarine carrying up to four tons of cocaine along the ⁠Pacific ⁠Ocean off the country’s West coast, Mexico’s Security Minister Omar Garcia Harfuch said on Thursday. "In the last ⁠week, maritime ⁠operations have ⁠made it possible to seize nearly 10 tons ⁠of this drug. This represents a direct and ⁠multimillion-dollar blow to the financial structures of ⁠organized crime, preventing millions of doses from reaching the streets and protecting the safety of Mexican families," Garcia Harfuch said ⁠in a post on X, and added that three individuals had been arrested.

CyberScoop [2/19/2026 1:25 PM, Derek B. Johnson, 122K] reports a top FBI cyber official said Salt Typhoon, the Chinese cyber espionage group behind the widespread compromise of U.S. telecommunications infrastructure in 2024, continues to pose a broad threat to both America’s private and public sectors. Michael Machtinger, deputy assistant director for cyber intelligence at the FBI, touted improved partnerships between the telecommunications industry and government in the wake of the campaign while speaking at CyberTalks, presented by CyberScoop, in Washington D.C. Thursday. Companies who engaged with the FBI and federal agencies like CISA early after the campaign went public “have been without a doubt the most successful in mitigating the impact of the Salt Typhoon intrusions,” he claimed. Last year, CyberScoop’s reporting found that the U.S. telecommunications sector was riddled with basic cybersecurity vulnerabilities and patchwork consolidated networks, and Salt Typhoon took advantage of these weaknesses to gain widespread, persistent access to major telecom networks. Machtinger echoed a similar sentiment in describing lessons the FBI took away from the episode, saying that “despite all the advances in cybersecurity tools and strategies, it is still the most basic vulnerabilities that provide entry points.”

DefenseScoop [2/19/2025 1:25 PM, Drew F. Lawrence, 150K] reports top Defense Department officials focused on combating cybercrime said Thursday that artificial intelligence and cryptocurrency are making it easier for nefarious actors to threaten national security and circumvent traditional financial tracking systems. The warning comes amid what the officials described as a rapidly changing threat environment, one that allows for low-level criminals to adopt sophisticated cyber exploitation methods and adversarial countries to obscure their actions, often in tandem. “Cyber threats are no longer theoretical, episodic or isolated. They are persistent, adaptive and increasingly strategic,” according to Lesley Bernys, executive director of the DOD Cyber Crime Center. He said cyber groups operate with nation-state capabilities, acting as proxies for hostile countries to disrupt infrastructure, steal intellectual property and loot data. “Artificial intelligence is accelerating all of it, lowering barriers to entry, while increasing speed, scale and precision,” he said during CyberTalks, presented by CyberScoop. Bernys, who is also an agent with the Air Force Office of Special Investigations, noted that cybercriminals use AI to automate phishing scams, create malware and amplify fraud. Palo Alto Networks, a California-based cybersecurity company, released a report Tuesday that found online actors were using AI to accelerate their attacks, in some cases four times faster than last year.

New York Times [2/19/2026 11:25 PM, Chris Cameron, 148038K] reports President Trump said on Thursday that he had directed his administration to begin releasing files related to aliens, extraterrestrial life and unidentified flying objects, only hours after attacking former President Barack Obama for saying that aliens were real. It was the latest effort by Mr. Trump, ever the television showman, to stir anticipation for the release of secret government documents, even as he has continued to lash out at reporters over the release of the Jeffrey Epstein files and his connections to the disgraced financier. The release of the Epstein files has dragged on for nearly a year and Mr. Trump did not set a timeline for files on aliens. “Based on the tremendous interest shown,” Mr. Trump wrote on social media, he had directed officials to “begin the process of identifying and releasing Government files related to alien and extraterrestrial life, unidentified aerial phenomena (UAP), and unidentified flying objects (UFOs), and any and all other information connected to these highly complex, but extremely interesting and important, matters.” For decades, sightings of cutting-edge spy planes, drones, low-orbit satellites and weather balloons have driven theories about U.F.O.s, most famously at a secret military flight testing base called Area 51. While many reports of unidentified flying objects remain unsolved, the Pentagon has found no evidence that the government was covering up knowledge of extraterrestrial technology and has said there is no evidence that any U.F.O. sightings represented alien visitation to Earth. But government assurances have done little to deter U.F.O. enthusiasts, who continue to trade theories and grainy videos of strange phenomena in the skies on Reddit and other social media platforms.

Reported similarly:
CBS News [2/19/2026 9:53 PM, Joe Walsh, 51110K]
CNN [2/19/2026 11:16 PM, Aileen Graef, 19874K]

NewsMax [2/19/2026 6:41 PM, Mark Swanson, 3760K] reports President Donald Trump on Thursday accused former President Barack Obama of improperly revealing classified information while discussing extraterrestrial life, saying the former two-term Democrat made a "big mistake." The exchange came after a White House correspondent pressed Trump aboard Air Force One about Obama’s weekend comments on aliens and asked whether the president has seen any evidence of non-human visitors on Earth. "Well, he gave classified information. He’s not supposed to be doing that," Trump responded. When asked to elaborate, Trump doubled down. "I don’t know if they’re real or not," he said. "I can tell you he gave classified information. He’s not supposed to be doing that. He made a big mistake. He took it out of classified information." Trump added that he does not personally weigh in on the issue. "I never talk about it. A lot of people do," the president said, adding, "I may get him out of trouble by declassifying."

FOX News [2/19/2026 11:57 AM, Ashley Oliver Fox, 37576K] reports Republican lawmakers called it "insane" that the secretive Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court appointed to a key advisory panel a lawyer with past ties to the Biden administration’s controversial Disinformation Governance Board. Judges on the FISC appointed Jennifer Daskal this month to serve as an amicus curiae, meaning Daskal is now among a small group of lawyers designated to advise the court, which approves warrants for federal authorities to surveil targets for foreign intelligence purposes. The GOP lawmakers said Daskal’s history with the disinformation board raises worries about her ability to discern whether warrants are appropriate. "The same person who helped to build a board to censor American speech now advises judges on how to protect American liberties," House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, told Fox News Digital in a statement. "That’s ridiculous — and exactly why Congress must continue our oversight.” Sen. Eric Schmitt, R-Mo., echoed Jordan’s concerns, saying Daskal’s appointment was "insane" and calling for reforms to the FISC. Schmitt shared a video of himself on X questioning Daskal during a hearing about what he called the Biden administration’s "censorship enterprise," referencing Daskal’s role in aiming to dispel what the Biden administration viewed as inaccurate information about COVID-19 masks and vaccines and information about election security. FISC proceedings are classified and "ex parte," meaning a judge reviews the federal government’s warrant application and the target of the warrant has no awareness of the proceedings. A judge reviewing the application can, however, turn to an amicus curiae to present counterpoints to the government’s application, meaning Daskal is among a handful of lawyers who could be tapped to argue for or against allowing the government to wiretap a person’s phones or otherwise surveil them. Under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, the government has access to these powerful spy tools for foreign intelligence purposes, but it has sometimes, whether inadvertently or intentionally, improperly targeted U.S. citizens. Daskal served as a top lawyer in the Department of Homeland Security when she helped launch the Disinformation Governance Board. Conservatives heavily criticized it, describing the board as a "Ministry of Truth" that sought to censor their viewpoints in violation of the First Amendment.

FOX News [2/19/2026 2:04 PM, Rachel Wolf, 37576K] reports that the U.S. is putting its money where its mouth is when it comes to the Board of Peace. President Donald Trump announced during the inaugural meeting of the board that the U.S. was committing to contribute $10 billion to the board. "The Board of Peace is showing how a better future can be built, starting right here in this room," Trump said on Thursday. "I want to let you know that the United States is going to make a contribution of $10 billion to the Board of Peace... and we’ve had great support for that number." The president said the contribution "sounds like a lot, but it’s a very small number" when compared to the cost of war. Trump estimated that the $10 billion commitment was equivalent to the cost of two weeks of fighting. "Together, we can achieve the dream of bringing lasting harmony to a region tortured by centuries of war, suffering and carnage," Trump added, saying that he hoped it could serve as inspiration for other nations entangled in conflicts that seem unending. The Board of Peace was set up as part of the Trump administration’s plans to end the Israel-Hamas war and to rebuild Gaza. Several countries have committed to joining the board, including Argentina, Albania, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Belarus, Bulgaria, Cambodia, Egypt, El Salvador, Hungary, Indonesia, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kosovo, Kuwait, Morocco, Mongolia, Pakistan, Paraguay, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, the United Arab Emirates, Uzbekistan and Vietnam. [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

Politico [2/19/2026 4:45 AM, Jordain Carney, John Sakellariadis, and Mia McCarthy, 21784K] reports some of Donald Trump’s biggest loyalists in Congress are itching to rein in federal surveillance powers. So far his administration isn’t biting. Instead, the White House is quietly pushing for a key spy authority to be extended as is into 2027, according to five people granted anonymity to discuss the private talks. The length of that “clean” extension is still under discussion, but the administration wants at least 18 months, according to three of the people. Stephen Miller, the influential senior White House domestic policy adviser, is a leading advocate within the administration for extending the program that lets the government collect the data of noncitizens abroad without a warrant, according to two of the five people. One of the people said that Miller sees the spying statute under Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, or FISA, as critical to a variety of homeland security missions. The behind-the-scenes push comes as Congress barrels toward an April 20 deadline to reauthorize Section 702, which is itself a perennial source of intraparty tension for the GOP. Even as some Hill Republicans believe that Trump supports a clean extension, others cautioned there are still two months to go and things will remain in flux until the president weighs in publicly — underscoring the fraught nature of the discussion. But if Trump embraces the view held by Miller and other administration officials, it would be a major win for the intelligence community and its allies in Congress, who have fretted for months that Trump’s stated hatred of the broader FISA law could tank hopes of getting any reauthorization of the warrantless spy provision over the finish line. On the other hand, it’s likely to be a major problem for Speaker Mike Johnson, a former Judiciary Committee member who frustrated conservative hard-liners in 2024 when he sided with the Intelligence Committee and cast the deciding vote to reject a new policy requiring law enforcement to obtain a warrant before searching for Americans under Section 702 surveillance. GOP leaders are involved in conversations with House Republicans about how to reauthorize the program, but there is not yet a consensus on how to move forward ahead of the April deadline.

CBS News [2/19/2026 11:58 PM, Faris Tanyos, 51110K] reports U.S. fighter jets were scrambled Thursday to intercept multiple Russian bombers, fighter jets and a spy plane that were spotted flying off the coast of Alaska, U.S. authorities said. Two Russian Tu-95s bombers, two Su-35s fighter planes and an A-50 spy plane were detected in the Alaskan Air Defense Identification Zone, the North American Aerospace Defense Command reported in a statement. NORAD said it launched two F-16s, two F-35s and four KC-135s to escort the Russian aircraft until they had departed the Alaskan ADIZ. The Russian aircraft did not enter U.S. or Canadian airspace, said NORAD, which described Russia’s activity in the Alaskan ADIZ as a regular occurrence that was not considered a threat. The Alaskan ADIZ is a stretch of international airspace that begins where U.S. and Canadian sovereign airspace ends. According to NORAD, it is a "defined stretch of international airspace that requires the ready identification of all aircraft in the interest of national security.”

FOX News [2/19/2026 12:11 PM, Greg Nojrman-Diamond, 37576K] reports that the head of the U.S. Southern Command traveled to Venezuela to meet with the country’s acting president just weeks after U.S. forces captured former leader Nicolás Maduro. The trip on Wednesday, described as a surprise visit, was the first to Venezuela by a U.S. military delegation since the Jan. 3 raid to retrieve Maduro, according to Reuters. "The commander of U.S. Southern Command, Marine Gen. Francis L. Donovan, Chargé d’Affaires to the Venezuela Affairs Unit, Ambassador Laura F. Dogu, and U.S. Acting Assistant Secretary of War for Homeland Defense and the Americas Joseph M. Humire met with Venezuelan interim authorities in Caracas," U.S. Southern Command said in a statement. "During the meeting, the leaders reiterated the United States’ commitment to a free, safe and prosperous Venezuela for the Venezuelan people, the United States, and the Western Hemisphere," it added. "Discussions focused on the security environment, steps to ensure the implementation of President Donald Trump’s three-phase plan – particularly the stabilization of Venezuela – and the importance of shared security across the Western Hemisphere," U.S. Central Command also said. The U.S. Embassy in Venezuela added in a post on X that it was a "historic day" in a push to "advance the objective of a Venezuela aligned with the United States."

Daily Wire [2/19/2026 7:25 AM, Drew Berkemeyer, 2314K] reports that U.S. intelligence and military officials say a coordinated operation moved nearly 6,000 detainees linked to the Islamic State from unstable prisons in northeastern Syria into Iraqi custody, a transfer aimed at preventing a potential mass breakout and a resurgence of the terror group. The relocation mission, led by the U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM), began on January 21, when American forces transported an initial group of 150 Islamic State fighters from a detention facility in Hasakah, Syria, to secure facilities in Iraq. CENTCOM said as many as 7,000 detainees could ultimately be transferred from Kurdish-run prisons in northeastern Syria into Iraqi-controlled facilities to ensure continued detention amid shifting conditions on the ground. In a press release last month, CENTCOM described the mission as an effort to keep Islamic State detainees in secure custody and prevent them from exploiting regional instability to escape. In an interview, a senior U.S. intelligence official told Fox News that agencies had tracked the situation for months as fighting erupted in Aleppo and spread eastward, threatening prisons that have long held ISIS fighters. If those facilities had collapsed amid the chaos, the official said, thousands of militants could have returned to active operations —"the instant reconstitution of ISIS."

AP [2/19/2026 10:33 PM, Jon Gambrell, 31753K] reports Iran held annual military drills with Russia on Thursday as a second American aircraft carrier drew closer to the Middle East, with both the United States and Iran signaling they are prepared for war if talks on Tehran’s nuclear program fizzle out. President Donald Trump said Thursday he believes 10 to 15 days is "enough time" for Iran to reach a deal. But the talks have been deadlocked for years, and Iran has refused to discuss wider U.S. and Israeli demands that it scale back its missile program and sever ties to armed groups. Indirect talks held in recent weeks made little visible progress, and one or both sides could be buying time for final war preparations. Iran’s theocracy is more vulnerable than ever following 12 days of Israeli and U.S. strikes on its nuclear sites and military last year, as well as mass protests in January that were violently suppressed. In a letter to the U.N. Security Council on Thursday, Amir Saeid Iravani, the Iranian ambassador to the U.N., said that while Iran does not seek "tension or war and will not initiate a war," any U.S. aggression will be responded to "decisively and proportionately." "In such circumstances, all bases, facilities, and assets of the hostile force in the region would constitute legitimate targets in the context of Iran’s defensive response," Iravani said.

FOX News [2/19/2026 7:21 PM, Staff, 37576K] reports Fox News chief national security correspondent Jennifer Griffin reports on rising U.S.-Iran tension as the military builds up in the Middle East on ‘Special Report.’ [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

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