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

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

The New York Times [2/4/2026 2:49 AM, Catie Edmondson, 330K] reports a partial government shutdown ended Tuesday as President Trump signed a spending package to reopen major parts of the government as well as fund the Department of Homeland Security during his negotiations with Democrats over restrictions on the administration’s immigration crackdown. The package passed the House on a bipartisan 217 to 214 vote, and lawmakers from both chambers gathered in the Oval Office to applaud the shutdown’s end. But under the deal, the money for the Department of Homeland Security lasts just through the end of next week. The vote in the House capped an extraordinary spending fight that erupted 11 days ago, when the fatal shooting of an American citizen by federal immigration agents in Minneapolis torpedoed what had been a bipartisan deal to keep federal funding flowing and touched off a fevered round of negotiations. Senate Democrats demanded that any new homeland security money be tied to limits on Mr. Trump’s deportation campaign. But even though the president endorsed the deal, which he reached with Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, the Democratic leader, conservative Republicans were dissatisfied with the concessions it included nearly thwarted it in the House. Speaker Mike Johnson struggled until the last moment to muster the votes to bring it up on Tuesday, haggling with an animated group of hard-line holdouts on the House floor for nearly an hour before he managed to cobble together a bare majority. Such messy and drawn-out scenes have become routine in the chamber, where Mr. Johnson is working with a razor-thin majority. “I share the frustrations of many that the Senate altered our deal at the last minute,” Representative Tom Cole of Oklahoma, the chairman of the Appropriations Committee said. “But our obligation is not to those emotions — it’s to the American people.” While the package brings the current partial shutdown to a close, its passage only created another funding cliff for Mr. Trump and congressional leaders, who now have roughly 10 days to strike a deal imposing new restrictions on immigration agents. If they fail, regular funding for the Department of Homeland Security would lapse. Democrats and Republicans are still far apart on the changes they are willing to agree to, and key Democrats have said they would not vote for another stopgap measure if a deal is not reached at the end of next week. Most Democrats, 193 of them, voted against the spending deal on Tuesday, a reflection of how toxic funding the Department of Homeland Security and ICE has become in the party. Twenty-one supported it. “I will not stand by and give any more money to Stephen Miller and Kristi Noem to bankroll an out of control operation that is terrorizing communities and shredding the Constitution,” Representative Jim McGovern, Democrat of Massachusetts, said, naming the president’s senior adviser and architect of his hard-line immigration policies and the homeland security secretary. “I am not interested in business as usual. Not for two more weeks; not for two more seconds.” FOX News [2/3/2026 4:41 PM, Diana Stancy, 37576K] reports that the legislation Trump signed funds agencies, including the Departments of State, Treasury and War and others, through the end of September and the end of the fiscal year. However, it only funds the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) through Feb. 13, meaning Republicans and Democrats will be forced to work together to secure a longer-term funding plan for the agency. While the House had previously passed funding bills to keep the government open through the end of September, Democrats failed to get on board with the measures in response to Trump’s ramped-up immigration efforts in Minneapolis. Ultimately, the Senate passed the compromise spending measure Friday that would fund key agencies, but the House was out of session and couldn’t pass its version of the measure in time to prevent a partial government shutdown. The New York Times [2/3/2026 5:51 PM, Matthew Cullen, 148038K] reports the negotiations over federal spending aren’t over. The legislation, which advanced with the support of 196 Republicans and 21 Democrats, provided money for the Department of Homeland Security only through the end of next week. Trump and his congressional allies will have roughly 10 days to reach a deal with Democrats to avoid another lapse. It is almost certain to be difficult. Democrats negotiated the financial cliff to put pressure on Republicans to agree to restrictions on the administration’s immigration crackdown. Outraged by the killing of American citizens in Minneapolis, Democrats vowed to tie funding for D.H.S. to a set of changes, including a ban on masks for federal agents, a requirement that they wear body cameras and a mandate that they follow the same use-of-force policies as the local police. Axios [2/3/2026 2:16 PM, Andrew Solender and Kate Santaliz, 17364K] reports that more than 20 House Democrats voted with Republicans on Tuesday to reopen the government and keep the Department of Homeland Security funded for two weeks. Why it matters: The vote created harsh divisions among Democrats, some of whom argued that the party should use the partial shutdown as leverage to force drastic reforms of ICE and Customs and Border Protection. Many Democrats also felt considerable apprehension about the optics of voting for even short-term DHS funding without strings attached following the fatal shootings of Renée Good and Alex Pretti. But several members of leadership argued that it would be bad strategy to allow the government to stay shut down, with other lawmakers saying their districts need agencies like FEMA to be funded. Driving the news: The House voted 217 to 214 to pass the legislation, which funds the Departments of Defense, Treasury, Health and Human Services, Housing and Urban Development, State and Labor until September. Most Republicans voted for the package, with 21 mostly right-wing GOP lawmakers defecting in protest of stripping out the full-year DHS appropriations bill, which previously passed the House. 21 Democrats voted for the package, and most voted against.

Reported similarly:
New York Post [2/3/2026 2:11 PM, Ryan King, 40934K]
Politico [2/3/2026 2:27 PM, Jennifer Scholtes and Katherine Tully-McManus, 21784K]
Breitbart [2/3/2026 6:22 PM, Nick Gilbertson, 2238K]
ABC News [2/3/2026 2:15 PM, Staff, 34146K]
Federal News Network [2/3/2026 2:11 PM, Jory Heckman, 1297K]
USA Today [2/3/2026 1:30 PM, Zac Anderson, 70643K]
Daily Caller [2/3/2026 2:21 PM, Adam Pack, 803K]

CNN [2/4/2026 12:01 AM, Sarah Ferris, Ted Barrett, Manu Raju, 19874K] reports that, for a fleeting moment in Washington, top Democrats believed last week they could reach a deal with the GOP to set new limits on President Donald Trump’s nationwide immigration enforcement after federal agents killed two US citizens in Minnesota. That hope is mostly gone inside the US Capitol. Congress’ push for a bipartisan deal to scale back federal immigration officers’ powers is now in doubt, with Speaker Mike Johnson ruling out two of Democrats’ biggest demands after the deaths of Renee Nicole Good and Alex Pretti in Minneapolis. Johnson is among many Republicans who are refusing Democrats’ demands to stop searches without a judicial warrant and unmask ICE officers in public. Instead, many GOP lawmakers are issuing their own must-haves, like language to end so-called sanctuary cities – a nonstarter for Democrats. Johnson said Tuesday that Republicans are "never" going to agree to requiring that ICE agents obtain warrants from a judge, rather than simply getting the greenlight from a Trump administration official. "It is unimplementable. It cannot be done, and it should not be done. It’s not necessary," he said. Democrats, meanwhile, are insisting they cannot accept anything but dramatic reforms to the Department of Homeland Security that can satisfy the national uproar from their base. Now, both parties are anticipating a nasty standoff over the DHS budget when its current funding runs out in just two weeks. Tensions are quickly rising on Capitol Hill as the two sides harden their positions, with growing odds of a DHS shutdown that could snarl airport traffic and leave the Coast Guard and Secret Service without pay. The biggest question now is whether the two sides can come up with a funding bill that any Democrats can support — or whether the department is headed for its third shutdown in less than a year. Senate Majority Leader John Thune said Tuesday afternoon that it will be very difficult to get a deal over ICE by the deadline and it might take a miracle. "There’s always miracles, right? Maybe things will come together and we’ll be able to vote on something at the end of the two weeks," Thune told reporters. "I think that would be overly optimistic, based on my experience.” Asked about whether Republicans can reach a deal by mid-February, House Majority Leader Steve Scalise seemed even more downbeat. "Democrats have been the party of defunding the police for a long time. They’ve been clear for years that they don’t want to fund law enforcement of any kind," Scalise told CNN.

NewsMax [2/3/2026 11:50 AM, Staff, 3760K] reports that the Department of Homeland Security sharply increased contract spending during the first year of President Donald Trump’s second term, butting heads with Democrats. DHS poured billions into border enforcement, deportation efforts, and surveillance technology amid an escalating standoff in Congress over DHS funding, according to a Wall Street Journal analysis published Tuesday. DHS contract spending jumped 35% in 2025, driven largely by Trump’s mass-deportation agenda. Customs and Border Protection spending nearly tripled from a year earlier to about $15 billion, while Immigration and Customs Enforcement awarded $5.1 billion in contracts since Jan. 20, 2025, a 63% increase, the Journal found. Nearly every other DHS agency reduced spending, but the top 100 contracts accounted for roughly 60% of DHS’ total contract outlays last year and could exceed $44 billion by the end of Trump’s second term. The top 50 contractors alone stand to receive nearly $24 billion. Major beneficiaries include construction firm Fisher Sand & Gravel, which received more than $6 billion to build and maintain border wall segments, as well as private prison operators CoreCivic and GEO Group and deportation airline CSI Aviation, which together have received nearly $2 billion during Trump’s second term. DHS declined to comment on the analysis, according to the Journal.

Breitbart [2/3/2026 9:44 PM, Ian Hanchett, 2238K] reports on Tuesday’s broadcast of CNN’s “The Lead,” Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) responded to a question on if he wants to defund ICE by saying that “I will vote against another dime for the Department of Homeland Security unless Republicans meet our demands for completely rebuilding, overhauling, and, in fact, reimagining the Department of Homeland Security.” Host Jake Tapper played video of Rep. Melanie Stansbury (D-NM) saying about ICE, “We need to defund and dismantle this agency immediately. And a bill just passed a few moments ago, before we walked into this hearing room, to give another two weeks to think about a deal. No, it’s time to defund this. This has to end.” Tapper then asked, “Do you agree? And are you concerned that two weeks are not enough time to negotiate a Department of Homeland Security funding agreement?” Blumenthal answered, “I will vote against another dime for the Department of Homeland Security unless Republicans meet our demands for completely rebuilding, overhauling, and, in fact, reimagining the Department of Homeland Security. I will not vote for another dime unless there is reform top to bottom and Kristi Noem goes from this agency. I believe, very strongly, we have a responsibility to make sure that this paramilitary force is stopped from violating the Constitution, exacting violence on our citizens. And I believe that we have — two weeks is enough time, and here’s the reason, Jake: All my Republican colleagues have to do is ask their local police chiefs, what do you tell your cops on the beat is the right thing to do? Wearing badges, wearing body cameras, no masks, standards of accountability, and, most important for me — and by the way, I was attorney general of the state of Connecticut, and I helped to advise police on what they should do — they should be subject to lawsuits, to legal redress from everyday citizens…when their rights are violated. That kind of recourse is a strong deterrent. But it also enables people to have real rights. There are no real rights unless there are remedies.” [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

FOX News [2/3/2026 6:03 PM, Preston Mizell, 37576K] reports Secretary Kristi Noem stood by her decision to equip federal agents with body cameras after President Donald Trump said the move "wasn’t [his] decision." During an exclusive interview with Fox News Digital, the DHS secretary said body cameras would make "sure that people know the truth of a situation," and that both agents and the American people want cameras on federal law enforcement officials. "Our officers want [body cams] and the people want it, they want the relationship with their communities to know all of the information that we need to have during these situations of conflict and violence," Noem told Fox News Digital. "And we’ve seen that that can be very helpful in making sure that people know the truth of a situation and that we can get people help as soon as possible." Noem pointed to lack of resources as to why agents weren’t previously wearing cameras, and said that many border patrol agents already actively use body cams. "The Department of Homeland Security trains a lot of federal agents already, and different agencies have body cameras that they wear already," Noem explained to Fox. "CBP has many officers that already have body cameras on them." "The problem was having the resources to get them on every agent and every officer that’s out there. And then having the resources to do the analyses and the storage of those videos and who can help us really utilize them," Noem added.

FOX News [2/3/2026 1:53 PM, Staff, 37576K] reports that in an exclusive interview with Fox News Digital, Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said body cameras "can be very helpful in making sure that people know the truth." [Editorial note: consult source link for video]

FOX News [2/3/2026 11:23 AM, Staff, 37576K] reports Assistant Secretary of Homeland Security Tricia McLaughlin discusses DHS officers wearing bodycams in Minneapolis, ongoing unrest and more during ‘America’s Newsroom.’[Editorial note: consult video at source link]

(B) Good Morning America [2/3/2026 8:13 AM, Staff] reports Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem announced all of the Homeland Security officers in Minneapolis will be outfitted with cameras and the body camera program will be expanded nationwide. This comes after weeks of controversial tactics that put the city on edge. ICE has received tens of billions of dollars. DHS says both investigations into the deaths of Alex Pretti and Renee Good are being carried out by the book.

NewsMax [2/3/2026 7:45 PM, Jim Mishler, 3760K] reports the Department of Homeland Security reported Tuesday that federal immigration enforcement officers have faced more than 180 vehicle attacks since President Donald Trump took office. DHS said Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection officers experienced a combined 182 vehicular attacks between Jan. 21, 2025, and Jan. 24. During that period, ICE officers reported 68 vehicle attacks, up from two during the same time frame as the previous year, representing a 3,300% increase. CBP officers reported 114 vehicle attacks during the same period, compared with 51 the year before, a 124% increase. "Sanctuary politicians with their rhetoric comparing ICE to the Nazi Gestapo, slave patrols, and the secret police and encouraging illegal aliens to evade arrest have incited violence against law enforcement," Assistant DHS Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement. "In addition to these vehicle attacks, our officers are also facing a more than 1,300% increase in assaults against them and an 8,000% increase in death threats as they risk their lives to arrest murderers, pedophiles, rapists, gang members, and terrorists." DHS cited related attacks on federal officers during enforcement operations that received little media attention. DHS said Secretary Kristi Noem has made clear that immigration enforcement will continue without interruption, with ICE and federal partners carrying out the law, and that anyone who assaults a law enforcement officer will be prosecuted to the fullest extent. The Washington Times [2/3/2026 6:08 PM, Stephen Dinan, 1323K] reports Customs and Border Protection, ICE’s sister enforcement agency, saw a much smaller increase from 51 attacks to 114 attacks — a 124% rise. CBP dealt with far more border activity under the Biden administration, but has shifted attention to the interior now that Mr. Trump has largely solved the southwest border situation. Homeland Security Department officials blamed “sanctuary politicians” for fomenting anger against the two agencies, sparking the rise in attacks. “.

Reported similarly:
New York Post [2/3/2026 2:26 PM, Josh Christenson, 40934K]

FOX News [2/3/2026 10:21 PM, Staff, 37576K] reports DHS Assistant Secretary of Public Affairs Tricia McLaughlin calls out Democratic politicians’ anti-I.C.E. rhetoric and discusses the dangers law enforcement officers face on ‘Hannity.’ [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

FOX 10 Phoenix [2/3/2026 6:06 PM, Steve Nielsen, 40621K] reports Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem landed at Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport on Tuesday afternoon, greeting supporters ahead of a scheduled visit to the Arizona-Mexico border. Noem’s arrival was met with significant fanfare as a line of Border Patrol agents stood to greet her. Cheers erupted from more than 50 supporters as she exited her aircraft, taking time to shake hands and take selfies with them at the airport. Following the visit, Noem is traveling to Nogales to survey the border wall on Feb. 4. Her appearance in Arizona will only amplify those concerns from protesters, amid rising tensions and rumors that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) may increase enforcement actions in the state following recent events in Minneapolis. The Washington Examiner [2/3/2026 9:49 AM, Rob Crilly, 1147K] reports "Last week sucked," said Tricia McLaughlin, the Department of Homeland Security’s assistant secretary for public affairs. "This is returning to normal. "I don’t know of another cabinet secretary who’s going out and meeting people in the field as much as she is." McLaughlin bridled at the idea that the trip was about anything other than a Cabinet secretary doing her job. Border Protection Commissioner Rodney Scott and Immigration and Customs Enforcement acting Director Todd Lyons have both been invited, along with Trump’s border czar, Tom Homan.

FOX News [2/3/2026 10:43 AM, Preston Mizell and Greg Norman-Diamond, 37576K] Video: HERE reports Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem spoke out after Bad Bunny, Billie Eilish and other celebrities bashed U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) at the Grammy Awards, telling Fox News Digital that their criticism is "ill-informed.” "I wish they knew what wonderful, amazing people our ICE officers are. Many of these officers live in these communities where they are doing enforcement activities," Noem told Fox News Digital during an interview at a Mississippi National Guard facility in Tupelo on Monday. The secretary was visiting the governor, Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) officials and military members in the aftermath of Winter Storm Fern. "Their families live there and that’s their neighbors they are protecting by getting dangerous criminals off the streets. They are going after those murderers and rapists, people that are trafficking drugs, and protecting America," Noem continued. "That is what President Trump said he would do, he said he would make us safer, and he has done that. We have reached historic lows in crime rates in this country, the lowest rate of murder and crime since we have been recording it for over 100 years," Noem also told Fox News Digital. "So it’s real results, people are feeling it in their communities, and it’s too bad that ill-informed famous musicians make statements like that without truly knowing what great Americans our ICE and Border Patrol officers are." [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

Reuters [2/3/2026 5:59 PM, Nate Raymond, 38315K] reports a federal appeals court expressed unease on Tuesday with the Trump administration’s practice of rapidly deporting migrants to countries other than their own even as it signaled it may narrow a lower court’s injunction designed to safeguard their due process rights. A three-judge panel of the Boston-based 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals at oral arguments appeared likely to reject the administration’s stance that a trial judge had no power to issue a preliminary injunction that would force it to provide migrants notice and an opportunity to raise any fears of persecution or torture they would face if they were deported to a third country. But Aframe, who was appointed by Democratic President Joe Biden, said the appeals court could not ignore that the U.S. Supreme Court in June stayed the nationwide injunction that U.S. District Judge Brian Murphy had issued at the behest of immigrant rights advocates who filed a class action lawsuit challenging the policy. He suggested the court may need to narrow the class-wide injunction to only cover the four named plaintiffs in the case, which the Justice Department has said it anticipates will eventually reach the Supreme Court again.

ABC News [2/3/2026 9:53 AM, Staff, 34146K] reports the Pentagon’s Northern Command over the weekend stood down more than 1,500 federal troops placed on alert for potential deployment to Minneapolis, according to two U.S. officials with direct knowledge of the situation. ABC News first reported that roughly 1,500 active duty soldiers from the 11th Airborne Division at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson in Alaska had been ordered to prepare for a possible mission to the Twin Cities in Minnesota. Additional units across the country, including some 200 Texas National Guard troops, also had been directed to make preparations. No specific mission was ever outlined, and placing units on alert is a relatively routine step when commanders anticipate a potential presidential order, according to officials familiar with the planning. The New York Times was the first to report that units were being taken off high alert. The prepare-to-deploy orders came as President Donald Trump, threatened to use the Insurrection Act of 1807, a rarely used statute that grants a president authority to deploy federal troops for domestic law enforcement missions under limited circumstances. The law has been invoked most frequently during the Civil Rights era, particularly to enforce court-ordered desegregation and quell large-scale unrest. The order to stand down comes as the Trump administration has signaled a potential de-escalation in Minneapolis following the fatal shootings of two people involving federal officers. On Monday, Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said that every officer in Minneapolis will start to wear body cameras. "As funding is available, the body camera program will be expanded nationwide," Noem said in a statement. "We will rapidly acquire and deploy body cameras to DHS law enforcement across the country.”

The Washington Post [2/4/2026 1:57 AM, Kelly Kasulis Cho, 24826K] reports an Oregon judge on Tuesday temporarily banned federal agents from using tear gas at protests outside the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement office in Portland, days after agents deployed the chemical agents during a largely peaceful demonstration in the city that included children. In his ruling, U.S. District Judge Michael H. Simon ordered federal officers to refrain from using chemical or projectile munitions for at least 14 days “at or in the vicinity of” the ICE office in Portland’s South Waterfront neighborhood. The building has become a focal point for protests against President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown, with recent demonstrations there sparked by outrage over the killings of Renée Good and Alex Pretti in Minneapolis. Simon also barred federal agents in the area from firing any munitions or using any weapons — including less-lethal arms — on anyone’s head, neck or torso, “unless the officer is legally justified in using deadly force against that person.” The court documents cite several alleged acts of violence or excessive force by federal agents during peaceful protests near the building, including an incident in which Department of Homeland Security officers shot an 84-year-old woman in the head with a chemical impact munition “while she was peacefully holding a sign on a public street,” causing her to walk home “soaked in blood.” She was later treated at an emergency room, where she was diagnosed with a concussion, according to the documents. The documents also describe an incident in which a freelance video journalist said he was shot in the groin with projectile munitions and suffered bruises despite wearing protective gear. On another occasion, the journalist said an officer maced him in the face and on his camera equipment. In another allegation, a freelance photojournalist described how he was documenting federal agents shooting tear gas canisters into a crowd of dancing protesters when he was shoved by an agent several times. The federal agent hit his camera “until it stopped working,” and the photojournalist was then shot with pepper balls approximately 20 times, the documents say. “In a well-functioning constitutional democratic republic, free speech, courageous newsgathering, and nonviolent protest are all permitted, respected, and even celebrated. In an authoritarian regime, that is not the case. Our nation is now at a crossroads,” Simon said in court filings. “In helping our nation find its constitutional compass, an impartial and independent judiciary operating under the rule of law has a responsibility that it may not shirk,” he said, adding that this was part of the reason for granting the temporary restraining order. DHS, ICE and U.S. Customs and Border Protection did not immediately respond to a request for comment. FOX News [2/4/2026 2:39 AM, Landon Mion, 37576K] reports that the complaint argues that federal officers’ use of chemical munitions and excessive force represents retaliation against protesters, which violates their First Amendment rights. The Department of Homeland Security contends that the federal officers have "followed their training and used the minimum amount of force necessary to protect themselves, the public, and federal property.” "HS is taking appropriate and constitutional measures to uphold the rule of law and protect our officers and the public from dangerous rioters," DHS spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin said.

The New York Times [2/3/2026 6:00 AM, Michael Gold, 148038K] reports the Department of Homeland Security’s independent watchdog is reviewing the use of force by federal immigration agents, according to a letter sent Monday night by congressional Democrats, who called on the inspector general to expedite his report amid the crackdown in Minneapolis. A spokesman for the department’s inspector general, Joseph V. Cuffari, confirmed that he began investigating last month whether Immigrations and Customs Enforcement properly scrutinizes complaints that its agents use excessive force and holds them appropriately accountable. According to the Democrats’ letter, the review began on Jan. 8, the day after Renee Good, a 37-year-old U.S. citizen, was shot and killed by an ICE agent in Minneapolis. The 41 lawmakers — nine senators and 32 members of the House — wrote that Ms. Good’s death and the killing weeks later of Alex Pretti, another U.S. citizen, reflect the need for a faster review, particularly as immigration raids continue in Minneapolis and across the country. Both deaths, they wrote, were “appalling and preventable incidents that underscore the urgent need for rapid, independent oversight,” according to a copy of the letter obtained by The New York Times. The letter was led by Senators Elizabeth Warren and Ed Markey, both of Massachusetts, and Representatives Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts, Dan Goldman of New York and Lou Correa of California. The lawmakers’ request came as Democrats have pressed to add new restrictions on ICE and Customs and Border Protection to a spending bill to fund the Department of Homeland Security for the remainder of the fiscal year. NewsMax [2/3/2026 9:51 AM, Staff, 3760K] reports that a spokesman for DHS Inspector General Joseph Cuffari confirmed the office began examining last month whether Immigration and Customs Enforcement properly reviews excessive force complaints and whether it holds personnel accountable when policies are violated, according to New York Times. The review began Jan. 8, the day after Renee Good, a 37-year-old U.S. citizen, was shot and killed by an ICE agent in Minneapolis. Democrats argued that Good’s death and the shooting weeks later of Alex Pretti, another U.S. citizen, underscore the need for a faster review. Republicans in Congress, while generally backing President Donald Trump’s deportation efforts, have also called for an independent inquiry into Pretti’s death. In a letter sent Monday, 41 Democrat lawmakers, including nine senators and 32 House members, wrote that the deaths highlight the importance of an expedited review, particularly as immigration raids continue in Minneapolis and elsewhere. The letter was backed by Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Ed Markey of Massachusetts and Reps. Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts, Dan Goldman of New York, and Lou Correa of California. The Justice Department has opened a civil rights investigation into the killing, while Homeland Security Investigations, a DHS component, is expected to have a more limited role. The request comes as Democrats push to add restrictions on ICE and Customs and Border Protection to a spending bill to fund DHS for the remainder of the fiscal year.

Washington Times [2/3/2026 4:45 PM, Mallory Wilson, 1323K] reports Democratic lawmakers allege that a “culture of impunity” is what led to the killings of two Americans in Minnesota by federal agents last month. A report released Tuesday by Democrats on the House Oversight Committee blamed “extreme policies, violent tactics, and culture of impunity” for the killing of protesters Renee Good and Alex Pretti during confrontations with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents. The Democrats’ report also accused administration officials of “attempting to cover up misconduct” and perpetuating the cover-up by “impeding thorough and impartial investigations into the shootings.” Rep. Robert Garcia of California, the top Democrat on the committee, said Mr. Trump and Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem need to be held accountable. The White House on Tuesday stood by the federal agents. The Democrats said the Trump administration covered up misconduct by ICE agents and then “sidelined independent investigators, shut out state authorities, and insisted that a DHS-led internal administrative review would be sufficient.”

Los Angeles Times [2/3/2026 5:17 PM, Andrea Castillo, 12718K] reports one of the brothers of Renee Good, the 37-year-old mother of three who was shot and killed by an immigration agent in Minneapolis, told congressional Democrats on Tuesday that he needed their help. Luke Ganger said their family had taken some consolation in the thought that his sister’s death might spark a change. That is why Ganger and people who had been violently detained by immigration agents gathered to share their experiences with ICE and to ask the government to rein in an agency they described as lawless and out of control. Garcia and Blumenthal convened the forum to gather testimony "on the violent tactics and disproportionate use of force by agents of the Department of Homeland Security." All of the incidents referenced in the forum were captured on video. Democrats heard from three U.S. citizens who are residents of San Bernardino, Chicago and Minneapolis. Also present were Good’s two brothers and an attorney representing their family. Blumenthal called for a "complete overhaul, a rebuilding" of the Department of Homeland Security and its sub-agencies. Such an overhaul, he said, would require body-worn cameras, that officers wear identification and rigorous use-of-force training and policies; acts of violence would require full investigations under the supervision of an independent monitor. Without those reforms, he said he wouldn’t support more funding for DHS.

AP [2/3/2026 7:12 PM, Ryan Murphy, Sarah Raza and Steve Karnowski, 35287K] reports immigration officers with guns drawn arrested activists who were trailing their vehicles on Tuesday in Minneapolis, while education leaders described anxiety and fear in Minnesota schools from the ongoing federal sweeps. Both are signs that tension remains in the Minneapolis area after the departure of high-profile commander Greg Bovino of U.S. Border Patrol and the arrival of Trump administration border czar Tom Homan, which followed the fatal shooting of protester Alex Pretti. "There’s less smoke on the ground," Gov. Tim Walz said, referring to tear gas and other irritants used by officers against protesters, "but I think it’s more chilling than it was last week because of the shift to the schools, the shift to the children.” At least one person who had an anti-ICE message on clothing was handcuffed while face-down on the ground. An Associated Press photographer witnessed the arrests. Federal agents in the Twin Cities lately have been conducting more targeted immigration arrests at homes and neighborhoods, rather than staging in parking lots. The convoys have been harder to find and less aggressive. Alerts in activist group chats have been more about sightings than immigration-related detainments. Several cars followed officers through south Minneapolis after there were reports of them knocking at homes. Officers stopped their vehicles and ordered activists to come out of a car at gunpoint. Agents told reporters at the scene to stay back and threatened to use pepper spray. Homeland Security spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin said agents detained the activists because they hindered efforts to arrest a man who is in the country illegally.

The AP [2/3/2026 10:52 PM, Rebecca Santana, 31753K] reports the brothers of Renee Good, one of two U.S. citizens killed by federal immigration officers in Minneapolis, called on Congress to do something about the violence on American streets as a result of immigration operations, warning Tuesday that the scenes playing out are "changing many lives, including ours, forever.” Good, a 37-year-old mother of three, was shot and killed Jan. 7. Her death and that of another protester, Alex Pretti, just weeks later have sparked outrage across the country and calls to rein in immigration enforcement. Brothers Luke and Brett Ganger spoke during a hearing held Tuesday by congressional Democrats to highlight use-of-force incidents by officers from the Department of Homeland Security as they arrest and deport immigrants. The mood was somber as the brothers spoke, often comforting each other as they talked and listened to others speaking. Luke Ganger, speaking of the "deep distress" the family felt at losing their sister in "such a violent and unnecessary way," didn’t specify what they wanted from Congress but painted his sister’s death as a turning point that should inspire change in operations such as those going on in Minneapolis. "The completely surreal scenes taking place on the streets of Minneapolis are beyond explanation. This is not just a bad day, or a rough week, or isolated incidents," he said. "These encounters with federal agents are changing the community and changing many lives, including ours, forever." NBC News [2/3/2026 6:28 PM, Daniella Silva and Suzanne Gamboa, 42967K] reports Good’s death on Jan. 7 resulted in an escalation of anger, opposition and protests against the administration’s immigration enforcement policies and was followed weeks later by the fatal shooting of Alex Pretti by Customs and Border Protection officers on Jan. 24. Their killings have led lawmakers to call for reform and accountability in the Department of Homeland Security, as well as for the resignation of DHS Secretary Kristi Noem. "The deep distress our family feels because of Nee’s loss in such a violent and unnecessary way is complicated by feelings of disbelief, distress and desperation for change," Luke Ganger testified Tuesday at a public forum held by Democrats to discuss violent tactics and use of force by DHS. Others who spoke at the event included Marimar Martinez, who was shot five times by a Border Patrol agent in Chicago, Aliya Rahman, a Minneapolis resident who said she was dragged out of her car by immigration agents, and Martin Daniel Rascon, a U.S. citizen whose car was fired on by agents in San Bernardino, California. After the shooting, Noem said Good was a domestic terrorist and, without providing evidence, that she "weaponized" her vehicle against law enforcement. Noem also added that the officer who fired the fatal shots, Jonathan Ross, acted in self-defense. DHS said the officer sustained injuries. DHS spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin also accused Good of not complying with officers’ commands, saying that leads to "dangerous, and in this case deadly, consequences." What happened, she said, was "entirely preventable.” ABC News [2/3/2026 4:38 PM, Mark Guarino, 34146K] reports Luke and Brent Ganger’s remarks were part of a special public forum organized by Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., and Rep. Robert Garcia of D-Calif., as part of an inquiry into the tactics and use of force by Department of Homeland Security agents. Good’s killing intensified protests in Minneapolis that have continued into this month and were compounded by the fatal federal agent-involved shooting of Alex Pretti. The Department of Homeland Security has said that agents in the interaction with Good acted in self-defense after Good tried to ram them with her car in an act of "domestic terrorism." Local and state officials have disputed federal officials’ claims. He called for a complete overhaul of DHS and a revamping of policies, resulting in bodycams for each ICE agent, "masks off all the time," and additional training and monitoring for all officers. The New York Times [2/3/2026 6:20 PM, Michael Gold, 148038K] reports “In the last few weeks, our family took some consolation thinking that perhaps Nee’s death would bring about change in our country,” Luke Ganger told members of Congress, using a nickname for his sister. “And it has not.” Reading from the eulogy he said he had given for his sister days earlier, Brent Ganger called Ms. Good “unapologetically hopeful.” Choking back tears as he described Ms. Good as a devoted mother, he likened his sister to a dandelion. “They keep coming back stronger, brighter, spreading seeds of hope everywhere they land,” he said. Ms. Good’s brothers spoke at a public forum held by congressional Democrats, which was focused on the use of force by federal agents conducting the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown. Though Democrats have demanded limits on Immigration and Customs Enforcement throughout President Trump’s second term, their calls intensified after Ms. Good’s death and the killing weeks later of Alex Pretti, a 37-year-old I.C.U. nurse who was also an American citizen. Tuesday’s event, led by Senator Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut and Representative Robert Garcia of California, came as Democrats threatened to block long-term funding from the Department of Homeland Security if Republicans do not agree to new restrictions on immigration enforcement efforts. They have demanded that ICE and Border Patrol agents be required to wear body cameras and be barred from wearing masks to hide their faces from the public. They have also sought to establish clear guidelines for when immigration agents use force and to mandate independent investigations after shootings like those of Ms. Good and Mr. Pretti. Ms. Good’s brothers said that they wanted to better explain who their sister was. But they also made a plea to lawmakers. “We’re here to ask for your help,” Luke Ganger said. In his testimony, Luke said that his family was in “disbelief, distress and desperation for changes.” He described the difficulty of explaining to his daughter what was happening in their city as they drove past “surreal scenes” involving immigration officers.

Reported similarly:
Washington Post [2/3/2026 5:21 PM, Annie Gowen, 24826K]
USA Today [2/3/2026 6:43 PM, Christopher Cann, 70643K]

Washington Examiner [2/3/2026 6:42 PM, Lauren Green, 1147K] reports the brothers of Renee Good, Luke and Brent Ganger, told lawmakers on Capitol Hill on Tuesday that their lives have "forever" changed following the fatal shooting of their sister in Minneapolis by immigration enforcement personnel. During testimony in front of Democratic lawmakers, Luke Ganger said the fatal shooting of his sister on Jan. 7 was not "just a bad day" and that he was giving his testimony to show the panel and the public "what a beautiful American we have lost. "This is not just a bad day or a rough week or isolated incidents," Luke Ganger said. "These encounters with federal agents are changing the community and changing many lives, including ours, forever.” Her brothers comforted each other as they shared memories of their sister and the characteristic traits that people remember her by. As Brent Granger described her and her children, he teared up before describing her both as a mother and a sister. "Renee is not gone from us," Brent Ganger said in his concluding remarks. "She’s in the light that finds us on hard days. She’s in the resilience we didn’t know we had until we needed it.” The two appeared on Capitol Hill the same day that the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform Democrats released a report on their key findings in the killings of Good and 37-year-old Alex Pretti, who was shot and killed by immigration enforcement personnel in Minneapolis on Jan. 24. "Let’s be clear: the killings of Renée Good and Alex Pretti could have been prevented, and they should both still be alive," House Oversight ranking member Robert Garcia (D-CA) said in a statement. "President Trump, Kristi Noem, and DHS have lied over and over again and are now trying to cover up the truth. The Trump Administration needs to be held accountable.” The report outlined four key findings ahead of the emotional testimony from Luke and Brent Ganger. The findings show how the Trump administration’s policies led to their deaths and that their "lies" can not "cover up" what people saw, while claiming that there is evidence to suggest the Trump administration is attempting to suppress misconduct and is continuing to conceal by not having impartial investigations into the shootings. While there has been a Justice Department investigation into the shooting of Pretti, Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche has previously stated the department will not open an investigation into the shooting of Good. "The Department of Justice doesn’t just stand up and investigate because some congressman thinks we should, because some governor thinks that we should," Blanche said on Fox News last month. "We investigate when it’s appropriate to investigate, and that is not the case here; it wasn’t the case when it happened, and it’s not the case today.” The Trump administration has continuously praised the work of federal law enforcement officers and DHS Secretary Kristi Noem, while Democrats have called for her impeachment or resignation. "Federal law enforcement officers are heroically removing dangerous criminal illegal aliens from American communities – including murderers, rapists, and pedophiles. The Trump Administration is grateful for their important work," White House Spokeswoman Abigail Jackson told the Washington Examiner in response to the report.

Reported similarly:
Politico [2/3/2026 6:21 PM, Myah Ward and Ben Johansen, 21784K]

Washington Examiner [2/3/2026 3:39 PM, Anna Giaritelli, 1147K] reports Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem’s initial declaration that a department agency would oversee the investigation into the fatal shooting of Alex Pretti left current and former senior federal law enforcement officials stunned, according to four sources. A day after Pretti was killed on Jan. 24, when two U.S. Customs and Border Protection employees opened fire on him during an arrest in Minneapolis, Noem stated that her department would lead the federal investigation into the use-of-force incident. Federal agents who spoke with the Washington Examiner since then said they were baffled by that announcement, given the long-standing protocol that any instance of a weapon being discharged be handled by the FBI, an agency not housed in DHS but rather the Justice Department. While Noem has since said the FBI has taken the lead of the investigation, her early decision to let her own agency handle it in the immediate aftermath of the shooting contributed to tensions within DHS.

Wall Street Journal [2/3/2026 11:57 AM, Lydia Wheeler, Valerie Bauerlein, and James Romoser, 646K] reports the fatal shootings of Alex Pretti and Renee Good are fueling new efforts to fill a longstanding gap in U.S. law: It is nearly impossible to hold federal agents liable for causing someone’s death. Federal law has long allowed civil lawsuits seeking damages against state and local government officials, including police officers, for violating someone’s constitutional rights. But that same right to sue doesn’t apply when the alleged wrongdoer is an employee of the federal government. Legislatures in several states are now considering bills that would allow lawsuits under state law that seek to hold federal officials, including agents with Immigration and Customs Enforcement, liable for committing civil-rights abuses. “In our community there’s a lot of despair that there may not ever be accountability for these individuals,” said Minnesota Rep. Jamie Long, a Democrat who started working on legislation after Good was killed by an ICE officer. Illinois, which has faced months of U.S. immigration raids, passed such a law in December and drew a quick lawsuit from the Trump administration, which argues that the measure is an unconstitutional effort to regulate the federal government. The case is pending. The legislation “inevitably will become a vehicle to threaten and harass federal officers” at an already dangerous time for federal law enforcement, the Justice Department said in its lawsuit. Tricia McLaughlin, a spokeswoman for the Department of Homeland Security, said, “Federal officials acting in the course of their duties are immune from liability under state law. Politicians are laying blame at the feet of law enforcement instead of looking in the mirror at how they have fueled the hatred and violent attacks we are seeing against federal law enforcement officers.” Other states working on legislation include Colorado, Maryland, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, Virginia, Washington and Wisconsin. Four states—California, Maine, Massachusetts and New Jersey—previously had legal mechanisms that made it possible to sue any official, state or federal, for constitutional violations, but they have been largely untested against federal officers, lawyers said.

AP [2/3/2026 10:48 AM, Eric Tucker and Alanna Durkin Richer, 35287K] reports a new wave of departures is rippling through the U.S. Attorney’s office in Minnesota, where additional federal prosecutors are leaving at a time of mounting frustration with the Trump administration’s stepped-up immigration enforcement and the Justice Department’s response to fatal shootings of civilians by federal agents, two people familiar with the matter said Tuesday. The latest departures are on top of a half-dozen attorneys who left the office last month amid disagreements over the Justice Department’s response to the shooting of Renee Good by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer. At least one supervisory agent in the FBI’s Minneapolis office is known to have resigned last month as well. The Minnesota Star Tribune reported Monday evening that eight lawyers have since departed the office or announced plans to do so. A person familiar with the matter, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss non-public personnel moves, confirmed that this number was correct and that more departures were likely. Another person also confirmed a new wave of departures in the office. The resignations reflect the turbulence that has roiled the state over the last month or so as law enforcement officials have clashed over how to respond to violent confrontations during the heightened immigration enforcement. Minnesota officials, for instance, raised alarm after federal officials blocked state investigators from accessing evidence in the Good shooting and declared that Minnesota has no jurisdiction to investigate the killing. The Justice Department also declined to open a civil rights investigation into her death.

The Hill [2/3/2026 11:49 AM, Ryan Mancini, 18170K] reports Democrats on the House Oversight Committee, in a new report, allege that a “culture of impunity” at the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) led to the shooting deaths of two Minneapolis residents last month. U.S. citizens Renee Good and Alex Pretti were both killed in separate shootings involving federal immigration enforcement officers operating in Minneapolis last month. Trump administration officials accused both U.S. citizens of attempted acts of “domestic terrorism,” which critics have challenged based on videos of both incidents. “The Trump administration established extreme policies, endorsed violent tactics, and amplified a culture of impunity that created heightened conditions for the use of deadly force against Americans for exercising their constitutional rights and expressing dissent,” said the analysis report from Oversight Democrats, released on Saturday. “These conditions resulted in the violent shootings of two Americans in the span of two weeks. Then, in the face of evidence that these slain Americans posed no threat to federal officers or intended to kill them, Trump Administration officials lied to the public and tried to paint Ms. Good and Mr. Pretti as domestic terrorists.” Democrats rely on local reporting to describe conditions for Minnesotans under “Operation Metro Surge” as a “nightmare,” an “occupation,” “unsustainable” and “widespread disruption” for local businesses. They also provide examples of several incidents where Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and other federal officers reportedly “intimidate, threaten, and use indiscriminate force against individuals who exercise their constitutional rights.”

Washington Post [2/3/2026 5:00 AM, John Woodrow Cox, 24826K] reports he had decided that the America he believed in would not make it if people like him didn’t speak up, so on a cool, rainy morning in the suburbs of Philadelphia, Jon, 67 and recently retired, marched up to his study and began to type. He had just read about the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s case against an Afghan it was trying to deport. The immigrant, identified in The Washington Post’s Oct. 30 investigation as H, had begged federal officials to reconsider, telling them the Taliban would kill him if he was returned to Afghanistan. “Unconscionable,” Jon thought as he found an email address online for the lead prosecutor, Joseph Dernbach, who was named in the story. Peering through metal-rimmed glasses, Jon opened Gmail on his computer monitor. “Mr. Dernbach, don’t play Russian roulette with H’s life,” he wrote. “Err on the side of caution. There’s a reason the US government along with many other governments don’t recognise the Taliban. Apply principles of common sense and decency.” That was it. In five minutes, Jon said, he finished the note, signed his first and last name, pressed send and hoped his plea would make a difference. Five hours and one minute later, Jon was watching TV with his wife when an email popped up in his inbox. He noticed it on his phone. “Google,” the message read, “has received legal process from a Law Enforcement authority compelling the release of information related to your Google Account.” Listed below was the type of legal process: “subpoena.” And below that, the authority: “Department of Homeland Security.” That’s how it began. Soon would come a knock at the door by men with badges and, for Jon, the relentless feeling of being surveilled in a country where he never imagined he would be. “This subpoena was part of a criminal investigation,” Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement, noting that Homeland Security Investigations has “broad administrative subpoena authority” under the law. McLaughlin didn’t say who was under criminal investigation, and the agency didn’t answer questions about Jon’s case or its broader use of administrative subpoenas.

NPR [2/4/2026 4:45 AM, Brian Bakst and Steve Inskeep, 34837K]reports after a call with Trump border czar Tom Homan, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz signaled there is still a deep chasm between what he wants to see and the actions of federal agents in his state.[Editorial note: consult audio at source link]

CBS News [2/3/2026 9:42 PM, Staff, 51110K] reports that, in the week-and-a-half since federal immigration agents fatally shot a man in Minnesota, the state’s top corrections official told CBS News there have been "conversations" with the federal government, including with people who report to White House border czar Tom Homan. But Department of Corrections Commissioner Paul Schnell said details on a possible deescalation in the state — which has been the subject of a monthslong immigration crackdown — remain "sketchy," with no signs of a drawdown of federal forces yet. Homan said last week he is preparing to reduce the thousands of ICE and Border Patrol agents in the Minneapolis area at some point, but the exact timeline is not clear. Schnell also said he remains "deeply concerned" about tactics that are still being reported, including agents appearing at bus stops and entering apartment buildings without a clear, targeted list of priorities. "We don’t want roving bands of agents going into apartment buildings and asking people for their papers," Schnell said. "We want a focused, targeted operation aimed at people who actually pose a risk to public safety.” The immigration operation in the Minneapolis area — known as Operation Metro Surge — began in early December and has led to more than 3,000 arrests. The operation has drawn stiff criticism from state and local officials over agents’ tactics, which intensified after 37-year-old Alex Pretti was shot by a Border Patrol agent and a Customs and Border Protection officer on Jan. 24. Weeks earlier, Renee Nicole Good was shot by an ICE agent in Minneapolis. The Trump administration, meanwhile, has demanded more cooperation from the state of Minnesota and the city of Minneapolis in detaining and turning over people accused of being in the U.S. illegally, with Homan suggesting the timing of a federal drawdown could be "dependent upon cooperation." The administration has accused the state of not honoring detainer requests from ICE, which Schnell has strongly denied in the past. Federal immigration "detainers" are administrative requests — not criminal warrants — that ICE sends to a state prison or county jail asking to be notified before a person is released and, in some cases, asking the facility to hold that person briefly so federal agents can take custody. Because detainers are not signed by a judge, many states — including Minnesota — treat them with some caution. Local officials in Minnesota say holding someone past their scheduled release without a court order can raise constitutional concerns and expose local agencies to legal liability. Historically, Minnesota’s state practice has been to notify and coordinate ICE when a non-citizen is released from custody, without extending their detention. Schnell said the state carried out a review of its prison population and found that 380 non-U.S. citizens are currently in Minnesota custody statewide. Of those, he added, 270 had active ICE detainers, leaving 110 people that the federal government could have placed detainers on but did not, even after state authorities notified the Department of Homeland Security. "We notified them. They did not issue detainers," Schnell said emphatically.

New York Post [2/3/2026 5:46 PM, Josh Christenson, 40934K] reports Vice President JD Vance unloaded on New York Democratic Rep. Jerry Nadler "openly calling" for the shooting of ICE agents and other federal law enforcement officers. "Jerry Nadler is one of the highest ranking Democrats in the House of Representatives and he is openly calling for people to shoot federal law enforcement," Vance posted on X Tuesday. "This is despicable behavior from an elected official and I’m sure the leftwing media will cover it extensively." The Manhattan Democrat in a House Judiciary Committee hearing had said "what is really the major problem in this country today, is the fascism in our streets, the attacks on American citizens by masked hoodlums." "If you were attacked by a masked person, you might think you were being kidnapped. You’d be justified in shooting the person to protect yourself," he said.

NewsMax [2/3/2026 9:12 PM, Staff, 3760K] reports Department of Homeland Security Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs Tricia McLaughlin tore into Rep. Jerry Nadler, D-N.Y., on Tuesday for comments suggesting Americans could be justified in shooting federal law enforcement officers, calling the statements "deeply irresponsible.” Appearing on Newsmax, McLaughlin said Nadler’s rhetoric has real-world consequences at a critical moment for the country. "It’s just deeply irresponsible and reckless and dangerous for the public, for our law enforcement officers at a serious moment for our country," McLaughlin said on "Rob Schmitt Tonight.” At a House Judiciary Committee hearing earlier Tuesday, Nadler criticized what he called "the attacks on American citizens by masked hoodlums," referring to federal immigration agents. He added, "If you were attacked by a masked person, you might think you were being kidnapped; you’d be justified in shooting the person.” Vice President JD Vance condemned Nadler’s remarks as "despicable," while McLaughlin said the comments demonized federal law enforcement agents. "As far as Jerry Nadler and these other politicians who have sat in Congress for decades, DHS is a law enforcement agency," McLaughlin said. "The men and women of ICE and CBP are enforcing the rule of law on the books in Congress. "If they don’t like it, they should change the law," McLaughlin said. She added, "Don’t demonize our law enforcement. Don’t liken them to the Nazis, to the Gestapo.” McLaughlin cited alarming statistics about attacks on federal officers, saying anti-law enforcement rhetoric fuels violence against those enforcing U.S. laws. "It’s no coincidence we are seeing a 1,000% increase in assaults against our law enforcement. "We’ve seen 180 vehicle rammings against our law enforcement in the past year alone, and we’re only seeing that kind of rhetoric continue.

The Hill [2/3/2026 2:24 PM, Ashleigh Fields, 18170K] reports that Rep. Delia Ramirez (D-Ill.) on Tuesday said the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is the “greatest threat” to the homeland right now as Democrats fight to reform the agency and restrict the Trump administration’s most controversial immigration enforcement practices. “Let me be very blunt, I’m gonna just say it: The greatest threat to the homeland is called the Department of Homeland Security. We have seen the danger in infusing resources into DHS’ abuse of power,” Ramirez said during a Tuesday press conference. “Now I’m gonna also say something else here. DHS is not rogue, because when it was built, it was built to violate our rights and has been empowered to act with impunity. Congress needs to send a message, and it’s why we are here today, that we do not consent, nor will we enable DHS and ICE’s lawlessness,” she added. Her statement follows weeks of protests against Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Border Patrol in Minnesota, where two U.S. citizens were shot and killed by federal immigration officials last month. Democrats briefly shut down the government over demands to reform DHS, forcing Republicans to pull funding for the agency from a 6-piece “minibus.” The funding package passed the House on Tuesday with a two-week extension of DHS funding, setting up immigration reform talks in the days ahead. Democrats have urged DHS Secretary Kristi Noem to resign or be fired amid a push to remove masks from immigration officers and require judicial warrants for enforcement activities, among other changes.

Daily Caller [2/3/2026 2:28 PM, Harold Hutchison, 803K] reports that Democratic Illinois Rep. Delia Ramirez vowed that the Department of Homeland Security would be "dismantled" during a Tuesday press conference, adding that "every fascist" in the Trump administration would face "justice." Democrats blocked a "minibus" spending bill that included funding for DHS, demanding reforms to United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) that would severely restrict their enforcement operations following the fatal shootings of Alex Pretti and Renee Nicole Good in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area. Ramirez claimed the cabinet agency was "the greatest threat to the homeland" before she targeted Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem, White House Deputy Chief of Staff for Policy Stephen Miller and border czar Tom Homan. "Americans are past reforms of a department that has used your taxpayer dollars to execute people in broad daylight," Ramirez claimed. "This is why the Melt ICE Act ends the Department of Homeland Security’s funding to detain and monitor pregnant women, children, neighbors, disrupting immigration enforcement and then redirecting that money, your money, into the communities that have been impacted, whether that’s in Minnesota, in Chicago, in Portland, and all over the country." "Here’s the bottom line, folks, that I’m getting off before [Democratic Rep.] Bonnie [Watson Coleman] pushes me out," Ramirez continued. "We must have accountability and we must bring justice to every fascist in the administration, and that includes Kristi Noem, that includes Stephen Miller, and that includes Tom Homan. ICE will be abolished, DHS will be dismantled, and together we will get it done."

NBC News [2/3/2026 5:15 AM, Dennis Romero, 42967K] reports journalist Don Lemon said Monday that he offered to turn himself in days before his arrest last week, but he was instead detained by federal agents in order to "embarrass" him. Lemon appeared as the headlining guest on "Jimmy Kimmel Live" Monday night and talked through the night of his arrest at a Beverly Hills hotel he used as a base during his coverage of the run-up to Sunday’s Grammy Awards. Lemon, an independent journalist who is a former anchor for CNN, was arrested Friday in Los Angeles County and charged with violating the rights of worshippers at a St. Paul church on Jan. 17 after his coverage of protesters who interrupted services. Lemon told Kimmel that his lawyer reached out to federal authorities with a customary offer have his client turn himself in, but he "never heard back from them." Afterward, Lemon said, about dozen law enforcement personnel arrested him. "They want to embarrass you," he told the late-night host. "They want to intimidate you. They want to instill fear." The Department of Justice did not immediately respond to a request for comment about Lemon’s comments late Monday.

Washington Post [2/3/2026 8:12 AM, Christina Buttons, 24826K] reports in less than a month, two "ICE watchers" have been shot and killed by immigration enforcement agents in Minneapolis. On January 24, a federal agent shot and killed 37-year-old Alex Pretti, a Veterans Affairs ICU nurse. His death follows that of Renée Good, a 37-year-old mother of three, who was killed on January 7. Both Pretti and Good participated in "ICE watching," an anti-immigration-enforcement tactic that can involve tracking ICE agents, filming arrests, and alerting other activists of enforcement actions. While participants frame ICE watching as a "community safety" measure, these tactics often place untrained civilians in direct, high-stakes confrontation with armed federal agents. In Minneapolis, one key organizer of these activities is "Defend the 612." The group, the membership of which apparently included Renee Good, oversees a massive network of Signal chats dedicated to monitoring and protesting ICE activity. It has become the beating heart of the city’s resistance to federal immigration enforcement. (The group’s name refers to the Minneapolis area code.). City Journal reviewed Defend the 612’s trainings, entered its Signal network, and traced its organizational support. Our reporting reveals that members and related officials have encouraged protesters to impede law enforcement; pushed civilians toward legally and physically risky confrontations; and helped mobilize a counterprotest that turned violent. The group’s growth threatens to stoke the city’s already-raging fire.

New York Post [2/3/2026 6:31 AM, Chadwick Moore, 40934K] reports it’s the same dark money, with new signs. Anti-ICE protests in Minnesota may appear to be "grassroots" efforts organized by concerned citizens, but they’re really funded with megadonor money — some coming from China. A so-called "ICE Out" march drew an estimated 15,000 left-wing political activists to a frozen, snow-covered Minneapolis on Friday, with attendees chanting "ICE out now" and demanding an end to federal immigration enforcement in the city. Although framed as a spontaneous uprising of concerned, everyday people, the demonstration — like countless that have regularly metastasized during President Trump’s terms — featured a familiar cast of politically obsessed activists and terminally online characters. They organize on radical message boards and encrypted texting apps, but are backed by funds created by radical leftist billionaires. "My team’s best judgement is that it’s the Neville Singham network that is most active [in Minnesota], partly because that’s the most crazy network. But they aren’t alone," Scott Walter, president of Capital Research and an expert on dark money outfits, told The Post. Walter was referring to the People’s Forum and the Party for Socialism and Liberation, both funded by China-based former software exec Singham. Both groups promoted the "ICE Out" protests — which were organized by another group, called 50501 — through social media, and Walter said their members were in attendance, but he noted they have recently been getting their members to blend in more with the crowds.

FOX News [2/3/2026 8:11 AM, Taylor Penley, 37576K] reports Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche says federal investigators are uncovering a "massive underground fraud network" in Minneapolis that he suggested helped fuel a sudden, coordinated push to drive ICE out of the city. "We had a massive fraud going on all through Minneapolis, all through Minnesota, and suddenly it turned. It turned almost on a dime, and it became suddenly all about ICE, all about getting ICE out and how horrible ICE was doing," Blanche said Monday on "The Ingraham Angle." "[We had] very strong pushback when we raised our hands and said ‘stop,’ so, yes, we have multiple investigations going on." Blanche also pointed to the financial dimensions of the case, noting that investigators are making "progress" in tracing funding streams connected to the alleged network. Blanche said unraveling those money trails is a priority for federal law enforcement, though he did not name specific individuals or sources. "It’s not something we’re going to do overnight," he said, "But… it’s not just [a] coincidence that these massive numbers of protesters and rioters and agitators show up at the same time, and they’re pushing back on what has been a profit center for fraudsters.”

The Hill [2/3/2026 11:42 AM, Judy Kurtz, 18170K] reports Bruce Springsteen’s protest song ripping what he calls the “state terror” tactics by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) is topping the music sales charts in the United States. “Streets of Minneapolis” was last week’s highest-selling song in the United States, Billboard reported Monday. The tune took the top spot on Billboard’s digital song sales chart in the last week of January, selling 16,000 downloads, according to data from Luminate. Billboard noted that Springsteen’s song hit No. 1 despite only being available for two days of the tracking period. The “Born in the USA” singer — a frequent critic of President Trump who has called his administration “corrupt” and “treasonous” — said in a social media post last week that he penned the song “in response to the state terror being visited on the city of Minneapolis.” The release followed the two separate shooting deaths last month in Minneapolis involving federal immigration authorities. In January, a federal immigration enforcement officer shot and killed a 37-year-old woman, Renee Good, during the Department of Homeland Security’s immigration crackdown in Minnesota. Less than three weeks later, Alex Pretti, a 37-year-old ICU nurse, was killed by a Customs and Border Patrol agent. In his message about his new music, Springsteen said it was “dedicated to the people of Minneapolis, our innocent immigrant neighbors and in memory of Alex Pretti and Renee Good.”

New York Post [2/3/2026 8:35 PM, Ben Chapman, 40934K] reports a violent agitator who used a slingshot to fire metal objects at officers during violent anti-ICE protests over the weekend has been identified by police as Jose Guillen of Los Angeles. Guillen, 27, wielded a slingshot to shoot "hard metal objects at officers who were standing on the line" at an anti-ICE demonstration in downtown Los Angeles on Friday night, the Los Angeles Police Department said in a statement posted to social media. Guillen was arrested at 7:10 p.m. that night and charged with assault with a deadly weapon on a peace officer, a felony punishable by up to five years in state prison, police said. He was being held Tuesday at the Twin Towers Correctional Facility on $50,000 bail, according to a spokesman for the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department.

FOX News [2/3/2026 2:11 PM, Anders Hagstrom, 37576K] reports that Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., is calling out what he described as anti-ICE agitators "presenting" as grassroots organizations across the country Tuesday, urging a Justice Department investigation into what he said reporting suggests is actually a "coordinated national operation." Hawley called for the investigation in a letter to Attorney General Pam Bondi obtained by Fox News Digital, saying there is evidence that the agitators are "substantially financed and professionally organized by wealthy left-wing organizations." "Recent reporting indicates that these protests are neither spontaneous nor decentralized. Instead, they reflect a coordinated national operation supported by layered nonprofit pass-through entities, fiscal sponsorship arrangements, and short-lived ‘grassroots’ fronts designed to obscure donor identity, funding sources, and operational control," Hawley wrote. "The scale, geographic simultaneity, messaging uniformity, and logistical sophistication of these operations strongly suggest centralized planning and financing inconsistent with lawful domestic advocacy," he continued. Hawley said that if foreign groups are linked to the alleged funding schemes it could violate "federal prohibitions on foreign influence." He argued such funding schemes could also amount to "racketeering."

NewsMax [2/3/2026 11:07 AM, Charlie McCarthy, 3760K] reports teachers unions are reportedly helping organize protests against Immigration and Customs Enforcement, with some activists bringing children to potentially dangerous demonstrations. Major teachers unions in Oregon and other Democrat-led states have mobilized members to protest ICE operations, as some of the demonstrations have escalated into violent confrontations with federal agents, The Washington Examiner reported Tuesday. Late last month, Oregon’s largest teachers unions helped organize a large protest outside an ICE detention facility in Portland that ended with federal agents deploying tear gas after protesters attempted to breach federal property. Video footage from the scene showed children, including infants, caught in the chaos as officers tried to control the crowd. Critics say activists deliberately placed children in harm’s way to generate emotional outrage and anti-ICE media coverage. The Oregon Education Association (OEA), a state affiliate of the National Education Association, helped rally educators from across the Portland area to join what organizers called an "ICE Out" march. The American Federation of Teachers of Oregon, which represents more than 18,000 educators statewide, also co-organized the event.

Los Angeles Times [2/3/2026 9:30 AM, Andrew J. Campa, 12718K] reports returning home is always weird, whether the trip is dreamed of or dreaded. Depending on how long a person’s been away, families have changed, friends have left, businesses have closed or opened, and nostalgia often interferes with reality. Homecoming was the subject of a piece written by Times special correspondent Steve Fisher and my colleague Kate Linthicum. The twist, however, is that the pair spoke with migrants recently deported back to Mexico after spending decades in the U.S. For many of the tens of thousands of people deported by the Trump administration, returning migrants have discovered that their country has also changed in more profound ways.

New York Times [2/3/2026 10:16 AM, Ruth Igielnik, 148038K] reports new polls show that a vast majority of Republicans still support President Trump’s aggressive immigration enforcement, which led to the killing of two protesters in Minneapolis last month. But the polls, one by the public affairs firm Ipsos, another from Pew Research Center, also reveal that a small, but growing, share of Republicans now say that the Trump administration’s enforcement tactics have gone too far. And independent voters, who helped swing the 2024 election to Mr. Trump, also say that enforcement has gotten out of hand. Immigration was key to Mr. Trump’s victory in November 2024 and has been a top issue driving Republican voters. But after federal agents killed two Minneapolis protesters, Alex Pretti and Renee Good, Mr. Trump said that he may “de-escalate a little bit,” and then removed Gregory Bovino, the hard-line senior Border Patrol official, from the city. The Ipsos poll, released on Monday, was conducted entirely after Mr. Pretti was shot. It found that 62 percent of Americans said they thought Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers had gone too far in dealing with unauthorized immigration in the country, a modest increase over the 58 percent in a Reuters/Ipsos poll conducted just before the shooting. Much of that movement came from Republicans. Most Republicans still said they thought enforcement was about right (45 percent) or had not gone far enough (22 percent). But 30 percent of Republicans now say that immigration enforcement efforts have gone too far, up from 20 percent just before the shooting.

AP [2/3/2026 2:22 PM, Aaron Katersky and Josh Margolin, 35287K] reports that Operation Dirtbag in Florida. Operation Catahoula Crunch, also known as Swamp Sweep, in Louisiana. Operation Catch of the Day in Maine. The Department of Homeland Security’s approach to naming immigrant enforcement operations, accompanied by a punchy, at times mocking tone in its official statements, elicits polarizing opinions: Are the names funny or offensive? Reactions often depend on political affiliation and support for the operations that largely target Black and brown communities. The names send a message that immigrants in the U.S. are "sub-human," Congressman Jimmy Gomez, a California Democrat, told The Associated Press. "That is why they have those disgusting names," said Gomez, who sits on the House Intelligence Committee. Administration officials "don’t even use that kind of language when they conduct operations across the globe dealing with some of the worst terrorists imaginable." But Congressman Brandon Gill believes the names demonstrate President Donald Trump is not joking about reining in illegal immigration and securing the border. "I think all he’s doing is letting them know we continue to be serious about that," the Texas Republican said. "We’re serious about keeping the border secure. We’re serious about deporting illegal aliens."

New York Times [2/3/2026 4:02 PM, Ruth Graham, 148038K] reports a few years ago, Nick Shirley’s career seemed to have plateaued. Still a teenager, he had created some videos that had become popular on YouTube, including one that showed him sneaking into the influencer Jake Paul’s wedding in Las Vegas, and another in which he threw a prom dance in his kitchen for his mother in the stir-crazy spring of 2020. But by 2021 he was selling pest control door to door in Florida with his brother, also an aspiring YouTuber. Mr. Shirley decided he had to make a big change. A member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, he signed up to go on a two-year missionary trip to an unknown location, a rite of passage that is encouraged by the church but not required. He was so eager to depart that he forged signatures on his required medical forms, he told one interviewer. (He said he later acquired the proper signatures.) “God didn’t want me to blow up on YouTube because he wanted me to go on this mission,” he speculated to a friend on a video podcast before he left. He was sad to leave because “I love posting,” he said, but he was determined to see it through. The church sent him to Santiago, Chile, where he spent two years knocking on doors, speaking with strangers about faith and (mostly) not posting. When Mr. Shirley came back to the United States at the end of 2023, he relaunched his influencer career with a new editorial mission. Rebranding himself an independent journalist, he began traveling to politically charged hot spots like the U.S.-Mexican border, Ukraine and Greenland, producing videos with a distinct MAGA edge. Weeks before the 2024 election, for example, he asked residents in Springfield, Ohio, about the debunked rumors spread by JD Vance that Haitian immigrants were eating pets. Mr. Shirley nodded soberly as one young interviewee said her aunt’s outdoor cat had been stolen by a Haitian. His breakthrough came about five weeks ago, when he posted a 43-minute video claiming to expose fraud at about a dozen Somali-run day care centers in Minnesota. The video mostly shows Mr. Shirley, 23, knocking on the doors of registered day cares and autism centers.

Breitbart [2/3/2026 8:45 PM, Staff, 2238K] reports a federal judge denied bail for Anthony Kazmierczak, who is accused of disrupting a town hall by Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., in Minneapolis on Jan. 27 by spraying her with water and vinegar. U.S. District Court of Minnesota Magistrate Judge David Schultz on Tuesday denied a motion by Kazmierczak, 55, to be released from custody while his case is active. He is charged with assaulting and interfering with a member of Congress when he approached Omar, 43, while she stood at a lectern and used a plastic syringe to spray her midsection with what later was determined to be a mixture of apple cider vinegar and water. He could be sentenced to a year in prison if he is convicted. Kazmierczak interrupted Omar after she called for Homeland Security Sec. Kristi Noem to resign and accused the congresswoman of "splitting Minnesotans apart. Omar’s security staff tackled Kazmierczak and kept him detained until local police arrived to arrest him. An FBI affidavit indicates that Kazmierczak has a history of making threatening comments toward Omar and years ago allegedly suggested "somebody should kill her.”

ABC News [2/3/2026 1:02 PM, Aaron Katersky and Josh Margolin, 34146K] reports that domestic partners are "increasingly likely" to use chemical and biological toxins to kill or harm their partners, a trend so alarming that the Department of Homeland Security issued a warning to law enforcement. The warning came in a January intelligence note, obtained by ABC News, that said people intent on harming or killing their domestic partners are turning to poisons like cyanide or ricin to do it, which are "often sourced from online black markets or made at home." "The use of chemical and biological toxins in domestic violence cases poses a significant challenge for detection and prosecution due to the often subtle and delayed onset of symptoms," the intelligence note said. The document highlighted as an example the case of a Colorado dentist convicted of first-degree murder last year after gradually poisoning his wife with a mix of arsenic, cyanide and tetrahydrozoline, the latter a medication commonly found in over-the-counter eye drops. The dentist secretly dosed his wife by adding the poisons to her protein shakes, according to prosecutors, resulting in her being hospitalized three times in a 10-day span, and then gave her a fatal dose of cyanide while she was ill in the hospital. "Incidents using chemical or biological toxins to harm or kill are driven by several factors including accessibility of online information, ease of obtaining certain chemicals, and perceived difficulty in detection," the DHS note said. It also listed an additional 16 cases in the U.S. since 2019 in which individuals were accused or convicted of poisoning current or former spouses, domestic or romantic partners, or family members, 10 of which resulted in the victim’s death.

Washington Post [2/3/2026 6:30 PM, Henry Olsen, 24826K] reports the short shutdown is over, but another looms next Friday if Republicans and Democrats cannot strike a deal to rein in immigration enforcement. As polarized as the parties have become around this issue, the contours of a potential deal seem obvious. President Donald Trump signaled a willingness to negotiate Tuesday as he signed the short-term funding bill, and a reasonable compromise appears within reach. Clearly changes are needed at the Department of Homeland Security, and the demands of Democratic leaders are mostly reasonable. Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer (New York) wants Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents to be required to wear body cameras on duty. A previous compromise, which cleared the House two weeks ago, allocated funding for cameras but didn’t require they be worn. But the politics changed after the unjust killing of Alex Pretti, and Senate Democrats couldn’t accept what was on the table. DHS Secretary Kristi L. Noem made a serious concession late Monday when she said all immigration officers in Minneapolis will now wear body cams and eventually this will roll out nationwide. Congress should codify this into law, so the administration cannot backtrack. Schumer also wants ICE agents to take off their masks and wear some form of identification, which are standard practices across American law enforcement. DHS warns of doxing, but anyone who threatens federal officers can and should be prosecuted. At the same time, bands of faceless and unidentifiable plainclothes agents patrolling American streets sow fear and seed mistrust. Such scenes cannot become the norm. Other Democratic asks are more contentious, such as requiring ICE to obtain a judicial warrant. The devil will be in the details. House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-Louisiana) said the GOP won’t entertain “a whole new layer of judicial warrant requirements.” Making the government appear in front of a federal judge every time agents want to detain someone is impractical and would place an untenable burden on the already overwhelmed judiciary. But Congress should set clearer bounds on how far ICE’s jurisdiction goes. A leaked memo revealed that DHS has been authorizing agents to enter homes without a judicial warrant. The Fourth Amendment protects individuals from unreasonable searches and seizures. Congress should clarify that ICE can’t just storm into any private home.

New York Post [2/3/2026 9:06 PM, Staff, 40934K] reports it has happened again: anti-ICE extremists attacked officials whom they mistook for ICE agents. This time, at least, the attacks were only on social media. A video went viral this week from an arrest last Friday in Lynwood. The arrest involved a scuffle between police officers and a 17-year-old suspect in a local jewelry heist. At one point, an officer appeared to strike the suspect — possibly with his service weapon — before wrestling him to the ground. Bystanders shouted at the police in protest. The controversy might have ended there, but the social media mob caught onto the video. One verified account claimed that the video "shows an ICE agent pistol whipping a 16-year-old boy.” That false claim was reposted over 5,000 times. Just a few days before, also in Lynwood, an anti-ICE mob, carrying a Mexican flag, surrounded a Korean barbecue restaurant because the activists believed, falsely, that ICE officers were eating inside. The officers turned out to be federal air marshals who work for the Transportation Safety Administration (TSA). The TSA officials pleaded with the mob, to no avail. The men had to be escorted to safety by Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department deputies. These ugly scenes echo similar standoffs in Minneapolis, where extremists have hounded ICE agents — not just to restaurants, but to hotels and even churches. In one case, the anti-ICE crowd falsely identified a customer at a restaurant as an ICE agent, and surrounded the door. Local customers had to walk through an angry crowd just to escape. Once the story hit social media, the owner of the restaurant faced violent threats — including some, allegedly, from pro-ICE people who assumed she had tipped off the mob. These cases of mistaken identity have a real cost. They hurt law enforcement officials who are just trying to keep the peace. And they put innocent people in danger. Last month, activists interrupted a service at Cities Church in St. Paul, targeting a pastor whom they believed was also an ICE official. Whether he was or wasn’t, the activists violated the religious freedom of everyone else in the congregation. The anti-ICE hysteria has crossed all reasonable boundaries of protest. There is a way to express grievances — even serious and urgent ones — without violating the rights and security of other people. The fault lies at the feet of elected officials who have demonized ICE. The most infamous example is Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, who called ICE a "modern-day Gestapo.” Our own Gov. Gavin Newsom was forced to backtrack after his infamous social media account, "@GovPressOffice," called ICE a form of "state-sponsored terrorism.” LA Mayor Karen Bass used her "State of the City" address this week to encourage residents to protest against ICE. She added that people should protest peacefully, but she still said that ICE — a federal law enforcement agency — should leave the city. That is irresponsible. Politicians can and should resolve these difficult issues through the legislative process, and the courts — not in the streets. Innocent people are bearing the cost.

The Hill [2/3/2026 11:00 AM, Matthew R. Auer, 18170K] reports just prior to the full fury of January’s great winter storm, the Federal Emergency Management Agency declared it would “cease offboarding” frontline disaster responders whose terminations were pending. A month prior to the storm, the agency ceased renewing contracts for workers serving in frontline response and recovery roles. FEMA and its parent organization, the Department of Homeland Security, have not indicated whether the pause is temporary or long-term. A permanent reversal seems unlikely, considering President Trump’s repeated criticisms of FEMA’s performance and his view that disaster management is primarily the responsibility of states. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem shares this perspective. In calling for a state-led approach, the administration makes a point worth considering. There are credible advantages to devolving decisions nearer to incidents. Local authorities can align mitigation and response with granular knowledge of high-risk locations, the status of critical infrastructure and considerations for social vulnerability. Neighboring states can develop networks to provide mutual aid. And states and local governments can adjust building codes and experiment with land use rules. A devolved, decentralized approach is consistent with a doctrine that the most effective response is locally executed and state managed. But in disaster governance, local control is effective only when federal partners provide robust and sustained support. This is especially important in a system where 50 states and five inhabited U.S. territories (including Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands) — each with differing capabilities and resources — are responsible for protecting lives and property during emergencies. Even comparatively well-resourced crisis responders need federal help during natural disasters. Most major emergency response and recovery efforts in the U.S. find local officials working shoulder-to-shoulder with specialists from FEMA, including preliminary damage assessors, crisis counselors, insurance experts and communications professionals.

Wall Street Journal [2/3/2026 1:17 PM, William A. Galston, 646K] reports during the first year of his second term, President Trump has governed as if he needs to please only one subset of those who voted for him in 2024—his hard-core MAGA base. This is a mistake. Only 6 in 10 Republicans identify as MAGA supporters, while about 3 in 10 say they aren’t and the rest are unsure, according to a recent Economist/YouGov poll. Only 54% of all Americans who voted for Mr. Trump identify with MAGA. Polling last summer found that while 55% of Americans liked Mr. Trump’s deportation goals, only 44% liked the means he was using to achieve those goals—and that support for Immigration and Customs Enforcement was declining. Many of the president’s supporters have come to share these reservations. More than a third of those who voted for him in 2024 now say in a Politico poll that while they back the goals of his mass-deportation campaign, they disapprove of the way he’s implementing it. This sentiment is especially prevalent among non-MAGA supporters. Overall, 62% of MAGA Trump voters and only 37% of non-MAGA Trump voters support Mr. Trump’s deportation goals and methods. That Mr. Trump has governed with an eye only to his base helps explain the steady erosion of support since the early weeks of his administration. The recent violent confrontations in Minneapolis have generated a crisis that threatens to engulf his agenda and wipe out the Republican majority in the House. Nearly everyone agrees that immigrants illegally in the U.S. who have committed serious crimes should be deported. But self-identifying MAGA voters are out of step with the broader public. Of those polled by Politico, 44% of MAGA Trump voters say that “the federal government should aim to deport as many illegal immigrants as possible, regardless of criminal history.” Only 18% of all voters take this stance. Less than a third of voters think that people who arrived here illegally as children should be deported, according to a Harvard Harris Poll. Putting a 5-year-old in a detention center generates images that no public-relations expert can spin away. The distinction between permitted and forbidden means is the core of the rule of law. Most Americans understand this instinctively and reject government actions that violate their sense of what law and common decency permit. The actions of ICE and Border Patrol agents have crossed this line.

New York Times [2/3/2026 5:40 AM, Tressie McMillan Cottom, 148038K] reports in the latest stop in Donald Trump’s war on liberal democracy, federal agents in Minnesota have shot and killed Renee Good and Alex Pretti. It was difficult to avoid the videos of what I can only think of as their executions. The images captured by bystanders and immigration agents were reminiscent of the lynching postcards that white spectators once bought and traded — reproductions of retributive violence, tailor-made to titillate and intimidate. Alex Pretti’s killing, in particular, struck a chord of dismay with a cross section of Americans. There is some small measure of comfort that our public conscience can still be shocked. One may wish that it had happened sooner — when other people died in ICE custody this past year or immigrants were rounded up into camps. But whichever abuse convinced you, whichever needless death shocked you, you are here now. You need to pay attention to the guns ICE agents are pointing at all of us. You also need to pay attention to everything happening around the guns. Just before Jonathan Ross, an ICE agent, pulled the gun that he discharged into Good’s S.U.V., he was shooting video of the incident on his cellphone. The gun and the phone are both weapons, one a tool for violence and the other a tool of control. We understand what the gun is intended to do. That’s why, finally, opposition to the Trump administration seems to be coalescing around a rallying cry: “Abolish ICE!” It’s another way of saying, control the hand that holds the gun. It is the gun that produces the spectacle of violence from which we cannot, in good conscience, look away. Yes, we must pay attention to the gun. But, we must also pay attention to the phone. That phone represents a greater power, one that could outlast Trumpism. ICE knows that it cannot shoot us all. But the Department of Homeland Security is close to being able to track us all.

Bloomberg [2/3/2026 7:30 AM, Noah Feldman, 18082K] reports in an outrageous expansion of its authority, Immigration and Customs Enforcement is now authorizing its agents to arrest anyone they suspect of being undocumented, even if the officers don’t have a warrant and the person isn’t a flight risk. The directive, contained in a memo obtained by the New York Times, reverses long-standing ICE policy and effectively renders the warrant requirement itself empty. Coming on the heels of another legally indefensible memo, which purported to allow ICE agents to enter the homes of suspected undocumented people without a judicial warrant, the new policy shows that ICE isn’t just exploiting legal loopholes to create massive sweeps. Instead, it reveals an agency actively attempting to change the legal landscape to turn itself into an all-powerful police force. Federal law permits ICE to make warrantless arrests under only two circumstances. The first is when an agent sees someone actively crossing the border illegally. That scenario isn’t relevant to the current ICE sweeps, which take place in cities far from the border. The second situation in which the law allows a warrantless arrest, the one addressed by the new memo, is if an ICE officer “has reason to believe” that someone is in the US without legal authority and “is likely to escape before a warrant can be obtained for his arrest.” As even ICE has been forced to acknowledge, the phrase “reason to believe” in the statute means that the agent must have probable cause to think that the person is undocumented. That standard, borrowed from the context of criminal arrest, appears protective of individual rights. But in a decision in its emergency docket last September, the Supreme Court disastrously eroded this protection by allowing street stops based merely on “reasonable suspicion” — a standard lower than probable cause. A solo opinion by Justice Brett Kavanaugh then extended reasonable suspicion to include factors like appearing Latino and speaking Spanish. That brings us to the new memo, which addresses whether ICE agents can then arrest the person who has been stopped.

Washington Examiner [2/3/2026 9:11 AM, Christopher Tremoglie, 1147K] reports let’s stop pretending that the crusade to unmask Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers is anything other than a nefarious attempt to cause them violence and harm. For months now, Democrats have had an obsession with demanding that ICE officers remove masks during their operations. Multiple Democrats, including Sen. Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and Gov. Gavin Newsom (D-CA), passed largely unenforceable laws requiring ICE officers not to wear masks in their cities and states. They’ve provided myriad reasons for this unmasking, but truthfully, there is only one reason for it: so ICE officers can be harassed and harmed. Consider the inflammatory rhetoric Democrats have used to demonize illegal immigration enforcement operations. From labeling ICE, Border Patrol, and Department of Homeland Security officials as, mentioned above, Nazis, fascists, and the Gestapo to parroting false news stories, Democrats have engaged in a propaganda campaign to discredit federal law enforcement officers and characterize these American citizens as enemies of the population. Think, for a second, just how unhinged that is. Democrats have branded citizens, employees of the federal government, as an enemy occupying force, all for upholding federal immigration laws. ICE, Border Patrol, and other federal officers risk their lives daily to protect innocent people from being victims of violent crime, and Democrats denigrate them for doing so. Approximately 70% of the illegal immigrants ICE has arrested were "convicted or charged with a crime in the U.S," and Democrats denigrate the federal officers removing them. This includes rapists, murderers, pedophiles, and drug traffickers, yet Democrats object to law enforcement holding and arresting these monsters. They prefer these criminals to be in this country solely because they are illegal immigrants.

Daily Caller [2/3/2026 2:10 PM, Natalie Sandoval, 803K] reports that federal judge Ana Reyes blocked the Trump administration from ending Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for about 350,000 Haitians on Monday. "Plaintiffs charge that [Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Kristi Noem] preordained her termination decision and did so because of hostility to nonwhite immigrants. This seems substantially likely," writes Reyes. Reyes does not offer proof of Noem’s supposed racism, beyond the fact that Haiti is a "majority nonwhite country." Reyes takes a snarky, Slate-like tone totally unbefitting a judge. If a "shithole" is a "wretched place," Haiti certainly qualifies. Reyes argues as much in her opinion. She cites Haiti’s 2010 TPS designation, which claims Haiti suffers from "a housing shortage, a cholera epidemic, limited access to medical care, damage to the economy, political instability, security risks, limited access to food and water, a heightened vulnerability of women and children, and environmental risks." Reyes refers to Haiti’s high rates of chronic malnutrition, dirty water, and violent protests. This is how Biden-appointed Judge Ana Reyes opened her ruling overturning the Trump admin ending TPS for Haitians. Does this sound like a federal judge’s opinion to you or a paper being written by a freshman political science major?

New York Times [2/3/2026 7:32 PM, Michelle Goldberg, 148038K] reports Judge Ana Reyes did not have to go far to discover Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem’s animus toward Haitians. She just had to read her social media feed. “I am recommending a full travel ban on every damn country that’s been flooding our nation with killers, leeches and entitlement junkies,” Noem wrote on X in December. She added, “WE DON’T WANT THEM. NOT ONE.” Reyes, a Federal District Court judge in Washington, cited Noem’s post at the very beginning of a blistering opinion issued Monday night preventing the administration from ending Temporary Protected Status for Haitians, at least for now. That status was due to expire on Tuesday, rendering more than 350,000 Haitians who are now legally living and working in America undocumented overnight. Ohio officials had warned that once that happened, ICE agents could swoop into Springfield, a city of around 60,000 where up to a quarter of the population is Haitian, and start rounding people up. Many Haitians here have been living in terror, some afraid to leave their homes. But Noem, in her sycophantic sadism, unintentionally helped give them a reprieve by serving up undeniable evidence of her racist decision-making to a court. “Plaintiffs charge that Secretary Noem preordained her termination decision and did so because of hostility to nonwhite immigrants,” wrote Reyes. “This seems substantially likely.” The reprieve may not last long. Donald Trump’s administration is sure to appeal. Given that the Supreme Court has already allowed the administration to end T.P.S. for Venezuelans, the Haitians’ chances are not good. Both Trump and JD Vance have been singling out the refugees who live in this small postindustrial city since the presidential campaign, and they’re unlikely to stop now. So the relief that many Haitians here feel is tempered by an omnipresent dread, one most likely felt in immigrant communities across America as they wait to see which city ICE will surge into next. “To me last night, it was like traveling through a desert and you came across a little oasis,” Viles Dorsainvil, executive director of Springfield’s Haitian Community Help and Support Center, told me on Tuesday. (His brother Vilbrun Dorsainvil was one of the plaintiffs in the T.P.S. lawsuit.) It wasn’t cause for a huge celebration, he said, but it eased at least some of the unbearable tension plaguing his community. “It’s just a pause,” he said. That pause comes at a time when resistance to ICE is building nationwide, including in Springfield, a place without much of a progressive infrastructure. Here, that resistance isn’t organized by neighborhood, as in Minneapolis, but through a network of Black, white and Hispanic churches. They call themselves the G92 Coalition, after the ancient Hebrew word “ger,” for stranger or foreigner, that appears 92 times in the Hebrew Bible. One of the founders is Carl Ruby, pastor of the nondenominational Central Christian Church. He’s a former Republican — he remains a fan of Ohio’s Republican governor, Mike DeWine — who describes himself as theologically conservative but social-justice oriented. Central Christian has been training people to protest and document ICE raids. At first, its training sessions would bring out about 30 people. The most recent one, a week and a half ago, drew 200. In the lobby was a bucket of orange whistles of the kind that have become ubiquitous in Minneapolis, packaged with instructions on how to use them: short blasts to warn of ICE sightings, long continuous ones if someone is being detained. “The pastors’ group that I’m in, we got together, and we agreed that if violence breaks out in Springfield, we have a duty to go right to the front of it and to call for peace,” said Ruby.

AP [2/3/2026 6:22 PM, Heather Hollingsworth, David A. Lieb and Morgan Lee, 35287K] reports federal immigration officials are scouting warehouses and beginning to purchase some of them to transform into detention and processing facilities. Some warehouse owners have decided not to sell to Immigration and Customs Enforcement under pressure from elected officials and advocates. Some cities are issuing statements urging ICE to look elsewhere, and Kansas City has passed a moratorium on non-city-run detention facilities. ICE has offered few specifics, even to the cities, but said in a statement that the sites wouldn’t be warehouses but “well structured detention facilities” and said it should come as no surprise that the agency is working to expand detention space. ICE paid $70 million last month for a vast warehouse facility on the northwestern outskirts of Phoenix, according to a deed filed with Maricopa County. In Orlando, Mayor Buddy Dyer said in a statement last month that the city was advised that it has no legal options to halt a possible ICE facility from opening. The town council in Merrillville passed a resolution last week in opposition of ICE converting a warehouse into a processing or detention facility. ICE purchased a warehouse in a county about 60 miles (96 kilometers) northwest of Baltimore for $102.4 million, a deed signed last month shows. The deed was unearthed by Project Salt Box, a Maryland ICE watchdog. In the suburbs of Minneapolis, the owners of two warehouses have pulled out of possible ICE deals amid a public outcry. Federal officials were spotted last month scouting a building in Marshall County, the county’s board vice president, Neil Bennett, told The Commercial Appeal. In Kansas City, the city council passed a five-year moratorium on non-city-run detention facilities on the very day that ICE officials were spotted touring a warehouse. The town council in Merrimack — population 30,000 — expressed its opposition to an ICE immigration detention and processing center in a January letter to Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, without receiving a direct response. In Roxbury, council members passed a resolution saying that they aren’t in support of an ICE facility after township manager J.J. Murphy spotted ICE officials touring a warehouse there last month. The council also pointed out that the township’s zoning regulations prohibit using the warehouse as a detention facility. Elected officials are pushing back after the Department of Homeland Security posted a notice announcing a proposal to purchase a vacant warehouse in Chester, a town more than an hour north of New York City, for “ICE operations.” ICE said the proposed improvements would include a small guard building and outdoor recreation area. In Oklahoma City, Mayor David Holt announced Thursday that he has been informed that the Department of Homeland Security is no longer in talks to acquire a warehouse after the city council urged federal officials to take part in the city’s permitting process. ICE paid $87.4 million for a nearly 520,000-square-foot (48,309-square-meter) warehouse, according to a deed that was recorded Monday in Berks County. In El Paso County, commissioners on Monday formally expressed opposition to the construction of detention facilities amid reports that ICE is eying a warehouse in the county. Commissioners also said they working with other officials to try to get more details. In Salt Lake City, Mayor Erin Mendenhall expressed gratitude last week in her State of the City address that the owners of a warehouse that ICE was eying as a detention facility had announced plans not to sell or lease the property to the federal government. In the suburbs of Richmond, Virginia, officials in Hanover County are asking their attorney to evaluate legal options after the Department of Homeland Security sent a letter confirming its intent to purchase and operate an ICE processing facility in an area that includes retail, hotels and restaurants.

Blaze [2/3/2026 3:00 PM, Candace Hathaway, 1556K] reports a kidnapper and a child predator were apprehended by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents Monday, according to a press release obtained by Blaze News. The Department of Homeland Security, which has been tracking and sharing the "worst of the worst" immigration enforcement arrests at wow.dhs.gov, reported that ICE has nabbed more "heinous criminals.” "While sanctuary politicians and Hollywood were vilifying our law enforcement, our officers we were arresting kidnappers, pedophiles, and drug traffickers," DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said. The DHS highlighted four of ICE’s arrests from Monday. The department stated that federal immigration agents captured Armando Miguel Hernandez-Valdez, an illegal immigrant from Mexico. Hernandez-Valdez was previously convicted in St. George, Utah, for kidnapping, possession of a controlled substance, and escape. Armando Miguel Hernandez-Valdez. ICE nabbed Carlos Martinez, a Salvadoran national with a prior conviction in Dallas County, Texas, for aggravated sexual assault of a child under 14 years old. Immigration officers captured Freddy Railandy Medina-Cruz, an illegal immigrant from the Dominican Republic who was previously convicted for crimes in multiple states, including drug trafficking in Massachusetts, fraud in Michigan, and re-entry of a removed alien in Florida. Freddy Railandy Medina-Cruz. Image source: Department of Homeland Security. The DHS also highlighted the arrest of Jianqiao Lu, a Chinese national who was convicted of criminal possession of an assault weapon in New York. According to a 2023 article from the Hudson Valley Post, Lu initially faced a 113-count felony indictment after police allegedly discovered over a dozen illegally owned firearms.

FOX News [2/3/2026 11:05 AM, Ashley Oliver Fox, 37576K] reports the top official at Immigration and Customs Enforcement made clear to federal agents in a new memo that they can make snap decisions to arrest suspected illegal immigrants without a warrant under certain conditions. The memo, which the government filed in federal court on Friday as part of a case in Minnesota, broadens ICE’s view of warrantless arrests. Acting Director Todd Lyons suggested that previously, the agency had been interpreting the law incorrectly. When ICE agents make civil immigration arrests, they are required to obtain an administrative warrant, which supervisors within ICE sign off on to confirm that probable cause exists to make the arrest. But the law has a carve-out that allows ICE agents to make an arrest without a warrant if they believe the person is "likely to escape" before a warrant is obtained. Lyons wrote in the memo that an "alien is ‘likely to escape’ if an immigration officer determines he or she is unlikely to be located at the scene of the encounter or another clearly identifiable location once an administrative warrant is obtained." ICE previously interpreted "likely to escape" to mean "flight risk," which Lyons said was an improper view of the law. A flight risk describes someone who might not show up to a future hearing, but Lyons said ICE agents making "on-the-spot determinations" in the field do not necessarily have enough information to know if someone is a flight risk prior to arresting them. The memo noted that agents should document in a government form, as soon as possible after the arrest, what factors they considered when apprehending someone without a warrant. DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement to Fox News Digital the memo was "nothing new." "This is just a reminder to officers to be [keeping] detailed records on their arrests," she said, adding that "authorities under USC 1357 and, of course, reasonable suspicion are protected by the U.S. Constitution."

Washington Times [2/3/2026 10:06 AM, Mary McCue Bell, 1323K] reports menstrual products must be accessible to women detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the Bureau of Prisons, but both agencies are failing to do so, according to a new report by the Government Accountability Office. What’s more, after the watchdog gave ICE the advice, the immigration agency rejected it. The problem, published in a Monday report, is fourfold: empty containers, a bartering economy, policy gaps and “orderly” system failure. At one Bureau of Prisons facility, investigators found storage containers for menstrual products empty, which stayed empty for both days of the visit. Staff brought supplies only once a week, prompting inmates to hog the products. Eight women said that staff refused to provide more menstrual products after they asked. Such inadequate access has created an underground economy where inmates trade, sell, beg for and steal others’ menstrual products, make homemade products — including Christmas decor — and wear products longer than safe. Some of the bureau’s facilities also rely on prisoners rather than staff to distribute products, with the guards sometimes playing favorites. Neither the BOP nor ICE can systematically verify whether its facilities are following policy. BOP’s audits do not consistently check all policy requirements, and ICE’s detention standards are too vague for inspectors to assess whether prisons are providing adequate access.

Washington Times [2/3/2026 8:35 AM, Stephen Dinan, 1323K] reports ICE has hit a new record pace for formal deportations, averaging more than 1,450 removals a day in the middle of January, according to the agency’s latest data. If it keeps up that pace for a year, it would top the half-million mark for formal removals for the first time in history. And that was just the tip of the new records. The data, current as of Jan. 25, showed U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement was booking in migrants at a record rate of more than 1,500 a day. And ICE had more than 70,000 migrants in detention — yet another record. Both the book-ins — a rough proxy for ICE’s arrests — and the pace of deportation data are below the goal of a million a year that administration officials had set, but they do indicate an agency beginning to hit its stride after last summer’s infusion of tens of billions of dollars. The new data covers much of the enforcement surge in Minnesota, where some 3,000 officers have been deployed to carry out President Trump’s plans. Homeland Security says those numbers are misleading because many of the migrants without criminal histories here may have them in their home countries. “It is a lot worse than that statistic lets on,” Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin told The Washington Times last month.

Daily Caller [2/3/2026 12:00 PM, Hudson Crozier, 803K] reports Minnesota officials’ proposed eviction moratorium for migrants is legally flawed, law and immigration experts told the Daily Caller News Foundation. The Minneapolis and St. Paul city councils passed resolutions in January asking Democratic Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz to pause evictions in response to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) operations across the state. If enacted, the policy may violate federal anti-discrimination laws, the Constitution’s Supremacy Clause that gives federal immigration law precedence and its Takings Clause that protects landlords’ rights, analysts told the DCNF. "In short, states, counties and cities can’t exempt themselves from federal laws that they don’t like," said Matt O’Brien, the Federation for American Immigration Reform’s deputy executive director. "And this is all an unlawful, performative, virtue signaling stunt.” Minneapolis City Councilwoman Robin Wonsley, who wrote her city’s resolution, did not respond to the DCNF’s request for comment. The offices of Walz and Democratic St. Paul Mayor Kaohly Vang Her, who signed her city’s proposal, did not respond to inquiries. Wonsley’s resolution demands evictions stop "throughout the duration of Operation Metro Surge or other future deployments of federal immigration enforcement agents, to protect residents who have been harmed by the federal government’s unprecedented attacks." The two resolutions also claim the moratorium is needed to shield "legal observers and community members protecting their neighbors" from law enforcement. Freezing evictions exclusively for migrants would be illegal, said O’Brien, who was formerly an immigration judge and has held multiple immigration policy roles in the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). "Exempting foreign nationals from eviction on the basis of their citizenship status is impermissible discrimination against U.S. citizens who wouldn’t receive a similar reprieve," he told the DCNF.

FOX News [2/3/2026 6:00 AM, Charles Creitz, 37576K] reports a string of recent incidents in which ICE agents and Department of Homeland Security leadership have been refused service at corporate gas stations and hotel chains has raised questions about whether private businesses can lawfully deny service to federal law enforcement officers. The incidents — including ICE agents who were turned away from hotels and a Border Patrol commander being denied service at a gas station — have prompted debate over whether such refusals amount to lawful private discretion or illegal discrimination against federal law enforcement carrying out official duties. The most recent flashpoint unfolded at a Speedway gas station, where video captured by conservative activist Cam Higby showed U.S. Border Patrol Cmdr. Gregory Bovino being followed out of the store by a man identifying himself as a manager. Bovino himself was silent on the matter when asked by Higby among the crowd outside Speedway, while Deputy Homeland Security Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said similar situations had transpired at several different gas stations where agitators stalked agents. When Higby asked the man why he refused Bovino service, he replied: "Because I wanted to. I don’t support ICE and nobody here does.”

NPR [2/3/2026 5:00 AM, Mawa Iqbal and Marianna Bacallao, 28764K] Audio: HERE reports the deaths of Renee Macklin Good and Alex Pretti have shaken up the conversation about how states should respond to immigration crackdowns across the country. Some Democratic leaders have vowed to hold federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers accountable — even charging them with crimes. After an ICE surge in Chicago last year, state leaders established the Illinois Accountability Commission to collect evidence from citizens about ICE’s actions, including the agency’s leadership, and to make accountability recommendations. The chair of the commission and former federal judge, Rubén Castillo, says the group is having conversations with local law enforcement to "suggest prosecutions that should be coming as we speak." Prosecutors in Philadelphia and California say they are also considering criminal charges against federal agents. [Editorial note: consult audio at source link]

OutKick [2/3/2026 7:30 AM, Bobby Burack] reports in January, numerous news and sports outlets covered NBA coach Steve Kerr’s condemnation of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Kerr described the shooting of Renee Good in Minneapolis as "murder," using the term as a legal accusation, and claimed the agency was arresting innocent children. "We’re really hopeful that the protests here and nationwide will lead to a much better solution for immigration. It’s not like they’re rooting out violent criminals. They’re taking five-year-old kindergartners, U.S. citizens, and detaining people," Kerr told reporters Jan. 27. Kerr was referring to 5-year-old Liam Conejo Ramos, whose illegal alien father abandoned him during his arrest by ICE on Jan. 20. The child was not detained. Agents ensured his safety. On Friday, OutKick asked Kerr about those remarks and cited evidence showing ICE did not target the child and has arrested convicted murderers, sex offenders, and other violent criminals. Kerr acknowledged the mistake and apologized. "You’re right, I definitely misspoke, and I knew that ICE was arresting some criminals," Kerr said during Friday’s pregame session at Chase Center. "I immediately regretted it because I knew that to be the case. My point is that they’re also arresting people and detaining citizens and people who should not be being detained. The manner in which they’re doing it is riling everybody up all over the country," he continued. OutKick respects Kerr for correcting the record. By contrast, fellow NBA coach Doc Rivers doubled down over the weekend on claims that ICE is "murdering" people and targeting random "brown people." At a minimum, NBA coaches have a responsibility to get the facts straight, given the size of their platforms. The media has a responsibility as well, including reporting updates when new information emerges, even if it complicates a preferred narrative. The New York Times, Washington Post, USA Today, ESPN, and other outlets all covered Kerr’s remarks about ICE. None of them updated their coverage or reported on his apology and clarification. Two days later, many of those same outlets amplified Rivers standing by his dubious claims. The trend is obvious. NBA reporters are quick to amplify stories critical of ICE and the Trump administration, yet show little interest in reporting information that reflects favorably on ICE or contradicts earlier claims. As a result, many NBA fans who do not closely follow the news may still believe ICE avoids arresting violent criminals and targets kindergartners. That’s on the reporters. This is not about opinions. The criticism is about ignoring the facts (and Kerr’s updated comments) to preserve a storyline. Any journalist who does so is failing at the most basic function of the job. Of course, this was all avoidable. There is no need for NBA coaches and players to comment as moral authorities on political and social issues. That’s not their role in society. And it’s evident that many of them don’t know the facts. Unfortunately, outside of OutKick, no major outlet appears willing to hold them accountable or even report when they admit they were wrong.

CNN [2/3/2026 9:53 PM, Staff, 19874K] reports Sen. Bernie Sanders tells Kaitlan Collins ICE is no longer focused on immigration enforcement and is instead Trump’s "well funded" domestic army. [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

Washington Times [2/3/2026 8:06 PM, Stephen Dinan, 1323K] reports a government lawyer begged a federal judge to hold her in contempt of court so she could spend 24 hours behind bars and finally get some sleep, rather than deal with the tsunami of legal work President Trump’s immigration enforcement surge has spawned. Julie Le, who is helping the Justice Department defend cases in federal court in Minnesota, had a stinging criticism of the way things are playing out, with hundreds of challenges filed last month to Homeland Security’s immigration arrests in Minnesota. “The system sucks, this job sucks,” Ms. Le said, according to Fox 9 in Minneapolis. She asked to be held in contempt “so I can get 24 hours of sleep.” Ms. Le was arguing before U.S. District Judge Jerry Blackwell, one of a number of judges in Minnesota who are handling the hundreds of “habeas corpus” cases that have been filed demanding U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement release detained migrants. The chief federal judge in Minnesota last month said ICE had defied 96 federal court orders in 74 different cases. Those orders were usually writs of habeas corpus ordering migrants released. Judge Patrick Schiltz, a George W. Bush appointee, said the problem didn’t appear to be the Justice Department, which was struggling to handle the caseload, but rather ICE, which wasn’t moving quickly enough to comply. Ms. Le said she was trying to get ICE to comply. “I am here to make sure the agency understands how important it is to comply with court orders,” she said, according to Fox 9. Her complaints about the surge of litigation were stark, but they are from from unique as the Trump administration moved aggressively to enforce immigration laws, and is now seeing unprecedented pushback from judges who say the push has gone too far. The administration last year reinterpreted a law to argue that DHS has the ability to detain illegal immigrants arrested out in the community even if ICE didn’t first have a warrant or a deportation order secured. That change has produced thousands of habeas challenges across the country and judges have almost universally ruled against the Trump position.

The New York Times [2/4/2026 3:23 AM, Luis Ferré-Sadurní, 330K] reports Letitia James, the New York attorney general, announced on Tuesday that her office would deploy legal observers to document raids conducted by federal immigration authorities across the state. The observers, outfitted with purple vests, could be sent to where immigration raids are unfolding to serve as “neutral witnesses on the ground,” her office said in a release, adding that they would be instructed not to interfere with enforcement activity. The initiative, after criticism over the aggressive tactics used by immigration officers in Minneapolis, is aimed at collecting real-time information on immigration enforcement activity and identifying whether federal agents are acting lawfully, her office said. The effort, which will be staffed by lawyers and other state employees, is the first of its kind by an attorney general’s office, according to Sophie Hamlin, a spokeswoman for Ms. James. “We have seen in Minnesota how quickly and tragically federal operations can escalate in the absence of transparency and accountability,” Ms. James, a Democrat, said in a statement. “My office is launching the Legal Observation Project to examine federal enforcement activity in New York and whether it remains within the bounds of the law.” Tricia McLaughlin, a spokeswoman for the Department of Homeland Security, accused Ms. James of backing so-called sanctuary laws that prohibit cooperation between immigration authorities and local jails and police forces in certain parts of New York. (While Ms. James is broadly supportive of sanctuary laws, the policies are enacted by city and county officials, not the attorney general’s office). “ICE law enforcement wouldn’t have to be in the field in New York if we had state and local cooperation,” she said in a statement. “Letitia James is not letting that happen, which puts New Yorkers in danger.” After the fatal shootings in January of two American citizens in Minneapolis, Renee Good and Alex Pretti, the Trump administration has come under scrutiny — from lawmakers, judges and voters — over the use of excessive force by its immigration officers. Democrats in Congress have pressed President Trump to rein in his mass deportation operation and to impose restrictions on immigration agents, demanding that they stop wearing masks and cease searches and arrests without warrants.

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ABC News [2/3/2026 12:06 PM, Staff, 34146K]
CBS News [2/3/2026 11:03 AM, Staff, 51110K] Video: HERE
CBS New York
NewsMax [2/3/2026 11:46 AM, Brian Freeman, 3760K]
Telemundo47 [2/3/2026 4:29 PM, Staff, 78K]

New York Post [2/3/2026 4:28 PM, Tina Moore, 40934K] reports court officials insisted that a judge had no clue there was a federal warrant on a sex offender migrant from Mexico who strolled free from a Manhattan courtroom last week — even as New York’s Finest doubled down Tuesday and said the jurist was alerted. The NYPD said Judge Sheridan Jack-Browne should have seen a notation in the file that the career criminal Gerardo Miguel Mora was a wanted, deported felon. Mora, 45, was in Manhattan Criminal Court on Jan. 29 to face a shoplifting charge from a day earlier, records show. But Mora was wanted on a federal arrest warrant. He had been deported from the US in 2014 after serving a year and a half in an upstate prison for an attempted rape in Midtown, and he had a long rap sheet – including a recent crack-possession charge in Manhattan. But he waltzed out of the courtroom, leading vigilant federal marshals to collar him near a rear exit of the courthouse, according to records and law enforcement sources. Federal authorities had been looking for Mora on an arrest warrant under a section of the US code that concerns "reentry of removed aliens," and were there to arrest him, The Post exclusively reported on Sunday. Law enforcement sources blamed Jack-Browne for not acting on information that was in her "packet." But "the judge didn’t know about the warrant," a court insider said. "It wasn’t in the file." Further, court officials claim an NYPD note in the file said the warrant should not be honored. And NYPD officials now insist that even if the warrant was not in the judge’s file, a note identifying Mora as a federal fugitive was.

Univision [2/3/2026 2:06 PM, Staff, 4937K] reports a new series of raids by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) shook the communities of Hackensack and Fairview on Monday. These actions come on top of immigration raids recorded over the weekend in Hoboken and Jersey City, which have intensified the climate of fear experienced by immigrant communities. From early morning, residents reported the mobilization of federal agents in residential and commercial areas, just as many families were leaving for work and school. Videos recorded by residents during the raid in Hackensack show federal vehicles blocking even a school bus, a scene that caused further alarm among neighbors. Following the raids in Hackensack and Fairview, residents say that going out on the street is no longer the same. The fear of encountering federal agents has altered the daily routine of many immigrant families. So far, the exact number of people arrested during the operations in New Jersey is unknown, as the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has not released any further information.

Washington Examiner [2/4/2026 2:40 AM, Staff, 1147K] reports Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner drew the ire of the Department of Homeland Security, as well as elected officials throughout the country, for his recent comments at an "ICE OUT" press conference about "hunting down" Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers similar to the way they "hunted down Nazis for decades." It marks the second time Krasner compared ICE officers to Nazis in less than a month. "This is a small bunch of wannabe Nazis, that’s what they are, in a country of 350 million," Krasner said about ICE officers. "We outnumber them, and as long as we stick to our values, protect our rights, make it very clear that homicide is not OK just because you are a federal law officer, if we do that, this will end differently.” "There will be accountability now, there will be accountability in the future, there will be accountability after Trump is out of office," Krasner said. "If we have to hunt you down the way they hunted down Nazis for decades, we will find your identities, we will find you, we will achieve justice, and we will do so under the Constitution and the laws of the United States." The comments comparing ICE officers to Nazis and the claim that they will be "hunted down" were rebuked by Department of Homeland Security Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin. She called Krasner’s remarks "vile." "He is intentionally stoking the flames of hatred and division in this country for political gain," said McLaughlin. "Calling law enforcement Nazis and encouraging violence and doxing of them is absolutely disgusting." "The violence and dehumanization of these men and women who are simply enforcing the law must stop," she added.

CBS Philadelphia [2/3/2026 4:46 PM, Joe Brant, 51110K] reports that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has acquired a massive 64-acre warehouse property in rural Berks County, Pennsylvania, that may soon be used for detaining people. A deed obtained by CBS News Philadelphia shows ICE bought the property at 3501 Mountain Road in Upper Bern Township for $87 million Monday. The property is just off Interstate 78 and close to an Amazon fulfillment center. The sale happened about 16 months after the property was acquired by commercial real estate investment firm PCCP. In September 2024, PCCP bought the property for $57.5 million from Transwestern Development Co. and QuadReal Property Group, according to Traded, a site that tracks major commercial real estate deals. In response to an inquiry about the purchase, an ICE spokesperson said the "One Big Beautiful Bill" gave ICE "new funding to expand detention space to keep these criminals off American streets before they are removed for good from our communities.". Traded’s listing says the warehouse building is 518,140 square feet, with 40-foot ceilings and 100 loading docks. Township Solicitor Andrew D. Hoffman provided a statement on behalf of the township: Upper Bern Township learned yesterday that the United States of America, with an address of U.S. Immigration & Customs Enforcement Agency in Washington, D.C., purchased the GACSD warehouse located at 3501 Mountain Road, Hamburg, Berks County, PA. The Township was not involved in this transfer and has not received any applications from either the prior or new owners regarding the future use of the property. The Township has no further comment on this matter at this time.

Washington Times [2/3/2026 1:55 PM, Mary McCue Bell, 1323K] reports that both chambers of the Maryland General Assembly passed two bills to effectively end local law enforcement cooperation agreements with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The bills would end existing and prohibit new 287(g) agreements, which allow local police and correctional officers to assist ICE with immigration enforcement duties. The different types of 287(g) agreements include permitting police officials to ask about immigration status during an arrest and requiring local jails to check the immigration status of detainees and turn undocumented people over to ICE. Eight Maryland jurisdictions have 287(g) cooperating agreements with ICE. Such agreements have increased in the past year as the Trump administration carries out its immigration crackdown. Democratic Gov. Wes Moore, who is up for reelection this year, has not publicly stated whether he supports the bills. But on Friday, his office told Baltimore’s WBAL-TV that he is “gravely concerned” about ICE’s actions in his state and across the country. “Instead of focusing on violent offenders or public safety, the federal administration has wrecked chaos and made communities less safe,” his office said. “The governor has made crystal clear: Maryland has no place for agents who are untrained, unqualified and unaccountable.” CASA, an immigration advocacy group, praised the legislation’s passage.

FOX News [2/3/2026 7:34 PM, Greg Wehner, 37576K] reports U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) arrested a New Orleans Police Department recruit from Cameroon who was issued a firearm despite an active deportation order, just one week before he was set to graduate from the police academy. ICE said in a press release Tuesday that 46-year-old Larry Temah was arrested Jan. 28 and remains in ICE custody. The New Orleans Police Department recruited Temah and issued him a firearm despite federal law prohibiting illegal aliens from possessing firearms, according to ICE. Temah entered the U.S. legally in 2015 on a visitor visa and was granted conditional residency the following year after marrying a U.S. citizen, ICE said. In 2022, his application for permanent residency was denied due to fraud. Temah was ordered to appear in immigration court three times but failed to appear, resulting in an immigration judge ordering him removed from the country in absentia, ICE said. ICE also said Temah did not have valid work authorization and remains in custody pending removal proceedings. "This illegal alien from Cameroon, Larry Temah, is not only breaking the law with every step he takes in this country illegally, but the New Orleans Police Department hired him and issued him a firearm — what kind of law enforcement department gives criminal illegal aliens guns and badges?" Department of Homeland Security Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said. "It’s a felony for illegal aliens to possess a firearm.” McLaughlin said ICE is restoring law and order under President Trump and Secretary Noem and accused sanctuary cities such as New Orleans of protecting illegal aliens at the expense of American citizens. A spokesperson for the New Orleans Police Department disputed ICE’s claims, calling them misleading. "The New Orleans Police Department verified Mr. Temah’s employment eligibility through ICE’s E-Verify system prior to hiring and was never notified of any ICE detainer," the spokesperson told Fox News Digital. "New Orleans is not a sanctuary city, and NOPD does not control jail operations or detainer decisions, which fall under the Sheriff’s Office.” "Any claim that NOPD knowingly violated the law is false," the spokesperson added. [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

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Breitbart [2/3/2026 3:59 PM, John Binder, 2238K]
Breitbart [2/3/2026 5:22 PM, AWR Hawkins, 2238K]

Federalist [2/3/2026 7:27 AM, Joy Pullmann, 540K] reports on Monday Indiana lawmakers upgraded an immigration bill to require sheriffs to honor immigration detainers, require hospitals to identify illegal aliens using Medicaid, and penalize employers that hire illegal labor. State Rep. J.D. Prescott successfully amended Senate Bill 76 in committee Monday to incorporate key measures of a stronger enforcement bill he proposed in the House, known as the Fairness Act. The bill now goes to the full state House for a vote and then back to the Senate to accept the amendments. "The goal is to get this into a bill where the state of Indiana can partner with the Trump administration and Tom Homan … doing everything we can as a state to assist in those efforts to honor detainer requests, assist ICE in getting these illegal immigrants out of our state and country and make sure that employers are doing the right thing by only hiring a legal workforce," Prescot told The Federalist in a phone call. Supermajority-Republican Indiana has lagged behind other conservative states in mandating cooperation with federal immigration enforcement after former President Joe Biden’s open borders admitted historic numbers of fraudulently present foreigners. U.S. border czar Tom Homan visited Indiana in October to support the Fairness Act after Republican Sen. Liz Brown refused to allow a vote on a similar proposal in spring 2025. After getting a primary opponent, Brown sponsored SB76 in the current session. Prescott noted Brown accepted his friendly amendments and worked with him to improve SB76. Eighteen states require law enforcement to cooperate with Immigration and Customs Enforcement in some way, which the Indiana bill enhances. Texas has required this since 2017. Georgia passed an anti-sanctuary city law in 2024, as did Alabama, Arkansas, and Tennessee in 2025. Florida has required local police to cooperate with ICE in various ways for several years. The open borders advocacy group Immigrant Resource Legal Center said in May 2025 that Florida, Georgia, Iowa, Texas, and West Virginia have the strongest anti-sanctuary laws. These and other Republican-run states are considering bills to strengthen state-level immigration enforcement assistance.

Univision Chicago WGBO [2/3/2026 3:12 PM, Staff, 4937K] reports Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson signed an executive order called “ICE on Notice,” which aims to document and facilitate the prosecution of federal agents who engage in misconduct during operations in the city of Chicago. The mayor’s decision comes after a lack of legal consequences in several recent cases, including the shooting of Marimar Martinez in Chicago, the murder of Silverio Villegas Gonzalez in Franklin Park, and the deaths of Renee Good and Alex Pretti in Minneapolis. The order instructs the Chicago Police Department to observe, document, and preserve evidence of possible violations of state or local laws committed by federal agents, including those from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). During the announcement, Mayor Brandon Johnson stated that the order seeks to protect residents from what he described as dangerous operations. Additionally, the information gathered on alleged legal violations will be shared by the Chicago Police Department. The councilman explained that, although federal agents will continue to follow instructions from their superiors, the order will allow them to document the facts and act in favor of the affected people, especially if they are injured during an operation. The executive order comes amid rumors of a possible intensification of immigration operations during the spring in Chicago and its suburbs.

Daily Wire [2/3/2026 11:48 AM, Jennie Taer, 2314K] reports a controversial new bill in Illinois would ban federal immigration agents hired under the Trump administration from ever working as local police in the sanctuary state. Democratic Illinois State Senator Laura Fine, who is also running for Congress, introduced the legislation after the two recent fatal shootings in Minneapolis involving federal immigration authorities. Fine called the deaths of Renee Good and Alex Pretti "a glass break moment," adding, "enough is enough.” "It is blatantly obvious that ICE officers are not going through extensive training. Hiring ICE agents for our local and state police force is not a priority, keeping our communities safe is. And my bill aims to do just that," Fine said in a separate post. "The message is simple: If you enabled the cruelty of the Trump administration, you don’t get to wear a badge in Illinois," she earlier said. The bill lays out "that a law enforcement agency may not hire … any person who was hired as a federal immigration officer by the U.S. Department of Immigration and Customs Enforcement between January 20, 2025 and January 20, 2029.” The Department of Homeland Security hit back at Fine’s proposal, with Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin telling The Daily Wire that the Democratic lawmaker is wrongly villainizing ICE agents who are taking criminal illegal immigrants off the streets after they were released under sanctuary policies. "Illinois sanctuary politicians are falsely casting federal law enforcement as villains while ICE officers are being targeted, threatened, and doxxed simply for doing their jobs and enforcing our nation’s laws. Under President Trump and Secretary Noem, ICE is held to the highest professional standard and officers regularly receive ongoing training," McLaughlin said. "As our brave law enforcement arrests and removes dangerous criminal illegal aliens, including murderers, rapists, and gang members from our communities, America can be proud of the professionalism our officers bring to the job day-in and day-out. Instead of working with us, Illinois sanctuary politicians RELEASE violent criminals from their jails directly back into our communities to perpetrate more crimes and create more victims," she added.

Axios [2/3/2026 7:19 AM, Brittany Gibson and Kyle Stokes, 17364K] reports the Department of Homeland Security has been scouring industrial parks nationwide for empty warehouses to hold immigration detainees. A lack of detention space has been a bottleneck on the Trump administration’s push for mass deportations — and has led to severe overcrowding and deteriorating conditions at ICE’s holding facility at Fort Snelling, the Star Tribune has reported. Congress has given DHS billions to spend on potential holding sites nationwide — but so far, all DHS has found in the Twin Cities is pushback from neighbors. The owners of a Woodbury warehouse property told city officials last month they would not sell or lease to the federal government, which wanted to turn the vacant building into a detention center. In Shakopee, DFL state Rep. Brad Tabke said neighbors’ opposition scuttled plans for a facility to hold 1,500 detainees. (The property owner hasn’t confirmed this publicly, KSTP reported.) DHS has faced similar pushback in Maryland, Texas, New York, and Virginia, where anti-ICE demonstrators have packed county meeting rooms to protest detention expansions. DHS has already spent more than $170 million on properties in Maryland and Arizona, according to Bloomberg. State-run sites like Florida’s "Alligator Alcatraz" have brought hundreds more beds online — but also legal pushback.

FOX News [2/3/2026 2:12 PM, Michael Dorgan, 37576K] reports that anti-Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agitators in Minneapolis have set up a makeshift street checkpoint to track federal agents, stopping vehicles and questioning drivers to determine whether they are ICE officers, video shows. Agitators could be seen standing in the roadway near makeshift barricades and traffic cones while they stopped or flagged down passing vehicles. In one clip, an agitator dressed in a black coat and black mask was seen approaching a stopped vehicle and directly asking the driver if they were "ICE," before allowing the car to proceed. "It looks like in our system that your plates come up as an ICE plate," the agitator said to the driver. "That doesn’t seem like it’s the case," he added. "I just want to come through and ask what’s up and see how you’re doing.". The agitator also asked the driver for his name. "He’s clearly Somalian," someone is also heard saying. Journalist Jorge Ventura captured the video from the scene. Ventura asked the agitator what system they were using, pressing him on how the group was identifying vehicles and noting that the driver was not a federal agent. The agitator responded that ICE agents were renting a large number of vehicles and said the car would be taken "off the list.". The agitator acknowledged that the encounter was being posted on social media, but said many nearby residents supported the effort. [Editorial note: consult source link for video]

NPR [2/3/2026 4:49 AM, Sergio Martínez-Beltrán, 28764K] Audio: HERE reports in Minneapolis, some immigrants who have not gone to work because they fear being detained by ICE are at risk of eviction. There’s a growing number of grassroots efforts to provide rent relief. [Editorial note: consult audio at source link]

NPR [2/3/2026 4:35 PM, Kat Lonsdorf, 28764K] Audio: HERE reports a professional airplane enthusiast has been tracking the federally chartered deportation flights out of the Minneapolis airport as DHS sends detainees to other states and, eventually, other countries.

Reuters [2/3/2026 5:31 PM, Jonathan Allen, 38315K] reports U.S. President Donald Trump says he wants more help from Minnesota with enforcing federal immigration laws. Minnesota says its state-run prison system has long cooperated with federal immigration agents, to the maximum extent required and allowed by law. So do many sheriff-run county jails. Trump administration officials have said the deployment of thousands of armed agents into Minnesota’s cities to deport migrants would continue if they do not get more cooperation from state and local officials. The agents have fatally shot two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis who were observing or protesting the surge, sparking angry demonstrations across the country. The DOC says it has long cooperated with ICE, and abides by state law that requires it to notify ICE each time it takes into custody someone convicted of a felony who is not a U.S. citizen, even if ICE has not yet sent a detainer request. As of early February, there were about 8,000 people in DOC prisons, of whom around 380 were not U.S. citizens, according to the department. The DOC says it always cooperates with ICE detainer requests, working with ICE agents ahead of the prisoner’s release date at the end of their state custodial sentence to arrange a transfer to federal custody. In 2025, this successfully happened with all 84 state prisoners sought by ICE, the department says. Some sheriffs cooperate with ICE in a similar manner as the state prison system: sheriffs in seven of Minnesota’s 87 counties have signed formal cooperation agreements with ICE. Others say cooperation can undermine public safety if immigrants who are victims of or witnesses to crimes are afraid to come forward.

AP [2/3/2026 5:11 PM, Eric Tucker and Alanna Durkin Richer, 1323K] reports that a new wave of departures is rippling through the U.S. Attorney’s office in Minnesota, where additional federal prosecutors are leaving at a time of mounting frustration with the Trump administration’s stepped-up immigration enforcement and the Justice Department’s response to fatal shootings of civilians by federal agents, two people familiar with the matter said Tuesday. The latest departures are on top of a half-dozen attorneys who left the office last month amid disagreements over the Justice Department’s response to the shooting of Renee Good by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer. At least one supervisory agent in the FBI’s Minneapolis office is known to have resigned last month as well. The Minnesota Star Tribune reported Monday evening that eight lawyers have since departed the office or announced plans to do so. A person familiar with the matter, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss non-public personnel moves, confirmed that this number was correct and that more departures were likely. Another person also confirmed a new wave of departures in the office. The office did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The resignations reflect the turbulence that has roiled the state over the last month or so as law enforcement officials have clashed over how to respond to violent confrontations during the heightened immigration enforcement. Minnesota officials, for instance, raised alarm after federal officials blocked state investigators from accessing evidence in the Good shooting and declared that Minnesota has no jurisdiction to investigate the killing. The Justice Department also declined to open a civil rights investigation into her death.

Washington Post [2/3/2026 6:00 AM, María Luisa Paúl, David Ovalle, and David Nakamura, 24826K] reports two detainees at the nation’s main immigrant family detention center, in Dilley, Texas, have tested positive for measles, authorities said, alarming lawmakers and attorneys who fear the virus could spread in the crowded facility. The active cases were confirmed by the Texas Department of State Health Services on Jan. 31. The Department of Homeland Security said officials at the South Texas Family Residential Center moved to quarantine anyone who had made contact with the two people and took steps to limit movement of those inside the facility, which is about 70 miles south of San Antonio. “Medical staff is continuing to monitor the detainees’ conditions and will take appropriate and active steps to prevent further infection,” DHS assistant secretary Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement. “All detainees are being provided with proper medical care.” McLaughlin did not say how the detainees were exposed, whether any other potential cases are under investigation, or how many of the approximately 1,100 detainees in the facility — which include adults and children — have been vaccinated.

Axios [2/3/2026 6:08 PM, Naheed Rajwani-Dharsi, 17364K] reports local officials and residents are pushing back on the possibility of a new ICE detention center in Hutchins. ICE’s detention population has nearly doubled over the past year, and the agency is experiencing a bottleneck on mass deportations. The Hutchins City Council will hold a special meeting at 6pm Wednesday, mostly behind closed doors, to discuss a 1 million-square-foot warehouse reportedly under consideration by ICE. ICE was considering nearly two dozen sites across the country, including a warehouse off Interstate 45 and Interstate 20 in Hutchins, the Washington Post reported in December. The Department of Homeland Security identified Hutchins as the possible site of a large-scale ICE detention center, according to a person close to the agency who asked not to be identified because they weren’t authorized to share the plans. A document shared with Axios listing two dozen potential sites included Hutchins as the largest proposed facility, with an estimated 9,500 beds. Hutchins Mayor Mario Vasquez said his office is talking to Dallas County officials and "all the way to Washington" to stop any of ICE’s plans to expand to the city. Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins tells Axios a 9,500-bed ICE facility would not logistically work in Hutchins, which has a population of around 5,600 people. "At this time, we have no new detention centers to announce," a DHS spokesperson said in a statement on Tuesday.

Axios [2/3/2026 5:47 PM, Megan Stringer, 17364K] reports several San Antonio elected officials aren’t happy about reports that ICE is eyeing a warehouse on the city’s East Side to expand its detention space, but it’s not clear what they can do about it. The federal government directly purchases facilities, making it harder — but not impossible — for local officials to combat the Trump administration’s plans to scale up its detention capacity. A lack of detention space has been a bottleneck in President Trump’s push for mass deportations — and has led to overcrowding and illnesses at ICE’s facility in Dilley, south of San Antonio. ICE completed the purchase of a vacant warehouse at 542 S.E. Loop 410 from Atlanta-based Oakmont Industrial Group, the Express-News reported Tuesday, citing two anonymous sources. In a statement to Axios Tuesday, an ICE spokesperson said the agency had no new detention centers to announce, but it is "actively working to expand detention space." Bexar County Commissioner Tommy Calvert, who represents the East Side, tells Axios that the city and county should both explore other legal options to halt a new detention center — such as filing an injunction based on the lack of an environmental impact study that is typically required by the federal government. DHS has scouted dozens of locations, including sites outside Dallas, in El Paso and the Rio Grande Valley, to retrofit into ICE detention centers. The biggest ones could hold as many as 9,500 people. Now that the agency has $45 billion to spend from the "big, beautiful bill," it’s quickly making purchases for hundreds of millions of dollars. These sites will require additional spending to retrofit them to house people — for up to six months, as permitted by law — before deportation.

ABC News [2/3/2026 10:52 AM, Marwa Mouaki, 34146K] reports a family in Arlington, Texas, grieved as they laid 30-year-old Wael Tarabishi to rest. His father, Maher Tarabishi, however, was not at the funeral. Instead, he was at an Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention center nearly three hours away in Anson, Texas. Wael faced a long battle with Advanced Pompe Disease, causing him to be severely disabled. Maher was by his side through it all, and has been described as his son’s arms, legs and lungs because of how involved and essential he was in his life. Maher, a Jordanian native, overstayed a tourist visa here in the U.S. in 1994, his family and advocates said via @freemahertrabishi on Instagram account. The U.S. government allowed Maher to remain in the country legally to care for Wael through a Supervision Order in 2008, according to the account. Maher presented himself at the Dallas field office to fulfill conditions of the Supervision Order last year for his annual check-in appointment, but found the building under temporary closure, the account noted. In an act of good will, the account said, Maher visited the office again once it re-opened. Despite maintaining lawful status and carrying valid documentation of Wael’s condition, officers placed Maher in handcuffs and was told to "shut up and sit down" as he pleaded with them, according to the account. After Maher was detained by ICE in October 2025, his family and advocates rallied to reunite the father and son. They said Wael, a U.S. citizen, would die without Maher’s care. Three months later, he did. After Wael’s death on Jan. 23, heartbroken family and supporters desperately tried to get ICE to allow Maher to attend his son’s funeral on Thursday. Late Tuesday night, ICE gave final word that Maher would be denied permission. In a statement to ABC News, ICE accused Maher of being part of an organization the U.S. deems a terrorist group. "Maher Mohd Tarabishi, 62, a criminal alien and self-admitted member of the Palestine Liberation Organization -- a murderous foreign terrorist organization that has carried out countless terrorist attacks and plane hijackings, was arrested by ICE officers Oct. 28 in Dallas, Texas. Shockingly, Tarabishi has been permitted to remain in the U.S. illegally for nearly two decades despite being ordered removed from the U.S. by both an immigration judge and the Board of Immigration Appeals," the agency said. According to ICE, the Obama administration proactively filed a joint motion to dismiss the immigration case against Tarabishi in 2011, "despite the fact that he had admitted to being a member of a foreign terrorist organization" and had been ordered removed. The agency said its arrest of Tarabishi "shows clear evidence of the game-changing impact the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement efforts are having.”

Houston Chronicle [2/3/2026 4:27 PM, Nancy M. Preyor-Johnson, 2493K] reports Texas National Guard members are “embedded” at immigration detention facilities in Texas, including the South Texas Family Residential Center in Dilley, according to U.S. Rep. Joaquin Castro. Castro, a San Antonio Democrat, told the Express-News that he first learned of the Guard’s presence from sources who are not authorized to speak publicly. He said he later confirmed the information with ICE personnel during visits to the facilities. He went public with his claim during a live Facebook video on Monday in which he also discussed detention conditions at Dilley, the case of a Minnesota child detained by ICE, and a measles outbreak. Castro asserts the Guard members, who he said were wearing civilian clothing instead of military uniforms, are assisting ICE operations at detention and processing centers in Dilley, Pearsall and other Texas cities.

FOX News [2/3/2026 7:42 AM, Michael Dorgan, 37576K] reports a Honduran illegal immigrant who fled the United States after killing an Iowa woman in 2016 while driving drunk in Nebraska has been sentenced to more than 20 years in prison. Eswin Mejia was sentenced to 20 to 22 years in prison on Monday after being convicted on charges of motor vehicle homicide and flight to avoid arrest, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) announced. Mejia, who was living in the U.S. illegally, was driving drunk when he crashed into 21-year-old Sarah Root’s vehicle at a stoplight in Omaha, Nebraska, in January 2016. Root, an Iowa native, later died at a hospital. Mejia was detained and charged, but he fled the country after being released on bond. He was later added to the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) "Most Wanted" list. At the time of his arrest, ICE said that Mejia was not an "enforcement priority." In March 2025, the Trump administration announced the extradition of Sarah’s killer from Honduras to the United States to face justice once and for all. It came after Honduras reached an agreement with the United States to continue a century-old extradition treaty. It was the first time Honduras had ever extradited someone to the U.S. for homicide. "The criminal illegal alien who stole Sarah Root’s life was just convicted to 21 years. Nothing will bring her back, but I am glad to see some justice for Sarah’s family," DHS Secretary Kristi Noem said.

Reported similarly:
Breitbart [2/3/2026 1:47 PM, John Binder, 2238K]

Axios [2/3/2026 12:42 PM, Staff, 17364K] reports that Colorado Democrats are calling on the Department of Homeland Security to investigate the ace of spade cards that ICE agents allegedly placed on abandoned vehicles in Eagle County last month. The latest: U.S. Sen. John Hickenlooper and his Democratic colleagues in Congress issued a letter Tuesday to DHS Secretary Kristi Noem demanding a detailed briefing on ICE activities in Eagle County. Why it matters: Colorado Democrats — who are pushing to block DHS funding — say the tactic sought to intimidate the county’s Latino population by using an emblem known as a "death card." Between the lines: U.S. soldiers used the ace of spades as an intimidation tactic during the Vietnam War, something Voces Unidas, in a blog post Wednesday, alleged immigration authorities were attempting to replicate. The big picture: The cards were found inside two abandoned cars belonging to ICE detainees in the Western Slope county, Alex Sanchez, president and CEO of Voces Unidas, a Glenwood Springs-based immigrant advocacy nonprofit, told Axios at the time. What they’re saying: "This behavior undermines public trust in law enforcement, raises serious civil rights concerns, and falls far short of the professional standards expected of federal agents," the letter reads. State of play: ICE last month condemned the card’s placement and said it would investigate. Colorado Newsline [2/3/2026 4:50 PM, Sara Wilson, 111K] reports that, known as the “death card,” the ace of spades has been associated with psychological warfare, as U.S. soldiers left the card on the bodies of dead Vietnamese soldiers during the Vietnam War. “It is unacceptable and dangerous for federal law enforcement to use this symbol to intimidate Latino communities. This behavior undermines public trust in law enforcement, raises serious civil rights concerns, and falls far short of the professional standards expected of federal agents,” the letter reads. The group of lawmakers is requesting, by Feb. 13, a briefing on ICE activity in Eagle County, a written report about an ongoing Homeland Security investigation, a separate investigation by the Homeland Security Office of Inspector General into the Denver Field Office, and confirmation of any corrective action.

Axios [2/3/2026 12:42 PM, Staff, 17364K] reports that Colorado Democrats are calling on the Department of Homeland Security to investigate the ace of spade cards that ICE agents allegedly placed on abandoned vehicles in Eagle County last month. The latest: U.S. Sen. John Hickenlooper and his Democratic colleagues in Congress issued a letter Tuesday to DHS Secretary Kristi Noem demanding a detailed briefing on ICE activities in Eagle County. Why it matters: Colorado Democrats — who are pushing to block DHS funding — say the tactic sought to intimidate the county’s Latino population by using an emblem known as a "death card." Between the lines: U.S. soldiers used the ace of spades as an intimidation tactic during the Vietnam War, something Voces Unidas, in a blog post Wednesday, alleged immigration authorities were attempting to replicate. The big picture: The cards were found inside two abandoned cars belonging to ICE detainees in the Western Slope county, Alex Sanchez, president and CEO of Voces Unidas, a Glenwood Springs-based immigrant advocacy nonprofit, told Axios at the time. What they’re saying: "This behavior undermines public trust in law enforcement, raises serious civil rights concerns, and falls far short of the professional standards expected of federal agents," the letter reads. State of play: ICE last month condemned the card’s placement and said it would investigate.

AP [2/3/2026 6:43 PM, Claire Rush, 35287K] reports federal officers are temporarily restricted from using tear gas at protests outside a Portland immigration building, a judge in Oregon ruled Tuesday, just days after agents fired gas into a crowd of demonstrators that local officials described as peaceful and which included young children. U.S. District Judge Michael Simon ordered federal officers to not use chemical or projectile munitions unless the person targeted poses an imminent threat of physical harm. Simon also limited federal officers from firing munitions at the head, neck or torso "unless the officer is legally justified in using deadly force against that person." The temporary restraining order will be in effect for 14 days. The ruling came in response to a lawsuit filed by the ACLU of Oregon on behalf of protesters and freelance journalists covering demonstrations at the flashpoint U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement building. The suit names as defendants the Department of Homeland Security and its head Kristi Noem, as well as President Donald Trump. It argues that federal officers’ use of chemical munitions and excessive force is a retaliation against protesters that chills their First Amendment rights.

Reuters [2/3/2026 10:08 AM, Frank Pingue and Max A. Cherney, 36480K] reports the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has no plans to conduct immigration operations at the Super Bowl, two people familiar with the security arrangements said on Monday. Security at Sunday’s game in Santa Clara that will see the Seattle Seahawks face off against the New England Patriots is expected to be consistent with past Super Bowls, according to one of the people, who cited an email sent last week from the Bay Area Host Committee to elected officials in the Bay Area. ICE immigration enforcement is not typically conducted at Super Bowls.

Axios [2/3/2026 5:22 PM, Nadia Lopez, 17364K] reports there are no planned ICE operations tied to the Super Bowl, local and federal officials said Tuesday during a press conference in San Francisco. Amid a nationwide immigration crackdown under President Trump, officials are working to reassure the public that Super Bowl security is solely focused on safety and will operate as it has in previous years. Department of Homeland Security federal coordinator Jeffrey Brannigan said that the surge of federal personnel is strictly in support of Super Bowl security in San Francisco, Santa Clara and San Jose. NFL chief security officer Cathy Lanier said there are no immigration enforcement operations tied to the game at Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara or its surrounding regional events. Expect to see a heightened police presence in downtown, near the Moscone Center and other areas this week as part of the city’s safety plan. Telemundo47 [2/3/2026 4:57 PM, Staff, 78K] reports "There are no known planned ICE or immigration enforcement operations surrounding the Super Bowl or any other related events," NFL Chief Safety Officer Cathy Lanier said Tuesday during a public safety press conference. "I will say...", Lanier continued, "that there is no known specific or credible threat to the Super Bowl or any of our related events." The Department of Homeland Security (DHS), Lanier explained, has collaborated with the NFL "for more than 20 years." He acknowledged that other DHS agencies might be present on the field over the weekend. DHS official Corey Lewandowski, a key advisor to DHS Secretary Kristi Noem, stated in October that ICE agents would be conducting immigration checks at the game. When asked this week to clarify ICE’s role, DHS spokeswoman Tricia McLaughlin declined to confirm whether federal immigration agents will be present at the Super Bowl. Local leaders have also stated that they have been informed that immigration raids will not take place this weekend. Regardless of official statements, community members have already begun taking action to protest against ICE in the lead-up to the Super Bowl.

Reported similarly:
FOX News [2/3/2026 1:55 PM, Paulina Dedaj, 37576K]

NewsMax [2/3/2026 9:40 PM, Sam Barron, 3760K] reports a law in California bans federal law enforcement officers from wearing masks while on duty, but the Los Angeles Police Department has no plans to enforce it. Police Chief Jim McDonnell told KABC that one armed agency approaching another armed agency to create conflict doesn’t make sense. He criticized the No Secret Police Act, saying it was not a good policy decision and not well thought out. McDonnell has condemned the way immigration enforcement has been conducted in the city. "We are in line with our federal partners on everything except immigration enforcement," he said. "What we’ve seen since June here in Los Angeles and seen across the country, we’re as frustrated as everybody else — about the way that’s being done," McDonnell said. McDonnell said he is concerned people wouldn’t call police if they need help, but acknowledged there is no evidence of a decrease in calls to law enforcement. The police chief told "Good Day Los Angeles" the department does not work with federal law enforcement. "We’ve been solid on that since 1979. That’s been our policy," he said. "That’s worked for us. We cannot afford to alienate immigrant communities within Los Angeles," McDonnell said. "We’ve built up trust over many years, and we can’t afford to lose that trust," he continued. "We’ve tried to be as clear as we can about what our position is relative to ICE and immigration enforcement. We don’t work with ICE on that," McDonnell added. Tricia McLaughlin, a spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security, said the state’s mask ban was unconstitutional. "At a time that ICE law enforcement faces a 1,000% increase in assaults and their family members are being doxxed and targeted, the sitting Governor of California signed unconstitutional legislation that strips law enforcement of protections in a disgusting, diabolical fundraising and PR stunt," McLaughlin said in a statement last fall when the bill was signed. The state has agreed not to enforce the measure while a lawsuit filed by the Trump administration makes its way through the courts.

Reuters [2/4/2026 12:22 AM, Helen Coster and Steve Gorman, 38315K] reports lawyers for the family of a California man shot dead by an off-duty U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent outside his apartment on New Year’s Eve urged the state’s attorney general on Tuesday to open an independent investigation of the killing. Prominent civil rights attorney Ben Crump told reporters that relatives of Keith Porter Jr., the 43-year-old father of two who was gunned down on January 31, lacked faith in the Los Angeles Police Department to conduct a "fair and transparent investigation" of the shooting. Details of Porter’s killing have remained sketchy. According to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, which oversees ICE, Porter was a suspected "active shooter" killed in an exchange of gunfire with the off-duty immigration agent who confronted him. The officer, whose identity DHS has not made public, lived at the same apartment complex as Porter and was "protecting his community," agency spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin said. Reuters could not independently verify the account given by DHS, and the Los Angeles Police Department has released few details of the incident. Jamal Tooson, another lawyer for Porter’s loved ones, suggested the LAPD was dragging its feet in its investigation. "It has been over a month since Keith Porter’s death, and we still haven’t gotten meaningful answers," Tooson said at the news conference. He and Crump called for California Attorney General Rob Bonta to initiate an independent inquiry of Porter’s death, drawing parallels to last month’s fatal shootings of two other U.S. citizens - Renee Good and Alex Pretti - by federal immigration agents in Minneapolis. In response to a request from Reuters for comment, Bonta’s office issued a statement declining to "confirm or deny any potential or ongoing investigation." While Porter’s killing had nothing to do with the deportation crackdown ordered by President Donald Trump in Minneapolis, Tooson said the three killings taken together showed that federal immigration officers are "acting with immunity and a license to kill." The Los Angeles Times, citing accounts of "friends and advocates," has reported that Porter was firing a gun into the air to celebrate the new year - an illegal but not uncommon practice authorities strongly discourage because of the danger it poses to bystanders. The group Black Lives Matter presented a similar narrative in a press release last month, saying Porter’s celebratory gunfire prompted the ICE-employed neighbor to take matters into his own hands. According to the BLM account, the off-duty agent ducked inside his own apartment, "put on his tactical gear, grabbed his ICE-issued firearm" and stepped back outside to shoot Porter dead. At Tuesday’s press conference, Tooson said there were "multiple people" who were outside shooting at the time, but after canvassing the neighborhood himself he had yet to find "one witness" who recalled seeing Porter firing a gun.

Blaze [2/3/2026 4:35 PM, Carlos Garcia, 1556K] reports leaders of a Methodist church in California say the church was "desecrated" by federal immigration agents and suggested that their right to worship had been violated by the operation. The Department of Homeland Security released a statement denying that agents had targeted the church and clarified that the illegal alien who was detained had previously been removed from the U.S. in 2016. Leaders said they were forced to stop their ministries because of the operation. A nonprofit leader said that Chavez had sought refuge at the church but agents did not hesitate to rush in. The DHS issued a statement saying that other illegal aliens were captured during the operation. "U.S. Border Patrol did NOT target United Methodist Church or its parking lot in North Hills, California," said the DHS in the statement. "On January 29, Border Patrol conducted an immigration enforcement operation in the area of Rayen Street and Sepulveda Boulevard that resulted in the arrest of Carlos Chavez-Guzman, an illegal alien from Mexico who was previously removed from this country in 2016," the department added. "Chavez-Guzman chose to run from law enforcement, a federal crime, leading them on a foot chase before his arrest." Two other individuals from Mexico were arrested and taken into ICE custody, the DHS said. Chavez’s wife told KTLA-TV that he had already been deported to Mexico.

Los Angeles Times [2/3/2026 4:42 PM, Salvador Hernandez, 12718K] reports authorities in Los Angeles on Tuesday touted the results of a statewide crackdown on human trafficking, announcing the arrests of more than 600 suspects and saying more than 170 victims were rescued as part of the operation. The weeklong campaign was part of an annual effort spearheaded by the Los Angeles Regional Human Trafficking Task Force, and 80 local, state and federal law enforcement agencies looking to curb a crime that officials said targets the most vulnerable. Operations focused on corridors known for prostitution, and also involved parole and probation checks on individuals previously arrested for similar crimes, authorities said. This year’s operation was conducted the last week of January, but law enforcement officials stressed enforcement was ongoing. A total of 611 criminal arrests were conducted, and 156 adults were rescued as part of the operations, officials said. In addition, 14 children were rescued from sex trafficking. Officials said 71 suspected traffickers were arrested, and an additional 328 sex buyers were arrested. The numbers were noticeably higher than previous operations. Luna attributed the higher number this year to the information and experience the task force has developed.

Reported similarly:
CBS Los Angeles [2/3/2026 3:16 PM, Austin Turner, 51110K]

USA Today [2/3/2026 5:24 PM, Paris Barraza, 70643K] reports a Southern California legislator has introduced a bill that would allow for remote court appearances through the end of President Donald Trump’s second term, a move that could prevent people from encountering federal immigration enforcement agents at a time when detentions have been happening near churches, schools and courthouses. It’s among a string of legislation introduced this year and passed last year that seeks to shape how federal immigration enforcement plays out in the state as Americans navigate tense — and at times, deadly — interactions with federal immigration agents. That includes legislation that tackles federal immigration enforcement operations at California schools and the controversial No Secret Police Act. Senate Bill 882, called the Keep Courts Safe from the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Act, was introduced by California State Senator Susan Rubio. She serves a swath of Los Angeles and San Bernardino residents as the seat holder of California’s 22nd Senate District.

ABC News [2/3/2026 11:05 AM, Staff, 34146K] reports a federal judge on Monday blocked the Trump administration from ending Temporary Protected Status for more than 350,000 Haitian immigrants. In an 83-page opinion, U.S. District Judge Ana Reyes granted a stay maintaining the legal status of Haitian nationals "pending judicial review." In her ruling, she accused Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem of "preordaining" her termination decision, saying she "did so because of hostility to nonwhite immigrants.” "There is an old adage among lawyers," Judge Reyes wrote. "If you have the facts on your side, pound the facts. If you have the law on your side, pound the law. If you have neither, pound the table.” "Secretary Noem, the record to-date shows, does not have the facts on her side -- or at least has ignored them," Reyes continued. "Does not have the law on her side -- or at least has ignored it. Having neither and bringing the adage into the 21st century, she pounds X (f/k/a Twitter).” Judge Reyes wrote that while Noem has a First Amendment right "to call immigrants killers, leeches, [and] entitlement junkies," she is constrained by the Constitution and federal law to "apply faithfully the facts to the law in implementing the TPS program.” "The Government does not cite any reason termination must occur post haste," Reyes wrote. "Secretary Noem complains of strains unlawful immigrants place on our immigration-enforcement system. Her answer? Turn 352,959 lawful immigrants into unlawful immigrants overnight.” The federal judge noted that Noem "has terminated every TPS country designation to have reached her desk -- twelve countries up, twelve countries down.” DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin released a statement to ABC News on Monday night, saying, "Supreme Court, here we come.” "This is lawless activism that we will be vindicated on. Haiti’s TPS was granted following an earthquake that took place over 15 years ago, it was never intended to be a de facto amnesty program, yet that’s how previous administrations have used it for decades. Temporary means temporary and the final word will not be from an activist judge legislating from the bench," McLaughlin said.

Reported similarly:
Wall Street Journal [2/3/2026 2:17 PM, Alyssa Lukpat, 646K]
The Hill [2/3/2026 10:55 AM, Max Rego, 18170K]
Blaze [2/3/2026 12:05 PM, Joseph MacKinnon, 1556K]
Daily Caller [2/3/2026 9:29 AM, Jason Hopkins, 803K]

AP [2/3/2026 3:43 PM, Luis Andres Henao and Liseberth Guillaume, 35287K] reports Roudechel Charpentier moved to Springfield in 2023 to escape the violence in his native Haiti, enrolled in college and got a part-time job at a fast-food restaurant. He’s been losing sleep over the Trump administration’s push to end the temporary protected status, or TPS, that allows him and roughly 350,000 other Haitians to live and work in the U.S. Although a judge intervened Monday to keep the protection in place while a lawsuit challenging the administration’s order plays out, Charpentier’s driver’s license was set to expire Tuesday, and he’s worried he still might be forced to leave before he can graduate in May. “Everybody is happy right now,” said Charpentier, an agriculture technology major at Clark State College. “Everything is not done yet because we don’t have the final decision on TPS. But the situation is much better than last week.” The Monday ruling by U.S. District Judge Ana Reyes came a day before the scheduled ending of TPS status for Haitians. The Homeland Security secretary may grant the designation if conditions in home countries are deemed unsafe for return due to a natural disaster, political instability or other dangers. TPS recipients are allowed to live and work in the U.S., but the status doesn’t provide a legal pathway to citizenship. The U.S. initially gave it to Haitians following the catastrophic 2010 earthquake that rocked their Caribbean island homeland, and extended it several times since. It’s been 16 years since Haitians became eligible for temporary protective status, and many have grown up in the U.S. and worry about what their futures might hold. Hansmie Pierre, 22, hasn’t been back to Haiti since moving to Florida in 2007 at age 4. She said the uncertainty over TPS forced her to confront the idea that she might not get to see her new nephew in Jacksonville grow up. In addition to Haitians, President Donald Trump has aggressively sought to strip of TPS protections from other nationalities as part of his administration’s wider, mass deportation effort. They include about 600,000 Venezuelans, 60,000 people from Honduras, Nicaragua and Nepal, more than 160,000 Ukrainians and thousands of people from Afghanistan and Cameroon. Some have pending lawsuits in federal courts. Pierre said the TPS program’s impacts permeate so many lives. In her written opinion, Reyes said the plaintiffs’ lawsuit was likely to prevail on its merits and that she found it “substantially likely” that Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem preordained her decision to end Haitians’ TPS status because of “hostility to nonwhite immigrants.” Department of Homeland Security spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin denounced the ruling as “lawless activism.” “Haiti’s TPS was granted following an earthquake that took place over 15 years ago,” she said in a statement. “It was never intended to be a de facto amnesty program, yet that’s how previous administrations have used it for decades.”

Reported similarly:
NewsNation [2/3/2026 8:57 AM, Brooke Shafer, 4464K]

Daily Signal [2/3/2026 11:30 AM, Virginia Allen, 474K] reports the Trump administration will ask the Supreme Court to take up its case aimed at ending the protected immigration status of about 350,000 Haitians living in the United States. "Supreme Court, here we come," Department of Homeland Security Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin wrote on X after a federal judge issued an order Monday night halting the termination of Temporary Protected Status for Haitian nationals. The protections from deportation were set to expire Tuesday, but District Judge Ana C. Reyes of the District of Columbia halted the administration’s move to end the status, declaring Haitians living in the U.S. under TPS will be allowed to remain until there is further judicial review of the case. At the end of November, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem announced she was terminating TPS for Haitians on Feb. 3 after a previous attempt to do so was blocked in the courts. "After reviewing country conditions and consulting with appropriate U.S. Government agencies, the Secretary determined that Haiti no longer meets the conditions for the designation for Temporary Protected Status," stated the announcement in the Federal Registrar. TPS allows foreign nationals to live and work in the U.S. for a period of time, and is usually granted to citizens of nations experiencing war or recovering from a major natural disaster. The first administration of President Donald Trump attempted to end the status for Haitians, but it remained in place due to court rulings and injunctions. President Joe Biden then redesignated Haiti for TPS in 2021. Haiti’s temporary protected status was "never intended to be a de facto amnesty program, yet that’s how previous administrations have used it for decades," McLaughlin said. "Temporary means temporary and the final word will not be from an activist judge legislating from the bench.” Reyes issued a stern rebuke of Noem in her order Monday evening, asserting that the homeland security secretary "neither" has the "law" nor the "facts" on her side to end TPS for Haitians as she attempted to do. "Secretary Noem, however, is constrained by both our Constitution and the [Administrative Procedure Act] to apply faithfully the facts to the law in implementing the TPS Program," Reyes wrote in the 83-page order.

New York Post [2/3/2026 4:40 PM, Josh Christenson, 40934K] reports a federal judge who blocked the Trump administration from deporting 350,000 Haitians has donated more than $38,000 to Democratic campaigns — including the main committee for the former president who appointed her and let those migrants in: Joe Biden. The order revoking temporary protected status for the Haitian migrants from DC US District Judge Ana C. Reyes outraged administration officials and Republicans like Sen. Bernie Moreno (R-Ohio), who posted on X that "an unelected Democrat judge" had "unilaterally" halted President Trump’s deportations. Biden appointed Reyes to the federal bench in February 2023 — one month after his administration allowed up to 30,000 Haitians to enter the US every month under a humanitarian parole program. Others entered through the southern border — including several apprehended by Border Patrol agents in Texas. The Biden administration falsely accused agents of whipping those migrants. The Uruguay-born jurist had previously served as a litigation attorney focused on international disputes at Williams & Connolly LLP, while working pro bono on behalf of refugee groups. She emigrated with her family to Kentucky when she was a child. Reyes’ federal election contributions, which were previously exposed by Fox News, show that while at the law firm she has apparently donated exclusively to Democratic campaigns since 2008. She maxed out donations to Biden for President with two $2,800 contributions in August 2020 — and shelled out $2,700 to Democrat Hillary Clinton’s campaign against Donald Trump in 2016. Then-California Sen. Kamala Harris’ campaign also received $4,500 from Reyes during her failed run for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2019. Reyes gave $200 to Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez for Congress in 2019, one year after her first successful run for Congress. The Bronx and Queens Democrat has supported the "Abolish ICE" movement and even hawked "Dad Hats" bearing the slogan. Reyes ruled Monday that Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem did not have authority to terminate Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for Haitian migrants, which gave them work authorizations to remain in the US. "Supreme Court, here we come," DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin fired back on X. "Haiti’s TPS was granted following an earthquake that took place over 15 years ago, it was never intended to be a de facto amnesty program, yet that’s how previous administrations have used it for decades.”

(B) NBC News Daily [2/3/2026 3:25 PM, Staff] reports that overnight, a DC federal judge postponed the end of terminating Temporary Protected Status for Haitians in this country. The judge ruled Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem overstepped her authority in cancelling the program.

Telemundo Washington DC [2/3/2026 4:21 PM, Eduardo Orbea, 120K] reports the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) announced that the initial registration period for fiscal year 2027 H-1B visas will begin at noon (Eastern Time) on March 4 and end at noon (Eastern Time) on March 19, 2026. During this period, petitioners and representatives who wish to apply for an H-1B visa subject to the annual fee must use a USCIS online account to electronically register each beneficiary for the selection process and pay the registration fee of $215 for each registration. It is worth remembering that there is a limit of 65,000 visas of this category per year, with the possibility of adding 20,000 more for a total of 85,000 H-1B visas.

New York Times [2/4/2026 3:23 AM, Jonah E. Bromwich, 330K] reports a coalition of immigrants working with an academic labor union on Tuesday sued President Trump over his “gold card” initiative, arguing that a program offering visas for cash takes coveted spots away from scientists, doctors and others whose presence would benefit the United States. The program, effectively an expedited visa for which applicants are required to pay more than $1 million, was opened to the public in December, when the Trump administration debuted a website featuring a gold card with Mr. Trump’s face on it and promising to “unlock life in America.” The lawsuit, filed in Federal District Court in Washington, argues that the program fundamentally changes the way a limited number of visas are dispersed by the government, prioritizing “wealth over intellect or ability” and bypassing Congress in the process. “Rather than reserving those visas for the world’s best and brightest, the Gold Card program converts those visas into revenue-generating commodities sold to the highest bidder,” the lawsuit argues. It asks a judge to find that the program is unlawful and to block its implementation. A number of Mr. Trump’s agency heads, including Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem are named as defendants, as are a number of agencies. A spokesman for the Commerce Department, one of the named defendants, said in a statement that “the days of America opening its borders to foreigners who end up only being a burden for the American people ended the moment President Trump took office.” “The administration’s historic Gold Card program ensures that our immigration system prioritizes those with a demonstrated track record of success and who will contribute to America’s economic resurgence under President Trump,” the statement said. Mr. Trump created the program in September, signing an executive order meant to facilitate the entry of immigrants who “have demonstrated their ability and desire to advance the interests of the United States by voluntarily providing a significant financial gift.” According to the website, applicants who were approved would receive EB-1 or EB-2 visas. For decades, EB-1s, sometimes referred to as the “Einstein visa,” have been reserved by law for immigrants of “extraordinary ability”; EB-2s have been reserved for those of “exceptional ability.” Such visas have fixed caps, meaning that a limited number are issued each year.

New York Times [2/3/2026 5:57 PM, Jonah E. Bromwich, 148038K] reports that a coalition of immigrants working with an academic labor union on Tuesday sued President Trump over his “gold card” initiative, arguing that a program offering visas for cash takes coveted spots away from scientists, doctors and others whose presence would benefit the United States. The program, effectively an expedited visa for which applicants are required to pay more than $1 million, was opened to the public in December, when the Trump administration debuted a website featuring a gold card with Mr. Trump’s face on it and promising to “unlock life in America.” The lawsuit, filed in Federal District Court in Washington, argues that the program fundamentally changes the way a limited number of visas are dispersed by the government, prioritizing “wealth over intellect or ability” and bypassing Congress in the process. “Rather than reserving those visas for the world’s best and brightest, the Gold Card program converts those visas into revenue-generating commodities sold to the highest bidder,” the lawsuit argues. It asks a judge to find that the program is unlawful and to block its implementation. A number of Mr. Trump’s agency heads, including Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem are named as defendants, as are a number of agencies. A spokesman for the Commerce Department, one of the named defendants, said in a statement that “the days of America opening its borders to foreigners who end up only being a burden for the American people ended the moment President Trump took office.”

Bloomberg [2/3/2026 8:34 PM, Andrew Kreighbaum, 763K] reports the Trump administration’s gold card program allowing ultra wealthy immigrants to obtain permanent residency in the US with a $1 million payment is unlawful, a university faculty group argues in a new lawsuit. The program violates the Administrative Procedure Act and the Immigration and Nationality Act, and was enacted without statutory authority, the American Association of University Professors argued in a complaint filed in the US District Court for the District of Columbia. “The Gold Card, which privileges wealthy immigrants over others, is part of a larger attack on immigrants, research, and higher education,” Todd Wolfson, AAUP’s president, said in a statement. “This unlawful program directly harms our members and the public. We stand firmly against it.” The departments of Commerce, State and Homeland Security launched the visa option in December, nearly a year after President Donald Trump unveiled plans in the Oval Office for a new avenue for legal immigration. Rather than proposing another visa category, an executive order directed the agencies to use existing EB-1 “extraordinary ability” and EB-2 “exceptional ability” green card categories for employment-based immigration. The latter category allows applicants to apply for a visa without an employer sponsor. The program treats a $1 million payment by an individual—or $2 million by a corporation on their behalf—as evidence they meet criteria for the visa categories. By redefining eligibility for the visas, the Trump administration upended longstanding immigration law and exceeded its authority, AAUP’s lawsuit argued. It also disadvantages engineers, physicians, researchers, and other accomplished professionals that the INA dictates should receive the visas and who would benefit the US, the suit says. Individual plaintiffs joining AAUP in the suit include a biomedical researcher from Colombia seeking an EB-1 visa, a psychologist from Mexico applying for an EB-2 visa, and a cancer and immunotherapy researcher from Taiwan filing for an EB-2 visa with a national interest waiver. Because availability of those green cards is limited, prioritizing gold card applicants will increase wait times, prolonging the plaintiffs’ reliance on temporary status, extending employment instability, and disrupting research, the lawsuit argues. “In a system where demand for EB-1 and EB-2 visas exceeds annual supply, a paid fast lane that consumes visas and agency processing capacity necessarily pushes back qualified applicants who will have to wait longer for their applications to be considered and may ultimately not be awarded a visa,” according to the complaint.

The Hill [2/3/2026 12:24 PM, Ashleigh Fields, 18170K] reports that Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) on Monday condemned legislation requiring ID and proof of citizenship to register to vote as “nothing more than Jim Crow 2.0.” Florida Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R) has attempted to include the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) Act in a massive funding package under review by the House and send it back to the Senate. “The SAVE Act is nothing more than Jim Crow 2.0. It would disenfranchise millions of Americans. Every single Senate Democrat will vote against any bill that contains it,” Schumer wrote in a Monday post on the social platform X. “Speaker Johnson should tell SAVE Act Republicans to stand down or else this shutdown will be on them,” the Senate Minority Leader added. Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) has raised objections to including the measure in the funding bills despite White House support for the measure. “We all want the SAVE Act, but we look at the reality of the numbers here. And we passed the SAVE Act twice in the House. We’ll pass it again, we’ll do that. But this is a funding package right now, and I don’t think we need to be playing games with government funding,” Johnson said on Monday. “We still have winter storms, we got FEMA and TSA and troop pay and everything else wrapped into this, so we’ve got to get the job done,” he added. The Speaker has remained optimistic that the House will approve the funding package by Tuesday in spite of Democratic objections to funding the Department of Homeland Security in a continuing resolution. But after two House Republicans voted no on advancing the package Tuesday afternoon, the lower chamber’s procedural vote threatened to fail.

The Hill [2/3/2026 12:28 PM, Rebecca Beitsch, 18170K] reports that the State Department was sued Tuesday by would-be immigrants who argue the Trump administration ran afoul of the law when barring immigrant visas for 75 different countries. The Monday suit targets a January decision by the Trump administration to pause processing for immigrant visas, arguing people from those countries may end up relying on welfare. The 107-page lawsuit argues the administration violated a number of laws in doing so, including requirements for how to affect such a massive policy change as well as constitutional protections for due process. “[The State Department] has imposed a categorical nationality-based ban on legal immigration for nationals of 75 countries — nearly half of all visa applicants — based on an unsupported and demonstrably false claim that nationals of the covered countries migrate to the United States to improperly rely on cash welfare,” the complaint states, referring to the policy as a “blanket ban.” They argue the policy has a sweeping impact on countries that account for half of immigrant visas and should be subject to notice and comment rulemaking, not a cable that “was never formally released to the public or otherwise published.” The suit was brought by U.S. citizens petitioning to bring family members into the country, would-be immigrants and immigrant resettlement agencies.

Axios [2/3/2026 5:06 PM, Brittany Gibson, 17364K] reports multiple segments of border wall construction are being held up by lack of final sign-off from Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, Axios has learned from two sources familiar with the delays. Only 30 miles of border barriers— out of a target of nearly 2,000 miles by 2029 — have been started and completed since the beginning of President Trump’s second term. Contracts for about 200 miles of border wall barriers had been awarded and were awaiting Noem’s signature as of last Tuesday, according to an update memo on border wall construction obtained by Axios. A senior DHS official confirmed on Tuesday that the contracts have yet to be signed, saying they’re going through the review process at headquarters and are not yet at Noem’s desk. The memo listed three contracts for building in Texas that needed "S1 approval," referring to Noem. But the DHS official said that two of these contracts only just made it to HQ on Tuesday morning. "There are currently no border wall related contracts pending the Secretary and just last year the Secretary reviewed over a thousand contracts related to border security," DHS spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement. Noem is holding a press conference in Nogales, Arizona on Wednesday to announce "a major border wall update." Noem has approved multiple waivers bypassing environmental laws and regulations that had blocked or slowed down border wall construction.

Washington Examiner [2/3/2026 5:56 PM, Anna Giaritelli, 1147K] reports border wall construction during President Donald Trump’s second term is far ahead of where it was at the same point in his first term, but Department of Homeland Security officials say it should be going much faster this time around. Officials involved in planning and implementing the border wall system along the 1,950-mile U.S.-Mexico border can agree that more progress should have been made by now, but they cannot agree on who is to blame. A government document that outlines border wall progress as of Jan. 27, obtained by the Washington Examiner on Monday evening, states that more than 100 miles of wall and 93 miles of waterborne barriers in Laredo, Del Rio, and Big Bend, Texas, have stalled because the final approval is waiting on DHS Secretary Kristi Noem — a claim that the DHS denied. The Customs and Border Protection memo states that the Big Bend, Laredo, and Del Rio regions of Texas will receive 102 miles of steel bollard wall, more than 90 miles of waterborne "buoy" barriers, and 2 miles of smaller replacement fencing. The document states that the contract awards are ready to be made for those three sections of the wall, but that they are still pending approval from Noem, who is referred to in the document as "S1." The two-page document also states that CBP is awaiting DHS approval before awarding contracts to procure bulk steel; a project in El Centro, California; and a project in El Paso, Texas. Four senior federal sources told the Washington Examiner that they believe Noem’s demand to review all contracts is the reason for the delay in wall construction. However, the DHS has pointed the finger at CBP Commissioner Rodney Scott. In a story published by Politico in January, anonymous sources said that Scott, who was confirmed in his job in June, was holding up progress. DHS spokeswoman Tricia McLaughlin wrote in an email on Tuesday afternoon that "there are no wall contracts currently sitting in front of Secretary Noem." McLaughlin added that because the wall funding was passed through the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, contracts did not fall under the $100,000 contract approval process that Noem implemented last year. A second senior federal source said that, regardless of the $100,000 approval process Noem implemented last year, the contracts have been sitting since December.

New York Times [2/3/2026 8:15 AM, Eileen Sullivan and Jazmine Ulloa, 148038K] reports it happened in a remote area near Laredo, Texas, not far from the Rio Grande in May 2018. Claudia Patricia Gomez Gonzalez, 20, of Guatemala, was walking with a group of other migrants when a Border Patrol agent spotted them in the brush. Most of the others ran, but Ms. Gomez, unarmed, took a step forward. The agent shot her in the head. Customs and Border Protection, Border Patrol’s parent agency, initially said that she and others were throwing blunt objects at the agent, but later changed its description, no longer describing her as an assailant. The F.B.I. reviewed the case and declined to pursue criminal charges, according to a lawsuit filed by her family. The incident was one of many brutal and violent episodes in the 100-year history of the Border Patrol, which has typically operated on the furthest edges of the country, outside of the view of many Americans. The fatal killing of protester Alex Pretti in Minneapolis last month reflects what critics say is a longstanding ethos of aggressiveness that permeates the agency and was imported into U.S. cities through President Trump’s immigration crackdown. Despite multiple efforts over the years to provide greater oversight of the agency, there is still not data available about how the use of force by Border Patrol agents compares to that of other federal law enforcement officers. But local communities and civil rights groups have documented a long pattern of aggressive tactics that raises questions about how frequently the Border Patrol uses excessive force. “There have been concerns over use of force policies within C.B.P. for many years,” said Dan Herman, a former adviser on accountability and transparency at the agency during part of the Biden administration. Tricia McLaughlin, a spokeswoman for the Department of Homeland Security, which includes the Border Patrol, defended its agents as “highly trained and required to meet the highest standards of professionalism and law enforcement capability.”

CBS Chicago [2/3/2026 12:20 PM, Lauren Victory, Adam Harrington, and Desiree Evans, 51110K] reports a Chicago woman shot by shot by a U.S. Customs and Border Protection agent back in the fall was set to testify on Capitol Hill on Tuesday. Marimar Martinez is one of several U.S. citizens set to appear before a congressional forum examining the use of force by U.S. Department of Homeland Security agents. U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Connecticut), Ranking Member of the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, and Rep. Robert Garcia (D-California), Ranking Member of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, are holding hold the bicameral public forum. DHS claimed Martinez was in a car that blocked Border Patrol agents near Pershing Road and Kedzie Avenue in the city’s Brighton Park neighborhood last October. They accused her of ramming her car into federal agents before one of them shot her five times while she was still inside the vehicle. But nearly two months later, federal prosecutors dropped charges of assaulting the agents that had been filed against her, and a judge dismissed them with prejudice, which prevents the government from filing them against her again. Also to testify at the forum are Brent and Luke Ganger, the brothers of Renee Good, who was shot and killed by a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent in Minneapolis last month.

Chicago Tribune [2/3/2026 10:54 AM, Jason Meisner and Caroline Kubzansky, 5209K] reports federal prosecutors said Tuesday they’re no longer seeking to block release of body-worn camera footage showing the traffic crash in Brighton Park last October that led a Border Patrol agent to shoot Marimar Martinez. Lawyers for Martinez, who was initially charged with assault, have argued for the video and other evidence in the case should be made available for public scrutiny, particularly after the controversial fatal shootings of two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis in January. Martinez is scheduled to give testimony at a forum on the actions of immigration agents in Washington on Tuesday. Martinez attorney Christopher Parente has argued that despite all charges being dropped against his client in November, the government “continues to prosecute her character in the court of public opinion,” with labels of “domestic terrorist” and other falsehoods still visible on official government websites and social media. In a response filed just after midnight, prosecutors said they will not oppose the request to lift the protective order on the body cam video, which depicts the moments leading up to the Oct. 4 crash but does not show the shooting itself. They also agreed to the release of other evidence including interviews of the Border Patrol agent who shot Martinez, Charles Exum, his two partners that day, as well as FBI photographs and reports, Martinez’s 911 call, and FBI reports regarding Martinez’s “custody and medical treatment,” the motion stated. The U.S. attorney’s office will oppose, however, the release of any text messages Exum sent to co-workers and his wife after the shooting that have not already been made public in previous court hearings, saying they have “no bearing” on Martinez’s efforts to clear her name. “Indeed, the release of these messages after the charges against Ms. Martinez have been dismissed with prejudice will serve only to further sully Agent Exum, his family, and co-workers without any corresponding benefit to Ms. Martinez based on the stated reasons in her motion,” Assistant U.S. Attorneys Aaron Bond and Ronald DeWald argued.

Washington Examiner [2/3/2026 3:10 PM, David Zimmermann, 1147K] reports Customs and Border Protection has deployed tracking dogs to search for the missing mother of Today co-host Savannah Guthrie, Arizona law enforcement confirmed on Tuesday. "CBP’s role within this was in our search-and-rescue mission, where we constantly use them," Pima County Sheriff Chris Nanos said, noting that his department does not have tracking dogs. The FBI is another federal partner assisting the investigation into the mysterious disappearance of Nancy Guthrie, 84. She went missing unexpectedly over the weekend. Authorities believe Nancy Guthrie may have been forcibly removed from her home, where she was last seen Saturday evening. It remains unclear who was behind the abduction.

Univision [2/4/2026 12:45 AM, Staff, 4937K] reports Maria Shantanu was live-streaming when CBP agents broke her window and arrested her in El Monte. Local police responded to maintain order. CBP reports that the driver violated traffic laws and was charged with two counts of assaulting an officer. [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

FOX News [2/3/2026 12:45 PM, Preston Mizell, 37576K] reports that the total national death toll from Winter Storm Fern has risen to 85 as additional storms are expected to make landfall in the U.S. over the coming weeks. Mississippi took one of the hardest hits from the storm, with 23 killed in the Magnolia State, and tens of thousands still without power. Despite the storm heading north several days ago, Mississippi Gov. Tate Reeves says while the state has seen many improvements, there is still work to be done and hundreds of thousands of Americans remain without power across the country. "There’s no doubt that Mississippi got hit hard in this ice storm and ice is unlike anything we’ve ever seen before," Reeves told Fox News Digital, as Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem joined him in visiting a Mississippi National Guard facility in Tupelo, Miss. "We appreciate the fact that she understands that these disasters are state-managed, locally executed, and federally supported," the governor said. "I will tell you the team at FEMA has been integrated with our team at the Mississippi Emergency Management Agency since the very beginning of this storm and when we need assets they have delivered, and I am very thankful for that.". Noem told Fox News Digital she thought FEMA did "a great job."

(B) NBC News Daily [2/3/2026 2:22 PM, Staff] reports the governor and other statewide officials met with FEMA and the Department of Homeland Security to discuss a winter storm recovery across the state. The governor met with Secretary Kristi Noem and FEMA in north Mississippi. They were joined by the National Guard, linemen, and other first responders. There were two more deaths reported, bringing the statewide total to 25. The governor also visited a warming center in Alcorn County and the Mississippi National Guard Armory in Tishomingo County.

Breitbart [2/3/2026 1:27 PM, Amy Furr, 2238K] reports that an elderly victim of cyber crime no longer has to worry how she will pay the bills thanks to investigators who turned her life around. Seventy-one-year-old Jeanette Voss of Bennington, Vermont, was forced to obsess over saving money after cyber scammers took her life savings which was $950,000 just over four years ago, NHPR reported January 20. Voss, who lives in a small home, rationed her car trips, unplugged appliances, and checked her bank account frequently to ensure she had enough money to live on. The outlet said when the scammers took her money, she ended up living on her Social Security checks and used food stamps for groceries. It seemed to Voss all was lost even though she had responsibly planned for retirement. She also felt down because due to not having that money, she was unable to afford visiting loved ones who lived out of state. The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) in 2025 highlighted the problem of elder fraud, explaining that criminals target and take advantage of that vulnerable group. "The FBI continues to work with our local, state, tribal, and federal partners to tackle elder fraud and stop those who attempt to harm the elderly," the agency said. However, everything changed for Voss when she learned the United States Secret Service had been working on her case and others like it. "Investigators traced $648,000 of her funds to a cryptocurrency account associated with a man involved in the international scam ring, court records show. After seizing the crypto wallet, government officials sold the tokens in order to compensate Voss and some of the other 20-plus victims," the NHPR article said, noting every penny was returned to her, plus interest, with a total of $1,033,000.

AP [2/4/2026 12:02 AM, David Fischer, 16072K] reports federal prosecutors are set to ask that a man convicted of trying to assassinate President Donald Trump on a Florida golf course in 2024 be sentenced to life in prison at a hearing on Wednesday. Ryan Routh is scheduled to appear before U. S. District Judge Aileen Cannon in Fort Pierce. Her courtroom erupted into chaos in September shortly after jurors found Routh guilty on all counts, including attempting to kill a presidential candidate and several firearm-related charges. Routh tried to stab himself in the neck with a pen, and officers quickly dragged him out. Routh’s sentencing had initially been scheduled for December, but Cannon agreed to move the date back after Routh decided to use an attorney during the sentencing phase instead of representing himself as he did for most of the trial. Prosecutors said in a sentencing memorandum filed last month that Routh has yet to accept any responsibility for his actions and that he should spend the rest of his life in prison, in accordance with federal sentencing guidelines. "Routh remains unrepentant for his crimes, never apologized for the lives he put at risk, and his life demonstrates near-total disregard for law," the memo said. Routh’s new defense attorney, Martin L. Roth, is asking the judge for a variance from sentencing guidelines: 20 years in prison on top of a seven-year, mandatory sentence for one of the gun convictions. "The defendant is two weeks short of being sixty years old," Roth wrote in a filing. "A just punishment would provide a sentence long enough to impose sufficient but not excessive punishment, and to allow defendant to experience freedom again as opposed to dying in prison.” Prosecutors said Routh spent weeks plotting to kill Trump before aiming a rifle through shrubbery as the then-Republican presidential candidate played golf on Sept. 15, 2024, at his West Palm Beach country club. At Routh’s trial, a Secret Service agent helping protect Trump on the golf course testified that he spotted Routh before Trump came into view. Routh aimed his rifle at the agent, who opened fire, causing Routh to drop his weapon and run away without firing a shot. In the motion requesting an attorney, Routh offered to trade his life in a prisoner swap with people unjustly held in other countries and said an offer still stood for Trump to "take out his frustrations on my face.” "Just a quarter of an inch further back and we all would not have to deal with all of this mess forwards, but I always fail at everything (par for the course)," Routh wrote.

Reported similarly:
Daily Wire [2/3/2026 12:48 PM, Leif Le Mahieu, 2314K]

CBS News [2/3/2026 8:48 AM, Staff, 51110K] reports Secret Service located and removed 19 credit card skimmers in Denver as part of a multi-city operation in January. [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

FOX News [2/3/2026 7:05 PM, Alexandra Koch Fox, 37576K] reports the U.S. Coast Guard has released the names of seven people who died aboard a Gloucester, Massachusetts, commercial fishing boat that sank Friday in frigid waters 25 miles off Cape Ann. Coast Guard watchstanders received an emergency position indicating a radio beacon (EPIRB) alert at about 6:50 a.m. Friday registered to the 72-foot commercial fishing vessel Lily Jean. USCG crews attempted to contact the boat, and after getting no response, issued an urgent marine information broadcast (UMIB), according to officials. Multiple aircraft, cutters and small boats searched 1,047 square miles over 24 hours, finding debris near the location where the EPIRB was activated, along with one body and an unoccupied life raft that had been deployed. Search and rescue mission coordinators, on-scene commanders and the Coast Guard determined on Saturday all reasonable search efforts for the missing crew members had been exhausted. The crew members presumed dead have been identified as: captain Accursio "Gus" Sanfilippo; crew member Paul Beal Sr.; crew member Paul Beal Jr.; crew member John Rousanidis; crew member Freeman Short; crew member Sean Therrien; and NOAA fisheries observer Jada Samitt.

CyberScoop [2/3/2026 6:10 PM, Derek B. Johnson, 122K] reports more than a year after national security officials revealed that Chinese hackers had systematically infiltrated U.S. telecommunications networks, the top Senate Democrat on the committee overseeing the industry is calling for hearings with executives from the nation’s biggest telecom companies. In a public letter released Tuesday, Sen. Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., called for the CEOs of Verizon and AT&T to appear before Congress and explain how the hacking group known as Salt Typhoon breached their networks, as well as what steps they’ve taken to prevent another intrusion. “For months, I have sought specific documentation from AT&T and Verizon that would purportedly corroborate their claims that their networks are now secure from this attack,” Cantwell wrote to Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, who is the Chair of the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee. “Unfortunately, both AT&T and Verizon have chosen not to cooperate, which raises serious questions about the extent to which Americans who use these networks remain exposed to unacceptable risk.” Congress has neither proposed or passed meaningful legislation to address the issue. While a handful of federal departments and agencies began public regulatory and oversight reviews, most of those efforts have been shut down or rolled back. Salt Typhoon’s intrusion into telecom networks exposed major security weaknesses and put sensitive communications and data belonging to U.S. politicians and policymakers at risk. The federal government has done little since to hold the industry publicly accountable.

CyberScoop [2/3/2026 4:10 PM, Tim Starks, 122K] reports a revised government-industry council devoted to critical infrastructure protection could be set up to have broader and more specific discussions on things like cybersecurity and threats to hardware and software that monitor and control industrial processes, known as operational technology (OT). A top official at the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), Nick Andersen, said Tuesday he couldn’t share a timeline yet for the replacement of the Critical Infrastructure Partnership Advisory Council, which the Homeland Security Department disbanded to private sector dismay last year. But he said the replacement, details of which CyberScoop was first to report, was trying to solve a number of problems with the original council (CIPAC). “Old CIPAC never made any explicit focus on cybersecurity, that just wasn’t part of what was chartered back in the day when it was originally launched,” Andersen, executive assistant director for cybersecurity, told reporters at an event hosted by the Information Technology Industry Council (ITI). “Additionally, it didn’t give us the opportunities for having focus groups to have conversations [about] like undersea cables, might be a good example. OT systems might be a good example,” he said. “OT had to nest itself under the IT Sector Coordinating Council in the past. There’s real opportunities for us to improve, opportunities for elements of the community that didn’t necessarily have opportunities to engage in a substantive way in the past, to give them a voice in the process.”

CyberScoop [2/3/2026 1:10 PM, Tim Starks, 122K] reports the Trump administration needs help from industry to reduce the cybersecurity regulatory burden and to back important cyber legislation on Capitol Hill, among other areas, National Cyber Director Sean Cairncross said Tuesday. “You know your regulatory scheme better than I do: Where there’s friction, where there’s frustration with information sharing, what sort of information is shared, the process through which it’s shared,” he said. “It is helpful for us to hear that and have that feedback so that we can address it, engage it and try to make it better.” The Trump administration is interested in being a partner with industry rather than a “scold,” Cairncross said at an Information Technology Industry Council event. The Biden administration sought to impose more cybersecurity rules on the private sector than prior administrations. Cairncross also called on industry to help pass the Cybersecurity Information Sharing Act of 2015, which has expired and dealt with short-term extensions in recent months as Congress stalls on what to do with a law that provides legal protections to companies that share cyber threat data with the government and each other. The Trump administration would like to see the law extended as-is for 10 years.

FOX News [2/3/2026 1:30 PM, Kurt Knutsson, 37576K] reports that it has been a rough start to the year for password security. A massive database containing 149 million stolen logins and passwords was found publicly exposed online. The data included credentials tied to an estimated 48 million Gmail accounts, along with millions more from popular services. Cybersecurity researcher Jeremiah Fowler, who discovered the database, confirmed it was not password-protected or encrypted. Anyone who found it could have accessed the data. The database contained 149,404,754 unique usernames and passwords. It totaled roughly 96 GB of raw credential data. Fowler said the exposed files included email addresses, usernames, passwords and direct login URLs for accounts across many platforms. Some records also showed signs of info-stealing malware, which silently captures credentials from infected devices. Importantly, this was not a new breach of Google, Meta or other companies. Instead, the database appears to be a compilation of credentials stolen over time from past breaches and malware infections. That distinction matters, but the risk to users remains real. Based on estimates shared by Fowler, the following services had the highest number of credentials in the exposed database. Email accounts dominated the dataset, which matters because access to email often unlocks other accounts. A compromised inbox can be used to reset passwords, access private documents, read years of messages and impersonate the account holder. That is why Gmail appearing so frequently in this database raises concerns beyond any single service.

Axios [2/3/2026 8:30 AM, Sam Sabin, 17364K] reports a suspected China-based hacking group spun up a phishing campaign around Christmas that mimicked U.S. policy briefings in an attempt to hack diplomats, according to new research from cybersecurity firm Dream Security shared first with Axios. The campaign successfully infected "a lot of people," Dream CEO Shalev Hulio said in an interview. "We just don’t know who and how big [of a] scale," he added. Researchers at Israel-based Dream uncovered a phishing campaign designed to ensnare officials tied to diplomacy, elections and international coordination around the world. Between late December and mid-January, China-based hackers sent emails with files that pretended to be official U.S. diplomatic summaries or policy documents. The attack did not rely on a software vulnerability. Simply opening the file was enough to trigger the compromise. The malware is designed to collect data and maintain persistent access to the affected device. Dream is attributing the campaign to the China-linked cyberespionage group Mustang Panda.

CBS News [2/3/2026 12:24 PM, Olivia Gazis and Eleanor Watson, 51110K] reports two senators — one Republican and one Democrat — warned Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth against relocating and reducing resources for a Pentagon team charged with investigating so-called "Anomalous Health Incidents," or AHI, colloquially known as Havana Syndrome, arguing that such a move would undercut care for affected personnel and stall ongoing research. In a letter sent to Hegseth on Monday, Democratic Sen. Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire and Republican Sen. Susan Collins of Maine raised concerns about reported plans within the Department of Defense to shift the cross-functional team, known as a CFT, that coordinates the department’s response to the Havana Syndrome out of its current position under the Office of the Under Secretary for Policy. While the proposed change has been described internally as a bureaucratic reorganization, the senators cautioned that it could effectively sideline the team and weaken its ability to research the underlying cause and identify care for victims. "We owe it to these personnel to continue to receive care while ongoing research is done on attribution and technology, which can only be done by the CFT in its current form," the senators wrote. The Pentagon did not respond to a request for comment on whether it had any plans to relocate the CFT. The Washington Examiner first reported officials were considering moving the team from the portfolio of the under secretary of defense for policy to the under secretary of defense for research and engineering. [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

Reuters [2/3/2026 11:03 AM, Sabine Siebold, 38315K] reports NATO has started military planning for an Arctic Sentry mission, a spokesperson for the alliance’s military headquarters SHAPE said on Tuesday, against a backdrop of tensions between the U.S. and European allies over Greenland. Repeated remarks by U.S. President Donald Trump that he wants to acquire Greenland, accusing European allies of failing to properly secure the large Arctic island against Russia or China, has sparked a dispute with Copenhagen over the Danish overseas territory and triggered strains with NATO. "Planning is underway for NATO has started military planning for an Arctic Sentry mission, a spokesperson for the alliance’s military headquarters SHAPE said on Tuesday, against a backdrop of tensions between the U.S. and European allies over Greenland.a NATO enhanced vigilance activity, named Arctic Sentry," Colonel Martin O’Donnell, spokesperson for the Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe, said, confirming a report by German magazine Spiegel. He declined to provide additional details as planning had only just begun.

Washington Examiner [2/3/2026 3:19 PM, Kaelan Deese, 1147K] reports the Trump administration urged a federal judge not to block construction of the White House ballroom, arguing that stopping the project midstream would create security risks at the executive mansion and force an emergency appeal. In a late-day filing on Monday, the Justice Department asked U.S. District Judge Richard Leon to stay any injunction he might issue against the East Wing modernization and ballroom project, warning that a halt would disrupt Secret Service operations and leave an exposed excavation site in President’s Park. The government said the project is "imperative for reasons of national security" and cannot be safely paused in part. The stay request follows Leon’s recent expression of skepticism toward the administration’s argument that the president may construct the ballroom using private donations without explicit congressional authorization. During oral arguments last month, Leon likened the legal framework offered by government lawyers to a "Rube Goldberg contraption" and said he anticipated the losing party would appeal. Expecting that outcome, the DOJ told Leon it would immediately seek appellate review if construction is paused and urged him to delay enforcement while the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit considers the case. Suspending a major construction project tied to security operations, the filing argues, would create unnecessary risk and procedural chaos. The DOJ again leaned heavily on declarations from the Secret Service, which has warned that the partially demolished East Wing and underground work already complicate protective measures. A senior Secret Service official previously said the open construction site is "in and of itself, a hazard," and the administration said it will submit an additional classified declaration detailing why a pause would endanger national security and undermine the public interest.

Reported similarly:
ABC News [2/3/2026 9:48 AM, Staff, 34146K] r

Daily Wire [2/3/2026 8:32 AM, Zach Jewell, 2314K] reports President Donald Trump suggested that Republicans may have to "nationalize the voting" in a Monday interview, predicting that "interesting" details would come out of the FBI’s probe of a Fulton County, Georgia, election office last week. Trump told conservative podcaster and former FBI deputy director Dan Bongino that Republicans "should take over the voting in at least 15 places," citing his belief that it’s the only way to secure elections. "The Republicans should say, we want to take over, we should take over the voting, the voting in at least many, 15 places. The Republicans ought to nationalize the voting," Trump told Bongino. "We have states that are so crooked and they’re counting votes. We have states that I won that show I didn’t win," he said. "Now, you’re going to see something in Georgia where they were able to get the ballots with the court order. You will see some interesting things come out. But like the 2020 election. I won that election by so much. Everybody knows it.” Last Wednesday, the FBI raided a Georgia election office and took 700 boxes of election materials. The raid was reportedly related to a federal probe into allegations of interference in the 2020 election, which Trump lost to former President Joe Biden. Trump has argued that the 2020 election results from Georgia were rigged against him. Trump lost to Biden by fewer than 12,000 votes in Georgia in 2020. Fulton County officials are questioning the legality of the FBI’s search and said the county would sue and attempt to "force the government to return the ballots taken.” When asked about Trump’s comments to Bongino, a White House official told The Daily Wire on Tuesday morning that Trump doesn’t believe states taking election security seriously. The official highlighted more than a dozen states, including California, New York, and Illinois, that do not require photo ID to vote, and accused many states of refusing to comply with federal law on sharing voter-roll information. White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson told The Daily Wire: "President Trump cares deeply about the safety and security of our elections – that’s why he’s urged Congress to pass the SAVE Act and other legislative proposals that would establish a uniform standard of photo ID for voting, prohibit no-excuse mail-in voting, and end the practice of ballot harvesting.”

FOX News [2/3/2026 8:57 PM, Staff, 37576K] reports Government Accountability Institute President Peter Schweizer exposes Mexico’s alleged mission to conquer U.S. land on ‘Jesse Watters Primetime.’[Editorial note: consult video at source link]

Breitbart [2/4/2026 1:00 AM, Staff, 2238K] reports that, Tuesday on FNC’s “Jesse Watters Primetime,” Breitbart News senior contributor and author of The Invisible Coup: How American Elites and Foreign Powers Use Immigration as a Weapon Peter Schweizer talked about Mexico. Schwezier said, “People don’t realize that, right now, in the United States, there are more than a dozen senators and members of their House of Representatives, of the Mexican Congress, who live in the United States. And their job is to represent Mexicans living in the United States in the Mexican Parliament. So, they’ve already started to take steps to undermine our sovereignty, and that’s not even to mention what they’re doing with their 53 consulates, which, by the way, is almost ten times as many as Great Britain has in the United States. They’re involved in politics and they’re organizing some of these anti-ICE protests.” [Editorial note: consult video at source link]

CBS News [2/3/2026 3:25 PM, Staff, 51110K] reports British maritime security firm Vanguard Tech said Tuesday that a U.S.-flagged tanker was approached by Iranian gunboats, which threatened to board the vessel, in the Strait of Hormuz, before continuing on its way under military escort. The incident comes amid a tense standoff between the U.S. and Iran, and just days ahead of expected negotiations. The Stena Imperative was approached by three pairs of small armed boats belonging to the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps while transiting the Strait of Hormuz, approximately 16 nautical miles north of Oman’s coast, the company said. The gunboats hailed the tanker by radio, ordering the captain, "to stop the engines and prepare to be boarded," but the ship increased speed and maintained course, the firm added, stressing that it never entered Iranian territorial waters. "The vessel is now being escorted by a U.S. warship," Vanguard Tech said. The U.S.-flagged tanker was still on course for its destination in Bahrain on Tuesday afternoon, scheduled to arrive at the port Sitrah on Feb. 5, information from the MarineTraffic website showed. The British maritime security agency UKMTO had reported the incident earlier, without specifying the nationality of the ship nor of the boats that approached it, saying only that it had been "hailed on VHF by numerous small armed vessels," but ignored the request to stop and "continued on its planned route.” President Trump has threatened repeatedly that he could launch a new military strike on Iran over the country’s brutal suppression of recent protests, or if it declines to negotiate a new deal on its nuclear program. Speaking to CBS News last week, Mr. Trump said "I have had" conversations with Iran in the last few days, and "I am planning" to have more. Mr. Trump said that, in those conversations, he "told them two things. No. 1, no nuclear. And No. 2, stop killing protesters. They’re killing them by the thousands.” At least 10 U.S. warships — including an aircraft carrier and at least five destroyers — were heading toward Iran’s coastal waters as of last week, a deployment Mr. Trump has called an "armada," which he said he hopes he doesn’t need to use. U.S. and Iranian officials are expected to hold talks at the end of this week.

Reported similarly:
Bloomberg [2/3/2026 3:20 PM, Alex Longley, 18082K]
Reuters [2/3/2026 6:35 AM, Jonathan Saul, Tala Ramadan, Idrees Ali, Elwely Elwelly, 16072K]
FOX News [2/3/2026 12:28 PM, Anders Hangstrom, 37576K]

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