By LARRY NEUMEISTER, Associated Press

NEW YORK (AP) — Former federal prosecutor Maurene Comey sued the U.S. government Monday to get her job back, saying her firing was for political reasons and was unconstitutional.

Her lawsuit in Manhattan federal court blamed the firing on the fact that her father is James Comey, a former F.B.I. director, “or because of her perceived political affiliation and beliefs, or both.”

Comey is seeking to be reinstated as well as a declaration that her firing was unlawful and a violation of the “Separation of Powers” clause in the U.S. Constitution.

“Defendants have not provided any explanation whatsoever for terminating Ms. Comey. In truth, there is no legitimate explanation,” the lawsuit said.

Comey, who successfully prosecuted hundreds of cases since becoming an assistant U.S. attorney in 2015, was notified of her dismissal in an email with an attachment saying she was being fired “(p)ursuant to Article II of the United States Constitution and the laws of the United States,” the lawsuit said.

James Comey was fired as FBI director by President Donald Trump in 2017. The lawsuit noted that he has since written a memoir critical of Trump and has continued to publicly criticize Trump and his administration, including a social media post in May that Trump and others perceived as threatening.

The lawsuit noted that Maurene Comey’s firing in July came the day after her supervisors had asked her to take the lead on a major public corruption case and three months after she’d received her latest “Outstanding” review.

“The politically motivated termination of Ms. Comey — ostensibly under ‘Article II of the Constitution’ — upends bedrock principles of our democracy and justice system,” the lawsuit said. “Assistant United States Attorneys like Ms. Comey must do their jobs without fearing or favoring any political party or perspective, guided solely by the law, the facts, and the pursuit of justice.”

Named as defendants in the lawsuit were, among others, the Justice Department, the Executive Office of the President, U.S. Attorney General Pamela Bondi, the Office of Personnel Management and the United States.

A message for comment from the Justice Department was not immediately returned.

Comey’s July 16 firing came amid a spate of dismissals of prosecutors by the Justice Department without explanation, raising alarm that civil service protections meant to prevent terminations for political reasons were being overlooked.

Comey’s lawsuit noted that she was employed with protections under the Civil Service Reform Act governing how and why she could be terminated, including specific prohibitions against termination for discriminatory reasons such as political affiliation.

“Her termination violated every one of those protections,” the lawsuit said.

The Justice Department also has fired some prosecutors who worked on cases that have provoked Trump’s ire, including some who handled U.S. Capitol riot cases and lawyers and support staff who worked on special counsel Jack Smith’s prosecutions of Trump.

She became a rising star in her office for her work on the case against financier Jeffrey Epstein and his onetime girlfriend, British socialite Ghislaine Maxwell, and the recent prosecution of music mogul Sean “Diddy” Combs.

Maxwell is serving a 20-year prison sentence after her December 2021 conviction on sex trafficking charges. She was recently transferred from a prison in Florida to a prison camp in Texas.

Epstein took his own life in a federal jail in August 2019 as he awaited trial on sex trafficking charges. Combs is awaiting sentencing next month after his conviction on prostitution-related charges after he was exonerated in July of more serious sex trafficking and racketeering conspiracy charges.

By Nada Hassanein, Stateline.org

Pharmacies in Black and Latino neighborhoods are less likely to dispense buprenorphine — one of the main treatments for opioid use disorder — even though people of color are more likely to die from opioid overdoses.

The drug helps reduce cravings for opioids and the likelihood of a fatal overdose.

While the nation as a whole has seen decreases in opioid overdose deaths in recent years, overdose deaths among Black, Latino and Indigenous people have continued to increase.

Many medical and health policy experts fear the broad domestic policy law President Donald Trump signed in July will worsen the problem by increasing the number of people without health insurance. As a result of the law, the number of people without coverage will increase by about 10 million by 2034, according to the Congressional Budget Office.

About 7.5 million of the people who will lose coverage under the new law are covered by Medicaid. Shortly before Trump signed the bill into law, researchers from the University of Pennsylvania and Boston University estimated that roughly 156,000 Medicaid recipients will lose access to medications for opioid addiction because of the cuts, resulting in approximately 1,000 more overdose deaths annually.

Because Black and Hispanic people are overrepresented on the rolls, the Medicaid cuts will have a disproportionate effect on communities that already face higher barriers to getting medications to treat addiction.

From 2017 to 2023, the percentage of U.S. retail pharmacies regularly dispensing buprenorphine increased from 33% to 39%, according to a study published last week in Health Affairs.

But researchers found the drug was much less likely to be available in pharmacies in mostly Black (18% of pharmacies) and Hispanic neighborhoods (17%), compared with mostly white ones (46%).

In some states, the disparity was even worse. In California, for example, only about 9% of pharmacies in Black neighborhoods dispensed buprenorphine, compared with 52% in white neighborhoods.

The researchers found buprenorphine was least available in Black and Latino neighborhoods across nearly all states.

Barriers to treatment

Dr. Rebecca Trotzky-Sirr, a family physician who specializes in addiction medicine, said many communities of color are “pharmacy deserts.” Even the pharmacies that do exist in those neighborhoods tend to “have additional barriers to obtain buprenorphine and other controlled substances out of a concern for historic overuse of some treatments,” said Trotzky-Sirr, who wasn’t involved in the study.

In addition to its federal classification as a controlled substance, buprenorphine is also subject to state regulations to prevent illegal use. Pharmacies that carry it know that wholesalers and distributors audit their orders, which dissuades some from stocking or dispensing it.

Dima Qato, associate professor of clinical pharmacy at the University of Southern California and an author of the Health Affairs study, said that without changes in policy, Black and Hispanic people will continue to have an especially hard time getting buprenorphine.

“If you don’t address these dispensing regulations, or regulate buprenorphine from the aspect of pharmacy regulations, people are still going to encounter barriers accessing it,” she said.

In neighborhoods where at least a fifth of the population is on Medicaid, just 35% of pharmacies dispensed buprenorphine, Qato and her team found. But in neighborhoods with fewer residents on Medicaid, about 42% of pharmacies carried the drug.

Medicaid covers nearly half— 47% — of nonelderly adults who suffer from opioid use disorder. In states that expanded Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act, another recent study found an increase in people getting prescriptions for buprenorphine.

“Medicaid is the backbone of care for people struggling with opioid use disorder,” said Cherlette McCullough, a Florida-based mental health therapist. “We’re going to see people in relapse. We’re going to see more overdoses. We’re going to see more people in the ER.”

Qato said the shortage of pharmacies in minority communities is likely to get worse, as many independent pharmacists are already struggling to stay open.

“We know they’re more likely to close in neighborhoods of color, so there’s going to be even fewer pharmacies that carry it in the neighborhoods that really need it,” she said.

‘There needs to be urgency’

Qato and her colleagues say states and local governments should mandate that pharmacies carry a minimum stock of buprenorphine and dispense it to anyone coming in with a legitimate prescription. As examples, they point to a Philadelphia ordinance mandating that pharmacies carry the opioid overdose-reversal drug naloxone and similar emergency contraception requirements in Massachusetts.

“We need to create expectations. We need to encourage our pharmacies to carry this to make it accessible, same day, and there needs to be urgency,” said Arianna Campbell, a physician assistant and co-founder of the Bridge Center, a California-based organization that aims to help increase addiction treatment in emergency rooms.

“In many of the conversations I have with pharmacies, when I’m getting some pushback, I have to say: ‘Hey, this person’s at the highest risk of dying right now. They need this medication right now.’”

She said patients frequently become discouraged due to barriers they face in getting prescriptions filled. The Bridge Center has been expanding its patient navigator program across the state, and helping other states start their own. The program helps patients identify pharmacies where they can fill their prescription fastest.

“There’s a medication that can help you, but at every turn it’s really hard to get it,” she said, calling the disparities in access to medication treatment “unacceptable.”

Trotzky-Sirr, the California doctor, fears the looming Medicaid cuts will cause many of her patients to discontinue treatment and relapse. Many of her patients are covered by Medi-Cal, the state’s Medicaid program.

“A lot of our patients are able to obtain medications for treatment of addiction like buprenorphine, because of the state covering the cost of the medication,” said Trotzky-Sirr, who also is a regional coordinator at the Bridge Center.

“They don’t have the resources to pay for it, cash, out of pocket.”

Some low-income patients switch between multiple providers or clinics as they try to find care and coverage, she added. These could be interpreted as red flags to a pharmacy.

Trotzky-Sirr argued buprenorphine does not need to be monitored as carefully as opioids and other drugs that are easier to misuse or overuse.

“Buprenorphine does not have those features and really needs to be in a class by itself,” she said. “Unfortunately, it’s hard to explain that to a pharmacist in 30 seconds over the phone.”

More is known about the medication now than when it was placed on the controlled substances list about two decades ago, said Brendan Saloner, a Bloomberg Professor of American Health in Addiction and Overdose at Johns Hopkins University.

Pharmacies are fearful of regulatory scrutiny and don’t have “countervailing pressure” to ensure patients get the treatments, he said.

On top of that fear, Medicaid managed care plans’ prior authorization processes may also be adding to the pharmacy bottleneck, he said.

“Black and Latino communities have higher rates of Medicaid enrollment, so to the extent that Medicaid prior authorization techniques are a hassle to pharmacies, that may also kind of discourage them [pharmacies] from stocking buprenorphine,” he said.

In some states, buprenorphine is much more readily available. In Maine, New Hampshire, Oregon, Rhode Island, Utah and Vermont, more than 70% of pharmacies carried the drug, according to the study. Buprenorphine availability was highest in states such as Oregon that have the least restrictive regulations for dispensing it.

In contrast, less than a quarter of pharmacies in Iowa, North Dakota, Texas, Virginia and Washington, D.C., carried the medication.

“We’re going to see more people becoming unhoused, because without treatment, they’re going to go back to those old habits,” McCullough, the Florida therapist, said. “When we talk about marginalized communities, these are the populations that are going to suffer the most because they already have challenges with access to care.”

Stateline reporter Nada Hassanein can be reached at nhassanein@stateline.org.

©2025 States Newsroom. Visit at stateline.org. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

By Kate Linthicum, Los Angeles Times

KINI, Mexico — On a hot June night Jesús Cruz at last returned to Kini, the small town in Mexico’s Yucatán Peninsula where he spent the first 17 years of his life.

His sister greeted him with tearful hugs. The next morning she took him to see their infirm mother, who whispered in his ear: “I didn’t think you’d ever come back.”

After decades away, Cruz was finally home.

Yet he was not home.

So much of what he loved was 3,000 miles away in Southern California, where he resided for 33 years until immigration agents swarmed the car wash where he worked and hauled him away in handcuffs.

Cruz missed his friends and Booka, his little white dog. His missed his house, his car, his job.

But most of all, he missed his wife, Noemi Ciau, and their four children. Ciau worked nights, so Cruz was in charge of getting the kids fed, clothed and to and from school and music lessons, a chaotic routine that he relished because he knew he was helping them get ahead.

“I want them to have a better life,” he said. “Not the one I had.”

Now that he was back in Mexico, living alone in an empty house that belonged to his in-laws, he and Ciau, who is a U.S. permanent resident, faced an impossible decision.

Should she and the children join Cruz in Mexico?

Or stay in Inglewood?

Cruz and Ciau both had families that had been broken by the border, and they didn’t want that for their kids. In the months since Cruz had been detained, his eldest daughter, 16-year-old Dhelainy, had barely slept and had stopped playing her beloved piano, and his youngest son, 5-year-old Gabriel, had started acting out. Esther, 14, and Angel, 10, were hurting, too.

But bringing four American kids to Mexico didn’t seem fair, either. None of them spoke Spanish, and the schools in Kini didn’t compare with those in the U.S. Dhelainy was a few years from graduating high school, and she dreamed of attending the University of California and then Harvard Law.

There was also the question of money. At the car wash, Cruz earned $220 a day. But the day rate for laborers in Kini is just $8. Ciau had a good job at Los Angeles International Airport, selling cargo space for an international airline. It seemed crazy to give that up.

Ciau wanted to hug her husband again. She wanted to know what it would feel like to have the whole family in Mexico. So in early August she packed up the kids and surprised Cruz with a visit.

Kini lies an hour outside of Merida in a dense tropical forest. Like many people here, Cruz grew up speaking Spanish and a dialect of Maya and lived in a one-room, thatched-roof house. He, his parents and his five brothers and sisters slept in hammocks crisscrossed from the rafters.

His parents were too poor to buy shoes for their children, so when he was a boy Cruz left school to work alongside his father, caring for cows and crops. At 17 he joined a wave of young men leaving Kini to work in the United States.

He arrived in Inglewood, where a cousin lived, in 1992, just as Los Angeles was erupting in protest over the police beating of Rodney King.

Cruz, soft-spoken and hardworking, was overwhelmed by the big city but found refuge in a green stucco apartment complex that had become a home away from home for migrants from Kini, who cooked and played soccer together in the evenings.

Eventually he fell for a young woman living there: Ciau, whose parents had brought her from Kini as a young girl, and who obtained legal status under an amnesty extended by President Reagan. They married when she turned 18.

As their family grew, they developed rituals. When one of the kids made honor roll, they’d celebrate at Dave & Buster’s. Each summer they’d visit Disneyland. And every weekend they’d dine at Casa Gambino, a classic Mexican restaurant with vinyl booths, piña coladas and a bison head mounted on the wall. On Fridays, Cruz and Ciau left the kids with her parents and went on a date.

As the father of four Americans, Cruz was eligible for a green card. But the attorneys he consulted warned that he would have to apply from Mexico and that the wait could last years.

Cruz didn’t want to leave his children. So he stayed. When President Trump was reelected last fall on a vow to carry out mass deportations, he tried not to worry. The government, he knew, usually targeted immigrants who had committed crimes, and his record was spotless. But the Trump administration took a different approach.

On June 8, masked federal agents swarmed Westchester Hand Wash. Cruz said they slammed him into the back of a patrol car with such force and shackled his wrists so tightly that he was left with bruises across his body and a serious shoulder injury.

Ciau, who was helping Esther buy a dress for a middle school honors ceremony, heard about the raid and raced over. She had been at the car wash just hours earlier, bringing lunch to her husband and his colleagues. Now it was eerily empty.

Cruz was transferred to a jail in El Paso, where he says he was denied requests to speak to a lawyer or call his family.

One day, an agent handed him a document and told him to sign. The agent said that if Cruz fought his case, he would remain in detention for up to a year and be deported anyway. Signing the document — which said he would voluntarily return to Mexico — meant he could avoid a deportation order, giving him a better shot at fixing his papers in the future.

Cruz couldn’t read the text without his glasses. He didn’t know that he very likely would have been eligible for release on bond because of his family ties to the U.S. But he was in pain and afraid and so he signed.

Returning to Kini after decades away was surreal.

Sprawling new homes with columns, tile roofs and other architectural flourishes imported by people who had lived in the U.S. rose from what had once been fields. There were new faces, too, including a cohort of young men who appraised Cruz with curiosity and suspicion. With his polo shirts and running shoes, he stood out in a town where most wore flip-flops and as few clothes as possible in the oppressive heat.

Cruz found work on a small ranch. Before dawn, he would pedal out there on an old bicycle, clearing weeds and feeding cows, the world silent except for the rustle of palm leaves. In all his years in the big city, he had missed the tranquility of these lands.

He had missed his mother, too. She has multiple sclerosis and uses a wheelchair. Some days, she could speak, and would ask about his family and whether Cruz was eating enough. Other days, they would sit in silence, him occasionally leaning over to kiss her forehead.

He always kept his phone near, in case Ciau or one of the kids called. He tried his best to parent from afar, mediating arguments and reminding the kids to be kind to their mother. He tracked his daughters via GPS when they left the neighborhood, and phoned before bed to make sure everyone had brushed their teeth.

He worried about them, especially Dhelainy, a talented musician who liked to serenade him on the piano while he cooked dinner. The burden of caring for the younger siblings had fallen on her. Since Cruz had been taken, she hadn’t touched the piano once.

During one conversation, Dhelainy let it slip that they were coming to Mexico. Cruz surged with joy, then shuddered at the thought of having to say goodbye again. He picked them up at the airport.

That first evening, they shared pizza and laughed and cried. Gabriel, the only family member who had never been to Mexico, was intrigued by the thick forest and the climate, playing outside in the monsoon rain. For the first time in months, Dhelainy slept through the night.

“We finally felt like a happy family again,” Ciau said. But as soon as she and the kids arrived, they started counting the hours to when they’d have to go back.

During the heat of the day, the family hid inside, lounging in hammocks. They were also dodging unwanted attention. It seemed everywhere they went, someone asked Cruz to relive his arrest, and he would oblige, describing cold nights in detention with nothing to keep warm but a plastic blanket.

But at night, after the sky opened up, and then cleared, they went out.

It was fair time in Kini, part of an annual celebration to honor the Virgin Mary. A small circus had been erected and a bull ring constructed of wooden posts and leaves. A bright moon rose as the family took their seats and the animal charged out of its pen, agitated, and barreled toward the matador’s pink cape.

Cruz turned to his kids. When he was growing up, he told them, the matador killed the bull, whose body was cut up and sold to spectators. Now the fights ended without violence — with the bull lassoed and returned to pasture.

It was one of the ways that Mexico had modernized, he felt. He felt pride at how far Mexico had come, recently electing its first female president.

The bull ran by, close enough for the family to hear his snorts and see his body heave with breath.

“Are you scared?” Esther asked Gabriel.

Wide-eyed, the boy shook his head no. But he reached out to touch his father’s hand.

Later, as the kids slept, Cruz and Ciau stayed up, dancing cumbia deep into the night.

The day before Ciau and the kids were scheduled to leave, the family went to the beach. Two of Ciau’s nieces came. It was the first time Gabriel had met a cousin. The girls spoke little English, but they played well with Gabriel, showing him games on their phones. (For days after, he would giddily ask his mother when he could next see them.)

That evening, the air was heavy with moisture.

The kids went into the bedroom to rest. Cruz and Ciau sat at the kitchen table, holding hands and wiping away tears.

They had heard of a U.S. employer who, having lost so many workers to immigration raids, was offering to pay a smuggler to bring people across the border. Cruz and Ciau agreed that was too risky.

They had just paid a lawyer to file a lawsuit saying Cruz had been coerced into accepting voluntary departure and asking a judge to order his return to the U.S. so that he could apply for relief from removal. The first hearing was scheduled for mid-September.

Cruz wanted to return to the U.S. But he was increasingly convinced that the family could make it work in Mexico. “We were poor before,” he told Ciau. “We can be poor again.”

Ciau wasn’t sure. Her children had big — and expensive — ambitions.

Dhelainy had proposed staying in the U.S. with her grandparents if the rest of the family moved back. Cruz and Ciau talked about the logistics of that, and Ciau vowed to explore whether the younger kids could remain enrolled in U.S. schools, but switch to online classes.

When the rain began, Cruz got up and closed the door.

The next morning, Cruz would not accompany his family to the airport. It would be too hard, he thought, “like when somebody gives you something you’ve always wanted, and then suddenly takes it away.”

Gabriel wrapped his arms around his father’s waist, his small body convulsed with tears: “I love you.”

“It’s OK, baby,” Cruz said. “I love you, too.”

“Thank you for coming,” he said to Ciau. He kissed her. And then they were gone.

That afternoon, he walked the streets of Kini. The fair was wrapping up. Workers sweating in the heat were dismantling the circus rides and packing them onto the backs of trucks.

He thought back to a few evenings earlier, when they had celebrated Dhelainy’s birthday.

The family had planned to host a joint sweet 16 and quinceñera party for her and Esther in July. They had rented an event hall, hired a band and sent out invitations. After Cruz was detained, they called the party off.

They celebrated Dhelainy’s Aug. 8 birthday at the house in Kini instead. A mariachi played the Juan Gabriel classic, “Amor Eterno.”

“You are my sun and my calm,” the mariachis sang as Cruz swayed with his daughter. “You are my life / My eternal love.”

©2025 Los Angeles Times. Visit at latimes.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

By SAFIYAH RIDDLE, Associated Press/Report For America

The Posse Comitatus Act is a nearly 150-year-old federal law that limits the U.S. military’s role in enforcing domestic laws. At its core, experts say the law reflects America’s long-standing belief that law enforcement should remain in civilian hands, separate from military power.

President Donald Trump has tested the law’s limits in the first few months of his second term, as he expands the footprint of the U.S. military on domestic soil.

Here’s what to know about the law.

Posse Comitatus Act stops military from enforcing US law

The criminal statute prohibits military enforcement of domestic law. It also prevents the military from investigating local crimes, overriding local law enforcement or compelling certain behavior.

There are key exceptions. Congress can vote to suspend the act, or the president can order it suspended in defense of the Constitution. The Insurrection Act of 1807 allows the president to deploy troops during invasions, rebellions or when local authorities can’t maintain order.

National Guard members are under state authority and commanded by governors, so they’re generally exempt. However, the Posse Comitatus Act applies to National Guard forces when they’re “federalized,” meaning the president puts them under his control. That’s what Trump did in California over the governor’s objections.

The military is allowed to share intelligence and certain resources if there’s an overlap with civilian law enforcement jurisdiction, according to the Library of Congress. There’s also an exception for the U.S. Coast Guard, which has some law enforcement responsibilities.

Law was enacted after the Reconstruction era

The law was enacted in 1878 following the post-Civil War era known as Reconstruction. At that time, segregationist lawmakers didn’t want the U.S. military from blocking Jim Crow laws that imposed racial segregation.

But the spirit of the law has roots going all the way back to the Revolutionary War, when the nation’s founders were scarred by the British monarchy’s absolute military control, said William C. Banks, a professor at the Syracuse University College of Law.

“We have a tradition in the United States — which is more a norm than a law — that we want law enforcement to be conducted by civilians, not the military,” Banks said.

Courts have rarely interpreted the Posse Comitatus Act, leaving much of its scope shaped by executive branch policy and military regulations rather than judicial precedent.

Steve Vladeck, a law professor at Georgetown University, notes that this lack of legal rulings makes the law unusual.

“There is no authoritative precedent on exactly where these lines are, and so that’s why over the years the military’s own interpretation has been so important,” Vladeck said.

New tests for the law

A federal judge has ruled that the Trump administration violated federal law by sending troops to accompany federal agents on immigration raids in Los Angeles this summer. The ruling does not require the remaining troops to withdraw.

Trump administration attorneys argued the law doesn’t apply because the troops were protecting federal officers, not enforcing laws.

Trump also sent 800 troops to Washington D.C., saying without substantiation that they were needed to reduce crime in the “lawless” city.

In Washington, a federal district, the president is already in charge of the National Guard and can legally deploy troops for 30 days without congressional approval.

Trump has since discussed sending the National Guard to other Democratic-led cities like Chicago, Baltimore and New York.

Riddle is a corps member for The Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.

By VALERIE GONZALEZ, Associated Press

McALLEN, Texas (AP) — President Donald Trump’s administration has started requiring parents looking to reunite with their children who crossed into the U.S. alone to show up for interviews where immigration officers may question them, according to a policy memo obtained by The Associated Press.

Legal advocacy groups say the shift has led to the arrest of some parents, while their children remain in U.S. custody. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security did not confirm that or answer questions about the July 9 directive, instead referring in a statement to the Biden administration’s struggles to properly vet and monitor homes where children were placed.

The Office of Refugee Resettlement, which is part of the U.S. Health and Human Services Department and which takes custody of children who cross the border without a parent or legal guardian, issued the directive. The agency said the goal is to ensure that sponsors — usually a parent or guardian — are properly vetted.

The memo said sponsors must now appear in person for identification verification. Previously, sponsors could submit identity documents online. The directive also says “federal law enforcement agencies may be present to meet their own mission objectives, which may include interviewing sponsors.”

Neha Desai, managing director of human rights at the National Center for Youth Law, said the change provides U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement a “built-in opportunity” to arrest parents — something she said has already happened.

Mary Miller Flowers, director of policy and legislative affairs for the Young Center for Immigrant Children’s Rights, said she knew of a case in which immigration officers arrested the father of a child under the age of 12 who had shown up for an identification check. “As a result, mom is terrified of coming forward. And so, this child is stuck,” Miller Flowers said.

Desai also said the interviews are unlikely to produce information authorities don’t already have. Vetting already included home studies and background checks done by Office of Refugee Resettlement staff, not immigration enforcement.

The Office of Refugee Resettlement said it communicates “clearly and proactively” with parents, telling them they may be interviewed by ICE or other law enforcement officials. It said parents can decline to be interviewed by ICE and that refusal won’t influence decisions about whether their children will be released to them.

“The goal is to ensure that every child is released to a stable and safe environment and fully vetted sponsors by ensuring the potential sponsor is the same individual submitting supporting documentation, including valid ID,” it said in a statement.

However, Desai is aware of a situation in which a sponsor was not notified and only able to decline after pushing back.

“We know of sponsors who are deeply, deeply fearful because of this interview, but some are still willing to go forward given their determination to get their children out of custody,” she said.

Trump administration points to Biden

Tricia McLaughlin, a Homeland Security spokesperson, issued a statement that did not address any arrests or mention the specific changes. Instead, she said the department is looking to protect children who were released under President Joe Biden’s administration.

A federal watchdog report released last year addressed the Biden’s administration struggles during an increase in migrant children arriving at the U.S.-Mexico border in 2021. The Trump administration has dispatched Homeland Security and FBI agents to visit the children.

Another recent change allows ICE to interview children while they are at government-run shelters. That took effect July 2, according to a separate directive that the Office of Refugee Resettlement sent to shelters, also obtained by the AP.

The agency said it provides legal counsel to children and that its staff does not participate in interviews with law enforcement. Child legal advocates say they get as little as one-hour notice of the interviews, and that the children often don’t understand the purpose of the interview or are misled by officers.

“If we don’t understand what the interview is for or where the information is going, are we really consenting to this process?” said Miller Flowers, with the Young Center.

Jennifer Podkul, chief of global policy at Kids in Need of Defense, said some officers lack language skills, trauma-informed interviewing techniques and knowledge of the reunification process.

“It seems like it’s designed just to cast the net wider on immigration enforcement against adults,” she said.

String of policy changes adding hurdles to reunification process

The July changes are among a series of steps the Trump administration has taken to ramp up vetting of parents seeking to reunite with children.

The administration has required fingerprinting from sponsors and any adults living in the home where children are released. It has also required identification or proof of income that only those legally present in the U.S. could acquire, as well as introducing DNA testing and home visits by immigration officers.

Children have been spending more time in government-run shelters under increased vetting. The average length of stay for those released was 171 days in July, down from a peak of 217 days in April but well above 37 days in January, when Trump took office.

About 2,000 unaccompanied children were in government custody in July.

Shaina Aber, an executive director of the Acacia Center for Justice analyzing child custody data, attributes the longer custody times to the policy changes.

“The agency’s mission has been conflated and entangled,” she added. “It seems ORR’s mission has been somewhat compromised in that they are now doing more on the immigration enforcement side, and they’re not an immigration enforcement entity.”

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By Madyson Fitzgerald, Stateline.org

Self-driving vehicle technology continues to advance, prompting a wave of liability and safety regulations from state lawmakers.

This year, lawmakers in Arizona, Louisiana, Montana, Nevada and the District of Columbia enacted legislation to regulate driverless vehicles, according to a database from the National Conference of State Legislatures.

While much of the legislation aims to update existing law to include new definitions for autonomous vehicles, other measures put rules in place regarding insurance, permitting, licensing and road testing.

In total, lawmakers in 25 states introduced 67 bills related to autonomous vehicles, according to the database. California, Illinois, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York and Pennsylvania currently have bills under consideration. Alaska, Delaware and Washington have bills that will be carried over into the next legislative session.

Governors vetoed two measures this year. Colorado Democratic Gov. Jared Polis shot down a measure that would have required a driver to be present in any commercial vehicle being operated by an automated driving system.

Virginia Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin vetoed a measure that would have put rules in place for “high-risk artificial intelligence systems,” but would have excluded “autonomous vehicle technology” from that category.

As of now, there are no vehicles that have achieved full autonomy, according to the Society of Automotive Engineers’ criteria. But several car companies have introduced automated driving features, allowing drivers to take their hands off the wheel.

Tesla is rolling out its Full Self-Driving feature, a system under which a vehicle can drive itself almost anywhere with minimal intervention from the driver. Tesla Autopilot, which the company made available to the public in late 2024, also helps with basic vehicle maneuvering.

And Waymo, the country’s first autonomous ride-hailing service, is currently operating in Atlanta; Austin, Texas; Los Angeles; Phoenix and San Francisco. The robo-taxi company plans to expand to Miami and Washington, D.C., next.

According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, vehicle safety is the main benefit of driverless cars. With higher levels of automation, there is less room for human error or driver distractions. The new technology also could improve safety for bicyclists and pedestrians, according to the agency.

But driverless cars have been involved in hundreds of accidents over the past few years. Between 2021 and 2024, there were 696 accidents reported that involved a Waymo vehicle, according to an analysis by California-based law firm DiMarco — Araujo — Montevideo.

And last year, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration began investigating Tesla’s Full Self-Driving system after multiple reports of crashes that occurred in low-visibility conditions.

©2025 States Newsroom. Visit at stateline.org. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

By Amanda Hernández, Stateline.org

For years, state lawmakers have taken the lead on regulating kratom — the controversial herbal supplement used for pain relief, anxiety and opioid withdrawal symptoms. Some states have banned it entirely. Others have passed laws requiring age limits, labeling and lab testing.

At least half of the states and the District of Columbia have enacted some form of regulation on kratom or its components — building a patchwork of policies around a product largely unaddressed by the federal government.

But that may soon change. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is pushing to ban 7-hydroxymitragynine, or 7-OH — a powerful compound found in small amounts in kratom and sometimes concentrated or synthesized in products sold online, at smoke shops or behind gas station counters.

Federal health officials announced last month that the compound poses serious public health risks and should be classified as a Schedule I controlled substance, alongside heroin and LSD.

The move marks a significant shift in how federal regulators are approaching kratom, which they attempted to ban in 2016. It also has sparked debate about how the change could impact the growing 7-OH industry and its consumers.

This year, at least seven states have considered bills to tighten kratom regulations, including proposals for bans, age restrictions and labeling requirements.

Kratom, which originates from the leaves of a tree native to Southeast Asia, can have a wide range of mental and bodily effects, according to federal officials, addiction medicine specialists and kratom researchers. Reports of fatal kratom overdoses have surfaced in recent years, though kratom is often taken in combination with other substances.

Kratom and 7-OH are distinct products with separate markets, but they are closely connected. 7-OH is a semi-synthetic compound derived from kratom and only emerged on the market in late 2023, while kratom itself has been available for decades.

Leading kratom researchers also say more research is needed to fully understand the long-term effects of using both substances.

“There’s much we don’t know, unfortunately, on all sides,” said Christopher R. McCurdy, a professor of medicinal chemistry at the University of Florida. McCurdy is a trained pharmacist and has studied kratom for more than 20 years.

Research suggests kratom may help with opioid withdrawal and doesn’t seem to cause severe withdrawal on its own. Smaller amounts seem to act as a stimulant, while larger doses may have sedative, opioidlike effects. Very little is known about the risks of long-term use in humans, according to McCurdy.

As for 7-OH, it shows potential for treating pain, but it hasn’t been studied in humans, and it may carry a high risk of addiction. Researchers don’t yet understand how much is safe to take or how often it should be used, McCurdy told Stateline.

While some leading kratom experts agree that kratom and 7-OH should be regulated, they caution that placing 7-OH under a strict Schedule I classification would make it much harder to study — and argue it should instead be classified as Schedule II like some other opioids.

A federal survey from 2023 estimated that about 1.6 million Americans age 12 and older used kratom in the year before the study. The American Kratom Association, a national industry lobbying group, estimated in 2021 that between 11 million and 16 million Americans safely consume kratom products each year.

Since gaining popularity in recent years, 7-OH has appeared in a growing number of products. Some researchers and addiction medicine specialists say many consumers, especially those new to kratom, sometimes don’t understand the difference between products.

“It’s a pure opioid that’s available without a prescription, so it’s akin to having morphine or oxycodone for sale at a smoke shop or a gas station,” McCurdy said. “This is a public health crisis waiting to happen.”

Federal crackdown targets 7-OH, not kratom

In late July, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services recommended that the federal Drug Enforcement Administration place 7-OH in Schedule I, citing a high potential for abuse. The classification would not apply to kratom leaves or powders with naturally occurring 7-OH.

“We’re not targeting the kratom leaf or ground-up kratom,” FDA Commissioner Marty Makary said at a news conference. “We are targeting a concentrated synthetic byproduct that is an opioid.”

Makary acknowledged that there isn’t enough research or data to fully understand how widespread 7-OH’s use or impact may be. Still, he said the Trump administration wants to be “aggressive and proactive” in addressing the issue before it grows into a larger public health problem.

While only small amounts of 7-OH occur naturally in the kratom plant, federal officials have raised concerns about U.S. products containing synthetic or concentrated forms of the compound because it’s more potent than morphine and primarily responsible for kratom’s opioidlike effects.

The FDA’s recommendation to schedule 7-OH will now go to the DEA, which oversees the final steps of the process — including issuing a formal proposal and opening a public comment period.

If finalized, the rule could affect both companies selling enhanced kratom products and consumers in states where those products are currently legal.

The DEA backed off scheduling kratom compounds in 2016 after widespread public opposition.

Kirsten Smith, an assistant professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Johns Hopkins University who is studying kratom’s effects in humans, said she was surprised by the FDA’s push to schedule 7-OH.

“We don’t really have a public health signal of a lot of adverse events for either kratom or for 7-OH at this time,” she told Stateline. “I was, frankly, always surprised that kratom was pushed toward scheduling at an earlier time point. … I don’t know that we have data to support scheduling even now.”

Still, some advocacy groups, including the Holistic Alternative Recovery Trust, argue the push to schedule 7-OH is driven more by corporate interests than public health, suggesting the kratom industry is trying to sideline competition from 7-OH products.

“We think that this is just happening because of the legacy kratom manufacturers losing market share and wanting to gin up a crisis with this,” said Jeff Smith, the national policy director for the group, who said he has used 7-OH for sleep and pain management.

While his organization supports regulation and safe consumption, members worry the federal government’s move could drive people to riskier substances or push the market underground.

“It’s made a profound difference in my life,” Smith said. “We think it would be tragic to cut it off based on such a paucity of data when there’s so much potential for this product to help people.”

Public health concerns

Federal health officials say a key concern is the growing use of kratom and 7-OH products among teens and young adults.

Some officials and addiction medicine specialists have pointed out that these products often come in flavors and packaging designed to appeal to younger buyers, with few controls over where or how they’re sold. In some states without clear regulations, kratom and 7-OH products are available at gas stations or online, sometimes without any age verification.

“Whenever you go into a gas station and even though it’s behind the glass, it’s kind of eye level, and it has all of these bright colors — it has all of these things that really attract the visual of a kiddo,” said Socorro Green, a prevention specialist with Youth180, a nonprofit focused on youth substance use prevention in Dallas.

Green added that kratom and 7-OH products may be even more accessible to young people in rural communities, where gas stations and convenience stores are often among the few available retailers.

Some researchers and experts say that certain products may not clearly or accurately disclose their 7-OH content and are sometimes marketed or mistaken for traditional kratom.

Some cities, counties and states have responded by banning kratom or raising the minimum purchase age to 18 or 21. But in many areas, enforcement remains inconsistent, and some addiction specialists say clearer federal and state guidance is needed — especially as more people are using kratom and 7-OH to manage pain, anxiety or withdrawal symptoms on their own.

“There needs to be some kind of oversight, including some way of maybe helping to ensure that people know what they’re getting,” said Terrence Walton, the executive director and chief executive officer of NAADAC, the Association for Addiction Professionals.

State regulations

At least seven states have considered or enacted legislation this year related to kratom — ranging from age restrictions and labeling requirements to outright bans.

In New York, lawmakers passed two bills: one requiring warning labels and prohibiting kratom products from being labeled as “all natural,” and another raising the minimum purchase age to 21. Neither has been sent to the governor.

In Colorado, a new measure, which was signed into law in May, prohibits kratom from being sold in forms that resemble candy or appeal to children, increases labeling requirements, limits concentrations of 7-OH, and bans the manufacture and distribution of synthetic or semi-synthetic kratom.

In Mississippi, a new law that took effect in July raised the minimum purchase age for kratom to 21. It also bans synthetic kratom extracts and products with high concentrations of 7-OH. Lawmakers in Montana and Texas introduced similar legislation this year, but neither proposal advanced.

Louisiana is the latest state to enact a kratom ban, which took effect Aug. 1. Meanwhile, in July, Rhode Island became the first state to reverse its ban. The new law establishes a regulatory framework for the manufacturing, sale and distribution of kratom products, set to take effect in April 2026.

As of this year, Washington, D.C., and seven states — Alabama, Arkansas, Indiana, Louisiana, Rhode Island (until April 2026), Vermont and Wisconsin — have banned kratom. At least half of U.S. states now regulate kratom or its components in some way.

©2025 States Newsroom. Visit at stateline.org. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

By NADIA LATHAN and SOPHIA TAREEN, Associated Press

CHICAGO (AP) — Texas Democrats on Thursday moved closer to ending a nearly two-week walkout that has blocked the GOP’s redrawing of U.S. House maps before the 2026 election and put them under escalating threats by Republicans back home.

The Democrats announced they will return so long as Texas Republicans end a special session and California releases its own redrawn map proposal, both of which were expected to happen Friday.

Democrats did not say what day they might return.

Republican Texas Gov. Greg Abbott still intends to push through new maps that would give the GOP five more winnable seats before next year’s midterm elections.

Texas House Democrats said in a statement that under the advice of legal counsel, they needed to return to the state to “build a strong public legislative record” for an upcoming legal battle against a new map.

“Now, as Democrats across the nation join our fight to cause these maps to fail their political purpose, we’re prepared to bring this battle back to Texas under the right conditions and to take this fight to the courts,” said state Rep. Gene Wu, the House Democratic leader.

Lathan reported from Austin.

By MEG KINNARD, Associated Press

President Donald Trump says homeless people in the nation’s capital will be moved far from the city as part of his federal takeover of policing in the District of Columbia and crackdown on crime.

With his exact plans unclear, there is concern among advocates and others who say there are better ways to address the issue of homelessness than clearing encampments, as the Republican administration has pledged to do.

Washington’s status as a congressionally established federal district gives Trump the opportunity to push his tough-on-crime agenda, though he has not proposed solutions to the root causes of homelessness or crime.

Here’s a look at what we know and what questions remain about how Trump’s actions will affect the city’s homeless population:

How many homeless people are in Washington?

It is difficult to obtain accurate counts of homeless populations.

On one day at the end of each January, municipal agencies across the United States perform what is called a “point-in-time” count aimed at capturing the total number of people in emergency shelters, transitional housing or without any housing.

The 2025 count in the district put the total at 5,138 adults and children, a 9% decrease compared with the year before, according to Democratic Mayor Muriel Bowser.

Where will the city’s homeless people be taken?

It’s not entirely clear.

Trump wrote on his social media site before Monday’s news conference announcing the takeover that “The homeless have to move out, IMMEDIATELY. We will give you places to stay, but FAR from the Capital.”

Asked during a media briefing at the White House on Tuesday where homeless people would be relocated, press secretary Karoline Leavitt said local police and federal agencies would “enforce the laws that are already on the books,” which, she said, “have been completely ignored.”

Citing a city regulation that she said gives local police “the authority to take action when it comes to homeless encampments,” Leavitt said homeless people “will be given the option to leave their encampment, to be taken to a homeless shelter, to be offered addiction or mental health services.” Those who refuse “will be susceptible to fines or to jail time.”

In the past five months, the U.S. Park Police has removed 70 homeless encampments, giving the people living in them the same options, she said. As of Tuesday, Leavitt said only two homeless encampments remained in district parks maintained by the National Park Service and would be removed this week.

What are city officials doing for the homeless?

District officials said Tuesday they were making additional shelter space available after Trump said federal agents would remove homeless people in the city.

Kevin Donahue, the city administrator, said outreach workers were visiting homeless encampments and that the city has a building available that could house as many as 200 people, if needed.

Donahue made the comments during a conversation with community advocates and Bowser. The conversation was broadcast on X.

He said the outreach would continue through the week with a “greater level of urgency.”

Bowser said that when Trump sees homeless encampments in the city it “triggers something in him that has him believing our very beautiful city is dirty, which it is not.”

What are Washington residents saying?

Washington residents emphasized reductions in crime in recent years and concerns over the removal of homeless encampments in interviews Tuesday criticizing the federal takeover of the city’s police department.

Jeraod Tyre, who has lived in the city for 15 years, said “crime has been slowing down lately” and argued that federal troops would only escalate tensions because they do not have “relationships with the people in the community” like local police do.

Sheiena Taylor, 36, said she is more fearful as a result of the presence of federal forces in the city where she was born and raised.

Taylor said she has seen federal officers around her home and on the subway and worries about their targeting of young people and people experiencing homelessness.

“Being homeless isn’t a crime,” she said, emphasizing the need for solutions to the root causes of homelessness or crime rather than policing.

What do we still not know?

It’s not exactly clear what agents specifically will be tasked with moving homeless people to areas outside the city.

There also hasn’t been detailed information about how the people will be housed or provided for in new locations.

Some advocates have raised constitutional questions about the legality of forcibly removing homeless people from the city.

Associated Press writers River Zhang, Christine Fernando, Mike Balsamo and Darlene Superville contributed to this report.

Kinnard can be reached at http://x.com/MegKinnardAP

By CALEIGH WELLS

CHAGRIN FALLS, Ohio (AP) — A significant share of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions comes from heating, cooling and powering homes — about 15%, according to one estimate by the Environmental Protection Agency. So if you want to reduce your carbon footprint, the home is an effective place to start.

There are so many factors involved in a household’s energy consumption, including whether you have gas or electric heat and how you use your kitchen appliances, washer and dryer. It’s often overwhelming to figure out where to begin.

That’s why experts recommend a home energy assessment conducted by a professional. The room-by-room examinations help homeowners determine energy use, discover inefficiencies and create a plan to reduce both. In addition to helping the environment, improving efficiency saves money over the long term.

The assessments typically last several hours and cost anywhere from $100 to more than $1,000. Until the end of the year, the Inflation Reduction Act, a major U.S. climate law passed in 2022, helps cover the cost. Congress recently rescinded many of those benefits, which will be phased out.

I’m a climate reporter, so I’ve written about responsible energy use more than a few times. But in May, after years of apartment-dwelling, I moved into the first home I’ve ever owned.

So, I signed up for a home energy assessment.

My home, outside of Cleveland, is more than 100 years old. When I blast the air conditioning, it’s still hot and humid upstairs. I can hear birds chirping outside no matter how hard I shut the windows. And there’s a giant pipe in my basement held together by duct tape and prayers.

My assessment delivered pretty bad news. But with it came with lots of room for improvement. Here’s how the day unfolded:

The HVAC tests

Tim Portman, owner of the HVAC company Portman Mechanical in northeast Ohio, started with an hourlong interview about my goals of having a more comfortable and climate-friendly house. Then he headed into the basement to test my furnace, air conditioner and water heater.

The water heater pressure was normal, so Portman said there was no major risk of a water burst. However, the pressure in both the furnace and air conditioner was too high.

Which reveals my first problem: They are too big for the duct work. That’s inefficient, and it wears on the equipment. Making matters worse, Portman noticed a bunch of unnecessary turns in the ducts.

He equated it to having great water pressure in a kinked garden hose.

“If you don’t get the kink out of that garden hose, you’re never going to have a good experience,” he said.

The highlight of my basement woes was a giant pipe that feeds heating and cooling to the rest of the house. It just … wasn’t connected. It was jammed together like two straws without a junction. It bugged him enough that he paused to fix it.

And who am I to stop him?

The blower door

After the basement, Portman assembled a contraption called a blower door. He jammed a bunch of airtight plastic in my front doorway, shoved a big fan through the middle and turned it on so that it was blowing air out of my house.

“It literally sets up a vacuum in the house. So anywhere where there are leaks, you can see where those leaks are,” he said.

Seconds later, my home got hot and musty as the fan pulled outdoor air through all the leaky seams. Portman guessed the primary culprit immediately. I followed him upstairs into what felt like a sauna near the opening to the attic.

“You literally have hot, humid air — and your attic’s warmer than outside — just pouring into the second floor,” Portman said.

The blower door measures how many cubic feet of air flow through per minute. In a well-sealed house, the number should be less than or equal to the square footage. In my 1,500 square-foot (139-square-meter) house, the blower door number was 4,500. Three times as leaky as it should be.

Portman called it a worst-case scenario.

“It’s like driving your car around with the AC on and the windows rolled down,” he said.

The thermal camera

Next, Portman grabbed a thermal camera. The goal, since it was 80 degrees Fahrenheit (27 degrees Celsius) outside, was to see if leaks would show up as hot spots on the camera.

There were a lot. On the screen, yellow revealed a hot spot. The coolest spaces were dark blue. The leaky door frame around the attic lit up bright yellow.

“Do you think that’s a problem?” Portman joked.

“Oops,” I said.

“Yeah,” he said. “Oops is the right answer.”

There were a few unsurprising finds, including a leaky bathroom fan and gaps around the hundred-year-old windows. Downstairs we also found major gaps in the living room’s exposed beams.

Thermal images proved Portman’s theory that my walls were not insulated. That’s because my house still has some knob and tube wiring, a system of ceramic supports and porcelain-wrapped wires that’s a relic of the early 20th century. Because of how it heats up, only certain insulation can be used with it. It can also be very expensive to remove.

In the basement, the camera revealed major gaps next to pipes and some other just … random holes. They were maybe where wiring used to be, or just hollow spots in the old wooden framing. But the air seepage was strong enough to make the cobwebs flutter frantically, as if reflecting my dread discovering them.

The verdict

After his review, Portman’s first recommendation was to call an electrician about the old wiring.

“Getting knob and tube out of your house opens the door to have insulation in your walls,” he said.

Once that’s addressed, Portman said I need to upgrade my electrical panel to support an eventual switch to a heat pump and an electric water heater, though those appliances don’t fit my budget this year.

One electrician I spoke to by phone guessed it would cost $30,000 to remove the old wiring. But another said as long as he inspects the wiring and doesn’t find any dangerous modifications, I could leave it and replace the panel for roughly $3,000.

I went with the second guy.

Through the end of 2025, federal tax credits will help subsidize weatherization upgrades, including insulation, windows, doors and electrical panels.

In the meantime, my husband and I have a different homework assignment: use a caulk gun and spray foam to plug the holes that we found on the thermal camera.

Between July heat waves and January cold snaps, sealing a house in the Cleveland area isn’t just good for the planet. It’s a good investment.

“You could potentially cut your bills in half. Potentially even more,” he said.

The Associated Press’ climate and environmental coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.

By Amanda Hernández, Stateline.org

U.S. families lose nearly $350 billion each year due to the incarceration of a loved one in jail or prison, according to a recent report from the criminal justice advocacy group FWD.us. The estimate includes both direct expenses and long-term losses in household income.

The findings are based on a national survey of just over 1,600 adults conducted in partnership with researchers at Duke University and the National Opinion Research Center at the University of Chicago.

Families reported losing an average of $1,803 in income per month when a loved one is incarcerated. That includes the loss of the incarcerated person’s wages and may also reflect reduced work hours by family members to manage court proceedings or provide child care, according to the report.

The researchers also found that families spend an average of $4,200 annually per incarcerated relative.

These expenses include phone and email communication, travel for visits, child care and commissary purchases — such as food, hygiene products and clothing — some of which are marked up as much as 600% above retail prices, according to the report.

The burden is especially acute for Black families, who reported significantly higher expenses, according to the report. Black families reported spending an average of $8,005 per year supporting incarcerated loved ones — 2.5 times more than white families with an average of $3,251.

One in 5 family members reported being forced to move due to a loved one’s incarceration, including 1 in 3 children of incarcerated parents, according to the report. Overall, 9% of family members said they experienced a period of homelessness, a figure that rose to 18% — or roughly 1 in 6 — among those who had an incarcerated parent.

Low wages for incarcerated people, often just cents per hour, only deepen this strain, leaving families to fill in the financial gaps, according to the report. Meanwhile, extended prison lockdowns, staff shortages and overcrowded conditions have further limited access to basic services, including phone calls, visitation, medical care and rehabilitative programming.

Researchers also identified long-term economic consequences after incarceration. Collectively, formerly incarcerated individuals lose an estimated $111 billion in wages each year due to limited job opportunities, according to the report. The report also found long-term financial consequences for children of incarcerated parents, who collectively lose $215 billion in annual earnings — an average of nearly $4,500 per adult child each year.

The survey has some limitations. Many of the cost estimates were self-reported and rounded by participants. Still, previous research has reached similar conclusions. A 2017 report from the Prison Policy Initiative, a nonprofit and nonpartisan research organization, estimated that mass incarceration costs governments and the families of incarcerated people at least $182 billion annually.

In 2023, the most recent year available, state governments spent more than $66 billion on corrections, according to the U.S. Census Bureau’s Annual Survey of State and Local Government Finances. That total does not include the additional financial support provided by families of incarcerated people.

Preliminary national data from the federal Bureau of Justice Statistics shows the U.S. prison population is once again on the rise. At the end of 2023, there were more than 1.25 million people in state and federal prisons, a 2% increase from the previous year. The vast majority were serving sentences longer than one year and were held in state prisons.

The male prison population rose by 2% in 2023, while the number of incarcerated women rose by 4%. Still, both figures remain below their 2013 levels.

Researchers projected that if incarceration rates remain steady, families could face $3.5 trillion in cumulative financial losses over the next decade.

Stateline reporter Amanda Hernández can be reached at ahernandez@stateline.org.

©2025 States Newsroom. Visit at stateline.org. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

By JAIMIE DING, Associated Press

LOS ANGELES (AP) — A fast-growing brush fire has forced thousands of people to evacuate in a mountainous area north of Los Angeles.

The Canyon Fire ignited Thursday afternoon and grew to more than 7.6 square miles by 11 p.m., according to the Ventura County Fire Department. At least 400 personnel were battling the blaze along with several planes and helicopters. It remained uncontained late Thursday and was spreading east into Los Angeles County, officials said.

The fire is burning just south of Lake Piru, a reservoir located in the Los Padres National Forest. It’s close by Lake Castaic, a popular recreation area burned by the Hughes Fire in January. That fire burned about 15 square miles in six hours and put 50,000 people under evacuation orders or warnings.

Sunny, hot and dry conditions were expected in the area where the Canyon Fire was burning on Friday, with the daytime high near 100 degrees Fahrenheit  and minimum humidity in the mid-teens, according to the National Weather Service. Winds were expected to be light in the morning and grow from the south to southwest in the afternoon.

In LA County, around 2,700 residents evacuated with 700 structures under an evacuation order, officials said late Thursday. Another 14,000 residents and 5,000 structures were covered by an evacuation warning. Areas within the Val Verde zone had been reduced from an order to a warning.

The evacuation zones in nearby Ventura County were relatively unpopulated, Ventura County Fire Department spokesperson Andrew Dowd said Thursday. Fifty-six people were evacuated from the Lake Piru recreation area.

Dowd called the blaze a “very dynamic situation” caused by hot, dry weather, steep and rugged terrain and dry fuel.

LA County Supervisor Kathryn Barger, who represents the district, urged residents to evacuate.

“Extreme heat and low humidity in our north county have created dangerous conditions where flames can spread with alarming speed,” Barger said in a statement. “If first responders tell you to leave, go—without hesitation.”

The new blaze comes as a massive wildfire in Central California became the state’s largest blaze of the year, threatening hundreds of homes and burning out of control in the Los Padres National Forest.

The Gifford Fire had spread to 155 square miles by Thursday night with 15% containment. It grew out of at least four smaller fires that erupted Aug. 1 along State Route 166, forcing closures in both directions east of Santa Maria, a city of about 110,000 people. It has injured at least four people. The causes of the fires are under investigation.

Wildfire risk will be elevated through the weekend across much of inland California as a heat wave gripping the area intensifies. August and September are typically the most dangerous months for wildfires in the state.

By ERIC TUCKER and ALANNA DURKIN RICHER, Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Justice Department has subpoenaed New York Attorney General Letitia James as part of an investigation into whether she violated President Donald Trump’s civil rights, according to two people familiar with the matter.

The subpoenas sought records related to the lawsuit James filed against Trump over alleged fraud in his personal business dealings and a separate lawsuit involving the National Rifle Association, according to the people, who could not publicly discuss details of the investigation and spoke to the AP on Friday on the condition of anonymity.

They mark an escalation of the Trump administration’s ongoing efforts to scrutinize perceived adversaries of the president, including those like James who had investigated him before his election win last November.

A spokesperson for the attorney general’s office, Geoff Burgan, declined to confirm the subpoenas but issued a statement that said, “Any weaponization of the justice system should disturb every American. We stand strongly behind our successful litigation against the Trump Organization and the National Rifle Association, and we will continue to stand up for New Yorkers’ rights.”

In a separate statement, James’ personal attorney, Abbe D. Lowell, said “if prosecutors carry out this improper tactic and are genuinely interested in the truth, we are ready and waiting with the facts and the law.”

“Investigating the fraud case Attorney General James won against President Trump and his businesses has to be the most blatant and desperate example of this administration carrying out the president’s political retribution campaign,” Lowell said. “Weaponizing the Department of Justice to try to punish an elected official for doing her job is an attack on the rule of law and a dangerous escalation by this administration.”

A spokesperson for the Justice Department, Natalie Baldassarre, declined to comment.

James, a Democrat, has sued Trump and his Republican administration dozens of times over his policies as president and over how he conducted his private business empire. Trump is appealing the multimillion dollar judgment she won against him in a lawsuit alleging that he defrauded banks and other lenders by giving them financial statements that inflated the value of his properties, including his golf clubs and penthouse in Trump Tower.

Trump says his financial statements actually understated his wealth and that any mistakes in the documents were harmless errors that played no role in banks’ lending decisions. He and his lawyers have repeatedly accused James of engaging in “lawfare” for political purposes — a claim she has denied.

News of the subpoena comes as the Justice Department advances an investigation into the Trump-Russia probe that shadowed Trump for much of his first term as president and as the administration has engaged in a widespread purge from the workforce of law enforcement officials who had been involved in examining the activities of Trump and his supporters.

By Christie D’Zurilla, Los Angeles Times

LOS ANGELES — Actor Kelley Mack, who played Addy in Season 9 of “The Walking Dead” in addition to doing national commercials and voice-over work, has died at age 33, her family said on social media.

“It is with indelible sadness that we are announcing the passing of our dear Kelley. Such a bright, fervent light has transitioned to the beyond, where we all eventually must go,” the family wrote Tuesday on her Instagram account. She died in Cincinnati after battling glioma of the central nervous system, according to a notice posted on her CaringBridge page.

“Kelley passed peacefully on Saturday evening with her loving mother Kristen and steadfast aunt Karen present. Kelley has already come to many of her loved ones in the form of various butterflies … She will be missed by so many to depths that words cannot express.”

Mack, born Kelley Lynne Klebenow in Cincinnati on July 10, 1992, was raised in towns around Ohio and also in Missouri, Connecticut, North Carolina and Illinois. She moved to Los Angeles after earning a cinematography degree from Chapman University’s Dodge College of Film in Orange in 2014.

Her commercial work included playing Becky in “Fansville” ads for Dr Pepper and her voice-overs could be heard in spots for the Hyundai Ioniq, Budweiser, Credit Karma and more. Her “Walking Dead” character, Addy, was one of the young residents of Hilltop who had a crush on Henry while he had feelings for Lydia. Addy’s reanimated head wound up on a pike at the border of the Whisperers’ territory along with those of Henry and a handful of others who fought bravely but unsuccessfully after being kidnapped by Alpha.

After experiencing pain last fall in her lower back and legs, Mack was diagnosed in late November with a diffuse midline glioma, a rare type of astrocytoma, a cancer that starts in the central nervous system. “Due to the biopsy surgery on my spinal cord,” she said on Instagram in January, “I have lost the use of my right leg and most of my left leg, so I now get around with a walker and a wheelchair.”

She started proton radiation treatments in Cincinnati in mid-January — “It felt like I was filming an episode of my new TV show, set on a space ship floating somewhere in our infinite galaxy,” she wrote on Instagram — and by March had regained some ability to walk despite continuing pain in her lower body.

“Some days are challenging,” she said in April on CaringBridge, listing all the “healthy” things she was trying to do with aid from caregivers — her family members. “We have our emotional hiccups,” she said, “but we remind each other of our positivity and strength. We continue to feel confident in our path forward, God, and in our love for each other all leading up to overcome.”

By July, however, Mack was receiving respite care, which was described as “the toughest part of her journey.”

She is survived by her mother and father, Kristen and Lindsay Klebenow, sister Katherine, brother Parker, grandparents Lois and Larry Klebenow and her boyfriend, Logan Lanier. A celebration of life will be held Aug. 16 in Glendale, Ohio, and at a future date in Los Angeles.

©2025 Los Angeles Times. Visit at latimes.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

By ADITHI RAMAKRISHNAN, Associated Press

NEW YORK (AP) — The National Science Foundation can continue to withhold hundreds of millions of dollars from researchers in several states until litigation aimed at restoring it plays out, a federal court ruled Friday.

U.S. District Judge John Cronan in New York declined to force the NSF to restart payments immediately, while the case is still being decided, as requested by the sixteen Democrat-led states who brought the suit, including New York, Hawaii, California, Colorado and Connecticut.

In his ruling, Cronan said he would not grant the preliminary injunction in part because it may be that another court, the Court of Federal Claims, has jurisdiction over what is essentially a case about money. He also said the states failed to show that NSF’s actions were counter to the agency’s mandate.

The lawsuit filed in May alleges that the National Science Foundation’s new grant-funding priorities as well as a cap on what’s known as indirect research expenses “violate the law and jeopardize America’s longstanding global leadership in STEM.”

Another district court had already blocked the the cap on indirect costs — administrative expenses that allow research to get done like paying support staff and maintaining equipment. This injunction had been requested to restore funding to the grants that were cut.

In April, the NSF announced a new set of priorities and began axing hundreds of grants for research focused on things like misinformation and diversity, equity and inclusion. Researchers who lost funding also were studying artificial intelligence, post-traumatic stress disorder in veterans, STEM education for K-12 students and more.

Researchers were not given a specific explanation for why their grants were canceled, attorney Colleen Faherty, representing the state of New York, said during last month’s hearing. Instead, they received boilerplate language stating that their work “no longer effectuates the program goals or agency priorities.”

NSF has long been directed by Congress to encourage underrepresented groups like women and people with disabilities to participate in STEM. According to the lawsuit, the science foundation’s funding cuts already halted efforts to train the next generation of scientists in fields like computer science, math and environmental science.

A lawyer for the NSF said at the hearing that the agency has the authority to fund whatever research it deems necessary — and has since its inception in 1950. In the court filing, the government also argued that its current priorities were to “create opportunities for all Americans everywhere” and “not preference some groups at the expense of others, or directly/indirectly exclude individuals or groups.”

The plaintiff states are trying to “substitute their own judgement for the judgement of the agency,” Adam Gitlin, an attorney for the NSF, said during the hearing.

The science foundation is still funding some projects related to expanding representation in STEM, Cronan wrote in his ruling. Per the lawsuit filed in May, for example, the University of Northern Colorado lost funding for only one of its nine programs focused on increasing participation of underrepresented groups in STEM fields.

The states are reviewing the decision, according to spokespeople from the New York and Hawaii attorney general offices. The National Science Foundation declined to comment.

The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

By MATTHEW BARAKAT, Associated Press

ALEXANDRIA, Va. (AP) — Federal judge T.S. Ellis III, whose legal scholarship and commanding courtroom presence was evident in numerous high-profile trials, has died after a long illness. He was 85.

Ellis oversaw the trials of former Donald Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort and former U.S. Rep. William “Dollar Bill” Jefferson as well as the plea deal of “American Taliban” John Walker Lindh across a judicial career that lasted more than 35 years.

His acerbic wit sometimes drew muted complaints at the courthouse in Alexandria, Virginia, where Ellis was based, but his legal reasoning was unquestioned.

Ellis died Wednesday at his home in Keswick, according to the Cremation Society of Virginia.

Thomas Selby Ellis III was born in Colombia in 1940 and frequently found ways in court to utilize his Spanish-language skills. He often told Spanish-speaking defendants who relied on interpreters to speak up as they pleaded for leniency, saying he wanted to hear their words for himself.

He joined the Navy after receiving an undergraduate degree from Princeton, and completed graduate studies at Oxford. He received his law degree from Harvard, graduating magna cum laude.

He was appointed to the federal bench by President Ronald Reagan in 1987.

In a courthouse known as the “Rocket Docket” for its speedy disposition of cases, Ellis’ courtroom reflected his iconoclastic nature. Rarely did his hearings start on time, though when he presided over jury trials his punctuality improved as he zealously guarded jurors’ time commitments.

He frequently chastised lawyers to cut short long-winded arguments, in what he called “a concession to the shortness of life.” But he was easily coaxed or diverted into telling stories from the bench recalling episodes from his long legal career.

He snapped at lawyers who annoyed him, but would often adopt a more conciliatory tone later in the same hearing, and apologize for his short temper.

His penchant for speaking freely drew raised eyebrows at what was arguably the highest-profile trial over which he presided: the prosecution of Manafort, on charges of tax and bank fraud related to his work advising pro-Russia Ukrainian politicians before managing Trump’s campaign.

Ellis ultimately delivered a 47-month sentence, and said as an aside that Manafort appeared to have lived “an otherwise blameless life,” a phrase he often used at criminal sentencings. Critics who found much to blame in Manafort’s long career working for clients including the tobacco industry and international despots were outraged by the comment.

In 2009, Ellis sentenced Jefferson, a former Louisiana congressman, to 13 years in prison for taking bribes, including $90,000 found hidden in his freezer. The case threw multiple curveballs at Ellis, including a sexual relationship between a key witness and an investigating FBI agent.

In 2017, Ellis reduced Jefferson’s sentence to time served after a Supreme Court case changed the rules for what constitutes bribery of public officials. He made clear, though, that he believed Jefferson’s actions were criminal, and called his conduct “venal.”

“Public corruption is a cancer,” he said at the time of Jefferson’s resentencing. “It needs to be prosecuted and punished.”

Ellis’ sentencing hearings often followed a familiar script in which he invited defendants to explain themselves “by way of extenuation, mitigation, or indeed anything at all” that they wanted to say on their behalf. He invariably told defendants before passing judgment that “you write the pages to your own life story.”

Ellis took senior status as a judge in 2007 but regularly worked an extensive docket. In recent years, with his failing health, his cases were reassigned.

By LARRY NEUMEISTER, Associated Press

NEW YORK (AP) — Prosecutors said they now expect music mogul Sean “Diddy” Combs could face a prison sentence “substantially higher” than the four to five years they once thought he was likely to face after his conviction on two prostitution-related charges.

They made the observation late Thursday in a Manhattan federal court written submission in which they also opposed Combs’ request this week to be released on $50 million bail while he awaits an Oct. 3 sentencing.

In early July, Combs, 55, was acquitted of racketeering conspiracy and sex trafficking charges carrying potential life prison terms but was convicted of two counts of transportation to engage in prostitution for arranging for girlfriends and male sex workers to travel to engage in sexual encounters that he filmed.

Each prostitution-related charge carries a potential maximum 10 years in prison.

Prosecutors said after the verdict that they thought federal sentencing guidelines meant to prevent wide disparities in sentencings for the same crimes would likely call for a prison term of four to five years. But they said Thursday they believe the guidelines range “will be substantially higher,” raising the risk Combs will flee.

Judge Arun Subramanian will have wide latitude in determining a sentence and can choose to ignore the guidelines, which are not mandatory. Combs’ lawyers have said they believe the guidelines, if properly calculated, will call for 21 to 27 months in prison.

On the day of the verdict, prosecutors won a bail fight after defense lawyer Marc Agnifilo argued Combs should be freed immediately on bail.

Subramanian denied the defense request, saying Combs had not met the burden of showing by clear and convincing evidence a “lack of danger to any person or the community.” But he said Agnifilo could renew the request.

In doing so Tuesday, Agnifilo cited other cases he said were comparable to Combs’ conviction in which defendants were granted bail. And he cited severe conditions at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn, where Combs has been held since his September arrest at a New York hotel.

He also said Combs was being treated unfairly for engaging in a “swingers” lifestyle in which he and his girlfriends sometimes invited male sex workers to join them in multiday marathon sex performances.

Prosecutors said in their filing Thursday that Combs’ conviction on the prostitution-related counts carried a mandatory requirement that he remain in jail prior to sentencing, unless he could prove exceptional circumstances, which they said he cannot.

They said he should also remain in prison as a danger to the community, a claim that Agnifilo disputed in his papers.

“Sean Combs will not be violent to anyone. As we said in court, this jury gave him his life back, and he will not squander his second chance at life, nor would he do anything to further jeopardize his seven children not having a father, and four of his children not having a parent at all,” Agnifilo wrote earlier this week.

Prosecutors also said conditions at the federal lockup had improved considerably before Combs was arrested. A federal judge in January 2024 had blasted conditions at the jail, including its extensive lockdowns and inadequate medical care.

Prosecutors said cases cited by Agnifilo in which other defendants received bail were not comparable to the crimes Combs was convicted of carrying out, particularly because of his propensity for violence.

“The defendant’s extensive history of violence — and his continued attempt to minimize his recent violent conduct — demonstrates his dangerousness and that he is not amendable to supervision,” they wrote. “The defendant utterly fails to establish by clear and convincing evidence, as required, that he does not pose a danger to the community.”

One of the strongest earthquakes ever recorded struck Russia’s Far East early Wednesday, causing tsunami waves to wash ashore in Japan and Alaska and calls for people around the Pacific to be on alert or move to higher ground.

The 8.8 magnitude temblor set off warnings in Hawaii, North and Central America and Pacific islands south toward New Zealand, with officials warning that the potential tsunami danger may last for more than a day.

Here’s a glance at some of the most powerful earthquakes recorded previously, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.

1. Biobío, Chile

A 9.5 magnitude earthquake struck in a central region of Chile in 1960. Known as the Valdivia earthquake or Great Chilean earthquake, the largest ever recorded temblor resulted in more than 1,600 deaths in the country and beyond, most of which were caused by resulting large tsunami. Thousands of people were injured.

2. Alaska

In 1964, a 9.2 magnitude earthquake jolted the Alaska’s Prince William Sound, lasting for almost 5 minutes. More than 130 people were killed in the largest recorded earthquake in the U.S. and subsequent tsunami. There were huge landslides and towering waves that caused severe flooding. The event was followed by thousands of aftershocks for weeks after the initial quake.

3. Sumatra, Indonesia

A 9.1 magnitude earthquake and resulting tsunami devastated Southeast and South Asia and East Africa in 2004, killing 230,000 people. Indonesia alone recorded more than 167,000 deaths as entire communities were wiped out.

4. Tohoku, Japan

A magnitude 9.1 earthquake struck off the coast of northeastern Japan in 2011, triggering a towering tsunami that smashed into the Fukushima nuclear plant. It knocked out power and cooling systems and triggered meltdowns in three reactors. More than 18,000 people were killed in the quake and tsunami, some of whom have never been recovered.

5. Kamchatka, Russia

In 1952, a magnitude 9.0 quake caused significant damage but no reported deaths despite a tsunami that hit Hawaii with 9.1-meter (30-foot) waves.

6. Biobío, Chile

A massive 8.8 magnitude earthquake hit central Chile in 2010, shaking the capital for a minute and half and setting off a tsunami. More than 500 people were killed in the disaster.

7. Esmeraldas, Ecuador

In 1906, an 8.8 magnitude earthquake and resulting tsunami killed about 1,500 people. Its effects were felt for miles along the Central American coast and as far as San Francisco and Japan.

8. Alaska

In 1965, a magnitude 8.7 quake struck Alaska’s Rat Islands, causing an 11-meter (35-foot) -high tsunami. There was some relatively minor damage, including cracks in buildings and an asphalt runway.

9. Tibet

At least 780 people were killed when a magnitude 8.6 earthquake struck in 1950. Dozens of villages were destroyed, including at least one that slid into a river. There were also major landslides that jammed the Subansiri River in India. When the water eventually broke through, it resulted in a deadly 7-meter (23-foot) wave.

10. Sumatra, Indonesia

In 2012, a powerful 8.6 magnitude earthquake struck off the west coast of northern Sumatra in Indonesia. Though the quake caused little damage, it increased pressure on a fault that was the source of the devastating 2004 tsunami.

Tsunami warnings fading after one of the largest earthquakes ever recorded. Here’s what to know