Applause, laughter and cheering reverberated in a Madison auditorium on Thursday as students raced to answer questions during the African American History Academic Challenge. The annual event, a partnership between the Madison Metropolitan School District and the nonprofit 100 Black Men of Madison, Inc., seeks to enhance appreciation and knowledge of Black history and bolster pride and self-worth.
Student teams representing two high schools and a half-dozen middle schools demonstrated knowledge through challenges focused on key events, figures and themes in African American history. McFarland and Verona middle schools also hold the event, with winners advancing to a regional competition on March 14. That contest determines who represents Madison’s 100 Black Men chapter on a national stage in New York City.
As the middle school competition unfolded in the Doyle Administration Building, Sennett Middle School teacher Johnny Kennedy pumped her fist as she cheered on the students she coached.
“I’m so proud of them,” Kennedy said.
Her group of seventh and eighth graders had practiced since November. Some had competed last year without advancing, but they immediately knew they wanted to try again this year. James C. Wright Middle School ultimately advanced.
During the separate high school contest that Robert M. La Follette High School won, “Coach O” Anderson, a Madison West High School student engagement specialist, said she learned about the event when her son Micah advanced to the national finals in Las Vegas during his eighth grade year in 2018.
High schoolers tend to lag behind middle schoolers in participation. Anderson aimed to ramp up the same level of excitement among high schoolers that younger students display. She aims to engage more than just the “usual kids who get the opportunities” — like those already earning A’s in history and taking AP courses.
“I wanted the regular kids who don’t necessarily see themselves involved like this to have an opportunity,” she said. Her main motivation is watching her students put themselves in “transformational situations,” she added.
African American History Academic Challenge encourages pride, learning among Madison students is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.
After nearly 30 years in prison, Derek Williams appreciates the progress he’s made in his pursuit of parole.
NNS previously reported that Williams’ 180-year sentence for a string of armed robberies was reduced after he protected a correctional officer during a stabbing.
The sentence reduction made him eligible for parole decades earlier than he would have been otherwise.
He said he’s been doing all he can to go from parole eligibility to freedom.
Right now, he’s housed at the Sturtevant Transitional Facility, a minimum-security prison.
Five days a week, he is transported to the Racine Correctional Institution for his job in the gatehouse.
“I walk around freely,” Williams said. “I see every staff member and every visitor that comes through.”
But what he wants is work release, something fundamentally different.
Williams, 51, said he has always understood that a key way to demonstrate readiness for parole is doing work release – in which the Wisconsin Department of Corrections allows incarcerated people to leave a prison for a job in the community and return after their shift.
Williams said his pursuit of parole hit a major setback because his pursuit of work release has hit one.
In February, the Wisconsin Parole Commission deferred Williams’ parole for six months and withdrew its endorsement for work release, citing concerns that he was dishonest during his January parole hearing.
It is a setback driving Williams, his wife and other loved ones crazy.
“I’m literally being held in prison because the prison is not letting me out to do work release,” he said.
A Wisconsin Watch investigation found that work release opportunities in the state were limited and that prison officials weren’t tracking participation rates.
The commission said Williams falsely claimed during his January hearing that at a previous hearing a commissioner had discussed initiating a pre-release investigation.
A pre-release investigation is conducted by correctional staff to verify housing, employment and public safety before parole is granted.
After reviewing the audio and transcript from the earlier hearing, the commission wrote that there was no mention of a pre-release investigation.
Williams’ “willingness to be dishonest during a parole review (and about another parole commissioner) heightens the commissioner’s stated reservations,” the Wisconsin Parole Commission said in its Feb. 2 decision.
Williams disputes this characterization, saying he was attempting to explain prior discussions, not mislead the panel or manipulate the parole process.
He also said he was not provided an opportunity to clarify his comments before the Wisconsin Parole Board made its decision.
Despite the different claims about what happened, the effect on Williams’ prospects is clear.
Robert Miller is the warden of the Racine Correctional Institution, who oversees off-site authorizations for people housed at Sturtevant. Miller told Rikki Williams in an email that because the Parole Commission no longer endorses work release, her husband’s anticipated release date could be “significantly in the future.”
Beth Hardtke, director of communications for the Wisconsin Department of Corrections, said in an email that work release decisions are made on a case-by-case basis.
“Work release placement decisions and approvals may vary based on the individual and the types of conviction(s),” Hardtke said. “The individual’s conduct and work history … may be considered.”
In its decision, the Wisconsin Parole Commission also cited Williams’ criminal history and public safety concerns but did not elaborate on them.
A spokesperson for the commission previously told NNS that “a parole grant is not an entitlement.”
For now, Williams remains in the gatehouse.
Jonathan Aguilar is a visual journalist at Milwaukee Neighborhood News Service who is supported through a partnership between CatchLight Local and Report for America.
What do you do when the Parole Commission says you’re lying? Following up with Derek Williams is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.
More than 71,000 customers of Wisconsin’s largest electric utility were without power Friday afternoon due to strong winds.
The post Tens of thousands of We Energies customers without power due to strong winds appeared first on WPR.
The city's 57 deaths last year represented a decline of nearly 20 percent compared to 70 deaths in 2024, Mayor Cavalier Johnson said at a press conference this week at South Division High School. It's the largest single-year decline since the 2022 peak for traffic deaths at 77.
The post Milwaukee traffic deaths hit record 4-year low in 2025, city officials say appeared first on WPR.
Forward Analytics used six indicators to measure the state’s economy and in “Keeping Pace,” said in the past seven-year period Wisconsin falls short.
The post Wisconsin’s economy lags behind the rest of the country, new report shows appeared first on WPR.
State regulators gave three utilities the OK to acquire a large solar and battery project in Rock County that will provide enough energy to power more than 45,000 homes.
The post Regulators sign off on utilities’ purchase of solar, battery project in Rock County appeared first on WPR.
A DNR senior fisheries biologist says whitefish populations have been sharply declining in the lake for the last 20 years.
The post New reduced Lake Michigan whitefish quota goes into effect for commercial fishers appeared first on WPR.
The growth of industrial farms in America’s dairyland is outpacing regulators tasked with reviewing permits and overseeing compliance with waste regulations.
The post Wisconsin agency tasked with industrial farm permits plagued by low-staffing levels appeared first on WPR.
Two Nigerian teachers moved to Milwaukee to teach in Milwaukee Public Schools. Now, changes to H-1B visas have forced the district to pause hiring international teachers.
The post What does it take to get a US work visa? 2 Nigerian teachers’ journey to Milwaukee appeared first on WPR.
Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell speaks during a press conference on Dec. 10, 2025 in Washington, D.C. (Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)
WASHINGTON — A federal judge blocked the Trump administration’s subpoenas to probe the Federal Reserve and Chair Jerome Powell, pointing to “a mountain of evidence” that President Donald Trump is using the investigation to force lower interest rates, according to an order unsealed Friday.
In a scathing 27-page order issued Wednesday, Chief Judge James Boasberg for the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia wrote there is “abundant evidence that the subpoenas’ dominant (if not sole) purpose is to harass and pressure Powell either to yield to the President or to resign and make way for a Fed Chair.”
In explaining his rationale for granting the Federal Reserve Board of Governors’ motion to quash the subpoenas, Boasberg added, “For years, the President has publicly targeted Powell because the Fed is not delivering the low rates that Trump demands.”
On more than 100 occasions, Boasberg wrote, Trump or “his deputies” made statements attacking Powell. The judge detailed more than a dozen of Trump’s posts on his platform, Truth Social, in which he namecalls Powell and demands his resignation.
Boasberg also invoked the Trump administration’s attempts to criminally prosecute former FBI Director James Comey and New York State Attorney General Letitia James.
“Being perceived as the President’s adversary has become risky in recent years,” Boasberg wrote.
Boasberg wrote later in the order that he would also unseal the Fed Board’s motion to quash the subpoenas and the government’s opposition, as Department of Justice officials had already revealed details about the probe.
The government “has produced essentially zero evidence to suspect Chair Powell of a crime; indeed, its justifications are so thin and unsubstantiated that the Court can only conclude that they are pretextual. The Court therefore finds that the subpoenas were issued for an improper purpose and will quash them,” Boasberg concluded.
In a brief press conference Friday afternoon during which she became combative with journalists, U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Jeanine Pirro slammed Boasberg’s decision as “outrageous” and said the administration plans to appeal.
“One of the age-old tools that all prosecutors have to investigate any crime, including cost overruns, is a grand jury subpoena. Today, however, in Washington, an activist judge has taken that tool away from us by inserting himself and preventing the grand jury from even obtaining, let alone hearing, evidence,” Pirro said.
“He has neutered the grand jury’s ability to investigate crime. As a result, Jerome Powell today is now bathed in immunity, preventing my office from investigating the Federal Reserve. This is wrong, and it is without legal authority,” she said.
Department of Justice officials served the central bank with grand jury subpoenas in mid-January as part of a probe into multi-year renovation costs at the Fed’s offices in Washington, D.C., and whether Powell lied about it to Congress in June.
The subpoenas prompted a rare video statement from Powell, who alleged the subpoenas were not about construction cost oversight, but about the Fed’s independence to set interest rates.
Powell’s term as chair expires in May.
To replace him, Trump has nominated bank executive and former Fed Board Governor Kevin Warsh, who will need the support of all Republicans on the tightly divided Senate Banking Committee to reach a full Senate floor vote.
Retiring Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., who sits on the committee, has said he’ll refuse to back Warsh until the administration drops its criminal probe of Powell.
“This ruling confirms just how weak and frivolous the criminal investigation of Chairman Powell is and it is nothing more than a failed attack on Fed independence,” Tillis said in a statement Friday.
“We all know how this is going to end,” he continued. “The U.S. Attorney’s Office should save itself further embarrassment and move on. Appealing the ruling will only delay the confirmation of Kevin Warsh as the next Fed Chair.”
Trump nominated Powell for the role during his first term, and President Joe Biden re-nominated him in 2021.The Senate overwhelmingly confirmed his appointment on both occasions.
A sign explaining restrictions on buying soda and sweetened drinks using Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits is displayed in a grocery store in Bountiful, Utah on Feb. 11, 2026. (McKenzie Romero/Utah News Dispatch)
WASHINGTON — A group of food stamp recipients sued the U.S. Department of Agriculture this week over its efforts to prohibit the benefits from being used to purchase certain non-nutritious items.
Five consumers enrolled in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, brought the lawsuit March 11 in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. The recipients hail from Colorado, Iowa, Nebraska, Tennessee and West Virginia and are challenging the waivers in those states.
President Donald Trump’s administration has so far approved waivers in 22 states — part of its Make America Healthy Again agenda — that restrict which items recipients of the federal food assistance program that helps 42 million people can buy with their benefits.
The restrictions, which range from candy to sugar-sweetened beverages and other processed foods, differ throughout states.
The agency has described the waivers as a “key step in ensuring that taxpayer dollars provide nutritious options that improve health outcomes within SNAP.”
But the lawsuit claims that the “practical effect” of the waivers is “to destabilize food access for every SNAP participant in the affected states.”
The lawsuit argues that the waivers “impose ambiguous and scientifically untethered product restrictions that vary not only by state but, in some instances, by store location.”
The lawsuit also claims that people with chronic illnesses are “losing access to products they need to manage blood sugar or sustain diets they need to maintain baseline health care needs.”
“The challenged waivers also create confusion and conflict at the point of sale by depriving SNAP recipients of clear notice about which products remain eligible for purchase,” the lawsuit notes.
The SNAP recipients are represented by the National Center for Law and Economic Justice, a nonprofit that advocates on behalf of low-income families, individuals and communities, along with the law firm Shinder Cantor Lerner.
A spokesperson for USDA said Friday the agency would not comment on pending litigation.
A U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement field office at 310 E. Knapp St. in Milwaukee. (Paul Kiefer / Wisconsin Watch)
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers arrested a Sheboygan Falls woman during a routine check-in this week, taking her back into custody just months after an immigration court judge canceled her deportation order and began the process of securing her a green card.
Elvira Benitez, 51, spent six months in ICE custody last year after accidentally crossing the Canadian border during a family road trip in Michigan. Benitez fled an abusive home in Michoacán, Mexico, as a teenager and lived without legal status for 35 years, her family said. She first entered the immigration court system after last year’s arrest.
She was among more than 25,000 people arrested by ICE in July 2025 alone. Roughly a third of immigrants arrested by the agency nationally between January and mid-October 2025Wi had neither a prior criminal history nor pending criminal charges, including Benitez.
In her absence, her two adult daughters — both U.S. citizens — took in their school-age siblings. Judge Richard Drucker of the Cleveland immigration court cited her younger children’s struggles during Benitez’s initial detention as a reason to cancel her deportation and set her on the path to legal residency.
Drucker initially signaled a willingness to grant Benitez relief in early November, but the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) delayed her background check — necessary for her path to a green card — for over a month, eventually releasing her in mid-December.
The agency soon appealed Drucker’s order, stalling Benitez’s green card process. She continued attending mandatory check-ins at the Milwaukee DHS office, where ICE agents arrested her Tuesday morning before transferring her to a holding facility outside Chicago.
ICE arrested at least 107 people at the DHS office in downtown Milwaukee between January and mid-October 2025 — more than at any other Wisconsin site named in ICE arrest records. Three-quarters of those immigrants had no pending criminal charges or past convictions, compared with just 17% of all immigrants arrested by ICE in Wisconsin during the same period.
Benitez had no other run-ins with law enforcement that could have triggered her recent arrest, said Crystal Aguilar, her eldest daughter. In Aguilar’s view, the arrest calls into question “whether families who follow the rules can rely on the decisions made in immigration court,” she added.
She complied with all requirements following her initial release, including attending every ICE supervision appointment, according to her attorney, Marc Christopher. DHS was not legally required to arrest her while its appeal is pending, he added.
Benitez’s detention serves “no legitimate public safety purpose,” Christopher wrote in a Tuesday press release. “It separates a mother from her vulnerable U.S. citizen children despite a federal immigration judge already recognizing the extreme hardship her removal would cause them.”
An ICE spokesperson told Wisconsin Watch that Benitez will remain in custody “pending further immigration proceedings.”
“Being in detention is a choice,” they added, suggesting that undocumented immigrants should self-deport or face arrest and a permanent ban on re-entering the U.S.
This article first appeared on Wisconsin Watch and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
University of Oklahoma freshmen attend a student welcome event in August 2023. A lawsuit by a coalition of mostly Democratic-led states argues that a new Trump administration reporting requirement on race, gender and test scores could threaten student privacy and overburden universities. (Photo by Kyle Phillips/For Oklahoma Voice)
A coalition of mostly Democratic-led states is suing the Trump administration over a new federal requirement that would force colleges to report detailed admissions data, including race, gender, test scores and financial aid for individual students.
The mandate is an expansion of a 40-year-old system known as IPEDS and follows the 2023 Supreme Court decision banning race-based admissions. The lawsuit argues the new requirement could threaten student privacy and overburdens universities.
The Trump administration’s requirement comes as data suggests the Supreme Court ruling has already shifted campus demographics: Black enrollment has dropped at several elite universities, while Asian American enrollment has increased at some schools. Researchers say it may take years to fully understand how admissions patterns are changing.
For roughly 40 years, the federal government’s primary way of collecting data and information about colleges and universities across the U.S. has been a database called Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System, or IPEDS.
Included in IPEDS data is information on enrollments, graduation rates and financial aid, and some of this data has informed higher-ed policies and research.
In August, President Donald Trump issued a memorandum directing the Department of Education to use IPEDS data as a way to track whether colleges are considering race in admissions decisions.
Trump’s directive was preceded by the Supreme Court’s 2023 ruling in Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard, which banned colleges from considering race directly in admissions decisions.
The Trump administration isn’t just looking for demographic data from IPEDS, but also is rolling out a new reporting mandate for four-year colleges — the Admissions and Consumer Transparency Supplement (ACTS) — to report detailed admissions data such as race, gender, test scores and financial aid levels.
Colleges were expected to begin complying with the new reporting requirement this year, with responses due March 18, according to the suit.
A coalition of 17 states led by Massachusetts has filed a lawsuit in U.S. District Court seeking to block the new mandate. The states argue the ACTS survey imposes onerous reporting demands on universities and requires institutions to collect data they have not historically collected and may not be compelled to expose due to student safety.
The lawsuit says the administration seeks “to fundamentally change IPEDS, converting it from a reliable tool for methodical statistical reporting to a mechanism for law enforcement and the furthering of partisan policy aims.”
The states also argue that the new requirement is rushed, forces colleges to compile data in months that normally would take years, and risks reporting errors.
Other states listed as plaintiffs include California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Nevada, New Jersey, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, Washington and Wisconsin. It names U.S. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon and Management and Budget Director Russell Vought as defendants.
Federal officials argue the additional reporting in the new survey is necessary to ensure transparency and confirm that colleges are complying with the Supreme Court’s ruling.
Since the 2023 Supreme Court ruling, declines among Black college enrollment have been strongest at highly selective private universities.
An Associated Press analysis of 20 selective colleges found that nearly all saw a drop in Black freshman enrollment compared with 2023. At Harvard, Black enrollment fell from 18% in 2023 to less than 12% in the next incoming class. Princeton’s drop was from about 9% to roughly 5% Black freshmen in the following admissions cycle.
Several universities reported higher Asian American enrollment in the years immediately after the ruling. At Harvard, the share of Asian American freshmen rose from 37% to about 41%. Some institutions saw even larger changes — one analysis reported Asian enrollment jumping from 26% to 45% between 2023 and 2025 at a selective university.
Researchers suggest a cascading effect of higher enrollment numbers of Black and Hispanic students at public universities, as selective school admissions drop and students enroll at less selective colleges. Data from fall 2024 admissions cycles show Black and Hispanic enrollment rising about 8% at public flagship universities overall.
Stateline reporter Robbie Sequeira can be reached at rsequeira@stateline.org.
This story was originally produced by Stateline, which is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network which includes Wisconsin Examiner, and is supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity.
U.S. Sen. Markwayne Mullin speaks to reporters after a vote at the on March 12, 2026. President Donald Trump has nominated the Oklahoma Republican to lead the Department of Homeland Security. (Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)
WASHINGTON — If Oklahoma GOP Sen. Markwayne Mullin is confirmed by the Senate to lead the Department of Homeland Security, he will take over an agency that has faced a weeks-long funding lapse, public blowback to its immigration enforcement strategy and a bottleneck of disaster relief awards left by his predecessor that drew bipartisan ire.
Additionally, if the United States remains at war with Iran, he’d oversee monitoring for security threats. That is a task some lawmakers are skeptical the department can undertake during its shutdown.
Mullin, who does not need any Democratic support to be confirmed to lead DHS, will have his nomination hearing March 18 before the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs. The committee will vote to move his nomination to the Senate floor the following day, committee Chair Rand Paul of Kentucky told reporters.
The Oklahoman would take over from Kristi Noem, whom President Donald Trump ousted after a disastrous two days of testimony on Capitol Hill that capped a controversial 14-month tenure as DHS secretary.
“She was tasked to do a very difficult job … and I think she has performed the best she can do under the circumstances,” Mullin said of Noem, shortly after the president announced his intention to nominate him. “Is there always lessons that can be learned? Every day there’s something you can do better.”
But Mullin would face the same challenges, if not more, once he takes over.
In addition to heading Trump’s aggressive immigration push, which is at a low point in popular support after the fatal shootings of two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis in January, Mullin would also be tasked with restoring faith in the department’s spending decisions and repairing the pipeline for sending relief to disaster-stricken areas.
Noem faced bipartisan scrutiny during hearings this month for her record on those issues, including awarding a $220 million no-bid contract for an ad campaign to a firm owned by a subordinate’s spouse and requiring that she personally approve almost all Federal Emergency Management Agency expenditures.
Noem often clashed with critics, especially Democrats. Mullin indicated he’d try to find more common ground.
“Yes, I’m a Republican. Yes, I’m conservative. But (the) Department of Homeland Security is to keep everybody (safe), regardless if you support me or not,” he told reporters. “My focus is to keep the homeland secure.”
His time in Congress has not given Mullin a strong background in the subject matter. He’s never sat on any committees dealing with DHS policy. He is a member of the Senate Appropriations Committee, which writes funding bills for the entire federal government, but is not a member of the subcommittee that oversees the DHS funding bill.
If the Senate confirms Mullin, he would be the first Native American to lead DHS. He is an enrolled member of the Cherokee Nation.
Mullin’s office referred questions for this story to the White House. In an email to States Newsroom, the White House said the Trump administration has “no DHS related policy announcements to make at this time.”
Mullin is a staunch Trump defender and supporter and will be tasked with carrying out his campaign promise of mass deportations of immigrants. To do that, DHS is flush with more than $175 billion for immigration enforcement and detention, through Republicans’ “One, Big Beautiful” law that Mullin voted for.
“I look forward to earning the support of my colleagues in the Senate and carrying out President Trump’s mission alongside the department’s many capable agencies and the thousands of patriots who keep us safe every day,” Mullin wrote in a social media post shortly after the president’s announcement.
Polling has found many Americans have soured on the campaign platform that won Trump a second term in the White House as DHS has deployed officers to conduct aggressive immigration enforcement in the interior of the country. Majorities of Democrats and independents said the Minneapolis shootings were a sign of broader problems in immigration enforcement, though most Republicans remained supportive of the administration.
The approach has led to massive protests against U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, especially after the deaths of Renee Good and Alex Pretti, both 37-year-old residents of Minneapolis. Another U.S. citizen, Ruben Martinez, was also killed by immigration agents in Texas last year.
Since Good and Pretti’s deaths last month, Democrats have blocked an appropriations bill for the department without significant changes in enforcement tactics.
Mullin has argued that the appropriations bill provides an accountability measure in funding body cameras for immigration agents. He has pushed back on any restrictions on officers, such as barring them from covering their faces.
“We’re not going to handcuff law enforcement for a useless political exercise,” he wrote in a social media post.
One of the biggest criticisms from Noem was that she referred to Pretti and Good as domestic terrorists. Multiple videos contradicted those claims, and Noem refused to admit she made a mistake or apologize to their families when she was questioned by lawmakers.
While Mullin didn’t use that label, he made a similar claim, implying that Pretti’s actions were a felony. Mullin stressed his support for law enforcement.
“Obstructing federal law enforcement is a felony. Most Americans follow ICE instructions without thinking twice,” Mullin wrote on social media hours after the shooting. “These patriots are doing a difficult job under an 8,000% rise in death threats.”
Mullin was not the only Senate Republican to take that position, but some did take a different view.
Paul joined the top Democrat on the committee that oversees DHS, Gary Peters of Michigan, in grilling the heads of two immigration enforcement agencies within the department about Pretti’s death.
“He is retreating at every moment,” Paul said of Pretti. “He’s trying to get away, and he’s being sprayed in the face. I don’t think that’s de-escalatory. That’s an escalatory thing.”
Senators will get a chance to question where Mullin will lead the agency and whether he will continue some of Noem’s hardline immigration policies, such as the revocation of legal status for millions of immigrants who hail from countries initially granted protections because their home country is deemed too dangerous to return to.
Mullin has often criticized local governments that have policies to not cooperate with or assist the federal government in immigration enforcement.
In an interview with States Newsroom, Peters said he had not spoken with Mullin about leading DHS and looked forward to questioning him before the committee.
In addition to immigration-related agencies and FEMA, the department includes the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, the Secret Service and the Coast Guard.
Additionally, the department will manage security for major events: the World Cup and the celebration for the 250th anniversary of the country’s founding that will occur blocks from the White House.
Another Noem policy that drew bipartisan criticism was her requirement she give personal approval of any FEMA contracts or grants worth more than $100,000.
It effectively created a bottleneck of relief to disaster-stricken places, and lawmakers expressed their frustration to Noem that the policy meant delayed payments.
North Carolina GOP Sen. Thom Tillis berated Noem for his full 10 minutes of questioning when she appeared before the Senate Judiciary Committee about how her policy has slowed down recovery efforts in North Carolina, which was hit by the devastating Hurricane Helene in 2024.
It’s unclear if Mullin will keep that policy in place.
“The Department of Homeland Security has a very broad jurisdiction and I think there’s a lot of work that we need to do,” Mullin told reporters.
FEMA’s disaster relief fund is somewhat unique among federal programs since Congress has granted it the authority to deficit spend; it cannot run out of money, even during a shutdown.
Trump has sought to downsize FEMA, firing part of its workforce and directing his officials to restructure the agency. There is currently no permanent FEMA administrator.
Mullin spent a decade in the House before being elected to the Senate in a special election in 2022.
In his time in the House from 2013 to 2023, Mullin sat on the Energy and Commerce, Transportation and Infrastructure and Natural Resources committees.
In the Senate, besides Appropriations, he sits on the Armed Services, Indian Affairs and Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions committees.
He chairs an appropriations subcommittee that handles funding for the legislative branch, and on the HELP Committee, he chairs the panel on Employment and Workplace Safety.
Mullin, whose congressional staff totals nearly 40, based on records from the Legistorm data service, would oversee an agency with more than 272,000 employees and an annual budget of approximately $64 billion.
During a 2023 HELP Committee hearing, Mullin challenged International Brotherhood of Teamsters President Sean O’Brien to a physical fight, after heated testimony.
“You know where to find me,” Mullin, who is a former professional MMA fighter, said to O’Brien.
Mullin will also have to appear before Paul, who he’s referred to as a “freaking snake,” for his confirmation hearing. Mullin also expressed sympathy for a neighbor of Paul’s, who was charged with assaulting the senator on his front lawn, breaking several ribs.
When pressed by reporters, Paul did not address Mullin’s comments.
“We’ll see how the hearing goes,” he said.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth speaks at a briefing at the Pentagon on March 13, 2026. (Screenshot from C-SPAN)
WASHINGTON — The Department of Defense announced Friday that six more American troops have died as a result of the war in Iran, bringing the total to 13 since the conflict began in late February.
U.S. Central Command wrote in an early-morning social media post that a “KC-135 refueling aircraft went down in western Iraq” on Thursday and that four of the six crew members aboard had been confirmed dead, but posted later that no one survived.
“The circumstances of the incident are under investigation. However, the loss of the aircraft was not due to hostile fire or friendly fire,” Central Command said.
Joint Chiefs of Staff Chair Gen. Dan Caine said during a press conference at the Pentagon the “incident occurred over friendly territory in western Iraq while the crew was on a combat mission.”
He reiterated there was no “hostile or friendly fire” that led to the crash.
“We’re also aware of a fire on board the USS Gerald R. Ford. We’re thinking about the crew there who were injured in the fire,” Caine said. “We believe and hope that everyone will be okay.”
U.S. Naval Forces Central Command posted on social media late Thursday the fire began “in the ship’s main laundry spaces” and that it “was not combat-related and is contained.”
The post said the ship was in the Red Sea in support of the Iran war, which the administration has dubbed Operation Epic Fury.
“There is no damage to the ship’s propulsion plant, and the aircraft carrier remains fully operational,” the post said. “Two Sailors are currently receiving medical treatment for non-life-threatening injuries and are in stable condition.”
Before Friday, there had been seven U.S. deaths reported in the conflict.
Caine said during the briefing that military officials expect Friday will be the “heaviest day of kinetic fires” in the Iran war since it began on Feb. 28.
“They’re continuing to destroy the Iranian Navy to ensure freedom of navigation. And this means going after Iran’s minelaying capability and destroying their ability to attack commercial vessels,” he said. “And we’re targeting their defense industrial base so they cannot rebuild the capabilities that can harm America’s interests or our partners in the future.”
Caine said while the U.S. military has made “progress” since it began bombing nearly two weeks ago, “Iran still has the capability to harm friendly forces and commercial shipping.”
The Pentagon’s efforts, he said, remain “complex, dangerous and difficult.”
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, who was also at the briefing, said he believes Iran’s new supreme leader has been “wounded and likely disfigured.”
Hegseth also criticized journalists for not providing the government with more favorable coverage of the war in Iran, before moving on to recognize the troops killed during the airplane crash in Iraq.
“War is hell. War is chaos. And as we saw yesterday with the tragic crash of our KC-135 tanker, bad things can happen,” he said, later adding that “war, in this context and in pursuit of peace, is necessary.”
Hegseth did not provide any updates about the military’s investigation into whether it bombed a girls’ school in Iran in the first days of the war, killing at least 168 people.
“I can report that CENTCOM has designated an investigating officer to complete a command investigation,” he said. “The command investigation will take as long as necessary to address all the matters surrounding this incident. And the investigating officer is from outside CENTCOM and is a general officer.”
Nearly every Democrat in the Senate sent a letter to Hegseth earlier in the week demanding military officials conduct “a swift investigation into the strikes on this school and any other potential U.S. military actions causing civilian harm, and the findings must be released to the public as soon as possible, along with any measures to pursue accountability.”
The New York Times reported the same day that an “ongoing military investigation has determined that the United States is responsible for a deadly Tomahawk missile strike on an Iranian elementary school.”
Hegseth declined to say exactly what additional objectives President Donald Trump believes the military must accomplish before ending the bombing campaign he began alongside the Israeli government.
“The president has his hand on the throttle and will decide, ultimately, when they’ve been reached that serve the purposes of the United States of America,” he said.
New cases of police using Flock for inappropriate, personal surveillance purposes have contributed to mounting public concern about the technology. | Photo courtesy Flock Safety
Four Milwaukee aldermen are expressing concern about “the lack of adequate guardrails, auditing, supervision, and transparency” surrounding the use of Flock Safety license plate reader cameras. In a three-page letter sent Wednesday to the city’s Fire and Police Commission (FPC), Common Council President José Pérez and Alders Marina Dimitrijevic, Alex Brower and Sharlen Moore said that recent cases like one involving a Milwaukee police officer who used Flock to stalk a romantic partner “are alarming and underscore the systemic oversight gap rather than an isolated failure.”
The letter is the latest ripple in a wave of community pushback against the use of Flock Safety cameras, which are equipped with license plate reading technology and can be accessed by law enforcement agencies across the country using search terms and filters. Critics also express concern that the cameras can be used for backdoor surveillance by the federal government, particularly as the Trump administration pursues an aggressive immigration crackdown.
Audit data reviewed by Wisconsin Examiner shows that officers often use vague terms like “investigation,” “suspicious,” “cooch,” or just “.” to search the network. Some Wisconsin communities have canceled their contracts with the multi-billion dollar Flock Safety company due to concerns about its technology.
When powerful surveillance systems exist without strong, enforceable audit protocols and independent oversight, the risk of abuse is not theoretical — it is foreseeable.
– - Letter from Milwaukee Common Council President José Pérez and Alders Marina Dimitrijevic, Alex Brower, and Sharlen Moore to the Fire and Police Commission.
Just a day before the Milwaukee council members sent their letter to the FPC, TMJ4 reported that the Milwaukee Police Department cut off access to its license plate reader database. The police department said officers have been blocked from using the system while the department re-evaluates who needs access to the technology. Currently, TMJ4 reported, only officers in “sensitive portions” of MPD’s Criminal Investigations Bureau can access Flock for emergency cases. The department, headed by Chief Jeffrey Norman, has also banned facial recognition technology after months of community pushback.
In their letter, the four Milwaukee alders warned that a system like Flock — capable of “tracking movement patterns, identifying vehicles, and storing sensitive location data” — can be “weaponized against residents, including survivors of domestic violence, journalists, advocates, and everyday community members.”
The alders were especially alarmed about a recent case involving Josue Ayala, a Milwaukee police officer facing one misdemeanor count of misconduct in public office for allegedly using Flock to track two people, one of whom was Ayala’s a romantic partner, 179 times. When he used Flock, Ayala entered the search term “investigation,” the most common search used by Wisconsin law enforcement agencies during the first half of 2025, according to the Examiner’s analysis of audit data.
In their letter, Milwaukee council members ask the FPC what specific training officers must receive to access Flock; how use is supervised real time, who’s responsible for reviewing searches, how frequently audits are conducted, and what “independent body oversees compliance and investigates misuse?” The alders are demanding that the city support reforms including:
Just a day after the alders issued their letter, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Wisconsin also sent its own communication to the Public Safety and Health Committee regarding Flock and other police surveillance technology.
“It is critical that our community has a say in if and how invasive surveillance technologies are used, how they are deployed against residents, if and how their data is stored and shared with third parties, and whether spending our limited tax dollars on surveillance technologies is the best way to promote public safety,” the ACLU letter stated.
The ACLU’s letter also noted “a disturbing trend in Wisconsin and across the country regarding law enforcement abuse of Flock [Automatic License Plate Reader] technology to stalk and harass people, in most cases women.”
If convicted, Ayala could face up to nine months in prison and up to $10,000 in fines. However, a criminal complaint issued for Ayala mentions that negotiations have been underway for a settlement that would include his resignation.
Departments are also inconsistent in how they respond to the use of vague or overly common search terms. After the Examiner approached the Waukesha Police Department about why hundreds of Flock searches had been labeled with only “.” in the field indicating the reason for the search, a spokesperson said that a single officer was responsible for the searches and had been counseled and retrained. By contrast the West Allis Police Department — the state’s most frequent user of the “.” Flock search term during the first half of 2025 — only asserted that its officers are properly trained, and that it investigates misuse cases “when warranted.”
In addition to Ayala, another officer accused of misusing surveillance technology is Jay Johnson, the chief of the Greenfield Police Department. Johnson is facing felony misconduct in public office charges for installing a department-owned pole camera on his property during a messy divorce. Johnson is also accused of destroying data by deleting text messages after a meeting where he learned about the accusations and was offered a chance to retire.
In Menasha, Wisconsin, Cristian Morales is facing felony misconduct in public office charges for allegedly using Flock to track someone while he was off duty. If convicted, the Menasha Police Department officer could be imprisoned for up to three and a half years and be fined up to $10,000. As with Ayala, Morales’ alleged misuse of Flock was discovered only after a complaint was made to another police department, and not through oversight by Menasha, Auto Wire reported.
In Kenosha County, a sheriff’s deputy was reportedly offered a severance package to resign, and has yet to face charges for inappropriate use of surveillance technology.
Internal investigation documents obtained by the Examiner through an open records request show that, in late September, Frank McGrath, at that time a Kenosha County Sheriff Department deputy, logged into an app on his phone to access his agency’s Flock network. McGrath wanted to search for a specific vehicle, entering “suspicious” as the reason for using the AI-powered cameras. But McGrath was off duty, and his searches — lacking any case numbers — weren’t intended to find a murder suspect, stolen car, or kidnapped child. Instead, McGrath was apparently stalking another Kenosha County deputy whom he was dating.
McGrath’s 16 Flock searches were first noticed by Kenosha County Sheriff Capt. Erik Klinkhammer, during an audit in October 2025. After checking the license plate which McGrath repeatedly searched in the TIME system — a consolidated information database used by law enforcement — Klinkhammer confirmed that the targeted vehicle belonged to a Kenosha County Sheriff’s deputy, whose name is redacted in the documents obtained by the Examiner through records requests.
“There was no indication that [REDACTED] or her vehicle were connected to any investigation, and informal internal speculation suggested a possible romantic relationship between McGrath and [REDACTED],” the internal investigation report states. “These factors raised concerns regarding McGrath’s motive for conducting off-duty searches of her vehicle.”
None of McGrath’s other Flock searches were like those that raised Klinkhammer’s suspicions. McGrath was placed on administrative leave and ordered to report to the sheriff’s office for questioning. The vice president of the Kenosha Sheriff Offices union was also notified of the situation.
McGrath initially denied having misused Flock stating that, “he performed the searches through the FLOCK app on his phone and dismissed the relevance of questions about a relationship with [REDACTED],” the investigation report states. McGrath surrendered his badge and firearm before leaving the room. “Within moments,” the reports continued, McGrath returned with the union vice president saying he didn’t want to leave the situation unresolved, and admitting that he was having romantic relationship problems with the deputy whose license he searched in Flock. Klinkhammer then called the deputy in question, who confirmed that she already knew about McGrath monitoring her vehicle through Flock. “[REDACTED] said she was not afraid of McGrath and is not in fear of her safety,” the investigation report states.
In a separate interview, the deputy McGrath was monitoring also appeared with a union representative. She said that McGrath had told her about the Flock searches a week or two before Klinkhammer contacted her. “[REDACTED] stated she did believe his actions were in violation of policy and found it ‘weird,’ but she did not report the information to a supervisor,” the investigation report states. She elaborated on a close friendship she had with another male coworker who, after learning about her relationship with McGrath, had been giving her the “cold shoulder.”
“She was extremely upset by this change, and while speaking with McGrath on the day of the FLOCK searches, she became emotional and cried,” the investigation report states. “She explained that she and this coworker communicated daily, both on and off duty, and the sudden distance was upsetting. She stated that McGrath told her her reaction was not normal and questioned whether she had romantic feelings for the coworker. [REDACTED] told him she did not, explaining she was simply hurt by the loss of the friendship.”
Later, McGrath questioned her about who had access to her vehicle. “Because she lives with her parents, she explained that either her mother or father can take her car at any time,” the investigation report states. “She noted it was unusual that McGrath repeatedly asked this question.” The two eventually had “a significant argument related to her having male friends,” which led to her distancing herself from her male friends, after which things with McGrath improved, according to the report.
“[REDACTED] denied any physical altercations, domestic violence, or concerning behavior of that nature during the relationship,” the investigation report states. “She stated McGrath did not like her having male friends, wanted to go through her phone at times, and had expressed jealousy issues, but she denied any physical incidents. She also denied believing she was being stalked, stating that she and McGrath shared their iPhone locations with each other.”
The two talked about the situation again after McGrath was placed on leave, devolving into another argument. “[REDACTED] stated McGrath never asked her to lie for him and instructed her to tell the truth,” the investigation report states. “She confirmed they are still currently in a relationship, though McGrath has made only limited comments about discussing the situation with his union representative.” The investigation report notes that, “when asked why she did not initially report McGrath’s FLOCK use after he told her, [REDACTED] said she did not know what to do and felt the situation was strange.”
When he spoke with investigators, McGrath said he’d undergone Flock training and understood police databases can only be used for “legitimate investigative purposes,” and agreed that his own use was “unauthorized.” However, McGrath told investigators that his understanding of Flock and license plate reader policies “was vague” and he said that “although he signs off on policy updates, he often does not read them.”
McGrath said that his own insecurity and the way the female deputy reacted to her friend cutting her off contributed to his misuse of Flock. “He explained that he first ran a partial plate using the digits he knew, then used an Antioch, Illinois, camera hit from a prior visit to his residence to identify her full plate number,” the investigation reads. “He then continued searching her movements through the system. His stated goal was to determine whether [REDACTED] was at home or possibly visiting the male coworker he was suspicious of.”
McGrath said he “knew [he] probably shouldn’t have” used Flock for personal reasons “but believed FLOCK was not as tightly regulated as TIME.” He also said that he didn’t use other police databases such as LEADS or New Work for personal reasons “and could not explain why he treated FLOCK differently.” McGrath also admitted to initially lying to Capt. Klinkhammer “claiming he was embarrassed and ashamed,” the investigation report notes.
Besides Flock, McGrath also used a squad car tracking system called Polaris to monitor his partner. “He admitted these searches were motivated by jealousy, stating he checked to see where she was, who she might be sitting near, or which deputies she was working alongside,” the report states. “He agreed this behavior was inappropriate and understood how it could be viewed as stalking-type conduct.” McGrath entered the reason for the searches as “suspicious” as “likely an attempt to legitimize the searches, and stated that although he knew in the back of his mind that what he was doing was wrong, he was not in the right frame of mind at the time.”
The internal investigation found that McGrath “knowingly and repeatedly” misused Flock and Polaris, and was not truthful when confronted by a supervisor about his actions. “His actions constitute an abuse of his authority and a serious breach of trust regarding confidential law enforcement information,” the investigation report states. “His pattern of personal surveillance using restricted law enforcement systems, coupled with his initial dishonesty, represents serious misconduct. The misuse was repeated, knowing, and extended over multiple months. It occurred off duty, and it was directed at a fellow member of this agency in the context of a romantic relationship.”
Kenosha County Sheriff Lt. Chase Forster concluded in the investigation that “this level of misconduct significantly undermines the integrity and credibility expected of a Kenosha County Sheriff’s Deputy, and formal discipline is warranted.” Yet that discipline never came.
According to a John Doe petition filed by Kevin Mathewson, a controversial local figure who runs the Kenosha County Eye, McGrath resigned and avoided having his case referred to the district attorney’s office. Mathewson also wrote on Kenosha County Eye that McGrath received a severance agreement when he resigned. Mathewson points out in his John Doe petition that other Wisconsin officers — including in Milwaukee, Menasha and Greenfield — have faced misconduct in public office charges for abusing Flock. By filing a John Doe petition, Mathewson is asking a judge to consider whether probable cause exists to charge McGrath. If a judge decides that probable cause exists, he or she may appoint special prosecutors to explore options to convict.
The Examiner reached out to the Kenosha County Sheriff’s Office for comment. Acting as a spokesperson, Forster declined to comment, saying that the criminal investigation is being carried out by the neighboring Racine County Sheriff’s Office. While a spokesperson from Racine County confirmed that the department is “working on it,” referring to the investigation against McGrath, they declined to comment further, stating that Kenosha is in charge of releasing information and statements. The Racine County Sheriff spokesperson assured the Examiner that they weren’t “trying to play ‘hide the ball.’”
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Zabi Sahibzada, refugee resettlement director for Jewish Social Services (JSS) at his office in Madison. Photo by Ruth Conniff/Wisconsin Examiner
Zabi Sahibzada, refugee resettlement director for Jewish Social Services (JSS) in Madison, Wisconsin, has lived through war, displacement, the collapse of Afghanistan and the cataclysmic consequences of shifting U.S. policies abroad and at home.
Today, even as our country plunges into a new war in the Middle East, the Trump administration has pulled back from its commitments to people who helped the U.S. during the long, brutal war in Afghanistan.
Sahibzada talks to his family every day as they cope with the hardships of living under Taliban rule. He had hoped to bring his family to the U.S. as part of a family reunification program for people who helped our country in Afghanistan. But that program was suspended by President Donald Trump. Now his family is in limbo. He is particularly concerned about his two daughters, ages 18 and 11, who can no longer go to school because of the ban on education for girls.
Meanwhile, Sahibzada is managing a program that has been severely disrupted by the Trump administration, which set a record-low refugee admissions ceiling of only 7,500 people for Fiscal Year 2026 — down from 125,000 the previous year — with most slots reserved for white South Africans. JSS is no longer resettling hundreds of refugees from around the world in South Central Wisconsin. Instead, the group is focused on continuing to serve the people it has already resettled here. Part of that work involves fielding panicked calls from people who are losing their status as the Trump administration strips protections from those who fled to the U.S. seeking a safe haven from persecution.
Because of funding cuts, JSS, which traces its roots to the Madison Welfare Fund, created in 1940 to help resettle Jewish refugees fleeing the Holocaust, has had to let go of most of its staff. “Currently we have three full-time case managers that are working with a huge population that’s already here, and we cannot afford more,” Sahibzada said.
JSS works with about 450 people, most of them in Dane County. Among the services the group provides are help with finding employment, health care, housing, language instruction and financial assistance for up to five years. The organization is scrambling to raise money privately to make up for the loss of federal funds.
Sahibzada estimates that staff salaries cost JSS about $300,000 per year, with another $250,000 going to cover direct assistance for clients — but that amount rises and falls depending on need. This year, he expects need to rise significantly because of Trump administration policies, including the cancellation of Temporary Protected Status for people from Afghanistan and Haiti.
“Those people, they’re not having documents anymore to work,” he said. “They’re losing their job, they’re losing their driving license, they cannot renew it. And then those will be knocking on our doors that they may need a lot of help … they’ll not be able to pay their rents, they’ll not be able to receive any other benefits from the government. And by the next few months, there will be cuts to health insurance. They’ll be cut from the food assistance or the cash assistance that a lot of people were depending on. So they will be coming and knocking on our doors, and that’s the gap that we may need to fill with the help from the communities.”
The gap, he estimates, will likely be between $300,000 and $400,000.
“I would say it’s a very chaotic moment for all the refugees and immigrants in the country,” Sahibzada said during a recent interview in his office on the west side of Madison.
Confronting chaos is, unfortunately, a familiar experience for Sahibzada.
Before he came to the United States from Afghanistan in 2022 on a special immigrant visa, Sahibzada worked for USAID in Afghanistan for more than a decade. As a software engineer, he helped create a text-messaging system that allowed farmers to get timely information about agricultural markets, and he was the main point of contact for people in rural areas in his region who wanted to get in touch with USAID-funded projects. “My name was the contact person on billboards and brochures and reference cards,” he said. “Everyone in the community knew my name. They knew my face.”
That was a dangerous position to be in as the Taliban came back into power. Even before the U.S. withdrawal and the Taliban’s resurgence, Sahibzada began receiving threatening calls and social media warnings. He was approved for a special immigrant visa for Afghans who worked with the U.S. government — a program President Donald Trump suspended this year — but he had no idea how he would get out of the country, he said. The U.S. government offered to help him relocate to Doha, Qatar.
“That was a time where it was not easy to go through the custom borders in Afghanistan, like, through the airport,” he said. “I was afraid, like … how can I just go and will they allow me, or will they just keep me in prison, or will they just, I don’t know what will happen to me.”
“Thankfully, I made it to the airplane,” he said. He attributes his escape in part to the fact that he used an unfamiliar, formal name on his passport. “When I was working with USAID, my name was Sunny, which is like my nickname,” he explained. But on his passport, “I just put my last name as Sahibzada, which is our family name. So that helped me. When I was going to the airport, I was like, OK, whatever they’re having on their list will be not similar as what I have on my passport.” As a result, he thinks, he was able to slip past the Taliban and fly to Doha and from there, after a month-long process of vetting and background checks, to Wisconsin, where he has been living and working since December 2022.
After resettling in Madison, Sahibzada got a job with the Milwaukee transit system, and commuted to work for a couple of months. He started at JSS in 2023 as a program manager and was promoted this year to direct the resettlement program.
During the time he has worked at JSS, much has changed.
A lot of clients call JSS with legal questions, worried that they might be deported. “We are connecting them with legal service providers,” Sahibzada said, “because we cannot answer.”
The group is planning “know your rights” and emergency preparedness training sessions for April, and working on creating a hotline for ICE sightings, staffed by volunteers speaking multiple languages, coordinated statewide with Wisconsin’s eight refugee services agencies.
Meanwhile, Sahibzada calls home every morning and evening to talk with his family, including his parents, his wife and his two daughters and three sons. “It’s really hard just staying home, not going out, and not going to school,” he said of his daughters. When he talks to them, “They’re always asking me, ‘What’s gonna happen?’ And I’m just giving them sometimes, like some false hopes that it will get better, which I don’t think it will in the very near future, but this is the hope that I’m giving.”
His family, seeking to join him in the U.S., traveled to Pakistan during the Biden administration and waited for months to have their papers processed by the U.S. embassy there. But their visas expired and they were forced to return to Afghanistan. Now, with the new U.S. immigration restrictions, things have gotten even more difficult. Sahibzada continues to hold out hope that things will eventually improve.
“I’m hopeful that it gets changed, either with this administration or any other administration in the future,” he said. “I’m hopeful that this will change and people will be turning back to their normal life.”
More information about making a donation or volunteering is available on the JSS website
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