A man closes the entrance to Fort McHenry National Monument and Historic Shrine on Oct. 3 in Baltimore because of the federal government shutdown. States are currently covering costs of some federal programs, but it’s unclear whether they will be repaid once the government reopens. (Photo by Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)

States are doing what they generally do during a federal government shutdown: continuing to operate programs serving some of the neediest people.

That means schools are still serving federally subsidized meals and states are distributing funding for the federal food stamp program. For now.

If the shutdown drags on and federal dollars run out, states can only keep programs going for so long. States may choose to pay for some services themselves so residents keep their benefits.

But this time, state leaders have new worries about getting reimbursed for federal costs once the federal spending impasse is resolved. That’s traditionally been the practice following a shutdown, but the Trump administration’s record of pulling funding and targeting Democratic-led states has some officials worried about what comes after the shutdown.

Many states already struggled to balance their own budgets this year. And some fear going without federal reimbursement for shutdown costs could force states to make painful cuts to their own budget priorities.

Nevada State Treasurer Zach Conine, a Democrat, said the administration has not made good on its word to states in recent months — freezing some congressionally approved funding and cutting already awarded grants. So it’s likewise unclear whether the federal government will follow previous practice and reimburse states for covering shutdown costs of crucial federal programs such as food assistance.

“I think everything is a risk with this administration. … We in the states are kind of left holding the bag yet again as the federal government tries to sort out what it wants to be when it grows up,” he told Stateline.

Nevada entered the shutdown with more than $1.2 billion in reserves. Last week, Republican Gov. Joe Lombardo’s office said in a statement that state funds would be adequate to cover “a short period of time with minimal disruption to services.”

But the governor’s office said a shutdown of more than 30 days would cause more significant challenges for the state.

Lombardo’s office did not respond to Stateline’s questions. But last week, it released a three-page document on the shutdown, saying it expected the federal government to reimburse states once the budget stalemate is resolved.

“As D.C. works through its issues, our administration will continue to support Nevadans in any way we can throughout this unnecessary federal government shutdown,” Lombardo said in the statement.

While mandatory programs such as Medicaid and Social Security continue to send funds to beneficiaries during the shutdown, funding for other safety net programs such as food assistance are more uncertain. The federal government told states there were enough funds for the food stamp program to cover October benefits, though the special food program for women, infants and children may run out of money sooner.

By furloughing workers and halting federal spending, the shutdown could cost the national economy $15 billion per week, President Donald Trump’s economic advisers estimated.

The White House says a prolonged shutdown will affect the economies of every state by reducing employment, federal benefits and consumer spending. White House estimates say this could cost Michigan $361 million per week in lost economic output, for example, while Florida could lose $911 million each week.

‘Fend for themselves’

Some federal services are shuttered during a shutdown: The Environmental Protection Agency has ceased many research, permitting and enforcement efforts, and official jobs data is no longer being released. Federal funds for other programs, including food assistance, are expected to last through the end of the month. But states can elect to spend their own funds on these programs, which were previously authorized by Congress and state legislatures.

Before the shutdown, states were stockpiling reserve funding. The National Association of State Budget Officers reported most state budgets this year maintained or increased rainy day funds. At the same time, state and local governments are borrowing record amounts: As much as $600 billion in municipal bonds is projected to be issued by the end of 2025.

“So states and localities are kind of getting the message they really need to fend for themselves much more than they ever had,” said William Glasgall, public finance adviser at the Volcker Alliance, a nonprofit that works to support public sector workers.

Since January, the Trump administration has stripped states and cities of billions of dollars that Congress approved for education, infrastructure and energy projects. Glasgall said that record leaves states with legitimate concerns about getting repaid for their shutdown-related expenses — a prospect that would likely spark even more lawsuits from Democratic-led states.

“They’ve already, before the shutdown, started rolling back federal funding, and I don’t see any reason why they would stop now,” he said. “The recissions that have been announced are pretty harsh, and it’s money we’re expecting and not getting.”

The last shutdown, which lasted five weeks during Trump’s first term, delayed billions in federal spending and reduced gross domestic product — the value of all goods and services produced — by $11 billion, the Congressional Budget Office estimated in 2019. Experts say states were repaid for costs they incurred providing federal services during that shutdown.

In Minnesota, State Budget Director Ahna Minge said staff have been studying previous shutdowns. But at a news conference with Democratic Gov. Tim Walz last week, she characterized this shutdown as “unpredictable.”

“The current federal administration may not follow the historic playbook,” she said.

Walz said farmers would be among the first hit as the federal Farm Service Agency has ceased operations in the middle of the state’s harvest season. Among other duties, that agency works on disaster assistance and processes loans during harvest to protect farmers against commodity price fluctuations.

Minge said Minnesota officials think programs like the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program and the Special Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program for Women, Infants and Children have enough existing federal funds to operate through October. But she said the state budget cannot backfill all the commitments made by federal programs.

“What we know is that the longer a shutdown lasts, the greater the impact to state programs and services,” she said.

Connecticut Gov. Ned Lamont, a Democrat, has pledged to use state dollars to keep WIC afloat if needed, The Associated Press reported. And Colorado lawmakers set aside $7.5 million just before the shutdown to keep WIC running.

Already under strain

In Maryland, the shutdown is compounding the economic instability from Trump’s ongoing efforts to shrink the number of federal employees, agencies and spending.

With more than 160,000 federal employees, Maryland’s economy relies heavily on the federal workforce. The Trump administration has said it may deny back pay to hundreds of thousands of furloughed federal workers, despite a law he signed in 2019 guaranteeing such back pay.

Chief Deputy Comptroller Andrew Schaufele told lawmakers last week that a shutdown could cost the state $700,000 per day in lost tax revenue.

Democratic Gov. Wes Moore pledged to continue funding some federal programs, but said the state would not tap into its rainy day funds to do so.

“We’re going to continually evaluate how long we can go,” he said at a news conference.

As for getting repaid, Moore spokesperson David Turner told Stateline that the state had received no indication that the federal government would deviate from past practice, “but we are monitoring closely.”

This fiscal uncertainty hits states as they are already struggling to respond to the strain of federal agency layoffs and cuts in the major tax and spending law Trump signed this summer. The law slashed billions in social service funding and created costly new bureaucratic burdens for states, which administer Medicaid and food assistance programs.

“There’s no way, really at this point, to sort of assess with any level of confidence what’s going to happen when you also have these massive layoffs that were going on pre-shutdown,” said Lisa Parshall, a professor of political science at Daemen University in New York. “There’s just a real sense from states and localities — and I think rightly so — that that kind of reliability of the federal government is now in question.”

It may not be a question of whether states are reimbursed for their shutdown expenses, but which states are reimbursed, Parshall said. The Trump administration has publicly targeted funding of liberal-led states and cities over policy disagreements, raising the possibility it could do something similar with the shutdown.

“Whether it’s a good thing or a bad thing, you know, you could argue,” she said. “But it’s definitely a thing that seems to be adding to this level of uncertainty — this shutdown feels different.”

In California, officials just closed a nearly $12 billion shortfall when negotiating the budget that was approved in June. The budget deficit is expected to grow to more than $17 billion next year, said H.D. Palmer, spokesperson for the State of California Department of Finance, which advises the governor and state agencies on budget issues.

“There isn’t a long-term, open-ended line of credit available if this drags out,” he said of the federal government shutdown.

The depth of reserve funds available varies by federally funded program, he said. CalFresh, California’s name for its Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program, has enough funds to cover food stamp benefits for this month, but anything beyond that is uncertain.

“If the duration of this is in the matter of days, it will be an inconvenience, but should not pose a massive problem,” he said. “However, if it does drag out for an extended period of time, then clearly it’s going to be a problem.”

Stateline reporter Kevin Hardy can be reached at khardy@stateline.org.

Federal agents, including members of the Department of Homeland Security, the Border Patrol, and police, attempt to keep protesters back outside a downtown U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility on Oct. 4, 2025 in Portland, Oregon.  (Photo by Spencer Platt/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — The White House slammed a President Donald Trump-appointed federal judge Monday for blocking the deployment of National Guard troops to Oregon, as hostilities escalate between the administration and Democratic states where Trump has begun sending in troops over governors’ objections.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said the Trump administration is within legal bounds and will appeal the district court’s decision, which she described as “untethered in reality and in the law.” 

“The president is using his authority as commander in chief, U.S. Code 12406, which clearly states that the president has the right to call up the National Guard in cases where he deems it’s appropriate,” Leavitt said at the press briefing, referring to a section in Title 10 of the U.S. Code that authorizes the president to send in the National Guard in cases of invasion or rebellion.

Leavitt told reporters that a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, facility in Portland where nightly protests have been occurring has been “under siege” by “anarchists.”

“They have been disrespecting law enforcement. They’ve been inciting violence,” Leavitt said.

Mainstream local media reports and statements from local officials have contradicted that claim.

​​”There is no need for military intervention in Oregon. There is no insurrection in Portland. No threat to national security,” Oregon Gov. Tina Kotek, a Democrat, said in a statement Sunday.

Federal agents used tear gas and pepper balls on nonviolent protesters Saturday evening, according to local media reports.

Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker also filed a legal challenge against the administration Monday morning. A federal judge set a hearing for Thursday. Illinois and Chicago sought a temporary restraining order to stop Trump and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth from ordering Texas and Illinois Guard troops to the country’s third-largest city.

Trump teases Insurrection Act 

Trump on Monday afternoon raised the possibility of invoking the Insurrection Act of 1807, a tool to expand the president’s legal authority for using military personnel for domestic law enforcement.

Asked by a reporter in the Oval Office the conditions under which he would invoke the law, Trump said “if it was necessary,” and speculated that he could use it to defy courts or state officials.

“So far it hasn’t been necessary,” he said. “But we have an Insurrection Act for a reason. If I had to enact it, I’d do that. If people were getting killed and courts were holding us up or governors or mayors were holding us up, sure, I’d do that. I want to make sure that people aren’t killed. We have to make sure our cities are safe.”

Court battle in Portland 

In Oregon, federal District Judge Karin Immergut broadened her order Sunday night barring the Trump administration from deploying any National Guard troops to Portland. 

The edict came after Trump and Hegseth defied a temporary restraining order that Immergut issued Saturday halting 200 Oregon National Guard troops from being sent there. 

Immergut was nominated by Trump in 2019 and confirmed by the U.S. Senate by voice vote.

The administration maintains the Guard is needed to protect federal agents, as sustained small protests pop up outside an ICE facility 2 miles south of city hall. Kotek rebuffed Trump’s claims that the city is “on fire” and said local authorities are equipped to handle the demonstrations that lately range from a dozen or so people to roughly 100.

Trump ordered 101 California National Guard troops to Portland overnight, without the knowledge of Kotek, she said Sunday. California Gov. Gavin Newsom, a fellow Democrat, confirmed that Trump had ordered up to 300 of his state’s National Guard troops to Oregon. 

Just before Immergut’s Sunday night emergency hearing, an Oregon assistant attorney general filed a memo with the court showing that Hegseth had ordered 400 Texas National Guard troops to Portland and Chicago.

California joined Oregon and Portland in suing the administration.

‘A domestic militarization’

Pritzker said he has urged Texas Gov. Greg Abbott to “immediately withdraw his support for this decision and refuse to allow Texas National Guard members to be used in this way.”

“Let me be clear, Donald Trump is using our service members as political props and as pawns in his illegal effort to militarize our nation’s cities,” Pritzker said at a press conference Monday afternoon.

Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul said the deployment “is unfair to National Guardsmen, it is unfair to local law enforcement, and it is certainly unfair to the law-abiding citizens of Illinois who do not want to be subject to military occupation.”

Chicago is nearly a month into a federal immigration crackdown. Dozens of federal agents raided an apartment building in the city’s South Shore neighborhood on Sept. 30, ziptying adults and children, and detaining some U.S. citizens, according to multiple media reports. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security published a highly produced video of the raid on social media.

Trump’s federalization and deployment of National Guard troops to mostly Democratic-run states has alarmed political and constitutional experts. 

Pat Eddington, senior fellow in homeland and civil liberties at the libertarian Cato Institute, said he agrees with Pritzker’s concerns.

“I share his belief 100% that the use of the American military and all these massive employment of ICE and HSI and FBI and marshals and the rest for ostensible immigration enforcement and ostensible crime control, it’s really designed to lay the groundwork to normalize a militarization, essentially a domestic militarization of Americans, civic life,” Eddington told States Newsroom in an interview in late September.

On a Monday afternoon press call, Hima Shansi, the head of the American Civil Liberties Union’s national security program, said Trump’s use of military and federal police forces in recent months “raises serious constitutional concerns in terms of federalism, the separation of powers between the federal government and the states which generally exercise police power.”

“What that means in real-people language is that, as the states have been saying, they are fully capable of doing their jobs as needed, and there is absolutely no reason for the president to assert federal power in the way that he is forcibly doing.”

Starting in Los Angeles

Trump federalized California National Guard troops and deployed U.S. Marines to Los Angeles in June in response to protests against aggressive immigration enforcement there. 

Newsom objected to the plan and sued to stop the deployment. A federal judge initially sided with the Democratic governor and blocked the deployment, but an appeals panel reversed the decision. 

The trial court ruled again in September that Trump had overstepped the line separating military forces from law enforcement. The administration has appealed.

While that case in California was ongoing, Trump also ordered the District of Columbia National Guard to assist local police in the nation’s capital. Because the district is a federal territory, it is relatively clear that move was within the president’s legal authority, even if many Trump critics questioned its necessity. 

National Guard troops from several Republican states also deployed to the district in a more legally dubious move.

Trump also ordered Tennessee National Guard troops to Memphis last month, with the approval of the state’s Republican governor.

Ashley Murray reported from Washington, D.C. Jacob Fischler reported from Portland, Oregon.

The Rev. Michael Vanacore leads a prayer before a rally ends Oct. 6, 2025, outside U.S. District Court in Greenbelt, Maryland,  before a hearing in support of Kilmar Abrego Garcia. (Photo by William J. Ford/Maryland Matters)

GREENBELT, Md. — A federal judge on Monday ordered the Trump administration to produce evidence within 48 hours on its efforts to again deport Kilmar Abrego Garcia, this time to the southern African country of Eswatini.

That evidence from the Trump administration is due by Wednesday to  Maryland District Court Judge Paula Xinis. She will consider an order to release Abrego Garcia as part of his habeas corpus petition, which challenges his detention at a U.S.immigration and Customs Enforcement facility. 

If the Trump administration is making no effort to remove Abrego Garcia, Xinis said the issue then becomes indefinite detainment of an individual, which runs against a Supreme Court ruling that found immigrants can’t be detained longer than six months if they are not in the process of being removed.

Abrego Garcia, the Salvadoran immigrant whom the Trump administration mistakenly deported to his home country and to a notorious mega-prison before returning him to the United States to face criminal charges, has thrown the Trump administration’s aggressive immigration crackdown into the spotlight. 

Xinis, nominated by former President Joe Biden, scheduled another hearing Friday, which will be about Abrego Garcia’s possible removal to Eswatini, formerly known as Swaziland. The African country has aided the Trump administration in accepting third-country removals.

Department of Justice attorney Jonathan D. Guynn during Monday’s hearing confirmed such a removal is planned at some point by the administration.

Xinis pressed DOJ attorneys on exactly what steps the federal government has taken to send Abrego Garcia to Eswatini.

Guynn said the federal government has not formally started a plan of removal, but said he could not confirm if removal plans were in motion. He argued that there are no imminent plans by the federal government to remove Abrego Garcia and the DOJ is trying to show that by keeping him in ICE custody.

“The government feels like it’s in the damned if it does, damned if it doesn’t, situation,” Guynn said. “The government has been trying to respond … about concerns that Mr. Abrego Garcia will be rapidly removed from the United States, notwithstanding his habeas case, and ongoing immigration proceedings, and so in an abundance of caution… the United States is not imminently planning to remove Mr. Abrego Garcia.” 

Previously the Trump administration planned to deport Abrego Garcia to either Uganda or Eswatini. 

DOJ attorneys also asked for a temporary stay in the habeas corpus petition because of the government shutdown. 

Xinis denied the stay. She pointed to the DOJ’s own shutdown contingency plan, which allows for litigation concerning habeas petitions to continue. 

Protests in support of Abrego Garcia

About an hour before Monday’s hearing, the immigrant advocacy group CASA led a rally in front of the courthouse to continue its show of support for Abrego Garcia.

About 100 people led chants shouting, “We are Kilmar!” “No More” and “When we fight, we win!” and held signs in support of Abrego Garcia and criticizing the Trump administration.

Religious leaders said prayers and a few other people spoke, such as Krystal Oriadha, who serves as vice chair of the Prince George’s County Council. Oriadha’s father was born in Kenya and immigrated to the U.S., where he met her mother in college.

“I understand the story of immigration, and it’s one that has been such a story of pride in my life because it’s filled of sacrifice, yes and struggles, but pride and love for your family and hard work,” she said. “It is what every immigrant stands for, not the propaganda that this administration is propping up calling hardworking, loving families criminals, demonizing them. So let’s be careful and mindful of the propaganda that they’re spilling today.”

Tennessee charges

The federal judge in Abrego Garcia’s criminal trial in Tennessee, in which he is accused of human smuggling of immigrants, on Friday granted Abrego Garcia an evidentiary hearing. It will determine if those charges from the Trump administration are an illegal retaliation after Abrego Garcia successfully brought a suit challenging his wrongful deportation to El Salvador. 

Separately, an immigration judge last week denied Abrego Garcia’s request to reopen his asylum case. 

Abrego Garcia first came to the U.S. without legal authorization as a teenager in 2011. He tried to open an asylum case in 2019, but was denied because he did not apply within his first year in the U.S., which is the legal deadline for such claims.

The Friday decision from that immigration judge ends one of the efforts for Abrego Garcia’s lawyers to keep him in the U.S., due to his protections from deportation to El Salvador. 

A separate immigration judge granted Abrego Garcia those protections from El Salvador in 2019, finding that Abrego Garcia would likely face violence if returned to his home country. 

At the time, the federal government didn’t search for a third country to remove Abrego Garcia. 

Six-month limit

Monday’s hearing focused on the time frame of Abrego Garcia’s detainment and whether it conflicted with a 2001 Supreme Court case, in which justices ruled immigrants who are not in the process of removal cannot be kept in ICE detention for more than six months. 

Xinis questioned the reason for Abrego Garcia’s detention since late August if the Trump administration had no evidence of its plans to remove the longtime Maryland man. 

Another DOJ attorney, Bridget K. O’Hickey, said the federal government has not formalized a removal plan for Abrego Garcia, adding that she didn’t know if there were any plans in the process. 

Xinis called a short break in the middle of Monday’s hearing to give the DOJ attorneys time to make any calls to get information if the Trump administration was removing him. 

DOJ attorney Ernesto H. Molina said he was unable to reach anyone, pointing to the possible furlough of federal workers.

“It just is remarkable to me that you’re saying you can’t find a soul who can give you, in this case, any additional information,” Xinis said. “That suggests there is none.” 

One of Abrego Garcia’s lawyers in the Maryland case, Simon Y. Sandoval-Moshenberg, argued that if the Trump administration wanted to remove Abrego Garcia, they would send him to Costa Rica, which has already agreed to accept Abrego Garicia as a refugee. 

Xinis asked why Abrego Garcia hasn’t been removed to Costa Rica. 

“We’ve received no communications, and I can’t even wrap my brain to think of a constitutionally permissible reason why they would be fighting over whether to send them across the Atlantic Ocean when they can, this afternoon, send him to Costa Rica,” Sandoval-Moshenberg said.

Xinis asked the DOJ attorneys if there has been any effort to remove Abrego Garcia to Costa Rica, but Molina and O’Hickey said they have not been informed of those efforts.

Human smuggling charges

Attorneys for Abrego Garcia’s criminal case in Nashville said in court filings that the Trump administration was trying to force him to plead guilty to  human smuggling charges by promising to remove him to Costa Rica if he does so, and threatening to deport him to Uganda if he refuses. 

Abrego Garcia has pleaded not guilty and was ordered released by the federal judge in Tennessee to await his trial there in January on charges he took part in a long-running conspiracy to smuggle immigrants without legal status across the United States. 

In late August, after Abrego Garcia was released from U.S. Marshals Service custody in Tennessee, immigration officials informed him he had to appear in Baltimore before the ICE field office for a check-in appointment. During that appointment, Abrego Garcia was detained. 

Xinis has previously ordered the Trump administration cannot remove Abrego Garcia from the U.S. while his habeas petition continues, and that he must be kept within 200 miles of the courthouse in Greenbelt, Maryland. Last month, the Trump administration transferred Abrego Garcia from a facility in Virginia to an ICE detention facility 189 miles away in Pennsylvania. 

William J. Ford contributed to this report. 

Federal police push towards a crowd of demonstrators at an ICE processing facility south of downtown Portland on Sat., Oct. 4, 2025. (Photo by Alex Baumhardt/Oregon Capital Chronicle)

Hours after a federal judge blocked the Trump administration from mobilizing 200 Oregon National Guard troops in Portland, the federal government began sending California National Guard troops to Oregon. 

Gov. Tina Kotek said Sunday that she’s aware that 101 California troops arrived in Oregon via plane overnight and that more were on their way. She received no official notice or correspondence from the federal government. 

Up to 300 soldiers from California are being sent to Oregon on Trump’s orders, California Gov. Gavin Newsom said in a statement Sunday.

Abigail Jackson, a White House spokesperson, said in an email that Trump, “exercised his lawful authority to protect federal assets and personnel in Portland following violent riots and attacks on law enforcement. For once, Gavin Newscum should stand on the side of law-abiding citizens instead of violent criminals destroying Portland and cities across the country.”

Kotek said the move, “appears to (be) intentional to circumvent yesterday’s ruling by a federal judge. The facts haven’t changed. There is no need for military intervention in Oregon. There is no insurrection in Portland. No threat to national security. Oregon is our home, not a military target.”

Late Saturday afternoon, Trump-appointed federal Judge Karin Immergut approved a temporary restraining order to block the mobilization of Oregon troops until Oct. 18, with another check-in scheduled for Oct. 17. Attorneys for the federal government promptly filed a notice that they would appeal Immergut’s temporary order to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.

“This is a nation of Constitutional law, not martial law,” Immergut wrote. “Defendants have made a range of arguments that, if accepted, risk blurring the line between civil and military federal power — to the detriment of this nation.”

Oregon Attorney General Dan Rayfield signaled Sunday that the state is ready to sue again to prevent the deployment of troops from California or anywhere else. 

“This president is obviously hellbent on deploying the military in American cities, absent facts or authority to do so,” Rayfield said. “It is up to us and the courts to hold him accountable. That’s what we intend to do.”

Newsom said California will also pursue legal action to stop Trump’s “breathtaking abuse of the law and power.”

“The commander-in-chief is using the U.S. military as a political weapon against American citizens,” Newsom said. “We will take this fight to court, but the public cannot stay silent in the face of such reckless and authoritarian conduct by the president of the United States.”

Protests have continued outside the Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in Portland, with about 100 people on the streets Saturday night. 

At one point during the evening, federal agents used chemical irritants to push protesters a block away from the facility, further than protesters who have been out for weeks said they’ve been forced back before. A Portland Police spokesperson said local law enforcement were not aware of or assisting with the federal agents’ actions.

The ramping up of federal pressure on Portland has coincided with a similar display of force in Chicago over the past few days. During a speech to military officials last week, Trump said he wanted to use Democratic cities as “training grounds” for the military. 

Senior reporter Alex Baumhardt contributed to this article. 

Federal officers atop the ICE building in Portland on Sunday, Sept. 28, 2025. (Photo by Alex Baumhardt/Oregon Capital Chronicle)

This is a breaking news story and will be updated.

A federal judge has temporarily blocked President Donald Trump from federalizing and deploying Oregon National Guard troops to Portland following a challenge from the state and the city of Portland.

Judge Karin Immergut of the U.S. District Court in Portland granted the city and the Oregon Department of Justice a temporary restraining order Saturday afternoon, stopping for now Trump’s and Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth’s plan to deploy 200 Oregon Guard troops to Portland to guard federal buildings.

The order expires Oct. 18, and the parties will discuss Oct. 17 whether the order should be extended for another two weeks. Federal lawyers have until Oct. 17 to argue for a preliminary injunction to block the temporary restraining order. Late Saturday, attorneys for the federal government also filed a notice that they would appeal Immergut’s temporary order to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.

In her 30-page opinion, Immergut issued a powerful rebuke of Trump’s perception of his executive power and found he violated the 10th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, which guarantees police power within the states resides with the states. Immergut said protests in Portland were not by any definition a “rebellion” nor do they pose the “danger of a rebellion.”

“Furthermore, this country has a longstanding and foundational tradition of resistance to government overreach, especially in the form of military intrusion into civil affairs,” Immergut wrote. “This historical tradition boils down to a simple proposition: this is a nation of Constitutional law, not martial law. Defendants have made a range of arguments that, if accepted, risk blurring the line between civil and military federal power — to the detriment of this nation.”

Oregon Guard members have in recent days been training at Camp Rilea in Warrenton in preparation for a potential activation to Portland. They now go back under the command of Gov. Tina Kotek, Oregon Attorney General Dan Rayfield said in a Saturday evening news conference.

“Today’s ruling halts what appears to be the president’s attempt to normalize the United States military in our cities,” Rayfield said. “Mobilizing the United States military in our cities is not normal, it should not be normal, and we will fight to make sure that it is never normal.”

Portland’s Mayor Keith Wilson at the same news conference said the state “won through peace.”

“I’ve said from the very beginning, the number of federal troops that are needed or wanted is zero,” he said.

Kotek in a statement Saturday evening said the ruling meant “the truth has prevailed.”

“There is no insurrection in Portland,” Kotek continued. “No threat to national security. No fires, no bombs, no fatalities due to civil unrest. The only threat we face is to our democracy — and it is being led by President Donald Trump.”

Oregon’s senior U.S. Sen. Ron Wyden, a Democrat, said in a statement Trump was provoking, not quelling, conflict by trying to deploy federal troops.

“I will keep working with local and state officials to ensure Trump does not keep wasting millions of taxpayer dollars to make Portland the center of his perverse fantasy about conducting assaults on U.S. cities,” Wyden said.

Trump at a Tuesday speech with military leaders said “we should use some of these dangerous cities as training grounds” for the U.S. military. In the same meeting he described Portland as “like World War II.”

By Saturday morning, Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker said Trump had notified him that he would soon federalize 300 National Guard troops in Illinois to guard federal property in Chicago, against Pritzker’s wishes. It’s unclear yet what bearing Immergut’s ruling in Oregon could have on any lawsuits brought against Trump in Illinois over the attempted deployment there.

Trump has claimed in posts on his social media site TruthSocial that the ICE processing facility south of downtown Portland is under attack by anti-fascists and domestic terrorists. He used the site to announce on Sept. 27 that he’d attempt to deploy troops to Portland.

The facility has drawn weekly protests of just a couple dozen people in recent months, and they have remained mostly peaceful. The local U.S. attorney has brought charges against 26 people since early June for crimes at the protest site, including arson and resisting arrest.

Protests last weekend grew to a couple hundred following Trump’s call for federal reinforcement. The protests have stayed mostly peaceful, with Portland Police arresting several men throughout the week for fighting, including a right-wing influencer, according to reporting in The Oregonian. The U.S. Justice Department said Friday it’s launching an investigation into the Portland Police Department over that influencer’s arrest.

On Saturday, as hundreds protested at the ICE facility, federal agents used chemical sprays on the crowd and several people were arrested, according to reporting from Oregon Public Broadcasting.

Later in the evening, after Immergut’s ruling, federal agents used chemical irritants to push protesters back a block from the building, farther than protesters said they had been pushed back prior. A Portland Police Bureau spokesperson said the agency did not assist or have any knowledge of their actions and that the bureau has not had any discussions about jurisdiction.

Federal forces inexplicably tried to move all protestors out a city block using chemical irritants.

— Alex Baumhardt (@alexbaumhardt.bsky.social) 2025-10-05T03:51:26.440Z

“I call on all federal law enforcement to meet the high standards set by the Portland Police Bureau,” Wilson said. “We need them to focus on transparent use of force, clear officer identification, strict limits on chemical munitions and mandatory body worn cameras. The Federal Protective Services’ core values are service, integrity, honor and vigilance. Now is the time to live up to those principles, not erode them with masks and violence.”

Oregon’s U.S. Rep. Maxine Dexter, who represents the state’s 3rd Congressional District that includes parts of Portland, said she peacefully protested in the city’s Lloyd District on Saturday, and that she is concerned about the excessive force she saw federal officers using against protestors in videos taken at the ICE facility south of downtown.

“It is absolutely antithetical to your First Amendment rights, and we know that the administration is not encouraging restraint at this moment, so please continue to stay away from the ICE facility,” she said.

In a two-hour hearing over the temporary restraining order Friday, senior assistant Oregon attorney general Scott Kennedy called the attempted federal deployment “one of most dramatic infringements on state sovereignty in Oregon’s history.”

Eric Hamilton, a lawyer for the federal government, called protestors outside the ICE facility in Portland “vicious and cruel” and said federal police, ICE agents and Department of Homeland Security agents were overworked and needed Guard reinforcement.

Rayfield requested the restraining order motion on behalf of the state and the city of Portland as part of their broader lawsuit filed against Trump, Hegseth, U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem, the U.S. Department of Defense and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

That suit, also filed in U.S. District Court in Portland, alleges the federal leaders and their agencies by attempting to send troops to Portland are violating the 10th Amendment of the Constitution, which guarantees police power within states resides with the states. They also allege the federal government is violating the Posse Comitatus Act, which generally forbids military members from conducting domestic law enforcement. The state and Portland also allege the city is being singled out for political retaliation.

White House budget director Russ Vought, who is depicted as the Grim Reaper in a video posted by President Donald Trump during the shutdown in October 2025,  speaks with reporters inside the U.S. Capitol building on July 15, 2025. (Photo by Jennifer Shutt/States Newsroom)

WASHINGTON — Trump administration officials on Friday defended the decision to cancel federal projects in regions of the country that have voted for Democrats, saying the move isn’t political but an effort to reduce the size and scope of government during the shutdown.

Republican leaders in Congress also backed the White House’s decision to punish Democratic voters by unilaterally canceling funding that lawmakers approved on a bipartisan basis. Democrats, however, said it’s an unacceptable escalation that further erodes Congress’ constitutional authority over spending.

“The president and (White House budget director) Russ Vought were not given any additional authority under a shutdown, and they shouldn’t pretend they have it and they shouldn’t act like it and they certainly should not be threatening people,” Senate Appropriations Committee ranking member Patty Murray, D-Wash., said on a call with reporters.

Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., gave a bit of a mixed message during a morning press conference, saying that while decisions about which projects to cancel are “tough,” President Donald Trump and other officials “are having fun with” the shutdown on social media.

“Are they taking great pleasure in that? No,” Johnson said, referring to the actual governing. “Is he trolling the Democrats? Yes, because that’s what President Trump does and people are having fun with this.”

Later in the day, Johnson opted to further delay bringing the House back into session, canceling a second week of floor votes, which means the earliest that chamber will return to Capitol Hill is Oct. 14. 

Shutdown ‘is not a joke’

Trump has posted frequently on social media during the shutdown, including a video that depicted House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries wearing a sombrero and a video that appeared to be created by artificial intelligence depicting Vought as the Grim Reaper.

Murray said on the call with reporters that Republicans posting the videos show they are treating the shutdown “as a joke.” 

“This is not a joke. This is real,” Murray said. “They need to stop the taunting. They need to stop the childish behavior. They need to stop hurting people and they need to come and work with us to solve a serious problem in front of our country.”

Jeffries, asked about the social media videos during a press conference, said it shows Republicans are on “defense” over their policies on health care and other issues. 

“Donald Trump has behaved in a deeply unserious and deeply unhinged manner and it’s evidence of the fact that Republicans have a weak argument, so they’ve resorted to deepfake videos and to lying about the nature of the policy decisions,” Jeffries said.

Projects axed in Chicago, New York, blue states

Johnson said he spoke earlier this week with Vought — one of the authors of Project 2025 who said previously he wanted “bureaucrats to be traumatically affected” — and that Vought “takes no pleasure in this.”

“Russ wants to see a smaller, more efficient, more lean, effective federal government, as we do. But he doesn’t want people to lose jobs. He doesn’t want to do that,” Johnson said. “But that’s his responsibility. So he’s very carefully, methodically, very deliberately looking through that to see which decisions can be made in the best interest of the American people. That’s his obligation and that’s his real desire.”

Typically during a government shutdown, federal employees are categorized as exempt, meaning they keep working without pay, or are placed on furlough. Both categories receive back pay once Congress votes to approve a stopgap spending bill.

But Vought has indicated he wants to use the shutdown as an excuse to lay off federal workers en masse, a step not taken during past funding lapses. He’s also taken to social media several times to announce canceled or halted projects in areas of the country that don’t regularly vote for Republicans.

Vought wrote in a post on Wednesday, shortly after the shutdown began, that $18 billion in Transportation Department funding for the Hudson Tunnel Project and the Second Ave Subway in New York City was put “on hold.” Both are in Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer and Jeffries’ home state.

Vought then said the Energy Department would cancel $8 billion in climate funding that was slated to go to projects in California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Vermont and Washington.

The Washington State Standard reported some of the funding would have gone toward the Pacific Northwest Hydrogen Hub and Source New Mexico posted an article detailing a few impacted projects, including funds to the “New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology for the third phase of a project … to develop a storage hub at a commercial scale within (the) San Juan basin.”

Additionally, Vought on Friday froze $2.1 billion in Transportation Department funding for the “Red Line Extension and the Red and Purple Modernization Project” in Chicago, writing it was “put on hold to ensure funding is not flowing via race-based contracting.”

Senate Democratic Whip Dick Durbin represents Illinois, and the state’s governor, JB Pritzker, has been in a public back-and-forth with Trump over immigration enforcement, which the administration has heightened in Chicago. Pritzker has repeatedly rebuffed Trump’s requests to bring in the National Guard.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., said during the press conference with Speaker Johnson that it makes sense the Trump administration would implement the shutdown through a political lens.

“I think they’re going to make decisions that are consistent with their priorities,” Thune said. “And yes, they’re going to have a different political view of the world than the Democrats might have.”

Hatch Act questions

The actions of Trump administration officials have raised questions about whether they could be in violation of the Hatch Act, a 1939 law that “limits certain political activities of federal employees.” 

The Office of Special Counsel writes on its website the law is meant to “ensure that federal programs are administered in a nonpartisan fashion, to protect federal employees from political coercion in the workplace, and to ensure that federal employees are advanced based on merit and not based on political affiliation.”

Any federal employee found to have violated the law can face removal from service or a fine of up to $1,000, among other possible repercussions. 

Public Citizen has filed numerous complaints against the Trump administration, alleging that banners and messages posted on government websites about the shutdown violate the Hatch Act. 

“Even for an administration that flouts ethics guidelines regularly, these messages are a particularly egregious and clear-cut sign that Trump and his cabinet see themselves as above the law,” Craig Holman, a government ethics expert with Public Citizen, wrote in a statement. 

As with many of the Trump administration’s actions, any new precedent set by the Republican administration could be used by a future Democratic president in a way that would very likely be harmful to Republican voters and regions of the country that consistently support GOP policies.

Layoffs still threatened

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said during an afternoon briefing that administration officials are trying to determine where to make additional spending cuts and layoffs during the shutdown. 

“The Office of Management and Budget is in constant communication and contact right now with our Cabinet secretaries and agencies across the board to identify, unfortunately, where layoffs have to be made and where cuts have to happen,” Leavitt said. “But again, the Democrats have an opportunity to prevent this if they vote to reopen the government.”

Leavitt declined to say whether the administration would back away from plans to lay off federal workers by the thousands or cancel funding for projects in Democratic areas if Republicans and Democrats in Congress strike a deal to reopen government. 

Leavitt said the “blueprint” for shrinking the size and scope of the federal government is whatever the president and administration officials come up with, after being asked by a Fox News reporter about Trump writing in a social media post earlier this week that Vought was “of PROJECT 2025 Fame,” after the president repeatedly distanced himself from the document on the campaign trail.

Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem at a Nashville press conference on July 18, 2025, to discuss arrests of immigrants during recent Immigration and Customs Enforcement sweeps. (Photo by John Partipilo/Tennessee Lookout)

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Supreme Court Friday again allowed the Trump administration to strip temporary protections for more than 300,000 Venezuelans, opening them up for quick deportations as the president continues with his plans for mass deportations.  

The conservative justices granted, 6-3, President Donald Trump’s request from last month to pause a federal judge’s ruling that found Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem lacked the authority to revoke Temporary Protected Status granted to hundreds of thousands of Venezuelan immigrants under the Biden administration. 

All three liberal justices sided with the lower court, with Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson writing a dissent with the conservative Supreme Court majority. She criticized the high court’s use of the emergency docket, also known as the shadow docket, which can allow the justices to avoid explaining their reasoning for decisions brought on an emergency basis. 

“We once again use our equitable power (but not our opinion-writing capacity) to allow this Administration to disrupt as many lives as possible, as quickly as possible,” Jackson wrote. 

The conservative justices did not explain their reasoning but said the harms faced by the Trump administration remained the same as when the case was first brought to the high court in May.

Jackson said that not only were the lower courts correct in their orders to block the removal of TPS protections to limit harm, but that the Supreme Court should have denied the emergency request from the Trump administration.

“Having opted instead to join the fray, the Court plainly misjudges the irreparable harm and balance-of-the-equities factors by privileging the bald assertion of unconstrained executive power over countless families’ pleas for the stability our Government has promised them,” Jackson wrote. 

“Because, respectfully, I cannot abide our repeated, gratuitous, and harmful interference with cases pending in the lower courts while lives hang in the balance, I dissent,” she continued. 

The suit in the Northern District of California will continue despite Friday’s emergency ruling from the high court. 

U.S. Solicitor General D. John Sauer argued that Noem had the authority to revoke extended protections initially granted to Venezuelans under the Biden administration. 

Former President Joe Biden granted TPS for Venezuelans who came to the U.S. in 2021 and 2023. Those TPS protections were set to last until October 2026. 

TPS is granted when a national’s home country is deemed too dangerous to return to due to violence, political instability or extreme natural disasters. It’s renewed every 18 months and protects immigrants from deportation and allows them access to work permits.

This is the second time the Trump administration has appealed to the high court to allow it to end TPS protections for Venezuelans. In late May, the Supreme Court paved the way for the Trump administration to temporarily terminate TPS for more than 300,000 Venezuelans while the case continued in lower courts.

A closed sign is seen on the Washington Monument on Oct. 1, 2025 in Washington, D.C. The federal government shut down many operations overnight after Congress failed to pass a stopgap funding bill. (Photo by Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — Vice President JD Vance said Wednesday the administration is looking for ways to get a handful of additional U.S. Senate Democrats to vote for Republicans’ stopgap spending bill to reopen government. 

But, in the meantime, White House officials plan to lay off federal workers en masse, a dramatic and unsettling step that’s not traditionally been taken during past shutdowns. 

“We’re going to have to take extraordinary measures to ensure the people’s government operates — again not perfectly because it’s not going to operate perfectly in the midst of a shutdown — but operates as well as it possibly can,” Vance said.

Any Democrats concerned about the impacts of layoffs on federal programs or people’s lives, Vance said, should vote to advance a seven-week stopgap spending bill that has stalled in the Senate.  Senate and House Democrats say they will not support a GOP path to reopen the government unless Republicans agree to negotiate on rising health care costs. 

Typically during a shutdown, some federal employees are categorized as exempt, meaning they work throughout the funding lapse. Others are furloughed. All receive back pay once Congress funds the government, under a 2019 law.  

Widescale layoffs were not part of the 2013 shutdown or the 2018-2019 shutdown that took place during the first Trump administration. 

Vance during the White House briefing placed blame for the shutdown on Democrats, as the Trump administration ramped up similar rhetoric, including on government agency websites that said the “radical left in Congress” is at fault.

“Three moderate Democrats joined 52 Republicans last night. We need five more in order to reopen the government and that’s really where we’re going to focus, is how to get those five additional Democrats,” Vance said. 

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said during the same briefing that layoffs for federal employees are “imminent” but declined to say what percentage of workers would be let go or share any other details. 

Leavitt indicated that White House budget director Russ Vought would release those details “soon,” saying she didn’t want to get ahead of that office.  

“These (Reductions in Force) are unfortunately going to have to happen very soon,” Leavitt said. 

Effects on key programs

The administration expects several programs will be impacted by the shutdown, including new enrollees in the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children, or WIC. 

Leavitt said the funding lapse means “1.3 million active duty troops will work now without pay; critical food assistance for low-income women, infants and children will now lapse, no new mothers or children are allowed to join this critical program because of the Democrats’ decision to shut down the government; telehealth services for seniors and in-home treatment options for Medicare patients will now come to an end; nearly 50,000 members of the United States Coast Guard are going to have to work unpaid; over 13,000 air traffic controllers will work without pay as well as TSA agents, which will very likely create flight disruptions; and pay will now stop for over 150,000 federal law enforcement officers. 

“These are not just numbers and statistics, these are real Americans who have families at home. And I saw some Democrat members today saying they’re still going to accept their paychecks because they have three kids at home and they have mouths to feed. Well, so do these federal workers.”

Members of Congress, the president and federal judges must receive their salary under various provisions in the Constitution. While some lawmakers have publicly asked for their paychecks to be withheld until the government reopens, that’s not a legal option. 

They could, however, donate their salaries to charity, which they can do regardless of whether the government is shut down.  

‘Mafia-style threat’

The threat to fire federal workers en masse has already prompted a lawsuit in a Northern California district court, arguing the executive branch has no statutory authority to fire federal workers during a government shutdown.

There were roughly 2.2 million federal workers throughout the country as of July 1, with large portions of them living in California, Florida, Georgia, Maryland, Texas and Virginia. Roughly 30% of the workforce is made up of veterans. 

Maryland’s Democratic Sen. Chris Van Hollen told States Newsroom on Wednesday morning that his office has not heard of any federal workers in his state being fired, and even if it were the case, “it’s illegal.” 

“The president has no additional authority, in a shutdown, to fire people,” Van Hollen said. “This is just a mafia-style threat and blackmail.”

He didn’t detail what plans Democrats have to prevent those potential firings, but called them unlawful and pointed to the lawsuit filed in California by labor unions representing more than 1 million federal employees. Those unions are the American Federation of Government Employees and the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees.

Virginia Democratic Sen. Mark Warner made similar remarks, saying “the president has no enhanced powers during the shutdown so his ability to randomly and arbitrarily fire is not enhanced.”

North Dakota Republican Sen. Kevin Cramer said Democrats “don’t have the high ground in this situation” and need to pass the GOP stopgap bill so that the government can reopen. 

But Cramer said he’s concerned the White House budget office will go too far in implementing a shutdown, including mass layoffs, and could create challenges for Republican lawmakers. 

“I worry a little bit that they could be counterproductive for us politically in the long run, because other things are going to require 60 votes again,” Cramer said.

Legislation needs the support of at least 60 senators to advance toward final passage, a rule that typically leads to compromise and bipartisanship in that chamber. 

Sen. Tim Kaine, Democrat of Virginia, said he hopes lawmakers can strike a deal to prevent the Trump administration from firing more federal workers. He said Congress has specifically carved out protections for federal workers, such as in 2019 when lawmakers included a provision to give back pay to furloughed federal workers.  

“So it used to be we had to fight about back pay after the shutdown,” he said. “Now everybody’s guaranteed back pay, so they have that as a backstop that they can count (on).”

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries said during a press conference Wednesday President Donald Trump’s administration “has been engaging in” the mass firings of federal workers since Trump took office on Jan 20.

“The Trump administration has been killing jobs,” the New York Democrat said. “This is a job-killing administration. Job creation is down, but you know what’s up? Costs. They promised to lower costs on day one. Costs aren’t going down. Costs are going up.” 

Here are department shutdown plans

The Trump administration has been steadily posting its plans for how many federal workers in each department will keep working without pay during a shutdown and which employees will be furloughed. 

The plans, listed below, also detail which programs the Trump administration believes it can legally continue during a funding lapse without violating federal law. 

They do not explain how many federal workers could be laid off and the White House declined to provide additional details about those plans or whether they’ll be posted publicly following the briefing, 

• Agriculture Department contingency plan
• Commerce Department contingency plan
• Defense Department contingency plan
• Education Department contingency plan
• Energy Department contingency plan
• Health and Human Services contingency plan
• Homeland Security Department contingency plan
• Housing and Urban Development contingency plan
• Interior Department contingency plan
• Labor Department contingency plan
• Justice Department contingency plan
• State Department contingency plan
• Social Security Administration contingency plan
• Transportation Department contingency plan
• Treasury Department contingency plan
• Veterans Affairs Department contingency plan

Attack banners

The Trump administration has taken a new approach to letting people visiting their websites know about the shutdown, adding banners laying the blame at Democrats’ feet. 

The Agriculture Department’s website states that “(d)ue to the Radical Left Democrat shutdown, this government website will not be updated during the funding lapse. President Trump has made it clear he wants to keep the government open and support those who feed, fuel, and clothe the American people.”

The website for the Department of Housing and Urban Development includes a pop-up and a banner on the homepage that reads, “The Radical Left in Congress shut down the government. HUD will use available resources to help Americans in need.”

The Defense Department had a more measured message: “The most recent appropriations for the Department of War expired at 11:59 p.m. EDT on Sept. 30, 2025. Military personnel will continue in a normal duty status, without pay, until such time as a continuing resolution or appropriations are passed by Congress and signed into law. Civilian personnel not engaged in excepted activities will be placed in a non-work, non-pay status.”

The message posted by the Department of Health and Human Services was similar. 

“Mission-critical activities of HHS will continue during the Democrat-led government shutdown. Please use this site as a resource as the Trump Administration works to reopen the government for the American people.”

The messages could be in violation of a longstanding rider in federal spending law that states “(n)o part of any funds appropriated in this or any other Act shall be used by an agency of the executive branch … to support or defeat legislation pending before the Congress, except in presentation to the Congress itself.” 

Shauneen Miranda contributed to this report.

U.S. Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., speaks to the media at the U.S. Capitol on Sept. 30, 2025 in Washington, D.C. Thune was joined by Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., Sen. Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va., Sen. John Barrasso, R-Wyo., and Sen. James Lankford, R-Okla. (Photo by Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)

This report has been updated.

WASHINGTON — The federal government started shutting down early Wednesday after Congress failed to approve a funding bill before the beginning of the new fiscal year — resulting in widespread ramifications for hundreds of programs and giving the Trump administration an avenue to fire federal workers en masse.

The U.S. Senate was unable to advance two short-term government funding bills Tuesday when Democrats and Republicans deadlocked for the second time this month, with just hours to go before the midnight Tuesday shutdown deadline.

Senators voted 55-45 on Republicans’ bill that would fund the government for seven weeks and 47-53 on a Democratic stopgap proposal that would keep the lights on for a month and included several health care provisions that they said were needed for their support. Neither had the 60 votes needed to advance. 

Nevada Democratic Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto, Pennsylvania Democratic Sen. John Fetterman and Maine independent Sen. Angus King voted with GOP senators on their stopgap bill. Kentucky GOP Sen. Rand Paul voted against it.

White House Office of Management and Budget Director Russ Vought said in a memo to departments and agencies Tuesday night after the Senate vote that “affected agencies should now execute their plans for an orderly shutdown.” Vought said federal employees should report for their next regularly scheduled tour of duty to undertake shutdown activities.

The consequences of a shutdown will be sweeping in the nation’s capital and across the country, where states are bracing for the impact. About 750,000 federal workers could be furloughed, leading to a $400 million impact a day, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office reported. All federal employees would go unpaid until the shutdown is over.

Additionally, the Trump administration plans to lay off thousands of federal employees, which would reshape the federal workforce. President Donald Trump again vowed Tuesday to undertake layoffs and a major government employee union filed suit in federal court in advance of such a move.

More votes on GOP bill planned

Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., said hours before the votes there wouldn’t be any talks with Democrats during a shutdown. 

“The negotiation happens when the government is open. So let’s keep the government open and then we will have the negotiations,” Thune said. 

“We’re happy to sit down and talk about these issues that they’re interested in,” he said. “But it should not have anything to do with whether or not for a seven-week period we keep the government open, so that this government can continue to do its work and that we can do our work through the regular appropriations process to fund the government.” 

After the votes failed, Thune expressed his frustration with Democrats during a press conference. 

“This is so unnecessary and uncalled for,” he said. 

Thune said he plans to bring up a vote on the continuing resolution again. He said as soon as Wednesday the federal government can be funded if five Democrats voted with Republicans. 

“Democrats may have chosen to shut down the government, but we can reopen it tomorrow,” Thune said. 

Republican Whip John Barrasso of Wyoming said the “cracks in the Democrats are already showing,” noting that three Democrats voted with Republicans Tuesday night. 

“There is bipartisan support for keeping the government open,” Barrasso said. “We’re happy to see that the Democrats are already starting to break from (Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer) and we’re going to continue to offer a clean (continuing resolution) on the floor of the Senate to open the government for the next seven weeks.”

Health care tax credits at center of standoff

The disagreement isn’t entirely about GOP lawmakers writing their short-term funding bill behind closed doors and then expecting Democrats to help advance it in the Senate, where bipartisanship is required for major legislation.

Democratic leaders have raised concerns for weeks about the end-of-year sunset of enhanced tax credits for people who buy their health insurance on the Affordable Care Act Marketplace, arguing a solution is needed now ahead of the open enrollment period starting on Nov. 1. 

Democrats have also grown increasingly frustrated with the White House budget office’s unilateral actions on spending, arguing Vought is significantly eroding Congress’ constitutional power of the purse. Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, the Republican chairwoman of the U.S. Senate Appropriations Committee, said Tuesday the Government Accountability Office should sue the Trump administration over its efforts to freeze or unilaterally cancel spending approved by Congress. 

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said Democrats need an agreement with Republicans to extend the enhanced tax credits. 

Schumer said people will begin getting notices in October telling them how much the cost of their ACA plans will increase during the next year, which he expects will ratchet up pressure on Republican leaders to broker a bipartisan agreement. 

“We’re going to be right there explaining to them it’s because the Republicans wouldn’t negotiate with us,” Schumer said, referring to consumers. “We’re ready to do it anytime. And there will be huge heat on (Republicans) on this issue.”

People who buy health insurance on the ACA marketplace and receive subsidies through enhanced ACA tax credits could expect to pay on average more than double for annual premiums in 2026 if the credits expire as scheduled at the end of this year, according to an analysis released Tuesday by the nonprofit health policy research organization KFF. 

The analysis found premiums could increase from an average of $888 this year to $1,904 in 2026.

Claims about immigrants 

Schumer also rebuffed GOP leaders saying that Democrats want to include people without legal immigration status in federal health care programs. 

“They say that undocumented people are going to get these credits. That is absolutely false. That is one of the big lies they tell, so they don’t have to discuss the issues,” Schumer said. “The federal government by law that we passed does not fund health insurance for undocumented immigrants in Medicaid, nor the ACA nor Medicare. Undocumented immigrants do not get federal health insurance premiums.” 

Immigrants in the country without legal authorization are not eligible for Medicaid, and neither are most immigrants with legal status, such as those with student visas or enrollment in the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, known as DACA. 

Only immigrants with a “qualified status,” such as legal permanent residents, asylees and refugees, are able to get Medicaid benefits, and they usually have to wait five years before their coverage can even begin. 

Democrats explain why they voted with GOP 

Cortez Masto of Nevada wrote in a statement explaining her vote to advance the GOP stopgap bill that she could not support “a costly shutdown that would hurt Nevada families and hand even more power to this reckless administration.”

“We need a bipartisan solution to address this impending health care crisis, but we should not be swapping the pain of one group of Americans for another,” she added. “I remain focused on protecting health care for working families, and I call on my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to work together to tackle this problem.”

Pennsylvania’s Fetterman wrote in a statement of his own that his vote on the Republican bill “was for our country over my party.

“Together, we must find a better way forward.”

Collins said during a brief interview before the vote she is worried about the broad authority the White House holds during a shutdown and how the Office of Management and Budget has indicated it will use that power. 

“I’m much more concerned about OMB sending signals that there should be mass firings of federal employees who have the misfortune to be designated as non-essential, when in fact they’re performing very essential work, they’re just not being paid,” Collins said.  

North Dakota Republican Sen. John Hoeven, chairman of the Agriculture spending subcommittee, said lawmakers will have to sort through how various departments implement their contingency plans as well as the possibility of mass layoffs during a shutdown. 

“We’ll have to work through those things and figure out how we do keep things going as best we can during this Democrat shutdown,” Hoeven said.

West Virginia Sen. Shelley Moore Capito said Republicans are “unified in the belief that this is an easy choice” to fund the government with a stopgap bill that doesn’t include any contentious or political provisions. 

Capito — who chairs the Appropriations subcommittee that funds the departments of Education, Health and Human Services, and Labor — said there are several programs that will be “missed” during a shutdown. 

“And that’s concerning. So I think the option is to keep the government open so we can avoid this pain,” Capito said. 

‘I’m not optimistic that we’re going to get a path forward’

Missouri Republican Sen. Josh Hawley said he is worried about the possible impacts of a shutdown on his home state and that keeping the government open is the only way to avoid that.  

“I’m sure the administration will do everything they can,” Hawley said. “But the solution is to not shut the government down. I mean, why would you punish working people because you’re not getting what you want on any issue, whatever it is.”

South Dakota Republican Sen. Mike Rounds said he doesn’t expect a shutdown will end until after Democrats have sent a message to their voters. 

“I’m not optimistic that we’re going to get a path forward until they’ve had a shutdown,” he said. 

Rounds, who negotiated a handshake agreement with the White House budget director this summer to preserve some funding for rural tribal radio stations after Congress eliminated funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, said that deal could be affected by a shutdown. 

“They’re putting the administration in a position where they can pick and choose what they’re going to do, and a shutdown is not going to be beneficial to these Native American radio stations,” Rounds said. 

Democratic Sen. Elissa Slotkin of Michigan said she wants Democrats and Republicans to negotiate on health care provisions.

“I’ve been making the case constantly, that (it) is literally my obligation to try and fight for health care, and I’m willing to talk to anyone,” she said. “I’m willing to accept that I certainly will not get everything I want.”

Senate Minority Whip Dick Durbin of Illinois said that while Democrats agreed to help advance what’s known as a continuing resolution in March, they can’t now because of “what President Trump is doing to this country, particularly when it comes to health care costs for families.”  

The shutdown will significantly affect the operations of the federal government as lawmakers have not passed any of the dozen full-year appropriations bills that finance agency operations. Oct. 1 is the beginning of the new fiscal year for the federal government.

Shutdown plan for national parks

Departments began releasing updated contingency plans this weekend, detailing how many of their employees would work during a government shutdown and how many would be furloughed.

The Interior Department, which includes the Bureau of Land Management, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and National Park Service, posted its updated plans late Tuesday. 

The National Park Service plans to furlough 9,300 of its 14,500 workers. 

The Trump administration will allow several activities necessary for the protection of life or property to continue, including fire suppression for active fires, permitting and monitoring First Amendment activities, border and coastal protection and surveillance, and law enforcement and emergency response.

The contingency plan says that roads, lookouts, trails, and open-air memorials will generally remain accessible to visitors,” but it adds that if “access becomes a safety, health or resource protection issue … the area must be closed.”

Union files suit

In anticipation of layoffs by the Trump administration, labor unions representing more than 1 million federal workers filed a lawsuit in the Northern District of California on Tuesday to block the Trump administration from carrying out mass firings. The suit argues that there is no statutory authority to fire federal employees during a government shutdown.

“These actions are contrary to law and arbitrary and capricious, and the cynical use of federal employees as a pawn in Congressional deliberations should be declared unlawful and enjoined by this Court,” according to the suit filed by the American Federation of Government Employees and the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees.

Ashley Murray and Shauneen Miranda contributed to this report. 

U.S. Senate Appropriations Committee Chairwoman Susan Collins, R-Maine, speaks with reporters inside the Capitol building in Washington, D.C., on Monday, Sept. 29, 2025. (Photo by Jennifer Shutt/States Newsroom)

WASHINGTON — The chairwoman of the U.S. Senate Appropriations Committee said Tuesday the Government Accountability Office should sue the Trump administration over its efforts to freeze or unilaterally cancel spending approved by Congress. 

“I believe that GAO, which is empowered under the Impoundment and Budget Control Act of 1974 to sue in cases, should do so,” Sen. Susan Collins said. “The GAO has found seven instances in which the (impoundments) violate the act and it has standing to sue.”

Collins, R-Maine, also told reporters that she doesn’t agree with the Supreme Court’s decision last week on its emergency docket that allows the Trump administration to cancel $4 billion in foreign aid. 

“I disagree with the Supreme Court’s temporary decision, but it was not a decision that delved into the merits of the case,” Collins said. “That’s yet to come.”

Collins, one of the more vocal members of her party over preserving Congress’ constitutional power of the purse, said “Well, let’s see,” when asked if she expects the GAO, a government watchdog agency, would win a lawsuit over the Trump administration impounding funds. 

The GAO and White House budget office did not immediately respond to a request for comment. 

Funds frozen for libraries, medical research, FEMA

Republicans in Congress have been either supportive or relatively quiet about the Trump administration’s efforts to freeze or cancel funding approved by Congress. 

The GAO has cited the Trump administration for illegally impounding funding for electric vehicle charging, museums and libraries, Head Start, energy efficiency upgrades in K-12 schools, funding for medical research at the National Institutes of Health and funding for the Federal Emergency Management Agency. 

Senate Appropriations Committee ranking member Patty Murray, D-Wash., released a statement earlier this week rebuking the Trump administration’s actions after the GAO released its seventh impoundment decision. 

“Today, we have another stark reminder of how President Trump’s lawless assault on our spending laws is hurting real people in every part of the country—as funding is held up to address homelessness, prepare for disasters, and much more,” Murray wrote. “It is time for Republicans to join us in insisting that every last penny that is owed to the American people gets out to the American people.”

State Superintendent Jill Underly with Madison La Follette High School Principal Mathew Thompson and Madison Public School District Superintendent Joe Gothard in the hallway at La Follette in September 2024. | Photo by Ruth Conniff

During her 2025 State of Education address in the Wisconsin Capitol rotunda, State Superintendent Jill Underly called the Trump administration the “biggest school-yard bully” that Wisconsin schools must overcome and said chronic underfunding at the state level continues to put pressure on districts to do more with less. 

Thursday’s address was Underly’s first during her second term in office. She won reelection in April this year. She used the address as an opportunity to call for the state to give more support to schools.

“Public education in Wisconsin is not just a system; it’s a living story written daily by the people who believe in its promise…  by students walking into classrooms filled with possibility, by the teachers who dedicate their lives to unlocking potential, by the families and the communities who support them,” Underly said. However, she warned that pride in the public education story “does not guarantee a happy ending.” 

“Pride alone can’t patch a leaking roof. Pride doesn’t shrink a class of 32. Pride will not put a counselor in every school, and pride does not replace sustainable funding. Pride doesn’t fix inequity,’ Underly said. “Pride must be paired with action.” 

The first several months of Underly’s term have been marked by federal upheaval as the Trump administration has abruptly paused and pulled federal funding that goes to education priorities and also by the completion of a state budget that fell short of public school advocates’ goals. 

Underly said the Trump administration is using funding as a bargaining chip by withholding it with little notice in order to demand schools comply with unclear and unlawful requests. 

Most recently, the Trump administration decided to withhold nearly $11 million in grants to support deafblind students and special education teachers. The explanation delivered to the state DPI was that the programs “reflect the prior administration’s priorities and policy preferences and conflict with those of the current administration.” 

Over the summer, schools across the nation were thrown into uncertainty after the Trump administration said it would be withholding Title program payments. The administration eventually reversed its decision. 

“Their efforts seek to sow confusion and create chaos and erode trust in an education system already under incredible pressure. We teach our students to stand up to bullies, but this year, the biggest school-yard bully in our public schools is our own federal government,” Underly said. “We will not allow politics or outside forces to rewrite the story of Wisconsin’s public schools. We will not stand by while the future of our children is at stake. We will fight, we will lead, and we will stand up for every student.”

Underly also said the state government is putting school districts in a situation where they must stretch their budgets and are left to solve their problems alone. 

“Decades of insufficient funding have forced a historic number of districts into an impossible situation, turning to referenda year after year just to survive, all while facing micromanaging from Madison and endless finger pointing from lawmakers who too often choose politics over partisanship,” Underly said. 

The state budget, which was passed by the Republican-led state Legislature and signed by Gov. Tony Evers, included a boost in special education funding from about 30% to 45%. But school districts have said that another aspect of the budget, which made no increase at all in state aid for both years of the biennium, left them in a tight spot. Underly said the budget was “not perfect” but “makes meaningful progress for our schools, especially in special education” and acts as a “starting point.” 

‘Pulling resources away from public schools to fund private ones’

“And here’s the truth: We are starving one system while funding another. We cannot afford to keep pulling resources away from public schools to fund private ones and expect both to thrive. That is not good stewardship, and that is not Wisconsin,” Underly said. 

Underly was referencing the state’s school voucher programs, which allow students to use public funds to attend participating private schools. Caps on the program, which limit the number of students who can participate, are scheduled to lift after the 2025-26 school year. 

The growth of the state’s school voucher programs coincides with public school districts’ increasing reliance on raising money through property tax hikes that local taxpayers have to decide whether to approve.

“This under-investment has created a growing sense in too many classrooms during too many school board meetings and around too many kitchen tables that our schools are being left to go it alone,” Underly said. 

Underly said the financial pressures are placing teachers and students under other types of stress as well. 

“Our schools are not failing. We are failing our schools, and we can’t afford to keep writing this chapter. If we truly believe in writing a better story for public education, then it’s long past time for our state to step up and deliver on its promise,” Underly said. “When we underfund, we burn out teachers. When we ignore, we lose talent.” 

Underly called attention to the mental health problems that many students are facing, saying that the political environment could be making things worse. She specifically noted the high rates of depression, anxiety and self-harm among LGBTQ+ students, especially transgender students. 

“The debates taking place in the public sphere, and right here in this Capitol building aren’t about sports,” Underly said, referencing bills that have been debated this year that would bar transgender girls from participating on girls’ sports teams. “They’re about something much deeper — whether kids are allowed to belong. It’s not just one group of kids, it’s every kid. It’s the kid who doesn’t know where their next meal is going to come from. It’s the kid growing up in a low-income neighborhood without access to the same opportunities just a few miles away. It’s the kids still learning English like so many generations of Americans before them, navigating a world that too often makes them feel invisible. It’s the rural kid who has big dreams but lacks access to broadband or after-school programs.” 

Undery said that despite the challenges, there is hope for the future of Wisconsin schools. 

“Throughout history, Wisconsin has led the way,” Underly said, noting that the state had the first kindergarten program in the country and created one of the first statewide public library systems. 

“That courage, that commitment to progress, that’s in Wisconsin’s DNA,” Underly said. “Now, we stand at a defining moment. In this next chapter, you re-elected me to lead that work not to maintain the status quo, but to drive real change to lead to act to set a clear path forward, and that’s exactly what I intend to do.” 

She listed priorities including hands-on learning, embracing new technologies, creating personalized learning experiences and recruiting and retaining teachers. She also said DPI is also working to modernize to be a “stronger and more effective partner” to schools and educators.

“The future isn’t red. The future isn’t blue. The future, Wisconsin, is sitting in our classrooms right now, and this is our wake-up call. This is the mirror we must face,” Underly said. “Will we be the generation that looked away as our schools crumbled? Or will we be the ones who stood up, kept our promise, and chose to write a different story?”

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DACA supporters rally outside the U.S. Supreme Court in 2019. (Photo by Robin Bravender/States Newsroom)

WASHINGTON — Advocates Thursday raised alarm over immigrants with special deportation protections facing detainment across the country, as the Trump administration continues its aggressive mass deportation campaign. 

Home is Here, a coalition of advocates for immigrants with Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, status, has documented a pattern of immigration agents targeting DACA recipients. At least 18 DACA recipients are detained, according to a Home is Here tracker. 

So far, Home is Here has pinpointed DACA recipients detained in Alabama,  Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Florida, Georgia, Kansas, Texas, New Mexico, New York, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Rhode Island and Virginia.

The immigrant advocates were joined at a press conference by congressional Democrats and family members of DACA recipients currently detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The lawmakers included Sens. Dick Durbin of Illinois and Alex Padilla of Carlifornia and Reps. Sylvia Garcia of Texas and Delia Ramirez of Illinois. 

“The Trump administration is killing DACA piece by piece,” Garcia said. 

DACA tied up in court

The Trump administration tried to end DACA during President Donald Trump’s first term, but the Supreme Court blocked the effort. Republican-led states have challenged the legality of DACA and its fate is tied up in an appeals court.

There are roughly 550,000 DACA recipients, a program created under the Obama administration for undocumented children brought into the country without legal authorization by their parents. 

DACA allows that group to be shielded from deportation and obtain work authorizations and driver’s licenses. DACA recipients have to reapply every two years for a renewal fee of $520 and pass a background check.

Ramirez said the Trump administration’s aggressive mass deportation campaign is indiscriminately targeting immigrants and has instilled fear in Latino communities. 

“The whole (Trump) administration are waging a campaign of terror against our neighbors, against our own families, against our loved ones as they advance their fascist agenda and they try to cast immigrants as a public enemy,” said Ramirez, who is married to a DACA recipient and is the daughter of Guatemalan immigrants. 

The Democrats said they would continue to speak out against the detention of DACA recipients and provide assistance in litigation for families. A handful of Democrats have sued ICE over blocked access to detention facilities to conduct oversight. 

An arrest, and detainment

The wife of a DACA recipient in ICE detention, Alejandra, who spoke at the press conference, said that she saw through a home security camera her husband, Paulo Cesar Gamez Lira, being arrested by masked men in the driveway of their Texas home.

Alejandra said their children were in the car and they could be heard screaming on the video. Her husband remains in detainment. The ACLU of New Mexico said in a statement he is 28 years old and the father of four U.S. citizen children.

“No family should ever have to endure that kind of terror,” she said. “For more than a decade, Paulo has been able to renew his status without issues. He has always followed the rules, done everything this country asked of him, and yet, under this administration, it feels like none of that matters anymore.”

(L-R) Adrien Wood, Aeriana Wood, and Juliana Wood have a picture taken by Michael Race in front of the Alligator Alcatraz sign at the entrance to the Dade-Collier Training and Transition Airport on July 10, 2025, in Ochopee. The site is the location of the state-managed immigration detention facility in the Florida Everglades that officials have named “Alligator Alcatraz.” (Photo by Joe Raedle/Getty Images)

A federal appeals court last week ordered the “Alligator Alcatraz” detention center to remain open partially because it lacked federal ties. A week later, Florida formally applied for federal funds.

The state’s request for reimbursement for its spending on the migrant detention facility in the heart of the Everglades came just days after the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit hit pause on a federal judge’s order shutting down the center over environmental concerns. The 2-1 vote claimed that federal environmental laws don’t apply because Florida officials haven’t used any federal money.

But less than eight days after the ruling — which stayed all aspects of the case — the Florida Division of Emergency Management asked the Federal Emergency Management Agency to be reimbursed, a Department of Homeland Security spokesperson told the Florida Phoenix in an email.

“The State of Florida submitted an application for reimbursement to [FEMA],” the spokesperson said. Although they didn’t comment on what day the application was made nor for how much money, this confirmed Politico’s reporting that FDEM’s executive director, Kevin Guthrie, said the state had applied for federal money.

Gov. Ron DeSantis has long promised that Florida would be reimbursed for its detention center spending, although neither his office nor FDEM ever clarified when they planned to ask for the money. Federal authorities similarly lauded the facility as a joint effort, but showed no signs of chipping in until last week.

“Under President Trump’s leadership, we are working at turbo speed on cost-effective and innovative ways to deliver on the American people’s mandate for mass deportations of criminal illegal aliens,” the DHS official said. “These new facilities are in large part to be funded by FEMA’s Shelter and Services Program.”

The Shelter and Services program allocated $608.4 million toward FEMA’s new Detention Support Grant Program, specifically designed to expedite Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s mass detention and deportation agenda. If FEMA approves Florida’s request, the money will be awarded by Sep. 30. The Everglades facility is estimated to cost around $450 million for the year.

The attorney general’s office redirected questions to FDEM, which did not respond to questions about the application’s timeline.

‘So what do you say, judges?’

In a 2-1 decision on Sep. 4, the Eleventh Circuit both paused federal trial judge Kathleen Williams’ order to shut down the facility and fully stayed the case. The lawsuit was brought against the state by the Miccosukee Tribe and environmental groups Friends of the Everglades and the Center for Biodiversity.

They claimed the center, located within the Everglades and Big Cypress National Preserve, was harming the environment and violating the National Environmental Policy Act.

But judges Barbara Lagoa and Elizabeth Branch, both Trump appointees, ruled that Williams had erred by applying the federal law to a center that had exclusively received state funds. Florida hadn’t even applied for federal reimbursement, they argued. The activists have since asked the appeals court to reconsider their decision to halt the lawsuit.

If the judges don’t, Miami attorney Joseph DeMaria said the plaintiffs would be stymied unless they can “un-stay” the case — even though the majority opinion was largely predicated on the lack of federal ties.

“Unless they can get the case unstuck, there’s nothing they can do,” said DeMaria, who once worked as a prosecutor with the Justice Department’s Miami Organized Crime Strike Force. [The state] played it cute by saying, ‘We haven’t formally agreed yet, so federal law doesn’t apply.'”

He posed a rhetorical question to the appellate judges on the case: “You said that the feds haven’t agreed to pay, so there’s no jurisdiction to enforce the federal environmental law, but then almost immediately after you said that, they went and agreed to pay. So what do you say, judges?”

Attorneys for the Friends of the Everglades declined to comment, while the governor’s office, the Miccosukee Tribe, and the Center for Biodiversity did not respond to requests for comment.

Wisconsin Superintendent Jill Underly called on the Trump administration to reconsider the decision in a statement this week. Underly at a rally for 2025 Public Schools Week. Photo by Baylor Spears/Wisconsin Examiner

The U.S. Department of Education has abruptly terminated nearly $11 million for two grant programs that have been helping Wisconsin serve children with vision and hearing loss and others receiving special education services, according to the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction.

Wisconsin is one of several states to be affected by the cuts to Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) Part D grants. Others include Washington, Oregon and a consortium of New England states including Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Vermont, according to ProPublica.

Wisconsin Superintendent Jill Underly called on the Trump administration to reconsider the decision in a statement this week. 

“Make no mistake, losing these funds will directly impact our ability to serve some of our most vulnerable kids,” Underly said. “Wisconsin had planned work with these funds that includes direct support for deafblind learners and their families and efforts to recruit and retain new special education teachers.”

According to DPI, the Trump administration said the programs “reflect the prior administration’s priorities and policy preferences and conflict with those of the current administration.” 

The first program to be affected is the Wisconsin Deafblind Technical Assistance Project, which provides assistive technology tools, coaching, family support and professional training for young people up to the age of 21 with vision and hearing loss. The program currently serves 170 students, and of those, 85% have four or more disabilities. 

The funding cut comes in the middle of a five-year grant cycle. Wisconsin was supposed to get a total of about $550,000 that was expected to last through September 2028.

“These are kids who depend on specialized support just to access their guaranteed right to a free and appropriate public education,” Dr. Underly said. “Losing these dollars at this point in the year will be devastating for the kids who need these supports the most.”

The other program being cut is the State Personnel Development Grant, which focuses on helping address Wisconsin’s critical special education teacher shortage as well as assisting with recruitment, retention and development.

The grant funds from the program, which totaled $10.5 million, was helping to fund a number of programs, including the Special Educator Induction Program. In its first year, the state program helped 280 new special education teachers. 

“At a time when schools in every corner of the state are struggling to find and keep special educators, cutting this support is unconscionable and harmful to every student with an IEP,” Underly said.

According to DPI data, only 46% of new special education teachers in Wisconsin remain in the field after seven years. 

The state agency plans to appeal the Trump administration’s decision.

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U.S. Marshals and Homeland Security Investigations agents take a man into custody at the intersection of 14th and N streets NW in Washington, D.C., on Sept. 3, 2025. (Photo by Ashley Murray/States Newsroom)

WASHINGTON — A siren blared down one of Washington, D.C.’s busiest thoroughfares. And then, a loud noise. 

Residents in nearby apartment buildings peered through windows and from balconies to find a dark-colored SUV bumped up against a moped lying on the ground. A dog walker called 911 to report the incident before it became apparent that the unmarked vehicle belonged to federal law enforcement, when men in U.S. Marshals Service flak vests exited.

The rear driver-side tire on the Chevy Tahoe had completely blown and the marshals struggled to find a jack and spare while a uniformed Washington Metropolitan Police Department officer stood guard.

Bystanders pulled out phones to record and heckled. “Shame, shame, shame,” one repeatedly yelled. Another from a nearby apartment balcony screamed “Nazis!” Eyewitnesses began exchanging bits and pieces of what they said they saw, that the driver of the moped fled the scene.

“He didn’t get away though, did he? He’s down there in custody,” a U.S. marshal responded, gesturing to where the driver ran. 

The incident was like so many that have played out on the streets of Washington since Aug. 11, when President Donald Trump declared a federal crime emergency in the District of Columbia: A detainee is taken away by federal agents, often with local law enforcement standing by, and with little information provided to the public.

On the night of Sept. 3, a States Newsroom reporter witnessed and recorded most of the incident at 14th and N streets NW. 

U.S. marshals and Homeland Security Investigations agents detain a man at the intersection of 14th and N streets Northwest in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday, Sept. 3, 2025. (Video by Ashley Murray/States Newsroom)  

Earlier this summer, Trump ordered National Guard troops and Marines to the streets of Los Angeles as his administration launched an immigration crackdown, muddling the messages on violent crime and immigration status. 

In recent days Trump has threatened to send National Guard troops to Chicago, Boston, Baltimore, New Orleans, Portland and other Democratic-led cities. As of Monday, the administration announced a wave of federal immigration agents were headed to Chicago.

“This is a big issue,” said Mike Fox, legal fellow for the Cato Institute’s Project on Criminal Justice.

Fox, whose think tank advocates for limited federal government, told States Newsroom in an interview about Trump’s federalization of law enforcement in cities that he believes the strategy breaks down trust.

“You have unidentified federal agents coming in, seizing people’s property, but more importantly, seizing people. It undermines the very premise upon which community policing is supposed to work,” Fox said.

Despite multiple inquiries, States Newsroom was not able to get any additional information on the man taken into custody.

Moped drivers 

On the night of Sept. 3, as U.S. marshals continued to struggle with the tire, Homeland Security Investigations agents arrived a short time later with a detainee in the back of a separate unmarked SUV. 

Eight marshals and Homeland Security Investigations agents surrounded the man to switch his restraints to a new set with chains around his waist and between his ankles. HSI is a law enforcement agency within U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement, under the Department of Homeland Security.

News outlets including The New York Times, The Washington Post and Bellingcat have reported on the detainments of moped drivers in the district, and publicly crowd-sourced alerts from online monitor “Stop ICE Alerts” have included sightings of federal agents stopping mopeds. 

The 30-day federal crackdown has drawn widespread criticism and protests from district residents. District Mayor Muriel Bowser, however, has agreed to keep federal law enforcement on the streets beyond Trump’s emergency, which ends Wednesday.

Moped drivers who run food deliveries are a routine sight on D.C. streets, and many are from Latin America. Until recently, it wasn’t uncommon to see groups of moped food delivery drivers along 14th Street NW before a day’s work or on breaks between orders.

Law enforcement mum

A States Newsroom reporter saw the man being taken into custody but his name and his citizenship or immigration status could not be determined, nor the reason why police chased him. Officers on the scene did not respond to shouted questions.

The U.S. Marshals Service and Homeland Security Investigations have not provided information requested by States Newsroom regarding the incident, including whether the detainee was wanted on criminal charges or what happened to the moped that was left behind at the scene on a nearby sidewalk.

U.S. marshals are officers of the federal courts who usually apprehend fugitives and manage or sell seized assets. In January, Trump directed numerous federal law enforcement agencies, including the Marshals Service, to “investigate and apprehend illegal aliens.” 

States Newsroom has filed Freedom of Information Act requests with both agencies for body camera footage and reports about the incident and apparent impact between the SUV and moped, among other records.

Similarly, the Washington Metropolitan Police Department did not provide information on the incident, despite its presence on the scene.

When asked by States Newsroom if the agency made any records of assisting federal agents that night, MPD spokesperson Tom Lynch responded, “There is no publicly available document for this matter.”

‘It should scare people across the country’

Cato’s Fox said information on the federal crackdown in the district is scarce. 

“And that should scare everyone in D.C. It should scare Congress. It should scare people across the country. This is not a D.C.-specific issue,” Fox said. 

The American Civil Liberties Union’s D.C. Director Monica Hopkins told States Newsroom in a statement that “there are huge gaps and limitations in the accountability that is available to people” when it comes to federal law enforcement.

“Despite the Trump administration’s attempts at fear and intimidation, everyone in D.C. has rights, regardless of who they are and their immigration status,” Hopkins said.

The ACLU-DC is urging Congress to pass legislation barring federal immigration authorities from wearing face coverings and obscuring their agencies or identification when engaged in enforcement actions.

The Homeland Security Investigations agents and U.S. marshals at the incident witnessed by States Newsroom did not have their faces covered and were wearing vests identifying their respective agencies.

However, agents carrying out detainments in balaclava-style face coverings or bandanas and plain clothes, donning vests that only say “police,” have been witnessed and recorded by members of the public and journalists.

Later that night

As the scene wrapped up in Northwest D.C. on Sept. 3, immigrant advocates on bicycles arrived.

The volunteers said they were with the Migrant Solidarity Mutual Aid group, a network in the D.C., Maryland and Virginia area collecting information on immigration arrests and raids. The group runs a hotline for arrest reports and for family members seeking relatives who may have been detained.

States Newsroom contacted the mutual aid organization but could not obtain any details about the Sept. 3 incident.

Roughly an hour after police cleared that night, a States Newsroom reporter witnessed a small group of people surrounding the moped. A few tried to start the engine and removed at least one item from the under-seat storage compartment.

The moped was no longer there the following morning.

U.S. Marshals and the Department of Homeland Security have not responded to questions about the whereabouts of the moped.

Minister of Justice and Public Security Héctor Villatoro, right, accompanies Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, center, during a tour of the Terrorist Confinement Center on March 26, 2025 in Tecoluca, El Salvador.  (Photo by Alex Brandon-Pool/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — The Trump administration paid El Salvador $4.76 million to detain up to 300 immigrant men for up to a year at a notorious mega-prison and barred the funds from being used to help asylum seekers, reproductive care or diversity initiatives, according to a court document filed Tuesday. 

It’s the first time the financial agreement has been made public after the White House initially said the deal amounted to $6 million. 

The payments were part of the Trump administration’s aggressive immigration crackdown and decision to invoke a wartime law to remove Venezuelan nationals. 

The four-page agreement between the United States and El Salvador verifies that the funds came out of the State Department’s Bureau of International Narcotics and Law, which gives financial assistance to security forces and is subject to a human rights law known as the Leahy Law. 

That human rights law bars State’s financial support of “units of foreign security forces” — which can include military and law enforcement staff in prisons —  facing credible allegations of gross human rights violations. 

“The purpose of this grant is to provide funds to be used by the Salvadoran law enforcement and corrections agencies for its law enforcement needs, which includes costs associated with detaining the 238 TdA members recently deported to El Salvador,” according to the agreement.

Those who drafted the law raised concerns that those payments violated human rights laws, as more than 250 Venezuelan men were removed from the U.S. to the brutal prison, Centro de Confinamiento del Terrorismo, or CECOT, despite a federal judge’s order barring such action.

Congressional Democrats have asked Secretary of State Marco Rubio and the White House for a copy of the financial agreement for months, over concerns the funds were being used in violation of human rights. 

March flight to El Salvador

On March 15, the Trump administration sent 238 men to CECOT, after invoking the Alien Enemies Act of 1798 to apply to Venezuelan nationals 14 and older who are suspected members of the gang Tren de Aragua. 

The agreement, dated March 22, noted the men could be detained up to a year. 

It also bars any of the $4.76 million to be used to help asylum seekers seek legal counsel for the U.S. asylum process, for access to abortion, funds for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency that provides humanitarian assistance to Palestinians or for programs that promote diversity, equity and inclusion.

The men were released back to Venezuela as part of a prison swap in July, but they remained at CECOT for four months. Some of those detained, including Kilmar Abrego Garica, of Maryland, whose mistaken deportation captured national attention, detailed psychological and physical torture. 

No protection from torture

The document was obtained through a lawsuit by Democracy Forward, which specifically argued the financial agreement between El Salvador and the U.S. “was created without any legal basis.” 

“The correspondence between the U.S. State Department and El Salvador confirms what we have long suspected: the Trump-Vance administration did nothing to meaningfully ensure that individuals disappeared from the U.S. to El Salvador’s notorious CECOT prison were protected from torture, indefinite confinement, or other abuses,” Skye Perryman, president and CEO of Democracy Forward, said in a statement. “The agreement did, however, go to lengths to ensure that the funds the U.S. provided to El Salvador not be used to provide reproductive health care or to assist asylum seekers in accessing resources and counsel.”  

That case is being overseen by District of Columbia Judge James Boasberg, who also ordered the Trump administration to turn around planes carrying men removed under the wartime law. Instead, the planes landed in El Salvador. 

Secretary of U.S. Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. speaks at the Rx and Illicit Drug Summit at the Gaylord Opryland Resort & Convention Center in Nashville, Tennessee, on April 24, 2025. (John Partipilo/Tennessee Lookout)

WASHINGTON — The Trump administration released its strategy to Make America Healthy Again on Tuesday, which officials hope will reduce chronic diseases and align federal policy with their beliefs. 

Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said during a briefing on the strategy the 128 “recommendations are things that I’ve been dreaming about my whole life.”

Kennedy said he hoped to implement several of the changes before the end of the year, including defining what constitutes an ultra-processed food, updating water quality standards for forever chemicals known as PFAS and changing infant formula standards. 

The report also includes potentially controversial elements that address access to vaccines, a topic several Republican senators rebuked Kennedy over during a lengthy hearing last week. 

The 20-page strategy follows the MAHA Commission’s release of its first report in May that outlined four areas of concern — nutrition, physical activity, environmental factors and “overmedicalization.”

The proposals in the new report range in scope from issues that have largely been addressed to initiatives that are likely to cause concerns among doctors and reputable medical organizations. 

For example, the strategy calls on the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to “develop guidance on diagnostics and treatments for food allergies,” even though doctors are already able to diagnose and treat those conditions. 

The report also calls on the FDA to “improve regulatory processes for over-the-counter sunscreen, which has fallen behind other countries.”

Vaccine plan to come

The White House Domestic Policy Council and HHS intend to draft a separate plan addressing the childhood vaccine schedule, vaccine injuries, vaccine science, “misaligned incentives” and “scientific and medical freedom.”

Kennedy indicated during the briefing that he may seek to overhaul the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System, claiming that 99% of vaccine injuries are not reported, in part, because doctors are not compensated for doing so.  

“We are recasting the entire program so that vaccine injuries will be reported; they will be studied; that individuals who suffer them will not be denied, or marginalized, or vilified, or gaslighted,” Kennedy said. “They will be welcomed and we will learn everything we can about them.”

The report doesn’t include any plans to reduce pesticide use or to seek solutions to end mass shootings, though Kennedy and others at the event said those are issues the administration will look into. 

“The firearms question is a complex question and it’s not an easy question,” Kennedy said. “The violence is what we’re concerned with.”

Kennedy said that guns have been around for a while and that they also exist in other countries that don’t have nearly the number of mass shootings as the United States, before talking about psychiatric drugs, video games and social media. 

“We are looking at that at NIH,” Kennedy said, referring to the National Institutes of Health. “We are doing studies now. We’re initiating studies to look at the correlation and the potential connection between overmedicating our kids and this violence.” 

Kennedy deferred a question about pesticides to White House Domestic Policy Council Director Vince Haley, Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins and Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lee Zeldin. 

Haley referenced a section in the newly released report titled “cumulative exposure” that said USDA, EPA and NIH will use new approach methodologies “to improve methods for evaluating human health and environmental risks of chemical contaminants.”

Rollins told reporters that pesticides require study before being approved and that they are needed to ensure a stable food supply. 

“Is it a perfect process? Arguably there is no perfect process,” Rollins said. “But it is a strong process that our farmers stand by. And a crop protection tool, such as pesticides, is absolutely essential for America not to compromise our food supply system at this point.”