WASHINGTON — U.S. Senate Majority Leader John Thune said Tuesday he plans to use the complex reconciliation process to fund immigration enforcement for the next three years, though it wasn’t immediately clear if House Republicans were on the exact same page.

The plan to fund Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the Border Patrol with only Republican votes could end the two-month shutdown at the Department of Homeland Security when combined with the regular funding bill for that department, which the Senate already approved but is stalled in the House. 

Thune, R-S.D., said during an afternoon press conference that House GOP leaders “could” add additional provisions to the reconciliation bill, but said he would like it to remain narrow. 

“My hope would be that if we can execute on getting that done here in the Senate, the House would be able to follow through,” he said. 

Thune said the Senate could vote as soon as next week on a budget resolution with reconciliation instructions. That is the first step of the complicated process. But the House must vote to adopt that budget resolution before Republicans can pass the funding bill for ICE and the Border Patrol.  

Speaker Mike Johnson’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment. 

Homeland Security shuttered

The Department of Homeland Security has been shut down since Feb. 14, after Democrats insisted on new guardrails for immigration enforcement following the fatal shootings of two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis by federal immigration officers.

Without any bipartisan consensus on how to do that, Republicans have instead decided to use the same reconciliation process they used last year to enact their “big, beautiful” law to approve funding for Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Border Patrol. 

The House would then likely pass DHS’ spending bill without those two line items, which the Senate has already approved. That would provide funding for the other agencies within the department, including the Coast Guard, Federal Emergency Management Agency, Secret Service and Transportation Security Administration.

Safeguards demanded

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said during a separate press conference that Democrats have repeatedly asked for “common sense” safeguards that would require immigration agents to show identification, prevent them from wearing masks and require judicial warrants to enter someone’s home. 

“The bottom line is these are simple. These are common sense,” he said. “They’re what every police department uses and when you ask the American people, they’re on our side. It’s the intransigence, particularly of the hard right, who seem to like what ICE is doing.”

Schumer said Democrats would use the marathon amendment voting session on both the budget resolution and the later reconciliation bill to hold Republicans’ “feet to the fire on DHS, on the war, on so many other issues.”

Thune said he has been “trying to figure out exactly” what Democrats have gotten out of the DHS shutdown, especially considering that immigration enforcement operations haven’t been affected since there was funding for that in last year’s reconciliation bill, exempting those programs from the funding lapse. 

“All of the things that the Democrats made this about, which was supposed to be reforms to the way that ICE and CBP operate. They got none of that. Zero,” he said, referring to Customs and Border Protection, the larger agency that includes the Border Patrol. “And now we’re going to fund those agencies for three years into the future.”

The Department of Justice’s stated reason for obtaining sensitive personal data on millions of voters masks the Trump administration’s true intention for obtaining state voter lists, Michigan’s top election official asserted in federal appeals court Monday.

Attorneys for Michigan Democratic Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson made the allegation in a brief in the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. The argument reflects a concern broadly held among Democratic state election officials that the Trump administration wants to compile voter data in an effort to influence the upcoming midterm elections. 

The Justice Department, under President Donald Trump, is suing 29 states for refusing to provide voter information. It says it needs the data to evaluate efforts to clean and maintain voter rolls, including whether noncitizens are registered to vote.

But Benson’s brief says that “appears to be a pretext for improper purposes.”

Michigan and other states argue the Trump administration is instead effectively building a nationwide voter registration list — a move not authorized under the 1960 Civil Rights Act, a federal law to combat voting discrimination that the Justice Department has cited in demanding states turn over voter data.

“Collecting Michigan’s voter data to conduct its own list maintenance and to use Michigan’s list as part of creating a national voter file is not encompassed within the purpose stated in DOJ’s demand, which is simply ‘to ascertain Michigan’s compliance with the list maintenance requirements’” of federal election laws, Benson’s brief says.

“Moreover, creating a national voter file of U.S. Citizens is beyond any purpose contemplated by the (Civil Rights Act).”

After U.S. District Court Judge Hala Jarbou ruled in February that the Justice Department isn’t entitled to Michigan’s unredacted voter list containing driver’s license and partial Social Security numbers, the department appealed to the 6th Circuit.

Trump priority

Over the past year, Trump has attempted to exercise greater power over federal elections, which, under the U.S. Constitution, are run by the states.

“Trump does not have the authority to create a Trump voter list,” Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold, a Democrat whom the Justice Department is suing for not providing voter data, said in an interview earlier this month.

Studies have shown noncitizen voting is extremely rare, though Trump has long fixated on the prospect of noncitizen voting and other forms of election fraud. Last year, Trump signed an executive order that would have unilaterally required voters to provide documents proving their citizenship. The order was struck down in court, but Trump is pressuring the U.S. Senate to pass the SAVE America Act, which would implement similar proof of citizenship rules.

Michigan state officials and other critics of the Justice Department’s voter data effort point to actions by Trump and remarks by a DOJ attorney as evidence that the Trump administration is already compiling a national voter list.

Trump’s recent executive order to restrict mail-in ballots directs the Department of Homeland Security to build lists of voting-age citizens in each state and then share those lists with state officials. Homeland Security operates a powerful computer system, called SAVE, that can verify citizenship by checking names against information in federal databases.

And at a federal court hearing in Rhode Island in late March, Justice Department Voting Section Acting Chief Eric Neff said his department intends to share voter lists with Homeland Security, according to a transcript. He said DOJ and DHS have already entered into a use agreement to govern the sharing of data, though he didn’t detail its requirements.

Mail ballot order an ‘iceberg’ to DOJ case

A DOJ attorney, James Tucker, has denied any effort to create a national voter file. 

“There is not going to be a national voter registration database,” Tucker said at a hearing in Maine on March 26 — less than a week before Trump signed the executive order.

But David Becker, executive director of the nonpartisan Center for Election Innovation & Research, likened the Justice Department’s litigation strategy to a legal Titanic and the executive order to an iceberg: The order effectively creating a nationwide voter list could sink a strategy that denies such a goal exists.

“The DOJ … has been trying to assure the courts that this data is not going to be used to create a national voter list,” Becker said during a press briefing this month.

The Justice Department didn’t respond to a request for comment Tuesday.

Civil Rights Act argued

The Justice Department has so far failed to persuade any federal judges that it’s entitled to state voter data. Judges have dismissed the DOJ’s lawsuits against California, Massachusetts, Michigan and Oregon. 

At least a dozen states, all Republican led, have voluntarily provided their voter lists. The Justice Department has also reached a settlement agreement with one state, Oklahoma, to obtain its data. 

When Jarbou, a Trump appointee, dismissed the Justice Department’s lawsuit for Michigan’s voter roll, she ruled that the Civil Rights Act doesn’t require the disclosure of the information. The law, signed by President Dwight Eisenhower, empowered federal officials to investigate state and local discrimination against Black voters.

The law requires states to preserve election records for at least 22 months after a federal election, including any documents that come into the possession of an election official. Jarbou wrote in her decision that the state’s voter registration list is created by election officials but isn’t a document, such as a voter registration application, that comes into their possession.

When the Justice Department filed its brief in March, it argued that Jarbou misinterpreted the Civil Rights Act. “The CRA’s text … does not exclude self-generated documents,” the department’s brief says.

The Justice Department’s appeal of the Michigan loss has advanced the furthest, with state officials filing their brief on Monday. The DOJ has pushed for quick timelines in the appeals, arguing that court rulings are needed ahead of the midterms to ensure the fairness of elections.

Local officials back states

Regardless, 18 local election officials from across the country, including seven in Michigan, on Monday filed a brief in the case arguing that the Justice Department hasn’t provided a legitimate basis to obtain election records under the Civil Rights Act.

As election misinformation has proliferated in recent years, local election officials face increasing requests for information, the group wrote. They are accustomed to providing public voter registration information, with steps in place to exclude sensitive, nonpublic data.

Courts act as a “backstop” to enforce bans on disclosing sensitive information in response to records requests from the public, the local election officials argue.

“Courts should perform that same function for requests for records under the CRA,” the group said.

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump lashed out at Pope Leo XIV Sunday night following the pontiff’s sharp criticism of the U.S.-Israeli war in Iran and wider Middle East conflict.

In a lengthy post, littered with falsehoods, on his social media platform, Truth Social, Trump accused the first U.S.-born pope of being “WEAK on crime” and of supporting Iran having a nuclear weapon. The president also invoked the 70-year-old pontiff’s brother, Louis Prevost, “because Louis is all MAGA.”

Leo, born Robert Prevost, is from Chicago.

During a flight to Algeria on Monday, Leo told reporters, “I have no fear of the Trump administration or of speaking out loudly of the message of the Gospel, which is what I believe I am here to do, what the church is here to do.”

“We are not politicians,” he said, as reported by Vatican media. “We don’t deal with foreign policy with the same perspective he might understand it, but I do believe in the message of the Gospel, as a peacemaker.”

List of complaints

Trump’s Sunday night post criticized Leo for not backing his foreign policy and aggressive immigration agenda, and generally for not being more supportive of his administration. 

The United States and Israel ordered military strikes on Iran in late February, despite not facing an imminent threat from the Islamic state. Trump did not give a clear rationale for the strikes until about a month after they launched, saying they were meant to prevent Iran from gaining a nuclear weapon.

“I don’t want a Pope who thinks it’s OK for Iran to have a Nuclear Weapon. I don’t want a Pope who thinks it’s terrible that America attacked Venezuela, a Country that was sending massive amounts of Drugs into the United States and, even worse, emptying their prisons, including murderers, drug dealers, and killers, into our Country,” Trump posted just after 9 p.m. Eastern.

“And I don’t want a Pope who criticizes the President of the United States because I’m doing exactly what I was elected, IN A LANDSLIDE, to do, setting Record Low Numbers in Crime, and creating the Greatest Stock Market in History,” the president continued in his 334-word message about the pontiff.

Further, Trump claimed Leo should be “thankful” because Trump is responsible for the Chicago native being installed as the leader of the Roman Catholic church.

“He wasn’t on any list to be Pope, and was only put there by the Church because he was an American, and they thought that would be the best way to deal with President Donald J. Trump. If I wasn’t in the White House, Leo wouldn’t be in the Vatican,” he wrote.

Less than an hour later, the president posted an artificial intelligence-generated image of himself as Jesus Christ blessing an ailing man as what appear to be angels in full military fatigues hover in the clouds above with fighter jets nearby. Trump deleted the post Monday morning.

The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment Monday.

While speaking to reporters outside the Oval Office Monday afternoon, Trump said he posted the image but that he wasn’t depicted as Jesus. Rather, he said, he was supposed to represent a doctor associated with the Red Cross.

“I did post it, and I thought it was me as a doctor, and had to do with Red Cross as a Red Cross worker there, which we support, and only the fake news could come up with that one,” he said in response to a question about the image.

“So I just heard about it, and I said, ‘how do they come up with that?’ It’s supposed to be me as a doctor, making people better. And I do make people better, I make people a lot better,” he continued.

One minute after the post depicting Jesus, the president posted an AI-generated image of a skyscraper bearing his name on the moon’s surface.

Iran talks crumble

In the hours prior to sounding off on the pope, Trump posted a video of himself shaking hands with mixed martial artist Paul Costa following an Ultimate Fighting Championship cage match he and Secretary of State Marco Rubio attended in Miami on Saturday night.

At the time of the fight, Vice President JD Vance was wrapping up failed peace talks with Iranian leaders in Pakistan. U.S. and Iranian leaders reached a two-week ceasefire deal last week. Trump described it at the time as a major step toward a permanent peace deal.

Trump threatened to establish a U.S. military blockade in the Strait of Hormuz Monday after talks collapsed. Not long after the war began, Iran effectively closed the narrow maritime passageway that moves one-fifth of the world’s oil.

Vance, whose forthcoming book focuses on his conversion to Catholicism, was one of the last guests to visit Pope Francis before his death nearly one year ago.

Archbishop Paul Coakley, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, issued a statement Sunday night disapproving of Trump’s social media post about the pontiff.

“I am disheartened that the President chose to write such disparaging words about the Holy Father,” said Coakley, the archbishop of Oklahoma City. “Pope Leo is not his rival; nor is the Pope a politician. He is the Vicar of Christ who speaks from the truth of the Gospel and for the care of souls.”

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said Trump’s post “viciously attacked” Leo’s opposition to the Iran war. Trump’s comments that the pope is “weak on crime,” among other claims, reached “a new low,” the New York Democrat added.

Schumer also said the president’s AI-generated image of himself depicted as Christ “makes a mockery of millions of Christian Americans, many of whom voted for Trump and who fervently believe that Jesus Christ is the son of God.”

“If King Herod had a Truth Social account in the first century, I think he’d probably describe Jesus Christ, who saved the penitent thief crucified alongside him, as weak on crime,” Schumer said on the Senate floor.

Jennifer Shutt contributed to this report.

WASHINGTON — California Democratic Rep. Eric Swalwell and Texas Republican Rep. Tony Gonzales both announced Monday evening that they would resign from Congress amid sexual misconduct allegations.  

Swalwell’s announcement came just one day after he suspended his campaign for governor over allegations of sexual assault. 

“I am aware of efforts to bring an immediate expulsion vote against me and other members,” he wrote in a statement on X. “Expelling anyone in Congress without due process, within days of an allegation being made, is wrong. But it’s also wrong for my constituents to have me distracted from my duties. Therefore, I plan to resign my seat in Congress.”

Just over an hour later, Gonzales posted his plans to resign on social media.

“There is a season for everything and God has a plan for us all,” he wrote. “When Congress returns tomorrow, I will file my retirement from office. It has been my privilege to serve the great people of Texas.”

Debate about whether to expel four House members, which would require the support of two-thirds of the chamber, resurfaced this weekend when Swalwell dropped out of the gubernatorial election. 

New Mexico Rep. Teresa Leger Fernández, chair of the Democratic Women’s Caucus, wrote in a statement that the reports regarding Swalwell were “horrific.”

“Rep. Swalwell’s actions would not be tolerated in any place of work, and the United States Congress should be no different,” she wrote. “We must believe and support survivors, and hold perpetrators accountable.”

Fernández called for an immediate investigation that ensures the “staffers and interns who courageously came forward must be listened to and kept safe.”

Fernández wrote in a separate statement that Swalwell and Gonzales, who is under investigation by the House Ethics Committee for allegations he engaged “in sexual misconduct towards an individual employed in his congressional office,” should immediately leave Congress. 

“Reps. Gonzales and Swalwell are not fit to serve. They must resign. If they do not, I will vote to expel them,” she wrote. 

Florida Republican Rep. Anna Paulina Luna wrote in a social media post that she “will be supporting this resolution!”

The House Ethics Committee announced Monday afternoon its members had opened an investigation into Swalwell “with respect to allegations that he may have engaged in sexual misconduct, including towards an employee working under his supervision.”

Florida lawmakers

There is also the possibility that an expulsion resolution would include Florida Democratic Rep. Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick and Florida Republican Rep. Cory Mills.

The House Ethics Committee voted to find Cherfilus-McCormick guilty on more than two dozen ethics charges in late March after holding a public hearing. The panel plans to hold another hearing on April 21 to decide “what, if any, sanction would be appropriate for the Committee to recommend to the House of Representatives.”

Mills has been under investigation by the Ethics Committee for months over allegations he “engaged in misconduct with respect to allegations of sexual misconduct and/or dating violence,” among several other possible violations. 

Few expulsions in history

The House has rarely expelled its members, voting just six times to force lawmakers out. 

New York Republican Rep. George Santos was the most recent member removed from the House, following a 311-114 vote in December 2023 to approve an expulsion resolution sponsored by Mississippi Republican Rep. Michael Guest, chairman of the Ethics Committee. 

The resolution noted that in May 2023 “Santos was charged in Federal court in the Eastern District of New York with wire fraud in connection with a fraudulent political contribution scheme, unlawful monetary transactions in connection with the wire fraud allegations, theft of public money in connection with his alleged receipt of unemployment benefits, fraudulent application for and receipt of unemployment benefits, and false statements in connection with his 2020 and 2022 House of Representatives Financial Disclosure Statements.”

The next most recent expulsion came in 2002, when Ohio Democratic Rep. James A. Traficant was expelled for conspiracy, defrauding the government, illegal gratuity, obstruction of justice, racketeering and tax evasion violations, according to a report from the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service. 

Pennsylvania Democratic Rep. Michael J. Myers was expelled in 1980 for bribery, conspiracy and Travel Act violations. In 1861, during the Civil War, Kentucky Rep. Henry C. Burnett along with Missouri Reps. John B. Clark and John W. Reid were expelled for “disloyalty to the Union.”

Jacob Fischler contributed to this report.

WASHINGTON — Spikes in energy prices caused by the U.S.-Israeli war in Iran drove up inflation for Americans in March, according to the latest consumer price index figures released Friday.

Costs jumped 0.9% in March compared to the previous month — that’s up from the 0.3% increase in February. 

Prices for all items together, including food, energy, shelter and other commodities like vehicles, rose by 3.3% from a year ago. That’s the highest annual jump since May 2024, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics historical data. 

Fuel costs drove the spike, with gasoline and fuel oil together rising 10.9% in March compared to the previous month. Singled out, gas prices jumped 21.2% in March. The cost for airfare, largely driven by jet fuel prices, rose 2.7% in March, up from the 1.4% jump in February.

President Donald Trump launched the joint war in Iran with Israel on Feb. 28. In response to the intense bombing campaign that killed the country’s supreme leader and numerous senior officials, the Iranian regime effectively closed the Strait of Hormuz, a narrow passage in and out of the Persian Gulf vital to the transport of one-fifth of the world’s petroleum.

As of Friday, Americans were paying $4.15 on average nationwide for a gallon of regular gas, according to AAA. The average for diesel across the U.S. is $5.68 per gallon.

Prior to the war, a gallon of regular hadn’t topped $3 all year.

Iran’s de facto takeover of the Strait of Hormuz by threatening to strike any tankers, other than a handful from friendly countries, has caused the largest supply disruption in the history of the global oil market, according to the International Energy Agency.

Despite a tenuous ceasefire agreed to Tuesday evening Eastern time, Iran is still controlling the strait. Ten oil tankers transited the waterway Tuesday, and only one on Wednesday, according to the latest figures available from the Joint Maritime Information Center, which tracks tankers and cargo ships worldwide that are transmitting location data.

Prior to the war, roughly 140 vessels daily flowed freely through the Strait of Hormuz.

Dems pounce on affordability issue

Democrats blamed Trump Friday for higher inflation, as affordability is emerging as perhaps the single-most important issue ahead of the 2026 midterm elections in November that will determine control of Congress.

Democratic National Committee Chair Ken Martin said the president is “pushing working families to the brink.” 

“Trump promised to ‘lower prices on Day One,’ and instead he waged an unhinged trade war and started an unpopular war with Iran — and what have Americans gotten in return? Nothing except even higher prices. Americans are sick and tired of this president putting his own interests first and using their hard-earned dollars to fund his war instead of making health care more affordable or expanding access to child care,” Martin said in a statement Friday morning.

White House senior deputy press secretary Kush Desai responded to the inflation figures, saying the president “has always been clear about short-term disruptions as a result of Operation Epic Fury, disruptions that the Administration has been diligently working to mitigate.”

“Although gas and energy prices are seeing volatility, prices of eggs, beef, prescription drugs, dairy, and other household essentials are falling or remain stable thanks to President Trump’s policies. As the Administration ensures the free flow of energy through the Strait of Hormuz, the American economy remains on a solid trajectory thanks to the Administration’s robust supply-side agenda of tax cuts, deregulation, and energy abundance,” Desai wrote in a statement Friday morning posted on social media. 

Other costs

The price index for food consumed at home decreased 0.2% compared to the previous month, but increased 1.9% from a year ago. 

The costs of fruits and vegetables rose 1% in March compared to the previous month, but prices for meat, poultry, fish and eggs declined 0.6%, according to the latest BLS figures.

The price index for items minus food and energy rose 0.2% in March, matching the increase in February. The cost of all items, less food and energy, rose 2.6% over the past 12 months.

WASHINGTON — First lady Melania Trump said Thursday she was “never involved in any capacity” with the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and that “baseless lies” about her are being circulated.

In a rare solo statement livestreamed on the White House website, Melania Trump also called for a congressional hearing featuring the women who have shared stories of abuse by Epstein, who died in jail in 2019 while awaiting federal trial on sex trafficking charges.

“I call on Congress to provide the women who have been victimized by Epstein with a public hearing specifically centered around the survivors, to give these victims their opportunity to testify under oath in front of Congress,” the first lady said in her nearly six-minute remarks. 

“With the power of sworn testimony, each and every woman should have her day to tell her story in public, if she wishes, and then her testimony should be permanently entered into the Congressional Record,” she added. “Then and only then, we will have the truth.”

Since returning to office, President Donald Trump has repeatedly dismissed the government’s files related to Epstein as a “hoax.” However, throughout the 2024 campaign, Trump promised to make the investigatory materials public.

The scandal has followed the president through most of his first term. While Trump shared a well-documented friendship with Epstein, who pleaded guilty to soliciting a minor in Florida in 2008, he denies any knowledge of Epstein’s criminal activities.

The first lady also reproached individuals who she said are “devoid of ethical standards” for spreading “completely false” stories that she shared relationships with Epstein and convicted sex trafficker Ghislane Maxwell. 

“I was not a participant, was never on Epstein’s plane, and never visited his private island,” she said. “I have never been legally accused or (convicted) of a crime in connection with Epstein sex trafficking, abuse of minors and other repulsive behavior. The false smears about me from meanspirited and politically motivated individuals and entities looking to cause damage to my good name to gain financially and climb politically must stop.”

Free speech suit

It was unclear what spurred the first lady’s statement. 

She specifically mentioned the Daily Beast, James Carville and HarperCollins UK. The three are mentioned in exhibits attached to a lawsuit in New York against Melania Trump by journalist Michael Wolff, accusing her of seeking to intimidate him into retracting statements he’d made alleging a connection between her and Epstein. 

She also mentioned a 2002 email exchange between her and Maxwell that was revealed among the hundreds of thousands of records from the federal Epstein investigation that the Justice Department released beginning in December, as required by law. The first lady defended the email exchange as “casual correspondence.”

All but one member of Congress supported legislation compelling the Justice Department to release the Epstein files. 

The effort gained steam after the department, then under Attorney General Pam Bondi, said in July it would not release anything further related to the case. Bondi had previously claimed she had Epstein’s client list sitting on her desk.

Trump removed Bondi this month.

Dem endorses call for hearing

Rep. Robert Garcia, D-Calif., the top Democrat on the U.S. House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, lauded the first lady’s call for a hearing.

“We agree with First Lady Melania Trump’s call for a public hearing with the survivors of Jeffrey Epstein. We encourage Chairman Comer to respond to the First Lady’s request and schedule a public hearing immediately,” Garcia wrote on X.

The Oversight Committee, led by Kentucky Republican James Comer, is conducting its own investigation into the files and has subpoenaed high-profile figures to testify, including former President Bill Clinton and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, as well as Bondi.

Millions of women could face new challenges to voting under President Donald Trump’s SAVE America Act, which would require voters to prove their citizenship before casting a ballot.

The federal legislation would mandate that most Americans show a birth certificate or passport to register to vote. But people with names that don’t match their birth certificate in some instances could have to produce additional documents like a marriage certificate or divorce decree linking their past and current identities.

The proposal holds potentially outsized consequences for millions of married and divorced women, transgender individuals and others who have changed their names. 

As many as 69 million American women have birth certificates that don’t match their current name, according to an analysis by the liberal Center for American Progress. 

“The fact that the majority of women upon marriage do change their name already means that this is going to be completely unequal in how the law is applied,” said Letitia Harmon, senior director of policy and research at Florida Rising, a racial and economic justice nonprofit.

Harmon, 43, has personal experience with the issue because of state proof-of-citizenship laws, which have become more common in recent years. 

The Florida resident used to live in Kansas, which required individuals to show documents like a birth certificate or passport to register to vote until federal courts struck down the law as unconstitutional. Ahead of the 2014 election, Harmon was unable to locate her birth certificate before the registration deadline and couldn’t vote.

More recently, Florida, Mississippi, South Dakota and Utah have all enacted proof-of-citizenship measures this year, in addition to Wyoming in 2025. Florida Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis signed the Florida SAVE Act last week.

A dozen years later, Harmon worries she could again face additional hurdles to voting — this time because of multiple name changes. Harmon, who changed her name when she married but later divorced and changed it back, voiced concern that if election officials ever check her registration, it will be flagged.

“It’s heartbreaking and it’s infuriating. It feels like we’re going backwards,” Harmon said.

Debate in D.C.

In Washington, the U.S. Senate has been debating the SAVE America Act, Trump’s signature elections initiative, after a version of the legislation passed the House. The bill doesn’t appear to have enough support to survive a filibuster, but Trump and his allies have pressured senators to end the filibuster to pass it before the midterm elections.

Supporters of the bill describe it as an election integrity measure and say it’s necessary to prevent noncitizen voting, though studies have shown that’s extremely rare. The measure reflects a long-running effort by Trump to assert more federal control over elections that includes a campaign by the Department of Justice to obtain sensitive state voter data and an executive order signed last week restricting mail-in voting.

Opponents condemn the legislation as unneeded and poorly drafted. If enacted, the bill would take immediate effect, throwing the election process into chaos in a midterm election year as millions of people registering to vote attempt to prove their citizenship. The new requirements would risk disenfranchising American voters struggling to obtain the documents they need in time.

Disproportionate effect on married women

Critics have especially focused on the disproportionate effect the legislation could have on women. Eighty-four percent of women in opposite-sex marriages take either their husband’s last name or hyphenate their name, according to a 2023 Pew Research Center survey. By contrast, less than 6% of men took their wife’s last name or hyphenated their name.

“Given that 85% of American women change their name when they get married, the impact on women is going to be huge and it’s going to be very problematic,” Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows, a Democrat, said in a February interview.

The House-passed version of the bill says that when individuals applying to register have names that don’t match the name on their proof-of-citizenship documents, they could provide “additional documentation as necessary to establish that the name on the documentation is a previous name of the applicant” or sign an affidavit affirming that the name on the documents is their previous name.

According to the bill, each state would establish a process to carry out this provision, in line with guidance from the federal Election Assistance Commission, a bipartisan independent commission that aids election officials.

Affidavit provision unclear

Some election and legal experts have said the affidavit provision is unclear. It comes immediately before another provision that allows individuals without proof-of-citizenship documentation to register if they sign an attestation that they are a citizen and an election official signs an affidavit saying the person has sufficiently established citizenship. The Election Assistance Commission would create a uniform affidavit for use in that situation.

“Who knows what sort of process they’ll say,” said Alison Gill, director of nominations and democracy at the National Women’s Law Center, a progressive legal advocacy group. “So there is language there, but it’s still very vague and conflictual.”

Because states would be responsible for setting procedures to vet those with different names on their documents, Gill said some states would probably try to make the process easier than others. But election officials would likely err on the side of strict enforcement because they could be prosecuted for registering individuals who don’t provide citizenship documents.

“Ultimately, this puts the burden on election officials, who face criminal and civil liability under the bill, potentially to decide whether to risk registering a person with mismatching documents,” Gill said.

‘Frankly insulting’

White House officials and some congressional Republicans have denied that individuals who change their name would face greater difficulty registering to vote. White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said in March that there was “zero validity” to claims that the legislation would stop women from voting or make it harder for them to vote.

Married women who have changed their name and are already registered to vote would be unaffected by the legislation, Leavitt said. She added that for the “small fraction” of individuals who go on to change their name or their address, they would have to go through their state’s process to update their documentation.

“I think it’s frankly insulting that the Democrats are saying that there are certain groups of people in this country who aren’t smart enough to update their documentation to allow them to vote,” Leavitt said.

But Alaska Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski has raised concerns about how the SAVE America Act would affect married women. Murkowski, who opposes the bill, said in a floor speech that an estimated 155,000 female citizens in Alaska age 15 and older have names that don’t match their birth certificates.

“Again, is it impossible? No,” Murkowski said. “Is it going to be really challenging? Absolutely, yes.”

Lawsuits ensured

The SAVE America Act would almost certainly face legal challenges if it became law and the Supreme Court would come under immense pressure to weigh in because of the sweeping, nationwide changes in the legislation.

Some federal courts have ruled against proof-of-citizenship voter registration requirements. In 2020, the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals struck down Kansas’ law, finding that it violated federal voting laws as well as the Constitution’s equal protection clause. The Supreme Court at the time declined to take the Kansas case.

The provisions on name changes alone could face their own legal challenges. 

Tracy Thomas, a constitutional law professor at the University of Akron School of Law in Ohio, said opponents could argue the bill’s impact on people who change their name amounts to voting discrimination in violation of the 14th Amendment, which guarantees equal protection under the law.

Courts have affirmed some election restrictions, like requirements to show a photo ID at the polls, as acceptable rules that don’t overly burden voters. However, Thomas suggested the SAVE America Act may go too far if it delays people from registering, requires multiple steps and forces them to pay for needed documents.

“That starts to sound like more than minimal inconvenience,” Thomas said.

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump’s threats to destroy power plants and bridges in Iran before saying he was prepared for a “whole civilization” to die have renewed questions about what constitutes an illegal order and what, if any, repercussions officials could face for committing war crimes.  

The issue originally surged to the forefront last year when the Trump administration repeatedly struck boats in the Caribbean officials alleged were carrying illegal drugs. Democratic lawmakers with backgrounds in the military and intelligence community then published a video reminding troops they “can” and “must refuse illegal orders.”

“No one has to carry out orders that violate the law or our Constitution. We know this is hard and that it’s a difficult time to be a public servant,” they said. “But whether you’re serving in the CIA, in the Army, or Navy, or the Air Force, your vigilance is critical.”

The issue of legal versus illegal military orders surfaced again this week when Trump escalated his threats against Iran, leading to bipartisan condemnation from members of Congress before he gave that country’s leaders two more weeks to negotiate.

But what exactly violates international law or rises to the level of a war crime is often murky, as is who would be willing to prosecute U.S. troops, according to experts interviewed by States Newsroom. 

Rachel E. VanLandingham, professor of law at Southwestern Law School in Los Angeles and a former judge advocate in the U.S. Air Force, said that “at the end of the day, the law of war does allow for a great deal of violence and a great deal of civilian suffering.” 

But several of the threats Trump has made, including to destroy power plants and bridges in Iran, would likely violate the law if the military were to carry them out, she said. 

“Under no stretch of interpretation would that be lawful, right? Because that just fails to distinguish whatsoever the civilian objects versus lawful military objectives, even if we stretch the definition of what’s a lawful military objective,” VanLandingham said. 

The boat strikes in the Caribbean, including the decision to order a second strike on two survivors, could also have been illegal, she said. 

VanLandingham doesn’t expect the Trump administration will hold anyone accountable for actions the military has already taken or may take. But she noted there is no statute of limitations on the charges that would likely apply under the Uniform Code of Military Justice for military members or the War Crimes Act for anyone not subject to the military justice system.

“The next administration could come in and investigate our service members for alleged war crimes. And they should, to demonstrate renewed fidelity to U.S. law, to the law of war,” she said. 

Congress doesn’t have the authority to prosecute anyone for violating the law, but could hold oversight hearings with Defense Department officials, a scenario that would become more likely if one or both chambers return to Democratic control following the November midterm elections. 

“They can have public, open hearings and drag in every single military member that was involved in the chain of command of orders for striking Iran, if they wanted to,” VanLandingham. “That’s not a criminal prosecution, but it’s transparency.”

Lawmakers could also provide more funding and require the Pentagon to reinstitute the Civilian Harm Mitigation Program, which she said “the Trump administration has gutted.”

Geneva Conventions

Leila Sadat, the James Carr Professor of International Criminal Law at WashU Law School in St. Louis, Missouri, said that in a situation where the president directs the military to violate the laws of war, it’s highly unlikely military commanders or the Department of Justice would then turn around and prosecute those actions. 

Even if a prosecutor were to try, Trump would likely be insulated from any domestic prosecution for “official acts.” And as president he could issue preemptive pardons for any military members he believes could face future prosecution, either in the military or civilian justice system.

Trump has a history of absolving military members accused of violating military law, including in 2019, when he pardoned two officers in the Army for actions in Afghanistan and restored the rank of a Navy SEAL who had been demoted for his conduct in Iraq. Trump later pardoned four contractors for killing more than a dozen Iraqi civilians in 2007.

But those protections only apply within the United States. 

The Geneva Conventions’ provision on universal jurisdiction would apply internationally and any country could choose to prosecute. 

“Now you still have to catch them, you have to get the evidence, but every state in the world is a party to the Geneva Conventions,” Sadat said. “So committing violations of the Geneva Conventions by attacking civilian objects, by attacking marketplaces, or hospitals, or schools, or electrical infrastructure, those kind of crimes can be prosecuted by every country in the world. So people should think about it before they do it.”

France, Germany and Sweden have all used the principle of universal jurisdiction to prosecute Syrians for crimes they committed during the war in their home country, she said. 

“The one debate is, do you have to have the person on your territory before you can go forward? Or can you do an investigation even if the person is not on your territory?” Sadat said. “And many have argued that you can do the investigation even if the individual is not on your territory. Different countries have different rules on whether they accept trials in absentia.”

Sadat said that gets a bit more complicated when the Status of Forces Agreements that give the U.S. jurisdiction over alleged wrongdoing by U.S. troops in dozens of countries come into play. 

Sadat, who was a special adviser on Crimes Against Humanity to the International Criminal Court Prosecutor from 2012 through 2021, said if the U.S. military were to carry out some or all of the threats Trump posted to social media, that could have led countries to reconsider those agreements. 

“It could create a huge security problem for the United States eventually. And that’s why I hope calmer heads are prevailing. Saying, ‘You know, there’s an entire complex web of treaties and agreements,'” she said. 

Trump would also likely pressure countries not to try U.S. military members for violating international law, but he may not always be successful, she said.  

“Eventually there’s going to be a country in which that’s not going to work,” Sadat said. “And so that’s why you really do have to think of this a little bit differently, because there are external forces and external actors that could decide we’re going to enforce the law, even if the United States is not going to enforce the law.”

Investigating US forces

Susana Sacouto, director of the War Crimes Research Office at American University’s Washington College of Law, said the Geneva Conventions require the U.S. to “investigate and … deal with alleged violations of the law of war by its own forces.”

How well that works in practice has “varied over time,” she said. 

“The problem is, we have an architecture, but those cases, particularly the criminal cases, are really exceptional, and they’re really exceptional, especially regarding senior officials,” Sacouto said. “So there’s been a lot of criticism about whether that architecture that exists is actually functioning to routinely investigate our own military actions for potential war crimes or (international humanitarian law) violations.” 

There is the possibility a future presidential administration may have defense officials or the Department of Justice look into allegations that emerge during the Trump administration. But Sacouto said, “past history with respect to accountability for U.S. officials, especially senior officials, is not very encouraging.”

Congressional investigations into the Central Intelligence Agency’s use of torture in the aftermath of the 9/11 terrorist attacks is one example Sacouto pointed to of a long-term investigation that did not lead to any high-level prosecutions. 

“Even then, no senior officials were really ultimately held accountable for their role in that program,” she said. “There were lower-level Abu Ghraib prosecutions, but no senior-level folks were found accountable.”

WASHINGTON — House Democrats on Capitol Hill Thursday slammed President Donald Trump’s rhetoric on Iran as “beyond the pale” and urged House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., to reconvene Congress and rein in the president’s war powers.

The eight Democrats, who represent districts in California, Maryland, Pennsylvania, Virginia and Washington state, made a largely symbolic attempt to bring a War Powers Resolution to the House floor during the morning’s pro forma session — a short, routine meeting that occurs when Congress is out of session. The House is not scheduled to return until April 14.

“The pro forma speaker ignored us, which was a tragedy, but we will keep fighting,” Rep. Don Beyer, D-Va., said.

U.S. House Democrats discuss the Iran war on April 9, 2026. (Video by Ashley Murray/States Newsroom)

Efforts to limit Trump’s military actions in Iran failed last month in both the House and Senate.

Rep. Glenn Ivey, D-Md., who led a press conference afterward on the steps outside the House of Representatives, said Trump’s war with Iran is on “the wrong track.”

“He’s been terrible at the wheel. The threats of total annihilation were beyond the pale. It’s time for Congress to step in and take control of the wheel,” Ivey said.

Threats and then a ceasefire

Trump threatened Tuesday to wipe out Iran’s “whole civilization” if the regime did not open the Strait of Hormuz, a major maritime passageway for one-fifth of the world’s oil and liquid natural gas. 

The United States and Iran entered a tenuous two-week ceasefire agreement roughly 90 minutes before Trump hit his self-imposed deadline to begin bombing civilian infrastructure, likely a war crime.

One day into the ceasefire Wednesday, the pause in fighting was punctuated by Iranian drones and missiles striking Gulf nations. Israeli forces reported launching 100 strikes in Lebanon in 10 minutes. The wave of intense bombardment killed roughly 300 and injured just over 1,100, according to health officials cited by the United Nations.

Trump’s post urging violence on his social media platform, Truth Social, followed his Easter Sunday profanity-laced message threatening to bomb Iran’s power plants and bridges unless they lifted their blockade on the strait.

The regime has for weeks only allowed a trickle of tankers and cargo ships from certain friendly countries to pass, routing the traffic through Iranian waters and reportedly charging steep tolls. Islamic Republic officials told the Financial Times Wednesday that they planned to charge tankers $1 per barrel of oil, to be paid in cryptocurrency, going forward. 

Prior to the war, roughly 140 ships a day flowed freely through the strait. The chokepoint has rocked the global oil market.

Ivey called the situation “out of control.”

“In fact, Iran’s in a better place with respect to the strait than they were before this war started,” he said.

Pentagon reports 380 injured troops

The war has claimed thousands of lives across the Middle East, and scores of civilians have been injured. Thirteen U.S. service members were killed in the fighting, and as of Thursday the Pentagon reported 380 injured.

“Look at us now in a war of his choosing, egged on by Mr. (Benjamin) Netanyahu for his purposes, a war that has proved deadly to 13 members of the American military,” said Mary Gay Scanlon, D-Pa., referring to the Israeli prime minister.

“The speaker must live up to his constitutional responsibilities. Call us back in, consider the War Powers Resolution, let the American people and their representatives in Congress weigh in. The words and actions of this president have proved that he is unhinged and unwell,” Scanlon said.

Johnson’s office did not immediately respond for comment.

At least 2.5 million low-income people quickly lost help affording groceries under a Republican-passed law that added new requirements for the nation’s largest nutrition program and shifted hundreds of millions of dollars in costs from the federal government to states, according to a study the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities published Wednesday.

Some 6% of the 41 million Americans enrolled in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, when President Donald Trump signed the One Big Beautiful Bill Act on July 4, 2025, were no longer receiving benefits by the end of the year. 

The left-leaning think tank’s report was based on U.S. Department of Agriculture and state agency data from July to December 2025. 

Arizona was the largest outlier in the data, with a whopping 47% of people in the program — about 424,000 Arizonans — losing benefits in 2025, according to the think tank, which cited more recent state agency data in addition to last year’s USDA numbers.

Full-year 2025 data from the USDA, which operates the federal side of SNAP, shows an even bigger drop of 3.4 million people, or roughly 8% of the program’s total, CBPP said. SNAP is federally funded and administered by states, though that cost-share will change under the law.

In a late Wednesday email, a USDA spokesperson applauded the drop in SNAP participation, noting the program’s rolls had fallen below 40 million for the first time since the pandemic. The spokesperson said the program would continue “to serve those with the greatest need while also strengthening program integrity.”

“This change reflects several factors, including the most comprehensive work requirement reform since 1996, the One Big Beautiful Bill of 2025, as well as USDA initiatives that expand access to employment services, career and technical education, and case‑management support through USDA’s More Than a Job campaign,” the spokesperson wrote.

Incentives for states

The study did not intend to find a cause for the decline, co-author Joseph Llobrera, CBPP’s senior director of research for food assistance, said in an interview. But he noted the law created incentives for states to limit participation in the program. 

Under a provision of the law that is not yet in force, the share of the program’s cost that states must shoulder is tied to the state’s “error rate” — payments a state makes that were either more or less than the beneficiary should have received.

That motivates states to restrict access to the program, without providing a corresponding reward for expanding access, Llobrera said.

“So the incentive structure that’s in place, it really pushes states to make it harder to get onto the program for people who need that assistance,” he said.

The drop in participation happened without improving economic conditions, such as a decline in the unemployment rate, the researchers said. 

That indicates people are moving off the rolls due to changes in the program, not because their circumstances have improved to the point they no longer need food assistance, the study said.

Many provisions of the law have not yet gone into effect. The error rate penalties, for example, start in fiscal year 2028.

Design, not a bug

In part, though, that restriction is by design, as the law’s supporters intended to cut SNAP benefits for recipients who met certain criteria and to control what they portrayed as fraud and waste at the state level. 

The cuts in the federal share of SNAP funding helped pay for massive tax cuts and a boost to military spending in other parts of the megabill, which Republicans passed without any Democratic support through a process known as budget reconciliation.

The proponents of the agriculture section of the megabill championed provisions to make beneficiaries report their eligibility more often, boost work requirements, disqualify certain categories of legal immigrants, raise the age of children at which parenting would cease to qualify as work and otherwise tighten the availability of the program.

The provisions would help ensure only those who truly needed the federal assistance would get it, advocates said. 

It would also create an incentive for states to control erroneous payments, which was not the case when the federal government took on the entire cost of the program before the bill’s enactment.

“It is a disservice to the truly needy to rely on SNAP,” House Agriculture Chairman Glenn “GT” Thompson, a Pennsylvania Republican, said as the committee marked up the bill last year. “Clearly, SNAP is not working as Congress intended. We must ensure the proper incentives are in place for states to administer the program more effectively for those it serves.”

Llobrera said he understood members of both parties would engage in rhetoric about restrictions on SNAP, but that the center at the time was “raising the alarm that the bill was going to hurt people.”

A spokesperson for Thompson did not respond to a request for comment Wednesday.

Arizona

The CBPP report included a breakout section on Arizona, where the SNAP enrollment dropped much further than any other state.

As in other states, economic gains did not explain the changes in Arizona, the case study said.

“This dramatic drop cannot be explained by a rapid improvement in people’s economic well-being or reduced need for help affording food,” the report said, noting that Arizona’s unemployment rate rose over the period of the study, while the cost of groceries rose about 4% in 2025.

The state’s Democratic governor, Katie Hobbs, and state agency spokespeople have blamed the GOP law for the drastic reduction in benefits, the study said, but the decline goes beyond what would be expected based on the law’s provisions. 

That suggests that state administrators — even under Democratic leaders — are going beyond the minimum requirements of the law to restrict access, the authors said.

“Thus, it appears that a combination of factors, including the megabill and the state’s response to it, are contributing to the sharp decline in the number of Arizona families getting SNAP,” they wrote.

Because the law also raises the costs to states of administering the program, in addition to requiring states pay for some portion of benefits, some, including Arizona, cut staff ahead of the law’s enactment, Llobrera said. 

“With the cuts to the administrative funding for states due to that megabill, those are only just going to accelerate,” he said.

Shutdown

Such changes to SNAP rules added to an already tumultuous period for the program’s recipients. Over the course of a then-record-long partial government shutdown last year, benefits were constantly turned off and on as the Trump administration said it could not spend SNAP funds during a shutdown and federal courts held that benefits must be paid.

Spokespeople for the White House did not return messages seeking comment Wednesday.

WASHINGTON — The United States and Iran both claimed victory Wednesday, a day after agreeing to a two-week conditional ceasefire, though doubts loomed following continued strikes across the Gulf nations and an indication by Iran that it will continue to control the Strait of Hormuz, a major passage for one-fifth of the world’s oil and gas. 

Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth said during an early-morning briefing the U.S. achieved an “historic and overwhelming victory,” but also troops are “prepared to restart at a moment’s notice.”

“We’ll be hanging around. We’re not going anywhere. We’re going to make sure Iran complies with this ceasefire, and then ultimately comes to the table and makes a deal,” Hegseth said.

Oil prices dropped sharply after news of the ceasefire, with Brent crude, the international standard, sitting at $95 a barrel before noon Eastern Wednesday. That’s down from the previous day’s price of nearly $110 per barrel. 

U.S. stocks shot up Wednesday, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average, S&P 500 and Nasdaq Composite all on the rise.

U.S. and Iranian delegations were set to arrive in Islamabad Friday for negotiations, according to Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, who in part brokered the pause in fighting.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters at an afternoon briefing that Vice President JD Vance, special envoy Steve Witkoff and the president’s son-in-law Jared Kushner will attend a first round of talks Saturday morning.

Nuclear material

President Donald Trump said early Wednesday morning that the U.S. “will work closely with Iran, which we have determined has gone through what will be a very productive Regime Change!”

“There will be no enrichment of Uranium, and the United States will, working with Iran, dig up and remove all of the deeply buried (B-2 Bombers) Nuclear ‘Dust,’” Trump wrote on his platform, Truth Social, referring to Iran’s buried enriched uranium following heavy U.S.-Israeli bombing in June.

When pressed at the briefing, Hegseth said of the nuclear material: “We’re watching it. We know what they have, and they will give it up, and we’ll get it, and we’ll take it if we have to. We can do it in any means necessary. So that’s something the president is going to solve for.”

Hegseth ended the press conference saying the Iranian public has been “oppressed by the previous regime, and they’ll have a new opportunity with this regime that remains to be seen,” adding that a civilian uprising was “not our objective.” 

“We wish them the best,” Hegseth said. 

Hegseth’s claim about a civilian uprising directly contradicted Trump’s message to the Iranian people on Feb. 28, when the U.S. and Israel began the bombing.

Iran’s new supreme leader, Mojtaba Khamenei, is the son of the slain Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who led the Islamic Republic from 1989 until U.S. and Israeli strikes assassinated him hours into the conflict. Experts point to Mojtaba Khamenei as being a conservative hardliner with close ties to the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps.

Reports across Iranian state media and Middle East regional news outlets Wednesday quoted the regime’s Supreme National Security Council as declaring an “historic and crushing defeat” over the U.S. and Israel.

Calls for invocation of 25th Amendment

Hegseth’s victory declaration came after Trump on Tuesday threatened Iran’s “whole civilization will die tonight” if the regime did not meet his self-imposed 8 p.m. Eastern deadline to open the Strait of Hormuz. 

The comments drew intense criticism, with some — from progressive Democrats to former Trump loyalists — calling for the president’s removal under the Constitution’s 25th Amendment.

Two Senate Republicans, John Curtis of Utah and Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, denounced Trump’s rhetoric and actions in recent days. One House GOP member, Nathaniel Moore of Texas, also joined them Tuesday. 

The offices of Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., and House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., did not respond to States Newsroom Tuesday for comment on Trump’s remark that he would wipe out Iran’s “whole civilization.” Neither have posted anything regarding Trump’s comments on their X social media feeds, where they regularly communicate to the public.

Others continued to support Trump. Sen. Mike Rounds, R-S.D., told local media Tuesday “I take it with a grain of salt,” when asked about Trump’s vow to wipe out Iran’s civilization.

Leavitt told reporters at the White House briefing Wednesday, “The world should take his word very seriously.”

“He said that they would face very grave consequences … by the 8 p.m. deadline if they did not agree to reopening the Strait of Hormuz. And what did they do last night? They agreed to reopen the Strait of Hormuz,” she said.

Roughly 90 minutes before his deadline to order strikes on Iran’s power plants and bridges, the president agreed to stop the bombardment for two weeks, after receiving a 10-point plan from Iran that “is a workable basis on which to negotiate,” he wrote on his social media platform, Truth Social.

In a statement released early Wednesday morning Tehran time, Iran appeared to retain control of the narrow passage in and out of the Persian Gulf.

“For a period of two weeks, safe passage through the Strait of Hormuz will be possible via coordination with Iran’s Armed Forces and with due consideration of technical limitations,” the country’s foreign minister, Seyed Abbas Araghchi, said in a written statement posted on social media. 

Iranian drones and missiles

Strikes continued across the Gulf region, with Kuwait’s defense ministry reporting “an intense wave” of Iranian drones and missiles that damaged oil infrastructure, power stations and water desalination plants.

“Violations of ceasefire have been reported at (a) few places across the conflict zone which undermine the spirit of peace process. I earnestly and sincerely urge all parties to exercise restraint and respect the ceasefire for two weeks, as agreed upon, so that diplomacy can take a lead role towards peaceful settlement of the conflict,” Sharif warned on X just after 10 a.m. Eastern. 

The Pakistani prime minister tagged in the post Trump and numerous administration officials, as well as Iranian leaders.

Israel continued bombardment on southern Lebanon, launching widespread strikes across the region and in the capital city of Beirut Wednesday. By noon Eastern, which is evening in Lebanon, health authorities said 89 people were killed in the strikes and over 700 had been injured. An official with Doctors Without Borders reporting from a large public hospital in Beirut cited a higher death toll.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu claimed on social media early Wednesday that “The two-weeks ceasefire does not include Lebanon.”

When asked during the White House press briefing Wednesday, Leavitt echoed Netanyahu.

“Lebanon is not part of the ceasefire that has been related to all parties involved in the ceasefire,” she said.

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump agreed Tuesday evening to a two-week ceasefire with Iran, at least delaying his threat of a catastrophic attack on the country’s civilian population as he said the countries were near a long-term peace agreement.

The ceasefire was negotiated with Pakistani leaders as intermediaries, Trump said in a post to his social media site, Truth Social. The deal was conditional on Iran agreeing to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, a key shipping lane for the global supply of oil, Trump wrote.

“Based on conversations with Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and Field Marshal Asim Munir, of Pakistan, and wherein they requested that I hold off the destructive force being sent tonight to Iran, and subject to the Islamic Republic of Iran agreeing to the COMPLETE, IMMEDIATE, and SAFE OPENING of the Strait of Hormuz, I agree to suspend the bombing and attack of Iran for a period of two weeks,” he wrote. 

Trump added that he had received “a 10-point proposal from Iran” that would form the basis of a long-term agreement. 

“Almost all of the various points of past contention have been agreed to between the United States and Iran, but a two week period will allow the Agreement to be finalized and consummated,” he said.

A day of global outrage

Earlier Tuesday, Trump had escalated his rhetoric against Iran, even as some Republicans in Congress began to back away from his declarations, threatening that “A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again.”

“I don’t want that to happen, but it probably will,” he wrote. 

He ended the 85-word message with “God Bless the Great People of Iran!”

The threat drew intense opposition throughout the day, including from Pope Leo XIV.

Trump posted the early-morning message roughly 12 hours before his self-imposed deadline for Iran to open the Strait of Hormuz or otherwise face U.S. strikes on the country’s bridges and power plants, he wrote Sunday in an expletive-laden Truth Social post. 

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y, denounced Trump as “an extremely sick person.” 

“Each Republican who refuses to join us in voting against this wanton war of choice owns every consequence of whatever the hell this is,” he wrote on X Tuesday morning.

Some Democrats in Congress said it’s time to invoke the 25th Amendment to the Constitution and remove Trump from office.

Threats followed rescue operations

Trump’s flurry of fresh threats followed Iran’s downing of two U.S. military aircraft. U.S. forces and intelligence officers launched a major operation to rescue one of the plane’s weapons system officers, which proved successful Sunday, according to the president and U.S. officials. Two pilots had already been rescued.

As of Tuesday, the United States struck Kharg Island, Iran’s main oil export terminal, according to The Associated Press, and Israeli forces struck eight bridges, according to a post on X by Israel’s military. 

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Tuesday forces had also struck railways. “Yesterday, we destroyed transport planes and dozens of helicopters. Today, we attacked the train tracks and bridges used by the Revolutionary Guards,” he wrote on social media.

Speaking in Hungary, Vice President JD Vance said he hopes Iran chooses “the right response” by Trump’s evening deadline. 

“We’ve got tools in our toolkit that we so far haven’t decided to use. The president of the United States can decide to use them, and he will decide to use them if the Iranians don’t change their course of conduct,” Vance said.

Sharif n a statement prior to Trump’s post announcing the ceasefir urged all parties to continue negotiations, and for Trump to abandon his Tuesday night deadline.

“To allow diplomacy to run its course, I earnestly request President Trump to extend the deadline for two weeks. Pakistan, in all sincerity, requests the Iranian brothers to open Strait of Hormuz for a corresponding period of two weeks as a goodwill gesture,” Sharif wrote on social media.

Trump repeated the threat to bomb Iran’s civilian infrastructure Monday during a lengthy White House press conference. Targeting civilian infrastructure violates international humanitarian law, including the Geneva Conventions that were updated following World War II.

U.S. cybersecurity officials alerted critical infrastructure operators to “urgently review” cybersecurity protocols and take measures to disconnect certain components from the internet after indications that Iranian hackers have begun exploiting water and energy systems. 

The advisory Tuesday from the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Agency, and a host of other federal agencies including the FBI and Department of Energy, did not provide details on locations.

Sens. Ron Johnson, John Curtis express objections

Republicans on Capitol Hill, with the exception of Kentucky’s Sen. Rand Paul and Rep. Thomas Massie, have blocked efforts to rein in Trump’s war on Iran, but three more GOP voices against the conflict emerged in recent days. 

Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., told conservative commentator John Solomon Monday that he is against Trump’s threats to bomb civilian targets in Iran.

“I hope and pray that President Trump is just using this as bluster,” he said on the “John Solomon Reports” podcast, produced by Just the News. “… We are not at war with the Iranian people. We are trying to liberate them.”

Sen. John Curtis, R-Utah, declared opposition Friday to funding the U.S.-Israeli war in Iran. 

“I stand by the President’s actions taken in defense of our national security interests in the Middle East. But we must be clear-eyed about history and the Constitution. While I support maintaining our readiness and replenishing stockpiles, I cannot support funding for further military operations without a formal declaration of war from Congress,” he wrote on X.

On Tuesday afternoon, Rep. Nathaniel Moore, R-Texas, joined the opposition, posting on X that “what sets America apart is not only our strength, but how we use it.”

“I do not support the destruction of a ‘whole civilization.’ That is not who we are, and it is not consistent with the principles that have long guided America,” Moore wrote in a statement on X.

The U.S. and Israel began a joint bombing campaign on Iran on Feb. 28, killing  Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and numerous other senior officials of the Islamic state. 

In response, Iran has targeted global oil trade by effectively choking off the Strait of Hormuz, a major maritime passage for one-fifth of the world’s petroleum and liquid natural gas. 

The conflict has killed thousands of civilians across the Middle East and injured thousands more. Thirteen U.S. service members have died, and 372 have been injured since the start of fighting, according to the Pentagon’s Defense Casualty Analysis System.

25th Amendment

Trump’s rash threat to wipe out Iran’s “whole civilization” sparked numerous calls to remove the president from office.

Former U.S. House GOP lawmaker and Trump loyalist, Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, swiftly denounced Trump’s latest threat.

“25TH AMENDMENT!!! Not a single bomb has dropped on America. We cannot kill an entire civilization. This is evil and madness,” she posted on X.

Nearly two dozen Democratic lawmakers, including several progressive members, also turned to social media to appeal for the 25th Amendment, which authorizes the vice president and a majority of Cabinet members or Congress to deem the president unfit for office. The amendment has never been invoked.

Rep. Yassamin Ansari, D-Ariz., accused Trump of threatening “massive war crimes” and also implicated Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth.

“In the last 48 hours alone, the rhetoric has crossed every line. Pete Hegseth is complicit. I’ve called for the 25th Amendment and am introducing Articles of Impeachment against Hegseth,” said Ansari, an Iranian-American.

Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass., said “removal is the top priority.”

In a video message posted on X, Markey urged the House to “immediately” come back into session and pass articles of impeachment against Trump, and for the Senate to remove him from office.

“He is completely unstable and dangerous,” Markey said.

Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, D-R.I., countered the calls, saying, “The president is facing serious mental decline; I’m with you on that.”

“But unfortunately, invoking the 25th is not realistic right now, given his oddball cabinet of sycophants and eccentrics, and Republican ‘spines of foam.’ We’re going to have to buckle down and win this the old-fashioned way.”

Rep. Marcy Kaptur, whose seat in red northwest Ohio is under threat, stopped short of mentioning the 25th Amendment, but urged GOP congressional leadership to act as Trump is “recklessly threatening to commit atrocities and war crimes.”

“This is unhinged saber rattling that follows consistent threats over the past week to violate international law. The President is using the might of the United States military to wage war without constitutionally mandated approval from Congress. Until Congress reasserts itself as a co-equal branch of government, he will remain unchecked and the security of our nation will continue to be at risk,” she said in a statement.

Illegal orders

Sen. Elissa Slotkin, D-Mich., reminded American service members in a statement Tuesday that attacking civilians en masse “puts them in very real legal jeopardy,” as the action is not only in violation of the Geneva Conventions, but also the Pentagon’s Law of War Manual.

Slotkin, a former CIA analyst, and five other congressional Democrats who served in the military or national security roles, published a video in November stating that members of the armed services are not obligated to follow illegal orders. The video came during the height of the administration’s strikes on small alleged drug-running boats in the Caribbean.

“It’s moments like these that are why we made the video to service members last year. And I hope and believe our troops — especially those in command — will have the moral clarity to push back if they are given clearly illegal orders,” Slotkin said in a statement Tuesday.

Rep. Jason Crow, a Colorado Democrat who appeared in the video with Slotkin, said House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., must bring the House back into session and vote to end the war.

“Members of our Armed Forces must remember their oaths to the Constitution. As I have said before, if servicemembers are asked to carry out illegal orders, they have a solemn duty to follow the law,” said Crow, a former paratrooper and Army Ranger.

Pope Leo XIV, during a press gaggle outside his summer residence near Rome, appealed to Americans to contact Congress and express opposition to the Iran war.

“I would invite the citizens of all countries involved to contact the authorities, political leaders, congressmen, to ask them, tell them to work for peace and to reject war always,” he said.

The offices of Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., and Johnson did not respond for comment on Trump’s latest statements.

A general social media account for the Senate Republican Conference posted mid-day Tuesday: “Iran would be wise to take President Trump at his word. They can choose the easy way or the hard way.”

WASHINGTON — New Hampshire’s Republican governor, frustrated with little information about the Department of Homeland Security’s plan to put a new detention facility in her state, joined local Democrats to oppose the move and disclosed DHS plans to retrofit warehouses across the nation to expand immigrant detention.

Two Republican members of the U.S. Senate, one who chairs the Armed Services Committee and another running for governor, personally lobbied DHS to find other locations for planned large-scale detention centers in rural Byhalia, Mississippi, and Lebanon, Tennessee. 

And a city manager for a small town in Georgia that overwhelmingly voted to put President Donald Trump back in the White House placed a lock on a meter to prevent water access to a newly purchased warehouse for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

At every turn, DHS has faced pushback from Republicans in its drive to quickly scale up immigrant detention to 92,600 people by September, a pillar of the president’s mass deportation plan as Trump aims to remove 1 million immigrants without legal status each year. Republicans warn that the move to convert warehouses into hulking detention sites in rural areas will strain local communities’ water, sewage, electricity, heat and health care. 

Yet Republicans also cheered Trump’s 2024 campaign rhetoric on deportation, voted to return him to the White House and in Congress last year, GOP lawmakers spearheaded $45 billion for ICE detention. 

Experts on detention say the growing burden on communities and the subsequent uproar should be no surprise to members of the GOP. 

“You cannot have a successful deportation agenda, which is the president’s obsession of wanting to have 1 million a year … unless you scale up detention,” said Muzaffar Chishti, Migration Policy Institute senior fellow and director of the MPI office at New York University School of Law. 

Billions for detention

Last year, congressional Republicans provided a separate funding pool of $175 billion for immigration enforcement through the massive tax cuts and spending package, with $45 billion set aside specifically for the detention of immigrants. 

Of that sum, the Trump administration plans to use $39 billion to overhaul its current detention model of using existing jails and prisons and instead consolidate 34 facilities owned by the federal government for detention. 

That would include eight mega-sites of refurbished warehouses to hold as many as 10,000 people each; 16 processing centers, also refurbished warehouses, to each hold 1,000 to 1,500 people; and 10 “turnkey” facilities, which would be the preexisting jails and prisons with ICE contracts. 

Those plans for DHS to expand immigrant detention became public after New Hampshire’s GOP Gov. Kelly Ayotte released documents about a now-canceled site planned for Merrimack, as well as sites across the rest of the country.

The eight large-scale sites would hold more people than the largest federal prison in the United States, which houses roughly 4,000 inmates.

“I think for a lot of people, it sounds and looks a lot like we’re building an infrastructure for concentration camps,” said Elliott Young, a professor of history at Lewis & Clark College.

The Trump administration’s rapid expansion of detention — as many as 68,000 immigrants, as of February — has proven deadly. In 2025, there were 31 known detainee deaths, the highest in 20 years. This year alone, more than a dozen immigrants already have died in detention, and advocates are concerned the plans to detain up to 10,000 immigrants in mega-sites will only lead to more deaths. 

This is not the kind of economic development many rural communities may have envisioned.

“Having such a big amount of people detained in one place comes with its own issues, but the second thing is that industrial warehouses are just not equipped, and they will never be equipped, to be able to detain that many folks,” said Luis Suarez, the senior field advocacy manager at Detention Watch Network.

“With the current facilities that ICE is managing, we have seen an unprecedented amount of inhumane conditions and deaths, and we feel that with this large-scale expansion that we’re going to continue to see it on a larger scale,” Suarez continued.

Public opinion on detention centers

The GOP pushback on warehouses in communities grew after two U.S. citizens, Renee Good and Alex Pretti, were killed by federal immigration agents in Minnesota, and public opinion ratings on ICE and the president’s agenda took a dive. 

“This is just coming off the heels of what happened in Minneapolis,” Suarez said. “I feel like for people it’s sending a signal that if these facilities open up, there might be increased enforcement, and they don’t want to continue to see the violence that DHS and ICE has been inflicting on communities.”

How the DHS push to acquire warehouses develops over the coming months could also be affected by the newly confirmed Homeland Security secretary, former Oklahoma Sen. Markwayne Mullin, who replaced Kristi Noem.

While NBC reported on March 31 that Homeland Security is pausing plans to buy more warehouses, quoting two senior DHS officials, the officials “stressed the decision may only be temporary.” 

During Mullin’s confirmation hearing, he agreed to work with local communities concerned with large detention centers after New Jersey Sen. Andy Kim raised the issue. 

Kim said in the town of Roxbury, New Jersey, which has a volunteer fire department and 42 police officers, DHS purchased a warehouse as a processing center to detain up to 1,500 people. 

Roxbury is in western Morris County, where Trump gained 50% of the presidential vote in 2024. City officials filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration to prevent the conversion of the warehouse. 

“Does that sound like the kind of town that has the resources to take on a warehouse of this magnitude?” Kim asked Mullin during his confirmation hearing.

Mullin pledged to personally visit the facility himself, if confirmed. 

Out west, red states object

In Mullin’s own Republican-led state, officials in Oklahoma City met with the owners of a warehouse that DHS was looking to purchase, and the owners eventually backed out of talks with the federal government.

Oklahomans were only made aware of the potential warehouse because of a local law requiring a mandatory disclosure that any property purchased will not impact the historic preservation of certain buildings. 

But not all officials have received warning. 

Utah’s Republican Gov. Spencer Cox, along with congressional lawmakers from both parties, were blindsided by the sale of a warehouse in Salt Lake City to the federal government.

“When the sale went through, we were not given any notice,” Cox told reporters during a press conference. “No members of our congressional delegation were given any notice. No locals were given any notice. That’s, I think, a little frustrating for everyone. We want to work closely together to get things right.”

In response, Salt Lake City officials have placed restrictions on how much water ICE can use.

So far, DHS has purchased 10 warehouses among the 34 planned. 

But communities and lawmakers have been able to end the bids of another 13 proposed detention centers, according to Project Salt Box, which is tracking the purchases of warehouses by the federal government.

In Social Circle, Georgia, and Schuylkill, Pennsylvania, located in counties that gave Trump more than 70% of the vote in the 2024 presidential election, local leaders are opposed to the government’s purchase of two large-scale warehouses.

Social Circle City Manager Eric Taylor said a lock would remain on the water meter at a recently purchased facility until ICE officials can demonstrate that the warehouse can operate without overburdening water and sewer services. DHS plans to use the warehouse as one of its mega-facilities to detain up to 10,000 immigrants, which is double the entire population of Social Circle.

The GOP lawmaker who represents that area, U.S. Rep. Mike Collins, also raised concerns about the huge detention center in Social Circle. He voted for the tax cuts and spending package that added billions for detention. 

“I’m all for helping DHS, and I’m behind that to make sure we get rid of these illegal criminals that have been throughout our country, but I also understand Social Circle’s concerns, from not just the infrastructure but the resources that may be needed,” Collins said in an interview with a local TV station. 

Collins also shepherded a bill through the House, now law, that requires mandatory detainment by DHS of immigrants charged with local theft, burglary or shoplifting. The bill was named after Georgia college student Laken Riley, whose murder by a Venezuelan immigrant conservatives blamed on the immigration policies of the Biden administration.

In Pennsylvania, Democratic Gov. Josh Shapiro said he’s opposed to the detention center in Schuylkill and another proposed facility, and noted the pushback did not come from Democrats alone. 

“I’m going to do everything in my legal power and my regulatory power to see to it that these facilities are not sited here in Pennsylvania,” Shapiro said at a press conference. “After concluding this meeting here today, I’m even more determined … To hear from Republicans and Democrats alike expressing opposition to this, I think speaks volumes about how unwanted these facilities are in our communities.”

Rural America as a home for detention centers

It’s no surprise to Young, a professor of history at Lewis & Clark College, that the federal government is aiming to place detention centers in rural areas, which often lean Republican. 

“I think there’s a number of reasons for that,” he said. “One, these rural areas tend to be poorer areas where space is available cheaply, but it’s also areas where the local community might be lobbying for jobs that would come as a result of it. I think the other reason why they put them in these remote areas is it makes it very difficult for lawyers and advocates to access immigrants.”

Two Republican senators, Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee and Roger Wicker of Mississippi, petitioned DHS to halt its plans to acquire warehouses for the purpose of detaining thousands of immigrants. 

Wicker wrote a letter to then-Homeland Security Secretary Noem, asking that ICE look elsewhere for its proposed 8,500 bed-space detention center other than the rural town of Byhalia, which has a population of under 1,500.

“Existing medical and human services infrastructure in Byhalia is insufficient to support such a large detainee population,” Wicker said. “Establishing a detention center at this site would place significant strain on local resources.”

Blackburn also worked with DHS to end plans to build a mega-detention center to hold up to 16,000 immigrants. She told her residents that the planned facilities for detention in Lebanon “will not move forward.”

Additionally, Young said “there is some sort of early version of” the federal government trying to retrofit warehouses to detain immigrants.

“If you go back to the origins of immigrant detention, late 19th century, under Chinese exclusion, there was absolutely no infrastructure for detaining immigrants,” Young said. “And so the first immigrant, Chinese immigrants, were detained and jailed in dock warehouses in San Francisco.”

The most recent example of the federal government turning to quickly constructed detention facilities to detain thousands of immigrants is the mass deportation campaign of 1954.

Most recently was the 1980s, when Mariel Cubans were held on military bases. One of the bases in Arkansas held up to 20,000 Cubans, and a riot erupted. It was a disaster that nearly ended then Arkansas Democratic Gov. Bill Clinon’s political career, and the blunder continued to follow him to the White House.

Detention centers and communities

Deirdre Conlon, an associate professor of geography at the University of Leeds, and Nancy Hiemstra co-wrote a book about the web of financial relationships that detention centers have with local communities and private corporations.

“The people who are detained become commodities out of which revenue is generated, that not only the private provider makes money off, but then the county government becomes dependent on,” Conlon said.

When the federal government disinvests in some communities, filling in budget gaps tends to come from detention centers owned and operated by private companies, Hiemstra added. 

“But the warehouse model just axes that relationship,” she said.

Hiemstra, an associate professor at Stony Brook University in New York, points out that even though DHS is trying to pitch to these communities that the operation of a warehouse will create jobs, those skills needed to run a facility are unlikely to come from the local community. A majority of the daily operations of the facility comes from the migrants detained, who typically earn up to $1 a day in cleaning and cooking.

“For the size of some of these facilities and the skills that are required … they will have to pull people from the outside (of the community) in,” she said. “That is not going to benefit the existing community at all.”

Hiemstra said it’s no surprise that DHS is facing opposition to operate  large-scale detention facilities in communities. 

“It removes the economic benefit to local communities that is present with the existing model,” she said. “Not that we want that to continue, but this will just pull it out of local communities even more and make it a total corporate money grab.”

But the main concern, she added, is using a warehouse to detain thousands of people.

“If these come to pass and it seems normal to throw humans in warehouses that will further normalize the deaths that are occurring and this dehumanization of people,” Hiemstra said. 

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump on Monday declined to rule out bombing certain types of civilian infrastructure in Iran, including schools and hospitals, and said that any agreement to end the war must include free navigation through the Strait of Hormuz.

“We have to have a deal that’s acceptable to me,” he said during a 90-minute press conference. “And part of that deal is going to be, we want free traffic of oil and everything else.”

Trump said he hopes he doesn’t need to bomb non-military targets, like power plants and bridges, but that even if he did, he doesn’t believe it would constitute a war crime. International law, including the Geneva Conventions ban on destroying “objects indispensable to the survival of the civilian population,” generally considers the targeting of civilian infrastructure a war crime.

Trump also reiterated a Tuesday evening deadline for Iranian leaders to make a deal to end the war.

“We’re giving them until tomorrow, eight o’clock Eastern time,” he said. “And after that, they’re going to have no bridges. They’re going to have no power plants. Stone ages, yeah. Stone ages.”

Negotiations to end the war that Trump and the Israeli government began in late February, have been slow going, in part, due to the destruction of Iran’s communications infrastructure.  

“We’re communicating like they used to communicate 2,000 years ago with children bringing a note back and forth,” Trump said. “They have no communication.”

Trump contended during the press conference that many Iranians have welcomed their country being bombed and that they get upset when the destruction halts. 

“They would be willing to suffer that in order to have freedom,” he said. “We’ve had numerous intercepts. ‘Please keep bombing.’ Bombs that are dropping near their homes. ‘Please keep bombing. Do it.’ And these are people that are living where the bombs are exploding. And when we leave and we’re not hitting those areas, they’re saying, ‘Please come back. Come back. Come back.'” 

Trump said that after the war ends, his administration “may even get involved with helping them rebuild their nation.”

“Right now, if we left today, it would take them 20 years to rebuild their country, and it would never be as good as it was,” he said. “And the only way they’re going to be able to rebuild their country is to utilize the genius of the United States of America.”

Prosecuting leak

Trump said a search had begun for whichever official or officials released information last week about a U.S. aircraft being shot down over Iran, leading to rescue operations for two servicemen. 

“So whoever that was, we think we’ll be able to find it out, because we’re going to go to the media company that released it, and we’re going to say, ‘National security, give it up or go to jail,’ he said. “And we know who, and you know who we’re talking about.” 

Numerous news organizations published the information on Friday and it wasn’t immediately clear which one Trump planned to pursue. 

As the U.S. Supreme Court heard arguments last week about the constitutionality of President Donald Trump’s executive order to end birthright citizenship, Justice Sonia Sotomayor seemed skeptical.

The order as written applies only to babies born in the future, and the Trump administration has asked the court to exclude current citizens from any decision. Still, the court’s senior liberal justice wasn’t so sure it would work out like that.

“But the logic of your position, if accepted, is that this president or the next president or Congress or someone else could decide that it shouldn’t be prospective,” Sotomayor told U.S. Solicitor General D. John Sauer, the government’s top advocate at the court. “There would be nothing limiting that, according to your theory.”

The birthright citizenship case, Trump v. Barbara, is forcing the Supreme Court to confront the prospect of the United States becoming a much different kind of nation — one where Americans risk losing their citizenship and babies could be born effectively stateless. It’s also a nation that would more closely resemble its past, when broad swaths of people were excluded from the coveted title of American.

A majority of the court, including several conservative justices, appeared unpersuaded by the Trump administration’s argument that the 14th Amendment to the Constitution, ratified during Reconstruction, doesn’t guarantee citizenship to nearly everyone born on American soil. The court may very well strike down the order, which has never taken effect, later this year.

But whatever the decision, the case has prompted a high-stakes debate over who is an American — and the consequences of that definition — that’s playing out in the courtroom, in court documents and on the steps of the Supreme Court.

“Birthright citizenship is not just a legal principle,” Norman Wong said at a demonstration outside the Supreme Court last week.

Wong is a grandchild of Wong Kim Ark, who was born in San Francisco but denied entry back into the country after visiting China more than a century ago. Officials at the time argued he wasn’t a citizen, but he took his case to the Supreme Court and, in a 1898 decision, the justices affirmed that virtually all children born in the United States were guaranteed citizenship.

“It’s a statement about who we are as a nation,” Wong said of birthright citizenship. “It affirms that America is not defined by bloodlines or exclusion, but shared values and equal rights.”

A different view

Trump and some Republicans view birthright citizenship differently. 

The 14th Amendment says “all persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.” 

The Trump administration, which has worked to carry out mass deportations, contends that children born to parents in the country illegally or temporarily are not subject to the country’s jurisdiction. Most historians and legal scholars repudiate that position.

The executive order, signed on Trump’s first day back in office, calls citizenship a privilege — not a right — that’s a “priceless and profound gift.” 

During a recent Oval Office event, Trump told reporters that birthright citizenship was intended to extend citizenship to formerly enslaved people and their children following the Civil War. 

“The reason was it had to do with the babies of slaves,” Trump said.

Some Republicans have embraced a conception of the U.S. as a nation bound by a distinct cultural heritage — sometimes in language that celebrates European settlers — as opposed to a people brought together by the idea of America or a set of common principles. Like Trump, they advocate for a restrictive approach to immigration.

At a conference last fall on national conservatism — the name sometimes given to this perspective — U.S. Sen. Eric Schmitt, a Missouri Republican, called America a “a way of life that is ours, and only ours, and if we disappear, then America, too, will cease to exist.”

Schmitt filed a brief with the Supreme Court in January, along with Republican Rep. Chip Roy of Texas, in support of the executive order. 

“The Citizenship Clause applies only to those who have been allowed to adopt our country as their permanent and lawful home,” the brief says.

Revoking citizenship?

At the Supreme Court last week, Sotomayor pressed Sauer on a 1923 Supreme Court decision, U.S. vs. Thind. In that case, the justices ruled that a Sikh man from India, Bhagat Singh Thind, wasn’t eligible for citizenship. 

Thind argued that he was a “free white person,” a category of person allowed to naturalize under federal law at the time. The court found that Thind didn’t meet that definition under the common understanding of the phrase. The federal government revoked the citizenship of dozens of South Asian Americans following the decision.

Sauer reiterated that the Trump administration was only asking for “prospective relief,” prompting Sotomayor to interject.

“No, what I’m saying to you (is), yeah, that’s what you’re asking for relief right now,” Sotomayor said. “I’m asking whether the logic of your theory would permit what happened after the court’s decision in Thind, that the government could move to unnaturalize people who were born here of illegal residents.”

Sauer responded no, before concluding that “we are not asking for any retroactive relief.”

The exchange spotlighted the scenario that many advocates for immigrants fear if the Supreme Court strips away birthright citizenship. 

In a court brief, the Fred T. Korematsu Center for Law and Equality at the University of California, Irvine School of Law, which uses litigation to advance racial justice, and more than 70 other nonprofit groups warned that upholding the order would invite efforts to revoke the citizenship of countless Americans.

While the order is styled as only forward-looking, the groups said it threatens much deeper harms. To uphold Trump’s order, the Supreme Court would need to conclude that birth on U.S. soil doesn’t guarantee citizenship. Once that happens, they argue, “it is all too easy” to imagine the government retroactively removing citizenship.

“In that scenario, without further intervention from Congress, the affected individuals would become undocumented, with many or most becoming stateless,” the brief says.

American Civil Liberties Union national legal director Cecillia Wang, arguing against the order at the Supreme Court, said the 14th Amendment has provided a “fixed, bright-line rule” on citizenship that has contributed to the growth and thriving of the nation. 

She cautioned that the order would render whole swaths of American laws senseless.

“Thousands of American babies will immediately lose their citizenship,” Wang said. “And if you credit the government’s theory, the citizenship of millions of Americans — past, present and future — could be called into question.”

Ariana Figueroa contributed to this report. 

WASHINGTON — Congress will look considerably different next year, after dozens of its members move on to other political offices or retire, a number that’s likely to grow as some of those hoping to stay lose their reelection bids. 

A turnover of at least 13% will be the highest in more than three decades, bringing in a wave of new lawmakers, who will be looked to as a source of solutions for some of the country’s biggest problems. 

But the loss of institutional knowledge and negotiating expertise held by committee chairmen and seasoned lawmakers will not be easily replaced. 

Experts interviewed by States Newsroom said a surge of freshmen could lead to a further concentration of power in congressional leaders and heighten the influence of lobbyists, though they added there are benefits as well. 

“Serving in Congress is like any other job. It takes you some time to figure out how to be good at it,” said Molly Reynolds, vice president and director of Governance Studies at the Brookings Institution. “Even members who come in with state legislative experience, they will know some things about legislating, but they won’t know all the things about Congress.”

New lawmakers don’t often understand the more complicated procedures and practices, like budget reconciliation, which Republicans used last year to enact their “big, beautiful” law. 

“We ran the reconciliation process last year with lots of members who had never experienced a reconciliation bill before,” Reynolds said. “And one consequence of this kind of lack of experience is that that can stand to empower party leaders even more.” 

But, she added, there can be value in “having younger members, who have a different time horizon for thinking about some of the problems facing the country.” 

Generational change ahead

So far 57 House lawmakers, 21 Democrats and 36 Republicans, have opted to run for another political position or retire. In the Senate, four Democrats and seven Republicans are choosing to leave for one reason or another, according to data compiled by Ballotpedia. 

Jonathan K. Hanson, lecturer in public policy at the University of Michigan, said it can take a while for newer members to learn the policy landscape well enough to understand when to listen to outside influence and when not to. 

“A person doesn’t walk into Congress knowing how things work,” he said. “And the more that you have people who are fresh, kind of green, don’t know how to navigate the institution, the more power that special interests, lobbyists, so forth might have to influence the political process.”

Hanson also said that “some generational change is a good thing.”

Longing to be the chief executive

North Dakota Republican Sen. John Hoeven said many of his colleagues are opting to run for governor, which he believes is a superior role to the one he holds now. 

“I was governor for 10 years before I came here. It’s the best job you can have. It’s a better job than Senate,” Hoeven said. “I mean, it’s an honor to serve in the Senate, for sure. But you just can’t find a better job than being governor. So that’s totally understandable.”

More than a dozen lawmakers are running for governor, including Alabama Republican Sen. Tommy Tuberville, Colorado Democratic Sen. Michael Bennet, Florida Republican Rep. Byron Donalds, Minnesota Democratic Sen. Amy Klobuchar and Tennessee Republican Sen. Marsha Blackburn.

Virginia Democratic Sen. Tim Kaine said being a member of Congress can be difficult, leading some lawmakers to head for the exits and other opportunities.  

“This is not an easy job and people, you know, decide that they’ve had a good chapter and want to do something else,” Kaine said. “I can understand why people might make that call.”

South Dakota Republican Rep. Dusty Johnson, who is campaigning to be governor of his home state, said that every two years, the institution changes when more experienced members leave and newer ones are voted into Congress. 

“Every cycle, we always have plenty of retirements, certainly enough retirements to change the nature of the body,” Johnson said. “The bigger factor is, who replaces those who have left? And of course, we’re not going to know that until after the primaries and generals are wrapped up.”

Primary elections began in early March and will take place on different dates in each state through mid-September. 

Michigan Democratic Sen. Gary Peters, who is set to leave at the end of this year, said the impact of retirements will depend on which candidates Americans elect during November’s midterm elections.

“If you have people who are getting elected who are practical, common-sense problem solvers, that’ll be good,” Peters said. “If people are hyper-partisan, either left or right, that’s not going to be good.” 

Oklahoma Republican Rep. Tom Cole said the retirements from members of his own party could have an impact on the elections.

“Obviously, we’re losing some very good members. And it’s easier, as a rule, to defend an incumbent than it is to win an open seat, particularly in a challenging year,” Cole said. “But look, these things run in cycles. You just have to work your way through it.”

Travel, long hours, little satisfaction

Hanson from the University of Michigan said more Republicans have decided to retire or seek another office because their party is likely to lose at least one chamber of Congress. 

“They’re expecting to lose control of the House of Representatives, and it’s not very enticing for them to stay in the fight under those circumstances,” he said. 

The mounting challenges that come with being a member of Congress are part of the reason some lawmakers are planning to step aside from their current roles, Hanson said. 

“I do think that the job, while seeming glamorous from the outside, is not that glamorous from the inside,” he said. “There’s lots of travel. Even when you go home, you’re traveling around your district. It’s hard on family life. The hours can be very long in those late-night voting sessions. 

“And then that would be one thing if what you’re getting out of it is a positive sense of contributing to the broader good, to, you know, the idea of public service.”

But, Hanson added, there aren’t that many opportunities these days for lawmakers to pass legislation they believe is meaningful. 

“So I think it’s fair to say that while there are certain people who are attracted to being in the thick of this kind of scene, a lot of people find that it’s just not a very satisfying occupation,” he said. 

Zachary Peskowitz, a political science professor at Emory University in Georgia, said there are both pros and cons to more than 65 lawmakers leaving Congress at one time.  

“On the one hand, there are a lot of members who have a lot of seniority and have served for a long time and a lot of expertise but are in their 70s and 80s in some cases,” he said. “And there have been concerns about how engaged some of them are.”

Younger members, Peskowitz said, may “approach the job with more energy than you might get from somebody who’s been in Congress for decades.” Newer lawmakers will also likely come with different viewpoints and priorities, he said.

WASHINGTON — A federal court order last month to effectively axe a Biden-era student loan repayment plan capped years of chaos for more than 7 million student borrowers enrolled in the program.

The Saving on a Valuable Education, or SAVE, plan marked a cornerstone of the Joe Biden administration’s loan forgiveness efforts but became mired in legal challenges from several GOP-led states. 

On July 1, federal loan servicers will start sending notices to borrowers instructing them to enter into a legal repayment plan within 90 days, the department said. Borrowers who do not switch within the 90-day window outlined by their servicer will be automatically placed into a new plan.

The agency issued guidance to borrowers in late March instructing them of the timeline and urging people to switch into a new plan. 

Here’s what borrowers need to know as they navigate next steps:

How did we get here? 

The program, introduced in 2023, sought to lower monthly loan payments for borrowers and forgive remaining debt after a certain period of time.

But millions of borrowers experienced chaos and confusion as they were forced to navigate complex court rulings, interest accrual on their debt and continued uncertainty over the plan’s fate.

Borrowers were placed in an interest-free forbearance in 2024 amid legal limbo, and the department resumed charging interest on the debt of those in the program in August 2025. 

President Donald Trump’s administration in December announced a proposed agreement to end the plan. 

The agreement stemmed from a legal challenge to the plan brought by Missouri, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, North Dakota, Ohio and Oklahoma in 2024.

A federal judge dismissed that lawsuit in late February, striking down the administration’s efforts to axe the plan. 

But a federal appeals court reversed the lower court’s decision in March, effectively putting an end to the SAVE plan. 

Was the SAVE plan already slated for elimination? 

Congressional Republicans’ mega tax and spending cut bill signed into law by Trump in July 2025 includes a sweeping overhaul of the federal student loan system. 

Part of the GOP’s “big, beautiful” law phased out the SAVE plan by July 2028. 

I’m in SAVE. What are my new repayment options? 

Borrowers have several new repayment options, and can switch to a new plan prior to receiving the incoming notice from their federal loan servicer.

One option includes the Income-Based Repayment, or IBR, plan, which ties borrowers’ loan payment to their earnings. 

Borrowers also have the option to enter into two repayment plans stemming  from the GOP’s “big, beautiful” law — the Repayment Assistance Plan, or RAP, and the Tiered Standard plan — which will both launch July 1. 

Preston Cooper, senior fellow in higher education policy at the American Enterprise Institute, a right-leaning think tank, noted that whether IBR or RAP is a better deal for borrowers depends on their particular circumstances.

“I would recommend that if you are kind of earlier in your repayment journey, and you have a lot more interest because your balance is higher, the Repayment Assistance Plan is going to be your best bet,” Cooper said.

“If you’re later in your repayment journey, you’re closer to that 20 or 25-year mark for forgiveness, Income-Based Repayment is probably going to be your better bet,” he added.

Borrowers could also opt into a handful of other repayment options, such as the Pay as You Earn and Income-Contingent Repayment plans. 

However, those two plans will be eliminated by July 2028 under Republicans’ “big, beautiful” law, meaning borrowers would have to switch plans again in two years. 

What other steps can I take in the meantime? 

Michele Zampini, associate vice president for federal policy and advocacy at the Institute for College Access & Success, said the best thing for a borrower to do is “just be proactive.” 

“Make sure, from a very base level, you can access your account, you know all the basics of where you stand, and then do some comparisons across what plan options you’re going to have,” said Zampini, whose organization aims to advance affordability, accountability and equity in higher education.   

Zampini also pointed to Federal Student Aid’s loan simulator as a good resource for borrowers to get specific numbers to compare across plans. 

“If there’s a plan that you want to move into that’s already open and available, if it’s one of the older plans, start moving now, if you can afford it,” she said. “And then, if you want to wait for the new plan to open … know what that payment estimate is going to look like, and then set yourself a reminder for July to check back and look at the enrollment process once that plan opens.” 

Amid the “total dissonance and chaos” borrowers in SAVE have experienced, Zampini said the department “has really shirked its responsibility in at least keeping borrowers updated and giving them clear information on what’s happening, when it’s happening, and what the implications are going to be for their payments and kind of their budgets and what they have to do and when they have to do it.” 

What about the plan to eliminate the department?

Persis Yu, deputy executive director and managing counsel at the advocacy group Protect Borrowers, told States Newsroom she is “incredibly worried about borrowers not being able to figure out what to do, missing the deadline, getting put into a plan that they can’t afford, and then falling into default, which has, of course, incredibly onerous consequences.” 

The end of SAVE also comes as the Trump administration continues its efforts to dismantle the Department of Education, including through a series of interagency agreements that transfer several of its responsibilities to other departments. 

Under the most recent agreement, the Treasury Department will take over Education’s responsibility for collecting on defaulted federal student loan debt — the first step in a multiphase process toward Treasury taking on Education’s entire, roughly $1.7 trillion federal student loan portfolio.

“The specifics of the plan with Treasury right now are about debt collection, but the overarching mission of dismantling the Department of Education at this moment means that there are not the people in place to oversee the servicers,” Yu said. 

Part of the administration’s efforts to do away with the agency included a reduction in force initiated in March 2025 that hit wide swaths of the department, including Federal Student Aid, or FSA. 

Yu also highlighted a March report from the nonpartisan Government Accountability Office, which found that staffing reductions at FSA affected the government’s ability to determine how well student loan servicers are doing their jobs. 

Before Wyoming elections, the state’s League of Women Voters tries to get voter registration information into the hands of residents at events and gatherings. But under state law, League volunteers can’t sign up voters themselves — only local election officials can do that.

“It’s been tough,” said Linda Barton, president of the League of Women Voters of Wyoming. She added that her group does its best to offer registration information. “We provide a lot of printed literature that we hand out all over the state.”

Congress may take Wyoming’s approach nationwide.

The SAVE America Act would effectively ban voter registration drives, a mainstay of college campuses and neighborhood events. 

The U.S. Senate began debating a version of President Donald Trump’s signature elections measure last month, after the House passed it in February. The legislation would require voters to show photo identification to cast a ballot. It would also require individuals to present documents proving their citizenship, such as a passport or birth certificate, to government officials in person to register to vote. 

Trump and Republican members of Congress have cast the proposal as necessary to secure elections and crack down on noncitizen voters ahead of the midterms. Democrats and other critics warn it risks disenfranchising wide swaths of Americans. Studies have shown noncitizen voting is extremely rare.

In many states, civic groups have long provided applications to would-be voters that they can quickly fill out. During the 2024 election cycle, voter registration drives accounted for 3.7% of registrations, according to survey data from the federal Election Assistance Commission. While a small percentage, the figure still represents 2.1 million Americans.

Twenty-four states and the District of Columbia placed no restrictions on voter registration drives as of November 2024, according to the Movement Advancement Project, a Colorado-based think tank. An additional 24 states impose some limits, while Wyoming and New Hampshire prohibit them.

Bill would end registration drives nationwide

Every form of voter registration drive would effectively end under the SAVE America Act as currently drafted in the Senate, said Brian Miller, executive director of NonprofitVOTE, which aids nonprofit organizations in helping individuals vote and participate in the democratic process. Community-based groups, universities, food pantries and others who help register voters would all be affected.

“That’s the high school civics teacher who works with his graduating class … gone, they can’t do that anymore,” Miller said.

NonprofitVOTE, working with 120 organizations across nine states, engaged 60,000 voters during the 2022 midterm cycle, according to a report by the group. It found that individuals reached by nonprofits were 10 percentage points more likely to cast a ballot than comparable registered voters.

The effect was more pronounced among younger voters. Those ages 18 to 24 who were engaged by nonprofit groups were 12 percentage points more likely to cast a ballot than comparable registered voters.

Hispanic Federation, a nationwide Hispanic and Latino advocacy group, says it has registered 160,000 voters since 2016. Frederick Vélez III Burgos, the federation’s senior director for communications and community outreach, said the organization works to register voters because of language and cultural barriers, work schedules and other factors that make the process challenging.

“There’s just a group of people and communities that is just very difficult to get registered through normal means,” Burgos said.

Top Trump priority

Trump has made clear the SAVE America Act is his top legislative priority and he has urged Congress to pass the measure before moving to other business. While Republicans control both chambers of Congress, support for the proposal falls short of the 60 votes needed to break a filibuster in the Senate.

“The SAVE Act would gut tried-and-true methods of voter registration, including registration by mail and registering online,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, a New York Democrat, said earlier this year.

Still, Senate Republican leaders in March kicked off an extended, wide-ranging debate over the bill. It remains unclear when the debate will end. Congress is scheduled to be in recess until mid-April.

GOP proponents have dismissed concerns that the legislation would make registering to vote and casting a ballot difficult. Sen. Chuck Grassley, an Iowa Republican, said on the Senate floor that the bill offers multiple ways to prove citizenship and “gives states the flexibility to create other pathways to show proof of citizenship.”

Grassley noted that his mother was one of the first women to cast a ballot after ratification of the 19th Amendment, which guaranteed women the right to vote.

“The SAVE America Act doesn’t infringe on these hard-fought voting rights. It would preserve the integrity of every vote cast in a federal election,” Grassley said.

Hard-to-reach voters

Third-party voter registration drives date back to voter education and registration efforts by the National American Woman Suffrage Association, according to Joshua Douglas, a University of Kentucky law professor who specializes in voting rights and election law. The association eventually morphed into the League of Women Voters, which helped spearhead registration efforts following the 19th Amendment.

Voter registration drives typically aid voters who may not otherwise have opportunities to register, Douglas wrote in an email to States Newsroom. They may not have a driver’s license or may not be thinking about registering.

“There is a long history of civic organizations engaged in voter registration drives and this legislation would make that work harder,” Douglas wrote.

Tom Lopach, president and CEO of the nonpartisan Voter Participation Center, an organization that works to register voters from underrepresented populations, said he fears some members of Congress haven’t fully read the bill or digested how it would affect voting. 

Since VPC was founded in 2003, it has helped register 7 million voters, Lopach said.

“And that’s just us,” he said. “When you think about the League of Women Voters, when you think about in-person voter registration drives happening in a grocery store parking lot, or knocking doors in a neighborhood, you would have tens of millions of Americans not registered and then not voting.”

States trending toward more restrictions

Even if the SAVE America Act doesn’t become law, some states have taken steps to make voter registration drives more difficult. 

The Center for Public Integrity and NPR found in 2024 that at least six states had passed legislation cracking down on voter registration drives following the 2020 election. Some of the bills imposed massive fines for violations or barred noncitizens from participating.

As recently as March, the North Carolina State Board of Elections announced it would require groups conducting voter registration drives to print their own registration forms. The board cited significant costs, after it provided nearly 1.3 million applications to organizations and government agencies in 2024 at a cost of more than $269,000.

“Nothing about this temporary tightening of our practice surrounding voter registration drives changes the fact that any North Carolina citizen who wants a voter registration application will always be able to get one simply by contacting their county board of elections or the State Board,” Sam Hayes, the board’s executive director, told NC Newsline.

Courts have blocked some state-level restrictions. A federal court prohibited Kansas from enforcing a 2021 law that barred out-of-state organizations from distributing advance mail ballot applications to voters and prohibited applications that contained personalized voter information. Kansas has appealed the decision.

The Missouri Supreme Court last week ruled against a state law that prohibited groups like the League of Women Voters from using paid workers in voter registration drives. The state’s high court also struck down requirements that individuals who solicit more than 10 registration applications must register with the state and be Missouri voters. The law had also prohibited encouraging someone to obtain an absentee ballot.

Kay Park, president of the League of Women Voters of Missouri, called the restrictions “ridiculous” and said that while they were in effect the organization did nothing with absentee ballots — such as suggesting an absentee ballot could be an option for someone with a disability, for instance.

The League of Women Voters of Missouri holds voter registration drives in high schools, Park said. While Missouri residents must be 18 to vote, they can register once they’re 17 ½ years old. The SAVE America Act would effectively end those drives.

If the legislation becomes law, Park said the Missouri league would likely focus more of its efforts on helping individuals obtain identification documents and birth certifications — something it’s already trying to do.

“It just puts another cog in the wheel,” Park said.

Wyoming model

In Wyoming, Barton and her fellow League of Women Voters members are already grappling with a state-level proof-of-citizenship voter registration law passed last year, regardless of whether Congress passes the SAVE America Act.

Residents who want to register to vote must visit a county clerk’s office and bring a valid passport or birth certificate. Wyoming also accepts REAL ID-compliant driver’s licenses and tribal IDs, as long as they do not indicate the individual is a noncitizen, and a few other documents, such as a naturalization certificate. Individuals may register by mail but must include copies of their documents along with a notarized application.

The new state requirements were championed by Wyoming Secretary of State Chuck Gray, a Republican who is running for the state’s U.S. House seat.

“As the chief election official of Wyoming that has experience with these common sense election integrity measures, I can tell you that the SAVE America Act will be easy for states to implement,” Gray wrote in a March 17 letter to Senate Majority Leader John Thune, a South Dakota Republican.

Gray didn’t respond to questions from States Newsroom.

Barton said without the option to hold voter registration drives, going to events and speaking to clubs and organizations like Rotary are imperative.

“I just think that the only other choice is to be out there, communicating as much as possible,” she said.

President Donald Trump’s executive order restricting mail ballots faced a fresh challenge on Friday, as a coalition of Democratic states filed a lawsuit seeking to block an order that experts say is an extraordinary attempt by the president to assert authority over elections.

More than 20 states — led by California, Massachusetts, Nevada and Washington — and the District of Columbia sued in federal court in Massachusetts. They argue the order violates the Constitution, which gives states the responsibility to run elections and allows Congress, not the president unilaterally, the power to override state regulations.

“Though the President may wish he had unlimited power to restrict voting rights, the Constitution gives states – not the White House – the authority to oversee elections,” Massachusetts Attorney General Andrea Joy Campbell, a Democrat, said in a statement.

The lawsuit is only the latest in a growing number of legal challenges to the order since Trump signed it on Tuesday.

The Democratic National Committee, top Democrats in Congress and other Democratic groups have sued, along with the American Civil Liberties Union, League of Women Voters, the League of United Latin American Citizens and other voting rights groups. 

Friday’s state-led challenge marked at least the fifth lawsuit over the order.

“Neither the Constitution nor any act of Congress confers upon the President the authority to mandate sweeping changes to States’ electoral systems or procedures,” the complaint reads.

The Trump administration has said the order is necessary to ensure the security of elections and crack down on noncitizen voting, which studies have found is extremely rare. Trump acknowledged the order would likely face litigation when he signed it but called it “foolproof.”

“The President will do everything in his power to defend the safety and security of American elections and to ensure that only American citizens are voting in them,” White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson said in a statement on Wednesday.

List required

The order requires the Department of Homeland Security, with help from the Social Security Administration, to compile a list of voting-age U.S. citizens living in each state and then provide that information to state officials at least 60 days before each federal election. 

The order does not tell states how to use the data, but it instructs the U.S. attorney general to prioritize investigations into state and local officials who issue federal ballots to ineligible voters.

The list of citizens will be drawn from naturalization and Social Security records, according to the order. It will also include data from SAVE, a powerful computer program maintained by Homeland Security that verifies citizenship by checking names against information in federal databases. 

The order also directs the postmaster general to require every outbound mail ballot be in an envelope that includes a tracking barcode. 

At least 90 days before a federal election, states must notify the U.S. Postal Service whether they intend to allow ballots to be sent through the mail. States would then have to submit to USPS a list of voters planning to vote by mail at least 60 days before the election.

“The expression ‘a solution in search of a problem’ came to mind, but this is sort of a quasi-solution in search of a hallucination,” said Pamela Smith, president and CEO of Verified Voting, an organization that promotes the responsible use of technology in elections.

Under the order, the Justice Department and other federal agencies would be directed to withhold federal funds from states and localities that don’t comply with federal laws. It doesn’t specify what federal funds would potentially be targeted or whether states could lose election-related dollars.

“The president’s illegal executive order creates a shadow voter eligibility list within the federal government and it threatens to coerce states into disenfranchising voters missing from those lists,” Nevada Attorney General Aaron Ford said at a news conference in Las Vegas.

States say they run elections, not feds

The coalition of states argues in the lawsuit that Trump’s order would require states to upend existing election administration procedures and spend significant time and resources “mitigating the harms” of its requirements and educating voters about the new rules.

The states joining the lawsuit include Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, Virginia, Washington and Wisconsin, in addition to the District of Columbia and Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, a Democrat.

Some Republican state officials have backed Trump’s efforts. Wyoming Secretary of State Chuck Gray in a statement voiced “complete and total” support for the order.

“I look forward to continuing to work with the Trump Administration, the Department of Homeland Security, the United States Postal Inspection Service, and our county clerks on implementation of this executive order,” Gray said.

But the states say the order would require states to act contrary to their own voter roll procedures, systems and voter registration laws, the complaint argues. Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes, a Democrat, said the Constitution is clear that states run elections.

“Not the President,” Mayes said. “And Arizona will not allow the federal government to seize control of our elections.”

WASHINGTON — The Trump administration released its fiscal 2027 budget request Friday, asking Congress to increase spending on defense programs by 43% and decrease funding for non-defense accounts by 10%. 

The proposal kicks off what will be a monthslong process on Capitol Hill as lawmakers write the dozen annual government funding bills ahead of the Oct. 1 deadline. 

Congress rarely adheres to the president’s request entirely, and didn’t do so last year, rejecting many of the proposed cuts, including to health and education.

Last year’s process, the first of President Donald Trump’s second term, was considerably rocky, leading to a 43-day shutdown that began in October, a brief partial shutdown that ended in early February and an ongoing shutdown for the Department of Homeland Security. 

This budget request proposes Republicans again use the complex budget reconciliation process they used last year to enact the “big, beautiful” law to further bolster spending on the Pentagon and DHS. 

The Defense Department would have its budget raised to $1.5 trillion, a $445 billion increase over its current funding level. The administration proposes lawmakers put $1.1 trillion of that in the annual spending bill that would require bipartisan support to move through the Senate and place the other $350 billion in the partisan reconciliation bill. 

“America has already begun to strengthen and reinvigorate the military by committing tens of billions of dollars to new and innovative programs such as the Golden Dome for America, and making critical investments in the defense industrial base,” the document states. “By continuing to provide the resources necessary to rebuild America’s military, the Budget re-establishes deterrence, revives the warrior ethos of America’s Armed Forces, and prioritizes investments against the most acute national security threats.”

Department-by-department requests

The budget asks that lawmakers also increase spending on:  

• The Energy Department by $4.8 billion, or 10%, to $53.9 billion.
• The Justice Department by $4.7 billion, or 13%, to $40.8 billion.
• The Veterans’ Affairs Department by $11.5 billion, or 9%, to $144.9 billion in discretionary spending. 

The proposal asks Congress to decrease spending on: 

• The Agriculture Department by $4.9 billion, or 19%, to $20.8 billion.
• The Commerce Department by $1.3 billion, or 12.2%, to $9.2 billion. 
• The Education Department by $2.3 billion, or 2.9%, to $76.5 billion.
• The Environmental Protection Agency by $4.6 billion, or 52%, to $4.2 billion. 
• The Department of Health and Human Services by $15.8 billion, or 12.5%, to $111.1 billion. 
• The Department of Housing and Urban Development by $10.7 billion, or 13%, to $73.5 billion.
• The Interior Department by $2.3 billion, or 12.9%, to $15.9 billion. 
• The Labor Department by $3.5 billion, or 25.9%, to $9.9 billion.
• The Small Business Administration by $671 million, or 67%, to $329 million. 
• The State Department and other international programs by $15.5 billion, or 30%, to $35.6 billion.
• The Transportation Department by $1.6 billion, or 6.2%, to $26.6 billion.
• The Treasury Department by $1.5 billion, or 12%, to $11.5 billion. 

The budget proposes $63 billion in funding for the Department of Homeland Security, which doesn’t yet have its appropriations bill from the current year for comparison. 

Senate Appropriations Committee Chairwoman Susan Collins, R-Maine, said in a statement there are issues with some of its proposals for both defense and domestic spending. 

“While there are some improvements over last year’s domestic discretionary budget request, including full support for the Pell Grant program, the request has several shortcomings,” she said. “For example, the proposal includes unwarranted funding cuts in biomedical research. It would also terminate worthwhile programs like LIHEAP, which helps low-income families and seniors to pay their energy bills during the cold winter and hot summer months, and TRIO, which assists low-income, first-generation students in pursuing higher education.” 

Collins indicated she may bolster defense spending for a certain type of ship that she views as essential to the country’s military. 

“The request for just one DDG-51, the workhorse of the U.S. Navy, is insufficient to counter the ever-growing Chinese fleet, which now exceeds the size of the American Navy, as well as other global threats,” she said. 

Privatizing TSA screening

The president’s request asks lawmakers to cut funding for the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s non-disaster grant program and to begin the process of offloading security screening at the nation’s airports. 

“The Budget begins the privatization of TSA’s airport screeners by requiring small airports to enroll in the Screening Partnership Program, under which TSA pays for private screeners at designated airports,” it states. “The airports that already use this program have demonstrated savings compared to Federal screening operations. The move would yield cost savings compared to Federal screening and begin reform of a troubled Federal agency.”

The budget asks Congress to provide an increase of $1.7 billion to the Bureau of Prisons to improve working conditions and pay, with $152 million of that going to the first year costs to “rebuild Alcatraz as a state-of-the-art secure prison facility.” The Bureau of Prisons has been evaluating whether to restore the closed California facility.

The budget proposes increases in funding for Trump’s efforts to improve the District of Columbia, including a $10 billion Presidential Capital Stewardship Program run through the National Park Service and $403 million for a new Transportation Department program to upgrade security in the Metro system and other local projects. 

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration, which launched the Artemis II mission this week to orbit the moon, would receive a $5.6 billion, or 23%, cut under Trump’s budget proposal to a total funding level of $18.8 billion. 

It asks Congress to decrease funding for the International Space Station by $1.1 billion and “prioritizes the rapid development and deployment of commercial space stations, while also keeping the safe de-orbit of the ISS on track for 2030.” 

Dems reject ‘bleak’ budget

Washington Democratic Sen. Patty Murray, ranking member on the Appropriations Committee, wrote in a statement that the budget request was “bleak and unacceptable.”

“President Trump wants to slash medical research to fund costly foreign wars,” she wrote. “It doesn’t get more backward than that, and the only responsible thing to do with a budget this morally bankrupt is to toss it in the trash.”

Murray added that she expects Congress to pursue bipartisan spending bills, just as lawmakers did during last year’s process, including investments in domestic issues. 

“This week, President Trump said that our country cannot afford to help families with child care or health care—but his own budget proves what a ridiculous farce that is,” she said. “Imagine how many families we could help if, instead of giving the Pentagon more money than they can even figure out what to do with, we cut people’s heating bills in half and made child care affordable for every family in America.”

Senate Budget Committee ranking member Jeff Merkley, D-Ore., wrote in a statement the request lacks detail for programs that run outside of the annual budget and appropriations process, like Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. 

“Going back decades, presidents have sent to Congress detailed budgets with 10 years’ worth of detailed plans – outlining their approach to tax policy and our growing debt, as well as the solvency of our biggest programs like Medicare and Social Security,” he wrote. “This budget doesn’t do any of that. It’s just an out-of-touch plea for more money for guns and bombs, and less for the things people need, like housing, health care, education, roads, scientific research, and environmental protection.”

Minnesota Democratic Rep. Betty McCollum, ranking member on the Defense Appropriations Subcommittee, said the Pentagon doesn’t have an issue with how much in taxpayer money lawmakers allocate, but “a problem with efficiently spending the funding that Congress has provided them – and accounting for it.”

“The President’s request for $1.15 trillion in defense spending is outrageous and unacceptable, especially when President Trump and Congressional Republicans intend to make further cuts to critical services that Americans rely on at home,” she said. “Our nation cannot be secure without investments in our country’s critical health care, education, nutrition, and infrastructure.”