March for Peace & Justice, not more WAR
Saturday, March 14th, in the annual Saint Patrick’s Day Parade.
Veterans For Peace (VFP) San Francisco chapter #69 has marched in the huge annual SF Saint Patrick’s Day Parade since 2012, marching for Palestine and against All Wars. Now the U.S. and Israel are bombing Iran! Join us!
The Irish government and People were the First in Europe to stand up to Israeli genocide and Call for a Ceasefire. They are again calling for a Ceasefire in the Entire Middle East.
VFP & “About Face – Veterans Against the War” (POST 9/11 vets), along with CodePink will be the official organizations representing our contingent. All Anti-War individuals are ASKED TO JOIN US!
The parade is viewed by thousands. We will be handing out an Informational Leaflet to those watching the parade.
Two years ago we had a very large contingent, with lots of Palestinian flags, and won First Place for a “Military” Unit!
Join us!
LOGISTICS:
· Saturday, March 14th. Muster by 11:30 AM on Second Street, between Bryant & Brannan – 5 ½ blocks South of Market St. on Second.
· We will have a vehicle as well. Our Official Number in the parade is #87.
· Bring Veterans For Peace banners, flags, etc. We will have US, Irish and VFP flags and banners - and a Palestinian flag as well. All to be carried by participants or taped to the vehicle.
CONTACTS: VFP SF Chapter 69 Organizers:
Nadya Williams - CELL: (415) 845-9492, EMAIL: nadyanomad@gmail.com
Louis Flores – CELL: (925) 550-9775, EMAIL: louisflores2468@comcast.net
Mike Wong - EMAIL: mikevfp69@gmail.com
Please join us on March 14 as we march for peace and justice through diplomacy not more war!
Eleanor Levine
CodePink, SF Bay Area
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March 19: The Voice of Hind Rajab Screening @ Middle East Children’s Alliance (MECA) Offices
1101 Eighth St, Berkeley, CA 94710, USA
Join the Middle East Children's Alliance for our screening of The Voice of Hind Rajab. This tragic docudrama, written and directed by Kaouther Ben Hania, follows the Red Crescent response during the killing of Hind Rajab, a six-year-old Palestinian girl, by the Israel Occupation Forces during the Israeli invasion of the Gaza Strip. It stars Saja Kilani, Motaz Malhees, Amer Hlehel, and Clara Khoury.
Tickets: $10.00
https://events.humanitix.com/the-voice-of-hind-rajab?emci=a59ade92-0318-f111-a69a-000d3a1f0a97&emdi=7c21261a-2118-f111-a69a-000d3a1f0a97&ceid=2453624*..........*..........*..........*..........*..........*..........*..........*
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Saturday, March 28
11:30 A.M. – 3:00 P.M.
Embarcadero Plaza
Market and Steuart Street
San Francisco, CA 94105
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Veterans For Peace Condemns
U.S. Attack on Iran
Military Members and Civilians:
Resist Illegal Wars!
Veterans For Peace condemns the U.S./Israeli attack on Iran in the strongest possible terms. We call on our members, friends, and allies to resist this dangerous and illegal war. We offer our support to members of the military who decide to refuse illegal orders and resist an illegal war.
A War Based on Lies
The Trump administration’s ever-changing rationales for going to war against Iran are lies. Iran posed no threat to the United States. This military operation is not a defensive war, but rather a war of choice by Israel and the U.S., a war of aggression, a war for regime change – very much like the disastrous U.S. wars that killed millions of people in Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan – wars that many veterans remember with horror and regret.
Contrary to President Trump’s oft-repeated lie, Iran has repeatedly stated that it has no intention of acquiring nuclear weapons. Rather, the United States, the only country to attack another nation with nuclear weapons, has unilaterally abrogated multiple arms control treaties, and is investing Two Trillion Dollars in a new generation of nuclear weapons. It was the U.S., not Iran, that violated and withdrew from the Iran nuclear deal. Israel also has nuclear weapons – undeclared and uninspected. Two nuclear powers attacking Iran, claiming to stop it from pursuing a nuclear program, is the height of hypocrisy.
The aggression against Iran follows by less than two months the U.S. attack on Venezuela and the unlawful abduction of its president and wife. It comes amid the ongoing war threats and oil blockade of Cuba. This complete disregard and abuse of the process of negotiations only encourages nuclear proliferation around the world.
Illegal and Unconstitutional
The U.S. war on Iran is illegal in multiple ways. It is a violation of the UN Charter, a treaty which is the “supreme law of the land” under Article VI of the U.S. Constitution. Article 2(4) of the UN Charter states, “All Members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state, or in any other manner inconsistent with the Purposes of the United Nations.”
The unilateral war of aggression against Iran is a blatant violation of the U.S. Constitution, which explicitly grants Congress the sole authority to declare war. This power was intentionally given to the legislative branch to prevent unilateral military action by a single executive.
These legal and constitutional issues may seem quaint to those of us who have seen them routinely violated by president after president with the complicity of a supine Congress. Nonetheless, they constitute both international and domestic law. They are the legal codification of a moral framework for international peace and cooperation. Peace-loving people must struggle to ensure that these laws are followed. We must hold our government officials accountable when they are not.
Refuse Illegal Orders – Resist Illegal Wars
Veterans For Peace reminds our sisters and brothers, children, and grandchildren in the U.S. military that an order to participate in an illegal war is, by extension, an illegal order. You have the right and even the duty to refuse illegal orders. Veterans For Peace and many others will stand with you when you do, and provide helpful information and resources. Whatever legal consequences you may endure pale compared to risking your life in an illegal war or living with Post Traumatic Stress and Moral Injury.
Veterans and civilians also have the right and the responsibility to resist the illegal actions of our government at home and abroad. This attack is a very critical moment in the history of the United States and the world. We must be in the streets protesting. We must be on our phones telling our representatives to Vote Yes on the Iran War Powers resolution. We must be on our keyboards, writing letters to the editors. Tell them to:
IMMEDIATELY HALT U.S. MILITARY ATTACKS ON IRAN!
· End U.S. Support for Israel and Genocide in Palestine!
· End Economic Warfare against Iran, Venezuela, and Cuba!
· End ICE and Authoritarian Repression in U.S. Cities!
· Abolish Nuclear Weapons and War!
PEACE AT HOME, PEACE ABROAD!
https://prod.cdn.everyaction.com/emails/van/EA/EA015/1/94223/Alqa3p0mdFGQOfwCaEOYO6dpWCJEn2qC1GPoEaid_7O_archive?emci=6196a802-9415-f111-a69a-000d3a57593f&emdi=d3c0d4a7-a515-f111-a69a-000d3a57593f&ceid=10474381
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Tell Congress: No War On Iran!
On Saturday, February 28th, the United States and Israel bombed Iran’s capital. Shortly after, President Donald Trump announced a planned prolonged war against Iran and stated that American servicemembers would likely be killed in the process. He addressed Iranians, telling them to stay inside because bombs would be dropping all over Iran, and called on them to overthrow their government. The self-proclaimed “peace president” has launched yet another endless war – risking millions of human lives. The entire world should be outraged.
Tell Congress we want PEACE with Iran, we don’t want the US bombing Iran, we don’t want a regime change war, and we want to lift the sanctions that are hurting everyday Iranians.
https://www.codepink.org/iranaction
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The Trump administration is escalating its attack on Cuba, cutting off the island’s access to oil in a deliberate attempt to induce famine and mass suffering. This is collective punishment, plain and simple.
In response, we’re releasing a public Call to Conscience, already signed by influential public figures, elected officials, artists, and organizations—including 22 members of the New York City Council, Kal Penn, Mark Ruffalo, Susan Sarandon, Alice Walker, 50501, Movement for Black Lives, The People’s Forum, IFCO Pastors for Peace, ANSWER Coalition, and many others—demanding an end to this brutal policy.
The letter is open for everyone to sign. Add your name today. Cutting off energy to an island nation is not policy—it is a tactic of starvation.
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Petition to Force Amazon to Cut ICE Contracts!
https://actionnetwork.org/letters/tell-amazon-end-contracts-with-ice/?source=group-amazon-labor-union&referrer=group-amazon-labor-
Amazon Labor Union
Over 600,000 messages have already been sent directly to Amazon board members demanding one thing: Amazon must stop fueling deportations by ending its contracts with ICE and DHS.
ICE and DHS rely on the data infrastructure provided by Amazon Web Services. Their campaign against immigrants and those who stand with them depends on the logistical, financial, and political support of companies like Amazon.
But workers and communities have real power when we act collectively. That’s why we must expose Amazon’s role in the deportation machine. Help us reach 1 million messages and force Amazon to act by signing our petition with The Labor Force today:
Tell Amazon: End contracts with ICE!
On Cyber Monday 2025, Amazon workers rallied outside of Amazon’s NYC headquarters to demand that Amazon stop fueling mass deportations through Amazon Web Services’ contracts with ICE and DHS.
ICE cannot operate without corporate backing; its campaign against immigrants and those who stand with them depends on the logistical, financial, and political support of companies like Amazon. Mega-corporations may appear untouchable, but they are not. Anti-authoritarian movements have long understood that repression is sustained by a network of institutional enablers and when those enablers are disrupted, state violence weakens. Workers and communities have real power when they act collectively. That is why we must expose Amazon’s role in the deportation machine.
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) rely on Amazon Web Services (AWS) as its most commonly used cloud platform. DHS and ICE cannot wage their attack on immigrants without the critical data infrastructure that Amazon Web Services provide, allowing the agencies to collect, analyze, and store the massive amounts of data they need to do their dirty work. Without the power of AWS, ICE would not be able to track and target people at its current scale.
ICE and DHS use Amazon Web Services to collect and store massive amounts of purchased data on immigrants and their friends and family–everything from biometric data, DMV data, cellphone records, and more. And through its contracts with Palantir, DHS is able to scour regional, local, state, and federal databases and analyze and store this data on AWS. All of this information is ultimately used to target immigrants and other members of our communities.
No corporation should profit from oppression and abuse. Yet Amazon is raking in tens of millions of dollars to fuel DHS and ICE, while grossly exploiting its own workers. Can you sign our petition today, demanding that Amazon stop fueling deportations by ending its contracts with DHS and ICE, now?
https://actionnetwork.org/letters/tell-amazon-end-contracts-with-ice/?source=group-amazon-labor-union&referrer=group-amazon-labor-
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End Texas Torture of Revolutionary Elder Xinachtli
Organization Support Letter
Letter to demand the immediate medical treatment and release of Chicano political prisoner Xinachtli (Alvaro Hernandez #00255735)
To the Texas Department of Criminal Justice,
We, the undersigned organizations, write to urge immediate action to protect the life, health, and human rights of Xinachtli (legal name Alvaro Hernandez). Xinachtli is 73-year-old Chicano community organizer from Texas who has spent 23 years in solitary confinement and 30 years incarcerated as part of a 50-year sentence. His health is now in a critical and life-threatening state and requires prompt and comprehensive medical intervention.
Since his conviction in 1997, Xinachtli has spent decades in conditions that have caused significant physical and psychological harm. As an elder in worsening health, these conditions have effectively become a de facto death sentence.
Xinachtli’s current medical condition is severe. His physical, mental, and overall well-being have declined rapidly in recent weeks. He now requires both a wheelchair and a walker, has experienced multiple falls, and is suffering from rapid weight loss. He is currently housed in the McConnell Unit infirmary, where he is receiving only palliative measures and is being denied a medical diagnosis, access to his medical records, and adequate diagnostic testing or treatment.
A virtual clinical visit with licensed medical doctor Dr. Dona Kim Murphey underscores the severity of his condition. In her report of the visit, she wrote: "Given the history of recent neck/back trauma and recurrent urinary tract infections with numbness, weakness, and bowel and bladder incontinence, I am concerned about nerve root or spinal cord injury and/or abscesses that can lead to permanent sensorimotor dysfunction."
Despite his age and visible disabilities, he remains in solitary confinement under the Security Threat Group designation as a 73-year-old. During his time in the infirmary, prison staff threw away all of his belongings and “lost” his commissary card, leaving him completely without basic necessities. He is experiencing hunger, and the lack of consistent nutrition is worsening his medical condition. McConnell Unit staff have also consistently given him incorrect forms, including forms for medical records and medical visitation, creating further barriers to care and communication.
A family visit on November 29 confirmed the seriousness of his condition. Xinachtli, who was once able to walk on his own, can no longer stand without assistance. He struggled to breathe, has lost more than 30 pounds, relied heavily on his wheelchair, and was in severe pain throughout the visit.
In light of these conditions, we, the undersigned organizations, demand that TDCJ take immediate action to save Xinachtli’s life and comply with its legal and ethical obligations.
We urge the immediate implementation of the following actions:
Immediate re-instatement of his access to commissary to buy hygiene, food, and other critical items. Immediate transfer to the TDCJ hospital in Galveston for a full medical evaluation and treatment, including complete access to his medical records and full transparency regarding all procedures. Transfer to a geriatric and medical unit that is fully accessible under the Americans with Disabilities Act. Xinachtli requests placement at the Richard P LeBlanc Unit in Beaumont, Texas. Approval of Medical Recommended Intensive Supervision, the release program for individuals with serious medical conditions and disabilities, in recognition of the severity and progression of his current health issues. Failure to act will result in the continued and foreseeable deterioration of Xinachtli’s health, amounting to state-sanctioned death. We urge TDCJ to take swift and decisive action to meet these requests and to fulfill its responsibility to safeguard his life and well-being.
We stand united in calling for immediate and decisive action. Xinachtli’s life depends on it.
Signed, Xinachtli Freedom Campaign and supporting organizations
Endorsing Organizations:
Al-Awda Houston; All African People’s Revolutionary Party; Anakbayan Houston; Anti-Imperialist Solidarity; Artists for Black Lives' Equality; Black Alliance for Peace - Solidarity Network; Columbia University Students for a Democratic Society; Community Liberation Programs; Community Powered ATX; Contra Gentrificación; Diaspora Pa’lante Collective; Down South; DSA Emerge; Entre nos kc; Fighting Racism Workshops; Frontera Water Protectors; GC Harm Reductionists; JERICHO MOVEMENT; Jericho Movement Providence; Montrose Anarchist Collective; NYC Jericho Movement; OC Focus; Palestine Solidarity TX; Partisan Defense Committee; Partido Nacional de la Raza Unida; PDX Anti-Repression; Red Star Texas; Root Cause; San Francisco Solidarity Collective; Shine White Support Team; Sunrise Columbia; UC San Diego Faculty for Justice in Palestine; Viva Palestina, EPTX; Water Justice and Technology Studio; Workshops4Gaza.
Sign the endorsement letter for your organization here:
https://cryptpad.fr/form/#/2/form/view/MiR1f+iLiRBJC7gSTyfhyxJoLIDhThxRafPatxdbMWI/
IMPORTANT LINKS TO MATERIALS FOR XINACHTLI FREEDOM CAMPAIGN:
PHONE BLAST: Your community can sign up for a 15-minute-long call shift here: bit.ly/xphoneblast
FUNDRAISER: Here is the link to Jericho's fundraiser for Xinachtli: http://givebutter.com/jerichomovement
CASE HISTORY: Learn more about Xinachtli and his case through our website: https://freealvaro.net
CONTACT INFO:
Follow us on Instagram: @freexinachtlinow
Email us:
xinachtlifreedomcampaign@protonmail.com
COALITION FOLDER:
https://drive.proton.me/urls/SP3KTC1RK4#KARGiPQVYIvR
In the folder you will find: Two pictures of Xinachtli from 2024; The latest updated graphics for the phone blast; The original TRO emergency motion filing; Maria Salazar's declaration; Dr. Murphy's report from her Dec. 9 medical visit; Letter from Amnesty International declaring Xinachtli's situation a human rights violation; Free Xinachtli zine (which gives background on him and his case); and The most recent press release detailing who Xinachtli is as well as his medical situation.
Write to:
Alvaro Hernandez CID #00255735
TDCJ-W.G. McConnell Unit
PO Box 660400
Dallas, TX 75266-0400
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Self-portrait by Kevin Cooper
Funds for Kevin Cooper
Kevin was transferred out of San Quentin and is now at a healthcare facility in Stockton. He has received some long overdue healthcare. The art program is very different from the one at San Quentin but we are hopeful that Kevin can get back to painting soon.
For 41 years, an innocent man has been on death row in California.
Kevin Cooper was wrongfully convicted of the brutal 1983 murders of the Ryen family and houseguest. The case has a long history of police and prosecutorial misconduct, evidence tampering, and numerous constitutional violations including many incidences of the prosecution withholding evidence of innocence from the defense. You can learn more here .
In December 2018 Gov. Brown ordered limited DNA testing and in February 2019, Gov. Newsom ordered additional DNA testing. Meanwhile, Kevin remains on Death Row at San Quentin Prison.
The funds raised will be used to help Kevin purchase art supplies for his paintings . Additionally, being in prison is expensive, and this money would help Kevin pay for stamps, books, paper, toiletries, supplies, supplementary food, printing materials to educate the public about his case and/or video calls.
Please help ease the daily struggle of an innocent man on death row!
An immediate act of solidarity we can all do right now is to write to Kevin and assure him of our continuing support in his fight for justice. Here’s his address:
Kevin Cooper #C65304
Cell 107, Unit E1C
California Health Care Facility, Stockton (CHCF)
P.O. Box 213040
Stockton, CA 95213
www.freekevincooper.org
Call California Governor Newsom:
1-(916) 445-2841
Press 1 for English or 2 for Spanish,
press 6 to speak with a representative and
wait for someone to answer
(Monday-Friday, 9:00 A.M. to 5:00 P.M. PST—12:00 P.M. to 8:00 P.M. EST)
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Dr. Atler Still Needs Our Help!
Please sign the petition today!
https://www.change.org/p/texas-state-university-give-tom-alter-his-job-back
What you can do to support:
—Donate to help Tom Alter and his family with living and legal expenses: https://gofund.me/27c72f26d
—Sign and share this petition demanding Tom Alter be given his job back: https://www.change.org/p/texas-state-university-give-tom-alter-his-job-back
—Write to and call the President and Provost at Texas State University demanding that Tom Alter be given his job back:
President Kelly Damphousse: president@txstate.edu
President’s Office Phone: 512-245-2121
Provost Pranesh Aswath: xrk25@txstate.edu
Provost Office Phone: 512-245-2205
For more information about the reason for the firing of Dr. Tom Alter, read:
"Fired for Advocating Socialism: Professor Tom Alter Speaks Out"
Ashley Smith Interviews Dr. Tom Alter
—CounterPunch, September 24, 2025
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 Russia Confirms Jailing of Antiwar Leader Boris Kagarlitsky In a secret trial on June 5, 2024, the Russian Supreme Court’s Military Chamber confirmed a sentence of five years in a penal colony for left-wing sociologist and online journalist Boris Kagarlitsky. His crime? “Justifying terrorism” — a sham charge used to silence opponents of Putin’s war on Ukraine. The court disregarded a plea for freedom sent by thirty-seven international luminaries. Kagarlitsky, a leading Marxist thinker in Russia’s post-Soviet period, recently addressed socialists who won’t criticize Putin: “To my Western colleagues, who…call for an understanding of Putin and his regime, I would like to ask a very simple question. [Would] you want to live in a country where there is no free press or independent courts? In a country where the police have the right to break into your house without a warrant? …In a country which…broadcasts appeals on TV to destroy Paris, London, Warsaw, with a nuclear strike?” Thousands of antiwar critics have been forced to flee Russia or are behind bars, swept up in Putin’s vicious crackdown on dissidents. Opposition to the war is consistently highest among the poorest workers. Recently, RusNews journalists Roman Ivanov and Maria Ponomarenko were sentenced to seven, and six years respectively, for reporting the military’s brutal assault on Ukraine. A massive global solidarity campaign that garnered support from thousands was launched at Kagarlitsky’s arrest. Now, it has been revived. This internationalism will bolster the repressed Russian left and Ukrainian resistance to Putin’s imperialism. To sign the online petition at freeboris.info —Freedom Socialist Party, August 2024 https://socialism.com/fs-article/russia-jails-prominent-antiwar-leader-boris-kagarlitsky/#:~:text=In%20a%20secret%20trial%20on,of%20Putin's%20war%20on%20Ukraine. Petition in Support of Boris KagarlitskyWe, the undersigned, were deeply shocked to learn that on February 13 the leading Russian socialist intellectual and antiwar activist Dr. Boris Kagarlitsky (65) was sentenced to five years in prison. Dr. Kagarlitsky was arrested on the absurd charge of 'justifying terrorism' in July last year. After a global campaign reflecting his worldwide reputation as a writer and critic of capitalism and imperialism, his trial ended on December 12 with a guilty verdict and a fine of 609,000 roubles. The prosecution then appealed against the fine as 'unjust due to its excessive leniency' and claimed falsely that Dr. Kagarlitsky was unable to pay the fine and had failed to cooperate with the court. In fact, he had paid the fine in full and provided the court with everything it requested. On February 13 a military court of appeal sent him to prison for five years and banned him from running a website for two years after his release. The reversal of the original court decision is a deliberate insult to the many thousands of activists, academics, and artists around the world who respect Dr. Kagarlitsky and took part in the global campaign for his release. The section of Russian law used against Dr. Kagarlitsky effectively prohibits free expression. The decision to replace the fine with imprisonment was made under a completely trumped-up pretext. Undoubtedly, the court's action represents an attempt to silence criticism in the Russian Federation of the government's war in Ukraine, which is turning the country into a prison. The sham trial of Dr. Kagarlitsky is the latest in a wave of brutal repression against the left-wing movements in Russia. Organizations that have consistently criticized imperialism, Western and otherwise, are now under direct attack, many of them banned. Dozens of activists are already serving long terms simply because they disagree with the policies of the Russian government and have the courage to speak up. Many of them are tortured and subjected to life-threatening conditions in Russian penal colonies, deprived of basic medical care. Left-wing politicians are forced to flee Russia, facing criminal charges. International trade unions such as IndustriALL and the International Transport Federation are banned and any contact with them will result in long prison sentences. There is a clear reason for this crackdown on the Russian left. The heavy toll of the war gives rise to growing discontent among the mass of working people. The poor pay for this massacre with their lives and wellbeing, and opposition to war is consistently highest among the poorest. The left has the message and resolve to expose the connection between imperialist war and human suffering. Dr. Kagarlitsky has responded to the court's outrageous decision with calm and dignity: “We just need to live a little longer and survive this dark period for our country,” he said. Russia is nearing a period of radical change and upheaval, and freedom for Dr. Kagarlitsky and other activists is a condition for these changes to take a progressive course. We demand that Boris Kagarlitsky and all other antiwar prisoners be released immediately and unconditionally. We also call on the auth *..........*..........*..........*..........*..........*..........*..........* *..........*..........*..........*..........*..........*..........*..........* |
Mumia Abu-Jamal is Innocent!
FREE HIM NOW!
Write to Mumia at:
Smart Communications/PADOC
Mumia Abu-Jamal #AM-8335
SCI Mahanoy
P.O. Box 33028
St. Petersburg, FL 33733
Join the Fight for Mumia's Life
Since September, Mumia Abu-Jamal's health has been declining at a concerning rate. He has lost weight, is anemic, has high blood pressure and an extreme flair up of his psoriasis, and his hair has fallen out. In April 2021 Mumia underwent open heart surgery. Since then, he has been denied cardiac rehabilitation care including a healthy diet and exercise.
He still needs more complicated treatment from a retinal specialist for his right eye if his eyesight is to be saved:
Donate to Mumia Abu-Jamal's Emergency Legal and Medical
Defense Fund
Mumia has instructed PrisonRadio to set up this fund. Gifts donated here are designated for the Mumia Abu-Jamal Medical and Legal Defense Fund. If you are writing a check or making a donation in another way, note this in the memo line.
Send to:
Mumia Medical and Legal Fund c/o Prison Radio
P.O. Box 411074, San Francisco, CA 94103
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Resources for Resisting Federal Repression
https://www.nlg.org/federalrepressionresources/
Since June of 2020, activists have been subjected to an increasingly aggressive crackdown on protests by federal law enforcement. The federal response to the movement for Black Lives has included federal criminal charges for activists, door knocks by federal law enforcement agents, and increased use of federal troops to violently police protests.
The NLG National Office is releasing this resource page for activists who are resisting federal repression. It includes a link to our emergency hotline numbers, as well as our library of Know-Your-Rights materials, our recent federal repression webinar, and a list of some of our recommended resources for activists. We will continue to update this page.
Please visit the NLG Mass Defense Program page for general protest-related legal support hotlines run by NLG chapters.
Emergency Hotlines
If you are contacted by federal law enforcement, you should exercise all of your rights. It is always advisable to speak to an attorney before responding to federal authorities.
State and Local Hotlines
If you have been contacted by the FBI or other federal law enforcement, in one of the following areas, you may be able to get help or information from one of these local NLG hotlines for:
Portland, Oregon: (833) 680-1312
San Francisco, California: (415) 285-1041 or fbi_hotline@nlgsf.org
Seattle, Washington: (206) 658-7963
National Hotline
If you are located in an area with no hotline, you can call the following number:
National NLG Federal Defense Hotline: (212) 679-2811
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Articles
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1) America Is an Oil Exporter. Why Does a Mideast War Raise U.S. Gas Prices?
The U.S.-Israeli attacks on Iran have intensified and the conflict has widened, shaking global energy markets.
By Emmett Lindner, March 10, 2026
A tanker and a cargo ship in Muscat, Oman, on Monday. The war in Iran has affected the shipping of oil through the Strait of Hormuz and the Gulf of Oman. Benoit Tessier/Reuters
The price of gasoline in the United States rose again on Tuesday, to an average of $3.54 a gallon, according to data from the AAA motor club, raising the cost of a fuel many Americans purchase frequently.
That’s an increase of 19 percent in since the United States and Israel attacked Iran, inciting a conflict that has engulfed oil production, storage and shipping from the Persian Gulf to the rest of the world.
In financial markets, concern that oil shipments from the region won’t resume soon has lifted the price of crude oil — the largest factor in the cost of gasoline — about 24 percent in the same period.
The gains show just how vital the Persian Gulf region is to global energy supplies — and how interconnected global energy markets are, even if the United States produces plenty of oil.
Here’s what you need to know.
Who sets gas prices, and how are they determined?
In November the cost of crude oil accounted for about 50 percent of the price of a gallon of regular gasoline, according to the most recent estimate from the Energy Information Administration.
Refining and distribution by big energy companies and taxes account for most of the rest, which is why prices vary regionally. Station owners have a little wiggle room to set the price they charge, usually just a few cents per gallon.
Why does a disruption in the Middle East affect U.S. drivers?
Oil, no matter where it comes from, is priced largely on global supply and demand. Prices can change quickly when supply is cut off by wars or weather, or if demand rises or falls.
The price that American refiners pay is underpinned by benchmarks set in the commodities markets. The two main ones are Brent and West Texas Intermediate, but there are many different oil prices across the globe — determined by where it’s produced and how far into the future it’s expected to be delivered.
By any measure, oil prices have surged: West Texas Intermediate futures are 30 percent higher than before the attacks began.
“When there’s a supply disruption in the Middle East, that raises prices for every barrel of oil in the world,” said Christopher Knittel, associate dean for climate and sustainability at M.I.T. “Those price increases then trickle down to products that use oil, gasoline being the most relevant one.”
But isn’t the United States the world’s largest oil producer?
Yes, but not all American-produced oil can be easily used by American refiners. The United States is a net exporter of petroleum products, which include gasoline, diesel, jet fuel and propane, but it still imports millions of barrels of crude oil.
In December, the United States imported about 200 million barrels of crude oil, according to the Energy Information Administration. That same month, it exported more than 350 million barrels of petroleum products, including 128 million barrels of crude oil.
Fuel made from imported oil often winds up in U.S. gas stations. The type of oil produced in the United States tends to be higher-quality, so-called sweet oil, but domestic refineries are set up to handle heavy and sour oil. It is often more cost efficient to sell the sweet and buy the heavy.
It would be expensive and difficult to reconfigure refineries, said Willy Shih, an international trade expert at Harvard Business School.
Also, a federal law called the Jones Act requires goods shipped between U.S. ports to be carried on American-made and operated vessels, which can sometimes make it more efficient for refiners to import oil than moving it within the country.
Refineries in New Jersey, for example, might import oil from Algeria or Nigeria instead of buying it from Texas.
“You say, ‘Well, how can that make sense?’” Mr. Shih said. “Because that was the most efficient way of transporting it.”
Can the government drive down prices?
Energy experts generally say presidents have little control over oil prices, but the United States does have the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, which can hold up to 714 million barrels of crude. In 2022, as gas prices spiked after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, President Joseph R. Biden Jr. released millions of barrels from the stockpile to help tamp down prices.
But any effect from such sales will likely be temporary. Another option, drilling more, takes time.
“Let’s just say you wanted to open up some environmentally fragile areas up for oil drilling to respond to this oil shock,” Mr. Knittel said. “Those barrels of oil aren’t going to get online for upward of six months.”
What has the Trump administration said?
On Monday, top officials from the United States and six other industrialized nations, known as the Group of 7, signaled that they were not yet worried about running short of fuel.
President Trump has also roiled markets with conflicting messages about the war. He said in a Monday phone interview with a CBS News reporter that the war “is very complete, pretty much.”
A few hours later he warned of even more aggressive action if Iranian leaders tried to cut off the world’s energy supply.
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2) Trump Antisemitism Inquiry Demanding List of Jews at Penn Heads to Court
The Trump administration, which said it is investigating harassment, sued the University of Pennsylvania after it refused a request to provide information about Jewish students and staff.
By Alan Blinder and Michael C. Bender, March 10, 2026
Alan Blinder and Michael C. Bender have been covering the Trump administration’s pressure campaign on higher education. They welcome tips at nytimes.com/tips.
Jacob Naimark, a law student at the University of Pennsylvania, has worried ever since he learned that Trump administration investigators had demanded that his school turn over the names of many Jewish people on campus.
“It was disturbing,” said Mr. Naimark, a co-president of the school’s Jewish Law Students Association, adding: “We know very well the history of governments assembling lists of Jews does not end well.”
On Tuesday, a federal judge in Philadelphia is considering whether the government’s tactics went too far.
The government has argued it was investigating harassment and other potential episodes of antisemitism on campus, including some related to campus protests over the war in Gaza. But the request upset many Jewish faculty and students, and Penn has refused to comply, calling the Trump administration’s demands unconstitutional and “disconcerting.” Some say the campaign to force the university to give information about Jewish people makes them feel less safe, in part because it recalls the methods of Nazi-era Germany.
The two sides are meeting in court after the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission asked a judge, Gerald J. Pappert, to enforce a subpoena requiring Penn to turn over the information. Mr. Naimark’s group is among those that have joined the case opposing the government.
The Trump administration has repeatedly adopted a hard line toward elite universities, which it regards as opposed to its ideology and as hot spots of discrimination. Last year, the government paused $175 million in federal funding to Penn amid a dispute about a transgender swimmer, before it reached a settlement with the university.
The antisemitism case is testing how far the government can go to investigate its suspicions about American universities. It could determine how aggressively the Trump administration pursues inquiries on other campuses.
The E.E.O.C. has argued to Judge Pappert that there is nothing out of the ordinary about its investigation. A commissioner, Andrea R. Lucas, a Penn alumna, launched the case in 2023, asserting that she believed Penn had “engaged in a pattern or practice of harassment based on national origin, religion and/or race against Jewish employees.” Ms. Lucas is now the chairwoman of the E.E.O.C.
She said the allegations were based on information published in news reports and congressional testimony, among other sources.
In March 2025, the commission asked for a range of records, including complaints about antisemitism. It also asked for a list of “all clubs, groups, organizations and recreation groups” that were “related to the Jewish religion, faith, ancestry/national origin,” as well as membership rosters of those groups, so it can speak with students and faculty members about discrimination on campus.
It also sought a list of employees in Penn’s Jewish Studies Program since November 2022. After Penn balked, the commission issued a subpoena for the records and added more demands, including notes taken during “listening sessions” of a campus antisemitism task force.
Instead, Penn, according to its court filings, told the commission it was willing to inform all employees about the inquiry and how to contact the commission directly.
The government refused the offer as unworkable and said it was not seeking to “imperil any individual.” In a court filing last month, Trump officials called the request routine and the criticism speculative.
In an earlier filing, the commission said that Penn was waging “an intensive and relentless public relations campaign” that yielded “dark prognosticating.”
A spokesman for the E.E.O.C. declined to comment. The commission’s case was filed by Debra Lawrence, a veteran civil rights lawyer who was named the top lawyer for the commission’s Philadelphia district in 2010.
Penn declined to make an administrator available for an interview for this article, and university officials have repeatedly declined to comment beyond court filings. Penn’s legal team includes Debo P. Adegbile, a former member of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, and Seth P. Waxman, a former U.S. solicitor general, who are partners at WilmerHale.
In one filing in January, the university argued that the government’s approach was unwarranted because Ms. Lucas’s charge failed “to identify a single allegedly unlawful employment practice or incident involving employees.”
Among other contentions, the university has also argued that the government’s demands threaten employees’ First Amendment right of association, and that the university does not even possess some of the information the commission has subpoenaed.
Some at Penn say the case has unified the campus after years of acrimony tied to the campus protests.
“Somehow, the E.E.O.C. has managed to find the one thing in the last three years that at least everybody I’ve talked to agrees on,” said Lorena Grundy, the vice president of Penn’s chapter of the American Association of University Professors, which has also joined the case.
“There’s a lot of division right now,” she added, but “I have not talked to a single person who wants the list of information to be released.”
Dr. Grundy did not know how many A.A.U.P. members might be affected by the subpoena. “I don’t have a list, and I shouldn’t have a list,” she said. “There shouldn’t be a list!”
The E.E.O.C. has been central in other Trump administration’s negotiations with top universities. It has broad powers to investigate discrimination, and universities routinely cooperate with government investigations of all kinds.
But the Penn inquiry has revived concerns about the aggressive tactics the Trump administration is using to stamp out antisemitism.
“It’s good for governments to be concerned about prejudice and to combat it,” said Steven Weitzman, the director of Penn’s Katz Center for Advanced Judaic Studies. “But the tactics from the Trump administration have been too coercive.”
Mr. Naimark, whose grandfather survived the Holocaust, said he did not believe that the sharing of the names would swiftly lead to a “second Holocaust.” But, he said, he and others feared what could happen if the list fell into the hands of a bad actor inside or outside the government.
“We’d like to sound the alarm before there’s a five-alarm fire,” he said.
Dr. Grundy warned that a victory for the E.E.O.C. could lead to similar scenarios for other institutions, because the commission’s purview extends beyond universities.
“It is absolutely the slipperiest of slopes,” she said.
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3) U.S. Solar Installations Fell in 2025 as Trump Attacked Clean Energy
More solar energy was added to U.S. grids than any other technology, but the amount installed fell by 14 percent, according to a new report.
By Ivan Penn, March 10, 2026
A solar field in Riesel, Texas, in 2023. Solar power is projected to account for just over half of the new power projects that will be added this year. Mason Trinca for The New York Times
Solar power installations declined in the United States last year, as the Trump administration sought to impede the growth of renewable energy, according to an industry report released on Tuesday.
Solar energy maintained its position as the largest source of new electricity generation added to the electric grid, but the amount added was 14 percent lower than in 2024, according to the report and data published by the Solar Energy Industries Association and Wood Mackenzie, an energy research firm.
Last year was much better for battery storage installations, which increased to their highest annual level, the report said. Trump administration officials have not criticized batteries as much as they have criticized solar and wind power.
“The emphasis in federal energy policy that happened throughout 2025 on fossil fuels and a kind of a move away from renewables definitely made an impact on the solar industry, to be sure,” said Michelle Davis, head of global solar at Wood Mackenzie Power & Renewables. “It’s undeniable.”
It is too early to say how the war with Iran, which has sharply driven up the prices of oil and natural gas, will affect renewable energy. A sustained rise in those costs could push businesses and individuals worldwide to buy more solar panels and batteries. But some policymakers may respond by pulling back clean energy goals and increase subsidies for fossil fuels.
The U.S. government began making drastic changes to energy policies when President Trump returned to office. Last summer, the Energy Department announced plans to cut hundreds of millions of dollars from federal renewable energy and efficiency programs, largely targeting solar and wind power. Other government departments and agencies have stalled environmental and other reviews of wind and solar projects.
Mr. Trump’s energy secretary, Chris Wright, has frequently criticized renewable energy, describing it as inadequate and unreliable while praising and directing more federal funding to coal, natural gas and nuclear projects.
“Beyond the obvious scale and cost problems, there is simply no physical way wind, solar and batteries could replace the myriad uses of natural gas,” Mr. Wright, a former oil and gas executive, said last year at CERAWeek by S&P Global, an annual energy conference in Houston.
Yet the Energy Information Administration, a division of the Energy Department, still projects that solar power will account for just over half of the new power projects this year. More than half of those new installations are expected in Texas, Arizona, California and Michigan.
“We expect 2026 to be another big year for solar additions,” the agency said in a statement last month.
Mr. Wright and other administration officials have taken a softer position on the batteries as large as shipping containers used by energy companies and other businesses to store and discharge power. Many battery projects are being approved and built, especially in California and Texas.
Solar and battery installations are also growing in other countries, with solar panels leading all forms of new power generation worldwide. Wood Mackenzie expects global solar additions to triple by 2035, with countries like India and Saudi Arabia leading the way.
At the same time, growth of solar energy is starting to slow or decline in countries, like the United States and China, that have been adding a lot of renewable energy capacity for many years.
China is expected to experience a 32 percent drop in solar installations this year, largely because recent policy changes effectively reduced the profits of solar energy companies. Solar additions globally are expected to decline by a fifth as a result.
Despite the slowing of new installations, the solar industry could grow rapidly outside the United States and China.
The greater use of solar panels is one of the main reasons that the energy industry is adding a lot of batteries, which can soak up excess electricity generated during the day for use at night and in the early morning.
Last year, U.S. energy storage installations grew 30 percent above the previous record, set the prior year, and were four times what the industry installed just three years ago.
Businesses, including electric utilities, and individuals are both installing batteries. Many people buy batteries as part of a home solar system. But homeowners are also increasingly buying stand-alone batteries to protect themselves against power outages.
Solar and batteries can help individuals and businesses reduce electricity costs and support the electric grid, which is struggling with rising demand for energy. Utilities also are contending with the need to upgrade and repair aging equipment and prepare for extreme weather.
“Deployment is rising fast, but without a course correction from federal actions targeting the industry, Americans will face higher electricity prices and a less resilient energy system,” said Darren Van’t Hof, interim president and chief executive of the Solar Energy Industries Association.
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4) Cancer Haunts Neighbors of Canada’s Oil Sands Wastelands
Though high rates of the disease persist among the nearby Indigenous communities, the Canadian government is weighing rules that may allow energy giants to release treated mining waste into the river system.
By Emily Baumgaertner Nunn, March 10, 2026
Emily Baumgaertner Nunn reported from Fort Chipewyan, Fort McKay and Fort McMurray, Alberta.
A Syncrude facility near Fort McMurray, Alberta. Pat Kane for The New York Times
In a tiny hamlet of the Canadian subarctic, something was wrong with the fish.
Indigenous elders and university scientists stood over a tarp of dissected walleye on the banks of a channel near Fort Chipewyan, Alberta. The scientists clutched clipboards as they analyzed humpbacks, lesions, discolored scales and outsize livers. An elder, who had long relied on the waterway’s marine life for sustenance, knew simply by first glance: “No good.”
It was five days into their investigation on the freshwater Chenal des Quatre Fourches, in a place everyone just called Cutfish. They had pitched tents among the diamond willow and settled in for a week of dissections — their best chance at understanding the contaminants they believed were plaguing the food supply from one of the largest industrial operations on Earth.
That operation was more than 100 miles upstream, where energy companies, including a subsidiary of Exxon Mobil, were drilling for a viscous form of petroleum called bitumen, using water from the Athabasca River to extract it from deposits that stretch out beneath some 140,000 square kilometers of boreal forest. Massive pools of toxic waste with known carcinogens — their collective volumes estimated at more than half a million Olympic-size swimming pools — sit near the river, and an analysis suggests they are leaking around 11 million liters per day into the groundwater. As oil-company operations have increased, so have bouts of unexplained illness among residents of Fort Chipewyan.
Now, the Canadian government is weighing regulations that could allow the companies to release the oil sands wastewater directly into the river system, so long as they first use filtration systems, microorganisms or other methods to reduce contaminants to safe levels. But scientists say there are no safe levels of exposure to some carcinogenic components — and no proven methods for fully eliminating them.
Environmental experts are worried about implications well beyond Fort Chipewyan, since the Athabasca River runs north through Alberta and the Northwest Territories, ultimately joining a vast river system that empties into the Arctic Ocean. They say pollution from the oil sands could threaten biodiversity and the waterway’s climate-stabilizing properties — and could share contaminants from the mining waste, known as tailings, with the rest of the world.
When the last walleye was examined, elders from the three Indigenous groups in Fort Chipewyan gathered in a tent for an emergency meeting. It wasn’t just the fish, they agreed: The muskrat dens had all but disappeared. The wild tern eggs were contaminated with mercury. Petroleum sheens were collecting around the water caves. And the rate of rare cancers in the hamlet was high. There were fewer than a thousand residents, but lately, there seemed to be a funeral every week, sometimes two.
“I don’t care how many times they treat that contaminated water — it’s going to end up here,” said Alice Martin, a Mikisew Cree elder with feathery gray bangs who was pleading with others to help make a plan to fight the oil companies. “We can’t depend on others to say what is important to us. It’s time. Because we’re going to die out.”
The wind rushed in from the marshlands, and the smell of mint tea wafted from a fire nearby. Ron Campbell, an elder who spent six decades in Fort Chipewyan, cleared his throat.
“For thousands of years, we have lived off this delta,” he said, adjusting his Toronto Blue Jays baseball cap. “It’s in our genetic makeup to hunt, trap, fish, gather. Now the food that kept us alive for thousands of years is killing us. Where do they expect us to go?”
Decades of Worry
From above, the oil sands tailings are a study in explosive growth.
In 1975, their footprint in the Fort McMurray region was smaller than one square mile.
By 2000, the tailings grew more than 30 times larger.
They now cover an area greater than 115 square miles, more than twice the size of Vancouver.
As the tailings ponds leak waste, doctors are worried about the health effects in communities downstream.
Source: Landsat. By Blacki Migliozzi/The New York Times
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5) U.S. at Fault in Strike on School in Iran, Preliminary Inquiry Says
Outdated targeting data may have resulted in a mistaken missile strike, according to the ongoing military investigation, which undercuts President Trump’s assertion that Iran could be to blame.
By Julian E. Barnes, Eric Schmitt, Tyler Pager, Malachy Browne and Helene Cooper, March 11, 2026
The reporters have been covering the U.S.-Israeli war against Iran.
An ongoing military investigation has determined that the United States is responsible for a deadly Tomahawk missile strike on an Iranian elementary school, according to U.S. officials and others familiar with the preliminary findings.
The Feb. 28 strike on the Shajarah Tayyebeh elementary school building was the result of a targeting mistake by the U.S. military, which was conducting strikes on an adjacent Iranian base of which the school building was formerly a part, the preliminary investigation found. Officers at U.S. Central Command created the target coordinates for the strike using outdated data provided by the Defense Intelligence Agency, people briefed on the investigation said.
Officials emphasized that the findings are preliminary and that there are important unanswered questions about why the outdated information had not been double checked.
Striking a school full of children is sure to be recorded as one of the most devastating single military errors in recent decades. Iranian officials have said the death toll was at least 175 people, most of them children.
While the overall finding was largely expected — the United States is the only country involved in the conflict that uses Tomahawk missiles — it has already cast a shadow on the U.S. military operation in Iran.
President Trump’s attempts to sidestep the blame for the strike have also already complicated the inquiry, leaving officials who have reviewed the findings showing U.S. culpability expressing unease. The people interviewed for this story spoke on the condition of anonymity, citing the sensitive nature of the ongoing investigation and Mr. Trump’s assertion at one point that Iran, not the United States, was responsible.
“As The New York Times acknowledges in its own reporting, the investigation is still ongoing,” Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, said in a statement.
People briefed on the investigation said many questions were yet to be answered around why outdated information was used and who failed to verify the data.
Still, the error has not surprised current and former officials.
The school, in the town of Minab, is on the same block as buildings used by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Navy, a top target of the U.S. military strikes. The site of the school was originally part of the base. Officials briefed on the inquiry said the building was not always used as a school, though it is not clear precisely when the school opened on the site.
A visual investigation by The Times showed the building housing the school had been fenced off from the military base between 2013 and 2016.
Satellite imagery reviewed by The Times showed that watchtowers that once stood near the building had been removed, three public entrances were opened to the school, ground was cleared and play areas including a sports field were painted on asphalt, and walls were painted blue and pink.
The “target coding” provided by the Defense Intelligence Agency, the military intelligence agency that helps develops targets, labeled the school building as a military target when it was passed to Central Command, the military headquarters overseeing the war, according to people briefed on the preliminary findings of the investigation.
Investigators do not yet fully understand how the outdated data was sent to Central Command or whether the Defense Intelligence Agency had updated information.
Military targeting is very complex and involves multiple agencies. Many officers would have been responsible for verifying that the data is correct, and officers at Central Command are responsible for checking the information they receive from the Defense Intelligence Agency or another intelligence agency. But in a fast-moving situation, like the opening days of a war, information is sometimes not verified.
In addition to the Defense Intelligence Agency and Central Command, investigators are examining the work of the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, known as the N.G.A., which provides and examines satellite imagery of potential targets.
U.S. officials and others emphasized that the investigation was ongoing and there was more to learn, according to people briefed on the inquiry. Officials from Central Command declined to comment. Officials from the Defense Intelligence Agency referred questions to the Pentagon, which declined to comment, saying the incident was under investigation. The National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The Defense Intelligence Agency and the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency have dozens, even hundreds, of analysts at combatant commands who work with military operational planners and intelligence offices to develop targets.
When the Defense Intelligence Agency’s targeting data is older, intelligence officers are expected to use imagery or data from the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency to update and verify the target.
While Mr. Trump has made targeting Iran’s navy a top priority of the war to prevent it from interfering with global commerce in the region, historically it is not been a top priority of the Defense Intelligence Agency, which has focused more on Iran’s missiles and other priorities like China and North Korea.
Officials conducting the investigation have examined whether any artificial intelligence models, data crunching programs or other technical intelligence gathering means were to blame for the mistaken targeting of the school, according to U.S. officials.
While Claude, the large language model created by Anthropic, does not directly create targets, it works with the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency’s Maven Smart System and other software to identify points of interest for military intelligence officers.
But officials said the error was unlikely to have been the result of new technology. Instead, they said, it likely reflected a common — but sometimes devastating — human error in wartime.
The top line finding of the internal military investigation mirrors a growing body of public evidence that clearly suggests U.S. responsibility.
Satellite imagery, social media posts and verified videos assembled by The Times visual investigation team indicate that the school was severely damaged by a precision strike that occurred around the same time as attacks on the naval base. A Times analysis showed that base was hit again within around two hours of the first strikes.
A video uploaded Sunday by Iran’s semiofficial Mehr News Agency and verified by The Times also shows a Tomahawk cruise missile striking the naval base beside the school in Minab on Feb. 28.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and other administration officials have declined to comment on the strike, other than to say it is under investigation. Despite that, the president has tried at times to put the blame on Iran.
“In my opinion, based on what I’ve seen, that was done by Iran,” Mr. Trump told reporters on Air Force One on Saturday, as Mr. Hegseth stood beside him, adding: “They’re very inaccurate, as you know, with their munitions. They have no accuracy whatsoever. It was done by Iran.”
On Monday, a Times reporter asked Mr. Trump why he was the only official in his administration blaming Iran. “Because I just don’t know enough about it,” Mr. Trump answered, asserting incorrectly that Iran might also have Tomahawk missiles but adding that he would accept the results of the inquiry into what happened.
Although most presidents might refrain from commenting or couch their statements while an investigation is underway, Mr. Trump has not hesitated to weigh in, and has not fully backed down even as evidence has mounted of U.S. culpability.
On Tuesday, Ms. Leavitt, the White House press secretary, reiterated that Mr. Trump would accept the findings of the investigation.
While the investigation into the school is not complete, the use of old data evoked the biggest misstep of the Kosovo war.
In 1999, old, outdated maps and poor tradecraft led the C.I.A. to provide erroneous targeting data to the military, resulting in an airstrike on the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade that killed three Chinese citizens. The C.I.A. wrongly assessed that the building was the headquarters of a Yugoslav arms agency.
“Database maintenance is one of the basic elements of our intelligence effort, but it is also one that has suffered in recent years as our work force has been spread thin,” George J. Tenet, the C.I.A. director at the time, told a congressional committee in 1999.
Military planners assumed the intelligence agency had verified the site and ordered the strike.
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6) The Weapons of War
We have a guide to the primary weapons being used in the current conflict.
By John Ismay, I cover the military., March 11, 2026
The war on Iran is being fought not on the ground but in the sky. Here is a guide to the primary weapons each nation is using to achieve its objectives.
The United States and Israel
They opened this war by moving two Navy aircraft carriers — along with dozens of Air Force fighters, bombers and refueling planes — into the region. Three destroyers escort each carrier, armed with a variety of offensive and defensive missiles.
When the war commenced, the first wave of the bombardment used weapons, like the AGM-154 glide bomb, that could be launched far beyond the reach of Iran’s defenses.
What it does: When a glide bomb is dropped from a plane like an F/A-18 Super Hornet, the munition’s wings swing out, providing lift for a long, quiet flight to its target. Rotating tail fins use GPS to steer the bomb. Some models can hit moving targets.
How far it goes: More than 80 miles.
How it’s used: One variant is a cluster weapon that blankets enemy air-defense sites with bomblets. Another version contains a warhead with the equivalent of about 200 pounds of TNT.
Who makes it: Raytheon.
How much it costs: $578,000 to $836,000.
How many the U.S. has: The Navy bought 3,000 of them nearly two decades ago.
Now the Defense Department says the military has destroyed Iran’s air defense and will switch to using far less expensive “general purpose” bombs that are dropped much closer to their targets. They come in three sizes: 500, 1,000 and 2,000 pounds.
Source: U.S. Air Force and Beyond Precision, report by Tyler Hacker, Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments. The New York Times
What it does: It falls down and blows things up. It is guided by GPS signals and can be programmed to explode just above its target or on impact.
How far it goes: Depending on the altitude of the aircraft that drops it, this weapon can travel up to 15 miles.
How it’s used: Of the three sizes of warheads available, the 500-pound version is most commonly used. Designed to work in all kinds of weather and cost about half the price of laser-guided bombs, the Joint Direct Attack Munition became the Pentagon’s go-to tool for airstrikes during the post-Sept. 11 wars. These bombs land within about 30 feet of their targets with roughly 200 pounds of explosives.
Who makes it: Paligen Technologies and Boeing.
How much it costs: The warhead costs about $1,000, and the guidance kit runs about $38,000.
How many the U.S. has: Likely hundreds of thousands.
Iran
Commanders there are fighting back with missiles and drones across the region. They don’t have much in the way of air defenses or an air force anymore. Their main offensive weapons are medium-range ballistic missiles like the Shahab-3.
What it does: It launches from the ground and flies up to 250 miles above the Earth’s surface, where there’s less aerodynamic drag. Then it arcs down and falls toward its target.
How far it goes: More than 1,200 miles.
How it’s used: These missiles have aimed at cities in Israel and infrastructure across the Gulf — refineries, air-defense radars and military buildings. The Shahab-3 is believed to be accurate to roughly 150 feet and carries a 1,500-pound warhead.
Who makes it: Iran’s Aviation Industries Organization. It’s based on North Korea’s Nodong missile.
How much it costs: Unknown.
How many Iran has: Unknown, but U.S. intelligence agencies say Iran’s arsenal of medium-range ballistic missiles is “substantial.”
To avoid the countermeasures that intercept and destroy their missiles, Iranians also use drones. The main one is the Shahed-136.
What it does: It’s essentially a crudely made, propeller-driven cruise missile.
How far it goes: Up to 1,500 miles.
How it’s used: The Shahed-136 is slow (about 115 miles per hour), but it flies at a low altitude, making it difficult to spot by radar. The drone uses GPS to find its target, and the 90-pound warhead explodes on impact.
Who makes it: Iran Aircraft Manufacturing Company.
How much it costs: $35,000, analysts think.
How many Iran has: Likely thousands.
After a Tomahawk missile destroyed a girls’ school in southern Iran and killed dozens of students, President Trump said the weapon may have been Iran’s. But only a few nations possess the Tomahawk, and the Islamic Republic is not known to be one of them.
Persian Gulf nations and Israel
These countries are on the receiving end of Iran’s retaliatory strikes, so they’ve been working to shoot down drones — the tech for this is evolving rapidly — and missiles. Their most reliable tool is the Patriot system.
What it does and how it works: A Patriot battery consists of a control van and one or more missile launchers and radars. When the radar spots an incoming threat, soldiers make the decision to shoot or not, based on where it’s heading.
What it defends against: The Patriot can shoot down planes, helicopters and missiles up to an altitude of 80,000 feet. There are three different Patriot missiles for different kinds of targets. (You don’t use the same weapon to strike a slow-flying aircraft and a ballistic missile moving at five times the speed of sound.)
How it’s used: Patriots create a bubble of protection — up to 100 miles in any direction — around high-value locations such as government buildings, military sites and power plants.
Who makes it: Raytheon.
How much it costs: $2 million to $4 million per missile.
Who has them: In the Middle East region, Bahrain, Israel, Kuwait, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.
To account for attacks from Hamas and Iran, Israel developed the most robust air-defense network in the Middle East — much of it designed and made domestically. The Pentagon even purchased one Israeli system, called Iron Dome, for its own use.
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7) They Don’t Want Their Company’s Surveillance Tool Used by ICE
Thomson Reuters, best known for its media outlet and legal research tools, provides an investigative tool to immigration enforcers. Its Minnesota employees want that to stop.
By Kashmir Hill, March 11, 2026
Thomson Reuters is a $50 billion Toronto-based company that owns the Reuters news service. Its widely used legal research tool, Westlaw, has operations based in the suburbs of Minneapolis. Jeenah Moon/Reuters
The size of the contract, in the realm of federal contracts, was not huge: $22.8 million.
But it has shaken employees of Thomson Reuters for two reasons. The government agency is Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and the employees’ location is Minnesota.
Thomson Reuters is a $50 billion Toronto-based company that owns the Reuters news service. It also operates a widely used legal research tool, Westlaw, whose operations are based in the suburbs of Minneapolis. Thousands of the company’s employees live there.
Operation Metro Surge, as the government called the influx of thousands of ICE agents to Minneapolis in December, directly affected their lives. One employee said ICE agents had raided his child’s school. Another bought groceries for immigrant neighbors who were afraid to leave their homes. Two had carried whistles to alert community members when ICE agents were spotted.
So when employees learned that the company was providing ICE with investigative software to pull public and private information about individuals, and to track license plates, it felt personal and they mobilized.
More than 200 Thomson Reuters employees have signed a letter to management asking that the company not renew the ICE contract when it expires in May. (Ten employees spoke to The New York Times, but asked that their names not be used for fear of retaliation.)
“We have experienced our neighbors, friends and family members undergoing arrests and detention, intimidation and harassment, and public violence,” the letter said. We “question if our investigative products and services are being used in accordance with our mission and values, as well as in accordance with the law and our nation’s Constitution.”
In an emailed statement, a Thomson Reuters spokeswoman, Julia Commons, said that the company did not comment on specific contracts, but that it worked with customers “to support investigations into areas of national security and public safety.” The statement continued: “We remain committed to this mission while maintaining strong safeguards that ensure our products and services are used in accordance with our contractual terms and applicable law.”
During President Trump’s first term, tech employees and top tech executives criticized aggressive immigration policies, including a ban on visitors from some Muslim-majority countries. But his second administration has received a more muted response from the C-suite, and that is causing unrest among some workers, particularly after the surge in Minneapolis and the killing of two protesters, Renee Good and Alex Pretti, by federal agents. Since their deaths, more than 2,000 technology workers have signed a public letter condemning ICE’s actions and pressuring their companies to cancel contracts with the agency.
The pressure campaign within Thomson Reuters, which was reported earlier by The Minnesota Star Tribune, was set off by an Instagram post.
On Jan. 24, the day Mr. Pretti was killed in Minneapolis, a labor studies professor posted what he called the “Top Corporate Collaborators” with Immigration and Custom Enforcement.
“ICE can’t function without the private sector,” wrote Eric Blanc, an assistant professor of labor studies at Rutgers University.
The post, which got 99,000 likes, was just a list of 17 companies, without any accompanying evidence, but it caught the attention of a Thomson Reuters worker in Minnesota.
The worker shared the image on the internal communication platform used by the company’s 27,000 employees. “I was extremely troubled to find Thomson Reuters on this list,” he wrote, in a message reviewed by The Times.
It kicked off a conversation about why the company was on the list. Three employees told The Times that this was how they had learned that the company provided investigative tools to the government and that it had a $22.8 million contract with ICE.
The company turned off comments on the post, saying the corporate channel was intended to “foster productive conversations that move our business and community forward.” But the conversation continued. Hundreds of employees moved first to a new channel to keep talking and, when they thought it was being monitored, to the encrypted messaging platform Signal. A dozen employees formed “The Committee to Restore Trust” to draft the letter to management.
Employees who spoke with The Times do not work for the subsidiary that has the contract with ICE. That subsidiary, Thomson Reuters Special Services, or TRSS, is based in Virginia, and its website says it “helps customers identify and manage risk.”
It troubled the Minnesota-based employees that part of their company would allow a user to know a person’s identity and address by searching a license plate number. They knew people who had been intimidated by ICE agents. A legal complaint last month from the American Civil Liberties Union of Minnesota described episodes in which ICE agents looked up the personal information of peaceful protesters and intimidated them by reciting their names and, with knowledge of their addresses, leading them home in violation, the organization claims, of their constitutional rights.
The lawsuit describes how one resident, Emily Beltz, followed an ICE sport utility vehicle into a parking lot with her car. An agent leaned out the window and shouted, “Emily, Emily, we’re going to take you home,” then read out her home address.
Ultimately the employees want to know if the company’s software is being used to harass their communities, and the response they have gotten from Thomson Reuters managers and executives has not reassured them.
Employees also found that a minority shareholder in Thomson Reuters, the British Columbia General Employees’ Union, has been pressuring the company since 2020 to ensure that its investigative tools comply with human rights.
“Thomson Reuters is the gas in the tank that helps power the government’s immigration machinery,” said Emma Pullman, the head of shareholder engagement and responsible investment at the union. “We are currently engaging with the company about human rights due diligence and governance of A.I.-enabled products.”
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8) Iran War Live Updates: New Supreme Leader Issues Defiant Statement Amid Growing Disruption to Global Oil Supplies
Iranian state media said Mojtaba Khamenei had released his first written statement as supreme leader, vowing that Iran would continue to block the Strait of Hormuz, a vital oil route. Global oil markets have been roiled by the war.
Aurelien Breeden, Rebecca Elliott, Erika Solomon and John Yoon, March 12, 2026
Mojtaba Khamenei, Iran’s new supreme leader, struck a defiant tone on Thursday in his first known public comments since succeeding his slain father, vowing to keep blocking the Strait of Hormuz, a vital oil route, and to avenge “the blood of the martyrs.”
In written statements carried by Iranian state media, Mr. Khamenei said Iran would pursue “an effective and regret-inducing defense” and “the lever of blocking the Strait of Hormuz must also continue to be used.”
The comments were likely to add further instability to oil markets. Iran has threatened attacks on shipments through the Strait of Hormuz, which is normally a conduit for one-fifth of the world’s oil. Iraq and Oman closed oil terminals on Thursday after two tankers were attacked and left burning off Iraq’s coast, as the International Energy Agency warned that the war in the Middle East had caused “the largest supply disruption in the history of the global oil market.”
Oil prices have surged despite a coordinated effort by the United States and other major economies to calm markets by pledging to release emergency reserves. The U.S. administration, too, has tried to soothe fears, with Chris Wright, the U.S. energy secretary, telling CNN on Thursday that “the world is very well supplied with oil right now.” In an earlier CNBC interview, Mr. Wright said that the U.S. Navy could begin escorting ships through the strait by the end of the month.
In his statement, Mr. Khamenei also threatened more strikes on U.S. military bases in the region. Countries in the Persian Gulf that host those bases “must have realized that America’s claim of establishing security and peace has been nothing more than a lie,” he said.
Mr. Khamenei has not appeared on video or in public since he was appointed on Monday to replace his father, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who was killed in Israeli airstrikes at the start of the U.S.-Israeli bombing campaign. Mr. Khamenei, 56, a hard-line cleric seen as close to Iran’s top military force, was injured in the initial strikes, according to Iranian and Israeli officials. The full circumstances and extent of his injuries is unclear. His mother, wife, and daughter were also killed in the U.S.-Israeli strikes.
Fighting has displaced up to 3.2 million people inside Iran, the United Nations refugee agency said on Thursday, as the human toll of the conflict rose. Almost 2,000 people have been killed since the start of the U.S.-Israeli assault, mostly in Iran.
The Israeli military said that it had launched a new wave of strikes in the country, targeting government infrastructure, as it also expanded its campaign against Hezbollah in Lebanon. Workers swept bloodstained sand off the sidewalk along the waterfront in Beirut, the Lebanese capital, after Israeli airstrikes killed at least seven people.
Here’s what else we are covering:
· Death toll: The number of people who have died in Iran is unclear. Iran’s representative to the United Nations, Amir Saeed Iravani, told the Security Council on Wednesday that more than 1,348 civilians had been killed. Dozens have also died in Iranian drone and missile attacks on Gulf countries and Israel. In Lebanon, the Israeli bombardment has killed more than 600 people and displaced over 800,000, according to Lebanese officials.
· Tanker attacks: Iran’s Revolutionary Guards Corps claimed responsibility for attacking one of the two tankers off Iraq’s coast, a Marshall Islands-flagged ship that Iraqi officials said was owned by an American company. In a statement cited by Iranian state media, the Guards said the ship had “disobeyed and ignored” warnings.
· Banks threatened: Major financial institutions, including Citi and HSBC, temporarily closed offices in the Persian Gulf after Iran said it would target U.S. and Israeli banks in the region. Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps made the threat after an airstrike hit a building in Tehran linked to Bank Sepah, an institution founded in 1922 as Iran’s first modern domestic bank. Read more ›
· Deadly school strike: The United States was responsible for the strike on an Iranian school that killed 175 people, most of them children, based on outdated targeting information, according to the preliminary findings of a Pentagon investigation. Mr. Trump had suggested that Iran could be to blame.
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9) How Hegseth Came to See Moral Purpose in War as Weakness
By Greg Jaffe, Reporting from Washington, March 12, 2026
Mr. Hegseth, right, in Samarra, Iraq, in 2006. Those who knew Mr. Hegseth from that period describe him as ambitious, passionate and dedicated to the mission. via Pete Hegseth
Long before President Trump chose him to lead the U.S. military, Pete Hegseth described the moral calling that had compelled him to volunteer to serve in Iraq.
He was working on Wall Street in the summer of 2005 and had read an article about an insurgent who blew himself up, killing 18 Iraqi children. “To me, that was the face of evil,” Mr. Hegseth told The Princeton Alumni Weekly, adding, “That sent to me a signal that I need to do my part not to let that ideology win in Iraq.”
He deployed to the war-torn city of Samarra a short time later.
Today, Mr. Hegseth describes the mission and moral purpose animating the war in Iran, now in its second week, in starkly different terms. The goal, he said recently, is to unleash “death and destruction from the sky all day long.” Instead of seeking justice, U.S. forces are pursuing vengeance against an implacable foe.
“Their war on Americans has become our retribution,” he vowed.
For decades, presidents and their secretaries of defense have framed American military interventions in altruistic terms. Even though the truth was often more complicated, they cast U.S. troops as liberators bringing democracy and freedom to those living under tyranny and oppression.
Mr. Hegseth has largely dispensed with that talk. His bellicose, at times vengeful, rhetoric reflects his belief that the United States’ lofty goals in Iraq and Afghanistan caused the military to lose focus on its main task, killing the enemy, and led to costly defeats in both wars.
In his view, the U.S. military’s strength is not rooted in its high ideals, humanity or moral purpose, but rather its ability to punish adversaries. Anything that distracts from that singular mission, he has said, is weakness.
“This is not 2003. This is not endless nation building,” Mr. Hegseth said on Tuesday at the Pentagon. “It’s not even close. Our generation of soldiers will not let that happen again.”
Instead, he said, the U.S. military was pursuing Mr. Trump’s war objectives with “brutal efficiency, total air dominance and an unbreakable will.”
A Pentagon spokeswoman said Mr. Hegseth’s remarks “project strength, resolve and confidence” to enemies and allies in “an increasingly dangerous world.”
In 2006, shortly after Mr. Hegseth arrived in Samarra, a powerful explosion shattered the golden dome of one of Iraq’s most revered Shiite shrines in the city. The blast set off months of sectarian fury, plunging the country into a state of civil war.
Mr. Hegseth was part of a small team focused on rebuilding Samarra, where the U.S. military had spent tens of millions of dollars. He pored over spreadsheets detailing the reconstruction contracts and visited many of the sites, some of which were half-finished or empty lots. He concluded that a major chunk of the military’s money was funding the insurgency.
He and his team redirected the remaining funds to the head of the Samarra City Council, who used them to build a security force. The Iraqi leader also provided valuable intelligence on the enemy. To show solidarity, Mr. Hegseth and other soldiers from his team spent the night at the embattled Iraqi leader’s home. The gesture was Mr. Hegseth’s idea, according to a former soldier from his unit.
Those who knew Mr. Hegseth from that period describe him as ambitious, passionate and dedicated to the mission.
“In Iraq, I often met these midlevel officers who were very competent and actually cared despite being thrust into an almost impossible situation not of their making,” recalled Philip Shishkin, a former Wall Street Journal reporter who embedded with Mr. Hegseth’s unit in 2006. “Hegseth fell into that category.”
Upon his return, Mr. Hegseth spoke hopefully of the mission and campaigned to send more troops to Iraq to support Gen. David H. Petraeus’s counterinsurgency strategy, which focused on pushing U.S. troops off big bases and into neighborhoods, where they could focus on protecting Iraqi citizens from insurgent attacks.
Mr. Hegseth wrote in his book “American Crusade” that he initially “mocked” Mr. Trump’s presidential campaign in 2016, put off by his reality TV celebrity and his style. But after Mr. Trump was elected, the two men found common cause in Mr. Hegseth’s campaign to pardon three U.S. troops — two soldiers and a member of the Navy SEALs — who had been accused or convicted of war crimes in Iraq and Afghanistan.
In two of the three instances, the service members were turned in by their own troops — the men they were charged with leading in combat. Mr. Hegseth, then a Fox News host, cast the accused as victims of muddled military thinking and overly restrictive rules of engagement that had prevented troops from killing insurgents and defending themselves. The whistle-blowing soldiers said they were defending their honor and a moral code.
On the day Mr. Trump decided to pardon the three men in late 2019, he called Mr. Hegseth to share the news. Mr. Trump ended the conversation with a compliment that Mr. Hegseth wrote he would “never forget.”
“You’re a warrior, Pete,” Mr. Trump told him, adding an expletive for emphasis.
“It was a hallowed night,” Mr. Hegseth recalled.
As secretary of defense — Mr. Hegseth prefers to be called the “secretary of war” — he vowed to return the military’s focus to killing the enemy. “Maximum lethality, not tepid legality,” he said this year. “Violent effect, not politically correct.”
His diagnosis of the military’s shortcomings is one that often emerges after a lost war. “There’s always someone who thinks that if only we were crueler, if only we’d killed another million Vietnamese, then we would have won this war,” said Phil Klay, a novelist and a Marine Corps veteran of the Iraq war. “If you reduce war to the satisfied feeling you get when you kill the enemy, it makes it a lot simpler and more satisfying.”
Mr. Hegseth’s views also mirror those of Mr. Trump, who has consistently rejected the idea that the United States by virtue of its unique history and superpower status has a special role in the world with regard to spreading democracy or defending freedom.
Mr. Trump’s and Mr. Hegseth’s views are reflected in the name they have given to the Iran mission. In the past, the Pentagon has chosen names that sought to send a message to the American people and the world that the military was fighting for some higher ideal, such as “Operation Enduring Freedom” in Afghanistan or “Operation Unified Protector” in Libya.
For the Iran mission, Mr. Hegseth signed off on “Epic Fury,” a name that connotes retribution and rage.
To the pilots flying missions and sailors firing missiles into Iran, the bellicose rhetoric is, for now, most likely background noise. They are focused on the immediate, and often dangerous, task at hand.
But over the longer term, couching wars in moral terms, such as defending democracy or protecting civilians, gives troops a framework to understand why they are being asked to kill. “Moral language acts as a psychological scaffolding for service members,” said Michael Valdovinos, a former Air Force psychologist and author of the forthcoming book “Moral Injuries.” “When that disappears, it can leave troops carrying the moral burden alone.”
One question is whether a war waged without a clear moral purpose and with mixed support from the American public will weigh heavier on the troops fighting it after the shooting stops.
“Some might say at least they’re being honest about the fact that it’s just sheer brute force,” said Elliot Ackerman, who led Marines in the second battle of Falluja in Iraq and now writes novels and nonfiction works that frequently focus on the moral complexity of war. “But it’s also very dangerous. You’re asking people to die for the ambitions of a president and a moral calculus that’s no greater than might makes right.”
Moral justifications and public support matter to troops taking lives on behalf of their country.
“I can tell you from experience on the back end, it doesn’t feel very good to have participated in a war that everybody thinks was a disaster,” Mr. Ackerman said.
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10) Videos of ICE Shooting in Texas Capture a Confused and Fatal Encounter
Officials said a 23-year-old Texan had intentionally run over an officer, a claim his family and friend denied. Newly released footage leaves the truth murky.
By Pooja Salhotra, Devon Lum, Alexander Cardia, Dmitriy Khavin and Edgar Sandoval, March 12, 2026
Moments before a 23-year-old man was fatally shot by a federal immigration agent, police body cameras captured him driving behind an ambulance in the beachside resort town of South Padre Island, Texas.
The driver, Ruben Ray Martinez, had an open bottle of Crown Royal whiskey in his blue Ford sedan and caught the eye of a local police officer directing traffic on March 15, 2025, after a major car accident.
Law enforcement officers from several agencies yelled commands at one another and to Mr. Martinez, before an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent fired three bullets through the open driver’s side window, killing Mr. Martinez. Blood spread across his white T-shirt as he was pulled from the car and placed in handcuffs.
Nearly one year after the fatal encounter, the Texas Department of Public Safety released video, witness accounts and police reports that recorded a chaotic and confusing scene unfolding in the middle of the night.
Federal officials have said that Mr. Martinez, who was driving slowly and braking repeatedly, ran over an agent before he was shot, and some video appears to show a figure on the car. But some footage from key moments is missing, and some is grainy, making it difficult to render definitive conclusions.
In an interview after the encounter, a passenger in the car, Joshua Orta, 25, told investigators that an officer had been on the hood but that Mr. Martinez had been scared and did not mean to hurt anyone.
Mr. Martinez, who worked at an Amazon warehouse and had nothing more serious than traffic violations on his record, was the first of at least three Americans fatally shot by federal immigration agents during President Trump’s second term. The killings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti in January occurred during large immigration enforcement operations in Minneapolis, and bystander video drew intense scrutiny and challenged official explanations.
Mr. Martinez’s death did not take place during an enforcement action, but while the ICE agent helped local authorities control traffic after an unrelated car crash. It was not clear that he had been killed by an immigration agent until last month, when a watchdog group, American Oversight, unearthed internal ICE documents describing the killing.
Federal officials have since defended the shooting and attacked Mr. Martinez, saying he “intentionally ran over” a federal agent.
The shooting occurred around 12:40 a.m., as the car moved along a roadway crowded with vehicles and officers from several agencies — the South Padre Island Police, the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department and ICE — who were responding to the crash.
As he approaches the intersection, Mr. Martinez draws the notice of a police officer for driving closely behind an ambulance in an otherwise empty lane, passing a line of cars on his left, according to a written statement from the police.
The officer sees an open bottle of alcohol in the car and directs him to pull to the right. Mr. Martinez instead pulls forward, and an officer tells him to “keep going.” Mr. Martinez continues driving straight.
The car appears to momentarily stop at a crosswalk. An officer yells out “hold him,” but Mr. Martinez passes through the intersection, and then stops again.
“Hey, stop him,” an officer says. Another says, “Get him out, get him out, get him out.”
Mr. Martinez slowly pulls forward and to the left. Three gunshots ring out.
The documents released by the Texas Rangers identified the officer who opened fire as Jack C. Stevens, an agent with Homeland Security Investigations, which operates under ICE. Another officer with the same agency, Hector Sosa, was said to have been struck by the vehicle.
In all, the Texas Department of Public Safety released footage from surveillance cameras at two businesses and from the body cameras of five local and state officers. But the footage, taken at night and at a distance, provides an incomplete view of what took place.
One body camera is missing eight seconds during which the shooting happened; the state and local police did not respond to questions about the gap. Another body camera had video and audio that were out of sync. And the surveillance footage from one business, which jumps forward in time sporadically, skips the moment of the shooting.
No footage was provided from Mr. Stevens or Mr. Sosa — whose email signature states that he is a body camera coordinator. Neither state nor federal officials responded to questions about whether they had been wearing cameras.
Videos show that about five seconds before the shooting, Mr. Stevens and Mr. Sosa appear to cross in front of Mr. Martinez’s stopped car. Mr. Stevens moves to the driver’s side window, while Mr. Sosa remains at the front of the vehicle.
When Mr. Martinez’s vehicle moves forward slowly and begins to turn left, Mr. Sosa does not appear to move out of the way.
This is also the moment that the security camera footage jumps forward in time, capturing only one frame every two seconds. Two frames appear to show a figure on the hood of the vehicle, but with the currently available footage, it is impossible to conclusively determine whether that is the case.
Frames from a security camera show the moments Mr. Sosa, who was wearing white sneakers, may have come into contact with the car. In the first image, Mr. Sosa is seen in front of the car. Two seconds later, it appears he is on the hood of the car. Two seconds after that, a third image shows he may still be on the hood.
The passenger, Mr. Orta, who was a friend of Mr. Martinez from childhood, told investigators in an interview hours after the killing that they had been drinking and had smoked marijuana. He said that Mr. Martinez had “panicked” because he had consumed alcohol and did not want to get arrested — and that Mr. Martinez had not intended to hit anyone.
“I saw the officer kind of like get on the hood,” Mr. Orta said in the videotaped questioning that was released last Friday. “He didn’t necessarily hit him, but it kind of, like, you know what I mean, caught his feet.”
If Mr. Sosa was on the hood of the car, the circumstances of how he got there are not visible. In body camera footage, someone is heard shouting “don’t jump on it!” just after the shooting. It is unclear what they are referring to.
A local prosecutor brought the case to a grand jury, which did not issue an indictment.
Todd Lyons, the acting director of ICE, said in a statement on Sunday that “we stand by the grand jury’s unanimous decision that found no criminality.”
He added, “This incident was investigated from every possible angle by an independent body, and it cleared our officer.”
Neither Mr. Sosa nor Mr. Stevens could be reached for comment. Mr. Orta died in an unrelated car crash in late February.
Lawyers representing Mr. Martinez’s mother, Rachel Reyes, said in a statement that the investigative materials show “no justification for Ruben’s killing.”
“These new videos confirm that Ruben’s car was barely moving when he was shot,” said the lawyers, Charles M. Stam and Alex Stamm. “That he was shot at point-blank range through his side window by an ICE agent who was in no danger.”
The agents were not visibly injured. Seconds after the shooting, the videos show Mr. Stevens pulling Mr. Martinez from the vehicle, and then walking away while other officers handcuff his motionless body. About a minute later, Mr. Stevens compresses his chest to revive him, without success.
Robin Stein and Haley Willis contributed reporting.
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11) A Third of Americans Have Cut Spending or Borrowed Money for Health Care
As medical costs rise, more than 80 million people have made sacrifices like skipping meals and driving less, a new survey finds.
By Reed Abelson, March 12, 2026
A recent poll found that health care costs topped a list of the public’s economic anxieties, above concerns about the prices of food and groceries, gas and utilities. Credit...Arin Yoon/Reuters
Americans are feeling the squeeze from rising health care costs, and they are already doing without. One-third of Americans — an estimated 82 million people — say they are making sacrifices, including skipping meals or driving less, to pay for care, according to a new survey released on Thursday.
In the survey, 15 percent of individuals said they had borrowed money in the last year to pay for medical expenses, while another 11 percent said they had skipped a meal. Those without insurance reported even more trade-offs.
The survey was conducted from June through August 2025 by the West Health-Gallup Center on Healthcare in America, a partnership between Gallup and West Health, a group of nonprofits focused on health care costs.
“It is impacting people every day in their decisions,” Tim Lash, president of the West Health Policy Center, said. “It is getting worse.”
In the survey, people also said they had delayed making major changes to their lives, like having a child or retiring, in the last four years because of health care costs. About 29 percent said they had postponed a vacation, while 26 percent said they had put off surgery or another medical treatment.
A poll by the same groups in late 2024 found an increasing number of Americans believed they would not be able to afford care if they needed it. At the time, the share of adults reporting that they had recently been unable to pay for a medicine and treatment was about 11 percent, the highest level in four years.
“It’s telling a consistent story here,” said Ellyn Maese, a senior researcher at Gallup and research director for the West Health-Gallup Center.
The broader issue of affordability already looms over the midterm elections, with health care costs a major part of it. The bitter debate in Congress over the fate of enhanced Obamacare subsidies helped focus attention on rising costs. When those subsidies ended last year, millions of Americans saw their insurance premiums more than double, and Democrats seized on the issue.
But it’s not just Obamacare; people with coverage from an employer are also facing much higher rates. Health insurance premiums for a family are approaching $27,000 a year, and people are paying more out of pocket when they see a doctor or stay overnight in the hospital.
A recent poll by the health policy organization KFF found that health care costs topped a list of the public’s economic anxieties, above concerns about the prices of food and groceries, gas and utilities. And the issue proved consequential in the 2018 midterm elections, when Democrats made major gains in Congress after Republicans tried to repeal the Affordable Care Act.
In the West Health-Gallup survey, some individuals reported delaying major life events because of health care costs. About 14 percent said they had postponed buying a new home, while 18 percent said they had put off changing jobs. About 6 percent said they had delayed having or adopting a child, and 9 percent said they had postponed retirement.
Even those with family incomes above $240,000 a year were postponing significant events, according to the survey. Individuals who said they were in poor health were more likely to make sacrifices.
“No one is safe from making these trade-offs,” Ms. Maese said. She added that she was startled to see people saying they were making such significant decisions about their work, their homes and how they lived their lives because they needed to pay for medical expenses.
“To see some of those things put at risk was jarring,” she said.
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12) The Death Penalty Is Even More Horrifying Than You Think
By The Editorial Board, March 13, 2026
The editorial board is a group of opinion journalists whose views are informed by expertise, research, debate and certain longstanding values. It is separate from the newsroom.
Illustration by Rebecca Chew/The New York Times
The use of the death penalty has risen sharply in the United States, with more executions in 2025 than any year since 2009. It is a cruel and unjust development.
In theory, the death penalty is reserved for “the worst of the worst.” In practice, it is very different. People who are executed for their crimes are disproportionately poor or intellectually disabled and often lacked good lawyers. They are also more likely to be sentenced to death if they have been convicted of killing a white person.
Anthony Boyd, who maintained his innocence until Alabama executed him last year at age 54, had an inexperienced court-appointed lawyer and was convicted on disputed eyewitness testimony. Charles Flores, 56, has spent 27 years on death row in Texas for a murder conviction based solely on unreliable testimony from a hypnotized witness. Robert Roberson, who has autism, remains on death row there despite having been convicted on now-debunked evidence that he had shaken his daughter to death.
Adding to the injustice, executions often go awry and become a grisly spectacle. As Alabama administered nitrogen gas to kill Mr. Boyd, he violently thrashed and drew agonized breaths for 30 minutes.
The death penalty is a fraught subject because most people on death row are guilty of murder and deserve tough punishment. But a life sentence without parole is a tough punishment. And the death penalty is both unavoidably flawed and unworthy of a decent society. As long it exists, it will disproportionately spare criminals with more resources and be used against people who are poor, mentally disabled or otherwise vulnerable.
Much of the world has come to this same conclusion. The list of countries that have abolished or effectively ended the death penalty includes all of Western Europe, Canada, Mexico, Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Morocco, South Africa and Australia. By continuing to execute people regularly, the United States puts itself in the company of only about 20 countries, among them Afghanistan, China, Iran and North Korea.
Over the past year, the United States has become even more of an outlier among democracies because the states that still conduct executions have accelerated the pace. Many of these states have in recent years passed secrecy laws to hide the details of what they are doing. We urge Americans not to look away.
In the initial years of the 21st century, more Americans recognized the flaws with the death penalty, and its use fell sharply. Opponents highlighted a wave of DNA-related exonerations, including of more than 20 people who were cleared after having spent time on death row.
More than 200 people on death row have been exonerated since 1973.
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13) U.S. Economy Was Vulnerable Before War With Iran
Economic growth at the end of 2025 was revised downward and consumer prices rose at the start of 2026.
By Talmon Joseph Smith, March 13, 2026
The latest price data offers a worrisome setup for inflation going forward. Credit...Hiroko Masuike/The New York Times
Economic growth was slower at the end of 2025 than data first showed and inflationary pressures persisted at the start of this year, a troubling snapshot of an economy on unsteady footing before war with Iran upended oil and financial markets.
Consumer prices increased moderately in January, the Federal Reserve’s preferred inflation gauge showed on Friday. Economists worry prices will march even higher in the coming weeks. And gross domestic product, the benchmark measure of economic growth, which is adjusted for inflation, was revised down to a 0.7 percent annual pace for the last three months of the year.
The Personal Consumption Expenditures price index, the Fed’s preferred inflation gauge, notched a 0.3 percent monthly increase in the first month of 2026. Compared with the same time last year, prices were up 2.8 percent. The “core” inflation reading, which strips out more volatile food and energy prices, came in at 0.4 percent on a monthly basis, and 3.1 percent on an annual basis. That is a full percentage point above the Fed’s 2 percent target.
“It basically shows that inflation firmed up to start the year,” Omair Sharif, founder of the research firm Inflation Insights, said of the data. “All the key measures are moving in the wrong direction.”
A snapshot taken just before the shock to oil prices from the war with Iran, the price data offer a worrisome setup for inflation going forward.
After peaking over 9 percent on an annual basis in 2022, inflation cooled off by 2024, gliding just above the Fed’s 2 percent target. Since 2025, though, the inflation picture has worsened. Goods inflation, which had been slowing for years, has swung back up in various categories since President Trump announced tariffs last spring. Some of those tariffs have been struck down by the Supreme Court. Others, though, remain in place, and have led businesses to toggle between absorbing the increased cost of imports and passing along those new costs to consumers.
“Things aren’t collapsing,” said Claudia Sahm, the chief economist at New Century Advisors and a former forecaster at the Fed. “But I do think consumer spending has been a source of resilience, and things are not as strong as they’ve been in recent years.”
According to analysts at Employ America, a research group that tracks employment and price data, tariffs are an “obvious culprit” of some excess inflation, especially in apparel and furniture. But they note that shortages stemming from the artificial intelligence boom are also playing a part in price rises. Computer accessories and tech equipment, for instance, are experiencing abnormal cost increases compared with averages in recent years.
Inflation in health care services, a major part of the economy, continues to play a role in hotter prices too. This Personal Consumption Expenditures index released Friday has been running slightly hotter than the more commonly cited Consumer Price Index. That divergence is largely the result of the fact that C.P.I. weighs housing inflation more heavily. And the rate of increases in rent has slowed as the overall economy has slowed.
Regardless, both inflation measures are likely to tilt higher next month once the inflationary impacts of higher oil prices are felt. The price of West Texas Intermediate crude, the U.S. benchmark, has risen to around $90 a barrel from $60 levels in February. Airfares, gasoline prices and restaurant costs are all expected to be affected. Despite all of the sobering news weighing on consumer sentiment and financial markets, consumption levels in January indicate that the economy is growing.
The new data, and the new war, complicate decision making for Federal Reserve leaders who have found themselves torn between the bank’s dual mandates of price stability and maximum employment.
The economy added just 116,000 jobs in all of 2025, and employers have cut jobs in two of the past three months, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. And yet, inflation has been above the central bank’s 2 percent target for five years now.
Investors worried about the purchasing power of their dollars want the Fed to hold steady and not reduce interest rates, even as the oil shock threatens growth. They point to the example of the 1970s, when a Fed facing an oil shock caused by geopolitical tremors overseas decided to ease interest rates. The “stagflation” of rising prices and stagnant growth conditions persisted.
The consensus in central banking today is that this move was a mistake, and that the Fed then ought to calibrate interest rates to fend off inflationary pressures, rather than risk contributing to them.
Analysts and traders that closely follow the Fed acknowledge the balancing act is treacherous. In the lead up to the global financial crisis of the 2000s, energy prices soared. Near-term inflation rose substantially, ticking above 5 percent on an annual basis.
At the same time, central banks across the globe in 2008 were still worried about rate cuts fueling further inflation and financial market speculation. That year, the price of oil peaked at over $130 before falling to $41 by December, as the global economy entered a recession.
“We can learn something from history,” Ms. Sahm, the former Fed economist, said. “I can come up with scenarios for the Fed going forward in which it’d be appropriate for them to pause, cut or hike rates. They’ll need to be ready to act when it’s clear.”
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14) Globalization Faces Its Next Crisis
Beyond its effects on oil and gas, the unfolding war in the Middle East is roiling shipping and airfreight, threatening the availability of a vast range of goods.
By Peter S. Goodman, March 13, 2026
Peter Goodman covered the supply chain disruptions of the pandemic and has written about global trade for 25 years.
The container terminal in Newark. Vincent Alban/The New York Times
Thousands of miles from the attacks in the Middle East, at his company’s headquarters in Toronto, Amar Zaidi confronted what is normally a straightforward logistical task. He needed to ship fabric from a mill in Istanbul to a customer in Shanghai.
But the usual route involved passing through Oman via the Suez Canal — a pathway suddenly fraught with danger. The price of booking a container ship was soaring.
Mr. Zaidi’s company, Rebus International, makes yarn and textiles, supplying raw materials to international clothing brands like Calvin Klein and Hugo Boss. Before the war in the Persian Gulf, transporting a container from Turkey to China cost about $2,000, he said. When he tried to book the journey this week, carriers demanded surcharges that multiplied the price to $10,000.
“It’s chaos,” said Mr. Zaidi, 52, who has worked in the industry for three decades. “It’s the ripple effect. Everything is blamed on the war.”
Fabric is probably not the first item that springs to mind on the list of cargo waylaid by war. Wildly fluctuating prices for oil and natural gas are the most obvious manifestation, a result of the effective shutdown of the Strait of Hormuz, the channel linking the Persian Gulf to the rest of the planet.
But the consequences of upending commerce in much of the Middle East are far broader, and increasingly apparent in industries beyond energy. From industrial commodities to tropical fruits, products needed in one place are getting stuck somewhere else. The longer the hostilities persist, the greater the upheaval for shoppers and businesses throughout the global economy.
The reverberations amount to a rebuke of the notion that globalization is history, a claim popularized by nationalist movements on multiple continents.
President Trump has pursued a trade war in the name of forcing factory production back to the United States. China and India have pursued versions of self-sufficiency. Yet the war in the Middle East has highlighted the enduring reality of global economic integration. Supply chains are not only intact but expanding, heightening the risks when the movement of goods is interrupted.
“Every time we get one of these disruptions, we have these predictions that it’s the end of globalization,” said Steven A. Altman, a globalization expert at New York University’s Stern School of Business and co-author of a recent study on the continued expansion of trade and investment across borders. “The narrative is different from the reality.”
The turmoil of the Covid-19 pandemic revealed how bottlenecks in shipping can trigger cascading troubles. A floating traffic jam off a port in Southern California strands chemicals needed to make paint in Delaware. It ties up containers that could otherwise be used to load cargo in China, delaying exports of electronics destined for Ireland and pushing up the price of moving cargo everywhere.
Such realizations prompted companies to highlight commitments to “supply chain resilience” alongside their usual devotion to efficiency. Retailers like Walmart shifted manufacturing from Asia to Mexico, shrinking the distance between factories and customers to limit their vulnerability to the hazards of global commerce.
But the push toward more regional trade appears to be reversing, according to Mr. Altman’s report.
From 2020 to 2023, the share of American imports arriving from Mexico and Canada increased to 29 percent, from 26 percent. But over the first nine months of 2025, it dipped to 27 percent.
As the pandemic fades into memory, international companies have returned to seeking the lowest-cost suppliers of goods, wherever they may be.
And as the Trump administration dismantles federal programs aimed at increasing renewable sources of energy like solar and wind power, the nation is more exposed to the implications of higher prices for oil and gas.
All of which means that the halting of marine traffic through the Persian Gulf is likely to spread dysfunction widely.
The most immediate crisis centers on energy. Tankers have been attacked. Oil facilities have been shut down. The war has delivered “the largest supply disruption in the history of the global oil market,” the International Energy Agency declared on Thursday.
Not even the concerted release of oil reserves by 30 nations could prevent the price of oil from again breaching $100 a barrel. The prospect of a sustained increase in energy prices has economists warning of the potential for stagflation, a term coined to describe the impact of shocks in the 1970s: stagnant economic growth and higher prices.
Higher energy prices make fuel more expensive for trucks, tankers and jets, increasing the costs of moving cargo. Larger bills for gasoline and air-conditioning leave households with less money to spend on goods and experiences — a drag on economic growth.
Companies that import products into the United States, the world’s largest economy, are grappling with confusion over the future of Mr. Trump’s tariffs after the Supreme Court ruled that he had breached his presidential authority.
“We have created equal if not greater uncertainty parameters than during the pandemic,” said Nick Vyas, a supply chain expert at the University of Southern California’s Marshall School of Business. “It’s a perfect storm for stagflation.”
In Southeast Asia, producers of shrimp and tropical fruits now struggle to transport their wares to Europe and North America. From India to Indiana, farmers are confronting higher prices for fertilizer because of the disruption to stocks produced in the Persian Gulf. The price of aluminum is climbing, given impediments to shipments from Qatar and Bahrain. Helium, a critical element for making computer chips, could soon become scarce.
“This is not just an oil story,” Mr. Vyas said. “This is an industrial supply story.”
The Gulf is a dominant source of urea, the leading form of nitrogen fertilizer. Making it requires ammonia, which is produced with natural gas. So long as energy production is hampered, the ability to make fertilizers will be constrained. Urea prices have already climbed significantly.
If farmers economize in their use of fertilizer, that could reduce harvests, diminishing the supply of food and pushing prices higher. In vulnerable countries in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia, that could lead to greater malnutrition.
At the center of concern is disruption to shipping lanes and air cargo hubs in the Persian Gulf.
With planes unable to land and refuel at major airports in Dubai and Doha on trips between Europe and Asia, they have had to reroute, often over Central Asia. That has lengthened journeys, requiring more fuel. And that has forced carriers to limit how much cargo they carry.
The cost of airfreight from Asia to Europe has doubled since the beginning of the war. Vietnam to the United States has increased by nearly half. That has challenged the ability of American automakers and retailers to secure electronics and components.
“Freight rates are more volatile,” said Chloe Lee at Olympia Express, a freight forwarding company in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. “Many Vietnamese exporters are becoming more cautious about booking shipments.”
This is the time of year when major importers tend to negotiate yearlong contracts with ocean carriers. Container shipping prices have been relatively cheap because of a glut of new vessels entering the market. But now ocean carriers are absorbing the likelihood that fuel prices will be significantly higher just as some routes are impeded by the war.
“It’s certainly just one thing after another in this industry,” said Ryan Petersen, chief executive of Flexport, a global logistics company.
For the shipping realm, the latest conflict in the Gulf is unfolding just as the last one appeared to be fading — the strikes on ships entering the Red Sea by Houthi rebels. Vessels moving between Europe and Asia had been avoiding that corridor, instead traveling the long way around Africa.
In recent months, ships had been returning to the Red Sea. Not anymore.
With ships again looping around Africa on trips between Europe and Asia, carriers are affixing fees and lifting prices.
That was the situation confronting Mr. Zaidi and his Canadian textile company this week.
He tried to ship a load of fabric to England from Pakistan. The carriers said they could not locate shipping containers. The steel boxes were scattered at ports around the Indian Ocean, held in place by the shutdown of marine traffic through the Middle East.
“I’m ready to pay whatever it costs, and I don’t have containers available for the next three weeks,” Mr. Zaidi said.
His company tried to ship 10 containers of machinery to Pakistan from Durban, South Africa. It had already booked the journey at a price of $2,500 per box. The carrier suddenly lifted the rate to $4,800. The route required a much longer run to Singapore.
The further out Mr. Zaidi contemplated, the greater his concern grew.
If the shipping crisis persists, cotton harvested in China may arrive late to Pakistan, delaying his production of yarn. Mills that weave fabric in Indonesia will struggle to find raw materials. Making clothing will get harder.
“Prices will go up,” he said.
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15) E.P.A. Moves to Weaken Limits on a Cancer-Causing Gas
The gas, ethylene oxide, plays a crucial role in sterilizing medical devices. But long-term exposure is linked to several types of cancer and other ailments.
By Maxine Joselow, Reporting from Washington, March 13, 2026
A chemical and petroleum industrial corridor, a known source of ethylene oxide emissions, in Ascension Parish, La. Credit...Gerald Herbert/Associated Press
The Environmental Protection Agency on Friday proposed to weaken limits on emissions of ethylene oxide, a cancer-causing gas, from manufacturing facilities that use it to sterilize medical devices.
The move revived a long-running debate about the paradoxical effects of ethylene oxide on public health. While it plays a crucial role in sterilizing lifesaving medical devices like pacemakers and syringes, long-term exposure can cause leukemia and other types of cancer among people who work in or live near medical sterilization facilities.
“The Trump E.P.A. is committed to ensuring lifesaving medical devices remain available for the critical care of America’s children, elderly and all patients without unnecessary exposure to communities,” Lee Zeldin, the E.P.A. administrator, said in a statement.
The agency’s proposed rule would loosen limits on ethylene oxide emissions from around 90 commercial sterilization facilities across the country. Roughly 2.3 million people live within two miles of these facilities in what are often low-income neighborhoods or communities of color, according to an analysis by the Union of Concerned Scientists, an environmental group.
The proposal is the E.P.A.’s latest move to relax pollution limits in an effort to lower costs for industries. In recent months, the agency has also weakened restrictions on mercury from coal-burning power plants and repealed a scientific finding that allowed the government to regulate planet-warming pollution from cars and trucks.
In a news release, the E.P.A. said the Biden administration’s stricter limits on ethylene oxide emissions would be difficult, if not impossible, for many facilities to meet. In particular, the agency said it was proposing to rescind a requirement that facilities conduct round-the-clock monitoring of their ethylene oxide emissions.
Ethylene oxide is used to sterilize about half of all medical devices in the United States, helping to prevent infections in patients undergoing surgeries and other treatments. It is applied to roughly 20 billion medical devices each year, including catheters, heart valves, stents and ventilators.
The gas is valued for its ability to destroy bacteria, viruses and other microorganisms without damaging delicate materials like plastics. There is no viable alternative on the market, the E.P.A. said in the news release.
At the same time, inhaling the gas can cause coughing, dizziness, fatigue and nausea. Long-term exposure can damage the brain and central nervous system and can increase the risk of breast cancer, leukemia, lymphoma and other cancers of the white blood cells.
The E.P.A. first classified ethylene oxide as a human carcinogen in 2016. The agency based the determination on studies showing that the gas was 60 times more toxic to children and 30 times more toxic to adults than previously thought.
The Biden administration significantly strengthened limits on ethylene oxide emissions in 2024. The move was part of President Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s “moonshot” effort to sharply cut cancer deaths in the United States.
At the time, Biden administration officials estimated that the rules would reduce ethylene oxide emissions from sterilization plants by 90 percent. Some of the plants would have been required to install or upgrade pollution controls.
President Trump has already exempted 40 sterilization plants from complying with the Biden-era limits on ethylene oxide for two years. In a proclamation in July 2025, Mr. Trump argued that the rules would “likely force existing sterilization facilities to close down, seriously disrupting the supply of medical equipment.”
The Natural Resources Defense Council, the Southern Environmental Law Center and other environmental groups have filed a lawsuit to block the exemptions. The suit, which is pending in federal court in Washington, argues that many of the sterilization facilities were capable of complying with the Biden-era rules using existing pollution controls.
“This administration is systematically looking for ways to let polluters off the hook,” Sarah Buckley, a senior attorney at the Natural Resources Defense Council, said in a statement. “If this abuse of authority is left unchecked, communities will pay the price in higher cancer risks.”
AdvaMed, a group that lobbies for the interests of medical device manufacturers, said in a statement that the proposed rule issued on Friday would ensure the supply of safe, sterile devices without interruption.
The E.P.A. will solicit public comments on the proposed rule for 45 days after its publication in the Federal Register. The agency will then finalize the rule, likely within the next year.
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16) Cuban President Acknowledges Talks With Trump Administration
President Miguel DÃaz-Canel, whose country is rapidly running out of fuel, said the talks were based on “respect for the political systems of both countries.”
By Frances Robles, David C. Adams and Patricia Mazzei, March 13, 2026
“Mr. DÃaz-Canel, in a 90-minute news conference broadcast on state media, said the talks were aimed at finding solutions to Cuba’s differences with the United States. He said the discussions were based on ‘respect for the political systems of both countries, sovereignty and our government’s self-determination,’ suggesting that, from his point of view, political changes in Cuba were not on the table.”
Searching for salvageable items after the attacks in Caracas, Venezuela, in January. Credit...The New York Times
In what was seen as a last-ditch effort to save his hobbled government, President Miguel DÃaz-Canel of Cuba announced on Friday that his government had been holding talks with the Trump administration while managing an increasingly severe lack of fuel.
Cuba’s government is facing an existential crisis as the Trump administration ratchets up pressure on the 67-year-old Communist state, maintaining what amounts to an oil blockade. Fuel is rapidly running out, plunging Cuba into prolonged periods of darkness.
Though the discussions with the United States had previously been reported by U.S. news outlets, it was the first time the government had acknowledged that talks were underway.
Mr. DÃaz-Canel, in a 90-minute news conference broadcast on state media, said the talks were aimed at finding solutions to Cuba’s differences with the United States. He said the discussions were based on “respect for the political systems of both countries, sovereignty and our government’s self-determination,” suggesting that, from his point of view, political changes in Cuba were not on the table.
He said international factors had facilitated the exchanges, without providing specifics. Cuba’s foreign minister recently met with the Vatican, as did Mike Hammer, the top U.S. diplomat in Havana.
The Vatican’s secretary of state, Cardinal Pietro Parolin, said the Vatican had taken “the necessary steps, always with a view to a dialogue-based solution to the problems that exist.”
Cuba’s government announced on Thursday that it would soon release 51 prisoners, in what appeared to be an effort to appease the Trump administration.
Mr. DÃaz-Canel said a development to be announced on Monday would “greatly facilitate” the participation of Cubans abroad in the island’s “economic and social development program,” strongly suggesting that the government would allow Cubans overseas to invest in the nation’s economy. Exiles in Florida and other places with large Cuban communities have been pushing for that for years.
Over the past year, Mr. DÃaz-Canel said, the island’s foreign ministry has held talks with Cubans abroad to listen to their ideas. He acknowledged that there had been a significant exodus from the country, saying the number of Cubans overseas “has grown.”
More than two million Cubans have left the country in the past five years, demographers estimate. “It is our responsibility as the government to embrace them, listen to them, tend to them and offer them a space to participate in the economic and social development,” Mr. DÃaz-Canel said.
He said Cuba’s power grid was growing increasingly unstable because the country had imported no oil in three months.
Two crucial power plants had exhausted their supplies of fuel, he said. “Therefore, a considerable number of megawatts that we were generating, especially during peak and nighttime hours, are lost from that generation system, putting the grid in a very unstable situation,” Mr. DÃaz-Canel said.
He said that Cuba was rushing to expand its use of solar energy, but that the challenges were daunting. Nearly 7,000 homes in Cuba are now connected to solar power, he said.
Electric cars are being used to bring patients to dialysis appointments, he said. About 700 bakeries have converted to wood-fired or charcoal-fired ovens, Mr. DÃaz-Canel said.
Mr. DÃaz-Canel said the talks with the United States were needed, in part, “to determine the willingness of both sides to take concrete actions.” He said the discussions were unlikely to yield results soon.
“Agendas are built, negotiations and conversations take place, and agreements are reached — things we are still far from because we are in the initial phases of this process,’’ Mr. DÃaz-Canel said.
He put the blame for Cuba’s ills squarely at Washington’s feet. “Workers are making an effort to overcome the impossible,” he said. “It’s the fault of the energy blockade that has been imposed on us.”
The Cuban government has been in dire straits since the United States attacked Venezuela in January, arrested its president, took control of its state oil industry and blocked fuel shipments to Cuba. Venezuela had been Cuba’s top supplier of oil.
President Trump threatened to impose severe tariffs on any country that provided Cuba with oil. The Cuban government was forced to curtail public transportation, elective surgeries and other services that depended on diesel fuel.
With Cuba dependent on foreign oil for 60 percent of its fuel supply, experts have estimated that it would run out of fuel this month. Mr. Trump has repeatedly said that the Cuban government would collapse on its own.
On Saturday, Mr. Trump suggested that a Cuba deal was imminent. “As we achieve a historic transformation in Venezuela, we’re also looking forward to the great change that will soon be coming to Cuba,” Mr. Trump said.
“Cuba’s at the end of the line,” he added. “They have no money. They have no oil.”
Earlier in the week, hosting the Inter Miami soccer team at the White House, Mr. Trump indicated to its co-owner Jorge Mas — the son of a prominent Cuban exile leader, Jorge Mas Canosa — that travel restrictions to Cuba would be eased. “You’re going to go back, and you won’t need my approval,” Mr. Trump told Mr. Mas.
He also said about Cuba, “They want to make a deal so badly. You have no idea.”
Any meaningful deal between the United States and the Cuban government, experts say, would have to include the release of all political prisoners, an end to the criminalization of dissent, permitting independent political organizing, the legalization of political parties besides the Communist Party and a restoration of basic civil liberties, including freedom of speech and the press.
“The main question for me is whether and what political, social and civic changes will also be included in any deal,” said Ted Henken, a Cuba scholar at Baruch College.
Jack Nicas contributed reporting.
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