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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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Help World-Outlook Win New Subscribers
(the subscription is free of charge)
Dear reader,
Over the last month, World-Outlook and its sister publication in Spanish Panorama-Mundial have published unique coverage of U.S. and world events.
This includes the three-part interview with Cuban historian and writer Ernesto Limia Díaz, ‘Cuba Is the Moral and Political Compass of the World.’ A related article by Mark Satinoff, World Votes with Cuba to Demand an End to U.S. Blockade, included information on the campaign to send medical aid to Cuba in the aftermath of Hurricane Melissa and was shared widely by the Los Angeles Hands Off Cuba Committee and other Cuba solidarity groups.
A number of readers sent their appreciation for Cathleen Gutekanst’s article Chicago Residents Fight ICE Abductions, Deportations, which provided a compelling, eyewitness account of this example of working-class resistance to the Trump administration’s war on undocumented immigrants. Some readers shared it widely on social media platforms.
The news analysis Bigotry, Jew Hatred Take Center Stage in GOP Mainstream also generated interest. It is part of World-Outlook’s consistent analysis of the danger of the rise of incipient fascism that Trumpism has posed for the working class and its allies in the U.S. and the world.
Most recently, another article by Mark Satinoff, ‘From Ceasefire to a Just Peace’ in Israel and Occupied Territories, was promoted by Friends of Standing Together (FOST NY/NJ) on the group’s website. Alon-Lee Green and Sally Abed — the two Standing Together leaders featured at the November 12 event in Brooklyn, New York, that Mark’s article covered — and Israelis for Peace sent their thanks to Mark for his accurate reporting.
This is a small sample of the news coverage and political analysis World-Outlook offers.
We ask you to use this information to try to convince at least one of your acquaintances, colleagues, friends, fellow students, neighbors, or relatives to subscribe to World-Outlook. As you know, the subscription is free of charge. Increasing World-Outlook’s subscription base will widen the site’s reach. It will also provide new impetus to improve our coverage. Comments and reactions from subscribers, or initiatives from readers to cover events in their areas, often result in unexpectedly invaluable articles or opinion columns clarifying important political questions.
Feel free to share this letter, or part of its contents, with those you are asking to subscribe. And keep World-Outlookinformed about the reactions you get from potential new readers.
In solidarity,
World-Outlook editors
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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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Stop Cop City Bay Area
Did you know about a proposed $47 million regional police training facility in San Pablo—designed for departments across the Bay Area?
We are Stop Cop City Bay Area (Tours & Teach-Ins), a QT+ Black-led grassroots collective raising awareness about this project. This would be the city’s second police training facility, built without voter approval and financed through a $32 million, 30-year loan.
We’re organizing to repurpose the facility into a community resource hub and youth center. To build people power, we’re taking this conversation on the road—visiting Bay Area campuses, classrooms, cafes, and community spaces via our Fall 2025 Tour.
We’d love to collaborate with you and/or co-create an event. Here’s what we offer:
Guest Speaker Presentations—5-minute visits (team meetings, classrooms, co-ops, etc.), panels, or deep dives into:
· the facility’s origins & regional impacts
· finding your role in activism
· reimagining the floorplan (micro-workshops)
· and more
· Interactive Art & Vendor/Tabling Pop-Ups — free zines, stickers, and live linocut printing with hand-carved stamps + artivism.
· Collaborations with Classrooms — project partnerships, research integration, or creative assignments.
· Film Screenings + Discussion — e.g., Power (Yance Ford, 2024) or Riotsville, U.S.A. (Sierra Pettengill, 2022), or a film of your choice.
👉 If you’re interested in hosting a stop, open to co-creating something else, or curious about the intersections of our work: simply reply to this email or visit: stopcopcitybayarea.com/tour
Thank you for your time and consideration. We look forward to connecting.
In solidarity,
Stop Cop City Bay Area
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Dear Organization Coordinator
I hope this message finds you well. I’m reaching out to invite your organization to consider co-sponsoring a regional proposal to implement Free Public Transit throughout the San Francisco Bay Area.
This initiative directly supports low-income families, working people, seniors, youth, and others who rely on public transportation. It would eliminate fare barriers while helping to address climate justice, congestion, and air pollution—issues that disproportionately affect disadvantaged communities.
We believe your organization’s mission and values align strongly with this proposal. We are seeking endorsements, co-sponsorship, and coalition-building with groups that advocate for economic and racial equity.
I would love the opportunity to share a brief proposal or speak further if you're interested. Please let me know if there’s a staff member or program director I should connect with.
A description of our proposal is below:
sharethemoneyinstitute@gmail.com
Opinion: San Francisco Bay Area Should Provide Free Public Transportation
The San Francisco Bay Area is beautiful, with fantastic weather, food, diversity and culture. We’re also internationally famous for our progressiveness, creativity, and innovation.
I believe the next amazing world-leading feature we can add to our cornucopia of attractions is Free Public Transportation. Imagine how wonderful it would be if Muni, BART, Caltrain, AC Transit, SamTrans, SF Bay Ferries, and all the other transportation services were absolutely free?
Providing this convenience would deliver enormous, varied benefits to the 7.6 million SF Bay Area residents, and would make us a lovable destination for tourists.
This goal - Free Public Transportation - is ambitious, but it isn’t impossible, or even original. Truth is, many people world-wide already enjoy free rides in their smart municipalities.
New York City mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani is promoting free transit, with a plan that’s gained the endorsement of economists from Chile, United Kingdom, Greece, and the USA.
The entire nation of Luxembourg has offered free public transportation to both its citizens and visitors since 2020. Tallinn, the capital of Estonia, has given free transit to its residents since 2013. In France, thirty-five cities provide free public transportation. Ljubljana, the capital of Slovenia, offers free rides to seniors, disabled, and students. In Maricá (Brazil) – the entire municipal bus system is free. Delhi (India) – offers free metro and bus travel for women. Madrid & Barcelona (Spain) offer free (or heavily discounted) passes to youth and seniors.
Even in the USA, free public transit is already here. Kansas City, Missouri, has enjoyed a free bus system free since 2020. Olympia, Washington, has fully fare-free intercity transit. Missoula, Montana, is free for all riders. Columbia, South Carolina, has free buses, and Chapel Hill, North Carolina, has enjoyed free transit for over a decade. Ithaca, New York, and Madison, Wisconsin, offer free transit to students.
But if the San Francisco Bay Area offered free transit, we’d be the LARGEST municipality in the world to offer universal Free Transit to everyone, resident and visitor alike. (Population of Luxembourg is 666,430. Kansas City 510,704. Population of San Francisco Bay Area is 7.6 million in the nine-county area)
Providing free transit would be tremendously beneficial to millions of people, for three major reasons:
1. Combat Climate Change - increased public ridership would reduce harmful CO2 fossil fuel emissions. Estimates from Kansas City and Tallinn Estonia’s suggest an increase in ridership of 15 percent. Another estimate from a pilot project in New York City suggests a ridership increase of 30 percent. These increases in people taking public transportation instead of driving their own cars indicates a total reduction of 5.4 - 10.8 tons of emissions would be eliminated, leading to better air quality, improved public health, and long-term climate gains.
2. Reduce Traffic Congestion & Parking Difficulty - Estimates suggest public transit would decrease traffic congestion in dense urban areas and choke points like the Bay Bridge by up to 15 percent. Car ownership would also be reduced. Traffic in San Francisco is the second-slowest in the USA (NYC is #1) and getting worse every year. Parking costs in San Francisco are also the second-worst in the USA (NYC #1), and again, it is continually getting worse.
3. Promote Social Equity - Free transit removes a financial cost that hits low-income residents hard. Transportation is the second-biggest expense after housing for many Americans. In the Bay Area, a monthly Clipper pass can cost $86–$98 per system, and much more for multi-agency commuters. For people living paycheck-to-paycheck, this is a significant cost. People of color, immigrants, youth, seniors, and people with disabilities rely more heavily on public transit. 55–70% of frequent transit riders in the Bay Area are from low-to moderate-income households, but these riders usually pay more per mile of transit than wealthy drivers. Free fares equalize access regardless of income or geography.
Free transit would help people 1) take jobs they couldn’t otherwise afford to commute to, thus improving the economy, 2) Stay in school without worrying about bus fare, 3) Get to appointments, child care, or grocery stores without skipping meals to afford transit.
To conclude: Free Public Transit should be seen as a civil rights and economic justice intervention.
The Cost? How can San Francisco Bay Area pay for Free Transit throughout our large region?
ShareTheMoney.Institute estimates the cost as $1.5 billion annually. This sum can acquired via multiple strategies. Corvallis, Oregon, has had free public bus service since 2011, paid for by a $3.63 monthly fee added to each utility bill. Missoula, Montana, funds their fare-free Mountain Line transit system, via a property tax mill levy. Madison, Wisconsin’s transit is supported by general fund revenues, state and federal grants, and partnerships/sponsorships from local businesses and organizations.
Ideally, we’d like the funds to be obtained from the 37 local billionaires who, combined, have an approximate wealth of $885 billion. The $1.5 billion for free transit is only 0.17% of the local billionaire's wealth. Sponsorship from the ultra-wealthy would be ideal. Billionaires can view the “fair transit donation” they are asked to contribute not as punishment or an “envy tax”, but as their investment to create a municipality that is better for everyone, themselves included. They can pride themselves on instigating a world-leading, legacy-defining reform that will etch their names in history as leaders of a bold utopian reform.
Our motto: “we want to move freely around our beautiful bay”
——
Hank Pellissier - Share The Money Institute
Reverend Gregory Stevens - Unitarian Universalist EcoSocialist Network
*..........*..........*..........*..........*..........*..........*..........* *..........*..........*..........*..........*..........*..........*..........*  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 authorities of the Russian Federation to reverse their growing repression of dissent and respect their citizens' freedom of speech and right to protest. Sign to Demand the Release of Boris Kagarlitskyhttps://freeboris.infoThe petition is also available on Change.org *..........*..........*..........*..........*..........*..........*..........* *..........*..........*..........*..........*..........*..........*..........* |
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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) Cuba’s Long-Suffering Economy Is Now in ‘Free Fall’
With widespread power outages, medicine shortages and rising food prices, experts say Cuba’s economy has never been worse, with the crisis coming just as the supply of Venezuelan oil is threatened.
By David C. Adams and Frances Robles, Reporting from Florida, Published Jan. 6, 2026, Updated Jan. 7, 2026
Cooking soup over an open fire in Havana after the failure of a major power plant in October. Credit...Ramon Espinosa/Associated Press
By all accounts, Cuba is enduring the worst economic moment in the 67-year history of its communist revolution.
While the island nation has endured periodic episodes of mass migration, food shortages and social unrest in decades past, never before have Cubans experienced such a wholesale collapse of the social safety net that the country’s leaders — starting with Fidel Castro — once prided themselves on.
“I, who was born there, I, who lives there, and I’ll tell you: It’s never been as bad as it is now, because many factors have come together,” said Omar Everleny Pérez, 64, an economist in Havana.
As Trump administration officials congratulate themselves on a triumphant military victory in Venezuela, in which President Nicolás Maduro was seized and the United States claimed control over the South American country, eyes have now turned to Cuba, which enjoyed a warm relationship with the jailed president and which depended on the oil he sent.
Of Cuba, “It’s going down for the count,” Mr. Trump said Sunday, dismissing the need for military action there, because he said the government was likely to collapse on its own.
Odalis Reyes can see evidence of Cuba’s decay with her own two eyes.
From the window in her cramped sitting room, Ms. Reyes, a seamstress in Old Havana, looks out at a relic of the country’s obsolete past, the rusting hulk of an electric power station that once provided electricity to her poor neighborhood on the edge of the popular tourist district of Cuba’s capital.
Now it serves as a reminder of the constant blackouts.
“Yes, many hours without electricity, many, many — 14, 15 hours,” Ms. Reyes, 56, said. “Oh, that terrifies you, it terrifies you, because food — which this is the hardest thing — you’re afraid it will spoil.”
“We don’t even know how we’re going to get by anymore,” she added. “We’re like human robots, humanoids.”
In recent years, Cubans complained because the monthly allotments of rice, beans and other food staples that they received from government ration cards lasted only 10 days. Now the cards are virtually worthless because food is rarely available at the government ration stores.
To buy gasoline, people have to use an app to sign up for an appointment — at least three weeks in advance. One resident of Havana, the capital, said he joined the queue three months ago, and is now No. 5,052 in line.
The lack of gasoline has led to sporadic trash pickup, which has led to outbreaks of mosquito-borne illnesses like dengue and chikungunya. Medicines are nearly impossible to find without relatives abroad to send them.
The blackouts have exacerbated an already bleak situation, particularly in provinces outside the capital, which can go 20 hours a day without power.
It’s dark, people are sick, and they don’t have medicine, said Mr. Pérez, the economist.
The economic situation in Cuba has always been difficult. It was particularly terrible during an era in the mid-1990s known as the “special period,” which came after the collapse of the Soviet Union, which had kept Cuba afloat.
The Cuban government has consistently blamed its economic travails on a decades-long U.S. trade embargo that it claims puts a chokehold on its ability to do business in the world market and earn much-needed cash. Economic sanctions by Republican administrations, which have excluded food and medicine, have made it even harder, government officials say.
“Correcting distortions and reviving the economy is not a slogan,” President Miguel Diaz-Canel said in a speech last month. “It is a concrete battle for stability in everyday life, so that wages are sufficient, so that there is food on the table, so that blackouts end, so that transportation is revived, so that schools, hospitals and basic services function with the quality we deserve.”
At the end of the third quarter last year, the country’s gross domestic product had fallen by more than 4 percent, the president said, inflation was skyrocketing, and deliveries of rationed food were not being met.
Mr. Díaz-Canel reiterated the government’s long running goals: to make food production a top priority and work to make state-owned businesses more efficient.
Experts say that it remains unclear how big an effect the fall of Mr. Maduro will have on Cuba, as the Trump administration exerts more control over Venezuela’s state oil industry. When Hugo Chávez was president, he kept Cuba afloat with some 90,000 barrels of oil daily. In the last quarter of 2025, Cuba received just 35,000.
The resulting power outages have hurt industries like nickel production, because the factories are off when there’s no power.
Another crucial industry, tourism, has also suffered in recent years. Before the Covid pandemic, four million people a year used to visit Cuba; that number has struggled to get back to two million, economists said.
Amid the struggles, some were calling for more private enterprise.
Emilio Interián Rodríguez, a Cuban lawmaker who is president of an agricultural cooperative, delivered a blistering speech urging agricultural overhauls and more private enterprise. He made the declaration on the floor of the National Assembly — where pro-government rhetoric is the norm. Private business owners, he said, were doing a better job than state companies.
“Thanks to micro, small and medium enterprises, today we have more things, and thanks to micro, small, and medium enterprises today we are achieving results in many things that we had never achieved before,” he said.
Experts agree that while U.S. policies have hurt Cuba, poor planning and mismanagement are also to blame for the country’s economic troubles. Efforts to allow private businesses to operate have faltered because of onerous regulations.
The private enterprises, known as MiPyMEs, were legalized in 2021 and have been a lifeline in Cuba, Mr. Pérez and other residents said.
Some private stores resemble supermarket chains in the United States, with everything from Goya brands to Philadelphia cream cheese.
But prices at the private stores are exorbitant, particularly for people who earn salaries in the local currency. A typical monthly pension is 3,000 pesos, less than $7, while a carton of 30 eggs costs 3,600 pesos — $8.
“There is food, and plenty of it, but the prices are incredible,” Mr. Pérez said. “Nobody with a salary, not even a doctor, can hardly buy in those stores.”
About a third of Cubans receive economic help from overseas, and some earn dollars in the private sector. But about a third, particularly pensioners, are living in poverty, Mr. Pérez said.
Difficult living conditions helped spur spontaneous mass protests in 2021, but a harsh government crackdown quashed the demonstrations.
Cuba’s financial collapse has fueled an extraordinary exodus — about 2.75 million Cubans have left the country since 2020, according to Juan Carlos Albizu-Campos, a Cuban demographer. While the official population is about 9.7 million people, Mr. Albizu-Campos said 8.25 million would be more accurate.
Some people have taken to cooking with firewood. The country is producing 25 percent less power than it did in 2019, said Ricardo Torres, a Cuban economist who is currently a fellow at American University.
Cuba’s economy has declined three years in a row, he said.
“The domestic economy,” Mr. Torres said, “is in a free fall.”
Yoan Nazabal, 32, a bartender and taxi driver in Havana, said his wife had a cesarean section six months ago, and was stunned to find out what they were expected to bring to the hospital.
“We had to bring our own catheter to the hospital!” he said. “Everyone talks about how great our medical system is, and how it is free — and it has been, historically. Our doctors are first-class. But they don’t have any resources with which to do their job.”
Hannah Berkeley Cohen contributed reporting from Miami.
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2) U.S. to Control Venezuela Oil Sales ‘Indefinitely,’ Energy Secretary Says
Chris Wright said the Trump administration was in “active dialogue” with Venezuela’s government about the plan.
By Rebecca F. Elliott, Jan. 7, 2026
An oil refinery in Punto Fijo, Venezuela. President Trump said late Tuesday that Venezuela would soon send 30 million to 50 million barrels of oil to the United States. Credit...Adriana Loureiro Fernandez for The New York Times
The energy secretary, Chris Wright, said on Wednesday that the United States intended to maintain significant control over Venezuela’s oil industry, including by overseeing the sale of the country’s production “indefinitely.”
“Going forward we will sell the production that comes out of Venezuela into the marketplace,” Mr. Wright said at a Goldman Sachs energy conference near Miami.
Mr. Wright’s remarks came after President Trump said late Tuesday that Venezuela would soon hand over tens of millions of barrels of oil to the United States.
Venezuela would send 30 million to 50 million barrels of oil, or up to two months’ worth of daily production, to the United States, Mr. Trump said in a social media post, adding that he would control the profits from those sales.
“We need to have that leverage and that control of those oil sales to drive the changes that simply must happen in Venezuela,” said Mr. Wright, a former oil industry executive. He added that the money “can flow back into Venezuela to benefit the Venezuelan people.”
If put in place, the Trump administration’s plans would amount to a sharp reversal in U.S. policy on Venezuela. The nation’s oil production and exports have been severely restricted since 2019, when Mr. Trump imposed tough sanctions on the country, including on Venezuela’s state-owned oil company.
More recently, the United States has imposed a partial blockade designed to prevent many tankers from leaving Venezuela with oil. That has choked a vital source of revenue for the country’s government and forced it to keep oil in storage tanks and ships floating off the coast.
It was not clear what legal authority the Trump administration would operate under to oversee Venezuela’s sales of oil.
Taylor Rogers, a White House spokeswoman, said the Trump administration made a deal with Venezuela’s interim authorities for the United States to control the sale of the country’s oil. “Secretary Wright and the Department of Energy are working with the interim authorities and private oil industry to execute this historic energy deal that will restore prosperity, safety, and security in the United States and Venezuela,” she said in a statement.
As of Wednesday morning, leaders in Caracas, the Venezuelan capital, had not commented publicly on the U.S. government’s plans or confirmed the existence of an agreement with the Trump administration.
Mr. Wright said the Trump administration was in “active dialogue” with Venezuela’s leadership, as well as U.S. oil giants that have operated in the country. Executives from some of the largest Western oil producers are expecting to meet Mr. Trump at the White House on Friday afternoon, according to people familiar with the plans.
Many Western oil companies abandoned operations in Venezuela over the last two decades. The opportunity there is large given the country’s vast oil reserves, but returning is politically risky and likely would come down to the terms of investment. Chevron is the only large U.S. oil company to stay and continue producing oil in the country.
Oil prices were down around 1 percent on Wednesday morning after Mr. Wright’s remarks.
The energy secretary echoed outside estimates forecasting that Venezuela could potentially boost oil production by several hundred thousand barrels per day relatively quickly. But more substantial increases above current output levels of around one million barrels per day would take much longer, even if international oil companies were ready to invest more money in the country.
“To get back to the historical production numbers, that takes tens of billions of dollars and significant time,” Mr. Wright said. “But why not?”
Emma Bubola, Kenneth P. Vogel and Ivan Penn contributed reporting.
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3) Buy Greenland? Take It? Why? An Old Pact Already Gives Trump a Free Hand.
Analysts say the Cold War agreement allows the president to increase the American military presence almost at will.
By Jeffrey Gettleman, Amelia Nierenberg and Maya Tekeli, Maya Tekeli reported from Copenhagen, Jan. 7, 2026
The remnants of an American air base on Greenland called Bluie East Two, which was built during World War II. Ivor Prickett for The New York Times
President Trump has ridiculed Denmark’s dog sled teams in Greenland.
He has cited mysterious Chinese and Russian ships prowling off the coast.
He seems increasingly fixated on the idea that the United States should take over this gigantic icebound island, with one official saying the president wants to buy it and another suggesting that the United States could simply take it. Just a few days ago, Mr. Trump said: “We need Greenland from the standpoint of national security.”
But the question is: Does the United States even need to buy Greenland — or do something more drastic — to accomplish all of Mr. Trump’s goals?
Under a little-known Cold War agreement, the United States already enjoys sweeping military access in Greenland. Right now, the United States has one base in a very remote corner of the island. But the agreement allows it to “construct, install, maintain, and operate” military bases across Greenland, “house personnel” and “control landings, takeoffs, anchorages, moorings, movements, and operation of ships, aircraft, and waterborne craft.”
It was signed in 1951 by the United States and Denmark, which colonized Greenland more than 300 years ago and still controls some of its affairs.
“The U.S. has such a free hand in Greenland that it can pretty much do what it wants,” said Mikkel Runge Olesen, a researcher at the Danish Institute for International Studies in Copenhagen.
“I have a very hard time seeing that the U.S. couldn’t get pretty much everything it wanted,” he said, adding, “if it just asked nicely.”
But buying Greenland — something that Secretary of State Marco Rubio told lawmakers on Tuesday was Mr. Trump’s latest plan — is a different question.
Greenland does not want to be bought by anyone — especially not the United States. And Denmark does not have the authority to sell it, Dr. Olesen said.
“It is impossible,” he said.
In the past, Denmark would have been the decider. In 1946, it refused the Truman administration’s offer of $100 million in gold.
Today, things are different. Greenlanders now have the right to hold a referendum on independence and Danish officials have said it’s up to the island’s 57,000 inhabitants to decide their future. A poll last year found 85 percent of residents opposed the idea of an American takeover.
Greenland’s prime minister, Jens-Frederik Nielsen, has repeatedly scoffed at the idea of being bought, saying this past week, “Our country is not for sale.”
The relatively short, straightforward defense agreement between the United States and Denmark was updated in 2004 to include Greenland’s semiautonomous government, giving it a say in how American military operations might affect the local population. The roots of the agreement go back to a partnership forged during World War II.
At that time, Denmark was occupied by the Nazis. Its ambassador in Washington, cut off from Copenhagen, took it upon himself to strike a defense agreement for Greenland with the United States. (The island is part of North America, along the Arctic Ocean and close to Canada’s coast.)
The fear was that Nazis could use Greenland as a steppingstone to America. The Germans had already established small meteorological bases on the island’s east coast and relayed information for battles in Europe. American troops eventually ousted them and established more than a dozen bases there with thousands of troops, landing strips and other military facilities.
After World War II, the United States continued to run some bases and a string of early warning radar sites. As the Cold War wound down, the United States closed all of them except one. It’s now called the Pittufik Space Base and helps track missiles crossing the North Pole.
The Danes have a light presence, too: a few hundred troops, including special forces that use dog sleds to conduct long-range patrols. In recent months, the Danish government has vowed to upgrade its bases and increase surveillance.
After American special forces captured Nicolás Maduro, the president of Venezuela, from a safehouse last week, Mr. Trump seemed emboldened. Stephen Miller, a top aide, then claimed that Greenland should belong to the United States and that “nobody’s going to fight the United States” over it. Danish and Greenlandic anxiety skyrocketed.
On Tuesday night, Danish and Greenlandic leaders asked to meet with Mr. Rubio, according to Greenland’s foreign minister. It’s not clear if or when that might happen.
Tensions between Mr. Trump and Denmark’s prime minister, Mette Frederiksen, have been steadily rising, as Mr. Trump pushes to “get” Greenland, as he puts it, while Ms. Frederiksen refuses to kowtow to him.
Just a few days ago, Ms. Frederiksen cited the 1951 agreement, saying, “We already have a defense agreement between the Kingdom and the United States today, which gives the United States wide access to Greenland.” She urged the United States “to stop the threats” and said an American attack on Greenland would mean the end of the international world order.
European leaders issued their own statement on Tuesday, also citing the 1951 agreement and saying, “Greenland belongs to its people.”
Analysts said that if the United States tried to use the defense pact as a fig leaf to send in a lot of troops and try to occupy Greenland, that wouldn’t be legal either.
According to the 2004 amendment, the United States is supposed to consult with Denmark and Greenland before it makes “any significant changes” in its military operations on the island. The 2004 amendment, which was signed by Gen. Colin L. Powell, who was then the secretary of state, explicitly recognizes Greenland as “an equal part of the Kingdom of Denmark.”
Peter Ernstved Rasmussen, a Danish defense analyst, said that in practice, if American forces made reasonable requests, “the U.S. would always get a yes.”
“It is a courtesy formula,” he said. “If the U.S. wanted to act without asking, it could simply inform Denmark that it is building a base, an airfield or a port.”
That’s what infuriates longtime Danish political experts. If Mr. Trump wanted to beef up Greenland’s security right now, he could. But there has been no such official American request, said Jens Adser Sorensen, a former senior official in Denmark’s Parliament.
“Why don’t you use the mechanism of the defense agreement if you’re so worried about the security situation?” he said, adding: “The framework is there. It’s in place.”
But Greenland’s strategic location is not the only thing that has attracted Mr. Trump’s inner circle. The enormous island has another draw: critical minerals, loads of them, buried under the ice. Here, too, analysts say, the United States doesn’t need to take over the island to get them.
Greenlanders have said they are open to doing business — with just about anyone.
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4) Federal Agent Shoots Woman Amid Minneapolis Crackdown
Her condition was not immediately known. Gov. Tim Walz asked for calm.
By Julie Bosman and Mitch Smith, Jan. 7, 2026
The aftermath of a shooting involving federal agents in Minneapolis. Credit...Tim Evans/Reuters
A federal immigration officer shot a woman in Minneapolis on Wednesday during an enforcement operation, state and local officials said.
The shooting came as the Trump administration ramped up a promised crackdown on illegal immigration in Minnesota.
The woman’s condition was not immediately clear. The Department of Homeland Security had no immediate comment.
Gov. Tim Walz of Minnesota said in a statement that he had been informed of the shooting involving U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, which took place in a residential neighborhood in South Minneapolis.
“My public safety team is working to gather information on an ICE-related shooting this morning.” Mr. Walz said. “We will share information as we learn more. In the meantime, I ask folks to remain calm.”
About 2,000 federal agents were expected to take part in the enforcement operation, which could last for weeks, according to administration posts on social media.
Elliott Payne, the president of the Minneapolis City Council, said in an interview from the scene that a woman appeared to have been driving a maroon sedan while agents were conducting an enforcement operation.
“I don’t know if she was an observer or their target,” he said, condemning the presence of ICE in Minneapolis. “They’re an escalating factor. We need them out of our city.”
Mayor Jacob Frey said on social media that the shooting involved an ICE agent. Mr. Frey, a Democrat who was recently sworn in for a third term, said that “the presence of federal immigration enforcement agents is causing chaos in our city.”
He added, “We’re demanding ICE to leave the city immediately.”
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5) Oil Firms Say Venezuela Owes Them Billions, Complicating Trump’s Plan
Companies like Exxon Mobil and ConocoPhillips say that Venezuela owes them billions of dollars for confiscating their assets two decades ago.
By Ivan Penn, Jan. 7, 2026
“ConocoPhillips’s claims against Venezuela add up to $12 billion, while Exxon Mobil, the largest U.S. oil company, has said the country owes it an estimated $20 billion.”
A tanker docked near a refinery in Punto Fijo, Venezuela. The cost of restoring the country’s oil production after decades of decline is expected to be substantial. Credit...Adriana Loureiro Fernandez for The New York Times
Western oil companies have been fighting to recoup tens of billions of dollars that they say Venezuela owes them — debts that could greatly complicate efforts by President Trump to compel U.S. businesses to produce more oil in the country.
Exxon Mobil and ConocoPhillips top the list of oil companies with big financial claims against Venezuela, whose president, Nicolás Maduro, was captured by U.S. forces over the weekend in Caracas.
American and European oil companies once had significant operations in Venezuela, ranked as having the world’s largest proven oil reserves. But most Western energy businesses abandoned the country after disputes with its leftist government, and since then corruption, mismanagement and neglect have greatly eroded oil production.
The foreign oil companies have been fighting for two decades to be compensated for being forced out of the country under Mr. Maduro’s predecessor, Hugo Chávez. Oil executives and experts have said that until those debts are resolved these companies will be very reluctant to invest more in the country — something Mr. Trump has made one of his key aims for reviving the Venezuela’s economy.
In the mid-2000s, the Chávez government demanded that oil companies accept a smaller stake in Venezuelan projects without compensation. Most foreign companies left the country rather than accept the new terms.
ConocoPhillips’s claims against Venezuela add up to $12 billion, while Exxon Mobil, the largest U.S. oil company, has said the country owes it an estimated $20 billion.
Chevron is the only U.S. oil company that stayed in Venezuela. That gambit has put it in a potential position to reap a significant reward as the Trump administration presses the country to accept greater U.S. investment.
Exxon Mobil, ConocoPhillips and other companies have spent years trying to make Venezuela pay through international arbitration and cases in U.S. courts.
“It’s a stigmatizing action against a country,” Shon Hiatt, director of the Zage Business of Energy Initiative at the Marshall School of Business at the University of Southern California. “It’s basically telling everybody that they’re never going back in to the country.”
European energy companies, including Italy’s Eni, France’s TotalEnergies and Spain’s Repsol, also invested billions of dollars in Venezuela though their operations were much smaller than those of Exxon Mobil and ConocoPhillips, said Mr. Hiatt, who has long tracked the oil industry in Venezuela.
While oil companies have categorized those debts as unlikely to be repaid, they are highly unlikely to give up on their claims.
ConocoPhillips may end up recouping some of its losses as part of a U.S. Bankruptcy Court’s auction of Citgo, an American subsidiary of Venezuela’s state-owned oil company, Petróleos de Venezuela.
ConocoPhillips declined to comment beyond what it has said in regulatory filings.
The company had substantial investments in oil projects in central and eastern Venezuela as well as off the country’s coast. International arbitration bodies have repeatedly ruled in Conoco’s favor, but turning those decisions into cash has been very difficult.
Exxon Mobil has said in regulatory filings that it collected awards of $908 million related to its investment in the Cerro Negro Project in eastern Venezuela, and $260 million in compensation related to the La Ceiba Project on a port in the nation’s central region.
But another $1.4 billion arbitration award was annulled in the International Center for Settlement of Investment Disputes. Exxon filed a new claim to restore the award, but that and the large majority of Exxon’s claims have gone unpaid.
Exxon Mobil did not respond to requests for comment.
Venezuela has contested many foreign oil company claims, and said it owes much less or nothing at all.
U.S. and European oil companies have been speaking with the Trump administration about their next steps in Venezuela. But new investments pose significant challenges because of the political instability created by Mr. Maduro’s capture.
Mr. Trump said on Saturday the U.S. oil companies would “spend billions of dollars, fix the badly broken infrastructure” and “start making money for the country.”
An Energy Department spokesman said that Chris Wright, the energy secretary, “remains in close contact with U.S. oil companies and plans to meet with several of them” at a conference on Wednesday.
But investors remain wary. Exxon Mobil’s stock price fell more than 3 percent on Tuesday. ConocoPhillips fell more than 1 percent, and Chevron’s share price dropped more than 4 percent after significant gains on Monday.
Even before the Trump administration seized Mr. Maduro, the cost of restoring Venezuela’s oil production would have been substantial.
The Inter-American Development Bank, the primary source of development financing in South America and the Caribbean, estimated in 2020 that it would cost $10 billion a year over a decade to restore Venezuela’s oil production.
The Center for Energy Studies at the Rice University’s Baker Institute for Public Policy estimated that Venezuela’s production peaked in 1998 at 3.4 million barrels of oil a day and dropped to 1.3 million barrels a day by 2018.
In a 2020 report the center noted that the failure to attract more investment into its oil industry has been “one of the key drivers of the economic catastrophe facing the country.”
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6) Trump Says U.S. Oversight of Venezuela Could Last for Years
In a wide-ranging interview with The New York Times on Wednesday, President Trump said “only time will tell” when it comes to how long the United States aims to control the country.
By David E. Sanger, Tyler Pager, Katie Rogers and Zolan Kanno-Youngs, Jan. 8, 2026
The reporters are White House correspondents for the Times. They interviewed President Trump in the Oval Office on Wednesday evening.
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/01/08/us/politics/trump-interview-venezuela.html
President Trump in the Oval Office with Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Wednesday. Doug Mills/The New York Times
President Trump said on Wednesday evening that he expected the United States would be running Venezuela and extracting oil from its huge reserves for years, and insisted that the interim government of the country — all former loyalists to the now-imprisoned Nicolás Maduro — is “giving us everything that we feel is necessary.”
“Only time will tell,” he said, when asked how long the administration will demand direct oversight of the South American nation, with the hovering threat of American military action from an armada just off shore.
“We will rebuild it in a very profitable way,” Mr. Trump said during a nearly two-hour interview. “We’re going to be using oil, and we’re going to be taking oil. We’re getting oil prices down, and we’re going to be giving money to Venezuela, which they desperately need.”
Mr. Trump’s remarks came hours after administration officials said the United States plans to effectively assume control of selling Venezuela’s oil indefinitely, part of a three-phase plan that Secretary of State Marco Rubio outlined for members of Congress. While Republican lawmakers have been largely supportive of the administration’s actions, Democrats on Wednesday reiterated their warnings that the United States was headed toward a protracted international intervention without clear legal authority.
During the wide-ranging interview with The New York Times, Mr. Trump did not give a precise time range for how long the United States would remain Venezuela’s political overlord. Would it be three months? Six months? A year? Longer?
“I would say much longer,” the president replied.
Over the course of the interview, Mr. Trump addressed a wide range of topics, including the fatal ICE shooting in Minneapolis, immigration, the Russia-Ukraine war, Greenland and NATO, his health and his plans for further White House renovations.
Mr. Trump did not answer questions about why he recognized Mr. Maduro’s vice president Delcy Rodríguez as Venezuela’s new leader instead of backing María Corina Machado, the opposition leader whose party led a successful election campaign against Mr. Maduro in 2024 and recently won the Nobel Peace Prize. He declined to comment when asked if he had spoken to Ms. Rodríguez.
“But Marco speaks to her all the time,” he said of the secretary of state. Mr. Trump added: “I will tell you that we are in constant communication with her and the administration.”
Mr. Trump also made no commitments about when elections would be held in Venezuela, which had a long democratic tradition from the late 1950s until Hugo Chavez took power in 1999.
Shortly after four New York Times reporters sat down to speak with him, Mr. Trump paused the interview to take a call from President Gustavo Petro of Colombia, days after Mr. Trump threatened to target the country because of its role as a cocaine hub.
As the call was connected, the president invited the Times reporters to remain in the Oval Office to hear the conversation with the Colombian president, on the condition that its contents remain off the record. He was joined in the room by Vice President JD Vance and Mr. Rubio, both of whom left after the call concluded.
After speaking to Mr. Petro, Mr. Trump dictated to an aide a post for his social media account saying that the Colombian president had called “to explain the situation of drugs” coming out of rural cocaine mills in Colombia and that Mr. Trump had invited him to visit Washington.
Mr. Petro’s call — which ran about an hour — appeared to dissipate any immediate threat of U.S. military action, and Mr. Trump indicated he believed that the decapitation of the Maduro regime had intimidated other leaders in the region to fall into line. During the lengthy conversation with The Times, Mr. Trump reveled in the success of the operation that broke into the heavily fortified compound in Caracas and resulted in the capture of Mr. Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores.
He said he had tracked the training of the forces for the operation, down to the creation of a life-size replica of the compound at a military facility in Kentucky.
The president said that as the operation unfolded, he was worried it could end up being a “Jimmy Carter disaster. That destroyed his entire administration.” He was referring to the failed operation on April 24, 1980, to rescue 52 American hostages held in Iran. An American helicopter collided with an aircraft in the desert, a tragedy that haunted Mr. Carter’s legacy but led to the creation of a far more disciplined, well-trained special operations forces.
“I don’t know that he would have won the election,” Mr. Trump said of Mr. Carter, “but he certainly had no chance after that disaster.”
He contrasted the success of the seizure of Mr. Maduro, in an operation that appears to have killed about 70 Venezuelans and Cubans, among others, to operations under his predecessors that had gone wrong.
“You know you didn’t have a Jimmy Carter crashing helicopters all over the place, that you didn’t have a Biden Afghanistan disaster where they couldn’t do the simplest maneuver,” he said, referring to the chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan that resulted in the deaths of 13 American servicemembers.
Mr. Trump said that he had already begun to make money for the United States by taking oil that has been under sanctions. He referred to his Tuesday night announcement that the United States would obtain 30 to 50 million barrels of heavy Venezuelan crude oil.
But he offered no time period for that process, and he acknowledged it would take years to revive the country’s neglected oil sector.
“The oil will take a while,” he said.
Mr. Trump appeared far more focused on the capture mission than the details of how to navigate Venezuela’s future. He declined to say what might prompt him to put American forces on the ground in the country.
“I wouldn’t want to tell you that,” he said.
Would he insert American troops if the Venezuelan government blocked him from access to the country’s oil? Would he send them in if Venezuela refused to kick out Russian and Chinese personnel, as his administration has demanded?
“I can’t tell you that,” said Mr. Trump. “I really wouldn’t want to tell you that, but they’re treating us with great respect. As you know, we’re getting along very well with the administration that is there right now.”
He sidestepped a question about why he declined to install the man the United States declared the winner of the 2024 Venezuelan presidential election, Edmundo González. Mr. González was essentially a proxy candidate for the lead opposition leader, Ms. Machado.
He reiterated that Mr. Maduro’s allies are cooperating with the United States, despite their hostile public statements.
“They’re giving us everything that we feel is necessary,” he said. “Don’t forget, they took the oil from us years ago.”
He was referring to the nationalization of facilities built by American oil companies. Mr. Trump has already been talking to American oil executives about investing in the Venezuelan fields, but many are reluctant, worried that the operation to run the country could falter when Mr. Trump leaves office, or that Venezuela’s military and intelligence services would undercut the effort because they were being cut out of the profits.
Mr. Trump said that he would like to travel to Venezuela in the future.
“I think at some point it’ll be safe,” he said.
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7) Fatal Shooting by ICE Follows Weeks of Turmoil in Minnesota
Residents of the state said they were reeling after a series of blows that have exposed a deepening rift between the Trump administration and Minnesota leaders.
By Julie Bosman, Jan. 8, 2026
Thousands of people gathered for a vigil on the block where Renee Nicole Good, a 37-year-old woman, was killed on Wednesday in Minneapolis. Jamie Kelter Davis for The New York Times
The blows in Minnesota began landing last year, when a fraud scandal in the state’s social services system ripped through the national news and disgusted taxpayers.
Then in December, President Trump laced into Somali refugees, a group that has settled in Minnesota in large numbers, saying they were “garbage” that he did not want in his country.
Just after Christmas, another jolt: A conservative influencer posted a video that went viral online claiming that day care centers in Minneapolis were cheating taxpayers out of more than $100 million. And this week, as federal officials threatened to cut funding for Minnesota’s social service programs and a new surge of federal immigration agents arrived in Minneapolis, the state’s beleaguered governor, Tim Walz, said that he would not run for re-election.
But it was the shooting death of a 37-year-old woman by a federal immigration officer along a Minneapolis street on Wednesday that exposed just how a wide a gulf there is between the Trump administration and Minnesota’s Democratic leaders.
At a news conference, Mr. Walz delivered an angry message to President Trump: “You’ve done enough.” Hours later, Kristi Noem, the homeland security secretary, labeled the woman who was killed a terrorist and vowed to continue aggressive enforcement actions in the city.
The clash left residents expressing anguish and fear over where events might lead next.
At a candlelight vigil on Wednesday evening, Andy Cuate, a 24-year-old from Cottage Grove, Minn., said that the eyes of the country on Minnesota brought him back to the aftermath of the murder of George Floyd by a police officer in 2020. More than five years later, he said, it still feels raw.
“Now that we’re the center of attention again, it’s just kind of like, ‘When are the people from Minnesota going to catch a break here?’” Mr. Cuate said.
The Minneapolis neighborhood where the shooting occured on Wednesday is less than a mile from where George Floyd was killed by the police in 2020.
Throughout the day, local and state officials condemned the killing of Renee Nicole Good, a Minneapolis resident who was driving a vehicle when an Immigration and Customs Enforcement fatally shot her on a residential street.
Federal officials had just begun a broad crackdown on immigration in the Twin Cities, with Department of Homeland Security officials promising that 2,000 agents would fan out in search of criminal offenders.
Mayor Jacob Frey, a Democrat, called for immigration agents to get “out of Minneapolis.”
“Now somebody is dead,” he said. “That’s on you. And it’s also on you to leave.”
Mr. Walz urged Minnesotans to be calm in their response to the shooting.
Federal immigration officials said that an ICE agent shot and killed Ms. Good in self-defense. They said her vehicle was driving toward the agent and she had refused to cooperate when ordered to stop.
That explanation was sharply dismissed by many people in Minneapolis, a liberal-leaning city where suspicion of Mr. Trump and his immigration crackdown is fierce.
“More than anything, I feel like we’re prepared as a city for events like these,” said Elliott Payne, the president of the Minneapolis City Council, as he drove to join thousands of people at vigil by nightfall. “And sadly, it’s because we have been through many events like these.”
During the Covid pandemic, when the city was recovering from the civil unrest that followed Mr. Floyd’s death, Minneapolis residents organized community aid to help neighbors who were short on food and money. They formed group chats and community patrols as crime spiked. Many of those networks came back to life when ICE agents flooded into the city in recent days, and neighbors began warning one another if agents were spotted.
“This was just a bystander looking to protect their community,” Mr. Payne said of Ms. Good.
Demonstrators mourned the loss of Ms. Good at a vigil Wednesday night. “I’m happy to see the unity of the people,” said Bella Bessantez, a resident who recorded the vigil from her porch on Portland Avenue.
Even outside the Twin Cities, Minnesota residents said it was impossible to ignore the turmoil that had settled over the state.
“It is exhausting,” said Jessie Hennen, a professor of creative writing at Southwest Minnesota State University, who has followed the news of the ICE influx so closely, she wasn’t sure how she would finish preparing for the spring semester. “It’s hard to focus.”
Many people in Minnesota said they were bracing for the weeks ahead, and the protests, investigations and recriminations that were to come.
Hours after Ms. Good’s death, some people had already called for criminal charges to be brought against the ICE agent who shot her, while Ms. Noem said on Wednesday that she will ask the Justice Department to prosecute as domestic terrorism the use of vehicles to block immigration enforcement operations.
Dan Simmons contributed reporting from Minneapolis.
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8) Videos Contradict Trump Administration Account of ICE Shooting in Minneapolis
An analysis of footage from three camera angles show that the vehicle appears to be turning away from a federal officer as he opened fire.
By Devon Lum, Robin Stein and Ainara Tiefenthäler, January 8, 2026
https://www.nytimes.com/video/us/100000010631041/minneapolis-ice-shooting-video.html
The Minneapolis neighborhood where the shooting occurred on Wednesday is less than a mile from where George Floyd was killed by the police in 2020
On Wednesday in Minneapolis, a federal agent fatally shot a motorist, 37-year-old Renee Nicole Good. Trump administration officials said these were “defensive shots” fired because the officer was being run over. But our analysis of bystander footage, filmed from different angles, appears to show the agent was not in the path of the victim’s SUV when he fired three shots at close range. Here’s how events unfolded. Moments before the shooting, the victim’s maroon SUV is stopped in the middle of the street. Multiple unmarked federal vehicles are idling nearby. Secretary Noem alleged the motorist “was blocking the officers in.” Bystanders are blowing whistles and yelling at federal agents. Then, federal vehicles start moving toward the maroon SUV with sirens and lights blaring. A federal agent films the scene on his phone. The driver rolls forward slightly, turning left, then stops and waves for others to go ahead. Two agents exit this silver pickup and walk toward the vehicle. Moments later, shots are fired. Let’s look at the scene again more closely. This is the agent who shoots the driver. He walks around the car filming and disappears from view. Other agents pull up and order the driver to exit her vehicle. One of them grabs at the door handle and reaches inside. The SUV reverses, then turns right, apparently attempting to leave. At the same time, the agent filming crosses toward the left of the vehicle and grabs his gun. He opens fire on the motorist and continues shooting as she drives past. The moment the agent fires, he is standing here to the left of the SUV and the wheels are pointing to the right away from the agent. This appears to conflict with allegations that the SUV was ramming or about to ram the officer. President Trump and others said the federal agent was hit by the SUV, often pointing to another video filmed from a different angle. And it’s true that at this moment, in this grainy, low-resolution footage, it does look like the agent is being struck by the SUV. But when we synchronize it with the first clip, we can see the agent is not being run over. In fact, his feet are positioned away from the SUV. The SUV crashes into a white car parked down the road. A bystander runs toward the collision. The federal agents on scene do not appear to rush to provide emergency medical care. Eventually, the agent who shot the motorist approaches the vehicle. Seconds later, he turns back around and tells his colleagues to call 911. Agents blocked several bystanders who attempt to provide medical care, including one who identifies himself as a physician. At the same time, several agents, including the agent who opened fire, get in their vehicles and drive off, apparently altering the active crime scene.
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9) Victim in ICE Shooting Is Remembered for Her Kindness
Renee Good, 37, a resident of Minneapolis, was mourned on Wednesday as a cherished member of the community.
By Christina Morales, Published Jan. 7, 2026, Updated Jan. 8, 2026
Demonstrators mourned the loss of Ms. Good at a vigil Wednesday night. “I’m happy to see the unity of the people,” said Bella Bessantez, a resident who recorded the vigil from her porch on Portland Avenue.
The woman killed by a federal agent on Wednesday in Minneapolis was remembered as a compassionate, giving person.
The woman, identified by the authorities as Renee Nicole Good, 37, was a cherished Minnesotan, said State Representative Leigh Finke of St. Paul, Minn., who paid tribute to her in a statement. Ms. Good was “a loved and celebrated community member, who has now been stripped away from her family,” Ms. Finke said.
Ms. Good, a U.S. citizen, lived in Minneapolis with her partner, according to an interview with her mother, Donna Ganger, in The Minnesota Star Tribune, which said that Ms. Good had a 6-year-old child.
Federal officials said an ICE agent shot and killed Ms. Good in self-defense, and they accused her of trying to use her vehicle to run over law enforcement officers. Local officials have strongly disputed that account.
Ms. Ganger told The Star Tribune that her daughter “was one of the kindest people I’ve ever known,” adding that she was “loving, forgiving and affectionate.”
Ms. Ganger declined a request for additional comment, and other family members could not be immediately reached.
Ms. Finke condemned the federal immigration operation that led to the fatal encounter, calling for those activities to end, “as well as full transparency and accountability to ensure justice for the victim.”
Mitch Smith, Kevin Draper and Julie Bosman contributed reporting. Sheelagh McNeill contributed research.
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10) A Construction Worker’s Suicide Highlights a Wider Crisis
The death of TJ Kimball was a private tragedy that underscores a widespread risk in the stressful field.
By Ronda Kaysen, Photographs by Sophie Park, Jan. 8, 2026
Ronda Kaysen reported this story from Raynham, Mass., interviewing 45 industry leaders, academics, and laborers and their loved ones.
TJ Kimball with his dogs over the years.
A stack of paint buckets. Trowels nestled along the wall. A hard hat. These items remain, untouched since March 15, in Timothy J. Kimball’s backyard work shed.
It has been 10 months since Mr. Kimball, at 37, quietly walked into his Raynham, Mass., bedroom on a chilly Saturday afternoon and killed himself. And it is in his work shed where his father, Timothy Kimball, lingers in his only son’s presence. “This is where he’d come out, smoke, have a cigarette — I feel him here,” the elder Mr. Kimball, 62, said, after rifling through his son’s first tool bag, from when he became an apprentice in the painters union almost 20 years ago. “I tend to talk to him here.”
The younger Mr. Kimball, whom everyone called TJ, was a drywall finisher, known as a taper, the laborer who prepares freshly hung drywall for a coat of paint. He came from three generations in the trades — his father, uncles and great-uncles were all tapers and carpenters in the Boston area.
Over 300 people, stunned by the loss, turned up for his wake.
“It’s just like a big, huge tsunami came in and wiped everything out,” said Mr. Kimball’s oldest sister, Shannon Kilburn, 43.
The shattering loss of TJ Kimball was not an isolated incident. The construction industry has one of the highest suicide rates of any major industry in the country, second only to mining, according the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Add in drug overdoses, where construction workers die at a greater rate than workers in any other industry, and a bleak picture emerges of a population in crisis.
Construction is already among the most dangerous jobs in the country, with about 1,000 people dying each year from work-related injuries, more than any other industry. But five times as many workers, 5,100, died by suicide, and 15,900 died from drug overdoses, in 2023, according to an analysis of the most recent federal data by the Center for Construction Research and Training, an occupational safety organization. While the number of overdoses declined from 2022, from 17,000, the number of suicides remained virtually unchanged.
“The crisis affects every single job on every single job site in this country,” said Sonya Bohmann, the executive director of the Construction Industry Alliance for Suicide Prevention, a nonprofit organization. Employers and unions have expanded access to mental health support and drug treatment programs; job sites often stock Narcan, or naloxone, a drug that reverses the effect of an overdose, in first aid kits; drug testing is increasingly commonplace; and companies and unions offer suicide prevention training programs. But the crisis persists.
Construction workers are particularly vulnerable to suicide because of a collision of risk factors. Men without a college degree and veterans, two groups with high rates of suicide and of gun ownership, often work in construction. Guns are used in the majority of all suicides, and men who own handguns are nearly eight times as likely to die by gun suicide than those who do not.
Construction is hard, physical labor, often done outside in the elements and sometimes far from home.
“It’s also a very cyclical job — you can’t guarantee a 40-hour week,” said Shawn Nehiley, president of the Ironworkers District Council of New England. “You don’t know if you’re going to be laid off, if you’re going to work overtime.”
Fentanyl Overdoses: What to Know
Understand fentanyl’s effects. Fentanyl is a potent and fast-acting drug, two qualities that also make it highly addictive. A small quantity goes a long way, so it’s easy to suffer an overdose. With fentanyl, there is only a short window of time to intervene and save a person’s life during an overdose.
Stick to licensed pharmacies. Prescription drugs sold online or by unlicensed dealers marketed as OxyContin, Vicodin and Xanax are often laced with fentanyl. Only take pills that were prescribed by your doctor and came from a licensed pharmacy.
Talk to your loved ones. The best way to prevent fentanyl use is to educate your loved ones, including teens, about it. Explain what fentanyl is and that it can be found in pills bought online or from friends. Aim to establish an ongoing dialogue in short spurts rather than one long, formal conversation.
Learn how to spot an overdose. When someone overdoses from fentanyl, breathing slows and their skin often turns a bluish hue. If you think someone is overdosing, call 911 right away.
Buy naloxone. If you’re concerned that a loved one could be exposed to fentanyl, you may want to buy naloxone. The medicine can rapidly reverse an opioid overdose and is often available at pharmacies without a prescription. Narcan, the nasal spray version of naloxone, has received F.D.A. approval to be sold over the counter.
Get hurt on the job and a painkiller prescription can spiral into addiction, as it did for Mr. Nehiley, who was prescribed opioids in 2001 for an injury, leading to a relapse of an addiction that began in adolescence. “The prayers before I went to bed at night were ‘Please God, don’t let me wake up in the morning,’” said Mr. Nehiley, 62, now sober for 15 years.
In his office hang 45 prayer cards and photographs of union members who died from overdoses or suicide since 2008. “And that’s not all of them,” he said.
No occupation has a higher rate of substance abuse than construction and extraction. A substance abuse disorder, even for someone in recovery, increases suicide risk.
“There’s this high density of risk with this community,” said Craig Bryan, a clinical psychologist and the director of the University of Vermont Medical Center’s suicide care clinic.
Interviews with dozens of construction workers described a culture of widespread drinking and drug use. “There’s cocaine, there’s pills, there’s even alcohol at lunch,” said Paul Reed, a recovering addict who runs Roofers in Recovery, a Colorado nonprofit organization.
The regional chapter of Mr. Kimball’s union, the International Union of Painters and Allied Trades, does not track how many of its 4,000 members die by overdose or suicide. But its quarterly magazine memorializes members who died in the intervening months. In the spring issue, of the 28 people commemorated, four died by overdose or suicide.
One of them was Mr. Kimball.
‘He Was Our Boy’
With five uncles and his father working in the trades, it was no surprise Mr. Kimball became a union apprentice at 19. “We’re just blue collar, get out, hustle, work hard,” his father said. “It was a chance for him to make something of himself.”
But his first few years on the job were troubled, and in the aftermath of his death, Mr. Kimball’s parents and his wife felt compelled to speak publicly to increase awareness and reduce the stigma surrounding suicide and addiction. “There’s no shame,” his father said. “He was our boy. He was our son.”
Mr. Kimball struggled with a Percocet addiction that started in high school after he broke his sternum playing football. At 23, he was arrested for drug possession and distribution, but avoided a felony conviction “with a very expensive lawyer,” his father said. His mother, Angela Kimball, forced him, through the court system, into a drug-treatment program. He got clean, but spent the rest of his life on Suboxone, a maintenance drug for opioid addiction.
By his late 20s, Mr. Kimball, a perfectionist, had gained a reputation as a reliable, fastidious worker, and a good foreman who could motivate a crew. He was considered among the best tapers in the area, someone who used traditional methods to lay the tape and spread the mud along the seams of the drywall, leaving the surface so flat and flawless that a wall could almost vanish behind a coat of paint.
But his days were long, often starting at 4:30 a.m. The pandemic building boom, and the slowdown that followed, added to the pressure and the gnawing sense that at any moment work could dry up.
“Everybody’s under the gun. Everybody’s under stress,” said Ryan Barry, 36, who worked with Mr. Kimball on his last job, at a Google office in Cambridge. “When you walk on the job site the first day, you’re already in the red and everybody’s yelling that you got to go 100 miles an hour to get these jobs done. And you just use and abuse your body.”
While the life of a construction worker can sometimes be described as lonely and isolated, Mr. Kimball’s was not. He dated the same woman, Ashley Kimball, who he’d known since high school, for 15 years before they married, 11 days before his death. The only son in a family with three daughters, he regularly checked in with his parents and was the boisterous uncle who helped his nieces and nephews learn to hit a ball. He played paintball with his high school buddies and was a loyal member of a fantasy football league.
Mr. Kimball left no note, and no one interviewed for this story thought that he might be suicidal. Experts point to a mosaic of risk factors, with warning signs that can be difficult to spot. Interviews with friends, family and co-workers revealed Mr. Kimball’s last few months as a challenging time. One sister was battling cancer, another filed for divorce from Mr. Kimball’s best friend. In June 2024, Mr. Kimball and his girlfriend bought a house, which added new financial strain.
Mr. Kimball picked up overtime and overnight shifts. In text messages to his mother, he spoke about a delirious exhaustion, with days where he only slept a single hour.
“Nights are terrible, they’re just terrible,” said Roger Audet, 64, a retired taper who worked with Mr. Kimball and his father over the years. “You’re angry a lot, you’re stressed out a lot, you’re exhausted a lot.”
Night shifts also meant leaving Ms. Kimball, 36, who works at a dry cleaner, alone all night in a house secluded on an acre of land.
Ms. Kimball bought a pistol for safety, which the couple kept loaded by the bedside table.
In the weeks before his death, Mr. Kimball seemed unmoored and, at times, paranoid. He thought someone in the office building where he was working was watching him and his mother.
On March 4, Mr. Kimball married his longtime girlfriend, ending years of procrastination, and ahead of his upcoming hernia surgery, when he might need her as a medical proxy. “We just went to the courthouse and everything was fine,” said Ms. Kimball, adding that she did not notice worrisome mood or behavioral changes.
A few days later, at a family dinner intended to celebrate, he was so agitated that his mother called him later that night. They spoke for two and a half hours. “He was trying to keep his head above water,” said the elder Ms. Kimball, 61, a bartender. “He was trying to stay here, but something was pulling him down.”
At work, he was uncharacteristically withdrawn and distant. “He was really off,” Mr. Barry said. “He wasn’t really his typical self.”
The morning of his death, Mr. Kimball called his supervisor at New England Finish Systems, Richard Foux, and told him he wanted to take the weekend off. To Mr. Foux, 41, the conversation seemed ordinary. “If I had known there was any sign I would have gone straight to his house,” he said. Ms. Kimball was happy that her husband, who frequently worked Saturdays, had prioritized time with family instead.
Mr. Kimball visited his grandmother in the morning. He came home, ate an Italian sub at the kitchen counter, and called his father to finalize Sunday dinner plans. He and his wife added all their nieces’ and nephews’ birthdays to a calendar.
Ms. Kimball stepped outside to smoke a cigarette. Mr. Kimball let the dog out with her.
An Absent Foreman
At the job site on Monday morning, another taper was filling in as foreman for Mr. Kimball. Other workers were confused, uneasy about Mr. Kimball’s absence. On a coffee break, Mr. Barry scrolled through Facebook, pausing on an cryptic post from Mr. Kimball’s father. As social media feeds filled with photos of Mr. Kimball and messages commemorating him, the mood collapsed.
There was no representative from the company or Mr. Kimball’s union to make an immediate announcement.
“We waited until the family made an announcement,” Mr. Foux said. “We respected their privacy.”
A union representative contacted individual members directly to see if they needed support.
The crew, focused on a pressing deadline, continued to tape. No one considered leaving. “Jesus no, you had to stay, it’s a cutthroat business,” said Mr. Barry.
At the end of the week, Mr. Barry collected Mr. Kimball’s black and red tool bag to bring home to his family. It is still sitting on the floor of Mr. Kimball’s work shed, his hard hat resting atop it.
If you are having thoughts of suicide, call or text 988 to reach the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline or go to SpeakingOfSuicide.com/resources for a list of additional resources.
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11) I’m the Mayor of Minneapolis. Trump Is Lying to You.
By Jacob Frey, Mr. Frey is the mayor of Minneapolis, Jan. 8, 2026
Charly Triballeau/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
On Aug. 1, 2007, the Interstate 35W bridge spanning the Mississippi River in Minneapolis collapsed into the water during rush hour. Thirteen people died, and dozens more were injured.
In the immediate aftermath, the president, a Republican, showed up in a city full of Democrats ready to help.
Minneapolis leaders were passionate and vocal critics of President George W. Bush’s policies at the time. But when the crisis struck, it didn’t matter. We were partners in what mattered most: saving lives, steadying our community and rebuilding infrastructure. Cities could count on the administration in a crisis. Politics stopped, quite literally, at the water’s edge.
Blue cities like Minneapolis used to be able to count on good-faith partnerships with the federal government under both Republican and Democratic administrations. Under the Biden administration, our police officers worked with federal agents and the U.S. attorney’s office to bring down shooting rates in North Minneapolis. The effort wasn’t political — it was practical, and it continues to keep people safe.
But such partnerships, in both crisis and ordinary governance, are not the experience of big-city Democratic mayors under the Trump administrations. I learned that the hard way in 2020 during the civil unrest that came in the wake of George Floyd’s murder by a Minneapolis police officer. I’ll never forget the shock I felt when President Trump not only encouraged violence during the unrest, but denied federal approval for disaster relief.
On Wednesday, when I learned that a Minneapolis resident had been shot and killed by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent, I didn’t feel the shock in my gut that I felt over five years ago. Nothing about this was shocking. The chaos that ICE and the Trump administration have brought to Minneapolis made this tragedy sadly predictable. In mid-December, ICE agents were filmed dragging a pregnant woman through the street. Heavily armed agents have been deployed to arrest lone individuals in public libraries and malls. Even in the aftermath of this week’s shooting, ICE agents continued to spread chaos, apparently deploying chemical agents at a local public high school.
The actions of the ICE agents deployed to my city are dangerous, and now, even deadly. But that danger has been compounded by the administration’s claim that the victim committed an act of domestic terrorism. The Department of Homeland Security secretary, Kristi Noem, baselessly insisted the shooting was an act of self-defense. Mr. Trump falsely claimed that the victim, Renee Nicole Good, “behaved horribly” and “ran him over,” referring to the ICE agent. I’ve watched multiple videos, from multiple perspectives — it seems clear that Ms. Good, a mother of three, was trying to leave the scene, not attack an agent.
The Trump administration’s false narrative about this week’s shooting, and the demonization of the victim, are only part of a bigger lie. It wants the American public to believe that ICE’s heavily militarized crackdown across this country is an effort to keep cities like Minneapolis safe. It is not. It is about vilifying not just immigrants, but all who welcome them and their contributions to our communities. By defending the lie about this clearly avoidable shooting in Minneapolis and refusing to allow Minnesota officials to investigate the crime, the administration is sending a message to the entire country: If you show up for your immigrant neighbors, or even are simply present when those neighbors are taken, your rights will not be protected by the law and your life will be at risk.
Under both the first and second Trump administrations, the country has learned from watching Minneapolis that the federal government holds no regard for cities or the people who live in them. When coupled with this administration’s open contempt for democratic norms — indeed, our Constitution — this is a threat to the long-term endurance of our Republic.
I hope no more of my fellow mayors find their cities in this administration’s cross hairs. But for those who do, here is my advice: The best thing you can do is to build cities that work, and love those streets and those citizens above any ideology. By bringing down violent crime, Minneapolis has been able to successfully push back against those who have tried to portray our city as a postapocalyptic hellscape. By building housing and focusing on affordability, we have made our city a place that immigrants, transplants and native Minneapolitans can all call home. By supporting immigrant-owned small businesses, our city has become living proof that immigrants make our city and our nation stronger.
Cities are on the front lines of this dark hour in our national politics. But after we weather this moment — and we will weather it — it will be on us to light the way forward. The best way to convince the country that welcoming and lifting up immigrants is good for its communities is by proving it in our own cities.
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12) By Killing Renee Good, ICE Sent a Message to Us All
By Michelle Goldberg, Opinion Columnist, Jan. 8, 2026
Tim Evans/Reuters
Throughout Donald Trump’s second term, when he’s sent armed, masked ICE agents into cities, locals have tried to resist by organizing neighborhood watches, both to warn people that agents are coming and to document the arrests they make. Minneapolis, where this week ICE launched what its acting director called the “largest immigration operation ever,” was no different.
Keith Ellison, Minnesota’s attorney general, told me that since ICE ramped up its operations in Minneapolis, it’s felt “like we are being inundated with a hostile paramilitary group that is mistreating, insulting, terrorizing our neighbors.” And the residents of Minneapolis have responded: “People have got their whistles, and they’ve got their little alert system to tell people ICE is in the neighborhood. They’ve been protesting. They’ve been out there trying to protect their neighbors.”
Many of these people probably believed that even in Trump’s America, citizens still have inviolable liberties that allow them to stand up to the jacked-up irregulars who’ve descended on their communities. The civil rights of immigrants have been profoundly curtailed; even green card holders are on notice that this government may detain and deport them simply for protesting. But Americans — particularly, let’s be honest, white Americans — might have thought themselves immune from ICE abuses.
The killing of Renee Nicole Good, a mother of three and widow of a military veteran, tests that assumption. ICE, said Ellison, is all but telling people, “‘You want to defend your neighbors, you’re going to do it at the risk of your own life.’ I think that’s the unmistakable message. Just looking at the tape, they could have said, ‘You get out of here,’ right? And then she gets out of there. They didn’t want her to get out of there. They wanted to either drag her out of that car or do what they did. And it was all about teaching lessons.”
The lesson didn’t end with Good’s killing — the administration had to smear her afterward. As The New York Times reported, bystander footage filmed from several different angles shows that the agent who shot Good wasn’t in the path of her S.U.V. when he fired on her. That did not stop Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem from accusing Good of trying to run agents over in “an act of domestic terrorism.” Vice President JD Vance called her a “deranged leftist.”
In the imagination of some on the right, Good quickly came to stand in for all the grating Resistance moms they’d like to see crushed. Fox News sneered that Good was a “self-proclaimed poet” — she’s the winner of a prestigious poetry award — “with pronouns in her bio.” The conservative radio host Erick Erickson described her as an “AWFUL,” or “Affluent White Female Urban Liberal.”
It’s entirely possible that had Good lived, the Trump administration might have tried to prosecute her. That’s essentially what happened to Marimar Martinez, a U.S. citizen in Chicago, in October. Martinez was in her car trying to warn people about ICE when she collided with a Border Patrol vehicle. Federal officials claimed she “rammed” a car driven by the agent Charles Exum, while her lawyers say he sideswiped her. Exum then got out of his car and shot her five times.
Martinez survived, only for the Justice Department to charge her with assaulting a federal officer. Her lawyers soon discovered that Exum had been boasting about the shooting in text messages. In one, he wrote, “I fired 5 rounds, and she had 7 holes. Put that in your book boys.” In another, he said, “Sweet. My fifteen mins of fame. Lmao.” The Justice Department ended up dropping the case before even more messages could be revealed.
Exum’s giddy sadism shouldn’t have been surprising; it reflects the culture the administration is encouraging among its immigration enforcers. In one ICE recruiting ad, an agent mans a mounted gun atop some sort of militarized vehicle, with the words, “Destroy the flood.” It was a reference to the video game Halo, where players must kill hostile space aliens. Another shows sword-wielding knights with the words, “The enemies are at the gates.”
Homeland Security’s social media feed is an unending stream of demented propaganda and bellicose Christian nationalism. An image posted on New Year’s Eve shows a classic car on an idyllic beach with the slogan, “America after 100 million deportations.” Homeland Security has added the words, “The peace of a nation no longer besieged by the third world.” One hundred million, it’s important to note, is almost twice America’s entire immigrant population. They are telegraphing the creation of a far-reaching police state.
In such a system, the relationship between every citizen and their government is transformed by the constant demand for submission. Since Good’s death, Republicans have been lining up to threaten those who don’t immediately comply with ICE’s orders. “The bottom line is this: When a federal officer gives you instructions, you abide by them and then you get to keep your life,” Representative Wesley Hunt of Texas said on Newsmax.
All of us, citizens and immigrants alike, are being ruled by people who think life is a privilege bestowed by authority, and death is a fair penalty for disobedience.
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13) Federal Agents Shoot 2 During Traffic Stop in Portland, Ore.
The shooting came as Minneapolis grappled with a federal agent’s killing of a woman a day earlier, prompting calls from local leaders for an end to the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown.
By Anna Griffin, Hamed Aleaziz and Thomas Fuller, Anna Griffin reported from Portland, Ore., Published Jan. 8, 2026, Updated Jan. 9, 2026
Federal agents shot two people in Portland on Thursday during a traffic stop, a day after the fatal shooting of a woman in Minneapolis stoked outrage over the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown.
A Homeland Security Department spokeswoman said in a statement that U.S. Border Patrol agents were conducting a “targeted vehicle stop,” and that an agent fired a shot after the driver tried to run them over.
The spokeswoman, Tricia McLaughlin, described the agents’ target as an undocumented immigrant and member of Tren de Aragua, a gang with roots in a Venezuelan prison that has been a frequent target of President Trump. She provided no immediate evidence that the person who was targeted was affiliated with the gang.
Bob Day, Portland’s police chief, said at an evening news conference that he had no information on the identity of the two people who were shot, a man and a woman. He said that the federal officials involved in the shooting were no longer on the scene when local officers arrived.
The police were alerted to the shooting when the injured man called 911, Chief Day said.
The chief’s comments appeared to underscore the limited cooperation between federal and local officials. Chief Day said local officials knew little about the shooting and that the investigation would be led by the F.B.I. “We do not know if this is an immigration-related event,” he said. “We do not know which federal agencies were involved.”
Gov. Tina Kotek of Oregon called for a full and transparent federal investigation. “Trust is essential to maintain community safety and uphold the law,” she said. “Federal agents at the direction of the Department of Homeland Security are shattering trust. They are destroying day by day what we hold dear.”
The shooting occurred around 2:15 p.m. Pacific near Adventist Health Portland, a hospital and collection of health clinics in the Hazelwood neighborhood, about eight miles from the city center, officials said.
The driver of the vehicle that federal officials fired into drove off after the shooting, local officials said, and the victims were found by the police more than two miles away, with gunshot wounds. Emergency medical technicians who rushed the victims to hospitals described both as Spanish speakers in conversations captured by emergency radio broadcasts. The woman had a gunshot wound to the chest, an E.M.T. told a dispatcher. The man was described as having two gunshot wounds.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney, Portland’s City Council president, said during a council meeting Thursday afternoon that she believed the two people who had been shot were still alive, though local officials later said they did not know their condition.
Teddy Jay, 20, a resident of the Bria apartment complex in Hazelwood, said he believed the two people who were shot lived in the complex but that he did not know their names. He said he saw them arrive by truck earlier in the afternoon.
“Basically, I was sitting in the house. I heard complete chaos. A whole lot of police sirens,” he said.
Mr. Jay said there was a bloody footprint on the sidewalk outside his building. He said he later saw an official providing medical aid and loading the two people into an ambulance.
Residents said the neighborhood has a high crime rate. A former resident at the complex, Debbie Rembert, 60, said the area “was so horrible — the shootings and the robberies and the drugs.”
Portland was the site of months of clashes between demonstrators and law enforcement after the murder of George Floyd by Minneapolis police officers in 2020. Last summer, protests at the city’s ICE facility at times turned violent, and led Mr. Trump to attempt to use the National Guard to quell demonstrations. A federal judge blocked that effort.
At the news conference Thursday, several officials sharply criticized the presence of federal officials in the city and demanded that they leave.
Kayse Jama, the majority leader of the Oregon State Senate, said that the shooting occurred near his home and that he was “outraged.” Addressing federal immigration officials directly, he said: “We do not need you. You are not welcome. You need to get the hell out of our community.”
On Thursday evening, hundreds gathered at an Immigration and Customs Enforcement building in Portland to protest the crackdown, chanting slogans including “no justice, no peace.”
Just before 9 p.m. local time, the police arrived and began moving protesters out of the area. The Portland Police Bureau said that its officers arrested six people there on charges of disorderly conduct.
Despite their criticism of the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown, local leaders urged calm, particularly in the wake of the already charged national environment following the fatal shooting of a woman by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer in Minneapolis on Wednesday.
Mayor Keith Wilson said the incident was another sign that federal immigration efforts were out of control. He called on the Trump administration to end enforcement operations in Portland.
“The administration is trying to divide us, to pit communities against one another, to make us fear one another,” he said. “Portland, this is a moment to hold each other close.”
Pooja Salhotra, Amanda Waldroupe and Aaron West contributed reporting. Susan C. Beachy contributed research.
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14) Iran Is Cut Off From Internet as Protests Calling for Regime Change Intensify
As protests swelled around the country, Iran’s internet was shut down, and the heads of its judiciary and its security services warned of a harsh response amid calls for “freedom, freedom.”
By Farnaz Fassihi, Pranav Baskar and Sanam Mahoozi, Published Jan. 8, 2026, Updated Jan. 9, 2026
An image taken from social media shows Iranian security forces using tear gas to disperse protesters at the Tehran bazaar on Tuesday. Credit...Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
Iran plunged into an internet blackout on Thursday, monitoring groups said, as nationwide protests demanding the ouster of the Islamic government spread to multiple cities and grew in size, according to witnesses.
The internet shutdown came a day after the heads of Iran’s judiciary and its security services said they would take tough measures against anyone protesting. But the threats did not deter demonstrators.
In telephone interviews, more than a dozen witnesses said that they saw large crowds forming on Thursday night in neighborhoods across Tehran, the capital, and in cities around Iran, including Mashhad, Bushehr, Shiraz and Isfahan. They said the crowds were diverse, with men and women, young and old. The people interviewed inside Iran asked that their names not be published out of fear of retribution.
One resident of Tehran said that the crowds were chanting, “Death to Khamenei,” referring to Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and “freedom, freedom.” The chants could be heard from several blocks away in the affluent neighborhood of Shahrak Gharb in Tehran, which had until now sat out the protests.
Videos filmed on Thursday night showed government buildings on fire across the country, including in Tehran, as protests grew. While the protests were mostly peaceful early in the evening, violence broke out later in the night in Tehran, with demonstrators setting fire to cars, buildings and items in the street. A video verified by The New York Times shows fires in the streets of Kaj Square in the capital, with thousands of protesters flooding the area.
In Karaj, a suburb west of Tehran, a video verified by The Times showed protesters fleeing after gunshots were fired, though it is unclear from the videos whether it was security forces firing.
As the protests grew, internet connectivity data showed an abrupt and near-total drop in connection levels in Iran on Thursday afternoon, according to NetBlocks, an internet monitoring group, and the Georgia Institute of Technology’s Internet Outage Detection and Analysis database. The data indicates that the country is almost completely offline.
Iranian officials did not immediately respond to questions about the cause of the shutdown, but the government has previously enforced internet blackouts during moments of crisis. During the country’s 12-day war with Israel last June, Iran blocked access to the internet, saying that it was a necessary security measure to stop Israeli infiltration. That measure also cut off the flow of information outward to the rest of the world.
“The Iranian government uses internet shutdowns as a tool of repression,” said Omid Memarian, an Iranian human rights expert and senior fellow at DAWN, a Washington-based organization focused on the Middle East. “Whenever protests reach a critical point, authorities sever the country’s connection to the global internet to isolate protesters and limit their communication with the outside world.”
Iranians have been protesting against the authoritarian rule of the Islamic clerics for decades, in wave after wave of protests that have been repeatedly crushed.
The latest round of protests began a week ago. Multiple opposition groups, including Kurdish political groups, the Coordination Council of Azerbaijani Parties and Reza Pahlavi, the son of the deposed Shah of Iran, had all called for people inside Iran to take to the streets. Mr. Pahlavi had said in a video message that people opposing the government should come to the streets at 8 p.m. on Thursday.
Pro-democracy activists, such as the Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Narges Mohammadi, who is currently in detention, said in a statement with 17 prominent dissidents and film directors last week that the demand for democracy could not be quashed.
A resident in the southern city of Bushehr said the crowd was so large there that the security forces retreated.
A resident of Isfahan said that as a crowd of protesters marched, drivers honked and waved, and people in nearby apartment building whistled in solidarity.
A resident of Sadeghiyeh, a middle-class neighborhood in Tehran, said the crowd was swelling in size by the hour. He said security forces had fired their weapons into the air and fired tear gas canisters, but did not disperse the crowd. He said that some people in the crowd chanted, “Long live the Shah,” a reference to the last monarch in Iran, who was toppled in the 1979 revolution.
Ebrahim Azizi, the head of the Parliament’s national security and foreign policy committee, said in a post on social media that the “Zionist regime” — referring to Israel — was behind the protests. “The destabilization puzzle has been activated; a puzzle that the Iranian nation will not allow to be completed,” he added.
A senior government official, who did not want to be identified, said in an interview that many officials were privately calling and texting one another, at a loss of how to contain the avalanche of protests. He said the Revolutionary Guards Corps, typically in charge of securing Iran’s borders not internal security, would likely take over.
The slogans chanted by the crowd covered an array of political views but with one united target: the end of the Islamic regime.
Amir Ali, a 32-year-old businessman in Tehran, said he and a group of friends had joined the protests and chanted, “death to the oppressor, be it king or supreme leader,” and “the street will prevail, the people will win.”
Shima, a 52-year-old from Tehran, said she and her husband, her teenager children and her elderly parents were all on the streets Thursday night protesting for the first time as a family and chanting, “we are together, we are together, don’t be afraid,” and “clerics, get lost, the shah is coming back.”
As the protest movement has spread to cities across the country, the head of Iran’s judiciary, Gholam-Hossein Mohseni-Eje’i, told Iranian media that the protests were plotted by the country’s enemy and the government would show no mercy.
“This time it’s different. This time there are no excuses left,” he said. “The enemy has officially announced its support. I tell the people and the families that this time no one will be spared.”
Amnesty International said in a statement on Thursday that it had documented at least 28 protesters killed in the recent days of protest, including children. Three other groups that document and track human rights — HRANA, based in Washington, Iran Human Rights based in Norway and the Hengaw Organization for Human Rights — put the toll higher, at more than 40.
Amirparsa Neshat, an Iranian influencer and podcaster who supports the protests, was arrested when security forces raided his home in the middle of the night, Kaveh Rad, a lawyer and one of his relatives, announced on his Instagram on Thursday morning.
On Wednesday, a crowd of several hundred men stormed into a Shia seminary that trains clerics in the city of Gonabad, ransacking the building and beating up the clerics with “wood and batons,” said a statement from the cleric who directs the seminary, which was published in Iranian media. “We, too, are protesting the high prices, but protests are different than riots, people must part ways with rioters,” said the statement from the cleric, Hujjat al-Islam Ismaeil Tavakoli.
Merchants and business owners in the traditional bazaars in the cities of Tehran, Tabriz, Isfahan, Mashhad and Kerman have closed their shops to protest the dire state of the economy and the plunging value of Iran’s currency, according to interviews with witnesses and Iranian news media reports. These bazaars are at the heart of the country’s commerce and economy, and strikes could paralyze the economy if they continued.
Aric Toler contributed reporting from Kansas City.
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15) After Machado Offers Her Nobel, Trump Says It Would Be an ‘Honor’ to Accept It
President Trump indicated that he would meet the Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado. Last year, she won the Nobel Peace Prize, an award he covets.
By Lynsey Chutel, Jan. 9, 2026
María Corina Machado, Venezuela’s opposition leader, at an election rally in Caracas in 2024. Adriana Loureiro Fernandez for The New York Times
President Trump indicated on Thursday evening that he will meet with María Corina Machado, Venezuela’s opposition leader, next week in Washington, after refusing to support her to lead the country following the U.S. seizure of Nicolás Maduro.
Ms. Machado has tried to ingratiate herself to Mr. Trump and earlier this week offered to give him the Nobel Peace Prize she was awarded last year. Mr. Trump has long coveted the award.
“I understand she’s coming in next week sometime, and I look forward to saying hello to her,” Trump told the Fox News host Sean Hannity in an interview at the White House.
Ms. Machado led a successful election campaign in 2024 against Mr. Maduro and had the greatest popular legitimacy to lead the nation, but Mr. Trump has said she doesn’t have the necessary support or respect within Venezuela to govern it.
On Monday, Ms. Machado said on Fox News that presenting the prize to Mr. Trump would be a token of gratitude from the Venezuelan people for the removal of Mr. Maduro. She had previously dedicated the award to Mr. Trump.
Mr. Trump said in the Thursday interview that “it would be a great honor” to accept the award, adding that it was “a major embarrassment to Norway,” where the Nobel Peace Prize is awarded, that he had not been given the prize.
Mr. Trump often claims credit for having ended several wars since taking office in January, and has taken credit for release of political prisoners underway in Venezuela.
In some cases, warring parties have credited him with advancing peace or calming hostilities. In others, his role is disputed or less clear, or fighting has resumed.
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16) More Agents Head to Minnesota as U.S. Takes Over Shooting Investigation
A day after an ICE agent fatally shot a 37-year-old woman in Minneapolis, the governor activated the state’s National Guard, and 100 more federal agents were also being deployed.
By Nicholas Bogel-Burroughs, Mitch Smith and Jacey Fortin, Nicholas Bogel-Burroughs reported from Minneapolis, Mitch Smith from Chicago and Jacey Fortin from New York., Published Jan. 8, 2026, Updated Jan. 9, 2026
Federal agents were spotted around the Twin Cities on Thursday. Credit...David Guttenfelder/The New York Times
Disputes between Minnesota officials and the Trump administration intensified Thursday over a federal agent’s fatal shooting of a woman, after the state withdrew from the investigation into the incident because federal officials had denied it access to evidence.
The death of Renee Nicole Good, 37, prompted furious demonstrations; protesters were met with tear gas at a federal building Thursday morning and at least 1,000 people gathered in south Minneapolis in the evening. Gov. Tim Walz activated the state’s National Guard “out of an abundance of caution,” according to his office, though the troops have not yet been deployed.
Documents obtained by The New York Times suggested that at least 100 more federal agents were being deployed to Minnesota.
Mayor Jacob Frey of Minneapolis said in an interview on Thursday that the Trump administration would use any chaos as an opportunity to “occupy Minneapolis in some form.”
“Our community members are not taking the bait,” he said.
Officials have described the killing of Ms. Good in starkly different terms. She was killed on Wednesday during a protest on a residential street as federal agents ordered her to get out of her vehicle.
Administration officials, including President Trump, defended the shooting as lawful, saying that the agent who fired was acting in self-defense. City and state officials described those accounts as “propaganda” and “garbage.”
A video analysis shows that the woman’s vehicle appeared to be turning away from the officer as he opened fire.
State officials initially said they would investigate the killing. But Drew Evans, the superintendent of the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension, said on Thursday that the agency had withdrawn because it had been denied access to evidence.
Mr. Walz said at a news conference on Thursday that “Minnesota must be part of this investigation.”
“I say that only because people in positions of power have already passed judgment,” Mr. Walz added. He said that some of the federal government’s statements regarding the circumstances of the shooting had been “verifiably false.”
At a news conference in New York City on Thursday, Kristi Noem, the homeland security secretary, said that Minnesota and Minneapolis officials had failed to maintain order.
“They have not been cut out,” Ms. Noem told a reporter who had asked about state investigators. “They don’t have any jurisdiction in this investigation.”
Cindy Burnham, a spokeswoman for the F.B.I. office in the Minneapolis area, declined to comment.
At a White House press briefing, Vice President JD Vance doubled down on claims about the shooting, calling news reporters “agents of propaganda of a radical fringe” for reports indicating that Ms. Good never put the ICE agent in danger before she was shot.
Last year, the federal agent who shot Ms. Good, identified as Jonathan Ross, was dragged about 100 yards by a different driver during an immigration operation in Minnesota, interviews and court records show. He and other agents had been trying to apprehend a Guatemalan man who had been convicted of sexual abuse. Mr. Ross was treated for a gash on his forearm that required 20 stitches after the episode, for which the driver was convicted of assault last month.
On social media, Attorney General Pam Bondi warned protesters in Minnesota not to cross a “red line” into obstructing, impeding or attacking federal law enforcement.
The Department of Homeland Security defended its work in Minnesota on Thursday, pointing to recent arrests of men who they said were in the country illegally and had been convicted of crimes.
“In the face of violent attacks, ICE law enforcement arrested pedophiles, rapists and drug traffickers in Minneapolis yesterday,” Tricia McLaughlin, a department spokeswoman, said in a statement. Operation Metro Surge, as the department calls it, has resulted in the arrests of more than 1,500 people in Minnesota, she said.
Protests against Immigration and Customs Enforcement action in Minneapolis have occurred for weeks, but Ms. Good’s killing ratcheted up the tension. Demonstrators gathered Thursday at the Bishop Henry Whipple Federal Building just outside the city, the home of local ICE headquarters. By 9 a.m., federal agents had pushed protesters across the street after deploying tear gas.
The building also houses an immigration court, which was closed on Thursday. Public schools were also closed across the city, and will remain so on Friday, because of “safety concerns” related to “incidents around the city,” school officials said in a statement.
Demonstrators gathered again on Thursday evening just blocks from where the shooting happened. At least a thousand people marched through rainy streets after dark, chanting and waving signs.
“Yesterday, they shot Renee Nicole Good, and today, news is coming out of Portland that they shot two more people,” one organizer told the crowd at the intersection of Lake Street and Chicago Avenue in south Minneapolis.
The two people were shot by federal agents on Thursday afternoon in Oregon’s largest city in an incident that also involved people in a vehicle. U.S. Border Patrol agents conducting a “targeted vehicle stop” opened fire after the driver tried to run over agents, a Homeland Security Department spokeswoman said in a statement. The conditions of the two people were not immediately clear.
In Minneapolis, many local and state leaders had been warning for weeks that the surge of immigration enforcement work was bound to stoke chaos. Mr. Walz put the blame squarely on Mr. Trump and Ms. Noem, asking them to pull back federal agents and declaring at a Wednesday news conference, “You’ve done enough.”
Now, more federal agents are on the way. The additional 100 federal agents the Trump administration plans to deploy are Customs and Border Protection officials who will travel to Minnesota from Chicago and New Orleans.
The Department of Homeland Security plans to pause operations in Chicago to support the operation in Minnesota.
The deployment of additional Border Patrol agents is expected to last through the weekend, with a planned return to their cities on Sunday. The Department of Homeland Security declined to comment on the plans.
On Thursday, Mr. Walz put Minnesota National Guard troops on active duty after placing them on standby the day before. He indicated that while the troops would be “staged” and ready to help local law enforcement officers, there were no immediate plans to deploy them on the streets. The governor also issued a proclamation declaring Friday as a “Day of Unity” in honor of Ms. Good. He encouraged residents to observe a moment of silence and to participate in “acts of service.”
Tensions between federal and Minnesota officials have been exacerbated by a fraud scheme that siphoned money from social service programs in the Minneapolis area. The president has unleashed xenophobic tirades and made repeated, derisive comments about members of Minnesota’s large Somali diaspora, whose members make up a majority of the fraud defendants.
The shooting on Wednesday happened on Portland Avenue, less than a mile away from the spot where George Floyd was killed by the police in 2020, prompting angry protests and tearful vigils late into the night.
Mr. Frey said on Thursday that there were no major public safety incidents in Minneapolis overnight, and that local officials were still monitoring demonstrations.
The city’s priorities, he said, were “keeping people safe” and then “getting ICE out of here.”
Hamed Aleaziz, Devlin Barrett, Jamie Kelter Davis, Luis Ferré-Sadurní and Madeleine Ngo contributed reporting.
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17) Agents in Trump’s Immigration Crackdown Have Fired at Vehicles at Least 10 Times
The confrontations over the last four months have left two people dead and prompted criticism of federal agencies for allowing officers to open fire on moving vehicles.
By Tim Arango, Jan. 9, 2026
Law enforcement officials blocked off an area near where federal agents shot two people during a “targeted vehicle stop” in Portland, Ore. Credit...Jordan Gale for The New York Times
Maryland. Chicago. Phoenix. Los Angeles. Minneapolis.
And now Portland.
A day after a federal immigration agent shot and killed a woman in her vehicle in Minneapolis, federal agents in Portland, Ore. on Thursday afternoon shot a man and a woman in their car during a “vehicle stop.” The Department of Homeland Security said in a statement that the driver had tried to run the agents over.
The shooting in Portland was at least the 10th since September by federal agents who are part of the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown — and all 10 involved people who were in their vehicles.
At least two people, including the woman in Minneapolis, have died in these shootings.
Federal officials have said the shootings were justified because the vehicles had been “weaponized,” and that officers’ lives were in jeopardy. According to the Justice Department, agents can fire at a car only under two circumstances: if the person in the car is threatening the officer or others with “deadly force by means other than the vehicle,” or the driver is operating the vehicle in a way that threatens serious injury or death.
At the heart of the debates in many cases over the use of force by officers is whether a driver’s actions have posed a grave threat.
In the case of the Minneapolis shooting, a Times analysis of video of the incident, from multiple angles, raised questions about the official assertion that the driver presented a deadly threat. Instead, the woman appeared to be turning the car away from the officers.
“Look at the wheels on the car, they are turning to the right, and all he has to do is step out of the way,” Geoffrey Alpert, an expert on police use of force at the University of South Carolina, said this week after reviewing the Minneapolis video at the request of The New York Times. “She’s jacking the wheels all the way to the right.”
Many of the country’s largest cities, including New York and Los Angeles, have banned police officers from shooting at moving vehicles except in very rare circumstances, such as a driver shooting at the police, or a terrorist driving into a crowd. Police cadets often aren’t trained in shooting at moving vehicles, and officials have long warned the practice risks hitting innocent bystanders.
The Police Executive Research Forum, a nonprofit that studies law enforcement policy, put it this way in a paper published in 2023: “Shooting at a moving vehicle is not an effective way to get it to stop. There is the challenge of hitting a moving target, and the risk of an errant bullet hitting an unintended target, such as a bystander. There is also a risk that if the driver is struck, they will lose control of the vehicle.”
Law enforcement officers have been killed by drivers using their vehicles as weapons. Five officers died in this manner through the first seven months of 2024, according to the most recent data from the F.B.I.
This week, in the aftermath of the Minnesota shooting, Xochitl Hinojosa, a former spokeswoman for the Department of Justice during the Biden Administration, wrote on X that in 2022 the department updated its use of force policy for the first time in 20 years. She wrote that the new policy “included a duty to render medical aid and specifics on how firearms may not be discharged at a moving vehicle in most circumstances.”
Shaila Dewan contributed reporting.
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18) Democracy for the Rich Versus Democracy for All
By Bonnie Weinstein
Socialist Viewpoint, Jan/Feb 2026
Capitalism has turned democracy into its opposite—democracy for the few and brutal dictatorship over the many.
The U.S. touts itself as the quintessential leader of democracy in the world yet it costs tens-of-millions-of dollars to win an election here—and this true for all capitalist countries who call themselves democratic. Whether they have a parliamentary system, or a presidential system within a federal republic like the U.S.—it is the wealthy elite who rule over the majority. This is also true for countries who do not call themselves democratic.
The exception is Cuba—a tiny country with very limited resources. While they have a single “leader,” industry is nationalized and based upon production for need, not profit. They also have community councils that democratically govern community concerns at the ground level. Unfortunately, they are also in a severe economic crisis due to a worldwide U.S. blockade and embargo stripping them of their ability to trade for the things they need to improve the quality of life for the Cuban people—and everything to do with thwarting their ability to carry out the gains of the Cuban socialist revolution.
The U.S. war on Venezuela (and Cuba, Palestine, Syria, Nigeria, Sudan, to name a few) exposes the true nature of U.S. “democracy”
The assault on Venezuela, Cuba, and other countries the U.S. military is targeting has nothing to do with bringing democracy or economic stability to the people and everything to do with gaining control over their natural resources for U.S. private investment interests.
The U.S. first started investing in Venezuela in the 20th century spurred by major oil discoveries in the 1920’s making it a major oil producer with U.S. corporations claiming ownership of Venezuelan oil and the territory it sits on. In a December 18, 2025, New York Times article by Sam Sifton titled, “Is It About the Oil?” the author explains:
“…Trump remembers a past when South and Central America were open markets. Before Venezuela nationalized its oil industry in 1976, foreign companies accounted for 70 percent of production there. American drillers like Exxon, Mobil and Gulf Oil were major players. (Today, only one American company, Chevron, still operates in Venezuela.) … Stephen Miller, the White House homeland security adviser, recalled that bygone era on social media. … ‘American sweat, ingenuity and toil created the oil industry in Venezuela,’ he wrote. ‘Its tyrannical expropriation was the largest recorded theft of American wealth and property. These pillaged assets were then used to fund terrorism and flood our streets with killers, mercenaries and drugs.’”
And in a December 17, 2025, New York Times article by
David E. Sanger, titled, “For Hegseth, There Is One Boat Strike He Doesn’t Want the Public to See,” (specifically, the U.S. murder of two survivors of a U.S. targeted boat strike who were seen clinging to flotsam and waving for help then blown up by a U.S. drone.):
“Mr. Trump suggested the real objective [of the boat strikes] was to get Venezuela to return ‘all of the Oil, Land, and other Assets that they previously stole from us.’”
So, the U.S. owners of corporate investments everywhere in the world claim that their ownership gives them the right not only to the natural resources, but to the very territory they sit upon or are extracted from.
This includes the U.S. factories around the world—in China, India, Vietnam, to name a few. U.S. corporations claim the right to invest in virtually every country where there is a profit to be made.
According to capitalist democracy, it is the democratic right of corporations to compete for and own property anywhere in the world they so desire. And this right is claimed not only by major U.S. corporations, but by corporations everywhere—placing U.S corporations in the forefront of fierce competition with corporations from other countries.
The right of the private ownership of the means of production under capitalism supersedes all other rights and can be enforced by any means necessary, including nuclear war.
Capitalists make the laws—including laws regarding democratic rights—and enforce them through the threat of war, the police, the courts and incarceration.
The democracy they fight for is the right of the rich to privately own and control the wealth and resources of the whole world at the expense of everyone else—the masses of the poor and the working class.
That’s why, under capitalism, only they can own and control the means of production. Only they can lay claim to the tremendous profits produced by our labor—our sweat and blood—and all too often, our lives in the case of war.
The democratic rights of workers under capitalism
The democratic rights of the masses—all of us who do not own the means of production—is the right to vote for one wealthy representative of the capitalist class over another.
As a Democratic or Republican candidate, you must support capitalism to survive in any capitalist party—to garner the millions of dollars of donations from wealthy capitalists in order to win an election.
We do not live in a democracy. We live in a capitalist dictatorship of the wealthy over the poor.
There is no democracy on the job. The boss is in charge, and workers have no right to vote on who will be the boss. Just as we have no right to vote on how much pay we earn; how much our rent is; how much we must pay for healthcare or education; how much in taxes we must pay or how much we must pay for a stick of butter. Prices are dictated to us by the corporations and enforced by the government—the police and the military.
Worker’s democracy
Worker’s democracy is defined by majority rule. A strike is an expression of worker’s democracy on the job. A strike is effective only if the majority of workers participate in it. And this depends on how well workers are organized in their own defense against the controlling minority—the capitalist class.
A victorious strike reinforces the reality that unity and solidarity toward a common goal can be victorious over the bosses because workers are the majority and if we go on strike and don’t work, the capitalist engine of production stops and so does their flow of profits.
Strikes are also an example that we who do the work could, in our numbers, completely control production without the capitalist class.
If workers were in ownership and control of production, we could stop the production of products designed to break down—creating not only financial hardship by having to replace things over and over again but creating trillions of dollars in waste of materials that become mountains of trash that pollute our environment.
In just the last ten years I have had to replace two refrigerators, a stove, two washing machines and two dryers that broke down and were unrepairable in spite of the “protection plans” I had been paying for regularly—the plans simply didn’t cover the specific parts that were planned to break down first!
Capitalist production is irrational because it is production for nothing else but profit. Having to buy products over and over again because they are designed to break down benefits the owners of the means of production—to the detriment of the owners of the shabby products they produce and to the horrendous detriment of our planet’s environment.
If the working class owned and controlled the means of production, we could produce products built and designed to last and that can be repaired instead of replaced. We could make waste obsolete.
It’s the workers who know how to run the factories, stores, hospitals, schools, construction, power and water services, farms, railroads, airlines—workers know how to work—proving that capitalists are completely superfluous to production. Their only role is to keep control of the profits, and that’s what they designed the capitalist state to do.
Unions
The major labor unions in the U.S. are run by a labor bureaucracy that acts in partnership with the bosses. They funnel union funds into the Democratic and Republican parties—the parties of the bosses—claiming that donating these union funds to capitalist party candidates will strengthen the union’s partnership with the bosses which will benefit the workers in the long run.
These labor fakers are paid many times more than the average worker in their industry. In the case of the auto industry, labor leaders earn around four-and-a-half times what the average auto worker makes.
United Auto Worker (UAW) President Shawn Fain earned a gross salary of $229,514, with total payments (including expenses/benefits) reaching $274,407. The average auto worker’s pay varies, but generally falls around $23-$28 per hour or $49,000-$50,000 annually, though top-tier union (UAW) assembly workers at the “Big Three” (Ford, GM, Stellantis) can earn much more, with experienced workers hitting $33+ per hour and total compensation potentially reaching $90,000+ with benefits, while newer hires start lower, around $17 per hour .
The high salaries for union leaders tend to conservatize them making them more likely to want to maintain the status quo of partnership with the bosses rather than putting up a real fight for better pay and benefits for the majority rank-and-file membership.
And far too often, workers are asked to vote on contracts, sight-unseen, upon the recommendation of the labor leadership. Union meetings are too frequently called to rubber-stamp decisions already agreed upon between the union leadership and the bosses behind closed doors.
This really puts a damper on union attendance by the rank and file and, without their participation in the decision-making process, the bosses essentially have no opposition.
To correct this, unions have to be democratized. Contracts should be negotiated and discussed and voted upon by the whole membership in detail, and labor leaders chosen based upon their independence from the bosses and their agreement with the decisive vote of the membership on the contracts. All union leaders and officials should come from the rank and file who have had experience actually working on the job. Shop stewards should come from the union membership not from graduates of “labor studies” courses in college.
Labor leaders must carry out the will of the majority of the rank and file. Labor leaders should be paid no more than the highest rate of pay of the average worker and the membership should be able to change that leadership if they do not carry out the will of the majority.
Workers are the majority and we should have the right to control our organizations without interference from the capitalist class.
We are the majority; we create all the wealth in the world and should have the right to own and control that wealth for the benefit of all of us.
Political organizations
Today we find ourselves splintered, divided, blinded by bigotry and hate to our universal common interests of freedom, justice and economic and social equality—the right to all the necessities of life and happiness—free from capitalist exploitation, starvation and war.
The only solution is to create an economy based upon production for the needs and wants of all by ending production based upon the private ownership of the means of production benefiting only the wealthy while condemning us to a life of servitude and ever-increasing poverty.
We need to build workers’ organizations that empower the entire working class to control our own destiny by rejecting capitalism’s minority rule over us.
We must, as the most powerful class in the world, reject bigotry of all kinds, unite in pursuit of our common interests—through cooperation, democratic discussions of the issues we face in common and democratic decision-making that allow we, the majority, to rule our own lives and livelihoods to benefit all of us everywhere in the world.
All workers’ political organizations—from united front coalitions to independent working-class parties—must be organized and run democratically—one-person-one-vote and majority rule.
Capitalist rule is from the top down—the wealthy rule—and the masses of workers and the poor must serve this tiny minority or starve.
Only well-organized, democratically run organizations of the working class and our allies can turn capitalist rule upside-down and take the control of our social structure and resources out of the hands of the capitalist class and into our own hands.
United Front-type organizations
United fronts are powerful tools for organizing massive support for particular issues that affect masses of people such as immigrant rights, free speech, the right to protest, the fight against war and genocide, LGBTQ rights, democratic rights, the right to healthcare, education, housing, etc. anyone can be a part of a coalition no matter who they are if they support the demands of the democratically organized coalition. They need not agree on other issues to form a powerful battle for the demands they do agree upon.
Participating in a united front type of organization should be a lesson in democratic decision-making including planned conferences and conventions, free and open discussions that include the right of the minority to participate fully in debates, etc., and ultimately, the right of the majority and the leadership it chooses, to rule until the next planned conference or convention.
The majority must have the right to carry out their program. That means that while the minority has a right to their opinions, they are obligated to respect and carry out the will of the majority until the next democratic decision-making body has had the time to evaluate the effectiveness of their program in the real world.
Again, any compensation paid to the leadership of any workers’ organization must not exceed highest wages of the average worker. And the rank and file must have the right to remove leaders who do not carry out the decisions of the majority.
A labor party
An independent labor party can represent the most rational alternative to the capitalist parties that are dead ends on the road to social and economic equality and freedom and justice for all.
Any labor party must, first and foremost, be completely independent of all capitalist parties. Capitalism, by its very nature, is undemocratic. It’s the rule of a tiny minority over the lives of the overwhelming masses of people in the world through the use of force and violence—to maintain their rule over us and the vast wealth produced from our labor—of which we get only a tiny portion. And we have to fight bitterly for every penny we get.
An effective labor party can bring the united front organizations together with the unions to democratically develop a common program to fight against war, violence, racism, sexism, and bigotry—all the things that capitalism has devised to divide us and make us feel helpless—and fight for the common needs and wants of all.
United, we will have the power and the strength we need to rid the world of the despotism of capitalism’s tyranny and establish a socialist society under the democratic control of we who do the work, to create a bounty of wealth we all can share.
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