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Hands Off Rick Toledo, Pro-Palestine Grad Student at Cal Poly Humboldt! Give Him His Electronics Back!
Don't forget to sign this sign-on letter for Toledo here:
https://stopfbi.org/news/hands-off-rick-toledo-pro-palestine-grad-student-at-cal-poly-humboldt-give-him-his-electronics-back/
Please email any statements of solidarity to:
stopfbi@gmail.com
When: 10 to 3pm PST, Monday, April 20
Who: Stacey Eads, Humboldt DA
Phone Number: 707-445-7411
On the night of March 19, 2026, University Police Department returned with a warrant to the apartment of Rick Toledo, Students for a Democratic Society organizer at Cal Poly Tech Humboldt, and seized his laptop, phone, and other electronics such as a camera. They attempted to force him to give up his passcodes, and he told them no. He did the right thing.
This violation of his privacy comes as part of their effort to charge him with four bogus felonies - false imprisonment, conspiracy, battery, and assault - related to the student protest on Feb 27. This is the latest in their string of acts to suppress any campus free speech for Palestine and divestment from Israel, along with suspending and firing him from his university teaching job.
We should be perfectly clear about it: there is nothing wrong with supporting any student action, including building occupations, that is taken to make demands of a university. Our rights to free speech and freedom of assembly are protected by the First Amendment, enshrined in the constitution. College protest is a long-time tradition, and it continues on today. Toledo committed no crime in supporting the student protest, and the university is determined to create lie after lie in order to demonize him.
In our view, what they really want to do is punish Toledo not for the one-day building occupation last month, but for the 9-day building occupation during the encampment movement in spring of 2024. That display of courage by the students in the name of ending university support for a genocide made it to millions of TV screens, and the state of California and university want someone to pay. Toledo is their target of choice, years later.
We demand that he not be charged of any crime, because he didn't do anything wrong. We demand that his devices be returned ASAP. Activists should learn from his example of not telling the police a single thing, including a passcode. The university and police are the criminals here for trying to scare activists out of speaking out against the university's continued financial support to Israeli apartheid. Now is not the time to suffer in silence; it’s the time to speak out. We need to condemn political repression, stand with Rick Toledo, and defend our rights to speak out for Palestine.
Don’t Charge Rick Toledo!
Give Him His Property Back!
Protesting for Palestine Is Not a Crime!
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Born in rural Ohio, Howard Keylor attended a one-room country schoolhouse. He became a mem-ber of the National Honor Society when he graduated from Marietta High School.
After enlisting in the U.S. Army, Howard fought in the Pacific Theater in World War Two, during which he participated in the Battle of Okinawa as a Corporal. The 96th U.S. Army Division, which Howard trained with, had casualty rates above 50%. The incompetence and racism of the military command, the destruction of the capital city of Naha and the deliberate killings of tens of thousands of Okinawan civil-ians – a third of the population - made Howard a committed anti-imperialist, anti-militarist and anti-racist for the rest of his life.
Upon returning to the United States, Howard enrolled in the College of the Pacific, but dropped out to support Filipino agricultural workers in the 1948 asparagus strike, working with legendary labor leader Larry Itliong. He became a longshore worker in Stockton in 1953. As a member of the Communist Party, Howard and his wife, Evangeline, were attacked in the HUAC (McCarthy) hearings in San Francisco. Later, Howard transferred to ILWU Local 10. In 1971 he, along with Brothers Herb Mills, Leo Robinson and a ma-jority of Local 10’s members, opposed the proposed 1971 contract which codified the 9.43 steadyman sys-tem. This led to the longshore strike of 1971-1972, which shut down 56 West Coast ports and lasted 130 days. It was the longest strike in the ILWU’s history.
In Local 10 Brother Keylor was a member of the Militant Caucus, a class struggle rank-and-file group which published a regular newsletter, the “Longshore Militant”. He later left the Militant Caucus and pub-lished a separate newsletter on his own, the “Militant Longshoreman.” Howard advocated deliberate defi-ance of the “slave-labor” Taft-Hartley law through illegal secondary boycotts and pickets. Running on an open class-struggle program which called for breaking with the Democratic and Republican Parties, form-ing a worker’s government, expropriating the capitalists without compensation and creating a planned economy, Howard won election to the Executive Board of Local 10 for twelve years.
The Militant Caucus was involved in organizing protests and boycotts of military cargo bound for the military dictatorship in Chile in 1975 and 1978 and again in 1980 to the military dictatorship in El Sal-vador. The Caucus also participated in ILWU Local 6’s strike at KNC Glass in Union City, during which a mass picket line physically defeated police and scabs, winning a contract for a workforce composed pri-marily of Mexican-American immigrants.
In 1984, Brother Keylor made the motion, amended by Brother Leo Robinson, which led to the elev-en-day longshore boycott of South African cargo on the Nedlloyd Kimberley. In 1986, Howard again partici-pated in the Campaign Against Apartheid’s community picket line against the Nedlloyd Kemba. When Nel-son Mandela spoke at the Oakland Coliseum in 1990 after his release from prison, he credited Local 10 with re-igniting the anti-Apartheid movement in the Bay Area.
Other actions Brother Howard initiated, organized or participated in included the 1995-98 struggle of the Liverpool dockworkers; the 1999 coastwide shutdown and march of 25,000 in San Francisco to de-mand freedom for Mumia Abu-Jamal; the 2000 Charleston longshore union campaign; the 2008 May Day anti-imperialist war shutdown of all West Coast ports; the shutdown of Northern California ports in pro-test of the murder of Oscar Grant; the blockades of Israeli ships to protest the war on Gaza in 2010 and 2014; the 2011 ILWU struggle against the grain monopolies in Longview; Occupy Oakland’s march of 40,000 to the Port of Oakland, and countless other militant job actions and protests. Throughout his life, Brother Keylor always extended solidarity where it was needed. He fought racist police murders and fas-cist terror, defended abortion clinics, and fought for survivors of psychiatric abuse. Having grown up in Appalachia, he has always been an environmentalist, and helped shut down a Monsanto facility in Davis in 2012, as well as fighting pesticide use and deforestation in the East Bay.
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The Trump administration is escalating its attack on Cuba, cutting off the island’s access to oil in a deliberate attempt to induce famine and mass suffering. This is collective punishment, plain and simple.
In response, we’re releasing a public Call to Conscience, already signed by influential public figures, elected officials, artists, and organizations—including 22 members of the New York City Council, Kal Penn, Mark Ruffalo, Susan Sarandon, Alice Walker, 50501, Movement for Black Lives, The People’s Forum, IFCO Pastors for Peace, ANSWER Coalition, and many others—demanding an end to this brutal policy.
The letter is open for everyone to sign. Add your name today. Cutting off energy to an island nation is not policy—it is a tactic of starvation.
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Petition to Force Amazon to Cut ICE Contracts!
https://actionnetwork.org/letters/tell-amazon-end-contracts-with-ice/?source=group-amazon-labor-union&referrer=group-amazon-labor-
Amazon Labor Union
Over 600,000 messages have already been sent directly to Amazon board members demanding one thing: Amazon must stop fueling deportations by ending its contracts with ICE and DHS.
ICE and DHS rely on the data infrastructure provided by Amazon Web Services. Their campaign against immigrants and those who stand with them depends on the logistical, financial, and political support of companies like Amazon.
But workers and communities have real power when we act collectively. That’s why we must expose Amazon’s role in the deportation machine. Help us reach 1 million messages and force Amazon to act by signing our petition with The Labor Force today:
Tell Amazon: End contracts with ICE!
On Cyber Monday 2025, Amazon workers rallied outside of Amazon’s NYC headquarters to demand that Amazon stop fueling mass deportations through Amazon Web Services’ contracts with ICE and DHS.
ICE cannot operate without corporate backing; its campaign against immigrants and those who stand with them depends on the logistical, financial, and political support of companies like Amazon. Mega-corporations may appear untouchable, but they are not. Anti-authoritarian movements have long understood that repression is sustained by a network of institutional enablers and when those enablers are disrupted, state violence weakens. Workers and communities have real power when they act collectively. That is why we must expose Amazon’s role in the deportation machine.
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) rely on Amazon Web Services (AWS) as its most commonly used cloud platform. DHS and ICE cannot wage their attack on immigrants without the critical data infrastructure that Amazon Web Services provide, allowing the agencies to collect, analyze, and store the massive amounts of data they need to do their dirty work. Without the power of AWS, ICE would not be able to track and target people at its current scale.
ICE and DHS use Amazon Web Services to collect and store massive amounts of purchased data on immigrants and their friends and family–everything from biometric data, DMV data, cellphone records, and more. And through its contracts with Palantir, DHS is able to scour regional, local, state, and federal databases and analyze and store this data on AWS. All of this information is ultimately used to target immigrants and other members of our communities.
No corporation should profit from oppression and abuse. Yet Amazon is raking in tens of millions of dollars to fuel DHS and ICE, while grossly exploiting its own workers. Can you sign our petition today, demanding that Amazon stop fueling deportations by ending its contracts with DHS and ICE, now?
https://actionnetwork.org/letters/tell-amazon-end-contracts-with-ice/?source=group-amazon-labor-union&referrer=group-amazon-labor-
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End Texas Torture of Revolutionary Elder Xinachtli
Organization Support Letter
Letter to demand the immediate medical treatment and release of Chicano political prisoner Xinachtli (Alvaro Hernandez #00255735)
To the Texas Department of Criminal Justice,
We, the undersigned organizations, write to urge immediate action to protect the life, health, and human rights of Xinachtli (legal name Alvaro Hernandez). Xinachtli is 73-year-old Chicano community organizer from Texas who has spent 23 years in solitary confinement and 30 years incarcerated as part of a 50-year sentence. His health is now in a critical and life-threatening state and requires prompt and comprehensive medical intervention.
Since his conviction in 1997, Xinachtli has spent decades in conditions that have caused significant physical and psychological harm. As an elder in worsening health, these conditions have effectively become a de facto death sentence.
Xinachtli’s current medical condition is severe. His physical, mental, and overall well-being have declined rapidly in recent weeks. He now requires both a wheelchair and a walker, has experienced multiple falls, and is suffering from rapid weight loss. He is currently housed in the McConnell Unit infirmary, where he is receiving only palliative measures and is being denied a medical diagnosis, access to his medical records, and adequate diagnostic testing or treatment.
A virtual clinical visit with licensed medical doctor Dr. Dona Kim Murphey underscores the severity of his condition. In her report of the visit, she wrote: "Given the history of recent neck/back trauma and recurrent urinary tract infections with numbness, weakness, and bowel and bladder incontinence, I am concerned about nerve root or spinal cord injury and/or abscesses that can lead to permanent sensorimotor dysfunction."
Despite his age and visible disabilities, he remains in solitary confinement under the Security Threat Group designation as a 73-year-old. During his time in the infirmary, prison staff threw away all of his belongings and “lost” his commissary card, leaving him completely without basic necessities. He is experiencing hunger, and the lack of consistent nutrition is worsening his medical condition. McConnell Unit staff have also consistently given him incorrect forms, including forms for medical records and medical visitation, creating further barriers to care and communication.
A family visit on November 29 confirmed the seriousness of his condition. Xinachtli, who was once able to walk on his own, can no longer stand without assistance. He struggled to breathe, has lost more than 30 pounds, relied heavily on his wheelchair, and was in severe pain throughout the visit.
In light of these conditions, we, the undersigned organizations, demand that TDCJ take immediate action to save Xinachtli’s life and comply with its legal and ethical obligations.
We urge the immediate implementation of the following actions:
Immediate re-instatement of his access to commissary to buy hygiene, food, and other critical items. Immediate transfer to the TDCJ hospital in Galveston for a full medical evaluation and treatment, including complete access to his medical records and full transparency regarding all procedures. Transfer to a geriatric and medical unit that is fully accessible under the Americans with Disabilities Act. Xinachtli requests placement at the Richard P LeBlanc Unit in Beaumont, Texas. Approval of Medical Recommended Intensive Supervision, the release program for individuals with serious medical conditions and disabilities, in recognition of the severity and progression of his current health issues. Failure to act will result in the continued and foreseeable deterioration of Xinachtli’s health, amounting to state-sanctioned death. We urge TDCJ to take swift and decisive action to meet these requests and to fulfill its responsibility to safeguard his life and well-being.
We stand united in calling for immediate and decisive action. Xinachtli’s life depends on it.
Signed, Xinachtli Freedom Campaign and supporting organizations
Endorsing Organizations:
Al-Awda Houston; All African People’s Revolutionary Party; Anakbayan Houston; Anti-Imperialist Solidarity; Artists for Black Lives' Equality; Black Alliance for Peace - Solidarity Network; Columbia University Students for a Democratic Society; Community Liberation Programs; Community Powered ATX; Contra Gentrificación; Diaspora Pa’lante Collective; Down South; DSA Emerge; Entre nos kc; Fighting Racism Workshops; Frontera Water Protectors; GC Harm Reductionists; JERICHO MOVEMENT; Jericho Movement Providence; Montrose Anarchist Collective; NYC Jericho Movement; OC Focus; Palestine Solidarity TX; Partisan Defense Committee; Partido Nacional de la Raza Unida; PDX Anti-Repression; Red Star Texas; Root Cause; San Francisco Solidarity Collective; Shine White Support Team; Sunrise Columbia; UC San Diego Faculty for Justice in Palestine; Viva Palestina, EPTX; Water Justice and Technology Studio; Workshops4Gaza.
Sign the endorsement letter for your organization here:
https://cryptpad.fr/form/#/2/form/view/MiR1f+iLiRBJC7gSTyfhyxJoLIDhThxRafPatxdbMWI/
IMPORTANT LINKS TO MATERIALS FOR XINACHTLI FREEDOM CAMPAIGN:
PHONE BLAST: Your community can sign up for a 15-minute-long call shift here: bit.ly/xphoneblast
FUNDRAISER: Here is the link to Jericho's fundraiser for Xinachtli: http://givebutter.com/jerichomovement
CASE HISTORY: Learn more about Xinachtli and his case through our website: https://freealvaro.net
CONTACT INFO:
Follow us on Instagram: @freexinachtlinow
Email us:
xinachtlifreedomcampaign@protonmail.com
COALITION FOLDER:
https://drive.proton.me/urls/SP3KTC1RK4#KARGiPQVYIvR
In the folder you will find: Two pictures of Xinachtli from 2024; The latest updated graphics for the phone blast; The original TRO emergency motion filing; Maria Salazar's declaration; Dr. Murphy's report from her Dec. 9 medical visit; Letter from Amnesty International declaring Xinachtli's situation a human rights violation; Free Xinachtli zine (which gives background on him and his case); and The most recent press release detailing who Xinachtli is as well as his medical situation.
Write to:
Alvaro Hernandez CID #00255735
TDCJ-W.G. McConnell Unit
PO Box 660400
Dallas, TX 75266-0400
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Self-portrait by Kevin Cooper
Funds for Kevin Cooper
Kevin was transferred out of San Quentin and is now at a healthcare facility in Stockton. He has received some long overdue healthcare. The art program is very different from the one at San Quentin but we are hopeful that Kevin can get back to painting soon.
For 41 years, an innocent man has been on death row in California.
Kevin Cooper was wrongfully convicted of the brutal 1983 murders of the Ryen family and houseguest. The case has a long history of police and prosecutorial misconduct, evidence tampering, and numerous constitutional violations including many incidences of the prosecution withholding evidence of innocence from the defense. You can learn more here .
In December 2018 Gov. Brown ordered limited DNA testing and in February 2019, Gov. Newsom ordered additional DNA testing. Meanwhile, Kevin remains on Death Row at San Quentin Prison.
The funds raised will be used to help Kevin purchase art supplies for his paintings . Additionally, being in prison is expensive, and this money would help Kevin pay for stamps, books, paper, toiletries, supplies, supplementary food, printing materials to educate the public about his case and/or video calls.
Please help ease the daily struggle of an innocent man on death row!
An immediate act of solidarity we can all do right now is to write to Kevin and assure him of our continuing support in his fight for justice. Here’s his address:
Kevin Cooper #C65304
Cell 107, Unit E1C
California Health Care Facility, Stockton (CHCF)
P.O. Box 213040
Stockton, CA 95213
www.freekevincooper.org
Call California Governor Newsom:
1-(916) 445-2841
Press 1 for English or 2 for Spanish,
press 6 to speak with a representative and
wait for someone to answer
(Monday-Friday, 9:00 A.M. to 5:00 P.M. PST—12:00 P.M. to 8:00 P.M. EST)
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Dr. Atler Still Needs Our Help!
Please sign the petition today!
https://www.change.org/p/texas-state-university-give-tom-alter-his-job-back
What you can do to support:
—Donate to help Tom Alter and his family with living and legal expenses: https://gofund.me/27c72f26d
—Sign and share this petition demanding Tom Alter be given his job back: https://www.change.org/p/texas-state-university-give-tom-alter-his-job-back
—Write to and call the President and Provost at Texas State University demanding that Tom Alter be given his job back:
President Kelly Damphousse: president@txstate.edu
President’s Office Phone: 512-245-2121
Provost Pranesh Aswath: xrk25@txstate.edu
Provost Office Phone: 512-245-2205
For more information about the reason for the firing of Dr. Tom Alter, read:
"Fired for Advocating Socialism: Professor Tom Alter Speaks Out"
Ashley Smith Interviews Dr. Tom Alter
—CounterPunch, September 24, 2025
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 Russia Confirms Jailing of Antiwar Leader Boris Kagarlitsky In a secret trial on June 5, 2024, the Russian Supreme Court’s Military Chamber confirmed a sentence of five years in a penal colony for left-wing sociologist and online journalist Boris Kagarlitsky. His crime? “Justifying terrorism” — a sham charge used to silence opponents of Putin’s war on Ukraine. The court disregarded a plea for freedom sent by thirty-seven international luminaries. Kagarlitsky, a leading Marxist thinker in Russia’s post-Soviet period, recently addressed socialists who won’t criticize Putin: “To my Western colleagues, who…call for an understanding of Putin and his regime, I would like to ask a very simple question. [Would] you want to live in a country where there is no free press or independent courts? In a country where the police have the right to break into your house without a warrant? …In a country which…broadcasts appeals on TV to destroy Paris, London, Warsaw, with a nuclear strike?” Thousands of antiwar critics have been forced to flee Russia or are behind bars, swept up in Putin’s vicious crackdown on dissidents. Opposition to the war is consistently highest among the poorest workers. Recently, RusNews journalists Roman Ivanov and Maria Ponomarenko were sentenced to seven, and six years respectively, for reporting the military’s brutal assault on Ukraine. A massive global solidarity campaign that garnered support from thousands was launched at Kagarlitsky’s arrest. Now, it has been revived. This internationalism will bolster the repressed Russian left and Ukrainian resistance to Putin’s imperialism. To sign the online petition at freeboris.info —Freedom Socialist Party, August 2024 https://socialism.com/fs-article/russia-jails-prominent-antiwar-leader-boris-kagarlitsky/#:~:text=In%20a%20secret%20trial%20on,of%20Putin's%20war%20on%20Ukraine. Petition in Support of Boris KagarlitskyWe, the undersigned, were deeply shocked to learn that on February 13 the leading Russian socialist intellectual and antiwar activist Dr. Boris Kagarlitsky (65) was sentenced to five years in prison. Dr. Kagarlitsky was arrested on the absurd charge of 'justifying terrorism' in July last year. After a global campaign reflecting his worldwide reputation as a writer and critic of capitalism and imperialism, his trial ended on December 12 with a guilty verdict and a fine of 609,000 roubles. The prosecution then appealed against the fine as 'unjust due to its excessive leniency' and claimed falsely that Dr. Kagarlitsky was unable to pay the fine and had failed to cooperate with the court. In fact, he had paid the fine in full and provided the court with everything it requested. On February 13 a military court of appeal sent him to prison for five years and banned him from running a website for two years after his release. The reversal of the original court decision is a deliberate insult to the many thousands of activists, academics, and artists around the world who respect Dr. Kagarlitsky and took part in the global campaign for his release. The section of Russian law used against Dr. Kagarlitsky effectively prohibits free expression. The decision to replace the fine with imprisonment was made under a completely trumped-up pretext. Undoubtedly, the court's action represents an attempt to silence criticism in the Russian Federation of the government's war in Ukraine, which is turning the country into a prison. The sham trial of Dr. Kagarlitsky is the latest in a wave of brutal repression against the left-wing movements in Russia. Organizations that have consistently criticized imperialism, Western and otherwise, are now under direct attack, many of them banned. Dozens of activists are already serving long terms simply because they disagree with the policies of the Russian government and have the courage to speak up. Many of them are tortured and subjected to life-threatening conditions in Russian penal colonies, deprived of basic medical care. Left-wing politicians are forced to flee Russia, facing criminal charges. International trade unions such as IndustriALL and the International Transport Federation are banned and any contact with them will result in long prison sentences. There is a clear reason for this crackdown on the Russian left. The heavy toll of the war gives rise to growing discontent among the mass of working people. The poor pay for this massacre with their lives and wellbeing, and opposition to war is consistently highest among the poorest. The left has the message and resolve to expose the connection between imperialist war and human suffering. Dr. Kagarlitsky has responded to the court's outrageous decision with calm and dignity: “We just need to live a little longer and survive this dark period for our country,” he said. Russia is nearing a period of radical change and upheaval, and freedom for Dr. Kagarlitsky and other activists is a condition for these changes to take a progressive course. We demand that Boris Kagarlitsky and all other antiwar prisoners be released immediately and unconditionally. We also call on the auth *..........*..........*..........*..........*..........*..........*..........* *..........*..........*..........*..........*..........*..........*..........* |
Mumia Abu-Jamal is Innocent!
FREE HIM NOW!
Write to Mumia at:
Smart Communications/PADOC
Mumia Abu-Jamal #AM-8335
SCI Mahanoy
P.O. Box 33028
St. Petersburg, FL 33733
Join the Fight for Mumia's Life
Since September, Mumia Abu-Jamal's health has been declining at a concerning rate. He has lost weight, is anemic, has high blood pressure and an extreme flair up of his psoriasis, and his hair has fallen out. In April 2021 Mumia underwent open heart surgery. Since then, he has been denied cardiac rehabilitation care including a healthy diet and exercise.
He still needs more complicated treatment from a retinal specialist for his right eye if his eyesight is to be saved:
Donate to Mumia Abu-Jamal's Emergency Legal and Medical
Defense Fund
Mumia has instructed PrisonRadio to set up this fund. Gifts donated here are designated for the Mumia Abu-Jamal Medical and Legal Defense Fund. If you are writing a check or making a donation in another way, note this in the memo line.
Send to:
Mumia Medical and Legal Fund c/o Prison Radio
P.O. Box 411074, San Francisco, CA 94103
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Resources for Resisting Federal Repression
https://www.nlg.org/federalrepressionresources/
Since June of 2020, activists have been subjected to an increasingly aggressive crackdown on protests by federal law enforcement. The federal response to the movement for Black Lives has included federal criminal charges for activists, door knocks by federal law enforcement agents, and increased use of federal troops to violently police protests.
The NLG National Office is releasing this resource page for activists who are resisting federal repression. It includes a link to our emergency hotline numbers, as well as our library of Know-Your-Rights materials, our recent federal repression webinar, and a list of some of our recommended resources for activists. We will continue to update this page.
Please visit the NLG Mass Defense Program page for general protest-related legal support hotlines run by NLG chapters.
Emergency Hotlines
If you are contacted by federal law enforcement, you should exercise all of your rights. It is always advisable to speak to an attorney before responding to federal authorities.
State and Local Hotlines
If you have been contacted by the FBI or other federal law enforcement, in one of the following areas, you may be able to get help or information from one of these local NLG hotlines for:
Portland, Oregon: (833) 680-1312
San Francisco, California: (415) 285-1041 or fbi_hotline@nlgsf.org
Seattle, Washington: (206) 658-7963
National Hotline
If you are located in an area with no hotline, you can call the following number:
National NLG Federal Defense Hotline: (212) 679-2811
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Articles
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1) Immigrants Are Scared to File Taxes. It Could Cost the U.S. Billions.
Fears that the I.R.S. could share their data with ICE have turned tax season into a gamble for people who are in the country illegally.
By Miriam Jordan and Andrew Duehren, April 14, 2026
Miriam Jordan, who covers immigration, reported from Los Angeles and Andrew Duehren, who covers tax policy, reported from Washington.
Many undocumented immigrants who want to file tax returns have sought the help of clinics like this one in Los Angeles. Mark Abramson for The New York Times
Evelin and Gustavo Quebedo have filed U.S. tax returns every year for more than a decade.
That they are undocumented immigrants did not deter them.
“Our thinking has been, if one day there’s immigration reform and the chance to legalize our status, we can show that we file our taxes, are not a burden — that we do the right thing,” said Mr. Quebedo, a car mechanic, who lives with his family in Los Angeles.
But as April 15 approached this year, the couple, who came to the United States from Central America, agonized over whether to file.
Their fears, shared by many of the millions of undocumented people who file tax returns, are rooted in the decision last year by the Internal Revenue Service to give immigration officials the addresses of people subject to deportation — a break with the tax agency’s longstanding practices.
The shift sent shock waves through the I.R.S., where taxpayer privacy has been an article of faith, and through immigrant communities, where filing tax returns was seen as a way for people in the country illegally to show that they were complying with tax laws.
The federal treasury could take a hit. Many undocumented immigrants have taxes withheld in every paycheck, but experts worry some could shift into under-the-table jobs. Others with less formal earnings may now skip filing a tax return — and therefore not pay federal taxes at all. The Yale Budget Lab, a nonpartisan research center, projected lost tax revenue of about $300 billion over a decade.
The fallout from the I.R.S. agreement with Immigration and Customs Enforcement is becoming clearer as the annual tax deadline nears, according to several organizations that assist immigrants with filing their tax returns.
At the Koreatown Youth and Community Center in Los Angeles, certified volunteers help low-income residents prepare returns through a partnership with the I.R.S. Undocumented immigrants file using an Individual Taxpayer Identification Number, or ITIN, a nine-digit identifier issued by the I.R.S. for people who don’t have Social Security numbers.
This year, only 10 percent of clients at the Koreatown center’s free tax clinics have been ITIN holders, compared with about a third in previous years, said Audrey Casillas, a director.
A week before the April 15 tax deadline, the Quebedos were among the immigrants who came by the clinic seeking help but were stricken by anxiety.
“I don’t know if we can trust this government not to come after us,” Ms. Quebedo said, glancing at their daughter, born in the United States, and their son, brought to the country as a little boy.
For decades, the I.R.S. implicitly encouraged undocumented taxpayers to file a return as part of its broader mission to promote tax compliance. Before the agreement between the I.R.S. and ICE, unauthorized immigrants paid roughly $60 billion annually in federal taxes, according to an estimate by the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, a progressive think tank. Much of it went to Social Security and Medicare, which are programs that undocumented immigrants cannot benefit from.
With few exceptions, taxpayer information was kept walled off from other government agencies, and that won a measure of trust among many undocumented immigrants. But under President Trump, the effort to find as many immigrants to deport as possible led the administration to try to exploit that trust.
The Department of Homeland Security, which includes ICE, first sought the help of the I.R.S. in early 2025, soon after President Trump returned to the White House and launched his mass deportation campaign. The I.R.S. initially balked at the request, which sought information on about 700,000 immigrants. Several top I.R.S. officials resigned because they feared working with ICE to detain immigrants could be illegal.
ICE didn’t relent, though, and by the spring, the agency had secured an agreement to get information from the I.R.S., which had cycled through a series of leaders and had seen an exodus of career employees.
Over the summer, ICE sought the addresses of about 1.3 million immigrants, and the I.R.S. handed over information on about 47,000 of them before federal judges ordered a stop to the practice.
“It’s sending the message to undocumented immigrants and mixed-status families that being in the shadows is safer,” said Louis DeSipio, a political scientist at the University of California, Irvine.
The I.R.S. did not respond to a request for comment.
John Koskinen, who was the I.R.S. commissioner from 2013 to 2017, said the potential consequences of sharing tax data with D.H.S. were evident.
“Our job was to collect taxes owed, not enforce immigration laws,” said Mr. Koskinen. “That was the job of D.H.S. And it was clear to me that, if immigrants thought their information was going to be shared, many of them would quit filing their tax returns.”
Brian Pastori, who helps undocumented immigrants file tax returns in New Bedford, Mass., said he first noticed a drop in filings last year, after news broke that ICE was seeking information from the I.R.S. “We got a significant drop-off last year, and we haven’t recovered,” said Mr. Pastori, who is deputy director of the Community Economic Development Center of Southeastern Massachusetts.
“The damage is already done,” he said.
About 14 million undocumented immigrants lived in the United States in 2023, the latest available estimate, and about 70 percent of them were in the labor force, according to the Pew Research Center, a nonpartisan think tank.
Since creating the ITIN in 1996, the I.R.S. has issued 31 million of them; about five million were active as of October 2025. In 2022, about 3.8 million tax returns included at least one ITIN, and those returns accounted for about $17 billion in federal income taxes that year, according to I.R.S. data.
Not all ITIN holders are undocumented immigrants. Some are foreign students or other noncitizens who have tax-reporting obligations because they earn income in the United States.
Many of the undocumented immigrants work in jobs in which taxes are withheld on every paycheck. They may have used a fake, expired or stolen Social Security number to obtain that job, but they use the separate nine-digit code provided by the I.R.S. to document their tax payments.
For those workers, filing a return presents an opportunity to receive a refund if they paid too much in taxes, and that can provide a boost to household budgets.
Now, some of those families are going to miss out, said Luz Arevalo, a lawyer who sued to block the sharing of taxpayer information on behalf of the Community Economic Development Center of Southeastern Massachusetts and other groups.
“People are forgoing refunds, and often it’s money they paid in,” Ms. Arevalo said.
Other undocumented immigrants may be paid in cash, off the books, or work as independent contractors, so they won’t have had taxes deducted over the course of the year. If they decide not to file a return, they would not be paying any taxes.
Undocumented immigrants were already cut off from most federal tax benefits, such as the earned-income tax credit. But last year’s Republican tax law cut off the child tax credit, which had been available to families if a child was a U.S. citizen.
In Huntington Park, a predominantly Latino city in Los Angeles County, banners recently advertised tax preparation offices hemmed between quinceañera dress shops and taquerias.
The area was the target of big immigration raids last year, including one that Kristi Noem, the homeland security secretary at the time, showed up to observe.
Javier Oviedo owns Ov Professional Services, one of several tax preparers who reported a steep decline in business. “We have clients who have self-deported,” he said.
Nonprofits like the United Ways of California, which connects low-income workers with tax prep sites like the Koreatown center, and groups like the National Immigration Law Center have been inundated with questions about what immigrants should do this tax season.
“We had never received as many questions and seen this level of concern and confusion,” said Ben D’Avanzo, a senior strategist at the immigration law center.
On its website, the nonprofit offers some guidance: “If ICE already has your address, filing does not add to your risk. “
“You don’t have to file a tax return unless your income is over the filing minimum, or you owe self-employment taxes,” it says, “but filing tax returns may help if you plan to apply for a green card or citizenship.”
The last time a bipartisan immigration bill was introduced in Congress, it required proof of “good moral character” to qualify for permanent residency. And the last immigration amnesty, in 1986, required applicants to prove they had lived and worked in the United States for several years.
Maria Garcia, who sells cosmetics and clothes at a downtown Los Angeles stall, is among those who have decided not to file.
“In all my years in this country, I had never experienced what is happening now,” said Ms. Garcia, who has lived in the United States for more than 30 years. Earlier this year, she narrowly avoided arrest during a raid that targeted street vendors.
“My whole life is here. My elderly mother is here. My two children are here. I don’t want to be separated from them,” Ms. Garcia said.
At the Koreatown tax clinic, many immigrants said they felt a duty to comply with the law.
“I want to show I have integrity,” said Manuel Aranguiz, a computer technician from South America, after filing his taxes. “One of my sons will hopefully be able to sponsor me for a green card one day.”
The Quebedos completed their return at around 8 p.m., and tucked it inside Ms. Quebedo’s tan purse alongside years of past returns.
“We thought hard before coming here,” Mr. Quebedo said.
Their expected refund: less than $200.
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2) Iran Threatens Retaliation Over U.S. Blockade
Iran’s armed forces said they would attempt to expand their influence over sea lanes beyond the Strait of Hormuz if the U.S. military continued to block Iranian shipping.
By Ali Watkins, Peter Eavis, Aaron Boxerman and Erika Solomon, April 15, 2026
A billboard depicting the Strait of Hormuz with a banner that says “Forever in Iran’s hands” in Tehran on Monday. Credit...Arash Khamooshi for The New York Times
Iran on Wednesday threatened further retaliation over an American naval blockade of its ports in the critical Strait of Hormuz as the U.S. military said that it had “completely halted” trade in and out of Iran by sea.
More than 10,000 soldiers, as well as dozens of planes and warships, are enforcing the blockade, the U.S. military said. In response, the Iranian military said on state media that it could expand its grip over critical shipping routes beyond the strait if the U.S. blockade continued.
“Iran’s powerful armed forces will not allow any exports or imports to continue in the Persian Gulf, the Sea of Oman and the Red Sea,” said Maj. Gen. Ali Abdollahi, leader of the military joint command that oversees Iran’s army and Revolutionary Guards.
Mediators are rushing to shore up a two-week cease-fire in the war between the United States, Israel and Iran that expires April 21. But the future of the talks is unclear after a meeting between Vice President JD Vance and senior Iranian leaders over the weekend in Pakistan ended without a breakthrough.
Esmaeil Baghaei, a senior Iranian official, said that Iran had continued to exchange messages with the United States through Pakistan since the talks ended on Sunday morning.
President Trump, in an interview with Fox Business, again deemed the conflict “close to over” — a claim he has made repeatedly — while also suggesting that U.S. attacks could continue as long as needed to keep Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon.
Iran has not fully relaxed its control over the Strait of Hormuz, the Persian Gulf conduit for oil and gas, which Mr. Trump said was a precondition for the current truce. Iran began blockading the Strait of Hormuz as a pressure tactic during the war, rattling the world economy and sending energy prices soaring.
Reaching a deal to end the war would require not only an agreement to reopen the strait, but also an agreement over Iran’s nuclear program and Israel’s military campaign in Lebanon against Hezbollah, the Iran-backed militant group.
The United States announced on Tuesday that Israel and Lebanon had agreed to “launch direct negotiations” to end fighting between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon. The announcement followed a rare face-to-face meeting in Washington between the Israeli and Lebanese ambassadors.
Hezbollah condemned the Lebanese government for negotiating with Israel, however, and it was unclear whether any Israel-Lebanon agreement would lead to an end in the fighting. Hezbollah has long been Lebanon’s dominant military and political force, defying attempts by the official Lebanese government to assert control.
Here’s what else we’re covering:
· Lebanon: The talks between Israel and Lebanon did not lead to an immediate cease-fire. Israeli forces bombarded towns in southern Lebanon on Wednesday, according to Lebanese state media. Several people were killed in a strike in the coastal town of Ansariya, Lebanon’s official National News Agency said.
· Iranian rescues: Emergency teams have rescued more than 7,200 Iranians from rubble after U.S. and Israeli bombings throughout the war, the president of Iran’s Red Crescent society, Pir Hossein Kolivand, said. The Iranian authorities have released little comprehensive information about the dead and wounded in the country, more than a month in the war.
· Death tolls: The Human Rights Activists News Agency said at least 1,701 civilians, including 254 children, had been killed in Iran as of last Wednesday. Lebanon’s health ministry said on Tuesday that 2,124 people had been killed in the latest fighting between Israel and Hezbollah. In attacks attributed to Iran, at least 32 people have been killed in Persian Gulf nations. At least 22 people had been killed in Israel as of Sunday, as well as 12 Israeli soldiers fighting in Lebanon. The American death toll stands at 13 service members.
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3) This Is Not a Man in Control of Himself
By Jamelle Bouie
Opinion Columnist, April 15, 2026
Jason Hendardy for The New York Times
To have spent any amount of time observing President Trump over the last month is to conclude that he is in far over his head.
The president is struggling with the consequences of his actions, raging in protest of the fact that for all its firepower, the United States cannot bomb Iran into submission. When Trump launched his “short-term excursion,” he assumed that it would be — in the words of a Pentagon official in the last Republican administration to launch a Middle East war — a “cakewalk.”
That, as Trump’s own intelligence agencies told him, was a mistake. Now, he is stuck. And he lacks the skill and patience to find a way out of his self-inflicted catastrophe. Unable to will a better outcome into existence — there are limits to the power of positive thinking — and frustrated by his own impotence, his response, familiar to anyone who must manage the emotions of a young child, is to throw a tantrum.
Over the last few days, Trump has denounced “the Fake News Media” as “CRAZY, or just plain CORRUPT!” for its reporting on the war. He attacked Pope Leo XIV in a bizarre rant, calling him “WEAK on Crime” and “terrible for Foreign Policy.” And he posted an A.I. image of himself as Jesus, surrounded by devotees, healing an unnamed man.
This is not a man in control of himself, or a president in control of the situation around him.
I’ve written before about the irony of a strongman president so uninterested in governing that he has handed his power over to a handful of deputies. Trump’s behavior as he faces failure in Iran underscores another such irony.
Months before Trump won his second term, and well before he took office, the Supreme Court handed him the reins of the unitary executive — the promise of an active, energetic administration free of what the court deemed unnecessary constraints. The president has used this power to run wild, trampling over constitutional government. But he has also, at the same time, shown himself to be the weakest and most ineffectual president of recent memory, less a man of commanding authority than, well, a buffoon.
This is not to say that Trump has been an inconsequential president, that he hasn’t presided over the wholesale destruction of large parts of the federal government, or that he hasn’t turned the sharp edge of the state against the most vulnerable people in the country.
First under the Department of Government Efficiency and then under the direction of Russell Vought, director of the Office of Management and Budget, the administration summarily liquidated several key agencies. Among them: the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, the U.S. Agency for International Development, the United States Institute of Peace, the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. Trump’s White House has also slashed hundreds of millions of dollars in taxpayer funding for new medicines and technologies in a crushing blow to scientific research in the United States.
Under the direction of Stephen Miller, a White House deputy chief of staff and the architect of the president’s deportation program, the administration has used its court-sanctioned authority to build a roving secret police of armed immigration agents, used both to terrorize the president’s political enemies and to remove as many immigrants from the country as possible, regardless of legal status.
But these grim facts of Trump’s tenure should not blind us to the way his unilateral action betrays the weakness of his regime. Trump works almost exclusively through executive orders — presidential directives used to shape the priorities of the federal bureaucracy. This allows him to move quickly. But there are also limits to his reach. In areas where Trump cannot compel political actors to obey his demands — where there is no legal basis for his authority — he struggles to do anything of consequence.
Consider his effort to impose a new citizenship requirement for voting, as well as a national voter ID. He has issued two executive orders that purport to change federal elections to suit his demands. But neither has much in the way of legal force. Presidential power does not extend to election administration. There is the SAVE Act — a bill that would write these restrictions into law — but other than writing posts on his social media website, Trump has done little to nothing to push that bill through Congress.
He’s done little to nothing with Congress, period. He’s taken few, if any, steps to work with the supine Republican majority to consolidate his transformation of the executive branch through legislation. Some of this is no doubt strategy, with destruction as a fait accompli. But most of it reflects his inability to engage the legislative process. The weakness we see abroad is the weakness we see at home, and vice versa.
Politically, the president’s unilateralism has been a disaster. His universal tariffs — a vanity project as much as an economic program — are a drag on both the economy and his approval rating.
The same goes for his immigration policies, which also started with a broad assertion of executive authority. They then produced an enormous backlash from Americans under siege by ICE and Customs and Border Protection. The resistance in Minnesota, in particular, underscored the extent to which the president cannot withstand significant pushback. And it ultimately forced him to fire his secretary of homeland security, Kristi Noem, sideline the face of his efforts, Greg Bovino, and execute a strategic retreat.
Nothing underscores Trump’s weakness as an executive more than the war with Iran. This is not to downplay the president’s decision to circumvent Congress and start a war without so much as a nod to democratic decision-making. It is the imperial project of a would-be authoritarian. But, like many such projects throughout history, it is a showcase for the pathologies and dysfunctions of the regime in question. Initial operational success has given way to what is essentially a stalemate, with Trump screaming at the world, unwilling to do much else.
For as much as Trump is uniquely unsuited for the tremendous power of his office, it is also true that the idea of the unitary executive rests on a fundamental misunderstanding of the American political system. It imagines that government can be managed by a single figure, directing each part of the executive branch as an extension of his person. But the American system rests on consensus and collaboration. It depends on an active relationship between the three branches, each working to steer the affairs of a state and each entitled to its influence.
As weak as Trump is, it’s not clear that any president could unilaterally govern the country with any success. Even our strongest and most aggressive presidents — Franklin Roosevelt comes to mind — worked in conjunction and cooperation with congressional majorities and allies within and outside the federal government. They understood that American governance was a partnership and that collaboration is necessary if one wants a durable and lasting legacy.
This raises what is already the most important question of the Trump years thus far: Will his legacy be durable and lasting? Does it represent a new template for American government going forward? Or is it more like an unfortunate detour into a dark alley?
There is a decent chance that Trump is the beginning of something, and not the end. But if we can escape these years intact and respond accordingly, we may find that Trump stands less as an example and more as a cautionary tale of what happens when we embrace unaccountable, unilateral authority.
In the end, it just doesn’t work.
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4) Vance Says the Pope Should Be More Careful When Talking About Theology
The vice president, who is Catholic, took issue with Pope Leo XIV’s statement that disciples of Christ are “never on the side of those who once wielded the sword and today drop bombs.”
By Anton Troianovski, Reporting from Washington, Published April 14, 2026, Updated April 15, 2026
Vice President JD Vance spoke at a Turning Point USA event in Athens, Ga., on Tuesday. Credit...Alyssa Pointer/Reuters
Vice President JD Vance invoked World War II on Tuesday to defend the U.S. bombing of Iran from criticism by Pope Leo XIV, extending the Trump administration’s spat with the Catholic Church and underlining the White House’s struggle to justify an unpopular war.
Mr. Vance, who is Catholic, told a conservative audience at the University of Georgia that the pope was wrong to say that disciples of Christ are “never on the side of those who once wielded the sword and today drop bombs.”
“Was God on the side of the Americans who liberated France from the Nazis?” Mr. Vance said after referring to the pope’s comment. “I certainly think the answer is yes.”
President Trump has appeared stung by Leo’s condemnation of the war, criticism that has highlighted the challenge the administration faces from the coalition of conservative and religious voters who helped elect Mr. Trump in 2024. The president lashed out at the pope on Sunday in a social media post that called the first American-born pontiff “weak on crime” and “terrible for foreign policy.”
Leo has stuck to his antiwar stance, telling reporters Monday that he had “no fear of the Trump administration.” Without mentioning Iran or Mr. Trump, the pope posted on social media on Tuesday that “God’s heart is torn apart by wars, violence, injustice and lies.”
The back-and-forth has presented a particular quandary for Mr. Vance, a convert to Catholicism who is publishing a book about his path to the faith and who has long courted the Republican religious base. Asked about the debate between Mr. Trump and the pope at an Athens, Ga., event hosted by the conservative group Turning Point USA, Mr. Vance admonished Leo, saying that if he was “going to opine on matters of theology,” his comments needed to be “anchored in the truth.”
“In the same way that it’s important for the vice president of the United States to be careful when I talk about matters of public policy, I think it’s very, very important for the pope to be careful when he talks about matters of theology,” Mr. Vance said.
But the vice president also echoed the diplomatic approach he took on Fox News on Monday in playing down the political disagreement.
“I have a lot of respect for the pope. I like him. I admire him. I’ve gotten to know him a little bit,” Mr. Vance said. “It doesn’t bother me when he speaks on issues of the day — frankly, even when I disagree with how he’s applying a particular principle.”
Moments later, someone in the crowd interrupted, yelling, “Jesus Christ does not support genocide!” It was an apparent reference to Israel’s war in Gaza.
“I agree,” Mr. Vance responded. “Jesus Christ certainly does not support genocide, whoever yelled that out from the dark.”
Ben Shpigel contributed reporting from New York.
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5) I Have Watched the Catastrophe of My Country Be Reduced to Nothing
By Mohammed Ahmed, Mr. Ahmed is a Sudanese writer based in Seoul, April 15, 2026
Ben Roberts/Panos Pictures, via Redux
The word “home” held two meanings in my life. One was the physical space of my childhood in Sudan: the textured walls of my room, the scent of my mother’s cooking, the squeak of ceiling fans pushing back against the endless summer heat. The other was an unspoken, fragile assumption that the land we stood on was permanent. On April 15, 2023, the war in Sudan erased both meanings.
The news arrived in frantic, broken messages, reaching me halfway across the globe in South Korea, where I had left for college two years earlier. My family had fled and our house in Khartoum was ransacked. Photographs, books, the mundane artifacts of our daily lives were looted or scattered. An archive of my family’s story, built over several decades, suddenly became silent.
For three years, I have watched this catastrophe be reduced to a headline, then a call for action, then nothing at all. The consequences of the war, meanwhile, read like a checklist of human suffering at its peak: the largest displacement crisis in the world — nearly 13 million people, one in three Sudanese, have been forced out of their homes — amid extraordinary levels of food insecurity, countless cases of violence against women and children, and undeniable acts of genocide.
The world, distracted by other calamities, has largely looked away. But the Sudanese people are not waiting to be saved. In the shadow of the world’s condescension, and in the face of terrible cruelty, we have built our own lifeline. Far from picturesque or photogenic, it is messy and exhausting and achingly slow. But the resilience is real, proof that our spirit cannot be crushed by suffering.
Sudan’s plight is rooted not in poverty but in plunder. Under British colonial rule, Sudan’s resources — gold, cotton, gum arabic, even its people — were extracted for profit. After independence, the pattern continued: Oil was siphoned off as successive regimes enriched themselves and their foreign patrons. Today, the same dynamic plays out with gold, of which Sudan has some of the African continent’s most significant reserves. This war has taken things to a new level of brutality.
After the revolution of 2019 toppled the country’s dictator, the Sudanese Army and the Rapid Support Forces, a militia group, settled into an uneasy power-sharing arrangement. The R.S.F., whose roots are in the Janjaweed militias that carried out genocide in Darfur early this century, chafed under the control of the military. Tensions between the two forces and their leaders grew and grew. In April 2023, they broke out into open fighting.
Foreign powers stepped in, with most regional countries supporting the army. But the United Arab Emirates, which had previously cultivated ties with the R.S.F., lost no time in backing the militia. The group could deliver what the U.A.E. coveted: access to the Red Sea and Sudanese gold. Since the war began, smuggled gold has flooded Dubai’s markets, gleaming in the city’s new gold district. The U.A.E. has even reportedly had a role in recruiting Colombian mercenaries to fight alongside the R.S.F. in the conflict.
Outsiders tend to call what is happening in Sudan a “civil war.” The framing is convenient: It allows people to file Sudan away as another incomprehensible African tragedy, too complex to understand, too distant to matter. But there is nothing particularly Sudanese about Emirati drones or foreign mercenaries. What is happening in Sudan is entirely modern: a resource war fought by proxy, playing out against the world’s indifference.
Those fleeing the violence have found scant welcome. Western countries that previously streamlined visa processing for Ukrainian and Syrian refugees did not extend the same courtesy to Sudanese refugees. Several countries have imposed strict barriers on Sudanese applicants, from callous travel bans to stringent new regulations, often indefinitely delaying asylum claims and even short-term visas. In one tellingly egregious example of this spirit of exclusion, independent Sudanese filmmakers were recently denied entry to Germany to attend a Berlinale industry gathering.
We have had to help ourselves. In Sudanese Arabic, the word “nafeer” describes a communal mobilization: When a village needs food to be harvested, everyone gathers; when a home is destroyed by a Nile flood, everyone rebuilds. For the past couple of years, nafeer has gone viral in the best sense. Diaspora WhatsApp groups raise thousands of dollars overnight. Young volunteers inside Sudan coordinate emergency aid kitchens, delivering meals to families who have not eaten in days. Sudanese physicians operate in clinics under R.S.F.-controlled areas, risking death to heal the wounded.
Multinational aid agencies, bound by bureaucracy and security protocols, have largely retreated to the relative safety of Port Sudan. Yet Sudanese volunteers with little funding, and hardly any recognition, have reached places the United Nations cannot. They are not waiting for permission. They are not waiting for cease-fires. They are simply doing what the Sudanese have always done: showing up for one another. This is the story the world fails to see — our stubborn refusal to surrender to misery.
Nowhere is this more visible than in Khartoum. When the military recaptured the capital from the R.S.F. last year, hardly anyone was expected to return. But return they did. More than a million displaced Sudanese have come back to Khartoum, not because it is safe or whole, but because it is home. In February, a Sudan Airways flight landed at Khartoum International Airport for the first time in nearly three years, carrying 160 passengers. It was a small but powerful sign that the capital was coming back to life.
The war continues. The R.S.F., weathering the army’s efforts to push it back, now controls almost all of Darfur in western Sudan. Last April, the militia claimed to have established a parallel administration there, proclaiming it the “Government of Peace and Unity.” The irony is not lost on those who have witnessed the group’s brutality: The same forces that have killed thousands of civilians in ethnically targeted massacres now claim to govern in the name of peace.
With the war in Iran spilling out into the U.A.E., the calculus has shifted. The country that fanned the flames in Sudan is suddenly preoccupied with threats at its own doorstep, a reminder that those who profit from chaos rarely get to control it for long. For Sudan, this distraction may provide some respite. No matter what, the Sudanese people — tenacious, resourceful, unbreakable — are here to stay.
We remember what we lost. And we will make this rubble home again.
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6) Hegseth Says U.S. Is Poised to Resume Combat if Talks Fail
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth urged Iran’s leaders to “choose wisely” and threatened more attacks, even as the war’s economic toll puts pressure on President Trump.
By Eric Schmitt, John Ismay, Elian Peltier and Aurelien Breeden, April 16, 2026
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth spoke to reporters at the Pentagon on Thursday. Pete Marovich for The New York Times
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on Thursday threatened U.S. attacks on Iran’s energy infrastructure if its leaders did not agree to a peace deal, less than a week before a temporary cease-fire is set to expire.
Speaking at a news conference at the Pentagon, Mr. Hegseth repeatedly urged Iran’s leaders to “choose wisely” and said an American naval blockade of Iranian ports would continue “as long as it takes.” The Trump administration has alternated between assuring that a peace deal was within reach and threatening Iran’s leadership if it does not comply, as the war’s economic toll puts President Trump under increasing domestic pressure.
“If Iran chooses poorly,” Mr. Hegseth said on Thursday, “then they will have a blockade and bombs dropping on infrastructure, power, and energy.” Under international law, intentionally targeting Iran’s civilian infrastructure could constitute a war crime.
Gen. Dan Caine, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said at the news conference that U.S. Navy forces in the Pacific could be called upon to intercept ships moving to resupply Iran — which would broaden the naval blockade beyond the Middle East.
Iran threatened on Wednesday to halt all trade in the Persian Gulf, the Gulf of Oman and the Red Sea in response to the blockade. It was unclear how much control Iran could exert over shipping in the region. Its battered armed forces can still use mines and fast boats to harass ships in the Strait of Hormuz. Its allies in Yemen, the Houthi militia, have also shown they can attack shipping in the Red Sea.
Analysts say the U.S. blockade will squeeze Iran’s economy but might not be enough to force concessions from its government or lessen the global energy crunch.
Here’s what else we’re covering:
· Peace talks: Pakistan said Thursday that it expected to host a second round of peace negotiations between the United States and Iran but declined to give a date, as senior Pakistani mediators visited Tehran in an effort to shore up the U.S.-Iran cease-fire. American and Iranian officials have said that indirect negotiations are continuing but have not confirmed they will hold another round of direct discussions.
· Israel-Lebanon: As the conflict between Israel and Hezbollah, the Iran-backed Lebanese militia, threatens to upend the cease-fire, Secretary of State Marco Rubio spoke by phone with Lebanon’s president on Thursday, the Lebanese president’s office said. President Trump said that Israeli and Lebanese leaders would speak on Thursday, though neither side confirmed it. Lebanon’s official news agency reported new Israeli strikes in southern Lebanon on Thursday.
· Iranian sailors: Sri Lanka has used the U.S.-Iran cease-fire to repatriate more than 200 Iranian sailors who came into its custody last month after a U.S. submarine torpedoed an Iranian warship near its waters, resolving a diplomatic standoff for Sri Lanka with Iran.
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7) ‘Blessed Are the Peacemakers,’ Pope Says Amid Standoff With Trump
For days, Pope Leo XIV has attracted criticism from President Trump and his allies for refusing to back the war in Iran. On Thursday, he reiterated his calls for peace.
By Motoko Rich, April 16, 2026
Motoko Rich reported from Bamenda, Cameroon, where Pope Leo spoke to local Catholics.
Pope Leo XIV is not backing down.
Amid a growing dispute with the Trump administration over the legitimacy of American attacks in Iran, Leo used a speech on Thursday in Cameroon to express “woe to those who manipulate religion and the very name of God for their own military, economic and political gain, dragging that which is sacred into darkness and filth.”
“Blessed are the peacemakers,” he said.
The pope was speaking in a region of Cameroon where separatists have been clashing with the government for a decade, and he praised local religious leaders seeking to end that conflict.
But against the backdrop of American efforts to use Christian theology to justify the Iran campaign, the pope’s words seemed as directed at the Trump administration as they were at separatist leaders and the government of Paul Biya, 93, the world’s oldest president and an authoritarian who has ruled Cameroon for more than 40 years.
The Trump administration has sought to portray its war in Iran as a “just war” backed by the will of God and Jesus Christ. Pope Leo has stridently disagreed, saying previously that Jesus “does not listen to the prayers of those who wage war.”
That led to an extraordinary broadside on Sunday from Mr. Trump, who attacked the pope on social media as “terrible on foreign policy.”
On Monday, as the pope left for a tour through four countries in Africa, he said he had “no fear” of the Trump administration and would continue to protest war and speak out “loudly about the message of the Gospel.” The Trump administration continued to needle him, with Vice President JD Vance saying on Tuesday that Leo should be more “careful when he talks about matters of theology.”
On Wednesday, the pope traveled to Cameroon, where he immediately spoke against the authoritarian rule of President Biya. In a speech at the presidential palace on Wednesday, Leo said that “public authorities are called to serve as bridges, never as sources of division” and that “authentic peace arises when everyone feels protected, heard and respected, when the law serves as a secure safeguard against the whims of the rich and powerful.”
On Thursday, Leo traveled to Bamenda, an English-speaking region of Cameroon, which is led by a French-speaking national government. A violent secessionist movement centered in Bamenda has divided the country over the past decade.
Although the pope has not referred specifically to Mr. Trump or his administration since Monday, his words in Bamenda seemed to extend beyond local conflicts in Cameroon.
“The masters of war,” he said, “pretend not to know that it takes only a moment to destroy, yet often a lifetime is oft not enough to rebuild. They turn a blind eye to the fact that billions of dollars are spent on killing and devastation.”
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8) ICE Arrests 85-Year-Old French Widow Who Married Her G.I. Sweetheart
After Marie-Thérèse Ross-Mahé’s husband died, an inheritance battle exploded. Her stepson then used his influence to have her arrested, an Alabama probate judge said.
By Nicholas Bogel-Burroughs and Catherine Porter, Catherine Porter reported from Paris., April 16, 2026
A few years ago, Marie-Thérèse Ross-Mahé reconnected with a man named Bill Ross, whom she had met when she was a young secretary and he was stationed in France for the U.S. military. Both widowed and in their 80s, the two fell in love, and last year she moved more than 4,000 miles to Anniston, Ala., to marry him.
But the continent-spanning love story soured in January after Mr. Ross died, setting off an ugly inheritance battle between his two sons and Ms. Ross-Mahé, 85. This month, immigration agents arrested her in her nightgown at her late husband’s home — and a county probate judge overseeing his estate said that one of his sons was responsible for the arrest.
Ms. Ross-Mahé is now in a detention center hundreds of miles away in Louisiana, her own three children back in France unable to reach her and fearing for her health.
The Calhoun County probate judge, Shirley A. Millwood, a Republican elected in 2024, in a Friday ruling urged the federal government to investigate, “especially in light of the ongoing national events surrounding the distrust of federal law enforcement officers and the many investigations ongoing of corruption within our government.”
In her ruling, she appointed an independent administrator for Mr. Ross’s estate and temporarily ordered his sons to give up their keys to their father’s home. The ruling has not been previously reported.
Judge Millwood wrote in her ruling that she believed that Mr. Ross’s younger son, Tony Ross, who she said was a retired Alabama state trooper now working at a federal courthouse in Anniston, had used his position as a government employee to have Ms. Ross-Mahé arrested.
The son testified in probate court that he had not asked co-workers to have Ms. Ross-Mahé arrested. But, Judge Millwood wrote, law enforcement officers told Tony Ross a day before Ms. Ross-Mahé’s arrest that she would be detained, and he also received a text confirming the arrest less than an hour after it happened. Two hours after her arrest, the judge wrote, Mr. Ross’s other son, Gary, went to their father’s house and changed the locks.
Judge Millwood directed that copies of her ruling be sent to the presiding federal judge in Anniston, as well as to the top U.S. marshal for the region, possibly in an effort to prompt an investigation into the sons’ behavior.
Mr. Ross’s sons, who are in their 50s, did not respond to requests for comment, and neither did their lawyer in the inheritance case.
Ms. Ross-Mahé said in a court filing before her arrest that she had been trying to gain American citizenship. The Homeland Security Department said in an unsigned statement only that Ms. Mahé had overstayed a 90-day visa by roughly four months and was arrested by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents.
One of Ms. Ross-Mahé’s sons said his mother first became acquainted with Mr. Ross in the late 1950s while working at a military base in western France. Mr. Ross later married one of her friends, returning to the United States with her and beginning a life in Alabama.
Ms. Ross-Mahé married, too, and had three children, but many decades later, after both of their spouses died, the long-lost friends struck up a long-distance romance. She visited Alabama, and he visited the Nantes area where she lived, meeting her family. The children found it slightly awkward that their mother had fallen in love again so quickly, but they were glad that she was finding a second youth, said her son, who asked not to be identified out of fear of affecting his mother’s case.
And so Ms. Ross-Mahé gave up her life in western France — and her pension — to live in Anniston, a city of about 21,000 people not far from the Talladega racecar track. The couple married civilly in April 2025 and had a religious ceremony that summer, which her children watched online from France.
The house Mr. Ross had owned for nearly 50 years became home base, with its backyard pool, brick exterior and manicured lawn. The pair explored parks, drove to Florida and had plans to visit Louisiana, too, Ms. Ross-Mahé’s son said. But on Jan. 24, Mr. Ross died unexpectedly of natural causes at 85.
The dispute over his possessions — the one-story home worth about $173,000, as well as two cars and a bank account holding about $1,500 — began shortly after.
In Alabama, probate judges oversee many administrative matters, including wills, and Judge Millwood is handling the inheritance dispute because Mr. Ross did not leave one.
Under Alabama’s inheritance laws for people who die without a will, Ms. Ross-Mahé would be entitled to half of Mr. Ross’s estate, and his children would split the other half.
But Tony Ross testified that Ms. Ross-Mahé had said, while she was married to his father, that if he died, she did not want anything of his but would need to be able to fly back to France. After his death, the sons sent Ms. Mahé an offer of $10,000 if she waived her right to any inheritance.
Ms. Ross-Mahé and the judge described more aggressive approaches.
The day after Mr. Ross died, his sons came to the house and each drove off with one of his vehicles, a truck and a 2018 Mercedes-Benz, according to Judge Millwood.
Mr. Ross’s sons denied removing other pieces of property and countered that Ms. Mahé had “removed, concealed or disposed” of certain assets herself. They also said she had told them she did not want certain things in the house — guns and Mr. Ross’s dog — but had later claimed that the sons had taken them unfairly.
Ms. Ross-Mahé said in a court filing last month that the older of Mr. Ross’s sons, Gary Ross, had rerouted all mail sent to his father’s home, which caused her to miss an appointment with immigration officials. Because of her citizenship status, Ms. Ross-Mahé said, she was not on her husband’s checking account and did not have access to money to pay for food, clothing or utilities. Her son said the internet, utilities and cable had been turned off at the home.
On March 30, Judge Millwood issued an order temporarily prohibiting all of Mr. Ross’s family members from selling or giving away any of his assets.
Two days later, on April 1, ICE agents came to the home on quiet Gann Drive and arrested Ms. Ross-Mahé, dressed only in her nightgown, robe and underwear, according to a neighbor’s account filed in court.
Her son said he had been unable to contact his mother since her arrest, because the detention center where she is held does not accept international phone calls. Instead, she has been communicating through her neighbors in Anniston, who have rallied around her cause. The French Consulate has also been working to free her.
According to Ms. Ross-Mahé’s son, she has told her neighbors that other people being held at the detention center have been taking care of her, offering her covers at night and calling her “Unsinkable Molly” after Margaret Brown, a survivor of the Titanic.
Bryant K. Oden contributed reporting from Anniston, Ala. Georgia Gee and Kirsten Noyes contributed research.
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9) Thousands of Lebanese Try to Head Home After Israel-Lebanon Truce
Hezbollah, the Iran-backed militia Israeli forces are battling in Lebanon, avoided mention of the 10-day cease-fire but appeared to be adhering to it. A truce could remove an obstacle in U.S.-Iran peace talks.
By Christina Goldbaum, Euan Ward, Johnatan Reiss and Max Bearak, Christina Goldbaum reported from Qasmiyeh, Lebanon; Euan Ward from Beirut, Lebanon; and Johnatan Reiss from Tel Aviv, April 17, 2026
Thousands of families made their way along the highway south of Beirut and Saida, Lebanon, on Friday after the cease-fire with Israel was announced. David Guttenfelder/The New York Times
Thousands of Lebanese families displaced by fighting filled the main highway to southern Lebanon on Friday in hopes of returning to their homes, as a 10-day cease-fire in Israel’s military campaign against Hezbollah went into effect.
The fighting between Israeli forces and Hezbollah, an Iran-backed militant group, has threatened the fragile halt in the war between Iran and the United States. Tehran has insisted that the truce extend to Lebanon, meaning that if the Lebanon cease-fire holds, it could remove a major hurdle to ending the U.S.-Iran war.
In a statement on Friday, Hezbollah sidestepped any direct reference to the cease-fire while offering little indication that they would violate it. Israeli forces continue to occupy southern Lebanon and have warned residents not to return there, despite the truce.
The latest fighting has killed more than 2,100 people in Lebanon and displaced over one million residents, mostly from the south of the country, according to the Lebanese authorities. At least 13 Israeli soldiers have been killed, along with two civilians, according to the Israeli authorities.
Israel and Hezbollah traded strikes on Thursday right up to midnight, when the cease-fire took effect, according to statements from both sides. And while Israel and Lebanon said they would abide by the U.S.-brokered truce, its enforcement could be complicated by the fact that the Lebanese government does not control Hezbollah, which is more powerful than the Lebanese military.
News of the cease-fire brought relief to many in northern Israel, which has faced daily Hezbollah rocket fire for seven weeks. No incoming rockets have been reported in Israel since the cease-fire took hold.
Still, there was unease on both sides of the border. In Israel, local officials criticized the U.S.-brokered truce for coming before Hezbollah had been militarily neutralized. Among the thousands of Lebanese waiting on the country’s main highway heading south, the cease-fire’s short length was a primary concern.
The State Department, in a memo outlining the terms of the truce, said that Israel would retain its right “to take all necessary measures in self-defense” but would not carry out “offensive operations” against Lebanese targets. The Lebanese government, with international support, is expected to take “meaningful steps” to prevent Hezbollah from attacking Israeli targets, according to the memo.
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10) House Votes to Extend Expiring Law on Warrantless Surveillance for 10 Days
The Senate would need to also approve the stopgap measure that passed the House early Friday. Libertarian-leaning House Republicans had balked at a long-term extension.
By Charlie Savage, April 17, 2026
Charlie Savage writes about national security and legal policy. He reported from Washington.
Gen. Joshua M. Rudd, the director of the National Security Agency, during his confirmation hearing in January. Kenny Holston/The New York Times
The House of Representatives voted early Friday to extend an expiring surveillance law for 10 days, after libertarian-leaning Republicans demanded that they be allowed to vote on adding new privacy limits to any long-term extension.
The law, a major section of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, or FISA, is set to expire on Monday. The House bill would push that off until April 30, creating more time for negotiations. The Senate, which reconvenes on Monday, would still need to approve the stopgap measure.
President Trump has been pressuring Republicans to pass an 18-month reauthorization without any changes to the provision, known as Section 702.
Speaker Mike Johnson has been attempting to comply, but he needs the backing of nearly every G.O.P. member in the House to proceed. Twenty balked early Friday morning, making it impossible to move forward even though four Democrats crossed party lines to try to help him bring the matter up for a vote.
President Trump had urged Republicans on Wednesday to “unify” behind Mr. Johnson and extend the law without any new limits.
“I am willing to risk the giving up of my Rights and Privileges as a Citizen for our Great Military and Country!” Mr. Trump declared on social media, portraying the section as crucial to protecting troops abroad and preventing terrorist attacks.
But that characterization did little to allay the concerns of some Republicans associated with the libertarian-leaning Freedom Caucus. The debate has scrambled the usual polarized party lines: Privacy and civil liberties-focused lawmakers in both parties have allied to press for greater limits, while centrists and national security hawks in both parties are working together to try to extend the surveillance law without changes.
Section 702 allows the government to collect — on domestic soil and without a warrant — the communications of foreigners abroad, including when those people are interacting with Americans. Under the law, the National Security Agency can order email services like Google and network operators like AT&T to turn over copies of messages of targeted foreigners.
The provision legalized a form of the Stellarwind program, the once-secret warrantless wiretapping program that the Bush administration launched after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. When Congress enacted Section 702 in 2008, it added a “sunset” deadline to ensure that lawmakers would periodically review — and potentially modify — the program.
Privacy-minded lawmakers want to require a court order to access information about and the private messages of Americans swept up in the program. They have also proposed using the bill to bar the government from purchasing data about Americans from data brokers if it would need a warrant to collect the information directly.
“I will be voting NO on final passage of the FISA 702 Reauthorization Bill if it does not include a warrant provision and other reforms to protect US citizens’ right to privacy,” Rep. Thomas Massie, Republican of Kentucky, wrote on social media shortly after Mr. Trump’s post.
Before blocking an up-or-down vote on the 18-month extension bill early Friday, the House also blocked a proposal that would have extended Section 702 by five years. That version would have made what appeared to be largely superficial changes, like enhancing criminal penalties for misusing the program.
Proponents of Section 702 have warned that any lapse would gravely threaten national security, but the program has a temporary safety net. Because an intelligence court recertified the program last month, intelligence agencies can legally continue to operate the program through March 2027 even if the underlying statute has expired in the meantime.
Still, during the last cycle of debate over reauthorizing the law, in 2024, the Biden administration warned that a lapse could lead some tech companies to stop cooperating anyway, creating gaps in data collection until the government could get court orders compelling compliance.
Mr. Trump’s full-throated endorsement of the surveillance tool marked a sharp pivot. For years, he has railed against the F.B.I.’s use of different part of FISA during the investigation into Russia and his 2016 campaign, and only grudgingly acceded to Section 702 extensions.
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11) She Made Sure Her Baby Was Born an American. Then Federal Agents Separated Them.
Diana Acosta Verde, who came into the United States illegally when she was six months pregnant, had to leave her baby at a hospital while she returned to a detention center.
By Caroline Kitchener, Charo Henríquez and Hamed Aleaziz, April 17, 2026
The reporters reviewed text messages, medical records, government documents and photos from the parents’ time in detention.
Diana Acosta Verde and her baby, Gael, at a farm in Honduras owned by her partner’s family earlier this month. Daniele Volpe for The New York Times
Diana Acosta Verde received the order from the detention officer less than 24 hours after she gave birth.
“Leave the baby in the crib,” Ms. Acosta recalled the officer saying as she held her newborn son. “You need to go.”
Her baby, Gael, was born a month early in a South Texas hospital. As Gael slept, the officer explained that a bus had arrived to take Ms. Acosta back to the detention center where she had lived for the past three months.
It was time to say goodbye.
Ms. Acosta felt her whole body tremble as she moved away from her son. A 27-year-old immigrant from Honduras, she and her partner had crossed the southern border in the fall, when Ms. Acosta was about six months pregnant, after being deported from the United States the previous spring. The couple knew they were taking a chance when they began their 1,700-mile journey back to the United States. But to give their first child together a chance at American citizenship — to be born on U.S. soil — they had agreed that they would do anything.
In arguing at the Supreme Court this month to overturn birthright citizenship, which many see as central to the country’s identity, the Trump administration asserted that the practice acts as a “powerful pull factor,” encouraging people to cross the border illegally and give birth in the United States. With a majority of justices appearing likely to uphold birthright citizenship, Ms. Acosta’s experiences reflect the often fraught choices and questions inherent in the policy.
Ms. Acosta and the baby’s father, Jaime Murillo Padilla, made decisions that put themselves and their future child at risk — desperate for their son to achieve citizenship in a stable country rich with economic promise. They also encountered an immigration system ill equipped to deal with the consequences of a practice that creates strong incentives for noncitizens to have children in the United States, with detention policies and conditions that can put mothers and their babies in jeopardy.
Of all the potential perils they had contemplated, the couple never imagined they would be separated from their newborn. Gael was in the hospital without a family member for more than 24 hours before his grandmother, a U.S. resident, came to collect him.
“I felt so much pain that I didn’t really know where it hurt,” Ms. Acosta said in an interview. “I wanted to vomit. I felt like my world was falling to pieces.”
U.S. Border Patrol does not track childbirths. Lauren Bis, a spokeswoman for the Department of Homeland Security, said that Border Patrol encountered over 15,000 pregnant women in 2023 under President Biden. She added that the number of pregnant women crossing the border dropped by 81 percent after President Trump took office.
The Biden administration issued extensive guidance on how to handle childbirth and pregnancy in Customs and Border Protection custody, including directives that required parents to be processed within 12 hours of a birth and stressed the importance of families remaining together. Much of that guidance has been rescinded by the Trump administration.
Ms. Bis said the Biden-era policy was “no longer needed.”
“With the most secure border in history, C.B.P. is not prioritizing releasing individuals into the country,” she said.
Ms. Acosta and Mr. Padilla were initially arrested by Border Patrol, according to court records, then transferred into the custody of the U.S. Marshals Service while awaiting prosecution for crossing the border illegally. Before and after Ms. Acosta gave birth, she was held at the East Hidalgo Detention Center, a facility in La Villa, Texas, operated by the GEO Group, a private company that runs immigration detention centers across the country. The GEO Group did not respond to a request for comment.
Brady McCarron, a spokesman for the U.S. Marshals Service, said pregnant prisoners have access to obstetric care, including prenatal and postpartum follow-up, and that the prisoners are responsible for arranging custody of the child immediately after birth. If the mother cannot find someone to take custody, Mr. McCarron said, the Marshals Service will notify child protective services.
Ms. Acosta said she was not given the option to keep her baby with her in detention.
When Gael was born, Ms. Acosta and Mr. Murillo achieved the goal they had gambled so much for: Their son was an American citizen. He would never have to sneak across the border, or get deported. He had full access to the country Mr. Murillo saw as the world’s “greatest nation.”
But back at the detention center, Ms. Acosta did not know if she would ever see her son again.
A Clear Path Forward
As soon as she found out she was pregnant last summer, Ms. Acosta started to cry.
“I’m scared,” she’d said, holding out the positive test to show Mr. Murillo.
Ms. Acosta and Mr. Murillo had just been deported to Honduras from the United States, where Ms. Acosta had lived for four years after seeking asylum under the Biden administration. Mr. Murillo, 34, had lived in the United States since he crossed the border at 10 years old, qualifying for Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, the Obama-era program that shielded from deportation undocumented immigrants who came to the country as children.
The couple had always planned to have a baby in the United States — far from the violence they had come to expect in Honduras. Ms. Acosta’s brother was killed there a few years ago, they said.
But then the couple was picked up by ICE in early 2025, arrested after the police found drugs in the glove compartment of a relative’s car Mr. Murillo had been driving. He was charged with possession of a small amount of cocaine — which he said was not his — and deported in March. Ms. Acosta, against whom all charges were dropped, was deported a few months later.
Back in Honduras, expecting a baby, Mr. Murillo saw a clear path forward.
“Our daughter or son is not going to be born here,” he recalled telling his partner.
Mr. Murillo, who ran a restaurant business in Chicago, where he had lived, started calling people he thought could help them get back into the United States.
“We knew the importance of that birth certificate,” he said. Mr. Murillo was also eager to return to his family. He has three other children in the United States from previous relationships who are American citizens.
The last time Mr. Murillo and Ms. Acosta had crossed into the United States, they had felt welcomed into the country. Ms. Acosta had obtained asylum papers. In 2002, when a 10-year-old Mr. Murillo first immigrated, he nibbled happily on a bologna sandwich he got from a Border Patrol officer, who had assured him that everything would turn out OK.
They knew it would be different under the Trump administration. But friends assured them that they could still find a way to cross safely.
Five months later, Mr. Murillo said, he and Ms. Acosta were sleeping in a shed just south of the border with blood stains on their mattress and AK-47s stashed in the corner. The man he had promised thousands of dollars to shuttle them across had lied to them, he said, by promising that they would be staying with families and traveling in a private car, far from the cartels.
A Border Patrol agent found them hiding in a bush on Nov. 3, he said, less than five minutes after they had crossed the border.
Ms. Acosta texted Mr. Murillo’s mother, who had been awaiting their arrival in Chicago, right before they got arrested.
“They got us,” she said.
Delivery and Detention
Three months later, on Friday, Jan. 30, Blanca Padilla Tejeda received a call from a U.S. marshal in South Texas.
Ms. Acosta had delivered her baby that day, the marshal said. Ms. Padilla, Mr. Murillo’s mother, had to get to the hospital by Sunday to take custody of her grandson, the marshal said in text messages reviewed by The New York Times.
Ms. Padilla had no idea how she would come up with money to travel to Texas in two days. But she feared her family could lose Gael if she didn’t.
“Is the boy OK?” Ms. Padilla asked the marshal on the phone. “Is Diana OK?”
“Yes,” she recalled him saying. “But you have to come for him now.”
At the hospital, a social worker noted that the baby was premature and would be kept in the nursery for monitoring, according to medical records. Medical providers had already designated Ms. Acosta as a “high-risk” patient, writing that, before arriving at the hospital, she had received “inadequate or lack of prenatal care.”
Ms. Padilla arrived at Knapp Medical Center in Weslaco, Texas, on Sunday morning, ready to pick up her grandson.
At that point, Ms. Acosta was in solitary confinement at the detention center — unable to talk to Ms. Padilla or anyone who could give her news about her son. She said she sat in a freezing cell for more than two days without anything to cover herself, afraid to bathe in a bathroom covered in mold, hair and vomit. When she told officers her breasts were in pain, she said, they prohibited her from touching them to pump her breast milk, instructing her to bandage and ice her chest.
“I didn’t know if my baby had been taken by the state,” Ms. Acosta said. “I told them that, please, I need to communicate with my family. They gave me nothing. Nothing, nothing, nothing.”
Medical experts provided with the details of Ms. Acosta’s case stressed the importance of newborn babies staying close to their mothers in their first weeks, especially those born prematurely. Separating the two can affect a baby’s neurological development and ability to bond, said Dr. Rose Molina, an obstetrician-gynecologist and fellow at the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists.
“The mom and newborn should always be together,” said Ms. Molina. “Especially in those first days.”
Mothers who are unable to pump their unused breast milk are at a higher risk of contracting an infection, Ms. Molina added.
That Sunday morning, Ms. Padilla, who is 53 years old and walks with a cane, collected her grandson from the hospital and took him back to a small house her other son had reserved on a remote country road. They planned to stay there until she could pick up her grandson’s birth certificate.
Within a few days, Ms. Padilla said, the baby turned bright red and started throwing up phlegm.
“I began to ask God not to take him away from me,” she said.
Ms. Padilla knew her grandson needed his mother and father.
When she took him to the detention center, she said, officers allowed the baby to see his parents for less than half an hour, separated by glass.
‘Your Future Is Set’
Gael was nearly 2 months old when his father held him for the first time at an airport in Honduras, where the couple had returned in February after being deported. The baby had just arrived on a plane with his grandmother — and his U.S. birth certificate.
The baby did not cry as Ms. Padilla handed him over, wrapped in a blue velvet blanket. First to his mom, then to his dad.
Mr. Murillo thought about the guns officials had pointed at the mother of his child in Mexico. The masked men at the house that he assumed was run by a cartel. The days Ms. Acosta had to spend in a cold, dark room alone.
To Mr. Murillo, it had all been worth it.
“Every day we get up and we thank God for the opportunity of our son being born over there,” he said. “It’s the biggest win for us. All we can think about now is, your future is set.
“He is a U.S. citizen.”
Kitty Bennett contributed research.
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12) We Disagree on a Lot. But We Know This Law Must Change
By Mike Lee and Dick Durbin, Mr. Lee and Mr. Durbin are senators, April 17, 2026
Grade Solomon
We disagree on many issues. One of us is a longtime Democrat, the other a conservative Republican. But both of us are deeply concerned about warrantless government surveillance of the American people.
Early this morning, the House voted to briefly extend Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which was originally enacted in 2008 to allow the government to gather vital intelligence about foreign governments, terrorists and spies.
The problem is that it has also allowed agencies like the F.B.I. and the National Security Agency to regularly gather and search through the private communications of American citizens without a warrant. That is a clear violation of rights protected by the Constitution.
Whether or not the House’s 10-day extension is approved by the Senate, it’s time to have a serious debate about this problem as we consider the future of the law.
It’s true that Section 702 doesn’t allow the direct targeting of Americans, but their communications are still often gathered during the warrantless surveillance of foreigners abroad. Once the government has this data, agencies then have the ability to search through it. And they do: Transparency reports reveal that thousands of such searches are performed every year. A federal court previously found that some the F.B.I. had conducted had violated the Fourth Amendment.
Predictably, without a requirement for court approval of these searches, abuses have been rampant. As a recent report from the Brennan Center for Justice highlighted, F.B.I. agents in recent years have searched for the communications of “protesters across the political spectrum; members of Congress; a congressional chief of staff; a state court judge; multiple U.S. government officials, journalists and political commentators; and 19,000 donors to a political campaign.” In a time of extreme partisanship, these abuses have provoked bipartisan outrage.
For too long, Congress has habitually reauthorized Section 702 without significant reforms. As in past years, some may reprise the perennial excuse that there is no time to debate the needed changes before the authority expires. They’re wrong. If it were to expire, the law permits existing surveillance to continue under an annual certification by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court until at least March 2027.
Congress should not needlessly rush to extend this authority without the American people and their elected representatives knowing the full truth about the extent of ongoing abuses and compliance failures. Government officials have failed to testify before Congress about their use of this authority since it was last reauthorized. And in the recent ruling on the annual certification, the court reportedly found problems — but the details of those concerns remain classified.
Congress should have a serious and informed debate on these issues rather than ramming through a reauthorization of Section 702 with minimal reforms yet again, sidelining Americans’ constitutional rights in the process.
That’s why the two of us have proposed the Security and Freedom Enhancement (SAFE) Act, a compromise that would reauthorize the valuable core of this tool while enacting reasonable safeguards to protect the Fourth Amendment rights of all Americans.
The government would still be able to check its databases to uncover connections between targeted foreigners and Americans. But it would have to get court approval in the small number of cases in which these searches have generated results and the government has a proper basis for gaining access to the contents of the communications. Importantly, our warrant requirement also contains robust exceptions for legitimate emergencies, so that we can balance civil liberties with legitimate security needs.
Our bill would also cut off another form of warrantless surveillance: the widespread practice of circumventing the Fourth Amendment by purchasing Americans’ sensitive information from data brokers.
The Department of Justice (including the Drug Enforcement Administration and the F.B.I.), the Department of Homeland Security (including ICE, Customs and Border Patrol and the Secret Service) and the Defense Intelligence Agency have purchased cellphone location information for millions of Americans. Such information is highly sensitive and can reveal intimate details of that person’s life. Even more troubling, artificial intelligence could supercharge such surveillance, allowing the government to harvest and analyze mass quantities of highly personal and sensitive information about Americans without court approval. Our legislation would close these loopholes — again with pragmatic exceptions to accommodate legitimate safety and security needs.
Congress should not take an all-or-nothing approach to reauthorizing Section 702. We have the time and the responsibility to get this right. Members may disagree about what reforms are required — that’s why we have debates and amendments. But simply extending the law without any changes to protect Americans’ privacy should be off the table.
We owe it to the American people to meet this moment and do our jobs to protect both national security and civil liberties. Our bill offers a bipartisan solution to do just that.
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13) Iran’s Military Says It Has Reimposed ‘Strict Control’ of Strait of Hormuz
The military said it would tighten its grip on the vital waterway until the U.S. ended its blockade of Iranian ports. The statement added to the uncertainty over access to the strait.
Tankers anchored in the Strait of Hormuz off the coast of Iran, on Saturday. Credit...Asghar Besharati/Associated Press
Iran tightened its grip on the Strait of Hormuz again on Saturday, asserting that it was “under strict control” by Iranian forces — just hours after Iranian officials and President Trump had raised hopes for an end to the war by announcing that the waterway had reopened.
Iran’s military said in a statement that the strait had now “returned to its previous state” unless the United States ended its own blockade of Iranian ports. A shipping monitor run by the British navy said Saturday that it had received a report of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards firing at a tanker in the strait.
The new developments added to the confusion on Saturday over the status of transit through the strait, where Iran has choked global energy supplies by menacing passing ships during more than a month of war with the United States and Israel.
Just a day earlier, Iran’s foreign minister called the strait “completely open,” leading Mr. Trump to declare a breakthrough in the negotiations between the two countries on a permanent cease-fire.
Both countries immediately cooled that optimism, however. Iranian officials insisted ships still needed Iranian permission to cross. And Mr. Trump said the American naval blockade of Iran’s ports would continue until a deal was reached to end the war, prompting Iranian ire and vows to retaliate.
The president has often made overly optimistic claims about the war, which began in late February. Although Mr. Trump expressed confidence late Friday about the negotiations with Iran that he said would happen over the weekend, no new face-to-face talks were announced as of Saturday morning.
Mr. Trump also claimed in a phone interview with CBS that Iran had “agreed to everything.” But Iran’s top negotiator, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, quickly denied Iran had agreed to any of their adversaries’ core demands.
The announcement of the strait’s reopening had soothed energy prices on Friday, sending oil futures tumbling to around $90 a barrel. Oil markets are closed for the weekend.
Hopes for an end to the war were boosted by the 10-day cease-fire in Lebanon that went into effect on Friday. Thousands of displaced families made their way home, and there was heavy traffic again Saturday morning as people continued to head to Lebanon’s south.
Iran had demanded the truce with the United States extend to Lebanon as a condition for a broader deal. Mr. Trump and U.S. officials worked to make that happen, even as they denied they were trying to meet Iran’s conditions.
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14) Maduro Is Gone, and the Purge Has Begun
The successor to Venezuela’s captured President Nicolás Maduro is purging the people who kept him in power.
By Anatoly Kurmanaev and Mariana Martínez, April 18, 2026
Anatoly Kurmanaev and Mariana Martínez reported this article from Caracas, Venezuela.
Delcy Rodríguez, Venezuela’s former vice president, in January in Caracas, the capital. The New York Times
U.S. Special Forces brought down President Nicolás Maduro of Venezuela swiftly and publicly.
Now, the people who kept him in power are being purged gradually and inconspicuously. Some have been fired or detained, and others are anxiously looking over their shoulders, worried they might be next.
Oligarchs close to Mr. Maduro’s family have been snatched from their homes. His political allies have been summarily removed from their posts. His relatives have been sidelined from business deals and barred from media appearances.
The housecleaning is being carried out by Mr. Maduro’s former vice president, Delcy Rodríguez, who is running the country under instructions from the Trump administration. The detentions and leadership purges have unfolded without public explanation, but often with the approval — and sometimes at the urging — of the White House, according to people close to Ms. Rodríguez’s government.
After Mr. Maduro was dragged off in January to a New York jail, Ms. Rodríguez presented herself as a reluctant and temporary stand-in for a fallen leader, denouncing his capture as an illegal attack on her country.
But now, with Mr. Maduro gone, she is dismantling his ruling coterie and embarking on the largest redistribution of power in Venezuela in decades.
The overhaul of national leadership, combined with sweeping new laws and her alliance with President Trump, is reshaping Venezuela and its management of one of the planet’s largest oil reserves, just as the world grapples with the energy turmoil caused by war in the Middle East.
In the three months since Mr. Maduro’s capture, Ms. Rodríguez has changed 17 ministers, replaced military commanders and installed new diplomats. She has also overseen the detention of at least three businessmen tied to Mr. Maduro, fired several of his relatives and cut off most of his family from oil contracts.
In their places, she has appointed her own loyalists or championed businessmen beholden to her, while opening the doors to American oil and mining investors.
The changes have brought little transparency or pluralism to a government that remains authoritarian. Venezuela’s opposition says that rather than returning the country to democracy, Ms. Rodríguez is solidifying her rule.
But she is hardly making all decisions on her own. After capturing Mr. Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, in an overwhelming show of force, the Trump administration threatened to attack Venezuela again if the new leaders refused to cooperate. Several senior Venezuelan officials and government insiders have likened Ms. Rodríguez’s rule to governing with a gun to her head.
Ms. Rodríguez is now using that threat of U.S. coercion to go after ruling party power brokers once considered untouchable. The result has been a political win for Mr. Trump and Ms. Rodríguez, allowing U.S. officials to settle scores with Maduro allies who had defied them, while simultaneously cementing Ms. Rodríguez’s leadership.
Venezuela’s transformation from U.S. adversary to a protectorate has been head spinning for most Venezuelans.
Polls show a large majority of Venezuelans welcome the end of Mr. Maduro’s 13-year autocratic reign, which he enforced through violence, corruption and electoral fraud.
Many also remain skeptical of Ms. Rodríguez, a longtime official of the governing Socialist Party who has never held elected office.
But for Mr. Maduro’s friends, business associates and governing party companions, the new political landscape has ushered in an unfamiliar swirl of anxiety and danger.
More than a dozen spoke with The New York Times on the condition of anonymity, fearing reprisal. Some said they had been placed under surveillance by Venezuela’s secret police since Mr. Maduro’s ouster. Others said they had tried to stay out of Caracas, the capital, and have considered exile.
The Venezuelan government did not respond to questions for this article. A White House spokeswoman, Anna Kelly, said the Trump administration had a mutually beneficial relationship with the Rodríguez government.
“We are dealing very well with President Delcy Rodríguez,” Ms. Kelly said. “Oil is starting to flow, and large amounts of money, unseen for many years, will soon be greatly helping the people of Venezuela.”
The people who lost out from Mr. Maduro’s downfall are part of a disparate group. They include relatives of Mr. Maduro and his predecessor Hugo Chávez, many of whom amassed great wealth in the nearly three decades of their combined rule.
They also include businessmen who owe their fortunes to personal ties to the two presidents, as well as veterans of the socialist movement formed by Mr. Chávez in the 1990s, which became known as chavismo.
One longtime friend of Mr. Maduro’s broke down in tears in an interview after his capture, calling Mr. Maduro the last bastion of Venezuela’s revolution.
Few apparatchiks have dared criticize Ms. Rodríguez publicly, but Mario Silva is one who has. A veteran propagandist, his state television program was canceled after Mr. Maduro’s capture, forcing him to turn to social media or radio graveyard slots.
Like many pro-government Venezuelan media figures, he built a career promoting official anti-imperialist dogma, only to fall out of favor when the new administration shifted to building a business-friendly, pro-American image.
“Damn it, keep following the gringos’ orders, then, go ahead,” Mr. Silva said on his radio show on March 18. “Just prostrate yourself and be done with it.”
Mr. Maduro’s disparate allies are united by a distrust of Ms. Rodríguez, who has transformed from a socialist firebrand into Washington’s lauded partner.
People close to the deposed president argued that Mr. Maduro had never considered her as his successor, seeing her as a capable manager rather than a leader.
Nor did Mr. Maduro’s inner circle prepare for the possibility that the clash with Mr. Trump could result in a government led by one of their own, the people said. “The plan was always either everyone falls, or nobody does,” said one senior Maduro official.
The apparent ease with which U.S. forces snatched Mr. Maduro from a heavily guarded military base has fueled suspicion that he was betrayed by people who benefited from his downfall.
One senior Venezuelan official, a day after the U.S. attack, said treason had been committed. Officials from Russia, which lost an ally in Mr. Maduro, have made similar claims.
The Trump administration had been considering Ms. Rodríguez as Mr. Maduro’s successor since 2025, and had indirect contact with her. There has been no evidence that she was privy to the U.S. military’s plans, yet that fact has not eased the distrust within the governing party.
Ms. Rodríguez’s caretaker post began hours after Mr. Maduro’s capture, on Jan. 3, with a fiery speech denouncing U.S. aggression. A week later, Ms. Rodríguez led a retinue of power brokers and Cuban officials to commemorate dozens of Cuban and Venezuelan servicemen who died in the American attack.
“We are not handing down a legacy of traitors and cowards,” Ms. Rodríguez said in a televised speech intended to project unity.
Most of those by her side that day have since been cast aside.
Mr. Maduro’s longest-serving minister, Gen. Vladimir Padrino López, was fired as defense minister in March and later given a much less important post running agriculture. Mr. Maduro’s son, Nicolás Maduro Guerra, and a son of Ms. Flores, Yosser Gavidia Flores, have been sidelined from lucrative business deals with the state, according to government insiders.
Mr. Maduro’s attorney general, Tarek William Saab, was fired, given a consolation post, and then fired again. Camilla Fabri, Mr. Maduro’s immigration envoy, lost her post. Days later, her husband was detained.
And then there’s Cuba’s foreign minister, Bruno Rodríguez. Since attending Ms. Rodríguez’s speech, he has watched his country’s decades-long alliance with Venezuela unravel in weeks.
As Ms. Rodríguez has tightened control, the dismissals grew bolder.
The first Maduro confidant to fall was Alex Saab, a Colombian-born businessman and Ms. Fabri’s husband, who has made billions from preferential food and oil trade contracts and is under indictment in the United States on corruption-related charges.
On Jan. 16, Ms. Rodríguez wrote on social media that Mr. Saab was no longer Venezuela’s industry minister, thanking him “for his service to the Fatherland” and saying he would “assume new responsibilities.”
Two weeks later, Mr. Saab was detained. American officials and Ms. Rodríguez are now negotiating his fate, which includes potential extradition to the United States.
People close to Ms. Rodríguez said she had overseen the detention of two other prominent businessmen close to Mr. Maduro’s family: Raúl Gorrín and Wilmer Ruperti. Mr. Gorrín also faces a corruption-related indictment in the United States.
Mr. Saab’s lawyer declined to comment. Legal representatives for Mr. Ruperti and Mr. Gorrín did not respond to requests for comment.
Ms. Rodríguez’s administration has neither commented on the detentions nor announced any charges, leaving Mr. Maduro’s allies to speculate who might be next.
Ms. Rodríguez in March widened the purge to the armed forces, firing Venezuela’s entire military leadership, including General Padrino López, once considered one of Venezuela’s most powerful men.
One Venezuelan general said that many see the dismissals of senior commanders as the start of a much deeper, U.S.-guided overhaul of Venezuela’s armed forces.
People close Ms. Rodríguez’s government said she had coordinated some replacements with the Trump administration. U.S. officials, they said, have also pressured her to go after American adversaries like Mr. Gorrín and Mr. Saab.
Ms. Rodríguez’s allies include younger chavistas with weaker connections to the movement’s roots. Some are scions of the governing party’s aristocracy more interested in the fruits of a market economy than in maintaining Mr. Chavez’s legacy.
Ms. Rodríguez has also found willing enforcers in Venezuela’s security forces who have pledged their allegiance, hoping to avoid retribution for decades of human rights abuses. Her new defense minister is Gen. Gustavo González López, Venezuela’s former head of secret police, who was placed under sanction by the Obama administration for crushing protests.
Some former government opponents have been lured by career opportunities. Venezuela’s new envoy to North America and Europe, Oliver Blanco, had worked as personal assistant to an opposition leader.
The winners of Ms. Rodríguez’s economic restructuring include Venezuela’s traditional economic elites, who once sided with the opposition but made peace with chavismo. Their bet on stability over democracy has given them access to foreign markets and the U.S. banking system.
Western investors are other beneficiaries. They have recently been descending on Caracas’s luxury hotels searching for bargain assets in the oil, mining and tourism industries.
Only one senior minister in Mr. Maduro’s government remains in his post: Diosdado Cabello, the interior minister who oversaw the governing party’s repression apparatus.
Mr. Cabello is wanted by the United States on drug-trafficking charges and had clashed with Ms. Rodríguez in the past. But his connections to armed pro-government groups have also made him a valuable ally — and a risky target.
To hang on to power, Mr. Cabello has recast himself, from ruling party pit bull to a patriotic guarantor of stability.
“Let’s accompany our sister Delcy,” Mr. Cabello said at a government rally. “Let’s confide completely in the ability, work ethic and conscience of comrade Delcy.”
His adaptation has so far borne fruit. Mr. Cabello’s cousin and brother have kept their government jobs running Venezuela’s secret police and tax service. His daughter is Venezuela’s new tourism minister.
Inside the governing party, most officials have adapted, jettisoning their avowed anti-imperialism for a chance to stay in power.
One senior official said his colleagues did not trust Ms. Rodríguez, but felt they had no choice.
“We need her, and she needs us,” another said.
Sheyla Urdaneta contributed reporting from Buenos Aires, and Tyler Pager from Washington.
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15) In Angola, Pope Faces the Legacy of Colonialism
His visit includes a trip to a shrine where enslaved Africans were baptized before being forced into the treacherous voyage across the Atlantic Ocean.
By Cláudio C. Silva and John Eligon, April 18, 2026
Cláudio C. Silva reported from Luanda, Angola, and John Eligon from Johannesburg.
Pope Leo XIV in Cameroon on Thursday. He is scheduled to visit Angola on Saturday as part of his 10-day trip through Africa. Credit...Guglielmo Mangiapane/Reuters
When Pope Leo XIV visits the African nation of Angola on Saturday, he will encounter one of the Roman Catholic Church’s enduring challenges on the continent.
Angola has more than 20 million Catholics, but not a single cardinal, making the country a stark example of Africa’s lack of representation in Vatican leadership.
Only 14 of the 121 cardinals eligible to elect a pope are from Africa, where the church is growing faster than anywhere else in the world. There are 365,000 Catholics for every bishop in Africa, a ratio higher than any other continent.
But the Angolan church is the oldest Catholic community in southern Africa, with a history that goes back more than 500 years.
Portuguese settlers arrived in the Kongo Kingdom, which is part of present-day Angola, toward the end of the 15th century. Its Black rulers quickly embraced Catholicism. They were baptized, established local clergy and sent an envoy to represent them at the Vatican.
Within just a few decades, Catholicism had become the kingdom’s dominant religion, leading to a rare instance, historians say, of African and European states interacting as equals during slavery.
But a power imbalance quickly emerged.
The kingdom asked Vatican officials to appoint a local bishop. Instead, at Portugal’s urging, they gave control of the kingdom’s church to a bishop nearly 800 miles away on the tiny Portuguese island colony of São Tomé. It was a bitter pill to swallow.
Since then, Angola has only ever had two cardinals, and just one of them was Angolan. Portugal, which colonized Angola in the 16th century, currently has six cardinals.
“I believe we have not been treated with the same attention that the Vatican gives to other regions,” said Albino Pakisi, a former priest and now a professor at Catholic University in Luanda, the capital of Angola. “We feel a bit like stepchildren when other churches have cardinals and we do not.”
While many members of the Angolan clergy are looking at the pope’s visit through the lens of spiritual enrichment rather than Vatican politics, some analysts see Leo as uniquely positioned to address the needs of the church in Africa.
He has African roots — something many Africans remain unaware of — and a familiarity with the continent, having visited more than a dozen times as a bishop, including at least nine trips to Nigeria and five to Tanzania. He belongs to the Order of St. Augustine, a bishop who did some of his most important work in Algeria and encouraged the church to speak out on biblical values, such as the rights of the most vulnerable.
Many African Catholic leaders, including in Angola, have had to grapple with those values in the face of autocratic governments.
Leo is scheduled to meet with Angola’s president, João Lourenço, whose government has been accused by the church and civil society leaders of failing to address grinding inequality. Despite the country’s oil wealth, more than half of the population lives on less than $3.65 per day.
Three out of four Angolans are under 30. Young people in the country face mass unemployment and lack of access to health care and education. Young Africans more broadly represent a critical demographic in the church’s growth. While other regions struggle with aging populations, Africa is experiencing a youth boom.
José Manuel Imbamba, the archbishop of Saurimo in eastern Angola, said he hoped that Leo’s visit would help heal the political and societal tensions that have lingered in Angola after its 27-year civil war, which ended in 2002.
Leo will be the third pontiff to visit Angola, after John Paul II in 1992 and Benedict XVI in 2009. Diplomatic relations between the Vatican and Angola span seven centuries. António Manuel Nsaku Ne Vunda of Angola was the first African diplomat to reach the Vatican, said Carlos Bumba, a historian in Luanda.
Ne Vunda met with the pope in Rome in 1608 to negotiate better treatment and representation for African Catholics in the kingdom before succumbing to a severe illness shortly after his arrival.
Despite his short stay in Rome, Ne Vunda became a popular figure at the papal court. He was immortalized with a bust in the Vatican and buried in the Papal Basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore, where Pope Francis is also buried.
Filomeno do Nascimento Vieira Dias, the archbishop of Luanda, said in a news conference this month that he hoped Leo would, “at his own pace and without pressure,” appoint an Angolan cardinal because the country had one of the oldest Catholic communities in Africa, according to the Angolan newspaper Novo Jornal.
Some in Angola say that the country should have an archdiocese with a cardinal’s seat, meaning that the bishop who occupies it would automatically become a cardinal.
While in Angola, Leo will also pray with pilgrims at the Sanctuary of Our Lady of the Conception of Muxima, a shrine along the Cuanza River where enslaved Africans were baptized before being forced into a treacherous voyage to the Americas.
Today, the shrine, known as Mama Muxima, is one of the most popular pilgrimages in southern Africa, where visitors offer up their prayers to the Virgin Mary. The shrine’s visitors rarely focus on its role in the slave trade, and several Angolan clergy members said they looked forward to Leo sharing a positive message while in the country.
Pope John Paul II prayed for forgiveness for the church’s role in the atrocities of slavery during visits to Africa in 1985 and 1992.
In the present day, the church has to contend with other challenges. Although about 40 percent of the population is Catholic, the church has stiff competition from evangelical Christian sects. They combine local faith systems, like the belief in modern-day prophets, with evangelical Christian teachings. They host huge conferences throughout the country that reach into both rural and urban areas.
One of the most popular evangelical churches in Angola, the Universal Church of the Kingdom of God, has experienced huge growth over the last two decades, including among politicians, and built large cathedrals in Luanda.
Father Celestino Epalanga, who leads a commission of justice and peace in the Angolan bishop’s conference, said the growth of evangelical churches in the country reflected the richness of its religious diversity. But those churches also present “a challenge to society” because of what he said were their predatory practices, such as equating support for particular politicians with salvation.
Catholic leaders and analysts say that the challenges for the church in Angola and other African nations are both internal and external. The Angolan church does not have enough bishops and priests writing about “profound theological issues,” said Mr. Pakisi, the Catholic University professor.
Manuel de Jesus João Dias Brandão, the director of liturgy in the Saurimo archdiocese, said African priests and bishops needed to show more leadership and influence in their communities. He pointed to the church in Latin America as a model.
Even though the church in Latin America is younger than Africa’s, it has greater representation at the Vatican and is more influential worldwide, Father Brandão said. Latin American Catholics also have more parishes and missionaries around the world than Africans, he said, “which tells me we need to be more conscious of our responsibilities.”
Father Epalanga questioned whether the church in Africa was doing enough to help people live the message of the Gospel, and added that could be one reason for the lack of African representation at the Vatican.
“I don’t know,” he said. “It’s difficult to judge if really the Vatican is looking down upon us or we Africans are not doing enough.”
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16) Migrant Children Removed From New York Shelter After Abuse Allegations
Federal officials received complaints about the treatment of children and adolescents at a facility in Westchester County, N.Y.
By Ana Ley, April 18, 2026
The Department of Health and Human Services said that it was aware of abuse claims leveled at the Children’s Village in Dobbs Ferry, N.Y. Seth Harrison/The Journal News, via USA TODAY NETWORK, via Imagn Images
Federal officials have moved migrant children and adolescents out of a shelter in Westchester County, N.Y., after receiving reports that detainees there had been mistreated.
The allegations of abuse at a facility run by the Children’s Village, a shelter operator in Dobbs Ferry, were first reported by CNN on Thursday. The Department of Health and Human Services said in a statement to The New York Times that it was aware of the abuse claims and, as a result, transferred unaccompanied children to other locations and notified investigators.
An audit of the facility was completed on Jan. 20, and the children were removed from the facility the next week. Unaccompanied migrant children are the responsibility of the Office of Refugee Resettlement, known as O.R.R., within the Health and Human Services Department.
“The safety and well-being of children in O.R.R. care is a top priority,” Andrew Nixon, a D.H.S. spokesman, said in a statement. “Any credible concerns are addressed swiftly and thoroughly.”
A lawyer who had visited the facility said that children who had been detained there had been punished with restraints and seclusion. Leecia Welch, the chief legal counsel at Children’s Rights, a nonprofit organization that represents children in government custody, said that adolescents had complained about being placed alone for days in what they described as a “red room.”
“There’s just no question kids have been harmed,” Ms. Welch said. “Children’s behaviors continue to worsen the longer they are detained in these facilities, and these types of harmful practices create a perfect storm for them to get seriously injured.”
Christopher Rucas, a spokesman for the Children’s Village, which was founded in 1851 to care for children legally removed from their parents, said that the allegations were distressing.
“We have zero tolerance for any form of punishment,” Mr. Rucas said in a statement. “All teens in our care deserve the highest level of care, support and professionalism from every adult responsible for their well-being.”
The New York State Justice Center for the Protection of People with Special Needs, a state agency, had received complaints about the shelter and said that it was investigating them. The agency declined to comment further.
The Children’s Village has several facilities across New York, and unaccompanied migrant children have stayed there since 2004. The organization tries to find relatives or suitable sponsors who can care for children until their immigration hearings. The Children’s Village offers help to children struggling with mental health problems, and it receives funding from the federal government.
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17) Corporate Profits Are at Record Highs. These 4 Factors Could Sink Them.
Experts have different theories about what’s driving steep gains. But many agree the window for growth is shrinking.
By Peter Coy, April 18, 2026
An Amazon data center being built in New Carlisle, Ind. Jim Vondruska/Reuters
Times are good for big business. In the last quarter of 2025, even though economic growth and job creation slowed to a crawl, pretax corporate profits set a record, reaching their highest share of gross domestic product since record-keeping began in 1947.
This year, Wall Street analysts are predicting that profits are likely to be even stronger despite dismal consumer sentiment and high energy costs. For example, Mike Wilson, the chief investment officer at Morgan Stanley, is sticking to his prediction that earnings of the S&P 500 companies will rise 17 percent in 2026.
Optimism that the profit juggernaut will keep rolling drove the S&P 500 to a record this week. Will it? To figure that one out, you need to be able to explain why it’s happening in the first place, which is not easy. Experts have different ideas. However, many of them share a belief that the headroom for further profit growth is shrinking.
Here are some of the leading theories for why profits have soared so high — and what could sink them.
Technology
Suppliers of technology got a huge profit boost from sales of networking gear during and after the Covid-19 pandemic, and they’re getting an even bigger boost from the artificial intelligence boom. The tech sector as a whole has experienced much faster growth in stock prices and measured productivity growth than the rest of the economy, said Jim Paulsen, a veteran market strategist who writes the Paulsen Perspectives newsletter.
Surprisingly, though, strong profit growth hasn’t been confined to tech. An analysis last spring by Ricardo Marto, an economist at the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, found that “the recent surge in corporate profits was driven by retail and wholesale trade, construction, manufacturing and health care,” not tech. Marto said this week that the surge in profits had continued across most of these industries in the year since.
One possible explanation for Marto’s finding is that tech investment is genuinely paying off outside the tech sector. If so, that would indicate that there’s room for profits to run. Artificial intelligence is beginning to boost profits by automating some jobs out of existence. And before A.I., there was the postpandemic productivity dividend.
“In my previous job before Covid, I had a video monitor that was set up to do videoconferencing at my desk,” said Diane Swonk, the chief economist of the consulting firm KPMG. “I never used it once. It was kind of a big eyesore.” Since Covid, she said, “a lot of things we didn’t use suddenly got applied.”
Continuous growth
Recessions crush profits far more than they reduce wages, so every year without one is a year the profit share holds up. Outside of the pandemic shock in 2020, the United States has not experienced a recession since the financial crisis ended in 2009.
That’s a remarkable stretch, and it could continue. The traditional preconditions for a downturn — overextended consumers, overleveraged businesses, excess staffing — are largely absent, Paulsen said. Household debt-to-income ratios have been falling since 2009, corporate balance sheets are strong, and pessimism itself has kept everyone cautious enough to avoid the kind of overreach that typically ends an expansion.
“You usually don’t have a recession when everybody expects a recession, because everybody’s on their best behavior,” he said.
Market power
Corporate concentration has been rising for a century, according to research from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business. Typically, fewer than 1 percent of corporations now account for more than 90 percent of corporate profits.
Fewer, bigger firms tend to have more pricing power, which translates into fatter margins. Ownership matters, too. A 2025 Chicago Fed study found that a one-percentage-point increase in concentrated institutional ownership of a firm is associated with a 0.17 percent reduction in its payroll — evidence that dominant shareholders are pressing companies to keep labor costs lean.
Concentration may not keep rising, though. If a Democrat wins the White House in 2028, Biden-style trustbusting could return, constraining profit growth. That’s a segue into the last theory: policy.
Policy
Congress and the Federal Reserve have a lot to do with the profit surge. Over the past four decades, the federal tax rate on corporate profits has fallen to 21 percent from 46 percent. Interest rates have fallen as well. Michael Smolyansky, a Fed economist, has calculated that declining interest rates and declining tax rates “mechanically” explain more than 40 percent of real corporate profit growth from 1989 to 2019.
Corporate profits have also benefited from the erosion of labor-market regulation, the decline of union membership and the broader political realignment that began with the election of President Ronald Reagan, said Michalis Nikiforos, an economist at the University of Geneva and the Levy Economics Institute of Bard College.
But interest rates aren’t falling anymore, fiscal policy has become less stimulative, and the pro-business realignment under Reagan seems to be coming undone.
There are lots of forces acting on profits, but one clear one is that profits this far above the historical norm tend to generate pushback. “What’s happening to workers will be a major issue in the midterms,” Swonk said. “It doesn’t matter what side of the aisle you’re on. A backlash can be quite disruptive to profits.”
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