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  • Trump administration can target Ethiopians for deportation

    Trump administration can target Ethiopians for deportation

    A U.S. federal judge has cleared the way for the Trump administration to end Temporary Protected Status, a critical humanitarian immigration program, for approximately 5,000 Ethiopian nationals currently residing in the United States. This ruling marks the final step in the administration’s broader push to terminate TPS designations for more than a dozen countries, advancing its sweeping immigration enforcement agenda.

    The decision by U.S. District Judge Brian Murphy reverses a prior temporary hold that had blocked the cancellation of Ethiopian TPS, and comes just months after the U.S. Supreme Court upheld similar terminations of TPS protections for thousands of immigrants from Haiti and Syria in June. Immediately following the ruling, the Department of Homeland Security issued a stark statement on social media platform X declaring that all immigrants whose TPS has been canceled are present in the country unlawfully, adding that they face only two outcomes: immediate voluntary departure or forced deportation. DHS General Counsel James Percival also celebrated the ruling in a separate post, confirming that all previously ordered TPS terminations are now fully in effect.

    Temporary Protected Status is a longstanding humanitarian program that grants eligible immigrants from crisis-stricken nations temporary protection from deportation and formal authorization to work in the U.S. The designation is granted to people who have fled their home countries due to extraordinary, life-threatening circumstances such as large-scale armed conflict, natural disasters, and public health emergencies. Ethiopia was first added to the TPS program in 2022 by the Biden administration, following the outbreak of the brutal two-year Tigray war that killed hundreds of thousands of people and displaced millions more.

    Today, nearly four years after the signing of the 2022 Pretoria peace agreement that formally ended the Tigray conflict, instability persists across Ethiopia. Recent weeks have seen renewed fighting and drone strikes in multiple regions of Tigray, as tensions between the Ethiopian federal government and Tigrayan regional leaders have escalated. Both sides have repeatedly accused one another of violating the terms of the Pretoria Agreement, and the TPLF, Tigray’s ruling political faction, has moved to reestablish its pre-war regional government while dissolving the interim administration appointed by Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed’s government. In turn, the federal government has accused Tigrayan leaders of colluding with neighboring Eritrea and the Sudanese military, raising widespread fears that Eritrea could reenter the conflict and spark broader regional instability. Beyond Tigray, Ethiopia also continues to face active armed insurgencies in Oromia and Amhara, its two most populous regions, leaving large swathes of the country facing ongoing violence and insecurity.

    Despite this persistent crisis, DHS announced the termination of Ethiopian TPS last December under then-Secretary Kristi Noem, claiming that security conditions in Ethiopia had improved enough to no longer require the humanitarian protection. Prior to this, the administration had already ended TPS designations for multiple other nations, including Venezuela and Honduras.

    Immigrant advocates and the Ethiopian plaintiffs who brought the lawsuit to block the termination have expressed deep disappointment and alarm over Murphy’s ruling, warning that the decision will put thousands of lives at grave risk. “The crisis in Ethiopia is still ongoing, and this decision puts the lives of thousands of Ethiopians living in the US at severe risk,” said Diana Konaté, deputy executive director for policy and advocacy at advocacy group African Communities Together, in comments to Reuters.

    While Murphy dismissed a number of the legal claims raised by the plaintiffs in the lawsuit, he did allow challengers to move forward with litigation over one core allegation: that the Trump administration’s decision to terminate TPS for Ethiopians was motivated by illegal bias based on race or national origin, which would violate the U.S. Constitution. That legal challenge will continue even as the termination itself takes effect.

  • Spared execution eight times, oldest inmate in US dies at 101

    Spared execution eight times, oldest inmate in US dies at 101

    For nearly 76 years behind bars, Francis Clifford Smith faced death eight times, each time walking away from a scheduled execution to hold the title of the United States’ longest-serving incarcerated person before passing away at 101 years old. Throughout his decades in custody, those close to him say he never once wavered from claiming he was wrongfully convicted of a 1949 murder.

    Smith’s saga began in 1949, when the 25-year-old former petty offender was accused of killing Grover Hart, a night watchman at a Connecticut yacht club. He was arrested alongside a second suspect, who accepted a plea deal in exchange for testifying against Smith. A jury found Smith guilty of first-degree murder in 1950, and he was sentenced to death. Over the decades that followed, however, credible doubts emerged about his conviction: multiple key witnesses later withdrew their original statements, another incarcerated person confessed to the murder in custody, and even the lead interrogation officer Major Leo Carroll publicly told the Board of Pardons he did not believe Smith was present at the killing at all.

    During his decades at Osborn Correctional Institution, Smith became a well-known figure among staff and fellow inmates for his quiet habit of sneaking bread out of the cafeteria to feed wild birds around the prison grounds. “He would stuff as much bread as he could fit in his clothing,” Andrius Banevicius, public information officer for the Connecticut Department of Correction, recalled. “Everyone kind of turned a blind eye to it because they knew he was just feeding the birds.” The small, gentle routine earned Smith the nickname “The Birdman of Osborn.”

    Beyond his continuous sentence, Smith experienced three brief breaks from incarceration: he escaped in 1967 and was recaptured after 12 days; he was granted a one-day Christmas furlough in 1974 and returned voluntarily the next morning; and he won parole in 1975, spending 10 months in free society before a petty larceny and weapons charge sent him back to prison for a parole violation. For decades after that, Smith repeatedly declined offers to pursue new parole opportunities, only accepting supervised release to a specialized justice system care home for elderly inmates in 2020.

    Smith’s death in his sleep at the 60 West care facility in June, from natural causes related to old age, has thrown a sharp spotlight on a growing national and international crisis: the rapid graying of prison populations. Long-term incarceration is well-documented to cause accelerated aging, with many people who spend decades behind bars developing age-related health conditions 20 to 30 years earlier than their non-incarcerated peers. “We frequently say that a person coming from a long period of incarceration can be 60 but have the health status of a 90-year-old,” David Skoczulek, spokesman for 60 West, explained. Smith, who developed age-related cognitive decline in his final years, received specialized end-of-life care through MissionCare Health, one of the few programs in the U.S. focused on geriatric care for formerly incarcerated people.

    Data underscores the scale of the aging inmate crisis. A 2025 study found that the population of incarcerated people aged 55 and older in the U.S. grew by nearly 400% between 1991 and 2021. The U.S. Census Bureau projects that by 2030, at least one in three incarcerated people across the country will be over the age of 50. This crisis is not unique to the U.S.: Dr. Stephanie Prost, a researcher focused on older adults in carceral settings at the University of Louisville, notes that similar trends are unfolding in Australia and England, though the U.S. faces a far larger scale of the issue due to its high mass incarceration rate.

    Prost and other criminal justice researchers are advocating for targeted “smart decarceration” policies to address the crisis, including expanding compassionate release, medical parole, and elderly parole initiatives. These policies prioritize releasing aging inmates who have complex, costly medical needs that are impossible to adequately address in traditional, rigid prison environments, where elderly inmates often struggle with common age-related conditions such as mobility impairment, incontinence, and hearing loss. Even when parole is granted, however, experts point out that few care facilities are willing to accept convicted elderly inmates, leaving very few options for people like Smith outside of traditional prison walls.

    After his death, Smith was cremated per his wishes. Though he had little contact with remaining family in his final days, Skoczulek confirmed that staff at 60 West ensured his end-of-life care was dignified and aligned with his requests, closing a 76-year chapter that began with a disputed conviction and ended as a stark case study of America’s unfolding aging prison crisis.

  • Apparent human remains found in US reservoir as water levels hit record low

    Apparent human remains found in US reservoir as water levels hit record low

    For more than two decades, the United States’ largest reservoir, Lake Mead, has faced a steady, alarming decline in water levels, driven by an intensifying drought that has gripped the American West. In the latest unexpected consequence of this accelerating dry spell, authorities have recovered what are believed to be human remains from the reservoir’s shores, a discovery that traces directly to the retreating waters.

    The US National Park Service confirmed that it was alerted to the apparent skeletal remains at Boulder Beach, located on the Nevada side of the Lake Mead, which straddles the state’s border with Arizona, on August 16. In an official statement shared with CBS, the BBC’s US partner outlet, the agency confirmed that park rangers joined investigators from the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department to respond to the site and secure the remains. As of the latest update, the case remains open and under active investigation, with no further details on the identity or timeline of the remains available to the public.

    The discovery was made by two recreational visitors: Dianelis Molina Cruz and her friend Noel De Leon. Cruz told local CBS affiliate KLAS that the find happened by chance while her companion was exploring the rocky shoreline. “My friend was playing with the rocks in the lake, and then he grabbed the jaw. And when he looked, he saw the teeth and everything,” Cruz recounted. De Leon noted that the extremely low water levels made the discovery possible, adding, “The water looks very low compared to where it should be. As the water goes down, the skeletons come up.”

    Lake Mead’s water levels have been in consistent decline since 2000, a trend that has accelerated sharply in recent years as drought conditions worsen across the western United States. Last week, the US Bureau of Reclamation reported that the reservoir’s water level fell to 1,040 feet (317 meters) above sea level, a new record low that dips well below the previous low set in July 2022. According to the US Drought Monitor, nearly all of Clark County, Nevada, where most of Lake Mead is located, is currently classified as being in moderate drought. Climate scientists have repeatedly linked the deepening drought across the American West to human-caused climate change, which has amplified average temperatures and prolonged dry spells across the region.

    This discovery at Lake Mead is far from an isolated event. Across the globe, record-breaking summer heat and persistent drought have driven water levels down in rivers and reservoirs, uncovering long-submerged artifacts, remains, and landscapes that have been hidden for decades.

    Earlier this month in Hungary, the remains of two German World War II soldiers were recovered from the Danube River in Budapest, alongside a largely intact Wehrmacht military motorcycle. Further downstream in Serbia, additional World War II remnants, including the broken hull of a watercraft, have emerged from the Danube’s retreating waters in recent weeks. In the United Kingdom, low water levels at a reservoir in Rutland have exposed the ruins of Nether Hambleton, a village that was intentionally demolished and flooded in the 20th century to create the reservoir that now covers its original site.

    As climate change continues to drive rising global temperatures and more frequent extreme drought events, experts warn that more unexpected discoveries of both modern and historical remains are likely to occur as water levels continue to drop across the world’s major freshwater bodies.

  • US charges 17 Iranians over ‘massive’ cyber theft campaign

    US charges 17 Iranians over ‘massive’ cyber theft campaign

    In a major announcement outlining one of the largest documented state-sponsored cyber intrusions in recent history, the U.S. Department of Justice (DoJ) has unsealed charges against 17 Iranian individuals linked to a coordinated, years-long hacking campaign that stole massive volumes of academic data and intellectual property from hundreds of American and global organizations.

    According to official DoJ allegations, the hacking operation was run out of Tehran by the Mabna Institute, a front organization founded in 2013 specifically to illicitly access scientific resources outside Iran. From the campaign’s launch in 2013 through at least December 2017, the group systematically targeted digital networks across 144 U.S. universities, 42 U.S. private sector companies, five American federal and state government agencies, 178 international academic institutions, and 11 additional private companies based in Germany, Italy, Switzerland, Sweden, and the United Kingdom.

    Prosecutors confirm the hacking ring carried out most of its attacks on behalf of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), alongside other Iranian government bodies and domestic academic clients. The group specifically targeted the personal and professional accounts of more than 100,000 academics worldwide, successfully breaching approximately 8,000 university professor email accounts to steal research data. Over the course of the campaign, the hackers exfiltrated more than 31 terabytes of stolen information, with the total value of the taken intellectual property estimated at around $3.4 billion.

    FBI Assistant Director in Charge James C. Barnacle, Jr. emphasized the severity of the coordinated intrusion, framing it as a direct threat to U.S. national security. “Backed by the IRGC, this operation reflects a broader, organised effort to target US institutions and global partners,” Barnacle said in an official statement released alongside the charges.

    U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York Jamie McDonald reinforced that warning, noting that malicious cyber operations have now become a core tool of state power for adversarial nations, with far-reaching consequences for both American national security and economic stability.

    In a parallel action to the unsealed charges, the DoJ announced a $10 million reward for any information that leads to the identification or location of five of the charged accused hackers, who remain at large. Nine of the 17 defendants facing charges were first indicted in a 2018 seven-count charging document, with eight new defendants added in the updated unsealed case.

    The charges mark the latest high-profile U.S. government action cracking down on transnational state-sponsored cybercrime, highlighting the ongoing risk of large-scale intellectual property theft targeting academic and private sector research networks.

  • Iranian academic writes of US detention ‘hell’ over link to 1979 hostage crisis

    Iranian academic writes of US detention ‘hell’ over link to 1979 hostage crisis

    In April 2026, a Los Angeles-based academic and her family—all lawful permanent residents of the United States—were taken into immigration custody, triggering a high-profile debate over collective punishment and U.S. immigration policy amid escalating tensions with Iran. Maryam Tahmasebi, a professor of psychology and statistics, has publicly denounced the U.S. government’s actions as unjust “bloodline punishment,” after authorities revoked her family’s green cards solely over her husband’s familial connection to a 1979 Iranian hostage crisis figure.

    Tahmasebi’s husband, Seyed Eissa Hashemi, is the son of Masoumeh Ebtekar, who gained international notoriety as the English-language spokesperson for the student group that seized the U.S. Embassy in Tehran and held 52 American citizens hostage for 444 days in 1979–1981. Ebtekar later went on to hold multiple senior positions in the Iranian government, most recently serving as vice president for women and family affairs until 2021. In a first-person account written from inside detention and published by *The Nation*, Tahmasebi emphasized that the government is penalizing her husband for actions taken by his mother decades before he was even born.

    Since their arrest four months ago, the family has been held in separate immigration detention facilities across South Texas. Tahmasebi and their teenage son are currently detained at the facility in Dilley, while Hashemi is held in Pearsall, where Tahmasebi says he endures “horrible conditions.” In her essay, Tahmasebi described the four months in custody as an unrelenting ordeal, writing that the family’s physical and mental health has sustained damage that may take years to recover, if it ever does. Jack Mirkinson, senior editor at *The Nation*, confirmed Tahmasebi drafted the account from detention with extremely limited access to email, before she and her legal team submitted it for publication.

    The revocation of the family’s permanent resident status is part of a broader wave of U.S. enforcement actions targeting relatives of current and former Iranian regime officials, a policy shift that comes as bilateral hostilities between Washington and Tehran have risen sharply over the course of 2026. The move also followed public pressure from Iranian diaspora activists, who have pushed for legal status revocations against relatives of Iranian officials in response to Tehran’s violent crackdown on anti-government protests late last year.

    In January 2026, an online petition called for Hashemi’s deportation from the U.S. over his mother’s role in the hostage crisis, and conservative U.S. media outlets published on-the-ground reports from outside the family’s Los Angeles home in early April. Less than a week after those reports, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio publicly announced that the government would revoke the entire family’s legal permanent resident status. Notably, Rubio’s announcement never specified that Hashemi, Tahmasebi, or their son had committed any individual wrongdoing, or that they posed an independent national security threat to the U.S.

    State Department spokesperson Tommy Pigott defended the policy in a formal statement, noting that the agency does not disclose protected or classified information related to the termination of foreign nationals’ legal status, and asserting that the government retains the authority to revoke status for individuals deemed a threat to U.S. national security interests. But members of the family’s legal team push back sharply against this justification, arguing that the government has failed to bring any national security charges against the family under U.S. immigration law. “If the government had any evidence that this family threatened national security, it has had several opportunities to say so but the government has not,” explained Maria Kari, a member of the defense team, speaking to the BBC. “In fact, no U.S. government agency has presented any evidence to support their allegations.”

    Prior to their detention, Tahmasebi and Hashemi built quiet, law-abiding lives in Southern California’s academic community. The couple entered the U.S. legally on work visas in 2014, and successfully obtained lawful permanent resident status in 2016. After their detention, legal challenges filed by the defense team led a federal judge to issue a temporary block on the family’s deportation.

    In a surprising twist that underscores the arbitrary nature of the government’s actions, Tahmasebi wrote in her essay that the family had voluntarily offered to self-deport to end their detention—only to have the request rejected by U.S. authorities. “In other words, they want to continue our indefinite detention without any end in sight,” she wrote. Official records provided by the family’s legal team confirm that the U.S. Department of Homeland Security denied their request for voluntary departure in July 2026. A government attorney instead offered to review a stipulated removal arrangement, which would require the family to waive their right to an immigration hearing before deportation proceedings begin. When contacted for comment by the BBC, a DHS spokesperson directed non-citizens seeking voluntary departure to the agency’s app-based departure program, and claimed “Being in detention is a choice.”

    This case is not an isolated incident. The U.S. government has already revoked legal status for multiple other Iranian individuals based on purported familial ties to Iranian officials, including two women initially identified as relatives of deceased IRGC Major General Qassem Soleimani, who was killed in a 2020 U.S. drone strike. After the announcement, Soleimani’s family denied the women were related to him, and independent subsequent reporting has raised significant questions about the accuracy of the U.S. government’s original claim. Authorities have also revoked the legal status of the daughter of Ali Larijani, former Secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council.

  • Witness gets combative in Tupac murder trial – ‘I don’t want to send him to prison’

    Witness gets combative in Tupac murder trial – ‘I don’t want to send him to prison’

    Thirty years after the fatal drive-by shooting that left legendary West Coast rapper Tupac Shakur dead at 25, one of the highest-profile unsolved murder cases in American modern history finally reached its trial phase – and on the second day of proceedings, a key witness from Shakur’s own inner circle openly defied the court, citing long-held street gang loyalties that have defined the case from its beginning.

    James “Mob James” McDonald, a former enforcer for Shakur’s label Death Row Records and member of the Mob Piru Bloods gang, was openly combative during his testimony Tuesday, decrying court orders forcing him to take the stand and identify the parties responsible for Shakur’s 1996 killing. He told the court he was explicitly threatened with contempt of court sanctions if he refused to testify, prompting him to request that he be formally treated as a hostile witness over his repeated refusal to answer key questions from legal teams.

    The defendant at the center of the trial is Duane “Keffe D” Davis, a former South Side Compton Crips leader who stands charged with orchestrating Shakur’s murder. Davis has maintained his innocence and entered a formal not guilty plea. Prosecutors argue Davis planned the September 7, 1996, shooting in retaliation for a fight between Shakur and Davis’s nephew, Orlando Anderson, that unfolded earlier that same night outside a Las Vegas boxing match featuring Mike Tyson. Prosecutors contend Davis believed the attack on his nephew could not go unanswered, setting the stage for the killing that shook the 1990s hip-hop world.

    McDonald’s refusal to cooperate is rooted in the street culture and gang dynamics that shaped the 1990s Los Angeles hip-hop scene, a period when entrenched street codes banned cooperation with police, and widespread distrust of law enforcement ran deep in Black communities in the wake of the brutal Rodney King police brutality case and the 1992 Los Angeles riots. Even Shakur, while he was being transported to an ambulance after the shooting, refused to speak to investigators about the attack, telling officers “we’ll take care of it” before dying six days later in a local hospital.

    When pressed repeatedly by Davis’s defense attorney Michael Sanft to confirm what he knew about who was present at the shooting and who bore responsibility, McDonald openly pushed back. Pointing directly at Davis, he told the court: “You’re asking me something that wouldn’t be good for him. I’m not going to send him to prison, you are.” He later added, under oath: “I don’t want to send him to prison, even though we don’t like each other. I don’t want to send you to prison.”

    Though McDonald confirmed he was not present in the vehicle with Shakur when the shooting occurred, he acknowledged that members of the rapper’s entourage who were on the scene quickly identified the responsible parties in the immediate aftermath. He testified that the killing was a product of a brutal 1990s gang war, noting: “It was a gang war. People were getting hurt. People were being sought. Orlando (Anderson), him and certain other people were being sought because people wanted to kill them.” When his testimony concluded, he addressed Davis directly: “What you are going through brother is what you going through. I don’t want to be a part of it.” Davis remained expressionless, seated at the defense table through most of the day’s testimony.

    Also testifying Tuesday was Reggie Wright Jr., a former member of Shakur’s security detail who later became general manager of Death Row Records after Suge Knight, the label’s founder who was in the car with Shakur during the shooting, stepped back from the company. Davis has previously attempted to shift blame to Wright, a former Compton police officer, and the defense team pressed Wright on his role at the label and his rise to power after Knight left the company.

    The case only moved forward decades after Shakur’s death after Davis gave multiple public statements about his alleged role in the killing, including co-writing a memoir where he admitted he was a passenger in the vehicle from which the fatal shots were fired and had supplied the gun used in the attack. Davis has since walked back those claims, arguing that portions of the book were fictionalized by his co-author to boost sales. The trial is set to resume Wednesday, with ongoing proceedings covered in the BBC podcast *Fame Under Fire: The Tupac Murder Trial* available on all major podcast platforms.

  • Trump pauses new tariffs on Canada and says countries close to a deal

    Trump pauses new tariffs on Canada and says countries close to a deal

    U.S. President Donald Trump has announced a last-minute three-day delay to 50% tariffs on nearly $20 billion worth of Canadian imports, revealing that the two North American neighbors have reached a tentative trade agreement pending final document formalization. The tariff pause was unveiled in a social media post less than two hours before the levies were scheduled to take effect on August 19, averting immediate economic disruption for cross-border businesses on both sides of the Canada-U.S. border.

    Negotiators from both countries have engaged in months of intensive talks since July, when Trump set the August 19 deadline for new tariffs amid a long-running trade impasse. The core sticking points in negotiations have included existing U.S. tariffs on Canadian steel, aluminum, lumber and automobiles, as well as retaliatory bans on American alcohol sales implemented by most Canadian provinces last year in response to Trump’s earlier tariff measures. President Trump and Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney held two direct discussions this week to break the deadlock in negotiations.

    Alongside the tariff delay announcement, Trump confirmed that a finalized trade deal could clear the way for the revival of the long-blocked Keystone XL oil pipeline project. The 830,000-barrel-per-day pipeline, which would transport crude oil from Alberta’s oil sands to refineries and distribution networks in the United States, was previously blocked by both the Obama and Biden administrations. Trump drew sharp contrast to his predecessor in his post on Truth Social, writing that the “great Keystone XL Pipeline, long ago killed by Sleepy Joe Biden, may be awoken from the grave!” The project has faced sustained opposition from environmental advocacy groups and Indigenous communities over concerns about carbon emissions and ecological harm, but Trump has repeatedly pledged to restart development since taking office.

    Business groups on both sides of the border have welcomed the temporary tariff extension and breakthrough in talks, having repeatedly warned that the proposed 50% levies would inflict widespread economic damage on both nations. The tariffs were set to apply to a broad range of Canadian goods, including wine, dairy products, cement, clothing and even hockey equipment, and would have come on top of existing U.S. tariffs already in place for key Canadian exports.

    Trade tensions have escalated dramatically between the two top trading partners since Trump returned to the White House in January last year, when he launched a global agenda of sweeping tariffs that upended decades of established integrated free trade between Canada and the United States. Canada has centered its negotiation demands on getting the U.S. to roll back or eliminate existing tariffs on its key industrial and agricultural sectors, while the U.S. has pushed for Canadian concessions including the removal of remaining retaliatory tariffs on American automobiles, expanded access for U.S. cheese producers to Canada’s dairy market, and an end to the Canadian provincial ban on U.S. alcohol sales.

    According to a Reuters report citing anonymous sources familiar with the negotiations, negotiators were closing in on a deal in the final hours before the original deadline that would cut U.S. tariffs on Canadian automobiles from 25% to 15%. However, the two sides remained at an impasse over eligibility criteria, with U.S. negotiators pushing to limit the reduced tariff rate only to vehicles with a high proportion of American-manufactured components.

    A key hurdle to finalizing any agreement remains the need for Canadian Prime Minister Carney to secure approval from provincial premiers to lift the U.S. alcohol ban, as liquor regulation and sales fall under provincial rather than federal jurisdiction in Canada. Ontario Premier Doug Ford, whose province bears the brunt of U.S. auto tariffs, has stated he is only willing to lift the ban if the final agreement delivers fair terms for Canada. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the country’s largest business advocacy group, issued a statement Tuesday urging negotiators to finalize a deal, warning that higher tariffs would harm both economies, raise household costs for American consumers, disrupt critical cross-border supply chains, and put the 13 million American jobs tied to USMCA trade at risk.

  • Republican Byron Donalds and Democrat David Jolly to face off in race to replace Ron DeSantis

    Republican Byron Donalds and Democrat David Jolly to face off in race to replace Ron DeSantis

    As the United States gears up for the November general elections that will determine control of Congress, primary voting has wrapped up across three key states, with projected results already painting a clearer picture of the upcoming battles for statewide and federal offices.

    In Florida, America’s third most populous state, major projections from leading national media outlets including CNN and The Associated Press point to Republican U.S. Representative Byron Donalds and former Republican turned Democratic candidate David Jolly emerging as the winners of their respective gubernatorial primaries. With roughly 89% of all ballots counted, the two candidates are now set to face off in November’s general election to fill the seat being vacated by term-limited incumbent Governor Ron DeSantis.

    Donalds, a high-profile conservative Congressman, secured the critical endorsement of former President Donald Trump ahead of the primary. He outpaced a crowded Republican field that included right-wing challenger James Fishback, who drew notable attention from young conservative voters through his provocative public statements and aggressive social media-focused campaign strategy. For Democrats, the path to the general election has been far less straightforward: the party has not held the Florida governor’s mansion since 1999, and Jolly, a well-known Trump critic who left the Republican Party to run as a Democrat, had to defeat multiple primary opponents including state legislator Dotie Joseph and criminal justice reform advocate Evelyn Castillo-Bach to claim the projected nomination.

    Beyond the governor’s race, Florida voters also cast ballots in primaries for U.S. Senate and all of the state’s U.S. House seats. In the Senate race, Republican incumbent Ashley Moody is seeking her first full term after being appointed to fill the vacancy left by Marco Rubio, who stepped down to become U.S. Secretary of State. On the Democratic side, the primary has exposed ongoing intraparty divides between progressive and moderate factions: state Representative Angie Nixon is running as the progressive standard-bearer, while Alex Vindman — the former White House official who testified during Trump’s first impeachment inquiry in 2019 before being fired from the National Security Council — is positioning himself as the moderate alternative.

    One of the most closely watched House contests in the state played out in Florida’s 7th Congressional District, where political newcomer Ryan Elijah has been projected to defeat incumbent Republican Congressman Cory Mills in the GOP primary. The race drew national attention after Mills was hit with a House Ethics Committee investigation and public allegations of domestic abuse, which he has repeatedly denied. Even sitting Governor DeSantis, a fellow Republican, opted to distance himself from Mills, declining to issue an endorsement ahead of the primary.

    Thousands of miles away on the opposite coast, Alaska held its own competitive Senate primary, where the race gained unusual attention from an unexpected source: a little-known challenger who shared the incumbent’s name. Incumbent Republican Senator Dan Sullivan was forced to compete against Daniel J. Sullivan Jr., a little-known candidate who shared nearly the same name. Despite legal efforts to remove the namesake challenger from the ballot, both candidates appeared on the primary ballot, differentiated only by the incumbent’s “incumbent” label and the challenger’s “Jr.” suffix. Political analysts have noted that even with the clear labeling, the identical name could siphon off enough votes from the sitting senator to shake up the race in a state with a small overall voting population. Under Alaska’s election rules, the top four vote-getters regardless of party affiliation advance to the November general election, and Democrats are banking on their candidate, incumbent U.S. Representative Mary Peltola, to flip the seat and help the party take control of the U.S. Senate.

    Further inland in Wyoming, a deeply red state where the outcome of the Republican primary is widely seen as a predictor of the November general election result, voters are choosing a new governor after incumbent Mark Gordon hit his term limit. Three Republican candidates — Megan Degenfelder, Eric Barlow, and Brent Bien — are competing for the GOP nomination, while Democrat Kenneth Casner is running unopposed for his party’s spot on the general election ballot. Voters are also selecting a new U.S. Senator following the announced retirement of incumbent Cynthia Lummis, with former President Trump throwing his weight behind Republican U.S. Representative Harriet Hageman for the open seat.

  • Harvard agrees to pay $53 million to settle lawsuits related to morgue manager who sold body parts

    Harvard agrees to pay $53 million to settle lawsuits related to morgue manager who sold body parts

    One of the world’s most prestigious higher education institutions, Harvard University, has reached a $53 million settlement agreement to resolve multiple civil lawsuits brought by families of individuals whose donated bodies were illegally exploited by a former morgue manager at Harvard Medical School (HMS). The resolution, formally proposed to a Boston court on Monday, brings a partial close to a years-long scandal that erupted after former morgue supervisor Cedric Lodge pleaded guilty to running a black market operation stealing and selling human remains taken from donated cadavers.

    Now 58 years old, Lodge oversaw HMS’s Anatomical Gifts Program, the initiative that manages body donations intended to support critical medical education and research for Harvard medical students. According to federal court documents, his illegal trafficking scheme operated undetected between 2018 and 2021. In his role, Lodge abused institutional trust to dismember donated cadavers, removing body parts that he and his co-conspirators then sold to private buyers across Pennsylvania and Massachusetts.

    Standard protocol at Harvard Medical School requires that after donated cadavers have served their purpose for student education and research, they are either cremated with remains returned to families or laid to rest in the university’s dedicated medical cemetery. Lodge’s actions completely violated these long-standing policies and betrayed the trust of donors and their next of kin, who agreed to donation to advance medical science.

    Lodge and six additional co-defendants, all of whom had no official affiliation with Harvard, were indicted and ultimately pleaded guilty to federal charges in 2025. That December, the U.S. Department of Justice announced sentencing outcomes: Lodge received an eight-year prison term, while his wife, who participated in the selling scheme, was sentenced to one year and one day in custody.

    The first civil lawsuits against Harvard were filed in 2023 by family members of affected donors. These plaintiffs argued that university leadership and HMS administration were grossly negligent, ignoring repeated red flags of Lodge’s misconduct for years before his criminal indictment. Though a Massachusetts state court judge initially dismissed the claims, the state’s Supreme Judicial Court reinstated the class-action suits in autumn 2024, clearing the way for negotiations that led to Monday’s settlement.

    Under the terms of the agreement presented to the court this week, the $53 million settlement fund will be distributed to eligible claimant families once the court issues formal approval. In a public letter shared Monday, signed by George Daley, dean of Harvard’s faculty of medicine, and Bernard Chang, HMS dean for medical education, university leaders acknowledged the profound harm caused by Lodge’s crimes. The letter stated: “Lodge’s criminal acts were morally reprehensible and inconsistent with the standards that Harvard University and HMS expect for the treatment of anatomical donors and their loved ones.”

    Beyond the financial settlement, HMS has also committed to permanent institutional changes to honor affected donors and prevent future abuses. Starting in the 2027-2028 academic year, the school will launch a new annual need-based scholarship for medical students, created specifically to honor all anatomical donors who contribute to medical education and research.

    University leaders emphasized that while criminal sentencing and the civil settlement mark major milestones in addressing the scandal, the harm inflicted on donor families will take far longer to heal. The letter concluded: “While Lodge’s sentencing and the settlement conclude the case, the process of recovering from this painful incident continues.”

  • Meta hooked children on Facebook and Instagram, US court hears

    Meta hooked children on Facebook and Instagram, US court hears

    One of the most consequential legal battles in the history of social media got underway this week in Oakland, California, where 29 US states are bringing sweeping claims against Meta Platforms, accusing the tech giant of intentionally addicting underage users and covering up well-documented harms to adolescent mental health. Over the next six weeks, a jury will weigh competing narratives from state prosecutors and Meta’s defense team, unpacking millions of internal company documents that lie at the heart of the case.

    The lawsuit, first filed in 2023, alleges widespread violations of state and federal child privacy laws, and asks the court to order billions of dollars in damages and sweeping changes to Meta’s flagship products, Facebook and Instagram—including the elimination of public like counts and the infinite scroll feature that keeps users scrolling for hours on end.

    In her fiery opening statement on Tuesday, lead California attorney Megan O’Neill built her case around internal Meta research, employee communications, and executive chat logs that reach all the way to Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg. O’Neill argued that for years, Meta’s own data confirmed its platforms pose severe risks to young users, yet the company prioritized profit over child safety while deliberately misleading the public about its products’ dangers. Citing one internal study, O’Neill noted that Meta itself acknowledged “teens have an addict’s narrative about use” of Instagram. Another internal assessment, she told the jury, found that product features built to maximize user screen time were “inherently at odds with well-being” and eroded users’ ability to engage in meaningful, value-add activities.

    O’Neill pulled back the curtain on what she called Meta’s core business model: “Hook the users; hold them for as long as they can; harvest their data; hide the truth from the public when making public statements.” She emphasized that the company’s public assurances that it prioritizes safety over profit directly contradict its internal decision-making, where growth and revenue have repeatedly won out over public health protections. The prosecution also claims Meta was fully aware that millions of children as young as 11 and 12 were active on Instagram, yet took minimal action to block their access, a violation of age restrictions designed to protect minors.

    Meta’s lead defense attorney Paul Schmidt pushed back forcefully against every one of the states’ claims, framing the prosecution’s argument as an oversimplified distortion of the full picture of Meta’s research and policy. Addressing the widely cited internal statistic that one in five teens report Instagram worsens their mental health, Schmidt reminded the jury of the full findings: 41% of teen users reported the platform made them feel better, while an additional 41% said it had no negative impact on their well-being.

    Schmidt also disputed the claim that Meta intentionally allowed under-13 users onto its platform, arguing that the very privacy laws the company is accused of violating bar Meta from collecting and storing the detailed user data needed to accurately verify every user’s age. Most notably, Schmidt repeated a stance Meta has already advanced in other 2024 litigation: that clinical social media addiction does not exist as a diagnosable condition.

    He acknowledged that some users struggle to regulate their social media use, noting Meta has rolled out a suite of tools to help people manage their screen time. He also pushed back on the claim that Meta designs its platforms to be addictive, citing public statements from both Zuckerberg and Instagram head Adam Mosseri that the company never built its products with the goal of hooking young users, and adding that no conclusive research supports the existence of a diagnosable social media addiction. On the question of how many under-13 users are active on Instagram, Schmidt countered the prosecution’s “millions” claim, putting the actual number at just over 100,000.

    As the trial unfolds over the coming weeks, the jury will be tasked with sorting through conflicting evidence to decide whether Meta’s business practices have harmed a generation of young users—and what changes the company will be forced to make if found liable. A ruling against Meta could reshape the design and regulation of social media platforms across the industry, setting a new precedent for how tech companies must address underage use and adolescent mental health.