April 6, 2026: All Newsclips

Lead Stories

Trump warns Iran he could strike ‘every power plant,’ in WSJ interview

President Trump threatened to destroy all of Iran’s power plants if the country’s leaders don’t agree to reopen the Strait of Hormuz by Tuesday evening, ratcheting up pressure on Tehran. “If they don’t come through, if they want to keep it closed, they’re going to lose every power plant and every other plant they have in the whole country,” Trump said in an eight-minute interview with The Wall Street Journal on Sunday. The comments came hours after U.S. forces rescued an American aviator trapped in Iran. Trump in recent days has repeatedly escalated his threats against the country, which has resisted his demands and appears determined to carry out a war of attrition. An administration official said the events of the weekend have animated the president and made him eager to apply even more pressure on the Iranians as he seeks a deal.

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Trump warned during his address last week that he planned to hit Iran hard over the next two to three weeks. Now entering its sixth week, the conflict was initially forecast to last four to six weeks by the Trump administration. In response to Trump’s threats, Iran’s parliamentary speaker, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, said on social media that the only viable path was to step back from further escalation. “Your reckless moves are dragging the United States into a living hell for every single family, and our whole region is going to burn,” he said. Behind the scenes negotiations to reach a cease-fire hit a dead end on Friday, mediators said, but back channel efforts continued over the weekend between mediators from regional countries and special envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner. Monday marks the end of a 10-day deadline Trump gave Iran last month to make a deal and open the Strait of Hormuz. The deadlines themselves have been a moving target. In the interview, Trump moved it to Tuesday, and on Sunday afternoon, without elaboration, Trump posted “Tuesday, 8:00 P.M. Eastern Time!”

Tony Gonzales sought sex from subordinate years before 2024 scandal, texts show

Late on a June night in 2020, amid a nail-biter of a GOP primary runoff, then-congressional candidate Tony Gonzales quickly turned a conversation with his campaign’s political director from casual to intimate. Gonzales texted that she was a “smart girl" in response to frustrations she had expressed about dating. He used a diamond emoji to convey that she was special and shouldn't "settle." Then, he asked when she normally went to sleep. Next, he asked what she would wear to bed. Soon, it was “What kind of panties do you wear?” Within hours, the married Navy veteran from San Antonio was asking for nude photos and describing how he wanted to have sex with her and have her "squeeze my balls." At the end of the night, after she replied “Nope” to yet another request for a photo, he replied, “47 nos is about my limit.”

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The next day, the father of six again asked for a picture. And again the day after. “I know what I want and won’t stop until I get it,” he said in a text on June 15, 2020. She responded with a facepalm emoji. “You better do that in Congress,” she said. “And take me with you.” The previously-unreported messages — and hundreds of others obtained by the San Antonio Express-News — show the congressman pursued a sexual relationship with a subordinate years before his 2024 affair with a married congressional staffer who later committed suicide. That later liaison, with Regina Santos-Aviles – along with lewd texts that Gonzales sent to her – was made public this year by the San Antonio Express-News, provoking a furor that led House Republican leaders to disown Gonzales and force him to abandon his campaign for a fourth term. He will serve out the remainder of his term through January.

Lesley Briones: The next storm is coming. FEMA must be ready to answer the call

Last Fourth of July, families across the Texas Hill Country woke in the dark to the sound of rushing water as the Guadalupe River rose 26 feet in under an hour. By morning, entire neighborhoods were underwater, homes that families had built over lifetimes were destroyed, and more than 130 Texans were dead. When desperate survivors called for assistance, no one picked up. The Department of Homeland Security let funding lapse for the federal aid hotline, and roughly 40,000 calls went unanswered over five days. To make it worse, the Trump administration also ended FEMA's door-to-door canvassing program, leaving families to navigate online forms with spotty cell phone service. Three months later, less than a fifth of flood survivors had been deemed eligible for aid.

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As a proud Texan and American, I am outraged for the families in the Hill Country. And as a Harris County commissioner, I’m terrified of what will happen (or not) with FEMA when the next storm hits Houston. We have an inkling of how that would go because the people of New Orleans lived a similar story 20 years ago, after the federal government cut key disaster programs and replaced experienced FEMA leaders with political appointees. After Hurricane Katrina made landfall, the consequences were catastrophic — tens of thousands were stranded, hospitals went without resources, and chaos reigned. The lessons of Katrina came at an enormous cost, and Congress took those lessons seriously by passing the Post-Katrina Emergency Management Reform Act, which specifically prohibited DHS from undermining FEMA's mission. It was a promise that this nation would never again be caught unprepared. The Trump administration has now broken that promise. They have already slashed FEMA's workforce by roughly 20%. Contracts for experienced disaster response teams are not being renewed. And despite bipartisan outrage from leaders in states like Missouri and North Carolina — where botched responses to tornadoes and floods left communities without help — DHS has only doubled down, ordering the agency to reduce its workforce by roughly half, with more than 10,000 additional positions slated for elimination in the coming months.

Texas goes solo on psychedelic drug research due to private sector's skepticism

The Texas Legislature's decision last year to invest $50 million in taxpayer money on a clinical trial for the powerful hallucinogen ibogaine came amid a rising tide of enthusiasm around psychedelics. Former Gov. Rick Perry extolled its benefits for the treatment of drug addiction and other mental health issues, saying he took ibogaine to overcome anxiety and insomnia caused by head injuries sustained in his youth. U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. suggested in June thatfederal approval for the drugs would come within 12 months. Ten months later, the Trump administration has shown little progress on that front. And Texas' Republican-backed effort to get the schedule one narcotic, which carries the same penalties as heroin, approved for medical use by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, appears to be in turmoil.

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Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick and House Speaker Dustin Burrows announced last week that drug companies and state officials have been unable to come to terms on what was supposed to be a lucrative public-private partnership to get ibogaine into U.S. pharmacies. They said the state's ibogaine research would go ahead without the drug companies, which were supposed to match the state's $50 million investment and share a portion of whatever revenues they earned from ibogaine with the Texas government. "We intend to fully fund this program," the House and Senate leaders said, without disclosing what the total budget may be. But in pressing ahead on the clinical trials, which are set to take place at University of Texas facilities in Houston and Galveston, Texas is taking a big risk. Getting a drug approved by the FDAis a years-long process that often results in failure. In 2024, the FDA declined to approve the use of MDMA for mental health treatment after two decades of work by the drug company Lykos Therapeutics. In addition, taking ibogaine carries significantcardiac risk. Patients who travel to Mexico for treatment typically do so in a medical clinic with a heart monitor, the sort of drug therapy the FDA does not typically approve, said Katharine Neill Harris, a drug policy fellow at Rice University’s Baker Institute for Public Policy.

State Stories

ICE inspection finds 49 deficiencies at El Paso’s Camp East Montana following migrant deaths

An Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) inspection is raising new questions about conditions inside the nation's largest immigrant detention facility. The feds opened Camp East Montana last year, down in El Paso. Since mid-December, at least three migrants have died while in custody there and FOX 4 is learning that the detention site was recently cited for dozens of deficiencies.

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Camp East Montana sits on Fort Bliss in El Paso. A report describes the detention center failures in some of the most basic parts of detention operations. From medical care to safety. Now DHS suggests a new contractor will help turn things around. A three-day federal inspection, by ICE's own team, over two days, in February found 49 deficiencies inside the massive detention facility. The report cites problems with medical care, security, staffing, suicide watch checks, tuberculosis isolation and documentation of force incidents. Among the most serious finding failures are tied to use of force and restraints. Since mid-December, at least three detainees have died in custody there. The inspection happened before ICE replaced the original contractor. DHS says a new company will run East Montana with promises, moving forward of better medical support, more staff and tighter oversight.

Energy Dome, NUAI eye CO2 battery for Texas AI data center

Energy Dome, an Italian maker of CO2 batteries designed to store renewable energy for up to 24 hours, has signed a pact to deploy its technology at New Era Energy & Digital Inc’s AI data centee project under development in Odessa, Texas. The companies have signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) setting a framework to consider how Energy Dome’s product will back NUAI’s planned deployment of large-scale power capacity to meet the energy demand of its AI-optimised hub. The initiative is aimed at boosting speed to power, cutting dependence on constrained grid interconnection timelines, ensuring the high levels of availability required for mission-critical data centre operations and supporting lower-emissions power generation, a statement says.

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The CO2 battery is planned for NUAI’s Texas Critical Data Centers LLC (TCDC). The project, spanning 438 acres in Ector County, will be built in multiple phases, targeting an overall capacity of more than 1 GW over time. Google-backed and Milan-based Energy Dome applies a thermodynamic process with a modular, site-independent approach in which CO2 warms up, evaporates and expands, turning a turbine to generate electricity. The technology uses only water, steel and CO2.

Why electric big rigs and self-driving semis are flocking to Texas highways

The heavy duty cabless autonomous truck pulls out of a lot onto a quiet street outside a North Austin brewery, flexing its ability to maneuver alongside other vehicles on a public street before turning around, coming back and parking. Einride CEO Roozbeh Charli, whose company built the truck, and other leaders in autonomous and electric trucking say such big rigs soon could be a common sight across Texas. “I’m quite comfortable with the trajectory of the regulatory environment,” he said. “With the environment today, we and other players in industry will be able to deploy tens and maybe hundreds of vehicles.”

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Stockholm-based Einride, which became the first company to operate an autonomous truck on a public road in 2019, says it already operates one of the world’s largest electric heavy-duty fleets. Now, the company is putting its self-driving trucks on the road across the U.S. In late March, it received approval from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration to operate its autonomous big rig in Austin — where Einride has U.S. headquarters — after receiving similar approvals for deployments in Arizona, Colorado, South Carolina and Tennessee. A week earlier, it announced that it’s turning a 41-mile stretch of the Texas 130 toll road between San Antonio and Austin into an autonomous freight corridor in partnership with SH 130 Concession Co. Charli said the company is aiming to start testing by the end of this year, then gradually increase testing before moving to commercial operations. Its trucks will join a still-relatively small fleet of electric vehicles operating in Texas. Now, there are only about 250 heavy duty EVs on the road, according to data from the North Central Texas Council of Governments. But that number could grow rapidly.

CPS Energy to tackle $50 million budget shortfall later in 2026

CPS Energy won’t ask for a rate increase yet, but that means the public utility is looking at a $50 million funding gap through the beginning of 2027 after its board of trustees approved its budget on March 30. The electricity provider moved the budget forward after scrutiny from San Antonio City Council last month and will look at multiple strategies for addressing the $50 million funding gap. The current budget does not include a rate increase, officials said, but rate increases are still on the table in future years as the utility makes large infrastructure investments. CPS Energy had proposed a budget earlier this year that ran between February 2026 and January 2027 with plans to discuss filling that $50 million shortfall by increasing rates for customers. But the utility was cautioned by city council members, who were concerned that, by approving such a budget, the utility intended to propose a rate increase without their approval.

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The City of San Antonio owns CPS Energy and rate changes require a city council vote. The utility met with council members on March 4 to discuss the budget and their rates. The budget hasn’t changed since then, but CPS Energy’s explanation satisfied Mayor Gina Ortiz Jones, who voted to approve it this week. “When we had this briefing last month, the exact verbiage was this budget assumes a rate increase. With everything our neighbors are facing, the assumption that a rate increase was the only thing that would close the gap was jarring,” she said. “I certainly appreciate CPS Energy coming before the owners, city council, to explain that.” Jones added that the budget now does not assume a rate increase. Instead, the utility will look at other ways of addressing the $50 million gap later this year. “There is a gap of revenues relative to expenditures that we will work to close. There are many ways that you could go forward to doing that,” said Cory Kuchinsky, CPS Energy’s chief financial officer. “That is for a future discussion we’ll be more prepared to have once we get through the summer months and we see ultimately how that revenue picture will manifest.”

Texas is changing its social studies curriculum. Critics say it's too state-centric

The Texas State Board of Education is in the process of rewriting the K-12 social studies curriculum. The new standards would shape teachers’ lesson plans and textbooks for more than 5.5 million students in Texas. Last year, the board adopted a new framework to teach social studies. Some of the major changes include teaching events in chronological order, emphasizing Texas and U.S. history and deemphasizing world history. But the process of rewriting the curriculum has been contentious. Some people involved have been critical of how historical events are presented, the amount of content teachers are expected to cover in each grade and the Texas-centric approach. Meghan Dougherty was part of a workgroup that provided feedback on the curriculum. She said this is an approach that doesn’t exist anywhere else in the country.

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"It's a huge shift. Teachers are gonna have to learn all new content," Dougherty said. "Any lesson plans that they currently have are going to be thrown out." The State Board of Education has appointed nine content advisers to review drafts, provide feedback and make recommendations to the board on the new state standards. Some advocacy groups have raised concerns about some content advisers having a right-wing bias. Dougherty said she is also concerned that most of the appointed advisers do not have experience teaching K-12. "They're writing topics that are being taken as standards for kindergartners and first graders when they really don't even have a good understanding of the cognitive and developmental abilities of 6-year-olds," she said. Dougherty said that while using chronological order makes sense on the surface, the curriculum jumps from ancient history to Texas history. She said jumping around topics will make it hard for younger kids to get a good grasp of history and connect abstract ideas to the present.

How much money do college athletes in Texas make? Public universities won’t say

As the first college basketball season under a new era of student-athlete compensation comes to a close, March Madness has been marred by concerns about what player compensation means for competition. And it's nearly impossible to get a clear picture of how much money student-athletes in Texas made over the past year, further muddying the picture. Starting last July, schools across the country were permitted to pay their athletes a total of $20.5 million per year in revenue-sharing as part of a multibillion-dollar settlement reached in lawsuits against the NCAA. Since 2021, student-athletes also have been allowed to secure Name, Image and Likeness (NIL) deals with private entities.

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Houston Public Media submitted a set of public records requests to 11 schools in the state for information about financial compensation of student-athletes. We requested per-player pay on an individual level as well as per-team financials on an aggregate level. The 11 schools — including competitors in the men's or women's NCAA basketball tournament like the University of Texas at Austin (UT-Austin), Texas A&M University, Texas Tech University, the University of Houston (UH), Prairie View A&M University, Stephen F. Austin University and the University of Texas at San Antonio — refused to turn over the information. It's an unusual level of secrecy for financial information held by a public institution, and it comes as policymakers and athletic administrators ask existential questions about the changing nature of college sports. Daniel Libit is an investigative and enterprise reporter for Sportico, a digital news outlet covering sports, and a self-described "evangelist of all things transparency as it relates to college sports."

Lawsuit against Starr County brought by woman charged with murder for abortion pending

After a federal judge dismissed some of the claims in a lawsuit against Starr County officials brought by a woman who was wrongfully arrested following reports of a self-induced abortion. Lizelle Gonzalez was arrested on April 7, 2022 and charged with murder for a self-induced abortion. She was released on bond on April 9, 2022, and Starr County District Attorney Gocha Ramirez released a statement shortly after stating that his office was dropping an indictment against Gonzalez. Since then, attorneys representing Gonzalez, who went by Herrera at the time of her arrest, filed a lawsuit against Ramirez, Assistant District Attorney Alexandria Barrera, and Sheriff Rene Fuentes, and Starr County on March 28, 2024 seeking damages that in the aggregate, exceed $1 million, as well as punitive damages.

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U.S. District Judge Drew B. Tipton granted summary judgment on the claims against the individual defendants, Ramirez, Barrera and Fuentes, but has yet to rule on the claims against the county. “We’re still in the process of trying to figure out what our plan is going forward with the county, as well as any appellate issues we may have,” Cecilia Garza, one of Gonzalez’s attorneys, said Thursday. “But since we do have claims against the county pending, we only have one appeal. So any appeal would come after finalization with the pending county causes of action.” The motion for summary judgement was signed on Tuesday. Garza said that an appeal will depend on whether Tipton rules in the claims against the county. Garza explained that Tipton essentially ruled that the individual defendants have immunity. “Although we respectfully disagree with the court’s findings, his ruling was that these defendants have immunity, but claims will proceed to the next step as to the county,” she said.

How new Texas billionaire Thomas Powell grew a $6.7 billion Houston business

When Powell Industries first opened its doors in Houston, in 1947, it was just a metal-working shop, producing products such as portable hammocks, clothesline poles and cattle guards. Nearly 80 years later, the company has grown alongside the city, and has diversified its businessto focus on designing and manufacturing equipment and systems for electrical infrastructure. Today, Powell Industries has about 3,000 employees around the world. Its longtime CEO, Thomas Powell, has recently become a billionaire.The company's market capitalization is about $6.7 billion, and last month, after its stock soared over the past five years, Powell Industries announced that its board had approved a three-for-one stock split, that will take effectMonday, April 6.

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Powell Industries was founded in 1947 by William E. Powell. His son Thomas Powell, who started working at the company in 1964, became its chairman and CEO in 1984. Thomas Powell served as the company's CEO until 2008, then returned twice as interim CEO before retiring from that post in 2016. He retired as chairman in 2019, and as a director in 2022. Thomas Powell now lives in Giddings in central Texas, according to Forbes, and remains a major shareholder in the company, which went public in 1974. Last month, he was named to the Forbes World Billionaires list for the first time, with an estimated net worth of $1.3 billion as of April 2. Powell Industries began to specialize in electrical infrastructure by the 1960s. The company says on its website that it introduced its first power control room in 1968 in Ponce, Puerto Rico, in a project for Union Carbide, now a subsidiary of The Dow Chemical Company. In 1984, it developed its first medium voltage breaker. Today, the company says, it is focused on "designing, manufacturing and packaging equipment and systems for the distribution and control of electrical energy," for industrial customers such as refineries and petrochemical plants.

UTD students say campus speech feels ‘sterilized’ after SJP suspension

On Monday, March 30, about 40 to 50 people gathered at North Point Park, steps from the University of Texas at Dallas, for a press conference. Speakers—an imam, organizers, a lawyer—took turns at a makeshift podium, decrying the university’s suspension of the Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) organization. For UTD students, the ban signals deeper issues with campus expression. “We’ve got real freedom-of-speech problems,” says Thaden Hill, a UTD undergrad. “You can feel it in the air. It’s sterilized.” Another student, Pari Sarangdevot, describes a disconnect between what the school stands for and what its students are actually experiencing. “That a university that prides itself on fostering the next generation of leaders and being innovative is letting such censorship and anti-student life happen on campus is just really saddening,” she says.

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SJP, active at UTD for over a decade, has been banned from campus until February 7, 2027. A notice was sent at the beginning of September, stating that the student organization violated community standards. This suspension follows a months-long disciplinary process tied to a protest during the Spring 2025 commencement ceremony. Organizers say this has only accelerated their efforts—they’ve since rebranded as SJP Dallas, extending their reach beyond the campus. “We knew UTD’s stance on Palestine,” says student organizer Aisha Ahmed. “This was coming. Now we’re a full community group—and growing.” Tensions around student expression at UTD have been building, with students pointing to a series of decisions they say have reshaped how freely they feel they can speak on campus. In June 2025, UTD shut down its school publication The Mercury, after its editor, Gregorio Olivares Gutierrez, was fired over pro-Palestine coverage. He and other students then launched The Retrograde without university funding.

J.J. Spaun survives wild-weather weekend to win Valero Texas Open

Rain jackets, not green jackets, were the order of the day at the Valero Texas Open, where defending U.S. Open champion J.J. Spaun won a battle with the elements to notch a one-stroke win at the last PGA Tour event before the Masters. Spaun followed his birdie on the 16th hole with a huge drive on the par-4 17th and holed an eagle putt to seal the one-stroke win over a trio of pursuers. Spaun finished with a 17-under-par 271. Robert MacIntyre’s 15 under led the field when third-round play resumed Sunday, but the Scotsman recorded only one birdie through the first 14 holes of the final round, before mounting a late charge with a birdie on 15 and matching Spaun’s eagle on 17. He settled for par on the final hole, however, to finish a stroke below Spaun. England’s Matt Wallace and American Michael Kim also finished a shot behind Spaun at 16-under 272.

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The Texas Open isn’t the brightest star in the PGA’s tournament constellation, but it dangles an exquisite prize for its winner: the last spot in the Masters Tournament for a player who has not yet qualified. Spaun’s invitation was already securely in hand. But for Wallace and American Andrew Putnam, who each had turns atop the leaderboard, missing their chance at a first-ever Masters made Sunday’s wind and cold rain even more bitter. It was the second Texas Open win for Spaun. His 2022 victory clinched his first Masters invitation. “It means a lot to come back and win here at a place that’s been so great to me,” Spaun told NBC. Spaun said he’s trying to dial down the pressure he had put on himself this year in the wake of his breakthrough victory at last year’s U.S. Open. “There’s just so much that comes with winning big events like that, like a U.S. Open or any other major,” Spaun said. “I put a lot of pressure on myself this year to start the year, and a lot of expectations. It’s the complete opposite of the mantra I had all year last year that really helped me, so I tried to get back to that.”

Priest accused of coercing congregants for sex in Texas could have single trial for charges from three separate accusers

Prosecutors say Anthony Odiong exploited his parishioners’ emotional dependency to engage in sexual conduct with them A Roman Catholic priest with ties to Texas and south-east Louisiana and criminally charged with abusing his position as a clergyman to pursue sex with three spiritually vulnerable female congregants faces being taken to trial on all of those cases at once. The Texas district attorney’s office prosecuting Anthony Odiong filed a motion seeking to consolidate the three cases in late March, ahead of a trial date that the Guardian understands has tentatively been set for 4 May. Prepared by McLennan county first assistant district attorney Ryan Calvert, the motion notes that Texas state law allows “a defendant [to] be prosecuted in a single criminal action” if the crimes alleged “are connected or … are the repeated commission of the same or similar offenses”.

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And Calvert’s motion maintains that each of the three cases pending against Odiong involves his “exploiting his parishioners’ emotional dependency upon him as a spiritual adviser and engaging in sexual conduct with them”, conduct which Texas law classifies as a felony. Odiong can object to Calvert’s motion in favor of being tried on each case individually. His defense attorney, Gerald Villarrial, declined to comment. Calvert’s three-page motion marked the latest substantial turn in a high-stakes prosecution that authorities in the community of Waco, Texas, undertook after the Guardian in February 2024 published a report on women who accused Odiong of sexual coercion, unwanted touching and abusive financial control while on the clock as a Catholic priest. The defendant ultimately was charged with five counts of sexual assault in the first degree and two such counts in the second-degree stemming from encounters with three women. He could receive a maximum of life imprisonment if convicted of any of the first-degree charges.q

Reading to stop family detainment

A few feet away from the metal fencing surrounding the South Texas Family Residential Center (which is commonly referred to as Dilley ICE Detention Center) are several stuffed teddy bears and books. Everything one would need for a children’s story time. Only this story time is symbolic, and a call to action for the children just a few yards away being held in the Texas detention center. On Thursday, April 2, a group of national leaders and organizations arrived at Dilley Detention Center for an event they are calling “Read Them Home: End Family Detention.” Organized by a coalition of groups including the 10 Steps Campaign, the National Education Association, the American Federation of Teachers, SEIU, and the National Domestic Workers Alliance, this campaign is raising awareness about the families and children held in places like Dilley, while also advocating for the full end of family detention at Dilley and beyond.

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It was a strategic launch day, timed with International Children’s Book Day. In addition to holding their vigil just outside Dilley Detention Center, there is a virtual reading challenge that will go on for thirty days. Some of the authors that took part in the virtual event on Thursday included Glennon Doyle, Ilana Glazer, and Greg Foley. The delegation in Dilley, which held their vigil as close as possible to the detention center, included 10 Steps founder Stacey Abrams, the former Georgia state representative and best-selling author. The PBS resident librarian, and the current host of their program Reading Rainbow Mychal “The Libarian” Threets was also at Dilley with community and labor leaders. The Texas Signal spoke with Rosa Lozano, the Director of Immigration Campaigns, for the National Domestic Workers Alliance, who was on the ground in Dilley as well with her organization. Lozano described arriving at the detention center and seeing the barren landscape as “heavy.” Dilley Detention Center is operated by the private prison group Core Civic and is located next to a state prison (Dolph Briscoe Unit).

National Stories

Stephen Miller is still pursuing his immigration agenda, but more quietly

It was May 2025, a few months into the second Trump administration, and Stephen Miller, the right-wing populist powering the White House crackdown on immigration, was clearly frustrated. President Trump had talked about arresting “the worst of the worst” of undocumented immigrants — the rapists, killers and other criminals he had emphasized during the previous year’s campaign. Mr. Miller, however, had long pushed for removing anyone who had entered the country illegally. So when Mr. Miller arrived one day last spring at the headquarters of Immigration and Customs Enforcement for an update from agency leaders, an official raised a question on many agents’ minds: Who exactly should they be going after? Mr. Miller was unequivocal, according to three people with knowledge of the meeting. Agents should not limit themselves to dangerous criminals.

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Instead, they should stop people with the lowest level of reasonable suspicion, and detain anyone in the country illegally, with warrantless arrests. His message was clear: Push the limits. Eight months later, Mr. Miller did something startling — he backpedaled. His demands had helped set in motion militarized operations on the streets of Democratic-run cities, intensified by immigration agents killing two U.S. citizens protesting in Minneapolis. After initially denouncing one of the slain protesters, an intensive care nurse, as a would-be assassin, Mr. Miller offered a rare concession that immigration authorities might have made a mistake. Now, Mr. Miller, 40, one of the most influential presidential advisers in recent memory and an unabashed champion of Mr. Trump’s hard-line immigrant crackdown, is at a crossroads. He faces questions about how aggressively he can continue to drive the deportation campaign, and how much appetite his party and the country have for tactics that proved successful in helping to boost arrests of immigrants but reignited a polarizing debate over what it means to be American. The administration has toned down its immigration strategy. Federal agents have drawn down from the streets of major cities, and Kristi Noem, the homeland security secretary who had become the face of the policy, is out. Mr. Miller even pulled back his public appearances for a time.

A harrowing race against time to find a downed U.S. airman in Iran

The two crew members ejected from their fighter jet just seconds after it was hit by Iranian fire. The F-15E Strike Eagle, the first fighter jet lost to enemy fire in the war, crashed violently to the ground. The Air Force officers were deep in hostile territory on Friday morning, alone and armed only with pistols. The plane’s pilot was in “constant communication” with his unit and rescued about six hours later by a force that included attack planes and helicopters that came under heavy fire, military officials said. But the aircraft’s weapons systems officer was missing. In the chaos of the ejection — a violent, lifesaving maneuver — he had become separated from the pilot, setting off a vast search that became the primary focus for the U.S. military troops and C.I.A. officers across the entire theater for two days.

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This account of the weapons officer’s fight for survival and rescue is based on interviews with about a dozen current and former military and administration officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the sensitive operation. Surveillance planes and drones combed the area near where the plane had crashed but could not find the weapons officer or any signs that he was alive, a military official briefed on the rescue said. The military described him as “status unknown,” the official said. On the ground in Iran, the downed officer’s mission boiled down to two words: evasion and survival. Surrounded by potential enemies, he hiked up a 7,000-foot ridgeline and wedged himself into a crevice where he hoped he would be safe until American forces found him, U.S. military officials said. U.S. Central Command was preparing a statement that the plane had gone down and the pilot had been rescued. But just as they were about to release the statement — about 14 hours after the fighter jet was hit — U.S. officials got a lock on the weapons officer’s location via a beacon he was carrying.

NASA's Artemis II crew readies for Monday's lunar flyby. Here's what you need to know

The crew of NASA's Artemis II will make its closest approach to the moon Monday afternoon after launching from Kennedy Space Center last week. It marks a critical milestone of the agency's Orion space capsule, sending humans on a mission to the moon for the first time in more than 50 years. As the capsule loops around the moon, the astronauts will reach farther into space than humans have ever ventured. The Orion spacecraft is now in the lunar sphere of influence, meaning the moon's gravity has more pull on the vehicle than the Earth. At 1:46 p.m. ET, the crew will surpass the record for the farthest distance traveled from Earth by humans, which was set by the Apollo 13 mission at 248,655 statute miles from Earth. At 2:45 p.m., the crew will begin making observations of the surface of the moon during the flyby.

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As the vehicle circles the far side of the moon, communication back to Earth is expected tobe blocked for about 40 minutes. At 7:02 p.m., the crew is expected to have reached the mission's maximum distance from Earth at 252,760 statute miles. The flyby is scheduled to conclude at 9:20 p.m., and then the crew will be on its way home, with a planned splashdown in the Pacific Ocean off San Diego, Calif., on Friday at 8:07 p.m. During the Artemis II flyby, the crew will pass over two previous human lunar landing sites — Apollo 12 and 14. During the lunar flyby, the closest Orion will come to the surface of the moon is 4,070 miles. From that distance, the crew will have a unique vantage point of the moon as a full disc — and the ability to take observations never before seen by human eyes. NASA scientists have identified about 35 geological features for the crew to observe. Working in pairs, they will take photos of the sites and describe them in real time to scientists at Mission Control at the Johnson Space Center in Houston. "They're going to be absolutely buzzing," said Artemis II lunar science lead Kelsey Young on Sunday. The team will monitor the observations and provide guidance to the crew. "The science team will get to work right away, kind of synthesizing those [observations], and then we'll actually downlink the rest of the descriptions overnight, in advance of a crew conference we'll have the following morning to continue the science discussion."

FCC eyes changes to live sports broadcast rules amid fan frustration

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is opening the door to a rewrite of its rules for local blackout restrictions on live sports, a move that could be the first step in a potential shakeup of the broadcasting landscape for pro leagues and their media partners. The FCC announced in February it is seeking public comment on “consumer experience” with live sports viewing, noting the rising cost of subscription services and pointing out what it called a “fragmented” modern media landscape. The department’s move comes as polls and social media feedback consistently show fans are increasingly annoyed with the cost and hassle of paywalled subscription services required to view games. Lawmakers on Capitol Hill, meanwhile, are suggesting Congress do more to curb the leverage top leagues have long held over when making deals on media rights.

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“The thing that’s getting lost in some of this discussion is the broader economics of sports,” one media consultant specializing in streaming told The Hill this week. “The leagues are pretty clearly not interested in doing what’s best for fans. And why would they [be] when people continue to pay to see games on all of these services?” Today, it is more expensive than ever to watch live sports events, particularly marquee events like the NFL playoffs or the NCAA March Madness tournament. Major streamers like YouTubeTV and Roku have largely replaced traditional cable bundles, while more media companies like Disney, Paramount and Comcast have launched direct-to-consumer streaming services largely with pro and college sports coverage in mind. No league is more profitable for major media conglomerates than the NFL, which raked in more than $110 billion with its most recent broadcast rights deal.

Notice anything different about Jim Jordan? That’s because he’s probably angling for leadership

If Republicans lose their majority in November — and it’s widely expected they will — Speaker Mike Johnson will likely step away from leadership, and many members believe that House Judiciary Chair Jim Jordan is laying the groundwork to take Johnson’s place. Jordan ran for the speaker’s gavel in 2023 as a conservative firebrand, with a brash, unapologetic style — and rubbed many of his colleagues the wrong way. NOTUS spoke with over two dozen lawmakers, congressional aides, outside advisers and lobbyists — who were granted anonymity to speak candidly about Jordan — and nearly all of them said there are signs Jordan is preparing for a potential leadership bid by making inroads with the moderate and establishment wings of the party. “He’s done a really good job kind of broadening his base of support,” said one moderate Republican. “He’s gone out of his way to help people and build relationships.”

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Jordan has undertaken a near-total rebrand in the past three years. He has traveled the country from coast to coast campaigning for members and candidates who don’t align with him. After former Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s ouster in 2023, when Jordan became Republicans’ nominee for a time, his colleagues had hundreds of questions for him. But one in particular got to the heart of why a handful of members would take issue with him leading their conference — and why, after three failed votes, Jordan dropped out of the race. A member asked Jordan at the time why the conference should believe — after years of refusing to help or fundraise for members who did not agree with him — that he would suddenly be helpful. “It wasn’t my job to help you then,” Jordan responded, according to two sources in the room. His response epitomized why so many were reluctant to support his bid for any leadership position at all. They didn’t see Jordan as a team player. For years after he first came to Congress in 2007, Jordan made a name for himself by leading efforts to stifle leadership and, at one point, famously refused to help anybody who wasn’t aligned with the hardline Freedom Caucus that he founded.

Democratic candidate recruitment is booming, even in Republican districts

Democrats say a recruitment effort to find candidates in Republican strongholds has paid off — even in often-overlooked races down the ballot. In a handful of key states this year, Democrats are running an uncommonly broad field of state legislative candidates, challenging Republicans in races that had often gone unopposed in recent elections. The data, compiled by the Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee, show that in states like Texas and North Carolina, the party has recruited a candidate to run in every state House and Senate district up for election this year. Other states have more Democratic candidates running than any time in recent history. “There’s no question that state Democrats are breaking recruitment records across the country,” Heather Williams, DLCC president, said in an interview. “We’re hitting these markers in all of these important states.”

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The success in recruiting at the state legislative level is another force behind the wave of Democratic candidates this election, many of them motivated by an animus toward President Donald Trump. It’s also the product of a party that — eyeing the president’s low approval ratings and mindful that out-of-power parties traditionally do well in midterm elections — says it’s made a conscious effort to recruit candidates in places it previously hadn’t, eager to take maximum advantage of a favorable political climate should the fall’s election go its way. Democrats have taken a similar approach in U.S. House, Senate and gubernatorial races, challenging in places like rural North Carolina, deep red Mississippi or heavily conservative Oklahoma. “The work we’ve been able to do in states is demonstrating that it’s not just in Democratic districts or even toss-up districts that we should be able to run candidates,” Williams said. “It’s in every corner of the country.” Even candidates recruited by the party establishment don’t always run serious campaigns, of course, much less win on Election Day. And many of them running in Republican-heavy districts aren’t guaranteed to receive substantial support from a party with limited resources, leaving them vulnerable to blow-out defeats even in a strong year for Democrats.

Your Amazon orders may cost more now. Here’s what changed.

Amazon customers will be hit with an extra charge later this month as the e-commerce giant increases fees in response to higher costs caused by the U.S.-Israeli war with Iran. The Seattle-based company notified customers it will be adding a 3.5% fuel and logistics-related surcharge “to recover a portion of the actual cost increases we’re experiencing.” Advertisement Article continues below this ad The announcement comes as the war creates shipping complications and drives up gasoline prices and costs for food and other essential goods. Major shippers including UPS and FedEx also have increased their fuel surcharge rates, as the cost of gasoline and diesel fuel has skyrocketed. The U.S. Postal Service also is introducing a limited-time 8% surcharge on shipping services starting April 26 and running through Jan. 17.

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Amazon’s increase takes effect April 17 in the U.S. and Canada for goods from third-party sellers that use its Fulfillment by Amazon services. For those sellers, the company handles packing, shipping, customer service and returns. The charge also will be added to international sales from the U.S. to Canada, Mexico and Brazil. Starting May 2, it will apply to the Buy with Prime program, through which Prime members receive faster shipping on products from partnering third-party websites. The surcharge will be applied on sales in the U.S. and Canada. “Due to the work we have already done together to lower costs, this surcharge is meaningfully lower than other major carriers,” Amazon said. In 2024, Amazon subsidiary Amazon Fresh slashed costs up to 30% on 4,000 weekly rotating grocery items to help reduce inflation-related price bumps.

Copyright April 06, 2026, Harvey Kronberg, www.quorumreport.com, All rights are reserved