What a cool request! Trout had already agreed to give Alberto — who attended the game with his wife and two children — three signed bats and two signed baseballs in exchange for the ball he crushed.
While Trout signed the balls and bats in the dugout long after the game had ended, Alberto politely asked him while making a throwing motion with his right arm, “You mind if we play catch with a ball on the field?” the three-time American League Most Valuable Player didn’t hesitate, saying, “Yeah, you want to do it?” Alberto grabbed his glove.
A post on the MLB.com X account shows Alberto tossing the ball back and forth to Trout, who catches it with his bare hands while wearing his cap backward. At one point, Trout says something to Alberto’s young son, who is watching in awe.
And no wonder. Shortly before Trout hit No. 400, Alberto told Trout he’d turned to his son and said, “He’s got a lot of power.” No kidding, enough to drive the ball deep into the left-center field stands. Alberto caught the blast with his bare hands.
It was Trout’s third home run of at least 485 feet since Statcast began tracking long balls in 2015, the most of any player. The 34-year old outfielder in his 15th season became the 59th MLB player to reach 400 homers and the 20th to hit them all with one franchise.
The No. 400 ball clearly had more monetary value than the signed balls and bats, but nowhere near the value of a career 500 home run ball or, say, the home run the Dodgers’ Freddie Freeman hit to win Game 1 of the 2024 World Series — which was sold at auction for $1.56 million.
The home run was meaningful to Trout, who admitted to feeling pressure as he approached the milestone. It was only his second long ball since Aug. 7.
He also recognized that catching the ball and returning it to the player who belted it was meaningful to Alberto, who likely has already done what dads do — play catch with his children.
“Once they get older and realize, that’ll be an awesome memory for the dad to tell the kids, to experience that,” Trout told reporters. “I know how I felt when I went to a ballgame with my dad.”
The lights never dimmed and Angel Minguela Palacios couldn’t sleep. He pulled what felt like a large sheet of aluminum foil over his head, but couldn’t adjust to lying on a concrete floor and using his tennis shoes as a pillow.
He could smell unwashed bodies in the cramped room he shared with 40 detainees. He listened as men, many of them arrested at car washes or outside Home Depots, cried in the night for their loved ones.
Minguela, 48, lay in the chilly downtown Los Angeles ICE facility known as B 18 and thought about his partner of eight years and their three children. In his 10 years in the United States, he had built a secure life he had only dreamed of in Mexico, ensconced in their humble one-bedroom rented home, framed photos of the family at Christmas, his “#1 Dad” figurine. Now it was all falling apart.
The morning of Aug. 14, Minguela had been on his last delivery of the day, dropping off strawberries to a tearoom in Little Tokyo. He didn’t know that Gov. Gavin Newsom was holding a news conference there to inveigh against President Trump’s efforts to maintain control of the U.S. House of Representatives through redistricting in Texas. U.S. Border Patrol agents were massing nearby, creating a show of force outside the event.
As they moved in, one agent narrowed in on Minguela’s delivery van. Soon, he was in handcuffs, arrested for overstaying a tourist visa. As his lawyer put it, Minguela became “political, collateral damage.”
Over the six days he spent in B 18, a temporary immigration processing center, Minguela watched as several detainees chose to self-deport rather than remain in detention.
A building marking is painted on a wall at an Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility known as “B 18.”
(Carlin Stiehl / Los Angeles Times)
”No aguanto aqui,” the men would say. “I can’t take it here.”
The harsh conditions, Minguela said, felt intentional. He knew he needed to stay for his family. But he wondered if he’d make it.
::
Minguela fled Mexico in 2015, driven in part by violence he faced there.
In his time servicing ATMs in Ciudad Juárez, he said he was kidnapped twice and at one point stabbed by people intent on stealing the cash. After his employers cut staff, he lost his job, helping drive his decision to leave.
Minguela came to Texas on a tourist visa and left the same day to L.A. drawn by the job opportunities and its many Spanish speakers. He had little money, rented a room as he searched for employment and soon found a job at the downtown produce market.
He met the woman he calls his esposa, who asked not to be named for fear of retaliation, at the second job he worked in the Piñata District. They are not married but Minguela helped raise her two children and later their son, who is autistic. The children — 15, 12 and 6 — all call him Dad.
With Minguela there, his esposa said she never felt alone. He helped with the laundry and cleaning. He played Roblox with his middle son and helped his 15-year-old daughter with her homework, especially math.
“He would always make sure that we would stay on track,” his daughter said. “He would always want the best for us.”
Photos captured the life they had built in L.A. The family in San Pedro for a boat ride. Celebrating Father’s Day and birthdays with cake and balloons. At a Day of the Dead celebration on Olvera Street downtown.
Angel Minguela Palacios with his partner of eight years and their 6-year-old son.
(Carlin Stiehl/Los Angeles Times)
When immigration raids began in June, their lives suddenly narrowed. Minguela rarely went out, leaving the house only for work and errands. His daughter would warn him if she heard rumors of immigration officers near her high school, so he wouldn’t risk picking her up.
Minguela planned ahead, made copies of his keys and left money for his family in case he was grabbed by immigration agents. But he never expected it would happen to him.
On Aug. 14, his alarm went off at 1:15 a.m., as it did almost every day. He drank the coffee his wife had brought him as he headed to the produce market, where he’d worked for the same company for eight years.
Minguela helped take orders of strawberries, raspberries and blueberries, before heading out to make deliveries around 8 a.m. He had around half a dozen places to hit before he would call it a day.
His partner called to warn him that she’d seen on social media that ICE officers were near one of his delivery spots. He had just been there and luckily missed them, he said.
He was relieved that the Little Tokyo tearoom was his last stop. It didn’t open until 11 a.m. He arrived 10 minutes after. He found a parking spot out front and began unloading the boxes of strawberries and one box of apples.
Minguela was adjusting wooden pallets in the van when he heard a knock. He turned to see a Border Patrol agent, who began asking him about his legal status. Rather than answer, Minguela said he pulled a red “know your rights” card out of his wallet and handed it to the agent.
Angel Minguela Palacios took this image of a federal agent looking at his identification outside of the Japanese American National Museum on Aug. 14.
(Angel Rodrigo Minguela Palacios)
The agent told him it was “of no use” and handed it back. As he held his wallet, Minguela said the agent demanded his license. After running his information, Minguela said, the agent placed him in handcuffs.
::
Inside B 18, the lights never turned off. No matter the hour, officers would call detainees out of the room for interviews, making it difficult to get uninterrupted sleep, Minguela recounted. The temperature was so cold, family members dropped off sweaters and jackets for loved ones.
The detainees were given thin, shiny emergency blankets to sleep with. He described them as “aluminum sheets.” As the days passed, he said, even those ran out for new detainees. The bathrooms were open-air, providing no privacy. Detainees went days without showering.
The conditions, he said, felt intentional. A form of “pressure to get people to sign to leave.”
Department of Homeland Security officials have previously told The Times that “any claim that there are subprime conditions at ICE detention centers are false.”
When Minguela closed his eyes, he saw the faces of his family. He wondered how his esposa would keep them afloat all alone. He wanted to believe this was just a nightmare from which he would soon awaken.
He replayed the morning events over and over in his head. What if he had gotten to Little Tokyo five minutes earlier? Five minutes later?
“Those days were the hardest,” Minguela said. “My first day there on the floor, I cried. It doesn’t matter that you’re men, it doesn’t matter your age. There, men cried.”
The men talked among themselves, most worrying about their wives and children. They shared where they’d been taken from. Minguela estimated that around 80% of people he was held with had been detained at car washes and Home Depot. Others had been arrested while leaving court hearings.
Minguela said he’d only been asked once, on his second day, if he wanted to self-deport. He said no. But he watched as several others gave up and signed to leave. Minguela hoped he’d be sent to Adelanto, a nearby detention center. He’d heard it might be harder to get bond in Texas or Arizona.
On the sixth day, around 4 a.m., Minguela and more than 20 others had been pulled out of the room and shackled. He only learned he was going to Arizona after overhearing a conversation between two guards.
It felt, Minguela said, “like the world came crashing down on me.”
The 25 detainees were loaded onto a white bus and spent around 10 hours on the road, before arriving at a detention center near Casa Grande. When Minguela saw it for the first time, in the desert where the temperature was hitting 110 degrees, he felt afraid. It looked like a prison.
“Ay caray, adonde nos trajeron,” he thought. Wow, where did they bring us?
::
There were around 50 people in Minguela’s wing. His cell mate, an African immigrant, had been fighting his asylum case for five months, hoping to get to his family in Seattle.
For the first time since his youth, Minguela had time to read books, including Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s “No One Writes to the Colonel.” He read the Bible, taking comfort in Psalm 91, a prayer of trust and protection. He took online courses on CPR, computer skills and how to process his emotions.
But all the distractions, he said, didn’t change the fact that detainees were imprisoned.
“Lo que mata es el encierro,” Minguela said. “What kills you is the confinement.”
Angel Minguela Palacios spent more than a month in immigration detention.
(Carlin Stiehl / Los Angeles Times)
Almost everyone there, Minguela said, had arrived with the intention of fighting their case. There were detainees who had been there for a year fighting to get asylum, others for eight months. Some had been arrested despite having work permits. Others had been scammed out of thousands of dollars by immigration lawyers who never showed up for their court hearings. Many decided to self-deport.
If he wasn’t granted bond, Minguela told his partner he feared he might do that in a moment of desperation.
Minguela lay in his darkened cell, reflecting on moments when he had arrived home, tired from work and traffic, and scolded his children about minor messes. About times he’d argued with his wife and given her the silent treatment. He made promises to God to be an even better husband and father. He asked that God help his lawyer on his case and to give him a fair judge.
Minguela had his bond hearing Sept 9. He was aided by the fact that he had entered the country lawfully, providing the judge the ability to either grant or deny him bond.
Alex Galvez, Minguela’s lawyer, told the judge about his client’s children. He pointed out that Minguela didn’t have a criminal record and was gainfully employed, the primary breadwinner for his family. Galvez submitted 16 letters of recommendation for his client.
Angel Minguela Palacios beams at his 6-year-old son.
(Carlin Stiehl / Los Angeles Times)
When the government lawyer referred to Minguela as a flight risk, Galvez said, the judge appeared skeptical, pointing out that he’d been paying tens of thousands of dollars in taxes for the last 10 years.
The judge granted a $1,500 bond. Minguela’s employers at the produce company paid it. When Minguela was pulled out of his cell on the night of Sept. 17, the other detainees applauded.
“Bravo,” they shouted. “Echale ganas.” Give it your all.
::
A crowd of people waited to greet Minguela as soon as he stepped off a Greyhound bus at Union Station in downtown L.A. on Thursday night. His partner and their three children all wore black shirts that read “Welcome Home.”
Minguela’s employer, Martha Franco, her son, Carlos Franco, and her nephew held “Welcome Back” balloons and flowers.
“He’s coming,” the children cried, when the bus groaned to a halt at 9:35 p.m. When Minguela spotted the waiting crowd, he beamed. His youngest son jumped up and down with anticipation as he stepped off the bus.
“Estas contento,” Minguela asked the boy. “Are you happy?”
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He held his esposa tight, kissing her on the cheeks, the forehead and the lips.
Minguela knows his release is just a step in the journey. His lawyer plans to file for cancellation of his removal and hopes to secure him a work permit. Minguela said he wants other immigrants to know that “there’s hope and not to despair.”
“Have faith,” Minguela said.
When Minguela arrived home after 10 p.m., he clasped his face in surprise as he was greeted by more than a hundred red, gold and black balloons. Signs strung up around the living room read “God loves you” and “Welcome home we missed you so much.”
His partner had decorated and bought everything to make ceviche and albondigas to celebrate his return. But she hadn’t had time that day to cook. Instead, she bought him one of his favorites in his adopted home.
A key committee of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention voted Thursday to alter its recommendation on an early childhood vaccine, after a discussion that at times pitted vaccine skeptics against the CDC’s own data.
After an 8 to 3 vote with one abstention, the CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices will no longer recommend that children under the age of 4 receive a single-shot vaccine for mumps, measles, rubella and varicella (better known as chicken pox).
Instead, the CDC will recommend that children between the ages of 12 to 15 months receive two separate shots at the same time: one for mumps, measles and rubella (MMR) and one for varicella.
The first vote of the committee’s two-day meeting represents a relatively small change to current immunization practices. The committee will vote Friday on proposed changes to childhood Hepatitis B and COVID vaccines.
But doctors said the lack of expertise and vaccine skepticism on display during much of the discussion would only further dilute public trust in science and public health guidance.
“I think the primary goal of this meeting has already happened, and that was to sow distrust and instill fear among parents and families,” said Dr. Sean O’Leary, chair of American Academy of Pediatrics’ Committee on Infectious Diseases, during a Zoom press conference Thursday.
“What we saw today at the meeting was really not a good faith effort to craft immunization policy in the best interest of Americans. It was, frankly, an alarming attempt to undermine one of the most successful public health systems in the world,” O’Leary said. “This idea that our current vaccine policies are broken or need a radical overhaul is simply false.”
Giving the MMR and chickenpox vaccines in the same shot has been associated with a higher relative risk of brief seizures from high fevers in the days after vaccination for children under 4 — eight children in 10,000 typically have febrile seizures after receiving the combination shot, compared with four out of 10,000 who receive separate MMR and chickenpox shots at the same time.
Distressing as they are for family members to witness, seizures are a relatively common side effect for high fevers in young children and have not been associated with any long-term consequences, said Dr. Cody Meissner, a former pediatric infectious diseases chief at Tufts-New England Medical Center who is serving on ACIP for the second time (he previously served under Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama).
The problem with splitting vaccines into multiple shots is that it typically leads to lower vaccine compliance, Meissner said. And the risks of not vaccinating are real.
“We are looking at a risk-benefit of febrile seizures … as compared to falling below a 95% coverage rate for herd immunity, and the consequences of that are devastating, with pregnant women losing their babies, newborns dying and having congenital rubella syndromes,” said Dr. Joseph Hibbeln, a psychiatrist and neuroscientist and another current ACIP member.
Meissner, Hibbeln and Hilary Blackburn were the only three members to vote against the change.
The meeting ended with a vote regarding continued coverage of the MMRV shot under the CDC’s Vaccines for Children Program, a publicly-funded service that provides immunizations to nearly half of the nation’s children. VFC currently only covers shots that ACIP recommends.
As chair Martin Kulldorff called the vote, several committee members complained that they did not understand the proposal as it was written. Three abstained from the vote entirely.
As the meeting broke up, members could be heard trying to clarify with one another what they had just voted for.
The committee also spent several hours debating whether to delay the first dose of the Hepatitis B vaccine, a shot typically given at birth, until the child is one month old. They will vote on the proposal Friday.
The medical reason for altering the Hepatitis B schedule was less clear.
“What is the problem we’re addressing with the Hepatitis B discussion? As far as I know, there hasn’t been a spate of adverse outcomes,” said pediatrician Dr. Amy Middleman, one of several people to raise the point during the discussion and public comment period.
Committee member Dr. Robert Malone replied that changing the recommendation for when children should get vaccinated for hepatitis B would improve Americans’ trust in public health messaging.
“A significant population of the United States has significant concerns about vaccine policy and about vaccine mandates, [particularly] the immediate provision of this vaccine at the time of birth,” Malone said. “The signal that is prompting this is not one of safety, but one of trust.”
Hepatitis B is often asymptomatic, and half of infected people don’t know they have it, according to the CDC. Up to 85% of babies born to infected mothers become infected themselves, and the risk of long-term hazards from the disease is higher the earlier the infection is acquired.
Since the vaccine was introduced in 1991, infant hepatitis B infections have dropped by 95% in the U.S. Nearly 14,000 children acquired hepatitis B infections between 1990 and 2002, according to the CDC; today, new annual infections in children are close to zero.
This week’s two-day meeting is the second time the committee has met since Kennedy fired all 17 previous ACIP members in June, in what he described as a “clean sweep [that] is necessary to reestablish public confidence in vaccine science.”
The next day, he named seven new members to the committee, and added the last five earlier this week. The new members include doctors with relevant experience in pediatrics, immunology and public health, as well as several people who have been outspoken vaccine skeptics or been criticized for spreading medical misinformation.
They include Vicky Pebsworth, a nurse who serves as research director for the National Vaccine Information Center, an organization with a long history of sharing inaccurate and misleading information about vaccines, and Malone, a vaccinologist who contributed to early mRNA research but has since made a number of false and discredited assertions about flu and COVID-19 shots.
In some cases, the new ACIP members also lack medical or public health experience of any kind. Retsef Levi, for example, is a professor of operations management at MIT with no biomedical or clinical degree who has nonetheless been an outspoken critic of vaccines.
“Appointing members of anti-vaccine groups to policy-setting committees at the CDC and FDA elevates them from the fringe to the mainstream. They are not just at the table, which would be bad enough; they are in charge,” said Seth Kalichman, a University of Connecticut psychologist who has studied NVIC’s role in spreading vaccine misinformation. “It’s a worst-case scenario.”
Though ACIP holds three public meetings per year, it typically works year-round, said Dr. Paul Offit, director of the Vaccine Education Center at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia and a former ACIP member in the early 2000s.
New recommendations to the vaccine schedule are typically written before ACIP meetings in consultation with expert working groups that advise committee members year-round, Offit said. But in August, medical groups including the American Medical Association, the American Academy of Pediatrics and Infectious Diseases Society of America were told they were no longer invited to review scientific evidence and advise the committee in advance of the meeting.
That same month, Kennedy fired CDC director Dr. Susan Monarez — who had been appointed to the position by President Trump and confirmed by the Senate. This past Wednesday, Monarez told a Senate committee that Kennedy fired her in part because she refused to sign off on changes he planned to make to the vaccine schedule this month without seeing scientific evidence for them.
She did not specify during the hearing what those changes would be.
ACIP’s recommendations only become official after the CDC director approves them. With Monarez out, that responsibility now goes to Health and Human Services deputy secretary Jim O’Neill, who is serving as the CDC’s acting director.
Asked by reporters on Wednesday whether the U.S. public should trust any changes ACIP recommends to the childhood immunization schedule, Sen. Bill Cassidy (Rep. – LA) was blunt: “No.”
He cast his vote after Kennedy privately pledged to Cassidy that he would maintain the CDC immunization schedule.
As public trust in the integrity of CDC guidelines wobbles, alternative sources for information have stepped up. Earlier this year, the American Academy of Pediatrics announced that it would publish its own evidence-based vaccination schedule that differs from the CDC’s on flu and COVID shots. And on Wednesday, Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a law giving California the power to establish its own immunization schedule, the same day the state partnered with Oregon and Washington to issue joint recommendations for COVID-19, flu and RSV vaccines.
On Tuesday, an association representing many U.S. health insurers announced that its members would continue to cover all vaccines recommended by the previous ACIP — regardless of what happened at Thursday’s meeting — through the end of 2026.
“While health plans continue to operate in an environment shaped by federal and state laws, as well as program and customer requirements, the evidence-based approach to coverage of immunizations will remain consistent,” America’s Health Insurance Plans said in a statement. The group includes major insurers like Aetna, Humana, Kaiser Permanente, Cigna and several Blue groups. UnitedHealthcare, the nation’s largest insurer, is not a member.
A barrage of airstrikes killed at least 32 people across Gaza City as Israel ramps up its offensive there and urges Palestinians to evacuate, medical staff reported Saturday.The dead included 12 children, according to the morgue in Shifa Hospital, where the bodies were brought.In recent days, Israel has intensified strikes across Gaza City, destroying multiple high-rise buildings and accusing Hamas of putting surveillance equipment in them.On Saturday, the army said it struck another high-rise used by Hamas in the area of Gaza City. It has ordered residents to leave as part of an offensive aimed at taking over the largest Palestinian city, which it says is Hamas’ last stronghold. Hundreds of thousands of people remain there, struggling under conditions of famine.One of the strikes overnight and into early morning Saturday hit a house in the Sheikh Radwan neighborhood, killing a family of 10, including a mother and her three children, said health officials. The Palestinian Football Association said a player for the Al-Helal Sporting Club, Mohammed Ramez Sultan, was killed in the strikes, along with 14 members of his family. Images showed the strikes hitting followed by plumes of smoke.Israel’s army did not immediately respond to questions about the strikes.Hostages’ relatives rally in IsraelMeanwhile, relatives of Israeli hostages held by Hamas rallied in Tel Aviv on Saturday to demand a deal to release their loved ones and criticized what they said was a counterproductive approach by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in securing a resolution.Einav Zangauker, the mother of hostage Matan Zangauker, described Israel’s attempted assassination of Hamas leaders in Qatar this week as a “spectacular failure.”“President Trump said yesterday that every time there is progress in the negotiations, Netanyahu bombs someone. But it wasn’t Hamas leaders he tried to bomb — it was our chance, as families, to bring our loved ones home,” Zangauker said.Some Palestinians are leaving Gaza City, but many are stuckIn the wake of escalating hostilities and calls to evacuate the city, the number of people leaving has spiked in recent weeks, according to aid workers. However, many families remain stuck due to the cost of finding transportation and housing, while others have been displaced too many times and do not want to move again, not trusting that anywhere in the enclave is safe.In a message on social media Saturday, Israel’s army told the remaining Palestinians in Gaza City to leave “immediately” and move south to what it’s calling a humanitarian zone. Army spokesman Avichay Adraee said that more than a quarter of a million people had left Gaza City — from an estimated 1 million who live in the area of north Gaza around the city.The United Nations, however, put the number of people who have left at around 100,000 between mid-August and mid-September. The U.N. and aid groups have warned that displacing hundreds of thousands of people will exacerbate the dire humanitarian crisis. Sites in southern Gaza where Israel is telling people to go are overcrowded, according to the U.N., and it can cost money to move, which many people do not have.An initiative headed by the U.N. to bring temporary shelters into Gaza said more than 86,000 tents and other supplies were still awaiting clearance to enter Gaza as of last week.Gaza’s Health Ministry said Saturday that seven people, including children, died from malnutrition-related causes over the past 24 hours, raising the toll to 420, including 145 children, since the war began.The bombardment Friday night across Gaza City came days after Israel launched a strike targeting Hamas leaders in Qatar, intensifying its campaign against the militant group and endangering negotiations over ending the war in Gaza.Families of the hostages still held in Gaza are pleading with Israel to halt the offensive, worried it will kill their relatives. There are 48 hostages still inside Gaza, around 20 of them believed to be alive.The war in Gaza began when Hamas-led militants stormed into southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, abducting 251 people and killing some 1,200, mostly civilians. Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed at least 64,803 Palestinians, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, which does not say how many were civilians or combatants. It says around half of those killed were women and children. Large parts of major cities have been completely destroyed, and around 90% of some 2 million Palestinians have been displaced.
DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip —
A barrage of airstrikes killed at least 32 people across Gaza City as Israel ramps up its offensive there and urges Palestinians to evacuate, medical staff reported Saturday.
The dead included 12 children, according to the morgue in Shifa Hospital, where the bodies were brought.
In recent days, Israel has intensified strikes across Gaza City, destroying multiple high-rise buildings and accusing Hamas of putting surveillance equipment in them.
On Saturday, the army said it struck another high-rise used by Hamas in the area of Gaza City. It has ordered residents to leave as part of an offensive aimed at taking over the largest Palestinian city, which it says is Hamas’ last stronghold. Hundreds of thousands of people remain there, struggling under conditions of famine.
One of the strikes overnight and into early morning Saturday hit a house in the Sheikh Radwan neighborhood, killing a family of 10, including a mother and her three children, said health officials. The Palestinian Football Association said a player for the Al-Helal Sporting Club, Mohammed Ramez Sultan, was killed in the strikes, along with 14 members of his family. Images showed the strikes hitting followed by plumes of smoke.
Israel’s army did not immediately respond to questions about the strikes.
Hostages’ relatives rally in Israel
Meanwhile, relatives of Israeli hostages held by Hamas rallied in Tel Aviv on Saturday to demand a deal to release their loved ones and criticized what they said was a counterproductive approach by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in securing a resolution.
Einav Zangauker, the mother of hostage Matan Zangauker, described Israel’s attempted assassination of Hamas leaders in Qatar this week as a “spectacular failure.”
“President Trump said yesterday that every time there is progress in the negotiations, Netanyahu bombs someone. But it wasn’t Hamas leaders he tried to bomb — it was our chance, as families, to bring our loved ones home,” Zangauker said.
Some Palestinians are leaving Gaza City, but many are stuck
In the wake of escalating hostilities and calls to evacuate the city, the number of people leaving has spiked in recent weeks, according to aid workers. However, many families remain stuck due to the cost of finding transportation and housing, while others have been displaced too many times and do not want to move again, not trusting that anywhere in the enclave is safe.
In a message on social media Saturday, Israel’s army told the remaining Palestinians in Gaza City to leave “immediately” and move south to what it’s calling a humanitarian zone. Army spokesman Avichay Adraee said that more than a quarter of a million people had left Gaza City — from an estimated 1 million who live in the area of north Gaza around the city.
The United Nations, however, put the number of people who have left at around 100,000 between mid-August and mid-September. The U.N. and aid groups have warned that displacing hundreds of thousands of people will exacerbate the dire humanitarian crisis. Sites in southern Gaza where Israel is telling people to go are overcrowded, according to the U.N., and it can cost money to move, which many people do not have.
An initiative headed by the U.N. to bring temporary shelters into Gaza said more than 86,000 tents and other supplies were still awaiting clearance to enter Gaza as of last week.
Gaza’s Health Ministry said Saturday that seven people, including children, died from malnutrition-related causes over the past 24 hours, raising the toll to 420, including 145 children, since the war began.
The bombardment Friday night across Gaza City came days after Israel launched a strike targeting Hamas leaders in Qatar, intensifying its campaign against the militant group and endangering negotiations over ending the war in Gaza.
Families of the hostages still held in Gaza are pleading with Israel to halt the offensive, worried it will kill their relatives. There are 48 hostages still inside Gaza, around 20 of them believed to be alive.
The war in Gaza began when Hamas-led militants stormed into southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, abducting 251 people and killing some 1,200, mostly civilians. Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed at least 64,803 Palestinians, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, which does not say how many were civilians or combatants. It says around half of those killed were women and children. Large parts of major cities have been completely destroyed, and around 90% of some 2 million Palestinians have been displaced.
OREM, Utah — President Donald Trump said Friday that he believes “with a high degree of certainty” that authorities have apprehended a suspect in the fatal shooting of conservative activist Charlie Kirk.
“I think with a high degree of certainty we have him in custody,” Trump said during an appearance on Fox & Friends, noting that someone “very close to him turned him in.”
Trump praised local and state officials for their work tracking down the suspect who was captured on video on the rooftop of a Utah Vallery University building after Kirk was killed after being struck in the neck with one single shot.
“Everybody did a great job, you know,” the President said. “You start off with absolutely nothing, and we started off with a cliff that made him look like an ant, that was almost useless. We just saw there was somebody up there. And so much work has been done over the last two and a half days.”
Trump said he hoped the suspect would be found guilty and get the death penalty.
“What he did, Charlie Kirk, he was the finest person that, he didn’t deserve this.”
State and federal officials have scheduled a news conference for 6 a.m. Pacific time.
Trump’s claims came the morning after Utah authorities pleaded for the public’s help in identifying the gunman and released new video of a suspect in dark clothing lying face-down on the corner of a roof at Utah Valley University. He then ran across the roof and jumped off of it, using his hands to lower himself over the edge.
Beau Mason, the head of Utah’s Department Public Safety, said in a TV interview Thursday night on MSNBC that “we’re exploring leads for individuals out of state and individuals that live close by.” We literally have persons of interest, tips coming in on the tip line that are spanning far, far and wide.”
Beau Mason, commissioner of the Utah Department of Public Safety, said investigators were chasing several leads after the suspect left palm impressions and smudges on the roof that they hoped would allow them to collect DNA. He also left a shoe imprint officials believe is from a Converse tennis shoe.
Law enforcement is circulating the video as well as photos of the suspect — who was last seen wearing blue jeans, a baseball cap, gray Converse shoes and a long-sleeved black T-shirt that appeared to show an American flag and an eagle. Anyone with information is encouraged to come forward.
Utah Gov. Spencer Cox said Thursday night they hoped the images and video would get as much attention as possible to help investigators capture “this evil human being.”
“We are going to catch this person,” Cox said, noting that he had worked with attorneys to get affidavits ready “so that we can pursue the death penalty in this case.”
With pressure building on authorities, the F.B.I. director, Kash Patel, took the unusual step Thursday of flying to Utah. But he did not speak at the news conference.
More than 7,000 tips have been submitted to the FBI, according to Utah Gov. Spencer Cox. But on Thursday evening Beau Mason, commissioner of the Utah Department of Public Safety, told MSNBC that authorities still “have no idea” where Kirk’s killer is.
The suspected murder weapon, a high-powered bolt-action rifle, was recovered in a wooded area near a parking lot, said Robert Bohls, the special agent in charge of the FBI’s Salt Lake City office. Mason said the suspect was seen running to that area after getting down from the roof.
Kirk was afervant conservative and enormously influential figure in American politics, with a combined 25.6 million followers across TikTok, Instagram, YouTube and Twitter.
A provocative figure, Kirk was known for challenging left-wing orthodoxies on college campuses and clung strongly to his Christian faith, arguing that there should be no division between church and state in America.
Kirk’s assassination sparked fierce backlash from conservative leaders, including President Trump, who blamed the rhetoric of the “radical left” for his death. On Wednesday, Vice President JD Vance traveled from Utah to Phoenix aboard Air Force Two with Kirk’s family to bring the activist’s casket home.
On Thursday evening, hundreds gathered in a park in Orem, Utah, to remember and honor Kirk.
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The multi-generational crowd held American flags, pushed children in strollers and donned “Make America Great Again” hats while they prayed and sang together.
“Come together in light,” Mayor David Young said to the crowd. “Violence has no place here.”
The mourners sang along to Lee Greenwood’s “God Bless the USA” and participated in a group prayer.
“This is the healing that we needed,” said Klea Harris, whose children helped organize the event.
More than a hundred people lined up with flowers, candles and flags, waiting for their turn to place them before a memorial that centered on a larger-than-life photo of Kirk.
“It’s important that we don’t turn on each other in this moment,” said Jason Preston, a conservative podcast host. He received rousing applause when he told the crowd: “This is not a battle of right versus left, this is a battle of good versus evil.”
Earlier in the day, young conservatives gathered on campus, hanging red banners in honor of Kirk’s Republican ideology and carrying posters with phrases such as “We are not afraid” and “Charlie Kirk, American hero.”
“I think this kind of woke a sleeping giant,” said UVU student Jillian Green, 20. “People are outraged and very upset that he [was killed] when he was advocating for so many of us.”
Koby Herrera, a fellow student at the university, also felt that the death could mark a shift in political history, noting that it could further raise Kirk’s influence.
“He had a voice, and I feel like his voice is bigger now that he’s in the grave,” said Herrera, 22.
Kirk held huge sway over young Republicans, and key members of the Trump administration credited him with helping them secure the GOP’s 2024 electoral victory.
A man who evaded authorities with his three children in the remote New Zealand countryside for nearly four years was shot and killed by a police officer Monday, law enforcement said.One child was with Tom Phillips at the time of the confrontation and the other two children were found in the forest hours after the shootout, in which an officer was critically injured.The December 2021 disappearance of Phillips and his children — now about 9, 10 and 11 years old — confounded investigators for years as they scoured the densely forested area where they believed the family was hiding. The father and children were not believed to ever have traveled far from the isolated North Island rural settlement of Marokopa where they lived, but credible sightings of them were rare.Phillips has not been formally identified, but authorities believed he was the man killed.Police officer was shot and critically injuredA police officer was shot in the head and critically injured during a confrontation with Phillips after he robbed an agricultural supplies store early Monday morning, New Zealand’s Acting Deputy Police Commissioner Jill Rogers told reporters in the city of Hamilton. The child with Phillips at the time of the robbery was taken into custody.The officer was undergoing surgery at a hospital. His injuries were survivable, Rogers said, but he was shot “multiple times with a high-powered rifle” and further surgeries were expected.Fugitive’s other two children found hours after shootoutThe whereabouts of Phillips’ other two children was unknown immediately after the shooting and authorities held serious concerns for them, Rogers said earlier.About 13 hours after their father was killed, however, Rogers told reporters that the children had been found unaccompanied at a remote campsite in rugged forest. The child taken into custody Monday had cooperated with the authorities, allowing them to narrow the search area, she said.The farm supplies store targeted Monday was in a small town in the same sprawling farming region of Waikato, south of Auckland, as the settlement of about 40 people from where the family vanished. The case has fascinated New Zealanders and the authorities made regular unsuccessful appeals for information.Sightings of Phillips were limited to surveillance footage that showed him allegedly committing crimes in the area. He was wanted for an armed bank robbery while on the run in May 2023, accompanied by one of his children, in which he reportedly shot at a member of the public.Authorities believed Phillips had helpPhillips did not have legal custody rights for his children, Detective Senior Sgt. Andrew Saunders told reporters in 2024. Authorities said they had not had access to formal education or health care since their disappearance.Law enforcement always believed that Phillips had help concealing his family and some residents of the isolated rural area expressed support for him. A reward of 80,000 New Zealand dollars ($47,000), large by New Zealand standards was offered for information about the family’s whereabouts last June, but it was never paid.Family had gone missing beforeDecember 2021 was not the first time Phillips prompted national news headlines after disappearing with his children. The family went missing that September, launching a three-week land and sea search after Phillips’ truck was found abandoned on a wild beach near where he lived.Authorities eventually ended the search, concluding the family might have died, before Phillips and the children emerged from dense forest where he said they had been camping. He was charged with wasting police resources and was due to appear in court in January 2022, but weeks before the scheduled date he and the children vanished again.The police did not immediately launch a search because Phillips, who is experienced in the outdoors, had told family he was taking the children on another trip. He never returned.The search intensified again after several sightings of Phillips in 2023 in the same region where he had vanished. He was last seen on surveillance video in August this year as he robbed a grocery store in the night, accompanied by one of his children.Children’s mother issues a statementThe children’s mother issued a statement to Radio New Zealand on Monday in which she said she was “deeply relieved” that the “ordeal” for her children had ended.“They have been dearly missed every day for nearly four years, and we are looking forward to welcoming them home with love and care,” said the woman, who has been identified in New Zealand news outlets only by her first name, Cat.
WELLINGTON, New Zealand —
A man who evaded authorities with his three children in the remote New Zealand countryside for nearly four years was shot and killed by a police officer Monday, law enforcement said.
One child was with Tom Phillips at the time of the confrontation and the other two children were found in the forest hours after the shootout, in which an officer was critically injured.
The December 2021 disappearance of Phillips and his children — now about 9, 10 and 11 years old — confounded investigators for years as they scoured the densely forested area where they believed the family was hiding. The father and children were not believed to ever have traveled far from the isolated North Island rural settlement of Marokopa where they lived, but credible sightings of them were rare.
Phillips has not been formally identified, but authorities believed he was the man killed.
Police officer was shot and critically injured
A police officer was shot in the head and critically injured during a confrontation with Phillips after he robbed an agricultural supplies store early Monday morning, New Zealand’s Acting Deputy Police Commissioner Jill Rogers told reporters in the city of Hamilton. The child with Phillips at the time of the robbery was taken into custody.
The officer was undergoing surgery at a hospital. His injuries were survivable, Rogers said, but he was shot “multiple times with a high-powered rifle” and further surgeries were expected.
Fugitive’s other two children found hours after shootout
The whereabouts of Phillips’ other two children was unknown immediately after the shooting and authorities held serious concerns for them, Rogers said earlier.
About 13 hours after their father was killed, however, Rogers told reporters that the children had been found unaccompanied at a remote campsite in rugged forest. The child taken into custody Monday had cooperated with the authorities, allowing them to narrow the search area, she said.
The farm supplies store targeted Monday was in a small town in the same sprawling farming region of Waikato, south of Auckland, as the settlement of about 40 people from where the family vanished. The case has fascinated New Zealanders and the authorities made regular unsuccessful appeals for information.
Sightings of Phillips were limited to surveillance footage that showed him allegedly committing crimes in the area. He was wanted for an armed bank robbery while on the run in May 2023, accompanied by one of his children, in which he reportedly shot at a member of the public.
Authorities believed Phillips had help
Phillips did not have legal custody rights for his children, Detective Senior Sgt. Andrew Saunders told reporters in 2024. Authorities said they had not had access to formal education or health care since their disappearance.
Law enforcement always believed that Phillips had help concealing his family and some residents of the isolated rural area expressed support for him. A reward of 80,000 New Zealand dollars ($47,000), large by New Zealand standards was offered for information about the family’s whereabouts last June, but it was never paid.
Family had gone missing before
December 2021 was not the first time Phillips prompted national news headlines after disappearing with his children. The family went missing that September, launching a three-week land and sea search after Phillips’ truck was found abandoned on a wild beach near where he lived.
Authorities eventually ended the search, concluding the family might have died, before Phillips and the children emerged from dense forest where he said they had been camping. He was charged with wasting police resources and was due to appear in court in January 2022, but weeks before the scheduled date he and the children vanished again.
The police did not immediately launch a search because Phillips, who is experienced in the outdoors, had told family he was taking the children on another trip. He never returned.
The search intensified again after several sightings of Phillips in 2023 in the same region where he had vanished. He was last seen on surveillance video in August this year as he robbed a grocery store in the night, accompanied by one of his children.
Children’s mother issues a statement
The children’s mother issued a statement to Radio New Zealand on Monday in which she said she was “deeply relieved” that the “ordeal” for her children had ended.
“They have been dearly missed every day for nearly four years, and we are looking forward to welcoming them home with love and care,” said the woman, who has been identified in New Zealand news outlets only by her first name, Cat.
AURORA, Colo. — A child was unharmed, and two people were arrested following a police pursuit in the Denver metro area Wednesday.
Around 5 p.m., detectives with the Aurora Police Department’s Robbery Investigative Unit spotted a Volvo sedan that was connected to a home invasion that occurred earlier in the day in the 1300 block of Idalia Court. The Volvo was seen driving near East Colfax Avenue and South Peoria Street.
Aurora PD said its detectives started following the vehicle while additional officers responded to the area as backup.
Officers initiated a traffic stop on the Volvo near Quebec Street and Northfield Boulevard. The driver did not stop, according to Aurora police, and a “pursuit was authorized.”
During the pursuit, the Volvo crashed into an uninvolved vehicle in the 5100 block of Quebec Street. The uninvolved driver was not injured, according to police.
Officers detained the Volvo’s female driver and the male passenger. Detectives also found a “young child” in the vehicle. The child’s age is not known at this time, but Aurora PD said they are approximately 3 years old.
Aurora police said officers did not previously see the child due to the Volvo’s dark-tinted windows. The department identified the Volvo passenger as the child’s father.
The child was unharmed and was returned to their mother, who came to the scene after the crash.
The man and woman were booked into the Aurora Municipal Detention Center. Aurora PD said the woman was arrested for felony eluding and child abuse. She is also suspected in the Idalia Court home invasion, but charges are pending further investigation.
The man was booked on an outstanding warrant, and additional charges are pending further investigation.
The Denver Police Department is investigating the crash, according to Aurora PD.
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Video shows a boy walking on the monorail tracks at Hersheypark before being rescued by an adult.Watch the video in the player above.The video, sent to sister station WGAL, shows a panicked crowd trying to direct the child to a nearby roof, where a man is waiting to grab him.The man then hops up on the monorail from the roof of the nearby building, picks up the boy and carries him to safety. The child was reported missing around 5:05 p.m. Saturday after becoming separated from his parents, according to a statement from a spokesperson for Hersheypark. While employees were searching for the boy, he entered a secured area for the monorail and remained there for almost 20 minutes before briefly walking along the track. The monorail was not in operation, and the ride was chained off as the child walked on the tracks, according to the park. The park said a guest quickly noticed the child walking on the tracks and helped the child off the track to safety.
HERSHEY, Pa. —
Video shows a boy walking on the monorail tracks at Hersheypark before being rescued by an adult.
Watch the video in the player above.
The video, sent to sister station WGAL, shows a panicked crowd trying to direct the child to a nearby roof, where a man is waiting to grab him.
The man then hops up on the monorail from the roof of the nearby building, picks up the boy and carries him to safety.
The child was reported missing around 5:05 p.m. Saturday after becoming separated from his parents, according to a statement from a spokesperson for Hersheypark.
While employees were searching for the boy, he entered a secured area for the monorail and remained there for almost 20 minutes before briefly walking along the track.
The monorail was not in operation, and the ride was chained off as the child walked on the tracks, according to the park.
The park said a guest quickly noticed the child walking on the tracks and helped the child off the track to safety.
A 2-year-old is dead and two adults are in critical condition after being shot inside a home in Melbourne.Police say they responded to a report of a shooting at around 10 Friday night at a residence off Poplar Lane.Upon arrival, officers located three gunshot victims inside the home: two adults and a 2-year-old child.The child died at the scene while the adults were taken to the hospital.Police say the child and the adults are related. Police haven’t identified the victims, but family members tell WESH 2 it was a 2-year-old girl name Bless’yn and her grandparents. One neighbor said she knew the little girl’s family and this tragedy has shaken the entire street. This is an active and ongoing investigation, and investigators say further details will be released as they become available.>> This is a breaking news story and will be updated as more information is released.
MELBOURNE, Fla. —
A 2-year-old is dead and two adults are in critical condition after being shot inside a home in Melbourne.
Police say they responded to a report of a shooting at around 10 Friday night at a residence off Poplar Lane.
Upon arrival, officers located three gunshot victims inside the home: two adults and a 2-year-old child.
The child died at the scene while the adults were taken to the hospital.
Police say the child and the adults are related. Police haven’t identified the victims, but family members tell WESH 2 it was a 2-year-old girl name Bless’yn and her grandparents.
One neighbor said she knew the little girl’s family and this tragedy has shaken the entire street.
This is an active and ongoing investigation, and investigators say further details will be released as they become available.
>> This is a breaking news story and will be updated as more information is released.
Harrison Dayton loves his food and toys, but his parents remember his time in the neonatal intensive care unit all too well.”We would shake him and be like, ‘Come on, take a breath’ — just hearing his crying and not being able to hold him the first day,” said Wendy Dayton, Harrison’s mom.The 2-and-a-half-year-old was born at 33 weeks and weighed just over three pounds at birth. He was diagnosed with trisomy 21, also known as Down syndrome, something that was uncharted territory for his family.”To be honest, I was devastated,” said Wendy, reflecting on the diagnosis. “I didn’t know what our lives were going to look like.”The Daytons are no strangers to hospital visits. On Mother’s Day of 2024, Harrison suffered a medical setback that left him intubated for 13 days.”I felt hopeless,” said Wendy. “The next morning, I had a conversation with his doctor and asked, ‘Am I going to lose my son?’”But things took a turn for the better this past fall, when Harrison took his first steps. In April, he could be seen practicing walking with a physical therapist.The Daytons are embracing new adventures as they prepare to travel to New York City next week for the National Down Syndrome Society Times Square Presentation, where Harrison’s photo will be displayed on a jumbotron.Wendy says it’s important that Harrison be featured on screen because “there isn’t a lot of representation of children with Down syndrome.””It’s such a hard journey for him, now he’s there,” said Wendy. “He’s happy, and he looks great and healthy, and it’s just truly amazing.”Despite their challenges, this family is navigating parenthood the best way they know how — by learning from their kids every day.”He’s a normal kid,” said Jake Dayton, Harrison’s dad. “We’re raising him the same way we raised any child.””He’s made us more empathetic and more patient,” Wendy added. “You look at life differently with him in your life.”
Harrison Dayton loves his food and toys, but his parents remember his time in the neonatal intensive care unit all too well.
“We would shake him and be like, ‘Come on, take a breath’ — just hearing his crying and not being able to hold him the first day,” said Wendy Dayton, Harrison’s mom.
The 2-and-a-half-year-old was born at 33 weeks and weighed just over three pounds at birth. He was diagnosed with trisomy 21, also known as Down syndrome, something that was uncharted territory for his family.
“To be honest, I was devastated,” said Wendy, reflecting on the diagnosis. “I didn’t know what our lives were going to look like.”
The Daytons are no strangers to hospital visits. On Mother’s Day of 2024, Harrison suffered a medical setback that left him intubated for 13 days.
“I felt hopeless,” said Wendy. “The next morning, I had a conversation with his doctor and asked, ‘Am I going to lose my son?’”
But things took a turn for the better this past fall, when Harrison took his first steps. In April, he could be seen practicing walking with a physical therapist.
A man was arrested after stealing a car in East Los Angeles with three children inside, then crashing it in Malibu during a police pursuit Friday evening, officials confirmed.
The car, a light-colored sedan, was left running with three children inside at a 7-Eleven on East Olympic Boulevard, according to the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department. A stranger jumped inside the idling vehicle and took off at around 6:38 p.m.
The California Highway Patrol began pursuing the vehicle minutes later, traveling westbound on the 10 Freeway at Maple Avenue in Los Angeles, the agency confirmed.
The chase continued until roughly 7:34 p.m., when the sedan appeared to T-bone a light-colored SUV at the intersection of Pacific Coast Highway and Kanan Dume Road in Malibu.
Following the crash, live footage broadcast from a news helicopter showed the suspect fleeing the scene barefoot and shedding layers of clothes. The man ran through a residential area into a field before being arrested.
Four people at the scene were taken to a hospital — three by helicopter and one by ambulance, according to the Los Angeles County Fire Department. Three were listed with minor-to-moderate injuries, but no condition was available for the fourth person.
It is unclear how seriously injured the children were, but they were conscious and breathing after the crash as paramedics removed them from the vehicle, KTLA-TV reported.
KINI, Mexico — On a hot June night Jesús Cruz at last returned to Kini, the small town in Mexico’s Yucatán Peninsula where he spent the first 17 years of his life.
His sister greeted him with tearful hugs. The next morning she took him to see their infirm mother, who whispered in his ear: “I didn’t think you’d ever come back.”
After decades away, Cruz was finally home.
Yet he was not home.
So much of what he loved was 3,000 miles away in Southern California, where he resided for 33 years until immigration agents swarmed the car wash where he worked and hauled him away in handcuffs.
Cruz missed his friends and Booka, his little white dog. His missed his house, his car, his job.
But most of all, he missed his wife, Noemi Ciau, and their four children. Ciau worked nights, so Cruz was in charge of getting the kids fed, clothed and to and from school and music lessons, a chaotic routine that he relished because he knew he was helping them get ahead.
“I want them to have a better life,” he said. “Not the one I had.”
Now that he was back in Mexico, living alone in an empty house that belonged to his in-laws, he and Ciau, who is a U.S. permanent resident, faced an impossible decision.
Should she and the children join Cruz in Mexico?
Or stay in Inglewood?
Cruz and Ciau both had families that had been broken by the border, and they didn’t want that for their kids. In the months since Cruz had been detained, his eldest daughter, 16-year-old Dhelainy, had barely slept and had stopped playing her beloved piano, and his youngest son, 5-year-old Gabriel, had started acting out. Esther, 14, and Angel, 10, were hurting, too.
But bringing four American kids to Mexico didn’t seem fair, either. None of them spoke Spanish, and the schools in Kini didn’t compare with those in the U.S. Dhelainy was a few years from graduating high school, and she dreamed of attending the University of California and then Harvard Law.
There was also the question of money. At the car wash, Cruz earned $220 a day. But the day rate for laborers in Kini is just $8. Ciau had a good job at Los Angeles International Airport, selling cargo space for an international airline. It seemed crazy to give that up.
Ciau wanted to hug her husband again. She wanted to know what it would feel like to have the whole family in Mexico. So in early August she packed up the kids and surprised Cruz with a visit.
The Cruz family — from left, Dhelainy, Angel, Esther, Jesús, Gabriel and Noemi — head to the vaqueria, a traditional Yucatecan festival in Kini.
(Juan Pablo Ampudia / For The Times)
Kini lies an hour outside of Merida in a dense tropical forest. Like many people here, Cruz grew up speaking Spanish and a dialect of Maya and lived in a one-room, thatched-roof house. He, his parents and his five brothers and sisters slept in hammocks crisscrossed from the rafters.
His parents were too poor to buy shoes for their children, so when he was a boy Cruz left school to work alongside his father, caring for cows and crops. At 17 he joined a wave of young men leaving Kini to work in the United States.
He arrived in Inglewood, where a cousin lived, in 1992, just as Los Angeles was erupting in protest over the police beating of Rodney King.
Cruz, soft-spoken and hardworking, was overwhelmed by the big city but found refuge in a green stucco apartment complex that had become a home away from home for migrants from Kini, who cooked and played soccer together in the evenings.
Eventually he fell for a young woman living there: Ciau, whose parents had brought her from Kini as a young girl, and who obtained legal status under an amnesty extended by President Reagan. They married when she turned 18.
As their family grew, they developed rituals. When one of the kids made honor roll, they’d celebrate at Dave & Buster’s. Each summer they’d visit Disneyland. And every weekend they’d dine at Casa Gambino, a classic Mexican restaurant with vinyl booths, piña coladas and a bison head mounted on the wall. On Fridays, Cruz and Ciau left the kids with her parents and went on a date.
As the father of four Americans, Cruz was eligible for a green card. But the attorneys he consulted warned that he would have to apply from Mexico and that the wait could last years.
Cruz didn’t want to leave his children. So he stayed. When President Trump was reelected last fall on a vow to carry out mass deportations, he tried not to worry. The government, he knew, usually targeted immigrants who had committed crimes, and his record was spotless. But the Trump administration took a different approach.
On June 8, masked federal agents swarmed Westchester Hand Wash. Cruz said they slammed him into the back of a patrol car with such force and shackled his wrists so tightly that he was left with bruises across his body and a serious shoulder injury.
Ciau, who was helping Esther buy a dress for a middle school honors ceremony, heard about the raid and raced over. She had been at the car wash just hours earlier, bringing lunch to her husband and his colleagues. Now it was eerily empty.
At the Westchester Hand Wash last June, an employee tells a customer that they are closed due to a recent immigration raid. (Genaro Molina/Los Angeles Times)
At a news conference in June at Culver City Express Hand Car Wash and Detail, Noemi shows a photo of her husband, Jesús, who was taken into custody by immigration agents that month at a car wash. (Genaro Molina/Los Angeles Times)
Cruz was transferred to a jail in El Paso, where he says he was denied requests to speak to a lawyer or call his family.
One day, an agent handed him a document and told him to sign. The agent said that if Cruz fought his case, he would remain in detention for up to a year and be deported anyway. Signing the document — which said he would voluntarily return to Mexico — meant he could avoid a deportation order, giving him a better shot at fixing his papers in the future.
Cruz couldn’t read the text without his glasses. He didn’t know that he very likely would have been eligible for release on bond because of his family ties to the U.S. But he was in pain and afraid and so he signed.
Returning to Kini after decades away was surreal.
Sprawling new homes with columns, tile roofs and other architectural flourishes imported by people who had lived in the U.S. rose from what had once been fields. There were new faces, too, including a cohort of young men who appraised Cruz with curiosity and suspicion. With his polo shirts and running shoes, he stood out in a town where most wore flip-flops and as few clothes as possible in the oppressive heat.
Cruz found work on a small ranch. Before dawn, he would pedal out there on an old bicycle, clearing weeds and feeding cows, the world silent except for the rustle of palm leaves. In all his years in the big city, he had missed the tranquility of these lands.
He had missed his mother, too. She has multiple sclerosis and uses a wheelchair. Some days, she could speak, and would ask about his family and whether Cruz was eating enough. Other days, they would sit in silence, him occasionally leaning over to kiss her forehead.
He always kept his phone near, in case Ciau or one of the kids called. He tried his best to parent from afar, mediating arguments and reminding the kids to be kind to their mother. He tracked his daughters via GPS when they left the neighborhood, and phoned before bed to make sure everyone had brushed their teeth.
He worried about them, especially Dhelainy, a talented musician who liked to serenade him on the piano while he cooked dinner. The burden of caring for the younger siblings had fallen on her. Since Cruz had been taken, she hadn’t touched the piano once.
During one conversation, Dhelainy let it slip that they were coming to Mexico. Cruz surged with joy, then shuddered at the thought of having to say goodbye again. He picked them up at the airport.
That first evening, they shared pizza and laughed and cried. Gabriel, the only family member who had never been to Mexico, was intrigued by the thick forest and the climate, playing outside in the monsoon rain. For the first time in months, Dhelainy slept through the night.
“We finally felt like a happy family again,” Ciau said. But as soon as she and the kids arrived, they started counting the hours to when they’d have to go back.
Noemi Ciau is comforted by her cousin Rocio after listening to her talk about her husband’s time in immigrant detention.
(Juan Pablo Ampudia / For The Times)
During the heat of the day, the family hid inside, lounging in hammocks. They were also dodging unwanted attention. It seemed everywhere they went, someone asked Cruz to relive his arrest, and he would oblige, describing cold nights in detention with nothing to keep warm but a plastic blanket.
But at night, after the sky opened up, and then cleared, they went out.
It was fair time in Kini, part of an annual celebration to honor the Virgin Mary. A small circus had been erected and a bull ring constructed of wooden posts and leaves. A bright moon rose as the family took their seats and the animal charged out of its pen, agitated, and barreled toward the matador’s pink cape.
Cruz turned to his kids. When he was growing up, he told them, the matador killed the bull, whose body was cut up and sold to spectators. Now the fights ended without violence — with the bull lassoed and returned to pasture.
It was one of the ways that Mexico had modernized, he felt. He felt pride at how far Mexico had come, recently electing its first female president.
The bull ran by, close enough for the family to hear his snorts and see his body heave with breath.
“Are you scared?” Esther asked Gabriel.
Wide-eyed, the boy shook his head no. But he reached out to touch his father’s hand.
Later, as the kids slept, Cruz and Ciau stayed up, dancing cumbia deep into the night.
The day before Ciau and the kids were scheduled to leave, the family went to the beach. Two of Ciau’s nieces came. It was the first time Gabriel had met a cousin. The girls spoke little English, but they played well with Gabriel, showing him games on their phones. (For days after, he would giddily ask his mother when he could next see them.)
Seperated for months, Jesús Cruz and Noemi Ciau share a moment at her parents’ home in Kini.
(Juan Pablo Ampudia / For The Times)
That evening, the air was heavy with moisture.
The kids went into the bedroom to rest. Cruz and Ciau sat at the kitchen table, holding hands and wiping away tears.
They had heard of a U.S. employer who, having lost so many workers to immigration raids, was offering to pay a smuggler to bring people across the border. Cruz and Ciau agreed that was too risky.
They had just paid a lawyer to file a lawsuit saying Cruz had been coerced into accepting voluntary departure and asking a judge to order his return to the U.S. so that he could apply for relief from removal. The first hearing was scheduled for mid-September.
Cruz wanted to return to the U.S. But he was increasingly convinced that the family could make it work in Mexico. “We were poor before,” he told Ciau. “We can be poor again.”
Ciau wasn’t sure. Her children had big — and expensive — ambitions.
Dhelainy had proposed staying in the U.S. with her grandparents if the rest of the family moved back. Cruz and Ciau talked about the logistics of that, and Ciau vowed to explore whether the younger kids could remain enrolled in U.S. schools, but switch to online classes.
When the rain began, Cruz got up and closed the door.
The next morning, Cruz would not accompany his family to the airport. It would be too hard, he thought, “like when somebody gives you something you’ve always wanted, and then suddenly takes it away.”
Jesús comforts his son Angel as they walk to the car to leave for the airport. (Juan Pablo Ampudia/For The Times)
Jesús hugs his son Gabriel as they say goodbye. (Juan Pablo Ampudia/For The Times)
Gabriel wrapped his arms around his father’s waist, his small body convulsed with tears: “I love you.”
“It’s OK, baby,” Cruz said. “I love you, too.”
“Thank you for coming,” he said to Ciau. He kissed her. And then they were gone.
That afternoon, he walked the streets of Kini. The fair was wrapping up. Workers sweating in the heat were dismantling the circus rides and packing them onto the backs of trucks.
He thought back to a few evenings earlier, when they had celebrated Dhelainy’s birthday.
The family had planned to host a joint sweet 16 and quinceñera party for her and Esther in July. They had rented an event hall, hired a band and sent out invitations. After Cruz was detained, they called the party off.
They celebrated Dhelainy’s Aug. 8 birthday at the house in Kini instead. A mariachi band played the Juan Gabriel classic, “Amor Eterno.”
“You are my sun and my calm,” the mariachis sang as Cruz swayed with his daughter. “You are my life / My eternal love.”
Two children who disappeared from their foster home in the early hours of Thursday morning have been found, the Los Angeles Police Department said Sunday.
When the brothers — a 10-year-old and a toddler — vanished, police said they were believed to be in imminent danger.
Two young brothers were believed to have been abducted by their biological mother, left.
(California Highway Patrol)
Derek Rodriguez-Hernandez, 2, and older brother Jaden Hernandez left their foster home in the Westlake neighborhood about 1:30 a.m., police said.
The boys’ foster parents heard the door of their house opening and ran outside, they told KTLA, but the boys were already gone.
The LAPD said they’d been taken by their biological mother, Jackeline Hernandez-Torres. An Amber Alert was issued for the trio.
On Sunday afternoon, the alert was canceled, and LAPD officials said the boys had been found and were in good health.
They will soon be reunited with their foster parents, the news release said. No information was immediately provided about their mother.
Israeli strikes and gunfire killed at least 33 Palestinians in Gaza on Saturday, including people sheltering in tents or seeking scarce food, local hospitals said as a famine in Gaza’s largest city sparks new pressure on Israel over its 22-month offensive.Israel’s defense minister has warned that Gaza City could be destroyed in a new military operation perhaps just days away, even as famine spreads there.Aid groups have long warned that the war, sparked by Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, attack, and months of Israeli restrictions on food and medical supplies entering Gaza are causing starvation.Israel has rejected the data-based famine declaration as “an outright lie.” Hamas recently agreed to the terms for a six-week ceasefire, but hopes for a ceasefire that could forestall the offensive are on hold as mediators await Israel’s next steps. Women and children struck and killed in tentsIsraeli strikes killed at least 17 people in southern Gaza, more than half of them women and children, according to morgue records and health officials at Nasser Hospital. The officials said the strikes targeted tents sheltering displaced people in Khan Younis.“Awad, why did you leave me?” a small boy asked his brother’s plastic-wrapped body.Another grieving relative, Hekmat Foujo, pleaded for a truce.“We want to rest,” Foujo said through her tears. ‘’Have some mercy on us.”In northern Gaza, Israeli gunfire killed at least five aid-seekers near the Zikim crossing with Israel, where U.N. and other agencies’ truck convoys enter the territory, health officials at the Sheikh Radwan field hospital told the AP.Six people were killed in attacks elsewhere, according to hospitals and the Palestinian Red Crescent.Israel’s military said it was not aware of a strike in Khan Younis at that location and was looking into the other incidents.Braving gunfire and crowds for foodMohamed Saada was among thousands of people who sought food from a delivery in the Zikim area on Saturday — and one of many who left empty-handed.“I came here to bring food for my children but couldn’t get anything, due to the huge numbers of people and the difficulty of the situation between the shootings and the trucks running over people,” he said.Some carried sacks of food like lentils and flour. Others carried the wounded, including on a wooden pallet. They navigated fetid puddles and the rubble of war as temperatures reached above 92 degrees Fahrenheit.Friday’s report by the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification said Gaza City is gripped by famine that is likely to spread if fighting and restrictions on aid continue. It said nearly half a million people in Gaza — about one-fourth of the population — face catastrophic hunger.The rare pronouncement came after Israel imposed a 2 1/2-month total blockade on Gaza earlier this year, then resumed some access with a focus on a new U.S.-backed private aid supplier, the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation. Over 1,000 people have been killed near GHF distribution sites.In response to global outrage over images of emaciated children, Israel has also allowed airdrops and a new influx of aid by land, but the U.N. and others say it’s still far from enough.AP journalists have seen chaos on roads leading to aid deliveries, and there have been almost daily reports of Israeli troops firing toward aid-seekers. Israel’s military says it fires warning shots if people approach troops or pose a threat.Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office asserts it has allowed enough aid to enter during the war. It also accuses Hamas of starving the Israeli hostages it holds.An increase in Israeli airstrikes this monthWith ground troops already active in strategic areas, the military operation in Gaza City could start within days in an area that has hundreds of thousands of civilians.Aid group Doctors without Borders, or MSF, said its clinics around Gaza City are seeing high numbers of patients as people flee. Caroline Willemen, MSF project coordinator in the city, noted a marked increase in airstrikes since early August.“Those who have not moved are wondering what they should do,” she told the AP. “People want to stay; they have been displaced endlessly before, but they also know that at some point, it will become very dangerous to remain.”Israel’s military has said troops are operating on the outskirts of Gaza City and in the city’s Zeitoun neighborhood. Israel says Gaza City is still a Hamas stronghold, with a network of militant tunnels.Ceasefire efforts await Israel’s responseMany Israelis fear the assault on Gaza City could doom the 20 hostages who are believed to have survived captivity since 2023. A further 30 are thought to be dead. Hundreds of thousands of Israelis protested a week ago for a deal to end the war and bring everyone home.Netanyahu said Thursday he had instructed officials to begin immediate negotiations to release hostages and end the war on Israel’s terms. It was unclear if Israel would return to talks mediated by the United States, Egypt and Qatar after Hamas said earlier this week it accepted a new proposal from Arab mediators.Hamas has said it will release hostages in exchange for ending the war, but rejects disarming without the creation of a Palestinian state.U.S. President Donald Trump has expressed frustration with Hamas’ stance, suggesting the militant group is less interested in making deals with few hostages left alive.“I actually think (the hostages are) safer in many ways if you went in and you really went in fast and you did it,” Trump told reporters Friday.Gaza’s Health Ministry said at least 62,622 Palestinians have been killed in the war, including missing people now confirmed dead by a special ministry judicial committee.The total number of malnutrition-related deaths rose by eight to 281, the ministry said.Israeli protest against far-right security ministerA small group of Israelis protested against the far-right national security minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir, as he walked to a synagogue in Kfar Malal, north of Tel Aviv. Videos showed the minister arguing with the protesters.“We don’t want him in our village. Our message is to bring back the hostages,” one of the protesters, Boaz Levinstein, told the AP.Ben-Gvir is a key partner in Netanyahu’s political coalition and a staunch opponent of reaching a deal with Hamas, which hostages’ families see as the only way to secure the release of loved ones. Magdy reported from Cairo. Sam Mednick in Jerusalem and Michelle Price in Washington contributed.
KHAN YOUNIS, Gaza Strip —
Israeli strikes and gunfire killed at least 33 Palestinians in Gaza on Saturday, including people sheltering in tents or seeking scarce food, local hospitals said as a famine in Gaza’s largest city sparks new pressure on Israel over its 22-month offensive.
Israel’s defense minister has warned that Gaza City could be destroyed in a new military operation perhaps just days away, even as famine spreads there.
Aid groups have long warned that the war, sparked by Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, attack, and months of Israeli restrictions on food and medical supplies entering Gaza are causing starvation.
Israel has rejected the data-based famine declaration as “an outright lie.”
Hamas recently agreed to the terms for a six-week ceasefire, but hopes for a ceasefire that could forestall the offensive are on hold as mediators await Israel’s next steps.
Women and children struck and killed in tents
Israeli strikes killed at least 17 people in southern Gaza, more than half of them women and children, according to morgue records and health officials at Nasser Hospital. The officials said the strikes targeted tents sheltering displaced people in Khan Younis.
“Awad, why did you leave me?” a small boy asked his brother’s plastic-wrapped body.
Another grieving relative, Hekmat Foujo, pleaded for a truce.
“We want to rest,” Foujo said through her tears. ‘’Have some mercy on us.”
In northern Gaza, Israeli gunfire killed at least five aid-seekers near the Zikim crossing with Israel, where U.N. and other agencies’ truck convoys enter the territory, health officials at the Sheikh Radwan field hospital told the AP.
Six people were killed in attacks elsewhere, according to hospitals and the Palestinian Red Crescent.
Israel’s military said it was not aware of a strike in Khan Younis at that location and was looking into the other incidents.
Braving gunfire and crowds for food
Mohamed Saada was among thousands of people who sought food from a delivery in the Zikim area on Saturday — and one of many who left empty-handed.
“I came here to bring food for my children but couldn’t get anything, due to the huge numbers of people and the difficulty of the situation between the shootings and the trucks running over people,” he said.
Some carried sacks of food like lentils and flour. Others carried the wounded, including on a wooden pallet. They navigated fetid puddles and the rubble of war as temperatures reached above 92 degrees Fahrenheit.
Friday’s report by the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification said Gaza City is gripped by famine that is likely to spread if fighting and restrictions on aid continue. It said nearly half a million people in Gaza — about one-fourth of the population — face catastrophic hunger.
The rare pronouncement came after Israel imposed a 2 1/2-month total blockade on Gaza earlier this year, then resumed some access with a focus on a new U.S.-backed private aid supplier, the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation. Over 1,000 people have been killed near GHF distribution sites.
In response to global outrage over images of emaciated children, Israel has also allowed airdrops and a new influx of aid by land, but the U.N. and others say it’s still far from enough.
AP journalists have seen chaos on roads leading to aid deliveries, and there have been almost daily reports of Israeli troops firing toward aid-seekers. Israel’s military says it fires warning shots if people approach troops or pose a threat.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office asserts it has allowed enough aid to enter during the war. It also accuses Hamas of starving the Israeli hostages it holds.
An increase in Israeli airstrikes this month
With ground troops already active in strategic areas, the military operation in Gaza City could start within days in an area that has hundreds of thousands of civilians.
Aid group Doctors without Borders, or MSF, said its clinics around Gaza City are seeing high numbers of patients as people flee. Caroline Willemen, MSF project coordinator in the city, noted a marked increase in airstrikes since early August.
“Those who have not moved are wondering what they should do,” she told the AP. “People want to stay; they have been displaced endlessly before, but they also know that at some point, it will become very dangerous to remain.”
Israel’s military has said troops are operating on the outskirts of Gaza City and in the city’s Zeitoun neighborhood. Israel says Gaza City is still a Hamas stronghold, with a network of militant tunnels.
Ceasefire efforts await Israel’s response
Many Israelis fear the assault on Gaza City could doom the 20 hostages who are believed to have survived captivity since 2023. A further 30 are thought to be dead. Hundreds of thousands of Israelis protested a week ago for a deal to end the war and bring everyone home.
Netanyahu said Thursday he had instructed officials to begin immediate negotiations to release hostages and end the war on Israel’s terms. It was unclear if Israel would return to talks mediated by the United States, Egypt and Qatar after Hamas said earlier this week it accepted a new proposal from Arab mediators.
Hamas has said it will release hostages in exchange for ending the war, but rejects disarming without the creation of a Palestinian state.
U.S. President Donald Trump has expressed frustration with Hamas’ stance, suggesting the militant group is less interested in making deals with few hostages left alive.
“I actually think (the hostages are) safer in many ways if you went in and you really went in fast and you did it,” Trump told reporters Friday.
Gaza’s Health Ministry said at least 62,622 Palestinians have been killed in the war, including missing people now confirmed dead by a special ministry judicial committee.
The total number of malnutrition-related deaths rose by eight to 281, the ministry said.
Israeli protest against far-right security minister
A small group of Israelis protested against the far-right national security minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir, as he walked to a synagogue in Kfar Malal, north of Tel Aviv. Videos showed the minister arguing with the protesters.
“We don’t want him in our village. Our message is to bring back the hostages,” one of the protesters, Boaz Levinstein, told the AP.
Ben-Gvir is a key partner in Netanyahu’s political coalition and a staunch opponent of reaching a deal with Hamas, which hostages’ families see as the only way to secure the release of loved ones.
Magdy reported from Cairo. Sam Mednick in Jerusalem and Michelle Price in Washington contributed.
A vacation to Niagara Falls ended in tragedy on Friday as a tour bus with about 50 passengers heading back to New York City crashed into a ditch, killing five people and injuring dozens.Officials believe most of the passengers were not wearing a seat belt, as multiple people were also ejected from the bus, which sustained heavy damage in the incident, said New York State Police spokesperson James O’Callaghan.“We believe there is a child that is a fatality,” he said.And translators are headed to the scene to assist police in the investigation, as most of the passengers were Indian, Chinese or Filipino, he said at a news conference.Erie County Medical Center in Buffalo received 24 patients and 20 are being treated, it confirmed at a Friday afternoon news conference.Video below: NY State Police Trooper James O’ Callaghan discusses bus crashAs the investigation unfolds, it’s not yet clear why the crash took place, O’Callaghan said, but he added authorities have a “good idea” of what caused the bus to roll over after losing control, without offering further details.The bus was driving at full speed and did not hit any other vehicles, but lost control from the median onward, O’Callaghan said.Helicopters, ambulances and law enforcement swarmed the crash site, where the bus was seen on its side with many people gathered around it.A list of the passengers provided by the bus company confirms there were 52 people on board, including the driver, police said in a statement.“Several witnesses observed the bus lose control, enter the median, then cross to the southern shoulder and overturn,” the state police said in a news release.The state’s department of transportation is trying to help people get off the interstate as some remain stranded due to the incident, O’Callaghan said. The state Thruway is currently closed in both directions near the crash site, state police say.“It’s a very volatile scene. We have vehicles going the wrong way on the 90,” he said, describing the area as “highly traveled.”The driver is “alive and well” and working with authorities, O’Callaghan said, and some victims were taken to the Strong Memorial Hospital in Rochester, New York.New York Gov. Kathy Hochul described the crash as “tragic” and said first responders are “working to rescue and provide assistance to everyone involved” in a post on X.CNN has contacted the U.S. embassies for the Philippines, China and India for comment.
PEMBROKE, N.Y. —
A vacation to Niagara Falls ended in tragedy on Friday as a tour bus with about 50 passengers heading back to New York City crashed into a ditch, killing five people and injuring dozens.
Officials believe most of the passengers were not wearing a seat belt, as multiple people were also ejected from the bus, which sustained heavy damage in the incident, said New York State Police spokesperson James O’Callaghan.
“We believe there is a child that is a fatality,” he said.
And translators are headed to the scene to assist police in the investigation, as most of the passengers were Indian, Chinese or Filipino, he said at a news conference.
Erie County Medical Center in Buffalo received 24 patients and 20 are being treated, it confirmed at a Friday afternoon news conference.
Video below: NY State Police Trooper James O’ Callaghan discusses bus crash
As the investigation unfolds, it’s not yet clear why the crash took place, O’Callaghan said, but he added authorities have a “good idea” of what caused the bus to roll over after losing control, without offering further details.
The bus was driving at full speed and did not hit any other vehicles, but lost control from the median onward, O’Callaghan said.
Helicopters, ambulances and law enforcement swarmed the crash site, where the bus was seen on its side with many people gathered around it.
A list of the passengers provided by the bus company confirms there were 52 people on board, including the driver, police said in a statement.
“Several witnesses observed the bus lose control, enter the median, then cross to the southern shoulder and overturn,” the state police said in a news release.
The state’s department of transportation is trying to help people get off the interstate as some remain stranded due to the incident, O’Callaghan said. The state Thruway is currently closed in both directions near the crash site, state police say.
“It’s a very volatile scene. We have vehicles going the wrong way on the 90,” he said, describing the area as “highly traveled.”
The driver is “alive and well” and working with authorities, O’Callaghan said, and some victims were taken to the Strong Memorial Hospital in Rochester, New York.
New York Gov. Kathy Hochul described the crash as “tragic” and said first responders are “working to rescue and provide assistance to everyone involved” in a post on X.
CNN has contacted the U.S. embassies for the Philippines, China and India for comment.
YOJUELA, Mexico — Modesta Matías Aquino was working her regular morning shift — 3 a.m. till noon — at the Glass House Farms in Camarillo, caring for rows of marijuana plants.
Among her co-workers on the morning of July 10 were two of her daughters, aged 16 and 19.
“With everything going on, with the raids, there had been rumors that something bad might happen,” Matías recalled.
About 9 a.m., she said, phalanxes of masked agents in tactical vests sealed off the sprawling compound. Matías and her daughters were among more than 300 undocumented immigrants — including at least 10 minors — who, according to U.S. authorities, were detained at a pair of Glass House sites.
The raids, like other such operations across the United States, split many so-called “mixed-status” families, those with both U.S.-born citizens — often children — and undocumented relatives, typically one or both parents.
Matías’ family life is, by any definition, complicated, including seven daughters in all. Her two youngest daughters, aged 2 and 5, are U.S. citizens, born in California. Her 2-year-old grandson —the child of Matías’ 16-year-old daughter — is also a native Californian. So when Matías was held in a federal lockup in downtown Los Angeles, she faced a momentous choice — one that would mark her family for life.
Matías, 43, could accept removal to Mexico. But that might effectively banish her from returning to the United States, where she had toiled as a field worker for most of the past quarter-century — and where she had deep family ties.
Alternately, she could fight expulsion in court. But that would leave her in custody, possibly indefinitely.
“They told me I could be locked up for months, maybe a year, and never see my children,” Matías said, recalling what U.S. agents informed her in Los Angeles. “I just couldn’t endure that.”
Instead, Matías said, she agreed to return voluntarily to Mexico, but with a caveat: She had to be accompanied by her two youngest daughters and her grandson. After some haggling — federal authorities initially balked at sending U.S. citizen minors to Mexico, Matías said — an agreement was reached. (The Department of Homeland Security didn’t respond to inquiries from The Times.)
She and four daughters — the two undocumented teenagers who worked at Glass House and the two U.S. citizen youngsters — were soon in a van en route to Tijuana. The U.S.-born grandson was also with them.
“Go ahead,” an agent told Matías upon letting the family out at the border. “You’re back in your country now.”
Ailed Lorenzo Matías and her son, Liam Yair, in the family home in Miahuatlán de Porfirio Díaz, have a video chat with the boy’s father, who is in California.
(Liliana Nieto del Rio / For The Times)
Back to Yojuela
The hamlet of Yojuela is home to some 500 people — all of Indigenous Zapotec origins — who reside deep in the Sierra Madre Oriental, in Mexico’s southern Oaxaca state. The area is known for its clay pottery, fired from distinctive reddish earth, and for something else — dispatching its offspring to work in the fields of California, supporting loved ones left behind in a time-tested rite of passage.
The scripted sequel is the triumphant homecoming of those who moved on but never forsook their roots. These days, however, many return to places like Yojuela broke and embittered, casualties of President Trump’s deportation onslaught.
Matías and her family showed up last month, just 20 days after she was detained. She had last set foot here seven years earlier.
“This is is where I was born and reared,” Matías said with both resignation and pride, ushering visitors onto a verdant patch shimmering in the aftermath of recent rains.
Reaching the ancestral hearth involves a two-hour, uphill drive on a washboard road from the nearest city, and then a short hike — across a stream and up a steep hill, past fields of corn and beans and stands of pine, all to a soundtrack of clucking turkeys and braying donkeys.
Accompanying Matías were two U.S.-born daughters, Arisbeth, 2, and Keilani, a onetime Oxnard preschooler who turned 5 in Tijuana. Also present were Matías’ 16-year-old daughter, Ailed, and Ailed’s U.S.-born son, Liam Yair, 2.
I’d like like to go back to California
— Ailed Lorenzo Matías
It marked the first time that the native Californians met their extended family, including a platoon of curious cousins.
Seasoned to the periodic reunion ritual was Cecilia Aquino, mother of Matías and her five siblings— all of whom had made the trek to California. For decades, her adobe dwelling hosted waves of grandchildren and great-grandchildren as sons and daughters went back and forth, entrusting expanding broods to the matriarch.
Matías and her mother, now 72, embraced, no words needed. Each examined the other closely. Time had taken its melancholic toll.
“All of my children had to go away and leave their kids with me — there’s no work here,” said Aquino, worn down by years of toil, as she prepared coffee on a kindling-fired stove. “Then they come back. Then they leave again. It’s sad. The children never really get to know their parents. I wish the officials on the other side [of the border] would let them be together.”
Leaving home
Matías joined the migrant trail as a teenager, following the harvests — strawberries, celery, broccoli and more — from California to the Pacific Northwest. Through the years, she gave birth to her seven daughters — four in the United States, three in Mexico — as she crisscrossed the border a dozen times.
“I was always a single mother, always battling on my own for my children,” Matías said. “I earned everything through my own sweat and toil. The fathers of my kids never gave me anything.”
Her last journey north, in 2018, was the most difficult, as the once-porous international boundary had become a militarized bulwark. She vowed it would be her last crossing. Four years ago, she said, she secured work at Glass House Farms, a major player in the legalized cannabis boom.
“It was the best job I ever had,” she said.
There was no back-breaking stooping: Trimmers sat on benches. The pounding sun wasn’t an issue in the temperature-controlled facilities.
Matías said she rose to become a crew chief, overseeing 240 workers. She said she earned more than $20 an hour, and, with overtime, regularly grossed in excess of $1,000 a week — a unfathomable haul in Oaxaca, where field hands pocket the equivalent of about $10 a day.
Her plan, she said, was to remain in California until she turned 65, then retire to Yojuela, using savings to open a shop.
“I never wanted to stay forever in Oxnard,” she said.
Then came July 10.
‘Total chaos’
“People were running all over the place,” Matías recalled of the raid. “Some tried to hide inside the greenhouses. Others crawled inside the ventilation shafts. It was total chaos.”
One worker, Jaime Alanis García, 56, died from injuries suffered when he fell from a greenhouse roof, apparently while trying to evade arrest.
Blocking any escape for herself and her two daughters, Matías said, were los militares — heavily armed U.S. agents in martial getup.
That evening, Matías said, she spent a sleepless night in detention in downtown Los Angeles. The next day, she accepted a “voluntary return” to Mexico.
For almost a week, the family stayed in a shelter in Tijuana, awaiting the arrival of her male partner and the boyfriend of her 19-year-old-daughter. Both were also among the of Glass House detainees. The three-day bus ride south included a frenzied, crosstown change of terminals in Mexico City at midnight to catch the last coach for Oaxaca.
With her remaining savings, Matías purchased an unfinished, cinder-block house on the outskirts of Miahuatlán de Porfirio Díaz, a historic but drab city that hosts a federal prison. It’s about a two-hour drive on a rough track from Yojuela, but offers baseline schooling and job prospects.
The expulsion to Mexico shattered a family that had attained a modicum — perhaps an illusion — of stability in California.
Keilani Lorenzo Matías, 5, a U.S.-born daughter of Modesta Matías Aquino, at the family’s new home in Miahuatlán de Porfirio Díaz.
(Liliana Nieto del Rio / For The Times)
Like her mother, Ailed Lorenzo Matías, 16, succumbed to the siren call of the border. She was 14 when she and her boyfriend crossed into California. She struggled to climb the fence and descend on the U.S. side, worrying about her baby. She was five months pregnant.
The other day, Ailed sat in a stairwell of the new home in Miahuatlán, cuddling her son. They were sharing a video call to Oxnard with the boy’s father, who also worked at Glass House. But, in a twist of fate, he was off duty on July 10.
“I’d like like to go back to California,” the soft-spoken Ailed said. “My son was born there. And that’s where his papá is.”
Unlike Ailed, her sister, Natalia Lorenzo Matías, 19, has no intention of returning.
“No, I don’t want to go back,” Natalia said. “You don’t have a real life there. You spend your time working and locked in your house, always afraid that you will be arrested.”
Her mother is deeply tormented but endeavors to conceal her despair. “I have to be strong for the kids,” Matías said. “When I’m alone, I begin to cry.”
She says she understands Trump’s point: He wants to deport criminals. But, she asks, why target hardworking immigrants?
“In all my years in the north,” she said, “I never saw an American working in the fields.”
Her plan, she says, is to stabilize the family, enroll her 5-year-old in school, find some work — and, then, perhaps in a year or two, set off once more.
For now, though, Matías says she is concentrated on helping her family adjust to a new way of life — albeit, she hopes, a transitory one, until they get back on the road to California.
Special correspondents Cecilia Sánchez Vidal and Liliana Nieto del Río contributed.
A woman has been arrested and charged with felony child neglect after Cocoa police said a child in her care was found wandering the streets in a soiled diaper.Trimeka Dixon, 45, was taken into custody Tuesday.Police responded to the neighborhood near London Boulevard and Robin Hood Drive after a witness called 911 to report a 3-year-old child walking alone in the roadway wearing only a diaper, according to an arrest affidavit. Another neighbor told police he had seen the same child walking in the road unsupervised on three previous occasions.”But they only contacted us the week prior,” Cocoa police spokesperson Yvonne Martinez said. “We got DCF involved in it. It happened again, and we responded on Tuesday. That’s when they decided to arrest the guardian.”Once officers contacted Dixon, they determined the child had been left unsupervised for more than an hour and a half. Dixon told police someone else was supposed to be watching the child.”Nobody was there. Nobody was home,” Martinez said. “When we responded, the neighbors were out there with the child. Our officers went in and searched the home for a family member or someone who was watching the child, and there was nobody around.”Martinez said the case appeared to show a pattern of neglect.The child is now staying with other family members. Police are urging residents to report suspected neglect or abuse.”You don’t know what could have happened to that child,” Martinez said. “That’s a very dangerous situation — happening once is bad enough, but for it to happen as many times as they say it did? That child is lucky not to have been seriously injured, kidnapped or worse.”The Florida Department of Children and Families confirmed it has an open case and said a representative is working to provide a report.We attempted to reach Dixon at her home for comment. A family member said she had nothing to say.
COCOA, Fla. —
A woman has been arrested and charged with felony child neglect after Cocoa police said a child in her care was found wandering the streets in a soiled diaper.
Trimeka Dixon, 45, was taken into custody Tuesday.
Police responded to the neighborhood near London Boulevard and Robin Hood Drive after a witness called 911 to report a 3-year-old child walking alone in the roadway wearing only a diaper, according to an arrest affidavit. Another neighbor told police he had seen the same child walking in the road unsupervised on three previous occasions.
“But they only contacted us the week prior,” Cocoa police spokesperson Yvonne Martinez said. “We got DCF involved in it. It happened again, and we responded on Tuesday. That’s when they decided to arrest the guardian.”
Once officers contacted Dixon, they determined the child had been left unsupervised for more than an hour and a half. Dixon told police someone else was supposed to be watching the child.
“Nobody was there. Nobody was home,” Martinez said. “When we responded, the neighbors were out there with the child. Our officers went in and searched the home for a family member or someone who was watching the child, and there was nobody around.”
Martinez said the case appeared to show a pattern of neglect.
The child is now staying with other family members. Police are urging residents to report suspected neglect or abuse.
“You don’t know what could have happened to that child,” Martinez said. “That’s a very dangerous situation — happening once is bad enough, but for it to happen as many times as they say it did? That child is lucky not to have been seriously injured, kidnapped or worse.”
The Florida Department of Children and Families confirmed it has an open case and said a representative is working to provide a report.
We attempted to reach Dixon at her home for comment. A family member said she had nothing to say.
FT. HUACHUCA, Ariz. — Inside a windowless and dark shipping container turned into a high-tech surveillance command center, two analysts peered at their own set of six screens that showed data coming in from an MQ-9 Predator B drone.
Both were looking for two adults and a child who had crossed the U.S.-Mexico border and had fled when a Border Patrol agent approached in a truck.
Inside the drone hangar on the other side of the Ft. Huachuca base sat another former shipping container, this one occupied by a drone pilot and a camera operator, who pivoted the drone’s camera to scan 9 square miles of shrubs and saguaros for the migrants. Like the command center, the onetime shipping container was lit mostly by the glow of the computer screens.
The hunt for the three migrants embodied how advanced technology has become a vital part of the Trump administration’s efforts to secure the border.
The Department of Homeland Security allocated 12,000 hours of MQ-9 drone flight time this year at the Ft. Huachuca base, and says the flights cost $3,800 per hour, though an inspector general report in 2015 said the amount is closer to $13,000 when factoring in personnel salaries and operational costs. Maintenance issues and bad weather often mean the drones fly around half the allotted hours, officials said.
With the precipitous drop in migrant crossings at the southern U.S. border, the drones are now tasked with fewer missions. That means they have the time to track small groups or even individual border jumpers trekking north through the desert.
This type of drone, first used in warfare, was operated by the National Air Security Operations division of Customs and Border Protection at the Army base about 70 miles south of Tucson. A reporter was allowed to observe the operation in April on the condition that personnel not be named and that no photographs be taken.
An air interdiction agent, left, programs an unmanned Predator aircraft from a flight operations center near the Mexican border at Fort Huachuca in Sierra Vista, Ariz., in March 2013.
(John Moore / Getty Images)
The drone flying this day was mounted with a radar, called Vehicle and Dismount Exploitation Radar, or VaDER, that could identify any moving object in the drone’s sight, and pinpoint them with color-coded dots for the two analysts in the first container. The program had already located three Border Patrol agents, one on foot and two on motorcycles, searching for the migrants. The analysts had also identified three cows and two horses, headed toward Mexico.
Then, one of the analysts spotted something.
“We got them,” he said to his colleague, who had been scanning the terrain. “Good work.”
The analyst dropped a pin on the migrants and the VaDER program began tracking their movement in a blue trail. Now, he had to guide agents on the ground to them.
“We’ve got an adult male and a child, I think, tucked in this bush,” the analyst radioed to his team, as he toggled between the live video to an infrared camera view that showed the heat signature of every living thing in range. The analyst saw his Border Patrol colleagues approaching on motorcycles.
The roar of the oncoming machines scared up a bird, the tracking program showed. The migrants began running.
“OK, it looks like they’re starting,” the camera operator said into the radio to the Border Patrol agents. “They’re hearing the bikes. They hear you guys.” The camera operator and the other personnel spoke in the professional, matter-of-fact tone of 911 operators.
One adult and the child began scrambling up a hill. “They’re moving north and west, mainly,” the camera operator said. “Starting to pick up the pace going uphill.”
The agents rushed in on the pair and detained them. It was a mother and her child. The drone team turned its attention to the third person, who was stumbling through the brush and making a beeline for the Mexican border.
“If you cut due south from your current location,” the drone pilot said to the camera operator. “You should pick up some sign.”
The camera operator, as directed, panned across the desert, scanning farther and farther south.
“I’ve got them,” he said when he spotted someone running. He radioed the coordinates to the Border Patrol team.
By now, the man, carrying a backpack, had scaled a hill.
“He’s on the ridgeline right now, working his way up due south, slowly,” the camera operator radioed.
Then the man dropped something.
“Hey, mark that spot,” the camera operator said. “He just threw a pack, right here where my crosshairs are at. ”
Agents would go back later and see if the backpack contained drugs, an analyst said. “Usually, if it’s food or water, they’re not going to do that,” he said.
On this spring morning, the drone wasn’t the only airborne asset deployed. A helicopter had joined the chase to catch the southbound man, who stumbled, got up and kept running.
“He took a pretty good spill there,” an analyst said into the radio.
“We have a helo inbound, three point five minutes out,” the camera operator said.
A helicopter came into the drone’s view. It swooped in, circling the location of the man, who was by now hiding under a bush.
“You just passed over him,” the camera operator radioed the helicopter pilot. “He’s between you and that saguaro.”
With a keystroke, he switched to infrared vision to find the man’s heat profile through the brush to make sure he still had him.
Guided by the camera operator, the pilot landed the helicopter in a cloud of dust near the cowering target. The video feed showed agents jump out of the aircraft, detain the man and load him into the helicopter. The chopper lifted off and tilted back north toward a nearby Border Patrol post. “Thanks, sir, appreciate all the help,” the analyst said to the helicopter pilot.
Mission accomplished, the drone pilot turned the MQ-9 back along the U.S.-Mexico border, scanning the vast desert in search of more migrants. The military is planning to deliver a third MQ-9 drone to the base this fall after spending a year retrofitting it for civilian authority use.
Fisher is a special correspondent. This article was co-published withPuente News Collaborative, a bilingual nonprofit newsroom, convener and funder dedicated to high-quality, fact-based news and information from the U.S.-Mexico border.
If the Trump administration succeeds in barring undocumented immigrants from federally funded “public benefit” programs, vulnerable children and families across California would suffer greatly, losing access to emergency shelters, vital healthcare, early education and life-saving nutritional support, according to state and local officials who filed their opposition to the changes in federal court.
The new restrictions would harm undocumented immigrants but also U.S. citizens — including the U.S.-born children of immigrants and people suffering from mental illness and homelessness who lack documentation — and put intense stress on the state’s emergency healthcare system, the officials said.
Head Start, which provides tens of thousands of children in the state with early education, healthcare and nutritional support, may have to shutter some of its programs if the new rules barring immigrants withstand a lawsuit filed by California and other liberal-led states, officials said.
In a declaration filed as part of that litigation, Maria Guadalupe Jaime-Milehan, deputy director of the child care and developmental division of the California Department of Social Services, wrote that the restrictions would have an immediate “chilling effect” on immigrant and mixed-status families seeking support, but also cause broader “ripple effects” — especially in rural California communities that rely on such programs as “a critical safety net” for vulnerable residents, but also as major employers.
“Children would lose educational, nutritional, and healthcare services. Parents or guardians may be forced to cut spending on other critical needs to fill the gaps, and some may even be forced out of work so they can care for their children,” Jaime-Milehan said.
Rural communities would see programs shutter, and family providers lose their jobs, she wrote.
Tony Thurmond, California’s superintendent of public instruction, warned in a declaration that the “chilling effect” from such rules could potentially drive away talented educators who disagree with such policies and decide to “seek other employment that does not discriminate against children and families.”
Thurmond and Jaime-Milehan were among dozens of officials in 20 states and the District of Columbia who submitted declarations in support of those states’ lawsuit challenging the Trump administration’s new rules. Six other officials from California also submitted declarations.
The lawsuit followed announcements last month from various federal agencies — including Health and Human Services, Labor, Education and Agriculture — that funding recipients would be required to begin screening out undocumented immigrants.
The announcements followed an executive order issued by President Trump in which he said his administration would “uphold the rule of law, defend against the waste of hard-earned taxpayer resources, and protect benefits for American citizens in need, including individuals with disabilities and veterans.”
Trump’s order cited the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996, commonly known as welfare reform, as barring noncitizens from participating in federally funded benefits programs, and criticized past administrations for providing exemptions to that law for certain “life or safety” programs — including those now being targeted for new restrictions.
The order mandated that federal agencies restrict access to benefits programs for undocumented immigrants, in part to “prevent taxpayer resources from acting as a magnet and fueling illegal immigration to the United States.”
California and the other states sued July 21, alleging the new restrictions target working mothers and their children in violation of federal law.
“We’re not talking about waste, fraud, and abuse, we’re talking about programs that deliver essential childcare, healthcare, nutrition, and education assistance, programs that have for decades been open to all,” California Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta said.
In addition to programs like Head Start, Bonta said the new restrictions threatened access to short-term shelters for homeless people, survivors of domestic violence and at-risk youth; emergency shelters for people during extreme weather; soup kitchens, community food banks and food support services for the elderly; and healthcare for people with mental illness and substance abuse issues.
The declarations are part of a motion asking the federal judge overseeing the case to issue a preliminary injunction barring the changes from taking effect while the litigation plays out.
Beth Neary, assistant director of HIV health services at the San Francisco Department of Public Health, wrote in her declaration that the new restrictions would impede healthcare services for an array of San Francisco residents experiencing homelessness — including undocumented immigrants and U.S. citizens.
“Individuals experiencing homelessness periodically lack identity and other documents that would be needed to verify their citizenship or immigration status due to frequent moves and greater risk of theft of their belongings,” she wrote.
Colleen Chawla, chief of San Mateo County Health, wrote that her organization — the county’s “safety-net” care provider — has worked for years to build up trust in immigrant communities.
“But if our clients worry that they will not be able to qualify for the care they need, or that they or members of their family face a risk of detention or deportation if they seek care, they will stop coming,” Chawla wrote. “This will exacerbate their health conditions.”
Greta S. Hansen, chief operating officer of Santa Clara County, wrote that more than 40% of her county’s residents are foreign-born and more than 60% of the county’s children have at least one foreign-born parent — among the highest rates anywhere in the country.
The administration’s changes would threaten all of them, but also everyone else in the county, she wrote.
“The cumulative effect of patients not receiving preventive care and necessary medications would likely be a strain on Santa Clara’s emergency services, which would result in increased costs to Santa Clara and could also lead to decreased capacity for emergency care across the community,” Hansen wrote.
The Trump administration has defended the new rules, including in court.
In response to the states’ motion for preliminary injunction, attorneys for the administration argued that the rule changes are squarely in line with the 1996 welfare reform law and the rights of federal agencies to enforce it.
They wrote that the notices announcing the new rules that were sent out by federal agencies “merely recognize that the breadth of benefits available to unqualified aliens is narrower than the agencies previously interpreted,” and “restore compliance with federal law and ensure that taxpayer-funded programs intended for the American people are not diverted to subsidize unqualified aliens.”
The judge presiding over the case has yet to rule on the preliminary injunction.
Debut author releases kid-friendly tale that encourages friendship, creativity, and empathy in young readers.
LOUISVILLE, Ky., August 11, 2025 (Newswire.com)
– “Have You Seen My Hat?” Brings Kentucky Derby Magic to Life Through Friendship, Imagination, and Joy based in LOUISVILLE, KY – A heartwarming new children’s book is galloping into the hearts of readers.
Have You Seen My Hat?, written by Kentucky native Ladie Warfield, is a joyful adventure celebrating friendship, creativity, and community set against the vibrant backdrop of the Kentucky Derby Kids’ Parade.
In this beautifully illustrated story, young Zara is thrilled to show off her one-of-a-kind hat at the Derby parade until it mysteriously vanishes. With the help of Marley, the shy new girl in town, the two set off on a whimsical journey filled with mystery, mazes, and Derby Day surprises.
Behind this sweet and spirited story is an author with an inspiring journey of her own. Ladie Warfield is more than a storyteller she’s a proud mother of four, a dedicated healthcare worker of 20 years, a widow, and the founder of a nonprofit honoring her late husband. Her organization, The Ladie Presentz ( theladiepresentz ), is based in Kentucky and provides emotional support and resources to adolescents who have lost a parent to cancer or cancer-related illness.
“Writing this book was about more than creating a story,” Warfield says. “It was about capturing the imagination of children and reminding them of the power of compassion and belonging especially when life feels uncertain.” With her rich Kentucky roots and a heart dedicated to healing, Warfield’s storytelling brings a rare authenticity and emotional depth to children’s literature.
Have You Seen My Hat? is perfect for children ages 4-8, educators, and families looking for diverse, engaging books that inspire joy, empathy, and curiosity. Whether for classroom shelves or bedtime stories, this uplifting tale will leave a lasting shelves or bedtime stories, just like Zara’s unforgettable hat.
Book Details:
Title: Have You Seen My Hat? Author: Ladie Warfield Age Group: 4-8 years Themes: Friendship, Creativity, Problem-Solving, Representation
