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  • As Shutdown Drags On, US Voters See Blame Game Threatening Democrats and Republicans

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    VIRGINIA BEACH, Virginia (Reuters) -Betty Snellenberg and Grace Cook stood on opposite sides of the walkway into the early voting center in Virginia Beach – one promoting the Democratic ticket for the November 4 statewide election, the other distributing pamphlets for the Republican nominees.

    Flanking the entrance, the two women embodied the country’s partisan split as a days-old government shutdown threatened to cleave the political left and right further apart, with each side blaming the other for the paralysis in Washington.

    Yet Snellenberg and Cook shared a common concern: their parties risk losing the messaging war if the shutdown goes on for weeks or months, especially in an area of their state so dependent on civil service and military jobs. Tens of thousands of workers have been furloughed or are working without pay.

    A long shutdown could severely damage the economy of the Hampton Roads area of Virginia, home to multiple military installations, including the world’s largest naval base in Norfolk and a base for fighter jets in Virginia Beach.

    Snellenberg, an 84-year-old Democrat, said she was worried that in a prolonged shutdown voters would eventually come to care more about the broader economic toll than the extension of healthcare subsidies that are at the core of Democrats’ demands.

    “I don’t want the Dems to back down because it shows weakness,” said Snellenberg, who worked at a nearby naval intelligence center prior to retirement. “But it’s going to come back and bite us if it goes on longer than a month.”

    Cook, Snellenberg’s Republican counterpart, said she was unsure if the shutdown would prove to be a critical factor in the off-year election’s headline race for governor between Democratic former Representative Abigail Spanberger and Republican Lieutenant Governor Winsome Earle-Sears.

    But she worried a protracted shutdown could boomerang on Republicans heading into the 2026 midterm elections. Democrats are seeking to oust the Republican incumbent in a competitive congressional seat that includes the city of Virginia Beach in their bid to retake control of the House of Representatives. 

    “It might hurt us in the midterms,” said Cook, 61, a former Department of Defense employee who was wearing a T-shirt bearing the word “Freedom” in a tribute to slain conservative activist Charlie Kirk. “In this area – only because we’re a lot of Navy and a lot of DOD and federal jobs.”

    About 335,000 civilian employees at the Defense Department – nearly half its workforce – were slated for furlough under its shutdown plan.

    Public opinion surveys echo Snellenberg and Cook’s shared anxieties: that both parties stand to lose support, though more people seem ready, at least for now, to fault President Donald Trump and his Republican Party, which controls both chambers of Congress.

    A poll by Marist, PBS News and NPR conducted in late September prior to the shutdown found that 31% of respondents would blame both sides equally, while 38% said they would hold Republicans culpable and 27% said they’d blame Democrats.

    The shutdown is already factoring into a key state-level November 4 race, with incumbent Democrat Michael Feggans last week releasing a 30-second ad highlighting the potential economic damage to his lower house district in Virginia Beach.

    “Someone who’s always spoken about the art of the deal is going on another shutdown,” Feggans, referring to Trump and his self-branding as a deal-maker, said in an interview. “We didn’t have any government shutdowns during the Biden administration.”

    Tim Anderson, his Republican opponent, said he believes Democrats, who have the votes to block a stopgap funding bill in the U.S. Senate, will be seen by most Americans as the intransigent party at the outset of the shutdown.

    “But if this continues for a while, voters will start looking at the president as the responsible entity in the shutdown,” Anderson told Reuters, adding that he could see an ongoing shutdown hurting his chances on November 4. “The longer this goes, the worse it’s going to hurt Republicans.”

    The shutdown, which entered its fifth day on Sunday, has suspended scientific research, financial oversight, economic data reports, and a wide range of other activities. With some exceptions, most federal employees will not be paid until a deal to reopen the government is made.

    Nearly 60,000 people in the Hampton Roads area work for the federal government, while another 85,000 in the area are active duty military, according to Bob McNab, chair of the economics department at Old Dominion University. Because of a pullback in their spending, the region could lose $1 billion a month in economic activity during a sustained shutdown, McNab said.

    In interviews with more than two dozen voters, federal employees and elected officials in Virginia Beach and the nearby city of Chesapeake on Thursday, nearly all expressed worries about the financial impact on themselves or their loved ones.

    But several Republicans told Reuters that they wanted Trump to hold his ground, even if it meant economic pain for the region, arguing that Democrats were wrong as a matter of principle for using their leverage to block the proposed short-term spending bill.

    Democrats say they do not trust Republicans to honor any agreement that would first reopen the government and then tackle the healthcare subsidies, which were passed as part of a 2021 Democratic COVID relief package and now help 24 million Americans pay for coverage.

    Jan Callaway, a Republican poll watcher, said depending on how Trump went about it she could support him using the shutdown to fire more civil servants, as he has threatened to do, even with 300,000 already set to be pushed out by the end of 2025.

    “I’m concerned if it goes on for a long time, but I think the Democrats are shooting themselves in the foot,” Callaway, 69, said. “I trust Trump … he’s the king of making deals.”

    Two Democratic-leaning independents told Reuters that they were worried that Republicans were winning the messaging battle, gaining traction by repeatedly making the false claim that the Democratic spending proposal would extend health coverage to people who are in the country illegally.

    “They have not done a very good job in selling the truth,” said Stuart, who would only give her first name, referring to leaders of the Democratic Party. “It seems to me, unfortunately, that the Republicans have the larger megaphone.”

    Much like their parties, Snellenberg and Cook have not crossed the aisle, or in their case the walkway, to discuss the shutdown. Volunteers for both parties were mostly keeping to themselves, when Reuters visited this week.

    (Reporting by Nathan Layne in Virginia Beach, editing by Ross Colvin and Diane Craft)

    Copyright 2025 Thomson Reuters.

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  • US Judge Temporarily Blocks Trump Administration From Deploying National Guard in Portland

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    (Reuters) -A federal judge on Saturday temporarily blocked U.S. President Donald Trump from deploying 200 Oregon National Guard troops to the city of Portland while a lawsuit challenging the move plays out.

    The ruling by U.S. District Judge Karin Immergut in Portland is a setback for Trump, a Republican, as he seeks to dispatch the military to cities he describes as lawless over the objections of their Democratic leaders.

    Democratic Oregon Attorney General Dan Rayfield’s office filed the lawsuit on September 28, a day after Trump said he would send troops to Portland to protect federal immigration facilities from “domestic terrorists.”

    The case was initially assigned to U.S. District Judge Michael Simon, an appointee of Democratic President Barack Obama. He recused himself after the Trump administration raised concerns about comments made by his wife, a congresswoman, criticizing the troop deployment. The case was reassigned to Immergut, who was appointed by Trump during his first term in office.

    Oregon asked the court to declare the deployment illegal and block it from going forward, saying Trump was exaggerating the threat of protests against his immigration policies to justify illegally seizing control of state National Guard units.

    While Trump described the city as “War ravaged,” Oregon said that Portland protests were “small and sedate,” resulting in only 25 arrests in mid-June and no arrests in the three-and-a-half-months since June 19. Oregon’s lawsuit said that Trump announced the troop deployment after Fox News showed video clips from “substantially larger and more turbulent protests” in Portland in 2020.

    The stark divide in how the two sides described the situation on the ground in Portland was evident at a Friday court hearing before Immergut.

    U.S. Department of Justice attorney Eric Hamilton said that “vicious and cruel radicals” had laid siege to the Portland headquarters of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The decision to send 200 troops – just 5% of the number recently sent to respond to Los Angeles protests – showed restraint, Hamilton said.

    Caroline Turco, representing Portland, said that there had been no violence against ICE officers for months and that recent ICE protests were “sedate” in the week before Trump declared the city to be a war zone, sometimes featuring less than a dozen protesters.

    “The president’s perception of what is happening in Portland is not the reality on the ground,” Turco said. “The president’s perception is that it is World War Two out here. The reality is that this is a beautiful city with a sophisticated police force that can handle the situation.”

    Immergut asked attorneys how much deference she should give to Trump’s description of Portland in social media posts, and seemed skeptical about treating those posts as an official legal determination.

    “Really? A social media post is going to count as a presidential determination that you can send the National Guard to cities?” Immergut asked. “I mean, is that really what I should be relying on as his determination?”

    Oregon’s lawsuit argued that Trump’s deployment violates several federal laws and the state’s sovereign right to police its own citizens. Trump’s decision to send troops only to “disfavored” Democratic cities like Portland also violates the state’s rights under the 10th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, according to the lawsuit.

    The lawsuit is the latest legal challenge to Trump’s deployments of military forces to Democrat-led cities, including Los Angeles and Washington, which he says were overrun with crime and hostile to immigration enforcement.

    State and local Democratic leaders have disputed those claims and accused Trump of violating longstanding U.S. laws and norms against using the military for domestic law enforcement.

    A federal judge blocked the Trump administration from using the military to fight crime in California on September 2, but that ruling is on hold while the administration appeals.

    Washington D.C.’s Democratic attorney general filed a lawsuit on September 4 to end Trump’s deployment of National Guard troops in the nation’s capital. A judge has yet to rule on the request.

    (Reporting by Brendan O’Brien and Dietrich Knauth in New York, Editing by Alexia Garamfalvi, Lincoln Feast and Rosalba O’Brien)

    Copyright 2025 Thomson Reuters.

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  • Democrat in Virginia Attorney General Race Apologizes for 2022 Texts Depicting Political Violence

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    RICHMOND, Va. (AP) — Virginia’s Democratic candidate for attorney general has apologized for widely condemned text messages from 2022 that revealed him suggesting that a prominent Republican get “two bullets to the head.”

    The texts put the Democratic challenger, Jay Jones, on the defensive in what has been a hard-hitting campaign. Early voting is well underway in Virginia ahead of the November general election.

    Jones’ campaign didn’t challenge the accuracy of the texts, first reported by The National Review, and he offered a public apology to Todd Gilbert, the target of the messages. Jones said he took “full responsibility for my actions.” Gilbert was speaker of Virginia’s House of Delegates at the time of the text messages but is no longer a legislator.

    Jones has faced a torrent of bipartisan criticism since the messages surfaced. Jones is challenging Republican incumbent Jason Miyares for the job as Virginia’s top prosecutor.

    Miyares ripped into Jones on Saturday, questioning his challenger’s fitness for the job.

    “You have to be coming from an incredibly dark place to say what you said,” Miyares told reporters. “Not by a stranger. By a colleague. Somebody you had served with. Someone you have worked with.”

    Jones and Republican House Delegate Carrie Coyner spoke in a phone conversation following the text exchange, in which Jones described Gilbert’s children dying in the arms of their mother, according to the National Review’s report.

    “I have been a prosecutor, and I have been obviously serving as attorney general,” Miyares said. “I have met quietly one-on-one with victims. There is no cry like the cry of a mother that lost her child. None.”

    A spokesperson for the Virginia House Republican caucus, contacted on Saturday by The Associated Press, said Gilbert was not commenting on the text messages. Gilbert stepped down as a legislator to become a federal prosecutor this year but resigned a month later.

    The revelation about the text messages shook up the campaign and comes as both parties seek advantage in statewide races being closely watched for trends heading into next year’s midterm elections, when control of Congress is at stake. And it comes amid an escalating threat of political violence in the country following the shooting deaths of conservative activist Charlie Kirk and former Minnesota Democratic House Speaker Melissa Hortman and her husband.

    In Virginia, other Democrats running for statewide office didn’t mince words in criticizing Jones.

    Abigail Spanberger, the Democratic gubernatorial candidate, said in a statement Friday that she “spoke frankly with Jay about my disgust with what he had said and texted. I made clear to Jay that he must fully take responsibility for his words.” She vowed to ”always condemn violent language in our politics.”

    Ghazala Hashmi, the Democrat running for lieutenant governor, said “political violence has no place in our country and I condemn it at every turn.” Hashmi added that “we must demand better of our leaders and of each other.” Candidates for governor and lieutenant governor run separately in Virginia.

    The Republican Attorneys General Association said Jones should withdraw from the campaign for his “abhorrent” text messages. The group’s chairman, Kansas Attorney General Kris Kobach, said the messages were unacceptable “from someone who wants to represent law enforcement.”

    “There is no place for political violence, including joking about it – especially from an elected official,” Kobach said.

    Jones did not hold elected office when he sent the text messages about Gilbert to Coyner, who is seeking reelection in a competitive House district. Jones had formerly served as a state legislator, and stepped down in 2021.

    In his texts, Jones wrote: “Three people two bullets … Gilbert, hitler, and pol pot … Gilbert gets two bullets to the head.” Pol Pot was the leader of the murderous Khmer Rouge regime in Cambodia.

    Conyer replied: “Jay … Please stop.” Jones responded: “Lol … Ok, ok.”

    In his statement Friday, Jones said: “Reading back those words made me sick to my stomach. I am embarrassed, ashamed and sorry.”

    “I have reached out to Speaker Gilbert to apologize directly to him, his wife Jennifer, and their children,” he added. “I cannot take back what I said; I can only take full accountability and offer my sincere apology.”

    Schreiner reported from Shelbyville, Kentucky.

    Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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  • AP Reader Question: How Does the Shutdown Affect National Guard Troops?

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    Here’s a question about the shutdown submitted by an Associated Press reader, Christian P.:


    How does the shutdown affect National Guard troops?

    National Guard troops will not be paid on time during the shutdown, just like the thousands of other employees deemed “essential.”

    All active-duty military members, including those in the deployed Guard, must remain on duty, but they will not receive pay until funding is restored.

    In years past, Congress has passed a stopgap measure preventing this pause in military pay. Days before government funding lapsed in 2013, lawmakers approved the Pay Our Military Act, which kept military paychecks going during the shutdown.

    Before this shutdown happened, a similar bill was introduced, but it was not voted on before lawmakers adjourned and the shutdown went into effect.

    We’ll be showcasing a different reader question about the shutdown each day for the coming several days.

    Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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  • Trump Is Reviving Large Sales of Coal From Public Lands. Will Anyone Want It?

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    BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) — U.S. officials in the coming days are set to hold the government’s biggest coal sales in more than a decade, offering 600 million tons from publicly owned reserves next to strip mines in Montana and Wyoming.

    The sales are a signature piece of President Donald Trump’s ambitions for companies to dig more coal from federal lands and burn it for electricity. Yet most power plants served by those mines plan to quit burning coal altogether within 10 years, an Associated Press data analysis shows.

    Three other mines poised for expansions or new leases under Trump also face declining demand as power plants use less of their coal and in some cases shut down, according to data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration and the nonprofit Global Energy Monitor.

    Those market realities raise a fundamental question about the Republican administration’s push to revive a heavily polluting industry that long has been in decline: Who’s going to buy all that coal?

    The question looms over the administration’s enthusiastic embrace of coal, a leading contributor to climate change. It also shows the uncertainty inherent in inserting those policies into markets where energy-producing customers make long-term decisions with massive implications, not just for their own viability but for the future of the planet, in an ever-shifting political landscape.


    Rushing to approve projects

    The upcoming lease sales in Montana and Wyoming are in the Powder River Basin, home to the most productive U.S. coal fields.

    Officials say they will go forward beginning Monday despite the government shutdown. The administration exempted from furlough those workers who process fossil fuel permits and leases.

    Democratic President Joe Biden last year acted to block future coal leases in the region, citing their potential to make climate change worse. Burning the coal from the two leases being sold in coming days would generate more than 1 billion tons of planet-warming carbon dioxide, according to a Department of Energy formula.

    Trump rejected climate change as a “con job” during a Sept. 23 speech to the U.N. General Assembly, an assessment that puts him at odds with scientists. He praised coal as “beautiful” and boasted about the abundance of U.S. supplies while deriding solar and wind power. Administration officials said Wednesday that they were canceling $8 billion in grants for clean energy projects in 16 states won by Democrat Kamala Harris in the 2024 presidential election.

    In response to an order from Trump on his first day in office in January, coal lease sales that had been shelved or stalled were revived and rushed to approval, with considerations of greenhouse gas emissions dismissed. Administration officials have advanced coal mine expansions and lease sales in Utah, North Dakota, Tennessee and Alabama, in addition to Montana and Wyoming.

    Interior Secretary Doug Burgum said Monday that the administration is opening more than 20,000 square miles (52,000 square kilometers) of federal lands to mining. That is an area bigger than New Hampshire and Vermont combined.

    The administration also sharply reduced royalty rates for coal from federal lands, ordered a coal-fired power plant in Michigan to stay open past planned retirement dates and pledged $625 million to recommission or modernize coal plants amid growing electricity demand from artificial intelligence and data centers.

    “We’re putting American miners back to work,” Burgum said, flanked by coal miners and Republican politicians. “We’ve got a demand curve coming at us in terms of the demand for electricity that is literally going through the roof.”

    The AP’s finding that power plants served by mines on public lands are burning less coal reflects an industrywide decline that began in 2007.

    Energy experts and economists were not surprised. They expressed doubt that coal would ever reclaim dominance in the power sector. Interior Department officials did not respond to questions about future demand for coal from public lands.

    But it will take time for more electricity from planned natural gas and solar projects to come online. That means Trump’s actions could give a short-term bump to coal, said Umed Paliwal, an expert in electricity markets at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.

    “Eventually coal will get pushed out of the market,” Paliwal said. “The economics will just eat the coal generation over time.”

    The coal sales in Montana and Wyoming were requested by Navajo Nation-owned company. The Navajo Transitional Energy Co. (NTEC) has been one of the largest industry players since buying several major mines in the Powder River Basin during a 2019 bankruptcy auction. Those mines supply 34 power plants in 19 states.

    Twenty-one of the plants are scheduled to stop burning coal in the next decade. They include all five plants using coal from NTEC’s Spring Creek mine in Montana.

    In filings with federal officials, the company said the fair market value of 167 million tons of federal coal next to the Spring Creek mine was just over $126,000.

    That is less than one-tenth of a penny per ton, a fraction of what coal brought in its heyday. By comparison, the last large-scale lease sale in the Powder River Basin, also for 167 million tons of coal, drew a bid of $35 million in 2013. Federal officials rejected that as too low.

    NTEC said the low value was supported by prior government reviews predicting fewer buyers for coal. The company said taxpayers would benefit in future years from royalties on any coal mined.

    “The market for coal will decline significantly over the next two decades. There are fewer coal mines expanding their reserves, there are fewer buyers of thermal coal and there are more regulatory constraints,” the company said.

    In central Wyoming on Wednesday, the government will sell 440 million tons of coal next to NTEC’s Antelope Mine. Just over half of the 29 power plants served by the mine are scheduled to stop burning coal by 2035.

    Among them is the Rawhide plant in northern Colorado. It is due to quit coal in 2029 but will keep making electricity with natural gas and 30 megawatts of solar panels.


    Aging plants and optimism

    The largest U.S. coal company has offered a more optimistic take on coal’s future. Because new nuclear and gas plants are years away, Peabody Energy suggested in September that demand for coal in the U.S. could increase 250 million tons annually — up almost 50% from current volumes.

    Peabody’s projection was based on the premise that existing power plants can burn more coal. That amount, known as plant capacity, dropped by about half in recent years.

    “U.S. coal is clearly in comeback mode,” Peabody’s president, James Grech, said in a recent conference call with analysts. “The U.S. has more energy in its coal reserves than any nation has in any one energy source.”

    No large coal power plants have come online in the U.S. since 2013. Most existing plants are 40 years old or older. Money pledged by the administration to refurbish older plants will not go very far given that a single boiler component at a plant can cost $25 million to replace, said Nikhil Kumar with GridLab, an energy consulting group.

    That leads back to the question of who will buy the coal.

    “I don’t see where you get all this coal consumed at remaining facilities,” Kumar said.

    Gruver reported from Wellington, Colorado. Associated Press writer Susan Montoya Bryan in Albuquerque, New Mexico, contributed to this report.

    Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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  • New Mexico Governor Signs Bills to Counter Federal Cuts, Support Health Care and Food Assistance

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    SANTA FE, N.M. (AP) — New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham signed a package of bills Friday aimed at shoring up food assistance, rural health care and public broadcasting in response to recently enacted federal cuts.

    The new legislation responds to President Donald Trump’s big bill as well as fear that health insurance rates will rise with the expiration of COVID-era subsidies to the Affordable Care Act exchange in New Mexico. Exchange subsidies are a major point of contention in the Washington budget standoff and related federal government shutdown.

    New Mexico would set aside $17 million to backfill the federal credits if they are not renewed, under legislation signed by the governor.

    The Democratic-led Legislature met on Wednesday and Thursday to approved $162 million in state spending on rural health care, food assistance, restocking food banks, public broadcast and more.

    Starting this year, New Mexico expects to lose about $200 million annually because of new federal tax cuts. But the state still has a large budget surplus thanks to booming oil production.

    “When federal support falls short, New Mexico steps up,” Lujan Grisham said in a statement.

    Many federal health care changes under Trump’s big bill don’t kick in until 2027 or later, and Democratic legislators in New Mexico acknowledged that their bills are only a temporary bandage.

    Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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  • Trump Administration Offers Unaccompanied Migrant Children $2,500 to Voluntarily Leave US, Letter Shows

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    LOS ANGELES (Reuters) -The Trump administration is offering unaccompanied migrant children $2,500 to leave the U.S. voluntarily, according to a letter seen by Reuters that was sent to migrant shelters.

    Officials at the Department of Homeland Security’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement confirmed a monetary offer was being made but did not specify an amount.

    The move is the latest financial offer made by the DHS under President Donald Trump aimed at encouraging voluntary deportations. In June, the State Department moved $250 million to DHS for voluntary deportations with the administration offering a $1,000 stipend to migrants who “self deported.”

    KIDS NEED PROTECTION NOT COERCION, CRITIC SAYS

    According to the letter sent to shelters on Friday by the DHS Office of Refugee Resettlement, the department will provide a “one-time resettlement support stipend of $2,500” to unaccompanied children 14 or older.

    An ICE official said the offer was first being made to 17-year-olds.

    Minors from Mexico are not eligible for the program but children who had already volunteered to leave the U.S. as of Friday would be covered, the letter says.

    Wendy Young, president of Kids in Need of Defense, which provides legal services and support to unaccompanied children, called the move “a cruel tactic” that undermined “laws that guarantee” a process to determine if a child is eligible for U.S. protection.

    “Unaccompanied children seeking safety in the United States deserve our protection rather than being coerced into agreeing to return back to the very conditions that placed their lives and safety at risk,” Young said in a statement.

    According to federal law, migrant children who arrive at U.S. borders without a parent or legal guardian are classified as unaccompanied and sent to federal government-run shelters until they can be placed with a family member or in foster care.

    More than 2,100 unaccompanied children were in the custody of the Department of Health and Human Services as of Thursday, according to department data.

    HHS communications director Andrew Nixon said in a statement that the program “gives UACs a choice and allows them to make an informed decision about their future.”

    Any payment would be provided after an immigration judge approved the request and the child arrived in their country of origin, Nixon said.

    The administration’s efforts to swiftly deport unaccompanied children have faced legal challenges.

    Last month, a federal judge ordered that the administration refrain from deporting unaccompanied Guatemalan migrant children with active immigration cases while a legal challenge continued.

    More than 600,000 migrant children have crossed the U.S.-Mexico border without a parent or legal guardian since 2019, according to government data.

    (Reporting by Kristina Cooke, Ted Hesson; Writing by Christian Martinez; Editing by William Mallard)

    Copyright 2025 Thomson Reuters.

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  • The Latest: Trump Cancels Billions in Clean Energy Grants

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    The Trump administration is canceling $7.6 billion in grants that supported hundreds of clean energy projects in 16 states, all of which voted for Democrat Kamala Harris in last year’s presidential election.

    The Energy Department said in a statement Thursday that 223 projects were terminated after a review determined they did not adequately advance the nation’s energy needs or were not economically viable.

    Officials did not provide details about which projects are being cut, but said funding came from the Office of Clean Energy Demonstrations, Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, and other DOE bureaus.

    The cuts are likely to affect battery plants, hydrogen technology projects, upgrades to the electric grid and carbon-capture efforts, among many others, according to the environmental nonprofit Natural Resources Defense Council.


    Trump embraces Project 2025, which he once avoided

    Trump is openly embracing the conservative blueprint he tried to distance himself from during the 2024 presidential campaign.

    In a post on his Truth Social site Trump announced he would be meeting with his budget chief, “Russ Vought, he of PROJECT 2025 Fame, to determine which of the many Democrat Agencies, most of which are a political SCAM, he recommends to be cut, and whether or not those cuts will be temporary or permanent.”

    The comments, posted on Thursday, represented an about-face for Trump, who spent much of last year denouncing Project 2025, The Heritage Foundation’s massive proposed overhaul of the federal government, which was drafted by many of his longtime allies and current and former administration officials.

    Trump has seized on the government shutdown as an opportunity to reshape the federal workforce, threatening mass firings of workers and suggesting “irreversible” cuts to programs important to Democrats.


    What are Trump’s chances of the Nobel Prize?

    U.S. President Donald Trump’s bid to win the Nobel Peace Prize has drawn added attention to the annual guessing game over who its next laureate will be.

    Longtime Nobel watchers say Trump’s prospects remain remote despite a flurry of high-profile nominations and some notable foreign policy interventions for which he has taken personal credit.

    Experts say the Norwegian Nobel Committee typically focuses on the durability of peace, the promotion of international fraternity and the quiet work of institutions that strengthen those goals. Trump’s own record might even work against him, they said, citing his apparent disdain for multilateral institutions and his disregard for global climate change concerns.

    Still, the U.S. leader has repeatedly sought the Nobel spotlight since his first term, most recently telling United Nations delegates late last month “everyone says that I should get the Nobel Peace Prize.”

    A person cannot nominate themselves.

    Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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  • AP Decision Notes: What to Expect in Tennessee’s Special Congressional Election

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    WASHINGTON (AP) — More than a dozen candidates will compete for their parties’ nominations Tuesday to fill a vacant Tennessee congressional seat in the closely divided U.S. House.

    The winners will face off in a Dec. 2 special election to replace Republican former U.S. Rep. Mark Green, who resigned in July to work in the private sector. The contest in the state’s reliably Republican 7th Congressional District will likely temporarily pad the House GOP’s narrow advantage in the chamber. A vacant seat in a heavily Democratic Houston-area district in Texas will be filled in November.

    Among the 11 candidates seeking the Republican nomination are state Reps. Jody Barrett, Gino Bulso and Lee Reeves, former Tennessee Department of General Services Commissioner Matt Van Epps, who has Green’s endorsement, and Montgomery County Commissioner Jason Knight. The field also includes health care industry businessman Mason Foley; real estate businessman Stewart Parks, who was pardoned by President Donald Trump for his actions at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021; and former state Senate policy analyst Tres Wittum, who previously lost GOP primaries against U.S. Sen. Marsha Blackburn in 2024 and U.S. Rep. Andy Ogles in 2022.

    State Reps. Aftyn Behn, Vincent Dixie and Bo Mitchell and businessman Darden Copeland seek the Democratic nomination.

    Van Epps led the Republican field in campaign contributions, with about $359,000 raised through mid-September. Reeves and Parks raised close to $270,000 each and Barrett nearly $242,000. Still, Van Epps was outspent by much of the field thanks to large loans several candidates made to their own campaigns. Bulso loaned nearly $494,000 to his campaign. Foley loaned his campaign $325,000, while Reeves loaned $300,000 to his committee and Parks loaned $67,000 to his.

    Copeland raised the most in the Democratic contest, with about $335,000 in contributions and $100,000 loaned from the candidate. He had the bulk of his haul available to spend as of Sept. 17. By that point, Mitchell had raised about $203,000 for his campaign and had less than half of it remaining available to spend as the campaign entered its final stretch.

    Most of the 7th District has elected only Republicans to Congress for more than a dozen years. The district also includes parts of heavily Democratic Davidson County, which is home to Nashville. The Nashville area once anchored a separate congressional district favorable to Democrats, but state Republicans redrew the lines in 2022 and divided Davidson County among the 7th and two neighboring Republican-friendly districts.

    Trump carried the 7th District in 2024 with about 60% of the vote, compared with about 38% for then-Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic nominee. Harris received nearly 68% of the vote in the 7th District’s portion of Davidson County, which comprised about 22% of the total district vote. Trump carried each of the remaining 13 counties with at least 59% of the vote.

    Montgomery County made up about 24% of the district vote in the 2024 presidential race, the largest share of any county in the district.

    Green was elected twice each under the old and new district boundaries. Under the old lines, he received between 67% and 70% of the vote. He won with 60% of the vote under the current lines in 2022 and 2024. He never ran in a competitive primary under the current boundaries.

    The Associated Press does not make projections and will declare a winner only when it’s determined there is no scenario that would allow the trailing candidates to close the gap. If a race has not been called, the AP will continue to cover any newsworthy developments, such as candidate concessions or declarations of victory. In doing so, the AP will make clear that it has not yet declared a winner and explain why.

    In Tennessee, recounts are held only as part of a legal challenge in the courts. There are no automatic recounts, and losing candidates may not request recounts. The AP may declare a winner in a race that is subject to a recount if it can determine the lead is too large for a recount or legal challenge to change the outcome.

    Here’s a look at what to expect Tuesday:

    The special primary in Tennessee’s 7th Congressional District will be held Tuesday. Polls in the district close at 7 p.m. local time, which is 8 p.m. ET. Although Tennessee is located in two time zones, the 7th District falls entirely within the Central time zone.

    The AP will provide vote results and declare a winner in the special congressional primary.

    Tennessee does not register voters by party, which in other states usually means that any registered voter may choose to vote in any party’s primary. A rarely enforced 1972 law says primary voters must be “affiliated with” or a “bona fide” member of a party to vote in that party’s primary, and a 2023 law requires local elections officials to post signs at polling places saying so. But those terms aren’t clearly defined. The law faced multiple legal challenges, but a federal court dismissed the complaint in 2024.


    What do turnout and advance vote look like?

    There were more than 469,000 registered voters in the 7th Congressional District in the August 2024 state primary. Turnout was about 7% of registered voters in the Republican U.S. House primary and about 5% in the Democratic primary. Both primaries were uncontested.

    Among the 14 counties located either entirely or partly within the 7th District, about 58% of 2024 primary ballots were cast early by in-person or absentee voters.

    As of Wednesday, nearly 15,000 Democratic primary ballots and nearly 16,000 Republican primary ballots had been cast before the special primary.


    How long does vote-counting usually take?

    In the 2024 general election, the AP first reported 7th District results at 8:03 p.m. ET from Perry County, three minutes after polls closed. The election night tabulation ended at 12:36 a.m. ET with more than 99% of total votes counted.

    As of Tuesday, there will be 56 days until the Dec. 2 special election in the 7th District and 392 days until the 2026 midterm elections.

    Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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  • The Blame Game Is on at Federal Agencies, Where Political Messages Fault Democrats for the Shutdown

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    NEW YORK (AP) — Army veteran Samuel Port couldn’t believe what he was reading in his latest weekly newsletter emailed from the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs.

    In Port’s view, the finger-pointing was inappropriate from a federal agency and lacked the context that Republicans, too, could have taken steps to keep the government funded. He said it wore away any trust he had left in the VA to offer services without a political agenda.

    “This blatant propaganda being spat out was astonishing,” said Port, a Virginia-based volunteer for the progressive advocacy organization Common Defense. “Then the astonishment turned into just anger that we’re being politicized like this.”

    Port is among a growing number of Americans whose routine interactions with the federal government this week have been met with partisan messaging. As a Senate deadlock keeps the federal government unfunded, with no end in sight, some traditionally apolitical federal agencies are using their official channels to spread a coordinated political message: It’s the Democrats’ fault.

    The rhetoric, popping up in bright-red webpage banners, email autoreplies and social media posts, lays blame on the political party that is out of power in Washington when both sides are refusing to accommodate the other.

    Democrats, who have minorities in both the U.S. Senate and House, have demanded that a set of expiring health insurance tax credits be extended before they sign on to any deal. Republicans, who need several Democratic votes in the Senate, said those negotiations should wait until after the funding measure passes.

    Experts say the communication strategy from across the federal government reflects how aligned President Donald Trump’s entire administration has become in targeting his political opponents.

    Far more partisan than the straightforward alerts that typically grace agency websites during shutdowns, the messages are in keeping with Trump’s pattern of requiring loyalty and obedience at all levels of government.

    “There’s really been a consistent and sustained effort to try to pull the entire bureaucracy in sync with what the president wants,” said Don Kettl, a professor emeritus and former dean of the University of Maryland School of Public Policy. “The big risk here is that it erodes the fundamental trust that people have in government’s ability to be impartial.”


    Several government websites blame Democrats

    Many internet users noticed the first political postings from government agencies on Tuesday, before the shutdown began. The website of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development displayed a message warning that “The Radical Left are going to shut down the government and inflict massive pain on the American people unless they get their $1.5 trillion wish list of demands.”

    That afternoon, employees across the federal government reported receiving messages from their agencies noting Trump’s general opposition to a shutdown.

    By Thursday, the second day of the shutdown, at least nine federal agencies displayed messages on their websites or social media accounts pinning it on the “radical left” or Democrats.

    The website of the Small Business Administration placed its message in a red banner that took up the entire screen on a smartphone. It said actions from Senate Democrats are preventing the agency “from serving America’s 36 million small businesses.” Other websites, including that of the Food and Drug Administration, told visitors that mission-critical activities would continue “during the Democrat-led government shutdown.”

    Several other federal agencies maintained politically neutral messages, noting simply that there might be delays in services or updates because of the lapse in funding.


    Employee out-of-office messages are changed

    At the Department of Education, out-of-office email messages were reset Wednesday with language blaming Democrats for the shutdown.

    “On September 19, 2025, the House of Representatives passed H.R. 5371, a clean continuing resolution,” the message said. “Unfortunately, Democrat Senators are blocking passage of H.R. 5371 in the Senate which has led to a lapse in appropriations.”

    Some employees tried to change it to something nonpartisan only to see it reverted, according to an employee who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of retribution.

    The White House isn’t shying away from the politics, displaying a by-the-second ticker on its website adding up the length of time for which “Democrats Have Shut Down the Government.”

    Concerned citizens calling the White House comment line on Wednesday also heard a political voicemail message. In the recording, press secretary Karoline Leavitt repeats Trump’s false claim that Democrats forced the government shutdown fight because they want to fund health care for illegal immigrants.


    Could the messaging violate federal law?

    Ethics watchdogs said the political messages from government agency websites and emails exceed the level of partisanship they have seen in the past from the civil service.

    Multiple experts said the messages also violate a 1939 law called the Hatch Act, which restricts certain political activities by federal employees. Kathleen Clark, a government ethics lawyer and law professor at Washington University said they are “aimed at pursuing partisan political advantages” and therefore violate the law.

    On Thursday, Democrats on the House Oversight Committee sent a letter to the Office of Special Counsel calling for an investigation into the messages for “apparent violations of the Hatch Act.”

    Donald K. Sherman, executive director of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, said he doesn’t think the messages violate the Hatch Act because they discuss the Democratic Party related to a policy difference rather than an election or a candidate. Still, he said, the postings might violate other ethics laws and are “wildly inappropriate.”

    Veterans Affairs spokesman Pete Kasperowicz defended his agency’s email message, saying it was “100% factual.”

    HUD Secretary Scott Turner said in a Wednesday night interview with NewsNation that he’s not worried about the Hatch Act allegations against his agency. He called them a “distraction” to deflect from “irresponsible actions on the Hill” and how “Americans are being impacted greatly by this government shutdown.”

    Asked about the HUD website banner Thursday morning, House Speaker Mike Johnson said it shared “the objective truth.”

    “There are 44 Democrats in the Senate — and by the way every Democrat in the House except one — who voted to shut the government down,” Johnson said in a press conference outside his office. “They are the ones that made that decision. The White House, the executive branch, take no pleasure in this.”

    Associated Press writers Collin Binkley, Joey Cappelletti and Gary Fields in Washington, and video journalist Ty ONeil in Las Vegas contributed to this report.

    Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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  • Trump Says There Could Be Firings and Project Cuts if Shutdown Continues

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    WASHINGTON (Reuters) -U.S. President Donald Trump on Thursday said firings of federal workers and cuts to projects could occur if a government shutdown that began Wednesday continues.

    “There could be firings, and that’s their fault,” Trump said of Democrats in Congress, when asked during an interview with OAN television network about a recent memo from the Office of Management and Budget that raised prospects of firings.

    “We could cut projects that they wanted, favorite projects, and they’d be permanently cut,” he said, adding “I am allowed to cut things that should have never been approved in the first place and I will probably do that.”

    (Reporting by Kanishka Singh and Andrea Shalal, Editing by Franklin Paul)

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  • Putin Praises Trump but Warns That Supplies of US Long-Range Missile to Ukraine Will Badly Hurt Ties

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    MOSCOW (AP) — Russian President Vladimir Putin warned the United States that supplies of long-range missiles to Ukraine will seriously damage relations between Moscow and Washington but will not change the situation on the battlefield where the Russian army is making slow but steady advances.

    The potential supply of U.S. Tomahawk cruise missiles to Kyiv will signal a “qualitatively new stage of escalation, including in relations between Russia and the U.S.,” Putin said at a forum of foreign policy experts in Russia’s Black Sea resort of Sochi.

    The Russian leader noted that even though Tomahawk missiles will inflict damage on Russia if supplied to Ukraine, Russian air defenses will quickly adapt to the new threat. “It will certainly not change the balance of force on the battlefield,” he added, emphasizing that the Russian military is continuously making gains against Ukraine.

    The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Putin’s remarks.

    At the same time, Putin hailed U.S. President Donald Trump’s efforts to help negotiate peace in Ukraine and described their August summit in Alaska as productive.

    “It was good that we made an attempt to search for and find possible ways to settle the Ukrainian crisis,” he said, adding that he felt “comfortable” talking to Trump.

    While praising Trump and trying to emphasize potential common interests, including nuclear arms control, the Russian president sent a stern warning to Ukraine’s Western allies against trying to seize ships that carry Russian oil to global markers. He argued that would amount to piracy and could trigger a forceful response while sharply destabilizing the global oil market.

    Asked about the detention of an oil tanker off France’s Atlantic coast, which President Emmanuel Macron linked to Russia’s so-called shadow fleet of aging tankers of uncertain ownership that are avoiding Western sanctions, Putin cast it as an attempt by Macron to distract public attention from his country’s own internal problems.

    He strongly warned the West against such action, arguing that it defies international maritime law and could trigger a forceful response. “The risk of confrontation will seriously increase,” he added.

    Putin also scoffed at Western claims of possible Russian involvement in recent drone flights over Denmark, casting them as part of purported NATO efforts to “inflame tensions to boost the defense spending.”

    “I won’t do it anymore — to France, Denmark, Copenhagen, Lisbon — wherever they could reach,” he said with a sardonic grin.

    Asked about Charlie Kirk’s assassination, Putin called it a “heinous crime” that reflected a “deep split” in American society. He hailed Kirk as a hero killed for promoting the same conservative values that Russia shares.

    Putin also praised Michael Gloss, an American and the son of a deputy CIA chief, who joined the Russian military and was killed in action in Ukraine in 2024. He said he had awarded Gloss with a medal, which he handed to Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff during his visit to Moscow.

    The Russian leader likened Gloss to Kirk, saying they championed similar “traditional” values. “He gave his life while defending those values as a Russian soldier, and Kirk gave his life while fighting for the same values in the United States,” Putin said.

    In response to questions about Gloss, the CIA said in a statement that the agency “considers Michael’s passing to be a private family matter — and not a national security issue. The entire CIA family is heartbroken for their loss.”

    Associated Press Writer David Klepper in Washington contributed.

    Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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  • The Government Shuts Down, and Trump Goes Online — Very Online

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    WASHINGTON (AP) — On Thursday morning, as thousands of federal employees stayed home and faced potential layoffs because of the government shutdown, President Donald Trump got right to work on social media.

    He started by sharing praise from supporters. Then he falsely claimed that “DEMOCRATS WANT TO GIVE YOUR HEALTHCARE MONEY TO ILLEGAL ALIENS.” And then he announced that he would meet with his top budget adviser to figure out where to make permanent cuts to federal programs that “are a political SCAM.”

    All that was before 8 a.m., just one flurry in a blizzard of online commentary from the president as the government shutdown entered a second day. Like so many other times when he’s faced complex crises with no easy solutions, Trump seems determined to post his way through it.

    The stream of invective and trolling has been remarkable even for a 79-year-old president who is as chronically online as any member of Gen Z. His style is mirrored by the rest of his administration, which so far seems more interested in mocking and pummeling Democrats than negotiating with them.

    Government websites feature pop-up messages blaming “the Radical Left” for the shutdown, an unusually political message for ostensibly nonpartisan agencies. When reporters email the White House press office, they receive an automated reply blaming slow answers on “staff shortages resulting from the Democrat Shutdown.”

    Trump’s White House is accustomed to take-no-prisoners political messaging, continuing its aggressive style from last year’s campaign that critics describe as callous and vindictive. The administration rarely misses an opportunity to get under the skin of its opponents.

    The president took a similar online approach to the last government shutdown, which began in December 2018 and lasted until January 2019 during his first term in office. On the 30th day of that shutdown, Politico tallied 40 tweets from Trump, including a complaint that then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi was acting “so irrationally” and gratitude for federal employees for “working so hard for your Country and not getting paid.”

    Back then, Trump took most of the blame, with an Associated Press-NORC poll showing about 7 in 10 Americans saying he had “a great deal” or “quite a bit” of responsibility. He ultimately backed down from his demand for border wall funding, signed legislation allowing the government to reopen.

    It remains to be seen who will face the most blowback this time. Democrats say they won’t vote for any spending legislation unless it extends health care subsidies, used to purchase insurance through the Affordable Care Act, that are scheduled to expire at the end of the year. Republicans accuse them of being obstructionist, insisting that government operations should be funded while other policies are negotiated separately.

    A recent New York Times/Siena poll, which was conducted before the shutdown began, found slightly more registered voters would blame Trump and Republicans in Congress than Democrats. About one-third said they’d blame both sides equally.

    There was another red flag for Trump in a one-day text message poll conducted Oct. 1 by the Washington Post. The results showed 47% of Americans saying they thought the president and Republicans in Congress are mainly to blame, compared with 30% saying that of Democrats in Congress.

    Trump appears determined to move the needle — or at least blow off some steam — with his account on Truth Social, a social media platform founded by Trump after he was banned from Twitter following the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol.

    The presidential trolling began on Monday after Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries met with Trump and Republicans at the White House. Trump posted a deepfake video of the lawmakers, with Schumer saying, “nobody likes Democrats anymore.” Jeffries was depicted with a cartoon sombrero and mustache.

    “It’s a disgusting video, and we’re going to continue to make clear that bigotry will get you nowhere,” Jeffries said on MSNBC this week.

    Trump posted a clip of his appearance, but with a soundtrack of mariachi music. The sombrero and mustache were back, too.

    “Every day Democrats keep the government shut down, the sombrero gets 10x bigger,” the White House wrote on social media.

    Hours before the shutdown began on Tuesday night, the president posted photos from his meeting with Jeffries and Schumer. The pictures showed red “Trump 2028” hats on the Resolute Desk in the Oval Office, a nod to his talk of running for an unconstitutional third term.

    Trump did not have any public appearances scheduled on Thursday. An event to commemorate National Hispanic Heritage Month was postponed because of the shutdown.

    The White House did not respond to questions about how he was working to resolve the situation. But for at least a few hours, Trump’s social media account went quiet.

    Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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  • Justice Department Fires Key Prosecutor in Elite Office Already Beset by Turmoil, AP Sources Say

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    WASHINGTON (AP) — The Justice Department fired a top national security prosecutor amid criticism from a right-wing commentator over his work during the Biden administration, further roiling the prominent U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Virginia after the ousting of other senior attorneys in recent weeks, according to people familiar with the matter.

    Michael Ben’Ary, who was chief of the office’s national security unit, was fired Wednesday just hours after Julie Kelly, a conservative writer and activist, shared online that he previously worked as senior counsel to Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco during the Biden administration, two people familiar with the matter said. The people spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss personnel matters.

    Kelly’s post speculated that Ben’Ary may have been part of the “internal resistance” in the office to the recently charged case against FBI Director James Comey. But Ben’Ary played no role in the Comey case, one of the people said.

    His termination comes days after the firing of another prosecutor in the Alexandria, Virginia, office: Maya Song, the people said. Song had served as the top deputy to former U.S. Attorney Erik Siebert, who was nominated by President Donald Trump but pushed out last month amid pressure from the administration to bring charges against New York Attorney General Letitia James in a mortgage fraud investigation.

    The firings are the latest in a wave of terminations that have thrown the department into turmoil and raised alarm over political influence over the traditionally independent law enforcement agency and the erosion of civil service protections afforded to federal employees. While U.S. attorneys generally change with a new president, rank-and-file prosecutors by tradition remain with the department across administrations. The Trump administration, however, has fired prosecutors involved in the U.S. Capitol riot criminal cases and lawyers who worked on special counsel Jack Smith’s prosecutions of Trump, among others.

    Ben’Ary worked for the Justice Department for nearly two decades and was promoted under both Republican and Democratic administrations. He was currently prosecuting the case against the suspected planner in the suicide bombing at the Kabul airport that killed 13 American service members and roughly 170 Afghan civilians during the chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan.

    Song was fired Friday shortly after the Trump administration installed a new U.S. attorney, Lindsey Halligan, a former White House aide who had been one of Trump’s personal lawyers but had not previously served as a federal prosecutor. Halligan was put in the top job after Trump publicly pressed Attorney General Pam Bondi in an extraordinary social media post to move forward with pursuing cases against some of his political opponents.

    Days after that post, Halligan secured the indictment of Comey on allegations that he lied to Congress when he said he had not authorized anyone else at the FBI to be an anonymous source in news reports about a particular investigation. Comey, who is expected to make his initial court appearance next week, has denied any wrongdoing and said: “My heart is broken for the Department of Justice.”

    Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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  • US Government Layoffs Could Be in the Thousands, White House Says

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    WASHINGTON (Reuters) -U.S. government layoffs could be in the thousands, White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt said on Thursday as the federal government began the second day of a shutdown.

    (Reporting by Doina Chiacu; Editing by Caitlin Webber)

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  • Trump Uses Government Shutdown to Dole Out Firings and Political Punishment

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    Rather than simply furlough employees, as is usually done during any lapse of funds, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said layoffs were “imminent.” The Office of Management and Budget announced it was putting on hold roughly $18 billion of infrastructure funds for New York’s subway and Hudson Tunnel projects — in the hometown of the Democratic leaders of the U.S. House and Senate.

    Trump has marveled over the handiwork of his budget director.

    “He can trim the budget to a level that you couldn’t do any other way,” the president said at the start of the week of OMB Director Russ Vought, who was also a chief architect of the Project 2025 conservative policy book.

    “So they’re taking a risk by having a shutdown,” Trump said during an event at the White House.

    Thursday is day two of the shutdown, and already the dial is turned high. The aggressive approach coming from the Trump administration is what certain lawmakers and budget observers feared if Congress, which has the responsibility to pass legislation to fund government, failed to do its work and relinquished control to the White House.

    Vought, in a private conference call with House GOP lawmakers Wednesday afternoon, told them of layoffs starting in the next day or two. It’s an extension of the Department of Government Efficiency work under Elon Musk that slashed through the federal government at the start of the year.

    “These are all things that the Trump administration has been doing since January 20th,” said House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries, referring to the president’s first day in office. “The cruelty is the point.”

    With no easy endgame at hand, the standoff risks dragging deeper into October, when federal workers who remain on the job will begin missing paychecks. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office has estimated roughly 750,000 federal workers would be furloughed on any given day during the shutdown, a loss of $400 million daily in wages.

    The economic effects could spill over into the broader economy. Past shutdowns saw “reduced aggregate demand in the private sector for goods and services, pushing down GDP,” the CBO said.

    “Stalled federal spending on goods and services led to a loss of private-sector income that further reduced demand for other goods and services in the economy,” it said. Overall CBO said there was a “dampening of economic output,” but that reversed once people returned to work.

    “The longer this goes on, the more pain will be inflicted,” said House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., “because it is inevitable when the government shuts down.”

    Trump and the congressional leaders are not expected to meet again soon. Congress has no action scheduled Thursday in observance of the Jewish holy day, with senators due back Friday. The House is set to resume session next week.

    The Democrats are holding fast to their demands to preserve health care funding, and refusing to back a bill that fails to do so, warning of price spikes for millions of Americans nationwide. The Kaiser Family Foundation estimates insurance premiums will more than double for people who buy policies on the Affordable Care Act exchanges.

    The Republicans have opened a door to negotiating the health care issue, but GOP leaders say it can wait, since the subsidies that help people purchase private insurance don’t expire until year’s end.

    “We’re willing to have a conversation about ensuring that Americans continue to have access to health care,” Vice President JD Vance said Wednesday at the White House.

    With Congress as a standstill, the Trump administration has taken advantage of new levers to determine how to shape the federal government.

    The Trump administration can tap into funds to pay workers at the Defense Department and Homeland Security from what’s commonly called the “One Big Beautiful Bill” that was signed into law this summer, according to CBO.

    That would ensure Trump’s immigration enforcement and mass deportation agenda is uninterrupted. But employees who remain on the job at many other agencies will have to wait for government to reopen before they get a paycheck.

    Already Vought, from the budget office, has challenged the authority of Congress this year by trying to claw back and rescind funds lawmakers had already approved — for Head Start, clean energy infrastructure projects, overseas aid and public radio and television.

    The Government Accountability Office has issued a series of rare notices of instance where the administration’s actions have violated the law. But the Supreme Court in a ruling late last week allowed the administration’s so-called “pocket rescission” of nearly $5 billion in foreign aid to stand.

    Associated Press writers Stephen Groves, Joey Cappelletti, Matt Brown, Kevin Freking and Mary Clare Jalonick contributed to this report.

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  • US Energy Department Cancels $7.6 Billion in Funding Meant for Projects

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    WASHINGTON (Reuters) -The U.S. Department of Energy on Wednesday said it planned to cancel $7.56 billion in financing for hundreds of energy projects that it said would not provide sufficient returns to taxpayers.

    The department’s announcement came hours after White House budget director Russell Vought said in a post on X that the administration would terminate nearly $8 billion in climate-related funding in 16 Democratic-led states, including California and New York.

    The move was part of a broader, $26 billion funding freeze that was unveiled on Wednesday as President Donald Trump followed through on a threat to use the federal government shutdown to target Democratic priorities.

    In a statement issued late on Wednesday, the DOE said it would cancel 321 financial awards supporting 223 projects. It did not list the projects, but said the grants had been issued by six agency offices responsible for clean energy, efficiency, grid deployment, advanced research, manufacturing and fossil fuels.

    “President Trump promised to protect taxpayer dollars and expand America’s supply of affordable, reliable, and secure energy,” Energy Secretary Chris Wright said in a statement. “Today’s cancellations deliver on that commitment. Rest assured, the Energy Department will continue reviewing awards to ensure that every dollar works for the American people.”

    Earlier, Bloomberg reported that the planned cancellations included funding for proposed hydrogen hubs in California and the Pacific Northwest.

    California Governor Gavin Newsom, a Democrat, criticized the administration for canceling its $1.2 billion commitment to fund his state’s hydrogen hub.

    “We’ll continue to pursue an all-of-the-above clean energy strategy that powers our future and cleans the air, no matter what DC tries to dictate,” Newsom said in a statement.

    (Reporting by Jasper Ward, Nichola Groom and Tim Gardner; Editing by Chris Reese and Thomas Derpinghaus.)

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  • FBI Cuts Ties With Anti-Defamation League

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    WASHINGTON (Reuters) -The FBI has cut ties with advocacy group Anti-Defamation League, Kash Patel, the bureau’s director, said on Wednesday.

    “This FBI won’t partner with political fronts masquerading as watchdogs,” Patel said in a post on X.

    (Reporting by Kanishka Singh and Jasper Ward in Washington; Editing by Katharine Jackson)

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  • Fired Rail Board Member Sues Trump Over Removal

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    WASHINGTON (Reuters) -A member of the Surface Transportation Board fired by President Donald Trump in August filed suit on Wednesday, challenging his removal.

    Robert Primus called his firing an “illegal removal” and said Trump “did not identify a reason, let alone one that satisfies the statutory requirement of inefficiency, neglect of duty, or malfeasance in office” and asked a U.S. district judge in Washington to reinstate him. The U.S. rail regulator is considering the proposed $85-billion merger of Union Pacific and Norfolk Southern.

    The ouster is the latest in a series of dismissals by President Donald Trump’s administration from independent agencies and commissions.

    (Reporting by David Shepardson)

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  • Looming Health Insurance Spikes for Millions Are at the Heart of the Government Shutdown

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    WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. government shut down Wednesday, with Democratic lawmakers insisting that any deal address their health care demands and Republicans saying those negotiations can happen after the government is funded.

    At issue are tax credits that have made health insurance more affordable for millions of people since the COVID-19 pandemic. The subsidies, which go to low- and middle-income people who purchase health insurance through the Affordable Care Act, are slated to expire at the end of the year if Congress doesn’t extend them. Their expiration would more than double what subsidized enrollees currently pay for premiums next year, according to an analysis by KFF, a nonprofit that researches health care issues.

    Democrats have demanded that the subsidies, first put in place in 2021 and extended a year later, be extended again. They also want any government funding bill to reverse the Medicaid cuts in President Donald Trump’smega-bill passed this summer, which don’t go into effect immediately but are already driving some states to cut Medicaid payments to health providers.

    Some Republicans have expressed an openness to extending the tax credits, acknowledging many of their constituents will see steep hikes in insurance premiums. But the party’s lawmakers in Congress argue negotiations over health care will take time, and a stopgap measure to get the government funded is a more urgent priority.


    Health insurance rates will skyrocket for millions without congressional action

    A record 24 million people have signed up for insurance coverage through the ACA, in large part because billions of dollars in subsidies have made the plans more affordable for many people.

    With the expanded subsidies in place, some lower-income enrollees can get health care with no premiums, and high earners pay no more than 8.5% of their income. Eligibility for middle-class earners is also expanded.

    When the tax credits expire at the end of 2025, enrollees across the income spectrum will see costs spike. Annual out-of-pocket premiums are estimated to increase by 114% — an average of $1,016 — next year, according to the KFF analysis.


    Millions expected to lose Medicaid coverage without changes to Trump’s big bill

    Republicans’ tax and spending bill passed this summer includes more than $1 trillion in cuts to Medicaid and food assistance over the next decade, largely by imposing new work requirements on those receiving aid and by shifting certain federal costs onto the states.

    Medicaid’s programs, which serve low-income Americans, enroll roughly 78 million adults and children. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office projects 10 million additional Americans will become uninsured in the next decade as a result of Republicans’ law, between Medicaid and other federal health care programs.

    Democrats want to roll back the Medicaid cuts in any government funding measure, while Republicans have argued that cuts are needed to reduce federal deficits and eliminate what they say is waste and fraud in the system.


    Democrats say health care can’t wait

    Democrats have insisted an extension of the health subsidies needs to be negotiated immediately as people are beginning to receive notices of premium increases for next year.

    “In just a few days, notices will go out to tens of millions of Americans because of the Republican refusal to extend the Affordable Care Act tax credits,” House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries said Tuesday on the steps of the U.S. Capitol.

    He added the higher health care costs millions of Americans are facing are coming “in an environment where the cost of living is already too high.”

    At the White House on Monday, congressional Democratic leaders shared their health care concerns with Trump. Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer said after the meeting that Trump “was not aware” that so many Americans would see increases to their health care costs.


    Republicans call for stopgap funding first, and a negotiation later

    Republican leaders say they handed Democrats a noncontroversial stopgap funding measure and argue that Democrats are instead choosing to shut the government down.

    “We didn’t ask Democrats to swallow any new Republican policies,” Senate Majority Leader John Thune said after Tuesday’s failed vote. “We didn’t add partisan riders. We simply asked Democrats to extend the existing funding levels, to allow the Senate to continue the bipartisan appropriations work that we started. And the Senate Democrats said no.”

    Republican leaders have offered to negotiate with Democrats on ACA health insurance subsidies — but only once they vote to keep the government open until Nov. 21.

    “I will go to the Capitol right now to talk to Chuck Schumer and Senate Democrats about premium support for the Affordable Care Act, but only after they’ve reopened the government,” Vice President JD Vance said Wednesday on Fox News.

    That might be easier said than done, with many Republicans in Congress still strongly opposed to extending the enhanced tax credits.

    Swenson reported from New York.

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