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Tag: Trump

  • U.S. sanctions Venezuelan oil firms, tightens noose on Maduro’s energy trade

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    A man watches two crude oil tankers remaining anchored on Lake Maracaibo, near Maracaibo, Zulia state, Venezuela on Dec. 17, 2025. On Dec. 16, President Donald Trump ordered a "total and complete blockade" of sanctioned oil tankers Venezuela has been using to bypass a six-year-old US oil embargo.

    A man watches two crude oil tankers remaining anchored on Lake Maracaibo, near Maracaibo, Zulia state, Venezuela on Dec. 17, 2025. On Dec. 16, President Donald Trump ordered a “total and complete blockade” of sanctioned oil tankers Venezuela has been using to bypass a six-year-old US oil embargo.


    ALEJANDRO PAREDES

    AFP via Getty Images

    The U.S. imposed new sanctions Wednesday on four companies operating in Venezuela’s oil sector and blocked four oil tankers accused of helping the Nicolás Maduro regime evade international restrictions and generate revenue for what U.S. officials described as an “illegitimate narco-terrorist regime.”

    The measures, announced by the Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control, target companies and vessels involved in transporting Venezuelan crude as part of what officials say is a growing “shadow fleet” used to bypass sanctions and move oil through opaque global networks.

    “President Trump has been clear: We will not allow the illegitimate Maduro regime to profit from exporting oil while it floods the United States with deadly drugs,” Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said in a statement. “The Treasury Department will continue to implement President Trump’s campaign of pressure on Maduro’s regime.”

    According to Treasury, the newly sanctioned entities include Corniola Limited, Krape Myrtle Co. Ltd., Winky International Limited and Aries Global Investment Ltd., all accused of operating in Venezuela’s oil sector in violation of U.S. sanctions. Four oil tankers linked to those companies — Nord Star, Rosalind (also known as Lunar Tide), Della and Valiant — were also designated as blocked property.

    U.S. officials said the vessels have been used to transport Venezuelan crude in defiance of sanctions first imposed in 2019, when Washington targeted PDVSA, the state-run oil company, as part of a broader effort to pressure the Maduro regime.

    “Maduro’s regime increasingly relies on a shadow fleet of vessels to evade sanctions, disguise the origin of oil shipments and generate revenue for its destabilizing activities,” the Treasury Department said.

    Under the sanctions, all property and interests belonging to the designated companies that fall under U.S. jurisdiction are blocked. U.S. persons and entities are generally prohibited from engaging in transactions involving the sanctioned firms unless authorized by the Treasury Department. The measures also extend to any entities that are owned, directly or indirectly, 50 percent or more by the designated parties.

    Treasury officials warned that violations of U.S. sanctions could result in civil or criminal penalties, including for non-U.S. persons who facilitate prohibited transactions. Financial institutions and shipping companies that do business with the sanctioned entities also risk enforcement action.

    The latest designations build on a series of recent U.S. moves targeting Venezuela’s energy sector. In December, Treasury sanctioned additional individuals, companies and vessels tied to PDVSA, citing efforts to disrupt revenue streams that help sustain the Maduro regime.

    U.S. officials have long argued that oil exports remain the primary financial lifeline for Maduro’s administration, which Washington accuses of drug trafficking, corruption, human rights abuses and undermining democratic institutions. Both the Biden and Trump administrations have relied on sanctions as a central tool to pressure Caracas, though limited licenses have at times been granted to allow restricted energy transactions.

    Earlier this month, President Trump ordered what he described as a “complete blockade” of sanctioned oil tankers traveling to and from Venezuela, escalating pressure on the Caracas socialist regime. “Venezuela is completely surrounded by the largest armada ever assembled in the history of South America,” Trump said in a social media post. “It will only get bigger, and the shock to them will be like nothing they have ever seen before.”

    The sanctions move could significantly disrupt Venezuela’s oil exports, the backbone of its economy. The country relies almost entirely on tanker shipments to move crude to international markets. According to the tracking firm TankerTrackers, more than 30 vessels operating in or near Venezuelan waters this month have already been sanctioned by the United States.

    The U.S. military has also expanded its presence in the region in recent months, with American forces carrying out operations in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific. Since September, U.S. forces have conducted dozens of strikes on vessels suspected of trafficking narcotics, actions that U.S. officials say are part of a broader campaign to counter drug trafficking networks linked to Venezuela.

    Antonio Maria Delgado

    el Nuevo Herald

    Galardonado periodista con más de 30 años de experiencia, especializado en la cobertura de temas sobre Venezuela. Amante de la historia y la literatura.

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    Antonio María Delgado

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  • What To Know About Trump Administration Freezing Federal Child Care Funds – KXL

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    The Trump administration has said it is freezing child care funds to all states until they provide more verification and administrative data about the programs in a move fueled by a series of fraud schemes at Minnesota day care centers run by Somali residents.

    All 50 states will be impacted by the review, but the Republican administration is focusing most of its ire on the blue state of Minnesota. Minnesota Democratic Attorney General Keith Ellison said in a statement Wednesday that he was “exploring all our legal options to ensure that critical childcare services do not get abruptly slashed based on pretext and grandstanding.”

    Minnesota will face additional hurdles to restart child care funding by needing to provide even more verification for child care centers in the state that are suspected of fraud. The administration is also calling for an audit of some Minnesota child care centers after a series of fraud schemes involving government programs in the state in recent years.

    It is unclear how much more robust the verification process for states will be than it was before the new measures were implemented.

    Deputy Secretary of Health and Human Services Jim O’Neill called it a response to “blatant fraud that appears to be rampant in Minnesota and across the country” in a social media post announcing the change on Tuesday. Officials are also requiring all states to provide additional verification to get child care funds.

    Here are some things to know about these moves:

    More verification needed for all states to get child care funds
    All 50 states will have to provide additional levels of verification and administrative data before they receive more funding from the Child Care and Development Fund, according to a U.S. Department of Health and Human Services spokesperson. However, before Minnesota can receive child care funds again, it will have to provide even more verification for child care centers in that state that are suspected of fraud, such as attendance and licensing records, past enforcement actions and inspection reports.

    In his post on Tuesday, O’Neill said all Administration for Children and Families payments nationwide would require “justification and a receipt or photo evidence” before money is sent, but the HHS spokesperson said Wednesday that the additional verifications only apply to CCDF payments.

    Walz says Trump is politicizing the issue
    Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, the 2024 Democratic vice presidential nominee, said in a social media post that fraudsters are a serious issue that the state has spent years cracking down on but that this move is part of “Trump’s long game.”

    “He’s politicizing the issue to defund programs that help Minnesotans,” Walz said.

    State Senate Majority Leader Erin Murphy condemned the move in a statement Wednesday.

    “Republicans are playing sick games and winning devastating prizes,” Murphy said. “And now, tens of thousands of Minnesota families will pay the price as Donald’s Trump’s agents strip away crucial funding. Our day care system is already stressed; this reckless decision could force a collapse that affects all of us.”

    Fraud investigations could stretch to other programs, states
    The administration launched efforts in recent weeks to track down fraud in other programs in Minnesota and is looking at fraud in other states. White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said in an interview with “Fox & Friends” on Wednesday that the administration is considering similar fraud investigations in other blue states, such as California and New York.

    The administration will continue to send officers to investigate “potential fraud sites” in Minnesota and deport undocumented immigrants, Leavitt said, adding that the Department of Homeland Security is considering plans to denaturalize citizens.

    The Department of Labor is also investigating the state’s unemployment insurance program, Leavitt said. The administration this month threatened to withhold SNAP food aid funding from Democratic-controlled states, including Minnesota, unless they provide information about people receiving assistance. Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins in December sent Minnesota a letter threatening to disqualify it from SNAP and cut funding unless it recertified the eligibility for over 100,000 households and interviewed them in-person within 30 days, according to a lawsuit filed by Minnesota’s attorney general, who Leavitt criticized.

    Attention focused on Minnesota
    The announcement came a day after U.S. Homeland Security officials conducted a fraud investigation in Minneapolis, questioning workers at unidentified businesses. Trump has criticized Walz’s administration over the cases, capitalizing on them to target the Somali diaspora in the state, which has the largest Somali population in the U.S.

    In his post Tuesday, O’Neill, who is serving as acting director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, referenced a right-wing influencer who posted a video last week claiming he found that day care centers operated by Somali residents in Minneapolis had committed up to $100 million in fraud.

    Meanwhile, there are concerns about harassment that home-based day care providers and members of the Somali community nationwide might face amid the vitriol, including Trump’s comments earlier this month, referring to Somali immigrants as “garbage.” Washington state Attorney General Nick Brown released a statement about home-based day care providers being harassed and accused of fraud, saying, “Showing up on someone’s porch, threatening, or harassing them isn’t an investigation. Neither is filming minors who may be in the home.”

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    Jordan Vawter

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  • With CIA strike, signs Trump is ‘shaping the battlespace’ in Venezuela

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    WASHINGTON — The day after Christmas is typically quiet in the nation’s capital. But President Trump’s decision to acknowledge a covert U.S. strike on Venezuelan territory, in an interview with an obscure local news outlet on Friday, set off a scramble in a drowsy Washington that has become a hallmark of the president.

    Officials working on Latin America policy for the administration that had been closely tracking reports of refinery fires and other curious events throughout Venezuela couldn’t immediately figure out which target the president was talking about, three sources familiar with the matter told The Times.

    Trump would later detail that the strike targeted a “dock area where they load the boats up with drugs.” But initial confusion from within his own government signaled just how tight a circle within the West Wing is determining whether to climb the escalation ladder toward war with Caracas.

    Trump initially confirmed he had authorized CIA actions in Venezuela in an exchange with reporters on October. While the administration is obligated to report covert CIA operations to Congress, more robust congressional authorization is required for the use of military force.

    “I authorized for two reasons, really. No. 1, they have emptied their prisons into the United States of America,” Trump said at the time. “And the other thing, the drugs, we have a lot of drugs coming in from Venezuela, and a lot of the Venezuelan drugs come in through the sea.”

    The strike comes as Venezuelan authorities have increased the number of U.S. citizens detained in their custody, the New York Times first reported on Friday. Caracas had freed 17 Americans and permanent residents held in notorious Venezuelan prisons at the start of the Trump administration.

    Evan Ellis, who served in Trump’s first term planning State Department policy on Latin America, the Caribbean and international narcotics, said it was “unclear whether the initial plan was for this operation to be publicly announced in an interview by the president.” Venezuela’s dictatorial president, Nicolás Maduro, “was certainly confused about it,” he said.

    “It would make sense for them to do something like that, rather then a military strike, especially right now when there’s a delicate line between military operations and other things,” Ellis added. “My sense is — to the extent the president has acknowledged it — that this was them carrying out their mission to shape the battlespace in support of broader national objectives.”

    But Trump has yet to articulate the full scope of those objectives, leaving observers to wonder whether regime change in Venezuela is his true, ultimate aim.

    Trump has repeatedly told the media that Maduro’s days in power are numbered. The administration refers to him and his regime as an illegitimate narco-state terrorizing American communities. On a bipartisan basis, going back to Trump’s first term and throughout the Biden administration, the United States has recognized a democratic opposition in Venezuela as its rightful government.

    But a military war on the drug trade would make little sense targeting Venezuela, where only a fraction of illicit narcotics smuggled into the United States originate. Trump has hinted in recent weeks at other motives driving his calculus.

    Over the last four months, the Trump administration slowly ramped up its pressure campaign on Maduro, first by targeting boats allegedly carrying narcotics and drug smugglers in international waters before announcing a blockade of Venezuelan oil tankers. Venezuela’s oil exports have consequently plummeted by half over the course of the last month.

    On Wednesday, the Treasury Department also issued sanctions against four companies that it said were either operating in Venezuela’s oil sector or as accompanying oil tankers.

    “Maduro’s regime increasingly depends on a shadow fleet of worldwide vessels to facilitate sanctionable activity, including sanctions evasion, and to generate revenue for its destabilizing operations,” the department said in a statement. “Today’s action further signals that those involved in the Venezuelan oil trade continue to face significant sanctions risks.”

    The Pentagon, meanwhile, has stationed nearly a quarter of the U.S. naval fleet in the Caribbean since the summer, in what Trump has referred to as a “massive armada” without precedent in the region.

    While Venezuela’s current oil output is modest, the nation sits on the world’s largest known oil reserves, offering significant potential access to any future strategic partners. China is currently the largest importer of Venezuelan oil, and at least one tanker subjected to the U.S. blockade has sought protection from Moscow, Maduro’s chief military ally.

    Addressing the blockade in an exchange with reporters, Trump said he had spoken with top U.S. oil executives about what the Venezuelan market would look like with Maduro no longer in power. And he suggested the U.S. government would keep whatever barrels are seized, hearkening back to Trump’s campaign, throughout the 2010s, for the United States to control the oil fields of Iraq as the spoils of its war there.

    “We’re going to keep it,” Trump said last week, of the 1.9 million barrels of Venezuelan oil on the first tanker seized. “Maybe we’ll sell it. Maybe we’ll keep it. Maybe we’ll use it in the strategic reserves. We’re keeping it.”

    “We’re keeping the ships, also,” he added.

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    Michael Wilner

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  • Conspiracy theorist-podcaster joins crowded GOP race for Colorado governor, but will candidacy ‘go nowhere’?

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    A conservative podcaster who’s trumpeted false election conspiracies and called for the execution of political rivals, including Gov. Jared Polis, has formally joined the Republican race to become Colorado’s next governor.

    Joe Oltmann, who filed his candidacy paperwork Monday night, now seeks to participate in an electoral system that he has repeatedly tried to undermine.

    He is the 22nd Republican actively seeking to earn the party’s nomination in June. It’s the largest gubernatorial primary field for a major party in Colorado this century, surpassing the GOP’s previous records set first in 2018, and then again in 2022 — and it comes as the party hopes to break Democrats’ electoral dominance in the state.

    That field will almost certainly narrow in the coming months; four Republicans who’d filed have already dropped out. No more than four are likely to make it onto the ballot — either through the state assembly or by gathering signatures — for the summer primary, said Dick Wadhams, the Colorado GOP’s former chairman.

    The size of the primary field doesn’t really matter, he said, because few candidates will actually end up in front of voters. Eighteen candidates filed ahead of the 2022 race, for instance, but just two were on the primary ballot.

    On the Democratic side, a smaller field of seven active candidates is headlined by Attorney General Phil Weiser and U.S. Sen. Michael Bennet. Polis is term-limited from running again.

    For 2026, Wadhams counted only a half-dozen or so Republican candidates whom he considered “credible,” a qualifier that Wadhams said he used “very, very loosely”: Oltmann, state Sens. Barbara Kirkmeyer and Mark Baisley, state Rep. Scott Bottoms, ministry leader Victor Marx, Teller County Sheriff Jason Mikesell and former Congressman Greg Lopez.

    Wadhams said that other than Kirkmeyer, all of those candidates had either supported election conspiracies or a pardon for Tina Peters, the former Mesa County clerk now serving a nine-year sentence for convictions related to providing unauthorized access to voting equipment.

    Oltmann, of Castle Rock, has repeatedly — and falsely — claimed that the 2020 presidential election was not won by Democrat Joe Biden, while calling for the hanging of political opponents. He previously said he wanted to dismember some opponents to send a message, according to the Washington Post, before adding that he was joking.

    In his Dec. 26 announcement video, Oltmann baselessly claimed that Democrats, who have won control of the state amid demographic shifts and anti-Trump sentiment, were in power in Colorado only because of election fraud.

    He said Polis and Secretary of State Jena Griswold, along with 9News anchor Kyle Clark, were part of a “synagogue of Satan.” Polis and Griswold are both Jewish.

    In his announcement, Oltmann painted an apocalyptic picture of the state and said he hoped that three of its elected leaders — Polis, Griswold and Weiser — would all be imprisoned. He pledged to eliminate property taxes, to focus on the “have-nots” and to pardon Peters, whom President Donald Trump has also sought to release by issuing a federal pardon that legal experts say can’t clear Peters of state convictions.

    Oltmann’s decision to join the field is an example of “extreme candidates” from either major party “who file to run but will go nowhere,” predicted Kristi Burton Brown, another former state GOP chair. She now sits on the Colorado State Board of Education.

    She said the size of the Republican primary field was a consequence of Republicans’ difficulties winning statewide races in Colorado. Democrats have won all four constitutional elected offices for two straight election cycles.

    Burton Brown said it “might be a good idea moving forward” to require candidates to do more than just submit paperwork to run for office. That might include a monetary requirement: She said she didn’t support charging candidates significant sums but thought that “requiring some skin in the game” could prevent “unreasonable primaries.”

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    Seth Klamann

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  • 2025 in photos: The year ICE came to New York City – amNewYork

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    For just over half a year, amNewYork has documented the effect of Trump’s immigration crackdown in the Big Apple — from the advent of masked and heavily armed agents inside of immigration court, to the arrest of a prominent elected official, the separation of families, the emergence of federal detainments on the streets, and the citizens who fought back.

    June

    In early June amNewYork began chronicling the emergence of ICE agents inside 26 Federal Plaza and the revolving door of detainments started occurring as immigrants attended their legally mandated court hearings. Individuals were blindsided as they left the courtroom by the masked agents waiting in the corridor, dragging them away into elevators and out of sight.

    ICE arrests a man inside 26 Federal Plaza in early June.Photo by Dean Moses
    A man disappears in an elevator in ICE custody.Photo by Dean Moses
    A man cries out as he is forced into an elevator by ICE. Photo by Dean Moses

    Mid – June

    The first major escalation occurred later that month. New York City Comptroller and then mayoral candidate Brad Lander set out to observe immigration hearings as news of the mass detainments began spreading. Lander not only looked to bear witness to what was taking place but to help escort immigrants from their hearings. On June 17 Lander became caught up in a now-infamous incident that saw the Feds tackle Lander as he asked them to show a warrant for their arrests. Lander clung to the arms of one respondent as he was grappled by at least four agents. The politician was roughed up and held at the facility until Gov. Kathy Hochul was able to help secure his release. 

    Brad Lander is grappled by ICE agents inside 26 Federal Plaza. Photo by Dean Moses
    Brad Lander is grappled by ICE agents inside 26 Federal Plaza.Photo by Dean Moses
    Brad Lander is grappled by ICE agents inside 26 Federal Plaza.Photo by Dean Moses
    Brad Lander leaves 26 Federal Plaza with his wife and Gov. Kathy Hochul.Photo by Dean Moses

    July  

    In July, immigration enforcement inside 26 Federal Plaza ramped up, with detainments becoming more heavy-handed. The agents changed tactics in July by rushing people into stairwells instead of loading them into elevators. This month also saw an apparent health-related emergency of a man who collapsed after being whisked into a stairwell. As the door swung open, he could be seen lying on the ground with his hands handcuffed as a masked agent looked over him.

    The agents changed tactics in July by rushing people into stairwells instead of loading them into elevators.Photo by Dean Moses
    A man is brutally pulled into a stairwell.Photo by Dean Moses
    An ICE agent grabs a man by the back of his neck.Photo by Dean Moses
    A man is yanked through the hallway by ICE.Photo by Dean Moses

    August 

    For the most part, men found themselves the primary target of ICE inside the halls of immigration court. Sources with knowledge of the arrests say this was an attempt to cripple the income of a family unit by removing the breadwinner.  Things changed in August as ICE began detaining women as well, in addition to a steady flow of males.

    Things changed in August as ICE began detaining women. Photo by Dean Moses
    A woman fights back tears as she is taken by ICE.Photo by Dean Moses
    A woman is left stunned when she is set upon by ICE.Photo by Dean Moses
    An ICE agent pulls a woman into a stairwell.Photo by Dean Moses
    An ICE agent pushes his way through the hallway while dragging a man along with him.Photo by Dean Moses

    Late – August

    August also one of the most emotional family separations of the year.  A mother of three from the Bronx begged for help her husband was ripped away from her family during a routine immigration hearing.

    “It was very traumatic for me and my children. My daughter is distraught, they took their father away. I don’t know what to do,” Cocha said.

    Cocha’s young daughter was pulled from her farther, begging and screaming.

    A young girl clings to her father as ICE approaches.Photo by Dean Moses
    But the young girl is ripped away by ICE.Photo by Dean Moses
    The family was manhandled by the ICE agents.Photo by Dean Moses
    They were left in tears.Photo by Dean Moses

    September 

    In September, the violence escalated. A man who said he is an American Citizen was grasped around the neck by an ICE agent as he spoke out against the detainments. Meanwhile, a coalition of elected officials demanded access to inspect the conditions of the detainment facility, refusing to leave until they were granted access. Simultaneously, other politicians and New Yorkers protested outside of 26 Federal Plaza, resulting in mass arrests. 

    a coalition of elected officials demanded access to inspect the conditions of the detainment facility,Photo by Dean Moses
    A man who said he is an American Citizen was grasped around the neck by an ICE agentPhoto by Dean Moses
    A coalition of elected officials demanded access to inspect the conditions of the detainment facility, refusing to leave until they were granted access.Photo by Dean Moses
    A coalition of elected officials demanded access to inspect the conditions of the detainment facility, refusing to leave until they were granted access.Photo by Dean Moses
    Simultaneously, other politicians and New Yorkers protested outside of 26 Federal Plaza, resulting in mass arrests.  Photo by Dean Moses
    Simultaneously, other politicians and New Yorkers protested outside of 26 Federal Plaza, resulting in mass arrests.  Photo by Dean Moses

    Late – September   

    The violence inside 26 Federal Plaza reached a boiling point in late September when several journalists felt the wrath of ICE. An amNewYork journalist was manhandled and tossed by several ICE agents while several others were sent slamming to the floor. One photographer was so severely injured EMS had to remove him on a stretcher. Late into the month, another family separation left a child in tears.

    amNewYork journalist is shoved by ICE.Photo by Dean Moses
    One photographer was severely injured.Photo by Dean Moses
    One photographer was severely injured.Photo by Dean Moses
    EMS had to remove him on a stretcher.Photo by Dean Moses
    A child was left weeping after his father was taken by ICE.Photo by Dean Moses

    October

    In October, amNewYork visited Franyelis and her children, 3-year-old Emmanuel and 8-year-old Yoneifer, at their Brooklyn home. The family described the emotional pain and financial struggles of living without her husband, who was detained by ICE. Every time someone knocked at the door, Emmanuel believed his dad was on the other side. 

    Every time someone knocked at the door, Emmanuel believed his dad was on the other side. Photo by Dean Moses
    The family described the emotional pain and financial struggles of living without her husband, who was detained by ICE.Photo by Dean Moses

    Late – October 

    On October 21, ICE spilled out of 26 Federal Plaza and onto the city streets. Conducting a massive operation on Canal Street, the agents detained several street vendors that drew immediate and fierce backlash from bystanders and immigrant advocates. The operation began at about 3 p.m. in the area of Centre and Canal Streets, where ICE agents showed up to question street vendors as part of an alleged operation to tackle counterfeit goods, according to a Homeland Security official. Soon thereafter, chaos erupted as pedestrians clashed with the armed Feds.

    ICE pushes a man.Photo by Dean Moses
    A woman wearing a polkadot dress became a folk hero after standing between ICE and protesters.Photo by Dean Moses
    ICE arrests a man near Canal Street.Photo by Dean Moses
    An ICE agent pushes a woman to the ground with a nightstick.Photo by Dean Moses

    November 

    In November, amNewYork documented the lives of several more families, including that of Jessica Supliguicha, whose daughter was born mere days after her husband was deported, leaving her and her son Dylan in emotional ruin. Meanwhile, Alexandra Alvarez and her baby Mia were separated from Manuel Mejia Hernandez, resulting in them begging for aid to get him back. Finally, Heury Gomez, who had been held in ICE custody for four months, finally reunited with his family in time for Thanksgiving.

    Queens mom hugs her son with baby girl in foreground after dad abducted by ICE
    Hearing his mother, Jessica Supliguicha, sob softly, her 9-year-old son Dylan sidled over to her and embraced her. Jessica’s husband, Jorge, was apprehended by ICE in September.Photo by Dean Moses
    Jessica weeps as she stands over her baby.Photo by Dean Moses
    mom holding baby while husband and father are in ICE custody
    Alexandra Alvarez holds her 11-month-old baby surrounded by photographs of her husband.Photo by Dean Moses
    “You don’t love me anymore, you don’t come to visit me no more,” Heury Gomez’s mothersaid in Spanish, blissfully unaware of where her son had been for so long.Photo by Dean Moses
    Heury Gomez was surprised by the awaiting family.Photo by Dean Moses
    Family in tears as man held in ICE custody for moths reunites with his family
    Heury Gomez’s eyes lit up, a young child ran into his arms, his sister broke down into profuse, uncontrolled tears. Even the 16-year-old family dog greeted him warmly.Photo by Dean Moses

    Late – November

    At the end of November, ICE tried once more to perform a massive, sweeping ICE raid along Canal Street, but this time New Yorkers were ready for them. A large group of protesters tracked the army of Feds to a nearby parking garage, where they had a standoff before NYPD officers arrived, resulting in a violent clash and a slew of arrests.  

    Mayhem erupted outside of a Chinatown parking garage on Saturday after protesters learned of a massive ICE presence inside.
    Mayhem erupted outside of a Chinatown parking garage on Saturday after protesters learned of a massive ICE presence inside.Photo by Dean Moses
    Photo by Dean Moses
    Photo by Dean Moses
    Photo by Dean Moses
    ICE protester arrested by NYPD officers in Chinatown
    Immigrant advocates and elected officials condemned the NYPD on Sunday for its heavy-handed response to anti-ICE protests in Chinatown that turned chaotic 24 hours earlier.Photo by Dean Moses
    Photo by Dean Moses

    December  

    In December, good fortune fell upon several families. NYC high school student Deglis Yohardis Salazar Osuna, 20, was reunited with his parents after being held in ICE detention. The holiday season also saw Alexandra Alvarez reunited with her husband Manuel Mejia Hernandez at La Guardia airport minutes before their daughter’s first birthday.

    Mom of NYC high school teen embraces after his release from ICE custody
    A high school student brutally arrested by ICE during a routine court hearing last week was released back into the arms of his family Wednesday after a massive fight for his release.Photo by Dean Moses
    Emerging through the door, his mother leapt to her feet, wrapping her arm around her son and letting out wails of pain and happiness.Photo by Dean Moses
    The family wiped their tears.Photo by Dean Moses
    The family embraces for the first time.Photo by Dean Moses
    Queens man held by ICE for months reunites with family at airport
    Manuel Mejia Hernandez reunites with his wife Alexandra Alvarez and their 1-year-old daughter Mia at LaGuardia Airport in Queens on Dec. 5, 2025. Hernandez had spent many weeks in ICE captivity.Photo by Dean Moses
    Manuel Mejia Hernandez and Alexandra Alvarez celebrate their daughter’s first birthday.Photo by Dean Moses
    Photo by Dean Moses

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    Dean Moses

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  • Trump claims U.S. destroyed Venezuelan dock used for drug shipments

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    An F-18E fighter jet is seen on the deck of the aircraft carrier USS Gerald R. Ford while it sails during NATO’s Neptune Strike 2025 exercise on September 24 in the North Sea.

    An F-18E fighter jet is seen on the deck of the aircraft carrier USS Gerald R. Ford while it sails during NATO’s Neptune Strike 2025 exercise on September 24 in the North Sea.


    JONATHAN KLEIN

    AFP via Getty Images

    Maracaibo

    President Donald Trump said Monday that the United States has destroyed a docking area used by suspected drug traffickers in Venezuela, marking what would be the first publicly acknowledged U.S. ground strike inside the country amid escalating tensions with the Nicolás Maduro regime.

    Speaking to reporters at his Mar-a-Lago residence in Florida during a meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Trump said U.S. forces targeted a coastal facility used to load drugs onto boats bound for international markets.

    “There was a big explosion in the dock area where they load the boats with drugs,” Trump said. “So we hit all the boats, and now we hit the area. It’s the staging area. And that’s gone now.”

    The president did not specify whether the operation was carried out by U.S. military forces or intelligence agencies, nor did he identify the precise location of the strike, saying only that it occurred “along the coast.” He also declined to say whether there were casualties.

    Trump’s remarks, first made during a radio interview on Friday and reiterated Monday, have not been confirmed by U.S. defense officials. The White House has issued no formal statement, and the Pentagon referred questions to the president’s office.

    Venezuelan authorities have likewise remained silent. State-controlled media have not reported any attack, although social media users in western Venezuela circulated images and videos over the weekend of a large fire at what appeared to be a warehouse near the city of Maracaibo. The cause of the blaze has not been independently verified.

    The blaze erupted early Tuesday morning at the Primazol facility in the city of San Francisco, in Zulia state, roughly 700 kilometers west of Caracas and near Lake Maracaibo, one of the largest bodies of water in South America. Local authorities said the incident was unrelated to any foreign military action.

    According to Mayor Héctor Soto, a political ally of strongman Nicolás Maduro, the fire was caused by an electrical failure. Speaking to local media, Soto said no one was injured and dismissed suggestions that the incident was linked to an external attack. He added that agents from Venezuela’s military counterintelligence agency, along with police and firefighters, responded immediately to the scene.

    “Let the Americans — the gringos, in this case Donald Trump and all his people — continue to dream,” Soto said. “We will defend the homeland of Bolívar.”

    Primazol dismissed in a statement the unofficial versions that linked the fire to President Trump’s statements, calling it an “incident.”

    If confirmed, the strike would represent a significant escalation in Washington’s pressure campaign against the Maduro regime and the first known instance of a U.S. military strike on Venezuelan territory in the current standoff.

    The Trump administration has accused Maduro and senior officials of leading what it calls the “Cartel of the Suns,” a network of military and political figures allegedly involved in large-scale cocaine trafficking. U.S. authorities have offered a reward of up to $50 million for information leading to Maduro’s arrest on charges including narco-terrorism and conspiracy.

    Trump said Monday that he had spoken “very recently” with Maduro by phone but characterized the conversation as unproductive. “Not much came of it,” he said.

    The alleged strike comes amid an intensifying U.S. campaign against drug trafficking networks operating in the Caribbean and along South America’s northern coast. Since September, U.S. forces have increased maritime and aerial patrols in the region, targeting vessels suspected of transporting narcotics.

    According to U.S. officials, at least 107 people have been killed in operations tied to what the administration has dubbed Operation Southern Spear, a sweeping effort aimed at disrupting transnational drug networks. Washington has described the campaign as one of the largest U.S. military deployments in the Caribbean in decades.

    The Pentagon has recently surged additional assets into the region, including the aircraft carrier USS Gerald R. Ford and several guided-missile destroyers. U.S. officials say the deployments are intended to bolster interdiction efforts in both the Caribbean Sea and the eastern Pacific.

    Human rights organizations, however, have raised concerns about civilian casualties and the legal basis for some of the operations. Several groups have accused the United States of carrying out extrajudicial killings, allegations the administration has firmly denied, insisting all actions comply with international law and are conducted in self-defense.

    The reported strike also comes as Washington tightens economic pressure on Caracas. The Trump administration has expanded sanctions on Venezuela’s oil sector and recently ordered the seizure of vessels linked to sanctioned entities. U.S. officials argue that oil revenues are being funneled into drug trafficking, corruption, and the financing of armed groups.

    The Maduro regime has repeatedly rejected those claims, accusing Washington of waging economic warfare and seeking to justify regime change. Venezuelan officials insist that the country is the victim of an international disinformation campaign aimed at undermining its sovereignty and seizing control of its vast oil reserves.

    Trump, however, struck a defiant tone, suggesting that the operation marked a turning point. “They’re loading the ships with drugs,” he said. “So we attacked the ships, and now we’re attacking the area. That area no longer exists.”

    Antonio Maria Delgado

    el Nuevo Herald

    Galardonado periodista con más de 30 años de experiencia, especializado en la cobertura de temas sobre Venezuela. Amante de la historia y la literatura.

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    Antonio María Delgado

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  • Trump says US ‘hit’ facility along shore where he says alleged drug boats ‘load up’

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    PALM BEACH, Fla. — President Donald Trump has indicated that the U.S. has “hit” a dock facility along a shore as he wages a pressure campaign on Venezuela, but the U.S. offered few details.

    Trump initially seemed to confirm a strike in what appeared to be an impromptu radio interview Friday, and when questioned Monday by reporters about “an explosion in Venezuela,” he said the U.S. struck a facility where boats accused of carrying drugs “load up.”

    “There was a major explosion in the dock area where they load the boats up with drugs,” Trump said as he met in Florida with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. “They load the boats up with drugs, so we hit all the boats and now we hit the area. It’s the implementation area. There’s where they implement. And that is no longer around.”

    It is part of an escalating effort to target what the Trump administration says are boats smuggling drugs bound for the United States. It moves closer to shore strikes that so far have been carried out by the military in international waters in the Caribbean Sea and eastern Pacific Ocean.

    Trump declined to say if the U.S. military or the CIA carried out the latest strike or where it occurred. He did not confirm it happened in Venezuela.

    “I know exactly who it was, but I don’t want to say who it was. But you know it was along the shore,” Trump said.

    Trump first referenced the strike on Friday, when he called radio host John Catsimatidis during a program on WABC radio and discussed the U.S. strikes on alleged drug-carrying boats. The attacks have killed at least 105 people in 29 known strikes since early September.

    “I don’t know if you read or saw, they have a big plant or a big facility where they send the, you know, where the ships come from,” Trump said. “Two nights ago, we knocked that out. So, we hit them very hard.”

    Trump did not offer any additional details in the interview.

    Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth or one of the U.S. military’s social media accounts has in the past typically announced every boat strike in a post on X, but there has been no post of any strike on a facility.

    The Pentagon on Monday referred questions to the White House, which did not immediately respond to a message seeking more details. The press office of Venezuela’s government did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Trump’s statement.

    Trump for months has suggested he may conduct land strikes in South America, in Venezuela or possibly another country, and in recent weeks has been saying the U.S. would move beyond striking boats and would strike on land “soon.”

    In October, Trump confirmed he had authorized the CIA to conduct covert operations in Venezuela. The agency did not immediately respond to a message seeking comment Monday.

    Along with the strikes, the U.S. has sent warships, built up military forces in the region, seized two oil tankers and pursued a third.

    The Trump administration has said it is in “armed conflict” with drug cartels and seeking to stop the flow of narcotics into the United States.

    Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro has insisted the real purpose of the U.S. military operations is to force him from power.

    White House chief of staff Susie Wiles said in an interview with Vanity Fair published this month that Trump “wants to keep on blowing boats up until Maduro ‘cries uncle.’”

    Price reported from Washington. Associated Press writers Konstantin Toropin in Washington and Regina Garcia Cano in Caracas, Venezuela, contributed to this report.

    Copyright © 2025 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.

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    AP

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  • Zelensky works yet again to break Putin’s hold on Trump

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    WASHINGTON — Standing alongside President Trump at his Palm Beach estate, Volodymyr Zelensky could only smirk and grimace without overtly offending his host. “Russia wants to see Ukraine succeed,” Trump told reporters, shocking the Ukrainian president before claiming that Vladimir Putin is genuine in his desire for peace.

    It was just the latest example of the American president sympathizing with Moscow in its war of conquest in Europe. Yet Zelensky emerged from the meeting Sunday ensuring once again that Ukraine may fight another day, maintaining critical if uneasy support from Washington.

    Few signs of progress toward a peace agreement materialized from the meeting at Mar-a-Lago, where Zelensky traveled with significant compromises — including a plan to put territorial concessions to Russia before the Ukrainian people for a vote — in order to appease the U.S. president.

    But Zelensky won concessions of his own from Trump, who had for weeks been pushing for a ceasefire by Christmas, or else threatening to cut off Ukraine from U.S. intelligence that would leave Kyiv blind on the battlefield. “I don’t have deadlines,” Trump said Sunday.

    Over the course of Trump’s first year in office, Zelensky and other European leaders have repeatedly worked to convince Trump that Russia’s President Putin is, in fact, an aggressor opposed to peace, responsible for an unprovoked invasion that launched the deadliest conflict in Europe since the Second World War.

    Each time, Trump has come around, even going as far over the summer as to question whether Ukraine could win back the territories it has lost on the battlefield to Russia — and vowing to North Atlantic Treaty Organization allies, “we’re with them all the way.”

    Yet, each time, Trump has changed course within a matter of days or weeks, reverting to an embrace of Putin and Russia’s worldview, including a proposal that Ukraine preemptively cede sovereign territories that Russia has sought but failed to occupy by force.

    Zelensky’s willingness to offer concessions in his latest meeting with Trump has, at least temporarily, “managed to keep President Trump from tilting further towards the Russian position,” said Kyle Balzer, a scholar at the conservative American Enterprise Institute. “But Trump’s position — his repeated insistence that a deal is necessary now because time is not on Ukraine’s side — continues to favor Putin’s line and negotiating tactics.”

    U.S. intelligence agencies have assessed that Putin’s revanchist war aims — to conquer all of Ukraine and, beyond, to reclaim parts of Europe that once were part of the Soviet empire — remain unchanged.

    Yet Trump’s director of national intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard, whose own sympathies toward Russia have been scrutinized for years, recently dismissed the assessments as products of “deep state” “warmongers” within the intelligence community.

    On Monday, hours after speaking with Trump, Putin ordered the Russian military to push toward Zaporizhzhia, a city of 700,000 before the war began. The city lies far outside the Donbas region that Moscow claims would satisfy its war aims in a negotiated settlement.

    “Trump’s instincts are to favor Putin and Russia,” said Brian Taylor, director of the Moynihan Institute of Global Affairs at Syracuse University. “Ukraine and its European partners still hope to convince Trump of the obvious fact that Putin is not interested in a deal that doesn’t amount to a Ukrainian surrender.

    “If Trump was convinced of Putin’s intransigence, he might further tighten sanctions on Russia and provide more assistance to Ukraine to try to pressure Putin into a deal,” Taylor added. “It’s an uphill battle, one might even say Sisyphean, but Zelensky and European leaders have to keep trying. So far, nearly a year into Trump’s second term, it’s been worth it.”

    On Monday, Moscow claims that Ukraine orchestrated a massive drone attack targeting Putin’s residence that would force it to reconsider its stance in negotiations. Kyiv denied an attack took place.

    “Given the final degeneration of the criminal Kyiv regime, which has switched to a policy of state terrorism, Russia’s negotiating position will be revised,” Sergei Lavrov, Russia’s foreign minister since 2004, said in a Telegram post.

    Another senior Russian official said the reported attack shocked and infuriated Trump. But Zelensky, responding on social media, said that Russia was “at it again, using dangerous statements to undermine all achievements of our shared diplomatic efforts with President Trump’s team.”

    “We keep working together to bring peace closer,” Zelensky said. “This alleged ‘residence strike’ story is a complete fabrication intended to justify additional attacks against Ukraine, including Kyiv, as well as Russia’s own refusal to take necessary steps to end the war.”

    “Ukraine does not take steps that can undermine diplomacy. To the contrary, Russia always takes such steps,” he added. “It is critical that the world doesn’t stay silent now. We cannot allow Russia to undermine the work on achieving a lasting peace.”

    Frederick Kagan, director of the Critical Threats Project, which collaborates with the Institute for the Study of War to produce daily battlefield assessments on the conflict, said that the meeting did not appear to fundamentally shift Trump’s position on the conflict — a potential win for Kyiv in and of itself, he said.

    “U.S.-Ukraine negotiations appear to be continuing as before, which is positive, since those negotiations seem to be getting into the real details of what would be required for a meaningful set of security guarantees and long-term agreements to ensure that any peace settlement will be enduring,” Kagan said.

    Gaps still remain between Kyiv and the Trump administration in negotiations over security guarantees. While Trump has offered a 15-year agreement, Ukraine is seeking guarantees for 50 years, Zelensky said Monday.

    “As Trump continues to say, there’s no deal until there’s a deal,” Kagan added. “We’ll have to see how things go.”

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    Michael Wilner

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  • NASA finally has a leader, but its future is no more certain

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    After a rudderless year and an exodus of around 4,000 employees due to Trump administration cuts, NASA got what may be its first piece of good news recently. On December 17, the Senate confirmed billionaire Jared Isaacman as the agency’s new administrator. He now holds the power to rehabilitate a battered engine of scientific research, or steer it towards even more disruption.

    Considering the caliber of President Trump’s other appointees, Isaacman is probably the best candidate for the job. Outside of being a successful entrepreneur, he has flown fighter jets and been to space twice as part of the Inspiration4 and Polaris Dawn private missions. One of those flights saw him complete the first commercial space walk, and travel farther from Earth than any human since the end of the Apollo program.

    “Perfect is the enemy of the good. Isaacman checks a lot of boxes,” says Keith Cowing, a former NASA employee and the founder of NASA Watch, a blog dedicated to the agency. “He’s passed every requirement to fly in a spacecraft that American astronauts at NASA are required to pass. He also went out of his way to have a diverse crew, and shove as much science as he could in those missions.”

    And yet if you’re a NASA employee or just someone who cares about the agency’s work, there are still plenty of reasons to be concerned for its future. When Trump first nominated Isaacman in the spring, the billionaire wrote a 62-page document detailing his vision for NASA. In November, Politico obtained a copy of that plan, titled Project Athena.

    To some insiders, Project Athena painted a picture of someone who, at least at the time when it was written, fundamentally misunderstood how NASA works and how scientific discovery is funded in the US and elsewhere. It also suggests Isaacman may be more open to Trump’s NASA agenda than would appear at first glance.

    When asked about the plan by Politico, one former NASA official characterized it as “bizarre and careless.” Another called it “presumptuous,” given many of the proposed changes to the agency’s structure would require Congressional approval. In one section, Isaacman recommended taking “NASA out of the taxpayer funded climate science business and [leaving] it for academia to determine.” In another section, he promised to evaluate the “relevance and ongoing necessity” of every agency center, particularly NASA’s iconic Jet Propulsion Laboratory, saying the facility and others must increase the “output and time to science KPI.”

    A lot has changed since Isaacman first wrote that document. It came before the workforce cuts, before the future of Goddard Space Flight Center became uncertain and before Trump surprised everyone by renominating Isaacman. But during his Senate testimony earlier this month, the billionaire said “I do stand behind everything in the document, even though it was written seven months ago. I think it was all directionally correct.”

    He did appear to distance himself from some viewpoints expressed in or inferred by Project Athena, however. Isaacman stated that “anything suggesting that I am anti-science or want to outsource that responsibility is simply untrue.” He also came out against the administration’s plan to cut NASA’s science budget nearly in half, claiming the proposals would not lead to “an optimal outcome.”

    One thing is clear, Isaacman is not your typical bureaucrat. “One of the pitfalls of some prior NASA administrators has been that they’ve shown too much reverence for the internal processes and bureaucratic structure of the agency to the detriment of decision-making and performance,” said Casey Drier, chief of space policy at The Planetary Society, a nonprofit that advocates for the exploration and study of space. “Isaacman has positioned himself as the opposite of that. Clearly, that’s something that could lead to a lot of political and congressional challenges if taken too far.”

    Even if Isaacman doesn’t follow through on any of the proposals made in Project Athena, there’s only so much a NASA administrator — even one sympathetic to civil servants working under them — can do.

    “Once a budget request goes out publicly, everyone in the administration has to defend it. Anything he does will have to be internal and private,” Drier explains. “He never explicitly criticized the administration during his hearing. He’s also coming relatively late in the budget process.”

    A lot of NASA’s future will depend on the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB), which is responsible for implementing the president’s agenda across the executive branch. As a direct result of guidance the OMB issued over the summer, NASA awarded 25 percent fewer new grants in 2025 than it did on average between 2020 and 2024.

    “The OMB has added layers of requirements that scientists now have to go through to spend the money they’ve already been allocated. The administration has worked against its own stated goals of efficiency,” Drier said. “Isaacman can’t solve that himself. He can’t tell the OMB what to do. That’s going to be a serious challenge.”

    Looming over everything is the fact NASA still does not have a full-year budget for 2026. Congress has until January 30 to fund NASA and the rest of the federal government before the short-term funding bill it passed on November 12 runs out. “On paper, the official policy of the administration is still to terminate a third of NASA’s scientific capability,” Drier points out.

    There are reasons to be cautiously optimistic. Publicly, both the House and Senate have come out against Trump’s funding cuts. And some science missions that were slated to be cancelled, such as OSIRIS-APEX, have been approved for another full year of operations.

    What NASA needs now is someone who will, as Drier puts it, “vigorously advocate” for the agency in whatever way they can. It remains to be seen if that’s Jared Isaacman.

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    Igor Bonifacic

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  • Here are PolitiFact’s top 10 fact-checks of 2025

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    Claims about deportations, the Department of Government Efficiency, and someone fainting in the White House were among the mistruths that kept PolitiFact busy in 2025 — and they featured in some of our most popular stories this year. 

    Here are our 10 most-read fact-checks, from a tenuous gang connection to fears over voter eligibility.

    10. President Donald Trump says Kilmar Abrego Garcia has “‘MS-13’ on his knuckles.” 

    President Donald Trump said Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia, a man the U.S. government deported to El Salvador in March, had MS-13 tattooed on his knuckles — illustrating a purported affiliation with the MS-13 gang founded by El Salvadoran immigrants.

    Trump made the claim during an April interview, referring to an image he posted on Truth Social of a left hand bearing four tattoos. Each finger in the picture displayed a different image — a marijuana leaf, a smiley face with an X for eyes, a cross and a skull — and an M, an S, a 1 and a 3 above these images. 

    But we found that the M, S, 1 and 3 don’t appear in other photos of Abrego Garcia’s hand, including one that Salvadoran government officials took when Abrego Garcia met with Sen. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., on April 17 in El Salvador. (Abrego Garcia is now back in the U.S awaiting a criminal trial.)  

    The tattoos also do not appear in an Abrego Garcia family photo immigration advocates shared. The photograph Trump shared appears to have been altered to include “MS-13” above the other symbols. And MS-13 experts told PolitiFact that none of those symbols are known signifiers of the gang. 

    We rated this claim Pants on Fire!

    9. Novo Nordisk’s Gordon Findlay didn’t faint Nov. 6, 2025, in the Oval Office. He wasn’t even there

    Dave Ricks, chair and chief executive officer of pharmaceutical giant Eli Lilly and Co., was speaking in the Oval Office on Nov. 6 when a man standing behind him fainted. 

    Multiple social media posts claimed the man who became ill was “Novo Nordisk Executive Gordon Findlay.” They included a post from X’s artificial intelligence-powered chatbot Grok.

    But Gordon Findlay, a Novo Nordisk manager based in Switzerland, wasn’t at the White House that day.

    The man who fainted doesn’t work for Novo Nordisk or Eli Lilly; he was an Eli Lilly GLP-1 patient and attended a drug pricing announcement at the White House as the company’s guest.

    We rated this claim False.

    8. Did Bill Clinton create a fast-track deportation process exempt from due process? No.

    As the Trump administration drew criticism over aggressive deportations, some social media users pointed to a law enacted under former President Bill Clinton, a Democrat. The posts said an immigration law Clinton signed showed immigrants who entered the U.S. illegally are not entitled to due process.

    The 1996 law established a fast-track deportation process called expedited removal that allows people to be deported without first going to immigration court. Although immigrants going through that process have fewer protections, they are not exempt from due process. People are screened, notified of deportation and can contest the deportation if they have a well-founded fear of persecution. Legal experts say there are no exceptions to due process rights, regardless of immigrants’ legal status or how they entered the country.

    We rated this claim False.

    7. Is it ‘official’ that Trump approved a $5,000 ‘DOGE dividend’ stimulus? No.

    As the Department of Government Efficiency touted billions in canceled government contracts, rumors spread that the reclaimed money would wind up in taxpayers’ pockets.

    A Feb. 23 Facebook post, for example, said Trump was going to sign an order giving some taxpayers a stimulus check for $5,000.

    We found no White House announcements or news reports reflecting this. 

    James Fishback, CEO of the investment firm Azoria Partners, proposed giving American taxpayers a $5,000 “DOGE dividend” with money the Department of Government Efficiency aimed to save, and Trump mentioned the idea to reporters.

    But DOGE didn’t cut the necessary $2 trillion from the federal government’s budget to make this proposed plan feasible.

    We rated this claim False.

    6. El gobernador de Texas Greg Abbott no dijo que deportaría a Dios si ‘fuera ilegal’

    A Spanish-language TikTok video appeared to show a journalist reporting that Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said he would have deported God if the higher power were in the U.S. illegally. 

    But the July video manipulated TelevisaUnivision journalist Enrique Acevedo’s voice to present the misleading news. PolitiFact en Español submitted the audio from the video to an AI detector, which said the audio was fake.

    We rated this claim False.

    5. X post exaggerates wealth of Nancy Pelosi, Mitch McConnell, Chuck Schumer and Elizabeth Warren

    A Feb. 11 X post called out the significant wealth of prominent Democratic and Republican members of Congress. The account wrote about the supposed annual salaries and net worths of Rep. Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif.; Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky.; Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y.; and Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass.

    Members of Congress are required to file annual financial disclosure reports detailing their assets and liabilities. Lawmakers also publicly report their annual salaries. But the lawmakers’ net worths weren’t driven by their government salaries; instead, their wealth mostly came from investments, such as stocks and real estate.

    PolitiFact analyzed these four congressional members’ 2023 financial disclosure reports — the most recent ones available at the time — and found that this post exaggerated their wealth.

    We rated this claim Mostly False.

    4. Zelenskyy’s statement about Ukraine aid didn’t reveal money laundering operation

    After Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said his military had received only a portion of the U.S. aid earmarked for the country’s war against Russia, critics floated that the funding was misused through money laundering.

    But Zelenskyy’s Feb. 1 statements aren’t proof of money laundering; they align with public data on the U.S. funding packages. 

    Zelenskyy said Ukraine had received about $75 billion in military assistance of the $175 billion the U.S. has dedicated to Ukraine aid. That was in line with what researchers monitoring funding to Ukraine observed at the time.

    A large portion of the money stayed in the U.S. and a smaller portion went to other countries in the region. 

    We rated these claims False.

    3. No, Trump didn’t post that the president should be impeached if the Dow drops 1,000 points

    As Trump’s tariffs on Canada and Mexico took effect March 4, the Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped by more than 1,300 points in two days.

    Some X users — including former U.S. Rep. Adam Kinzinger, R-Ill., — shared a screenshot of what looked like a 2012 X post from Trump.

    The screenshot made it look like Trump wrote, “If the Dow drops 1,000 points in two days the President should be impeached immediately.”

    But this was a fake post that had been circulating for at least six years. There’s no record of Trump making such a statement.

    We rated this claim Pants on Fire!

    2. Trump had hand in temporary ceasefires around the world but evidence is scant he stopped ‘six wars’

    Trump has repeatedly said he’s ended several wars, but there’s a lot of uncertainty around Trump’s role in these conflicts.

    “I’ve stopped six wars — I’m averaging about a war a month,” Trump said July 28 in Scotland. 

    Experts said in August that although he deserves some credit for deals that eased various conflicts, some leaders dispute his role in such negotiations.

    The U.S. was involved in a temporary peace deal between the Democratic Republic of Congo and Rwanda that experts said is significant albeit shaky, for example. But Trump also wrongly said he ended a conflict between Egypt and Ethiopia, and there’s little evidence he thwarted an escalation between Kosovo and Serbia. 

    We fact-checked other similar statements from the president this year, including one that he ended “seven unendable wars.”

    We rated that and this claim Mostly False.

    1. SAVE Act would make it harder, not impossible, for married people to register to vote

    Congressional Republicans want to pass a bill that would require documentary proof of citizenship to register to vote. This worried voting rights advocates who say it would hinder registration among eligible citizens.

    The SAVE Act, would require people registering to vote or updating their voter registrations to use certain identifying documents, including military IDs, enhanced IDs showing citizenship, birth certificates or passports to prove citizenship. The bill passed in the House in April and is awaiting debate in the Senate.

    “If you are a woman that has changed your name from your birth certificate, let’s say through marriage and you took your husband’s name, you are no longer eligible to vote if this bill passes the Senate,” a Feb. 10 TikTok video said. 

    That’s not quite accurate. The bill would make voter registration more difficult for married people who change their last names, and anyone whose name does not match the name on a birth certificate. But it would not prohibit it outright. 

    We rated this claim Mostly False. 

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  • GOP coalescing behind Vance as Trump privately dismisses third-term run

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    WASHINGTON — When Charlie Kirk was killed by an assassin this fall, Republican leaders credited the organization he founded for enabling President Trump’s return to power.

    Now that organization is mobilizing behind Vice President JD Vance.

    Uninterested in a competitive Republican primary in 2028, Turning Point USA plans to deploy representatives across Iowa’s 99 counties in the coming months to build the campaign infrastructure it believes could deliver Vance, a Midwesterner from nearby Ohio, a decisive victory, potentially short-circuiting a fractious GOP race, insiders said.

    It is the latest move in a quiet effort by some in Trump’s orbit to clear the field of viable competitors. Earlier this month, Marco Rubio, the secretary of State previously floated by Trump as a possible contender, appeared to take himself out of the running.

    “If Vance runs for president, he’s going to be our nominee, and I’ll be one of the first people to support him,” Rubio told Vanity Fair.

    After Kirk’s widow, Erika, endorsed Vance on stage at Turning Point USA’s annual conference in Arizona last week, a straw poll of attendees found that 84% would support Vance in the coming primaries. Yet, wider public polling offers a different picture.

    A CNN poll conducted in early December found that Vance held a plurality of Republican support for 2028, at 22%, with all other potential candidates, such as Rubio and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, registering in single digits.

    The remaining 64% told pollsters they had “no one specific in mind,” reflecting an open field with plenty of room for other figures to gain ground.

    While a recent Gallup poll found that 91% of Republicans approve of Vance’s job performance as vice president — an encouraging number entering a partisan primary — only 39% of Americans across party lines view him positively in the role, setting Vance up for potential challenges should he win the nomination.

    Potential presidential candidates on both sides of the political aisle are expected to assess their chances over the next year, before primary season officially kicks off, after the midterm elections in November.

    Closing out the Turning Point USA conference, Vance called for party unity amid escalating conflicts among right-wing influencers over the acceptability of racism and antisemitism within Republican politics.

    “President Trump did not build the greatest coalition in politics by running his supporters through endless, self-defeating purity tests,” Vance said. “Every American is invited. We don’t care if you’re white or Black, rich or poor, young or old, rural or urban, controversial or a little bit boring, or somewhere in between.”

    Charlie Kirk, he added, “trusted all of you to make your own judgment. And we have far more important work to do than canceling each other.”

    Vance’s remarks drew criticism from some on the right for appearing to tolerate bigotry within the party. The vice president himself has been subjected to racist rhetoric, with Nick Fuentes — a far-right podcaster who has praised Adolf Hitler — repeatedly directing attacks at Vance’s wife and children over their Indian ancestry.

    “Let me be clear — anyone who attacks my wife, whether their name is Jen Psaki or Nick Fuentes, can eat s—,” Vance said in an interview last week, referring to President Biden’s former press secretary. “That’s my official policy as vice president of the United States.”

    In the same interview, Vance praised Tucker Carlson, another far-right podcaster who has defended Fuentes on free speech grounds, as a “friend of mine,” noting that he supported Vance as Trump’s vice presidential pick in 2024.

    Trump has floated Vance as his potential successor multiple times without ever explicitly endorsing his nomination, calling him “very capable” and the “most likely” choice for the party.

    “He’s the vice president,” Trump said in August. “Certainly he’s doing a great job, and he would be probably favored at this point.”

    Several of Trump’s most ardent supporters have pushed the president to seek a third term in 2028, despite a provision of the Constitution, in the 22nd Amendment, barring him from doing so.

    Trump himself has said the Constitution appears clear on the matter. But Steve Bannon, an architect of Trump’s historic 2016 campaign and one of his first White House strategists, continues to advocate a path forward for another run, reportedly disparaging Vance as “not tough enough” to lead the party to victory.

    “He knows he can’t run again,” Susie Wiles, the president’s White House chief of staff, told Vanity Fair in a recent profile of her. “It’s pretty unequivocal.”

    Trump, who will be 82 when he is slated to leave office, has told Wiles he understands a third term isn’t possible “a couple times,” she added.

    Alan Dershowitz, a prominent constitutional law professor and a lawyer to Trump during his Senate impeachment trial, recently presented Trump with a road map to a third term in an Oval Office meeting, which he will publish in a new book slated for release next year.

    Even he came away from their meeting believing Trump would pass on another bid.

    “That is my conclusion based on what he has said in public,” Dershowitz told The Times.

    “He has said in the past,” he added, “that it’s too cute.”

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    Michael Wilner

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  • Trump-Zelenskyy talks will address security guarantees, reconstruction, Ukraine leader says

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    Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Friday that he will meet with U.S. President Donald Trump in Florida over the weekend.Related video above: Ukraine and U.S. discuss peace proposals on Christmas Day amid Russian attacksZelenskyy told journalists that the two leaders will discuss security guarantees for Ukraine during Sunday’s talks and that the 20-point plan under discussion “is about 90% ready.”The meeting will take place at Mar-a-Lago.An “economic agreement” also will be discussed, Zelenskyy said, but added that he was unable to confirm “whether anything will be finalized by the end.”The Ukrainian side will also raise “territorial issues,” he said. Moscow has insisted that Ukraine relinquish the remaining territory it still holds in the Donbas — an ultimatum that Ukraine has rejected. Russia has captured most of Luhansk and about 70% of Donetsk — the two areas that make up the Donbas.Zelenskyy said that Ukraine “would like the Europeans to be involved,” but doubted whether it would be possible at short notice.“We must, without doubt, find some format in the near future in which not only Ukraine and the U.S. are present, but Europe is represented as well,” he said.The announced meeting is the latest development in an extensive U.S.-led diplomatic push to end the nearly four-year Russia-Ukraine war, but efforts have run into sharply conflicting demands by Moscow and Kyiv.Zelenskyy’s comments came after he said Thursday that he had a “good conversation” with U.S. special envoy Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law.Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters Friday that the Kremlin had already been in contact with U.S. representatives since Russian presidential envoy Kirill Dmitriev recently met with U.S. envoys in Florida.“It was agreed upon to continue the dialogue,” he said.Trump is engaged in a diplomatic push to end Russia’s all-out war, which began on Feb. 24, 2022, but his efforts have run into sharply conflicting demands by Moscow and Kyiv. Zelenskyy said Tuesday that he would be willing to withdraw troops from Ukraine’s eastern industrial heartland as part of a plan to end the war if Russia also pulls back and the area becomes a demilitarized zone monitored by international forces.Though Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said Thursday that there had been “slow but steady progress” in the peace talks, Russia has given no indication that it will agree to any kind of withdrawal from land it has seized.On the ground, two people were killed and six more wounded Friday when a guided aerial bomb hit a busy road and set cars aflame in Ukraine’s second biggest city, Kharkiv, mayor Ihor Terekhov wrote on Telegram.One person was killed and three others were wounded when a guided aerial bomb hit a house in Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia region, while six people were wounded in a missile strike on the city of Uman, local officials said Friday.Russian drone attacks on the city of Mykolaiv and its suburbs overnight into Friday left part of the city without power. Energy and port infrastructure were damaged by drones in the city of Odesa on the Black Sea.Meanwhile, Ukraine said that it struck a major Russian oil refinery on Thursday using U.K.-supplied Storm Shadow missiles.Ukraine’s General Staff said that its forces hit the Novoshakhtinsk refinery in Russia’s Rostov region.“Multiple explosions were recorded. The target was hit,” it wrote on Telegram.Rostov regional Gov. Yuri Slyusar said that a firefighter was wounded when extinguishing the fire.Ukraine’s long-range drone strikes on Russian refineries aim to deprive Moscow of the oil export revenue it needs to pursue its full-scale invasion. Russia wants to cripple Ukraine’s power grid, seeking to deny civilians access to heat, light and running water in what Ukrainian officials say is an attempt to “weaponize winter.”

    KYIV, Ukraine —

    Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Friday that he will meet with U.S. President Donald Trump in Florida over the weekend.

    Related video above: Ukraine and U.S. discuss peace proposals on Christmas Day amid Russian attacks

    Zelenskyy told journalists that the two leaders will discuss security guarantees for Ukraine during Sunday’s talks and that the 20-point plan under discussion “is about 90% ready.”

    The meeting will take place at Mar-a-Lago.

    An “economic agreement” also will be discussed, Zelenskyy said, but added that he was unable to confirm “whether anything will be finalized by the end.”

    The Ukrainian side will also raise “territorial issues,” he said. Moscow has insisted that Ukraine relinquish the remaining territory it still holds in the Donbas — an ultimatum that Ukraine has rejected. Russia has captured most of Luhansk and about 70% of Donetsk — the two areas that make up the Donbas.

    Zelenskyy said that Ukraine “would like the Europeans to be involved,” but doubted whether it would be possible at short notice.

    “We must, without doubt, find some format in the near future in which not only Ukraine and the U.S. are present, but Europe is represented as well,” he said.

    The announced meeting is the latest development in an extensive U.S.-led diplomatic push to end the nearly four-year Russia-Ukraine war, but efforts have run into sharply conflicting demands by Moscow and Kyiv.

    Zelenskyy’s comments came after he said Thursday that he had a “good conversation” with U.S. special envoy Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law.

    Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters Friday that the Kremlin had already been in contact with U.S. representatives since Russian presidential envoy Kirill Dmitriev recently met with U.S. envoys in Florida.

    “It was agreed upon to continue the dialogue,” he said.

    Trump is engaged in a diplomatic push to end Russia’s all-out war, which began on Feb. 24, 2022, but his efforts have run into sharply conflicting demands by Moscow and Kyiv.

    Zelenskyy said Tuesday that he would be willing to withdraw troops from Ukraine’s eastern industrial heartland as part of a plan to end the war if Russia also pulls back and the area becomes a demilitarized zone monitored by international forces.

    Though Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said Thursday that there had been “slow but steady progress” in the peace talks, Russia has given no indication that it will agree to any kind of withdrawal from land it has seized.

    On the ground, two people were killed and six more wounded Friday when a guided aerial bomb hit a busy road and set cars aflame in Ukraine’s second biggest city, Kharkiv, mayor Ihor Terekhov wrote on Telegram.

    One person was killed and three others were wounded when a guided aerial bomb hit a house in Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia region, while six people were wounded in a missile strike on the city of Uman, local officials said Friday.

    Russian drone attacks on the city of Mykolaiv and its suburbs overnight into Friday left part of the city without power. Energy and port infrastructure were damaged by drones in the city of Odesa on the Black Sea.

    Meanwhile, Ukraine said that it struck a major Russian oil refinery on Thursday using U.K.-supplied Storm Shadow missiles.

    Ukraine’s General Staff said that its forces hit the Novoshakhtinsk refinery in Russia’s Rostov region.

    “Multiple explosions were recorded. The target was hit,” it wrote on Telegram.

    Rostov regional Gov. Yuri Slyusar said that a firefighter was wounded when extinguishing the fire.

    Ukraine’s long-range drone strikes on Russian refineries aim to deprive Moscow of the oil export revenue it needs to pursue its full-scale invasion. Russia wants to cripple Ukraine’s power grid, seeking to deny civilians access to heat, light and running water in what Ukrainian officials say is an attempt to “weaponize winter.”

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  • Trump-Zelenskyy talks will address security guarantees, reconstruction, Ukraine leader says

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    Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Friday that he will meet with U.S. President Donald Trump in Florida over the weekend.Related video above: Ukraine and U.S. discuss peace proposals on Christmas Day amid Russian attacksZelenskyy told journalists that the two leaders will discuss security guarantees for Ukraine during Sunday’s talks and that the 20-point plan under discussion “is about 90% ready.”An “economic agreement” also will be discussed, Zelenskyy said, but added that he was unable to confirm “whether anything will be finalized by the end.”The Ukrainian side will also raise “territorial issues,” he said. Moscow has insisted that Ukraine relinquish the remaining territory it still holds in the Donbas — an ultimatum that Ukraine has rejected. Russia has captured most of Luhansk and about 70% of Donetsk — the two areas that make up the Donbas.Zelenskyy said that Ukraine “would like the Europeans to be involved,” but doubted whether it would be possible at short notice.“We must, without doubt, find some format in the near future in which not only Ukraine and the U.S. are present, but Europe is represented as well,” he said.The announced meeting is the latest development in an extensive U.S.-led diplomatic push to end the nearly four-year Russia-Ukraine war, but efforts have run into sharply conflicting demands by Moscow and Kyiv.Zelenskyy’s comments came after he said Thursday that he had a “good conversation” with U.S. special envoy Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law.Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters Friday that the Kremlin had already been in contact with U.S. representatives since Russian presidential envoy Kirill Dmitriev recently met with U.S. envoys in Florida.“It was agreed upon to continue the dialogue,” he said.Trump is engaged in a diplomatic push to end Russia’s all-out war, which began on Feb. 24, 2022, but his efforts have run into sharply conflicting demands by Moscow and Kyiv. Zelenskyy said Tuesday that he would be willing to withdraw troops from Ukraine’s eastern industrial heartland as part of a plan to end the war if Russia also pulls back and the area becomes a demilitarized zone monitored by international forces.Though Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said Thursday that there had been “slow but steady progress” in the peace talks, Russia has given no indication that it will agree to any kind of withdrawal from land it has seized.On the ground, two people were killed and six more wounded Friday when a guided aerial bomb hit a busy road and set cars aflame in Ukraine’s second biggest city, Kharkiv, mayor Ihor Terekhov wrote on Telegram.One person was killed and three others were wounded when a guided aerial bomb hit a house in Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia region, while six people were wounded in a missile strike on the city of Uman, local officials said Friday.Russian drone attacks on the city of Mykolaiv and its suburbs overnight into Friday left part of the city without power. Energy and port infrastructure were damaged by drones in the city of Odesa on the Black Sea.Meanwhile, Ukraine said that it struck a major Russian oil refinery on Thursday using U.K.-supplied Storm Shadow missiles.Ukraine’s General Staff said that its forces hit the Novoshakhtinsk refinery in Russia’s Rostov region.“Multiple explosions were recorded. The target was hit,” it wrote on Telegram.Rostov regional Gov. Yuri Slyusar said that a firefighter was wounded when extinguishing the fire.Ukraine’s long-range drone strikes on Russian refineries aim to deprive Moscow of the oil export revenue it needs to pursue its full-scale invasion. Russia wants to cripple Ukraine’s power grid, seeking to deny civilians access to heat, light and running water in what Ukrainian officials say is an attempt to “weaponize winter.”

    KYIV, Ukraine —

    Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Friday that he will meet with U.S. President Donald Trump in Florida over the weekend.

    Related video above: Ukraine and U.S. discuss peace proposals on Christmas Day amid Russian attacks

    Zelenskyy told journalists that the two leaders will discuss security guarantees for Ukraine during Sunday’s talks and that the 20-point plan under discussion “is about 90% ready.”

    An “economic agreement” also will be discussed, Zelenskyy said, but added that he was unable to confirm “whether anything will be finalized by the end.”

    The Ukrainian side will also raise “territorial issues,” he said. Moscow has insisted that Ukraine relinquish the remaining territory it still holds in the Donbas — an ultimatum that Ukraine has rejected. Russia has captured most of Luhansk and about 70% of Donetsk — the two areas that make up the Donbas.

    Zelenskyy said that Ukraine “would like the Europeans to be involved,” but doubted whether it would be possible at short notice.

    “We must, without doubt, find some format in the near future in which not only Ukraine and the U.S. are present, but Europe is represented as well,” he said.

    The announced meeting is the latest development in an extensive U.S.-led diplomatic push to end the nearly four-year Russia-Ukraine war, but efforts have run into sharply conflicting demands by Moscow and Kyiv.

    Zelenskyy’s comments came after he said Thursday that he had a “good conversation” with U.S. special envoy Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law.

    Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters Friday that the Kremlin had already been in contact with U.S. representatives since Russian presidential envoy Kirill Dmitriev recently met with U.S. envoys in Florida.

    “It was agreed upon to continue the dialogue,” he said.

    Trump is engaged in a diplomatic push to end Russia’s all-out war, which began on Feb. 24, 2022, but his efforts have run into sharply conflicting demands by Moscow and Kyiv.

    Zelenskyy said Tuesday that he would be willing to withdraw troops from Ukraine’s eastern industrial heartland as part of a plan to end the war if Russia also pulls back and the area becomes a demilitarized zone monitored by international forces.

    Though Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said Thursday that there had been “slow but steady progress” in the peace talks, Russia has given no indication that it will agree to any kind of withdrawal from land it has seized.

    On the ground, two people were killed and six more wounded Friday when a guided aerial bomb hit a busy road and set cars aflame in Ukraine’s second biggest city, Kharkiv, mayor Ihor Terekhov wrote on Telegram.

    One person was killed and three others were wounded when a guided aerial bomb hit a house in Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia region, while six people were wounded in a missile strike on the city of Uman, local officials said Friday.

    Russian drone attacks on the city of Mykolaiv and its suburbs overnight into Friday left part of the city without power. Energy and port infrastructure were damaged by drones in the city of Odesa on the Black Sea.

    Meanwhile, Ukraine said that it struck a major Russian oil refinery on Thursday using U.K.-supplied Storm Shadow missiles.

    Ukraine’s General Staff said that its forces hit the Novoshakhtinsk refinery in Russia’s Rostov region.

    “Multiple explosions were recorded. The target was hit,” it wrote on Telegram.

    Rostov regional Gov. Yuri Slyusar said that a firefighter was wounded when extinguishing the fire.

    Ukraine’s long-range drone strikes on Russian refineries aim to deprive Moscow of the oil export revenue it needs to pursue its full-scale invasion. Russia wants to cripple Ukraine’s power grid, seeking to deny civilians access to heat, light and running water in what Ukrainian officials say is an attempt to “weaponize winter.”

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  • Dallas Mavericks owner reignites Trump third term debate. Could he run again?

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    WASHINGTON, DC - DECEMBER 16: U.S. President Donald Trump (L) looks on as Miriam Adelson speaks during a Hanukkah Reception in the East Room of the White House on December 16, 2025 in Washington, DC. Trump hosted attendees to celebrate the holiday and the lighting of the menorah on the third night of Hanukkah. (Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)

    WASHINGTON, DC – DECEMBER 16: U.S. President Donald Trump (L) looks on as Miriam Adelson speaks during a Hanukkah Reception in the East Room of the White House on December 16, 2025 in Washington, DC. Trump hosted attendees to celebrate the holiday and the lighting of the menorah on the third night of Hanukkah. (Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)


    Anna Moneymaker

    Getty Images

    President Donald Trump has spent years sending mixed signals about serving beyond two terms.

    At rallies, he’s joked about staying longer, and in interviews he’s hinted that “there are methods” to make it happen.

    Those comments recently resurfaced after Dallas Mavericks owner Miriam Adelson told Trump she would support him if he ran in 2028, which sparked fresh questions from people who aren’t sure what the Constitution actually permits.

    The rules are more straightforward than the speculation suggests. Here’s what to know about presidential term limits and what’s legally possible.

    🔥 In case you missed it…

    What does the Constitution say about presidential term limits?

    The Constitution limits presidents to two elected terms.

    According to the Constitution Center, the 22nd Amendment states that “no person shall be elected to the office of the President more than twice.”

    The rule took effect in 1951 after Franklin D. Roosevelt won four elections, which prompted lawmakers to create a formal cap.

    The amendment also says that anyone who serves more than two years of another president’s term can only be elected once. This prevents a president from stretching their time in office much longer than eight years.

    Because Trump has already been elected twice, the amendment blocks him from running in 2028.

    Why do people think Trump might still try for a third term?

    Trump’s mixed comments over the years have created space for speculation, and those remarks often pick up momentum when they’re echoed by his supporters.

    Former strategist Steve Bannon has been one of the most vocal.

    During an interview with The Economist, Bannon said “Trump is going to be president in ‘28 and people just ought to get accommodated with that.”

    He also claimed there are “different alternatives” or “workarounds” to the Constitution’s amendment and that a plan would be laid out “in the appropriate time.” Other allies have taken more formal steps. Rep. Andy Ogles, a Tennessee Republican, introduced a resolution earlier this year that would amend the Constitution so a president could be elected to three terms.

    But Trump has recently acknowledged the limit, telling reporters in late October that he’s “not allowed to run” again and calling it “too bad.”

    Could Trump return to the presidency through another route?

    There are unusual scenarios that legal scholars have debated, but none are tested or realistic.

    For example, some law professors have questioned whether a former two-term president could serve as vice president, but the 12th Amendment says anyone ineligible to be president is also ineligible to be vice president.

    Others have wondered whether a former president could become Speaker of the House and then enter the presidential line of succession.

    The Library of Congress has discussed these hypotheticals, but notes neither the 12th nor the 22nd Amendment clearly addresses such scenarios.

    Experts told CBS News that changing the Constitution to allow a third term would be extremely unlikely because it would require support from two thirds of Congress and ratification by three fourths of states.

    In practice, there is no real path for Trump to legally serve a third term.

    Related Stories from Fort Worth Star-Telegram

    Tiffani Jackson

    Fort Worth Star-Telegram

    Tiffani is a service journalism reporter for the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. She is part of a team of local journalists who answer reader questions about life in North Texas. Tiffani mainly writes about Texas laws and health news.

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  • Ukraine, US discuss peace proposals on Christmas Day amid Russian attacks

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    Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy spoke with U.S. representatives on Christmas Day about ongoing peace proposals after Russia launched a deadly attack on Ukraine.Zelenskyy said in a video message that he had “a good conversation” with U.S. Special Envoy Steve Witkoff and President Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner, during which they drafted new ideas about how to bring about real peace.This comes after Russia fired more than 600 drones and three dozen missiles at Ukraine earlier this week, killing at least three people, including a 4-year-old child. The attack caused significant damage, collapsing homes and knocking out the power grid in 13 regions of Ukraine, leading to widespread outages in bitter cold temperatures.The strikes are “an extremely clear signal of Russian priorities,” Zelenskyy said. In Rome, Pope Leo XIV delivered his first Christmas message as pontiff, condemning the violence and praying for the fighting to end.”Let us pray in a particular way for the tormented people of Ukraine. May the clamor of weapons cease and may the parties involved with the support and commitment of the international community find the courage to engage in sincere, direct and respectful dialogue,” the pope said. Leaders in Ukraine will continue to speak with U.S. representatives Friday. Additionally, Zelenskyy said on social media that Ukraine agreed to a meeting with Trump in the near future.Keep watching for the latest from the Washington News Bureau:

    WASHINGTON —

    Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy spoke with U.S. representatives on Christmas Day about ongoing peace proposals after Russia launched a deadly attack on Ukraine.

    Zelenskyy said in a video message that he had “a good conversation” with U.S. Special Envoy Steve Witkoff and President Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner, during which they drafted new ideas about how to bring about real peace.

    This comes after Russia fired more than 600 drones and three dozen missiles at Ukraine earlier this week, killing at least three people, including a 4-year-old child.

    The attack caused significant damage, collapsing homes and knocking out the power grid in 13 regions of Ukraine, leading to widespread outages in bitter cold temperatures.

    The strikes are “an extremely clear signal of Russian priorities,” Zelenskyy said.

    In Rome, Pope Leo XIV delivered his first Christmas message as pontiff, condemning the violence and praying for the fighting to end.

    “Let us pray in a particular way for the tormented people of Ukraine. May the clamor of weapons cease and may the parties involved with the support and commitment of the international community find the courage to engage in sincere, direct and respectful dialogue,” the pope said.

    Leaders in Ukraine will continue to speak with U.S. representatives Friday. Additionally, Zelenskyy said on social media that Ukraine agreed to a meeting with Trump in the near future.

    Keep watching for the latest from the Washington News Bureau:


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  • Jimmy Kimmel defends free speech in ‘alternative Christmas message’ for Britain

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    Talk show host Jimmy Kimmel took aim at U.S. President Donald Trump as he warned Thursday about the rise of fascism in an address to U.K. viewers dubbed “The Alternative Christmas Message.”The message, aired on Channel 4 on Christmas Day, reflected on the impact of the second term in office for Trump, who Kimmel said acts like he’s a king.”From a fascism perspective, this has been a really great year,” he said. “Tyranny is booming over here.”The channel began a tradition of airing an alternative Christmas message in 1993, as a counterpart to the British monarch’s annual televised address to the nation. Channel 4 said the message is often a thought-provoking and personal reflection pertinent to the events of the year.The comedian has skewered Trump since returning to the air after ABC indefinitely suspended the “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” show in September following criticism of comments the host made over the killing of conservative activist Charlie Kirk.Kimmel made remarks in reference to the reaction to Kirk’s shooting, suggesting that many Trump supporters were trying to capitalize on the death.Trump celebrated the suspension of the veteran late-night comic and his frequent critic, calling it “great news for America.” He also called for other late-night hosts to be fired.The incident, one of Trump’s many disputes and legal battles waged with the media, drew widespread concerns about freedom of speech and freedom of the press.Hundreds of leading Hollywood stars and others in the entertainment industry urged Americans to “fight to defend and preserve our constitutionally protected rights.” The show returned to the air less than a week later.Kimmel told the U.K. audience that a Christmas miracle had happened in September when millions of people — some who hated his show — had spoken up for free speech.”We won, the president lost, and now I’m back on the air every night giving the most powerful politician on earth a right and richly deserved bollocking,” he said.Channel 4 previously invited whistle-blower Edward Snowden and Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to deliver the alternative Christmas message.Kimmel, who said he didn’t expect Brits to know who he was, warned that silencing critics is not just something that happens in Russia or North Korea.Despite the split that led to the American Revolution 250 years ago, he said the two nations still shared a special relationship and urged the U.K. not to give up on the U.S. as it was “going through a bit of a wobble right now.””Here in the United States right now, we are both figuratively and literally tearing down the structures of our democracy from the free press to science to medicine to judicial independence to the actual White House itself,” Kimmel said, in reference to demolition of the building’s East Wing. “We are a right mess, and we know this is also affecting you, and I just wanted to say sorry.”

    Talk show host Jimmy Kimmel took aim at U.S. President Donald Trump as he warned Thursday about the rise of fascism in an address to U.K. viewers dubbed “The Alternative Christmas Message.”

    The message, aired on Channel 4 on Christmas Day, reflected on the impact of the second term in office for Trump, who Kimmel said acts like he’s a king.

    “From a fascism perspective, this has been a really great year,” he said. “Tyranny is booming over here.”

    The channel began a tradition of airing an alternative Christmas message in 1993, as a counterpart to the British monarch’s annual televised address to the nation. Channel 4 said the message is often a thought-provoking and personal reflection pertinent to the events of the year.

    The comedian has skewered Trump since returning to the air after ABC indefinitely suspended the “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” show in September following criticism of comments the host made over the killing of conservative activist Charlie Kirk.

    Kimmel made remarks in reference to the reaction to Kirk’s shooting, suggesting that many Trump supporters were trying to capitalize on the death.

    Trump celebrated the suspension of the veteran late-night comic and his frequent critic, calling it “great news for America.” He also called for other late-night hosts to be fired.

    The incident, one of Trump’s many disputes and legal battles waged with the media, drew widespread concerns about freedom of speech and freedom of the press.

    Hundreds of leading Hollywood stars and others in the entertainment industry urged Americans to “fight to defend and preserve our constitutionally protected rights.” The show returned to the air less than a week later.

    Kimmel told the U.K. audience that a Christmas miracle had happened in September when millions of people — some who hated his show — had spoken up for free speech.

    “We won, the president lost, and now I’m back on the air every night giving the most powerful politician on earth a right and richly deserved bollocking,” he said.

    Channel 4 previously invited whistle-blower Edward Snowden and Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to deliver the alternative Christmas message.

    Kimmel, who said he didn’t expect Brits to know who he was, warned that silencing critics is not just something that happens in Russia or North Korea.

    Despite the split that led to the American Revolution 250 years ago, he said the two nations still shared a special relationship and urged the U.K. not to give up on the U.S. as it was “going through a bit of a wobble right now.”

    “Here in the United States right now, we are both figuratively and literally tearing down the structures of our democracy from the free press to science to medicine to judicial independence to the actual White House itself,” Kimmel said, in reference to demolition of the building’s East Wing. “We are a right mess, and we know this is also affecting you, and I just wanted to say sorry.”

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  • Why Has The Solana Price Been In A Steady Downtrend Since January?

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    Solana’s price action this year has followed a clear but uncomfortable pattern. After pushing to a new all-time high around the $296 region in January, the rally quickly lost momentum and transitioned into a steady decline that has persisted for months. 

    Many traders have attributed this weakness to a risk-off sentiment across crypto, but a deeper on-chain breakdown shared by crypto analyst Ardi on X suggests the story began well before the January peak and has more to do with who was buying and who was quietly exiting.

    Distribution Was Already Underway Before The January Peak

    Solana has been on a clear downtrend since September, when it reached a lower high of around $247 compared to its January 19 all-time high of $293. One of the most important insights from Ardi’s analysis is that Solana’s January all-time high did not mark the start of distribution but rather the culmination of it. 

    Related Reading

    The chart attached to his post shows that selling volume was already increasing months earlier, well ahead of October, meaning that large holders were positioning for exits long before price reached its final peak. From that perspective, the January high looks less like the beginning of a new expansion phase and more like the last push of a rally. 

    Source: Chart from Ardi on X

    After that point, price action began forming lower highs, and each rebound attempt lacked the strength needed to reclaim the all-time high. Interestingly, Solana failed to reach a new all-time high, even as other large market cap cryptos like Bitcoin, Ethereum, XRP, and BNB pushed to new all-time highs during the year.

    Another interesting feature of the data is the widening gap between retail behavior and that of larger players. Cumulative delta metrics on the chart show that retail-sized wallets have been consistently active throughout the year and are increasing their activity even as Solana’s price moved lower.

    On the other hand, mid-sized and institutional wallets tell a very different story. Their activity has been trending downward for months, starting from the January peak and extending up until the time of writing.

    Is Solana’s Price Becoming Dependent On Memecoin Activity?

    Ardi’s analysis also raises a broader question about what is currently driving demand for Solana. Outside of retail activity on Solana itself, one of the few consistent sources of activity has been the memecoin sector. Successes and booms of meme coins like Cat in a Dogs World (MEW), Peanut the Squirrel (PNUT), and Fartcoin (FARTCOIN), which gained traction in the second half of 2024, contributed to Solana’s push to all-time highs during those periods.

    Related Reading

    Those meme coin successes culminated with the launch of the Official Trump ($TRUMP) token in January 2025 on Solana, which experienced eye-watering gains shortly after its launch. This, in turn, contributed to Solana’s all-time high in January. 

    However, since then, the TRUMP token and other Solana-based meme coins have been trending downwards in recent months and no longer command the same level of attention or trading intensity they had this time last year. That has led to the view that Solana’s price is increasingly sensitive to the success of memecoins in its ecosystem. 

    At the time of writing, Solana is trading at $121.50, down by about 58.6% from its January all-time high of $293.

    Solana
    SOL trading at $121 on the 1D chart | Source: SOLUSDT on Tradingview.com

    Featured image from iStock, chart from Tradingview.com

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    Scott Matherson

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  • Trump administration’s ban on foreign-made drones starts this week — you can say goodbye to new DJI models | TechCrunch

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    On Monday, the Trump administration’s Federal Communications Commission banned all new foreign-made drone models from distribution in the U.S., citing “national security concerns.” Americans who already own older foreign drone models will still be able to use those products, the government said.

    In a fact sheet published Monday, the FCC claimed that “criminals, hostile foreign actors, and terrorists” could use drones “to present new and serious threats to our homeland.” As a result, the agency said that it had updated its Covered List — which is a list of products that have been “deemed to pose an unacceptable risk to the national security” of the country — to include all “UAS and UAS critical components produced abroad.”

    The FCC’s chairman, Brendan Carr, said Monday that he approved of the policy. “I welcome this Executive Branch national security determination, and I am pleased that the FCC has now added foreign drones and related components, which pose an unacceptable national security risk, to the FCC’s Covered List,” Carr said. “Following President Trump’s leadership, the FCC will work closely with U.S. drone makers to unleash American drone dominance.”

    The new rule will obviously impact many different companies, but it is destined to strike a blow against Chinese drone maker DJI, which is currently considered the dominant player in drone sales globally. Indeed, DJI is considered to be one of the most popular drone brands for American consumers.

    When reached for comment by TechCrunch, DJI said it disapproved of the decision. “DJI is disappointed by the Federal Communications Commission’s action today to add foreign‑made drones to the Covered List. While DJI was not singled out, no information has been released regarding what information was used by the Executive Branch in reaching its determination.”

    The company, which said that it remained committed to the U.S. market, continued: “As the industry leader, DJI has advocated for an open, competitive market that benefits all US consumers and commercial users, and will continue to do so. DJI products are among the safest and most secure on the market, supported by years of reviews conducted by U.S. government agencies and independent third parties.”

    Throughout his multiple presidential administrations, Trump has repeatedly played hardball with Chinese companies. His administration laid the groundwork for the new drone ban with an executive order passed in June that sought to boost the production of U.S.-made drones and thus foster a “strong and secure domestic drone sector,” while also securing “the United States drone supply chain against foreign control or exploitation.”

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    Lucas Ropek

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  • Supreme Court rules against Trump, bars National Guard deployment in Chicago

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    WASHINGTON  — The Supreme Court ruled against President Trump on Tuesday and said he did not have legal authority to deploy the National Guard in Chicago to protect federal immigration agents.

    Acting on a 6-3 vote, the justices denied Trump’s appeal and upheld orders from a federal district judge and the U.S. 7th Circuit Court of Appeals that said the president had exaggerated the threat and overstepped his authority.

    The decision is a major defeat for Trump and his broad claim that he had the power to deploy militia troops in U.S. cities.

    In an unsigned order, the court said the Militia Act allows the president to deploy the National Guard only if the regular U.S. armed forces were unable to quell violence.

    The law dating to 1903 says the president may call up and deploy the National Guard if he faces the threat of an invasion or a rebellion or is “unable with the regular forces to execute the laws of the United States.”

    That phrase turned out to be crucial.

    Trump’s lawyers assumed it referred to the police and federal agents. But after taking a close look, the justices concluded it referred to the regular U.S. military, not civilian law enforcement or the National Guard.

    “To call the Guard into active federal service under the [Militia Act], the President must be ‘unable’ with the regular military ‘to execute the laws of the United States,’” the court said in Trump vs. Illinois.

    That standard will rarely be met, the court added.

    “Under the Posse Comitatus Act, the military is prohibited from execut[ing] the laws except in cases and under circumstances expressly authorized by the Constitution or Act of Congress,” the court said. “So before the President can federalize the Guard … he likely must have statutory or constitutional authority to execute the laws with the regular military and must be ‘unable’ with those forces to perform that function.

    “At this preliminary stage, the Government has failed to identify a source of authority that would allow the military to execute the laws in Illinois,” the court said.

    Although the court was acting on an emergency appeal, its decision is a significant defeat for Trump and is not likely to be reversed on appeal. Often, the court issues one-sentence emergency orders. But in this case, the justices wrote a three-page opinion to spell out the law and limit the president’s authority.

    Justice Amy Coney Barrett, who oversees appeals from Illinois, and Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. cast the deciding votes. Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh agreed with the outcome, but said he preferred a narrow and more limited ruling.

    Conservative Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel A. Alito Jr. and Neil M. Gorsuch dissented.

    Alito, in dissent, said the “court fails to explain why the President’s inherent constitutional authority to protect federal officers and property is not sufficient to justify the use of National Guard members in the relevant area for precisely that purpose.”

    California Gov. Gavin Newsom and Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta filed a brief in the Chicago case that warned of the danger of the president using the military in American cities.

    “Today, Americans can breathe a huge sigh of relief,” Bonta said Tuesday. “While this is not necessarily the end of the road, it is a significant, deeply gratifying step in the right direction. We plan to ask the lower courts to reach the same result in our cases — and we are hopeful they will do so quickly.”

    The U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals had allowed the deployments in Los Angeles and Portland, Ore., after ruling that judges must defer to the president.

    But U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer ruled Dec. 10 that the federalized National Guard troops in Los Angeles must be returned to Newsom’s control.

    Trump’s lawyers had not claimed in their appeal that the president had the authority to deploy the military for ordinary law enforcement in the city. Instead, they said the Guard troops would be deployed “to protect federal officers and federal property.”

    The two sides in the Chicago case, like in Portland, told dramatically different stories about the circumstances leading to Trump’s order.

    Democratic officials in Illinois said small groups of protesters objected to the aggressive enforcement tactics used by federal immigration agents. They said police were able to contain the protests, clear the entrances and prevent violence.

    By contrast, administration officials described repeated instances of disruption, confrontation and violence in Chicago. They said immigration agents were harassed and blocked from doing their jobs, and they needed the protection the National Guard could supply.

    Trump Solicitor Gen. D. John Sauer said the president had the authority to deploy the Guard if agents could not enforce the immigration laws.

    “Confronted with intolerable risks of harm to federal agents and coordinated, violent opposition to the enforcement of federal law,” Trump called up the National Guard “to defend federal personnel, property, and functions in the face of ongoing violence,” Sauer told the court in an emergency appeal filed in mid-October.

    Illinois state lawyers disputed the administration’s account.

    “The evidence shows that federal facilities in Illinois remain open, the individuals who have violated the law by attacking federal authorities have been arrested, and enforcement of immigration law in Illinois has only increased in recent weeks,” state Solicitor Gen. Jane Elinor Notz said in response to the administration’s appeal.

    The Constitution gives Congress the power “to provide for calling forth the militia to execute the laws of the union, suppress insurrections and repel invasions.”

    But on Oct. 29, the justices asked both sides to explain what the law meant when it referred to the “regular forces.”

    Until then, both sides had assumed it referred to federal agents and police, not the standing U.S. armed forces.

    A few days before, Georgetown law professor and former Justice Department lawyer Martin Lederman had filed a friend-of-the-court brief asserting that the “regular forces” cited in the 1903 law were the standing U.S. Army.

    His brief prompted the court to ask both sides to explain their view of the disputed provision.

    Trump’s lawyers stuck to their position. They said the law referred to the “civilian forces that regularly execute the laws,” not the standing army.

    If those civilians cannot enforce the law, “there is a strong tradition in this country of favoring the use” of the National Guard, not the standing military, to quell domestic disturbances, they said.

    State attorneys for Illinois said the “regular forces” are the “full-time, professional military.” And they said the president could not “even plausibly argue” that the U.S. Guard members were needed to enforce the law in Chicago.

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    David G. Savage

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  • Claims about Trump in Epstein files are ‘untrue,’ the Justice Department says

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    WASHINGTON — Tips provided to federal investigators about Donald Trump’s alleged involvement in Jeffrey Epstein’s schemes with young women and girls are “sensationalist” and “untrue,” the Justice Department said on Tuesday, after a new tranche of files released from the probe featured multiple references to the president.

    The documents include a limousine driver reportedly overhearing Trump discussing a man named Jeffrey “abusing” a girl, and an alleged victim accusing Trump and Epstein of rape. It is unclear whether the FBI followed up on the tips. The alleged rape victim died from a gunshot wound to the head after reporting the incident.

    Nowhere in the newly released files do federal law enforcement agents or prosecutors indicate that Trump was suspected of wrongdoing, or that Trump — whose friendship with Epstein lasted through the mid-2000s — was investigated himself.

    But one unidentified federal prosecutor noted in a 2020 email that Trump had flown on Epstein’s private jet “many more times than previously has been reported,” including over a time period when Ghislaine Maxwell, Epstein’s top confidante who would ultimately be convicted on five federal counts of sex trafficking and abuse, was being investigated for criminal activity.

    The Justice Department released an unusual statement unequivocally defending the president.

    “Some of these documents contain untrue and sensationalist claims made against President Trump that were submitted to the FBI right before the 2020 election,” the Justice Department statement read. “To be clear: the claims are unfounded and false, and if they had a shred of credibility, they certainly would have been weaponized against President Trump already.”

    “Nevertheless, out of our commitment to the law and transparency, the DOJ is releasing these documents with the legally required protections for Epstein’s victims,” the department added.

    The Justice Department files were released with heavy redactions after bipartisan lawmakers in Congress passed a new law compelling it to do so, despite Trump lobbying Republicans aggressively over the summer and fall to oppose the bill. The president ultimately signed the Epstein Files Transparency Act into law after the legislation passed with veto-proof majorities in both chambers.

    One newly released file containing a letter purportedly from Epstein — a notorious child sex offender who died in jail while awaiting federal trial on sex-trafficking charges — drew widespread attention online, but was held up by the Justice Department as an example of faulty or misleading information contained in the files.

    The letter appeared to be sent by Epstein to Larry Nassar, another convicted sex offender, shortly before Epstein’s death. The letter’s author suggested that Nassar would learn after receiving the note that Epstein had “taken the ‘short route’ home,” possibly referring to his suicide. It was postmarked from Virginia on Aug. 13, 2019, despite Epstein’s death in a Manhattan jail three days prior.

    “Our president shares our love of young, nubile girls,” the letter reads. “When a young beauty walked by he loved to ‘grab snatch,’ whereas we ended up snatching grub in the mess halls of the system. Life is unfair.”

    The Justice Department said that the FBI had confirmed that the letter is “FAKE” after it made the rounds on Tuesday.

    “This fake letter serves as a reminder that just because a document is released by the Department of Justice does not make the allegations or claims within the document factual,” the department posted on social media. “Nevertheless, the DOJ will continue to release all material required by law.”

    The department has faced bipartisan scrutiny since failing to release all of the Epstein files in its possession by Dec. 19, the legal deadline for it to do so, and for redacting material on the vast majority of the documents.

    Justice Department officials said they were following the law by protecting victims with the redactions. The Epstein Files Transparency Act also directs the department not to redact images or references to prominent or political figures, and to provide an explanation for each and every redaction in writing.

    The latest release, just days before the Christmas holiday, includes roughly 30,000 documents, the department said. Hundreds of thousands more are expected to be released in the coming weeks.

    Democrats on the House Oversight Committee released a statement in response to the Tuesday release accusing the Justice Department of a “cover-up,” writing on social media, “the new DOJ documents raise serious questions about the relationship between Epstein and Donald Trump.”

    Documents from Epstein’s private estate released by the oversight committee earlier this fall had already cast a spotlight on that relationship, revealing Epstein had written in emails to associates that Trump “knew about the girls.”

    The latest documents release also includes an email from an individual identified as “A,” claiming to stay at Balmoral Castle, a royal residence in Scotland, asking Maxwell if she had found him “some new inappropriate friends.” Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, formerly known as Prince Andrew, has come under intense scrutiny over his ties to Epstein in recent years.

    Speaking at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida on Monday, Trump said the continuing Epstein scandal amounts to a “distraction” from Republican successes, and expressed disapproval over the release of images in the files that reveal associates of Epstein.

    “I believe they gave over 100,000 pages of documents, and there’s tremendous backlash,” Trump told reporters. “It’s an interesting question, because a lot of people are very angry that pictures are being released of other people that really had nothing to do with Epstein. But they’re in a picture with him because he was at a party, and you ruin a reputation of somebody. So a lot of people are very angry that this continues.”

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    Michael Wilner

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