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    Newsom to sue Trump over California national guard deployment to Oregon

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    California’s governor, Gavin Newsom, announced on Sunday that he is suing Donald Trump over the alleged deployment of 300 California national guard personnel to Oregon.“They are on their way there now,” Newsom said in a press statement. “The Trump Administration is unapologetically attacking the rule of law itself and putting into action their dangerous words – ignoring court orders and treating judges, even those appointed by the President himself, as political opponents.”Newsom’s proposed lawsuit follows a federal judge’s ruling that blocked the Trump administration from deploying the Oregon national guard to Portland. US district judge Karin Immergut agreed with arguments it would inflame rather than calm tensions in the city.Immergut said in her ruling, which delays sending the guard until at least 18 October, that there was a lack of evidence that the recent protests in Portland justified the move.Caroline Turco, Portland’s senior deputy attorney, said that there had been no violence against Ice officers for months and that recent Ice protests were “sedate” in the week before the president declared the city to be a war zone, sometimes featuring fewer than a dozen protesters.“This isn’t about public safety, it’s about power,” Newsom said. “We will take this fight to court, but the public cannot stay silent in the face of such reckless and authoritarian conduct by the President of the United States.”In a statement on X, Oregon attorney general Dan Rayfield said the state is “quickly assessing our options and preparing to take legal action.“The President is obviously hellbent on deploying the military in American cities, absent facts or authority to do so,” he wrote. “It is up to us and the courts to hold him accountable. That’s what we intend to do.”The California national guard referred questions to the defense department. A department spokesperson declined to comment.“President Trump exercised his lawful authority to protect federal assets and personnel in Portland following violent riots and attacks on law enforcement. For once, Gavin Newscum should stand on the side of law-abiding citizens instead of violent criminals destroying Portland and cities across the country,” read a response from the White House deputy press secretary, Abigail Jackson.The news from Oregon came just a day after Trump authorized the deployment of national guard troops to Chicago, the latest in a string of similar interventions across several US states.Trump had first announced the plan on 27 September, saying he was “authorizing full force, if necessary” despite pleas from Oregon officials and the state’s congressional delegation, who said there had been a single, uneventful protest outside one federal immigration enforcement office.For years, Trump has amplified the narrative that Portland is a “war-ravaged” city with anarchists engaging in chaos and unlawful behavior.During his first term in 2020, he deployed federal forces to the city amid the protests over the murder by police of George Floyd in Minneapolis. The protests spread across the US but were especially heightened in Portland. Despite protests against Ice being relatively small in the state this year, Trump has used them as a justification to deploy troops.Speaking on X about the latest move from Trump, Newsom said: “It’s appalling. It’s un-American, and it must be stopped.” More

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      Trump says ‘no choice’ but to cut federal workers if government shuts down as midnight deadline looms – live

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      When asked by a reporter during his executive order signing, why it’s necessary to cut more federal jobs in the event of a government shutdown, the president said it’s something you “have to do”.“No country can afford to pay for illegal immigration, healthcare for everybody that comes into the country. And that’s what they [Democrats] are insisting,” Trump said. “They want open borders. They want men playing in women’s sports. They want transgender for everybody. They never stop. They don’t learn. We won an election in the landslide. They just don’t learn. So we have no choice. I have to do that for the country.”On the Senate floor, Patty Murray – who serves as the senior senator from Washington, and vice-chair of the influential appropriations committee – just said that she hopes Republicans will “come to their senses and come to the table”.“If Republicans want to avoid a shutdown like Democrats want to avoid a shutdown, then stop spending so much time saying you will sit down with us on healthcare later,” Murray said. “Spend that time working with us right now.”Attorney general Pam Bondi is set to appear before the Senate judiciary committee on Tuesday, 7 October, as turmoil in the justice department continues.Last week, federal prosecutors indicted former FBI director James Comey. This despite the US attorney for the eastern district of Virginia, Erik Siebert, finding insufficient evidence to prosecute him.The president, then moved to fire Siebert and installed White House staffer and his personal attorney, Lindsey Halligan.When asked by a reporter during his executive order signing, why it’s necessary to cut more federal jobs in the event of a government shutdown, the president said it’s something you “have to do”.“No country can afford to pay for illegal immigration, healthcare for everybody that comes into the country. And that’s what they [Democrats] are insisting,” Trump said. “They want open borders. They want men playing in women’s sports. They want transgender for everybody. They never stop. They don’t learn. We won an election in the landslide. They just don’t learn. So we have no choice. I have to do that for the country.”The president signed an executive order today to “accelerate” pediatric cancer research by using artificial intelligence.This includes doubling a $50m investment in the childhood cancer data initiative.“For years, we’ve been amassing data about childhood cancer, but until now, we’ve been unable to fully exploit this trove of information and apply it to practical medicine,” Trump said.It’s worth noting something that Donald Trump said earlier, during his announcement in the Oval Office.“We can do things during the shutdown that are irreversible. Like cutting vast numbers of people out, cutting things that they like, cutting programs that they like,” the president said, seemingly in reference to the memo sent out by the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) last week that told federal agencies to prepare for layoffs in the event of a government shutdown. “And you all know Russell Vought. He’s become very popular recently because he can trim the budget to a level that you couldn’t do any other way.”Vought, who is the director of the OMB, was standing beside the president during today’s announcement.In response, top Senate Democrat, Chuck Schumer said the president “admitted himself that he is using Americans as political pawns”.“He is admitting that he is doing the firing of people, if god forbid it [the shutdown] happens,” Schumer added. “Democrats do not want to shut down. We stand ready to work with Republicans to find a bipartisan compromise.”In terms of who stands to be affected if Congress fails to pass a funding extension today, my colleague Lauren Gambino notes that approximately 750,000 federal employees will be furloughed each day of a government shutdown, according to an estimate by the Congressional Budget Office released on Tuesday.Operations deemed essential – such as social security, military duties, immigration enforcement, and air traffic control – continue, but other services may be disrupted or delayed. Mail delivery and post office operations will continue without interruption.Agencies have been releasing updated contingency plans in the event of a shutdown. The Department of Education said nearly all its federal employees would be furloughed, while most of the Department of Homeland Security workforce would remain on the job.The effect can be wide-ranging and potentially long-lasting. Previous shutdowns have closed national parks and the Smithsonian museums in Washington; slowed air travel; delayed food safety inspections and postponed immigration hearings.Lauren notes that while the broader economy may not feel the effects immediately, analysts warn that a prolonged shutdown could slow growth, disrupt markets, and erode public trust.Read Lauren’s full primer on the looming shutdown below.Qatar, Egypt and Turkey are urging Hamas to give a positive response to Donald Trump’s proposal for ending Israel’s war in Gaza, Axios is reporting, citing two sources with knowledge of the talks.Trump said earlier this morning that he was giving the group “three or four days” to respond. “We have one signature that we need, and that signature will pay in hell if they don’t sign,” Trump told US generals and admirals in Quantico, Virginia. Yesterday the president made clear that he would support Israel continuing the war if Hamas rejects the proposal, or reneges on the deal at any stage.According to Axios’s source, while Trump presented the plan at a press conference yesterday alongside Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu at the White House, Qatari PM Mohammed bin Abdulrahman al-Thani and Egyptian intelligence chief Hassan Rashad were presenting it to Hamas leaders in Doha – and both urged Hamas to accept.Per Axios’s report: “Al-Thani advised the Hamas leaders that this was the best deal he was able to get for them and it won’t get much better, the source told the news agency. He also stressed that based on his conversations with Trump, he was confident the US president was seriously committed to ending the war. He said that was a strong enough guarantee for Hamas. The Hamas leaders told al-Thani they would study the proposal in good faith.”They met again on Tuesday, this time along with Turkish intelligence director Ebrahim Kalin, the source told Axios. Ahead of that meeting, al-Thani told Al-Jazeera he hopes “everyone looks at the plan constructively and seizes the chance to end the war”. He said Hamas needs to get to a consensus with all other Palestinian factions in Gaza before issuing an official response. “We and Egypt explained to Hamas during yesterday’s meeting that our main goal is stopping the war. Trump’s plan achieves the main goal of ending the war, though some issues in it need clarification and negotiation,” the Qatari PM added.The US is set to deport some 400 Iranian people back to Iran in the coming months as part of a deal with the Iranian government, the New York Times (paywall) reports.Iranian officials have told the paper that a US-chartered flight carrying about 100 people departed Louisiana last night and will arrive in Iran via Qatar in the next few days.The deportation to Iran, which has one of the harshest human rights records in the world, marks “one of the starkest efforts yet by the Trump administration to deport migrants no matter the human rights conditions in countries on the receiving end”, the NYT’s report reads.“The identities of the Iranians on the plane and their reasons for trying to immigrate to the United States were not immediately clear,” it notes. But Iranian officials add “that in nearly every case, asylum requests had been denied or the [deportees] had not yet appeared before a judge for an asylum hearing”.Earlier today, the homepage of the US Department of Housing and Urban Development (Hud) was changed to a message in bold, claiming “the Radical Left are going to shut down the government and inflict massive pain on the American people unless they get their $1.5 trillion wish list of demands. The Trump administration wants to keep the government open for the American people.”The partisan message comes after whistleblowers at the agency claimed they were fired for raising concerns about the agency dismantling efforts to enforce fair housing laws.Here is my colleague Alice Speri’s story on today’s ruling from a federal judge that found the Trump administration’s policy to detain and deport foreign scholars over their pro-Palestinian views violates the US constitution and was designed to “intentionally” chill free speech rights.In a short while, Donald Trump is expected to sign executive orders at 3pm EST in the Oval Office.As of now, it’s closed press, but we’ll keep you updated if anything changes.With the potential for another contentious government shutdown looming large, national park leaders and advocates are concerned the Trump administration could again push for leaving America’s parks open when they are unstaffed.“National parks don’t run themselves. It is hard-working National Park Service employees that keep them safe, clean and accessible,” 40 former superintendents said in a letter issued to Doug Burgum, the interior secretary, this week, urging him to close the parks if a shutdown occurs. “If sufficient staff aren’t there, visitors shouldn’t be either.”Irreversible damage was done at popular parks, including Joshua Tree in California, following a month-long shutdown in Trump’s first term, when his administration demanded parks be kept open while funding was paused and workers were furloughed.Without supervision, visitors left behind trails of destruction. Prehistoric petroglyphs were vandalized at Big Bend national park. Joshua trees, some more than a century old, were chopped down as trash and toilets overflowed. Tire tracks crushed sensitive plants and desert habitats from illegal off-roading vehicles in Death Valley. There were widespread reports of wildlife poaching, search-and-rescue crews were quickly overwhelmed with calls and visitor centers were broken into.There were 26 pages of listed damages, according to Kristen Brengel, senior vice-president of government affairs for the National Parks Conservation Association, who added that those effects happened in late December and January – a season when many parks are typically quieter.The autumn months, and October especially, still draw millions of visitors even as the peak of summer visitation begins to slow. In 2024, there were more than 28.4m recreational visits in October alone, according to data from the NPS.One House Democrat told me, on the condition of anonymity to speak candidly, that the “best thing” for Democrats right now is that their Republican colleagues are “refusing” to negotiate on healthcare, and “forcing the American people to get hammered with these consequences of what they’ve done”.This Democrat added that if GOP lawmakers were to “cut some kind of deal on health care” it would “inoculate them to some extent, for the midterms in 2026”.The Hill is reporting that the Senate is expected to vote on the Republican and Democratic versions of a stopgap funding bill at 5pm EST today.A reminder that both failed to achieve the 60 votes needed to clear the chamber prior to last week’s congressional recess.At the time of writing this post, government funding is set to expire in under 10 hours.A federal district court judge in Massachusetts today ruled that the Trump administration’s policy of arresting, detaining, and deporting noncitizen students and faculty members for pro-Palestinian advocacy violates the first amendment.Judge William Young said that today’s ruling was to decide whether noncitizens lawfully present in the US “have the same free speech rights as the rest of us”.“The Court answers this Constitutional question unequivocally ‘yes, they do.’ ‘No law’ means ‘no law’,” he said.The lawsuit, brought by the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University after activist Mahmoud Khalil’s was arrested and detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) in March, alleged the Trump administration was conducting an “ideological deportation” that was unconstitutional. It resulted in a nine-day trial in July.Coming soon to Miami: the Donald J Trump presidential library.Florida’s Republican governor Ron DeSantis and his cabinet voted Tuesday morning to hand over a lucrative parcel of land for the venture, the first formal step towards a building intended to honor the legacy of the 45th and 47th president.The unanimous vote by DeSantis and three loyalists, including the unelected Florida attorney general James Uthmeier, conveys almost three acres of prime real estate in the shadow of the Miami Freedom Tower, the iconic and recently reopened “beacon of freedom” that saw tens of thousands of Cubans enter the US during its time as an immigration processing center.On Monday, protestors at the site, currently a parking lot for Miami Dade College’s downtown campus, highlighted the juxtaposition with a building celebrating a president who has implemented the biggest crackdown on immigration in the nation’s history.“I look forward to the patriotic stories the Trump Library Foundation will showcase for generations to come in the Free State of Florida,” Uthmeier said in a statement following the vote.Eric Trump, the president’s son, celebrated the news in a post to X. “It will be the greatest Presidential Library ever built, honoring the greatest President our Nation has ever known,” he wrote.Critics of the venture note that college trustees voted a week ago to transfer ownership of the land, estimated to be worth $67m, to the state without knowing what DeSantis intended to do with it.On CNN today, Democratic senator Elizabeth Warren, of Massachusetts, said that “sometimes you’ve got to stand and fight” in regard to the looming shutdown.“A fight to protect Americans who can’t afford their healthcare, is a fight worth having,” she added.The president said that he didn’t see Democrats “bend” at all when they discussed healthcare provisions in his meeting on Monday. He spoke with Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer and House minority leader Hakeem Jeffries.But when asked to clarify what he means when he talks about Democrats fighting for undocumented immigrants’ access to federal healthcare programs, when they aren’t eligible to access them, Trump didn’t answer the question.Instead he listed off, what he described as, several achievements by the administration to curb illegal migration.Donald Trump has just said that the government will “probably” shut down, while addressing reporters in the Oval Office.“They want to give Cadillac Medicare to illegal aliens … at the cost to everyone else,” the president said. This is a false claim that Trump and congressional Republicans have repeated since lawmakers have failed to pass a continuing resolution to keep the government funded. A reminder, this lapses tonight.Undocumented immigrants are not eligible to enroll in subsidized programs like Medicaid, Medicare or the Affordable Care Act. More

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      in US Politics

      Oregon sues to block ‘illegal’ deployment of 200 national guard troops to Portland

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      The state of Oregon filed a lawsuit in federal court on Sunday seeking to block the deployment of 200 national guard troops to Portland, arguing Donald Trump’s characterization of the peaceful city as “war ravaged” is “pure fiction”.Oregon’s governor, Tina Kotek, said at a news conference that she had been notified by the Pentagon that the US president had seized control of the state’s reservists, claiming authority granted to him to suppress “rebellion” or lawlessness.“When the president and I spoke yesterday,” Kotek said, “I told him in very plain language that there is no insurrection, or threat to public safety that necessitates military intervention in Portland.”A Pentagon memorandum dated Sunday and signed by the defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, obtained by the Washington Post, said: “200 members of the Oregon National Guard will be called into Federal service effective immediately for a period of 60 days.”Trump’s action, in asserting federal control of the state’s national guard troops, is clearly “unlawful”, Oregon’s attorney general, Dan Rayfield, said, given that it was not taken in response to a foreign invasion or mass anarchy, but one small protest by dozens of activists outside a single Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) field office in Portland.“Let’s be clear, local law enforcement has this under control,” Kotek, said. “We have free speech demonstrations that are happening near one federal facility. Portland police is actively engaged in managing those, with the federal folks a the facility, and when people cross the line, there’s unlawful activity, people are being held accountable.”The state’s lawsuit notes that the president’s false claims about the Ice facility being “under siege”, and life for Portland resident being “like living in Hell”, appear to be based on a single Fox News report broadcast earlier this month, which mixed social media video from a conservative journalist of the current protest with video of much larger protests in 2020, in another part of the city.“The problem is the president is using social media to inform his views,” the attorney general said, either because he was trying to mislead the public intentionally, or is “relying on social media gossip” about the actual conditions in a US city.Kotek added that she had tried to inform Trump, during a phone conversation on Saturday, that he had been badly misled about current conditions in Portland, which is once again a vibrant and peaceful city a half-decade on from the pandemic-era racial justice protests.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotion“What I said to the president is: ‘I don’t understand what information you have.’ When he says to me that the federal courthouse is under attack, that is absolutely not true,” Kotek said. Video featured in the recent Fox News report on Portland did show images of a 2020 protest outside the federal courthouse in downtown Portland that were wrongly described as recorded during the current anti-Ice protest.“Some demonstrations happening at one federal facility, that are being managed on a regular basis by local law enforcement, if that is the only issue he’s brining up, he has been given bad information,” Kotek said.“We cannot be looking at footage from 2020 and assume that that is the case today in Portland.” More

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      in US Politics

      Portland residents scoff at Trump threat to send military: ‘This is not a war zone’

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      A visit to downtown Portland, Oregon, on Saturday, hours after Donald Trump falsely declared the city “war ravaged” to justify the deployment of federal troops, made it plain the US president’s impression of the city, apparently shaped by misleading conservative media reports, is entirely divorced from reality.There were just four protesters outside the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) field office in an outlying residential neighborhood that the president had claimed was “under siege” by antifascists and “other domestic terrorists”. Jack Dickinson, 26, wore a chicken costume draped in an American flag and held a sign that read “Portland Will Outlive Him”. Passing motorists honked in appreciation.Dickinson, who is from Portland and has helped organize the small but persistent protest at that location, which is going on three months, said he was not surprised to see Trump focus his attention on the city. But he called the president’s threat to have soldiers use “full force” against the protesters, whose numbers occasionally swell into the dozens, unwarranted.“There’s no justification, no reason for the national guard or military to be using ‘full force’ on people,” Dickinson said, “but they have this narrative about Portland that’s been helped by selectively edited videos to set themselves up for a crackdown.”The Ice field office, which the city of Portland recently accused the agency of illegally using for detentions, is also attractive to protesters because it sits directly next to a Tesla dealership. Another protester held up a sign that read “Tesla Funds Fascism/Stop Buying Teslas”.A third protester, a young man who goes by the nickname Burrito, said that he was “protesting them wrongfully kidnapping random individuals based on their skin color”.He also rejected the president’s characterization of the city and of the anti-Ice protesters. “This is not a war zone and it’s disgusting the way that he talks about us,” he said.The activist said that the point of the protests was to frustrate and wear out the federal agents, who, he said, have been responsible for any violence that has taken place: “As the day progresses, we get more numbers, they start to show more force and our people come out. It’s just a matter of how they escalate things, because they are the escalators, not like the one that Trump took that doesn’t work.”The number of protesters was vastly smaller than the number of people in nearby coffee shops and restaurants, where Portlanders went about their usual weekend business, joking about life during wartime.The city’s downtown blocks, which were the scene of mass protests in 2020, first against racist policing and then against Trump’s deployment of federal agents to guard a courthouse, were similarly placid.View image in fullscreenThe only person on the sidewalk outside the federal courthouse was a street sweeper, wearing a neon-green vest with the words “Clean & Safe” on the back. The fence that surrounded the building five years ago had long since been removed, as had the plywood boards that covered the windows of the adjacent police headquarters, where thousands of racial justice protesters rallied after the murder of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer in 2020.There was also no sign of activity at the nearby Edith Green federal building, with its distinctive facade clad in vegetated screens, one day after a local TV reporter recorded the arrival of a convoy that included masked federal agents in an armored homeland security truck.By contrast, the nearby Portland farmers’ market was packed with residents and tourists buying produce and eating acaí bowls from a thriving local business started by a yoga and meditation teacher.On social media, Portlanders continued to mock Trump’s false claims about the city as they have for weeks, by posting images of themselves enjoying life in the city with audio of the president saying, earlier this month, that it is “like living in Hell”. More

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      in US Politics

      Donald Trump says he is deploying troops to Portland, Oregon

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      Donald Trump said on Saturday he is deploying troops to Portland, Oregon, “authorizing Full Force, if necessary”, ignoring pleas from local officials and the state’s congressional delegation, who suggested that the president was misinformed or lying about the nature and scale of a single, small protest outside one federal immigration enforcement office.Trump made the announcement on social media, using references to antifascists and US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice). He claimed that the deployment was necessary “to protect War ravaged Portland, and any of our ICE Facilities under siege from attack by Antifa, and other domestic terrorists”.Oregon’s governor, Tina Kotek, rejected the president’s characterization. “There is no national security threat in Portland. Our communities are safe and calm,” she wrote on social media. “My office is reaching out to the White House and Homeland Security for more information. We have been provided no information on the reason or purpose of any military mission.”A visit by the Guardian to downtown Portland on Saturday morning confirmed that the city is placid, the farmers’ market was packed and the protest against immigration enforcement in an outlying residential neighborhood remained small. There were just four protesters on the sidewalk near the Ice field office Trump claimed was “under siege”. One, wearing a chicken costume and draped in an American flag, held up a sign that read: “Portland Will Outlive Him.” Passing motorists honked in appreciation.The White House did not provide details in connection with Trump’s announcement, including a timeline for the deployment or what troops would be involved.Portland’s mayor, Keith Wilson, said at a hastily assembled news conference on Friday night that the city had become aware of “a sudden influx of federal agents in our city. We did not ask for them to come. They are here without clear precedent or purpose.”“The President has sent agents here to create chaos and riots in Portland, to induce a reaction, to induce protests, to induce conflicts. His goal is to make Portland look like what he’s been describing it as,” Oregon’s junior senator, Jeff Merkley said. “He wants to induce a violent exchange. Let us not grant him that wish. Let us be the force of orderly, peaceful protest.”The senator also drew attention to video evidence from the local newspaper, the Oregonian, which showed federal agents using force against a small number of protesters outside the Ice facility, who remained peaceful.Although a spokesperson for the Oregon national guard told the Oregonian that no official request for troops had been made yet, convoys of dozens of federal agents, in marked and unmarked SUVs, were seen on Friday entering a federal building downtown and an Ice field office in a residential neighborhood that has been the scene of regular protests by dozens of protesters.“The President of the United States is directing his self-proclaimed ‘Secretary of War’ to unleash militarized federal forces in an American city he disagrees with,” Representative Maxine Dexter wrote in a social media statement on Saturday, referring in part to the Pentagon chief, Pete Hegseth. “This is an egregious abuse of power and a betrayal of our most basic American values. Authoritarians rely on fear to divide us. Portland will not give them that.”Both of Oregon’s US senators and three of its House representatives had in recent days strongly rejected Trump’s claims about mass anarchy in the city as a fiction intended to justify the unnecessary deployment of federal troops as part of an “authoritarian” crackdown.Ron Wyden, the state’s senior Democratic senator, told reporters on Friday: “It’s important to recognize that the president’s argument is a fable – it does not resemble the truth.”“If he watches a TV show in the morning and he see Portland mentioned, he says it’s a terrible place,” Wyden added.During an Oval Office event on Thursday to announce that the administration intends to investigate and disrupt what it claims is “organized political violence” funded by leftwing groups, Trump made several wild claims about Portland, which was a center of racial justice protests in 2020 after the murder of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer. But life has long since returned to normal, and barriers around the federal courthouse and police headquarters downtown have been removed.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionThe president, however, apparently deceived by video of a handful of protesters gathered outside the Ice facility in a south-west Portland neighborhood broadcast by conservative outlets, insisted that the city has been in non-stop “anarchy” since 2020 and is barely livable.“Portland is, I don’t know how anybody lives there, it’s amazing. But it’s anarchy out there,” Trump said. The president then claimed, falsely, that most of the city’s retail stores had closed, due to arson attacks, and “the few shops that are open” were covered in plywood.Describing the small number of protesters who have gathered outside an Ice facility that has been illegally used for detentions in a residential neighborhood, Trump claimed, without evidence: “These are professional agitators, these are bad people and they’re paid a lot of money by rich people.“But we’re going to get out there and we’re gonna do a pretty big number on those people in Portland that are doing that.”Representative Suzanne Bonamici, an Oregon Democrat, said on Friday: “This proclaimed ‘war on Antifa’ is completely a fallacy. Antifa is an ideology, it is not a group, and so we’re extremely concerned with what he’s going to try to do with that pronouncement.”“Donald Trump does not care about safety. If he cared about safety he would not have released 1,600 convicted insurrectionists into the streets. He cares about control and authoritarianism,” she added, referring to Trump’s clemency for those who carried out the 6 January 2021 attack on the US Capitol after he lost the 2020 election to Joe Biden. “Portland does not need the military. We do not want them, we do not need them, we do not welcome them to come here under his orders.”Trump, a Republican, has sent military troops to the Democratic-controlled cities of Los Angeles and Washington DC so far in his second presidency. He has discussed doing the same in Memphis and New Orleans, which are also Democratic strongholds. More

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      A Pro-Trump Community Reckons With Losing a Beloved Immigrant Neighbor

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      Voters here in Oregon’s rural Yamhill County have backed Donald Trump for three presidential elections in a row, most recently by a six-point margin. His promises to crack down on immigration resonated in these working-class communities.Then last month ICE detained Moises Sotelo, a beloved but undocumented Mexican immigrant who has lived in the county for 31 years and owns a vineyard management company employing 10 people. Two of his children were born here and are American citizens, and Sotelo was a pillar of his church and won a wine industry award — yet he was detained for five weeks and on Friday was deported to Mexico, his family said.“Moises’s story just really shook our community,” Elise Yarnell Hollamon, the City Council president in Newberg, Sotelo’s hometown, told me. “Everyone knows him, and he has built a reputation within our community over the last few decades.”Christopher Valentine for The New York TimesThe result has been an outpouring of support for Sotelo, even in this conservative county (which is also my home). More than 2,200 people have donated to a GoFundMe for the family, raising more than $150,000 for legal and other expenses, and neighbors have been dropping off meals and offering vehicles and groceries.“Oh, my God, it’s been insane,” said Alondra Sotelo Garcia, his adult daughter, who was born in America. “I knew he was well known, but I didn’t know how big it would blow up to be.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      The US is woefully underprepared for wildfire season, say insiders: ‘The stakes are life and death’

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      Summer temperatures are rising and the US is bracing for another hot, dry and hectic wildfire season. But with the promise of extreme conditions in the months to come, federal fire crews are also growing concerned that a series of changes brought on by the Trump administration have left them underprepared.Severe cuts to budgets and staff have hamstrung the agencies that manage roughly 640m acres of the nation’s public lands, leaving significant gaps in a workforce that supports wildfire mitigation and suppression. The administration’s crackdown on climate science and the dismantling of departments that provided world-class research and weather forecasting, may also undermine early warning systems, slowing response and strategic planning.Donald Trump has championed firefighters and called for bolstering preparedness for the a year-round fire season, using the devastating fire storms that leveled communities across Los Angeles at the start of the year as a call to action. But in the six months since, the administration has only added obstacles to addressing the key issues.There are also fears that Trump’s new wildfire directive to bring the country’s federal firefighters together under a new agency will be rushed, adding another layer of uncertainty and chaos just as crews are trying to prepare for another grueling season.Many areas have had an exceptionally warm spring following a dry winter. The south-west and Pacific north-west are already experiencing sizzling heatwaves, and on landscapes across California, Montana and Texas, there’s a high danger for ignitions to turn into infernos. Climate forecasters are predicting the potential for forest fires is higher this year than in the previous two years.“If this turns out to be a major fire year, it’s going to be a shit show,” said Dr Hugh Safford, a fire ecologist at the University of California, Davis, who spent more than two decades working for the US Forest Service (USFS) before retiring in 2021.Five federal firefighters, who spoke with the Guardian under the condition of anonymity because they are barred from speaking publicly, echoed Safford’s unease. When asked if their agencies were ready for the season ahead, the answer was a resounding “no”.And it’s already getting busy.Homes and businesses were lost to the flames in Oregon this week, and dozens of blazes are tearing through Canada – where more than 8.5m acres have already been consumed by fires – brought the rising risks forming across the continent into sharper focus.During a Senate appropriations committee hearing last week, Tom Schultz, the chief of the USFS, which currently employs the bulk of the US government’s fire workforce, said his teams are well-positioned for the months ahead.Many fire experts, firefighters and lawmakers don’t agree.“The reality is on the ground we have lost workers whose jobs are absolutely essential,” Patty Murray, a US senator, said during the hearing, sharing that an estimated 7,500employees have been pushed out of the USFS this year. That includes scientists, maintenance staff and administrators who support wildfire response, and workers who had qualifications to fill in as firefighters on blazes when they were needed.“The stakes are life and death here – and this raises serious alarms about this agency being ready for this critical fire season.”A fraying firefighter workforceFears are mounting that the loss of support staff could mean a range of needs, from meals to medical services, will not be in place during large fires when they are needed most.“Those agencies were already understaffed,” Lenya N Quinn-Davidson, director of University of California Agricultural and Natural Resources Fire Network, said. “Now they are skeletal.”Already, there have been reports of crews being left without power for weeks due to cut maintenance workers, paychecks being late or halved because administrative roles were left empty, or firefighters having to mow lawns outside their offices, manage campsites, and do plumbing work at their barracks in addition to their other duties.Access to purchase cards that teams typically rely on for everything from bathroom supplies to fuel for chainsaws were revoked. District offices couldn’t buy ink or paper for their printers. Others struggled to get safety and tactical supplies for the season, including radios and fire shelters.A squad leader for the USFS said some newly hired firefighters had had to go for months without healthcare and seasoned ones were left waiting on backpay because the human resources department has less than a quarter of the staff it did previously. Another firefighter said thousands of cases are lagging in HR because people haven’t gotten paid properly and promotions aren’t being processed.“I think we have taken those people for granted for a long time,” the squad leader added. “Now that they aren’t around we are going to be in for a shock.”View image in fullscreenCapacity will probably be crunched on the fire line too.The forest service is going into the summer with fewer firefighters and teams than it had last year, when overwork led to an increase in injuries and burnout.Schultz confirmed the agency has hired 11,000 firefighters, roughly 900 fewer than last season, and that there are 37 incident management teams, down by five. Those teams are a crucial need for responding to complex and large-scale disasters, and there may not be enough to go around.“It is just another example of the administration making these kneejerk reactions and truly not understanding what it takes to respond to wildfires and other disasters,” said Riva Duncan, a former manager and firefighter in the USFS and vice-president of ​​Grassroots Wildland Firefighters, a non-profit advocacy group. “Come August, when more geographic areas are on fire, I think we are going to see some glitches in the system.”Roughly 4,800 USFS workers have signed on to a program offering workers paid administrative leave through September if they opted to resign or retire, pushed by the Trump administration as a way to rapidly shrink the federal government. That figure includes 1,400 people with so-called “red cards”,trained to join operations on the fire line if needed.Schultz told senators that, because the offer to leave was voluntary, the USFS didn’t do an analysis ahead of time to strategically make cuts or keep staff who might be needed when emergencies strike. Now in an effort to get some of those workers back, the Department of Agriculture, which the USFS falls under, has called for volunteers willing to take fire assignments until their contracts end.A spokesperson for the USDA said it was a top priority for Brooke Rollins, the agriculture secretary, to “ensure the entire agency is geared to respond to what is already an above normal summer fire season”, and claimed the forest service was well on its way with 96% of its hiring goals met. They cited the program to bring those on administrative leave back to active duty as an indication that the USFS “is operationally ready for the fire season ahead”.Even if some do opt to sign on for the summer, time is running short to reposition resources and get them ready.“A lot of those folks have missed their fire refreshers, they have missed taking their fitness tests, they are behind the curve,” Duncan said “And, not everybody is willing to come back.”A fire planner at the USFS, who also asked not to be named, said he did not expect many to sign up. He said the loss will result in heavy “brain drain”, as people with decades of experience are now missing from the agency’s roster.View image in fullscreenTeams are bracing for another round of cuts expected to come. An executive order signed by Trump last week directing the government to combine federal firefighters under a new agency in the Department of Interior is shaking up the workforce just as the season enters full-swing. The order gives departments just 90 days to formulate plans.Federal firefighters have spent years advocating for the move, but there are concerns the process will be rushed and mismanaged. Leaders were told the consolidation wouldn’t happen until next year.“It seems like a joke if you can’t even pay my guys or get them insurance,” the squad leader said of the administration’s aim to merge departments while pressing needs of their crews go unaddressed. He added that the idea of a new agency – one that puts firefighters in positions to make key decisions – is promising. “But I don’t have faith in these people putting it together.”It’s a feeling the other firefighters who spoke to the Guardian share.There have long been challenges at the agencies they work for, especially at the USFS. Now there are fears that the administration’s answers to those problems are ignoring firefighters’ needs. Morale has continued to plummet.One USFS firefighter said the lack of workforce planning “could be catastrophic”: “I am not seeing our interests being represented.”An anti-science agendaBeyond the personnel shortage, grants that support important forest health and fire mitigation work are being phased out, leaving more landscapes vulnerable to burning.Schultz told senators during the hearing that those grants – including funds that support wildfire risk reduction on state, local and tribal lands, as well as a program that helps private landowners maintain their trees – were halved this year so that more than $43m could go toward the program incentivizing early resignations and retirements. In next year’s budget, the grants are completely closed out.Some funds appropriated by Congress were not distributed at all. Murray, the senator, highlighted that $97m budgeted to support state, rural and volunteer fire departments in wildfire reduction work was withheld by the agency this year.The effects of these deep cuts are expected to be far-reaching and long term, especially due to the loss of science and research capacity that support land management work and wildfire mitigation.“The administration’s budget for Forest Service research is $0 – this for the world’s most important forest research organization,” Safford said. It’s not just new research being squashed; Trump has enforced an anti-science agenda across the government that will leave the US less prepared as the climate crisis unfolds.The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (Noaa), which saw large-scale layoffs earlier this year, may also be less able to provide important forecasts and data used to plan prescribed burns, warn the public and pre-position crews during extreme weather events. National Weather Service stations no longer have the staff for round-the-clock monitoring, especially in high fire-prone regions in California and the Pacific north-west. The overhaul of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (Fema) could leave gaps in response and recovery.View image in fullscreenThe USFS is also returning to a “full-suppression” ethos that has shocked ecologists and firefighters alike. Rather than letting some backcountry blazes burn – wildfires that can be healthy for forests that evolved with fire – Schultz ordered the agency to revert to a strategy widely recognized as a key culprit in the increase in catastrophic fire. The USFS chief has also placed higher restrictions on prescribed burning.“We have known since the late 1960s that full-tilt suppression is reactive and does nothing to solve the underlying issues,” Safford said. A push to put all fires out immediately, regardless of their ecological benefit or risks to communities, “wastes extraordinary amounts of money, puts firefighters at risk, and additionally has all sorts of negative environmental and ecological repercussions in both the short and long term”.Plugging the shortfallsStates are now scrambling to fill the gaps left by the federal government.California issued nearly $72m in May to support land management projects in the state and fast-tracked projects in partnership with tribes, private landowners and local districts.In Colorado this spring,Jared Polis, the governor, issued $7m in state wildfire mitigation grants. “Forest fires aren’t going to take four years off just because of who’s in the White House,” he told Politico at the time. “So it’s really important that states up the bar on preparation.”This is, in part, by design.“There’s going to be a shift to put greater reliance on state and local governments to cover those costs on their own without direct federal support,” Schultz told lawmakers at the hearing.For Quinn-Davidson, these moves speak to the importance of community-based work and leadership. With less federal support, it will fall to individuals and local groups to do the important work needed in their own backyards to prevent the worst fires.Quinn-Davidson, who oversees programs helping communities conduct prescribed burns, thinks they will be up for the challenge. She lamented the loss of passionate federal workers but said people were jumping at the opportunity to get involved and do what’s required to reduce the risk of catastrophic fire in their own backyards.“The more involved people can be at the local level, and the more we can empower communities to have leadership on fire,” she said, “the more resilient we will be in the face of disaster.” More

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      From Oregon, a Chocolate Cake That Changes Hearts and Minds

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      In Oregon, there’s a through line from 19th century saints to 21st century sinners. They both sought salvation, of a sort, by eschewing meat.It was in Portland, in the 1890s, that Seventh-day Adventists opened one of the first vegetarian restaurants in the country, in line with their belief that a Godly diet was one of fruit, vegetables, legumes and grains.It was also in Portland, more than hundred years later, that Johnny Diablo Zukle opened a vegan strip club, now in its 18th year.50 States, 50 Fixes is a series about local solutions to environmental problems. More to come this year.Portland, highly praised for its food scene, is a hot spot for vegans, who don’t eat dairy or meat. The maker of Tofurky, the vegan holiday roast, is headquartered nearby, as is Bob’s Red Mill, global purveyor of artisanal whole grains.Tell Us About Solutions Where You Live More

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      From One Forest to Another: A Homeless Sweep Changes Little

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      After federal officials began a sweep of a vast forest in Oregon, most of the people who had used the woods as a last refuge had left. But they didn’t go far.With nowhere else to go, many drove their aging R.V.s to a different forest just a few dozen miles away. Advocates for the homeless estimate that there had been 100 to 200 people living in the original encampment on the outskirts of Bend, Ore., a town that has been transformed by an influx of wealthy newcomers.The cost of housing is now out of reach for many in Bend. In recent years, the town has increased the number of beds in shelters, but has not been able to meet the demand. The chasm between rich and poor has widened so much that it even swallowed up a former mayor: He died homeless after being discovered with frostbite in a tent in a Walmart parking lot.Forest law enforcement officials have been deployed to clear the homeless encampment near Bend.On the day of the closure, many R.V.s got no farther than the blacktop just past the police cordon.“I honestly don’t know what to do,” said Andrew Tomlinson, 41, who had been living in the encampment. “I have nowhere to put our R.V. If we leave it, it will be towed, and everything we own is in there.” Mr. Tomlinson said he was unable to work after a heart attack four years ago. He has two stents in his heart and edema in his legs — the wounds have broken the skin, requiring him to apply daily bandages.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More