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      Voice of America Recalls Staff for Iranian Language News Service From Leave

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      Most of the staff of Voice of America, the federally funded news network, were put on administrative leave by the Trump administration in March.The Farsi language news broadcast for Voice of America was abruptly reactivated on Friday, calling back dozens of workers for the news network who had been put on paid leave as hostilities between Israel and Iran intensified, two staff members at the Farsi news service said.Voice of America, a federally funded news network that reports the news in dozens of foreign languages, had previously included a news service in Farsi, also known as Persian, the language most commonly spoken in Iran. Workers for the Farsi news service were among the vast majority of staff at Voice of America who were placed on paid administrative leave after President Trump signed an executive order gutting the news agency in March.Employees for the news service have since sued to have the service restored even as the Trump administration moves to all but eliminate the news network. Supporters of the network argued that the service provided credible news in places that lacked an independent press, while the White House accused it of leftist bias.Kari Lake, a senior adviser for the U.S. Agency for Global Media, which oversees Voice of America, did not respond to a request for comment.In an email reviewed by The New York Times, workers for the Farsi news service were told they were recalled “effective immediately” and told to “report to your duty station immediately.” Workers were also told to ensure that their security credentials had been reactivated.About 100 staff members work at the Farsi news service. All the full-time staff members, about half of the total work force, were called back to work, a staffer at the Farsi language service said, but contractors have not been, creating problems as the news agency quickly ramped up production for a television broadcast late Friday evening.The website for Voice of America’s Farsi language service was updated with a collection of stories on the conflict between Israel and Iran on Friday.Journalists for Voice of America who were still on administrative leave lamented that staff members were only now being recalled in an emergency, adding that the situation in the Middle East showed why the network never should have been shut down.“After months off the air, we’ve already lost a lot of audience and credibility,” Patsy Widakuswara, a former Voice of America White House bureau chief who was placed on leave and is leading a lawsuit against Ms. Lake and the U.S. Agency for Global Media, said in a statement. “They should bring us all back so we can respond to breaking news in all parts of the world.”Jessica Jerreat, an editor at Voice of America who was also placed on leave, said in a statement that “by reducing programming since March, V.O.A. has cut off its audience right at the very moment they need it most.” More

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      Judge Reinstates Product Safety Regulators Fired by Trump

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      It’s the latest setback for President Trump in his effort to purge perceived political opponents from independent agencies.A federal judge in Maryland reversed President Trump’s firings of the three Democratic members of the five-member Consumer Product Safety Commission, which monitors the safety of products like toys, cribs and electronics.In the ruling, Judge Matthew J. Maddox of the Federal District Court in Maryland said that the law only allowed Mr. Trump to fire the officials for “neglect of duty or malfeasance,” while Mr. Trump had purported to fire them without cause.“Plaintiffs have performed ably in their roles,” Judge Maddox wrote, “and have never been accused of neglect of duty or malfeasance in office by either President Trump or President Biden.”It is the latest setback for Mr. Trump in his effort to purge perceived political opponents from independent agencies in the government, part of an assault on counterweights to his authority. Another federal judge ruled last month that Mr. Trump broke the law when he fired Democratic members of the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board, an independent civil liberties watchdog.The three Democratic members of the Consumer Product Safety Commission, Mary T. Boyle, Richard L. Trumka Jr. and Alexander Hoehn-Saric, said in separate statements after Mr. Trump moved to fire them that they had been targeted for votes they cast to stop the importing of poorly made lithium-ion batteries and objecting to staffing cuts.Ms. Boyle’s term as a commissioner ends in October, and Mr. Trump will be able to pick her replacement, granting him a Republican-controlled majority on the commission. More

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      Trump’s Deployment of Troops to L.A. Protests Is a Do-Over of 2020

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      President Trump was talked out of deploying the military to crush the George Floyd protests in 2020. He always regretted it.In 2020, as racial justice protests swept through the country over the murder of George Floyd, President Trump was itching to deploy the military to crush the unrest. He was talked out of it by his top national security advisers, who feared that such a decision would be viewed as moving toward martial law.Five years later, as protests against his immigration policies began to swell in Los Angeles, Mr. Trump said he had learned his lesson.“I’ll never do that again,” Mr. Trump said on Thursday, about waiting to send in the National Guard in 2020. “If I see problems brewing,” he added, “I’m not going to wait two weeks.”With the Los Angeles protests, Mr. Trump has seized the chance to make up for his first-term regret.His decision to send in federal troops right away, taking the extraordinary step of deploying active-duty military to deal with domestic unrest, fits into the larger pattern of Mr. Trump operating without any significant pushback from the people around him in his second term.“He saw the military as his reactionary arm,” said Olivia Troye, a former homeland security official and aide to former Vice President Mike Pence. Ms. Troye said she witnessed multiple national security officials explain to Mr. Trump in 2020 that the military takes an oath to the Constitution — not Mr. Trump — and that it should not be turned against American citizens, even protesters.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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      Former L.A.P.D. Chief: Deploying Troops Was a Profound Mistake

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      Over the past week, President Trump has deployed more military troops to the streets of Los Angeles than there are stationed in Iraq and Syria. The president has warned that if protests break out in other cities, he’ll send troops to “attack” with even greater force. “You’ll have them all over the country,” he said.That would be a mistake. Deploying soldiers to any American city isn’t just at odds with the principles of our democracy. It’s tactically unsound. Let me be clear: I admire the honorable men and women who serve in our military. But they are not the right tool for this mission — certainly not under these conditions and not without first exhausting the substantial civilian resources already in place.I speak from experience. Over the course of more than 40 years with the Los Angeles Police Department — including nearly six as chief of police — I’ve seen what works and what doesn’t in times of civil unrest. I was an officer during the 1992 Los Angeles riots, when federal troops were last deployed to our streets. I witnessed the confusion and the risks created by sending soldiers trained for combat into a civilian environment. Even basic commands like “cover me” were misunderstood — interpreted by troops as calls for gunfire rather than tactical positioning. Whereas police officers are taught to use time, distance and de-escalation, soldiers are trained to apply overwhelming force.There is no question that serious unrest and violence have occurred in parts of downtown Los Angeles. Attacks on buildings and threats to public safety must be taken seriously. But this is not an insurrection. These incidents are localized, and local law enforcement agencies are fully capable of addressing them.California’s emergency response infrastructure is among the most advanced in the country. Its emergency management system and mutual aid plan allow it to request help from neighboring law enforcement agencies, the California Highway Patrol and, when needed, the California National Guard. I have overseen the activation of these systems in response to both natural disasters and overwhelming disorder. They work — and they are rooted in principles of local control, coordination and public accountability. Deploying federal troops undermines all three.The roles of the military and law enforcement are fundamentally distinct. Police officers are trained to protect constitutional rights, use measured force and remain accountable to civilian oversight. They operate within a legal framework grounded in probable cause and community trust. The military, by contrast, is designed for combat operations under a chain of command that originates in Washington. Military training, equipment and tactics are optimized for warfare — not for safeguarding civil liberties or managing peaceful protest.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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      ICE Says It Has No Immediate Plans to Release Mahmoud Khalil

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      A federal judge ruled this week that the government cannot hold the Columbia University graduate under the rarely invoked law it used to detain him.A Trump administration official has told lawyers for Mahmoud Khalil that the government has no immediate plans to release him, in spite of a judge’s order barring his detention on the grounds for which he was originally arrested.The field office director for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in New Orleans told the lawyers on Thursday, “I have no information that your client will be released or a time for that.” The judge, Michael E. Farbiarz, had opened the door to Mr. Khalil’s release as early as Friday morning.Spokeswomen for the Homeland Security and Justice departments did not immediately respond to requests for comment.Mr. Khalil, a Columbia University graduate and legal permanent resident, was prominent in pro-Palestinian demonstrations on the school’s campus. He was arrested in March and transferred to Louisiana, where he has been held in a federal detention center for three months.Shortly after his arrest, the secretary of state, Marco Rubio, justified his detention by invoking a rarely cited law that he said allowed him to declare Mr. Khalil’s presence in the United States a threat to the country’s foreign policy goal of preventing antisemitism. Mr. Khalil’s lawyers have rejected that argument, pointing to comments their client made on CNN saying that “antisemitism and any form of racism has no place on campus and in this movement.”Judge Farbiarz found that the law Mr. Rubio invoked was likely unconstitutional, and on Wednesday ruled that the government could no longer detain Mr. Khalil under that justification.The judge paused his own order until 9:30 am on Friday to allow the Trump administration time to appeal. But after the deadline had passed on Friday morning, it appeared the government had not done so.Having seen no appeal, Mr. Khalil’s lawyers wrote a letter to Judge Farbiarz asking that he order their client’s release. The judge responded, asking that the government weigh in by 1:30 p.m.It is not clear whether the government is actively violating Judge Farbiarz’s order. He had suggested that it might be able to continue detaining Mr. Khalil for reasons other than Mr. Rubio’s invocation, and it is possible that the Trump administration could seek to convince the court that there is some additional justification for doing so.Two weeks after Mr. Khalil was first arrested, the government added new allegations to its case against him, accusing him of failing to disclose his membership in certain organizations when he applied for legal residency.Mr. Khalil’s lawyers have said those allegations are false, and Judge Farbiarz wrote in his Wednesday decision that it was “overwhelmingly likely” that Mr. Khalil would not be detained on that basis alone.Given that declaration, the judge would probably be skeptical were the Trump administration to put forward that rationale for continuing to detain Mr. Khalil. More

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      5 Takeaways From the Debate for N.Y.C. Mayor

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      The two front-runners in the New York City mayor’s race, Andrew M. Cuomo and Zohran Mamdani, traded barbs over their records, immigration and a host of other issues.In the final Democratic debate in the primary for mayor of New York City, seven candidates sparred over immigration, affordability and President Trump’s policies. But more often, the debate on Thursday devolved into sharp personal attacks.The most pointed exchanges involved former Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo and Assemblyman Zohran Mamdani, the two front-runners in polls.Mr. Cuomo pummeled Mr. Mamdani, arguing that his inexperience was dangerous. Mr. Mamdani criticized the former governor as out-of-touch and beholden to the same special interests that support Mr. Trump.Other candidates often entered the fray. Brad Lander, the city comptroller, drew attention to Mr. Cuomo’s handling of nursing home deaths during the pandemic and the sexual harassment allegations that led to his resignation as governor in 2021.The debate was the candidates’ best and possibly last chance to grab attention ahead of the start of early voting on Saturday. The primary will be held June 24.Here are five takeaways from the debate.Ganging up on CuomoMr. Cuomo is still clearly viewed as the front-runner based on the attacks he faced from his rivals. Several of the candidates mentioned the sexual harassment allegations, which he denied.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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      Supreme Court Sides With Teenager in School Disability Discrimination Case

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      Disability rights groups had followed the case closely, warning that arguments by the school district could threaten broader protections for people with disabilities.The Supreme Court on Thursday sided with a teenage girl with epilepsy and her parents who had sued a Minnesota school district, claiming that her school had failed to provide reasonable accommodations, which made it difficult for her to receive instruction.The case hinged on what standard of proof was required to show discrimination by public schools in education-related disability lawsuits.In a unanimous decision written by Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., the court held that the student and her family needed to show only that the school system had acted with “deliberate indifference” to her educational needs when they sued.That is the same standard that applies when people sue other institutions for discrimination based on disability.The school district argued that a higher standard — a stringent requirement that the institution had acted with “bad faith or gross misjudgment” — should apply. Had the district prevailed, the new standard might have applied broadly to all kinds disability rights claims filed under the Rehabilitation Act and the Americans with Disabilities Act.That argument had unnerved some disability rights groups, which had cautioned that a ruling for the school could make it much harder for Americans with disabilities to successfully bring court challenges.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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      How the 2020 George Floyd Protests Are Haunting Democrats in 2025

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      No longer demanding cuts to police budgets or straining to show solidarity with protesters, Democrats are taking a far more cautious approach.Five years ago, as grief and anger over George Floyd’s murder ignited national protests, top Democrats joined the demonstrations, called for cutting police budgets and, in a ham-fisted effort at solidarity, even knelt in kente cloth at the Capitol.Now, as President Trump spoils for a fight by sending unwanted troops to Los Angeles to stamp out protests and help with immigration raids, Democrats scarred by recent elections have a starkly different message for demonstrators:Don’t play into his hands.Five years after the 2020 racial justice movement prompted a wave of cultural changes and then an enduring political backlash, many Democrats are signaling that they now recognize how skillful Republicans can be in using scenes of unrest — whether limited or widespread, accurate or not — to cast liberal lawmakers as tolerant of lawlessness.Then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi lead fellow Democrats in moment of silence for George Floyd in 2020.Anna Moneymaker/The New York Times“Many of the 2020 protests played out in ways that Democrats did not see and they did not foresee,” said former Senator Doug Jones of Alabama, a Democrat who lost his re-election bid that year. At the time, he said, some did not grasp that “once you got to a certain critical mass of protesters, that some bad things were going to happen.”“I think they do now,” said Mr. Jones, who stressed that Mr. Trump was needlessly escalating tensions. “I also think that they appreciate the fact that any violence is one, is uncalled-for, it needs to be prosecuted. But it’s also playing into the narrative of Donald Trump.”So far, the demonstrations now — relatively small, scattered and generally peaceful — bear little resemblance to the mass protests of 2020, which in some cases devolved into destructive riots.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