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A U.S.-Mexico Impasse Will Test How Far the Trump Administration Will Go to Fight Drug Trade

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Rubén Rocha Moya, governor of Mexico’s Sinaloa state, left, with then-President-elect Claudia Sheinbaum, center, and then-President Andrés Manuel López Obrador in 2024. The U.S. has charged Rocha with drug corruption, but Sheinbaum has refused to arrest him. Rashide Frias/AFP via Getty Images After months of U.S.-Mexico tensions sparked by the Trump administration’s threats to strike unilaterally at Mexican drug traffickers, the two governments are heading for a potentially more serious confrontation over President Claudia Sheinbaum’s refusal to arrest Mexican officials charged in the United States with drug corruption. U.S. Justice Department officials have yet to present a full picture of their evidence against 10 current and former Mexican officials, whose indictments were announced on April 29. They include the governor of Sinaloa state, Rubén Rocha Moya, an ally of the president and a prominent figure in her leftist political party. But as the Trump administration...
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He’s Suspected of Hiring a Venezuelan Gang for a Political Killing. Trump Officials Still Work With Him.

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The widow, son and sister of Venezuelan dissident Ronald Ojeda attend his burial service in Santiago, Chile, on March 8, 2024. The former military officer was kidnapped, killed and buried under cement in a slum. Prosecutors have alleged that members of the Tren de Aragua street gang killed him on the orders of the regime of former President Nicolás Maduro of Venezuela. Esteban Felix/AP When Rafael Enrique Gámez Salas crossed the Mexican border in late 2024, U.S. Border Patrol agents first thought he was like hundreds of thousands of other Venezuelan migrants fleeing their country’s devastating economic and political crises. But today the 40-year-old sits in a federal jail in Los Angeles awaiting extradition to Chile, where prosecutors accuse him of being a boss of Tren de Aragua, the Venezuelan street gang. Chilean authorities say Gámez organized a kidnapping that resulted in the killing of an exiled Venezuelan dissident there. Even more troubling, they believe he acted at...
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Lawmakers Call for CDC to Track Vitamin K Shot Refusals, Cite ProPublica Report

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Cengiz Yar/ProPublica. Source images: Documents obtained by ProPublica and Getty Images. Two members of Congress have called on federal officials to address what they described as “a growing and preventable public health crisis” of families refusing the long-standard vitamin K shot for their newborns, which has led to some of those babies suffering uncontrollable bleeding and even dying.  “We write to urge the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to take immediate action,” two Democrats, Rep. Kim Schrier, from Washington, and Sen. Angela Alsobrooks, from Maryland, wrote in a letter last week to Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, who is acting as director of the CDC.  The letter followed a ProPublica investigation that found babies were dying after families refused the vitamin K shot, a critical and inexpensive injection given at birth to help the blood clot, and that federal and state agencies were not tracking vital data.  “Recent reporting from ProP...
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Trump Pushes Out Remaining Members of Bipartisan Election Commission Ahead of Midterms

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iStockphoto President Donald Trump has pushed out the three remaining members of the Election Assistance Commission, leaving the bipartisan agency in limbo as he rushes to remake how elections are run before this year’s midterms. Trump fired Benjamin Hovland and Thomas Hicks, the Democrats on the commission, multiple sources familiar with the matter told ProPublica, which was the first to report the actions on its social media accounts . Christy McCormick, the Republican, was allowed to resign, the sources said. Thomas Hicks, center left, and Benjamin Hovland, center right, were fired from the Election Assistance Commission, and Christy McCormick, right, was allowed to resign, according to multiple sources. Andrew Harnik/Getty Images The commission’s unprecedented dismantling alarmed voter advocacy groups and Democratic state election officials, who called the move “reckless and irresponsible.” “The EAC plays a critical role in supporting state and local elect...
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New York Hasn’t Raised Housing Allowances for Needy Residents in Decades. That’s Unconstitutional, a Lawsuit Says.

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Minerva Pacumio, 54, said she is facing eviction from her Queens, New York, apartment because the welfare allowance the state provides for rent is so low that it can’t pay for a modest apartment anywhere in the state. She is a plaintiff in a lawsuit filed against New York last month that seeks an increase in the allowance. Zaydee Sanchez/ProPublica New York makes an unusual promise to its residents: Its constitution says the state must provide “aid, care and support for the needy.” But for at least the fourth time in almost 40 years, the state is being sued for failing to live up to this commitment by putting impoverished families at risk of homelessness. A new lawsuit filed last month argues New York is failing for the same reason it has in the past: The welfare allowance it provides for housing, known as a shelter allowance, doesn’t come close to the cost of the state’s rents, which are among the highest in the country. The Legal Aid Society and Empire Justice Cen...
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