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Yahoo
9 hours ago
- Politics
- Yahoo
'Are you from California?' Political advisor said he was detained at airport after confirming he's from L.A.
Veteran Los Angeles political consultant Rick Taylor said he was pulled aside by U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents while returning from a trip abroad, asked if he was from California and then separated from his family and put in a holding room with several Latino travelers for nearly an hour. 'I know how the system works and have pretty good connections and I was still freaking out,' said Taylor, 71. 'I could only imagine how I would be feeling if I didn't understand the language and I didn't know anyone.' Taylor said he was at a loss to explain why he was singled out for extra questioning, but he speculated that perhaps it was because of the Obama-Biden T-shirt packed in his suitcase. Taylor was returning from a weeklong vacation in Turks and Caicos with his wife and daughter, who were in a separate customs line, when a CBP agent asked, "Are you from California?" He said he answered, 'Yeah, I live in Los Angeles.' The man who ran campaigns for L.A.'s last Republican mayor and for current Democratic Sen. Alex Padilla when he was a budding Los Angeles City Council candidate in the 1990s found himself escorted to a waiting room and separated from his family. There, Taylor said he waited 45 minutes without being released, alleging he was unjustly marked for detention and intimidated by CBP agents. 'I have no idea why I was targeted,' said Taylor, a consultant with the campaign to reelect L.A. City Councilwoman Traci Park. 'They don't talk to you. They don't give you a reason. You're just left confused, angry and worried.' The story was first reported by Westside Current. Read more: Most nabbed in L.A. raids were men with no criminal conviction, picked up off the street Former Los Angeles County Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky said the incident brought to mind Sen. Alex Padilla, who was arrested and handcuffed June 12 while trying to ask a question during a Los Angeles press conference by Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem. 'My former chief of staff and political consultant, Rick Taylor, was detained at Miami International Airport by federal authorities after returning from an international vacation,' he said in an email. 'As Senator Alex Padilla said a couple of weeks ago, 'if it could happen to me, it could happen to anyone.' This Federal government operation is OUT OF CONTROL! Where will it end?!' A representative from the Customs and Border Protection in Florida said an inquiry made by the Los Angeles Times and received late Friday afternoon will likely be answered next week. 'If Mr. Taylor feels the need to, he is more than welcome to file a complaint online on our website and someone will reach out to him to try and get to the bottom of things,' CBP Public Affairs Specialist Alan Regalado said in an email. Taylor, a partner at Dakota Communications, a strategic communications and marketing firm, said he was more concerned about traveling and returning to the U.S. with his wife, a U.S. citizen and native of Vietnam. He said he reached out to a Trump administration member before leaving on vacation, asking if he could contact that individual in case his wife was detained. Read more: ICE arrests at L.A. courthouse met with alarm: 'Absolutely blindsided' The family flew American Airlines and landed in Miami on June 20, where he planned to visit friends before returning to Los Angeles on Tuesday. In a twist, Taylor's wife and daughter, both Global Entry cardholders, breezed through security while Taylor, who does not have Global Entry, was detained, he said. He said after the agent confirmed he was a Los Angeles resident, he placed a small orange tag on his passport and was told to follow a green line. That led him to another agent and his eventual holding room. Taylor described '95% of the population' inside the room as Latino and largely Spanish-speaking. 'I was one of three white dudes in the room,' he said. 'I just kept wondering, 'What I am doing here?'' Read more: ICE seizes 6-year-old with cancer outside L.A. court. His mom is fighting for his release He said the lack of communication was 'very intimidating,' though he was allowed to keep his phone and did send text message updates to his family. 'I have traveled a fair amount internationally and have never been pulled aside,' he said. About 45 minutes into his holding, Taylor said an agent asked him to collect his luggage and hand it over for inspection. He said he was released shortly after. 'The agents have succeeded in making me reassess travel,' Taylor said. 'I would tell others to really think twice about traveling internationally while you have this administration in charge.' Sign up for Essential California for news, features and recommendations from the L.A. Times and beyond in your inbox six days a week. This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
Irish Times
5 days ago
- Politics
- Irish Times
Did Iran move its uranium? Opinions split on fate of 400kg stockpile
The fate of Iran 's nuclear programme, and attempts by the US and Israel to destroy it, could hang on the Islamic republic's more than 400kg of uranium enriched to levels just short of weapons-grade. After US stealth bombers dropped huge 30,000lb bunker-buster bombs on Iran's main nuclear sites, Donald Trump claimed the 'key nuclear enrichment facilities have been completely and totally obliterated'. There is little doubt that the sites Tehran has been using to produce highly enriched uranium – Natanz and Fordow – have suffered severe damage. A third site in Isfahan, used in the fuel cycle but also for storage, was hit by Tomahawk cruise missiles launched from an American submarine. But as the Trump administration conducts its damage assessment, the critical question will be whether Iran's programme has been destroyed, or simply pushed into smaller, secret facilities that are harder to find. READ MORE The answer depends significantly on what has happened to Iran's 408kg stockpile of uranium enriched to 60 per cent purity – approaching the 90 per cent purity required for weapons. 'It comes down to the material and where it is,' said Richard Nephew, a former senior US official who worked on Iran in the Obama and Biden administrations. 'On the basis of what we've seen at this point, we don't know where the material is. We don't have any real confidence that we've got the ability to get it any time soon.' 'I think you would be foolish,' he added, 'if you said that the programme was delayed by anything more than a few months.' [ Live updates: Trump hints at Iran regime change after US attacks on nuclear sites Opens in new window ] Marco Rubio, US secretary of state, said 'no one will know for sure for days' whether Iran attempted or was able to move highly enriched uranium. 'I doubt they moved it, because you really can't move anything right now,' he told CBS. 'The minute a truck starts driving somewhere, the Israelis have seen it, and they've targeted it and taken it out.' But an Iranian regime insider said it would have been 'very naive to keep our enriched uranium in those sites', adding: 'The enriched uranium is untouched now.' He added that Iran – which has always insisted its programme is for peaceful, civilian purposes – would not seek to weaponise its programme. As hostilities with Israel have intensified, other Iranian officials have hinted that Tehran could look to alter its nuclear doctrine. Analysts have warned Tehran could rush to develop a bomb using clandestine facilities if it becomes desperate and feels the need to restore its deterrent. Ali Shamkhani, senior adviser to Iran's supreme leader, said the country's nuclear abilities remained steadfast. 'Even if nuclear sites are destroyed, [the] game isn't over,' he wrote on X. 'Enriched materials, indigenous knowledge, political will remain,' said Shamkhani, who was reported to have been wounded in Israel's first round of strikes more than a week ago. The highly enriched uranium had been held at Natanz, in central Iran; Fordow, the main enrichment facility dug deep into a mountain near the holy city of Qom; and in tunnels at the Isfahan site, Nephew said. Once cooled, it is stored in powder form in large cylinders similar to a water heater. A protest following US attacks on Iranian nuclear sites, amid the Iran-Israel conflict, in Tehran on Sunday. Photograph: Arash Khamooshi/The New York Times The stockpile of uranium enriched to 60 per cent – part of an overall stockpile of more than 8,400kg, the majority of it low-level purity – meant Tehran had the capacity to produce sufficient fissile material required for several nuclear bombs within days if it chose. But the actual weaponisation process would be expected to take months or a year, experts said. The risk was always that after Israel launched its bombing campaign on the pretext of destroying Tehran's nuclear programme, Iran would secretly take the stockpile to hidden locations, where advanced centrifuges had been covertly set up. Nephew said the 'unknowns here are killing us a little bit'. 'If they've got a uranium conversion line set up ... and if they were able to enrich up to 90 per cent at Fordow before it was attacked, and they had eight or nine days, that's potentially enough for two bombs' worth of 90 per cent,' he said. India, Pakistan and North Korea all successfully developed covert nuclear weapons programmes despite onerous surveillance and restrictions from the US. [ US-Iran: What comes next after Donald Trump's risky foreign policy move? Opens in new window ] Sima Shine, a former Iran specialist at Mossad, the Israeli intelligence agency, said she was convinced Iran had moved enriched material. 'They have enough enriched uranium somewhere, and they took some advanced centrifuges somewhere, in order to enable them to some day go to a nuclear device,' Shine said. 'The programme is not destroyed completely, no matter what the Americans say.' One Israeli official said that if Tehran and Washington resumed talks on allowing Iran to have a peaceful nuclear energy programme, Israeli prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu might insist Tehran hand over any highly enriched uranium to be transported and stored outside the country. A second official acknowledged that Iran could have spirited away at least some of its highly enriched stockpile. But the officials added that after Israel last week assassinated at least 11 Iranian nuclear scientists, the regime would struggle to create an 'efficient, miniaturised nuclear weapon'. The International Atomic Energy Agency has inspectors in the republic who frequently visit Fordow, Natanz and other declared facilities. But Israel's bombing campaign put a halt to those inspections. Even before the strikes, the UN nuclear watchdog lacked oversight over all of the thousands of advanced centrifuges Iran developed after Trump in his first term pulled out of the 2015 nuclear deal that severely restricted Tehran's activity. Iran's co-operation with the IAEA had also severely deteriorated in recent years, impeding the agency's ability to conduct inspections to the level agreed in the 2015 agreement. After Iran was censured in an IAEA resolution, days before Israel launched its attack, Iran also revealed that it had built a previously undeclared enrichment facility – the country's third. Israel targeted the Natanz facility on the first day of its strikes and has hit it again, causing damage to its overground and underground plants, the IAEA said last week. Israel also hit the Isfahan site twice. But it lacked the military capacity to cause significant damage to Fordow and waited for the US's intervention. 'It's certainly the end of the Iranian nuclear programme as we knew it,' said Ali Vaez, an Iran expert at Crisis Group. 'If the programme survives, it'll either become a clandestine weapons programme or, in case of a deal, a neutered civilian programme without access to nuclear fuel cycle technology.' – Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2025
The Independent
11-06-2025
- Politics
- The Independent
Trump's plan to begin 'phasing out' FEMA after hurricane season burdens states, experts warn
President Donald Trump 's plan to begin 'phasing out' the federal agency that responds to disasters after the 2025 hurricane season is likely to put more responsibilities on states to provide services following increasingly frequent and expensive climate disasters, experts said. 'We want to wean off of FEMA and we want to bring it down to the state level,' Trump said Tuesday in an Oval Office appearance with administration officials about preparations for summer wildfires. Trump and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem have repeatedly signaled their desire to overhaul, if not completely eliminate, the 46-year-old Federal Emergency Management Agency. While there has been bipartisan support for reforming the agency, experts say dismantling it completely would leave gaps in crucial services and funding. 'It just causes more concern on how states should be planning for the future if the federal government's not going to be there for them,' said Michael Coen, FEMA chief of staff during the Obama and Biden administrations. Disaster response is already locally led and state-managed, but FEMA supports by coordinating resources from federal agencies, providing direct assistance programs for households and moving money to states for repairing public infrastructure. Trump said Tuesday he wants to 'give out less money,' and to 'give it out directly,' sidestepping FEMA programs. He said he did not know who would distribute the funds, saying they could come 'from the president's office' or DHS. 'I was left with the impression that he doesn't really understand the scale of what FEMA manages on a yearly basis with a budget of over $30 billion,' said Coen. Dismantling FEMA, or even changing how much of the costs it shares with states in the event of a major disaster declaration, would require action from Congress, including amending the 1988 Stafford Act, which outlines FEMA's roles and responsibilities and the cost share between the feds and the states. Declaring fewer major disasters or giving less federal support could put an untenable financial burden on states, said Sara McTarnaghan, principal research associate at the Urban Institute. 'Very few of them would have had enough funds set aside to anticipate the federal government stepping back from its historic role in disaster recovery for major events,' McTarnaghan said. A recent Urban Institute analysis found that between 2008-2024, quadrupling the economic threshold of when major disasters are declared would have shifted $41 billion in public assistance costs alone to state and local governments. 'I think the trade off for states and communities is going to be, do we accept a less full recovery or do states draw on other resources to meet these goals and needs, perhaps at the cost of investments in other kinds of social programs or functions of the state,' said McTarnaghan. Not all states will be able to generate much more revenue, she added. 'The confluence of states that have really high disaster exposure and states that have relatively limited fiscal capacity are overlapping in many ways,' she said. 'That's the case for a lot of states along the Gulf Coast that we're concerned about going into hurricane season but also the case for some Midwestern states that face issues with severe convective storms.' Trump dismissed the idea that states can't handle the bulk of disasters on their own. 'The governor should be able to handle it and frankly if they can't handle the aftermath, then maybe they shouldn't be governor,' he said. He suggested that some of the gaps could be filled by more collaboration among states. Noem said FEMA is building communication and mutual aid agreements among states 'to respond to each other so that they can stand on their own two feet.' A national mutual-aid structure called the Emergency Management Assistance Compact already exists, but its operations are typically reimbursed by the federal government, said Coen. 'There's already robust communication between states. The confusion is what they can expect from the federal government.' Regarding the current hurricane season, which began June 1, Noem said FEMA 'stands prepared.' But there have already been changes to how the agency operates. It suspended its door-to-door canvassing program that helped enroll survivors for assistance. More than 2,000 FEMA staff, around one-third of the full-time workforce, have left or been fired since January. After severe weather this spring, some states waited as long as eight weeks for their disaster declaration requests, and several requests are still pending. Trump has not approved any requests for hazard mitigation assistance since February, a typical add-on to individual and public assistance that helps states build back in more resilient ways. A FEMA review council established by Trump and co-chaired by Noem and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth will submit suggestions for reforms in the next few months, according to Noem. In its first meeting in May, Noem told the group of governors, emergency managers, and other officials primarily from Republican states that Trump is seeking drastic change. 'I don't want you to go into this thinking we're going to make a little tweak here,' she said. 'No, FEMA should no longer exist as it is.' ___
Associated Press
11-06-2025
- Politics
- Associated Press
Trump's plan to begin 'phasing out' FEMA after hurricane season burdens states, experts warn
SAN DIEGO (AP) — President Donald Trump's plan to begin 'phasing out' the federal agency that responds to disasters after the 2025 hurricane season is likely to put more responsibilities on states to provide services following increasingly frequent and expensive climate disasters, experts said. 'We want to wean off of FEMA and we want to bring it down to the state level,' Trump said Tuesday in an Oval Office appearance with administration officials about preparations for summer wildfires. Trump and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem have repeatedly signaled their desire to overhaul, if not completely eliminate, the 46-year-old Federal Emergency Management Agency. While there has been bipartisan support for reforming the agency, experts say dismantling it completely would leave gaps in crucial services and funding. 'It just causes more concern on how states should be planning for the future if the federal government's not going to be there for them,' said Michael Coen, FEMA chief of staff during the Obama and Biden administrations. Disaster response is already locally led and state-managed, but FEMA supports by coordinating resources from federal agencies, providing direct assistance programs for households and moving money to states for repairing public infrastructure. Trump said Tuesday he wants to 'give out less money,' and to 'give it out directly,' sidestepping FEMA programs. He said he did not know who would distribute the funds, saying they could come 'from the president's office' or DHS. 'I was left with the impression that he doesn't really understand the scale of what FEMA manages on a yearly basis with a budget of over $30 billion,' said Coen. Dismantling FEMA, or even changing how much of the costs it shares with states in the event of a major disaster declaration, would require action from Congress, including amending the 1988 Stafford Act, which outlines FEMA's roles and responsibilities and the cost share between the feds and the states. Declaring fewer major disasters or giving less federal support could put an untenable financial burden on states, said Sara McTarnaghan, principal research associate at the Urban Institute. 'Very few of them would have had enough funds set aside to anticipate the federal government stepping back from its historic role in disaster recovery for major events,' McTarnaghan said. A recent Urban Institute analysis found that between 2008-2024, quadrupling the economic threshold of when major disasters are declared would have shifted $41 billion in public assistance costs alone to state and local governments. 'I think the trade off for states and communities is going to be, do we accept a less full recovery or do states draw on other resources to meet these goals and needs, perhaps at the cost of investments in other kinds of social programs or functions of the state,' said McTarnaghan. Not all states will be able to generate much more revenue, she added. 'The confluence of states that have really high disaster exposure and states that have relatively limited fiscal capacity are overlapping in many ways,' she said. 'That's the case for a lot of states along the Gulf Coast that we're concerned about going into hurricane season but also the case for some Midwestern states that face issues with severe convective storms.' Trump dismissed the idea that states can't handle the bulk of disasters on their own. 'The governor should be able to handle it and frankly if they can't handle the aftermath, then maybe they shouldn't be governor,' he said. He suggested that some of the gaps could be filled by more collaboration among states. Noem said FEMA is building communication and mutual aid agreements among states 'to respond to each other so that they can stand on their own two feet.' A national mutual-aid structure called the Emergency Management Assistance Compact already exists, but its operations are typically reimbursed by the federal government, said Coen. 'There's already robust communication between states. The confusion is what they can expect from the federal government.' Regarding the current hurricane season, which began June 1, Noem said FEMA 'stands prepared.' But there have already been changes to how the agency operates. It suspended its door-to-door canvassing program that helped enroll survivors for assistance. More than 2,000 FEMA staff, around one-third of the full-time workforce, have left or been fired since January. After severe weather this spring, some states waited as long as eight weeks for their disaster declaration requests, and several requests are still pending. Trump has not approved any requests for hazard mitigation assistance since February, a typical add-on to individual and public assistance that helps states build back in more resilient ways. A FEMA review council established by Trump and co-chaired by Noem and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth will submit suggestions for reforms in the next few months, according to Noem. In its first meeting in May, Noem told the group of governors, emergency managers, and other officials primarily from Republican states that Trump is seeking drastic change. 'I don't want you to go into this thinking we're going to make a little tweak here,' she said. 'No, FEMA should no longer exist as it is.' ___
