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Marshall — As a part of its grid enhancement project, Southwestern Electric Power Company (SWEPCO) is launching the first phase in Marshall to improve its power grid infrastructure, the company announced on Tuesday.

Earlier this month, the Public Utility Commission of Texas (PUCT) awarded SWEPCO a $200 million grant aiming to upgrade approximately 700 miles of power line infrastructure in Northeast Texas, ultimately enhancing reliability for more than 192,000 Texas customers, according to our news partner, KETK.

The first project will begin in Marshall, marking the first step in the effort to modernize electric infrastructure and reliability, SWEPCO said.

“When we analyzed our system, upgrading copper wire to more modern equipment stood out as an area that would have the biggest impact,” Adam Keeth, SWEPCO Director of Distribution Engineering & Reliability, said. “By replacing it with modern aluminum?alloy conductors and installing stronger poles, we’re building a system that can better withstand ice, wind, and long?duration storms and deliver more reliable service to our customers.”

The project includes the following upgrades:

Replacing copper wire with stronger conductors
Installing new utility poles designed to withstand severe weather
Strengthen the power distribution network
Support long-term reliability for homes, schools, hospitals and businesses

As work continues throughout the region, the full project is expected to be completed by 2031.

“Together, these efforts will modernize some of the oldest portions of the distribution system, rebuilding them to a more resilient, storm-hardened design within fully cleared rights-of-way,” SWEPCO said.

Washington, D.C. – Today, U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Brooke L. Rollins announced the Strengthening Processing for U.S. Ranchers (SPUR) Program that will provide temporary support for eligible beef processing establishments. Under SPUR, the U.S. Department of Agriculture will provide up to $500 million in payments to eligible entities to support stronger and more stable market opportunities for American ranchers.

“America’s ranchers deserve a strong, competitive marketplace that rewards their hard work and preserves opportunity for generations to come,” said Secretary Brooke L. Rollins. “Today, historically tight cattle supplies, the Biden administration’s anti-cattle focus, consolidation in and foreign ownership of meat packing and the reemergence of New World Screwworm have created extraordinary market conditions that are placing significant pressure on our independent and regional beef processors. Through the Strengthening Processing for U.S. Ranchers (SPUR) Program, USDA is taking targeted action to preserve the independent processing capacity that ranchers rely on, strengthen competition across the American beef supply chain, and support rural communities across the country. This is another important step in our Plan to Fortify the American Beef Industry by strengthening domestically owned processing capacity and ensuring America’s cattle producers continue to have strong market opportunities and meet America’s historically high beef demand. As we Make America Healthy Again, we are working to ensure American families have continued access to nutritious, high-quality American beef while promoting greater competition, a more resilient food supply chain, and long-term affordability at the grocery store.”

“Small and mid-size beef processors are essential to maintain the diversity of America’s food system,” said Under Secretary for Food Safety Mindy Brashears. “Supporting this processing capacity helps preserve market options for our United States ranchers, strengthens regional supply chains and ensures American families continue to have access to safe, high-quality beef produced here at home.”

“Competitive supply chains help ensure American ranchers have reliable markets for their cattle,” said Under Secretary for Farm Production and Conservation Richard Fordyce. “Through the SPUR Program, USDA is bolstering market opportunities for ranchers and supporting a resilient beef industry.”

These payments are authorized under the Commodity Credit Corporation Charter Act and are administered by the Farm Service Agency (FSA). Payments are intended to provide financial support to eligible beef processors who have faced increased costs of acquiring cattle for processing due to the abnormally low number of cattle being raised in the U.S at this time and other conditions currently impacting the cattle market. Additional information, including applications, will be provided to eligible entities using contact information that is currently on file with the USDA Food Safety and Inspection Service.

Entities eligible to receive funding under SPUR must be beef processing establishments under Federal inspection, as well as beef processing establishments inspected under the Talmadge-Aiken Cooperative Inspection Program and the Cooperative Interstate Shipment Program (CIS). Further, eligible entities must be U.S. owned and cannot be nationally dominant in beef processing (or owned by an entity that is). For purposes of SPUR, nationally dominant will be defined as an entity holding a market share greater than or equal to the entity holding the fourth-largest share of the beef processing market.

For decades, the beef processing industry in the U.S. has been heavily concentrated and today just four companies control nearly 85% of the beef processing market, including two foreign owned companies. Ensuring domestic processors can continue operating during this period where the U.S. cattle herd is at a 75-year low is critical to national security and will ensure a strong supply chain once the herd is rebuilt.

This new program also directly supports the USDA Plan to Fortify the American Beef Industry and the USDA Small Processors Action Plan (PDF, 2.3 MB) by ensuring American ranchers have access to regional processing capacity they rely on to support branded and value-added beef programs, such as the Product of USA label that USDA started promoting earlier this year.

SHERMAN – A Denton man who committed three armed robberies of banks in the Denton County area, has been sentenced to 78 months in federal prison, announced Eastern District of Texas, U.S. Attorney Jay R. Combs. Jonathan Mark Fleming, 41, pleaded guilty to bank robbery and was sentenced to 78 months in federal prison by U.S. District Judge Richard Schell on June 29, 2026.

According to court records, from November 2022 to February 2023, the defendant committed three armed robberies of banks in the Denton County area. For each robbery, the defendant dressed in all black, wore black gloves, black ski goggles and a black mask. He also brandished a firearm. During the first two robberies, the defendant arrived at the banks in a red Dodge Challenger. For the final robbery, he arrived in a Dodge Ram truck. Investigators were able to track the truck to the original dealership and learned the defendant had purchased the truck with a large cash payment and a trade-in of a red Dodge Challenger.

Having identified the defendant as a possible suspect, a search warrant was subsequently obtained for Fleming’s apartment on February 23, 2023. During the search of the apartment, Fleming was located as the sole occupant and was arrested. Officers also located items that they had observed on video surveillance from the robberies, including a black/gray duffel bag, black clothing, a black face covering, a gun belt with holster, and black ski goggles.

A large sum of United States currency, which was still wrapped in bank currency bands, was also located inside the apartment, as well as multiple firearms; specifically, a black M&P Smith and Wesson handgun in a holster (believed to be used in the robbery committed on November 10, 2022); a black newly purchased Glock handgun with a receipt; and two AR-style rifles. In addition, two police radio scanners and multiple receipts, detailing large deposits ranging from $19,000 to $40,000 into various bank accounts, were located. In all the defendant stole approximately $450,000.00 in cash from the three bank robberies.

This case was investigated by the Denton Police Department; Lewisville Police Department; Flower Mound Police Department; and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Matthew T. Johnson.

SAN MARCOS (THE TEXAS TRIBUNE) – San Marcos has become the first Texas city to ban data centers within city limits, banking on its local authority to stop the data center boom and setting a precedent for other municipalities to follow.

San Marcos City Council voted 4-3 on June 16 to define data centers and make them ineligible for any part of the city in its zoning laws, citing concerns that these developments would funnel water and energy resources from the local community.

The city has no data center projects proposed within its limits, although the threat has reached its borders where at least two data centers have been proposed in surrounding unincorporated parts of Hays County, according to Data Center Map, an industry research tool. Powerless to leverage any of their laws to outright ban data centers, Hays County commissioners recently passed a mostly symbolic resolution to pause data center development over severe water scarcity but the resolution isn’t legally binding.

San Marcos is testing a novel approach to outright ban data centers by exerting its home rule powers, which gives certain bigger cities — 352 of them across the state — the right to create their own zoning codes and control development, land law experts say. Compared to counties and cities without home rule powers or zoning authority, municipalities like San Marcos have a better chance at surviving legal challenges to their data center bans because of their expanded powers, experts say.

Some counties have tried testing their authority to restrict data centers but have failed. Early June, Hill County rescinded its data center moratorium after a developer sued the county for $100 million. Hood County commissioners also tried to pass a moratorium, but pulled it after state Sen. Paul Bettencourt, a Houston Republican who leads the Senate Committee on Local Government, asked for an attorney general opinion on whether counties have the right to enact such restrictions.

Similar to what he did with Hood County, Bettencourt told The Texas Tribune he plans to challenge San Marcos’ ban, arguing that it violates 2025’s House Bill 2559, which restricts the ability of municipalities to issue indefinite moratoriums on certain types of property developments and the state’s 2023 Death Star Law, which restricts municipalities from enacting local law that contradicts state law.

“They should not use zoning to ban anything everywhere in the city, because that’s not lawful under the state of Texas guidelines,” Bettencourt said. “[A ban] doesn’t work here, and this will get challenged.”

Texas is on track to become the top data center market in the U.S but a majority of Texans oppose the construction of data centers in their community, citing concerns over water usage, energy demand, and noise pollution. The issue has become bipartisan, drawing calls for regulation from Gov. Greg Abbott who recently wrote a letter to state regulators outlining proposals for data centers such as eliminating state sales tax exemptions for data centers.

While San Marcos is the first in Texas to ban data centers, local officials elsewhere are using whatever authority they have to restrict the rapidly growing industry without drawing the ire of the state government. Other home-rule cities are amending their land development code to restrict data centers. Cities and counties are also including restrictions in incentive agreements they enter into with developers.

“You’re seeing a lot of cities in the age of preemption being creative about things,” said Amanda Rodriguez, a San Marcos city council member.

Multiple cities interested in passing their own bans have reached out to San Marcos to see how the city will survive legal challenges from state lawmakers and private citizens who can also sue the city over its ban.

“All cities are watching what happens to San Marcos,” said Taylor Burge, a council member for Lockhart.
Threats to local control

In February, residents packed San Marcos’ City Hall and aired concerns about how a proposed 200-acre development by Highlander SM One LLC, a Fort Worth-based developer, could consume more than 25 million gallons of water annually from local aquifers. The council ultimately rejected the developer’s request to annex into the city.

Rodriguez first proposed the ban at the end of March, but fellow council members rejected it because of how restrictive it was. It received a new life when council member Lorenzo Gonzalez — who originally rejected the change — moved to reconsider it, seconded by council member Alyssa Garza.

“I think we debated this to death,” Gonzalez said in the council hearing. “The promised benefits remained speculative while many of the concerns raised by residents remained unresolved.”

The city’s ban works by defining data centers in the city’s land development code and setting restrictions on this type of future development, effectively making data centers impossible to build in the city.

“I don’t see how any business minded developer would want to reapproach, hoping they’ll read the room,” Garza said.

In response to San Marcos’ ban, Dan Diorio, vice president of state policy for the industry association, the Data Center Coalition, said the ban signals that San Marcos is “closed for business.”

“A local moratorium on data centers discourages further investment, both from the data center industry and other advanced industries,” Diorio said.

Land use experts and city council members believe San Marcos has a better shot at passing a ban because cities have more power in regulating land use than counties. Nearly half of the 248 data centers that are planned for development in Texas will be built in unincorporated areas.

Although land use bans are uncommon, “theoretically, I think the courts could uphold it,” said Robert Paterson, a University of Texas at Austin professor who specializes in land use and environmental planning. As long as the ban aligns with a city’s comprehensive plan — a long-range policy document which governs the protection of public health, safety, and general welfare — it falls within the city’s power.

But, the 2023 Death Star law complicates city authority. The Death Star law “theoretically pulled back home rule authority,” said Paterson, adding that it bars cities from exercising powers more stringent than those the state itself uses. Republicans and business groups argued that the Death Star was needed to undo a “patchwork” of progressive local policies that made it difficult to do business in cities and it remains unclear what local regulations are out-of-bounds under the law.

Paterson said the law has “a chilling effect on our ability to do our police power, protect the public health and safety,” which is one reason cities are being cautious now.

Bettencourt said a ban on any development has never been upheld in court and he is confident that the state will make San Marcos reverse its ban if a developer doesn’t file a private lawsuit first.

“If you overuse existing legal principles, eventually they get challenged, and/or … laws are changed to make it clear that this can’t happen,” Bettencourt said.

He also says San Marcos is violating HB 2559 that states that property development moratoriums can last no longer than 180 days, and according to Bettencourt, this would apply to San Marcos’ “de facto ban.” However, land experts said that this law would not apply to San Marcos because the city changed its zoning laws to ban data centers, and did not issue a moratorium.

While Bettencourt is among the Republican camp that support data centers, San Marcos’ state senator Judith Zaffirini, a Democrat, says the city’s decision reflects concerns that many communities across Texas share and that the City Council acted “decisively and appropriately” to ensure the safety of the community.

“Anytime you’re operating in the state of Texas and you’re wanting to do something that goes against the grain, there’s always that thought in the back of your head,” Rodriguez said about legal pushback to the ban.

In response to Bettencourt’s plans, Rodriguez said San Marcos’ ban is different from Hood County’s proposed moratorium, which Bettencourt contested using HB 2559. Council members said the Death Star law has yet to be tested in court and they’re willing to try.

“If they want to make this the precedent case for the bill, they’re gonna have to explain why this is the priority and not addressing the problem [data centers] at hand,” Rodriguez said.
What other municipalities are doing

Bans aren’t the only way to stop data centers. Smaller cities like Lockhart and Kerrville have adopted strict zoning rules that make it difficult for data centers to build, hoping the effect will feel like a ban without immediately triggering legal challenges. Cities that don’t have authority to approve development and counties are exploring other tools to signal or impose restrictions, including through resolutions and tax abatement agreements.

“I think the smartest cities in Texas are already doing this, but they’re doing it in such a way that is not going to raise the hackles of the state Legislature,” Paterson said.

Local lawmakers like Burge are communicating with other city and county officials to figure out what they are permitted to do to stop development in their communities. “This is a big game of telephone,” Burge said.

To pre-empt legal action, Lockhart and Kerrville have instituted regulations in hopes of banning data centers without having to technically ban them. They worry that outright bans would leave them open to lawsuits they do not have the resources to fight, said Burge.

In May, Lockhart City Council moved to define data centers in its zoning codes. The council limited data centers to one land-use category — heavy industry — confining such development to two areas in the city.

In addition to zoning restrictions, Burge also said they want to implement restrictions through special use permits, which add another layer of requirements for developers to meet before they are allowed to build. She hopes the “intense filtration” provided by a permit will have the same effect as a ban.

Like Lockhart, Kerrville City Council updated its zoning code to restrict — but not outright ban — where developers can build data centers. The council also added water capacity approvals, requiring developers to disclose cooling systems and water usage amounts. “My experience is that an outright ban usually ends up more contested,” said Drew Paxton, Kerrville’s director of planning and development.

For municipalities without zoning, like Alvin, they have passed resolutions declaring they don’t want data centers within their city limits. While these resolutions cannot produce anything actionable and are more symbolic, local officials hope state legislators will empower localities like them with more protections, said Dixie Roberts, Alvin’s assistant city manager.

“Resolutions do not have a lot of meat to it,” said Roberts, but the hope is “to get the word out that the council is not interested in this kind of development.”

Still, cities that are using other ways to restrict data centers instead of ban are not completely ruling out that a developer or the state will thwart their decisions.

“We know the state’s going to keep working on this [data center policies]. We don’t know which direction the state’s going to go, but let’s go ahead and get something in place in case we get a request,” said Kerrville’s Paxton.

Another way for cities and even counties to exert some control over data centers are in their incentive programs, such as Chapter 380, Chapter 381 and Chapter 312 agreements. For example, a city could offer a reduction in their property tax bill and in return, require additional development standards.

“This is a tool that counties could maybe use in this period of time when they don’t necessarily have a good amount of development authority,” said Kayla Landeros, a land law professor at Baylor University and a former Temple city attorney.

State lawmakers will likely decide whether to give counties more authority or strip cities of the power to make these kinds of bans, in the next legislative session, depending on what the general reaction is from constituents, said Landeros. San Marcos’ ban will be the first test of which direction state legislators will take.

“Local officials are in the best position to understand the unique needs, infrastructure constraints and priorities of their communities,” Zaffirini said.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court on Tuesday erased limits on how much political parties can spend in coordination with candidates for Congress and president, striking down a federal election law that is more than 50 years old.

Prodded by a Republican-led lawsuit that includes Vice President JD Vance, the court’s conservative justices were again in the majority of the latest decision that upended congressionally enacted limits on raising and spending money to influence elections. The court’s 2010 Citizens United decision opened the door to unlimited independent spending in federal elections.

The limits on party spending stem from a desire to prevent large donors from skirting caps on individual contributions to a candidate by directing unlimited sums to the party, with the understanding that the money will be spent on behalf of the candidate.

The Supreme Court had previously upheld the limits, in 2001.

The Republican committees for House and Senate candidates filed the lawsuit in Ohio in 2022, joined by Vance, then a senator from Ohio, and then-Rep. Steve Chabot.

After President Donald Trump took office for his second term, the Federal Election Commission dropped its defense of the law and joined with Republicans in urging that it be overturned.

Democrats had called on the court to uphold the law, even though there is wide agreement that the spending limits have hurt political parties in an era of unlimited spending by other organizations.

Last year, the coordinated party spending for Senate races ranged from $127,200 in several states with small populations to nearly $4 million in California, the most populous state. For House races, the limits were $127,200 in states with only one representative and $63,600 everywhere else.

Entrenched divisions between liberal and conservative justices over campaign finance restrictions were on display when the court heard arguments in December.

“Every time we interfere with the congressional design, we make matters worse,” said Justice Sonia Sotomayor, a dissenter in Citizens United and the court’s other campaign money cases.

By contrast, Justice Samuel Alito, a member of the Citizens United majority, described the decision as “much maligned, I think unfairly maligned.” The effect of the decision was to ”level the playing field,” Alito said, by expanding the right to spend freely that had previously belonged only to media companies.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court on Tuesday upheld a broad conception of birthright citizenship, rejecting President Donald Trump’s executive order declaring that children born to people who are in the United States illegally or temporarily are not American citizens.

The justices relied on a long-settled understanding of the 14th Amendment, adopted after the Civil War, and more recent federal laws in ruling that anyone born in the country, with very limited exceptions, is a citizen.

The Republican president’s restrictions had been blocked by several lower courts and had not taken effect anywhere in the U.S.

During arguments in April, both conservative and liberal justices questioned the order’s legality in a momentous case that was magnified by Trump’s unprecedented attendance in the courtroom.

The case framed another test of Trump’s assertions of executive power that defy long-standing precedent for a court with a conservative majority and a robust view of presidential power that has largely ruled in his favor. In the notable exceptions when the court has not, Trump has responded with starkly personal criticisms of the justices.

The justices ruled on Trump’s appeal of a lower-court ruling from New Hampshire that struck down the citizenship restrictions.

The birthright citizenship order, which Trump signed on the first day of his second term, is part of his administration’s broad immigration crackdown.

Birthright citizenship was the first Trump immigration-related policy to reach the court for a final ruling. The justices previously struck down global tariffs Trump had imposed under an emergency powers law that had never been used that way.

Trump reacted furiously to the late February tariffs decision, saying he was ashamed of the justices who ruled against him and calling them unpatriotic.

He also seemed to recognize the court was likely to rule against him on birthright citizenship, too, using his Truth Social platform to criticize “dumb judges and justices” and wealthy pregnant women from China and elsewhere who come to the U.S. to give birth so their newborns will have American citizenship.

Trump’s order would have upended widely held views that the 14th Amendment confers citizenship on everyone born in the U.S., excluding only the children of foreign diplomats and those born to a foreign occupying force.

The amendment was intended to ensure that Black people, including former slaves, had citizenship, though the Citizenship Clause is written more broadly. “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside,” it reads.

In a series of decisions, lower courts have struck down Trump’s executive order as illegal. The decisions have invoked the high court’s 1898 ruling in Wong Kim Ark, which held that the U.S.-born child of Chinese nationals was a citizen.

The Trump administration argued that the common view of citizenship is wrong, asserting that children of noncitizens are not “subject to the jurisdiction” of the United States and therefore are not entitled to citizenship.

More than one-quarter of a million babies born in the U.S. each year would have been affected by the executive order, according to research by the Migration Policy Institute and Pennsylvania State University’s Population Research Institute.

While Trump has largely focused on illegal immigration in his rhetoric and actions, the birthright citizenship restrictions also would have applied to people who are legally in the United States, including students and applicants for green cards, or permanent resident status.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court on Tuesday upheld state laws barring transgender girls and women from playing on school athletic teams, in another setback for transgender people.

The court’s conservative majority, which has repeatedly ruled against transgender Americans in the past year, ruled that state bans in Idaho and West Virginia don’t violate the Constitution or the federal law known as Title IX, which prohibits sex discrimination in education.

More than two dozen other Republican-led states have adopted bans on female transgender athletes, and the decision seems certain to extend to them as well.

Left unresolved by the outcome are lawsuits challenging state laws and regulations in Connecticut, California and elsewhere that permit transgender athletes to compete consistent with their gender identity.

Becky Pepper-Jackson, a 16-year-old high school sophomore in Bridgeport, West Virginia, has been taking puberty-blocking medication, has publicly identified as a girl since age 8 and has been issued a West Virginia birth certificate recognizing her as female. She is the only transgender person who has sought to compete in girls sports in West Virginia.

Pepper-Jackson has progressed from a back-of-the-pack cross-country runner in middle school to statewide champion in the shot put. She beat the second-place finisher by two feet in last month’s West Virginia championship meet.

In the Idaho case, Lindsay Hecox sued over the state’s first-in-the-nation ban for the chance to try out for the women’s track and cross-country teams at Boise State University in Idaho. She didn’t make either squad because “she was too slow,” her lawyer, Kathleen Hartnett, told the court during arguments in January, but she competed in club-level soccer and running.

Prominent women in sports have weighed in on both sides. Tennis champion Martina Navratilova, swimmers Summer Sanders and Donna de Varona and beach volleyball player Kerri Walsh Jennings are supporting the state bans. Soccer stars Megan Rapinoe and Becky Sauerbrunn and basketball players Sue Bird and Breanna Stewart back the transgender athletes.

In 2020, the Supreme Court ruled LGBTQ people are protected by a landmark federal civil rights law that prohibits sex discrimination in the workplace, finding that “sex plays an unmistakable role” in employers’ decisions to punish transgender people for traits and behavior they otherwise tolerate.

But last year, the six conservative justices on the nine-member court declined to apply the same sort of analysis when they upheld state bans on gender-affirming care for transgender minors.

The states supporting the prohibitions on transgender athletes argued there is no reason to extend the ruling barring workplace discrimination to Title IX.

Idaho’s law, state Solicitor General Alan Hurst said, is “necessary for fair competition because, where sports are concerned, men and women are obviously not the same.”

Lawyers for Pepper-Jackson argued that such distinctions generally make sense but that their client has none of those advantages because of the unique circumstances of her early transition. In Hecox’s case, her lawyers wanted the court to dismiss the case because she had forsworn trying to play on women’s teams.

NCAA president Charlie Baker told Congress in 2024 that he was aware of only 10 transgender athletes out of more than half a million students on college teams. But despite the small numbers, the issue has taken on outsize importance.

Baker’s NCAA and the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committees banned transgender women from women’s sports after President Donald Trump, a Republican, signed an executive order aimed at barring their participation.

The public generally is supportive of the limits. An Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research poll conducted in October 2025 found that about 6 in 10 U.S. adults “strongly” or “somewhat” favored requiring transgender children and teenagers to compete only on sports teams that match the sex they were assigned at birth, not the gender they identify with, while about 2 in 10 were “strongly” or “somewhat” opposed and about one-quarter did not have an opinion.

About 2.1 million adults, or 0.8%, and 724,000 people ages 13 to 17, or 3.3%, identify as transgender in the U.S., according to the Williams Institute at the UCLA School of Law.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Students pursuing graduate degrees in nursing, physical therapy and several other fields will be eligible to take out higher federal student loan amounts — at least for now — after a federal judge blocked part of a Trump administration rule that held them to lower limits.

The U.S. Education Department issued a revised rule on Monday designed to follow the judge’s order from last week, officials told The Associated Press. Agency officials called it a temporary change while they fight in court to keep the original rule, which defined medicine, law and other fields as “professional programs” but excluded fields such as nursing.

The department disagrees with the judge’s order but will comply, even as officials plan to prevail in the case over which degrees are defined as “professional,” Undersecretary Nicholas Kent said in a statement. “We will continue to make the case that the definition is both lawful and appropriate,” he said.

The change represents a short-term win for groups that sued to stop the rule. Eight groups challenged the department’s definition in court, representing nurse practitioners, therapists, speech language pathologists and more.

But in strictly applying the judge’s order, the department is now striking some degrees from the list of professional programs, meaning those students will face lower loan limits. Theology studies programs are among the biggest to shift from professional to non-professional degrees in the shuffle, subjecting theology students to a lower student loan limit. The master of divinity degree — a common degree for pastors and ministers — remains on the professional list, with a more generous student loan limit.

The new rule, which takes effect Wednesday, comes from a student loan overhaul passed in President Donald Trump’s tax bill last year. Programs designated as professional degrees face federal loan caps of $200,000, while other graduate programs are capped at $100,000.

Previously, graduate students had been able to take out federal loans up to the full cost of their degree. Trump officials pushed for new loan caps to rein in student debt and lower tuition prices that they said had grown out of control.

The groups that brought the lawsuit said the rule would require students to forgo their studies or take out riskier private loans. Although many graduate nursing degrees fall within the lower loan limits, some can cost more than $100,000, including in high-demand fields like nurse anesthesia.

In a notification to universities on Monday, the Education Department said it’s confident the Trump administration’s initial rule will ultimately be upheld in court. The amended rule is expected to remain in effect during the judge’s preliminary stay, but the department warned that it “may change as litigation in the case proceeds.”

The original rule included about a dozen programs that were deemed professional, which Trump officials had said was not a judgment on their importance but part of a technical definition dating to the 1960s. Along with law and medicine, that list also included theology, pharmacy, veterinary medicine, clinical psychology and more.

The temporary rule expands that list to 29 specific degree programs, including master of science in nursing, doctor of nursing practice, and doctor of nurse anesthesia practice. Others newly added to the professional list include degrees for physical therapy, athletic training, speech-language pathology, physician associates and anesthesiologist assistants.

The department’s communication listed about 25 programs that are now considered non-professional degrees. Along with theology, that list now includes applied psychology, pharmaceutical sciences and others. (The doctor of pharmacy degree remains professional.)

Last week’s court ruling blocked parts of the Education Department’s definition that were added in a federal rulemaking process. U.S. District Judge Beryl Howell in Washington called it a “misguided” interpretation that strayed from a longstanding definition created by Congress.

The department’s definition laid out several criteria used to weigh if degrees count as professional programs. It said those degrees generally take six years to complete and require licenses to begin practicing, among other requirements.

It also said professional degrees cannot lead to employment that must be “be supervised by another professional” with “more education, training, and qualifications.”

A separate lawsuit filed by a coalition of Democratic-led states challenging the loan caps is still pending.

WASHINGTON (AP) — When U.S. health officials meet next month to reconsider a list of controversial peptide drugs, they will hear from a new set of voices: doctors and pharmacists with deep financial ties to the burgeoning industry of unproven chemicals.

The Food and Drug Administration on Monday released its list of participants for an upcoming meeting to reconsider the safety and effectiveness of several popular peptide injections, including some that have been praised by Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

Previous FDA panels on the topic have been composed of academics and researchers. The agency’s new group mainly includes health professionals who prescribe, produce or promote peptides, which have become a wellness trend among athletes, influencers and celebrities.

The two-day meeting is the latest example of how Kennedy and his deputies are trying to reshape U.S. health policy in the mold of the Make America Healthy Again movement. Some of the biggest supporters of the movement sell peptide formulas, though many pharmaceutical industry experts consider them illegal, unapproved drugs.

The substances are sold online and promoted by wellness clinics as a means to build muscle, heal injuries and look younger, though there’s little evidence behind those claims. Peptide sellers often skirt U.S. regulations by labeling their products as “for research use only,” since the FDA doesn’t regulate research chemicals.

FDA has raised safety concerns about peptides

Many of the injectable peptides sold in the U.S. are produced by compounding pharmacies, which mix custom medications that aren’t available from traditional drug manufacturers.

For several years, the FDA has warned Americans about the risks of injecting chemicals with names like BPC-157 and TB-500, which have not been extensively studied in humans. Both drugs are considered doping substances by international sports authorities. They are among seven peptides set for review in July.

Previous versions of the FDA’s panel on drug compounding — the group that will meet next month — have voted against a string of peptide ingredients brought forward by compounding pharmacies, declaring all of them too risky to be offered to patients. Those panels were mostly composed of experts from universities including Duke, Harvard and Johns Hopkins.

New FDA panel includes peptide proponents

The FDA’s new group includes more than a half-dozen panelists who run clinics, online businesses or pharmacies specializing in peptides, which are often given alongside other unapproved therapies, including vitamin infusions.

For example, panel member Dr. Haleem Mohammed runs clinics in Florida that sell injections of peptides, vitamins, testosterone and weight loss medications. The business is part of a national chain of clinics dubbed Gameday Men’s Health. The company’s website states, “compounded medications offered through our services are not FDA-approved, and the FDA does not verify their safety.”

Another panelist, Dr. Gabriel Alizaidy, charges $500 for “peptide and hormone” consultations, including advice on “where to safely get each peptide or compound.” Alizaidy promotes BPC-157, GHK-Cu and other peptides to thousands of followers through his accounts on Instagram and TikTok.

His website contains the disclaimer that each consultation “is educational in nature and does not constitute medical care, diagnosis, or treatment.”

Another member is Bobby Harshbarger, a Tennessee state senator who has multiple connections to the industry. Harshbarger is a pharmacist at his family’s business, Premiere Pharmacy, which sells compounded medications for weight loss, longevity, pain and other conditions.

His mother, Rep. Diana Harshbarger, is also a pharmacist and a Republican member of U.S. Congress from Tennessee. Last year she sent a letter to Kennedy calling on him to relax FDA restrictions on a half-dozen peptides.

President Donald Trump has repeatedly praised Harshbarger’s support of his “Make America Great Again” agenda. Last year, the president pardoned her husband, Robert Harshbarger Jr., who pleaded guilty more than a decade ago to substituting an unapproved drug from China for one used by patients on kidney dialysis. He was stripped of his pharmacy license and sentenced to four years in prison, which he served.

Mohammed and Alizaidy did not immediately respond to messages from The Associated Press Monday afternoon. A spokesperson for Harshbarger could not immediately provide comment when reached by phone.

Kennedy and his allies previously criticized government panels

The FDA has more than 30 panels of experts who advise the agency on various drugs, vaccines, food ingredients and other products.

Advisory meetings are subject to strict government transparency rules in terms of panel composition and financial disclosures. Experts who have a financial stake in a company or industry are permitted to serve on the panels, but the relationship must be disclosed and regulators are supposed to explain why the person’s expertise outweighs their potential conflict of interest.

Kennedy and his allies have been highly critical of federal expert panels, often alleging that they are riven with conflicts of interest, despite federal data showing otherwise.

Last year, Kennedy fired the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s entire 17-member vaccine panel and replaced it with a group that includes several anti-vaccine voices. A federal judge later said that action likely violated federal rules.

Kennedy told podcast host Joe Rogan earlier this year that he is “a big fan of peptides,” and described using them to recover from injuries.

Former FDA Commissioner Marty Makary — who resigned in May — was also highly critical of FDA advisory panels, complaining that they were expensive, time-consuming and subject to too many financial conflicts.

The number of such meetings plummeted during Makary’s tenure. Instead, the FDA held a number of ad hoc meetings with handpicked experts on topics favored by Kennedy, including the risks of talc powder and antidepressants.

McALLEN (AP) — A nun was released from immigration custody after she was arrested walking to Mass in her habit in South Texas.

Sister Leticia Ugboaja was walking to Our Lady of Sorrows Church in McAllen, Texas, just a few miles from the U.S.-Mexico border on Sunday when she was detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers.

The Department of Homeland Security and ICE have not responded to a request for comment since Sunday.

Parish officials posted a message on social media shortly after the arrest that gained traction in the news and led to Congress members including U.S. Rep. Monica de la Cruz intervening on Ugboaja’s behalf.

The nun is part of the Daughters of Mary Mother of Mercy and volunteered as an Extraordinary Minister of Holy Communion at Our Lady of Sorrows Church, according to Brenda Riojas, a spokesperson for the Diocese of Brownsville.

Ugboaja is also a registered nurse at South Texas Health System and worked previously for 10 years as a certified nursing assistant at DHR Health in Edinburg, Riojas confirmed.

Members of congress representing south Texas intervened with federal officials. As of Monday, Ugboaja was back in her home.

“We are grateful for the quick response of local representatives who reached out to the Department of Homeland Security to get her released from custody,” Riojas added in her statement.

President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown — including at sensitive sites such as houses of worship — has prompted faith leaders to adjust their response to church members who have become too afraid to attend. Some have encouraged online attendance, while others have offered help doing errands such as grocery shopping for people too fearful to leave their homes.