GREGG COUNTY — The Greater Longview United Way, LANFest and CableLynx Broadband are teaming up to host the inaugural East Texas Gamer Con this Friday and Saturday, according to our news partner KETK.
âGaming has the power to bring people together, and through ETX Gamer Con, weâre channeling that connection into meaningful community support,â said Dr. Evan Dolive, the executive director of the Greater Longview United Way. âWhen you participate in this event, youâre not just playing games â youâre helping provide meals to families in need, supporting after-school programs for our youth, and ensuring our neighbors have access to vital health services.â
WASHINGTON (AP) â The United States is halfway to the next once-a-decade census, but the Supreme Court is still dealing with lawsuits that grew out of the last one.
The justices on Monday are taking up a challenge to Louisianaâs congressional map, which was drawn so that, for the first time, two of its six districts have majority Black populations that elected Black Democrats to Congress. Black Louisianans make up about one-third of the stateâs population.
Just two years ago, the court ruled 5-4 that Alabama discriminated against Black voters by adopting a congressional map with just one majority Black district, in violation of the landmark federal Voting Rights Act.
The Louisiana case features an unusual alliance of the Republican-led state government, which added a second majority Black district to essentially comply with the Alabama ruling, and civil rights groups that more often find themselves fighting the state’s redistricting plans.
A decision should come by late June.
How did we get here?
It has been a winding road. The court fight over Louisiana’s congressional districts has lasted three years. Two maps were blocked by lower courts, and the Supreme Court has intervened twice. Most recently, the court ordered the new map to be used in the 2024 election.
The stateâs Republican-dominated legislature drew a new congressional map in 2022 to account for population shifts reflected in the 2020 Census. But the changes effectively maintained the status quo of five Republican-leaning majority white districts and one Democratic-leaning majority Black district.
Civil rights advocates won a lower court ruling that the districts likely discriminated against Black voters.
The Supreme Court put the ruling on hold while it took up the Alabama case. The justices allowed both states to use congressional maps in the 2022 elections even though both had been ruled likely discriminatory by federal judges.
The high court eventually affirmed the ruling from Alabama, which led to a new map and a second district that could elect a Black lawmaker. The justices returned the Louisiana case to federal court, with the expectation that new maps would be in place for the 2024 elections.
The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals gave lawmakers in Louisiana a deadline of early 2024 to draw a new map or face the possibility of a court-imposed map.
The state complied and drew a new map.
The court must decide: politics or race?
One of the questions before the court is whether race was the predominant factor driving the new map. That’s what white Louisiana voters claimed in their separate lawsuit challenging the new districts. A three-judge court agreed.
But Gov. Jeff Landry, a Republican, and other state officials argue that politics, not race, helped set the boundaries. The congressional map provides politically safe districts for House Speaker Mike Johnson and Majority Leader Steve Scalise, fellow Republicans.
The decision âreflects the imminent reality that Louisiana would be projected to lose one of five Republican congressional seatsâ when a court or the legislature adopted a second majority Black district, state Attorney General Elizabeth Murrill wrote in court papers.
Some lawmakers have also noted that the Republican lawmaker whose district was greatly altered in the new map supported a GOP opponent of Landry in the 2023 governorâs race. Former Rep. Garret Graves chose not to seek reelection under the new map.
The Supreme Court faces a lurking issue
Louisiana argues that dueling lawsuits over redistricting make it almost impossible for states to know what to do. So the state has a suggestion that, if adopted, would mark an upheaval in redistricting.
The justices could declare that racial gerrymandering cases do not belong in federal courts, Murrill wrote.
The court’s conservative majority reached that conclusion for partisan gerrymandering in 2019. Justice Clarence Thomas said the court also should no longer decide race-based redistricting cases. âDrawing political districts is a task for politicians, not federal judges,â Thomas wrote last year in an opinion no other justice joined.
But the court doesn’t have to touch that issue to resolve the Louisiana case.
A Black Democrat won the new district
The reconfigured 6th Congressional District stretches across the state, linking parts of the Shreveport, Alexandria, Lafayette and Baton Rouge areas. The percentage of Black voters in the district jumped from about 25% to 55%, based on data collected by the state.
The district’s voters last year elected Cleo Fields, a Black Democrat. He returned to the House of Representatives, where he had served decades earlier.
New election dates
The state also has changed the state’s election process so that the so-called jungle primary will be replaced by partisan primary elections in the spring, followed by a November showdown between the party nominees.
The change means candidates can start gathering signatures in September to get on the primary ballot for 2026.
A Supreme Court decision invalidating the congressional map would leave little time to draw a new one before then.
TYLER — The University of Oxford Somerville College Choir concert at Marvin Methodist Church in Tyler Tuesday night has been canceled. Due to the fire at Heathrow Airport last week, the group was not able to make their flight.
WASHINGTON (AP) â A federal judge blocked enforcement of President Donald Trumpâs executive order banning transgender people from military service on Tuesday, the latest in a string of legal setbacks for his sweeping agenda.
U.S. District Judge Ana Reyes in Washington, D.C., ruled that Trump’s order to exclude transgender troops from military service likely violates their constitutional rights. She was the second judge of the day to rule against the administration, and both rulings came within hours of an extraordinary conflict as Trump called for impeaching a third judge who temporarily blocked deportation flights, drawing a rare rebuke from Chief Justice John Roberts.
Reyes, who was nominated by President Joe Biden, delayed her order until Friday morning to give the administration time to appeal.
“The court knows that this opinion will lead to heated public debate and appeals. In a healthy democracy, both are positive outcomes,â Reyes wrote. âWe should all agree, however, that every person who has answered the call to serve deserves our gratitude and respect.â
Army Reserves 2nd Lt. Nicolas Talbott, one of 14 transgender active-duty servicemembers named as plaintiffs in the lawsuit, said he was holding his breath as he waited to find out if he would be separated from the military next week.
âThis is such a sigh of relief,â he said. âThis is all Iâve ever wanted to do. This is my dream job, and I finally have it. And I was so terrified that I was about to lose it.â
The White House didnât immediately respond to a message seeking comment. Trumpâs deputy chief of staff, Stephen Miller, posted about the ruling on social media, writing, âDistrict court judges have now decided they are in command of the Armed ForcesâŚis there no end to this madness?â
The judge issued a preliminary injunction requested by attorneys who also represent others seeking to join the military.
On Jan. 27, Trump signed an executive order that claims the sexual identity of transgender service members “conflicts with a soldierâs commitment to an honorable, truthful, and disciplined lifestyle, even in oneâs personal lifeâ and is harmful to military readiness.
In response to the order, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth issued a policy that presumptively disqualifies people with gender dysphoria from military service. Gender dysphoria is the distress that a person feels because their assigned gender and gender identity donât match. The medical condition has been linked to depression and suicidal thoughts.
Plaintiffsâ attorneys contend Trumpâs order violates transgender peopleâs rights to equal protection under the Fifth Amendment.
Government lawyers argue that military officials have broad discretion to decide how to assign and deploy servicemembers without judicial interference.
Reyes said she did not take lightly her decision to issue an injunction blocking Trumpâs order, noting that âJudicial overreach is no less pernicious than executive overreach.â But, she said, it was also the responsibility of each branch of government to provide checks and balances for the others, and the court âtherefore must act to uphold the equal protection rights that the military defends every day.â
Thousands of transgender people serve in the military, but they represent less than 1% of the total number of active-duty service members.
In 2016, a Defense Department policy permitted transgender people to serve openly in the military. During Trumpâs first term in the White House, the Republican issued a directive to ban transgender service members. The Supreme Court allowed the ban to take effect. President Joe Biden, a Democrat, scrapped it when he took office.
Hegsethâs Feb. 26 policy says service members or applicants for military service who have âa current diagnosis or history of, or exhibit symptoms consistent with, gender dysphoria are incompatible with the high mental and physical standards necessary for military service.â
The plaintiffs who sued to block Trumpâs order include an Army Reserves platoon leader from Pennsylvania, an Army major who was awarded a Bronze Star for service in Afghanistan and a Sailor of the Year award winner serving in the Navy.
âThe cruel irony is that thousands of transgender servicemembers have sacrificedâsome risking their livesâto ensure for others the very equal protection rights the military ban seeks to deny them,” Reyes wrote.
Their attorneys, from the National Center for Lesbian Rights and GLAD Law, said transgender troops âseek nothing more than the opportunity to continue dedicating their lives to defending the Nation.â
âYet these accomplished servicemembers are now subject to an order that says they must be separated from the military based on a characteristic that has no bearing on their proven ability to do the job,â plaintiffsâ attorneys wrote. âThis is a stark and reckless reversal of policy that denigrates honorable transgender servicemembers, disrupts unit cohesion, and weakens our military.â
Government attorneys said the Defense Department has a history of disqualifying people from military service if they have physical or emotional impairments, including mental health conditions.
âIn any context other than the one at issue in this case, DoDâs professional military judgment about the risks of allowing individuals with physical or emotional impairments to serve in the military would be virtually unquestionable,â they wrote.
Plaintiffsâ attorneys say Trumpâs order fits his administrationâs pattern of discriminating against transgender people.
Federal judges in Seattle and Baltimore separately paused Trumpâs executive order halting federal support for gender-affirming care for transgender youth under 19. Last month, a judge blocked prison officials from transferring three incarcerated transgender women to menâs facilities and terminating their access to hormone therapy under another Trump order.
Trump also signed orders that set up new rules about how schools can teach about gender and that intend to ban transgender athletes from participating in girlsâ and womenâs sports.
âFrom its first days, this administration has moved to strip protections from transgender people across multiple domains â including housing, social services, schools, sports, healthcare, employment, international travel, and family life,â plaintiffsâ lawyers wrote.
Talbott, 31, of Akron, Ohio, enlisted in March 2024 as an openly trans person after fighting for roughly nine years to join the service. He said his fellow soldiers gave him some good-natured flak for being so much older than other recruits, but never treated him differently for being trans. Talbott anticipates that his colleagues will be âpretty excited that I get to stay.â
âNow I can go back to focusing on whatâs really important, which is the mission,â said Talbott, a platoon leader for a military policing unit.
EAST TEXAS — Texas Governor Greg Abbott has appointed a new 62nd Judicial District court judge who will cover cases in Delta, Franklin, Hopkins and Lamar counties. According to our news partner KETK, William âBillâ Harris of Paris is the current County Court Judge for Lamar County and Abbott has selected him to fill the 62nd Judicial District court judge seat for a term that will last till Dec. 31, 2026.
His appointment as the 62nd Judicial District court judge will have to be approved by the Texas Senate before he can fill the role. If confirmed, Harris will fill the role until a permanent replacement for former judge Will Biard is elected. Read the rest of this entry »
MIAMI (AP) â Franco Caraballo called his wife Friday night, crying and panicked. Hours earlier, the 26-year-old barber and dozens of other Venezuelan migrants at a federal detention facility in Texas were dressed in white clothes, handcuffed and taken onto a plane. He had no idea where he was going.
Twenty-four hours later, Caraballoâs name disappeared from the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcementâs online detainee locator.
On Monday, his wife, Johanny SĂĄnchez, learned Caraballo was among more than 200 Venezuelan immigrants flown over the weekend to El Salvador, where they are in a maximum-security prison after being accused by the Trump administration of belonging to the Venezuelan Tren de Aragua gang.
SĂĄnchez insists her husband isn’t a gang member. She struggles even to find logic in the accusation.
The weekend flights
Flights by U.S. immigration authorities set off a frantic scramble among terrified families after hundreds of immigrants vanished from ICEâs online locator.
Some turned up at that massive El Salvador prison, where visitors, recreation and education are not allowed. The U.S. has paid El Salvador’s government $6 million to hold immigrants, many of them Venezuelan, whose government rarely accepts deportees from the U.S.
But many families have no idea where to find their loved ones. El Salvador has no online database to look up inmates, and families there often struggle to get information.
âI donât know anything about my son,â said Xiomara Vizcaya, a 46-year-old Venezuelan.
Ali David Navas Vizcaya had been in U.S. detention since early 2024, when he was stopped at a U.S.-Mexico border crossing where he had an appointment to talk to immigration officers. He called her late Friday and said he thought he was being deported to Venezuela or Mexico.
âHe told me, âFinally, weâre going to be together, and this nightmare is going to be over,ââ Vizcaya said in telephone interview from her home in the northern Venezuela city of Barquisimeto.
His name is no longer in ICEâs system. She said he has no criminal record and suspects he may have been mistakenly identified as a Tren de Aragua member because of several tattoos.
âHe left for the American dream, to be able to help me financially, but he never had the chance to get outâ of prison, she said.
Nearly 8 million Venezuelans have left their homeland since 2013, when its oil-dependent economy collapsed. Most initially went to other Latin American countries but more headed to the U.S. after COVID-19 restrictions lifted during the Biden administration.
An 18th century law
On Saturday, President Donald Trump announced he had invoked the Alien Enemies Act of 1798, which allows the U.S. to deport noncitizens without any legal recourse, including rights to appear before an immigration or federal court judge.
Many conservatives have cheered the deportations and the Trump administration for taking a hard stance on immigration.
The administration says it is using the wartime Alien Enemies Act to deport alleged Tren de Aragua members, saying the gang was invading the U.S., though it has not provided any evidence to back up gang-membership claims.
U.S. officials acknowledged in a court filing Monday that many people sent to El Salvador do not have criminal records, though they insisted all are suspected gang members.
âThe lack of a criminal record does not indicate they pose a limited threat,â said a sworn declaration in the filing, adding that along with their suspected gang membership âthe lack of specific information about each individual actually highlights the risk they pose.â
ICE regional supervisor Robert Cerna said in an affidavit that agents did not rely on âtattoos aloneâ to identify potential members.
âWe followed the lawâ
On Feb. 3, Caraballo went to an ICE office in Dallas office for one of his regular mandatory check-ins with agents handling his asylum request.
He was âapprehended and releasedâ after illegally crossing the southern U.S. border in October 2023, according to Department of Homeland Security documents provided by his wife. The documents said he was a “member/active” of Tren de Aragua, but offered no evidence to support that.
What gang member, his wife asked, would walk into a federal law enforcement office during a Trump administration crackdown that has left immigrants across the country terrified?
âWe followed the law like we were told to. We never missed anyâ meetings with authorities, said SĂĄnchez, who remains in the U.S. trying to secure her husbandâs release. SĂĄnchez said her husband, whom she married in 2024 in Texas, has had no run-ins with the law in the U.S. She also showed The Associated Press a Venezuelan document showing he has a clean criminal record there.
SĂĄnchez believes he was wrongly accused of belonging to Tren de Aragua because of a clock-shaped tattoo marking his daughter’s birthday.
âHe has lots of tattoos, but thatâs not a reason to discriminate against him,â she said.
SĂĄnchez said she and her husband left Venezuela with barely $200 and spent three months sleeping in plazas, eating out of trash cans and relying on fellow migrants’ goodwill as they journeyed north.
She thought the sacrifice would be worth it. Her husband had been working as a barber since the age of 13 and was hopeful he could find a new start in the U.S., escaping poverty wages and Nicolas Maduroâs ironfisted rule in Venezuela.
Venezuela responds
The Venezuelan government has called the flights âkidnappings.â It urged its citizens living in the U.S. to return home and vowed get others back from El Salvador. But with diplomatic ties long broken between Venezuela and El Salvador, the prisoners have few advocates.
The U.S. deportations exacerbate Venezuelaâs immigration crisis by turning âmigrants into geopolitical pawns,â said Oscar Murillo, head of the Venezuelan human rights group Provea. “There is a lack of transparency on the part of the U.S. and El Salvador regarding the status of deported individuals and the crimes for which they are being prosecuted.â
SĂĄnchez is among those who believes the American dream has turned ugly. She wants to leave the U.S. once she finds her husband.
âWe fled Venezuela for a better future. We never imagined things would be worse.â
SAN ANTONIO (AP) â Two smugglers charged after 53 immigrants died in the back of a sweltering tractor-trailer with no air conditioning were found guilty Tuesday after a two-week trial. The 2022 tragedy in San Antonio was the nationâs deadliest smuggling attempt across the U.S.-Mexico border.
Jurors in federal court in San Antonio took only about an hour to convict Felipe Orduna-Torres and Armando Gonzales-Ortega, finding that they were part of a human smuggling conspiracy that resulted in death and injury. They face up to life in prison and have a June 27 sentencing date.
The immigrants had come from Guatemala, Honduras and Mexico and had paid between $12,000 and $15,000 each to be smuggled into the United States, according to an indictment in the case. They had made it as far as the Texas border city of Laredo when they were placed into a tractor-trailer with broken air conditioning for a three-hour drive to San Antonio.
As the temperature inside the trailer rose, those inside screamed and banged the walls of the trailer for help or tried to claw their way out, investigators said. Most eventually passed out. When the trailer was opened in San Antonio, 48 people were already dead. Another 16 were taken to hospitals, where five more died. The dead included six children and a pregnant woman.
âThese defendants knew the air conditioning did not work. Nevertheless they disregarded the danger,â Acting U.S. Attorney Margaret Leachman for the Western District of Texas said in a news conference after the verdict Tuesday. Orduna-Torres was the leader of the smuggling group inside the U.S., and Gonzales-Ortega was his âright-hand manâ she said.
Five men previously pleaded guilty to felony charges in the smuggling case, including the truck driver Homero Zamorano Jr., who was found hiding near the trailer in some bushes. He faces a maximum sentence of life in prison. Also pleading guilty are Christian Martinez, Luis Alberto Rivera-Leal, Riley Covarrubias-Ponce and Juan Francisco DâLuna Bilbao. All five will be sentenced later this year. Another person charged in the U.S. remains a fugitive, Leachman said. Several others have been charged in Mexico and Guatemala.
The incident is the deadliest among tragedies that have claimed thousands of lives in recent decades as people attempt to cross the U.S. border from Mexico. Ten immigrants died in 2017 after they were trapped inside a truck parked at a Walmart in San Antonio. In 2003, the bodies of 19 immigrants were found in a sweltering truck southeast of San Antonio.
Jose Manuel Cendan Ley, a 29-year-old medical assistant, is accused of performing an illegal abortion and practicing without a license at a clinic in connection to Maria Margarita Rojas whose arrest was announced Monday by Republican Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton.
Court records show Ley was arrested on March 6, released on bond a few days later, then arrested again Monday.
Rojas, 48, was also charged with providing an illegal abortion and practicing medicine without a license, which are second- and third-degree felonies. She is accused of operating three clinics northwest of Houston that performed illegal abortion procedures. Her arrest signified the first time authorities have filed criminal charges under the stateâs near-total abortion ban.
The attorney general’s office is alleging that Ley worked as a medical assistant at one of Rojasâ three clinics and performed at least one abortion illegally. In an announcement on Tuesday, the office states that Ley is a Cuban national who entered the U.S. illegally in 2022 and was later placed on parole. Rubildo Labanino Matos, 54, was also arrested in connection to the investigation for practicing medicine without a license, according to Paxton’s office.
âIndividuals killing unborn babies by performing illegal abortions in Texas will be prosecuted to the full extent of the law, and I will not rest until justice is served,â Paxton said in a statement. âI will continue to fight to protect life and work to ensure that anyone guilty of violating our stateâs pro-life laws is held accountable.â
Court records did not list an attorney for Ley or Rojas who could comment on their behalf.
Those convicted of performing an illegal abortion can face up to 20 years in prison, while practicing medicine without a license carries a penalty of up to 10 years in prison.
Texas law bans an abortion at all stages of a pregnancy and only allows exceptions when a patient has a life-threatening condition, making it one of the strictest abortion bans in the nation. Opponents of the ban say it is too vague when defining allowable medical exceptions. A state lawmaker has filed a bill that aims to clarify when medical exceptions are allowed under the law.
Earlier this year, a Louisiana grand jury indicted a New York doctor on charges that she illegally prescribed abortion pills online to a Louisiana resident. Paxton has filed a civil lawsuit against the doctor under a similar accusation.
WASHINGTON (AP) â In an effort to limit fraudulent claims, the Social Security Administration will impose tighter identity-proofing measures â which will require millions of recipients and applicants to visit agency field offices rather than interact with the agency over the phone.
Beginning March 31st, people will no longer be able to verify their identity to the SSA over the phone and those who cannot properly verify their identity over the agency’s âmy Social Securityâ online service, will be required to visit an agency field office in person to complete the verification process, agency leadership told reporters Tuesday.
The change will apply to new Social Security applicants and existing recipients who want to change their direct deposit information.
Retiree advocates warn that the change will negatively impact older Americans in rural areas, including those with disabilities, mobility limitations, those who live far from SSA offices and have limited internet access.
The plan also comes as the agency plans to shutter dozens of Social Security offices throughout the country and has already laid out plans to lay off thousands of workers.
In addition to the identity verification change, the agency announced that it plans to expedite processing of recipientsâ direct deposit change requests â both in person and online â to one business day. Previously, online direct deposit changes were held for 30 days.
âThe Social Security Administration is losing over $100 million a year in direct deposit fraud,â Leland Dudek, the agencyâs acting commissioner, said on a Tuesday evening call with reporters â his first call with the media. âSocial Security can better protect Americans while expediting service.â
He said a problem with eliminating fraudulent claims is that âthe information that we use through knowledge-based authentication is already in the public domain.â
âThis is a common sense measure,â Dudek added.
More than 72.5 million people, including retirees and children, receive retirement and disability benefits through the Social Security Administration.
Connecticut Rep. John Larson, the top Democrat on the House Ways and Means Social Security Subcommittee, said in a statement that âby requiring seniors and disabled Americans to enroll online or in person at the same field offices they are trying to close, rather than over the phone, Trump and Musk are trying to create chaos and inefficiencies at SSA so they can privatize the system.â
The DOGE website says that leases for 47 Social Security field offices across the country, including in Arkansas, Texas, Louisiana, Florida, Kentucky and North Carolina, have been or will be ended. However, Dudek downplayed the impact of its offices shuttering, saying many were small remote hearing sites that served few members of the public.
Many Americans have been concerned that SSA office closures and massive layoffs of federal workers â part of an effort by President Donald Trump and Elon Muskâs Department of Government Efficiency to shrink the size of the federal government â will make getting benefits even more difficult.
Musk has pushed debunked theories about Social Security and described the federal benefit programs as rife with fraud, and called it a âPonzi schemeâ suggesting the program will be a primary target in his crusade to reduce government spending.
Voters have flooded town halls across the country to question Republican lawmakers about the Trump administrationâs cuts, including its plans for the old-age benefits program.
In addition a group of labor unions last week sued and asked a federal court for an emergency order to stop DOGE from accessing the sensitive Social Security data of millions of Americans.
About 2,200 files consisting of over 63,000 pages were posted on the website of the U.S. National Archives and Records Administration. The vast majority of the National Archivesâ collection of over 6 million pages of records, photographs, motion pictures, sound recordings and artifacts related to the assassination had previously been released.
President Donald Trump told reporters on Monday that the release was coming, though he estimated it at about 80,000 pages.
âWe have a tremendous amount of paper. Youâve got a lot of reading,â Trump said while visiting the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington.
There is an intense interest in details related to the assassination, which has spawned countless conspiracy theories.
He directed the national intelligence director and attorney general to develop a plan to release the records. The order also aimed to declassify the remaining federal records related to the 1968 assassinations of Sen. Robert F. Kennedy and the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.
After signing the order, Trump handed the pen to an aide and directed that it be given to Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the Trump administration’s top health official. He’s the nephew of John F. Kennedy and son of Robert F. Kennedy. The younger Kennedy, whose anti-vaccine activism has alienated him from much of his family, has said he isnât convinced that a lone gunman was solely responsible for his uncle’s assassination.
Nov. 22, 1963
When Air Force One carrying JFK and first lady Jacqueline Kennedy touched down in Dallas, they were greeted by a clear sky and enthusiastic crowds. With a reelection campaign on the horizon the next year, they went to Texas for a political fence-mending trip.
But as the motorcade was finishing its parade route downtown, shots rang out from the Texas School Book Depository building. Police arrested 24-year-old Lee Harvey Oswald, who had positioned himself from a sniperâs perch on the sixth floor. Two days later, nightclub owner Jack Ruby fatally shot Oswald during a jail transfer.
A year after the assassination, the Warren Commission, which President Lyndon B. Johnson established to investigate, concluded that Oswald acted alone and that there was no evidence of a conspiracy. But that didn’t quell a web of alternative theories over the decades.
The JFK files
In the early 1990s, the federal government mandated that all assassination-related documents be housed in a single collection in the National Archives and Records Administration. The collection was required to be opened by 2017, barring any exemptions designated by the president.
Trump, who took office for his first term in 2017, had said that he would allow the release of all of the remaining records but ended up holding some back because of what he called the potential harm to national security. And while files continued to be released during President Joe Bidenâs administration, some remain unseen.
The National Archives says that the vast majority of its collection of over 6 million pages of records, photographs, motion pictures, sound recordings and artifacts related to the assassination have already been released.
Researchers have estimated that 3,000 files or so havenât been released, either in whole or in part. And last month, the FBI said that it had discovered about 2,400 new records related to the assassination. The agency said then that it was working to transfer the records to the National Archives to be included in the declassification process.
Around 500 documents, including tax returns, were not subject to the 2017 disclosure requirement.
What’s been learned
Some of the documents from previous releases have offered details on the way intelligence services operated at the time, including CIA cables and memos discussing visits by Oswald to the Soviet and Cuban embassies during a trip to Mexico City just weeks before the assassination. The former Marine had previously defected to the Soviet Union before returning home to Texas.
One CIA memo describes how Oswald phoned the Soviet Embassy while in Mexico City to ask for a visa to visit the Soviet Union. He also visited the Cuban Embassy, apparently interested in a travel visa that would permit him to visit Cuba and wait there for a Soviet visa. On Oct. 3, more than a month before the assassination, he drove back into the United States through a crossing point at the Texas border.
Another memo, dated the day after Kennedyâs assassination, says that according to an intercepted phone call in Mexico City, Oswald communicated with a KGB officer while at the Soviet Embassy that September. The releases have also contributed to the understanding of that time period during the Cold War, researchers said.
LONGVIEW — CHRISTUS Health is hosting a hiring event in Longview on Thursday for healthcare professionals who want to start or further their career. According to CHRISTUS Health and our news partner KETK, the event will take place at 2005 Tolar Road inside El Sombrero from 4 p.m. to 6 p.m. for people to interact with hospital leaders. On-the-spot interviews will be conducted for opportunities to discover diverse career paths, along with food, refreshments and giveaways. Full-time and part-time schedules will be available for candidates ready to achieve their personal and professional goals.
âWe are looking for dedicated professionals to join our faith-based ministry and provide the best, compassionate care in the region,â CHRISTUS Health Manager of Talent Acquisition Michaela Ahlfinger said.
CHRISTUS Good Shepherd in Longview is celebrating their 90th anniversary this year and recently broke ground on the CHRISTUS Cancer Center which opened in January. Read the rest of this entry »
âMore than ever, consumers are looking for convenient and great-tasting options that fit their lifestyles and respond to their growing interest in health and wellness,â PepsiCo Chairman and CEO Ramon Laguarta said in a statement.
PepsiCo said the transaction includes $300 million of anticipated cash benefits, bringing the net purchase price to $1.65 billion.
Allison Ellsworth, the co-founder of Austin, Texas-based Poppi, said the combination with PepsiCo will expand Poppiâs reach.
âWe canât wait to begin this next chapter with PepsiCo to bring our soda to more people â and I know they will honor what makes Poppi so special while supporting our next phase of growth and innovation,â Ellsworth said in a statement.
Ellsworth developed Poppi â then known as Mother Beverage — in her kitchen in 2015 because she loved soda but was tired of the way it made her feel. She mixed fruit juices with apple cider vinegar, sparkling water and prebiotics and sold the drink at farmer’s markets.
The brand took off in 2018 when Ellsworth and her husband pitched it on âShark Tank.â An investor on the show, Rohan Oza, took a stake in Mother Beverage and undertook a major rebrand. Poppi, with its brightly-colored, fruit-forward cans, was born.
âWeâre beyond thrilled to be partnering with PepsiCo so that even more consumers across America, and the world, can enjoy Poppi,â said Oza, the co-founder CAVU Consumer Partners, which has also invested in beverage brands like Oatly and Bai.
But it hasnât all been smooth sailing for Poppi. Last summer, multiple class-action lawsuits were filed against the brand by consumers who said its products donât improve gut health as much as their marketing suggests.
Poppi denied those claims, and noted that it removed references to âgut healthâ from its packaging in late 2023. But according to a court filing last week, Poppi has agreed to a settlement that includes an $8.9 million fund for payments to consumers. A hearing on the settlement is scheduled for May 8.
PepsiCo shares rose nearly 2% in morning trading Monday.
DALLAS (AP) â President Donald Trump says files related to the 1963 assassination of President John F. Kennedy will be released Tuesday without any redactions, making good on a promise he made during his campaign.
Trump told reporters Monday that his administration will be releasing 80,000 files, though itâs not clear how many of those are among the millions of pages of records that have already been made public.
He also said he doesnât believe anything will be redacted from the files. âI said, âJust donât redact. You canât redact,ââ he said.
Many who have studied what’s been released so far by the government say the public shouldnât anticipate any earth-shattering revelations from the newly released documents, but there is still intense interest in details related to the assassination and the events surrounding it.
Here are some things to know:
Trump’s order
Shortly after he was sworn into office, Trump ordered the release of the remaining classified files related to the assassination, which has spawned countless conspiracy theories.
He directed the national intelligence director and attorney general to develop a plan to release the records. The order also aimed to declassify the remaining federal records related to the 1968 assassinations of Sen. Robert F. Kennedy and the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.
After signing the order, Trump handed the pen to an aide and directed that it be given to Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the Trump administration’s top health official. He’s the nephew of John F. Kennedy and son of Robert F. Kennedy. The younger Kennedy, whose anti-vaccine activism has alienated him from much of his family, has said he isnât convinced that a lone gunman was solely responsible for his uncle’s the assassination.
Nov. 22, 1963
When Air Force One carrying JFK and first lady Jacqueline Kennedy touched down in Dallas, they were greeted by a clear sky and enthusiastic crowds. With a reelection campaign on the horizon the next year, they went to Texas for a political fence-mending trip.
But as the motorcade was finishing its parade route downtown, shots rang out from the Texas School Book Depository building. Police arrested 24-year-old Lee Harvey Oswald, who had positioned himself from a sniperâs perch on the sixth floor. Two days later, nightclub owner Jack Ruby fatally shot Oswald during a jail transfer.
A year after the assassination, the Warren Commission, which President Lyndon B. Johnson established to investigate, concluded that Oswald acted alone and that there was no evidence of a conspiracy. But that didn’t quell a web of alternative theories over the decades.
The JFK files
In the early 1990s, the federal government mandated that all assassination-related documents be housed in a single collection in the National Archives and Records Administration. The collection of over 5 million pages of records was required to be opened by 2017, barring any exemptions designated by the president.
Trump, who took office for his first term in 2017, had said that he would allow the release of all of the remaining records but ended up holding some back because of what he called the potential harm to national security. And while files continued to be released during President Joe Bidenâs administration, some remain unseen.
Researchers have estimated that 3,000 files or so havenât been released, either in whole or in part.
And last month, the FBI said that it had discovered about 2,400 new records related to the assassination. The agency said then that it was working to transfer the records to the National Archives to be included in the declassification process.
There are still some documents in the JFK collection that researchers donât believe the president will be able to release. Around 500 documents, including tax returns, werenât subject to the 2017 disclosure requirement.
What’s been learned
Some of the documents already released have offered details on the way intelligence services operated at the time, including CIA cables and memos discussing visits by Oswald to the Soviet and Cuban embassies during a trip to Mexico City just weeks before the assassination. The former Marine had previously defected to the Soviet Union before returning home to Texas.
One CIA memo describes how Oswald phoned the Soviet embassy while in Mexico City to ask for a visa to visit the Soviet Union. He also visited the Cuban embassy, apparently interested in a travel visa that would permit him to visit Cuba and wait there for a Soviet visa. On Oct. 3, more than a month before the assassination, he drove back into the United States through a crossing point at the Texas border.
Another memo, dated the day after Kennedyâs assassination, says that according to an intercepted phone call in Mexico City, Oswald communicated with a KGB officer while at the Soviet embassy that September.
The releases have also contributed to the understanding of that time period during the Cold War, researchers said.
DENVER (AP) â Twelve people were taken to hospitals after an American Airlines plane landed at Denver International Airport on Thursday and caught fire, prompting slides to be deployed so passengers could evacuate quickly. All of the people transported to hospitals had minor injuries, according to a post on the social platform X by Denver International Airport.
Flight 1006, which was headed from the Colorado Springs Airport to Dallas Fort Worth, diverted to Denver and landed safely around 5:15 p.m. after the crew reported engine vibrations, the Federal Aviation Administration said in a statement.
While taxiing to the gate, an engine on the Boeing 737-800 caught fire, the FAA added.
Photos and videos posted by news outlets showed passengers standing on a planeâs wing as smoke surrounded the aircraft. The FAA said passengers exited using the slides.
American said in a statement that the flight experienced an engine-related issue after taxiing to the gate. There was no immediate clarification on exactly when the plane caught fire.
The 172 passengers and six crew members were taken to the terminal, airline officials said.
âWe thank our crew members, DEN team and first responders for their quick and decisive action with the safety of everyone on board and on the ground as the priority,â American said.
Firefighters put out the blaze by the evening, an airport spokesperson told media outlets.
Recent on-the-ground incidents have included a plane that crashed and flipped over upon landing in Toronto and a Japan Airlines plane that clipped a parked Delta plane while it was taxiing at the Seattle airport.
LUFKIN — A former Lufkin ISD superintendent spoke against House Bill 3 during a House Committee meeting on Wednesday. According to our news partner KETK, Roy Knight, who was in the education industry for over 40 years, testified against HB 3 that would use state funds to pay for private schools, homeschooling and other educational services. The bill would also create more flexibility for parents to choose their childâs education.
âThis bill is a skunk that weâre trying to pass off as a kitty cat,â Knight said.
The bill argues that directing funds toward private schools will enable competitive pay for public school teachers. However, Knight contends that Lufkin has remained competitive with other schools for years. He also stated that public school teachers are frustrated by the implication that they have not been working hard until private schools became more popular. Read the rest of this entry »
First ever East Texas Gamer Con coming to Longview
Posted/updated on:
March 27, 2025 at
3:25 am
GREGG COUNTY — The Greater Longview United Way, LANFest and CableLynx Broadband are teaming up to host the inaugural East Texas Gamer Con this Friday and Saturday, according to our news partner KETK.
âGaming has the power to bring people together, and through ETX Gamer Con, weâre channeling that connection into meaningful community support,â said Dr. Evan Dolive, the executive director of the Greater Longview United Way. âWhen you participate in this event, youâre not just playing games â youâre helping provide meals to families in need, supporting after-school programs for our youth, and ensuring our neighbors have access to vital health services.â
The conventionâs lineup consists of the following exciting activities: (more…)
Halfway to the 2030 census, the Supreme Court is still dealing with lawsuits over the last one
Posted/updated on:
March 25, 2025 at
7:13 am
WASHINGTON (AP) â The United States is halfway to the next once-a-decade census, but the Supreme Court is still dealing with lawsuits that grew out of the last one.
The justices on Monday are taking up a challenge to Louisianaâs congressional map, which was drawn so that, for the first time, two of its six districts have majority Black populations that elected Black Democrats to Congress. Black Louisianans make up about one-third of the stateâs population.
Just two years ago, the court ruled 5-4 that Alabama discriminated against Black voters by adopting a congressional map with just one majority Black district, in violation of the landmark federal Voting Rights Act.
The Louisiana case features an unusual alliance of the Republican-led state government, which added a second majority Black district to essentially comply with the Alabama ruling, and civil rights groups that more often find themselves fighting the state’s redistricting plans.
A decision should come by late June.
How did we get here?
It has been a winding road. The court fight over Louisiana’s congressional districts has lasted three years. Two maps were blocked by lower courts, and the Supreme Court has intervened twice. Most recently, the court ordered the new map to be used in the 2024 election.
The stateâs Republican-dominated legislature drew a new congressional map in 2022 to account for population shifts reflected in the 2020 Census. But the changes effectively maintained the status quo of five Republican-leaning majority white districts and one Democratic-leaning majority Black district.
Civil rights advocates won a lower court ruling that the districts likely discriminated against Black voters.
The Supreme Court put the ruling on hold while it took up the Alabama case. The justices allowed both states to use congressional maps in the 2022 elections even though both had been ruled likely discriminatory by federal judges.
The high court eventually affirmed the ruling from Alabama, which led to a new map and a second district that could elect a Black lawmaker. The justices returned the Louisiana case to federal court, with the expectation that new maps would be in place for the 2024 elections.
The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals gave lawmakers in Louisiana a deadline of early 2024 to draw a new map or face the possibility of a court-imposed map.
The state complied and drew a new map.
The court must decide: politics or race?
One of the questions before the court is whether race was the predominant factor driving the new map. That’s what white Louisiana voters claimed in their separate lawsuit challenging the new districts. A three-judge court agreed.
But Gov. Jeff Landry, a Republican, and other state officials argue that politics, not race, helped set the boundaries. The congressional map provides politically safe districts for House Speaker Mike Johnson and Majority Leader Steve Scalise, fellow Republicans.
The decision âreflects the imminent reality that Louisiana would be projected to lose one of five Republican congressional seatsâ when a court or the legislature adopted a second majority Black district, state Attorney General Elizabeth Murrill wrote in court papers.
Some lawmakers have also noted that the Republican lawmaker whose district was greatly altered in the new map supported a GOP opponent of Landry in the 2023 governorâs race. Former Rep. Garret Graves chose not to seek reelection under the new map.
The Supreme Court faces a lurking issue
Louisiana argues that dueling lawsuits over redistricting make it almost impossible for states to know what to do. So the state has a suggestion that, if adopted, would mark an upheaval in redistricting.
The justices could declare that racial gerrymandering cases do not belong in federal courts, Murrill wrote.
The court’s conservative majority reached that conclusion for partisan gerrymandering in 2019. Justice Clarence Thomas said the court also should no longer decide race-based redistricting cases. âDrawing political districts is a task for politicians, not federal judges,â Thomas wrote last year in an opinion no other justice joined.
But the court doesn’t have to touch that issue to resolve the Louisiana case.
A Black Democrat won the new district
The reconfigured 6th Congressional District stretches across the state, linking parts of the Shreveport, Alexandria, Lafayette and Baton Rouge areas. The percentage of Black voters in the district jumped from about 25% to 55%, based on data collected by the state.
The district’s voters last year elected Cleo Fields, a Black Democrat. He returned to the House of Representatives, where he had served decades earlier.
New election dates
The state also has changed the state’s election process so that the so-called jungle primary will be replaced by partisan primary elections in the spring, followed by a November showdown between the party nominees.
The change means candidates can start gathering signatures in September to get on the primary ballot for 2026.
A Supreme Court decision invalidating the congressional map would leave little time to draw a new one before then.
University of Oxford Somerville College Choir concert canceled
Posted/updated on:
March 25, 2025 at
3:16 pm
TYLER — The University of Oxford Somerville College Choir concert at Marvin Methodist Church in Tyler Tuesday night has been canceled. Due to the fire at Heathrow Airport last week, the group was not able to make their flight.
Federal judge blocks Trump administration’s transgender military service ban
Posted/updated on:
March 21, 2025 at
3:15 am
WASHINGTON (AP) â A federal judge blocked enforcement of President Donald Trumpâs executive order banning transgender people from military service on Tuesday, the latest in a string of legal setbacks for his sweeping agenda.
U.S. District Judge Ana Reyes in Washington, D.C., ruled that Trump’s order to exclude transgender troops from military service likely violates their constitutional rights. She was the second judge of the day to rule against the administration, and both rulings came within hours of an extraordinary conflict as Trump called for impeaching a third judge who temporarily blocked deportation flights, drawing a rare rebuke from Chief Justice John Roberts.
Reyes, who was nominated by President Joe Biden, delayed her order until Friday morning to give the administration time to appeal.
“The court knows that this opinion will lead to heated public debate and appeals. In a healthy democracy, both are positive outcomes,â Reyes wrote. âWe should all agree, however, that every person who has answered the call to serve deserves our gratitude and respect.â
Army Reserves 2nd Lt. Nicolas Talbott, one of 14 transgender active-duty servicemembers named as plaintiffs in the lawsuit, said he was holding his breath as he waited to find out if he would be separated from the military next week.
âThis is such a sigh of relief,â he said. âThis is all Iâve ever wanted to do. This is my dream job, and I finally have it. And I was so terrified that I was about to lose it.â
The White House didnât immediately respond to a message seeking comment. Trumpâs deputy chief of staff, Stephen Miller, posted about the ruling on social media, writing, âDistrict court judges have now decided they are in command of the Armed ForcesâŚis there no end to this madness?â
The judge issued a preliminary injunction requested by attorneys who also represent others seeking to join the military.
On Jan. 27, Trump signed an executive order that claims the sexual identity of transgender service members “conflicts with a soldierâs commitment to an honorable, truthful, and disciplined lifestyle, even in oneâs personal lifeâ and is harmful to military readiness.
In response to the order, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth issued a policy that presumptively disqualifies people with gender dysphoria from military service. Gender dysphoria is the distress that a person feels because their assigned gender and gender identity donât match. The medical condition has been linked to depression and suicidal thoughts.
Plaintiffsâ attorneys contend Trumpâs order violates transgender peopleâs rights to equal protection under the Fifth Amendment.
Government lawyers argue that military officials have broad discretion to decide how to assign and deploy servicemembers without judicial interference.
Reyes said she did not take lightly her decision to issue an injunction blocking Trumpâs order, noting that âJudicial overreach is no less pernicious than executive overreach.â But, she said, it was also the responsibility of each branch of government to provide checks and balances for the others, and the court âtherefore must act to uphold the equal protection rights that the military defends every day.â
Thousands of transgender people serve in the military, but they represent less than 1% of the total number of active-duty service members.
In 2016, a Defense Department policy permitted transgender people to serve openly in the military. During Trumpâs first term in the White House, the Republican issued a directive to ban transgender service members. The Supreme Court allowed the ban to take effect. President Joe Biden, a Democrat, scrapped it when he took office.
Hegsethâs Feb. 26 policy says service members or applicants for military service who have âa current diagnosis or history of, or exhibit symptoms consistent with, gender dysphoria are incompatible with the high mental and physical standards necessary for military service.â
The plaintiffs who sued to block Trumpâs order include an Army Reserves platoon leader from Pennsylvania, an Army major who was awarded a Bronze Star for service in Afghanistan and a Sailor of the Year award winner serving in the Navy.
âThe cruel irony is that thousands of transgender servicemembers have sacrificedâsome risking their livesâto ensure for others the very equal protection rights the military ban seeks to deny them,” Reyes wrote.
Their attorneys, from the National Center for Lesbian Rights and GLAD Law, said transgender troops âseek nothing more than the opportunity to continue dedicating their lives to defending the Nation.â
âYet these accomplished servicemembers are now subject to an order that says they must be separated from the military based on a characteristic that has no bearing on their proven ability to do the job,â plaintiffsâ attorneys wrote. âThis is a stark and reckless reversal of policy that denigrates honorable transgender servicemembers, disrupts unit cohesion, and weakens our military.â
Government attorneys said the Defense Department has a history of disqualifying people from military service if they have physical or emotional impairments, including mental health conditions.
âIn any context other than the one at issue in this case, DoDâs professional military judgment about the risks of allowing individuals with physical or emotional impairments to serve in the military would be virtually unquestionable,â they wrote.
Plaintiffsâ attorneys say Trumpâs order fits his administrationâs pattern of discriminating against transgender people.
Federal judges in Seattle and Baltimore separately paused Trumpâs executive order halting federal support for gender-affirming care for transgender youth under 19. Last month, a judge blocked prison officials from transferring three incarcerated transgender women to menâs facilities and terminating their access to hormone therapy under another Trump order.
Trump also signed orders that set up new rules about how schools can teach about gender and that intend to ban transgender athletes from participating in girlsâ and womenâs sports.
âFrom its first days, this administration has moved to strip protections from transgender people across multiple domains â including housing, social services, schools, sports, healthcare, employment, international travel, and family life,â plaintiffsâ lawyers wrote.
Talbott, 31, of Akron, Ohio, enlisted in March 2024 as an openly trans person after fighting for roughly nine years to join the service. He said his fellow soldiers gave him some good-natured flak for being so much older than other recruits, but never treated him differently for being trans. Talbott anticipates that his colleagues will be âpretty excited that I get to stay.â
âNow I can go back to focusing on whatâs really important, which is the mission,â said Talbott, a platoon leader for a military policing unit.
Governor Abbott appoints 62nd Judicial District court judge
Posted/updated on:
March 22, 2025 at
5:55 am
EAST TEXAS — Texas Governor Greg Abbott has appointed a new 62nd Judicial District court judge who will cover cases in Delta, Franklin, Hopkins and Lamar counties. According to our news partner KETK, William âBillâ Harris of Paris is the current County Court Judge for Lamar County and Abbott has selected him to fill the 62nd Judicial District court judge seat for a term that will last till Dec. 31, 2026.
His appointment as the 62nd Judicial District court judge will have to be approved by the Texas Senate before he can fill the role. If confirmed, Harris will fill the role until a permanent replacement for former judge Will Biard is elected. (more…)
Immigrants disappear from US detainee tracking system after deportation flights
Posted/updated on:
March 21, 2025 at
3:15 am
MIAMI (AP) â Franco Caraballo called his wife Friday night, crying and panicked. Hours earlier, the 26-year-old barber and dozens of other Venezuelan migrants at a federal detention facility in Texas were dressed in white clothes, handcuffed and taken onto a plane. He had no idea where he was going.
Twenty-four hours later, Caraballoâs name disappeared from the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcementâs online detainee locator.
On Monday, his wife, Johanny SĂĄnchez, learned Caraballo was among more than 200 Venezuelan immigrants flown over the weekend to El Salvador, where they are in a maximum-security prison after being accused by the Trump administration of belonging to the Venezuelan Tren de Aragua gang.
SĂĄnchez insists her husband isn’t a gang member. She struggles even to find logic in the accusation.
The weekend flights
Flights by U.S. immigration authorities set off a frantic scramble among terrified families after hundreds of immigrants vanished from ICEâs online locator.
Some turned up at that massive El Salvador prison, where visitors, recreation and education are not allowed. The U.S. has paid El Salvador’s government $6 million to hold immigrants, many of them Venezuelan, whose government rarely accepts deportees from the U.S.
But many families have no idea where to find their loved ones. El Salvador has no online database to look up inmates, and families there often struggle to get information.
âI donât know anything about my son,â said Xiomara Vizcaya, a 46-year-old Venezuelan.
Ali David Navas Vizcaya had been in U.S. detention since early 2024, when he was stopped at a U.S.-Mexico border crossing where he had an appointment to talk to immigration officers. He called her late Friday and said he thought he was being deported to Venezuela or Mexico.
âHe told me, âFinally, weâre going to be together, and this nightmare is going to be over,ââ Vizcaya said in telephone interview from her home in the northern Venezuela city of Barquisimeto.
His name is no longer in ICEâs system. She said he has no criminal record and suspects he may have been mistakenly identified as a Tren de Aragua member because of several tattoos.
âHe left for the American dream, to be able to help me financially, but he never had the chance to get outâ of prison, she said.
Nearly 8 million Venezuelans have left their homeland since 2013, when its oil-dependent economy collapsed. Most initially went to other Latin American countries but more headed to the U.S. after COVID-19 restrictions lifted during the Biden administration.
An 18th century law
On Saturday, President Donald Trump announced he had invoked the Alien Enemies Act of 1798, which allows the U.S. to deport noncitizens without any legal recourse, including rights to appear before an immigration or federal court judge.
Many conservatives have cheered the deportations and the Trump administration for taking a hard stance on immigration.
The administration says it is using the wartime Alien Enemies Act to deport alleged Tren de Aragua members, saying the gang was invading the U.S., though it has not provided any evidence to back up gang-membership claims.
U.S. officials acknowledged in a court filing Monday that many people sent to El Salvador do not have criminal records, though they insisted all are suspected gang members.
âThe lack of a criminal record does not indicate they pose a limited threat,â said a sworn declaration in the filing, adding that along with their suspected gang membership âthe lack of specific information about each individual actually highlights the risk they pose.â
ICE regional supervisor Robert Cerna said in an affidavit that agents did not rely on âtattoos aloneâ to identify potential members.
âWe followed the lawâ
On Feb. 3, Caraballo went to an ICE office in Dallas office for one of his regular mandatory check-ins with agents handling his asylum request.
He was âapprehended and releasedâ after illegally crossing the southern U.S. border in October 2023, according to Department of Homeland Security documents provided by his wife. The documents said he was a “member/active” of Tren de Aragua, but offered no evidence to support that.
What gang member, his wife asked, would walk into a federal law enforcement office during a Trump administration crackdown that has left immigrants across the country terrified?
âWe followed the law like we were told to. We never missed anyâ meetings with authorities, said SĂĄnchez, who remains in the U.S. trying to secure her husbandâs release. SĂĄnchez said her husband, whom she married in 2024 in Texas, has had no run-ins with the law in the U.S. She also showed The Associated Press a Venezuelan document showing he has a clean criminal record there.
SĂĄnchez believes he was wrongly accused of belonging to Tren de Aragua because of a clock-shaped tattoo marking his daughter’s birthday.
âHe has lots of tattoos, but thatâs not a reason to discriminate against him,â she said.
SĂĄnchez said she and her husband left Venezuela with barely $200 and spent three months sleeping in plazas, eating out of trash cans and relying on fellow migrants’ goodwill as they journeyed north.
She thought the sacrifice would be worth it. Her husband had been working as a barber since the age of 13 and was hopeful he could find a new start in the U.S., escaping poverty wages and Nicolas Maduroâs ironfisted rule in Venezuela.
Venezuela responds
The Venezuelan government has called the flights âkidnappings.â It urged its citizens living in the U.S. to return home and vowed get others back from El Salvador. But with diplomatic ties long broken between Venezuela and El Salvador, the prisoners have few advocates.
The U.S. deportations exacerbate Venezuelaâs immigration crisis by turning âmigrants into geopolitical pawns,â said Oscar Murillo, head of the Venezuelan human rights group Provea. “There is a lack of transparency on the part of the U.S. and El Salvador regarding the status of deported individuals and the crimes for which they are being prosecuted.â
SĂĄnchez is among those who believes the American dream has turned ugly. She wants to leave the U.S. once she finds her husband.
âWe fled Venezuela for a better future. We never imagined things would be worse.â
Two men found guilty in smuggling conspiracy where 53 immigrants died
Posted/updated on:
March 21, 2025 at
3:15 am
SAN ANTONIO (AP) â Two smugglers charged after 53 immigrants died in the back of a sweltering tractor-trailer with no air conditioning were found guilty Tuesday after a two-week trial. The 2022 tragedy in San Antonio was the nationâs deadliest smuggling attempt across the U.S.-Mexico border.
Jurors in federal court in San Antonio took only about an hour to convict Felipe Orduna-Torres and Armando Gonzales-Ortega, finding that they were part of a human smuggling conspiracy that resulted in death and injury. They face up to life in prison and have a June 27 sentencing date.
The immigrants had come from Guatemala, Honduras and Mexico and had paid between $12,000 and $15,000 each to be smuggled into the United States, according to an indictment in the case. They had made it as far as the Texas border city of Laredo when they were placed into a tractor-trailer with broken air conditioning for a three-hour drive to San Antonio.
As the temperature inside the trailer rose, those inside screamed and banged the walls of the trailer for help or tried to claw their way out, investigators said. Most eventually passed out. When the trailer was opened in San Antonio, 48 people were already dead. Another 16 were taken to hospitals, where five more died. The dead included six children and a pregnant woman.
âThese defendants knew the air conditioning did not work. Nevertheless they disregarded the danger,â Acting U.S. Attorney Margaret Leachman for the Western District of Texas said in a news conference after the verdict Tuesday. Orduna-Torres was the leader of the smuggling group inside the U.S., and Gonzales-Ortega was his âright-hand manâ she said.
Five men previously pleaded guilty to felony charges in the smuggling case, including the truck driver Homero Zamorano Jr., who was found hiding near the trailer in some bushes. He faces a maximum sentence of life in prison. Also pleading guilty are Christian Martinez, Luis Alberto Rivera-Leal, Riley Covarrubias-Ponce and Juan Francisco DâLuna Bilbao. All five will be sentenced later this year. Another person charged in the U.S. remains a fugitive, Leachman said. Several others have been charged in Mexico and Guatemala.
The incident is the deadliest among tragedies that have claimed thousands of lives in recent decades as people attempt to cross the U.S. border from Mexico. Ten immigrants died in 2017 after they were trapped inside a truck parked at a Walmart in San Antonio. In 2003, the bodies of 19 immigrants were found in a sweltering truck southeast of San Antonio.
Medical assistant arrested in connection to clinics accused of providing illegal abortions
Jose Manuel Cendan Ley, a 29-year-old medical assistant, is accused of performing an illegal abortion and practicing without a license at a clinic in connection to Maria Margarita Rojas whose arrest was announced Monday by Republican Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton.
Court records show Ley was arrested on March 6, released on bond a few days later, then arrested again Monday.
Rojas, 48, was also charged with providing an illegal abortion and practicing medicine without a license, which are second- and third-degree felonies. She is accused of operating three clinics northwest of Houston that performed illegal abortion procedures. Her arrest signified the first time authorities have filed criminal charges under the stateâs near-total abortion ban.
The attorney general’s office is alleging that Ley worked as a medical assistant at one of Rojasâ three clinics and performed at least one abortion illegally. In an announcement on Tuesday, the office states that Ley is a Cuban national who entered the U.S. illegally in 2022 and was later placed on parole. Rubildo Labanino Matos, 54, was also arrested in connection to the investigation for practicing medicine without a license, according to Paxton’s office.
âIndividuals killing unborn babies by performing illegal abortions in Texas will be prosecuted to the full extent of the law, and I will not rest until justice is served,â Paxton said in a statement. âI will continue to fight to protect life and work to ensure that anyone guilty of violating our stateâs pro-life laws is held accountable.â
Court records did not list an attorney for Ley or Rojas who could comment on their behalf.
Those convicted of performing an illegal abortion can face up to 20 years in prison, while practicing medicine without a license carries a penalty of up to 10 years in prison.
Texas law bans an abortion at all stages of a pregnancy and only allows exceptions when a patient has a life-threatening condition, making it one of the strictest abortion bans in the nation. Opponents of the ban say it is too vague when defining allowable medical exceptions. A state lawmaker has filed a bill that aims to clarify when medical exceptions are allowed under the law.
Earlier this year, a Louisiana grand jury indicted a New York doctor on charges that she illegally prescribed abortion pills online to a Louisiana resident. Paxton has filed a civil lawsuit against the doctor under a similar accusation.
Social Security Administration to require in-person identity checks for new and existing recipient
Posted/updated on:
March 20, 2025 at
4:32 am
WASHINGTON (AP) â In an effort to limit fraudulent claims, the Social Security Administration will impose tighter identity-proofing measures â which will require millions of recipients and applicants to visit agency field offices rather than interact with the agency over the phone.
Beginning March 31st, people will no longer be able to verify their identity to the SSA over the phone and those who cannot properly verify their identity over the agency’s âmy Social Securityâ online service, will be required to visit an agency field office in person to complete the verification process, agency leadership told reporters Tuesday.
The change will apply to new Social Security applicants and existing recipients who want to change their direct deposit information.
Retiree advocates warn that the change will negatively impact older Americans in rural areas, including those with disabilities, mobility limitations, those who live far from SSA offices and have limited internet access.
The plan also comes as the agency plans to shutter dozens of Social Security offices throughout the country and has already laid out plans to lay off thousands of workers.
In addition to the identity verification change, the agency announced that it plans to expedite processing of recipientsâ direct deposit change requests â both in person and online â to one business day. Previously, online direct deposit changes were held for 30 days.
âThe Social Security Administration is losing over $100 million a year in direct deposit fraud,â Leland Dudek, the agencyâs acting commissioner, said on a Tuesday evening call with reporters â his first call with the media. âSocial Security can better protect Americans while expediting service.â
He said a problem with eliminating fraudulent claims is that âthe information that we use through knowledge-based authentication is already in the public domain.â
âThis is a common sense measure,â Dudek added.
More than 72.5 million people, including retirees and children, receive retirement and disability benefits through the Social Security Administration.
Connecticut Rep. John Larson, the top Democrat on the House Ways and Means Social Security Subcommittee, said in a statement that âby requiring seniors and disabled Americans to enroll online or in person at the same field offices they are trying to close, rather than over the phone, Trump and Musk are trying to create chaos and inefficiencies at SSA so they can privatize the system.â
The DOGE website says that leases for 47 Social Security field offices across the country, including in Arkansas, Texas, Louisiana, Florida, Kentucky and North Carolina, have been or will be ended. However, Dudek downplayed the impact of its offices shuttering, saying many were small remote hearing sites that served few members of the public.
Many Americans have been concerned that SSA office closures and massive layoffs of federal workers â part of an effort by President Donald Trump and Elon Muskâs Department of Government Efficiency to shrink the size of the federal government â will make getting benefits even more difficult.
Musk has pushed debunked theories about Social Security and described the federal benefit programs as rife with fraud, and called it a âPonzi schemeâ suggesting the program will be a primary target in his crusade to reduce government spending.
Voters have flooded town halls across the country to question Republican lawmakers about the Trump administrationâs cuts, including its plans for the old-age benefits program.
In addition a group of labor unions last week sued and asked a federal court for an emergency order to stop DOGE from accessing the sensitive Social Security data of millions of Americans.
Trump administration makes public thousands of files related to JFK assassination
About 2,200 files consisting of over 63,000 pages were posted on the website of the U.S. National Archives and Records Administration. The vast majority of the National Archivesâ collection of over 6 million pages of records, photographs, motion pictures, sound recordings and artifacts related to the assassination had previously been released.
President Donald Trump told reporters on Monday that the release was coming, though he estimated it at about 80,000 pages.
âWe have a tremendous amount of paper. Youâve got a lot of reading,â Trump said while visiting the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington.
There is an intense interest in details related to the assassination, which has spawned countless conspiracy theories.
He directed the national intelligence director and attorney general to develop a plan to release the records. The order also aimed to declassify the remaining federal records related to the 1968 assassinations of Sen. Robert F. Kennedy and the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.
After signing the order, Trump handed the pen to an aide and directed that it be given to Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the Trump administration’s top health official. He’s the nephew of John F. Kennedy and son of Robert F. Kennedy. The younger Kennedy, whose anti-vaccine activism has alienated him from much of his family, has said he isnât convinced that a lone gunman was solely responsible for his uncle’s assassination.
Nov. 22, 1963
When Air Force One carrying JFK and first lady Jacqueline Kennedy touched down in Dallas, they were greeted by a clear sky and enthusiastic crowds. With a reelection campaign on the horizon the next year, they went to Texas for a political fence-mending trip.
But as the motorcade was finishing its parade route downtown, shots rang out from the Texas School Book Depository building. Police arrested 24-year-old Lee Harvey Oswald, who had positioned himself from a sniperâs perch on the sixth floor. Two days later, nightclub owner Jack Ruby fatally shot Oswald during a jail transfer.
A year after the assassination, the Warren Commission, which President Lyndon B. Johnson established to investigate, concluded that Oswald acted alone and that there was no evidence of a conspiracy. But that didn’t quell a web of alternative theories over the decades.
The JFK files
In the early 1990s, the federal government mandated that all assassination-related documents be housed in a single collection in the National Archives and Records Administration. The collection was required to be opened by 2017, barring any exemptions designated by the president.
Trump, who took office for his first term in 2017, had said that he would allow the release of all of the remaining records but ended up holding some back because of what he called the potential harm to national security. And while files continued to be released during President Joe Bidenâs administration, some remain unseen.
The National Archives says that the vast majority of its collection of over 6 million pages of records, photographs, motion pictures, sound recordings and artifacts related to the assassination have already been released.
Researchers have estimated that 3,000 files or so havenât been released, either in whole or in part. And last month, the FBI said that it had discovered about 2,400 new records related to the assassination. The agency said then that it was working to transfer the records to the National Archives to be included in the declassification process.
Around 500 documents, including tax returns, were not subject to the 2017 disclosure requirement.
What’s been learned
Some of the documents from previous releases have offered details on the way intelligence services operated at the time, including CIA cables and memos discussing visits by Oswald to the Soviet and Cuban embassies during a trip to Mexico City just weeks before the assassination. The former Marine had previously defected to the Soviet Union before returning home to Texas.
One CIA memo describes how Oswald phoned the Soviet Embassy while in Mexico City to ask for a visa to visit the Soviet Union. He also visited the Cuban Embassy, apparently interested in a travel visa that would permit him to visit Cuba and wait there for a Soviet visa. On Oct. 3, more than a month before the assassination, he drove back into the United States through a crossing point at the Texas border.
Another memo, dated the day after Kennedyâs assassination, says that according to an intercepted phone call in Mexico City, Oswald communicated with a KGB officer while at the Soviet Embassy that September. The releases have also contributed to the understanding of that time period during the Cold War, researchers said.
CHRISTUS Health to host hiring event in Longview
Posted/updated on:
March 20, 2025 at
3:15 am
LONGVIEW — CHRISTUS Health is hosting a hiring event in Longview on Thursday for healthcare professionals who want to start or further their career. According to CHRISTUS Health and our news partner KETK, the event will take place at 2005 Tolar Road inside El Sombrero from 4 p.m. to 6 p.m. for people to interact with hospital leaders. On-the-spot interviews will be conducted for opportunities to discover diverse career paths, along with food, refreshments and giveaways. Full-time and part-time schedules will be available for candidates ready to achieve their personal and professional goals.
âWe are looking for dedicated professionals to join our faith-based ministry and provide the best, compassionate care in the region,â CHRISTUS Health Manager of Talent Acquisition Michaela Ahlfinger said.
CHRISTUS Good Shepherd in Longview is celebrating their 90th anniversary this year and recently broke ground on the CHRISTUS Cancer Center which opened in January. (more…)
PepsiCo buys prebiotic soda brand Poppi
Posted/updated on:
March 19, 2025 at
8:55 am
AUSTIN (AP) – PepsiCo said Monday itâs acquiring the prebiotic soda brand Poppi for $1.95 billion.
âMore than ever, consumers are looking for convenient and great-tasting options that fit their lifestyles and respond to their growing interest in health and wellness,â PepsiCo Chairman and CEO Ramon Laguarta said in a statement.
PepsiCo said the transaction includes $300 million of anticipated cash benefits, bringing the net purchase price to $1.65 billion.
Allison Ellsworth, the co-founder of Austin, Texas-based Poppi, said the combination with PepsiCo will expand Poppiâs reach.
âWe canât wait to begin this next chapter with PepsiCo to bring our soda to more people â and I know they will honor what makes Poppi so special while supporting our next phase of growth and innovation,â Ellsworth said in a statement.
Ellsworth developed Poppi â then known as Mother Beverage — in her kitchen in 2015 because she loved soda but was tired of the way it made her feel. She mixed fruit juices with apple cider vinegar, sparkling water and prebiotics and sold the drink at farmer’s markets.
The brand took off in 2018 when Ellsworth and her husband pitched it on âShark Tank.â An investor on the show, Rohan Oza, took a stake in Mother Beverage and undertook a major rebrand. Poppi, with its brightly-colored, fruit-forward cans, was born.
âWeâre beyond thrilled to be partnering with PepsiCo so that even more consumers across America, and the world, can enjoy Poppi,â said Oza, the co-founder CAVU Consumer Partners, which has also invested in beverage brands like Oatly and Bai.
But it hasnât all been smooth sailing for Poppi. Last summer, multiple class-action lawsuits were filed against the brand by consumers who said its products donât improve gut health as much as their marketing suggests.
Poppi denied those claims, and noted that it removed references to âgut healthâ from its packaging in late 2023. But according to a court filing last week, Poppi has agreed to a settlement that includes an $8.9 million fund for payments to consumers. A hearing on the settlement is scheduled for May 8.
PepsiCo shares rose nearly 2% in morning trading Monday.
Trump says his administration is set to release JFK files with no redactions
Posted/updated on:
March 19, 2025 at
4:33 am
DALLAS (AP) â President Donald Trump says files related to the 1963 assassination of President John F. Kennedy will be released Tuesday without any redactions, making good on a promise he made during his campaign.
Trump told reporters Monday that his administration will be releasing 80,000 files, though itâs not clear how many of those are among the millions of pages of records that have already been made public.
He also said he doesnât believe anything will be redacted from the files. âI said, âJust donât redact. You canât redact,ââ he said.
Many who have studied what’s been released so far by the government say the public shouldnât anticipate any earth-shattering revelations from the newly released documents, but there is still intense interest in details related to the assassination and the events surrounding it.
Here are some things to know:
Trump’s order
Shortly after he was sworn into office, Trump ordered the release of the remaining classified files related to the assassination, which has spawned countless conspiracy theories.
He directed the national intelligence director and attorney general to develop a plan to release the records. The order also aimed to declassify the remaining federal records related to the 1968 assassinations of Sen. Robert F. Kennedy and the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.
After signing the order, Trump handed the pen to an aide and directed that it be given to Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the Trump administration’s top health official. He’s the nephew of John F. Kennedy and son of Robert F. Kennedy. The younger Kennedy, whose anti-vaccine activism has alienated him from much of his family, has said he isnât convinced that a lone gunman was solely responsible for his uncle’s the assassination.
Nov. 22, 1963
When Air Force One carrying JFK and first lady Jacqueline Kennedy touched down in Dallas, they were greeted by a clear sky and enthusiastic crowds. With a reelection campaign on the horizon the next year, they went to Texas for a political fence-mending trip.
But as the motorcade was finishing its parade route downtown, shots rang out from the Texas School Book Depository building. Police arrested 24-year-old Lee Harvey Oswald, who had positioned himself from a sniperâs perch on the sixth floor. Two days later, nightclub owner Jack Ruby fatally shot Oswald during a jail transfer.
A year after the assassination, the Warren Commission, which President Lyndon B. Johnson established to investigate, concluded that Oswald acted alone and that there was no evidence of a conspiracy. But that didn’t quell a web of alternative theories over the decades.
The JFK files
In the early 1990s, the federal government mandated that all assassination-related documents be housed in a single collection in the National Archives and Records Administration. The collection of over 5 million pages of records was required to be opened by 2017, barring any exemptions designated by the president.
Trump, who took office for his first term in 2017, had said that he would allow the release of all of the remaining records but ended up holding some back because of what he called the potential harm to national security. And while files continued to be released during President Joe Bidenâs administration, some remain unseen.
Researchers have estimated that 3,000 files or so havenât been released, either in whole or in part.
And last month, the FBI said that it had discovered about 2,400 new records related to the assassination. The agency said then that it was working to transfer the records to the National Archives to be included in the declassification process.
There are still some documents in the JFK collection that researchers donât believe the president will be able to release. Around 500 documents, including tax returns, werenât subject to the 2017 disclosure requirement.
What’s been learned
Some of the documents already released have offered details on the way intelligence services operated at the time, including CIA cables and memos discussing visits by Oswald to the Soviet and Cuban embassies during a trip to Mexico City just weeks before the assassination. The former Marine had previously defected to the Soviet Union before returning home to Texas.
One CIA memo describes how Oswald phoned the Soviet embassy while in Mexico City to ask for a visa to visit the Soviet Union. He also visited the Cuban embassy, apparently interested in a travel visa that would permit him to visit Cuba and wait there for a Soviet visa. On Oct. 3, more than a month before the assassination, he drove back into the United States through a crossing point at the Texas border.
Another memo, dated the day after Kennedyâs assassination, says that according to an intercepted phone call in Mexico City, Oswald communicated with a KGB officer while at the Soviet embassy that September.
The releases have also contributed to the understanding of that time period during the Cold War, researchers said.
American Airlines Boeing 737 catches fire at Denver airport
Posted/updated on:
March 16, 2025 at
9:13 pm
DENVER (AP) â Twelve people were taken to hospitals after an American Airlines plane landed at Denver International Airport on Thursday and caught fire, prompting slides to be deployed so passengers could evacuate quickly. All of the people transported to hospitals had minor injuries, according to a post on the social platform X by Denver International Airport.
Flight 1006, which was headed from the Colorado Springs Airport to Dallas Fort Worth, diverted to Denver and landed safely around 5:15 p.m. after the crew reported engine vibrations, the Federal Aviation Administration said in a statement.
While taxiing to the gate, an engine on the Boeing 737-800 caught fire, the FAA added.
Photos and videos posted by news outlets showed passengers standing on a planeâs wing as smoke surrounded the aircraft. The FAA said passengers exited using the slides.
American said in a statement that the flight experienced an engine-related issue after taxiing to the gate. There was no immediate clarification on exactly when the plane caught fire.
The 172 passengers and six crew members were taken to the terminal, airline officials said.
âWe thank our crew members, DEN team and first responders for their quick and decisive action with the safety of everyone on board and on the ground as the priority,â American said.
Firefighters put out the blaze by the evening, an airport spokesperson told media outlets.
Recent on-the-ground incidents have included a plane that crashed and flipped over upon landing in Toronto and a Japan Airlines plane that clipped a parked Delta plane while it was taxiing at the Seattle airport.
Former superintendent speaks out against school choice bill
Posted/updated on:
March 15, 2025 at
4:47 am
LUFKIN — A former Lufkin ISD superintendent spoke against House Bill 3 during a House Committee meeting on Wednesday. According to our news partner KETK, Roy Knight, who was in the education industry for over 40 years, testified against HB 3 that would use state funds to pay for private schools, homeschooling and other educational services. The bill would also create more flexibility for parents to choose their childâs education.
âThis bill is a skunk that weâre trying to pass off as a kitty cat,â Knight said.
The bill argues that directing funds toward private schools will enable competitive pay for public school teachers. However, Knight contends that Lufkin has remained competitive with other schools for years. He also stated that public school teachers are frustrated by the implication that they have not been working hard until private schools became more popular. (more…)
GREGG COUNTY — The Greater Longview United Way, LANFest and CableLynx Broadband are teaming up to host the inaugural East Texas Gamer Con this Friday and Saturday, according to our news partner KETK.
TYLER — The University of Oxford Somerville College Choir concert at Marvin Methodist Church in Tyler Tuesday night has been canceled. Due to the fire at Heathrow Airport last week, the group was not able to make their flight.
EAST TEXAS — Texas Governor Greg Abbott has appointed a new 62nd Judicial District court judge who will cover cases in Delta, Franklin, Hopkins and Lamar counties. According to our news partner KETK, William âBillâ Harris of Paris is the current County Court Judge for Lamar County and Abbott has selected him to fill the 62nd Judicial District court judge seat for a term that will last till Dec. 31, 2026.
LONGVIEW — CHRISTUS Health is hosting a hiring event in Longview on Thursday for healthcare professionals who want to start or further their career. According to CHRISTUS Health and our news partner KETK, the event will take place at 2005 Tolar Road inside El Sombrero from 4 p.m. to 6 p.m. for people to interact with hospital leaders. On-the-spot interviews will be conducted for opportunities to discover diverse career paths, along with food, refreshments and giveaways. Full-time and part-time schedules will be available for candidates ready to achieve their personal and professional goals.
LUFKIN — A former Lufkin ISD superintendent spoke against House Bill 3 during a House Committee meeting on Wednesday. According to our news partner KETK, Roy Knight, who was in the education industry for over 40 years, testified against HB 3 that would use state funds to pay for private schools, homeschooling and other educational services. The bill would also create more flexibility for parents to choose their childâs education.