Today is
Thursday June 04, 2026
MINERAL WELLS (AP) — Thunderstorms tore through parts of Texas on Tuesday, sending at least two people to the hospital as powerful winds ripped roofs off homes, flattened buildings and tossed debris through the air.
Multiple homes and businesses were damaged and families were displaced in Mineral Wells, a small city about 45 miles west of Fort Worth. Two people were taken to the hospital and others with minor injuries were treated at the scene, according to Ryan Dunn, the city’s fire chief. There were no immediate reports of fatalities or people missing.
Dunn warned people to stay out of an industrial area where there’s “major damage and major hazards that are all across the roads.”
The wild weather came just days after a tornado-producing thunderstorm left at least two people dead in northern Texas and displaced at least 20 families.
Tuesday’s thunderstorms, including at least one unconfirmed tornado, were caused by large storm cells that were drifting southeast from north-central Texas, said Brian Hurley, a meteorologist with National Weather Service.
The storms continued Tuesday night as they moved across Texas and into Arkansas and Mississippi, according to the National Weather Service. The storms could produce hail larger than 2 inches, damaging winds and some tornadoes, according to the agency.
In Mineral Wells, where the streets were left littered with fallen trees and other debris, the mayor declared a local state of disaster. The city also instituted a 10 p.m. curfew that will be lifted around daylight as authorities continue to assess the damage, said Tim Denison, the city’s police chief.
He said the curfew was to “make sure that we keep people out of the areas and also try to help these victims out, and keep their personal belongings safe.”
Officials directed anyone who needed help to the local high school, where the Red Cross was setting up.
Ventamatic, a fans and ventilation manufacturer in Mineral Wells, said its facilities would be closed Wednesday “due to severe damage and ongoing safety hazards — including downed power lines.” The company announced on its website that all of its employees had been evacuated before the storms and everyone was safe.
WOOD COUNTY — A grand jury indicted a Sulphur Springs teenager in March for allegedly shooting into a crowd at a Wood County property in November 2025. According to an arrest affidavit from the Wood County Sheriff’s Office and our news partner KETK, 19-year-old Drake White was arrested following an investigation of a mass shooting on Nov. 25, 2025.
Sheriff’s office deputies arrived at a residence off of N. State Highway 37 in Wood County following reports of a shooting. Witnesses told deputies that a fight over money and a gun began between the shooter, who they identified as White, and another individual.
The affidavit alleges that one victim tried to stop the fight by telling everyone on the property to leave, specifically White. Read the rest of this entry »
TYLER — Businesses and community members in the Downtown Tyler area are speaking out on how the city’s improvement project is affecting day-to-day operations. A project aimed at revitalizing downtown is now creating real challenges for some business owners in the heart of Tyler, according to our news partner KETK.
J. Witcher, general manager at Rick’s on the Square, says it’s been a months-long uphill battle getting customers through the door. “I would say the main complaint is parking; they just don’t know where to go,” Witcher said. “People just are faced with a variety of choices in Tyler; coming downtown right now poses different challenges.”
Witcher supports a better downtown, but right now, the cost is hitting hard as the restaurants and bars that have been open for more than 30 years are feeling the strain. Read the rest of this entry »
UPDATE: A 16-year-old was taken into custody and charged with unlawful carrying of a weapon and manslaughter in connection with the deadly shooting. The Polk County Sheriff’s Office says he may face additional charges and will remain in custody at the juvenile detention center.
POLK COUNTY — Three people were arrested on Sunday after a 20-year-old was fatally shot at an after-prom party in Polk County. According to the Polk County Sheriff’s Office and our news partner KETK, dispatchers received calls that 20-year-old Jeremy Lamar Bennett was shot at a location off of US Highway 146 in Polk County at around 1:07 a.m. on Sunday.
Deputies arrived at the scene and started to try and save Bennett’s life when a fight broke out in the crowd at the scene. This diverted efforts to try and save Bennett’s life as deputies tried to stop the fighting in the crowd.
EMS then arrived to take Bennett to a local hospital where he was later pronounced dead from his wounds. The sheriff’s office said investigators believe that Bennett was shot when an after-prom party grew into a larger party where alcohol, marijuana and firearms were involved.
According to a press release, the party eventually led to a fight in which gunfire hit Bennett, fatally injuring him. The following three men were arrested in connection to the party:
The sheriff’s office said that, Osvaldo Daniel Alvarez, 19, was arrested for deadly conduct after he told deputies that he invited the crowd to his home to continue the party. Gabriel Ramirez Jr., 21, was charged with deadly conduct for allegedly discharging a firearm and Jon R. Villarreal, 19, was arrested for unlawfully carrying a weapon.
“Sheriff Lyons and the Polk County Sheriff’s Office expressed their condolences to Jeremy’s family, stating that the loss of such a young life is heartbreaking and could have been prevented,” the sheriff’s office said. “He also urged the youth of Polk County to avoid situations involving large crowds, alcohol, drugs and weapons, emphasizing the importance of making safe choices and leaving potentially dangerous environments to return home safely.”
A search warrant was executed at the US Highway 146 property as part of an ongoing homicide investigation with the sheriff’s office and the Texas Rangers. During the search, officials recovered six firearms and undisclosed amounts of alcohol and drugs.
MEXICO CITY (AP) — Mexico’s government said Saturday that two U.S. federal agents recently killed in a car crash in the country’s northern region were not authorized to participate in operations in Mexico.
The role of the two CIA agents who were returning from destroying a clandestine drug lab in the northern Mexican state of Chihuahua remains unclear.
Local government officials have said they were part of a convoy when their car drove off a ravine last weekend and the vehicle exploded. Two Mexican officers also were killed.
The Americans killed were from the CIA, The Associated Press confirmed earlier this week with a U.S. official and two other people familiar with the matter who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive intelligence matters.
The CIA has declined to comment.
A statement from Mexico’s Ministry of Security said one U.S. agent entered Mexico as a visitor while the other entered with a diplomatic passport.
It also asserted that Mexico’s government was not aware of foreign agents operating or planning to participate in an operation on its soil.
The ministry said it is reviewing the case with local authorities and the U.S. Embassy in Mexico.
“Mexican law is clear: it does not permit the participation of foreign agents in operations within the national territory,” the ministry said in a statement.
It added: “The Government of Mexico reiterates its willingness to maintain a close, serious, and respectful relationship with the Government of the United States for the benefit of the security of both countries.”
Officials from both countries have offered contradictory accounts on the issue, with Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum admitting on Wednesday that federal forces were involved after Mexico’s government said it had no knowledge of any operation or U.S. involvement.
GATESVILLE (THE TEXAS TRIBUNE) – Every Thursday at 9 a.m. when the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals publishes its orders and opinions online, Melissa Lucio’s family, supporters and lawyers scan the court’s website for the death row inmate’s name.
Caught between freedom and a potential execution for the last two years, waiting for every Thursday morning is all Lucio and her team can do. The 56-year-old, found guilty in 2008 of killing her 2-year-old daughter, Mariah Alvarez, has spent two of her 17 years on death row in a legal limbo as the CCA weighs a district judge’s 2024 recommendation to overturn her capital murder conviction because of withheld evidence. An additional ruling from the judge six months later declared Lucio “actually innocent” of killing Mariah.
If the CCA, which stayed her execution in 2022, upholds the district judge’s recommendation and Lucio is freed, she would be the first woman on Texas’ death row to be exonerated. But because the court has no deadlines for rulings and does not communicate its progress, Lucio’s future remains just as clouded as ever, as she has no more legal recourse beyond waiting for the court’s decision.
A spokesperson for the CCA said the court does not comment on pending cases or disclose its internal procedures.
Despite the wait, Lucio said in a written response to The Texas Tribune through her lawyer that state District Judge Arturo Nelson’s 2024 rulings were a “tremendous relief,” and that her faith and the support of others have kept her resolute through the wait since.
“I am grateful to God who continues to give me the strength to keep my hopes up and has kept me going through this unimaginable ordeal,” Lucio said. “I am lucky to have a wonderful community of people who know I am innocent and have been fighting for my freedom, including my family, my legal team, my faith community, many Texas lawmakers, and so many others.”
One of Lucio’s 14 children, 36-year-old John Lucio, was 17 when his sister died and his mother was arrested, but has never believed his mother committed the crime she was convicted for. Having just left prison himself on a parole violation, he had hoped she would beat him to freedom. He said his mother talks with his wife on the phone almost every day and with him as much as she can, and that their conversations are often spirited and joyful despite the state of her case looming constantly.
“She’s just like, trigger-happy, dialing and dialing and dialing as much as she can until the time runs out,” John said.
Lucio has attempted several appeals during her time on death row, including a habeas corpus claim denied by the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals in 2021. Because her current appeal awaits a ruling from the CCA, the highest criminal court in Texas, any decisive ruling on her cases will be final at the state level and would not be directed to the state Supreme Court. All death penalty appeals go from district courts straight to the CCA. Texas and Oklahoma are the only states that have a separate appeals court for criminal cases.
“Functionally, it’s not that different from a state in which a district court would make a legal conclusion, and then that would be appealable to the highest state court,” said Jordan Steiker, director of the Capital Punishment Center at the University of Texas at Austin School of Law.
Steiker said the two years Lucio has waited for a ruling on the judge’s recommendation is “unusual, but not unprecedented” for a death penalty appeal. Eighteen men on death row have been exonerated in Texas since capital punishment was reinstated in 1982. Of those, at least three have been granted their release through a CCA acceptance of a district judge’s recommendation, according to available court records. The time spans between district judge recommendations and CCA rulings in those cases range from a year to upwards of a decade.
The remaining exonerees either had their convictions thrown out on immediate appeals or were granted relief by federal courts. Another woman on death row, Brittany Holberg, is currently waiting for the full panel of judges on the U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals to rule on whether it will maintain its initial decision to overturn her capital murder conviction. Holberg was convicted in 1998 of killing and robbing an 80-year-old man.
In Lucio’s case, Judge Nelson of Cameron County found in two separate recommendations in April and October of 2024 that county prosecutors in 2008 had suppressed evidence and used flawed scientific evidence and false testimony to secure her conviction. The first recommendation simply recommended her case be overturned; the second declared Lucio “actually innocent” of killing her daughter.
The withheld evidence, including interviews with Lucio’s other children, revealed that what had been framed as murder due to abuse was more likely an accidental death caused by Mariah falling down a flight of stairs days before she died. At least one of the children had seen the fall, and others confirmed her declining health in the following days.
Prosecutors during her trial also relied on a “confession” obtained from Lucio after several hours of interrogation by DPS officers and testimony from a Texas Ranger who asserted he could determine Lucio’s guilt based on her demeanor and body language in the interrogation room. The judge had barred expert testimony aimed at explaining why Lucio, a repeated domestic and sexual abuse victim, would confess falsely under pressure from male authority figures.
Lucio has already filed a motion to expedite in her case to ask the court to rule on the judge’s recommendation, but motions like it do not compel the court to work with any additional speed.
Steiker described the CCA’s decision-making process as a “black box,” but there are some elements known to contribute to added time for rulings. Judges must come to agreement on how to resolve cases, and then write opinions that require more time to review evidence in the case. Dissenting opinions from other judges can double that time as they come to their own conclusions.
“It’s very hard to guess from the outside exactly what’s taking the court so long, but I do think that the best guess is probably that there’s not unanimity about how the court should proceed,” Steiker said.
The strength of the material already available to judges and the public outcry over Lucio’s innocence has added to the pressure on the CCA, Steiker said. Lucio’s conviction has garnered international attention, including a documentary and the condemnation of more than half of the Texas House. Prior to the court granting a stay of Lucio’s execution in 2022, a bipartisan group of lawmakers urged the state parole board to consider Lucio’s innocence.
“I think it’s regrettable that in a case where there’s as powerful evidence as there is that this conviction is problematic, that the CCA hasn’t acted more expeditiously,” Steiker said.
John Lucio helps coordinate many of the decisions surrounding public action supporting his mother alongside advocacy group Death Penalty Action, and said the strength of her support has underscored her innocence even more.
“If this lady I knew I was going to put up a fight for was guilty of murdering my baby sister, I would have just let justice be served,” John Lucio said. “But I know that my mother is not guilty for killing my sister, Mariah, so I had to fight for her life.”
Vanessa Potkin, one of Lucio’s lawyers who works for the Innocence Project, said they are “very hopeful” the CCA will accept the judge’s recommendation and free Lucio. More than anything, John Lucio and his wife, Michelle, said they’re ready to take her into their home in Harlingen any day to live with them and their granddaughter.
Lucio said she looks forward to being reunited with her children and grandchildren if she is released.
“I can’t wait to cook for my family, it’s one of the first things I dream of doing,” she said.
AUSTIN (THE TEXAS TRIBUNE) – The Texas Supreme Court tossed temporary injunctions Friday that halted child abuse investigations against parents who allowed their transgender kids to access puberty blockers and hormone therapy, in large part because the state has closed such inquiries into three families who sued and a fourth child is now an adult.
The court’s ruling did not determine whether providing such healthcare to kids constitutes child abuse, as Attorney General Ken Paxton concluded in a nonbinding legal opinion in 2022. The legal battle seeking to shield parents from such state investigations began before Texas banned doctors outright from providing puberty blockers and hormone therapies to kids for gender transitioning.
There was no immediate comment from the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services.
Four families and the organization PFLAG, Inc. had won temporary injunctions stopping DFPS from investigating reports of trans minors using puberty blockers and hormone therapy. While the agency’s appeal of the temporary injunctions were pending, DFPS officials permanently closed its investigations and a fourth child has now reached their 18th birthday. As such, the Texas Supreme Court ruled, there was no need to keep the temporary injunctions in place.
“There exists no credible, nonspeculative threat that DFPS will investigate these plaintiffs in the future based on the use of medical treatments for gender transitioning, either because DFPS has already ruled out these families for such an investigation or because the children’s having reached the age of majority deprives DFPS of authority to investigate.”
The case began four years ago shortly after Gov. Greg Abbott notified DFPS that the attorney general’s office had issued an opinion that concluded it is “against the law to subject Texas children to a wide variety of elective procedures for gender transitioning.” The governor’s letter directed the agency “to conduct a prompt and thorough investigation of any reported instances of these abusive procedures” in Texas. As a result the agency announced it would follow the law.
A week later, parents of a then 16-year-old child diagnosed with gender dysphoria and a psychologist who treats such children sued the Governor, the DFPS Commissioner, and DFPS in Travis County. A few months after that, three more families brought a similar suit. A Travis County trial court ultimately issued three separate orders temporarily enjoining DFPS and its commissioner from investigating allegations regarding children’s use of drugs for the purpose of gender transitioning.
Three of the families had their cases closed with no further investigation or action. The fourth child, that former 16-year-old, is now an adult and the agency can no longer investigate their case.
DILLEY (THE TEXAS TRIBUNE) – A flight carrying an Egyptian family to Michigan late Saturday abruptly turned around after a Texas judge ruled that the six should remain in the U.S. pending further litigation.
The last-minute reversal was the most recent development in a dizzying series of events this week that attorneys said added to ongoing questions over the executive’s power compared to the judiciary when it comes to President Donald Trump’s purview of immigration and his administration’s push for expanded deportations.
A Texas federal judge Saturday ruled that the family, believed to be the longest held at the controversial South Texas Family Residential Center in Dilley, should not immediately be deported after immigration agents suddenly re-arrested the mother and her children hours earlier. A second order by a federal judge in Colorado was issued Saturday evening, reiterating that the family should not be deported.
The rulings came as the family was on a plane to Michigan, from where the government ostensibly planned to quickly deport them to Egypt, where their attorneys said the mother and her children fear persecution.
The plane, the attorney, Michigan-based Eric Lee, posted on X, “constitutionally cannot be allowed to take off.”
It would not have been the first time that Trump’s administration deported immigrants after federal judges ordered against their removal. Among the most well-known cases is that of Kilmar Abrego Garcia of El Salvador, who was living in Maryland before he was mistakenly sent to a notorious mega-prison in that Central American country last year despite an earlier U.S. court order barring Abrego Garcia’s deportation. His case spurred global criticism, although he has since returned to the U.S., as litigation in his case is ongoing.
“Stop this travesty of justice from taking place,” Lee, the Gamal family attorney, posted on X earlier Saturday, referring to the El Gamal family.
Lee added that the “attempt to remove the El Gamal family is in violation of a federal court order and must be halted immediately. The rights of the entire population and the most basic principles of separation of powers are at stake.”
U.S. District Court Judge Fred Biery in San Antonio ruled hours after the family’s re-detention Saturday that given the emergency appeal by lawyers, the family’s deportation to Egypt should be paused. Biery agreed with his own previous ruling as well as one by U.S. Magistrate Judge Elizabeth Chestney this week that the family, which includes 5-year-old twins who have been held at Dilley for more than 10 months, should be freed while they await an immigration judge’s decision on their asylum case.
The family received widespread attention after the mother and her children earlier this year began publicly raising alarms about the treatment at the facility, including medical neglect, rotting food, impotable water, and disrespect for their Muslim faith. Last week, lawyers said that the mother was rushed to the emergency room after months of suffering from an unidentified bump, which she feared may be cancerous due to her family history and possibly heightened by the lack of medical care at the detention center.
AUSTIN (THE TEXAS TRIBUNE) – The City of Austin on Friday announced it is updating Austin Police orders to clarify when officers should contact Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents about people they detain. It is the third city in Texas to revise its policy on local law enforcement’s cooperation with federal immigration authorities this week, amid massive funding threats from Gov. Greg Abbott.
On April 16, the governor’s office warned Austin and Dallas that millions in grants — including more than $55 million in World Cup public safety funding for Dallas — could be at risk if city police failed to change their general orders limiting officers’ coordination with ICE. Austin risked $2.5 million in grants for sexual assault evidence testing, victims assistance programming and other public safety initiatives.
A press release about the new orders states that officers should contact ICE “when operationally feasible” if a person detained by an officer is found to have an administrative warrant issued by ICE. The orders also direct Austin police to “not take an unreasonable amount of time assisting” with the warrants.
The new orders come a day after Austin received a deadline extension to update their rules, which placed restrictions on when and how an officer could contact ICE. It is unclear what exact language was changed, as Austin officials did not immediately provide the text of the new general orders for city police, but said they would be available online next week.
Austin Police Chief Lisa Davis said in a statement that the updated general orders allow the city to properly allocate resources to maintain public safety.
“My focus — and the focus of every Austin Police officer — remains on public safety and community policing,” Davis said.
Andrew Mahaleris, Abbott’s spokesperson, said in a statement that the governor’s office had lifted the funding hold and “expects full contract compliance moving forward.”
“Governor Abbott has been clear: cities in Texas must fully comply with state law and cooperate with federal immigration authorities to keep dangerous criminals off our streets,” Mahaleris said.
Dallas on Thursday removed its ban on police officers prolonging a person’s detention during encounters like traffic stops to hold them for Immigrations and Customs Enforcement agents. Dallas Police Chief Daniel Comeaux announced that the department had updated its general order to affirm that local officers will “cooperate with federal authorities when required” while still protecting the safety of all residents.
TYLER — Governor Greg Abbott helped dedicate a new Safe Haven Baby Box on Saturday at the CHRISTUS Mother Frances Hospital in Tyler. State Sen. Bryan Hughes and State Rep. Daniel Alders will also speak at the event as the new box becomes officially operational. According to our news partner KETK, Safe Haven Baby Boxes allow mothers in crisis to legally and anonymously drop off their baby in a safe and secure location. Thanks to Hughes’ Senate Bill 780, these boxes can now be installed at infant care hospitals like CHRISTUS Mother Frances Hospital.
“That is Texas, where we build an infrastructure of hope before you even know who will need it and then you pray, you pray that somebody will find it,” Abbott said.
The first Safe Haven Baby Box in East Texas was installed in 2024 at a fire station in Palestine. The dedication ceremony for the new Baby Box started at 3 p.m. on Saturday. Read the rest of this entry »
TYLER — The University of Texas at Tyler and UT System leadership hosted the grand opening Friday for the new School of Medicine Building, the physical home of East Texas’ first medical school. The five story facility brings education, clinical care and community services together in one place.
According to the university’s website, the five-story facility is LEED-certified, a globally recognized rating system for green buildings. The building includes 16 clinical skills rooms, a student lounge and four simulation labs. In addition to medical education, the building will provide clinical services by UT Health East Texas clinicians ranging from imaging and women’s health to pulmonary, orthopedic and sports medicine care as well as eight fully equipped surgical suites.
Construction on the $308 million nearly 250,000-square-foot building began in 2023. Read the rest of this entry »
BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) — Louisiana authorities said Friday they had charged a 17-year-old with murder and were searching for another suspect after bystanders were caught in the crossfire of a shooting at a mall in Baton Rouge that killed one teenage girl and injured five other people.
Baton Rouge Police Chief TJ Morse said the shooting Thursday at the Mall of Louisiana was not a random act and seemed to be driven by “social media beefs and maybe gang-related stuff,” adding that the investigation was ongoing.
“We know that this was two groups of people that met up at the mall, exchanged words and then pulled guns and innocent people were hit,” Morse said.
The chief spoke at a news conference alongside Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry, who vowed to crack down on gang violence in the capital city and said he had spoken with FBI Director Kash Patel. The Republican governor promised to use state, local and federal resources to address the issue and that consequences “are going to start being felt immediately.”
Landry said he was asking all levels and sectors of law enforcement to “prepare for a targeted warrant sweep” for anyone connected to the mall shooting. He said it would focus on the “neighborhoods that these individuals came out of” without naming specific parts of the city.
“We are not going to allow our streets, our schools and our public spaces to become your battleground,” Landry said. “Those who brought this violence into our public spaces and into the lives of our ordinary citizens, I want you to know you are now the criminal problem and we are focused on you.”
Shoppers and workers inside mall fled and hid for cover as shots rang out at in the food court. Morse said that two officers on duty at the mall ran toward the gunfire without hesitation and rendered aid. Their quick action helped save lives, he said.
Hundreds of police officers — some wearing tactical gear and carrying long riffles — descended on the mall.
Authorities say Martha Odom, a 17-year-old high school student from Lafayette, died in the shooting. Odom was visiting the mall with friends for her “senior skip day,” The Advocate reported. Two other high school students from Odom’s school, Ascension Episcopal School, were among the injured.
In a social media post by the school, Odom was described as “a joyful presence whose kindness and infectious enthusiasm brought light to all who knew her.”
Five people were initially taken into custody following the shooting but later released. A 17-year-old was arrested Friday after turning himself in, Morse said. The teen has been charged with first-degree murder, five counts of attempted first-degree murder and a count of illegal use of a weapon.
Under recently enacted Louisiana law, 17-year-olds are treated as adults in the state’s criminal justice system.
The deadly shooting is the second high-profile case of gun violence in Louisiana this week. A father fatally shot eight children, including seven of his own, in an attack on his family Sunday morning that stretched across two houses in a Shreveport neighborhood, police said. Two women, including the gunman’s wife who was the mother of their children, were critically wounded.
NEW YORK (AP) — It might be hard to imagine the Iran war weighing on stuffed toys with names like Snuggle Glove, Bizzikins and Wobblies, but even plush playthings are not immune when oil shipments from the Middle East are constrained.
Like many soft toys, the creatures developed by a manufacturer in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, are made with polyester and acrylic, synthetic fibers derived from petroleum. Three weeks after the war started, suppliers in China notified Aleni Brands that getting the materials already was costing them 10% to 15% more, CEO Ricardo Venegas said.
“I think this situation demonstrates how much oil permeates throughout our system, and we can’t get away from it,” said Venegas, who founded Aleni Brands last year and is in the process of adding product lines. “Who would have thought that the price of a toy would have a direct relationship with oil?”
It’s not just toys. Petrochemicals derived from oil and natural gas go into making more than 6,000 consumer products, according to the U.S. Department of Energy. Computer keyboards, lipstick, tennis rackets, pajamas, soft contact lenses, detergent, chewing gum, shoes, crayons, shaving cream, pillows, aspirin, dentures, tape, umbrellas and nylon guitar strings are just a few of them.
So far, the war’s most tangible and immediate effect for many people outside the conflict zone has been spiking gasoline prices. Travelers also are seeing higher airfares and flight fees as airlines respond to the rising cost of jet fuel. Consumers may find themselves paying more for food, furniture or any of the myriad of goods transported by trucks that run on diesel.
But crude oil isn’t just refined as fuel. It gets turned into chemicals, waxes, oils and other mixtures that appear in a vast array of everyday items, including most made with plastic and rubber. Petroleum derivatives also are used in a lot of packaging. With disruptions to global oil supplies now in their eighth week, higher production costs also could make things more expensive for shoppers, according to trade groups and some companies.
Venegas, a 30-year toy industry veteran, said he would absorb higher material costs for now but expects to increase prices for customers by early 2027, if the war goes on another three to six months.
While 85% of global oil consumption is in the form of fuel, the rest goes into a wide range of consumer products, according to Gernot Wagner, a climate economist at Columbia University’s School of Business.
Crude oil is mostly a complex mixture of hydrocarbons, which are compounds made of carbon and hydrogen atoms. Refineries and chemical plants separate and break them down to convert them into smaller chemical building blocks known as petrochemicals.
Six petrochemicals — ethylene, propylene, butylene, benzene, toluene and xylenes — are the major foundations of plastics and synthetic materials like nylon and polyesters, which manufacturers in turn use to design and deliver products. More from the Department of Energy: Automobile parts, ballpoint pens, curtains, dice, eyeglasses, fertilizer, golf balls, hearing aids, insect repellant, kayaks, luggage, mops and nail polish.
Materials account for a big share of production costs for many manufacturers, including those that supply carpets, clothing and tires, according to Andrew Walberer, partner and global lead in the chemicals practice of global strategy and management consultancy Kearney.
Take a button-down shirt, for example. Walberer estimated that materials account for 27%-30% of how much it costs a manufacturer to make one. Labor costs contribute 10% to 30%. Business expenses tied to marketing, distribution and administration comprises the rest, he said.
Experts say if oil holds above $90 per barrel for the next several months, cost pressures will accelerate throughout the supply network.
Footwear Distributors and Retailers of America CEO Matt Priest said most of the trade organization’s members keep a two- to three-month inventory of finished products, providing a temporary cushion against higher materials costs.
Roughly 70% of the materials in synthetic shoes are petrochemical-based, and 30% of the costs for those materials are directly tied to oil price rate swings, according to a report the organization published last month on the U.S. footwear industry’s “exposure to oil prices & the impact on shoe costs.”
The FDRA analysis estimated that between materials, factory energy and transportation, companies paying more for petroleum could translate into a 1.5% to 3% increase in the price shoppers pay for a pair of shoes by late summer and the fall.
By the end of April, U.S. shoe and clothing manufacturers need to start signing contracts with suppliers, mostly outside the U.S., for orders of polyester staple fiber and polyester filament yarn to get their designs on retail shelves and online for the holiday shopping season, according to Nate Herman, executive vice president of the American Apparel & Footwear Association.
One kilogram, or a little over two pounds, of the materials used in polyester textiles, has increased in price from an average of 90 cents before the U.S. and Israel attacked Iran to $1.33 per kilogram, Herman said. He estimated that each garment will cost 10 cents to 15 cents more to produce as a result.
Some businesses are looking for ways to offset rising costs.
Lisa Lane is the founder of Rinseroo, which sells portable shower head, bathtub and sink attachments for cleaning, pet grooming, and bathing. She recently tripled the number of the slip-on hoses she procures from China each month after her manufacturer said the cost would be 30% higher in another 30 days. She had a few days to decide whether to place a three-month advance order.
The components of Rinseroo’s products include petroleum derivatives like polyvinyl chloride, Lane said. After purchasing 240,000 units instead of her usual 80,000, she is also evaluating cost-cutting options.
Lane said she wants to hold off on increasing prices for retailers that sell the attachments since Rinseroo did that last year to offset higher U.S. tariffs on imports from China. For example, a hose for washing pets in a bathtub went up to $33.95 from $29.95 on retail websites, she said.
“We want to stay at that sweet spot where people want to continue to buy from us and feel like they’re getting a good value,” Lane said.
Another company, which sells wound care products like bandages, dressings, pads and sponges to nursing homes and other medical facilities, plans to raise its prices by 15% in a matter of weeks. Gentell CEO David Navazio noted that adhesives in the products rely on several petrochemicals.
Including energy for production and materials, Navazio estimated the company’s costs are going up by 20%.
Gentell, which is based in Yardley, Pennsylvania but has its main manufacturing location in Toronto, also makes private label products for other companies, including a medical technology firm that supplies retail stores like CVS.
Because bandages and dressings are necessities, Navazio said he doesn’t think his business will suffer if it raises customer prices. Less certain is whether prices will come down once the war ends and oil shipments stabilize.
“In the past, I’ve seen transportation costs come down, but I’ve never seen prices of raw material come down,” he said.
EL PASO (AP) – At the peak of the crackdown, carloads of masked immigration officers were a common sight in the streets of Minneapolis, while thousands of people were being arrested every week in Texas, Florida and California.
“Turn and burn,” top Border Patrol commander Gregory Bovino called the strategy, with relentless displays of force and teams of agents descending on restaurant kitchens, bus stops and Home Depot parking lots.
In December, arrests by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents peaked at nearly 40,000 nationwide and were nearly as high the next month, according to data provided to UC Berkeley’s Deportation Data Project and analyzed by The Associated Press.
In late January, the killings in Minneapolis of two American citizens by immigration officers and growing concerns over the government’s heavy-handed tactics led to a shake-up of top immigration officials. In the weeks that followed, ICE arrests across the country dropped on average by nearly 12%.
Polling has found the general public felt the immigration enforcement operation in Minnesota went too far, a factor that may have contributed to the abrupt firing of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem in early March.
Bovino, who swaggered through raid scenes in tactical gear and was the public face of the Trump administration crackdown, was pushed aside following the killings in Minneapolis of Renee Good and Alex Pretti. Border czar Tom Homan was then sent to the Twin Cities to chart a new course for immigration enforcement, and he announced the drawdown of immigration agents in the state on Feb. 4.
An AP analysis of ICE arrest records show the department averaged 7,369 weekly arrests nationwide in the five weeks after Homan’s drawdown announcement, , the most recent period for which data is available, down from 8,347 per week in the previous five weeks. Those arrest numbers were still higher on average than during much of the first year of President Donald Trump’s second term, and were dramatically higher than during the Biden administration.
The numbers were not, however, uniform across the country.
ICE arrests rose significantly in Kentucky, Indiana, North Carolina and Florida during those five weeks, in some cases hitting their highest weekly count since the start of Trump’s second term.. In Kentucky alone, weekly arrests more than doubled, reaching 86 by early March.
Those increases were offset by steep drops in a handful of large states, including Minnesota and Texas.
The Trump administration insists it is targeting the most vicious criminals living illegally in the U.S., and the president has referred to them as “the worst of the worst.”
In some cases the description is accurate, but the reality is complicated.
Many of the toughest criminals taken into ICE custody were already in prison, but many others who were arrested have no criminal history.
Nationally, some 46% of the people ICE arrested in the five weeks before Feb. 4 had no criminal charges or convictions, dropping to 41% in the five weeks that followed.
Yet that’s still above the 35% weekly average for the time since Trump returned to office. And in a number of states, even after Feb. 4, the share of noncriminals being arrested went up, not down.
Across the country, thousands of federal court filings offer an imperfect window into how the Trump administration’s deportation tactics remain in high gear, even if activity has waned.
Like the 21-year-old Honduran man with no criminal record who has filed a petition for release after being arrested Feb. 22 in a suburban San Diego traffic stop. The father of three U.S. citizen children — ages 5, 3 and 10 months — had been under ICE surveillance, the petition says, before officers in tactical gear pulled him over.
Or the 33-year-old Venezuelan woman, a well-known South Texas doctor who worked in a region designated as medically underserved, who was arrested earlier this month with her five-year-old daughter, a U.S. citizen, on her way to her husband’s asylum hearing.
She was arrested, officials said, for overstaying her visa.
Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, a senior fellow with the research and advocacy group the American Immigration Council, says he sees signs of change in lower arrest and detention numbers but warns it’s too early to know if those shifts are permanent.
“The Trump administration says: ‘We’re not slowing down,’ ‘Nothing has changed,’” in immigration enforcement, he said. “But it’s very clear that they have pulled back from some of the tactics of Operation Metro Surge,” the crackdown that swept Minneapolis.
TEXARKANA, Texas (AP) — A long-distance runner for Texas A&M-Texarkana died after collapsing during a competition in New Orleans, the university said Saturday.
Graycen Vargo of Dallas suffered a medical emergency and collapsed Friday evening at the Red River Athletic Conference track and field championships hosted by Xavier. He was given on-site medical attention before being taken to a hospital, where he died, Texas A&M-Texarkana said in a news release.
Vargo was a junior computer science major competing in his first year with the Eagles after previously competing at Jacksonville College.
“Our thoughts are with Graycen’s family, teammates, and friends as they deal with this unimaginable loss,” said Ross Alexander, A&M-Texarkana’s president. “Graycen was a respected member of the student body and a beloved member of the Cross Country and Track and Field Teams. His presence will be greatly missed by the entire university community.”
The school said counseling services would be available to students.