(LONDON) -- Israel's renewed military operation in the Gaza Strip "is expanding to crush and cleanse the area of ??terrorists and terrorist infrastructure and seize large areas that will be annexed to the security zones of the state of Israel," Defense Minister Israel Katz said in a statement on Wednesday.
The minister said that a "large-scale evacuation of the Gazan population from the fighting areas" is accompanying the expanded military campaign in the strip.
"I call on the residents of Gaza to act now to eliminate Hamas and return all the kidnapped," Katz added. "This is the only way to end the war."
Israel renewed its assault on neighboring Gaza in March after a pause of nearly two months, during which time 33 Israeli hostages were released by Hamas in exchange for some 1,800 Palestinian prisoners, according to The Associated Press.
Israel is demanding the immediate release of all remaining hostages -- consisting of 59 people, 24 of whom are still believed to be alive -- who were abducted to Gaza during the Hamas-led surprise attack on southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a statement that he ordered renewed strikes after Hamas refused Israeli demands to free half of the remaining hostages as a precondition for extending the ceasefire, the first phase of which expired on March 1. The bombardment resumed with "full force," the prime minister said on March 18, adding that further negotiations "will continue only under fire."
Israel's renewed operations in Gaza sparked condemnation from regional powers including Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Jordan. Israeli government spokesman David Mencer said the resumption was "fully coordinated with Washington."
Israeli leaders have consistently expressed their intention to fully destroy Hamas and remove the Palestinian militant group from power in Gaza. Israel intends to retain security control over the territory as part of any post-war settlement, Netanyahu, Katz and other top officials have said.
Katz last month also announced the creation of a new directorate within the Israeli Ministry of Defense to facilitate the "voluntary emigration" out of strip. The directorate's work aligns with U.S. President Donald Trump's suggestion that Palestinians be resettled outside of Gaza, Katz said in February.
Palestinian, United Nations and human rights organizations have suggested that the U.S.-Israeli resettlement policy is akin to "ethnic cleansing." Israel has denied such allegations.
Gaza has been devastated by the war that was sparked by the Oct. 7 terror attack, in which some 1,200 people were killed in Israel, according to the Israeli government.
Israel's subsequent operations in Gaza have killed more than 50,300 people and injured more than 114,000, according to Gaza’s Hamas-run Ministry of Health. More than 1,000 people have been killed since the resumption of Israeli strikes on March 18, the ministry said.
ABC News' Morgan Winsor contributed to this report
Maiker Escalona was a barber in Venezuela. (Raida)
(NEW YORK) -- Over the last month, the Trump administration has sent over 200 alleged Venezuelan gang members to El Salvador to be detained in a notorious mega-prison with a track record of human rights abuses.
An official with the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has acknowledged that "many" of the men lack criminal records in the United States -- but said that "the lack of specific information about each individual actually highlights the risk they pose" and "demonstrates that they are terrorists with regard to whom we lack a complete profile."
The families of some of the men -- who learned about their whereabouts by seeing them in promotional videos shared by the El Salvadoran and United States governments -- have denied any gang affiliation in court filings and shared their stories with ABC News. They said that they fear for the safety of their loved ones and do not know if they will ever return.
Maiker Espinoza Escalona - Deported to El Salvador under Title 8 on March 30
Escalona was detained by U.S. authorities last year when he tried to enter the United States to seek asylum with his partner Yorely Bernal Inciarte and their one-year old baby.
The family was immediately separated, with Escalona sent to a detention center in El Paso, Texas.
On Sunday, Escalona was deported to El Salvador under Title 8, with authorities alleging he was a member of Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua -- an accusation his family denies.
"They are liars," said Raida, Inciarte's mother, of the Trump administration. "I cannot believe that half of Venezuela is Tren de Aragua. That can't be."
According to Escalona's sister, he entered the United States to pursue a career as a barber and does not have a criminal record in Venezuela. She suspects he and his wife were detained based on their tattoos.
"He finished high school, he took courses in barbering and set up his barbershop in Venezuela. But things got a bit tough in Venezuela, so he emigrated to have a better life," she said.
Jose Franco Caraballo Tiapa - Deported to El Salvador on March 15
Tiapa, a 26-year-old Venezuelan migrant who was seeking asylum in the U.S., was detained by immigration officials during a routine ICE check-in last month.
His wife Ivannoa Sanchez told ABC News she believes her husband is one of the hundreds of Venezuelan men who earlier this month was sent by plane to El Salvador under the Alien Enemies Act.
According to Sanchez, the couple crossed the U.S. border in November 2023 and surrendered to authorities. After claiming asylum and being detained for a few days, ICE released them and ordered them to check in routinely with the federal agency.
Sanchez said the couple had gone to several of their scheduled check-ins without experiencing any issues. But on Feb. 3, Tiapa was not allowed to return home with his wife despite being scheduled to have his first court appearance in his asylum case in March.
Sanchez provided ABC News with documents that confirmed Tiapa's scheduled appointment with an immigration judge on March 19. She also provided ABC News with documents that show Tiapa does not have a criminal record in Venezuela.
"He went to his routine ICE appointment and he didn't come out," Sanchez told ABC News.
Sanchez said that after being detained in Dallas, her husband was transferred to a detention center in Laredo, Texas, where she was able to speak with him regularly. In mid-March, she said her husband told her that he believed he was going to be transferred and possibly deported, and she now believes he is detained in El Salvador's notorious CECOT prison.
"He has never done anything, not even a fine, absolutely nothing," Sanchez said of her husband. "We chose this country because it offers more security, more freedom, more peace of mind. But we didn't know it would turn into chaos."
Francisco Garcia Casique - Deported to El Salvador on March 15
Garcia Casique was detained by immigration authorities last month after going to an ICE office for a routine appointment, his brother told ABC News.
Garcia Casique originally entered the United States in December 2023 and surrendered to authorities, according to his brother Sebastian. After appearing before an immigration judge, Garcia Casique was released with an ankle monitor. A review of federal court records found no criminal court cases associated with Garcia Casique.
According to his brother, Garcia Casique was a professional barber who aspired to start a career in the United States.
"[He] was hoping for a better future to help us, help all the family members, and look at the situation now," his brother said.
Earlier this month, Garcia Casique called his family from the detention center in Texas where he was being held to let them know that he believed he was being deported to Venezuela. A few days later, his family recognized his brother in a photo posted on social media by the White House.
"It's a nightmare," his brother told ABC News.
Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia - Deported to El Salvador on March 15 due to 'administrative error'
Abrego Garcia -- a Salvadoran national who has two U.S. family members and protected legal status -- was sent to El Salvador's notorious CECOT prison due to an "administrative error," according to a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement official.
Abrego Garcia entered the United States in 2011 when he was 16 to escape gang violence in El Salvador, according to his lawyers. He received a form of protected legal status in 2019, married a U.S. citizen, and has a 5-year-old child.
Earlier this month, he was detained by ICE officials who informed him that his immigration status had changed, sending him to a detention center in Texas before being removing him to El Salvador on Mar. 15.
While the Trump administration has argued that Abrego Garcia is a MS-13 member who is a "danger to the community," his attorneys said that he "is not a member of" and "has no affiliation with Tren de Aragua, MS-13, or any other criminal or street gang," and that the U.S. government "has never produced an iota of evidence to support this unfounded accusation."
Jerce Reyes Barrios - Deported to El Salvador on March 15
Reyes Barrios was a professional soccer player in Venezuela who crossed the U.S.-Mexico border legally in 2024 after being detained and tortured by the Maduro regime, according to his attorney Linette Tobin.
He was immediately detained after authorities accused him of being a member of TdA based on what they said was a gang-affiliated tattoo, and they claimed a photo showed him throwing up gang signs. However, the tattoo in question was an homage to the Real Madrid soccer team logo adorned with a rosary and the word "Dios" meaning God, according to the artist who did the piece.
Barrios did not have a criminal record in Venezuela, according to government records reviewed by ABC News, and he worked as a professional soccer player and children's soccer coach.
"He collaborates with the schools to teach children his techniques. A lot of children admire him because he's a goalie," his family member Ayari del Carmen Pedroza Guerrero said in an interview with ABC News.
Border czar Tom Homan defended Barrios' removal when pressed about the lack of evidence regarding his alleged gang affiliation by ABC's Jonathan Karl.
"We got to count on the men and women who do this every day for a living, who designated these people as a members of TdA, through, like I said, various law enforcement methods," Homan said. "This will be litigated."
(WASHINGTON) -- As Democrats continue to express frustrations over Elon Musk's outsized role in reshaping the federal bureaucracy, a new effort on Capitol Hill takes aim at the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) while proposing guardrails to reassert congressional oversight authority over the executive branch.
California Democratic Rep. Sydney Kamlager-Dove is proposing the Defending American Diplomacy Act, which would prohibit the executive branch from reorganizing the State Department without Congressional consultation and approval.
"They are gutting foreign assistance, and I'm not going to be complicit in that," Kamlager-Dove, who sits on the Foreign Affairs Committee, told ABC News in an exclusive interview ahead of the bill's release Wednesday. "It is unfortunate that they are crushing USAID -- What that means is American farmers are not going to have contracts that they would normally have to produce crops to sell them to other countries. By crushing foreign assistance, it also means that people in other spaces are going to get sick."
The measure, which has more than 20 Democratic original cosponsors, requires any major reorganization of the State Department to be passed into law by an act of Congress and calls for the secretary of state to submit a detailed plan to Congress about the administration's intended reorganization and an assessment of any impacts to the U.S. diplomatic toolbox.
"We have three pillars: defense, development and diplomacy," Kamlager-Dove said. "All of those things are very important when you are trying to stop us from going into war. And if we are going to get rid of those tools in our toolbox because of some dodgy thing called DOGE that is using taxpayer dollars to actually hurt taxpayers, I feel like I have a responsibility to step up and say no."
The bill has consequences for noncompliance built into the legislative text, directing Congress to cut funding for DOGE and even prohibit travel for President Donald Trump's political appointees, including every member of his cabinet, if the administration initiates a reorganization that circumvents Congress.
"DOGE has been operating in the shadows," Kamlager-Dove said. "So part of the noncompliance elements of the bill is about bringing in a little sunlight so that we have a sense about what is actually going on."
While the administration has signaled that some eliminated jobs could be potentially absorbed by other federal agencies, the bill also prohibits that from happening without Congressional say-so.
Kamlager-Dove explained that her gripe with DOGE "is not about efficiencies."
"It is about unlawfully accessing our systems and our codes and stealing taxpayer dollars and doing things in the shadows," the representative said.
"The American people deserve to know what is happening, and if what DOGE is doing is so great, then I would think they would be more than willing to come to Congress and share with us and the American people all that they are doing," she added. "But the reality is they are not willing to share that information."
With narrow Republican majorities in both chambers and a Trump White House -- there is virtually no chance the bill becomes law in this session of Congress. But at a minimum, it gives Democrats who are powerless on the legislative front another messaging tool to campaign alongside their hopes to seize congressional majorities.
Still, Kamlager-Dove argues the measure is more than a messaging bill.
"There is a lot of dysfunction with this Republican Congress right now, and the reason why we probably won't have this come up for a vote is because Republicans are too afraid of the bill. If it does come up for a vote, then they would have to put their cards on the table," Kamlager-Dove said. "They would have to say, I recognize that Congress is being complicit in self-neutering itself and yielding all of its power to Donald Trump."
Despite the long odds, Kamlager-Dove maintains optimism that her bill won't be lost among thousands of other bills as Democrats toil in the minority.
"My hope is that having this bill, having other bills like this, talking about these issues in committee, will rattle their brains and clear out the hypnotic fog that they're in," she said. "If you continue to beat the drum, you do make headway, and that's what this bill is about: Beating the drum."
(WASHINGTON) -- Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., is launching a "Save Our Schools" campaign on Wednesday against President Donald Trump and Education Secretary Linda McMahon's attempt to dismantle the Department of Education.
"The federal government has invested in our public schools," Warren said in an exclusive interview with ABC News. "Taking that away from our kids so that a handful of billionaires can be even richer is just plain ugly, and I will fight it with everything I've got."
Warren suggested she is working with students, teachers, parents and unions to "sound the alarm" nationwide.
"My starting point with this campaign is that I know the power of telling stories and the power it brings to organize people into the fight. We need numbers to win, and this is how we start," Warren said.
In a short video obtained by ABC News that Warren is posting to her roughly 20 million social media followers Wednesday morning, Warren says she is launching an investigation into reported plans to replace Department of Education call centers with chatbots. ABC News has not independently confirmed these reports.
Warren said that through a combination of federal investigations, oversight, storytelling and even lawsuits, she will work with the community, including lawmakers in Congress, to do everything she can to defend public education. Warren did not provide further details on how she plans to challenge the administration through federal oversight and lawsuits.
A former special education teacher, Warren said she opposes the Trump administration's agency overhaul because she said it may result in fired teachers and increased class sizes, adding that programs for students with special needs will "disappear." However, the Trump administration has vowed to keep statutory funding, such as the programs for students with special needs.
Trump said those services for students with disabilities, such as those protected by the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, will be rehomed in other departments, including the Department of Health and Human Services, which is undergoing massive layoffs itself.
"They think that the American people are stupid [and] will be fooled by slapping a different title on the door and that somehow our kids will get the help that they're entitled to," Warren told ABC News.
"No one is fooled and certainly not the kids who need that help," she added.
The Trump administration has said it is returning education to the states in dismantling the federal department and that students will be better served by their state departments.
The campaign is also personal for Warren. In the video obtained by ABC News, Warren said she has seen with her own eyes what the Department of Education does for special needs families and that she is doing everything she can to "fight back."
Warren said she was inspired by her second grade teacher to join the education ranks.
"Whenever someone asked about my future, I would stand a little taller and say: 'I'm going to be a teacher,'" Warren recalled. "It guided my entire life."
Last month, Trump signed an executive order that aims to gut the Department of Education. It directs McMahon to close the department using all necessary steps permitted under the law. Still, eliminating the department would require an act from Congress because it was created by Congress.
The campaign comes in the wake of the department cutting nearly half its workforce last month. Hundreds of employees in the Federal Student Aid Office were let go, which Warren said could have "dire consequences" on the tens of millions of student loan borrowers who rely on the department's $1.6 trillion student loan portfolio to achieve higher education. Trump has said student loans will now be handled by the Small Business Administration.
"The Department of Education (ED) appears to be abandoning the millions of parents, students, and borrowers who rely on a functioning federal student aid system to lower education costs," Warren and a group of Democratic senators wrote in a letter urging McMahon to reinstate the fired federal employees.
The FSA's operations have already been affected, according to a source familiar. The federal student loan website was down briefly less than 24 hours after the agency cuts. Fired IT employees were called frantically to join an hourslong troubleshooting call to restore the website for millions of borrowers, according to the source.
As part of Warren's campaign launch, the senator said she will also highlight the real-world impact on educators, students and families through a series of story collections. She said she is encouraging community members to share submissions on how public education has influenced their lives and what it means to them. Warren told ABC News she did a similar campaign with federal employees at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau earlier this year.
However, Warren's investigations and federal oversight could be hampered by Democrats' position in Washington.
"Democrats are in the minority in the House and the Senate, and obviously we don't have the White House, but not having as much power as we want does not mean having no power," Warren told ABC News. "We've still got a lot we can do, and this combination of investigations, oversight, storytelling and lawsuits is that we can combine more power and push back hard, and it's already yielded some results."
Meanwhile, the administration's quest to abolish the department has already triggered a legal battle by a coalition of states and education and civil rights groups, including ??a group of teachers unions and public school districts in Warren's home state of Massachusetts.
The senator said she is hopeful every person who cares about education joins her campaign.
"We've got to fight for an America where it's not just the kids of billionaires who get a good education but it's every kid in every community who gets a great education," she said. "This fight is our fight."
President Donald Trump on Wednesday unveiled a long-promised, sweeping set of baseline tariffs on all countries and what he described as "kind reciprocal" tariffs on nations he claimed were the worst offenders in trade relations with the U.S.
"My fellow Americans, this is Liberation Day," Trump said from the White House Rose Garden, claiming the action will free the U.S. from dependence on foreign goods.
"April 2, 2025, will forever be remembered as the day American industry was reborn, the day America's destiny was reclaimed and the day that we began to make America wealthy again," he said.
The new measures -- which Trump described as "historic" -- include a minimum baseline tariff of 10% and further, more targeted levies on certain countries like China, the European Union and Taiwan.
"We will charge them approximately half of what they are and have been charging us," he said, adding, "because we are being very kind."
"This is not full reciprocal. This is kind reciprocal," he said.
Trump held up a chart with a list of nations and what the new U.S. tariffs against them will be. At the top was China, which Trump said was set to be hit with a 34% tariff rate as he claimed it charged the United States 67%.
The 10% baseline tariff rate goes into effect on April 5, according to senior White House officials. The "kind reciprocal" tariffs go into effect April 9 at 12:01 a.m., officials said, and will impact roughly 60 countries.
Trump described trade deficits as a "national emergency" and that his actions will usher in what he called "the golden age of America."
"In short, chronic trade deficits are no longer merely an economic problem. They're a national emergency that threatens our security and our very way of life. It's a very great threat to our country," he said.
Wednesday's tariff announcement is a moment months in the making for the president, but one that comes with significant political and economic risk.
Some experts warn his moves could cause the economy to slide into a recession and markets seesawed ahead of Wednesday's announcement, after weeks of turmoil as Trump's tariff policy shifted and took shape.
The White House had been mum on details ahead of Wednesday's event. One senior administration official said the situation was "still very fluid" after meetings on Wednesday morning and that Trump and his top advisers were trying to find some common ground where they agreed.
Some options debated in recent weeks, ABC News Senior White House Correspondent Selina Wang reported, were a 20% flat tariff rate on all imports; different tariff levels for each country based on their levies on U.S. products; or tariffs on about 15% of countries with the largest trade imbalances with the U.S.
Wednesday's tariffs build onto levies already imposed by the administration, including on steel and aluminum as well as certain goods from China, Canada and Mexico.
The actions have strained relations with Canada and Mexico, two key allies and neighbors. Prime Minister Mark Carney said last week the U.S. and Canada's deep relationship on economic, security and military issues was effectively over.
Canada has vowed retaliatory tariffs and Mexico said it will give its response later this week. The European Union, too, said it has a "strong plan to retaliate."
But Trump and administration officials are plowing full steam ahead, arguing America's been unfairly "ripped off" by other nations for years and it's time for reciprocity.
"For decades, our country has been looted, pillaged, raped and plundered by nations near and far, both friend and foe alike," Trump said on Wednesday.
The economy was the top issue for voters in the 2024 presidential election, with Americans casting blame on President Joe Biden for high prices and Trump promising to bring families financial relief.
The administration has painted tariffs as a panacea for the economy writ large, arguing any pain experienced in the short term will be offset by what they predict will be major boosts in manufacturing, job growth and government revenue.
"Jobs and factories will come roaring back into our country, and you see it happening already. We will supercharge our domestic industrial base," Trump said. "We will pry open foreign markets and break down foreign trade barriers. And ultimately, more production at home will mean stronger competition and lower prices for consumers."
But economists say it will be American consumers who bear the brunt of higher costs to start.
It's unclear how much leeway the public is willing to give Trump to get past what he in the past called "a little disturbance."
Already, little more than two months into his second term, polls show his handling of the economy is being met with pushback.
An Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research survey published on Monday found a majority of Americans (58%) disapprove of how Trump has been handling the economy.
On his protectionist trade negotiations with other nations, specifically, 60% of Americans said they disapproved of his approach so far. It was his weakest issue in the poll among Republicans.
Trump's GOP allies on Capitol Hill have said they're placing trust in the president, but acknowledged there will be some uncertainty to start.
"It may be rocky in the beginning but I think this will make sense for Americans and it will help all Americans," House Speaker Mike Johnson said at his weekly press conference on Tuesday alongside other members of Republican leadership.
Democrats, meanwhile, pledged to fight the tariffs "tooth and nail" and were trying to force a vote aimed at curtailing his authorities to impose levies on Canada.
"Trump's done a lot of bad things. This is way up there," Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said earlier on Wednesday.
ABC News' Mary Bruce, Katherine Faulders and Fritz Farrow contributed to this report.
(WASHINGTON) -- The battle over taxpayer funding for Planned Parenthood takes center stage at the U.S. Supreme Court on Wednesday in a dispute over South Carolina's exclusion of the group from the state Medicaid program because it provides abortions.
On the line is the ability of Medicaid beneficiaries to freely choose a healthcare provider, including physicians at Planned Parenthood who provide services other than abortion, like contraception treatments and cancer screenings.
South Carolina's two Planned Parenthood clinics have served mostly low-income, minority women for more than 40 years. Hundreds of their patients are Medicaid recipients.
The case also implicates the millions of federal dollars Planned Parenthood receives in the form of reimbursements for treating Medicaid patients each year.
According to Planned Parenthood, 34% of its overall revenue, or $699 million, comes from government grants, contracts, and Medicaid funds.
In 2018, South Carolina's Republican governor Henry McMaster issued executive orders disqualifying Planned Parenthood from receiving Medicaid reimbursements for non-abortion services.
Julie Edwards, a Medicaid beneficiary and type-1 diabetic who sought medical care at a Planned Parenthood clinic in Columbia, SC, sued the state alleging a violation of the Medicaid Act, which guarantees a "free choice of provider" that is willing and qualified.
"Medicaid beneficiaries often face significant barriers to obtaining care, particularly in South Carolina. Twenty-five percent of state residents live in medically underserved areas," the plaintiffs wrote in their brief to the high court.
"[Congress] enacted the free-choice-of-provider provision to ensure that Medicaid patients, like everyone else, can choose their own doctor," they wrote. "Congress specifically enacted this provision in response to some States' efforts to restrict Medicaid patients' choice of provider."
The state argues that Congress never intended to give individuals the right to sue over access to a particular provider and that there are plenty of other clinics available to serve Medicaid recipients.
"Congress wanted states to have substantial discretion to innovate with their Medicaid programs," the state wrote in its brief to the high court. Allowing individuals to sue over access to specific providers would "subject the state to unanticipated (and expensive) lawsuits."
While federal law already prohibits any government funding of abortions, South Carolina contends it has the right to target non-abortion funding to abortion providers. "Because money is fungible, giving Medicaid dollars to abortion facilities frees up their other funds to provide more abortions," the state told the court.
"[Planned Parenthood] can restore Medicaid funding if it stops performing abortions— but it has chosen not to do so," South Carolina wrote.
If the justices allow the suit to go forward, Edwards and Planned Parenthood can continue to challenge the clinics' exclusion from the state's Medicaid program in a lower court.
If the justices side with the state, they would bolster efforts to cut off Planned Parenthood from sources of government funding and effectively limit the number of providers available to Medicaid recipients.
A decision in the case is expected by the end of the Court's term in June.
(WASHINGTON) -- Nearly 2,000 scientists, engineers and researchers penned an open letter this week to President Donald Trump's administration, calling for a stop to its "assault" on science.
The letter was signed by elected members of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine, a congressional chartered organization that provides independent analysis and helps inform public policy decisions.
The group made clear the signatories are expressing their own views and not those of the National Academies or their home institutions.
"We are speaking out as individuals. We see real danger in this moment," the letter said, in part. "We hold diverse political beliefs, but we are united as researchers in wanting to protect independent scientific inquiry. We are sending this SOS to sound a clear warning: the nation's scientific enterprise is being decimated."
"We call on the administration to cease its wholesale assault on U.S. science, and we urge the public to join this call," the letter continued.
The group called out the Trump administration for actions including the ending funding for research, firing scientists and removing public access to data.
Recently, several active research grants related to studies involving LGBTQ+ issues, as well as gender identity and diversity, equity and inclusion, were canceled at the National Institutes of Health. According to termination letters sent to researchers at various universities that were reviewed by ABC News, the projects were canceled because they did not serve the "priorities" of the current administration.
Additionally, earlier this year staff were laid off across the Department of Health and Human Services as part of Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency effort to shrink the size of the federal government.
Earlier this month, HHS also appeared to have taken down a webpage from the Office of the Surgeon General that included an advisory on gun violence. In a statement to ABC News, the HHS said that the department "and the Office of the Surgeon General are complying with President Trump's Executive Order on Protecting Second Amendment Rights."
The White House did not immediately respond to ABC News' request for comment on the letter.
"If our country's research enterprise is dismantled, we will lose our scientific edge," the letter goes on. "Other countries will lead the development of novel disease treatments, clean energy sources, and the new technologies of the future. Their populations will be healthier, and their economies will surpass us in business, defense, intelligence gathering, and monitoring our planet's health. The damage to our nation's scientific enterprise could take decades to reverse."
The letter comes as layoffs begin at HHS, including at the National Institutes of Health, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and the Food and Drug Administration.
Up to 10,000 people are expected to lose their jobs in this round of layoffs, an amount that could significantly alter the department's roles and abilities. That's in addition to the nearly 10,000 who have already left the agency in the last few months through buyout offers or early retirements.
ABC News' Hannah Demissie, Cheyenne Haslett and Etic Strauss contributed to this report.
(WASHINGTON) -- After creating history by smashing the record for the longest Senate speech in history, Sen. Cory Booker told reporters as he walked off the floor that he was achy and tired, but grateful for his time.
"I didn't know how long I could go. I'm so grateful I lasted for 25 hours," Booker said.
Without taking a seat for the entirety of his speech, dehydration, the New Jersey senator said, had its pros and cons.
Booker sidestepped a question of whether he had any sort of device or diaper on to help him with bathroom demands.
However, he did say he didn’t need to use the restroom for the entirety of the 25 hours because of an incredibly rigorous fasting routine.
“My strategy was to stop eating. I think I stopped eating on Friday, and then to stop drinking the night before I started on Monday. And that had its benefits and it had its really downsides," he said.
"The biggest thing I was fighting was that different muscles were starting to really cramp up, and every once a while, spasm or something.”
Booker's speech, which began Monday evening, continued for a total of 25 hours and 4 minutes, surpassing the previous record set by Sen. Strom Thurmond, who filibustered the Civil Rights Act of 1957 for 24 hours and 18 minutes.
Booker was "very aware" of Thurmond's record going into the speech.
"I was very aware of Strom Thurmond’s records since I got to the Senate. I always felt that it was a strange shadow to hang over this institution,” Booker told reporters.
“The mission was really to elevate voices of Americans to tell some of their really meaningful stories, very emotional stories, and to let go and let god." To prepare, Booker said he tried to make himself as light as possible, and took everything out of his pockets except for a notecard with a handwritten Bible verse on it: Isaiah 40:31. "But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles, they shall run and not be weary, and they shall walk and not faint," Booker read.
He relied on his faith, he said, at one point praying with Reverend Sen. Raphael Warnock ahead of the speech.
For the entirety of his marathon talk-a-thon, Booker occupied the small square of space surrounding his desk.
(DALLAS, TEXAS) -- A woman and a teenager drowned during an alleged smuggling attempt after the driver of their vehicle drove into a canal while fleeing authorities following major flooding in Texas, authorities said.
Now, two men face federal charges in connection with their deaths, the Department of Justice announced on Tuesday.
The DOJ said the incident occurred Friday morning in McAllen, which saw record rain bring severe flooding last week.
U.S. Border Patrol agents conducting surveillance spotted a white Ford F-150 that had "previously identified as being involved in alien smuggling," according to the federal complaint. The agents surveilled the vehicle and saw a "body swap of suspected illegal aliens" with a black Ford Explorer, according to the complaint.
Agents followed the Ford Explorer and approached the vehicle after it stopped at a low spot in a flooded road, according to the complaint.
The driver of the Ford Explorer -- identified by the DOJ as Jose Alexis Baeza-Combaluzier, a 26-year-old Mexican national -- then fled and drove through the flooded area, according to the complaint.
The agents found the vehicle approximately half a mile away in a nearby canal, according to the complaint. The agents jumped into the canal and were able to rescue Baeza-Combaluzier and four migrants, including an undocumented Guatemalan and her 13-year-old son, according to the complaint.
Two other occupants of the vehicle drowned, the DOJ said. The rescued mother's 14-year-old son was found in the recovered vehicle, and the body of another woman was recovered from the canal, according to the complaint.
Baeza-Combaluzier and the alleged driver of the white Ford F-150 -- Vicente Garcia Jr., 18, of Roma, Texas -- have been charged in the smuggling deaths, the Justice Department said.
Baeza-Combaluzier was denied bail during a court appearance on Monday and is scheduled to have a preliminary hearing on Wednesday, court records show. ABC News has reached out to his public defender for comment and has not gotten a response.
Garcia is expected to make his initial appearance on Wednesday. It is unclear if he has an attorney.
If convicted, they face up to life in prison or the possibility of a death sentence, prosecutors said.
The popular Keanu Reeves character will return in the upcoming film John Wick: Chapter 5, Lionsgate announced during CinemaCon 2025 on Tuesday.
Entertainment Weekly reports that Reeves will reteam with director Chad Stahelski for the film. The actor will also produce alongside Basil Iwanyk and Erica Lee.
"Keanu, Chad, Basil, and Erica would not return unless they had something truly phenomenal and fresh to say with these characters and this world," Adam Fogelson, chair of Lionsgate's Motion Picture Group, said in a statement to the outlet. "We can’t wait for audiences to see where the journey takes us next."
The news of Reeves' return for a fifth installment of the franchise is significant, as the fate of his character was left on an ambiguous note at the end of the 2023 film John Wick: Chapter 4.
In other John Wick news, a spinoff film starring and directed by Donnie Yen centered around his character, Caine, is entering production in Hong Kong later in 2025.
Additionally, Lionsgate is making an animated film about John Wick. Reeves will produce the anime alongside Stahelski, Iwanyk and Lee. It will be directed by Shannon Tindle from a script by Vanessa Taylor.
The film's story will go back in time before the events of the first John Wick film as the assassin completes the Impossible Task — which is killing all of his rivals in one night — to free himself from his obligation to the High Table.
"To have the opportunity to develop a John Wick anime seems to be the perfect progression for the John Wick world," Stahelski said. "I feel John Wick is the perfect property for this medium — anime holds the potential to expand our world, our characters, and our action in ways unimaginable before.”
(TABLE ROCK, SC) -- Three teenagers are accused of causing a massive fire that ignited in a South Carolina state park after failing to extinguish cigarettes while on a hiking trail, officials said.
The teens -- Nyzaire Jah-Neiz Marsh, 19, Tristan Tyler, 18, and Isaac Wilson, 18 -- were arrested Tuesday on charges in connection with the origin of the Table Rock Fire, the South Carolina Forestry Commission said.
The teens were among several hikers who had been evacuated from Table Rock State Park in Pickens County on March 21 after first responders discovered the rapidly growing wildfire while searching for a missing hiker, the commission said.
They were questioned about the origins of the fire, and investigators "obtained evidence that they allege identified these subjects as suspects in the origin of the Table Rock State Park fire," the South Carolina Forestry Commission said.
According to the arrest warrant affidavits, "the suspects took part in smoking activities on a hiking trail at the state park and did not extinguish their cigarettes in a proper and safe manner, which officials allege led to the ignition of the Table Rock Fire," the South Carolina Forestry Commission said.
The three teens are charged with one count each of negligently allowing fire to spread to lands or property of another, a misdemeanor, the commission said. They were booked and released on $7,500 bonds. Online court records did not list any attorney information for them.
If convicted, they face up to 30 days in jail or a $200 fine.
A fourth suspect, a juvenile, was also charged with one count of the same offense and released into the custody of his parents, the commission said.
The Table Rock Fire has burned more than 13,000 acres total in South Carolina and North Carolina since igniting on March 21, the South Carolina Forestry Commission said Tuesday. It was 30% contained as of Tuesday morning.
Fire crews responded from multiple states to help battle the blaze, which prompted the evacuation of more than 1,400 homes and businesses on Thursday.
The South Carolina Forestry Commission issued a burning ban for all counties on March 21 due to the elevated wildfire risk.
The following day, South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster declared a state of emergency to support the response to the Table Rock Fire.
(WASHINGTON) -- Civil rights groups, including the NAACP, filed a federal lawsuit on Tuesday challenging President Donald Trump's effort to overhaul the election system.
The executive order, which Trump signed on March 25, requires stricter voting regulations in federal elections, including showing proof of citizenship when registering to vote.
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) is among the groups representing the plaintiffs in the complaint.
"We know that providing documentation in general tends to fall more heavily on people who are already having so many obstacles thrown in their lives at them," ACLU attorney Sophia Lin Lakin told ABC News. "These are real barriers for populations that unfortunately intersect very much with voters of color."
Lakin highlighted logistical obstacles such as transportation, childcare responsibilities and financial barriers that could prevent people from obtaining and paying out of pocket for documents like passports and naturalization certificates.
The order directs the Election Assistance Commission (EAC), an independent agency of the U.S. government that supports election officials, to require people to provide documentary proof of U.S. citizenship when registering to vote to prevent noncitizens from voting.
This comes after the president and his Republican allies characterized noncitizen voting during the 2024 presidential campaign as widespread -- a false claim that was debunked by experts and by a spate of GOP-led inquiries in the weeks leading up to the election, which found that noncitizen voting is extraordinarily rare.
"Using this very racialized, this very xenophobic fear mongering -- it's really just a vehicle for voter suppression to justify imposing requirements that are going to silence a certain segment of the population," Lakin, director of the ACLU's Voting Rights Project, told ABC News.
Plaintiffs in Tuesday's lawsuit, which was filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, include organizations that advocate for voting right across the country: the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), Asian and Pacific Islander American Vote, the Hispanic Federation, National League of Women Voters, League of Women Voters of Arizona, League of Women Voters Education Fund and Asian Pacific American Advocates (OCA).
The complaint names Trump and EAC officials as defendants. ABC News has reached out to the White House and EAC but requests for comment on the lawsuit were not immediately returned.
The lawsuit, which is known as "League of Women Voters v. Trump," argues that the president "has no authority to make or change the rules for conducting federal elections," -- a claim that was also made in a similar federal lawsuit challenging this executive order that was filed in D.C. court on Monday by The League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC) – the largest civil rights organization in the U.S.
"In the [Executive Order] the President attempts to usurp the power to regulate federal elections from Congress, the States, and an independent agency to which Congress delegated certain limited responsibilities," plaintiffs argue in the "League of Women Voters v. Trump," claiming that the president is violating the "constitutional separation of powers."
Existing federal law, as outlined in the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA) of 1993, already requires anyone who registers to vote to swear to their citizenship under penalty of perjury, but it does not require individuals to present documents to demonstrate proof of citizenship when they register.
The executive order directs the EAC to revise its national mail voter registration form within 30 days of the order's issuance to require voters to show proof of citizenship through a U.S. passport, a state-issued driver's license or identification card, an official military identification card or a valid federal or state government-issued photo identification. The order mandates that all documents provided should show proof of citizenship, but many state or government-issued ID's, including drivers licenses, don't show an individual's citizenship.
The lawsuit argues that requiring documentation to prove citizenship "would impose a severe burden on, if not wholly disenfranchise, millions of voters" who face various barriers, including financial and logistical, that prevent them from obtaining the required documentation.
Ahead of Trump's inauguration, on Jan. 3, Texas Republican Rep. Chip Roy introduced H.R. 22 -- legislation known as the "Safeguard American Voter Eligibility Act" or the SAVE Act -- a bill that would require people to provide documentary proof of U.S. citizenship when registering to vote in federal elections.
"Like the SAVE Act, this executive order is part of a broader voter suppression strategy designed to silence eligible voters rather than protect election integrity," Lakin said.
As the U.S. House considers the SAVE Act this week, House Speaker Mike Johnson House and GOP leaders urged bipartisan support for the legislation in a statement on Monday.
"American citizens -- and only American citizens -- should decide American elections," the statement says. "This legislation cements into law President Trump's executive action to secure our voter registration process and protect the voices of American voters. We urge all our colleagues in the House to join us in doing what the overwhelming majority of people in this country rightfully demand and deserve."
ABC News' Peter Charalambous and Olivia Rubin contributed to this report.
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — A federal judge in California on Tuesday ordered the Trump administration to temporarily restore legal aid to tens of thousands of migrant children who are in the United States without a parent or guardian.
The Republican administration on March 21 terminated a contract with the Acacia Center for Justice, which provides legal services for unaccompanied migrant children under 18 through a network of legal aid groups that subcontract with the center. Eleven subcontractor groups sued, saying that 26,000 children were at risk of losing their attorneys; Acacia is not a plaintiff.
Those groups argued that the government has an obligation under a 2008 anti-trafficking law to provide vulnerable children with legal counsel.
U.S. District Judge Araceli Martínez-Olguín of San Francisco granted a temporary restraining order late Tuesday. She wrote that advocates raised legitimate questions about whether the administration violated the 2008 law, warranting a return to the status quo while the case continues. The order will take effect Wednesday and runs through April 16.
“The Court additionally finds that the continued funding of legal representation for unaccompanied children promotes efficiency and fairness within the immigration system,” she wrote.
It is the third legal setback in less than a week for the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown, though all may prove temporary as the lawsuits advance. On Friday, a federal judge in Boston said people with final deportation orders must have a “ meaningful opportunity ” to argue against being sent to a country other than their own. On Monday, another federal judge in San Francisco put on hold plans to end protections for hundreds of thousands of Venezuelans, including 350,000 whose legal status was scheduled to expire April 7.
The Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act of 2008, which created special protections for migrant children who cannot navigate a complex immigration system on their own. Plaintiffs said some of their clients are too young to speak and others are too traumatized and do not know English.
The law requires the government to ensure “to the greatest extent practicable” that all children entering the country alone have legal counsel to represent them in proceedings and to “protect them from mistreatment, exploitation, and trafficking.”
Defendants, which include the Department of Health and Human Services and its Office of Refugee Resettlement, said that taxpayers have no obligation to pay the cost of direct legal aid to migrant children at a time when the government is trying to save money. They also said district courts have no jurisdiction over a contract termination that would have expired at the end of March.
Acacia is under a new contract with the government to provide legal orientations, including “know your rights” clinics.
But plaintiffs said they are not asking for the contract to be restored; rather, they want a return to the status quo, which is spending $5 billion that Congress appropriated so children have representation, said Karen Tumlin with the Justice Action Center at a court hearing Tuesday.
She said the administration cannot simply zero out funding without providing direction on who will help these children.
“They need to make sure to the greatest extent practicable that there is a plan,” she said.
Jonathan Ross with the U.S. Department of Justice said the government is still funding legally required activities, such as the “know your rights” clinics, and that legal clinics can offer their services without charge.
“They’re still free to provide those services on a pro bono basis,” he said.
DALLAS (AP) – Oscar-winning director Oliver Stone, whose 1991 film “JFK” portrayed President John F. Kennedy’s assassination as the work of a shadowy government conspiracy, called Tuesday for a new congressional investigation of the killing during a hearing that aired conspiracy theories about it.
The freewheeling hearing of the House Task Force on the Declassification of Federal Secrets, where partisan grievances were aired, followed last month’s release of thousands of pages of government documents related to the assassination. The task force’s Republican chair opened the proceedings by questioning the Warren Commission investigation’s conclusion that Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone in fatally shooting Kennedy as his motorcade finished a parade route in downtown Dallas on Nov. 22, 1963.
Scholars say the files that President Donald Trump ordered to be released showed nothing undercutting the conclusion that a lone gunman killed Kennedy. Many documents were previously released but contained newly removed redactions, including Social Security numbers, angering people whose personal information was disclosed.
Stone’s “JFK” was nominated for eight Oscars, including best picture, and won two. It grossed more than $200 million but was also dogged by questions about its historical accuracy. Stone told the committee that he believes decades of delays in releasing unredacted records had prevented “clarity” about who killed JFK.
Stone also said a new investigation “outside all political considerations” should begin “at the scene of the crime” and reexamine all of the evidence from the day of the assassination. Scholars and historians have concluded that there’s strong evidence that Oswald, a 24-year-old former Marine, acted alone in killing Kennedy.
“Can we return to a world where we can trust our government to level with us, the people for which this government exists?” Stone said. “This is our democracy. This is our presidency. It belongs to us.”
The task force’s chair, Rep. Anna Paulina Luna of Florida, said she thinks the federal government under previous administrations had engaged in “stonewalling.”
The task force also heard from a witness called by Democrats who criticized the Trump administration’s handling of the recent JFK document release. John Davisson, senior counsel for the Washington-based Electronic Privacy Information Center, called it “hurried” and suggested that the National Archives and Records Administration “simply ignored” procedures for protecting people’s privacy.
The task force’s Democrats followed up on his comments by criticizing the Trump administration over a variety of other issues.
“What I find funny about this hearing is that the Republicans are here relitigating whether CIA agents lied 60 years ago,” said Rep. Jasmine Crockett, whose Texas district includes part of Dallas.
Crockett suggested that Congress should instead delve deeper into revelations that top national security officials discussed sensitive attack plans over a messaging app and mistakenly added a journalist to the group chat.
The last formal congressional investigation of Kennedy’s assassination took three years and ended in 1978, when a House committee issued a report concluding that the Soviet Union, Cuba, organized crime, the CIA and the FBI weren’t involved, but Kennedy “probably was assassinated as a result of a conspiracy.” In 1976, a Senate committee said it had not uncovered enough evidence “to justify a conclusion that there was a conspiracy.”
The Warren Commission, appointed by Kennedy’s successor, President Lyndon B. Johnson, concluded that Oswald fired on Kennedy’s motorcade from a sniper’s perch on the sixth floor of the Texas School Book Depository, where Oswald worked. Police arrested Oswald within 90 minutes, and two days later, Jack Ruby, a nightclub owner, shot Oswald during a jail transfer broadcast on live television.
For Tuesday’s hearing, the task force also invited Jefferson Morley and James DiEugenio, who have written books arguing for conspiracies behind the assassination. Morley is editor of the JFK Facts blog and vice president of the Mary Ferrell Foundation, a repository for files related to the assassination.
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Val Kilmer, the brooding, versatile actor who played fan favorite Iceman in “Top Gun,” donned a voluminous cape as Batman in “Batman Forever” and portrayed Jim Morrison in “The Doors,” has died. He was 65.
Kilmer died Tuesday night in Los Angeles, surrounded by family and friends, his daughter, Mercedes Kilmer, said in an email to The Associated Press.
Val Kilmer died from pneumonia. He had recovered after a 2014 throat cancer diagnosis that required two tracheotomies.
“I have behaved poorly. I have behaved bravely. I have behaved bizarrely to some. I deny none of this and have no regrets because I have lost and found parts of myself that I never knew existed,” he says toward the end of “Val,” the 2021 documentary on his career. “And I am blessed.”
Kilmer, the youngest actor ever accepted to the prestigious Juilliard School at the time he attended, experienced the ups and downs of fame more dramatically than most. His break came in 1984’s spy spoof “Top Secret!” followed by the comedy “Real Genius” in 1985. Kilmer would later show his comedy chops again in films including “MacGruber” and “Kiss Kiss Bang Bang.”
His movie career hit its zenith in the early 1990s as he made a name for himself as a dashing leading man, starring alongside Kurt Russell and Bill Paxton in 1993’s “Tombstone,” as Elvis’ ghost in “True Romance” and as a bank-robbing demolition expert in Michael Mann’s 1995 film “Heat” with Al Pacino and Robert De Niro.
“While working with Val on ‘Heat’ I always marvelled at the range, the brilliant variability within the powerful current of Val’s possessing and expressing character,” director Michael Mann said in a statement Tuesday night.
Actor Josh Brolin, a friend of Kilmer, was among others paying tribute.
“You were a smart, challenging, brave, uber-creative firecracker,” Brolin wrote on Instagram. “There’s not a lot left of those.”
Kilmer — who took part in the Method branch of Suzuki arts training — threw himself into parts. When he played Doc Holliday in “Tombstone,” he filled his bed with ice for the final scene to mimic the feeling of dying from tuberculosis. To play Morrison, he wore leather pants all the time, asked castmates and crew to only refer to him as Jim Morrison and blasted The Doors for a year.
That intensity also gave Kilmer a reputation that he was difficult to work with, something he grudgingly agreed with later in life, but always defending himself by emphasizing art over commerce.
“In an unflinching attempt to empower directors, actors and other collaborators to honor the truth and essence of each project, an attempt to breathe Suzukian life into a myriad of Hollywood moments, I had been deemed difficult and alienated the head of every major studio,” he wrote in his memoir, “I’m Your Huckleberry.”
One of his more iconic roles — hotshot pilot Tom “Iceman” Kazansky opposite Tom Cruise — almost didn’t happen. Kilmer was courted by director Tony Scott for “Top Gun” but initially balked. “I didn’t want the part. I didn’t care about the film. The story didn’t interest me,” he wrote in his memoir. He agreed after being promised that his role would improve from the initial script. He would reprise the role in the film’s 2022 sequel, “Top Gun: Maverick.”
One career nadir was playing Batman in Joel Schumacher’s goofy, garish “Batman Forever” with Nicole Kidman and opposite Chris O’Donnell‘s Robin — before George Clooney took up the mantle for 1997’s “Batman & Robin” and after Michael Keaton played the Dark Knight in 1989’s “Batman” and 1992’s “Batman Returns.”
Janet Maslin in The New York Times said Kilmer was “hamstrung by the straight-man aspects of the role,” while Roger Ebert deadpanned that he was a “completely acceptable” substitute for Keaton. Kilmer, who was one and done as Batman, blamed much of his performance on the suit.
The Times was the first to report his death on Tuesday.
“When you’re in it, you can barely move and people have to help you stand up and sit down,” Kilmer said in “Val,” in lines spoken by his son Jack, who voiced the part of his father in the film because of his inability to speak. “You also can’t hear anything and after a while people stop talking to you, it’s very isolating. It was a struggle for me to get a performance past the suit, and it was frustrating until I realised that my role in the film was just to show up and stand where I was told to.”
His next projects were the film version of the 1960s TV series “The Saint” — fussily putting on wigs, accents and glasses — and “The Island of Dr. Moreau” with Marlon Brando, which became one of the decade’s most infamously cursed productions.
David Gregory’s 2014 documentary “Lost Soul: The Doomed Journey of Richard Stanley’s Island of Dr. Moreau,” described a cursed set that included a hurricane, Kilmer bullying director Richard Stanley, the firing of Stanley via fax (who sneaked back on set as an extra with a mask on) and extensive rewrites by Kilmer and Brando. The older actor told the younger at one point: “‘It’s a job now, Val. A lark. We’ll get through it.’ I was as sad as I’ve ever been on a set,” Kilmer wrote in his memoir.
In 1996, Entertainment Weekly ran a cover story about Kilmer titled ?The Man Hollywood Loves to Hate.? The directors Schumacher and John Frankenheimer, who finished “The Island of Dr. Moreau,” said he was difficult. Frankenheimer said there were two things he would never do: ?Climb Mount Everest and work with Val Kilmer again.?
Other artists came to his defense, like D. J. Caruso, who directed Kilmer in ?The Salton Sea? and said the actor simply liked to talk out scenes and enjoyed having a director’s attention.
?Val needs to immerse himself in a character. I think what happened with directors like Frankenheimer and Schumacher is that Val would ask a lot of questions, and a guy like Schumacher would say, ‘You’re Batman! Just go do it,’? Caruso told The New York Times in 2002.
After “The Island of Dr. Moreau,” the movies were smaller, like David Mamet human-trafficking thriller “Spartan”; ?Joe the King? in 1999, in which he played a paunchy, abusive alcoholic; and playing the doomed ’70s porn star John Holmes in 2003’s “Wonderland.” He also threw himself into his one-man stage show “Citizen Twain,” in which he played Mark Twain.
“I enjoy the depth and soul the piece has that Twain had for his fellow man and America,” he told Variety in 2018. “And the comedy that’s always so close to the surface, and how valuable his genius is for us today.”
Kilmer spent his formative years in the Chatsworth neighborhood of Los Angeles. He attended Chatsworth High School alongside future Oscar winner Kevin Spacey and future Emmy winner Mare Winningham. At 17, he was the youngest drama student ever admitted at the Juilliard School in 1981.
Shortly after he left for Juilliard, his younger brother, 15-year-old Wesley, suffered an epileptic seizure in the family’s Jacuzzi and died on the way to the hospital. Wesley was an aspiring filmmaker when he died.
?I miss him and miss his things. I have his art up. I like to think about what he would have created. I’m still inspired by him,? Kilmer told the Times.
While still at Juilliard, Kilmer co-wrote and appeared in the play “How It All Began” and later turned down a role in Francis Ford Coppola’s “The Outsiders” for the Broadway play, “Slab Boys,” alongside Kevin Bacon and Sean Penn.
Kilmer published two books of poetry (including “My Edens After Burns”) and was nominated for a Grammy in 2012 for spoken word album for “The Mark of Zorro.” He was also a visual artist and a lifelong Christian Scientist.
He dated Cher, married and divorced actor Joanne Whalley. He is survived by their two children, Mercedes and Jack.
“I have no regrets,” Kilmer told the AP in 2021. “I’ve witness and experienced miracles.”
