Measles Overtakes ICE Detention Center as Immigrants Remain Trapped

An ICE family detention center in Texas is halting “all movement” after finding two cases of measles.

The cases were detected Friday, Department of Homeland Security spokeswoman Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement, confirming that two detainees had “active measles infections.” The facility in Dilley, Texas, located about an hour away from San Antonio, holds parents suspected of immigration violations alongside their children.

Some detainees have been quarantined, McLaughlin said, adding that everyone is “being provided with proper medical care.”

The Dilley facility is where 5-year-old Liam Conejo Ramos, whose picture went viral after he was detained in Minneapolis, last month by ICE agents, was held, along with his father, Adrian Conejo Arias, before being released Sunday. During his time in the detention center, Conejo Ramos reportedly felt feverish, complained about being tired, vomited at least once, and was not eating well, but was not reported to have measles. When Conejo Arias asked for medication from staff, they said they didn’t have any.

Measles cases have skyrocketed under the second Trump administration, with Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. denigrating vaccination and failing to take the rising number of cases seriously, while promoting policies that will encourage future outbreaks. A new measles outbreak in South Carolina, for example, just became the largest in the United States since the disease was declared eliminated in 2000.

As the level of measles vaccination drops, the number of outbreaks is only going to go up, spreading the disease among vulnerable populations in crowded areas like ICE detention centers and prisons, which are already known to have inhumane living conditions. Measles spreading to an ICE detention facility seems to be an unholy by-product of MAGA immigration cruelty and MAHA’s anti-vaccine agenda.

The Trump administration’s chief priority for 2026: persecuting the president’s political nemeses.

Despite efforts by the judiciary to limit Donald Trump’s revenge quest, Justice Department officials are expected to meet as early as Monday to reignite efforts to investigate and punish government officials who played a role in investigating him prior to his return to the White House.

The DOJ staffers will meet under the banner of the “Weaponization Working Group,” an entity that Attorney General Pam Bondi invented mere days after she entered office, reported CNN. The group was designed to challenge former special counsel Jack Smith and his staff, as well as Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg and New York Attorney General Letitia James. The initiative would also target any officials who attempted to hold Trump accountable in the wake of the January 6, 2021, attack.

Some of those efforts may already be a dud, however, thanks to the loud mouths of some of Trump’s own staff: In December, White House chief of staff Susie Wiles fessed to Vanity Fair that the president’s flimsy charges against James were his “one retribution,” an admission that would give James’s legal defense plenty of reason to toss his cases against her for eternity.

One official familiar with the administration’s new plan told CNN that the Weaponization Working Group is expected to start meeting “daily,” with the intent of producing results within the next two months.

Back in October, Bondi told lawmakers that ending the “weaponization of justice” would be a chief priority for the agency under her stewardship.

Justice Department officials declined to provide specifics on the daily meetings but told CNN that the “efforts of the Weaponization Working Group continue.”

“The Justice Department is actively looking into the areas outlined in Attorney General Bondi’s Day One memo,” the spokesperson said. “The Weaponization Working Group is diligently working to restore integrity to the Department of Justice and is utilizing resources across the entire agency to fulfill this effort.”

Editor’s Note: Jon Weinstein, a vice president of communications at the National Hockey League, said Gélinas’s reporting was inaccurate and no such restrictions were in place for the Montreal Canadiens.

Donald Trump has said his immigration crackdown is targeting the “worst of the worst.” It’s finally clear who he means by that: Canadian professional hockey players.

Hockey journalist Luc Gélinas reported that the Montreal Canadiens, who play the Minnesota Wild on Monday night, have been told by management to stay inside their Minneapolis hotel at all times, take the team bus rather than walk to the stadium, and carry passports with them.

The cautiousness of the team comes as a result of the Trump administration’s violent immigration crackdown in Minneapolis. Operation Metro Surge has killed two residents and sparked nationwide protests.

The Canadiens traveled across the border on Sunday rather than Saturday in order to spend one less night in the United States. They will also wait until Tuesday morning to leave Minneapolis so they can avoid any nighttime disturbances in the city.

“Perhaps we shouldn’t be hosting the World Cup and the Olympics,” one Bluesky commenter wryly noted.

Hopefully, the Canadiens can forget about ICE when they get on the ice tonight.

If you believe the president’s word, then fear not: The White House is not planning to demolish the Kennedy Center during its summer renovation.

But if you tend to trust the evidence of history, you might have cause to be suspicious of whether the famed cultural institution will still be in one piece by the time Donald Trump is done with it.

A White House official told ABC News’s Hannah Demissie Monday that the administration has no intention of tearing down the Kennedy Center during its two-year remodeling project. Starting July 4, the performing arts space will close for two years in order to undergo “construction, revitalization, and complete rebuilding,” Trump announced Sunday evening.

The sudden decision to reinvent the world-class arts institution comes just a month after Trump potentially broke the law in renaming the center to include his name, and after more than a year of canceled performances by a litany of artists who opposed the Trump administration’s agenda.

Meanwhile, Trump’s other government renovation projects have been constructed out of a web of lies. Back when his White House ballroom was first announced in July, Trump pledged that the development would “be near but not touching” the White House East Wing.

Months later, his construction teams completely razed the FDR-era extension, plowing forward without prerequisite approval from the National Capital Planning Commission or the express permission of Congress, both of which were conveniently unavailable at the time, due to the longest government shutdown in U.S. history.

Trump also renovated Jackie Kennedy’s famous Rose Garden, mowing down flowers in order to literally pave paradise; gutted the Lincoln bathroom, transforming it from Lyndon B. Johnson’s favorite office into a marble-slathered eyesore; and swapped the historic Palm Room’s lush green tones and tall ferns for white paint and framed photos of plants.

Meanwhile, his administration is doing some demolition of its own, reportedly planning to destroy some 13 historic buildings on the grounds of former psychiatric hospital St. Elizabeths in order to expand facilities for the Department of Homeland Security.

Alex Pretti’s death was ruled a homicide Monday by the Hennepin County medical examiner.

In the medical examiner’s report, Pretti’s cause of death was listed as multiple gunshot wounds, and how the injury occurred was due to being “shot by law enforcement officer(s).” His manner of death was listed as “homicide.”

The 37-year-old ICU nurse was shot and killed by two Customs and Border Protection officers during a violent confrontation at a protest in Minneapolis last month.

Footage from the confrontation showed that Pretti was tackled to the ground by several federal agents, after he approached another protester who’d been sprayed with a chemical irritant. While beating Pretti, agents realized he was armed and took his firearm. Once they’d pinned Pretti to the ground, two federal officers shot him at least 10 times.

The medical examiner’s determination comes shortly after ProPublica uncovered the names of the officers who shot and killed Pretti: Border Patrol agent Jesus Ochoa and Customs and Border Protection officer Raymundo Gutierrez.

CBP Commander Greg Bovino, who was recently removed from overseeing the Minnesota crackdown, refused to identify the officers. He told reporters they were still working the streets, just in another city. A spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security has since confirmed that the two had been placed on administrative leave, according to ProPublica.

Pretti’s senseless killing has sparked national outrage as Donald Trump’s federal immigration forces have killed a total of two U.S. citizens in Minnesota in broad daylight. The Trump administration has blocked Minnesota officials from investigating residents’ killings by federal agents, hampering the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension, and opposed a federal judge’s order preventing them from tampering with evidence related to Pretti’s death.

This story has been updated.