SANTA BARBARA, Calif. (KEYT) - Some four-legged friends have now been given a chance to experience a boat trip as part of their future work with Guide Dogs for the Blind.

The Saturday morning ride was on board the Lil' Toot and Celebration Cruises at the Santa Barbara harbor.

Six dogs, a mix of retrievers and labradors, were in training to get them comfortable with the movement of the ocean – not just in the harbor, but a short distance out where there's a light swell.

It's part of the work with guide dogs for the blind to give them locations they may go to when they are paired up with their new owner.

Vicki Lyons Wait with Guide Dogs for the Blind was on board with her pup and with other inquisitive dogs and their owners.

"We want to socialize them in all ways possible. So we want to take them on a boat, we want to take them golfing, we want to take them to the bowling alley, to the movies, and all those things so that when the person has the dog, the dog is ready to go."

She says the dogs want to be helpful. "These dogs are bred to be working dogs and they just want to be with us and they want to please."

The dogs were on a one-hour cruise and part of it included a stop by the near shore buoy off of Stearns Wharf where they got a close up look at some sea lions.

They seemed to enjoy the trip and passed their test with wagging tails on and off the Lil' Toot.

After about 13 to 15 months of training they are ready to be paired up with a visually impaired owner.

The Latest Breaking News, Weather Alerts, Sports and More Anytime On Our Mobile Apps. Keep Up With the Latest Articles by Signing Up for the News Channel 3-12 Newsletter.

The post Pups Cruise The Santa Barbara Harbor to Help Assist the Visually Impaired appeared first on News Channel 3-12.

By Jennifer Hansler, CNN

(CNN) — The Trump administration on Monday designated Afghanistan as a state sponsor of wrongful detention – a move meant to deter the Taliban from abducting Americans.

It is the second country to be designated as such, and the announcement comes on Hostage and Wrongful Detainee Day. The administration designated Iran as a state sponsor of wrongful detention the day before it launched military operations against the country.

“The Taliban continues to use terrorist tactics, kidnapping individuals for ransom or to seek policy concessions,” Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in a statement Monday.

“These despicable tactics need to end,” he said.

“It is not safe for Americans to travel to Afghanistan because the Taliban continues to unjustly detain our fellow Americans and other foreign nationals,” Rubio continued.

“The Taliban needs to release Dennis Coyle, Mahmoud Habibi, and all Americans unjustly detained in Afghanistan now and commit to cease the practice of hostage diplomacy forever,” he said.

Habibi was detained in August 2022. The Taliban has never acknowledged holding him. The State Department is offering up to $5 million for information leading to his location, recovery and safe return.

Habibi’s brother, Ahmad Habibi, said he met with Sebastian Gorka and special envoy Adam Boehler on Monday “and both gave me assurances that President Trump will not leave my brother behind.”

“The Taliban need to admit what we already know – that they have my brother – so we can move forward in bringing him home to his wife and young daughter. The Taliban should not be defying President Trump as he seeks to bring home Americans to their family,” he said.

Coyle was detained in January 2025. His family said he has not been charged with a crime and has been held in solitary confinement.

The designation creates the possibility for the US to impose travel restrictions for Afghanistan.

There is such a travel restriction in place for North Korea. The US does not allow its citizens to travel to North Korea on US passports without an approved exception, and in those cases, the State Department issues a “special validation passport.”

Several Americans detained in Afghanistan were released last year – George Glezmann, Ryan Corbett, William McKenty, and Amir Amiry.

The-CNN-Wire
™ & © 2026 Cable News Network, Inc., a Warner Bros. Discovery Company. All rights reserved.

The post Trump administration designates Afghanistan as state sponsor of wrongful detention appeared first on News Channel 3-12.

By John Fritze, CNN

(CNN) — Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson on Monday said the Supreme Court’s handling of emergency cases has created a “warped” process that effectively signaled the outcome of high-profile controversies prematurely, describing that as an “unfortunate” departure from how the justices handled short-fuse appeals just a few decades ago.

“This uptick in the court’s willingness to get involved with cases on the emergency docket is a real unfortunate problem,” Jackson said in remarks at the federal courthouse in Washington, DC, during an event attended by lower court judges and lawyers. “I think it is not serving the court or our country well at this point.”

Though Jackson’s point was similar to one she has repeatedly made in written dissents, the liberal justice’s airing of her concerns added a degree of tension to the event in which she spoke alongside Justice Brett Kavanaugh, a conservative who offered a vastly different view of the reasons for the increase in the court’s “shadow docket” rulings and its significance.

Jackson’s comments came as the three-justice liberal wing has expressed growing frustration with the conservative Supreme Court’s resolution of a flood of emergency appeals in President Donald Trump’s favor, including decisions that allowed the administration to significantly step up immigration enforcement, fire the leaders of independent federal agencies and cut spending approved by Congress. The court has backed the Trump administration in 80% of those cases, a far higher share than during the Biden administration.

Neither Jackson nor Kavanaugh discussed specific cases at the event.

An otherwise breezy conversation between the two justices about the routines of the Supreme Court turned more testy when US District Judge Paul Friedman asked about the court’s emergency docket. Those cases involve relatively quick decisions about what should happen to a policy or law in the meantime while courts are considering their legality.

The cases are usually decided without the full briefing of regular, merits decisions by the court, and they almost never involve oral argument.

Kavanaugh opined that the rise in emergency cases was at least partly attributable to presidents who are eager to push policies — and who are thwarted by a gridlocked Congress — resorting to executive action to accomplish their goals. Kavanaugh said that some of the criticism of the court’s emergency docket is unfair, given that the court must rule one way or the other on whether to grant or deny those cases. He questioned the “short memories” of some of the court’s critics, noting that the Biden administration also regularly appealed cases when lower courts shut down its policies.

But that prompted Jackson to retort that the court itself was at least partly to blame.

“I think it’s because the Supreme Court has shown a willingness to grant these emergency motions,” she said. “Brett will remember that when we clerked some 20 years ago, this was not the Supreme Court’s stance, that just because these motions were filed the court actually had to entertain and grant them on their merits.”

As if speaking at a televised presidential debate, Friedman asked if Kavanaugh wanted to offer a rebuttal.

“Ketanji states it well,” Kavanaugh responded, before adding that “you have to have the same position, no matter who’s president. “

“I agree with that,” Jackson said.

“I know you do,” Kavanaugh added.

The back and forth came a week after the court handed down simultaneous emergency docket orders in two touchy political cases. In one, the court blocked a California education policy that restrict

Por Erick E. Beltran, CNN en Español

Grupo Frontera anunció 27 presentaciones en Estados Unidos en distintas ciudades de varios estados. La banda de regional mexicano extendió el tour “Triste pero bien cab**n” que ya tenía consideradas presentaciones en distintas partes de Latinoamérica y Europa.

La etapa comenzará el 16 de julio en Edinburg, Texas, y también contempla presentaciones en estados como California, Arizona, Illinois y Florida, además de una fecha en Puerto Rico. Según un comunicado de la agrupación, se trata de uno de los “movimientos más ambiciosos” del grupo en el mercado estadounidense.

La serie de conciertos acompaña el lanzamiento de su más reciente álbum, “Lo que me falta por llorar”, un proyecto que reafirma la identidad del grupo dentro del regional mexicano, con una mezcla de sonidos que incluye influencias de norteño y cumbia.

Los fans que deseen adquirir las entradas para alguna de las presentaciones de la banda podrán hacerlo a partir del martes 10 de marzo en preventa con un banco, mientras que la venta general de boletos dará inicio el viernes 13 de marzo.

Recientemente, Grupo Frontera obtuvo sus primeras nominaciones en los Premios Grammy, donde fue considerado en la categoría de mejor álbum de música mexicana por sus trabajos “Y lo que viene” y “Mala mía”.

The-CNN-Wire
™ & © 2026 Cable News Network, Inc., a Warner Bros. Discovery Company. All rights reserved.

The post Grupo Frontera llevará su gira 2026 a distintas ciudades de Estados Unidos appeared first on News Channel 3-12.

SANTA BARBARA, Calif. (KEYT) Monday's roller coaster ride before the closing bell marked the end of the trading day on Wall Street shows that the war in Iran and comments made by President Donald Trump impact investors.

California Economic Forecast Director Dr. Mark Schniepp said Monday turned out to be a good day.

"The markets opened up sharply down, in fact severely down, investors came in and saw this as an opportunity to buy at a low price and they drove the market up quite a bit and so actually all the indexes finished up strongly today, so it was a wild volatile day and we ended in a better position than we were on Friday," said Schniepp.

It was as if nothing happened over the weekend.

But as the war entered its second week a strike on a refinery in Iran drove oil prices above $119 a barrel.

"Those rose significantly at the open but the President calmed the markets down and we saw prices reverse and that really drove investors to go on a buying spree, so we are back to normal," said Schniepp.

He called Wall Street a leading indicator for Main Street and said prices will be more volatile than they usually are in a day to day market during the conflict in Iran.

"It is a foreboding warning of what could actually happen over the next several months, I mean Wall Street is a futures market not a present day market so that is what we will watch very carefully," said Scniepp.

President Trump's communication skills played a role on Monday.

"He does tend to calm the markets by his calm demeanor with these things, according to Trump the war is going very well."

While talking to reporters on Monday afternoon President Trump suggested the end of the war could be near.

"It is the beginning of building a new country, they have no navy, no air force, no anti-aircraft equipment, it has all been blown up, they have no radar, they have no telecommunications, and they have no leadership, it is all gone, so you can look at that and we call it a tremendous success right now," said President Trump.

He added that the U.S. military could leave it at that or go further.

Economists and investors are listening to every word.

"I don't think that this war is going to affect the markets much unless we get some kind of episodic change in the event."

President Trump also said he knew oil prices would go up.

Schniepp said the economy is doing well.

"Growth is moderate, but it is likely to pick up this year, earnings reports among firms have been very very good and inflation is actually doing better than we thought it would do so let's watch how things progress," said Schiepp.

He said people will have to wait and see when it comes to tariffs struck down by the U.S. Supreme Court last month.

"It will takes years before that really has to settle out, I don't think that is going to be a big issue if here is or has to be a big rebate, that is one of the things the Supreme Court did not finish," said Schniepp.

He thinks the economy is going to do well this year.

"We are in the fourth year of a bull market so things could get volatile because of that, that tends to be the case with older bull markets, nevertheless the economy is going to do very well this year, so I don't expect any kind of problems with recession or lower growth than expected, so I would stay the course," said Schniepp.

But affordability remains an issue especially when it comes to housing.

"Economic growth seems to be in decent shape right now we don't see anything that is getting out of whack that would create any recessionary conditions, inflation is like