Santa Barbara County News and Events

Trump administration asks court to pause Louisiana lawsuit targeting abortion pill access while it conducts review

Kraig Pakulski 0 15 Article rating: No rating

By Tierney Sneed, CNN

(CNN) — The Trump administration on Tuesday asked a federal court to pause a Louisiana lawsuit seeking to end access to abortion pills by mail.

The new filing from the US Food and Drug Administration said the court should put the case on hold while it conducts its own review of mifepristone, one of the two drugs used in medication abortion.

The request stands to further anger anti-abortion activists who are already frustrated that President Donald Trump has not reversed the FDA’s move, during the Biden administration, to lift a requirement that medication abortion drugs be obtained in person. The current regulations have made it easier for women who live in states that ban abortion to obtain mifepristone.

In its filing on behalf of the FDA Tuesday, the Justice Department said that having the court move forward with the case while the agency itself is already scrutinizing the current regulations “would waste judicial resources because FDA’s own review may eliminate any need for the Court’s.”

If the request to pause the case is granted, the Trump administration said it would inform the court within 14 days of any decision to modify the current regulations because of the review.

A spokesperson for Louisiana Attorney General Liz Murrill did not immediately respond to CNN’s request for comment.

Anti-abortion advocacy group Americans United for Life blasted the Trump administration’s filing in a statement.

“The FDA’s filing today is just another episode in the continuing saga of the Trump Administration’s lawyers seeking legal delays while administration officials make promises of action on chemical abortion. Pro-life Americans are growing increasingly frustrated with the failure to meet words with action,” Steven H. Aden, chief legal officer and general counsel for AUL, said.

The lawsuit is one of three lawsuits that are being led by anti-abortion states challenging the FDA’s current approach to mifepristone. While Trump has been eager to tout his role in the 2022 reversal of Roe v. Wade by appointing the justices who were key swing votes, he avoided questions during the 2024 campaign about what he would do on abortion if reelected.

Some anti-abortion activists believe that the mifepristone review announced by the Trump-appointed FDA head Marty Makary is a stalling tactic — a claim the FDA has denied. Pointing to reporting and comments by Makary suggesting the review is still at an early phase, Louisiana is asking for a preliminary order in the case that would restore the in-person mifepristone dispensing requirement, halting its availability by mail.

The deadline for the FDA to respond to that request was Tuesday. In its filing, the Justice Department also argued that the judge should reject Louisiana’s request for procedural reasons.

A hearing is scheduled in the case for February 24.

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After town hall attack, Ilhan Omar condemns ‘terrorizing’ immigration push and criticism from GOP

Kraig Pakulski 0 14 Article rating: No rating

By Eric Bradner, Annie Grayer, CNN

(CNN) — Minnesota Rep. Ilhan Omar ignored staffers’ pleas to end a town hall early and get a medical check Tuesday after a man rushed the podium and sprayed a substance at the Democratic congresswoman.

Omar said after the town hall ended that she has “survived war” and that she is “definitely going to survive intimidation and whatever these people think that they can throw at me because I’m built that way.”

The dramatic moment punctuated a high-profile public appearance for a progressive lawmaker who has been the subject of Republican attacks and scrutiny, as President Donald Trump’s administration focuses its attention on Minneapolis, the city she represents.

Omar condemned federal immigration agents’ “terrorizing” tactics and “reckless and lawless” actions, as she told attendees that the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown in the Twin Cities is antithetical to “the America we love.”

She also called for Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s abolition and said Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem should resign or be impeached. And she praised how Minneapolis has responded to immigration agents’ presence and the killings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti.

“Minnesotans are showing up for one another in ways that people didn’t expect. We are showing the country and the world what real solitary looks like. And we should be goddamn proud of ourselves,” she said.

Long a target of Republicans, Omar is now the subject of investigations by Trump’s Justice Department and the House Oversight Committee, after both Trump and the committee’s chairman, Kentucky Rep. James Comer, said this week they were probing her finances.

Omar, 43, is a Somali-born refugee whose family immigrated to the United States when she was 12. She was first elected to the state legislature in 2016 and became one of the first Muslim-American women elected to Congress in 2018, when she won a House seat representing much of the overwhelmingly Democratic city of Minneapolis.

She has been a frequent target of political attacks and at times racist smears by Republicans. She has also faced heat from some Democrats who point to her criticism of Israel — particularly in 2021, when she seemed to equate “atrocities” by the United States and Israel to those of Hamas and the Taliban, as she called in a social media post for “the same level of accountability and justice for all victims of crimes against humanity.”

In 2023, the Republican-controlled House voted to remove Omar from the Foreign Affairs Committee. In 2025, a push to censure Omar and remove her from two committees over her comments about conservative political commentator and activist Charlie Kirk in the wake of his killing failed by just one vote, after four Republicans joined all Democrats in rejecting the effort.

Trump has repeatedly said Omar should be impeached, jailed or deported to Somalia — despite her becoming a US citizen in 2000.

Omar said at the town hall she carries her passport with her at all times.

“I know people talk about me and Somalia. I don’t know any home the way I know this home,” she said, referring to the United States. “And so I do feel strong sentiments toward immigrants that find home in the United States.”

Omar said that other immigrants are tr

¿Qué se define en la última fecha de la Champions League? Clasificados, eliminados y los que se juegan la clasificación

Kraig Pakulski 0 15 Article rating: No rating

Por Federico Leiva, CNN en Español

Si con el nuevo formato se buscaba darle emoción a la UEFA Champions League, pues, enhorabuena, lo han conseguido. Restan apenas 90 minutos de juego de la primera etapa de competencia y apenas 6 equipos de los 36 participantes tienen confirmado su futuro en el torneo. Este miércoles llega la última jornada de la llamada Fase de Liga, donde todos los clubes jugarán a la misma hora, con un pronóstico extremadamente reservado.

Por segunda temporada consecutiva, la UEFA decidió implementar una Fase de Liga que reemplazó a la ahora extinta Fase de Grupos. Bajo este formato, los 36 equipos están en una misma tabla de posiciones, y tras ocho partidos (decididos por sorteo y basándose en los cuatro bombos en que fueron repartidos los clubes participantes), los ocho mejores ubicados acceden a los octavos de final del torneo.

Del mismo modo, los ocho peores del certamen quedan automáticamente eliminados, sin posibilidad de jugar otra competencia europea hasta el próximo año (a diferencia de lo que sucedía hasta 2024, cuando los terceros de cada grupo bajaban a la Europa League).

Los ocho lugares vacantes de octavos de final se los disputarán los equipos que finalicen entre el noveno y el vigesimocuarto lugar de la tabla, jugando una fase de playoff con partidos de ida y vuelta. Los ocho ganadores completarán los octavos, donde ya se repetirá la modalidad de siempre, con series de ida y vuelta hasta la gran final, a partido único.

Hay apenas dos equipos que ya tienen garantizada su participación entre los 16 mejores del torneo. Uno de ellos es el Arsenal de Inglaterra, el único que mantiene un paso perfecto, con siete triunfos en siete presentaciones. Los Gunners llegaron a semifinales en la campaña pasada y parece que este año van a por todo, ya que también son líderes de la Premier League.

El otro club clasificado es el Bayern Munich de Alemania, que ganó seis de los siete partidos que jugó. El restante fue derrota, precisamente ante el Arsenal. Los bávaros también dominan la Bundesliga, por lo que están redondeando una gran temporada.

Apenas cuatro conjuntos ya saben que este miércoles se despiden de la competencia.

El Kairat Almaty (36°) tuvo este año su debut en la máxima competencia de clubes de Europa, pero su sueño terminó de la peor manera, con apenas un punto de 21 posibles. Su último rival será el Arsenal en Londres, en un encuentro donde no hay nada por definir.

Sorpresivamente, el paso del Villarreal (35°) fue efímero en esta edición de la Champions League. A pesar de que en LaLiga marcha cuarto, en puesto de clasificación para la próxima Liga de Campeones, en Europa apenas sacó un empate y seis derrotas, sumando los mismos puntos que el debutante Kairat Almaty.

Los otros dos eliminados son el Slavia Praga (34°) de República Checa y el Eintracht Frankfurt (33°) de Alemania, un equipo del que se esperaba un poco más en la competencia. Con tres y cuatro unidades, respectivamente, su destino ya está sellado.

Hay exactamente 30 equipos con futuro incierto, que este miércoles saldrán al campo, ya sea jugándose la clasificación directa a los octavos o al menos una plaza en los playoffs previos.

El Real Madrid (3°) y el Liverpool (4°) tienen 15 puntos y grandes chances de meterse entre los 16 mejores, pero para estar seguros deberán ganar, ya que un empate los pone a tiro de casi una decena de equipos que podrían superarlos o igualarlos en cantidad de unidades. El Merengue tiene una visita riesgosa ante el Benfica (29°) de José Mourinho, que debe ganar y por buena diferencia para meterse en la ronda de playoffs. Los Reds, por su parte, recibirán al sorpresivo Qarabag FK (18°) de Azerbaiyán, que contra todo pronóstico está escapando a la eliminación, pero no está a salvo definitivamente.

A pesar de la crisis futbolística que lo está haciendo ver de reojo los puestos de descenso e

‘We all have to be brave’: Meet the woman whose video of Alex Pretti’s killing contradicted the administration’s claims

Kraig Pakulski 0 16 Article rating: No rating
Stella Carlson talks with CNN's Anderson Cooper during an exclusive interview.

By Michael Williams, CNN

(CNN) — Stella Carlson was supposed to spend Saturday morning painting children’s faces at a church. It would have been a welcome contrast to the weekslong onslaught of federal immigration enforcement and protests that have overwhelmed her home in the Twin Cities.

Being an active participant in her community is important for Carlson, and she had spent the last three weeks learning about mutual aid and participating in grassroots efforts to warn her neighbors of impending federal immigration action. The fatal shooting of Renee Good by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer earlier this month proved to Carlson and other Minnesotans that the potential for danger as an observer was not abstract.

“I know every time I leave my vehicle or leave my house and I put that whistle around my neck, I know because of Renee Good, the risk,” she told CNN’s Anderson Cooper during an interview Tuesday. “I think we all knew after that happened, it is now at that point, and it could be any of us.”

But she had no way of knowing that she would soon watch a man die — or that her video of that fatal incident would serve as a crucial counter to the Trump administration’s initial efforts to paint Alex Pretti as a wannabe assassin or domestic terrorist.

On her way to work, and wearing a pink jacket that would become instantly recognizable from other videos of the incident, Carlson heard the sound of whistles that have become the ubiquitous warning of the arrival of immigration officers.

She drove down Nicollet Avenue and saw what she described as a brawl in the street. She thought of Good, who was also driving her car when she was fatally shot. This was when she first noticed Pretti directing traffic.

“It felt like somebody in my opinion, in my background, who was doing a risk assessment and found his place in this moment to be useful,” she said of Pretti.

Carlson got out of her car and began recording.

The video Carlson took showed that Pretti, who had a permit to carry a concealed pistol, never brandished his gun, as Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem first claimed he did (Carlson said she didn’t even know Pretti had been armed until after he was shot, and wouldn’t have gotten so close if she had known). Nor did he approach law enforcement with the intent to assassinate them, as Stephen Miller, the architect of the White House’s immigration policy, also claimed.

Instead, Carlson’s video showed that the 37-year-old ICU nurse who treated veterans spent his last moments trying to help a woman who had been knocked down.

The video also showed that Pretti’s handgun had been removed from its holster by an officer seconds before he was pinned down and shot multiple times, including in his back.

“I remember him arching his back and his head rolling back,” Carlson said. She had previously seen people die in hospice settings and said she knew by looking at Pretti that he was not going to make it.

“I knew he was gone because I watched it,” she said. “And then they come over to try to perform some type of medical aid by ripping his clothes open with scissors, and then maneuvering his

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