The Brief

Wendy Tang pauses while presenting in front of class. It’s not an easy feat for anyone to speak in front of nearly 20 peers, even harder for someone whose primary language isn’t English. She laughs from embarrassment and discloses that she’s nervous.

Inspired by the “cajita” project, students have filled “sacred boxes” with significant personal belongings and artifacts that honor family struggles and triumphs.

This is the end of the unit on identity for the lowest credit language class for English learners at Mt. San Antonio College (Mt. SAC). These kinds of classes are meaningful for the students enrolled in them. They’re also in decline, as transfer reforms and other factors shape community college course offerings.

Giving voice to past and present

Tang moved from China to the U.S. on her own. Sharing various items with the class, she points to a small glass bottle containing blades of grass that she’s chosen to represent herself.

“I feel grass is the strongest plant because it doesn’t matter where you put the seeds. It doesn’t matter if there’s a lot of rain,” Tang said. “You just give them a little bit of sunshine and they will grow everywhere. Like the grass, you put me here, I can grow. You put me in another place and I can grow too.”

Students chose items to represent their past cultures, their adjustment to the U.S., and their futures. This project modeled sentipensante — a sensing, thinking approach to learning, professor and chair of Mt. SAC’s American Language program Elizabeth Casian said.

Their boxes are also informed by a True Colors personality test, which Casian uses to help students find more congruence between their values and lives.

Coming to the U.S. from another country is a chance to redirect one’s course, Casian said; immigrants who may have come from more collectivist cultures may not have pursued their individual dreams before, a defining characteristic of American culture.

A former student from Hong Kong told Casian that taking the personality test changed her life when she realized she was in the wrong career — banking. After getting encouragement from Casian, the student embarked on a career change.

Moving between countries and cultures

Through thoughtfully chosen objects, students shared a longing for family and friends, challenges they’ve faced, and changes in perspective. One student shared a picture from his brother’s birthday of them eating hot pot together, a reminder of his Chinese culture. Deanna Contreras brought a baseball hat from the Carl’s Jr. fast food restaurant chain. It represented her growing pains upon coming to the United States from Mexico.

“It was my first job here in the U.S.,” Contreras said. “It was really difficult because I was still learning. I didn’t know any English and a lot of people were mean.”

Referring to a U.S. dollar bill, the student Tang said that money has represented both her Chinese and American cultures. Her relationship toward money has changed. Once seen as an end in itself, she now sees money as a means for having life experiences.

Nguyen Huynh, who goes by Tom, poses by his cajita – a box that includes significant personal belongings and family artifacts that would be transported across borders. It includes a bottle of Vietnamese Chin-Su hot sauce that he attests can be used in every meal and a printed image of the “lady justice” which represents his future in America, where he plans to improve public safety as a police officer.

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“After coming to America, I tried to find life’s meaning. What’s the meaning for my life? Making money to buy a house — is that happy? Or is it making money so that I can go travel? The world is so big,” Tang said.

Another student from China, Wayne Wang, had a different perspective on money.

“My favorite perfume — Chanel!” Wang said, presenting the bottled fragrance to his class. Unabashedly laughing, he said it represents luxury and his love of money and beauty.

Across California, advancing in English more quickly 

Changes to English-as-a-second-language (ESL) credit courses have been underway since the implementation of Assembly Bill 705, which nominally took effect in January 2018 and aimed to get community college students to higher levels of math and English more quickly. For example, English-learners who graduated from high school in the U.S. who may have otherwise placed in a lower level of English in the ESL program now start at a higher level of college composition.

“It's now that we have to meet students where they are, whereas before, if you don't have these skills, then you need to get these skills in these lower level classes,” Casian said. “The reason why they pushed AB 705 through in the first place was that the more levels a student has to take, the more chances we have of losing them from college.”

Findings from a 2022 report by the Public Policy Institute of California on the early effect of AB 705 on credit-level English Second Language showed that colleges have been shortening ESL course sequences. Prior to the law, some colleges offered course sequences with as many as six levels or more. According to PPIC, in 2021, over half of colleges offered sequences of four levels or less, compared to just one-third in 2016.

Another consequence of AB 705 includes a decline in student enrollment at Mt. SAC’s American Language Program, according to Casian, who suggested that students may bypass the program for the English department. Casian said the COVID-19 pandemic and travel restrictions also contributed to the decline. Based on data provided by Mt. SAC, student enrollment for credit-level courses in the American Language Program declined substantially, from nearly 1,400 in 2018-2019 to less than half (just over 600) in 2022-2023. (Students may be counted more than once if enrolled in more than one course.)

One concern of the effect of AB 705 is placing students in classes before they’re ready. While getting English learners to higher levels faster is beneficial, Casian said there is still value in offering lower-level credit ESL courses where students can build foundational skills.

A cajita project box.

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“I think that's a testament to what is still needed,” said Casian, who pointed out that while recent legislation asserts all students have a right to take transfer-level courses, not everyone should start there.

Referring to her class, she said, “If you can imagine these students in English 1A [a freshman composition transfer-level class] with the skills that they have, that's not equitable. So that's why we're still here. We're here to provide equity. We're here to provide that support to get students from where they are, to that next level where they need to.”

Second chances and wanting to connect

Damayanthi Jesudason moved to the U.S. in 1996 in response to the Sri Lankan civil war. Over the years, Jesudason said she has not passed a number of English learner classes due to difficulty writing essays and understanding grammar. She said she was also identified as having a learning disability.

Her English language level has affected her regular interactions with others.

“Even when I say ‘vaccine’ at the pharmacy, they don't understand,” she said. “So it was really frustrating me, making me sad because the other person cannot understand my pronunciation. So I thought of coming to class. In that way, I can learn.”

Taking this class has been a way to improve and get closer to her goal of working with animals as a pet groomer. Jesudason recites the maxim “practice makes perfect.”

Another student who goes by the name Ryder Freeman has found it to be a safe haven, a place to make friends. Freeman moved to the U.S. in 2022 and said he is a political refugee from China.

Before taking this class, Freeman stayed home and didn’t know that many people.

“After I took this class, I met my classmates and made friends with them,” he said. “That's a big change to my life.”

The Columbia Memorial Space Center in Downey held a groundbreaking ceremony Monday for a roughly 40,000-square-foot expansion that will include indoor and outdoor science learning areas and space for special exhibits.

The centerpiece of the buildout will include an interactive display of the Inspiration space shuttle mockup, where visitors can go inside the cargo bay.

Built in 1972, the 35-foot-tall model made of wood, plastic and aluminum functioned as a prototype and fitting tool for all of the orbiters that launched into space.

“We’re super excited to be able to put it on display for the public, really for the first time in forever,” Ben Dickow, president and executive director of the Columbia Memorial Space Center, told LAist.

The expansion will also allow for educational areas, where students can learn about the pioneering engineering and design work that went into building the model at Rockwell International in Downey.

The backstory

Last fall, after sitting in storage for more than a decade, the full-scale model was moved a few blocks to a temporary home.

The Inspiration space shuttle mockup was moved in sections to a temporary home last fall

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The Space Center said renovation work on the mock up will take months and include rehabs of its 60-foot cargo bay and flight deck.

Dickow said Downey is where all of the Apollo capsules that went to the moon and all of the space shuttles were designed and built.

“This is part of the L.A. story as much as entertainment or anything like that,” Dickow said, adding that it’s a legacy he feels like Angelenos sometimes forget. “The space craft that took humanity to the moon, the space craft that brought humanity into lower earth orbit and built the international space station, these are human firsts... and they all happened right here.”

What’s next? 

The Space Center is looking to raise $50 million that would go toward building plans, special exhibits and more.

Dickow said the new building that will house the space shuttle mockup should be open to the public in about two years.

By early next year, he said the plan is to have the shuttle model available for bi-monthly public visits as it undergoes renovation.

Pacific Palisades homeowners looking to sell high-end properties after the January fires could escape the city’s “mansion tax” under a proposal advanced Monday by a key committee of the Los Angeles City Council.

Measure ULA is a voter-approved tax on real estate selling for $5.3 million or more. The city uses the revenue for rent relief, eviction defense and affordable housing construction efforts.

Councilmember Traci Park, who represents the Palisades, said she has heard from hundreds of homeowners who say the tax is affecting their post-fire recovery plans.

“For some, recovery is going to mean leaving the Palisades,” Park said during Monday’s meeting of the Ad-Hoc Committee for L.A. Recovery. “In those instances — where a sale is by no means voluntary — I don't think we should impede that objective.”

Vote follows direction from mayor

Measure ULA levies a 4% tax on properties selling for more than $5.3 million, and a 5.5% tax on properties selling for more than $10.6 million.

Last month, Mayor Karen Bass sent a letter asking the City Council to pass an ordinance giving the city’s director of finance the power to exempt Palisades homeowners from Measure ULA within three years of the fire.

In her letter, Bass wrote: “After adoption of the ordinance, I will issue an executive directive instructing the Director of Finance to promulgate a temporary exemption that provides much needed relief for those Palisades residents who owned and occupied residential property in the Palisades at the time of the fire, avoids unintended loopholes, and furthers the purpose of ULA.”

Bass’ office said the letter was sent following a meeting she had with Rick Caruso, the billionaire real estate developer, former mayoral candidate and founder of Steadfast L.A., an organization focused on fire recovery.

How we got here

Any final tax exemption would still need further action from the City Council and Mayor’s Office to take effect.

The proposal cleared Monday’s committee in a 3-0 vote. But it needs further consideration by the full City Council before any ordinance is passed. Bass would then need to issue an executive directive with full details of the post-fire tax exemption.

This isn’t the first effort to cancel the “mansion tax” for Pacific Palisades homeowners. A state bill introduced days before the end of Sacramento’s legislative session would have carved out sales in the fire zone.

But the exemption would have only gone through if efforts to repeal the tax either failed to qualify for the ballot or were dropped by the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association, an anti-mansion tax group. The bill also would have sought to address concerns about depressed housing development in the city by lowering the tax on sales of recently constructed apartments.

Bass said she asked Sacramento lawmakers to shelve the bill so more amendments could be made in the upcoming legislative session.

NBC late night host Seth Meyers has consistently made President Donald Trump the target of his jokes. The latest bits include Meyers teasing about a recent decline in Republican support of the president and his recent comments to Fox News host Laura Ingraham that America doesn't have enough skilled workers for certain jobs.

Trump seems to have had enough with Meyers, as he had with late night hosts Stephen Colbert and Jimmy Kimmel.

"NBC's Seth Meyers is suffering from an incurable case of Trump Derangement Syndrome (TDS)," the president posted on Truth Social on Nov. 15. "He was viewed last night in an uncontrollable rage, likely due to the fact that his "show" is a Ratings DISASTER. Aside from everything else, Meyers has no talent, and NBC should fire him, IMMEDIATELY!"

Less than an hour later Trump's tirade was reposted on X by Brendan Carr, chairperson of the Federal Communications Commission, the independent agency that regulates radio, TV, wire, satellite and cable across the country.

While the FCC can fine broadcasters for indecency, it has limited authority over content. According to its website, "The limitations on the FCC's power to restrict or ban speech begin with the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which decrees that the federal government 'shall make no law … abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press.'"

Carr's repost drew quick criticism.

In an email to NPR, Lisa Macpherson, policy director at the consumer advocacy group Public Knowledge, wrote that Carr's intervention is "a distortion of the FCC's authorities in an effort to force the media to toe the line for President Trump."

Former congressman and free speech advocate Justin Amash wrote on X, "The government shouldn't be pressuring companies with respect to late night hosts, comedians, or anyone else for monologues, commentary, or jokes—whether their words are insightful, ignorant, funny, boring, politically neutral, or politically biased."

The FCC also oversees major corporate media mergers like the one it recently approved between Paramount Global and Skydance Media. Not long after Trump called for the firing of Colbert, CBS, which is owned by Paramount Global, announced The Late Show with Colbert would end in May of 2026. In a statement, CBS said the decision was purely financial.

NBC's Late Night with Seth Meyers is a property of NBCUniversal, which is owned by Comcast, one of the corporations expected to bid on Warner Bros. Discovery, a sale that will likely face scrutiny from the Trump Administration.

NPR has reached out to NBCUniversal and the FCC for comment.
Copyright 2025 NPR

In July, federal immigration agents took Milagro Solis-Portillo to Glendale Memorial Hospital just outside Los Angeles after she suffered a medical emergency while being detained. They didn’t leave.

For two weeks, Immigration and Customs Enforcement contractors sat guard in the hospital lobby 24 hours a day, working in shifts to monitor her movements, her attorney Ming Tanigawa-Lau said.

ICE later transferred the Salvadoran woman to Anaheim Global Medical Center, against her doctor’s orders and without explanation, her attorney said. There, Tanigawa-Lau said, ICE agents were allowed to stay in Solis-Portillo’s hospital room round-the-clock, listening to what should have been private conversations with providers. Solis-Portillo told her attorney that agents pressured her to say she was well enough to leave the hospital, telling her she wouldn’t be able to speak to her family or her attorney until she complied.

“She described it to me as feeling like she was being tortured,” Tanigawa-Lau said.

Legal experts say ICE agents can be in public areas of a hospital, such as a lobby, and can accompany already-detained patients as they receive care, illustrating the scope of federal authority. Detained patients, however, have rights and can try to advocate for themselves or seek legal recourse.

Earlier this year, California set aside $25 million to fund legal services for immigrants, and some local jurisdictions — including Orange County, Long Beach, and San Francisco — have put money toward legal aid efforts. The California Department of Social Services lists some legal defense nonprofits that have received funds.

Sophia Genovese, a supervising attorney and clinical teaching fellow at Georgetown Law, said law enforcement officers, including federal immigration agents, can guard and even restrain a person in their custody who is receiving health care, but they must follow constitutional and health privacy laws regardless of the person’s immigration status. Under those laws, patients can ask to speak with medical providers in private and to seek and speak confidentially with legal counsel, she said.

“ICE should be stationed outside of the room or outside of earshot during any communication between the patient and their doctor or medical provider,” Genovese said, adding that the same applies to a patient’s communication with lawyers. “That’s what they’re supposed to do.”

ICE Guidelines

When it comes to communication and visits, ICE’s standards state that detainees should have access to a phone and be able to receive visits from family and friends, “within security and operational constraints.” However, these guidelines are not enforceable, Genovese said.

If immigration agents arrest someone without a warrant, they must tell them why they’ve been detained and generally can’t hold them for more than 48 hours without making a custody determination. A federal judge recently granted a temporary restraining order in a case in which a man named Bayron Rovidio Marin was monitored by immigration agents in a Los Angeles hospital for 37 days without being charged and was registered under a pseudonym.

In the past, perceived violations by agents could be reported to ICE leadership at local field offices, to the agency’s headquarters, or to an oversight body, Genovese said. But earlier this year, the Department of Homeland Security cut staffing at ombudsman offices that investigate civil rights complaints, saying they “obstructed immigration enforcement by adding bureaucratic hurdles.”

The assistant secretary for public affairs at DHS, Tricia McLaughlin, said that agents arrested Marin for being in the country illegally and that he admitted his lack of legal status to ICE agents. She said agents took him to the hospital after he injured his leg while trying to evade federal officers during a raid. She said officers did not prevent him from seeing his family or from using the phone.

“All detainees have access to phones they can use to contact their families and lawyers,” she said.

McLaughlin said the temporary restraining order was issued by an “activist” judge. She did not address questions about staffing cuts at the ombudsman offices.

DHS also said Solis-Portillo was in the country illegally. The department said she had been removed from the United States twice and arrested for the crimes of false identification, theft, and burglary.

“ICE takes its commitment to promoting safe, secure, humane environments for those in our custody very seriously,” McLaughlin said. “It is a long-standing practice to provide comprehensive medical care from the moment an alien enters ICE custody. This includes access to medical appointments and 24-hour emergency care.”

Protections in California

Anaheim Global Medical Center did not respond to a request for comment. In a statement, Dignity Health, which operates Glendale Memorial Hospital, said it “cannot legally restrict law enforcement or security personnel from being present in public areas which include the hospital lobby/waiting area.”

California enacted a law in September that prohibits medical establishments from allowing federal agents without a valid search warrant or court order into private areas, including places where patients receive treatment or discuss health matters. But many of the most high-profile news reports of immigration agents at health care facilities have involved detained patients brought in for care.

Erika Frank, vice president of legal counsel for the California Hospital Association, said hospitals have always had law enforcement, including federal agents, bring in people they’ve detained who need medical attention.

Hospitals will defer to law enforcement on whether a patient needs to be monitored at all times, according to association spokesperson Jan Emerson-Shea. If law enforcement officers overhear medical information about a patient while they’re in the hospital, it doesn’t constitute a patient-privacy violation, she added.

“This is no different, legally, from a patient or visitor overhearing information about another patient in a nearby bed or emergency department bay,” Emerson-Shea said in a statement.

She didn’t address whether patients can demand privacy with providers and attorneys, and she said hospitals don’t tell family and friends about the detained patient’s location, for safety reasons.

Sandy Reding, who is president of the California Nurses Association and visited the Glendale facility when Solis-Portillo was there, said nurses and patients were frightened to see masked immigration agents in the hospital’s lobby. She said she saw them sitting behind a registration desk where they could hear people discuss private health information.

“Hospitals used to be a sanctuary place, and now they’re not,” she said. “And it seems like ICE has just been running rampant.”

The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors is scheduled to vote Nov. 18 on a proposal to provide more protections for detainees at county-operated health facilities. These include limiting the ability of immigration officials to hide patients’ identities, allowing patients to consent to the release of information to family members and legal counsel, and directing staff to insist immigration agents leave the room at times to protect patient privacy. The county would also defend employees who try to uphold its policies.

Solis-Portillo’s lawyer, Tanigawa-Lau, said her client ultimately decided to self-deport to El Salvador rather than fight her case, because she felt she couldn’t get the medical care she needed in ICE custody.

“Even though Milagro’s case is really terrible, I’m glad that there’s more awareness now about this issue,” Tanigawa-Lau said.