The Brief

When I moved from Mexico to L.A. a year ago, people would often ask me what region I was from. When I said Colima, there was usually a short, awkward moment as people tried to place it — and failed.

"It’s a tiny state,” I'd say, “in between Michoacán and Jalisco on the west coast.” Ah. They'd enthusiastically nod. They got it.

Colima may be small, but it punches above its weight. It’s got the largest seaport in Mexico, the port of Manzanillo, and volcanoes, which boast both fire and snow.

One of its cities, Tecomán, is known as the "lime capital of the world" with its own key lime (Colima green diamond). The region also produces Sal de Cuyutlán, a crunchy, coarse hand harvested sea salt.

All that adds up to incredibly fresh seafood and distinctive flavors. As I settled into L.A., I realized I missed it. Could I find the taste of Colima in the city?

Intern Mariana Cardenas, at Tejuinos Colima, happy to drink her tejuino.

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I finally tracked it down in the guise of two food trucks: one on Alameda Street and one in Boyle Heights..

Tejuinos Colima

I found out about Juan Casillas’ food truck from my mother back in Colima. He’s from Manzanillo like us. He's had his food truck for 23 years, on Alameda Street, near the exit of the Jordan High School parking lot.

When I tasted his tejuino for the first time a few months ago, I felt I’d been transported to the vibrant streets of Santiago’s market where I usually got it back home.

Casillas preparing tejuino as done in the streets of Colima.

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Tejuino is a traditional drink made of corn dough (masa), piloncillo (cone-shaped brown sugar), the region's Sal de Cuyutlán sea salt, and limes. It’s the perfect refreshing summer drink, with just the right mix of sweet and sour, and a thick, nourishing texture.

Colima's famous sea salt

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You can get tejuino in other states, like neighboring Jalisco, but there it’s fermented, so it’s alcoholic. In Colima, it’s not.

In 2002, after Casillas had tried, and failed, to find a Colima tejuino in L.A. — "all the tejuino stands were from Jalisco,” he says — he saw an opening to introduce it to the city. He started his stand with $50, a pot and a cooler full of ice.

Since then, people who hail from all over Mexico and even different U.S. states come to get his tejuino, telling him they can’t find another one like his. “I try tejuino in other places to know with whom I am competing,” Casillas said, with a laugh, affirming that yes, his tejuino is better than all the others.

He says the recent ICE raids have affected his business, because people are afraid to go outside. But he's noticing that his frequent customers send their kids to get the drinks, and he also offers delivery on Uber Eats.

Mariscos El Colima

As a coastal port, Colima is known for its quality seafood. That’s the focus of Mariscos El Colima, a food truck in Boyle Heights off Olympic Boulevard between Orme Ave and Camulos Street.

A half dozen of blood clams from Mariscos El Colima.

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Prepared queen clam.

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When I went there for the first time, I was surprised by the breadth of the fresh seafood they offered. 80% of their products are Mexican, which are driven up fresh from Mexico weekly. Even though I’d grown up on the coast, there were some varieties I didn’t know even existed, like axe callus, a scallop, and different types of clams such as chocolate clam, pismo clam and queen clam.

Oyster shots from Mariscos El Colima.

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Siblings Mercedes Diaz and Raul Diaz started the business four years ago. Mercedes had been a waitress for 20 years at a Mexican restaurant in L.A., and Raul had worked as a plumber.

Their mother had been an entrepreneur in Mexico and pushed them to be their own bosses. They figured since they were from the coast, "we knew how to make seafood,” and that since Colima was little known and underrated, they could offer something different.

They're known for innovating and experimenting with different ingredients, like their oyster shots which include oysters, shrimp and their specially-made sauce.

One of their most popular items is the “levanta muertos” cocktail, considered a cure for a hangover, which contains blood clam, shrimp, octopus, abalone, axe callus and the sauce.

Ernesto de la Cruz, a customer waiting for food at the truck, said he goes there because "it's not easy to find the freshness, authentic flavor and variety of seafood in L.A." Meanwhile, Mercedes says, other customers drive in from Bakersfield, Fontana and even San Diego.

That kind of loyalty is what the Diaz siblings are hoping for — interacting and building a relationship with their customers is a priority.

“We want a well known customer, not a one day customer,” Mercedes said.

The Los Angeles World Cup host committee has quietly posted its guidance on human rights after months of speculation over where the plan was and when it would be published.

Advocates had pushed the committee, an arm of the Los Angeles Sports & Entertainment Commission, to produce its plan. But now that it's out, they're not satisfied with what they're seeing.

The human rights guidance is required by FIFA and outlined on the host committee's website. It includes a list of online resources including where to file complaints with various local and state level agencies and a summary of local, state and federal laws protecting human and civil rights. The committee is also touting a partnership with L.A. County in which people can call 211 to report a concern during the tournament.

"Los Angeles is weeks away from hosting one of the largest sporting events in the world, and yet what has been posted is not a plan,” Stephanie Richard, director of the Sunita Jain Anti‑Trafficking Initiative at Loyola Law School, said in a statement. “It is a list of laws and hotline numbers."

The human rights document also skirts fears around ICE and its potential presence at the tournament and surrounding celebrations. Todd Lyons, the agency's head, said earlier this year that ICE's investigatory branch will play a key role in security for the tournament.

But ICE and immigration enforcement aren't mentioned on the host committee's web page on human rights or in its outline of its approach to human rights. "Immigration status" only gets a mention in the list of existing anti-discrimination laws.

"It certainly could have been much stronger," Angelica Salas, executive director of the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights in Los Angeles, said of the plan. She added that her organization participated in a roundtable on the plan, and she was disappointed ICE and recent immigration sweeps weren't mentioned in the resulting document.

"In order for all of this to happen, immigrant workers are part of it," she said of the World Cup. "Your hotel workers, your service workers, stadium workers, drivers." 

LAist reached out to spokespeople for the host committee for comment via email, phone and text, but did not hear back in time for publication. FIFA's press team also did not respond to an email from LAist.

According to the host committee's website, the human rights plan is the result of coordination with the city and county of Los Angeles, the city of Inglewood, and 14 roundtable discussions held in the fall of 2025.

"As a non-profit organization, the Host Committee’s role is primarily and necessarily focused on aligning and collaborating with governmental and non-governmental organizations," the document sums up the committee's approach.

The plan also promises more actions, including "Know Your Rights" training for L.A. residents and visitors and "Know Your Responsibilities" training for businesses and vendors. The committee also says it will develop a "rapid response" strategy to respond to potential problems at the tournament.

Available details on those plans were scant. And with the tournament just 30 days away, labor unions and community groups are continuing to voice concerns about potential ICE presence at SoFi Stadium and other potential consequences of the tournament coming to town.

The mayor of Arcadia has agreed to plead guilty to a charge she acted as an agent for China, federal prosecutors announced Monday. She has resigned from her position with the city.

Eileen Wang, 58, faces one count of acting as an illegal agent of a foreign government, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office. The charge carries a potential sentence of up to 10 years in federal prison.

What we know about the criminal case

According to the U.S. Attorney’s Office, Wang and Yaoning “Mike” Sun of Chino Hills worked at the direction of the Chinese government and with individuals based in the U.S. to promote pro-People’s Republic of China propaganda in the United States. Those actions occurred between 2020 and 2022, prosecutors said.

According to federal prosecutors, Wang and Sun operated a website — known as U.S. News Center — billed as a news source for the local Chinese American community in Los Angeles County. They posted content on the site, described as "pre-written articles," based on directives from Chinese government officials.

Sun, 65, pleaded guilty in October 2025 in federal court to acting as an illegal agent of a foreign government. He is serving a four-year federal prison sentence.

Prosecutors also said Wang communicated with John Chen, whom they described as “a high-level member of the [Chinese government] intelligence apparatus,” in November 2021, and asked him to post an article from her website.

In a group chat, Wang referenced the article and wrote: “This is what the Ministry of Foreign Affairs wants to send,” according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office.

Chen pleaded guilty in New York to acting as an illegal agent of the People’s Republic of China and conspiracy to bribe a public official. In 2024, he was sentenced to 20 months in federal prison.

What's next

Wang, who was elected to the City Council in November 2022, was expected to make her first appearance in U.S. District Court Monday afternoon.

Citing a plea agreement, prosecutors said she's expected to enter the guilty plea within the next few weeks.

Arcadia's mayor is selected from the elected council members. A post on the city's website announced that Wang had resigned her position as of Monday and that a new mayor would be picked from the remaining council members at the next meeting.

The Supreme Court on Monday gave itself more time to consider a national ban on telemedicine access to the abortion pill mifepristone.

Justice Samuel Alito extended an earlier order he issued by three more days, so rules for prescribing mifepristone online or through the mail remain in effect through Thursday at a minimum.

The case at issue

The tumult over the future of telemedicine access to mifipristone started on May 1 with a ruling from the U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals. That ruling re-instituted prescribing rules from before the pandemic that required patients to receive mifepristone in person in a doctor's office or clinic.

The Food and Drug Administration determined that the rule was medically unnecessary in 2021. The state of Louisiana sued last fall, arguing that telemedicine access undermines the state's abortion ban.

What is telemedicine abortion?

The telemedicine abortion process starts with a patient connecting with a healthcare provider on the phone or online. If the patient is eligible, that provider can prescribe two medications — mifepristone and another pill called misoprostol. Patients can pick up the medicine at a local pharmacy, or providers can mail the drugs to a patient's home.

That access is a big part of the reason why the number of abortions nationally has actually increased since the Supreme Court overturned the constitutional right to abortion in 2022. Now, most abortions in the U.S. use this combination of medications, and one quarter happen via telemedicine.

After the 5th Circuit ruling, some providers said they would continue offering telemedicine access to abortion medication using a different protocol that involves higher doses of misoprostol and no mifepristone.

Researchers say that method is just as safe and effective, but tends to cause more pain for patients and more side effects, like nausea and diarrhea. Misoprostol has other medical uses, such as treating gastric ulcers and hemorrhage, and has been on the market longer than mifepristone. It is likely to remain fully accessible, even if mifepristone is restricted.

Since the FDA's prescribing rules for medications apply to the whole country, a change to the rules about how mifepristone can be accessed has national impact. That means it affects states with constitutionally-protected access to abortion, states with criminal bans, like Louisiana, and all states in between.

States' rights

Nearly two dozen Democratic-led states submitted an amicus brief in this case, writing that the appeals court decision put the policy choices of states with bans above the choices of states "that have made the different but equally sovereign determinations to promote access to abortion care."

There are also stakes related to the power of FDA and other expert agencies to set rules. While the Trump administration's FDA did not respond to the Supreme Court's request for briefs, a group of former leaders of the agency, who served under mainly Democratic and some Republican presidents, wrote about this in an amicus brief.

They defended the FDA's process in approving the medication and modifying the rules for prescribing it, and say the appeals court decision "would upend FDA's gold-standard, science-based drug approval system."

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