The Brief

Of all the mysteries that the massive James Webb Space Telescope has seen so far in the early universe, among the strangest are objects that astronomers now call "little red dots."

Like the nickname suggests, these celestial objects appear to be compact — much smaller than our Milky Way galaxy. And their color is reddish, although their light signatures are also unusual in ways that astronomers have struggled to explain.
Now, at a conference of the American Astronomical Society being held this week in Maryland, astronomers say they combed through public data from the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) to collect hundreds of examples of little red dots.
Their study shows that these cosmic oddballs appear to be a common but transient feature of the early universe.

"Essentially, all of them exist back when the universe was a billion years old or younger, and then they petered out," says Dale Kocevski, an astrophysicist at Colby College.

They may only seem to go away because their appearance changes, he says, and "it could be that we're seeing the formation of the core of today's massive galaxies."
Large galaxies that exist today almost all seem to have a supermassive black hole at their centers, he notes. A subsample of little red dots that researchers examined in more detail showed light signatures that indicate hot gasses spiraling down into a growing black hole.
That could mean the little red dots are, "a potential building block, or maybe the first stage, of producing the galaxies and black holes that we see today," says Kocevski.

Breaking the universe

The enormous $10 billion JWST is about a million miles away from Earth, and it's able to detect extremely faint objects that the Hubble Space Telescope and ground-based telescopes never saw.
When the little red dots first showed up in some of JWST's early observations, in December of 2022, it was a surprise.
These faint objects are so far away that the light has to travel for billions of years before it's finally detected by the telescope, which means the light reveals how the universe appeared in its early stages of development.

The bright little red dots initially looked to be massive galaxies putting out dust-reddened starlight, but no one could understand how Milky Way-sized galaxies could have built up that fast, so soon after the Big Bang.
People started talking "about how JWST was breaking the existing theories of universe formation," says Kocevski, "because these things were too massive too early on in the history of the universe."
In early 2023, however, he and some colleagues examined a little red dot and detected light signatures indicative of gas rapidly spinning down into a black hole.
So they wondered if it could be that the light from little red dots could be coming from both a growing black hole and the stars in a small host galaxy, rather than stars alone.

"They may not be these massive galaxies," says Kocevski.
He and his colleagues wanted to see if other little red dots had signs of a black hole lurking within, so they searched through public data, hunting for as many objects with the specific features of little red dots that they could find.
Looking at 341 of them revealed that these objects mostly appeared around 600 million years after the big bang and then declined, disappearing by about 1.5 billion years ago.

Hotly debated

A subset of a couple dozen little red dots had additional data available, 80% of them showed those same signs of gas spiraling into a black hole, Kocevski says.
"So it does look like there's a good chance that these are actively accreting supermassive black holes," he says. "The thing that's surprising is they're just really, really common. They're much more common than we would have anticipated."

Still, some astronomers continue to believe that little red dots are, in fact, massive galaxies, he says.
Little red dots aren't bright in X-ray light, which would normally be seen from black holes. It may be, however, that gases are obscuring this form of light.
"It's been a very, very healthy academic debate as to what's going on with these things," he says. "It's exciting because rarely do you find a population of objects where you say, 'I simply don't know what's going on here.' "
Copyright 2025 NPR

Every January, the open-air downtown food fair reopens after its winter break and announces new additions to its carefully selected group of regular vendors.

This year’s new vendor class demonstrates the resilience of L.A.'s independent food scene, ranging from a Grammy-nominated producer's Persian-influenced pizza to Southern fried fish celebrating Black American culinary traditions, to an LAist 2025 Tournament of Cheeseburger heavyweight contender.

The reopening also marks the start of Smorgasburg LA's 10th anniversary year, and will feature 41 returning vendors, who've helped build the regular event into a fun, family-friendly opportunity to try new, often cutting-edge food you may not be familiar with.

Doors open from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. at DTLA’s The Row, with free entry and free parking for the first two hours.

A new year

General manager Zach Brooks said this is his favorite time of year. "We add the new vendors at the beginning of the new year, everyone's excited."

Vendors apply through Smorgasburg's website, and the team meets with every applicant to taste their food before acceptance. Brooks said it's not a vetting process like "Shark Tank" but rather a matter of seeing if it's a good fit. Competition remains fierce, with many more applicants than available spots.

"I think it's just a testament to L.A. and the resilience of people who love this business and have a passion for it, and are going to continue to persevere and start their businesses and want to be out there selling food," Brooks said.

Here are a few highlights:

Viral orange chicken sandwich 

Long Beach-based Terrible Burger becomes Smorgasburg's new permanent burger vendor after standout appearances at LAist's Tournament of Cheeseburgers and the market's rotating Smorgasburger Stand. The smashburger pop-up, run by husband-and-wife team Nicole and Ryan Ramirez, specializes in burgers that draw from pop culture and global influences. They've made waves with a Korean barbecue burger topped with bulgogi barbecue sauce and a viral orange chicken sandwich, previously available only at their Tuesday night residency at Long Beach's Midnight Oil, making its L.A. debut Sunday.

Terrible Burger's viral orange chicken sandwich makes its LA debut at Smorgasburg after being available only in Long Beach.

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Courtesy Terrible Burger

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"We have been big Smorgasburg fans for a really long time before we even started Terrible Burger. We would go to Smorgasburg on dates, just eat and hang out. And it was just always a little dream of, "oh, what if we ever sold food here?" Nicole Ramirez said.

Crispy fried snapper and thick-cut fries 

Orange County-based Hot Grease, run by Asha Starks, is among four vendors graduating from residencies to permanent status. The Southern fried fish pop-up celebrates Black American history through food that honors Starks' family heritage.

"Folks often forget that there are Black folks in Orange County. My family came to Orange County during the second wave of the Great Migration, and they settled in Santa Ana... my food is very cultural. And the story, I feel like, is just as important to highlight," Starks said.

Hot Grease's crispy buttermilk fried snapper with thick-cut fries and "Ill Dill" tartar sauce.

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Courtesy Hot Grease

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Hot Grease serves crispy buttermilk fried snapper with thick-cut fries and small-batch sauces like "Ill Dill" tartar. Honoring the fish fry's history as a site of mutual aid, Starks directs 3% of sales to the Potlikker Line, Hot Grease's reproductive justice mutual aid fund. For January, she's added fish and grits, black-eyed peas and collard greens.

Pizza with a Persian twist

Mamani Pizza brings studio-born energy to Smorgasburg LA with pies featuring Persian-inspired creativity.

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Courtesy Mamani Pizza

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Mamani Pizza, from the Grammy-nominated producer Farsi, part of the music production team Wallis Lane, started making Neapolitan-style pizzas at his West L.A. recording studio a year ago. What began as late-night pies for friends and artists became an underground hit. Most pizzas are traditional, but Farsi adds Persian touches like The Mamani, topped with ground wagyu koobideh, roasted Anaheim chilis, Persian herbs and pomegranate molasses.

Other new vendors

Banana Mama - Asian-inspired pudding
Barranco's Yogurt - Oaxacan fruit yogurt
Franzl's Franks - Austrian sausages
Melnificent Wingz - Gourmet chicken wings
Piruchi - Peruvian street food
RuRu's Golden Tea - Karak chai
Stick Talk - vegan corn dogs
SouuLA - Taiwanese breakfast concept
Unreal Poke - Hawaiian poke
Zindrew Dumpling Shop - Spicy wontons

In halting childcare and welfare benefits to hundreds of thousands of low-income Californians, the Trump administration says it’s “concerned by the potential for extensive and systemic fraud.”

“These concerns have been heightened by recent federal prosecutions,” states the funding freeze letters to California from Trump-appointed officials at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS).

When pressed for details about what specific prosecutions justify the freeze in California, administration officials have offered few specifics. Confirmed fraud concerning the targeted programs appears to be a tiny fraction of the total spending.

The letters don’t mention any prosecutions here in California, as the administration cites it as justification for cutting off billions of dollars in support for food, housing and childcare.

A spokesperson for the federal agency declined to comment when asked what prosecutions the letter refers to, and for the basis for the broader fraud concerns cited as the reason for cutting off funds.

Prosecutions that have been brought around child care benefits amount to a small fraction of 1% of the federal childcare funding California has received, according to a search of all case announcements on federal prosecutors’ websites covering the whole state. The U.S. Department of Justice, which oversees such prosecutions, has not responded to a request asking if additional cases exist.

At a news conference Friday, LAist asked Bill Essayli, the top federal prosecutor for the region, if he knew of any federal prosecutions of childcare benefit fraud besides a single 2023 case previously cited by federal officials. Essayli did not point to any other federal prosecutions. The region he oversees includes over half of California’s population, including the counties of L.A., Orange, Riverside and San Bernardino.

In a separate emailed response to questions from an NPR reporter, the White House pointed to an article about a separate case in San Francisco that did not indicate it involves the federal funds being frozen.

What’s not known is the scale of complaints federal authorities have received about California’s spending with these three programs, and to what extent cases will be brought in the future. It’s also unclear how problems with California’s spending on these programs compare with other states that are not being targeted with funding freezes.

Last year, a federal Government Accountability Office review found about three-quarters of states — 37 of 50 — had negative findings in audits about their oversight of the largest program the administration is freezing funding to in five blue states.

That federal program is called Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, or TANF.

Mississippi has an ongoing fraud scandal over misuse of $77 million in TANF and other welfare dollars — much of which was used to benefit wealthy athletes like former NFL quarterback Brett Favre.

Former pro wrestler Ted DiBiase Jr. is currently on trial in a federal case alleging he conspired to fraudulently get millions in TANF welfare dollars through sham contracts for services that were never provided, as part of Mississippi's fraud scandal.

Mississippi is not among the five states the Trump administration is freezing TANF funds to, all of which are run by Democrats.

One known federal case in California

In order to determine what federal prosecutions the administration is using to justify cutting California off from federal safety net programs, LAist ran searches through all announced cases over the past decade-plus by all four federal prosecutor offices in the state. It shows a total of one case mentioning childcare benefits fraud, brought in San Diego in 2023 over $3.7 million in alleged stolen funds.

The amount alleged to be stolen was equivalent to less than $1 out of every $10,000 California received from the funding the administration is freezing over the timeframe of the announcement search.

The federal agency that distributes the funds, HHS, has a nationwide watchdog office that investigates fraud in the programs being frozen. It’s known as the Office of Inspector General, or OIG.

The inspector general’s office has thousands of reports online about fraud and misspending across HHS’ vast programs nationwide.

But a search found no reports around problems with spending in California among the three programs impacted by the spending freeze.

“As your search confirms, there aren’t public OIG-released materials on fraud in these programs occurring in California,” said a spokesperson for the inspector general’s office.

That contrasts with Minnesota, where large-scale fraud cases have been brought in recent years over theft of federal dollars meant for food and other social services. An OIG report last year found Minnesota did not comply with requirements around documenting attendance and payment to childcare providers.

In an apparent error, one of the administration’s funding freeze letters to California asks for documents about Minnesota’s processes.

Criticism that Minnesota officials failed to prevent fraud in their state drove the state’s Democrat governor, Tim Walz — who ran for vice president against Donald Trump’s ticket in 2024 — to announce Monday he was dropping out of running for reelection.

That same day, the administration announced it was expanding the funding freeze to include California and three other Democrat-led states, in addition to Minnesota.

The following morning, President Trump alleged — without giving specifics — that corruption in California is worse than Minnesota.

“California, under Governor Gavin Newscum, is more corrupt than Minnesota, if that’s possible??? The Fraud Investigation of California has begun. Thank you for your attention to this matter! PRESIDENT DONALD J. TRUMP,” the president wrote on his social media platform Truth Social.

The White House has not responded to LAist requests for an interview with President Trump.

Governor Newsom has drawn criticism in recent years for vetoing a bill to more closely track spending and outcomes for tens of billions of state homelessness dollars, which had passed unanimously in the state Legislature.

CalWORKS

In response to NPR’s questions about the basis for the funding freeze, the White House’s Office of Management and Budget pointed to the San Diego case and a local prosecution by the San Francisco DA last year involving up to $400,000 in childcare funds.

It’s unclear if the San Francisco childcare case involved the same funding streams that are being frozen. The DA’s office and White House have not responded to a request for clarification.

The other, and by far largest, issue pointed to by the White House was described as $108 million lost from California’s welfare program, CalWORKS.

“CalWorks, a TANF recipient, had lost more than $108 million in cash benefits due to welfare fraud," the White House statement said with a link to a news release from the Orange County DA's Office.

LAist looked into it, and the situation is more complex. The DA’s news release says the losses are related to a scam called EBT card skimming.

That’s when scammers steal benefit card money from welfare recipients’ benefit cards. When that happens, the state covers the losses out of state funds, according to CalMatters.

The CalWORKS EBT cards are mostly funded by state and local dollars, according to state figures. About a third of the funding for those cards comes from TANF, the largest federal program being frozen.

The White House has not responded to follow-up questions.

EBT card skimming is an issue nationwide, not just the states where funds are being frozen, according to news reports.

Legal challenge

Trump has pardoned or commuted the sentences of several people convicted of large-scale frauds, including commuting the 20-year prison sentence of a man convicted in a case alleging $1.3 billion in fraudulent health claims to the federal government. The Justice Department called it the largest health care fraud scheme ever prosecuted up to that point.

At a news conference Thursday, Vice President J.D. Vance said the Justice Department would be creating a new high-level position to oversee fraud prosecutions. That official will be directly overseen by Trump and Vance, according to the vice president.

Later in the day, California Attorney General Rob Bonta announced a lawsuit seeking to stop the funding freeze, filed by California and the other blue states targeted by the freeze.

The next day — Friday — a federal judge granted a temporary restraining order preventing the freeze for now. Further arguments and decisions in the case are expected in the coming weeks.

NPR correspondent Jennifer Ludden contributed reporting to this story.

Hiring remained anemic in December, closing out the weakest year for job growth since the beginning of the pandemic.

U.S. employers added just 50,000 jobs last month, according to a report Friday from the Labor Department. Meanwhile, the unemployment rate dipped to 4.4%, from 4.5% in November, while job gains for October and November were also revised down by a total of 76,000 jobs.

For all of 2025, employers added 584,000 jobs — compared to 2 million new jobs in 2024. That meant that last year was the worst for employment growth since 2020.

Health care and hospitality were among the few industries adding jobs in December. Health care employment is generally immune from ups and downs in the business cycle.

Manufacturing continues to lose workers, cutting 8,000 jobs in December. Factories have been in a slump for the last 10 months, according to an index of manufacturing activity compiled by the Institute for Supply Management. The sector has been hit hard by President Trump's tariffs, since many domestic manufacturers rely on some foreign components.

"Morale is very low across manufacturing in general," said an unnamed factory manager quoted in this week's ISM report. "The cost of living is very high, and component costs are increasing with folks citing tariffs and other price increases."

The federal government added 2,000 jobs in December, but is still down 277,000 jobs from the beginning of the year. The government recorded big job losses earlier in the fall, when workers who accepted buyouts officially dropped off the government's payroll.

While unemployment remains low by historical standards, workers are increasingly nervous about job security. A survey last month by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York found workers slightly more worried about losing their job in the coming year, and less confident about finding a new job if they are laid off.

The slowdown in hiring makes people who already have jobs reluctant to give them up. The resulting lack of turnover means fewer job openings for young people and others trying to get a foot in the door.

Concern about the weakening job market prompted the Federal Reserve to cut its benchmark interest rate in December for the third time since September.
Copyright 2026 NPR