The Brief

Jets are blazing across the sky in and around Huntington Beach on the first day of the Pacific Airshow that starts Friday and continues over this weekend.

In recent years, more than half a million visitors have come out to watch eye-and-ear popping aerial demonstrations from the U.S. Air Force Thunderbirds and other renowned daredevils.

The event has also become a political lightning rod in the increasingly fractious beach city.

Why opinions are divided

Some say the airshow promoter got a suspiciously sweet deal in a recent legal settlement with the city. Others say Huntington Beach should support the airshow, and its hometown promoter, in any way it can.

At issue are questions of political quid pro quo, transparency and how cities determine whether and how much to support special events put on by private companies.

The backstory

Fans watch the 2021 Pacific Airshow in Huntington Beach.

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Here’s a guide to what happened, why this matters for residents and what’s to come.

First the shorthand timeline:

• In October 2021, the city canceled the final day of the three-day airshow after oil began gushing from an underwater pipeline and moving toward the Huntington Beach shoreline. 

• A year later, in October 2022, airshow organizer Kevin Elliott sued the city, saying the previous year's cancellation amounted to a breach of contract. Elliott also supported the election of new city council members who promised to support the airshow. 

• Then, earlier this year, that new city council majority approved a minimum $5.4 million settlement with Elliott plus a potential additional $2 million if the city recoups money from the companies responsible for the oil spill. 

About Huntington Beach politics

The strong and distinct reactions to the deal from residents and officials in this city of 200,000 residents illustrate intensifying political divisions. While Huntington Beach is traditionally conservative, the electorate had been trending more purple in recent years. Then, in November, voters handed a solid victory to four ardently conservative candidates.

Huntington Beach Mayor Tony Strickland, a Republican former state legislator who ran Larry Elder's 2020 presidential campaign, said the settlement was good for the city.

"Anything that brings in $70 million to our local economy, that's worth it," Strickland said, referring to an economic impact report on the 2022 airshow.

On the other side, City Councilmember Dan Kalmick, one of three Democrats on the council, said Huntington Beach taxpayers got a "horrible deal." He and the other two Democrats on the council voted against the airshow settlement.

"The settlement, as publicized, goes well beyond any exposure the city had for cancellation of one day of an airshow, which it didn't even do," Kalmick said. He said multiple authorities — state, federal and local — agreed the airshow had to be canceled so that monitoring and clean-up crews could get to work.

Kevin Elliott, organizer of the Pacific Airshow and CEO of event company Code Four.

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What the airshow organizer says

Elliott, for his part, says he regrets that the airshow has gotten wrapped up in local politics. (We should note that after we published this story, it was announced that former President Donald Trump would do a flyover as part of Friday’s airshow lineup. Trump is on his way to the California Republican Party convention in Anaheim.)

Elliot told us that, at heart, he's a "plane brain" who's especially excited this year to watch the F-22 Raptor do "things that an airplane shouldn't do, including flying backwards and all kinds of really cool stuff."

"I just want to put on a great event and I want to go back to running my business and having a good time," he told LAist. "And staying out of the newspaper. That would be my goal."

The start of the problems: The oil spill

On Friday, Oct. 1, 2021 coastal authorities got a call reporting an oil sheen off the coast of Huntington Beach. Amplify Energy, ultimately responsible for the spill, later said it found out Saturday morning about the pipeline leak from one of its offshore oil platforms.

A worker with Patriot Environmental Services stands near bags of oil collected throughout Sunday morning near the mouth of the Santa Ana River and Talbert Marsh.

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That same Saturday, the Pacific Airshow went on, as planned as local officials tried to understand the extent of the oil spill and whether and when it might reach shore. By afternoon, boaters watching the airshow from the ocean began reporting oil in the water.

City and state parks authorities closed the water at many of the area beaches to swimming and surfing.

That evening, then-Huntington Beach Mayor Kim Carr appeared at a news conference with the city's marine safety chief, Eric McCoy, and several other officials. Carr said a decision about whether to cancel the third and final day of the airshow would be made the following morning.

At the time, the leak was estimated to be around 126,000 gallons of oil, which McCoy said was considered a major spill by the U.S. Coast Guard. Later estimates revised that down to a much smaller amount, around 25,000 gallons.

On Sunday morning, Oct. 3, 2021, the city announced that the airshow was canceled "in order to facilitate clean-up coordination efforts, and given the potential health impacts from the ongoing situation."

Beaches were closed and remediation workers were dispatched to mop up the oil that had already washed up on the shore and into several sensitive wetland areas. The coast reeked of petroleum.

A sign keeps beachgoers off the sand.

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Impact of the 2021 cancellation

The airshow cancellation was devastating for Elliott. "It was probably one of the worst days of my professional life," Elliott said. "What we had put together in 2021 was essentially the Super Bowl of air shows."

Plus, the previous year, 2020, the entire airshow had been canceled because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Elliott, who also runs an event company called Code Four, said he lost "in the multi-millions" the day of the oil spill. "We put over $750,000 worth of catering in the trash," he said.

It was also upsetting for patrons, some of whom had spent hundreds or thousands of dollars on premium tickets for the last day of the show.

The airshow is free to watch from part of the city beach and nearby state beaches. But Elliott also sells tickets, for example, for seating on the Huntington Beach pier or for a private cabana on the beach. This year, prices range from $25 to more than $5,000 for a group.

Elliott said he eventually reimbursed everyone who had bought tickets "out of my own pocket."

The legal battle that followed

The following year, 2022, Elliott asked the city to give him a break on some of the fees and other expenses involved with putting on the airshow — as the city had in previous years. Specifically, the city had previously credited Elliott up to $110,000 in parking revenue generated over the airshow weekend toward his bill for permits, reserved parking, and extra public safety staff needed for the event.

Elliott's city bill for the 2022 airshow, according to a presentation at the time, was expected to be around $257,000.

This time, though, Elliott made a last-minute request that all of the city's parking revenue generated by the airshow be credited toward his bill, with no cap.

The city council at the time denied his request by a vote of 6 to 1 and decided to revoke the parking credit completely. City officials and staff at the time noted that Huntington Beach didn't grant this kind of credit to the organizers of any other big events in the city, including the U.S. Open of Surfing, which has drawn crowds similar in size to the airshow, although over a longer period of time.

Former Councilmember Mike Posey told LAist the parking "subsidy … was always supposed to be temporary" until Elliott could attract a corporate sponsor for the airshow. A smaller, previous iteration of the airshow, before Elliott took it over, was sponsored by Swiss watchmaker Breitling.

But Elliott saw the city's decision to revoke the parking subsidy as the latest in a series of efforts, starting with the 2021 post-oil spill cancellation, to shut the airshow down.

The following month, Elliott sued the city and then-Mayor Carr.

In his complaint, he alleged the 2021 cancellation amounted to a breach of contract and damaged the airshow's reputation. He also claimed that subsequent actions taken by Carr and the city, including removing the parking subsidy, were retaliation for Elliott raising concerns about the cancellation.

Elliott told LAist he felt slighted after investing heavily in the airshow to try and make it profitable and to bring tourism benefits to the city.

"I wish that the city had come forth and said, 'Hey, you've been a great partner to the city, you're a local kid … we understand that you've been damaged by this and we want to try to do the right thing.' But instead they basically told me to pound sand and left me with no choice but to protect my interests."

Initially, the city tried to get the lawsuit dismissed, claiming it had no factual basis. But then it seemed to do an abrupt about-face, settling with Elliott for at least $5.4 million, to be paid out incrementally through January 2029. What changed?

How the air show became a hot-button campaign issue

A seat on the Huntington Beach city council is generally considered a non-partisan position — a candidate's political party is not listed on the ballot. But Huntington Beach had traditionally had a conservative-leaning council. That changed after the 2020 election, but not the way you might think.

Tito Ortiz, a mixed martial arts fighter and staunch conservative, won a seat on the council in 2020 and then resigned six months later. In his place, the council appointed left-leaning attorney Rhonda Bolton, giving Huntington Beach's city government a majority Democrat block.

They passed pro-housing measures and voted to fly the Pride flag outside city hall every June — with the support of the council's moderate Republicans. A backlash ensued.

A group of residents attempted to recall six of the seven council members in 2021. But the effort failed to make it to the ballot. They set their sights on the 2022 general election.

The Lincoln Club and several other conservative political action committees coalesced around a slate of four conservative council candidates — Strickland, Casey McKeon, Pat Burns and Gracey Van Der Mark — dubbed by supporters the "Fab 4," plus city attorney Michael Gates, who was running for re-election. (Huntington Beach is one of the few cities in California where voters elect their city attorney.)

They paid for mailers and signs saying the candidates would "save" Huntington Beach — and "save" the airshow.

On Oct. 27, 2022, the candidates held a "victory rally" at the Huntington Beach pier. Elliott's company, Code Four, provided the sound and some of the signage for the rally, he said.

Elliott said the work was "pretty simple" and cost him less than the $1,089 that the four city council candidates claimed as in-kind contributions in campaign finance disclosures.

Elliott did not donate money directly to any of the four council candidates or city attorney Gates. (His company Code Four did give money, the maximum $4,900 allowed, to the 2022 winning campaigns of state Republican state legislators Diane Dixon and Janet Nguyen.)

"Franky, I supported them as much as I could without creating any kind of a conflict of interest for them," Elliott said of the council candidates. "Because, you know, they campaigned on saving the air show and I've invested millions and millions of dollars in saving this air show for the city, so our interests were pretty aligned in that regard."

But looking back — post-election and post-airshow settlement — some political opponents and civic watchdogs see the rally and Elliott's work on it as part of a suspicious pattern.

"I have substantial questions about the relationship between the four newly elected council members, the city attorney and Elliott," said Kalmick, one of the liberal council members.

Kalmick also pointed to several photos from the 2022 airshow posted to Facebook showing Elliott and his wife posing on the beach with the "Fab 4" candidates. (Elliott said he regularly invites candidates, council members and many others to the show, "Democrats, Republicans, my mom's friends, you know, my friends that were my teachers in the first grade.")

All four council candidates and city attorney Gates won their election in November.

The settlement and concerns about quid pro quo

In March 2023, Gates, the city attorney, filed a request in Orange County Superior Court to have Elliott's airshow cancellation lawsuit dismissed. Gates and deputy city attorney Lauren Rose argued that the city was "legally permitted to cancel the Airshow due to unforeseen circumstances rendering performance impossible due to health and safety reasons."

They also said this about Elliott's claim that revoking the parking subsidy was retaliation: "it is speculative and unsubstantiated how this was in any way connected to [Elliott's] negative comments regarding the City's reaction to the unexpected and disastrous oil spill."

But less than two months later, Gates, Elliott, Strickland and two of the other conservative council members held a news conference announcing a settlement. "Ladies and gentlemen, we saved the airshow," Strickland said to applause.

"The previous city council was not business-friendly and not airshow-friendly," he went on. "The Fab 4 …saved the airshow by putting the hard work and leadership required to solve this conflict."

In dollars, what they put in is $4,999,999 of city funds spread out over seven years, with the first payment of $1,999,000 due before July 31.

The city also agreed to:

• Forfeit $194,945 in fees still owed by Elliott for the 2021 airshow.
• Refund him $149,200 from the 2022 airshow, when the city council declined to give him the parking subsidy. 
• Reinstate the parking subsidy, starting at a minimum, rather than maximum, of $110,000. Plus, waive parking fees for up to 600 spaces for airshow setup and takedown.
• Pay Elliott up to an additional $2 million of any money the city recovers from the oil companies responsible for the 2021 spill. 

Those are the details in the settlement summary released to the public. Gates has declined to make the full settlement public, raising questions about what else the city may have agreed to.

A legal push for more transparency

Gina Clayton-Tarvin, a local school board member and former city council candidate, has sued Gates under state public records law in an effort to get the full settlement released.

Gates told LAist earlier this year that he hasn't released the full settlement agreement because there's still pending litigation in the airshow saga and doing so could compromise the city's position in that litigation. "But if a judge were to order the release of [the settlement], I'm happy to release it," Gates said.

Both sides of the settlement say it was a tough negotiation and neither side got everything they wanted. "We get a lot more as a city than we're giving out," Strickland said. "It's not even a close call."

Earlier this year, a former Huntington Beach mayor and a former planning commissioner tried to intervene to halt the settlement agreement. Thus far, they haven't been successful, although Lee Fink, a lawyer working with them, has said they haven't given up.

At the same time, Elliott hasn't dropped his lawsuit against former Mayor Carr for her role in canceling the 2021 airshow. In his complaint, he said Carr "unilaterally" canceled the airshow because of her personal feelings towards Elliott, and in order to garner media attention to “further her own political career.”

Carr told LAist earlier this year that the claim was bogus. "He's created a completely fantastic tale of somehow I unilaterally canceled the air show," she said. "As the mayor of Huntington Beach, you do not have the authority to issue permits, consequently, you don't have the authority to cancel permits."

She said she didn't understand why the city would offer millions to settle what she called "an easily dismissible lawsuit." Then she corrected herself.

"Well, I do understand why the new council majority would settle. I mean, [Elliott] is their friend, their ally," Carr said. "To me, it smacks of corruption, definitely feels like a pay to play."

What about the oil company responsible for the spill that caused the 2021 airshow to be canceled? Amplify Energy recently settled a $45 million class action lawsuit with impacted businesses and property owners.

Elliott's company was not part of that settlement, but he said he's been "in very intensive pre-litigation settlement discussions" with the company.

The city of Huntington Beach also plans to pursue money from Amplify. How much could come back to city coffers after the Pacific Airshow gets its $2 million cut is unknown.

Fink, the lawyer, said his clients would likely be enjoying the airshow this weekend. "No one’s against the Airshow," he wrote in an email. "The Airshow will go on regardless of the litigation. But people are against a $7 Million giveaway to a political supporter under the guise of a settlement agreement in a frivolous case."

Updated March 31, 2026 at 20:14 PM ET

President Trump said on Tuesday that the United States will be leaving Iran very soon, giving a two to three week timetable.

Trump's remarks came in response to a question about gas prices — which earlier Tuesday hit a national average of $4 a gallon. Asked what he would do about it, Trump said: "All I have to do is leave Iran, and we'll be doing that very soon, and they'll become tumbling down."

"I would say that within two weeks, maybe two weeks, maybe three," he added.

Trump also appeared to reverse previous promises about reopening the Strait of Hormuz.

"We'll be leaving very soon. And if France or some other country wants to get oil or gas, they'll go up through the strait, the Hormuz Strait, they'll go right up there, and they'll be able to fend for themselves. I think it'll be very safe, actually, but we have nothing to do with that. What happens with the strait? We're not going to have anything to do with it," he said.

Just on Monday, though, Trump offered this threat on social media over the strait reopening: "If for any reason a deal is not shortly reached, which it probably will be, and if the Hormuz Strait is not immediately 'Open for Business,' we will conclude our lovely 'stay' in Iran by blowing up and completely obliterating all of their Electric Generating Plants, Oil Wells and Kharg Island (and possibly all desalinization plants!), which we have purposefully not yet 'touched.'"

The White House later said Trump would speak to the nation about the war at 9 p.m. ET on Wednesday.

Here are more updates from the war in the Middle East:

Kidnapped journalist | Troop visit | Peacekeeper deaths | Iran | Rubio on Spain | Trump slams allies | Dalai Lama

American journalist kidnapped in Iraq

Iraqi authorities reported a foreign journalist was kidnapped in Baghdad Tuesday. It turned out to be an American freelance reporter, Shelly Kittleson, according to Al-Monitor, a Middle Eastern news site for which she has written articles.

Iraqi security forces said they intercepted a vehicle that crashed and arrested one of the suspected kidnappers, but are stilling searching for the kidnapped journalist and other suspects.

U.S. officials say they're working to get her released.

"The State Department previously fulfilled our duty to warn this individual of threats against them and we will continue to coordinate with the FBI to ensure their release as quickly as possible," Dylan Johnson, the assistant secretary of state for global public affairs, said on social media.

He said Americans, including media workers, have been advised not to travel to Iraq and should leave the country. The statement did not condemn the kidnapping or express concern.

Johnson said Iraqi authorities apprehended a suspect associated with Iran-backed Iraqi militia Kataib Hezbollah, believed to be involved in the kidnapping.

This comes as the U.S.-Israeli war in Iran enters its second month, and the fallout ricochets across the region.

Press freedom organizations expressed deep concern. The Committee to Protect Journalists called on "Iraqi authorities to do everything in their power to locate Shelley Kittleson, ensure her immediate and safe release, and hold those responsible to account."

Based in Rome, Kittleson has reported on Iraq, as well as Syria and Afghanistan, for years, according to Al-Monitor.

Reporters Without Borders said she is "very familiar with Iraq, where she stays for extended periods."

"RSF stands alongside her loved ones and colleagues during this painful wait," the organization said.

Al-Monitor said in a statement it is "deeply alarmed" by her kidnapping. "We stand by her vital reporting from the region and call for her swift return to continue her important work," it said.

U.S. defense secretary visits troops

U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth made an undisclosed trip to the Middle East to visit troops over the weekend. He did not divulge the location for the troops' safety.

"I spoke to Air Force and Navy pilots on the flight line who every day both deliver bombs deep into Iran, but also shoot down drones defending their base. Many had just returned from the skies of Iran and Tehran," he told reporters in a briefing Tuesday.

He said he "witnessed an urgency to finish the job" and tried to draw a comparison with America's earlier drawn-out wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

He said the U.S. is improving bunkers and layered air defenses as a priority to protect troops and aircraft.

This comes after more than a dozen U.S. service members were injured, several severely, and U.S. aircraft were damaged in Iranian strikes on a base in Saudi Arabia last Friday. The Pentagon says 13 U.S. service members have been killed and 300 wounded in what it calls Operation Epic Fury.

He repeated the administration's assertion that the U.S. is negotiating with Iran, despite Iranian officials' denial that talks are happening.

He said the U.S. prefers negotiations, but would not rule out using ground troops.

"In the meantime, we'll negotiate with bombs," Hegseth said. "Our job is to ensure that we compel Iran to realize that this new regime, this regime in charge is in a better place if they make that deal."

President Trump told the New York Post he is in talks with Iran's parliamentary speaker, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf.

Security Council meets after U.N. peacekeeper deaths

Countries denounced the killings of three U.N. peacekeepers in Lebanon this week as they met for an emergency meeting of the U.N. Security Council.

"These are sadly not the only dangerous incidents faced by UNIFIL's courageous peacekeepers," Jean-Pierre Lacroix, the head of U.N. peacekeeping, said, using the acronym for the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon. "There has been a worrying increase in denials of freedom of movement and aggressive behavior."

Lacroix said initial findings suggested two Indonesian peacekeepers were killed Monday in a roadside explosion in southern Lebanon. A day earlier another peacekeeper from Indonesia was killed when a projectile hit a U.N. base, Lacroix said.

Their deaths came as Israeli forces have invaded Lebanon, intensifying a second front in the war in the Middle East. Israel says it is targeting the Iran-backed Lebanese militant group Hezbollah.

The U.N. has not pinned blame and is investigating the incidents.

Ahead of the Security Council meeting, Israel's ambassador to the U.N., Danny Danon, expressed condolences for the Indonesian peacekeepers' deaths.

Displaced people warm up around a fire outside their tent along Beirut's seafront area on March 30, 2026.

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Danon blamed Hezbollah for laying explosive devices that killed two peacekeepers on Monday.

U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Mike Waltz paid tribute to the Indonesian peacekeepers and urged Security Council members not to jump to conclusions but to allow the U.N. to investigate.

Indonesia's foreign minister called for a swift, thorough and transparent investigation.

Iran executions, Starlink arrests

Meanwhile, Iran says it has arrested 46 people who were selling Starlink internet connections — one of the few ways that people in Iran have been able to connect to the global internet while authorities block communication. Starlink allows users to connect directly to the internet via satellite, bypassing government firewalls.

Global internet monitor NetBlocks said the country's "internet blackout has entered day 32."

"Extended digital isolation is bringing new challenges for Iranians, from expired domains and accounts to unpatched servers on a degrading national intranet," it said on X.

Iran said it executed two people who had taken part in opposition activities as well as two citizens it accused of spying for the U.S. and Israel.

Rubio accuses Spain's prime minister of "bragging"

Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Monday responded to news that Spain had closed its airspace to U.S. planes involved in the Iran war by lashing out at the NATO partner. In an interview with Al Jazeera, Rubio answered a question about whether the EU and NATO countries had "betrayed the U.S." by focusing on Spain, a NATO member who has publicly adopted a position opposing the war in Iran.

Gas prices are displayed at a Mobil gas station on March 30, 2026 in Pasadena, California. The average price of one gallon of regular self-service gasoline rose to $5.99 today in Los Angeles County, climbing from $4.69 one month ago, amid the ongoing war with Iran.

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"We have countries like Spain, a NATO member that we are pledged to defend, denying us the use of their airspace and bragging about it, denying us the use of our – of their bases," Rubio said.

Earlier on Monday, Spain Defense Minister Margarita Robles said the country had closed its airspace to U.S. planes involved in the Iran war. It is unclear when the closure started — Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez had hinted at the measure during a parliamentary debate on March 25.

The weekend the U.S. and Israel launched the attack on Iran, flight records showed at least 15 in-flight refueling planes leaving two jointly operated military bases in the south of Spain after not being allowed to provide support for the military action in Iran. Robles later confirmed the decision by the Spanish Government. That triggered a spat between President Trump and Spain's leadership the week after the war started. Trump said from the Oval Office that he would cut off all trade with Spain if the Spanish government did not allow U.S. forces to use the jointly operated bases. In response, Sánchez doubled down on his stance on the war in the Middle East.

Sánchez has relied on his opposition to the war, making it his main platform at the domestic level. Sánchez's Socialist Party has struggled to keep a government coalition from breaking apart, as he faces pressure to keep his party's hopes alive ahead of a parliamentary election due in 2027.

Trump slams allies

President Trump criticized France and the United Kingdom, among others, on his social media platform.

"All of those countries that can't get jet fuel because of the Strait of Hormuz, like the United Kingdom, which refused to get involved in the decapitation of Iran, I have a suggestion for you: Number 1, buy from the U.S., we have plenty, and Number 2, build up some delayed courage, go to the Strait, and just TAKE IT," Trump wrote on Truth Social.

Trump had asked allies for help after Iran largely blockaded the vital waterway, sending up oil and gas prices. But they have been hesitant to join in the war, with British Prime Minister Keir Starmer repeating again this week that Britain would not get involved.

"You'll have to start learning how to fight for yourself, the U.S.A. won't be there to help you anymore, just like you weren't there for us. Iran has been, essentially, decimated. The hard part is done. Go get your own oil!" Trump's post concluded.

He also said France "wouldn't let planes headed to Israel, loaded up with military supplies, fly over French territory." and called the country "VERY UNHELPFUL."

Dalai Lama calls for peace

Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama on Tuesday posted an appeal for an end to war in the Middle East.

"History has shown us time and again that violence only begets more violence and is never a lasting foundation for peace," he said on his official account on X.

"An enduring resolution to conflict, including the ones we see in the Middle East or between Russia and Ukraine, must be rooted in dialogue, diplomacy and mutual respect — approached with the understanding that, at the deepest level, we are all brothers and sisters," he said.

He said he was adding his plea to one made at the Vatican by Pope Leo during his Palm Sunday Mass, adding: "His call for the laying down of arms and the renunciation of violence resonated profoundly with me, as it speaks to the very essence of what all major religions teach."

Carrie Kahn in Tel Aviv, Israel, Lauren Frayer in Beirut, Jennifer Pak in Shanghai, Emily Feng in Van, Turkey, Miguel Macias in Seville, Spain, Kate Bartlett in Johannesburg, Jane Arraf in Amman, Jordan, Quil Lawrence in New York, Giles Snyder, Michele Kelemen and Alex Leff in Washington contributed to this report.
Copyright 2026 NPR

The Los Angeles region’s homelessness agency will miss a Tuesday deadline for submitting its federally required annual audit of the agency’s financial records, which could jeopardize its federal funding.

LAHSA executives blamed the delay on a “perfect storm” of leadership changes and competing priorities within LAHSA’s finance department, including an L.A. County review of LAHSA’s delayed payments to contractors.

“Our staff made a good-faith effort to meet the deadline,” interim CEO Gita O’Neill said at a LAHSA Commission meeting Tuesday. “However, over the past year, we've experienced several transitions. As a result, we could not get all the required materials to the auditors as quickly as needed.”

Each year, LAHSA, like all non-federal agencies and organizations that get substantial federal dollars, is required to hire an outside auditor to determine whether it’s properly tracking and reporting the taxpayer funds it manages.

LAHSA’s single audit report for last fiscal year was due March 31, nine months after fiscal year 2024-2025 ended. Earlier this month, LAHSA officials said they were on track to meet the March 31 deadline.

Justin Measley, lead auditor for the firm CliftonLarsonAllen, had warned that LAHSA was months behind schedule turning over records.

At a meeting Tuesday, Measley explained that because of LAHSA’s earlier delays, the firm would need at least an additional week to complete a quality-control review process.

“We’re moving at the fastest pace we possibly can,” Measley said.

On Tuesday, LAHSA officials said the single audit will be filed “at the earliest possible opportunity,” within the next few weeks.

Federal funds at risk

LAHSA manages hundreds of millions of federal dollars each year, through grants from the U.S. Office of Housing and Urban Development, or HUD.

O’Neill said the agency has been communicating with HUD officials regularly about the missed audit deadline and is “hoping for understanding.”

Janine Lim, LAHSA’s deputy chief financial officer, said she’s also been talking with HUD.

“They seem amenable to our situation and to our stated timelines,” Lim said. “So, we are hopeful that this will be a good outcome, despite having missed the deadline.”

HUD did not immediately respond to LAist’s request for comment Tuesday.

What went wrong 

Measley said LAHSA’s financial statements should have been turned over around last December, but LAHSA only submitted them this month, after blowing through multiple extended deadlines.

Measley said he contacted LAHSA’s governing commission about the overdue documents March 3.

He said he also previewed his firm’s findings, noting one “significant deficiency” in its draft report, related to LAHSA’s timeliness in detecting accounting errors.

LAHSA could contest those findings, officials said. That would add additional back-and-forth between the homelessness agency and accounting firm before the audit report is ready to file.

Justin Szlasa, a LAHSA commissioner who chairs the audit subcommittee, told LAHSA’s CEO he’s concerned that there was no time provided for LAHSA’s governing body to review the audit report.

“Next year, we will absolutely do that,” O’Neill responded. “I think this year, we were under the gun, and so we felt it was the most important thing was to get it uploaded on time.”

O’Neill said the agency hired accounting firm KPMG to help modernize LAHSA’s financial systems, with a focus on its contractor payments.

“We have an outside, trusted voice to help us create a system that works going forward because the system we have is not working at all, in finance,” O’Neill said.

Updated March 31, 2026 at 20:44 PM ET

President Trump on Tuesday escalated his efforts to reshape American elections, signing an executive order that seeks to create lists of U.S. citizens who are eligible to vote in each state, and instructing the U.S. Postal Service to send mail ballots only to verified voters.

Trump told reporters in the Oval Office that he believes the order is legally "foolproof." But election experts said the order was unconstitutional, and voting rights advocates and Democratic state officials quickly pledged to sue to block the order from going into effect.

A previous executive order on elections, signed about a year ago, has been blocked by federal judges who said the president lacked the constitutional authority to set voting policy.

The Constitution says the "Times, Places and Manner" of federal elections are determined by individual states, with Congress able to enact changes.

"This Executive Order is a disgusting overreach from the federal government and shows how little the Trump Administration understands about election administration," Adrian Fontes, the Democratic secretary of state of Arizona, said in a statement Tuesday. "We will not let this order stand without a fight and will meet the federal government in court," he added.

Arizona is among more than two dozen states Trump's Department of Justice has sued over access to sensitive voter data.

The Trump administration claims it needs the data to enforce states' voter list maintenance. Federal judges in three states have dismissed the Justice Department's lawsuits in those states.

In another case, a DOJ official admitted in court last week that the department plans to share that voter data with the Department of Homeland Security, to run it through the so-called SAVE system to search for noncitizens.

NPR has reported that some U.S. citizens have also been inaccurately flagged by SAVE.

How the executive order seeks to change voting

Trump has long railed — baselessly — about widespread illegal voting by noncitizens and fraud associated with mail ballots.

The new executive order — which was first reported by The Daily Caller — takes aim at both.

It instructs the Department of Homeland Security, working in conjunction with the Social Security Administration, to "compile and transmit to the chief election official of each State a list of individuals confirmed to be United States citizens who will be above the age of 18 at the time of an upcoming Federal election and who maintain a residence in the subject State."

The order then "requires the USPS to transmit ballots only to individuals enrolled on a State-specific Mail-in and Absentee Participation List, ensuring that only eligible absentee or mail-in voters receive absentee or mail-in ballots," according to a White House fact sheet.

Trump's executive order claims that "additional measures are necessary" to secure voting by mail, a form of voting he has used himself — including last week — but also falsely maligned for years. In the 2024 general election, nearly a third of all voters cast mail ballots.

The Postal Service should also review the design of mail ballot envelopes to protect "the integrity of Federal elections," the order says.

Collectively, the provisions would be a significant change to how mail ballot programs are currently administered in American elections, which are largely carried out by state and local officials.

"Our government's citizenship lists are incomplete and inaccurate. The United States Postal Service is overburdened and inadequate. This combines a car crash with a train wreck," the Brennan Center for Justice, which advocates for expanded voting access and sued to block Trump's 2025 election executive order, said in a statement.

Rick Hasen, an election law expert at UCLA, wrote on his blog that the order is likely unconstitutional. And regardless, he added, "the timing here makes this virtually impossible to implement in time for November's elections. … It seems highly unlikely any of this could be implemented for 2026, even if it were not blocked by courts."

The order comes as Trump pressures Republicans in Congress to pass the SAVE America Act, a sweeping election overhaul that would impose new voter identification and documentation requirements.

That bill is stalled in the Senate due to Democratic opposition and the legislative filibuster.

The Supreme Court is also expected to rule this year on whether Mississippi should be allowed to count mail ballots that are postmarked by Election Day but received by election officials after Election Day.

The legal challenge, which could have sweeping implications for mail voting nationwide, was filed by the Republican National Committee and Trump's 2024 presidential campaign.

Copyright 2026 NPR

Federal immigration officials arrested more than 14,000 people in the greater Los Angeles area in 2025 — the majority of whom had no criminal record, according to an LAist analysis of new data from the Deportation Data Project.

The data project, an initiative between UCLA and UC Berkeley, publishes federal data obtained under the Freedom of Information Act.

In 2025, federal officials arrested 14,394 people, up from 4,681 the year prior. Forty-six percent of people arrested had criminal convictions, 15% had pending charges, and 39% had no criminal charges or convictions.

In a December news release, the Department of Homeland Security said it had arrested more than 10,000 people in the L.A. area since immigration raids began in June of last year, including "murderers, kidnappers, sexual predators and armed carjackers,” but did not publish details of the number of people who had criminal records.

The data from the Deportation Data Project shows that arrests in L.A. spiked in June, and about two-thirds of people arrested that month had no criminal convictions.

More than 313,000 people were arrested by ICE nationwide in 2025, according to an LAist analysis.

In a statement, a DHS spokesperson said the agency has not “verified the accuracy, methodology or analysis of the project and its results” and said “this only reveals how data is manipulated to peddle the false narrative that DHS is not targeting the worst of the worst.” The spokesperson said 61% of people ICE arrested across the country either had criminal convictions or pending charges.

The agency has regularly published press releases identifying people they have arrested and who they have called “the worst of the worst,” including from the raids in L.A. in June. But an LAist investigation and reporting from other outlets has found that some of the people on those lists already has been in custody and were serving lengthy sentences.