The Brief

California’s Legislature on Monday approved a plan to fund potential lawsuits against President Donald Trump’s administration, an action that represents the state’s most direct rebuke to the White House to date.

The state Assembly approved a $50 million legal aid package on a party-line vote as part of a special session called by Gov. Gavin Newsom. Heated debate over the bills sparked an afternoon of rhetorical fireworks on the floor of the Assembly, where Democratic and Republican members exchanged broadsides over the state’s relationship with Trump.

“Let me be blunt — right now, Californians are being threatened by an out-of-control administration in Washington that doesn’t care about the Constitution and thinks there are no limits to its power,” Assembly Speaker Robert Rivas (D–Hollister) said. “Increasingly, our own residents are being threatened by actions taken by the Trump administration, and it is our duty to rise to the moment.”

The two bills now go to Gov. Gavin Newsom, who is expected to quickly sign them into law. One bill would allocate up to $25 million to the state attorney general for court battles with the Trump administration. Another would set aside $25 million for legal nonprofits to defend residents facing detention or deportation as a result of federal actions.

In the weeks since Trump took office, the state has joined lawsuits to challenge the president’s executive actions on a birthright citizenship ban and his directive to freeze disbursements of nearly all federal funding.

However, Republicans have dismissed the legal aid bills as political posturing, arguing that the Legislature’s attention is better focused away from Washington.

“For this body to appropriate $50 million to sue and block and obfuscate the president of the United States, I think, is outrageous,” Assemblymember Bill Essayli (R–Corona) said. “We need to be focused on the state of California.”

Before debate began on the two bills, Rivas spoke to the entire body at the front of the Assembly, an atypical move that followed days of hand-wringing among Democrats over the special session legislation.

“Given the many executive orders that have been issued over the past two weeks, I can say with clarity that we do not trust President Donald Trump,” Rivas said.

On Jan. 31, Democrats scrapped a planned vote on the bills after a lengthy closed-door caucus meeting. Republicans had planned to force votes on amendments to clarify that the legal aid could not be used to defend immigrants convicted of a felony.

“We actually didn’t spend the weekend talking about this amendment at all,” Assemblymember Isaac Bryan (D–Los Angeles) said. “We spent the weekend talking about the message. We were thinking about the message we wanted to send to the millions of undocumented families, including trafficking survivors, who are terrified their cries for asylum and refuge will go unanswered.”

On Monday, the authors of the bills, Sen. Scott Wiener (D–San Francisco) and Jesse Gabriel (D–Encino), published a letter to the chief clerk of the Assembly stating that none of the funding “is intended to be used for immigration-related services for individuals with serious or violent felony convictions.”

Republicans pushed to add the clarification into the language of the bill, arguing that the letter did not provide strong enough guardrails. Democrats voted down an amendment to do that, which would have likely triggered the need for another vote on the bill in the Senate.

“Without these amendments, state resources could still flow to organizations that obstruct federal efforts to bring these criminals to justice,” Assemblymember Leticia Castillo (R–Corona) said. “Protecting our communities and ensuring that criminals face the consequences of their actions should not be a partisan issue.”

The bills could be the last action taken during the special session that began in December, a move that allows bills signed into law to take effect more quickly. Last month, Newsom expanded the scope of the session to include response to the fires in Los Angeles and passed a $2.5 billion fire relief plan.

Despite a seemingly unimpeachable goal — ensuring adequate child support to keep kids out of poverty — a bill making its way through the state Assembly has left legislators and advocates divided.

The measure, from Elk Grove Democratic Assemblymember Stephanie Nguyen, would compel separated families to enroll in a state program empowered to garnish wages for child support.

Currently, custodial parents must “opt in” to enroll in the California Department of Child Support Services. They often do not take that step, sometimes because they have made their own arrangements.

Under Nguyen’s bill, families would have to opt out of the program. She said the goal of the bill is to ensure that children get the money they need.

“It’s the child that suffers. If you’re a single-income parent…and struggling to make ends meet, then the extra piece of income comes in. I think it reduces child poverty,” said Nguyen.

The measure addresses what groups close to the child support system say is a pressing issue: When parents split up, child support arrangements can fall to the wayside. That leaves the problem to the court system and puts children at risk for poverty.

At a March hearing, the bill had support from the California Child Support Association and the Department of Child Support Services from Sacramento, Solano and San Joaquin Counties.

“Right now, just in Sacramento County, my department is sending $11 million every month home to families putting food on the table and shoes on children's feet. It's an incredible anti-poverty program,” Dallin Frederickson, the director of Sacramento County’s Department of Child Support Services, told lawmakers at a March hearing, according to the CalMatters Digital Democracy database.

“Unfortunately, the child support program in California is underutilized,” he said.

But critics say that entering all families into the child support services system could actually undermine the stability of separated families by disrupting the bonds that remain, as when parents have come to their own financial agreements.

Even a Democratic lawmaker who voted for the bill at the hearing raised questions about how it could affect families who make their own child support arrangements.

“I've seen what happens when families get separated and crumble and fall to pieces,” Assemblyman Isaac Bryan, a Los Angeles Democrat, said at the hearing. “And I'm just concerned that any ways that we further deteriorate a strong relationship between parents, we're harming the best interests of the child.”

A first-in-the-nation proposal

Among California’s 2 million children in single-parent households, 1 in 4 live in poverty. That rate is four times higher than among children living with married parents. Women head 80% of single-parent households, which are more likely to live in poverty than single-father households.

Statewide, there are slightly more than 1 million court orders for child support payments, with total payments owed reaching $2.6 billion in 2024.

If Nguyen’s Assembly Bill 1643 passes, it’s unclear how many additional families would be enrolled into the state collection program, but it could be thousands, based upon the annual number of court orders.

“There’s a bit of unknown. This could be a really fundamental change in a big state. (So), should they do a pilot study in one county?,” said Rebecca Miller, senior attorney for Western Center for Law and Poverty.

Custodial parents of any income level can choose to enroll into child support services, however, enrollment is mandatory for parents who receive public assistance under Title IV-D of the Social Security Act of 1975.

No state currently mandates child support services enrollment for families not receiving public assistance, as stipulated in Nguyen’s bill.

“It could violate federal law because it forces people into the system,” said Rebecca Gonzalez, policy advocate for Western Center for Law and Poverty.

Another concern is cost to taxpayers, though Nguyen said that the bill won’t add costs.

However, because it requires that all child support payments go through the State Disbursement Unit, the measure could increase administrative costs for local agencies, triggering state-mandated reimbursement costs, according to a legislative committee analysis.

“I don’t see why they think it’s cost-free,” said Gonzalez.

The mechanics of California child support

Child support payments decrease poverty for children living with their primary caregiver, but the payments alone are not enough to eliminate poverty, according to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. In addition, making payments may worsen poverty for fathers living separately, especially if they’re already low-income.

Child support payments also have proven to offer other benefits, including more involvement of the paying parent with their children, better academic outcomes and wellbeing for the kids and improved parent-to-parent relationships.

The system Nugyen’s bill would default California families into, from the Department of Child Support Services, already collects and distributes almost two thirds of child support owed in the state, as of 2024. When needed, the department also locates parents and establishes paternity. It collects money using payroll deductions and, if necessary, by garnishing wages, intercepting tax refunds or suspending drivers’ licenses to compel compliance.

The public system for child support payments isn’t straightforward, especially if the parents’ split is acrimonious. That’s when the courts — actually two courts — can step in.

Attorney Miller said Family Court is the system most people think of for handling divorce, child custody and support payments.

Separately, the Title IV-D court is the federally required child support system designed in the 1970s primarily to manage payments for families receiving Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) or welfare. Nearly half of custodial parents enrolled in child support services receive TANF. California Work Opportunity and Responsibility for Kids, better known as CalWORKS, is our state’s TANF program.

In California, when parents separate, Family Courts order child support payments based on both parents’ incomes and the amount of time each spends with the kids. Then the custodial parent can choose to complete “opt in” paperwork for the payments to go through child support services.

Many parents choose not to enroll for a multitude of reasons, for example if they have

an agreement with their former spouse, or if they believe the non-custodial parent can’t afford payments. Some parents don’t want to interact with the other parent because it’s unpleasant or dangerous. Some domestic violence survivors fear that reporting their former partners to child support services would expose them or their kids to harm.

“We think parents should be trusted to make the decision of what’s best for their family and not forced into the system…the system doesn’t work for everyone,” said Gonzales.

Nguyen said she’s working with the opponents to resolve their differences.

“This is really just about making sure the money gets to the parents who have custody of the kids and making sure they are fed, and they are properly cared for,” said Nguyen.

This article was originally published on CalMatters and was republished under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives license.

This story first appeared on The LA Local.

On a recent Wednesday evening in March, the auditorium at Roosevelt High School buzzed with old-school Japanese anime anthems.

Songs like Hironobu Kageyama’s “Cha-La Head-Cha-La,” the theme from “Dragon Ball Z,” and selections from Hayao Miyazaki’s cult classic “My Neighbor Totoro” echoed throughout the performing arts center.

The concert was an intentional tribute to a community once central to Boyle Heights, as students used music to honor a history largely erased during World War II, when more than  400 Japanese American students were forcibly removed and incarcerated in camps. 

Guiding the 77-piece ensemble was band director Pedro Ramos, who took over the program last fall and, in collaboration with the school’s Japanese teacher and club, built the concert around themes of culture and solidarity.

“Roosevelt was hit hard during Japanese Internment and continues to be attacked with ongoing ICE raids,” said Ramos, 24. “The purpose of this concert is to bring solidarity and highlight the perpetuity and appreciation of each other’s culture in turbulent times.”

That vision came through in a program that blended cultures and histories. One piece, “Gelato Con Caffé” by Toshio Mashima, fused rock with samba, reflecting both Japanese and Latin influences. The concert also featured a video of students speaking on what Japanese culture means to them.

Band director Pedro Ramos leads his student ensemble on stage on March 25, 2026.

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“We’re a community now, but there was a Japanese community here once before us,” said Frankie Danielle Trujillo, a senior who plays the alto saxophone. “These pieces honor them and show our appreciation of both communities.”

The performance drew students from across campus, including members of Roosevelt’s Japanese Club.

Junior Eric Samaniego, 17, joined the club as a freshman and said it gave him a sense of belonging.

“Middle school was miserable … This was a very refreshing start,” he said, standing next to his mother, who wore a pink cherry blossom T-shirt designed by students and sold to raise funds for the club’s cultural activities.

The club, supported by Japanese teacher Yoriko Hongo, offers a space for students to connect and celebrate their passion for Japanese culture.

“What’s special is that many of our members are not enrolled in Japanese classes and find a strong sense of belonging and identity through the club,” said Hongo. “It shows how culturally-inclusive spaces can impact students beyond the classroom.”

For Ramos, that community building is at the heart of his work in the classroom and on the stage.

“My job as a teacher is to simulate a consistent environment where students can learn and be the best version of themselves,” he said. “Only by recognizing patterns and tools of oppression can students see themselves as powerful forces in a world that needs drastic change. I’m happy I can provide that in an entertaining, musical way.”

A student plays the drums at Roosevelt High School’s Japanese appreciation concert on March 25, 2026.

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The concert ended with a rendition of the chart-topping “Naruto” theme song “Go!!!” by 90s Japanese rock band Flow.

For freshman trombone player Eliah Daniel Gramajo, performing the music made that connection feel personal.

“It’s not every day you get to play a piece from one of your favorite anime that you watched as a little kid,” he said.

In the latest move to rewrite the history of the violent Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol, the Department of Justice has filed papers seeking to vacate the seditious conspiracy convictions against members of the Proud Boys and Oath Keepers extremist groups, who previously received commutations rather than full pardons from President Donald Trump.

About a dozen defendants who received lengthy sentences for their roles in planning and executing the riot were released from prison once Trump returned to office, though the felony convictions remained on their records. If approved by the federal courts, the move would wipe out those convictions and, among other things, restore the defendants' right to own guns.

On Tuesday, the Trump administration described the decision in court filings as "in the interests of justice."

Members of the Oath Keepers and Proud Boys celebrated.

"I am beyond thrilled right now," wrote Proud Boy Zachary Rehl, who was previously sentenced to 15 years in prison, on the social media site X.

Ed Martin, who has held multiple roles in the Trump Justice Department and currently serves as the U.S pardon attorney, cast the move as a triumph and called for further action.

"Hearing from J6rs and families tonight. They feel respected even loved. Proud," Martin wrote on X. "But there is more for you to do. Keep grinding. You were directly wronged by Biden prosecutors and you deserve more."

Martin has previously called for former Jan. 6 defendants to receive financial restitution.

The decision illustrates both the dramatic extent of changes at the Department of Justice in Trump's second term, as well as the stunning reversal of fortunes for the Jan. 6 defendants convicted of some of the most serious crimes that day.

During the Biden administration, the indictments and subsequent convictions on the rarely used seditious conspiracy charge underscored how law enforcement viewed the Jan. 6 attack: as a historic threat to democracy and the defendants as key orchestrators. Judges and juries largely agreed.

At the trial of Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes, prosecutors had played a recording discussing additional violence after Jan. 6. "We should have brought rifles," Rhodes said. "We could have fixed it right then and there. I'd hang f***in' Pelosi from the lamppost."

When federal judge Amit Mehta sentenced Rhodes to 18 years in prison, he described him as "an ongoing threat and peril to this country ... and to the very fabric of our democracy."

Now, under the Trump administration, leaders of the Justice Department say they take orders directly from the president, who has called Jan. 6 a "day of love," described the rioters as "great people" and denied — falsely — that his supporters assaulted police.

"I pardoned people that were assaulted themselves. They were assaulted by our government," Trump told reporters last year. "They didn't assault. They were assaulted."

Todd Blanche, the acting attorney general, recently touted the mass pardons of Jan. 6 defendants as one of the administration's greatest achievements.

Greg Rosen, who led the "Capitol Siege" unit that prosecuted more than 1,500 Jan. 6-related cases, castigated the Trump administration for its latest move to vacate the conviction of Rhodes and several others.

"This is a sad and selfish reminder that constitutional due process — jury verdicts, judicial findings, years of hard-fought litigation and mountains of evidence — doesn't appear to matter once again," said Rosen, who is now with the law firm Rogers Joseph O'Donnell. "This isn't about fairness or justice. It's about overriding the considered will and judgments of judges and juries and rewarding individuals solely because of their political alignments with an administration."

An estimated 140 police officers were injured in the Jan. 6 attack, including many who testified to lifelong physical and mental trauma from what they endured.

Meanwhile, since receiving presidential pardons, dozens of former riot defendants have been charged with or convicted of additional crimes. On the same day the Justice Department moved to vacate the seditious conspiracy cases, it also filed documents in the ongoing case against David Daniel, who assaulted police Jan. 6 and was separately accused of child sexual abuse.

Daniel, prosecutors said, agreed to plead guilty to allegations that he sexually abused two young girls, including one who was under 12 years old at the time of the abuse.
Copyright 2026 NPR

Editor's note: This is an update of the profile published in December of the great African musician Fela Kuti. The original post was published when it was announced that Kuti would become the first African musician ever awarded a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award. Now this week, he is on the list of Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductees and again is a historic "first" — the first African musician to be inducted into the hall.

Fela Kuti, the Afrobeat pioneer and activist who died in 1997, now holds two landmark honors.

On Dec. 19, he became the first African musician ever awarded a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award, joining an elite group of legends like The Beatles, Johnny Cash, Aretha Franklin, Bob Marley and Frank Sinatra — all recognized for making "creative contributions of outstanding artistic significance to the field of recording."

This week it was announced that he is one of the musicians who will be inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2026. He is being honored in the category of "musical influence." The Hall of Fame paid this tribute: "Fela Kuti was a revolutionary voice who spoke out against injustice through his innovative music — provoking political change while infusing jazz, West African and soul music to pioneer the Afrobeat genre."

He has long been acclaimed by his fellow African artists. "Fela Kuti's music was a fearless voice of Africa — its rhythms carried truth, resistance and freedom, inspiring generations of African musicians to speak boldly through sound," says the legendary Senegalese singer Youssou N' Dour.

Nicknamed the "Black President" for his role as a political and cultural leader, Fela is one of the rarified artists who's recognized by a single name. He saw huge success as a pioneer of the Afrobeat genre, with its multilayered and shifting syncopation, psychedelic horns and chants. He was never nominated for a Grammy during his lifetime — although his musician sons, Femi and Seun, and grandson Made, have received eight nominations collectively.

A really big sound

Fela embraced a massive sound. His band often swelled to more than 30 members (including backup singers and dancers) and featured two bass guitars and two baritone saxophones. He himself played saxophone, keyboards, guitar, drums and trumpet (his first instrument as a child). His emphasis on complex polyrhythms and the inclusion of traditional African instruments like the talking drum were revolutionary at the time — a rebellion against the dominance of Western pop and a marked effort to forge a post-colonial African identity.

From the start of his career, Fela aimed to reach a larger and Pan-African audience by singing almost exclusively in Nigerian Pidgin English (rather than his mother tongue, Yoruba, which doesn't translate throughout most of the continent).

He did not play by the rules of the music biz. He expressed disdain for party tunes and love songs. He'd release as many as seven albums in a single year. And he refused to perform songs live once they'd been recorded.

His music broke new ground with songs that could stretch to 45 minutes. One of his most famous albums, Confusion, was composed of a lone tune broken into two sides, Confusion Pt. I and Confusion Pt. II — the first half entirely instrumental.

BCUC (Bantu Continua Uhuru Consciousness) from Soweto, South Africa, the incendiary live band and 2023 winner of the WOMEX Artist Award, sent a statement to NPR: "Fela is our spiritual muse and if he didn't pursue music without boundaries of song length and speaking his truth — even when it was putting his life in danger — we wouldn't have had the guts to be ourselves without fear or favor."

A political awakening — and repercussions

During a 10-month stay in Los Angeles in 1969, Fela befriended members of the Black Panther Party. Afterward, his music grew political. He became an outspoken opponent of Nigeria's military dictatorship and of South African apartheid.

The year following his 1976 album Zombie's scathing indictment of the Nigerian government, The New York Times reported that a force comprising 1,000 Nigerian military members burned Fela's Lagos home and recording compound (including all his instruments and master recording tapes). Fela was beaten unconscious, and his mother, Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti, was thrown from an upstairs window and later died from the resulting injuries.

That album, Zombie, was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame last year, becoming only the fourth record by an African artist among the 1,165 releases.

In 1979, Fela unsuccessfully ran for president of Nigeria. His political activism added to his high profile — and controversial history. He was arrested many times by Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari's military junta, including at Lagos airport while departing for a U.S. tour. He was sentenced to five years in prison and held for over a year. Amnesty International classified him as a "prisoner of conscience." Fela was freed only after the Buhari regime was overthrown in August 1985.

Musical life after death

Fela succumbed to complications from AIDS in 1997. His older brother, Olikoye Ransome-Kuti, a pediatrician and AIDS activist who served as health minister for Nigeria, spread the word that Fela's death was AIDS-related. According to Ransome-Kuti, Fela had believed that "all doctors were fabricating AIDS, including myself."

Following that news, one of the nation's largest daily papers reported that condom sales surged in Nigeria. Fela's passing marked a turning point in bringing greater consciousness about the epidemic across Africa. It is estimated that over one million people attended his funeral.

Since his death, his music has carried on. A tribute album, Red Hot + Riot: The Music and Spirit of Fela Kuti, was released in 2002, featuring such artists as Sade, D'Angelo, Nile Rodgers, Questlove and Taj Mahal. Profits went to organizations working to raise AIDS awareness. And in 2009, Jay-Z and Will Smith produced Fela!, a Broadway musical about Fela's life that earned 11 Tony Award nominations.

For today's African musicians and worldwide, he is both a legend and an inspiration.

Tunde Adebimpe, the Nigerian American actor (Rachel Getting Married, Twisters) and lead singer for Grammy-nominated band TV on the Radio, told NPR: "Fela for me is the chapter heading in my musical education. He is the originator who showed us music as a power move calling out corruption. Music that questions your psyche and health, worries for your ecosystem, gut checks your self-worth and pride, and keeps you lifted. And it moves nyash [ass]."

Four-time Grammy-nominated Malian singer Salif Keita puts it this way: "Brother Fela was a great influence for my music. I loved him very much. He was a brave man. His legacy is undisputed."

Ian Brennan is a Grammy-winning music producer (Tinariwen, Parchman Prison Prayer, The Good Ones, West Virginia Snake Handler Revival) who has recorded over 50 records by international artists across five continents. He is the author of 10 books. His latest is Missing Music: Voices From Where the Dirt Roads End.

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