The Brief

A federal judge in Los Angeles denied a motion from the Trump administration Friday to throw out a decades-old settlement that outlines protections for immigrant children in federal detention.

In her ruling, U.S. District Judge Dolly Gee said the federal government had not shown that Homeland Security regulations satisfy the agreement's requirements, including that minors be released quickly and that family detention centers be properly licensed. 

She also said the government failed to "identify any new facts or law" since she rejected an effort to end the agreement in 2019.

The White House did not immediately respond to LAist's request for comment.

Gee heard arguments from the federal government and immigrant advocates in a hearing last week. Lawyers representing immigrant children said minors were being held in U.S. Customs and Border Protection facilities for extended periods of time and asked the judge to appoint an independent monitor.

The hearing centered on the Flores Settlement Agreement , a 1997 consent decree that outlines minimum standards for conditions for children in immigration custody. It broadly requires the government to quickly move minors out of immigration detention and into facilities licensed to care for children.

Last year, Gee ended part of that agreement for the Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees care for unaccompanied immigrant children in the U.S., with some exceptions. But the requirements of Flores are still in place for Homeland Security facilities like Border Patrol.

It's those requirements that the government was seeking to end, arguing that the executive branch needed more flexibility and citing recent legislation like the "Big Beautiful Bill," which includes billions of dollars for new detention facilities including for families.

"We're raising this early in an administration that ran on immigration issues," Justice Department attorney Tiberius Davis told the judge last week.

Multiple immigrant rights groups represented the Flores plaintiffs in court. Sergio Perez, executive director for the Center for Human Rights and Constitutional Law, told LAist the government's attempt was ridiculous.

" It's an absurd and political move that reflects this administration's seemingly insatiable disdain for the checks and balances," he said.

The judge also heard a second motion from immigrant advocacy organizations alleging that the government is violating the Flores agreement by keeping children in "prison-like" conditions for extended periods of time.

" Nobody's supposed to be held in Border Patrol facilities for more than 72 hours," Diane de Gramont is an attorney with National Center for Youth Law told LAist. "But kids had been held for over a week, even two weeks, three weeks. And there have been children held for over a month in a holding cell with no access to daylight or recreation, and infrequent access to even showers."

The judge has not yet ruled on that motion, but she expressed concern about holding times at Border Patrol facilities at last week's hearing.

The origins of the Flores agreement protections are in Los Angeles in the 1980s . Lawyers brought the federal government to court over the treatment of a 15 year-old girl from El Salvador in federal custody in a Pasadena hotel. That eventually led the government to agree to the national standards for the treatment of children in immigration detention that still stand today.

The immigration lawyer that brought that lawsuit, Carlos Holguín, is still on the case. 

Once again, Taylor Swift tops this week's Billboard albums and singles charts. Elsewhere, two holidays collide, as Halloween perennials coexist with the charts' first flurries of the Christmas season. Along the way, Michael Jackson's Thriller shoots up the chart, making this the sixth consecutive decade in which Jackson has scored at least one top 10 hit. That's an all-time chart record.

Top story

Before the streaming era, holidays rarely had much of an impact on Billboard's Hot 100 singles chart. You'd see an occasional novelty hit here and there, but generally speaking, the Hot 100 in December didn't look all that different from the Hot 100 in, say, March.

The streaming era has changed that radically — and in ways that extend well beyond Christmas time. Just this year, Toby Keith 's 35 Biggest Hits compilation zoomed back into the top 10 in the aftermath of July 4. Earth, Wind & Fire 's Greatest Hits re-entered the Billboard 200 albums chart because so many fans like to stream the group's 1978 song "September" — with its famous question, "Do you remember the 21st night of September?" — on Sept. 21.

And Halloween? Well, Halloween has become a musical season unto itself — for at least a few weeks, anyway.

Last week's charts reflect the seven days immediately before Halloween — the "spooky season," you might say, but not the holiday itself or the weekend that followed. And several titles did re-enter the charts, led by Michael Jackson's "Thriller," which resurfaced on the Hot 100 at No. 32.

This week's charts cover a seven-day stretch beginning with Halloween, so you get a full reflection of costume-party playlists and titles streamed on front porches for the benefit of trick-or-treaters. And, though it can't compare to the annual pre-Christmas onslaught, a handful of spooky and spookiness-adjacent songs do make their way back onto the Hot 100 this week.

The songs themselves are more or less exactly what you'd expect: Bobby "Boris" Pickett & The Crypt-Kickers' "Monster Mash" (No. 21), Ray Parker Jr.'s "Ghostbusters" (No. 22) and Rockwell's "Somebody's Watching Me" (No. 24) all reemerge from their respective crypts in lockstep, with The Citizens of Halloween's "This Is Halloween" (from Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas) right behind them.

But one Halloween jam outshines them all — and hits some massive milestones in the process.

"Thriller" was the seventh single from Jackson's 1982 mega-blockbuster of the same name and hit No. 4 during its initial chart run. It became a durable classic — and Halloween staple — thanks to its iconic video , which premiered in December 1983.

"Thriller" has re-entered the Hot 100 numerous times since then, most prominently in the aftermath of Jackson's death in 2009. This week, it jumps from No. 32 all the way to No. 10.

For Jackson, that triggers a remarkable chart milestone: He's the first artist in history to hit the top 10 in six different decades. Before, he was tied with … who, The Beatles ? Nope. Elvis Presley ? Nuh-uh. The answer is Andy Williams , who had loads of hits in the '50s, '60s and '70s, then returned to the top 10 in the 2010s and 2020s thanks to the streaming-fueled holiday hit "It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year."

In Jackson's case, his six decades have been consecutive — and there's even a seventh with an asterisk, because The Jackson 5 cracked the top 10 with "I Want You Back" in December 1969. Prior to this week's "Thriller" renaissance, Jackson's last appearance in the top 10 arrived thanks to his posthumous appearance in Drake 's 2018 hit "Don't Matter to Me."

Don't expect "Thriller" to remain in the top 10 now that Halloween is an increasingly distant memory. The spooky season is well and truly over, provided you don't look too closely at the Hot 100 and grimace in terror as you spy the song at No. 31.

It's Mariah Carey , who reenters the chart — earlier than ever — with "All I Want for Christmas Is You." Eeeeeeeeeeeek!

Top albums

For the fifth straight week, Taylor Swift's The Life of a Showgirl sits atop the Billboard 200 albums chart. But Swift's grip on the top spot would at least appear to be slipping, with several high-profile albums on the immediate horizon.

Though she's yet to hit the Billboard 200's top 10 in her career, Rosalía 's LUX is due to hit next week's charts, and has gotten tremendous reviews. (Seriously, it's so great.) Summer Walker 's Finally Over It drops this Friday and will enter the Billboard 200 the following week. Michael Bublé 's Christmas has — [emits deep, tortured sigh, followed by a three-minute stare, unblinking, into the middle distance] — already reentered the chart at No. 65.

The Life of a Showgirl easily survived this week's top new threat, as Florence + The Machine debuted at No. 4 with a Halloween-friendly new album called Everybody Scream. And a huge chart leap for Tyler, The Creator 's CHROMAKOPIA — boosted by the release of deluxe editions surrounding the anniversary of its release — only sent it from No. 117 to No. 5.

Still, for The Life of a Showgirl — and for those of us who toil aggressively to avoid exposure to Bublé's music — winter is coming.

Case in point: There are now four Christmas albums on the Billboard 200. Bublé leads the way, followed by the Vince Guaraldi Trio 's A Charlie Brown Christmas (No. 85), Carey's Merry Christmas (No. 113) and Bing Crosby 's Ultimate Christmas (No. 160). Whole lotta holiday-music enthusiasts are out there opening their gifts early this year.

Top songs

Taylor Swift is a master of extending her chart runs, thanks to a deep bag of tricks that includes remixes, staggered releases on vinyl and CD, acoustic versions and more. The woman possesses a great many talents, but she's an all-timer when it comes to leveraging her fans' enthusiasm.

On the albums chart, it's a challenge to extend The Life of a Showgirl's run at No. 1, in part because she's already exhausted so many of those opportunities in the album's first week of release. The price of that record-setting sales week is that it gets harder and harder to go back to the well and sell fans more copies of the same album.

But when it comes to "The Fate of Ophelia," which tops the Hot 100 for a fifth straight week, she's still got some bullets in the chamber as she labors to remain ahead of two colossal hits. And she needs them, because the song isn't No. 1 in streaming or radio airplay this week.

The top song on streaming is HUNTR/X's "Golden," from the KPop Demon Hunters soundtrack. When it comes to commercial radio airplay, the top song is Alex Warren 's "Ordinary," which is likely evident to anyone who's tried to listen to a commercial pop station since, say, June. But the former lags a bit in airplay, the latter lags a bit in streaming and "The Fate of Ophelia" leads the field in sales — an area where Swift's bag of tricks comes in especially handy.

"The Fate of Ophelia" gets a boost this week from two alternate versions: an "Alone in My Tower Acoustic Version" that's padding her streaming and sales numbers, and a brand-new remix by the duo Loud Luxury that dropped on Nov. 6.

Those moves were enough to keep the song atop the Hot 100 for another week, but as the holidays loom, all three songs face a force as predictable as the tides. Today, they're jockeying for the top of the charts; tomorrow, they'll all be eating Paul Anka 's dust.
Copyright 2025 NPR

Seven detainees at an immigration detention center in California City have sued U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, alleging the facility is polluted by sewage leaks, infested with bugs and is denying people access to food, water and their lawyers.

The lawsuit filed Wednesday in U.S. District Court in the Northern District of California also claims detainees do not have appropriate clothing for the chilly desert nights, nor appropriate medical attention for life-threatening conditions. The lawsuit alleges detainees with mobility issues don’t have access to wheelchairs, and in some cases are unable to bathe or dress themselves.

The plaintiffs are seeking to make the lawsuit a class action on behalf of all detainees housed at the California City Immigration Processing Center, which is about 75 miles east of Bakersfield and run by the private prison company CoreCivic.

“In their haste to warehouse hundreds of men and women in this isolated facility, defendants have failed to provide for the basic human needs of the people for whose lives and wellbeing they are legally responsible,” the lawsuit alleges.

ICE opened the immigration detention center at the site of a closed prison and began admitting detainees in August. On average, there were about 480 people held in the detention center each day in September, and the facility has the capability to house up to 2,560 people. The lawsuit asserts 800 people are now housed there.

A spokesperson for ICE declined to comment on the lawsuit for this story.

In September, a state disability rights group conducted a two-day inspection of the facility and found that its operators failed to distribute medication for life-threatening conditions and did not schedule timely surgeries for people that needed them.

CalMatters reported on conditions at the detention center last month. Ryan Gustin, a spokesperson for CoreCivic, in a written statement at the time said the site provides robust medical care. He said those services adhere to “standards set forth by our government partners.”

The detention center’s accelerated opening was part of the Trump administration’s plan to execute the largest deportation program in U.S. history. California City’s mayor previously told CalMattersthe federal government opened the facility without proper permits or a business license as required by state law.

“In the rush to expand capacity, ICE has cobbled together a patchwork system of county jails, private prisons, and newly converted facilities across the country. The rapid and haphazard growth of the detention system has outstripped any meaningful system of accountability or oversight,” the lawsuit alleges.

The lawsuit was filed by Prison Law Office, a nonprofit organization that focuses on conditions in California prisons; along with the American Civil Liberties Union, the advocacy group California Collaborative for Immigrant Justice and the law firm Keker Van Nest & Peters LLP.

Conditions in immigration detention facilities have long been the subject of complaints and lawsuits. Counties in California have the option to inspect immigration detention facilities, although few do. Three of the four counties in California that host the facilities have not held inspections .

Seventeen people have died in ICE facilities this year, two in California. The agency’s official list of deaths in custody documents 15. Two subsequent deaths — one each in California and New York have not yet been added to the ICE list.

One plaintiff in the lawsuit, Yuri Alexander Roque Campos, alleged that he has been denied medication for a heart condition for days at a time. The lawsuit alleges the lack of medication led to him being hospitalized twice.

“During the last hospitalization, a doctor told Mr. Roque Campos that he could die if this were to happen again,” the lawsuit alleges. “Mr. Roque Campos has yet to see a cardiologist and still does not consistently receive his medication.”

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

California plans to revoke 17,000 commercial driver's licenses given to immigrants after discovering the expiration dates went past when the drivers were legally allowed to be in the U.S., state officials said Wednesday.

The announcement follows harsh criticism from the Trump administration about California and other states granting licenses to people in the country illegally. The issue was thrust into the public's consciousness in August, when a tractor-trailer driver not authorized to be in the U.S. made an illegal U-turn and caused a crash in Florida that killed three people.

Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said Wednesday that California's action to revoke these licenses is an admission that the state acted improperly even though it previously defended its licensing standards. California launched its review of commercial driver's licenses it issued after Duffy raised concerns.

"After weeks of claiming they did nothing wrong, Gavin Newsom and California have been caught red-handed. Now that we've exposed their lies, 17,000 illegally issued trucking licenses are being revoked," Duffy said, referring to the state's governor. "This is just the tip of iceberg. My team will continue to force California to prove they have removed every illegal immigrant from behind the wheel of semitrucks and school buses."

Newsom's office said that every one of the drivers whose license is being revoked had valid work authorizations from the federal government. At first, his office declined to disclose the exact reason for revoking the licenses, saying only they violated state law. Later, his office revealed the state law it was referring to was one that requires the licenses expire on or before a person's legal status to be in the United State ends, as reported to the DMV.

Still, Newsom's spokesperson Brandon Richards shot back at Duffy in a statement.

"Once again, the Sean 'Road Rules' Duffy fails to share the truth — spreading easily disproven falsehoods in a sad and desperate attempt to please his dear leader," Richards said.

Fatal truck crashes in Texas and Alabama earlier this year also highlight questions about these licenses. A fiery California crash that killed three people last month involved a truck driver in the country illegally, only adding to the concerns.

Duffy previously imposed new restrictions on which immigrants can qualify for commercial driver's licenses. He said earlier this fall that California and five other states had improperly issued commercial driver's licenses to noncitizens, but California is the only state Duffy has taken action against because it was the first one where an audit was completed. The reviews in the other states have been delayed by the government shutdown, but the Transportation Department is urging all of them to tighten their standards.

Duffy revoked $40 million in federal funding because he said California isn't enforcing English language requirements for truckers, and he reiterated Wednesday that he will take another $160 million from the state over these improperly issued licenses if they don't invalidate every illegal license and address all the concerns. But revoking these licenses is part of the state's effort to comply.

The new rules for commercial driver's licenses that Duffy announced in September make getting them extremely hard for immigrants because only three specific classes of visa holders will be eligible. States will also have to verify an applicant's immigration status in a federal database. The licenses will be valid for up to one year unless the applicant's visa expires sooner.

Under the new rules, only 10,000 of the 200,000 noncitizens who have commercial licenses would qualify for them, which would only be available to drivers who have an H-2a, H-2b or E-2 visa. H-2a is for temporary agricultural workers while H-2b is for temporary nonagricultural workers, and E-2 is for people who make substantial investments in a U.S. business. But the rules won't be enforced retroactively, so those 190,000 drivers will be allowed to keep their commercial licenses at least until they come up for renewal.

Those new requirements were not in place at the time the 17,000 California licenses were issued. But those drivers were given notices that their licenses will expire in 60 days.

Duffy said in September that investigators found that one quarter of the 145 licenses they reviewed in California shouldn't have been issued. He cited four California licenses that remained valid after the driver's work permit expired — sometimes years after.

Newsom's office said the state followed guidance it received from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security about issuing these licenses to noncitizens.
Copyright 2025 NPR

The longest government shutdown in U.S. history is officially over after President Trump signed a bill passed by Congress on Wednesday night.

The federal government is reopening. But after 43 days on pause, things may not return to business as usual right away. For instance, federal workers are still awaiting backpay and air travel disruptions are expected to linger.

And some impacts could continue much longer than six weeks, whether that's national parks trying to make up for lost visitor revenue or taxpayers waiting longer for refunds from a backlogged Internal Revenue Service (IRS).

There's also the looming threat of another potential shutdown in the not-too-distant future, since this bill only funds the government through Jan. 30.

Here's a look at where things stand for now.

Keep scrolling for updates, and jump by category here:

Federal workers | SNAP | Smithsonian

Federal employees return to work, awaiting back pay 

Roughly 1.4 million federal workers have gone without pay for six weeks. Roughly half of them were required to keep working without paychecks, while hundreds of thousands of others were furloughed.

Russ Vought, director of the Office of Management and Budget, told agency heads to direct furloughed employees to return to work Thursday.

"Agencies should take all necessary steps to ensure that offices reopen in a prompt and orderly manner" on Thursday, Vought wrote in a Wednesday memo .

The timing of backpay is a different question.

After the government shutdown ending in January 2019 — then the longest in history — Congress passed a law ensuring back pay for federal workers "at the earliest date possible after the lapse in appropriations ends, regardless of scheduled pay dates."

But Trump appeared to suggest otherwise in public comments last month, leaving many feds worried.

The bill that Congress passed to end the shutdown guarantees back pay. It also reverses several agencies' attempted staffing reductions during the shutdown, which were paused by a federal judge , and prevents additional layoffs of federal employees through January.

Shaun Southworth, a federal employment attorney, said in an Instagram video that the timing of backpay will vary by agency based on their payroll providers, but most employees should start seeing deposits within days.

"Many employees historically saw deposits within the first business days after reopening," he says of the last shutdown. "A minority may roll to the next cycle if the system needs extra processing."

SNAP is back 

The bill Congress passed to reopen the government funds the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) through September 2026.

The program, which some 42 million Americans rely on for food assistance, has been the subject of much uncertainty — and an escalating legal battle — in recent weeks. The Trump administration said last month that it would suspend SNAP funding in November due to the shutdown, prompting a wide outcry and a series of legal challenges.

While the administration initially said it would comply with two rulings requiring it to provide at least partial funding for SNAP in November, it balked — and ultimately appealed to the Supreme Court — after one of those judges said it must fund the program fully for the month. The Supreme Court paused that order (and extended that pause again on Tuesday, with the end of the shutdown in sight).

At this point, beneficiaries in some states have gotten their full monthly allocations, while others have gotten partial payments or nothing at all. Reopening the government means restarting SNAP, but it's not clear how quickly full payments will resume, since that varies by state. And, as NPR has reported , many who rely on the program are worried that benefits could be cut again.

Smithsonian institutions will reopen on a rolling basis

The Smithsonian, which encompasses 21 museums and the National Zoo, says its reopening will be gradual.

Its website says the National Museum of American History, as well as the National Air and Space Museum and its Virginia annex, the Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center, will open their doors on Friday.

All other museums and the zoo — including its beloved live animal cams — will reopen to the public "on a rolling basis" by Monday.

This is a live story that will be updated throughout the day as we learn more.

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