SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Oakland, California, voters who recalled their mayor in November over crime, homelessness and allegations of corruption are weighing whether to give the job to former U.S. Rep. Barbara Lee, a progressive icon and Black female trailblazer who represented the city in Congress for over two decades.

The 78-year-old Lee is widely considered the front-runner in the April 15 election. This is despite her politics in a state where progressives have not fared well lately, partly over perceptions they are too soft on crime.

Former Mayor Sheng Thao was ousted barely two years into her term. Voters in November also recalled Alameda County District Attorney Pamela Price, whose territory included Oakland, and Los Angeles County voters denied progressive DA George Gascón a second term in office.

Ballots for the Oakland race have been mailed and voting is underway.

Lee is walking a careful line in how she addresses public safety in an Oakland that has become less permissive and more strident about punishing wrongdoers, like many other Democratic cities in California where voters are exasperated over grimy street conditions and empty storefronts.

Her leading opponent is Loren Taylor, 47, a former Oakland City Council member who supports using drones and surveillance cameras to fight crime.

“She can’t govern on the public safety front as a progressive or liberal. That has been repudiated throughout the state of California and almost nationally,” said James Taylor, a political science professor at the University of San Francisco.

“So she’s going to have to find a good team of people around her who will help administer the balance between community and neighborhood and individual rights and overall public safety,” he said. “But Oaklanders want the streets to be safe.”

Oakland’s troubles

Oakland has long been the cheaper, funkier alternative to San Francisco across the Bay. The city of 400,000 is deeply liberal and multicultural, the birthplace of the Black Panther Party and claimed by former Vice President Kamala Harris as her hometown.

But the city also is reeling from tent encampments, public drug use, illegal sideshows, gun violence and brazen robberies that prompted In-N-Out Burger to close its first location ever last year. California Gov. Gavin Newsom has sent California Highway Patrol officers to help combat what he called an alarming and unacceptable rise in crime. Oakland also doesn’t have enough money to pay for public services.

Lee on the campaign trail

On the campaign trail, Lee emphasizes the need for more community services as well as more police. She wants guns off the streets and more money for crime prevention. Economic development, job creation and ensuring core city services like fire hydrants work properly are among her priorities.

Lee rejects the idea that her progressive politics are at odds with the city.

“I believe that my values are Oakland values,” Lee said in an interview with The Associated Press.

Lee was first elected to the U.S. House in 1998 and became best known nationally as the only lawmaker to vote against the 2001 authorization for the use of military force in response to the Sept. 11 attacks. She ran unsuccessfully for the U.S. Senate last year.

Her chief opponent, Taylor, who also is Black, says Oakland needs a pragmatic mayor who knows city government.

“The problems we’re facing, the things that need to be fixed in Oakland, she’s not the right fit,” he said of Lee. Consensus-building skills honed in Congress don’t always serve the needs of an executive in City Hall. For example, Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass, also a former member of Congress, is taking heat over January’s deadly wildfires, with some calling for a more take-charge mayor.

In Oakland, Lee and Taylor agree the Oakland Police Department needs 800 officers, up from the under 700 it has now. Taylor says he has a plan to get to 800 in three years, while Lee says it will be difficult.

Lee wants to test a guaranteed basic income program for homeless people and called the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling making it easier for cities to clear encampments “cruel.” Taylor voted against defunding police in the aftermath of George Floyd’s killing by a police officer in 2020. He wants to clear homeless encampments and supports the use of drones, license plate readers and cameras to nab perpetrators.

Recall hangs over election

Taylor, an engineer, served on the Oakland City Council from 2019 to 2023 and narrowly lost a bid for mayor in 2022 to Sheng Thao. He supported the recall while Lee opposed it.

Brenda Harbin-Forte, a retired judge who helped lead the recall, said she hopes voters will see beyond Lee’s star power.

“I did not recall Sheng Thao to have Sheng Thao 2.0 in office,” she said.

But Carl Chan, a Chinatown community leader and recall leader, said he believes either Taylor or Lee will focus on the budget, public safety and economic revitalization. He hopes they will work together no matter who wins.

“No one can fix our problems immediately,” he said. “We’ll be very happy if we can stop the bleeding.”

Janie Har, The Associated Press

MADISON, Wis. (AP) — President Donald Trump on Friday called on his supporters to vote for a candidate for the Wisconsin Supreme Court who already had the full-throated backing of Trump’s billionaire adviser Elon Musk.

“All Voters who believe in Common Sense should GET OUT TO VOTE EARLY for Brad Schimel,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform.

Trump’s post came a little over a week before the April 1 election that will determine control of the court, which since 2023 has a majority of liberal justices. Who controls the court will impact a wide range of pending high profile issues, like abortion rights and congressional district boundaries, but it could also determine what the voting rules are for the 2026 midterms and 2028 presidential election in the battleground state.

Schimel reacted to Trump’s post with a statement saying: “I’m humbled and deeply honored to receive the endorsement of our President.” He added, “On April 1, Wisconsin conservatives must unite to restore objectivity to our Supreme Court and save our state like we saved our country in November.”

Schimel, a former Republican attorney general, is a Trump backer who had previously said he would welcome an endorsement from the president. He also appeared at a rally with Trump’s son, Donald Trump Jr., in March, posed for a picture in front of a giant inflated Trump and attended Trump’s inauguration in January. Schimel has also benefited from more than $12 million spent by groups funded by Musk.

One of the mailers used by the Musk group says that Schimel would back Trump’s agenda from the Supreme Court. Trump Jr. stressed that a Schimel win was needed to protect his father’s agenda. And Schimel told a group of Turning Point USA canvassers earlier this month that he needs to be elected to be part of a “support network” for Trump.

“Donald Trump doesn’t do this by himself; there has to be a support network around him,” Schimel said, according to a video of his comments posted on YouTube. “They filed over 70 lawsuits against him since he took the oath of office barely a month ago, over 70 lawsuits to try to stop almost every single thing he’s doing because they don’t want him to get a win. ”

Schimel has also echoed unfounded concerns about unproven voter fraud that Trump raised following his 2020 loss.

Despite all of that, Schimel has repeatedly said he would not let his feelings about Trump impact any rulings he would make on the state Supreme Court, which came one vote away from reversing Trump’s loss in Wisconsin in 2020. Trump won the state in both 2016 and 2024.

“If President Trump or anyone defies Wisconsin law and I end up with a case in front of me, I’ll hold them accountable as I would anybody in my courtroom,” Schimel said during a March debate.

Schimel faces Democratic-backed candidate Susan Crawford in the election for an open seat. Liberals currently hold a 4-3 majority on the court. Whoever wins will be elected to a 10-year term that begins in August.

On Truth Social, Trump called Crawford “the handpicked voice of the Leftists who are out to destroy your State, and our Country — And if she wins, the Movement to restore our Nation will bypass Wisconsin.”

A spokesman for Crawford’s campaign said, “Schimel has spent his entire career on bent knee to right-wing special interests, we assumed he had this endorsement locked up months ago.”

This isn’t the first time Trump has gotten involved in a Wisconsin Supreme Court race. He endorsed the conservative candidate in the 2023 whose loss led to liberals taking control of the court for the first time in 15 years.

Scott Bauer, The Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Department of Homeland Security is making cuts to three key offices that oversee civil rights protections across its broad mission, suggesting that they were impeding immigration enforcement efforts.

A spokeswoman for the department, Tricia McLaughlin, said in a statement Friday that it was implementing a “reduction in force” for three offices: the Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties, the Office of the Immigration Detention Ombudsman, and the Office of the Citizenship and Immigration Services Ombudsman.

President Donald Trump has made downsizing the federal government a key policy goal.

Federal agencies were directed to submit by March 13 plans that would not only lay off employees but eliminate positions altogether and consolidate programs. The DHS developments were first reported by The New York Times.

McLaughlin said Homeland Security is “committed to civil rights protections” but said these offices were a roadblock to immigration enforcement.

“These offices have obstructed immigration enforcement by adding bureaucratic hurdles and undermining DHS’s mission. Rather than supporting law enforcement efforts, they often function as internal adversaries that slow down operations,” she said.

The Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties was created by the Homeland Security Act of 2002, with the mission of protecting civil liberties in the department created in the wake of the Sept. 11 attacks. It investigates hundreds of complaints a year about the agency’s mission and recommends changes as necessary.

The Office of the Immigration Detention Ombudsman is an independent office within Homeland Security — not connected to either Immigration and Customs Enforcement or Customs and Border Protection. Its job it is to make sure immigration detention facilities are safe and humane.

The Office of the Citizenship and Immigration Services Ombudsman is another independent office in the department responsible for helping people or businesses resolve issues with the agency that oversees immigration benefits.

Democrats slammed the moves, saying they would hurt transparency.

“With Trump’s mass firing of the entire DHS Civil Rights and Civil Liberties workforce, he is ensuring in advance that there will be no transparency or oversight of his extreme agenda,” said Rep. Bennie G. Thompson of Mississippi, the top Democrat on the House Committee on Homeland Security.

A staffer who works in the Civil Rights and Civil Liberties office and asked not to be identified for fear of retribution stressed that the office’s mission stretches far beyond immigration and border security, noting that they look into allegations concerning all parts of Homeland Security, including the Transportation Safety Administration and the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

Rebecca Santana, The Associated Press

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. (AP) — City officials in Fort Myers, Florida, unanimously agreed to pass a memorandum on Friday allowing local authorities to receive training from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and assist with deportations. This decision reverses a contentious vote earlier this week that led to threats of suspension from state officials.

The three-hour special meeting began with two hours of spirited public comment, with most speakers dissenting the memorandum by citing fears of increased racial profiling as a top concern. The presiding officer of public comment also continually interrupted speakers who discussed the council’s vote or thanked councilmembers on Monday who disagreed with the memorandum, saying that it was off-topic to Friday’s meeting.

Then, councilmembers prompted questions to Fort Myers Deputy Police Chief Victor Medico and City Attorney Grant Alley, who Councilmember Darla Bonk called out for leaving members with multiple unanswered questions before Friday’s presentation.

“I must express my grave concern that there was a significant dereliction of the duty on the part of my city attorney,” said Bonk, who initially voted against the agreement earlier this week. “We, as councilmembers, were put in the position of voting on a matter that was not within our legal authority or jurisdiction, as a state rep also reminded us at the top of this meeting. The actions subjected us public servants to unnecessary grave, personal and professional risk.”

City officials’ about-face comes a day after Gov. Ron DeSantis warned them that failing to approve an immigration agreement could have steep consequences, including suspension from office. Earlier this week, state Attorney General James Uthmeier announced an investigation of councilmembers who voted against the agreement, saying the city was implementing an illegal sanctuary policy.

Councilmember Diana Giraldo said in the meeting that she was concerned with the memorandum’s designation of authorized functions to police officers, saying it could boost racial profiling. These functions, according to the memorandum, include the power to arrest any immigrant who does not have legal status without a warrant and the power to interrogate any person believed to be an immigrant.

Giraldo said the city already has been working with federal immigration agents for years, a reason she objected to any claims of Fort Myers being a sanctuary city.

When asked, Alley said it was “very not clear” whether the council violated the law, and that he’d normally suggest asking the attorney general. In this case, the attorney general weighed in, and when asked he advised the councilmembers to support this agreement.

“The attorney general is not a court, but it is the top law enforcement, and they issue opinions, and this wasn’t in the form of an opinion. This was in the form of an immediate compliance with state immigration laws,” Alley said.

In Uthmeier’s letter, he cited laws passed by Florida legislators just earlier this year in a special session, which include provisions that say state and local law enforcement and supervising entities must use “best efforts to support the enforcement of federal immigration law.”

Stephany Matat, The Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration Friday ended a contract that provides legal help to migrant children entering the country without a parent or guardian, raising concerns that children will be forced to navigate the complex legal system alone.

The Acacia Center for Justice contracts with the government to provide legal services through its network of providers around the country to unaccompanied migrant children under 18, both by providing direct legal representation as well as conducting legal orientations — often referred to as “know your rights” clinics — to migrant children who cross the border alone and are in federal government shelters.

Acacia said they were informed Friday that the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services was terminating nearly all the legal work that the center does, including paying for lawyers for roughly 26,000 children when they go to immigration court. They’re still contracted to hold the legal orientation clinics.

“It’s extremely concerning because it’s leaving these kids without really important support,” said Ailin Buigues, who heads Acacia’s unaccompanied children program. “They’re often in a very vulnerable position.”

People fighting deportation do not have the same right to representation as people going through criminal courts, although they can hire private attorneys.

But there has been some recognition that children navigating the immigration court system without a parent or guardian are especially vulnerable.

The Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2008 created special protections for children who arrive in the U.S. without a parent or a legal guardian.

Emily G. Hilliard, deputy press secretary at Health and Human Services, said in an emailed statement that the department “continues to meet the legal requirements established” by the Act as well as a legal settlement guiding how children in immigration custody are being treated.

The termination comes days before the contract was to come up for renewal on March 29. Roughly a month ago the government temporarily halted all the legal work Acacia and its subcontractors do for immigrant children, but then days later Health and Human Services reversed that decision.

The program is funded by a five-year contract, but the government can decide at the end of each year if it renews it or not.

A copy of the termination letter obtained by The Associated Press said the contract was being terminated “for the Government’s convenience.”

Michael Lukens is the executive director of Amica, which is one of the providers contracting with Acacia in the Washington, D.C. area. He said with the renewal date swiftly approaching, they had been worried something like this would happen.

He said they will continue to help as many kids as they can “for as long as possible” and will try to fight the termination.

“We’re trying to pull every lever but we have to be prepared for the worst, which is children going to court without attorneys all over the country. This is a complete collapse of the system,” he said.

Rebecca Santana, The Associated Press

After Chief Justice John Roberts rebuked calls this week by the Trump administration to impeach judges, social media users falsely claimed that he and other high-level legal professionals are part of a “secretive, invite only club.”

Many questioned the motives of members, hinting at coordinated efforts to oppose President Donald Trump.

Among those named was U.S. District Judge James E. Boasberg, who Trump had demanded be removed from the bench for his order blocking deportation flights that the president was carrying out by invoking wartime authorities from 18th century law.

But the group in question — the American Inns of Court — is hardly secretive given its large public presence, and there is no evidence that members are involved in nefarious activities targeting Trump. Roberts is no longer an active member and Boasberg is the president of a chapter that is no longer affiliated with the parent association.

Here’s a closer look at the facts.

CLAIM: Roberts, Boasberg and other powerful legal professionals are part of a secret, invite-only club that is working against Trump.

THE FACTS: This is false. Roberts was a member of the Edward Coke Appellate Inn of Court chapter of the organization prior to his confirmation to the Supreme Court in 2005, but he is not currently an active member of the organization, according to Executive Director Malinda Dunn.

Boasberg is the president of the Edward Bennett Williams Inn of Court, but the chapter disaffiliated from the parent association about 10 years ago when it decided it no longer wanted to pay dues to the national group, Dunn said. He was an active member prior to the chapter’s decision to operate independently.

Information on the American Inns of Court is readily available online. Chapters also have their own websites, which often include details about programs they host for members, typically focused on networking, education and mentorship. Dunn said that members have a wide range of political opinions, but that the organization itself is “assiduously apolitical.”

Some on social media, however, baselessly claimed that there is more to the group than meets the eye.

“It has been revealed that Chief Justice John Roberts is part of an elite, invite-only group called the American Inns of Court, alongside some of the most openly anti-Trump judges in D.C.,” reads one X post.

And yet a check of other members reveals a diverse group. Many current and former Supreme Court justices have been members of the American Inns of Court, according to Dunn, including Sandra Day O’Connor, Neil Gorsuch, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Ketanji Brown Jackson and Clarence Thomas.

Inns of Court have existed in the United Kingdom for hundreds of years. The American system, founded in 1980 out of discussions among legal professionals, including Chief Justice Warren Burger, is loosely based on this concept from across the pond.

The American Inns of Court states on its website that it is “dedicated to professionalism, ethics, civility, and excellence” and that its mission is to “inspire the legal community to advance the rule of law by achieving the highest level of professionalism through example, education, and mentoring.”

O’Connor said in a 2015 video that “maintaining and improving an ethics of professionalism is what the American Inns of Court are all about.”

There are more than 300 active chapters across the U.S. Each one manages its own membership and some are limited to practitioners in a certain legal field. Roberts’ former chapter, for example, states that “members are elected to the Inn after being nominated by a current member” and that they must be “actively engaged in appellate practice.”

Dunn said chapters are advised to ensure that their members include legal professionals with different levels of experience. Some may hold membership drives to recruit new faces.

Roberts is currently an honorary bencher in The Honourable Society of the Middle Temple, an inn of court in the U.K. This is a purely ceremonial role that, according to Dunn. British inns of court will always offer such a position to Supreme Court justices when they are confirmed, she said.

Representatives for Roberts and Boasberg did not respond to a request for comment.

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Find AP Fact Checks here: https://apnews.com/APFactCheck.

Melissa Goldin, The Associated Press

NEW YORK (AP) — Major League Baseball removed references to “diversity” from its MLB Careers home page following an executive order by President Donald Trump that could lead to possible federal action against organizations using DEI programs in violation of his administration’s interpretation of civil rights law.

“Our values on diversity remain unchanged,” MLB said in a statement Friday. “We are in the process of evaluating our programs for any modifications to eligibility criteria that are needed to ensure our programs are compliant with federal law as they continue forward.”

The removal of the references was first reported by the website cupofcoffeenews.com.

Baseball Commissioner Rob Manfred, who launched a Diversity Pipeline Program in 2016, said following an owners meeting in Palm Beach, Florida, last month that MLB was evaluating the interpretation of law coming from the federal government.

“Our values, particularly our values on diversity, remain unchanged, but another value that is pretty important to us is we always try to comply with what the law is,” he said. “There seems to be an evolution going on here. We’re following that very carefully. Obviously, when things get a little more settled, we’ll examine each of our programs and make sure that while the values remain the same that we’re also consistent with what the law requires.”

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AP MLB: https://apnews.com/mlb

The Associated Press

Two California researchers said Friday that a U.S. government health publication instructed them to remove data on sexual orientation from a scientific manuscript that had been accepted for publication.

The researchers also said they were told to remove the words “gender,” “cisgender” and “equitable” from their paper, which looked at smoking among rural young adults.

The reason given for the changes was to comply with an executive order from President Donald Trump, researchers Tamar Antin and Rachelle Annechino said in a blog post where they included screenshots of the revisions.

Instead of complying, the researchers withdrew their paper from Public Health Reports, the official journal of the U.S. Surgeon General and U.S. Public Health Service.

On his first day back in office, Trump signed an executive order directing government agencies to remove “gender ideology” from publications. He has signed other orders targeting diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives.

The researchers plan to publish their findings elsewhere, Antin told The Associated Press. In the blog post, Antin and Annechino urged other researchers to refrain from publishing in journals published by the federal government to avoid political interference.

“In normal times, this would never happen,” said Antin, director of the Center for Critical Public Health, a California-based research group. “I have never been asked to censor any articles for publication, nor, to my knowledge, have any of my colleagues ever been asked to censor words, word choice, or remove data from a publication in response to an executive order from the White House. This is extremely unusual.”

Screenshots in the blog post show suggested deletions of data in categories labeled “straight or heterosexual,” “gay or lesbian,” “bisexual” and “unknown.” A note says: “Per the Executive Order, we cannot include language surrounding gender.”

Understanding how smoking fits into the lives of rural young adults of all genders and sexual orientations can help tailor more effective public health messages, Antin said. And it’s a longstanding practice to include these demographic variables in research.

Antin said censorship threatens scientific integrity and, in this case, appears to violate the policy of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, which says that scientific findings should not be “unduly suppressed, delayed, or altered for political purposes.”

An HHS spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

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The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Science and Educational Media Group and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

Carla K. Johnson, The Associated Press