(AP) – Six months into the U.S. conflict with Iran, President Donald Trump says American and allied forces have achieved major military gains, even as the administration works to turn those battlefield successes into a lasting agreement.

Trump initially predicted the war would last four to five weeks. But the administration has shifted from sustained strikes toward economic pressure and diplomacy.

The White House says the strategy reflects a position of strength. U.S. and Israeli operations have sharply reduced Iran’s military capabilities, damaged its defense-industrial base and weakened its ability to threaten American forces and regional allies.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio told lawmakers that Iran’s defense industry had suffered between 80 and 90 percent attrition and could take years to rebuild. He said Iran had lost much of its ability to launch large-scale drone attacks, and that its navy had effectively been reduced to small vessels capable of harassment and mine-laying.

President Trump has gone further, saying Iran’s navy and air force are “totally gone.”

The administration also says the United States quickly established air superiority over Iran, allowing American and Israeli aircraft to operate largely without opposition. U.S. Central Command has continued targeting missile and drone launch sites, air-defense systems, command centers, coastal surveillance facilities and communications networks.

Those operations have changed the strategic balance in the Middle East, but several of Trump’s original objectives remain unresolved.

One of the most urgent is keeping open the Strait of Hormuz, a critical shipping route through which roughly one-fifth of the world’s oil normally passes. Iran’s efforts to use the waterway as an economic chokepoint have driven up prices for fuel and fertilizer, increasing pressure on American consumers and farmers.

Trump has repeatedly said the strait is open or functioning, despite continued reports of attacks and disruptions. In a recent radio interview, he said occasional drones or rockets did not mean the waterway had ceased operating.

The administration has proposed linking a broader agreement with Iran to the reopening of the strait and an end to the U.S. blockade of Iranian ports. Trump has also suggested that the United States could impose terms, including possible tolls, to ensure safe passage for international shipping.

Another unresolved issue is Iran’s nuclear program.

Last year, Trump declared that U.S. strikes had “obliterated” Iran’s nuclear capabilities. But officials continue to face questions about an estimated 970 pounds of enriched uranium believed to be buried beneath sites targeted by American and Israeli forces.

Trump has said the material should be retrieved and destroyed in coordination with Iran and the International Atomic Energy Agency. Iran has not agreed to that proposal, and experts say removing the stockpile without Tehran’s consent could require a major military operation.

A June memorandum of understanding reportedly called for Iran to abandon the pursuit of nuclear weapons and dilute its highly enriched uranium. However, negotiations broke down before many details could be settled.

The administration has also sought to weaken Iran-backed militant groups. Early U.S. strikes targeted militia forces in Iraq, while American diplomacy helped produce an agreement for Israeli forces to leave southern Lebanon in exchange for Hezbollah’s disarmament. Hezbollah has rejected direct talks and refuses to give up its weapons.

Trump’s Republican allies argue that the campaign has demonstrated the value of decisive military action followed by economic and diplomatic pressure. Democrats and critics counter that the war has lasted far longer than promised.

The White House says the United States now holds the leverage needed to secure a stronger deal—one that protects American forces, supports Israel and other allies, and prevents Iran from rebuilding its military and nuclear capabilities.

SAUGATUCK, Mich. (AP) — When Democrats gathered this week in a West Michigan congressional district they’re trying to flip blue, they wanted to talk about the cost of living under President Donald Trump. But it didn’t take long for the conversation to turn to a controversy dividing their party.

One attendee chided U.S. Rep. Hillary Scholten for failing to support Democratic Senate nominee Abdul El-Sayed.

“Your inflammatory rhetoric has nothing to do with creating a better economic future for the people of West Michigan, and everything to do with protecting the pipeline of our tax dollars to Israel,” the woman said.

The exchange captured a problem confronting Democrats as they head toward November. Party leaders believe concerns about the economy have given them an opening to win control of Congress, but internal divisions are making it harder to keep the focus there.

Nowhere is that tension more pronounced than Michigan, where Democrats are trying to regroup after a bruising Senate primary that El-Sayed won over U.S. Rep. Haley Stevens earlier this month. Disputes over Israel, antisemitism and El-Sayed’s association with controversial online commentator Hasan Piker have complicated the party’s effort to turn its attention to Republican Mike Rogers.

With the election fast approaching, Scholten and some other Democrats have withheld their support for El-Sayed for now.

“I think it’s up to the top of the ticket to unify the top of the ticket,” Scholten said Tuesday.

El-Sayed, who would be the country’s first Muslim senator, has denounced antisemitism while fiercely criticizing Israel for its military operations in Gaza.

Some members of his party have balked at his rhetoric.

Michigan state Rep. Jeremy Moss, the Democratic nominee for a House seat outside Detroit, has also withheld his support. In an interview with The Atlantic’s David Frum released Wednesday, Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel, who is Jewish, said El-Sayed should not “make excuses” for domestic terrorism.

She was referencing a video statement he put out in March following an attack on Temple Israel synagogue outside Detroit when he said “hurt people hurt people.”

Some Democrats outside Michigan have gone further in criticizing El-Sayed.

“There’s no way I’m ever coming out for El-Sayed, right now,” New Jersey Rep. Josh Gottheimer said on CNN, adding that El-Sayed has “refused to back off his views towards Jewish Americans.”

El-Sayed’s appearances on the campaign trail with Piker have become a particular flashpoint in the disagreement. Piker is a popular streamer with a history of controversial remarks that include saying America “deserved 9/11.”

Piker recently became embroiled in controversy again when he argued against the idea that opposing Israel is antisemitic. American Jews are not uniformly supportive of Israel, he said, but many “Jewish institutions” are “teaching people the idea that Jews are monolithic” and “it’s a very dangerous mode of propaganda.”

“If Jews in America keep putting this idea out there that they are singularly invested in Israel, eventually someone is going to come around and take action, not against the state of Israel mind you, but against American Jews,” he said.

The backlash was swift among Democrats, with critics saying Piker was suggesting that American Jews who support Israel were inviting violence.

“Hasan Piker’s dangerous and hateful language targeting Jewish Americans has no place in our civic discourse,” Sen. Cory Booker, a Democrat from New Jersey, wrote on social media. “Suggesting that Jewish Americans bear responsibility for hatred or violence directed against them is wrong, dangerous, and antisemitic.”

Piker rejected that interpretation in a phone interview, saying he was warning that associating American Jews broadly with Israel’s actions could fuel antisemitism, much as Muslims in the United States have been associated with Islamic terrorist groups.

He said he was never particularly close with El-Sayed’s campaign — despite appearing with him at various events during the primary — and said that he did not want the race to become a conversation about him. He said he did not regret the remarks, however.

“I’m just a platform, I’m just a megaphone for people’s anger and frustration,” Piker said. “Even if I was going to go away tomorrow, I don’t think this problem would go away for our politicians.”

While El-Sayed has put some distance between himself and Piker amid the controversies, he has refused to cut ties completely. In a statement, he said “nobody speaks for this campaign besides me and my campaign spokesperson.”

Republicans see an opportunity in the continued dispute.

“It’s great,” said Republican strategist Jason Roe. “You can tell these Democrats are not going to distance themselves. Piker is to Democrats what Trump is to Republicans. You embrace him, it’s not helpful, and distance is also not helpful.”

Democrats who have rallied behind El-Sayed are increasingly eager to move beyond the fight.

“I am done. So don’t any reporter ask me again about Hasan Piker. It’s not what November is about,” Democratic Rep. Debbie Dingell said Wednesday. “I don’t agree with Hasan Piker on a lot of stuff.”

She appeared alongside El-Sayed and U.S. Rep. Jamie Raskin of Maryland at a campaign event in Ann Arbor on Wednesday. The day prior, El-Sayed stood beside Eli Savit, the Democratic nominee for attorney general, and Lt. Gov. Garlin Gilchrist II, the party’s nominee for secretary of state, at a press conference.

Democrats who have backed El-Sayed argue that the party is largely unified and that the remaining disagreements are a natural part of moving beyond a contentious primary. Raskin, who is Jewish, described it as a “process that we go through” after the primary.

“The Democratic Party is a big, sometimes an unruly family, but we’re all going to be together in the end,” Raskin said.

Michigan Democrats from across the state are expected to gather this weekend for a convention in Lansing to finalize the party’s November ticket. Ahead of the convention, all the party’s nominees and party chair, Curtis Hertel, sent a letter saying that “disruptive behavior or harassment of any kind will not be tolerated.”

“This convention is our moment to celebrate our candidates,” the letter read.

El-Sayed at Wednesday’s event in Ann Arbor expressed frustration with the continued focus on Piker.

“You would think if you turn on any media that this whole campaign is about a streamer in California,” El-Sayed said at the Ann Arbor event. He added that he’s “less interested in going to the sort of tabloid version of our politics where we cover this like, who’s in, who’s out, who’s up, who’s down, who’s talking to who?”

But El-Sayed acknowledged that some Democrats have yet to put the primary behind them.

“There are a few people who are still nursing wounds or grievances from the primary,” El-Sayed said. “I get it. Losing is hard.”

___

Associated Press reporter Jesse Bedayn contributed to this report.

By Karen Brettell

Aug 27 (Reuters) – Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Federal Reserve Chairman Kevin Warsh appear at odds over a question at the heart of U.S. financial policy. How hands-off can policymakers be when it comes to setting a price for money?

Warsh has advocated retreating from some of the central bank’s longstanding communication policies in favor of letting markets do the heavy lifting, while Bessent has deployed a number of tools, some of them unusual, in the name of aiding market function. 

The divide has come into view as the Trump administration steps up efforts to contain long-term borrowing costs — a push whose success appears unlikely to many analysts and portfolio managers without concrete steps to contain the sprawling U.S. fiscal deficit.

That contrast in approaches will come into focus on Friday morning, when Warsh is scheduled to speak at the Fed’s annual event in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. He wants bond markets to play a bigger role in setting rates, a stance arguably at odds with Bessent’s interventionism. Meanwhile investors are seeking assurance that Warsh will act decisively against inflation in his first year leading a divided Fed.

DOUBLING DOWN AT TREASURY

Bessent said last week Treasury would at least double buybacks of longer-dated debt, arguing that a rise in yields, which pushed 30-year rates to a 19-year high, didn’t reflect fundamentals. Investors read it as a sign Washington won’t let 10-year yields, which drive mortgage rates, approach 5% unanswered.

Many investors say Bessent is fighting the wrong fight. They say strong growth, sticky inflation, likely Fed hikes and heavy bond supply, including from AI-driven corporate borrowing, are what’s pushing yields up, along with a widening fiscal premium tied to the deficit — not market dysfunction.

Billionaire investor Stanley Druckenmiller, a hedge-fund titan and workplace mentor to both men, called the plan “price management” rather than liquidity management and warned it could damage Treasury’s credibility.

“There’s very little evidence that Treasuries are oversold right now,” said Will Compernolle, macro strategist at FHN Financial.

Traders say that pressure will surface elsewhere if bond yields aren’t allowed to rise to a market-clearing price — including in a dollar that has slid since Bessent’s announcement.

A SMALL BUYBACK, A LARGER SIGNAL

Bessent’s strategy appears aimed at easing the economy’s interest burden while preserving growth. He says Treasury has a large toolkit, but its influence over long-term yields is constrained by cash management, financing needs and that the U.S. will follow a predictable issuance schedule.

Some investors believe that the tools can’t be ignored. Padhraic Garvey, head of global rates and debt strategy at ING, called using unscheduled buybacks a potential “bazooka” that could be expanded and amplify the impact of some Treasury efforts.

Beyond buybacks, Treasury can adjust its borrowing maturity mix and has backed efforts to strengthen banks’ capacity to intermediate the Treasury market.

“Treasury can decrease long end auction sizes,” said Molly Brooks, U.S. rates strategist at TD Securities. “I think that’s probably the next move.” 

FED HAS THE MORE POWERFUL TOOLS

The Fed’s instruments are more powerful. It sets short-term rates and can buy or sell securities to shape broader conditions. The twist is that Warsh has said he doesn’t want to do that as much as the Fed has in recent years.

Warsh has long criticized the Fed’s large-scale asset purchases, arguing such interventions should be reserved for genuine market dysfunction, with rate policy driving the employment and inflation mandates.

Stanford finance professor Hanno Lustig contends in a recent Aspen Institute paper that the question of how safe Treasuries are has become a key dividing line.

Trends in government-bond pricing and other factors show that markets already treat Treasuries as risky, he says, while the Fed and policymakers still act as if they’re safe. This distinction matters because when yields spike on fiscal worries, the Fed intervenes to calm markets on the grounds that market dysfunction is causing the problem rather than worries about investment safety, he says — a decision that stands to muffle the price signals that would otherwise warn of unsustainable debt.

Ultimately, many analysts and portfolio managers agree that tweaks to buybacks, issuance and market plumbing can’t fix a longstanding problem that has recently gotten much more acute — persistent fiscal deficits. 

The best case is for policymakers to embrace debt reduction driven by stronger growth, Garvey said — a choice that implies some hard choices in Washington. “It’ll be very difficult to reduce the deficit without taking some fiscal action,” he said, “which requires either higher taxes or lower spending.”  

(Reporting by Karen Brettell; Editing by Colin Barr and Lisa Shumaker)

By Phil Stewart

WASHINGTON, Aug 27 (Reuters) – A Pentagon review of U.S. troop deployments in Europe will create at least four sets of options for Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth by November 6, well ahead of a December deadline for the review’s completion, according to a document seen by Reuters.

NATO allies worry that the six-month review, announced in June, will lead to large-scale cuts to the roughly 80,000 U.S. forces across Europe and punish countries that President Donald Trump believes failed to support the U.S.-Israeli war against Iran.

The Pentagon’s “Terms of Reference,” which have not been previously detailed, explain the steps that the internal review will take and some of the criteria that will be used to evaluate U.S. basing decisions throughout Europe.

One important disclosure in the document is a plan for the top U.S. general in Europe to participate in a decision briefing with the Pentagon’s policy chief, Elbridge Colby, by September 18, according to the document.

That briefing will be key, according to the document, in hashing out options to develop for Hegseth.

NATO SKEPTICISM OF U.S. REVIEW PROCESS

Colby is expected to speak with NATO ambassadors about the review on Thursday at the alliance’s Brussels headquarters.

Asked about the Terms of Reference, a senior Pentagon official said the fact that a spectrum of options would be generated, in detail, underscored the seriousness of the process.

“We want to be able to talk through the pros and cons of a variety of different force levels or dispositions,” the official told Reuters.

It is unclear, however, whether the details will convince European officials skeptical of the review process, who say privately they are concerned Washington’s decision is all but made.

The Trump administration has long signaled it intends to reduce the military resources it devotes to Europe, with the expectation that NATO allies will carry a greater share of the burden than they have historically.

Trump has also fumed that European NATO allies have long relied on U.S. security guarantees while providing inadequate support for the Iran war. Accusations include that some allies failed to grant basing and overflight access to U.S. warplanes, or did it too slowly.

NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte has expressed some understanding of Trump’s disappointment but said the large majority of Europeans have been helpful.

The Pentagon official said the Trump administration had made clear that “we are transitioning to provide critical, more limited support with allies in the lead.”

“President Trump has also been quite rightly and clearly frustrated with certain allies’ behavior in recent months. So there’s clearly at least some demand signal to have options that would show us (downgrading) our force levels in Europe,” the official said on condition of anonymity to discuss the matter.

Still, the official said the review sought to “provide a spectrum of options from where we are to wherever” the review leads.

HEGSETH ACCUSES SOME NATO ALLIES OF ‘FREE-RIDING’

Announcing the review in June, Hegseth chided some “free-riding” NATO allies and said the review would ensure U.S. military “access, basing, and overflight are clearly delineated.”

The Terms of Reference go further.

Beyond calling for reliable U.S. access, basing and overflight rights, called ABO, in allied NATO nations, they examine space, cyber and “intelligence architectures and infrastructure that enable U.S. global power projection,” the document says.

The Pentagon expanded the definition of ABO to ensure the U.S. takes into account all the types of support that NATO allies provide, the senior official said. 

The Terms of Reference also address other ways allies will be evaluated, and appear to be in line with previous U.S. remarks by senior officials.

The document says the Pentagon will seek to determine whether allies have a credible path to meet their NATO spending pledges and fill in gaps to NATO crisis forces — known as the NATO Force Model — after U.S. reductions were announced earlier this year. 

Reuters has reported on a U.S. questionnaire sent to allies to inform the review. It covers issues ranging from defense spending to strategy, procurement and support for U.S. foreign policy priorities.

“What if any restrictions has the country placed on U.S. access, basing, and overflight (ABO)? If so, why? Are they willing to reduce or eliminate any such restrictions?” the U.S. asked in its questionnaire.

“Has the country publicly opposed regulations or other measures designed to inhibit or reduce transatlantic defense industrial cooperation? If so, how? If not, would they be willing to do so?” another question read.

The responses are due by Friday.

“We are working very, very hard, and it is a relatively tight timeline,” the official said. “A lot of prior analysis will inform this, which should allow us to move quicker on our end.”

(Reporting by Phil Stewart; Additional reporting by Idrees Ali; Editing by Don Durfee and William Mallard)

By Ann Saphir

Aug 26 (Reuters) – Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook’s lawyer on Wednesday offered a detailed rebuttal to the accusations of mortgage fraud that U.S. President Donald Trump asserts provide cause to fire her, saying they rely “on untried and unproven allegations of criminal wrongdoing.”

“Governor Cook has never committed mortgage fraud or any intentional wrongdoing, and there is no legally cognizable cause for removing her from the Federal Reserve Board,” Cook’s attorney Abbe David Lowell said in a letter to the White House.

Trump has been trying to sack Cook for more than a year in an unprecedented effort widely seen as part of a broader assault on the U.S. central bank’s independence. It’s the first time a U.S. president has attempted to remove a central banker since the institution’s founding more than a century ago. If he succeeded in removing Cook, Trump, who has long pushed for lower interest rates, would be able to install a replacement sympathetic to his view.  

Mortgage fraud allegations against Cook, the first Black woman to serve as a Fed governor, were first leveled a year ago by Federal Housing Finance Agency Director William Pulte. The accusations were promptly amplified by Trump, who announced on social media that he was dismissing her over them.

Cook denied any wrongdoing, calling the allegations a pretext to remove her for monetary policy differences, and she sued to keep her job.

In June, the U.S. Supreme Court refused to allow her removal in a 5-4 ruling that definitively protects Fed officials from being fired at will by a president. It has since returned the case to the lower court.

The decision left open the question of whether there was any wrongdoing that could serve as cause for termination, provided Cook was given the opportunity to defend herself.

FED INDEPENDENCE 

Earlier this month, the White House took a fresh run at Trump’s firing effort, telling Cook in a letter dated August 5 that the president was “considering” removing her from her role “due to there being sufficient reason to believe that you made false statements on one or more mortgage agreements.”

The letter told Cook that “this is your chance to respond” and set a deadline of Wednesday.

“The Letter describes two acts by Governor Cook that, ‘taken together,’ supposedly constitute grounds for her removal,” Lowell’s response to the White House said. “But neither of those acts shows intentional wrongdoing or amounts to a crime, and neither constitutes ’cause’ under the Federal Reserve Act.”

Lowell said any mistakes on Cook’s mortgage applications indicating she was seeking a primary residence mortgage for a second home were inadvertent and were partly the result of errors on forms prepared by the lender.

“The pre-office conduct at issue, all of which took place in Governor Cook’s private capacity, was not fraudulent or criminal in any form, nor a basis for the President attempting to remove her,” Lowell said.

Lowell also surfaced news reports that Trump and other members of his administration had done essentially the same thing as Cook at various points in the past.

“Surely the President does not believe himself ‘unfit for office’ because he signed these contradictory ‘primary’ mortgage documents,” Lowell said, adding: “The conduct of others in this Administration further undercuts any notion that the allegations against Governor Cook are grounds for removal.”

GOVERNORS APPOINTED BY BIDEN

Fed Chairman Kevin Warsh has not addressed Cook’s case since taking the reins at the Fed in May. But he has publicly echoed past Fed chiefs and the broader economic consensus that any loss of political independence for the central bank’s monetary policy decision-making would imperil its inflation-fighting credibility. 

Trump repeatedly threatened to fire Warsh’s predecessor, Jerome Powell, for not lowering interest rates, and his Department of Justice pursued a criminal investigation of Powell over building renovations that a federal judge found to be a thinly disguised effort to pressure him into resigning.

Once Powell’s term as Fed chief ended and Warsh began his, the Republican president redirected his criticisms at other Fed board members, a majority of whom, including Cook, were appointed by Trump’s Democratic predecessor, Joe Biden.

In a criminal referral to the Justice Department a year ago, Pulte suggested Cook had committed bank fraud punishable by 30 years in prison because mortgage documents appeared to simultaneously claim more than one home as her primary residence. The referral was one of several Pulte made containing similar allegations against other targets of Trump’s disfavor.

There has been no indication a criminal investigation into Cook is moving forward. A Reuters report last year showed Cook had indicated to a lender that one of the homes at issue was a vacation property. Reuters also reported the local tax authority in Michigan said Cook had not broken rules for tax breaks on a home there that she declared as her primary residence.

The letter this month to Cook, signed by White House Deputy Chief of Staff Dan Scavino, said that even if there wasn’t fraud, Cook’s misstatements constitute negligence that calls into question her trustworthiness as a Fed governor.

(Reporting by Ann Saphir; Editing by Paul Simao and Cynthia Osterman)

JUNEAU, Alaska (AP) — A man who is serving time in a federal prison in New York advanced on Wednesday from the primary for Alaska’s lone U.S. House seat.

Eric Hafner, a registered Democrat, also ran for the seat in 2024 and secured a spot on the general election ballot that November despite a challenge brought by the Alaska Democratic Party.

Hafner pleaded guilty in 2022 to charges of making threats against police officers, judges and others. He is set to be released in 2036.

The leading candidates in the race are the incumbent, Republican Rep. Nick Begich, and independent Bill Hill, a commercial fisherman and retired educator.

Hafner’s success in the primary as one of the candidates moving on to the general election is almost certain to draw another legal challenge because the U.S. Constitution requires candidates to live in the state they will represent at the time of the election.

In the candidate information he filed with the state, he listed the same Box Elder, South Dakota, mailing address and New York phone number as his mother, Carol Hafner. Neither has any apparent ties to Alaska.

Carol Hafner also is a failed prior candidate and ran again this year, this time in the state’s U.S. Senate primary.

Under Alaska’s election system, the top four primary finishers advance to the general election regardless of party affiliation. Eric Hafner had received 5,757 votes after 93% of ballots had been counted. That was far behind the third-place candidate, Democrat Matt Schultz. But Schultz withdrew from the general election and was ineligible to advance.

It remained too early to call the fourth-place finisher.

Aug 26 (Reuters) – A federal judge on Tuesday again blocked a Texas law restricting public drag performances, ruling for a second time that the legislation passed in the heavily Republican state violated the U.S. Constitution’s free speech protections.

“For those who find such activities as described in this case offensive, the solution is relatively simple … just don’t go,” U.S. District Judge David Hittner wrote in his opinion — the second time the Texas-based judge has found the measure in violation of the Constitution’s First Amendment.

The law, Texas Senate Bill 12, had previously been tossed by Hittner in 2023 but was allowed to take effect in 2026 during an appeal.

In his Tuesday ruling, Hittner wrote that the law is “unconstitutionally vague,” adding that performers ranging from Dolly Parton and Elvis Presley to Miley Cyrus could have been subject to penalties under the law if their performances were seen as “erotic.”

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton’s office had defended the law, which, among other restrictions, banned “the exhibition of sexual gesticulations using accessories or prosthetics that exaggerate male or female sexual characteristics” in public, or in venues where people under 18 may see it.

Paxton, a Republican who is currently running for the U.S. Senate, called the ruling “a profoundly flawed decision that endangers our children and is an affront to Texas values.”

Opponents of the law criticized it as too broad and said it was explicitly intended to target LGBT performers.

“Today’s decision confirms that the Legislature’s attempt to ban drag performances was unconstitutional from start to finish,” Brian Klosterboer, senior staff attorney at the ACLU of Texas, which represented the plaintiffs, said in a statement. “Drag has a rich history as a refuge of joy and liberation for countless Texans, and it’s not going anywhere.”

(Reporting by Christian Martinez in Los Angeles; Editing by Scott Malone and Lisa Shumaker)

By Nate Raymond

BOSTON, Aug 26 (Reuters) – A federal judge on Wednesday blocked President Donald Trump’s administration from restructuring a federal grant program to redirect money away from over 100 non-profit organizations that had historically received funding to help prevent and investigate housing discrimination.

U.S. District Judge Myong Joun in Boston ruled the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development had failed to provide a reasoned explanation for its decision to implement “sweeping changes” to a decades-old grant program run by the agency designed to combat housing discrimination.

His ruling came in a lawsuit by the National Fair Housing Alliance and the Massachusetts Fair Housing Center, which sued in July to block the changes.

Lila Miller, a lawyer for the plaintiffs at the law firm Relman Colfax, in a statement said the ruling “rightfully recognizes the stakes at issue and protects the rule of law.”

HUD did not respond to a request for comment.

Joun, an appointee of Democratic President Joe Biden, said Congress had long recognized the need to provide funding for fair housing organizations to help support the work of HUD, which had funded them through multi-year grants.

Yet he said HUD in July upended that system of enforcing the Fair Housing Act by announcing it would not allocate any of its congressionally appropriated funding for the 2025 fiscal year to private enforcement initiatives or to multi-year grants issued through the Fair Housing Initiatives Program, which Congress created in 1987.

In the past, HUD would typically award over 100 grants ranging from $75,000 to $425,000, according to lawyers for the fair housing groups.

HUD instead planned to use $46 million of the $56 million that Congress had appropriated for just five grants, $25 million of which would go to a law school. The remaining $10 million could go to a state or local agency.

“The effect of HUD’s restructure effectively bars the very housing organizations that have been effectuating FHIP’s mission year after year since its enactment,” Joun said. 

The Trump administration also sought to force grant recipients to sign onto unrelated conditions to receive funding, by imposing requirements that they not use any funding to support “gender ideology” or “illegal immigration.”

HUD had argued it had the discretion to impose those conditions and that the changes it was making to the grant program were part of a large-scale modernization effort designed to broaden participation.

But Joun said that the “pithy description falls woefully short of the mark in both form and substance,” and it was “hard to see how or where Defendants relied on relevant data in crafting these changes.”

(Reporting by Nate Raymond in Boston; Editing by Aurora Ellis)

PORTLAND, Maine (AP) — Maine’s Republican nominee for governor recently told a crowd of supporters that he would ask a top Department of Homeland Security official to send U.S. Marshals and Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents to polling places in the state for this fall’s midterm elections, according to audio obtained by The Associated Press.

During an Aug. 20 event in Arundel, Bobby Charles told a group of supporters that he would ask Tom Homan, the White House border czar, to send federal agents to polling places in the weeks before Election Day. The audio was first reported by the Bangor Daily News.

“Here’s my secret,” Charles told members of a Maine Young Republicans chapter. “I have a friend named Tom Homan. Tom and I used to get on Fox all the time together. Tom’s an awesome guy.”

“I’m going to ask Tom, I’m going to actually — three or four weeks before the election, maybe three — I’m going to make an appeal for ICE and Marshals to be at our voting booths,” Charles said, according to the audio.

On Wednesday, he explained his comments by saying state and local authorities who manage elections should have an open line of communication with federal authorities if needed to “prevent violence at a voting place, in order to prevent intimidation at a voting place and in order to prevent illegality at a voting place.”

He said his point was that Maine authorities should do everything legally possible to prevent illegal voting in the state.

“Everybody who is legally entitled to vote should be free from any intimidation and should be able to vote,” he said in a statement released by his campaign. “Anybody who is not legally entitled to vote should not be voting.”

Charles’ comments come as President Donald Trump continues to sow doubt about the security of elections in the U.S. elections and takes unprecedented measures to intervene in election administration. The Constitution gives states, and sometimes Congress, the authority to set election rules but grants no such power to the president.

A central part of his attacks is to claim widespread fraud through voting by noncitizens. But those claims are vastly overstated. Voting by noncitizens is exceptionally rare and is punishable as a felony, with deportation as one potential penalty.

Nevertheless, Trump has been pushing Congress to pass a bill that would require voters to show documentary proof of citizenship to vote in the upcoming midterms and signed an executive order directing the Postal Service to send mail ballots only to those on an approved list of verified voters.

When reached for comment on Wednesday, DHS did not address whether department officials had held or planned to hold conversations with political campaigns about election security. DHS officials have previously said they do not have plans to send ICE agents to polling places.

“Elections exist for the American people, not illegal aliens, to choose their leaders,” a Homeland Security spokesperson said in a statement to the AP.

Democratic state officials have been concerned about the possibility of immigration agents showing up near polling places on Election Day or during early voting. Several states have taken actions this year to guard against it.

In February, a DHS official told a group of secretaries of state that “any suggestion that ICE will be present at any polling location is simply not true,” according to several secretaries who were part of the conversation. That followed congressional testimony from the heads of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection, who both answered “No, sir” when asked if they are involved in any efforts to guard voting precincts.

Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows, a Democrat, said ICE agents are prohibited by law from being at polling places and that Maine residents can expect a free and secure election in November. Bellows ran for governor this year but lost in the Democratic primary.

“The political rhetoric coming from Mr. Charles is just politics, but it won’t change the laws or the Constitution,” Bellows said.

The Maine Democratic Party also criticized Charles’ comments and described his plan as likely illegal. The party also criticized the timing of the comments as the state is continuing to wrestle with the killing of Biddeford resident Johan Sebastián Durán Guerrero by an ICE officer earlier this summer.

The comments expose Charles as a “MAGA extremist” who will do Trump’s bidding, said Maine Democratic Party Executive Director Devon Murphy-Anderson.

“His plan to ask Trump’s border czar to send ICE agents to Maine polling places just weeks before Election Day is not only deeply alarming — it is likely illegal. This is a blatant attempt to intimidate voters and yet another reason Bobby Charles is too extreme for Maine,” Murphy-Anderson said.

Federal law prohibits the military and federal agencies from putting troops or armed officers near polling sites, according to the Brennan Center.

The White House has dismissed concerns that federal agents would interfere with elections and noted that there was no disruption to the election process in last year’s elections, when Democrats performed well.

During his March confirmation hearing, Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin downplayed concerns about ICE agents being used to intimidate voters or interfere with election administration. But he maintained that agents had a right to conduct immigration enforcement activities at sites related to election administration.

“I don’t understand what the concern is about enforcement of immigration at polling places anyways, because honestly if you’re not a citizen you shouldn’t be voting anyways,” Mullin testified. “So technically, there shouldn’t be illegals at the polling spot.”

He continued: “The only reason why my officers would be there is if there was a specific threat for them to be there, not for intimidation.”

Charles is an attorney who served as U.S. assistant secretary of state under President George W. Bush. He won the Republican primary for governor in June and will face Democratic candidate Hannah Pingree, the former speaker of the Maine House of Representatives, in November. Democratic Gov. Janet Mills, a Democrat, is term-limited.

___

Brown reported from Washington, D.C.

KYIV, Aug 26 (Reuters) – A U.S. senator sponsoring a bill for wide-ranging sanctions on Russia said on Wednesday he was hopeful it would pass the House of Representatives next month, and be a “sledgehammer” to President Vladimir Putin’s efforts to fund his war in Ukraine.

Senator Richard Blumenthal, a Democrat from Connecticut who met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy and senior officials during a visit to Kyiv, said the bill had strong Republican support in the House, after comfortably passing an initial Senate vote last month.

“Putin understands only force,” Blumenthal told a news conference. “And the Russia sanctions bill is a sledgehammer that can have the kind of force Putin understands.” 

Though Democrats are broadly supportive of the sanctions, some have expressed concern that it would give Republican President Donald Trump leeway to impose additional tariffs, including on U.S. allies.

The bill would sanction top Russian officials and allow Trump to set tariffs of up to 100% on the top buyers of Russia’s oil and gas, which include China and India, in an effort to stem revenue flows to Moscow.

Blumenthal said exemptions in the bill would spare European allies from the imposition of tariffs, allaying concerns raised by some Democratic legislators.

Blumenthal said he had asked Zelenskiy to lobby members of the House of Representatives to support its passage.

Zelenskiy spoke to several senators in Washington last month ahead of the vote on the bill, which took place on the day of the funeral of its co-author, the late Senator Lindsey Graham.

Blumenthal said Zelenskiy had “heartily and readily agreed” to his request. Ukraine’s presidency did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

(Reporting by Daniel FlynnEditing by Bill Berkrot)