Astronauts aboard the International Space Station were ordered Friday to shelter inside a docked SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft after a persistent air leak in the Russian section of the orbiting laboratory worsened.   NASA mission control issued the order at approximately 9:04 a.m. Eastern as Russian cosmonauts worked to repair the leak. Reuters reports a senior NASA official said the leak rate had increased from roughly one pound of air per day to two pounds per day. Five of the station’s seven crew members temporarily took refuge inside the SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft while two Russian cosmonauts remained in the affected area to carry out repairs.  American astronauts Jessica Meir, Jack Hathaway, and Chris Williams, French astronaut Sophie Adenot, and Russian cosmonaut Andrey Fedyaev took shelter inside the Dragon capsule.  Roscosmos cosmonauts Sergey Kud-Sverchkov and Sergey Mikayev remained aboard the station to address the leak.  NASA and Russia’s space agency, Roscosmos, have reportedly spent months investigating a series of recurring air leaks in a Russian section of the International Space Station. The latest leak is believed to be associated with the Zvezda service module, a critical Russian-built component that includes living quarters, life-support systems, communications, and propulsion functions.  NASA spokesperson Bethany Stevens said the agency acted out of caution. “Out of an abundance of caution, Nasa has directed all four of the agency’s SpaceX Crew-12 members and Nasa astronaut Chris Williams to assume an elevated safety posture in the Dragon spacecraft while the repair is under way,” said Stevens.  Officials later reported that one leak had been while crews continued work on a second.  After approximately two hours inside teh Dragon spacecraft, NASA instructed the crew to return to normal operations aboard the station. “Roscosmos has paused Friday’s structural repair efforts inside the Zvezda service module transfer tunnel, known as PrK, as more measurements and data is assessed,” Stevens said. “Given this development, NASA has instructed the crew members inside the Dragon spacecraft to end the safe haven procedures and return to planned operations aboard the International Space Station. We look forward to working with Roscosmos on a collaborative approach to address the leaks.” The International Space Station, which is about the size of a football field, serves as a permanent laboratory in space. It is a joint effort between the United States, Russia, Europe, Japan, and Canada. While small air leaks are not uncommon aboard aging spacecraft, officials have said the recurring leaks remain a concern. 

Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy has launched a federal investigation into Atlanta’s Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority (MARTA) after a series of violent incidents, including the fatal stabbing of a 66-year-old grandmother aboard a train.  The Department of Transportation announced the review this week, citing concerns about rider safety and rising crime on the transit system. “Every American should be disturbed by the horrific crimes we have seen on MARTA in the last month,” Duffy said. “No one should be forced to fear for their safety simply because they choose to ride public transit.” The investigation was triggered after the May killing of Margaret Swan, who was fatally stabbed while riding a MARTA train. According to authorities, surveillance video showed 25-five-year-old John Elijah Matthews approach Swan without provocation before stabbing her repeatedly as she attempted to defend herself. Swan died at the scene. The attack came less than a week after another stabbing at a MARTA station, where a 40-year-old man was injured. Duffy’s Transportation Department has given MARTA 15 days to submit detailed plans to combat fare evasion, its 2026 and 2027 security budgets, and records of all safety-related funding received from the Department of Homeland Security for its review and analysis.  Duffy said the administration has already pushed transit agencies in other major cities to strengthen security measures. According to the Transportation Department, Chicago has increased police patrols, Washington, D.C., has reported a decline in transit crime, Los Angeles has hired a police chief dedicated to transit authority, and Philadelphia has expanded its camera network.  The push has gained urgency after a string of violent attacks, including the killing of  Debrina Kawam, who was set on fire aboard a New York City subway train in 2024, and the fatal stabbing of Iryna Zarutska on North Carolina’s light rail system. 

A federal judge on Friday struck down a Trump administration policy that froze immigration proceedings for applicants from 39 countries after an Afghan refugee was accused of killing a National Guardsman and wounding another in Washington, D.C., according to the Associated Press.  U.S. District Chief Judge John McConnell Jr. ruled that U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services exceeded its legal authority when it halted final decisions on asylum, work permit, green card, and citizenship applications from nationals of dozens of countries across Africa, Asia, Latin America, and the Middle East. The policy was enacted after prosecutors accused Rahmanullah Lakanwal, a 29-year-old Afghan national, of carrying out a deadly shooting in the nation’s capital the day before Thanksgiving. Prosecutors say Lakanwal drove from Bellingham, Washington, to Washington, D.C., and opened fire on National Guard troops, killing U.S. Army Spc. Sarah Beckstrom, 20, and wounding U.S. Air Force Staff Sgt. Andrew Wolfe, 24.  Wolfe, who underwent skull reconstruction surgery, is making a slow—but remarkable—recovery. Lakanwal pleaded not guilty to nine charges, including first-degree murder. Lakanwal entered the United States during former President Joe Biden’s administration after serving alongside U.S. troops in Afghanistan in a CIA-backed unit, The Daily Wire previously reported.  After the shooting, President Donald Trump called for the death penalty and signed off on the immigration restrictions, citing national security concerns. “This order aims to safeguard U.S. citizens from aliens who may seek to commit terrorist acts, pose threats to national security, promote hateful ideologies, or exploit immigration laws for malicious purposes,” the administration said at the time. In the 135-page opinion issued Friday, McConnell sharply criticized the policy and the government’s implementation of it.   McConnell said the restrictions “threw the lives of countless immigrants living in the United States into indeterminate legal limbo” and said USCIS exceeded its legal authority, failed to explain its policy changes, and accused USCIS of leaning on “anti-immigrant sentiments.”  “Over six months later, many of those individuals remain without work, without legal status, and without any meaningful ability to plan for their futures,” Judge McConnell wrote.  “In legal terms, that means USCIS’s actions are contrary to law and arbitrary and capricious.” Democracy Forward, a legal nonprofit that helped represent the immigration groups behind the lawsuit, celebrated the ruling. “This ruling reaffirms a basic principle: the federal government cannot shut down lawful immigration pathways or discriminate against people based on where they come from,” Skye Perryman, President and CEO of Democracy Forward, said.  The decision marks a significant defeat for the White House, which is expected to appeal. 

A massive show of federal force descended on Columbus, Ohio, on Thursday following a Daily Wire investigation into Medicaid, with top Trump administration officials including Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, and the head of Medicaid Dr. Mehmet Oz on the ground to announce major anti-fraud initiatives. At a joint press conference in Columbus, the administration officials announced several steps that are being taken to eliminate fraud in the state. Forty-nine home health care firms have been suspended (most of them in the buildings highlighted in our stories), and one was raided Thursday morning, Dr. Oz said. He specifically mentioned The Daily Wire’s findings, saying “there’s a road here very close to where we are [with] 288 facilities in one block,” and “no more champagne on private jets.” The press conference came a day after the House Oversight Committee spotlighted the Daily Wire’s reporting, in which task force chairman Brandon Gill drilled down into the abuse’s connection to refugee communities. Oz highlighted that connection. “This is a Mecca for Somalian populations, it’s a hub for the Bhutanese and Nepalese. We were naive to think that practices that are common in other parts of the world wouldn’t follow them here,” he said. The assistant attorney general for the National Fraud Enforcement Division, Colin McDonald, said that Ohio’s attorney general will announce an $11 million action from the state’s Medicaid fraud control unit, that Ohio’s secretary of state has signed a data-sharing agreement giving investigators access to corporate ownership records, and that State Auditor Keith Faber has applied to have federal fraud investigators detailed to the state. “To the people of Ohio, if someone offers you a medical perk that sounds too good to be true, it is,” McDonald said. “We are resolved to till every field and turn over every rock to bring [fraudsters] to justice.” There were numerous announcements of fraud in various fields in the state. Dominick Gerace, U.S. attorney for the Southern District of Ohio, announced a $30 million Medicaid fraud prosecution involving non-existent autism care. He said a home health care company in Columbus was raided Thursday morning, but that he would not be sharing details. “This task force is going to operate similar to how we operate in the violent crime space, we’re going to inject a sense of urgency,” he said. David Tuppler, U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Ohio, said five individuals from Ghana have been charged with conspiracy to commit wire fraud and money laundering, involving swindling the elderly. “They devised a romance scheme to establish trust and then tell stories of vast inheritances and convince the elderly to pay them, using it to buy a mansion in Ghana, a Lamborghini,” he said. Luxury cars that had been seized were on display at the press conference. Andrew Ferguson, who co-chairs the anti-fraud task force alongside Vice President J.D. Vance, announced that major actions were being taken outside of the state to combat fraud as well. In Hawaii, he announced during the press briefing that the state’s Medicaid fraud control unit was decertified. He said the federally-funded unit astoundingly “didn’t produce a single indictment of a fraudster from 2021 through 2026,” a near-certain sign that nobody was even looking. Ferguson pledged a “two-pronged attack on fraudsters: DOJ will put fraudsters in jail, and the agencies will make sure we install safeguards to the money never reaches the fraudsters in the first place.” Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche’s message was clear. “This is a good day for Ohio,” Blanche said.

Three United States citizens accused of helping fund ISIS attacks on American servicemembers were arrested on Friday morning by federal authorities.  According to the Department of Justice, FBI agents arrested 21-year-old Bisaam Ghafoor of Leawood, Kansas, 21-year-old Elias Shamsaldeen of Porterville, California, and 25-year-old Bereen Dzayee of Lakeside, California. The three men conspired from at least February 2025 through June 2026 to support the designated terror group, according to a criminal complaint filed in the District of Kansas. The men communicated through Discord chats, voice calls, and other messaging platforms, where they pledged allegiance to ISIS and promoted violence on the group’s behalf, according to the Department of Justice.  According to the complaint, the men repeatedly spoke about violence against Americans and U.S. military personnel.  Prosecutors say Ghafoor remarked that it would be “sick” to have his name written on a drone used in an attack on Americans, while Dzayee suggested drone strikes should target U.S. Special Forces. Shamsaldeen expressed a desire to stab a U.S. servicemember, and Ghafoor said he had long wanted to behead a female soldier before adding, “I wish I could kill 300,000,000 Americans.” Federal authorities accuse the three men of collectively providing over $2,000 to a person they understood to be a member of ISIS and trying to develop a cryptocurrency scheme to buy RPGs and drones to enable the designated terror organization to attack U.S. servicemembers.  According to prosecutors, Ghafoor’s name was inscribed on a rocket-propelled grenade that was purportedly intended for use in an overseas attack targeting U.S. servicemembers. Investigators also say that Shamsaldeen helped finance the purchase of drones that were intended to be used in attacks against American troops deployed abroad. The defendants also expressed a desire to travel outside the United States to fight and die on behalf of ISIS, according to authorities. The three men were charged with conspiracy to provide material support to a foreign terrorist organization. “This administration has put terrorists, cartels, and gangs on notice,” said Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche. “Today’s arrest of three individuals who allegedly conspired to provide material support to ISIS makes clear our commitment to taking down terrorist networks — anywhere. Thanks to the vigilance of the FBI, their alleged scheme was dismantled and further acts of violence against U.S. service members were prevented.” FBI Director Kash Patel said the suspects “swore allegiance to ISIS, plotted multiple attacks, and even targeted U.S. service members.” “The success of this op shows once again this FBI’s continued record of stopping terrorist attacks before they happen,” Patel said. Assistant Attorney General for National Security John Eisenberg said the defendants wished to betray their country. “According to the complaint, these defendants conspired to support ISIS, a ruthless terrorist organization, with the intent, among other things, to fund plans to kill American servicemembers abroad,” said Assistant Attorney General for National Security John A. Eisenberg. “Thanks to the work of the FBI, their plans to betray their country in the gravest way lies in ruin. Instead, these defendants will face justice in our courts.” The investigation was conducted by FBI Joint Terrorism Task Forces in Kansas City, San Diego, and Sacramento, with assistance from FBI field offices in Richmond and Newark.