WASHINGTON, May 11 (Reuters) – The U.S. Supreme Court cleared the way on Monday for Alabama Republicans to pursue a congressional voting map more favorable to the GOP ahead of November’s midterm elections, the latest fallout from the court’s seismic voting rights ruling. The justices lifted a lower court’s decision that had blocked state Republicans’ preferred map as racially discriminatory and for illegally diluting the voting power of black Alabamians. Federal courts had previously ruled Alabama’s map likely violated the Voting Rights Act by failing to create a second majority-black district in the state. The Supreme Court said the lower courts must reconsider previous rulings in light of the high court’s recent decision in the Voting Rights Act case, Louisiana v. Callais, which struck down a majority-black district in that state as an unconstitutional racial gerrymander. The ruling limited how race can be used in drawing congressional districts under the Voting Rights Act. President Donald Trump called on states to redraw maps after that decision. Alabama is expected to revert to a map passed in 2023, which would reduce the number of districts where black voters comprise a majority or near-majority from two to one of the state’s seven U.S. House districts. According to CBS News, the ruling “appears to be 6 to 3.” Justice Sonia Sotomayor, joined by fellow liberal Justices Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson, broke with the majority in a written dissent, arguing the lower court’s conclusion that Alabama deliberately discriminated against black voters should remain in place. Sotomayor was the only justice to disclose their vote publicly, The Hill reported. The ruling could reshape control of the U.S. House by allowing states to redraw maps to reduce minority-opportunity districts. Alabama is one of several red Southern states attempting to redraw its congressional map before the November midterms. Tennessee lawmakers approved a congressional map expected to hand Republicans control of all nine of the Volunteer State’s congressional districts. The map, signed by Republican Gov. Bill Lee, spreads out the heavily Democratic population centers in Memphis and Nashville across multiple Republican-favorable districts and is likely to eliminate the state’s lone Democratic seat, currently held by Rep. Steve Cohen of Memphis. In Florida, Republicans led by Gov. Ron DeSantis passed new congressional district boundaries projected to give the GOP four additional House seats. Lawmakers in Louisiana, South Carolina, and Mississippi are also reviewing potential redistricting plans that could further shift seats to Republicans. Before the Supreme Court decision last week, Alabama had been required to maintain one majority-black district and a second with a near-majority black population under an interpretation of the Voting Rights Act that has now been ruled an unconstitutional racial gerrymander. After the ruling, Attorney General Steve Marshall, a Republican, said the state would move quickly to ensure its maps “reflect the will of the people, not a racial quota system the Constitution forbids.” “The Court rightly acknowledged that the South has made extraordinary progress, and that laws designed for a different era do not reflect the present reality,” Marshall stated.    

President Donald Trump’s administration carried out a recent crackdown on the Venezuelan gang known as Tren de Aragua, hitting 25 alleged members of the criminal organization with federal charges. The Department of Justice announced Monday that it filed charges in six states against the accused gangbangers for firearms trafficking, drug trafficking, and possession of a firearm in furtherance of a drug trafficking crime, among others. Many of the accused are illegal immigrants from Venezuela, Colombia, and Honduras, the Justice Department said. The operation took place the last week of April, resulting in the seizure of more than 80 firearms and roughly 18 kilograms of drugs, including fentanyl, cocaine, methamphetamine, ecstasy, ketamine, MDMA, and Tusi, or pink cocaine, a mixed substance that contains ketamine and/or MDMA. Federal authorities also confiscated more than $100,000. “In a few days, the Justice Department and its partners on Joint Task Force Vulcan carried out a nationwide takedown of vicious Tren de Aragua terrorist networks — depraved, violent offenders who have illegally invaded our country and preyed upon American communities,” Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche said in a statement Monday. “This effort underscores the Trump Administration’s dedication to restoring public safety, dismantling violent firearms and drug trafficking networks, and enforcing law and order,” Blanche said. As part of the recent sweep, the Trump administration targeted two Venezuelan nationals in Colorado accused of selling numerous firearms to a Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) undercover agent. The department said the pair came to the United States during former President Joe Biden’s administration. Between October 2025 and April 2026, Wilmer Jose Bolano-Sanchez and Jeremmy Andres Boscan-Delfin sold seven firearms, including two firearms with obliterated serial numbers, to an undercover ATF agent, according to court documents. They also allegedly sold the undercover federal agent several high-capacity firearm magazines, including a 60-round drum magazine, and ammunition. The undercover ATF agent, along with a confidential informant working with federal authorities, told the accused that they planned to take the guns to Mexico, according to court documents. Boscan-Delfin also allegedly sold tusi to the undercover agent, who said he was going to bring it to girls at a club in Colorado Springs. Federal authorities arrested five individuals, three of whom are illegal immigrants living in Tennessee, for allegedly trafficking firearms and narcotics. Two of the accused are believed to be associates of Tren de Aragua or of the gang’s splinter faction “Anti-Tren.” During multiple undercover operations targeting the group, federal authorities seized 25 firearms, hundreds of rounds of ammunition, extended magazines, a drum magazine, more than $8,000 cash, as well as methamphetamine, MDMA, ketamine, and cocaine, according to the Justice Department. Eight of the 25 guns were previously reported as stolen, while two were tied to previous shootings that occurred in Nashville. Three other illegal immigrants with alleged ties to Tren de Aragua are accused of working as associates of another federally charged defendant accused of having ties to the Venezuelan gang, according to the Justice Department. The associates allegedly were part of the sales of large amounts of narcotics and firearms that took place in Florida. ATF agents seized 500 MDMA pills, two firearms, cocaine, ketamine, and methamphetamine while investigating the trio. Since Trump’s second inauguration, the Justice Department has hit more than 260 members and associates of Tren de Aragua with federal charges. Tren de Aragua originated as a prison gang in Venezuela. Its members began flooding across the U.S.-Mexico border when the Biden administration was releasing illegal migrants en masse. A number of the gangbangers came across the border without tattoos or markings showing their affiliation with the gang, making it difficult for them to be easily identified by sight. The federal government at the time also had no cooperation with the Venezuelan regime to access criminal histories. Many of the illegal border crossers ended up in cities like Aurora, Colorado, where they took over apartment complexes and terrorized residents. The gang has also been tied to sex trafficking rings across the country and has made pink cocaine its drug of choice. A member of the gang also murdered 22-year-old Georgia nursing student Laken Riley while she was out for a run in February 2024. On the campaign trail, Trump pledged to carry out “Operation Aurora” to “target and dismantle every migrant criminal network operating on American soil.”

A 23-year-old woman in New York City said she did not want to cooperate with prosecutors after a man attacked her on the subway because she did not want to “put another black man in jail.” The same suspect is now accused of pushing a 76-year-old man to his death at a Chelsea station. The New York Post interviewed the unidentified woman, who recounted a harrowing experience with a friend on a Manhattan subway. On April 2, the suspect, Rhamell Burke, a former Broadway dancer who fell off during the pandemic, approached the woman and her friend and tried to strike up a conversation. The two shut him down and tried to move to another subway car, according to The Post. The alleged attacker didn’t take no for an answer. Burke, according to the woman, yanked the back of her head and kicked her friend.  “He comes up, and he kicks my friend in the back, and basically pushes him through the transition of the cars,” the woman said in an interview with The Post. “My friend freaks out, runs away, and then he grabs me by the head and pushes my head down, trying to, like, maybe throw me on the ground or something. But I didn’t, I resisted as much as I could. I didn’t fall, and then I immediately opened up the car and then ran towards my friend,” she said to The Post.  The woman and her friend got off the train at the West 4th Street–Washington Square station in Greenwich Village, but Burke followed them, she said. “We started running a little bit, but then thank God the cops were right there because, I mean, we kept thinking about, imagine that there were no cops, we would have had to literally run for our lives. They immediately arrested him. It was shut down really fast by the cops, and we respected that,” the woman said.  Cooperation with law enforcement appeared to stop there. The alleged female victim declined to cooperate with prosecutors, and the same suspect is now accused of fatally shoving 76-year-old Ross Falzone down a flight of stairs at Manhattan’s 18th Street subway station. Falzone, a retired high school teacher who lived alone, landed on his head at the bottom of the stairs and sustained a traumatic brain injury, a fractured spine, and a fractured rib, according to the New York Times. He later died from his injuries.  NEW: Repeat offender and Broadway dancer shoves a 76-year-old retired teacher down New York City subway stairs, killing him. 32-year-old Rhamell Burke was seen grinning in court after allegedly carrying out the horrific murder. The victim, Ross Falzone, was a social worker for… pic.twitter.com/cBlbscyOOW — Collin Rugg (@CollinRugg) May 11, 2026 Three months before the deadly attack, Burke had been arrested four times, including for assault on a police officer. New York Democratic Mayor Zohran Mamdani said he was “horrified” by the killing and called for an investigation into whether the tragedy could have been prevented. “New Yorkers deserve answers,” Mamdani said in a statement. “That is why I’ve directed NYC Health + Hospitals to conduct both an immediate investigation on what steps should have been taken to prevent this tragedy and a comprehensive review of their psychiatric evaluation and discharge protocols.”   Police had previously taken Burke to a hospital after he was observed “acting erratically.” About an hour later, he was released and allegedly carried out the deadly attack later that night, according to the New York Post. “I regret it 100%, and I actually feel really bad that a man lost his life,” the woman said of her decision not to cooperate with prosectors. “Maybe a part of me was just like, I don’t want to put another black man in jail, but, you know, at some point, if you are a criminal, you’re a criminal, and he was scary, he was a scary guy.”

Department of War Secretary Pete Hegseth publicly accused Sen. Mark Kelly of disclosing classified information after the Arizona Democrat discussed depleted U.S. weapons stockpiles during a Sunday television interview, escalating a months-long feud that has increasingly elevated Kelly’s national profile. Appearing on CBS’s “Face the Nation,” Kelly warned that the recent conflict with Iran had significantly drained American munitions reserves, specifically naming Tomahawk cruise missiles, Army Tactical Missile Systems (ATACMS), SM-3 interceptors, THAAD rounds, and Patriot missiles. Mark Kelly alleges America is “less safe” because our “munitions are depleted” due to the Iran conflict: “This President got our country into this without a strategic goal, without a plan, without a timeline, and because of that, we’ve expended a lot of munitions, and that means… pic.twitter.com/k3tpvN8Kw4 — Julia

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump vowed Monday to plead Jimmy Lai’s case to Chinese President Xi JinPing, telling The Daily Wire, “I’m going to bring his name up.” The president discussed his upcoming trip to China during an Oval Office announcement on maternal healthcare. When the president took questions from reporters, the Daily Wire told Trump that Claire Lai, Jimmy Lai’s adult daughter, believes that Trump has the power to free her father, a Catholic media tycoon imprisoned by the Chinese government. “He has very much earned the title of liberator in chief,” she told The Daily Wire on Monday morning. “I believed and dad believed it would be this administration that would free him.” Trump promised that he would speak to President Xi about Lai, who is 78 years old. In February, Lai was sentenced to 20 years in prison under a national security law used by the Chinese Communist Party to crack down on dissenters. Given his age and declining health, the CCP’s sentence means he’ll die in prison — unless Trump can save him. “There’s another gentleman, a minister, a pastor, as you know,” Trump pointed out to The Daily Wire, referring to Pastor Ezra Jin, who is also unjustly imprisoned. “I’ll bring them both up.” President Trump tells @MaryMargOlohan that he would like to see Jimmy Lai freed from jail: “People would like him out, and I’d like to see him get out too. I’ll bring him up again.” pic.twitter.com/yYlgrA0vof — Daily Wire (@realDailyWire) May 11, 2026 “Somebody has to ask him,” the president added. “Biden never asked. We asked, and we were getting hundreds of people out of confinement and prisons that shouldn’t be there. And hundreds — and many of them aren’t even citizens of the United States. There are people that have been captured in some form, ministers, and people that are really innocent people, and they’re being held captive. And I bring up Jimmy.” Trump’s next comments suggested that Xi might be loath to part with his political prisoner, who was targeted by the Chinese government for his pro-democracy activism. “Now, Jimmy Lai, you know, did — he caused a lot of bedlam,” Trump added. “You know, I don’t know. It’s like saying to me, if Comey ever went to jail, would you let him out? Eh, that’s — it might be a hard one for me. Does that make sense? It might be hard with me, you know, because he’s a dirty cop.” “But Jimmy Lai isn’t that way,” Trump continued. “But Jimmy Lai — he caused lots of turmoil for China. He tried to do the right thing. He wasn’t successful. He went to jail, and people would like him out. And I’d like to see him get out too. So, I’ll bring him up again. I have brought him up. There’s another gentleman, a pastor, as you know, with a beautiful daughter and son-in-law that would like to see him get out. I’m going to bring his name up.” Lai is a Chinese-born British citizen who published “Apple Daily” in Hong Kong from 1995 to 2021. Chinese authorities arrested top executives at the publication and froze its assets in 2021, and, after a two-year trial and five-year detention, Lai was convicted in December 2025 of conspiracy to collude with foreign forces and publish seditious material. He is considered the most high-profile political prisoner in Hong Kong. Trump will arrive in China on Wednesday evening. On Thursday morning, he will participate in a welcome ceremony and a bilateral meeting with President Xi, then tour the Temple of Heaven with President Xi on Thursday afternoon, and that evening, he will attend a state banquet. Trump will participate in a bilateral tea and working lunch with President Xi on Friday morning before heading home. The White House expects to host President Xi and his wife, Madam Peng Liyuan, for a reciprocal visit in D.C. later this year.