Posts by Newspaper Staff

The White House confirmed that President Donald Trump would be departing the G7 summit early, citing matters in the Middle East.
Trump told reporters he had to be “back as soon as I can…I have to be back early.”
“This is big stuff,” the president told reporters Monday evening in Alberta, Canada.
Despite earlier unconfirmed reports that the U.S. had joined Israel in a fight against Iran, Alex Pfeiffer, deputy assistant to the president and principal of deputy communications at the White House, denied the reports.
“This is not true. American forces are maintaining their defensive posture, and that has not changed. We will defend American interests,” Pfeiffer posted to X.
Earlier in the evening, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt announced the president’s early departure from the summit after what she described as a great day for the president.
“President Trump had a great day at the G7, even signing a major trade deal with the United Kingdom and Prime Minister Keir Starmer. Much was accomplished, but because of what’s going on in the Middle East, President Trump will be leaving tonight after dinner with Heads of State,” Leavitt posted to X.
Earlier in the day, Trump posted an ominous message to Iran and its people, warning them to evacuate.
“Iran should have signed the ‘deal’ I told them to sign. What a shame, and waste of human life. Simply stated, IRAN CAN NOT HAVE A NUCLEAR WEAPON. I said it over and over again! Everyone should immediately evacuate Tehran!” the president posted to Truth Social.
He followed the warning with another post, reiterating that Iran should not have nuclear weapons.
“AMERICA FIRST means many GREAT things, including the fact that, IRAN CAN NOT HAVE A NUCLEAR WEAPON. MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!!!” he posted later.
This is a developing story…

According to federal law enforcement officials, California’s sanctuary state policy that prohibits immigration enforcement in the state jail and prison system is responsible for many of the recent raids.
Earlier this year, California legislators quashed a proposed bill that would have required local law enforcement to cooperate with federal immigration authorities for illegal immigrants convicted of serious and violent felonies. The bill’s author – Senate Minority Leader Brian Jones, R-San Diego – said the legislation would have resulted in the need for fewer ICE raids.
A Senate bill passed by Democrats, called the California Values Act, has been criticized by a U.S. attorney.
“SB 54 (Sanctuary State) is the reason you are seeing large scale enforcement operations in California,” said U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli, who served as a state Assemblyman until his federal appointment, on X. “We would much rather work with local law enforcement to focus on those involved in criminal activity, but CA law makes that illegal.”
Essayli further detailed that under SB 54, local jails are unable to honor U.S Immigration and Customs Enforcement detainers — requests that the jails hold individuals until ICE can take custody. ICE is not allowed to enter jails to screen for immigration status, and local police are not allowed to ask criminals about their immigration status or report a criminal to ICE.
“Accordingly, ICE has no choice but to go into the community and look for the criminals who have been released by local authorities,” continued Essayli.
On June 6, on the first day of Los Angeles’s ongoing immigration-enforcement-related protests and riots, Los Angeles Police Department Chief Jim McDonnell reiterated the department’s policy on cooperation with ICE, including its desire to ensure all residents feel comfortable calling for police assistance and reporting crimes.
“The LAPD is not involved in civil immigration enforcement. While the LAPD will continue to have a visible presence in all our communities to ensure public safety, we will not assist or participate in any sort of mass deportations, nor will the LAPD try to determine an individual’s immigration status,” said McDonnell. “Since 1979, our policy has barred officers from initiating police action solely to determine a person’s immigration status … I want everyone, including our immigrant community, to feel safe calling the police in their time of need and know that the LAPD will be there for you without regard to one’s immigration status.”
Jones’ SB 554, which failed to pass the Senate Public Safety Committee, would have required that California law enforcement agencies provide requested release dates to federal immigration officials for individuals convicted of serious or violent felonies or wobblers – crimes serious enough to be prosecuted as either a felony or a misdemeanor. Eligible convictions include rape, robbery, human trafficking, and committing a crime while out on bail or while released under one’s own recognizance.
“California Republicans had a solution in our Senate Bill 554, but the ‘Sanctuary City’ crowd brought this on themselves by prohibiting state and local law enforcement from cooperating with the Feds to identify violent illegal immigrants in prisons and jails,” said Jones, regarding the ongoing protests and riots. “Now the Feds have to run broader raids, like what we’re seeing in LA, which sweep up way more people. This whole thing was easily preventable.”
Opponents of SB 554, such as the Immigrant Legal Resource Center, say the bill would have increased deportations.
“In a time when immigrants and their loved ones are facing widespread fear from the current presidential administration, SB 554 would not only exacerbate fear, but roll back years of local progress that promotes building strong, and safe communities,” wrote ILRC in opposition. “Sen. Jones wants to use our local and state tax dollars to turn more Californians over to the Trump administration.”
The bill failed along party lines, with one vote in favor from state Sen. Kelly Seyarto, R-Murietta, and four votes against from state Sens. Jesse Arreguín, D-Berkeley; Anna Caballero, D-Merced; Lena Gonzalez, D-Long Beach; Sasha Pérez, D-Alhambra, and Scott Wiener, D-San Francisco.

The U.S. Senate Finance Committee has released some of the final pieces of Republicans’ multitrillion-dollar budget reconciliation bill implementing President Donald Trump’s policy priorities.
Yet the major tax policy changes have already caused an uproar among Republican lawmakers in both chambers, jeopardizing the bill’s chances of reaching Trump’s desk by his self-imposed July 4 deadline.
Released Monday evening, the committee’s revisions to the House-passed One Big Beautiful Bill Act include making key provisions of the expiring 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act permanent, rather than the House’s 10-year extension.
“This bill prevents an over-$4 trillion tax hike and makes the successful 2017 Trump tax cuts permanent, enabling families and businesses to save and plan for the future,” Senate Finance Committee Chairman Mike Crapo, R-Idaho, said Monday. “It powers the economy by permanently extending critical pro-growth provisions and introduces new incentives for domestic investment, providing certainty for American job creators to spur domestic economic activity and invest in their workers.”
The codification of the TCJA could surge the national debt and deficit, given the trillions of dollars in federal revenue loss by 2034, according to budget watchdogs.
This includes the $15,000 maximum standard deduction, the 20% Qualified Business Income deduction, and the doubled child tax credit of $2,000, though both parents now need a Social Security number to claim it.
It also would make key business tax credits permanent – full reimbursement for capital investments, an expanded deduction for corporation’s interest on debt, and streamlined deductions for companies’ research costs.
Despite rumors the committee would axe certain temporary tax proposals in the OBBBA, lawmakers kept the four-year provisions nixing taxes on tips and overtime and ending interest on loans for American cars. However, it lowers a temporary $500 boost to the child tax credit that the House included, instead capping it at $2,200 for the next four years.
The changes also would cap the Medicaid provider tax at 3.5%, down from the House’s version that bans states from raising provider taxes higher than 6%.
The committee infuriated fiscal hawks in the House and Senate by slowing phaseouts of renewable energy subsidies from the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act, though those could still change in future negotiations.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., may still be able to get 51 votes for the filibuster-skirting bill to pass the upper chamber. But the Senate committee’s sledgehammer to the House’s quadrupled state and local tax (SALT) deduction cap will make the bill “dead on arrival” when it returns to the lower chamber, according to Rep. Mike Lawler, R-N.Y., and other New York lawmakers.
The committee’s changes to SALT — making the current $10,000 SALT deduction cap permanent rather than raising it to $40,000 — undo crucial negotiations Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., made to get the OBBBA through the House.
That number could also change, however, as Senate leaders assured lawmakers it is only a placeholder as they continue to haggle over a final compromise number.