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Carmen Cancino and her daughter Ximena Lopez  at a December protest against arrests of immigrants at green card appointments in Salt Lake City. The Trump administration is threatening to force legal immigrants applying for green cards to return home first and wait for processing. (Photo by Annie Knox, Utah News Dispatch) Immigrants seeking green cards will have to return first to their home countries and wait despite years of potential backlogs, the Trump administration announced Friday.  “An alien who is in the U.S. temporarily and wants a Green Card must return to their home country to apply,” Zach Kahler, a spokesperson for U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, said in a statement .  The change would apply to workers on temporary visas, as well as to people living here illegally but hoping for legal status through sponsorship by relatives such as spouses or children who are U.S. citizens. The immigration advocacy group FWD.us said the new policy “will create chaos and impo...

Kevin Warsh, left, takes the oath of office from U.S. Supreme Court Associate Justice Clarence Thomas, right, as Warsh's wife Jane Lauder looks on during his swearing-in ceremony to be the new chairman of the Federal Reserve in the East Room of the White House on May 22, 2026 in Washington, D.C. (Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images) WASHINGTON —  Kevin Warsh assumed his new role as chair of the Federal Reserve Friday after a swearing-in ceremony in the White House East Room, where U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas delivered the oath of office. President Donald Trump said before a crowd of high-profile former and current lawmakers and officials that he wants Warsh, of Florida, to be “totally independent.” “I want him to be independent and just do a great job. Don’t look at me, don’t look at anybody, just do your own thing and do a great job,” Trump said. Warsh vowed to be a “reform-oriented” leader in brief remarks after he was sworn in as the 17th Fed chair by ...

Indiana State Police patrol vehicles sit ready for deployment in Indianapolis. In 2025, the overall violent crime fell an estimated 9.3% compared with 2024, according to the FBI’s latest release of preliminary data. (Photo by Casey Smith/Indiana Capital Chronicle) U.S. violent crime fell sharply in 2025, according to preliminary federal data , with murders dropping an estimated 18.1% — a decline that could push the national homicide rate to its lowest level on record if the figures hold. The FBI’s Uniform Crime Reporting Program reported that overall violent crime fell an estimated 9.3% compared with 2024, alongside broad decreases across major categories. Robbery dropped 18.5%, aggravated assault fell 7.2% and reported rapes declined 7.6%. Property crime was down an estimated 12.4%. The FBI said the estimates, released last week, are based on data submitted by more than 17,000 law enforcement agencies covering about 96% of the U.S. population.  Participation in the FBI’s crime data...

Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche appears at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., on May 21, 2026. (Photo by Shauneen Miranda/States Newsroom) WASHINGTON — A multibillion-dollar package to fund immigration enforcement for the rest of President Donald Trump’s term faced new delays Thursday as Senate Republicans showed a rare split with the president over his  new “anti-weaponization” fund . The administration dispatched Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche to Capitol Hill to meet with Senate Republicans as many fought to add restrictions to Trump’s $1.776 billion fund as a condition for passing a proposed $72 billion for the departments of Homeland Security and Justice. Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., said the hourslong closed-door meeting with Blanche included “spirited discussion.” The Department of Justice announced Monday the  fund for “victims of lawfare” in exchange for Trump dropping his $10 billion lawsuit against the IRS. Both agencies are under his purview. “It’s unpreced...

Missouri Governor Mike Kehoe, left, talks with U.S. Vice President JD Vance after he arrived at Kansas City International Airport, May 18, 2026 in Kansas City, Missouri. Vance on his visit pitched voters on keeping Republicans in control of Congress. (Photo by Eric Lee-Pool/Getty Images) KANSAS CITY, Missouri — When Vice President JD Vance pitched voters on electing Republicans to Congress this November during a trip to a Kansas City manufacturing plant on Monday, he delivered the message while standing in a newly gerrymandered U.S. House district. “If you want congressional leadership that fights to lower your taxes, that fights to put more money in your pockets and fights to protect your jobs, the only game in town is Donald J. Trump and congressional Republicans,” Vance said. But the Trump brand is hurting — placing Republicans’ miniscule U.S. House majority at high risk, despite a GOP rush to redistricting in Southern states this spring following a landmark U.S. Suprem...

The U.S. Supreme Court as seen on April 9, 2026. The court on Thursday upheld a lower court ruling determining that Alabama death row inmate Joseph Clifton Smith had intellectual disabilities that made him ineligible for the death penalty. (Ashley Murray/States Newsroom) The U.S. Supreme Court Thursday rejected a move by Alabama to overrule lower court rulings that an Alabama death row inmate is ineligible for execution due to intellectual disabilities. In a 5-4 decision , the court ruled that it had “improvidently granted” a writ of certiorari in Hamm v. Smith, which meant that it first agreed to hear the case but later decided that it should not have been accepted. The case hinged on the meaning of IQ tests taken by Joseph Clifton Smith, sentenced to death for the 1997 murder of Durk Van Dam and one of several factors used to determine intellectual disability. The U.S. Supreme Court declared in Atkins v. Virginia in 2002 that the death penalty could not be used on those with inte...