Force

A coalition of press rights organizations is seeking a court order to stop the “continuing abuse” of journalists by the Los Angeles Police Department during protests over President Trump’s immigration crackdown.

The federal lawsuit, filed Monday by the Los Angeles Press Club and investigative reporting network Status Coup, seeks to “force the LAPD to respect the constitutional and statutory rights of journalists engaged in reporting on these protests and inevitable protests to come.”

The suit cites multiple instances of officers firing foam projectiles at members of the media and otherwise flouting state laws that restrict the use of so-called less-lethal weapons in crowd control situations and protect journalists covering the unrest. Those measures were passed in the wake of the 2020 protests over the killing of George Floyd by police in Minneapolis when journalists were detained and injured by the LAPD while covering the unrest.

The recent suit filed in the Central District of California describes journalists being shot with less-lethal police rounds, tear-gassed and detained without cause.

Carol Sobel, a longtime civil rights attorney who represents the plaintiffs, said LAPD officers have also been blocking journalists from areas where they had a right to be, in violation of the department’s own rules and Senate Bill 98, a state law that prohibits law enforcement from interfering with or obstructing journalists from covering such events.

“You have people holding up their press credentials saying, ‘I’m press,’ and they still got shot,” she said. “The Legislature spent all this time limiting how use of force can occur in a crowd control situation, and they just all ignored it.

Apart from journalists, scores of protesters allege LAPD projectiles left them with severe bruises, lacerations and serious injuries.

The Police Department said Monday that it doesn’t comment on pending litigation. A message for the Los Angeles city attorney’s office, which represents the LAPD in most civil suits, went unreturned.

Sobel filed a similar action in the wake of the LAPD’s response to the 2020 protests on behalf of Black Lives Matter-L.A. and others who contended that LAPD caused scores of injuries by firing hard-foam projectiles. A federal judge later issued an injunction restricting the department’s use of 40-millimeter and 37-millimeter hard-foam projectile launchers to officers who are properly trained to use them.

Under the restrictions, which remain in place with the court case pending, police can target individuals with 40-millimeter rounds “only when the officer reasonably believes that a suspect is violently resisting arrest or poses an immediate threat of violence or physical harm.” Officers are also barred from targeting people in the head, torso and groin areas.

The city has paid out millions of dollars in settlements and jury awards related to lawsuits brought by reporters and demonstrators in 2020 who were injured.

On Monday, the LAPD announced an internal review of a June 10 incident in which a 30-year-old man suffered a broken finger during a confrontation with officers of the vaunted Metropolitan Division.

According to the department’s account, the Metro officers had been deployed to contend with an “unruly” crowd on Alameda Street and Temple Street and said that Daniel Robert Bill and several other demonstrators refused to leave the area and instead challenged officers. During a confrontation, several officers swung their batons and fired less-lethal munitions at Bill “to no effect” and then “used a team takedown” before arresting him.

After his arrest, Bill was taken to an area hospital, where he underwent surgery to repair a broken finger on his left hand.

The department’s Force Investigation Division will review the case, as it does all incidents in which someone is seriously injured or killed while in policy custody.

Department leaders have in the past argued that officers need less-lethal weapons to restore order, particularly when faced with large crowds with individuals throwing bottles and rocks.

The department’s handling of the recent protests is expected to be addressed at Tuesday’s meeting of the LAPD Police Commission, the department’s civilian policy-making body. The body reviewed complaints of excessive force against the department stemming from the 2020 protests but has not staked a public position about the continued use of the 40-millimeter projectiles and other crowd control measures.

Russian officials said Sunday that Moscow is still awaiting official confirmation from Ukraine that a planned exchange of 6,000 bodies of soldiers killed in action will take place, reiterating allegations that Kyiv had postponed the swap.

On the front line in the war, Russia said that it had pushed into Ukraine’s Dnipropetrovsk region.

Russian state media quoted Lt. Gen. Alexander Zorin, a representative of the Russian negotiating group, as saying that Russia delivered the first batch of 1,212 bodies of Ukrainian soldiers to the exchange site at the border and is waiting for confirmation from Ukraine, but that there were “signals” that the process of transferring the bodies would be postponed until next week.

Citing Zorin on her Telegram channel, Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova asked whether it was Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky‘s “personal decision not to take the bodies of the Ukrainians” or whether “someone from NATO prohibited it.”

Ukrainian authorities said plans agreed upon during direct talks in Istanbul on Monday were proceeding accordingly, despite what Ukraine’s intelligence chief, Kyrylo Budanov, called Russian attempts to “unilaterally dictate the parameters of the exchange process.”

People rest in a metro station, being used as a bomb shelter, during a Russian drone attack in Kyiv, Ukraine, on Friday.

(Dan Bashakov/AP)

“We are carefully adhering to the agreements reached in Istanbul. Who, when and how to exchange should not be someone’s sole decision. Careful preparation is ongoing. Pressure and manipulation are unacceptable here,” he said in a statement on Telegram on Sunday.

“The start of repatriation activities based on the results of the negotiations in Istanbul is scheduled for next week, as authorized persons were informed about on Tuesday,” the statement said. “Everything is moving according to plan, despite the enemy’s dirty information game.”

Russia and Ukraine each accused the other on Saturday of endangering plans to swap 6,000 bodies of soldiers killed in action, which was agreed upon during the talks in Istanbul, which otherwise made no progress toward ending the war.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky speaks to journalists during a press conference in Kyiv, Ukraine.

(Evgeniy Maloletka / Associated Press)

Vladimir Medinsky, an aide to Russian President Vladimir Putin, led the Russian delegation. Medinsky said that Kyiv called a last-minute halt to an imminent swap. In a Telegram post on Saturday, he said that refrigerated trucks carrying more than 1,200 bodies of Ukrainian troops from Russia had already reached the agreed exchange site at the border when the news came.

According to the main Ukrainian authority dealing with such swaps, no date had been set for repatriating the bodies. In a statement Saturday, the agency also accused Russia of submitting lists of prisoners of war for repatriation that didn’t correspond to agreements reached Monday.

It wasn’t immediately possible to reconcile the conflicting claims.

Russia says it is heading into Dnipropetrovsk region

In other developments, Russia’s Defense Ministry said Sunday that its forces had reached the western edge of the Donetsk region, one of the four provinces Russia illegally annexed in 2022, and that troops were “developing the offensive” in the neighboring Dnipropetrovsk region. This would be the first time Russian troops had pushed into the region in the more than three-year-old war.

Ukraine didn’t immediately respond to the claim, and the Associated Press couldn’t immediately verify it.

Russia’s advance would mark a significant setback for Ukraine’s already stretched forces as peace talks remain stalled and Russian troops have made incremental gains elsewhere.

Russia and Ukraine exchange aerial attacks

One person was killed and another seriously wounded in Russian aerial strikes on the eastern Ukrainian Kharkiv region. These strikes came after Russian attacks targeted the regional capital, also called Kharkiv, on Saturday. Regional police in Kharkiv said on Sunday that the death toll from Saturday’s attacks had increased to six people. More than two dozen others were wounded.

Russia fired a total of 49 exploding drones and decoys and three missiles overnight, Ukraine’s air force said Sunday. Forty drones were shot down or electronically jammed.

Russia’s defense ministry said that its forces shot down 61 Ukrainian drones overnight, including near the capital.

Five people were wounded Sunday in a Ukrainian drone attack on a parking lot in Russia’s Belgorod region, according to regional Gov. Vyacheslav Gladkov. Two people were wounded when a Ukrainian drone attack sparked a fire at a chemical plant in the Tula region, local authorities said.

Russian authorities said early Sunday that Vnukovo and Domodedovo airports, two international airports serving Moscow, temporarily suspended flights because of a Ukrainian drone attack. Later in the day, Domodedovo halted flights temporarily for a second time, along with Zhukovsky airport.

June 4 (UPI) — Russian President Vladimir Putin will respond to the Ukrainian drone strikes that destroyed Russian military aircraft in several locations on Sunday, President Donald Trump said on Wednesday.

Trump spoke with Putin by phone for more than an hour on Wednesday and said it was “not a conversation that will lead to immediate peace,” CNBC reported the president saying in a Truth Social post.

Putin told Trump the Russian military will retaliate against Ukraine for the drone strikes conducted during a long-planned operation dubbed “spiderweb.”

The drone strikes destroyed more than 40 Russian heavy bombers that are capable of deploying missiles that contain nuclear warheads.

Putin said Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is disrupting peace talks with such attacks.

Putin aide Yury Ushakov said the conversation lasted about 70 minutes and was the fourth between the two world leaders.

“It was emphasized that Ukraine tried to derail these talks by carrying out targeted attacks on entirely civilian targets and civilians on direct orders from the Kiev regime,” Ushakov said in an online announcement.

“These attacks unequivocally constitute an act of terrorism under international law,” Ushakov said. “The Kiev regime has essentially degenerated into a terrorist organization.”

Trump said the United States had no advance knowledge of the drone strikes, Ushakov said, adding that the two presidents agreed to continue working to achieve peace between Ukraine and Russia.

Putin and Trump also discussed matters in the Middle East, the conflict between India and Pakistan, and a potential restoration of cooperation between Russia and the United States regarding various global issues.

“We also discussed Iran and the fact that time is running out on Iran’s decision pertaining to nuclear weapons, which must be made quickly!” Trump said in his Truth Social post.

Putin said he could assist with nuclear talks with Iran, which Trump is working to stop from developing nuclear weapons, the BBC reported.

Ushakov credited Trump with halting the recent armed conflict between India and Pakistan and said both agreed their phone conversation was “positive and highly productive.”

June 4 (UPI) — More than 20,000 people in Germany were evacuated as authorities worked Wednesday to defuse three huge unexploded bombs from World War II at a construction site in the center of the city.

A major incident was declared due to the danger from the bombs — two 2,200 lb devices and one of 1,100 lbs — with police making checks door-to-door in the Old Town and Deutz areas of Cologne after 20,500 people were ordered to leave and businesses, tourist attractions and stations were shuttered, the city said in a news release.

The 1,100-yard-wide exclusion zone covers the city’s UNESCO-listed 13th-century cathedral, 58 hotels, parts of the subway system, at least nine schools, day care centers, two retirement homes, a hospital, as well as city hall and many other sites.

“The evacuation is the largest measure since the end of the Second World War. Everyone involved hopes that the defusing can be completed in the course of Wednesday,” city authorities said.

“This is only possible if all those affected leave their homes or workplaces early and stay outside the evacuation area from the outset on that day. We ask you to be cooperative and follow our instructions so that the evacuation and defusing can proceed quickly and without danger.”

Officials told Sky News the measures could remain in force for some time if the effort to defuse the devices was unsuccessful and it became necessary to detonate them, as that would require a major operation to contain the blast.

All three bombs are American-made, but likely dropped by the Royal Air Force, which dropped around 1.5 million bombs in raids on Cologne between 1940 and 1945, some of them with as many as 1,000 aircraft, launched from bases in eastern England.

However, as many as 300,000 of the bombs did not explode, according to experts, causing frequent scares when they turn up during construction projects or in dredging of the River Rhine, which runs through the heart of the city.

Last year alone, more than 30 were discovered, forcing 17 evacuations affecting 36,000 people. The bombs were among around 2,000 that are found across Germany each year, according to the Smithsonian Magazine.

In 2021, four people were injured in Munich when a World War II bomb exploded during construction work near the main train station and more than 65,000 people were evacuated in Frankfurt in 2017 after a “Blockbuster” 1.4-ton British bomb was found near Goethe University. That device was safely defused.

German bombs are frequently discovered in Britain, which was heavily bombed by the Luftwaffe between 1940 and 1941 and in 1944, most recently last year when 10,000 people were evacuated after a large bomb was found in the yard of a suburban property in Plymouth.

Naval and army bomb disposal officers extracted the device and took it out to sea, where it was detonated.

WASHINGTON — Defense Secretary Dick Cheney on Monday fired Air Force Chief of Staff Michael J. Dugan, saying that the four-star general displayed “poor judgment at a very sensitive time” by revealing possible targets of air strikes in Iraq in the event of war.

President Bush and Gen. Colin L. Powell, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, concurred in the dismissal, which came in a 10-minute meeting with Dugan in Cheney’s Pentagon office early Monday.

Dugan was fired for comments published in The Times and Washington Post on Sunday, in which he said that–if war comes–the U.S. military intends to conduct a massive air campaign against Iraq, specifically targeting Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, his family and his palace guard.

“Given the extreme delicacy and sensitivity of the current situation, it’s incumbent upon senior officials to be discreet and tactful in their public statements, and I found those qualities lacking” in Dugan’s remarks, Cheney said in a news conference Monday.

The defense secretary said Dugan’s comments put at risk the lives of the more than 150,000 U.S. troops in the region and jeopardized the five-week-old Persian Gulf operation by revealing classified details of U.S. war planning.

Cheney said he will nominate Gen. Merrill A. McPeak, currently commander of Pacific Air Forces, to be the next chief of staff.

As for Dugan, who had been in the post only since July, Cheney said: “He will be retired.”

The only other member of the Joint Chiefs to have been fired was Adm. Louis E. Denfeld, sacked in October, 1949, by President Harry S. Truman. Denfeld, ironically, had irritated the President and his fellow chiefs for raising questions about the value of air power in modern warfare.

Cheney cited a number of critical sins that Dugan committed in the interviews with three journalists conducted over several hours aboard his aircraft on a trip to Saudi Arabia last week.

“We never talk about future operations, such as the selection of specific targets for potential air strikes. We never talk about the targeting of specific individuals who are officials of other governments. Taking such action might be a violation of the standing presidential executive order” banning assassinations, Cheney said.

He also chastised Dugan for underestimating Iraqi military capabilities, for revealing classified information about the size and disposition of U.S. forces in Saudi Arabia and for demeaning the role of the other U.S. military services by citing air power as the “only option” available for defeating the 1-million-member Iraqi army.

Cheney also was disturbed with Dugan for “treating (U.S.) casualties cavalierly,” an aide said. He apparently was referring to a comment from a senior Dugan aide on the trip who called the expected loss of American lives in such a military operation a “manageable risk.”

Powell reportedly was furious when he saw the Post story on Sunday morning and called Cheney at home at 7 a.m. to point it out. Cheney then sought The Times’ version to see if Dugan’s remarks were accurately reported. The two articles were similar, and the quotations in common were exactly the same. Cheney was “very upset,” but did not make up his mind to fire Dugan until Sunday night, a knowledgeable defense official said.

An aide to Cheney said the defense secretary believes Dugan’s comments “showed egregious judgment” and could not be tolerated. “He became the self-appointed spokesman for (Gen. H. Norman Schwarzkopf, who is directing the U.S. operation in Saudi Arabia) and the chiefs. He revealed classified information. He talked about operational plans that are fundamentally not his choice. He raised sensitive matters of diplomacy relating to other nations. He set a poor standard of military leadership, that a military commander would not take seriously the people we’re up against,” this official said.

“Based on all these things, the secretary just lost confidence in him,” the aide said.

Powell contacted Dugan in Florida and asked if he had been accurately quoted. Dugan assured him that he had been. Powell told him to report to Cheney’s office at 8 a.m. Monday but did not tell the Air Force chief that the decision had been made to dismiss him.

Dugan did not know when he entered Cheney’s Pentagon office that he was about to be fired, an Air Force official said.

In his news conference, Cheney did not dispute the truth of any of Dugan’s assertions, which included a statement that the Joint Chiefs have concluded that the United States would never have sufficient ground forces in Saudi Arabia to drive Iraqi troops out of Kuwait and would therefore be dependent on air power to sway any potential battle.

Dugan also revealed for the first time that the United States has deployed 420 combat aircraft to the Arabian Peninsula–nearly as much striking power as the fleet dedicated to defending Europe against the Soviet Union. Previous estimates of air power in the Persian Gulf region were about half that.

The Air Force chief also disclosed for the first time that the United States had recently purchased advanced Israeli cruise missiles and deployed them aboard B-52 bombers stationed within striking distance of Baghdad. In addition, he said that the Pentagon has consulted with Israeli intelligence agencies to determine the best targets in Iraq.

The most troubling matter, senior Pentagon officials said, was Dugan’s discussion of the possible targeting of Hussein, his family, his inner circle and even his mistress. Cheney suggested that such action “might” violate Executive Order 12333, issued in December, 1981, which specifically prohibits assassinations.

“I think it’s inappropriate . . . for U.S. officials to talk about targeting specific foreign individuals,” Cheney said in the news conference. “I think it is potentially a violation of the standing presidential Executive Order.”

However, the ban on assassinations was modified last year to allow for the killing of senior enemy military commanders as part of a “decapitation” strategy. Hussein is commander in chief of Iraqi military forces–as Bush is commander of all U.S. forces–and thus would be a legal target for military action, Pentagon officials said Monday.

But it clearly would violate U.S. law and policy to target Hussein’s wife, his children or his girlfriend, officials noted.

Cheney, pressed on a variety of Dugan’s assertions, said he could not confirm or deny them without violating the security considerations for which he dismissed Dugan.

The defense secretary also noted that Dugan is “not even in the chain of command,” which runs from Bush to Cheney to Powell to Schwarzkopf, commander of the U.S. Central Command, which covers the Middle East.

Under the current military structure, the members of the Joint Chiefs are advisers to the chairman and provide forces, equipment and support to theater commanders, known inside the Pentagon as the “war-fighting CINCs” or regional commanders in chief.

Cheney praised Dugan’s record of 32 years of Air Force service and said that he regretted firing him. “But under the circumstances, I felt it was necessary,” the secretary said. Dugan’s comments, Cheney noted, “did not in my mind reveal an adequate understanding of the situation and what is expected of him as chief of staff of the Air Force and as a member of the Joint Chiefs.”

The abrupt dismissal undoubtedly will reverberate throughout the Pentagon and the entire U.S. military, which has not enjoyed good relations with the press for two generations.

“You won’t be talking to any generals any time soon,” one senior Army officer told a reporter Monday.

Cheney denied that he was sending a message to military officers to avoid reporters. But he said that he expected his subordinates “to exercise discretion in what they say. . . . That sort of wide-ranging speculation about those matters that were discussed in the interviews that were granted by the general is what I felt was inappropriate.”

Air Force Secretary Donald B. Rice, who had recommended Dugan for the job and who concurred in Cheney’s decision to relieve him, said in a prepared statement: “I regret the circumstances that made it necessary for Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney to take this action. Gen. Dugan is a superb officer. His leadership and innovation will be missed by every man and woman in the Air Force.”

Dugan, 53, jumped over a number of senior Air Force officers when he was chosen for the chief of staff job earlier this year. He is a fighter and attack plane pilot with more than 4,500 flying hours and 300 combat missions in Vietnam.

A graduate of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, N.Y., Dugan rose rapidly through the Air Force, serving chiefly in fighter squadron commands. His last post before becoming chief of staff in July was as commander of U.S. Air Forces in Europe.

His last Washington assignment was in 1988 and early 1989, when he served as deputy Air Force chief of staff for plans and operations.

Among his decorations are the Distinguished Service Medal, Silver Star, Legion of Merit with two oak leaf clusters, Purple Heart, Distinguished Flying Cross, Air Medal and the Republic of Vietnam Gallantry Cross with Palm.

Dugan has six children, three of them Air Force officers. When the articles appeared Sunday, he was in Florida attending a ceremony for his son Michael’s graduation from F-16 pilot training school.

Sen. John S. McCain (R-Ariz.), a former Navy bomber pilot who was shot down and taken prisoner in Vietnam, said the American system of civilian control of the military dictated Cheney’s firing of Dugan. “I think that clearly Cheney has the authority, and indeed the responsibility, to discipline anyone who violated policy,” he said.

McCain said he was especially troubled by Dugan’s comment that in any bombing campaign “the cutting edge would be in downtown Baghdad. This wouldn’t be a Vietnam-style operation, nibbling around the edges. . . . The way to hurt you is at home, not out in the woods somewhere.”

McCain said he did not think the American public would accept that tactic, even if it were justifiable on purely military grounds.

“His comments are at best not cognizant of the sensitivity of those remarks and the reaction that would be fueled by them,” McCain said. “It’s too bad, because I’m sure the guy was highly qualified for the job. But it comes down to the fact that the civilian leaders have a right to choose whom they want.”

Sens. Sam Nunn (D-Ga.) and John W. Warner (R-Va.), chairman and ranking minority member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said in a joint statement that they believe Dugan’s firing to be justified.

“The recent public statements attributed to Gen. Dugan were inappropriate,” they said.

THOSE WHO WENT TOO FAR The following is a list of some U.S. military leaders who have been cashiered or disciplined for their comments. GEN. MICHAEL J. DUGAN, Air Force chief of staff

Fired on Sept. 17, 1990

By: Defense Secretary Dick Cheney

For: Publicly discussing possible targets of U.S. air strikes in Iraq if President Bush ordered use of military force against Saddam Hussein.

MAJ. GEN. JOHN K. SINGLAUB, U.S. chief of staff in South Korea

Fired May 21, 1977

By: President Jimmy Carter

For: Publicly opposing Carter’s plan to withdraw U.S. ground forces from Korea. He contended that the move would lead to war.

GEN. DOUGLAS MacARTHUR, Commander, U.S. , U.N. forces in Korean War

Fired on April 11, 1951

By: President Harry S. Truman

For: Making public his disagreement with Truman over methods to win the war, including his desire to bomb supply centers in Manchuria.

ADM. LOUIS E. DENFELD, Chief of naval operations

Fired in October, 1949

By: President Harry S. Truman

For: Speaking out on Capitol Hill against Navy budget cuts and questioning the value of air power.

GEN. WINFIELD SCOTT, General in chief, U.S. Army

Suspended for a year in 1810

By: Court-martial

For: Calling his superior officer, Gen. James Wilkinson, as great a traitor as Aaron Burr.

(Southland Edition) THOSE WHO WENT TOO FAR . . . OR NOT FAR ENOUGH

The following is a list of some U.S. military leaders who have been cashiered or disciplined for their actions or comments. ADM. HUSBAND E. KIMMEL Commander in chief, Pacific Fleet

Retired in 1942 after being accused of dereliction of duty

By: Naval board of inquiry

For: Poor state of readiness of naval forces; poor response to Japan attack on Pearl Harbor.

GEN. JOSEPH HOOKER Commander, Union Army

Relieved of command in April, 1863

By: President Abraham Lincoln

For: Indecisiveness at the battle of Chancellorsville which allowed Confederates to mount surprise attack.

GEN. AMBROSE E. BURNSIDE Commander, Army of the Potomac

Relieved of command in December, 1862.

By: President Lincoln

For: Ordering his forces on Dec. 13, 1862, to make suicidal assault on entrenched

Confederate positions in Fredericksburg, Va., and sustaining 12,600 casualties.

GEN. GEORGE B. McCLELLAN Commander, Union Army

Fired on Nov. 7, 1862

By: President Lincoln

For: Procrastination and failure to capitalize on military opportunities, including allowing Confederates to hold the line at the Battle of Antietam on Sept. 17.

BRIG. GEN. JOHN POPE Union Army

Fired on Sept. 5, 1862

By: President Abraham Lincoln

For: Leading Union forces to defeat at the Second Bull Run battle in August.

DUGAN WAS WARNED: Cheney aides told the general to steer clear of the press. A10

WHITE HOUSE CONCERN: Officials are said to feel the military was too candid. A12

DONALD Trump’s luxury “sky Palace” gifted to him by Qatar will cost a few billion dollars, says the President of Emirates airline.

The US government now faces a “Herculean task” to transform the huge Boeing 747-8 into a new Air Force One fit for a president, warns Sir Tim Clark.

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President Trump, 78, sparked concerns earlier this month with his willingness to accept the plush flying mansion from the Qatari royal family.

The giant gift, worth an estimated $400m (£300m), has raised several ethical questions about if the US leader should be allowed to accept such expensive goods from other states.

But despite the controversy, Trump gladly took the 13-year-old mega jet back to Washington with him.

He now plans to make it part of his Air Force One fleet alongside two other Boeing 747-200 jumbo jets.

They have been operational since 1990 but are now said to be not up to scratch compared to modern planes such as Qatar‘s 747-8.

In order for it to become a fully fledged member of the president’s aviation arsenal however, it will need to go through some serious work.

It would have to be kitted out with top-tier communications and security tech before ever ferrying around Trump.

And significant retrofitting and clearance from security officials would be required.

Sir Tim, president of Emirates, told Piers Morgan Uncensored that President Trump’s flashy plans may cost a “couple of billion dollars”.

He explained to Piers: “I think you’re talking a couple of billion dollars to start with.

“Just roll back a little bit and look at what it takes for us to convert our 777s – from the old to the new – because we haven’t got the Boeing’s coming in at the pace we want them so we’re having to reconfigure all of them.”

The top aviation boss said trying to fix up all the jets as an airline has been an extremely tough task.

Tim admitted to “pulling his hair out” over the regulators and the tiny tweaks that have to be made to modernise a plane of that size and stature.

And he believes the US government will face an even trickier – and much more expensive – battle to get the gifted plane ready for presidential trips.

He said: “It’s a Herculean task, make no mistake about it.

“Whether President Trump will adapt fully, this present from Qatar, to an Air Force One I doubt it, but he’ll certainly get a lot of it done.”

Aviation specialist Jeff Wise also told The Sun that he expects the Air Force One replacement to take years and need billions of dollars pumped into the project to make the jet viable.

Trump’s Air Force One jets currently in use come with dozens of specialised security features.

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These include armoured glass and plating, on board flares to confuse enemy missiles, mirror-ball defences and even an electric jamming system.

Another unique yet needed element is an electromagnetic shield for nuclear explosions.

This has to be on a presidential plane as the leader of Washington can actually launch a nuke from the aircraft.

But the new Qatari jet lacks most of these security features.

Instead, the lavish aeroplane boasts a luxurious interior, featuring spacious suites and rooms with ornate interior decoration.

It also has glittering gold-coloured furnishings and hallways that echo Trump’s well-know interior design preferences.

The president is believed to have spent an hour inspecting the plan when when it was parked at West Palm Beach International Airport back in February.

The luxury Boeing was once even listed for a whopping $400 million, according to the Business Jet Traveler.

During his first stint in office, Trump had ordered two new Air Force One jumbo jets from Boeing to replace the pair that have been in service since George H. W. Bush’s presidency.

But the Boeing contract has faced delays, and reports suggest the new plans would not be ready until after Trump leaves the Oval Office.

Fears Trump’s new Air Force One replacement is vulnerable to devastating HACKS – or worse

By Chief Foreign Reporter, Katie Davis

A LAVISH jumbo jet Donald Trump plans to receive from Qatar will be vulnerable to hacking, an expert has warned.

The Boeing 747 – dubbed a “palace in the sky” – could even be blasted out the sky, aviation specialist Jeff Wise believes.

He fears Trump may bypass necessary measures to save time and money – which could therefore invite hacking or a devastating assassination attempt.

Wise told The Sun: “This Air Force One would be a major intelligence target for any adversary nation or even our allies, because allies love to spy on each other.

“The United States is being given this albatross that they are going to have to spend billions of dollars on to fix up for the personal use of Trump.

“If your job is to protect the President of the United States or if your job is to protect the secrets of the United States, then this is a massive headache for you.

“This is a plane that does not have secure communications and the anti-missiles defence systems that a normal Air Force One has. It’s just wide open.

“This is an administration that is completely irresponsible in the way they use their personal devices. They’re using these off-brand apps to communicate. It’s just a hacker’s dream.”

Wise continued: “I would say an increasing number of people would like to target Air Force One. 

“America’s list of enemies is growing longer and longer as we become an increasingly horrible nation, from the Houthis to the Iranians to the Russians.”

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A coalition of airlines, hotels and concession companies at Los Angeles International Airport filed paperwork Thursday to force a citywide vote on a new ordinance hiking the minimum wage of hotel and airport workers to $30 per hour by 2028.

The group, known as the L.A. Alliance for Tourism, Jobs and Progress, is hoping to persuade voters to repeal the ordinance. But first, the alliance would need to gather about 93,000 signatures within 30 days to qualify the measure for the ballot in an upcoming election.

Phil Singer, a spokesperson for the alliance, said the wage increase “threatens revenue Los Angeles urgently needs” — and its standing as the host of the 2028 Olympic and Paralympic Games.

“Small businesses will be forced to shut down, workers will lose their jobs, and the economic fallout will stretch across the city,” Singer said in an email. “We’re fighting for all of it: the city’s future, the jobs that sustain our communities, and the millions of guests the tourism industry proudly serves year after year.”

The new ballot measure campaign comes just two days after Mayor Karen Bass signed the minimum wage legislation into law.

The wage ordinance has been hotly opposed by an array of L.A. business organizations, which argue that it increases wages in the tourism industry too much and too quickly. However, it was welcomed by unions representing hotel and airport employees, which have supported many of the politicians who backed the measure.

The alliance’s campaign committee has received major funding from Delta Airlines, United Airlines and the American Hotel & Lodging Assn., Singer said. The group’s petition, submitted to the city clerk’s office, was signed by five businesspeople, including Greg Plummer, operator of an LAX concession company; Mark Beccaria, a partner with the Hotel Angeleno on L.A.’s Westside; and Alec Mesropian, advocacy manager with the organization known as BizFed.

The alliance is targeting a law that’s slated to push the hourly minimum wage to $22.50 on July 1 for housekeepers, parking attendants and hotel restaurant workers, as well as LAX skycaps, baggage handlers and concession employees. The wage would jump to $25 in 2026 and $27.50 in 2027.

The wage increase was spearheaded by Unite Here Local 11, the hotel and restaurant worker union, and by Service Employees International Union United Service Workers West, which represents private-sector airport workers.

Kurt Petersen, co-president of Unite Here Local 11, called the business group’s proposal “shameful” and promised his union’s members would go “toe to toe out on the streets” with the alliance’s signature gatherers.

“The hotel industry’s greed is limitless,” Petersen said. “They would rather spend millions getting them to sign this petition than pay their workers enough to live in Los Angeles. It’s shameful, but we’re confident that Angelenos will see through their deceptions and stand with workers.”

Under the city’s laws, hotel and airport workers have minimum wages that are higher than those who are employed by other industries.

The hotel minimum wage, approved by the council in 2014, is currently $20.32 per hour. The minimum wage for private-sector employees at LAX is $25.23 per hour, which includes a $5.95 hourly healthcare payment.

For nearly everyone else in L.A., the hourly minimum wage is $17.28, 78 cents higher than the state’s. The federal minimum wage is $7.25 per hour.

Backers of the airport and hotel minimum wage hikes say they will help some of the region’s lowest paid workers cover the rising cost of rent and food, while also giving them more disposable income to spend locally, delivering a boost to the region’s economy.

Detractors say it will undermine efforts by L.A.’s tourism industry to recover from the decline in business that was sparked by the outbreak of COVID-19 five years ago. They contend the ordinance will lead to layoffs, while also chilling development of new hotels.

The ordinance also requires airport and hotel businesses to provide an hourly healthcare payment — on top of the minimum wage — that starts at $7.65 in July and is expected to go up each year. (Hotels will be exempted from that requirement until 2026.)

Once the healthcare requirement is included, some businesses will be required to pay their workers an additional 60% over a three-year period, opponents of the wage increase say.

SAN FRANCISCO — Inside the once-bustling campaign headquarters for California’s medical marijuana initiative hangs a portrait of an angel with delicate wings, a sly smile and a cannabis leaf tattooed on its chest.

For those involved with Proposition 215, it takes only a glance to guess the portrait’s subject. It’s Dennis Peron, San Francisco’s silver-haired pot guru, an angel to some, a devil to others, but unquestionably a critical force–perhaps THE force–behind California’s historic Nov. 5 vote to legalize marijuana for medical use.

Although indicted in a felony drug case, the 50-year-old Peron was jubilant on election day as the ballot measure headed for victory.

Admirers lined up several deep inside the campaign’s Market Street office to shake his hand, offer him hugs. The lights of television cameras illuminated his face, and when Peron, between interviews, needed a moment of quiet in the packed room, the din abruptly fell to a hush.

“If there has to be a hero in all of this, it’s him,” said A. Das of Boulder, Colo. “Dennis Peron has put his life on the line for this.”

Das strode forward to shake Peron’s hand, then began handing out hemp cookies. Peron sat casually on his desk, smoking the stub of a joint, telling one person after another, “Thank you, brother. Thank you, brother.”

*

It’s almost impossible to imagine Peron in a dark suit and tie, peddling computers. But the choice was one he wrestled with in the early 1970s, fresh from Vietnam. The idea soon wore off. So, too, did his childhood desire to become a psychiatrist.

The horrors of the war, Peron says, convinced him he needed to live in poverty and work for peace. He chose San Francisco and decided to make ends meet by dealing pot.

“I decided I’d be a hippie faggot,” he says, offering, with a laugh, the words he says would later be used against him by police during drug busts.

Peron acknowledges his deep roots in marijuana culture and admits he’s been dealing for more than 25 years. In an autobiography published this year, Peron said bluntly: “Marijuana made me the person I am.”

Evidence of that is scattered in his past. In the early 1970s, he helped run the Big Top supermarket, a one-stop drug emporium that led to jail time. Then came the Island Restaurant, “a two-way feed, with the pot supermarket upstairs supplying customers for the food downstairs.”

Meanwhile, Peron was building his “family” and living in communes. He became politically active in the pro-marijuana movement and in gay rights and other civil rights causes.

Peron recalls those days as “the best of my life.” But then came San Francisco’s AIDS epidemic, Ronald Reagan’s presidency and the subsequent “war on drugs.”

Friends told him he’d never be able to deal marijuana with Reagan in office. Peron considered their advice and kept right on dealing.

It was during the early 1980s, Peron says, that he began to see how marijuana eased the suffering of AIDS patients and gave them dignity in death. The observation became more personal when his lover, Jonathan West, succumbed to AIDS in 1990.

“At that point, I didn’t know what I was living for. I was the loneliest guy in America,” Peron recalls. “In my pain, I decided to leave Jonathan a legacy of love. I made it my moral pursuit to let everyone know about Jonathan’s life, his death, and his use of marijuana and how it gave him dignity in his final days.”

A year later, Peron “almost single-handedly” collected enough signatures to put Proposition P on the San Francisco ballot. The measure, advocating the use of pot as medicine within city limits, passed by a 4-to-1 margin, and Peron set his sights on a larger audience.

*

“Oh, man, you can’t believe how deep this has gone, how deep these guys are going to go to defeat [Proposition] 215,” Peron said days before the Nov. 5 election.

His Cannabis Buyers’ Club, which ostensibly provided marijuana to people with AIDS, cancer and other diseases, was raided by state agents in August. Sixty pounds of pot and $750,000 were seized. The club was shut down.

Later, Peron was indicted in neighboring Alameda County on drug charges, accused of running the club as a front to deal marijuana. Undercover agents caught him on videotape, allegedly handing over $900 worth of pot, seemingly more than would be needed to help with a medical problem.

Peron pleaded “morally not guilty,” charging state Atty. Gen. Dan Lungren staged the raid as a political tactic against the medical marijuana initiative.

More personally, as the Proposition 215 campaign wore on, Peron found himself distanced from key allies. The fear shared by some at Yes on 215 was that the darker side of Peron’s image–a defiant pothead facing indictment–might damage the initiative’s chances.

But Peron never stepped aside.

He granted countless interviews, appeared on local television news almost nightly in support of the initiative. He worked the phones. And he kept referring to Lungren as a dirty trickster, the second coming of Nixon. He called detractors within the campaign bullheaded, driven by jealousy.

“If I had resigned, what would it have been? [They’d say], ‘Mr. Peron ran away.’ See, I don’t run away. You’re talking to the wrong guy.”

*

Soon after the election, Peron is hard at work. As director of a group called Californians for Compassionate Use, he’s drafting “contracts” he hopes will let sick people legally secure marijuana through a doctor.

He’s making plans to reopen the Cannabis Buyers’ Club under a new name: the Cannabis Cultivators’ Co-op, a legal nod to restrictions of the new state law.

“Everything I was doing all along was the right thing to do,” he says.

A glance back at the powerful opponents who tried to derail Proposition 215 makes victory all the sweeter, he says.

“Look at them, they had [U.S. Sen.] Dianne Feinstein, [Clinton drug czar] Gen. [Barry] McCaffrey, every sheriff in the state, Dan Lungren, all on their side. They had the endorsement of three presidents, and then they tried to make me their poster boy.

“If they succeeded in making it a referendum on me, then I won,” he says. “And it feels like vindication.”

“But this was never about me,” he adds, quickly. “All of this, all along, was about love and compassion.”

As mass protests over the police murder of George Floyd raged across Los Angeles in late May 2020, the LAPD had an unexpected problem.

After a week of demonstrations, officers had fired so many “less-lethal” crowd control projectiles made of rubber that the department’s stockpile was running low.

Scrambling to buy more, officials arranged for two reserve officers to fly a private plane to Casper, Wyo., to pick up 2,000 additional rounds from an arms wholesaler called Safariland, according to LAPD emails reviewed by The Times.

The days and weeks that followed brought more unrest in the streets, with police criticized for indiscriminately firing rubber rounds into crowds, injuring scores of people with shots to the face or torso.

Multiple reports and activists assailed the department’s response to the protests as a botched operation that resulted from poor planning, inadequate training and failure to learn from past mistakes.

According to The Times’ analysis of LAPD data released by the L.A. city attorney’s office, police actions related to the George Floyd protests have cost $11.9 million in settlements and jury awards. Scores of other pending lawsuits represent potentially tens of millions more in liability exposure.

Yet five years removed from Floyd’s killing, police backers say public opinion has largely swung back in favor of aggressive law enforcement, pointing as proof to last year’s passage of tough-on-crime legislation and ousting of progressive prosecutors.

Last month, President Trump issued an executive order promising to “unleash high-impact local police forces” in his administration’s campaign against “criminal aliens.”

The U.S. Department of Justice moved last week to cancel settlements to overhaul police departments in Louisville, Ky., and Minneapolis. The federal oversight was part of the national reckoning with racism and police brutality that followed the law enforcement killings of Breonna Taylor and Floyd, who was pinned to the pavement by a police officer for nearly 10 minutes before dying.

The push to overhaul the LAPD that began in 2020 did not result in sweeping changes, but the Police Department has in some ways come to resemble the slimmed-down version sought by some activists.

While its multibillion-dollar budget has only grown, the number of low-level arrests and traffic stops have plummeted, and staffing shortages have forced the department to focus more on responding to and solving violent crimes.

Today, the department is nearly 1,300 officers smaller than it was when Floyd died, with fewer cops on the force than at any point since 1995, mirroring nationwide declines in police staffing.

On Thursday, the L.A. City Council signed off on a $14-billion spending plan for 2025-26 that cuts funding for police recruitment in order to avoid laying off hundreds of city workers. The council provided enough money for the LAPD to hire 240 new officers over the coming year, down from the 480 proposed by Mayor Karen Bass last month.

Asked in a news radio appearance last week whether Floyd’s death had changed policing, LAPD Chief Jim McDonnell said it had, largely with the slump in hiring.

LAPD Chief Jim McDonnell, center, and Capt. James Hwang perform the uniform inspection during graduation for recruit class 11-24 on May 2.

(Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Times)

The department lost scores of cops who didn’t “feel support,” he said, and recruitment continues to prove challenging.

“So that has had a negative impact on the profession overall,” he told public radio station KCRW. “We have to restore morale within the organization; we have to restore pride within the profession.”

Following years of calls for embracing alternatives to traditional policing, LAPD officials and city leaders are continuing to explore ways to hand off calls involving substance abuse, homelessness and mental illness. Officers are also no longer responding to minor traffic accidents.

Efforts to limit police traffic involvement have gained some traction, and a controversial policy enacted by former Chief Michel Moore still restricts so-called pretextual stops of motorists or pedestrians that critics say led to the disproportionate harassment of Black and brown Angelenos. The department has also taken steps to try to limit dangerous pursuits by asking supervisors to monitor them in real-time, and if the chase proves too dangerous, to call them off.

Police data show violent crime continues to drop from pandemic highs, with the exception of aggravated assaults and robberies in certain parts of the city. Property crimes, including most burglaries, have also started to trend downward.

Some efforts at reform have stalled, including a proposal to overhaul the department’s disciplinary system for officers. Another plan that would have replaced LAPD officers with unarmed transportation workers on traffic stops sputtered amid debates around jurisdiction and funding.

Art Acevedo, who began his career with the California Highway Patrol before serving as police chief in several major cities including Houston and Miami, blamed movements to “defund” and “abolish” police for polarizing the debate on how to move forward.

Acevedo, who applied for the LAPD chief’s job that eventually went to McDonnell, said police unions and allies weaponized such rhetoric because it “effectively equated advocating for police reform as one and the same as advocating for defunding the police.”

“That movement created a backlash that has translated into a diminished appetite” for reform, he said.

Acevedo also worried about officers feeling emboldened to bend or break the rules in the current climate: “You don’t want to re-create the perception, real or not, that it’s open season for bad policing, because you’re going to have that small percentage that’re going to act on that belief that they’re not going to be held accountable.”

Melina Abdullah, co-founder of Black Lives Matter-Los Angeles, shared similar concerns.

“I think they absolutely feel unleashed,” she said of police. “Not that they were ever on a leash.”

Part of the problem, Abdullah said, is public fatigue over the seemingly constant barrage of troubling incidents.

“People don’t have the bandwidth to respond with the kind of outrage that they would when you saw the beatings at Pan Pacific Park,” said Abdullah, referring to the LAPD’s response to protests in 2020.

John Burton, an attorney who filed lawsuits on behalf of several people who were wounded by less-lethal rounds during L.A. protests in 2020, said that most changes to the LAPD have been around the edges, but the department hasn’t addressed its culture of aggression.

The lack of progress, he said, is obvious in the LAPD internal affairs investigations he’s reviewed that rarely found anything wrong with officers’ use of force — even in the face of overwhelming video evidence. More than a few officers mentioned in his lawsuits have since been promoted, he said, even after he accused them of lying in police reports.

LAPD supervisors looked the other way, he said, because they are “very protective” of their officers.

Burton also noted that rubber projectiles are still being used, despite little evidence the weapons helped rein in chaos on the streets. Police also once faced criticism last year for the handling of pro-Palestinian protests on the USC and UCLA campuses.

“The thought that you’re going to stop somebody from throwing a rock at the cops by shooting one of these first is a fantasy,” he said. “They can cause very serious injuries.”

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

May 21 (UPI) — A U.S. Air Force veteran detained in Venezuela has been released, according to his family and Trump administration officials.

Joseph St. Clair was freed Tuesday, according to Richard Grenell, President Donald Trump‘s special presidential envoy for special missions and the newly appointed president of the Kennedy Center.

On his X account, Grenell posted pictures of himself and St. Clair boarding a small airplane.

“Joe St. Clair is back in America,” he said.

Grenell on Tuesday met with Venezuelan officials in an unidentified “neutral country to “negotiate an America First Strategy” he said.

Scott and Patti St. Clair, Joseph St. Clair’s parents, confirmed their son’s release from Venezuelan detention in a statement.

“This news came suddenly, and we are still processing it — but we are overwhelmed with joy and gratitude,” they said.

Details about St. Clair’s release were not immediately clear.

According to the James Foley Foundation, St. Clair was working in the food services industry in South America when his family lost contact with him in November. In February, the U.S. State Department told his family — who had not heard from him in months — that he had been wrongly detained by Venezuela, the foundation, which advocates for U.S. hostage prevention and release, said.

St. Clair’s release comes after Sens. Patty Murray and Maria Cantwell, both Democrats from Washington, called on Trump earlier this month to become personally involved in pressing for the release of the Air Force veteran.

“Each day he is held, it prolongs his suffering, and the suffering of his friends and family,” they said in the letter.

In February, the Trump administration secured the release of six Americans who had been wrongly detained in Venezuela for several months.

WASHINGTON — The head of the U.S. Space Force is moving ahead with plans to pull talent from Air National Guard units to help build up the still new-military service — but several governors remain opposed and argue it tramples on their rights to retain control over their state units.

Overall, the plan would affect only 578 service members across six states and the Air National Guard headquarters and augment the Space Force without creating a separate Space Force National Guard — something the service has said would not be efficient because it would be so small.

“We are actively pursuing where do we want our part-time workforce? What type of work do they do?” the head of Space Force, Gen. Chance Saltzman, said Thursday at a Politico conference.

The transferred service members would be a part-time force like they are now, just serving under the Space Force instead of their state units.

But space missions are some of the most lucrative across the military and private sectors, and the states that lose space mission service member billets are potentially losing highly valuable part-time workforce members if they have to move away to transfer to the Space Force.

Last month, the National Governors Assn. said the transfers violate their right to retain control over their state units.

“We urge that any transfers cease immediately and that there be direct and open engagement with governors,” the association said in April. The group was not immediately available to comment on Space Force’s plan.

“There’s a lot of concern in the National Guard about these individuals who are highly skilled that want to be in the Guard being transferred out,” Oklahoma Republican Sen. Markwayne Mullin said at an Air Force manpower hearing this week.

Congress directed the transfers in its 2025 defense bill. But the contention between the states and the Space Force has meant the service hasn’t so far been able to approach individual members about transferring in.

According to the legislation, each National Guard will get the option to either stay with their units — and get retrained in another specialty — or join the Space Force. Those who do transfer would be allowed to remain in their home state to perform their mission for at least the next 10 years, according to the 2025 legislation.

The affected personnel include 33 from Alaska, 126 from California, 119 from Colorado, 75 from Florida, 130 from Hawaii, 69 from Ohio and 26 from Air National Guard headquarters

Copp writes for the Associated Press.

After deadly attacks between Pakistan and India, a ceasefire was suddenly declared. Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar rejects claims that Washington imposed the truce, insisting Pakistan acted independently. He addresses India’s accusations and Pakistan’s military influence. As two rivals teetered on the edge of war, Ishaq Dar explains Pakistan’s strategy, its position on Kashmir, and whether this ceasefire might not last.

Democrats and good government advocates say it is unethical and likely unconstitutional for Trump to accept.

The United States is discussing an offer from the royal family of Qatar to supply a luxury jumbo jet for use as a presidential plane.

US President Donald Trump’s administration has signalled that it plans to accept the Boeing 747-8 airliner to serve as a temporary replacement for Air Force One. The news has provoked warnings from critics that accepting the plane would be unethical.

Qatar denied in a statement that the plane would be a gift, saying the transfer of the aircraft for “temporary use” was under discussion.

Spokesperson Ali Al-Ansari said the offer was still under consideration by Qatar’s Ministry of Defence and the US Department of Defense and “no decision has been made”.

However, in a post on his social media site Truth Social late on Sunday, Trump appeared to confirm that he intends to accept the plane as a gift.

At a cost of about $400m, it would be one of the most valuable gifts ever received by the US government.

“So the fact that the Defense Department is getting a GIFT, FREE OF CHARGE, of a 747 aircraft to replace the 40 year old Air Force One, temporarily, in a very public and transparent transaction, so bothers the Crooked Democrats that they insist we pay, TOP DOLLAR, for the plane,” the Republican president wrote.

Democrats and good government advocates said accepting the plane as a gift would be unethical and likely unconstitutional.

“Nothing says ‘America First’ like Air Force One, brought to you by Qatar,” Chuck Schumer, leader of the Democrats in the Senate, wrote on X.

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt rejected such claims.

“Any gift given by a foreign government is always accepted in full compliance with all applicable laws. President Trump’s administration is committed to full transparency,” she said.

Trump toured the Qatari-owned 747-8 in February when it was parked at Palm Beach International Airport in Florida near his Mar-a-Lago resort.

At the time, the White House said the president did so to get a better understanding of how the updated Air Force One planes would be configured.

Al-Ansari said the proposed arrangement involves Qatar donating the luxury jet to the US government for use as Air Force One during Trump’s presidency.

The aircraft would then be transferred to the Donald J Trump Presidential Library upon his departure from office, according to reports in the US media.

Trump is to visit Qatar during a trip to the Gulf this week. The airplane will not be presented or accepted while Trump is in Qatar.

May 11 (UPI) — The Qatari Royal Family has planned to gift a super luxury Boeing 747-8 jumbo jet to President Donald Trump to be used for Air Force One and for his own private use when his presidency ends, reports said Sunday.

News of the major gift was first reported by ABC News, citing anonymous sources, and later confirmed by The New York Times and NBC News. United Press International has reached out to Qatar’s Government Communications Office for confirmation.

The gift is expected to be formally announced when Trump visits Qatar next week, according to the reports. Trump toured the plane when it was parked at the West Palm Beach International Airport in February.

A Qatari representative, however, told Axios that while reports of Trump being gifted a jet were “inaccurate,” Qatar’s Ministry of Defense and the U.S. Department of Defense are discussing the possible temporary use of an aircraft as Air Force One.

If it is gifted, the jet could become the most valuable gift ever from a foreign government to the United States, ABC News reported. Its $400 million estimated price tag surpasses the estimated $250,000 cost of constructing the Statue of Liberty — which was gifted to the United States from France.

But the expected acceptance of the gift by Trump raises questions of its legality, raising the possibility that the president could face scrutiny for bribery or violating the emoluments clause of the U.S. Constitution.

The Emoluments Clause prohibits federal officials from accepting gifts, payments or other benefits from foreign governments without the consent of Congress but there is debate as to whether it applies to elected officials. According to Cornell’s Legal Information Institute, the interpretation of the clause has never been litigated before the U.S. Supreme Court.

Lawyers for the White House reportedly expect accepting the gift to draw scrutiny and have drafted an analysis for U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, which concludes that it is legal for the U.S. Defense Department to accept the gift and then to later hand it over to Trump’s presidential library for his private use when he leaves office.

The Trump administration is looking to the precedent set by the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in handling the ethical considerations of accepting a retired presidential aircraft.

The Reagan Library boasts a 90,000-square-foot exhibit hangar that permanently displays a Boeing VC-137C aircraft with the tail letters SAM 27000, which entered service as Air Force One under President Richard Nixon.

Though the plane was used by each president until George W. Bush, it is best known in relation to Reagan and was gifted to his library when it was decommissioned in 2001. Reagan died in 2004.

The difference between the use of the two gifts that could pose a challenge for Trump is that the Reagan Library immediately installed it for permanent display while Trump is reported to be planning to continue using it for personal travel.

Trump currently owns a Boeing 757 that dates to the early 1990s. The jet was originally operated by Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen before Trump purchased it in 2011.

Two new Air Force One planes have been in the works since at least 2018 when the Air Force awarded a $3.9 billion contract for two modified Boeing 747-8 planes that were expected for delivery by 2024.

Trump told ABC News in 2019 that he wanted to change up the traditional baby blue and white pattern chosen by former first lady Jacqueline Kennedy in the 1960s to a new color scheme that resembled that of his private jet.

Boeing started modifying the first of the two aircraft in February 2020 and the second in June 2020. According to a 2022 report from the U.S. Government Accountability Office, the company had completed major structural modifications on the first aircraft and is now preparing it for wiring installations.

However, at the time, Boeing struggled to find workers to complete the modifications because of a “competitive labor market” and “lower-than-planned security clearance approval rates.” The Air Force later lowered security clearance standards to make it easier to find workers.

Last week, Defense One reported that Boeing has told the Air Force it can deliver the new jets by 2027 if the government loosens some requirements.

Infielder Eddie Castorena, 75, wore two braces under his Old Spice uniform, one for his knee and one for his back.

Big Red catcher Tony Spallino, 67, was moving pretty well behind the plate, hoping he won’t need a second hip replacement.

His teammate Agustin Quezada, 83, limped through the dugout between innings, leaning on his bat as if it were a cane.

“When I first started, it was like, man, it smells like Bengay here,” said Big Red utilityman Ruben Enriquez.

But there is no glory in compromise, and no thrill like blasting a ball into the gap and circling the bases, no matter how many paramedics it might take to get you home. So the games go on every Thursday at Smith Park in Pico Rivera, home of the Go-Getter softball league.

“I never played baseball before. Never. I learned here, and I love it,” said Isabel Enriquez, 73, who plays several positions for Big Red and made a sure-handed catch of a towering fly ball to left in a game against the Force.

Reflexes are generally good and the bats still have some pop in them, for the most part, especially for players closer to 50 than 80. When it comes to chasing after a ball or sprinting the basepaths, the effort is there, even if the feet can’t always deliver what the heart desires.

Big Red hitter Tony Spallino, 67, walks away in frustration after making an out during a game against the Force in the Go-Getter league.

(Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times)

“I hope when I’m their age … I’ll be flexible and be able to run down the basepath like that,” said Pico Rivera Mayor Johnny Garcia, who stopped by to take in some of the action in a league that’s more than 30 years young.

Lorenzo Sanchez, who pitched Rolling Thunder to a 14-2 win over the Warriors, wore a boyish smile and looked nothing like 83. He said that in 15 years of lacing up his cleats, he could only recall one minor muscle pull.

“I’m in good condition,” Sanchez boasted.

“I try to emphasize to my new players, go out with the grandkids, do some running and throw the ball back and forth,” said Rolling Thunder manager Gil Perez, 76. “Some of them do and some of them don’t.”

Perez and his wife, Deborah, 71, who plays catcher, work out regularly.

“I’m doing 2½-minute planks,” said Deborah, referring to the exercise in which you get into a push-up position and hold it for as long as you can. “So my core is pretty tight.”

Several players encouraged me to get out of the press box and onto the field.

I’d love to, I said. But I’ve had two knee replacements.

That drew a sharp, one-word response from Dichosa “Dee” Quezada, Agustin’s wife and a loyal spectator who watches every game from a lawn chair behind the backstop.

“So?” she asked with a withering glare.

A game in the Go-Getter league.

(Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times)

I wouldn’t be the first, Dichosa told me, saying there was a guy with two knee replacements on a team from Anaheim.

In years past, one former Go-Getter used a walker to get to the field, swung a mean bat, and let a pinch-runner take over after she banged out a hit.

And then there’s Spallino, with the hip replacement, who told me he tried to come back too soon after his 2017 surgery. A little more rest did the trick and that hip is still holding up, Spallino said, “but I’m having problems with the other one now.”

The players have a sense of reassurance in knowing that former softballer Lupe Diaz, a retired registered nurse, comes to all the games with her first aid kit. Once, several years ago, there weren’t enough tools in that kit.

1

2

1. Rolling Thunder pitcher Lorenzo Sanchez, 83, watches the flight of the ball while batting during a Pico Rivera Co-ed Senior Softball League game at Smith Field. (Robert Gauthier/Los Angeles Times) 2. Deborah Perez, Rolling Thunder catcher, sets up behind the plate at the Pico Rivera Co-ed Senior Softball League at Smith Field. (Robert Gauthier/Los Angeles Times)

“I remember it like it was yesterday,” Diaz said. “I was catcher, and I was getting ready to throw the ball back when I saw this player lying on the ground in the outfield.”

Diaz raced out and began CPR on the fallen fielder, whose heart had given out, while someone called 911.

“I brought him back and they carried him to the dugout,” she said.

The player recovered at the hospital but died about two weeks later, as Diaz recalls.

On Thursday, Big Red outfielder Art Montano, 77, swung at a pitch and missed. He ended up hammering a sharp single to right, but he was still frustrated by the earlier whiff.

“My vision’s not like it used to be,” Montano said, and sometimes the brain isn’t reacting quickly enough to messages sent by the eyes. “Let’s say the ball is pitched, and you’re waiting on it, and the brain is telling you it’s right there, but you can’t pull the trigger.”

Big Red pitcher Agustin Quezada, 83, faces off against the Force at Smith Park.

(Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times)

In the Rolling Thunder rout of the Warriors, outfielder Uvaldo Davila showed off a slick glove and a strong arm, and after banging out a hit, he scampered around the bases to score. But back in the dugout, he said he’s been battling a big challenge.

“I was diagnosed with Parkinson’s about eight years ago,” said Davila, 64, who told me his hand tremors are getting worse, and his neurologist told him he may soon have some balance issues.

“I’m taking medicine,” Davila said, and he intends to keep playing as long as he can, because softball is “better than medicine.”

The Force, this season’s strongest team, showed no mercy on Thursday, routing Big Red by a score of 21-1 to improve to 8-0.

“We have a lot of good hitters and no drama,” said Force journeyman Lee Wabash, 75. “In the past, there were a lot of arguments. But this team has it together.”

At one point, with nobody on base, a Force batter hit a routine grounder. Big Red’s second baseman fielded it cleanly, but threw to second instead of first.

“Senior moment,” a disappointed Big Red teammate muttered in the dugout.

In the sixth inning, several Big Red players noticed that their pitcher had gone missing. They looked around and spotted him in the parking lot, pedaling away on his bicycle.

“Rick!” one player called out, to no avail.

“He’s going home,” said another.

Agustin Quezada often uses his bat as a cane. At 83, he pitches and plays infield in the Go-Getter league.

(Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times)

But two games remain in the regular season, so there’s still time to find a groove. And then all six teams qualify for the playoffs.

Anything can happen, said Ruben Enriquez, and just showing up to get some exercise and be with friends is a victory in itself.

“Better to play,” he said, “than to rot away at home.”

[email protected]

Steve Lopez

Steve Lopez is a California native who has been a Los Angeles Times columnist since 2001. He has won more than a dozen national journalism awards and is a four-time Pulitzer finalist.

WASHINGTON — President Trump reportedly is set to accept a luxury Boeing 747-8 jumbo jet as a gift from the ruling family of Qatar during his trip to the Middle East this week, and U.S. officials say it could be converted into a potential presidential aircraft, raising ethical questions.

ABC News reported that Trump will use the plane as a new version of Air Force One until shortly before he leaves office in January 2029, when ownership will be transferred to the foundation overseeing his yet-to-be-built presidential library.

The gift is expected to be announced when Trump visits Qatar as part of a trip that also includes stops in Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, the first extended foreign travel of his second term. The Qatari government did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Administration officials, anticipating questions about the president accepting such a large gift from a foreign government, have prepared an analysis arguing that doing so would be legal, according to ABC. The Constitution’s Emoluments Clause bars anyone holding government office from accepting any present, emolument, office or title from any “King, Prince, or foreign State,” without congressional consent.

One expert on government ethics, Kathleen Clark of the Washington University School of Law in St. Louis, said the gift suggests that Trump is “committed to exploiting the federal government’s power, not on behalf of policy goals, but for amassing personal wealth.”

“This is outrageous,” Clark said. “Trump believes he will get away with this.”

Air Force One is a modified Boeing 747. Two exist and the president flies on both, which are more than 30 years old. Boeing Inc. has the contract to produce updated versions, but delivery has been delayed while the company has lost billions of dollars on the project. Delivery has been pushed to 2027 for the first plane and in 2028 — Trump’s final full year in office — for the second.

Trump intends to convert the Qatari aircraft into a plane he can fly on as president, with the Air Force planning to add secure communications and other classified elements to it. But it will still have more limited capabilities than the existing planes that were built to serve as Air Force One, as well as two other aircraft under construction, according to a former U.S. official.

The official was briefed about the plane and spoke Sunday on condition of anonymity to discuss plans that have not yet been made public.

The existing planes used as Air Force One are heavily modified with survivability capabilities for the president for a range of contingencies, including radiation shielding and antimissile technology. They also include a variety of communications systems to allow the president to remain in contact with the military and issue orders from anywhere in the world.

The official told the Associated Press that it would be possible to quickly add some countermeasures and communications systems to the Qatari plane, but that it would be less capable than the existing Air Force One aircraft or long-delayed replacements.

Neither the Qatari plane nor the upcoming VC-25B aircraft will have the air-to-air refueling capabilities of the current VC-25A aircraft, which is the one the president currently flies on, the official said.

ABC said the new plane is similar to a 13-year-old Boeing aircraft Trump toured in February, while it was parked at Palm Beach International Airport and he was spending the weekend at his Mar-a-Lago club.

Trump faced lawsuits for violating the Emoluments Clause during his first term, but those were ended by the Supreme Court in 2021, which found the cases moot because the Republican had left office.

Clark said the reported Qatari gift is the “logical, inevitable, unfortunate consequence of Congress and the Supreme Court refusing to enforce” the Emoluments Clause.

Trump’s family business, the Trump Organization, which is now largely run by his sons Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump, has vast and growing interests in the Middle East. That includes a new deal to build a luxury golf resort in Qatar, partnering with Qatari Diar, a real estate company backed by that country’s sovereign wealth fund.

Qatar, which is ruled by the Al Thani family, is home to the state-owned airline Qatar Airways. The country has worked to nurture a close relationship with Trump after he apparently backed a boycott of Doha by four Arab nations in his first term. Trump later in his term applauded Qatar.

Administration officials have brushed off concerns about the president’s policy interests blurring with his family’s business profits. They argue that Trump’s assets are in a trust managed by his children and that a voluntary ethics agreement released by the Trump Organization in January bars the company from striking deals directly with foreign governments.

But that same agreement allows deals with private companies abroad. That is a departure from Trump’s first term, when the organization released an ethics pact prohibiting either foreign government or foreign company deals.

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt, when asked Friday if the president during his upcoming trip might meet with people tied to his family’s business, said it was “ridiculous” to suggest Trump “is doing anything for his own benefit.”

Miller and Weissert write for the Associated Press. AP writers Christine Fernando in Chicago and Jon Gambrell in Dubai contributed to this report.

May 7 (UPI) — Two Columbia University Public Safety officers were injured and dozens of people were in custody Wednesday after 100 pro-Palestinian protesters forced their way into the New York City campus’ library in “actions that are outrageous,” the university president said.

Acting University President Claire Shipman said the officers were hurt during a crowd surge.

“The individuals who disrupted activities in Butler Reading Room 301 still refuse to identify themselves and leave the building,” she said in a statement.

Protesters started peacefully outside, the Daily News reported, but then some entered Butler Library’s Reading Room 301 around 3:15 p.m.

Activists wearing masks pushed through security at the entrance of the library, as shown in videos on social media. One person pulled a fire alarm inside the library.

After protesters were physically removed from the library, clashes broke out between demonstrators and New York Police Department and campus security in other parts of the campus.

About 60 to 70 were in custody, Deputy Mayor Kaz Daughtry told WABC-TV.

NBC News shared video of several dozen people pushing up against NYPD barricades just outside the university’s campus at 114th Street and Amsterdam Avenue.

At least three protesters were taken out of the library by Columbia security in handcuffs. A fourth person was on a gurney and put into a Columbia ambulance.

“While this is isolated to one room in the library, it is completely unacceptable that some individuals are choosing to disrupt academic activities as our students are studying and preparing for final exams,” the university said in a statement. “These disruptions of our campus and academic activities will not be tolerated. Individuals found to be in violation of University Rules and policies will face disciplinary consequences.”

Shipman asked for assistance with NYPD to secure the building after the demonstrators refused to identify themselves and leave the building.

“Due to the number of individuals participating in the disruption inside and outside of the building, a large group of people attempting to force their way into Butler Library creating a safety hazard, and what we believe to be the significant presence of individuals not affiliated with the university, Columbia has taken the necessary step of requesting the presence of NYPD to assist in securing the building and the safety of our community,” she said.

New York Mayor Eric Adams said in a statement that the NYPD was entering the campus at the “written request” of the university to remove trespassing individuals.

NYPD officers had originally stayed off campus.

“As I’ve said repeatedly, New York City will always defend the right to peaceful protest, but we will never tolerate lawlessness,” Adams said. “To our Jewish New Yorkers, especially the students at Columbia who feel threatened or unsafe attending class because of these events: Know that your mayor stands with you and will always work to keep you safe.”

New York Gov. Kathy Hochul, who was briefed on the situation, said in a statement to WABC-TV: “Everyone has the right to peacefully protest. But violence, vandalism or destruction of property are completely unacceptable.”

Outside the library, activists played drums, and people posted signs and stickers seeking to free Mahmoud Khalil, a recent Columbia grad who has been detained by federal immigration authorities.

This has been the third takeover of a campus building this semester.

“Disruptions to our academic activities will not be tolerated and are violations of our rules and policies; this is especially unacceptable while our students study and prepare for final exams,” the university president said. “Columbia strongly condemns violence on our campus, antisemitism and all forms of hate and discrimination, some of which we witnessed today. We are resolute that calls for violence or harm have no place at our University. We will continue to keep our community apprised as the situation evolves.

In March, the Trump administration in March paused $400 million in federal funding, saying the Ivy League school did not do enough to protect Jewish students from harassment during the protests.

“Once again, protesters violated many University rules and infringed on the rights of Jewish students to study for exams without being screamed at and harassed,” Hillel executive director Brian Cohen posted on X. “We are grateful to the public safety officers who, at great risk to themselves, tried to stop the protesters from storming the library. The University must act quickly and decisively to discipline every student involved in today’s takeover, and the local authorities must do the same for non-students involved.”

Finals begin Friday.