worker

A British woman who is obsessed with travelling has now revealed what it is like working on a cruise ship – from no days off to cheeky guests ‘cheating’ on board

Many of us adore cruise holidays, but could you imagine making a ship your permanent home? While we catch glimpses of maritime life through TV programmes like Below Deck or Disney Channel‘s Suite Life on Deck, you might wonder what the reality is actually like. Fortunately, a young British woman has satisfied this curiosity.

Travel enthusiast Anaya revealed what life is genuinely like residing on a cruise ship – from all the benefits she receives, as well as the exhausting shift patterns. She has been able to journey to destinations including Bali, Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, Bali, Amsterdam, Singapore, Laos, Dominican Republic, Australia, Italy, Monaco, Spain, Germany, Portugal and Antigua – to mention just a few.

Anaya is employed by Marella Cruises, owned by TUI, in destination services – assisting people in crafting their ideal trip when they disembark the ship, as well as helping them navigate their way around new locations and arranging excursions and activities.

Although she gets to undertake extensive travelling, enjoys exciting experiences and the facilities aboard the vessel, Anaya acknowledges she also grafts tremendously hard. And apparently, securing any time off is virtually impossible, she claims.

READ MORE: Woman takes video of Magaluf party strip in 2025 and reality is devastating

Speaking on TikTok, Anaya revealed: “Basically, it’s like an unwritten rule that when you work on a cruise ship, you just don’t get a day off for the entirety of your contract. Because the cruise is running nearly every day of the year, we can’t have any days off.”

Anaya typically works several hours, enjoys some leisure time, then returns to her duties later in the day. During breaks from her responsibilities aboard the vessel, she’s able to experience ship life and discover the destinations she visits.

The cruise ship employee explained that while each shift differs, she never exceeds 10 hours of work daily.

The travel enthusiast revealed: “Sometimes we have breaks off in the middle of the day and I work in the excursions department so I spend a lot of time on the trips and seeing the places that way.”

She added she “wouldn’t trade it for the world“.

In the comments section of her video, someone enquired what occurs if a crew member becomes unwell.

Anaya responded: “You would see the medical centre if you were ill. If they thought you were too sick to work then you’d get ‘signed off’. If you’ve not been signed off by medical then you’d still have to work.”

The cruise ship worker clarified that employment contracts for staff can span from three months to eight months.

She continued: “In my department you wouldn’t really do more than seven [months], but in my experience I haven’t really done more than five and a half.”

Anaya says people frequently assume you must speak several languages to work aboard a cruise ship, though this isn’t necessarily true. The vessel she works on chiefly accommodates English and Canadian passengers, so she doesn’t need to be multilingual. Nevertheless, other companies might require this on job applications. On top of this, she doesn’t have to fork out rent for her cabin.

She also receives complimentary meals daily and can enjoy onboard entertainment without any extra cost.

Another bonus is that she’s exempt from paying tax while aboard the vessel. What’s more, social gatherings are frequently arranged for crew members each month.

These evenings off can become quite raucous – as Anaya disclosed it’s “very common” for passengers to be unfaithful to their partners while on board.

So could you cope with life on the ocean? If you’re not scared of grafting hard, it sounds like it could be an absolutely brilliant way to explore the globe.

One of California’s largest legal cannabis companies announced Monday that it would radically revamp its labor practices in the wake of a massive immigration raid at two company facilities last month. The raid led to the death of one worker and the detention of more than 360 people, including, according to government officials, 14 minors.

Glass House Brands announced it had “terminated its relationship” with the two farm labor contractors who had provided workers to the cannabis green house operations in Camarillo and Carpinteria. It also announced that it has “made significant changes to labor practices that are above and beyond legal requirements.”

Those include hiring experts to scrutinize workers’ documents as well as hiring the consulting firm Guidepost Services to advise the company on best practices for determining employment eligibility. The firm is led by Julie Myers Wood, a former ICE director under President George W. Bush.

The company also said it has signed a new “labor peace” agreement with the International Brotherhood of the Teamsters.

Glass House officials declined to comment publicly beyond what was in a press release, but a source close to the company said that officials wanted to “make sure we never have a situation that we had on July 10. We can’t have this ever happen again.”

On that day, federal agents in masks and riot gear stormed across Glass House operations in Ventura and Santa Barbara county in the state’s largest ICE workplace raid in recent memory. Agents chased panicked workers through vast green houses and deployed tear gas and less-than-lethal projectiles at protesters and employees.

One worker, Jaime Alanis Garcia, died after he fell three stories from the roof of a greenhouse trying to evade capture. Others were bloodied from shards of glass broken or hid for hours on the roofs or beneath the leaves and plastic shrouding. More than 360 people — a mixture of workers, family members of workers, protesters and passerby—were ultimately detained, including at least two American citizens including a U.S. Army veteran.

In the wake of the raid, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said that Glass House had been targeted because “we knew, specifically from casework we had built for weeks and weeks and weeks, that there was children there that could be trafficked, being exploited, that there was individuals there involved in criminal activity.”

To date, neither Homeland Security nor the U.S. Department of Justice have announced any legal action regardlng the alleged trafficking and exploitation of juveniles.

In its press release, Glass House said that just nine of its direct employees were detained; all others picked up were either employees of its labor contractors or were “unassociated with the company.”

With regards to the government’s contention that it had found children working in cannabis, the company said: “while the identities of the alleged minors have not been disclosed, the company has been able to determine that, if those reports are true, none of them were Glass House employees.” California labor law allows children as young as 12 to work in agriculture, but workers must be 21 to work in cannabis.

The raid devastated Glass House and its workforce. Numerous workers were detained or disappeared, terrified to return. Those that remained were so distraught the company called in grief counselors.

Across the wider world of legal cannabis, people were also shaken. Glass House, which is backed by wealthy investors and presents a sleek corporate image in the wild world of cannabis in California, has long been known as the “Walmart of Weed.” Many in California’s cannabis industry feared the raid on Glass House was a signal that the federal government’s ceasefire against cannabis —which is legal in California but still not federally—had come to an end.

In the wake of the raid, the United Farm Workers and other organizations warned farm laborers who were not citizens — even those with legal status — to avoid working in cannabis because “cannabis remains criminalized under federal law.”

In its statement, Glass House said the search warrant served on the company the day of the raid was seeking “evidence of possible immigration violations.” A source close to the company said officials have had no further contact with the federal government since the raid.

Some farm labor advocates were unimpressed by the company’s announcement of revamped labor practices, saying it was farm workers who would pay the price.

Lucas Zucker, co-executive director of Central Coast Alliance United for a Sustainable Economy, or CAUSE, said Glass House was using farm labor contractors to avoid responsibility “while their workers are torn away from their families in handcuffs.”

“This shows the double standards of our legal system, where corporations can profit from the immigrant workers their businesses depend on, yet wipe their hands clean when it becomes inconvenient,” he said. He added that “many farmworkers are still struggling to navigate this mess of labor contractors and have not been paid for the work they did at Glass House.”

A source close to Glass House said company officials want to make sure everyone who was at work on the day of the raid receives all the wages they are owed.

Company officials authorized all workers to be paid through 11:30 pm on the day of the raid, because workers who had finished their shifts couldn’t get out because immigration agents were blocking the doors. The source said the farm labor contractors had been paid and should have released wages to all the workers.

“We don’t want anyone to be shorted,” the source said.

MASERU, Lesotho — The southern African nation of Lesotho has had its U.S. export tariff reduced from a threatened 50% to 15%, but its crucial textile industry still faces massive factory closures, officials said Friday.

Despite a reduction announced by President Trump, the country’s textile sector says it remains at a competitive disadvantage and faces ongoing factory closures and job losses.

In April, the Trump administration announced a 50% tariff on imports from Lesotho, the highest among all countries.

The tariffs were paused across the board, but the anticipated increase wreaked havoc across the country’s textile industry, which is its biggest private-sector employer with more than 30,000 workers.

About 12,000 of them work for garment factories exporting to the U.S. market, supplying American retailers such as Levi’s and Wrangler.

The Associated Press reported this week that clothing manufacturer Tzicc has seen business dry up ahead of the expected tariff increase, sending home most of its 1,300 workers who have made and exported sportswear to American stores, including JCPenney, Walmart and Costco.

David Chen, chairperson of the Lesotho Textile Exporters, has warned that the U.S. government’s move to reduce the tariffs offers little relief for the struggling industry as their competitors have lesser tariffs.

“Other countries which we are competing against are already being charged 10%, which makes it difficult for us to compete on an equal footing,” said Chen, singling out the East African country of Kenya as its strongest competitor with a more favorable 10% tariff.

“As a result, many factories will have to shut down,” Chen said. “They had already been forced to lay off workers when the tariffs were first announced in April.”

According to the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative, in 2024, U.S.-Lesotho bilateral trade stood at $240.1 million. Apart from clothing, Lesotho’s exports also include diamonds and other goods.

Lesotho is classified as a lower-middle-income country by the World Bank, and nearly half of its 2.3 million population live below the poverty line, while a quarter are unemployed.

Lesotho’s minister of Trade, Industry and Business Development, Mokhethi Shelile, said that while several meetings with U.S. trade representatives led to a reduced tariff, more needed to be done to lower it further.

“We remain committed to pushing for a further reduction to the minimum tariff level of 10%, which is essential for our textile sector to compete effectively in the U.S. market,” he said. “I have already communicated with the U.S. Embassy regarding continued negotiations.”

Lesotho’s neighbor and trading partner, South Africa, is also reeling after Trump announced a reciprocal 30% tariff for the country, which is expected to significantly affect its agriculture and manufacturing sectors, among others.

Phakela writes for the Associated Press.

Camarillo — Ever since federal immigration agents raided one of the largest licensed cannabis operators in the state this month, the phones of cannabis industry insiders have been blazing with messages of fear, sadness and confusion.

“It sent shock waves through the community,” said Hirsh Jain, the founder of Ananda Strategy, which advises cannabis businesses. “Everyone is on text threads.”

Glass House Brands, whose cannabis operations have helped make Santa Barbara and Ventura counties the new cannabis capitals of California, has long been among the most prominent companies in the state’s wild frontier of legal cannabis. Some call it the “Walmart of Weed” for its streamlined, low-cost production methods, its gargantuan market share and its phalanx of wealthy investors and powerful lobbyists.

But federal immigration agents stormed onto company property in Camarillo and Carpinteria on July 10 in a cloud of tear gas, as if they were busting a criminal enterprise. Agents in masks and riot gear marched for hours through the company’s vast greenhouses as workers fled and hid in panic. One worker, Jaime Alanís Garcia, died after he fell three stories while trying to evade capture.

For Glass House, the aftermath has been devastating. Its stock, which is traded on the Canadian stock exchange, dropped from more than $7.75 a share the day before the raid to $5.27 on Thursday. Some workers disappeared into Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention or bolted, too fearful to return. Others were so traumatized that Glass House brought in grief counselors, according to a source close to the company.

Glass House Brands has long been a prominent company in California’s wild frontier of legal cannabis.

(Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Times)

Across the wider world of legal California cannabis — where many growers and entrepreneurs have hoped the Trump administration would legalize the drug — people were also shaken. Did the action against Glass House signal an end to federal law enforcement’s ceasefire against legal cannabis in California and dozens of other states?

And what did it mean for Glass House itself, among the largest cannabis companies in the world? How could this slick corporate entity, founded by an ex-cop and special education teacher and a former tech entrepreneur, be in a position in which federal agents claimed to have apprehended more than a dozen undocumented minors on site?

“This could not come at a worse time,” said Jain, the cannabis consultant, adding that the images and rhetoric that have whipped across social media in the wake of the raid “impedes our ability to legitimize this industry in the eyes of California and the American public.”

He added that “a failure to legitimize a legal cannabis industry enables the proliferation of an illicit industry that is not accountable and engages in far more nefarious practices.”

Working conditions in the cannabis industry are notoriously grim, as documented in a 2022 Times investigation that revealed workers who had their wages stolen, were forced to live in squalid and dangerous conditions and sometimes even died on the job.

Glass House had no such reports of injuries or deaths before the raid and has long touted its working conditions. A source close to the company said it pays workers more than minimum wage, and internet job postings reflect that.

Still, as with almost all farmwork in California, some of those who labored there were undocumented. The company employs some people directly and relies on farm labor contractors to supply the rest of its workforce. A source close to the company said labor contractors certify that the workers satisfy all laws and regulations, including being 21 or older as required to work in cannabis in California.

In the days after the raid, federal officials announced they had detained 361 people, including 14 minors, who by California law cannot work in cannabis. It wasn’t clear how many of those detained were undocumented or how many were even working at the operation or were just nearby. At least two American citizens were caught up in the dragnet — a security guard headed to work at Glass House and a philosophy professor at Cal State Channel Islands who was protesting the raid.

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said this month that Glass House had been targeted because “we knew, specifically from casework we had built for weeks and weeks and weeks, that there was children there that could be trafficked, being exploited, that there was individuals there involved in criminal activity.”

Glass House officials declined to comment for this article, but in an earlier statement on X, the company said that it had never employed minors and that it followed all applicable employment laws. A source close to the company said the search warrant federal officials presented to Glass House the day of the raid alleged it was suspected of harboring and unlawfully employing undocumented immigrants — but did not mention child labor.

In the last few years, the company — along with labor contractors — was named in lawsuits by workers alleging they had been sexually harassed, suffered discrimination, and been shorted overtime pay and required meal and rest breaks.

One worker at Glass House — who asked not to be identified because he is undocumented and hid from immigration agents during the raid before escaping — said he was employed to work in Glass House’s cannabis operation through one of its labor contractors and valued the job because it is year round, not seasonal like many agricultural jobs.

But he complained that the contractor had repeatedly paid him late, forcing him to borrow money to make his rent. He also said supervisors put intense pressure on employees to work faster, screaming expletives at workers, refusing to allow breaks, or yelling at them to eat quickly and return to work before their rest periods were done.

A source close to the company said the complaints involved people employed by labor contractors, regarding actions by those contractors and not Glass House directly.

Many of the suits are pending, with Glass House named as a co-defendant. Company officials declined to comment publicly.

A source close to the company said Glass House takes seriously its responsibilities under California labor law and is committed to ensuring that all labor practices within its operations meet the highest standards.

The source added that the raid has shaken a company that has always tried to operate by the book and that, despite its exponential growth in recent years, has sought to maintain a close-knit feel.

“It’s very sad,” the source said.

In the wake of the raids at Glass House, the United Farm Workers union issued a bulletin in English and Spanish warning anyone who is not a U.S. citizen to “avoid working in the cannabis industry, even at state-licensed operations.” The union noted that “because cannabis remains criminalized under federal law, any contact with federal agencies could have serious consequences even for people with legal status.”

TODEC Legal Center, a Coachella Valley-based group that supports immigrants and farmworkers, issued a similar message. TODEC warned noncitizens to avoid working in the marijuana industry and avoid discussing any marijuana use or possession — even if it is legal in California — with federal agents, because it could hurt their status.

Federal agents conduct a raid of Glass House Brands on Laguna Road in Camarillo.

(Julie Leopo / For The Times)

About half the farmworkers in California are undocumented, according to UC Merced researchers. Cannabis industry experts said it is too soon to know whether the raid on Glass House will affect the larger cannabis workforce — or whether more licensed cannabis operations will be raided.

“My best guest would be that this is going to be happening to a lot more cultivation farms,” said Meilad Rafiei, chief executive of the cannabis consulting group We Cann.

Among the undocumented workers at Glass House on the day of the raids was Alanís, 56, who had been a farmworker in California for three decades. Over the last 10 years, Alanís worked in the Ventura area, first in a flower nursery and then, once Glass House converted the massive greenhouse complex there, in cannabis.

On Monday night, his family held an emotional wake for him in Oxnard, where he lived. The Camino del Sol Funeral Home was filled, as many family members held one another tightly and cried. They remembered him as a hardworking, joyful man, who danced at parties and enjoyed every meal he shared with family.

State Sen. Monique Limón (D-Goleta), who led the Senate in adjourning in Alanís’ memory last week, told the chamber how he had climbed onto the roof of a greenhouse to escape federal officers. From 30 feet up, she said, he called his family to tell them what was happening, and to report “how scared he was.”

“Jaime’s life was dedicated to our lands, our crops, and to providing for his family,” Limón said, adding that he “had had no criminal record, he was who our country and our state depended on to provide food on all of our tables.”

She added that “his last moments on Earth were filled with terror.”

July 20 (UPI) — The Chinese government is preventing a Chinese American banker for Wells Fargo and, separately, an employee of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office from leaving the country, reports said Sunday.

The identity of the detained U.S. government employee was not known to the Washington Post, which first reported the news. Mao Chenyue, the managing director of Wells Fargo Credit Solutions, was confirmed as the bank employee facing the exit ban by the company in statements to The New York Times and the Wall Street Journal.

People familiar with the Patent and Trademark Office employee’s case told the Washington Post that he traveled to China to visit family but allegedly failed to disclose on his visa application that he worked for the government.

Wells Fargo has since reportedly suspended travel by its executives to China, noting in its statement to The New York Times that the company is tracking the situation and working “through the appropriate channels” to ensure their employee is returned.

The company did not provide any details as to why Mao was prevented from leaving the country but noted that she has not been detained in China and is free to move about the country.

“We have raised our concern with Chinese authorities about the impact arbitrary exit bans on U.S. citizens have on our bilateral relations and urged them to immediately allow impacted U.S. citizens to return home,” said a U.S. Embassy in Beijing spokesperson.

A Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman was asked about Mao’s exit ban on Friday but said he was not aware of it.

Her LinkedIn account, reviewed by UPI, shows that she was active on social media as recently as two weeks ago when she thanked people for congratulatory messages on her recent election as chairman of FCI.

A baggage handler has shared his top tip for ensuring your luggage doesn’t get damaged during a flight – and it’s all to do with the type of wheels your suitcase has

Picture yourself embarking on that dream getaway you’ve been planning for ages. You’ve navigated airport security at your perfect destination and now find yourself stationed beside the baggage carousel, anxiously awaiting your luggage’s arrival.

Yet when your case finally emerges, it’s glaringly obvious that it’s been through the wars. It’s bashed about, potentially sporting a busted zip, leaving you to wonder what carnage awaits your fragile belongings inside.

This nightmare scenario is every holidaymaker’s worst fear, but there are measures you can implement to reduce the likelihood of your baggage getting a battering.

An airport baggage handler has taken to Reddit to reveal insider knowledge about their profession, according to Devon Live.

The key to protecting your luggage lies entirely with the wheels, reports the Express.

Cases featuring two wheels, or ideally four functioning ones, can be effortlessly wheeled into the aircraft’s cargo hold, keeping your precious items secure.

Bags lacking wheels frequently end up being hurled into the hold, potentially causing significant damage.

The baggage handler admitted that cases with jammed wheels represent their “absolute least favourite” items to handle.

They revealed: “We try to roll it down, but it just falls over after moving six inches.”

To guarantee your belongings’ safety, they suggest purchasing a top-quality suitcase equipped with four properly working wheels, cushioned interior lining, and a robust outer casing for maximum protection. The handler confessed that fragile stickers might not offer the safeguard travellers assume, hinting that they could inadvertently encourage harsher treatment from staff.

“Some of us are tempted to treat them worse, but we never do. Having a fragile tag doesn’t really make a difference,” he clarified.

Regarding how far wheel-less luggage can be lobbed, the baggage handler revealed the furthest distance they’ve seen was “about five metres or so”.

A former Heathrow Airport employee has revealed an easy trick to getting your seats changed at the very last minute, avoiding the extra fees – but there’s a catch

When it comes to travelling for long hours, especially on a plane, everyone wants to sit next to their loved ones. But sometimes, big parties get split up. Here’s how travellers can change their seats at no extra cost. Many of us are counting down the days until our much-deserved holidays, away from the busy city life and spending some time at the beach soaking in all the UV rays.

But at the time of checking in for our flight, we’ve all been in a situation where seats have been allocated poorly. A former check-in agent at the UK’s busiest airport Heathrow shared some insightful information as to when the most appropriate time to ask for a seat change is – and it’s not at the check-in desk.

READ MORE: Airport worker shares tip to make your suitcase the first off the plane

She said: “Online check-in doesn’t always offer the best seat selection, and let’s be honest, no one likes getting stuck in the middle seat.” The former airport worker revealed that the best time to ask for this is after the check-in closes.

It’s important to note that all airlines operate differently, and different rules apply based on the routes. Although most airlines will automatically seat you with the people under the same reservation, sometimes, sudden changes occur.

For those who wish to have their seats changed, they must wait until the check-in time closes, or in some cases, after all passengers have boarded. “This is when all unclaimed seats, such as those from passengers who haven’t checked in, become available,” she added.

According to Forbes, airlines allocate seats for weight and balance reasons, which is why it’s important for passengers to sit in their designated seats.

Gerrie Brand, a spokesperson for Dutch airline KLM, said: “The captain calculates weight and balance for take-off. If the occupancy is low, passengers tend to want to change seats, but that could change the weight distribution and balance for take-off.”

READ MORE: Plane passengers warned they might want to swerve travel pillows on flights

However, the former Heathrow employee warned that this trick doesn’t always work, especially during peak season. In this case, passengers can ask the cabin crew once on board, or the passenger who’s seated next to them.

As holidaymakers look forward to their much-deserved breaks, it’s important to remember that check-in agents are human too and will always try to accommodate all passengers, especially those travelling with small children.

Nonetheless, as much as travelling can be expensive and stressful, taking out your anger on the staff won’t benefit you at all! Kindness goes a long way, so just be nice!

An airport worker has shared a simple hack to make sure your luggage is one of the first to come off the plane – and it’s all to do with when you check in your bags

Standing around the baggage carousel can prove quite irritating at the beginning of any getaway, particularly when your case happens to be amongst the final items removed from the aircraft.

Observing fellow travellers swiftly collecting their luggage and departing the terminal only heightens this frustration.

Luckily, there is a technique that significantly increases the chances of your suitcase being amongst the first to emerge.

An airport employee suggests checking in as late as you possibly can. This approach means your baggage will probably be amongst the final items loaded onto the aircraft, making it more probable to be amongst the first removed upon arrival at your destination, reports the Express.

In a post on Quora, Thomas Lo Sciuto, who works as a ramp operative and gate agent at a regional American airport, explained: “Your best option is to be one of the last passengers to check your bags.”

He detailed the loading process, stating: “Bags will always be loaded front to back on the bag carts, so if you check in last, your bags will be in the last bag cart, which will make them the last on the aircraft, and the first off the aircraft at your destination.”

Thomas additionally recommends gate-checking your luggage to guarantee it emerges first from the plane.

He said: “The best way to ensure your bag gets to you the quickest is to ask the counter agent very nicely if they will let you gate-check your bag.”

However, he warns of limitations with this approach: “The downside of that method is that you will not be able to pack liquids or any other items that cannot go in a carry-on bag, as you will need to bring the bag with you through the security checkpoint and to the gate.”

The New York Post has revealed a nifty trick for retrieving your luggage swiftly – simply grab a complimentary “fragile” sticker from airport staff and affix it to your suitcase.

They said: “Often the fragile tagged luggage goes into the plane last and as a result, it comes onto the belt first.”

However, they caution against including one particular detail on your luggage tag, advising: “But if you’re going to tag your luggage, make sure to leave one thing off – your address. Opportunistic thieves will know that you are not at home and could try to burgle the property as a result.”

A security officer has revealed a common mistake the majority of passengers make when going through airport security, and doing this will get you stopped and searched.

An airport worker has revealed the most common mistake passengers make when going through security – that leads to them being stopped the majority of the time. Going on holiday is exciting, but it can also be stressful. A security airport for one of London’s busiest airports has shared advice to help you avoid delays getting to your gate.

On average, London’s Heathrow Airport handles approximately 1,300 flights per day across all four terminals. According to OAG, it’s also one of the busiest airports in the world. One important thing to note is that travel restrictions are different depending on the country.

READ MORE: Brits urged to leave one appliance door open before going away on holiday

It’s best to learn the rules beforehand to avoid getting stopped and getting second-hand embarrassment. He told Travel Radar: “Your bags will be rejected and have to be manually searched if you don’t remove certain items – these are CAA and DfT rules we have to follow, and we have no power to change or circumvent them.”

The security officer also explained that there’s always a reason why people have to empty their pockets or their bags. Whenever unsure, ask any member of staff. Otherwise, be prepared to have a ten-minute bag search.

Whenever travelling, it’s important to empty all of your pockets before passing through, as the scanners can detect anything that may seem suspicious. Even an extra pocket on your trousers could set the red alarm.

READ MORE: Airport worker’s suitcase hack that means it comes off the plane first

Most importantly, travellers are to pack smartly, considering the number of items they’re bringing with them and their shape. For instance, some countries have ditched the rule of putting all liquids under 100ml in a transparent plastic bag, and can now be spread in the luggage. However, some airports still ask travellers to do so.

As a former check-in agent, there was a time when a passenger had to have his luggage searched because he had a toy shaped like a gun, but it turned out to be a harmless water pistol. Those items are better off left at home – and I’m sure this passenger learnt his lesson for his next time travelling.

With Brits heading off to sunny destinations for the summer, it’s best to take precautions when it comes to travelling. If you’re a nervous flyer, it’s best to get to the airport with time to spare, but either way, it’s best to avoid getting stuck at security.

Have you ever had an encounter at the airport while going through security? Let us know in the comments below.

A farmworker has died from injuries he sustained in immigration raids on two California cannabis farms, as United States authorities confirmed they arrested 200 workers after a tense standoff with protesters.

The United Farm Workers advocacy group confirmed the death of Jaime Alanis, who was injured after a 30-foot (nine-metre) fall during one of the raids, in a post on X on Friday.

“We tragically can confirm that a farm worker has died of injuries they sustained as a result of yesterday’s immigration enforcement action,” it said.

Federal immigration authorities confirmed on Friday that they had arrested about 200 immigrants suspected of being in the US illegally in raids on Thursday at two cannabis farms in Carpinteria and Camarillo, Southern California.

The Department of Homeland Security said in a statement that they also found at least 10 immigrant children during the raids who were rescued from “potential exploitation, forced labour, and human trafficking”.

The statement said four US citizens had been arrested for their role in violent confrontations between agents and protesters. Authorities are also offering a $50,000 reward for information leading to the arrest of another person suspected of firing a gun at the federal agents.

“During the operation, more than 500 rioters attempted to disrupt operations. Four US citizens are being criminally processed for assaulting or resisting officers. The rioters damaged vehicles, and one violent agitator fired a gun at law enforcement officers,” the statement said.

One of the raids saw immigration agents clad in military-style helmets and uniforms storm Glass House Farms – a licensed cannabis grower which also grows tomatoes and cucumbers – in Camarillo on Thursday.

Agents faced off with the demonstrators outside the farm, as crowds of people gathered to seek information about their relatives and to oppose the raids.

Andrew Dowd, a spokesperson for the Ventura County Fire Department, said at least 12 people were injured as a result of the raid and protest.

During the raid, Alanis, who had reportedly worked at Glass House Farms picking tomatoes for 10 years, called his family in Mexico to say he was hiding from authorities.

“The next thing we heard was that he was in the hospital with broken hands, ribs and a broken neck,” said Juan Duran, Alanis’s brother-in-law, according to The Associated Press news agency.

In a statement, Glass House said immigration agents held valid warrants, and it is helping provide detained workers with legal representation.

“Glass House has never knowingly violated applicable hiring practices and does not and has never employed minors,” the statement said.

United Farm Workers said in a statement that some US citizens who worked at the firm are not yet accounted for.

The raid is the latest to take place as part of the Trump administration’s controversial all-out campaign cracking down on immigration in the US.

Since returning to the White House, Trump has unleashed groups of immigration agents to round up undocumented migrants and sent accused gang members to a maximum-security prison in El Salvador without due process.

But in the wake of Thursday’s raids, Federal Judge Maame E Frimpong ordered a temporary halt to the Trump administration’s indiscriminate immigration stops and arrests in seven California counties, including Los Angeles.

The Friday ruling comes in response to a lawsuit filed by immigrant advocacy groups in the US District Court last week, accusing the Trump administration of systematically targeting brown-skinned people during immigration raids in Southern California.

The filing asked the judge to block the administration from using what they called unconstitutional tactics.

In her ruling, which remains in place for 10 days, Judge Frimpong agreed that “roving patrols” of immigration agents without reasonable suspicion violated the Fourth Amendment, protecting individuals from unreasonable searches and seizures, and the Fifth Amendment, ensuring due process of law.

Frimpong directed agents to stop racially profiling people and ordered the federal government to ensure detainees have access to legal counsel.

Al Jazeera correspondent in Washington, DC, Shihab Rattansi, said the case gets to the “heart of whether we can have these marauding sort of gangs of ICE agents without any identification” sweeping people up.

“[The plaintiffs argue there is] no probable cause to suspect they’re breaking any kind of immigration laws. And we know a lot of people who are citizens are being swept up too,” Rattansi said.

In a Congress addicted to bad ideas and bloated spending — something we saw again last week — it’s rare to find a tax policy with broad, bipartisan support that also happens to be good policy. Health savings accounts, known as HSAs, are one of those rare gems. They promote individual responsibility, reduce healthcare costs and enjoy overwhelming support from voters across the political spectrum.

The good news is that for all its flaws, the “Big Beautiful Bill” that was just signed by the president includes several expansions to the program.

In a perfect world, we wouldn’t need tax-protected healthcare savings accounts. The tax code wouldn’t punish saving in the first place. Income would only be taxed once and not a second time through taxes on returns generated by savings. Families could set aside money for future expenses without being hit with additional penalties.

But that’s not the tax system we have. The double taxation of saving discourages people from preparing for medical and other costs.

Ideally, individuals would also be able to make their own decisions about health. But for the past century, Congress has used the tax code to pressure workers into accepting employer-controlled health insurance by penalizing those of us who choose otherwise. As Michael F. Cannon of the Cato Institute has demonstrated, this system effectively strips workers of control over roughly $1 trillion of their income. Imagine the possibilities if we could each demand more value and accountability for our share.

HSAs offer a partial solution to both of these problems. They can shelter a small portion of income and allow people to make their own decisions about some healthcare purchases without the government penalizing them. Since their creation in 2003, HSAs have become a lifeline for nearly 40 million account holders.

The accounts are triple tax-advantaged: Contributions go in tax-free, grow tax-free and can be withdrawn tax-free for qualified medical expenses. They reward frugality, encourage price sensitivity (in a way most health insurance plans do not) and allow families to build health-related savings year after year.

Still, HSAs have benefited only a small segment of workers. To truly bring about individual healthcare freedom, it is essential that Congress expand them to everyone and end the preferential tax treatment for employer-based coverage. And to give credit where it’s due, Congress did indeed deliver on at least part of this agenda.

The House version of the budget included long-overdue HSA reforms, most notably a fix to a particularly maddening and regressive feature of current law: If you’re a working senior who needs to claim Social Security at 65 to make ends meet, you’re automatically enrolled in Medicare Part A — and disqualified from contributing to an HSA. A wealthier colleague who delays retirement can continue to enjoy tax-free contributions. Same job. Same employer. Different treatments based purely on wealth.

In addition to abolishing this injustice by allowing working seniors enrolled in Part A to remain eligible for HSA contributions, the House bill expanded the menu of healthcare options that can be paid for with HSA funds. It made gym memberships, personal training, preventive care and wellness among the new options — a smart, targeted reform.

Unfortunately, the Senate stripped many of the House’s reforms, but enough were retained in the final version of the bill for it to expand access to HSAs and make a significant difference.

Starting Jan. 1, 2026, Americans enrolled in Bronze or Catastrophic Affordable Care Act plans may contribute to HSAs — around 7.3 million people who previously lacked access in 2025. The bill also allows HSA funds to pay for direct primary care memberships — modernizing how Americans can save for and manage healthcare expenses — and makes permanent the ability of high-deductible health plans to waive the deductible for telehealth visits.

By some measures, these might be the most popular tax provisions in the entire package. As Cannon has pointed out, large majorities of Democrats (73%), Republicans (74%) and independents (65%) have shown past support for HSAs. A Luntz poll found 83% support for working seniors on Medicare to be allowed to contribute to HSAs.

In other words, this wasn’t just smart policy, it was a political layup.

There is still a lot of work to be done, such as delinking HSA eligibility from high-deductible plans entirely, expanding contribution limits and eliminating barriers for all Medicare recipients. These moves would further reduce tax-code distortions and reinforce a healthcare system rooted in choice and accountability.

Nevertheless, HSA reform is one instance of the “Big Beautiful Bill” producing good and popular policy.

Veronique de Rugy is a senior research fellow at the Mercatus Center at George Mason University. This article was produced in collaboration with Creators Syndicate.

If you’re a fan of taking your holidays onboard luxury cruiseliners to travel the world and experience far flung destinations, you might want to pay more attention to the type of jewellery you choose to take with you

Cruises are an increasingly popular way to enjoy a trip away from home to visit multiple destinations during one holiday. You only have to unpack once and get to enjoy all the onboard amenities, activities and fine dining right on your cabin doorstep every day.

You could be an experienced cruise traveller or be considering the option for your next vacation but it seems there’s a whole lot more that goes on behind the scenes than you might expect.

When it comes to choosing what accessories you take with you, it may, or may not – depending on your preference – pay to be wary of packing a certain type of jewellery.

According to one cruise worker who sailed the seas for 10 years, if you wear a black ring or jewellery with a pineapple theme, you could be approached by people with a preference for a particular type of lifestyle.

Lucy Southerton, 28, from Birmingham has plenty of knowledge about what goes on in the darker corners of the huge ships and has shared her experiences on her YouTube channel Cruising as Crew.

In one video from 2023, she claims that “swinging is a popular pastime” onboard the floating hotels – and suggests it could be because cruises offer an “enclosed population of people”.

Couples who enjoy swapping sexual partners, use certain techniques to identify other potential companions onboard, according to the former cruise worker.

One of them is by displaying the upside down pineapple symbol in some way. “Some people put the upside down pineapple on their cabin door,” Lucy says. “Some people wear an upside down pineapple like a hat or brooch.”

But there’s also a more “inconspicuous” way to alert others to your desires than dangling a spiky fruit from your person – and that’s by wearing a black ring on your right hand, apparently.

Although as Lucy points out, this more subtle sign can have its issues. “Imagine if you went up to someone and you’re like [in a suggestive voice], ‘Hey, I can see that black ring on your right hand,’ and they’re like, ‘Yeah it’s just a black ring on my right hand’. You can never really be sure whether that’s just something they like to wear, or if it’s a signal,” she warns.

According to Lucy, the third signpost that someone is a swinger open to offers is a male and female sign with “a third gender sign in there”. She also shares an “embarrassing story” about how she came to realise the significance of the pineapple. Revealing that a long time ago she used to work in a ship’s spa, she said a couple came in for a couple’s massage.

When she went back to the treatment room after they had got dressed to tell them about aftercare such as drinking plenty of water, she noticed they were both wearing silver upside down pineapple necklaces. “They weren’t like this bright yellow upside down. They’ve very subtle, very, very nice,” she recalls. “And I was like, ‘Oh I love your necklaces. I think it’s so cute that you’re both wearing matching necklaces. That’s really sweet, but why the pineapple? Like what does that represent to you in your relationship?’.”

The couple who she had built up a rapport with after treating them a few times, burst out laughing. “They were like, ‘Look, we’re swingers and this is how people can identify us as swingers,’.” Intrigued, she went on to have a conversation about it with them where they told her the terminology used within the community.

Apparently, a unicorn is a woman who wants to swing on her own and swing with another couple. “They’re basically like mythical creatures,” she says the couple informed her. “They don’t exist and if you find one then you’ve hit the jackpot.”

A rhino is a single man willing to swing, while a mermaid is a married woman who wants to swing with a couple on her own. The word ‘play’ means sex, so you may say you don’t play on the first date. Rainbow means they don’t discriminate on gender and will swing with “everyone and anyone”. While ‘DDF’ is drug and disease free.

Comments on Lucy’s video, which has had over a million views, were suitably amusing. “Thanks for the info on the up side down pineapple. I will be placing a sticker of one on my brother and sister in laws cabin door on our upcoming cruise. Boy will they be surprised:),” joked one.

Another shared: “I’ll never forget the amount of attention I got in the buffet on my first ever cruise – I bought shorts that had loads of little pineapples in all different directions – I innocently thought they were just ‘nice and summery’ – how wrong I was… Ha!”

A third wrote: “Jee whizz, I will have to make sure my pineapple earrings are pointing up,” while a fourth revealed: “My partner bought me a nice black ring for Valentine’s Day. Damn…I’ll have to have a chat with her.”

Officials pledge to toughen laws after 26-year-old childcare worker charged with abusing eight children under his care.

Australia has announced plans to tighten oversight of childcare facilities after a man in Melbourne was charged with dozens of sexual offences against children in his care.

The moves come after police in the southern state of Victoria announced on Tuesday that they had charged a 26-year-old childcare worker with more than 70 child sex offences, including rape.

The man, identified as Joshua Dale Brown, is accused of abusing eight victims, aged between five months and two years, at a childcare centre in Melbourne’s western suburbs.

Police have said they are also investigating evidence of abuse at a second childcare centre in the northwest of the city.

Authorities say the accused worked at 20 childcare facilities in total during an eight-year span that lasted until May.

Health authorities in Victoria have recommended that 1,200 children linked to facilities where the man worked be tested for infectious diseases as a precautionary measure.

On Wednesday, Australian Education Minister Jason Clare said he would press ahead with legislation to strip funding from childcare facilities that do not meet adequate safety standards and examine other potential measures, including strengthening background checks for those working with minors.

“Any Australian who heard the news from Victoria yesterday would be sickened by what they heard,” Clare said during a news conference in Sydney.

“And for every parent that is directly affected by this in Victoria, they would be frightened and they’d be angry.”

Victorian Premier Jacinta Allan said she would introduce a state register of childcare workers and ban personal devices at childcare centres from September.

Allan said her government would also commence an “urgent review” to examine options for improving safety in the sector, including potentially installing security cameras in childcare facilities.

“We will adopt every recommendation of the review and implement them as quickly as possible,” Allan said in a statement.

“Following yesterday, I know too many families are suffering unbearable pain and uncertainty. I cannot imagine what they are going through.”

The latest safety scare to engulf Australia’s childcare sector comes less than a year after a Queensland man pleaded guilty to sexually abusing dozens of girls at childcare centres in one of the worst paedophile cases in the country’s history.

Ashley Paul Griffith was sentenced to life in prison in November after admitting to more than 300 offences against 69 girls at daycare facilities in Brisbane and Italy.

July 1 (UPI) — Authorities in Australia are recommending that 1,200 children be tested for infectious diseases after a 26-year-old man who worked at 20 childcare centers over the last few years was charged with dozens of offenses related to the sexual abuse of minors.

Victoria Police announced in a statement Tuesday that Joshua Brown of Point Cook, a Melbourne suburb, has been charged with more than 70 counts related to the alleged abuse of eight children at a Point Cook childcare center between April 2022 and January 2023.

He was arrested on May 12 and was remanded into police custody, where he remains, authorities said.

Since his arrest, Victoria Police has undertaken what the department described as a “significant investigation” that established Brown worked at 20 childcare centers between January 2017 and May, and they are examining evidence of potential additional alleged offenses having committed at a second childcare facility.

Investigators are currently trying to identify potential additional victims, Acting Commander Jane Stevenson of Crime Command said.

“There will be people in the community who hear this news and feel very concerned about their own children. Parents who had a child at a center at the time of the many’s employment are being notified today and a website has been set up by the Victorian government with further information for impacted families,” Stevenson said in a statement.

Australian police and health officials said families were being contacted “to ensure appropriate support and welfare services are provided.”

“The manner of the alleged offending means some children may be recommended for screening for infectious diseases,” the government of Victoria said in a statement.

“We acknowledge how distressing this will be for all families involved and the impact it will have on the broader community. Everything possible is being done to provide the vital support now required.”

Chief Health Officer Christian McGrath told reporters during a press conference that around 2,600 families have been contacted in connection to the case and that they are recommending approximately 1,200 children undergo testing for infectious diseases.

“Families and the wider community can be reassured that the infections that the children were potentially exposed to can be treated with antibiotics and that there’s no broader public health risk to the community,” he said.

Stevenson said in the press conference that they are not suggesting that the accused offended in all 20 centers, but they are encouraging anyone with information to come forward.

She added that all alleged offenses are believed to have taken place within Victoria and that no other childcare workers were involved.

Premier Jacinta Allan of Victoria issued a statement saying she was “sickened” by the allegations and that her “heart breaks for those families who are living every parent’s worst nightmare.”

“As a parent, I can only imagine the unbearable pain and distress the affected families are feeling,” she said.

“Every health and mental health support will be provided to them.”

An airport worker has said you shouldn’t put anything on your bag to identify it – and there’s also one food item you should never take with you while travelling

A baggage handler has spilled the beans on why holidaymakers should think twice about using ribbons as suitcase identifiers. Many travellers attach some sort of marker to their luggage to swiftly spot it at the baggage reclaim, but an airport worker has highlighted why this common practice could actually be counterproductive – and might even risk suitcases not making their flights at all.

The worker warned: “Ribbons people tie onto their suitcases to help identify them can cause issues with the bag being scanned in the baggage hall. If the bag can’t be scanned automatically it can end up in manual processing, which could mean your bag doesn’t make it to the flight. Take old stickers off the bag, it can cause confusion with the scanning process.”

READ MORE: Pet owners rush to claim free flea treatment as UK heatwave sees pests rise

Further to that, the insider advised against packing marzipan, as it shares a similar density with explosives and could lead to matched luggage and owners being removed from their flights.

It comes as the Department for Transport is yet to axe the 100mL liquid limit, despite the fact that advanced CT scanners have been installed in a number of UK airports. In addition to the strict regulations around liquids – which also include gels and aerosols – there are restrictions on a number of substances and electronic devices that passengers can carry into the cabin.

The UK government website outlines a full range of items that are prohibited from hand luggage and hold luggage. Here is a full breakdown of every item passengers may be asked to remove from their bags at security in UK airports.

Liquids

How much liquid you can carry in your hand luggage and how it should be handled depends on your departure airport. That said, the UK government website states: “Airport security staff will not let anything through that they consider dangerous – even if it’s normally allowed in hand luggage.”

At most airports, you cannot take liquids in containers larger than 100ml through security. This still applies if the container is only part full.

Liquids include the following:

• all drinks, including water
• liquid or semi-liquid foods, for example soup, jam, honey and syrups
• cosmetics and toiletries, including creams, lotions, oils, perfumes, mascara and lip gloss
• sprays, including shaving foam, hairspray and spray deodorants
• pastes, including toothpaste
• gels, including hair and shower gel
• contact lens solution
• any other solutions and items of similar consistency

You cannot carry frozen liquids in your hand luggage – this includes frozen breast milk. Additionally you can only carry formula milk/cow’s milk, sterilised water for babies, soya milk for babies and baby food in your hand luggage if the baby is present.

Personal items

You should contact your airline in advance if you plan to travel with a large musical instrument. You may need to make special arrangements like buying an extra seat.

Mobility aids are permissible but will need to be security screened first. Other personal items like corkscrews, knives (with a sharp or pointed blade and/or blade longer than 6cm), large scissors (with blades longer than 6cm), non-safety matches, fireworks, flares and other pyrotechnics, including party poppers and toy caps and cigarette lights are not permitted in hand luggage.

Medicines, medical equipment and dietary requirements

Travellers are allowed to carry essential medicines of more than 100ml, including liquid dietary foodstuffs and inhalers in their hand luggage. As well as medical equipment, if it’s essential for your journey

However, you may need to carry proof that the medication is prescribed to you (for example a letter from your doctor or a copy of your prescription) if it’s in liquid form and in a container larger than 100ml.

If you are taking medicine out of the UK, ask your doctor or pharmacist whether your medicine contains a controlled drug. If it does, check the rules for the country you’re going to with the embassy before you travel. Again, you will need to prove it’s yours with either a prescription or letter from your doctor.

Airport staff might also need to open the containers to screen the liquids at the security point.

Electronic devices and electrical items

You can only take certain electronic devices and electrical items on flights to the UK. Some airlines might also have different restrictions so you should check with your airline before you travel to understand what is permissible in your hand luggage.

Make sure your electronic devices are charged before you travel. If your device does not switch on when requested, you will not be allowed to take it onto the aircraft.

Sports equipment

Heavy bats and sticks (including baseball, softball and cricket bats), golf clubs, darts, walking/hiking poles, catapult, firearms (including replica firearms), harpoons or spear guns, crossbows, and martial arts equipment (including knuckledusters, clubs, coshes, rice flails and nunchuks) are not permitted in hand luggage.

Work tools

All the following tools are not permitted in hand luggage:

• Tool with a blade or shaft longer than 6cm (for example chisel)
• Drill and drill bits
• Stanley knife
• Saw (including portable power saw)
• Screwdriver
• Hammer
• Pliers
• Wrench or spanner
• Bolt gun or nail gun
• Crowbar
• Blowtorch

Chemicals and toxic substances

You cannot take any of these items as hand luggage or in the hold:

• oxidisers and organic peroxides, including bleach and car body repair kits
• acids and alkalis (for example spillable ‘wet’ batteries)
• corrosives or bleaching agents (including mercury and chlorine)
• vehicle batteries and fuel systems
• self defence or disabling sprays (for example mace, pepper spray)
• radioactive materials (including medicinal or commercial isotopes)
• poisons or toxic substances (for example rat poison)
• biological hazards (for example infected blood, bacteria, viruses)
• materials that could spontaneously combust (burst into flames)
• fire extinguishers

Ammunition

You cannot take any guns or firearms (including air rifles and starting pistols) as hand luggage. You may be able to take them as hold luggage – check with your airline before you travel.

You cannot take any of these items as hand luggage or in the hold:

• blasting caps
• detonators and fuses
• imitation explosive devices (including replica or model guns)
• mines, grenades, and other explosive military stores
• fireworks and pyrotechnics
• smoke canisters
• smoke cartridges
• dynamite
• gunpowder
• plastic explosives (including black powder and percussion caps)
• flares
• hand grenades
• gun cigarette lighters

As the crucial summer harvest season gets underway in California’s vast agricultural regions, farmers and their workers say they feel whiplashed by a series of contradictory signals about how the Trump administration’s crackdown on illegal immigration might affect them.

California grows more than one-third of the country’s vegetables and more than three-quarters of the nation’s fruits and nuts in the fertile expanses of the Central Valley, Central Coast and other farming regions. The industry produced nearly $60 billion in goods in 2023, according to state figures — an output that depends heavily on the skilled labor of a workforce that is at least 50% undocumented, according to University of California studies.

Without workers, the juicy beefsteak tomatoes that are ripening and must be hand-harvested will rot on the vines. The yellow peaches just reaching that delicate blend of sweet and tart will fall to the ground, unpicked. Same with the melons, grapes and cherries.

That’s why, when federal immigration agents rolled into the berry fields of Oxnard last week and detained 40 farmworkers, growers up and down the state grew worried along with their workers.

Farm laborers, many of whom have lived and worked in their communities for decades, were terrified of being rounded up and deported, separated from their families and livelihoods. Farmers worried that their workforce would vanish — either locked up in detention centers or forced into the shadows for fear of arrest — just as their labor was needed most. Everyone wanted to know whether the raids in Oxnard were the beginning of a broader statewide crackdown that would radically disrupt the harvest season — which is also the period when most farmworkers earn the most money — or just a one-off enforcement action.

In the ensuing days, the answers have become no clearer, according to farmers, worker advocates and elected officials.

“We, as the California agricultural community, are trying to figure out what’s going on,” said Ryan Jacobsen, chief executive of the Fresno County Farm Bureau and a farmer of almonds and grapes. He added that “time is of the essence,” because farms and orchards are “coming right into our busiest time.”

After the raids in Ventura County last week, growers across the country began urgently lobbying the Trump administration, arguing that enforcement action on farm operations could hamper food production. They pointed to the fields around Oxnard post-raid, where, according to the Ventura County Farm Bureau, as many as 45% of the workers stayed home in subsequent days.

President Trump appeared to get the message. On Thursday, he posted on Truth Social that “our great farmers,” along with leaders in the hospitality industry, had complained that his immigration policies were “taking very good, long time workers away from them, with those jobs being almost impossible to replace.”

He added that it was “not good” and “changes are coming!”

The same day, according to a New York Times report, a senior official with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement wrote regional ICE directors telling them to lay off farms, along with restaurants and hotels.

“Effective today, please hold on all work site enforcement investigations/operations on agriculture (including aquaculture and meat packing plants), restaurants and operating hotels,” the official wrote.

Many in California agriculture took heart.

Then on Monday came news that the directive to stay off farms, hotels and restaurants had been reversed.

“There will be no safe spaces for industries who harbor violent criminals or purposely try to undermine ICE’s efforts,” Tricia McLaughlin, an assistant secretary for the Department of Homeland Security, said, according to the Washington Post. “Worksite enforcement remains a cornerstone of our efforts to safeguard public safety, national security and economic stability.”

In California’s heartland, Jacobsen of the Fresno County Farm Bureau spoke for many farmers when he said: “We don’t have a clue right now.”

Asked Tuesday to clarify the administration’s policy on immigration raids in farmland, White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson said the Trump administration is committed to “enforcing federal immigration law.”

“While the President is focused on immediately removing dangerous criminal illegal aliens from the country,” Jackson said, “anyone who is here illegally is liable to be deported.”

Still, Jacobsen and others noted, aside from the upheaval in Ventura County last week, agricultural operations in other parts of the state have largely been spared from mass immigration sweeps.

Workers, meanwhile, have continued to show up for work, and most have even returned to the fields in Ventura County.

There has been one notable outcome of last week’s raids, according to several people interviewed: Employers are reaching out to workers’ rights organizations, seeking guidance on how to keep their workers safe.

“Some employers are trying to take steps to protect their employees, as best they can,” said Armando Elenes, secretary treasurer of the United Farm Workers.

He said his organization and others have been training employers on how to respond if immigration agents show up at their farms or packinghouses. A core message, he said: Don’t allow agents on the property if they don’t have a signed warrant.

Indeed, many of the growers whose properties were raided in Ventura County appear to have understood that; advocates reported that federal agents were turned away from a number of farms because they did not have a warrant.

In Ventura County, Lucas Zucker, co-executive director of the Central Coast Alliance United for a Sustainable Economy, a group that has often been at odds with growers over issues such as worker pay and protections, underscored the unusual alliance that has forged between farmers and worker advocates.

Two days after the raids, Zucker read a statement condemning the immigration sweeps on behalf of Maureen McGuire, chief executive of the Ventura County Farm Bureau, an organization that represents growers.

“Farmers care deeply about their workers, not as abstract labor, but as human beings and valued community members who deserve dignity, safety and respect,” McGuire said in the statement. “Ventura County agriculture depends on them. California’s economy depends on them. America’s food system depends on them.”

Before reading the statement, Zucker evoked light laughter when he told the crowd: “For those of you familiar [with] Ventura County, you might be surprised to see CAUSE reading a statement from the farm bureau. We clash on many issues, but this is something where we’re united and where we’re literally speaking with one voice.”

“The agriculture industry and farmworkers are both under attack, with federal agencies showing up at the door,” Zucker said later. “Nothing brings people together like a common enemy.”

This article is part of The Times’ equity reporting initiative, funded by the James Irvine Foundation, exploring the challenges facing low-income workers and the efforts being made to address California’s economic divide.

Pacific Palisades will reopen to the general public Saturday, Los Angeles Police Department Chief Jim McDonnell told The Times Friday afternoon.

The affluent coastal enclave has remained closed to the public since the devastating January wildfires, months after other fire-damaged neighborhoods reopened. Access to the neighborhood was limited to residents and workers with passes. Dozens of LAPD officers have been staffing 16 checkpoints on major streets into the community, according to the mayor’s office.

Those checkpoints will no longer be staffed as of Saturday, but there “will still be a heavy police presence for the foreseeable future there,” McDonnell said.

The decision was made in conjunction with Mayor Karen Bass, with input from members of the community, McDonnell said. Bass did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The city is bracing for widespread demonstrations against the Trump administration on Saturday that will include a heavy law enforcement presence. The need to shift personnel to other parts of the city ahead of the protests was “a factor” in McDonnell’s decision, but he said it was also a necessary evolution months after the fires.

The status of the checkpoints will be reassessed after this weekend, LAPD spokesperson Jennifer Forkish said.

SEONGNAM, South Korea  — South Korean President-elect Lee Jae-myung has always described his politics as deeply personal, born of the “wretchedness” of his youth.

In his last presidential run three years ago, when his conservative opponent Yoon Suk Yeol, a former prosecutor, appealed to the rule of law, Lee told a story from his childhood: how his family’s poverty pushed him into factory assembly lines while his peers were entering middle school — and how his mother would walk him to work every morning, holding his hand.

“Behind every policy that I implemented was my own impoverished and abject life, the everyday struggles of ordinary South Koreans,” he said in March 2022. “The reason I am in politics today is because I want to create … a world of hope for those who are still suffering in the same puddle of poverty and despair that I managed to escape.”

Lee Jae-myung, foreground center, joins a rally against then-President Yoon Suk Yeol at the National Assembly in Seoul in December 2024.

(Ahn Young-joon / Associated Press)

Although Lee lost that race by 0.73 of a percentage point — or 247,077 votes — it was Yoon who set the stage for Lee’s comeback. Impeached halfway into his term for his declaration of martial law in December, the former president is now on trial for insurrection.

In the snap presidential election that took place Tuesday, the liberal Lee emerged the winner, with South Korea’s three major television broadcasters calling the race just before midnight here.

On the campaign trail, Lee framed his run as a mission to restore the country’s democratic norms. But he also returned to the theme that has, over the years, evolved from childhood yearning into his signature political brand: the promise of a society that offers its most vulnerable a “thick safety mat” — a way out of the puddle.

Born in December 1963, the fifth of seven siblings, Lee grew up in Seongnam, a city near the southeastern edge of Seoul that, by the time his family settled there in 1976, was known as a neighborhood for those who had been evicted from the capital’s shantytowns.

The family rented a single semi-basement room by a local market, where his father made a living as a cleaner. At times his family lived on discarded fruit he picked up along his route. Lee’s mother worked as a bathroom attendant just around the corner.

Lee spent his teenage years hopping from one factory to another to help. His first job, at 13, was soldering lead at a jewelry maker for 12 hours a day, breathing in the acrid fumes. At another job, the owner skipped out without paying Lee three months’ worth of wages.

A few years later, while operating a press machine at a baseball glove factory, Lee suffered an accident that permanently disfigured his left arm.

Banners featuring ruling and opposition presidential candidates hang over a street in Seoul days before an election in March 2022.

(Ahn Young-joon / Associated Press)

Lee then began studying for middle school and high school at night after getting off work. He proved to be a gifted student, earning himself a full ride to Chung-Ang University to study law.

After passing South Korea’s bar exam in 1986, he was moved by a lecture given by Roh Moo-hyun, a human rights lawyer who went on to become president in 2003, and the 26-year-old Lee opened up his own legal practice to do the same.

Seongnam by then was rapidly developing, becoming the site of several projects, and Lee threw himself into local watchdog activism.

Ha Dong-geun, 73, who spent a decade organizing in the city with Lee, recalled the day they met: The latter wore an expression of great urgency — “like something bad would happen if he didn’t immediately hit the ground running.”

He added: “He wasn’t afraid of what others thought of him.”

Ha remembered Lee as a keen strategic mind, with a knack for “finding out his opponent’s weaknesses.” Yet despite the noise they made, substantive change proved harder to achieve, leading to Lee’s political awakening in 2004.

A year earlier, two of the city’s major hospitals had shut down, threatening the accessibility of emergency care in its poorest neighborhoods. But though Lee’s campaign had gathered nearly 20,000 signatures from residents to build a public hospital in their place, the proposal was struck down almost immediately by the city council.

“Those in power do not care about the health and lives of people unless there are profits to be made,” Lee wrote in 2021 of his reaction then. “If they won’t do it, let’s do it ourselves. Instead of asking for it from someone else, I will become mayor and do it with my own hands.”

Lee Jae-myung was attacked and injured during a January 2024 visit to the city of Busan in South Korea.

(Sohn Hyung-joo / Yonhap / AP)

Lee was mayor of Seongnam from 2010 to 2018. During that time, he repaid over $400 million in municipal debt left behind by his predecessor. He moved his office down from the ninth to the second floor, frequently appearing in person to field questions or complaints from citizens.

But he was best known for his welfare policies, which he rolled out despite intense opposition from the then-conservative central government: free school lunches, free school uniforms for middle-schoolers and financial support for new mothers seeking postpartum care. For all 24-year-old citizens, the city also provided an annual basic income of around $720 in the form of cash vouchers that could be used at local businesses.

In 2016, when the plight of a high school student who couldn’t afford sanitary pads using a shoe insole instead made national headlines, the city also added a program that gave underprivileged teenage girls cash for female hygiene products. A few years later, Lee also made good on his campaign promise to build the public hospital that had first propelled him into politics.

“My personal experiences made me aware of how cruel this world can be to those who have nothing,” he said in 2021.

Though it has been years since Lee left the city to become the governor of Gyeonggi province and to stage three presidential runs, his track record still inspires fierce loyalty in Seongnam’s working-class neighborhoods, where Lee is remembered as a doer who looked after even the little things.

“His openness and willingness to communicate resonated with a lot of people,” said Kim Seung-man, 67, a shop owner in Sangdaewon Market, where Lee’s family eked out a living in the 1970s. “Working-class people identify with him because he had such a difficult childhood.”

People shout slogans during a rally on April 4, 2025, to celebrate impeached South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol’s removal from office by the Constitutional Court.

(Lee Jin-man / Associated Press)

And while the Seongnam Citizens Medical Center — which opened in 2020 — is deep in the red and has become a target for Lee’s critics who dismiss his welfare policies as cheap populism, Kim says it is a lifeline to this working-class neighborhood.

“It was a treatment hub for COVID patients during the pandemic,” he said. “Serving the public good means doing so regardless of whether it is profitable or not.”

Beyond Seongnam’s working-class neighborhoods, Lee has provoked in many an equally intense dislike — a fact that cannot be explained by his policies alone.

Some have attributed this to his brusque, sometimes confrontational demeanor, others to classist prejudice. Lee has pointed to his status as an “outsider” in the world of South Korean establishment politics, where the paths of most ambitious young politicians follow a script he has eschewed: getting in line behind a party heavyweight who will open doors to favorable legislative seats.

“I have never become indebted to anyone during my time in politics,” Lee said at a news conference last month.

He has faced attacks from within his own party, and conservatives have cast him as a tyrant and a criminal, noting allegations against him in legal cases. Former President Yoon cited the “legislative tyranny” of the Lee-led liberal opposition as justification for declaring martial law in December.

“There are still controversies over character or ethics trailing Lee,” said Cho Jin-man, a political scientist at Duksung Women’s University. “He doesn’t have a squeaky clean image.”

Since losing the 2022 election, Lee has faced trial on numerous charges, including election law violations and the mishandling of a real estate development project as mayor of Seongnam — indictments which Lee has decried as politically motivated attacks by Yoon and his allies.

Lee Jae-myung speaks during a Dec. 15 news conference about the impeachment of President Yoon Suk Yeol.

(Lee Jin-man / Associated Press)

Few of the allegations against Lee have stuck. Others, like an election law clause that prohibits candidates from lying during their campaigns, is an oft-abused technicality that would leave few politicians standing were it consistently enforced.

“On the contrary, these have only led to perceptions that there are problems with the prosecution service,” Cho said.

In recent months, Lee has tried to smooth the rougher edges of his public persona, vowing to mend the country’s increasingly combustible partisan rifts.

Last year, after he survived an assassination attempt in which the assailant’s blade nicked a major vein in his neck, Lee denounced the “politics of hate” that had taken root in the country, calling for a new era of mutual respect and coexistence.

In his recent campaign, Lee has billed his welfare agenda, which includes pledges for better labor protections as well as more public housing and public healthcare, not as class warfare but as commonsense pragmatism, reflecting his efforts to win over moderate conservatives.

But there are still questions whether Lee, whose party now controls both the executive and legislative branches, will be successful.

”He now has a clear path to push through what he wants very efficiently,” Cho said. “But the nature of power is such that those who hold it don’t necessarily exercise restraint.”

Although Lee has promised to not seek retribution against his political enemies as president, he has also made it clear that those who collaborated with former President Yoon’s illegal power grab will be held accountable — a move that will inevitably inflame partisan discord.

His working-class background has not staved off criticisms from labor activists, who say his proposal to boost the domestic semiconductor industry would walk back the rights of its workers.

That background will also do little for Lee’s first and most pressing agenda item: dealing with President Trump, whose tariffs on South Korean cars, steel and aluminum are set to fully go into effect in July.

“I don’t think Lee and Trump will have good chemistry,” Cho said.

“They both have such strong personalities, but they are so different in terms of political ideology and personal upbringing.”

Several Vietnamese American-owned nail salons in Orange County have sued California, alleging the state’s labor code is discriminating against their businesses.

The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Santa Ana on Friday, alleges that the state’s labor code violates the 14th Amendment’s guarantee of equal protection under the law by forcing nail technicians to be classified as employees.

The suit argues that professionals in the beauty industry for years have operated as independent contractors, renting space in a salon and bringing in their own clients. That changed at the beginning of 2025, when nail technicians under the labor code became required to be classified as employees, the lawsuit said.

State Assemblyman Tri Ta (R-Westminster), who represents Little Saigon and surrounding communities, said his office has fielded much concern from Vietnamese American nail salon owners.

“Their lives have turned upside down overnight,” Ta said at a news conference Monday morning. “It is not just unfair, it is discrimination.”

The switch in labor law came in 2019 when Assembly Bill 5, a sweeping law governing worker classification rules across various industries, was approved. It codified a California Supreme Court decision creating a stricter test to judge whether a worker should be considered an employee rather than an independent contractor.

AB 5 sought to crack down on industries in which many workers are misclassified as independent contractors, who are not afforded protections including minimum wage, overtime pay and workers’ compensation that employees have access to. But various industries have said AB 5 targets them unfairly, creating an uneven playing field for businesses.

Some professions received carve-outs, including doctors, accountants, real estate agents and hairdressers. Others such as truckers, commercial janitors and physical therapists must abide by the tighter classification rules.

Some implementation of the law was staggered to give industries, including nail technicians, time to adapt.

But Ân Tran, who owns two franchisee locations of Happy Nails & Spa that are among the businesses suing the state, said the law remains burdensome. Hiring employees is more costly, and it’s unfair that businesses hiring hairdressers, aestheticians and other beauty workers aren’t subject to the requirement, he said.

“We don’t have customers all the time. That’s going to cost us a lot more to pay them for the downtime when they don’t have any customers,” Tran said in an interview.

The requirement also defies the flexible work culture and control over their clients that many manicurists prefer, Tran said.

Emily Micelle was among several manicurists who spoke in support of the salon owners’ lawsuit at the Monday news conference.

“No one forced me to be here today. I chose to be here because I want to express my side of the story,” Micelle said. “Being [an independent contractor] means I can work for myself, I can be my own boss, I can create my own branding within the business, I choose my own hours, I choose my own clients. … The law means to protect us workers, but [being an employee] doesn’t work for everyone.”

The lawsuit describes how the nail salon industry in California became dominated by Vietnamese workers in recent decades, when Vietnamese refugees began fleeing to the U.S. in large numbers in 1975 after the fall of Saigon in America’s failed military intervention in Southeast Asia.

The industry “has become synonymous with the Vietnamese community,” the lawsuit said, with more than 82% of nail technicians in California being Vietnamese American and some 85% women.

The legal action highlights the tension between how small businesses can serve as a pathway for immigrants and others to build wealth, and how workers at times might have little formal recourse for low wages or unsafe work conditions, experts have said.

Researchers with the UCLA Labor Center last year analyzed U.S. Census Bureau data and released a report estimating that the hourly median wage for nail salon workers in 2021 was $10.94, below the then-$13 minimum wage for small businesses.

In 2017, four women sued a salon in Tustin, alleging that the owners had created bogus time records and paychecks to create an illusion that manicurists were paid lawfully by the hour, but instead workers were compensated based on a 60% commission system where their pay was further deducted for using business supplies, such as spa chairs.

Businesses that filed suit include multiple locations of Blue Nail Bar, Happy Nails & Spa and Holly & Hudson Nail Lounge.