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What could tariffs on April 2 mean for prices and the economy?

March 26, 2025 by WDNY Radio

(NEW YORK) — President Donald Trump has vowed to issue a fresh round of tariffs on April 2, presenting it as an inflection point for the economy weeks after a previous set of duties roiled markets and incited recession fears.

Trump has repeatedly referred to April 2 as “liberation day,” saying a wide-ranging slate of reciprocal tariffs would rebalance U.S. trade relationships.

Trump’s plan for reciprocal tariffs next week, however, is expected to be narrower than he previously vowed, though the plan remains under discussion, sources told ABC News this week.

The news of a potentially softer approach to forthcoming tariffs rallied U.S. stocks earlier this week, recovering some of the losses suffered earlier in March.

While key details remain unknown, new duties would ratchet up the global trade war, raising prices for an array of consumer goods and risking an economic slowdown, experts told ABC News.

“This certainly will be an escalation,” Mary Lovely, a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics who studies trade policy, told ABC News. “We know the direction of travel, if not how far this will go.”

Here’s what the latest round of tariffs could mean for prices and the economy, according to experts:

Will the tariffs on April 2 raise prices?
In setting tariffs for April 2, the U.S. will target countries that have major trade imbalances with the U.S., sources said.

“It’s 15% of the countries, but it’s a huge amount of our trading volume,” Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said last week, describing the countries as a “Dirty 15.”

Last year, according to federal census data, the U.S. had its biggest trade deficits with China, the European Union, Mexico, Vietnam, Taiwan, Japan, South Korea, Canada and India, among other nations.

Reciprocal tariffs could raise prices for imported goods from those countries, since importers typically pass along a share of the tax burden to consumers.

The tariffs could hike prices for furniture and consumer electronics from Vietnam, fresh fruits and vegetables from Mexico, and cars from South Korea, experts told ABC News.

“This is going to mean prices will ultimately go up,” Jason Miller, a professor of supply chain management at Michigan State University, told ABC News.

The scale of price increases will likely depend on the tariff rate set by the Trump administration, which remains unclear, the experts said.

Speaking at the White House on Monday, Trump said the reciprocal tariffs could fall short of the rate that target countries impose on U.S. goods.

“I may give a lot of countries breaks,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office. “I’m embarrassed to charge them what they’ve charged us.”

Kyle Handley, a professor of economics at the University of California, San Diego, said he expects consumer prices to rise enough for consumers to identify the change.

“Depending on what tariff rates they put in place, it could be pretty massive,” Handley said. “It will be a non-trivial increase in the price of imports. People will notice.”

What do the tariffs on April 2 mean for the economy?
Experts told ABC News the fresh tariffs would put downward pressure on U.S. economic growth, since the additional tax burden for importing businesses and uncertainty about additional duties could deter private sector investment.

“A lot of the uncertainty about tariffs very likely has firms sort of frozen in place as they’re waiting to evaluate and see what happens,” Miller said.

Looming tariffs also risk unease among shoppers, threatening to undermine a key engine of the U.S. economy, some experts said. Consumer attitudes worsened more than expected in March, dropping to their lowest levels since 2021, a Conference Board survey on Tuesday showed.

Consumer spending, which accounts for about two-thirds of U.S. economic activity, could weaken if shopper sentiment sours, Bret Kenwell, U.S. investment analyst at eToro, told ABC News in a statement.

By some key measures, however, the economy remains in solid shape. A recent jobs report showed steady hiring last month and a historically low unemployment rate. Inflation stands well below a peak attained in 2022, though price increases register nearly a percentage point higher than the Fed’s goal of 2%.

Still, recession fears are mounting on Wall Street as businesses and consumers weather the trade war. Goldman Sachs earlier this month hiked its odds of a recession from 15% to 20%. Moody’s Analytics pegged the chances of a recession over the next year at 35%.

“These tariffs will be very detrimental for economic performance and business growth,” Handley said. “It may not take long for us to start seeing some of those effects.”

ABC News’ Selina Wang contributed to this report.

Mega Millions says new rules will more than double jackpot value

March 26, 2025 by WDNY Radio

(NEW YORK) — New Mega Millions rules will come into play next month, the company has announced, under which the minimum jackpot value will more than double to $50 million.

The new rules will come into force after the final drawing of the current game on Friday, April 4, the company said in a notice posted to its website. The first drawing under the new rules will be on April 8.

From that draw, jackpots will start at $50 million, rather than the current starting point of $20 million. “Jackpots are expected to grow faster and get to higher dollar amounts more frequently in the new game,” the company said.

Minimum non-jackpot prizes will jump in value from between $2 and $1 million to between $10 and $10 million. Every winning ticket will payout at least double the price, Mega Millions said.

Mega Millions will introduce a new $5 game with a built-in multiplier, with a multiplier value of 2, 3, 4, 5 or 10 randomly assigned at the time of purchase.

Prizes for match 5 — achieved by matching five white balls — will range from $2 million to $10 million with the new multiplier.

Matching the Mega Ball on its own will now payout $10 to $50, depending on the assigned multiplier.

Mega Millions said the new rules improve the odds of players winning the jackpot — from 1 in 302,575,350 to 1 in 290,472,336 — due to the removal of one gold Mega Ball from the game. The new format will have 24 rather than 25 Mega Balls.

Overall odds of winning any prize will improve to 1 in 23 from 1 in 24, the company said.

Alleged victim in former Michigan coach hacking case speaks out: ‘They have betrayed me’

March 26, 2025 by WDNY Radio

(ANN ARBOR, MI) — One of the alleged victims in a widespread hacking scandal involving a former University of Michigan football coach said she feels “betrayed” by the school and is fearful that her personal information was further leaked online.

The woman is one of two anonymous plaintiffs in a federal lawsuit filed a day after the Department of Justice announced Matthew Weiss had been indicted on two dozen federal charges alleging he hacked into thousands of athlete and alumni accounts and downloaded private data, including intimate photos, over eight years.

“It never would have crossed my mind that I could have been involved, and that’s, I think, why there’s so much outrage on our end,” the woman, a former University of Michigan female athlete, told “Good Morning America.”

The Jane Doe said she was at the University of Michigan for six years as a student and employee and does not know Weiss.

“I’ve been a fan of the university my entire life,” she said. “To know that I put so much trust and so much faith into that institution, and they have betrayed me in such a significant way — I mean, it’s terrifying.”

Citing the allegations in the indictment against Weiss, the lawsuit claimed that Weiss was able to gain unauthorized access to the student-athlete databases of more than 100 colleges and universities maintained by Keffer Development Services, LLC, a Pennsylvania-based company, and downloaded the personally identifiable information and medical data of over 150,000 athletes.

The former coach is then accused of unlawfully gaining access to the social media, email and/or cloud storage accounts of more than 3,300 people, including the two plaintiffs, and then downloading personal, intimate photos and videos. Weiss primarily targeted female college athletes, the indictment alleged.

“I don’t think there’s really any way to know exactly what information of mine is out there,” the Jane Doe said. “It’s kind of one of those things that you can’t really shut off.”

Weiss is among the defendants in the lawsuit. ABC News has reached out to his attorney for comment on the lawsuit and federal charges and has not gotten a response.

The University of Michigan and the Regents of the University of Michigan are also named as defendants in the lawsuit, which alleged that as a result of their “recklessness and negligence,” Weiss downloaded the women’s “personal, intimate digital photographs and videos.”

“I obviously am afraid of an individual that’s capable of doing something like this, but I’m possibly more afraid of a university that has the opportunity to prevent it from happening and doesn’t,” the Jane Doe said.

In response to the lawsuit, Kay Jarvis, the director of public affairs for the University of Michigan, said in a statement to ABC News, “We have not been served with the complaint and cannot comment on pending litigation.”

Keffer is also named as a defendant in the lawsuit, which claimed that the company’s alleged “misconduct, negligence, and recklessness also contributed to Weiss invading the privacy of Plaintiffs and their fellow student athletes.” ABC News has reached out to the company for comment and has not gotten a response.

The lawsuit was filed on behalf of the two plaintiffs and as a potential class action on behalf of other alleged victims. The number of potential class members is unclear but is estimated to exceed 1,000, the lawsuit stated.

Parker Stinar, a managing partner with the Chicago-based firm Stinar Gould Grieco & Hensley who filed the lawsuit on behalf of the plaintiffs, said he hopes to find out more about what happened to the alleged victims’ information and “to better understand how the university failed these individuals and to hold them accountable.”

“We’re talking about the University of Michigan, one of the largest, most powerful and respected academic institutions in the world, that allowed this to take place by one of their employees,” Stinar told “Good Morning America.”

Stinar said this “isn’t the first time that we have seen the University of Michigan fail their alumni and their athletes,” pointing to the case of the late Dr. Robert Anderson, who served as the school’s sports team physician for decades and was accused of molesting or sexually abusing more than 1,000 victims. In 2022, the university reached a $490 million settlement in connection with the allegations.

“We’re seeing it again, where the university has failed to protect those that give their blood, sweat and tears to the school,” Stinar said.

Weiss, 42, was arraigned Monday on 14 counts of unauthorized access to computers and 10 counts of aggravated identity theft. A not guilty plea was entered on his behalf, The Associated Press reported. His attorney, Douglas Mullkoff, declined to comment to the AP following the proceeding. ABC News also reached out to Mulkoff multiple times, but did not receive a response.

Weiss was released on a $10,000 unsecured bond, ESPN reported.

If convicted, Weiss could face up to five years in prison on each count of unauthorized access and two years on each count of aggravated identity theft, according to the attorney’s office.

‘Extreme alarm’: Democrats demand answers after Signal chat firestorm

March 26, 2025 by WDNY Radio

(WASHINGTON) — Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and top Senate Democrats from national security committees wrote a letter to President Donald Trump seeking more information about reports that members of his cabinet used the Signal app to convene a group chat to “coordinate and share classified information about sensitive military planning operations” and mistakenly included The Atlantic Editor-in-Chief Jeff Goldberg.

“We write to you with extreme alarm about the astonishingly poor judgment shown by your Cabinet and national security advisors,” the senators wrote, according to a copy of the letter obtained by ABC News. “You have long advocated for accountability and transparency in the government, particularly as it relates to the handling of classified information, national security, and the safety of American servicemembers. As such, it is imperative that you address this breach with the seriousness and diligence that it demands.”

Committees “have serious questions about this incident, and members need a full accounting to ensure it never happens again,” the letter said. The authors requested a “complete and unredacted” transcript of the Signal chat for the appropriate committees to review in a secure setting.

The senators also called on Attorney General Pam Bondi to carry out a thorough investigation of the matter, citing concerns that “willful or negligent disclosure of classified or sensitive national security information may constitute a criminal violation of the Espionage Act or other laws.”

The letter asked Trump to preserve the chat in question, along with any other discussions of government business occurring on any messaging application, citing concerns that the Signal messages — which are set to automatically disappear after a fixed period of time — could violate both Federal Records Act and the Presidential Records Act.

“You and your Cabinet are responsible for the safety and security of the American people, as well as our military servicemembers and intelligence personnel in the field. We expect your Administration to address this dangerous lapse in security protocol—whether intended or not—with the utmost seriousness, and to uphold the ethic of accountability that our nation holds sacred,” the letter said.

The letter is signed by Judiciary Committee Ranking Member Dick Durbin, Armed Services Committee Ranking Member Jack Reed, Foreign Relations Committee Ranking Member Jeanne Shaheen, Intelligence Committee Vice Chairman Mark Warner, Appropriations Subcommittee on Defense ranking member Chris Coons, and Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs ranking member Gary Peters. It therefore represents a joint statement from the top Democrats across the committees dealing with national security matters.

In their letter to Trump, the Senators asked for answers to 10 specific questions related to the reported Signal chat, including a full list of its participants.

Those included inquiries about whether any other individuals were mistakenly added to the chat, whether any individual used a personal device to access the chat, whether anyone was out of the country while accessing the chat and whether any classified documents were transferred to unclassified systems. The senators also sought a response on whether the intelligence community has done a damage assessment of the matter.

The senators further requested an answer about whether any cabinet or White House officials are using Signal or other commercial products to discuss classified or sensitive information, or any communications subject to statutory recordkeeping requirements. If so, they asked the White House to provide details on how it is meeting record-keeping requirements.

These are the impacts some scientists fear most from EPA deregulation

March 26, 2025 by WDNY Radio

(WASHINGTON) — Environmental lawyers would argue that part of the American dream is the right to live in a clean environment – a freedom from worry that the air you breathe, the food you eat and the water you drink are without pollutants and toxins that could make you sick.

But several of the environmental freedoms Americans experience today – clean air, clean water and clean rain among them – could soon be in jeopardy from the Environmental Protection Agency’s deregulation plans, several experts told ABC News.

On March 12, the EPA announced sweeping moves in its effort to walk back environmental protections and eliminate a host of climate change regulations, changes described by the agency as the “biggest deregulatory action in U.S. history.”

EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin announced earlier this month that the agency will undertake 31 actions, including rolling back emission regulations on coal, oil and gas production. The announcement also said the EPA will reevaluate government findings that determined that greenhouse gas emissions heat the planet and are a threat to public health. In addition, the EPA plans to eliminate its scientific research office and may have plans to fire more than 1,000 employees, The New York Times reported last week.

“Alongside President Trump, we are living up to our promises to unleash American energy, lower costs for Americans, revitalize the American auto industry, and work hand-in-hand with our state partners to advance our shared mission,” Zeldin said in the EPA announcement.

The EPA, with its mission to protect human health and the environment, is fundamentally a public health organization, Patrick Simms, vice president for healthy communities at Earthjustice, the nation’s largest public interest environmental law firm, told ABC News.

Revoking these regulations would hamper the EPA’s ability to keep Americans from getting sick from the exposure to environmental pollutants, experts said.

“Any policy changes that may occur under this Administration will continue to protect human health and the environment,” and EPA spokesperson said in response to an ABC News request for comment. ”They will be guided by science and the law, as well as input from the public. They will also be guided by many of the Executive Orders issued by the President and EPA Administrator Zeldin’s Powering the Great American Comeback Initiative.”

Impacts some experts fear most from EPA deregulation

Environmental impacts such as toxic air, poisoned water and acid rain that killed forests and caused crop failures were all occurring prior to EPA regulations, the experts said.

Bedrock environmental laws such as the Clean Water Act, the Safe Drinking Water Act and the National Environmental Policy Act were all established after the EPA was created in 1970 under Republican President Richard Nixon.

Some of the regulations Zeldin has proposed eliminating could negatively affect the safety of drinking water and the amount of pollutants that are released into the atmosphere, Simms said.

Additionally, the rollbacks having to do with air pollutants means those toxins will be deposited back into the soil, Murray McBride, a soil and crop scientist and retired Cornell University professor, told ABC News. Coal ash, for example, contains heavy metals, which are absorbed especially by crops like leafy greens, McBride said.

Loosening wastewater rules will pollute soil and negatively impact crops even more, McBride said.

Should the EPA cease monitoring environmental pollutants, it would be especially dangerous for people with underlying health conditions, such as asthma or heart illness, Paul Anastas, director of the Center for Green Chemistry and Green Engineering at Yale University and former assistant administrator for the EPA, told ABC News.

“People don’t know what they’re breathing when data is not being collected,” Anastas said. “You don’t know whether or not your water is contaminated.”

Deregulation would greatly reduce the country’s momentum in transitioning away from fossil fuels as well, Michael Gerrard, a professor of environmental law at Columbia Law School, told ABC News.

“This moves us even further behind, and it inevitably will mean that the extreme weather events we’ve experienced, the floods and the heat waves and the wildfires and so forth, will get worse,” he said.

U.S. environmental issues prior to the EPA

In the late 1960s, there was an “explosion” of public concern about environmental conditions in the country said A. James Barnes, a professor of law and environment and public affairs at Indiana University and former EPA general counsel and deputy administrator.

The year 1970 was monumental for progress in environmental protection, Barnes said. The first Earth Day occurred in April 1970, and when the EPA was established in December of that year, Barnes served as chief of staff to William Ruckelshaus, the first EPA administrator.

“In 1970, when most of the current environmental laws were initially adopted, we lived in a very different and much more hazardous and toxic country,” Simms said.

Smoke pollution and disposal of waste and sewage were at the top of the list of concerns, Barnes said. A significant portion of untreated municipal sewage was still being dumped into rivers and lakes. Hazardous waste was being dumped into landfills along with household garbage and was often incinerated, which in turn sent the toxic materials into the atmosphere. Some rivers were so polluted that they caught fire, as did Ohio’s Cuyahoga River in 1969, Barnes noted.

Lake Erie was considered to be “dying” because it was choking on an uncontrolled growth of algae due to the pollution, according to Barnes, who grew up in industrialized Michigan and recalled fishing in Lake Erie, where he caught carp that had “huge sores” on them.

“You wouldn’t want anything to do with possibly eating it,” Barnes said.

All major U.S. cities had unhealthy levels of carbon monoxide from motor vehicle emissions, before the EPA required that cars manufactured after 1975 be equipped with a catalytic converter to remove pollutants from automotive emissions, said Gerrard.

A chronic smog of air pollutants that hung over Los Angeles was viewed as a “national joke” at the time, Barnes said, while in places that had steel mills, like Pittsburgh and Birmingham, it was not unusual to see blackened skies from the heavy amounts of pollution in the air.

“Your eyes burned,” Barnes said. “Your lungs were aggravated by the quality of the air.”

Additionally, exposure to lead and mercury contaminants in the environment was causing brain damage in some people, according to Anastas.

Coal was the dominant source of electricity production, the burning of which reduced air quality due to high levels of sulfur dioxide and particulates emitted during production and use, Gerard said.

Atmospheric ozone pollution and acid rain would often damage crops, McBride said.

“In general, the air quality and water quality in 1970 were much, much worse than they are today,” Gerrard said.

History serves as a reminder of what could again happen if actions are not taken to protect health and the environment, experts warned.

“If we don’t understand our history, we’re doomed to repeat it,” Simms said.

ABC News’ Matthew Glasser, Kelly Livingston and MaryAlice Parks contributed to this report.

3 skiers killed, including American, in large avalanche in Canada

March 26, 2025 by WDNY Radio

Three people were killed when a large avalanche swept away a group of skiers in Canada, officials said.

The avalanche struck just before 1 p.m. on Monday when two groups of skiers had just finished skiing and were waiting in a staging area below the tree line of Clute Creek water shed in an alpine area on the east side of Kootenay Lake in the British Columbia backcountry, according to a statement from the Kaslo Royal Canadian Mounted Police.

“A transport helicopter was nearing the group when the pilot observed an avalanche and sounded the siren,” officials said. “One group of skiers was able to run out of harm’s way, while the other group of four was swept away into the tree line.”

Efforts to recover the men were immediately initiated but when officials located them, they found three of them deceased.

They were identified as “a 44-year-old man from Whistler BC, a 45-year-old man from Idaho USA and the 53-year-old guide from Kaslo BC.”

The fourth man, a 40-year-old from Nelson, British Columbia, was critically injured.

Avalanche Canada said the Kootenays have a high danger rating at all elevations and that rising temperatures can create avalanche conditions.

Measles vaccinations are increasing in some areas hit hard by cases: Officials

March 26, 2025 by WDNY Radio

(WASHINGTON) — Measles vaccination rates appear to be increasing in some areas of the U.S. that have been affected by outbreaks this year.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) currently recommends that people receive two doses of the measles, mumps, rubella (MMR) vaccine — the first at ages 12 to 15 months and the second between 4 and 6 years old. One dose is 93% effective, and two doses are 97% effective, the CDC says.

Of the 378 measles cases confirmed by the CDC so far this year, the majority have been among those who are unvaccinated or whose vaccination status is unknown.

In western Texas, an outbreak has infected 327 people, according to data from the Texas Department of State Health Services (DSHS). Of those cases, just two have been among people fully vaccinated with the MMR vaccine.

Health officials have been urging anyone who isn’t vaccinated to receive the MMR vaccine or to catch up on missed doses.

In Texas, as of March 16, at least 173,362 MMR vaccine doses have been administered across the state this year, according to DSHS data provided to ABC News.

This is higher than the number of doses administered in the state over the same period since at least 2020.

A DSHS spokesperson told ABC News that because there is no statewide requirement to report vaccine administration, the data is not a comprehensive accounting of all MMR vaccines administered in the state.

Lubbock County, in western Texas, has seen 10 measles cases so far this year, DSHS data shows. Despite not being at the epicenter of the outbreak, the number of people being vaccinated has increased, according to Katherine Wells, director of public health for the city of Lubbock.

“We’re 75 miles east of the actual outbreak, but we’re seeing an increase in the number of vaccinations that we’re giving in our community,” she told ABC News. “Over the last four weeks, our health department has been operating a walk-in vaccine clinic that’s just for MMR, and that vaccine clinic [has] administered a little over 300 vaccines.”

She added that health officials have seen multiple babies under 6 months old who have been exposed to measles. Because they are too young to be vaccinated, they have been given shots of immunoglobulin, which are antibodies that act as a post-exposure prophylaxis.

Wells said the vaccines are available at no cost, and health officials have been trying to spread the word over social media and the local news.

“So we’re kind of just getting the people that, I think, either their children are behind on vaccines, just because parents get busy and it’s hard to get your four-year-old sometimes into the doctor’s office, or people that were kind of on the fence about vaccines and maybe said, ‘Well, I don’t want to vaccinate my kids, because you never see measles.’ But now that you’re seeing measles, they’re bringing their children in for vaccinations,” she said.

In conversations with colleagues in nearby health departments, such as in epicenter Gaines County, Wells has said it’s been harder to reach residents to distribute the MMR vaccine, making the process somewhat of a “struggle.”

She explained that in Lubbock, the health department building is large — with most residents knowing where it is — and the department has more outreach staff than smaller departments.

“I think it’s a little bit harder in some of these rural areas, because they’re setting up in places that might not be as familiar to individuals,” Wells said. “They’re finding different locations in order to have those clinics; they’re starting to focus a lot more on school-based clinics. So, let’s go to where the children are and get the parents to come to that school and then offer the vaccine there, which I think is a great tactic.”

Meanwhile, in nearby New Mexico, the state Department of Health (NMDOH) reported a total of 43 measles cases so far this year. Most of the cases have been confirmed in Lea County, which borders western Texas.

Health officials suspect there may be a connection between the Texas and New Mexico cases, but a link has not yet been confirmed.

Data from NMDOH provided to ABC News shows that between Feb. 1 and March 24 of this year, more than 13,100 MMR doses have been administered. Of those, about 7,000 doses have been administered among those under age 18 and about 6,100 have been administered among adults.

This is more than the double the number of MMR vaccine doses that were administered over the same period last year, according to Robert Nott, communications director for the NMDOH. The vaccines are being administered at no charge.

“We’re encouraged by the number of people getting vaccinated but we’re not taking it for granted,” Nott told ABC News. “You can see nationwide: measles is highly contagious.”

Measles is one of the most contagious diseases known to humans. Just one infected patient can spread measles to up to nine out of 10 susceptible close contacts, according to the CDC.

The measles virus can linger in the air and live on surfaces for up to two hours after an infected person has left a room, the CDC says.

Wells, from Lubbock, said during a press briefing last week that it could take up to a year to gain control over the outbreak.

“Our number of cases are continuing to increase daily. There [are] also still cases that are unreported or under-reported because people aren’t seeking testing,” she told ABC News. “So, I still think we’re on the growth side of this outbreak, and it’s going to be until we get a significant number of vaccines and really be able to identify all of those cases. So, it’ll take both of those things happening before we can get this under control.”

Egypt, Saudi Arabia condemn establishment of Israeli agency to ‘voluntarily’ remove Gazans

March 26, 2025 by WDNY Radio

(GAZA CITY) — The Israeli government approved the establishment of an agency to facilitate the “voluntary” removal of residents from Gaza, drawing condemnation from across the region.

The agency, proposed by the Israeli Defense Ministry, was approved last weekend, but has not been formally established.

“We are working by all means to implement the vision of the U.S. president, and we will allow any Gaza resident who wishes to voluntarily move to a third country to do so,” Israel Defense Minister Israel Katz said in a statement.

President Donald Trump began to publicly push in February for the forced displacement of Palestinians from Gaza — a move that some, including the United Nations and U.S. allies like France and Germany, have said would be a violation of international law.

Despite Trump threatening to pull aid from Egypt and Jordan if they do not agree to take in the Palestinians living in Gaza, both countries remained steadfast in their opposition of the proposal.

The Arab Summit approved a draft proposal for a Gaza reconstruction plan that would not displace the Palestinians living in Gaza earlier this month. Under the proposal, Gaza would be governed by a committee of independent professionals and technocrats for six months until the Palestinian Authority resumes control over the enclave.

Egypt “strongly condemned” the establishment of an agency “tasked with the displacement of Palestinians from the Gaza Strip” and the “recognition of 13 new settlements in West Bank,” in a statement Monday.

“Egypt affirms the denial the bases of the so-called ‘voluntary displacement’ that Israel claims it is targeting through this agency, stressing that leaving while under fire from strikes and war and the blockade preventing humanitarian aid and usage of starvation as a weapon is considered forced displacement, a crime and violation of international law and international humanitarian law,” the Egyptian Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement in Arabic.

Saudi Arabia also condemned the move. The country’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a post on X Monday: “The Kingdom reiterates its firm rejection of Israel’s continuous violations of international law and international humanitarian law.”

“The Foreign Ministry expresses Saudi Arabia’s condemnation of the Israeli occupation authorities’ announcement on the establishment of an agency that aims to displace Palestinians from the Gaza Strip, as well as the approval of the separation of 13 illegal settlement neighborhoods in the West Bank in preparation for legitimizing them as colonial settlements,” the Saudi Arabian ministry added.

The proposal for the new Israeli agency comes days after the number of Palestinians killed in Gaza surpassed 50,000, according to the Hamas-run Gaza Ministry of Health. At least 792 people were killed and 1,663 others were injured in Israeli strikes last week alone, after the ceasefire ended between Israel and Hamas, the ministry said.

DHS secretary set to visit infamous migrant prison on trip that includes stops in El Salvador

March 26, 2025 by WDNY Radio

(WASHINGTON) — Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem on Wednesday is set to visit the prison in El Salvador that took in migrants at the center of the deportation battle playing out in U.S. courts.

On Wednesday, Noem will visit the Terrorist Confinement Center with the Salvadorian minister of justice, according to a U.S. Department of Homeland Security official, and will later meet with President Nayib Bukele of El Salvador.

“This week, I’m headed down to El Salvador,” Noem said during a Cabinet meeting at the White House on Monday. “I’ll be in the prison where we sent [Tren De Aragua] gang members. I’ll be meeting with the president and also Colombia and Mexico and talking about building these relationships so we can continue to get people out of this country that don’t belong here and take them home.”

She said the president talked to her about “sending the message worldwide” that people shouldn’t illegally be entering the United States.

The DHS has rolled out a $200 million advertising campaign to tell people who are thinking about coming to the U.S. illegally not to come and to urge those who are in the U.S. without legal status to leave.

“They shouldn’t be coming here illegally,” Noem said. “So we are in several other countries around the world with a message right now that’s saying if you are thinking about coming to America illegally, don’t do it — you are not welcome. We have a legal process to become a United States citizen, and there are consequences if you come here illegally.”

The administration allegedly sent members of the Venezuelan Tren De Aragua gang to the infamous prison — even though a federal judge ordered officials not to do so.

“America has changed because we are putting Americans first,” Noem concluded during the meeting on Monday.

Noem will also meet with leaders from Colombia and with Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum later in the week.

“President Trump and Secretary Noem have a clear message for criminal aliens considering entering America illegally: don’t even think about it. If you come to our country and break our laws, we will hunt you down, and lock you up,” Assistant Homeland Security Secretary of Public Affairs Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement. “This trip underscores the importance of our partner countries to help remove violent criminal illegal aliens from the United States.”

Ukraine’s ‘drone sanctions’ on Russia bring bite to peace talks strategy: Analysts

March 26, 2025 by WDNY Radio

(LONDON) — Increasingly squeezed by allies and enemies alike, Ukraine’s armed forces are still setting records in their stubborn defense against Russia’s 3-year-old invasion, which — if President Donald Trump’s peace talks bear fruit — may soon see a partial ceasefire.

Month after month, Ukraine has increased the size and scope of its drone assaults within Russia. The high watermark this month came on March 10 as Kyiv launched at least 343 drones into Russia — according to the Defense Ministry in Moscow — representing Kyiv’s largest ever such attack. More than 90 drones were shot down over Moscow, the capital’s mayor describing the assault as “massive.”

The timing was pointed, coming hours before American and Ukrainian officials gathered in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, for ceasefire talks.

While straining to prove to the White House they were ready to discuss peace with Moscow, the Ukrainians were also exhibiting their ever-evolving capability to wage war deep inside Russia.

“We keep developing a lot of different types of long-range deep strikes,” Yehor Cherniv — a member of the Ukrainian Parliament and the chairman of his country’s delegation to the NATO Parliamentary Assembly — told ABC News.

“Our capacity is growing to destroy the capacity of Russia to continue this war,” he added.

Ukraine’s strikes against Russian critical infrastructure, energy facilities, military-industrial targets and military bases have mirrored Moscow’s own long-range campaign against Ukraine. Cross-border barrages in both directions have grown in size and complexity throughout the full-scale war.

Ukrainian short-range drones are harrying Russian forces on the devastated battlefields while long-range strike craft hit targets closer to home. Kyiv this month even claimed the first successful use of its domestically produced Neptune cruise missile, with a range of 600 miles.

Since the opening of U.S.-Russian talks in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, on Feb. 18, Russia’s Defense Ministry claims to have shot down a total of 1,879 long-range Ukrainian drones — an average of more than 53 each day. On four occasions, the ministry reported intercepting more than 100 drones over a 24-hour period.

“Ukraine is pulling every single lever that it can, as hard as it can, to get it the kind of lethal strike capability that it needs for both of those campaigns,” Nick Reynolds, a research fellow at the Royal United Services Institute think tank in London, told ABC News.

Three years of Russia’s full-scale war have supercharged drone innovation in Ukraine. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, Ukraine’s armed forces and intelligence services have lauded what they call their “drone sanctions” — a tongue-in-cheek reference to drone attacks on Russian fossil fuel, military industrial and other infrastructure targets far beyond the front.

“Our Ukrainian production of drones and their continuous modernization are a key part of our system of deterrence against Russia, which is crucial for ensuring Ukraine’s security in the long term,” Zelenskyy said in a recent Telegram post.

Ukrainian drones have hit targets more than 700 miles inside Russia, have regularly forced the temporary closures of major Russian airports and have bombarded the power centers of Moscow and St. Petersburg. At sea, Ukraine’s naval drones have confined Russia’s fleet to the eastern portion of the Black Sea and made its bases in Crimea untenable.

It is no longer unusual for more than 100 attack drones to cross into Russian territory in the course of one night. Meanwhile, Kyiv is pushing to replace its relatively low-tech propeller-driven unmanned aerial vehicles, or UAVs, with more jet-powered craft — potentially extending range, payload and survivability. “The number of rocket drones production will grow just like our long-range strike drones production did,” Zelenskyy said last summer.

Kyiv’s strikes have particularly disrupted Russia’s lucrative oil refining and export industry, prompting concerns abroad — including in the U.S. — that the Ukrainian campaign is driving up oil prices globally.

Federico Borsari of the Center for European Policy Analysis think tank told ABC News that Ukraine’s evolving long-range strike industry represents a “strategic advantage,” especially if Kyiv is able to protect its industrial sites from Russian strikes and stockpile weapons for future use.

“Ukraine has damaged Russian oil refining facilities hard since 2024 and destroyed several key storage bases of the artillery shells,” Pavel Luzin, a Russian political analyst at The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts, told ABC News. “So, the Russians are highly concerned about this.”

“The amount of financial loss and material damage is huge,” Borsari added.

Drones of all ranges are expected to serve a key role in Ukraine’s future deterrence of repeat Russian aggression. Defense Minister Rustem Umerov, for example, said Kyiv is planning a 6- to 9-mile drone “kill zone” to buffer any future post-war frontier with Russia, “making enemy advances impossible.”

Ivan Stupak, a former officer in the Security Service of Ukraine, told ABC News that Ukraine’s drone threat could also prove an important lever in ongoing negotiations with both Moscow and Washington, neither of which want continued — or expanded — drone strikes on Russian oil infrastructure and other sensitive targets.

The weapons could also be vital to future deterrence of repeat Russian aggression, Stupak said, as Ukraine pursues a “hedgehog” strategy by which the country would make itself too “prickly” for Moscow to attempt to swallow again.

Ukraine’s success has not gone unnoticed by its foreign partners. Kyiv appears to be carving out a potentially lucrative niche in providing long-range, low-cost strike platforms.

“There is immense interest from our friends around the world in Ukraine’s developments, our capabilities and our technological production,” Zelenskyy said recently.

Last fall, reports emerged indicating that Ukraine was considering lifting a wartime ban on drone exports, seeking to take advantage of growing demand worth as much as $20 billion annually, per an estimate by Ukrainian lawmaker Oleksandr Marikovskyi.

Ukraine’s military and intelligence services collaborate with domestic and international private companies to expand their drone capabilities. Kyiv has estimated there are more than 200 domestic companies working in the sector. This year, Zelenskyy wants Ukraine to produce 30,000 long-range drones and 3,000 ballistic missiles.

This month’s brief U.S. aid and intelligence freeze has raised concerns within Ukraine’s domestic drone industry, arguably one of the most insulated and resilient areas of the country’s defense sector.

“The reality is that Western-provided intelligence — and the Americans are a big part of that — does feed into a better targeting picture,” Reynolds said. “The efficiency and effectiveness is, in part, tied to that.”

“Ukraine became partly blinded as to how and where Russian anti-aircraft and electronic warfare systems are being deployed,” Stupak said.

If such a freeze is repeated, “I suppose it will be more difficult for Ukraine to avoid anti-aircraft and electronic warfare systems and maybe we will see decreased levels of successful strikes,” he said.

Ukraine’s largest drone attack of the war thus far came days after the U.S. announced its intelligence sharing freeze. It is not clear whether Ukraine used previously shared intelligence to carry out the strike, in which scores of craft reached Moscow.

Some targets are easier to find than others. Airfields — like Engels strategic bomber air base — oil refineries, ports and the like are static and their locations known to Ukrainian military planners.

Still, a lack of intelligence would make it harder for Kyiv to locate and avoid Russian defensive systems. The pause in American intelligence sharing was brief, but for Ukrainians highlighted their level of reliance on U.S. assistance.

A long-lasting paucity of intelligence would represent “an important vulnerability,” Borsari said. “For very long-range targets, they require satellite information, satellite imagery — and most of the time this information comes from Western allies.”

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