News

(SPOKANE, Wash.) –A 40-year-old man attacked a priest during a church service in Spokane, Washington, on Tuesday night, according to officials.

Around 350 to 400 people had gathered at the Cathedral of Our Lady of Lourdes in downtown Spokane on Tuesday for the second night of novena, a tradition of gathering for prayer for nine days or nine weeks, when the man, identified as Joshua James Sommers, allegedly attacked the priest.

Security camera footage shows Sommers leaving his pew, rushing up to the altar near the end of the service and attempting to strike Rev. David Gaines in the face. Gaines was able to pin down Sommers, with other staff and churchgoers running up to help.

In the footage, Sommers lets out screams, and Gaines continues to say, “It’s OK, just calm down.”

Security guards quickly came to assist, and the Spokane Police Department was also notified immediately of the incident, according to the church. Gaines was not harmed in the attack.

Father Darrin Connall, who was kneeling at the altar when the attack occurred, told ABC News the church has not seen “anything quite this serious.”

“All of us were pretty shaken,” Connall said. “You don’t expect to see something like that when you’re gathering together to pray and worship.”

Once Sommers was escorted out by police, Connall said the entire group stopped the service and prayed for him.

“Whatever demons he was struggling with needed to be healed,” Connall said.

Sommers was arrested on misdemeanor assault charges, and also has a previous record of harming others. In 2023, Sommers was charged with third-degree assault after attacking an employee at a mental health facility. Sommers, who was a patient at this facility, allegedly punched the employee multiple times and stole their keys to try and escape, according to the affidavit on those charges.

Sommers appeared in court Wednesday on assault charges, along with the outstanding warrant from his previous assault. He will return to court later this month and remains behind bars.

ABC News’ Irving Last and Jennifer Watts contributed to this report.

Copyright © 2025, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(WASHINGTON) — At the U.S. Agency for International Development this week, as a team from the Department of Government Efficiency quietly worked to dismantle the aid agency, those who hadn’t already been locked out of its Washington headquarters busied themselves with work they never imagined doing — shutting it down.

“We feel like it’s closing time at the store and we’re the ones left to turn off the lights,” one career official told ABC News. “There’s lots of tears, lots of heartbreak.”

Normal day-to-day work ceased earlier in the week, when the Trump administration announced plans to place all direct-hire employees on leave starting Friday, leaving career officials to focus on the logistical hurdles of recalling thousands of overseas employees back to the U.S., including reserving flights for those officials and their families.

“We could be doing the lifesaving work we’ve been doing,” the official said, “but instead we’re stuck here like travel agents.”

As congressional Democrats scramble to rescue USAID, its thousands of employees in the U.S. and around the globe are grappling with how to “leave with dignity,” another career agency official said.

But doing so has proven to be a challenge. A message posted on USAID.gov signaled that some “designated personnel” would remain on the job, prompting a frantic race among staff to secure their livelihoods.

“It’s the Hunger Games,” another career USAID official based in Washington said. “They’re narrowing down lists to the smallest number of staff. People fighting to be on those lists.”

USAID staff on Thursday were digesting news that all but roughly 600 employees would be placed on leave by the end of the week. President Trump has accused the agency of perpetrating “tremendous fraud” and promoting left-wing ideologies.

Meanwhile, officials deployed overseas face hurdles of their own. The abrupt stop-work orders and funding freezes imposed by the Trump administration have placed frontline USAID employees in the uncomfortable position of explaining to regional partners what is happening.

“Many of [the foreign service nationals] have worked for USAID for 20-30 years,” said one USAID official stationed in the Democratic Republic of Congo. “It’s impossible to explain to them what is going on. It breaks their faith in America. We are going to lose thousands of our best friends and allies.”

 

In a different African country, staff met earlier in the week to begin choreographing their departure, a local USAID official recalled.

“The meeting today with local staff was rough,” the official said. “The ambassador was there, and folks were crying. It was extremely sad. Both the mission director and the deputy mission director were also in tears.”

One official with 20 years at USAID under their belt said the ambassador in their country encouraged staff to “start preparing your CVs and start looking for jobs, because inevitably, you’re all going to be terminated.”

“[The administration is] just terrorizing everyone in USAID who has served their country, making huge sacrifices, moving around the world every four years, pulling kids out of school and away from friends and like spouses giving up their own careers so that we can serve our country and do this important work around the world,” the official said. “And I feel like It’s being erased.”

At the agency’s Bureau for Humanitarian Assistance, which has been the U.S. government’s lead response coordinator for international disasters, several employees said their email access was revoked, rendering them unable to communicate with senior officials.

One USAID contractor overseas said they were “stuck abroad on official travel with no guidance on how to proceed, where they are able to work, how to get home, or whether they are able to work.”

On Thursday, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who is overseeing USAID as its acting administrator, insisted during a press conference in the Dominican Republic that the administration would accommodate “exceptional circumstances regarding families or displacement.”

“We’re not trying to be disruptive to peoples’ personal lives,” Rubio insisted. “We’re not being punitive,” he said.

Back in Washington, Peter Marocco, a Trump loyalist and the architect of plans to drastically diminish the agency’s footprint, has been “in and out” of the building, but has not engaged with career officials or addressed any large numbers of staff. Marocco did not reply to ABC News’ request for comment.

Rubio has said rank-and-file USAID officials had demonstrated “rank insubordination” during attempts to overhaul the agency, claiming that the administration was left with “no choice but to take dramatic steps to bring this thing under control.”

Late Thursday, as working hours on the East Coast wound down, a senior career official at USAID shared this somber text message with ABC News: “I just lost my job.”

The official, who spent nearly a decade at the agency, was not told she was dismissed. Instead, she said agency leaders alerted those who will remain in their roles on Thursday afternoon, leaving the remaining employees to assume they would be placed on administrative leave.

Copyright © 2025, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(WASHINGTON) — A federal judge on Friday will consider issuing a temporary restraining order to block the dismantling of the United States Agency for International Development, the embattled agency that handles foreign aid, disaster relief and international development programs.

Two foreign service unions are suing the federal government as the Trump administration attempts to reduce USAID’s workforce from 14,000 to only 300 employees.

The American Foreign Service Organization and the American Federation of Government Employees filed the lawsuit in D.C. federal court Thursday, alleging that President Donald Trump engaged in a series of “unconstitutional and illegal actions” to systematically destroy USAID.

“These actions have generated a global humanitarian crisis by abruptly halting the crucial work of USAID employees, grantees, and contractors. They have cost thousands of American jobs. And they have imperiled U.S. national security interests,” the lawsuit said.

The plaintiffs said Trump has unilaterally attempted to reduce the agency without congressional authorization, arguing that Congress is the only entity with the authority to dismantle USAID.

The lawsuit reads like a timeline of the last two weeks, laying out each step that formed the groundwork to break USAID, beginning with Trump’s first day in office. Shortly after Trump froze foreign aid via an executive order on his first day, he began to target USAID by ordering his State Department to begin issuing stop work orders, the lawsuit said.

“USAID grantees and contractors reeled as they were — without any notice or process — constrained from carrying out their work alleviating poverty, disease, and humanitarian crises,” the lawsuit said.

Next came the layoffs, the lawsuit alleges, with thousands of contractors and employees of USAID losing their jobs, leading medical clinics, soup kitchens, and refugee assistance programs across the world to be brought “to an immediate halt.”

“The humanitarian consequences of defendants’ actions have already been catastrophic,” the lawsuit said.

The lawsuit alleges the Department of Government Efficiency and Elon Musk — who boasted about “feeding USAID into the woodchipper” — made the final move to gut the agency, locking thousands of employees out of their computers and accessing classified material improperly.

While each step to dismantle the organization differed, the lawsuit alleged that they were unified by one thing: “Not a single one of defendants’ actions to dismantle USAID were taken pursuant to congressional authorization.”

The plaintiffs have asked the court to declare Trump’s actions unlawful and issue an order requiring the Trump administration to “cease actions to shut down USAID’s operations in a manner not authorized by Congress.”

Copyright © 2025, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(WASHINGTON) — A federal judge on Friday will consider blocking the Department of Government Efficiency from accessing records from the Department of Labor after a lawsuit alleged that Elon Musk’s cost-cutting team sought to illegally access highly sensitive data, including medical information, from the federal government.

Five federal unions alleged that DOGE employees are breaking the law by seeking to access sensitive records from the Department of Labor, including the “most private, sensitive employee and medical information on virtually every worker in America,” according to the suit

“Department of Labor employees have been told to unquestionably give DOGE operatives access to any system or information they request, or else face termination,” the lawsuit said, alleging that DOGE’s pattern of conduct has been “replete with violations of law.”

Musk’s private companies, including SpaceX and Tesla, have been investigated and fined by parts of the Department of Labor, and at least one of his companies is being actively investigated. Musk has denied all wrongdoing.

On Wednesday, in response to a lawsuit by several federal employee unions, lawyers with the Justice Department agreed to a temporary restraining order that would largely prohibit DOGE from accessing Treasury Department data.

As DOGE has, according to the suit, “zeroed in on and sought unprecedented access to sensitive information” from other federal agencies, including the Treasury Department and Department of Education, the lawsuit raised red flags about Musk’s intrusion into the Department of Labor because of the sensitivity of their records related to the administration of the Federal Employees’ Compensation Act.

According to the lawsuit, Labor Department records include injury reports for thousands of employees, medical records, claim forms, and personal information gathered during the administration of FECA claims.

The department also has records of at least 86,000 workers compensation claims from 2024 alone that could be breached by DOGE, the suit said.

“The threats to the Department of Labor that give rise to this action and application for emergency relief represent yet another iteration of what is fast becoming a pattern for DOGE: exceeding its narrow mission and exercising authority it does not (and cannot) possess by exerting control over agencies through personal attacks and threats of unlawful reprisals, and harming people and the stability of our nation in the process,” the lawsuit said.

In a court filing Thursday, Justice Department attorneys representing DOGE argued that the federal unions who brought the case failed to show how they would be harmed by the sharing of data between DOGE and the Labor Department, acknowledging that multiple DOGE representatives have already been sent to work for the department.

“Plaintiffs cannot establish standing, much less irreparable harm, to challenge the sharing of unstated categories of information from unidentified records systems to unknown individuals working in the Executive Branch,” their filing said.

The lawsuit further alleged that Musk — described as an “an unappointed, unelected, and temporarily serving official” — has sought to “run roughshod” over the Labor Department at the same time it has active investigations pending into his private companies.

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration — which falls under the Labor Department — previously investigated and fined Musk’s SpaceX and Tesla for multiple safety incidents, including one in connection with a SpaceX employee’s death. OSHA also has multiple open investigations into Musk’s Boring Company.

“Mr. Musk would ordinarily be unable to access nonpublic information regarding those investigations,” the lawsuit said. “In light of the blanket instruction to provide DOGE employees with ‘anything they want,’ Mr. Musk or his associates will be able to access that information simply by asking DOL employees for it.”

The plaintiffs are asking a federal judge to issue a temporary restraining order that would prohibit the Department of Labor from sharing any records with DOGE.

Copyright © 2025, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(DENVER) — Two federal law enforcement sources briefed on Wednesday morning’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)-led raids in seven locations across Denver tell ABC News that the operation yielded the arrest of just one alleged gang member. Twenty-nine people were also detained, sources told ABC News.

ICE previously said on Wednesday that “100+ members of the violent Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua were targeted for arrest and detention” in raids that day. However, the operation ultimately produced far fewer than that number.

The arrest and detentions are separate from a DEA operation ABC News also observed in Denver that day while accompanying ICE and Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) agents. The DEA operation resulted in at least two-drug related arrests that were not related to immigration status, sources told ABC News.

ABC News interviewed and obtained Ring doorbell footage from one person that revealed agents on Wednesday going door-to-door asking residents at one apartment complex for identification, travel documents, and permission to enter the units to look around. In many cases, agents did not present a warrant or explain why they were there, according to ABC News interviews with residents and examination of obtained footage.

A DEA official on scene told ABC News that they executed two targeted drug trafficking warrants at the apartment complex at the same time as the ICE raid.

After the operation, Tim Lenzen, the acting special agent in charge of HSI’s Denver office, told reporters that they did not have the total numbers of detainments or how many of those were for alleged immigration-related offenses, though he did say that one arrest was a fugitive from Chile and “a known [Tren de Aragua] member.” Lenzen said that member was wanted for kidnapping and extortion in another country.

President Trump’s border czar, Tom Homan, said Wednesday on Fox News that the ICE “operation was leaked,” which compromised its effectiveness.

“This is not a game,” Homan said, adding that “people who want to game this … need to stop or we’ll prosecute them through the Department of Justice.”

Copyright © 2025, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(NEW YORK) — The Justice Department and attorneys representing a group of FBI employees who sued over a list compiled of personnel who worked on cases stemming from the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol reached a temporary deal Friday to ensure the list won’t be released publicly pending further legal proceedings.

The agreement by the Justice Department states “the government will not disseminate the list … to the public, directly or indirectly, before the Court rules on Plaintiff’s anticipated motions for a preliminary injunction.”

If DOJ leadership were to change their minds and release the list, they would need to provide two business days’ notice to attorneys and the court, per the agreement.

The anonymous group of FBI agents had sought a temporary restraining order to keep the FBI from releasing the names on a list the bureau collected as part of what the plaintiffs’ lawsuit says is the agency’s plan to engage in “potential vigilante action” to retaliate against government employees who worked on Jan. 6 cases or Donald Trump’s classified documents case.

After several hours of grueling back and forth during a hearing Thursday, the Justice Department’s attorney, Jeremy Simon, was able to commit that the DOJ itself would not further disseminate the list pending further proceedings in the case — but that answer did not satisfy either the judge or plaintiffs’ attorneys because Simon said he could not ensure that other parties in the government would not be able to release the list in some form.

Simon noted he had no reason to believe the list has been shared beyond DOJ leadership, and ultimately was able to relay from a superior that there’s been no “official” dissemination of the list after it was handed over by the FBI.

“What does that mean?” pressed U.S. District Judge Jia Cobb, questioning whether the list could have been unofficially leaked outside of the department.

Simon said he had no reason to believe it had been leaked but couldn’t commit under oath that the list wouldn’t be shared or released by a separate government entity outside of DOJ.

“You represent the government,” Judge Cobb said. “The White House wants this information. Does the government have present intent to publicly release names of FBI agents that worked on Jan. 6 cases?”

“People who have the list don’t have present intent,” Simon replied.

Simon further said he had difficulty getting approval from superiors about language they could agree upon to further bind the government from releasing the list, citing other major civil rulings that the department has faced in just the past several hours.

The parties reached an out-of-court agreement on Friday that restricts the government from releasing the list pending further proceedings. The court set a preliminary injunction hearing over the list for March 27.

Earlier Thursday, attorneys for the agents argued that the release of the list would have serious consequences.

“Our argument is that the threat to national security is so extreme that we cannot risk letting it happen first, and then trying to put it back together,” said attorney for the agents Margaret Donovan in arguing for the temporary restraining order.

“I appreciate that, and I’m sympathetic to that argument,” Judge Cobb said. “A fear of something happening is not sufficient, even if — you know — the fear is a serious one.”

Lawyers representing the plaintiffs warned that the Trump Administration and DOGE head Elon Musk have demonstrated a willingness to publicly name officials they’ve accused of wrongdoing, such as the 51 former intelligence officials who wrote a letter about the Hunter Biden laptop and were later stripped of their security clearances in a Day-1 executive order by President Donald Trump.

“We have seen Elon Musk, working for the so-called DOGE agency, release names of individuals in public service. We have seen Jan. 6 pardonees very active on social media around the time of the survey, anticipating that the names would be released,” Donovan said. “We have a good faith reason to believe that those names may get out.”

In a court filing submitted Thursday morning, the Justice Department urged the judge hearing the case to reject the plaintiffs’ request to impose a restraining order blocking any public release of the list.

DOJ attorneys argued in the filing that the motion for the restraining order is based largely on speculation and that the FBI agents have failed to show they face any imminent threats in connection with the list.

Trump pleaded not guilty in 2023 to 40 criminal counts related to his handling of classified materials after leaving the White House, and, separately, to charges of undertaking a “criminal scheme” to overturn the results of the 2020 election. The classified documents case was dismissed last year by a federal judge, and both cases were subsequently dropped following Trump’s reelection in November due to a longstanding DOJ policy prohibiting the prosecution of a sitting president.

Copyright © 2025, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.