The Education Department will begin collection next month on student loans that are in default, including the garnishing of wages for potentially millions of borrowers, officials said Monday.

Currently, roughly 5.3 million borrowers are in default on their federal student loans.

The Trump administration ’s announcement marks an end to a period of leniency that began during the COVID-19 pandemic. No federal student loans have been referred for collection since March 2020, including those in default. Under President Joe Biden, the Education Department tried multiple times to forgive millions of people’s student loans, only to be stopped by courts.

“American taxpayers will no longer be forced to serve as collateral for irresponsible student loan policies,” Education Secretary Linda McMahon said.

Beginning May 5, the department will begin involuntary collection through the Treasury Department’s offset program, which withholds payments from the government — including tax refunds, federal salaries and other benefits — from people with past-due debts to the government. After a 30-day notice, the department will also begin garnishing wages for borrowers in default.

ACA provision likely to survive high court

The Supreme Court seemed likely to uphold a key preventive-care provision of the Affordable Care Act in a case heard Monday.

Conservative justices Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett, along with the court’s three liberals, appeared skeptical of arguments that Obamacare’s process for deciding which services must be fully covered by private insurance is unconstitutional.

The case could have big ramifications for the law’s preventive care coverage requirements for an estimated 150 million Americans. Medications and services that could be affected include statins to prevent heart disease, lung cancer screenings, HIV-prevention drugs and medication to lower the chance of breast cancer for high-risk women.

The plaintiffs argued that requirements to cover those medications and services are unconstitutional because a volunteer board of medical experts that recommended them should have been Senate- approved. The challengers have also raised religious and procedural objections to some requirements.

The Trump administration defended the mandate before the court, though President Donald Trump has been a critic of the law.

Texas Walmart killer gets life in state case

A state judge sentenced Patrick Crusius, a self-described white nationalist with a history of mental illness, to life in prison on Monday for killing 23 people and injuring 22 others in 2019 at a Walmart store in El Paso, Texas, one of the deadliest attacks on Hispanic civilians in American history.

Judge Sam Medrano Jr. handed down the sentence before hearing impact statements from family members and survivors.

“You traveled nine hours to a city that would have welcomed you with open arms,” Medrano told Crusius. “You brought not peace but hate. You came to inflict terror, to take innocent lives.”

“Your mission failed,” the judge continued. “You did not divide this city. You strengthened it.”

Crusius, looking disheveled in a white and orange prison jumpsuit, did not betray any emotions as the judge read his sentence, other than to say that he pleaded guilty to capital murder, with its automatic life sentence, and to 22 counts of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon. He has no chance of parole.

Crusius had already been sentenced by a federal judge last year to 90 consecutive life terms after he pleaded guilty to federal hate crimes charges. Then in late March, a newly elected district attorney in El Paso announced, after consulting with families of the victims, that he would not seek the death penalty for the state charges that were still pending. That answered the last remaining question about Crusius’ fate.

Menendez’s wife convicted of bribery

Nadine Menendez, the wife of former U.S. Sen. Bob Menendez, was convicted Monday of teaming up with her husband to accept bribes of cash, gold bars and a luxury car from three New Jersey men looking for help with their business dealings or legal troubles.

The jury returned a verdict of guilty on all counts in the same federal courthouse in Manhattan where a different jury convicted Bob Menendez of many of the same charges last year. The Democrat is supposed to begin serving an 11-year prison term in June.

Nadine Menendez, who stood but did not appear to react as the verdict was delivered by the jury foreperson, was scheduled to be sentenced on June 12, six days after her husband is expected to report to prison.

Judge blocks ICE from New York jail

A New York judge has ordered city officials to temporarily halt a plan allowing federal immigration agents to operate within the Rikers Island jail complex ahead of a hearing later this week.

In a written order Monday, Judge Mary Rosado barred the city from “taking any steps toward negotiating, signing, or implementing any Memorandum of Understanding with the federal government” before an April 25 hearing in a suit challenging the plan.

That hearing will focus on a lawsuit brought last week by the New York City Council against Mayor Eric Adams that seeks to block his recent executive order permitting U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and other federal agencies to maintain office space at the jail complex. The suit accuses Adams, a Democrat, of entering into a “corrupt quid pro quo bargain” with the Trump administration in exchange for the Justice Department dropping criminal charges against him.

RFK Jr. will move to ban 8 food dyes

In his first attempt to significantly change the nation’s food supply, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the health secretary, will direct food manufacturers to phase out eight petroleum-based food dyes that are found in hundreds of thousands of grocery-store staples, the department said Monday.

The plan, expected to be described in detail at an event in Washington on Tuesday, targets dyes used in cereals, sports drinks and a host of other foods. The Department of Health and Human Services has not outlined a regulatory path to enforce the changes, but wants them to be made by the end of 2026.

Health advocates have long criticized food dyes, citing a limited body of research connecting them to hyperactivity and other neurobehavioral problems in children. The Food and Drug Administration, which regulates 80% of the food supply, banned Red Dye No. 3 shortly before President Donald Trump took office, after studies connected it to cancer in laboratory animals. That followed a 2023 California ban.

China warns others not to curb their trade

The Chinese government Monday warned other countries against curbing trade with China in order to win a reprieve from U.S. tariffs, promising to retaliate against countries that do so.

The Chinese Ministry of Commerce said it was responding to foreign media reports that President Donald Trump’s administration was trying to pressure other countries on their trade with China as a negotiating tactic.

China “firmly opposes any party reaching a deal at the expense of China’s interests,” the ministry said in a statement, adding that China would “resolutely take countermeasures.”

Far-right Israeli official brushes off hostages

A far-right Israeli politician said Monday that saving the hostages in the Gaza Strip was not Israel’s “most important goal” in its war with Hamas, further stoking the debate in Israel over its objectives for the war.

Bezalel Smotrich, the country’s powerful finance minister, suggested in a radio interview that ensuring that Hamas no longer ruled Gaza after its deadly 2023 attack in southern Israel was a higher priority.

“We have promised the Israeli people that at the end of the war, Gaza will no longer be a threat to Israel,” said Smotrich, who has called for building Jewish settlements in the Palestinian enclave. “We need to eliminate the problem of Gaza.”

Shin Bet chief alleges Netanyahu wrongdoing

The head of Israel’s internal security service on Monday accused Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of trying to exploit the power of the agency for political and personal gain through a litany of improper demands. His comments deepened a showdown between the two men that has divided the nation.

In a submission to the Supreme Court, Shin Bet chief Ronen Bar wrote that he refused a request from Netanyahu to identify Israeli anti-government protesters and surveil their financial backers.

Bar said he also was told to obey Netanyahu and not the courts in the event of a constitutional crisis. And he said there were attempts to force him to sign a document that would make it nearly impossible for Netanyahu to testify in his corruption trial because of security concerns, something he said he rejected doing.

Noem’s handbag with credentials, $3K stolen

A handbag belonging to Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem containing her passport, department security badge and $3,000 in cash was stolen Sunday night at a restaurant in Washington, the department confirmed.

Noem also confirmed the theft at the White House on Monday morning.

The department did not give specifics, but said it could confirm the details of a CNN article, which said that Noem’s bag also contained her driver’s license, medication, apartment keys and blank checks.

“Her entire family was in town including her children and grandchildren,” the department said via email. “She was using the cash withdrawal to treat her family to dinner, activities and Easter gifts.”

U.N. official warns of deepening Haiti crisis

The top U.N. official in Haiti sounded an alarm to the U.N. Security Council on Monday that escalating gang violence is liable to lead the Caribbean nation to “a point of no return.”

María Isabel Salvador warned that “Haiti could face total chaos” without increased funding and support for the operation of the Kenya-led multinational force helping Haiti’s police to tackle the gangs’ expanding violence into areas beyond the capital, Port-Au-Prince.

Most recently, she said, gangs seized the city of Mirebalais in central Haiti and during the attack over 500 prisoners were freed. It was the fifth prison break in under a year, “part of a deliberate effort to entrench dominance, dismantle institutions and instill fear.”

Sole Wyoming abortion clinic resumes services

Wyoming’s only abortion clinic is resuming abortions after a judge on Monday suspended two state laws.

One suspended law would require clinics providing surgical abortions to be licensed as outpatient surgical centers. The other would require women to get an ultrasound before a medication abortion.

Wyoming Health Access in Casper had stopped providing abortions Feb. 28, the day after Republican Gov. Mark Gordon signed the licensing requirement into effect.

The result: At least some women seeking abortions had to travel out of state. Now, women will once again be able to get abortions in central Wyoming while the two laws continue to be contested in court.

Russian attacks during ‘ceasefire’ killed 3

Russian attacks during the 30-hour Easter ceasefire unilaterally declared by President Vladimir Putin over the weekend killed three people in Ukraine’s southern Kherson region, a regional official said Monday.

Oleksandr Prokudin, the head of Kherson’s administration, wrote on Telegram that the casualties occurred over the last 24 hours, adding that three others were wounded in the region, parts of which are occupied by Russia.

After Putin declared the move on Saturday, Ukraine responded by voicing readiness to reciprocate any genuine ceasefire but said the Russian attacks continued. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that Russia violated the ceasefire more than 2,900 times.

— News service reports