State Dept. can’t fire workers while injunction is in effect

A federal judge in San Francisco on Friday stopped Secretary of State Marco Rubio from proceeding with plans to downsize the State Department, saying that it was prohibited behavior under an injunction she issued last month.

U.S. District Judge Susan Illston barred the Republican administration from carrying out much of its plans to reorganize and slash departments while she hears a legal challenge brought by labor unions and others. She said that President Donald Trump had failed to seek Congressional cooperation to do so when he ordered government-wide cuts.

But, in late May, the State Department notified Congress of an updated reorganization of the agency that would cut programs and personnel even more deeply than previously revealed.

Rubio this week also ordered U.S. embassies to fire all remaining staffers with the U.S. Agency for International Development. He said the State Department will take over USAID’s foreign assistance programs by Monday.

4 detainees escaped from an immigration detention center

Four detainees broke through a wall and escaped from a federal immigration detention center in Newark, N.J., amid reports of disorder breaking out there, according to a U.S. senator and the Department of Homeland Security.

Sen. Andy Kim, a Democrat from New Jersey, spoke Friday outside the Delaney Hall detention center. He said he was told detainees managed to break through an interior wall that led to an exterior one and from there were able to escape to a parking lot.

More “law enforcement partners” have been brought in to find the missing detainees, according to an emailed statement attributed to a senior DHS official whom the department did not identify. The statement also didn’t specify which law enforcement agencies are involved.

The development comes amid Trump’s crackdown on illegal immigration and a day ahead of major protests against his policies planned across the country.

U.S. can’t fire members of product safety commission

A federal judge has blocked the terminations of three Democratic members of the Consumer Product Safety Commission after they were fired by President Donald Trump in his effort to assert more power over independent federal agencies.

The commission helps protect consumers from dangerous products by issuing recalls, suing errant companies and more. Trump announced last month his decision to fire the three Democrats on the five-member commission. They were serving seven-year terms after being nominated by President Joe Biden.

After suing the Trump administration last month, the fired commissioners received a ruling in their favor Friday; it will likely be appealed.

Ukraine repatriates more bodies of fallen soldiers

Ukraine has repatriated more bodies of fallen soldiers in line with an agreement reached during peace talks in Istanbul between Russian and Ukrainian delegations, Ukrainian officials said Friday.

Ukraine’s Coordination Headquarters for the Treatment of Prisoners of War said in a statement that Russia returned 1,200 bodies, and “according to the Russian side, the bodies belong to Ukrainian citizens, in particular military personnel.”

The repatriation of the bodies was carried out with the help of Ukraine’s Armed Forces, the country’s Security Service, the Interior Ministry and other government agencies. Forensic experts will now work to identify the remains, the statement said.

The repatriation of the bodies marks one of the largest returns of remains since Russia launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine more than three years ago. Earlier this week, Russia returned 1,212 bodies of Ukrainian soldiers and received 27 bodies of its own killed troops.

Appeals court refuses to vacate Biden approval of oil project

A federal appeals court panel on Friday refused to vacate the approval of the massive Willow oil project on Alaska’s petroleum-rich North Slope though it found flaws in how the approval was reached.

The decision from a panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals comes in a long-running dispute over the project, most recently greenlit in March 2023 by then-President Joe Biden’s administration and under development in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska by ConocoPhillips Alaska.

The court’s majority opinion found what it called a procedural error — but not a serious or substantive one — by the U.S. Bureau of Land Management as part of the analysis in approving Willow. The court sent the matter back to the agency for additional work.

Judge rules activist Mahmoud Khalil can remain jailed

A federal judge who barred the Trump administration from deporting Palestinian activist Mahmoud Khalil declined Friday to order his release from an immigration detention center, saying the former Columbia University student hadn’t yet proven he was being held illegally.

The ruling is a setback for Khalil, who was detained in March. He had appeared to be close to winning his freedom after U.S. District Judge Michael Farbiarz held that the government’s initial effort to deport him on foreign policy grounds was likely unconstitutional.

The judge had given the Trump administration until Friday morning to appeal an order that could have led to Khalil’s release.

But the government filed court papers saying it believed it could continue detaining Khalil based on its secondary rationale for expelling him from the U.S. — an allegation that he lied on his green card application.

Deaths in San Antonio rise to 11 and some are still missing

The number of deaths from drenching rains in San Antonio rose to 11 people on Friday and crews searched for others still missing a day after fast-rising floodwaters tossed and swept away more than a dozen cars into a creek.

Search teams combed low-water crossings a day after Thursday’s downpour that dumped more than 7 inches of rain in a span of hours in parts of the nation’s seventh-largest city. Authorities said firefighters made more than 70 rescues across San Antonio.

— Denver Post wire services