A federal judge in Boston granted class-action status to transgender and nonbinary Americans on Tuesday in a lawsuit challenging a U.S. State Department policy that requires passports to reflect only the holder’s sex recorded on their original birth certificate.

The order extends a preliminary injunction blocking the State Department from enforcing the policy against six plaintiffs to apply to all class members who apply for or update passports while the case proceeds. In the earlier order from April, U.S. District Judge Julia E. Kobick concluded that the passport policy likely violates the Fifth Amendment’s equal protection guarantee because it discriminates based on sex and is “rooted in irrational prejudice toward transgender Americans.”

The State Department filed an appeal of the preliminary injunction last week.

The government maintains that it has a strong interest in passports that accurately reflect the holder’s sex. The State Department adopted the new policy this year to comply with an executive order from President Donald Trump directing all government agencies to limit official recognition of transgender identity and mandating that federal documents reflect what it termed the “immutable biological classification as either male or female.”

In court documents, plaintiffs argued that a mismatch between the sex listed on their passport and their gender identity puts them at risk of suspicion and hostility that other Americans do not face.

Brain-dead woman delivers baby in Ga.

The baby of a woman in Georgia who was declared brain dead and has been on life support since February was delivered early Friday morning, her mother said.

April Newkirk told WXIA-TV that 31-year-old Adriana Smith’s baby was born prematurely by an emergency cesarean section early Friday, the Atlanta station reported Monday night. She was about six months into her pregnancy. The baby, named Chance, weighs about 1 pound and 13 ounces and is in the neonatal intensive care unit.

“He’s expected to be okay,” Newkirk told the TV station. “He’s just fighting. We just want prayers for him.”

Newkirk said her daughter had intense headaches more than four months ago and went to Atlanta’s Northside Hospital, where she received medication and was released. The next morning, her boyfriend woke to her gasping for air and called 911. Emory University Hospital determined she had blood clots in her brain and she was declared brain-dead. She was eight weeks pregnant, according to WXIA.

Newkirk said Smith would be taken off of life support Tuesday.

7 charged in massive Calif. jewelry heist

Seven people have been identified and charged with stalking an armored truck to a rural highway rest stop north of Los Angeles and stealing $100 million worth of diamonds, emeralds and more in what is believed to be the largest jewelry heist in U.S. history, federal authorities announced Tuesday.

Two of the seven suspects have been arrested and were due in federal court in Los Angeles on Tuesday, court records showed. Four of them remained at-large Tuesday, while one of the suspects is serving prison time in Arizona for an unrelated burglary and was expected to appear in court in Los Angeles in the coming weeks.

Pablo Raul Lugo Larroig and Jeson Nelon Presilla Flores were arrested Monday, and both have been indicted on federal theft and conspiracy charges, authorities said. The Associated Press sent emailed requests Tuesday seeking comment from their lawyers.

The heist unfolded in July 2022 after the suspects scouted the armored truck leaving an international jewelry show near San Francisco with 73 bags of jewelry, according to the indictment.

The suspects followed the truck for roughly 300 miles, making off with 24 of the bags that authorities said also contained gold, rubies and luxury watches.

Some of the jewelry has since been recovered, the U.S. Attorney’s Office in California said Tuesday in a news release.

Mexico braces for Tropical Storm Erick

A hurricane warning was issued Tuesday for a portion of southern Mexico as Tropical Storm Erick gained strength in the Pacific Ocean, forecasters said.

The National Hurricane Center said Erick was expected to rapidly intensify and become a hurricane by late Tuesday or early Wednesday. The cyclone was centered about 240 miles southeast of Puerto Ángel, Mexico, on Tuesday afternoon.

The tropical storm had maximum sustained winds of 50 mph, the Miami-based center said. It was moving west-northwest at 7 mph and forecast to approach the coast by late Wednesday.

The storm’s projected path would take its center near the resort of Acapulco, which was devastated in October 2023 by Hurricane Otis, a Category 5 hurricane that rapidly intensified and caught many unprepared.

NY mayoral candidate arrested at court

New York City Comptroller and Democratic mayoral candidate Brad Lander was arrested by federal agents at an immigration court Tuesday after he linked arms with a person authorities were attempting to detain.

A reporter with The Associated Press and other journalists witnessed Lander’s arrest at a federal building in Manhattan. The immigrant Lander escorted out of the courtroom was also arrested.

Lander was released from custody after a few hours. The U.S. attorney’s office said it was investigating his actions and would decide later whether to charge him with a crime.

Lander had spent the morning observing immigration court hearings and told an AP reporter that he was there to “accompany” some immigrants out of the building.

TV chef Anne Burrell dies at 55

TV chef Anne Burrell, who coached culinary fumblers through hundreds of episodes of “Worst Cooks in America,” died Tuesday at her New York home. She was 55.

The Food Network, where Burrell began her two-decade television career on “Iron Chef America” and went on to other shows, confirmed her death. The cause was not clear, and medical examiners were set to conduct an autopsy.

Police were called to her address before 8 a.m. Tuesday and found an unresponsive woman who was soon pronounced dead. The police department did not release the woman’s name, but records show it was Burell’s address.

Burrell was on TV screens as recently as April, making chicken Milanese cutlets topped with escarole salad in one of her many appearances on NBC’s “Today” show. She faced off against other top chefs on the Food Network’s “House of Knives” earlier in the spring.

“Anne was a remarkable person and culinary talent — teaching, competing and always sharing the importance of food in her life and the joy that a delicious meal can bring,” the network said in a statement

— From news services