
Dean Cain signs up to work for US Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Entertainment News
The actor will be signed up as an agent "ASAP" amid the federal agency's recruitment drive in order to support US President Donald Trump's scheme to boost immigration raids.
Dean told Fox News host Jesse Watters he had decided to join ICE after the presenter shared a recruitment video on his Instagram.
He said: "I'm actually a sworn deputy sheriff and a reserve police officer — I wasn't part of ICE, but once I put that out there and you put a little blurb on your show, it went crazy.
"So now I've spoken with some officials over at ICE, and I will be sworn in as an ICE agent, ASAP."
Dean believes the current immigration system is "broken" so he is keen to do what he can to support the president.
He said: "This country was built on patriots stepping up, whether it was popular or not, and doing the right thing. I truly believe this is the right thing.
"We have a broken immigration system. Congress needs to fix it, but in the interim, President Trump ran on this. He is delivering on this. This is what people voted for. It's what I voted for and he's going to see it through, and I'll do my part and help make sure it happens.
"I'm stepping up. Hopefully, a whole bunch of other former officers, former ICE agents, will step up and we'll meet those recruitment goals immediately, and we'll help protect this country."
Dean recently expressed concern that James Gunn has made Superman too "woke" in his new movie, which stars David Corenswet.
Dean — who played the superhero in Lois + Clark: The New Adventures of Superman from 1993 to 1997 — told TMZ: "How woke is Hollywood going to make this character? How much is Disney going to change their Snow White? Why are they going to change these characters [to] exist for the times?"
James had previously compared his movie to "the story of America", with a central character who is "an immigrant that came from other places and populated the country".
Referencing the traditional Superman motto of "Truth, justice, and the American way" — which has evolved over the years and has most recently been "Truth, justice, and a better tomorrow" — Dean said: "We know Superman is an immigrant - he's a freaking alien...
"The 'American way' is immigrant-friendly, tremendously immigrant-friendly. But there are rules.
"You can't come in saying, 'I want to get rid of all the rules in America, because I want it to be more like Somalia.' Well, that doesn't work, because you had to leave Somalia to come here... There has to be limits, because we can't have everybody in the United States. We can't have everybody, society will fail. So there have to be limits."
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Straits Times
2 hours ago
- Straits Times
How a CIA hit on al Qaeda ensnared a US citizen in Afghanistan
WASHINGTON - As a crowd looked on, uniformed Taliban surrounded the Toyota Landcruiser in which Mahmood Habibi, a naturalized U.S. citizen, sat. Other Taliban smashed open the door of his Kabul apartment, emerging later with his laptop and papers. Blindfolded in the back seat, Habibi and his driver were driven off by gunmen sporting shoulder patches of the Taliban's feared secret police, the General Directorate of Intelligence (GDI), according to several witness statements in U.S. government possession seen by Reuters. Afghanistan's Taliban government denies it detained Habibi, 37, who was a former head of Afghanistan's civil aviation. While dividing his time between the United States and Kabul working for a private company, he became a U.S. citizen after the Taliban took power in 2021. The Taliban also says they have no knowledge of his whereabouts, three years after he disappeared. That is contradicted by the witness accounts and other evidence, including data monitored from Habibi's cellphone, described to Reuters by a U.S. official and a former U.S. official familiar with the matter. The Taliban denials present a conundrum for the FBI, which is leading the U.S. government effort to gain his release; and for the State Department, which describes Habibi's detention a major impediment to exploring increased engagement with Afghanistan, three years after his August 10, 2022 arrest. U.S. President Donald Trump has made freeing Americans held abroad a top priority and already has secured the release of dozens, including from Afghanistan, Russia and Venezuela. The case of Habibi - the only publicly identified American held in the country - has been harder to resolve. This story is the most comprehensive account to date of the circumstances of Habibi's capture and includes previously unreported details. Among them, interviews with the U.S. official and a former U.S. official with knowledge of the case reveal that the Taliban likely detained Habibi because the CIA had penetrated the company where he worked. The sources say the U.S. spy agency had accessed one of the company's security cameras, helping it pinpoint the al Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri in a Kabul guesthouse. Habibi's detention came 10 days after Zawahiri - the last of the top plotters of the September 11, 2001, attack on the United States - was dramatically assassinated by a U.S. drone strike on the guesthouse, ordered by Trump's predecessor, Joe Biden. At the time, U.S. officials briefed journalists that it was a CIA operation. The U.S. sources told Reuters that Habibi was unaware of the CIA plot and was wrongly detained after returning to Kabul from a work trip to Dubai after the assassination, oblivious of the danger he was in. The CIA, the Taliban, the White House and Habibi's employer, Virginia-based ARX Communications, did not respond to detailed requests for comment for this story. ARX has previously said neither it, nor its subsidiaries, were involved with the strike on Zawahiri. Reuters could not independently verify whether Habibi was or wasn't aware of the plot. In a statement to Reuters, a State Department spokesperson called for Habibi's immediate release. "We know the Taliban abducted Mahmood Habibi nearly three years ago," the spokesperson said. A co-worker detained with Habibi, then later released, saw him in GDI headquarters and heard him in an adjacent room being asked if he worked for the CIA or was involved in the strike on Zawahiri, according to one of the statements in U.S government possession, seen by Reuters. Then, in June and August of 2023, the U.S. government detected that his mobile phone had been switched on in GDI headquarters, the U.S. official and former official said. Reuters could not reach the witnesses who made statements, including the coworker, or verify the accuracy of their account of Habibi's detention. The U.S. official familiar with the matter said excerpts of the statements have been presented to the Taliban in response to their repeated denials of Habibi's detention. As Habibi and his family on Sunday mark the third anniversary of his arrest, the Trump administration has stepped up efforts to win his release, including offering a $5 million reward for information. But so far, he appears no closer to freedom, the U.S. sources said. "Our family has new hope that the Trump team will be successful," said Habibi's older brother, Ahmad. Ahmad said his brother would never have gone to Kabul four days after the Zawahiri assassination if the CIA had told ARX to warn him it was too dangerous to return. 'Nobody told him anything. Neither the company, neither the CIA nor anybody. So, he just went back,' Ahmad said. The U.S. government officially considers Habibi a hostage, said the U.S. official, because his arrest and location remain unconfirmed by the Taliban. The official and the former official spoke on condition of anonymity, citing the sensitivity of the case. In response to a request for comment, the FBI said that along with partners in other U.S. departments involved in hostage recovery, it remains "committed to bringing Habibi home to his family." The Taliban rejected an offer made last year to trade Habibi for alleged Osama bin Laden aide Mohammad Rahim al-Afghani, the last Afghan held in the Guantanamo Bay military prison. 'We've tried in terms of both carrots and sticks,' said the official, who requested anonymity to discuss the case. The Taliban "literally throw up a wall," said the official. CAMERA ON CELL TOWER As part of the operation against Zawahiri, the CIA penetrated the Asia Consultancy Group (ACG), a subsidiary of ARX, according to the current and former U.S. officials, who provided previously unreported details of how the spy agency was able to target the al Qaeda chief. Reuters presented these details to the CIA, ACG and ARX, requesting comment, but received no response. ACG, whose parent is headquartered in Herndon, Virginia, had a contract to erect cellphone towers around Kabul, the sources said. CCTV cameras were fitted to the towers to protect the structures, they said. One of the cameras, the sources said, was pointed at a house U.S. officials have linked to Sirajuddin Haqqani, the Taliban's acting interior minister both at the time and now, in the heart of Kabul's diplomatic quarter, a short distance from the shuttered British and American embassies. The sources said the camera sent back video to the CIA confirming Zawahiri's presence in the residence. That confirmation helped the agency kill the Egyptian Islamist with two drone-fired Hellfire R9X missiles on July 31, 2022, as he emerged onto a balcony, they said. His wife and family survived the strike. While officials in the Biden administration at the time described the CIA's drone operation to kill Zawahiri with Hellfires, the details of the agency's operation on the ground, including the presence of the camera and its role in identifying Zawahiri have not been previously disclosed. ARREST On the day of his arrest, Mahmood Habibi was in his apartment in Kabul's Sherpur neighborhood packing to return to New Jersey, where he had a home, with the help of a sister, who was there with her two children, according to Ahmad. It was about noon when a phone call came from the ACG office saying it had just been raided by the Taliban, Ahmad said. Habibi told his sister that he had to leave without explaining why. He was arrested immediately after getting into his vehicle, Ahmad said. A few minutes later, somebody announcing that they were with GDI knocked on his apartment door, according to Ahmad and a witness statement. His sister declined to open it, telling those outside that she had to conform to the Taliban rule that an adult male relative had to be present. The Taliban broke open the door, entered the apartment and rifled through closets and drawers, demanding Habibi's laptop, according to Ahmad and the witness statement. A crowd had gathered outside after the Taliban arrived in five vehicles, blocked the street and surrounded Habibi's car, before driving him off, according to Ahmad and a separate witness statement. The GDI arrested 30 other ACG employees, according to a letter that ACG sent to Afghanistan's Ministry of Communications, seen by Reuters. Except for Habibi and one other, all were eventually released. In the letter, dated September 15, 2022, ACG asked that family members be allowed to visit him and three other staff who the GDI still held. The ministry appeared to confirm Habibi was a GDI prisoner in a reply two days later, seen by Reuters, saying that the intelligence directorate would decide on the petition when its investigation was completed. However, in a July 3, 2025 statement reported by Afghanistan's state news agency, Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said that in response to requests from Habibi's family, the Taliban had investigated but no evidence has been found to suggest that he was detained by Afghanistan's security forces. Mujahid said the Taliban are a legitimate governing body that does not detain individuals without due process or hide them from public view. Mujahid did not respond to a Reuters request for comment. US CITIZEN Born to parents from the southern city of Kandahar, Habibi is one of eight siblings – three brothers and five sisters – who grew up in the Kabul neighborhood of Karte Parwan. His excellent English helped him secure a job with the U.N. civil aviation agency in Kabul in 2008. He worked for the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration's U.S. embassy office from 2011 to 2013. Tapped as deputy civil aviation minister, Habibi helped transition Afghanistan's air traffic system from U.S. control to the U.S.-backed Kabul government. Habibi became civil aviation minister in 2017. He held that post until 2019 while earning a civil aviation master's degree from Embry Riddle Aeronautical University in Florida, the university confirmed. In 2019, he resigned and then joined ARX to help oversee its Afghan subsidiary's contract to run air traffic control at Kabul's international airport. Habibi lived between the city and the United States, accumulating the last of the 30 months of U.S. residency he needed over a five-year period for U.S. citizenship in 2021, Ahmad said. He was in Kabul with his family during the chaotic departure of the last U.S. troops in August 2021, Ahmad said, as the Taliban consolidated its grip on the capital after 20 years of war. Habibi flew from Dubai to Kabul on August 4, 2022, after stopping in Qatar to check on his family and parents who were housed on a U.S. military base there waiting for final processing of U.S. immigration visas, said Ahmad. A week later Habibi was arrested. His wife, daughter and parents, who waited in Qatar until October for their visas before flying to the United States and settling in California, have not seen or heard from him since. Resolving Habibi's case would be the easiest way for the Taliban, who crave international recognition as Afghanistan's legitimate rulers, to explore improving ties with the U.S., the current U.S. official said. Since Habibi's detention, four other Americans have been arrested and released by the Taliban. REUTERS

Straits Times
5 hours ago
- Straits Times
US, EU, and Ukrainian officials to meet in UK ahead of Trump-Putin meeting
Sign up now: Get ST's newsletters delivered to your inbox British Foreign Secretary David Lammy (left) meeting US Vice-President J.D. Vance in Sevenoaks, Britain, on Aug 8. LONDON - British foreign minister David Lammy and US Vice President JD Vance will meet Ukrainian and European allies in Britain on Aug 9 to discuss President Donald Trump's push for peace in Ukraine, a spokesperson for Downing Street said. British Prime Minister Keir Starmer spoke to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky ahead of the security meeting, the spokesperson added. Mr Starmer and Mr Zelenskyy discussed Mr Trump's proposals for ending the war in Ukraine ahead of talks between the American president and his Russian counterpart on Aug 15 in Alaska. "The Prime Minister spoke to President Zelenskyy of Ukraine this morning. They looked ahead to the meeting of National Security Advisers from Europe, Ukraine and the United States taking place today, hosted by the UK Foreign Secretary and US Vice President," the spokesperson said. "They agreed this would be a vital forum to discuss progress towards securing a just and lasting peace." REUTERS


AsiaOne
15 hours ago
- AsiaOne
Trump and Putin to meet to discuss Ukraine peace deal in Alaska, World News
WASHINGTON - US President Donald Trump will meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Aug 15 in Alaska to negotiate an end to the war in Ukraine, Trump said on Friday (Aug 8). Trump made the highly anticipated announcement on social media after he said that the parties, including Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, were close to a ceasefire deal that could resolve the three-and-a-half-year conflict, one that could require Ukraine to surrender significant territory. Addressing reporters at the White House earlier on Friday, Trump suggested an agreement would involve some exchange of land. "There'll be some swapping of territories to the betterment of both," the Republican president said. The Kremlin subsequently confirmed the summit in an online statement. The two leaders will "focus on discussing options for achieving a long-term peaceful resolution to the Ukrainian crisis," Putin aide Yuri Ushakov said. "This will evidently be a challenging process, but we will engage in it actively and energetically," Ushakov said. In his evening address to the nation on Friday, Zelenskiy said it was possible to achieve a ceasefire as long as adequate pressure was applied to Russia. He said he had held more than a dozen conversations with leaders of different countries and his team was in constant contact with the United States. Putin claims four Ukrainian regions - Luhansk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson - as well as the Black Sea peninsula of Crimea, which he annexed in 2014. His forces do not fully control all the territory in the four regions. Earlier, Bloomberg News reported that US and Russian officials were working towards an agreement that would lock in Moscow's occupation of territory seized during its military invasion. A White House official said the Bloomberg story was speculation. A Kremlin spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment. Reuters was unable to confirm aspects of the Bloomberg report. Ukraine has previously signaled a willingness to be flexible in the search for an end to a war that has ravaged its towns and cities and killed large numbers of its soldiers and citizens. But accepting the loss of around a fifth of Ukraine's territory would be painful and politically challenging for Zelenskiy and his government. Tyson Barker, the US State Department's former deputy special representative for Ukraine's economic recovery, said the peace proposal as outlined in the Bloomberg report would be immediately rejected by the Ukrainians. [[nid:721085]] "The best the Ukrainians can do is remain firm in their objections and their conditions for a negotiated settlement, while demonstrating their gratitude for American support," said Barker, a senior fellow with the Atlantic Council. Under the putative deal, according to Bloomberg, Russia would halt its offensive in the Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions along current battle lines. The last time Alaska hosted a high-stakes diplomatic gathering was in March 2021, when senior officials from the administration of Democratic former President Joe Biden met with top Chinese officials in Anchorage. The get-together involving Biden's top diplomat Antony Blinken and his Chinese counterpart Yang Jiechi quickly turned into a stunning public clash in front of the cameras, with both sides leveling sharp rebukes of the others' policies that reflected the high tension in bilateral ties. Since his return to the White House in January, Trump has moved to mend relations with Russia and sought to end the war. In his public comments he has veered between admiration and sharp criticism of Putin. In a sign of his growing frustration with Putin's refusal to halt Russia's military offensive, Trump had threatened to impose new sanctions and tariffs from Friday against Moscow and countries that buy its exports unless the Russian leader agreed to end the conflict, the deadliest in Europe since World War Two. It was unclear by Friday evening whether those sanctions would take effect or be delayed or cancelled. The administration took a step toward punishing Moscow's oil customers on Wednesday, imposing an additional 25 per cent tariff on goods from India over its imports of Russian oil, marking the first financial penalty aimed at Russia in Trump's second term. Trump's special envoy Steve Witkoff held three hours of talks with Putin in Moscow on Wednesday that both sides described as constructive. Prime Minister Donald Tusk of Poland, a close ally of Ukraine, said earlier on Friday that a pause in the conflict could be close. He was speaking after talks with Zelenskiy. "There are certain signals, and we also have an intuition, that perhaps a freeze in the conflict - I don't want to say the end, but a freeze in the conflict - is closer than it is further away," Tusk told a news conference. "There are hopes for this." Tusk also said Zelenskiy was "very cautious but optimistic" and that Ukraine was keen that Poland and other European countries play a role in planning for a ceasefire and an eventual peace settlement.