Judge blocks Trump administration's effort to eliminate Job Corps
U.S. District Judge Andrew Carter in Manhattan issued a temporary restraining order in a lawsuit filed by a trade group representing contractors that operate Job Corps centers. Carter ordered the government not to terminate Job Corps contractors or stop work at Job Corps centers until a further ruling in the case, and he ordered the Labor Department to appear at a court hearing on June 17.
The lawsuit alleges that the U.S. Department of Labor is violating federal law and its own regulations by abruptly shuttering the program, a plan the agency announced last week, opens new tab.
Job Corps was created by Congress in 1964 and allows 16-to-24-year-olds from disadvantaged backgrounds to obtain high school diplomas or an equivalent, vocational certificates and licenses and on-the-job training. The program currently serves about 25,000 people at 120 Job Corps centers run by contractors.
The Labor Department in announcing the end of the program said it was not cost effective, had a low graduation rate and was not placing participants in stable jobs. The department also said there had been thousands of instances of violence, drug use and security breaches at Job Corps centers.
The National Job Corps Association and other plaintiffs in Tuesday's lawsuit said the Labor Department does not have the power to dismantle a program established and funded by Congress.
Shuttering Job Corps is a small piece of a broader effort by Trump, a Republican, and his appointees to drastically shrink the federal bureaucracy, including by getting rid of some offices and agencies altogether.
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The Independent
29 minutes ago
- The Independent
Trump wants to change how elections are run. The Constitution won't let him
Donald Trump has vowed to implement significant changes to the conduct of US elections, despite constitutional constraints limiting his ability to act unilaterally. His pledges, made on his social media platform, are rooted in the same false information and conspiracy theories he has consistently used to account for his 2020 election defeat. Mr Trump specifically targeted mail voting, which remains popular and is utilised by approximately one-third of all voters, and voting machines, a form of which is employed across nearly all of the country's thousands of election jurisdictions. Ironically, these are the very systems that facilitated Mr Trump's victory in the 2024 election and enabled Republicans to secure control of Congress. Trump's post marks an escalation even in his normally overheated election rhetoric. He issued a wide-ranging executive order earlier this year that, among other changes, would have required documented proof-of-citizenship before registering to vote. His Monday post promised another election executive order to "help bring HONESTY to the 2026 Midterm elections." The same post also pushed falsehoods about voting. He claimed the U.S. is the only country to use mail voting, when it's actually used by dozens, including Germany, Switzerland and the United Kingdom. Similar complaints to Trump's, when aired on conservative and conservative-leaning networks such as Newsmax and Fox News, have led to multimillion dollar defamation settlements, including one announced Monday, because they are full of false information and the outlets have not been able to present any evidence to support them. Trump's post came after the president told Fox News that Russian President Vladimir Putin, in their Friday meeting in Alaska, echoed his grievances about mail voting and the 2020 election. Trump continued his attack on mail voting and voting machines in the Oval Office on Monday, during a meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. The announcement signals yet another way that Trump intends to stack the cards in his favor in the 2026 midterm elections, after he already has directed his attorney general to investigate a Democratic fundraising platform and urged states to redraw their congressional districts to help the GOP maintain its majority in the House of Representatives. Here's a breakdown of Trump's latest election post and why Congress is the one entity that can implement national election rules. Trump's post Trump for years has promoted false information about voting, and Monday was no exception. He claimed there is "MASSIVE FRAUD" due to mail voting, when in fact voting fraud in the U.S. is rare. As an example, an Associated Press review after the 2020 election found fewer than 475 cases of potential fraud in the six battleground states where he disputed his loss, far too few to tip that election to Trump. Washington and Oregon, which conduct elections entirely by mail, have sued to challenge Trump's earlier executive order — which sought to require that all ballots must be received by Election Day and not just postmarked by then. The states argue that the president has no such authority, and they are seeking a declaration from a federal judge in Seattle that their postmark deadlines do not conflict with federal law setting the date of U.S. elections. Trump also alleged that voting machines are more expensive than "Watermark Paper." That's a little-used system that has gained favor and investments among some voting conspiracy theorists who believe it would help prevent fraudulent ballots from being introduced into the vote count. Watermarks would not provide a way to count ballots, so they would not on their own replace vote tabulating machines. While some jurisdictions still have voters use electronic ballot-marking devices to cast their votes, the vast majority of voters in the U.S. already vote on paper ballots, creating an auditable record of votes that provides an extra safeguard for election security. In his post, Trump also claimed that states "are merely an 'agent' for the Federal Government in counting and tabulating the votes" and must do what the federal government "as represented by the President of the United States" tells them to do. Election lawyers said that's a misrepresentation of the U.S. Constitution. It also flies in the face of what had been a core Republican Party value of prioritizing states' rights. Thousands of elections, none under presidential control Unlike in most countries, elections in the U.S. are run by the states. But it gets more complicated — each state then allows smaller jurisdictions, such as counties, cities or townships, to run their own elections. Election officials estimate there are as many as 10,000 different election jurisdictions across the country. A frequent complaint of Trump and other election conspiracy theorists is that the U.S. doesn't run its election like France, which hand counts presidential ballots and usually has a national result on election night. But that's because France is only running that single election, and every jurisdiction has the same ballot with no other races. A ballot in the U.S. might contain dozens of races, from president on down to city council and including state and local ballot measures. The Constitution makes the states the entities that determine the "time, place and manner" of elections, but does allow Congress to "make" or "alter" rules for federal elections. Congress can change the way states run congressional and presidential elections but has no say in the way a state runs its own elections. The president is not mentioned at all in the Constitution's list of entities with powers over elections. "The president has very limited to zero authority over things related to the conduct of elections," said Rick Hasen, an election law professor at the University of California, Los Angeles. Courts have agreed — no presidential involvement Parts of Trump's earlier executive order on elections were swiftly blocked by the courts, on the grounds that Congress, and not the president, sets federal election rules. It's unclear what Trump plans to do now, but the only path to change federal election rules is through Congress. Although Republicans control Congress, it's unclear that even his party would want to eliminate voting machines nationwide, possibly delaying vote tallies in their own races by weeks or months. Even if they did, legislation would likely be unable to pass because Democrats could filibuster it in the U.S. Senate. Mail voting had bipartisan support before Trump turned against it during the COVID-19 pandemic and the 2020 election, but it's still widely used in Republican-leaning states, including several he won last November — Arizona, Florida and Utah. It's also how members of the military stationed overseas cast their ballots, and fully eliminating it would disenfranchise those GOP-leaning voters. The main significance of Trump's Monday statement is that it signals his continuing obsession with trying to change how elections are run. "These kinds of claims could provide a kind of excuse for him to try to meddle," Hasen said. "Very concerned about that."
Daily Mail
30 minutes ago
- Daily Mail
Transgender teacher buys Scottish souvenir plot in bid to be called Lord instead of Miss
A transgender teacher in Florida has bought a plot of land in Scotland in a bid to be called Lord instead of Miss. Toby Tobin, 30, who teaches maths and science to fifth graders, claims to have been forced to resign after school authorities insisted a female title and pronouns were used. The teacher, who is biologically female, was open about identifying as male when taking the job in 2021 and had previously been referred to as Mr Tobin. But in 2023, a new law was applied in the state which said that when it comes to public schools a person's sex is an 'immutable biological trait and that it is false to ascribe to a person a pronoun that does not correspond to such person's sex'. It meant school staff were banned from asking students to refer to them by pronouns which do not reflect their sex at birth and students were not required to use them. In an effort to get around the law, the teacher bought a 4 sq ft 'souvenir plot' on an estate in Fife through a website offering customers the chance to become a 'Lord, Lady or Laird'. Toby purchased a 4 sq ft 'souvenir plot' on an estate in Fife through a website offering people a chance to become a 'Lord, Lady or Laird'. However, the school refused to let the teacher use the title or ask the 10 and 11-year-old children in the class to use it. In response, Toby filed a lawsuit against the Pinellas County School District claiming gender discrimination. The teacher said: 'After a conversation with the district they said I would have to use only female-specific pronouns and a title. 'In response to this I thought "OK, I can't be Mr Tobin, why don't I go purchase some land in Scotland and I could become a Lord?". 'So I did make some attempts to combat this in the most gentle way that I could at the time.' Toby also became an ordained minister and a Count of the Principality of Sealand - an offshore platform in the North Sea - in other attempts to dodge using a female title and pronouns. 'After proposing that I be Lord Tobin my administration said "no", but I did not give up,' the teacher said. 'I became a minister through the Universal Life Church so I now am Minister Toby Tobin as well as Lord Toby Tobin. 'I then found the Principality of Sealand and I became a Count with them which I thought would be hysterical because I taught math. 'Count Tobin was also not deemed appropriate for the classroom so I started to realise that if it wasn't Mrs it wasn't going to be it so I was essentially constructively discharged.' Toby's lawsuit, filed in the US District Court in Florida, states: 'Plaintiff attempted to work with the school district by voluntarily obtaining honorifics such as "lord" by purchasing a tract of land in Scotland. 'Defendant did not allow plaintiff to use any titles or pronouns other [than] ones that corresponded to the incorrect gender. 'Defendants' directives undermined plaintiff's identity, dignity, and ability to perform his job in a manner consistent with his personal and professional integrity.' Lawyers for the school authorities filed a motion to dismiss the case, arguing Toby's pronoun preference is not protected speech and the state's interest in upholding the law outweighs his request. There are a handful of websites selling souvenir plots in remote parts of Scotland to give owners a chance to become a lord or lady. However, the companies warn that you 'cannot buy a noble title' and use of it is for enjoyment purposes only.
Daily Mail
30 minutes ago
- Daily Mail
Alaskan man is left 'speechless' after Putin gifts him Russian motorbike after the American complained that sanctions made refitting his own model impossible
An Alaska man as been left 'speechless' after Russian President Vladimir Putin gifted him a new Russian motorcycle after the American man complained that sanctions made refitting his own model impossible. An employee of the Russian embassy in the United States handed the man, Mark Warren, the keys to his new Ural motorcycle in the parking lot of the Anchorage hotel where the Russian delegation was staying. 'I have to say that this is a personal gift from the President of the Russian Federation,' Andrei Ledenev, the embassy employee, told Warren. The white-haired, bespectacled Warren was seen hopping aboard his new bike, Ledenev behind him and another man in the sidecar, to take it for a spin. 'It's night and day,' Warren said. 'I like my old one, but this one is obviously much better. 'It's newer, it's more precise in control. 'I'm speechless, it's amazing. Thank you very much.' The unexpected gift by the Russian leader came after reporters with Russian state television Channel 1 met Warren by chance on the streets of Anchorage ahead of the summit. The reporters stopped to admire Warren's bike, which is manufactured by Ural, whose original factory was founded in 1941 in what was then Soviet Russia. Warren told a reporter, Valentin Bogdanov, that he struggled to obtain spare parts for the bike, including a new starter, because the manufacturing plant is 'located in Ukraine.' 'So for you, if they resolve this conflict here in Alaska, I mean Putin and Trump, it will be good?' Bogdanov asks Warren. 'Yes, it will be good,' the Alaskan replies. Ural, which is headquartered in Washington State, says that all of its motorcycles are assembled in Kazakhstan. The vehicles are known for their iconic sidecars, and were initially developed for use by the Soviet military during WW2 on the Eastern front. The company pulled all its production out of Russia after the start of the full-scale war in Ukraine, as sanctions prevented them from exporting bikes.
