Inquirer.com – Zurich DR

Category: News

  • Three injured in a fire at Delta’s Monroe Energy refinery in Delco

    Three injured in a fire at Delta’s Monroe Energy refinery in Delco

    A fire involving a process unit pump, a device that moves fluids, broke out Thursday morning inside the Monroe Energy refinery in Trainer, Delaware County, according to the company.

    At least one person suffered burn injuries in the fire, which began about 11:30 a.m., county spokesperson Michael Connolly said. The individual had to be airlifted to Thomas Jefferson University Hospital; their condition remained unclear. Monroe later confirmed it was an employee who suffered non-life-threatening injuries that were treated off-site. The county later said two other people experienced heat-stress-related injuries, which were not expected to be critical.

    “Our understanding is that it’s contained to a small location and is under control,” Connolly said.

    Local police and fire could not immediately be reached for details regarding the blaze and how many people were in the facility when the fire broke out, but the large black plumes rising from the refinery raised alarm among area residents.

    “As of now all we know is that there is a fire at the refinery all personnel are working on locating the fire and extinguishing it!!” read a Facebook post by the Trainer Borough Police Department from around noon.

    Amid the chaos, at least one individual sought guidance on how to reach out to someone working inside in the comments of the post.

    Just last week, the refinery stopped its two 100,000-barrels-per-day crude-oil distilleries because of a leak, though a Delta Air Lines spokesperson — the airline owns the refinery and uses much of it to produce jet fuel — said there was no danger to the public.

    Delta’s Monroe Energy refinery in Delco shuts due to internal leak

    Connolly said it was unclear if the leak was connected to the fire, directing questions to Monroe.

    The company, which employs about 500 workers, did not say whether the leak played a role.

    “Our on-site Fire Response Team was immediately activated, deploying multiple emergency response resources, including fire and foam tanker vehicles, mobile deluge guns, and stationary high flow firewater suppression systems,” a company statement said.

    The company said air monitoring showed there was no current risk to the community.

    Police said air quality was at a “nuisance level” and it was recommended for people up to half a mile from the refinery to shelter in place. The county lifted the order at 3:15 p.m.

    “The specific cause of the incident will be investigated,” the company said.

  • Philly area set to receive record-breaking $322M in state and federal money for trails

    Philly area set to receive record-breaking $322M in state and federal money for trails

    Philadelphia and its surrounding counties are set for what could be a record-breaking $322 million in federal and state funding to go toward building new trails segments, say trail advocates.

    Projects in line for funding include the much-anticipated Spring Garden Connector in Philly. And it would include the Newtown Rail, Chester Creek, and Parkside-Wynnefield-Cynwyd trails in the suburban counties.

    The money is part of a larger $8.2 billion pool of transportation funding updated through the federal Transportation Improvement Program (TIP) for 2027 and spread over four years.

    “We consider this to be potentially record breaking,” said Patrick Monahan, vice chair of the Circuit Trails Coalition in Pennsylvania. “It’s proof that the trails are being treated as essential infrastructure, making it safer and easier to walk and bike in the region.”

    In 2024, Pennsylvania received $200 million for trails under TIP.

    Pennsylvania gets its TIP plan updated every two years and the majority of money goes to highways, bus and rail systems, trolleys, and ferries. It is part of an agreed-upon list of priority transportation projects. That list includes 344 projects.

    In all, this year’s proposed $322 million in funding for trails would advance 27 bike and pedestrian projects across Philadelphia, Bucks, Chester, Delaware, and Montgomery Counties.

    The Delaware Valley Regional Planning Commission (DVRPC) is set to vote on approving the allocations in July.

    The trails, either begun or being planned, are part of the Circuit Trails, a network of hundreds of miles of multiuse trails throughout the Philadelphia region including southern New Jersey, which updates its TIP funding in alternate years.

    A sample of the trail projects in line for funding include:

    • $11 million for the second phase to extend the Schuylkill Banks trail in Philadelphia south from near 61st Street to Passyunk Avenue that would include a new park at the base of the Passyunk Avenue Bridge.
    • $58.5 million for Philadelphia’s Spring Garden Connector project that would link trail systems along the Delaware and Schuylkill rivers and make Spring Garden Street safer for cyclists and pedestrians.
    • $50 million to improve safety for roadway users, including pedestrians and cyclists, on PA 291 from Irving Street to Ridley Creek. The project includes building a multiuse side path that will be designated as part of the East Coast Greenway, a trail system linking Maine to Florida.
    • $8.5 million for the Chester Valley Trail, a multiuse trail along the alignment of the former Philadelphia and Thorndale Branch, a former freight train route, including renovation of the Whitford Bridge and Downingtown Trestle Bridge for bicycle and pedestrian use.
    • $10 million to develop a segment in Whitemarsh Township, Montgomery County, that would run from the existing Wissahickon Trail in Fort Washington State Park to the existing Cross County Trail near SEPTA’s Fort Washington Station.

  • Supreme Court clears way for Trump administration to revive restrictive immigration policy

    WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court cleared the way Thursday for the Trump administration to potentially revive an immigration policy once used to turn back migrants seeking asylum at the U.S.-Mexico border.

    The justices, in a 6-3 decision, overturned a lower court order blocking the practice that limited the number of people who could apply for asylum each day, first under the Obama administration and then expanded during President Donald Trump’s first term.

    Advocates said the tactic created a humanitarian crisis as thousands of people settled in unsafe makeshift shelters to await their turn. The Trump administration said it was necessary to deal with an increase of asylum seekers at the border.

    The policy is not in place now, though authorities have imposed other restrictions on asylum seekers. The Department of Homeland Security did not say if they plan to revive it, but applauded the ruling. “This decision opens up an important tool to continue securing our southern border,” said James Percival, the agency’s general counsel.

    The administration argued that metering is a critical tool that’s been used by presidents of both parties and should stay available. Federal attorneys say people turned away at the border could come back later, though lines were thousands of people long when the policy was in place before.

    The case is one of several immigration suits the court is considering this term, including Trump’s push to end restrict birthright citizenship. The high court also allowed his administration to end deportation for migrants fleeing instability and armed conflict on Thursday.

    Under federal law, migrants who arrive in the U.S. must be able to apply for asylum and be screened for fear of persecution in their home countries.

    The Justice Department argued that people stopped by authorities haven’t arrived in the country, so immigration agents don’t have to let them apply.

    The court’s conservative majority agreed. “A guest does not arrive in a house when he knocks on the front door,” Justice Samuel Alito wrote.

    But attorneys for people seeking asylum say the law has long meant anyone arriving at a port of entry should be screened, and blocking arrivals disregards the nation’s ideals.

    Justice Sonia Sotomayor dissented from the bench, saying that the majority’s opinion “regrettably and tragically extinguishes the light of the torch of the Statue of Liberty.”

    In an unusual exchange, Alito voiced a response after she finished speaking. He expressed surprise that she had read her dissent out loud and defended his opinion by pointing out that the policy had been used during two presidential administrations. “I won’t add anything more to that,” Alito said.

    Metering was first used under President Barack Obama when large numbers of Haitians appeared at the main crossing to San Diego from Tijuana, Mexico. It was expanded to all border crossings from Mexico during Trump’s first term in the White House.

    It ended in 2020 when the government introduced greater restrictions during the coronavirus pandemic, and President Joe Biden formally rescinded it in 2021.

    The same year, a California-based federal judge found that metering violated the asylum seekers’ rights and the law requiring screening. A divided appeals court panel affirmed the ruling but nearly half of judges on the full San Francisco-based court voted to rehear it, a strong signal that might have caught the attention of the Supreme Court.

    Attorneys with the group Democracy Forward first brought the case, and condemned Thursday’s ruling. “We are disappointed in the Court’s decision and call on all Americans to demand that our government protect the families the Court today decided to keep in harm’s way,” said President and CEO Skye Perryman.

    They represented the group Al Otro Lado, whose executive director said the decision would mean a “hardening of borders to keep out the most vulnerable,” that is “sure to result in many more lives lost.”

    U.S. law allows people seeking refuge to apply for asylum once they are on American soil, regardless of whether they came legally. To qualify for asylum, they must show a fear of persecution in their homeland for specific reasons, like race, religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group or political opinion.

    People who are eventually granted asylum can’t be deported. They can legally work, bring in immediate family, apply for legal residency and seek citizenship.

  • Supreme Court allows Trump administration to end legal protections for Haitians, Syrians

    WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Thursday allowed the Trump administration to end legal protections for migrants fleeing violence and natural disaster in Haiti and Syria, exposing hundreds of thousands more people to potential deportation.

    The 6-3 decision overturns lower court orders and allows the Department of Homeland Security to swiftly end temporary protected status, a program that protects a total of 1.3 million people from 17 countries.

    It marked another victory at the high court for Republican President Donald Trump’s sweeping crackdown on immigration. Though the conservative-dominated court has put the brakes on some of Trump’s immigration policies over the last year, it handed him a second win Thursday in a decision clearing the way for the revival of a policy restricting immigrants seeking asylum.

    The court’s conservative majority found that immigration authorities have sole authority over the program, and the law doesn’t allow judges to intervene.

    The majority opinion from Justice Samuel Alito also brushed aside arguments that derogatory comments from Trump about Haitians showed the decision was unlawfully tinged by prejudice. He called the statements “insufficient to show that the termination of Haiti’s TPS designation was based on the race of the Haitian people.”

    Justice Elena Kagan forcefully disagreed, calling Trump’s comments “so repellent and racially inflected that the majority declines to put them in print.” She pointed out that Trump had said Haitians in the U.S. “probably have AIDS,” and he also amplified false rumors during the 2024 campaign that Haitian immigrants in Ohio were abducting and eating dogs and cats.

    Lawyers said Haitian immigrants would be in serious danger if they are sent back. “Simply put, the Supreme Court’s ruling will directly result in thousands of innocent people dying violent, needless deaths,” Geoff Pipoly and Andy Tauber said.

    They urged the Senate to approve an extension of deportation protections for Haitians that’ passed the House on a rare bipartisan vote in April.

    “Families are here, kids are going to school, parents are going into work, folks are trying to commute, and it’s like the Supreme Court just put all those activities on stop and put folks in limbo,” said Viles Dorsainvil, who runs a support center for Haitians in Springfield, Ohio.

    Derrick Johnson, president and CEO of the NAACP, called the “a devastating betrayal of Haitian families who have lived, worked, and contributed to this country for years — only to be cast out based on anti-Black immigration sentiment.”

    Haitians with TPS are also a key part of the workforce in long-term care facilities. “This would be a dreadful loss for all seniors in our community,” said Rita Siebenaler, a resident at Goodwin Living, a senior living community in Virginia.

    The Justice Department appealed to the Supreme Court after judges postponed the end of the program for about 350,000 Haitians and 6,000 Syrians. The high court sided with the administration before and allowed the end of the program for people from Venezuela.

    Federal authorities deny prejudice played a role. They also cited a Supreme Court decision from Trump’s first term that rejected bias claims based on his social media posts and upheld a travel ban on several Muslim-majority countries.

    James Percival, DHS general counsel, applauded Thursday’s ruling. He said the program had, in many cases, become “de facto amnesty. This is a win for the rule of law and common sense.”

    Since Trump returned to the White House in January 2025, Homeland Security has ended the protections, including some that had been in place for more than a decade, for people from 13 countries.

    The terminations were made even though countries such as Haiti and Syria remain dangerous, immigration lawyers said. Four Haitian women who were deported from the United States in February were found beheaded and dumped in a river several months later, lawyers said in court documents.

    The United States first granted protections to Haitians in 2010 after a catastrophic earthquake and extended them multiple times amid ongoing gang violence that has displaced more than a million people, according to court documents.

    Syrians were first granted protected status in 2012, during a civil war that lasted for more than a decade before the fall of President Bashar Assad’s government in late 2024.

    “Today, many of our community members they feel lost,” Farrah AlKhorfan of Immigrants Act Now said about Syrian immigrants losing TPS protections. “They are trying to understand … what this decision means for them and how it will be implemented and how much time they will have to prepare for what comes next.”

    The program was created by Congress in 1990 to prevent deportations to countries suffering from natural disasters, civil strife and other instability. It allows people already in the country to stay with work permits in increments of up to 18 months, but it does not provide a path to citizenship.

  • David Clayton-Thomas, powerhouse lead singer of Blood, Sweat & Tears, has died at 84

    NEW YORK — David Clayton-Thomas, the lead singer of Blood, Sweat & Tears, whose husky, high-strung tenor on “Spinning Wheel,” “And When I Die,” and other hits helped make the so-called “brass rock” band among the most popular acts of the late 1960s, has died at age 84.

    Spokesperson Eric Alper said that Mr. Clayton-Thomas died “peacefully” Wednesday at St. Michael’s Hospital in Toronto. Alper did not cite a specific cause.

    Mr. Clayton-Thomas was a onetime street fighter and petty thief from Canada who briefly became a rock superstar, the front man of a nine-member group that sold millions of records and won two Grammys for Blood, Sweat & Tears, which beat out the Beatles’ Abbey Road for best album of 1969. Calling out amid a jazzy parade of horns, keyboards, and percussion, Mr. Clayton-Thomas’ urgent shout was a signature voice of the era, preaching love on the Motown cover “You’ve Made Me So Very Happy,” a lasting legacy on Laura Nyro’s “And When I Die,” and a cool head on his own “Spinning Wheel.” Meanwhile, Blood, Sweat & Tears helped inspire a wave of horn-led bands, among them Chicago, the Electric Flag, and Ten Wheel Drive.

    “A lot of the guys [in Blood, Sweat & Tears] would play a Broadway show matinee, then go up to Harlem and play Latin music or R&B and funk at night, or come down to the Village and play pure jazz the next night,” Mr. Clayton-Thomas told bestclassicbands.com in 2023. “I was just a blues player: give me three chords and I’ve got a song.”

    At its peak, Blood, Sweat & Tears’ appeal was so broad it helped lead to the band’s downfall.

    Hip enough to perform at the 1969 Woodstock festival, where they were among the highest paid acts, they also were known enough to the establishment to tour Eastern Europe the following year on behalf of the State Department. When Mr. Clayton-Thomas and other band members denounced the Communist regimes on the other side of the Cold War, Rolling Stone’s David Felton wrote that “the State Department got its money worth.” Yippies would turn up at a 1970 Blood, Sweat & Tears show at Madison Square Garden, carrying obscene banners outside and dumping manure by the front gate.

    The band had practical reasons for going along with the government: Mr. Clayton-Thomas, who had allegedly wielded a gun at his girlfriend, had been denied a green card and faced deportation. But after topping the charts in 1970 with the album Blood, Sweat & Tears 3, their appeal soon faded. A burned out Mr. Clayton-Thomas left the group in 1972, and neither he nor the remaining musicians ever regained their old stature. Blood, Sweat & Tears would continue recording over the next few years, and even briefly reunited with Mr. Clayton-Thomas, who went on to release more than a dozen solo albums and tour on his own for decades.

    Mr. Clayton-Thomas was inducted into the Canadian Music Hall of Fame in 1996. “Spinning Wheel,” covered by everyone from James Brown to TV star Barbara Eden, was voted into the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame a decade later.

    Mr. Clayton-Thomas is survived by his daughters, Ashleigh Clayton-Thomas and Christine Graham.

    Up from the streets

    Born David Henry Thomsett in Surrey, England, and raised near Toronto and Ottawa, he was the son of a Canadian World War II veteran and of a pianist-entertainer who helped inspire her son’s interest in music. Thomsett was lucky to have the chance. He fought violently with his father, was living in the streets by his mid-teens and by age 20 was serving time in a reformatory for vagrancy, assault and other crimes.

    An old guitar, left behind by a fellow inmate, changed his life. He taught himself to play and began spending extensive time in the early 1960s around Toronto’s Yonge Street music “strip,” where peers included the American rockabilly star Ronnie Hawkins, a mentor to Robbie Robertson and other future members of the Band and a guide for Thomsett early in his career.

    Anxious to reinvent himself, he changed his last name to Clayton-Thomas while leading his own groups. In the mid-60s, he released such albums as Sings Like It Is and had a hit single with the anti-war rocker “Brainwashed.” He would also befriend a rising star, Joni Mitchell, whose childlike “Circle Game” helped inspire “Spinning Wheel,” and the venerable John Lee Hooker, who would indirectly contribute to Mr. Clayton-Thomas’ breakthrough in the U.S.

    America beckons

    Hooker had encouraged Mr. Clayton-Thomas to move to New York, where the American bluesman had an engagement at the Cafe Au Go Go in Greenwich Village. When Hooker unexpectedly departed for a tour of Europe, club owner Howard Solomon needed a replacement and recruited Mr. Clayton-Thomas.

    “So I played him a couple songs on the guitar,” Mr. Clayton-Thomas told bestclassicbands.com. “He said, ‘Do you have a band?’ I said, ‘Sure,’ and went out into Greenwich Village looking for anybody carrying a guitar case or even looking like a musician, and we put together a little band and we opened there that night. We ended up staying there for several months.”

    Around the same time, session man-producer Al Kooper was looking to a form jazz-rock group and was joined by such musicians as guitarist Steve Katz, drummer Bobby Colomby, and horn players Randy Brecker and Jerry Weiss. They called themselves Blood, Sweat & Tears, releasing the debut album Child Is Father to the Man early in 1968. Although praised by Rolling Stone publisher Jann Wenner as “a fine, exemplary group,” members were torn between those allied with Kooper and those who thought his vocals too weak to attract a substantial audience.

    By the end of the year, Kooper and others had departed, and the band was seeking a new singer. After Judy Collins saw Mr. Clayton-Thomas perform, she recommended him to Colomby.

    “I got home and just a couple of days later, Bobby Colomby called me up and said, ‘Hey, Kooper’s gone. We got four guys left out of the nine. And we still got a record contract with Columbia. Do you want to come down and try out for the band?”’ Mr. Clayton-Thomas told bestclassicbands.com. ”I said, ‘You’re damn right.’ I knew [bassist] Jim Fielder real well and I knew they were superb musicians. So I was on the next plane. We had a rehearsal that afternoon, an audition, and it was instant magic. We just knew right off the bat.”

  • New acting intel czar Bill Pulte starts trimming staff as Trump urged

    New acting intel czar Bill Pulte starts trimming staff as Trump urged

    Acting director of national intelligence Bill Pulte, installed Friday by President Donald Trump, has at Trump’s urging begun trimming his organization, which coordinates the nation’s 18 spy agencies.

    This week Pulte fired a half-dozen political appointees and notified several dozen career officers on loan to the Office of the Director of National Intelligence that they were being sent back to their home agencies.

    Pulte’s immediate predecessor, Tulsi Gabbard, had already culled hundreds of personnel, boasting that she had slashed the staff by 40%. Trump has long been distrustful of what he calls the “deep state” intelligence community, and the cuts by Pulte are the latest in a series of shocks that have roiled the ODNI.

    Gabbard, who left office last week, had a stormy tenure, falling in and out of favor with Trump’s White House. Current and former officials criticized as ham-handed her release of files related to President John F. Kennedy’s assassination. She selectively declassified data on Russia’s interference in the 2016 U.S. election and other matters that supported Trump’s views.

    In recent months, the ODNI has seen a number of high-level resignations and a roller coaster of leadership announcements by Trump.

    The agency “is being so hollowed out that its new name might become DNR — do not resuscitate. It’s on life support already,” said Beth Sanner, a former ODNI deputy director who served as Trump’s intelligence briefer in his first administration.

    While a number of current and former intelligence officials note that there are merits to shrinking the ODNI, the Trump administration, they say, has gone about it in a haphazard way that could undermine the intelligence coordination that Congress created the agency to do.

    “Reasonable people can debate ODNI’s size and mission, but sacking dozens of seasoned officers in your first week isn’t reform — it’s performative firing to please a president who treats his own intelligence community as the enemy within,” said Julia Curlee, who served as a director for intelligence programs in Trump’s White House until last year and recently resigned from the CIA after 20 years as an analyst.

    Pulte asked program heads for a rank-ordered list of personnel to guide decisions on who could be let go, according to former intelligence officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of retribution.

    One apparent casualty of the personnel moves that began under Gabbard is the National Intelligence Council, which was staffed primarily by career officers on loan from other agencies, such as the CIA. The NIC is considered the most authoritative intelligence analysis unit, producing in-depth reports on key topics for top government officials using information gathered by multiple spy agencies.

    About 20 NIC personnel have been removed or have chosen to leave, including several senior officers who oversaw the production of analysis on Russia, China, and Europe.

    The deputy director for mission integration, Will Ruger, who effectively led the council, was placed on administrative leave, according to three former intelligence officials.

    It is unclear whether and to what extent the vacancies will be filled. When the principal deputy intelligence officer for Russia left last year, the position was kept open.

    Trump told the Wall Street Journal this month that he’d like to see a “smaller” ODNI. “I think there are a lot of people in there that shouldn’t be there,” Trump said, noting that he was referring to holdovers from the Biden and Obama administrations.

    Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Tom Cotton said on the Senate floor Wednesday that “mass firings” were not taking place. He said Pulte told him that “a small handful of front-office personnel” were leaving, “which is not at all uncommon when a senior leader leaves an agency or one comes into an agency.” He added that “around 45 or 50 career officers” were returning to their home agencies.

    “I think that’s a step in the right direction,” said Cotton, who has long called for shrinking the ODNI and last year proposed legislation that would cap its full-time staff at 650.

    Some agency insiders have heard that there could be subsequent rounds of cuts and that keeping each round relatively small will help avoid congressional blowback, according to one former intelligence official.

    Trump’s appointment of Pulte, who has no intelligence or national security experience, has alarmed Democratic lawmakers, as well as some Republicans. Some current and former intelligence officials fear he will use the post to further Trump’s agenda, including weaponizing intelligence against the president’s enemies.

    As head of a federal mortgage regulation agency, Pulte has launched mortgage fraud probes of people Trump considers adversaries, including Sen. Adam Schiff (D., Calif.) and Federal Reserve Board member Lisa Cook.

    Government reorganization efforts under Trump have been marked by chaos and missteps, such as when Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency last year dismantled the U.S. Agency for International Development and conducted mass firings at the State Department and other agencies.

    The Office of the Director of National Intelligence was created by Congress in the wake of the September 2001 terrorist attacks, after investigations found that the CIA, the FBI and other agencies had failed to share critical information about al-Qaeda plots.

    The ODNI had a little more than 2,000 employees at the start of Trump’s second term. By the time Gabbard left last week, the number had shrunk to 1,300, according to congressional aides.

    Morale was shaken last year when Gabbard dismissed the chair and vice chair of the NIC after it produced a report that found that the Venezuelan government was most likely not directing the activities of Tren de Aragua, a criminal gang that Trump has vilified. The finding contradicted his rationale for invoking the Alien Enemies Act and deporting alleged Venezuelan gang members without due process.

    “Getting [the agency] smaller makes sense, but this isn’t the way to do it,” said John Sipher, a 28-year veteran CIA operations officer and former Moscow station chief, who has argued that the ODNI should be dismantled.

    Sipher said the ODNI’s problem is that it suffers not just from bureaucratic bloat, but from political interference. “The office that was meant to safeguard intelligence from fragmentation has become another perch from which intelligence can be politicized and bent toward partisan narratives,” he wrote in the Bulwark.

    This week’s cuts do not appear to have significantly affected the agency’s largest component, the National Counterterrorism Center, which was set up by Congress to be the government’s primary organization for analyzing international terrorism and which in its heyday had more than 1,000 personnel, according to former senior intelligence officials.

    Trump has nominated Jay Clayton, U.S. attorney and former Securities and Exchange Commission chairman, to be the permanent director of national intelligence.

    But last week, Trump abruptly froze Clayton’s nomination, prompting the Senate to postpone a confirmation hearing, in a fit of pique over lawmakers’ failure to pass unrelated election legislation.

  • No sign of Pennsylvania at Trump’s 250th fair as state fails to find companies to participate

    No sign of Pennsylvania at Trump’s 250th fair as state fails to find companies to participate

    WASHINGTON — Pennsylvania is not participating in President Donald Trump’s Great American State Fair, which kicked off Wednesday, after state leaders failed to find a company willing to represent it at one of the hallmark 250th anniversary events in Washington that some say have become overly partisan.

    Pennsylvania’s state government, like those in some other Democratic-led states, had already chosen to not sponsor a booth at the 16-day fair. Gov. Josh Shapiro’s office had still been trying to connect Freedom 250, the nonprofit behind the fair, with organizations and companies that could represent the state, according to federal and state sources familiar with the planning.

    “Unfortunately, due to the high cost to taxpayers and not being able to secure PA businesses to sponsor the booth, Pennsylvania will not be a participant in the Great American State Fair,” the Pennsylvania Department of Economic and Community Development said in a statement.

    The fair, being held at the National Mall to celebrate the nation’s 250th anniversary, was originally planned to feature a pavilion dedicated to each state and territory.

    But as tourists visited Thursday on the fair’s first full day, there were no signs of the commonwealth where American democracy was born 250 years ago.

    Almost every other state was showcased — with most sending state or local government staff and tourism boards to host educational or interactive exhibits.

    Cape May County, a Republican stronghold that is representing New Jersey after the state government declined to participate, featured an 8-ton sand sculpture that a sculptor from Wildwood took 4½ days to create.

    An 8-ton sand sculpture promotes Cape May at New Jersey’s pavilion at the Great American State Fair, in Washington, D.C. The pavilion was sponsored by Cape May County, a Republican stronghold that chose to represent New Jersey after the state government declined to participate.Sam Janesch / Staff

    Maryland’s state tourism department handed out information about its vacation hot spots. Staff in the Lone Star State’s pavilion greeted tourists with a cheerful “Welcome to Texas” and offered an interactive space flight exhibit, a replica of the Alamo, and an Austin City Limits music display.

    Delaware highlighted Founding Father Caesar Rodney’s ride to cast the decisive vote for independence in Philadelphia.

    Delaware’s pavilion at The Great American State Fair highlights Caesar Rodney’s ride to cast the deciding vote for independence. Sam Janesch / Staff

    Pennsylvania joined seven other Democratic-led states — Connecticut, Illinois, Maine, Massachusetts, North Carolina, Oregon, and Washington — in declining to participate.

    Some of those states had flags outside the pavilions where they would have been located. A few chairs and a sign with the state’s name were also inside.

    But in the booth where, according to an interactive map, Pennsylvania’s location was supposed to be, a flag reading just “250″ was outside and the room was blocked off for the fair’s staff.

    As recently as this month, Pennsylvania was still seeking companies to represent it, but Rosie Lapowsky, Shapiro’s spokesperson, confirmed Thursday that the state had given up that effort.

    “None were interested,” Shapiro said to the New Republic in a story that first reported Pennsylvania’s lack of participation. “It reflects this sad state of affairs that we find ourselves in — that the president has politicized this to a degree that businesses don’t want to participate.”

    Trump’s presence has increasingly hung over events tied to the 250th anniversary in the nation’s capital, with the president planning to hold a political rally on the Fourth of July as part of the long-planned fireworks celebrations. It has made the decision to participate by entertainers and states alike more politically fraught.

    “Freedom 250 is a nonpartisan organization, full stop — and our track record of collaboration across red, blue, and purple states speaks for itself,” Freedom 250 spokesperson Rachel Reisner said in a statement earlier this month. She did not respond to a request for comment Thursday about Pennsylvania’s lack of involvement or Shapiro’s comments.

    Cape May represents New Jersey at the Great American State Fair Thursday, June 25, 2026, in Washington, D.C.Sam Janesch / Staff

    In New Jersey’s pavilion, visitors were met with not just the sand sculpture but also a new three-minute video highlighting Cape May County and a giant image of George Washington lounging at the beach with a cold drink.

    County administrator Kevin Lare said it took a significant amount of work — and at least $150,000 from the county’s tourism budget — to pull it all together in recent weeks. It is worth it, he said, to highlight the county in the hopes of bolstering its largest economic engine — tourism.

    “It’s a once-in-a-250-year event,” Lare said. “It’s not something the county will do every year at this level. It’s a celebration of our country, and our board of commissioners still believe we live in the greatest nation in the world. They’re happy to be a part of it.”

    Staff writer Gillian McGoldrick contributed to this article.

  • Residents are mourning after an apparent arson on their block killed 1 man and damaged 5 homes

    Residents are mourning after an apparent arson on their block killed 1 man and damaged 5 homes

    Ciara VanBuren was on the couch with her 4-year-old daughter in the next room and her 13-year-old upstairs when she smelled something burning.

    She looked out the window of her Franklinville rowhouse a few moments later and saw smoke coming from her neighbor’s window. She heard pounding on the door as neighbors and firefighters checked for anybody inside. In the moments that it took to get outside with her daughters, the front porch had collapsed, with the blaze killing a 69-year-old man and prompting charges for the woman accused of setting it.

    Natasha Teague, 38, has been arrested and charged with murder and arson, among other offenses, in connection with the Monday fire, police said Wednesday. Teague had been a frequent presence in the neighborhood over the last year, said neighbors, who said they believed she knew the fire victim’s brother.

    Two fires were started on the block that day. In the early morning, police were called to the 3600 block of Percy Street after a small fire was started on the porch, according to the Philadelphia Fire Department. The fire department was not called, and no one was arrested. In the early afternoon, police say, Teague started the second fire, which severely damaged five homes and killed Barry Turner.

    A preliminary hearing for Teague is scheduled for July 13. She remained in custody Thursday and no attorney for her was listed in court records.

    Turner, 69, grew up in the area and came back to live with his brother, neighbors said. Other residents have described Turner as having been a straight-A student in school, said James Martinez, a 21-year-old who was in the shower when his house started to burn down. He said he did not know Turner well.

    Martinez sat by the burned porch, sighing as he looked toward to the homes that were destroyed. “We are missing half a block.”

    James Martinez sitting on the porch of a neighbor’s house on Percy Street.Isabel Maney

    Neighbors said they were saddened and scared by the tragedy. Kendra Olen, who lives a few houses down from the fire with her 66-year-old mother and 22-year-old daughter, said she had not been able to sleep since the fire.

    “It’s from fear,” she said. Firefighters knocked down the front door to rescue her mother, and they had to install fans in the house to get rid of the smoke.

    This was the second incident of arson reported on the block in less than a month, according to the fire department. On May 23, a Molotov cocktail was thrown into an unoccupied house. No other houses were affected. Before these two incidents, neighbors could not remember a fire starting on their block in recent decades.

    The fires concerned and confused neighbors who previously thought of their block as an idyllic place.

    Days after the fire, there was a clear blue sky and cool breeze. Many residents sat on their porches as they usually do. Jose Vazquez lounged comfortably, wearing a blue-and-white-striped linen shirt, as he looked out to the row of burned houses.

    “Almost everyone knows me, even if I forget their names,” Vazquez, who is 85 and has lived in the neighborhood for decades, said with a laugh. He does not plan to move.

  • Federal judge halts Trump’s election executive order seeking to create a federal voter list

    BOSTON — A federal judge on Thursday halted President Donald Trump’s executive order that sought to create a federal voter list and limit who can receive a mail ballot.

    U.S. District Court Judge Indira Talwani, who was nominated by Democratic President Barack Obama, sided with a coalition of nearly two dozen states that challenged the Republican president’s order in granting a summary judgment. Her ruling applies to this year’s midterm election cycle.

    Plaintiffs argued in two lawsuits, both filed in federal court in Boston, that Trump’s order should be found unconstitutional because the states and Congress, not the president, have the power to set election rules. The judge agreed, noting in her ruling that the provisions of Trump’s order “unconstitutionally violate the separation of powers.”

    It was the second ruling in as many days against executive orders Trump has signed seeking oversight of the nation’s elections. A separate ruling Wednesday prohibited an executive order he had signed last year that would have required people to show documents proving their citizenship when registering to vote.

    The administration, in its motions to dismiss the lawsuits challenging the order seeking to establish a federal voter list, argued that the motions are premature and that plaintiffs lacked the legal basis to bring their claim based on the Administrative Procedure Act, which governs how federal agencies develop and issue regulations.

    But in an interim order before Thursday’s ruling, Talwani said the motions pertaining to this year’s election cycle were relevant: “In light of the EO’s specific deadlines over the next three months, and the reality that elections will be occurring throughout this period with the November 3, 2026 midterm occurring in just five months, postponing judicial review is impracticable and may inflict significant hardship on Plaintiffs,” she wrote. That order denied the Trump administration’s motion to dismiss the challenges.

    Trump’s executive order, the second one aimed at elections during his second term, comes as he continues to raise the specter of widespread voting by noncitizens as a reason to change election rules. But states already have detailed processes aimed at keeping their voter rolls accurate, and voting by noncitizens has been shown to be rare. It also is a felony that can be punishable by deportation.

    Trump issued his second order in March after a bill he supported to overhaul voting stalled in Congress. The order would have had the federal government create a list of eligible voters and then directed the U.S. Postal Service to deliver mail ballots only to those on the list. Election officials argued that it was ripe for abuse and could cause chaos, and the postal union has objected to the idea of mail carriers policing ballots.

    The Postal Service has published a proposed rule required by Trump’s executive order in the Federal Register. Among other things, the rule would not apply to primary elections or overseas ballots.

    The lawsuit seeking summary judgment was filed by Democratic attorneys general representing 22 states and the District of Columbia. Also signing on were attorneys representing Democratic Gov. Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania, which has a Republican attorney general.

    “Donald Trump’s illegal and unconstitutional Executive Order sought to undermine eligible voters’ ability to make their voices heard in our democracy,” Pennsylvania Shapiro posted on X Thursday. “Our Constitution is clear: the authority to set our election rules belongs to the states.”

    The states also told the court that the move imposes a costly burden on election officials to comply and would spread fear about the possibility of prosecution. Stephen Pezzi, a lawyer for the Trump administration, had argued that no one would be prosecuted for violating the order.

    In a separate lawsuit filed against the executive order, a federal judge in Washington, D.C., in May agreed with the Trump administration that it was too early to block the order because it had yet to be implemented. That lawsuit was brought by Democratic and civil rights groups, who have appealed.

    Since his 2020 presidential election loss to Democrat Joe Biden, Trump has groundlessly claimed mail voting is rife with fraud and has launched a federal investigation into that year’s vote, even though repeated audits and investigations, including ones run by Republicans, found it was free of widespread fraud. Trump also has said he wants to “take over” election administration in Democratic areas.

  • Gov. Mikie Sherrill proposed an 80% cut to a program that provides job training and support to Hispanic women. The budget is due in days.

    Gov. Mikie Sherrill proposed an 80% cut to a program that provides job training and support to Hispanic women. The budget is due in days.

    Consensa Francisca Silva Silva moved to Camden from Costa Rica more than two years ago knowing nobody. She lived on the street for two months, she said, and then was bouncing from house to house when a young man in the neighborhood told her to check out the Hispanic Women’s Resource Center in Camden, one of several such centers in the state.

    She went. With help from the program, Silva received food, obtained a work permit, made a down payment for a studio apartment, and started a job at McDonald’s.

    That statewide initiative is now facing detrimental cuts under Democratic Gov. Mikie Sherrill’s budget proposal. The governor has proposed cutting nearly 80% of its funding, and Silva worries that other immigrant women looking to improve their circumstances will not get the help she received.

    “It was very hard to come here without knowing anyone, and it was really hard because at first I couldn’t find any work,” Silva, who is Nicaraguan, said in Spanish, translated by Jesselly De La Cruz, the executive director of the Latino Action Network Foundation, which funds the centers.

    The initiative is one of numerous South Jersey programs at risk under Sherrill’s proposal, including the Rowan University veterinary school and a program that provides mental healthcare to abused children. But the cuts are not a done deal.

    Sherrill and legislative leaders announced Tuesday they had come to an “agreement” on a budget totaling $60.7 billion, the same price tag Sherrill proposed in March. But it has not been made public and it is unclear how far into the details they have gotten. They have until Tuesday to figure it out.

    And the process is still underway. State Sen. Nilsa Cruz-Perez, a Camden Democrat who sits on the Senate Budget and Appropriations Committee, has been a supporter of the centers. She was unable to speak Wednesday afternoon because she was in a committee budget hearing.

    Client Consensa Francisca Silva Silva (right) participates in a workshop at the Hispanic Women’s Resource Center in Camden Thursday, June 11, 2026.Tom Gralish / Staff Photographer

    On a recent Thursday, Silva participated in a healthy life skills workshop in Spanish at the Camden center, where she learned about taking care of herself as summer temperatures get hotter in the city. About 20 adults clapped for one another with big smiles on their faces, and they received goody bags with sunscreen, lip balm, a towel to keep cool, and a little fan. A young girl played with magnetic tiles and a baby was kept calm, passed between women.

    The governor proposed cutting funding for the center’s programs to $535,000, down from more than $2.5 million this year and more than $3 million in 2025. Murphy had proposed a similar cut last year, but the funding was restored during budget negotiations.

    Hispanic Women’s Resource Centers were established through 1991 legislation to address the wage gap for Latinas. New Jersey is one of the states with the biggest wage gap for Latina workers, according to the National Women’s Law Center.

    Staff members observe from back of the room during a workshop at the Hispanic Women’s Resource Center in Camden Thursday, June 11, 2026. Tom Gralish / Staff Photographer

    The Latino Action Network Foundation funds these resource centers in partnership with six nonprofits across 14 sites, including five in South Jersey. The Camden center is located at the nonprofit Healthy Families and Communities, and there are centers in Vineland in Cumberland County, Hammonton in Atlantic County, Pennsville in Salem County, and Rio Grande in Cape May County.

    Sherrill’s proposal would “drastically cut” the number of resource centers, and sites in Hammonton and in Lakewood, in Ocean County, would likely be on the chopping block, De La Cruz said, adding that services would need to be cut in eight of 11 counties.

    Martha Infante, 38, who lives in Pennsauken, said she was disoriented when she moved to South Jersey from the Dominican Republic. But through the Camden center, she found out how to apply for work online and learned basic English. She obtained coats for her daughters’ first U.S. winter, and a staffer accompanied her to a New Jersey Department of Motor Vehicles center to get her driver’s license.

    “I came here and my mind was all over the place, I didn’t know where things were,” she said in Spanish.

    She now works as a home health aide, thanks to training she got through the center, and even participated in a program where she learned about advocating for her community in Trenton.

    “Don’t cut these funds, Gov. Sherrill,” she pleaded. “Don’t cut the funds! This is like a family. It’s like a home for the community.”

    Client Martha Infante (left) talks with staff member Chailienisse Vega (right) after participating in a workshop at the Hispanic Women’s Resource Center in Camden Thursday, June 11, 2026. Tom Gralish / Staff Photographer

    Some of the women in the program are fleeing domestic violence and seeking financial independence. Others are struggling to get a work permit, or may have lost a family member who helped pay the bills to deportation. A lot of former “Dreamers” — undocumented immigrants who came to the U.S. as children — utilize the center as well, De La Cruz said.

    The need for the centers has only escalated under President Donald Trump’s second administration, she said.

    The social worker-turned-executive said she was surprised by the severity of Sherrill’s proposed cut, especially because of the governor’s efforts to push back against Trump’s immigration policies.

    A 2023 Rutgers study funded by the Latino Action Network Foundation found that the most popular services at these resource centers were English-language classes and employment services, such as job referrals, assistance filling out applications, resume writing, and interview preparation.

    Staff member Andreina Pardo pauses to stretch with participants as she leads a workshop at the Hispanic Women’s Resource Center in Camden Thursday, June 11, 2026. Tom Gralish / Staff Photographer

    “Aside from helping them with the technical aspects of job hunting, the assistance from the Centers seemed to provide a boost of confidence for many of the women, giving them an additional push to apply for positions even if they felt hesitant to do so at first,” the study said.

    Gladys, 48, who declined to give her last name due to concerns over her safety, said in Spanish that the free English courses made her feel like she could “come up for air and breathe” after not being able to communicate.

    The Camden resident had been an ecologist in Nicaragua and has gotten involved in the center’s community garden. She said she would love to pursue a career teaching children about the environment, but her plans are on hold because her work visa was canceled.

    In the meantime, Gladys said, activities at the center like art classes have made her feel less alone. She has been able to connect with women in the same situation as her, and those who migrated to the U.S. earlier who can give her advice from their experiences.

    “Maybe my circumstances don’t change, but my emotional well-being changes because I’m able to connect with others,” she said in Spanish.