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  • Sheriff Rochelle Bilal’s new undersheriff has resigned just three months into the job

    Sheriff Rochelle Bilal’s new undersheriff has resigned just three months into the job

    Philadelphia Sheriff Rochelle Bilal’s new second-in-command has left the job — three months after he arrived.

    Undersheriff George Gossett Jr., whom Bilal hired in June as part of what she had described as a major “reorganization and modernization” initiative, confirmed Monday that he had resigned from the job effective last Friday.

    Gossett said through a spokesperson that he is “excited to pursue opportunities in the private sector” but provided no other explanation for his short tenure.

    Bilal’s office has been hit with three court orders since 2024 seeking to correct alleged mismanagement, most recently in May over delays in processing deeds of properties won at auction.

    Gossett, a Roxborough-based lawyer and former assistant district attorney, was tapped in June at an annual salary of $185,000, weeks after a Common Pleas Court judge ordered Bilal to fix the sheriff sale process or face consequences.

    According to a news release Bilal issued that month, Gossett was to “oversee daily operations, strategic planning initiatives, personnel management, and operational coordination across the agency.”

    “This reorganization is about building a stronger organization for the future,” Bilal said at the time.

    It is unclear where that plan now stands, with the new undersheriff having already departed.

    Gossett is the fourth undersheriff to serve Bilal since she took office in 2020. Bilal and her spokesperson, Teresa Lundy, declined to provide any details about why her top deputy would leave so soon after taking the job.

    Sources in the office said that the pair did not see eye-to-eye, and that Gossett was said to have made a remark about Bilal’s “anger management” issues, which may have escalated the situation.

    Separately, Bilal last week fired Mark Wilson, the office’s codirector of real estate. Wilson declined to comment.

    Gossett’s predecessors also had rocky terms in the sheriff’s office.

    In August 2020, seven months into the job, Undersheriff Sommer Miller resigned after she said she faced retaliation for reporting alleged theft in the advertising department, unauthorized spending of public funds, and instances of extreme sexual harassment. She later claimed in a whistleblower lawsuit that Bilal had been “reading and monitoring her emails in real time.”

    Miller’s replacement, Undersheriff Curtis Douglas, left in May 2021, about a week after reports that Bilal’s office had botched a contract meant to move sheriff sales to an online platform. A spokesperson at the time described Douglas’ departure as a planned retirement.

    In May 2026, Undersheriff Tariq El-Shabazz, a criminal defense attorney who came to personally oversee the handling of deeds related to sheriff sales, also retired. He left one day after the most recent court order dropped.

    Under Bilal, who was elected as a reformer in 2019, sales of foreclosed and tax-delinquent properties have been mired in post-auction delays, with winning bidders waiting a year or more to get their deeds.

    Many auctions were halted altogether between 2021 and 2024. Court security and inmate transportation, two other key functions of the office, have also been recurring problems, with judges saying they have felt unsafe.

    In addition to Gossett, Bilal recently hired William A. Brownlee Sr. as part of the office restructuring earlier this year.

    Brownlee, a West Philadelphia pastor, a motivational speaker, a real estate investor, and an entrepreneur with a checkered financial history, has previously described himself on his website and social media as the office’s “Deputy Chief Financial Officer.” His website has since gone dark, and Bilal’s office said Brownlee currently serves as project manager. Payroll records show he is being paid $95,000 a year.

    Another new hire, Steven A. Wakefield, is a former Philadelphia Law Department attorney serving as Bilal’s deputy undersheriff in charge of deed compliance. He is being paid $120,000 a year.

    Wakefield took the stand last month and told Common Pleas Court Judge Paula Patrick, supervisor of the court’s commerce division, that the office had previously misplaced records and lost track of the distribution of some auction proceeds. Wakefield blamed the situation on a since-terminated employee who allegedly concealed the problem from Bilal.

    Bilal did not testify at the hearing. Her city-appointed lawyer had filed a motion seeking to keep her off the stand, saying the sheriff had “limited personal knowledge” of how sheriff sales work.

    Wakefield said he had enacted operational reforms, speeding the deed issuance process while largely clearing out a backlog of deeds from earlier sales.

    Even so, Patrick took the rare step of imposing six months of outside supervision of sheriff sales.

    That independent monitor has yet to be appointed.

  • In fits and starts, the Supreme Court stands up to Trump

    In fits and starts, the Supreme Court stands up to Trump

    WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court has not been eager to tangle with President Donald Trump. For much of his second term, the court seemed to have settled on a strategy of deference, ducking, and delay.

    But sometimes the court put its foot down. It did so Monday night in rejecting Trump’s plan to make it harder to vote by mail by having the Postal Service screen mail ballots and determine which ones it would deliver.

    Election administrators of both parties were mystified and alarmed by the plan, which they said would result in the disenfranchisement of millions of voters. Just three weeks ago, the court’s conservative majority deferred a decision on the matter, saying it was not yet ripe.

    That punt, the court’s unsigned ruling said, did not mean it would approve the plan in the end. “On that score,” the majority wrote, “time will tell.”

    That time arrived Monday, and the message was clear. The majority blocked the plan, saying it was most likely unlawful.

    “There aren’t five votes for abject chaos,” said Justin Levitt, a law professor at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles.

    Trump, for his part, reacted to the decision with fury, lashing out at his three appointees, none of whom noted a dissent.

    “This Supreme Court is bullied and cajoled by the Radical Left into making decisions that have set America back at least a hundred years,” he wrote Tuesday morning on social media. “These are not the people I interviewed to serve on the United States Supreme Court, they are merely a shell of their original selves.”

    The decision on mail ballots is part of a pattern. The Trump administration met with overwhelming success in some 30 emergency applications to the Supreme Court since the president’s second term began, on what critics call its shadow docket. Those decisions were nominally provisional, but they often delivered lasting victories to the president.

    In rushed proceedings that mostly yielded decisions with scant or no reasoning, the court divided along partisan lines much more often than in cases on the court’s so-called merits docket, which require full briefing, oral arguments, and in-person deliberations.

    The theme of those emergency rulings was deference to presidential power.

    But the tide started to turn in December, when the court refused to allow the deployment of the National Guard in Illinois over the objection of local officials.

    The rebukes continued in the term that ended in June.

    The court rejected the centerpiece of Trump’s beloved tariffs program, leading to refunds of many billions of dollars in illegal levies. It also thwarted Trump’s attempt to fire a Fed governor and disagreed with his interpretation of a law that he said barred counting some ballots received after Election Day.

    After a preliminary ruling last year limiting the power of lower courts to order relief in a case that arose in the context of birthright citizenship — at the time perceived as a major victory for Trump — the court this summer returned to address the citizenship question directly. This time, it dealt Trump a stinging loss, ruling that his executive order seeking to curtail automatic citizenship for babies born in the United States violated the Constitution.

    The majority opinion about mail-in balloting Monday was just three sentences long, but it went further than it might have. Instead of ruling merely that the administration’s plan had been rolled out too close to the November election, a conclusion that might have suggested Trump might still win in the end, the majority signaled that the government was likely to lose on the merits.

    That move was at odds with one of Chief Justice John Roberts’ judicial touchstones. “If it is not necessary to decide more to dispose of a case,” he wrote in 2022, “then it is necessary not to decide more.”

    All the court had to do to block the postal regulation was to say it would cause more harm than good in the current election cycle, Josh Blackman, a law professor at South Texas College of Law Houston, wrote in a blog post Monday night.

    “But the chief justice didn’t want this case to come back, so he reached the merits,” Blackman wrote. “If there is no need to decide more, the court should not decide more. Except when Trump is involved.”

    That approach may be a response to the fire hose of executive orders, programs, initiatives, dodges, and feints from the Trump administration that have threatened to overwhelm and outpace the courts. However significant Trump’s losses in the Supreme Court may have been, he remains hard to constrain by a judicial system used to moving at a stately pace.

    The vote count in Monday’s ruling was not disclosed, but only Justice Samuel Alito, appointed by President George W. Bush, and Justice Clarence Thomas, appointed by President George H.W. Bush, publicly dissented.

    Those two justices are the most reliable votes for Trump’s agenda, while the court’s three Democratic appointees seldom vote for the president. That leaves the three Trump appointees and the chief justice, who was appointed by George W. Bush, at the court’s center.

    If the court is to check Trump in the typical case, then, at least one of his appointees must vote against him. And that has now happened in a series of major clashes.

    “This is not a MAGA court,” Donald B. Verrilli Jr., who served as solicitor general in the Obama administration, said at a briefing for reporters Tuesday at Georgetown University Law Center.

    The practical consequences of the court’s ruling are a mixed bag, election administrators said.

    “The feeling of relief here is palpable,” Marybeth Kuznik, the director of elections in Fayette County, Pa., said on an email forum for election law specialists. Still, she added, “with all the hullabaloo in the media, voters have become alarmed and many are afraid their mail-in votes may not be counted no matter what the ruling may be.”

    There was another election-related ruling last week, about an attempt to redraw Missouri’s voting map to give Republicans an advantage in the midterm elections. It also took two trips to the Supreme Court to resolve. Over the administration’s objections and without public dissent, the court rejected the map.

    Yet another election-related application from the administration is pending at the court. It asks the justices to allow the use of a government database that includes Social Security information to help verify whether potential voters are citizens. It is another example of the administration’s everything-all-at-once approach.

    Still, the combination of the Missouri ruling and the one Monday on the postal regulations sent a message for the coming election, Levitt said.

    “The court is effectively done with actors making sizable last-minute changes,” he said. “The rules are now what they are, and the election is going to be — as it should be — up to the voters.”

    This article originally appeared in the New York Times.

  • Lower Merion asks court to deny parents’ ‘fearmongering’ request to opt out of computers

    Lower Merion asks court to deny parents’ ‘fearmongering’ request to opt out of computers

    The Lower Merion School District has urged a federal judge to deny a request from parents to opt their children out of school-assigned computers, accusing them of “fearmongering” about technology in schools and abusing the legal process to get their way.

    In a filing in U.S. District Court, lawyers for the district and school board said seven families who sued the district last month were trying to force the district to align with their preferred approach to instruction.

    “There is no constitutional right for a parent to choose which technology their child uses in a public school,” the district said in the Monday filing. It called the lawsuit “just the latest attempt by a small — but vocal — minority of the district community to pressure the duly-elected members of the board of school directors to kowtow to their peculiar views on technology in the classroom.”

    The affluent Montgomery County district has been a focal point of a national battle around technology use in schools. Since the spring, Lower Merion parents have been raising concerns about how much their kids are on screens — from worries about children gaming and accessing inappropriate content on their district-issued laptops to complaints about the quality of the educational software programs used by the district and fears that kids’ cognitive abilities are diminishing.

    The district revised its technology policy last month, specifying that students in kindergarten through second grades would no longer be assigned individual electronic devices. It also implemented guidelines for screen time by grade level and announced new tools for monitoring what kids are accessing on their laptops.

    But the new policy did not include a provision that had previously existed, which specified that district officials would work to accommodate students whose parents did not consent to being issued electronic devices. Parents organized under a Pencils Over Pixels group had pleaded with the board not to eliminate that provision, which was repealed in June.

    In their lawsuit filed last month — which one of the plaintiffs’ lawyers said he believed was the first of its kind — seven families accused the district of forcing a “digital free-for-all” on students, and violating their parental rights by requiring their children to use internet-connected computers to access their education without adequate safeguards.

    They also filed a motion for a preliminary injunction, asking a judge to order the district either to allow them to opt their kids out of personal devices or to pay for them to attend private schools. Three of the families who sued withdrew their kids from the district.

    Schools around Philly are no longer giving laptops to kindergartners and scaling back on screen time. It’s a tech backlash.

    In its response Monday, the district said parents had mischaracterized its former policy. Families were never permitted to opt out of technology entirely, the district said. While the policy had said officials would make their “best efforts” to work with students whose families declined personal devices, they were not guaranteed specific accommodations, the district said.

    The district accused parents of trying to force the school system to bend to their beliefs — and said the court would be setting a dangerous precedent if it sided with them.

    “This court should decline plaintiffs’ invitation to convert the American public school educational system into a private school, whereby each parent has the right to hand-select each and every aspect of their child’s education,” the district said.

    A debate around parents’ rights

    In asking Judge John M. Younge to deny the families’ request for a preliminary injunction that would allow them to decline an internet-connected computer, the district said families had not made their case on a number of grounds.

    Six of the seven families do not have standing to sue, the district said. It said four of the families did not have children enrolled in district schools at the time the new technology policy was adopted.

    Two families, meanwhile, only had children in elementary schools, where they “would not have been eligible to receive a district-issued electronic device under the one-to-one electronic device initiative because they are not in 5th grade or above,” the district said.

    While elementary school students in Lower Merion have had access to personal electronic devices, the district said that its one-to-one program was “never formally extended” to those grades. A district spokesperson did not immediately respond to a question Tuesday about how the iPads and Chromebooks previously assigned to elementary schoolers were not considered part of the one-to-one program.

    Families also have not shown the district is permanently harming them, the district said. Although several of the families are now sending kids to private school or homeschooling, those decisions do not constitute “irreparable harm” warranting a preliminary injunction, the district said. It noted that families could be compensated with monetary damages if the court ruled in their favor.

    The district also said the harms of using computers alleged by the families were “vague and speculative.” In their lawsuit, families had described risks to physical and mental health, citing manipulative practices by technology companies, the dangers of artificial intelligence chatbots, and warnings from the U.S. surgeon general and the FBI about youth social media use and groups targeting minors online.

    While the district has revised its policies and placed more restrictions on what kids can access, Andrew Liddell, a lawyer for the parents, said in a recent interview that the changes “aren’t even the bare minimum of what the district should have been doing in the 20 years they’ve been giving internet-connected computers to children.”

    Liddell, an Austin, Texas-based lawyer whose wife founded the EdTech Law Center, said he believed the lawsuit was the first that had been brought alleging school computers were violating parents’ constitutional rights. Lower Merion still is not adequately restricting screen time, he said, and is “putting more burden on parents” to monitor what kids are doing online.

    While Lower Merion is a wealthy suburb, and some of the suing parents are doctors who can afford private school, Liddell said, “you have a right to a public education.”

    The parents “just want our kids to be able to go back to school,” Liddell said.

    In its response Monday, the district said parents do not have the right to dictate what is taught in public schools.

    “At most, the district’s new technology policy (Board Policy 141) only incidentally interferes with a parent’s limited right to direct their child’s education,” the district said.

    It also said that granting the parents’ request would cause a “logistical and financial hardship for the district,” requiring it “to develop a non-technological curriculum for each of plaintiffs’ children.”

  • An Upper Bucks man who shot at a DoorDash driver over a cheesesteak is sentenced to prison

    An Upper Bucks man who shot at a DoorDash driver over a cheesesteak is sentenced to prison

    An Upper Bucks man who shot at a DoorDash driver last year, irate that his cheesesteaks were late, was sentenced to four to 10 years in state prison Tuesday.

    Keilan McKeever, 33, pleaded guilty earlier this year to aggravated assault and related crimes, in exchange for prosecutors dropping an attempted murder charge for the 9mm bullet he fired at Khalik Lewis in March 2025.

    The gunshot struck the back windshield of Lewis’ Honda Civic, shattering it. Later, the then-19-year-old found the bullet stuck in the hood of his sweatshirt.

    Judge Steven Corr, in handing down the sentence, said he had been prepared to send McKeever, of Richlandtown, to prison for even longer, citing the “disgusting” nature of the case.

    But McKeever’s statement of contrition in court, including his detailed efforts to better himself while behind bars, moved Corr to exercise some leniency.

    Still, Corr was adamant that McKeever’s actions were unreasonable. It was only pure luck, he said, that Lewis was not killed, and that no one else was injured as McKeever opened fire on a residential street.

    “We have a young man out trying to make money, providing a service to you,” Corr said. “The way you treated him, I don’t know what causes someone to fire a shot at someone like that.”

    Video of the incident recorded from a neighbor’s security camera, played in court, showed Lewis pulling up to McKeever’s home on Cherry Street. Almost immediately, McKeever begins shouting and threatening Lewis.

    At one point, McKeever is heard saying “I’ll shoot you right now” and “see this” before a gunshot rings out.

    Pennsylvania State Police troopers who investigated the case wrote in court filings that McKeever initially lied to them, denying he shot anyone and saying, instead, that the noise heard by his neighbors was a car backfiring.

    Lewis, in an interview after Tuesday’s hearing, said McKeever came out of his house holding a loaded handgun. He was combative, Lewis said, and would not listen to him explain that his order was not late, as McKeever believed it was.

    McKeever followed Lewis as he walked back to his car, and stood behind him as he attempted to pull away. When Lewis did finally pull out of the driveway, he heard a bang and saw his windshield shatter.

    Lewis said he had no idea a bullet caused the damage.

    “Literally, my life was just inches away from ending,” Lewis said. “I still suffer from it: Loud noises trigger me, it’s hard to sleep at night.”

    He gave up driving for DoorDash, a side gig he had hoped would help pay for college and car repairs, right after the shooting.

    And Tuesday’s sentence did little to calm his fears.

    “I feel it could have been a much heavier sentence,” he said. “I feel like the judge could have seen it a little more from my point of view, instead of seeing the work he’s doing in jail. Everyone does that.”

    McKeever’s attorney, Riley Downs, told Corr during the proceeding that his client struggles with mental health issues, including anxiety and depression, that are debilitating when left untreated. At the time of the shooting, McKeever had not been taking his prescribed medication, Downs said, having lost his health insurance after being fired from his last job months earlier.

    His treatment, however, resumed after his arrest, along with therapy that McKeever said has helped him see what he did was wrong.

    “I know I have a lot of issues. I know I have some things I want to work,” McKeever said. “It’s just hard on the outside to find help.”

    McKeever apologized to Lewis and his family, saying he never intended to hurt him, only to scare him.

    “I failed myself and everyone else,” he said. “I hope you can forgive me for your sake, so you can forget and move on with your life.”

  • ‘The deal is off’ to limit development of Rock Hill Farm, attorney threatens, as officials seek more certainty in preserving land

    ‘The deal is off’ to limit development of Rock Hill Farm, attorney threatens, as officials seek more certainty in preserving land

    The “deal is off,” an attorney for a developer told Willistown elected officials Monday, as the board hesitated to accept a settlement that would preserve a great portion of Rock Hill Farm but still allow for housing to be built.

    The township’s three elected officials voted unanimously to table their decision, saying there was a lack of assurances in the settlement that guaranteed it would limit the amount of development and preserve a majority of the 222 acres of rolling hills, meadowlands, and woodlands at the historic farm.

    The board’s decision to hold off on agreeing to the settlement, which would conclude years of litigation over a proposal to build luxury homes on land that residents have advocated to keep as open space, drew opposition from Edmund Campbell, the attorney representing Rock Hill Farm LLC and developer Brian J. O’Neill, who purchased the land in 2021.

    “This settlement agreement has been negotiated for almost over a year,” he told the board Monday. “At the last minute, we were asked for additional concessions; we immediately replied … with a letter addressing those concessions and accepting changes that [the township’s solicitor] proposed. My client needs to make sure that the township understands that the deal is off if the settlement agreement is not approved tonight.”

    “I think we understand, and I can’t speak for my fellow supervisors, but I don’t have anywhere near enough information to make a decision,” board chairperson Molly Perrin responded.

    Campbell did not immediately respond to a message on whether the settlement had been withdrawn.

    The officials’ concern is whether the proposed settlement, which the township presented to the public last month, would bind certain mortgage holders to its terms.

    “Without some degree of surety there, we don’t feel that we can move forward,” said board member Bill Shoemaker. “We understand that, from the perspective of the applicant, this essentially, if they take it that way and choose not to continue, will void the agreements. So we’re back to square one.”

    A Chester County judge in July sided with the developer, overturning the township’s September 2024 denial of plans to build more than a dozen homes on the property. The township promptly appealed the ruling.

    Under the proposed settlement, the developer would radically scale down the plan that was before the court, preserving roughly 166 acres of the larger tract, or 75% of the land, under a conservation easement. The land would be subdivided into 18 lots, down from roughly 24, with all but one lot proposed for residential development. The one non-residential lot would be conserved as open space. The lots vary from about four acres to up to 26 acres.

    Separately, the developer has offered Willistown Conservation Trust the exclusive option to buy an adjacent 24-acre property, also purchased by the developer, if the settlement agreement is approved by the township and court. The township would plan to buy it from the trust using designated open space funds, and preserve the property as open land. The board voted to approve the purchase in February, officials said, though that is in jeopardy as part of the settlement.

    A number of residents who spoke last month responded positively to the proposal, but others were apprehensive.

    The community had rallied together to form a group, Save Rock Hill Farm, in an effort to stave off development of the land.

    “We appreciate the Supervisors’ efforts to address these issues carefully,” the group posted on Facebook after the meeting. “The Supervisors have heard the community’s substantial opposition and concerns about what could be lost if the proposal moves forward as presented.”

    But as the board prepared to take a vote, there was still uncertainty.

    Max O’Keefe, the solicitor for the township, said he and the counsel for Rock Hill Farm LLC discussed additional language, which was sent to the board of supervisors late Monday.

    “I certainly don’t anticipate that the board had any real meaningful opportunity to review or digest those proposed changes,” he said.

    The board concurred.

    “I never want to be the one who’s going to rush into a decision, especially a decision that’s so much value and importance to this community,” board member Matt McCarry said.

    This suburban content is produced with support from the Leslie Miller and Richard Worley Foundation and The Lenfest Institute for Journalism. Editorial content is created independently of the project donors. Gifts to support The Inquirer’s high-impact journalism can be made at inquirer.com/donate. A list of Lenfest Institute donors can be found at lenfestinstitute.org/supporters.

  • U.S. poverty rate drops slightly, but experts fear worse ahead

    U.S. poverty rate drops slightly, but experts fear worse ahead

    The U.S. poverty rate fell slightly last year as Americans’ incomes rose alongside rising prices, according to new census data published Tuesday. But the data from 2025 did not reflect cuts to social assistance this year that experts fear will cause a rise in poverty soon.

    Just over 1 in 10 Americans lived below the poverty line in 2025, the Census Bureau found, a half-percentage point drop since 2024.

    The median American household income rose more than 2% in inflation-adjusted terms, to $87,460. And the numbers reflected a narrowing of the income gap between men and women: Women’s earnings from full-time, year-round work rose about 3%, while men’s earnings remained mostly flat, meaning the average full-time female worker went from earning about 80% as much as an average man to about 83% as much.

    Officials touted the lowest official poverty rates on record for children and for Hispanic Americans, at about 13% of both groups.

    But advocates for people in poverty warned that the gains might be short-lived.

    The report reflects the number of people in poverty in America last year, before significant changes to the social safety net, passed by Congress in 2024 as part of a major tax and spending bill, took fuller effect this year. Experts who reviewed Tuesday’s numbers said they expect next year’s census data to show a substantial increase in poverty, due largely to cuts to the food stamps program.

    “The nature of an annual statistic might mask some of the volatility that families already started to experience,” said Megan Curran, a poverty expert at Columbia University. “We know the reality on the ground is going to be looking quite different from what the numbers were” a year ago.

    “This was the situation that families were in on the eve of the full implementation of these major changes to the safety net,” she said. “But it’s not reflecting what life is like for families who rely on SNAP and programs like that in September of 2026.”

    The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities found that 5 million people lost SNAP benefits between July 2025 and May 2026 as a result of the new legislation, which strengthens work requirements for food stamps and eventually shifts much more of the cost of the program onto states. In the first five months of this year, the organization found, the number of people receiving assistance fell in all but three states, and by as much as 20% in Arizona.

    This year’s Supplemental Poverty Measure — a more sophisticated method that takes into account families’ expenses and government benefits, rather than just marking whether their income falls above or below the poverty line — remained basically unchanged since last year, designating about 13% of Americans as impoverished. Advocates said they expect the SPM to rise next year as well, as government benefits decrease.

    Chastity Lord, president of an anti-poverty program for single mothers and their children, said rising prices have pushed women to take on more work this year to support their families, as reflected in the rising female income numbers. Overall, the average income for full-time, year-round work stayed flat this year while overall household income rose, reflecting more income from other sources including gig work, as well as retirement benefits and other inputs.

    “You’re talking about rising gas prices, rising food prices, rising utility prices. Those are baseline expenses that when they don’t get paid, the engine doesn’t run of life, and folks are having to do what they need to do,” said Lord, whose organization — Jeremiah Program — supports working mothers in nine cities around the country. “Where you’re really seeing supplement around that employment is the gig economy. We call it the ‘survival economy.’”

    She predicts a substantial increase in the SPM next year, when that gig work won’t be enough to replace widespread cuts to food stamps.

    Tuesday’s data also showed that 92% of Americans had health insurance for some or all of the year, a near-historic high that has held fairly steady for the past decade.

    But on health insurance, too, the 2025 numbers don’t reflect changes already underway this year. Substantial subsidies for people who buy their health insurance on the Affordable Care Act marketplace expired on Jan. 1, and the healthcare group KFF predicted that as many as 5 million people could lose marketplace coverage in 2026, either because high premiums deterred them from signing up or because they failed to make payments during the year.

    Meanwhile, premiums for employer-sponsored insurance spiked this year and are set to climb more next year, leading more people to choose to go without insurance.

    Tuesday’s data comes from the annual Current Population Survey, a sample conducted by the Census Bureau early each year. The full decennial census that counts every American will next run in 2030. Last week, the Trump administration proposed both adding a question about citizenship to the 2030 Census and leaving immigrants without permanent residency status out of the count.

  • Kennedy Center board votes to close after judge blocks returning Trump’s name to building

    Kennedy Center board votes to close after judge blocks returning Trump’s name to building

    WASHINGTON — The Trump-aligned Kennedy Center board voted on Tuesday to close most of the iconic performing arts venue just hours after a federal judge blocked the institution from returning President Donald Trump’s name to the building.

    In a social media post, Trump said the closure was needed for safety repairs. But he said the repairs, which Congress has allocated $257 million to cover, would only happen if the board was allowed to move forward with plans to add his name to the building. A federal judge has twice said that can’t happen without the approval of Congress.

    “Simply put, Defendants cannot install memorials for President Trump or anyone or anything else at the Kennedy Center without Congress’s blessing,” U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper said in the latest ruling on Tuesday.

    Trump, who was named the Kennedy Center’s chairman last year by loyalists on the board, participated in the virtual board meeting and said on social media that the Justice Department would appeal Cooper’s ruling. He said he’d given $17 million to an endowment intended to support the institution.

    The meeting included testy exchanges at points between Trump and Rep. Joyce Beatty, an Ohio Democrat who has led the campaign to block efforts to memorialize the president at the Kennedy Center. At one point, Beatty referred to Trump as someone who caused “extreme harm,” according to a participant in the meeting who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss private conversations.

    Trump said Beatty was “incompetent” and “holding up everything.”

    “You’re holding up the whole country,” she responded.

    The developments threw into limbo the fate of one of the nation’s most prominent cultural institutions, a place where presidents, lawmakers, and celebrities of all political ideologies have gathered for decades to recognize and celebrate the best in American arts and culture.

    The venue’s leaders have argued that the massive building, which began construction in 1965, was in dire need of renovations. A partial ceiling collapse in the building’s main hallway earlier this month intensified the calls for renovations.

    But Trump’s insistence on a physical recognition of his work on the building, reminiscent of his tendency to add his name to buildings as a real estate developer, has been a persistent sticking point — alienating many of the institution’s longtime supporters and facing repeated legal roadblocks.

    The fight over the Kennedy Center marks a rare setback in Trump’s second term bid to dramatically remake the nation’s capital in his gilded tastes. He’s demolished the East Wing of the White House and is replacing it with a ballroom and plans to build a triumphal arch near Arlington National Cemetery. He’s also eyeing a golf course renovation along the Potomac River.

    The Kennedy Center board voted in August to inscribe his name on the Kennedy Center’s facade so it would read “The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts Restored and Renovated By President Donald J. Trump.” If the Trump Kennedy Center Fund reached $100 million, another inscription would be added reading: “Endowed by the Trump Kennedy Center Fund.”

    The plaza in front of the Kennedy Center would also be renamed in Trump’s honor.

    Cooper ruled in May that the Kennedy Center illegally added Trump’s name to the building, ordering it removed. The institution’s leaders complied in June but left a tarp and scaffolding in place where Trump’s name once stood.

    Hanging over the hearing was the prospect that the administration may seek to demolish the Kennedy Center. In a filing earlier this week, administration lawyers told the court that absent recognition of the president, the Kennedy Center would struggle to raise money for renovations. Without that money, they suggested, the building may need to be demolished, a prospect that alarmed some given Trump’s swift moves last year to dismantle the East Wing.

    The Kennedy Center, the lawyers argued, “will deteriorate further into an unsafe, decrepit structure that will be required to be taken down, with a determination to follow on what to build on the site, such as a large outdoor amphitheater overlooking the Potomac River that has been proposed, by some, for many years.”

  • Prosecutors will not seek death penalty for Nick Reiner

    Prosecutors will not seek death penalty for Nick Reiner

    LOS ANGELES — The Los Angeles County district attorney said Tuesday that his office would not seek the death penalty in the double murder case against Nick Reiner, who is accused of killing his parents, Hollywood director Rob Reiner and Michele Singer Reiner.

    Nathan J. Hochman, the district attorney, said in a news conference before a hearing in the case that the decision was made after “a rigorous review, where we look at the aggravating factors as well as the mitigating factors.”

    Hochman said the district attorney’s office had spoken with the victims’ family, prosecutors, and law enforcement.

    “We did speak with Nick Reiner’s siblings,” he said, referring to Jake and Romy Reiner. “They made their views very clear. We took their views into consideration in ultimately deciding not to seek the death penalty.”

    If Reiner, 33, is convicted, he would face a maximum sentence of life in prison without the possibility of parole. No trial date has been set.

    Rob Reiner and Michele Singer Reiner were found dead inside their home in the Brentwood neighborhood of Los Angeles in December. A grand jury indicted Nick Reiner on two counts of first-degree murder, to which he has pleaded not guilty.

    Reiner has been charged with murder under special circumstances — including the fact that there were multiple killings — which meant prosecutors could seek the death penalty. Other special circumstances included in the indictment were the allegations that he committed the murders “by means of lying in wait” and with a dangerous and deadly weapon, a knife.

    A public defender representing Reiner did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

    Reiner has been trying to gain access to a $1.6 million family trust fund so he can hire a private lawyer, but he has faced opposition from a financial steward who cited California’s “slayer statute.” The statute blocks people from inheriting money from someone they “feloniously and intentionally” kill.

    Reiner has a history of serious mental illness and drug addiction. He has been diagnosed at different times with schizophrenia and schizoaffective disorder, according to people familiar with the situation, and was placed into a yearlong mental health conservatorship in 2020. One of those people told the New York Times that Reiner had been struggling in the weeks before his arrest with a change in his medication.

    Few details have been shared publicly about what the authorities believe led to the killings and what Reiner’s motive could have been. A judge has issued a protective order, barring prosecutors or defense lawyers from releasing any discovery materials.

    Jake and Romy Reiner were both listed on the witness list for grand jury proceedings in July. In an interview with ABC that was broadcast last month, Jake Reiner recalled the discovery of his parents’ killings on Dec. 14, 2025, when his sister called him in distress.

    “Romy told me our dad was dead,” he said in the interview, “and then she said, ‘I can’t find mom.’”

    He declined to say whether he was surprised when he learned that his brother was considered the prime suspect.

    “I’ll never understand,” he said. “I don’t care how it’s explained to me, I don’t care what facts come out. I will never understand why this happened.”

    This article originally appeared in the New York Times.

  • Jalen Hurts donated $600,000 for AC at Philadelphia’s largest high school

    Jalen Hurts donated $600,000 for AC at Philadelphia’s largest high school

    Jalen Hurts was watching morning TV three years ago when he saw something that stopped him in his tracks.

    “I was very blown away by school not being canceled for snow, not for a hurricane or tropical storm, but for lack of AC,” the Eagles star quarterback said Tuesday.

    So Hurts went about doing something to fix that.

    On Tuesday, he stood on Northeast High’s stage to announce his foundation was putting up $600,000 to air-condition the school’s auditorium.

    Mayor Cherelle L. Parker and Eagles quarterback Jalen Hurts are greeted by selected students at they arrive at Northeast High School Tuesday, Sept. 15, 2026 where Hurts announced he was giving the school $600k for an air conditioning system.Tom Gralish / Staff Photographer
    Tiffany W. Thurman, the mayor’s chief of staff, takes a surreptitious selfie as Eagles quarterback Jalen Hurts (rear) waits in the office before the rally.Tom Gralish / Staff Photographer
    Northeast Viking cheerleaders warm up their classmates appearance before the Eagles quarterback arrives onstage.Tom Gralish / Staff Photographer
    Students and staff react as Hurts appears at the pep rally.Tom Gralish / Staff Photographer
    When asked why he was turning his attention to city schools, Hurts said, “it’s about service and showing up for those around you.” Tom Gralish / Staff Photographer
    School Superintendent Tony B. Watlington, Sr. greets Jalen Hurts at a pep rally at Northeast High School Tuesday, Sept. 15, 2026. At left is Kathryn Epps, president & CEO of the Fund for the School District of Philadelphia.Tom Gralish / Staff Photographer
    City Councilmember Isaiah Thomas wipes perspiration from his face, onstage in the sweltering auditorium. Northeast senior Mekhriyona Ilkhomova (right) spoke during the event to thank Hurts and his foundation.Tom Gralish / Staff Photographer
    Hurts onstage with principal Andrew Lukov (from left) School Superintendent Tony B. Watlington, Sr. and Mayor Cherelle L. Parker.Tom Gralish / Staff Photographer
    Hurts signs jerseys and meets with Northeast staff as he leaves the school.Tom Gralish / Staff Photographer
    Northeast High School students watch from their classroom – with a window air conditioning unit – as Eagles quarterback Jalen Hurts leaves the school Tuesday, Sept. 15, 2026 following his donation of $600k for an a new cooling system.Tom Gralish / Staff Photographer

    The timing was good: Although temperatures were in the high 60s when Hurts made his announcement, it was sweltering in the auditorium, with more than 1,000 students, teachers, and dignitaries in the room. Sweat ran down the faces of members of the marching band toting heavy instruments and cheerleaders in long-sleeved uniforms. Mayor Cherelle L. Parker cooled herself with a small personal fan.

    When Hurts watched that TV spot, about half of the district’s schools were not air-conditioned. Hurts’ largesse has helped get the number down, but 52 schools — about a quarter of district buildings — still lack air-conditioning.

    Hurts, on Tuesday, said he wanted to move the needle more for Philadelphia schools.

    “Let’s get it to zero,” Hurts said of the number of schools without air-conditioning. “I want to get it to zero.”

    Northeast High School watch from their classroom – with a window air conditioning unit – as Eagles quarterback Jalen Hurts leaves Tuesday, Sept. 15, 2026 following his appearance there to give the school $600k for an a new cooling system.Tom Gralish / Staff Photographer

    Asked why he was turning his attention to city schools, Hurts said he was influenced by his educator parents and the people who made a way for him.

    “It’s about service and showing up for those around you,” the quarterback said.

    Northeast High had window units cooling classrooms prior to Hurts’ announcement, but the auditorium, a hub of the school and the community, was tough to use in the spring and summer months, said Andrew Lukov, the school’s principal.

    “This changes everything for us,” Lukov said.

    A beaming Parker, who made sure to lead the adoring Northeast crowd in an E-A-G-L-E-S chant, spelled correctly, led the crowd in giving Hurts a standing ovation.

    “Jalen, on behalf of the entire city of Philadelphia, we say thank you for your gift,” Parker said. “You will have an impact on more than the 3,400 students who attend this school on a daily basis. You’ve also done something even more important: You’ve used your time, your treasure, and your celebrity to assist a constituency who will never be able to walk in your shoes.”

    Eagles quarterback Jalen Hurts as he appears at a rally in the auditorium at Northeast High School Tuesday, Sept. 15, 2026 to give the school $600k for an air conditioning system. With him onstage in the auditorium Northeast principal Andrew Lukov, School Superintendent Tony B. Watlington, Sr. and Mayor Cherelle L. Parker.Tom Gralish / Staff Photographer

    It feels a little surreal that a major space in an important school lacks adequate climate control in the United States, said Mekhriyona Ilkhomova, a Northeast senior whose speech earned a broad smile and a hands-over-heart gesture from Hurts.

    Hurts’ donation matters, not just because of the money but because of who he is, said Ilkhomova, a standout student and athlete.

    “It reminds us students of what we can become,” she said, “and what we can give back after becoming.”

    The state of the cool

    District officials had promised the entire system would be air-conditioned by 2027; the system appears off track to reach that goal.

    While Northeast is getting an upgrade, 52 schools lack air-conditioning.

    When temperatures are forecast to hit 85 degrees or higher by noon, those 52 schools are dismissed early. If the weather forecast calls for temperatures of 85 or higher before 9 a.m., those schools are closed for in-person instruction and remote learning days are called.

    That means unequal experiences, with students in some schools not missing instructional time when it’s hot, and those in a quarter of schools subject to interrupted schedules.

    School Superintendent Tony B. Watlington, Sr. (right) greets Eagles quarterback Jalen Hurts as he appears at a rally in the auditorium at Northeast High School Tuesday, Sept. 15, 2026 to give the school $600k for an air conditioning system. At left is Kathryn Epps, president & CEO, The Fund for the School District of PhiladelphiaTom Gralish / Staff Photographer

    Four weeks into a new school year, Philadelphia has had two heat-interrupted days at the 52 schools.

    Cooling the remainder of the 52 schools is not as simple as buying air-conditioning units: Many old buildings lack adequate electrical systems to support whole-school cooling.

    Those projects are complicated.

    An HVAC project at Kensington High went awry this summer, triggering asbestos issues that forced students and staff to relocate for the rest of the calendar year.

  • Reading Terminal Market reports nearly 6 million annual visitors, who spend $1.2 billion in Philly

    Reading Terminal Market reports nearly 6 million annual visitors, who spend $1.2 billion in Philly

    Nearly 6 million Reading Terminal Market visitors, a mix of locals and tourists, spent $1.2 billion in Philadelphia last year, according to a new study on the economic impact of the historic Center City market.

    It’s the first time the nonprofit Reading Terminal Market Corp. has commissioned such a report, and the stats solidify the market’s status as “a beloved civic institution, and a powerful and vital economic engine for Philadelphia and Pennsylvania,” said Annie Allman, CEO and general manager. With the report, Allman said she is encouraging “continued investment in the market, its merchants, and its infrastructure.”

    It highlighted the market’s importance to lower-income residents, with 18 Reading Terminal merchants accepting SNAP and EBT benefits. This accounts for about 55% of the Center City merchants who accept food-assistance programs, according to the report. Reading Terminal Market is considered the largest EBT- and SNAP- redemption location in Pennsylvania.

    “Every dollar spent here is a dollar invested in Philadelphia — in our merchants, our hospitality industry, our neighbors, and our future,” Allman said in a statement.

    The “Feeding the City, Fueling the Economy” report — released Tuesday and conducted by the Philadelphia firm Econsult Solutions at Reading Terminal Market Corp.’s request — found that the market has contributed about $126 million worth of annual economic activity to the city of Philadelphia and $146 million to the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. These figures include direct spending at the market’s more than 75 vendors, as well as the subsequent spending by those vendors and the employees they pay.

    Diners at the Reading Terminal Market in June.Alejandro A. Alvarez / Staff Photographer

    The study also cited national accolades, noting that Reading Terminal was recently named the No. 1 public market in America by USA Today travel experts.

    The new report found just over half of the market’s visitors last year, 3.1 million customers, were visitors staying overnight in the region, while the rest were Philly-area residents.

    Some Reading Terminal customers may have first heard of the market online, on a podcast, or on TV and streaming programs: The report found that Reading Terminal reached 10.8 billion people through these kinds of media mentions, equaling $81 million in “publicity value.”

    People enjoy the pop-up outdoor area on Filbert Street at Reading Terminal Market in July. Tom Gralish / Staff Photographer

    Between the market’s merchants and the corporation that runs it, Reading Terminal pays nearly 700 full-time-equivalent employees a combined $39 million a year, according to the report.

    And market partners spend about $6.1 million a year on capital improvements, which include mechanical, plumbing, and electrical upgrades, as well as larger undertakings like the 2022 Filbert Street Project that added 15,000 square feet of pedestrian-friendly outdoor space.

    Founded in 1893, Reading Terminal is one of the country’s oldest continuously operating markets. Spanning nearly 80,000 square feet along 12th Street, between Arch and Filbert Streets, the market sells everything from fresh produce and seafood to meats and homemade baked goods.

    At its quick-service restaurants, customers can find Caribbean cuisine, Asian street food, Filipino-fusion eats, Thai food, falafel, cheesesteaks, and vegan bites.

    Allman, CEO and general manager, said 2026 “brought unprecedented global attention” to Philadelphia. This summer, the city hosted the World Cup, America’s 250th birthday celebrations, and the MLB All-Star Game. Any economic impact those events had on Reading Terminal Market, however, would be reflected in next year’s report.

    Correction: This story has been updated to reflect that $1.2 billion is the estimated total spend by Reading Terminal Market visitors in Philadelphia, not in the market alone. It also reflects how much market partners spent on capital improvements.