Feds say anti-government group plotted New Year’s Eve bombings in Southern California

LOS ANGELES — A plan to attack several Los Angeles-area businesses on New Year's Eve was detailed, dangerous and already in motion, authorities said.

But as four people allegedly tied to a left-wing, antigovernment group gathered last week in the Mojave Desert to make and test several test bombs, FBI officials say, agents were able to foil the terror plot.

"They had everything they needed to make an operational bomb at that location," First Assistant U.S. Atty. Bill Essayli said at a news conference Monday morning. "We disrupted this terror plot before buildings were demolished or innocent people were killed."

The four people were arrested on suspicion of devising a plot that Essayli called "organized, sophisticated and extremely violent." They all were tied to what officials described as a radical faction of the Turtle Island Liberation Front called Order of the Black Lotus. FBI Assistant Director in Charge Akil Davis called the faction "a violent, homegrown, antigovernment group."

Officials wouldn't name the businesses or buildings the group allegedly planned to target, but Essayli said they were various "logistic centers" similar to ones that Amazon might have. He said they were located in Los Angeles and Orange counties.

A criminal complaint charged Audrey Illeene Carroll, 30, of Los Angeles; Zachary Aaron Page, 32, of Torrance; Dante Gaffield, 24, of Los Angeles; and Tina Lai, 41, of Glendale, with conspiracy and possession of an unregistered destructive device. Their attorneys either did not immediately respond to inquiries or declined to comment.

—Los Angeles Times

Court battle begins over Republican challenge to California's Proposition 50

Republicans and Democrats squared off in court Monday in a high-stakes battle over the fate of California’s Proposition 50, which reconfigures the state’s congressional districts and could ultimately help determine which party controls the U.S. House in the 2026 midterms.

Dozens of California politicians and Sacramento insiders — from GOP Assembly members to Democratic redistricting expert Paul Mitchell — have been called to testify in a Los Angeles federal courtroom over the next few days.

The GOP wants the three-judge panel to temporarily block California’s new district map, claiming it is unconstitutional and illegally favors Latino voters.

An overwhelming majority of California voters approved Proposition 50 on Nov. 4 after Gov. Gavin Newsom pitched the redistricting plan as a way to counter partisan gerrymandering in Texas and other GOP-led states. Democrats admitted the new map would weaken Republicans’ voting power in California, but argued it would just be a temporary measure to try to restore national political balance.

Attorneys for the GOP cannot challenge the new redistricting map on the grounds that it disenfranchises swaths of California Republicans. In 2019, the U.S. Supreme Court decided that complaints of partisan gerrymandering have no path in federal court.

But the GOP can bring claims of racial discrimination.

On Monday, attorneys for the GOP began by homing in on the new map’s Congressional District 13, which currently encompasses Merced, Stanislaus and parts of San Joaquin and Fresno counties, along with parts of Stockton.

—Los Angeles Times

House clears whole milk for school menus

Whole milk is poised to return to the menu for schools participating in the National School Lunch Program for the first time in over a decade.

The House cleared a bill Monday for the president’s desk that would put whole milk back into K-12 schools. The chamber passed the measure by voice vote less than a month after the Senate passed it by unanimous consent.

“This is a win for kids, parents, Kansas dairy farmers, and common sense,” Sen. Roger Marshall, R- Kan., the bill’s sponsor, said in a statement Monday. “The Whole Milk for Healthy Kids Act puts nutrition back in the lunchroom, gives families more choice, and ensures our children have access to the nutrients they need to grow strong and healthy.”

The bill would allow public schools to serve flavored and unflavored, organic and nonorganic whole and 2 percent milk. The National School Lunch Program currently allows schools to serve only fat-free and low-fat, flavored and unflavored milk.

The measure has the backing of House Agriculture Chairman Glenn “GT” Thompson. The Pennsylvania Republican has for years tried to get whole milk back into schools. He sponsored the House version that was approved, 24-10, by the House Education and Workforce Committee in February.

—CQ Roll Call

EU blacklists former Haitian President Martelly, 2 former senators for alleged gang ties

Former Haitian President Michel Martelly has been blacklisted by the European Union alongside two once powerful lawmakers and a criminal gang, the EU said Monday, citing their alleged roles in Haiti’s escalating gang violence.

Martelly’s name was added to the EU Council’s sanctions list along with that of former senators Youri Latortue, founder of the political party L’Ayiti An Aksyon, and Rony Célestin, as well as the 5 Segond gang, a powerful criminal group operating in Port-au-Prince.

The EU Council said Martelly, 64, and Latortue, who served as an adviser to the singer-turned-president, “both armed and financed several gangs to promote their political agenda, defend their personal and economic interests, and control the territory.”

Latortue told the Miami Herald that he recognizes “it is the prerogative of the EU to levy administrative sanctions on whomever it wishes, even if the justification offered is false and even, absurd,” but they are ill-timed considering the ongoing volatility in the capital, and the Artibonite region, which he represented in the Senate.

—Miami Herald