37 live giant beetles found inside Japanese snack packets at LAX
U.S. Customs and Border Protection
(LOS ANGELES) — At least 37 giant live beetles measuring 4 to 5 inches have been found concealed inside of multiple packages of Japanese snacks, potato chips and chocolate at Los Angeles International Airport, authorities said.
The contraband was discovered by U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agriculture specialists assigned to LAX during a physical examination of a shipment arriving from Japan via air cargo last month.
Upon inspection, authorities ended up discovering discovered 37 live giant beetles — worth an estimated $1,480 — hidden in packets of Japanese junk food.
“They may look harmless but in reality, smuggled beetles pose a significant threat to our vital agriculture resources,” said Cheryl M. Davies, CBP Director of Field Operations in Los Angeles. “Beetles can become a serious pest by eating plants, leaves, and roots and by laying eggs on tree bark which damages our forests.”
Sought after by collectors and enthusiasts, exotic insects are highly popular and often sold online and underground, authorities said.
“The illegal trade of exotic insects bring hefty profits for those willing to take the risk of circumventing U.S. laws and regulations,” CBP said in their release regarding the case on Wednesday.
Importing live insects into the U.S., require a U.S. Department of Agriculture Animal and Plant Inspection Service Plant Protection and Quarantine permit, or a letter issued by PPQ Plants, Pathogens and Biocontrol unit, according to CBP.
The seized beetles were turned over to USDA officials, who will determine the final destination of the insects, meaning they will likely be donated to local zoos that have permits for live insects or be preserved in a local insect collection.
“CBP agriculture specialists combine their scientific knowledge of harmful pests and plant diseases with their expertise in detecting and intercepting these threats before their enter our country,” said Andrew H. Douglas, CBP LAX Port Director. “We are very proud of their contributions to our national security mission.”
On an average day in 2023, CBP agriculture specialists seize an estimated 3,287 prohibited plants, meat and animal byproducts and intercept over 231 agricultural pests that could potentially harm America’s agricultural resources.
(WASHINGTON) — The Internal Revenue Service on Thursday began laying off more than 6,000 new and newly promoted employees across the country, sources familiar with the planning told ABC News, as part of President Donald Trump’s campaign to shrink the federal workforce that could have potential consequences for the current tax filing season.
The layoffs, impacting roughly 6%-7% of the agency’s 100,000-person workforce, began midday Thursday primarily outside the Washington, D.C., area, with thousands of employees facing layoffs at offices in Texas, Florida, Pennsylvania, Georgia, Tennessee, New York, and beyond, sources told ABC News.
As of Thursday morning, over 500 terminations were expected in Texas; over 600 in New York; over 400 in Georgia; and over 300 in each Florida, Tennessee, and Philadelphia, one source said.
Layoffs could continue into Friday at some IRS offices around the country if weather conditions prevent managers and employees from getting to work, according to an email sent to managers of probationary employees and obtained by ABC News.
The layoffs arrive in the middle of tax season as millions of Americans are filing their returns and hoping for timely refunds — but the exact impact on filing season is not yet clear.
Teams within the IRS being impacted by the layoffs include members of the small business/self-employed unit and clerks in various units, sources told ABC News.
Also impacted are members of the appeals team, whose role is to “resolve disputes, without litigation” with taxpayers, according to the IRS website, as well as employees with the Taxpayer Advocate Service, an independent organization within the IRS that helps to “protect taxpayer rights” and advocate for taxpayers who have issues with the IRS or are experiencing financial hardship.
Ahead of the layoffs, the IRS combed through an initial list of approximately 15,000 probationary employees to try to ensure that no one being laid off this week plays a “direct” role in filing season, sources said. But there are still widespread concerns within the IRS that the firings could ultimately cause delays:
One former IRS commissioner told ABC News it’s “unrealistic” to think firings could occur during filing season and that the process would still run entirely smoothly.
“The bottom line: Forever, it has been an absolute rule of thumb that you keep things stable during filing season. Because it’s delicate,” the former commissioner said. “And the idea that nearly 10% of the entire IRS workforce is being laid off right in the middle of filing season is extremely risky.”
The former commissioner said filing season is like an assembly line with incoming and outgoing products: there are incoming tax forms and correspondence, and outgoing credits, refunds, and balance-due notices.
“There are layers of indirect support that go into that — that could be technology, other types of logistics, supply chains. If you lose that capacity, it will diminish productivity,” the former commissioner said. “Filing season is all hands on deck. Something could break down. You could need to surge resources to one area of service. Things don’t always go as planned at the assembly line.”
“We can expect Americans to experience a return to slower refunds, to longer waits on hold, to dropped calls,” Vanessa Williamson, senior fellow at the Tax Policy Center, said on a call with reporters Thursday. “It’s going to be a real impact on customer service right as taxes are due this year.”
One probationary worker expecting to be fired told ABC News that “termination of probationary employees could prolong audits.”
Another agency official said morale at the IRS is “low” and that they expected remaining workers to “protest internally in ways that could impact filing season.”
On Thursday morning, a union representing IRS employees distributed a letter to members with instructions on what to do if they receive a termination letter.
“Print out everything in your Employee Personnel File that verifies when you started your job,” the email said. “Print last three paystubs and W-2. Print your annual appraisal. Keep your printed copies at home.”
An IRS spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment from ABC News.
Sources told ABC News that they expect further layoffs after tax season, and senior Trump administration officials have said that Trump wants to dismantle the tax-collecting agency entirely, which would require congressional approval.
“His goal is to abolish the Internal Revenue Service and let all the outsiders pay,” Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said on Fox News Wednesday night, referencing Trump’s proposal to create an “External Revenue Agency” to collect tariffs on foreign imports.
Experts say that abolishing the IRS would be extraordinarily difficult, and that it’s the sole government agency that collects the taxpayer money Trump is using to pay for his priorities, including border enforcement.
The IRS also would have to oversee any repayments to taxpayers envisioned by Trump and DOGE head Elon Musk, who recently floated the idea that Americans should receive a percentage of savings from the widespread government cuts.
“I love it. A 20% dividend, so to speak, for the money that we’re saving by going after the waste, fraud and abuse and all of the other things that are happening,” Trump said this week. “I think it’s a great idea.”
The cuts come two years after the IRS received tens of billions of dollars in funding from the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act, which the agency said helped it hire more customer service representatives — thereby cutting in half the average time needed to process taxpayer correspondence from 7 months to 3.5 months.
At the end of fiscal year 2024, the IRS employed a total of 100,433 people — including accountants, managers, lawyers and other staff — which was up from about 90,000 the year before.
ABC News’ Anne Flaherty and Elizabeth Schulze contributed to this report.
(CALIFORNIA) — Voices were full of panic when 911 operators began answering the urgent calls for help that started flowing into the emergency line on the evening of Jan. 7.
“There’s houses on fire. There’s no [expletive] anybody here,” one caller told the woman answering for the Sierra Madre Police Department in the suburbs of Los Angeles County. The caller was begging for firefighters. “Get them here now!”
The caller had spotted what would become known as the Eaton Fire, one of the most destructive infernos in California history.
ABC News and affiliate KABC-TV obtained a recording of the woman’s call, along with multiple other conversations between residents and Sierra Madre dispatchers under the California Public Records Act.
The recordings shine new light on the initial confusion and subsequent fear faced by residents who saw the initial flames during January’s deadly wildfires.
“I don’t know if anyone has called yet, but we noticed that there is an extremely large fire to the northwest of Grand View,” another caller said. “It looks like it’s in the neighborhood. Like, we’re starting to think we need to evacuate and we need Sierra Madre to start getting on this.”
The dispatcher responded that the fire was in neighboring Pasadena at the time, not in the caller’s area.
“No, no, no, not Pasadena,” the caller responded, explaining his location. “We just walked outside. We’re panicking to evacuate.”
One by one, the calls poured in from Sierra Madre and surrounding areas. A third caller told a dispatcher that he was not home at the time, but could see flames from a surveillance camera on his property.
“There’s homes on fire on Ranch Top in Hastings Ranch,” a fourth caller said. “There’s no fire truck out here. Not one.”
Over the next 24 days, the Eaton Fire would spread across 14,000 acres in the San Gabriel Mountains, Altadena, Pasadena and Sierra Madre, according to the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection. More than 9,000 structures were destroyed and 17 people died.
The cause of the fire remains under investigation.
The Eaton Fire started more than seven hours after the Palisades Fire broke out on the other side of Los Angeles County, near the Pacific Ocean.
Multiple agencies, including the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department, the California Highway Patrol and the Los Angeles Police Department, have declined requests to provide ABC News with audio files associated with the Palisades Fire.
Nancy Lane/MediaNews Group/Boston Herald via Getty Images
(NEW YORK) — Deviations from normal weather patterns are putting several regions in the U.S. at risk for an uptick of disease-spreading pests as winter turns to spring, according to a new analysis.
A surge in disease-spreading pests like ticks, mosquitoes, cockroaches and rodents is expected in regions that experienced especially warm or wet winters this season, according to the National Pest Management Association’s bi-annual Public Health Pest Index.
These pests can spread dangerous diseases such as Lyme disease, West Nile virus, Salmonella, plague, and hantavirus, said Jorge Parada, medical adviser for NPMA with a focus on infectious disease, in a statement. These types of pests can also trigger asthma and allergies, Parada said.
Warm winters typically allows more rats to survive, while unusual weather patterns — such as snow in New Orleans — can present a host of new pest problems, Jim Fredericks, senior vice president of public affairs for NPMA, told ABC News.
Ticks and mosquitoes survive better when it is moist, so regions that experienced especially wet winters will likely see those pests on the rise during the spring, Fredericks said.
“If the temperatures are above 50 degrees Fahrenheit, ticks will be active and in search of food,” Fredericks said.
Changes in climate — both in terms of warmer temperatures as well as the extreme weather events occurring as global temperatures rise — will have a greater impact on the threats these pests pose in the future, Fredericks said. The range for pests like ticks are also spreading due to warmer temperatures, Fredericks said.
The top U.S. cities named on the pest index include:
Boston:“Brutal” snowstorms and cold snaps pushed rodents indoors in search of warmth and food sources, according to the NPMA. In addition, a forecasted warmer start to spring could give ticks a jumpstart to the season.
Cleveland:“Mild, soggy conditions” during the winter could allow for pest populations like cockroaches and ticks to flourish as temperatures rise, the analysis found.
“The pathogens that they carry that could cause food-borne illness,” Fredericks said, adding that rodent dander and urine can also exacerbate asthma symptoms.
Denver: “A frigid and snow-packed” start to the season will likely drive house mice into homes and businesses, while white-footed mice activity inside structures could increase in rural areas, according to the NPMA.
“The white-footed mouse is actually one of the vectors for hantavirus,” Fredericks said.
Grand Rapids, Michigan: “Record-breaking” snowfall is expected to drive rats and mice indoors, and heavy rain forecasted for the area could lead to a rise in tick populations as temperatures rise, according to the NPMA.
Louisville, Kentucky: Rats and mice are expected to enter structures due to extreme cold and historic snowfall. Tick activity may also begin earlier than usual due to a warm spring.
New Orleans: Historic snowfall in the region sent rats and cockroaches into homes, and mosquitoes are expected to make a “fierce comeback” as temperatures climb, the analysis found.
Salt Lake City: Winter conditions could send house mice and white-footed mice indoors.
San Antonio: “Record-breaking warmth” during the winter allowed mosquitoes, cockroaches and ticks to stay active, and a “pest boom” is expected come spring — with a surge in bites, infestations and pest-related health concerns forecasted.
Seattle: A warm, dry start to winter could lead to an increase in rodent and cockroach activity indoors and an increase in tick populations could occur with the spring rains, according to the NPMA.
Washington, D.C.: A “rollercoaster” winter that started unusually warm and ended in heavy snowfall has made rodent activity climb significantly in the nation’s capital, the report states. Tick populations could surge if spring arrives early.
Florida: The group has issued a statewide warning for Florida, pointing to the Sunshine State’s humid climate that allows disease-carrying pests to thrive year-round, the report stated. Although the winter brought dry, cool conditions, a surge is expected this spring as rising temperatures and humidity create ideal breeding conditions.
“We have all of the mosquito species here,” Ryan Carney, an assistant professor at the University of South Florida’s Department of Integrative Biology, told ABC News. “There’s a huge diversity, over 90 species of mosquitoes. Fourteen of those are anopheles, which spread malaria.”
Mosquitoes are the deadliest animal on the planet, killing more than 1 million people per year from the diseases they carry, and Florida is no stranger to outbreaks of mosquito-borne illness. In 2023, nearly 200 people contracted dengue fever, and there were more than 1,500 cases of Zika in the state from 2016 to 2018, Carney said.
A citizen science project run by USF creates artificial intelligence algorithms to help identify and stop disease-carrying mosquitoes before they are able to infect humans and other large mammals.
“These citizen sciences, especially for mosquitoes, are a way that people can report these sightings of mosquitoes or mosquito bites, and that helps us scientists understand the biodiversity of mosquitoes in the area,” Carney said.
