DOJ orders federally funded legal service providers to stop providing support at immigration courts
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(WASHINGTON) — The Department of Justice, under new leadership following the inauguration of Donald Trump, has told legal service providers who receive federal funding to stop providing legal orientation and other work intended to support immigrants at immigration courts.
In a memo obtained by ABC News, the DOJ ordered all such legal providers on Wednesday to “stop work immediately” in those areas.
“This email is to send you notification to stop work immediately pursuant to the Executive Order on the following task orders,” the memo said. The programs listed in the memo include the Legal Orientation Program; the Immigration Court Helpdesk; the Family Group Legal Orientation Program; and the Counsel for Children Initiative.
Legal service providers are usually present at immigration courts across the country to help individuals navigate immigration court proceedings and handle legal paperwork.
“The suspension of these longstanding programs could leave hundreds of thousands of vulnerable immigrants — including children and families — without access to basic legal information and representation,” a spokesperson for Acacia Center for Justice told ABC News in a statement.
The directive from the DOJ comes a day after ABC News reported that four top officials within the Justice Department’s Executive Office for Immigration Review — the DOJ’s office that oversees immigration courts — were removed from their positions.
Experts and advocates told ABC News that, without a lawyer, migrants are left to navigate the different avenues of relief alone, filling out documents in a foreign language and arguing their case before a judge.
As ABC News previously reported, DOJ data from 2023 showed that only 56% of unaccompanied minors in immigration courts were represented by counsel, forcing thousands of unaccompanied young migrants to represent themselves before federal immigration judges.
One of the programs listed in the DOJ memo –The Counsel for Children Initiative — provides legal representation to children in immigration court proceedings.
The total immigration court backlog of children and adults has surged to a record high of 3.5 million cases.
(LOS ANGELES) — Los Angeles County District Attorney Nathan Hochman said Monday he’s asking the court to withdraw the previous district attorney’s motion for resentencing for the Menendez brothers, calling the brothers’ claims of self-defense “lies.”
“We are prepared to go forward” with the hearing regarding their resentencing case, Hochman said at a news conference Monday. “However, we are asking the court to withdraw the previous district attorney’s motion for resentencing, because we believe there are legitimate reasons and the interests of justice justifies that withdrawal.”
The resentencing hearing is set for March 20 and 21.
The request to withdraw the resentencing motion is “based on the current state of the record and the Menendez brothers’ current and continual failure to show full insight and accept full responsibility for their murders,” Hochman said in a statement. “If they were to finally come forward and unequivocally and sincerely admit and completely accept responsibility for their lies of self-defense and the attempted suborning of perjury they engaged in, then the Court should weigh such new insight into the analysis of rehabilitation and resentencing — as will the People.”
Lyle and Erik Menendez are serving life without the possibility of parole.
In October, then-LA County District Attorney George Gascón announced he supported resentencing for the brothers. Gascón recommended their sentences of life without the possibility of parole be removed, and said they should instead be sentenced for murder, which would be a sentence of 50 years to life. Because both brothers were under 26 at the time of the crimes, they would be eligible for parole immediately with the new sentence.
The DA’s office said its resentencing recommendations take into account many factors, including rehabilitation in prison and abuse or trauma that contributed to the crime. Gascón praised the work Lyle and Erik Menendez did behind bars to rehabilitate themselves and help other inmates.
Weeks after Gascón’s announcement, he lost his race for reelection to Hochman.
When Hochman came into office on Dec. 3, he promised to review all the facts before reaching his own decision. He said that effort included speaking to all the prosecutors and defense attorneys involved as well as reviewing thousands of pages of court filings, trial transcripts and confidential prison records.
Hochman’s announcement on Monday comes days after one of the brothers’ cousins, Tamara Goodell, slammed the DA in a letter to the U.S. Attorney’s Office Civil Rights Division.
Goodell accused Hochman of being “hostile, dismissive and patronizing” during two meetings in January with family members who want the brothers released. She said the “lack of compassion was palpable, and the family left feeling not only ignored but further intimidated and revictimized.”
Goodell wants Hochman removed and the case turned over to the attorney general’s office.
This case dates back to 1989, when Lyle Menendez, then 21, and Erik Menendez, then 18, shot and killed their parents, Kitty and Jose Menendez, in the family’s Beverly Hills home.
The defense claimed the brothers acted in self-defense after enduring years of sexual abuse by their father. Prosecutors alleged they killed for money.
Their first trial ended in a mistrial. Lyle and Erik Menendez were convicted in 1996 following their second trial.
The brothers were sentenced to two consecutive life prison terms without the possibility of parole.
Besides resentencing, the brothers have been pursuing two other paths to freedom.
One is their habeas corpus petition, which they filed in 2023 for a review of two new pieces of evidence not presented at trial: a letter Erik Menendez wrote to his cousin eight months before the murders detailing his alleged abuse from his father, and allegations from a former boy band member who revealed in 2023 that he was raped by Jose Menendez.
Hochman announced in February that he’s asked the court to deny the habeas corpus petition, arguing the new evidence isn’t credible or admissible.
The third path to freedom is through the brothers’ request for clemency, which has been submitted to California Gov. Gavin Newsom.
On Feb. 26, Newsom announced that he’s ordering the parole board to conduct a 90-day “comprehensive risk assessment” investigation into whether the brothers pose “an unreasonable risk to the public” if they’re granted clemency and released.
“There’s no guarantee of outcome here,” Newsom said. “But this process simply provides more transparency … as well as provides us more due diligence before I make any determination for clemency.”
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
(WASHINGTON) — President-elect Donald Trump’s attorney general pick, Pam Bondi, made at least $3 million from the merger that formed the parent company of Trump’s Truth Social platform, her new personal financial disclosure filing showed.
According to the filing, Bondi, like “all other shareholders,” received $3 million worth of shares and warrants of the special purpose acquisition company Digital World Acquisition Corporation through a Puerto Rico-based LLC “on the morning of the merger.”
The shares and warrants were then converted to stock in Trump Media & Technology Group (DJT) “upon closing of the merger,” the filing said.
Bondi, a former Florida attorney general who represented Trump during his first impeachment, is listed as a “consultant” for the merger.
Additionally, Bondi disclosed owning another $2 million to $10 million in shares and warrants in the Trump Media & Technology Group.
She has pledged to divest her assets from the Trump Media & Technology Group upon her confirmation as attorney general “as soon as practicable but not later than 90 days after” her confirmation, and to “not participate personally and substantially in any particular matter” related to the company.
The disclosure filing also sheds more light on her lobbying and consulting work for Ballard Partners, a lobbying firm with close ties to Trump, including that last year she made nearly $1.1 million as the firm’s government and public affairs consultant.
Several of her lobbying clients included sheriffs associations, including the Florida Sheriff’s Association, the Florida Sheriff’s Risk Management Fund and Major County Sheriffs of America, as well as Aiden Torch Financial, Safety Net DC, and iGas USA.
She also earned $520,000 last year from consulting for the pro-Trump think tank America First Policy Institute, and another $203,738 from providing legal serves to Pfizer through the law firm Panza, Maurer, & Maynard, P.A., according to the filing.
Her other notable income from the past year included $27,600 in contributor fees from Newsmax and a $20,000 speaking fee from a conference last year hosted by bitnile.com, an online gaming company.
She also earned between $110,003 and $1 million from renting out commercial real estate properties in Florida.
In all, Bondi, together with her spouse, reported a net worth of up to $20 million, with much of her assets other than her Trump social media company holdings consisting of millions of dollars worth of commercial properties in Florida and South Carolina.
In her ethics agreement, Bondi stated that, if confirmed as U.S. attorney general, she will resign from Ballard Partners, AFPI, and Panza, Maurer, & Maynard.
(CALIFORNIA) — Authorities in California are searching for a man who allegedly gunned down his daughters’ mother and kidnapped the two young girls.
The suspect, 23-year-old Jonathan Alexis Maldonado-Cruz, may have fled to Mexico, the Kings County Sheriff’s Office said Wednesday.
The case began Tuesday afternoon when deputies responded to a welfare check in Hanford, about 30 miles south of Fresno, and found a woman shot dead, according to the sheriff’s office.
Authorities believe Maldonado-Cruz fled the home around 1 a.m. Tuesday with the two daughters he shares with the victim: 3-year-old Arya Maldonado and 2-year-old Alana Maldonado.
An Amber Alert has been issued for Arya and Alana, the sheriff’s office said.
Maldonado-Cruz was last known to be driving a gray 2020 Hyundai Elantra with California license plate 8LZD084, authorities said.
The sheriff’s office urges anyone with information to call Detective Tyler Haener at 559-670-9320 or 559-852-2818, or the Kings County Sheriff’s Dispatch at 559-852-2720. Information can be provided anonymously at 559-852-4554.
