Former Yankee Brett Gardner’s teen son died on family vacation to Costa Rica: Officials
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(COSTA RICA) — The 14-year-old son of former New York Yankees player Brett Gardner was vacationing with his family in Costa Rica when he suddenly fell ill and died in his sleep, according to the U.S. State Department.
Miller Gardner’s death was announced Sunday in a statement by his father and mother, Jessica Gardner, that was released on the Yankees’ X account.
Brett and Jessica Gardner said their son died in his sleep on Friday while on vacation, after falling ill along with several other family members.
The Gardners said their youngest child “has left us far too soon.”
On Monday, the U.S. State Department confirmed to ABC News that Miller Gardner died while he was in Costa Rica.
“We can confirm the death of a U.S. citizen in Costa Rica on March 21,” a State Department spokesperson said. “We are closely monitoring local authorities’ investigation into the cause of death. Out of respect for the privacy of the family and loved ones during this difficult time, we have no further comment at this time.”
The State Department did not say what city the Gardners were staying in at the time of the teen’s death.
“We have so many questions and so few answers at this point, but we do know that he passed away peacefully in his sleep on the morning of Friday, March 21st,” the statement from Gardner and his wife read. “Miller was a beloved son and brother and we cannot yet comprehend our life without his infectious smile. He loved football, baseball, golf, hunting, fishing, his family and his friends. He lived life to the fullest every single day.”
The couple also expressed deep gratitude for the support and encouragement they’ve received.
“We are confident our faith, family, and friends will help us navigate this unimaginable loss,” the Gardners wrote in the statement. “Our prayers go out to Miller’s teammates and friends, as well as to all other families who have lost a child far too soon as we share their grief. Please respect our wishes for privacy as we mourn and search for healing.”
In addition to Miller, Brett and Jessica Gardner also share an older son, Hunter Gardner.
Brett Gardner, a former outfielder, spent his entire 14-season MLB career with the Yankees. He was named an American League All-Star in 2015 and won a Golden Glove Award in 2016, and was part of the team that won the World Series in 2009, just one year after making his major league debut. He retired following the 2021 season.
In the wake of the news of Miller Gardner’s death, the Yankees shared a separate statement on Facebook, offering “unconditional and absolute” love to the Gardner family, while also acknowledging their need for privacy during this difficult time.
“Words feel insignificant and insufficient in trying to describe such an unimaginable loss,” the Yankees’ statement reads. “It wasn’t just Brett who literally grew up in this organization for more than 17 years — so did his wife, Jessica, and their two boys, Hunter and Miller.”
“We grieve with Brett, Jessica, Hunter and their community of family and friends in mourning the loss of Miller, who had a spark in his eyes, an outgoing and feisty personality, and a warm and loving nature,” the statement added.
“May Miller rest in peace,” the statement concludes.
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(SAN DIEGO) — Sea lions on the California coast are reportedly displaying strange behavior, likely due to a harmful algae bloom impacting the region, according to marine researchers.
There have been reports of the marine mammals acting aggressively in some cases, and in others, they appear lethargic, Jeni Smith, rescue supervisor at SeaWorld San Diego, told ABC San Diego affiliate KGTV. Smith described one sea lion who appeared to be “star-gazing.”
“Some animals seem very, very sleepy, maybe right after having a seizure, Smith said. “They may be abnormally aggressive.”
The sea lions are likely being poisoned by domoic acid, a neurotoxin within the algae blooms, which they ingest through the fish they eat, according to marine experts. Ingesting domoic acid can cause amnesic shellfish poisoning in humans and marine mammals, according to the Marine Mammal Care Center.
Harmful algal blooms occur when colonies of algae grow out of control and produce toxic or harmful affects on people, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Some blooms produce toxins that can kill fish, mammals and birds. In some cases, the algal blooms can cause illness or death in humans, according to NOAA.
The toxic algae blooms typically only form every four to seven years, but warming temperatures and an increase of pollution can increase the growth and occurrences, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Recently, marine researchers in Southern California have witnessed consecutive years of harmful algal blooms, Dave Bader, chief operations and education officer at the Marine Mammal Care Center in San Pedro, told KGTV.
The Marine Mammal Care Center has taken in nearly 150 sea lions since February, Bader said. There have been reports of dolphins and seabirds falling ill as well, and this event could be worse than the bloom that occurred in 2023, which killed 1,000 sea lions, according to the marine conservation group.
RJ LaMendola said he was surfing when he was attacked at Oxnard State Beach in Ventura County, California, by a “demonic” sea lion that bit him and dragged him off his board, he wrote on Facebook on Friday.
LaMendola described the sea lion as “feral” and “almost demonic.” The decades-long surfer was struck that the mammal was “devoid of the curiosity or playfulness” he usually associates with sea lions, he wrote.
“This isn’t normal sea lion behavior — it’s something darker, something dangerous,” he wrote, saying he won’t be surfing again “anytime soon.”
Smith urged the public to do their part to create a better environment for marine life and prevent pollution.
“Throwing away their trash, not allowing anything toxic to go down the storm drain, because everything goes back to the ocean,” Smith said.
Alfredo Pacheco, a Venezuelan migrant who earlier this year was diagnosed with end-stage kidney failure, displays a photo of himself and his brother Jose Gregorio Gonzalez, March 26, 2025, in Cicero, Illinois. Gonzalez, also a migrant from Venezuela, was set to donate a kidney for his brother but was arrested and now detained by ICE. (Antonio Perez/Chicago Tribune/Tribune News Service via Getty Images)
(BROADVIEW, Ill.) — A man who was detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) earlier this month was temporarily released from an Illinois facility on Friday, after community advocates and officials appealed for his freedom so he can resume the kidney donation process in hopes of saving his brother’s life.
José Gregorio González, who was detained by ICE on March 3, was reunited with his brother José Alfredo Pacheco, who is in end-state kidney failure.
The brothers spoke out during a press conference in Chicago on Friday morning, where they were joined by their legal team, local officials and community advocates from the The Resurrection Project — the group that advocated for González’s release.
“I want to inform you that I’m extremely happy for the liberation of my brother. We fought for one month and one day to reach this goal,” Pacheco said in Spanish, addressing a group of supporters. “Thank you to the team of my lawyer Peter, thank you to the press that has helped get to this goal. I’m extremely thankful. Thank you very much.”
Visibly emotional and wearing a mask, Pacheco told reporters that he had a dialysis appointment earlier in the morning and he wouldn’t wish this illness on anybody.
Asked about the first thing he and his brother will do together, Pacheco said that they are going to call their mother so she can see them together.
According to The Resurrection Project, González was released from ICE custody three hours ahead of schedule on Friday morning. He was being held in the Clay County Jail in Brazil, Indiana, ICE records showed, and transferred to Broadview, Illinois, for release.
González answered one question during the press conference, speaking in Spanish.
“He said that he’s very happy for all the help the community has given him, for all the support that he thought was unbelievable, and to see his brother, he thinks it was something just very unbelievable,” a translator said. “He never would have imagined that that was possible.”
According to his attorney Peter Meinecke, González has been granted supervised release for one year.
“ICE has granted José a stay of removal for one year and released him under an order of supervision,” Meinecke said at Friday’s press conference. “This means ICE has decided José’s release is warranted due to urgent humanitarian factors. José will now be able to return home where he can resume the process of donating his kidney and saving his brother’s life.”
He noted that González will have to check in with ICE periodically during this time.
“This is part of an alternative to detention program for individuals whose continued detention is not in the public interest,” Meinecke said on Friday. “While José is released on an order supervision, he will be eligible to apply for a work permit at the end of one year, ICE could detain him and could ultimately seek to remove him to Venezuela.”
An ICE spokesperson provided a statement Friday evening in response to an ABC News request for comment evening stating: “Jose Gregorio Gonzalez, 43, is a citizen of Venezuela who has been ordered removed to his home country by an immigration judge. Gonzalez was arrested and placed in ICE custody March 3 without incident. After providing proper documentation ICE granted Gonzalez a temporary stay on humanitarian grounds.”
Meinecke, an attorney with The Resurrection Project, told ABC News in an interview on Wednesday that Pacheco reached out to the group earlier this month seeking support after González was detained.
Speaking in Spanish, Pacheco addressed a crowd of supporters during a press conference on Monday and called for his brother’s release.
“My health is at serious risk — I have 100% kidney failure and depend on dialysis three times a week,” he said, according to a translation provided by The Resurrection Project.
“It’s extremely difficult — sometimes, I can barely get out of bed. I have three children, 9-year-old twins and a 17-year-old back home, and I want to live to see them grow up. My brother used to take me to my appointments, but now I’m alone. My brother is a good man, not a criminal in Venezuela or here — he came only with the hope of donating his kidney to me. I thought I was alone, but seeing the support of this community has moved me deeply.”
Meinecke said that he had been in touch with González’s ICE officer over the past few weeks and submitted a request for release on temporary humanitarian parole on March 25.
“He needs to show that his release is either in the public interest or is necessary for like, urgent humanitarian factors. And in his case, we argue both,” Meinecke said. “You know, obviously, the medical conditions kind of speak to both. They’re both urgent humanitarian factors by now, but organ donation is in the public interest as well.”
Meinecke explained that Pacheco was admitted into the U.S. from Venezuela in 2023 and was permitted to apply for asylum, so he has a work permit while his asylum application is pending. His wife and three children remain in Venezuela. But soon after he arrived in the U.S., he suffered from stomach pain, according to Meinecke.
“[Alfredo] went to the hospital with severe abdominal pain, which is when he was diagnosed with end-stage kidney failure,” Tovia Siegel, director of organizing and leadership at the Resurrection Project, told ABC News on Wednesday. “At the time, he was told he had 2% functioning of his kidneys and would need dialysis consistently, multiple times a week to survive, and really, his best chance to live a full, healthy life would be a kidney transplant.”
Since his diagnosis in 2023, Pacheco’s condition has deteriorated, Siegel said.
“[Alfredo] currently receives [dialysis] three times a week, from 4 a.m. to 8 a.m., and his brother José came here to help care for him, and with the intention of being able to donate his kidney and save Alfredo’s life,” Siegel said. “And so for the last year, José has essentially been a full-time caretaker for Alfredo, helping with cooking, cleaning, etc, and with the intent to donate his kidney.”
But unlike Pacheco, when González arrived to the U.S. from Venezuela “primarily to assist” his brother, he failed to pass the credible fear screening, which did not allow him to apply for asylum like Pacheco had done, according to Meinecke, so he was detained by ICE for several months and then he was granted temporary supervised release but still faced a pending removal order. During his time on supervised release, González routinely checked in with his ICE officer, provided his address and wore an ankle monitor, Meinecke said.
Siegel said that González was detained while the brothers were leaving their home to go to Pacheco’s kidney dialysis appointment.
“It was shocking and devastating,” she said. “They had been living life together, and an incredibly difficult life where one of the brothers was undergoing incredible medical distress and suffering.”
“They were taking care of one another and surviving for a year together,” she added. “And during that time, clearly, you know, caring deeply for one another, loving each other as family members do. José [Gregorio] had no contact with police, the criminal legal system, and then one morning, with, you know, completely unexpected, ICE came to their home.”
González is likely going to donate for a swap but is hoping he’s a match, according to Siegel.
Friday’s release came after ICE denied on Monday a stay of removal request submitted by his attorneys and then the case was elevated to an ICE Chicago Field Supervisor, according to The Resurrection Project.
“This is literally a matter of life and death,” said Erendira Rendón, vice president of immigrant justice at The Resurrection Project. “ICE has the discretionary authority to release Mr. González on humanitarian grounds. Every day he remains detained is another day his brother’s life hangs in the balance.”
Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem/ Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
(WASHINGTON) — Immigrant rights groups and immigration law experts are raising concerns after the Department of Homeland Security announced that it is creating an online database designed to keep track of migrants over the age of 14 who are living in the country illegally.
Migrants who are in the United States without authorization must register their information in a database that tracks them in an effort to “compel” self-deportation, the DHS said in a press release on Tuesday. However, the registry had not been set up as of Wednesday. A U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services webpage instructed migrants who are required to register to create an online account with the agency.
Vowing to “use every available tool to compel illegal aliens to self-deport,” a DHS statement said people who fail to register and submit fingerprints could face fines and imprisonment.
“President [Donald] Trump and Secretary [of Homeland Security Kristi] Noem have a clear message for those in our country illegally: leave now. If you leave now, you may have the opportunity to return and enjoy our freedom and live the American dream,” a DHS spokesperson said in a statement on Tuesday. “The Trump administration will enforce all our immigration laws—we will not pick and choose which laws we will enforce. We must know who is in our country for the safety and security of our homeland and all Americans.”
The DHS said it’s invoking a decades-old section of the Immigration and Nationality Act that requires registration from migrants over the age of 14 who are in the United States, who have not been fingerprinted or registered, and who have been in the country for more than 30 days.
“Historically, we know that we have to sit up and pay attention anytime a government says it’s going to set up a registry on the basis of national origin or race or religion or any other immutable characteristic, because dramatic losses of civil liberties and civil rights are sure to follow and potentially worse,” said Heidi Altman, vice president of policy at the National Immigration Law Center.
Following the 9/11 attack, President George W. Bush’s administration set up a system known as the National Security Entry-Exit Registration System, which required registration from certain noncitizens — mostly from Muslim-majority countries and North Korea.
“Like the registry system that Trump is envisioning here, it was set up under a guise of national security or public safety concerns that, in the end, only served to eviscerate civil rights for the communities that were targeted and to separate communities,” Altman said. “There were about 83,000 people who were forced to register through NSEERS and many thousands of them were put in deportation proceedings.”
Parents and legal guardians of undocumented immigrants who are under 14 years of age and have not previously registered would also have to sign up to the database.
Under the Trump administration’s registry, immigrants over the age of 18 would be issued proof that they’ve registered that they “must carry and keep in their possession at all times,” the USCIS website said.
That requirement is stoking fears that this would be a new “show me your papers” type of law, said Michelle Lapointe, legal director for the American Immigration Council.
“There are some real civil liberties issues here,” Lapointe told ABC News. “It will end up ensnaring people based on law enforcement’s perceptions of their race and assumptions that law enforcement makes about people’s immigration status based on that.”
“So, there’s real opportunity for abuse, because this is essentially setting up a system where people have to produce their papers — show their papers to law enforcement to prove their status,” she continued.
Lapointe said that the DHS is also threatening jail time for failing to register, even though being in the country without authorization isn’t always punishable by imprisonment.
“An alien’s failure to register is a crime that could result in a fine, imprisonment, or both,” Tuesday’s press release said.
In many cases, being in the country without authorization is a civil offense and would typically be punishable by removal instead of incarceration.
As the Trump administration continues to ramp up its deportation efforts, Greg Chen, senior director of Government Relations for American Immigration Lawyers Association, said that few people may choose to register.
“I don’t think many people are going to come forward and register, because they’re going to be too afraid that if they register, they’re simply going to be deported rapidly, given the aggressive mass deportation plan that administration is setting up,” Chen said.
