The high-profile deportation case of Kilmar Abrego Garcia is once again in the spotlight after an “activist” judge once again temporarily threw a wrench in the Department of Homeland Security’s work.

On Friday, U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis issued an order barring immigration enforcement officials from detaining and deporting Garcia.

‘This order lacks any valid legal basis, and we will continue to fight this tooth and nail in the courts.’

Judge Xinis, who was appointed by former President Barack Obama, upheld requests from Garcia’s lawyers for a temporary restraining order against Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials, Newsweek reported.

Garcia was freed from immigration detention on Thursday after months of being in limbo, the Associated Press reported.

RELATED: Kilmar Abrego Garcia’s days in the US may be numbered after court’s latest ruling

Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images

“For the public to have any faith in the orderly administration of justice, the Court’s narrowly crafted remedy cannot be so quickly and easily upended without further briefing and consideration,” Xinis wrote.

Garcia’s attorney, Simon Sandoval-Moshenberg, celebrated the news of the restraining order and his client’s release.

“Yesterday’s order from Judge Xinis and now the temporary restraining order this morning represent a victory of law over power,” Sandoval-Moshenberg said.

Department of Homeland Security Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin, who allegedly faced death threats from twin brothers from New Jersey earlier this week, told Newsweek that the decision was “naked judicial activism.”

“This order lacks any valid legal basis, and we will continue to fight this tooth and nail in the courts,” McLaughlin added.

Garcia, an illegal alien and alleged MS-13 associate living in Maryland, was deported to an infamous Salvadoran prison earlier this year before being returned to the United States for continued processing of his case.

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An Atlanta homeowner shot two juveniles who were taking packages from his porch Thursday afternoon, police said.

Atlanta Police Chief Darin Schierbaum told WXIA-TV that officers responded around 3:30 p.m. to the 800 block of Celeste Lane in the Mays neighborhood, which is part of the Villages of Cascade complex, after reports of shots fired. The townhomes are down the street from a high school, the station said.

‘At that exact moment, was he realistically and reasonably under an apparent threat?’

WXIA said a 15-year-old was shot in the foot while a second juvenile was taken to a hospital in critical condition. Police told the station late Thursday night that he made it through surgery and is expected to survive. WXIA said in its video report that the second juvenile was shot in the arm.

Schierbaum told the station that investigators determined the two juveniles were taking packages from a townhome when the homeowner came outside and opened fire.

RELATED: Texas homeowner brings his AK-style rifle — and his armed wife — to confront suspected car thieves. One shot is all it takes.

The homeowner was taken to police headquarters for questioning, WXIA said, and officers executed a search warrant at the residence as part of the ongoing investigation.

“That search warrant is allowing us to gather evidence, is allowing us to gain clarity,” Schierbaum added to the station.

The chief also noted to WXIA: “The Atlanta Police Department takes gun violence very seriously. It’s been the charge of Mayor [Andre] Dickens to address gun violence in our city; that’s why you see a robust response. But anytime a child is injured in our city, we really take that seriously. And we want to make sure we know what’s happening as individuals being held accountable.”

RELATED: Texas homeowner shoots and kills man trying to steal his car, police say

The station added that the shooting is stirring debate over the use of deadly force to protect property.

Atlanta criminal defense attorney Joshua Schiffer, who is not affiliated with the case, told WXIA that people in Georgia have the right to protect themselves and their property, but deadly force must be justified.

“Were these two young men on the doorstep acting in a violent or threatening manner, or were they running away? What juncture did the homeowner decide to discharge their personal weapon using deadly force, and were they justified? That’s going to depend on the facts,” Schiffer told the station. “At that exact moment, was he realistically and reasonably under an apparent threat?”

Police added to WXIA that charges, if any, will depend on evidence and witness statements gathered as part of its investigation.

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Instead of the usual Nativity scene this time of year, St. Susanna Catholic Church in Dedham, Massachusetts, featured something far less Christmasy: a sign reading “ICE was here.” Rather than celebrate the joy of the Incarnation, the pastor, Fr. Stephen Josoma, wanted to suggest that Jesus and His family had been abducted by federal agents and couldn’t make it to Bethlehem.

To be fair, this year’s stunt was tame compared with the church’s 2018 display, when the infant Jesus appeared — in a cage. Back then, the leftist narrative insisted that Trump’s “goons” were snatching innocent immigrant families and throwing their kids in cages while deporting the parents.

Fr. Josoma is at least forthright. The pro-immigration bishops, by contrast, wrap their open-borders stance in warm, fuzzy language about ‘compassion’ and ‘Christian charity.’

When complaints poured in, a spokesman for the Archdiocese of Boston offered mild disapproval and asked that the display be removed. One wonders what he would do if a priest used the Nativity to condemn transgenderism — perhaps a bubble of Mary saying, “It’s a boy!” and baby Jesus responding, “Of course I am.” Would the archbishop quietly distance himself again, or would he move to defrock the priest by morning?

The bishops’ real position

By now, it’s no secret that many Catholic bishops share Fr. Josoma’s immigration politics. Their public statements this year made that obvious: endless denunciations of border enforcement and deportations and near-total silence on the humanitarian crises created by Biden’s failed border policies — including the disappearance of some 400,000 migrant children, many of whom ended up in forced labor and sex trafficking.

Pope Leo XIV has only magnified this confusion. Though he recently muttered a few words denying he supports open borders, his actions and rhetoric signal the opposite. He consistently encourages mass migration into the West, especially from the poorer regions of the Global South.

Passive-aggressive rhetoric

All this might be tolerable if it weren’t so passive-aggressive. Fr. Josoma is at least forthright. The pro-immigration bishops, by contrast, wrap their open-borders stance in warm, fuzzy language about “compassion” and “Christian charity.” They never explicitly endorse illegal mass migration, but every message they send clearly communicates support for it.

Worse, they frame the debate as a false dilemma: either welcome millions from the Third World with open arms and open wallets, or turn everyone away and treat them like garbage. In their telling, unrestricted immigration is Christian charity; any attempt at regulation is moral failure. Like the Good Samaritan caring for the mugging victim, Americans are told to fund luxury-hotel stays and generous entitlements for ex-convicts from Haiti.

Little is said about the profound cultural and social challenges posed by non-Christian mass migration. Western Europe’s experience with Muslim migration is well-documented: spikes in crime, poverty, and urban decay.

In the United States, Muslim and Hindu migrants increasingly form self-segregated enclaves, complete with their own customs and sometimes their own informal legal norms — communities where Christian Americans are outsiders in their own towns.

Some progressive Christians claim this is an opportunity for evangelization. Yet no one in the church seems interested in actually evangelizing. Instead the faithful are browbeaten to be more “accommodating,” while bishops host endless interfaith dialogues with leaders who preach backward belief systems fundamentally at odds with liberal democracy.

Follow the money trail

Why then have bishops embraced such a self-destructive position? Two reasons stand out.

First, many bishops are simply committed leftists. Under Pope Francis — for most of the woke era — this meant preaching climate dogma and celebrating the LGBTQ agenda. Under Pope Leo, it means promoting open borders and a global welfare regime. The ideology changes, but the political alignment remains.

Second, mass migration pays. State and federal governments funnel enormous sums to Catholic NGOs for immigrant resettlement. “Caring for the stranger” has become a lucrative business. Vice President JD Vance, himself a Catholic, was blunt when he said much of the bishops’ outrage at border enforcement comes down to the billions of dollars at stake.

By shutting the border and deporting illegal migrants, the Trump administration is threatening a revenue stream.

Lingering hypocrisy

For conservative Catholics, the bishops’ partisan protests have become intolerable — especially after their submissiveness during COVID. Having failed as shepherds when it mattered most, they still presume they possess the moral authority to demand open borders forever.

It feels reminiscent of the Catholic Church’s reaction to the Black Death. As Barbara Tuchman recounts in her excellent history of the 14th century, the Catholic Church ramped up the sale of indulgences to replenish its coffers after the plague. Revenue rose. Respect collapsed. The peasant uprisings that followed eventually swelled into a continent-wide revolt that split Christianity.

RELATED: Viral video shows priest tossing ICE out of his church and mocking Trump — but it’s not what it seems

Photo by Suzanne Kreiter/The Boston Globe via Getty Images

Today’s immigration racket is unlikely to cause that level of destruction, but it is still a serious problem. Younger Catholics — anyone not a Baby Boomer — now tune out the clergy’s homilies about “harsh treatment” of migrants. They know it isn’t true. The Catholic Church in America is already as diverse and welcoming as a religious institution can be.

I was reminded of this recently at a Mass celebrating the feast of the Immaculate Conception. The only service I could attend was the evening Spanish Mass. Among Filipinos, Vietnamese, Latinos, Tejanos, and a handful of fellow gringos, I listened to our Indian priest celebrate the liturgy in Spanish, accompanied by a choir singing mariachi-styled hymns.

Nothing about this scene matched the bishops’ narrative of a hostile, unwelcoming Catholic Church. Perhaps if more of them bothered to attend or celebrate such a Mass, they would drop the sanctimonious posturing and address real problems.

That alone would be a welcome Christmas gift.

​Opinion & analysis, Stephen josoma, Catholic church, Immigration and customs enforcement, Ice raids, Holy family, Nativity scene, Dedham, Massachusetts, St. susanna’s catholic church, Anti-ice protests, Anti-ice nativity scene, Leftists, Pope leo xiv, Boston archdiocese, Boston archbishop, Donald trump, Open borders, Jd vance 

After a long battle, a D.C. Circuit panel froze a federal judge’s order blocking President Donald Trump’s effort to ban the use of hormones in the military — which would effectively disqualify all transgender people from military service.

The court decided that this policy advances military interests, with two judges ruling in favor and one judge — who was appointed by Obama — dissented.

BlazeTV host Sara Gonzales couldn’t be happier with the decision.

“I definitely don’t think that a man who is mentally ill enough, who thinks that he’s a woman, should be in that realm at all … luckily, this appeals court, well, two out of three of them agreed,” Gonzales says.

BlazeTV host and columnist Auron MacIntyre is pleased with the decision as well, but he points out that it’s not exactly reassuring that the decision came down to several circuit judges.

“It really is terrifying that the effectiveness of our military could come down to whether or not you got the right guy appointed to a particular circuit judgeship. It’s insane that anyone but the commander in chief determines who is or is not in the military,” Macintyre says.

“Military is not a place for you to do your social science experiments or work out your feminist fantasies. Military is a place where we kill people who are trying to murder us. This is literally the most important type of decision you can make,” he continues.

“You do not fool around and try to do some kind of DEI stuff with this,” he adds. “The idea that you would put mentally ill men in the military and put them anywhere near combat … that’s just disgraceful.”

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The leftist identitarian organization Black Lives Matter has long been attractive to bad actors keen to manufacture outrage and cash in on liberal guilt. While some BLM activists have already been exposed as criminals, it appears the rot goes far deeper.

The Justice Department announced on Thursday that a federal grand jury has indicted the executive director of Black Lives Matter Oklahoma City, Tashella Sheri Amore Dickerson, on charges of wire fraud and money laundering.

‘It is not about me at all.’

Dickerson, a 52-year-old pro-abortion and pro-Palestinian activist, is accused of embezzling millions of dollars and blowing various funds on recreational travel, shopping, real estate, and even a new vehicle.

Although not itself a registered tax-exempt organization, BLMOKC was apparently able to accept charitable donations through its affiliation with the Open Society Foundations-supported leftist organization Alliance for Global Justice — its fiscal sponsor — on the conditions that it use its funds only as permitted by Section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code and account for the disbursement of all funds received upon request.

The indictment alleges that the BLMOKC under Dickerson began hitting people and organizations up for cash in a big way around the time of the deadly 2020 BLM riots, ultimately raking in over $5.6 million.

Dickerson told the Oklahoman in July 2020, “It is very humbling to be able to serve my community and help people in this manner. But I also understand it is not about me at all. That it is all about being community.”

The DOJ indicated that BLMOKC was supposed to use grant money from national bail funds to post pretrial bail for race rioters, though it was sometimes permitted to keep some or all of the bail money when returned for the purposes of establishing a revolving bail fund or in service of its supposed “social justice mission.”

It turns out Dickerson had other ideas.

RELATED: University of Minnesota faces backlash over project that seeks to cure the ‘Whiteness Pandemic’

Photo by Ira L. Black/Corbis via Getty Images

According to the indictment, from June 2020 through at least October 2025, Dickerson allegedly embezzled funds from the BLM chapter’s coffers, depositing at least $3.15 million in returned bail checks into her personal accounts.

Rather than use the funds for so-called social justice or to spring thugs from jail, Dickerson allegedly blew the money on trips to Jamaica and the Dominican Republic; on costly retail shopping sprees; on a personal vehicle registered in her name; and on six real estate properties either deeded in her name or in the name of an entity she alone controlled.

Dickerson, who apparently had access to the group’s bank, Paypal, and CashApp accounts since its inception in 2016, also allegedly spent at least $50,000 on food deliveries for herself and her kids.

The indictment alleged further that Dickerson, adding insult to injury, repeatedly submitted false annual reports to Alliance for Global Justice, claiming that she had used the BLM chapter’s funds only for tax-exempt purposes.

“We seek to combat and counter acts of violence, create space for black sustainability and creativity, advocate for non-racist, non-oppressive policies, demand justice, and develop black power,” states the website for Dickerson’s BLM chapter.

The website’s donation page was still up at the time of publication.

Dickerson has been charged with 20 counts of wire fraud and five counts of money laundering. For each wire fraud charge, the BLM activist faces up to 20 years in federal prison and a fine of up to $250,000. For each of the money laundering charges, she faces up to 10 years in prison and a fine of up to $250,000.

Dickerson indicated in a Facebook video on Thursday she was not in custody and that she was “fine.” While she suggested she could not make an “official comment” about the indictment, she said, “A lot of times when people come at you with these types of things … it’s evidence that you are doing the work. That is what I’m standing on.”

The indictment in Oklahoma comes just months after Massachusetts-based BLM activist Monica Cannon-Grant pleaded guilty to three counts of wire fraud conspiracy, 10 counts of wire fraud, one count of mail fraud, and two counts each of filing false tax returns and failing to file tax returns.

The race hustler, whose Violence in Boston organization partnered with BLM, duped people into thinking she was helping reduce violence and promoting social awareness, when in fact, she was using their donations to enrich herself. She also defrauded the Boston COVID-19 relief fund, the Boston Office of Housing Stability, and other institutions.

Last year, BLM activist Tyree Conyers-Page of Ohio was convicted of wire fraud and money laundering. Prosecutors indicated that Conyers-Page defrauded donors of more than $450,000 that they collectively gave to his “Black Lives Matter of Greater Atlanta” organization, which he falsely claimed was a nonprofit.

WPDE-TV reported in May 2023 that federal tax filings from 2020 to 2022 revealed only $30 million of the $90 million BLM raised went to other charitable organizations; $22 million went to expenses; $1.6 million went to BLM co-founder Patrisse Cullors’ father for security service; and $2.1 million went to BLM board member Shalomyah Bowers for consulting.

While activists sued the organization in the wake of reports that BLM co-founders Cullors, Alicia Garza, and Melina Abdullah treated themselves to a $6 million mansion in Southern California with donation money, their suit was dismissed in June 2023 by a judge who concluded their “complaint fails to sufficiently allege the how, when, where, to whom, and by what means” misrepresentations were tendered.

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The Trump administration is challenging bureaucracy and freeing up the tech industry from burdensome regulations as the AI race speeds on. This week saw Trump’s most recent efforts to keep the United States on the leading edge.

President Donald Trump signed an executive order Thursday that will challenge state AI regulations and work toward “a minimally burdensome national standard — not 50 discordant state ones.”

‘You can’t expect a company to get 50 Approvals every time they want to do something.’

“It is the policy of the United States to sustain and enhance the United States’ global AI dominance through a minimally burdensome national policy framework for AI,” the executive order reads.

The executive order commands the creation of the AI Litigation Task Force, “whose sole responsibility shall be to challenge state AI laws inconsistent with the policy set forth in … this order.”

RELATED: ‘America’s next Manifest Destiny’: Department of War unleashes new AI capabilities for military

Photo by ANDREW CABALLERO-REYNOLDS / AFP via Getty Images

The order provided more reasons for a national standard as well.

For example, it cited a new Colorado law banning “algorithmic discrimination,” which, the order argued, may force AI models to produce false results in order to comply with that stipulation. It also argued that state laws are responsible for much of the ideological bias in AI models and that state laws “sometimes impermissibly regulate beyond state borders, impinging on interstate commerce.”

On Monday, Trump hinted that he would sign an executive order this week that would challenge cumbersome AI regulations at the state level.

Trump said in a Truth Social post on Monday, “There must be only One Rulebook if we are going to continue to lead in AI.”

“We are beating ALL COUNTRIES at this point in the race, but that won’t last long if we are going to have 50 States, many of them bad actors, involved in RULES and the APPROVAL PROCESS,” Trump continued. “THERE CAN BE NO DOUBT ABOUT THIS! AI WILL BE DESTROYED IN ITS INFANCY! I will be doing a ONE RULE Executive Order this week. You can’t expect a company to get 50 Approvals every time they want to do something.”

The order is framed as a provisional measure until Congress is able to establish a national standard to replace the “patchwork of 50 regulatory regimes” that is slowly rising out of the states.

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