An illegal alien from El Salvador allegedly killed a U.S. citizen the day after being released, despite a detainer request from federal immigration officials.

Marvin Fernando Morales-Ortez was released from a Fairfax, Virginia, jail after county officials dropped several violent criminal charges against him in addition to ignoring the Immigration and Customs Enforcement detainer.

‘The sanctuary politicians of Fairfax County, VA have blood on their hands.’

Morales-Ortez allegedly shot and killed a 40-year-old man, Marvin Ernesto Morales, at a residence in Reston. After he fled, police were able to find and arrest him. He was charged with second-degree murder and use of a firearm in commission of a felony.

A spokesperson for ICE blamed local officials for the preventable death.

“Fairfax County failed the victim by refusing to work with ICE and releasing this criminal alien onto Virginia streets instead of safely into ICE custody,” the spokesperson said. “If Fairfax County would have simply worked to uphold our nation’s laws, then this tragedy may have never happened.”

The Department of Homeland Security went further in a statement on social media.

“The sanctuary politicians of Fairfax County, VA have blood on their hands,” reads a statement from the agency’s official account.

“The day after Fairfax County REFUSED to hand over Marvin Fernando Morales-Ortez, a criminal illegal alien from El Salvador, to ICE he allegedly MURDERED an American citizen,” they added. “He has a prior history of aggravated assault, larceny, assault on a law enforcement officer, weapons charges and other misdemeanor offenses.”

Most Fairfax County officials, including Sheriff Stacey Kincaid and almost every member of the Board of Supervisors, are Democrats.

After Morales-Ortez was released from jail on Tuesday, a Community Services Board did obtain an emergency order to have police take him into custody, according to the Fairfax County Police. However, the order was valid for only eight hours, and police were unable to find him before it expired.

Prosecutors are accused of ignoring the detainer, not notifying federal officials when Morales-Ortez was being released, and dropping criminal charges against him in numerous cases.

RELATED: New York Times gets absolutely hammered for sympathetic article on criminal illegal alien

The White House also released a statement condemning Fairfax officials.

“This tragic case is a prime example of what happens when Democrats choose to side with criminal illegal aliens over American citizens,” the statement reads. “This monster should’ve never been allowed to roam free in American communities. The Trump administration will continue our efforts to deport all criminal illegal aliens and Make America Safe Again, despite unrelenting Democrat opposition.”

Morales-Ortez is being held at the Fairfax County Adult Detention Center.

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​Marvin morales-ortez, Fairfax virginia prosecutors, Illegal alien murder, Ignored ice detainer, Politics 

A seismic shift is coming for Hollywood’s biggest awards show.

Following a tough decade that has seen the program lose more than 40% of its audience, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has agreed to a multiyear deal that will take it off television airwaves.

In 2021, viewership sank to less than a third of the 2016 audience, with just 10.4 million viewers.

California streaming

Starting in 2029, the 101st Oscars will air in an online format as part of an exclusive deal with YouTube for the global rights to the broadcast. The deal, which runs through 2033, includes the rights to cover the red carpet, behind the scenes, and the Governors Ball.

As reported by Variety, the awards show will leave ABC — where it has been for decades — and will become available on YouTube around the world and to YouTube subscribers in the United States.

Will the show leave extended commercial breaks behind as well? Unlikely. Inside sources revealed to Variety that ads will be a part of the broadcast, and the intent behind the shift was actually to capitalize on YouTube’s captioning and audio translation features.

RELATED: Guillermo del Toro stops awards show music to drop ‘F**k AI’ bomb

Photo by Jeffrey Mayer/WireImage

Falling stars

While the awards telecast has gained some of its viewership back in the last few years, the numbers are still much smaller than they were when President Trump took office the first time.

In 2016, the Oscars saw approximately 34.4 million viewers. That number dropped steadily to 23.6 million by 2020, until a massive free fall in 2021. That year, viewership sank to less than a third of the 2016 audience, with just 10.4 million viewers.

Viewership has climbed back up since and showed decent growth through 2024, when it had 19.5 million viewers. However, the numbers largely stagnated for 2025 with 19.7 million, which is about 57% of what viewership was in 2016.

Still it seems the program will never again reach the peaks it had as recently as 2010, when it garnered over 41 million sets of eyeballs.

RELATED: Can conservatives reclaim pop culture?

Photo by Araya Doheny/Getty Images for YouTube

Global services

Academy CEO Bill Kramer and Academy President Lynette Howell Taylor released a joint statement calling the new deal a “multifaceted global partnership with YouTube” that will reach “the largest worldwide audience possible.”

They added, “This collaboration will leverage YouTube’s vast reach and infuse the Oscars and other Academy programming with innovative opportunities for engagement while honoring our legacy. We will be able to celebrate cinema, inspire new generations of filmmakers, and provide access to our film history on an unprecedented global scale.”

YouTube CEO Neal Mohan labeled the Oscars “one of our essential cultural institutions, honoring excellence in storytelling and artistry.”

​Align, Movies, Film, Hollywood, Oscars, Award show, Youtube, Online, Academy, Entertainment 

The United States has paused a visa program after shocking details emerged in the Brown University shooting investigation.

Late Thursday night, Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem announced the pause of the DV1 program, a visa lottery system that the Brown University shooter, identified as Claudio Manuel Neves Valente, reportedly used to obtain a green card.

‘At President Trump’s direction, I am immediately directing USCIS to pause the DV1 program to ensure no more Americans are harmed by this disastrous program.’

“The Brown University shooter, Claudio Manuel Neves Valente entered the United States through the diversity lottery immigrant visa program (DV1) in 2017 and was granted a green card. This heinous individual should never have been allowed in our country,” Secretary Noem said on X. “In 2017, President Trump fought to end this program, following the devastating NYC truck ramming by an ISIS terrorist, who entered under the DV1 program, and murdered eight people.”

RELATED: Suspect in deadly Brown University shooting and fatal shooting of MIT professor found dead of self-inflicted gunshot wound

Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images

“At President Trump’s direction, I am immediately directing USCIS to pause the DV1 program to ensure no more Americans are harmed by this disastrous program,” Noem added.

Valente, who is also believed to be responsible for the recent slaying of an MIT physics professor, was found dead inside a storage facility Thursday night.

The DV1 program, also known as the Diversity Immigrant Visa program, makes up to 55,000 visas available to immigrants from countries with low rates of immigration to the United States. The program is “random and blind to the number of family members who might immigrate with the selectee,” according to the State Department website.

The 2026 visa lottery drew from 20,822,624 applicants from over 170 counties all around the world, according to State Department statistics.

The top 10 countries, from highest volume to lowest are: Egypt, Russia, Algeria, Ukraine, Sudan, Afghanistan, Iran, Kenya, Nepal, and Morocco. Other countries that broke 3,000 are Cameroon, Ethiopia, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Turkey.

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​Politics, Department of homeland security, State department, Uscis, Visa lottery program, Dv1 program, Visa lottery, Brown university shooter, Legal immigration, United states, Trump, Trump administration 

Actress Jennifer Lawrence says her creativity and politics are inherently intertwined.

Lawrence revealed her thoughts during a discussion with fellow Oscar-winning actor Leonardo DiCaprio.

‘Maybe she didn’t know that I was on an Ambien.’

Brain trust

Lawrence, 35, and DiCaprio, 51, appeared on Variety’s “Actors on Actors” segment, with the duo discussing their pasts as child actors, upcoming films, and briefly, politics as it pertains to their art.

DiCaprio was discussing his 2025 political film, “One Battle After Another,” when Lawrence asked about bringing politics into the movie industry.

“I think that the creative part of my brain and the political part of my brain are intrinsically linked,” Lawrence prefaced. “Like, I keep finding, like, every time I come up with, like, a movie or, like, it’s more often than not political.”

“I think it’s ’cause that’s how I’m, like, digesting the world. Are you like that?” she asked DiCaprio.

“No,” DiCaprio plainly replied.

Lawrence attempted to move on to another question, but the “Titanic” star was eager to explain why.

RELATED: Handmaid’s fail: Hillary stumps for Jennifer Lawrence’s new pro-abortion documentary

Photo by Taylor Hill/FilmMagic

Stating that his latest film feels “very topical,” DiCaprio said it is “very difficult to say something about the world we live in” on film.

“It has to have an element of irony or comedy to it; otherwise people — they’re not allowed in. … And it feels like, ‘Oh, I’m watching these people’s vocation and, you know, do I relate to them?'” he explained.

DiCaprio tacked on, “There’s all those political films of the ’70s: ‘The Parallax View,’ ‘Three Days of the Condor,’ ‘All the President’s Men.’ And they were taken very seriously. But nowadays, it feels like there’s such polarity and such extremism that if you pick a side, you’re alienating.”

Pillow talk

Later in the interview, Lawrence had more strange anecdotes that seemed to paralyze the veteran actor. She soon brought up the fact that both she and DiCaprio are “obsessive about sleep” when filming a movie, before reciting some of her on-set drug follies.

DiCaprio seemingly played along, smiling and laughing at times, but clearly had nothing to add.

“I took an Adderall instead of a sleeping pill,” Lawrence said, as DiCaprio smirked. “And then I didn’t sleep all night, and I was taking hot showers, panicking, because I am not somebody who can function without sleep. … I also once took an Ambien in the morning, thinking it was something else,” she continued.

“Wow. Those are key screwups,” the leading man laughed in response.

“Elizabeth Banks got really annoyed with me,” Lawrence said about her Ambien usage on the set of “Hunger Games.”

She continued, “Maybe she didn’t know that I was on an Ambien.”

DiCaprio simply put his head down and laughed, without responding.

RELATED: Jennifer Lawrence claims no women were action movie stars before her

Sigourney who?

Lawrence has made interesting claims during sit-downs on the same program before, including in December 2022 when she claimed she was the first female lead of an action movie.

Also on Variety’s “Actors on Actors,” Lawrence told Viola Davis:

“I remember when I was doing ‘Hunger Games,’ nobody had ever put a woman in the lead of an action movie because it wouldn’t work. We were told, girls and boys can both identify with a male lead, but boys cannot identify with a female lead.”

Sigourney Weaver (“Alien”), Uma Thurman (“Kill Bill”), and Milla Jovovich (countless “Resident Evil” films) could not be reached for comment.

​Jennifer lawrence, Align, Movies, Politics, Woke, Leonardo dicaprio, Actresses, Entertainment 

Another effort by liberal activists to shut down America’s first state-run facility for federal immigration detainees has fallen flat on its face.

Florida Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis’ administration, empowered by the governor’s 2023 emergency declaration over the border crisis, got to work in June on transforming the virtually abandoned Dade-Collier Training and Transition Airport into Alligator Alcatraz.

Within weeks, the airport’s 10,499-foot runway was crowded with tents and unsavory characters set for deportation.

Enraged by the Republican administration’s success in raising and filling the facility, liberal activists filed multiple legal challenges in hopes of shutting down the facility.

One of those challenges was filed in August by the American Civil Liberties Union, ACLU of Florida, Community Justice Project, and National Immigrant Justice Center on behalf of an anonymous plaintiff and a proposed class of foreign nationals who share in common their capture by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and detention at the facility.

The lawsuit claimed that Florida lacked the authority to detain illegal aliens at Alligator Alcatraz and asked the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida for a preliminary injunction barring state officials from detaining the plaintiff, identified only as M.A., and others like him at the site.

‘Plaintiff is essentially asking this Court to close a sizable and expensive detention facility, all before any decision on the merits of its legality.’

“Florida has wasted hundreds of thousands of taxpayer dollars to unlawfully detain people in this abusive immigration detention center,” Amy Godshall, an illegal aliens’ rights attorney with the ACLU of Florida, said at the outset. “Not only have the conditions been abhorrent, but the detention itself is unlawful.”

“The harm being inflicted on our clients is immediate and irreparable, and it underscores why states are not allowed to overstep into federal immigration processes,” added Godshall.

RELATED: ‘I’ll get the heat’: Milwaukee judge is now a convicted felon after violent illegal alien dodged ICE from her courtroom

Blaze Media illustration. Note: This is a Blaze Media illustration, not the actual facility.

U.S. District Judge Kyle Dudek, an appointee of President Donald Trump, delivered the activist groups and their noncitizen client some bad news on Thursday, denying their request to prevent the DeSantis administration from holding illegal aliens at the facility.

Dudek said in his six-page ruling that “preliminary injunctive relief ‘is an extraordinary and drastic remedy’ that is appropriate only in limited circumstances” and that one of the conditions that must be satisfied was that the movant must show “he will suffer an irreparable injury without the injunction.”

The Trump judge underscored that the noncitizen plaintiff has failed to prove irreparable injury.

“To meet his burden, Plaintiff first points to his incarceration at Alligator Alcatraz,” wrote Dudek. “He claims that ‘unlawful detention is a paradigmatic form of irreparable harm.’ But this argument makes little sense here because Plaintiff does not dispute that he (and the proposed class) is subject to confinement by the Attorney General.”

Dudek suggested further that the supposed evidence of systematic problems at Alligator Alcatraz that was given in support of the noncitizen’s claim of “downstream irreparable harms” was not only “months old and largely stale” but particular only to a handful of detainees and contradicted by other evidence.

“Plaintiff is essentially asking this Court to close a sizable and expensive detention facility, all before any decision on the merits of its legality,” wrote Dudek. “While there may indeed be deficiencies at Alligator Alcatraz that ultimately justify its dissolution, Plaintiff has not made the extraordinary showing needed to justify immediate relief of such magnitude.”

This gut punch for the liberal activist groups comes just months after the 11th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals in Atlanta blocked an Obama-appointed federal judge’s order that the facility be shut down.

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​Donald trump, Alligator alcatraz, Immigration, Deportation, Illegal aliens, Illegal alien, Florida, Ice, Immigration and customs enforcement, Politics 

A woman in the United Kingdom is in trouble with law enforcement yet again for daring to engage in silent prayers.

Isabel Vaughan-Spruce learned in March that she had been under investigation by Midlands Police in the U.K. since January. She has now been criminally charged for praying in her head.

‘You’ve said you’re engaging in prayer, which is the offense.’

More specifically, Vaughan-Spruce was allegedly charged because she “stood outside” an abortion facility in Birmingham, England, to conduct her silent prayers and, therefore, tried to “influence” visitors, which is prohibited.

According to the Alliance Defending Freedom, the charge against Vaughan-Spruce is under Section 9 of the U.K.’s Public Order Act 2023, which outlines “Safe Access Zones” around abortion clinics in England and Wales.

Discretion under the act is left to each individual officer, but all decisions must be made “on a case-by-case basis and must be balanced and proportionate to the circumstances,” the document says.

The law states it is an offense to recklessly or intentionally “do an act” that:

Influences “any person’s decision to access, provide, or facilitate the provision of abortion services at an abortion clinic”;Obstructs or impedes any person “accessing, providing, or facilitating the provision of abortion services at an abortion clinic”; orCauses “harassment, alarm, or distress to any person in connection with a decision to access, provide, or facilitate the provision of abortion services at an abortion clinic.”

Violators are subject to a fine.

RELATED: ‘Your arrest is necessary’: Woman arrested for silent prayer, ‘anti-social behavior’ outside abortion clinic

Photo by JUSTIN TALLIS/AFP via Getty Images

In 2022, Vaughan-Spruce made headlines for admitting to possibly engaging in silent prayer near an abortion clinic. She was asked by an officer to voluntarily go to a police station, and, upon declining, was informed that she was under arrest for failing to comply and would be charged with “anti-social behavior.”

According to a city of Birmingham website, anti-social behavior “includes behavior which has caused or is likely to cause you harassment, alarm, or distress.”

Vaughan-Spruce was later charged with “protesting and engaging in an act that is intimidating to service users” but was reportedly acquitted because the facility was actually closed at the time she was there.

She was arrested again in 2023 for praying in an excluded zone, this time on the corner of a road.

“You’ve said you’re engaging in prayer, which is the offense,” an officer told her.

Vaughan-Spruce claimed at the time that she assumed her acquittal meant she could now pray outside of the facility without causing offense.

RELATED: Real-life dystopia: Police arrest woman AGAIN after she silently prayed near abortion facility in UK

Similar charges were recently brought upon a retired pastor in Northern Ireland for preaching inside one of the protected zones.

According to the New York Post, the 76-year-old faces two charges and has pleaded not guilty to seeking to “influence” people accessing abortion services and for not immediately vacating the area when asked by police.

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​Christianity, Abortion, United kingdom, England, Northern ireland, Safe zones, Abortion clinic, Thought crime, Prayer, Faith 

Federal agents charged another Chinese national with allegedly trying to smuggle biological materials into the United States.

On Friday morning, FBI Director Kash Patel announced that the agency had filed charges against Youhuang Xiang, a postdoctoral researcher who is in the country on a J-1 visa.

‘To all universities and their compliance departments: Please be vigilant of this trend.’

These visas are issued to exchange visitors approved to participate in certain programs, such as studying or conducting research, according to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. J-1 visas are provided to professors, research assistants, and students.

Xiang allegedly smuggled Escherichia coli, commonly referred to as E. coli, into the country. He is also accused of making false statements about the smuggling scheme.

Patel explained that E. coli, when not properly controlled, can “inflict devastating disease to U.S. crops and cause significant financial loss to the U.S. economy.”

Xiang was listed on Indiana University’s website as a postdoctoral fellow. His “research interests” included “recognition specificity in host-pathogen interactions and engineering crop resistance to pathogen,” according to the website. As of Friday afternoon, the university removed Xiang from its Department of Biology webpage.

RELATED: University of Michigan’s bio-smuggling scandal explodes: More Chinese scholars busted in alleged plot

Kash Patel. Photo by Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images

“This is yet another example of a researcher from China — given the privilege to work at a U.S. university — who then allegedly chose to take part in a scheme to circumvent U.S. laws and receive biological materials hidden in a package originating from China,” Patel wrote in a post on social media.

The FBI director noted that the agency and Customs and Border Protection partners “are committed to enforcing U.S. laws put in place to protect against this global threat to our economy and food supply.”

RELATED: University of Michigan now under fire after Chinese scholars allegedly smuggle bio-weapon

Photo by Sean Gallup/Getty Images

“The FBI will not tolerate any attempt to exploit our nation’s institutions for illegal activity — as we have seen in this case and the three Chinese nationals charged in Michigan in November for allegedly smuggling biological materials into the U.S. on several occasions,” Patel continued. “The FBI and our partners are committed to defending the homeland and stopping any illegal smuggling into our country.”

Patel was referring to several Chinese scholars from the University of Michigan who were accused earlier this year of being tied to a smuggling conspiracy. Some of the biological materials the individuals allegedly brought into the U.S. were described as potential agricultural terrorism weapons.

“To all universities and their compliance departments: Please be vigilant of this trend. Ensure your researchers know that there is a correct and legal way to obtain a license to import/export approved biological materials, and it must be followed without exception. Our continued partnerships will help to better secure our nation and ensure all parties are held accountable,” Patel wrote.

Indiana University did not respond to a request for comment.

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​News, Kash patel, Fbi, Federal bureau of investigation, Chinese nationals, Chinese scholars, Michigan, University of michigan, Indiana university, Iu, J-1 visa, J-1 visas, J-1, Visas, China, Smuggling, Bio-material smuggling, Politics 

As the Trump administration continues to clean up the administrative state, the Department of Justice just landed a potentially significant victory. In a major reversal, the Department of Justice has discarded a decades-old interpretation of a law that essentially allowed illegal aliens to collect welfare benefits.

In a 20-page slip opinion bearing Assistant Attorney General T. Elliot Gaiser’s signature, the Department of Justice reversed its reading of “federal means-tested public benefit” in light of last year’s overturn of Chevron U.S.A. Inc. v. Natural Resources Defense Council Inc.

‘The existence of such reliance on federal welfare contradicts the textually expressed congressional policy that aliens must not rely on taxpayer support or burden the public benefits system.’

The previous interpretation, stemming from the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 under Democratic President Bill Clinton, extended welfare to illegal aliens by splitting hairs between mandatory and discretionary spending. The DOJ previously directed the Departments of Health and Human Services and Housing and Urban Development to interpret this phrase to allow the extension of benefits to illegal aliens under discretionary benefit programs.

RELATED: US Virgin Islands’ gun restrictions violate the Second Amendment, DOJ claims

Photo by Andrew Harnik/Getty Images

The new opinion rules that the PRWORA includes benefits under both mandatory and discretionary spending programs and withdraws the preceding 1997 opinion, effectively closing this loophole that allowed illegal aliens to collect welfare benefits.

The opinion notes that the PRWORA had many other parts that would seem to resist the old interpretation, particularly since the relevant section of the law was enacted “to address abuse of the welfare system by aliens in the United States.”

The opinion says that despite this clearly stated purpose, the old interpretation led to unrestricted discretionary funds flowing to illegal aliens over the ensuing decades from “many federal agencies.”

“Today, by some estimates, 59% of illegal alien-headed households receive government welfare,” the opinion reads, citing the director of research at the Center for Immigration Studies.

“While some aliens may have come to rely on means-tested public benefits funded through discretionary spending programs, the existence of such reliance on federal welfare contradicts the textually expressed congressional policy that aliens must not rely on taxpayer support or burden the public benefits system,” the opinion continued.

“American taxpayers have interests, too, in ensuring that their tax contributions do not encourage illegal entry into the United States. Americans are entitled to rely on duly enacted legislation crafted by their elected representatives and designed to protect the public fisc from abuse.”

The Office of Legal Counsel at the Department of Justice did not respond to a request for comment from Blaze News.

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​Politics, Chevron, Center for immigration studies, Illegal aliens, Mandatory spending, Discretionary spending, Hud, Hhs, Doj, Department of justice, T. elliot gaiser, Prwora