By GABRIELA AOUN ANGUEIRA, Associated Press

If a major hurricane approaches Central Florida this season, Maria knows it’s dangerous to stay inside her wooden, trailer-like home. In past storms, she evacuated to her sister’s sturdier house. If she couldn’t get there, a shelter set up at the local high school served as a refuge if needed.

But with aggressively accelerating detentions and deportations of immigrants across her community of Apopka, 20 miles northwest of Orlando, Maria, an agricultural worker from Mexico without permanent U.S. legal status, doesn’t know if those options are safe. All risk encountering immigration enforcement agents.

“They can go where they want,” said Maria, 50, who insisted The Associated Press not use her last name for fear of detention. “There is no limit.”

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Natural disasters have long posed singular risks for people in the United States without permanent legal status. But with the arrival of peak Atlantic hurricane season, immigrants and their advocates say President Donald Trump’s militaristic immigration enforcement agenda has increased the danger.

Places considered neutral spaces by immigrants such as schools, hospitals and emergency management agencies are now suspect, and agreements by local law enforcement to collaborate with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement make them more vulnerable, choosing between physical safety or avoiding detention.

“Am I going to risk the storm or risk endangering my family at the shelter?” said Dominique O’Connor, an organizer at the Farmworker Association of Florida. “You’re going to meet enforcement either way.”

For O’Connor and for many immigrants, it’s about storms. But people without permanent legal status could face these decisions anywhere that extreme heat, wildfires or other severe weather could necessitate evacuating, getting supplies or even seeking medical care.

Federal and state agencies have said little on whether immigration enforcement would be suspended in a disaster. It wouldn’t make much difference to Maria: “With all we’ve lived, we’ve lost trust.”

New policies deepen concerns

Efforts by Trump’s Republican administration to exponentially expand immigration enforcement capacity mean many of the agencies active in disaster response are increasingly entangled in immigration enforcement.

Since January, hundreds of law enforcement agencies have signed 287(g) agreements, allowing them to perform certain immigration enforcement actions. Most of the agreements are in hurricane-prone Florida and Texas.

This GOES-19 GeoColor satellite image taken Tuesday, Aug. 19, 2025 at 1:20 p.m. EDT and provided by NOAA, shows Hurricane Erin churning slowly toward the eastern U.S. coast. (NOAA via AP)

Florida’s Division of Emergency Management oversees building the state’s new detention facilities, like the one called “Alligator Alcatraz” in the Everglades. Federal Emergency Management Agency funds are being used to build additional detention centers around the country, and the Department of Homeland Security temporarily reassigned some FEMA staff to assist ICE.

The National Guard, often seen passing out food and water after disasters, has been activated to support U.S. Customs and Border Protection operations and help at detention centers.

These dual roles can make for an intimidating scene during a disaster. After floods in July, more than 2,100 personnel from 20 state agencies aided the far-reaching response effort in Central Texas, along with CBP officers. Police controlled entry into hard-hit areas. Texas Department of Public Safety and private security officers staffed entrances to disaster recovery centers set up by FEMA.

That unsettled even families with permanent legal status, said Rae Cardenas, executive director of Doyle Community Center in Kerrville, Texas. Cardenas helped coordinate with the Mexican Consulate in San Antonio to replace documents for people who lived behind police checkpoints.

“Some families are afraid to go get their mail because their legal documents were washed away,” Cardenas said.

In Florida, these policies could make people unwilling to drive evacuation roads. Traffic stops are a frequent tool of detention, and Florida passed a law in February criminalizing entry into the state by those without legal status, though a judge temporarily blocked it.

There may be fewer places to evacuate now that public shelters, often guarded by police or requiring ID to enter, are no longer considered “protected areas” by DHS. The agency in January rescinded a policy of President Joe Biden, a Democrat, to avoid enforcement in places like schools, medical facilities and emergency response sites.

The fears extend even into disaster recovery. On top of meeting law enforcement at FEMA recovery centers, mixed-status households that qualify for help from the agency might hesitate to apply for fear of their information being accessed by other agencies, said Esmeralda Ledezma, communications associate with the Houston-based nonprofit Woori Juntos. “Even if you have the right to federal aid, you’re afraid to be punished for it,” Ledezma said.

In past emergencies, DHS has put out messaging stating it would suspend immigration enforcement. The agency’s policy now is unclear.

DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said in an email that CBP had not issued any guidance “because there have been no natural disasters affecting border enforcement.” She did not address what directions were given during CBP’s activation in the Texas floods or whether ICE would be active during a disaster.

Florida’s Division of Emergency Management did not respond to questions related to its policies toward people without legal status. Texas’ Division of Emergency Management referred The Associated Press to Republican Gov. Greg Abbott’s office, which did not respond.

Building local resilience is a priority

In spite of the crackdown, local officials in some hurricane-prone areas are expanding outreach to immigrant populations. “We are trying to move forward with business as usual,” said Gracia Fernandez, language access coordinator for Alachua County in Central Florida.

The county launched a program last year to translate and distribute emergency communications in Spanish, Haitian Creole and other languages. Now staffers want to spread the word that county shelters won’t require IDs, but since they’re public spaces, Fernandez acknowledged there’s not much they can do if ICE comes.

“There is still a risk,” she said. “But we will try our best to help people feel safe.”

As immigrant communities are pushed deeper into the shadows, more responsibility falls on nonprofits, and communities themselves, to keep each other safe.

Hope Community Center in Apopka has pushed local officials to commit to not requiring IDs at shelters and sandbag distribution points. During an evacuation, the facility becomes an alternative shelter and a command center, from which staffers translate and send out emergency communications in multiple languages. For those who won’t leave their homes, staffers do door-to-door wellness checks, delivering food and water.

“It’s a very grassroots, underground operation,” said Felipe Sousa Lazaballet, the center’s executive director.

Felipe Sousa Lazaballet, executive director of the Hope Community Center walks through an area that can be set up for feeding families if they were to encounter a disaster Thursday, Aug. 14, 2025, in Apopka, Fla. (AP Photo/John Raoux)

Preparing the community is challenging when it’s consumed by the daily crises wrought by detentions and deportations, Sousa Lazaballet said.

“All of us are in triage mode,” he said. “Every day there is an emergency, so the community is not necessarily thinking about hurricane season yet. That’s why we have to have a plan.”

Associated Press coverage of philanthropy and nonprofits receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content. For all of the AP’s philanthropy coverage, visit https://apnews.com/hub/philanthropy.

NEW YORK  — Target is counting on a company veteran to revive its magic as it struggles to compete with rivals like Walmart.

The Minneapolis-based retailer said Wednesday that Chief Operating Officer Michael Fiddelke, who has been with Target for 20 years, will become CEO Feb. 1.

He succeeds Brian Cornell, who helped reenergize the company when he took the helm in 2014 but has struggled to turn around weak sales in a more competitive retail landscape since the COVID pandemic.

Fiddelke has overhauled Target’s supply network and expanded the company’s stores and digital services while cutting costs. In May, the company announced that he would lead a new office focused on faster decision-making to help accelerate sales growth.

Fiddelke is taking over at time when Target’s sales are in a funk, its stores are messy and understocked, and it’s losing market share to rivals.

He said he’s stepping into the role with three urgent priorities: reclaiming the company’s merchandising authority; improving the shopping experience by making sure shelves are consistently stocked and stores are clean; and investing in technology at the company’s stores and in its supply network.

“When we’re leading with swagger in our merchandising authority, when we have swagger in our marketing, and we’re setting the trend for retail, those are some of the moments I think that Target has been at its highest in my 20 years,” he said.

The change in leadership was announced Wednesday at the same time that Target reported another quarter of sluggish results.

The announcement surprised some analysts who expected Target to pick an outsider to turn things around. Neil Saunders, a managing director at GlobalData Retail, said he had mixed feelings.

“While we think Fiddelke is talented and has a somewhat different take on things compared to current CEO Brian Cornell, this is an internal appointment that does not necessarily remedy the problems of entrenched groupthink and the inward-looking mindset that have plagued Target for years,” he said.

Target reported a 21% drop in net income in the quarter ended Aug. 2. Sales were down slightly and the company reported a 1.9% dip in comparable sales — those from established physical stores and online channels. Target has seen flat or declining comparable sales in eight out of the past 10 quarters including the latest period.

Target, which has about 1,980 U.S. stores, has been the focus of consumer boycotts since late January, when it joined rival Walmart and a number of other prominent American brands in scaling back corporate diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives.

Target’s sales also have languished as customers defect to Walmart and off-price department store chains like TJ Maxx in search of lower prices. But many analysts think Target is stumbling because consumers no longer consider it the place to go for affordable but stylish products, a niche that long ago earned the retailer the jokingly posh nickname “Tarzhay.”

In fact, out of 35 merchandise categories that Target tracks, it gained or maintained market share in only 14 during the first half of the company’s fiscal year, Fiddelke said.

Meanwhile, Walmart gained market share among households with incomes over $100,000 as U.S. inflation caused consumer prices to rise rapidly. Lower-income shoppers have driven customer growth at Target, suggesting it may have lost appeal with wealthier customers, according to market research firm Consumer Edge.

“It’s probably not the best sign, especially because higher-income consumers continue to hold up a little bit better” during times of economic uncertainty, said Consumer Edge Head of Insights Michael Gunther.

In March, members of Target’s executive team told investors they planned to regain the chain’s reputation for selling stylish goods at budget prices by expanding Target’s lineup of store label brands and shortening the time it took to get new items from the idea stage to store shelves. The moves would help the company stay close to trends, executives said.

“In a world where we operate today, our guests are looking for Tarzhay,” Cornell told investors. “Consumers coined that term decades ago to define how we elevate the everything everyday to something special, how we had unexpected fun in the shopping that would be otherwise routine.”

Before joining Target in 2014, Cornell, 66, spent more than 30 years in leadership positions at retail and consumer-product companies, including as chief marketing officer at Safeway Inc. and CEO at Michaels, Walmart’s Sam’s Club and PepsiCo America Foods. In September 2022, the board extended his contract for three more years and eliminated a policy requiring its chief executives to retire at age 65. When Fiddelke takes over, Cornell will transition to be executive chair of the board.

When he got to Target, the company was facing a different set of challenges.

Cornell replaced former CEO Gregg Steinhafel, who stepped down nearly five months after Target disclosed a huge data breach in which hackers stole millions of customers’ credit- and debit-card records. The theft badly damaged the chain’s reputation and profits.

Cornell reenergized sales by having his team rev up Target’s store brands. It now has 40 private label brands in its portfolio. And even before the pandemic, Cornell spearheaded the company’s mission to transform its stores into delivery hubs to cut down on costs and speed up deliveries.

Target’s 2017 acquisition of Shipt helped bolster the discounter’s same-day, store-based fulfillment services. Cornell also focused on making its stores better tailored to the local community

The coronavirus pandemic delivered outsized sales for Target as well as its peers as people stayed home and bought pajamas, furnishings and kitchen items. And it continued to see a surge in sales as shoppers emerged from their homes and went to stores. But the spending sprees eventually subsided.

As inflation started to spike, Target reported a 52% drop in profits during its 2022 first quarter compared with a year earlier. Purchases of big TVs and appliances that Americans loaded up on during the pandemic faded, leaving the retailer with excess inventory that had to be sold off.

In July 2023, as shoppers feeling pinched by inflation curtailed their spending, Target said its comparable sales declined for the first time in six years.

Moreover, Target started losing its edge as an authority on style by focusing too much on home furnishings basics, and not enough trendy items, Fiddelke said.

A customer backlash over the annual line of LGBTQ+ Pride merchandise Target stores carried that year further cut into sales.

Although Walmart retreated from its diversity initiatives first, Target has been the focus of more concerted consumer boycotts. Organizers have said they viewed Target’s action as a greater betrayal because the company previously had held itself out as a champion of inclusion.

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Today is Wednesday, Aug. 20, the 232nd day of 2025. There are 133 days left in the year.

Today in history:

On Aug. 20, 2012, after 80 years in existence, Georgia’s Augusta National golf club (home to the Masters Tournament) invited former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and South Carolina financier Darla Moore to become its first female members; both accepted.

Also on this date:

In 1858, Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution was first published, in the “Journal of the Proceedings of the Linnean Society”.

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In 1862, the New York Tribune published an open letter by editor Horace Greeley calling on President Abraham Lincoln to take more aggressive measures to free enslaved people and end the South’s rebellion.

In 1866, President Andrew Johnson declared the official end of the Civil War.

In 1882, Tchaikovsky’s “1812 Overture” had its premiere in Moscow.

In 1910, a series of wildfires swept through parts of Idaho, Montana and Washington, killing at least 85 people and burning some 3 million acres.

In 1920, the American Professional Football Conference was established by representatives of four professional football teams; two years later, with 18 teams, it would be renamed the National Football League.

In 1940, exiled Communist revolutionary Leon Trotsky was attacked in Coyoacan, Mexico by assassin Ramon Mercader. (Trotsky died the next day.)

In 1964, President Lyndon B. Johnson signed into law the Economic Opportunity Act, a nearly $1 billion anti-poverty measure.

In 1968, the Soviet Union and other Warsaw Pact nations invaded Czechoslovakia to crush the “Prague Spring” liberalization movement.

In 1986, postal employee Patrick Henry Sherrill went on a deadly rampage at a post office in Edmond, Oklahoma, shooting 14 fellow workers to death before killing himself.

In 1989, 51 people died when the pleasure boat Marchioness sank in the River Thames in London after being struck by a dredger.

In 2023, Tropical Storm Hilary struck Baja California, killing three and causing $15 million in damage.

Today’s Birthdays:

Boxing promoter Don King is 94.
Former U.S. Senator and diplomat George Mitchell is 92.
Former U.S. Rep. Ron Paul, R-Texas, is 90.
Broadcast journalist Connie Chung is 79.
Rock singer Robert Plant is 77.
Country singer Rudy Gatlin is 73.
Singer-songwriter John Hiatt is 73.
Actor-director Peter Horton is 72.
TV weather presenter Al Roker is 71.
Actor Joan Allen is 69.
Movie director David O. Russell is 67.
Rapper KRS-One (Boogie Down Productions) is 60.
Actor Colin Cunningham is 58.
Actor Billy Gardell is 56.
Rock singer Fred Durst (Limp Bizkit) is 55.
Actor Ke Huy Quan is 54.
Baseball Hall of Famer Todd Helton is 52.
Actor Amy Adams is 51.
Actor Misha Collins (TV: “Supernatural”) is 51.
Actor Ben Barnes is 44.
Actor Andrew Garfield is 42.
Actor-singer Demi Lovato is 33.

For the past two seasons, it has been a given that somehow, some way, Joe Ryan would find a way to get through five innings.

Save for the game last season in which he left with an injury, you would have to go back nearly two years — Sept. 12, 2023 — to find the last time the starter didn’t complete at least five innings.

So it was a rare occurrence to see Ryan forced out of Tuesday night’s game after just four innings in the Twins’ 6-3 loss to the Athletics in the series opener at Target Field.

“(It was) much shorter than I would have liked,” Ryan said. “That gets frustrating. Try to go out there and get some more innings.”

Ryan gave up five runs, marking just the third time this season that he has allowed more than four. Just two of them were earned, as he was plagued by his defense, particularly in the fourth inning.

Ryan served up a two-out, two-run home run to Shea Langeliers in the third right after issuing a four-pitch walk to Nick Kurtz, turning the Twins’ lead into a deficit, and then found himself in more trouble an inning later.

After Tyler Soderstrom began the inning with an infield single, second baseman Luke Keaschall could not handle a rocket hit toward him, which took a hop and wound up in the outfield. The next batter reached when first baseman Kody Clemens dropped a throw from Royce Lewis. He was charged with an error.

“We want to hold ourselves to a high standard, and we want to make all the plays for our pitchers,” manager Rocco Baldelli said. “I think there were worlds where we work through that inning and they’re not putting those runs on the board, and then we’re right there in the game.”

The Athletics managed three runs from that opportunity, the first scoring on a shallow sacrifice fly hit to Keaschall, a play that he said he “should’ve thrown” the runner out on. Two more scored as Ryan gave up another pair of hits, allowing four total in the inning as his pitch count quickly climbed.

The Twins scored on a pair of solo home runs — Brooks Lee hit one in the fourth, Ryan Jeffers one an inning later — and a Matt Wallner double in the second inning. But they missed out on a chance to tie the game late with Lewis popping out in the bottom of the eighth with a pair of runners on.

“We could not sync those hits up enough tonight,” Baldelli said. “I think the at-bats were fine, but we certainly needed more on a day where we gave up a few.”

Briefly

The Twins promoted first-round draft pick Marek Houston on Monday to Class-A Advanced Cedar Rapids. The shortstop hit .370 with 20 hits in his first 12 professional games at Class A Fort Myers. … The Twins will send Bailey Ober to the mound Wednesday in the second game of the series. … Over in St. Paul, Connor Prielipp, one of the Twins’ top pitching prospects, gave up two runs in 3 1/3 innings in his Triple-A debut.

Minnesota Twins’ Byron Buxton (25) stands at the plate after striking out to end the bottom of the third inning of a baseball game against the Athletics Tuesday, Aug. 19, 2025, in Minneapolis. (AP Photo/Abbie Parr)

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