By Felice J. Freyer, KFF Health News

BRISTOL, R.I. — At age 82, Roberta Rabinovitz realized she had no place to go. A widow, she had lost both her daughters to cancer, after living with one and then the other, nursing them until their deaths. Then she moved in with her brother in Florida, until he also died.

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And so last fall, while recovering from lung cancer, Rabinovitz ended up at her grandson’s home in Burrillville, Rhode Island, where she slept on the couch and struggled to navigate the steep staircase to the shower. That wasn’t sustainable, and with apartment rents out of reach, Rabinovitz joined the growing population of older Americans unsure of where to lay their heads at night.

But Rabinovitz was fortunate. She found a place to live, through what might seem an unlikely source — a health care nonprofit, the PACE Organization of Rhode Island. Around the country, arranging for housing is a relatively new and growing challenge for such PACE groups, which are funded through Medicaid and Medicare. PACE stands for a Program of All-Inclusive Care for the Elderly, and the organizations aim to keep frail, older people in their homes. But a patient can’t stay at home if they don’t have one.

As housing costs rise, organizations responsible for people’s medical care are realizing that to ensure their clients have a place to live, they must venture outside their lanes. Even hospitals — in Denver, New Orleans, New York City, and elsewhere — have started investing in housing, recognizing that health isn’t possible without it.

And among older adults, the need is especially growing. In the U.S., 1 in 5 people who were homeless in 2024 were 55 or older, with the total older homeless population up 6% from the previous year. Dennis Culhane, a University of Pennsylvania professor who specializes in homelessness and housing policy, calculated that the number of men older than 60 living in shelters roughly tripled from 2000 to 2020.

Roberta Rabinovitz, who had been sleeping on her grandson’ s couch, says she loves her apartment at the Franklin Court assisted living facility in Bristol, Rhode Island. (Felice J. Freyer/KFF Health News/TNS)

“It’s a national scandal, really, that the richest country in the world would have destitute elderly and disabled people,” Culhane said.

Over decades of research, Culhane has documented the plight of people born between 1955 and 1965 who came of age during recessions and never got an economic foothold. Many in this group endured intermittent homelessness throughout their lives, and now their troubles are compounded by aging.

But other homeless older adults are new to the experience. Many teeter on the edge of poverty, said Sandy Markwood, CEO of USAging, a national association representing what are known as area agencies on aging. A single incident can tip them into homelessness — the death of a spouse, job loss, a rent increase, an injury or illness. If cognitive decline starts, an older person may forget to pay their mortgage. Even those with paid-off houses often can’t afford rising property taxes and upkeep.

“No one imagines anybody living on the street at 75 or 80,” Markwood said. “But they are.”

President Donald Trump’s recent budget law, which makes substantial federal cuts to Medicaid, the public insurance program for those with low incomes or disabilities, will make matters worse for older people with limited incomes, said Yolanda Stevens, program and policy analyst with the National Alliance to End Homelessness. If people lose their health coverage or their local hospital closes, it will be harder for them to maintain their health and pay the rent.

“It’s a perfect storm,” Stevens said. “It’s an unfortunate, devastating storm for our older Americans.”

Adding to the challenges, the Labor Department recently halted a job training program intended to keep low-income older people in the workforce.

Those circumstances have sent PACE health plans throughout the country into uncharted waters, prompting them to set up shop within senior housing projects, partner with housing providers, or even join forces with nonprofit developers to build their own.

A 1997 federal law recognized PACE organizations as a provider type for Medicare and Medicaid. Today, some 185 operate in the U.S., each serving a defined geographic area, with a total of more than 83,000 participants.

They enroll people 55 and older who are sick enough for nursing home care, and then provide everything their patients need to stay home despite their frailty. They also run centers that function as medical clinics and adult day centers and provide transportation.

These organizations primarily serve impoverished people with complex medical conditions who are eligible for both Medicaid and Medicare. They pool money from both programs and operate within a set budget for each participant.

Kriss Auger, social work and behavioral health manager at the PACE Organization of Rhode Island, outside the van used to transport participants to the PACE center in East Providence. (Felice J. Freyer/KFF Health News/TNS)

PACE officials worry that, as federal funding for Medicaid programs shrinks, states will curtail support. But the PACE concept has always had bipartisan support, said Robert Greenwood, a senior vice president at the National PACE Association, because its services are significantly less expensive than nursing home care.

The financing structure gives PACE the flexibility to do what it takes to keep participants living on their own, even if it means buying an air conditioner or taking a patient’s dog to the vet. Taking on the housing crisis is another step toward the same goal.

In the Detroit area, PACE Southeast Michigan, which serves 2,200 participants, partners with the owners of senior housing. The landlords agree to keep the rent affordable, and PACE provides services to their tenants who are members. Housing providers “like to be full, they like their seniors cared for, and we do all of that,” said Mary Naber, president and CEO of PACE Southeast Michigan.

For participants who become too infirm to live on their own, the Michigan organization has leased a wing in an independent living center, where it provides round-the-clock supportive care. The organization also is partnering with a nonprofit developer to create a cluster of 21 shipping containers converted into little houses in Eastpointe, just outside Detroit. Still in the planning stages, Naber said, the refurbished containers will probably rent for about $1,000 to $1,100 a month.

In San Diego, the PACE program at St. Paul’s Senior Services cares for chronically homeless people as they move into housing, offering not just health services but the backup needed to keep tenants in their homes, such as guidance on paying bills on time and keeping their apartments clean. St. Paul’s also helps those already in housing but clinging to precarious living arrangements, said Carol Castillon, vice president of its PACE operations, by connecting them with community resources, helping fill out forms for housing assistance, and providing meals and household items to lower expenses.

At PACE Rhode Island, which serves nearly 500 people, about 10 to 15 participants each month become homeless or at risk of homelessness, a rare situation five or six years ago, CEO Joan Kwiatkowski said.

The organization contracts with assisted living facilities, but its participants are sometimes rejected because of prior criminal records, substance use, or health care needs that the facilities feel they can’t handle. And public housing providers often have no openings.

So PACE Rhode Island is planning to buy its own housing, Kwiatkowski said. PACE also has reserved four apartments at an assisted living facility in Bristol for its participants, paying rent when they’re unoccupied. Rabinovitz moved into one recently.

Rabinovitz had worked as a senior credit analyst for a health care company, but now her only income is her Social Security check. She keeps $120 from that check for personal supplies, and the rest goes to rent, which includes meals.

Once a week or so, Rabinovitz rides a PACE van to the organization’s center, where she gets medical care, including dental work, physical therapy, and medication — always, she said, from “incredibly loving people.” When she’s not feeling well enough to make the trek, PACE sends someone to her. Recently, a technician with a portable X-ray machine scanned her sore hip as she lay in her own bed in her new studio apartment.

“It’s tiny, but I love it,” she said of the apartment, which she’s decorated in purple, her favorite color.

©2025 KFF Health News. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

Bad news, coffee drinkers: According to the latest inflation report, the average retail price of roasted coffee has risen 14.8% since last July.

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Worse news: Some of President Donald Trump’s highest new tariffs started this month and are throwing the coffee supply chain into disarray. They appear destined to send prices of America’s go-to beverage even higher in the months ahead.

High-quality coffee beans are grown in a few key countries, virtually all of which are subject to new tariffs. Brazil is by far the biggest, supplying 37% of global production last year, and it was hit with a blanket 50% tariff that took full effect Aug. 6.

Bean prices are jumping

Brazil’s high-quality arabica beans form the base of many popular specialty blends. Industry sources we spoke to say that a 50% price hike is likely too much for roasters and consumers to swallow, with importers and roasters alike wondering how to respond.

“I can tell you from conversations with some customers, there’s not an appetite to purchase large volumes of Brazilian coffee with a new 50% tariff,” says Peter Radosevich, a trader and international sales team leader for specialty importers Royal Coffee, based in Oakland, Calif.

“One of Brazil’s greatest selling points, because it’s one of the largest producers, has been its price point. And so when you remove that from the equation, I think people will move away from using it for sure.”

Which raises the question of how to find a replacement in a finite market where virtually every viable bean grown already finds its way into a cup somewhere in the world.

“Right now, roasters in the U.S. are scrambling to figure out, with the Brazil tariffs, what they’re going to replace it with,” says Spencer Turer, vice president of Coffee Enterprises, a Vermont-based company that provides consulting and product testing to the coffee trade.

“Or, they’re just going to have to absorb the costs and either reduce their profitability or pass those prices on to the consumer.”

Tariffs ranging from 10% to 50% are now in place on imports from almost every coffee-producing country.

The lone exception is Mexico, where coffee is covered by the pre-existing U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA). But according to both Radosevich and Turer, prices are rising there even without tariffs — driven by high demand as buyers crowd in to buy up available beans.

Before those beans can become a cup of joe — whether you make your coffee at home or pick up a cup from a cafe — they have to be roasted. So where does the current market turmoil leave roasters, of which there are thousands in the U.S., large and small?

“Intellectually, I would look at where the harvest cycles are, where coffee is fresh, what’s going to taste similar,” says Turer. “But once you make that conclusion, you have to realize that there are hundreds of roasters that have probably reached that conclusion before you, and already made those phone calls to the importers.”

Why tariffs on coffee?

Fair question. A traditional rationale for tariffs, and one that Trump cites, is to defend a domestic industry. But coffee, as an agricultural product, is not climactically suited for the contiguous United States. It is produced on only a miniscule scale (by global standards) in Hawaii and Puerto Rico, with some fledgling efforts in California.

Coffee is, essentially, collateral damage in Trump’s push to reshape global trade.

Until the day Brazil’s tariffs went into effect, there were hopes that coffee would get an exemption, and the co-chairs of the bipartisan Congressional Coffee Caucus (yes, there’s a Congressional Coffee Caucus) sent a letter to the administration in late July urging that unroasted coffee be exempted from all tariffs.

“Unlike many other goods affected by recent tariffs, coffee is not produced at a scale within the United States that can meet domestic demand,” stated the letter, signed by U.S. Reps. Jill Tokuda, D-HI, and William Timmons, R-S.C., co-chairs of the caucus.

“Every $1 of imported coffee creates an estimated $43 in value throughout the supply chain, and coffee shops, roasters, and distributors serve as important economic engines supporting small businesses and creating jobs that help sustain local economies.”

Renee Colon, co-owner of Fuego Coffee Roasters, holds coffee beans while working at her roasting facility, Friday, March 21, 2025, in Rochester, N.Y. (Max Conway via AP)

Hopes for a coffee exemption haven’t panned out, effectively keeping the industry in paralysis. An exemption could still come in an environment where fresh tariffs announcements are made almost daily, but roasters no longer have the luxury of waiting.

The coffee supply chain: a thumbnail sketch

It’s a long road from a coffee farm to your cup.

Coffee producers around the world can range from large plantations to small family-run operations, as well as cooperative farms. After harvest, the green beans — the seed of a coffee tree “cherry” — can be dried and processed (by one of several methods) at the farm or at a shared facility before being bagged for export.

Like other commodities, the baseline price of coffee is set by a futures market that is largely populated by traders who may never take possession of a bag of beans.

Factors in the futures price of coffee can range from on-the-ground conditions, like weather patterns and crop yields, to technical factors, like the price of oil, interest rates and the strength of the U.S. dollar.

Back-to-back droughts in Brazil have caused prices to spike in recent years, for example.

“Coffee has always been stated as one of the most volatile commodity prices in, basically, the world,” Turer says. “And it moves pretty aggressively day to day, month to month, week to week, and it goes up, it goes down, it changes, sometimes it goes beyond logic.”

And because there is such a spectrum in the quality of unroasted beans, most are bought and sold at a differential to the commodity price. Lower-quality beans sell for less while desirable varietals sell for more — sometimes much more.

The most sought-after beans in the specialty market tend to be grown at higher elevation, in places such as Colombia and Ethiopia. Those beans can be roasted and marketed as single-origin coffees or used in blends.

Coffee producer Jose Natal da Silva sifts coffee beans on his farm in Porciuncula, Rio de Janeiro state, Brazil, Thursday, July 17, 2025. (AP Photo/Bruna Prado)

Enter the importers, more than 7,000 of whom operate in the United States, who often build close relationships with producers large and small all over the world.

Radosevich’s company, Royal Coffee, imports from more than 30 countries, ranging from Indonesia to South America.

“It’s a weekly exercise in trying to figure out how to maintain both a good supply of coffee for our customers at a good price and also maintain relationships with suppliers,” Radosevich says.

“I mean, we want to honor every contract we’ve written, so we’re going to do that. But going forward, it is hard to make the same commitments that we’ve made. You know, for purchasing this year without knowing where these tariff levels may be.”

Importers are tasked with getting the beans, typically packaged in 60-kilogram sacks, to market in the U.S. That’s when general disruptions in global shipping further complicate the picture.

“Not just coffee, but all transporters, all freight companies, are kind of reshuffling where they’re sending ships. That’s just kind of in constant flux,” says David Yake, director of sales and sustainability for Tony’s Coffee, a roaster based in Bellingham, Wash. “It feels COVID-reminiscent. It’s not as bad as COVID, but it’s definitely returning to a higher level of unpredictability.”

Once they’re able to secure their supply, importers sell to roasters in the United States (and elsewhere), sometimes on advance contracts and sometimes on a spot basis. Estimates vary, but there are at least several thousand independent roasters in the U.S.

Some of the players, like Starbucks and Keurig, are mammoth and have scale on their side, while smaller roasters are scrambling to secure their supplies at a price they can afford. Tariffs are tacked onto the price roasters pay, even if they have a pre-tariff contract, and some or all of that will be passed on to the coffee drinker.

“The tariffs are being paid by U.S. small businesses,” says Yake. “This notion that they are being paid by the producing country is not true. We see the tariffs on our invoices that we pay every month.”

Tony’s is not dependent on Brazilian coffee, but the company had already been grappling with the general 10% baseline tariffs that have been in place for months, as well as overall escalation in coffee prices over the past two years.

“Drought, climate change, have had a real impact on coffee supply and stocks globally. These were all pre-tariff concerns,” Yakes says. “Our sales have definitely suffered. We do a lot of our distribution through grocery channels, and I think consumers are already shopping sales. We have very loyal customers but I think brand loyalty only goes so far when you’re seeing double-digit price increases.”

Chuck Nigash runs a boutique specialty roaster called Elevated Roast in Bainbridge Island, Wash., that sells directly to a core of steady customers. He’s trying to keep his lineup of offerings — and his prices — as stable as possible while adjusting to the changing coffee landscape.

“I figured out that my own tariff costs are roughly 21%,” he says.

“I’m intentionally eating half of that, because I don’t want the customer to eat that,” he adds — but he runs such a small operation that he’s able to do that while still making a margin he can live with. Not all roasters, especially those with debt or tighter margins, have as much flexibility.

“So, when a supply chain as complicated as coffee starts to get disrupted on political issues, on U.S. currency issues, on tariff issues,” it can be destabilizing for roasters, Turer says. “This causes all kinds of consternation, all kinds of financial stress, and with the interest [rates] pricing up, there are companies that may potentially close, because they don’t have the availability for credit, and they don’t have the profitability to stay functioning with their cost of goods going up.”

Where will Brazil’s coffee go?

If U.S. importers buy significantly less Brazilian coffee while tariffs are in place, which seems probable, other coffee-consuming countries will undoubtedly step up.

For instance, while the United States is the single biggest coffee consumer in the world, the European Union collectively drinks more coffee — and already imports about a third of it from Brazil.

And then there’s China. The same week that the U.S. tariffs on Brazil were made official, China authorized 183 Brazilian coffee companies to export into the country.

Coffee consumption is on the rise in China, but the move is largely seen as a soft-power play to build political capital with the biggest South American economy while its trading and political relationship with the United States founders.

“There’s a saying we have in the coffee industry,” Turer says. “All coffee will find a home.”

And what will coffee drinkers do?

An April 2025 survey by the National Coffee Association found that 66% of American adults drink coffee every day, surpassing the consumption of tea, juice, soda and bottled water. The popularity of more expensive specialty coffees has risen 18% since the same survey was last conducted in 2020.

A couple of espresso drinks sit on a counter at Fuego Coffee Roasters, Saturday, March 22, 2025, in Rochester, N.Y. (Max Conway via AP)

The way Americans consume their coffee varies of course, from a macchiato at Starbucks to a pot of home brew courtesy of Mr. Coffee. The survey found that 71% of past-day drinkers made at least one cup at home, 16% had coffee prepared out of home only, and 13% had coffee prepared both in and out of home.

Those who make coffee at home overwhelmingly bought their supplies at grocery stores, big-box stores and club stores.

As prices rise, consumers will have to decide whether to absorb the additional cost or make a money-saving adjustment — drinking less coffee, switching to cheaper brands, drinking coffee away from home less often, or some combination of the above.

“People can change their consumption, right? If they want to make sure they get their cup of coffee in the morning, there’s different ways to get that cup of coffee,” says Turer.

Coffee being coffee, though, a change in habits is not always easy.

“It’s a ritualistic product,” says Turer, “which means the consumer expects the coffee to look, smell and taste the same way every time.”

Rick VanderKnyff writes for NerdWallet. Email: rvanderknyff@nerdwallet.com.

The article Tariffs Are a Buzzkill for the Coffee Biz originally appeared on NerdWallet.

By OHAD ZWIGENBERG, SAM METZ and SAMY MAGDY, Associated Press

LOD, Israel (AP) — Protesters in Israel on Tuesday torched tires, blocked highways and clamored for a ceasefire that would free hostages still in Gaza, even as Israeli leaders moved forward with plans for an offensive which they argue is needed to defeat Hamas.

The disruption came as Palestinians in Gaza braced for the expanded offensive against a backdrop of displacement, destruction and parts of the territory plunging into famine. It also followed deadly strikes a day earlier on Gaza’s main hospital which killed 20 people including medics and journalists. Among them was Mariam Dagga, a journalist who worked for The Associated Press.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was expected to convene a security cabinet meeting later Tuesday. However, the government said the meeting will not include discussion of ceasefire talks, according to an official with knowledge of the situation. The official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak on the matter, said there was a delegation from Egypt in Israel on Monday and they discussed the negotiations.

Netanyahu has said that Israel will launch an expanded offensive in Gaza City while simultaneously pursuing a ceasefire, though Israel has yet to send a negotiating team to discuss a proposal on the table. Netanyahu has said the offensive is the best way to weaken Hamas and return hostages, but hostage families and their supporters have pushed back.

“Go back to the negotiation table. There’s a good deal on the table. It’s something we can work with,” said Ruby Chen, the father of 21-year-old Itay Chen, a dual Israeli-American citizen whose body is being held in Gaza. “We could get a deal done to bring all the hostages back.”

Hamas captured 251 hostages on Oct. 7, 2023, in the terrorist attack that triggered the current war. Most have been released during previous ceasefires. Israel has managed to rescue only eight hostages alive. Fifty remain in Gaza, and Israeli officials believe around 20 are still alive.

Hamas has been designated as a terrorist organization by the United States, Canada and the European Union.

Responding to a call from Israel’s Hostages and Missing Families Forum for a “National Day of Struggle,” protesters waved banners that read “Hostage Deal Now.” The relatives of hostages said they hope sustained public pressure can push Netanyahu and his security cabinet to commit to meaningful ceasefire talks. However far-right members of his coalition have threatened to resign if Israel agrees to a truce, dismissing the protesters’ demands.

“We could have ended the war a year ago and brought all the hostages and soldiers home. We could have saved hostages and soldiers, but the prime minister chose, again and again, to sacrifice civilians for the sake of his rule,” said Einav Zangauker, whose 25-year-old son Matan was abducted from one of Israel’s hardest hit kibbutzim on Oct. 7 and is among those believed to still be alive.

Israeli strikes continue after deadly hospital attack

Calls for a ceasefire came a day after Israel struck southern Gaza’s main hospital, killing at least five journalists and 15 others, including Dagga, who had covered doctors treating children for starvation at the same facility days before.

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The strike, among the deadliest of the war against both journalists and hospitals, sparked shock and outrage among press freedom advocates and Palestinians, who mourned the dead at funerals on Monday.

It was swiftly condemned across the globe. Netanyahu called it a “tragic mishap” and said the military would investigate.

Most of those killed died after rushing to the scene of the first blast, only to be hit by a second strike — an attack captured on television by several networks.

The southern Gaza strike came as Israel prepares to expand its offensive into densely populated areas of northern Gaza. Israel’s military wants people in hospitals, displacement camps and Gaza City neighborhoods to evacuate southward to so-called safe zones so it can destroy Hamas and prevent terrorist attacks like the Oct. 7, 2023, assault that killed about 1,200 people and triggered the war.

A day after the strike, Israeli strikes killed at least 16 Palestinians on Tuesday, hospitals said.

Officials from Nasser Hospital, Shifa Hospital and Gaza City’s Sheikh Radwan clinic reported that among the 16 were families, women and children.

Gaza’s Health Ministry also said on Tuesday that three more adults died of causes related to malnutrition and starvation, bringing the malnutrition-related death toll to 186 since late June, when the ministry started to count fatalities among this age category. The toll includes 117 children since the start of the war.

Israel’s military offensive has killed 62,819, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, which does not say how many were fighters or civilians but says around half were women and children. The ministry is part of the Hamas-run government and staffed by medical professionals. The U.N. and independent experts consider it the most reliable source on war casualties. Israel disputes its figures but has not provided its own.

Israeli forces raid downtown Ramallah

Lines of Israeli military vehicles entered downtown Ramallah on Tuesday afternoon in a rare daytime raid on one of the largest Palestinian cities in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.

The Israeli military acknowledged an ongoing operation in the city but would not provide any information about the purpose of the raid.

Ramallah is the headquarters of the Palestinian Authority, which cooperates with Israel on security and has been largely sidelined since the start of the war. The city has faced similar raids before, including in May when Israeli forces targeted money transfer businesses there and in other Palestinian cities, alleging they had ties to militant groups.

The Palestinian Red Crescent said there were 58 injuries during the raid, including injuries from live fire, rubber bullets, tear gas inhalation, and “live bullet shrapnel.” Israeli armored vehicles entered a busy downtown intersection in the city, stopping traffic. A few dozen people attempted to throw rocks at the military vehicles.

The war in Gaza has sparked a surge of violence in the West Bank, with the Israeli military carrying out large-scale operations targeting militants that have killed hundreds of Palestinians and displaced tens of thousands. That has coincided with a rise in settler violence and Palestinian attacks on Israelis.

There have been more than 1,000 attacks by Israeli settlers throughout 2025, with 11 Palestinians killed and roughly 700 injured, according to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.

Metz reported from Jerusalem and Magdy from Cairo. Associated Press journalists Sam Mednick in Tel Aviv, Israel, Jalal Bwaitel and Imad Isseid in Ramallah, West Bank, and Melanie Lidman in Jerusalem contributed reporting.

By JOSH FUNK, Associated Press Transportation Writer

California, Washington and New Mexico could lose millions of dollars of federal funding if they continue failing to enforce English language requirements for truckers, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said Tuesday.

An investigation launched after a deadly Florida crash involving a foreign truck driver who made an illegal U-turn earlier this month found what Duffy called significant failures in the way all three states are enforcing rules that took effect in June after one of President Donald Trump’s executive orders.

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Truckers are supposed to be disqualified if they can’t demonstrate English proficiency and Duffy said the driver involved in the crash that killed three should not have ever been given a commercial driver’s license because of his immigration status. But the crash has become increasingly political with the governors of California and Florida criticizing each other and Duffy highlighting the Trump administration’s immigration concerns in interviews.

“States don’t get to pick and choose which federal safety rules to follow,” Duffy said. “As we saw with the horrific Florida crash that killed three, when states fail to enforce the law, they put the driving public in danger.”

Duffy said California has conducted roughly 34,000 inspections that found at least one violation since the new language standards took effect requiring truck drivers be able to recognize and read road signs and communicate with authorities in English. But only one inspection involved an English language rules violation that resulted in a driver being taken out of service. And 23 drivers with violations in other states were allowed to continue driving after inspections in California.

He cited similar statistics for the other states with Washington finding more than 6,000 violations of safety rules during inspections, but only pulling four drivers out of service for English language violations. New Mexico has not placed any drivers out of service since the rules took effect.

Duffy said the states will lose money from the Motor Carrier Safety Assistance Program if they don’t comply with the rules within 30 days. But he did not specify how much each state could lose. The states did not immediately respond to the proposed sanctions that were announced before officials start their day on the West Coast.

Three people were killed when truck driver Harjinder Singh made an illegal U-turn on a highway, according to Florida’s Highway Patrol. He is being held without bond after being charged with three state counts of vehicular homicide and immigration violations.

Harjinder Singh is escorted to an airplane by Florida Lt. Gov. Jay Collins and law enforcement on Thursday, Aug. 21, 2025, in Stockton, Calif. (AP Photo/Benjamin Fanjoy)

A nearby minivan slammed into Singh’s trailer as he made the turn on a highway about 50 miles (80 kilometers) north of West Palm Beach. Singh and his passenger were not injured.

Diamond R. Litty, the elected public defender in St. Lucie County, said her office was provisionally assigned to Singh’s case during his initial appearance Saturday morning. A review of his finances will determine whether Litty’s office remains on the case.

Litty said her office will focus on the criminal charges against Singh, who is presumed innocent, but they will also work with an immigration attorney to determine how Singh’s status affects the case. After more than three decades at her position, Litty said she can’t recall a case that garnered more attention than this one.

“Unfortunately, Mr. Singh has been caught in the crosshairs of politics,” Litty said.

The Department of Homeland Security has said Singh, a native of India, was in the country illegally. So Duffy said he should not have been granted a commercial driver’s licenses by Washington and California.

California is one of 19 states, in addition to the District of Columbia, that issues licenses regardless of immigration status. Supporters say that lets people work, visit doctors and travel safely.

But in addition, California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s press office posted on the platform X that Singh obtained a work permit while Trump was president, which Homeland Security officials disputed.

Florida authorities have said Singh entered the U.S. illegally from Mexico in 2018.

Associated Press writers David Fischer, Morgan Lee and Eugene Johnson contributed to this report.