Several familiar names are joining the 2026 Winter Carnival as members of its Senior Royalty.

During the Jan. 15 coronation at Landmark Center, married duo John Erb and Teri Theno-Erb were crowned King Winter and Queen of the Northlands, respectively. Kitty Ryan will be Princess of the Four Winds.

Ryan’s Winter Carnival history traces back to before the annual festival celebrated its 70th anniversary, much less this year’s 140th — and, still to this day, she remains the only person to have ever held the title she once did.

King Winter and Queen of the Northlands

Teri Theno-Erb from Oakdale sings during the 2023 Klondike Kate contest at the DoubleTree by Hilton Saint Paul East on Wednesday, Jan. 11, 2023. (John Autey / Pioneer Press)

Theno-Erb is a longtime Carnival volunteer, and previously was a candidate for Queen of the Snows in 2022 and Klondike Kate in 2023. A St. Paul native who now lives in Oakdale, she’s the owner of Teri’s Hair Studio in Maplewood and also served as the senior queen for the Woodbury Ambassadors last year.

In his candidate bio, Erb, also born in St. Paul, describes himself as “a longtime Winter Carnival supporter” and a regular volunteer at Union Gospel Mission Twin Cities—Christ Recovery Center.

Princess of the Four Winds

In 1952, when Kitty Ryan was 14 years old, she joined the Vulcan Krewe — still the only woman to have ever done so.

She got the gig, she told the Pioneer Press a decade ago, because she could twirl a flaming baton. And the teenager, who grew up on a farm in Goodhue County, came up to Boreas Rex’s domain alone.

Kitty Ryan, the first and only woman Vulcan, stands (top row, center) with the 1952 Krewe in this pair of autographed photos, hanging in the personal collection of former Vulcanus Rex Tom Barrett on Jan. 12, 2022. In 2026, Ryan was crowned Princess of the Four Winds in the Carnival’s Senior Royalty. (Scott Takushi / Pioneer Press)

“My parents were ecstatic, but they couldn’t come along — cows don’t milk themselves. I can’t believe I was 14 years old and alone in a hotel room,” she said in 2016. But as she tells it, that year’s Vulcan Krewe took care of her and ensured both her safety and adherence to a proper bedtime.

“It was like having seven dads,” she said.

Then, in 1956, Ryan was nominated as a candidate for Queen of the Snows, but there was one problem: She was engaged. The Carnival mandated at the time that Queen candidates be unmarried, a rule that persisted until the early 1990s. This put Ryan, an evident front-runner among the 26 candidates, in a gray area.

The compromise Carnival leaders offered was that they’d allow Ryan to be queen if she would just agree to not wear her engagement ring, she has said in interviews. She refused.

But now, seven decades later, Ryan is finally getting her royal moment.

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The Trump administration has repeatedly said the surge of immigration enforcement in Minnesota is the result of “sanctuary politicians who release criminal illegal aliens directly from jails onto the streets to terrorize more innocent Americans,” but Minnesota officials say the state’s prisons work directly with ICE.

Since President Donald Trump took office, Gov. Tim Walz and Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey “have released nearly 470 criminal illegal aliens back onto the streets of Minneapolis,” said U.S. Homeland Security Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin this week, calling on the state “to stop this dangerous policy and commit to honoring the ICE arrest detainers of the more than 1,360 criminal illegal aliens in Minnesota’s custody.”

The Minnesota Department of Corrections, however, said Thursday night those numbers are “categorically false.”

Of about 8,000 people incarcerated in the state’s prisons, 207 are non-U.S. citizens, according to the DOC statement. The state’s prisons notify Immigration and Customs Enforcement when someone with a detention hold is being released from custody to coordinate a pick-up from immigration officials.

County jails and workhouses are a different matter. State law says local law enforcement cannot hold people in custody solely based on civil immigration detainer requests from ICE, according to a legal opinion last year from Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison.

County boards, however, can enter into such agreements with ICE, according to another advisory opinion from Ellison. Seven of Minnesota’s 87 counties have agreements with ICE. They are Cass, Crow Wing, Freeborn, Itasca, Kandiyohi, Mille Lacs and Sherburne counties, according to ICE.

Ramsey County said in 2014 that the county jail would no longer hold people on ICE detainers without a judge’s order, adopting a policy that was already in place for the Hennepin County jail. At the time, ICE directives and federal court decisions had made such holds discretionary.

In 2017, Ramsey County notified ICE they would stop housing people suspected of violating immigration rules effective Jan. 1, 2018; the sheriff’s office said they were losing money in the detentions.

“The ongoing misstatements by DHS leadership reflect a fundamental misunderstanding of how the criminal justice system operates,” DOC said in its statement. “Conflating local jail populations with state prison operations and confusing immigration enforcement authority with correctional custody misleads the public and obscures the truth.”

The DOC pointed out that Homeland Security hasn’t specified which jurisdictions or timeframes they’re using for their numbers. DHS and ICE spokespeople did not respond to Pioneer Press messages Friday.

Additionally, “DHS has not identified a single instance in which the Minnesota Department of Corrections released an individual from state prison custody in violation of an ICE detainer,” the statement said.

Last year, 84 people with ICE detainers were released from prison and DOC staff notified ICE in advance and coordinated with ICE officials to facilitate the custody transfer when requested.

Many on DHS’s ‘worst of worst’ list weren’t in state prison

According to Homeland Security, their operation targets “criminal illegal aliens” with prior convictions for serious crimes such as sexual assault, domestic violence and gang affiliation, as well as individuals with final deportation orders.

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Although DHS has not released a complete list of those arrested, the agency has said in several news releases they’ve included “pedophiles, rapists and violent thugs” who were “allowed to roam Minnesota’s streets thanks to sanctuary policies.”

DHS has highlighted some of the people they’ve arrested, calling them “the worst of the worst” and listing their charges or convictions; however, in most cases, where those took place are not included. The names do not include dates of births, making independent verification by the Pioneer Press through Minnesota and federal court records systems unreliable.

Minnesota’s Department of Corrections operates state prisons, not local jails. Many people who DHS recently listed as the “worst of the worst” were never in DOC custody and instead held in county jails, were under ICE-only custody or were in other states’ correctional systems, according to DOC.

A Homeland Security news release Wednesday highlighted the case of German Adriano Llangari Inga, an undocumented immigrant from Ecuador charged in a drunken driving crash that killed 31-year-old Victoria Eileen Harwell in north Minneapolis on Aug. 3, 2024.

According to DHS, the Hennepin County Jail refused to honor two ICE detainers: first after his arrest and again after he was charged with criminal vehicular homicide.

Court records show that Llangari Inga, 36, was charged on May 2, 2025, after testing on his blood-alcohol content was complete, and arrested eight days later. Three days after his arrest, he was released from the Hennepin County jail after posting a $100,000 bond, despite, according to ICE, a second detainer placed on him.

ICE arrested Llangari Inga on May 16, 2025.

“Victoria Eileen Harwell’s killer NEVER should have been RELEASED from Minnesota jails,” DHS’s McLaughlin said in this week’s news release.

White House, governor at odds

An observer holds a sign that says “Remember” to the window of a car with federal agents inside in St. Paul’s Frogtown neighborhood on Friday, Jan. 16, 2026. (John Autey / Pioneer Press)

Minnesota law requires DOC to notify ICE when a person in prison is not a U.S. citizen. “DOC fully complies with this requirement and goes further by honoring all detainers as a matter of policy, even though state law does not require detainer compliance,” DOC said in its statement. “ICE alone determines whether to place a detainer and is responsible for arranging pick-up.”

The White House said in a Friday statement that “Minnesota’s ‘leaders’ have chosen defiance over partnership. Instead of working with the Trump Administration to uphold the law and protect public safety, the state’s Democrat politicians have repeatedly boasted of their so-called ‘sanctuary’ status, encouraged resistance, and smeared ICE officers.”

But Walz’s office said the Minnesota legislature “has not passed legislation making Minnesota a sanctuary state, and the governor has not signed any such legislation into law. The fact is, Minnesota cooperates with federal immigration authorities in a number of ways.”

“The federal government seems to suggest that Minnesota’s reluctance to divert its own resources to implement federal policy somehow frustrates the federal government’s ability to enforce immigration laws,” the governor’s office statement said.

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“That is simply not the case. It is ridiculous to suggest that Minnesota — a state that is over 1,500 miles away from the Southern border, and a thousand miles from lawmakers in Washington, D.C. who decide and implement border policy — is somehow responsible for a failure of immigration enforcement,” the statement continued.

The White House, meanwhile, said Friday that a “toxic combination of ‘sanctuary’ policies and anti-ICE rhetoric” is endangering federal officers and inciting violence.

“Make no mistake: the responsibility for the enhanced enforcement operations in Minnesota — and the tension and violence — lies squarely with these officials who refuse to partner with the Trump Administration and instead put their Radical Left agenda over public safety and the rule of law,” the White House statement said.

By COLLIN BINKLEY, Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration is delaying its plans to withhold pay from student loan borrowers who default on their payments, backing off a measure that threatened to deliver a financial blow to millions of Americans.

The Education Department announced Friday involuntary collections on federal student loans will remain on hold as the agency finalizes new repayment plans. The shift reverses course on earlier plans to restart wage garnishments this month after a pandemic-era pause.

Nicholas Kent, the department’s higher education chief, said the agency is “committed to helping student and parent borrowers resume regular, on-time repayment, with more clear and affordable options.”

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“The Department determined that involuntary collection efforts such as Administrative Wage Garnishment and the Treasury Offset Program will function more efficiently and fairly after the Trump Administration implements significant improvements to our broken student loan system,” Kent said in a statement.

Federal student loan borrowers can have their wages garnished and their federal tax refunds withheld if they default on their loans, meaning they are at least 270 days behind on payments. The penalties were put on hold during the pandemic-era pause on student loan payments that the Trump administration lifted.

Last spring, Trump officials said they would resume targeting tax refunds for borrowers in default. In December, officials said they would restart wage garnishment in January, with initial notices being sent to 1,000 borrowers the week of Jan. 7.

Both penalties — withholding wages and federal payments — are being paused, according to the Friday announcement.

More than 5 million Americans were in default on their federal student loans as of September, according to department data. Millions more have fallen behind on loan payments and are at risk of going into default this year.

The department did not set a new date for involuntary collections. It said the delay will give borrowers time to evaluate new repayment plans that are scheduled to be available starting July 1.

Friday’s announcement was welcomed by student loan advocates who urged the department not to resume wage garnishment.

“The administration’s plans would have been economically reckless and would have risked pushing nearly 9 million defaulted borrowers even further into debt,” said Aissa Canchola Bañez, policy director at the nonprofit Protect Borrowers.

Congress last year ordered the department to overhaul repayment plans that critics said had become too confusing. New borrowers will have two options: a standard plan and a plan that lowers payments based on the borrower’s income.

Last month the department scrapped the SAVE Plan, which was created under former President Joe Biden and offered lower payments and a quicker path to student loan forgiveness. The plan had been blocked by a federal judge after Missouri and other states challenged it in court.

The Associated Press’ education coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.

Nobody needs to remind Minnesota Wild fans that January is the gloomiest month of the year — especially not after the week the Wild are having.

After finishing a 0-2-1 homestand with one of the more lopsided losses of the season on Thursday, the Wild left for western New York on Friday with two-thirds of their top line — including their leading goal-scorer — missing.

On Friday afternoon, the Wild announced that Matt Boldy, who leads the team with 27 goals, is being placed on injured reserve with a lower-body injury. Joel Eriksson Ek, the team’s second-line center, was also placed on IR after missing the past three games with a lower-body injury, as well.

The Wild are also currently playing without veteran defensemen Zach Bogosian and Jonas Brodin. Coach John Hynes had originally hoped that Eriksson Ek and Bogosian could travel with the team on their upcoming trip to Buffalo, Toronto and Montreal. But following Thursday night’s game, Hynes indicated there had been a setback.

Eriksson Ek and Brodin were selected for Team Sweden and Boldy was picked for Team USA for next month’s Winter Olympics in Italy. Their availability for international hockey is currently unknown.

With a line chart to fill, the Wild on Friday recalled forwards Nicolas Aube-Kubel and Hunter Haight, and defenseman David Jiricek, from Iowa. All three have seen NHL minutes with Minnesota this season. Defenseman Carson Lambos, who was recalled for Thursday night’s game with Winnipeg but was a healthy scratch, was sent back to Iowa on Friday.

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