Kay Ochi’s parents were 21 and 22 years old when they were forced to leave San Diego, where they were born, and taken to an incarceration camp in the desert of Poston, Arizona, simply because of their Japanese heritage.

“That was three years of pure hell,” said Ochi, a third-generation Japanese American, or Sansei, who is president of the Japanese American Historical Society of San Diego.

Kay Ochi, president of the Japanese American Historical Society of San Diego, holds several historical photos taken during the time when San Deigns with Japanese ancestry were taken to internment camps. (Nelvin C. Cepeda / The San Diego Union-Tribune)

The history of how the U.S. incarcerated more than 120,000 people of Japanese descent — most of them U.S. citizens like Ochi’s parents — during World War II is well-documented in museums and archives. It’s a memory that still shapes the identity of generations of Japanese Americans today and is a widely recognized example of how one group of people’s civil rights were ignored and violated.

But now civil rights activists and historians feel they are witnessing a flashback to history as President Donald Trump has invoked the same 227-year-old U.S. law that was used to justify incarcerating the Japanese American community during wartime.

“With the way the administration has gone forward with the executive orders, a lot of things seem to be able to happen again,” said Susan Hasegawa, a local historian of Japanese American history and a professor at San Diego City College.

The Alien Enemies Act, enacted in 1798 when the U.S. was on the brink of war with France, allows the president to detain or deport any “aliens” he considers “dangerous to the peace and safety” of the country.

U.S. presidents have invoked the law only three times before — during the War of 1812, World War I and World War II, when it was used to incarcerate people of Japanese, German and Italian descent.

Trump has been invoking the act to justify detaining, deporting and revoking visas for growing numbers of immigrants, largely Venezuelans that his administration has sent, without charges, to a notorious El Salvador prison.

Kay Ochi, president of the Japanese American Historical Society of San Diego, sits next to a construction replica of the wall that would be used to create a wall for apartments in the large buildings at the internment camps. (Nelvin C. Cepeda / The San Diego Union-Tribune)

Last week, the Supreme Court allowed the Trump administration to keep deporting people under the law, while saying the administration had to give people the chance to fight their deportations legally. The court didn’t weigh in on the law’s constitutionality.

Civil rights advocates and others have described Trump’s moves as alarming violations of civil rights, including the right to due process.

The danger of the Alien Enemies Act is that it enables such violations, “under the guise of national security,” said Michael Kurima, the co-president of the board of the San Diego chapter of the Japanese American Citizens League.

He noted that the last time the law was invoked, about two-thirds of the people it was used to incarcerate were U.S. citizens.

Historical photos from the archives belonging to the Japanese American Historical Society of San Diego. The photo was taken during the time when San Diegans of Japanese ancestry were required to report to the Santa Fe Railway Depot on April 8, 1942. (Nelvin C. Cepeda / The San Diego Union-Tribune)

“If the Alien Enemies Act is only a first step, then government suppression of dissent could be next,” Kurima said. “What begins with purported gang members from abroad could easily expand to include others — even American citizens — when civil liberties are treated as conditional.”

Critics have also noted that Trump is the only president in history to invoke the act when it’s not wartime as declared by Congress. He has repeatedly referred to unauthorized immigration as an “invasion.”

“The last time it was invoked, it was devastating to a lot of people who had nothing to do with the enemy,” Hasegawa said. “So then to do it again with a targeted group in a non-war time, it’s even more suspicious and scary.”

On Saturday, six local immigrant and refugee artists debuted an art installation at the San Diego Central Library, in collaboration with the local historical society, that shows parallels between the experiences of Japanese Americans during World War II and the experiences of immigrants today.

“It’s just horrendous, and we need to understand that it didn’t happen just now,” Shinpei Takeda, director of the AjA Project, whose artist fellows created the installation, said of the return of the Alien Enemies Act. “With art, at least it gives people a chance to talk about it, and it shows that something like this has happened in the past.”

A San Diego community dismantled

When the Alien Enemies Act was last invoked, in 1941, about 2,000 people of Japanese descent, known as Nikkei, were living in San Diego County.

First-generation Japanese immigrants, or Issei, arrived in San Diego starting in the 1880s, with many working in agricultural fields and on railroads. In the decades leading up to World War II, they had made significant contributions to the region’s farming and fishing industries, Ochi said; many worked as fishermen or at tuna canneries in San Diego Bay, and many were farmers, from the Tijuana River Valley up to Oceanside, Hasegawa said.

Issei also ran about 30 small businesses in downtown San Diego, near Fifth Street and Island Avenue, Hasegawa added. There were Japanese-language schools, as well as a Buddhist temple and two Japanese Christian churches.

After Japan bombed Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941, the U.S. moved quickly to begin its forcible removal of Nikkei.

By February, the FBI had arrested about three dozen local Issei whom it had pre-identified as community leaders, among them the leadership of San Diego’s Buddhist temple, Japanese language teachers and instructors of the Japanese martial art kendo, Hasegawa said.

On Feb. 19, 1942, President Franklin Roosevelt enacted Executive Order 9066, which mandated the removal of people of Japanese descent from their communities and sent them to incarceration camps. Japanese people were forced to abandon their homes, jobs and businesses.

The vast majority of those from San Diego were sent by train to the Santa Anita racetrack in Los Angeles County, a holding place for thousands being relocated from around Southern California. Then they were shipped to Poston, Arizona — one of 10 camps the U.S. government created to incarcerate people of Japanese descent.

San Diego leaders, meanwhile, supported and praised the incarceration. The San Diego City Council, county Board of Supervisors and Chamber of Commerce all passed measures saying Japanese American residents should be incarcerated or shouldn’t be allowed back to San Diego.

‘Intergenerational trauma’

After their release following the war, Japanese Americans struggled to rebuild their lives, including in San Diego.

Their forced removal and incarceration had decimated Japanese institutions, including the businesses that once existed downtown, Hasegawa said. Many were replaced or unable to rebuild, unlike in larger cities like Los Angeles. And many people were pressured or forced to assimilate by abandoning their language and culture.

For many, the toll on mental health and self-esteem persisted for decades. “Some people say that the resettlement was even harder than the incarceration,” Ochi said. “The emotional toll was even greater and has had lasting impact, intergenerational trauma.”

In 2022, the San Diego City Council formally apologized and revoked the resolution it had passed eight decades earlier to support the incarceration. “It is incredibly important that we identify the racist acts of the past and injustices of the past and address them head-on,” then-Council President Sean Elo-Rivera said at the time. “We can acknowledge the wrong that the city committed.”

To the artists whose work is now on display at the Central Library, addressing those injustices is also paramount, even as their installation examines ways incarcerated Nikkei found to preserve their community.

First-generation Laotian American artist Tarrah Aroonsakool focused on how incarcerated Nikkei used cooking as an act of resilience, adapting recipes to their wartime rations. First-generation Mexican American artist Jazmin Barajas connected parallels between how Japanese and Mexican traditions use altars and shrines to honor the dead, and juxtaposed images of the walls of the Tule Lake incarceration camp with that of the U.S.-Mexico border wall.

Historical photos from the archives belonging to the Japanese American Historical Society of San Diego. The photo was taken during the time when San Diegans of Japanese ancestry relocated to the Poston Internment Camp. (Nelvin C. Cepeda / The San Diego Union-Tribune)

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The artists said education and accurate descriptions of history are needed to ensure that mass civil rights abuses like the ones Japanese Americans faced are never repeated. If history is sanitized, it can more easily be repeated, the artists said.

“The silencing is exactly what allows these sorts of trajectories to repeat themselves without people realizing the signs,” Barajas said.

Their art installation will be on view at the library through June.

By FARNOUSH AMIRI

UNITED NATIONS (AP) — The highest-ranking U.S. representative now at the United Nations told Congress two years ago that Russia’s invasion of Ukraine was “unprovoked” and “unjustified,” urging U.N. members to condemn Moscow’s aggression and demand an end to the war.

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In February, it was the same career diplomat, Dorothy Shea, who voiced the Trump administration’s extraordinary decision to split with European allies and refuse to back a U.N. resolution blaming Russia for its invasion on the third anniversary of the war.

While it is typical for diplomats to stay on as U.S. presidents — and their political parties — change, Shea’s interim role has unexpectedly made her a face of the stunning U.S. transition on the world stage, with President Donald Trump’s “America First” approach increasingly upending the post-World War II international order.

Shea will be in place longer than expected after Trump’s unusual decision last month to withdraw his nominee for U.N. ambassador, Rep. Elise Stefanik, from consideration because of a slim Republican House majority.

“I would say (Shea’s) position is unique. It is probably particularly unique in that because of the extraordinary change, not just from one administration to another, but really an era of U.S. foreign policy, even when there were nuanced differences,” said Phillip Reeker, the former acting assistant secretary of state for Europe. “The change in the vote that took place at the U.N. on the Russia-Ukraine war was really an inflection point in U.S. policy.”

A UN vote changes US messaging on Ukraine

On Feb. 24, the U.S. joined Russia in voting against a European-backed Ukrainian resolution demanding an immediate withdrawal of Moscow’s forces. A dueling U.S. resolution noted “the tragic loss of life” and called for “a swift end to the conflict,” but it didn’t mention Moscow’s aggression as the Trump administration opened negotiations with Russia on a ceasefire.

“Continuing to engage in rhetorical rivalries in New York may make diplomats feel vindicated, but it will not save souls on the battlefield,” Shea, 59, said at the time. “Let us prove to ourselves and to our citizens that we can come together and agree on the most basic principles. Let us show one another that the bold vision of peace that once pulled us out of hell can prevail.”

The message was a shocking retreat for the U.S. in the 193-member U.N. General Assembly, whose resolutions are not legally binding but are seen as a barometer of world opinion. It also reinforced the fears of some allies about what a second Trump presidency could mean for longstanding transatlantic partnerships — and whether the U.S. could remain a bulwark against aggressors like Russia.

For Shea, it was another day at work. She has spent the last 30-plus years serving as a diplomat under both Republican and Democratic presidents — from Bill Clinton to Trump — carrying out their policies even if they were a departure from longstanding U.S. positions.

“I don’t know what her personal views are on things. But administrations change, policies change. And your job as a diplomat is to advocate for those policies,” said a former colleague and deputy U.S. ambassador, Robert Wood, who recently retired.

The U.S. mission to the U.N. declined to comment. The State Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The roots of a diplomat

Shea’s work has included stints in South Africa, where she witnessed Nelson Mandela become the first democratically elected president, and Israel, where she worked on the Israeli-Palestinian peace process.

Shea grew up in the suburbs of Washington — her father a World War II veteran and her mother active in the local Japanese American friendship society. The experience of Japanese exchange students staying with her family over several summers and wanting to understand world events propelled her into international relations at the University of Virginia. After graduation, she scored a job offer with the U.S. Foreign Service.

She worked her way up and in 2019 was tapped to be Trump’s ambassador to Lebanon, where the soft-spoken diplomat made headlines for her criticism of the Hezbollah militant group. A Lebanese judge banned local and foreign media outlets from interviewing Shea for a year, saying her criticism of Hezbollah was seditious and a threat to social peace.

In 2023, Biden nominated Shea to become No. 2 at the U.N.

The top US role at the UN — for now

It is unclear when Shea will hand off to a Senate-confirmed political appointee. Stefanik went through a confirmation hearing, but her nomination was pulled last month because her vote to advance Trump’s agenda remains crucial to Republicans in the House. The GOP congresswoman was the fourth Trump nominee not to make it through the confirmation process.

Trump has made no mention of whom he would nominate to replace Stefanik and fill his last remaining Cabinet seat. Until then, Shea is at the helm at a critical moment for U.S. foreign policy, selling big changes to dealing with both allies and adversaries and defending the administration’s slashing of foreign assistance.

The White House recently proposed additional drastic cuts to the State Department, which would include eliminating funding for nearly all international organizations, such as the U.N.

The proposal is highly preliminary but reflects the administration’s isolationist view, which, along with funding uncertainties, poses a major challenge to the mandate and work of the U.N.

By ALEXA ST. JOHN

Mike Summers was eager to install solar at his home in Ohio for years, and after he finally replaced his aging roof this year, his solar contractor swung into action. His system — including 19 panels and a battery backup — went up this week, and Summers considers himself lucky.

“I’m glad to have done it when I did,” said Summers, a former mayor in his city of Lakewood just west of Cleveland. He’ll get about $10,000 in tax credits on his $39,000 investment, but nearly as important is that all the equipment was readily available.

Other hopeful solar buyers may have a much harder time in coming months. President Donald Trump’s escalating trade war with China threatens to crimp a massive source of solar panels and parts, with experts saying the cost of projects will certainly rise as China retaliates.

China accounted for at least 80% of the components of solar panels as recently as 2022, according to an International Energy Agency report, especially polysilicon, glass and solar cells. Solar also demands increasing critical mineral supplies, of which China is a key player across the globe, and electronics.

In the U.S., private industry has poured $18.2 billion into developing a domestic supply chain in recent years, according to Atlas Public Policy, that includes everything from the ingots and wafers that make up panels to electrical and structural components to assembly of the panels themselves. Most of that came from the Inflation Reduction Act passed during former President Joe Biden’s administration, with massive funding for clean energy investment.

But that won’t come close to replacing what China produces.

“Really everybody’s losing when you think about it, because the systems are costing more for the customers and it’s also just making it more difficult, in some ways, for us to do business,” said Brian DiPaolo, assistant sales manager at Cleveland-based solar installer YellowLite, which is doing Summers’ project. DiPaolo said some customers are holding off on plans until there is more clarity. The company still stocked up on solar panels, made in North America, a month ago to stay competitive in coming months.

“We’re seeing both international as well as domestic manufacturers of the equipment increasing their costs to prepare for the tariffs,” DiPaolo said. “You think that the domestic manufacturers would keep their prices down because they don’t get hit by the tariffs, but they’re seeing this added demand for their equipment.”

It’s supply and demand, said Martin Pochtaruk, CEO of Heliene, which focuses on large-scale solar projects. He described the price of a necessary glass component from China going up in February due to a tariff hike. Suppliers in other countries matched the higher price, meaning higher costs no matter the source.

Alexis Abramson, dean of Columbia University’s Climate School, said there’s no doubt that residential solar is going to be more expensive. That will cut solar adoption, and small and mid-size installers will go under, she said.

It’s just “extremely difficult to offer current and future customers pricing certainty” when trade policy is changing so much, said James Hasselbeck, chief operating officer at New England-based solar company ReVision Energy.

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Solar has gotten significantly more affordable in recent years as the technology scales up, improves and gets cheaper to install. Systems can still cost thousands of dollars on average, but the average cost for a residential system is down more than 70% from 2010, according to the National Renewable Energy Laboratory. American consumers have also had a shot at credits that bring the cost down still further, although the future of those is uncertain under the Trump administration.

Commercial and utility-scale project costs have also dropped dramatically.

That’s fed rapid growth across the U.S. over the past two decades. In 2024, the commercial segment grew 8% and utility grew 33%, according to an annual report from the association and consultancy Wood Mackenzie. The residential segment fell 32% last year, but experts attribute that to high interest rates and election uncertainty, and said they had expected continued growth before the tariffs hit.

Solar is an important source of clean energy because it doesn’t emit the harmful greenhouse gases that coal, natural gas and oil do. Those are massive contributors to Earth’s warming.

Trump imposed tariffs during his first term on imported solar cells and modules in 2018 in hopes of slashing reliance on China.

But China subsidized its own domestic overproduction and some U.S. manufacturers accused it of essentially moving operations to four Southeast Asian countries that had a temporary exemption from tariffs.

Abigail Ross Hopper, president and CEO of the Solar Energy Industries Association, said the U.S. is “quickly taking back control of the supply chain from China to build the strongest solar manufacturing base in the world.” The group reported that in 2024, module manufacturing capacity, largely concentrated in the South, grew 190%, and said cell manufacturing “was reshored for the first time in five years” with company Suniva restarting production.

But Hopper also said sudden changes in policy risk chilling investment and slowing job creation, especially for manufacturers. The group said during the first Trump administration that tariffs issued then were harmful to the industry.

Ultimately, Abramson said she “would encourage anybody who has been really thinking about putting solar on their roof to really look into locking that in sooner rather than later.”

Read more of AP’s climate coverage at http://www.apnews.com/climate-and-environment.

Alexa St. John is an Associated Press climate reporter. Follow her on X: @alexa_stjohn. Reach her at ast.john@ap.org.

The Associated Press’ climate and environmental 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.

By WAFAA SHURAFA and FATMA KHALED

DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip (AP) — Israeli airstrikes across Gaza killed at least 25 people on Friday including children, hospital workers said, as the new U.S. ambassador to Israel made his first public appearance in Jerusalem.

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The dead included 15 people killed in three strikes on the southern city of Khan Younis, according to Nasser Hospital, which received the bodies. Ten people were killed in Jabaliya, including eight from the same home, according to the Indonesian Hospital, where the bodies were brought.

The strikes came a day after more than two dozen people died in Gaza as Israel continued attacks, pressuring Hamas to return the hostages and disarm.

U.S. Ambassador Mike Huckabee visited the Western Wall on Friday, the holiest Jewish prayer site in Jerusalem’s Old City. He inserted a prayer into the wall, which he said was handwritten by U.S. President Donald Trump. “Those are his initials, D.T.,“ said Huckabee while showing the note to the media.

In his first act as ambassador, Huckabee said Trump told him to pray for the peace of Jerusalem. Huckabee also said every effort was being made to bring home the remaining hostages held by Hamas. A one-time presidential hopeful, Huckabee has acknowledged his past support for Israel’s right to annex the West Bank and incorporate its Palestinian population into Israel but said it would not be his “prerogative” to carry out that policy.

During his first term, Trump recognized Jerusalem as Israel’s capital over Palestinian objections and moved the U.S. embassy from Tel Aviv. Palestinians seek the eastern part of the city, captured by Israel in the 1967 Mideast war, as their future capital.

Huckabee’s arrival comes at a pivotal time in the 18-month war, as international mediators including the U.S. are trying to get a broken ceasefire back on track.

Israel is demanding that Hamas release more hostages at the start of any new ceasefire and ultimately agree to disarm and leave the territory. Israel has said it plans to occupy large “security zones” inside Gaza.

Khalil al-Hayya, head of Hamas’ negotiating delegation, said Thursday the group had rejected Israel’s latest proposal along those lines. He reiterated Hamas’ stance that it will return hostages only in exchange for the release of more Palestinian prisoners, a full Israeli withdrawal from Gaza and a lasting truce, as called for in the now-defunct ceasefire agreement reached in January.

Hamas currently holds 59 hostages, 24 of whom are believed to be alive.

Friday’s airstrikes came a day after aid groups raised alarm over Israel’s blockade of of Gaza, where it has barred entry of all food and other goods for more than six weeks. Thousands of children have become malnourished, and most people are barely eating one meal a day as stocks dwindle, the United Nations said.

Israel’s Defense Minister says the blockade is one of the “central pressure tactics” against Hamas, which Israel accuses of siphoning off aid to maintain its rule. Aid workers deny there is significant diversion of aid, saying the U.N. closely monitors distribution. Rights groups have called it a “starvation tactic.”

The war began when Hamas-led terrorists attacked southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, killing about 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and abducting 251. Hamas has been designated a terrorist organization by the United States, Canada, and European Union.

Most of the hostages have since been released in ceasefire agreements or other deals.

Israel’s offensive has since killed over 51,000 Palestinians, mostly women and children, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, which does not distinguish between civilians and combatanFts. The war has destroyed vast parts of Gaza and most of its food production capabilities. The war has displaced around 90% of the population, with hundreds of thousands of people living in tent camps and bombed-out buildings.

Khaled reported from Cairo. Associated Press writer Sam Mednick in Tel Aviv, Israel, contributed to this report.

Follow AP’s war coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/israel-hamas-war