By JOHN HANNA, SARA CLINE and JIM VERTUNO, Associated Press

AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — Democratic state Rep. Nicole Collier refused to come to the Texas state Capitol for two weeks. Now she won’t leave, and fellow Democrats are joining her protest.

Collier was among dozens of Democrats who left the state for the Democratic havens of California, Illinois, Massachusetts and New York to delay the Republican-controlled Legislature’s approval of redrawn congressional districts sought by President Donald Trump. When they returned Monday, Republicans insisted that Democrats have around-the-clock police escorts to ensure they wouldn’t leave again and scuttle Wednesday’s planned House vote on a new political map.

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But Collier wouldn’t sign what Democrats called the “permission slip” needed to leave the House chamber, a half-page form allowing Department of Public Safety troopers to follow them. She spent Monday night and Tuesday on the House floor, where she set up a livestream while her Democratic colleagues outside had plainclothes officers following them to their offices and homes.

Dallas-area Rep. Linda Garcia said she drove three hours home from Austin with an officer following her. When she went grocery shopping, he went down every aisle with her, pretending to shop, she said. As she spoke to The Associated Press by phone, two unmarked cars with officers inside were parked outside her home.

“It’s a weird feeling,” she said. “The only way to explain the entire process is: It’s like I’m in a movie.”

The trooper assignments, ordered by Republican House Speaker Dustin Burrows, was another escalation of a redistricting battle that has widened across the country. Trump is pushing GOP state officials to tilt the map for the 2026 midterms more in his favor to preserve the GOP’s slim House majority, and Democrats nationally have rallied around efforts to retaliate.

Other Democrats join the protest

House Minority Leader Gene Wu, from Houston, and state Rep. Vincel Perez, of El Paso, stayed overnight with Collier, who represents a minority-majority district in Fort Worth.

On Tuesday, more Democrats returned to the Capitol to tear up the slips they had signed and stay on the House floor, which has a lounge and restrooms for members.

Dallas-area Rep. Cassandra Garcia Hernandez, called their protest a “slumber party for democracy” and said Democrats were holding strategy sessions on the floor.

“We are not criminals,” Houston Rep. Penny Morales Shaw said.

Collier said having officers shadow her was an attack on her dignity and an attempt to control her movements.

Republican leader says Collier ‘is well within her rights’

Burrows brushed off Collier’s protest, saying he was focused on important issues, such as providing property tax relief and responding to last month’s deadly floods. His statement Tuesday morning did not mention redistricting and his office did not immediately respond to other Democrats joining Collier.

“Rep. Collier’s choice to stay and not sign the permission slip is well within her rights under the House Rules,” Burrows said.

Under those rules, until Wednesday’s scheduled vote, the chamber’s doors are locked, and no member can leave “without the written permission of the speaker.”

To do business Wednesday, 100 of 150 House members must be present.

The GOP wants 5 more seats in Texas

The GOP plan is designed to send five additional Republicans from Texas to the U.S. House. Texas Democrats returned to Austin after Democrats in California launched an effort to redraw their state’s districts to take five seats from Republicans.

Democrats also said they were returning because they expect to challenge the new maps in court.

Republicans issued civil arrest warrants to bring the Democrats back after they left the state Aug. 3, and Republican Gov. Greg Abbott asked the state Supreme Court to oust Wu and several other Democrats from office. The lawmakers also face a fine of $500 for every day they were absent.

How officers shadowed Democratic lawmakers

Democrats reported different levels of monitoring. Houston Rep. Armando Walle said he wasn’t sure where his police escort was, but there was still a heightened police presence in the Capitol, so he felt he was being monitored closely.

Some Democrats said the officers watching them were friendly. But Austin Rep. Sheryl Cole said in a social media post that when she went on her morning walk Tuesday, the officer following her lost her on the trail, got angry and threatened to arrest her.

Garcia said her 9-year-old son was with her as she drove home, and each time she looked in the rearview mirror, she could see the officer close behind. He came inside a grocery store where she shopped with her son.

“I would imagine that this is the way it feels when you’re potentially shoplifting and someone is assessing whether you’re going to steal,” she said.

Hanna reported from Topeka, Kansas, and Cline reported from Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

By MATTHEW BROWN and HANNAH SCHOENBAUM, Associated Press

A Yosemite National Park ranger was fired after hanging a pride flag from El Capitan while some park visitors could face prosecution under protest restrictions that have been tightened under President Donald Trump.

Shannon “SJ” Joslin, a ranger and biologist who studies bats, said they hung a 66-foot wide transgender pride flag on the famous climbing wall that looms over the California park’s main thoroughfare for about two hours on May 20 before taking it down voluntarily. A termination letter they received last week accused Joslin of “failing to demonstrate acceptable conduct” in their capacity as a biologist and cited the May incident.

Yosemite visitors view El Capitan, where a transgender flag hangs in Yosemite National Park, Calif., May 20, 2025. (Jayce Kolinski via AP)

“I was really hurting because there were a lot of policies coming from the current administration that target trans people, and I’m nonbinary,” Joslin, 35, told The Associated Press, adding that hanging the flag was their way of saying, “We’re all safe in national parks.”

Joslin said their firing sends the opposite message: “If you’re a federal worker and you have any kind of identity that doesn’t agree with this current administration, then you must be silent, or you will be eliminated.”

Park officials on Tuesday said they were working with the U.S. Justice Department to pursue visitors and workers who violated restrictions on demonstrations at the park that had more than 4 million visitors last year.

The agencies “are pursuing administrative action against several Yosemite National Park employees and possible criminal charges against several park visitors who are alleged to have violated federal laws and regulations related to demonstrations,” National Park Service spokesperson Rachel Pawlitz said.

Joslin said a group of seven climbers including two other park rangers hung the flag. The other rangers are on administrative leave pending an investigation, Joslin said.

A group of people, including Shannon Joslin, a Yosemite National Park ranger and biologist who was fired, hang a transgender flag on El Capitan in Yosemite National Park, Calif., May 20, 2025. (Mitchell Overton via AP)

Flags have long been flown from El Capitan without consequences, said Joanna Citron Day, a former federal attorney who is now with the advocacy group Public Employees For Environmental Responsibility. She said the group is representing Joslin, but there is no pending legal case.

On May 21, a day after the flag display, Acting Superintendent Ray McPadden signed a rule prohibiting people from hanging banners, flags or signs larger than 15 square feet in park areas designated as “wilderness” or “potential wilderness.” That covers 94% of the park, according to Yosemite’s website.

Park officials said the new restriction was needed to preserve Yosemite’s wilderness and protect climbers.

“We take the protection of the park’s resources and the experience of our visitors very seriously, and will not tolerate violations of laws and regulations that impact those resources and experiences,” Pawlitz said.

It followed a widely publicized instance in February of demonstrators hanging an upside down American flag on El Capitan to protest the firing of National Park Service employees by the Trump administration.

Among the climbers who helped hang the transgender flag was Pattie Gonia, an environmentalist and drag queen who uses the performance art to raise awareness of conservation issues. For the past five years, Gonia has helped throw a Pride event in Yosemite for park employees.

She said they hung the transgender flag on the iconic granite monolith to express that being transgender is natural.

This year, Trump signed an executive order changing the federal definition of sex to exclude the concept of gender identity. He also banned trans women from competing in women’s sports, removed trans people from the military and limited access to gender-affirming care.

Gonia called the firing unjust. Joslin said they hung the flag in their free time, as a private citizen.

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“SJ is a respected pillar within the Yosemite community, a tireless volunteer who consistently goes above and beyond,” Gonia said.

Jayson O’Neill with the advocacy group Save Our Parks said Joslin’s firing appears aimed at deterring park employees from expressing their views as the Trump administration pursues broad cuts to the federal workforce.

Since Trump took office, the National Park Service has lost approximately 2,500 employees from a workforce that had about 10,000 people, Wade said. The Republican president is proposing a $900 million cut to the agency’s budget next year.

Pawlitz said numerous visitors complained about unauthorized demonstrations on El Capitan earlier in the year.

Many parks have designated “First Amendment areas” where groups 25 or fewer people can protest without permits. Yosemite has several of those areas, including one in Yosemite Valley, where El Capitan is located.

Park service rules on demonstrations have existed for decades and withstood several court challenges, said Bill Wade, executive director of the Association of National Park Rangers. He was not aware of any changes in how those rules are enforced under Trump.

Associated Press journalist Brittany Peterson contributed reporting from Denver.

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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