By COLLEEN BARRY

MILAN (AP) — Italy’s Ladin minority settled a millennium ago in the Dolomite mountain hamlet of Anpezo — now the two-time Olympic host city of Cortina d’Ampezzo. But members of this ancient ethnolinguistic group are disappointed that the Winter Games will not spotlight their culture.

Instead, Ladins will wave their flag themselves, both figuratively and literally, with a series of initiatives sharing their identity with visitors — and not just in Cortina, but across all of Ladinia, the Ladin-speaking region that spans five Dolomite valleys and three of Italy’s four Olympic territories.

FILE- Clouds hang over the ‘Seceda’ Dolomites mountain, 2519 meters, near Ortisei val Gardena, (St. Ulrich in Groeden) in northern Italian province of South Tyrol, Italy, June 28, 2021. (AP Photo/Matthias Schrader, File)

Ladin leaders expected Milan Cortina Olympics organizers would reach out to feature their language and traditions that exist only in Italy, just as organizers have done in previous host cities, from Lillehammer to Beijing.

When they didn’t, mayors of all 17 Ladin towns sent a letter soliciting that representation, but received no reply.

“We are cut out, as if we don’t exist,” said Elsa Zardini, head of the Ladin community in Cortina.

Half of Cortina’s population is Ladin

Wood carvers and stewards of the forest, Ladins have lived in the Dolomites for 2,000 years. Their legends include the story of Laurin, king of the dwarfs, whose curse is said to have bestowed the region’s dramatic pale limestone peaks with their pinkish sunset glow. For religious ceremonies, they wear traditional costumes including colorful dresses and headpieces for women.

Ladin is a Romance language, formed when the Latin of Roman conquerors blended with ancient Rhaetic. The U.N.’s cultural agency lists it as endangered, with just 35,000 speakers. About 2,500 of them live in Cortina, half the town’s population. Its mayor is half Ladin; his mother, from Genoa, didn’t want him to learn Ladin for fear it would interfere with his Italian.

The map shows the Ladin community spread across the Dolomites . (AP Digital Embed)

Ladinia spans three of the four territories hosting the Games: Veneto, home to Cortina, which will host curling, sliding and women’s Alpine skiing, as well as the autonomous provinces of Alto Adige and Trentino, which are hosting biathlon, cross-country skiing, ski jumping and Nordic combined.

Slalom skier Alex Vinatzer, competing in these Games, is Ladin. So is former Olympic figure skater Carolina Kostner, who won bronze in 2014, and downhill skier Kristian Ghedina, a five-time Olympian.

Excluded from the opening ceremony

When Ghedina went to Lillehammer in 1994 to compete in the Winter Games, the Artic Sami people featured in the opening ceremony. In Sydney in 2000, Indigenous Australian Cathy Freeman lit the caldron. And four years ago, Beijing — even with its record of suppressing some ethnic groups — showcased all of China’s 54 ethnic minorities.

In this undated handout photo, people carry a traditional Ladin flag during a parade through the streets of Cortina D’Ampezzo, northern Italy, Monday, Jan. 26, 2026. (ULdA, Ampezzo Ladin Union via AP)

But Milan Cortina’s 2 1/2-hour opening ceremony on Feb. 6 will not include the Ladins, local organizers confirmed, but will celebrate Italian beauty and culture, including fashion, design and music.

“We want to celebrate those elements that have been exported all over the world,” the opening ceremony’s creative director Marco Balich told The Associated Press.

Even before this perceived slight, the Games were a sore spot for the Ladins of Cortina.

The 1956 Olympics went a long way toward propelling the once-Ladin majority town into a luxury resort replete with luxury fashion boutiques. Today, Ladins struggle to hang on to inherited property due to the increased value and the corresponding inheritance tax. Many young Ladin families move away — tearing at the cultural fabric.

At the official Olympic events, both in Cortina before the Games begin, Ladins will enjoy just two appearances.

The Runcac chapel is seen in San Vigilio di Marebbe, northern Italy, Monday, Jan. 26, 2026. (AP Photo/Nicole Winfield)

A pair in traditional dress were on hand for the arrival of the Olympic torch on Monday, invited by the town. However, they didn’t appear in any images shared by the local organizing committee. And before the Olympic opening ceremony, a small group of costumed Ladins will parade through Cortina — footage that will not be broadcast with the main ceremony, which will reach millions across the globe, local organizers told the AP.

“It’s really not much. Yes, there will be someone in our costume, our costumes will be seen,” said Zardini, the president of Cortina’s Ladin association. “We had other goals, to highlight that we are a linguistic minority and to explain our culture, but that is not the case.”

Shining their own spotlight

That left Ladins to find other ways to raise their own profile.

Zardini is handing out Ladin flags — their azure, white and green colors representing the sky, snow and meadows of their mountain landscapes — to anyone wishing to display one during the Games. Her initiative has spread to neighboring South Tyrol and Trentino provinces.

“It isn’t so much a protest as a welcome, so visitors realize that a people living here speaks a certain language and has its own traditions,” she said. “That is our intention. And then, some have of course displayed it in protest.”

An umbrella group for six Ladin communities has prepared mini-dictionaries of Ladin terms translated into five languages for Olympic visitors, its president, Roland Verra, told the AP.

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“Nief” means snow and, for the more adventurous, Winter Games is “Juesc Olimpics da d’ivern.”

The group, the General Ladin Union of the Dolomites, also produced a video in Ladin, with English subtitles, explaining the Ladins’ history — from Roman conquest to Germanic invaders, the Napoleonic wars, up to 1919, when their region became part of Italy. It will be shown on a loop in front of Cortina’s Town Hall.

In Trentino, Ladins are preparing an event featuring Ladin music and literature, and hoping tourists turn up.

“This is a great opportunity to represent the ancient legends that would certainly be very well seen, very spectacular,” Verra said.

It wasn’t all that long ago that Edouard Julien was putting together an impressive rookie campaign and looked as if he would be an important piece of the Twins’ core moving forward. Julien finished seventh in Rookie of the Year voting for a 2023 season in which he hit .263 with a .839 OPS, boosted in part by his .381 on-base percentage and 16 home runs.

But he was never able to replicate that level of performance, and on Wednesday his Twins tenure came to an end when he was traded, alongside recently designated-for-assignment pitcher Pierson Ohl, to the Colorado Rockies for minor league pitcher Jace Kaminska and cash.

Julien spent last season up and down between the majors and minors, finishing the year hitting .220 with an OPS+ that was 24 percent worse than the league-average hitter.

While Julien played some first and mostly second, he was a below-average defender, and his fit on the roster was in question with others ahead of him on the depth chart at those positions. He also was out of options, meaning the Twins would have had to carry him on their major league roster or expose him to waivers.

Both Ohl and catcher Jhonny Pereda, whom the Twins sent to the Seattle Mariners on Tuesday for cash considerations, had been designated for assignment to make room on the 40-man roster for newly-signed reliever Taylor Rogers and catcher Victor Caratini.

Kaminska, a 24-year-old right-handed pitcher, spent last season at Single-A, where he pitched to a 2.78 earned-run average in 17 games (16 starts). He was a 10th-round pick in the 2023 draft. With the move, the Twins’ 40-man roster now sits at 39.

Keaschall progressing

Luke Keaschall spent his second straight winter rehabbing from a surgical procedure.

This time around, though, it was a much easier recovery. Keaschall suffered a thumb sprain in the final week of last season, necessitating a surgery just days later. Keaschall spent the early days of the offseason getting range of motion back and strengthening the finger before quickly getting back into baseball activity.

“I’m excited to be able to into (the season) healthy and be able to get ready for a season like a normal player and compete,” Keaschall said.

Keaschall underwent Tommy John surgery in August 2024 to repair his ulnar collateral ligament, which limited him to strictly second base last season as he was building back his arm strength and took the outfield, which he had played in the minors, out of the picture.

Now fully healthy, that could change this season.

“Playing baseball a year and a half out of TJ is going to be a little bit easier than playing six months out of TJ,” he said. “My arm’s going to be a little bit more comfortable, a little smoother, and more confident in my throwing 100 percent than I was last year. … I’m a ballplayer. I’ll play wherever you want me to play. If you want to move me somewhere, cool. I’ll be able to play winning baseball there.”

Briefly

The Twins’ equipment truck will depart for Fort Myers, Florida, on Monday from Target Field. It’s scheduled to arrive four days later. Pitchers and catchers are scheduled to report by Feb. 12 for their first workout.

Edouard Julien #47 of the Minnesota Twins celebrates after scoring a run in the first inning against the Milwaukee Brewers at American Family Field on August 23, 2023 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. (Photo by Patrick McDermott/Getty Images)

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By KATE BRUMBACK, Associated Press

ATLANTA (AP) — FBI agents were executing a search warrant at the Fulton County elections office near Atlanta on Wednesday, an agency spokesperson confirmed.

An FBI spokesperson said agents were “executing a court authorized law enforcement action” at the county’s main election office in Union City, just south of Atlanta. The spokesperson declined to provide any further information, citing an ongoing matter.

The search comes as the FBI under the leadership of Director Kash Patel has moved quickly to pursue the political grievances of President Donald Trump, including by working with the Justice Department to investigate multiple perceived adversaries of the Republican commander-in-chief.

The Justice Department had no immediate comment.

A spokesperson for Fulton County did not immediately have a comment or any information on the search.

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Trump has long insisted that the 2020 election was stolen even though judges across the country and his own attorney general said they found no evidence of widespread fault that tipped the contest in Democrat Joe Biden’s favor.

He has long made Georgia, one of the battleground states he lost in 2020, a central target for his complaints about the election and memorably pleaded with its then-secretary of state to “find” him enough votes to overturn the contest.

Last week, in reference to the 2020 election, he asserted that “people will soon be prosecuted for what they did.” It was not clear what in particular he was referring to.

Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis in August 2023 obtained an indictment against Trump and 18 others, accusing them of participating in a wide-ranging scheme to illegally try to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election. That case was dismissed in November after courts barred Willis and her office from pursuing it because of an “appearance of impropriety” stemming from a romantic relationship she had with a prosecutor she had appointed to lead the case.

The FBI last week moved to replace its top agent in Atlanta, Paul W. Brown, according to people familiar with the matter who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss a non-public personnel decision. It was not immediately clear why the move, which was not publicized by the FBI, was made.

The Department of Justice last month sued the clerk of the Fulton County superior and magistrate courts in federal court seeking access to documents from the 2020 election in the county. The lawsuit said the department sent a letter to Che Alexander, clerk of superior and magistrate courts, but that she has failed to produce the requested documents.

Alexander has filed a motion to dismiss the suit. The Justice Department complaint says that the purpose of its request was “ascertaining Georgia’s compliance with various federal election laws.” The attorney general is also trying to help the State Election Board with its “transparency efforts under Georgia law.”

A three-person conservative majority on the State Election Board has repeatedly sought to reopen a case alleging wrongdoing by Fulton County during the 2020 election. It passed a resolution in July seeking assistance from the U.S. attorney general to access voting materials.

The state board sent subpoenas to the county board for various election documents last year and again on Oct. 6. The October subpoena requested “all used and void ballots, stubs of all ballots, signature envelopes, and corresponding envelope digital files from the 2020 General Election in Fulton County.”

The Justice Department sent a letter to the county election board Oct. 30 citing the federal Civil Rights Act and asking for all records responsive to the October subpoena from the State Election Board. Lawyers for the county election board responded about two weeks later, saying that the records are held by the county court clerk. They also attached a letter the clerk sent to the State Election Board saying that the records are under seal in accordance with state law and can’t be released without a court order.

The Justice Department said it then sent a letter to Alexander, the clerk, on Nov. 21 requesting the documents and that she failed to respond.

The department is asking a judge to declare that the clerk’s “refusal to provide the election records upon a demand by the Attorney General” violates the Civil Rights Act. It is also asking the judge to order Alexander to produce the requested records within five days of a court order.

The State Election Board in May 2024 heard a case that alleged documentation was missing for thousands of votes in the recount of the presidential contest in the 2020 election in 2020. After a presentation by a lawyer and an investigator for the secretary of state’s office, a response from the county and a lengthy discussion among the board members, the board voted to issue a letter of reprimand to the county.

Shortly after that vote, there was a shift in power on the board, and the newly cemented conservative majority sought to reopen the case. The lone Democrat on the board and the chair have repeatedly objected, arguing the case is closed and citing multiple reviews that have found that while the county’s 2020 elections were sloppy and poorly managed there was no evidence of intentional wrongdoing.

The conservative majority voted to subpoena a slew of election records from the county in November 2024. A fight over that subpoena is tied up in court.

Associated Press writer Eric Tucker in Washington contributed to this report

Compassion to go around

Nearly every day I read articles in the Pioneer Press describing ICE activities as “massive, chaotic or aggressive,” and perhaps they are, sometimes even inappropriately so, but why are there no articles reminding readers that such “massive and aggressive action” is the necessary reaction, primarily to massive and aggressive illegal immigration orchestrated by the Biden administration, and secondarily to the massive, aggressive and often violent protests against ICE taking place in the Twin Cities?

Had not Biden illegally disregarded long-standing immigration law, millions of unvetted illegal immigrants, including thousands of violent criminals, terrorists and gang members, would not be in the U.S., Renee Good would not be dead and hundreds of documented violent crimes, perpetrated by some of those here illegally, would not have happened.

Obviously from my comments, I am a conservative, but do people really think that conservatives have no compassion for the large majority of those immigrants who are simply people seeking a new and better life? Of course we have compassion. President Trump stated Wednesday and has stated previously, that he, as do most conservatives, “has a heart” for such people, indicating that exceptions to deportation, allowed in immigration law, may be considered for some people here illegally.

Also obviously, those non-violent protestors who are not paid outside professional protestors, have great compassion for those being detained, arrested or deported, but where is their compassion for the hundreds of thousands of people assaulted, raped, murdered, killed from heat and cold, or trafficked enroute to the U.S.? Where is the compassion for the many people who have been, or will be, victimized by violent immigrants? Where is the compassion for the people who have lost jobs to immigrants, or for those seeking legal immigration who are bypassed for, or delayed in, the process of legal immigration? Where is the recognition that border control is necessary for the very existence of the US and for any country?

Richard M. Powell, Owatonna

 

To induce chaos?

I am wondering about whether there is a false flag set-up being instituted at the ongoing ICE protests.

It’s been said that there are professional agitators within the crowds to want to induce chaos and anarchy. Local, state and federal law enforcement would intervene with violence to put down protests should it move from peaceful assembly to rioting, chaos and destruction of property.

On the other hand, I wouldn’t put it past the Trump administration to embed its own paid professionals in these crowds to induce chaos and anarchy with the goal of invoking the Insurrection Act. The FBI, DEA, ATF and other federal agencies have been known to embed people in terrorist, cartel and other criminal groups. Militarily these tactics are used to create false-flag conditions. This possibility does exist.

Donald Trump has been itching to pull the trigger to invoke Insurrection Act, especially if  these professional agitators managed to cause the crowds to cross a line and start widespread violence, destruction, vandalism and damage.

It’s strange that the federal actions by the ICE, Border Patrol and others are seemingly trying to get the crowds beyond the threshold to cause Insurrection kinds of activities. It feels like a powder keg waiting for someone to light the fuse.

In this day and age, it seems that we cannot trust anybody. I am looking forward to the mid-terms to change the direction that our federal government has been heading. I am disappointed at our current Congress inability restrain the overreach that our Trump administration has demonstrated domestically over and over again. And now Trump is overreaching internationally, which threatens world peace, world trade and goodwill.

I hope with a changed Congress, our elected officials hopefully would act promptly to preserve our Constitution and our democracy. Enough already.

Barry Siebert, St. Paul

 

It may be hard to see right now, but …

A letter for my grandchildren:

I saw photographs of you and your school chums at St. Paul Central marching to protest ICE the other morning. Hundreds of you with creative sign boards, goofy hats, smiling faces of all colors and origins. Teenagers on the move. I am so proud of you. And at the same time, so sad and heartbroken at the world we are handing you.

This is not the America we once knew. It is not what our forefathers had in mind. Your parents scraped and borrowed to get you through school, to teach you to work hard, to care, to be honest, to love and appreciate your family, your neighbors, your country. Their parents did too. Your grandparents and great grandparents taught school, started businesses, created advertising, flew in the Pacific, invented things, raised dairy cows, worked on ore-freighters, ran for city council and applied their skills and intellect to improve the lives of their families, their country, their world.

That’s not what you’re seeing on your TV screens or I-phones today. You’re witnessing a dark period in American history — one filled with greed and hate and selfishness. One where the leader insults citizens with foul language and rude gestures, where government officials order and condone violence, where they dress up in makeup and jewelry for TV appearances, rationalize their crimes, and lie. And sadly, many support this behavior.

It is easy to get depressed about these events. Easy to give up, or to ignore what’s happening, or to rationalize it, or to excuse it. But it is not hopeless. You and your friends are coming along, full of hope, energy, caring and empathy. It may be hard to see right now, but your time will come.

Jim Force, Wausau

 

A Fair proposal …

A special welcome to Paul Hendrickson as new manager of the Washington County Fair.

Our former company had the pleasure of working with the great folks at both the Washington County and Ramsey County Fairs for many years prior to Covid. Now would be the time to bring forth the much talked about subject or merging the former Ramsey County Fair with the Washington County Fair.

I would guess that there are hundreds of food growers and exhibitors in Ramsey County that would like the opportunity to be involved in this great summertime event especially from the East Side of Saint Paul.

I like the sound of The Washington / Ramsey County Fair!

Gary Murphy, Vadnais Heights

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