WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court on Friday rejected the Trump administration’s appeal to quickly resume deportations of Venezuelans under an 18th century wartime law.

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Over two dissenting votes, the justices acted on an emergency appeal from lawyers for Venezuelan men who have been accused of being gang members, a designation that the administration says makes them eligible for rapid removal from the United States under the Alien Enemies Act of 1798.

The high court had already called a temporary halt to the deportations from a north Texas detention facility in a middle-of-the-night order issued last month.

Justices Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas dissented.

Top Minnesota lawmakers and Gov. Tim Walz reached a budget deal with just a handful of days left in the legislative session, but there are signs it could face a bumpy ride as the Monday deadline to pass bills closes in.

Democratic-Farmer-Labor and Republican lawmakers have already objected to key compromises that allowed the deal to materialize, including ending state-funded health benefits for adults in the U.S. without legal immigration status.

Margins are extremely tight in both the Senate and House, and a handful of defections on various bills that form the budget would stall progress. The DFL has a one-seat majority in the Senate, and the House is tied 67-67 between the parties.

The DFL’s progressive wing has already signaled it won’t support ending MinnesotaCare benefits for immigrants, protesting outside the governor’s reception room at the Capitol Thursday as he and legislative leaders briefed reporters on the deal. A proposal to close the 111-year-old state prison in Stillwater is meeting pushback as well.

Opposition to aspects of deal

As a group of legislators and clergy held a news conference and prayer vigil against the health care cuts outside the House chambers Friday, members of the state’s public employee unions briefed reporters on why they oppose closing the Stillwater prison, which employs more than 500 people.

“The proposed stated budget agreement that includes the closure of Stillwater Correctional Facility is not only shortsighted, it’s downright dangerous, disruptive and deeply disrespectful to the workers that keep the community safe and the inmates safe,” said Bart Andersen, executive director of the American Federation of State, County, & Municipal Employees Council 5.

AFSCME and MAPE — the Minnesota Association of Professional Employees — aren’t the only ones opposed to the closure, either.

Two Republican members of the Senate Judiciary Committee on Friday afternoon voiced concerns about how quickly the proposal came together and called for more scrutiny.

“This is a shortsighted and alarming development — there were no committee hearings and no bill language on the issue, and I am very concerned that this proposal lacks the thorough vetting necessary for such a large change,” Sen. Warren Limmer, R-Maple Grove, said in a statement.

Sen. Michael Kreun, R-Blaine, called the proposal “soft on crime” and said he had concerns about the public safety implications of closing the state’s second-largest prison in the next four years and sending its 1,100 inmates to other facilities.

While the state Department of Corrections had warned for years of deteriorating conditions and growing maintenance costs at the aging Stillwater prison, the proposal still caught many by surprise. Backers say it’ll save the state $40 million a year.

Reality of a future revenue shortfall

The state will have to find savings somewhere by the end of the decade as it faces a $6 billion deficit in the 2028-2029 fiscal year.

Walz, Senate Majority Leader Erin Murphy, DFL-St. Paul, House Speaker Lisa Demuth, R-Cold Spring, and House Leader Melissa Hortman, DFL-Brooklyn Park, said hard-earned compromises in their deal will put the state on the route to confronting that reality.

For the most part, their “global” budget deal aims to address a structural imbalance — state budget talk for the government spending more than it raises — by controlling growth in spending on areas like education and human services spending.

State leaders agreed — as with any compromise — no one came away perfectly happy. DFLers said their GOP colleagues wouldn’t budge on the MinnesotaCare issue, and that they weren’t happy with the move. Children in the U.S. illegally will still be eligible for benefits, however.

“No one got everything they wanted,” Walz told reporters Thursday. ”There were very difficult conversations about issues that were very dear to each of these caucuses.”

MinnesotaCare benefits

Republicans say higher-than-expected enrollment in the new MinnesotaCare benefits could cost the state down the road. More than 17,000 people had enrolled in the program since it opened late last year.

DFL-controlled state government budgeted about $200 million for the program when they created it in 2023, but Republicans say it could cost the state as much as $600 million by the end of the decade and make Minnesota draw more benefit-seekers.

DFLers, state officials and other supporters dispute that projection and say cutting off benefits will interrupt lifesaving cancer treatments and dialysis.

Taxes, other elements of budget deal

It also makes a few adjustments to taxes. Walz’s proposed reduction of the overall state sales tax rate and the creation of a new tax on services like accounting and legal advice did not make it to the final deal.

Minnesota’s paid family and medical leave program, created by DFLers in 2023 and set to begin in 2026, remains in place. Though Republicans got DFLers to agree to a small reduction in the payroll tax that will fund the program.

A plan to sunset unemployment insurance for hourly school workers, another DFL-created benefit from 2023, likely will go away as the Senate and House work on their pre K-12 education budgets, Hortman said. Proposed cuts to state aid for private schools are also off the table, something Republicans wanted.

There will be a small increase to the sales tax on cannabis. The deal also calls for the repeal of a data center electricity tax exemption, though there will be an exemption for research and development for those companies as well.

A proposed first-in-the-nation social media tax appears not to have made it into the deal.

Lawmakers expected to work through weekend

Many questions about the form cuts will take are still in the air. Lawmakers are expected to work through the weekend to craft final budget bills that will conform to the overall targets.

The final day to pass any bills is Monday, and if they don’t finish their work by then, they’ll have to return for a special session to enact a two-year budget by the end of the fiscal year on June 30.

If they don’t pass a budget, the state government will shut down on July 1, interrupting many services.

DFL and Republican leaders expect that if they do return for a special session, it’ll be a short one that’ll likely happen soon after the regular session closes.

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By HANNAH FINGERHUT

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — Iowa can continue to restrict instruction on gender identity and sexual orientation in schools up through the sixth grade, a federal judge said, but has to allow nonmandatory programs related to the topics.

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U.S. District Judge Stephen Locher offered a split decision late Thursday, siding in part with a LGBTQ advocacy organization, teachers and students who sued the state. Attorney General Brenna Bird said in a statement Friday that she is committed to defending Iowa’s law protecting children and her office is “looking at next steps, including appeal.”

In a separate ruling in March, Locher again temporarily blocked another disputed component of the law, which would prohibit school libraries from carrying books that depict sex acts. Iowa has asked the U.S. Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals to overturn that decision.

Republican majorities in the Iowa House and Senate passed the law in 2023, intending to reinforce what they consider to be age-appropriate education in kindergarten through 12th grades. It’s been a back-and-forth battle in the courts in the two years since. The provisions of the law that are being challenged were temporarily blocked by Locher in December 2023, just before they became enforceable.

That decision was overturned in August by the U.S. Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals, meaning the law had been enforceable for most of the current school year. The appellate court told the lower court that it failed to apply the correct analysis in determining whether to temporarily block the law.

An attorney for the LGBTQ students, teachers and advocacy organization told Locher in February that the law is overly broad because it prohibits “any program, curriculum, test, survey, questionnaire, promotion, or instruction relating to gender identity or sexual orientation” in kindergarten through sixth grade. Opponents argued the law is vague enough to limit any information accessed or activity engaged in within the school.

Locher agreed in his decision that any “program” or “promotion” is broad enough to violate students’ First Amendment rights and those provisions are therefore on hold. But restrictions on curriculum, tests, surveys, questionnaires or instruction can be interpreted in the way the state argues, as applying only to the mandatory school functions.

Locher laid out specifically what that means: “Students in grades six and below must be allowed to join Gender Sexuality Alliances (‘GSAs’) and other student groups relating to gender identity and/or sexual orientation.” And the district, teachers and students “must be permitted to advertise” those groups.

On the other hand, teachers are not allowed to provide mandatory instruction that include “detailed explanations or normative views” on the issues, Locher said. “It does not matter whether the lessons or instruction revolve around cisgender or transgender identities or straight or gay sexual orientations. All are forbidden.”

The state education agency’s rules on the law say they will not take a neutral statement on gender identity and sexual orientation to be a violation of the law.

During a February hearing, Locher posed questions to the state’s attorney asking, for example, how a teacher should decide whether a book featuring a same-sex couple is a neutral portrayal allowed under the law, or whether it is a positive or affirming portrayal.

The state often said the answers depend on context. Opponents of the law said that means the measure is too vague.

Locher’s decision dictated that neutral references where sexual orientation or gender identity aren’t the focus are allowed. That means books with characters of varying gender identities or sexual orientations are permitted, so long as those “are not the focus of the book or lesson.”

Locher also said a teacher can refer to their partner, even if that partner is the same sex.

Attorneys for Iowa Safe Schools, students and teachers that sued the state said Friday that the ruling is a win.

“Under this order, Iowa teachers no longer can be disciplined simply because their classroom contains a Pride flag or their library contains books with LGBTQ+ characters,” said Thomas Story, staff attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union of Iowa. “This law, with certain narrow exceptions, should no longer stand in the way of school districts supporting efforts to include and support their LGBTQ+ students.”

A person or family, regardless of their immigration status, could be eligible for the voucher if they don’t have a home or are about to lose their housing, and if they make less than 50 percent of the Area Median Income ($77,650 for a family of four in New York City).

An apartment building in the Bronx. (Photo by Adi Talwar)

After years of calls for a statewide rent voucher program for people experiencing or at risk of homelessness, Gov. Kathy Hochul announced her commitment to launching a pilot program for the Housing Voucher Access Program (HAVP) last week.

While the State and Assembly’s budget proposals sought $250 million for HAVP this year, the state budget deal included just $50 million to cover the first year of the four-year program, which would run from March 1, 2026 and end on May 1, 2030. Funding for the remaining three years will be negotiated in future budgets, officials said.

State Sen. Brian Kavanagh and Assemblymember Linda Rosenthal—who chair their respective houses’ housing committees—sponsored a version of the HAVP bill for the last few years, which shaped the final language included in the budget.

Here’s what we know about how HAVP would work so far, and what is yet to be determined.

Who will be eligible? 

A person or family, regardless of their immigration status, could be eligible for the voucher if they don’t have a home or are about to lose their housing. They also need to earn no more than 50 percent of the Area Median Income (AMI). In New York City, that would be less than $77,650 for a family of four, as defined by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD).

Both Rosenthal and Kavanagh’s offices said it has not yet been determined how much money will go to New York City and other localities, but said the amount may be calculated based on the proportion of severely rent-burdened households in each area.

“Priority shall be given to applicants who are homeless,” reads the budget bill establishing the program’s perimeters. The state Department of Housing and Community Renewal (HCR) commissioner has the discretion to establish further priorities as appropriate, the bill notes.

There were more than 130,000 people in New York City’s shelter system in January, including around 46,000 asylum seekers and immigrants, according to data tracked by City Limits.

Who will be in charge?

HCR will run the pilot program, and will define the specifics and documentation needed to apply. Rosenthal explained that of the $50 million available, 10 percent will go to administrative costs such as outreach, staff, program design, and other materials.

HCR will also coordinate with public housing agencies and local administrators in the state to distribute the vouchers. In the city, it could be the Housing Authority (NYCHA) and the Department of Housing and Development (HPD). 

City Limits asked all three agencies for more details about the pilot program, but did not receive additional information beyond what was included in the budget bill.

“I spoke to HPD, and they’re very eager to get started,” Rosenthal said.

How will the vouchers work? 

Voucher holders will contribute about 30 percent of their household’s monthly adjusted income on rent, and the voucher will cover the rest. Its value will be set between 90 and 120 percent of the fair market rent for the rental area. The vouchers will remain valid as long as funding is available, Rosenthal explained.

The New York State Child Poverty Reduction Advisory Council estimates that such a voucher program could help reduce poverty across the state.

Like federal Section 8 vouchers, the HAVP administrator will issue payments directly to the owner of the unit under contract. While the Section 8 voucher was used as a model for HAVP, having one of these vouchers excludes having the other, so people can only have one.

New York City also has its own voucher program called the City Fighting Homelessness and Eviction Prevention Supplement (CityFHEPS), to help families move out of shelters and into permanent housing. 

More than 55,000 households are receiving CityFHEPS vouchers currently, and the city is projected to spend $1.25 billion on the program this fiscal year—significantly more than the $50 million allocated for the statewide HAVP.

Hochul, who until this year had resisted the proposal, said last month that the state would be “moderating the cost and keeping an eye on the program.”

“This has potential to escalate a great deal,” she told reporters at the time. 

CityFHEPS works similarly to Section 8, though has been criticized for lack of consistency in making payments—something state lawmakers are mindful of in launching the new program.

“I think HCR is going to learn the lessons that are blatant through the city’s lack of finesse in administering CityFHEPS,” Rosenthal said. “There are reporting requirements that weren’t in the initial bill that we insisted be attached, so we can get more data and tailor it. See where it’s working, see where it needs improvement.”

What’s next?

Vouchers should be available for use starting March 1, 2026.

The first annual report on voucher pilot implementation should be available on Nov. 1, 2026. It will detail the amount of funding allocated for each county, number of voucher applicants, number of people on waiting lists, number of voucher beneficiaries, and data about the homeless population receiving vouchers, among other data points. A report will be published every year until the pilot program ends.

To reach the reporter behind this story, contact Daniel@citylimits.org. To reach the editor, contact Jeanmarie@citylimits.org

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