By MICHELLE L. PRICE, Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump will meet at the White House on Thursday with Edan Alexander, the last living American hostage in Gaza, who was released in May.

“The President and First Lady have met with many released hostages from Gaza, and they greatly look forward to meeting Edan Alexander and his family in the Oval Office tomorrow,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a statement.

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Alexander, now 21, is an American-Israeli from New Jersey. The soldier was 19 when combatants stormed his base in Israel and dragged him into the Gaza Strip. Alexander moved to Israel in 2022 after finishing high school and enlisted in the military.

He was released on May 12 by Hamas, which has been designated as a terrorist organization by the United States, Canada and the European Union, after 584 days in captivity. Alexander had been in Israel since he was freed until he traveled last month home to New Jersey, where his family still lives.

He was among 251 people taken hostage by Hamas in the Oct. 7, 2023 attack that led to the Israel-Hamas war.

Trump in early March met at the White House with a group of eight former hostages who had been released by Hamas: Iair Horn, Omer Shem Tov, Eli Sharabi, Keith Siegel, Aviva Siegel, Naama Levy, Doron Steinbrecher and Noa Argamani.

Thursday’s meeting comes ahead of a planned visit on Monday to the White House by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as Trump pushes the Israeli government and Hamas to negotiate a ceasefire and hostage agreement and end the war in Gaza.

By CURT ANDERSON and MARTA LAVANDIER, Associated Press

OCHOPEE, Fla. (AP) — The first group of immigrants were scheduled to arrive Wednesday night at a new detention center deep in the Florida Everglades that officials have dubbed “Alligator Alcatraz,” the state’s attorney general said.

“Alligator Alcatraz will be checking in hundreds of criminal illegal aliens tonight,” Florida Republican Attorney General James Uthmeier said on the X social media platform. “Next stop: back to where they came from.”

It wasn’t immediately clear precisely when the detainees would arrive or where they were coming from. They were being brought to the facility on buses, officials said.

A Sysco truck arrives at the “Alligator Alcatraz,” a new migrant detention facility at the Dade-Collier Training and Transition facility, Wednesday, July 2, 2025, in Ochopee, Fla. (AP Photo/Marta Lavandier)

The facility, at an airport used for training, will have a capacity of about 3,000 detainees when fully operational, according to Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis said. The center was built in eight days over 10 miles of Everglades. It features more than 200 security cameras, 28,000-plus feet of barbed wire and 400 security personnel.

Environmental groups and Native American tribes have protested against the center, contending it is a threat to the fragile Everglades system, would be cruel to detainees because of heat and mosquitoes, and is on land the tribes consider sacred.

President Donald Trump tours “Alligator Alcatraz,” a new migrant detention facility at Dade-Collier Training and Transition facility, Tuesday, July 1, 2025, in Ochopee, Fla. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

It’s also located at a place prone to frequent heavy rains, which caused some flooding in the tents Tuesday during a visit by President Donald Trump to mark its opening. State officials say the complex can withstand a Category 2 hurricane, which packs winds of between 96 and 110 mph, and that contractors worked overnight to shore up areas where flooding occurred.

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DeSantis and other state officials say locating the facility in the rugged and remote Florida Everglades is meant as a deterrent, and naming it after the notorious federal prison of Alcatraz, an island fortress known for its brutal conditions, is meant to send a message. It’s another sign of how the Trump administration and its allies are relying on scare tactics to try to persuade people in the country illegally to leave voluntarily.

State and federal officials have touted the plans on social media and conservative airwaves, sharing a meme of a compound ringed with barbed wire and “guarded” by alligators wearing hats labeled “ICE” for Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The Republican Party of Florida has taken to fundraising off the detention center, selling branded T-shirts and beer koozies emblazoned with the facility’s name.

Anderson reported from St. Petersburg, Florida.

By COLLEEN SLEVIN, Associated Press

DENVER (AP) — A federal judge on Wednesday ended an order blocking the deportation of the family of the man charged in the fatal firebomb attack in Boulder, Colorado, noting government lawyers say the man’s relatives are not being rushed out of the country as the White House originally stated.

Hayam El Gamal and her five children were detained by immigration agents on June 3, two days after her husband Mohamed Sabry Soliman was accused of throwing two Molotov cocktails at people demonstrating for awareness of Israeli hostages in Gaza. Prosecutors announced Monday that an 82-year-old woman who was injured in the attack had died.

U.S. District Judge Orlando L. Garica dismissed the family’s lawsuit challenging their detention by immigration authorities. The ruling noted that El Gamal and her children ages 4 to 18 are not eligible for expedited deportations because they have been in the country for over two years, which he said lawyers for the Department of Homeland Security and Immigration and Customs Enforcement have acknowledged.

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Soliman is an Egyptian national who federal authorities say was living in the U.S. illegally. He is being prosecuted in both state and federal court for the attack, which prosecutors say injured a total of 13 people. Investigators say he planned the attack for a year and was driven by a desire “to kill all Zionist people.” He has pleaded not guilty to federal hate crimes charges but hasn’t been asked to enter a plea in the state case, which now includes a murder charge.

On the day El Gamal and her children were arrested, the White House said in social media posts that they “COULD BE DEPORTED AS EARLY AS TONIGHT” and that six one-way tickets had been purchased for them, with their “final boarding call coming soon.” Those statements led a federal judge in Colorado to issue an emergency order temporarily blocking the family’s deportation, Garcia said.

The case was later transferred to Texas, where the family is being held in an immigration detention center for families. Garcia is based in San Antonio.

Because the family is in regular deportation proceedings, there is no longer any reason to block their deportation, Garcia said. Regular proceedings can take months or even years if decisions are appealed. He also turned down the family’s request to be released from the detention center in the meantime, saying they can pursue release through the normal bond process in the immigration system.

Lawyers for the family had challenged their detention as unconstitutional because they said it was intended to punish them for Soliman’s actions. According to a court filing by El Gamal’s lawyers, one of the immigration agents who arrested them told her, “You have to pay for the consequences of what you did.”

Garcia said immigration authorities have discretion in deciding who to detain and he did not have authority to review their decision to detain El Gamal and her children. Lawyers for the government said they are being lawfully held because they are accused of overstaying their visas.

One of the family’s attorneys, Niels Frenzen, said they hoped to get the family released from the detention center while the deportation proceedings continue.

An email seeking comment from the Department of Homeland Security and Immigration and Customs Enforcement was not immediately returned.

The iconic halftime performer Red Panda suffered a severe fracture in her left wrist after a fall from her 7-foot tall unicycle in the opening seconds of her routine on Tuesday night at Target Center.

Her agent Pat Figley told the Pioneer Press that Red Panda — the stage name for Chinese acrobat Ring Niu — spent 11 hours in a local hospital where she had a procedure on her left wrist. She was discharged and is currently on her way back home to San Francisco.

The recommendation from doctors in the Twin Cities is that Red Panda have an additional procedure on the wrist once she returns home, Figley said.

Red Panda’s routine involves balancing plates, bowls and cups on her head, hands and feet while pedaling her tall unicycle. According to a 2024 profile on scmp.com, she is 55 years old.

In an email sent to the Pioneer Press, Figley noted how much Red Panda appreciates everybody who has reacted out to her inthe wake of her fall, which occurred at halftime of the WNBA’s Commissioner’s Cup championship between the Lynx and Indiana Fever.

“It means the world to her,” Figley said. “She much appreciates from her heart the support she is receiving.”