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Oglala Sioux Tribe says three tribal members arrested in Minneapolis are in ICE detention

South Florida Local News - Tue, 01/13/2026 - 18:14

By GRAHAM LEE BREWER

The president of Oglala Sioux Tribe in South Dakota on Tuesday called for the immediate release of tribal members who were detained at a homeless encampment by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents in Minnesota last week.

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Three of the four Oglala Sioux Tribe members who were arrested in Minneapolis on Friday have been transferred to an ICE facility at Fort Snelling, President Frank Star Comes Out said in a statement released with a memorandum sent to federal immigration authorities.

“The Oglala Sioux Tribe’s memorandum makes clear that ‘tribal citizens are not aliens’ and are ‘categorically outside immigration jurisdiction,’” Star Comes Out said. “Enrolled tribal members are citizens of the United States by statute and citizens of the Oglala Sioux Nation by treaty.”

Details about the circumstances that led to their detention were unclear.

In the memorandum sent to Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, Star Comes Out said the when tribal nation reached out to the agency it was provided with only the first names of the men. Homeland Security refused to release more information, unless the tribe “entered into an immigration agreement with ICE.”

DHS did not immediately respond to a request for comment Tuesday evening.

Star Comes Out said the tribe has no plans enter an agreement with ICE.

In a post to his Facebook page, Star Comes Out said that the four detained tribal members are experiencing homelessness and living under a bridge in Minneapolis. One of the members was released from detention.

In the press release, he demanded information on the status of the three men in detention, the release of all tribal citizens in ICE custody and a meeting between the tribe and the government.

6 puppies treated for a suspected opioid overdose in Washington will find new homes soon

South Florida Local News - Tue, 01/13/2026 - 18:08

By CEDAR ATTANASIO

SEATTLE (AP) — Six puppies in rural Washington state will soon be up for adoption after being revived after a suspected drug overdose — and some of them might go home with the fire-station staff who saved them.

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Two people dropped off three of the sickened puppies at Sky Valley Fire, about an hour’s drive northeast of Seattle, on Sunday. Officials believe the animals either breathed or ate fentanyl.

Firefighters sprayed the anti-overdose medication naloxone up their noses, and also treated them with oxygen and even performed CPR. It wasn’t long before their tails started wagging, Battalion Chief Brandon Vargas said Tuesday.

Meanwhile, sheriff’s deputies tracked down the people believed to have dropped off the dogs and found three more puppies that also needed treatment. An animal cruelty or neglect investigation is underway. The pair claimed they were caring for the puppies temporarily, authorities said.

There have been a number of other cases nationally where pets have been saved after being exposed to fentanyl or other opioids.

The puppies have a clean bill of health, but are being quarantined for about one more week before being released for adoption, said David Byrd, manager of Snohomish County Animal Services.

The Everett animal shelter that has been monitoring their health has been overwhelmed with adoption offers, and asked people to not call the shelter with questions about the puppies.

“We definitely have some personnel that are interested in wanting to adopt those,” Vargas said.

South Florida restaurateur Louie Bossi arrested on misdemeanor domestic battery charge

South Florida Local News - Tue, 01/13/2026 - 17:57

Louie Bossi, the chef, partner and namesake of Louie Bossi’s Ristorante in Fort Lauderdale and Boca Raton, was arrested Monday on a misdemeanor domestic battery charge, court records show.

Bossi’s wife called police after an argument with Bossi, 58, in which she said her husband pushed her and threatened her at their Palm Beach County home, according to a probable cause affidavit for his arrest.

As the two were arguing in their bedroom, Bossi allegedly threw a water bottle at his wife and missed, the affidavit said. His wife told deputies that he then came toward her aggressively, grabbed her by her hair on the back of her head and pushed her against a wall, the affidavit said.

Bossi’s wife told deputies she held out her hand to try to prevent her face from hitting the wall, and her husband then grabbed her right wrist and pulled her toward the door, “screaming for her to get out of the house,” the affidavit said.

Louie Bossi: From heroin addict to kitchen kingpin

While on the phone with a 911 dispatcher, Bossi’s wife said he was shouting: “I’m going to kill you,” according to the affidavit.

A Palm Beach County Sheriff’s deputy who responded to the call wrote in the affidavit that Bossi’s wife had bruising and scratches on her right wrist. She declined to be medically treated at the scene, the affidavit said.

Bossi told the deputy he and his wife had an argument over his wife’s medication and that she had “aggressively approached him so he put his hands on her shoulders” to prevent her from getting to him, according to the affidavit.

He was handcuffed and put in the back of the deputy’s patrol car. Jail records show he was released Tuesday afternoon after posting bail on a $1,000 bond.

South Florida restaurateur and chef Louie Bossi was arrested Monday, Jan. 12, 2026, on a misdemeanor domestic battery charge. (Courtesy/Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office)

Bossi and representatives of Big Time Restaurant Group, which operates the restaurants, did not respond to phone and email messages on Tuesday evening.

Louie Bossi’s Ristorante first opened in Fort Lauderdale on Las Olas Boulevard in 2015. The second location in Boca Raton was forced to close in April 2025 after a kitchen fire. It reopened in November with an updated look.

The South Florida Sun Sentinel in 2017 chronicled Bossi’s troubled upbringing in Queens, N.Y. and New Jersey and his rise in the South Florida service industry after overcoming a heroin addiction.

Staff writer Phillip Valys contributed to this report. 

This is a developing story, so check back for updates. Click here to have breaking news alerts sent directly to your inbox.

Minneapolis duo details their ICE detention, including pressure to rat on protest organizers

South Florida Local News - Tue, 01/13/2026 - 17:50

By SARAH RAZA

Two Minneapolis residents who have been monitoring immigration officers’ actions during the Trump administration’s latest crackdown say they were detained without charge for several hours in distressing conditions, denied phone calls, and pressured to rat out protest organizers and people living in the country illegally.

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The accusations leveled by Brandon Sigüenza and Patty O’Keefe suggest that the Department of Homeland Security is employing similar tactics in Minneapolis and St. Paul as it did during the crackdowns in Los Angeles, Chicago and New Orleans. Federal officers are again using roving patrols, warrantless arrests and aggressive tactics such as spraying chemical irritants, breaking car windows and recording protesters, including Renee Good and her vehicle in the moments before an ICE officer fatally shot her.

According to organizers and an American Civil Liberties Union lawsuit, immigration officers have also been surveilling activists who have been observing their activities in the Twin Cities, violating their First Amendment rights. And Sigüenza, who like his friend O’Keefe is a U.S. citizen, said an immigration officer who questioned him Sunday even offered him money or legal protection if he gave up the names of organizers or neighbors who are in the country illegally.

“At one point, the officer said in vague terms that it looks like I’m in trouble, and he could possibly help me out,” Sigüenza said, noting he refused the offer.

DHS, which oversees Immigration and Customs and Enforcement and the Border Patrol, didn’t immediately respond to a Tuesday request for comment.

Aggressive tactics and an arrest

Sigüenza and O’Keefe, who are among an unknown number of Twin Cities residents observing the immigration officers in action, were detained Sunday while following ICE officers who were driving around and making arrests. The officers stopped in front of O’Keefe’s car, fired pepper spray through her windshield vent and smashed her car’s windows even though the doors were unlocked, the two told The Associated Press.

The car of Patty O’Keefe, a U.S. citizens who was arrested while following federal agents’ vehicles and briefly held at a federal facility in Minneapolis, shows glass on the ground after her front driver’s side window was smashed in, Tuesday, Jan. 13, 2026. (AP Photo/Jen Golbeck)

According to O’Keefe, the agents mocked her looks and laughed at her. She said they also brought up the killing of Good, a 37-year-old mother of three who was shot in the head last week by an ICE officer in front of her wife.

O’Keefe said the officer who sprayed their car Sunday threatened them, saying that “obstructing” their work was how Good got killed.

“It was very clear that they were trying to just humiliate me, break me down,” O’Keefe said.

Cash and legal help for information

Sigüenza and O’Keefe said they were arrested and taken in separate unmarked SUVs to the highly restricted federal facility on the edge of Minneapolis that’s serving as the crackdown’s main hub. They were put in adjacent cells reserved for U.S. citizens, one for men and the other for women. Each cell was also being used for other detainees and was no larger than 10 feet by 10 feet (about 9 square meters), with a concrete bench, flat-screen TV, two-way mirror and surveillance camera.

On their way to the cells, they saw other detainees who were screaming and wailing for help, though most were dejectedly staring at the ground, they said. In one instance, they observed a woman who was trying to use a toilet while three male agents watched. The overwhelming majority of detainees were Hispanic men, though some were East African — Minnesota is home to the country’s largest Somali community.

“Just hearing the visceral pain of the people in this center was awful,” O’Keefe said. “And then you juxtapose that with the laughter we heard from the actual agents. … It was very surreal and kind of shocking.”

Sigüenza said one of his cellmates had a cut on his head and the other had an injured toe, but neither was offered medical help. Their requests for water or to go to the bathroom outside their cells were also ignored, he said.

O’Keefe and Sigüenza were able to speak with lawyers, but only Sigüenza allowed to make a phone call — he called his wife.

Sigüenza, who is Hispanic, said DHS investigators took him to another room and offered him money or legal protection for any family members who might be in the country illegally in exchange for giving up the names of protest organizers or neighbors who don’t have legal immigration status. But he said he refused the offer, noting that he doesn’t have any family members without legal status.

Sigüenza and O’Keefe, who have shared their story widely on social media, were let go by evening without charges.

Once they left the facility, they were again hit with chemical agents officers were using on protesters in the area.

“We were not charged with a crime,” said Sigüenza. “We were released and then tear-gassed on our way out.”

Concerns about detention conditions elsewhere

The conditions at immigration detention facilities around the country have been the subject of complaints, including a lawsuit over the one that served as the Chicago-area’s operational hub that resulted in a judge’s oversight visit and an order to improve conditions.

DHS has defended the conditions in its facilities, saying detainees are fed and their medical concerns are addressed. And they’ve trumpeted the success of the immigration crackdowns, saying they’ve led to the arrests of thousands of people who are in the country illegally.

O’Keefe and Sigüenza believe their detention was meant to intimidate them and others critics of the immigration crackdown.

U.S. citizens’ and noncitizens’ rights differ slightly in immigration detention than in criminal detention, according to Lynn Damiano Pearson, an immigration attorney with the National Immigration Law Center. But detainees retain basic rights in both situations, including access to counsel and a phone, food and water, and privacy from the opposite gender when using the restroom.

Associated Press reporter Sophia Tareen contributed to this report.

House passes bill codifying Trump order to rinse away showerhead regulations

South Florida Local News - Tue, 01/13/2026 - 17:08

By JOEY CAPPELLETTI

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Republican-controlled House on Tuesday advanced legislation aimed at fulfilling President Donald Trump’s long-running desire to “make showers great again” by voting to loosen federal efficiency standards for showerheads.

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The bill — dubbed the Saving Homeowners from Overregulation With Exceptional Rinsing, or Shower ACT — passed 226-197, with 11 Democrats crossing the aisle in support.

Republicans have argued the measure would wash away unnecessary regulations and allow more water to flow through showerheads. Democrats warn the relaxed standards could soak consumers with higher utility bills and worsen environmental impacts.

“If they want a nozzle that dribbles on their head, well then go get one of those. If you want something that slices an orange, well then go get one of those. That should be your choice as a consumer,” said GOP Rep. Russell Fry, sponsor of the bill.

The legislation is light on details, and its prospects in the Senate are uncertain as members of that chamber focus attention on government funding and foreign policy. Still, it’s part of a broader effort by House Speaker Mike Johnson to codify Trump’s executive actions in federal law.

In April, Trump signed an executive order calling for an immediate end to water conservation standards that limit the gallons per minute flowing through showerheads and other household appliances, including dishwashers, washing machines, and toilets. The House bill builds on that directive, seeking to reduce what Republicans view as overregulation by permitting stronger water flow in homes than current standards allow.

Environmental groups have criticized the proposal, warning it would increase water consumption and energy use. Democrats echoed those concerns and questioned why Republicans were spending time on the issue.

“Why on God’s green earth, on the first full day that this Congress is back in 2026, are the Republicans using the floor time — in the midst of armed conflict and daily corruption by this administration — to run a bill on rich people showers?” said Rep. Melanie Stansbury, D-N.M., during debate last week.

For over three decades, federal energy law has outlined appliance standards that determine new showerheads shouldn’t pour out more than 2.5 gallons of water per minute (9.5 liters). The Obama administration refined the restrictions and applied those limits to the water that comes out of the entire showerhead, even ones with several nozzles.

During his first term, Trump relaxed that rule to allow each nozzle of a showerhead spray as much as 2.5 gallons. The Biden administration reversed Trump’s action in 2021.

Republicans defended the bill as a necessary corrective. GOP Rep. Michael Rulli of Ohio said Republicans are “worried about the working man.”

“You go on vacation, you go to a motel and you get a shower, it’s the worst shower you ever had. It’s cold. It’s dripping out there. The working man cannot even enjoy his daily life,” Rulli said.

 
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