Briefing: Immigration, Federal Workforce + more
Today’s update includes tentative good news from our Federal Workforce team, a mixed bag of Food Safety regulations, and the latest on the administration’s attempt to politicize Medical Research Funding. In Immigration, we documented too many events to summarize, including the deaths of three more people in ICE detention and a fatal Border Patrol shooting from last December.
Immigration
The Immigration team added 34 new events to our timeline, including the deaths of Prisciliano Trejo Ricano and Edwin Jeovanny Lopez Cornejo while in ICE custody, the death of an unnamed immigrant shortly after being released to a hospital from Delaney Hall, and the killing of Isaias Sanchez Barbosa, whose death back in December 2025 was just recently reported. We also recorded the case of Francisco Longoria, whose truck was stopped last August by unidentified, masked men who broke his window and shot at him as he fled. Longoria reported the violent assault to police, only to be arrested; the men who attacked him were federal immigration agents. We also documented reports of ICE force-feeding detained people on hunger strike.
On the administrative violence side: The TSA has been sharing domestic travel data with ICE, powering a recent surge in airport arrests, including of people who are legally authorized to be in the US. A judge formally confirmed the end of Temporary Protected Status for Haitians following the recent SCOTUS decision. DHS is stoking terror and despair in that community by sending vague, menacing letters to some Haitian immigrants, arresting others, and putting ankle monitors on still more.
Equitable Federal Workforce
This week, the Federal Workforce team added 5 events to our timeline, including good news in three separate cases, where arbitrators found that the Trump administration had violated collective bargaining agreements. Two cases had to do with Trump’s return-to-office orders: one brought by the union representing 65,000 IRS employees and one by the union representing nearly 20,000 Forest Service employees. In both instances, arbitrators found that the return-to-office directives and related actions were unfair labor practices and ordered the agencies to restore remote and telework arrangements. An arbitrator also found that the Department of Health and Human Services violated a union contract when it fired more than 5,000 probationary and trial employees in February and May of 2025. The government has 30 days to appeal the decisions to the Federal Labor Relations Authority.
Food Safety
The Food Safety team added 4 new items to our timeline. After confirming the first two deaths from the nationwide Cyclospora outbreak, the CDC announced a response team to manage this health crisis, which now affects at least 15 states. In Michigan, which has been hit hardest, positive tests are declining and health officials have lifted the warning against consuming lettuce. Meanwhile, the Republican-led Senate voted against a MAHA-supported amendment to strengthen pesticide labeling requirements. Days later, the FDA proposed a rule to close a longstanding loophole that companies exploit to bypass government review of food ingredients — but with a glaring omission that still allows them to deploy new ingredients before review by the (chronically understaffed) FDA.
Medical Research Funding
The Medical Research Funding team added 4 new entries to our timeline. In July, the administration shortened time limits for international student and researcher visas and blocked them from applying for bridge funding. In more recent, positive news, the Senate’s new short-term spending bill temporarily prevents implementation of the OMB’s plan to require explicit ideological review of research grants.
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