Jared Kushner-backed luxury resort stokes days of protests in Albania

June 6, 2026 / 2:03 PM EDT / CBS News

TIRANA, Albania— Demonstrators rallied against a billion-dollar resort development in Albania linked to Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump for a seventh consecutive day on Saturday.

Activists have dubbed it the “Flamingo Revolution,” adopting the pink flamingo as a symbol of the wildlife they say will be destroyed if the project goes ahead.

President Trump’s son-in-law is among a group investors planning to transform Sazan Island — once a secret communist military base off Albania’s Adriatic coast — into a luxury tourist destination. Hotels are also planned by the investors in surrounding areas in the Vjosa-Narta protected zone, which environmentalists say is rich with wildlife, including flamingo habitats.

Protesters carry pink flamingo cutouts during a demonstration against plans for a resort linked to Jared Kushner, President Trump’s son-in-law, on an environmentally sensitive part of the Adriatic coast, in Tirana, Albania, on Thursday, June 4, 2026. Atdhe Mulla/Bloomberg via Getty Images

Ivanka Trump, the eldest daughter of Mr. Trump, referenced her and her husband’s plans for the luxury resort while speaking to the “Founders” podcast last month.

“I’m working on an incredible project with my husband in the Mediterranean,” she said, before mentioning she and Kushner had “discovered” the island while sailing with friends.

“We swam to the island, we went on a hike, barefoot all the way up to the top, and we were just captivated,” she said.

Anger escalated sharply last month when excavators and bulldozers moved onto the site. Footage of an activist being dragged away from the development went viral, further inflaming public opposition.

Thousands have taken to the streets in the country’s capital every night since the incident and activists have told CBS News that a lack of transparency from the Albanian government — both over this project and wider issues related to alleged corruption — are central to the public outrage.

“There was no public consultation whatsoever,” Aleksandr Trajce, executive director of the country’s leading conservation group, the Protection and Preservation of the Natural Environment in Albania, told CBS News on Friday. “There was nobody who was informed. Just one day, we saw bulldozers entering outside, opening up roads, cutting trees, destroying the dunes, and so on. So the public knew nothing.”

“The government, after some time, they declared that there is apparently a development permit, but actually nobody has seen it, and they have not made that development permit public,” he said.

Rama’s socialist administration has been embroiled in a corruption scandal since charges were filed late last year against Deputy Prime Minister Belinda Balluku, a close ally of Rama. The country’s parliament, led by a socialist majority, has blocked her arrest, however.

Earlier this week, SPAK, Albania’s anti-corruption prosecution office, opened an investigation into the project, according to local media reporting.

Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama, who has led the country since 2013, has insisted the project will go ahead despite rising public pressure and has championed the development as a potential economic boon for the country, which has one of the lowest rates of GDP per capita in Europe.

“It is very important that we remain welcoming, that we remain fair, and that under no circumstances do we receive the stigma of being ⁠a country where investors are met with hostility,” he said in a statement shared with Reuters.”There is absolutely no chance that the investment will stop as long as I am here.”

CBS News travelled with protesters Saturday to the Zvërnec area on Albania’s southern coast, where some of the planned development is located. There was little trace of bulldozers or building equipment left in the area beyond tire tracks along the beach.

Protesters shout anti-government slogans during protest at Dalani Beach, part of the land for the disputed luxury project of Jared Kushner’s investment firm, Affinity Partners beach on June 6, 2026 in Zvernec, Albania. Armando Babani/Getty Images

Demonstrators attributed that to an effort by the Albanian government to quell public anger over the project but also told CBS News the planning stages of the development had already caused environmental damage.

A local environmental officer for the PPNEA told CBS News that the group had been able to map the destruction of at least one sea turtle nest in the area due to the bulldozers.

A representative for the development company Sazan Real Estate Development LLC and its investors, including Kushner, told CBS News the company was “excited about the opportunity to create a world-class destination and make one of the largest private investments in the region’s history.”

“Our focus remains on responsible stewardship, environmental enhancement, job creation, and creating long-term value for local communities. We respect the ongoing public and institutional processes, and we stand ready to move forward as they unfold,” the company’s CEO, Asher Abehsera, said in a statement to CBS News on Friday.

But protesters in Albania continue to reject the plans.

“It’s not that I don’t want this country to be grown and to be known worldwide, and to have a lot of tourists,” one young woman told CBS News in Tirana on Friday evening.

“But it’s not the best place because that place is part of UNESCO and I don’t want the flamingos and any kind of animals to be destroyed from their homes,” she said.

Fetterman roasts Maine’s dem senate candidate

2026-06-06T17:43:32.976Z / CNN Politics

Fetterman roasts Maine’s dem senate candidate

Pennsylvania Gov. John Fetterman joins Smerconish to discuss the latest involving the scandals associated with Graham Platner.

The Trump administration makes it harder for some sick Americans to maintain Medicaid

2026-06-06T16:00:09.280Z / https://www.cnn.com/2026/06/06/politics/medicaid-work-requirement-rules-cancer-patients

• A new federal rule makes it more difficult for sick Medicaid enrollees to qualify for an exemption from work requirements, which start in January in most states.
• To qualify for the medical frailty exemption, enrollees’ health condition must significantly impairs their ability to work.
• Patient advocacy groups warn the stricter standard could result in enrollees with serious medical conditions losing coverage.

AI-generated summary was reviewed by a CNN editor.

Millions of sick Americans could have a tougher time retaining — or even signing up for — Medicaid coverage after the first-ever federal work requirement begins in January in most states.

That’s because the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services issued a new rule this week that takes a harder line on defining which low-income adult enrollees are eligible for an exemption for those who are“medically frail.” The rule guides states on implementing the work mandate.

To qualify for the exemption, not only must enrollees have an illness or medical condition, such as cancer or a behavioral health issue, but that condition must also significantly impair their ability to comply with the work mandate, according to the rule, released Monday.

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The interpretation came as a surprise to many states and patient advocacy groups and immediately sparked an outcry, with warnings that it will strip needed health coverage from sick enrollees covered through Medicaid expansion.

“It is going to impose a lot more burdens to keeping coverage on people who have very serious conditions for whom loss of coverage can be catastrophic,” said Jocelyn Guyer, senior managing director at Manatt Health, a legal and consulting firm that advises states on Medicaid policy. “It will increase the number of people who lose coverage.”

The work mandate was included in President Donald Trump and his party’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which passed last year. CMS is in the process of issuing rules to help states implement the health provisions in the law, which includes historic cuts to Medicaid. The agency said its key focus for work requirements is to increase Medicaid enrollees’ self-sufficiency and economic mobility, while protecting the vulnerable.

The OBBBA requires Medicaid expansion enrollees ages 19 through 64 to work, volunteer, attend school or participate in a job program at least 80 hours a month, unless they are eligible for certain exemptions. Some 5.3 million more people are expected to be uninsured in 2034 because of the work requirement, according to a Congressional Budget Office estimate from last summer.

Tying the exemption to an enrollee’s inability to work, however, is not in the law itself, experts told CNN.

The rule prompted a swift response from a multitude of patient advocacy groups, who say the stricter interpretation will put people’s lives at risk by jeopardizing their coverage and access to care.

“Because of these requirements, an individual fighting for their life in active cancer treatment will now also have to have to climb what, for some, will be insurmountable obstacles to get or maintain coverage,” said Jennifer Hoque, associate policy principal at the American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network. “If they aren’t able to get through the system fast enough, they’ll show up to chemo or show up for cancer surgery and find out they don’t have the coverage they need. Their lifesaving treatment will be taken from them.”

CMS’ interpretation “clearly conflicts” with the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, according to a group of 48 patient organizations, including the American Lung Association, the Crohn’s & Colitis Foundation, and the National Alliance on Mental Illness.

“Redefining the law’s medical frailty exemption to only apply to individuals who can prove they cannot work and drastically limiting the ability of states to accept self-attestation from patients about compliance and exemptions starting in 2028 clearly conflicts with the law,” the group said in a statement.

“These policies will place massive paperwork burdens on patients and providers, upend months of planning by states and create chaos just months away from the January 2027 implementation deadline.”

CMS did not reply to a request for comment about advocates’ concerns.

The surprise interpretation adds an extra, two-step hurdle for state Medicaid agencies, who are already facing tight deadlines to stand up their work requirement programs by January. Many have already been setting up their systems based on informal guidance from CMS and must now make changes. Meanwhile, Nebraska launched its work mandate last month but will now have to conform to the new rule.

What’s more, CMS did not provide guidance to states on how to define and assess whether a person meets the medically frail exemption criteria, said Jennifer Tolbert, deputy director of the Program on Medicaid and the Uninsured at KFF, a nonpartisan health policy organization. States will likely adopt different practices, meaning there won’t be a uniform standard for determining if someone is too sick to work.

Further complicating matters is that the severity of these enrollees’ medical conditions — and the impact on their ability to work — can vary over time, as the rule noted.

The provision could also put doctors in a tough spot, since they may be called upon to help determine whether someone is able to work, which would affect their patient’s coverage. That is not typically part of providers’ clinical practice and area of expertise, Guyer said.

Plus, starting in 2028, enrollees and those signing up for Medicaid will only be allowed to self-attest that they qualify for the medical frailty exemption once. After that, if states don’t have data on file to confirm people’s eligibility, enrollees may have to provide documentation, which could prove to be a big lift for some.

States also will not be able to add additional categories to the exemption. For instance, the rule notes that being homeless would not automatically qualify a person as medically frail since that circumstance is not a health condition. However, if that person had a substance use disorder or mental health condition, they could be eligible for the exemption.

CMS officials defended their interpretation of the law in a call with reporters, which largely focused on the medical frailty provisions. States can use health claims data or ask for other documentation to determine whether an enrollee meets the criteria in the rule, they said.

“The exemption ensures that work expectations are directed towards those who can participate, while protecting those who cannot,” said Dan Brillman, who directs CMS’ Medicaid program.

Dr. Mehmet Oz, who oversees CMS and is a key player in the Trump administration’s crackdown on fraud in federal programs, linked the provisions to maintaining the program integrity.

“The mantra that we kept coming back to was that we’re forgiving but we’re not foolish,” Oz told reporters, noting that the work mandate will preserve Medicaid for the vulnerable. “Directionally, we are appropriately going after problem areas and doing it in a way that’s compassionate, forgiving — but we don’t want to be fools.”

The medically frail exemption is one of several examples of CMS’ stricter interpretations of the Big Beautiful Bill. Starting in 2028, the agency is eliminating the ability for enrollees to self-attest that they are meeting the work requirement, which can be important for gig workers or the self-employed, or that they qualify for an exemption, such as serving as a caregiver.

In 2027, states can accept self-attestations when there is no reliable data available to prove work hours or exemption eligibility.

Oz warned that enrollees must be honest when self-attesting.

“In the rare instance where you’re self-attesting, you need to tell the truth,” he told reporters on Monday. “We will be speaking with the different enforcement bodies to make sure that folks know that’s not a joke.”

Also, CMS last month proposed a rule that would further curtail states’ ability to boost certain types of payments to providers — beyond the limits Congress included in the law. These payments are used to encourage provider participation and improve access to care for Medicaid enrollees, but the agency argues that the practice drives up costs without ensuring better health outcomes.

The stricter work requirement rule met with the approval of at least one conservative health policy expert. Brian Blase, the president of Paragon Health Institute and an influential voice with the White House and Republican lawmakers, said it “strikes the appropriate balance” between protecting Medicaid’s integrity and accommodating those in need.

“Self-attestation alone for compliance or exemptions — particularly for medical frailty — risks repeating the improper enrollment and fraud seen in other programs when verification standards were weakened,” he said in a statement.

White House AI policy adviser Krishnan to leave position

2026-06-06T16:40:35.68Z / Reuters

Sriram Krishnan, Senior White House Policy Advisor on Artificial Intelligence, listens prior to U.S. President Donald Trump (not pictured) signing an executive order on AI in the Oval Office at the White House in Washington, D.C., U.S. December 11, 2025. REUTERS/Al Drago Purchase Licensing Rights, opens new tab

• Summary

• Krishnan to help address major AI challenges after White House exit
• Trump administration weighs government stakes in AI firms
• Security concerns and political risks complicate U.S. AI ​policy

June 6 (Reuters) – A top White House artificial intelligence policy adviser ‌on Saturday said he will leave his position at the end of June, marking the exit of a leading figure helping craft policies for frontier technologies.

“This journey has been the privilege of a lifetime,” the adviser, ​Sriram Krishnan, posted on social media platform X.

Get weekly news and analysis on U.S. politics and how it matters to the world with the Reuters Politics U.S. newsletter. Sign up here.

Krishnan did not give a reason for leaving, ​but wrote in the post he intends to help “tackle some of the ⁠large challenges facing America” related to AI.

Krishnan has been involved in the Trump administration’s efforts to create ​a national framework for regulating developments in AI.

His departure comes as the president looks at the ​possibility of the U.S. government acquiring stakes in AI firms.

“There’s something very interesting about it, where it almost becomes a partnership with the American public,” Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One on Friday, adding that he ​planned to meet with AI executives as soon as next week.

Trump’s embrace of AI has ​at times been complicated by security concerns about the technology within his own administration.

Fears over AI’s unknowns in national ‌security ⁠contributed to a months-long standoff between the Trump administration and AI firm Anthropic.

The Pentagon blacklisted Anthropic earlier this year after the tech company refused to allow the U.S. military to use its models for domestic surveillance and fully autonomous weapons systems.

After a White House meeting with ​the CEO of Anthropic, ​which is preparing to ⁠go public, tensions have appeared to thaw.

The White House in a Tuesday executive order directed federal agencies to ask leading AI developers to voluntarily submit their most capable models ​for government cybersecurity tests before releasing them to the public.

Some populists ​in the president’s ⁠orbit warn that AI presents a political risk, as proposals to build data centers to power these companies have stirred intense backlash.

In his State of the Union speech in February, Trump said he told ⁠big ​tech companies to build their own power plants. Tech CEOs ​later agreed to tackle new electricity generation and efficiency measures.

Reporting by Anusha Shah in Bengaluru, Jason Lange in Washington, and Bo ​Erickson in New Brunswick, New Jersey Editing by Rod Nickel, Franklin Paul, Sergio Non and Sanjeev Miglani

In France, Hegseth invokes immigration and “invasion” in D-Day remarks

June 6, 2026 / 12:41 PM EDT / AP

U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth used a D-Day anniversary speech on Saturday to appear to link immigration by sea to the wartime liberation of Europe, warning that the freedom won by Allied troops could prove temporary if leaders failed to defend it.

Hegseth, speaking at the Normandy American Cemetery in Colleville-sur-Mer in northwestern France during commemorations for the 82nd anniversary of the June 6, 1944, landings, said that today, “different European beaches are stormed by different dangerous ideologies.”

“Beaches in Spain and Italy and Greece and Bulgaria. Boats and men arrive,” he said.

U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth lays a wreath of flowers to commemorate the 82nd anniversary of the D-Day landings on June 6, 2026. Jeremias Gonzalez/AP

“When will European capitals do something about that invasion? Or is it too late?” he added. “I pray not, and I believe not.”

Hegseth also laid a wreath of flowers as part of a ceremony commemorating the landings.

Hegseth did not use the word immigration, but his remarks echoed broader Trump administration criticism of Europe over migration, borders and what U.S. officials have described as censorship of nationalist and far-right voices.

On Saturday, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s office condemned U.S. Vice President JD Vance for blaming immigration for the killing of Henry Nowak, an 18-year-old British student stabbed to death in Southampton, even though both Nowak and his killer were British.

blob:https://www.cbsnews.com/e98e05d8-9f49-4edc-89e4-52a62026431a

In December, the Trump administration’s national security strategy warned that Europe faced the “prospect of civilizational erasure” and could become “unrecognizable” within 20 years.

Justice Department rushes to defense of Chicago US attorney after weeks of turmoil

2026-06-06T16:00:07.953Z / https://www.cnn.com/2026/06/06/politics/chicago-us-attorney-e-jean-carroll-turmoil

• Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche publicly defended Chicago’s US Attorney Andrew Boutros amid mounting criticism.
• A judge described prosecutorial behavior in grand jury proceedings as unlike anything she had seen before.
• Defense attorneys question whether the Justice Department’s investigation was politically motivated by the Trump administration.

AI-generated summary was reviewed by a CNN editor.

After two weeks of turmoil at the US Attorney’s Office in the Northern District of Illinois, the acting attorney general has jumped in to publicly defend his leader on the ground in Chicago, Andrew Boutros.

Boutros, an ambitious, boastful, longtime line prosecutor-turned-defense attorney in a city filled with storied legal careers, came under fire when his office’s alleged mishandling of a high-profile investigation into a group of Democrat politicians and activists known as the Broadview Six became public.

Then, as his office was still dealing with the blowback, it was revealed Boutros’ office was overseeing the controversial investigation around E. Jean Carroll, President Donald Trump’s foe and sexual assault accuser.

The negative attention has led Boutros — who had worked in mainstream law firms before becoming Trump’s pick in Chicago and, according to attorneys who know him, had not shown partisanship previously in his career — to become weary of those in his office and of his contemporaries in the city’s legal community.

“This Department fully supports U.S. Attorney Boutros and his efforts to combat violent crime, drug trafficking, immigration violations, and fraud, and we look forward to more great work from his office,” Blanche said in a social media post on X on Thursday, the same day the president gave him the nod he’d nominate him to stay in the job.

Boutros responded to Blanche in his own post, thanking him for his support and criticizing what sources say he now believes is a coordinated effort to sabotage him.

“We have fixed — and continue to fix — an Office I inherited in April 2025 that was doing less than even the bare minimum, as widely reported in the press at that time,” Boutros wrote on Thursday on X.

“I am grateful to all of you,” Boutros also wrote, thanking prosecutors and other colleagues who have supported him, “and I will not forget how you all stood by me when others capitalized on the opportunity to attempt to destabilize the Office … under the guise that they love or even really care about this incredible and storied Office.”

The alliance between Boutros and Blanche isn’t likely to stop concerns that the prestigious US attorney’s office in Chicago is in crisis, or end a judge’s inquiry into its handling of the Broadview Six case.

It has also highlighted what some Justice Department critics say is grand jury abuse by the Justice Department in efforts around the country to appease Trump’s political vendettas.

It was two weeks ago when the grand jury scandal in the Broadview Six case was unearthed, leading the Justice Department to drop the indictment of several politicians who had been arrested on charges they impeded federal officers outside an Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention center in Broadview, Illinois, in September.

Court proceedings ratcheted up this week as a judge attempts to uncover what happened in the grand jury room ahead of the indictment.

Defense attorneys in the Broadview Six case say they believe what they’ve uncovered shows a cavalier, problematic and politicized approach and that the Trump Justice Department is bent on securing criminal charges against critics of the president.

Chris Parente, a defense lawyer for Broadview Six defendant Brian Straw, an elected trustee of a municipality near Chicago, says what’s come to the surface in Chicago raises concerns about how the Justice Department has secured indictments in other high-priority cases against Trump’s foes — including those against former FBI director James Comey and others.

“You have Todd Blanche out there telling everybody, ‘Don’t worry about [the] grand jury indictments of Comey, Don Lemon, Southern Poverty Law Center,’” Parente said, pointing to how the acting attorney general has attempted to shield criticism of the ongoing cases against Trump enemies by pointing to the secrecy and independence of grand juries, rather than the Justice Department’s choices.

A Justice Department official based in Washington said on Friday it was “absurd” to suggest the department would factor in the Broadview Six defendants’ politics.

Court proceedings in Chicago since mid-May and statements by the US attorney’s office have revealed problems before the previously confidential grand jury proceedings, on multiple levels.

A prosecutor — and potentially Boutros himself — suggested to grand jurors who had made up their mind to leave the grand jury.

Those statements happened in October after the grand jury first voted against indicting the Democratic officials. In one of the sessions, a lower-level prosecutor removed grand jurors from the grand jury, then the US attorney’s office abruptly ended the grand jury session, the US attorney’s office has said in court, according to transcripts from a May hearing about the issues obtained by CNN.

A prosecutor in the office also was “vouching to the grand jurors” for the strength of the Justice Department’s evidence in the case, rather than letting the grand jury weigh it impartially, the judge and the US attorneys’ office said in court, and was allegedly improperly communicating with grand jurors outside of the grand jury room, according to the May transcripts. That prosecutor no longer works in the office.

“I have never seen the types of prosecutorial behavior before a grand jury that I saw in those transcripts,” the judge said at a May 21 hearing, describing what she saw in grand jury transcripts from the sessions in October as the case was nearing indictment.

The situation has led multiple elected officials from Illinois to call for Boutros’ resignation in recent days — with the pressure on him as his office also pursues a criminal investigation around E. Jean Carroll, the magazine columnist who previously accused Donald Trump of assault and won a large defamation verdict against the president.

Other sources have noted to CNN that William Hogan, the prosecutor in Boutros’ office who submitted heavily redacted grand jury transcripts to the court last month, raising the judge’s suspicions of how the case was handled, is the same prosecutor leading the inquiry around Carroll.

Boutros tried to tamp down criticism with a public statement after the CNN report on an E. Jean Carroll investigation. He and the Justice Department have said his Chicago office “has not opened — and has never opened — a criminal investigation into E. Jean Carroll.”

The Broadview Six redactions were what Judge April Perry said she saw as “the most problematic,” according to a May court transcript, because the judge received those transcripts from the US attorney’s office recently in a way that obscured some of the alleged prosecutorial misconduct before the grand jury agreed to indict last year.

“Mistakes happen. They happen to all of us,” Perry also said in court. “What you do not do is hide it … I do believe deeply in the presumption of regularity and that most government attorneys are doing the best they can to do the right thing. That trust has been broken.”

Hogan in court on May 21 said he would “take responsibility for” the redactions.

The Broadview Six situation is likely to increase the scrutiny of Blanche, too.

Defense attorneys are attempting to uncover the Justice Department’s decision-making as it struggled to bring charges, and the reasons why prosecutors and Boutros interacted with the grand jurors as they did.

Perry now is considering sanctioning prosecutors in court, with proceedings and legal arguments about the Justice Department’s conduct set to continue at least into July, even though the case is dismissed. Justice Department prosecutors, in Chicago and elsewhere, could potentially be called into court for testimony.

The judge also is fielding a request from defense attorneys for records of Boutros’ office being in contact with the Justice Department’s Washington, DC, leadership, including Blanche’s office when he was deputy attorney general last fall.

The defense lawyers seek “to know whether or not the orders to pursue this sham political prosecution came from Washington, and how closely officials in the main Department of Justice were tracking or encouraging developments in this case,” Parente said in a statement yesterday.

A Justice Department official said on Friday that the anti-Trump immigration protesting and Democratic politics among those in the Broadview Six weren’t part of the investigation or charging decisions at all.

And, the Department has said the US attorney’s office didn’t communicate with Justice Department leadership in Washington about who the defendants in the case were “after a draft indictment was approved internally.”

Since the Broadview Six case fell apart, Boutros has faced the uphill battle of trying to defend himself, and his office’s work, against allegations of political maneuvering.

That effort became even more fevered after CNN and other outlets reported the existence of a criminal inquiry linked to Carroll. No charges have emerged, but public officials opposed to the Trump administration have harshly criticized the inquiry.

“After [Carroll], he started to crack at the seams,” one person familiar with his thinking told CNN, noting that Boutros became fearful that someone in his office was leaking to reporters.

Democrats in Illinois and several former prominent alumni of the US attorney’s office, who are now largely in the close-knit Chicago defense bar, have been highly critical of Boutros and his US attorney’s office, which has seen several of its assistant US attorneys leave during his tenure.

Three people familiar have told CNN that Boutros, who is not Senate confirmed, expressed serious concerns to associates that people are gunning to muddy his name.

Boutros has issued several unusual, lengthy statements, including a “special report” he says his office conducted of the Broadview Six grand jury proceedings, after the Justice Department asked the court to dismiss the indictment and bar it from being brought again.

The five-page report acknowledges that Boutros visited the grand jury, a rare move by any US attorney, in October last year, after that jury had declined to approve the Broadview Six case two weeks earlier.

He asked grand jurors to raise their hands if they were “struggling with a certain type of cases, such as the immigration cases or other cases where they do not believe that they can set aside their personal, their personal emotions,” according to a portion of the transcript the US attorney’s office made public in the report.

The grand jury then approved the Broadview Six indictment that day, court records show.

An assistant US attorney in Chicago has told the court that Boutros’ appearance wasn’t related specifically to the Broadview Six case, and that he consulted with the chief judge before visiting the secret session.

Parente, representing the Broadview Six defendant, told CNN this exchange defied logic, especially given that Boutros highlighted immigration cases before the grand jury.

“You’re never going to convince me it was a random time that he showed up in the grand jury that day,” Parente said this week.

The defense lawyers have made this argument to Perry as well, and the judge is still collecting information about Boutros’ and his prosecutors’ grand jury approach.

Boutros also appeared at the court hearing on May 21 when Perry, herself a former Chicago federal prosecutor, questioned the prosecutors’ work and summarized on the record the grand jury misconduct.

“It is my very sincere belief, Your Honor, that no prosecutor acted intentionally in misleading you, and that there was no desire to mislead the Court and no deliberate misconduct on the part of the prosecutors,” Boutros told the judge at the hearing.

At the end of that hearing, the case was dismissed.

CNN’s Hannah Rabinowitz and Paula Reid contributed to this report.

U.S. attorney’s office in California announces probe into elections

2026-06-06T17:09:59.816Z / The Washington Post

U.S. attorney’s office in California announces probe into elections

The confirmation of “multiple election fraud investigations” came a day after President Donald Trump criticized the state’s notoriously slow vote-counting process.

June 6, 2026 at 1:09 p.m. EDT Today at 1:09 p.m. EDT

An election worker examines a ballot in Industry, California, on Friday. (Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)

By Jeremy Roebuck

and

Arelis R. Hernández

The Los Angeles U.S. attorney’s office said it has opened “multiple election fraud investigations,” claiming the California election system has “serious structural vulnerabilities.”

First Assistant U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli, whose office is also attempting to audit the state voter rolls, confirmed the investigation late Friday and vowed to follow the evidence where it leads.

Pennsylvania AG explains why state leads nation in Medicaid fraud convictions while others battle mass schemes

June 6, 2026 2:54pm EDT / Fox News

Sunday’s office secured more convictions than any other state in fiscal year 2025, according to HHS rankings

By Robert McGreevy, Fox News

Pennsylvania Attorney General details his state’s $12 million Medicaid fraud bust

Pennsylvania Attorney General Dave Sunday explains a $12 million Medicaid bust of a Philadelphia pharmacy that allegedly fraudulently collected millions in Medicaid reimbursements for prescriptions it never fulfilled.

Pennsylvania’s Republican Attorney General Dave Sunday detailed how his state has become number one in the country in convicting Medicaid fraudsters in an exclusive interview with Fox News Digital.

“As you know, in Pennsylvania we had the most Medicaid fraud convictions in the entire country last year. And the reason for that is because of how aggressively we investigate and prosecute these cases,” Sunday told Fox News Digital.

“We have an absolute moral duty to protect the most vulnerable amongst us. And one of the ways we can do that is making sure that the resources that are meant to go to them actually get to them,” he continued.

Amid a strong push from the White House to investigate and prosecute fraud nationwide — demonstrated through Vice President JD Vance’s White House Task Force to Eliminate Fraud — Medicaid fraud in particular has come into the spotlight.

I’M OHIO’S STATE AUDITOR — MEDICAID FRAUD IS NOT JUST A WASHINGTON PROBLEM

FTC Chair Andrew Ferguson and Vice President Vance meet to discuss efforts to combat fraud and enhance accountability in social welfare programs.(Photo by Oliver Contreras / AFP via Getty Images)

In May, Vance’s task force announced an indictment in a $46.6 million Minnesota Medicaid fraud scheme that Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. called the “largest autism fraud bust in American history.”

And as high-profile fraud busts involving foreign nationals in Minnesota, California and other blue states increasingly highlight the prevalence of social service scams, Sunday’s efforts in a purple state stand out especially.

Key to Sunday’s nation-leading conviction rate, he told Fox News Digital, is the emphasis his office places on collaboration, including with his state’s Democratic governor, Josh Shapiro.

“We collaborate on a lot of issues, and this is one of those issues that our offices do collaborate on. The State Inspector General’s Office works with the Pennsylvania Office of Attorney General to make sure that we receive those complaints, and then we take them and we run with them,” Sunday explained.

In 2025, HHS’s Office of the Inspector General (OIG) ranked Pennsylvania’s Medicaid Fraud Control Unit number one in total fraud charges filed against individuals, while ranking Pennsylvania number three in total fraud convictions for the fiscal year 2024. For fiscal year 2025, the OIG ranked Pennsylvania third in charges and first in total convictions, suggesting a marked improvement in conviction efficiency.

“The reason why we are so successful and the reason the states that are successful are is because they’re working as a team together. This is much greater than any individual office,” Sunday told Fox News Digital.

FINAL WALZ FRAUD REPORT RIPS ‘CULTURE OF TOLERANCE’ AS MINNESOTA TAXPAYERS FACE BILLIONS IN ALLEGED LOSSES

“You have to work hard as an office. You have to collaborate with your federal partners, your local partners, your state partners. You have work with the different service providers. This has to be an all hands on deck effort where you collaborate and coordinate with everyone humanly possible. And that’s not just to get the successful prosecutions, but it’s to get their referrals. People have to know what to look for,” he continued.

Pennsylvania Attorney General Dave Sunday, then the Republican candidate for Pennsylvania attorney general, speaks during a rally for Dave McCormick, then a Republican U.S. Senate candidate, at Beerded Goat Brewery in Harrisburg, Pa., on Thursday, April 25, 2024.(Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)

His collaborative efforts, combined with vigilance, have prevented Pennsylvania from falling into the same trap as Minnesota, which had the seventh most fraud convictions in 2025, according to the HHS-OIG.

“The goal is to not let those criminal enterprises take root. That is the way that you have to do this to make sure that it doesn’t [turn into a Minnesota]. That’s how you have do it. You have to stay ahead of it. Every step of the way. You can’t ever let it grow. You have to watch it when it happens. And you have to make sure that you prioritize these cases, because as an AG, your time and efforts could go to a million different places. But when you’re like here in Pennsylvania, we are hyper focused on community safety,” Sunday said.

SEC SCOTT BESSENT: HOW TO STOP FRAUD IN MINNESOTA—AND ACROSS THE COUNTRY

He highlighted the need for collaboration, especially considering the cross-border and transnational efforts of many convicted fraudsters. The women convicted in the Minnesota autism fraud bust notably were sending millions of dollars in fraudulently obtained Medicaid payments back to their families in Kenya, prosecutors said.

“Remember, criminal enterprises, they don’t care about borders and they don’t pick and choose what jurisdiction that they’re only going to stick to. And so collaboration can’t know borders either. So we work with other states. We work across the country with other AG’s offices. We do everything we can to identify these cases and then hold these actors accountable because what’ll happen is a lot of times these cases will span multiple states. And so if you have an organization or a criminal enterprise that is operating in one state, there’s a good chance they’re operating in another state as well. And so when we can come together and work as a team, that allows us to be able to have even greater impact.”

Sunday praised Vance’s task force as a valuable focal point to catalyze statewide anti-fraud efforts.

Vice President JD Vance joined by White House deputy chief of staff and Homeland Security advisor Stephen Miller and Federal Trade Commission (FTC) Chair Andrew Ferguson during a roundtable discussion on anti-fraud initiatives on May 26, 2026, in Washington, D.C.(Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)

JD VANCE’S TASK FORCE FLAGS NEARLY $6.3B IN GOVERNMENT CONTRACTS GOING TO POTENTIALLY FRAUDULENT BUSINESSES

“I’m very thankful for the Vice President. I’m thankful for Vice President Vance and for his efforts in bringing everyone together and to sort of create a hub and spoke model where we all can work together and collaborate because that’s the only way that these cases are gonna be solved,” Sunday said.

He also highlighted cases his office had prosecuted in recent months as part of their efforts.

“We had a huge conviction this year with the Broad Street Family Pharmacy in Philadelphia. And these are individuals that were billing Medicaid up to $12 million for expensive medications that oftentimes they didn’t even obtain, let alone give to someone who needed that medication to stay alive. And so those are the type of cases we have to really go after, because when they are making that much money, if we don’t get involved, if we didn’t investigate it, they’re just gonna keep doing it,” he told Fox News Digital.

DR. OZ SAYS TAXPAYERS FOOTING $14 BILLION BILL FOR MEDICAID FRAUD WHILE ELIGIBLE PATIENTS STRUGGLE FOR CARE

In that case, the state charged nine people in a sprawling alleged scheme that prosecutors say included fraudulent claims for HIV drugs and antipsychotic medications, as well as a pill purchasing kickback plot.

The alleged scheme’s ringleaders — Peter Dello Buono and Frank Bengermino — were sentenced to between 1.5 and five years in prison and ordered to pay $12.25 million in restitution. Five of the other seven plead guilty to various charges, while the remaining two have pending cases.

https://www.foxnews.com/video/6397752264112

That $12.25 million is almost equal to the amount of federal funding that Pennsylvania’s Medicaid Fraud unit got in 2025. An HHS grant that composes three quarters of the state’s Medicaid fraud unit funding comes in at roughly $12.8 million.

Sunday also revealed that the Medicaid fraud unit recovers over four times the amount of money it spends on investigations.

“For every dollar spent in our Medicaid section, we recover $4.64. So think about that investment. For every dollar we spend, we recover $4.64 through our investigations and convictions. And I go back to the convictions because you can obtain restitution through sentences and through convictions. And if you can’t get those convictions, then you’re gonna leave a lot of that money with the bad actors that you can get back to taxpayers _,” he told Fox News Digital.

In addition to busting blatant fraud schemes, Sunday’s office also prosecutes neglect and abuse cases that involve Medicaid claimants.

“Some of these cases, especially the abuse and neglect cases are some of the absolute most horrific cases that any prosecutor sees. I’m a career prosecutor. I’ve been doing this for a long time. And when you see services that are supposed to be rendered that aren’t and you see individuals that are seniors, that are suffering in pain as a result of it, those are cases that those individuals need to not just be charged, but they need to be convicted,” he said.

DOGE’S MEDICAID DATA DUMP AIMS TO EXPOSE FRAUD — BUT PRIVACY AND LEGAL HURDLES LOOM

He pointed to the case of Kelly R. Gonzalez, a personal care administrator who a jury convicted on two counts of felony neglect in February when she failed to refill a care home resident’s seizure medication leading to his 2021 seizure death.

“The defendant in this case, Gonzalez, was tasked with overseeing the prescribing of medication in this home. One of her jobs was making sure that residents received the prescribed medications,” Sunday said. “There was a resident in that home, the victim, who did not receive the prescribed seizure medication. And the defendant, in this case, Gonzales, found out about it and still didn’t provide the medication.”

According to witness testimony, two of Gonzalez’s colleagues informed her that her patient needed a refill, but she still failed to get his medication refilled.

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“Apparently the victim in that case went 10 days without medication, and obviously when you’re taking serious medication, life-saving medication and you go 10 days without it, then there can be serious ramifications,” Sunday told Fox News Digital.

“So as a result of that, the victim in this case died,” he concluded.

Fox News Digital contacted the White House and Shapiro’s office for additional comment.

DOJ debunks social media claim of discrepancy in LA mayor voting count

2026-06-06 19:54:59 UTC / CNN

DOJ debunks social media claim of discrepancy in LA mayor voting count

By Kaanita Iyer

5 min ago

PUBLISHED Jun 6, 2026, 3:54 PM ET

Assistant US Attorney for the Central District of California Bill Essayli attends a news conference to discuss fraud prevention on January 9, 2026, in Los Angeles, California.

Patrick T. Fallon/AFP/Getty Images

A Los Angeles-based Justice Department official late Friday debunked a baseless claim of a discrepancy in the vote count of the city’s mayoral race that has circulated on social media.

The claim, which has been pushed by several right-wing figures on X, including billionaire Elon Musk, alleges a vote-count update on election night showed that Republican candidate Spencer Pratt received zero new votes.

First Assistant US Attorney Bill Essayli — an appointee of President Donald Trump who leads the Los Angeles-based US attorney’s office — addressed the conspiracy theory on Friday.

“There was a claim circulating on social media about an election night ballot update at the Los Angeles Registrar of Voters where one candidate received zero votes,” Essayli wrote. “We reviewed official county records. The claim is false. Each candidate received votes in every update.”

Several accounts posted a claim on social media suggesting there was election fraud in the race, alleging there was a vote count update in which Republican mayoral candidate Spencer Pratt received zero votes.

Pratt, a former reality TV star, ran against incumbent Mayor Karen Bass and City Councilwoman Nithya Raman, who are both Democrats, in Tuesday night’s nonpartisan primary election. CNN has projected that Bass will advance to the November general election but has yet to call whether she will face off against Pratt or Raman as votes continue to be counted.

A spokesperson for The Associated Press, which publishes vote counts in real time based on reports from election officials, told CNN in a statement that “there was a lag in an automated update such that some candidates’ votes were added in one update and the other candidates followed about a minute later.”

Pratt was in the second batch of candidates, the AP said, which means the vote counts were slightly delayed and, therefore, initially showed him appearing to gain zero additional votes in one of the updates that came in while two other leading candidates received thousands of votes.

“Exactly one minute later, the electronic update picked up the votes for another group of candidates including Spencer Pratt. Taken together, the updates included 21,870 votes for Pratt, 12,850 votes for Bass and 9,521 votes for Raman, along with votes for other candidates,” the AP spokesperson said.

CNN has reached out to the Los Angeles County clerk’s office for comment.

The conspiracy theory around the mayor’s race comes as the Trump administration continues to push false claims about election fraud in the US. Trump still baselessly alleges that the 2020 election, which he lost to former President Joe Biden, was rigged.

This week, Trump claimed repeatedly, without evidence, that the slow pace of the count from Tuesday’s primary was a sign of Democratic “cheating.” The Justice Department then sent one of its attorneys to observe ballot processing in Los Angeles, the county’s election office told CNN.

Earlier Friday, Essayli also alleged, “There is evidence of election fraud in California,” adding that “investigations are underway.”

California has long had a reputation for being slow to report the results. That’s because a significant number of the total votes come in as mail ballots are dropped off on Election Day, according to the California Voter Foundation, a nonprofit organization that seeks to improve the election process.

Under state law, mail ballots can be received at local election offices up to seven days after the election, as long as they are postmarked on or before Election Day. And officials must verify ballots before they can be counted. It’s typical for mail ballots counted in the days after the election to lean Democratic.

Top Trump artificial intelligence adviser to leave the White House

June 6, 2026 at 2:20 p.m. EDT / The Washington Post

Sriram Krishnan, who has been central to the administration’s AI efforts, will probably continue to play an active role in its approach to the technology.

Sriram Krishnan, White House senior policy adviser for artificial intelligence, in December. (Al Drago/Reuters)

By Cat Zakrzewski

A tech investor who shaped the Trump administration’s pro-industry artificial intelligence policies will depart the White House at the end of the month.

Sriram Krishnan has informed administration officials that he plans to leave his post as the White House senior policy adviser for AI to start an outside institution that will influence technology policy, according to a person familiar with his plans, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe the private discussions. Planning for the new initiative is in nascent stages, but it is intended to allow the tech leader to continue to play an active role in the Trump administration’s response to the development of AI.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2026/06/06/trump-top-ai-advisor-leaving-white-house/