Politics
A Los Angeles man was denied a green card over his tattoos. The Supreme Court might take up his case
Prominent Los Angeles civil rights attorney Sandra Muñoz spent her eighth Christmas countries apart from her husband, Luis Acensio Cordero, after the federal government denied him a visa, in part, over his tattoos.
The black ink images of La Virgen de Guadalupe, theater masks, a pair of dice and Ace playing cards were throwbacks to his high school days. But to government officials conducting a body search, the tattoos showed he was an MS-13 gang member.
Sandra Muñoz holds a photo of her husband Luis Acensio Cordero.
(Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times)
The couple sued, securing a victory in California’s 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, only to have that decision challenged by the Biden administration. Now the case is headed to the Supreme Court.
On Friday, justices are scheduled to review the case and decide whether to take it up. If they decline, the appeals court decision would stand and Acensio’s lawyers believe he would likely be allowed to return to live in the U.S. for the first time in nine years.
The outcome of the case could have ripple effects for immigrants like Acensio because it’s so rare to win challenges to the government’s visa denials. But his attorneys fear that if the Supreme Court sides with the Biden administration, former President Trump, if reelected, would use the decision, and the underlying authority, to justify blanket bans of people from certain countries, as he did during his first term.
Acensio, now 47, was undocumented when he met Muñoz in 2008 at a wedding. They married two years later and in 2013 he filed for a green card.
In 2015, Acensio returned to El Salvador for what the couple believed was the final security screening and an interview at the U.S. consulate. He expected to be in El Salvador only a few weeks, so Muñoz met him there and booked their return flights back home to L.A. together.
He remembers vividly the day of the interview, being asked to take his clothes off, having photos taken of his tattoos and being asked why he got them. On his chest, one features comedy and tragedy theater masks with a set of dice and three Ace cards. The others are of La Virgen de Guadalupe, a profile of Sigmund Freud and a tribal design with a paw print.
A consular officer asked about his criminal history, and Acensio said he described the only time he’d been arrested, when he and a friend got into a fight. They spent three days in jail and were released without charge.
After the interview, Muñoz spent the rest of the week desperately checking her email. “That email never came and I had to come back alone,” she said. “The first of many trips back alone.”
The government’s denial arrived six months later, saying Acensio would likely engage in unlawful activity if allowed back in the U.S.
A State Department spokesperson declined to comment to The Times because of pending litigation.
In court proceedings, consular officials argued they didn’t owe the family an explanation and there was no way to appeal because of the doctrine of consular non-reviewability, which prevents judicial reviews of visa determinations made by consular officers as long as the decision is “facially legitimate and bona fide.”
Sandra Muñoz is a civil rights attorney in Los Angeles.
(Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times)
In certain cases, a U.S. citizen who proves they were harmed by the denial can challenge the doctrine. Immigration attorney Alan Diamante, Muñoz’s friend from law school, took on the case.
They filed a lawsuit in 2017 in U.S. District Court for the Central District of California challenging the constitutionality of Acensio’s denial. Humberto Guizar, a lawyer and court-approved gang expert who has testified in 50 cases, submitted a declaration stating that he is intimately familiar with gang tattoos and that Acensio had none.
The couple learned in 2018 that the federal government believed Acensio was a member of MS-13, the Salvadoran criminal gang that started in Los Angeles in the ’80s, according to court documents. That determination, lawyers wrote, was based on the in-person interview, a criminal review and a review of his tattoos. Reviews of the visa denial by the consulate and State Department had not “revealed any grounds to change the finding of inadmissibility.”
Eric Lee, their lead attorney, said tattoos are a common reason for visa denials. In Acensio’s case, Lee said he isn’t sure whether the consular officer acted based solely on the tattoos or whether foreign databases had provided erroneous information about his background.
As the case made its way through the courts, Acensio and Muñoz settled into separate lives. He started a business in El Salvador giving electric four-wheeler bike tours. She was named California Lawyer of the Year by the Daily Journal after helping secure a $23-million settlement against Walmart and other companies on behalf of warehouse workers.
She bought a house in Montebello and decorated it with photos of her and Acensio, vowing that one day it would be his home, too.
Acensio was separated not only from his wife, but also from his young daughter, who lives in Las Vegas and whom he would frequently visit. She is now 17, and he has missed seeing her grow up.
Muñoz, 54, has also faced difficulties. She got COVID-19 and suffered from brain fog and fatigue for several months. Her sister and her best friend died in 2021. She fell and tore a quad tendon in 2022, was hospitalized for weeks and still uses a cane to walk. Then her mother’s health began to deteriorate; she died a week before Christmas.
“It was so sad because I had built my life there with her,” Acensio said. “And I’ve never been there as her husband to help her in the most difficult moments. I feel helpless.”
Still, the couple found ways to stay connected. They text throughout the day and frequently do video calls. They traveled to Barcelona together, and her visits to El Salvador deepened her relationship with his family.
Muñoz visited Acensio at least three times a year until the pandemic started. In 2022, he received a Mexican visitor visa and they were able to meet in Tijuana. Their last trip was in May.
El Salvador’s President Nayib Bukele launched a sweeping crackdown against the country’s powerful street gangs, netting more than 70,000 arrests since 2022. Muñoz feared her husband would get caught in the dragnet.
Acensio said police stopped him last year at a checkpoint, looked over his body and let him go. If they believed he was involved with gangs, he said, they would have jailed him.
In October 2022, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals agreed that the federal government had violated Muñoz’s fundamental right to marriage and due process as a U.S. citizen by denying her husband’s visa without providing an explanation for three years. That decision marked the first time a federal judge had rejected the government’s initial effort to dismiss a lawsuit by citing consular non-reviewability, Lee said.
Lee said he has since advised on similar cases, including four that have resulted in family reunification. Earlier this year, a judge in Arkansas cited Muñoz’s case in a ruling ordering the federal government to provide a better explanation for denying the visa of a U.S. citizen’s foreign husband.
After the appeals court ruling, Acensio applied for humanitarian parole, a form of temporary legal entry, to reunite with his wife. The State Department informed Muñoz’s lawyers that they would not oppose the application. Even so, it was denied last month.
In its petition to the Supreme Court, Biden administration lawyers echoed previous circuit court decisions in arguing that Muñoz’s right to marriage has not been violated because the government “has done nothing more than to say that the residence of one of the marriage partners may not be in the United States.”
Government lawyers argued the 9th Circuit ruling “represents a serious encroachment on the separation of powers. If allowed to stand, it will cause considerable disruption in U.S. consulates.”
Heidi Altman, policy director at the National Immigrant Justice Center, which is co-counsel on the Supreme Court case, said that Acensio and Muñoz’s case is an example of the Biden administration walking away from its commitment to immigrants. It also shows how central family separation is to the U.S. immigration system, she said.
“Fighting this case means really digging in on one particular way that family separation is regularly effectuated by immigration officers,” who ensure there is “no way to correct those mistakes, so that the family separation becomes permanent,” Altman said.
A similar case made its way to the Supreme Court in 2015. A man who had been employed in Afghanistan’s welfare department when the Taliban ruled the country was denied a green card after marrying a U.S. citizen, because the government reasoned he was engaged in terrorist activity.
In that case, the 9th Circuit had also ruled that the government didn’t offer a legitimate enough reason for the denial. But the Supreme Court ultimately ruled against the couple.
The notion that Acensio is a gang member is offensive, Muñoz said. As an attorney, she said, she’s naturally skeptical. And as an officer of the court, she’s sworn to uphold the Constitution.
“It just breaks my heart that this country — that my country — has taken so much from my husband and me,” she said.
Muñoz thinks back to a discrimination case she litigated in which she represented a Latino Los Angeles Sheriff’s deputy who was referred to by supervisors as the “Mexican Mafia.” The county responded by claiming he was in a deputy gang based solely on his tattoo, she recalled.
“A tattoo in and of itself doesn’t mean that somebody is a bad cop, a bad person,” she said. “You can’t simplify it that much. We went to trial in that case. We won.”
Politics
DOJ expands indictment against SPLC, alleging $4M secretly funneled to KKK and extremist groups
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The Department of Justice last month announced an indictment against the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), alleging that the civil rights nonprofit defrauded donors by secretly paying informants associated with extremist organizations, including the Ku Klux Klan.
A federal grand jury in the Middle District of Alabama returned an 11-count indictment in April charging the SPLC with six counts of wire fraud, four counts of making false statements to a federally insured bank and one count of conspiracy to commit concealment money laundering, according to the Justice Department.
The superseding indictment retains those charges while expanding on the alleged misconduct.
According to the DOJ, the SPLC “secretly funneled” more than $3 million in donor funds between 2014 and 2023 to numerous individuals associated with extremist organizations, including the Ku Klux Klan, United Klans of America, the National Socialist Movement, participants in the Unite the Right rally and the Aryan Nations-affiliated Sadistic Souls Motorcycle Club.
NEO-NAZIS, ‘SADISTIC’ BIKERS AND CHARLOTTESVILLE ORGANIZER: 5 OF THE MOST SHOCKING SPLC INFORMANTS
The Southern Poverty Law Center has widespread influence in education. FILE: Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, left, and SPLC interim President and CEO Bryan Fair are shown in a split image as the Justice Department pursues charges against the Southern Poverty Law Center. (Nathan Posner/Anadolu via Getty Images; USA TODAY Network via Imagn Images)
The original indictment alleged approximately $3 million in payments between 2014 and 2023.
“The SPLC’s paid informants (‘field sources’) engaged in the active promotion of racist groups at the same time that the SPLC was denouncing the same groups on its website,” the indictment states.
Prosecutors further allege the SPLC opened bank accounts tied to fictitious entities in order to conceal donor funds that were allegedly routed to confidential sources.
MIKE DAVIS: SOUTHERN POVERTY LAW CENTER: A TALE OF A RACISM SCAM
The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) building seen in March 2020 in Montgomery, Alabama. (Barry Lewis/InPictures via Getty Images)
According to the indictment, the SPLC began operating a covert informant network in the 1980s, and between 2014 and 2023 allegedly paid those sources in a clandestine manner.
The DOJ alleges an SPLC employee instead encouraged the pair to remain involved and offered them a monthly salary of $1,200.
The two subsequently agreed to remain in the organization, according to the indictment.
DR. BEN CARSON: I KNOW HOW BAD THE SPLC WAS, IT CAME AFTER ME AND PUT ME AT RISK
Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche spoke during a press conference alongside FBI Director Kash Patel at the Department of Justice on April 21, 2026, in Washington, D.C., following the indictment of the Southern Poverty Law Center. (Nathan Posner/Anadolu via Getty Images)
Prosecutors allege an SPLC employee instructed the individuals to claim they worked for a company called Rare Books and helped college students with research and writing assignments if anyone questioned the source of their income.
The indictment alleges donor funds were used to pay both individuals through SPLC accounts.
According to prosecutors, the pair were also reimbursed for expenses related to Ku Klux Klan activities, including cross-burning events and associated costs such as wood and fuel.
One of the individuals is also accused of recruiting new members using donor-funded payments. The indictment further alleges the SPLC knew donor funds were used to purchase materials for Ku Klux Klan garments.
In a statement to Fox News Digital, attorney Abbe Lowell, who represents the SPLC, denied the allegations.
A composite image shows Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche overlaid on photographs of the Department of Justice and FBI headquarters in Washington, D.C. (Valerie Plesch/Bloomberg via Getty Images; Graeme Sloan/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
“This apparent superseding indictment attempts to shore up the flaws in the initial charges, but it changes nothing,” Lowell said.
“The SPLC did not lie to its donors, it did not mislead banks it did business with, and its informant program prevented violence and saved lives,” he continued.
“It appears the Justice Department shared the indictment with media before it was unsealed by the court – another example of the government’s troubling handling of this case.”
“We will be addressing these irregularities with the court and look forward to presenting the truth at trial,” he added.
NONPROFIT REVENUE TOTALS SURGE AMID GROWING SCRUTINY AFTER MAJOR FRAUD CASES
SPLC interim President and CEO Bryan Fair speaks during a wreath-laying ceremony at the Southern Poverty Law Center Civil Rights Memorial in Montgomery, Ala., on March 5, 2026. (Jake Crandall/Advertiser / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images)
The superseding indictment also notes that the SPLC’s reported revenue increased from roughly $38.7 million in 2010 to more than $129 million in 2023, an increase of approximately 233%.
According to the filing, the organization’s net assets grew from approximately $238 million to nearly $787 million during the same period.
The SPLC is a longtime nonprofit organization that says it combats white supremacy and extremism through research, reporting and monitoring efforts intended to assist law enforcement and the public.
During a news conference announcing the original indictment, Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche alleged the SPLC paid members of extremist groups so it could generate “work product” documenting their activities.
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“To that end, [SPLC] was doing the exact opposite of what it told its donors it was doing – not dismantling extremism but funding it,” Blanche said.
Fox News Digital’s Alexandra Koch, David Spunt, Jake Gibson and Alec Schemmel contributed to this report.
Buoyed by a new Congressional map favoring their party, California Democrats were eyeing Tuesday’s primary elections as a critical first step toward flipping a handful of House seats and taking back power in Washington.
Results from California’s massive and slow-moving election process were not immediately clear late Tuesday, as polls closed and mail ballots continued to be processed and counted. Still, Democrats were bullish about their chances of advancing candidates to November’s general election in all five districts that were redrawn in their favor as a result of last year’s Proposition 50 ballot measure.
“The path to winning back the House starts with voting in the June 2nd primary,” the California Democratic Party posted online Monday.
Meanwhile, California Republican Party Chairwoman Corrin Rankin urged Republican voters to make their own voices heard too.
“Like President Trump said, we need to make it too big to rig,” Rankin said on “The Benny Show.” “We need to swamp the vote.”
One of the most closely watched races was in the redrawn 22nd Congressional District in the Central Valley, where incumbent Rep. David Valadao (R-Hanford) is facing challenges from moderate Assemblymember Jasmeet Kaur Bains (D-Delano) and progressive college professor Randy Villegas.
Another closely watched race was in the redrawn 48th Congressional District in San Diego and Riverside counties, where Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Bonsall) decided to retire rather than run for reelection, and where Republican San Diego County Supervisor Jim Desmond — who is endorsed by Trump — is running against a pack of Democrats.
Prop. 50 — which Californians passed with nearly 65% of the vote a year ago — was California Democrats’ response to Texas Republicans redrawing their state’s Congressional maps in the GOP’s favor, at President Trump’s behest. It was also the only major Democratic counterpunch in the wider mid-decade redistricting brawl that has spread across the country in the last year.
Experts expect the redistricting battle to deliver a net gain of a handful or more House seats to Republicans. But Democrats could gain even more ground given Trump’s lousy approval ratings and the long history of midterm election losses for the president’s party.
Combined, those factors make the battle for control of the House incredibly close, which in turn makes the five seats up for grabs in California pivotal — and potentially decisive.
Tuesday’s primaries won’t determine if any of those five seats will indeed flip parties in November. However, the primaries will define those head-to-head races to come and better inform the odds of Democrats toppling Republican incumbents, experts said.
In addition to flipping the seats currently held by Valadao and Issa, Democrats are hoping to pick up three additional seats.
In the 1st Congressional District — which after Prop. 50 lost rural reaches of northeast California and picked up liberal North Bay communities — various candidates were vying for the seat long held by the late Rep. Doug LaMalfa (R-Richvale), who died in January. They include Democratic state Sen. Mike McGuire and Republican Assemblymember James Gallagher, who is endorsed by Trump.
Voters from the existing district are also voting in a special election Tuesday to fill the remainder of LaMalfa’s term.
In the 3rd Congressional District, which lost an eastern rural stretch along Nevada and now holds more tightly to the Sacramento suburbs, Rep. Ami Bera (D-Elk Grove) — who currently represents a different district — is running to remain in Congress in a new seat.
Meanwhile, the 3rd Congressional District’s incumbent, Rep. Kevin Kiley (I-Rocklin), is seeking to do the opposite. He quit the Republican Party, became an independent and is now running for Bera’s current seat in Congressional District 6, which includes the city of Sacramento and Placer County suburbs.
In the 41st Congressional District, which became more liberal after Prop. 50 by losing voters in Riverside County and gaining them in Los Angeles County, a slate of candidates — including Rep. Linda Sánchez (D-Whittier), who currently represents a different district — are running to replace Rep. Ken Calvert (R-Corona). Calvert, a 17-term incumbent, decided to run in the neighboring 40th Congressional District instead.
In the 40th Congressional District, which covers a swath of inland Orange County and portions of San Bernardino and Riverside counties, incumbent Rep. Young Kim (R-Anaheim Hills) is now going head-to-head with Calvert, while also facing several Democratic challengers.
Other districts that were not part of the Prop. 50 shuffle are also attracting attention.
In the 11th Congressional District in San Francisco, several Democratic candidates are vying to replace Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-San Francisco), the retiring former House Speaker, including state Sen. Scott Wiener; tech millionaire and Democratic political operative Saikat Chakrabarti; and Connie Chan, a member of the San Francisco board of supervisors who Pelosi endorsed.
Democrats are also closely watching several races where younger Democrats and progressives are challenging older incumbent Democrats, and where newer Democratic incumbents are seeking to hold onto their seats in relatively competitive districts.
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LOS ANGELES — Outside a Bristol Farms market in LA’s Westchester neighborhood, residents who spoke to Fox News Digital all agreed that homelessness is a top problem facing the city, but disagreed on which mayoral candidate is the right choice to clean it up.
“Love him,” Shelley Zuckerman said about reality television star and independent candidate Spencer Pratt, adding that homelessness is a main motivator of her support for the reality TV star’s mayoral run.
“The fact that he’s not a politician, so he may or may not be a liar, we don’t know that yet, and I know that he wants to do something for LA that the politicians have been saying they’re going to do and then don’t,” Zuckerman added. “And I know politics works, that once you get in there you can’t always do what you want to do, but at least he’s got the passion.”
SPENCER PRATT SAYS HIS POLICY WILL FORCE HOMELESS OUT OF LA AND INTO CITIES LIKE SEATTLE
Los Angeles residents say homelessness is the top problem facing the city as they head to the polls for the mayoral primary. (Fox News Digital)
When asked if crime was a motivating factor to vote for Pratt, Zuckerman’s husband Saul responded, “Of course.”
The couple says they are supporting Republican Steve Hilton for governor.
Patrick Reynolds, who lives in the neighborhood, said he is “not happy with any of the candidates” and called Pratt a “clown” before saying he voted for incumbent Mayor Karen Bass “a little reluctantly.”
Homelessness has been a top-of-mind concern for voters in Los Angeles, and despite Bass being mayor for the last four years, Reynolds said he believes she’s the best choice on that front.
Reynolds, who said he is supporting billionaire Democrat Tom Steyer for governor, spoke at length about the problems with homelessness, including a local park he said has become “too dangerous” to visit in recent years.
KAREN BASS GRILLED OVER BROKEN HOMELESSNESS PROMISE, BLAMES BUREAUCRACY FOR SLOWED PROGRESS
Mayoral candidate Spencer Pratt hosts a campaign block party on 10th Avenue in Los Angeles on May 20, 2026. (Robert Gauthier/Los Angeles Times)
“Homelessness for sure,” a woman named Diane, who said she voted for Bass, told Fox News Digital, “That’s number one on my list, and I think she’s tried very hard to fix that problem. It’s a big problem, I know. And I just think she is down to earth. She’s not some rich billionaire, which I appreciate.”
Diane said she is supporting former Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra, a Democrat who served in the Biden administration, for governor because he is a “good guy.”
“I like that he is an immigrant and that he has worked his way up in this world,” Diane said. “I think he has a good sensibility. I like also that he isn’t a billionaire. I can relate to him.”
Dan Madden, a resident of nearby Manhattan Beach, told Fox News Digital that if he could vote in LA proper, he’d go with Pratt.
WHO IS TOM STEYER? ANTI-ICE BILLIONAIRE IN CA GOVERNOR’S RACE FACES SCRUTINY OVER DETENTION INVESTMENTS
A Los Angeles city councilwoman and progressive candidate for mayor Nithya Raman, left, pictured alongside incumbent mayor Karen Bass, right. (Ronaldo Bolaños/Los Angeles Times via Getty Images; Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)
“That’d be my man,” said Madden, who added that he is voting for Hilton for governor. “The last 20 years in Los Angeles has been screwed.”
“It’s getting worse,” Madden said about the homeless situation in the Los Angeles area. “They cleaned up here and there. Spots, especially along the beach, coastline, you see it cleaned up. Two months later, everybody’s back.”
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Pratt, a registered Republican running as an independent, faces off in a nonpartisan mayoral primary against incumbent Mayor Karen Bass, a Democrat, and City Councilmember Nithya Raman, a socialist.
Tuesday’s election will determine which two candidates advance to the November general election. If a candidate receives more than 50% of the vote, they will automatically be named the next mayor.
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