Politics
Suspect identified after fatal shooting at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate: officials
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A man was shot and killed early Sunday after allegedly breaching the secure perimeter of President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Florida, the U.S. Secret Service said.
The incident occurred around 1:30 a.m. when the suspect made an “unauthorized entry” through the north gate of the resort as another vehicle was exiting. The man has been identified as 21-year-old Austin Tucker Martin of North Carolina, Palm Beach County Sheriff Ric Bradshaw confirmed to Fox News.
The suspect was observed carrying what appeared to be a shotgun and a fuel can. Agents and a deputy from the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office (PBSO) confronted him.
“They confronted a white male that was carrying a gas can and a shotgun. He was ordered to drop those two pieces of equipment that he had with him – at which time he put down the gas can, raised the shotgun to a shooting position,” Bradshaw told reporters. “At that point in time, the deputy and the two Secret Service agents fired their weapons and neutralized the threat.”
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An aerial view shows the Mar-a-Lago estate and the north gate in Palm Beach, Florida, following reports of a shooting incident, Feb. 22, 2026. (Fox News)
Bradshaw said the suspect did not exchange any words with law enforcement officers who instructed the man to “drop the items.”
The man was pronounced dead at the scene.
No Secret Service or PBSO personnel were injured, and no Secret Service protectees were present at the location during the time of the incident, officials said.
Trump was at the White House at the time of the breach, even though he frequently spends weekends at Mar-a-Lago, according to The Associated Press.
Secret Service spokesman Anthony Guglielmi said the man is believed to have bought the shotgun while traveling south, and authorities later discovered the weapon’s box inside his vehicle, The Associated Press reported.
The Moore County Sheriff’s Office said in a press release that a relative reported Martin missing around 1:38 a.m. Sunday.
He was entered into a national missing person database before federal authorities informed local officials they were conducting an active investigation in Florida related to Martin.
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A moving truck is parked outside Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach, Fla., on Jan. 18, 2021. (Terry Renna/AP)
The sheriff’s office said it had no prior history with the 21-year-old and has since turned over the missing person case information to federal authorities. It is not involved in the Florida investigation.
The incident, including the suspect’s background, actions and potential motive, as well as the circumstances surrounding the use of force, are under investigation by the FBI, the U.S. Secret Service, and the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office.
Officials said they are working to compile a psychological profile as part of the investigation, according to The Associated Press.
FBI Miami Special Agent in Charge Brett Skiles said the bureau is assisting in the investigation because the shooting occurred in an area under Secret Service protection.
He said the FBI’s evidence response team is processing the scene and collecting evidence, and urged residents who live nearby to review their exterior cameras for footage from Saturday night into early Saturday morning.
“If you see anything that looks suspicious or out of place, please contact us,” he told reporters.
The man who was shot and killed after allegedly breaching the secure perimeter at President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Florida, was observed carrying what appeared to be a shotgun and a fuel can. (@PBCountySheriff via X)
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FBI Director Kash Patel said in a post on X that his agency is “dedicating all necessary resources in the investigation of this morning’s incident,” and “will continue working closely with @SecretService as well [as] our state and federal partners and will provide updates as we are able.”
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt wrote on X that the U.S. Secret Service “acted quickly and decisively to neutralize a crazy person, armed with a gun and a gas canister, who intruded President Trump’s home.”
The breach comes after Trump faced two assassination attempts during his 2024 campaign.
Politics
Despite Trump’s recent insistence, in-person voting does exist in Los Angeles
Yes, voting centers will be open across Los Angeles this week. And no, you don’t have to cast your ballot by mail.
With days left before the June 2 primary, President Trump made a round of misleading claims about the electoral process, this time falsely suggesting that the city was holding elections only by mail.
Trump’s comments came Saturday during an appearance on Fox News when he was asked by host Lara Trump — the president’s daughter-in-law — about his predictions for the upcoming primary.
“You know, they don’t have voting booths; everything’s by mail,” Trump responded. “I don’t think a Republican can win in California unless you pass the Save America Act — then they’re gonna have to show proof of citizenship, they’re going to have to get rid of mail-in voting.”
The L.A. County registrar-recorder moved to set the record straight in a tweet posted Sunday morning that read “MISINFORMATION ALERT.”
Noting that in-person voting was in fact allowed, the agency announced that it had 646 vote centers across the county — each with multiple voting booths. The centers will be open from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. on Monday and Tuesday, the agency said in the posting, while tagging Fox News and the White House.
A map of polling locations featured on the agency’s website shows that there are dozens of voter centers available countywide. Mobile vote centers also were made available at various sites in the county. Mobile voting runs for the 10 days before election day and will not be available on June 2, according to the county registrar-recorder.
As of Friday morning, 333,000 mail-in votes had been cast in the June 2 primary for Los Angeles mayor, city attorney, city controller and eight of the 15 City Council seats. This was up from 321,000 at the same time in 2022, according to registrar-recorder.
Registered voters already should have received a ballot in the mail. Those who choose to vote in person can take their mail-in ballot to a vote center and ask to vote in person instead. Residents who haven’t yet registered to vote can still do so by requesting a conditional voter registration application at any voter center and filling out their ballot as they normally would.
Recent polling suggests that, ahead of Tuesday’s primary, incumbent Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass has what pollsters deem a statistically insignificant lead in her bid for reelection as the city’s top executive. Bass is locked in a tight race with councilmember and former ally Nithya Raman and Spencer Pratt.
Trump has signaled his support for Pratt but hasn’t formally endorsed the former reality TV star and registered Republican. Former Trump advisor Steve Bannon said the president hadn’t done so out of the fear it would hurt Pratt’s chances in Democrat-dominant Los Angeles.
In 2020, during the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, Gov. Gavin Newsom took the unprecedented step of issuing a statewide order for voting by mail for that year’s election in what he described as a necessary step to limit the virus’ spread.
A handful of rural counties had no in-person voting locations that March.
In 1979, the state eliminated the need for an excuse to receive an absentee ballot, and an option to choose permanent absentee voting was created in 2002. In the decades since, Californians have embraced the flexibility that voting away from a polling place offers. In nearly every statewide election since 2008, the majority of votes have not been cast at a traditional polling place.
Fourteen more counties — including Orange, Sacramento and Santa Clara — have adopted the state Voter’s Choice Act, an optional state law that requires them to mail every voter a ballot and to replace traditional neighborhood polling places with multipurpose vote centers. Those in-person locations offer multiple election services for up to 10 days before election day.
Los Angeles, the 15th county to adopt the new state law, was initially given special permission by the Legislature to implement it without mailing every voter a ballot.
Trump has for years repeated baseless claims that the 2020 election was stolen and that undocumented immigrants were swaying elections by voting illegally.
In light of these claims, Trump and some Republicans have pushed for new restrictions on voters. A federal proposal known as the Save America Act — which would require Americans to prove they are U.S. citizens before they register to vote and to show identification at the polls, among other things — cleared the U.S. House but stalled out in the Senate.
In November, California voters will weigh in on a similarly contentious ballot measure pushed by Republicans that would require all voters in future elections to show identification every time they vote in person or provide a special PIN when submitting mail-in ballots.
Under current state law, Californians are required to provide identification when registering to vote and must swear under penalty of perjury, a felony, that they are eligible to vote and are U.S. citizens. They are not required to show or provide identification when casting a ballot in person or by mail.
If passed, the California ballot measure would require voters to present government-issued identification, such as a state driver’s license, every time they vote. Voters mailing ballots would be required to write a four-digit number, essentially a PIN, on their ballot envelopes matching the one generated when they registered to vote.
Critics of California’s voter ID initiative, including many legal scholars, say the ballot measure addresses a problem that does not exist.
In May, a federal judge handed Trump a victory by declining to halt the president’s executive order creating a federal list of eligible voters and then directed the U.S. Postal Service to deliver mail ballots only to those on the list. Observers say the decision opens the door for potential sweeping changes in how American elections are run shortly before this year’s midterm elections.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Politics
Arizona school board member gets backlash after mocking board president with Nazi salute
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An Arizona school board member is facing calls to resign after appearing to make a Nazi salute during a contentious public meeting before later comparing the board president to a dictator and saying, “All I could think of tonight was Hitler.”
Video from a May 26 Deer Valley Unified School District Governing Board meeting appears to show board member Kimberly Fisher raising her right arm and saying, “Heil, heil” during a dispute with board President Paul Carver Jr.
The exchange occurred near the end of the meeting during a disagreement over scheduling a community study session related to district boundary discussions.
According to video of the meeting, Fisher objected to holding the session during the afternoon, arguing that community members would have difficulty attending.
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A still image from a Deer Valley Unified School District board meeting shows board member Kimberly Fisher during a contentious exchange with board President Paul Carver Jr. over meeting procedures. (DVUSD)
“The whole point of having a study session with our community is that we can get their input and they can hear our discussions,” Fisher said during the meeting.
Carver later said he moved to adjourn the meeting because the discussion involved an item that was not on the posted agenda and could have raised concerns under Arizona’s Open Meeting Law.
“The reason for calling for the adjournment was simply that, as the question turned into discussion concerning an item that was not on the agenda, the board was moving into an area that could have been considered a violation of Arizona’s Open Meeting Law,” Carver said in a Facebook video posted after the meeting.
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Carver said Fisher made the gesture and comment after the motion to adjourn.
“The point behind this post is that there’s a lot of noise being made that she may have been justified in making that statement because she felt like I was being a dictator,” Carver said. “I was simply following the rules of the state of Arizona.”
He added that “it is never okay to make those gestures and make that statement with those gestures in any environment.”
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The incident prompted condemnation from district officials, who said Fisher was acting independently and did not represent the views of the district.
“The District does not condone, support, or endorse gestures or language associated with hate, discrimination, intimidation or violence in any form,” Deer Valley Unified School District said in a statement. “Such actions do not reflect the mission or vision of Deer Valley Unified School District.”
Kim Fisher took to Facebook hours after the board meeting to explain her side of the story. (Facebook/@kim.fisher.233417)
The district added that Fisher’s “views and actions do not reflect and should not be attributed to other board members, staff, other members of the school community or the District.”
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The Deer Valley Educators Association also condemned Fisher’s conduct and called for her resignation.
“DVEA was horrified and disgusted to see DVUSD Governing Board Member Kimberly Fisher deliver a Nazi salute during the Tuesday, May 26, 2026, board meeting,” association president Kelley Fisher said in a statement.
“Any leader who uses a Nazi salute during a School Board meeting is unfit for public service. There is no justification for this behavior. Kimberly Fisher should resign before she does more harm to our students and the community at large.”
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Hours after the meeting, Fisher posted a Facebook livestream in which she doubled down on her criticism of Carver, repeatedly describing his leadership as dictatorial.
“We have been living or operating under virtually a dictatorship for a long time,” Fisher said.
She also accused Carver of acting like “a dictator” and urged voters not to support him in future elections.
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Near the end of the livestream, Fisher appeared to connect her thinking during the meeting to historical dictators.
“What was it? Pol Pot, you know, was the most egregious dictator I’ve heard of,” Fisher said. “All I could think of tonight was Hitler.”
Fisher did not directly address the gesture or comment from the meeting during the livestream.
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In a separate video posted to social media, Carver said community members had asked why the board was not taking action against Fisher. He argued Arizona law limits the ability of school boards to discipline elected members.
Deer Valley Unified School District Governing Board President Paul Carver Jr. addresses community questions in a Facebook video after a May 26 board meeting during which board member Kimberly Fisher appeared to make a Nazi salute and say “heil, heil.” (Facebook/@paul.carver.264650)
“I need the community to understand that in the state of Arizona, the school district and the board do not have the ability to discipline board members,” Carver said.
Carver called Fisher’s behavior “rampant and repetitive” and said her actions were “totally unacceptable and unprofessional.”
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Deer Valley Unified School District serves more than 33,000 students across northern Maricopa County, including communities in north Phoenix, Glendale, Peoria, Cave Creek and New River, according to the district.
Fox News Digital reached out to Fisher for comment.
Politics
Commentary: In Washington, the knives are out for Xavier Becerra. Most anonymously, of course
Xavier Becerra has spent nearly four decades in elected office. To some that speaks of extensive experience and a deep grounding in policy. To others, it smacks of political careerism and a long-term investment in the failed status quo.
Wired or tired?
It all depends on your perspective.
Becerra, a California native, emerged from the hothouse of Latino politics on Los Angeles’ Eastside. He was elected to the state Assembly in 1990, served 12 terms in Congress, was California attorney general and then, for nearly four years, ran the Department of Health and Human Services under President Biden.
It’s that latter stint that’s become a particular focus in the final days of California’s long and winding gubernatorial primary.
As Becerra surged from inconsequence to front-runner, opponents — led by chief Democratic rival Tom Steyer — have hammered Becerra’s performance in the Biden administration, suggesting he was AWOL during the COVID-19 pandemic and inept in his handling of unaccompanied migrant children, 85,000 of whom were supposedly “lost” on Becerra’s watch.
Politics is about persuasion and emotion, not rocket telemetry, so it’s not hard to figure out what’s going on.
“You look at Xavier and he seems to be perceived as a thoughtful, credible, trustworthy choice. That’s what I hear when I talk to regular people who aren’t political insiders,” said Darry Sragow, a Democrat strategist who’s spent decades running California campaigns. “So you see the people who want to take him out going after one of the words I just used here, which is ‘trustworthy’ and, to some extent, ‘credible.’”
A recent Steyer mail piece — which, naturally, features a grim-faced portrait of Becerra — accuses him of “mismanagement,” “scandal” and “incompetence,” and cites a 2024 quote from Susan Rice, a former Biden domestic policy advisor, describing the ex-Cabinet member as an “idiot.” (Apparently “bitch-a—,” another Rice epithet from the same Axios news report, was deemed unsuitable.)
The mail piece also quotes Xochitl Hinojosa, a Justice Department spokesperson in the Biden administration, saying Becerra “was not effective in government,” though several people who worked in the White House could not think of any occasion, or any reason, Hinojosa would have meaningfully interacted with Becerra.
Pretty weak sauce. But at least Hinojosa, who delivered her gibe on one of CNN’s talking-head shows, was willing to publicly attach herself to the criticism.
Six former Biden administration officials were quoted by Politico “reacting with a mix of incredulity, mockery and resignation” to Becerra’s sudden ascendance in the governor’s race. Critics also unloaded to NBC News and other outlets. All of them spoke anonymously.
Therefore, it’s impossible to discern their motivations. Jealousy? Ego? An attempt to stay politically relevant?
Or maybe Becerra was, indeed, a feckless, flailing and thoroughly awful Cabinet member, deserving of scorn and shame.
Ron Klain, who was Biden’s chief of staff during the first two years of his presidency, doesn’t believe so.
“I think he did an excellent job as HHS secretary and I think the record shows that,” Klain said, citing, among other accomplishments, Becerra’s work helping negotiate a drop in the price of prescription drugs and expanding healthcare coverage under the Affordable Care Act.
On COVID-19, Becerra “wasn’t confirmed until several months into the Biden administration. Dr. [Anthony] Fauci had been on the job and was quite a well-known figure to Americans. So, of course, he became more the face of the COVID response.”
“On immigration,” Klain went on. “Xavier’s part was small and discreet. He wasn’t the secretary of Homeland Security. He didn’t run the border. He oversaw an office called the Office of Refugee Resettlement” responsible for processing children who crossed the border alone. “I was in meetings where he was a passionate and forceful advocate for these minors,” Klain said.
Still, there are legitimate questions, notwithstanding Becerra’s deflections — Trump! MAGA! Trump! — about his handling of the migrant children, some of whom died, suffered horrible abuse or were catastrophically injured, according to revelatory reporting by the New York Times. It’s worth noting, however, that Becerra inherited a plan to deal with unaccompanied minors that was drafted and phased in by Rice and her Domestic Policy Council.
There is an unhappy history between the two; apparently Becerra was not alone in drawing Rice’s ire. In 2022, an article in the American Prospect accused her of creating an “abusive and dehumanizing workplace,” in which Rice routinely berated others, including the Health and Human Services secretary.
On social media, Rice has made no secret of her continued contempt for Becerra, a display that carries no small whiff of ax-grinding and score-settling. She highlighted the refusal of Biden’s Homeland Security chief, Alejandro Mayorkas, to endorse Becerra in the governor’s race, though it would be surprising if Mayorkas, Biden, Kamala Harris or any high-level Democrat picked a favorite in such a fiercely contested primary.
Becerra “had big things to do and he got them done,” said Neera Tanden, who succeeded Rice as head of Biden’s Domestic Policy Council and has vigorously defended Becerra against attacks on social media.
“I am not on or coordinating with the Becerra campaign,” Tanden said. “I just know these attacks are ridiculous.”
If Becerra makes it past Tuesday’s primary to the November runoff, his career merits careful scrutiny — and not just those years spent in the Biden Cabinet. Many voters are still getting to know Becerra, who is the likeliest candidate to be California’s next governor. Anonymous quotes, drive-by commentary and incendiary mailers may be standard campaign fare. But voters deserve better.
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