Little Rock City Director Ken Richardson was a no-show at a virtual meeting of the city’s Board of Directors on Tuesday despite previously seeking authorization to attend sessions electronically.

City officials made Tuesday’s agenda-setting meeting a virtual session on the heels of a major winter storm in Arkansas.

Richardson, 59, has not attended meetings since May 2024 after facing a serious health crisis, although he and others have not fully explained his health issues or offered a timeline for when he might be able to return.

After Richardson missed a series of meetings in 2024, the city issued a statement Aug. 1 of that year acknowledging that Richardson had undergone multiple life-threatening surgeries and was hospitalized.

Since 2007, Richardson has represented Ward 2, which encompasses a southern section of the city around Scott Hamilton Drive, Geyer Springs Road and Baseline Road.

His latest four-year term expires Dec. 31, 2026, having been reelected in 2022 without an opponent. The Ward 2 seat will appear on the ballot during the November 2026 election.

Richardson was the only one of the 10 city directors who did not appear via teleconference during Tuesday’s meeting.

In March 2025, the board voted to do away with the virtual-attendance procedures that had allowed members to attend meetings electronically during the covid-19 pandemic and the subsequent period.

Several months after the board changed the rules, a new Arkansas law took effect that requires members of municipal governing bodies to attend meetings in person unless the governor has declared an emergency.

Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders declared a state of emergency Jan. 22 in anticipation of the winter storm.

In a letter addressed to Mayor Frank Scott Jr. in late October, Richardson asked to attend meetings virtually, citing the federal Americans with Disabilities Act.

The city’s Human Resources Department later asked that Richardson and his health care provider complete paperwork detailing his request for reasonable accommodation under the law.

The board typically meets every Tuesday, alternating between formal meetings in which action is taken and agenda-setting meetings in which officials review the agenda for the following week’s meeting or discuss other policy matters.

To date, board members have not been presented with a measure that would authorize Richardson to attend meetings virtually as a disability-related accommodation or for other reasons.

In December, the board rejected a measure sponsored by City Director Lance Hines of Ward 5 that would have called on Richardson to resign. Scott spoke out against the proposal and had pledged to veto it if it passed.

City code lacks provisions that could lead to Richardson’s removal from office based on nonattendance.

Last year, an effort by some of Richardson’s constituents to gather enough signatures from Ward 2 residents to initiate a recall election fell short. At the mid-December deadline, organizer Pam Noble said they obtained fewer than 500 signatures out of the nearly 1,400 required to trigger the election.

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Delaware’s congressional delegation is calling President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown lawless and vowing to oppose more money for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

The effort to vote down additional DHS funding this week comes after two U.S. citizens were fatally shot by Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Border Patrol agents, respectively, this month in Minneapolis. Renee Nicole Macklin Good, a 37-year old mom, was killed Jan. 7, and Alex Pretti, a Veterans Affairs intensive care nurse, died at the hands of federal officers last week.

U.S. Sen. Lisa Blunt Rochester of Delaware said federal agents are wreaking havoc on all Americans, and that this is a pivotal moment for the country.

“It is incumbent upon all of us to do whatever we can in this moment,” she said. “Delawareans, we’re known as a state of neighbors, and I hope that that sentiment stays with us and spreads across the country, because we need it now more than ever.”

The Trump administration, as well as the president himself, have blamed the victims for their deaths. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem called Good a “domestic terrorist.” She said Pretti was “brandishing a weapon,” although bystander video shows Pretti holding a cellphone and trying to help a woman who had been pepper sprayed. Border Patrol Chief Greg Bovino said Pretti intended to “massacre law enforcement agents.”

DHS received $75 billion in the massive tax and spending bill Republicans passed this summer, known as the “one big, beautiful bill.” Senators are currently scheduled to vote Thursday on six “minibus” appropriation bills to fund the government. If those fail, a partial government shutdown could begin as soon as midnight Friday. Senate Democrats want the DHS funding bill to get a separate vote from the other bills.

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — As cities across the country see growing protests over immigration enforcement, Florida Democrats are pushing bills they say would protect residents and undocumented migrants — and counter Republican proposals to expand enforcement across the state.

“We stand at a crossroads where we need to decide what world we live in,” said Rep. Dotie Joseph, D-North Miami.

One measure, Senate Bill 316, known as the Visible Act, would ban the public use of masks, require police officers to identify themselves and create safe zones around schools and houses of worship.

“We are not a dictatorship,” said Rep. Angie Nixon, D-Jacksonville. “Secret police belong in the history books, not Florida streets.”

Democrats are also spearheading efforts to grant in-state college tuition to recipients of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, often called DREAMers. Florida lawmakers ended that benefit in 2025.

“I dream and I dream big.I will always work as hard as I have to make my dreams come true,” said Alexander Vallejos, a DACA recipient and student at the University of Central Florida. “I love my beautiful Sunshine State of Florida, and I’m a Florida kid through and through.”

Republicans argued in-state tuition diverted state funds from legal residents during the 2025 debate.

“I don’t think it’s fair to ask hardworking Floridians who are struggling to make ends meet to spend $45 million subsidizing the education of people who shouldn’t even be here,” said U.S. Rep. Randy Fine, a former state legislator.

Gov. Ron DeSantis defended Florida’s continued cooperation with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, calling it “positive cooperation” that “has certainly made a difference here in Florida.”

Tensions over enforcement have deepened nationally after ICE agents in Minneapolis fatally shot two U.S. citizens, drawing condemnation from lawmakers and activists.

“They feel they can do anything they want — even including executing a United States citizen in broad daylight,” said Sen. Carlos Guillermo Smith, D-Orlando.

The Visible Act must pass three committees before it can reach the full Senate floor for a vote.