作者： root

消息称谷歌与美国签署协议 允许AI模型用于机密工作

2026年4月28日 18:01 / 联合早报

消息称，谷歌签署与美国战争部签署协议，允许五角大楼将谷歌的AI工具用于“任何合法的政府用途”。 （路透社档案照片）

知情人士称，Alphabet旗下的谷歌公司与美国战争部签署协议，允许人工智能（AI）模型用于机密工作。

美国科技媒体The Information星期二（4月28日）引述一名知情人士报道称，谷歌签署的这项协议，允许五角大楼将谷歌的人工智能用于“任何合法的政府用途”，这将与OpenAI和马斯克的xAI等公司并列。

合同中写明：“双方同意AI系统不应用于、也不应在缺乏适当人工监督和控制的情况下，用于国内大规模监控或自主武器。”

不过，协议规定，谷歌无权控制或否决政府合法的行动决策。机密网络用于处理各种敏感工作，包括任务规划和武器目标定位。

谷歌指出，公司支持政府机构开展机密与非机密项目。“我们认为，在遵循行业标准和相关条款的前提下，向商业模型提供API访问权限，是支持国家安全的负责任做法。”

五角大楼称，无意利用AI对美国公民进行大规模监控，也无意开发无需人工干预的武器，但希望允许“任何合法用途”的人工智能。

去年，五角大楼已与多家主要人工智能实验室签署价值高达2亿美元（约2亿5500万新元）的协议，包括Anthropic和OpenAI等。

路透社此前报道，五角大楼一直在敦促OpenAI和Anthropic等将AI工具用于机密网络上，并放宽对用户通常施加的限制。

此前，Anthropic公司因拒绝移除AI在自主武器或国内监控方面的安全限制，与五角大楼关系紧张，一度将其列为供应链风险。

希腊发生枪击事件造成五人受伤 89岁涉案男子仍在逃

2026年4月28日 18:02 / 联合早报

希腊首都雅典发生枪击事件，一名男子持猎枪先后在市区两处地点开枪，造成五人受伤。

新华社引述希腊媒体报道，雅典星期二（4月28日）上午发生枪击事件，一名89岁涉案男子仍在逃。

希腊发生枪击事件造成五人受伤 89岁涉案男子仍在逃

2026-04-28 10:02:10 / 联合早报

希腊首都雅典发生枪击事件，一名男子持猎枪先后在市区两处地点开枪，造成五人受伤。

新华社引述希腊媒体报道，雅典星期二（4月28日）上午发生枪击事件，一名89岁涉案男子仍在逃。

以色列敦促黎巴嫩南部十几个村镇居民立即撤离

2026年4月28日 18:12 / 联合早报

4月10日，在黎巴嫩提尔，一辆推土机正在清理遭以色列空袭严重损毁的建筑残骸。 （路透社档案照片）

以色列军方敦促黎巴嫩南部十几个村镇的居民立即撤离，暗示即将发动袭击。

路透社报道，以色列国防军阿拉伯语发言人阿德拉伊星期二（4月28日）在社媒X发文称：“以色列国防军无意伤害你们，但出于对你们安全的考虑，你们必须立即撤离家园，离开指定区域，前往西顿地区。”

他也强调，任何靠近真主党人员、相关设施或作战装备的人都将危及自身生命。

以军警告称，由于真主党民兵违反与以色列达成的停火协议，迫使以色列采取行动。

以黎双方于4月17日启动为期10天的停火安排，并在4月23日同意将协议延长三周。不过停火未能完全止息炮火，以军近期仍多次在黎境内展开军事行动。

以色列敦促黎巴嫩南部十几个村镇居民立即撤离

2026年4月28日 18:12 / 联合早报

4月10日，在黎巴嫩提尔，一辆推土机正在清理遭以色列空袭严重损毁的建筑残骸。 （路透社档案照片）

以色列军方敦促黎巴嫩南部十几个村镇的居民立即撤离，暗示即将发动袭击。

路透社报道，以色列国防军阿拉伯语发言人阿德拉伊星期二（4月28日）在社媒X发文称：“以色列国防军无意伤害你们，但出于对你们安全的考虑，你们必须立即撤离家园，离开指定区域，前往西顿地区。”

他也强调，任何靠近真主党人员、相关设施或作战装备的人都将危及自身生命。

以军警告称，由于真主党民兵违反与以色列达成的停火协议，迫使以色列采取行动。

以黎双方于4月17日启动为期10天的停火安排，并在4月23日同意将协议延长三周。不过停火未能完全止息炮火，以军近期仍多次在黎境内展开军事行动。

Trump squeezes Iran with maximum pressure — why it hasn’t forced a breakthrough

2026-04-28 05:00:16 EDT / Fox News

Analysts say Iran has proven more capable of absorbing pressure than Washington has been able to convert it into gains

By Morgan Phillips Fox News

Published April 28, 2026 5:00am EDT

Rubio WARNS Iran: US won’t tolerate threats to global waterways

Sec. of State Marco Rubio warned that the regime cannot be allowed to ‘normalize’ control over international waterways after President Donald Trump’s decision to cancel a diplomatic mission to Pakistan reportedly forced a ‘better’ offer from Iran.

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After two months of conflict, neither a deadly bombing campaign nor a blockade on Iranian exports has forced Tehran to make the concessions the Trump administration is seeking.

The campaign has intensified in recent weeks, targeting Iran’s oil exports and financial networks while a naval blockade has disrupted shipments through the Strait of Hormuz, a critical artery for global energy flows. U.S. officials argue the combination of military pressure and economic isolation is intended to weaken Iran’s capabilities and force it back to the negotiating table on more favorable terms.

While the U.S. has killed Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and dozens of top military and political figures, the regime itself remains intact. His son, Mojtaba Khamenei, was selected to succeed him, and leadership remains firmly hardline.

Aaron David Miller, a former State Department Middle East negotiator and fellow at the Carnegie Endowment, said the administration may have misjudged the type of negotiating partner it would face.

HORMUZ CHOKE POINT PERSISTS AS IRAN HALTS OIL TRAFFIC DESPITE TRUMP CEASEFIRE

“Trump was looking for an Iranian Delcy Rodriguez,” he told Fox News Digital. “More likely, he’s going to end up with an Iranian Kim Jong Un.”

The campaign has intensified in recent weeks, targeting Iran’s oil exports and financial networks while a naval blockade has disrupted shipments through the Strait of Hormuz, a critical artery for global energy flows.(CENTCOM)

He expressed doubt that any decisive victory was possible while the current Iranian regime remained in power.

“And we do not have the capacity to remove the regime.”

The standoff increasingly has become a test of whether U.S. pressure can be converted into political concessions — or whether it is instead being diluted through workarounds, institutional resilience and competing constraints.

So far, analysts say, Iran has proven more capable of absorbing and rerouting pressure than Washington has been able to translate it into durable gains.

On Monday, Iran floated a proposal to reopen the Strait of Hormuz in exchange for relief from the blockade, while deferring negotiations on more contentious issues.

But analysts caution that such proposals do not address the core dispute and may not even mean the same thing to both sides.

“What the Iranians mean by opening the straits, and what Trump means, may be two different sorts of things,” Miller said.

At the center of the standoff is Iran’s nuclear program, where the gap between the two sides remains wide. The Trump administration has pushed for Iran to eliminate its uranium enrichment capability entirely, while Iran insists that enrichment is a sovereign right and non-negotiable — leaving little room for compromise.

节点运行失败

CENTCOM shared footage of strikes against airplanes amid the Iran war.(U.S. Central Command on X)

That divide continues to block a broader agreement, even as both sides explore more limited steps to reduce immediate tensions.

US ‘LOCKED AND LOADED’ TO DESTROY IRAN’S ‘CROWN JEWEL’ ‘IF WE WANT,’ TRUMP WARNS

“It’s almost unimaginable that this administration and the Iranian leadership are willing to make the kinds of concessions that would allow this administration to walk away with a win,” Miller said.

“Iranians are willing to give concessions, but Trump is looking for capitulation,” said Trita Parsi, executive vice president of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft think tank. “And you can’t get a country to capitulate unless you have defeated them.”

Instead of folding under pressure, Iran largely has responded by adapting.

Despite the blockade, Iran has continued to move at least some oil through workaround methods, including sanctioned vessels, smaller ports and alternative routing strategies, even as overall exports have come under strain.

Those efforts have expanded in recent weeks. Reports indicate Iran is exploring overland shipments, including potential rail exports to China, while vessels have increasingly rerouted through Iranian territorial waters or controlled shipping corridors to bypass restrictions.

“The United States successfully closes off one avenue for them, and slowly, but surely, they are finding workarounds,” Parsi said.

The financial impact of the campaign has been significant, even if uneven. Estimates vary, but some analysts put Iran’s potential losses from the blockade at roughly $400 million per day, largely driven by disrupted oil exports and reduced access to hard currency.

At the same time, Iran has not been fully cut off. The country has continued to generate billions in oil revenue in recent months, underscoring both the scale of the pressure and its limits.

While a sustained drop in oil revenue would strain the government’s official budget and force cuts to public spending, the country’s most powerful institution, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, operates through its own economic networks, including smuggling routes and cross-border trade.

That allows key parts of the regime to continue functioning even under heavy sanctions, meaning economic pain often falls unevenly — hitting civilians before it weakens the state’s coercive apparatus.

“Trump was looking for an Iranian Delcy Rodriguez. More likely, he’s going to end up with an Iranian Kim Jong Un,” said Aaron David Miller.(Julia Demaree Nikhinson/The Associated Press)

Even attempts to directly destabilize Iran’s leadership have not fundamentally altered that dynamic. U.S. and Israeli operations earlier in the conflict killed Khamenei along with dozens of senior military and political figures.

Yet the regime has remained intact, with power consolidating among remaining political and security elites aligned with hardline positions.

How long Iran can sustain that posture remains uncertain. Miller said a prolonged blockade could eventually force a breaking point — but only if Washington is willing to maintain it.

“If the administration is prepared for six months to keep up this blockade, I think they could probably break the Iranian economy,” Miller said.

But he cautioned that such timelines are difficult to predict and that even U.S. intelligence lacks a clear picture of when economic pressure might translate into political concessions.

That uncertainty raises a broader question about the sustainability of the strategy. While Iran’s leadership may be willing to absorb significant economic pain, the U.S. faces its own constraints, including potential strain on military resources and growing risks to global energy markets.

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“There are no midterms. There are no primaries. There are no sell-by dates for Iran,” Miller said. “And Trump has a sell-by date.”

The White House did not respond to a request for comment.

For now, both sides appear to be waiting for the other to lose the political will to sustain the standoff, with global energy markets caught in the middle.

白宫晚宴枪手被控企图刺杀特朗普

2026年4月28日 19:05 / 联合早报

白宫晚宴枪手被控企图刺杀特朗普

美国哥伦比亚特区联邦检察官皮罗（右）和代理司法部长布兰奇星期一在司法部的记者会上，展示枪手冲击白宫记者协会晚宴所携带的武器照片。 （路透社）

（华盛顿综合电）冲击美国白宫记者晚宴的枪手被控企图刺杀总统特朗普，如果罪成，可判处终身监禁。

持枪犯案的艾伦（Cole Tomas Allen，31岁）星期一（4月27日）被带上哥伦比亚特区联邦地区法院的庭室。他身穿蓝色囚服，双手反铐背后。

上星期六晚上，艾伦持枪企图闯入在华盛顿希尔顿酒店举行的白宫记者协会晚宴，出席活动的特朗普、副总统万斯等政要紧急撤离，艾伦随后被制服逮捕。

除了被控企图刺杀总统，他也被控跨州运输武器以及使用枪械实施暴力犯罪。他在听证会上没有回应这些指控。他星期四（30日）将再次出庭，法庭将决定是否继续将他羁押候审。预审听证会定于5月11日举行。

法庭文件显示，艾伦上周乘火车从加利福尼亚州来到华盛顿，上星期五（24日）入住预订的华盛顿希尔顿酒店客房。

检察官说，艾伦带着一支12号口径泵动式霰弹枪、一支点38口径半自动手枪和三把刀到华盛顿。

根据呈堂文件，事发时，艾伦持长枪冲过酒店内的一处安检站，一名特勤局特工向他开枪，艾伦倒地但未被击中。这名特工也被子弹打中胸口，因穿着防弹衣而无大碍。艾伦是在宴会厅上方楼层被制服。

法庭文件也证实，艾伦动手前向家人发送一封电子邮件，表达对特朗普政府的愤怒，并把特朗普政府官员列为目标。

美国代理司法部长布兰奇过后在记者会上说，调查员之所以认为艾伦的目标是特朗普，理由之一是他在电邮中以“叛徒”和其他贬义词汇指摘特朗普。

布兰奇也再度为晚宴的安保措施辩护。“执法部门没有失职……他们完全按照训练指定行事。”

艾伦在给家人的电邮中嘲讽酒店安保松懈，指安保措施集中在酒店外，“因为显然没人考虑过，如果有人提前一天到来会发生什么事”。

白宫记者协会晚宴属私人活动，数十年来一直在希尔顿酒店举行，以前从没出过事。协会每年都向在任总统发出邀请，今年是特朗普首次同意出席。

白宫办公厅主任怀尔斯本周将召集特勤局和国土安全部高级官员开会，检讨如何确保特朗普出席活动时安全。

原本打算在晚宴上致辞时抨击媒体的特朗普在出事后呼吁各方团结，但很快又继续攻击媒体和政治对手。

白宫新闻秘书莱维特星期一把这起事件归咎于所谓的“左翼仇恨邪教”（left-wing cult of hatred）。“那些不断错误地给总统贴上法西斯标签、诽谤他是民主的威胁，并把他比作希特勒以捞取政治资本的人，正在助长这种暴力。”

她说，这是两年内针对特朗普的第三次刺杀企图，“近年来没有人比特朗普总统面对更多的子弹和暴力”。

众议院民主党领袖杰弗里斯反唇相讥称：“这位所谓的白宫新闻秘书想要教训美国，教我们什么叫文明？滚吧。在对我们的用语指手画脚之前，先管好你们自己吧。”

White House Correspondents’ Dinner shooting again put Washington Hilton at center of presidential history

April 28, 2026 / 7:23 AM EDT / CBS News

By Katrina Kaufman

When shots rang out at the Washington Hilton as President Trump sat in the ballroom for the White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner on Saturday night, there were echoes of the hotel’s storied presidential history.

On March 30, 1981, President Ronald Reagan nearly died after John Hinckley Jr. pulled out a .22 caliber revolver and unleashed six shots in 1.7 seconds, from a mere 15 feet away, as the president was leaving the hotel. He had come from addressing union members of the AFL-CIO in the ballroom, ending his remarks with a familiar line: “Together we’ll make America great again.”

Lead U.S. Secret Service agent Jerry Parr — who was inspired to become an agent after seeing Reagan play one in a film as a boy – acted quickly to throw Reagan in the limousine, according to Del Wilbur, author of “Rawhide Down” (Rawhide was Reagan’s Secret Service code name).

View of police officers and Secret Service agents as they dive to protect President Ronald Reagan amid a panicked crowd during an assassination attempt (by John Hinckley Jr) outside the Washington Hilton Hotel, Washington DC, March 30,1981. Hulton Archive / Getty Images

But, said Wilbur, Hinckley’s sixth shot “slaps against the side of the limousine, flattens to the size of a dime, slips through a gap an inch and a half wide between the door and the door frame and hits Reagan.”

Bullets hit White House press secretary James Brady in the head — paralyzing him, D.C. police officer Thomas Delehanty in the back, and U.S. Secret Service agent Tim McCarthy in the chest.

Diagram depicts assassination attempt on Pres. Reagan. Reagan and three others (A,B,C,D) were shot in front of the VIP exit at the Washington Hilton Hotel by a lone assailant, who was captured on the spot near the exit. Bettmann

“It’s important to remember how close he came to dying,” said Tevi Troy, a presidential historian and senior fellow at the Reagan Institute, recalling how the president insisted on walking into the hospital despite his grave condition, then collapsed inside. “He rallied so the nation wouldn’t panic and think he was dying.”

The assassination attempt was a pivotal moment for the Washington Hilton – and for presidential security.

The Hilton’s presidential attraction

Journalists report from outside of the Washington Hilton Hotel on April 26, 2026. Tasos Katopodis / Getty Images

Since its inception, presidents have frequented the Washington Hilton. A wing-shaped building that looks like a bird in flight, the hotel was designed to attract them, featuring a secret passageway, safe room, and spacious ballroom.

The hotel opened 16 months after President John F. Kennedy was assassinated. A few years later, the White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner was held there for the first time and became a tradition that has continued ever since.

“So how do you get the president to go?” said Wilbur. “Well, you make sure he has his own entrance. They built a whole separate entrance on T Street. And it’s beautiful. There’s a spiral staircase down. There’s a personal elevator. And there’s a holding room down there for him that, at the time before all these great wireless communications, they had wired to communicate with the White House.”

“So that’s where they took Trump right after, to that holding room. No windows, subterranean, and they built that just to attract the president. And the president went there all the time,” he added. “There’s a safe hallway that goes from the bunker, that holding room, all the way to the top. It’s like his own hallway that leads from that to the speech.”

The ballroom is one of the largest in Washington, D.C. Presidents speak there several times a year – and have since Lyndon Johnson. In April 2024, then-President Biden appeared for three speeches in eight days. It has been home to the National Prayer Breakfast, the First Lady’s Luncheon, and inaugural balls.

President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama look at their photos on the wall at the Hilton Washington prior to the MTV & ServiceNation: Live From The Youth Inaugural Ball on January 20, 2009 in Washington, DC. David Hume Kennerly / Getty Images

Presidents Richard Nixon, Barack Obama, George W. Bush, Bill Clinton, and Reagan have all attended Inaugural Balls there.

Security adjustments made

But when Reagan was shot, there was a vulnerability point – as the president exited the hotel, he had to step outside to reach his limo. The Hilton later remedied that by constructing a bunker-like garage with a secure door, so the president is not exposed.

FBI agents are seen at the Washington Hilton after shots were fired during the White House Correspondents dinner at the Washington Hilton in Washington, DC, on April 25, 2025. Alex Wroblewski /AFP via Getty Images

“The assassination attempt on Ronald Reagan led to all sorts of changes in Secret Service security,” said Wilbur. “They started using magnetometers at all events. There had been a lot of pressure not to do that because it really disrupted events and kept politicians away from people. People complained a lot. Donors, especially, complained a lot. They started staffing differently. They even added magnetometers to the White House, where they hadn’t been before.”

Forty-five years later, Cole Tomas Allen attempted to rush through a magnetometer into the hotel’s ballroom in an alleged attempt to assassinate Mr. Trump, carrying a pump action shotgun and a .38 caliber pistol, according to an affidavit.

Allen’s alleged “manifesto,” obtained by CBS News, stated that “administration officials” were targets “prioritized from highest-ranking to lowest,” with the exception of Kash Patel.

“Very unusual” pattern

It was the third alleged attempt on Mr. Trump’s life.

In February, Ryan Routh was sentenced to life in prison for plotting to assassinate him at the Trump International Golf Club in West Palm Beach, Florida, during the 2024 election campaign. Thomas Crooks attempted to assassinate Mr. Trump at a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, grazing his ear with a bullet, in July 2024.

“It’s very unusual to have multiple attempts,” said Troy. “Gerald Ford had two attempts in California in a one-month period. I can’t think of any recent president that’s had more attempts on his life.”

Reagan prayed for Hinckley after the shooting, expressing compassion for his would-be assassin in his diary. “I began to pray for his soul and that he would find his way back to the fold,” he wrote.

Hinckley was found not guilty by reason of insanity. His attempt to kill the president had been an effort to attract the attention of actress Jodie Foster.

His acquittal, which led to a public outcry, had an impact on the federal insanity defense — leading to a shift in the burden of proof. The Insanity Defense Act of 1984 changed the standard for insanity, putting the burden of proof on the defendant to prove insanity. In Hinckley’s case, prosecutors had to prove sanity beyond a reasonable doubt.

Hinckley spent more than three decades at St. Elizabeth’s Hospital in Washington, D.C., before being released in 2016. His first television interview was with CBS News chief Washington correspondent Major Garrett in 2022.

“I feel terrible for what I did. I have remorse for what I did,” said Hinckley. “If I could take it all back, I would.”

Reagan returned for the first time to the Washington Hilton in September of 1981 for a charity ball, about six months after he was wounded in the assassination attempt. He did not mention the shooting in his brief remarks, but his limousine entered and left the hotel through the new garage entrance.

Mr. Trump has insisted that the White House Correspondents’ Dinner should be rescheduled within 30 days, with increased security.

On the night of the shooting, reporters gathered in the White House press briefing room, some still dressed in black tie.

“We’re going to do it again,” said Mr. Trump.

Trump push for state voter rolls rebuffed by courts as midterms near

2026-04-28T10:08:38.381Z / Reuters

April 28 (Reuters) – As the U.S. midterm elections approach, Democrats are winning legal challenges to the Trump administration’s push to obtain states’ voter rolls, dealing a blow to the president’s unprecedented effort to expand the federal government’s role in elections.

The Democratic-run states’ victories come as their party is locked in a fierce battle to take back both houses of Congress from President Donald ​Trump’s Republicans in the November 3 midterms.

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So far this year, federal judges in California, Massachusetts, Michigan, Oregon and Rhode Island have dismissed Justice Department lawsuits demanding those states’ voter rolls, including sensitive information like partial Social Security numbers.

Litigation surrounding U.S. federal elections has become common, with Democrats ‌and aligned voting rights groups generally challenging state laws they believe restrict the right to vote and Republicans and their allies challenging state voting practices they say leave elections vulnerable to fraud. Trump asserts, falsely, that his 2020 election loss was due to fraud.

But the Justice Department’s efforts to obtain states’ voter rolls highlight a new dynamic this election cycle: voting rights groups are increasingly finding themselves in court fighting against the federal government.

“This year, we have the added layer of the Department of Justice being perhaps the main player in voter suppression litigation,” said Lis Frost, a lawyer with Elias Law Group, which has intervened in the voter data demand lawsuits on behalf of voting rights groups. “This DOJ has taken on the mantle that was previously ​carried by right-wing organizations to try to argue that there are voters on the rolls that shouldn’t be there and to try to remove voters from the rolls.”

Frost’s firm was founded by prominent election lawyer Marc Elias, an outspoken Trump critic. The firm frequently represents the Democratic party and ​its candidates in court.

Four of the judges who dismissed the suits – three of whom were appointed by Democratic presidents and one of whom was appointed by Trump during his first term – found that the federal government did not articulate ⁠why it needed the unredacted data to carry out oversight of state voting practices. The fifth judge, Trump appointee Hala Jarbou of Michigan, said the Justice Department adequately explained the basis of its request but that the laws it cited did not require the state to hand over the rolls.

The U.S. Constitution assigns individual ​states the role of administering federal elections.

To be sure, the Trump administration could still prevail: it is appealing three of its losses, and 25 similar cases are pending. Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon, who leads the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division, has said she is prepared to take the cases to the Supreme Court, where ​conservative justices hold a 6-3 majority.

In a statement, White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson said, “President Trump is committed to ensuring that Americans have full confidence in the administration of elections, and that includes totally accurate and up-to-date voter rolls free of errors and unlawfully registered non-citizen voters.”

TRUMP CALLS FOR ‘NATIONALIZING’ ELECTIONS

Since last year, the Justice Department has sent letters to nearly every state seeking their voter rolls, and asking for details about their procedures for removing ineligible individuals like deceased people, convicted felons and non-citizens. Seventeen states handed over their rolls voluntarily, Justice Department lawyers have said. The department sued dozens of states, including several led by Republicans, that did not comply.

In an interview with Fox News’ “Sunday Morning Futures” program on April 19, Dhillon said that the ​department had reviewed 60 million voter records so far and found the names of 350,000 dead persons and 25,000 people who lacked proof of citizenship.

Dhillon did not provide evidence that votes were cast for those names.

Trump and his allies have long asserted states are not doing enough to prevent voter fraud, even though state audits ​and academic studies have found it is rare.

Critics say Republicans are driven less by concerns over election security than by an effort to gain political advantage by narrowing the electorate, risking the disenfranchisement of eligible, often Democratic‑leaning voters.

Trump in February said in a podcast interview that Republicans should nationalize and “take over” voting, without giving details of what he intended.

Legal experts ‌say the steps ⁠his administration has taken in that direction are unlikely to survive challenges in the courts.

In addition to the losses over state voter rolls, three federal judges in separate cases have blocked Trump’s 2025 executive order requiring proof of citizenship to register to vote and restricting the counting of mail ballots. The Justice Department is appealing. A March 2026 executive order restricting mail-in voting has also drawn legal challenges.

“He doesn’t have the levers, he doesn’t have the switch, there is nobody he can order to federalize the elections who will listen to him,” said Justin Levitt, a former Justice Department elections lawyer and current professor at Loyola Law School in Los Angeles.

But even if the Justice Department continues to lose in court, some legal experts said they expected Trump to point to the legal battles to try to sow doubt in the legitimacy of the midterms should Republicans lose. That would echo a playbook that Trump deployed after his 2020 loss, when he used more than 60 defeats in legal challenges ​to the election results to rally his base and undercut faith in the ​reliability of the vote.

“This is using the legal process, the law enforcement ⁠process to serve a propaganda role, to lead to destabilization and delegitimization of future elections like in 2026,” said David Becker, a former Justice Department election lawyer and now the executive director of the Center for Election Innovation & Research, a non-partisan group that promotes voter participation and election security.

A Reuters/Ipsos poll found that Trump’s claims have gained broad traction with the American public, with 46% of respondents, including 82% of Republicans, agreeing with the statement that large numbers of fraudulent ballots are cast ​by non-citizens.

JUSTICE DEPARTMENT CITES CIVIL RIGHTS LAW

In suing states to demand their voter rolls, the department has cited the Civil Rights Act of 1960. The law, passed to combat racial discrimination at a time when Southern states were ​destroying Black Americans’ voter registration records to cover ⁠up disenfranchisement, requires states to preserve such records.

But the judge who dismissed the lawsuit against California said the Justice Department’s request for the most populous U.S. state’s voter roll went beyond what Congress intended when it passed the Civil Rights Act and other voting laws.

The judge, David Carter, said the fact that the department had requested the data of so many states suggested that the federal government was seeking to build a nationwide database of voter information, rather than investigate alleged mismanagement by individual states.

“The Department of Justice seeks to use civil rights legislation which was enacted for an entirely different purpose to amass and retain an unprecedented amount of confidential voter data,” Carter wrote in a ⁠January 15 decision.

The Santa ​Ana, California-based judge said the Constitution requires that policy changes that could erode privacy and voting rights must be decided by Congress.

“It cannot be the product of an executive fiat,” Carter, who ​was appointed by former President Bill Clinton, wrote.

The prospect of a nationwide voter database has alarmed voting rights activists, who are concerned that the government is seeking to compare voter rolls with other sources of data to purge people it believes are not citizens.

But those other sources may not have up-to-date information on whether previously ineligible immigrants have since become naturalized citizens, said Renata O’Donnell, senior litigation ​counsel at the Campaign Legal Center, a nonprofit that works to expand voting access.

“People who should lawfully be able to access the franchise are going to be disenfranchised,” said O’Donnell, whose organization is representing voting rights groups that have intervened in several voter roll cases.

Reporting by Luc Cohen in New York; Editing by Alistair Bell

白宫晚宴枪手被控企图刺杀特朗普

2026年4月28日 19:05 / 联合早报

白宫晚宴枪手被控企图刺杀特朗普

美国哥伦比亚特区联邦检察官皮罗（右）和代理司法部长布兰奇星期一在司法部的记者会上，展示枪手冲击白宫记者协会晚宴所携带的武器照片。 （路透社）

（华盛顿综合电）冲击美国白宫记者晚宴的枪手被控企图刺杀总统特朗普，如果罪成，可判处终身监禁。

持枪犯案的艾伦（Cole Tomas Allen，31岁）星期一（4月27日）被带上哥伦比亚特区联邦地区法院的庭室。他身穿蓝色囚服，双手反铐背后。

上星期六晚上，艾伦持枪企图闯入在华盛顿希尔顿酒店举行的白宫记者协会晚宴，出席活动的特朗普、副总统万斯等政要紧急撤离，艾伦随后被制服逮捕。

除了被控企图刺杀总统，他也被控跨州运输武器以及使用枪械实施暴力犯罪。他在听证会上没有回应这些指控。他星期四（30日）将再次出庭，法庭将决定是否继续将他羁押候审。预审听证会定于5月11日举行。

法庭文件显示，艾伦上周乘火车从加利福尼亚州来到华盛顿，上星期五（24日）入住预订的华盛顿希尔顿酒店客房。

检察官说，艾伦带着一支12号口径泵动式霰弹枪、一支点38口径半自动手枪和三把刀到华盛顿。

根据呈堂文件，事发时，艾伦持长枪冲过酒店内的一处安检站，一名特勤局特工向他开枪，艾伦倒地但未被击中。这名特工也被子弹打中胸口，因穿着防弹衣而无大碍。艾伦是在宴会厅上方楼层被制服。

法庭文件也证实，艾伦动手前向家人发送一封电子邮件，表达对特朗普政府的愤怒，并把特朗普政府官员列为目标。

美国代理司法部长布兰奇过后在记者会上说，调查员之所以认为艾伦的目标是特朗普，理由之一是他在电邮中以“叛徒”和其他贬义词汇指摘特朗普。

布兰奇也再度为晚宴的安保措施辩护。“执法部门没有失职……他们完全按照训练指定行事。”

艾伦在给家人的电邮中嘲讽酒店安保松懈，指安保措施集中在酒店外，“因为显然没人考虑过，如果有人提前一天到来会发生什么事”。

白宫记者协会晚宴属私人活动，数十年来一直在希尔顿酒店举行，以前从没出过事。协会每年都向在任总统发出邀请，今年是特朗普首次同意出席。

白宫办公厅主任怀尔斯本周将召集特勤局和国土安全部高级官员开会，检讨如何确保特朗普出席活动时安全。

原本打算在晚宴上致辞时抨击媒体的特朗普在出事后呼吁各方团结，但很快又继续攻击媒体和政治对手。

白宫新闻秘书莱维特星期一把这起事件归咎于所谓的“左翼仇恨邪教”（left-wing cult of hatred）。“那些不断错误地给总统贴上法西斯标签、诽谤他是民主的威胁，并把他比作希特勒以捞取政治资本的人，正在助长这种暴力。”

她说，这是两年内针对特朗普的第三次刺杀企图，“近年来没有人比特朗普总统面对更多的子弹和暴力”。

众议院民主党领袖杰弗里斯反唇相讥称：“这位所谓的白宫新闻秘书想要教训美国，教我们什么叫文明？滚吧。在对我们的用语指手画脚之前，先管好你们自己吧。”