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Iraq IS Prisoners

CENTCOM said that the transfer thatbegan on Jan. 21saw U.S. forces transporting more than 5,700 adult male IS suspects from detention facilities in Syria to Iraqi custody.

The prisoners were transferred to Iraq at therequest of Baghdad— a move welcomed by the U.S.-led coalition that had for years fought against IS.

"We appreciate Iraq's leadership and recognition that transferring the detainees is essential to regional security," said Adm. Brad Cooper, CENTCOM commander.

Iraq's National Center for International Judicial Cooperation said a total of 5,704 suspects from 61 countries who were affiliated with IS were transferred from prisons in Syria.

The Center said most of the suspects were Syrian or Iraqi, though there were other foreign nationals from Europe as well as Australia, Canada and the United States, among other countries.

Over the past three weeks, the U.S. military escorted the detainees fromprisons in northeastern Syriarun by the U.S.-backed and Kurdish-ledSyrian Democratic Forces,to Baghdad.

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The transfers have helped calm fears that the recent rounds of fighting in Syria between government forces and the SDF would allow the IS prisoners to flee from detention camps there and join militant sleeper cells that are still carrying outattacksin both Iraq and Syria.

Iraq is looking to put on trial some of the thousands of the IS detainees who were held for years in Syria without charges or access to the judicial system.

When IS declared a caliphate — a self-proclaimed territory under a traditional form of Islamic rule — in large parts of Syria and Iraq that the militant group seized in 2014, it attracted extremists from around the world.

From the caliphate, the extremists plotted attacks around the world that left hundreds dead from Europe to Arab countries and Asia.

"The successful execution of this orderly and secure transfer operation will help prevent an ISIS resurgence in Syria," said U.S. Army Maj. Gen. Kevin Lambert, commander of the Combined Joint Task Force – Operation Inherent Resolve, that led the mission planning, coordination, and execution. He used an acronym to refer to the Islamic State group.

Mroue reported form Beirut.

Supervisory CBP Officer Andres Wilkinson, 52, was living in Laredo, Texas, with a woman who overstayed her travel visa and "provided financial support" to the woman, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of Texas.

Wilkinson had worked for CBP since 2001 and was promoted to a supervisory position in 2021, prosecutors said. If convicted, he could face up to 10 years in federal prison and up to a $250,000 fine. An attorney representing Wilkinson didn't immediately respond to a request for comment. CBP also did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

According to astatementfrom the U.S. Attorney's Office and a criminal complaint viewed by USA TODAY, the CBP Office of Professional Responsibility, which handles allegations of wrongdoing by its officers, learned in April 2025 that the undocumented woman was living with Wilkinson and that he was aware of her immigration status.

After the fatal shootings of Alex Pretti and Renee Nicole Good by federal immigration agents (ICE), communities across the U.S. are protesting against Trump's surge of immigration enforcement actions.

Pictured here, Demonstrators gather for a protest calling for the removal of United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement on Jan. 30, 2026 in the Chinatown neighborhood of Washington, D.C. Protests were held across the United States in response to ICE enforcement activity.

" style="max-width:100%; height:auto; border-radius:6px; margin:10px 0;" loading="lazy" /> Hundreds of people gather to protest ICE at the corner of Palafox and Garden Streets in downtown Pensacola, Florida, on Jan. 30, 2026.

" style="max-width:100%; height:auto; border-radius:6px; margin:10px 0;" loading="lazy" /> Penn High School students participate in a walkout protesting U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement on Friday, Jan. 30, 2026, in Mishawaka, Indiana.

" style="max-width:100%; height:auto; border-radius:6px; margin:10px 0;" loading="lazy" /> Protesters gather at City Hall in response to recent actions by the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, commonly referred to as "ICE," and the presence of Flock cameras in the community and Indiana University campus, in Bloomington, Indiana, on Jan. 30, 2026.

" style="max-width:100%; height:auto; border-radius:6px; margin:10px 0;" loading="lazy" /> A Penn High School student confronts a man in a car line at the school who was shouting, "Let's go ICE!" as students were marching past during a walkout protesting U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement on Friday, Jan. 30, 2026, in Mishawaka, Indiana.

" style="max-width:100%; height:auto; border-radius:6px; margin:10px 0;" loading="lazy" /> Protesters gather at City Hall in Bloomington, Indiana, on Jan. 30, 2026, in response to recent immigration enforcement actions by the government.

" style="max-width:100%; height:auto; border-radius:6px; margin:10px 0;" loading="lazy" />

'ICE Out' protests spark marches, confrontations across US

After the fatal shootings of Alex Pretti and Renee Nicole Good by federal immigration agents (ICE), communities across the U.S. areprotestingagainst Trump's surge of immigration enforcement actions.Pictured here, Demonstrators gather for a protest calling for the removal of United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement on Jan. 30, 2026 in the Chinatown neighborhood of Washington, D.C. Protests were held across the United States in response to ICE enforcement activity.

The woman entered the United States in August 2023 and was admitted as a tourist to visit San Antonio, and after that had multiple entries into the country, according to a criminal complaint against Wilkinson. The last entry was granted for tourism to Eagle Pass, Texas, and expired in March 2025. In late 2023, she was living with her husband, who later filed a petition for her to become a resident, the complaint said. However, that petition was later withdrawn in 2025, the complaint said.

The woman lived with Wilkinson since 2024, prosecutors said. For several months in 2025, the Office of Professional Responsibility monitored the woman living with Wilkinson and her minor child, prosecutors said. She used vehicles registered to Wilkinson and he provided her with credit cards, according to the complaint. Wilkinson also knowingly drove her through U.S. Border Patrol checkpoints, prosecutors said.

OPR accessed a law enforcement database "indicating" that the woman is Wilkinson's niece; she is the daughter of a man Wilkinson listed on a background investigation as his brother. She also acknowledged to investigators that she "had been living with her uncle," the criminal complaint said. USA TODAY has reached out to attorneys for Wilkinson and the woman to clarify their relationship.

"The complaint further alleges that Wilkinson was aware of her unlawful immigration status yet maintained a romantic relationship with her," the U.S. Attorney's Office said in a statement.

The case was investigated as part of the Trump administration's "Operation Take Back America" to stop illegal immigration, drug cartels and violent crime, prosecutors said.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY:CBP supervisor charged with 'harboring' undocumented girlfriend

The campus, which is located in the city of Orangeburg, went into lockdown a little after 9 p.m. Thursday after gunfire erupted, according to the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division (SLED).

The lockdown was lifted around 5 a.m. Friday.

"The incident happened inside a room in the Hugine Suites housing complex," SLED said in a statement obtained byNBC affiliate WYFF of Greenville. "Three men were shot."

One of the shooting victims died at the scene, another died at a nearby hospital, SLED said.

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SLED did not give a condition for the wounded man or say where he was being treated. Nor has the agency released a motive.

The dead victims were taken to the Orangeburg County Coroner's Office, SLED said.

When asked if any of the victims were students, Sam Watson, the school's director of university relations, said they expect to have an update later Friday.

This was the second deadly shooting at South Carolina State this academic year. In October, one person waskilled and two otherswere injured in two unrelated shootings during the homecoming weekend celebration.

None of those victims were students, the university said at the time.

The historically Black university is located about 40 miles south of the state capital, Columbia.

They are loved.

They are ruining baseball.

They are great for baseball.

They are theLos Angeles Dodgers.

The Dodgers will open theirspring trainingcamp on Friday morning at Camelback Ranch as the first team in more than a quarter-century asrepeat World Series champions, and the first in baseball history to have a payroll exceeding $400 million, $406.5 million to be exact.

If you include their estimated luxury tax penalties, their payroll will exceed $550 million.

Their payroll is so immense that their mere luxury tax penalties is greater than the entire payroll of 10 teams.

Why, if you consider the 110% tax penalty they're paying for new right fielderKyle Tucker's $60 million annual salary, their tax bill is greater than the payroll of theMilwaukee Brewers, who won a major league-leading 97 games last season.

They are Exhibit 1-A for whythe owners want a salary capin the next collective bargaining agreement, and while they are willing to shut down the sport to obtain it.

Los Angeles Dodgers celebrate back-to-back World Series titles with thousands of fans

Oh, and just in case the non-Dodger fans aren't angry enough, Dodgers manager Dave Roberts had a proclamation on Feb. 12 that will have them screaming into the night and flooding MLB fan sites.

"This team, looking at the guys in their prime, the experience, the talent, the starters, the pen, the depth of the young players that we have coming behind them on the pitching side," Roberts said, "this probably is the best team we've had on paper yet."

Yep, once again the Dodgers will treat the regular season as a dress rehearsal for their gala performance in October, using a six-man pitching staff in which $1 billion worth of players — Shohei Ohtani and Yoshinobu Yamamoto — likely will pitch just once a week.

What other team in baseball has the resources to make two free-agent blunders with closer Tanner Scott and outfielder Michael Conforto in free agency a year ago, and then replace them with the best player on the free-agent market in Tucker, and the best reliever on the market inEdwin Diaz?

Indeed, the best team in baseball got even better.

"When we played them in the playoffs last year,"Cincinnati Redsmanager Terry Francona said, "I didn't know whether to try to get them out or get their autographs. They just keep running guys at you.

"I don't blame them. They're trying to win, and they've got the resources to do it. I'm just glad we're in a different division."

Really, it's similar to the same mantra heard throughout the land during the Yankees' dynasty and their payroll. Where was the outcry when Atlanta won 14 consecutive division titles? Did the Oakland A's ruin baseball duringthe Charlie Finley days?

"You always have to have somebody that teams and fans enjoy disliking,'' Roberts said, "and that's good for sports. I was one of those guys that didn't like the Yankees, but saw their value within the sport, certainly.

"I think what gets lost is all of the things that we do well, the scouting and player development, I think we do as good as anyone in baseball, and all of that to get superstars to play well every night, to put out a good product every single night.

"But when you're talking about the Yankees, if you be put in the same vein of the Yankees in the 90s, you're doing something right?''

See the Dodgers' World Series winning moment and champagne-soaked party

While MLB is using the Dodgers to argue for a salary cap, and fans will either scream at the Dodgers for their payroll or bash their own ownership for not spending, general managers and players surveyed in the Cactus League refuse to criticize the Dodgers' extravagant spending.

They might be jealous over the Dodgers' resources, but they rave about the Dodgers' front office and coaching staff, recognize their ability to scout and develop players, and praise the way they play the game.

"They're the juggernauts of the major leagues right, but you're not going to fault the team for spending money,'' Brewers ace Brandon Woodruff told USA TODAY Sports. "As a player, that's what you want to see. So why would anyone get mad at them for spending money. I mean, if they can do it, they can do it.

"They have good players, and a lot of money, but what's so impressive about them is that they play the game the right way. You go play them, and you see all of these superstars ... Freddie Freeman, Mookie [Betts] and those guys, and they're all out doing early work. They put in their work.

"They just don't show up when the game starts. They're good, but they put their work in. You've got to respect them.''

What folks conveniently forget is that while the Dodgers are consistently picking last or next-to-last in the draft, they still are a team filled with homegrown stars, from catcher Will Smith to recently retired Clayton Kershaw, and they used their own prospects to trade for All-Star shortstop Mookie Betts, infielder/outfielder Tommy Edman and starter Tyler Glasnow.

Sure, their enormous resources allow them to supplement their roster with whatever free agents they desire, enabling them to retain their own prospects without having to trade them away, but a team like theNew York Metshave spent more than the Dodgers the past five years and are still seeking their first World Series title since 1986.

"Hey, it's not necessarily who has the best players, but who plays the best,''Los Angeles AngelsGM Perry Minasian said. "Anybody can beat anyone on any given night. That's the beauty of baseball. It's 162 games. There are no Cinderella stories in 162 games. You have to earn it.

"They've earned it.''

Said J.J. Picollo,Kansas City Royalspresident of baseball operations: "They've done this strategically, and have done it well. They're capitalizing on things that are perfectly within what's permitted. What they're doing is fascinating, and it's really impressive.''

Chris Young,Texas Rangerspresident of baseball operations, added: "Whether somebody is having a problem with what they're doing and questioning whether or not it's good for the game, are two different things in my opinion. What they're doing is completely within the rules. They've operated with the resources they have in a tremendous matter.''

Really, if you want to feel sorry for anyone, you can sympathize with the other four teams in the NL West, particularly theSan Diego Padres. The Padres have been to the postseason in four of the past six years, winning 183 games the past two seasons, but the Dodgers are that roadblock that keeps them from greatness.

Yep, just like the days when no matter what theBoston Red Soxdid, the Yankees stood in their way.

"The difference between the Yankees teams and the Dodgers is the financial component of it,'' said A.J. Preller, Padres president of baseball operations. "I mean, you're talking over $500 million, and all of the deferrals. So that's a different level.

"But we understand they're a great team. They've got star players that are impactful. They just set up super high bars. If you want to get to that championship level, you've got to get past them.''

Year after year after year.

So you can complain, can get mad and can scream, but in the end, the Dodgers' rivals will tell you that there is respect, like it or not.

"The Dodgers are unquestionably awesome,'' said Jerry Dipoto,Seattle Marinerspresident of baseball operations. "There are superstars all around the field. They have awesome role players. They have depth everywhere you look. So to have a team like that, and to sustain it, is so impressive.

"Really, there's always been that team that dating back to as long as I watched or have been a fan of baseball. Look at the Yankees in the 90s and early 2000s. You had [Mariano] Rivera, [Jorge] Posada, [Andy] Pettitte and [Derek] Jeter. They were homegrown players. It was the with those great Braves' teams. And it's the same with the Dodgers.

"The team costs a lot more money to field, but that doesn't take away from anything they're doing.''

The Dodgers aren't about to apologize.

They plan to keep on winning.

And they dare someone to stop them.

FollowBob Nightengaleon X@Bnightengale.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY:Dodgers payroll: Why MLB's most hated team is also its most respected