RAINS COUNTY, Texas (KLTV) – The Northeast Texas Public Health District has received confirmation of a travel-related measles case in an adult living in Rains County, the agency said Tuesday.

NET Health said the person has remained isolated at their home throughout the contagious period and has recovered from the disease.

People who have been fully vaccinated against measles with two doses of the MMR vaccine have a very low risk of contracting the disease, NET Health said. However, unvaccinated individuals remain at higher risk, as do those in some other groups, including:

Children too young to have received both doses of the MMR vaccine yet

Anyone who has received only one dose of MMR

Those with compromised immune systems

NET Health said measles is a highly contagious viral illness that spreads when an infectious person coughs or sneezes. Someone with measles can spread it to susceptible people for up to four days prior to the appearance of a rash and for up to four days after rash onset. Early symptoms include:

High fever (may spike to over 104°F)

Cough, runny nose and/or red watery eyes

White spots inside the mouth

Appearance of a rash 3-5 days after symptoms begin

In some cases, measles can also cause illness, sometimes leading to hospitalization or death.

NET Health said that anyone who believes they have spent time with someone who has measles and who is experiencing symptoms consistent with measles should seek medical care as soon as possible.

Copyright 2025 KLTV. All rights reserved.

FILE – Vials of the measles mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine are displayed in Lubbock, Texas, on Tuesday, Feb. 25, 2025. Julio Cortez/AP

The Texas measles outbreak that sickened 762 people since late January is over, state health officials said Monday.

It’s been more than 42 days since the last new case was confirmed, meeting the threshold public health officials use to declare measles outbreaks over. The last person to have an outbreak-related case got a rash on July 1, according to state data.

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Two unvaccinated Texas children died of the virus earlier this year and 100 people were hospitalized throughout the outbreak, which spread to 37 counties. The outbreak and was linked to outbreaks in Canada and Mexico and other U.S. states.

The U.S. is having its worst year for measles in more than three decades, as childhood vaccination rates against the virus decline and more parents claim exemptions from school requirements. The U.S. has confirmed 1,356 cases as of Aug. 5, according U.S Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data. The nation’s third measles death was unvaccinated adult in New Mexico who died in March.

West Texas was the nation’s measles epicenter for months. The virus started spreading there in close-knit, undervaccinated Mennonite communities in Gaines County.

Even with that outbreak over, Texas will likely see more cases as the virus spreads worldwide, officials said.

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At least 19 U.S. states have had measles outbreaks this year. Across the border in Chihuahua, Mexico, an outbreak that started with a child who visited Gaines County has ballooned to 3,854 cases and 13 deaths. Another in Ontario, Canada, started in October, sickening 2,362 so far and killing one. And 1,762 have been sickened in Alberta, Canada.

Before the outbreak, most Texas doctors had never seen a measles case because of how uncommon it has become, said Texas Department of State Health Services Commissioner Jennifer Shuford.

She credited testing, vaccination, monitoring and education with helping to end the outbreak.

“I want to highlight the tireless work of the public health professionals across the state who contributed to the containment of one of the most contagious viruses,” Shuford said in a statement.

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Measles causes a rash and respiratory symptoms that can lead to severe complications or death. It is prevented by the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine, which is required for most young kids before they start school.

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AI-assisted summary Florida officials announced plans to end all state vaccine requirements, including those for school attendance.

The move has been strongly opposed by major medical groups, who warn of increased risks for preventable diseases.

Florida has recently seen a drop in vaccination rates and a rise in diseases like whooping cough and measles.

Florida is poised to become the first state to drop all vaccine requirements, including immunizations for schools.

At a Sept. 3 press conference in Valrico in Hillsborough County, Dr. Joseph Ladapo, Florida’s surgeon general, and Gov. Ron DeSantis said that all vaccine mandates in the state would end.

“Every last one of them is wrong and drips with disdain and slavery,” Ladapo said. “Who am I to tell you what your child should put in their body? I don’t have that right. Your body is a gift from God.”

Ladapo, the state’s top public health official, said that he would repeal about a half-dozen vaccine requirements controlled by the Florida Department of Health and DeSantis and that the Florida Legislature would work to repeal other vaccinations required under state law such as polio, diphtheria, rubeola, rubella, pertussis, mumps, tetanus and other communicable diseases.

A 2024 study showed that infant mortality rates have plummeted over the last 50 years and access to vaccines brought those rates 40% lower than they would have been otherwise.

Leaders of the American Medical Association, the American Academy of Pediatrics and other health professionals were quick to speak out against the move by Florida leaders.

Sandra Adamson Fryhofer, a member of the AMA Board of Trustees, said the group “strongly opposes Florida’s plan to end all vaccine mandates, including those required for school attendance.”

“This unprecedented rollback would undermine decades of public health progress and place children and communities at increased risk for diseases such as measles, mumps, polio, and chickenpox resulting in serious illness, disability, and even death,” said Fryhofer, a board-certified physician of internal medicine.

“While there is still time, we urge Florida to reconsider this change to help prevent a rise of infectious disease outbreaks that put health and lives at risk.”

Florida seeing drop in vaccinations, rise in preventable diseases

Vaccination rates have dropped in Florida as the anti-vaccine movement has picked up steam. Last year, the number of whooping cough cases in Florida soared eight time the cases compared to the year before as the vaccination rate dropped below herd immunity levels.

A measles outbreak in Miami-Dade resulted in nine infections in 2024. with four cases of the highly infectious and potentially fatal airborne disease in the state reported so far this year. Federal and medical professional guidelines recommend that unvaccinated children in schools where cases are reported stay home for three weeks.

Ladapo refused to mandate that move and said that the Florida Department of Health was “deferring to parents or guardians to make decisions about school attendance.”

When will Florida end its vaccination requirements?

No timeline was announced at the press conference, but Ladapo said some unspecified vaccine requirements could end soon.

“We actually have the ability to start that process with what government folks call ‘rules,'” he said. “So the Florida Department of Health, we have some, some rules that we promulgated, not me, predecessors, that include, you know, a handful, maybe a half a dozen, vaccines that that are mandated in Florida. So those are going to be gone, for sure.”

Ladapo said the FDOH would work with DeSantis and lawmakers to “get rid of the rest of it.”

“We need to end it. It’s the right thing to do,” he said.

Who is Dr. Joseph Ladapo, Florida Surgeon General?

Joseph Abiodun Ladapo, 46, is a Nigerian native and son of a microbiologist who immigrated to the U.S. with his family in the 1980s.

Ladapo earned a Bachelor of Arts in chemistry from Wake Forest University and an M.D. and a Ph.D in Health Policy from Harvard University. He worked at different hospitals in New York City and served as a professor at the NYU School of Medicine and a staff fellow with the Food and Drug Administration before becoming a researcher at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA. Ladapo is married, with three young sons.

Ladapo’s primary research interests, according to his previous online “about” page with UCLA Health, included assessing the cost-effectiveness of diagnostic technologies and reducing the population burden of cardiovascular disease.

Despite his lack of specialization in infectious disease, he also became prominent in the movement against the mainstream medical community’s positions on treatments, vaccines and masking. Ladapo wrote editorials for the Wall Street Journal, USA TODAY and the New York Daily News on the topic, saying masks have “little or no effect on respiratory virus transmission,” despite studies to the contrary, and recommending treatments such as the antimalarial drug hydroxychloroquine and the anti-parasitic drug ivermectin, which have since been proven ineffective.

Ladapo has been associated with extremist groups such as America’s Frontline Doctors and Tea Party Patriots Action and was a signatory of the Great Barrington Declaration, which criticized most pandemic mitigation measures and instead recommended allowing people to be infected to create a natural, or “herd,” immunity, an idea supported by President Donald Trump in his first term but considered dangerous by researchers and the larger medical community.

Supporters have said he is an intelligent and credentialed scientist and fully qualified. Some of Ladapo’s previous colleagues at UCLA have expressed surprise and shock at his views after the pandemic began.

When did Joseph Ladapo become Florida’s Surgeon General?

In 2020, then-Florida Surgeon General Scott Rivkees said in public that to fight the growing dangers of the COVID-19 pandemic Florida might need to practice social distancing well into the next year.

This conflicted with DeSantis’ growing message of opening up Florida and getting children back into schools, which turned into claims of governmental oppression and speeches in favor of personal freedom. The state’s surgeon general was kept out of public sight for months, during a global pandemic, before Rivkes finally retired in 2021. DeSantis replaced him with Ladapo, who had just been hired by the University of Florida College of Medicine, two events that DeSantis said at the time were coincidental.

That employment was later discovered to have been fast-tracked with the help of a DeSantis donor, resulting in the governor-appointed Florida Board of Medicine’s approval in only two days rather than the usual 2-6 months. Ladapo was reportedly pushed through the UF hiring process. He also received a 52% raise over Rivkees, making him one of the top 10 highest-paid Florida government employees.

Ladapo was quick to support DeSantis’ views and provided his own on social media, at public events and on multiple far-right anti-vaccine podcasts, claiming there was a concerted effort to hide stories of people with adverse reactions to vaccines, accusing the government in general and the former director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, Dr. Anthony Fauci, in particular of defrauding the American people, and urging Floridians to follow their intuition over medical professionals.

“Just check in with your gut. Who do you think you can trust, and go with those individuals,” Ladapo told First Class Fatherhood podcast host Alec Lace.

Dr. Joseph Ladapo’s controversy timeline in Florida

September 2021: Within a day of being hired, Ladapo signed new rules allowing parents to decide if children exposed to people who tested positive for COVID had to quarantine or if they could go to school, eliminating the previous requirement for exposed students to quarantine off campus for at least four days. “Fear is done,” he said during a press conference.

October 2021: Ladapo refused to wear a mask at a meeting with Democratic state Sen. Tina Polsky even after she told him she had a serious medical condition (later confirmed as breast cancer) and was at a higher risk for serious complications from COVID. After she asked him to leave and word got out, a firestorm erupted with Democrats and members of the medical community castigating him for endangering her life. Ladapo issued a statement nearly a week later saying he was saddened by her diagnosis but didn’t think he could communicate effectively with a mask on.

Ladapo appeared at DeSantis’ side in public appearances, promoting monoclonal antibody treatment, supporting the governor’s views on blocking vaccine and mask mandates and accusing the public health community of fearmongering. Critics accused him of spreading misinformation that led to people being hesitant or afraid of vaccines.

December 2021: The Florida Department of Health rejected a complaint about Ladapo that said he violated state medical laws by publicly casting doubts about COVID vaccines and promoting unproven treatments. Florida saw 2,933,782 cases of COVID-19 and 23,352 deaths in 2021, compared to 1,317,300 cases and 39,877 deaths in 2020.

January 2022: Senate Democrats all walked out of Ladapo’s confirmation hearing before the Senate Health Policy Committee after what they said was a lack of honest answers about his qualifications and the current state of the pandemic during a lengthy interview.

At a press conference that month, DeSantis and Ladapo told Floridians who weren’t showing symptoms not to get tested. “If you don’t have symptoms, you are not a case,” Ladapo said despite CDC guidance saying that asymptomatic people with COVID can still pass it on to more vulnerable people and they may still develop debilitating long COVID themselves weeks later.

February 2022: During his confirmation hearing Ladapo dodged questions about vaccine effectiveness, how much time he actually spent at UF, whether he had been vaccinated himself, and his connections with “fringe medical group” America’s Frontline Doctors. He was ultimately confirmed along party lines.

April 2022: Ladapo’s FDOH cited a study by an Australian pediatrician to support restricting transgender health care. The pediatrician, Dr. Ken Pang, strongly objected to the medical board, saying his research was misrepresented and showed exactly the opposite. “To be seeing the research we’ve done being utilized in this way — I was just dismayed by that,” Pang told VICE.com.

June 2022: DeSantis and the FDOH, under Ladapo, refused to pre-order COVID-19 vaccines for children under five when they became available, the only U.S. state to do so, citing the lack of need and the risks. Ladapo appeared before Congress to defend the state’s decision and said the state didn’t recommend vaccines for children under 18.

October 2022: Ladapo urged men younger than 40 to avoid the Pfizer and Moderna mRNA vaccine and booster shots because of the “abnormally high risk of cardiac-related death among men in this age group,” citing an anonymous non-peer-reviewed analysis from the FDOH. The move prompted a backlash from doctors, researchers and the federal government. At the time, Florida was leading the country in COVID deaths for the third month in a row.

January 2023: A task force of UF medical school doctors concluded that the FDOH recommendation against COVID vaccines for young men was of “highly questionable merit” and that Ladapo cherry-picked data to support his stance. Politico went further and, after examining different drafts of the analysis, reported that Ladapo had personally changed the study to remove data that contradicted his views. Ladapo has denied this.

March 2023: In response to a letter from Ladapo demanding answers based on his own research on vaccine safety, the FDA and CDC asked him to stop disproportionally focusing on the small number of adverse effects in the studies of 13 billion COVID shots given around the world while ignoring the number of people the vaccines have saved. “Unfortunately, the misinformation about COVID-19 vaccine safety has caused some Americans to avoid getting the vaccines they need to be up to date,” the letter reads.

April 2023: The FDOH under Ladapo stopped reporting COVID infections and deaths to the federal government

September 2023: Ladapo recommended against anyone under the age of 65 getting the new COVID-19 vaccine booster the FDA approved to combat new, more infectious variants, directly contradicting CDC guidance. He claimed that the mRNA boosters altered human DNA, which the CDC and multiple studies have said is false.

November 2023: After a two-year battle over COVID public records, the FDOH under Ladapo settled a lawsuit about withholding COVID data and released information spanning the entire duration of the pandemic on the state’s FLHealthCHARTS.gov site. However, the agency also stopped providing cumulative totals, percentages, new case positivity, data on booster doses and overviews that made it easier to see trends. Cases in Florida hit a new high of 3,071,567 in 2022 but the death rate dropped, with 21,320 deaths reported.

January 2024: Ladapo made headlines again by “calling for a halt to the use of mRNA COVID-19 vaccines” because he said he didn’t receive an adequate response from the FDA about the safety of vaccines. Meanwhile, Florida was seeing a spike in new COVID cases and hospitalizations.

February 2024: After six children at Manatee Baty Elementary School in Westin caught measles, Ladapo sent a letter to parents saying it was “normally recommended” for unvaccinated children who have not previously had the disease to be kept home for three weeks “because of the high likelihood” they would get infected. But he also said the state would not mandate such a move, saying the Florida Department of Health was “deferring to parents or guardians to make decisions about school attendance.”

Measles is considered one of the most contagious infections for humans, according to Dr. Aileen Marty, a professor at Florida International University and an expert in infectious disease and disaster medicine. If a person with measles comes in contact with a group of unvaccinated people, there is a 90% chance of the unvaccinated person becoming ill, according to the National Foundation for Infectious Diseases.

September 2024: Florida pediatricians reported that vaccination levels in the state are getting dangerously low, increasing the risk of outbreaks of diseases that are otherwise preventable. Ladapo issued a statement warning Floridians against getting the new COVID-19 vaccine, using the same anti-mRNA arguments the FDA rebutted the year before.

October 2024: The FDOH under Ladapo sent out a cease-and-desist order to at least two television stations over what it called misrepresentations of the state’s abortion laws in a political ad for a constitutional amendment. The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) under former President Joe Biden called the letter a “flagrant abuse of power” that “must be rejected.” The group behind the amendment filed a federal lawsuit against Ladapo, accusing him of violating its First Amendment rights.

November 2024: Ladapo asked Florida residents to call their legislators and demand them to stop adding fluoride to public drinking water, saying the practice is tantamount to “public health malpractice.” U.S. health experts strongly disagreedm but several cities ended the practice and the Florida Legislature banned it in 2025.

March 2025: In a press conference reporting the first measles case in Florida in 225, Ladapo reiterated that measles vaccines are available for children, but decisions about whether to give a child the vaccine, or whether to send an unvaccinated child to school, should be left to parents. As of Aug. 30, six cases have been reported in the state, according to FDOH data.

April 2025: Ladapo speaks at a “Freedom Fest” event in Sarasota denouncing Dr. Anthony Fauci, the former director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases who was a key member of the White House Coronavirus Task Force.

August 2025: A few days after 21 people were sickened (six of them under age 10) and seven people were hospitalized with severe complications after consuming raw (unpasteurized) milk from a Florida farm, Ladapo said that “Floridians have the freedom to make informed health choices” and that he supported the decision to consume it. Human consumption of raw milk, which has not been heated to neutralize harmful bacteria, is legal in Florida but selling it for human consumption is not.

(AP) – Kentucky has its first measles outbreak of 2025, as the U.S. case count sits just short of a 30-year high.

There have been 1,267 confirmed measles cases this year, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Wednesday. Texas confirmed three more measles cases this week tied to a major outbreak that raged through the late winter and spring.

There are three other large outbreaks in North America. The longest, in Ontario, Canada, has resulted in 2,212 cases from mid-October through June 24. The province logged its first death June 5 in a baby who got congenital measles but also had other preexisting conditions.

Another outbreak in Alberta, Canada, has sickened 1,169 as of Wednesday. And the Mexican state of Chihuahua had 2,810 measles cases and eight deaths as of Wednesday, according to data from the state health ministry.

Other U.S. states with active outbreaks — which the CDC defines as three or more related cases — include Arizona, Colorado, Georgia, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Michigan, Montana, New Mexico, North Dakota, Oklahoma and Utah.

In the U.S., two elementary school-aged children in the epicenter in West Texas and an adult in New Mexico have died of measles this year. All were unvaccinated.

Measles is caused by a highly contagious virus that’s airborne and spreads easily when an infected person breathes, sneezes or coughs. It is preventable through vaccines and has been considered eliminated from the U.S. since 2000.

How many measles cases are there in Texas?

Texas added three outbreak-related cases Tuesday, for a total of 753 across 36 counties, most of them in West Texas, state data shows.

Throughout the outbreak, 99 people have been hospitalized.

State health officials estimated less than 1% of cases — fewer than 10 — were actively infectious as of Tuesday.

Fifty-five percent of Texas’ cases are in Gaines County, where the virus started spreading in a close-knit, undervaccinated Mennonite community. The county has had 414 cases since late January — just under 2% of its residents. Statewide, officials said Tuesday only two counties — Gaines and Lamar — had ongoing measles transmission.

The state also said Tuesday there are 37 cases across 19 counties that don’t have a clear link to the outbreak now, but may end up added to it after further investigation.

The April 3 death in Texas was an 8-year-old child, according to Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Local health officials said the child did not have underlying health conditions and died of “what the child’s doctor described as measles pulmonary failure.” A unvaccinated child with no underlying conditions died of measles in Texas in late February; Kennedy said the child was 6.

How many measles cases are there in New Mexico?

New Mexico had 94 measles cases Friday. Five cases were confirmed last week in a jail in Luna County, which prompted health officials to urge locals to get vaccinated and halted in-person visits. The jail’s outbreak grew to 13 by Tuesday. All of the cases are in unvaccinated adults.

Seven people have been hospitalized since the state’s outbreak started. Most of the state’s cases are in Lea County. Sandoval County near Albuquerque has six cases, Eddy County has three, Doña Ana County has two. Chaves, Curry and San Juan counties have one each.

An unvaccinated adult died of measles-related illness March 6. The person did not seek medical care.

How many cases are there in Oklahoma?

Oklahoma held steady Tuesday for a total of 17 confirmed and three probable cases.

The state health department is not releasing which counties have cases.

How many cases are there in Arizona?

Arizona has four cases in Navajo County. They are linked to a single source, the county health department said June 9. All four were unvaccinated and had a history of recent international travel.

How many cases are there in Colorado?

Colorado has seen a total of 16 measles cases in 2025, which includes one outbreak of 10 related cases.

The outbreak is linked to a Turkish Airlines flight that landed at Denver International Airport in mid-May. Four of the people were on the flight with the first person diagnosed — an out-of-state traveler not included in the state count — while five got measles from exposure in the airport and one elsewhere.

Health officials are also tracking an unrelated case in a Boulder County resident. The person was fully vaccinated but had “recently traveled to Europe, where there are a large number of measles cases,” the state health department said.

Other counties that have seen measles this year include Archuleta and Pueblo.

How many cases are there in Georgia?

Georgia has an outbreak of three cases in metro Atlanta, with the most recent infection confirmed June 18.

The state has confirmed six total cases in 2025. The remaining three are part of an unrelated outbreak from January.

How many cases are there in Illinois?

Illinois health officials confirmed a four-case outbreak on May 5 in the far southern part of the state. It grew to eight cases as of June 6, but no new cases were reported in the following weeks, according to the Illinois Department of Public Health.

The state’s other two cases so far this year were in Cook County, and are unrelated to the southern Illinois outbreak.

How many cases are there in Iowa?

Iowa has had six total measles cases in 2025.

Four are part of an outbreak in eastern Johnson County, among members of the same household. County health officials said the people are isolating at home, so they don’t expect additional spread.

How many cases are there in Kansas?

Kansas added three more case this week for a total of 83 across 11 counties in the southwestern part of the state, with three hospitalizations. All but three of the cases are connected, and most are in Gray County.

How many measles cases are there in Kentucky?

Central Kentucky has an outbreak of four cases, the state announced Monday. The cases are in Fayette County, which includes Lexington, and neighboring Woodford County.

The state has confirmed seven total cases this year.

How many cases are there in Michigan?

Grand Traverse County in northern Michigan has an outbreak of four cases as of Wednesday.

The state declared an earlier outbreak of four cases in Montcalm County, near Grand Rapids in western Michigan, over June 2. The state has had 18 cases total in 2025; eight are linked to outbreaks.

How many cases are there in Montana?

Montana had 24 measles cases as of Tuesday, an increase of one since Friday. Sixteen were in Gallatin County, which is where the first cases showed up — Montana’s first in 35 years.

Flathead and Yellowstone counties had two cases each, and Hill County had four cases.

There are outbreaks in neighboring North Dakota and the Canadian provinces of Alberta, British Columbia and Saskatchewan.

How many cases are there in North Dakota?

North Dakota, which hadn’t seen measles since 2011, was up to 34 cases as of June 6, but has held steady since. Two of the people have been hospitalized. All of the people with confirmed cases were not vaccinated.

There were 16 cases in Williams County in western North Dakota on the Montana border. On the eastern side of the state, there were 10 cases in Grand Forks County and seven cases in Cass County. Burke County, in northwest North Dakota on the border of Saskatchewan, Canada, had one case.

How many cases are there in Utah?

Utah had nine total measles cases as of Tuesday. At least three of the cases are linked, according to the state health department.

State epidemiologist Dr. Leisha Nolen said last week she is aware of at least three different measles clusters in the state. She expects to see more cases because there are other unvaccinated people who were exposed.

At least two of the people infected had to be hospitalized and two are pregnant.

Where else is measles showing up in the U.S.?

Measles cases also have been reported this year in Alaska, Arkansas, California, District of Columbia, Florida, Hawaii, Louisiana, Maryland, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Oregon, Rhode Island, South Dakota, Vermont, Virginia, Washington and Wyoming.

Health officials declared earlier outbreaks in Indiana, Ohio and Pennsylvania over after six weeks of no new cases. Tennessee’s outbreak also appears to be over.

Cases and outbreaks in the U.S. are frequently traced to someone who caught the disease abroad. The CDC said in May that more than twice as many measles have come from outside of the U.S. compared to May of last year. Most of those are in unvaccinated Americans returning home. In 2019, the U.S. saw 1,274 cases and almost lost its status of having eliminated measles.

What do you need to know about the MMR vaccine?

The best way to avoid measles is to get the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine. The first shot is recommended for children between 12 and 15 months old and the second between 4 and 6 years old.

Getting another MMR shot as an adult is harmless if there are concerns about waning immunity, the CDC says. People who have documentation of receiving a live measles vaccine in the 1960s don’t need to be revaccinated, but people who were immunized before 1968 with an ineffective vaccine made from “killed” virus should be revaccinated with at least one dose, the agency said.

People who have documentation that they had measles are immune and those born before 1957 generally don’t need the shots because so many children got measles back then that they have “presumptive immunity.”

Measles has a harder time spreading through communities with high vaccination rates — above 95% — due to “herd immunity.” But childhood vaccination rates have declined nationwide since the pandemic and more parents are claiming religious or personal conscience waivers to exempt their kids from required shots.

What are the symptoms of measles?

Measles first infects the respiratory tract, then spreads throughout the body, causing a high fever, runny nose, cough, red, watery eyes and a rash.

The rash generally appears three to five days after the first symptoms, beginning as flat red spots on the face and then spreading downward to the neck, trunk, arms, legs and feet. When the rash appears, the fever may spike over 104 degrees Fahrenheit, according to the CDC.

Most kids will recover from measles, but infection can lead to dangerous complications such as pneumonia, blindness, brain swelling and death.

How can you treat measles?

There’s no specific treatment for measles, so doctors generally try to alleviate symptoms, prevent complications and keep patients comfortable.

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The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Science and Educational Media Group and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.

APD no longer under federal oversight — Daniel Montaño, KUNM News

A federal judge has dismissed the Court Approved Settlement Agreement, or CASA, mandating federal oversight of the Albuquerque Police Department, ending more than a decade of U.S. Department of Justice management.

The ruling by U.S. District Judge James Browning came today/yesterday [MON] after both the City of Albuquerque and the USDOJ filed a joint motion to conclude the CASA last week citing APD’s full compliance with all terms within the agreement according to a press release.

Albuquerque Mayor Tim Keller says the department and the community at large have “worked tirelessly for over the last decade, (and) earned back the right to run our own police department.”

In 2014 a series of protests and public criticism of APD after police killed James Boyd, a homeless man camping in Albuquerque’s foothills, resulted in a DOJ investigation that led to the settlement agreement, and found a pattern of excessive force.

APD has spent the last 11 years taking on new policies, increasing transparency and embedding accountability in its daily operations, according to the press release.

Some advocates, however, say the police still have a problem with violence. Searchlight New Mexico reports in 2023 there were 13 officer involved shootings, which is 44% more than there were in 2014 when the agreement was enacted.

Hundreds of migrants arrested after entering military area at NM border – Colleen Heild, Albuquerque Journal

Another 209 people were arrested last week in southern New Mexico after entering the newly established New Mexico National Defense Area along the U.S.-Mexico border. Where they end up could soon be decided by the state’s chief U.S. Magistrate judge.

Traditionally, individuals would face illegal entry charges, but now they are also subject to additional charges of entering a restricted military area and violating a defense property security regulation as part of the Trump administration’s enhanced immigration enforcement. That means up to an additional 18 months of incarceration, if convicted of the two misdemeanors.

“To allow this novel charging theory runs the risk of supporting the Government’s attempt to strike a foul blow against undocumented immigrants,” wrote assistant federal public defender Amanda Skinner, of the Federal Public Defender’s Office in New Mexico, in a filing last week in U.S. District Court in New Mexico.

The U.S. Attorney’s Office in New Mexico has contended that it doesn’t matter if an individual knew he or she was entering a prohibited military zone, as long as the person understood he or she were crossing illegally into the United States. A USAO spokesperson would not say where the 209 migrants are being detained as they await resolution of their cases.

“Most aliens who enter the District of New Mexico from Mexico through an area that is not a designated port of entry … and thereby enter the (restricted military area) without authorization — are not ‘engaged in apparently innocent conduct,’” federal prosecutors wrote in a May 5 court filing.

Typically, unless there are other charges, those convicted of the misdemeanor of illegal entry without inspection are given time served and deported.

On April 15, the U.S. Department of Interior transferred to the U.S. Army more than 109,651 acres of federal land along the U.S. border in New Mexico, including a 60-foot-wide strip along the Mexican border in Doña Ana, Luna and Hidalgo counties. That enabled the Secretary of the Army to designate the area as the New Mexico National Defense Area and issue a security regulation to formally prohibit any unauthorized entry onto the land.

In the past several weeks, an estimated 300 or so cases have been filed in New Mexico that have also included the trespassing on military property, including 209 such cases in the week that ended Friday, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office.

Skinner wrote in her filing that her agency “immediately” brought to the government’s and the court’s attention that the additional charges “are unsupported by probable cause.” On April 30, the federal public defender asked that all such charges be dismissed, but chief U.S. Magistrate Judge Gregory Wormuth of Las Cruces denied the motion.

A day later, Wormuth filed an order asking both sides to detail what proof would be necessary for a conviction on the two misdemeanor charges related to trespassing on military property.

In her filing Thursday, Skinner included a sworn affidavit from an investigator with her agency who toured the defense area May 7 with the U.S. Border Patrol. Investigator Horlando Lopez stated that he saw signs attached to stakes in the ground on the military land, but wasn’t permitted to photograph them or their locations.

The 12-by-18-inch signs warned that the area was restricted military property and that unauthorized entry was prohibited. But the words, in both Spanish and English, were not visible from the border wall, which appeared to be about 20-feet tall, Lopez’s affidavit stated. The signs were spaced about 200 to 300 feet apart from each other and seemed to be more than 60 feet away from the border wall, he added. He said he didn’t see any lighting in the area.

Lopez wrote that it appeared to him that someone could scale the border wall in the space between two signs, walk straight into the desert and never see a sign.

“Considering the placement of the signs, even if a migrant saw and read a sign, he or she would have already crossed through and exited the military land,” Lopez stated.

Skinner wrote that she also toured the area and it was “readily apparent…that the location of the signage is wholly inadequate to inform anyone approaching the alleged military land from either side of the border that they are entering the space prior to entering it.”

She asked Wormuth to hold a hearing so attorneys for both sides “may be questioned as to their positions and to develop a complete record on these emerging and important legal issues.” Absent proof that defendants willfully violated a military regulation and entered military property with a prohibited purpose or with knowledge the entry was prohibited, “this Court cannot allow the Government to continue to prosecute (the military property-related) charges.”

The U.S. Attorney Office says offenders by law don’t need to see posted warning signs or know they were violating the no-trespassing edict in order to be found guilty.

“If an illegal alien enters the U.S. from Mexico without going through a designated port of entry and knows that such conduct is unlawful, then he or she has violated the military regulation, even if he or she never saw a sign designating the area as restricted, never knew he or she was entering military property, was unaware the military had restricted entries onto this property, and didn’t specifically intend to violate the security regulation,” stated the government’s filing.

The government, nonetheless, has posted about 199 signs along the 180-mile border with Mexico, and says placement of the signs “in light of the often difficult and unforgiving desert and mountainous terrain” is “conspicuous and appropriate.” The federal government “is currently working on installing additional signs,” the U.S. Attorney’s Office filing added.

DOT warns new Mexicans to ignore scam toll violation text messages — Daniel Montaño, KUNM News

State officials are warning New Mexicans to beware of scam text messages asking for money to pay for a toll infraction.

The Department of Transportation released the warning Monday in a press release and on social media after a flood of calls from concerned citizens who received the fraudulent messages, which add urgency by threatening a late fee, driver’s license suspension or legal action.

Officials say citizens should never click any links or scan any QR codes in texts or emails referring to toll violations.

NMDOT Secretary Ricky Serna says the state doesn’t have any toll roads whatsoever, and thus “any message claiming you owe toll fees in our state is 100% fraudulent.”

In addition to text messages, scammers have also been making phone calls and utilizing convincing fraudulent websites that mimic official government pages.

The messages have already been common in other parts of the country since as early as March of 2024, according to the FBI.

For those who clicked any link or provided any information, the FBI recommends taking efforts to secure personal information and financial accounts, and to dispute any unfamiliar charges.

Federal officials say victims can file a complaint with the Internet Crime Complaint Center.

New Mexico Supreme Court reverses Whistleblower Protection ruling – Source New Mexico

The state Supreme Court on Thursday issued a unanimous opinion it says reconciles conflicting rulings by the Court of Appeals regarding the state’s Whistleblower Protection Act.

Specifically, the new opinion says for a public employee to receive protection under the act, disclosures about wrong or illegal actions by a public employer must benefit the public in some way.

While case law is “sparse” regarding the Whistleblower Protection Act, the opinion says, the Appeals Court decision in the case of corrections officer Manuel Lerma conflicted with one of its earlier rulings, the state Supreme Court said, and too narrowly interpreted the law.

Lerna, who had 16 years’ experience with the New Mexico Corrections Department, transferred to a new facility where he guarded the prison’s sally port and ensured, as “safety protocol” that one side of the dual-gate system remained closed when the other was open. dual-gate system was to have one gate closed when opening the other gate as a “safety protocol.”

Lerna’s “strict” enforcement of this protocol led to “disagreement” between him and other transportation division corrections officers, who wanted him to leave both gates open “at the same time…so they could come and go as they pleased.” Lerna alleges that “one day while he was driving home from the prison, his vehicle ‘kept [being] block[ed]’ when it was sandwiched between two vehicles, each driven by a DOC employee, causing him to pull his vehicle over and stop in an empty lot. Plaintiff, ‘fearing for [his] life,’ was beaten by a fellow corrections officer. A prison supervisory lieutenant filmed the altercation using his agency-issued cell phone.”

Lerna reported both the pushback on the protocol and the violent episode, and Corrections cited and disciplined two people involved for what the department acknowledged as “egregious conduct.” Lerna, however, contends he was reassigned after disclosing as retaliation.

He subsequently filed a lawsuit citing violations of whistleblower protections, which a district court dismissed in response to Corrections Department arguments that Lerma’s grievances were personal and not covered by the act. Lerma challenged the district court’s summary judgement against him and the Appeals Court ruled in his favor, saying his grievances did not have to be for the benefit of the public. This, the state Supreme Court said in its opinion today, is incorrect.

“A public employee’s disclosure of illegality or wrongdoing qualifies for protected whistleblower status, if otherwise eligible, so long as the disclosure confers a benefit on the public, irrespective of which benefit – public or personal – may be said to predominate,” the opinion written by Chief Justice David K. Thomson said.

The court returned the case to the Appeals Court to decide if Lerma qualifies for whistleblower protection under that standard of public benefit.

Mandatory training coming soon for NM university boards of regents – Leah Romero, Source New Mexico

Starting next month, regents on New Mexico university boards will have to complete 10 hours of training to prepare them for their roles in guiding academic institutions.

Senate Bill 19, sponsored by Sen. Jeff Steinborn (D-Las Cruces), directs the New Mexico Department of Higher Education to develop those training hours to include topics such as state law, financial management, institutional governance and student success. The HED is tasked with providing the training and ensuring regents comply.

Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham signed SB19 on April 8 and the bill goes into effect on June 20. The bill states that current regents must complete the training by Dec. 31 this year.

Higher Education Department Spokesperson Auriella Ortiz told Source NM in a written statement that members of the department have started considering requirements and platforms for the training, which she said is projected to be completed by the end of the year.

“Since the agency has provided a similar type of training for regents in the past, this process is not new to us,” Ortiz wrote.

Steven Neville, a former state senator who represented San Juan County, recently took over as chair of the Western New Mexico University Board of Regents. The entire board consists of four new members after previous members resigned or concluded their tenure in late 2024 and early 2025, following the board’s controversial decision to award outgoing university President Joseph Shepard a $1.9 million severance package. Attorney General Raúl Torrez filed a civil suit against Shepard and the board in an effort to recover the state funds. A hearing is scheduled in June to consider Shepard’s motion to dismiss the case against him.

Neville told Source NM that he has a lot of knowledge about state law and financial management from his time as a lawmaker and member of the Legislative Finance Committee, which he will use in his new role, but university management is still different.

“There’re certain things about the way universities run that are totally different than my county commission experience or my city council experience or even my state senate experience,” Neville said. “I’ve been on several boards and commissions through the years, but nothing is exactly the same.”

He added that all four members of the board need some aspect of the future training, despite everyone’s background. He said the HED provided all new regents with a short orientation over a couple of hours when they were first appointed, but hopes that future training also involves more explanation of higher education policies and funding “intricacies that are a little different from one agency to the next.”

Ortiz reiterated to Source that the HED already provides training to newly appointed and reappointed regents covering topics such as governance, ethics, fiscal management and state and federal laws.

“Adding a requirement of 10 hours will enhance a governing boards’ understanding of their appointed or elected positions in addition to the tools they need to better champion students, faculty and staff on their campuses,” Ortiz wrote. “It is important to note that Higher Education Secretary Stephanie M. Rodriguez and our colleagues at the department are always available to assist governing board members at any time beyond the training sessions.”

During the session earlier this year, Steinborn told Senate Education Committee members that he introduced the bill to ensure regents are prepared for their work in hiring university presidents, setting tuition and other actions that fundamentally impact students and faculty. SB19 was one of several bills and resolutions introduced this session that would have addressed the process for how regents are chosen and the preparation they receive for fulfilling their roles.

Steinborn also introduced Senate Joint Resolution 7, which would have required the governor to choose regent nominees from a pool of candidates approved by a nominating committee. House Joint Resolution 12, introduced by Rep. Nathan Small (D-Las Cruces), would have codified regents’ fiduciary duties; moved regent removal proceedings to the district courts; and allowed the attorney general or a majority of the board to initiate the removal of a regent. Both resolutions would have required a ballot vote to amend the state constitution, however both died in committee.

“I think we owe it to our universities and our kids and taxpayers that we have the best regents we can get and that they’re trained,” Steinborn said during the committee meeting.

The US has 1,001 measles cases and 11 states with active outbreaks – By Devi Shastri, AP Health Writer

The U.S. surpassed 1,000 measles cases Friday, even as Texas posted one of its lowest counts of newly confirmed cases since its large outbreak began three months ago.

Texas still accounts for the vast majority of cases in the U.S., with 709 confirmed as of Friday in an outbreak that also spread measles to New Mexico, Oklahoma and Kansas.Two unvaccinated elementary school-aged children died from measles-related illnesses in the epicenter in West Texas, and an adult in New Mexico who was not vaccinated died of a measles-related illness.

Other states with active outbreaks — which the CDC defines as three or more related cases — include Indiana, Michigan, Montana, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Tennessee.

North America has two other ongoing outbreaks, all of which are the same measles strain. One outbreak in Ontario, Canada, has resulted in 1,440 cases from mid-October through May 6, up 197 cases in a week. And the Mexican state of Chihuahua had 1,041 measles cases and one death as of Friday, according to data from the state health ministry.

Measles is caused by a highly contagious virus that’s airborne and spreads easily when an infected person breathes, sneezes or coughs. It is preventable through vaccines, and has been considered eliminated from the U.S. since 2000.

As the virus takes hold in U.S. communities with low vaccination rates, health experts fear that spread could stretch on for a year. Here’s what else you need to know about measles in the U.S.

How many measles cases are there in Texas?

There are a total of 709 cases across 29 counties, most of them in West Texas, state health officials said Friday. The state confirmed only seven more cases since its update Tuesday.

The state also added one hospitalization to its count, for a total of 92 throughout the outbreak.

State health officials estimated about 1% of cases — fewer than 10 — are actively infectious. Fifty-seven percent of Texas’ cases are in Gaines County, population 22,892, where the virus started spreading in a close-knit, undervaccinated Mennonite community. The county has had 403 cases since late January — just over 1.7% of the county’s residents.

The April 3 death in Texas was an 8-year-old child, according to Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Local health officials said the child did not have underlying health conditions and died of “what the child’s doctor described as measles pulmonary failure.” A unvaccinated child with no underlying conditions died of measles in Texas in late February; Kennedy said the child was 6.

How many measles cases are there in New Mexico?

New Mexico added four cases Friday for 71 total. Seven people have been hospitalized since the outbreak started. Most of the state’s cases are in Lea County. Three are in Eddy County, two in Doña Ana County and one in Chaves County. Curry County logged its first case this week.

An unvaccinated adult died of measles-related illness March 6. The person did not seek medical care.

How many cases are there in Oklahoma?

Oklahoma held steady with a total of 14 confirmed and three probable cases as of Friday.

The state health department is not releasing which counties have cases, but Cleveland, Oklahoma and Sequoyah counties have had public exposures in the past couple of months.

How many cases are there in Kansas?

Kansas has a total of 48 cases across eight counties in the southwestern part of the state, with one hospitalization. Most of the cases are in Gray, Haskell and Stevens counties.

How many cases are there in Indiana?

Indiana has eight cases, all of them in Allen County in the northeast part of the state. The cases have no known link to other outbreaks, the Allen County Department of Health has said.

How many cases are there in Michigan?

Michigan has nine confirmed cases of measles, with an outbreak of four connected cases in Montcalm County in the western part of the state that state health officials say is tied to the Ontario outbreak.

How many cases are there in Montana?

Montana added three new measles cases in the last two weeks, bringing the total to eight. The state’s outbreak started in mid-April in southwestern Gallatin County — Montana’s first measles cases in 35 years. Health officials didn’t say whether the cases are linked to other outbreaks in North America.

How many cases are there in North Dakota?

North Dakota has nine cases of measles as of Tuesday. The state hadn’t seen measles since 2011, health officials said.

All are in Williams County in western North Dakota on the Montana border. The state health department says three of the confirmed cases are linked to the first case — an unvaccinated child who health officials believe got it from an out-of-state visitor.

The other five cases were people who were not vaccinated and did not have contact with the other cases, causing concern about community transmission. The state health department said four people diagnosed with measles attended classes while infectious at a Williston elementary school, middle school and high school.

How many cases are there in Ohio?

Ohio has 34 measles cases and one hospitalization, according to the Ohio Department of Health. That count includes only Ohio residents.

The state has two outbreaks: Ashtabula County near Cleveland has 16 cases, and Knox County in east-central Ohio has 20 — 14 among Ohio residents and the rest among visitors.

Allen, Cuyahoga, Holmes and Defiance counties have one case each.

How many cases are there in Pennsylvania?

Pennsylvania has 15 cases overall in 2025 as of Friday, including international travel-related cases in Montgomery County and one in Philadelphia.

There were eight measles cases in Erie County in far northwest Pennsylvania in late April; the county declared an outbreak in mid-April.

How many cases are there in Tennessee?

Tennessee had six measles cases as of early May. Health department spokesman Bill Christian said all cases are the middle part of the state, and that “at least three of these cases are linked to each other” but declined to specify further. The state also did not say whether the cases were linked to other outbreaks or when Tennessee’s outbreak started.

Where else is measles showing up in the U.S.?

Measles cases also have been reported in Alaska, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Illinois, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Minnesota, Missouri, New Jersey, New York, Rhode Island, Vermont, Virginia and Washington.

Cases and outbreaks in the U.S. are frequently traced to someone who caught the disease abroad. In 2019, the U.S. saw 1,274 cases and almost lost its status of having eliminated measles.

What do you need to know about the MMR vaccine?

The best way to avoid measles is to get the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine. The first shot is recommended for children between 12 and 15 months old and the second between 4 and 6 years old.

Getting another MMR shot as an adult is harmless if there are concerns about waning immunity, the CDC says. People who have documentation of receiving a live measles vaccine in the 1960s don’t need to be revaccinated, but people who were immunized before 1968 with an ineffective vaccine made from “killed” virus should be revaccinated with at least one dose, the agency said.

People who have documentation that they had measles are immune, and those born before 1957 generally don’t need the shots because so many children got measles back then that they have “presumptive immunity.”

Measles has a harder time spreading through communities with high vaccination rates — above 95% — due to “herd immunity.” But childhood vaccination rates have declined nationwide since the pandemic and more parents are claiming religious or personal conscience waivers to exempt their kids from required shots.

What are the symptoms of measles?

Measles first infects the respiratory tract, then spreads throughout the body, causing a high fever, runny nose, cough, red, watery eyes and a rash.

The rash generally appears three to five days after the first symptoms, beginning as flat red spots on the face and then spreading downward to the neck, trunk, arms, legs and feet. When the rash appears, the fever may spike over 104 degrees Fahrenheit, according to the CDC.

Most kids will recover from measles, but infection can lead to dangerous complications such as pneumonia, blindness, brain swelling and death.

How can you treat measles?

There’s no specific treatment for measles, so doctors generally try to alleviate symptoms, prevent complications and keep patients comfortable.

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The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Science and Educational Media Group and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

NM utilities explain plans to turn off power in high fire risk, a new reality facing New Mexicans — Patrick Lohmann, Source New Mexico

People across the state should increasingly prepare to lose power the next time high winds and dry conditions combine to raise wildfire risk in their communities.

That was the message big and small electrical providers from all corners of New Mexico told the state’s utility regulator during a day-long hearing Thursday in Santa Fe. The New Mexico Public Regulation Commission held its first of four workshops, stemming out of the historic 2022 wildfire season, focused primarily on “public safety power shutoffs.”

Citing increased fire risk and also the specter of bankruptcy from class-action lawsuits, investor-owned utilities and small cooperatives said shutting off power when conditions require it is a crucial way to protect utilities and, therefore, ratepayers from huge expenses related to wildfires.

PNM, the state’s biggest electrical provider, did its first-ever power shutoff April 17 in Las Vegas, citing high winds and ongoing drought. The power shutoff affected about 2,300 customers and occurred during a particularly windy day in the Northern New Mexico town of about 12,000 people.

PRC commissioners sought to hear from utilities and state and local officials about the toll of recent wildfires, their criteria for future shutoffs and also how they’re approaching communicating with local governments and the public.

“These disasters not only cause massive losses for people and businesses, but for utilities as well,” PRC chair Gabriel Aguilera said in his opening remarks. “We’ve increasingly seen utilities facing lawsuits with insurance companies covering only a fraction of the damages, or in some cases, none at all.”

Speakers presented on behalf of small cooperatives in Mora, San Miguel and Taos Counties, as well as investor-owned utilities like PNM and SPS.

PNM is currently facing a lawsuit from hundreds of victims of the McBride Fire in Ruidoso in 2022. A tree falling into one of PNM’s utility lines caused that fire, though the parties disagree on whether it was a result of the utility’s negligence.

Singleton Schreiber, one of the nation’s biggest law firms bringing wildfire lawsuits, alleges the utility and its contractor negligently allowed the tree to be tall enough and close enough to the power line to cause a fire on a windy day.

PNM has denied any liability, citing public reports that said a “tree spanning approximately 50 feet tall that was outside of our right-of-way had contacted a powerline due to unanticipated wind gusts of over 90 miles per hour,” spokesperson Eric Chavez has said.

Before the McBride Fire lawsuit, the Jemez Mountain Electrical Cooperative ultimately had to pay $25 million for its role in the 2011 Las Conchas Fire. It sought rate hikes to cover the cost and also could only get between $2 million and $3 million in insurance coverage afterward.

It’s not just small cooperatives that face existential lawsuits for wildfires: Major utility PG&E filed for bankruptcy after being implicated in a series of fires in California in 2017 and 2018, ultimately being ordered to pay a $13.5 billion settlement.

The Legislature this year considered, but ultimately didn’t pass, a bill that would have limited liability to electrical cooperatives to $2 million, so long as the PRC approved a wildfire mitigation plan the utility provided in advance.

Cutting off power to prevent a wildfire carries its own costs. In Las Vegas, some families with elderly or sick relatives who relied on electric medical equipment had to scramble to find alternate power sources. And during the Hermits Peak-Calf Canyon Fire, long power outages meant many people in rural areas lost stores of food in their garage freezers.

Henri Hammond-Paul, Santa Fe’s director of community health and safety, said at the meeting that utilities need to communicate with local officials and the public as much as possible, including warnings well in advance of a shutoff. He noted that the cost of closing Santa Fe schools, in particular, due to a pre-emptive power shutoff could mean 16,000 students going without lunch.

“I understand that there is a lot of liability on utilities. There is a different type of liability and risk for cities, because even if we’re not the ones who are going to be sued, necessarily, for an incident, we are accountable and we are seen as responsible,” he said.

The PRC workshop was only to spur dialogue on the multi-faceted issue of the power shutoffs, members said, though Aguilera suggested the commission was considering crafting a rule that could require standards, public notice timelines and, “at a high level, minimum requirements” for utilities before they shut power off.

Watch the six-hour special PRC meeting here. The next three workshops are scheduled for July 17, Sept. 15 and Oct. 23.

Luján asks for focus on firearm smuggling at the border — Cathy Cook, Albuquerque Journal

Sen. Ben Ray Luján and 13 of his fellow Democratic legislators are pushing the Trump administration to more aggressively pursue firearm smuggling.

Attorney General Pam Bondi announced the bust of a five-state drug trafficking organization earlier this week. The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration recovered more than 4 million fentanyl pills and $4.4 million in cash, as well as methamphetamine, heroin, cocaine and weapons.

Luján, D-N.M., and his colleagues want the administration to continue a focus on drug trafficking, especially fentanyl, by bolstering interagency coordination and expanding border crossing inspections to stop American firearms from traveling south to Mexico. Sen. Martin Heinrich and Rep. Gabe Vasquez, both from New Mexico, have signed onto the letter.

“Put simply, if we do not stop the flow of American-made guns across the southern border to Mexico, we cannot stop the flow of fentanyl into our country over that same border,” the letter reads.

In a time characterized by partisan division, the call appears to align with the Republican Trump administration’s goals. When President Donald Trump signed an expansion on tariff exemptions for Mexico in February, Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum said the two leaders agreed to work together to stop the flow of fentanyl from Mexico and guns from the U.S., according to a BBC report.

In February, Secretary of State Marco Rubio designated eight Latin American cartels and gangs Foreign Terrorist Organizations. The letter points out the new designations could be used to sanction or fine people providing firearms to the criminal organizations: “it is unlawful to knowingly provide material support or resources to a Foreign Terrorist Organization and those who do so can be fined or imprisoned for up to 20 years,” the letter reads.

The members of Congress urged Bondi and Rubio, as well as Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, to increase interagency cooperation to dismantle smuggling rings that facilitate weapons trafficking; expand border crossing inspections; increase law enforcement efforts against straw purchasers and firearm dealers; and strengthen intelligence-sharing with Mexican authorities.