SAN DIEGO (KGTV) – Good morning! ABC 10News brings you the latest headlines and local microclimate forecasts to help you start your day right.
Here's what you need to know in the Wednesday, Jan. 29, 2025, edition of the 10News Wake Up Call newsletter:
TODAY'S TOP STORY:
With hundreds of Marines and National Guard members at the southern border in San Diego, concerns are being raised over how close the military personnel are to the ongoing sewage crisis in the area.
ABC 10News learned the troops are stationed close to what is considered a pollution “hot spot” near the Tijuana River. The personnel are likely sleeping in tents and spending a majority of their time outdoors.
ABC 10News previously reported the San Diego Air Pollution Control District measured elevated hydrogen sulfide levels in the Nestor neighborhood more than 15 times since the end of November 2024.
The levels are raising a red flag for many in the area, including a Navy veteran who lived and worked in Imperial Beach for 13 years.
The vet told ABC 10News he saw how much the sewage affected his fellow servicemembers and he said many of them ended up with respiratory infections.
In response to the concerns, a Marine Corps spokesperson stated, “We’re taking all necessary precautions to ensure the safety of the Marines and sailors, including monitoring drinking water cleanliness with medical personnel onsite."
The spokesperson did not provide a response regarding air pollution protection for troops.
MICROCLIMATE FORECASTS:
Coasts
Inland
Mountains
Deserts
BREAKING OVERNIGHT:
A man was shot and killed by a San Diego Police officer Tuesday night during a confrontation in downtown San Diego.
The San Diego County Sheriff’s Office, the agency investigating the officer-involved shooting, said the incident happened just after 9 p.m. near the Santa Fe Depot.
SDPD officers who were investigating a reported battery on Broadway heard shots fired near the MTS trolley station and went to investigate.
As the officers looked into the shooting, they “encountered an unidentified Hispanic male in his early 20s near 1100 Kettner Blvd. During this encounter, an officer-involved shooting took place. A handgun was subsequently recovered from the male individual at the scene,” according to sheriff’s officials.
Officers began life-saving measures before the man was taken to the hospital. Sheriff’s officials said the man, who was not identified, died after arrival.
No officers were injured in the incident.
Under San Diego County protocol, the sheriff’s Homicide Unit is investigating the shooting involving the SDPD officer.
Details on how the confrontation between officers and the suspected unfolded were not immediately released.
CONSUMER:
(CNN) — As a federal judge temporarily blocked part of the Trump administration’s pausing of federal grants and loans Tuesday, a slew of advocacy groups, charities, foreign aid and public health programs are decrying a potential upending of American lives on an unprecedented scale.
Hundreds of programs touching all corners of the US were placed under review, according to a document released by the Office of Management and Budget and obtained by CNN. The White House later issued a memo appearing to greatly limit the scope of the federal assistance freeze, targeting executive orders that it says address immigration, foreign aid, climate and energy, DEI initiatives, gender identity and abortion.
Yet the freeze – which could later resume and trigger a potential showdown at the Supreme Court – has left organizations and government agencies on the local, state and federal levels in flux.
Confusion abundant after announcements
Reaction to the Trump administration’s freeze resulted in a mix of lawsuits, statements and warnings of what is to come.
- Some nonprofit groups, including the National Council of Nonprofits, filed suit in federal court in Washington, DC, on Tuesday. “From pausing research on cures for childhood cancer to halting food assistance, safety from domestic violence, and closing suicide hotlines, the impact of even a short pause in funding could be devastating and cost lives. This order could decimate thousands of organizations and leave neighbors without the services they need,” said Diane Yentel, CEO of the National Council of Nonprofits. Several states, including New York and California, also sued.
- Tommy Sheridan, deputy director of the National Head Start Association, which serves nearly 800,000 low-income children from birth to age 5 and their families, told CNN that some Head Start programs were unable to access Payment Management Services (PMS) – the federal system used to draw grant money, which could have forced some to close their doors as early as Wednesday. While Head Start programs are now able to access their federal funding, the association believes the brief glitch is connected to the administration’s freeze order, Sheridan said.
- Universities across the country are also scrambling to figure out how a funding freeze could affect their research programs, students and faculty. Researchers at Gallaudet University in Washington, DC, said they were told to stop work on grant-funded projects, according to the Associated Press. Scientists could miss deadlines to present and share their work if funding freezes go forward, said researcher Lorna Quandt, who has a grant application pending. The Association of Public and Land-Grant Universities called the administration’s move “unnecessary and damaging,” saying that a federal funding freeze would “sideline” American scientists – some among the world’s best in discovering cures for cancer, developing breakthroughs in artificial intelligence and quantum computing.
- The National Science Foundation, which funds a wide range of scientific research through grants to universities and research institutions, has paused all of its grant review panels this week as it works to re-configure its grantmaking process in light of Trump’s executive order. All meetings will be rescheduled, allowing the agency “to make the best use of everyone’s time and resources as we continue to develop guidance to ensure compliance with the recent executive orders,” an NSF spokesperson said in a statement.
- “The United States has a unique government-to-government obligation to Tribal Nations,” said Native American Rights Fund director John Echohawk in a statement following Trump’s announcement to freeze federal aid. “Because of this unique relationship, Tribal Nations and Native people are especially and disproportionately affected by any federal actions like today’s funding freeze. The United States’ must fulfill its trust obligation to protect Tribal treaty rights, lands, assets, and resources.”
- Meals on Wheels programs, which rely on federal grants and serve more than two million senior citizens annually, may be severely impacted. “This would presumably halt service to millions of vulnerable seniors who have no other means of purchasing or preparing meals,” Jenny Young, spokesperson for Meals on Wheels America, told CNN Tuesday. “The uncertainty right now is creating chaos for local Meals on Wheels providers not knowing whether they should be serving meals today, which unfortunately means seniors will panic not knowing where their next meals will come from. … Largely, local providers don’t have the ability to absorb a blow like this.”
- The City of Atlanta is experiencing impacts due to the funding freeze, from affordable housing to salaries and public safety, Mayor Andre Dickens said in a statement Tuesday before the district court’s pause. Partner agencies were also not able to access portals essential to conducting business, like paying rent and operational costs, he said.
- In Colorado, the state’s Community Health Network said a pause in federal funding would impact more than 857,000 Coloradans who rely on care, according to CNN affiliate KKTV. Health officials say they are estimating the pause to prevent $9 million in monthly payments that cover payroll and other costs to Colorado’s Community Health Centers.
- Gian-Carl Casa, president of the Connecticut Community Nonprofit Alliance, told the CT Mirror that taking away federal funding “will cut a hole in the already-frayed safety net, through which tens of thousands of people who depend on nonprofit programs here will fall. … To implement this kind of order without regard for the impact on living, breathing people is beyond comprehension.”
Impacts facing humanitarian aid
The uncertainty facing the freeze is not limited to within the US. Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Tuesday added more exemptions to humanitarian programs that would otherwise be cut by the freeze on almost all US-funded foreign assistance.
In a waiver obtained by CNN, Rubio agreed this week to keep spending on humanitarian programs that provided “life-saving medicine, medical services, food shelter and subsistence assistance,” leaving out programs that involve abortions, family planning and transgender surgeries.
The move has caused more confusion among the humanitarian community – many of whom are at risk of layoffs and program shutdowns from the initial directive. They say they have not been informed or received guidance on the waiver.
Though it has only been a few days, implications have already been catastrophic for those in Gaza and Ukraine, humanitarian officials told CNN. One predicted that if the suspension continued for two more weeks, thousands could die.
And the freeze, if continued, could cause a huge number of organizations doing the work to close permanently, as they are not receiving the funding to keep their employees.
WE FOLLOW THROUGH:
In the wake of recent fires across San Diego County, the San Diego Fire-Rescue Department put a special fire retardant into action to protect against fires in or near homeless encampments.
Watch Ryan Hill’s report:
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