Authored by Matthew Vadum via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

A federal judge on March 24 seemed receptive to Anthropic’s request to temporarily block the Department of War from continuing to designate the AI company as a supply-chain risk.

The designation, under a federal law designed to protect military systems from foreign sabotage, functions as a blacklist, preventing the company from doing business with the federal government and its contractors.

If the block is granted, the company would be able to continue doing business with federal agencies and their contractors while the lawsuit moves forward in court.

The AI developer sued the department in the federal court’s Northern California district on March 9, after the federal government issued the designation, citing its national security concerns about the company. Anthropic also filed a separate lawsuit the same day over the designation in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.

President Donald Trump and War Secretary Pete Hegseth previously announced a federal boycott of Anthropic, directing federal agencies, contractors, and suppliers to end ties to the company.

On social media, Trump said Anthropic was attempting to “strong-arm” the federal government and officials elected by the American people by dictating its military policy.

“WE will decide the fate of our Country—NOT some out-of-control, Radical Left AI company run by people who have no idea what the real World is all about,” Trump said in a Feb. 27 Truth Social post.

The lawsuits came after Anthropic said it declined to change the user policy for its AI product, Claude, to remove safety guardrails preventing its use for mass surveillance and fully autonomous weapons.

The Department of War has said that it has no intent to use Claude for those purposes.

The department said on March 5 that the issue comes down to ensuring the military can use technology for “all lawful purposes.”

“The military will not allow a vendor to insert itself into the chain of command by restricting the lawful use of a critical capability and put our warfighters at risk,” the Pentagon said in a statement provided to multiple news outlets.

Anthropic’s technology is embedded in classified military platforms, including those that are already in use in current U.S. operations against the Islamic Republic of Iran in Operation Epic Fury.

The company alleged that the supply-chain risk designation constitutes unlawful retaliation and that it could lose billions of dollars if the federal boycott of its products continues. The designation requires that defense contractors certify that they are not using Claude when working with the department.

At a preliminary injunction hearing in San Francisco on March 24, U.S. District Judge Rita F. Lin (D) said the department’s actions against the company were “troubling” because they did not seem “tailored to the stated national security concerns,” and looked like “an attempt to cripple Anthropic.”

If the department were worried “about the integrity of the operational chain of command, [it] could just stop using Claude,” without banning Anthropic “from ever having another government contract,” she said.

She said the supply-chain risk designation applies to “adversaries of the U.S. government who may sabotage its technology systems.” Such designations typically apply to foreign intelligence, terrorists, and other hostile actors, the judge said.

Lin expressed concern that the government might be trying to punish Anthropic for “criticizing the government’s contracting position in the press,” adding that such punishment would violate the Constitution’s First Amendment.

Also at the hearing, Anthropic’s attorney, Mike Mongan, said the designation was the first time a U.S. company has been designated as a supply-chain risk.

“Everything we stand accused of in this proceeding is entirely above board,” Mongan said, adding the company has sincere concerns about the “profound implications” of using its AI tools for mass surveillance and fully autonomous weapons.

Deputy Assistant U.S. Attorney General Eric Hamilton said that the government’s national security concerns outweighed any alleged violations of Anthropic’s rights.

Given the company’s concerns about how the government will use its technology, the Department of War is worried that Anthropic may sabotage or subvert systems, possibly through technology updates, Hamilton said.

Mongan said the government has not identified any legal authority for the federal boycott of Anthropic. He urged the court to grant a preliminary injunction against the supply-chain risk designation, arguing the company was likely to succeed at trial on First Amendment and other grounds.

Hamilton told the court it should deny the injunction.

Failing to do so could allow a technology company to “gain leverage over the Department of War and decide which missions it can conduct,” the government lawyer said.

Anthropic asked Lin to rule on the company’s motion to stay the designation by March 26, but she is not required to meet that suggested deadline.

“I anticipate issuing an order in the next few days,” the judge said as she concluded the hearing.

Stacy Robinson, Aldgra Fredly, and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

During a recent podcast with Theo Von, Actor Vince Vaughn calls out late-night comedians, says people like Jimmy Kimmel, Stephen Colbert, and others have all become the “SAME SHOW.”

Via @VigilantFox:

THEO VON: “A lot of the late shows have struggled.”

VINCE VAUGHN: “Oh, bro.”

THEO: “Because… the only person they could make fun of at a certain point was just like white redneck kind of people. And it f*cking tanked [ratings].”

VINCE: “I think that the talk shows, to a large part, became really agenda-based.”

“They were gonna evangelize people to what they thought… It felt like they had an agenda.”

“It stopped being funny, and it started feeling like I was in a f*cking class I didn’t want to take.”

“They all became the same show.”

“And they all became so about their politics and who’s good and who’s bad.”

“Imagine sitting next to someone like that on a f*cking plane. You’d be like, how do I get out of this f*cking seat?”

THEO: “I would FART right next to them.”

VINCE: “You’d fart your way out of it?”

THEO: “Yeah, I would. I would for sure.”

*  *  *

Watch the clip here (via @VigilantFox)

Actor Vince Vaughn calls out late-night comedians, says people like Jimmy Kimmel, Stephen Colbert, and others have all become the “SAME SHOW.”

“It stopped being funny, and it started feeling like I was in a f*cking class I didn’t want to take.”

THEO VON: “A lot of the late… pic.twitter.com/9gTyBfdWtc

— The Vigilant Fox 🦊 (@VigilantFox) March 24, 2026

* * * THIS IS THE BIG BOY KIT – 3 MONTHS OF FOOD

Authored by Zachary Stieber via The Epoch Times,

Dr. Robert Malone said on March 25 that he will no longer advise health officials on vaccines.

“I’m done,” Malone told The Epoch Times.

Malone was vice chair of the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP), which advises the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on immunizations.

Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. selected Malone and other new ACIP members in 2025, after removing the previous slate.

A federal judge recently ruled that Kennedy did not follow proper procedure in appointing the members and stayed the appointments. The judge also blocked changes to the CDC vaccine schedule, some of which were prompted by votes from the remade ACIP.

Malone, a former EpochTV host and an adjunct professor at Louisiana State University, has panned the decision, noting that the judge deemed him unfit even though he has decades of experience in the vaccine field.

Malone said Wednesday that he had already been trying to figure out how to leave ACIP “in some sort of a graceful, professional way for months now,” in part because of criticism from health care groups over matters such as the ACIP vote to recommend the CDC narrow guidance for messenger ribonucleic acid and other vaccines against COVID-19.

He is also focusing on working with the State Department on biological warfare agreements.

Malone said that members, who do not receive compensation, have not been treated well by the Trump administration, pointing to how Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) spokesman Andrew Nixon responded after Malone publicized how officials allegedly told members they would be reconstituting ACIP rather than appeal the judge’s ruling.

“I’m tired of thousands of hours of free labor for just chronic disrespect for all of us,” Malone said.

The Epoch Times has requested a comment from HHS, the CDC’s parent agency, which Kennedy heads.

Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. in Washington on Jan. 29, 2026. Dimitrios Kambouris/Getty Images

Nixon pointed to how HHS adviser and former ACIP Chairman Martin Kulldorff told Roll Call, which first reported Malone’s departure, that he found Nixon “professional and honest in all his work supporting ACIP.”

The administration has still not appealed the ruling. Nixon told The Epoch Times in a March 20 email, “Unless officially announced by us, any assertions about what we are doing next is baseless speculation.”

Malone said that Kennedy called him on March 25 to provide an update.

“They’re still making decisions about what they’re going to do, trying to come up with a strategy that they can win on,” Malone said.

“And he gave me an update where that sat, but it would be inappropriate for me to share it.”

Dr. Wafik El-Deiry, director of the Legorretta Cancer Center at Brown University, who worked on an ACIP workgroup on COVID-19 vaccines with Malone, wrote in a post on X that he was sad to learn Malone was departing ACIP.

El-Deiry said in a follow-up post on X that his experience of working with Malone was “seeing only extremely knowledgeable, well-informed, always prepared, spontaneous and up to date, sharp, respectful and appropriately critical input as one would expect on a national advisory panel.”

On Tuesday, diners at a Haidilao hot-pot restaurant in San Jose saw an unexpected disruption when a service robot, apparently part of an in-house performance, malfunctioned and began moving erratically. Instead of entertaining guests, it knocked dishes to the floor and sent chopsticks flying as employees rushed to contain it. Video from the scene shows staff dodging the machine before eventually tackling it; no injuries are apparent, Hoodline wrote.

A malfunctioning service robot dances uncontrollably at a Haidilao hotpot restaurant in San Jose, California, knocking over tableware as staff members attempt to restrain it, March 2026. pic.twitter.com/6DFCojpeTS

— Future Adam Curtis B-Roll (@adamcurtisbroll) March 17, 2026

A short clip shared online captures the robot, dressed in an orange apron, flailing through the dining area and upsetting tableware. At one point, a worker appears to grab it near the neck while looking at a phone, seemingly trying to access controls as the situation unfolds.

The episode comes amid Haidilao’s broader push into automation. The company has spent years integrating technology into its restaurants, including delivery robots and highly automated kitchens. It also introduced a pilot “smart” restaurant in Beijing in 2018 that relied on robotic arms and guided vehicles.

After the footage spread, many online commenters focused on how the robot was shut down. Some pointed out that no obvious emergency stop button was visible and questioned whether clearer manual override systems should be required in restaurants using such machines.

Reports indicate the robot appeared as part of a promotional tie-in for Disney’s “Zootopia 2.” The incident has renewed concerns about how quickly staff can intervene and safely regain control when robotic systems malfunction in crowded public spaces.

Authored by Savannah Hulsey Pointer via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

More than 450 Transportation Security Administration agents have quit since the start of the partial Department of Homeland Security (DHS) shutdown.

Travelers wait in long security lines at George Bush Intercontinental Airport in Houston, Texas, on March 23, 2026. Ronaldo Schmidt/AFP via Getty Images

The partial shutdown has been ongoing since March 15, when funding for the agency lapsed without additional funding in place. 

Lauren Bis, acting assistant secretary for Public Affairs at DHS, told the Epoch Times in an emailed statement that as of day 38 of the partial shutdown, American travelers are facing hours-long waits at airports across the country.

“More than 450 TSA officers quit and thousands have called out sick from work because they are not able to afford gas, childcare, food, or rent,” Bis said. 

“President [Donald] Trump is taking action to deploy hundreds of ICE officers, who are currently funded by Congress, to airports being adversely impacted. This will help bolster TSA efforts to keep our skies safe and minimize air travel disruptions.”

The department stated that callout rates for TSA agents remained elevated, reaching almost 11 percent on March 23, representing 3,200 officers absent from duty. The recorded high callout rate for the shutdown was nearly 12 percent the day before.

Major airports saw higher than average absences among agents, including 33.7 percent at John F. Kennedy International Airport, 30.4 percent at Baltimore/Washington International Airport, and 27.5 percent at Pittsburgh International Airport

LaGuardia Airport’s callout rate was 20.3 percent, 37.4 percent at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, 34.9 percent at Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport, and 40.3 percent at William P. Hobby Airport in Houston.

Federal immigration agents were deployed to 14 U.S. airports starting on March 23.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents went to the international airport in Atlanta, airports in New York City, and a dozen others to help TSA personnel as long lines formed due to a lack of agents. 

As part of the deployment, ICE agents have been sent to Chicago-O’Hare International Airport, Cleveland Hopkins International Airport, Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, Houston’s William P. Hobby Airport, John F. Kennedy International Airport (New York), LaGuardia Airport (New York), Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport, Luis Munoz Marin International Airport (San Juan, Puerto Rico), Newark Liberty International Airport, Philadelphia International Airport, Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport, Pittsburgh International Airport, Southwest Florida International Airport (Fort Myers, Florida), and Houston’s George Bush Intercontinental Airport.

Senate Republicans are working on a plan to fully fund DHS, but that would exclude ICE enforcement and removal activities. The lawmakers say they would then look to fund the remainder of ICE through the reconciliation budget, which could be accomplished through a simple majority, rather than the 60 votes needed for the current funding plan.

Sen. Chris Coons (D-Del.) is cautiously optimistic but said the proposal needs to be in writing.

“I think the deal is possible, but we’re down to that point where, like lots of people are talking, but you’ve got to reduce it to writing, and you’ve got to actually trade paper,” he told reporters.

Coons said he won’t support a bill that doesn’t include reforms to ICE’s detention and deportation operations.

“Conversations are ongoing, but this deal seems to be acceptable,” a White House official told The Epoch Times on March 24.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) said, “All I can say is that the discussions have been very positive and productive, and hopefully headed in the right direction.”

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) offered a similar sentiment, telling reporters, “Both sides are working in a serious way.”

Jackson Richman and Nathan Worcester contributed to this report. 

The left-wing one-party rule in Baltimore City can barely govern its own imploding metro area. Parts of downtown are ghost towns; the resident exodus has been severe; taxes are through the roof; industry has left; and decades of progressive policies have helped transform large parts of the metro area into crime-ridden no-go zones. Yet somehow, city officials still found the time to weaponize local agencies and go after Elon Musk. 

Baltimore Mayor Brandon M. Scott and the City Council of Baltimore, represented by the Baltimore City Law Department and DiCello Levitt, filed a lawsuit in the Circuit Court for Baltimore City against Elon Musk’s xAI, claiming Grok users were able to create non-consensual sexual deepfakes, including images involving minors, and that the defendants violated Baltimore’s Consumer Protection Ordinance.

The core claim in the lawsuit is that Grok was marketed as a general-purpose AI chatbot with supposed safeguards, but in reality, it allegedly allowed users to “undress,” sexualize, and manipulate photos of real people, including children, with minimal prompting and without meaningful guardrails or age verification.

“Beginning in late 2025, x.AI expanded Grok’s image-generation and image-editing features, which ‘edit’ existing photographs, including images of private individuals and children, into photorealistic, sexually explicit, or otherwise degrading content. These features allow Grok, with minimal prompting, to ‘undress,’ sexualize, or otherwise manipulate images uploaded by or depicting third parties,” the lawsuit reads.

The lawsuit claims xAI knew the chatbot could be abused on a large scale. It cites allegations that millions of sexualized images were generated in a short period, including thousands that appeared to depict children, and argues users in the metro area were exposed either to the content itself or to the risk that their own images could be turned into deepfakes. 

“These deepfakes, especially those depicting minors, have traumatic, lifelong consequences for victims, who are left with no way to prevent the spread of disturbing, sexualized images created of them without their consent,” Mayor Scott wrote in a statement.

The only image in the lawsuit: 

DiCello Levitt Founding Partner Adam Levitt stated, “The City is setting a powerful example for municipalities nationwide in confronting a novel and rapidly advancing technology, and an emerging area of law, where accountability has not yet caught up with innovation.”

Baltimore is seeking civil penalties, injunctive relief, restitution, disgorgement, and a jury trial.

What’s odd is that Baltimore City officials weirdly found the time to hyperfocus on all things Elon Musk while ignoring all other chatbot companies. This lawsuit is merely a copy of how anti-free-speech Europeans went after Grok over nonconsensual deepfake images while failing to address other chatbots.

We wonder why Baltimore was chosen to target Musk. Let’s not forget this is political warfare from the high-ups of the Democratic Party.

Mayor Scott appears to have Soros connections. 

The Govenor of Maryland with Alex Soros … 

Perhaps the lawsuit from Baltimore is merely a shakedown of the world’s richest man. These local Democrats have badly mismanaged the city’s finances due to overspending and deficit woes. This mismanagement and failed progressive policies have sparked an exodus of residents, and since 2000, the metro area’s population has declined by 1% per year, according to the city’s own data.

This is political warfare. Shouldn’t Baltimore focus on rebuilding the Key Bridge or stopping the mass hemorrhaging of residents, or perhaps the power bill crisis?

Authored by Jill McLaughlin via The Epoch Times,

A Black Lives Matter activist in Boston was ordered on March 23 to pay back more than $224,000 in pandemic relief funds and donations to her nonprofit.

Monica Cannon-Grant, 44, pleaded guilty last fall to multiple fraud charges and filing false tax returns. She was sentenced to serve six months of home confinement, 100 hours of community service, and four years of probation.

Federal District Court Judge Angel Kelly in Boston set the monetary judgment equal to the amount of money Cannon-Grant admitted taking from nonprofit Violence in Boston, which Cannon-Grant founded and where she formerly served as CEO.

In March 2023, a grand jury handed down a 27-count indictment against Cannon-Grant and her husband Clark Grant, charging them with fraud in connection to Violence in Boston, which they founded in 2017. Grant died in a motorcycle crash three weeks after the indictment was served while driving about 30 minutes east of Boston.

Federal prosecutors said Cannon-Grant paid herself about $25,100 in 2020 and more than $170,000 in 2021 from the nonprofit’s account, according to the charging documents.

About $181,037 of the total funds in question were donated to the organization and diverted for her personal use, $33,426 was obtained from pandemic unemployment assistance benefits, and $12,600 were from rental assistance funds, according to the judge.

In September, Cannon-Grant admitted to diverting thousands of dollars in donor money earmarked for the nonprofit for her own personal use, according to federal prosecutors.

In one instance, prosecutors say after receiving about $54,000 in pandemic relief funds from the city of Boston, Cannon-Grant withdrew about $30,000 in cash from the nonprofit’s account and made deposits of $5,200 and $1,000 into her personal checking account. She also made payments on her personal auto loan and car insurance policy.

Cannon-Grant also pleaded guilty to filing false tax returns for two years, among other tax charges.

“Monica Cannon-Grant repeatedly scammed multiple public financial programs and stole money donated by members of the public who believed their donations would aid in reducing violence and promote social awareness,” U.S. Attorney Leah Foley said in September in a statement. “She betrayed the trust of everyone who donated and the public who supported her fraudulent charity.”

Cannon-Grant’s attorneys asked the judge for a lighter sentence of two years of probation, no fine, and a special fee of $1,650. They described their client as a “loving mother, wife, and daughter who had dedicated her life to advancing social justice and serving communities in need.”

Black Lives Matter activists in Los Angeles on Dec. 30, 2020. John Fredricks/The Epoch Times

“She has inspired a generation of social activists to speak out against injustice and to support those around them who need a voice and access to daily essentials like food and housing,” her attorneys wrote in a sentencing memo to the judge.

“Ms. Cannon-Grant made fundamental errors in judgment. She is deeply sorry and has now taken full responsibility for her actions.”

Her attorneys also described Cannon-Grant’s home life as traumatic and violent. She grew up in deep poverty and subsidized housing, and lived on welfare and food stamps with a violent and alcoholic father, according to court documents.

Her attorneys didn’t immediately return a request for comment.

A fresh NBC report has alleged that President Trump is being presented with a very incomplete picture of how the Iran war is going, with the conflict now approaching its first month, and as Washington struggles to find an offramp amid global oil market disruptions.

The report says that his daily military briefing provided by the Pentagon features a roughly 2-minute long video update for President Trump that shows the biggest, most successful strikes on Iranian targets of the prior 48 hours. Negative developments frequently get omitted or glossed over.

via Associated Press

Anonymous US officials have voiced fears that the video briefings, which the president tends to respond positively to, fail to represent the full scope of what’s going on. Also, Trump’s aides have reportedly voiced greater approval for the briefings, which feature Iranian military equipment and bases and sites getting blown up.

The NBC report, which has been rejected by White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt, in essence suggests Trump is not getting properly briefed on major negative developments.

Or in other words, the fear is that briefers are simply favoring information that he wants to hear, and too afraid to deliver bad news. According to NBC:

They said the videos are also driving Trump’s increasing frustration with news coverage of the war. Trump has pointed to the success depicted in the daily videos to privately question why his administration can’t better influence the public narrative, asking aides why the news media doesn’t emphasize what he’s seeing, one of the current U.S. officials and the former U.S. official said.

Again, Leavitt has called all of this “an absolutely false assertion” from people who aren’t in the briefing room; however NBC does offer the following example which seems consistent with its reporting:

One example came this month when five U.S. Air Force refueling planes were hit in an Iranian strike at Prince Sultan Air Base in Saudi Arabia, according to one of the current U.S. officials. Trump wasn’t briefed about the strikes, and he learned what had happened from media reports, the official said. When Trump inquired, he was told the planes weren’t badly damaged, the official said.

The official said Trump reacted angrily behind the scenes to the news coverage. Publicly he posted on Truth Social calling coverage of the strike misleading and accusing media organizations of wanting the U.S. “to lose the War.”

Given the initial projections by the administration that Operation Epic Fury would be rather quick (a mere ‘days’ was initially floated at the opener), there’s been growing criticism concerning strategy, tactics, and vision – even from former Trump officials. For an example:

Former U.S. Sec. of Defense Jim Mattis on Iran War:

15,000 targets have been hit.

There have been significant military successes, but they are not matched by strategic outcomes.

Now, some of the strategic outcomes floated early on — unconditional surrender, regime change,… pic.twitter.com/mxuO1fpB4W

— Clash Report (@clashreport) March 25, 2026

Many independent analysts have been pointing out, amid the effort to drum up some level of official Washington-Tehran peace talks, that Iran is in fact in a position to impose a high cost on the United States – particularly on the economic and political fronts. 

But still, official US military statements seem to just provide fodder for Trump’s ‘We Won’ statements, which have lately been repeated by the president more and more. Pentagon/DOD spokesperson Sean Parnell said in a statement, cited by NBC: “Operation Epic Fury has been an overwhelming success, with our forces executing the mission with unmatched precision and achieving every objective set out from the beginning. Secretary of War Pete Hegseth is in constant communication with President Trump regarding every aspect of Operation Epic Fury. We are proud of the exceptional performance by our warfighters and remain fully confident in the commander-in-chief’s decisions.”

Authored by Dave DeCamp via Antiwar.com,

Pope Leo XIV suggested on Monday that aerial bombing campaigns should have been “banned forever” following the atrocities committed from the sky during the 20th century, as he continues pushing an antiwar message following the start of the US-Israeli war against Iran.

“Airplanes should always be carriers of peace, never of war,” Leo said while hosting executives and staff from ITA Airways, Italy’s national airline, and the Lufthansa Group, according to Vatican News.

“No one should be afraid that threats of death and destruction might come from the sky.”

The Vatican News report said the US-born pope recalled the bombing campaigns of the World Wars and other conflicts.

“After the tragic experiences of the twentieth century, aerial bombings should have been banned forever,” he said.

“Instead, they still exist, and technological development, positive in itself, is being placed at the service of war. This is not progress; it is regression.”

Since World War I, the Vatican has been highly critical of modern war.

“The combatants are the greatest and wealthiest nations of the earth; what wonder, then, if, well provided with the most awful weapons modern military science has devised, they strive to destroy one another with refinements of horror,” Pope Benedict XV said in an encyclical in November 1914, a few months after the outbreak of the First World War.

“There is no limit to the measure of ruin and of slaughter; day by day the earth is drenched with newly-shed blood, and is covered with the bodies of the wounded and of the slain,” Benedict added.

Pope Pius XII, who led the Catholic Church during World War II, was outspoken about the impact that the strategic bombing campaigns and the war in general had on civilians.

“We have had to witness the harrowing scene of death leaping from the skies and stalking pitilessly through unsuspecting homes, striking down women and children,” Pius said in a 1943 letter to US President Franklin D. Roosevelt after US warplanes bombed Rome.

The Second Vatican Council’s 1965 document Gaudium et Spes strongly denounced strategic bombing campaigns aimed at destroying cities, saying:

“Any act of war aimed indiscriminately at the destruction of entire cities or extensive areas along with their population is a crime against God and man himself. It merits unequivocal and unhesitating condemnation.”

Leo has made opposing war a major theme of his pontificate since his election as pope on May 8, 2025.

Since the outbreak of the US-Israeli war on Iran, he has repeatedly called for an end to the conflict and suggested Christian leaders involved in starting wars should examine their conscience and go to confession, remarks seen as aimed at the Trump administration since Leo is American.

As most Americans are now well aware, national retail theft has seen a significant spike since 2021, with total shoplifting incidents increasing by roughly 53% between 2021 and 2024 based on industry data.  This has led to sweeping policy changes to retail businesses, specifically in urban locations, and long aisles of locked glass cases are only the beginning.  

In the case of Walgreens, the company has closed a significant number of locations in high crime areas since 2024 as part of a broader plan to shutter underperforming stores nationwide. The company announced in October 2024 that it would close approximately 1,200 stores across the U.S. over three years (through 2027), with about 500 targeted for fiscal year 2025. 

This decision is not unique. Hundreds of larger retailers are also shutting down stores in risky neighborhoods, and critics argue that these closures are directly targeting areas in predominantly black and minority neighborhoods.  They complain that this trend is leading to “food deserts” where minorities do not have easy access to convenient shopping.

The problem, of course, is that these are the areas with the worst crime rates.  Furthermore, to keep said stores open in such places also puts employee safety at risk and makes the companies vulnerable to liability. 

In 2024 there was a 17% spike in violent assaults on retail employees. In 2025, around 83% of businesses said incidents have stayed the same or slightly increased.  Retail currently accounts for a disproportionate share of workplace homicides (nearly 30%). 

In response, Walgreens is testing out a pilot program in a number of stores which gives employees access to body cameras.  They say that this tool will help to defuse potentially violent encounters with customers.  

“Walgreens is piloting the voluntary use of body-worn cameras in select stores to help promote the safety of both customers and team members,” a spokesperson said, “Body cameras can help de-escalate conflicts, ultimately contributing to a safer environment for everyone.”

There are a number of legal hurdles for Walgreens in some areas, depending on the types of cameras they use.  Under data privacy laws in some states, the company would have to provide written notice to employees before using video surveillance, but not to customers. If Walgreens were using the video to collect biometric data or other sensitive information on customers, it would be required to post notices and obtain “informed consent” from shoppers.  

In the meantime, Walgreens continues to close up stores in neighborhoods they consider high risk.  

Democrat leaders say they plan to stop the retail exodus from urban areas through lawsuits and other measures, while others argue in favor of “city run” grocery stores (socialized grocery stores paid for with taxpayer money).  None of these progressive advocates have thought to address the actual reason why companies are leaving.  The combination of shoplifting loses and the danger of lawsuits due to safety concerns is making it impossible for these outlets to make a profit. 

Contrary to what Democrats seem to believe, retailers are not a charity service for “marginalized” communities.