Hamas hostage; FEMA building codes; Guantanamo Bay

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Today’s top stories

• The fired workers were on probationary status, meaning they were within one year of taking the job, ‘s Lauren Sommer tells Up First. Some of the workers had been at the agency for more than a decade but obtained this status after accepting a promotion. FEMA helps develop building codes to help homes survive floods and hurricane winds. FEMA experts had already made recommendations to strengthen the codes; however, FEMA has asked for its name to be removed from the recommendations.

The Trump administration has released nearly all migrants detained at the Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, naval base. Over 170 migrants — all Venezuelan — were flown to Honduras as a layover before being sent back home to Venezuela yesterday.

• The administration previously stated that everyone sent to Guantánamo was a hardened criminal. That has been determined not to be true, ‘s Sergio Martínez-Beltrán says. An ACLU lawsuit revealed that the Trump administration admitted that nearly 30% of detainees were “low-threat illegal aliens.” Martínez-Beltrán says it is clear that many of the migrants were used as a PR campaign by the White House. The people sent to Guantánamo were not new arrestees. Most, if not all of them, had already been in detention during the Biden administration.
• Many mothers of the detainees have been pushing back on the narrative that their sons are part of the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua. Here’s how they are trying to set the record straight.

In a dramatic turn of events in Israel, authorities have announced that a body returned by Hamas yesterday is not who the militants claimed it to be. Two young boys and their mother were believed to be among the four bodies handed over. However, after conducting forensic testing, Israeli officials stated that the remains of the mother were not among the returned hostages.

• The body that was supposed to be Shiri Bibas was instead an “anonymous unidentified body,” ‘s Hadeel Al-Shalchi says. The Israeli military said the body didn’t belong to any known hostage. An official familiar with the situation informed that Israel is inclined to move forward with Saturday’s prisoner exchange and doesn’t want to jeopardize the release of Israeli hostages this weekend. Israel will likely try to take advantage of the fact that Bibas’ body was not returned as a point of negotiations for more Israeli hostage releases in the future.

Today’s listen

Weekend picks

3 things to know before you go

1. A striking new image decorates the wall outside the Oval Office for visitors to see a gold-framed mug shot of Trump.
2. Flares of light have been found in Sagittarius A*, a supermassive black hole in the center of the Milky Way, creating a light show for astronomers.
3. MLB players can challenge ball and strike calls during spring training. The camera-based system serves as a test to explore the potential role of technology alongside traditional human umpires.

This newsletter was edited by Suzanne Nuyen.