Military exchange shoppers gave $2.5M in 2025

April 9, 2026

Summary

Exchange shoppers donated more than $2.5 million in 2025 to military relief groups serving service members and their families.

Why this matters

The donations help fund emergency loans, scholarships and grants for military families facing financial strain. The figures also show increased charitable giving through a long-running exchange program that began in 2017.

Army & Air Force Exchange Service shoppers donated more than $2.5 million in 2025 to military relief organizations serving the Army, Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps, the service said.

The donations went to Army Emergency Relief, the Air Force Assistance Fund and the Navy-Marine Corps Relief Society.

The program began in 2017 and expanded in 2020 into a year-round effort. Shoppers can donate at checkout by selecting $1 or increments of $5, and can also give online.

Exchange senior enlisted adviser Chief Master Sgt. Richard Martinez said that 2025 and 2024 were the program’s highest annual fundraising years since 2017. He linked the increases to recent pressures on service members and families, including government shutdowns and rising living costs.

In the Pacific, where the Exchange also supports the Navy and Marine Corps, shoppers have donated more than $130,000 to the Navy-Marine Corps Relief Society.

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According to Hungary’s National Election Office, with more than 95% of votes counted, Tisza was set to win 138 of 199 seats, compared with 55 for Fidesz and six for Mi Hazank Mozgalom. Earlier provisional counts also showed Tisza leading, with 53.74% of the vote to 37.65% for Fidesz with more than 90% counted.

Addressing supporters in Budapest, Magyar said Tisza had won a mandate to govern. “We have done it, Tisza and Hungary have won this election,” he said. “In the history of democratic Hungary, this many people have never voted before, and no single party has ever received such a strong mandate as Tisza.”

He later added: “We did it … Together, we brought down the Orban regime — together. We liberated Hungary; we took back our homeland.”

The result would give Tisza the two-thirds supermajority needed to pursue constitutional changes without a coalition, according to the election office data. Earlier in the count, projections based on 45.7% of votes counted gave Tisza 135 seats and Fidesz 57.
Middle East

Report: Iran executions rose to 1,639 in 2025

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Iranian authorities executed at least 1,639 people in 2025, the highest annual total reported since 1989, two nongovernmental groups said Monday.

The total was up 68% from 975 executions in 2024, according to a joint annual report by Norway-based Iran Human Rights and Paris-based Together Against the Death Penalty. The groups said the figure, based on cases confirmed by at least two sources, was an “absolute minimum” because most executions were not reported in Iranian state media.

The report said the total amounted to more than four executions a day and was the highest since Iran Human Rights began tracking executions in 2008.

It warned that if the Islamic Republic “survives the current crisis, there is a serious risk that executions will be used even more extensively as a tool of oppression and repression.”

The groups also said “hundreds of detained protesters remain at risk of death sentences and execution” after being charged with capital offenses tied to January 2026 protests. Those demonstrations were suppressed in a crackdown that rights groups said left thousands dead and tens of thousands arrested.

Iran executed seven people in connection with the January protests during the war with Israel and the United States that began Feb. 28: six convicted of membership in the banned opposition group People’s Mujahedin of Iran, and one dual Iranian-Swedish citizen charged with spying for Israel.

Nearly half of those executed were convicted of drug-related offenses. At least 48 women were executed, up 55% from 31 in 2024 and the highest number recorded in more than 20 years. Of those, 21 were executed for killing husbands or fiancés, and rights groups said such cases often involved abusive relationships.

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Gold fell Monday as higher energy prices added to inflation concerns after U.S.-Iran talks ended without a deal and Washington said it would begin blockading the Strait of Hormuz.

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The strikes hit Jilli village, with casualty estimates varying by source. Amnesty International said on X that there were “more than 100 dead” and 35 people seriously wounded.

“We have their pictures and they include children,” Isa Sanusi, Amnesty International’s Nigeria director, told The Associated Press. “We are in touch with people that are there, we spoke with the hospital. We spoke with the person in charge of casualties, and we spoke with the victims.”

Local chief Lawan Zanna Nur said “the total casualties, dead and injured, is around 200.” He said many victims were taken to hospitals in nearby Geidam and Maiduguri, where at least eight more of the wounded died Sunday.

“We are talking of dozens dead but it is difficult to give a specific toll,” he said.

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Nigeria’s military said it struck a location in Jilli “long identified as a major terrorist movement corridor and convergence point for Islamic State West Africa Province terrorists and their collaborators.” It described the attack as “a carefully, well coordinated planned and intelligence-driven operation” and said it “successfully conducted a precision air strike on a known terrorist enclave and logistics hub located near the abandoned village of Jilli.”

The military said “scores of terrorists” were killed, but did not mention civilian casualties. The Nigerian Air Force later said it had activated its Civilian Harm Accident and Investigation Cell “to immediately proceed to the location on a fact-finding mission on the allegation.”

An intelligence source told AFP that Jilli market “is wholly controlled by Boko Haram who provides security and collect tax from traders.”

Nigeria has fought a jihadist insurgency since Boko Haram’s 2009 uprising. The conflict, which later included the Islamic State West Africa Province, has killed more than 40,000 people and displaced about 2 million, according to the United Nations.
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His itinerary includes the Great Mosque of Algiers, a meeting with Algeria’s small Christian community at the Basilica of Our Lady of Africa, and a trip to Annaba, the ancient city of Hippo Regius, where St. Augustine served as bishop in the fifth century.

Archbishop Jean-Paul Vesco, the French-born cardinal of Algiers, said he invited Leo on May 8, the day of his election and the feast day commemorating Algeria’s 19 martyrs, priests and nuns killed during the civil war.

Algeria welcomed the visit when it was announced in February, calling it a chance to strengthen ties with the Vatican and expand cooperation. President Abdelmadjid Tebboune had already met Leo in a private audience in 2025, three months after his election.

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As Virginia moves toward a retail cannabis market, questions remain about whether roadside tests can reliably detect marijuana impairment.

There is no standardized, widely approved THC breathalyzer on the market. Researchers have worked to develop one. Former Virginia Commonwealth University professor Emanuele Alves, who received a National Institute of Justice grant to develop a prototype, recently stated that a patent had been filed for a future prototype for roadside cannabis testing.

Michelle Peace, a VCU forensic science professor with toxicology experience, said alcohol standards do not translate to THC.

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A THC level also would not show when cannabis was consumed, Peace said.

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Peace said impaired-driving cases often involved multiple substances. A 2024 Virginia Department of Motor Vehicles analysis found that 30% of drivers with a blood alcohol concentration of 0.08% or higher also tested positive for cannabis.
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Hawaii

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House Bill 1950, introduced by Rep. Adrian Tam, D-Waikiki, would have directed part of the state’s transient accommodations tax to tourism marketing and destination management. The bill passed the House and the Senate Committee on Economic Development and Tourism, but Senate Ways and Means Chair Donovan Dela Cruz, D-Mililani-Wahiawa-Whitmore Village, did not schedule a hearing.

Dela Cruz said HTA already receives recurring support through the general fund, which preserves legislative oversight and flexibility during emergencies, including COVID-19, wildfires, floods, and volcanic activity. He also said lawmakers were still assessing HTA’s direction and performance as it operates under governance changes approved last year.

HTA was created in 1998 and long received a share of transient accommodations tax revenue. It now relies on general fund appropriations. The agency received $63 million for fiscal 2026 and is seeking $66 million for 2027, including funding for sports tourism.

As introduced, HB 1950 would have allocated 15% of transient accommodations tax revenue to HTA, though that provision was later removed. HTA has recommended a 10% to 12% allocation, which the agency said would bring funding closer to past levels. At 10%, funding would be about $81 million annually.

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Military & National Security

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The U.S. Defense Logistics Agency plans to store millions of gallons of ship and aircraft fuel in the southern Philippines, according to U.S. and Philippine officials.

A March 31 solicitation from the agency outlined plans for a fuel storage facility in or near Davao on Mindanao. Starting in April 2028, the contractor would provide 41 million gallons of storage capacity, including 23 million gallons of naval fuel and 18 million gallons of aviation fuel.

The contract would cover 24-hour receiving, storing, protecting, testing, and shipping of U.S. government-owned fuel, according to the notice.

Commercial fuel is already stored at Subic Bay, the former U.S. naval base on Luzon. A Mindanao facility would give U.S. forces another refueling point in the region in addition to Subic Bay and Manila.

Rear Adm. George Bresnihan, commander of the Defense Logistics Agency’s energy division, visited fuel storage sites in Australia and Papua New Guinea in September, according to a Nov. 24 agency news release.

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Rear Adm. Roy Vincent Trinidad, a Philippine military spokesman, told reporters Friday at Camp Aguinaldo in Quezon City that the proposed Mindanao site would remain under Manila’s ownership and control.

The project is covered by existing agreements, including the 2014 Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement, which grants U.S. forces access to nine sites in the Philippines, he said, according to a report published Friday in the Manila Bulletin.

“These will still be Philippine facilities, Philippine-controlled facilities,” he said. “They are designed to support our response capability for [humanitarian assistance and disaster response], maritime security and support, and sustain our forces deployed, not only in the West Philippine Sea, but even in the southern border.”