(upbeat music) - From NJ PBS Studios, this is NJ Spotlight News with Brianna Vannozzi.

- Good evening and thanks for joining us on this Wednesday.

I'm Brianna Vannozzi.

Tonight, a few stories we'll get into later in the broadcast.

First, acting U.S.

Attorney Alina Haba's authority is once again in the spotlight after the tenures of federal prosecutors in other states face challenges.

Then, high-impact tutoring is helping New Jersey students claw back pandemic learning loss.

So why are some schools pulling out of the program?

And later, with more than a million New Jerseyans facing food insecurity, community groups statewide are stepping up to get holiday meals on the table this Thanksgiving.

But first, a few of today's top headlines.

A major shift in how the state investigates corruption is now on the table in Trenton.

Senate President Nick Scuteri has introduced a fast-tracked bill that would strip key investigative powers away from the state comptroller and give them to the State Commission of Investigation, or the SCI, with a Senate committee scheduled to take up the bill on Monday.

Supporters say the measure would consolidate overlapping responsibilities in the offices, but critics are calling it a dangerous move that would weaken oversight and efforts to fight corruption, pointing to the fact that acting state comptroller Kevin Walsh has taken on powerful political and business figures, sparking frustration and even complaints from some of the people he's investigated.

Walsh wrote on X that a vote for the bill would be a "vote for corruption."

Investigations into things like public contracting and Medicaid would still be left to the comptroller, but with weakened authority.

Walsh's office has recouped about $100 million annually for the state in Medicaid fraud and overpayments alone.

Also tonight, New Jersey is joining a national legal fight over how the federal government handles support programs for homelessness.

Attorney General Matt Plotkin joined a coalition of 20 states and Washington, D.C., suing the Trump administration over funding cuts and new rules tied to federal housing aid.

The lawsuit targets changes to the U.S.

Department of Housing and Urban Development's Continuum of Care program, which helps unsheltered people find permanent housing.

Now, under the new policy, more than half of that funding would be shifted away from long-term housing to temporary shelter and programs that include work or treatment requirements.

The states argue the administration is violating federal law by rewriting rules already set by Congress.

The case also argues the changes would put tens of thousands of people at risk of losing stable housing, while HUD says the current "housing-first" model has failed and is in need of an overhaul.

And a lifeline for working families struggling with rising costs is set to reopen, but only on a limited basis.

The state announced today it will start taking new applications in January for the Child Care Assistance Program, which has been closed since August 1st, after the program lost $30 million in state funding.

Now the State Department of Human Services says slots will open up but only to priority groups including children experiencing homelessness and those from homes with very low incomes.

Lawmakers and child care advocates say cuts to the program have forced some parents, many of them mothers, to reduce work hours or leave their jobs entirely to stay home and take care of their children.

And the cuts not only harmed families but the providers who rely on the state funding to keep their doors open.

An estimated 70,000 children are currently enrolled in the Child Care Assistance Program.

Reopening the application process could extend that program to another 3 to 5,000 kids.

Advocates are calling on the state to fully restore funding and reopen the program to all eligible families.

And coming up, new court rulings from across the country are once again raising the question whether New Jersey's top federal prosecutor is legally on the job.

What the court's decision could mean for the state, that's next.

Funding for NJ Spotlight News, provided by the members of the New Jersey Education Association.

Making public schools great for every child.

And RWJBarnabas Health.

Let's be healthy together.

- Well, a legal battle is playing out that could determine whether New Jersey's top federal prosecutor has the authority to be in the job.

A federal judge already ruled that Alina Haba is serving unlawfully as the state's acting U.S.

attorney after her interim appointment by President Trump expired, though she remains in office while the Trump administration appeals.

But now, similar rulings against other Trump-appointed prosecutors in Nevada and California, Virginia, are raising the stakes and putting the spotlight back on the issue here.

Joining us now to help explain what it all means and what could happen next is Jacob Elberg, a former federal prosecutor and law professor at Seton Hall Law School.

Jacob, welcome back.

Thanks so much for coming on the show.

It seems now that this is snowballing.

We're seeing judges reject interim US attorneys from multiple states, as I mentioned.

Why is that happening?

Has there been a shift?

- So part of what's going on is that typically when you have this sort of an issue arise, you would see the administration then change tack.

When one court has raised the issue, you would expect around the country the administration to take steps to make sure to kind of nip that in the bud and make sure it wasn't going to be a problem.

Instead, the administration just doubled down and kept proceeding in the same way.

What we saw happen with Lindsey Halligan and the cases there, that -- they put her in place after all these issues with Alina Haba had already occurred.

And so the -- we haven't seen any change in how courts are reacting to this.

Courts are making -- seeing this as a problem everywhere.

But the administration isn't changing what they're doing.

So it's just growing in size.

LISA DESJARDINS: Yes, I mean, Lindsey Halligan, as you mentioned, the U.S.

attorney for Virginia, a stunning move happened this week from the courts, where they threw out politically motivated indictments against New York Attorney General Letitia James and former FBI Director James Comey, essentially saying those were unlawful, because she's in the position unlawfully.

Does that ramp up pressure on the courts reviewing Haba's case, which is currently in appeal?

Well, it adds even more attention to it.

There are some differences really in the weeds between all the various cases.

But the one here in New Jersey with Alina Haba is already teed up for the third circuit.

And that's one where they've heard argument.

They have the papers.

And so we could be any time now getting a ruling from the Third Circuit.

And with all of this at stake around the country even more attention now is going to be put on that ruling.

What happens inside a U.S.

attorney's office when leadership authority is in question.

So it's a real challenge.

On the one hand, the offices are for the most part filled with public servants, people who are career prosecutors, who are there regardless of what party is in charge, and they're just because of their commitment to doing the work.

And so folks are doing their best trying to do that.

At the same time, it's a real challenge when folks don't know who's in charge.

So there's questions about who can actually be making the tough decisions, because there are tough decisions that somebody needs to be making.

And it's also just a distraction.

There are questions of when folks are going to do work, is it going to be an unnecessary hurdle?

Is it going to cause challenges with work that they are trying to put forward?

And I'd say the job is hard enough without adding those extra things on top of it.

- Yeah, and I mean, what happens to the prosecutions?

Obviously there were two that were in question, which sparked this case with Alina Haba here in New Jersey, but what happens to the victims, to the investigations, to defendants?

- It's really an open question and it's a real problem.

There are a few different possibilities and that's gonna depend on the details of the cases.

One of the things that was significant in the Comey and James indictments is that there, Lindsey Halligan, the person who the court ruled should not have been doing what she was doing, there was nobody else signing off on those documents.

So the court then said, well, then since she's not okay, these indictments aren't okay.

Not as clear that that's gonna happen in every situation because there are some situations where DOJ may be able to say, basically, we were duplicating efforts.

We had this backstop with somebody else doing the work.

Obviously, that already comes at a cost.

You're talking about having extra layers of work going into it.

But in the end, we're talking about actual risks for prosecution, cases that I think everyone can agree when we're talking about the day-to-day work of the Department of Justice is important work for achieving justice.

And so that is really put at risk here.

Yeah.

And then what happens if the Third Circuit does rule against HABA?

Does that invalidate the prosecutions she approved or is it more of a case by case scenario?

So it's potentially a case by case analysis, but significantly it extends not only to those few cases that had been ruled on, but everything since then.

Because one of the things that was interesting is DOJ in the meantime, while these things have been in limbo, while the Third Circuit has been ruling on it, you could imagine DOJ taking the position of, "Okay, well, we'll fix it now, and we'll make sure that now there aren't going to be issues going forward."

DOJ really hasn't done that.

They've made some changes, but it's not clear those changes fix it.

And so to the extent that the Third Circuit agrees with the district court judge that Alina Haba was not properly there, not properly supervising cases, there are a lot more defendants that are potentially going to come forward and say, "Hey, she was supervising my case.

She was involved in the prosecution of my case."

And that's a problem there as well.

Yeah.

I mean, a real ripple effect.

The Trump administration, though, is now 0-4 when it comes to challenges to U.S.

attorneys who have been appointed.

What, if anything, does that tell us about how this could end?

So we haven't really seen a strong argument from DOJ to be doing what they're doing, which isn't surprising because this isn't something that anybody has attempted in all the history of U.S.

attorneys, which goes back a long way.

There has been a desire to have folks in place that the other party maybe hasn't agreed with for some time, and never before has an administration tried to say, basically, we can do whatever we want.

If we want the person in here, we can one way or another just put them in place.

And not surprisingly, the courts are saying, that doesn't fit with the statutes.

There are rules in place and this isn't it.

So, we're not seeing a mixed set of rulings or some courts going one way and some the other way.

There seems to be, not surprisingly, agreement that what they're trying to do doesn't work.

And how likely is this?

I mean, I'm asking you to speculate, but based off of your vantage point, how likely is this to reach the Supreme Court?

So that's an interesting question, because on the one hand, it is so easily fixable.

There are certainly folks who are Republicans, folks who would be supportive of the administration, who they could go put in these roles and where there wouldn't be these kind of objections, where they'd be able to get them in place and have it work.

There are also in all of these offices career folks, folks who could appropriately be there subject to the Vacancies Act.

And so this is easily fixable.

And so you'd expect to the extent the administration's focus is on making sure cases are moving forward, making sure justice is done, you'd expect the administration to change tact, say, you know what, we're just gonna let this one go, put people in place so work can continue.

And so that may still be what they do.

If not, though, if the plan is to keep fighting, really no choice but to take it to the Supreme Court.

And that may come up soon, whether through the issues of the Comey and James indictment or through Alina Havas, which is the one that is the furthest along since it's already with the Third Circuit.

It's a great point.

Jacob Elberg, thank you for your insight here.

Former federal prosecutor, Seton Hall Law Professor, thanks for your time.

Thank you for having me.

Well, the pandemic may be behind us, but students are still working to recover from the learning loss it brought on.

Advocates say one solution is proving especially effective, high-impact tutoring.

A non-profit called New Jersey Tutoring Corps has now served more than 15,000 students across the state, helping kids who were significantly behind make meaningful progress in both math and reading.

But funding cuts have forced some schools to pull out of the program, just as demand is growing.

Our education and child welfare writer, Hannah Gross, joins us now to talk about the program and why supporters will be looking to the governor-elect to keep it going.

Hannah, great to have you here.

So what does high-impact tutoring really look like on the ground?

How does it work and why is it so effective, at least according to these numbers?

It's based on a few principles supported by research.

So students meet with the same tutor consistently, so it's a familiar face.

And they meet two or three times a week in the same subject matter, in this case either English or math.

They also get tutored for a duration of 30 to 60 minutes.

And it's a small group, so no more than one tutor and three students.

So how significant are these improvements compared to where these students started at the beginning of the year?

What did they tell you about what they saw?

So looking at the start of last school year for students who are two or more grades behind, they cut that distance in half in math and by a third in English language arts by the end of May.

Which compared to other resources available, have we ever seen that type of gain made in that short of a period?

So it's still early.

This has only been happening for a few years post-pandemic, but it is showing early promise as one of the most effective methods of pandemic recovery.

And yet, despite that, despite the fact that it's working, schools are saying funding delays and other cuts may force them out of it entirely.

Walk us through what exactly is happening there.

So, shortly after the pandemic, there were some funds available from the State Department of Education.

That went out to about 250 districts.

This year there's also money in the budget, about a million dollars for the New Jersey tutoring corps, but that's not really enough for the students because it costs about $65 an hour per student to get this type of tutoring.

And districts are making tough choices right now with delays in federal funding, reductions in state funding for some districts across the state.

So they're making really hard choices.

I know that you report, you know, advocates are really looking at the governor-elect to leverage whatever power she has to get this expanded.

What are they asking for specifically?

Is there a dollar amount that they want to see and what can she ultimately do?

I haven't heard a specific dollar amount.

They would love to see more money in the budget than the $1 million that's there right now.

- Yeah, every program wants more money, sure.

- In Congress, Cheryl has been an advocate of high-impact tutoring.

She's introduced legislation to expand it.

She's also talked about it on the campaign trail.

So advocates are excited and hopeful that they'll have who they think is an ally in the governor's office.

- What happens though if the funding doesn't increase, if the program doesn't expand, and there are, of course, still kids who are behind in their learning, what happens to them?

I mean, some districts will find a way to pay for it.

A lot of districts who do have this tutoring, they use Title I funds, and they might have switched out other interventions, like paying for additional teachers to push into a classroom and switching that money over for tutoring.

But if a district doesn't have tutoring, some of the kids whose families can afford it might opt for private tutoring, and kids whose families can't afford it might be left behind.

- Hmm, so I would imagine the equity gaps there get bigger because the private tutoring, it's got to cost around the same per hour.

- It might even be more expensive than that and it's not offset by either school districts or local boys and girls clubs who are help covering some of that cost.

- Yeah, so I mean, one way I guess to measure this is how they're improved in the math and reading, but did the tutors who were involved say that they noticed other improved outcomes?

One big thing I heard from tutors is improved confidence from the students who might not be comfortable raising their hand or sharing out in class, but in this small group setting where they're working with just one or two other students and a tutor, they've become a lot more confident.

They might be showing up to class more, especially on days when they have tutoring, so they can participate.

So maybe not fighting in the morning having to go because they're looking forward to it and feeling more confident about it, something that obviously is hard for them to quantify and measure as far as progress goes.

Something interesting that you had here was that the program also trains future teachers, a little bit of a twofer.

How does that work then, given the fact that we do have a teacher shortage?

If this were to go away, does that affect the pipeline or the future pipeline?

A lot of the tutors are future educators.

I spoke to one tutor who started tutoring when they were a junior at TCNJ, and now they're a high school math teacher in a public school district in New Jersey.

So it gives former and future teachers knowledge of what the field might be like and encourages them to go out there.

There's also in-service teachers who are tutoring over the summer, retired teachers, people who are considering switching careers and going into education.

So it really does help shore up the pipeline.

Yeah.

What do you hear from parents?

Because the concern around the learning loss has been huge and we know that it's going to take some time before we're really back at where the kids need to be.

>> Parents are appreciative of the intervention and it works especially well for parents when this tutoring happens during school time because they don't have to worry about transportation to a separate location or picking their kids up at a different time, maybe when the bus isn't running or there's no after-school care.

So having it as built into the school day has been very helpful for parents.

>> All right.

You can read Hannah's story on this on our website, NJspotlightnews.org.

This is your last day with us, Hannah.

Your reporting has been magnificent.

It will be a loss not just for us but for the people of New Jersey and the press corps who I know has also relied on your reporting.

I wish you the best of luck.

We all do.

In an industry that hopefully is much more stable.

But you have been wonderful on our team.

So thank you.

Thank you so much, Brie.

It's been great working with you and everyone at NJ Spotlight covering my home state.

As families get ready for Thanksgiving tomorrow, food assistance groups across the state are racing to meet a growing need.

Handing out hot meals, frozen turkeys and fresh produce from one end of the state to the other as families try to stretch their budgets amid rising costs and increasing food insecurity.

has the story from Vineland.

I'm just checking all everyone that have the yellow ticket, make sure they have the ticket with the key chain.

The line wrapped around the Salvation Army of Vineland.

Hundreds of people bundled against the cold, waiting for a chance to bring home a Thanksgiving meal.

For many families across New Jersey, the holiday is not a celebration.

It's a struggle.

people wouldn't have anyt back tears.

Vineland resi stood in one of the longe says he's ever seen.

How in line since seven o'clo longest line I've seen in never seen the line is bi I was here, they ran out food and had to turn ever from alone.

According to the community food bank of New Jersey, nearly 1.1 million residents here struggle with food insecurity.

A third of them are children and with nearly one in 10 New Jerseyans living below the poverty line, the need has never been greater.

I've never seen nothing like this before and I've been here now for 75 years.

The first time I see something like this.

Vineland Salvation Army Major Brenda Gonzalez says families pre registered, ahead of time.

So they ha sign up, but we're not clo doors.

They can have the r and then they can have a lot of help.

Many families and many single moms coming in looking for help for these holidays.

Inside, volunteers handed out everything needed for a Thanksgiving meal, including dry goods, vegetables, milk, rice, and oil, much of it donated by local partners like BJ's and ShopRite.

Volunteers I spoke with say families waited in line for hours before the doors even opened.

Once inside here they were able to choose from more than 50,000 pounds of food.

I think our number last year was almost 3,000 that we gave out last year.

So far here this morning we've given out probably about 600 or 700 so far this morning.

We'll probably surpass 1500 as you walk outside and walk around the building.

There is a line down the side of the building still and probably halfway out the block here too.

So sometimes though you can't you can't give everything because if everything goes out at one shot folks in line still still won't get it.

adults giving back.

Yeah, types of people who come tell every person who com it, especially because of everything going on.

I bel have food anyway.

Similar out up and down the state the Boys and Girls Club ho annual clubs giving prov and $100 shop right gift it serves.

The Community was there to offering inf and school meal programs, families in Neptune, Fulf a pop the trunk drive thr with long lines of cars s parking lot and in Gambin County this weekend, the Salvation Army Kroc Center and the Food Bank of South Jersey held their annual Thanksgiving drive-thru event, distributing turkeys and food boxes to 1,300 local families.

For thousands of New Jersey families, these events aren't just about Thanksgiving dinner.

They're about survival.

And for the volunteers and donors who show up each year, they're about community and hope.