LAGOS, Portugal (AP) — Police investigating the disappearance of British toddler Madeleine McCann searched near an abandoned rural building in southern Portugal on Tuesday as they launched fresh probes near the holiday resort where she was last seen 18 years ago.
The case received worldwide interest for several years, with reports of sightings of McCann occurring as far away as Australia, while books and television documentaries were produced about her disappearance.
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FILE - Gerry, left, and Kate McCann, parents of four-year old Madeleine McCann, present a picture of their daughter during a press conference in Berlin, Wednesday, June 6, 2007. (AP Photo/Sven Kaestner, File)
Portuguese and German police investigating the 2007 disappearance of British toddler Madeleine McCann carry out searches near Lagos, southern Portugal Tuesday, June 3, 2025. (AP Photo/Joao Matos)
Portuguese and German police investigating the 2007 disappearance of British toddler Madeleine McCann carry out searches near Lagos, southern Portugal, Tuesday, June 3, 2025. (AP Photo/Joao Matos)
Portuguese and German police investigating the 2007 disappearance of British toddler Madeleine McCann carry out searches near Lagos, southern Portugal Tuesday, June 3, 2025. (AP Photo/Joao Matos)
German investigators and Portuguese police officers and firefighters were searching in the countryside several miles from the Praia da Luz resort, where the 3-year-old disappeared from her bed while on vacation with her family on May 3, 2007.
The teams were seen using pickaxes, shovels and chainsaws to clear dense vegetation and dig near a derelict building. Firefighters pumped water out of a well.
Almost two decades on, investigators in the U.K., Portugal and Germany are still piecing together what happened on the night the toddler disappeared. She was in the same room as her brother and sister — 2-year-old twins — while their parents, Kate and Gerry, had dinner with friends outside.
Portuguese police said Monday that detectives were acting on a request from a German public prosecutor as they carry out “a broad range” of searches this week in the area of Lagos, in southern Portugal.
The main suspect is a German national identified by media as Christian Brueckner, who is currently serving a seven-year prison sentence in Germany for raping a 72-year-old woman in Portugal in 2005.
He is under investigation on suspicion of murder in the McCann case but hasn’t been charged. He spent many years in Portugal, including in Praia da Luz, around the time of the child’s disappearance. Brueckner has denied any involvement.
The last time police resumed searches in the case was in 2023, when detectives from the three countries took part in an operation searching near a dam and a reservoir about 50 kilometers (30 miles) from the resort.
McCann's family marked the 18th anniversary of her disappearance last month, and expressed their determination to keep searching.
FILE - Gerry, left, and Kate McCann, parents of four-year old Madeleine McCann, present a picture of their daughter during a press conference in Berlin, Wednesday, June 6, 2007. (AP Photo/Sven Kaestner, File)
Portuguese and German police investigating the 2007 disappearance of British toddler Madeleine McCann carry out searches near Lagos, southern Portugal Tuesday, June 3, 2025. (AP Photo/Joao Matos)
Portuguese and German police investigating the 2007 disappearance of British toddler Madeleine McCann carry out searches near Lagos, southern Portugal, Tuesday, June 3, 2025. (AP Photo/Joao Matos)
Portuguese and German police investigating the 2007 disappearance of British toddler Madeleine McCann carry out searches near Lagos, southern Portugal Tuesday, June 3, 2025. (AP Photo/Joao Matos)
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump said he’s dropping — for now — his push to deploy National Guard troops in Chicago, Los Angeles and Portland, Oregon, a move that comes after legal roadblocks held up the effort.
“We will come back, perhaps in a much different and stronger form, when crime begins to soar again - Only a question of time!" he said in a social media post Wednesday.
Governors typically control states' National Guardsmen, and Trump had deployed troops to all three cities against the wishes of state and local Democratic leaders. He said it was necessary as part of a broader crackdown on immigration, crime and protests.
The president has made a crackdown on crime in cities a centerpiece of his second term — and has toyed with the idea of invoking the Insurrection Act to stop his opponents from using the courts to block his plans. He has said he sees his tough-on-crime approach as a winning political issue ahead of next year’s midterm elections.
Troops had already left Los Angeles after the president deployed them earlier this year as part of a broader crackdown on crime and immigration.
In his post, Trump said the troops' presence was responsible for a drop in crime in the three cities, though they were never on the streets in Chicago and Portland as legal challenges played out. When the Chicago deployment was challenged in court, a Justice Department lawyer said the Guard’s mission would be to protect federal properties and government agents in the field, not “solving all of crime in Chicago.”
Portland Mayor Keith Wilson’s office in a statement said the city’s reduction in crime was due to the efforts of local police and public safety programs. Chicago officials echoed the sentiment, saying in a release Tuesday that the city had 416 homicides in 2025 — the fewest since 2014.
Trump’s push to deploy the troops in Democrat-led cities has been met with legal challenges at nearly every turn.
The Supreme Court in December refused to allow the Trump administration to deploy National Guard troops in the Chicago area. The order was not a final ruling but was a significant and rare setback by the high court for the president’s efforts.
Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker wrote on X Wednesday that Trump “lost in court when Illinois stood up against his attempt to militarize American cities with the National Guard. Now Trump is forced to stand down.”
Hundreds of troops from California and Oregon were deployed to Portland, but a federal judge barred them from going on the streets. A judge permanently blocked the deployment of National Guard troops there in November after a three-day trial.
Oregon Gov. Tina Kotek said in a statement Wednesday that her office had not yet received “official notification that the remaining federalized Oregon National Guard troops can return home. They were never lawfully deployed to Portland and there was no need for their presence. If President Trump has finally chosen to follow court orders and demobilize our troops, that’s a big win for Oregonians and for the rule of law.”
Trump's decision to federalize National Guard troops began in Los Angeles in June, when protesters took to the streets in response to a blitz of immigration arrests in the area. He deployed about 4,000 troops and 700 Marines to guard federal buildings and, later, to protest federal agents as they carried out immigration arrests.
The number of troops slowly dwindled until just several hundred were left. They were removed from the streets by Dec. 15 after a lower court ruling that also ordered control to be returned to Gov. Gavin Newsom. But an appeals court had paused the second part of the order, meaning control remained with Trump. In a Tuesday court filing, the Trump administration said it was no longer seeking a pause in that part of the order.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit on Wednesday ordered the Trump administration to return control of the National Guard to Newsom.
“About time (Trump) admitted defeat,” Newsom said in a social media post. “We’ve said it from day one: the federal takeover of California’s National Guard is illegal.”
Troops will remain on the ground in several other cities. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in December paused a lower court ruling that had called for an end to the deployment of National Guard troops in Washington, D.C., where they’ve been deployed since August after Trump declared a “crime emergency.”
Trump also ordered the deployment of the Tennessee National Guard to Memphis in September as part of a larger federal task force to combat crime, a move supported by the state’s Republican Gov. Bill Lee and senators. A Tennessee judge blocked the use of the Guard, siding with Democratic state and local officials who sued. However, the judge stayed the decision to block the Guard as the state appeals, allowing the deployment to continue.
In New Orleans, about 350 National Guard troops deployed by Trump arrived in the city's historic French Quarter on Tuesday and are set to stay through Mardi Gras to help with safety. The state's Republican governor and the city's Democratic mayor support the deployment.
Ding reported from Los Angeles. Associated Press reporters John O'Connor in Springfield, Illinois, Becky Bohrer in Juneau, Alaska, Jack Brook in New Orleans and Adrian Sanz in Memphis contributed.
FILE - A protester confronts a line of U.S. National Guard members in the Metropolitan Detention Center of downtown Los Angeles, Sunday, June 8, 2025. (AP Photo/Eric Thayer, File)
FILE - Protesters stand off against California National Guard soldiers at the Federal Building in downtown Los Angeles, during a "No Kings" protest, June 14, 2025. (AP Photo/Richard Vogel, File)
President Donald Trump speaks during a news conference with Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at Mar-a-Lago, Monday, Dec. 29, 2025, in Palm Beach, Fla. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
