DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. (AP) — The Porsche Penske Motorsports program was one of the few bright spots in 2025 for Team Penske, which had a rough IndyCar season and saw its three-year run as NASCAR champions snapped.
The IndyCar team managed only two wins, never challenged for the championship, was engulfed in an Indianapolis 500 inspection infraction that cost three Penske executives their jobs and has forced Roger Penske to re-examine the technical structure of IndyCar officiating.
NASCAR saw a three-year reign as Cup Series champions snapped when Joey Logano and Ryan Blaney — the 2022, 2023 and 2024 title holders — both failed to advance to the finale. The Penske trio of drivers managed six wins on the season but Blaney's sixth-place finish showing in the final Cup standings was the best the proud organization could muster.
Now is a new year, the 60th anniversary of Penske fielding a racing organization, and it was the sports car program that set the tone for what the 88-year-old owner expects in terms of results. His No. 7 Porsche entry won the Rolex 24 at Daytona on Sunday to take its third consecutive win in the most prestigious endurance sports car race in the United States.
“Winning the 24 Hours of Daytona three consecutive times with this Porsche Penske Motorsport team is an incredible accomplishment. That sustained success is only achieved with great team work, focused and determined drivers, a resilient crew and a commitment to winning," Penske said at Daytona International Speedway.
“Our success at this event helped put our team on the map over six decades ago and winning here in Daytona is a perfect way to celebrate the start of Team Penske’s 60th anniversary season.”
There's no doubt Penske has something special in his sports car program, which has managed to win the Rolex as well as the overall IMSA championship in 2024 and 2025. The success has come with multiple different lineups, and Brazilian driver Felipe Nasr the lone holdover in the threepeat of Rolex wins. Nasr made it so that a Brazilian driver has been part of the winning team the last six seasons — countryman Helio Castroneves was part of the winning teams in the previous three.
Penske is only the third team in 64 years to win the Rolex in three consecutive years, joining Chip Ganassi Racing and Wayne Taylor Racing.
Penske made a joke in victory lane about Nasr showing up to their initial meeting in a clandestine parking lot wearing a full navy suit — an appreciation Penske felt made Nasr “Penske Material.”
Nasr at the time was in the middle of racing for a championship with Action Express Racing — a team owned by NASCAR chairman Jim France — and it wasn't the best time to discuss a possible defection. But Penske had a Porsche program to build and Nasr, who had misjudged the length of the walk to the meeting, stood before him sweating in his suit as the perfect candidate.
“It was kind of a secret meeting and I showed up to this place, but I was a little worried, and I thought I could walk the distance, but I never checked the weather outside,” Nasr said. "I was inside some kind of restaurant and I was just taking a drink and just waiting on time. I said, ‘OK, I’d better start walking.’
“But it was very warm that day, and those five minutes I walked, that was not a good move because I started to just sweat. I’m like, I’m going to look nervous now. What are those guys going to say? I said, ‘Well, it’s too late now.’ Then comes up this car, rolls down the window, it was Roger saying ‘Hey, you’re the driver, come on board, let’s talk.’ From that moment on, I knew something special was about to unfold.”
There's no guarantee the Rolex win is going to fix the entire Team Penske program, which has a new sports car lineup, as well as a new IndyCar lineup with youngster David Malukas taking over this year for Penske mainstay Will Power.
Power, who turns 45 the day of the IndyCar season-opener, is now with Andretti Global and was not renewed in large part because of age. Malukas is only 24.
The NASCAR program returns intact but a new championship-deciding format could possibly work against the Penske program. All three of Logano's titles and Blaney's lone Cup came in the now-defunct winner-take-all format, and both drivers previously capitalized on the win-and-advance model that also has been eliminated.
It's impossible to predict what kind of year Penske will have in 2026, and most organizational insiders point to the May disruptions around the Indy 500 as a months-long setback that took time and restructuring to recover from.
But the Rolex victory this weekend shows that Penske has not relented in his pursuit of winning and should stop at nothing to get all his programs back on top this year.
AP auto racing: https://apnews.com/hub/auto-racing
Porsche Penske Motorsport team owner Roger Penske hugs driver Felipe Nasr, of Brazil after winning the Rolex 24 hour auto race at Daytona International Speedway, Sunday, Jan. 25, 2026, in Daytona Beach, Fla. (AP Photo/John Raoux)
Driver Felipe Nasr, left, of Brazil, is congratulated by team owner Roger Penske after winning the Rolex 24 hour auto race at Daytona International Speedway, Sunday, Jan. 25, 2026, in Daytona Beach, Fla. (AP Photo/John Raoux)
FILE - Porsche Penske Motorsport team members, from left to right, Britain's Nick Tandy, Brazil's Felipe Nasr and Belgium's Laurens Vanthoor celebrate after winning the IMSA Rolex 24 hour auto race at Daytona International Speedway, Sunday, Jan. 26, 2025, in Daytona Beach, Fla. (AP Photo/John Raoux, file)
MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — A federal judge heard arguments Monday over Minnesota's challenge to the Trump administration's immigration enforcement crackdown, posing skeptical questions to both sides about the effort that has led to two fatal shootings by federal officers.
U.S. District Judge Katherine Menendez is considering whether to grant requests by the state and the cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul to temporarily halt the immigration operation. She said the case was a priority, though she issued no immediate ruling.
Menendez questioned the government’s motivation behind the crackdown and expressed skepticism about a letter recently sent by Attorney General Pam Bondi to Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz. The letter asked the state to give the federal government access to voter rolls, to turn over state Medicaid and food assistance records, and to repeal sanctuary policies.
“I mean, is there no limit to what the executive can do under the guise of enforcing immigration law?” Menendez asked. She noted that the federal requests are the subject of litigation.
Lawyers for the state and the Twin Cities argued that the situation on the street is so dire as to require the court to halt the federal government’s enforcement actions.
“If this is not stopped right here, right now, I don’t think anybody who is seriously looking at this problem can have much faith in how our republic is going to go in the future,” Minnesota Assistant Attorney General Brian Carter said.
Brantley Mayers, a Justice Department attorney, said the government's goal is to enforce federal law. Mayers said one lawful action should not be used to discredit another lawful action.
“I don’t see how the fact that we’re also doing additional things that we are allowed to do, that the Constitution has vested us with doing, would in any way negate another piece of the same operation, the same surge,” Mayers said.
Menendez questioned where the line was between violating the Constitution and the executive's power to enforce the law. She also asked whether she was being asked to decide between state and federal policies.
“That begins to feel very much like I am deciding which policy approach is best,” she said.
At one point, while discussing the prospect of federal officers entering residences without a warrant, the judge expressed reluctance to decide issues not yet raised in a lawsuit before her.
“I can’t be the global keeper of all things here. Like, presumably that will be litigated," she said to the state's attorney.
Menendez made it clear that she was struggling with how to rule because the case is so unusual, and there are few precedents in case law to guide her.
"It’s because this is important that I’m doing everything I can to get it right,” she said.
The state of Minnesota and the cities sued the Department of Homeland Security earlier this month, five days after Renee Good was shot by an Immigration and Customs officer. The shooting of Alex Pretti by a Border Patrol officer on Saturday added urgency to the case.
In other developments, President Donald Trump said he had a “very good” call with Walz about the latest shooting and that they are now on a “similar wavelength.” It was an abrupt shift from Trump, who frequently derides Walz for his actions on immigration issues in Minnesota.
Trump also said he would send border czar Tom Homan to Minnesota. The president's statement comes after Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and Border Patrol Commander Gregory Bovino, who has become the public face of the crackdown, answered questions at news conferences over the weekend about Pretti's shooting. Trump posted on social media that Homan will report directly to him.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said Homan would be “the main point of contact on the ground in Minneapolis” during continued operations by federal immigration officers.
Since the original court filing, the state and cities have substantially added to their request in an effort to restore the conditions that existed before the administration launched Operation Metro Surge on Dec. 1.
In court Monday, an attorney for the administration said about 2,000 Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers were on ground, along with at least 1,000 Border Patrol officers.
The lawsuit asks the judge to order a reduction in the number of federal law enforcement officers and agents in Minnesota back to the level before the surge and to limit the scope of the enforcement operation.
Justice Department attorneys have called the lawsuit “legally frivolous” and said Minnesota "wants a veto over federal law enforcement.” They asked the judge to reject the request or to at least stay her order pending an anticipated appeal.
Democratic Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison said Sunday that the lawsuit is needed because of “the unprecedented nature of this surge. It is a novel abuse of the Constitution that we’re looking at right now. No one can remember a time when we’ve seen something like this.”
The case has implications for other states that have been or could become targets of ramped-up federal immigration enforcement operations. Attorneys general from 19 states plus the District of Columbia, led by California, filed a friend-of-the-court brief supporting Minnesota.
"If left unchecked, the federal government will no doubt be emboldened to continue its unlawful conduct in Minnesota and to repeat it elsewhere,” the attorneys general wrote.
Menendez ruled in a separate case on Jan. 16 that federal officers in Minnesota cannot detain or tear gas peaceful protesters who are not obstructing authorities, including people who follow and observe agents.
An appeals court temporarily suspended that ruling three days before Saturday’s shooting. But the plaintiffs in that case, represented by the American Civil Liberties Union of Minnesota, asked the appeals court late Saturday for an emergency order lifting the stay in light of Pretti's killing.
The Justice Department argued in a reply filed Sunday that the stay should remain in place, calling the injunction unworkable and overly broad.
In yet another case, a different federal judge, Eric Tostrud, issued an order late Saturday blocking the Trump administration from “destroying or altering evidence” related to Saturday's shooting. Ellison and Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty asked for the order to try to preserve evidence collected by federal officials that state authorities have not yet been able to inspect.
A hearing in that case is scheduled for Monday afternoon in federal court in St. Paul.
On Sunday night, protesters targeted a Minneapolis hotel where federal agents were believed to be staying, blocking a major avenue on the edge of the University of Minnesota campus.
A freelance photographer working for The Associated Press saw smashed glass in the hotel lobby, as well as graffiti with obscenities and threats directed at ICE.
A Minneapolis police officer was inside the hotel and tried to provide aid to a federal agent who was injured. More officers from local and state agencies planned to move in to “deescalate the situation, and make arrests,” Minneapolis police said Monday in a statement.
But as they began to reach the scene and arrested two people, federal agents arrived and “deployed chemical munitions,” the police statement said. A DHS spokesperson said a statement on the situation would be provided later Monday.
Associated Press writers Jack Brook in Minneapolis and Mike Catlaini in Trenton, New Jersey, contributed to this report.
This story has been corrected to show the judge’s name is Katherine Menendez, not Kathleen.
A man, center left, next to a Minneapolis police officer grabs a protester in the doorway during a noise demonstration protest in response to federal immigration enforcement operations in the city Sunday, Jan. 25, 2026, in Minneapolis. (AP Photo/Adam Gray)
Federal agents try to clear demonstrators near a hotel, using tear gas during a noise demonstration protest in response to federal immigration enforcement operations in the city Sunday, Jan. 25, 2026, in Minneapolis. (AP Photo/Adam Gray)
A federal agent points a weapon at a person outside a hotel during a noise demonstration protest in response to federal immigration enforcement operations in the city Sunday, Jan. 25, 2026, in Minneapolis. (AP Photo/Adam Gray)
A federal agent stands guard near a hotel during a noise demonstration protest in response to federal immigration enforcement operations in the city Sunday, Jan. 25, 2026, in Minneapolis. (AP Photo/Adam Gray)
Attorney General Keith Ellison speaks during a news conference in Blaine, Minn., Sunday, Jan. 25, 2026. (AP Photo/Abbie Parr)
Attorney General Keith Ellison, right, and Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz give a news conference in Blaine, Minn., Sunday, Jan. 25, 2026. (AP Photo/Abbie Parr)
