Federal authorities arrest 18 for alleged drug distribution around Los Angeles park

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Federal authorities said they arrested 18 people Wednesday on charges related to selling illicit drugs including fentanyl and methamphetamine around a Los Angeles park.

The area, called MacArthur Park, is a densely populated immigrant neighborhood west of downtown LA where federal immigration authorities and the National Guard made a brief but mighty show of force last summer.

In this week's raids, authorities seized 40 pounds (18 kilograms) of fentanyl from a single home, the U.S. Attorney’s Office said. Two of the people arrested, a couple from South Los Angeles, are believed to be the main sources of those drugs sold in the park, which were stashed in storefronts and distributed to street-level dealers, authorities said.

“We're here today because California policy has failed,” First Assistant U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli said during a news conference announcing the arrests. “MacArthur Park should be for families, should be for residents of Los Angeles, not for drug dealers and gangsters.”

Essayli announced the arrests alongside officials from the Drug Enforcement Administration and the Los Angeles Police Department in the park. It has drawn numerous homeless encampments and has been the site of open-air drug use in recent years.

Aerial TV news footage showed agents gathered outside a strip of businesses across from the park, with one appearing to use a chain saw to cut through a business’s wall. Essayli posted video on the social platform X of LAPD officers assisting with the effort and a home in a residential neighborhood being raided.

Essayli, an appointee of President Donald Trump, said the area's struggles are a result of failed California policies including lax consequences for drug users and programs that involve handing out clean needles and Narcan, a life-saving emergency medication for fentanyl overdose.

Wednesday’s operation involved more than 200 personnel from the DEA, said Anthony Chrysanthis, special agent in charge of the department in Los Angeles.

Essayli said the operation began Tuesday night, with three warrants executed in the morning at residences in other locations in Southern California. Six warrants were served at businesses found to be selling narcotics in MacArthur Park.

Investigators have targeted the Sinaloa Cartel as the suppliers for fentanyl and methamphetamine in the area, Chrysanthis said.

The defendants are set to appear in court Thursday.

Seven others remain fugitives, Essayli's office said.

A man holding a pipe stands hunched over at MacArthur Park after federal authorities made arrests on charges related to selling illicit drugs on Wednesday, May 6, 2026, in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong)

Law enforcement officers stand on a street near MacArthur Park after federal authorities made arrests on charges related to selling illicit drugs on Wednesday, May 6, 2026, in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong)

Law enforcement vehicles are seen near MacArthur Park after federal authorities made arrests on charges related to selling illicit drugs on Wednesday, May 6, 2026, in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong)

A law enforcement officer stands on a street near MacArthur Park after federal authorities made arrests on charges related to selling illicit drugs on Wednesday, May 6, 2026, in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong)

Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) agents alongside other law enforcement officers work the scene near MacArthur Park after federal authorities made arrests on charges related to selling illicit drugs on Wednesday, May 6, 2026, in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong)

PARIS (AP) — France’s aircraft carrier strike group is moving south of the Suez Canal and into the Red Sea in preparation for a potential French-British mission in the Strait of Hormuz, French President Emmanuel Macron said Wednesday.

The deployment puts Europe’s most powerful warship closer to the strait whose effective closure has come to epitomize the war in Iran, stranding hundreds of ships and triggering what the International Energy Agency calls the largest supply disruption in the history of the global oil market.

The defensive effort is distinct from the U.S. “Project Freedom” that launched Monday and was paused by President Donald Trump on Tuesday evening.

The repositioning of the nuclear-powered Charles de Gaulle and its escorts comes as part of a proposed mission championed by France and Britain to restore maritime security in the Strait of Hormuz as soon as conditions allow.

It "may help restore confidence among shipowners and insurers,” Macron said on X. “It remains distinct from the parties at war.”

Macron, who spoke with Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian on Wednesday, said he also intends to raise the matter with Trump.

“A return to calm in the Strait will help advance negotiations on nuclear issues, ballistic matters, and the regional situation,” Macron wrote. “Europeans… will play their part.”

Col. Guillaume Vernet, spokesperson for the French armed forces chief of staff, stressed that the Hormuz coalition — drawn up by France, Britain and more than 50 nations — will not begin operating until two thresholds are cleared: The threat to shipping must come down, and the maritime industry must be reassured enough to use the strait.

Even then, he told The Associated Press, any operation would require the agreement of neighboring countries. That would include Iran, which borders the strait and effectively closed it by attacking and threatening ships after the war began on Feb. 28 with attacks by the U.S. and Israel.

Vernet did not specify when the carrier would reach its destination. He said the carrier was being positioned to be close enough to act if and when the conditions are met: “The French position is the same since the beginning — defensive posture, respecting international law."

War-risk insurance premiums for transits of the strait have risen four to five times above preconflict levels, according to industry estimates.

For now, insurance premiums are so high that "not a single ship will jeopardize their trip or go there,” Vernet said.

Washington has not been part of the French-British planning, which observers have said echoes the European “coalition of the willing” that Macron and British Prime Minister Keir Starmer assembled to support Ukraine.

“We want to send the message that not only are we ready to secure the Strait of Hormuz, but that we are also capable of doing so,” a French top official said, speaking anonymously in line with the French presidency’s customary practices.

Early in the war, France sought a multinational initiative to reestablish freedom of navigation in the strait. Macron and Starmer hosted dozens of countries at a Paris summit on April 17, and military planners from more than 30 nations later finalized operational details.

The Charles de Gaulle had been ordered from the Baltic to the eastern Mediterranean soon after the war began in what the French presidency described as an “unprecedented” mobilization that also includes eight frigates and two Mistral-class amphibious assault ships.

Meanwhile, French Rafale fighters based at Al Dhafra airbase in the United Arab Emirates have been intercepting Iranian drones and missiles over the Gulf state since the war began under a long-standing defense pact with Abu Dhabi that puts some 900 French personnel on the Gulf’s southern shore.

Associated Press writer Sylvie Corbet in Paris contributed to this report.

FILE - French President Emmanuel Macron, center right, visits the French aircraft carrier Charles de Gaulle, during his visit to Cyprus, March 9, 2026. (Gonzalo Fuentes/Pool Photo via AP, File)