Tag: Border security

Outrage against Univision grows after Trump interview

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Univision has found itself at the center of a growing controversy after a recent interview with former President Trump that critics have blasted as too friendly.

The interview that aired Nov. 9 was noticeably warm, and Trump received little pushback as he gave false or misleading statements on border security and immigration policies he instituted as president.

Backlash from certain corners of the Latino community was swift, including calls for more balanced reporting and an outright boycott of the television network ahead of the 2024 election.

Latinos are considered a crucial voting bloc — and largely up for grabs — in next year’s election, likely to be a rematch between Trump and President Biden. Although Latino voters have historically favored Democrats, the Republican Party in recent years has made significant progress in courting their votes.

The exclusive interview with Trump therefore raised significant alarms within the Democratic Party and its allies that the leading Republican candidate was making unchecked claims to important swing voters.

Actor John Leguizamo posted a video to his 1 million Instagram followers Thursday criticizing the Spanish-language media company for “softballing Trump” and reportedly canceling ads for Biden. He said the television network has become “MAGA-vision.”

He implored fellow entertainers, athletes, activists and politicians to join him in boycotting the network until it reinstated “parity, and equality and equity” between the presidential candidates. The television network has also requested an interview with Biden, according to the Washington Post.

The more-than-hourlong interview with Trump was conducted by Enrique Acevedo, an anchor from Mexican network Televisa who is not a Univision journalist. The two media groups merged last year. Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner reportedly helped organize the interview.

“All you have to do is look at the owners of Univision,” Trump said in the first few minutes of the interview when asked about Latino voters and recent polls showing him defeating Biden in 2024. “They’re unbelievable entrepreneurial people, and they like me.”

“They want to see security,” Trump added. “They want to have a border.”

During the interview, Trump made questionable claims that the partial wall built along the southern border was made possible by Mexico providing thousands of soldiers “free of charge,” and that former President Obama laid the groundwork for the controversial policy at the border to deter illegal crossings that became known as the family-separation crisis. Acevedo did not push back on either claim.

“It wasn’t just a friendly interview. It was an embarrassing 1-hour puff-piece with lots of smiles and no pushback with a guy who relished in attacking, belittling and otherizing Latinos and Latin American immigrants,” Ana Navarro-Cárdenas, a prominent Nicaraguan American political strategist and commentator, said on the platform X, the company formerly known as Twitter.

León Krauze, a veteran news anchor for Univision, has since resigned from the network. He did not provide a reason for his departure.

State Sen. Susan Rubio (D-Baldwin Park), a member of the California Latino Legislative Caucus who is running for Congress, said she knew many other Latino leaders who were “personally upset” about the interview.

Rubio said she was “appalled” at how the former president “was allowed to just continue to spew lies and go unchecked” during the conversation. She called the interview “an insult to our entire Latino community.”

The network is “absolutely influential” in households like hers, she said, describing it as a news source she and her Spanish-speaking parents view as trusted and unbiased.

“Our community relies on this information to be truthful. They rely on this source that has been trusted by the Latino community for many, many generations,” she said. “They should have done a better job of making sure that our community is not lied to.”

The Congressional Hispanic Caucus plans to send a letter to the television network requesting a meeting with its chief executive, Wade Davis, and calling for stronger guardrails against disinformation, according to a draft copy of the letter reviewed by The Times.

More than 70 organizations — including prominent Latino groups such as the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, America’s Voice and the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights — signed an open letter to Davis and other TelevisaUnivision executives, sharply criticizing the interview.

The letter, first reported by the Post, asks that the network “conduct a thorough internal review, take corrective measures, and reaffirm its commitment to unbiased reporting and to keeping the Latino community informed and up-to-date with facts and truth,” according to a copy reviewed by The Times.

The controversy is more complicated than what it seems, said Mike Madrid, a GOP political consultant who has a forthcoming book called “The Latino Century: How America’s Largest Minority is Shaping Our Democracy.”

Madrid, who is a vocal critic of Trump, said the objections to the interview are reflective of how the Democratic Party and other left-leaning organizations have taken Latino voters for granted — and relied on the television network to promote their candidates and policies for decades.

Since the late 1980s, Democrats have banked on Latino voters to win elections, Madrid said. But over the last decade, Democrats have begun “hemorrhaging” second- and third-generation Latino voters who are U.S.-born and English-dominant speakers.

Madrid doesn’t dispute that the interview with Trump may have been biased or too cozy, but he said it demonstrates the media company’s shift toward the middle and, therefore, a new Latino audience.

“Where were they for the past 30 years when the Democratic Party was getting softball interviews? The Democrats have taken this base vote for granted. They assumed it was there and Univision would always be in their corner, would always be championing them and advocating for their candidates and policies,” he said. “When you’ve been the beneficiary of media bias, objectivity sounds like betrayal. That’s what’s going on.”

Instead of promoting a boycott of the network, which Madrid called “absolute madness,” Democrats should adjust their strategy and start courting Latino voters on a variety of issues, such as the economy and jobs, rather than just immigration.

“The Democrats have to figure this out very quick that going to war is not in their best interest,” he said. “They are going to have to learn to fight for this vote, when they haven’t for decades. … And they have less than a year to figure this out.”

Times staff writer Stephen Battaglio contributed to this report.

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Hannah Wiley, Julia Wick

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November 19, 2023
The Republicans Have No Majority

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Mike Johnson now knows what Kevin McCarthy was dealing with.

At the new speaker’s behest, House Republicans today relied on Democratic votes to avert a government shutdown by passing legislation that contains neither budget cuts nor conservative policy priorities. The bill was a near replica of the funding measure that McCarthy pushed through the House earlier this fall—a supposed surrender to Democrats that prompted hard-liners in his party to toss him from the speakership.

Johnson is unlikely to suffer the same fate, at least not yet. But today’s vote laid bare a reality that’s become ever more apparent over the past year: Republicans may hold more seats than Democrats, but they don’t control the House.

Under McCarthy and now Johnson, Republicans have been unable to pass just about any important legislation without significant help from Democrats. The three most consequential votes this year have been the spring budget deal that prevented a catastrophic U.S. debt default, September’s stopgap spending bill that averted a shutdown, and today’s proposal that keeps the government funded through early 2024. More Democrats than Republicans have voted for all three measures.

Read: Kevin McCarthy finally defies the right

GOP leaders have struggled to pass their own proposals on spending bills, leaving the party empty-handed in negotiations with the Democratic-led Senate and the Biden administration. Like McCarthy before him, Johnson pledged that Republicans would advance individual appropriations bills to counter the Senate’s plans to combine them into legislative packages that are too big for lawmakers to adequately review. But in the past week, he’s been forced to scrap votes on two of these proposals because of Republican opposition.

McCarthy surrendered to Democrats in late September after his members refused to pass a temporary spending bill containing deep cuts and provisions to lock down the southern border. When it was his turn, Johnson didn’t even bother to try a conservative approach. On Saturday, he unveiled a bill that maintains current spending levels—enacted by Democratic majorities in 2022—for another two months. He did not include additional funding for either Israel or Ukraine, nor did he include any policy provisions that might turn off Democrats. Johnson’s only wrinkle was to create two different deadlines for the next funding extension; funding for some departments will run out on January 19, while money for the rest of the government, including the Defense Department, will continue for another two weeks after that.

The Louisiana Republican said that the dual deadlines would spare Congress from having to consider a trillion-dollar omnibus spending package right before Christmas, as it has done repeatedly over the past several years. “That is no way to run a railroad,” Johnson said this morning on CNBC. “This innovation prevents that from happening, and I think we’ll have bipartisan agreement that that is a better way to do it.”

Johnson’s decision to avoid a partisan shutdown fight seemed to catch Democrats off guard. The White House initially slammed his proposal, but once party leaders on Capitol Hill realized that the spending bill contained no poison pills, they warmed to it. Democratic support became necessary once it was clear that Republicans would not be able to pass the measure on their own. Conservatives couldn’t even agree to allow a floor vote on the proposal, forcing Johnson to bring it up using a procedure that ultimately required the bill to receive a two-thirds majority to pass.

Republican hard-liners have been no more willing to compromise under Johnson than they were under McCarthy. The conservative House Freedom Caucus, which initially suggested the two-deadline approach, ultimately opposed the bill anyway. “It contains no spending reductions, no border security, and not a single meaningful win for the American People,” the group said in a statement. “While we remain committed to working with Speaker Johnson, we need bold change.”

Buried in that final expression of support for Johnson was the first hint of a warning. Conservatives have given the untested speaker some leeway in his opening weeks. Even McCarthy received something of a grace period; when the speaker negotiated a debt-ceiling deal with President Joe Biden, conservatives voted against the bill but didn’t try to overthrow him. Hard-liners haven’t threatened to remove Johnson, but that could change if he keeps relying on Democratic votes. When McCarthy caved to Democrats on spending for the second time, he lost his job a few days later.

The former speaker and his allies warned his GOP critics that his replacement would find themselves in the same position: managing a majority that isn’t large enough to exert its will. “I’m one of the archconservatives,” Johnson told reporters before the vote, trying to defend himself. “I want to cut spending right now, and I would have liked to put policy riders on this. But when you have a three-vote majority, as we do right now, we don’t have the votes to be able to advance that.”

Read: ‘We put sharp knives in the hands of children’

Johnson has now used up one of his free passes. The question is how many more he’ll get. In the coming weeks, the speaker will have to navigate a series of fiscal fights over funding for Israel, Ukraine, and the southern border. The bill that the House passed today buys Congress another two months to hash out its differences over spending, but it doesn’t resolve them. Johnson vowed not to agree to any more “short-term” extensions of federal funding, increasing the risk of a shutdown early next year. The speaker will also have to decide whether to press forward with an impeachment of Biden that could please conservatives but turn off Republicans in swing districts.

In the meantime, frustrated lawmakers from both parties are racing to leave Congress. Since McCarthy’s ouster, nine members, five of them Republicans, have announced their plans to resign or forgo reelection. Many more are likely to do so before the end of the year. After fewer than two terms in the House, GOP Representative Pat Fallon of Texas even considered returning to his old seat in the state legislature, which Republicans have long dominated, before changing his mind today. The frustration extended to other corners of the House GOP. “We got nothing,” another Texas Republican, Representative Chip Roy, lamented to reporters yesterday. He shouldn’t have been surprised. At the moment, Republicans in the House have a majority in name only.

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Russell Berman

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November 14, 2023
Speaker Johnson led House passage of Israel aid. But the hard part comes next in confronting Biden

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WASHINGTON — As new Speaker Mike Johnson grabbed hold of the House gavel, he made a plea for Americans to “give me a chance” before making up their minds about the newcomer’s ability to lead the far-right House Republican majority that elected him to power.

What Johnson has shown in his first big test as the House passed a nearly $14.5 billion military aid package to Israel is that the easy-going social conservative is more than eager to lift up the priorities of his right flank rather than reach toward the political center in the name of compromise.

By seeking to force the Israel-Hamas war package to be paid for with government spending cuts, something rarely required in emergencies of war or natural disasters, Johnson turned what’s normally an overwhelming bipartisan issue, support for Israel, into one that bitterly split Democrats from Republicans. President Joe Biden threatened a veto.

It’s a stark example of what may come — or not. The looming government shutdown deadline, Biden’s nearly $106 billion request for aid to Israel, Ukraine, Taiwan and U.S. border security policy and the presidential impeachment inquiry are all demanding attention from the untested new leader.

“That’s his very first opening move?” asked an incredulous Sen. Chris Coons, D-Del., a close Biden ally, echoing the sentiment of many Democrats on Capitol Hill.

“Congress is all about what caucus and which members are driving you and setting your priorities,” he said. “And part of the challenge the House seems to be having is the House Republican caucus has deep divisions between their Main Street and their MAGA Republicans.”

Johnson, of Louisiana, is trying to accomplish the seemingly impossible — uniting a fractured House Republican majority where the past GOP leaders before him have very publicly and dramatically fallen short.

The new speaker, who is closely aligned with Donald Trump, the Republican frontrunner in the 2024 election, has positioned himself as someone who can unite the GOP’s flanks. A low-key, lower-rung leader, he surprisingly rose to the top spot after more tested or fiery contenders — Steve Scalise, Jim Jordan and Tom Emmer — were brushed aside to replace the ousted former speaker, Rep. Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif..

In Johnson, House Republicans ultimately found the leader it now seems they always wanted since taking control in January — a Trump defender who challenged the 2020 election results, voted against certifying the election for Biden and reflects the deeply conservative and growing Christian nationalist wing of the GOP.

“A lot of these people don’t know me,” Johnson told Fox News host Sean Hannity in the first of multiple interviews on the cable show. “Give me a chance. Let me have a chance to lead here, and you will see what I’m really about.”

While Johnson found quick political success in his first week on the job with House passage of the Israel aid package, he is keenly aware it is a short-lived victory. The package, with its plan to pay for the aid with cuts to the IRS, would actually end up costing the government billions in lost revenue from tax dodgers, according to budget scorekeepers. and is headed toward a dismal defeat. The Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer has already rejected it.

The speaker took the risk, ceding to the far-right’s demands to reduce the size of government, and calculating that doing so will position House Republicans with the strongest hand as they fight Biden and the Senate.

Jordan, a firebrand former rival allied with Johnson, said the new speaker is doing a “good job.”

But the chairman of the Democratic caucus, Rep. Pete Aguilar, said Johnson took a flat out “wrong” move.

Democrats argue that Johnson could have launched his speakership on a consensus note and won a full vote of support on the Israel aid package, with hundreds of Democrats and Republicans coming together to support the top U.S. ally in the Middle East. But instead he chose a divisive, starkly partisan path.

“We’re learning a lot about the new speaker,” Aguilar of California said at a press conference at the Capitol.

“These are the things that Speaker Johnson has to advocate to appease the most extreme members,” he said. “They are his base. They are who gave him the gavel.”

After so much turmoil in the House this year, there is little time left for Republicans in the majority to accomplish the big goals they promised voters they would set out to do.

The year-end calendar is pressing down on Johnson in disadvantageous ways, starting with this month’s deadline to fund the government by Nov. 17 or risk another federal shutdown. A lapse in government funding is what McCarthy successfully avoided in a compromise with Democrats, but it resulted in Republicans kicking him out of the speaker’s office.

Johnson also has signaled the Biden impeachment inquiry may soon come to actual impeachment proceedings. “I do believe that very soon, we are coming to a point of decision,” he told reporters.

Johnson has promised he would turn next to Ukraine as Congress tries to broker a compromise package that would provide money to help Kyiv fight Russia as part of a broader deal to beef up security at the U.S. Mexico border as well.

During the Hannity interview Johnson signaled a break from the GOP’s rising non-interventionist wing, and vowed the Congress would not “abandon” Ukraine.

“We can’t allow Vladimir Putin to prevail in Ukraine,” he said about the Russian president.

But Johnson said the U.S. has stewardship over “the precious treasure of the American people.” And he said House Republicans want to know the administration’s strategy: “What is the endgame in Ukraine?”

It’s a high-stakes trial for the new speaker, who met with Biden his first day on the job in what he first said was a very good meeting, before questioning the president’s “age and acumen” later on Fox.

The White House and its allies have allowed little of a honeymoon for the new speaker. In the administration’s stark veto message it said the Israel package’s “new and damaging precedent would have devastating implications for our safety and alliances in the years ahead.”

Still, the White House has begun reaching out to allies over the border security demands Johnson is making in return for the aid to Ukraine.

A former House Republican, Sen. Markwayne Mullin of Oklahoma, said Washington is underestimating Johnson.

“You’ll see consistency, consistency out of Mike,” said Mullin. “Mike will not be a guy that’s going to get rattled, he’s not going to get excited.”

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November 3, 2023
Speaker Mike Johnson signals that Ukraine aid, coupled with border security, is next on GOP agenda

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WASHINGTON — New Speaker Mike Johnson told Republican senators Wednesday that a fresh Ukraine aid package linked to U.S. border security will come up quickly in the House, as soon as lawmakers wrap up the $14.5 billion Israel aid package that is heading for passage this week.

Johnson, who has been on the job a week, made the trip across the Capitol to speak privately with GOP senators to outline the agenda ahead. He also said the House plans to pass a stopgap bill to fund the government into next year to avoid a federal shutdown on Nov. 17 when current funding runs out.

Later, discussing the Israel aid during a Fox News event at the Capitol, Johnson said, “We’re going to get it done.”

Johnson was greeted with applause at the start of the lunch meeting, a get-to-know-you session for a new GOP speaker that many senators had never met — or even heard of — until he won a longshot race to replace the ousted Kevin McCarthy.

“Look, we all like the new speaker, we want him to be successful,” Sen. J.D. Vance, R-Ohio, who opposes more aid to Ukraine, said afterward. “And that was the tenor of the conversation.”

The new speaker told the senators Ukraine needs U.S. aid as it battles Russia, but there was no way President Joe Biden’s nearly $106 billion supplemental funding request, which includes aid for Israel, could be passed through the House.

“’We want to take up Ukraine,’” was his message, said Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., who opposes more funding for the overseas war.

Hawley said Johnson told the Republican senators the “next order of business” after the Israel package would be the Ukraine-U.S. border package.

Senate Democratic Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said Wednesday that the House’s Israel-only approach was dead on arrival in the Senate.

The House’s approach to emergency funds for Israel requires that the $14.5 billion be offset with spending cuts elsewhere — namely, gutting the beefed-up Internal Revenue Service funds Biden and congressional Democrats secured last year to go after tax cheats. The Congressional Budget Office said Wednesday the House’s bill would actually end up costing the federal government $12.5 billion because of the reduction in tax revenues.

Johnson’s position puts him politically sideways with Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell, who is working to approve Israel and Ukraine aid together, aid to Taiwan and funding for U.S. border security.

But McConnell had also made it clear earlier this week that Democrats “will have to accept” a serious U.S.-Mexico border security measure as part of any package with Ukraine funding.

During Wednesday’s private lunch, Johnson echoed comments he made last week, saying Congress would not abandon Ukraine even as it first works to shore up aid for Israel.

Sen. Rick Scott, R-Fla. said his impression was Johnson wants to fund government responsibly. “We want to make sure that we want Ukraine to win, but we’ve got to do all these things in a responsible manner and in the right process,” he said.

The lunchtime session opened, as it often does, with a prayer, as the speaker, a staunch conservative evangelical Christian, presented himself to his colleagues.

Conservatives, in particular, liked what they heard.

“A good person,” said Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wisc., who said there’s “not a rough edge” on the new speaker, even when he is being blunt. “He just sounds nice.”

Said Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, “The No. 1 thing I recommend to newly elected senators, newly elected House members, is do what you said you would do, and I think the speaker is showing an admirable commitment to doing exactly that.”

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November 1, 2023
Venezuelans become largest nationality for illegal border crossings as September numbers surge

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SAN DIEGO — Venezuelans became the largest nationality arrested for illegally crossing the U.S. border, replacing Mexicans for the first time on record, according to figures released Saturday that show September was the second-highest month for arrests of all nationalities.

Venezuelans were arrested 54,833 times by the Border Patrol after entering from Mexico in September, more than double from 22,090 arrests in August and well above the previous monthly high of 33,749 arrests in September 2022.

Arrests of all nationalities entering from Mexico totaled 218,763 in September, up 21% from 181,084 in August and approaching an all-time high of 222,018 in December 2022, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection. Arrests for the government’s budget year that ended Sept. 30 topped 2 million for the second year in a row, down 7% from an all-time high of more than 2.2 million arrests in the same period a year earlier.

Venezuela plunged into a political, economic and humanitarian crisis over the last decade, pushing more than 7 million people to leave. They initially settled in nearby countries in Latin America but began coming to the United States in the last three years, settling in New York, Chicago and other major cities.

The Biden administration recently announced temporary legal status for nearly 500,000 Venezuelans who were already in the United States on July 31, while vowing to deport those who come illegally after that date and fail to get asylum. It recently began deportation flights to Venezuela as part of a diplomatic thaw with the government of Nicolás Maduro, a longtime adversary.

The U.S. “surged resources and personnel” to the border in September, said Troy Miller, acting commissioner of Customs and Border Protection.

“We are continually engaging with domestic and foreign partners to address historic hemispheric migration, including large migrant groups traveling on freight trains, and to enforce consequences including by preparing for direct repatriations to Venezuela,” Miller said.

For decades, Mexicans accounted for the vast majority of illegal crossings but flows shifted over the last decade to Central Americans and, more recently, to people from South America, Africa and Asia.

Mexicans were arrested 39,733 times crossing the border in September, well behind Venezuelans. Guatemalans, Hondurans and Colombians rounded out the top five.

Republicans seized on the latest numbers as its leading presidential candidates have tried to frame the border as a major issue in next year’s elections.

“This fiscal year may have ended, but the historic crisis at our Southwest border sparked by (Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro) Mayorkas’ policies rages on,” said Rep. Mark Green of Tennessee, chair of the House Homeland Security Committee.

The Biden administration proposed about $14 billion for the border in a $106 billion spending package announced Friday and has insisted that any long-term solution requires help from Congress.

The administration has adopted a carrot-and-stick approach of new legal pathways to seek asylum with restrictions on those who don’t adhere to them.

About 43,000 migrants entered the country at land crossings with Mexico in September using a mobile app called CBP One, bringing the total to nearly 278,000 since the online appointment system began in January. Also, more than 265,000 people from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela entered through September at airports after applying online with financial sponsors.

Including those legal pathways, the number of crossings hit a new all-time monthly high of 269,735 in September and a new budget-year high of nearly 2.5 million.

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October 21, 2023
Biden is dangling border security money to try to get billions more for Israel and Ukraine

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WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden is trying to sweeten his pitch for more money for Ukraine by mixing in billions of dollars for securing the U.S.-Mexico border in the hope that it will bring more Republicans on board.

The idea came up late last month, after Ukraine assistance was stripped out of a stopgap measure to keep the government running due to growing Republican resistance to financing the war effort. A lot has changed since Sept. 30: The House has lost its speaker and Republicans are in disarray over selecting a new one, and the Oct. 7 Hamas attack on Israel has prompted a much bigger funding request by the White House.

It’s not at all clear that including roughly $14 billion in border money included as part of the the $106 billion spending package the White House sent to Congress on Friday will placate those who are resisting.

“The border has never been a money issue,” said Rep. Dan Crenshaw, R-Texas. “It has always been a policy issue. So we need to get in a room, go to the White House and sort that out.”

The conflict in the Mideast may have pulled some of the spotlight away from the U.S.-Mexico border for now, but the migration challenges facing the U.S. are growing increasingly intractable. Democratic leaders at both the state and local level are begging for federal assistance to help care for migrant families living in squalid shelters and sleeping in police stations. Republicans are loudly critical of Biden’s border policies as too lax. And Congress has not passed an immigration overhaul in decades.

There are rising numbers of migrants at the border; arrests for illegal crossings along the U.S.-Mexico line were up 21% to 218,763 last month, and Biden has repeatedly said Congress should act to fix outdated immigration laws. But in the meantime, his administration has developed policies that aim to deter migrants from making a dangerous and often deadly journey while also opening up new legal immigration pathways.

The funding request is an attempt not only to manage people crossing the U.S.-Mexico border, but also to deal with the growing numbers of migrants who are already here, waiting for their cases to play out.

The White House proposal includes $1.6 billion to hire 1,600 new asylum officers and processing personnel, which could double the number of people working on asylum cases. It also suggests $1.4 billion to add 375 immigration judges and their teams in addition to money for 1,300 new border patrol agents. There is $4.4 billion for Homeland Security efforts, including increased funding for holding facilities as the administration works to quickly deport those who do not qualify for asylum.

“That’s a real effort and acknowledgement of the backlog that exists,” said Colleen Putzel, an associate policy analyst at the Migration Policy Institute, an immigration think tank.

There’s also $1.3 billion requested for regional migration centers outside the U.S., a new effort brokered by the Biden administration to encourage would-be migrants to stay where they are and apply for asylum before crossing the deadly Darien gap between South and Central America.

The request also includes $1.4 billion to help state and local governments provide shelter and services for migrants, following pleas from Democratic mayors and governors who want more assistance in caring for newly arriving migrants.

But New York City alone is expecting to spend more than $5 billion on the issue by the end of the budget year. More than 130,600 asylum seekers have come through the city’s intake system since 2022 and there’s been criticism over the conditions under which they are living.

New York Mayor Eric Adams went to Mexico to implore would-be migrants not to come. He has accused the Biden administration of not providing enough money or resources for the city to process migrants, telling reporters in the summer: “The president and the White House have failed New York City on this issue.”

In Chicago, O’Hare International Airport is now housing hundreds of migrants from babies to the elderly at a shuttle bus center. They sleep on cardboard pads on the floor and share airport bathrooms.

“The governor has been clear about the state’s urgent need for additional federal resources to address this crisis,” said Alex Gough, speaking for Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker, a Democrat. “While we are hopeful the Biden administration will be able to take further action soon, allocating any new funding would require the GOP members in the House to get their act together and do their jobs.”

Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey said the money was “urgently needed for states like Massachusetts that are experiencing historic surges in migrant arrivals, and we appreciate the Biden administration’s acknowledgement that these funds need to be distributed more equitably.”

It’s unclear how any spending package can pass. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy was ousted by fellow Republicans and there’s no leader in sight. Republicans are already pushing back on using funds to help people who are already in the country, rather than for limiting those at the border. A group of Republican senators met Thursday to discuss proposals that they would support.

After a classified briefing with administration officials on Wednesday, Sen. Kevin Cramer, R-N.D., said he’d be inclined to support the money for Israel and Ukraine as long as there was a strong border security component. “But it’s got to be designed to secure the border, not to facilitate travel through the border,” he said.

Texas Republican Sen. John Cornyn posted online Friday that he supported aid to Israel and Ukraine. “But without meaningful and substantive policy changes that will address the #BidenBorderCrisis such aid is in serious jeopardy,” he posted on the platform X. “No more money should be spent simply to facilitate current border policy.”

It’s unclear if compromise is possible on the issue.

Sen. Chris Murphy, a Connecticut Democrat who leads a Senate panel that oversees funding for the Department of Homeland Security, was wary of mixing any effort to overhaul border policy into a debate over spending.

“How are we going to settle our differences over immigration in the next two weeks?” Murphy asked. “This is a supplemental funding bill. The minute you start loading it up with policies, that sounds like a plan to fail.”

Crenshaw, the Texas Republican, said he agreed with the three priorities of the president’s proposal: Ukraine, Israel and the border. “Conceptually, we’re on the right track here.”

But he added: “The sticking point is going to be in the details. The border is not about money; there’s some money that needs to be spent on certain things, but it is way more about policy. And so we’re going to outline very clearly that the policy needs to be effective. When I say that, I mean asylum reform.”

___

Associated Press writers Mary Clare Jalonick and Kevin Freking in Washington, Claire Savage in Chicago, Mike Casey in Boston, Patrick Whittle in Portland, Maine, Lisa Rathke in Montpelier, Vt., and Holly Ramer in Concord, N.H., contributed to this report.

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October 21, 2023
Advocacy group says a migrant has died on US border after medical issue in outdoor waiting area

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An advocacy group says a migrant died this week after having a medical emergency in an area where people wait to be processed outdoors by Border Patrol agents

ByThe Associated Press

October 13, 2023, 3:36 PM

SAN DIEGO — A migrant in a waiting area between two border walls has died this week after a medical emergency, a migrant advocacy group said. U.S. authorities confirmed Friday that someone died but gave few details.

The migrant was a 29-year-old woman from Guinea who died Wednesday after encountering medical problems at an “open-air detention site” near the San Ysidro border crossing, according to the American Friends Service Committee’s US-Mexico Border Program.

The site is an enclosed area on U.S. soil where migrants wait outdoors to be processed while under the watch of Border Patrol agents. Human rights organizations have expressed concerns about the use of outdoor detention.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection said in a statement that Border Patrol agents “were approached by an individual in medical distress” about 1 mile (1.6 kilometers) west of the port of entry.

“Shortly thereafter, the person experienced a medical emergency. First aid was immediately initiated, and the individual was subsequently transported to a nearby hospital by local emergency medical services where they passed away,” the statement said.

The statement does not acknowledge if the person was in custody and does not provide any additional details, including whether they were a migrant. The incident is being reviewed by the agency’s office of professional responsibility. A cause of death has not been determined.

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October 13, 2023
2 Palestinian militants killed in gunfight with Israeli troops in West Bank raid

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Two Palestinian militants were killed by Israeli gunfire during an army raid in the West Bank, the Palestinian health ministry says

JERUSALEM — Two Palestinian militants were killed by Israeli gunfire during an army raid in the West Bank on Thursday, the Palestinian health ministry said.

They were the latest deaths in a monthslong surge of violence in the occupied territory.

The Israeli military said its troops carried out a raid in the Tulkarem refugee camp in the early morning hours. It said that soldiers came under fire and that troops shot Palestinian gunmen. Five border police officers were wounded in the clashes, it said.

The Hamas militant group that rules the Gaza Strip later claimed the two men as its members.

The incident was the latest in a spiral of violence that has gripped the occupied territory for more than 18 months.

The Israeli military has mounted near-nightly raids into Palestinian towns, often prompting deadly clashes with residents. Militancy has surged among young Palestinians who have lost hope in their leadership and in the prospect of a political resolution to the conflict.

Nearly 200 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli fire so far this year in the West Bank, according to a tally by The Associated Press — the highest death toll in years. Israel says most of those killed have been militants, but stone-throwing youths protesting incursions as well as innocent bystanders have also been killed.

Palestinian attacks against Israelis have killed more than 30 people since the start of 2023.

Israel captured the West Bank, along with east Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip, in the 1967 Mideast war.

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October 5, 2023
Biden administration waives 26 federal laws to allow border wall construction

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McALLEN, Texas — The Biden administration announced it waived 26 federal laws in South Texas to allow border wall construction on Wednesday, marking the administration’s first use of a sweeping executive power employed often during the Trump presidency.

The Department of Homeland Security posted the announcement on the U.S. Federal Registry with few details outlining the construction in Starr County, Texas, which is part of a busy Border Patrol sector seeing “high illegal entry.” According to government data, about 245,000 illegal entries have been recorded so far this fiscal year in the Rio Grande Valley Sector which contains 21 counties.

“There is presently an acute and immediate need to construct physical barriers and roads in the vicinity of the border of the United States in order to prevent unlawful entries into the United States in the project areas,” Alejandro Mayorkas, the DHS secretary, stated in the notice.

The Clean Air Act, Safe Drinking Water Act and Endangered Species Act were some of the federal laws waived by DHS to make way for construction that will use funds from a congressional appropriation in 2019 for border wall construction. The waivers avoid time-consuming reviews and lawsuits challenging violation of environmental laws.

Starr County’s hilly ranchlands, sitting between Zapata and McAllen, Texas, is home to about 65,000 residents sparsely populating about 1,200 square miles (3,108 square kilometers) that form part of the Lower Rio Grande Valley National Wildlife Refuge.

Although no maps were provided in the announcement, CBP announced the project in June and began gathering public comments in August when it shared a map of the additional construction that can add up to 20 miles (32 kilometers) to the existing border barrier system in the area. Starr County Judge Eloy Vera said it will start south of the Falcon Dam and go past Salineño, Texas.

“The other concern that we have is that area is highly erosive. There’s a lot of arroyos,” Eloy Vera, the county judge said, pointing out the creeks cutting through the ranchland and leading into the river.

Concern is shared with environmental advocates who say structures will run through public lands, habitats of endangered plants and species like the Ocelot, a spotted wild cat.

“A plan to build a wall through will bulldoze an impermeable barrier straight through the heart of that habitat. It will stop wildlife migrations dead in their tracks. It will destroy a huge amount of wildlife refuge land. And it’s a horrific step backwards for the borderlands,” Laiken Jordahl, a southwest conservation advocate for the Center for Biological Diversity, said Wednesday afternoon.

During the Trump administration, about 450 miles (724 kilometers) of barriers were built along the southwest border between 2017 and January 2021. Texas Governor Greg Abbott renewed those efforts after the Biden administration halted them at the start of his presidency.

The DHS decision on Wednesday contrasts the Biden administration’s posturing when a proclamation to end the construction on Jan. 20, 2021, stated, “building a massive wall that spans the entire southern border is not a serious policy solution.”

In a statement Wednesday, CBP said the project is consistent with that 2021 proclamation. “Congress appropriated fiscal year 2019 funds for the construction of border barrier in the Rio Grande Valley, and DHS is required to use those funds for their appropriated purpose,” the statement said. “CBP remains committed to protecting the nation’s cultural and natural resources and will implement sound environmental practices as part of the project covered by this waiver.”

The announcement prompted political debate by the Democratic administration facing an increase of migrants entering through the southern border in recent months, including thousands who entered the U.S. through Eagle Pass at the end of September.

“A border wall is a 14th century solution to a 21st century problem. It will not bolster border security in Starr County,” U.S. Representative Henry Cuellar said in a statement. “I continue to stand against the wasteful spending of taxpayer dollars on an ineffective border wall.”

Political proponents of the border wall said the waivers should be used as a launching pad for a shift in policy.

“After years of denying that a border wall and other physical barriers are effective, the DHS announcement represents a sea change in the administration’s thinking: A secure wall is an effective tool for maintaining control of our borders,” Dan Stein, president of the Federation for American Immigration Reform, said in a statement. “Having made that concession, the administration needs to immediately begin construction of wall across the border to prevent the illegal traffic from simply moving to other areas of the border.”

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October 4, 2023
On the brink of a government shutdown, McCarthy pivots to a 45-day plan relying on Democratic help

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WASHINGTON — On the brink of a federal government shutdown, Speaker Kevin McCarthy announced a dramatic pivot Saturday, trying to push a 45-day funding bill through the House with Democratic help — a move that could keep government open but most certainly risks his job.

Republican lawmakers met behind closed doors early in the morning with hours to go before the midnight deadline needed to fund government operations or face a disruptive federal closure. The new approach would leave behind aid to Ukraine, White House priority opposed by a growing number of GOP lawmakers.

The House was preparing for a quick vote Saturday on the plan, but Democrats hit the brakes, seeking time so they could read the 71-page bill. Across the Capitol, the Senate was opening a rare weekend session and hoping to advance its own stopgap plan.

“We’re going to do our job,” McCarthy said after the morning meeting. “We’re going to be adults in the room. And we’re going to keep government open.”

With no deal in place before Sunday, federal workers will face furloughs, more than 2 million active-duty and reserve military troops will work without pay and programs and services that Americans rely on from coast to coast will begin to face shutdown disruptions.

The sudden House action would fund government at current 2023 levels for 45 days and provide money for U.S. disaster relief — but without the Ukraine aid to fight the war effort against Russia.

McCarthy, R-Calif., will be forced to rely on Democrats for passage because the speaker’s hard-right flank has said it will oppose any short-term measure. McCarthy was setting up a process for voting that will require a two-thirds supermajority, about 290 votes in the 435-member House for passage. Republicans hold a 221-212 majority, with two vacancies.

Relying on Democratic votes and leaving his right-flank behind is something that the hard-right lawmakers have warned will risk McCarthy’s job as speaker. They are almost certain to quickly file a motion to try to remove McCarthy from that office, though it is not at all certain there would be enough votes to topple the speaker.

“If somebody wants to remove because I want to be the adult in the room, go ahead and try,” McCarthy said of the threat to oust him. “But I think this country is too important.”

The quick pivot comes after the collapse Friday of McCarthy’s earlier plan to pass a Republican-only bill with steep spending cuts up to 30% to most government agencies that the White House and Democrats rejected as too extreme.

“Our options are slipping away every minute,” said one senior Republican, Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart of Florida.

In the Senate, a bipartisan package would fund the government through Nov. 17.

“Congress has only one option to avoid a shutdown — bipartisanship,” said Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y.

Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky echoed the sentiment, warning his own hard-right colleagues there is nothing to gain by shutting down the federal government.

“It heaps unnecessary hardships on the American people, as well as the brave men and women who keep us safe,” McConnell said.

The federal government is heading straight into a shutdown that poses grave uncertainty for federal workers in states all across America and the people who depend on them — from troops to border control agents to office workers, scientists and others.

Families that rely on Head Start for children, food benefits and countless other programs large and small are confronting potential interruptions or outright closures. At the airports, Transportation Security Administration officers and air traffic controllers are expected to work without pay, but travelers could face delays in updating their U.S. passports or other travel documents.

An earlier McCarthy plan to keep the government open collapsed Friday due to opposition from a faction of 21 hard-right holdouts despite steep spending cuts of nearly 30% to many agencies and severe border security provisions.

The White House has brushed aside McCarthy’s overtures to meet with President Joe Biden after the speaker walked away from the debt deal they brokered earlier this year that set budget levels.

Catering to his hard-right flank, McCarthy had returned to the spending limits the conservatives demanded back in January as part of the deal-making to help him become the House speaker.

After Friday’s vote, McCarthy’s chief Republican critic, Rep. Matt Gaetz of Florida, said the speaker’s bill “went down in flames as I’ve told you all week it would.”

Some of the Republican holdouts, including Gaetz, are allies of former President Donald Trump, who is Biden’s chief rival in the 2024 race. Trump has been encouraging the Republicans to fight hard for their priorities and even to “shut it down.”

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September 30, 2023
McCarthy’s last-ditch plan to keep the government open collapses, making a shutdown almost certain

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WASHINGTON — House Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s last-ditch plan to keep the federal government temporarily open collapsed in dramatic fashion Friday as a robust faction of hard-right holdouts rejected the package, making a shutdown almost certain.

McCarthy’s right-flank Republicans refused to support the bill despite its steep spending cuts of nearly 30% to many agencies and severe border security provisions, calling it insufficient.

The White House and Democrats rejected the Republican approach as too extreme. The vote was 198-232, with 21 hard-right Republicans voting to sink the package. The Democrats voted against it.

The bill’s complete failure a day before Saturday’s deadline to fund the government leaves few options to prevent a shutdown that will furlough federal workers, keep the military working without pay and disrupt programs and services for millions of Americans.

A clearly agitated McCarthy left the House chamber. “It’s not the end yet; I’ve got other ideas,” he told reporters.

The outcome puts McCarthy’s speakership in serious jeopardy with almost no political leverage to lead the House at a critical moment that has pushed the government into crisis. Even the failed plan, an extraordinary concession to immediately slash spending by one-third for many agencies, was not enough to satisfy the hard-right flank that has upturned his speakership.

The federal government is heading straight into a shutdown after midnight Saturday that would leave 2 million military troops without pay, furlough federal workers and disrupt government services and programs that Americans rely on from coast to coast. Congress has been unable to fund the agencies or pass a temporary bill to keep offices open.

The Senate was pushing ahead Friday with its own plan favored by Republicans and Democrats to keep the government open while also bolstering Ukraine aid and U.S. disaster accounts. But that won’t matter with the House in political chaos.

The White House has brushed aside McCarthy’s overtures to meet with President Joe Biden after the speaker walked away from the debt deal they brokered earlier this year that set budget levels.

“Extreme House Republicans are now tripling down on their demands to eviscerate programs millions of hardworking families count on,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said.

Jean-Pierre said, “The path forward to fund the government has been laid out by the Senate with bipartisan support — House Republicans just need to take it.”

Catering to his hard-right flank, McCarthy had returned to the spending limits the conservatives demanded back in January as part of the deal-making to help him become the House speaker.

His package would not have cut the Defense, Veterans or Homeland Security departments but would have slashed almost all other agencies by up to 30% — steep hits to a vast array of programs, services and departments Americans routinely depend on.

It also added strict new border security provisions that would kickstart building the wall at the southern border with Mexico, among other measures. Additionally, the package would have set up a bipartisan debt commission to address the nation’s mounting debt load.

Ahead of voting, the Republican speaker all but dared his holdout colleagues to oppose the package a day before Saturday’s almost certain shutdown. The House bill would have kept operations open through Oct. 31.

“Every member will have to go on record where they stand,” McCarthy said.

Asked if he had the votes, McCarthy said, “We’ll see.”

But as soon as the floor debate began, McCarthy’s chief Republican critic, Rep. Matt Gaetz of Florida, announced he would be voting against the package, urging his colleagues to “not surrender.”

The hard right, led by Gaetz, has been threatening McCarthy’s ouster, with a looming vote to try to remove him from the speaker’s office unless he meets the conservative demands. Still, it’s unclear if any other Republican would have support from the House majority to lead the party.

Gaetz said afterward that the speaker’s bill “went down in flames as I’ve told you all week it would.”

He and others rejecting the temporary measure want the House to instead keep pushing through the 12 individual spending bills needed to fund the government, typically a weeks-long process, as they pursue their conservative priorities.

Some of the Republican holdouts, including Gaetz, are allies of Donald Trump, who is Biden’s chief rival in 2024. The former president has been encouraging the Republicans to fight hard for their priorities and even to “shut it down.”

The margin of defeat shocked even Republican members.

Rep. Mike Garcia, R-Calif., said: “I think what this does, if anything, I think it’s going to rally people around the speaker and go: ‘Hey, the dysfunction here is not coming from leadership in this case. The dysfunction is coming from individuals that don’t understand the implications of what we’re doing here.’”

Garcia said, “For the people that claim this isn’t good enough, I want to hear what good enough looks like.”

Another Republican, Rep. Ralph Norman of South Carolina, a member of the Freedom Caucus who supported the package, suggested the House was losing its leverage with the failed vote: “We control the purse strings. We just ceded them to the Senate.”

Republicans convened for a closed-door meeting later Friday afternoon that grew heated, lawmakers said, but failed to produce a new plan. Leaders announced the House would stay in session next week, rather than return home, to keep working on some of the 12 spending bills.

Rep. Rosa DeLauro of Connecticut, the top Democrat on the Appropriations Committee, criticized the proposed Republican cuts as hurting law enforcement and education and taking food out of the mouths of millions. She said 275,000 children would lose access to Head Start, making it harder for parents to work.

“This is a pointless charade with grave consequences for the American people,” DeLauro said.

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September 29, 2023
Mexico’s president slams US aid for Ukraine and sanctions on Venezuela and Cuba

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MEXICO CITY — Mexico’s president on Friday slammed U.S. aid for Ukraine and economic sanctions on Venezuela, Cuba and other nations as the first of two high-level U.S.-Mexico meetings got underway in Washington.

President Andrés Manuel López Obrador issued a broad criticism of U.S. foreign policy, saying U.S. economic sanctions were forcing people to emigrate from Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua.

The harsh comments came as U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken, Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo and Trade Representative Katherine Tai met their Mexican counterparts at the State Department. None of the officials, including Mexican Foreign Secretary Alicia Bárcena and Secretary of Economy Raquel Buenrostro, addressed or were asked about López Obrador’s comments.

Instead they concentrated on expanded trade and economic ties, hailing new cooperation on those fronts, and stressed their commitment to fight the surge of synthetic opioids like fentanyl into the U.S. from Mexico.

“By creating the right incentives and business environments and harnessing our two nations’ respective strengths, we have a tremendous opportunity to make North America the most competitive, the most productive, the most dynamic region in the world,” Blinken said.

“We’re continuing to strengthen, to expand, and diversify supply chains in emerging industries like electric vehicles and semiconductors,” he said, noting that the U.S. and Mexico are launching a new initiative to produce semiconductors.

Although Friday’s talks focused on commerce issues, Blinken will lead a U.S. delegation to Mexico next week with Attorney General Merrick Garland and Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas that will focus on border security and migration.

The State Department said in a statement that Blinken would be meeting López Obrador during the Oct. 4-5 trip.

Experts say economic mismanagement and political repression are largely to blame for the tide of migrants leaving Venezuela and Cuba.

López Obrador said the United States should spend some of the money sent to Ukraine on economic development in Latin America.

“They (the U.S.) don’t do anything,” he said. “It’s more, a lot more, what they authorize for the war in Ukraine than what they give to help with poverty in Latin America and the Caribbean.”

He called for a U.S. program “to remove blockades and stop harassing independent and free countries, an integrated plan for cooperation so the Venezuelans, Cubans, Nicaraguans and Ecuadorans, Guatemalans and Hondurans wouldn’t be forced to emigrate.”

There has been a surge in Venezuelan migrants moving through Mexico in recent weeks in a bid to reach the U.S. border. Many of the migrants say deteriorating economic and political conditions in their home country led them to make the journey.

Mexico has condemned the Russian invasion of Ukraine but has adopted a policy of neutrality and has refused to participate in sanctions. Mexico also continues to buy 2020-vintage COVID-19 vaccines from Russia and Cuba.

The Mexican president laughed off an effort by U.S. Republican lawmakers to cut the tiny amount of foreign aid the U.S. gives to Mexico. López Obrador estimated it involved $40 or $50 million, calling it “ridiculous.”

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September 29, 2023
Commander Biden bites another Secret Service employee at the White House

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President Joe Biden’s dog Commander has bitten another U.S. Secret Service employee

ByThe Associated Press

September 26, 2023, 6:29 PM

FILE – President Joe Biden’s dog Commander, a German shepherd, is walked outside the West Wing of the White House in Washington, April 29, 2023. Commander has bitten another U.S. Secret Service employee. A uniformed division officer was bitten by the dog around 8 p.m. Monday, Sept. 25, at the White House, and was treated on-site by medical personnel, said USSS chief of communications Anthony Guglielmi. The officer is doing just fine, he said. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster, File)

The Associated Press

WASHINGTON — WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden ’s dog Commander has bitten another U.S. Secret Service employee.

A uniformed division officer was bitten by the dog around 8 p.m. Monday at the White House, and was treated on-site by medical personnel, said USSS chief of communications Anthony Guglielmi. The officer is doing just fine, he said.

Elizabeth Alexander, communications director for first lady Jill Biden, said “the White House can be a stressful environment for family pets, and the first family continues to work on ways to help Commander handle the often unpredictable nature of the White House grounds.”

She said the Bidens are “incredibly grateful to the Secret Service and Executive Residence staff for all they do to keep them, their family, and the country safe.”

The German Shepherd purebred has bit or otherwise attacked Secret Service personnel at least 10 other times between October 2022 and January, including one incident that required a hospital visit by the injured law enforcement officer, according to records from the Department of Homeland Security.

Commander is the second dog of Biden’s to behave aggressively, including biting Secret Service personnel and White House staff. They eventually sent the first dog, a German shepherd named Major, to live with friends in Delaware after those incidents.

The Secret Service provides security protection for the president and his family, and scores of its officers are posted around the executive mansion and its sprawling grounds.

Biden received Commander in December 2021 as a gift from his brother James. The family also has a cat, Willow.

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September 26, 2023
The Biden administration is poised to allow Israeli citizens to travel to the US without a US visa

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WASHINGTON — The Biden administration is poised to admit Israel this week into an exclusive club that will allow its citizens to travel to the United States without a U.S. visa despite Washington’s ongoing concerns about the Israeli government’s treatment of Palestinian Americans.

U.S. officials say an announcement of Israel’s entry into the Visa Waiver Program is planned for late in the week, just before the end of the federal budget year on Saturday, which is the deadline for Israel’s admission without having to requalify for eligibility next year.

The Department of Homeland Security administers the program, which currently allows citizens of 40 mostly European and Asian countries to travel to the U.S. for three months without visas.

Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas is set to make the announcement Thursday, shortly after receiving a recommendation from Secretary of State Antony Blinken that Israel be admitted, according to five officials familiar with the matter who spoke Sunday on condition of anonymity because the decision has not yet been publicly announced.

Blinken’s recommendation is expected to be delivered no later than Tuesday, the officials said, and the final announcement will come just eight days after President Joe Biden met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in New York on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly. The leaders did not raise the issue in their brief remarks to reporters at that meeting but it has been a subject of intense negotiation and debate for months as has been the Biden administration’s effort to secure a deal to normalize relations between Israel and Saudi Arabia.

Both State and the Homeland Security departments said they had “nothing to announce publicly at this time,” adding that the two agencies will make a “final determination in the coming days.” The U.S. is working with Israel toward “fulfilling the full range of law enforcement, national security, and immigration related requirements” of the program, according to the State Department.

Israel’s admission has been a priority for successive Israeli leaders and will be a major accomplishment for Netanyahu, who has sparred frequently with the Biden administration over Iran, the Palestinian conflict and most recently a proposed remake of Israel’s judicial system that critics say will make the country less democratic.

Netanyahu’s far-right government has drawn repeated U.S. criticism over its treatment of Palestinians, including its aggressive construction of West Bank settlements, its opposition to Palestinian statehood and incendiary anti-Palestinian comments by senior Cabinet ministers.

The U.S. move will give a welcome boost at home to Netanyahu. He has faced months of mass protests against his judicial plan and is likely to come under criticism from the Palestinians, who say the U.S. should not be rewarding the Israeli government at a time when peace efforts are at a standstill.

Israel met two of the three most critical criteria over the past two years — a low percentage of visa application rejections and a low visa overstay rate — to join the U.S. program. It had struggled to meet the third, which is a requirement for reciprocity that means all U.S. citizens, including Palestinian Americans, must be treated equally when traveling to or through Israel.

Claiming national security reasons, Israel has long had separate entry requirements and screening processes for Palestinian Americans. Many complained that the procedures were onerous and discriminatory. Americans with Palestinian residency documents in the West Bank and Gaza Strip were largely barred from using Israel’s international airport. Instead, like other Palestinians, they were forced to travel through either Jordan or Egypt to reach their destinations.

In recent months, Israel has moved to adjust its entry requirements for Palestinian Americans, including allowing them to fly in and out of Ben Gurion International Airport in Tel Aviv and going directly to the West Bank and Israel proper, according to the officials. Israel also has pledged to ease movement for Palestinian Americans traveling in and out of the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip.

New regulations took effect earlier this month to codify the changes, although concerns remain and the Homeland Security Department intends to stress in its announcement that it will continue to monitor the situation to ensure that Israel complies, according to the officials. Failure to comply could result in Israel’s suspension from the program, the officials said.

Palestinian American activists have been critical of the impending decision, which has been expected for some time due to the priority placed on it by both the Israeli and U.S. governments.

“There are so many problems with this decision,” said Yousef Munayyer, the head of the Palestine-Israel Program and senior fellow at Arab Center Washington. “The reciprocity requirement is clearly still not being met since Israeli policy continues to treat some Americans, specifically Palestinian Americans, differently. The administration however seems committed at the highest levels to overlooking this continued discrimination against American citizens to rush Israel into the program before the deadline.”

Munayyer said it was “unclear why the Biden administration seems dead set on offering political victories for Benjamin Netanyahu at a time when his far-right government is outraging Palestinians and many Israelis with their extremist agenda.”

Under the waiver program, Israelis will be able to travel to the U.S. for business or leisure purposes for up to 90 days without a visa simply by registering with the Electronic System for Travel Authorization.

___

Associated Press writer Josef Federman in Jerusalem contributed to this report.

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September 24, 2023
With temporary status for Venezuelans, the Biden administration turns to a familiar tool

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MEXICO CITY — From a White House podium in May, U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas outlined new legal pathways to the United States for Venezuelans and others, along with a “very clear” message for those who come illegally.

“Our borders are not open. People who cross our border unlawfully and without a legal basis to remain will be promptly processed and removed,” he said.

On Wednesday, Mayorkas announced temporary legal status for an estimated 472,000 Venezuelans who had arrived in the country as of July 31 — including some who ignored his stern warnings and came illegally. Circumstances change, but the Biden administration’s sharp expansion of Temporary Protected Status may complicate its messaging.

Many Venezuelans will migrate to the United States with or without prospects for TPS, a 1990 law that empowers the Homeland Security secretary to grant eligibility for work permits in renewable increments of up to 18 months to people whose home countries are deemed unsafe due to natural disasters or civil strife.

But administration critics say the vast sweep of Mayorkas’ announcement will encourage other Venezuelans to try to enter the U.S., figuring that warnings of swift deportations ring hollow and another expansion will follow.

Smugglers will seize on the news, said Chad Wolf, acting Homeland Security secretary under President Donald Trump, whose administration sought to severely limit and reduce use of TPS.

“It’s just going to incentivize more and more, because you’re giving them a benefit that they want,” he said.

Others disagree. Outside a Mexico City bus station Friday, U.S.-bound Venezuelans, none of whom had heard the TPS news, said conditions at home drove them. Danny Romero, 45, flashed a family photo to explain his motivations.

“The one who is 18 years old wants to study medicine, but how can I pay for his school if I don’t have the money? I can’t ruin that dream,” said Romero, who left the northern city of Valencia on Sept. 2.

He came with a nephew and a few belongings in a backpack. His children and their mother remain in Venezuela. The son who hopes to become a doctor is working as a barber, and another, 14, sells drawings for a dollar each.

A political, social and economic crisis over the last decade has pushed millions of Venezuelans into poverty, with teachers, professors and public employees relying on side jobs or money from relatives abroad to make ends meet. At least 7.3 million have left the country, with many risking an often-harrowing route to the United States.

The recent announcement of status for 472,000 Venezuelans came on top of more than 242,000 who were previously covered under TPS grants in 2021 and 2022.

Returning home to Venezuela is unsafe “due to the enduring humanitarian, security, political, and environmental conditions,” Mayorkas said.

“However, it is critical that Venezuelans understand that those who have arrived here after July 31, 2023, are not eligible for such protection, and instead will be removed when they are found to not have a legal basis to stay,” he said.

Mayorkas on Saturday added that his department was using whatever tools it could to secure the border but emphasized broader issues that only Congress can fix.

“Our immigration system is absolutely broken,” he said during a tour with Honduran President Xiomara Castro in McAllen, Texas. “A fact on which everyone agrees and Congress needs to fix it. They have failed to do so for decades. … Most recently, Congress has yet to act on our request for $4 billion in funding and resources to address the immediate challenge — funding that is critical to our efforts and for border communities.”

Under Mayorkas’ watch, TPS grew to cover more than 600,000 people from 16 countries as of the end of March, according to the Congressional Research Service. On Thursday, the secretary extended protections to an estimated 14,600 Afghans, on top of the 3,100 who already had them.

Democratic mayors and governors have increasingly pressured the White House to help more with the migratory influx. The city of New York says 40% of the roughly 60,000 asylum-seekers it houses came from Venezuela, and 15,000 of them will now qualify for TPS.

More Venezuelans were encountered at the border this month than nationals of any other country except Mexico, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection figures released by Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador. Venezuelans were stopped 25,777 times the first 17 days of September, up 63% from the same period a month earlier. Those included some people admitted for scheduled asylum appointments, but the vast majority were illegal entries.

In Eagle Pass, Texas, on Saturday, an international rail bridge reopened about three days after it closed in response to the migrant influx.

About 900 migrants crossed Thursday and 1,200 Friday as of mid-afternoon, Maverick County Sheriff Tom Schmerber. Those numbers were down from earlier in the week.

Many migrants released from CBP custody arrived at Eagle Pass’ only migrant shelter, Mission: Border Hope.

The shelter recently moved to a new location that was previously a Sears store. Because of the increase in migrants, shelter officials decided to skip an inauguration ceremony Tuesday and immediately open, said Valeria Wheeler, the shelter executive director.

“We still do not have the signage,” Wheeler said.

Problems surfaced the first day with the plumbing, but migrants such as Mari Isabel Cadena said they were happy to have food, water, and shelter while they waited for their relatives to be released and for a bus to take them to their final destinations.

Jeremy MacGillivray, deputy representative of the United Nations’ International Organization for Migration in Mexico, declined to predict the impact of the TPS expansion but said, based on past experience, that “it is likely that measures of this kind, even when positive, encourage people to set out.”

Smugglers sell their services by saying, “Look, President Biden announced the expansion of this measure for Venezuelans, now is the time to come to the border,” MacGillivray said.

Pedro Luis Guerra, a Venezuelan who lived in a Chicago police station lobby after reaching the city in April with his wife and young child, said TPS will be “a great help” to his family. “This is what we’ve wanted for so long, because we came here to succeed and to work, to provide for ourselves and not to be relying on others,” he said.

Guerra said Venezuelans closely follow U.S. immigration policy news but this week’s developments won’t encourage more to come because “those who arrive after July, this law won’t apply to them, so for them the situation remains the same.”

Jenny Martínez, a 39-year-old nurse who saw her salary eaten up by inflation back home, said conditions there are “too terrible” and Venezuelans are so desperate that many will try to reach the U.S. regardless of what awaits them in terms of legal status.

Speaking in Mexico City across the street from the bus station where she hoped to board a bus north along with her teenage daughter and toddler son, Martínez said the family has been living off remittances from her husband in Utah for the last 18 months and are now hoping to join him there.

“Venezuelans are going to try to enter no matter what, with or without papers,” she said. “This is about crossing to be able to work, to be able to send money to grandparents.”

___

Spagat reported from San Diego. Associated Press writers Rebecca Santana in Washington, Christopher Sherman in Mexico City and Melissa Winder in Chicago contributed.

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September 23, 2023
With temporary status for Venezuelans, the Biden administration turns to a familiar tool

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MEXICO CITY — From a White House podium in May, U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas outlined new legal pathways to the United States for Venezuelans and others, along with a “very clear” message for those who come illegally.

“Our borders are not open. People who cross our border unlawfully and without a legal basis to remain will be promptly processed and removed,” he said.

On Wednesday, Mayorkas announced temporary legal status for an estimated 472,000 Venezuelans who had arrived in the country as of July 31 — including some who ignored his stern warnings and came illegally. Circumstances change, but the Biden administration’s sharp expansion of Temporary Protected Status may complicate its messaging.

Many Venezuelans will migrate to the United States with or without prospects for TPS, a 1990 law that empowers the Homeland Security secretary to grant eligibility for work permits in renewable increments of up to 18 months to people whose home countries are deemed unsafe due to natural disasters or civil strife.

But administration critics say the vast sweep of Mayorkas’s announcement will encourage other Venezuelans to try to enter the U.S., figuring that warnings of swift deportations ring hollow and another expansion will follow.

Smugglers will seize on the news, said Chad Wolf, acting Homeland Security secretary under President Donald Trump, whose administration sought to severely limit and reduce use of TPS.

“It’s just going to incentivize more and more, because you’re giving them a benefit that they want,” he said.

Others disagree. Outside a Mexico City bus station Friday, U.S.-bound Venezuelans, none of whom had heard the TPS news, said conditions at home drove them. Danny Romero, 45, flashed a family photo to explain his motivations.

“The one who is 18 years old wants to study medicine, but how can I pay for his school if I don’t have the money? I can’t ruin that dream,” said Romero, who left the northern city of Valencia on Sept. 2.

He came with a nephew and a few belongings in a backpack. His children and their mother remain in Venezuela. The son who hopes to become a doctor is working as a barber, and another, 14, sells drawings for a dollar each.

A political, social and economic crisis over the last decade has pushed millions of Venezuelans into poverty, with teachers, professors and public employees relying on side jobs or money from relatives abroad to make ends meet. At least 7.3 million have left the country, with many risking an often-harrowing route to the United States.

The recent announcement of status for 472,000 Venezuelans came on top of more than 242,000 who were previously covered under TPS grants in 2021 and 2022.

Returning home to Venezuela is unsafe “due to the enduring humanitarian, security, political, and environmental conditions,” Mayorkas said.

“However, it is critical that Venezuelans understand that those who have arrived here after July 31, 2023, are not eligible for such protection, and instead will be removed when they are found to not have a legal basis to stay,” he said.

Homeland Security said Saturday that it was using “the limited tools it has available,” while Congress has failed to agree to comprehensive changes tot he U.S. immigration system.

Under Mayorkas’ watch, TPS grew to cover more than 600,000 people from 16 countries as of the end of March, according to the Congressional Research Service. On Thursday the secretary extended protections to an estimated 14,600 Afghans, on top of the 3,100 who already had them.

Democratic mayors and governors have increasingly pressured the White House to help more with the migratory influx. The city of New York says 40% of the roughly 60,000 asylum-seekers it houses came from Venezuela, and 15,000 of them will now qualify for TPS.

More Venezuelans were encountered at the border this month than nationals of any other country except Mexico, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection figures released by Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador. Venezuelans were stopped 25,777 times the first 17 days of September, up 63% from the same period a month earlier. Those included some people admitted for scheduled asylum appointments, but the vast majority were illegal entries.

In Eagle Pass, Texas, on Saturday, an international rail bridge reopened about three days after it closed in response to the migrant influx.

Jeremy MacGillivray, deputy representative of the United Nations’ International Organization for Migration in Mexico, declined to predict the impact of the TPS expansion but said, based on past experience, that “it is likely that measures of this kind, even when positive, encourage people to set out.”

Smugglers sell their services by saying, “Look, President Biden announced the expansion of this measure for Venezuelans, now is the time to come to the border,” MacGillivray said.

Pedro Luis Guerra, a Venezuelan who lived in a Chicago police station lobby after reaching the city in April with his wife and young child, said TPS will be “a great help” to his family. “This is what we’ve wanted for so long, because we came here to succeed and to work, to provide for ourselves and not to be relying on others,” he said.

Guerra said Venezuelans closely follow U.S. immigration policy news but this week’s developments won’t encourage more to come because “those who arrive after July, this law won’t apply to them, so for them the situation remains the same.”

But Jenny Martínez, a 39-year-old nurse who saw her salary eaten up by inflation back home, said conditions there are “too terrible” and Venezuelans are so desperate that many will try to reach the U.S. regardless of what awaits them in terms of legal status.

Speaking in Mexico City across the street from the bus station where she hoped to board a bus north along with her teenage daughter and toddler son, Martínez said the family has been living off remittances from her husband in Utah for the last 18 months and now they’re hoping to join him there.

“The (Venezuelan) government gives you that minimum wage, and what does one do with that? Nothing,” she said. “Venezuelans are going to try to enter no matter what, with or without papers. This is about crossing to be able to work, to be able to send money to grandparents.”

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Spagat reported from San Diego. Associated Press writers Rebecca Santana in Washington, Christopher Sherman in Mexico City and Melissa Winder in Chicago contributed.

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September 23, 2023
Germany considering short-term migration border controls with Poland and the Czech Republic

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A government official says that Germany is considering establishing short-term border controls with Poland and the Czech Republic to keep irregular migrants from entering the country

ByThe Associated Press

September 22, 2023, 2:57 PM

Federal Minister of the Interior and Home Affairs Nancy Faeser speaks during the government questioning in the plenary session in the German Bundestag, in Berlin, Germany, Wednesday Sept. 20, 2023. (Bernd von Jutrczenka/dpa via AP)

The Associated Press

BERLIN — Germany is considering establishing short-term border controls with Poland and the Czech Republic to keep irregular migrants from entering the country, a government official said Friday.

Interior Minister Nancy Faeser told German newspaper Welt am Sonntag that setting up temporary police checks on border crossings would help Germany prevent the smuggling and trafficking of people.

She added that the increased border checks would need to be combined with the already ongoing random police checks that are being carried out.

Germany, Poland and the Czech Republic belong to the European Union’s visa-free zone, commonly known as the Schengen Area.

“Respective additional border police measures are currently being reviewed,” a German Interior Ministry spokesperson told the German news agency dpa.

Faeser is also discussing with the Czech Republic the possibility of German police officers operating on Czech territory, similar to an agreement that Germany has struck with Switzerland.

“In close coordination with Swiss police forces, German police officers are allowed to inspect on Swiss territory and to prevent unauthorized entry (into Germany),” the minister said.

Faeser also demanded closer cooperation on migration between the EU and Turkey, and said that the current EU-Turkey deal required an “update.”

The number of people who migrated to Germany in 2022 was higher than in any other year, according to the German federal statistics agency Destatis, with about 2.67 million people having entered the country in 2022.

Included in the number are 1.1 million Ukrainian refugees who sought safety in Germany after Russian launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

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Follow AP’s coverage of migration issues at https://apnews.com/hub/migration

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September 22, 2023
Under pressure over border, Biden administration to protect hundreds of thousands of Venezuelans

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WASHINGTON — The Biden administration said Wednesday that it was granting temporary legal status to hundreds of thousands of Venezuelans who are already in the country — quickly making them eligible to work — as it grapples with growing numbers of people fleeing the South American country and elsewhere to arrive at the U.S. border with Mexico.

The move — along with promises to accelerate work permits for many migrants — may appease Democratic leaders who have pressured the White House to do more to aid asylum seekers, while also providing grist for Republicans who say the president has been too lax on immigration.

The Homeland Security Department plans to grant Temporary Protected Status to an estimated 472,000 Venezuelans who arrived in the country as of July 31, 2023, making it easier for them to get authorization to work in the U.S. That’s been a key demand of Democratic mayors and governors who are struggling to care for an increased number of migrants in their care.

That’s in addition to about 242,700 Venezuelans who already qualified for temporary status before Wednesday’s announcement.

The protections for Venezuelans are significant because they account for such a large number of the migrants who have been arriving in the country in recent years.

Venezuela plunged into a political, economic and humanitarian crisis over the last decade, pushing at least 7.3 million people to migrate and making food and other necessities unaffordable for those who remain. The vast majority who fled settled in neighboring countries in Latin America, but many began coming to the United States in the last three years through the notoriously dangerous Darien Gap, a stretch of jungle in Panama.

Venezuelans who arrive in the U.S. after July 31 of this year will not be eligible for the protection. Those who are now eligible have to apply to get it.

Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas granted the expansion and an 18-month extension for those who already have temporary status due to “Venezuela’s increased instability and lack of safety due to the enduring humanitarian, security, political, and environmental conditions,” the department said in a statement.

The administration said it would accelerate work authorizations for people who have arrived in the country since January through a mobile app for appointments at land crossings with Mexico, called CBP One, or through parole granted to Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans and Venezuelans who have financial sponsors and arrive at an airport. It will aim to give them work permits within 30 days, compared with about 90 days currently.

The promise of accelerated work permits does not apply to people who cross the border illegally and seek asylum, who, by law, must wait for six months to receive work permits.

Mayors and governors have been clamoring for President Joe Biden to figure out a way to get newly arrived migrants to be able to work legally, so they can support themselves.

Democratic officials in New York , Massachusetts, Chicago and elsewhere have complained about the strain that newly arrived migrants are putting on their resources, especially in New York, where the government is required to provide housing for anyone who needs it. The city is currently paying to house about 60,000 newly arrived migrants.

New York Gov. Kathy Hochul said in a statement late Wednesday that she was “grateful the federal government has acted so speedily to grant one of our top priorities: Temporary Protected Status to Venezuelan asylum seekers and migrants who have already arrived in this country.”

The city’s mayor, Eric Adams, has been especially critical of the Biden administration. But Adams on Wednesday praised the decision to grant protections to Venezuelans and thanked the administration for listening to the city’s concerns.

The number of migrants trying to cross the southern border is rising. That poses a severe challenge for the administration, which has struggled to show it is in control of the border in the face of Republican criticism. The city of Eagle Pass, which borders Mexico along the Rio Grande in southern Texas, announced a state of emergency Wednesday due to a “severe undocumented immigrant surge.”

According to Maverick County Sheriff Tom Schmerber, about 2,700 migrants crossed into Eagle Pass on Tuesday and about 3,000 Wednesday.

The administration also said Wednesday it was also using Defense Department forces to support Homeland Security staff on the border. Homeland Security already uses about 2,500 National Guard troops to help Customs and Border Protection. In the news release, Homeland Security said up to 800 new active-duty troops would also be detailed to the border; they would be used for things like logistics to free up Customs officials for more front-line responsibilities.

Homeland Security said it was also taking other steps to deal with immigration, such as scaling up a process started in May to quickly remove families who are found to have no basis to stay in the country. The agency said it has also beefed up holding capacity along the southern border.

And it said it has increased the number of people expelled from the country. Since May 12, the agency said it has removed 253,000 people to a little over 150 countries around the world. That compares with 180,000 removed during the same period in 2019 — before the pandemic drastically alerted the government’s ability to expel migrants.

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Spagat reported from San Diego. Valerie Gonzalez in McAllen, Texas contributed to this report.

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September 20, 2023
Biden administration sharply expands temporary status for Ukrainians already in US

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SAN DIEGO — The Biden administration on Friday announced a major expansion of temporary legal status for Ukrainians already living in the United States, granting a reprieve for those who fled Russia’s invasion.

The move is expected to make 166,700 Ukrainians eligible for Temporary Protected Status, up from about 26,000 currently, the Homeland Security Department said. To qualify, Ukrainians must have been in the United States by Aug. 16, two days before the announcement. They are eligible for work authorization.

The temporary status was originally scheduled to expire on Oct. 19, 2023 but is being extended 18 months to April 19, 2025.

“Russia’s ongoing military invasion of Ukraine and the resulting humanitarian crisis requires that the United States continue to offer safety and protection to Ukrainians who may not be able to return to their country,” said Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas.

Also Friday, Homeland Security expanded Temporary Protected Status for Sudanese who were in the United States by Aug. 16, saying violent clashes in April have fueled instability. It estimated an additional 2,750 Sudanese would be eligible, bringing the total to 3,950. The new expiration date of April 19, 2025 marks the 16th extension since temporary status was first granted to Sudanese in 1997.

“Since the military takeover of its government and the recent violent clashes, Sudan has experienced political instability and ongoing conflict that has resulted in a humanitarian crisis,” Mayorkas said.

The expansions come as the administration extends Temporary Protected Status to people from a growing number of countries, including Cameroon, Haiti and Venezuela, as part of a carrot-and-stick approach to immigration that combines more legal entries on humanitarian grounds with more punitive measures against anyone who enters the country illegally.

A 1990 law allows the Homeland Security secretary to grant status in increments of up to 18 months to people already in the United States whose countries are struck by civil strife or natural disaster and are considered unsafe for return.

Ukrainians first got Temporary Protected Status immediately after Russia’s invasion. The administration added humanitarian parole for those not in the United States, a move that it considered so successful that it later did the same for people from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela.

Friday’s announcement gives additional time to Ukrainians whose two-year parole was due to expire early next year.

Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans and Venezuelans face more uncertainty.

Texas and other Republican-led states are challenging parole for up to 30,000 people a month from those four countries but is not contesting status for Ukrainians. A trial is scheduled next week in Victoria, Texas.

Ukrainian immigrants are dispersed widely across the United States, with the largest concentrations in the New York, Chicago, Seattle and Sacramento, California, metropolitan areas.

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August 18, 2023
Barrels of drinking water for migrants walking through Texas have disappeared

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HEBBRONVILLE, Texas — As one of the worst heat waves on record set in across much of the southern United States this summer, authorities and activists in South Texas found themselves embroiled in a mystery in this arid region near the border with Mexico.

Barrels of life-saving water that a human rights group had strategically placed for wayward migrants traveling on foot had vanished.

Usually, they are hard to miss. Labeled with the word “AGUA” painted in white, capital letters and standing about waist-high, the 55-gallon (208-liter), blue drums stand out against the scrub and grass, turned from green to a sundried brown.

The stakes of solving this mystery are high.

Summer temperatures can climb to 110 degrees Fahrenheit (43.3 degrees Celsius) in Texas’ sparsely populated Jim Hogg County, with its vast, inhospitable ranchlands. Migrants — and sometimes human smugglers — take a route through this county to try to circumvent a Border Patrol checkpoint on a busier highway about 30 miles (48 kilometers) to the east. More than 60 miles (96 kilometers) from the U.S.-Mexico border, it can take several days to walk there for migrants who may have already spent weeks crossing mountains and desert and avoiding cartel violence.

“We don’t have the luxury of losing time in what we do,” said Ruben Garza’s, an investigator with the Jim Hogg Sheriff’s Office. Tears streamed down his face as he recalled helping locate a missing migrant man who became overheated in the brush, called for help but died just moments after his rescue.

Exact counts of those who die are difficult to determine because deaths often go unreported. The U.N. International Organization for Migration estimates almost 3,000 migrants have died crossing from Mexico to the U.S. by drowning in Rio Grande, or because of lack of shelter, food or water.

Humanitarian groups started placing water for migrants in spots on the U.S. side of the border with Mexico in the 1990s after authorities began finding bodies of those who succumbed to the harsh conditions.

John Meza volunteers with the South Texas Human Rights Center in Jim Hogg County, where the population of about 5,000 people is spread over 1,100 square miles (2,850 square kilometers) — larger than the state of Rhode Island. He restocks the stations with gallon jugs of water, trims away overgrown grass, and ensures the GPS coordinates are still visible on the underside of the barrel lids.

On one of his rounds in July, Meza said, 12 of the 21 stations he maintains were no longer there.

The Associated Press compared images captured by Google Maps over the last two years and confirmed that some barrels that were once there were gone.

But to where?

Wildfires are common in this part of Texas, where dry grass quickly becomes fuel. Road construction crews frequently push or move aside obstructions for their work. But as Garza, the sheriff’s investigator, walked along a path designated by GPS coordinates for the barrels, there were no signs of melted, blue plastic. And nothing indicated the heavy barrels had been moved. Though volunteers fill them only partway, they can weigh up to about 85 pounds (38 kilograms).

The investigator drove up and down the main highway where many of the water stations were installed near private property fence lines making note of the circumstances of each missing barrel.

Empty water bottles sat on the ground near the round impression left behind by the heavy barrel in one site. At another, the grass was trimmed, and fresh earth was laid bare to create buffers against fire.

Garza suspected state road crews moved three barrels that had been along an unpaved road, but the Texas Department of Transportation denied it. The investigator also noted a “tremendous amount” of wildfires could be to blame. He’s also speaking with area ranchers in hopes of showing the disappearances may be a simple misunderstanding, not a crime.

“They probably have a logical explanation,” he said, with no apparent lead.

But in other states along the southern border, missing water stations have been ascribed to spiteful intentions.

The group No More Deaths in 2018 released video of Border Patrol agents kicking over and pouring water out of gallon jugs left for people in the desert.

No More Deaths said that from 2012 to 2015, it found more than 3,586 gallon jugs of water that had been destroyed in an 800-square-mile (2,072-square-kilometer) desert area in southern Arizona.

Laura Hunter and her husband, John, started putting out water along popular smuggling routes in Southern California in the 1990s. They note their effort is not affiliated with political or religious groups, but that their work is often attacked.

“Every single year, we have vandalism, of course, you know, people that don’t agree with what we do,” Laura Hunter said.

The Hunters met with Eddie Canales, the executive director of the South Texas Human Rights Center, about 15 years ago and provided the design for the low-cost water stations. In light of the news, they offered some advice.

“I would replace them all with some used barrels, just replace them all,” John Hunter said. “And then I would put a couple of cameras on those and get the guy’s license plates and his face.”

Canales said he plans to work with volunteers to replace the missing stations in the coming days.

The number of migrants crossing through South Texas and subsequent deaths decreased this year after President Joe Biden’s administration instituted new border polices. A medical examiner’s office who covers eleven counties including Jim Hogg has received the bodies of 85 migrants who died this year. It represents less than half the number sent to that office in 2022. Most of the migrants who died this year suffered fatal heat strokes.

But that could change, especially if legal challenges to the Biden administration’s policies are successful.

For now, the mystery about the barrels’ disappearance remains unsolved. But Meza, the volunteer who restocks the barrels in Jim Hogg County, plans to continue his work

“If that was intentional, that’s a pretty malicious thing. You know what I mean?” Meza asked. “You’re saying, ‘Let these people die because I don’t want to give them access to water.’”

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Associated Press writer Anita Snow in Phoenix contributed to this report.

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August 11, 2023