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Tag: immigration politics

  • Latest wave of migrants at US-Mexico border puts Biden under renewed pressure | CNN Politics

    Latest wave of migrants at US-Mexico border puts Biden under renewed pressure | CNN Politics



    CNN
     — 

    A new surge of migrants at the US-Mexico border has placed immense pressure on federal resources and tested President Joe Biden’s border policies only months after going into place, prompting fresh criticism from Republicans and concern within the administration over a politically delicate issue.

    Biden has been plagued by issues on the border since his first months in office when the US faced a surge of unaccompanied migrant children that caught officials flatfooted. Over the last two years, his administration has continued to face fierce pushback from Republicans – and at times, Democrats – over his immigration policies.

    That complicated political landscape was put into sharp focus this week when administration officials were forced to contend with images of migrants crossing into the US in large groups, while also heralding a major move that will make hundreds of thousands of Venezuelans already in the US eligible to work, addressing a major sticking point with allies in New York.

    But the new wave of newcomers – many of whom are from Venezuela – paints a grim outlook for the fall as Biden ramps up his reelection campaign and Republicans continue to hammer the administration over its handling of the border.

    On Thursday, Biden blasted Republicans in Congress during remarks at the 46th Annual Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute’s Gala in Washington, DC, saying they “continue to undermine our border security” by blocking bipartisan efforts to pass immigration reform.

    “We need our colleagues to act – for decades, immigration reform has been bipartisan in this country,” he said.

    “Unfortunately, MAGA Republicans in Congress spent four years gutting the immigration system under my predecessor,” he added.

    In the absence of immigration reform, the administration has put in place a patchwork of policies to try to stem the flow of migrants journeying to the US southern border amid unprecedented mass migration in the western hemisphere.

    Earlier this year, the administration rolled out new and additional avenues for migrants to enter the US legally, like a mobile app, to keep people from crossing unlawfully. They have also stood up centers in the hemisphere to allow migrants to apply to come to the US.

    But desperation and disinformation from smugglers have prompted migrants to cross anyway. Homeland Security officials are monitoring the situation and while they gave no clear explanation for what prompted the latest surge, they cited poor economies, authoritarian regimes and the climate crisis as forces driving migration.

    This week, US Border Patrol apprehended more than 8,000 migrants daily, according to two Homeland Security officials. That’s up from around 3,500 daily border arrests after the Covid-era border restriction known as Title 42 expired in May and triggered more severe consequences for people who crossed the border illegally.

    The Department of Homeland Security has ramped up capacity in border facilities to accommodate the growing number of migrants, as well as continued to conduct deportation flights of migrants deemed ineligible to stay in the United States. US officials are also coordinating with Mexico to try to drive down crossings.

    Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas is set to travel to the border on Saturday, going to McAllen, Texas, for a meeting with President Xiomara Castro of Honduras.

    The Department of Defense, for its part, is sending 800 new active-duty personnel to the US-Mexico border, in addition to the 2,500 National Guard members already in place, to provide support to federal authorities.

    The arrival of migrants at the US southern border also affects inner cities, where asylum seekers usually reside as they go through their immigration proceedings, expanding the scope of the issue for the Biden administration.

    The administration addressed a major concern among Democrats this week by making more than 472,000 Venezuelans already in the US eligible for Temporary Protected Status, which provides deportation protections and allows them to work in the US. Democratic allies had urged the White House to speed up the ability for Venezuelans to obtain work authorization so they wouldn’t have to rely on social services.

    “As a result of this decision, immigrants will be temporarily allowed to work, fill needed jobs and support their families while awaiting an asylum determination. The decision will also substantially reduce the cost to New York taxpayers with respect to the sheltering of asylum-seekers,” said Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries, both of whom are New York Democrats, in a statement.

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  • Supreme Court rejects Texas and Louisiana challenge to Biden deportation priorities | CNN Politics

    Supreme Court rejects Texas and Louisiana challenge to Biden deportation priorities | CNN Politics



    CNN
     — 

    The Supreme Court, in an 8-1 ruling on Friday, revived the Biden administration’s immigration guidelines that prioritize which noncitizens to deport, dismissing a challenge from two Republican state attorneys general who argued the policies conflicted with immigration law.

    The court said the states, Texas and Louisiana, did not have the “standing,” or the legal right, to sue in the first place in a decision that will further clarify when a state can challenge a federal policy in court going forward.

    The ruling is a major victory for President Joe Biden and the White House, who have consistently argued the need to prioritize who they detain and deport given limited resources. By ruling against the states, the court tightened the rules concerning when states may challenge federal policies with which they disagree. The Biden administration policy was put on pause by a federal judge nearly two years ago and the Supreme Court declined to lift that hold last year.

    Justice Brett Kavanaugh wrote Friday’s majority opinion in the case.

    “In sum, the states have brought an extraordinarily unusual lawsuit,” Kavanaugh wrote, in an opinion joined by Chief Justice John Roberts, and Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson. “They want a federal court to order the Executive Branch to alter its arrest policies so as to make more arrests. Federal courts have not traditionally entertained that kind of lawsuit; indeed, the States cite no precedent for a lawsuit like this.”

    Kavanaugh said that the executive branch has traditional discretion over whether to take enforcement actions under federal law. He said that if the court were to allow the states to bring the lawsuit at hand, it would “entail expansive judicial direction” of the executive’s arrest policy and would open the door to more lawsuits from states that think the executive is not doing enough to enforce the law in other areas such as drug and gun regulation and obstruction of justice laws.

    “We decline to start the Federal Judiciary down that uncharted path,” Kavanaugh said.

    Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said the administration welcomes the court’s ruling and that his department looks forward to using the immigration guidelines.

    The guidelines “enable DHS to most effectively accomplish its law enforcement mission with the authorities and resources provided by Congress,” Mayorkas said.

    Justice Neil Gorsuch, joined by Justices Clarence Thomas and Amy Coney Barrett, wrote a concurring an opinion that concluded that the states also lacked standing, but for different reasons than the majority opinion. Justice Samuel Alito dissented.

    At the heart of the dispute was a September 2021 memo from Mayorkas that laid out priorities for the apprehension and removal of certain non-citizens, reversing efforts by former President Donald Trump to increase deportations.

    In his memo, Mayorkas stated that there are approximately 11 million undocumented or otherwise removable non-citizens in the country and that the United States does not have the ability to apprehend and seek to remove all of them. As such, the Department of Homeland Security sought to prioritize those who pose a threat to national security, public safety and border security.  

    Kavanaugh’s opinion stressed that the standing doctrine “helps safeguard the Judiciary’s proper – and properly limited – role in our constitutional system.” He said that by ensuring a party has standing to sue, “federal courts prevent the judicial process from being used to usurp the powers of the political branches.”

    The majority did not address the underlying question of whether the administration had the authority to implement the policy.

    “We take no position on whether the executive branch here is complying with its legal obligations under §1226(c) and §1231(a)(2),” Kavanaugh wrote, referring to the relevant immigration statutes. “We hold only that the federal courts are not the proper forum to resolve this dispute.”

    Kavanaugh pointed out that five presidential administrations have determined that resource constraints necessitated prioritization in making immigration arrests.

    In his sole dissent, Alito wrote that this “sweeping executive power endorsed by today’s decision may at first be warmly received by champions of a strong Presidential power, but if presidents can expand their powers as far as they can manage in a test of strength with Congress, presumably Congress can cut executive power as much as it can manage by wielding the formidable weapons at its disposal.”

    “That is not what the Constitution envisions,” he wrote.

    Steve Vladeck, a CNN Supreme Court analyst who filed an amicus brief in the immigration case, noted that Friday’s ruling was the second decision within the last week in which the court “held that red states lacked standing to challenge a federal policy – perhaps a signal of dissatisfaction with how liberally lower courts, especially the Fifth Circuit, have permitted these challenges to go forward.”

    “And it’s the second in the last two years in which it has reversed a nationwide injunction against a Biden immigration policy in a suit brought by Texas,” Vladeck said. “When states are the right plaintiffs to challenge federal policies is also one of the central issues before the court in the challenges to Biden’s student loan program – in which the court is expected to rule next week.”

    Kavanaugh’s opinion emphasized that, in “holding that Texas and Louisiana lack standing, we do not suggest that federal courts may never entertain cases involving the executive branch’s alleged failure to make more arrests or bring more prosecutions.”

    In court, US Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar stressed that Congress has never provided the funds to detain everyone, prompting different administrations to consider how to prioritize limited funds. She noted that the executive branch retains the authority to focus its “limited resources” on non-citizens who are higher priorities for removal and warned that if the states were to prevail, it would “scramble” immigration enforcement on the ground, leading to a totally unmanageable landscape. She said the states’ view in the case was a “senseless” way to run an immigration system.

    “I think that that is bad for the executive branch. I think it’s bad for the American public and I think it’s bad for Article Three courts,” she said.  

    The guidelines call for an assessment of the “totality of the facts and circumstances” instead of the development of a bright-line rule. The government lists aggravating factors weighing in favor of an enforcement action, including the gravity of the offense and the use of a firearm, but it also lists mitigating factors that include the age of the immigrant. 

    Texas Solicitor General Judd Stone, representing Texas and Louisiana, argued that the administration lacked the authority to issue the memo because it conflicts with existing federal law. He accused the government of treating immigration law in the area as “discretionary” and not “mandatory” and argued that the executive branch lacks the authority to “disregard” Congress’ instruction.

    “The states prove their standing at trial based on harms well recognized,” Stone said, emphasizing the costs incurred when the government “violates federal law.”

    A district court judge blocked the guidelines nationwide. “Using the words ‘discretion’ and ‘prioritization’ the executive branch claims the authority to suspend statutory mandates,” ruled Judge Drew Tipton, a Trump appointee on the US District Court for the Southern District of Texas. “The law does not sanction this approach.” 

    A federal appeals court declined to issue a stay of the decision, prompting the Biden administration to ask the Supreme Court for emergency relief last July. A 5-4 court ruled against the administration, allowing the lower court’s decision to remain in effect while the legal challenge played out.

    Conservative Justice Amy Coney Barrett joined her three liberal colleagues in dissent without providing any explanation for her vote.  

    This story has been updated with additional details.

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  • Fact check: Trump delivers wildly dishonest speech at CPAC | CNN Politics

    Fact check: Trump delivers wildly dishonest speech at CPAC | CNN Politics


    Washington
    CNN
     — 

    As president, Donald Trump made some of his most thoroughly dishonest speeches at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference.

    As he embarks on another campaign for the presidency, Trump delivered another CPAC doozy Saturday night.

    Trump’s lengthy address to the right-wing gathering in Maryland was filled with wildly inaccurate claims about his own presidency, Joe Biden’s presidency, foreign affairs, crime, elections and other subjects.

    Here is a fact check of 23 of the false claims Trump made. (And that’s far from the total.)

    Crime in Manhattan

    While Trump criticized Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, who has been investigating Trump’s company, he claimed that “killings are taking place at a number like nobody’s ever seen, right in Manhattan.”

    Facts First: It isn’t even close to true that Manhattan is experiencing a number of killings that nobody has ever seen. The region classified by the New York Police Department as Manhattan North had 43 reported murders in 2022; that region had 379 reported murders in 1990 and 306 murders in 1993. The Manhattan South region had 35 reported murders in 2022 versus 124 reported murders in 1990 and 86 murders in 1993. New York City as a whole is also nowhere near record homicide levels; the city had 438 reported murders in 2022 versus 2,262 in 1990 and 1,927 in 1993.

    Manhattan North had just eight reported murders this year through February 19, while Manhattan South had one. The city as a whole had 49 reported murders.

    The National Guard and Minnesota

    Talking about rioting amid racial justice protests after the police murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis in 2020, Trump claimed he had been ready to send in the National Guard in Seattle, then added, “We saved Minneapolis. The thing is, we’re not supposed to do that. Because it’s up to the governor, the Democrat governor. They never want any help. They don’t mind – it’s almost like they don’t mind to have their cities and states destroyed. There’s something wrong with these people.”

    Facts First: This is a reversal of reality. Minnesota’s Democratic governor, Tim Walz, not Trump, was the one who deployed the Minnesota National Guard during the 2020 unrest; Walz first activated the Guard more than seven hours before Trump publicly threatened to deploy the Guard himself. Walz’s office told CNN in 2020 that the governor activated the Guard in response to requests from officials in Minneapolis and St. Paul – cities also run by Democrats.

    Trump has repeatedly made the false claim that he was the one who sent the Guard to Minneapolis. You can read a longer fact check, from 2020, here.

    Trump’s executive order on monuments

    Trump boasted that he had taken effective action as president to stop the destruction of statues and memorials. He claimed: “I passed and signed an executive order. Anybody that does that gets 10 years in jail, with no negotiation – it’s not ’10’ but it turns into three months.” He added: “But we passed it. It was a very old law, and we found it – one of my very good legal people along with [adviser] Stephen Miller, they found it. They said, ‘Sir, I don’t know if you want to try and bring this back.’ I said. ‘I do.’”

    Facts First: Trump’s claim is false. He did not create a mandatory 10-year sentence for people who damage monuments. In fact, his 2020 executive order did not mandate any increase in sentences.

    Rather, the executive order simply directed the attorney general to “prioritize” investigations and prosecutions of monument-destruction cases and declared that it is federal policy to prosecute such cases to the fullest extent permitted under existing law, including an existing law that allowed a sentence of up to 10 years in prison for willfully damaging federal property. The executive order did nothing to force judges to impose a 10-year sentence.

    Vandalism in Portland

    Trump claimed, “How’s Portland doing? They don’t even have storefronts anymore. Everything’s two-by-four’s because they get burned down every week.”

    Facts First: This is a major exaggeration. Portland obviously still has hundreds of active storefronts, though it has struggled with downtown commercial vacancies for various reasons, and some businesses are sometimes vandalized by protesters. Trump has for years exaggerated the extent of property damage from protest vandalism in Portland.

    Russian expansionism

    Boasting of his foreign policy record, Trump claimed, “I was also the only president where Russia didn’t take over a country during my term.”

    Facts First: While it’s true that Russia didn’t take over a country during Trump’s term, it’s not true that he was the only US president under whom Russia didn’t take over a country. “Totally false,” Michael Khodarkovsky, a Loyola University Chicago history professor who is an expert on Russian imperialism, said in an email. “If by Russia he means the current Russian Federation that existed since 1991, then the best example is Clinton, 1992-98. During this time Russia fought a war in Chechnya, but Chechnya was not a country but one of Russia’s regions.”

    Khodarkovsky added, “If by Russia he means the USSR, as people often do, then from 1945, when the USSR occupied much of Eastern Europe until 1979, when USSR invaded Afghanistan, Moscow did not take over any new country. It only sent forces into countries it had taken over in 1945 (Hungary 1956, Czechoslovakia 1968).”

    NATO funding

    Trump said while talking about NATO funding: “And I told delinquent foreign nations – they were delinquent, they weren’t paying their bills – that if they wanted our protection, they had to pay up, and they had to pay up now.”

    Facts First: It’s not true that NATO countries weren’t paying “bills” until Trump came along or that they were “delinquent” in the sense of failing to pay bills – as numerous fact-checkers pointed out when Trump repeatedly used such language during his presidency. NATO members haven’t been failing to pay their share of the organization’s common budget to run the organization. And while it’s true that most NATO countries were not (and still are not) meeting NATO’s target of each country spending a minimum of 2% of gross domestic product on defense, that 2% figure is what NATO calls a “guideline”; it is not some sort of binding contract, and it does not create liabilities. An official NATO recommitment to the 2% guideline in 2014 merely said that members not currently at that level would “aim to move towards the 2% guideline within a decade.”

    NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg did credit Trump for securing increases in European NATO members’ defense spending, but it’s worth noting that those countries’ spending had also increased in the last two years of the Obama administration following Russia’s 2014 annexation of Ukraine’s Crimea and the recommitment that year to the 2% guideline. NATO notes on its website that 2022 was “the eighth consecutive year of rising defence spending across European Allies and Canada.”

    NATO’s existence

    Boasting of how he had secured additional funding for NATO from countries, Trump claimed, “Actually, NATO wouldn’t even exist if I didn’t get them to pay up.”

    Facts First: This is nonsense.

    There was never any indication that NATO, created in 1949, would have ceased to exist in the early 2020s without additional funding from some members. The alliance was stable even with many members not meeting the alliance’s guideline of having members spend 2% of their gross domestic product on defense.

    We don’t often fact-check claims about what might have happened in an alternative scenario, but this Trump claim has no basis in reality. “The quote doesn’t make sense, obviously,” said Erwan Lagadec, research professor at George Washington University’s Elliott School of International Affairs and an expert on NATO.

    Lagadec noted that NATO has had no trouble getting allies to cover the roughly $3 billion in annual “direct” funding for the organization, which is “peanuts” to this group of countries. And he said that the only NATO member that had given “any sign” in recent years that it was thinking about leaving the alliance “was … the US, under Trump.” Lagadec added that the US leaving the alliance is one scenario that could realistically kill it, but that clearly wasn’t what Trump was talking about in his remarks on spending levels.

    James Goldgeier, an American University professor of international relations and Brookings Institution visiting fellow, said in an email: “NATO was founded in 1949, so it seems very clear that Donald Trump had nothing to do with its existence. In fact, the worry was that he would pull the US out of NATO, as his national security adviser warned he would do if he had been reelected.”

    The cost of NATO’s headquarters

    Trump mocked NATO’s headquarters, saying, “They spent – an office building that cost $3 billion. It’s like a skyscraper in Manhattan laid on its side. It’s one of the longest buildings I’ve ever seen. And I said, ‘You should have – instead of spending $3 billion, you should have spent $500 million building the greatest bunker you’ve ever seen. Because Russia didn’t – wouldn’t even need an airplane attack. One tank one shot through that beautiful glass building and it’s gone.’”

    Facts First: NATO did spend a lot of money on its headquarters in Belgium, but Trump’s “$3 billion” figure is a major exaggeration. When Trump used the same inaccurate figure in early 2020, NATO told CNN that the headquarters was actually constructed for a sum under the approved budget of about $1.18 billion euro, which is about $1.3 billion at exchange rates as of Sunday morning.

    The Pulitzer Prize

    Trump made his usual argument that The Washington Post and The New York Times should not have won a prestigious journalism award, a 2018 Pulitzer Prize, for their reporting on Russian interference in the 2016 election and its connections to Trump’s team. He then said, “And they were exactly wrong. And now they’ve even admitted that it was a hoax. It was a total hoax, and they got the prize.”

    Facts First: The Times and Post have not made any sort of “hoax” admission. “The claim is completely false,” Times spokesperson Charlie Stadtlander said in an email on Sunday.

    Stadtlander continued: “When our Pulitzer Prize shared with The Washington Post was challenged by the former President, the award was upheld by the Pulitzer Prize Board after an independent review. The board stated that ‘no passages or headlines, contentions or assertions in any of the winning submissions were discredited by facts that emerged subsequent to the conferral of the prizes.’ The Times’s reporting was also substantiated by the Mueller investigation and Republican-led Senate Intelligence Committee investigation into the matter.”

    The Post referred CNN to that same July statement from the Pulitzer Prize Board.

    Awareness of the Nord Stream 2 pipeline

    Trump claimed of his opposition to Russia’s Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline to Germany: “Nord Stream 2 – Nobody ever heard of it … right? Nobody ever heard of Nord Stream 2 until I came along. I started talking about Nord Stream 2. I had to go call it ‘the pipeline’ because nobody knew what I was talking about.”

    Facts First: This is standard Trump hyperbole; it’s just not true that “nobody” had heard of Nord Stream 2 before he began discussing it. Nord Stream 2 was a regular subject of media, government and diplomatic discussion before Trump took office. In fact, Biden publicly criticized it as vice president in 2016. Trump may well have generated increased US awareness to the controversial project, but “nobody ever heard of Nord Stream 2 until I came along” isn’t true.

    Trump and Nord Stream 2

    Trump claimed, “I got along very well with Putin even though I’m the one that ended his pipeline. Remember they said, ‘Trump is giving a lot to Russia.’ Really? Putin actually said to me, ‘If you’re my friend, I’d hate like hell to see you as my enemy.’ Because I ended the pipeline, right? Do you remember? Nord Stream 2.” He continued, “I ended it. It was dead.”

    Facts First: Trump did not kill Nord Stream 2. While he did approve sanctions on companies working on the project, that move came nearly three years into his presidency, when the pipeline was already around an estimated 90% complete – and the state-owned Russian gas company behind the project said shortly after the sanctions that it would complete the pipeline itself. The company announced in December 2020 that construction was resuming. And with days left in Trump’s term in January 2021, Germany announced that it had renewed permission for construction in its waters.

    The pipeline never began operations; Germany ended up halting the project as Russia was about to invade Ukraine early last year. The pipeline was damaged later in the year in what has been described as an act of sabotage.

    The Obama administration and Ukraine

    Trump claimed that while he provided lethal assistance to Ukraine, the Obama administration “didn’t want to get involved” and merely “supplied the bedsheets.” He said, “Do you remember? They supplied the bedsheets. And maybe even some pillows from [pillow businessman] Mike [Lindell], who’s sitting right over here. … But they supplied the bedsheets.”

    Facts First: This is inaccurate. While it’s true that the Obama administration declined to provide weapons to Ukraine, it provided more than $600 million in security assistance to Ukraine between 2014 and 2016 that involved far more than bedsheets. The aid included counter-artillery and counter-mortar radars, armored Humvees, tactical drones, night vision devices and medical supplies.

    Biden and a Ukrainian prosecutor

    Trump claimed that Biden, as vice president, held back a billion dollars from Ukraine until the country fired a prosecutor who was “after Hunter” and a company that was paying him. Trump was referring to Hunter Biden, Joe Biden’s son, who sat on the board of Ukrainian energy company Burisma Holdings.

    Facts First: This is baseless. There has never been any evidence that Hunter Biden was under investigation by the prosecutor, Viktor Shokin, who had been widely faulted by Ukrainian anti-corruption activists and European countries for failing to investigate corruption. A former Ukrainian deputy prosecutor and a top anti-corruption activist have both said the Burisma-related investigation was dormant at the time Joe Biden pressured Ukraine to fire Shokin.

    Daria Kaleniuk, executive director of Ukraine’s Anti-Corruption Action Center, told The Washington Post in 2019: “Shokin was not investigating. He didn’t want to investigate Burisma. And Shokin was fired not because he wanted to do that investigation, but quite to the contrary, because he failed that investigation.” In addition, Shokin’s successor as prosecutor general, Yuriy Lutsenko, told Bloomberg in 2019: “Hunter Biden did not violate any Ukrainian laws – at least as of now, we do not see any wrongdoing.”

    Biden, as vice president, was carrying out the policy of the US and its allies, not pursuing his own agenda, in threatening to withhold a billion-dollar US loan guarantee if the Ukrainian government did not sack Shokin. CNN fact-checked Trump’s claims on this subject at length in 2019.

    Trump and job creation

    Promising to save Americans’ jobs if he is elected again, Trump claimed, “We had the greatest job history of any president ever.”

    Facts First: This is false. The US lost about 2.7 million jobs during Trump’s presidency, the worst overall jobs record for any president. The net loss was largely because of the Covid-19 pandemic, but even Trump’s pre-pandemic jobs record – about 6.7 million jobs added – was far from the greatest of any president ever. The economy added more than 11.5 million jobs in the first term of Democratic President Bill Clinton in the 1990s.

    Tariffs on China

    Trump repeated a trade claim he made frequently during his presidency. Speaking of China, he said he “charged them” with tariffs that had the effect of “bringing in hundreds of billions of dollars pouring into our Treasury from China. Thank you very much, China.” He claimed that he did this even though “no other president had gotten even 10 cents – not one president got anything from them.”

    Facts First: As we have written repeatedly, it’s not true that no president before Trump had generated any revenue through tariffs on goods from China. In reality, the US has had tariffs on China for more than two centuries, and FactCheck.org reported in 2019 that the US generated an “average of $12.3 billion in custom duties a year from 2007 to 2016, according to the U.S. International Trade Commission DataWeb.” Also, American importers, not Chinese exporters, make the actual tariff payments – and study after study during Trump’s presidency found that Americans were bearing most of the cost of the tariffs.

    The trade deficit with China

    Trump went on to repeat a false claim he made more than 100 times as president – that the US used to have a trade deficit with China of more than $500 billion. He claimed it was “five-, six-, seven-hundred billion dollars a year.”

    Facts First: The US has never had a $500 billion, $600 billion or $700 billion trade deficit with China even if you only count trade in goods and ignore the services trade in which the US runs a surplus with China. The pre-Trump record for a goods deficit with China was about $367 billion in 2015. The goods deficit hit a new record of about $418 billion under Trump in 2018 before falling back under $400 billion in subsequent years.

    Trump and the 2020 election

    Trump said people claim they want to run against him even though, he claimed, he won the 2020 election. He said, “I won the second election, OK, won it by a lot. You know, when they say, when they say Biden won, the smart people know that didn’t [happen].”

    Facts First: This is Trump’s regular lie. He lost the 2020 election to Biden fair and square, 306 to 232 in the Electoral College. Biden earned more than 7 million more votes than Trump did.

    Democrats and elections

    Trump said Democrats are only good at “disinformation” and “cheating on elections.”

    Facts First: This is nonsense. There is just no basis for a broad claim that Democrats are election cheaters. Election fraud and voter fraud are exceedingly rare in US elections, though such crimes are occasionally committed by officials and supporters of both parties. (We’ll ignore Trump’s subjective claim about “disinformation.”)

    The liberation of the ISIS caliphate

    Trump repeated his familiar story about how he had supposedly liberated the “caliphate” of terror group ISIS in “three weeks.” This time, he said, “In fact, with the ISIS caliphate, a certain general said it could only be done in three years, ‘and probably it can’t be done at all, sir.’ And I did it in three weeks. I went over to Iraq, met a great general. ‘Sir, I can do it in three weeks.’ You’ve heard that story. ‘I can do it in three weeks, sir.’ ‘How are you going to do that?’ They explained it. I did it in three weeks. I was told it couldn’t be done at all, that it would take at least three years. Did it in three weeks. Knocked out 100% of the ISIS caliphate.”

    Facts First: Trump’s claim of eliminating the ISIS caliphate in “three weeks” isn’t true; the ISIS “caliphate” was declared fully liberated more than two years into Trump’s presidency, in 2019. Even if Trump was starting the clock at the time of his visit to Iraq, in late December 2018, the liberation was proclaimed more than two and a half months later. In addition, Trump gave himself far too much credit for the defeat of the caliphate, as he has in the past, when he said “I did it”: Kurdish forces did much of the ground fighting, and there was major progress against the caliphate under President Barack Obama in 2015 and 2016.

    IHS Markit, an information company that studied the changing size of the caliphate, reported two days before Trump’s 2017 inauguration that the caliphate shrunk by 23% in 2016 after shrinking by 14% in 2015. “The Islamic State suffered unprecedented territorial losses in 2016, including key areas vital for the group’s governance project,” an analyst there said in a statement at the time.

    Military equipment left in Afghanistan

    Trump claimed, as he has before, that the US left behind $85 billion worth of military equipment when it withdrew from Afghanistan in 2021. He said of the leader of the Taliban: “Now he’s got $85 billion worth of our equipment that I bought – $85 billion.” He added later: “The thing that nobody ever talks about, we lost 13 [soldiers], we lost $85 billion worth of the greatest military equipment in the world.”

    Facts First: Trump’s $85 billion figure is false. While a significant quantity of military equipment that had been provided by the US to Afghan government forces was indeed abandoned to the Taliban upon the US withdrawal, the Defense Department has estimated that this equipment had been worth about $7.1 billion – a chunk of about $18.6 billion worth of equipment provided to Afghan forces between 2005 and 2021. And some of the equipment left behind was rendered inoperable before US forces withdrew.

    As other fact-checkers have previously explained, the “$85 billion” is a rounded-up figure (it’s closer to $83 billion) for the total amount of money Congress has appropriated during the war to a fund supporting the Afghan security forces. A minority of this funding was for equipment.

    The Afghanistan withdrawal and the F-16

    Trump claimed that the Taliban acquired F-16 fighter planes because of the US withdrawal, saying: “They feared the F-16s. And now they own them. Think of it.”

    Facts First: This is false. F-16s were not among the equipment abandoned upon the US withdrawal and the collapse of the Afghan armed forces, since the Afghan armed forces did not fly F-16s.

    The border wall

    Trump claimed that he had kept his promise to complete a wall on the border with Mexico: “As you know, I built hundreds of miles of wall and completed that task as promised. And then I began to add even more in areas that seemed to be allowing a lot of people to come in.”

    Facts First: It’s not true that Trump “completed” the border wall. According to an official “Border Wall Status” report written by US Customs and Border Protection two days after Trump left office, about 458 miles of wall had been completed under Trump – but about 280 more miles that had been identified for wall construction had not been completed.

    The report, provided to CNN’s Priscilla Alvarez, said that, of those 280 miles left to go, about 74 miles were “in the pre-construction phase and have not yet been awarded, in locations where no barriers currently exist,” and that 206 miles were “currently under contract, in place of dilapidated and outdated designs and in locations where no barriers previously existed.”

    Latin America and deportations

    Trump told his familiar story about how, until he was president, the US was unable to deport MS-13 gang members to other countries, “especially” Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras because those countries “didn’t want them.”

    Facts First: It’s not true that, as a rule, Guatemala and Honduras wouldn’t take back migrants being deported from the US during Obama’s administration, though there were some individual exceptions.

    In 2016, just prior to Trump’s presidency, neither Guatemala nor Honduras was on the list of countries that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) considered “recalcitrant,” or uncooperative, in accepting the return of their nationals.

    For the 2016 fiscal year, Obama’s last full fiscal year in office, ICE reported that Guatemala and Honduras ranked second and third, behind only Mexico, in terms of the country of citizenship of people being removed from the US. You can read a longer fact check, from 2019, here.

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  • Mayorkas goes on the offensive as GOP scrutiny builds, says it’s up to Congress to fix immigration system | CNN Politics

    Mayorkas goes on the offensive as GOP scrutiny builds, says it’s up to Congress to fix immigration system | CNN Politics



    CNN
     — 

    Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas pointed the finger back at Congress to fix the country’s broken immigration system and maintained that he will not resign from his post in an new interview with CNN’s Chris Wallace.

    House Republicans, who have been fierce critics of President Joe Biden’s immigration policies, have been moving to build a case against Mayorkas as they consider launching rare impeachment proceedings against a Cabinet secretary.

    “I’m not going to resign,” Mayorkas told CNN’s Chris Wallace on “Who’s Talking to Chris Wallace,” which is now streaming on HBOMax and airs Sunday night at 7 p.m. ET on CNN.

    “I call upon Congress – as the president has done, as this nation has done – to actually fix an immigration system that has been broken for decades,” he added.

    Republican lawmakers have argued that Mayorkas’ claims of having operational control of the border are unfounded and that the record arrests mark a dereliction of duty – two themes that have come up repeatedly in congressional hearings and have been cited as reason to impeach the secretary.

    Ahead of potential proceedings, the Department of Homeland Security is bringing on a private law firm to help with potential impeachment proceedings against Mayorkas.

    “I don’t have any intention of being uncooperative. I have complete confidence in the integrity of our decision making,” Mayorkas told Wallace.

    Over recent weeks, key committee chairman already held two congressional hearings over the Biden administration’s handling of the US-Mexico border. Earlier this month, the House Judiciary Committee, which would have jurisdiction over an impeachment resolution, held its first border-related hearing.

    “These numbers make clear that the Biden administration does not have operational control of the border,” House Judiciary Committee Chair Jim Jordan said during a February hearing. “Month after month after month, we have set records for migrants coming into the country and frankly, I think it’s intentional.”

    Pressed by Wallace on what it means for the border to be secure and if it means people aren’t illegally crossing the border, Mayorkas said: “Of course not. By that measure, the border has never been secure, right?”

    Asked again by what measure the border is secure, he said: “There is not a common definition of that. If one looks at the statutory definition, the literal interpretation of the statutory language, if one person successfully evades law enforcement at the border, then we have breached the security of the border.”

    He added: “What our goal is – to achieve operational control of the border, to do everything that we can to support our personnel with the resources, the technology, the policies that really advance the security of the border, and do not come at the cost of the values of our country. And I say that, I say that, because in the prior administration, policies were promulgated, were passed, that did not hew to the values that we hold dear.”

    The Biden administration faces unprecedented movement across the Western Hemisphere that has contributed to a surge of migrants at the border, including more people from different countries, such as Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua. The US is largely barred from deporting migrants to Cuba and Venezuela, presenting a unique set of challenges for DHS.

    “The level of migration that has gripped our hemisphere is extraordinary,” Mayorkas said, stressing that Congress needs to pass reform to fix the immigration system, which Republicans and Democrats agree is broken.

    US border authorities encountered migrants more than 2.3 million times along the US-Mexico border in fiscal year 2022, according to US Customs and Border Protection data. Of those, more than 1 million migrants were turned away at the border.

    In early January, the Biden administration expanded a humanitarian parole program to include Haitians, Venezuelans, Nicaraguans, and Cubans to provide a legal pathway for them to enter the US instead of crossing the border. The administration also made those nationalities eligible for Title 42, meaning they can now be turned away by authorities if they don’t apply for the program.

    Since then, there has been a significant decline in migrants from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua, and Venezuela crossing the US-Mexico border unlawfully, according to the Department of Homeland Security, which attributed the drop to new border measures.

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  • Virginia Democratic Sen. Tim Kaine announces he’s running for reelection in 2024 | CNN Politics

    Virginia Democratic Sen. Tim Kaine announces he’s running for reelection in 2024 | CNN Politics



    CNN
     — 

    Democratic Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia announced Friday that he’s running for reelection in 2024.

    “I have been really grappling with what to do with respect to my time in the Senate, and I’m very happy to announce that I’m going to run for a third term in the Senate,” he told reporters at an event in Richmond, Virginia.

    Kaine’s announcement will likely come as a relief to Democrats as they face a difficult 2024 map and an uphill climb to hold their narrow majority. An open Virginia seat could have made for a competitive race. The Virginia governorship flipped Republican in 2021.

    Video from Kaine’s event Friday was provided by CNN affiliate WTVR in Richmond.

    Kaine, a former Virginia governor who was Hillary Clinton’s running mate in her 2016 presidential campaign, explained his decision on Friday, saying, “Here’s why in conversations with friends and especially with Anne and my family I’ve decided to run for a third term. I’m a servant. I love Virginia. I’m proud of what I’ve done. I got a whole lot more I want to do. So those are the four reasons.”

    Kaine was first elected to the US Senate in 2012. During a roundtable discussion Friday before his announcement, he told participants he ran for Senate after 16 years in state and local office because there were issues he wanted to “get done,” including tribal recognition, marriage equality, immigration reform and advances in gun safety.

    “We’ve done two of the four,” he said, adding that he thought the time might be ripe to reach a long-sought deal on immigration reform. “My gut tells me, and some of my conversations with colleagues, that the super-low unemployment rate in the country is opening the door again to a really good immigration reform discussion.”

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  • Biden heads to the border for the first time as president | CNN Politics

    Biden heads to the border for the first time as president | CNN Politics



    CNN
     — 

    President Joe Biden is heading to the US-Mexico border on Sunday on the heels of major policy announcements and following relentless calls from Republicans who believe the trip is overdue.

    The trip to the border – the first for Biden since he took office – comes as the administration wrestles with a growing number of migrants, overwhelming federal and local resources. Republicans, some border-district Democrats in Congress and even Democratic mayors have criticized Biden for failing to address record levels of border crossings.

    With his visit to El Paso, Texas, on Sunday, Biden is seizing on an issue that’s been a political liability for his administration, while calling on Congress to overhaul the US immigration system to meet current needs.

    But the patchwork of policies put in place by the administration to manage the border so far has often put Biden at odds with his own allies who argue that the administration’s approach is too enforcement heavy.

    “It’s enraging and sad to see a Democratic administration make it harder for vulnerable people to seek asylum all because they’re scared of angry MAGA voters on this issue,” a member of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus told CNN, responding to the latest policy announcements.

    Previewing the trip, a White House official said the president will “meet with federal, state, and local officials and community leaders who have been critical partners in managing the new migration challenge impacting the entire Western Hemisphere with record numbers of people fleeing political oppression and gang violence in Venezuela, Nicaragua, Haiti, and Cuba.” The president is scheduled to spend about three hours on the ground.

    Biden will evaluate border enforcement operations, touring the Bridge of the Americas Port of Entry alongside Customs and Border Protection officers, members of Congress and local officials and law enforcement.

    The White House said it’s the busiest port in El Paso and received $600 million under bipartisan infrastructure law.

    Biden will then visit the El Paso County Migrant Services Center to meet with local officials, faith leaders and non-governmental organizations “who have been critical to supporting migrants fleeing political oppression and economic collapse in their home countries.”

    The official said the president will also spend time with local business leaders to hear about the economic impact of migration in the region and worker shortages.

    Biden will be joined by Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas; Texas Reps. Veronica Escobar, Henry Cuellar and Vicente Gonzalez, all Democrats; El Paso Mayor Oscar Leeser; El Paso County Judge Ricardo Samaniego; and additional community and business leaders.

    Mayorkas on Sunday defended Biden’s approach to addressing the migrant surge at the southern border, saying the administration was operating in a humane but necessary way.

    “We are dealing with in a broken immigration system that Congress has failed to repair for decades, and there is unanimity with respect to that reality,” Mayorkas told ABC’s George Stephanopoulos on “This Week,” while attributing the surge to regional displacement impacting the entire Western Hemisphere.

    “We want individuals who qualify for relief under our laws to come to the United States in a safe and orderly way. And that is why we are building lawful pathways so people do not have to place their lives and their life savings in the hands of ruthless smugglers,” he said.

    Mass movement across the Western Hemisphere has posed an urgent challenge for Biden, who in his first few months in office faced a surge of unaccompanied migrant children at the border and later, the abrupt arrival of thousands of Haitian migrants.

    Since 2021, there have been more than 2.4 million arrests along the US-Mexico border, according to US Customs and Border Protection data. That includes people who have attempted to cross more than once. Many have also been turned away under a Trump-era Covid restriction known as Title 42 that allows federal authorities to expel migrants quickly, citing the Covid-19 pandemic.

    The arrival of thousands of migrants has strained border communities, including El Paso. The city has prided itself on being a welcoming place for migrants but has been overwhelmed in recent months with the sudden arrival of thousands of migrants, straining local resources and prompting pleas for federal assistance.

    Anxiety about the scheduled end of Title 42 prompted thousands of migrants in recent weeks to turn themselves in to border authorities or to cross into the United States illegally in a very short period.

    The policy was scheduled to lift last month, but a Supreme Court ruling kept the rule in place while legal challenges play out in court.

    Federal data shared with CNN indicates that migrant encounters in El Paso have dropped drastically since December, when thousands crossed on a daily basis.

    There have been less than 700 daily encounters on average over the last few days, compared to nearly 2,500 at its peak in December, according to the Department of Homeland Security.

    DHS said it deployed 100 additional personnel to the El Paso region in December, and this week, the department will open another temporary facility to process migrants. Shelters in Juarez, Mexico, just across the border from El Paso, have also seen a decrease in migrants, DHS said.

    Biden has said he wanted to wait until he knew an outcome in the Title 42 legal machinations before traveling to the border and accused Republicans calling for him to travel there of playing political games.

    “They haven’t been serious about this at all,” he said.

    El Paso has been at the center of the immigration debate dating back to the Trump administration, which piloted the controversial family separation policy in the region.

    While Biden has condemned Trump-era immigration policies, his own administration has wrestled with striking a balance between enforcement and holding up its humanitarian promises.

    In El Paso, Biden will be faced with the history of his predecessor and the challenges he faces as the administration tries to stem the flow of mass migration in the hemisphere.

    He’ll also be visiting a state whose governor has been a fierce critic of the Biden administration’s immigration policies. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, who already criticized the president’s upcoming visit on Twitter, has sent thousands of migrants on buses to Democratic-led cities and deployed the National Guard along the Texas-Mexico border, including in El Paso.

    In recent months, the El Paso sector has surpassed the Rio Grande Valley sector in migrant arrests. RGV has historically been one of the busiest sectors for border crossings. The El Paso sector patrols 268 miles of international border.

    Last November, border authorities encountered more than 53,000 migrants in the El Paso sector, according to the latest available data from US Customs and Border Protection.

    Last year, El Paso – whose mayor, Leeser, is a Democrat – began sending migrant buses to New York City, following in the footsteps of Republican governors, to try to get people to their destination and decongest the city. That effort has since stopped.

    Escobar, who represents El Paso, said in a tweet that she’s “excited” to welcome Biden to the city. While she didn’t place a big emphasis on Biden visiting the border, she made clear she welcomed it in recent weeks and urged the federal government to provide assistance to the city.

    John Kirby, the National Security Council coordinator for strategic communications, said that the president is looking forward to seeing firsthand the situation on the border ahead of the North American Leaders’ Summit in Mexico City.

    “The President is very much looking forward to seeing for himself first-hand what the border security situation looks like, particularly in El Paso. He’s very much also interested in getting to talk to Customs and Border Patrol agents on the ground who are actually involved in this mission to get their first-hand perspectives of it,” Kirby told reporters Friday.

    Ahead of Biden’s border visit, the administration also announced plans to expand the policy and include Haitians, Nicaraguans and Cubans while it remains in place. Title 42 has so far largely applied to migrants from Mexico, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras and Venezuela.

    The announcements Biden made Thursday reflect the administration’s effort to prepare for the end of Title 42, along with putting in place programs to manage the surge of migrants that have coincided with the anticipated end of the rule.

    The administration will now accept up to 30,000 migrants per month from Nicaragua, Cuba, Haiti, and Venezuela under a humanitarian parole program geared toward those nationalities. Those who do not come to the US under that program may be expelled to Mexico under Title 42.

    The announcement drew criticism from immigrant advocates and Democrats who argued the policies will put migrants who are seeking asylum in harm’s way.

    “The expansion of Title 42 to include Cubans, Haitians, and Nicaraguans is a broken promise,” said Dylan Corbett, executive director of Hope Border Institute, in a statement. Hope Border Institute has been assisting migrants who have arrived in El Paso.

    “Border communities will continue to work hard to pick up the broken pieces of our nation’s immigration system and show that our future lies not with expulsion and deportation, but with humanity and hope,” he added.

    Members of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus grilled top Biden officials, including Mayorkas, over the newly announced border policies in a call Thursday, according to two sources in attendance.

    Members felt blindsided by the new policies and frustrated with the lack of engagement prior to their rollout, the sources said.

    “It was really heated,” one source said, adding that members were “livid” that the administration didn’t consult with them ahead of time. The call included officials with the Department of Homeland Security and the White House.

    One of the sources of tension during the call was a new asylum regulation that could bar migrants who are seeking asylum in the United States from doing so if they passed through another country on their way to the US-Mexico border. The restrictions are reminiscent of limits rolled out during the Trump administration, though officials have rejected the comparison.

    This story has been updated with additional information.

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  • A pregnant mom crossed the Rio Grande decades ago to give her unborn child a better life. Now her daughter is becoming a member of Congress | CNN Politics

    A pregnant mom crossed the Rio Grande decades ago to give her unborn child a better life. Now her daughter is becoming a member of Congress | CNN Politics


    Washington
    CNN
     — 

    Delia Ramirez walks toward the microphone determined to make her message heard.

    “It is time – it is past time that we deliver on the promise that we have made to our Dreamers,” she says.

    On a crisp morning in early December, Ramirez is standing steps away from the US Capitol, with its white dome gleaming against the blue sky behind her. This is a rallying cry we’ve heard here time and again – but Ramirez hopes when she says it, the words will carry even more weight. This isn’t merely a talking point from her campaign platform.

    “This,” the Illinois lawmaker says, “is very personal for me.”

    It’s personal because if Congress doesn’t act, Ramirez’s husband could be among hundreds of thousands of people facing possible deportation. And it’s personal because Ramirez herself is about to become a member of Congress.

    She’s called this news conference, flanked by several of her fellow incoming freshmen lawmakers and Congressional Progressive Caucus Chair Pramila Jayapal, a Washington state Democrat, to push for members of Congress to pass several key pieces of legislation while Democrats still control the US House. Among them: the DREAM Act, which would give a possible pathway to citizenship to some 2 million undocumented immigrants who were brought to the United States as children.

    “I am the wife of a DACA recipient. I am the daughter of Guatemalan working immigrants. I know firsthand the challenges and constant fear our families live every single day,” Ramirez tells reporters. “We have to end this.”

    That’s far easier said than done, as decades of debate over immigration reform on Capitol Hill clearly show.

    But Ramirez says no matter how many obstacles pop up in her path, she’ll keep pushing.

    As constant and controversial as conversations around immigration in Washington have become, many lawmakers weighing in don’t have direct personal connections to the issues they’re debating.

    Ramirez, 39, has lived them her entire life.

    Her mom was pregnant with her when she crossed the Rio Grande – a detail Ramirez made a point to include in a candidate bio on her campaign website, which notes that her mom went on to work “multiple low-wage jobs to give her children a fighting chance to escape poverty.”

    Ramirez says over the years some of her political opponents have tried to use details like this from her background against her, accusing her of being in favor of open borders and speaking dismissively about her family during debates. But Ramirez sees her family’s story as a strength that’s helped her connect with voters and better understand the issues that matter to her constituents.

    “I didn’t have to shy away from the fact that I’m working class and my husband’s a DACA recipient, that I’m worried about how I’m going to pay for housing. That is the reality of so many people,” she says. “And I want men and women, young and old, to see me and think, ‘That was my m’hija, That was my daughter.’ Or…’I’m an intern somewhere and I don’t feel seen. But if she could do it, so can I.’”

    Ramirez says the story of her mom’s journey from Guatemala to the United States infused her childhood in Chicago, where Ramirez was born.

    According to the story Ramirez grew up hearing, when her mom crossed the Rio Grande, strong currents nearly swept her away. She’d hidden her pregnancy from others on the journey, but in that moment she called out in desperation, “Help! Help! Save me! Save my daughter!” A man did, Ramirez says, but after that day, her mom never saw him again.

    As she struggled with depression as a teenager, Ramirez says her mom would frequently invoke this part of her past, saying, “I nearly died so that you could be born. Now I have to fight to keep you alive.”

    That struggling teen, Ramirez says, would never have imagined that she’d run a homeless shelter and other successful nonprofits, go on to become a state lawmaker and one day be on the cusp of entering US Congress.

    “But that is the journey, right?” Ramirez says. “Maybe not the Congress part as often as it should be, but the journey of so many people and so many children of immigrants who contribute and do so much for this country.”

    How does her family’s journey shape her view of what’s unfolding now at the border?

    “I am clear that anyone willing to risk dying, starving or even being raped in the long journey through desert, cold and tunnels is crossing because they feel like there is no other solution to their situation. Their migration is the only way they see themselves and loved ones surviving deep poverty and, in some cases, persecution,” Ramirez says.

    “My mother wouldn’t have risked my life or hers had it not been the only option she saw for her unborn child to have a chance at a life and childhood better than hers.”

    As Ramirez shares these and other details from her past with CNN in the Longworth House Office Building one evening in early December, an aide steps in with her phone in hand.

    “It’s time,” he tells her.

    Ramirez is still an Illinois state legislator for a few more weeks, and she needs to vote on a measure that might not pass if she doesn’t.

    She holds the phone in one hand and looks into the camera.

    “Representative Ramirez votes yes,” she says, then hands the phone back to her aide.

    “Done,” she says with a triumphant smile.

    It’s the latest in numerous bills Ramirez has helped pass since her 2018 election to the Illinois General Assembly.

    In that way alone, she knows it will be an adjustment to work as a lawmaker in Washington, where partisan fights often get in the way of passing laws.

    She still remembers the first state bill she sponsored that passed in March 2019 – a measure to expand homelessness prevention programming, a top concern for Ramirez, who previously directed a homeless shelter.

    “It was a very emotional moment,” she says. And the first thing she did after the bill passed, she says, was call her mom and share the news.

    Ramirez in a portrait from her campaign website.

    “I said, ‘Mom, in three months I was able to do more (to prevent homelessness) than I had done in almost 15 years,’” Ramirez recalls.

    Her mom responded that she was proud but reminded Ramirez that her work wasn’t finished.

    “Go hang up, and do more,” she said, according to Ramirez. “And don’t forget where you come from.”

    It’s with that mantra in mind, and with memories of growing up as the daughter of immigrants who worked multiple jobs to support their family in Chicago, that Ramirez is heading to Washington.

    Both her parents are US citizens now, but Ramirez says they’re still struggling to make ends meet.

    “I am the daughter of a woman who at 61 has given so much to this country and is a minimum-wage worker that can’t afford health care, so she’s on Medicaid, and diabetic,” Ramirez says. “I am the daughter of a man who spent 30 years working in an industrial bakery, a union busting company, and the day he retired, he got a frozen pie. He didn’t get a retirement pension and he struggled with Medicare supplemental, covering the cost.”

    Ramirez’s newly redrawn Illinois congressional district is nearly 50% Latino and heavily Democratic, spanning from Chicago’s Northwest side into the suburbs, according to CNN affiliate WLS. She won more than 66% of the vote in the general election, defeating Republican mortgage company executive Justin Burau.

    After Ramirez’s election, her background landed her on many lists of firsts. She will be the first Latina elected to Congress from the Midwest.

    She’s also helped set another record as part of the largest number of Latinos ever in the House of Representatives.

    There’s another notable detail about her background that Ramirez has pointed to regularly in interviews since her election: She has a “mixed-status family.”

    More than 22 million people in the United States live in mixed-status families, according to immigrant advocacy group fwd.us, meaning at least one family member is an undocumented immigrant and others are US citizens, green card holders or other lawful temporary immigrants. But it’s rare to hear a member of Congress use the term to describe themselves.

    Because of her family’s experience, Ramirez knows many of the people who supported her candidacy see her as a voice who will speak out for them, and for so many immigrants who are in the shadows and rarely heard.

    Ramirez married Boris Hernandez in October 2020. They met earlier that year in what she describes as “one of those pandemic loves.”

    Delia Ramirez, left, with her husband, Boris Hernandez, center, and Ramirez's mother.

    She’s best friends with his cousin. Hernandez is originally from the same town in Guatemala as her parents. He came to the United States when he was 14. And for years, like hundreds of thousands of other people, he’s relied on the Obama-era program known as DACA, short for Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, which granted certain young undocumented immigrants who were brought to the United States as children work permits and protection from deportation.

    On her campaign website and social media feeds, Ramirez has shared photos of Hernandez. And she’s invoked her husband’s story in recent speeches and conversations with constituents.

    Hernandez often stood by her side at campaign events. He occasionally took photos, too (he’s a photographer, in addition to also having worked in nonprofits and early childhood development). He accompanied Ramirez as she voted on Election Day, even though he couldn’t cast a ballot.

    Ramirez acknowledges that she’s privileged compared to many loved ones of DACA recipients. She’s a US citizen, and because of that, Hernandez has a pathway to citizenship no matter what Congress decides. But still, she says, they could end up in a precarious position.

    If a federal judge’s ruling ends DACA – something many immigrant rights advocates warn is likely to happen in the next year – and her husband’s paperwork to adjust his immigration status is pending, Ramirez knows she could have a lot more to worry about in addition to her busy schedule as a first-term congresswoman.

    “I’m going to be fighting to keep my husband here,” she says, “and I’m a member of Congress. …. What happens to the other 2 million (undocumented immigrants that the DREAM Act would protect)? What happens to his brother? What happens to my best friend from high school? What happens to all of them who have no pathway, who don’t have a citizen husband or wife or partner?”

    Ramirez says that question keeps her up at night.

    Standing beside Ramirez outside the Capitol on that morning in December, Congressman-elect Robert Garcia of California praises her for bringing the group of freshmen lawmakers together even before they’ve taken office.

    “She’s been leading on issues of immigration, on DACA for Dreamers, to ensure that our country’s taking care of those who really need our help,” Garcia says.

    Helping Dreamers isn’t the only topic on the agenda during this December news conference; Ramirez and the others are also pushing for extensions to the child tax credit and the earned income tax credit, and more funding for early childhood education programs.

    In her interview with CNN, Ramirez said her plans to fight for policies that help immigrants extend beyond immigration reform. One key issue she wants to work on while in office: housing, an area that she says is critically important to immigrant families and working-class families in general.

    Ramirez ascends a staircase at the US Capitol on November 18, 2022.

    The progressive policies she champions, she says, would benefit immigrants and US citizens alike. “It’s an ‘and,’” she says, “not an ‘or.’”

    Ramirez’s voice cracks with emotion as the news conference ends and she makes her closing argument.

    “It is time to deliver for our Dreamers,” she says. “It is time for Boris Hernandez to finally have a pathway to citizenship.”

    Ramirez says she feels overwhelmed by gratitude that her constituents have given her this chance to represent them, and a strong sense of urgency to deliver the results she knows so many people desperately need.

    Weeks later, the 117th Congress adjourned without taking most of the steps Ramirez and her fellow incoming freshmen had been pushing for.

    And with the balance of power shifting, she knows the battles to come will be even tougher. But for Ramirez, the words she proudly proclaimed in that first news conference outside the Capitol still hold true. She and other new members of the House Progressive Caucus have only just begun to make their voices heard.

    “We’re rooted,” she says, “and we are ready to help with this fight. … Let’s get to work.”

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  • Manchin says Biden should ask for extension of Trump-era border policy | CNN Politics

    Manchin says Biden should ask for extension of Trump-era border policy | CNN Politics


    Washington
    CNN
     — 

    Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin said Sunday that President Joe Biden should ask for an extension of Title 42, a public health authority that was invoked under former President Donald Trump and allows officials to expel migrants encountered at the US-Mexico border.

    “I understand that the president needs to use every bit of power he has as an executive to find a way or ask for an extension,” the West Virginia senator told CBS News’ Margaret Brennan on “Face the Nation.”

    “The president can basically, I think, ask for that extension. I think his administration is doing that or will do that. I sure hope they do. But we need an extension until we can get a viable answer for this,” Manchin said.

    Title 42 – which has been heavily criticized by public health experts and immigrant advocates – has largely barred asylum at the US-Mexico border, marking an unprecedented departure from traditional protocol.

    But while its origins were in the Trump administration, Title 42 has become a key tool for the Biden White House as it faces mass migration in the Western Hemisphere.

    A federal appeals court on Friday rejected a bid by several Republican-led states to keep Title 42 in force, after a district court struck the controversial border policy down. The Biden administration is set to stop enforcing the rule Wednesday, though the GOP-led states had previously indicated that they’d seek the intervention of the Supreme Court should the appeals court rule against them.

    The states argued in the case that allowing Title 42 to terminate would “cause an enormous disaster at the border” and that a big jump in the number of migrants “will necessarily increase the States’ law enforcement, education, and healthcare costs.”

    In an interview on ABC’s “This Week” that aired Sunday, Republican Gov. Greg Abbott of Texas said migrants coming across the border untested for Covid-19 or any other illness pose a “public health risk” to the United States.

    “Whether it’s Covid or some other issue, when you have people coming from across the globe, without knowing at all what their health status is, that almost by definition – is a public health risk,” Abbott said, while speaking about the end of Title 42. “There’s every reason to keep that in place.”

    On Saturday, Mayor Oscar Leeser of El Paso, Texas, declared a state of emergency in response to the surge in migrants arriving in the community in recent days.

    “If the courts do not intervene and put a halt to the removal of title 42, it’s going to be total chaos,” Abbott said.

    Biden administration officials have been bracing for an influx of migrants when the authority lifts. The Department of Homeland Security’s six-pillar plan for the scheduled end of Title 42 includes surging resources to the border, increasing processing efficiency, imposing consequences for unlawful entry, bolstering nonprofit capacity, targeting smugglers and working with international partners.

    Keisha Lance Bottoms, the White House senior adviser for public engagement, on Sunday defended the administration’s preparedness to deal with any influx at the southern border, telling CBS News, “What we are seeing happening is that many people are taking advantage of the fact that Title 42 may go away.”

    “This week, we see many people exploiting migrants, saying, ‘Come now or you lose your ability to come at all.’ And that’s simply not the case,” she said on “Face the Nation.”

    Lance Bottoms called on Congress to act on comprehensive immigration reform – something unlikely to happen before Title 42 is lifted or in the next Congress when Republicans will control the House.

    Bottoms would not foreshadow what executive actions Biden could take, in lieu of any larger action from Congress.

    Democratic Sen. Alex Padilla of California said Sunday the federal government should focus on funding humanitarian assistance upon the lifting of Title 42.

    “The state of California is a prime example. More than a billion dollars of state funds going into humanity assistance for asylum seekers when they come to the United States. While they wait for their hearing, do they deserve some basic food and shelter and health screening? Absolutely. Frankly, the federal government should be investing more in that humane treatment of asylum seekers,” Padilla said on ABC’s “This Week.”

    But Manchin stressed Sunday that “we have a crisis at the border. Everyone can see that. I think everyone realizes that something has to be done. [Title] 42 needs to be extended until we can get a really, truly immigration reform.”

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  • Divided government is more productive than you think | CNN Politics

    Divided government is more productive than you think | CNN Politics

    A version of this story appeared in CNN’s What Matters newsletter. To get it in your inbox, sign up for free here.



    CNN
     — 

    Now that CNN has projected Republicans will win the House of Representatives, it’s time to consider a Washington where both parties have some control.

    Despite underperforming on Election Day, the GOP gains will have a major impact on what’s accomplished in the coming two years.

    Additional climate change policy? Don’t count on it. National abortion legislation? Not a chance. Voting rights? Not likely.

    Plus, Republicans have indicated they will use any leverage they can find – including the debt ceiling – to force spending cuts.

    While you might immediately think this is all a recipe for a stalemate in Washington, I was surprised to read the argument, backed up by research, that the US government actually overperforms during periods of divided government.

    Those periods are coming more and more frequently, by the way. While there used to be relatively long periods of a decade or more during which one party controlled all of Washington, recent presidents have lost control of the House.

    Barack Obama, Donald Trump and George W. Bush each saw their party lose the House. President Joe Biden will join that club.

    The two Republicans in the ’80s and ‘90s – Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush – both had productive presidencies and never enjoyed a sympathetic congressional majority. The last president to enjoy unified government throughout his presidency was Democrat Jimmy Carter, and voters did not look very kindly on him in the final analysis.

    What’s below are excerpts from separate phone conversations conducted before the midterm election with Frances Lee and James Curry, authors of the 2020 book, “The Limits of Party: Congress and Lawmaking in a Polarized Era.” Lee is a professor of politics and public affairs at Princeton University, and Curry is a political science professor at the University of Utah. What led me to them was their 2020 argument that divided government overperforms and unified government underperforms expectations.

    What should Americans know about divided government?

    LEE: It’s the normal state of affairs in our politics in the modern era. Since 1980, something like two-thirds of the time we’ve had a divided government.

    And yet you think about all the things that government has undertaken in the years since the Second World War. The role and scope of the US government is so much greater now than it was then. And a lot of that happened in divided government. Most of that has been under divided government time. …

    Unified government usually results in disappointment for the party in power, which is just exactly what we’ve seen here in (this) Congress. Democrats were unable to deliver on their bold agenda, and that’s not different than what Republicans faced when they had unified government and couldn’t pass repeal and replace of Obamacare.

    Now hold on. Republicans passed a massive tax cut bill with unified government. Democrats passed the Affordable Care Act and the Inflation Reduction Act, which included spending to address climate change. Those are the major accomplishments of recent years, no?

    CURRY: I think we’re making a mistake when we say that those are the three biggest things that have happened. For instance, earlier you talked about the American Rescue Plan (another Covid relief bill passed with only Democratic support) – it is not as significant as the CARES Act, which was the first major Covid relief legislation passed by Congress. It passed in March of 2020, and it passed on an overwhelming bipartisan basis.

    A lot of what was included in the American Rescue Plan were things that were initially set out under the CARES Act. Arguably the CARES Act was the single most important legislative accomplishment that we’ve had in this country in several decades.

    And there are other examples too … things like criminal justice reform that was passed with bipartisan support in 2018, and many others things that are just as significant from a public policy standpoint, including also the bipartisan infrastructure bill that Congress passed last year.

    They don’t have as much political significance, foremost because they were passed on a single-party basis. But I don’t think you can make the case that they’re necessarily more significant in terms of policy consequences for the country.

    (In a follow-up email, Curry said that Congress often flies its bipartisanship accomplishments under the radar as part of larger bills, which means they don’t get as much attention. He pointed to big-ticket items that passed quietly in 2019 as part of larger spending bills, including raising the age to buy tobacco to 21, pushing through the first major pay raise for federal employees in years and repealing unpopular Obamacare taxes. He has similar examples for each recent year. But if they are not contentious, they get less attention, he said.)

    Your argument is counter to the current narrative of American politics – that parties enact more on their own. Is that a media problem? A partisanship problem?

    LEE: I’m still blown away by how much was done on Covid. Basically the United States government spent 75% more in 2020 than it spent in 2019. All that was Covid.

    You’re talking about New Deal levels of spending and yet people just didn’t even seem to notice it because it was done on a bipartisan basis. We basically had a universal basic income in response to Covid and all the small business aid – it’s just extraordinary – and yet, it just seemed to pass people by as though nothing important occurred.

    I don’t think it’s just a media story. The media wrote stories about the Covid aid bills, but it just didn’t capture people’s attention.

    And I think that’s because it didn’t cut in favor of or against either party. When you don’t have a story that drives a partisan narrative, most people are just not that interested in it. Most people that pay attention to politics are not that interested in it. It lacks a rooting interest.

    What about the big things that need action? Immigration reform has eluded Congress for decades and climate change is an existential threat. How can divided government be preferable if Congress can’t come together to address these problems?

    CURRY: I’m not saying divided government is preferable, which I think is important. I’m just saying it doesn’t make that big a difference on a lot of these issues.

    So we’ve seen that list of issues you just mentioned – climate change, immigration, etc. These are issues that Congress has equally struggled to take big, bold action on under divided or unified government.

    On climate change, for instance, Democrats want to do big, bold things, but they aren’t able to go as far as they want to, because not only are there disagreements between the parties on how to address climate change, there are disagreements among Democrats about the best way to address climate and environmental legislation.

    On immigration, you have clear divisions across party lines, but also divisions within each party.

    LEE: Congress can pass legislation spending money or cutting taxes. The problem is it’s difficult to do things that create backlash. It’s hard to do serious climate legislation without being prepared to accept a backlash.

    Isn’t this just a structural problem then? If there was no requirement for a filibuster supermajority, couldn’t a simple majority of lawmakers be more effective?

    LEE: On the two examples that you just put forward – on immigration and climate – the filibuster has not been the obstacle to recent efforts.

    In immigration reform that Republicans attempted to do (under Trump), they couldn’t get majorities in either the House or Senate. Democrats were way short of a Senate majority when they tried to do climate legislation under Obama. They barely got out of the House.

    (Curry and Lee’s research shows the filibuster is not the primary culprit standing in the way of four out of five of the priorities that parties have failed to enact since 1985.)

    CURRY: We found a more common reason why the parties fail on the things that can be accomplished is because they are unable to unify internally about what to do. The filibuster matters, but it is far from the most significant thing.

    But certainly the legislation that passes under divided government is different than what would have passed under a unified government. The parties must compromise more. Whether the government is unified or divided matters, right?

    CURRY: It makes a difference certainly for precisely what is in these final policy bills. It certainly makes a difference for the politics of the moment. It really makes a difference for each side of the aisle in terms of being able to say, we got this much done or that much done that matches my hopes and dreams as a Democrat or a Republican.

    But it’s just sort of an overstated story that unified government means big, bold things happen and divided government means they don’t.

    Wouldn’t Washington work better if one party was more easily able to deliver on its goals when voters gave it power?

    CURRY: Whether it would be better if we had a situation like you have in more parliamentary-style governments where a party takes control, they pass what they will and stand to voters, I think it’s just in the eye of the beholder.

    On one hand, potentially, yes, because it’s very clear and clean from a party responsibility or electoral responsibility standpoint, where parties pass things and then voters can hold them accountable or not. On the other hand, then you would see more wild swings in policy from election to election.

    Does the growing number of swings in power in Congress mean American voters consciously prefer divided government?

    CURRY: I don’t think that Americans necessarily have a preference for divided government. That’s something that people sometimes say. It sounds nice.

    But the reality is that roughly since the 1980s and early 1990s, it’s been the case that electoral margins are really tight – you have relatively even numbers of Americans that prefer Democrats and Republicans. And so from election to election, based on turnout and swings back and forth, you get this constant back and forth of our electoral politics where one party is in control for two to four years and then the other party is in control.

    That’s really important because it has massive implications for our politics. If you have a political system and political dynamic like we have today, where each party thinks they can constantly win back control or lose control of the House, the Senate and the presidency, it ups the stakes for every single decision that’s going to be made.

    Everything is considered through a lens of how will this affect our partisan fortunes in the next election, and that makes things just naturally more contentious.

    Can we agree that ours is not a very effective way to govern?

    CURRY: It is certainly the case that Congress does not pass every single thing that every person wants it to. But I don’t think that is ever true of any government. Nor do I think that’s a reasonable bar to set a government against.

    The reality is Congress does a lot of stuff and does a lot more than people give it credit for, but it also fails to take action on a lot of policies. I think that’s just politics. That’s just government. It’s not just an American problem, and it’s not just a facet of our specific political system.

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  • DOJ asks judge to force Trump White House lawyers to testify in Jan. 6 probe | CNN Politics

    DOJ asks judge to force Trump White House lawyers to testify in Jan. 6 probe | CNN Politics



    CNN
     — 

    The Justice Department is asking a federal judge to force the top two lawyers from Donald Trump’s White House counsel’s office to testify about their conversations with the former President, as it tries to break through the privilege firewall Trump has used to avoid scrutiny of his actions on January 6, 2021, according to three people familiar with the investigation.

    The move to compel additional testimony from former White House counsel Pat Cipollone and deputy White House counsel Patrick Philbin just last week is part of a set of secret court proceedings. Trump has been fighting to keep former advisers from testifying before a criminal grand jury about certain conversations, citing executive and attorney-client privileges to keep information confidential or slow down criminal investigators.

    But the Justice Department successfully secured answers from top vice presidential advisers Greg Jacob and Marc Short over the past three weeks in significant court victories that could make it more likely the criminal investigation reaches further into Trump’s inner circle.

    Jacob’s testimony on October 6, which has not been previously reported, is the first identifiable time when the confidentiality Trump had tried to maintain around the West Wing after the 2020 election has been pierced in the criminal probe following a court battle. A week after Jacob spoke to the grand jury again, Short had his own grand jury appearance date, CNN reported.

    All four men previously declined to answer some questions about advice and interactions with Trump when they testified in recent months in the secret criminal probe. Trump lost the court battles related to Jacob and Short before the chief judge of the trial-level US District Court in Washington, DC, last month.

    Attorneys for the men whom the DOJ is seeking to compel have declined to comment for this story or haven’t responded to requests. Cipollone and Philbin didn’t respond to requests for comment. A spokesman for the Justice Department also declined to comment.

    All four men have been willing to be as cooperative as the law demands, leaving Trump’s team to handle the fight over certain details in the investigation, the sources say.

    The litigation around Cipollone and Philbin’s testimony may be important for investigators in the long run, given how close the pair was to the Trump leading up to and during the Capitol riot. Prosecutors are likely to aim for the grand jury to hear about their direct conversations with the then-President.

    The disputes – conducted under seal in court because they involve grand jury activity – may also spawn several more court fights that will be crucial for prosecutors as they work to bring criminal charges related to Trump’s post-election efforts.

    Witnesses the federal grand jury has subpoenaed, such as former White House officials Mark Meadows, Eric Herschmann, Dan Scavino, Stephen Miller and campaign adviser Boris Epshteyn, also could decline to describe their conversations with Trump or advice being given to him after the election, several sources familiar with the investigation say.

    Trump and his allies have used claims of confidentiality – both executive privilege and attorney-client privilege – with mixed results in multiple legal quagmires that surround the former President. Those include the January 6 federal criminal investigation, the Mar-a-Lago documents federal criminal investigation, Georgia’s Fulton County investigation of election meddling, and the House select committee probe of January 6 as well. Some of the privilege arguments Trump has raised have never been settled in federal court, and some of the fights could lead to the Supreme Court.

    Trump spokesman Taylor Budowich slammed the “weaponized” Justice Department in a statement and referred to the probes surrounding the former President as “witch hunts.”

    According to the sources, the Justice Department won a trial-level judge’s order at the end of September that said Jacob and Short must testify in response to certain questions over which Trump’s team had tried to claim presidential and attorney-client confidentiality.

    The sealed court case, stemming from the grand jury’s work, had been before the chief judge of the DC District Court, Beryl Howell. Howell refused to put on hold Jacob and Short’s testimony while Trump’s team appealed, a source said.

    The Trump team, meanwhile, took several days to respond to their loss before Howell in court. The Justice Department set a quick-turnaround subpoena date for Jacob, leaving him to head into the grand jury under subpoena on October 6, according to several sources.

    The DC Circuit Court of Appeals is still considering legal arguments from Trump’s defense lawyers and the Justice Department over his ability to make executive and attorney-client privilege claims.

    How that is resolved – either by the appeals court or even the Supreme Court, if Trump pursues it that far – could have significant consequences for the January 6 criminal investigation, and for multiple witnesses who may be refusing to share some of what they know because of Trump’s privilege claims.

    Among a large group of former top Trump officials, Jacob has been one of the most searing voices condemning the then-President’s actions after the election, especially regarding the pressure he and his election attorney, John Eastman, tried to place on then-Vice President Mike Pence to block the congressional certification of the presidential vote.

    Jacob has been a harsh critic of Eastman, who is also of interest to prosecutors, dating back to when Eastman tried to convince Pence’s office the vice president alone could override the vote. He told Eastman at the time the right-wing attorney was a “serpent in the ear” of the President, and wrote while Trump supporters stormed the Capitol on January 6, 2021, “thanks to your bulls**t, we are now under siege.”

    Jacob added to a parade of star witnesses at public House select committee hearings this summer, speaking candidly about his disgust with what he witnessed inside the White House complex from his high-ranking position administration.

    “There is almost no idea more un-American than the notion that any one person would choose the American President, and then unbroken historical practice for 230 years, that the vice president did not have such an authority,” Jacob testified in July.

    But what Jacob and Short knew of Trump’s conversations, they wouldn’t disclose to the House nor to the grand jury until this month.

    In a taped House select committee deposition, Cipollone answered many questions about what happened inside the West Wing on January 6 but declined to describe communications between him and Trump.

    Cipollone’s and Philbin’s roles as White House lawyers raise complicated legal questions about whether Trump can claim confidentiality over the legal advice they gave him, as well as whether a former president can assert executive privilege to hold off criminal investigators.

    President Joe Biden has repeatedly declined to assert executive privilege around January 6 information, essentially leaving the fight for Trump to wage opposite the Justice Department.

    While the courts will look at each situation individually, history isn’t on Trump’s side. Federal prosecutors investigating former Presidents Bill Clinton and Richard Nixon were able to overcome attorney-client privilege assertions for White House counsel as well as executive privilege assertions so the grand jury could hear closely guarded information.

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  • Immigration a top issue among Latino voters weeks out from Election Day | CNN Politics

    Immigration a top issue among Latino voters weeks out from Election Day | CNN Politics



    CNN
     — 

    With the midterm elections less than three weeks away, immigration remains a top issue among Latino voters – but views on legal and illegal immigration vary greatly.

    “I think it’s been misunderstood,” said Ruy Teixeira, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute who has studied Latino voter preferences for decades.

    While many Latino voters support a more “humane treatment” of migrants and creating a pathway to citizenship for the undocumented, Teixeira said there are many in the community who “are not really interested or delighted by the idea people can just pour across the border. … They also think we need more border security.”

    While polls show the majority of Hispanics align with Democrats on immigration, the GOP has recently made significant gains, even while escalating the anti-immigrant rhetoric popularized by former President Donald Trump.

    About 55% of Latinos support Democrats on the issue of legal immigration, according to a recent NYT/Siena College poll, which also indicated roughly a third support a border wall along the US southern border.

    With candidates racing to capture every last vote, Latinos – who make up more than 30 million of the country’s registered voters – could tilt the scales in major contests across battleground states.

    “There’s a vulnerability there. There’s a soft underbelly for the Democrats on this issue, even among Hispanic voters,” Teixera said.

    A hardline immigration policy is part of what Abraham Enriquez says attracted him and other Latinos in Texas’ Rio Grande Valley to Trump.

    “I think Latinos, we don’t really care much about what you say, it’s about what you’re going to do,” said Enriquez, who founded Bienvenido US, an organization that aims to mobilize conservative Hispanic voters.

    The grandson of Mexican migrants, Enriquez says Democrats are losing support among the nations’ fastest growing voting bloc because their rhetoric is out of touch: too critical of the capitalist system and not critical enough of what he calls unrestricted immigration.

    “If America is so bad, if America is such a terrible country to live in, why did 50 migrants die suffocated in a trailer to seek a better life in this country?” he asked.

    Trump unexpectedly made gains in the Rio Grande Valley in 2020 and the region recently elected the first GOP representative in more than a century, after US Rep. Mayra Flores won a special election earlier this year.

    While Republicans are closely eyeing three congressional races in South Texas as a test of their appeal in the community, immigration attorney Carlos Gomez argues campaign promises often don’t lead to change. He says a sensible, balanced approach to reform is sorely needed, but missing from the public discourse surrounding immigration.

    “Neither party is addressing the issue well,” Gomez said. “Either they talk to the right, or they talk to the left, but they don’t come (to the border) and talk to us. They don’t see what we’re doing on a daily basis.”

    Gomez criticized Texas Republican Gov. Greg Abbott’s busing of migrants to Democrat-led cities as an “inhumane” way to win votes, not a genuine effort to help migrants or border towns.

    In Florida, another state with a large Hispanic population, GOP Gov. Ron DeSantis similarly took the controversial step in September of flying dozens of Venezuelan asylum-seekers to Martha’s Vineyard in Massachusetts – a move that pro-immigration advocate Maria Corina Vegas called a “stunt.”

    “It may make for interesting television, to raise money, to play to the base, to feed a narrative of grievance. That’s what populists do, effectively,” said Vegas, a deputy state director for the American Business Immigration Coalition, a group that promotes comprehensive immigration reform.

    As a Venezuelan-American who came to the US fleeing Hugo Chavez’s communist regime, she argued the demonization of outsiders among politicians may help motivate some supporters, but will ultimately harm the country.

    “I never thought I would see that in this country. I saw that in my country – it tore my country apart. It doesn’t matter if it comes from the right or the left. It’s anti-democratic,” Vegas said.

    For Cuban-born entrepreneur Julio Cabrera, the issue is tied inextricably to the American economy: “This country moves because of immigrants and Latinos. … We do the dirty jobs others do not want.”

    Cuban-born entrepreneur Julio Cabrera.

    Cabrera is turned off by anti-immigrant rhetoric, he says, because the vast majority of immigrants entering the US are decent people looking to work and build a better life. He believes the immigration system should be kinder to those who have risked their lives for a better future.

    After fleeing Fidel Castro’s communist dictatorship in 2006, Cabrera says he was robbed at gunpoint while traveling through Mexico before arriving at the southern border, where he sought asylum with his daughter.

    Now, he is a successful restauranteur, running Cafe La Trova in Miami, where he says most of his staff are immigrants.

    “Everybody is an immigrant here and we’ve done something remarkable for this community.”

    Younger voters, like Marvin Tapia – a Colombian-American who lives in Little Havana – argues the recent rise in anti-immigrant sentiment is tied to nationwide demographic change, which he says is a positive development more politicians should embrace.

    “If we’re sharing a country built on immigrants, we should be proud of that. That we evolved and we grow and change. … I believe that growth is pivotal to the growth of a country, especially like the US,” Tapia said. “We should learn from it, instead of run from it.”

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  • Donald Trump Fast Facts | CNN Politics

    Donald Trump Fast Facts | CNN Politics



    CNN
     — 

    Here’s a look at the life of Donald Trump, the 45th president of the United States.

    Birth date: June 14, 1946

    Birth place: New York, New York

    Birth name: Donald John Trump

    Father: Fred Trump, real estate developer

    Mother: Mary (Macleod) Trump

    Marriages: Melania (Knauss) Trump (January 22, 2005-present); Marla (Maples) Trump (December 1993-June 1999, divorced); Ivana (Zelnicek) Trump (1977-1990, divorced)

    Children: with Melania Trump: Barron, March 20, 2006; with Marla Maples: Tiffany, October 13, 1993; with Ivana Trump: Eric, 1984; Ivanka, October 30, 1981; Donald Jr., December 31, 1977

    Education: Attended Fordham University; University of Pennsylvania, Wharton School of Finance, B.S. in Economics, 1968

    As Trump evolved from real estate developer to reality television star, he turned his name into a brand. Licensed Trump products have included board games, steaks, cologne, vodka, furniture and menswear.

    He has portrayed himself in cameo appearances in movies and on television, including “Zoolander,” “Sex and the City” and “Home Alone 2: Lost in New York.”

    Trump’s slogan, “Make America Great Again,” was first used by Ronald Reagan while he was running against President Jimmy Carter.

    For details on investigations into alleged Russian meddling in the 2016 election, visit 2016 Presidential Election Investigation Fast Facts.

    1970s – After college, works with his father on apartment complexes in Queens and Brooklyn.

    1973 – Trump and his father are named in a Justice Department lawsuit alleging Trump property managers violated the Fair Housing Act by turning away potential African American tenants. The Trumps deny the company discriminates and file a $100 million countersuit, which is later dismissed. The case is settled in 1975, and the Trumps agree to provide weekly lists of vacancies to Black community organizations.

    1976 – Trump and his father partner with the Hyatt Corporation, purchasing the Commodore Hotel, an aging midtown Manhattan property. The building is revamped and opens four years later as the Grand Hyatt Hotel. The project kickstarts Trump’s career as a Manhattan developer.

    1983-1990 – He builds/purchases multiple properties in New York City, including Trump Tower and the Plaza Hotel, and also opens casinos in Atlantic City, New Jersey, including the Trump Taj Mahal and the Trump Plaza. Trump buys the New Jersey Generals football team, part of the United States Football League, which folds after three seasons.

    1985 – Purchases Mar-a-Lago, an oceanfront estate in Palm Beach, Florida. It is renovated and opens as a private club in 1995.

    1987 – Trump’s first book, “Trump: The Art of the Deal,” is published, and becomes a bestseller. The Donald J. Trump Foundation is established in order to donate a portion of profits from book sales to charities.

    1990 – Nearly $1 billion in personal debt, Trump reaches an agreement with bankers allowing him to avoid declaring personal bankruptcy.

    1991 – The Trump Taj Mahal files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.

    1992 – The Trump Plaza and the Trump Castle casinos file for bankruptcy.

    1996 – Buys out and becomes executive producer of the Miss Universe, Miss USA and Miss Teen USA pageants.

    October 7, 1999 – Tells CNN’s Larry King that he is going to form a presidential exploratory committee and wants to challenge Pat Buchanan for the Reform Party nomination.

    February 14, 2000 – Says that he is abandoning his bid for the presidency, blaming discord within the Reform Party.

    January 2004 – “The Apprentice,” a reality show featuring aspiring entrepreneurs competing for Trump’s approval, premieres on NBC.

    November 21, 2004 – Trump Hotels & Casino Resorts Inc. files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.

    2005 – Establishes Trump University, which offers seminars in real estate investment.

    February 13, 2009 – Announces his resignation from his position as chairman of Trump Entertainment Resorts. Days later, the company files for bankruptcy protection.

    March 17, 2011 – During an interview on ABC’s “Good Morning America,” Trump questions whether President Barack Obama was born in the United States.

    June 16, 2015 – Announces that he is running for president during a speech at Trump Tower. He pledges to implement policies that will boost the economy and says he will get tough on immigration. “When Mexico sends its people, they’re not sending their best…They’re sending people who have lots of problems,” Trump says. “They’re bringing drugs, they’re bringing crime, they’re rapists, and some, I assume, are good people.”

    June 28, 2015 – Says he’s giving up the TV show “The Apprentice” to run for president.

    June 29, 2015 – NBCUniversal says it is cutting its business ties to Trump and won’t air the Miss USA and Miss Universe pageants because of “derogatory statements by Donald Trump regarding immigrants.”

    July 8, 2015 – In an interview with CNN’s Anderson Cooper, Trump says he “can’t guarantee” all of his employees have legal status in the United States. This is in response to questions about a Washington Post report about undocumented immigrants working at the Old Post Office construction site in Washington, DC, which Trump is converting into a hotel.

    July 22, 2015 – Trump’s financial disclosure report is made public by the Federal Election Commission (FEC).

    August 6, 2015 – During the first 2016 Republican debate, Trump is questioned about a third party candidacy, his attitude towards women and his history of donating money to Democratic politicians. He tells moderator Megyn Kelly of Fox News he feels he is being mistreated. The following day, Trump tells CNN’s Don Lemon that Kelly was singling him out for attack, “You could see there was blood coming out of her eyes, blood coming out of her wherever.”

    September 11, 2015 – Trump announces he has purchased NBC’s half of the Miss Universe Organization, which organizes the annual Miss USA and Miss Universe pageants.

    December 7, 2015 – Trump’s campaign puts out a press release calling for a “complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States until our country’s representatives can figure out what is going on.”

    May 26, 2016 – Secures enough delegates to clinch the Republican Party nomination.

    July 16, 2016 – Introduces Indiana Governor Mike Pence as his running mate.

    July 19, 2016 – Becomes the Republican Party nominee for president.

    September 13, 2016 – During an interview with CNN’s Jake Tapper, New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman says his office is investigating Trump’s charitable foundation “to make sure it’s complying with the laws governing charities in New York.”

    October 1, 2016 – The New York Times reports Trump declared a $916 million loss in 1995 which could have allowed him to legally skip paying federal income taxes for years. The report is based on a financial document mailed to the newspaper by an anonymous source.

    October 7, 2016 – Unaired footage from 2005 surfaces of Trump talking about trying to have sex with a married woman and being able to grope women. In footage obtained by The Washington Post, Trump is heard off-camera discussing women in vulgar terms during the taping of a segment for “Access Hollywood.” In a taped response, Trump declares, “I said it, I was wrong and I apologize.”

    October 9, 2016 – During the second presidential debate, CNN’s Cooper asks Trump about his descriptions of groping and kissing women without their consent in the “Access Hollywood” footage. Trump denies that he has ever engaged in such behavior and declares the comments were “locker room talk.” After the debate, 11 women step forward to claim that they were sexually harassed or sexually assaulted by the real estate developer. Trump says the stories aren’t true.

    November 8, 2016 – Elected president of the United States. Trump will be the first president who has never held elected office, a top government post or a military rank.

    November 18, 2016 – Trump agrees to pay $25 million to settle three lawsuits against Trump University. About 6,000 former students are covered by the settlement.

    December 24, 2016 – Trump says he will dissolve the Donald J. Trump Foundation “to avoid even the appearance of any conflict with my role as President.” A spokeswoman for the New York Attorney General’s Office says that the foundation cannot legally close until investigators conclude their probe of the charity.

    January 10, 2017 – CNN reports that intelligence officials briefed Trump on a dossier that contains allegations about his campaign’s ties to Russia and unverified claims about his personal life. The author of the dossier is a former British spy who was hired by a research firm that had been funded by both political parties to conduct opposition research on Trump.

    January 20, 2017 – Takes the oath of office from Chief Justice John Roberts during an inauguration ceremony at the Capitol.

    January 23, 2017 – Trump signs an executive action withdrawing the United States from the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a 12-nation trade deal negotiated by the Obama administration and awaiting congressional approval.

    January 27, 2017 – Trump signs an executive order halting all refugee arrivals for 120 days and banning travel to the United States from seven Muslim-majority countries for 90 days. Additionally, refugees from Syria are barred indefinitely from entering the United States. The order is challenged in court.

    February 13, 2017 – Trump’s national security adviser, Michael Flynn, resigns amid accusations he lied about his communications with Russian ambassador to the United States, Sergey Kislyak. Flynn later pleads guilty to lying to the FBI.

    May 3, 2017 – FBI Director James Comey confirms that there is an ongoing investigation into ties between the Trump campaign and Russia during a hearing on Capitol Hill. Less than a week later, Trump fires Comey, citing a DOJ memo critical of the way he handled the investigation into Clinton’s emails.

    May 2017 – Shortly after Trump fires Comey, the FBI opens an investigation into whether Trump “had been working on behalf of Russia against American interests,” citing former law enforcement officials and others the paper said were familiar with the probe.

    May 17, 2017 – Former FBI Director Robert Mueller is appointed as special counsel to lead the probe into Russian meddling in the 2016 election, including potential collusion between Trump campaign associates and Russian officials. Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein makes the appointment because Attorney General Jeff Sessions recused himself from investigations into Trump’s campaign.

    May 19, 2017 – Departs on his first foreign trip as president. The nine-day, five-country trip includes stops in Saudi Arabia, Israel, the Vatican, a NATO summit in Brussels and a G7 summit in Sicily.

    June 1, 2017 – Trump proclaims that the United States is withdrawing from the Paris climate accord but adds that he is open to renegotiating aspects of the environmental agreement, which was signed by 175 countries in 2016.

    July 7, 2017 – Meets Russian President Vladimir Putin in person for the first time, on the sidelines of the G20 meeting in Hamburg, Germany.

    August 8, 2017 – In response to nuclear threats from North Korea, Trump warns that Pyongyang will “face fire and fury like the world has never seen.” Soon after Trump’s comments, North Korea issues a statement saying it is “examining the operational plan” to strike areas around the US territory of Guam.

    August 15, 2017 – After a violent clash between neo-Nazi activists and counterprotesters leaves one dead in Charlottesville, Virginia, Trump holds an impromptu press conference in the lobby of Trump Tower and declares that there were “fine people” on both sides.

    August 25, 2017 – Trump’s first pardon is granted to former Arizona sheriff Joe Arpaio, who was convicted of criminal contempt for disregarding a court order in a racial-profiling case. Trump did not consult with lawyers at the Justice Department before announcing his decision.

    September 5, 2017 – The Trump administration announces that it is ending the DACA program, introduced by Obama to protect nearly 800,000 undocumented immigrants brought to the United States as children. Trump calls on Congress to introduce legislation that will prevent DACA recipients from being deported. Multiple lawsuits are filed opposing the policy in federal courts and judges delay the end of the program, asking the government to submit filings justifying the cancellation of DACA.

    September 19, 2017 – In a speech at the United Nations General Assembly, Trump refers to North Korean leader Kim Jong Un as “Rocket Man” and warns that the United States will “totally destroy North Korea” if forced to defend itself or its allies.

    September 24, 2017 – The Trump administration unveils a third version of the travel ban, placing restrictions on travel by certain foreigners from Chad, Iran, Libya, North Korea, Somalia, Syria, Venezuela and Yemen. (Chad is later removed after meeting security requirements.) One day before the revised ban is set to take effect, it is blocked nationwide by a federal judge in Hawaii. A judge in Maryland issues a similar ruling.

    December 4, 2017 – The Supreme Court rules that the revised travel ban can take effect pending appeals.

    December 6, 2017 – Trump recognizes Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and announces plans to relocate the US Embassy there.

    January 11, 2018 – During a White House meeting on immigration reform, Trump reportedly refers to Haiti and African nations as “shithole countries.”

    January 12, 2018 – The Wall Street Journal reports that Trump allegedly had an affair with a porn star named Stephanie Clifford, aka Stormy Daniels. The newspaper states that Trump’s personal attorney, Michael Cohen, arranged a $130,000 payment for a nondisclosure agreement weeks before Election Day in 2016. Trump denies the affair occurred. In March, Clifford sues Trump seeking to be released from the NDA. In response, Trump and his legal team agree outside of court not to sue or otherwise enforce the NDA. The suit is dismissed. A California Superior Court judge orders Trump to pay $44,100 to Clifford, to reimburse her attorneys’ fees in the legal battle surrounding her nondisclosure agreement.

    March 13, 2018 – Trump announces in a tweet that he has fired Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and will nominate CIA Director Mike Pompeo as Tillerson’s replacement.

    March 20, 2018 – A New York Supreme Court judge rules that a defamation lawsuit against Trump can move forward, ruling against a July 2017 motion to dismiss filed by Trump’s lawyers. The lawsuit, filed by Summer Zervos, a former “Apprentice” contestant, is related to sexual assault allegations. In November 2021, attorneys for Zervos announce she is dropping the lawsuit.

    March 23, 2018 – The White House announces that it is adopting a policy, first proposed by Trump via tweet in July 2017, banning most transgender individuals from serving in the military.

    April 9, 2018 – The FBI raids Cohen’s office, home and a hotel room where he’d been staying while his house was renovated. The raid is related to a federal investigation of possible fraud and campaign finance violations.

    April 13, 2018 – Trump authorizes joint military strikes in Syria with the UK and France after reports the government used chemical weapons on civilians in Douma.

    May 7, 2018 – The Trump administration announces a “zero tolerance” policy for illegal border crossings. Sessions says that individuals who violate immigration law will be criminally prosecuted and warns that parents could be separated from children.

    May 8, 2018 – Trump announces that the United States is withdrawing from the Iran nuclear deal.

    May 31, 2018 – The Trump administration announces it is imposing tariffs on steel and aluminum imported from allies Canada, Mexico and the European Union.

    June 8-9, 2018 – Before leaving for the G7 summit in Quebec City, Trump tells reporters that Russia should be reinstated in the group. The annexation of Crimea in 2014 led to Russia’s suspension. After leaving the summit, Trump tweets that he will not endorse the traditional G7 communique issued at the end of the meeting. The President singles out Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau for making “false statements” at a news conference.

    June 12, 2018 – Trump meets Kim in person for the first time during a summit in Singapore. They sign a four-point statement that broadly outlines the countries’ commitment to a peace process. The statement contains a pledge by North Korea to “work towards” complete denuclearization but the agreement does not detail how the international community will verify that Kim is ending his nuclear program.

    June 14, 2018 – The New York attorney general sues the Trump Foundation, alleging that the nonprofit run by Trump and his three eldest children violated state and federal charity law.

    June 26, 2018 – The Supreme Court upholds the Trump administration’s travel ban in a 5-4 ruling along party lines.

    July 16, 2018 – During a joint news conference with Putin in Helsinki, Trump declines to endorse the US government’s assessment that Russia interfered in the election, saying he doesn’t “see any reason why” Russia would be responsible. The next day, Trump clarifies his remark, “The sentence should have been, ‘I don’t see any reason why it wouldn’t be Russia.” He says he accepts the intelligence community’s conclusion that Russia meddled in the election but adds, “It could be other people also.”

    August 21, 2018 – Cohen pleads guilty to eight federal charges, including two campaign finance violations. In court, he says that he orchestrated payments to silence women “in coordination and at the direction of a candidate for federal office.” On the same day, Trump’s former campaign chairman, Paul Manafort is convicted on eight counts of federal financial crimes. On December 12, Cohen is sentenced to three years in prison.

    October 2, 2018 – The New York Times details numerous tax avoidance schemes allegedly carried out by Trump and his siblings. In a tweet, Trump dismisses the article as a “very old, boring and often told hit piece.”

    November 20, 2018 – Releases a statement backing Saudi Arabia in the wake of the murder of Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi, a Virginia resident, killed in October at a Saudi consulate in Turkey. Khashoggi was a frequent critic of the Saudi regime. The Saudis initially denied any knowledge of his death, but then later said a group of rogue operators were responsible for his killing. US officials have speculated that such a mission, including the 15 men sent from Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, to murder him, could not have been carried out without the authorization of Saudi leader Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. In the statement, Trump writes, “Our intelligence agencies continue to assess all information, but it could very well be that the Crown Prince had knowledge of this tragic event, maybe he did and maybe he didn’t!”

    December 18, 2018 – The Donald J. Trump Foundation agrees to dissolve according to a document filed in Manhattan Supreme Court. The agreement allows the New York attorney general’s office to review the recipients of the charity’s assets.

    December 22, 2018 – The longest partial government shutdown in US history begins after Trump demands lawmakers allocate $5.7 billion in funding for a border wall before agreeing to sign a federal funding package.

    January 16, 2019 – After nearly two years of Trump administration officials denying that anyone involved in his campaign colluded with the Russians to help his candidacy, Trump lawyer and former New York City mayor, Rudy Giuliani, says “I never said there was no collusion between the campaign, or people in the campaign. I said the President of the United States.”

    January 25, 2019 – The government shutdown ends when Trump signs a short-term spending measure, providing three weeks of stopgap funding while lawmakers work on a border security compromise. The bill does not include any wall funding.

    February 15, 2019 – Trump declares a national emergency to allocate funds to build a wall on the border with Mexico. During the announcement, the President says he expects the declaration to be challenged in court. The same day, Trump signs a border security measure negotiated by Congress, with $1.375 billion set aside for barriers, averting another government shutdown.

    February 18, 2019 – Attorneys general from 16 states file a lawsuit in federal court challenging Trump’s emergency declaration.

    March 22, 2019 – Mueller ends his investigation and delivers his report to Attorney General William Barr. A senior Justice Department official tells CNN that there will be no further indictments.

    March 24, 2019 – Barr releases a letter summarizing the principal conclusions from Mueller’s investigation. According to Barr’s four-page letter, the evidence was not sufficient to establish that members Trump’s campaign tacitly engaged in a criminal conspiracy with the Russian government to interfere with the election.

    April 18, 2019 – A redacted version of the Mueller report is released. The first part of the 448-page document details the evidence gathered by Mueller’s team on potential conspiracy crimes and explains their decisions not to charge individuals associated with the campaign. The second part of the report outlines ten episodes involving possible obstruction of justice by the President. According to the report, Mueller’s decision not to charge Trump was rooted in Justice Department guidelines prohibiting the indictment of a sitting president. Mueller writes that he would have cleared Trump if the evidence warranted exoneration.

    May 1, 2019 – The New York Times publishes a report that details how Giuliani, in his role as Trump’s personal attorney, is investigating allegations related to former Vice President Joe Biden, a potential Trump opponent in the 2020 presidential race. Biden’s son, Hunter Biden, served on the board of a Ukrainian energy company called Burisma Holdings. In 2016, the elder Biden pressured Ukraine to oust a prosecutor who had investigated Burisma for corruption. Giuliani suggests that Biden’s move was motivated by a desire to protect his son from criminal charges. Giuliani’s claims are undermined after Bloomberg reports that the Burisma investigation was “dormant” when Biden pressed the prosecutor to resign.

    June 12, 2019 – Trump says he may be willing to accept information about political rivals from a foreign government during an interview on ABC News, declaring that he’s willing to listen and wouldn’t necessarily call the FBI.

    June 16, 2019 – Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu unveils a sign at the proposed site of a Golan Heights settlement to be named Trump Heights.

    June 18, 2019 – Trump holds a rally in Orlando to publicize the formal launch of his reelection campaign.

    June 28, 2019 – During a breakfast meeting at the G20 summit in Osaka, Japan, Trump and Saudi Crown Prince Mohamed bin Salman reportedly discuss tensions with Iran, trade and human rights.

    June 30, 2019 – Trump becomes the first sitting US president to enter North Korea. He takes 20 steps beyond the border and shakes hands with Kim.

    July 14, 2019 – Via Twitter, Trump tells Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Rashida Tlaib, Illhan Omar and Ayanna Pressley to “go back” to their home countries. Ocasio-Cortez, Tlaib and Pressley are natural-born US citizens; Omar was born in Somalia, immigrated to the United States and became a citizen.

    July 16, 2019 – The House votes, 240-187, to condemn the racist language Trump used in his tweets about Ocasio-Cortez, Tlaib, Omar and Pressley.

    July 24, 2019 – Mueller testifies before the House Judiciary Committee and the House Intelligence Committee.

    July 25, 2019 – Trump speaks on the phone with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. Trump asks Zelensky for a “favor,” encouraging him to speak with Giuliani about investigating Biden. In the days before the call, Trump blocked nearly $400 million in military and security aid to Ukraine.

    August 12, 2019 – A whistleblower files a complaint pertaining to Trump’s conduct on the Zelensky call.

    September 11, 2019 – The Trump administration lifts its hold on military aid for Ukraine.

    September 24, 2019 – House Speaker Nancy Pelosi announces the beginning of an impeachment inquiry related to the whistleblower complaint.

    September 25, 2019 – The White House releases notes from the July 25 call between Trump and Zelensky. The readout contains multiple references to Giuliani and Barr. In response, the Justice Department issues a statement that says Barr didn’t know about Trump’s conversation until weeks after the call. Further, the attorney general didn’t talk to the President about having Ukraine investigate the Bidens, according to the Justice Department. On the same day as the notes are released, Trump and Zelensky meet in person for the first time on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly. During a joint press conference after the meeting, both men deny that Trump pressured Zelensky to investigate Biden in exchange for aid.

    September 26, 2019 – The House releases a declassified version of the whistleblower complaint. According to the complaint, officials at the White House tried to “lock down” records of Trump’s phone conversation with Zelensky. The complaint also alleges that Barr played a role in the campaign to convince Zelensky that Biden should be investigated. Trump describes the complaint as “fake news” and “a witch hunt” on Twitter.

    September 27, 2019 – Pompeo is subpoenaed by House committees over his failure to provide documents related to Ukraine. Kurt Volker, US special envoy to Ukraine, resigns. He was named in the whistleblower complaint as one of the State Department officials who helped Giuliani connect with sources in Ukraine.

    October 3, 2019 – Speaking to reporters outside the White House, Trump says both Ukraine and China should investigate alleged corruption involving Biden and his son. CNN reports that the President had brought up Biden and his family during a June phone call with Xi Jinping. In that call, Trump discussed the political prospects of Biden as well as Elizabeth Warren. He also told Xi that he would remain quiet on the matter of Hong Kong protests. Notes documenting the conversation were placed on a highly secured server where the transcript from the Ukraine call was also stored.

    October 6, 2019 – After Trump speaks on the phone with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the White House announces that US troops will move out of northern Syria to make way for a planned Turkish military operation. The move marks a major shift in American foreign policy and effectively gives Turkey the green light to attack US-backed Kurdish forces, a partner in the fight against ISIS.

    October 9, 2019 – Turkey launches a military offensive in northern Syria.

    October 31, 2019 – Trump says via Twitter that he is changing his legal residency from New York to Florida, explaining that he feels he is treated badly by political leaders from the city and state.

    November 7, 2019 – A judge orders Trump to pay $2 million to settle a lawsuit against his charity filed by the New York state attorney general. According to the suit, Trump breached his fiduciary duty by allowing his presidential campaign to direct the distribution of donations. In a statement, Trump accuses the attorney general of mischaracterizing the settlement for political purposes.

    November 13, 2019 – Public impeachment hearings begin and Trump meets Erdogan at the White House.

    November 20, 2019 – During a public hearing, US Ambassador to the European Union Gordon Sondland says he worked with Giuliani on matters related to Ukraine at the “express direction of the President of the United States” and he says “everyone was in the loop.” Sondland recounts several conversations between himself and Trump about Ukraine opening two investigations: one into Burisma and another into conspiracies about Ukrainian meddling in the 2016 US election.

    December 10, 2019 – House Democrats unveil two articles of impeachment, one for abuse of power and one for obstruction of Congress.

    December 11, 2019 – Trump signs an executive order to include discrimination against Jewish people as a violation of law in certain cases, with an eye toward fighting antisemitism on college campuses.

    December 13, 2019 – The House Judiciary Committee approves the two articles of impeachment in a party line vote.

    December 18, 2019 – The House of Representatives votes to impeach Trump, charging a president with high crimes and misdemeanors for just the third time in American history.

    January 3, 2020 – Speaking at Mar-a-Lago, Trump announces that a US airstrike in Iraq has killed Qasem Soleimani, the leader of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps Quds Force.

    January 8, 2020 – Iran fires a number of missiles at two Iraqi bases housing US troops in retaliation for the American strike that killed Soleimani. No US or Iraqi lives are reported lost, but the Pentagon later releases a statement confirming that 109 US service members had been diagnosed with mild traumatic brain injuries in the wake of the attack.

    January 24, 2020 – Makes history as the first President to attend the annual March for Life rally in Washington, DC, since it began nearly a half-century ago. Trump reiterates his support for tighter abortion restrictions.

    January 29, 2020 – Trump signs the US-Mexico-Canada Agreement into law, which replaces the North American Free Trade Agreement.

    January 31, 2020 – The Trump administration announces an expansion of the travel ban to include six new countries. Immigration restrictions will be imposed on: Nigeria, Eritrea, Tanzania, Sudan, Kyrgyzstan and Myanmar (known as Burma), with exceptions for immigrants who have helped the United States.

    February 5, 2020 – The Senate votes to acquit Trump on two articles of impeachment. Sen. Mitt Romney is the sole Republican to vote to convict on the charge of abuse of power, joining with all Senate Democrats in a 52-48 not guilty vote. On the obstruction of Congress charge, the vote falls along straight party lines, 53-47 for acquittal.

    May 29, 2020 – Trump announces that the United States will terminate its relationship with the World Health Organization.

    July 10, 2020 – Trump commutes the prison sentence of his longtime friend Roger Stone, who was convicted of crimes that included lying to Congress in part, prosecutors said, to protect the President. The announcement came just days before Stone was set to report to a federal prison in Georgia.

    October 2, 2020 – Trump announces that he has tested positive for coronavirus. Later in the day, Trump is transferred to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, and returns to the White House on October 5.

    November 7, 2020 – Days after the presidential election on November 3, CNN projects Trump loses his bid for reelection to Biden.

    November 25, 2020 – Trump announces in a tweet that he has granted Michael Flynn a “full pardon,” wiping away the guilty plea of the intelligence official for lying to the FBI.

    December 23, 2020 – Announces 26 new pardons, including for Stone, Manafort and son-in-law Jared Kushner’s father, Charles.

    January 6, 2021 – Following Trump’s rally and speech at the White House Ellipse, pro-Trump rioters storm the US Capitol as members of Congress meet to certify the Electoral College results of the 2020 presidential election. A total of five people die, including a Capitol Police officer the next day.

    January 7-8, 2021 – Instagram and Facebook place a ban on Trump’s account from posting through the remainder of his presidency and perhaps “indefinitely.” Twitter permanently bans Trump from the platform, explaining that “after close review of recent Tweets…and the context around them we have permanently suspended the account due to the risk of further incitement of violence.”

    January 13, 2021 – The House votes to impeach Trump for “incitement of insurrection.” He is the only president to be impeached twice.

    January 20, 2021 – Trump issues a total of 143 pardons and commutations that include his onetime political strategist, Steve Bannon, a former top fundraiser and two well-known rappers but not himself or his family. He then receives a military-style send-off from Joint Base Andrews on Inauguration morning, before heading home to Florida.

    February 13, 2021 – The US Senate acquits Trump in his second impeachment trial, voting that Trump is not guilty of inciting the deadly January 6 riots at the US Capitol. The vote is 43 not guilty to 57 guilty, short of the 67 guilty votes needed to convict.

    May 5, 2021 – Facebook’s Oversight Board upholds Trump’s suspension from using its platform. The decision also applies to Facebook-owned Instagram.

    June 4, 2021 – Facebook announces Trump will be suspended from its platform until at least January 7th, 2023 – two years from when he was initially suspended.

    July 1, 2021 – New York prosecutors charge the Trump Organization and Trump Payroll Corporation with 10 felony counts and Chief Financial Officer Allen Weisselberg with 15 felony counts in connection with an alleged tax scheme stretching back to 2005. Trump himself is not charged. On December 6, 2022, both companies are found guilty on all charges.

    February 14, 2022 – Accounting firm Mazars announces it will no longer act as Trump’s accountant, citing a conflict of interest. In a letter to the Trump Organization chief legal officer, the firm informs the Trump Organization to no longer rely on financial statements ending June 2011 through June 2020.

    May 3, 2022 – The Trump Organization and the Presidential Inaugural Committee agree to pay a total of $750,000 to settle with the Washington, DC, attorney general’s office over allegations they misspent money raised for former President Donald Trump’s inauguration.

    June 9-July 21, 2022 – The House select committee investigating the January 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol holds eight hearings, where it hears from witnesses including top ex-Trump officials, election workers, those who took part in the attack and many others. Through live testimony, video depositions, and never-before-seen material, the committee attempts to paint the picture of the former president’s plan to stay in power and the role he played on January 6.

    August 8, 2022 – The FBI executes a search warrant at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, Florida, as part of an investigation into the handling of presidential documents, including classified documents, that may have been brought there.

    August 12, 2022 – A federal judge unseals the search warrant and property receipt from the FBI search of Mar-a-Lago. The unsealed documents indicate the FBI recovered 11 sets of classified documents from its search, including some materials marked as “top secret/SCI” – one of the highest levels of classification, and identify three federal crimes that the Justice Department is looking at as part of its investigation: violations of the Espionage Act, obstruction of justice and criminal handling of government records.

    September 21, 2022 – The New York state attorney general files a lawsuit against Trump, three of his adult children and the Trump Organization, alleging they were involved in an expansive fraud lasting over a decade that the former President used to enrich himself. According to the lawsuit, the Trump Organization deceived lenders, insurers and tax authorities by inflating the value of his properties using misleading appraisals.

    October 3, 2022 – Trump files a lawsuit against CNN for defamation, seeking $475 million in punitive damages.

    November 15, 2022 – Announces that he will seek the Republican presidential nomination in 2024.

    November 19, 2022 – Trump’s Twitter account, which was banned following the January 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol, is reinstated after users respond to an online poll posted by Twitter CEO and new owner Elon Musk.

    December 19, 2022 – The Jan. 6 insurrection committee votes to refer Trump to the Department of Justice on at least four criminal charges. Four days later the panel releases its final report recommending Trump be barred from holding office again.

    February 9, 2023 – Trump’s Facebook and Instagram accounts are restored following a two-year ban in the wake of the Jan. 6, 2021 insurrection, a Meta spokesperson confirms to CNN. On March 17, 2023, YouTube restores Trump’s channel.

    March 30, 2023 – A grand jury in New York votes to indict Trump, the first time in American history that a current or former president has faced criminal charges.

    April 4, 2023 – Surrenders and is placed under arrest before pleading not guilty to 34 felony criminal charges of falsifying business records in Manhattan criminal court. Prosecutors allege that Trump sought to undermine the integrity of the 2016 election through a hush money scheme with payments made to women who claimed they had extramarital affairs with Trump. He has denied the affairs. Hours after his arraignment, Trump rails against the Manhattan district attorney and the indictment during a speech at his Florida resort at Mar-a-Lago.

    May 9, 2023 – A Manhattan federal jury finds Trump sexually abused former magazine columnist E. Jean Carroll in a luxury department store dressing room in the spring of 1996 and awards her $5 million for battery and defamation.

    May 15, 2023 – A report by special counsel John Durham is released. In it he concludes that the FBI should never have launched a full investigation into connections between Donald Trump’s campaign and Russia during the 2016 election. The report does not recommend any new charges against individuals or “wholesale changes” about how the FBI handles politically charged investigations, despite strongly criticizing the agency’s behavior.

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