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THE FORUM DAILY
Today, President Biden and presidential candidate Donald Trump will make separate border stops in Texas, as Uriel J. García of The Texas Tribune reports.
The White House said in a statement that during his visit to Brownsville, President Biden will urge Congress, especially GOP leaders, "to provide the funding needed for additional U.S. Border Patrol agents, more asylum officers, fentanyl detection technology and more."
Meanwhile, Trump will be in Eagle Pass, where state officials have taken over Shelby Park as a staging area for border enforcement. Trump has expressed interest in further militarizing the immigration system, Gaige Davila reports for Texas Public Radio.
Residents’ reactions are mixed, reports Rick Jervis of USA Today. For the people of Brownsville and Eagle Pass, "any campaign stop will simply showcase an immigration system that continues to disrupt their communities — and a political one that has yet to deliver them a solution," Jervis writes.
Americans, including evangelical Christians, continue to want solutions, as newly released polling shows. In contrast, Zolan Kanno-Youngs of The New York Times analyzes how the visits to the border have become a performative symbol in American politics.
Welcome to Thursday’s edition of The Forum Daily. I’m Dan Gordon, the Forum’s strategic communications VP, and the great Forum Daily team also includes Jillian Clark, Isabella Miller, Ally Villarreal and Clara Villatoro. If you have a story to share from your own community, please send it to me at [email protected].
EVANGELICALS’ OPINIONS — One of the new polls, from Lifeway Research, indicates that evangelicals’ support for immigration reforms has increased, reports Diana Chandler of Baptist Press. That could encourage faith leaders to talk about immigration and biblical perspectives, she notes. "We can talk about both things, the rule of law and compassion," said Dan
Darling, director of the Land Center for Cultural Engagement at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. Read more in the Evangelical Immigration Table’s statement.
EMERGING DATA — Recent immigration court data show the distribution of asylum seekers around the country, report Elena Mejia and Lisa Beyer of Bloomberg. Although many are landing in states with big cities such as New York and Illinois, rural areas with significant work in the meatpacking and agriculture industries have seen an increase as well. A growing backlog is a challenge
for immigration courts, Mejia and Beyer note. In Massachusetts, the Department of Justice plans to open a new immigration court in early April to address the backlog there, Carla Rojo of NBC Boston reports.
E-VERIFY — The Iowa State Senate has passed a bill that would require businesses to use the federal E-Verify system to determine workers’ legal status in the United States, reports Stephen Gruber-Miller of the Des Moines Register. The E-Verify system isn’t 100% reliable and can often be burdensome to employers, as we’ve noted. Many businesses in the state oppose the bill, Gruber-Miller reports.
COMPASSION — In Dallas, Oak Lawn United Methodist Church is responding with compassion to newly arrived migrants, reports Simone Carter of the Dallas Observer. Its outreach program, Dallas Responds, hosts a welcome center "where migrants can rest, refuel and receive travel assistance." That's a blessing for many. "I am happy that I'm here: that I have hope, that I have a new way to protect my family
and that I escaped the threats," said Marvin, a migrant from Honduras.
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