President Trump is so eager to deliver on his signature promise to build a 500-mile wall on the U.S.-Mexico border – of which just 60 miles have been completed – that he is pushing aides to get it done by any means necessary, including fast-tracking contracts, seizing private land and running roughshod over environmental rules, report Nick Miroff and Josh Dawsey in The Washington Post. Responding to the concerns of his aides about such practices, Trump is reported to have told them, “take the land … Don’t worry, I’ll pardon you.”
This news comes as a new Morning Consult/Politico poll shows that more than 40% of Democratic voters said they are more likely to support a primary candidate who supports getting rid of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and is open to letting more immigrants into the country. By contrast, 45% of all voters would be more likely to back a candidate in the general election who takes a hard line against illegal immigration.
It’s complicated.
Welcome to Wednesday’s edition of Noorani’s Notes.
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HAVOC – The Trump administration is diverting $155 million from the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s (FEMA) Disaster Relief Fund to allow ICE to pay for detention space and immigration court hearing locations, report Julia Ainsley and Frank Thorp V at NBC News. Much of the funds will go towards opening border courts in Laredo and Brownsville, Texas, where the administration expects to send about 150 immigration judges to handle the cases of the more than 35,000 asylum-seekers sent to Mexico under the “Remain in Mexico” policy, Hamed Aleaziz reports for BuzzFeed News. “This will wreak havoc on court dockets across the country,” said an immigration court official.
UNDERMINING OUR SAFETY – President Trump’s anti-immigration policies are pushing our immigration system to the brink and making the U.S. less safe, writes The New York Times Editorial Board. Pointing to “draconian” regulations and the siphoning of funds and personnel to the border, the Times argues that the administration has left the government, particularly the Department of Homeland Security, unable to address other issues like domestic terrorism. “Every president brings into office a particular set of principles and priorities. But when those biases start undercutting the government’s ability to pursue smart policies — or even carry out basic duties, a responsible leader must think less about his personal prerogatives and more about the nation’s overall security.”
MORE RULES – Speaking of anti-immigration rules: In response to an April memo in which President Trump derided “rampant abuse” in the asylum system, the federal government issued two new rules on Monday further clamping down on asylum seekers, Ted Hesson reports for Politico Pro [paywall]. While details remain scant, the rules, aimed squarely at the work authorization process, would (1) “promote greater accountability” in the asylum process and (2) eliminate a regulation requiring immigration authorities to approve or deny work permit applicants from asylum seekers within 30 days.
NUEVO LAREDO – After arriving in the Mexican border town of Nuevo Laredo to await her immigration hearing under the Migrant Protection Protocols (MPP), also known as the “Remain in Mexico” policy, Liceth Morales and her son were abducted and held ransom for three weeks. Unfortunately, Morales’s story is not unique in Nuevo Laredo, where migrants are regularly kidnapped and extorted by gangs, reports John Burnett at NPR. “For me, it's P-M-M, or Plan of Lies to Migrants … because there is no protection,” said Father Julio Lopez, director of the Nazareth Migrant House. Organized crime continues to be the benefactor of our broken immigration system.
DINERS TO DHABAS – As the U.S. trucking industry, long dominated by white men, grapples with retirements and growing labor shortages nationwide, Punjabi immigrants in California are changing not only what it means to be a trucker, but the cultural – and gastronomic – touchstones that go with it, per Tejal Rao in The New York Times. At the forefront of this change is Punjabi Dhaba, a family-run truck in Bakersfield, California, that is “reminiscent of dhabas in India and Pakistan, the absolutely-no-frills roadside restaurants that cater to truckers and others passing through with cheap, hearty dishes of chole — chickpeas soaked in a gingery tomato sauce — and slick parathas.” Only in America are diners being replaced by dhabas, and country music by bhangra (go ahead, turn up the volume).
Thanks for reading,
Ali
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