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PAYMENTS — President Biden said that the U.S. will not make payments to immigrant families separated by former President Trump’s zero tolerance policy, "throwing into doubt settlements the Justice Department has been negotiating to resolve legal claims," reports a team at the Wall Street Journal. Anthony D. Romero, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union, which is involved in the litigation, said that if he doesn’t follow through, "the president is abandoning a core campaign promise to do justice for the thousands of separated families." Meanwhile, Priscilla Alvarez at CNN reports that the Biden administration has ended the Trump-era "metering" policy that limited migrants’ ability to claim asylum at legal ports of entry, per a DHS memo released Monday. KAT PA KAT — Many Haitians — from business executives to politicians — rely on Mackenson Rémy, a popular reporter also known as Kat pa Kat, to get around Port-au-Prince’s streets safely, reports Monica Campbell for PRI’s The World. Because the "state is largely absent in Haiti right now — especially after President Jovenel Moïse was assassinated in July," Rémy serves as the liaison for information. "Police can’t go to certain areas because the gangs will shoot at them … But Rémy can drive through with permission," Campbell writes. ‘COMPLICATED REALITY’ — Though public polling on immigration "shows a strong shift to the left, survey responses in that vein mask a far more complicated reality," Thomas B. Edsall opines in The New York Times. "As a national issue immigration motivates anti-immigrant voters in a single-minded way, but pro-immigration voters have a long list of things they support. In that way it works for the right," explains Mary C. Waters, a sociologist at Harvard. Americans "are more open to immigration than either the left or the right assumes. But as soon as the issue is framed around race, it can become more polarized. I don’t think liberals understand that as well as they should," noted Waters, who is also chairman of the National Academy of Sciences panel on the integration of immigrants into American society.
CULTURE CONCERNS — On Tuesday we mentioned this year’s American Values Survey from the Public Religion Research Institute and the Brookings Institution. In a column for the Wall Street Journal, William A. Galston notes that Republican voters are more concerned about America "losing its culture and identity" than in previous years, "but it’s a bipartisan concern": A third of Democrats share it. And while 62% of Republicans say that being born in the U.S. is part of being "truly American," 43% of Democrats do as well. "Closing the gap between the American civic creed and public social attitudes might lower the heat-to-light ratio in politics," Galston concludes. ‘RUNNING DRY’ — For Politico Magazine, Erik Edstrom, who was deployed to Afghanistan as an infantry officer, tells the story of how he and a volunteer network of veterans helped get his former translator, "Rock," and other Afghan allies out of the country — several weeks after the U.S. withdrawal concluded. "Since the official withdrawal of U.S. forces at the end of August, the work of shepherding tens of thousands of Afghans out of the country has fallen to groups like Task Force Argo, who have tapped networks of private donors to fund an operation that was left unfinished by the U.S. government," writes Edstrom. From chartering an Airbus A340 to shelter and food, the costs have been extremely high. "We are constantly at risk of running dry," said "Duke," a veteran and member of the leadership team for Operation North Star. Side note: Don’t miss yesterday’s important press call with national security leaders on the vetting process for Afghan evacuees yesterday afternoon. Quotes and the call recording are available here. Here’s today’s list of local stories:
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