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Migrants, most with children follow a path along the concertina wire where ultimatley they will placed under guard by Border Patrol after having crossed the Rio Grande on May 27 2022 in Eagle Pass Texas, USA. Title 42, the Trump era mandate which was set to prevent migrants from entering the US, was to expire on May 23 but was blocked by a lawsuit filed by several states citing that the move to strike down the law “failed to meet standards set by the Administrative Procedure Act” and that there is no permanent solution to handling the inevitable surge in immigration. Opponents to upholding of the law voiced their demands stating that Title 42 is illegal in that it violates immigration laws that prevents immigrants from their right to seek asylum. Since the implementation of Title 42 in March 2020, US Customs and Border Protection has effected “more than 1.8 million expulsions, mostly on the southern border of the US-Mexico Border”.
Migrants rush to US border fearing Trump’s return
Hundreds of migrants from around a dozen countries left Mexico’s southern border area by foot onSunday, heading north toward the US border. They hope to make it to the frontier before November’s election out of fear that Donald Trump could win and close the border to asylum-seekers.
Migrants in the group reported that they fear that a Trump administration might stop granting appointments to migrants through CBP One, an app used by asylum-seekers to enter the US legally — by getting appointments at US border posts, where they then make their cases to officials. The app only works in northern Mexico and Mexico City.
Trump is likely to use the caravan to make his case that the US needs a president who is tough on immigration. During the Republican National Convention, he promised to crack down on the border if elected, including increasing deportations of illegal migrants and making asylum-seekers wait in Mexico while their claims are processed.
If the caravan continues to make the headlines, it could be bad news for Kamala Harris, as she trailsTrump on immigration and as a majority of Americans – some 55% – believe that immigration levels should be reduced for the first time in two decades.
Colombia, Acandi, 2021-10-29. Haitian migrants trek through the Darien Gap towards the border with Panama. Photograph by Yader Guzman / Hans Lucas Colombie, Acandi, 2021-10-29. Des migrants haitiens traversent le Darien Gap en direction de la frontiere avec le Panama.
Panama pledges to mind the gap
Newly inaugurated Panamanian President José Raúl Mulinopledged this week to stop illegal migration through the Darién Gap, a harrowing swath of jungle along his country’s border with Colombia.
Last year, more than half a million people crossed the Darién headed northward through Central America to the US southern border.
Until now, Panama has used a “Controlled Flow” strategy, helping migrants pass through rather than allowing them to linger in the country. Mulino now wants to stop the flow altogether as part of a new agreement with the US, which will pay to send home migrants caught in the Darién.
The White House, of course, is desperate to limit migration flows – the southern border crisis is one of President Joe Biden’s biggest liabilities as he seeks reelection this fall.
But experts are skeptical of the new approach. “It’s not as easy as ‘let’s control a couple of migration routes,’” says Diego Chaves-González, an expert at the Migration Policy Institute in Washington. The Colombian side of the border is controlled by powerful drug cartels; on the Panamanian side, Indigenous groups hold sway.
Trying to shut down known routes, he says, would simply drive migrants and traffickers to create alternative, more clandestine ones. The result would be a game of whack-a-mole that wrecks the “controlled flow” strategy and could lead to more migrants staying in Panama – precisely the opposite of what Mulino wants.
Putin's rare North Korea visit will deepen ties
Ian Bremmer shares his insights on global politics this week on World In :60.
Will Putin's rare visit to North Korea strengthen anti-West alignment?
It's deepening the relationship. There's no question. He hasn't been in North Korea in decades. And I mean they call it the Hermit Kingdom. It's completely totalitarian. It's incredibly poor. But they have a massive military and they've been providing an awful lot thousands and thousands of train containers, of weaponry, of ammunition, of artillery. And those containers haven't gone back empty from Russia. And there's been a lot of sense of technology that's been transferred. The interesting thing will be whether or not, this leads to more provocative North Korean behavior vis-à-vis the South and Japan, because they think they can get away with it because they have coverage from Russia. And will they start coordinating diplomatically, in response to the NATO threat, in response to, you know, the way that the war in Ukraine is going? Be interesting to watch. It's not what China wants to see, but that is certainly a piece of what happens when a couple of states considered pariahs and rogues by the West, are developing a real alliance.
Is escalation of war between Israel and Hezbollah inevitable?
Nothing's inevitable. It's looking more likely by the day. I've been very concerned about this second front. I didn't think it was going to open up in the early months because Israel is a small country and they've got a lot of people, a lot of forces that are fighting on the ground in Gaza. But as the war in Gaza, I don't want to say wraps up because I don't think that's going to happen, but at least winds down and becomes less about taking and controlling and rooting out Hamas in across all of the territory, and is less military intensive in terms of troops, then the Israelis can move a lot of those troops up to the north. And I think that is increasingly likely in part, because you have 100,000 Israelis that are evacuated still. And the Israeli leaders say a lot, you know, they got to get them back for the school year. That's September. It's coming up soon. And secondly, because Hezbollah is increasingly engaging in strikes against Israel and most recently, really invasive surveillance drone, you know, intervention, including the port of Haifa. So it's really showing off to the Israelis that we're going to hit you hard. We're going to make this really hurt. They're a hell of a lot more powerful militarily Hezbollah is than Hamas. So if this happens, it's going to be a lot bigger deal in terms of the impact and the casualties.
Will President Biden's new citizenship plan bolster his campaign?
I guess a little bit in the sense that it's an issue that is top two for most voters, inflation and the migration issue. And, you know, he has been taking a harder line on number of migrants coming in. So now he's offering the spouses that don't have citizenship, but their spouses do, you know, are going to have improved treatment. That's a give, especially in a lot of states, where you have lots of those people, and states that he needs those votes. Every vote matters. Is it really gonna help his campaign at the end of the day? This is a tough one. On balance, I think that, Trump does better on this issue in the same way Biden does on abortion.
United States President Joe Biden hosts a bilateral meeting with Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg of NATO at the White House. Featuring: President Joe Biden Where: Washington, District Of Columbia, United States.
Biden plays immigration wildcard ahead of election
In a bold pre-election move, President Joe Biden announced sweeping protections for hundreds of thousands of undocumented immigrants married to US citizens. Under the policy, undocumented spouses of US citizens will be shielded from deportation, provided work permits, and given a pathway to citizenship.
Marrying an American citizen is generally a pathway to US citizenship, but people who crossed the southern border illegally — rather than arriving in the country with a visa — must return to their home countries to complete the process for a green card, a process that could mean months away from family.
Biden’s move is a high-stakes gambit aimed at shoring up critical Latino support in swing states like Nevada, Arizona, and Georgia, which have sizable “mixed-status” household populations. But it also risks inflaming concerns over illegal immigration among moderate voters who’ve soured on his border policies.
Just weeks ago, Biden unveiled new asylum restrictions in an attempt to regain control of the southern border. These measures highlight how immigration has become an electoral tightrope, with Biden pandering to both pro- and anti-immigration blocs.
Will Biden's immigration order help border control...and his campaign?
Jon Lieber, Eurasia Group's head of research and managing director for the firm's coverage of United States political and policy developments, shares his perspective on US politics from Washington, DC.
What we're watching in US Politics this week? It’s immigration.
This is a big political liability for President Biden. It shows up as one of the top 2 or 3 issues, most of the big polls. And Donald Trump has a big advantage over him right now if you believed polls. So what Biden did this week is announced an emergency order that would restrict the number of people who would come to the United States seeking asylum in cases where border crossings breach over 2500 a day. This has been a pretty common occurrence, with border crossings at that level for the last several years. Last year there were over 3 million people who entered the country from abroad, both legally and illegally.
And it’s the illegal border crossings that's gotten Biden really in the most political trouble and has been at the heart of President Trump's political campaign since he first came down the golden escalator in 2015. So the big question is, does this hold and will it make any difference? And, you know, this is likely to be challenged in court by immigration advocates who want the number of asylum seekers to stay high so that people can get refuge in the United States.
But if the courts do uphold this, it should make a significant difference in the number of people crossing the border. The question is, does it come in time to help Joe Biden make a case that he's actually doing something about immigration in a way the American people want to see? Interestingly, this action is very similar to a deal that the Democrats struck with Republicans in the Senate earlier in the year, which was, of course, struck down when President Trump said he didn't really want to do anything to help Biden's reelection campaign.
So immigration is going to be an ongoing theme with this campaign. Biden took big action this week, and the numbers should help us see whether or not this makes any difference.
- Border disorder: Why Capitol Hill lawmakers disagree on the US immigration crisis ›
- US immigration policy: The unfixable political gift that keeps on giving for the GOP ›
- The New York migrant crisis up close ›
- Graphic Truth: The immigration waves that made America ›
- Putin's rare North Korea visit will deepen ties - GZERO Media ›
Mehrdad Bazrpash, an Iranian politician and the Minister of Roads and Urban Development, is speaking to the media at a media center in the Iranian Interior Ministry building after registering as a Presidential elections candidate during the last day of candidates' registration for Iran's early Presidential elections, in Tehran, Iran, on June 3, 2024.
Hard Numbers: Iran’s candidates, Stronach’s sex crime charges, Bulgarians vote again, US border crossings drop
6: Iran’s Guardian Council — an unelected body of religious clerics — has approved six candidates to run in elections scheduled for June 28, after President Ebrahim Raisi was killed in a helicopter crash last month. Five of the candidates come from the hardline conservative camp, one is a reformer, and former President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was barred from running again.
5: Austrian-Canadian billionaire and politician Frank Stronach has been charged with five sexual assault crimes dating between the 1980s and 2023. The 91-year-old’s lawyers denied any impropriety, and police are withholding details about the charges, which include rape, indecent assault on a female, sexual assault, and forcible confinement.
6: Bulgarians went to the polls for the sixth time in just three years on Sunday as the European Union’s poorest member struggles to form a stable government in the wake of anti-corruption protests. No single party is expected to gain a majority, which will continue to inhibit Bulgaria’s development and block access to funds from Brussels.
3,100: US Customs and Border Patrol apprehended roughly 3,100 migrants crossing the border with Mexico on Friday, reflecting a drop of about 20% from just days before. It may be an early indication that Biden’s new border crackdown, which went into effect last week, is working.Graphic Truth: The immigration waves that made America
As the 2024 US election approaches, immigration is among the most important and polarizing issues in American life.
The United States is, of course, a nation of immigrants. But their origins have changed a lot over the past 150 years, as have the laws that govern who can, and can’t come in.
Since the mid-19th century there have been three major waves. The first, mainly from Northern and Western Europe, came at a time when there was little federal immigration policy at all, with the notable exception of a racist law banning immigrants from China.
The second wave, coming chiefly from Southern and Eastern Europe, provoked a sizable backlash against Catholics and Jews who were seen as economic, political, and even genetic threats to America.
This led to a sweeping 1924 law that imposed national quotas, dramatically reducing overall immigration. That law held sway until a 1965 reform abolished the quotas and eased entry for family members of immigrants.
That marked the start of the third wave, which dwarfs the earlier two in size and has come mainly from Latin America and Asia.
Here’s a look at the overall number of immigrants in the US and their countries of origin in the three great waves. Note that these numbers capture only legal entries. The phenomenon of undocumented migration – which began at large scale only over the past several decades – is not reflected here.
Charles Davenport, a leading proponent of the now-discredited field of eugenics, which advanced racist theories that helped to drive major immigration restrictions in 1924.
One day we will look stupid, or cruel, or both
Joyful skeptics of prevailing wisdom will recall a scene from the classic 1973 Woody Allen movie “Sleeper.”
A doctor tells a colleague that Allen’s character, who has awoken in the 22nd century after a 200-year nap, has requested a breakfast of wheat germ, organic honey, and tiger’s milk. The second doctor is puzzled. “You mean he didn’t ask for steak, cream pies, or hot fudge?”
No, says the first doctor. “Back then those things were believed to be unhealthy, precisely the opposite of what we now know to be true.”
What we now know to be true.
As a society, we believe all kinds of seemingly scientific things that later turn out to be wrong. We sometimes funnel our biases and beliefs into science that sounds “right.” And we are confident that whatever we know is the cutting edge of knowledge – after all, we can’t know any more than we know.
There was, for example, a time when cocaine was considered a normal part of soda. When lead-based paint was thought to be perfectly fine for the baby’s room. When doctors endorsed cigarettes!
These beliefs affected the lives of untold millions of people. And they were, at the time, backed by the available science.
But one science-backed belief that used to enjoy the support of a huge swath of America’s elite institutions was especially pernicious. Not only that, it was instrumental in the passage of one of the most sweeping legal changes in American history.
Exactly a hundred years ago this Sunday, Congress approved the 1924 Immigration Act, a deeply prejudiced piece of legislation that effectively ended all immigration from Asia – and severely restricted it from Southern and Eastern Europe – for more than 40 years.
The law, which by the 1960s would halve the immigrant share of the US population to less than 6%, was a reaction to the wave of immigrants that started coming in the 1880s, when economic hardship in southern Italy and extreme antisemitism in the Russian empire pushed millions of Catholics and Jews across the Atlantic in search of a new American life.
By 1924, advocates of harsher limits on immigration – an alliance comprising labor unions worried about wage competition, Progressives who worried about crowded slums, and good old-fashioned Boston Brahmin racists and antisemites – had been working for decades to get the ultra-restrictive bill they wanted.
They fought against corporate lobbies that wanted cheap labor, steamship companies that thrived on immigrant passages, and increasingly well-organized groups of recent arrivals who were gaining power at the ballot box.
What helped to get the 1924 bill over the line, as historian and former New York Times public editor Daniel Okrent tells it in his superb recent book “The Guarded Gate,” was the imprimatur of science – or at least a form of it called “eugenics.”
By perversely applying Darwin’s theory of evolution to human personality traits, the eugenicists thought they had proved that intelligence, discipline, and moral virtue were determined by genes, that certain races (that is, whites from Northern and Western Europe) had more of these “positive” traits than others, and that allowing in “inferior races” would destroy America. On this view, Asians, Catholics from Ireland and Italy, and Jews from Eastern Europe were seen not only as culturally incompatible or politically suspect, but as overtly dangerous to the genetic stock of the country.
This wasn’t just fringe stuff. This was no mere Progressive Era QAnon. Eugenics captured the attention – and money – of Very Serious People™ who thought of themselves as reformers, educators, and technocrats. These included university presidents at Columbia, Princeton, and MIT, editorial writers at the Washington Post or The Nation, and the bosses of institutions like the American Museum of Natural History. Teddy Roosevelt himself warned of the perils of “race suicide.”
Now, a century later, it’s again the spring of ‘24. We are again embroiled in a ferocious debate about immigration on the eve of a presidential election. In some ways the debate is very different: The laws are very different now, and the focus is chiefly on the problem of large-scale undocumented migration, a phenomenon that hardly existed a 100 years ago. And eugenics, needless to say, has been discredited.
In some ways, though, the arguments are also the same. Reasonable ones about the impact of immigrants on working-class wages, or the ability (or willingness) of local communities to rapidly absorb large numbers of immigrants. But also vile ones about people from abroad – in our time primarily from South America, West Africa, and Asia rather than Southern and Eastern Europe – “poisoning the bloodstream” of America. Those owe a debt of hate to the eugenicist lexicon of the early 20th century.
At a time when Americans are locked in increasingly zero-sum clashes about a range of other political and cultural issues, and when trust in institutions of all kinds is falling, the power of eugenicists to shape the immigration debate in Congress a century ago – crazy as it seems today – is worth reflecting on.
You and I hold any number of beliefs today – about health, about technology, about people, about politics, or about nature – that will without a doubt look wrong, cruel, or incredibly stupid in 2124.
I would bet – hope! – that few are as wretchedly ugly and destructive as what the eugenicists cooked up. But not all are as harmless as ordering hot fudge for breakfast, either. What do you think they might be? What is the best way to find out?
Let me know what prevailing beliefs today you think will look dumb a century from now, and I’d be happy to include some of the best responses after my column next Friday. Write to us here, and include your name as you’d like it to be published and where you’re writing from. Enjoy.