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UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer meeting with Italy’s Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni.
Starmer asks Meloni for a lesson on curbing illegal migration
UK Prime Minister Keir Starmermet with Italy’s Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni on Monday to learn how her hard-line tactics against irregular migration could help him deliver on his election promise to “smash the gangs” driving such migration to the UK. The meetings came after eight migrants died crossing the English Channel on Sunday and on the heels of disinformation-fueled anti-immigrant riots in August.
Starmer is interested in how Meloni cut irregular sea crossings to Italy by 60% over the past year, and in the so-called “Rome Process” she adopted last year when she forged deals with North African countries like Tunisia and Libya to tackle people-smuggling gangs, intercept departing boats, and return migrants. Starmer pledged £4 million to support the Rome Process. He also said he was open to following Italy’s lead on processing asylum claims offshore — a project Meloni is struggling to get off the ground in Albania but one that has generated the interest of leaders across Europe, including in Brussels.
The meeting shows how Starmer has changed his tune on immigration since campaigning against Rishi Sunak’s plan to deport illegal migrants to Rwanda. It also signals how Europe's shift to the right on immigration has positioned Meloni’s tactics – once considered fringe – in the mainstream.
A demonstrator is holding a banner during an antigovernment protest in Lisbon, Portugal, on August 4, 2024. Venezuelans in Lisbon are gathering in Praca do Comercio to protest and express their disagreement with the election results in Venezuela and to support opposition leader Maria Corina Machado and opposition candidate Edmundo Gonzalez.
Venezuela’s neighbors brace for a fresh exodus
A new poll shows more than 40% of Venezuela’s population — roughly 7 million people — might flee the country in the wake of strongman President Nicolás Maduro’s apparently successful bid to steal the July 28 election.
According to research by local pollster Meganalisis, nearly a million of those people are planning to leave by the end of the year. If that happens, it will exacerbate what is already the world’s worst external refugee crisis.
Since 2014, nearly 8 million Venezuelans have fled their country’s political and humanitarian chaos, surpassing the numbers from Ukraine (6 million) and Syria (5.5 million). Three million went to Colombia, and 1.5 million are in Peru. Brazil, Chile, Ecuador, Spain, and the US are home to half a million each.
Their arrival has stretched the capacity of governments and societies to absorb newcomers, especially during the difficult climb out of the pandemic. Anti-immigrant sentiment has grown across the region. As far away as New York City, Mayor Eric Adams says the presence of 150,000 refugees, many from Venezuela, would “destroy the city.”
Venezuela’s opposition – which won the election, according to independent counts – is still in the streets, demanding a transition of power. But with Maduro now doubling down, millions may soon vote again – this time with their feet.
For more: Watch GZERO’s special report about the non-profits helping to welcome and resettle thousands of refugees amid New York City’s “broken” immigration system.
FILE PHOTO: Elon Musk, Chief Executive Officer of SpaceX and Tesla and owner of X looks on during the Milken Conference 2024 Global Conference Sessions at The Beverly Hilton in Beverly Hills, California, U.S., May 6, 2024.
Trolling with power: Elon Musk’s online antics are getting real
Businessman, entrepreneur, and increasingly, a disruptive force in geopolitics.
Elon Musk, the owner of X, SpaceX, and Tesla, has never shied away from controversial political posts, but over these last few weeks, his online trolling has had very real-world consequences.
Last week, he amplified posts on X that fueled racist riots in the United Kingdom and prophesized that civil war in the country was inevitable. Today, he is reportedly set to interview former President Donald Trump on X, a sitdown that will generate hundreds of headlines in a presidential cycle in which the interviewer, Musk, has unabashedly chosen a side.
In the immediate aftermath of the assassination attempt in Pennsylvania last month, Musk took to his app to endorse Trump’s candidacy – shattering the norm of self-declared neutrality by the leaders of social media platforms. (Mark Zuckerberg, for example, is not nearly as vocal about his political views). And in July, Musk announced the creation of a political action committee, America Pac, that would “mostly but not entirely” support the Republican Party.
The South African-born investor has also signaled his disapproval of Trump’s opponent, Kamala Harris, and even disseminated a deep fake video purportedly showing Harris calling herself “the ultimate diversity hire.” He also suspended the account “White Dudes for Harris” on X after it held a massive fundraising call that raised more than $4 millionfor her campaign.
Musk’s political interventions on X have been particularly controversial in the UK, where his inflammatory posts have been linked to recent civil unrest. British officials have criticized Musk for spreading misinformation, including false claims that the murderer of three British girls – which fueled protests and riots last week – was a Muslim migrant. During the riots, “super sharers,” or accounts like Elon Musk’s with large followings, acted as “nodes” for disseminating this lie through their interaction with the far-right content.
Musk is also responsible for relaxing the content moderation guidelines on the site and reinstating many far-right accounts that acted as super-sharers of misinformation. For example, he unbanned Tommy Robinson, a fringe and four-times-jailed extreme-right British activist, who went viral during the riots. He also promoted Ashlea Simon – co-founder of a white supremacist group — who claimed UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer planned to send British rioters to detention camps in the Falkland Islands.
Can he be regulated? As a result of the riots, many political leaders, including Starmer, EU commissioners, and US senators, have called for an inquiry into social media’s role in spreading incendiary disinformation.
According to Scott Bade, a geo-technology expert at Eurasia Group, Musk is increasingly becoming a “geopolitical agent of chaos.” But Musk isn’t too powerful to regulate, says Bade. “The thing is, you’re not going to regulate Elon himself. You’re going to regulate the pieces of his empire.”
The Online Safety Act is already set to take effect in the UK at the end of the year and will require platforms to remove illegal content or be fined 10% of global annual turnover or £18 million, whichever is higher. In the wake of the riots, legislatures are considering tightening restrictions so companies can be sanctioned if they allow “legal but harmful” content such as misinformation to flourish.
“There is a clear consensus emerging in the aftermath of the riots that Musk and X are a problem, given the amount of misinformation, racial abuse, and incitement to violence that was spread on the platform,” says Eurasia Group Europe expert Mujtaba Rahman. “There will be a political and a policy response, but what shape that will take remains unclear for now.”
Residential and office buildings are seen in Beijing, China, January 10, 2017.
Hard Numbers: Chinese house prices drop, Maryland governor pardons cannabis convicts, Nuclear spending soars, Putin visits Kim, Record migration through Mexico
3.9: China reported Monday that home prices across the country fell at a faster rate in May than at any time since last summer. They’ve dropped3.9% since last May, and they’ve now reached their lowest level since 2014. Housing prices are especially sensitive in China because property was once a primary engine of high growth, but the sector is now deeply in debt.
175,000: Maryland Gov. Wes Moore signed an executive order on Monday to pardonmore than 175,000 cannabis-related convictions. The use of marijuana remains a crime at the federal level, but 24 states have legalized it and another 14 allow marijuana use for medical purposes.
3,000: A nuclear watchdog reports that the world’s nine nuclear-armed states together spent $91.4 billion in 2023. That’s nearly$3,000 per second. The report says the United States spent $51.5 billion, which is “more than all the other nuclear-armed countries put together.” China spent $11.8 billion. Russia spent $8.3 billion.
24: Russia’s Vladimir Putin arrived in Pyongyang today for a two-day visit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un. It’s Putin’sfirst trip to the DPRK in 24 years, and he and Kim are expected to reaffirm the friendship between their countries. Putin is likely to want ammunition (and maybe some soldiers) for his war in Ukraine. Kim would like to have Russian technologies that can boost his country’s missile program.
177: The Mexican government reported Sunday that some1.39 million people from 177 countries traveled through Mexico so far this year trying to reach the United States without entry papers. For reference, the United Nations has 193 member states.
Ian Bremmer addresses the audience at the 2024 US-Canada Summit in Toronto.
American and Canadian voters yearn for something they might never get
Is there a deep, secret yearning from American and Canadian voters for a radically open border? Do people really want Canada and the US to be more like the EU? OR, is border politics all about isolationism, security fears, and building walls? The results of an exclusive new poll from GZERO and Data Science will surprise you – and ought to be shaping the election campaigns in both countries.
We revealed part of the poll at the US-Canada Summit that I had the pleasure of co-hosting in Toronto, put on by the teams at Eurasia Group and BMO. Led off by our own Ian Bremmer and BMO’s CEO Darryl White, it included a remarkable collection of over 500 people, including political leaders from across the spectrum in both countries who debated, speechified, conversed, and argued.
Why are so many people so keen to discuss the US-Canada relationship? As Bremmer said, this is a hinge moment in history, with three wars raging — one in Ukraine, one in the Middle East, and one in the United States — a remark that caused gasps and nods. On top of that, 60+ elections are reshaping the world this year (Modi humbled in India, Macron in a showdown with the far right in France, Sunak shambolically slinking off in the UK). Meanwhile, China is threatening Taiwan, and AI is grinding its way through our economies and imaginations.
Gary Cohn, former director of the National Economic Council under Trump and the vice chairman of IBM, admitted that what worries him most is the collision between geopolitics and the economy. They are inextricably linked and making things worse. With the political bombs falling so close, people are desperately looking for a safe shelter, and that shelter is the US-Canada relationship. As Delaware Sen. Chris Coons said, squabbles between the two countries over tariffs or softwood lumber don’t add up to a pile of shell casing next to say China and Taiwan, which may be why the relationship is so often taken for granted or outright ignored. It is and remains one of the biggest bilateral trading relationships in the world.
Globalization is giving way to new forms of regionalism, or “friend-shoring with a vengeance.” But should the region have internal walls or not?
The mandate of the conference is to bring together people tired of partisan bickering, slogan swamping, and dizzying disinformationalizing – in other words, the bubble-blowing BS of everyday politics. They are urged to be authentic, honest, and, despite their political differences, get on with figuring out how to build something better and more secure than we have now. And they did.
Who joined in?
This is a partial list (pause for a long breath): Delaware Sen. Chris Coons, Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker, Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister Mélanie Joly, Industry Minister Francois Phillippe Champagne, Treasury Board President Anita Anand, who settled a major border strike during the conference, Ontario and Saskatchewan Premiers Doug Ford and Scott Moe, Alaska Gov. Mike Dunleavy, political wizards like David Axelrod from the Obama campaign and Christopher Liddell, the former White House Deputy Chief of Staff to Donald Trump.
Speaking of the Trump folks, there was Gary Cohn, mentioned above, giving Canada a shot and saying it can “tag along” on US economic progress. Former Bank of Canada and England Governor Mark Carney spoke about building together based on common values, and there was Mitch Landrieu, the Biden/Harris 2024 National Campaign Co-Chair, who was in full fight mode over Trump. They were joined by more than 150 CEOs, dozens of policy wonks, and experts on everything from AI, security, economic policy, and more.
There were tray loads of interesting insights and ideas:
- On Trade: The 2026 review of the USMCA is widely seen as the most important framework for the economic future of North America, and there are genuine fears that if Trump wins (Turns out, Ivermectin may actually be a political vaccine against felony convictions) and senses that trade imbalances with the US have not changed, he will rip it up and send the economies reeling with nasty and counterproductive tariffs.
- On the Inflation Reduction Act: Candid admissions from US politicians that protectionism and US industrial policy can sideswipe Canada, simply because Canada gets forgotten.
- On Biden vs. Trump: A quote attributed to Bill Clinton was repeated as to why Biden’s good economic record is not reflected in his polling: “Strong and wrong beats weak and right.”
- On why Democrats are losing working-class voters: I asked David Axelrod why Democrats and progressives spend so much time convincing themselves that people like Trump are not fit for office but so little time reflecting on why their own policies are failing to connect with so many people. He told me — and later told the audience — that Democrats treat working-class Americans with such condescension it’s like anthropologist Margaret Mead studying what were then called “primitive societies” and telling them, “You need to be more like us, and we can teach you.” A devastating critique.
- Here is another Axe moment: Why are some independent and conservative voters tuning out Trump?” “Having Trump as president is like living next to someone who runs a leaf blower 24/7.”
- Personnel is policy: Gary Cohn spoke about why you need to know the people in power. “Any president gets to make 2,800 appointments — they make them all — but ‘personnel is policy,’ so if you want to know what Trump will do, see who he is appointing.” By the way, expect the USMCA trade negotiator Robert Leitheiser, the very guy who insisted on the six-year trade review, to be a senior member of the Trump team,
- Christopher Liddell of Trump White House 1.0, admitted that Trump didn’t know what he was doing in the first six months of his first term, but that it’s different this time, and that the planning and policies are already well underway. We should expect the first six months of a Trump 2.o to be rapid, decisive, and consequential, as he only has one term. His first target will be China and … his political enemies.
- On defense spending: Mark Carney said Canada has no more excuses and must reach 2% spending on NATO – just weeks before the NATO summit in Washington.
But there was one issue that lurked beneath the surface of cross-border politics and wasn’t raised: Should the demand by many US politicians to close down their southern border be counterbalanced by a much quieter, almost secret demand from people to … open the Canadian border, EU style?
It is not as crazy as it sounds.
GZERO commissioned an exclusive poll from our partners at Data Sciences and asked: Would you support an EU-like arrangement between the US and Canada?
The results are fascinating.
Overall, 53% said they would support such an arrangement – 50% in Canada and 55% in the US, while 33% are neutral. And, get this, only 14% are against the idea. Not surprisingly, it breaks down on party lines: 71% of Biden supporters are far more supportive the idea, while 45% of Trump supporters want it. In Canada, it’s almost an even split: 50% LPC/NDP lime it while on the right, 54% of CPC/PPC support the idea.
The point? The longest undefended border in the world is still very defended, and millions of people would like to cross more easily, work more freely, and trade more efficiently. In 2022, US trade with Mexico was $855 billion, and with China it was $758 billion. With Canada? $908 billion.
So making US-Canada trade more efficient with an EU-style arrangement seems like a no-brainer. Last week, we all celebrated D-Day and the beginning of the fight for peace. So many people died in that bloody sacrifice, yet today, the French and the Germans, who fought two world wars that left millions on both sides slaughtered, can move, trade, and work freely across each other's borders in a way Americans and Canada can only dream about. It is baffling.
If anything is a warning about why closing borders and setting up tariffs is disastrous, look at the UK and Brexit, which has essentially tanked the UK economy. The Brexit-loving Conservatives under Rishi Sunak are now facing a potential political extinction event on par with the Canadian Conservative party of 1993, when Brian Mulroney went from winning the biggest majority in Canadian history to stepping down months before an election his party lost so badly they were left with two lonely seats.
We are heading into a US election and a possible Canadian election where low growth, high inflation, and fear of an unstable world might kill prosperity. Why aren’t the two best friends in the world campaigning on an idea that has proven to be one of Europe’s great drivers of growth? An open border.
We all get it. The politics of the southern border is driving politics at the northern border, but if voters can distinguish between the two, why can’t politicians?
They likely never will. And this may be the most 2024 political moment of all: Ignore the quiet ideas people want, and focus on the noisy fights no one can stand.
Displaced Palestinian woman Mai Anseir stands with children at a school where they shelter as they prepare to flee Rafah after Israeli forces launched a ground and air operation in the eastern part of the southern Gaza City, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas, in Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip May 13, 2024.
Hard Numbers: Waves of Palestinians displaced, Deadly cartel violence in Mexico, Fatal riots in New Caledonia, Biden sanctions Nicaragua, Israeli soldiers killed by friendly fire
500,000: Over half a million people have been displaced in Gaza by recent Israeli military operations in Rafah and the northern part of the enclave, according to the UN. As the Israel-Hamas war rages on, over a million people in Gaza are on the verge of starvation, and a “full-blown famine” is occurring in the north.
11: Recent clashes between rival cartels in the southern Mexican state of Chiapas have killed at least 11 people, with two nuns and a teenager reportedly among the dead. The Sinaloa cartel and the Jalisco New Generation Cartel are fighting for control of the area.
4: At least four people are dead due to riots over electoral reform in New Caledonia, a Pacific island and French overseas territory. France declared a state of emergency over the situation, which grants authorities more power to ban gatherings and restrict movement.
250: The Biden administration on Wednesday imposed sanctions on Nicaraguan companies and visa restrictions on 250 people, accusing President Daniel Ortega’s government of “profiting off of irregular migration” to the US. Officials say the Nicaraguan government is exploiting migrants trying to reach the US by selling visas that require them to leave the country within 96 hours. Biden’s move aims to reduce the flow of migrants to the US — an issue that he continues to face pressure over with an election looming.
5: Five Israeli soldiers were killed in a friendly fire incident in northern Gaza on Wednesday, Israel’s military said today. The Israel Defense Forces have opened an investigation into the incident, which involved tank cross-fire in the town of Jabalia. Seven others were injured.
EU adopts new migration pact ahead of June vote
The European Union has recently endorsed significant reforms to its asylum system amid campaigning for June’s European Parliament elections in which immigration is expected to be a hot-button issue. The New Pact on Migration and Asylum includes a centralized database for tracking migrants, procedures for screening individuals to determine their asylum eligibility, deporting those who do not qualify, and, controversially, letting nations detain migrants at borders and fingerprint children.
Despite opposition from Hungary and Poland — who falsely claimed the measure would force them to accept migrants against their will — the majority of EU members supported the reforms, most of which will take effect in 2026. Mainstream political parties on the left and right hope these changes will help them win some votes back from far-right parties, which are expected to pick up seats in June’s elections.
Critics, however, argue that the pact focuses too heavily on deterrence, potentially compromising migrants’ rights to seek asylum.
This overhaul marks the first major update to Europe's asylum laws in approximately two decades, aiming to replace a system that collapsed in 2015 when over a million migrants, mostly fleeing conflicts in Syria and Iraq, entered Europe.
A US-Canada border crossing and monument.
The United States has another border crisis – with Canada
Former Republican nominee hopeful Vivek Ramaswamy was mocked for his proposal during one GOP debate to build border walls with Mexico and Canada.
The problems at the southern border are well-documented. In January, US Border Patrol reported 124,200 encounters with migrants trying to enter the country illegally – and that is a 50% drop from previous months. It is an issue that may cost Joe Biden the election: A Pew Research poll suggested 80% of those surveyed think he is doing a bad job at handling the migrant influx.
Less well-known is that northern border states like Vermont, New York, and New Hampshire are reporting their highest rates of illegal migration in years. Canada is seen as a stepping stone to the US by human smuggling organizations – and it has the added benefit of no border walls or razor wire.
In 2023, roughly 7,000 migrants were arrested for illegally entering the US from Ontario, Quebec, and New Brunswick – a number higher than the last 12 years combined.
Chief Patrol Agent Robert Garcia, who patrols the Swanton sector, the 295-mile section of rough border terrain that separates New York, Vermont, and New Hampshire from Canada, tweeted that between April 28 and May 4 there were 492 apprehensions – the same as the whole of 2021.
Erik Lavallee, a US Border Patrol Agent, told CBS News that multiple organizations are using Canada to smuggle individuals to the U.S. Those arrested come from 66 different countries, including India, Haiti, Venezuela, and Mexico.
While less dangerous than the southern crossing – Biden is expected to tighten access to asylum there with new regulations as soon as today – the northern border is not without its perils. Ten migrants died from drowning and hypothermia coming through the Swanton sector.
Lawmakers seem to have been caught flat-footed by the explosion in numbers.
When Biden visited Ottawa in spring 2023, he signed a deal with Justin Trudeau to update the Safe Third Country Agreement that allowed either country to turn back asylum-seekers at unofficial border crossings, on the basis that Canada and the US are “safe” countries for refugees and they should apply where they land. However, this was designed to close a loophole that saw 40,000 migrants a year cross from the States into Canada at the infamous and unofficial Roxham Road crossing in Quebec and hand themselves over to the first border agent.
Policymakers do not yet appear to have woken up to this latest surge of illegal migrants heading in the other direction.