Chris Hedges's Blog, page 552

Trump’s Military Drops a Bomb Every 12 Minutes, and No One Is Talking About It

We live in a state of perpetual war, and we never feel it. While you get your gelato at the hip place where they put those cute little mint leaves on the side, someone is being bombed in your name. While you argue with the 17-year-old at the movie theater who gave you a small popcorn when you paid for a large, someone is being obliterated in your name. While we sleep and eat and make love and shield our eyes on a sunny day, someone’s home, family, life and body are being blown into a thousand pieces in our names.

Once every 12 minutes.

The United States military drops an explosive with a strength you can hardly comprehend once every 12 minutes. And that’s odd, because we’re technically at war with—let me think—zero countries. So that should mean zero bombs are being dropped, right?

Hell no! You’ve made the common mistake of confusing our world with some sort of rational, cogent world in which our military-industrial complex is under control, the music industry is based on merit and talent, Legos have gently rounded edges (so when you step on them barefoot, it doesn’t feel like an armor-piercing bullet just shot straight up your sphincter), and humans are dealing with climate change like adults rather than burying our heads in the sand while trying to convince ourselves that the sand around our heads isn’t getting really, really hot.

You’re thinking of a rational world. We do not live there.

Instead, we live in a world where the Pentagon is completely and utterly out of control. A few weeks ago, I wrote about the $21 trillion (that’s not a typo) that has gone unaccounted for at the Pentagon. But I didn’t get into the number of bombs that ridiculous amount of money buys us. President George W. Bush’s military dropped 70,000 bombs on five countries. But of that outrageous number, only 57 of those bombs really upset the international community.

Because there were 57 strikes in Pakistan, Somalia and Yemen—countries the U.S. was not at war with and places that didn’t have ongoing internal conflicts. And the world was kind of horrified. There was a lot of talk that went something like, “Wait a second. We’re bombing in countries outside of war zones? Is it possible that’s a slippery slope ending in us just bombing all the goddamn time? (Awkward pause.) … Nah. Whichever president follows Bush will be a normal adult person (with a functional brain stem of some sort) and will therefore stop this madness.”

We were so cute and naive back then, like a kitten when it’s first waking up in the morning.

The Bureau of Investigative Journalism reported that under President Barack Obama there were “563 strikes, largely by drones, that targeted Pakistan, Somalia and Yemen. …”

It’s not just the fact that bombing outside of a war zone is a horrific violation of international law and global norms. It’s also the morally reprehensible targeting of people for pre-crime, which is what we’re doing and what the Tom Cruise movie “Minority Report” warned us about. (Humans are very bad at taking the advice of sci-fi dystopias. If we’d listened to “1984,” we wouldn’t have allowed the existence of the National Security Agency. If we listened to “The Terminator,” we wouldn’t have allowed the existence of drone warfare. And if we’d listened to “The Matrix,” we wouldn’t have allowed the vast majority of humans to get lost in a virtual reality of spectacle and vapid nonsense while the oceans die in a swamp of plastic waste. … But you know, who’s counting?)

There was basically a media blackout while Obama was president. You could count on one hand the number of mainstream media reports on the Pentagon’s daily bombing campaigns under Obama. And even when the media did mention it, the underlying sentiment was, “Yeah, but look at how suave Obama is while he’s OK’ing endless destruction. He’s like the Steve McQueen of aerial death.”

And let’s take a moment to wipe away the idea that our “advanced weaponry” hits only the bad guys. As David DeGraw put it, “According to the C.I.A.’s own documents, the people on the ‘kill list,’ who were targeted for ‘death-by-drone,’ accounted for only 2% of the deaths caused by the drone strikes.”

Two percent. Really, Pentagon? You got a two on the test? You get five points just for spelling your name right.

But those 70,000 bombs dropped by Bush—it was child’s play. DeGraw again: ” Obama] dropped 100,000 bombs in seven countries. He out-bombed Bush by 30,000 bombs and 2 countries.”

You have to admit that’s impressively horrific. That puts Obama in a very elite group of Nobel Peace Prize winners who have killed that many innocent civilians. The reunions are mainly just him and Henry Kissinger wearing little hand-drawn name tags and munching on deviled eggs.

However, we now know that Donald Trump’s administration puts all previous presidents to shame. The Pentagon’s numbers show that during George W. Bush’s eight years he averaged 24 bombs dropped per day, which is 8,750 per year. Over the course of Obama’s time in office, his military dropped 34 bombs per day, 12,500 per year. And in Trump’s first year in office, he averaged 121 bombs dropped per day, for an annual total of 44,096.

Trump’s military dropped 44,000 bombs in his first year in office.

He has basically taken the gloves off the Pentagon, taken the leash off an already rabid dog. So the end result is a military that’s behaving like Lil Wayne crossed with Conor McGregor. You look away for one minute, look back, and are like, “What the fuck did you just do? I was gone for like, a second!”

Under Trump, five bombs are dropped per hour—every hour of every day. That averages out to a bomb every 12 minutes.

And which is more outrageous—the crazy amount of death and destruction we are creating around the world, or the fact that your mainstream corporate media basically NEVER investigates it? They talk about Trump’s flaws. They say he’s a racist, bulbous-headed, self-centered idiot (which is totally accurate)—but they don’t criticize the perpetual Amityville massacre our military perpetrates by dropping a bomb every 12 minutes, most of them killing 98 percent non-targets.

When you have a Department of War with a completely unaccountable budget—as we saw with the $21 trillion—and you have a president with no interest in overseeing how much death the Department of War is responsible for, then you end up dropping so many bombs that the Pentagon has reported we are running out of bombs.

Oh, dear God. If we run out of our bombs, then how will we stop all those innocent civilians from … farming? Think of all the goats that will be allowed to go about their days.

And, as with the $21 trillion, the theme seems to be “unaccountable.”

Journalist Witney Webb wrote in February, “Shockingly, more than 80 percent of those killed have never even been identified and the C.I.A.’s own documents have shown that they are not even aware of who they are killing—avoiding the issue of reporting civilian deaths simply by naming all those in the strike zone as enemy combatants.”

That’s right. We kill only enemy combatants. How do we know they’re enemy combatants? Because they were in our strike zone. How did we know it was a strike zone? Because there were enemy combatants there. How did we find out they were enemy combatants? Because they were in the strike zone. … Want me to keep going, or do you get the point? I have all day.

This is not about Trump, even though he’s a maniac. It’s not about Obama, even though he’s a war criminal. It’s not about Bush, even though he has the intelligence of boiled cabbage. (I haven’t told a Bush joke in about eight years. Felt kind of good. Maybe I’ll get back into that.)

This is about a runaway military-industrial complex that our ruling elite are more than happy to let loose. Almost no one in Congress or the presidency tries to restrain our 121 bombs a day. Almost no one in a mainstream outlet tries to get people to care about this.

Recently, the hashtag #21Trillion for the unaccounted Pentagon money has gained some traction. Let’s get another one started: #121BombsADay.

One every 12 minutes.

Do you know where they’re hitting? Who they’re murdering? Why? One hundred and twenty-one bombs a day rip apart the lives of families a world away—in your name and my name and the name of the kid doling out the wrong size popcorn at the movie theater.

We are a rogue nation with a rogue military and a completely unaccountable ruling elite. The government and military you and I support by being a part of this society are murdering people every 12 minutes, and in response, there’s nothing but a ghostly silence. It is beneath us as a people and a species to give this topic nothing but silence. It is a crime against humanity.

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The President Threatens More Tariffs Against China

WASHINGTON — President Trump has directed the U.S. Trade Representative to prepare new tariffs on $200 billion in Chinese imports as the two nations move closer to a potential trade war.

In response, China has threatened what it called “comprehensive measures,” raising the risk that Beijing would target operations of major American companies in china.

Trump’s proposed new tariffs would amount to the latest round of punitive steps in an escalating dispute between the world’s two largest economies. The two appear to be edging toward a trade fight that analysts say would undermine both their economies and likely slow global growth.

The White House accuses China of forcing U.S. companies to share advanced technology with Chinese partners as a condition of doing business in China. The administration also revived its complaints Tuesday about America’s gaping trade deficit with China.

Trump previously ordered tariffs on $50 billion in Chinese goods in retaliation for Beijing’s forced transfer of U.S. technology and for intellectual property theft. Those tariffs were quickly matched by China’s threat to penalize on U.S. exports, a move that drew the president’s ire.

Neither side has yet imposed tariffs on the other in their growing dispute over technology and the U.S. trade gap; the first round is to take effect on July 6. But the rhetoric from both sides is intensifying, with Trump lashing out at Beijing over its threat to retaliate against the administration’s latest proposed tariffs.

The president asserted in a statement Monday night that China is determined “to keep the United States at a permanent and unfair disadvantage.”

“China apparently has no intention of changing its unfair practices related to the acquisition of American intellectual property and technology,” Trump said in the statement. “Rather than altering those practices, it is now threatening United States companies, workers, and farmers who have done nothing wrong.”

U.S. stock markets fell sharply Tuesday morning, with investors increasingly nervous about the impact of the escalating fight. The Dow Jones industrial average was down about 320 points, or 1.3 percent. Shares of large U.S. companies with significant overseas business were hit especially hard. Boeing’s stock shed 3.6 percent, Caterpillar 3.7 percent and GE 1.7 percent.

Should China impose its proposed expanded tariffs, Trump warned, he would slap duties on an additional $200 billion of Chinese imports. All told, Trump is now threatening to penalize up to $450 billion of Chinese goods — a value representing about 90 percent of Chinese imports last year.

China’s Commerce Ministry assailed Trump’s latest threat, saying it was an “act of extreme pressure and blackmail that deviates from the consensus reached by both parties after many negotiations, and is a disappointment to the international community.”

“If the U.S. becomes irrational and issues this list, China will have no choice but to adopt strong countermeasures of the same amount and quality,” the statement said.

China might struggle to match the U.S. tariffs because it imports much less from the United States — $130 billion in goods last year, compared with Chinese exports to the United States of $505.5 billion. That would leave less than $100 billion in U.S. goods to hit with a tariff hike, far short of the $200 billion Trump is threatening.

But Beijing’s mention of “comprehensive measures” suggests that it would go beyond tariffs, said Jake Parker of the U.S.-China Business Council. He asked whether that might include delaying or denying licenses required by U.S. companies.

The tit-for-tat moves could start to meaningfully slow U.S. growth, economists warn. Oxford Economics estimates that if Trump imposes the $200 billion in duties and China responds, U.S. growth could slow by 0.3 percentage point next year.

“It looks like the probability of a full-blown trade war between the world’s two largest economies is rising,” said Louis Kuijs, an economist at Oxford Economics.

Tariffs are already raising costs for some goods. A punitive duty the Trump administration applied to lumber imports from Canada has raised the price of a new home by $9,000, according to the National Association of Home Builders.

The White House has not set a date for the imposition of any new tariffs beyond the initial list. The next step will be for the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative to identify the Chinese goods to be penalized and conduct a legal review.

In the first round of penalties announced by both nations, to take effect July 6, the U.S. plans to impose tariffs of 25 percent on $34 billion of Chinese imports, such as construction machinery, aerospace, and power generation equipment. The White House is finalizing a list of $16 billion in additional goods it will sanction later.

China is retaliating by raising import duties on $34 billion worth of American goods, including soybeans, electric cars and whiskey. And it says it would impose tariffs on $16 billion more if the United States does so.

The tariffs on Chinese imports are the latest in a spate of protectionist measures unveiled by Trump in recent months that included tariffs on steel and aluminum imports to the U.S. and a tough rhetoric on trade negotiations from North America to Asia. The escalation in the dispute with China may also serve as a warning to other trading partners with which Trump has been feuding, including Canada and the European Union.

Wall Street has viewed the escalating trade tensions with concern that they could strangle the economic growth achieved during Trump’s watch. Gary Cohn, Trump’s former top economic adviser, said last week that a “tariff battle” could result in price inflation and consumer debt — “historic ingredients for an economic slowdown.”

In a statement, Trump says he has an “excellent relationship” with Xi, “but the United States will no longer be taken advantage of on trade by China and other countries in the world.”

___

Karoub reported from Detroit. Associated Press writers Ken Thomas and Christopher Rugaber in Washington and Gillian Wong, Joe McDonald and Christopher Bodeen in Beijing contributed to this report.

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Trump, GOP to Huddle as Outrage Builds Over Border Policy

WASHINGTON — Republicans on Capitol Hill frantically searched on Tuesday for ways to end the administration’s policy of separating families after illegal border crossings, ahead of a visit from President Trump to discuss broader immigration legislation.

Top conservatives, including key Trump allies, announced they were introducing bills to stop the practice amid a public outcry over the administration’s “zero tolerance” approach to illegal crossings.

Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas introduced legislation that the White House said it was reviewing, and Rep. Mark Meadows of North Carolina, a leader of the conservative Freedom Caucus, also introduced a measure.

Both bills were offered as alternatives in case broader GOP immigration legislation heading for a vote this week fails, as is likely. “This becomes a backup proposal,” Meadows told reporters at the White House.

Trump’s meeting late Tuesday with House Republicans comes as lawmakers in both parties are up in arms after days of news reports showing images of children being held at border facilities in cages and an audio recording of a young child pleading for his “Papa.”

The issue boiled over Tuesday at a House hearing on an unrelated subject when protesters with babies briefly shut down proceedings.

Maryland Rep. Elijah Cummings, the top Democrat on the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, teared up as he pleaded with Republicans on the panel to end what he called “internment camps.”

“We need you, those children need you —and I am talking directly to my Republican colleagues— we need you to stand up to President Donald Trump,” he said.

Under the current policy, all unlawful crossings are referred for prosecution — a process that moves adults to the custody of the U.S. Marshals Service and sends many children to facilities run by the Department of Health and Human Services. Under the Obama administration, such families were usually referred for civil deportation proceedings, not requiring separation.

Nearly 2,000 children were separated from their families over a six-week period in April and May.

The House is already embroiled in an election-year struggle over immigration legislation that threatens to hurt Republicans in November.

Democrats have seized on the family separation issue. And now, Republicans are increasingly joining them in their call to stop separating families.

“While cases are pending, families should stay together,” tweeted Cruz, who is in an unexpectedly tough re-election battle. He introduced his own bill to speed up court proceedings to no more than 14 days. “Children belong with their families.”

Michigan Republican Rep. Fred Upton called for an immediate end to the “ugly and inhumane practice” of separation. “It’s never acceptable to use kids as bargaining chips in political process.” Kansas GOP Sen. Pat Roberts said he was “against using parental separation as a deterrent to illegal immigration.”

“The time is now for the White House to end the cruel, tragic separations of families,” said Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska.

From afar, ailing Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., tweeted, “The administration’s current family separation policy is an affront to the decency of the American people and contrary to principles and values upon which our nation was founded. The administration has the power to rescind this policy. It should do so now.”

The Trump administration insists the family separations are required under the law. But after signaling Monday that it would oppose any fix aimed solely at addressing that issue, the White House said Tuesday it was reviewing the emergency legislation being introduced by Cruz to keep migrant families together.

The senator’s bill would add more federal immigration judges, authorize new temporary shelters to house migrant families, speed the processing of asylum cases and require that families that cross the border illegally be kept together, absent criminal conduct or threats to the welfare of any children.

At a White House briefing Monday, Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen declared, “Congress alone can fix it.” That line has been echoed by others in the administration, including Trump, who has falsely blamed a law passed by Democrats for the “zero tolerance” approach to prosecutions of families crossing the border.

Two immigration bills under consideration in the House could address the separations, but the outlook for passage is dim. Conservatives say the compromise legislation that GOP leaders helped negotiate with moderates is inadequate.

Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, a member of the Freedom Caucus, said he’s skeptical that even a full-throated endorsement from Trump will be enough to get the compromise bill through the House.

The compromise bill shifts away from the nation’s longtime preference for family immigration to a new system that prioritizes entry based on merits and skills. It beefs up border security, clamps down on illegal entries and reinforces other immigration laws.

To address the rise of families being separated at the border, the measure proposes keeping children in detention with their parents, undoing 2-decade-old rules that limit the time minors can be held in custody.

Rep. Bob Goodlatte R-Va., chairman of the Judiciary Committee, is reworking the family separation provision in the compromise bill, a GOP aide said Tuesday.

Faced with the prospect of gridlock in the House, senators appear willing to take matters into their own hands.

John Cornyn of Texas, the No. 2 Republican leader, said Senate Republicans are working on language to address the family separations that could receive a floor vote, potentially as part of a spending bill package.

“I don’t think the answer to family separation is to not enforce the law. I think the answer to family separation is: Don’t separate families while you’re enforcing the law,” Cornyn told reporters. “It’s all within our power, and people have to overcome their desire to preserve an issue to campaign on.”

GOP senators including Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, Jeff Flake of Arizona and Susan Collins of Maine also said they’ve been discussing family separation legislation.

The administration, meanwhile, is hoping to force Democrats to vote for the bills or bear some of the political cost in November’s midterm elections. Democrats brushed aside that pressure.

“As everyone who has looked at this agrees, this was done by the president, not Democrats. He can fix it tomorrow if he wants to, and if he doesn’t want to, he should own up to the fact that he’s doing it,” said Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer of New York.

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Associated Press writer Mary Clare Jalonick contributed to this report.

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‘Papa! Papa!’ Audio of Children at Border Stokes Rage Over Separation

BROWNSVILLE, Texas—An audio recording that appears to capture the heartbreaking voices of small Spanish-speaking children crying out for their parents at a U.S. immigration facility took center stage Monday in the growing uproar over the Trump administration’s policy of separating immigrant children from their parents.

“Papa! Papa!” one child is heard weeping in the audio file that was first reported by the nonprofit ProPublica and later provided to The Associated Press.

Human rights attorney Jennifer Harbury said she received the tape from a whistleblower and told ProPublica it was recorded in the last week. She did not provide details about where exactly it was recorded.

Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen said she had not heard the audio but said children taken into custody by the government are being treated humanely. She said the government has high standards for detention centers and the children are well cared for, stressing that Congress needs to plug loopholes in the law so families can stay together.

The audio surfaced as politicians and advocates flocked to the U.S.-Mexico border to visit U.S. immigration detention centers and turn up the pressure on the Trump administration.

And the backlash over the policy widened. The Mormon church said it is “deeply troubled” by the separation of families at the border and urged national leaders to find compassionate solutions. Massachusetts Gov. Charlie Baker, a Republican, reversed a decision to send a National Guard helicopter from his state to the Mexican border to assist in a deployment, citing the administration’s “cruel and inhumane” policy.

At the border, an estimated 80 people pleaded guilty Monday to immigration charges, including some who asked the judge questions such as “What’s going to happen to my daughter?” and “What will happen to my son?”

Attorneys at the hearings said the immigrants had brought two dozen boys and girls with them to the U.S., and the judge replied that he didn’t know what would happen to their children.

Several groups of lawmakers toured a nearby facility in Brownsville, Texas, that houses hundreds of immigrant children.

Democratic Rep. Ben Ray Lujan of New Mexico said the location was a former hospital converted into living quarters for children, with rooms divided by age group. There was even a small room for infants, complete with two high chairs, where two baby boys wore matching rugby style shirts with orange and white stripes.

Another group of lawmakers on Sunday visited an old warehouse in McAllen, Texas, where hundreds of children are being held in cages created by metal fencing. One cage held 20 youngsters.

More than 1,100 people were inside the large, dark facility, which is divided into separate wings for unaccompanied children, adults on their own, and mothers and fathers with children.

In Texas’ Rio Grande Valley, the busiest corridor for people trying to enter the U.S., Border Patrol officials say they must crack down on migrants and separate adults from children as a deterrent to others trying to get into the U.S. illegally.

“When you exempt a group of people from the law … that creates a draw,” said Manuel Padilla, the Border Patrol’s chief agent there.

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, speaking to reporters during a tour of San Diego immigration detention facilities with Rep. Juan Vargas and other House Democrats, said family separation is a “heartbreaking, barbarian issue that could be changed in a moment by the president of the United States rescinding his action.”

“It so challenges the conscience of our country that it must be changed and must be changed immediately,” she said during a news conference at a San Diego terminal that is connected to the airport in Tijuana, Mexico by a bridge.

U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas announced late Monday that he was introducing emergency legislation intended to keep immigrant families together.

“All Americans are rightly horrified by the images we are seeing on the news, children in tears pulled away from their mothers and fathers,” Cruz said. “This must stop.”

President Donald Trump emphatically defended his administration’s policy Monday, again falsely blaming Democrats.

“The United States will not be a migrant camp and it will not be a refugee holding facility,” he declared. “Not on my watch.”

___

Snow reported from Phoenix. Associated Press writers Elliot Spagat in San Diego and Mike Melia in Boston contributed to this report.

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Recording of Crying Children Fuels Outrage in Border Controversy

BROWNSVILLE, Texas—An audio recording that appears to capture the heartbreaking voices of small Spanish-speaking children crying out for their parents at a U.S. immigration facility took center stage Monday in the growing uproar over the Trump administration’s policy of separating immigrant children from their parents.

“Papa! Papa!” one child is heard weeping in the audio file that was first reported by the nonprofit ProPublica and later provided to The Associated Press.

Human rights attorney Jennifer Harbury said she received the tape from a whistleblower and told ProPublica it was recorded in the last week. She did not provide details about where exactly it was recorded.

Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen said she had not heard the audio but said children taken into custody by the government are being treated humanely. She said the government has high standards for detention centers and the children are well cared for, stressing that Congress needs to plug loopholes in the law so families can stay together.

The audio surfaced as politicians and advocates flocked to the U.S.-Mexico border to visit U.S. immigration detention centers and turn up the pressure on the Trump administration.

And the backlash over the policy widened. The Mormon church said it is “deeply troubled” by the separation of families at the border and urged national leaders to find compassionate solutions. Massachusetts Gov. Charlie Baker, a Republican, reversed a decision to send a National Guard helicopter from his state to the Mexican border to assist in a deployment, citing the administration’s “cruel and inhumane” policy.

At the border, an estimated 80 people pleaded guilty Monday to immigration charges, including some who asked the judge questions such as “What’s going to happen to my daughter?” and “What will happen to my son?”

Attorneys at the hearings said the immigrants had brought two dozen boys and girls with them to the U.S., and the judge replied that he didn’t know what would happen to their children.

Several groups of lawmakers toured a nearby facility in Brownsville, Texas, that houses hundreds of immigrant children.

Democratic Rep. Ben Ray Lujan of New Mexico said the location was a former hospital converted into living quarters for children, with rooms divided by age group. There was even a small room for infants, complete with two high chairs, where two baby boys wore matching rugby style shirts with orange and white stripes.

Another group of lawmakers on Sunday visited an old warehouse in McAllen, Texas, where hundreds of children are being held in cages created by metal fencing. One cage held 20 youngsters.

More than 1,100 people were inside the large, dark facility, which is divided into separate wings for unaccompanied children, adults on their own, and mothers and fathers with children.

In Texas’ Rio Grande Valley, the busiest corridor for people trying to enter the U.S., Border Patrol officials say they must crack down on migrants and separate adults from children as a deterrent to others trying to get into the U.S. illegally.

“When you exempt a group of people from the law … that creates a draw,” said Manuel Padilla, the Border Patrol’s chief agent there.

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, speaking to reporters during a tour of San Diego immigration detention facilities with Rep. Juan Vargas and other House Democrats, said family separation is a “heartbreaking, barbarian issue that could be changed in a moment by the president of the United States rescinding his action.”

“It so challenges the conscience of our country that it must be changed and must be changed immediately,” she said during a news conference at a San Diego terminal that is connected to the airport in Tijuana, Mexico by a bridge.

U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas announced late Monday that he was introducing emergency legislation intended to keep immigrant families together.

“All Americans are rightly horrified by the images we are seeing on the news, children in tears pulled away from their mothers and fathers,” Cruz said. “This must stop.”

President Donald Trump emphatically defended his administration’s policy Monday, again falsely blaming Democrats.

“The United States will not be a migrant camp and it will not be a refugee holding facility,” he declared. “Not on my watch.”

___

Snow reported from Phoenix. Associated Press writers Elliot Spagat in San Diego and Mike Melia in Boston contributed to this report.

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Unapologetic Trump Digs In on Immigration Despite Outrage

WASHINGTON — An unapologetic President Trump defended his administration’s border-protection policies Monday in the face of rising national outrage over the forced separation of migrant children from their parents. Calling for tough action against illegal immigration, Trump declared the U.S. “will not be a migrant camp” on his watch.

Images of children held in fenced cages fueled a growing chorus of condemnation from both political parties, four former first ladies and national evangelical leaders. The children are being held separately from parents who are being prosecuted under the administration’s “zero-tolerance” policy for illegal border crossings.

“I say it’s very strongly the Democrats’ fault,” Trump said Monday as his administration rejected criticism that the policy has resulted in inhuman and immoral conditions.

Trump pointed to more lenient policies under past administrations that had not charged all migrants who had crossed illegally.

“We will not apologize for the job we do or for the job law enforcement does, for doing the job that the American people expect us to do,” Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen said in an appearance before the National Sheriffs’ Association in New Orleans. “Illegal actions have and must have consequences. No more free passes, no more get out of jail free cards.”

Nearly 2,000 children were separated from their families over a six-week period in April and May after Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced the new “zero-tolerance” policy that refers all cases of illegal entry for criminal prosecution. Prior procedure had limited prosecution for many family entrants, in part because regulations prohibit detaining children with their parents since the children are not charged with a crime and the parents are.

The policy change was meant to deter unlawful crossings — and Sessions issued a warning last month to those entering the U.S. illegally that their children “inevitably for a period of time might be in different conditions.”

The current holding areas have drawn widespread attention after journalists gained access to one site Sunday. At a McAllen, Texas, detention center hundreds of immigrant children wait in a series of cages created by metal fencing. One cage had 20 children inside. Scattered about are bottles of water, bags of chips and large foil sheets intended to serve as blankets.

Administration officials said they do not like the family separations either — calling it the result of legal loopholes — but insist migrants who arrive illegally simply won’t be released or loosely kept track of.

“The United States will not be a migrant camp and it will not be a refugee holding facility,” Trump declared. “Not on my watch.”

Sessions, on Monday, echoed the administration’s defense of the zero tolerance policy, and called on Congress to act.

“We do not want to separate parents from their children,” he said. “If we build the wall, if we pass legislation to end the lawlessness, we won’t face these terrible choices.”

Mindful of the national outcry, lawmakers in both parties rushed Monday to devise a targeted legislative fix.

GOP senators, including Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, Jeff Flake of Arizona and Susan Collins of Maine, said they were considering legislation that would keep migrant families together; provide additional judges so detained families would face shorter waiting periods; and provide facilities for the families to stay.

Graham said he talked Mondayto about 40 senators, including Democrats, but not Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell. “It’s a concept it seems everybody is jumping on board,” he said.

California Sen. Dianne Feinstein said she had the backing of the Democratic caucus for a bill would that prohibit the separation of migrant children from their parents, with exceptions for findings of child abuse or trafficking.

But the White House signaled it would oppose any narrow fix aimed solely at addressing the plight of children separated from their parents under the immigration crackdown. Press secretary Sarah Sanders said Trump’s priorities, like funding a border wall and tightening immigration laws, must also be fulfilled as part of any legislation.

“We want to fix the whole thing,” she said. “We don’t want to tinker with just part of it.”

The national debate over the family separation policy comes as Republican lawmakers are growing ever more concerned about negative effects on their re-election campaigns this fall. Trump is to travel to Capitol Hill Tuesday for a strategy session on upcoming immigration legislation.

Underscoring the sensitivity of the issue, language curbing the taking of immigrant children from parents held in custody will be added to the House’s conservative immigration bill, a House GOP aide said Monday, A similar provision is already in a compromise GOP immigration measure between party conservatives and moderates, with the House expected to vote on both late this week.

The administration is hoping to force Democrats to vote for the bills or bear some of the political cost in November’s midterm elections.

White House officials have privately embraced the border policy as a negotiating tactic to win votes for legislation to fulfill the president’s pledge to build a border wall and to tighten the nation’s immigration laws.

Trump’s commitment to the current policy showed no sign of faltering as voices of outrage and condemnation grew louder and more diverse.

In Massachusetts, Republican Gov. Charlie Baker reversed a decision to send a state National Guard helicopter to the southern border, citing what he called the administration’s “cruel and inhumane” policy of separating children from their parents.

The Rev. Franklin Graham, a longtime Trump ally, called the policy “disgraceful.” Several religious groups, including some conservative ones, have pushed to stop the practice of separating immigrant children from their parents. The Mormon church said it was “deeply troubled” by the separation of families and urged national leaders to find compassionate solutions.

Former first lady Laura Bush called the policy “cruel” and “immoral,” and said it was “eerily reminiscent” of the U.S. internment of Americans of Japanese descent during World War II.

On Capitol Hill, Republicans joined Democrats in calling for an end to the separations. Michigan Republican Rep. Fred Upton called for an immediate end to this “ugly and inhumane practice,” adding, “It’s never acceptable to use kids as bargaining chips in political process.” Kansas GOP Sen. Pat Roberts said he is “against using parental separation as a deterrent to illegal immigration.” And GOP Rep. Mike Coffman warned, “History won’t remember well those who support the continuation of this policy.”

___

Kevin McGill reported from New Orleans. AP writers Alan Fram, Ken Thomas, Jill Colvin and Catherine Lucey in Washington, Nick Riccardi in Denver and Nomaan Merchant in McAllen, Texas, contributed.

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Majority of Republicans Support Trump’s Immigration Policy, Poll Finds

During a White House press briefing Monday, despite all available evidence to the contrary, United States Secretary of Homeland Security Kirstjen Nielsen claimed that the U.S. government “does not have a policy of separating children at the border.” If she was concerned about possibly alienating the president’s voters, she needn’t have worried. New polling data indicate more than half of Republicans favor a practice that has drawn comparisons to the internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II.

According to Quinnipiac, 55 percent of Republicans back family separation while just 35 percent oppose it. By contrast, 91 percent of Democrats oppose the president’s latest gambit versus 7 percent who support it. More than a quarter (27 percent) of the country overall approves the administration’s “zero tolerance” approach to immigration.

For his part, Trump has repeatedly attempted to blame the political opposition for his own policies, even as a senior White House adviser brags about tearing immigrant children from their parents.

Quinnipiac’s were not the only disturbing findings published Monday. An Ipsos survey conducted exclusively for The Daily Beast reveals that Kim Jong Un, who has executed his own officials with anti-aircraft weapons, is slightly more popular with the GOP than Nancy Pelosi. Nineteen percent hold a favorable opinion of the North Korean dictator against just 17 percent for the Democratic House minority leader, per the poll. Sixty-eight and 72 percent of Republicans disapproved of Kim and Pelosi respectively.

New data from Gallup are no less dispiriting. Weekly polling reveals that the president’s approval rating currently sits at 45 percent—his best mark since the first week of his presidency. Similarly, his support within the GOP has swelled to 90 percent, matching a personal high.

It would be unwise to extrapolate too much from a handful of polls in June of 2018. The Ipsos survey, for instance, was based on a sample of 1,000 respondents, while the midterm elections remain several months away. Still, amid reports that migrant children are being kept in cages, and that the Trump administration is weighing the construction of tent cities across Texas, it seems reasonable to wonder whether Republican voters are beyond reaching.

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Supreme Court Avoids Ruling on Two Partisan Gerrymandering Cases

The results of the 2018 midterm elections hinge not only on obvious factors such as money, Donald Trump’s approval rating and even whether the Democrats can muster a compelling enough message for voters to usher in a “blue wave.” They’ll be determined by a less flashy, but perhaps even more critical, issue. Namely, much will hinge on how the maps of election districts are drawn, and whether they have been deliberately configured to favor one party over another—e.g., whether the practice of partisan gerrymandering is in effect.

On Monday, the Supreme Court had an opportunity to take a stand on whether drawing such maps along party lines is unconstitutional. The top court was presented with a pair of partisan gerrymandering cases, one involving a map purportedly favoring Republicans in Wisconsin, the other featuring a map that allegedly gave Democrats in Maryland an edge.

The justices avoided the issue, dismissing both challenges on technical grounds. In the process, the court “[turned] potential constitutional blockbusters into minor rulings,” as Adam Liptak writes in The New York Times.

Wisconsin had attempted to use a map of that state as a whole in arguing its case, Gill v. Whitford. The court said the challenges should instead be brought district by district and sent the case back to a trio of federal judges who will determine whether the challengers can modify their lawsuit with plaintiffs in each district.

Wisconsin Democrats, as a recent Politico article points out, are rebuilding their party after a sobering 2016 presidential election. To recap, the state went Republican for the first time since 1984, and Hillary Clinton caught heat for not campaigning in Wisconsin at all during the general election. Now, Politico reports, Democrats have already invested more than $7 million, opened multiple field offices and taken visits from rumored 2020 presidential hopefuls—including California Sen. Kamala Harris, South Bend, Ind., Mayor Pete Buttigieg and former Attorney General Eric Holder.

The Supreme Court decision doesn’t negate those efforts, but it certainly doesn’t help what was already an uphill battle.

The Maryland case, Benisek v. Lamone, was in a relatively early stage. As The Washington Post reports, SCOTUS’ nine justices said that “the lower court had not been wrong when it decided not to make the state redraw the maps in time for the 2018 election.”

In practice, this means that upcoming elections in both states will proceed using the current maps. There’s also a redistricting case out of North Carolina that could offer the justices the opportunity to make a firmer ruling, although it’s not clear if that case will be decided before November.

Even with opportunities for future challenges, the delay amounts to a loss for anyone hoping this decision would help eradicate partisan electoral maps in time for the midterms. As Chris Carson, president of the League of Women Voters of the United States, told The Washington Post, “Today’s decision is yet another delay in providing voters with the power they deserve in our democracy.”

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Doubts Loom Over Colombia Peace Deal With Hawk’s Election

BOGOTA, Colombia — Uncertainty loomed over Colombia’s fragile peace deal on Monday with the victory of one of its most hawkish critics in a bruising presidential runoff that laid bare deep divisions in the South American nation as it emerges from decades of bloody conflict.

Ivan Duque, a law-and-order disciple of a powerful former president, won Sunday’s vote with a commanding 12-point lead over rival Gustavo Petro, a former rebel and ex-Bogota mayor.

On the campaign trail, Duque repeatedly vowed to roll back benefits inscribed in the deal, such as demanding that rebel commanders behind scores of atrocities first confess to their war crimes and compensate victims before they are allowed to take up the congressional seats they have been promised in the accord.

But once he takes office in August from the peace deal’s architect, President Juan Manuel Santos, Duque is likely to tread softer if he wants to broaden his base of support and unite the country, analysts said.

“Ironically, he has a chance to make the accords stronger by providing something the peace process has lacked from the outset: a national consensus,” said Michael Shifter, a longtime observer of Colombia and president of the Inter-American Dialogue in Washington.

This year’s elections were the safest in generations, a testament to how far the country has already come in putting Latin America’s longest-running conflict behind it. Not a single act of violence affected the campaign.

In the final stretch before the vote, as victory seemed within reach, the pro-business Duque was already moderating some of his proposals, including a call to overturn a negotiated amnesty for rebels involved in drug trafficking. He also stressed that rank-and-file guerrillas of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia would have his full support in making their transition to civilian life.

While Santos didn’t endorse any candidate and has feuded with Duque’s mentor, former President Alvaro Uribe, throughout his eight years in office, two of Santos’ advisers on the peace process have quietly migrated to the Duque camp in recent months, which is likely to make for a smoother transition.

“This is the opportunity that we have been waiting for,” the 41-year-old Duque said in his victory speech, playing up his youth — he is the youngest Colombian president ever elected in a popular vote — and pledging “to turn the page on the politics of polarization, insults and venom.”

His biggest challenge will be reining in the pressure from conservative allies. As a senator Duque earned a reputation for being a thoughtful, cordial adversary who frequently stretched his hand across the aisle, but some of his prominent backers are outright hostile to the FARC. Hours after his victory, congresswoman Maria Fernanda Cabal blasted on social media: “The FARC lost. Colombia won!”

One unknown is how much influence Uribe will wield. Duque was elected to Colombia’s Senate in 2014 barely two months after returning to Colombia from Washington, where he had worked for more than a decade at a development bank, thanks to Uribe’s endorsement. Throughout his presidential campaign, he was dogged by accusations that he would be little more than a puppet for Uribe, who is constitutionally barred from seeking a third term. Though praised for weakening the FARC and drawing record foreign investment, Uribe has also been blamed for the military’s killing of thousands of civilians who were falsely accused of being rebels.

“He will have to make some adjustments to the accord, if only to placate Uribe and other hard-liners and avoid being labeled a traitor,” Shifter said. “But these could be relatively modest and not put the entire peace effort at risk.”

It’s also not clear how much leeway there is to make changes to the 310-page accord that put a formal end to a conflict that caused more than 250,000 deaths. Colombia’s constitutional court has declared some aspects of the agreement irreversible. For Duque to prevail in his call for substantive “corrections” that deliver “peace with justice,” he’ll likely need to build political support in Congress that he currently lacks to pass a constitutional reform.

Among the rebels there is concern — and some goodwill.

The FARC has already accepted changes to the accord once before, after the original deal was rejected by voters led by Uribe in a referendum. After Sunday’s election victory, ex-guerrilla leader Rodrigo Londono immediately congratulated Duque and said Colombians should work together because “the road of hope is open.”

“The truth is we’re worried,” said Elkin Sepulveda, who joined the FARC at 15 and is now trying to launch an organization to help ex-combatants disabled during the conflict. He’s living in a rural camp in northern Colombia where some 200 rebels are catching up on their studies and learning new skills needed to reintegrate into civilian life.

Even before the election, implementation of the accord had been slow going and rebel commanders have complained that the recent arrest of a former rebel peace negotiator on U.S. drug charges could lead some of the 7,000 fighters who’ve surrendered their weapons to join dissident rebel factions or criminal gangs that have proliferated in former FARC-dominated areas.

“We hope that the next government complies with the peace accords,” said Virginia Lobo, a FARC militant living in the same camp. “Nobody wants to return to war.”

In addition to dealing with the rebels, Duque will have to contend with a weak economy, a migration crisis spurred by neighboring Venezuela’s collapse and a boom in illegal coca crops that has tested traditionally close relations with the U.S.

As part of the peace process, Santos had been betting heavily on a coca crop substitution program that has so far failed to reduce the supply of cocaine, leading the Trump administration to warn last year that it could decertify Colombia as a partner in the war on drugs. Last week, the government said the amount of land dedicated to coca production surged 23 percent last year, to 180,000 hectares, a level unseen in decades.

In March, Duque said he’d bring back a controversial aerial coca eradication program that Santos ended over health concerns. In his victory speech on Sunday, he said the rise in coca production threatens Colombia’s national security.

“Duque has the opportunity to be sort of like Nixon going to China,” said Bernard Aronson, who was the Obama administration’s special envoy to the Colombia peace talks. “I think he’s smart enough to know that not to pursue a pragmatic route could start his presidency off with a big crisis.”

___

Associated Press writer Manuel Rueda in Bogota, Colombia, contributed to this report.

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Even Trump Deserves to Plead the Fifth

”No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a grand jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the militia, when in actual service in time of war or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offense to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.”  —The Fifth Amendment (emphasis added)

Donald Trump has returned from his summit with the North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un to the unsettling reality that he is not yet a dictator in his own right. Instead of being welcomed home by the “fake news” media as a statesman and a conquering hero—as an aside, one wonders at times if Trump hasn’t studied Hitler henchman Joseph Goebbels’ attacks on the lügenpresse (lying press)—he finds himself still a “person of interest” in the criminal probe headed by special counsel Robert S. Mueller III.

Both Trump and his increasingly unhinged TV lawyer, former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, know that a showdown with Mueller is coming. They can see the metaphorical lights of the oncoming train headed their way. According to The Washington Post, in a matter of weeks, not months, Trump and his legal team—which, fortunately for him, includes some capable attorneys—will have to decide whether to consent to Mueller’s demand that the president submit to an in-person interview under oath. The decision could prove to be far more historic than the confab with Kim.

Like the majority of Americans, I have no love for Trump and his white nationalist “Make America Great Again” political agenda. I remain thoroughly revolted by such policies and actions as the Gestapo-like practice of separating immigrant children from their mothers to enforce the administration’s “no tolerance” stance on illegal border crossings; the travel bans imposed on Muslims seeking to enter the country; the unraveling of environmental protections; and the new tax law that will worsen our already obscene levels of wealth and income inequality.

I am also disgusted by the president’s history of abuse toward women and, more recently, his incendiary call to deport NFL players (presumably to African “shitholes”) for kneeling during the playing of the national anthem to protest police misconduct. I could go on and on, but the point is made: Trump is unfit to lead any nation committed to the principles of equal protection, civil liberties and the rule of law.

Still, that same commitment to civil liberties and the rule of law, honed over decades of work as a criminal-defense lawyer and later as a judge, has left me with a reserve of empathy for Trump when it comes to Mueller and, in particular, the interview demand. The president, like any other citizen, has a fundamental right under the Fifth Amendment that protects him from custodial interrogations conducted by law enforcement. Even if we don’t give a jailhouse-rat’s rump about Trump’s personal well-being, we have to respect that right, lest our own be diminished.

Mueller understandably wants to question and cross-examine Trump to complete his investigation of Russian meddling in the 2016 election and the president’s possible obstruction of justice for acts aimed at impeding the inquiry. No competent investigator would ask for anything less.

In the absence of an agreement between the two sides on a procedure for an interview, Mueller will likely cause a federal grand jury subpoena to be issued, commanding Trump to testify. Apart from pleading the Fifth, Trump’s options at that point will range from bad to worse.

Trump could take steps to dismiss Mueller, following the path of Richard Nixon, who fired Watergate special prosecutor Archibald Cox in the infamous Saturday Night Massacre of October 1973. Doing that, however, could precipitate a full-blown constitutional crisis, pave the way for a Democratic takeover of Congress in the midterm elections, and possibly lead to impeachment.

Alternatively, Trump could contest Mueller’s subpoena, but that would spark a high-profile legal battle that would be expedited to the Supreme Court. Even with its current conservative majority, the court likely would rule against Trump, in light of such precedents as United States v. Nixon (1974) and Clinton v. Jones (1997). Although the Nixon case dealt with subpoenas for documents rather than personal testimony and the Clinton case dealt with a federal civil lawsuit rather than a criminal investigation, both stand for the proposition that no one, even the president, is above the law.

Still another option would be for Trump to preemptively pardon himself for federal liability for all aspects of the Russia probe, including obstruction, pursuant to the powers granted to him under Article II, Section 2 of the Constitution. Such a move would be unprecedented and would probably be unlawful, as the concept of a self-pardon is a contradiction in terms. Even if a self-pardon withstood legal challenges, it would, under Supreme Court case law interpreting the pardon power, operate as an acknowledgment of guilt. It also would do nothing to protect Trump from impeachment, as the president’s pardon power does not extend to cases of impeachment.

The least worst of the president’s options—and the one I believe his lawyers ultimately will press him to exercise, even at the risk of causing some political embarrassment—would be to invoke his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination and refuse to answer Mueller’s questions.

If Trump does “take the Fifth,” I can just hear the jeers and cackling from liberal pundits like Rachel Maddow and Lawrence O’Donnell. They and others, no doubt, will accurately point out that during the presidential campaign Trump famously remarked, “The mob takes the Fifth. If you’re innocent, why are you taking the Fifth?”

Back then, Trump was referring to former aides of Hillary Clinton who pleaded the Fifth before congressional committees looking into Clinton’s use of a private email server while secretary of state. Should Trump invoke the Fifth on his own behalf in the future, his inconsistencies and hypocrisy will be boisterously lampooned. He’ll be compared to the mob boss that in some sense he actually is.

But in hoisting Trump on his own Fifth Amendment petard, the pundits will have to take care not to buy into candidate Trump’s characterization of the amendment itself as a refuge for the guilty. It’s not.

The framers included the amendment in the Bill of Rights not to shield criminals, but to counter the practices of the ecclesiastical courts of the Church of England, and the lay courts of the Star Chamber and the High Commission, which deployed inquisitorial methods to extract confessions from heretics and dissenters.

In the landmark 1965 case of Griffin v. California, the Supreme Court held that a jury in a criminal trial cannot draw an adverse inference of guilt from a defendant’s refusal to testify. In 2001, in Ohio v. Reiner, the court went further, observing that the Fifth Amendment “protects the innocent as well as the guilty.”

When the Fifth Amendment is violated, bad things happen. Consider, for example, the 1989 case of the Central Park Five. Five black and Hispanic teens, between ages 14 and 16, were coerced by New York City police into falsely confessing—after they were deprived of food, water and sleep for 24 hours—to the rape of a 28-year-old white woman jogging in Central Park.

Following the arrest of the teens, Trump took out full-page ads in every major New York City newspaper, calling for reinstatement of the death penalty, which the state had effectively abolished in 1984. The teens were convicted and sentenced to prison. Their convictions were vacated in 2002 only after another inmate confessed to the rape and DNA evidence was discovered that linked him to the crime.

This doesn’t mean that we buy into Trump’s “deep state” narrative that has Mueller running a latter-day Star Chamber, attempting to lure the president into a “perjury trap.” It means simply this: that in our efforts to hold Trump accountable to the law and constitutional norms, we hold fast to those norms ourselves. Trash Trump, but not his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination.

If Mueller has the goods on Trump, whether for obstruction or conspiring with the Russians to influence the elections, he should be able to make his case without the president’s testimony. In the wider criminal justice system, prosecutors do that all the time.

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