Tag: Trump racism

Trump’s ‘zero tolerance’ border policy was pushed aggressively by Jeff Sessions, despite warnings, Justice Dept. review finds

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The Trump administration and then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions barreled forward with their “zero tolerance” border crackdown in 2018 knowing that the policy would separate migrant children from their parents and despite warnings that the government was ill-prepared to deal with the consequences, according to a long-awaited report issued Thursday by the Justice Department’s Office of Inspector General.

The report called the Justice Department and the attorney general’s office a “driving force” in making sure the Department of Homeland Security aggressively prosecuted adults arriving with children, findings that cast doubt on statements made by Sessions that the government “never really intended” to separate families.

The bureaucratic chaos and trauma for families that resulted from the policy were not unanticipated consequences, the inspector general found. “DOJ officials were aware of many of these challenges prior to issuing the zero tolerance policy, but they did not attempt to address them until after the policy was issued,” the report states. Continue reading.

Arnold Schwarzenegger compares US Capitol mob to Nazis

Former California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger compared the mob that stormed the U.S. Capitol to the Nazis and called President Donald Trump a failed leader who “will go down in history as the worst president ever.” 

The Republican said in a video he released on social media on Sunday that “Wednesday was the Night of Broken Glass right here in the United States.” In 1938, Nazis in Germany and Austria vandalized Jewish homes, schools and businesses during an attack that became known as Kristallnacht or “the Night of Broken Glass.”

“The broken glass was in the windows of the United States Capitol. But the mob did not just shatter the windows of the Capitol, they shattered the ideas we took for granted,” he said. “They trampled the very principles on which our country was founded.” View the post here.

A New ICE Policy As Trump Is About To Leave Office Could Make It Harder For Immigrant Children To Get Asylum

“If implemented aggressively, this policy could significantly decrease the number of children who ultimately receive asylum in the United States,” one expert said.

Immigrant children could have a harder time obtaining asylum in the US under a new policy issued by Immigration and Customs Enforcement in the waning days of an administration that has spent the past four years restricting access at the nation’s southern border.

According to internal documents obtained by BuzzFeed News, the policy directive was issued by former acting agency leader Tony Pham, who left ICE on Dec. 31, and comes just weeks before the inauguration of President-elect Joe Biden, who is expected to rescind many of the restrictive immigration policies put in place under President Donald Trump.

Trump officials have long complained that unaccompanied minors and their families abuse the immigration system through “loopholes” that allow them to remain in the US after crossing the border to seek asylum. The Trump administration has responded by issuing controversial policies, including arresting undocumented people who come forward to care for immigrants in government shelters. Continue reading.

US Capitol protesters, egged on by Trump, are part of a long history of white supremacists hearing politicians’ words as encouragement

“President Trump and his Republican enablers in Congress incited a violent attack Wednesday against the government they lead,” The New York Times’ editorial board wrote on Jan. 6, summing up much of the response to the incursion into the Capitol by rioting Trump supporters that day.

At a rally that morning, Donald Trump had urged those supporters to march on the Capitol, saying he would “never concede” and that they should show “the kind of pride and boldness that they need to take back our country.” 

The Times was joined in laying the blame at Trump’s feet by many others, including Republican Sen. Mitt Romney, who said what happened at the Capitol was “an insurrection incited by the president of the United States.”

Among the protesters at the Capitol were members of white supremacy groups, including the Proud Boys. Their participation in the Jan. 6 events, egged on by Trump, reflects a long history in the U.S. of local, state and national political leaders encouraging white supremacist groups to challenge or overthrow democratic governments. Continue reading.

Cabinet members Betsy DeVos, Elaine Chao, other Trump officials resign over Capitol violence

The officials included those in prominent positions in the White House, and staff members who have been working in the Trump administration since the beginning of the president’s term in 2017.

Several Trump administration officials have announced that they are resigning after a mob of Trump supporters stormed the Capitol on Wednesday, temporarily disrupting Congress as it was certifying Joe Biden’s Electoral College victory.

The officials included those in prominent positions in the White House, and staff members who have been working in the Trump administration since the beginning of the president’s term in 2017. Some of the resignations came hours after President Donald Trump openly encouraged his supporters to go to the Capitol to protest what he has falsely claimed was a stolen election. The moves are being made with less than two weeks remaining in Trump’s term.

Here is a list of the administration officials who have resigned. Continue reading.

Justice Dept. Seeks to Pare Back Civil Rights Protections for Minorities

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A late move by the Trump administration would stop enforcement of protections against discriminatory practices that have a “disparate impact” on protected groups.

WASHINGTON — The Trump administration has embarked on an 11th-hour bid to undo some civil rights protections for minority groups, which could have a ripple effect on women, people with disabilities and L.G.B.T. people, according to a draft document, in a change that would mark one of the most significant shifts in civil rights enforcement in generations.

The Justice Department has submitted for White House approval a change to how it enforces Title VI of the Civil Rights Act, which prohibits recipients of federal funding from discriminating based on race, color or national origin. The regulation covers housing programs, employers, schools, hospitals, and other organizations and programs.

Under the change, the department would continue to narrowly enforce the law’s protections in cases where it could prove intentional discrimination, but no longer in instances where a policy or practice at issue had a “disparate impact” on minority or other groups. Continue reading.

Census Bureau to miss deadline, jeopardizing Trump plan

The Census Bureau will miss a year-end deadline for handing in numbers used for divvying up congressional seats, a delay that could undermine President Donald Trump’s efforts to exclude people in the country illegally from the count if the figures aren’t submitted before President-elect Joe Biden takes office.

The Census Bureau plans to deliver a population count of each state in early 2021, as close to the missed deadline as possible, the statistical agency said in a statement late Wednesday.

“As issues that could affect the accuracy of the data are detected, they are corrected,” the statement said. “The schedule for reporting this data is not static. Projected dates are fluid.” Continue reading.

Court records, FBI contradict Trump’s claims of organized ‘antifa-led’ riots in Minneapolis after George Floyd’s death

Court documents show wide variety of motives, little, if any, cohesion. 

In the months since riots erupted in Minneapolis this summer, state and federal court documents have told a story that largely contradicts the widely disseminated narratives from Republican and Democratic politicians of what happened in that chaotic week.

President Donald Trump blamed the violence in Minneapolis on radical leftists, saying “antifa” led the riots. Gov. Tim Walz warned that Minneapolis and St. Paul were “under assault” by an “organized attempt to destabilize civil society.” Other public officials said waves of out-of-state agitators descended on the Twin Cities and caused the bulk of the violence.

But documents in dozens of state and federal criminal charges, reviewed by the Star Tribune, present a much more complicated narrative of splintered and disorganized crowds with no single goal or affiliation, and in some cases contradictory motives, that vastly outnumbered police and took advantage of a lawless scene. Continue reading.

Supreme Court tosses challenge to Trump’s immigrant census plan

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The Supreme Court ruled 6-3 on Friday to dismiss a challenge to the Trump administration’s exclusion of undocumented immigrants from the U.S. census, the once-per-decade population count used to allocate House seats among the states.

The decision broke along ideological lines, with the court’s six conservative justices finding that the lawsuit brought by nearly two dozen states was premature. The court’s three more liberal members dissented.

If the courts take no further action on President Trump’s plan, the Friday ruling would effectively allow him to subtract undocumented residents from his mandatory January apportionment report to Congress, which could reduce House seats and federal funding among states with large undocumented populations.  Continue reading.

‘Is this what we’re becoming?’: Anne Frank memorial in Idaho, the only one in US, defaced with swastika stickers

The only Anne Frank memorial in the United States was vandalized Tuesday, a distressing display of hate that has prompted a police investigation, officials said.

“It’s sad that this is becoming a statement of who and what our community is,” said Dan Prinzig, director of the Wassmuth Center for Human Rights, which maintains the memorial in Boise, Idaho.

The memorial includes a life-size bronze statue of Frank, which depicts her holding her diary and peering out the window of the secret annex in which she and her family spent 761 days hiding from Nazis before they were found and sent to concentration camps in 1944. Continue reading.