A new Gallup poll finds 34% of Americans, up from 27% a year ago, would prefer to see immigration to the U.S. increased. This is the highest support for expanding immigration Gallup has found in its trend since 1965.
Meanwhile, the percentage favoring decreased immigration has fallen to a new low of 28%, while 36% think it should stay at the present level.
“President Trump’s transfer last year of $2.5 billion in military funds to pay for border wall construction was an illegal overreach of executive authority, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit ruled Friday,” the Washington Post reports.
“The 2-to-1 ruling was a setback to the president’s increasing reliance on the Pentagon to finance hundreds of miles of new barrier along the Mexico border. Its long-term implications were less certain, as the Supreme Court ruled in Trump’s favor in a similar case last year and Friday’s decision affects only a portion of the funds the White House has budgeted for what has become one of the largest federal infrastructure projects in U.S. history.”
“President Trump issued an executive order Monday barring many categories of foreign workers and curbing immigration visas through the end of the year, moves the administration characterized as necessary to protect U.S. workers following steep job losses amid the coronavirus pandemic,” the Washington Post reports.
“The freeze will apply to work visas that many companies use, especially in the technology sector, landscaping services and the forestry industry. It excludes agricultural laborers and some health care workers and includes a special exemption for the approximately 20,000 child-care providers who come to the United States as ‘au pairs.'”
“President Trump will spend time in Yuma to survey the border wall before his scheduled appearance in Phoenix next week,” KTAR reports.
The Supreme Court blocked the Trump administration’s attempt to end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, an Obama-era program that protects hundreds of thousands of immigrants brought to the US as children from deportation, CNN reports.
The 5 to 4 decision ruled that President Trump illegally ended the “Dreamers” program, with Chief Justice John Roberts writing for the majority and joined by Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer, Sonja Sotomayor and Elena Kagan.
New York Times: “The court’s ruling was a blow to one of President Trump’s central campaign promises — that as president he would ‘immediately terminate’ an executive order by former President Barack Obama that Mr. Trump had called an illegal executive amnesty for hundreds of thousands of young immigrants.”
“The Supreme Court on Monday left in place a lower court opinion upholding one of California’s so-called sanctuary laws that limits cooperation between law enforcement and federal immigration authorities, a measure that the Trump administration says is meant to ‘undermine’ federal immigration enforcement,” CNN reports.
Only Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito, two of the Court’s conservative members, supported taking up the case.
Although 194 miles of border barrier have been under construction since President Trump took office, just three miles of the border wall has been erected in places where no barrier had previously existed, CNN reports.
A construction company that has been repeatedly lauded by President Trump has secured a $1.3 billion deal to build over 40 miles of border fencing through south Arizona, the Washington Post reports.
“You will not find a citizenship question on the 2020 census forms,” NPR reports.
“But in the months since federal courts permanently blocked the Trump administration from asking the hotly-contested question for this year’s national head count, the administration has been pushing ahead with a backup plan — amassing government records to try to determine the U.S. citizenship status of every adult living in the country.”
“Put together, these records could be used to yield data that could radically change political mapmaking and shift the balance of political power across the U.S. over the next decade.”
“The Trump administration’s emergency coronavirus restrictions have shut the U.S. immigration system so tight that since March 21 just two people seeking humanitarian protection at the southern border have been allowed to stay,” the Washington Post reports.
“President Trump is once more pushing to have his border wall painted black, a design change that is projected to add at least $500 million in costs,” the Washington Post reports.
“The president’s determination to have the steel bollards coated in black has fluctuated during the past several years, and military commanders and border officials believed as recently as last fall that they had finally talked him out of it.”
“Trump has not let go of the idea, insisting that the dark color will enhance its forbidding appearance and leave the steel too hot to touch during summer months.”
Winner of the 2020 Pulitzer Prize in Nonfiction: The End of the Myth: From the Frontier to the Border Wall in the Mind of America by Greg Grandin.
“Ever since this nation’s inception, the idea of an open and ever-expanding frontier has been central to American identity. Symbolizing a future of endless promise, it was the foundation of the United States’ belief in itself as an exceptional nation—democratic, individualistic, forward-looking. Today, though, America hasa new symbol: the border wall.”
President Trump indicated he wouldn’t allow federal aid for states facing budget deficits from the coronavirus outbreak unless they take action against “sanctuary cities” — municipalities that prevent their police from cooperating with immigration authorities, Bloomberg reports.
Said Trump: “We would want certain things including sanctuary city adjustments, because we have so many people in sanctuary cities. What’s happening is people are being protected that shouldn’t be protected and a lot of bad things are happening with sanctuary cities.”
“Stephen Miller told White House supporters in a private call this week that the president’s new executive order curbing immigration will usher in the kind of broader long-term changes to American society he has advocated for years, even though the 60-day measures were publicly characterized as a ‘pause’ during the coronavirus pandemic,” the Washington Post reports.
The Wall Street Journal says President Trump’s order to “suspend immigration” won’t really change much.
“Administration officials said the order wouldn’t make substantial changes to current U.S. policy. Even without an executive order, the administration has already all but ceased nearly every form of immigration. Most visa processing has been halted, meaning almost no one can apply for a visa to visit or move to the U.S. Visa interviews and citizenship ceremonies have been postponed and the refugee program paused … Migrants caught crossing the border are now immediately expelled once they are found.”
President Trump tweeted that he will be signing an executive order to temporarily suspend immigration to the United States.
He said he would be signing the order “in light of the attack from the Invisible Enemy, as well as the need to protect the jobs of our GREAT American Citizens.”
“Smugglers sawed into new sections of President Trump’s border wall 18 times in the San Diego area during a single one-month span late last year,” the Washington Post reports.
“The breaches and attempted breaches were made between Sept. 27 and Oct. 27, according to CBP records, with five of the incidents occurring on a single day, Oct. 10. The agency withheld information about the specific locations of the incidents, citing law enforcement sensitivities.”
“The Trump administration has carried out nearly 10,000 summary deportations or ‘expulsions’ since March 21, using emergency public health measures that have given U.S. Customs and Border Protection broad authority to bypass immigration laws,” the Washington Post reports.
“The measures have allowed the agency to quickly turn away most unauthorized migrants — sending them back across the U.S.-Mexico border. The moves have dramatically slashed the number of detainees held in border stations, where they fear the coronavirus could spread, the officials said. CBP has fewer than 100 detainees in custody, down from nearly 20,000 at this time last year during the border crisis.”
Taegan Goddard is the founder of Political Wire, one of the earliest and most influential political web sites. He also runs Political Job Hunt, Electoral Vote Map and the Political Dictionary.
Goddard spent more than a decade as managing director and chief operating officer of a prominent investment firm in New York City. Previously, he was a policy adviser to a U.S. Senator and Governor.
Goddard is also co-author of You Won - Now What? (Scribner, 1998), a political management book hailed by prominent journalists and politicians from both parties. In addition, Goddard's essays on politics and public policy have appeared in dozens of newspapers across the country.
Goddard earned degrees from Vassar College and Harvard University. He lives in New York with his wife and three sons.