Eager to jump-start the stalled Keystone XL oil pipeline and other energy projects, President Donald Trump has acted to assert executive power over pipelines and such infrastructure. 

He issued a new permit for Keystone XL and insisted this exercise of presidential authority was not subject to judicial review. Then he signed an executive order clarifying that the president alone has the power to grant permits for cross-border projects such as pipelines. A separate order makes it harder for states to block pipelines and other energy projects on the basis of environmental concerns. 

Taken together, the actions amount to a broad assertion of power that reverses more than 50 years of precedent that delegated decision-making on energy projects to individual agencies. 

Trump has shown a willingness to override his own agencies to accomplish his aims. His actions, if upheld by the courts, could consolidate power over energy projects at the White House, increasing the influence of the president’s political advisers and potentially cutting out experts and career officials throughout the government. 

“Too often badly needed energy infrastructure is being held back by special interest groups, entrenched bureaucracies and radical activists,” Trump said Wednesday before signing the executive orders at an event in Texas. 

​’New decision-making structure’

Pipeline opponents say Trump acted illegally. They have asked a federal court to block the new Keystone permit, arguing that it is an effort to get around an earlier court ruling. 

But one legal expert said Trump’s approach might succeed. 

“He has now created a whole new decision-making structure” for cross-border pipelines, said Richard Pierce, a law professor at George Washington University. 

If the courts follow a 1992 Supreme Court ruling, they may find that action taken by the State Department in approving or rejecting the pipeline “is nonreviewable, because it doesn’t qualify as final agency action,” Pierce said. Further, Trump’s decision would not be subject to review because of a separate law that declares the president is not an agency and therefore is not bound by rules that apply to agency actions. 

“That’s a very clever approach that might well work,” Pierce said. 

Trump’s actions are “typical of this presidency,” said Holly Doremus, an environmental law professor at the University of California-Berkeley. She said Trump frequently seeks to stretch the limits of his power, and she cited Trump’s declaration of an emergency that he says allows him to shift more money to construction of a promised wall along the U.S.-Mexico border. 

In the case of Keystone, Trump appears to be arguing that the new presidential permit, issued March 29, gets around restrictions under the National Environmental Policy Act or other laws, because the statutes apply to executive-branch agencies but not to the president, Doremus said. 

“If the president is the only discretionary decision maker, NEPA simply does not apply,” she said. 

Who decides?

While Trump’s theory is plausible, it is unclear who is the ultimate decision-maker on Keystone XL, Doremus said. The pipeline would ship crude oil from the tar sands of western Canada to U.S. refineries along the Gulf of Mexico.  

Both a 2015 rejection of the project by the Obama administration and a 2017 approval by Trump were issued by the State Department under terms of a 2004 executive order that delegated presidential authority for cross-border projects to that agency. 

Trump’s executive order revokes the 2004 order, issued by President George W. Bush. Bush’s action extended an executive order first issued by President Lyndon B. Johnson in 1968. 

“It’s surprising that the president would come in and single-handedly try to circumvent 50 years of precedent for these types of projects by just issuing a permit himself,” said Doug Hayes, a Sierra Club attorney who has sued to block the Keystone project in court. 

In November, U.S. District Judge Brian Morris in Montana ruled that the Trump administration did not fully consider potential oil spills and other impacts when it approved the pipeline in 2017. Morris ordered a new environmental review of the pipeline. 

The White House said the new permit issued by Trump “dispels any uncertainty” about the long-delayed project, which was first proposed a decade ago by Calgary-based TransCanada.  

Trump’s move on Keystone XL reinforces the idea that “the presidential permit is indeed an exercise of presidential authority that is not subject to judicial review,” according to the White House. 

Reviews by different agencies

Under the new order, federal officials still would conduct environmental reviews of the project, but they would be carried out by agencies other than the State Department, the White House said. 

TransCanada spokesman Matthew John said the administration’s action “clearly demonstrates to the courts that the permit is [the] product of presidential decision-making and should not be subject to additional environmental review.” 

Carl Tobias, a law professor at the University of Richmond, said it was “strange” that Trump issued the executive order after granting the new permit. 

The White House is making the argument supposedly that he has untrammeled authority and doesn't have to obey the laws of Congress'' in approving a cross-border pipeline, Tobias said.I’m dubious and I think a number of other people are, too.” 

Kathryn Watts, a law professor at the University of Washington, said it’s unclear what happens next. Trump’s permit wades into “uncharted, unsettled” legal territory, she said.
…

President Donald Trump’s longtime confidant, Roger Stone, asked a federal judge Friday to compel the Justice Department to turn over a full copy of special counsel Robert Mueller’s report on the Russia investigation as part of discovery in his criminal case.

Stone has pleaded not guilty to charges he lied to Congress, engaged in witness tampering and obstructed a congressional investigation into possible coordination between Russia and Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign. In a court filing late Friday night, his lawyers said Stone is entitled to see the confidential report, which was submitted to the attorney general late last month, because it would help prove their allegation that there are constitutional issues with the investigation.

In a separate action, Andrew Miller, a former aide to Stone who was subpoenaed to testify before a grand jury, asked a federal appeals court to determine whether he still needs to testify now that the Russia probe has concluded.

Private disclosure of report

Stone’s team also filed motions Friday night arguing he was selectively prosecuted, challenging the constitutionality of Mueller’s appointment and that the special counsel didn’t have the ability to prosecute him for lying to Congress. They allege that Congress did not formally make a referral to the Justice Department about Stone’s testimony and because of that, Mueller’s investigation was “a violation of the separation of powers.”

In court documents, the lawyers argue they are entitled to a private disclosure of the nearly 400-page report that Mueller submitted to Attorney General William Barr late last month and said they “must be allowed to review the report in its entirety because it contains the government’s evidence and conclusions on matters essential to Stone’s defense.”

“To be clear, Stone is not requesting the report be disclosed to the world, only to his counsel so that it may aid in preparing his defense,” the lawyers wrote.

November trial

Stone, who is set to go on trial in November, has maintained his innocence and blasted the special counsel’s investigation as politically motivated. He has pleaded not guilty to the charges, which stem from conversations he had during the campaign about WikiLeaks, the anti-secrecy group that released material stolen from Democratic groups, including Hillary Clinton’s campaign.

In a four-page letter to Congress that detailed Mueller’s “principal conclusions,” Barr said the special counsel did not find a criminal conspiracy between Russia and Trump associates during the campaign, but did not reach a definitive conclusion on whether Trump obstructed justice. Instead, Mueller presented evidence on both sides of the obstruction question, but Barr said he did not believe the evidence was sufficient to prove that Trump had obstructed justice.

Barr has said he expects to release a redacted version of Mueller’s report next week that will be sent to Congress and made public.
…

U.S. President Donald Trump said Friday that he was considering sending detained illegal migrants to so-called sanctuary cities, which oppose his tough immigration policies. 

Trump made the announcement hours after White House and Homeland Security officials insisted the idea had been rejected. 

He told reporters at the White House that his administration was “strongly looking at the possibly.”  

Earlier Friday, he tweeted, “Due to the fact that Democrats are unwilling to change our very dangerous immigration laws, we are indeed, as reported, giving strong considerations to placing Illegal Immigrants in Sanctuary Cities.” 

“The Radical Left always seems to have an Open Borders, Open Arms policy — so this should make them very happy!” he added. 

Sanctuary cities are local jurisdictions — often run by Democrats — that have refused to hand over illegal immigrants to federal authorities for possible deportation.  

Offer of pardon?

In another development Friday, CNN reported that Trump told the head of Customs and Border Protection, Kevin McAleenan, that he would pardon him if he were sent to jail for denying U.S. entry to migrants. CNN cited two unnamed officials who said Trump made the offer during a visit to the border town of Calexico, California.

Trump has since named McAleenan the acting secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, following the resignation of Kirstjen Nielsen.

A spokesman for the Department of Homeland Security said in a statement Friday: “At no time has the president indicated, asked, directed or pressured the acting secretary to do anything illegal. Nor would the Acting Secretary take actions that are not in accordance with our responsibility to enforce the law.”

Sending a message

The White House proposal to send undocumented immigrants to sanctuary cities was first reported by The Washington Post. 

According to the Post, the White House told Immigration and Customs Enforcement that the plan would alleviate a shortage of detention space, as well as send a message to Democrats.  

The Post said a White House official and a spokesman for the Department of Homeland Security said the proposal was no longer under consideration. 

Revelation of the proposal drew criticism from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, as well as other Democrats. 

In remarks to reporters Friday, Pelosi called the idea “unworthy of the presidency of the United States and disrespectful of the challenges that we face as a country, as a people, to address who we are — a nation of immigrants.” 

Pelosi’s hometown of San Francisco is a sanctuary city.

Mayors of several sanctuary cities said Friday they would accept undocumented migrants.

Philadelphia Mayor Jim Kenney said in a statement, “While the Trump administration’s proposal shows their disdain to basic human dignity, the City (Philadelphia) would be prepared to welcome these immigrants just as we have embraced our immigrant communities for decades.”

Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel said, “We would welcome these migrants with open arms, just as we welcomed Syrian refugees, just as we welcomed Puerto Ricans displaced by Hurricane Maria and just as we welcome Rohingya refugees fleeing genocide in Myanmar.” 
…

A Washington political consultant initially entangled in the Russia investigation was sentenced to three years of probation for illegal lobbying and skirting the ban on foreign donations to President Donald Trump’s inaugural committee.

W. Samuel Patten and prosecutors had asked for leniency citing his cooperation in special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation and other ongoing probes.

U.S. District Judge Amy Berman Jackson imposed the sentence Friday as Mueller has concluded his investigation but federal prosecutors in New York continue to investigate foreign donations to the inaugural committee.

Patten has said he wasn’t part of a larger scheme to funnel money to the committee.

He pleaded guilty to violating the Foreign Agents Registration Act for lobbying on behalf of a Ukrainian political party. He also lied to the Senate intelligence committee.
…

U.S. President Donald Trump said Thursday he has no knowledge of the website WikiLeaks, after the whistleblowing site’s founder, Julian Assange, was arrested in Britain.

The 47-year-old Australian national had been living in the Ecuadorean Embassy in London since 2012, but was ejected Thursday and taken into custody by British police.

Ecuador said Assange had broken asylum conventions by continuing to interfere in other countries’ affairs through the publishing of confidential information.

WATCH: Trump Denies Knowledge of WikiLeaks

Trump was questioned by reporters on the arrest Thursday.

“I know nothing about WikiLeaks. It’s not my thing,” Trump said. “I know there is something to do with Julian Assange, and I’ve been seeing what’s happened to Assange. And that would be a determination, I would imagine, mostly by the attorney general, who’s doing an excellent job. So, he’ll be making a determination.”

On the campaign trail in 2016, Trump repeatedly referred to WikiLeaks after it published hacked emails from the Democrat National Committee. He once declared, “WikiLeaks! I love WikiLeaks,” at a rally in Pennsylvania.

In 2010, WikiLeaks published a cache of more than 700,000 documents, videos, diplomatic cables and battlefield accounts from Iraq and Afghanistan, obtained by former U.S. Army soldier Chelsea Manning, then known as Bradley Manning. They detailed civilian casualties, along with details of suspected terrorists held at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

Manning was prosecuted under the Espionage Act and jailed in 2010. She was released in 2017, but was jailed again in March 2019 for refusing to testify before a grand jury about WikiLeaks.

​Asylum in embassy

Assange sought asylum in the Ecuadorian Embassy after facing rape charges in Sweden, which have since been dropped. He predicted then that he would face extradition to the United States.

“As WikiLeaks stands under threat, so does the freedom of expression and the health of all our societies,” Assange told a crowd of supporters from the balcony of the embassy.

The United States accuses Assange of conspiring with Manning to access classified information on Department of Defense computers and has requested his extradition from Britain.

Freedom of the Press

Freedom of the press is protected under the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, so the precise charges against Assange will be key, said legal analyst Caroline Mala Corbin of the University of Miami School of Law.

“If you break the law while you gather information, that is not protected by the free speech clause. If, however, you publish information — even if someone else has illegally obtained it — the free speech clause does come into play,” she told VOA.

Assange supporter and prominent human rights campaigner Peter Tatchell said Assange must be afforded the rights of other journalists.

“It smacks of double standards, and it has the whiff of a vendetta against WikiLeaks and against Julian Assange,” he said.

British judges will now decide whether to fulfill the U.S. extradition request.

Geoffrey Robertson, an attorney who has represented Assange in the past, said Assange could face up to 40 years in prison if he is extradited to the United States.

“I have faith in the British justice system, and I think he will argue that this is a breach of his right of freedom of speech,” Robertson said.

Assange will first face sentencing for failing to surrender to authorities on sexual assault charges in 2012.

Meanwhile, one of the Swedish women who accused Assange of rape has requested the case be reopened, further complicating the legal case against him.
…

The Treasury Department did not meet House Democrats’ deadline to turn over President Trump’s past tax returns this week, escalating the legal battle and investigation into the president’s personal and business finances. White House correspondent Patsy Widakuswara looks at the tradition of American presidents releasing their tax returns, and why after Trump’s refusal some think the tradition should be codified into law.
…

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency will unveil a proposal to speed state-level permitting decisions for energy infrastructure projects soon, the agency’s chief told Reuters on Thursday, blasting states that have blocked coal terminals and gas pipelines on environmental grounds.

President Donald Trump is seeking to boost domestic fossil fuels production over the objections of Democrats and environmentalists concerned about pollution and climate change.

On Wednesday he issued a pair of executive orders targeting the power of states to delay energy projects.

“We started working on it in advance, so we hope to have something out soon,” EPA Administrator Andrew Wheeler said in an interview. He was unable to provide a precise timeline.

Based on Trump’s orders, Wheeler’s EPA has been tasked with clarifying a section of the U.S. Clean Water Act that has allowed states like New York and Washington to delay projects in recent years.

New York has used the section to delay pipelines that would bring natural gas to New England, for example, and Washington state has stopped coal export terminals that would open the Asian market for struggling coal companies in Wyoming and other landlocked western states.

“They are trying to make international environmental policy,” Wheeler said of Washington state, whose governor, Democrat Jay Inslee, is running for president on a climate change-focused platform. “They’re trying to dictate to the world how much coal is used.”

Wheeler said New York, which amid strong public pressure denied a clean water act permit for construction of a natural gas pipeline to New England, is forcing that region “to use Russian-produced natural gas.”

“We are importing Russian natural gas which is not produced in an environmentally conscious manner. If the states that are blocking the pipelines were truly concerned about the environment, they would look to where the natural gas would be coming from … I think it’s very short-sighted,” he said.

Wheeler said the EPA would not prevent a state from vetoing a project, but would clarify the parameters they should be able to consider, and the length of time they have to do so.

He also said that California is playing politics in its fight with the EPA to preserve its more stringent vehicle emission standards as the national standard.

Wheeler: Water trumps climate

Wheeler said he believes climate change is a problem, but that it had been overblown by former President Barack Obama’s administration — at the expense of other bigger issues like water quality.

“Yes, climate is an issue and we are working to address it, but I think water is a bigger issue,” he said.

Wheeler dismissed the findings of a report released earlier this week by EPA scientists in the journal Nature Climate Change that detailed the scale and urgency of climate change.

He said while he encouraged EPA scientists to carry out and publish research, he stressed the recent paper “did not reflect EPA policy.”

Environmental groups say the EPA’s replacement of an Obama-era rule limiting carbon emissions from power plants would likely lead to increased emissions by allowing older, more polluting coal plants to operate longer.

Asked whether the replacement — the Affordable Clean Energy rule, which gives states responsibility for regulating emissions — is stringent enough, Wheeler said it adheres to the parameters of federal law. 

“I think what is effective regulation is one that follows the law and one that will be held up in court,” he said.

EPA vs. polls

Several Democrats challenging Trump in the 2020 election have made climate change a top-tier issue, embracing aggressive policy platforms like the Green New Deal calling for an end of fossil fuels use.

Asked whether he was concerned that the EPA may be out of synch with polls showing an overwhelming number of young people believe climate change should be a priority issue, Wheeler was dismissive.

“I do fear that because so many people only talked about climate change. You’re right, there could very well be a new generation coming up saying that’s the only environmental issue — and it’s not,” he said.

 
…

The U.S. Senate is set to confirm former energy lobbyist David Bernhardt as the next Interior Secretary on Thursday, even as coastal state senators from both parties raise concerns about his plans to vastly expand offshore drilling.

Bernhardt would replace former Montana Congressman Ryan Zinke as the head of the Interior Department, which manages federal and tribal lands and waters and is key to President Donald Trump’s efforts to boost domestic crude oil, natural gas and coal production.

He is expected to be approved by the Republican-controlled Senate over the objections of Democrats concerned that his former lobbying for industry means he will favor energy and minerals development over conservation.

Republican Senators including Marco Rubio and Rick Scott of Florida have also raised concerns over the Interior Department’s looming five-year offshore drilling plan, which could expand drilling into new parts of the U.S. Gulf of Mexico, Atlantic, Pacific and Arctic. Coastal states like Florida are concerned about the impact of a spill on their tourism industries.

But in a sign that Bernhardt has assuaged some of those concerns in recent days, Rubio said on Twitter Wednesday evening he would vote for Berhardt’s confirmation.

“I am VERY confident that when all is said & done, no oil drilling is coming to our coastline,” Rubio said.

Rubio and Scott had sent a letter to Bernhardt last month urging him to keep Florida protected from offshore drilling and honor a promise Zinke had made prior to his resignation that Florida would be exempted from the plan.

Scott did not comment on Bernhardt’s confirmation. Democratic senators continued to urge that the Senate reject Bernhardt’s confirmation because of his close ties to some of the industries that the Interior Department would regulate.

Oregon Democratic Senator Ron Wyden, for example, asked the Department of Justice earlier this week to investigate whether Bernhardt was in violation of lobbying disclosure laws.

“Add these troubling allegations to the long list of reasons why the nomination of David Bernhardt should be stopped, or at minimum delayed, until the Senate and the American people get all of the facts,” said Wyden.
…

The acting defense secretary is making a renewed pitch to Congress for authority to create a Space Force as a separate branch of the military.

Patrick Shanahan, who’s been heading the Pentagon on an interim basis since Jan. 1, is testifying before the Senate Armed Services Committee. Some committee members have expressed skepticism about the need to establish a Space Force as a separate military service.

In his prepared remarks, Shanahan says a Space Force is required to maintain what he calls America’s “margin of dominance” in space. He also says China and Russia are — in his words — “weaponizing” space.

The Trump administration’s proposal is part of a broader plan intended to accelerate the development of U.S. space defenses.

 
…

South Korean President Moon Jae-In is meeting with U.S. President Donald Trump on Thursday to discuss ways of getting talks on denuclearization of the Korean peninsula back on track. North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has asked for concessions before halting the country’s nuclear program, but the U.S. government says the economic sanctions must stay in place until that program is dismantled. VOA’s Korean service discussed the future of the talks with U.S. lawmakers. Zlatica Hoke reports.
…

Emboldened by the new conservative majority on the Supreme Court, anti-abortion lawmakers and activists in numerous states are pushing near-total bans on the procedure in a deliberate frontal attack on Roe v. Wade.

Mississippi and Kentucky have passed laws that would ban most abortions after a fetal heartbeat is detected, which means as early as six weeks, when many women don’t even know they’re pregnant. Georgia could join them if Republican Gov. Brian Kemp signs a measure that has been sent to him.

And a bill in Ohio won final approval Wednesday in the Republican-controlled legislature; it now heads to GOP Gov. Mike DeWine, who said he will sign it. The final votes followed a spirited committee hearing where abortion rights activists evoked an era of back alleys and coat-hanger abortions.

Similar bills have been filed in at least seven other states with anti-abortion GOP majorities in their legislatures.

Criminalize abortion

Alabama may go further, with legislation introduced last week to criminalize abortion at any stage unless the mother’s health is in jeopardy.

The chief sponsor of the Alabama bill, Rep. Terri Collins, acknowledged that the measure, like the heartbeat bills, is intended as a direct challenge to Roe, the 1973 Supreme Court ruling that legalized abortion nationwide.

“To me this is an issue the court simply got wrong years ago,” said Collins, who hopes President Donald Trump’s appointments of Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court lead to a reconsideration of Roe.

Staci Fox, Atlanta-based CEO of Planned Parenthood Southeast, said these bans are “blatantly unconstitutional and lawmakers know it, they just don’t care.” The goal, she said, is to “challenge access to safe, legal abortion nationally.”

Trouble reaching Supreme Court

Activists and legal experts on both sides of the debate agree that getting a Supreme Court decision on such a defining case is unlikely any time soon.

The bans may face difficulties just reaching the high court, given that Roe established a clear right to an abortion during the first three months of pregnancy. Kentucky’s heartbeat law has been blocked for now by a federal judge; abortion-rights lawyers are seeking a similar injunction in Mississippi before the law there takes effect July 1.

“The lower courts are going to find these laws unconstitutional because the Supreme Court requires that outcome,” said Hillary Schneller, an attorney with the Center for Reproductive Rights.

However, some federal appeals courts around the country, such as the 5th Circuit, which covers Mississippi, Louisiana and Texas, are viewed as having grown more conservative with the addition of Trump appointees.

​Less-sweeping measures

If even one circuit breaks with Roe v. Wade and upholds a heartbeat ban, that could be enough for the Supreme Court to take up the issue, said Justin Dyer, a political science professor at the University of Missouri.

Alternatively, the high court could agree to hear any of several less sweeping anti-abortion measures. Some would tighten restrictions on clinics; others seek to ban certain categories of abortions.

What might happen at the Supreme Court is far from clear. Legal experts are unsure what effect the Trump appointees might have, or where Chief Justice John Roberts stands in regard to Roe.

Schneller said she is skeptical the reconfigured court will overturn or weaken Roe, as abortion foes are hoping.

“Over 45 years, the court has had different compositions, and we’ve always gotten the same answer,” she said.

Michael New, an abortion opponent who teaches social research at Catholic University of America, warned that it is impossible to predict what the court will do but said Kavanaugh’s appointment “gives pro-lifers hope that legislation which offers more comprehensive protection to the unborn will receive a sympathetic hearing.”

Some anti-abortion groups have declined to endorse the heartbeat bills, signaling doubts about their prospects. Texas Right to Life has instead endorsed bills that would curtail late-term abortions and ban abortions based on a fetus’ race, gender or disability.

If the Supreme Court ever did overturn Roe v. Wade, states would presumably be left to decide for themselves whether abortion would be legal.

Abortions declining

The renewed challenges come as the number of abortions performed in the U.S. has steadily declined since reaching a peak of 1.6 million in 1990. The latest 50-state tally was 926,000 in 2014, according to the Guttmacher Institute, a research group that supports abortion rights.

The heartbeat bills in particular have alarmed many women.

After Kentucky’s governor signed the heartbeat bill, and before it was blocked, “we could feel the fear,” said Marcie Crim of the Kentucky Health Justice Network, which runs a fund supporting Kentuckians who opt to get abortions.

“We had so many phone calls from people trying to save up the money for their procedure,” Crim said. “They were thinking they were safe and could go get this done, and all of a sudden it was snatched away from them.”

In Georgia, where Kemp is expected to sign the heartbeat bill soon, more than 50 actors, including Alyssa Milano, Alec Baldwin and Amy Schumer, have threatened a campaign to pull Hollywood productions out of Georgia, a hub for TV and movie projects, if the ban is enacted.

Other states where heartbeat bills have been filed, and in some cases advanced, include Tennessee, Missouri, South Carolina, Florida, Texas, Louisiana and West Virginia.
…

Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin says the department hasn’t decided whether to comply with a demand by a key House Democrat to deliver President Donald Trump’s tax returns and won’t meet a Wednesday deadline to provide them. 

In a letter to House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Richard Neal, D-Mass., who asked for Trump’s returns a week ago, Mnuchin said Treasury will consult with the Justice Department and “carefully” review the request further. 

“The legal implications of this request could affect protections for all Americans against politically motivated disclosures of personal tax information, regardless of which party is in power,” Mnuchin wrote. 

He said Treasury respects lawmakers’ oversight duties and would make sure taxpayer protections would be “scrupulously observed, consistent with my statutory responsibilities” as the department reviews the request. 

Under audit

Earlier Wednesday, Trump weighed in, telling reporters that he won’t agree to release his returns while he is under audit. 

Trump said, “I would love to give them, but I’m not going to do it while I’m under audit.” The IRS says there’s no rule barring subjects of an audit from publicly releasing their tax filings. 

Neal asked the IRS last Wednesday to turn over six years of the president’s tax returns within a week. Trump has broken with decades of presidential precedent by not voluntarily releasing his returns to the public. 

Trump’s position has long been that he is under audit and therefore could not release his returns. But in recent weeks, he has added to the argument, saying publicly and privately that the American people elected him without seeing his taxes and would do so again.  

“Remember, I got elected last time — the same exact issue,” Trump said. “Frankly, the people don’t care.” 

The president has told those close to him that the attempt to get his returns were an invasion of his privacy and a further example of the Democratic-led “witch hunt” — a term he has applied to special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation of Russian meddling in the 2016 election — meant to damage him. 

Trump has repeatedly asked aides about the status of the House request and has inquired about the “loyalty” of the top officials at the IRS, according to one outside adviser who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss private conversations. 

Democrats didn’t expect the department to comply, but they haven’t sketched out their next steps. Rep. Dan Kildee, D-Mich., speaking before Mnuchin’s response was delivered, said it may take Neal a couple of days to issue his own response. House Democrats are at a party retreat in the Virginia suburbs of Washington. 

Methodical approach

Neal has adopted a methodical approach to seeking Trump’s returns. He has the option of eventually seeking to subpoena the records or to go to court if Treasury does not comply, but it’s not clear he’ll adopt a more confrontational approach just yet. 

Neal’s initial letter, sent a week ago, didn’t lay out any consequences for the IRS if it didn’t comply, and a spokesman said a likely course would be a second, more insistent letter. 

“We intend to follow through with this,” Neal said Wednesday. “I’ll let you know fast.” 

The request for Trump’s tax filings is but one of many oversight efforts launched by Democrats after taking back the House in last fall’s midterms. Neal is relying on a 1920s-era law that says the IRS “shall furnish” any tax return requested by the chairmen of key House and Senate committees. 

Mnuchin told lawmakers that his department will “follow the law,” but he hasn’t shared the department’s interpretation of the statute. 

The White House did not respond to questions as to whether the president asked Mnuchin or the IRS head to intervene. The president’s outside attorney also did not respond to a request for comment. 
…

U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi castigated Attorney General William Barr on Wednesday for comments he made during congressional hearings this week about the federal probe of Russian interference in the 2016 election. 

“Let me just say I’m very, very dismayed and disappointed that the chief law enforcement officer of our country is going off the rails yesterday and today,” Pelosi told reporters at a Democratic Party retreat in Virginia. 

“He is attorney general of the United States of America, not the attorney general of Donald Trump.” 

Pelosi said Democrats want to see special counsel Robert Mueller’s report, which dealt with Russian interference in the 2016 election and possible links to the Trump campaign. 

Russia’s activities were an assault on U.S. democracy — “there is no doubt about that,” Pelosi said. 

During two congressional hearings this week, Barr defended his handling of the 400-page report Mueller submitted to him on March 22 after a two-year investigation. 

The attorney general released a four-page letter to Congress providing a broad outline of its assessments. In the March 24 letter, Barr said that Mueller’s investigation did not establish that members of Trump’s election campaign conspired with Russia. He also said that Mueller presented evidence “on both sides” about whether Trump had obstructed justice, but did not draw a conclusion one way or the other.

Barr said he would make public a redacted version of the report next week. Democrats have been calling for full disclosure. 

Barr, who was appointed by Trump, said Wednesday that he would look into whether U.S. agencies illegally spied on Trump’s 2016 campaign, but acknowledged under sharp questioning by lawmakers that there was no evidence of wrongdoing.
…

Rob Garver contributed to this report

The top Senate Democrat says President Donald Trump’s picks to fill two vacant seats on the Federal Reserve Board are unqualified for the job.

Trump has nominated former pizza chain boss Herman Cain and conservative economic commentator Stephen Moore for the Fed — posts that need Senate confirmation. Both are strong Trump supporters.

“I don’t see the qualifications of Cain or Moore fitting in with the mission of the Fed, which is to conduct monetary policy and not be political,” Sen. Chuck Schumer said Tuesday.

Cain is best known as the former CEO of the Godfather’s Pizza chain and a failed 2012 Republican presidential candidate.

He had several top positions at the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City. But local Fed boards do not set monetary policy and do not have the global impact that the main Federal Reserve has.

Stephen Moore was a Trump campaign economic adviser and is a TV commentator and columnist for The Wall Street Journal.

Opponents to their nominations say they could compromise the Fed’s credibility as an independent policymaking body that responds only to economic trends, not politics.

Chief White House economic adviser Larry Kudlow told CNN television that Cain and Moore are both “very smart people” and said Trump has “every right to put people on the Federal Reserve board … who share his philosophy.”

But Cain has faced charges of sexual harassment, which he denies, and Moore owes more than $75,000 in back taxes. He was once found in contempt of court for failing to pay $300,000 in alimony and child support.

Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell has not commented on the qualifications of either man, only saying “We’re going to look at whoever the president sends up.”
…

President Donald Trump is wholly mispresenting the immigration detention policy he introduced that forced migrant children from their parents at the border.

“President Obama had child separation,” Trump said Tuesday. “I’m the one that stopped it.”

In fact, he stopped — or at least suspended — family separations that spiked as a result of his own “zero-tolerance” policy.

A look at his remarks to reporters before meeting Egyptian President Abdel-Fatah el-Sissi:

TRUMP on family separations: “President Obama had the law. We changed the law, and I think the press should accurately report it but of course they won’t.”

THE FACTS: This is false. Trump did not achieve any change in the law.

Operating under the same immigration laws as Barack Obama, Trump instituted a zero-tolerance policy aimed at detaining everyone who was caught crossing the border illegally and criminally prosecuting all the adults.

The policy meant adults were taken to court for criminal proceedings and their children were separated and sent into the care of the Health and Human Services Department. In the face of a public uproar, Trump suspended most separations in June. About 2,400 children were taken from parents at the height of the separations. During the Obama administration and before Trump’s zero-tolerance policy was introduced, migrant families caught illegally entering the U.S. were usually referred for civil deportation proceedings, not requiring separation, unless they were known to have a criminal record.

Trump repeatedly but without specifics rails against a “Democrat” law that he wrongly claims to have changed. He appears to be referring to one that passed unanimously in Congress and was signed by Republican President George W. Bush. It was focused on freeing and otherwise helping children who come to the border without a parent or guardian and does not call for family separation.

TRUMP: “Just so you understand, President Obama separated the children.”

THE FACTS: Not in widespread fashion. Then and now, immigration officials may take a child from a parent in certain cases, such as serious criminal charges against a parent, concerns over the health and welfare of a child or medical concerns. The Obama administration also contended with a surge of minors who came to the border without parents and were held in short-term Border Patrol detention.

It did not seek to criminally prosecute all who crossed the border illegally, without regard to whether those who were caught had committed crimes other than illegal entry.

Family separations were the exception before Trump made them the rule.

TRUMP on family separations: “Once you don’t have it, that’s why you see many more people coming. They’re coming like it’s a picnic, because ‘let’s go to Disneyland.'”

THE FACTS: It’s not been proved that people are discouraged from coming to the U.S. when they know their children will be taken from them if they are caught.

Apprehensions did fall last summer, after the June suspension of separations, but they decline most summers because of the extreme heat in much of Mexico and the border region.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection officials announced on Tuesday that they apprehended about 53,000 parents and children at the southern border in March. The officials declined to answer a question about whether they believed family separation was an effective deterrent.

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Republican U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham flatly rejected on Tuesday President Donald Trump’s request to slash the budget for the U.S. State Department by more than 23 percent.

That proposal “ain’t happening,” Graham, chairman of the Senate Appropriations subcommittee that oversees the State Department, declared at the opening of the hearing with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.

Senator Patrick Leahy, the top subcommittee Democrat, said the administration has proposed “damaging funding cuts, with little to no logical explanation.”

The Trump administration requested about $40 billion to fund the State Department and its aid arm, the United States Agency for International Development, for the fiscal year starting in October.

Pompeo noted the hearing comes days before his first anniversary as Trump’s second secretary of state. Graham joked that Pompeo was the longest-serving member of Trump’s cabinet, referring to the high turnover of senior-level staff at the White House.

Pompeo smiled but did not reply.

Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen stepped down this week in the latest high-profile resignation, and Trump said on Monday he would replace the head of the U.S. Secret Service.

Democrats and Republicans in the House of Representatives have also said they will reject the proposed cuts to the budget, setting the stage for a budget battle with the White House.
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President Donald Trump is gearing up for an even tougher hard line immigration policy, after abruptly dismissing his Homeland Security Secretary, Kirstjen Nielsen Sunday. U.S. officials say the immigration crisis has worsened in recent weeks, and Trump is reportedly considering reinstating the hugely unpopular policy of separating migrant children from their families. White House Correspondent Patsy Widakuswara has this report.
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U.S. Attorney General William Barr goes before a House appropriations subcommittee Tuesday where he is expected to face some questions about special counsel Robert Mueller’s report on the investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 U.S. election.

The Mueller report is not the purpose of the meeting, and in a prepared statement released ahead of the session Barr does not mention it.

Instead, the topic of his appearance is the Trump administration’s proposed budget for the Justice Department for the fiscal year that begins in October.

Barr does highlight Justice Department efforts to protect future elections from foreign interference, saying securing elections is a key issue for the agency.

“I believe that our country must respond to any foreign interference with the strongest measures, and we must work with partners at the state level to ensure that our election infrastructure is completely protected,” his statement says.

Other national security initiatives in the 2020 budget request include counterterrorism efforts and combating cyber attacks. Barr’s statement mentions $16 million for a vetting program for those who wish to enter or remain in the United States, something he says will help the government “identify terrorists, criminals and other nefarious actors.”

Immigration enforcement is another main portion of the department’s proposed budget.

“As I’ve stated before, in order to ensure that our immigration system works properly, we must secure our nation’s borders, and we must ensure that our laws allow us to process, hold, and remove those who violate our immigration laws,” Barr says.

The budget request includes $72 million for added border security and enforcement activities. If Congress agrees, there would be 100 new immigration judges, which the attorney general says are necessary to help address a backlog of about 820,000 pending cases nationwide.

A final key section in Barr’s statement is additional money to combat the opioid epidemic. He says the number of overdose deaths is too high, and that the situation represents not only a public health crisis but also a need to address trafficking of illegal drugs.
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VOA News Center writer Ken Bredemeier contributed to this report from Washington.

Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen, who oversaw several contentious Trump administration immigration and border policies, will leave her post this week, opening up one of the most high-profile and influential positions in the president’s Cabinet.

The move appears to be part of broader leadership changes at several agencies within the DHS, following a string of departures in recent days.

On Monday, the White House said the head of the U.S. Secret Service (USSS) Randolph “Tex” Alles would step down. Three days earlier, President Donald Trump rescinded his own nomination for the director of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Ronald Vitiello.

The New York Times reported Monday that the head of the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), L. Francis Cissna, is also expected to step down soon, though neither the White House nor the agency has confirmed.

According to Trump, the head of U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), Kevin McAleenan — the country’s law enforcement agency at the border and at ports of entry — will temporarily take charge of DHS as acting secretary, which would mean a change in leadership at CBP as well.

Heading in a ‘tougher direction’

The top-down shake-up is said to be motivated by Trump’s interest in more restrictions regarding migration at the U.S.-Mexico border, and with immigration overall.

In rescinding Vitiello’s appointment last week, Trump said, “We want to go in a tougher direction” on immigration but did not elaborate.

Nielsen’s departure comes after publicly conflicting with the president late last month over U.S. relations with Central America, and amid media reports that Nielsen did not go far enough in pushing Trump’s restrictionist agenda at the southern U.S. border.

“Secretary Nielsen’s had a rocky tenure… from denying family separations were initially happening to having to justify the ‘zero-tolerance’ policy,” said Krish O’Mara Vignarajah, president of Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Services. “This wasn’t altogether unexpected.”

With media reports that Trump wants to reinstate a policy of separating migrant children from their families at the border, the White House on Monday did not issue a flat-out denial of the allegation.

WATCH: US immigration policy

Hogan Gidley, White House deputy press secretary, told reporters: “The separation of families, you know, the president has said before he does not like that. It’s a horrible practice. But Congress has a way to fix that so that it will not be a magnet for people to come here and use children to do it.”

But migration is not triggered by one variable, such as congressional action, rather by several: conditions in migrants’ home countries, policies in the United States, economic variables, weather. And that list changes.

Neither Nielsen nor Trump, however, have publicly acknowledged that the administration’s policies may in fact be contributing to the increased number of border-crossers in recent months, as Dree K. Collopy, chair of the National Asylum and Refugee Liaison Committee of the American Immigration Lawyers Association, suggested in January.

Democrats welcome Nielsen resignation

News accounts say Nielsen had no intention of quitting when she arrived at the White House on Sunday to meet with Trump, but that he was determined to ask for her resignation, which she submitted shortly after the meeting.

White House sources have said Trump often yelled at Nielsen for apparently not being strong enough in curbing the number of migrants trying to enter the United States.

“It is deeply alarming that the Trump administration official who put children in cages is reportedly resigning because she is not extreme enough for the White House’s liking,” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said in a statement following Nielsen’s announcement.

Chairman of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, U.S. Rep. Joaquin Castro, responded by summarizing Nielsen’s tenure at DHS as “championing President Trump’s cruel anti-immigrant agenda” and McAleenan’s appointment “deeply disturbing” given the CBP commissioner’s actions at the border.

Castro went on to say McAleenan “cannot be trusted… based on his record of prioritizing Trump’s harmful policies.”

But Nielsen’s removal and McAleenan’s temporary appointment are not a slam dunk on either side of the political spectrum. Noted immigration restrictionist Mark Krikorian, head of the Center for Immigration Studies, tweeted that he is “not sure McAleenan would be an improvement over Nielsen.”

He fully opposed Cissna’s possible removal and said it would be a “colossal blunder.”

Trump has expressed frustration with the situation along the southern border, where hundreds of thousands of migrants trying to escape poverty and crime in Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras have traveled through Mexico in hopes of entering the United States. Under U.S. law, foreign nationals are allowed to apply for asylum.

Nielsen’s last day in office will be Wednesday, April 10.

The Nielsen legacy

Trump’s immigration policies created tumult at the border, in airports and in the court system. For the first year, former Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly carried out those decisions.

His tenure largely focused on the first — and subsequent, controversial, and legally fraught — travel bans affecting international travelers and families with relatives abroad. The first successful attempt to cut refugee arrivals also happened under Kelly. Two of the three primary agencies tasked with refugee admissions are within the Department of Homeland Security.

When Nielsen succeeded Kelly in December 2017, she led a shift toward more domestic-oriented policies, namely on the U.S.-Mexico border. McAleenan not only has led an agency that focuses on the domestic aspects of immigration, but who also has experience in law enforcement.

O’Mara Vignarajah, head of LIRS, said that may reinforce Trump’s interest in clamping down on asylum-seekers.

“We cannot effectively employ a law enforcement answer to what is a humanitarian problem,” O’Mara Vignarajah said. “We just hope that Nielsen’s departure doesn’t allow for new leadership to be put in place doubling down on policies to turn away vulnerable women and children.”
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U.S. President Donald Trump is ousting the head of the Secret Service, the agency that protects him and his family and other former U.S. leaders.

Several U.S. news agencies reported Monday that Trump directed acting White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney to fire Secret Service Director Randolph “Tex” Alles, a Trump appointee who had held the position for two years. There was no immediate public explanation for the dismissal.

White House spokeswoman Sarah Sanders said Alles “has done a great job at the agency over the last two years, and the president is thankful for his over 40 years of service to the country. Mr. Alles will be leaving shortly.”

She said Trump had selected James Murray, a career Secret Service veteran, as the agency’s new director, starting in May.

Alles reported directly to outgoing Homeland Security chief Kirstjen Nielsen, who herself resigned under pressure Sunday after meeting with Trump. The U.S. leader had increasingly voiced his displeasure at the growing number of undocumented Central American migrants surging through Mexico to seek asylum in the United States and had frequently blamed Nielsen for the immigration crisis at the border.

Just five days ago, Trump said he “could not be happier with Secret Service,” even after a breach of security at Trump’s oceanfront retreat in Florida.

Aides familiar with Alles’ ouster said it was unrelated to the incident at Mar-a-Lago, the Trump resort, where a Chinese woman was detained after illegally entering the facility carrying four cellphones, a laptop and a thumb drive that the Secret Service said a preliminary analysis showed contained malware.

“Secret Service has done a fantastic job from Day 1. Very happy with them,” Trump said when asked about the trespasser.

Some Washington reports said Alles’ dismissal was part of a wholesale purge of top Department of Homeland Security officials being orchestrated by White House aide Stephen Miller, newly empowered by Trump to oversee tougher immigration policies. U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services director Francis Cissna is also expected to leave soon.

Alles had previously been acting deputy commissioner of U.S. Customs and Border Protection. In this role, he was the agency’s chief operating officer. He was a 35-year Marine Corps veteran, retiring in 2011 as a major general.
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Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders plans to hold rallies in battleground states this weekend, starting Friday night in the liberal stronghold of Madison, Wisconsin.

Sanders announced Monday that he will also hold rallies on Saturday at a community college in Warren, Michigan, and in Pittsburgh on Sunday. His campaign says additional stops in Indiana and Ohio are also planned.

Sanders won the Wisconsin and Michigan primaries in 2016 but lost to eventual nominee Hillary Clinton in Pennsylvania.

Wisconsin is seen as a tossup state and has been an early focus for Democratic presidential candidates. Beto O’Rourke campaigned in the state last month during the first week of his candidacy.

Sanders says the tour will emphasize that the Democrats’ “clearest and strongest path to victory in 2020 runs through the Upper Midwest.”
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President Donald Trump’s decision to fill two vacant positions on the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve with political supporters has experts concerned about the impact such a move would have on the credibility of the central bank as an independent, data-driven policymaking body, both domestically and around the world.

Last month, Trump said he would nominate Stephen Moore, a conservative economic commentator known for his devotion to supply-side economics, to fill one empty seat on the board. Last Thursday, the president said he planned to appoint Herman Cain, the former CEO of a pizza chain and an unsuccessful candidate for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination, to the other.

Neither Moore nor Cain has the sort of background or experience normally expected of nominees to the board of the world’s most powerful central bank, but each has been a vocal supporter of Trump, who is currently waging a one-sided war of words with the Fed over what he sees as excessively tight monetary policy.

Trump’s campaign to lower interest rates

Trump has put great public pressure on Jerome Powell, the chairman of the Federal Reserve Board, to abandon a plan to gradually raise interest rates over the next few years.

The central bank held rates at or near zero for more than six years during and after the Great Recession, and has been slowly increasing them since early 2016. During the recovery, it also implemented a last-ditch economic stimulus policy, called “quantitative easing,” under which the Fed bought trillions of dollars’ worth of U.S. Treasury securities and mortgage-backed securities as a means of injecting cash into the economy when interest rates could not be forced any lower.

The Fed has been slowly selling off those holdings as the economy strengthens.

Trump has repeatedly demanded that Powell lower rates again, despite the fact that the current target rate of between 2.25% and 2.50%, while higher than it was when Trump took office, is still historically low. On Friday morning, the president took his campaign against the Fed chairman a step further, telling reporters at the White House that the central bank should resume quantitative easing. 

“It’s certainly unprecedented for a president to go on camera and give, essentially, an ad-libbed multitiered criticism [of the Fed] and give a specific direction for monetary policy,” said Mark Hamrick, senior economic analyst for Bankrate. 

Larry Kudlow, the chief White House economic adviser, said on CNN’s “State of the Union” program on Sunday that Trump isn’t trying to interfere with the central bank’s independence, but that he has “every right to put people on the Federal Reserve Board with a different point of view.”

Kudlow added that Trump wants people on the Fed “who share his philosophy,” while insisting “this is not a political issue.”

If Moore and Cain are able to navigate the nomination process successfully — something that is far from certain — they would become de facto representatives of the president on the Federal Open Market Committee, which sets interest rate targets. 

Because the FOMC has 10 voting members, they would probably not be able to have an immediate effect on U.S. monetary policy. But the role of the Fed in the U.S. and world economies goes well beyond simply setting interest rates. 

Fed’s impact on the dollar

For example, actions at the Fed can have substantial impacts on the value of the U.S dollar.

During the financial crisis, when banks around the world were besieged by depositors looking to exchange foreign funds for the safety of U.S. currency, and bidding up prices in the process, the Fed mounted a massive loan campaign to provide other countries’ central banks with a supply of dollars. 

The action went little-noticed at the time, and was broadly seen by experts as a well-considered response to a crisis situation. But in an administration that touts its “America First” policies, loans to foreign countries in the midst of an economic crisis could easily be exploited by political opportunists.

Having two members of the Fed board with close political ties to the president could make executing that sort of policy extremely difficult in the future.

The Fed also plays a large role in the regulation and supervision of the U.S. financial services industry, and works closely with other central banks around the world to prevent and respond to financial crises. 

For all those reasons, experts are worried about the effect such a pair of nominations would have on the central bank’s reputation as an institution where decisions are made based on rigorous economic analysis.

Moore is a prolific writer and commentator on economic issues, but he has a reputation for getting basic facts and economic theories wrong, often in service of partisan political ends. He has acknowledged that he “will be on a steep learning curve myself about how the Fed operates,” according to published reports.

“Steve is a perfectly amiable guy, but he does not have the intellectual gravitas for this important job,” wrote N. Gregory Mankiw, a Harvard University economist who served as the Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers in the George W. Bush administration.

Cain, on the surface at least, has a connection to the Federal Reserve System. He served as chairman of the board of the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City for a little more than a year and a half. However, Fed Bank boards actually have no responsibilities related to monetary policy or in setting regulatory policy. 

In his run for the GOP presidential nomination in 2012, the former CEO of Godfather’s Pizza received considerable attention for his simplistic “9-9-9” tax plan, which aimed at cutting three major tax rates to 9% each. He has also been a vocal advocate of returning the U.S. to the gold standard, a policy almost all economists view as dangerous snake oil, and one that would make Cain an extreme outlier on the Fed board.

Experts say they worry about the central bank’s ability to be a calming presence for global markets if two of the seats on the Fed board are filled by men who economists simply refuse to take seriously.

Fed’s importance in times of crisis

“We learned in 2007-08 that when there is a financial crisis, the world — everybody from the traders in the bond market to ordinary workers and citizens — looks to Washington and says, ‘Gosh, this is bad. We hope that there’s some grown-ups in charge who can reassure us that things are going to be alright,” said David Wessel, director of the Hutchins Center on Fiscal and Monetary Policy at the Brookings Institution, a Washington think tank.

Wessel said Trump’s key economic policy figures, like Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin and National Economic Council Chairman Kudlow, were chosen more for loyalty to the president than for their policymaking acumen. There may be nobody with the gravitas to reassure global markets in the event of a major economic disruption, he added.

“That means the institution to which people will be looking in a crisis is the Federal Reserve,” Wessel said. “That’s just one more reason why it’s important that the Federal Reserve be seen as an island of sanity and competence in a city where everything else seems to be chaos and polarized politics.”

To be sure, neither Moore nor Cain is guaranteed to wind up on the Fed Board in the end. Both would have to be confirmed by the Senate, and would carry considerable baggage into their confirmation hearings. 

Moore’s checkered financial past

Moore, for instance, was once found in contempt of court for failure to pay some $300,000 in child support and alimony after a divorce. He also owes the federal government more than $75,000 in unpaid taxes and penalties, according to a lien filed in federal court last year.

Cain had to end his bid for the Republican presidential nomination in 2012 after at least five women came forward to accuse him of inappropriate sexual behavior. He denied the accusations but was forced to withdraw from the race.

Even if both men were to fail in the nomination process, though, critics like Wessel say that the very willingness of the president to nominate them in the first place is damaging.

“It makes people wonder, what is the president doing to our institutions if he is willing to put people like this on the most important economic body in the world?” he said.
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Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen has resigned after 16 months on the job and immense pressure from the White House and public over the situation along the U.S. southern border.

“Despite our progress in reforming homeland security for a new age, I have determined that it is the right time for me to step aside,” Nielsen wrote in her resignation letter to President Donald Trump.

While she did not say exactly why she is quitting, Nielsen wrote she hopes the next secretary “will have the support of Congress and the courts in fixing the laws which have impeded our ability to fully secure America’s borders and which have contributed to discord in our nation’s discourse. Our country and the men and women of DHS deserve to have all the tools and resources they need to execute the mission entrusted to them.”

Analysts have said Nielsen was frustrated by what she saw as a lack of cooperation from Congress and the courts in tackling illegal immigration.

Trump has also expressed frustration with the situation along the U.S. border with Mexico, where hundreds of thousands of migrants trying to escape poverty and crime in central America hope to enter the U.S.

White House sources have said Trump often yelled at Nielsen for apparently not being strong enough in curbing the flow of migrants trying to enter the U.S. They say she had to listen to what those sources called Trump’s impossible demands.

Along with the pressure from the White House to try to stop the influx of migrants, Nielsen faced a public outcry over the administration’s highly unpopular policy of separating migrant families when they crossed into the U.S.

Thousands of young children were taken from their parents and held in separation facilities, often in less than ideal conditions. Nielsen was responsible for executing that policy while at times denying there was such a policy.

Despite the acrimony, Nielsen wrote, “I can say with confidence our homeland is safer today than when I joined the administration. We have taken unprecedented action to protect Americans.”

President Trump tweeted Sunday that “Nielsen is leaving her position and I would like to thank her for her service.”

He announced that current U.S. Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Kevin McAleenan will become acting DHS secretary.

“I have confidence that Kevin will do a great job,” he tweeted.
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Cory Booker’s early fundraising numbers are well behind those posted by other major Democratic candidates in the race to challenge President Donald Trump.  

The New Jersey senator, who campaigned Sunday in New Hampshire, said he raised over $5 million in the two months since he entered the 2020 primary, and has over $6.1 million cash on hand.

Booker announced the figure in an email to supporters. The sum puts him near the back of the pack in fundraising with roughly 10 months left before the start of Democratic primary voting. Of those candidates that have announced their figures, only entrepreneur Andrew Yang announced raising less than Booker.

Former Texas Rep. Beto O’Rourke raised $6.1 million during his first 24 hours of presidential campaigning beginning March 14, edging Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders’ $5.9 million over the same period to top the Democratic field.

Booker said Sunday he feels “incredible” about the fundraising haul.

“Money is important, but it is definitely not going to be the barometer with which people make their decisions over who’s going to be the next president of the United States,” Booker said. “And I’m happy that we have the resources we need to be in this race.”

On the policy front, Booker on Sunday promoted a program known as baby bonds. It calls for newborns to get a savings account. The government would contribute up to $2,000 to the account annually until the child is 18. The amount would depend on their parents’ income.

Booker’s campaign says it’s expected that one in 10 kids in New Hampshire would receive the full $2,000 contribution annually. He said the plan would let kids use the fund to get training, to go to college, to start a business or to buy a home. Booker said the idea is to “create a fair playing field where everybody has a stake in this economy.”

Elsewhere in campaigning Sunday:

PETE BUTTIGIEG

The mayor of South Bend, Indiana, defended his experience ahead of an expected run for president, saying he isn’t someone who has “been marinating in Washington” for a long time.

Asked on NBC’s “Meet the Press” about his qualifications, he said he would “stack up my experience against anybody,” though he acknowledged “it’s not as traditional.”

The Democratic field is full of senators and members of the House.

Buttigieg said “being a mayor of a city of any size means that you have to deal with the kinds of issues that really hit Americans.”

Buttigieg would not confirm that he plans to announce his candidacy at an event next Sunday in South Bend but said “the kind of thing we’re going to announce is the kind of thing you only get to announce once.”

Buttigieg was campaigning in New Hampshire this weekend.

MICHAEL BENNET

The Colorado senator was in New Hampshire, days after he made his prostate cancer diagnosis public. Bennet said earlier this weekend that he wasn’t dwelling on the diagnosis and spoke to voters about health care and partisan divides in Washington.

He also told CNN’s “State of the Union” that he hopes to announce a run for president “as soon as I can,” depending on his health.

“I have got to go through a procedure at the beginning of the upcoming recess,” Bennet said. “That starts later this week.  And then it’s going to be a couple of weeks for recovery. But I would like to get on with this.”

He added that he’s “looking forward to running in 2020.”

“This obviously was unexpected,” Bennet said. “But we caught it early.  It’s something that I think we’re going to be able to treat. And I don’t think it should keep me off the trail.”  
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