RIYADMEDIA

Environmental Protection Agency head Scott Pruitt is proposing to yield some of the agency’s veto power over mining and other development.

The EPA released Pruitt’s proposal Wednesday.

The Clean Water Act allows the EPA to veto permits issued by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers that allow companies to dump waste into waterways. Pruitt is directing his agency to look at surrendering its authority to exercise that veto before permits are applied for or after they’re approved.

Pruitt says EPA veto power over dumping waste into waterways could “chill economic growth.” He cites Obama-era EPA decisions on Alaska’s proposed Pebble Mine. Developers there want to mine gold and copper near a salmon fishery.

Kyla Bennett of the Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility accuses Pruitt of shirking his environmental duty.
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The Trump administration on Wednesday began dismantling the sanctions relief that was granted to Iran under the 2015 nuclear deal, a step that follows President Donald Trump’s withdrawal from the international accord.

The Treasury Department announced it had revoked licenses that allowed U.S.-controlled foreign firms to export commercial aircraft parts to Iran as well as permitted Americans to trade in Iranian carpets, pistachios and caviar. It said businesses engaged in any such transactions have to wind down those operations by Aug. 6 or face penalties under U.S. sanctions. Another set of licenses covering other types of commerce, including oil purchases, will be revoked in coming weeks, with firms given until Nov. 4 to end those activities.

The step had been expected since May when Trump pulled the U.S. out of the landmark agreement under which Iran was given relief from sanctions in return for curbs on its nuclear program. Trump said the accord, a signature foreign policy achievement of his predecessor, President Barack Obama, was the worst deal ever negotiated by the United States because it gave Iran too much in return for too little. Trump also complained that the agreement did not cover Iran’s non-nuclear malign behavior.

Other parties to the deal — Britain, China, Germany, France, Russia and the European Union — have criticized the U.S. withdrawal, which has left the agreement at risk of collapse. The Trump administration is stepping up efforts to isolate Iran and its faltering economy from international financial and trading systems.

On Tuesday, the administration said it was pushing foreign countries to cut their oil imports from Iran to zero by Nov. 4. Previously, the administration had said only that countries should make a “significant reduction” in their imports of Iranian oil or be subject to separate U.S. sanctions prohibiting all transactions between their central banks and Iran’s central bank.

A senior State Department official said the administration is now telling European and Asian countries that the U.S. expects their imports to hit zero by the time the grace period ends. A U.S. team from the State Department and the National Security Council is currently in Europe delivering the message, said the official who was not authorized to speak publicly on the matter and spoke to reporters on condition of anonymity. The official added that the U.S. is working with other Middle Eastern countries to increase production so the global oil supply isn’t harmed.

Some close U.S. allies are among the largest importers of Iranian crude oil, including India and South Korea. Japan and Turkey also import significant amounts of Iranian oil, according to statistics from the U.S. Energy Information Agency. The biggest importer of Iranian oil last year was China.
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U.S. National Security Adviser John Bolton is expected in Moscow on Wednesday for talks with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and possibly Vladimir Putin, part of an effort to lay the ground for a summit between Putin and President Donald Trump.

Bolton, whom the Kremlin regards as an arch Russia hawk, is due to give a news conference after his meetings at 1630 GMT, where he might name the date and location of a summit, which the Kremlin has been trying to make happen for months.

Trump congratulated Putin by phone in March after the Russian leader’s landslide re-election victory and said the two would meet soon. However, the Russians have since complained about the difficulty of setting up such a meeting.

Relations between Washington and Moscow are languishing at a post-Cold War low. They are at odds over Syria, Ukraine, allegations of Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election, and accusations Moscow was behind the poisoning of a former Russian spy in Britain in March.

Expectations for the outcome of any Putin-Trump summit are therefore low, even though Trump said before he was elected that he wanted to improve battered U.S.-Russia ties and the two men occasionally make positive statements about each other.

The Kremlin said on Tuesday it wanted to talk about international security and stability, disarmament, regional problems and bilateral ties. It did not rule out a meeting between Bolton and Putin, but did not confirm one either.

Details unclear 

The summit is expected to take place around the second half of July after Trump attends a NATO summit in Brussels and visits Britain. It is unclear where it would be held, with Vienna and Helsinki cited as possible venues.

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said at the weekend he expected Bolton’s Moscow visit to lead to a summit “in the not too distant future.” He said Washington was “trying to find places where we had overlapping interests, but protecting American interest where we do not.”

Such a summit, if it happened, would be likely to cause irritation in parts of the West, where countries such as Britain want to isolate Putin. It would also go down badly among Trump’s foreign and domestic critics, who question his commitment to NATO and fret over his desire to rebuild ties with Russia even as Washington continues to tighten sanctions on Moscow.

The United States initially sanctioned Russia over its 2014 annexation of Ukraine’s Crimea and its backing for a pro-Russian uprising in eastern Ukraine. Subsequent sanctions have punished Moscow for what Washington has called its malign behavior and meddling in U.S. politics, something Russia denies.

Some Trump critics say Russia has not significantly altered its behavior since 2014 and should therefore not be given the prestige that a summit would confer.
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President Donald Trump on Tuesday endorsed U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin’s measured approach to restricting Chinese investments in U.S. technology companies, saying a strengthened merger security review committee could protect sensitive American technologies.

Trump, in remarks to reporters at the White House, said the approach would target all countries, not just China, echoing comments from Mnuchin on Monday amid a fierce internal debate over the scope of investment restrictions due to be unveiled Friday.

“It’s not just Chinese” investment, Trump told reporters when asked about the administration’s plans.

Mnuchin and White House trade adviser Peter Navarro sent mixed signals on Monday about the Chinese investment restrictions, ordered by Trump on May 29. Mnuchin said they would apply to “all countries that are trying to steal our technology,” while Navarro said they would be focused specifically on China.

The restrictions are being developed to help put pressure on China to address the administration’s complaints that it has misappropriated U.S. intellectual property through joint-venture requirements, unfair licensing policies and state-backed acquisitions of U.S. technology firms.

Enhanced reviews

Mnuchin would prefer to use new tools associated with pending legislation to enhance security reviews of transactions by the Committee on Foreign Investments in the United States (CFIUS), some administration officials have said.

A government official told Reuters on Sunday that Treasury had been working on a proposal to ban acquisitions of U.S. firms with “industrially significant technology” by companies with at least 25 percent Chinese ownership.

Asked about the pending restrictions at a White House meeting with Republican lawmakers on Tuesday, Trump said: “We have the greatest technology in the world. People copy it. And they steal it, but we have the great scientists, we have the great brains and we have to protect that and we’re going to protect it and that’s what we’re doing.

“And that can be done through CFIUS. We have a lot of things we can do it through and we’re working that out,” he said.

Prior to the meeting, Mnuchin was seen by reporters in the West Wing of the White House. A Treasury spokesman did not respond to a Reuters request for comment.

The U.S. House of Representatives passed legislation on Tuesday to strengthen the authority of CFIUS by a 400-2 vote, with many similarities to a Senate-passed bill. Both versions would expand CFIUS reviews to minority stakes in U.S. companies and investments that may reveal information on critical infrastructure to foreign governments.

​Signs of Fed shift

Trump’s intensifying list of trade disputes with China, the European Union, Canada and Mexico showed signs of influencing Federal Reserve policy on Tuesday. Atlanta Fed President Raphael Bostic said in Birmingham, Alabama, that increased tensions could cause him to oppose a fourth rate increase this year.

Trump said earlier on Twitter that his administration was “finishing up” its study of tariffs on U.S. car imports, suggesting that he would take action soon.

The Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers, a trade group, said it would file written comments in the study warning that a 25 percent tariff on imported passenger vehicles would cost American consumers $45 billion annually, or $5,800 per vehicle.

Tariffs of 25 percent on an initial $34 billion worth of Chinese imports are due to take effect on July 6, with a further $16 billion undergoing a vetting process for activation later this summer.

Should China follow through on its vow to retaliate in equal measure with tariffs on U.S. soybeans, cars and other goods, Trump has threatened to impose 10 percent tariffs on a further $400 billion worth of Chinese goods.

A Reuters analysis of the tariff lists found that most of the Chinese products targeted thus far are classified as intermediate or capital goods — avoiding a direct tax on voters — but many consumer goods have been caught up in the net, and will be targeted in future rounds.

Trump on Tuesday also threatened Harley-Davidson with higher taxes if it proceeded with a plan to move some production out of the United States to avoid the EU’s retaliatory tariffs on American motorcycles.
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The U.S. Supreme Court has narrowly upheld the Trump administration’s travel restrictions on citizens of five Muslim-majority countries, handing the president a victory on one of his most controversial policies. As White House Correspondent Patsy Widakuswara reports, reaction to Tuesday’s ruling was swift.
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Lawyers for Paul Manafort, Donald Trump’s former presidential campaign manager, said on Monday they plan to appeal a judge’s decision to jail Manafort while he awaits a criminal trial in Washington this fall.

Judge Amy Berman Jackson in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia sided with prosecutors from Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s office this month, agreeing to send Manafort to jail after he was hit with new criminal charges that he tampered with witnesses while under house arrest.

Manafort’s attorneys also said on Monday they plan to appeal an April 27 decision by Jackson dismissing a related civil lawsuit that had challenged the scope of Mueller’s authority.

Manafort is facing two indictments in Washington and Virginia arising from Mueller’s investigation into potential collusion between Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign and Russia.

His Washington trial is scheduled for September.

Manafort has pleaded not guilty to charges including conspiring to launder money, bank and tax fraud and failing to register as a foreign agent for the pro-Russia Ukraine government.

He has been held in a jail in Virginia since Jackson revoked his bond on June 15, after prosecutors presented evidence during a court hearing about Manafort’s alleged efforts to influence witnesses’ testimony.

On Monday, Manafort asked the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia to agree that he not attend a motions hearing, according to a court filing.

His lawyers said in the filing that transport between jail and court would take at least two hours each way, and Manafort was waiving his right to attend Friday’s hearing and agreed to be represented by his attorneys instead.

To date, Manafort has not prevailed in any efforts to dismiss the charges or suppress evidence against him in the Washington case.

In April, when Jackson dismissed his civil case challenging Mueller’s authority, the judge found that using a civil case to challenge criminal charges “is not the appropriate vehicle” for attacking prosecutors’ actions.
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The United States’ top border enforcement official acknowledged Monday that authorities are currently unable to carry out the Trump administration’s “zero-tolerance” policy of detaining and prosecuting everyone entering the country illegally, as officials work to develop a policy that would allow prosecutions without family separations. 

Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Kevin McAleenan told reporters in Texas he stopped sending cases of parents charged with illegally entering the country to prosecutors after U.S. President Donald Trump signed an executive order last week to stop the separation of migrant parents and children. 

McAleenan insisted the administration’s policy remains in effect despite the current challenges, and said he is working on a plan to resume prosecutions.

Last week, Trump signed an executive order maintaining his “zero tolerance” policy of detaining and prosecuting everyone entering the country illegally, but ending the practice of separating immigrant parents and children.

The move has led to logistical questions, including how to keep families together while also prosecuting migrant parents. It has also sent multiple government agencies in search of ways to house the migrants who are detained. 

Defense Secretary Jim Mattis said the military would help to house migrants at military bases, including two in Texas. 

Mattis told reporters during a trip to Alaska Monday that the military would provide logistics support and would not get into the “political aspect” of the situation. He said the U.S. military has a long history of providing logistical support to people affected by natural disasters or “escaping tyranny.”

Trump used a political rally Monday night in South Carolina to portray himself as tough when it comes to security.

“We’re defending our borders because if you don’t have borders, you don’t have a country,” he said. “Democrats want open borders and they don’t mind crime.”

Earlier in the day, Trump assailed judicial review for illegal border crossers, contending that the migrants entering the country illegally ought to be immediately sent back to their homelands.

“We want a system where when people come in illegally, they have to go,” Trump told reporters at the White House. “We want strong borders and we want no crime.”

In a tweet, he wrote “Hiring manythousands (sic) of judges, and going through a long and complicated legal process, is not the way to go – will always be disfunctional (sic),” he said. “People must simply be stopped at the Border and told they cannot come into the U.S. illegally.”

White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders argued Monday that “it makes no sense that an illegal alien sets one foot on American soil and they would go through a three to five year judicial process to be removed from the country.”

She said there are designated points of entry that asylum seekers can use to apply for asylum.

“Anyone that goes to a point of entry seeking asylum will not be prosecuted. We would encourage people to use the correct system and not break the law,” she said. 

The American Civil Liberties Union said Sunday that Trump’s call to end hearings for undocumented immigrants who enter the country illegally and seek asylum in the U.S. was unconstitutional.
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Former U.S. President George H.W. Bush is welcoming a new member of the family: a yellow Labrador retriever who’ll be his first service dog.

The 94-year-old and his new companion named “Sully” got acquainted Monday at the Bush family compound on the coast of Maine.

The two hit it off.

A photo sent via Twitter shows Sully lounging at the feet of Bush and former President Bill Clinton, who had been visiting on Monday.

Sully can open doors, pick up items and summon help but “more than anything else the dog will be a wonderful companion,” said an aide, Evan Sisley.

The nation’s 41st president uses a wheelchair and an electric scooter for mobility since developing a form of Parkinson’s disease. Bush is recovering from a recent hospitalization and is without his wife of 73 years, Barbara Bush, who died in April.

Sully was trained by America’s VetDogs, a nonprofit that provides service dogs.

“He’s a really sweet dog,” said Sisley, who hopes that Bush’s use of a service dog will call attention to the organization and to service dogs. Sully has his own Instagram account that’ll help in the effort to raise awareness, Sisley said.

Bush is a dog lover who has had dogs since he was a boy, and dogs are always welcome at the family home. Two of his kids, Neil Bush and Dorothy Bush Koch, together have five dogs there, and other family members bring pets with them when they visit, Sisley said.
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America has waited a year to hear what special counsel Robert Mueller concludes about the 2016 election, meddling by the Russians and — most of all — what Donald Trump did or didn’t do. But how much the nation will learn about Mueller’s findings is very much an open question.

Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein may end up wrestling with a dilemma similar to the one that tripped up fired FBI director James Comey: how much to reveal about Trump’s actions in the event the president is not indicted. Rosenstein, who lambasted Comey for disclosing negative information about Hillary Clinton despite not recommending her for prosecution, may himself have to balance the extraordinary public interest in the investigation against his admonition that investigators should not discuss allegations against people they don’t prosecute.

The quandary underscores how there’s no easy or obvious end game for the investigation, which last month reached its one-year anniversary. Though Mueller is expected to report his findings to Rosenstein, there’s no requirement that those conclusions be made public. And whatever he decides will unfold against the backdrop of a Justice Department inspector general report that reaffirmed department protocol against making detailed public statements about people who aren’t charged.

“Those are going to be the hard questions at the end of Mueller’s investigation: what is the nature of that report, and which if any parts are provided to Congress and the public,” said Georgetown law professor Marty Lederman, a former official in the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel. “There’s just no way for us to know what if any parts of those reports can be made public or should be made public or will be made public.”

The investigation has hit a critical phase. A forthcoming decision by Trump and his lawyers on whether to sit for an interview with Mueller, who is examining whether the president sought to obstruct justice, could hasten the conclusion of the investigation with regard to the White House. What happens next is unclear, though Mueller has been closely conferring along the way with Rosenstein, the No. 2 Justice Department official who appointed him special counsel.

If he decides a crime was committed, it’s theoretically possible he could seek a grand jury indictment, though that outcome is seen as highly questionable given a Justice Department legal opinion against charging a sitting president. Trump’s lawyers say Mueller’s team has indicated that it plans to follow that guidance. Depending on his findings, he also could seek to name Trump as an unindicted co-conspirator in a case against other defendants, an aggressive step taken by the special prosecutor who investigated President Richard Nixon.

The regulations require Mueller to report his findings confidentially to Rosenstein, who would then decide how and whether to share with Congress. Lawmakers and the public would almost certainly demand access to that report, no matter the conclusion; a determination of wrongdoing would presumably be forwarded to Congress to begin impeachment proceedings, while a finding that no crime was committed would be publicly trumpeted by Republicans as vindication of the president.

Spokespeople for Mueller and the Justice Department declined to comment on the options under consideration.

The easiest avenue for public disclosure in any criminal investigation is an indictment in which prosecutors lay out their allegations. But options are much trickier when cases close without prosecution.

In Clinton’s case, Comey held an extraordinary news conference in which he said Clinton did indeed have classified information on her private email server and branded her and her aides as “extremely careless.” But he concluded his remarks by recommending against charges, saying no reasonable prosecutor would bring a case.

That decision was condemned last May by Rosenstein, who said “we do not hold press conferences to release derogatory information about the subject of a declined criminal investigation.”

Inspector General Michael Horowitz echoed that criticism in a report this month that accused Comey of breaking from protocol. And Comey’s successor, Christopher Wray, further rebuked Comey at a congressional hearing last week, saying, “I think the policies the department has governing commenting publicly about uncharged conduct are there for good reason.”

Solomon Wisenberg, the deputy independent counsel in the 1990s investigation involving President Bill Clinton, said he struggled to envision Rosenstein making public the extent of Mueller’s findings if there’s no indictment “because it would be completely inconsistent with the criticism of Comey — and it wouldn’t be right. It wouldn’t be the right thing to do.”

“It’s long been considered unethical to not charge someone but smear them,” he said.

Lederman, however, said he thought it made sense to publicly release what investigators found about Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential election, especially if it could be relevant to helping combat the problem in the future.

“I don’t think there’s a problem to the extent the report would be less focused on what Trump did wrong in the past and is focused on his ability or willingness to deal with the Russia threat in the future,” he said.

As the investigation inches toward resolution, there’s not much reliable precedent to predict the outcome here.

Independent counsel Ken Starr issued a public report on Bill Clinton, but his appointment came under a different law. A special counsel investigation into the 2003 leak of a CIA officer’s identity resulted in criminal charges against a Bush administration White House official, I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby,” but produced no public report summarizing all the findings of probe.

Regardless of the conclusion, the public clamor for a full accounting may make it impossible for Mueller to wind up his investigation with only minimal comment, said Bill Jeffress, one of Libby’s lawyers.

“If that conclusion is simply Mueller announcing, `I’ve wound up my investigation and haven’t indicted anyone else,’ nobody’s going to be satisfied with that.”

 
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A Texas charitable organization says 32 immigrant parents separated from their children after crossing the U.S.-Mexico border were freed into its care, but they don’t know where their kids are or when they might see them again despite government assurances that family reunification would be well organized.

 

The release on Sunday is believed to be the first, large one of its kind since President Donald Trump signed an executive order Wednesday that preserved a “zero-tolerance” policy for entering the country illegally but ended the practice of separating immigrant parents and children. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement offered no immediate comment.

 

Ruben Garcia, director of Annunciation House in El Paso, said the group of both mothers and fathers includes some from Mexico, Guatemala and Honduras who arrived to his group after federal authorities withdrew criminal charges for illegal entry. He didn’t release names or personal details to protect the parents’ privacy, and Homeland Security officials said they needed more specifics in order to check out their cases.

 

A Saturday night fact sheet by the Department of Homeland Security and other agencies said authorities know the location of all children in custody after separating them from their families at the border and are working to reunite them. It called the reunification process “well coordinated.”

 

It also said parents must request that their child be deported with them. In the past, the fact sheet says, many parents elected to be deported without their children. That may be a reflection of violence or persecution they face in their home countries.

 

It doesn’t state how long it might take to reunite families. Texas’ Port Isabel Service Processing Center has been set up as the staging ground for the families to be reunited prior to deportation.

 

How the government would reunite families has been unclear because they are first stopped by U.S. Customs and Border Patrol, with children taken into custody by the Department of Health and Human Services and adults detained through ICE, which is under the Department of Homeland Security. Children have been sent to far-flung shelters around the country, raising alarm that parents might never know where their children can be found.

 

At least 2,053 minors who were separated at the border were being cared for in HHS-funded facilities, the fact sheet said.

 

The chairman of the Senate Homeland Security Committee hedged Sunday when pressed on whether he was confident the Trump administration knows where all the children are and will be able to reunite them with their parents.

 

“That is what they’re claiming,” Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., said on CNN’s “State of the Union.”

 

The fact sheet states that ICE has implemented an identification mechanism to ensure ongoing tracking of linked family members throughout the detention and removal process; designated detention locations for separated parents and will enhance current processes to ensure communication with children in HHS custody; worked closely with foreign consulates to ensure that travel documents are issued for both the parent and child at time of removal; and coordinated with HHS for the reuniting of the child prior to the parents’ departure from the U.S.

 

As part of the effort, ICE officials have posted notices in all its facilities advising detained parents who are trying to find or communicate with their children to call a hotline staffed 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. Monday through Friday.

 

A parent or guardian trying to determine if a child is in the custody of HHS should contact the Office of Refugee Resettlement National Call Center at 1-800-203-7001, or via email at information(at)ORRNCC.com. Information will be collected and sent to an HHS-funded facility where a minor is located.

 

But it’s unclear whether detained parents have access to computers to send an email, or how their phone systems work to call out. Attorneys at the border have said they have been frantically trying to locate information about the children on behalf of their clients.

 

Garcia, the Annunciation House director, said his experience has been that telephone contact doesn’t provide any information.

 

“If we bring in 30 cellphones, they’re going to call that number, they’re not going to reach 30 children,” said Garcia, whose organization has been working with federal authorities to assist immigrants for 40 years. “Actually [they’re] not going to be able to give them any information on what to expect.”

 

Customs and Border Patrol said it had reunited 522 children and that some were never taken into custody by Health and Human Services because their parents’ criminal cases were processed too quickly. Officials have said as many as 2,300 children had been separated from the time the policy began until June 9. It’s not clear if any of the 2,000 remaining children were taken into custody after June 9.

 

The “zero-tolerance policy” of criminally prosecuting anyone caught illegally crossing the border remains in effect, officials have said, despite confusion on the ground on how to carry out Trump’s order. Justice Department officials asked a federal judge to amend a class-action settlement that governs how children are treated in immigration custody. Right now, children can only be detained with their families for 20 days; Trump officials are seeking to detain them together indefinitely as their cases progress. Advocates say family detention does not solve the problem.
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Porn actress Stormy Daniels was scheduled to meet with federal prosecutors in New York on Monday as part of their investigation into President Donald Trump’s longtime personal attorney, but the meeting was abruptly cancelled late Sunday after it was reported by news organizations, her attorney said. 

Daniels, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford, was supposed to meet with prosecutors from the U.S. attorney’s office in Manhattan in preparation for a possible grand jury appearance as they work to assemble a case against Trump’s longtime personal lawyer, Michael Cohen. 

But after several news organizations, including The Associated Press, reported on the meeting, two prosecutors called Daniels’ lawyer, Michael Avenatti, and told him that they were concerned about media attention in the case, he said. 

“I was shocked at that response,” Avenatti said.

Avenatti offered to move the meeting to another location and reiterated that Daniels – who he says has been cooperating with prosecutors for months – was ready to go forward with the meeting, but they called back to cancel it, he said. The meeting has not been rescheduled and prosecutors offered no other explanation for the cancellation, he said. 

Daniels has said she had sex with Trump in 2006 when he was married, which Trump has denied. As part of their investigation into Cohen, prosecutors have been examining the $130,000 payment that was made to Daniels as part of a confidentiality agreement days before the 2016 presidential election.

​”We believe canceling the meeting because the press has now caught wind of it is ridiculous,” Avenatti wrote in an email to Assistant U.S. Attorney Nicolas Roos. “We do not think it was any secret that at some point you were going to meet with my client.” 

A spokesman for the U.S. attorney’s office in Manhattan had declined to comment on the meeting earlier Sunday night and did not immediately respond to messages seeking comment on the cancellation. 

Daniels is suing to invalidate the confidentiality agreement that prevents her from discussing the alleged relationship with Trump. She argues the nondisclosure agreement should be invalidated because Cohen, signed it, but the president did not. 

Daniels and Avenatti have also turned over documents in response to a subpoena from federal prosecutors about the $130,000 that Daniels was paid, a person familiar with the matter said. They weren’t authorized to discuss the matter publicly and spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity. 

Daniels’ interview had been in preparation for a possible grand jury appearance in the federal investigation into Cohen’s business dealings, the person familiar with the matter said. If prosecutors bring a case to a grand jury, they could call witnesses to testify under oath and the grand jury would decide whether to bring criminal charges with a written indictment.

In April, FBI agents raided Cohen’s home, office and hotel room as part of a probe into his business dealings and investigators were seeking records about the nondisclosure agreement that Daniels had signed, among other things. 

Cohen had said he paid Daniels himself, through a limited liability company known as Essential Consultants, LLC, and that “neither the Trump Organization nor the Trump campaign was a party to the transaction with Ms. Clifford, and neither reimbursed me for the payment, either directly or indirectly.” 

In May, Rudy Giuliani, one of Trump’s attorneys, said the president had repaid Cohen for the $130,000 payment to Daniels, contradicting Trump’s prior claims that he didn’t know the source of the money. 

Earlier this month, Trump said he hadn’t spoken with Cohen – his longtime fixer and a key power player in the Trump Organization – in “a long time” and that Cohen is “not my lawyer anymore.”
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The U.S. Supreme Court, winding down its nine-month term, will issue rulings this week in its few remaining cases including a major one on the legality of President Donald Trump’s ban on people from five Muslim-majority nations entering the country.

The nine justices are due to decide other politically sensitive cases on whether non-union workers have to pay fees to unions representing certain public-sector workers such as police and teachers, and the legality of California regulations on clinics that steer women with unplanned pregnancies away from abortion.

The justices began their term in October and, as is their usual practice, aim to make all their rulings by the end of June, with more due on Monday. Six cases remain to be decided.

The travel ban case was argued on April 25, with the court’s conservative majority signaling support for Trump’s policy in a significant test of presidential powers.

Trump has said the ban is needed to protect the United States from attacks by Islamic militants. Conservative justices indicated an unwillingness to second-guess Trump on his national security rationale.

Lower courts had blocked the travel ban, the third version of a policy Trump first pursued a week after taking office last year. But the high court on Dec. 4 allowed it to go fully into effect while the legal challenge continued.

The challengers, led by the state of Hawaii, have argued the policy was motivated by Trump’s enmity toward Muslims. Lower courts have decided the ban violated federal immigration law and the U.S. Constitution’s prohibition on the government favoring one religion over another.

The current ban, announced in September, prohibits entry into the United States by most people from Iran, Libya, Somalia, Syria and Yemen.

In a significant case for organized labor, the court’s conservatives indicated opposition during arguments on Feb. 26 to so-called agency fees that some states require non-members to pay to public-sector unions.

Workers who decide not to join unions representing certain state and local employees must pay the fees in two dozen states in lieu of union dues to help cover the cost of non-political activities such as collective bargaining. The fees provide millions of dollars annually to these unions.

The justices seemed skeptical during March 20 arguments toward California’s law requiring Christian-based anti-abortion centers, known as crisis pregnancy centers, to post notices about the availability of state-subsidized abortions and birth control. The justices indicated that they would strike down at least part of the regulations.
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Protests continue over the treatment of migrants detained in Texas for entering the United States illegally, although the Trump administration on Wednesday reversed its controversial practice of separating detained children and parents at the border.

Still, thousands of migrants remain in detention awaiting their court cases, and many are still apart from their children. As the dramatic story unfolds, Americans are hearing conflicting narratives.

At an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention center in Otay Mesa, California, near the U.S.-Mexico border, protesters Friday chanted “immigrants are welcome” and demanded the release of the families detained in Texas.

 

WATCH: Protests Continue Over Migrant Detentions, Despite Policy Change

“They’ve got a big mess right now, families that are separated that can’t even talk to each other, connect with each other, make sure that everybody in the family is still OK,” said protester Jan Denny. “We’re not even sure yet how they’re going to get all these people reunited,” she added of the confusion surrounding the shifting policy.

At the White House on Friday, President Donald Trump highlighted other families whose loved ones had been killed by illegal immigrants. 

“These are the families the media ignores,” he said, as he introduced people holding photos of their loved ones.

“Respect this country. Respect the laws of this country, and then you can come in, like my family did,” said Agnes Gibboney, the mother of a son killed by an illegal immigrant.

The Trump administration says 500 of the more than 2,000 separated children have been reunited with their families.

Protesters in California say Trump is following a pattern of blaming migrants for the nation’s problems. 

“Whether these are Chinese immigrants, whether these are Mexicano immigrants, and now Central American immigrants,” said a protester named Myron of the Fair Immigration Reform Movement, “there has always been an excuse to blame others.”

Among those raising their voices at the rally was a Democratic senator and frequent Trump critic, Kamala Harris (D-California). She toured this adult detention center, where she met with mothers separated from their family members and children. 

“This is a fight,” she said, “born out of knowing who we are and fighting for the ideals of our country.”

Trump has demanded better border security and a merit-based system of immigration. Protesters say he wants to bar immigrants from the developing world, who already face a hard path to entry and huge backlog of cases.

“We have a broken immigration system,” said Angelica Salas of the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights. “This is not news to anybody,” she added.

The immigration issue is divisive, but Andrew Pappas of Cincinnati, Ohio, told the Associated Press that he believes Trump’s goal “was not to tear families apart” but “to make Congress act on immigration reform.”

One California border protester, Ellen Montanari, said the issue is close to her heart because her adopted daughter is Latina, like most families in detention. 

“We do need sane members of Congress to sit down and talk about what a reasonable immigration policy looks like,” she said, although Montanari worries that in this year of congressional elections, there will instead be more posturing.
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Protests continue over the treatment of migrants detained for entering the United States illegally, although the Trump administration last week reversed its controversial policy of separating children and parents at the border. Still, thousands of migrants are in detention awaiting their court cases, and many remain separated from their children. Mike O’Sullivan reports from the California-Mexico border that Americans are hearing two conflicting narratives.
…

White House press secretary Sarah Sanders said Saturday that she was booted from a Virginia restaurant because she works for President Donald Trump, becoming the latest administration official to experience a brusque reception in a public setting.

Sanders tweeted that she was told by the owner of the Red Hen in Lexington, Virginia, that she had to “leave because I work for @POTUS and I politely left.”

She said the event Friday evening said far more about the owner of the restaurant than it did about her.

“I always do my best to treat people, including those I disagree with, respectfully and will continue to do so,” Sanders said in the tweet from her official account, which generated 22,000 replies in about an hour.

The restaurant’s co-owner, Stephanie Wilkinson, told The Washington Post that her staff had called her to report Sanders was at the restaurant. She said several restaurant employees were gay and knew Sanders had defended Trump’s desire to bar transgender people from the military.

“Tell me what you want me to do. I can ask her to leave,” Wilkinson told her staff, she said. “They said yes.”

Wilkinson said that she talked to Sanders privately and Sanders’ response was immediate: “That’s fine. I’ll go.”

No one answered the phone at the restaurant, which was not scheduled to open until the evening. Lexington is about a three-hour drive from the nation’s capital and is in Virginia’s Shenandoah Valley.

Sanders’ treatment at the restaurant created a social media commotion, with people on both sides weighing in with their critique, including her father, Mike Huckabee, a former Arkansas governor and Republican presidential candidate.

“Bigotry. On the menu at Red Hen Restaurant in Lexington VA. Or you can ask for the ‘Hate Plate,’ ” Huckabee said in a tweet, quickly generating 2,000 replies in about 30 minutes. “And appetizers are ‘small plates for small minds.’ ”

On Yelp, a responder from Los Angeles wrote: “Don’t eat here if you’re a Republican, wearing a MAGA hat or a patriot.”

But many were also supportive of the restaurant owner’s actions.

“12/10 would recommend. Bonus: this place is run by management who stuck up for their beliefs and who are true Americans. THANK YOU!!!!” said a comment from Commerce City, Colorado.

Politically, the town is a spot of blue in a sea of red. It sided with Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton in the 2016 presidential election, 61.8 percent to 31.3 percent. It’s the county seat of Rockbridge County, which went with Trump by a similar margin. And it is home to Virginia Military Institute and Washington and Lee University.

Tom Lomax, a local business owner, brought flowers to the restaurant Saturday afternoon as a show of support. He called Wilkinson a “force of nature” and “one of the biggest drivers of the downtown.”

“We support our own here, great little community we have,” he said.

The separation of families trying to enter the U.S. at the southern border has intensified political differences and passions that were already at elevated levels during the Trump presidency.

Earlier in the week, Trump’s homeland security secretary, Kirstjen Nielsen, cut short a working dinner at a Mexican restaurant in Washington after protesters shouted, “Shame!” until she left.

Ari Fleischer, the press secretary for former President George W. Bush, tweeted: “I guess we’re heading into an America with Democrat-only restaurants, which will lead to Republican-only restaurants. Do the fools who threw Sarah out, and the people who cheer them on, really want us to be that kind of country?”

Brian Tayback, of Shrewsbury, Pa., and Brandon Hintze, of Alexandria, Va., walked by the restaurant during a visit to Lexington on Saturday. Tayback said he believes the owner made the right decision. 

“They’re taking a stand against hate,” Tayback said. 
…

Republicans in the U.S. House of Representative plan to hold a vote next week on an immigration bill despite Trump urging them Friday to abandon efforts to pass legislation until after the mid-term elections.

Even if the Republicans — who have a majority in both the House and Senate — approve a bill, it faces almost certain defeat in the upper chamber where Democrats hold enough seats to prevent Republicans, even if they all vote together, from reaching the 60 votes needed for passage.

Earlier in the week, the president had called for Congress to quickly approve sweeping immigration legislation. But in a Friday tweet the president said, “Republicans should stop wasting their time on Immigration until after we elect more Senators and Congressmen/women in November. Dems are just playing games, have no intention of doing anything to solves this decades old problem. We can pass great legislation after the Red Wave!”

Congresswoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, a Republican representing a majority Hispanic district in the state of Florida, who is not running for re-election, termed the president’s tweets “schizoid policy making.”

Another retiring lawmaker, Republican Congressman Mark Sanford of South Carolina, a frequent Trump critic who recently lost his primary election, said Trump’s reversal sends “a horrifically chilling signal” that “makes immigration reform that much more unlikely.”

On Saturday, California Democratic Senator Kamala Harris spoke in Otay Mesa, a community in San Diego, at a rally for revised immigration policies. “This is a fight born out of knowing who we are and fighting for the ideals of our country,” she said. Harris spoke after touring a detention facility and speaking with several mothers.​

Trump’s call for Congress to postpone action came as House Republican leaders failed to garner enough support for two bills that would overhaul U.S. immigration laws and bolster border security.

A hard-line measure authored by House Judiciary Committee Chairman Bob Goodlatte failed to pass on Thursday. The measure would have not guaranteed young undocumented immigrants a way to achieve permanent legal residency and included controversial enforcement measures such as a required worker validation program.

House Republican leaders suddenly delayed a vote Thursday on a compromise measure that has the support of key moderate Republican after concluding they lacked enough support to gain passage despite the growing controversy over separating children from their families at the U.S.-Mexico border. Next week the House will vote on the compromise bill, which would provide $25 billion for Trump’s border wall, provide a pathway to “dreamers” and keep migrant families intact.

In his weekly radio address Saturday, Trump said the path to immigration reform starts on Capitol Hill.

“Congress and Congress alone can solve the problem. And the only solution that will work is being able to detain, prosecute and promptly remove anyone who illegally cross the border,” the president said.

Aboard Air Force One on Saturday en route to Las Vegas, Nevada, Trump lashed out at House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi of California and Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer of New York, accusing them on Twitter of favoring illegal immigrants over American citizens. ​

All 435 seats in the House and a third of the 100-member Senate will be contested in the November election.

What is unclear, however, is whether Trump realizes the moderate Republicans he is alienating are among the most vulnerable in the mid-term elections.

“No one has more to lose in November than the president does when it comes to the majority in the House, because if this majority flips over to be a Democrat, there will be a big push for impeachment,” said Republican Congressman Bradley Byrne of Alabama, an opponent of the immigration measure.

Trump demonstrated Friday after his tactical retreat on immigration policy that there is no strategic shift to his overall tough approach to those attempting to illegally enter the country — vowing to “end the immigration crisis, once and for all.”

U.S. immigration laws, Trump declared, are “the weakest in the history of the world.”

Trump made the remarks on Friday in an auditorium in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building, adjacent to the White House, where he presided over an event with “Angel Families” — those who have had relatives killed by people who have entered the country illegally.

“Your loss will not have been in vain,” the president told the families who held large photos of their slain relatives. “We will secure our borders … the word will get out. Got to have a safe country. We’re going to have a safe country.”

Family members were called by Trump to the presidential lectern to recount how their loved ones were killed by those who were in the United States illegally. Several of those speaking condemned the media for ignoring the stories of the victims and praised Trump and Vice President Mike Pence for their attention to border security.

Trump, in his remarks, also suggested those illegally in the United States commit more crimes on a statistical basis than citizens or resident aliens.

However, studies have shown that undocumented immigrants are less likely to commit a crime in the U.S. than native-born citizens, including one published by the libertarian CATO Institute this year. 

Despite Trump’s anti-immigration rhetoric, 75 percent of Americans believe immigration in general is beneficial to the U.S., according to a poll released Thursday by the polling organization Gallup.

“Americans’ strong belief that immigration is a good thing for the country and that immigration levels shouldn’t be decreased present the president and Congress with some tough decisions as to midterm elections loom,” Gallup said in a press release.
…

The Justice Department says it has given House Republicans new classified information related to the Russia investigation after they had threatened to hold officials in contempt of Congress or even impeach them.

A spokeswoman for House Speaker Paul Ryan says the department has partially complied with multiple requests from the House Intelligence and Judiciary committees. House Republicans had given the department a Friday deadline for all documents, but Ryan spokeswoman AshLee Strong said the department asked for more time.

“Our efforts have resulted in the committees finally getting access to information that was sought months ago, but some important requests remain to be completed,” Strong said in a statement Saturday. “Additional time has been requested for the outstanding items, and based on our understanding of the process we believe that request is reasonable. We expect the department to meet its full obligations to the two committees.”

In a letter sent to House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes late Friday, the Justice Department said it had that day provided a classified letter to his panel regarding whether the FBI used “confidential human sources” before it officially began its Russia investigation in 2016. Nunes has been pressing the department on an informant who spoke to members of President Donald Trump’s campaign as the FBI began to explore the campaign’s ties to Russia.

The department has already given top lawmakers in the House and Senate three classified briefings on the informant. But Nunes has said he wanted the entire committee to receive the information.

In the letter, the Justice Department’s acting assistant director of congressional affairs, Jill Tyson, said the department had also given Nunes materials related to oversight of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. Republicans have for months questioned whether the department abused that act when prosecutors and agents in 2016 applied for and received a secret warrant to monitor the communications of a Trump campaign associate.

Democrats have criticized the multiple document requests, charging that they are intended to discredit the department and discredit or even undermine special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into the Trump campaign’s Russia ties and whether there was obstruction of justice.

House Speaker Paul Ryan has backed the document requests, and he led a meeting last week with committee chairmen and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein to try to resolve the issue. In a television interview two days after that meeting, on June 17, Nunes said if they don’t get the documents by this week, “there’s going to be hell to pay” and indicated the House could act on contempt or even impeachment. A spokesman for Nunes did not immediately respond to a request for comment Saturday.

Tyson also wrote House Judiciary Committee Chairman Robert Goodlatte, who had subpoenaed the department for documents related to the Russia investigation and also the department’s investigation into Hillary Clinton’s emails in 2016. She detailed progress on those requests and said the department is “expeditiously completing them.”

In the letters, Tyson said the department had built “new tools” to search top secret documents and had diverted resources from other congressional requests.
…

President Donald Trump got some crime and immigration statistics right Friday but was off the mark on others in an appearance with those he calls “angel families,” people who lost loved ones at the hands of those living in the country illegally.

A look at how his statements compare with the facts:

TRUMP: “So here are just a few statistics on the human toll of illegal immigration. According to a 2011 government report, the arrests attached to the criminal alien population included an estimated 25,000 people for homicide, 42,000 for robbery, nearly 70,000 for sex offenses, and nearly 15,000 for kidnapping. In Texas alone, within the last seven years, more than a quarter million criminal aliens have been arrested and charged with over 600,000 criminal offenses. You don’t hear that.”

THE FACTS: Trump is likely working from a 2011 U.S. Government Accountability Office report that looked at arrests, costs and incarcerations of immigrants who were in the U.S. illegally. The statistics he cites are accurate. He doesn’t note that about half of all of the 3 million arrests of the “criminal alien population” in the study were for immigration (529,859), drugs (504,043) or traffic (404,488). And some of the immigration arrests were related to civil violations, not criminal charges. The report didn’t distinguish between the two.

TRUMP: “I always hear that, ‘Oh, no, the population’s safer than the people that live in the country.’ You’ve heard that, fellas, right? You’ve heard that. I hear it so much, and I say, ‘Is that possible?’ The answer is it’s not true. You hear it’s like they’re better people than what we have, than our citizens. It’s not true.”

THE FACTS: Trump is questioning reports that those living in the country illegally commit fewer crimes than people in the population overall. He shouldn’t.

Several studies from social scientists and the libertarian think tank Cato Institute have shown that people here illegally are less likely to commit crime than U.S. citizens, and legal immigrants are even less likely to do so.

A March study by the journal Criminology found “undocumented immigration does not increase violence.”

The study, which looked at the years 1990 through 2014, argues that states with bigger shares of such people have lower crime rates.

A study last year by Robert Adelman, a sociology professor at University of Buffalo, analyzed 40 years of crime data in 200 metropolitan areas and found that immigrants helped lower crime. New York City, for example, has the nation’s largest population of immigrants living in the country illegally — about 500,000 — and last year had only 292 murders among a total population of 8.5 million people. A city murder rate is often used as a bench mark for overall crime because it’s difficult to fudge murder statistics.

And Ruben Rumbaut, a University of California, Irvine sociology professor, co-authored a recent study that noted crime rates fell sharply from 1990 to 2015 at a time when illegal immigration spiked.
…

The Guatemalan father last saw his 12-year-old daughter on June 5 and knows nothing about her whereabouts.

The Guatemalan mother of three sons — ages 2, 6 and 13 — is being held in Pearsall, Texas,

The Honduran mother is in detention in El Paso, Texas, and believes her son is in New York.

Two days after U.S. President Donald Trump ordered an end to separating immigrant families at the U.S.-Mexico border, the three parents, like thousands of others, are “desperate” for information about the whereabouts and well-being of their children, their lawyer says.

No access to information

“Our clients are being held in detention facilities with no access to information about their children,” said Jerome Wesevich, an attorney with Texas RioGrande Legal Aid, Inc. in Brownsville, Texas. “The government has some procedures in place for supplying information. So far those have been entirely inadequate.”

The legal aid organization is suing the Trump administration over family separations on behalf of the three parents, one of two major legal challenges to the government’s now-rescinded policy.

Wesevich said Trump’s executive order, issued Wednesday, has done little to inspire hope among the separated families.

“I’d say there is not a lot of optimism,” Wesevich said. “The president’s announcement is not very understandable about what it’s going to mean in practical terms.”

​More than 2,300 children

According to the Department of Homeland Security, more than 2,300 children were separated from their parents between early May when the government started a “zero-tolerance policy” on immigration enforcement and last week.

The Department of Homeland Security says it has a plan to reunite the families in the wake of Trump’s order, but it hasn’t spelled out how it intends to carry out the program.

The Pentagon said Thursday that it had accepted a request from the Department of Health and Human Services, the agency tasked with finding shelter for asylum seekers, to house as many as 20,000 unaccompanied migrant children.

With uncertainty surrounding the government’s reunification plan, legal assistance organizations are working to locate and connect separated families.

The Texas Civil Rights Project said Friday that it was seeking to reunite as many as 381 immigrants who have been separated from their children.

Texas RioGrande Legal Aid said it would continue its efforts on behalf of the three Central American parents while hoping for a resolution to the plight of the more than 2,300 separated children.

“The point of our lawsuit that they do it as compassionately and quickly as possible,” Wesevich said. “By compassionate, I mean the parents are provided with information on where their children are, how they’re being cared for.”

The legal aid on Friday asked a federal court in Washington to order government agencies to provide the three parents with “immediate access to basic information about their children’s whereabouts and well-being, and frequent, meaningful opportunity to see and hear their children.”

Among other things, the three want government agencies to provide them with the exact address of where their children are being held; a description of the place they’re being held; information about whether the children have suffered any illness; and finally, the government’s best estimate on when they’ll be reunited.

The government has not responded to the lawsuit.

A spokeswoman for Customs and Border Protection, one of the agencies named in the lawsuit, declined to comment, citing the pending litigation.

Short phone calls

The three parents were detained and separated from their children as they crossed the border into the United States in recent weeks.

Wesevich said the father from Guatemala “does not know where (his daughter) is at all.”

The Honduran mother of a 9-year-old son has told the legal aid that she believes her son has been moved to New York.

Since their separation, the mother has been allowed to speak with her son three times for about five minutes each time, according to court filings.

“He only asks when we will see each other again and begs to be with me,” the mother is quoted in court documents as saying. “He is scared and lonely and desperate to be with me. I try to tell him everything will be OK and that I’ll see him soon but, the truth is, I don’t know what will happen with us.”

The Guatemalan mother of three sons has been allowed to speak with them for 10 minutes two times each week. 

“Of course her 2-year-old is unable to provide reliable information about his circumstances, and staff provide only general information to M.G.U., nothing specific about her children’s well-being, which causes her anguish,” according to court papers.
…

Mexican airline Volaris said Friday it was offering free flights to reunite families separated by the “zero tolerance” immigration policy of U.S. President Donald Trump.

“It hurts us to see these children without their parents and it is our vocation to reunite them,” Volaris said in a statement.

The airline said it would work with authorities in the United States, Mexico and Central America to offer free flights on its pre-existing routes to reunite children with their parents. According to its website, Volaris flies to more than 65 locations across Mexico, the United States, Guatemala, El Salvador, Nicaragua and Costa Rica.

After facing an uproar at home and abroad, Trump bowed to intense pressure Wednesday and signed an order ending the separation of children from their families while parents were prosecuted for crossing the border illegally.

This week, four major U.S. airlines asked the federal government not to use their flights to transport migrant children away from their parents.

Some of the more than 2,300 children separated from their parents since mid-April have been flown to states far from the border area between Mexico and the United States, where their parents are being charged in immigration courts, according to media reports.

There have been some cases of immigrants being deported without their children. On Thursday, El Salvador demanded a 7-year-old boy be returned to his father who was deported back to the Central American country this week.
…

President Donald Trump is trumpeting results of his summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un that get ahead of reality.

He is declaring that North Korea has begun ridding itself fully of nuclear weapons following an agreement with Kim in Singapore earlier this month, even though his Defense Department says otherwise.

Trump also prematurely claimed the return of remains of U.S. servicemen missing from the 1950-53 Korean War.

A look at how his statements compare with the facts:

TRUMP: “The big thing is, it will be a total denuclearization, which has already started taking place.” — remarks Thursday at Cabinet meeting.

THE FACTS: That’s not what his Pentagon chief, Jim Mattis, says. When asked by a reporter Wednesday whether he had seen any sign that North Korea had begun steps toward denuclearization, Mattis replied, “I’m not aware of any. Obviously, we’re at the very front end of the process. Detailed negotiations have not begun.”

At the summit, Kim committed to “complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula,” but no details were worked out.

In May, before the summit, North Korea demolished tunnels at its sole underground nuclear test site, although outsiders have not inspected the result. Its nuclear program has many other elements, including nuclear materials production facilities, nuclear warheads, ballistic missiles and missile launchers.

Soldiers’ remains

TRUMP: “We got back our great fallen heroes, the remains sent back today, already 200 have been sent back.” — remarks Wednesday at rally in Duluth, Minnesota.

THE FACTS: No remains have been returned, although Pentagon officials say they are prepared to receive them. Although the Singapore declaration said this would happen immediately, U.S. officials have given no indication that North Korea has committed to any specific timetable for the return.

On Thursday, in remarks at a Cabinet meeting, Trump modified his claim, saying, “They’ve already sent back or are in the process of sending back the remains of our great heroes who died in North Korea during the war.”

Aside from uncertainty over when North Korea will return the remains it has collected over the years, it’s unclear whether all will be in a condition to permit their positive identification, or whether they all are even Americans. A number of allied soldiers who fought alongside the U.S. during the war also are missing.

Nearly 7,700 American service members are listed as unaccounted for from the Korean War, of which an estimated 5,300 were lost in North Korea.
…

This week could turn out to be pivotal for the Trump White House as both major parties get ready for midterm congressional elections in November.

President Donald Trump’s decision to reverse a policy of separating families coming across the U.S. southern border came in the wake of a political firestorm that fired up opposition Democrats and alarmed even some Republicans. At the very least, it likely set the stage for immigration to be a key issue in November.

WATCH: Trump’s Immigration Actions Could Shape Midterm Election

​Defiant tone

Trump was in combat mode Wednesday during a political rally in Duluth, Minnesota, where he vowed to make immigration a central focus in the upcoming congressional campaign.

“If you want to create a humane, lawful system of immigration then you need to retire the Democrats and elect Republicans to finally secure our borders,” Trump said to an enthusiastic crowd, some chanting, “Build the wall!”

Just hours earlier, the president reversed his controversial policy of separating children from their parents by signing an executive order in the White House. 

“We are going to have strong, very strong, borders. But we are going to keep the families together,” he said.

​Outcry over separation

Trump decided to back away from the controversial policy of separating families after an outcry from around the country that included protests in several states, including Arizona, Texas, Pennsylvania and Massachusetts.

Also driving the outrage was a recording of children crying out for their parents released by the investigative journalist group ProPublica.

The separation policy drew condemnation from Republicans including former first lady Laura Bush and a host of Democrats.

“We should be able to agree that we will not keep kids in child internment camps indefinitely and hidden away from public view,” said Maryland Democratic Congressman Elijah Cummings. “What country is that? This is the United States of America!”

Divisive issue

Advocates for a tough border policy sided with the president including Art Arthur of the Center for Immigration Studies. He cited a recent upsurge in attempted border crossings.

“That large influx of individuals would suggest that we are starting to creep back up the numbers we saw during the Obama administration,” Arthur told VOA via Skype. “And the Trump administration needed to take action to respond, and this is an appropriate response.”

But many religious leaders were critical, including Monsignor Kevin Sullivan, executive director of Catholic Charities for Archdiocese of New York, who also spoke via Skype.

“To use the means of separating a child from his or her mother just is completely unacceptable for us as Americans,” he said.

​Political fallout

The immediate political fallout could be damaging for the president, especially with the midterms coming up later this year.

“It is a public relations disaster area for the Trump administration, and just about everybody but Donald Trump and his very strongly anti-immigration aides seem to realize that,” said University of Virginia analyst Larry Sabato.

Sabato also told VOA via Skype that Trump’s tough stance is also aimed at shoring up his political base for the midterms.

“Of course, they are focusing on their base. They are trying to make sure that they are going to show up and vote and it could make some difference in close midterm elections.”

Polls pro and con

Trump’s poll numbers have improved of late, but that was before the firestorm over separating families at the border.

Recent polls by Quinnipiac University and the Associated Press showed a majority of Americans approved of his outreach to North Korea to defuse the nuclear threat.

But surveys by Quinnipiac and CNN also found Americans opposed his child separation policy by margins of 2 to 1.

There is also fresh evidence that Trump is firing up both political parties in the run-up to the midterm voting. The Pew Research Center found that 55 percent of voters who intend to vote for Democrats in November are more enthusiastic than usual.

But the survey also found that 50 percent of those who intend to support Republicans are also more enthusiastic, setting the stage for what could be a monumental get out the vote struggle for both parties come November.
…

President Donald Trump’s decision to reverse a policy of separating immigrant families coming across the U.S. southern border came in the wake of a political firestorm this week. It also sets the stage for immigration to be a key issue in this year’s congressional midterm elections. VOA National correspondent Jim Malone has more on the political fallout from Washington.
…

Melania Trump made an unannounced visit to a Texas facility Thursday, talking with children and staff as she got a first-hand look at some of the migrant children sent there by the U.S. government after their families entered the country illegally.

 

The first lady’s stop at Upbring New Hope Children’s Center came the morning after President Donald Trump signed an executive order halting the practice of separating these families. The visit to the one-story red brick building, which houses 55 children between the ages of 12 and 17, was intended to lend support to those children who remain separated from their parents, said Stephanie Grisham, the first lady’s spokeswoman.

 

“She wanted to see everything for herself,” Grisham said.

Third-graders at the facility welcomed the first lady with a large paper American flag they’d signed taped to a wall. With the words, “Welcome! First Lady” written in black marker across the red and white bars, Mrs. Trump also signed the flag, which the children gave to her. Next to the flag on the classroom walls: A drawing of a flowering plant, a butterfly, a hummingbird and a heart, with the words, “New Hope, We Love You All, Staff” written in cursive.

Visiting another classroom, Mrs. Trump asked children where they were from, if they were friends and how long they’d been at the center where staff said children typically spend between 42 and 45 days. The children responded, sometimes in English, other times in Spanish, many of them wearing gray T-shirts with the red, white and blue words “We Are One.” She told children to “be kind and nice to each other” as she left for another classroom.

 

The first lady thanked the staff for their “heroic work” and asked them to reunite the children with their families as quickly as possible. In a makeshift conference room, Mrs. Trump met with staff from New Hope, HHS and border patrol, asking several questions about the children’s welfare and asking that the children be reunited with their families “as quickly as possible.”

 

New Hope staff reassured Mrs. Trump, who was accompanied by Health and Human Services secretary Alex Azar, that the children are assessed for physical and mental health issues when they enter the facility and are often distraught. They attend school five days a week and have a variety of activities.

 

“We just have a tremendous passion for working with these children,” said program director Roy De La Cerda. “We see them as our own.”

The trip was intended to lend support to those children who remain separated from their parents, said Stephanie Grisham, the first lady’s spokeswoman.

 

“She wanted to see everything for herself,” Grisham said.

 

The president had insisted incorrectly that his administration had no choice but to separate families apprehended at the border because children cannot go to jail with adults who are being criminally prosecuted for crossing the border illegally. Trump had said only Congress could fix the problem and he specifically pointed a finger at Democrats.

 

He reversed course Wednesday by signing the order ending separations and keeping families together when they are in custody, at least for the next few weeks. The administration’s “zero-tolerance” policy of criminally prosecuting illegal border-crossers, which has led to the removal of some 2,300 children from their parents since May, remains.

 

Accompanied by Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar, Mrs. Trump met with the executive director of the facility and other staff in a makeshift conference room where she was told the staff treated the 58 children housed there as if they were their own.

 

The first lady asked that the children be reunited with their families “as quickly as possible.”

 

WATCH: Melania Trump at Texas facility

President Trump had come under pressure to stop the practice of separating families, including from GOP allies and the first lady herself, following a public outcry sparked by widespread images of children held in fence-like structures. Plans for a visit to a second facility where children housed in cages were seen by The Associated Press last week were canceled because of flooding.

 

The trip was intended to lend support to some of the more than 2,300 children who remain separated from their parents, Grisham said. In addition to the meetings with staff and children, Mrs. Trump also was briefed on the children’s medical care by nursing staff.

 

The president had insisted incorrectly that his administration had no choice but to separate families apprehended at the border because children cannot go to jail with adults who are being criminally prosecuted for crossing the border illegally. Trump had said only Congress could fix the problem and he specifically pointed a finger at Democrats.

 

He reversed course Wednesday by signing the order ending separations and keeping families together when they are in custody, at least for the next few weeks. The administration’s “zero-tolerance” policy of criminally prosecuting illegal border-crossers, which has led to the removal of some 2,300 children from their parents since May, remains.

 

When asked Thursday if the first lady supports the policy, Grisham said, “She supports that the law should be followed.”

The trip came together within the past 48 hours, Grisham said.

 

“She told her staff she wanted to go and we made that happen,” she said.

President Trump spilled the beans about his wife’s trip to the border before it was announced, telling reporters during a Cabinet meeting: “My wife, our first lady, is down now at the border because it really bothered her to be looking at this and seeing it, as it bothered me, as it bothered everybody at this table. We’re all bothered by it.”

 

Grisham said that the first lady had the full backing of her husband.

 

“She told him ‘I am headed down to Texas’ and he was supportive.”

Mrs. Trump, whose focus as first lady is on child well-being, appears to have been among those pushing her husband to act.

 

Grisham released a statement last weekend saying the first lady “hates” to see children separated from their families and “believes we need to be a country that follows all laws, but also a country that governs with heart.”

 

WATCH: Melania Trump ask how often children speak to family

Hours before Trump used his executive order to halt family separations, a White House official let it be known that Mrs. Trump had been voicing her opinion to the president for some time, including that he needed to help families stay together. The official refused to be identified discussing Trump’s private conversations with his wife.

 

Trump acknowledged Wednesday that the mother of his 12-year-old son, Barron, had been prodding him.

 

“My wife feels very strongly about it,” he told reporters after he signed the order.

 

The pair of statements from the first lady amounted to an unusual public intervention by Mrs. Trump into a policy debate. Her four former living predecessors, seemingly encouraged after Laura Bush authored a scathing opinion piece, followed with sharper commentary of their own condemning the family separations as shameful.

 

The last-minute trip to Texas marks the first public action by Mrs. Trump since she announced in May an initiative named “Be Best” to focus on the overall well-being of children and help teach them kindness. She had been expected to travel to promote the campaign but was sidelined a week after the announcement following surgery to treat a benign kidney condition.

 
…