MARTHA’S VINEYARD, Mass., Sept 15 (Reuters) – Some migrants who were flown to the wealthy island of Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts, said on Thursday they were duped about their destination, and Democratic leaders called for a probe of the move by Florida’s Republican governor to send them there from Texas.
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, who is up for re-election in November and seen as a possible presidential contender in 2024, took credit for the two flights, which originated in San Antonio, Texas, and stopped in Florida on the way to Martha’s Vineyard.
The White House and residents of the vacation enclave called it a “political stunt,” as DeSantis joins Republican governors from Texas and Arizona in sending migrants north. The governors have sought to highlight the two parties’ differences on immigration policy and shift the burden of caring for immigrants to Democratic areas.
For months Texas and Arizona have sent busloads of migrants to the Democratic-run cities of New York, Chicago and Washington.
Florida now joins the campaign. Details of how the flights were arranged and paid for remain unclear, as well as an explanation as to why Florida was moving migrants in Texas. The Florida legislature has appropriated $12 million to transport migrants from the state to other locations.
The two flights on Wednesday carried about 50 migrants, mostly Venezuelans, a Martha’s Vineyard Airport official said.
Hours after the planes landed, two buses sent by Texas Governor Greg Abbott, another Republican facing re-election, dropped off migrants in a Washington neighborhood not far from Vice President Kamala Harris’ official residence on Thursday.
One Venezuelan migrant who arrived at Martha’s Vineyard identified himself as Luis, 27, and said he and nine relatives were promised a flight to Massachusetts, along with shelter, support for 90 days, help with work permits and English lessons. He said they were surprised when their flight landed on an island.
He said the promises came from a woman who gave her name as “Perla” who approached his family on the street outside a San Antonio shelter after they crossed from Mexico and U.S. border authorities released them with an immigration court date.
He said the woman, who also put them up in a hotel, did not provide a last name or any affiliation, but asked them to sign a liability waiver.
“We are scared,” he said, adding he and others felt they were lied to. “I hope they give us help.”
Residents of Martha’s Vineyard rallied to aid the confused migrants and offered housing at St. Andrews Episcopal Church.
Martha’s Vineyard is best known as a summer retreat populated mostly by affluent liberal Americans, including former President Barack Obama, a Democrat who owns a multimillion-dollar vacation home there.
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Migrants gather after being flown in from Texas on a flight funded by Florida Governor Ron DeSantis at Edgartown, Massachusetts, U.S. September 15, 2022. Vineyard Gazette/Handout via REUTERS.
Locals stopped by to donate money and children’s toys, while attorneys mobilized to offer free legal help.
“It’s a stunt to make political points and not caring about who gets hurt,” said Mike Savoy, 58, a nurse at Martha’s Vineyard Regional High School.
DeSantis defended the flights, telling a news conference that Democratic U.S. President Joe Biden “has refused to lift a finger” to secure the border.
“We’ve worked on innovative ways to be able to protect the state of Florida from the impact of Biden’s border policies,” DeSantis said.
White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said Republican governors were using migrants as “political pawns.”
LEGAL QUESTIONS
Several Democrats, including Charlie Crist, DeSantis’ opponent in Florida, and California Governor Gavin Newsom, called on federal authorities to investigate.
Massachusetts U.S. Attorney Rachael Rollins said at a news conference her office would be “looking into that case” and speaking with the Justice Department.
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security developed a plan last year to fly migrants to interior cities in coordination with aid groups to ease pressure on border regions, a Biden administration official told Reuters, requesting anonymity to discuss internal planning.
The White House never adopted the idea, according to a second U.S. official familiar with the matter.
The use of resources from Florida to move migrants from Texas to Massachusetts raises legal concerns, including about what information was relayed to the migrants before they boarded and whether they were coerced, said immigration law expert Pratheepan Gulasekaram of Santa Clara University School of Law.
U.S. border agents have made 1.8 million migrant arrests at the U.S.-Mexico border since last October. Many are quickly expelled to Mexico or other countries under a public health rule implemented in 2020 to curb the spread of COVID-19.
But hundreds of thousands Cubans, Nicaraguans, Venezuelans and others cannot be expelled because Mexico refuses to accept them, or because they can pursue asylum claims. read more
Many migrants who are released from U.S. custody in border states seek to move elsewhere to join relatives or find jobs. They often must check in with U.S. immigration authorities or attend court hearings to obtain legal status.
(CNN)Ukrainian authorities have found 440 graves at a mass burial site in Izium, an eastern city recently recaptured from Russian forces, Ukraine’s Defense Ministry said in a Twitter post Friday.
Democrats are accusing Republican governors of cruelly using migrants as political pawns after they chartered buses and flights to send them to places like New York City and Martha’s Vineyard.
Migrants on two flights chartered by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) landed at Martha’s Vineyard on Wednesday afternoon, and hours later, dozens of migrants sent by Texas Gov. Greg Abbott (R) arrived on buses near the vice president’s residence in Washington, D.C.
The governors, along with Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey (R), transported thousands of migrants in recent months, arguing the decision provides relief to border communities overwhelmed by President Biden’s immigration policies.
But Democrats have responded to the moves with intense pushback, and have accused the governors of providing no notice to localities and misleading the migrants.
“Why send these folks only to blue cities or blue states? Why isn’t Abbott sending refugees to Mississippi or Oklahoma or Idaho?” Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker (D) asked at a press conference on Wednesday.
“This is about politics for him without regard to the fear and anguish and the challenges that it poses for these refugees, but here in Illinois we refuse to stoop to that man’s level,” Pritzker continued, signing a disaster proclamation that frees up state resources and activates 75 members of the Illinois National Guard to assist.
Abbott’s office said on Friday that Texas bused more than 10,400 migrants since April, with more than 300 migrants arriving in Chicago.
Pritzker said Abbott isn’t notifying Chicago or the state when they send migrants. Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot (D) said on CNN on Saturday that some of the migrants were taken to hospitals upon arrival.
“They were put on the buses with delicate medical conditions that no one in Texas seemed to care anything about,” Lightfoot told the outlet. “That is simply not right, and it’s un-American.”
Abbott spokeswoman Renae Eze called Democrats complaining about the relocations “absolute hypocrites.”
“Instead of complaining about fulfilling their sanctuary city promises, these Democrat hypocrites should call on President Biden to do his job and secure the border — something the President continues failing to do,” Eze said.
“They all are concerned about a few dozen or a few hundred migrants coming to their town, and we get that many per hour in almost every community across the border,” Abbott said during an appearance on Fox News’s “Jesse Watters Primetime” on Tuesday. “So we’re dealing with this all the time, and I’m just helping out our local communities.”
Ducey spokesman C.J. Karamargin said Arizona has sent 1,809 migrants to D.C., which he called the “source” of the problem with an “unwillingness” to assist.
“We would encourage anyone who wants to get a better understanding of what’s happening to visit a small city on the border, like Yuma,” he said.
Meanwhile, DeSantis on Wednesday sent migrants on two chartered flights to Martha’s Vineyard, an island in Massachusetts known for its popularity among the wealthy.
“We are not a sanctuary state, and it’s better to be able to go to a sanctuary jurisdiction, and yes, we will help facilitate that transport for you to be able to go to greener pastures,” DeSantis said during a Thursday press conference.
Massachusetts state Sen. Julian Cyr (D), who represents Martha’s Vineyard, called the flights “a fundamentally racist tactic” in an interview, drawing comparisons to the “Reverse Freedom Rides,” when southern segregationists lured African Americans to northern cities under false pretenses in 1962.
The flights were also condemned by Massachusetts’s two Democratic senators, Ed Markey and Elizabeth Warren, who bothcalled the move “cruel.”
“The fact that human beings are being trafficked for political benefits is abhorrent,” said Cyr. “It also raises some real questions as to whether or not any laws have been broken here.”
Boston-based group Lawyers for Civil Rights said its attorneys traveled to Martha’s Vineyard to investigate whether state or federal human trafficking or kidnapping laws were violated.
Cyr said a woman named “Perla” misled the migrants into boarding the flight by promising expedited work papers and housing.
It’s unclear whether the migrants are undocumented or whether they are asylum seekers allowed into the country to wait out their immigration court cases, or a combination of both.
Still, an individual’s immigration status is determined by Department of Homeland Security agencies – state governments have little to no say or legal authority to expedite cases.
In a statement, DeSantis communications director Taryn Fenske called the migrants “illegal immigrants” but did not specify their immigration status.
“Florida can confirm the two planes with illegal immigrants that arrived in Martha’s Vineyard today were part of the state’s relocation program to transport illegal immigrants to sanctuary destinations,” she said.
Florida Democrats jumped on DeSantis’s move, particularly as it impacted Venezuelan nationals escaping the leftist authoritarian regime of President Nicolás Maduro.
Former Gov. Charlie Crist, DeSantis’s Democratic opponent, lashed out directly at the Republican governor.
“When you are this inhumane in how you treat human beings, you’re not qualified to be governor of anything,” said Crist.
And state Sen. Annette Taddeo (D), who is challenging Rep. María Elvira Salazar (R-Fla.), said the move makes Florida Republicans’ claims of opposition to leftist authoritarianism in Latin America moot.
“After last night’s news, Republicans can never again claim they stand with the victims of communism. To take advantage of people fleeing oppressive regimes and use them as political pawns to score cheap points with their Fox News audience and the extreme fringes of their party is cruel and inhumane,” said Taddeo in a statement.
Vanessa Cárdenas, deputy director of progressive immigration group America’s Voice, called the relocations “caravans 2.0,” a reference to Republicans who seized on large groups of migrants that traveled together to the U.S.-Mexico border in recent years.
“Their hope is to score points on Fox and distract from the Republican decline in the 2022 polls,” Cárdenas said in a statement.
“Ron DeSantis and Greg Abbott are competing to get MAGA-world kudos for ‘owning the libs,’” she continued. “In the process they are underscoring to the rest of the electorate how cruel, dehumanizing and transparently political their motivations are.”
RJ Hauman, director of government relations and communications at Federation for American Immigration Reform — a restrictionist group that holds considerable sway over immigration hawks in the GOP — applauded the relocations.
“It’s beyond hypocritical to see mayors get upset at governors for transporting illegal immigrants to their so-called sanctuaries because it’s ‘inhumane,’ when they’ve been silent on Biden policies that incentivize the same people to put their lives in the hands of actual human smugglers and cartels,” Hauman told The Hill.
Judge Aileen Cannon, the Trump-appointed judge recently known for twisting the law in knots in ways that undermine one of the Justice Department’s criminal investigations into former President Donald Trump, has issued a new order that, well, twists the law into knots.
Last month, the FBI executed a search warrant at Mar-a-Lago, Trump’s Florida residence, and seized several boxes of documents. They include 103 documents with classified markings, some of them indicating that the information contained in those papers are classified at the highest levels. According to the Washington Post, these papers include “a document describing a foreign government’s military defenses, including its nuclear capabilities.”
Trump’s legal team has been waging a campaign in Cannon’s court to hinder the DOJ’s ability to look into those documents. Cannon on Thursday gave Trump another win in that campaign, although her latest order does slightly narrow one of Trump’s earlier victories in her courtroom.
The Constitution provides several safeguards against unreasonable searches and seizures by law enforcement. The FBI must have probable cause to justify a search of a private residence, and it must obtain a warrant issued by a neutral magistrate.
Although DOJ complied with these constitutional requirements, Cannon issued an order earlier this month arguing that Trump is entitled to special protections that are rarely afforded to any criminal suspect, in large part because of Trump’s “former position as President of the United States.”
Specifically, Cannon ordered the Justice Department to halt its criminal investigation into Trump until a court-appointed official known as a “special master” reviews the seized documents.
Although Cannon’s original order permitted DOJ to continue a parallel national security investigation assessing how Trump’s possession of these documents may have damaged national security, DOJ informed Cannon in a motion filed last week that these two investigations “cannot be readily separated,” in large part because they are being conducted by the same personnel.
In last week’s motion, DOJ asked Cannon to allow its criminal investigation to continue with respect to the 103 classified documents. On Thursday, Cannon formally denied that request, and appointed Raymond Dearie, a senior federal judge, as that special master to review all of the documents seized from Trump for indications that they may be protected by attorney-client or executive privilege. Cannon also instructs Dearie to begin his review with the classified documents.
DOJ has already indicated that it will seek relief from a federal appeals court, possibly as soon as tonight. The case is called Trump v. United States.
But there are several things worth digging into with Cannon’s order first.
Cannon’s new order suggests that Trump could somehow own classified government documents
Classified documents by definition belong to the federal government and not to a private individual — indeed, the whole point of classifying a document is to prevent that document from coming into the possession of anyone that the government does not want to see it.
Moreover, the FBI says that some of the relevant documents are marked as “classified/TS/SCI,” a designation that refers to “sensitive compartmented information” — information that is typically stored in specialized facilities to prevent the information from getting out.
In her recent order, Cannon essentially says that the FBI cannot be trusted when it claims that these documents are classified. “The Court does not find it appropriate to accept the Government’s conclusions,” Cannon writes, that “all of the approximately 100 documents isolated by the Government (and “papers physically attached to them”) are classified government records.”
Such skepticism of a law enforcement’s agency’s assertions might be welcome in another context. But, again, the Constitution lays out the requirements that the FBI must comply with in order to seize documents and use them in a criminal investigation — probable cause plus a warrant — and the FBI complied with these constitutional obligations.
If Trump believes that some of these documents were unlawfully seized from him, he can raise that argument at his criminal trial, if he is ever indicted, and seek to have the documents excluded from that trial. He could do, in other words, what every other criminal defendant is permitted to do.
But Cannon is giving him additional protections that virtually no criminal suspect enjoys, based largely on the fact that he used to be president.
Cannon gives the Justice Department a little more leeway, but probably not enough that they can safely make use of it
Recall that Cannon’s original order said that the FBI could continue its national security investigation into how Trump’s possession of these documents may have damaged the nation’s intelligence interests, but that it must pause its criminal investigation. In response to DOJ’s argument that these two investigations are difficult to disentangle, Cannon essentially replies that “difficult” does not mean “impossible.”
One of the government’s filings, she notes, “states that it would be ‘exceedingly difficult’ to bifurcate the personnel involved in the described processes.” But “exceedingly difficult,” she claims, is not the same thing as “inextricably intertwined.”
That said, Cannon’s latest order does contain some language suggesting that DOJ can continue some parts of its criminal investigation.
Though Cannon forbids the Justice Department from “presenting the seized materials to a grand jury and using the content of the documents to conduct witness interviews as part of a criminal investigation” — a restriction that effectively precludes DOJ from indicting Trump until Cannon’s order is lifted — she does write that “to the extent that the Security Assessments truly are, in fact, inextricable from criminal investigative use of the seized materials,” then the criminal investigation may continue.
In practice, however, it is far from clear that the Justice Department can take advantage of this concession by Cannon. Cannon’s new order contains only limited descriptions of what DOJ can and cannot do. And it is possible that the FBI will be unwilling to make its own judgment calls so long as it knows that a seemingly hostile judge may hold them in contempt if she disagrees with the FBI’s judgment.
Cannon seems to have no idea how classified documents work
One other line in Cannon’s opinion is worth noting. In its motion from last week, the Justice Department argued that “the Court’s order would irreparably harm the government and the public by unnecessarily requiring the government to share highly classified materials with a special master.”
As the Supreme Court held in Department of the Navy v. Egan (1988), “For ‘reasons . . . too obvious to call for enlarged discussion,’” determinations about who should be allowed to see classified documents “must be committed to the broad discretion of the agency responsible, and this must include broad discretion to determine who may have access to it.”
But Cannon’s order effectively brings the special master, who does not have a “need to know” the information in the classified documents that is grounded in national security concerns, inside the community of individuals who are allowed to see specific highly classified documents. That places her order at odds with Egan, and with ordinary practices governing the nation’s most highly guarded secrets.
In any event, the most important upshot of Cannon’s order is that DOJ is now free to seek relief from a higher court. It is likely that they will do so as fast as their lawyers can draft the appropriate motion.
Rosneft Deutschland, which accounts for about 12% of German oil processing capacity, will fall under the trusteeship of the Federal Network Agency regulator, which said the original owner no longer had authority to issue instructions. The regulator was also handed control of Rosneft subsidiary RN Refining and Marketing.
U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon has ruled in favor of one of former President Donald Trump’s special master picks, appointing Raymond Dearie to review the trove of documents seized by the FBI at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home.
The Florida judge also denied the Department of Justice’s motion for a partial stay to allow DOJ continued access to at least 100 documents marked classified.
“The Court remains firmly of the view that appointment of a special master to conduct a review of the seized materials, accompanied by a temporary injunction to avoid unwarranted use and disclosure of potentially privileged and/or personal materials, is fully consonant with the foregoing principles and with the need to ensure at least the appearance of fairness and integrity under unprecedented circumstances,” Judge Cannon, who was appointed by Trump, writes.
Last month, Trump’s team asked that an independent third party be placed in charge of reviewing the 11,000 seized documents to ascertain whether any were protected by executive privilege or attorney-client privilege when removed in the Aug. 8 search.
The Justice Department opposed the request, but when Judge Cannon ruled in favor of a special master, it agreed to Trump’s pick, 78-year-old Dearie, as an appropriate choice.
Judge Dearie is a former U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of New York and served as chief judge of the court from 2007 to 2011. He was appointed as a judge by Ronald Reagan in 1986.
He previously approved a warrant for the FBI to surveil former Trump campaign aide Carter Page during the Russia investigation, though he is understood to have a stellar reputation and is highly regarded by Trump and his team.
Cannon gave the special master a Nov. 30 deadline to finish his review of the potentially privileged documents, which is more than a month after the DOJ’s request for an Oct. 17 deadline. She noted that date was “subject to modification if necessary as proposed by the special master.”
The extended deadline is likely to be a setback for the DOJ’s investigation into whether the former president unlawfully kept national defense records or hindered repeated attempts by the government to retrieve them.
The Justice Department has indicated it will appeal, which could see the case taken to the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit and as high as the U.S. Supreme Court. According to The New York Times, “top officials” were meeting Thursday night “to discuss the timing of their filing.”
In her 10-page ruling, Judge Cannon questioned the DOJ’s claims that the records it is attempting to review—in particular, 100 documents “marked as classified”—contain such urgent sensitive information that could place the country in peril and requests further review from the special master.
She said “there has been no actual suggestion by the Government of any identifiable emergency or imminent disclosure of classified information arising from Plaintiff’s [Trump’s] allegedly unlawful retention of the seized property.”
Instead, and “unfortunately” she said, “the unwarranted disclosures that float in the background have been leaks to the media after the underlying seizure.”
Cannon denied the DOJ’s request to exempt the 100 documents from the review and to lift restrictions on DOJ from using the classified materials seized during the search to further its criminal investigation into the handling of sensitive documents at Mar-a-Lago.
She said she would not accept the DOJ’s brief that the documents remain classified as fact without a review from the special master and asked that he prioritize them first and “thereafter consider prompt adjustments to the Court’s Orders as necessary.”
The temporary ban, however, “does not restrict the Government from conducting investigations or bringing charges based on anything other than the actual content of the seized materials; from questioning witnesses and obtaining other information about the movement and storage of seized materials, including documents marked as classified, without discussion of their contents.”
Trump has asserted publicly that he declassified all the records before the FBI search.
“The Court does not find it appropriate to accept the Government’s conclusions on these important and disputed issues without further review by a neutral third party in an expedited and orderly fashion,” Cannon writes, noting “there are documented instances giving rise to concerns about the Government’s ability to properly categorize and screen materials.”
Cannon’s order appointing a special master says Trump must pay the full cost of the review, despite a previous plea from his lawyers to split the bill. “Plaintiff shall bear 100% of the professional fees and expenses of the special master and any professionals, support staff, and expert consultants engaged at the special master’s request,” the order reads.
She also said both parties “must fully cooperate with the Special Master in the performance of their duties but the court “reserves the right to remove the special master.”
On Thursday, Trump warned of “big problems” if he was indicted over the mishandling of the documents, warning conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt that there would be “problems in this country the likes of which perhaps we’ve never seen before.”
“I don’t think the people of the United States would stand for it,” he said.
November’s midterm elections are likely toshift the political landscape and impact what President Biden can accomplish during the remainder of his first term. Here’s what to know.
Why are the midterms important? The midterm elections determine control of Congress: The party that has the House or Senate majority gets to organize the chamber and decide what legislation Congress considers.Thirty six governors and thousands of state legislators are also on the ballot. Here’s a complete guide to the midterms.
KYIV/KUPIANSK, Ukraine, Sept 16 (Reuters) – Ukrainian authorities found a mass grave containing 440 bodies in a northeastern city recaptured from Russian forces, calling it proof of war crimes carried out by the invaders in territory they had occupied for months.
“Russia is leaving death behind it everywhere and must be held responsible,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said in a video address overnight.
The mass grave discovered in the former Russian front-line stronghold of Izium would be the biggest in Europe since the aftermath of the Balkan wars of the 1990s. Ukrainian forces retook Izium after thousands of Russian troops fled the area, abandoning weapons and ammunition.
“For months a rampant terror, violence, torture and mass murders were in the occupied territories,” Zelenskiy adviser Mykhailo Podolyak tweeted in English, above a photo of a forest scattered with wooden crosses in fresh muddy ground.
“Anyone else wants to ‘freeze the war’ instead of sending tanks? We have no right to leave people alone with the Evil.”
Russia did not immediately comment on the reports of the mass grave. In the past it has denied its troops commit atrocities. Moscow calls its actions in Ukraine a “special military operation” to disarm its neighbour.
In Kupiansk, a northeastern railway junction city whose partial capture by Kyiv’s forces on Saturday cut Russia’s supply lines and led to the swift collapse of its front lines in the region, small units of Ukrainian troops were securing a nearly deserted ghost city.
BLOOD ON THE FLOOR
A formerly Russian-occupied police station had been hastily abandoned. Russian flags and a portrait of President Vladimir Putin lay on the floor amid broken glass. Records had been torched. Behind the steel doors of the station’s jail cells there was blood on the floor and stains on the mattresses.
Three piglets escaped from an abandoned sty were foraging in the city street. Serhiy, a middle-aged man in a thin jacket, was hungry for news.
“There’s no electricity, no phones. If there were electricity, at least we could have watched TV. If there were phones, we could have called our relatives,” he said. “If only there hadn’t been all this bombing with everyone in their basements.”
After a week of rapid gains in the northeast, Ukrainian officials have sought to dampen expectations that they could continue to advance at that pace. They say Russian troops that fled the Kharkiv region are now digging in and planning to defend territory in neighbouring Luhansk and Donetsk provinces.
“It is of course extremely encouraging to see that Ukrainian armed forces have been able to take back territory and also strike behind Russian lines,” NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg told BBC radio.
“At the same time, we need to understand that this is not the beginning of the end of the war. We need to be prepared for the long haul.”
Putin has yet to comment publicly on the battlefield setback suffered by his forces this month. Ukrainian officials say 9,000 sq km (3,400 sq miles) have been retaken, territory about the size of the island of Cyprus.
The speed of the advance has bolstered Ukrainian morale and bolstered its case for more weapons from Western allies.
In Washington, U.S. President Joe Biden announced a new $600 million arms package for Ukraine, including High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems (HIMARS) and artillery rounds. The United States has sent about $15.1 billion in security assistance to Kyiv since Russia’s Feb. 24 invasion. read more
Russian forces shelled Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second largest city, and other towns in the northeast on Thursday, Ukrainian officials said. More than 90 missiles and artillery shells hit the neighbouring Sumy region on the border with Russia, according to its governor, Dmytro Zhyvytsky.
On the Russian side, Vyacheslav Gladkov, governor of Russia’s Belgorod region, said the Ukrainian army shelled the town of Valuyki near the border.
“Anti-aircraft defences went into action but there is some destruction on the ground,” he said on Telegram. This included a power substation put out of commission and private homes and vehicles set on fire.
Reuters was not able to verify the reports.
In Uzbekistan on Thursday, Putin met Chinese President Xi Jinping for the first time since the two men signed a “no limits” friendship pact three weeks before the start of the war.
In his public remarks, Putin gave a rare hint of friction with Beijing over the war: “We understand your questions and concern about this. During today’s meeting, we will of course explain our position,” Putin told Xi. read more
Xi did not mention Ukraine in his public remarks, nor was it mentioned in a Chinese account of the meeting. China has so far trod a careful path, condemning Western sanctions against Russia but stopping short of endorsing or assisting Moscow’s military effort.
After 20 straight hours of negotiations , companies agreed to paid sick leave – for the first time – and other demands of unions.
The terms of the deal include:
Voluntary assigned days off and one additional paid day off (Unions had sought 15 paid sick days. Currently, rail freight workers don’t have any sick days)
Guaranteed time away for medical visits;
No disruptions to current health care plans;
An immediate wage increase of 14% and 24% over the next five years;
Annual lump sum bonuses of $5,000.
Biden interjected himself directly into the dispute.
According to two White House officials who discussed the president’s involvement on the condition of anonymity, Biden warned both sides by phone that “a shutdown is unacceptable” as differences still remained unresolved Wednesday night.
Ahead of a Friday deadline for a possible worker strike, railroads had prepared to halt the shipment of crops, while shipments of farm fertilizers were delayed this week. Amtrak and commuter railroads had braced for service cuts, disruptions and cancellations.
Biden celebrated the deal alongside union leaders and rail executives at the White House Rose Garden, calling it a “big win for America.”
“Together we reached an agreement that will keep our critical rail system working and avoid disruptions of our economy,” the president said, characterizing the deal as “validation” that unions and management “can work together.”
U.S. Chamber: rail deal the ‘best outcome’ for Americans
The head of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce called the deal between freight rail workers and companies “the best outcome for the American public” and a testament to compromise on both sides.
Suzanne Clark, president and CEO of the chamber, commended the six largest railroad companies and 12 unions that negotiated up to the brink of a possible rail strike that would have halted the shipment of food, fuel and other critics goods.
“Our nation was very close to a national rail shutdown this week, the effects of which were already beginning to be felt throughout the business community, and would have had devastating impacts to American families and our economy,” Clark said. “We are glad to see a rail strike averted and hope to see future negotiations finalized in a timely manner.”
Why rail unions signed off on 1 day of paid sick leave after wanting 15
Dennis Pierce, president of the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen, said the turning point in negotiations came when the unions “finally convinced” the railroad companies to provide workers time off for illness and medical illness.
The agreement only includes one paid sick day, far short of the unions’ goal of 15.
But Pierce said even a single day is an improvement from recommendations by a Presidential Emergency Board that Biden assembled in July to mediate the labor dispute. With the threat of congressional intervention if a deal wasn’t reached by Friday, he said it made it “incredibly hard” to get any paid leave in the final deal.
In addition, the deal gives engineers and other workers voluntary days off – allowing their work schedule to resemble something closer to five days a week rather than a full week – and guarantees they won’t be fired for visiting physicians.
“That’s a big win for us,” he told USA TODAY in an interview. “We actually, for the first time ever, negotiated contract language that prevents the railroads from punishing our guys under the attendance policy to go to the doc. That’s been a critical issue. That wasn’t a paid-leave issue.”
Members of the 12 rail unions must vote to ratify the agreement before it is final.
Pierce said when his members review the deal before voting on it, he believes they will see all the gains. “This is a vast improvement over what that railroad life was like before.”
“They told me that they had no new information for me and to call back around 11 or 12 (MT) to see if the train that I was supposed to take had been reinstated,” said Jenna Johnson-Hall, who had her from Utah to Illinois trip canceled. When she did, she said Amtrak still didn’t have any answers and asked her to call back in a few more hours.
“This tentative agreement will keep our trains moving, stations bustling, and employees proudly serving customers as we move them across this great country, stimulating local economies in more than 500 communities we serve,” Amtrak CEO Stephen Gardner said in a statement.
Although Amtrak operates services across the country, it actually owns very few of the tracks it uses. Many of its trains outside the Northeast Corridor between Boston and Washington use lines that are controlled by freight railroads. So, a strike by workers on those railroads could affect Amtrak’s ability to operate in their territory.
— Eve Chen
Will other unions seek what the railroad unions are asking for?
But despite big wins on pay increases and the possible end of a nearly three-year haggling match, it is difficult to compare America’s rail sector to any other.
Experts said Thursday that the nation’s railways are still largely in the hands of only a few companies and unions, so labor actions there are unlikely to translate to success for workers with less leverage.
Still, higher salaries and more sick leave is unlikely to raise price tags for consumers, one said.
“Sometimes there’s a narrative that, ‘Oh, I’m going to have to pay 24% more for fill in the blank,’ ” because that’s the wage increase that’s been proposed, said Carl Van Horn, Distinguished Professor of Public Policy and Director of the John J. Heldrich Center for Workforce Development at Rutgers University. “It doesn’t work that way. The economy is much more complicated than that.’’
— Charisse Jones and Riley Gutiérrez McDermid
Bernie Sanders says ‘real progress’ reached in rail deal
Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., who blocked a push by Senate Republicans to have Congress set contract terms with rail workers, said the deal represents “real progress” but noted union members must still vote to ratify the agreement.
“I congratulate the unions for standing strong, making it clear that, at a time when the industry is enjoying record breaking profits, they’ve got to treat their workers with respect,” Sanders told reporters.
He added: “When people get sick, needless to say, they should be able to get time off and not worry about being fired.”
– Joey Garrison
Biden told rail industry, unions ‘a shutdown is unacceptable’
As the stalemate moved into Wednesday night, Biden intervened with a 9 p.m. phone call to union heads and carrier executives who met with administration officials in Washington throughout the day.
The president, placed on speaker phone, told the negotiators “a shutdown is unacceptable,” according to two White House officials who discussed the president’s involvement on the condition of anonymity.
He warned of the catastrophic impact that a rail shutdown would have on communities amid already-strained supply chains.
“If one side is moving,” the president told the parties, “the other side has to move, too.”
– Joey Garrison
Biden: Railroads are ‘backbone of the economy’
Railroads are the “backbone of the economy,” Biden said Thursday when praising the tentative deal between unions and railway companies to avert a shutdown.
“I have a visual image of rail being the backbone, I mean, literally the backbone of the economy,” Biden said during brief remarks in the Rose Garden after meeting in the Oval Office with the negotiators who brokered the agreement.
Biden said trains carry everything from clean water, to food and liquefied natural gas – “every good that you need.”
A shutdown would disrupt supply chains and contribute to the persistent inflation on consumer goods.
As Biden turned to go back into the White House, a reporter asked the president what he would say to Americans struggling with the rising cost of groceries.
“With rails moving,” he replied, “it’s not going to go up.”
– Maureen Groppe
‘It feels good’
As the parties gathered in the Oval Office earlier in the morning, Biden told his favorite stories from his years riding Amtrak and thanked the companies and unions for working through differences.
As a senator, Biden commuted between Washington and Delaware.
“It feels good,” he said, pointing to the 20 hours of consecutive talks on the brink of a potential rail strike. “They should be in bed.”
– Joey Garrison
Terms of the deal
The deal includes wage increases, bonuses, no increases in copays and deductibles and – for the first time – paid time off for sick workers and exemptions for medical visits. Rail companies’ strict attendance policies had been a sticking point for the two largest unions representing conductors and engineers, which were among the final holdouts.
“The solidarity shown by our members, essential workers to this economy, who keep America’s freight trains moving, made the difference in our obtaining an agreement,” Jeremy Ferguson, president of SMART Transportation Division and Dennis Pierce, president of the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen, said in a joint statement.
The unions’ members must still vote on the contract for it to be finalized.
Labor Secretary Marty Walsh led 20 straight hours of meetings with union and carrier leaders in Washington that spilled into Thursday morning. He applauded a “hard-fought, mutually beneficial deal.”
“Our rail system is integral to our supply chain, and a disruption would have had catastrophic impacts on industries, travelers and families across the country,” Walsh said in a tweet.
– Joey Garrison and Francesca Chambers
Terms beyond recommendations
Negotiations for a new contract between the nation’s six largest freight carriers – Union Pacific, CSX, Norfolk Southern, BNSF, Canadian National and Kansas City Southern – and 12 unions go back nearly three years. Biden appointed a Presidential Emergency Board in July to mediate the dispute. Nineof the unions had already agreed to terms.
By ensuring paid time off for medical visits, the deal goes beyond the recommendations of Biden’s presidential board in a major win for unions that demanded the benefits.
Ian Jefferies, president and CEO of the Association of American Railroads, said a work stoppage would result in an “unnecessary $2 billion daily economic hit,” just as the freight sector moves into peak shipping season.
Biden was personally in touch with railroad companies and union representatives this week to try to avoid a shutdown.
The White House was exploring contingencies including invoking emergency authorities to ensure crucial materials are still delivered if one occurred, according to a White House official, who discussed the talks on the condition of anonymity.
– Joey Garrison
A clear win for the unions
In the end, the unions that threatened a freight rail strike over the labor dispute were the clear winners in the standoff.
“Most importantly, for the first time ever, the agreement provides our members with the ability to take time away from work to attend routine and preventative medical, as well as exemptions from attendance policies for hospitalizations and surgical procedures,” Ferguson and Pierce said in their statement on behalf of their unions.
Republican lawmakers introduced legislation that would have used congressional powers to intervene and adopt the board’s recommendations – which did not offer the paid-time off assurances – for all 115,000 union rail workers.
Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., opposed Republicans’ push Wednesday to pass the bill via unanimous consent, giving unions times to press for their demands until the end.
– Joey Garrison
Rail companies thank unions, Biden administration
The nation’s largest freight rail companies said agreements were reached with the three unions that had held out from supporting a new contract.
Those holdouts, representing about 60,000 rail workers, were:
Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen Division of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters
International Association of Sheet Metal, Air, Rail and Transportation Workers – Transportation Division (SMART-TD)
Brotherhood of Railroad Signalmen
The Association of American Railroads, a coalition representing the rail industry, issued a statement thanking “all unions involved in negotiations for their efforts” and the Biden administration for their assistance.
– Joey Garrison
Amtrak hustles to restore service
Amtrak was working to undo the cancellations it had announced for Thursday.
“Amtrak is working to quickly restore canceled trains and reaching out to impacted customers to accommodate on first available departures,” the system announced shortly after Biden relayed news of the tentative agreement.
– Joey Garrison
Pelosi: Congress was ready to act
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said in a Thursday morning statement that Congress was also considering any actions it could take.
“Congress under the Commerce Clause of the Constitution has the authority and responsibility to ensure the uninterrupted operation of essential transportation services and has in the past enacted legislation for such purposes,” Pelosi said. “Led by the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, the House prepared and had reviewed legislation, so that we would be ready to act, pursuant to Section 10 of the Railway Labor Act.”
– Joey Garrison
Biden’s loyalties tested
Biden was stuck in a hard spot politically as an outspoken supporter of unions while also desperately wanting to avoid the repercussions of a shutdown.
More than any other modern president, Biden regularly hails organized labor. He said last year his goal is to be “the most pro-union president leading the most pro-union administration in American history.”
A strike and bottlenecked supply chains could have undermined Democrats’ credibility on the economy, giving Republicans new ammunition as they look to regain control of Congress in the November elections.
Such a setback could have halted Biden’s recent momentum. The president is experiencing a bounce in approval ratings after a series of legislative wins in Congress and declining gas prices. And Democrats have been energized by the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, reversing their once-gloomy prospects to maintain control of Congress.
A former USC dean agreed Thursday to plead guilty to bribery, admitting that she arranged an illicit $100,000 payment for Mark Ridley-Thomas when he was on the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors in return for a USC contract with the county.
Marilyn Flynn, 83, who was dean of USC’s School of Social Work from 1997 to 2018, struck a plea agreement with federal prosecutors that was signed Thursday and filed in court the same day.
Her admission of guilt strikes a major blow to Ridley-Thomas, now a Los Angeles city councilman who has been suspended while he defends against federal charges of bribery, fraud and conspiracy.
Ridley-Thomas is scheduled to go on trial in November, and it was not immediately clear whether Flynn would testify against him. The plea agreement does not contain a requirement for her to cooperate, and her defense attorneys, Vicki Podberesky and Brian Hennigan, did not return messages seeking comment.
Flynn’s plea also reduces the likelihood that evidence related to Rep. Karen Bass, the front-runner in the race for L.A. mayor, would get a public airing at trial.
Karen Bass and Rick Caruso are attacking each other’s character and ethics, particularly when it comes to their alma mater.
The Times reported last week that prosecutors had examined Bass’ receipt of a full scholarship from Flynn in 2011, during her first term in office, and had considered it “critical” to showing Flynn’s corrupt intent. Prosecutors noted that Flynn had provided “input” on legislation to Bass, who later proposed a bill that would have given USC and other private universities greater access to federal funds for social work — “just as defendant Flynn wanted,” according to court papers.
With only Ridley-Thomas on trial this year, it is unclear how or whether prosecutors would introduce evidence unrelated to his conduct.
The charge to which Flynn has agreed to plead guilty carries a maximum sentence of 10 years in federal prison, but prosecutors agreed to recommend that she be confined to her home in Los Feliz and fined no more than $150,000.
As part of the plea agreement, Flynn admitted to a complex bribery scheme that involved funneling $100,000 from a Ridley-Thomas campaign committee through USC in 2018.
Once the $100,000 arrived, Flynn almost immediately had USC transfer the money to United Ways of California, a nonprofit that was sponsoring a newly formed organization run by the supervisor’s son, Sebastian Ridley-Thomas.
Prosecutors say L.A. mayoral candidate Karen Bass’ scholarship and her dealings with USC are ‘critical’ to a case about corruption at the university.
Neither Ridley-Thomas nor his son ever received the money personally. Flynn’s plea agreement confirms that the money was to be used to hire an employee at Sebastian Ridley-Thomas’ new initiative, which he joined after abruptly resigning as a state assemblyman following a sexual harassment investigation.
Flynn acknowledged that she arranged to route the money through USC in return for Ridley-Thomas’ support of a county contract with the School of Social Work to provide online mental health services to patients referred by the county.
According to the timeline in court papers, Flynn told Ridley-Thomas on May 8, 2018, that the $100,000 had been “cleared” and would be “overnight mailed” to his son’s group. Two days later — at a meeting set up by Ridley-Thomas — Flynn met with an L.A. County official regarding the mental health contract that she sought.
The next day, when the $100,000 payment was delivered, Ridley-Thomas told Flynn over email he wanted to talk about “master contract stuff” and “somehow use yesterday’s ‘discussion’ to advance it.” The email ended with a “winking face” emoji, according to the plea agreement.
Galia Amram, a defense attorney for Ridley-Thomas, told The Times in a statement that the plea deal “makes a number of erroneous assumptions — specifically where [Flynn] alleges an understanding as to what Mr. Ridley-Thomas understood or thought.”
“Mr. Ridley-Thomas is innocent of the charges levied against him,” Amram said. “We look forward to his day in court to clear his good name.”
Full coverage of Mark Ridley-Thomas, his son and the USC School of Social Work.
Flynn is expected to formally enter her plea in court in coming weeks.
Her acknowledgment of guilt marks an ignominious end to a decades-long career. Until her ouster as dean, revelations of financial problems at the School of Social Work, and involvement in a federal corruption case, Flynn was regarded as a visionary in her field who had made USC the largest social work program in the world.
She cultivated ties with political leaders in the region and hosted county officials for dinner at her well-appointed home near the foot of Griffith Park. After the high-profile abuse death of 8-year-old Gabriel Fernandez in Palmdale, she served on the blue ribbon commission tasked with assessing the child welfare system’s failures.
She summed up her view of the profession in a 2014 lecture at USC.
“I think of social work as the force that makes the economy a society, and that as the economy grows, social work ensures that those who are at the bottom — those who are disregarded, those who are forgotten — rise in their sense of opportunity and prospect along with the rest,” Flynn said.
Police have arrested two teenagers in connection with the overdose death of a Bernstein High School student and the overdoses of several other students who survived, authorities announced Thursday.
The first suspect, a 15-year-old boy who attends Academic Performance Excellence Academy on the same Hollywood property as Bernstein H.S., was taken into custody Thursday morning, LAPD Chief Michel Moore announced during a news conference.
He faces several charges, including manslaughter.
Moore said the 15-year-old sold pills purported to be Percocet but were laced with fentanyl to Melanie Ramos, 15, and a friend on the school’s campus early Tuesday afternoon.
“It’s common practice today in the illicit pill market to use fentanyl to spike or enhance a drug,” explained Moore. “Typically and frequently, these result in overdoses because of the overabundance of fentanyl and the powerful nature of it.”
Investigators believe the girls crushed the pills into powder and snorted them in a restroom, and then apparently lost consciousness.
When one girl regained consciousness hours later, she walked out of the restroom and located her father who had been looking for her, Moore said.
Ramos was already dead.
“We have mixed emotions — angry, sad. We want answers,” said Gladys Manriques, a relative of Ramos. “Why was she found so late?’” asked Manriques. “To me, in a sense, the school could have done better in doing a sweep, like make sure all the kids are out of school. I’m pretty sure that’s a protocol.”
Melanie Ramos, 15-year-o;d Bernstein High School student who overdosed on fentanyl-laced pills. (Courtesy of Gladys Manriques)
Melanie Ramos, 15-year-o;d Bernstein High School student who overdosed on fentanyl-laced pills. (Courtesy of Gladys Manriques)
The second suspect, a 16-year-old boy who also attends Academic Performance Excellence Academy is accused of selling narcotics at nearby Lexington Park, where investigators say other students overdosed on the same pills.
Three students remained hospitalized Thursday.
“These are people who have been poisoned. These are murders,” Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti said, vowing to follow the drugs to the source. “We are not just interested in the final distributors of the pills that peddled this death. We want to go up that chain.”
“Our work does not stop because these two individuals -15 and 16 years of age – are simply transferring and soldiering this distribution,” said Moore. “There’s a drug organization behind this. We will identify who are supplying these drugs to these two individuals and I look forward to pursuing an aggressive prosecution for them because the trail of this does not end here.”
“To the parents who are affected by this tragedy, we wrap our arms of love around you and our hearts break with you,” said Garcetti. “We have no tolerance for this evil. Anybody who is involved with the distribution of this, the manufacturing of this, those who are enabling the dealers that allow this to happen, this will not end well for you.”
“Melanie’s life was cut [too] short unfortunately on September 13 2022,” reads a GoFundMe campaign set up for the Ramos family. “Please we ask you to keep an eye on who your kids hang out with and how they influence our kids.”
Mr Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, which has not gone according to plan, has weakened Russia. The Kremlin admits that the Russian army has suffered “significant losses”, while Western sanctions are putting the economy under intense pressure. In the Russia-China relationship, it feels more and more that Russia is the junior partner.
Tallahassee, Florida — Florida Governor Ron DeSantis on Wednesday flew two planes of immigrants to Martha’s Vineyard, escalating a tactic by Republican governors to draw attention to what they consider to be the Biden administration’s failed border policies. Flights to the upscale island enclave in Massachusetts were part of an effort to “transport illegal immigrants to sanctuary destinations,” said Taryn Fenske, DeSantis’ communications director.
While DeSantis’ office didn’t elaborate on their legal status, many migrants who cross the border illegally from Mexico are temporarily shielded from deportation after being freed by U.S. authorities to pursue asylum in immigration courts — as allowed under U.S. law and international treaty — or released on humanitarian parole.
Terry MacCormack, press secretary for Massachusetts’ Governor Charlie Baker, a Republican, said in a statement that the state’s executive was “in touch with local officials regarding the arrival of migrants in Martha’s Vineyard.”
“At this time, short-term shelter services are being provided by local officials, and the Administration will continue to support those efforts,” MacCormack said.
A woman, who is part of a group of immigrants that had just arrived, holds a child as they are fed outside St. Andrews Episcopal Church, September 14, 2022, in Edgartown, Mass., on Martha’s Vineyard.
Ray Ewing/AP
State Rep. Dylan Fernandes, who represents Martha’s Vineyard, tweeted: “Our island jumped into action putting together 50 beds, giving everyone a good meal, providing a play area for the children, making sure people have the healthcare and support they need. We are a community that comes together to support immigrants.”
Martha’s Vineyard’s Island Wide Regional Emergency Management said in a statement Wednesday afternoon that “approximately 50 individuals, to the best of our knowledge originating from Venezuela, landed at the Martha’s Vineyard Airport, seeking shelter.”
Immigrants gather with their belongings outside St. Andrews Episcopal Church, September 14, 2022, in Edgartown, Mass., on Martha’s Vineyard.
Ray Ewing/AP
“Town Emergency Management Operations from the six Island towns and the Sheriff’s Office, as well as County Management are actively collaborating to develop a coordinated regional response,” the statement said, adding “two emergency shelters have been established at local Island churches, with additional space available in case further arrivals occur.”
The emergency management teams had “reached out to our State and Federal partners for additional and long term support and assistance.”
Texas Governor Greg Abbott began busing thousands of migrants to Washington D.C. in April and recently added New York and Chicago as destinations. Arizona Governor Doug Ducey has been busing migrants to Washington since May. Passengers must sign waivers that the free trips are voluntary.
DeSantis, who is mentioned as a potential presidential candidate, appears to be taking the strategy to a new level by using planes and choosing Martha’s Vineyard, whose harbor towns that are home to about 15,000 people are far less prepared than New York or Washington for large influxes of migrants.
CBS Boston reported that the group of migrants wandered about three and a half miles from the airport to Edgartown, where Barbara Rush, of St. Andrews Church, said “Martha’s Vineyard Community Services had 50 people sort of literally walk up to their front door.”
CBS News immigration reporter Camilo Montoya-Galvez notes that, unlike the other cities Republican governors have chosen as destinations for migrants, Martha’s Vineyard is not an urban, metropolitan area with a robust social services infrastructure: There are no large refugee or migrant services organizations on the island. There’s no Justice Department immigration court where the migrants can attend asylum hearings. There’s no ICE field office where migrants can check in. As it hasn’t been a top destination for recent arrivals, the flights will also raise questions about whether all the migrants transported there on Wednesday knew where they were going.
Regardless, the move is likely to delight DeSantis’ supporters who deride Democrat-led, immigrant-friendly “sanctuary” cities, and anger critics who say he is weaponizing migrants as pawns for political gain.
“History does not look kindly on leaders who treat human beings like cargo, loading them up and sending them a thousand miles away without telling them their destination,” admonished Rep. Bill Keating, a Massachusetts Democrat.
The Florida Legislature appropriated $12 million to transport “illegal immigrants” from the state, consistent with federal law, Fenske said.
“States like Massachusetts, New York, and California will better facilitate the care of these individuals who they have invited into our country by incentivizing illegal immigration through their designation as ‘sanctuary states’ and support for the Biden Administration’s open border policies,” Fenske said.
“I think they’d have big problems. Big problems. I just don’t think they’d stand for it. They will not sit still and stand for this ultimate of hoaxes,” Trump said.
It’s not the first time Republicans have hinted at potential civil unrest if the DOJ indicts Trump. Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham made headlines last month when he said there would be “riots in the street” if “there is a prosecution of Donald Trump for mishandling classified information.” Graham’s comments were slammed as “irresponsible” and “shameful.” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre, without naming the South Carolina senator, said these comments from “extreme Republicans” were “dangerous.”
Hewitt appeared to see Trump’s comments as a nod toward potential unrest, asking the former president how he would respond when the “legacy media” accuses him of inciting violence.
“That’s not inciting. I’m just saying what my opinion is,” Trump said. “I don’t think the people of this country would stand for it.”
On Capitol Hill, senior FBI and DHS officials briefed members of the Senate Judiciary and Homeland Security committees Thursday on the uptick in threats against federal law enforcement in the aftermath of the Mar-a-Lago search. Senators said the briefers didn’t specifically pinpoint a politician or political party when it comes to the threats, but they said the trend was clear.
“It was stunning the number of threats that have been cataloged since the Aug. 8 search of Mar-a-Lago,” Senate Judiciary Chair Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) said after the briefing, specifically mentioning the gunman who tried to enter an FBI building in Cincinnati, Ohio, in the days following the search. “It’s a much more dangerous environment because of the political statements made by some individuals since Aug. 8 — it’s alarming to me.”
Durbin said the threats ranged from explicit and specific to more generalized ones, most notably on social media. He also called out Trump for his rhetoric.
“Inviting a mob to return to the streets is exactly what happened here on Jan. 6, 2021. This president knew what he was doing…and we saw the results,” Durbin added. “His careless, inflammatory rhetoric has its consequences.”
Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.), a Trump ally and member of the Homeland Security Committee, said after the briefing that the Justice Department needed to be more transparent about the justification for the search in order to push back against “conspiracies.”
“You have to give people good information so these rumors don’t continue,” Scott said, condemning attacks on law enforcement. “I don’t know why they raided the former president’s house … They know the conspiracy theories that are out there. So convince people that they’re not true.”
The FBI search of Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence in Florida sparked a political firestorm last month. According to a Justice Department court filing released in August, prosecutors obtained a search warrant for the estate after receiving evidence there was “likely” an effort to conceal classified documents at the residence in defiance of a grand jury subpoena. Agents recovered highly classified records mixed among personal items, in addition to dozens of empty folders with classified markings.
The DOJ and Trump’s lawyers are now in the midst of legal deliberations on an outside review of the seized documents.
Graham, one of Trump’s staunchest Capitol Hill allies, echoed concerns that the Justice Department may have overstepped in its dealings with the former president. But he left open the possibility that the department’s probe could uncover material that might justify an indictment.
“There’s a belief from many on the right that the DOJ and the FBI have been less than unbiased when it comes to Trump. But having said that, nobody’s above the law including the president, but the law’s gonna be about politics,” Graham said. “So let’s wait and see what they find. I’ve got an open mind about what they find, but they need to have something that would justify what I think is political escalation.”
Speaking with Hewitt on Thursday, Trump continued to use the defense that he “declassified” everything he took to Mar-a-Lago, a claim his legal team has thus far declined to make in court.
Rhetoric that could be seen as alluding to violence is not out of character for Trump. In his speech on Jan. 6, 2021, to supporters before rioters stormed the Capitol in an effort to block the certification of President Joe Biden’s Electoral College victory, the then-president told the crowd to “fight much harder” against “bad people” and to “show strength.” His comments that day have been a focal point of Jan. 6 select committee’s investigation into the president and his inner circle, with investigators using one of their summer hearings to make the case that Trump’s efforts to hold on to power resonated with extremist groups and brought them to the Capitol.
A Massachusetts state senator said Wednesday that dozens of migrants arrived on Martha’s Vineyard Wednesday afternoon via charter flights.
Julian Cyr, the state representative serving Cape Cod, Martha’s Vineyard, and Nantucket, claimed that the charter flights arrived from Texas.
The group of approximately 50 Venezuelan migrants, some of them children, were brought to Martha’s Vineyard Regional High School, where they were given snacks and shelter. They were being cared for Wednesday night by two shelters in Edgartown.
“We’re going to take care of you,” Dukes County Sheriff Robert Ogden told the migrants, according to the Martha’s Vineyard Times.
“My understanding is there was no advance communication or notice that this plane and these people were arriving,” Cyr told WCVB. “The officials on Martha’s Vineyard, municipal and county officials, scrambled but did a pretty remarkable job to welcome these families.”
Barb Rush and others at St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church on Summer Street in Edgartown have been working all day to help the families she says are from Venezuela, some with children as young as 2.
“Many of them seem overwhelmed,” Rush said. “We’ve received calls from restaurants offering food, people trying to help. It’s amazing.”
“Florida can confirm the two planes with illegal immigrants that arrived in Martha’s Vineyard [Wednesday] were part of the state’s relocation program to transport illegal immigrants to sanctuary destinations,” a statement from Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ office obtained by WCVB sister station WESH in Orlando said.
“States like Massachusetts, New York, and California will better facilitate the care of these individuals who they have invited into our country by incentivizing illegal immigration through their designation as ‘sanctuary states’ and support for the Biden Administration’s open border policies,” the statement said.
DeSantis, who is running for reelection this year and is a potential 2024 presidential contender, has repeatedly criticized President Joe Biden’s immigration policies.
During an event Thursday, DeSantis said his office has have “worked on innovative ways to be able to protect the state of Florida from the impact of Biden’s border policies.”
“If you have folks that are inclined to think Florida’s a good place, our message to them is we are not a sanctuary state, and it’s better to be able to go to a sanctuary jurisdiction. And yes, we will help facilitate that transport for you to be able to go to greener pastures,” DeSantis said.
Online flight records show at least two private planes that began the day in San Antonio, Texas, also made stops in Florida’s panhandle, before later arriving on the island.
It was not immediately clear who paid for the private charter flights to the island; however, the statement from the governor’s spokesperson said the Florida Legislature appropriated $12 million to implement a program to facilitate the transport of undocumented immigrants from the state.
“The Baker-Polito Administration is in touch with local officials regarding the arrival of migrants in Martha’s Vineyard,” a written statement from Gov. Charlie Baker’s office said. “At this time, short-term shelter services are being provided by local officials, and the administration will continue to support those efforts.”
“This is an island that is in the business of welcoming people,” Cyr said. “But it’s pretty disgusting that a state or a governor or whoever this is would capitalize on the unfortunate, dire circumstances of these families who are just looking for a better life. To capitalize that for a political stunt or for a ‘gotcha’ moment. That’s just disgusting.”
“Gov. Ron DeSantis could learn a lesson from Massachusetts on what patriotism and liberty really look like if he weren’t so busy using humans as props in a cruel stunt to buoy his pathetic political aspirations,” Massachusetts U.S. Sen. Ed Markey wrote in a post on social media. “To those who’ve just landed: we gladly embrace you.”
WCVB has also reached out to U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s office for comment.
Information from WESH and the Associated Press was used in this report.
Mr. Biden and his economic team had increasingly inserted themselves in the talks over the past week, hoping to avoid a work stoppage that would have snarled the distribution of food, chemicals for water treatment plants and other critical goods across the country. Such a stoppage also risked creating shortages on store shelves that could have sent consumer prices soaring, further adding to an inflation rate that reached a four-decade high this summer.
Unions and the freight rail industry were negotiating ahead of a Friday deadline, when a federally imposed “cooling-off period” was set to end and workers would have been free to strike if no deal had been reached. That possibility had already shaken both freight and passenger rail companies.
Nearly a third of U.S. freight moves by rail, second only to trucking. The Association of American Railroads estimated that a nationwide rail service interruption would have idled more than 7,000 trains daily and cost the economy more than $2 billion a day.
Railroads began warning their customers last week that they would prepare for a strike by cutting back some services. Union Pacific, CSX and BNSF all said that they would begin securing hazardous and toxic materials on Monday to try to ensure that dangerous goods would not be left unguarded in the event of a strike. Norfolk Southern closed its gates to shipping containers coming off trucks and ships on Tuesday, and said it planned to begin shutting down its network entirely at midnight on Thursday.
Administration officials had begun making contingency plans for trying to minimize disruptions for critical shipments in the event of a strike. Those plans included working with trucking companies, ocean shippers and other alternative forms of transportation to ensure some supplies could still get to their destinations.
Niraj Chokshi and Ana Swanson contributed reporting.
Tallahassee, Florida — Florida Governor Ron DeSantis on Wednesday flew two planes of immigrants to Martha’s Vineyard, escalating a tactic by Republican governors to draw attention to what they consider to be the Biden administration’s failed border policies. Flights to the upscale island enclave in Massachusetts were part of an effort to “transport illegal immigrants to sanctuary destinations,” said Taryn Fenske, DeSantis’ communications director.
While DeSantis’ office didn’t elaborate on their legal status, many migrants who cross the border illegally from Mexico are temporarily shielded from deportation after being freed by U.S. authorities to pursue asylum in immigration courts — as allowed under U.S law and international treaty — or released on humanitarian parole.
Terry MacCormack, press secretary for Massachusetts’ Governor Charlie Baker, a Republican, said in a statement that the state’s executive was “in touch with local officials regarding the arrival of migrants in Martha’s Vineyard.”
“At this time, short-term shelter services are being provided by local officials, and the Administration will continue to support those efforts,” MacCormack said.
A woman, who is part of a group of immigrants that had just arrived, holds a child as they are fed outside St. Andrews Episcopal Church, September 14, 2022, in Edgartown, Mass., on Martha’s Vineyard.
Ray Ewing/AP
State Rep. Dylan Fernandes, who represents Martha’s Vineyard, tweeted: “Our island jumped into action putting together 50 beds, giving everyone a good meal, providing a play area for the children, making sure people have the healthcare and support they need. We are a community that comes together to support immigrants.”
Martha’s Vineyard’s Island Wide Regional Emergency Management said in a statement Wednesday afternoon that “approximately 50 individuals, to the best of our knowledge originating from Venezuela, landed at the Martha’s Vineyard Airport, seeking shelter.”
Immigrants gather with their belongings outside St. Andrews Episcopal Church, September 14, 2022, in Edgartown, Mass., on Martha’s Vineyard.
Ray Ewing/AP
“Town Emergency Management Operations from the six Island towns and the Sheriff’s Office, as well as County Management are actively collaborating to develop a coordinated regional response,” the statement said, adding “two emergency shelters have been established at local Island churches, with additional space available in case further arrivals occur.”
The emergency management teams had “reached out to our State and Federal partners for additional and long term support and assistance.”
Texas Governor Greg Abbott began busing thousands of migrants to Washington D.C. in April and recently added New York and Chicago as destinations. Arizona Governor Doug Ducey has been busing migrants to Washington since May. Passengers must sign waivers that the free trips are voluntary.
DeSantis, who is mentioned as a potential presidential candidate, appears to be taking the strategy to a new level by using planes and choosing Martha’s Vineyard, whose harbor towns that are home to about 15,000 people are far less prepared than New York or Washington for large influxes of migrants.
CBS Boston reported that the group of migrants wandered about three and a half miles from the airport to Edgartown, where Barbara Rush, of St. Andrews Church, said “Martha’s Vineyard Community Services had 50 people sort of literally walk up to their front door.”
CBS News immigration reporter Camilo Montoya-Galvez notes that, unlike the other cities Republican governors have chosen as destinations for migrants, Martha’s Vineyard is not an urban, metropolitan area with a robust social services infrastructure: There are no large refugee or migrant services organizations on the island. There’s no Justice Department immigration court where the migrants can attend asylum hearings. There’s no ICE field office where migrants can check in. As it hasn’t been a top destination for recent arrivals, the flights will also raise questions about whether all the migrants transported there on Wednesday knew where they were going.
Regardless, the move is likely to delight DeSantis’ supporters who deride Democrat-led, immigrant-friendly “sanctuary” cities, and anger critics who say he is weaponizing migrants as pawns for political gain.
“History does not look kindly on leaders who treat human beings like cargo, loading them up and sending them a thousand miles away without telling them their destination,” admonished Rep. Bill Keating, a Massachusetts Democrat.
The Florida Legislature appropriated $12 million to transport “illegal immigrants” from the state, consistent with federal law, Fenske said.
“States like Massachusetts, New York, and California will better facilitate the care of these individuals who they have invited into our country by incentivizing illegal immigration through their designation as ‘sanctuary states’ and support for the Biden Administration’s open border policies,” Fenske said.
KYIV, Sept 15 (Reuters) – Russian forces in eastern Ukraine are fortifying their defences and it will be hard for Kyiv’s troops to repeat the rapid success of their recent lightning counter offensive, a senior regional Ukrainian official warned on Thursday.
The sobering assessment was issued as Russian President Vladimir Putin told Xi Jinping, his Chinese counterpart, in a rare face-to-face meeting, that he understood that Xi had questions and concerns about the situation in Ukraine but welcomed China’s “balanced position”. read more
Thousands of miles to the west, Ursula von der Leyen, the president of the European Commission, was holding talks in Kyiv with President Volodymyr Zelenskiy about helping Ukraine move closer to joining the European Union.
Putin’s meeting with Xi, in Uzbekistan, was their first since Russia invaded Ukraine on Feb. 24. The Russian leader has yet to publicly comment on a severe setback suffered by his forces this month in eastern Ukraine. read more
The stunning reversal occurred in the northeastern region of Kharkiv after Ukrainian troops made a rapid armoured thrust, forcing a rushed and chaotic Russian withdrawal which left dozens of tanks and other armoured vehicles abandoned in haste.
Kyiv says it recaptured more than 8,000 sq km (3000 sq miles), nearly equivalent to the size of the island of Cyprus. The speed of the advance has lifted Ukrainian morale, pleased Western backers who have provided arms, intelligence and training, and raised hopes of further significant gains before the winter sets in.
But Serhiy Gaidai, governor of Ukraine’s eastern Luhansk region, warned that it would be a tough fight to wrest control of his region back from Russia, which recognises it as an independent state controlled by separatists.
“Here the Russians are digging in at Svatove and Troitske,” Gaidai told Ukrainian TV, referring to two settlements in Luhansk.
“Heavy fighting continues in many directions, including in (the) Luhansk region. The Kharkiv ‘instant scenario’ will not be repeated. We will have to fight hard for our region. The Russians are preparing for defence.”
Oleksiy Danilov, secretary of Ukraine’s national security and defence council, said in an online post: “We should avoid euphoria. There is still a lot of work to be done to liberate our lands, and Russia has a large number of weapons.”
There was no let-up either in Russia’s daily missiles strikes on Ukraine, a day after it fired cruise missiles at a reservoir dam near Kryvyi Rih, President’s Zelenskiy’s hometown.
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Russian President Vladimir Putin talks to Chinese President Xi Jinping during a meeting on the sidelines of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) summit in Samarkand, Uzbekistan September 15, 2022. Sputnik/Alexandr Demyanchuk/Pool via REUTERS
Authorities in the city of Kharkiv said Russian shells had hit a high-pressure gas pipeline, while a rescue operation was underway in the city of Bakhmut with four people suspected to be trapped under rubble after a strike, Pavlo Kyrylenko, the Donetsk regional governor, said.
Russian forces had launched attacks on several settlements on the Kharkiv frontline in the past 24 hours, the General Staff of Ukraine’s Armed Forces said on Thursday.
But Britain’s defence ministry said in an update that Ukraine’s forces were continuing to consolidate their control of newly liberated land in the region.
The United States, which has provided billions in aid to Ukraine, is expected to deliver a new security assistance package soon, White House spokesman John Kirby told MSNBC in an interview on Thursday.
Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova warned Washington to tread carefully, saying any decision to supply Kyiv with longer-range missiles for U.S.-made HIMARS systems would cross a “red line” and make the United States “a direct party to the conflict”. read more
Ukraine’s swiftest advance since driving Russian forces away from the capital in March has turned the tide in the six-month war
WAR CRIMES INVESTIGATION
On Wednesday, the first teams of war crimes prosecutors, both Ukrainian and international, gained early access to begin investigating the vast swathes of recently liberated territory.
They said initial indications were that widespread atrocities appear to have taken place.
Nigel Povoas, a British lawyer who went to the newly recaptured territory as part of an international team helping Ukraine with war crimes investigations, said the long Russian occupation of such a large area meant atrocities there were likely to have reached “an unprecedented level of horror”.
“Widespread civilian torture and executions appear to have occurred at make-shift detention centres around the region, for example, in Balakliia and Izium,” he said. The evidence so far was “following a similarly dreadful pattern” to that in cities occupied early in the war by Russian troops near Kyiv.
Russia denies that its forces commit war crimes, casting allegations as fabrications designed to besmirch the reputation of its armed forces.
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