AFRICA
Trump defends executive order to keep families together in Minnesota rally
Hours after signing his divisive executive order to prevent the separation of immigrant families at the U.S. border, President Donald Trump made a public appearance in Minnesota and defended his decision.
He highlighted that, despite having intentions of keeping families together, he is still looking to push forward border security. While his supporters cheered for his measures, several of them surprisingly stated that they would prefer for the measure to have stayed the same. Many of them echoed the previous arguments given by the Trump administration to defend the legislation, such as saying that the children’s parents were the ones who endangered them by bringing them to the country illegally and that it is the U.S.’ duty to enforce the law.
The event was part of his re-election campaign, and he also addressed the rise in employment, negotiations with North Korea and tax reforms as accomplishments of his administration. He even mentioned the fact that he lost the last election in Minnesota, and that he planned to increase voters for the next election. He said: “We came this close to winning the state of Minnesota and in two and half years it’s going to be really easy, I think. I needed one more visit, one more speech. That’s why — never give up, never, ever give up.” This might not be as easy as Trump sets it out to be, as the state has historically been dominated by Democrats. Trump didn’t go through the rally without his usual mention to Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, stating that “A vote for a Democrat in Congress is really a vote for [her].”
Minnesota also features four of the most competitive House districts in the U.S. Democrats are hoping that suburban districts will show their dissatisfaction with the current administration in both the coming elections in November and the ones in 2020.
The latest decision has been quite controversial, as the order says nothing about the children who have already been separated and tries to solve the previous problem by detaining entire families in facilities. This executive order comes after several days filled with criticism towards the Trump administration, which was not eased by its officials during press briefings. The controversy only increased after video and audio recordings of undocumented children surfaced online. The heartbreaking videos showed children being held in cages during the first days of the separation, and the audio featured children crying and calling out for their parents.
Prior to Wednesday’s executive order, The White House defended their policies by claiming that they were merely following existing immigration laws, and blamed the children’s parents for ‘endangering’ them by bringing them to the country ‘illegally.’ They also stated falsely that the measure was set by the previous administration and that only Congress could act against it and stop it. Tensions reached a high point on Tuesday during a press briefing with National Security Secretary Kristjen Nielsen. Nielsen echoed the claims previously made by Attorney General Jeff Sessions and Press Secretary Sarah Sanders and even stated that the administration would not apologize for their policies.
His officials’ incompetence to help their arguments reportedly angered President Trump, who chose to take the issue himself and called for a press briefing. While Trump still blamed the Democrats for his own administration’s policies, he attempted to humanize his administration by stating his concern regarding the subject.
When it comes to how the President will proceed in the near future, it is still unclear if he will both keep undocumented families together and treat undocumented children humanely while they remain in government custody. Barack Obama faced this same issue during his presidency, and the executive order that Obama signed to solve the problem was heavily criticized by Trump during his 2016 campaign.
These aides have also stated that Trump’s executive order is intended to pressure Democrats to move forward with either Paul Ryan or Ted Cruz’s GOP-backed immigration bills.
As the tab for Britain’s controversial proposal to relocate asylum seekers to the East African nation continues to increase, the United Kingdom paid Rwanda an extra 100 million pounds ($126 million) in April. This was in addition to the 140 million pounds it had already provided Rwanda.
Even though the Rwanda project is at the core of the policy that British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak is employing to discourage illegal immigration, there have been no individuals sent to Rwanda as of yet due to legal challenges that have taken place since the initiative was introduced in 2022.
After Sunak’s immigration minister resigned this week, the polarizing policy is now regarded as a danger to Sunak’s leadership, which is anticipated to be challenged in the election that will take place the following year.
According to a letter that the British Ministry of the Interior issued on Thursday, the United Kingdom plans to give Rwanda fifty million pounds in addition to the 240 million pounds it has already provided to the East African nation.
The opposition Labour Party criticized the disclosures regarding the rising cost of a scheme that legal experts warned could collapse. Some parliamentarians within Sunak’s party are also expected to express their disapproval of the idea.
A statement by Yvette Cooper, the shadow interior minister for the Labour Party, on social networking site X, said, “Britain cannot afford more of this costly Tory chaos and farce.”
On Friday, however, the newly appointed minister for legal migration, Tom Pursglove, explained what he called the “investment” of 240 million pounds. He stated that once the Rwanda policy was operational, it would reduce the money spent on hosting asylum-seekers in the United Kingdom.
“When you consider that we are unacceptably spending 8 million pounds a day in the asylum system at the moment, it is a key part of our strategy to bring those costs down,” Pursglove explained to Sky News.
Pursglove stated that the money donated to Rwanda would assist in the country’s economic growth and help get the asylum relationship with the United Kingdom up and running.
There was no connection between the money sent to Rwanda and the treaty that the two nations signed on Tuesday, according to the letter from the Ministry of the Interior.
The treaty aims to respond to a ruling by the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom, which stated that the deportation plan would contravene local laws based on international human rights standards.
“The Government of Rwanda did not ask for any payment in order for a Treaty to be signed, nor was any offered,” according to the correspondence.
After Robert Jenrick resigned from his position as immigration minister on Wednesday, Sunak made a plea to fellow Conservative parliamentarians on Thursday to come together in support of his Rwanda proposal. He stated that the emergency legislation the government had drafted to get the scheme up and running did not go far enough.
On Tuesday, the Minister of the Interior of the United Kingdom, James Cleverly, came to Rwanda to sign a new treaty. This was done to circumvent a court judgment that blocked the government’s contentious policy of transferring asylum seekers to the East African nation.
The Rwandan plan is at the core of the government’s attempt to reduce migration, and it is being closely monitored by other nations who are considered to be considering policies that are comparable to Rwanda’s.
In a decision handed down a month ago, the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom stated that such a move would violate international human rights norms embedded in domestic legislation.
Following the decision, the United Kingdom has been making efforts to revise its agreement with Rwanda to incorporate a legally binding treaty that guarantees Rwanda would not remove asylum seekers brought there by the United Kingdom. This is one of the primary concerns of the court.
Several attorneys and charitable organizations have said that it is highly improbable that deportation flights will begin before the election. With a lead of more than ten percentage points in the polls, the opposition Labour Party intends to abandon the Rwanda policy if it is victorious.
A meeting between Cleverly, who arrived in Kigali, the capital of Rwanda, on Tuesday morning, and Vincent Biruta, the country’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, is scheduled to take place to sign the agreement.
“Rwanda cares deeply about the rights of refugees, and I look forward to meeting with counterparts to sign this agreement and further discuss how we work together to tackle the global challenge of illegal migration,” Cleverly says.
The United Kingdom aims to transfer thousands of asylum seekers who came to its beaches without authorization to Rwanda under the plan that was agreed upon the previous year. This discourages migrants from crossing the Channel from Europe in tiny boats.
In exchange, Rwanda has been given an initial payment of 140 million pounds, equivalent to 180 million dollars, along with the promise of additional funds to cover the costs of housing and medical treatment for any deported persons.
THE PRESSURE
A great deal of pressure is being put on Prime Minister Rishi Sunak to reduce net migration, which reached a record high of 745 thousand people in the previous year, with the vast majority of migrants entering through legal channels.
“Stop the boats” is one of the five goals that Sunak has set for his government. The influx of asylum seekers who pay people smugglers for their crossings of the Channel, which frequently take place in boats that are overloaded and not seaworthy, is one of the aims that Sunak has set.
The Supreme Court determined that the Rwanda plan should not be implemented because there was a possibility that refugees who were deported would have their claims incorrectly evaluated or that they would be sent back to their country of origin to suffer persecution.
In the latter part of this week, it is anticipated that the new treaty will be followed by the release of legislation declaring Rwanda a so-called safe nation. This law is intended to prevent legal challenges against the planned deportation flights.
Despite this, this will probably result in a fresh set of political and legal difficulties.
An immigration attorney at Harbottle & Lewis named Sarah Gogan stated that the government’s policy will be challenged due to Rwanda’s history of violations of human rights provisions.
“Rwanda is an unsafe country and this is not a quick fix,” added the politician. “You cannot in a matter of weeks or months reform a country and turn it into one with an impartial judiciary and administrative culture.”
Another “gimmick” was what Yvette Cooper, the spokesperson for the Labour Party’s home affairs department, called the most recent measures proposed by the administration.
Whether or not to design the law in a way that would avoid subsequent legal challenges is still up for debate by the administration.
Several members of the Conservative Party in parliament are putting pressure on the government to incorporate a “notwithstanding” clause into Rwanda’s policy. This clause would disapprove the domestic and international human rights commitments of the United Kingdom regarding Rwanda.
However, some politicians within the ruling party, such as Robert Buckland, have stated that such a move would be “foolish” and undermine the Good Friday Agreement, which is primarily responsible for ending three decades of carnage in Northern Ireland. This is because the European Convention on Human Rights supports the treaty.
On Friday, the High Constitutional Court of Madagascar certified Andry Rajoelina, the current President of Madagascar, to be the victor of the election a month ago, essentially granting him a third term in office.
Following the dismissal of several challenges submitted against the preliminary results by the electoral board, the court said that Rajoelina collected 58.96% of the votes that were cast.
Florent Rakotoarisoa, the chairman of the High constitutional court, stated that “Andry Rajoelina is elected as the president of the republic of Madagascar and is taking his functions as soon as the swearing (is conducted) comes to an end.”
The rejected challenge was submitted by the politician Siteny Randrianasoloniaiko, who received 14.39% of the vote, according to the court. This was one of the challenges that was denied.
Ten of the thirteen candidates chose not to participate in the election; nevertheless, their names were already on the ballot, so they could still divide the remaining votes. The court reported that the turnout was 46.35 percent.
The election on November 16 was preceded by weeks of demonstrations, during which the opposition accused Rajoelina of having fostered conditions that were unjust to the election.
The charges that the vote was rigged have been refuted by Rajoelina, and the army has issued a warning against any attempts to destabilize the country.
As far as the opposition is concerned, the voter turnout for the election was the lowest it has ever been in the country’s history.
Hajo Andrianainarivelo, a former minister who was one of the candidates who chose to abstain from voting, has committed to fight against what he has described as a lack of respect for the rules of the state and the tyranny of the people.
“The popular fight begins now,” he declared on Thursday referring to the ongoing conflict.
Rajoelina, now 49 years old, initially won power in a coup in 2009. After resigning from his position as the head of a transitional authority in 2014, he went on to win another election in 2018 and regain his position as president.
Despair in Gaza as fighting intensifies despite Israel’s promise to scale back the war.
The Maldives upgrades ties with China amid pivot from India.
Ecuador’s president says the country is at war as gangs hold prison staff hostage.
Despair in Gaza as fighting intensifies despite Israel’s promise to scale back the war.
The Maldives upgrades ties with China amid pivot from India.
