US domestic policy

Rand Paul promises Covid review if Republicans retake Senate in midterms

The Kentucky senator Rand Paul promised on Saturday to wage a vigorous review into the origins of the coronavirus if Republicans retake the Senate and he lands a committee chairmanship.

Speaking to supporters at a campaign rally, the senator denounced what he sees as government overreach in response to Covid-19. He applauded a recent judge’s order that voided the federal mask mandate on planes and trains and in travel hubs.

“Last week I was on an airplane for the first time in two years and didn’t have to wear a mask,” he said, drawing cheers. “And you know what I saw in the airport? I saw at least 97% of the other free individuals not wearing masks.”

Paul has clashed repeatedly with Dr Anthony Fauci, the top US infectious disease expert, over government policies and the origins of the virus.

Paul, who is seeking a third term, said he was in line to assume a committee chairmanship if the GOP wins Senate control. The Senate has a 50-50 split, with the vice-president, Kamala Harris, the tie-breaking vote.

“When we take over in November, I will be chairman of a committee and I will have subpoena power,” Paul said. “And we will get to the bottom of where this virus came from.”

The senator, an ophthalmologist before politics, continued to offer his theory about the origins of the virus.

Fauci to Rand Paul: 'You do not know what you are talking about' – video — Fauci to Rand Paul: ‘You do not know what you are talking about’ – video

“If you look at the evidence, overwhelmingly, not 100%, but overwhelmingly the evidence points to this virus being a leak from a lab,” Paul said.

Many US conservatives have accused Chinese scientists of developing Covid-19 in a lab and allowing it to leak.

US intelligence agencies remain divided on the origins of the coronavirus but believe China did not know about the virus before the start of the global pandemic, according a Biden-ordered review released last summer.

The scientific consensus remains that the virus most likely migrated from animals. So-called “spillover events” occur in nature and there are at least two coronaviruses that evolved in bats and caused human epidemics, SARS1 and MERS.

At the Kentucky rally, the Senate Republican leader, Mitch McConnell, the state’s senior senator, also pointed to Paul’s opportunity to lead a committee. If that occurs, he said, Paul would become chairman of “one of the most important committees in the Senate – in charge of health, education, labor and pensions”.

McConnell was upbeat about Republican prospects in November.

“I’ve never seen a better environment for us than this year,” said McConnell, who is in line to again become majority leader.

The rally featured other prominent Kentucky Republicans, including several considering running for governor in 2023, when Andy Beshear, a Democrat, will seek a second term.

In his speech, Paul railed against socialism, saying it would encroach on individual liberties. The senator was first elected to the Senate in the Tea Party wave of 2010.

'Kindles the crazies': Fauci tells Rand Paul his accusations incite death threats – video — ‘Kindles the crazies’: Fauci tells Rand Paul his accusations incite death threats – video

“When President Trump said he wanted to ‘Make America Great Again’, I said, ‘Amen,’” Paul said. “But let’s understand what made America great in the first place, and that’s freedom, constitutionally guaranteed liberty.”

Charles Booker is by far the best known Democrats seeking their party’s nomination for Paul’s seat in the 17 May primary. Paul is being challenged by several little-known candidates. A general election campaign between Paul and Booker would be a battle between candidates with starkly different philosophies.

Booker, a Black former state lawmaker, narrowly lost a bid for the Democratic nomination in 2020. He is a progressive who touts Medicare for all, anti-poverty programs, a clean-energy agenda and criminal justice changes.

Paul, a former presidential candidate, has accumulated a massive fundraising advantage.

Kentucky has not elected a Democrat to the US Senate since Wendell Ford in 1992.

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Republicans have taken up the politics of bigotry, putting US democracy at risk | Robert Reich

Republicans are outraged – outraged! – at the surge of migrants at the southern border. The House minority leader, Kevin McCarthy, declares it a “crisis … created by the presidential policies of this new administration”. The Arizona congressman Andy Biggs claims, “we go through some periods where we have these surges, but right now is probably the most dramatic that I’ve seen at the border in my lifetime.”

Donald Trump demands the Biden administration “immediately complete the wall, which can be done in a matter of weeks – they should never have stopped it. They are causing death and human tragedy.”

“Our country is being destroyed!” he adds.

In fact, there’s no surge of migrants at the border.

US Customs and Border Protection apprehended 28% more migrants from January to February this year than in previous months. But this was largely seasonal. Two years ago, apprehensions increased 31% during the same period. Three years ago, it was about 25% from February to March. Migrants start coming when winter ends and the weather gets a bit warmer, then stop coming in the hotter summer months when the desert is deadly.

To be sure, there is a humanitarian crisis of children detained in overcrowded border facilities. And an even worse humanitarian tragedy in the violence and political oppression in Central America, worsened by US policies over the years, that drives migration in the first place.

But the “surge” has been fabricated by Republicans in order to stoke fear – and, not incidentally, to justify changes in laws they say are necessary to prevent non-citizens from voting.

designed to make it harder for people to vote – especially the young, the poor, Black people and Hispanic Americans, all of whom are likely to vote for Democrats – by eliminating mail-in ballots, reducing times for voting, decreasing the number of drop-off boxes, demanding proof of citizenship, even making it a crime to give water to people waiting in line to vote.

To stop this, Democrats are trying to enact a sweeping voting rights bill, the For the People Act, which protects voting, ends partisan gerrymandering and keeps dark money out of elections. It passed the House but Republicans in the Senate are fighting it with more lies.

On Wednesday, the Texas Republican senator Ted Cruz falsely claimed the new bill would register millions of undocumented migrants to vote and accused Democrats of wanting the most violent criminals to cast ballots too.

The core message of the Republican party now consists of lies about a “crisis” of violent migrants crossing the border, lies that they’re voting illegally, and blatantly anti-democratic demands voting be restricted to counter it.

The party that once championed lower taxes, smaller government, states’ rights and a strong national defense now has more in common with anti-democratic regimes and racist-nationalist political movements around the world than with America’s avowed ideals of democracy, rule of law and human rights.

Donald Trump isn’t single-handedly responsible for this, but he demonstrated to the GOP the political potency of bigotry and the GOP has taken him up on it.

This transformation in one of America’s two eminent political parties has shocking implications, not just for the future of American democracy but for the future of democracy everywhere.

“I predict to you, your children or grandchildren are going to be doing their doctoral thesis on the issue of who succeeded: autocracy or democracy?” Joe Biden opined at his news conference on Thursday.

In his maiden speech at the state department on 4 March, Antony Blinken conceded that the erosion of democracy around the world is “also happening here in the United States”.

The secretary of state didn’t explicitly talk about the Republican party, but there was no mistaking his subject.

“When democracies are weak … they become more vulnerable to extremist movements from the inside and to interference from the outside,” he warned.

People around the world witnessing the fragility of American democracy “want to see whether our democracy is resilient, whether we can rise to the challenge here at home. That will be the foundation for our legitimacy in defending democracy around the world for years to come.”

That resilience and legitimacy will depend in large part on whether Republicans or Democrats prevail on voting rights.

Not since the years leading up to the civil war has the clash between the nation’s two major parties so clearly defined the core challenge facing American democracy.

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Mayorkas blames Trump for border woes as Republicans attack Biden

The Biden administration is facing mounting pressure over a surge of unaccompanied migrant children crossing into the US, with the numbers seeking asylum at a 20-year high that is placing federal facilities and shelters under immense strain.

The homeland security secretary, Alejandro Mayorkas, took to the political talk show circuit on Sunday to press the administration’s case that it is doing all it can. He continued to refer to the problem as a “challenge” not a “crisis”, attempting to put blame squarely on the previous incumbent of the White House, Donald Trump.

“It is taking time and it is difficult because the entire system was dismantled by the prior administration,” Mayorkas told CNN’s State of the Union. “There was a system in place that was torn down by the Trump administration.”

On ABC’s This Week, Mayorkas highlighted the tougher aspects of Joe Biden’s border policy, stressing that the administration was still expelling families and single adults under a regulation known as Title 42. He insisted largely Central American migrants arriving in increasing numbers were being given a clear message: “Do not come. The border is closed. The border is secure.”

But prominent Republicans have seized on the border difficulties as an opportunity to attack Biden for being soft on immigration.

Donald Trump said Mayorkas was “clueless” and called on him to complete the border wall.

first acts as president, Biden scrapped Trump’s hardline policy of sending unaccompanied children seeking asylum back to Mexico.

Under Biden’s guidelines, unaccompanied minors were exempted from the Title 42 rules and shielded from expulsion. That was deemed in line with the president’s pledge to achieve a “fair, safe and orderly” immigration system.

On Sunday, Mayorkas said the new approach addressed the humanitarian needs of migrant children “in a way that reflects our values and principles as a country”. But in the past few weeks, the numbers of minors seeking asylum has grown so rapidly that it has outpaced capacity to process the children in line with immigration laws.

72 hours allowed under immigration law.

There have been reports of overcrowding and harsh conditions in federal facilities in Texas. The Associated Press reported that some children were said by immigration lawyers to be sleeping on the floor after bedding ran out.

The government has tried to move as many children as possible into shelters run by the US Refugee Office, but they in turn have become stressed. There are now more than 9,500 children in shelters and short-term housing along the border. Non-governmental groups working with migrants and refugees have been forced to scramble to deal with the sudden demand for shelter.

As the administration struggles to keep a grip on events, it is also coming under criticism from Republicans and media outlets for refusing to allow reporters inside the beleaguered CBP facilities where children are being held. On Friday, Mayorkas visited El Paso in Texas with a bipartisan congressional delegation. Reporters were not allowed to follow them.

US Customs and Border Protection agents take people into custody near the Mexico border in Hidalgo, Texas. — US Customs and Border Protection agents take people into custody near the Mexico border in Hidalgo, Texas, on Saturday. Photograph: Julio Cortez/AP

The Texas Republican senator Ted Cruz, called the move “outrageous and unacceptable”. In a tweet, he said: “No press. No cameras. What is Biden hiding?”

Quizzed by Fox News Sunday about the apparent lack of accountability, despite Biden’s promise to bring “trust and transparency” back to public affairs, Mayorkas said the administration was “working on providing access” to border patrol stations.

But he added: “First things first – we are focused on operations and executing our plans.”

While the political heat is rising at the border, moves are under way in Washington to try and find a longer-term fix to the age-old immigration conundrum. Last week the House of Representatives passed a bill that would give “Dreamers”, undocumented migrants brought to the US as children, a pathway to citizenship.

The legislation has an uncertain future in the Senate, given its 50-50 split and the need to reach 60 votes to pass most major legislation.

Dick Durbin, a Democratic senator from Illinois who has introduced a similar Dream Act to the Senate five times in the past 20 years, told CNN that he thought he was close to securing the necessary 60 votes. He also decried the current debate about whether there was a “crisis” or “challenge” at the border.

“We need to address our immigration laws in this country that are broken,” he said. “What you see at the border is one piece of evidence of that, but there’s much more.”

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Biden officials visit US-Mexico border to monitor increase in crossings

The new US secretary of homeland security, Alejandro Mayorkas, led a visit by Biden administration officials to the border with Mexico on Saturday, amid a growing number of border crossings and criticism by Republicans that a crisis is brewing.

Joe Biden has sought to reverse rigid immigration polices set up by his predecessor as president, Donald Trump, whose presidency was dominated by efforts to build a border wall and reduce the number of legal and illegal migrants.

Biden has faced criticism from immigration activists who say unaccompanied children and families are being held too long in detention centers instead of being released while asylum applications are considered.

The White House said last week Biden had asked senior members of his staff to travel to the border and report back about the influx of unaccompanied minors. It declined at the time to release details about the trip, citing security and privacy concerns.

Mayorkas and officials including domestic policy adviser Susan Rice visited a border patrol facility and a refugee resettlement facility, the White House said on Sunday.

“They discussed capacity needs given the number of unaccompanied children and families arriving at our border,” a statement said, “the complex challenges with rebuilding our gutted border infrastructure and immigration system, as well as improvements that must be made in order to restore safe and efficient procedures to process, shelter, and place unaccompanied children with family or sponsors.

“Officials also discussed ways to ensure the fair and humane treatment of immigrants, the safety of the workforce, and the wellbeing of communities nearby in the face of a global pandemic.”

An influx of people seeking to cross the border is likely to be a big issue in the 2022 midterm elections. Trump may use it to rally his base against Biden and lay the groundwork for a potential return as a presidential candidate in 2024 or as a way to boost a successor.

“The border is breaking down as I speak,” Republican South Carolina senator Lindsey Graham, a close Trump ally, told Fox News on Sunday.

“Immigration in 2022 will be a bigger issue than it was in 2016.”

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