GOP leaders strain for migrant solution
WASHINGTON — Republican lawmakers and President Donald Trump searched Tuesday evening for a way to end the administration’s policy of separating families after illegal border crossings, with their focus shifting to a new plan to keep children in detention longer than now permitted — but with their parents.
GOP leaders and lawmakers, increasingly fearful of voter reaction in November, met with Trump for about an hour at the Capitol to try to work out some resolution. Trump told rank-and-file Republicans he was “1,000 percent” behind them on their rival immigration bills. But it was unclear if that’s enough of a strategy boost to pass legislation through the divided GOP majority.
“We had a great meeting,” he called out as he left.
Leaders in both the House and Senate are struggling to shield the party’s lawmakers from the public outcry over images of children taken from migrant parents and held in cages at the border. But they are running up against Trump’s shifting views on specifics and his determination, according to advisers, not to look soft on immigration or his signature border wall.
Many lawmakers say he could simply reverse the administration’s “zero tolerance” policy and keep families together. But some worry the lack of a clear resolution could exacerbate an already tough situation as his party heads toward difficult midterm elections.
U.S. leaving the UN human rights council
WASHINGTON — The United States announced Tuesday it was leaving the United Nations’ Human Rights Council, with Ambassador Nikki Haley calling it “an organization that is not worthy of its name.” It was the latest withdrawal by the Trump administration from an international institution.
Haley, Trump’s envoy to the U.N., said the U.S. had given the human rights body “opportunity after opportunity” to make changes. She lambasted the council for “its chronic bias against Israel” and lamented the fact that its membership includes accused human rights abusers such as China, Cuba, Venezuela and the Democratic Republic of Congo.
“We take this step because our commitment does not allow us to remain a part of a hypocritical and self-serving organization that makes a mockery of human rights,” Haley said.
By wire sources
