‘Our country is full’: Trump says migrants straining system
CALEXICO, Calif. — Declaring “our country is full,” President Donald Trump on Friday insisted the U.S. immigration system was overburdened and illegal crossings must be stopped as he inspected a refurbished section of fencing at the Mexican border.
Trump, making a renewed push for border security as a central campaign issue for his 2020 re-election, participated in a briefing on immigration and border security in Calexico before viewing a 2-mile, see-through steel-slat barrier that was a long-planned replacement for an older barrier — and not new wall.
“There is indeed an emergency on our southern border,” Trump said at the briefing, adding that there has been a sharp uptick in illegal crossings. “It’s a colossal surge, and it’s overwhelming our immigration system. We can’t take you anymore. Our country is full.”
As Air Force One touched down in the state, California and 19 other states that are suing Trump over his emergency declaration to build a border wall requested a court order to stop money from being diverted to fund the project. But Trump, who ratcheted up his hard-line immigration rhetoric in recent weeks, declared that his move, which included vetoing a congressional vote, was necessary.
Also on Friday, House Democrats filed a lawsuit preventing Trump from spending more money than Congress has approved to erect barriers along the southwestern border. Congress approved just under $1.4 billion for work on border barricades. Trump has asserted he can use his powers as chief executive to transfer an additional $6.7 billion to wall construction.
Ex-convict charged
with pretending to be
long-missing boy
CINCINNATI — A 23-year-old ex-convict accused of pulling a cruel hoax by pretending to be a long-missing Illinois boy was charged Friday with making false statements to federal authorities.
The FBI said Brian Rini had made false claims twice before, portraying himself as a juvenile sex-trafficking victim.
The Medina, Ohio, man was jailed in Cincinnati on Thursday, a day after telling authorities he was 14-year-old Timmothy Pitzen, who disappeared in 2011 at age 6. The FBI declared Rini’s story a hoax after performing a DNA test.
The charge should send a message about the damage such false claims can do, said U.S. Attorney Benjamin Glassman.
“It’s not OK to do it because of the harm that it causes, the pain, for the family of that missing child,” Glassman said.
Boeing cutting production rate of troubled 737 Max jet
CHICAGO — Boeing will cut production of its troubled 737 Max airliner this month, underscoring the growing financial risk it faces the longer that its best-selling plane remains grounded after two deadly crashes.
The company said Friday that starting in mid-April it will cut production of the plane to 42 from 52 planes per month so it can focus its attention on fixing the flight-control software that has been implicated in the crashes.
The move was not a complete surprise. Boeing had already suspended deliveries of the Max last month after regulators around the world grounded the jet.
Preliminary reports into accidents in Indonesia and Ethiopia found that faulty sensor readings erroneously triggered an anti-stall system that pushed the plane’s nose down. Pilots of each plane struggled in vain to regain control over the automated system.
In all, 346 people died in the crashes. Boeing faces a growing number of lawsuits filed by families of the victims.
Harvard reviews sale of coach’s home to prospect’s father
BOSTON — Harvard’s longtime fencing coach sold his suburban Boston home for nearly double its assessed value to a man whose son was later admitted to the school and joined the team — a transaction now under review by the university.
The coach, Peter Brand, received nearly $1 million in 2016 for the three-bedroom house on a quarter-acre in Needham, which was assessed at the time at $549,300, The Boston Globe reported. The buyer, Jie Zhao, whose older son and wife also attended Harvard, never lived in the home and sold it for a steep loss 17 months later.
The sale appears unrelated to the recent college admissions scandal in which wealthy parents have been charged with bribing coaches and helping rig test scores to get their children into some of the nation’s most selective schools, said Claudine Gay, Harvard’s dean of the faculty of arts and sciences.
One of those parents, lawyer Gordon Caplan, of Greenwich, Connecticut, on Friday became the second one to announce plans to plead guilty. He is accused of paying $75,000 to get a test supervisor to correct answers on his daughter’s ACT exam after she took it.
Harvard and other schools have not been implicated in the admissions probe.
7 who accused Cosby of sex abuse settle defamation suits
SPRINGFIELD, Mass. — Seven women who said Bill Cosby sexually assaulted them decades ago and then labeled them liars by denying it have settled defamation lawsuits against the imprisoned actor.
Court documents filed Friday in Springfield, Massachusetts, show a settlement has been reached since Cosby went to prison last fall in a separate Pennsylvania sex assault case. Cosby, 81, is serving a three- to 10-year prison sentence.
Cosby’s spokesman, Andrew Wyatt, said Cosby did not authorize the settlement reached between the women and American International Group Inc., and “vehemently denies the allegations.”
“Mr. Cosby did not settle any cases with anyone. He is not paying anything to anyone, and he is still pursuing his counterclaims. AIG decided to settle these cases, without the knowledge, permission and/or consent of Mr. Cosby,” Wyatt said in a statement.
Courts had ruled that AIG had to pay for Cosby to defend the defamation lawsuits as part of his coverage. Cosby had homeowners and other coverage through AIG.
From wire sources
Job gain points to a US economy slowing but hardly stalling
WASHINGTON — A month ago, many economists fretted that the 10-year U.S. expansion looked wobbly. But after the government reported Friday that hiring rebounded in March, the economy suddenly looks sturdy again.
Growth has weakened since last year to something closer to the modest pace that has prevailed for most of the nearly decade-long expansion. The jolt from the Trump administration’s 2017 tax cuts and greater government spending last year has faded. And the global economy has swiveled from a driver of the U.S. economy to a headwind.
Yet last month’s solid job gain of 196,000 may also help undercut any lingering fears that a recession might arrive over the next year or so. The economy’s slow but steady pace of growth is likely to keep inflation low and perhaps sustain the expansion, which is set to become the longest on record in July.
By historical measures, the expansion has fallen short of the sometimes-explosive growth that businesses and workers enjoyed in the past but that often led to financial bubbles or economic excesses — and eventually a recession.
“Lackluster means that you’re not overheating,” Josh Wright, chief economist at recruiting software maker iCIMS, said of the current expansion. “It’s more stable, and we’ll have fewer imbalances. It looks like we’ll be able to prolong this recovery even further.”
