US authorities ‘seeing large numbers of migrants at border’ before Title 42 expiration – as it happened

The Biden administration is bracing for the end of the pandemic-era Title 42 and a potential surge of migrants at the southern border. Homeland security secretary Alejandro Mayorkas held a press conference where he warned people against trying to cross into the US, while fending off criticism from both the right and left over how the White House has prepared for this moment.

Here’s what else happened today:

• A meeting between Joe Biden and the top Republicans and Democrats in Congress aimed at reaching an agreement to raise the debt ceiling was postponed, which could be a good sign for the long-running talks.

• E Jean Carroll is considering another lawsuit against Donald Trump over comments he made about her at last night’s CNN town hall. You’ll recall that a jury earlier this week found him liable for sexual abuse and defamation of Carroll, and awarded her $5m. The former president is appealing that verdict.

• CNN’s chief executive defended last night’s town hall with Trump in a call with employees.

• House Republicans approved a bill to reform the US immigration system in line with conservative priorities. It faces doom in the Democratic-controlled Senate.

• Chuck Schumer, the Senate’s Democratic leader, condemned Republican senator Tommy Tuberville for remarks that appeared to defend white nationalists in the military.

A meeting set for Friday between Joe Biden and the top Democrats and Republicans in Congress intended to find an agreement on raising the debt ceiling has been postponed, Reuters reports.

The two parties have been at odds for months over finding a way to raise the US government’s legal limit on how much debt it can take on, ahead of a 1 June deadline after which America could default on its obligation and potentially spark an economic crisis.

Citing a source familiar with the negotiations, Reuters said the delay in the meeting was a good sign. “Meetings are progressing. Staff is continuing to meet and it wasn’t the right moment to bring it back to principals,” the source said.

A White House spokesperson confirmed the delay, saying, “Staff will continue working and the all the principals agreed to meet early next week.”

Biden had met with congressional leaders, including Republican House speaker Kevin McCarthy, earlier this week, but there seemed to be little progress made towards an agreement. McCarthy has demanded spending cuts and the enactment of conservative priorities in exchange for the GOP voting to increase the debt limit, which Biden and the Democrats have rejected.

Donald Trump has formally appealed a jury’s finding earlier this week that he is civilly liable for sexual abuse and defamation of advice columnist E Jean Carroll, Law & Crime reports:

The federal jury in New York City ordered him to pay a combined $5m in punitive and compensatory damages, following a trial in which Trump opted not to testify.

In a sign of the complexity of US immigration law, the conservative-dominated supreme court this morning issued an unanimous decision that offers a transgender woman from Guatemala a reprieve from deportation. Here’s more about it, from the Associated Press:

The US supreme court ruled on Thursday in favor of a transgender Guatemalan woman fighting deportation on the grounds that she would face persecution if returned to her native country.

The unanimous decision in favor of Estrella Santos-Zacaria gives her another chance to argue that immigration officials were wrong to reject her bid to remain in the US.

Lawyers for Santos-Zacaria, now in her mid-30s, said she first fled to the US after being raped as a young teenager and threatened with death because of her gender identity in a country that has targeted the LGBTQ+ community.

But a US immigration judge found she did not make a strong enough case that she would face persecution if sent back to Guatemala.

E Jean Carroll, the advice columnist who this week won a $5m civil judgment against Donald Trump for sexually abusing and defaming her, says she may again sue the former president over comments he made at last night’s CNN town hall.

In an interview with the New York Times, Carroll described her shock at reading a transcript of Trump’s comments, which included him calling her a “whack job” and saying the sexual assault she said he committed was “fake”.

Here’s more from the interview:

Ms. Carroll said on Thursday morning that she had been asleep as Mr. Trump talked about her on the town hall program. She said that her lawyer, Roberta A. Kaplan, had sent her the transcript of his comments, and that she had read only the first paragraph.

“It’s just stupid, it’s just disgusting, vile, foul, it wounds people,” Ms. Carroll said in an interview with The New York Times, adding that she had been “insulted by better people.”

Ms. Carroll said she had been infuriated when her longtime stylist told her that her 15-year-old son was talking about what Mr. Trump had said.

“I am upset on the behalf of young men in America,” Ms. Carroll said. “They cannot listen to this balderdash and this old-timey view of women, which is a cave-man view.”

In addition to the case that ended Tuesday, Ms. Carroll has an earlier defamation suit against Mr. Trump that is still pending. Mr. Trump has argued in that case that he cannot be sued because he made those comments in his official capacity as president.

On Thursday, Ms. Kaplan said no decision had been made on whether a new defamation suit would be filed in light of Mr. Trump’s latest comments.

“Everything’s on the table, obviously, and we have to give serious consideration to it,” Ms. Kaplan said. “We have to weigh the various pros and cons and we’ll come to a decision in the next day or so, probably.”

CNN is out with a statement about its town hall with Donald Trump, the target of widespread criticism since its staging in Manchester, New Hampshire, last night.

The network defends both its decision to stage the event and the performance of the anchor, Kaitlan Collins, who took the hospital pass that was going one-on-one with Trump in front of a Republican audience:

Kaitlan Collins exemplified what it means to be a world-class journalist.

She asked tough, fair and revealing questions. And she followed up and fact-checked President Trump in real time to arm voters with crucial information about his positions as he enters the 2024 election as the Republican frontrunner.

That is CNN’s role and responsibility: to get answers and hold the powerful to account.

Here’s our report:

The Guardian’s Alexandra Villareal has written about what the end of Title 42 will mean for the US’s commitment to being a land of refuge. Here is the top of her analysis:

The right to seek asylum in the United States is in the balance as migrants fleeing violence and instability at home anxiously await a chance at safety – amid a major policy shift at the US’s southern border.

The Title 42 public health order – which has allowed officials to quickly expel migrants without giving them access to asylum for years now – is expected to finally end on 11 May. What does this mean for the US’s historic commitment as a beacon for freedom from persecution?

As government leaders brace for an anticipated uptick in migrants and asylum seekers trying to cross the border, the hardline policies they’re advancing to keep people out may spell potentially deadly consequences for some of the world’s most vulnerable.

In Congress, an immigration and border security package that backs an enforcement-only approach is expected to receive a vote on the Republican-controlled House floor as soon as this week.

If enacted, the proposed legislation would significantly curtail asylum, limit other humanitarian pathways, restart border wall construction, do away with safeguards for migrant kids and otherwise rewrite the US’s laws to be far less welcoming to those in need of protection.

With Title 42 set to expire within hours, my colleague Joanna Walters has put together this guide explaining what it is, how it started, why it’s ending and what happens next:

As Mayorkas mentioned in the White House briefing, there have been large numbers of people gathering at the southern border. Here are some of the pictures sent to us on the newswires:

The Democratic US Senate leader, Chuck Schumer, has condemned as “utterly revolting” remarks in which the Alabama Republican Tommy Tuberville appeared to defend white nationalists in the US military.

In an interview with the Alabama station WBHM, published on Monday, Tuberville was asked: “Do you believe they should allow white nationalists in the military?”

He answered: “Well, they call them that. I call them Americans.”

The Senate armed forces committee member added: “We are losing in the military so fast. And why? I can tell you why. Because the Democrats are attacking our military, saying we need to get out the white extremists, the white nationalists, people that don’t believe in our agenda, as Joe Biden’s agenda.”

Tuberville is currently attempting to impose his own agenda on the US military, by blocking promotions and appointments in protest of Pentagon rules about abortion access.

On Thursday, Schumer said: “Does Senator Tuberville honestly believe that our military is stronger with white nationalists in its ranks? I cannot believe this needs to be said, but white nationalism has no place in our armed forces and no place in any corner of American society, period, full stop, end of story.”

Previously, Sherrilyn Ifill, a former president of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) legal defense fund, said: “I hope we are not getting so numb that we refrain from demanding that Mr Tuberville’s colleagues in the Senate condemn his remarks.”

Schumer added: “I urge Senator Tuberville to think about the destructive spectacle he is creating in the Senate. His actions are dangerous.”

Read on …

The Biden administration is bracing for the end of the pandemic-era Title 42 and a potential surge of migrants on the southern border. Homeland security secretary Alejandro Mayorkas just concluded a press conference where he warned people against trying to cross into the US, while fending off criticism from both the right and left over how the White House has prepared for this moment.

Here’s what else has happened today so far:

• Debt ceiling negotiators from the White House and Congress’s leaders are back at the Capitol to break the high-stakes deadlock ahead of a 1 June deadline for a potential default.

• CNN’s chief executive defended how last night’s town hall with Donald Trump went in a call with employees.

• House Republicans are expected to later today approve a bill to reform the US immigration system in line with conservative priorities. It faces doom in the Democratic-controlled Senate.

Joe Biden campaigned on undoing Donald Trump’s hardline immigration policies, but in recent months, the president has announced new rules for migrants that advocacy groups say are strikingly similar to those of his Republican adversary.

Mayorkas was challenged to respond to those claims at the briefing. Here’s what he had to say:

This administration stands markedly different than the prior administration … We have, in fact, a family reunification task force that has now reunified, I think, more than 700 families that were cruelly separated … We have rescinded the public charge rule that punishes individuals who have migrated to the United States just for accessing public resources to which they are entitled. We have granted temporary protected status to quite a number of countries. This president has led the unprecedented expansion of lawful pathways. We stand markedly different than the prior administration. We do not resemble it at all.

He concluded by saying: “We are a nation of immigrants, and we are a nation of laws. And those laws provide that, if one qualifies for humanitarian relief, then one has established the basis to remain in the United States. And if one has not, then one is to be removed. And that is exactly what is going to happen.”

Since Joe Biden took office, Republicans have repeatedly accused his administration of “opening” the southern border.

Asked about that claim, Mayorkas said that’s not the case.

“We removed, returned and expelled 1.4 million people last year,” he said. “Ask those 1.4 million people if they think the border is open. Our apprehension rate at the border is consistent with the average apprehension rate in prior years.”

Mayorkas warned that “we could see very crowded border patrol facilities” after Title 42’s end, but declined to say how long that situation could last.

“We are working as hard as we can to make sure that that time it takes is as little as possible,” the homeland security secretary said. “This is a challenge, and we’re going to meet this challenge.”

Republican administrations in states such as Texas have lately taken to bussing recently arrived migrants to Washington DC, with a new group being dropped off outside Kamala Harris’s residence this morning.

Asked about that at the press conference, Mayorkas condemned the practice:

It is a both sad and tragic day when a government official uses migrants as a pawn for political purposes.”

Mayorkas was challenged by a reporter about why the Biden administration didn’t move faster to prepare for Title 42’s end, considering they’ve known it was going to expire for about two years.

Here’s what he had to say:

I have said for months and months that the challenge at the border is, and is going to be, very difficult. And we have spoken repeatedly about the fact that that difficulty may actually only increase at this time of transition. It is going to take a period of time for our approach to actually gain traction and show results. And I’ve been very clear about that … The fundamental reason why we have a challenge at our border, and we’ve had this challenge many a time before, is because we are working within the constraints of … a fundamentally broken immigration system. And we also are operating on resources that are far less than those that we need.”

Mayorkas had some choice words for Congress, which he blamed for not changing immigration law to better react to the latest trends in immigration.

“Our current situation is the outcome of Congress leaving a broken, outdated immigration system in place for over two decades, despite unanimous agreement that we desperately need legislative reform,” Mayorkas said. “It is also the result of Congress’s decision not to provide us with the resources we need and that we requested.”

“We … yet again, call on Congress to pass desperately needed immigration reform,” he concluded.

There are plenty of ideas for immigration reform in Congress – in fact, the House will probably pass a measure to do that later today. What’s lacking is enough common ground between Democrats and Republicans, and even within the parties, to get a bill through Congress.

As the White House press briefing kicked off, homeland security secretary Alejandro Mayorkas warned migrants against trying to enter the United States after Title 42 ends at midnight tonight.

“If anyone arrives at our southern border after midnight tonight, they will be presumed ineligible for asylum and subjected to steeper consequences for unlawful entry, including a minimum five-year ban on re-entry and potential criminal prosecution,” Mayorkas said.

“We are clear-eyed about the challenges we are likely to face in the days and weeks ahead, and we are ready to meet them,” he said, noting that immigration authorities expect “to see large numbers of encounters” and “are already seeing high numbers of encounters in certain sectors”.

“I want to be very clear: our borders are not open. People who cross our border unlawfully and without a legal basis to remain will be promptly processed and removed,” Mayorkas said.

The White House press briefing should be getting under way any minute now.

This blog will follow it live as homeland security secretary Alejandro Mayorkas speaks. Or, you can watch it as it happens at the livestream above.