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      Eddie Canales, 76, Dies; Gave Migrants Water, and Dignity

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      After a long career as a union organizer, he came out of retirement in 2013 to form the South Texas Human Rights Center and provide lifesaving aid.Eddie Canales, a human rights advocate who fought to save migrants trekking through the harsh terrain of South Texas, died on July 30 at his home in Corpus Christi. He was 76.The cause was pancreatic cancer, said Nancy Vera, his associate at the South Texas Human Rights Center, the nonprofit rescue organization that Mr. Canales founded in Falfurrias, Texas.For over a decade, Mr. Canales placed dozens of water stations — giant blue plastic barrels marked “Agua” filled with gallon water jugs — along the region’s routes for migrants evading a checkpoint on U.S. Route 281, about 70 miles north of the border with Mexico. The migrants, who are usually led (and sometimes abandoned) by smugglers, known as “coyotes,” leave the main road and undertake a perilous journey through featureless scrub and bush to evade the Border Patrol.Some don’t make it. Those who fail succumb to severe dehydration, hunger and exposure to the unforgiving elements in a semi-desert where temperatures can easily reach 100 degrees in the summer and drop below freezing during the winter. Mr. Canales led a campaign to recover, identify and ensure proper burials for the migrants’ remains.The mission required forcefulness and tact. The land is private and belongs to South Texas ranchers, many indifferent or hostile. Some have created armed posses dressed in military gear to hunt up the migrants and turn them over to the authorities, as shown in a trenchant 2021 documentary about Mr. Canales’s work, “Missing in Brooks County.”The migrants “go through the ranches,” Mr. Canales said in a 2015 oral history interview for the University of North Texas.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Carlos Espina is a One-Man Telemundo on TikTok

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      On a recent scorcher of a Houston afternoon, Carlos Eduardo Espina was driving to a restaurant that specializes in Nicaraguan and Puerto Rican food when he received a news alert on his iPhone: The former president of Honduras had been sentenced to 45 years in a U.S. prison for drug trafficking.“Oh, I need to make a video, actually, in the car,” Mr. Espina, 25, said apologetically as he pulled his Honda crossover S.U.V. into the restaurant’s parking lot. He skimmed a Honduran newspaper’s Instagram post about the news and then opened TikTok, where he has 9.4 million followers. He turned the camera on himself while his girlfriend, who was sitting behind him, crouched out of the frame, clearly used to this sort of drill.His hazel eyes widened, and he boomed, “Importante noticia de última hora” — Spanish for “important breaking news” — then shared a one-minute recap. The video racked up more than 100,000 views during lunch, which Mr. Espina received for free because the restaurant owner was thrilled to recognize him from TikTok.Mr. Espina created TikTok content on his phone while dining at a Nicaraguan restaurant in Houston.Callaghan O’Hare for The New York TimesMr. Espina watching Mexico play Venezuela in the Copa América at a Venezuelan food truck in College Station, Texas. Mr. Espina, whose videos are mainly in Spanish, has flown under the radar in the national press.Callaghan O’Hare for The New York TimesMr. Espina, a recent law school graduate who lives in College Station, Texas, has become something of a one-man Telemundo for millions of Latinos in the United States and one of the White House’s favored social media personalities. He posts almost constantly, sharing earnest and personal news about immigration and the Latino community, along with videos about food, sports and politics — and often championing the Biden administration’s agenda.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Republicans Will Regret a Second Trump Term

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      Now is the summer of Republican content.The G.O.P. is confident and unified. Donald Trump has held a consistent and widening lead over President Biden in all the battleground states. Never Trumpers have been exiled, purged or converted. The Supreme Court has eased many of Trump’s legal travails while his felony convictions in New York seem to have inflicted only minimal political damage — if they didn’t actually help him.Best of all for Republicans, a diminished Joe Biden seems determined to stay in the race, leading a dispirited and divided party that thinks of its presumptive nominee as one might think of a colonoscopy: an unpleasant reminder of age. Even if Biden can be cajoled into quitting, his likeliest replacement is Vice President Kamala Harris, whose 37 percent approval rating is just around that of her boss. Do Democrats really think they can run on her non-handling of the border crisis, her reputation for managerial incompetence or her verbal gaffes?In short, Republicans have good reason to think they’ll be back in the White House next January. Only then will the regrets set in.Three in particular: First, Trump won’t slay the left; instead, he will re-energize and radicalize it. Second, Trump will be a down-ballot loser, leading to divided and paralyzed government. Third, Trump’s second-term personnel won’t be like the ones in his first. Instead, he will appoint his Trumpiest people and pursue his Trumpiest instincts. The results won’t be ones old-school Republicans want or expect.Begin with the left.Talk to most conservatives and even a few liberals, and they’ll tell you that Peak Woke — that is, the worst excesses of far-left activism and cancel culture — happened around 2020. In fact, Peak Woke, from the campus witch hunts to “abolish the police” and the “mostly peaceful” protests in cities like Portland, Ore., and Minneapolis that followed George Floyd’s murder, really coincided with the entirety of Trump’s presidency, then abated after Biden’s election.That’s no accident. What used to be called political correctness has been with us for a long time. But it grew to a fever pitch under Trump, most of all because he was precisely the kind of bigoted vulgarian and aspiring strongman that liberals always feared might come to power, and which they felt duty bound to “resist.” With his every tweet, Trump’s presidency felt like a diesel engine blowing black soot in the face of the country. That’s also surely how Trump wanted it, since it delighted his base, goaded his critics and left everyone else in a kind of blind stupor.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Oklahoma Law Criminalizing Immigrants Without Legal Status Is Blocked

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      The ruling by a federal judge is the latest setback for G.O.P.-controlled states that have passed their own laws on immigration. A federal judge on Friday temporarily blocked Oklahoma from enforcing its new immigration law that would make it a crime to enter the state without legal authorization to be in the United States.The ruling, issued just days before the law was set to go into effect on Monday, is the latest legal setback for Republican-controlled states that have tested the limits of their role in immigration by passing their own legislation meant to crack down on people who crossed the border illegally. The Justice Department maintains that only the federal government can regulate and enforce immigration. A Texas law that would have given state and local police officers the authority to arrest undocumented migrants was put on hold by a federal appeals court in March. The Supreme Court had briefly let the law stand but returned the case to the appeals court, which decided to pause enforcement of it. Then, in May, a federal judge temporarily blocked part of a Florida law that made it a crime to transport unauthorized immigrants into the state. And in mid-June, an Iowa law that would have made it a crime for an immigrant to enter the state after being deported or denied entry into the country was put on pause by a district court. In the Oklahoma case, U.S. District Judge Bernard M. Jones wrote in his ruling that the state “may have understandable frustrations with the problems caused by illegal immigration,” but the state “may not pursue policies that undermine federal law.” He issued a preliminary injunction, pausing enforcement of the law while a case over the law’s constitutionality continues. Under the new law, willfully entering and remaining in Oklahoma without legal immigration status would be a state crime called an “impermissible occupation.” A first offense would be a misdemeanor, with penalties of up to one year in jail and a $500 fine; a subsequent offense would be a felony, punishable by up to two years in jail and a $1,000 fine.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      President Biden and Donald Trump, Some Tough Questions for Each of You

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      The stakes in this year’s presidential election are the greatest in my lifetime. So as a way to frame the choice before voters, I offer these foreign policy questions for President Biden and Donald Trump in the debate on Thursday:President Biden, for months you called on Israel to refrain from invading Rafah and to allow more food into Gaza. Yet Israel did invade Rafah, and half a million Gazans are reported starving. Haven’t you been ignored? And isn’t that because of your tendency to overestimate how much you can charm people — Senate Republicans, Xi Jinping, Benjamin Netanyahu — to cooperate with you? When will you move beyond charm and use serious leverage to try to achieve peace in the Middle East?Mr. Trump, the Abraham Accords you achieved among Israel and several Arab countries were a legitimate foreign policy success, but you largely bypassed Palestinians. Perhaps as a result, those accords may have been a reason Hamas undertook its terror attack on Israel on Oct. 7, to prevent Saudi Arabia from joining and recognizing Israel. So did the Abraham Accords bring peace or sow the seeds of war? Isn’t it a mistake to ignore Palestinians and to give Israel what it wants, such as moving the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem, without getting anything in return?President Biden, you have been pushing a plan for Gaza that involves a cease-fire and a three-way deal with Saudi Arabia, America and Israel ending in a path to Palestinian statehood. Maybe it’ll come together, but if not, what’s your Plan B? If this war drags on, or expands to include Lebanon and perhaps Iran, how do you propose to deal with the Middle East more effectively than you’ve dealt with it so far?Mr. Trump, you’ve suggested that Israel is taking too long to finish the war in Gaza. So what precisely are you advocating? Are you saying that Israel should use more 2,000-pound bombs to level even more of Gaza and kill many more civilians? Or are you saying that Israel should cut a deal that leaves Hamas in place and then pull out?President Biden, Iran has enriched uranium to close to bomb-grade levels. In days or weeks, it could probably produce enough fuel for three nuclear weapons (though mastering a delivery system would take longer). Can we live with an Iran that is a quasi-nuclear power? What is the alternative?Mr. Trump, the reason Iran is so close to having nuclear weapons is that you pulled out of the international nuclear deal in 2018, leading Iran to greatly accelerate its nuclear program. Since you created this dangerous situation, how do you suggest we get out of it? If you are president again, do you contemplate solving this problem through a war with Iran — one that might now involve nuclear weapons? Or will you accept a nuclear Iran as the consequence of your historic mistake?We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      How Biden’s New Immigration Policy Works

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      The new policy will give some 500,000 people a pathway to citizenship.President Biden’s new immigration policy protects some 500,000 people who are married to U.S. citizens from deportation and gives them a pathway to citizenship.The election-year move comes just two weeks after Mr. Biden imposed a major crackdown at the U.S.-Mexico border, cutting off access to asylum for people who crossed into the United States illegally.The policy announced on Tuesday is aimed at people who have been living in the United States for more than a decade and have built their lives and families here.Here is how it works:Why do the spouses of American citizens need protection?Marrying an American citizen generally provides a pathway to U.S. citizenship. But people who crossed the southern border illegally — rather than arriving in the country with a visa — must return to their home countries to complete the process for a green card, something that can take years. The new program allows families to remain in the country while they pursue legal status.Who is eligible?There are roughly 1.1 million undocumented immigrants married to U.S. citizens in the United States, according to Fwd.us, an immigration advocacy group, but not all of them are eligible for the program.The spouses must have lived in the United States for 10 years and have been married to an American citizen as of June 17. They cannot have a criminal record. Officials estimate that the policy will provide legal status and protections for about 500,000 people. The benefits would also extend to the roughly 50,000 children of undocumented spouses who became stepchildren to American citizens.When will the program take effect?Biden administration officials said they expected the program to start by the end of the summer. Those eligible will then be able to apply for the benefits.Why is President Biden doing this now?Mr. Biden is trying to strike a tricky balance on immigration, which is a serious political vulnerability for him. Polls show Americans want tougher policies. Just two weeks ago, Mr. Biden announced a crackdown on asylum at the southern border.His new policy, giving hundreds of thousands of immigrants new legal protections, is a way for him to answer the calls from the progressive base of the Democratic Party, which has accused the White House of betraying campaign promises to enact a more humane approach to immigrants. More

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      Biden to Give Legal Protections to Undocumented Spouses of U.S. Citizens

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      Undocumented spouses of American citizens will be shielded from deportation, provided work permits and given a pathway to citizenship, according to officials briefed on the plan.President Biden on Tuesday will announce sweeping new protections for hundreds of thousands of immigrants who have been living in the United States illegally for years but are married to American citizens, officials familiar with the plan said.Mr. Biden will detail the policy at the White House on Tuesday while marking the 12-year anniversary of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, which protects people who came to the United States as children from deportation, the officials said. They spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a policy that had not been formally announced.Under the policy, undocumented spouses of U.S. citizens will be shielded from deportation, provided work permits and given a pathway to citizenship. Officials briefed on the conversations said it could affect up to 500,000 undocumented spouses, although the exact scale of the program remained unclear.The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.Marrying an American citizen generally provides a pathway to U.S. citizenship. But people who crossed the southern border illegally — rather than arriving in the country with a visa — must return to their home countries to complete the process for a green card.That means long separations from their spouses and families. The new program would allow families to remain in the country while they pursue legal status.Officials briefed on the discussions said the announcement could amount to the most sweeping unilateral move by a president to provide relief to unauthorized immigrants since President Barack Obama implemented DACA. In a separate move on Tuesday, Mr. Biden is also expected to announce new ways to help people in DACA, known as Dreamers, gain access to work visas.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      More Cities Feel Strain as Migrants Relocate When Aid Runs Out

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      After aid runs out elsewhere, some migrants relocate to places like Salt Lake City, where they find help but hurdles, too. “Consider another state,” says a flier distributed by Utah.The bright orange fliers from the State of Utah were blunt.“There is no room in shelters,” the advisory warns migrants contemplating travel to Utah. “No hotels for you.”It continues: “Housing is hard to find and expensive. Food banks are at capacity.”Confronted with a swelling number of migrants who have strained its resources, Utah in recent days has begun urging newcomers at the border and in the United States to “consider another state.”It is the latest sign of the challenges facing migrants and the communities where they hope to settle. As more people leave their initial destinations in search of better work and stable housing, more cities and towns are struggling to keep up.By the time Utah began warning migrants not to come, Carmen Selene and Cleodis Alvorado were already here, along with thousands of other migrants who have made their way to Utah in recent months from other U.S. cities.After traveling to the Texas border from Venezuela with their two sons, Ms. Selene and Mr. Alvorado crossed into the United States last September and were soon on a bus chartered by the state of Texas. Bound for Denver, the couple expected that Mr. Alvorado would quickly find a job and they would begin building a new life. But like so many of the other migrants arriving in the United States, Mr. Alvorado could not work legally and was competing for odd jobs with other migrants in the same predicament.When their hotel stay, paid for by the city of Denver, ran out, the family ended up on another bus, this one headed to Salt Lake City, thought to be a welcoming destination, thanks to plentiful jobs and the deep influence of Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More