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    Elon Musk and Social Security’s Effort to Curb Illegal Immigration

    As Elon Musk continues to argue that Social Security drives illegal immigration, a new effort at the agency aims to curb it.One hallmark of Elon Musk’s 12 weeks in government has been his focus on Social Security.He has sent one of his closest advisers to work at the Social Security Administration. He has falsely insisted that the program is rife with fraud. And he has depicted the entitlement as a tool — a “giant magnet,” to be specific — that he says entices illegal immigrants to come to the United States.That last part has turned Social Security into a major focal point of Musk’s unfounded belief that Democrats have allowed immigrants into the United States as part of a scheme to tilt the electorate in their favor.A team of my colleagues has reported that Musk is now driving big changes at the Social Security Administration that have braided aspects of his rhetoric about the agency directly into policy. The agency is placing certain immigrants — people who are very much alive — on the agency’s list of dead people, cutting them off from crucial financial services in an effort to push them to leave the country.I called my colleague Alexandra Berzon to talk about this reporting, and she explained that, according to the White House’s own accounting, the targeted migrants did not receive much in the way of government benefits — and none of them received Social Security.The new effort, she explained, is less about cost-cutting than it is about getting the Social Security Administration into the business of immigration enforcement, a push that has deeply alarmed current and former employees of the agency.Explain to me what you and our colleagues discovered when reporting this story. How is the Trump administration using Social Security as a tool for immigration policy?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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    Justice Sonia Sotomayor Says Judges Must Be ‘Fearlessly Independent’

    Justice Sonia Sotomayor, the senior member of the Supreme Court’s liberal wing, said on Friday that judges must remain “fearlessly independent” if the rule of law is to survive.Her remarks, made in a packed auditorium at Georgetown University Law Center, were at once cautious and forceful. She did not address particular controversies arising from the Trump administration’s actions testing the conventional understanding of presidential power, many of which appear likely to land at the Supreme Court. But she made plain that her observations about the fragility of the justice system addressed current events.She bemoaned, for instance, “the fact that some of our public leaders are lawyers making statements challenging the rule of law.”She was interviewed by the law school’s dean, William M. Treanor, who interspersed his questions with ones that had been submitted by students. He started the conversation by characterizing those questions, alluding to recent efforts by the Trump administration to punish major law firms and its battles with courts over its blitz of executive orders.“As our students prepare to join the legal profession, they are confronting genuine unsettling questions about the durability of that profession and of the law itself,” he said. “The most commonly asked question was the role of courts in safeguarding the rule of law.”Justice Sotomayor answered in general terms, citing reference works and experts. She said she had consulted with Justice Rosalie Silberman Abella, a former member of the Supreme Court of Canada, about judges’ obligations, quoting her response: “They need to remain fearlessly independent, protective of rights and ensure that the state is respectful of both.”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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    U.S. Attorney Rebuffed by Justice Dept. in Push to Escalate Inquiry into Schumer

    Ed Martin, the acting U.S. attorney in Washington, has been blocked so far in seeking a grand jury investigation into remarks made by Senator Chuck Schumer about Supreme Court justices.Ed Martin, the interim U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, has been quietly pushing to present evidence against Senator Charles Schumer of New York, the Democratic leader, to a federal grand jury over comments he made about Supreme Court justices in 2020, according to people with knowledge of the situation.Justice Department officials have thus far rebuffed the unusual request by Mr. Martin, a partisan ally of President Trump with no previous prosecutorial experience, one of those people said.Mr. Martin has made clear his hopes of investigating whether the remarks made five years ago by Mr. Schumer amounted to threats against Justice Brett Kavanaugh and Justice Neil M. Gorsuch. Bringing such a case is highly unusual and winning a conviction would be difficult, according to current and former prosecutors.Last month, Mr. Martin signaled his intention to take an aggressive approach, writing Mr. Schumer a letter demanding “information and clarification” of remarks he made at a rally on March 4, 2020.“You have released the whirlwind and you will pay the price!” Mr. Schumer said at the rally, addressing his remarks to Justices Kavanaugh and Gorsuch. Mr. Schumer’s staff retracted his statement and the senator apologized a day later, taking to the floor of the Senate to say, “I should not have used the words I used.”Mr. Schumer added that he had been referring to “political consequences” rather than violent retribution, chalking up his phrasing to his upbringing in Brooklyn.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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    Federal Prosecutor Responsible for Overseeing Major Criminal Cases Resigns

    A veteran federal prosecutor in Washington responsible for overseeing major criminal cases in one of the nation’s most important offices abruptly resigned on Monday, according to an email sent to colleagues.Denise Cheung, the head of the criminal division in the U.S. attorney’s office in Washington, resigned rather than carry out a directive from the office’s Trump-appointed leadership, according to several people with knowledge of her actions who spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of reprisal.Ms. Cheung did not say what precipitated her decision in her email, but she thanked her colleagues for adhering to the highest standards of professional conduct.“This office is a special place,” she wrote. “I took an oath of office to support and defend the Constitution, and I have executed this duty faithfully.”Ms. Cheung, a Harvard Law School graduate, said prosecutors in the office had conducted themselves “with the utmost integrity” by “following the facts and the law and complying with our moral, ethical and legal obligations.”The resignation came less than a day after President Trump nominated Ed Martin, a right-wing activist who sat on a board that raised cash for rioters at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, and pushed for their mass reprieve, to run the office permanently.A spokesman for Mr. Martin did not immediately respond to a request for comment.Decisions by Mr. Trump’s appointees have roiled the Justice Department. Last week, seven career officials, in the U.S. attorney’s office in Manhattan and at department headquarters, resigned rather than signing the dismissal of federal corruption charges against Mayor Eric Adams of New York, saying the request by the department’s acting No. 2 official was inappropriate and undermined an appropriate investigation. More