Mexico will continue to take migrants rejected from US after Title 42 ends in landmark agreement

 Mexico will continue taking Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans and Venezuelans rejected from the US border when Title 42 expires next week, according to an announcement by the Mexican government.

The landmark agreement was announced nine days before the end of Title 42, the federal pandemic era policy which allows US Border Patrol to kick out migrants to Mexico without hearing their asylum claims.

The move will come as a blow to migrants who have been camped out on the Mexican side of the border awaiting the expiration of Title 42 as they felt it would mean they could freely cross into the US.

As part of the deal, Mexico has agreed to continue taking 30,000 migrants a month from each of the four countries.

The US has trouble deporting many migrants to those countries because of its troubled — and in some cases non-existent — diplomatic relations with them according to a press release issued by Mexican officials.

It’s up to Mexico to accept citizens from countries other than their own ejected from the US.

“At no point in US history has there ever been another country which would take large numbers of deportations from the US of people who aren’t nationals of that country,” Aaron Reichlin-Melnick of the American Immigration Council tweeted.

Migrants gathered by the border wall after crossing into the United States from Mexico on May 3, 2023.

New York Post

In exchange, Washington will continue to allow 30,000 migrants a month from the same countries through the humanitarian parole program that has been created for them, which started in January.

In order to qualify, migrants must apply online, have a sponsor in the US and cannot cross into the country illegally.

However, migrants who talked to The Post last month said they tried to use the app set up to apply online but it had failed, then turned themselves in at the border without meeting the requirements and still been admitted.

Migrants standing in line for donated meals at Sacred Heart Church in El Paso, Texas on May 2, 2023.

James Keivom

Mexico has agreed to a deal with the US to take ejected Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans and Venezuelans after Title 42 is lifted.

James Keivom

Maria Jose, of Venezuela, said: “It’s a thing of luck. You see single men get through or single women, then a family with kids will get expelled.”

The Biden Administration has also agreed to allow up to 100,000 migrants from Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador into the US through a newly-announced family reunification parole process.

The pact forged with America’s southern neighbor would give the US a powerful tool to deter asylum-seekers from those countries from crossing the border illegally — with the threat that they would be returned south of the border.

However, when Title 42 ends, the US could see as many as 13,000 migrants cross the international boundary a day, according to Texas Gov. Greg Abbott.

It is unclear what will happen after 30,000 migrants have been sent back to Mexico in a month if more continue to cross over into the US.

Many asylum-seekers who had been waiting in Mexico for weeks or months have already started to trickle into the US, overwhelming border cities from San Diego, California on the West Coast to Brownsville, Texas — the most easterly point of the southern border with Mexico.

The crush of migrants expected at the border prompted President Joe Biden to send 1,500 active-duty soldiers to the border to assist federal immigration agents.

“We need all the help we can get,” Former El Paso Mayor Dee Margo told The Post Tuesday.

Migrants in a tent outside of the Opportunity Center for the Homeless in El Paso on May 2, 2023.

James Keivom

The West Texas city is currently ground zero for the border crisis and declared an emergency ahead of Title 42 ending May 11, as over 1,000 people a day hand themselves into authorities.

“The manpower for [US Customs and Border Protection] is insufficient,” Margo added.

“They’re recognizing that they’re going to need this.”

https://nypost.com/2023/05/03/us-reaches-post-title-42-deal-mexico-to-continue-taking-migrants/

Biden too diminished mentally to talk debt ceiling: Cruz

 Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) said Wednesday that President Biden has doomed negotiations with House Republicans over the debt ceiling because of his impaired mental state.

Cruz told reporters the 80-year-old president’s approach to the crisis is a far cry from his performance during similar debt limit talks involving the Obama White House in 2011 — and suggested cognitive decline was to blame.

“Vice President Biden sat down with House Republicans and reached a meaningful compromise,” the 52-year-old senator said.

“President Joe Biden needs to do the same thing.”

“Sadly, the reason he hasn’t so far, I believe, is because his mental faculties are too diminished right now to do what he did in 2011, to sit down and actually work together on a solution to the problem,” Cruz went on.

“What we’re left with is a bunch of young staffers in the White House — radical children — who are perfectly willing to risk a default on the debt because they have no appreciation of the chaos, and misery and damage a default would do.

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) said President Biden has doomed negotiations with House Republicans over the debt ceiling because of his impaired mental state.

Getty Images

Cruz told reporters at a GOP press conference that Biden should sit down with House Republicans to reach a compromise.

Getty Images

“We should not default on our debt, but the present path we’re on is unsustainable,” Cruz concluded.

“And Joe Biden needs to come to the table.”

On Monday, the president invited House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) to the White House to discuss raising the nation’s borrowing limit — the same day that Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said the US could default on its debt as soon as June 1.

“Sadly the reason he hasn’t so far, I believe, is because his mental faculties are too diminished right now to do what he did in 2011,” Cruz said.

AP

Senate Republicans at the Wednesday press conference argued the cuts were “reasonable.”

Getty Images

The president has also included Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY), Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) in the discussion, which is set to take place on May 9.

House Republicans last week narrowly passed a proposal to raise the US debt ceiling by $1.5 trillion or until March 31, 2024, whichever is reached first — but Schumer declared it “dead on arrival” in the Senate.

The bill, known as the Limit, Save, Grow Act, would also cap the growth of federal expenditures to 1% per year for the next decade to shrink non-defense discretionary spending.

Senate Republicans argued Wednesday the cuts were “reasonable,” given the trillions of dollars that have been added in just a few years to the national debt, which currently stands at over $31 trillion.

“In 2019, before the pandemic, the federal government in total spent $4.4 trillion. In 2022, we spent $6.3 trillion,” said Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.).

“President Biden in the next fiscal year wants to spend $6.9 trillion. That’s more than a 50% increase over pre-pandemic levels.”

“In our initial discussions, fiscal conservatives — we wanted to go back to some kind of baseline based on fiscal year 2019, pre-pandemic. That’s not what the House passed,” he added.

“We went back to fiscal year 2022, $6.3 trillion. Do you understand the magnitude of that concession?”

Senate Republican Conference Chair John Barrasso (Wyo.) echoed Johnson’s concern and called on Biden to come to the negotiating table.

“In the eight times that we raised the debt ceiling and have tied it to spending reforms, Joe Biden — either as a senator or a vice president — has supported six of those eight,” he said. “It is time for Joe Biden to end this debt ceiling madness.”

https://nypost.com/2023/05/03/biden-too-diminished-mentally-for-debt-ceiling-talks-sen-ted-cruz/

'South China Sea drills conceal a secret war to control the internet'

 With the U.S. and Philippines holding the largest ever military drills in the South China Sea, followed by China and Singapore planning drills of their own, tensions are heating up as the Phillippines has reported a “confrontation” between two of its vessels and the Chinese navy.

As one of the world’s most important shipping lanes for oil, minerals and food, whoever dominates the South China Sea will control over a fifth of global trade. But the biggest economic asset up for grabs in the region is Big Data — and the future of the entire internet depends on who wins the battle to dominate this strategic waterway.

Over 486 undersea cables carry more than 99 percent of all international internet traffic globally, according to the Washington-based research firm TeleGeography. The bulk of them are controlled by a handful of American technology giants, namely Google-owner Alphabet, Facebook-owner Meta, Amazon and Microsoft.

Southeast Asia’s internet economy is expected to reach $1 trillion in value by 2030. Whoever controls the Asia-Pacific’s subsea cabling infrastructure will not only dominate this booming economy but control the global internet. Internet data flows, carrying everything from emails and banking transactions to military secrets, are more valuable than oil. As such, the world’s subsea cabling infrastructure is increasingly vulnerable not only to sabotage, but also to espionage — spy agencies can easily tap into cables on their own territory. 

That’s why the geopolitical rivalry between the U.S. and China has increasingly focused on controlling the world’s subsea cabling networks.

The New Great Game

China, which claims almost the entire South China Sea, is planning a $500 million undersea internet cable network to create a superfast connection linking up Asia with the Middle East and Europe. It is also impeding U.S.-backed internet cable projects through the South China Sea by delaying licensing approvals and creating stricter operating restrictions.

Meanwhile, the U.S. government has thwarted several Chinese subsea cabling projects over concerns about Beijing’s surveillance capabilities. At least six private undersea cable deals led by Google, Facebook and Amazon connecting the U.S. with Hong Kong were blocked by Washington to keep HMN Tech, a subsidiary of the sanctioned Chinese firm Huawei, at bay. HMN Tech has won praise from the Chinese government as a model of “civil-military integration,” and acknowledges that its activities “offer powerful support for the modernization of our country’s national defense.”

To bypass Chinese control, American tech giants Facebook and Google are building Apricot, the first intra-Asian subsea cable avoiding Hong Kong. The 12,000-kilometer cable will connect Japan, Taiwan, Guam, the Philippines, Indonesia and Singapore — but excludes Malaysia, which has fast become the linchpin of U.S. and Chinese competition to dominate the global internet.

Malaysia’s involvement in Apricot was scuppered due to a 2020 cabotage ban on foreign vessels in the autonomous Sabah region of eastern Malaysia to protect the local shipping industry from foreign competition.

In response, Facebook, Google, Microsoft and Amazon wrote to the Malaysian government complaining that the ban would obstruct the new cable venture and requesting an urgent meeting with the prime minister. The request was ignored. As a result, Malaysia has been excluded not only from the Apricot route but also from the Echo and Bifrost cable routes across the South China Sea, also backed by Facebook and Google.

Local frustration over Malaysia’s cabotage ban has revived demands in Sabah for greater autonomy from the federal government. This dovetails with an international legal case on behalf of heirs of a colonial-era sultanate in the remote Sulu archipelago of the Philippines. The sultanate purportedly leased the region of Sabah to British colonists in 1878 in return for an annual payment, which the petitioners have used to justify undermining Malaysian sovereignty in Sabah, claiming a percentage of oil and gas profits there.  

The lawyers representing the Sulu heirs have what could be viewed by some as close ties with the same U.S. tech giants competing to dominate subsea internet cables in the South China Sea. Paul Cohen, a former speechwriter on the Clinton/Gore presidential campaign, currently serves as president of the Silicon Valley Arbitration and Mediation Center where he works in “dialog” with these U.S. tech firms. Cohen’s colleague, Elisabeth Mason, is a board member of the U.S. charity All Star Code alongside three senior Google executives and founded the Stanford Poverty and Technology Lab with support from both the Obama White House and Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg.

The future of the global internet

Even the appearance of close proximity between the Sulu heirs’ lawyers to U.S. tech giants that bypassed Malaysia to pursue U.S.-backed subsea internet cable routes will exacerbate Malaysian perceptions of Western hostility to its national interests.

Indeed, Malaysia’s exclusion from the U.S.-backed subsea cabling projects has already accelerated the country’s alliance with China. In 2022, Malaysia joined the 5,000-kilometer China-backed South East Asia Hainan Hong Kong Express Cable System (SEA-H2X) linking Hong Kong, China, the Philippines and Thailand to eastern Malaysia and Singapore.

The future of the global internet is at stake. If Malaysia falls under Chinese dominance, it will have major repercussions across the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), potentially triggering a domino effect.

Yet, the U.S. has a fresh opportunity for rapprochement under Malaysia’s new government led by long-time democracy activist Anwar Ibrahim. Given the latter’s first global trip to China securing $38 billion of investments, the U.S. should act fast to ensure Malaysia recognizes the benefits of digital cooperation with the West.

Maurizio Geri, Ph.D. (Twitter: @MauriGeri) is a former senior NATO analyst who has worked at the NATO Allied Command Transformation in the U.S., NATO Southern Hub in Italy and NATO HQ in Belgium, who previously served as an analyst in the Italian Defence General Staff. He is a recipient of the Marie Curie Global Fellowship for research on EU-NATO cooperation against Russian hybrid warfare in the context of the energy-resources-climate security nexus. He is also an associate fellow at South Asia Democratic Forum, at the Center for Media and Peace Initiatives and at the International Team for the Study of Security. He is the author of “Ethnic Minorities in Democratizing Muslim Countries: Turkey and Indonesia” Palgrave Macmillan, 2018.

https://thehill.com/opinion/national-security/3983240-south-china-sea-drills-conceal-a-secret-war-to-control-the-internet/

To effectively address the border crisis, Congress must narrow scope of parole authority

 House Republicans took a bold first step on Tuesday in the unveiling of H.R. 2, the Secure the Border Act, a flagship package that unequivocally rejects the Biden administration’s open-borders policies, including one of its go-to tools for unending illegal immigration: mass parole.  

After two years of a self-inflicted, unprecedented border crisis, Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas created yet another pathway for migrants attempting to enter the United States illegally by unilaterally and unlawfully authorizing the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to parole 30,000 Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans, and Venezuelans per month. The law is clear — only Congress has this power.  

Congress provided the secretary of Homeland Security authority to “parole into the United States temporarily … only on a case-by-case basis for urgent humanitarian reasons or significant public benefit any alien applying for admission to the U.S.” Despite congressional intent that this was an extraordinary measure, and twice amending this authority to express the intended narrowness of immigration parole, Mayorkas has created, re-created, and retained several types of mass parole programs in violation of this law.  

The executive branch has used parole on many occasions to allow large populations of aliens to enter the U.S. ever since the benefit was created in 1952 as part of the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA). Congress amended the statute in the Refugee Act of 1980 to state that the attorney general could not parole a refugee into the U.S. unless “compelling reasons in the public interest with respect to that particular alien require that the alien be paroled … rather than be admitted as a refugee.”  

After Congress’s amendment, administrations still abused parole to bring large numbers of aliens into the U.S. for lengthy or even indefinite periods of time. Congress again amended the parole statute in the 1996 Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act to add the current “only on a case-by-case basis for urgent humanitarian reasons or significant public benefit” language. Administrations have not only ignored Congress’ second clarification, but the Biden administration has brazenly acted in defiance of the courts.  

The Biden administration’s 30,000 monthly Cuban/Haitian/Nicaraguan/Venezuelan parole flow is the most recent and egregious demonstration that parole abuse is clearly their preferred tool to bring large numbers of illegal immigrants into the U.S. 

In addition, the administration provides work authorization for these populations as a default. While the DHS parole guidance states the benefit is for two years, the administration’s practice is to extend “temporary” benefits and automatically renew work authorization.  

Add the administration’s extremely low deportation numbers, and there is no expectation of an end to this benefit for an illegal alien. This is a clear violation of the “temporarily” requirement of the parole statute.  

This mass parole practice also violates the case-by-case basis. The administration insists that it grants parole on this basis, but these numbers belie that claim. Nor can the administration credibly say that each alien should be paroled for an urgent humanitarian reason or significant public benefit. They have the time to seek a visa or to apply for protection using the refugee admissions process.  

Fortunately, in December 2021, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals rebuked DHS’s abuse of parole in Texas v. Biden, stating “Deciding to parole aliens en masse is the opposite of case-by-case decision making.” The court further stated that “DHS’s pretended power to parole aliens while ignoring the limitations Congress imposed on the parole power…[is] not nonenforcement; it’s misenforcement, suspension of the INA, or both” (emphasis in original).  

Then, just last month, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Florida likewise found in Florida v. U.S. that the Biden administration’s frequent use of a particular parole tool violates the law because it does not contemplate a return to custody once the purposes of parole have been served; it does not comply with the case-by-case requirement; and it does not limit parole to urgent humanitarian reasons or significant public benefit.  

To properly address the Biden administration’s lawless parole abuse and the border crisis as a whole, Congress needs to reclaim its statutory authority from the executive branch and further narrow the scope of the parole statute to expressly match congressional intent.  

The package that House Republicans will soon send to the floor contains the House Judiciary Committee’s Border Security and Enforcement Act, which significantly limits the secretary’s parole authority so that broad, categorical parole programs cannot be established to circumvent Congress. The bill strongly reiterates that parole be determined on a true case-by-case basis, based on new definitions of “significant public benefit” and “urgent humanitarian reasons.” It also limits parole to just one year and prohibits those on parole from working, with limited exceptions.  

Parole should never be used to circumvent normal visa processes and timelines. Ending abuse of this authority is a key step to addressing the border crisis and it is encouraging to see the House majority step up to the plate. 

Lora Ries is Director of The Heritage Foundation’s Border Security and Immigration Center.  

https://thehill.com/opinion/congress-blog/3985822-to-effectively-address-the-border-crisis-congress-must-narrow-scope-of-parole-authority/

'DEA seeks to extend COVID-era prescription flexibilities'

The Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) has submitted plans to extend prescription flexibilities for telemedicine that were adopted during the COVID-19 pandemic as the end of the public health emergency for the outbreak quickly approaches.

Shortly after the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, the DEA temporarily relaxed several rules when it came to prescribing controlled substances in order to ensure that patients were still able to access necessary care. The public health emergency is set to end on May 11.

During lockdown, the agency began to allow providers to prescribe buprenorphine — a treatment for opioid use disorder — over telehealth appointments without requiring in-person visits.

“We recognize the importance of telemedicine in providing Americans with access to needed medications, and we have decided to extend the current flexibilities while we work to find a way forward to give Americans that access with appropriate safeguards,” DEA Administrator Anne Milgram said in a statement Wednesday.

The agency has previously indicated a desire to maintain the changes, announcing proposed rules in February to extend COVID-era flexibilities.

The proposed rules would allow providers to prescribe a 30-day supply of “Schedule III-V non-narcotic controlled medications” as well as buprenorphine without an in-person evaluation or a referral from a separate practitioner who has conducted an in-person evaluation.

However, the proposal also drew criticisms for leaving out Schedule II controlled substances, which include drugs like Adderall, oxycodone and Ritalin.

https://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/3986368-dea-seeks-to-extend-covid-era-prescription-flexibilities/

'Michelle Obama launches kids’ nutrition firm'

 Former first lady Michelle Obama has co-founded a new kids’ nutrition company geared at improving access to healthier foods, rolling out a low-sugar drink as its first product. 

Obama on Wednesday announced the launch of PLEZi Nutrition, a public benefit company, and the fruit-juice drink “PLEZi,” with plans to expand into other drinks and snacks in the coming years.  

“I’ve learned that on this issue, if you want to change the game, you can’t just work from the outside. You’ve got to get inside — you’ve got to find ways to change the food and beverage industry itself,” Obama said at the Wall Street Journal’s “Future Of Everything Festival.”

A release noted that PLEZi Nutrition builds on Obama’s “Let’s Move!” effort, an initiative she started while in the White House to encourage physical exercise and better nutrition among children, with the overall goal of addressing childhood obesity in the U.S.. 

“I’m proud to announce the national launch of a company designed not just to provide better products, but to jumpstart a race to the top that will transform the entire food industry,” Obama said Wednesday. 

The company’s first product will be available in Target and Sprouts stores, and online at Walmart, according to the release. As a public benefit company, PLEZi Nutrition plans to invest 10 percent of profits into initiatives aimed at upping kids’ health.

https://thehill.com/blogs/in-the-know/3986801-michelle-obama-launches-kids-nutrition-firm/

Mirasol knockout puts the pressure on Sutro

 It is unusual for a controlled study not only to meet but to beat the results seen in a single-cohort trial, but this is what appears to have happened in Mirasol, a randomised test of Immunogen’s anti-FRα antibody-drug conjugate Elahere.

The data back up what Elahere showed in Soraya, the trial that secured accelerated US approval, and put the drug on course for a formal green light later this year. If this happens it will make it hard for Sutro to argue for accelerated approval of its me-too project luveltamab tazevibulin, unless the regulator can be persuaded that luvelta can target a broader patient population.

Soraya and Mirasol both enrolled relapsed ovarian cancer patients whose tumours expressed high levels of FRα, and Sutro has argued that luvelta might address lower FRα expressers too. Detailed data have failed to make a strong case for such a claim, however.

Full label imminent?

Barring any nasty toxicity surprises it now seems that Immunogen’s Elahere is destined for full US approval. Mirasol had been powered to show a 30% reduction in risk of progression or death – PFS was its primary endpoint – and appears to have done so, and more.

In fact Elahere showed a 35% reduction versus chemo alone. Analysts had been hoping for a 1.5-month median PFS advantage versus a figure around 3.5 months for chemo, and Mirasol met this, with Elahere coming in at 5.6 months versus a higher than expected 4 months for chemo.

Overall survival is the icing on the cake, with Elahere cutting risk of death by 33% (p=0.0046). Immunogen had previously cautioned that Soraya enrolled a sicker patient population than Mirasol, but the risk that Elahere’s benefit might be less clear cut in the latter has been allayed.

Overall response rates reflected the differing patient populations, with ORR in Mirasol coming in a full 10 percentage points higher than in Soraya – and, Sutro investors will note, higher than luvelta had scored in the highest FRα expressers.

Two anti-FRα ADCs in ovarian cancer
	Elahere (mirvetuximab soravtansine, Immunogen)		Luveltamab tazevibulin (STRO-002, Sutro)
Study	Soraya	Mirasol	STRO-001-GM1
Population	FRα-high*	FRα-high*	>25% FRα**	25-75% FRα**	>75% FRα**
PFS	NA	5.6mth vs 4.0mth^	NA
		HR=0.65 (p<0.0001)
OS		16.5mth vs 12.8mth^
		HR=0.67 (p=0.0046)
ORR	33/104 (32%)	42%	12/32 (38%)	4/12 (33%)	8/20 (40%)
Median DoR	6.9mth	Not given	5.5mth	5.6mth	5.5mth
Safety	61% rate of eye disorders, including 9% at grade 3+	Grade 3+ TEAEs 42% vs 54%^; "no new safety signals"	31/44 (70%) grade 3+ neutropenia, incl 1 death
Notes: *defined as 75% tumour cells with 2+ intensity, measured by Ventana FOLR1 RxDx Assay; **measured by tumour proportion score; ^comparison is chemo alone. Source: prescribing info & Sutro presentation.

Immunogen refused to say where the full Mirasol data might be presented, and a key focus will be safety. For now all that is known is that there were “no new safety signals” in Mirasol, and that toxicities were generally worse with chemo than with Elahere.

When full Mirasol data are presented the spotlight will also fall on subgroup analyses, especially on any benefit Elahere brings to patients who have failed Parp inhibitors, representing a tough to treat population.

Immunogen stock surged 115% this morning. The bigger surprise was that Sutro also opened up, by around 20%. Perhaps Sutro investors are ignoring the hole that Mirasol has blown in their company’s accelerated approval plan, preferring to focus on the positive that Immunogen’s data have validated luvelta’s mechanism. The FRα ADC field has become highly competitive, however, and Sutro is not the only other game in town.

In the current quarter Sutro is to initiate Reframe, a phase 2/3 trial designed first to support luvelta's accelerated approval on the basis of ORR in the first 110 patients, and then to generate PFS data to back a full label.

The chances that Sutro will now have to wait at least until PFS data from Reframe read out before being able to file luvelta is a risk investors ignore at their peril.

https://www.evaluate.com/vantage/articles/news/trial-results/mirasol-knockout-puts-pressure-sutro