WASHINGTON: The Senate will open up a rare, open-ended debate on immigration and the fate of the “Dreamer” immigrants on Monday. But the most influential voice in the conversation may be on the other side of Pennsylvania Avenue.
If the aim is to pass a legislative solution soon, President Donald Trump remains a crucial player. His ultimate support will be vital if Congress is to overcome election-year pressures against compromise. No deal crafted in the Senate is likely to see the light of day in the more conservative House, without the president’s blessing. Trump, thus far, has balked on that front.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., scheduled an initial procedural vote for Monday evening to commence debate. It is expected to succeed easily, and then the Senate will spend days or weeks — no one knows how long — sorting through proposals.
Democrats and some Republicans say they want to help the “Dreamers,” young immigrants who have lived in the US illegally since they were children and have only temporarily been protected from deportation by an Obama-era program. Trump has said he wants to aid them and has even proposed a path to citizenship for 1.8 million, but in exchange wants $25 billion for his proposed US-Mexico border wall plus significant curbs to legal immigration.
McConnell agreed to the open-ended debate, a Senate rarity in recent years, after Democrats forced a government shutdown last month and would supply enough votes to reopen agencies with a promise of a debate and votes on immigration. They had initially demanded a deal toward helping Dreamers, not a simple promise of votes.
What is certain is that to prevail, any plan will need 60 votes, meaning substantial support from both parties is mandatory. Republicans control the chamber 51-49 but GOP Sen. John McCain of Arizona has been home for weeks battling brain cancer. It is unclear who will offer what.
Some version of Trump’s plan and a bipartisan proposal to give Dreamers a chance at citizenship — with no border security money or legal immigration restrictions — seem likely to surface. Both are considered certain to fail.
A rejection of Trump’s plan, which may not even attract all GOP votes, would be a black eye for the White House. For Democrats, perhaps its most radioactive proposal is barring legal immigrants from sponsoring their parents or siblings to live in the US.
Votes are also possible on a compromise by a small bipartisan group led by Sens. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., and Lindsey Graham, R-S.C. It would provide possible citizenship for hundreds of thousands of Dreamers, $2.7 billion for border security and some changes in legal immigration rules. McCain and Sen. Chris Coons, D-Del., would offer legal status but not necessarily citizenship, and require tougher border security without promising wall money.
Trump has rejected both proposals.
Some senators have discussed a bare-bones plan to protect Dreamers for a year in exchange for a year’s worth of security money. Flake has said he is working on a three-year version of that.
Underscoring how hard it has been for lawmakers to find an immigration compromise, around 24 moderates from both parties have met for weeks to seek common ground. So have the No. 2 Democratic and GOP House and Senate leaders. Neither group has come forward with a deal.
In January, Trump invited 24 lawmakers from both parties to the White House in what became a nearly hour-long immigration negotiating session. He asked them to craft a “bill of love.”
At another White House session days later, he told Durbin and Graham he was rejecting their bipartisan offer.
Last September Trump said he was ending the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, or DACA, which lets Dreamers temporarily live and work in the US. Trump said President Barack Obama had lacked the legal power to create DACA.
Trump gave Congress until March 5 to somehow replace it, though a federal court has forced him to continue its protections.
The court’s blunting of the deadline has made congressional action even less likely. Lawmakers rarely take difficult votes without a forcing mechanism — particularly in an election year. That has raised the prospect that the Senate debate launching Monday will largely serve to frame a larger fight over the issue on the campaign trail.
Trump seemed to acknowledge that in a tweet Saturday: “Republicans want to fix DACA far more than the Democrats do. The Dems had all three branches of government back in 2008-2011, and they decided not to do anything about DACA. They only want to use it as a campaign issue. Vote Republican!”
US Senate set to debate fate of ‘Dreamer’ immigrants
US Senate set to debate fate of ‘Dreamer’ immigrants
Daesh group claims attack on Sufi shrine in Afghanistan
- A local resident, who said he knew victims of the attack, said worshippers had gathered at the Sayed Pasha Agha shrine on Thursday evening
KABUL: Daesh (IS-K), the terrorist group’s branch in Afghanistan, on Saturday claimed responsibility for a gun attack that left 10 people dead at a Sufi shrine in northern Baghlan province.
Taliban authorities in Kabul have repeatedly said they have defeated IS-K, but the group regularly claims responsibility for attacks, notably against Sufi or Shiite minorities, targets they consider heretical.
On Friday, interior ministry spokesman Abdul Matin Qani told AFP that a gunman opened fire on Sufis “taking part in a weekly ritual” at a shrine in a remote area of Nahrin district, killing 10 people.
A local resident, who said he knew victims of the attack, said worshippers had gathered at the Sayed Pasha Agha shrine on Thursday evening.
They had begun a Sufi chant when “a man shot at the dozen worshippers,” he said on condition of anonymity.
“When people arrived for morning prayers, they discovered the bodies,” he added.
The UN special rapporteur for human rights in Afghanistan, Richard Bennett, wrote on X: “Religious minorities remain under grave threat. More prevention, protection & justice needed.”
The Daesh group accuses Sufis of worshipping more than one god because of their devotion to saints.
In mid-September, the group claimed responsibility for an attack in central Afghanistan that killed 14 people who had gathered to welcome pilgrims returning from Karbala in Iraq, one of the holiest sites for Shiites.
India opposes COP29 finance deal after it is adopted
BAKU: India strongly objected to a climate finance deal agreed at the United Nations COP29 summit on Sunday, but their objection was raised after the deal was formally adopted by consensus.
“I regret to say that this document is nothing more than an optical illusion. This, in our opinion, will not address the enormity of the challenge we all face. Therefore, we oppose the adoption of this document,” Indian delegation representative Chandni Raina told the closing plenary session of the summit.
UN climate chief says ‘no time for victory laps’ after COP29 deal
BAKU, Azerbaijan: UN climate chief Simon Stiell on Sunday said it was “no time for victory laps” after nations at COP29 in Azerbaijan agreed a bitterly negotiated finance deal.
“No country got everything they wanted, and we leave Baku with a mountain of work still to do. So this is no time for victory laps,” Stiell said in a statement.
Mass rape trial sparks demonstrations across France
- Police sources said 35,000 people had turned out across the country, while organizers put the figure at 100,000
PARIS: Tens of thousands demonstrated in major French cities Saturday against violence targeting women, as campaigners push for the country to learn from a mass rape trial that has shocked the public.
The prosecution in the southern city Avignon is in its final stages for 51 men, including one who drugged his wife over the course of a decade and dozens of others charged with accepting his invitations to abuse her at their home.
Out on the street, “the more of us there are, the more visible we are, this is everyone’s business, not just women,” said Peggy Plou, an elected official from the Indre-et-Loire region in western France who had made the trip to Paris.
Thousands of people marched in the capital alone, mostly women but including some children and men. Police put the turnout there at 12,500, while organizers said 80,000.
Police sources said 35,000 people had turned out across the country, while organizers put the figure at 100,000.
Hundreds also turned out in other major cities including Marseille in the south, Lille in the northeast and Rennes in the northwest. Local officials in Bordeaux, in the southwest, put the turnout there at 1,600.
Many demonstrators carried signs with variations on the slogan “Shame must switch sides,” popularised by the plaintiff in the Avignon trial, Gisele Pelicot.
She has become a feminist hero for choosing public hearings in her case rather than a trial behind closed doors, despite their painful content.
“A law about consent must be put in place very quickly. Just because someone doesn’t say something, doesn’t mean that they agree” to sexual contact, said Marie-Claire Abiker, 78, a retired nurse who marched in Paris.
France’s legal definition of rape calls it “any act of sexual penetration... by violence, constraint, threats or surprise” but includes no language about consent — a key demand of women’s rights groups especially since the MeToo movement launched in the late 2010s.
“In 2018, there were basically only women (demonstrating). Today there are, let’s say, 30 percent men. That’s really great news,” said Amy Bah, a member of the NousToutes (All of us women) feminist group protesting in Lille.
“I feel like this is my business too, we each have our role to play, especially men,” said Arnaud Garcette, 38, at the Marseille demonstration in the city’s historic port with his two children.
“We’re at the source of the problem, and at the source of the solutions too,” he added.
The demonstrations, called by more than 400 campaign groups, come two days before the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women on Monday.
Equality Minister Salima Saa has promised “concrete and effective” measures to coincide with the global day.
According to a report in Sunday’s Tribune Dimanche weekly, Prime Minister Michel Barnier will announce measures including increased training for police officers and more support for victims of domestic violence who leave their home.
The campaigners who organized Saturday’s protests are calling for more far-reaching measures, including a dedicated 2.6 billion-euro ($2.7 billion) budget and a stronger legal framework to tackle the problem.
During his first term as French president, Emmanuel Macron vowed to prioritize the cause of equality between men and women and to work to eliminate violence against women.
US reels from rain, snow as second round of bad weather approaches for Thanksgiving week
- A winter storm warning in California’s Sierra Nevada on Saturday was in effect through Tuesday, according to the National Weather Service’s Sacramento office, with heavy snow expected at higher elevations and wind gusts potentially reaching 55 mph (88 kph
WINDSOR, California: The US was reeling from snow and rain on Saturday with a second round of bad weather threatening to disrupt holiday travel ahead of Thanksgiving. A person was found dead in a vehicle submerged in floodwaters in California, which braced for more precipitation while still grappling with flooding and small landslides from a previous storm. And thousands in the Pacific Northwest remained without power after multiple days in the dark.
A winter storm warning in California’s Sierra Nevada on Saturday was in effect through Tuesday, according to the National Weather Service’s Sacramento office, with heavy snow expected at higher elevations and wind gusts potentially reaching 55 mph (88 kph). Total snowfall of roughly 4 feet (1.2 meters) was forecast, with the heaviest accumulations coming Monday and Tuesday.
Forecasters said the Midwest and Great Lakes regions will see rain and snow Monday, and the East Coast will be the most impacted on Thanksgiving and Black Friday.
A low pressure system will bring rain to the Southeast early Thursday before heading to the Northeast, where areas from Boston to New York could see rain and strong winds. Parts of northern New Hampshire, northern Maine and the Adirondacks could get snow. If the system tracks further inland, the forecast would call for less snow for the mountains and more rain.
Deadly ‘bomb cyclone’ on West Coast
The storm on the West Coast arrived in the Pacific Northwest earlier this week, killing two people and knocking out power to hundreds of thousands, mostly in the Seattle area, before its strong winds moved through Northern California. The system roared ashore on the West Coast on Tuesday as a ” bomb cyclone,” which occurs when a cyclone intensifies rapidly. It unleashed fierce winds that toppled trees onto roads, vehicles and homes.
Santa Rosa, California, saw its wettest three-day period on record with about 12.5 inches (32 centimeters) of rain falling by Friday evening, according to the National Weather Service in the Bay Area. On Saturday vineyards in Windsor, about 10 miles (16 kilometers) to the north, were flooded.
To the west, rescue crews in Guerneville recovered a body inside a vehicle bobbing in floodwaters around 11:30 a.m. Saturday, according to Rob Dillion, a Sonoma County sheriff’s deputy and spokesperson. The deceased was presumed to be a victim of the storm, but an autopsy had not yet been conducted.
Dominick Conti, a 19-year-old volunteer firefighter, and a friend drove around the Santa Rosa area Friday helping people whose vehicles were swamped. With his 2006 Dodge Ram pickup truck and a set of ropes, they were able to rescue the driver of a sedan that stalled out in water, a truck stuck in a giant mudhole and a farmer stranded on a dirt road.
Tens of thousands remain without power in Seattle area
Some 80,000 people in the Seattle area were still without electricity after this season’s strongest atmospheric river — a long plume of moisture that forms over an ocean and flows over land. Crews worked to clear streets of downed lines, branches and other debris, while cities opened warming centers so people heading into their fourth day without power could get warm food and plug in their cellphones and other devices.
The power came back in the afternoon at Katie Skipper’s home in North Bend, about 30 miles (50 kilometers) east of the city in the foothills of the Cascades, after being out since Tuesday. It was tiring to take cold showers, rely on a wood stove for warmth and use a generator to keep the refrigerator cold, Skipper said, but those inconveniences paled in comparison to the damage other people suffered, such as from fallen trees.
“That’s really sad and scary,” she said.
Northeast gets much-needed precipitation
Another storm brought rain to New York and New Jersey, where rare wildfires have raged in recent weeks, and heavy snow to northeastern Pennsylvania. Parts of West Virginia were under a blizzard warning through Saturday morning, with up to 2 feet (61 centimeters) of snow and high winds making travel treacherous.
Despite the mess, the precipitation was expected to help ease drought conditions after an exceptionally dry fall.
“It’s not going to be a drought buster, but it’s definitely going to help when all this melts,” said Bryan Greenblatt, a National Weather Service meteorologist in Binghamton, New York.
Heavy snow fell in northeastern Pennsylvania, including the Pocono Mountains. Higher elevations reported up to 17 inches (43 centimeters), with lesser accumulations in valley cities like Scranton and Wilkes-Barre. Less than 80,000 customers in 10 counties lost power, and the state transportation department imposed speed restrictions on some highways.
Parts of West Virginia also experienced their first significant snowfall of the season Friday and overnight Saturday, with up to 10 inches (25.4 centimeters) in the higher elevations of the Allegheny Mountains. Some areas were under a blizzard warning.
The precipitation helped put a dent in the state’s worst drought in at least two decades. It also was a boost for West Virginia ski resorts preparing to open their slopes in the weeks ahead.
