One asylum-seeking father dead by suicide after being torn from his wife and child.
A mother handcuffed for resisting when her breastfeeding baby was ripped from her breast.
Assembly line prosecutions.
The Trump Administration’s cruel and un-American policy of family separation must stop.
Meanwhile, Republicans in Congress have gone along with Trump’s hateful immigration policies every step of the way. Even now, they are cynically claiming to be voting on bills to stop this policy. They’re lying.
The extreme, nativist Goodlatte bill aims to criminalize all undocumented immigrants and eliminate protections for vulnerable adults and children seeking asylum. The second bill up for a vote, dangerously called a “compromise” even though it is being negotiated entirely amongst the anti-immigrant wing of Congress, is shaping up to be much of Trump’s nativist wish list with a few fig leaves added on. Both bills would only further harm women and children. As Speaker Ryan proudly put it, they’ve been “working hand-in-glove with the administration on this.”
Even normally loyal conservative commentators and religious leaders are starting to show their shock and disgust at these policies, and rallies are happening across the country, including at the Capitol this evening.
COMING SOON: COHEN’S COOPERATION?
Reports say Michael Cohen, Donald Trump’s longtime personal fixer and allegedly a key player in the #CultureOfCorruption, is sending signals for help.
Cohen dumped his legal team and may be close to flipping, despite Giuliani’s insistence that a) Cohen wouldn’t cooperate with Special Counsel Mueller and b) Trump did nothing wrong.
Should Trump be concerned? Who knows? But Cohen’s squirming suggests Mueller’s probe is digging in the right places.
Need a Cohen collusion refresher?
- He was part of the effort to build Trump Tower Moscow during the 2016 election campaign, which tried to secure financing from a state-run Russian bank. Cohen reportedly emailed a Kremlin spokesperson for help.
- Cohen worked with Andrii Artemenko, a pro-Kremlin Ukrainian politician, and another longtime Trump associate to broker a “peace plan” between Ukraine and Russia. The goal? Lifting Russian sanctions.
- Cohen’s alleged connections to individuals tied to the Russian mob date back to the 1990s.
Check out The Moscow Project’s Cohen profile here, and follow them on Twitter for all your Trump-Russia news and analysis.
A BIG PROGRESSIVE IDEA: EXPANDING FMLA
Progressives in Congress are starting to think ahead to midterms and beyond. What legislative priorities will become possible if progressives are in charge next year, instead of what Senator Bob Corker called the Trump “cult” in Congress?
Yesterday, Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-NY) introduced a bill that updates the definition of family in the Family Medical Leave Act to include “chosen family.” This would provide protections to people who have relationships akin to family members but are not bound by blood or legal ties. A recent Center for American Progress analysis showed that:
- 32 percent of people in the U.S. report having taken time off work to care for a friend or chosen family member.
- 42 percent of people who have a disability or identify as LGBTQ report having taken time off work to care for a friend of chosen family member.
This bill is an important step closer to the ultimate goal: paid leave policies that work for all families.