South Florida Sun-Sentinel (Sunday)
Judge blocks Trump’s rules on asylum days before they go in effect
A U.S. judge late Friday blocked the Trump administration’s most sweeping set of asylum restrictions less than two weeks before President-elect Joe Biden takes office.
The rules had been set to take effect Monday. The court order has limited immediate impact because the government has largely suspended asylum at the U.S.-Mexico border during the coronavirus pandemic, citing public health concerns.
Still, letting the rules take effect would have been felt by some who can still claim asylum and make it significantly more difficult for all asylum-seekers once pandemic-related measures are lifted.
The administration argued that the measures were an appropriate response to a system rife with abuse and overwhelmed with unworthy claims.
They sought to redefine how people qualify for asylum and similar forms of humanitarian protection if they face persecution at home. The restrictions would have broadened the grounds for a judge to deem asylum applications “frivolous” and prohibit applicants from ever winning protections in the U.S.
U.S. District Judge James Donato in San Francisco sided with advocacy groups who sued, saying acting Homeland Security secretary Chad Wolf lacked authority to impose the sweeping rules.
Donato, who was appointed to the bench in 2013 by President Barack Obama, wrote that Wolf ’s appointment violated an established order of succession. He said it was the fifth time a court has ruled against Homeland Security on the same grounds.
“The government has recycled exactly the same legal and factual claims made in the prior cases, as if they had not been soundly rejected in well-reasoned opinions by several courts,” Donato wrote.
Donato said his ruling applies nationwide because limiting its reach “would result in a fragmented and disjointed patchwork of immigration policy.”
Tuskegee Airman dies: Theodore “Ted” Lumpkin Jr., a member of the Tuskegee Airmen whose service as a member of the all-Black unit during World War II helped desegregate the U.S. military, has died at 100.
Lumpkin died of COVID19 on Dec. 26 at a hospital, just days shy of his 101st birthday, said his son Ted Lumpkin III.
“We’re carrying on his (legacy), but it’s an end of an era,” his son said.
Lumpkin was drafted into the military in 1942 when he was a 21-year-old student at UCLA. He was assigned to the 100th Fighter Squadron of the all-Black unit in Tuskegee, Alabama, as a
2nd lieutenant with the U.S. Army Air Force.
He said his eyes weren’t good enough to become a pilot, so he served as an intelligence officer, briefing pilots about missions during his overseas combat tour in Italy.
During his tenure in the military, he earned his bachelor’s and master’s degrees from USC. He met his wife, Georgia, while he was a student and got married soon after. Years later, Lumpkin retired from the Air Force Reserves as a lieutenant colonel.
Diplomatic changes: Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced Saturday that the State Department is voiding longstanding restrictions on how U.S. diplomats and others have contact with their counterparts in Taiwan, another move that is expected to upset China as the Trump administration winds down.
The Trump administration has sought to strengthen bilateral relations with Taiwan. It announced Thursday that U.N Ambassador Kelly Craft would go to Taiwan, a move that sparked sharp criticism from Beijing and a warning that the U.S. would pay a heavy price. In August, Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar became the first Cabinet member to visit Taiwan since 2014.
Pompeo said that the State Department has created complex restrictions when it comes to contacts between the two parties. He said those actions were taken to appease the Communist regime in Beijing.
“No more,” Pompeo declared in a statement. “Today I am announcing that I am lifting all of these self-imposed restrictions.”
The Chinese government maintains that mainland China and Taiwan are parts of “one China.”
Royal vaccinations: Queen Elizabeth II and her husband, Prince Philip, have received their COVID-19 vaccinations, royal officials said Saturday.
Buckingham Palace officials said in a statement that the 94-year-old monarch and Philip, 99, received their jabs Saturday, joining some 1.5 million people in Britain who have been given a first dose of a vaccine.
The injections were administered at Windsor Castle, where the queen and her husband have been spending their time during the lockdown in England.
Royal officials said they took the rare step of commenting on the monarch’s health in order to prevent inaccuracies and further speculation. The queen “decided that she would let it be known she has had the vaccination,” the palace statement said.
On Dec. 8, Britain became the world’s first country to begin a mass vaccination drive against the coronavirus. The government says it is aiming to deliver the first vaccine doses to some 15 million people in the top priority groups by the middle of February.
Pope ‘astonished’ by attack: Pope Francis has told an Italian broadcaster that he was “astonished” by the mob attack at the U.S. Capitol due to the democratic traditions of the United States.
The pope said in an interview with Mediaset that the private broadcaster is set to air Sunday that even “in the most mature reality, there is always something that doesn’t work, people who take a path against the community, against democracy and against the common good.”
In a brief excerpt posted Saturday on Mediaset’s website, Francis said, “Thank God this exploded” into the open “so it can be seen, so it can be remedied.”
“This must be condemned, this movement, regardless of the people” involved, he said of Wednesday’s rioting and violence on Capitol Hill.
10 infants killed in fire: A fire broke out in the intensive care unit of a government-run hospital in western India early Saturday, killing 10 infants, police and news reports said.
A preliminary investigation suggests the fire was caused by an electrical short circuit, said police officer V.S. Chavan.
The Press Trust of India news agency said the infants were 1 to 3 months old.
Firefighters rescued seven babies from the newborn care unit of the hospital in Bhandara, a town in Maharashtra state 625 miles south of New Delhi.