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As Trump ends DACA, all eyes turn to Congress for immigration reform; Hurricane Irma is shaping up to be another record-breaking storm; Cambodia is in turmoil amid a government crackdown on opposition leaders and journalists.
It's now up to Congress to save DACA
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- The Trump administration announced today it is ending the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, an Obama-era program that was shielding about 800,000 young unauthorized immigrants from being deported. [CNN / Tal Kopan]
- DACA specifically protected many immigrants known as DREAMers, who were brought to the US as young children. The program was meant to keep young people from being deported so they could go to school, get jobs, and become productive members of US society. [Vox / Dara Lind]
- As part of its strict immigration agenda, the Trump administration said it would end the program, but allow for six months for people who are already DACA recipients to apply for another two-year renewal. [Washington Post / David Makamura]
- People not already in the program who wanted to apply are out of luck; today was the last day for the government to accept applications. [Vox / Dara Lind]
- That means young immigrants may potentially be able to buy some time until Congress is able to pass comprehensive immigration reform. There are already three bills shaping up that could save DREAMers from deportation — and there's support from key people in leadership, like House Speaker Paul Ryan. [Politico / Nolan McCaskill]
- But Congress has tried and failed many times to pass comprehensive immigration reform over the years, so it’s still a big if, especially given the fact they also have pressing things like the national debt ceiling and hurricane relief to pass first. [Vox / Jeff Stein]
- Immigration reform that gives DREAMers a path to citizenship has support from members of Congress on both sides of the aisle — and apparently, Trump supports the concept as well. On Tuesday night, the president told reporters he has “great love” for DACA recipients and said he hopes Congress will act in the next six months. [Associated Press via Twitter]
Irma-god
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- A hurricane is barreling toward the East Coast — and this one is even bigger than Hurricane Harvey. [Washington Post / Brian McNoldy and Jason Samenow]
- Hurricane Irma is moving rapidly across the Atlantic, currently as a Category 5 hurricane (the strongest measurement on the Saffir-Simpson wind scale), with sustained winds blowing up to 185 miles per hour. [Vox / Brian Resnick]
- Hurricane Irma hasn’t made landfall yet, but it’s already another record-setting storm. Whereas Hurricane Harvey dumped a new record of rain on Texas, Irma is coming in with dangerous wind speeds. [Brian Kahn via Twitter]
- As Vox’s Brian Resnick writes, wind isn’t the only dangerous thing about a hurricane. The storms become deadly through a combination of factors, including wind, rainfall, and storm surge. [Vox / Brian Resnick]
- Current storm models show that Florida, Puerto Rico, Cuba, and other Caribbean islands are in the storm’s path, and Florida officials have already started evacuating certain counties. [Ryan Maue via Twitter]
- Meanwhile, the governor of Puerto Rico is urging the island’s residents to take cover in one of 460 hurricane shelters and said he’s getting ready to ask President Trump to declare a federal state of emergency. [Reuters / Scott Malone]
- If Irma is as bad as many fear, it could add billions in damages on top of Hurricane Harvey, which is already estimated to be the second-costliest natural disaster in the United States. [LA Times / Don Lee]
The Cambodian government really doesn’t want to hold elections
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- Cambodian opposition party leader Kem Sokha has been arrested and charged with treason, accused of formulating “a secret plan” with the United States to spy on the Cambodian government. [BBC]
- If convicted, Sokha could face up to 30 years in prison. His arrest comes a year before Cambodia is supposed to hold its general election, and opposition party members view this as a larger effort by the government to consolidate power. [Reuters / Prak Chan Thul, Matthew Tostevin]
- Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen has been ruling for the past 30 years, and would have faced Kem Sokha in the next election. Sokha’s party was looking like it could mount a competitive challenge against Hun Sen. [The Diplomat / David Hutt]
- With Sokha under arrest, Hun Sen’s party has ordered them to either find a replacement candidate or sit out the general election next year. [Reuters / Prak Chan Thul, Matthew Tostevin]
- It is also a sign that the country is moving away from ties to the US and aligning more closely with China, which supports Hun Sen’s government. [Associated Press / Todd Pitman]
- At the same time, the government’s crackdown on independent news organizations is resulting in one of its independent newspapers, the English-language Cambodia Daily, to shut down. The Daily had been operating for 24 years and closed on Monday. [The Cambodia Daily]
- The government contends the paper owes it millions in unpaid taxes, but shutting down the independent paper is part of a larger crackdown on journalists. Hun Sen’s government has recently ordered that radio stations stop broadcasting independent channels such as the Voice of America and Radio Free Asia, and has also forced out some NGOs. [NYT / Richard Paddock]
Miscellaneous
- Climate change is impacting even the sea creatures who live in the deepest, darkest, most remote parts of the ocean. [Nature Climate Change / Huw Griffiths, Andrew Meijers and Thomas Bracegirdle]
- There’s a petition going around Minnesota to replace a Christopher Columbus statue with one of Prince, who fans say they find much more inspirational. [Fader / Jordan Darville]
- The Terminator/former California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has a new pet project: ending gerrymandering across the country. In doing so, he’s going up against his own political party. [San Francisco Chronicle / Joe Garofoli]
- People in the tiny, landlocked Balkan country of Macedonia are mourning the death of Ognen Čemerski, a linguist and activist who completed the mammoth task of translating Moby Dick into Macedonian, even though the language has almost no words for ships or other maritime terminology. [Global Voices / Filip Stojanovski]
- Millennials aren't ruining libraries with their smartphones; a new study finds that they're actually more likely to turn to their local library than older generations. [Pew Research Center / Abigail Geiger]
Verbatim
- "He is not my bride, neither am I his bride or groom.” [Russian President Vladimir Putin about President Trump to the Moscow Times]
- “I enjoy being, frankly, a pain in the ass to anti-vaxxers.” [Craig Egan to Stat / Rebecca Robbins]
- “The mother could see the pups and smell the pups, but if they didn’t vocalize, it was as though they didn’t exist.” [Dr. Carmen Birchmeier to NYT / Natalie Angier]
- "When we are with God, there are no borders. Man made borders on this earth." [Rita Ruiz de Guillen, mother of Harvey victim and DACA recipient Alonso Guillen to the Houston Chronicle / Susan Carroll, Lomi Kriel]
- “I tend to think when you’ve been lucky and fortunate enough to make some money, you have a position of power, it’s like Spider-Man ethics — with power comes responsibility.” [Silicon Valley billionaire Reid Hoffman to Recode / Tony Romm]
Watch this:
The wall of eyes trained on the US-Mexico border. [Vox / Johnny Harris, Christina Thornell and Tian Wang]
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