As the NATO summit approaches, more than cash is at stake
What makes a good NATO ally? Debates over burden-sharing have 'moved and shaken' the alliance ever since its foundation in 1949, says Rafael Loss of the European Council on Foreign Relations, a think-tank. Most recently, Donald Trump, in both his first and his present term, has justifiably railed against Europeans for not paying their fair whack while America keeps them all safe.
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The Guardian
an hour ago
- The Guardian
The rise of Stephen Miller, the architect of Trump's hardline immigration policy
With Los Angeles convulsed by confrontation between pro-migrant protesters and military units dispatched by Donald Trump, no figure apart from the president has loomed larger than Stephen Miller. As the man in the Oval Office, it is Trump who has absorbed the accusations of authoritarianism for usurping the powers of California's government after deploying 4,000 national guard troops and 700 active marines on to the streets of a city that is home to more undocumented immigrants than any other in the US. Behind the scenes, however, this has been the apogee of Miller's power – and an episode that illuminated his power in a White House where his influence far outstrips his misleadingly modest title of deputy chief of staff. Miller, 39, may have been the true catalyst for the volatile scenes that played out over several days in the city of his birth. As the long-term architect of Trump's years-long effort to reinvent US immigration policy, he has pressed Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) agents to intensify efforts to arrest migrants as deportation figures fell far short of pre-election promises. At a meeting at Ice's Washington headquarters last month, Miller ordered them to skip the usual practice of compiling lists of suspected illegal migrants and instead target Home Depot, where day laborers gather for short-term hire, and 7-Eleven stores, to carry out mass arrests, the Wall Street Journal reported. Ice would aim for a minimum of 3,000 arrests a day, he told Fox News – a figure exceeding previous estimates, based on assumptions that those with criminal records would be prioritised. It also seemed to raise the risk of mistakes and wrongful arrests. Accordingly, Ice has drastically stepped up its arrest rate – and broadened the profile of those targeted. The results have been plain to see. As demonstrators took to the streets, Miller promptly raised the stakes by accusing them of an 'insurrection'. Amid the hullabaloo and expressions of outrage, Miller may allowed himself a quiet smile of satisfaction over sticking it to the city of his birth – in many ways emblematic of the progressive cultural trends despised by Trump's 'make America great again' (Maga) followers but a place where his own hardline anti-immigrant views had long provoked derision. The son of affluent Jewish parents, Miller's evolution into a race-baiting provocateur took shape in the upscale suburb of Santa Monica, where he gained notoriety as an incendiary agitator at the eponymous local high school. Video footage purportedly from the period and circulated on social media shows a bearded Miller stridently voicing his disdainful view of school janitorial staff 'Am I the only one who is sick and tired of being told to pick up my trash when we have plenty of janitors who are paid to do this,' he shouts into a microphone. The gross statement seems to have been representative of a broader canvas of toxic ideas, with racism at its core. In Hatemonger: Stephen Miller, Donald Trump, and the White Nationalist Agenda, to date the only biography published on Miller, author Jean Guerrero recounts one episode from the future political operative's adolescence, when he suddenly ditched a close friend, Jason Islas, on the grounds of his ethnicity. 'The conversation was remarkably calm,' Islas, a Mexican American, is quoted saying. 'He expressed hatred for me in a calm, cool, matter-of-fact way.' An article he wrote as a 16-year-old for a local website expresses contempt for fellow students of Hispanic origin. 'When I entered Santa Monica High School in ninth grade, I noticed a number of students lacked basic English skills,' Miller wrote on the Surfsantamonica site. 'There are usually very few, if any, Hispanic students in my honors classes, despite the large number of Hispanic students that attend our school.' The school, he added, was one where 'Osama bin Laden would feel very welcome' – a view reflecting the then recentness of the 9/11 attacks by al-Qaida and also Miller's increasing focus on Muslims. Miller's indulgence in far-right ideas continued during his college years at Duke University in North Carolina, where he associated with white nationalist thinkers and groups. According to the Southern Poverty Law Center, he worked with the David Horowitz Freedom Center, which it defined as a 'an anti-Muslim hate group', and also with Richard Spencer, a white nationalist leader who popularized the term 'alt-right' to describe groups that defined themselves through a white racial identity. After graduating, Miller moved to Washington to work in Congress, serving first as a press secretary to Michele Bachmann, then a Republican representative for Minnesota, before moving to work for Jeff Sessions, at the time a rightwing Alabama senator who later became Trump's first attorney general. It was in the latter role that his reputation as an avatar of extreme anti-immigrant agitprop became established. In 2013, helped by Miller, Sessions torpedoed a bipartisan piece of legislation that was intended to pave the way for immigration for undocumented migrants. To help sink the bill, Miller used Breitbart News, a rightwing website then headed by Steve Bannon. It would prove to be a fateful connection. The Breitbert connection also shone further light on Miller's views on race and immigration, as revealed in emails he sent to editors and reporters. They showed a preoccupation with the 1924 Immigration Act, signed by President Calvin Coolidge, which severely restricted immigration to the US from certain parts of the world on what observers say were racial and eugenics grounds. Hitler subsequently praised the legislation as a model for Germany in Mein Kampf. After Trump launched his presidential campaign in 2015 - creating scandalizing headlines by demonizing Mexican immigrants as 'drug dealers, criminals and rapists', Miller took a leave of absence from Sessions' Senate office to work for him. On the recommendation of Bannon, by then Trump's campaign chief, he was installed as a speech writer, chiefly because of his focus on immigration, which had become the candidate's own signature issue. It enabled Miller to showcase his ability to channel Trump's inner self. The pair have politically inseparable ever since. Miller wrote Trump's dystopian 'American carnage' speech for his first inauguration in January 2017. As a senior policy adviser in the first Trump administration, it was Miller who was behind some of its most notorious policy initiatives. These included the so-called 'Muslim ban' on travellers from seven majority-Muslim countries and the practice of separating migrant children from their parents at the southern border. His growing notoriety as an anti-immigration extremist drew criticism from his own relatives. In 2018, his maternal uncle, David Glosser, branded him a 'hypocrite' for ignoring the memory of his ancestors, who fled antisemitic pogroms in tsarist Russia. 'I have watched with dismay and increasing horror as my nephew, an educated man who is well aware of his heritage, has become the architect of immigration policies that repudiate the very foundation of our family's life in this country,' Glosser, a retired neuropsychologist, wrote in Politico. Miller cared little for such sentimentality. After Trump's defeat to Joe Biden in the 2020 presidential election, Miller stuck with the former president – even while his political future initially looked doomed in the aftermath of the 6 January 2021 attack by his supporters on the US Capitol. Consequently, he grew ever more powerful in Trump's inner circle. He may have earned extra kudos by declining to exploit their relationship to win lucrative consulting contracts, instead setting up a non-profit, the America First Legal foundation. Meanwhile, he immersed himself in studying how to overcome the hurdles that stymied Trump's agenda during his first presidency. The outcome has been apparent in the blizzard of executive orders druing the restored president's first months back in the White House. Miller purposely sought to 'flood the zone' in a manner that would overwhelm the capacity of the courts – or the media – to respond. No order was more quintessentially Miller's than that issued on the day of Trump's second inauguration on 20 January, which attempted to cancel birthright citizenship for children born to undocumented immigrants. The order was challenged in the courts and is now with the supreme court after the administration challenged the ability of lower courts to issue nationwide injunctions supporting a right that is guaranteed in the US constitution. Miller's anti-immigrant zeal has at times exceeded even that of Trump. According to the New York Times, the president told a campaign meeting last year that if it was up to Miller, there would only be 100 million people living in the US – and all of them would look like Miller. The bond between the two men has grown to such an extent that Miller has been dubbed 'the president's id' in some circles. 'He has been for a while. It's just now he has the leverage and power to fully effectuate it,' an unnamed former Trump adviser told NBC. Others have called him 'the most consequential' White House official since Dick Cheney, who exercised vast influence as vice-president under George W Bush. Critics cast Miller as the root of all evil in Trump's White House. 'Stephen Miller is responsible for all the bad things happening in the United States,' NBC quoted Ben Ray Luján, a Democratic senator for New Mexico, as saying. Miller's exalted place at Trump's side was illustrated during the recent Signalgate episode – as revealed by the Atlantic, whose editor, Jeffrey Goldberg, was inadvertently invited into a government chat group to discuss airstrikes on Houthi militants in Yemen, whose missile attacks on Israel threatened Suez canal shipping routes. When JD Vance questioned the strikes – asking whether Trump 'is aware how inconsistent this is with his message on Europe' – Miller unambiguously slapped the vice-president down. 'As I heard it, the president was clear: green light,' Miller said, according to the transcript. The clearest testimony to Miller's status has come from Trump himself. Asked by Kristen Welker, the moderator of NBC's Meet the Press, about speculation that Miller might become national security adviser, a usually influential White House post currently filled, albeit temporarily, by the secretary of state, Marco Rubio, after the previous incumbent, Mike Waltz, was fired. 'Stephen is much higher on the totem pole than that,' Trump replied. The result is that Miller's presence is detectable in all policy areas, including at the state department, where he succeeded in having his ally, Christopher Landau, installed as Rubio's deputy. The goal is to control the flow of foreigners entering the United States, insiders have told the Guardian. At the state department, Landau has become an important liaison to officials in the consular affairs section, which has been put under the leadership of a conservative coterie of diplomats and reoriented toward policing migration. Officials from the state department have joined FBI agents on recent Ice raids aimed at tracking down unregistered migrants. Tara Setmayer, a former Republican communications director on Capitol Hill, laments that Miller's rising star means he can 'use the powers of the federal government to unleash his fascist worldview'. '[That view] has now been transformed into the main political policy and aim of Donald Trump's presidency,' said Setmayer, who now heads the Seneca Project, a women-led political action committee. 'The demagoguery of immigration has long been at the centre of Donald Trump's political rise, and Stephen Miller's desire to make America whiter and less diverse, married with the power of the presidency without guardrails, is incredibly dangerous and should concern every American who believes in the rule of law.' Andrew Roth and David Smith contributed reporting
The Guardian
an hour ago
- The Guardian
BBC examining plans that could lead to US consumers paying for its journalism
Senior BBC figures are examining plans that would lead to American consumers paying to access its journalism, as the broadcaster looks to the US to boost its fragile finances. The corporation, which is facing fierce competition from streamers and falling licence fee income, has been targeting US audiences as it attempts to increase its commercial revenues outside the UK. Executives believe the perceived polarisation of the US media, especially during Donald Trump's second term, may have created an opportunity for the BBC's brand of impartial coverage. The US is considered to be a prime target for the BBC to increase its overseas income, which has become an urgent task as the value of the licence fee has fallen significantly in real terms since 2010. Last year, the number of people paying it also fell by half a million as audiences were drawn to alternatives like Netflix and YouTube. The licence fee is now £174.50 a year. While the corporation has already relaunched its website and news app in the US, American consumers of its content are not asked to make any kind of financial contribution to the BBC's output. The Guardian understands that senior figures are keen to increase revenues coming from the country, including examining the idea of asking users to pay for access in some form. Some US broadcasters, such as the free-to-air TV network Public Broadcasting Service (PBS), already ask for donations from supporters. It is one of the potential areas of reform being considered by BBC bosses as talks over the renewal of its royal charter begin in earnest. The charter expires in 2027, with the corporation's leadership adamant that their red lines are any move to a subscription or advertising model in the UK. However, they are also under pressure to show they are attempting to increase all other areas of income. Tim Davie, the BBC's director general, is keen to increase the corporation's non-licence fee income. He is the former boss of BBC Studios, which oversees the broadcaster's commercial operations. He has said he is willing to embrace reforms that make its finances 'fairer, more modern and more sustainable'. BBC Studios has already been selling ads on its content in the US, including the website and app. The corporation's website in the US was relaunched at the end of 2023, followed by an overhaul of the corporation's app last year. The US is the BBC's largest English-speaking market and its second-largest overall, behind India. Its focus on North America has led to its digital newsroom there doubling in size, with an expansion in live broadcast programming from its Washington DC bureau. Internal figures suggest since relaunching, has had double-digit growth for nine consecutive months. The website reaches 130 million people globally, with 67 million of those in North America. Despite the focus on increasing its income, the BBC's revenues actually fell by 12% last year to £1.84bn, though it has increased significantly over the last five years. The fall last year was blamed on a slump in a post-Covid pandemic fall in TV production and commissioning, as well as investments made in
Daily Mail
an hour ago
- Daily Mail
Britons warned not to travel to Israel as conflict with Iran ramps up and UK deploys more jets to region
Britons have been warned not to travel to Israel as the conflict with Iran ramps up today. The Foreign Office is now advising 'against all travel to Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territories'. The stark message came as Israel and Iran continued to bombard each other overnight. Keir Starmer has announced that the UK is sending more RAF jets to the region amid the increasing hostilities. Donald Trump has threatened a huge response if Tehran targets US bases or personnel in retaliation for Israel's action. The FCDO website warns that 'travel insurance could be invalidated' if people travel against the advice, and described the current status as a 'fast-moving situation that poses significant risks'. Chancellor Rachel Reeves insisted this morning deploying extra jets does not mean the UK is 'at war'. Additional refuelling aircraft have been deployed from UK bases and more fast Typhoon jets will be sent over, it is understood. The Chancellor suggested the UK could 'potentially' support Israel in fending off Iranian strikes - as has happened before. Asked whether the move by the PM means the UK is at war, Ms Reeves told Sky News: 'No, it does not mean that we are at war. 'And we have not been involved in these strikes or this conflict, but we do have important assets in the region and it is right that we send jets to protect them and that's what we've done. 'It's a precautionary move.' Oil prices have surged after Israel's initial strikes against Iran's nuclear programme, sparking fears of increasing prices in the UK. The Chancellor told the BBC that there is 'no complacency' from the Treasury on the issue and 'we're obviously, monitoring this very closely as a government'. Sir Keir has declined to rule out the possibility of intervening in the conflict entirely, and the Chancellor indicated on Sunday that the UK could 'potentially' support Israel in the future. Britain last announced it had deployed fighter jets in the region in last year, when the Government said British aircraft had played a part in efforts to prevent further escalation. Asked whether the UK would come to Israel's aid if asked, the Chancellor told Sunday Morning With Trevor Phillips: 'We have, in the past, supported Israel when there have been missiles coming in. 'I'm not going to comment on what might happen in the future, but so far, we haven't been involved, and we're sending in assets to both protect ourselves and also potentially to support our allies.' Pushed again on whether the UK would deploy assets in support of Israel if asked, she said: 'What we've done in the past (…) is help protect Israel from incoming strikes. 'So a defensive activity.' She added: 'I'm not going to rule anything out at this stage (…) it's a fast moving situation, a very volatile situation.' Iranian state media said Tehran could target US, UK and French bases in the region if the countries help Israel thwart Iran's strikes. Shadow chancellor Mel Stride backed the Government's decision to send further RAF jets to the region, telling the BBC it is the 'right thing' to do. He told the BBC: 'We've got assets out there in the UAE, Oman, Cyprus, they need to be protected given that Iran has suggested they may be under threat.'
