Judge blocks Trump's ban on asylum claims at US-Mexico border
District Judge Randolph Moss, in a case brought by immigrant rights groups and asylum seekers, said Trump's proclamation barring asylum requests exceeded his legal authority and is a violation of the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA).
"Congress has crafted detailed rules and procedures that would be rendered meaningless if an agency were free to adopt its own rules and procedures in place of those that Congress enacted," Moss said.
The judge said asylum applications are governed by the INA and the president cannot "adopt an alternative immigration system which supplants the statutes that Congress has enacted."
Trump campaigned for president promising to expel millions of undocumented migrants from the United States, and he has taken a number of actions since returning to the White House in January aimed at speeding up deportations and reducing border crossings.
But his mass deportation efforts have been thwarted or stalled by numerous courts, including the Supreme Court, over concerns that migrant rights to due process are being ignored.
In his opinion, Moss said the court "recognises that the Executive Branch faces enormous challenges in preventing and deterring unlawful entry into the United States and in adjudicating the overwhelming backlog of asylum claims."
"But the INA, by its terms, provides the sole and exclusive means for removing people already present in the country," the judge said.
Moss, an appointee of former president Barack Obama, put his ruling on hold for 14 days to give the Trump administration time to appeal.
White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller condemned the judge's decision.
"A marxist judge has declared that all potential FUTURE illegal aliens on foreign soil (eg a large portion of planet earth) are part of a protected global 'class' entitled to admission into the United States," Miller said on X.--AFP
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New Straits Times
an hour ago
- New Straits Times
US-Vietnam trade deal sows new China uncertainty
HANOI: Vietnam's trade deal with the United States averts the most punishing of Donald Trump's "reciprocal" levies, but analysts warned it could provoke a fresh standoff between Washington and Beijing. The Southeast Asian nation has the third-biggest trade surplus with the United States of any country after China and Mexico, and was targeted with one of the highest rates in the US president's "Liberation Day" tariff blitz on April 2. The deal announced Wednesday is the first full pact Trump has sealed with an Asian nation, and analysts say it may give a glimpse of the template Washington will use with other countries still scrambling for accords. The 46 per cent rate due to take effect next week has been averted, with Vietnam set to face a minimum 20 per cent tariff in return for opening its market to US products including cars. But a 40 per cent tariff will hit goods passing through the country to circumvent steeper trade barriers — a practice called "transshipping". Washington has accused Hanoi of relabelling Chinese goods to skirt its tariffs, but raw materials from the world's number two economy are the lifeblood of Vietnam's manufacturing industries. "From a global perspective, perhaps the most interesting point is that this deal again seems in large part to be about China," said Capital Economics. It said the terms on transshipment "will be seen as a provocation in Beijing, particularly if similar conditions are included in any other deals agreed over coming days". Shares in clothing companies and sports equipment manufacturers — which have a large footprint in Vietnam — rose on news of the deal in New York. But they later declined sharply as details were released. "This is a much better outcome than a flat 46 per cent tariff, but I wouldn't celebrate just yet," said Hanoi-based Dan Martin of Asian business advisory firm Dezan Shira & Associates. "Everything now depends on how the US decides to interpret and enforce the idea of transshipment," he added. "If the US takes a broader view and starts questioning products that use foreign parts, even when value is genuinely added in Vietnam, it could end up affecting a lot of companies that are playing by the rules." Vietnam's government said in a statement late on Wednesday that under the deal the country had promised "preferential market access for US goods, including large-engine cars". But the statement gave scant detail about the transshipment arrangements in the deal, which Trump announced on his Truth Social platform. Bloomberg Economics forecast Vietnam could lose a quarter of its exports to the United States in the medium term, endangering more than two per cent of its gross domestic product as a result of the agreement. Uncertainty over how transshipping will be "defined or enforced" is likely to have diplomatic repercussions, said Bloomberg Economics expert Rana Sajedi. "The looming question now is how China will respond," she said. "Beijing has made clear that it would respond to deals that came at the expense of Chinese interests." "The decision to agree to a higher tariff on goods deemed to be 'transshipped' through Vietnam may fall in that category," added Sajedi.
The Sun
2 hours ago
- The Sun
Trump tax bill stalled by Republican rebellion in Congress
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The Star
3 hours ago
- The Star
Beijing braces for US trade deals that aim to shut out China
BEIJING: The trade truce between Washington and Beijing may be holding for now, but China is increasingly wary about what's happening elsewhere: US efforts to forge deals that could isolate Chinese firms from global supply chains. Ahead of a July 9 deadline, US officials are deep in talks with major trading partners in Asia and Europe, pushing for new agreements that would include restrictions on Chinese content, or secure commitments to counter what Washington sees as China's unfair trade practices. In the first such deal, President Donald Trump on Wednesday (July 2) announced a tiered tariff agreement with Vietnam. Exports to the US from the South-East Asian nation will be charged a 20% rate, Trump said in a social-media post, with 40% levied on any goods deemed to be transshipped through the country. That will hit products with components from China and possibly other nations, which are routed through Vietnam or subject to only minimal final assembly before being exported to the US. The approach mirrors provisions in an existing US trade agreement with Mexico and Canada. India, another nation seen as close to a deal, has also been negotiating over "rules of origin.' Washington wants at least 60% of a product's value added locally to qualify as "Made in India' and benefit from the deal, Bloomberg News previously reported. India has pushed to bring that down to around 35%, according to the report. "Asia's dilemma when it comes to Trump's trade war is all about dependence on US final demand while relying heavily on China's value added in domestic production,' Alicia Garcia Herrero, Asia-Pacific chief economist at Natixis SA, said in a recent report, adding that Vietnam, Cambodia and Taiwan were among the most exposed. China, a larger trade partner than the US for most Asian economies, has warned of consequences if its interests are threatened, and Foreign Minister Wang Yi is likely to raise that again on his visit to Europe this week for talks in Brussels, Germany and France. "China firmly opposes any party reaching a deal at the expense of Chinese interests in exchange for so-called tariff reductions,' the Ministry of Commerce said in a statement Saturday, repeating earlier warnings. "If this happens, China will never accept it and will resolutely counter it to safeguard its legitimate rights and interests.' Trump's 90-day pause on what he called "reciprocal' tariffs on dozens of America's trading partners ends on July 9. Unless those countries reach trade deals with the US, they could potentially face much higher tariffs. Some governments are making moves to stay on the right side of Washington. Vietnam, Thailand and South Korea have all put in place measures to stop goods from being rerouted through their countries to the US since Trump's tariffs were unveiled in April. South Korean customs announced a crackdown on transshipments, citing a rise in the practice. Taiwan's President Lai Ching-te also flagged the issue and followed up with new rules requiring all US-bound exports to carry a legal declaration they were made on the island. Another concern for Beijing is whether the US could convince others to impose or tighten export controls on high-tech equipment, which would further hamper Chinese efforts to buy the tools it needs to produce advanced semiconductors. Taiwan in June added Huawei Technologies Co. and Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp. to its so-called entity list, barring Taiwanese firms from doing business with them without government approval. The pressure isn't limited to Asia. Europe, too, finds itself in a delicate position. The EU is China's largest export destination for electric vehicles, and investment from Chinese firms into the bloc plus the UK hit 10 billion euros (US$12 billion) last year, according to recent research from Rhodium Group. Yet trade tensions are rising. European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen recently accused Beijing of "weaponising' rare earths and magnets and warned of the risks posed by Chinese overcapacity. Beijing is particularly concerned that the EU might sign up to provisions similar to those in the UK's deal with the US, which included commitments around supply chain security, export controls, and ownership rules in sectors like steel, aluminum and pharmaceuticals. While the language did not name China, Beijing criticised the agreement in a rare public statement, interpreting it as a direct challenge, the Financial Times reported. "China is clearly worried that the EU will accept the same wording as the UK did on export controls,' said Joerg Wuttke, a partner at the Albright Stonebridge Group in Washington and former president of the EU Chamber of Commerce in China. "They are pushing the EU not to do this, and the US is pushing the EU to do it.' Brussels and Washington are aiming to reach some form of an agreement before July 9, when Washington is set to impose a 50% tariff on nearly all EU products. With European exports to the US worth more than double the amount to China, the bloc sees Washington as the more important partner, giving the US leverage in the talks. China's weekend statement is "obviously aimed entirely at Brussels,' said Hosuk Lee-Makiyama, director of the European Centre for International Political Economy in Brussels, who was recently in Beijing for meetings ahead of an EU-China summit this month. "China is concerned what the EU might agree with the US.' The long-term risk for Beijing is that these efforts coalesce into a broader shift - not just a US-led campaign to curb Chinese exports, but a reshaping of global trade around "trusted' supply chains, with China increasingly on the outside. In a visit to South-East Asia earlier this year, President Xi Jinping urged the region to stand together as an "Asian family,' warning against trade fragmentation. Beijing has often responded to actions it opposes with targeted trade measures. When the EU imposed tariffs on Chinese electric vehicles last year, China launched anti-dumping probes into European brandy, dairy and pork. It halted Japanese seafood imports in 2023 after Group of Seven meetings in Japan were seen as critical of China. A spat with Australia in 2020 led to trade restrictions on billions of dollars' worth of goods, including lobsters, wine and barley. "If some agreements explicitly list China as a target and show that some countries are cooperating or collaborating with the US to 'contain China,' then China will definitely respond,' said Tu Xinquan, dean of the China Institute for WTO Studies at the University of International Business and Economics in Beijing and a former adviser to the Chinese Commerce Ministry. - Bloomberg
