Trump to visit 'Alligator Alcatraz' migrant detention center this week, source says
U.S. President Donald Trump is expected to attend the opening on Tuesday of a temporary migrant detention center in southern Florida dubbed "Alligator Alcatraz", a source familiar with the matter said.
The step comes as Trump, a Republican, has sought to ramp up the detention and deportation of migrants, saying the measure was needed after millions crossed the border illegally under Democrat Joe Biden.
The center got the nickname from its remote location in the Everglades, a vast subtropical wetland teeming with alligators, crocodiles and pythons that a Florida official said this month provides natural barriers, requiring minimal security.
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Trump will be accompanied by Kristi Noem, the secretary of Homeland Security, who asked him to visit, said the source, who spoke on Sunday, on condition of anonymity.
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The numbers in federal immigration detention have risen sharply to 56,000 by June 15, from 39,000 when Trump took office, government data show, and his administration has pushed to find more space.
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Hindustan Times
21 minutes ago
- Hindustan Times
Bush, Obama, singer Bono rebuke Trump for dismantling USAID on agency's last day
Former Presidents Barack Obama and George W Bush delivered rare open criticism of the Trump administration — and singer Bono recited a poem — in an emotional video farewell Monday with staffers of the US Agency for International Development. USAID logo and US flag are seen in this illustration.(REUTERS) Obama called the Trump administration's dismantling of USAID 'a colossal mistake.' Monday was the last day as an independent agency for the six-decade-old humanitarian and development organization, created by President John F. Kennedy as a peaceful way of promoting U.S. national security by boosting goodwill and prosperity abroad. Secretary of State Marco Rubio has ordered USAID absorbed into the State Department on Tuesday. The former presidents and Bono spoke with thousands in the USAID community in a videoconference, which was billed as a closed-press event to allow political leaders and others privacy for sometimes angry and often teary remarks. Parts of the video were shared with The Associated Press. They expressed their appreciation for the thousands of USAID staffers who have lost their jobs and life's work. Their agency was one of the first and most fiercely targeted for government-cutting by President Donald Trump and his billionaire ally Elon Musk, with staffers abruptly locked out of systems and offices and terminated by mass emailing. Trump claimed the agency was run by 'radical left lunatics' and rife with 'tremendous fraud.' Musk called it 'a criminal organization.' Obama, speaking in a recorded statement, offered assurances to the aid and development workers, some listening from overseas. "Your work has mattered and will matter for generations to come,' he told them. Obama has largely kept a low public profile during Trump's second term and refrained from criticizing the monumental changes that Trump has made to US programs and priorities at home and abroad. 'Gutting USAID is a travesty, and it's a tragedy. Because it's some of the most important work happening anywhere in the world,' Obama said. He credited USAID with not only saving lives, but being a main factor in global economic growth that has turned some aid-receiving countries into US markets and trade partners. The former Democratic president predicted that 'sooner or later, leaders on both sides of the aisle will realize how much you are needed." Asked for comment, the State Department said it would be introducing the department's foreign assistance successor to USAID, to be called America First, this week. 'The new process will ensure there is proper oversight and that every tax dollar spent will help advance our national interests,' the department said. USAID oversaw programs around the world, providing water and life-saving food to millions uprooted by conflict in Sudan, Syria, Gaza and elsewhere, sponsoring the 'Green Revolution' that revolutionized modern agriculture and curbed starvation and famine, preventing disease outbreaks, promoting democracy, and providing financing and development that allowed countries and people to climb out of poverty. Bush, who also spoke in a recorded message, went straight to the cuts in a landmark AIDS and HIV program started by his Republican administration and credited with saving 25 million lives around the world. Bipartisan blowback from Congress to cutting the popular President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, known as PEPFAR, helped save significant funding for the program. But cuts and rule changes have reduced the number getting the life-saving care. 'You've showed the great strength of America through your work — and that is your good heart,'' Bush told USAID staffers. 'Is it in our national interests that 25 million people who would have died now live? I think it is, and so do you," he said. Former Liberian President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, former Colombian President Juan Manual Santos and former US Ambassador to the UN Linda Thomas-Greenfield also spoke to the staffers. So did humanitarian workers, including one who spoke of the welcome appearance of USAID staffers with food when she was a frightened 8-year-old child in a camp for Liberian refugees. A World Food Program official vowed through sobs that the US aid mission would be back someday. Bono, a longtime humanitarian advocate in Africa and elsewhere, was announced as the 'surprise guest,' in shades and a cap. He jokingly hailed the USAID staffers as 'secret agents of international development' in acknowledgment of the down-low nature of Monday's unofficial gathering of the USAID community. Bono spoke passionately as he recited a poem he had written to the agency and its gutting. He spoke of children dying of malnutrition, in a reference to people — millions, experts have said — who will die because of the U.S cuts to funding for health and other programs abroad. 'They called you crooks. When you were the best of us,' Bono said.
Hindustan Times
24 minutes ago
- Hindustan Times
Iran-linked hackers threaten to leak emails of Trump aides; FBI launches probe
Iran-linked hackers have threatened to disclose more emails stolen from U.S. President Donald Trump's circle, after distributing a prior batch to the media ahead of the 2024 U.S. election. The hackers, who go by the pseudonym Robert, said they had roughly 100 gigabytes of emails from the accounts of White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles, Trump lawyer Lindsey Halligan, Trump adviser Roger Stone(Kacper Pempel/Reuters) In online chats with Reuters on Sunday and Monday, the hackers, who go by the pseudonym Robert, said they had roughly 100 gigabytes of emails from the accounts of White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles, Trump lawyer Lindsey Halligan, Trump adviser Roger Stone and porn star-turned-Trump antagonist Stormy Daniels. Robert raised the possibility of selling the material but otherwise did not provide details of their plans. The hackers did not describe the content of the emails. U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi described the intrusion as "an unconscionable cyber-attack." The White House and the FBI responded with a statement from FBI Director Kash Patel, who said: "Anyone associated with any kind of breach of national security will be fully investigated and prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law." Halligan, Stone, a representative for Daniels and the U.S. cyberdefense agency CISA did not respond to requests for comment. Iran's mission to the United Nations did not return a message seeking comment. Tehran has in the past denied committing cyberespionage. Robert materialized in the final months of the 2024 presidential campaign, when they claimed to have breached the email accounts of several Trump allies, including Wiles. The hackers then distributed emails to journalists. Reuters previously authenticated some of the leaked material, including an email that appeared to document a financial arrangement between Trump and lawyers representing former presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. - now Trump's health secretary. Other material included Trump campaign communication about Republican office-seekers and discussion of settlement negotiations with Daniels. Although the leaked documents did garner some coverage last year, they did not fundamentally alter the presidential race, which Trump won. The U.S. Justice Department in a September 2024 indictment alleged that Iran's Revolutionary Guards ran the Robert hacking operation. In conversations with Reuters, the hackers declined to address the allegation. After Trump's election, Robert told Reuters that no more leaks were planned. As recently as May, the hackers told Reuters, "I am retired, man." But the group resumed communication after this month's 12-day air war between Israel and Iran, which was capped by U.S. bombing of Iran's nuclear sites. In messages this week, Robert said they were organizing a sale of stolen emails and wanted Reuters to "broadcast this matter." American Enterprise Institute scholar Frederick Kagan, who has written about Iranian cyberespionage, said Tehran suffered serious damage in the conflict and its spies were likely trying to retaliate in ways that did not draw more U.S. or Israeli action. "A default explanation is that everyone's been ordered to use all the asymmetric stuff that they can that's not likely to trigger a resumption of major Israeli/U.S. military activity," he said. "Leaking a bunch more emails is not likely to do that." Despite worries that Tehran could unleash digital havoc, Iran's hackers took a low profile during the conflict. U.S. cyber officials warned on Monday that American companies and critical infrastructure operators might still be in Tehran's crosshairs.
News18
27 minutes ago
- News18
Trump Govt Accuses Harvard Of Civil Rights Violations Against Jewish Students, Escalates Crackdown
The decision marks a significant escalation in the administration's ongoing battle with Harvard, which has already seen $2.5 billion in federal grant funding frozen. The Trump administration on Monday accused Harvard University of violating federal civil rights laws by failing to address the harassment of Jewish and Israeli students adequately. The findings come after a federal investigation concluded that the university showed 'deliberate indifference" toward reported cases of antisemitic discrimination on campus. However, critics, including faculty members and civil rights groups, argue the move is part of a broader effort by the administration to exert control over higher education institutions. The decision marks a significant escalation in the administration's ongoing battle with Harvard, which has already seen $2.5 billion in federal grant funding frozen. University leaders have warned that such actions pose a serious threat to academic freedom, free speech, and vital scientific research. In its findings, the Department of Health and Human Services' Office for Civil Rights (OCR) accused Harvard of failing to take timely or effective action to address a series of antisemitic harassment incidents. A letter sent to Harvard President Alan Garber warned that unless the university immediately implements corrective measures, it risks losing all federal financial assistance. 'Failure to institute adequate changes immediately will result in the loss of all federal financial resources," the administration stated in the letter, which was first reported by the Wall Street Journal. In response, Harvard issued a statement pushing back strongly against the government's conclusions, asserting that the university has taken 'substantive, proactive steps" to combat antisemitism. This includes reforming disciplinary procedures and expanding campus training to address antisemitic incidents. 'Harvard is far from indifferent on this issue and strongly disagrees with the government's findings," the university said. Monday's development is the latest in what has become an expansive and aggressive campaign by the Trump administration against elite universities. The administration has moved not only to freeze funding but also to block Harvard from enrolling international students and has threatened its tax-exempt status. The university has filed legal challenges against these measures. The crackdown extends beyond Harvard. Earlier this year, the administration terminated $400 million in grants and contracts to Columbia University, citing the school's alleged failure to protect Jewish students amid campus protests related to the Israel-Gaza conflict, despite some of those protests being organised by Jewish students themselves. Critics argue that these punitive actions violate constitutional protections of free speech and due process. In the wake of the Columbia controversy, the university entered negotiations with the administration over demands to tighten protest rules. The dispute culminated in the resignation of Columbia's interim president, Katrina Armstrong. In May, the administration determined that Columbia had violated federal civil rights laws, similar to the conclusion reached regarding Harvard. The administration has expanded this campaign to other institutions. On Friday, the University of Virginia's president, James Ryan, resigned following pressure over the university's diversity, equity, and inclusion policies. And last week, federal officials opened an investigation into the University of California system, which enrols nearly 300,000 students, focusing on whether its hiring practices violate anti-discrimination laws. (With inputs from Reuters) First Published: July 01, 2025, 07:20 IST
