America's Talking

In his first trip to the Rio Grande Valley in Texas since he took office, President Joe Biden blamed Republicans for the border crisis that Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, 25 Republican governors, Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson and many others argue he created. Biden arrived in Brownsville on Thursday afternoon and met with local law enforcement, Border Patrol agents and Democratic officials around the same time that former President Donald Trump arrived in Del Rio, Texas, and met with Abbott and Republican officials.

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Former President Donald Trump defeated former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley in Michigan’s Republican presidential primary while President Joe Biden cruised to an easy victory on the Democrats' side. The races were called within an hour of polls closing, with the GOP primary determined with about 80% of the vote counted. Biden received more than 126,000 votes while the “uncommitted” spot received more than 23,000 votes, a vote protesting the Israel-Hamas conflict and the U.S’s continual funding of the war.

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The rise of pro-Palestinian protests on U.S. university campuses often feature protesters calling for violence against Jews, leading to Jewish students feeling unsafe and frustrated by the lack of response from school administrators and federal officials. Pro-Palestine sentiment is not new to many of these campuses, but the deadly Oct. 7 Hamas attack on Israeli civilians and the ensuing war in Gaza have sparked far more frequent and zealous demonstrations. For Ethan Melman, a born-and-raised Chicagoan attending the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, that issue came to a head last fall when he, a Jewish student, attended one of the pro-Palestine protests to investigate.

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James Biden, the president’s brother, testified before lawmakers Wednesday in the ongoing impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden. The testimony comes as the indictment of a key witness in the inquiry has left Republicans playing defense and Democrats calling for the inquiry to end. Several media outlets reported Wednesday that during his opening statement, James defended his brother, President Biden, saying the president was not involved in his dealings and did not financially benefit from those deals. House Republicans on the Oversight, Judiciary and Ways and Means Committees are leading the inquiry, alleging that the Biden family and associates, with the president’s knowledge, raked in more than $20 million from entities in adversarial nations, including Russia and China.

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In its second vote attempt in exactly a week, the U.S. House on Tuesday night impeached Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, who becomes the first sitting cabinet member to be impeached in U.S. history. Mayorkas was impeached largely along party lines by a vote of 214-213, with three Republicans voting with 210 Democrats against. As more than 10 million illegal border crossers entered the country in three years and a record number of known or suspected terrorists have been apprehended under Mayorkas’ watch, House Committee on Homeland Security Chairman Mark Green, MD, R-Tenn., led the charge to impeach him.

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Former President Donald Trump’s first criminal trial date, in a case involving porn actress Stormy Daniels, will be March 25. A New York judge rejected a request from Trump to dismiss the case. He faces charges in multiple states while commanding the lead for the Republican nomination in the presidential race. His lawyers, appearing before Judge Juan Manuel Merchan, said the case will interfere with his campaign to return to the White House. Trump has three other prosecutions unresolved, one of which involved a district attorney under heavy scrutiny in Georgia on Thursday.

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All nine U.S. Supreme Court justices challenged constitutional arguments for removing former President Donald Trump from Colorado’s 2024 presidential primary ballot during arguments before the court on Thursday. During arguments scheduled to last 80 minutes, the justices spent almost 130 minutes listening to and questioning three attorneys: Jonathan Mitchell representing Trump, Jason Murray representing six Colorado Republicans who filed suit last year to remove the former president from the ballot, and Shannon Stevenson representing the Colorado secretary of state.

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The U.S. House of Representatives voted Tuesday against impeaching U.S. Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, with four Republicans joining all Democrats in voting against impeachment. The vote was 216 to 214 after one Republican changed his vote from "aye" to "nay," breaking what initially appeared to be a 215-215 tie. After the vote, House Speaker Mike Johnson sought to have a revote, which hasn't happen.

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A visibly upset President Joe Biden addressed the nation late Thursday to respond to news that the special counsel tasked with investigating his handling of classified documents had chosen not to charge him, but also detailed numerous examples of his memory loss. The blockbuster special counsel report, while clearing Biden, sparked questions about Biden’s mental fitness when it called him an “elderly man with a poor memory.” Biden is 81 years old. "My memory is fine," Biden fired back before getting hostile with reporters who asked about his mental fitness to serve as president.

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The U.S. House of Representatives passed a bipartisan tax bill with a vote of 357-70 late Wednesday, but that bill now faces an uncertain future in the Senate. The Tax Relief for American Families and Workers Act had bipartisan support after months of behind-the-scenes deals involving both parties. Whether the Senate can get the bill passed, though, remains unclear. The Senate faces several other deadlines, including a March deadline to reauthorize the Federal Aviation Act, two looming government shutdown deadlines the same month, as well as a border bill and a potential spending bill for Israel, Taiwan and Ukraine. Meanwhile, the potential impeachment of Homeland Security Secretary could soon land in the Senate’s lap.

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