On June 10 the House Judiciary Committee will hold a hearing on the Mueller report. Ahead of that, GOP Rep. Doug Collins has sent a letter to Jerry Nadler citing the “manual of decorum” with a list of words he wants Nadler to ban members from using about Trump during the hearing

Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, one of just two Republican senators who claim to be pro-choice, has voted for at least 32 of President Trump’s anti-abortion judicial nominees. (The other such senator is Lisa Murkowski of Alaska.)

Collins has voted to confirm more than 90 percent of Trump’s judicial picks, including 32 nominees that NARAL Pro-Choice America and the Democratic PAC American Bridge found had indicated they oppose abortion rights.

“Actions speak louder than words, and no amount of pro-choice rhetoric will change the fact that Senator Collins has voted to confirm over 30 anti-choice Trump judicial nominations,” Maine Democratic party spokesman Alex Stack told HuffPost. “Any pro-choice credibility Senator Collins built up over the past two decades in Washington is officially gone.”

The Trump administration is cancelling legal aid, as well as funding for English classes and recreational activities for unaccompanied minors who are detained crossing the border into the US, the Washington Post has reported.
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Items such as legal aid, English lessons or playtime are “not directly necessary for the protection of life and safety”, the Health and Human Services department spokesman Mark Weber told the Post.


Weber chooses to ignore the patent truth that children forced for lack of legal aid to defend their own immigration claims are most likely to have their claims refused and be deported to countries where their lives are at risk. He chooses to pretend that traumatised and vulnerable children detained while exercising their international right to seek asylum might need anything other than food, water, and perhaps some flat surface to lie on. He chooses to pretend that there could be some moral justification in imprisoning children who have committed no crime, and then holding them under worse conditions than those experienced by many adults caught up in the US’s harsh and punitive criminal legal system.

Immigrant aid and advocacy groups are understandably outraged. “It’s bad enough that the Trump administration is trying to normalise the warehousing of children. It’s unconscionable that they would so blatantly try to strip them of their rights. Locking up children and then denying them legal aid, education, and even playtime is all part of this administration’s cruel efforts to dehumanize people who have come to the US seeking safety,” said Denise Bell, a researcher for migrant rights at Amnesty International.