The United States is reducing the number of people deemed nonessential to operations in the Middle East, the State Department has announced. The U.S. is also authorizing nonessential personnel and family members to leave Bahrain and Kuwait, which will give them a choice on whether to leave those countries.
The State Department said it made the orders after evaluating recent tensions, which are on the rise in the region as high-stakes nuclear negotiations between the U.S. and Iran appear to have hit an impasse.
Meanwhile President Donald Trump announced that China will make it easier for American industry to obtain magnets and rare earth minerals, clearing the way for trade talks to continue between the world's two biggest economies. Trump also said Wednesday that the U.S. will stop efforts to revoke the visas of Chinese nationals on U.S. college campuses.
Here's the latest:
Immigration officers intensify arrests in courthouse hallways on a fast track to deportation
Many asylum-seekers dutifully appeared at routine hearings before being arrested outside courtrooms last week, a practice that has jolted immigration courts across the country as the White House works toward its promise of mass deportations.
The large-scale arrests that began in May have unleashed fear among asylum-seekers and immigrants accustomed to remaining free while judges grind through a backlog of 3.6 million cases, typically taking years to reach a decision. Now they must consider whether to show up and possibly be detained and deported, or skip their hearings and forfeit their bids to remain in the country.
The playbook has become familiar. A judge will grant a government lawyer's request to dismiss deportation proceedings. Moments later Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers — often masked — arrest the person in the hallway and put them on a fast track to deportation, called ''expedited removal.''