USA: Trump admin proposes new rules to cut stay of foreign students and journalists

Washington, US: The Trump administration has proposed a new rule to limit to four years the period of stay for non-immigrant international students and foreign media representatives.

It plans to cut the duration further to two years for those from certain countries under the F, J and I category visas, used for students, exchange visitors and media representatives, respectively. Foreigners on these visas can currently stay for “duration of status”, or the period of course in case of students, and employment in case of media representatives. This applies also to the dependents of principal visa holders.

The proposed rule, published by the department of homeland security, will be open for comments for 30 days. But it was not clear when it will go into effect. President Donald Trump has only a few months to finalise the rule by January 2021, and longer if he is re-elected.

If he loses the November 3 election to Joe Biden, the Democrat will be under no obligation to implement it. The duration of stay can be extended either by filing for extension with the US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) or by going back to their countries of origin for fresh visas.

The two-year rule will apply to people from countries that are either on state department’s list of state sponsors of terrorism or who have an overstay rate of over 10%. “The significant increase in the volume of F academic students, J exchange visitors, and I foreign information media representatives poses a challenge to the Department’s ability to monitor and oversee these categories of non-immigrants while they are in the United States,” the notice said.

The department added it is “concerned about the integrity of the programmes and a potential for increased risk to national security” from people on these visas.There are an estimated 200,000 Indian students in the US, which has admitted an estimated 1 million international students every year. Together, they have generated around $41 billion’s worth of economic activity and supported 450,000 jobs, according to the American Council on Education, which represents US colleges and universities. Incomes generated from foreign students are critical to the financial health of many US colleges.

New York Times reporter Kathy Gray said Trump campaign removed her from Michigan rally

Michigan, US: A New York Times reporter claimed Thursday night that she was removed from President Donald Trump's rally in Michigan after she posted photos from the event on her Twitter. 

Kathy Gray revealed on the social media platform that she was kicked out of the rally that drew several thousand Trump supporters to Freeland, Michigan. 'I've just been kicked out of the trump rally,' Gray wrote. That tweet was then followed by another which reads: 'First for me: Trump campaign tracked me down from pics i tweeted and escorted me out.'

The photos that Gray had posted showed Trump supporters awaiting the president's arrival. In the caption of one of the images, she wrote: 'Crammed in crowd in the rain for trump rally in michigan. Not many masks.' 'Trump rally in freeland attracts thousands. Maybe 10% have masks,' Gray wrote. 

Crammed in crowd in the rain for trump rally in michigan. Not many masks pic.twitter.com/5DZ6JBVNK8

— Kathy Gray (@michpoligal) September 10, 2020

The president held the rally at the MBS International Airport where he was met by a cheering crowd of several thousand, packed shoulder-to-shoulder, mostly without masks. 'This is not the crowd of a person who comes in second place,' Trump declared to cheers before criticizing Biden's performance during the Democratic debates. 

'The first lady actually came in... and she watched the debate and she watched Joe and she said, "Darling, it's so sad,"' Trump claimed, before taking aim at Biden's running mate, Kamala Harris, who he called the 'most liberal person in the USA'. The mention of Harris brought on boos and jeers from the crowd. 


'On November 3 Michigan you better vote for me! I got you so many damn car plants,' Trump said as the crowd cheered while waving 'Make America Great Again' signs. 

'If Joe Biden is elected far-left lunatics won't just be running frail Democrat cities, they'll be running the Department of Justice, the Department of Homeland Security and the US Supreme Court, and we can't let that happen. 

'No city, town or suburb will be safe. On November 3 your vote will save America. Remember it's the most important elect we've ever had,' Trump added. Trump arrived in Michigan for the rally despite pushback from officials worried that his rallies are growing in size and flouting public health guidelines intended to halt the COVID-19 spread. 


Michigan's Democratic Gov Gretchen Whitmer raised alarms earlier on Thursday about the rally. Whitmer did not try to scuttle the rally, but warned that such events 'threaten all that sacrifice that we've made'.

Donald Trump outraged by the news published against him, Asks Fox News To Fire Reporter

Washington: US President Donald Trump has demanded that Fox News fire its national security correspondent after she confirmed claims that the Republican leader had disparaged the military-a bombshell that has dogged him for two days.

Trump came under fire after The Atlantic magazine reported that he had called Marines killed in action in World War I "losers" and "suckers" in connection with a November 2018 visit to France when he skipped a visit to a US military cemetery. The official explanation for that missed visit was bad weather. Fox News correspondent Jennifer Griffin said two former administration officials had confirmed to her that the president "did not want to drive to honor American war dead" at the Aisne-Marne cemetery outside Paris, implying weather was not a factor.


One official also told her that Trump had used the word "suckers" to denigrate the military, but in a different context related to the Vietnam War. "When the President spoke about the Vietnam War, he said, 'It was a stupid war. Anyone who went was a sucker'," she quoted the unnamed official as saying.

Jennifer Griffin of Fox News Did Not Confirm ‘Most Salacious‘ Part of Atlantic Story https://t.co/rUpbSWhHac via @BreitbartNews All refuted by many witnesses. Jennifer Griffin should be fired for this kind of reporting. Never even called us for comment. @FoxNews is gone!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 5, 2020

"It was a character flaw of the President. He could not understand why someone would die for their country, not worth it," the source said. A furious Trump tweeted late Friday: "Jennifer Griffin should be fired for this kind of reporting. Never even called us for comment. FoxNews is gone!"


Trump has furiously defended himself in the wake of the story in The Atlantic, tweeting and retweeting stories condemning it as "fake news." The habitually Trump-friendly Fox News has been criticised for seemingly sidelining Griffin's reporting in its coverage of the story. A story on its front page Saturday was headlined: "Sources dispute claim Trump nixed visit to military cemetery over disdain for veterans who died."

Several of Griffin's colleagues at Fox have publicly defended her on Twitter, along with Republican congressman Adam Kinzinger, who called her "fair and unafraid." 


Just before The Atlantic published its story, a poll by the Military Times and the Syracuse University Institute for Veterans and Military Families found that just 37.4 percent of active duty personnel support Trump's reelection bid, while 43.1 percent back Joe Biden.

"Do you regret all your lies?" India born American journalist bluntly asks US President Donald Trump

Washington DC: SV Dáte, A Pune-born Indian-American  journalist bluntly asked the US President Donald Trump at a briefing Thursday if he regrets "all of the lying" he has done "to the American people" over the last three and a half years.

Shirish Date, the White House correspondent for Huffington Post, asked Trump at a press conference on Thursday: "Mr. President, after three and a half years do you regret at all, all the lying you've done to the American people?" Hover over the keyword to read more about the topic without leaving this page! Soon after the question was shot by the reporter, a visibly uncomfortable Trump asked him to repeat the query. Date followed up with "All the lying, all the dishonesty... You have done." Trump thereafter quietly moved on to another question from another reporter.

This incident is not something new as Trump has been involved in heated exchanges with the reporters during several press conferences during his tenure. Meanwhile, Trump yesterday said that he intended to deliver his Republican nomination acceptance speech from the White House, according to a media report. Trump, 75, is seeking re-election from the Republican party.

Having won the GOP primaries with historic margins, he will formally be nominated by the party through its virtual convention later this month. The convention was initially scheduled to be held in Charlotte in North Carolina but was later moved to Jacksonville in Florida, only to be cancelled again because of rising cases of the novel coronavirus.

The Washington Post fact-checker finds that Trump has made over 20,000 false or misleading claims throughout his presidency. Trump, who has rarely been confronted directly with claims that he has lied, paused for a moment before moving on to another reporter without answering the question.

Trump reacts to Newsweek opinion article questioning Kamala Harris's citizenship

Washington, DC: U.S. President Donald Trump said he would have to look into claims that Senator Kamala Harris, who is the 2020 Democratic vice-presidential nominee as Joe Biden's running mate, may not be eligible to run for office after Newsweek published an opinion article questioning her citizenship.

Harris was born in 1964 in California to an Indian mother and a Jamaican father. According to the article, her parents were not permanent residents at the time of her birth. "So I just heard that. I just heard it today, that she doesn't meet the requirements. And by the way, the lawyer who wrote that piece is a very highly-qualified, a very talented lawyer. I have no idea if that's right. I would have thought, I would have assumed the Democrats would have checked that out before she gets chosen to run for vice-president. But that's a very serious," said Trump. "I'll take a look."

The U.S. Constitution requires any person running for president or vice-president to be a "natural-born citizen." In 2011, Trump famously raised concerns in the past about the eligibility of former President Barack Obama to assume the office, claiming he was not born in Hawaii, and maintained that belief despite Obama eventually producing a copy of his Hawaiian birth certificate.

Trump ignores reporter who asked if he regrets 'all the lying'

Washington, DC: U.S. President Donald Trump on Thursday ignored a question by a reporter during a White House briefing who asked if he regretted all the lying he has done while in office.

"Mr. President, after three and a half years, do you regret at all, all the lying you've done to the American people?" asked Shirish Date, Huffington Post's White House correspondent, who later tweeted that he had waited for five years to ask him that question. Trump paused for a moment before he quickly moved on to take a question from another reporter, ignoring Date who looked on.

The president, who is running for re-election on Nov. 3, has long sparred with the media, blasting coverage of him as "fake news" and "hoaxes," and slamming news outlets and journalists on his Twitter feed. His re-election campaign also recently filed lawsuits against several outlets, including the New York Times and the Washington Post.