Delaware bans controversial ICE partnership program

Delaware Gov. Matt Meyer has signed legislation to block local law enforcement agencies from partnering with federal immigration authorities to enforce immigration violations and share related data.

House Bill 182 targets 287(g), a rapidly expanding initiative in which state and local police help enforce federal immigration laws. The program is currently active across 40 states and, according to ProPublica, Immigration and Customs Enforcement signed 514 new agreements from January to June this year.

The program’s growth comes amid ICE’s nationwide crackdown on immigration. During the first 100 days of Donald Trump’s second presidency, the agency reported 66,463 arrests and 65,682 removals. In Pennsylvania and New Jersey, immigrant detentions have surged to levels not seen since 2011.

In his remarks Monday at the bill signing, Meyer said “there’s been an urgency for getting laws like this passed. This is an attempt to say to communities in Delaware that law enforcement officials in Delaware are here for your safety,” he said. “They are here to protect you.”

—The Philadelphia Inquirer

Gag order removed in Bryan Kohberger case, allowing Idaho attorneys, police to speak

BOISE, Idaho — The presiding judge in Bryan Kohberger’s criminal case has lifted the gag order that prevents investigators, law enforcement and attorneys from speaking publicly about the high-profile homicides of four Idaho students.

“I just don’t think that I can justify the continuation of the nondissemination order,” 4th Judicial District Judge Steven Hippler ruled at a hearing Thursday that lasted less than 15 minutes. “The rights of the public to information in this case is paramount — given the fact that a plea has been entered in this case.”

Earlier this month, Kohberger, 30, admitted to “willfully, unlawfully, deliberately with premeditation and with malice aforethought” fatally stabbing four University of Idaho students to death: Madison Mogen, Kaylee Goncalves, Xana Kernodle and Ethan Chapin. He broke into their Moscow home in the early hours of Nov. 13, 2022.

Kohberger pleaded guilty to four counts of first-degree murder and a count of felony burglary, bringing some closure to the case that brought national attention to the college town. Kohberger’s all-day sentencing is scheduled for 9 a.m. July 23 at the Ada County Courthouse.

—Idaho Statesman

National Urban League calls its report on the state of Black America ‘a warning’

The National Urban League’s annual report The State of Black America, published Thursday, offers a pessimistic look at the state of civil rights protections in the United States and warns “that our country is on the brink of a dangerous tilt toward authoritarianism.”

The report, which has been an annual barometer on civil rights progress in the United States since it first appeared in 1976, details the onslaught of attacks to voting rights, civil rights protections and the dismantling of diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) initiatives intended to provide parity for Black Americans and other gender and racial minorities.

“There is a state of emergency in Black America, and our report this year is a warning and a rallying cry as civil rights protections are being unraveled (and) democracy is under siege,” the nonprofit’s CEO and president Marc Morial told reporters at a media briefing days before the formal release of the report.

“What began as what we thought were fringe attacks on racial equity has now become national policy,” he continued. “We are in a state of emergency, and the National Urban League has a fundamental obligation to stand up for democracy, to stand up for diversity, and stand up for economic policies that defeat poverty.”

—Miami Herald

Emboldened by Trump, El Salvador's president has jailed critics. Now journalists and human rights leaders are fleeing en masse

MEXICO CITY — They have fled to Guatemala, Mexico, Costa Rica and Spain. Most left in a hurry with few possessions, unsure of when — or whether — they would be able to return home.

As El Salvador cracks down on dissent, jailing critics of President Nayib Bukele, droves of human rights activists, journalists and other members of civil society are leaving the country out of fear.

More than 100 people have fled in recent months — the biggest exodus of political exiles since the country's bloody civil war. That puts El Salvador in the company of other authoritarian Latin American nations, including Nicaragua and Venezuela, where dissent has been criminalized and critics choose between prison and exile.

On Thursday, one of El Salvador's most prominent human rights groups joined the flight. Cristosal, founded in 2000 by leaders of the Episcopal Church, announced that it had suspended its operations in the country, and that nearly two dozen of its staffers had left.

—Los Angeles Times