bbcuk--2019-11-14--General election 2019: Is the NHS the best health service possible?

Political parties are generally in agreement about one thing - that the NHS needs more money. But is money all it takes?  To answer this, it's helpful to look at whether the NHS is getting the best out of its existing budget - and how that compares with other countries.  There's no single way of measuring the efficiency of a health service, though various bodies have tried.  Bloomberg's annual healthcare efficiency index, for example, looks simply at spending on healthcare versus life expectancy.  Its latest report ranked 56 wealthy countries, based on 2015 data. It put the UK 35th - down from 21st the year before, partly reflecting the slowing of growth in spending on the NHS.  Hong Kong and Singapore - mixed public and private systems with elements of both government funding and insurance - came top. They were followed by Italy and Spain - with national health services - which both have higher life expectancies than the UK and spend less per person to achieve this.  The UK was also beaten by France which has a system of social insurance paid for by the government, individuals and employers.  Compared with 35 other OECD countries (Organisation of Economic Cooperation and Development) - a group of rich nations - the UK spends an average amount on healthcare (about 9.8% of GDP) and has a slightly higher than average life expectancy for the group (81.3 years).  Life expectancy is a reasonable proxy for how good a healthcare system is, but it's not a perfect one.  While higher healthcare spending is linked to higher life expectancy, it's affected by other complicated social factors including diet and smoking. In the US, for example, opioid deaths and gun crime have been linked to a fall in life expectancy.  It's also a fairly crude measure - living longer isn't the only thing most people would want to achieve from a health system.  As a 2018 report by three health think tanks and the Institute for Fiscal Studies, entitled "How good is the NHS?", said, UK patients were more likely than average to report having had a good experience of the health system. The think tanks said this was "a valuable goal of health care in its own right".  UK patients were also less likely to say they skipped a consultation or prescription medicine because of cost.  And looking just at life expectancy doesn't capture how good a health system is at dealing with conditions that may require long-term care but don't cause death.  The 2018 report concludes that the NHS is relatively efficient, performing well in managing long-term conditions with "an unusually low level of staffing and, in at least some categories, equipment". This suggests the NHS is doing quite well with the money it has.  But equally, life expectancy measures don't capture experiences like waiting for a long time on a trolley in A&E or waiting in pain for a routine operation, which aren't fatal but are also not good experiences for patients. These have worsened as funding increases have slowed.  The NHS is below average among OECD countries at treating the illnesses that are the most common direct causes of death.  For example, the UK mortality rate for cancer and heart disease is higher than the average among similar countries and that's a longer-term trend.  Part of the reason the UK does worse on cancer survival is that British patients present late with cancer symptoms, and get diagnosed at a later stage. That's not necessarily a funding issue.  The UK has just about average waiting times for routine surgery like hip replacements, but just below average waiting times in A&E compared with other rich countries.  As the growth in funding has slowed, though, the NHS has become significantly worse at seeing people within four hours in A&E and within 18 weeks for non-urgent surgery. And it has become worse at getting cancer patients into treatment quickly.  This is significant for patients and their experience of the system, but it hasn't dramatically effected outcomes - although this may take some time to show up. Those worse than average trends pre-dated recent funding cutbacks, again suggesting there's something other than just money going on.  Improving outcomes in the health service often requires funding plus other action - for example training and retaining more staff or launching public information campaigns. Money alone is not enough to make those things happen.  US-based foundation the Commonwealth Fund published a comparison in 2017 which put the UK top out of 11 countries for healthcare performance.  It looked at five areas including equity and access, as well as health outcomes and the care process.  The UK came top partly because of the ranking's heavy weighting towards universal systems - since equity and access formed two out of the five criteria.  When it came to health outcomes, though, the UK scored tenth out of 11 countries which detracts from the overall score.  Although, arguably, the UK's relative equality of access to healthcare for both the rich and poor is a significant when it comes to assessing how well the health service is spending its money.  The IFS, Health Foundation, King's Fund and Nuffield Trust say the NHS "does better than health systems in comparable countries at protecting people from heavy financial costs when they are ill" and that overall, "the NHS performs neither as well as its supporters sometimes claim nor as badly as its critics often allege."


breitbart--2019-11-04--UK: National Health Service to Deny Treatment for 'Racist or Sexist Language, Gestures, Behaviour'

A National Health Service (NHS) trust has announced that it will withdraw treatment from patients it deems to be racist or sexist.  The North Bristol NHS Trust announced that patients will be subject a “sports-style disciplinary yellow card and then final red card in which treatment would be withdrawn as soon as is safe” on its official website.  The policy would cover not just “Threatening and offensive language” but also “Racist or sexist language, gestures or behaviour” more generally, as well as “malicious allegations” — a rather troubling caveat, given the NHS has in the past been entangled in large-scale malpractice scandals which hospitals and staff have initially denied.  “We have staff from many different backgrounds, from all over the world, and we pride ourselves on our commitment to equality which is a fundamental value of the NHS,” commented Andrea Young, Chief Executive for North Bristol NHS Trust.  “We’re sending a strong signal that any racism or discrimination is completely unacceptable – we want staff to challenge and report it and we want everyone to know that it will have consequences.”  How low the bar for deeming behaviour discriminatory and sufficiently “offensive” to withdraw treatment is not spelled out in explicit terms.  For example, in late 2017 an NHS patient who requested a female nurse to carry out a cervical smear complained when the hospital sent a person with “an obviously male appearance… close-cropped hair, a male facial appearance and voice, large number of tattoos and facial stubble” who insisted “My gender is not male. I’m a transsexual”.  It is not clear whether the patient could have fallen foul of the Bristol policy had it been in place and the nurse had chosen to take offence — and nor is it clear how far the trust’s assurances that it will only withdraw treatment once clinically safe extend, and if patients could, for example, be denied diagnostic procedures or so-called routine operations such as hip replacements, for which many patients have to wait eight months or more.  British state authorities have previously proved somewhat overzealous in their enforcement of political correctness, with foster parents caring for three “not indigenous White British” children having them taken away by Labour-run Rotherham Borough Council in 2012 because they were members of the UK Independence Party (UKIP), then led by Nigel Farage.  Strategic Director of Children and Young People’s Services Joyce Thacker said she was concerned that UKIP was opposed to mass immigration and the “active promotion of multiculturalism”, meaning UKIP members could not meet non-British children’s “cultural and ethnic needs”.  Another NHS trust for the area, the University Hospitals Bristol NHS Foundation Trust, has previously been criticised for ordering the removal of the British flag from security staff stab vests after someone complained that the country’s national banner was “offensive”.


breitbart--2019-12-14--UK: NHS to Administer Hormone Blockers to 12-year-old Trans Child

The National Health Service (NHS) will administer hormone blockers to a 12-year-old trans child said to have been born in the “wrong body”.  Ashley ‘Ash’ Lammin, whose name has been legally changed by deed poll, has claimed to be a girl born in a boy’s body since the age of three, if mother Terri is to be believed — and it seems this idea has never been discouraged.  “I never thought it was a phase, Ash was just Ash. When she was three she said to me, ‘I’m a boy because you gave me a boy’s name – it’s your fault’. I remember feeling horrible, because she blamed me,” the mother told the Metro.  “I’d never come across it before and I just went along with it. I just thought at the time “if he’s happy, well that’s the main thing”.”  Terri Lammin, who homeschools her child, also told the newspaper she would “like to see the subject of transgender people included in some lessons, like there are about same-sex families.”  The Metro article makes no reference to Ashley’s father.  “The journey is long and it’s still going, but I feel like the sense of victory is there through it all,” the 12-year-old told the newspaper.  “Not everyone is going to understand and people have to have their own opinions and I understand that. Some people might not like the idea of trans,” the child mused.  “I hope I inspire others but I just hope that love and acceptance comes through everything.”  The Metro notes that the pre-teen “eventually wants a womb transplant so she can be a mother when she is older” — a plan which seems extremely unlikely to be viable, as even if such a transplant was possible Lammin would still not be able to ovulate or have any of the other female reproductive equipment needed to conceive and then carry a child.  The Metro further notes that the 12-year-old will take the hormone blockers until age 18, and then decide whether to go ahead with so-called gender reassignment surgery — adding optimistically that “If she decides not to go ahead with it, Ash will come off the blocker, and her puberty will kick in just a few years later than her peers.”  This rather underestimates the likely impact of hormone treatment on an adolescent male body from the ages of 12 to 18, which is likely to have a drastic impact and possibly irreversible impact on the development of the male genitalia, height, facial structure, and even fertility.


breitbart--2019-12-15--NHS 'Over-Diagnosing' Transgender Children, Psychologists Warn

Six psychologists who resigned from England’s flagship National Health Service (NHS) child transgender clinic have raised concerns over its treatment of children with the mental disorder gender dysphoria, saying that they felt pressured to ignore psychological treatment and begin hormone treatment for minors.  Sky News reports that 35 psychologists have resigned in three years from the Tavistock and Portman NHS Foundation Trust, which runs the Gender Identity Development Service (GIDS) that deals with gender dysphoria. The service had treated 770 children a decade ago, compared to 2,590 last year. There are another 3,000 on the waiting list.  Most of those treated are girls (74 per cent) who believe they are boys. Some are as young as three-years-old when their parents take them to the Tavistock. In the United Kingdom, cross-hormone therapy — where girls are given testosterone and boys are given oestrogen — is not normally given until 16 and gender reassignment surgery is illegal under the age of 18.  However, children as young as ten have received puberty blockers, with Sky News reporting around half of those seen by the Tavistock Trust are on puberty blockers before they go on to cross-hormone therapy and then gender surgery.  So concerned over the future of their livelihoods, of the six psychologists that would talk on the record to the broadcaster, five would not go on camera. One permitted herself to be filmed on the condition that her voice and appearance were disguised.  She told Sky News that when she joined the clinic she was surprised to find that all child patients at the Tavistock were being treated medically, saying: “At the moment there’s only one pathway through the service, which is a medical pathway, not a psychological one.”  She detailed one instance where she felt a child who thought they were in the wrong body was put onto drugs too quickly, and that other issues in their psychological history had not been explored.  She said: “I once worked with an executive who thought that the gender dysphoria the young person was presented with was really strong, really intense. So she decided to put the young person forward for the hormone-blocking treatment after two appointments.  “Looking back, it was a young person with a history of trauma and direct trauma in terms of abuse. There were other things happening to them, and this was not being explored by the clinician.”  Others backed this view, with one anonymous psychologist saying: “Therapy is not an option in this service.”  The whistleblower who was willing to go on camera remarked on the fact that girls are disproportionately seeking to transition. She said that in a lot of cases, the girls had experienced homophobia and had a history of abuse.  “This [phenomena] is happening all across the Western world.”  The psychologist, who described herself as an “enthusiastic LGBTQ-ally”, continued to tell Sky that she would not be able to have this kind of conversation with parents of a child presenting gender dysphoria. She said: “I felt that if I ever spoke to a family like this, I would immediately be called transphobic.”  She also said that when she voiced her concerns, she was “often shut down by other affirmative clinicians”.  “Our fears are that young people are being over-diagnosed and then over-medicalised,” another anonymous whistleblower told Sky News.  “We are extremely concerned about the consequences for young people… For those of us who previously worked in the service, we fear that we have had front row seats to a medical scandal.”  One 19-year-old woman, Thomasin, who ceased her transition and reverted to seeing herself as a woman, told Sky that she was driven down the path of changing gender because she was struggling to come to terms with being a lesbian. Several former Tavistock clinicians have said that they are now supporting teenagers who have changed their minds and “detransitioned”.  This is not the first time that the Tavistock and Portman NHS Foundation Trust has come under criticism for its handling of mentally ill children. Former governor of the trust Marcus Evans quit in February after a damning internal report revealed that clinicians were fast-tracking children into sex-change procedures due to pressure from “highly politicised” trans lobbyists.  The report, written by Dr David Bell, who recently spoke at a British detransitioning conference, named pro-trans lobby groups Gendered Intelligence and Mermaids, which he said GIDS had gone “to some lengths to placate”.  Mermaids, which campaigns to lower the age for sex-changes, was exposed for having inflated the suicide risk of children waiting to change gender.


buzzfeed--2019-07-26--What Happens If Obamacare Is Overturned In An Election Year Senate Republicans Say To Trust Congres

What Happens If Obamacare Is Overturned In An Election Year? Senate Republicans Say To Trust Congress.

People participate in a protest on the second day of oral arguments for the Affordable Care Act in front of the Supreme Court building in Washington, DC, March 27, 2012.  WASHINGTON — A lawsuit winding through the courts could overturn Obamacare and cause millions of people to lose their health insurance, but Senate Republicans say there is nothing to worry about because Congress will come to the rescue.  In interviews with over a dozen Republican senators, most said they believed Congress is up to the task of passing a new health bill if the Affordable Care Act is overturned by the Supreme Court, though there exists no evidence to date that Congress is actually up to the task. Several said the ACA getting struck down would be a good thing because it would force Congress to come to an agreement.  “It would be noisy and loud, but it would need to be done. Congress only seems to get things done when they have to, so this would be one of those ‘have to’ ones,” said Oklahoma Sen. James Lankford.  It’s a scenario that has grown more realistic month by month. The Trump administration and 20 Republican-led states are arguing in court that the entire Affordable Care Act should be tossed out. One federal judge has already sided with them, and earlier this month they presented arguments to what appeared to be a receptive panel of judges at the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals. It is widely expected to be appealed to the Supreme Court either way, setting up a possible climactic decision in 2020.  The fight over Obamacare went all the way to the Supreme Court in 2012, and some provisions were struck down. But in a landmark 5–4 ruling, with Chief Justice John Roberts serving as the swing vote, the court upheld the law’s individual mandate. The new lawsuit is even broader with Republican lawyers pushing for every bit of the 900-page law to be tossed out now that Congress has repealed the individual mandate, arguing that without it the rest of the law is unconstitutional without it.  The GOP argument is that Obamacare disappearing would be so catastrophic — regulated markets would collapse, millions of low-income people would lose Medicaid, insurers could once again deny coverage to people with preexisting conditions — that Congress would have no choice but to set aside their differences and pass a replacement.  “One thing I’ve learned in eight and a half years here is you need almost a crisis to concentrate the minds and actually accomplish something, so hopefully we’d be able to do that,” said Sen. Ron Johnson.  There would be obstacles. Congress would have to reach a deal that Senate Republicans, President Trump, and House Democrats led by Nancy Pelosi could all agree on. The two parties are pushing in wildly opposite directions on health care, and this crisis could be dropped on them during the throes of a presidential election. There has been no movement since Trump took office to fix even smaller parts of the ACA. Sens. Lamar Alexander and Patty Murray spent months negotiating a bipartisan bill to stabilize Obamacare markets and lower premiums. It has yet to be brought up for a vote.  “There are already some plans out there that could be dusted off and people of goodwill could conceivably come together,” said Republican Sen. Todd Young. “I know it would be challenging and— Why are you giving me that look? I’m acknowledging the challenge!”  Asked whether they could imagine a split Congress managing to pass a comprehensive new health care system in an election year, Democrats mostly expressed bewilderment.  “Seriously? You’ve got Republican senators who actually say that with a straight face?” said Sen. Chris Coons during an interview in a cramped Senate elevator. “They had nine years to come up with a replacement plan and haven’t. I don’t find that credible.”  “Nine years!” Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin said to his Republican colleagues Mike Rounds and Rob Portman, all wedged in the elevator as well. “Oh my god, do your job, would you? Son of a bitch.”  In theory, Democrats and Republicans agree on keeping two parts of Obamacare: protecting people with preexisting conditions and allowing children to stay on their parent’s health insurance plans until age 26.  But this is meaningless. In reality, the two sides are fighting for polar opposite plans. Democrats want to strengthen and expand the Obamacare markets to bring in more people, which could drive down prices.  Republicans want to open up off-market options, allowing healthy people to move to cheaper but skimpier plans. They oppose most Obamacare regulations, as well as the taxes and subsidies that keep the individual markets stable. Obamacare regulations raise premium costs, but they also ensure that plans cover a wide range of services and people with health problems are charged at the same rate as everyone else.  GOP plans to repeal Obamacare were consistently projected to lead to millions more uninsured people and much higher premiums for people with preexisting health conditions, albeit while saving the government up to hundreds of billions of dollars. The projections sparked such a backlash that Republicans ultimately failed to deliver on their long-promised repeal of Obamacare.  Democratic Sen. Brian Schatz said that Republicans would be forced to decide between a plan that is essentially Obamacare or “some fig leaf nonsense that won’t cover anybody.” Democrats consistently rejected the idea of agreeing to a plan that would cause millions more uninsured people.  “The fantasy world the Republicans continue to live in on health care is a sight to behold,” said Sen. Chris Murphy. “They controlled every branch of government for two years and they couldn’t do anything on health care. Why on earth would we be able to restore the full protections in the Affordable Care Act with divided government?”  A group of Republicans led by Sen. Mitt Romney have started having discussions about an Obamacare replacement plan that would involve block granting for health care funding to the states. However, these talks are in early stages and there is no timeline to produce legislation, according to someone with knowledge of the discussions. The talks have not extended to Democrats, who strongly oppose block grants.  Just two Republican senators have been firmly critical of the lawsuit: Susan Collins of Maine and Senate Health Committee Chair Lamar Alexander.  Another option is that even if the Supreme Court tosses out Obamacare in 2020, the Trump administration could ask the court to delay the ruling taking effect until after the presidential election. This would set up an election where the White House and both chambers of Congress are up for grabs at a time when the health insurance of potentially tens of millions of people is on the line.


shareblue--2019-12-06--GOP senator claims birth control and HIV testing is not 'actual health care'

GOP Sen. Martha McSally's campaign is on the attack against Planned Parenthood Arizona, the state's largest sexual health organization, saying it does not provide residents with "actual health care," the Hill reported Friday.  McSally's comments came in response to Planned Parenthood's announcement that it would run ads in Arizona, Colorado, and North Carolina about the Trump administration's restrictions on health care funding that limit how doctors can interact with patients. All three of the states have closely watched Senate races in 2020.  "Senator McSally is focused on providing access to actual health care for women all across Arizona, while Planned Parenthood is only focused on protecting their business model," Dylan Lefler, the Arizona Republican's campaign manager, told the Hill.  Planned Parenthood Arizona serves more than 90,000 Arizona residents, according to its website, offering a wide range of real health care services, including annual well-woman exams, birth control consultation and supplies, HIV testing, emergency contraception, and pregnancy testing. Research from the Guttmacher Institute, a group focused on reproductive health, has shown that providers serving low-income patients, including Planned Parenthood, play a vital role in the public safety net, and may be the only health care available in some areas.  The Trump administration unveiled new rules earlier this year stating that federal funds from the Title X program can no longer go to organizations that either perform abortions or refer patients to facilities to receive abortions. Prior to the new rules, organizations like Planned Parenthood were already barred from using federal funds to perform abortions, but the new rule gagged the ability of health care professionals to even discuss the medical procedure.  After the rules went into effect, Planned Parenthood was forced to withdraw from the Title X program, the only federal program dedicated to providing family planning services, birth control, cancer screenings, STI testing, and annual exams, to low-income Americans. Most of the patients who rely on Title X services are people of color, according to Planned Parenthood.  The ads aim to pressure lawmakers to overrule Trump and allow organizations like Planned Parenthood to once again participate in Title X and offer health care services to low-income people.  However, the McSally campaign identified Planned Parenthood as a "hysterical liberal special interest group" invading Arizona "with false, negative ads."  McSally has previously voted to bar Planned Parenthood from receiving any federal funds whatsoever. She also voted to repeal the Affordable Care Act, which requires health insurance companies to cover maternity and newborn care.  "Republican senators are attacking access to affordable birth control and other vital reproductive health services by standing with the Trump administration's dangerous gag rule," Sam Lau, Planned Parenthood Action Fund's director of federal advocacy media, said in an email. "Congress has the power to take action, and the American people want them to stop putting politics over their health and protect access to affordable health care."  Published with permission of The American Independent Foundation.


theepochtimes--2019-11-09--Federal Judge Denies Rights of Conscience to Health Care Providers

A group of demonstrators display signs during a pro-life rally outside the Planned Parenthood Reproductive Health Center on June 4, 2019 in St Louis, Missouri. (Michael B. Thomas/Getty Images)  An Obama-appointed federal judge in Manhattan struck down as unconstitutional a Trump administration rule preventing federally-funded health care providers from being forced to participate in abortions and other activities that violate their conscience.  U.S. District Judge Paul A. Engelmayer of the Southern District of New York, who joined the court in 2011 after being nominated by then-President Barack Obama, issued a 147-page opinion and order Nov. 6 invalidating the regulation published by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS).  The rule, which the judge wrote “purports to interpret and provide for the implementation of more than 30 statutory provisions that recognize the right of an individual or entity to abstain from participation in medical procedures, programs, services, or research activities on account of a religious or moral objection,” was to become effective July 22. During the course of the litigation HHS agreed to delay the effective date to Nov. 22. Now it may never take effect.  The ruling came in three lawsuits brought by Planned Parenthood, New York State, and other state and local governments that were consolidated by the court.  Sen. Ben Sasse, a Nebraska Republican, described the court ruling as “absurd mush.”  “The point of the First Amendment–especially the free exercise of religion–is to protect the conscience rights of Americans,” he said in a statement. “In this country, government doesn’t get to tell you that your faith is fine on Sunday at church but not Monday at work.”  Lawyer Alexa Kolbi-Molinas of the American Civil Liberties Union praised the judicial order, characterizing it as protecting patients. “Everyone is entitled to their religious beliefs, but religious beliefs do not include a license to discriminate, to deny essential care, or to cause harm to others,” she said in a statement.  The rule, unveiled in May by the Office for Civil Rights (OCR) at HHS, was created to protect “individuals and health care entities from discrimination on the basis of their exercise of conscience in HHS-funded programs,” and implements “full and robust enforcement of approximately 25 provisions passed by Congress protecting longstanding conscience rights in healthcare.”  “Finally, laws prohibiting government funded discrimination against conscience and religious freedom will be enforced like every other civil rights law,” OCR Director Roger Severino said at the time.  “This rule ensures that healthcare entities and professionals won’t be bullied out of the health care field because they decline to participate in actions that violate their conscience, including the taking of human life.”  But in his ruling Judge Engelmayer didn’t need to reach religious freedom issues covered by the First Amendment or the abortion issue because he found other grounds to invalidate the HHS rule.  The rule, the court found, “imposes ambiguous and retroactive conditions on the States,” which would be required to enforce its provisions because they accept health care funding from the federal government.  “Once a State has accepted funds pursuant to a federal spending program, the Federal Government cannot alter the conditions attached to those funds so significantly as to “accomplish[ ] a shift in kind, not merely degree,” the judge wrote, quoting from the Supreme Court’s 2012 ruling in NFIB v. Sebelius.  The judge indicated he was striking down the entire rule instead of mere parts of it because it “was sufficiently shot through with glaring legal defects as to not justify a search for survivors.”  In his opinion, Engelmayer also noted that protecting health care providers’ freedom of conscience would be expensive for the states.  “HHS itself classifies the Rule as ‘economically significant,’ meaning it will have an annual economic effect of more than $100 million. … [and] will cost around $1 billion to implement … over its first five years, not including public health costs.”  “The Rule also puts in jeopardy billions of dollars in federal health care funds,” the judge wrote matter-of-factly, without noting that providing financial incentives for compliance was the purpose of the rule.  Planned Parenthood could be adversely affected, he wrote parenthetically, because “nearly” every one of its affiliates “participates in Medicaid, which garners hundreds of millions of dollars in reimbursement.”  The HHS regulation came two years after President Donald Trump signed Executive Order 13798 to protect Americans’ fundamental rights of conscience and religious liberty.  EO 13798 states it “shall be the policy of the executive branch to vigorously enforce Federal law’s robust protections for religious freedom” because our “Founders envisioned a Nation in which religious voices and views were integral to a vibrant public square, and in which religious people and institutions were free to practice their faith without fear of discrimination or retaliation by the Federal Government.”  President Trump later signed Executive Order 13831 which created a Faith and Opportunity Initiative in the White House.  The order will “ensure that the faith-based and community organizations that form the bedrock of our society have strong advocates in the White House and throughout the Federal Government,” a White House press release stated at the time.  The Epoch Times asked the Department of Justice if the administration planned to appeal the ruling but did not immediately receive a reply.


yahoonews--2019-06-17--McConnell on Jon Stewart I dont know why hes all bent out of shape over 911 victims fund

McConnell on Jon Stewart: 'I don't know why he's all bent out of shape' over 9/11 victims' fund

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell on Monday said he can’t understand why Jon Stewart is angry over the handling of health care funding for 9/11 victims.  “We have never failed to address this issue, and we will address it again,” McConnell said on “Fox & Friends.” “I don’t know why he’s all bent out of shape.”  Appearing at a hearing of a subcommittee of the House Judiciary Committee last week, Stewart made an impassioned plea for lawmakers to reauthorize the September 11th Victim Compensation Fund, which is set to expire next year amid mounting claims from first responders, construction workers and others involved in operations at Ground Zero up through May 30, 2002.  For years afterward, and down to the present, many first responders have been diagnosed with cancer or other diseases related to exposure to toxic material at the site.  The former “Daily Show” host berated those who failed to show up to the hearing.  “Sick and dying, they brought themselves down here to speak — to no one,” Stewart said. “Shameful. It’s an embarrassment to the country, and it is a stain on this institution.”  The subcommittee on Constitution, Civil Rights and Civil Liberties has 14 members, but fewer than half were present in the room at various points during the emotional hearing.  On “Fox & Friends,” McConnell said such absences are common in Congress.  “That frequently happens because members have a lot of things going on at the same time,” the Kentucky Republican said, adding, “It sounds to me like he’s looking for some way to take offense.”  A day after Stewart’s emotional appearance on Capitol Hill, the House panel voted unanimously to advance the 9/11 compensation bill. It now moves the House floor for a full vote.  The same day, McConnell was asked about the status of the soon-to-lapse fund.  “Gosh, we haven’t looked at that in a while,” the majority leader replied. “But we will look at it and I’m sure we’ll deal with it as compassionately as we have in the past.”  Stewart blasted McConnell in an interview with “Fox News Sunday.”  “I want to make it clear that this has never been dealt with compassionately by Sen. McConnell,” he said. “He has always held out until the very last minute and only then, under intense lobbying and public shaming has he even deigned to move on it.”  Stewart said the community of 9/11 victims is “at the end of their rope.”  “I think there’s a feeling of disbelief,” Stewart said. “They can’t understand why they have to continually saddle up and ride down to Washington and make these appeals for something that should be simple but is somehow, through politics, made agonizingly difficult.”  He added: “If you were to take all the arrogance and entitlement and elitism that people don’t like about Hollywood and show business, and you concentrated it in one city, and gave those people actual power, that’s Washington.”


yahoonews--2019-06-26--After fighting for 911 victims Jon Stewart turns to Wounded Warrior Games

After fighting for 9/11 victims, Jon Stewart turns to Wounded Warrior Games

Earlier this month Jon Stewart delivered powerful testimony on Capitol Hill, urging lawmakers to approve health care funding for 9/11 first responders and other victims of the attacks. Now the former host of “The Daily Show” is putting a spotlight on another deserving category: wounded service members.  This week Stewart is serving as the host and MC of the 2019 Department of Defense Warrior Games in Tampa, Fla., where about 300 wounded, ill or injured active-duty and veteran athletes from the United States, Australia, Canada, the Netherlands, Denmark, and the United Kingdom are competing in 14 adaptive sports.  The annual event, now in its 10th year, was established to help promote the recovery and rehabilitation of wounded military men and women and inspire others to do the same.  “What you see here, all these folks that don’t allow their worst day to define them,” Stewart told Yahoo News, “it’s just incredible.”  Stewart, who has hosted the games since 2016, said the camaraderie transcends the competition.  “When you’re in the military, look, it’s a very small percentage of our society, so it’s already somewhat isolated,” he said. “Then you get hurt. Now you’re isolated from your unit, your platoon, your family. And now, all of a sudden, you find a community that’s experiencing the exact same thing.”  Travis Dunn, a former U.S. Army Ranger, was shot in the upper torso during a six-hour firefight in Nangarhar province, Afghanistan, on Dec. 2, 2014. The bullet traveled through his armpit, severed his spinal cord and left him paralyzed from the waist down.  “I didn’t come to the realization of it, uh, until a couple months later, ’cause I was just on the pain medication,” Dunn said. “After I was done with all my rehab, that first probably couple months, I started to kinda realize that, you know, this was gonna be a forever thing. This was, this was how it was, this is how it was gonna be, you know, for the rest of my life.”  The 29-year-old discovered the Warrior Games after moving to Tampa with his wife, Kelley. The couple have a 15-month-old daughter, Sadie.  “I didn’t know what exactly I was gonna be capable of after my injury,” Dunn said. “It kinda opened my eyes that I can do a lot of things still.”  Dunn, who competes in archery, track and wheelchair basketball, said the games bring out the competitive nature in each athlete.  “We’re going out there, and dudes are just crushing each other,” he said. “Competition brings out the best in everybody. ’Cause nobody wants to lose. Everybody goes to win.”  “It’s intense competition,” he said. “But the real value of it is the brother- and sisterhood that evolves from it. The connections that they make with other people.”  For Stewart, his participation in the games is a no-brainer.  “You have to demonstrate that if they’re there for us, we’re there for them,” he said. “No matter what.”


abcnews--2019-01-07--Supreme Court to decide if Fosamax users can sue Merck over bone fractures

Like millions of Americans suffering from bone loss, Lorice Cortez embraced the prescription drug Fosamax with the hope of stopping osteoporosis in its tracks.  But in August 2009 -- a decade after she began regularly taking the medicine produced by pharmaceutical giant Merck -- Cortez said she experienced a painful and debilitating side effect: a spontaneous broken leg.  As the 70-year-old turned to unlock the front door of her house, she heard a “popping sound, then suddenly felt her left leg give out from beneath her,” according to court documents. In an instant, with no trauma or impact, she completely fractured her thighbone, requiring surgery to repair the break.  Monday the Supreme Court hears arguments in a case brought by Cortez and more than 500 Fosamax users from 45 states trying to sue Merck for damages after experiencing atypical femoral fractures, which they allege were caused by the drug.  The plaintiffs contend the company failed to warn them or their doctors of the danger, despite early evidence suggesting the increased potential for spontaneous bone breaks without any previous stress.  Merck does not dispute the heightened risk of femoral fractures in long-term users of Fosamax and has included a warning with prescriptions since 2010. But the company argues it cannot be held liable for damages in state courts because the Food and Drug Administration in 2009 rejected a proposed warning to patients.  “If a manufacturer proposes to warn about a risk, discloses what it knows about that risk, and gets rebuffed by the FDA, failure-to-warn claims against it are preempted as a matter of law,” Merck argues in its brief filed with the high court.  A federal district court and a circuit court of appeals divided on whether the FDA’s decision in 2009 preempts the patients’ claims or whether a jury must consider the facts of the case, weighing the FDA’s intent and whether Merck should have proposed different warning language.  Cortez “would not have used Fosamax for so many years had [Merck] properly disclosed the risks associated with its long-term use,” her lawyers wrote in a suit against the company.  Manufacturers are required by law to inform patients of potential adverse reactions to their drugs as soon as reasonable evidence exists. But the FDA has ultimate authority to approve or reject the wording that appears on drug labels.  In a 2008 application to the FDA, Merck proposed revising the warning language for Fosamax, describing a heightened risk of “stress fractures.”  One year later, the FDA rejected that draft language, saying the warning was “not warranted and is not adequately supported by the available literature” and asked for revised language.  Merck said the FDA’s conclusion, based on available evidence at the time, means the company cannot be held liable for failing to warn consumers as required under state law because the federal government wouldn’t allow it.  “Merck never proposed a warning of ‘atypical femoral fractures’ to the FDA,” the plaintiffs argue in their brief to the Supreme Court. “In an attempt to minimize the risk, Merck proposed to warn of ‘stress fractures,’ which are widely understood as minor fractures far less serious than atypical femoral fractures.”  Currently, Fosamax carries a warning of “atypical femoral fractures” -- the type of injury Cortez and hundreds of others endured -- making no mention of the term “stress fractures.” The FDA mandated the change in 2010 after mounting evidence of a link to the drug.  “The FDA was so concerned -- and had no response back from Merck -- that they convened their own panel to reexamine the evidence,” said Suzanne Robotti, founder and president of MedShadow Foundation, a nonprofit consumer advocacy group. “It recommended that a strong warning be put on there specifically describing spontaneous fractures. It was Merck’s responsibility to propose that warning themselves.”  The company maintains that there was insufficient evidence prior to 2010 to support a stronger warning for Fosamax. In an amicus brief filed to the Supreme Court, the Trump administration’s FDA backs up their claim.  Merck has “incontrovertible proof, from the agency’s own mouth, that it would not have authorized respondents’ proposed warning until October 2010,” the company argues to the court.  “If manufacturers must face tort suits, even when the FDA has made clear that no warning is necessary, they will continue to face an onslaught of troubling coercive litigation,” Merck says.  Patient advocates say a jury should be allowed to decide.  “If they are successful with this, other drug companies would obviously follow the exact same path: they would put in language to the FDA that they anticipate and hope would be rejected," said MedShadow's Robotti. "But it’s really not the FDA’s job to write the drug label, it’s the pharmaceutical company’s job to write the drug label."  “It would be a disaster for patient rights, for patient protection,” Robotti said.


abcnews--2019-03-12--Is Trump coming after Medicare White House Dems both claim upper hand ANALYSIS

Is Trump coming after Medicare? White House, Dems both claim upper hand: ANALYSIS

President Donald Trump has promised repeatedly to protect Medicare and Medicaid, the popular health care programs for older and low-income Americans, even tweeting last fall that “Democrats will destroy your Medicare and I will keep it healthy and well!”  It was a promise that started in the early days of his presidential campaign.  Then came this week’s 2020 White House budget request. That plan called for hundreds of billions of dollars to be trimmed from Medicare in the next 10 years, with estimates ranging from more than $500 billion to $845 billion depending upon the accounting.  On Medicaid -- the federal health care program for low-income Americans -- Trump’s plan would shift more than $1 trillion in federal money to limited, state-run block grants that analysts warned wouldn’t keep pace with inflation.  While both proposals were quickly pronounced dead-on-arrival in Congress, Democrats immediately tried to push the idea that only their party would protect health care for seniors and the poor. Trump's top health policy aide countered that reforms were necessary to keep Medicare solvent -- foretelling the debate to come in the 2020 elections.  House Speaker Nancy Pelosi suggested the president was more focused on "campaign applause" than substance.  “The president’s budget doesn’t match the values of the American people,” added Rep. G.K. Butterfield, a North Carolina Democrat.  Trump’s Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar on Tuesday tried to assure lawmakers seniors wouldn’t be directly affected. He noted the budget would find savings by reforming how Medicare pays providers like hospitals and argued the plan would extend the solvency of the program.  “On Medicare, we’re actually putting it on a sounder footing for the future,” Azar told the House Energy and Commerce Committee.  “Hospitals are gobbling up doctors’ practices and jacking up the rates,” he added.  Rodney Whitlock, a longtime Republican staffer on Capitol Hill, said that in recent years administration budgets -– and Congress’ response to them -– have become mostly partisan affairs rather than a starting point in real negotiations.  Medicare, in particular, he said, is a favorite topic because so many Americans support it. The program, which provides health insurance to some 60 million seniors and people with disabilities, represents some 15 percent of the federal budget.  “Rhetoric around Medicare goes from zero to 60 in microseconds,” said Whitlock, now a health care lobbyist with McDermott+Consulting in Washington.  Tricia Neuman, senior vice president and director of the program on Medicare policy at the Kaiser Family Foundation, said whether the administration’s proposal can hurt or help seniors in the long run is a much bigger issue that would have to take into account a number of factors. And it probably would impact different groups of people in different ways, such as capping drug prices for some but not others, she said.  Also, what qualifies as “waste” in any federal program often is in the eye of the beholder, she noted.  “This begs the longer term question of how to finance care for an aging population,” Neuman said. “The country hasn’t really engaged in a serious discussion” on that.


abcnews--2019-12-23--U.S. allows Utah to expand Medicaid with work requirement

SALT LAKE CITY -- The Trump administration said Monday it will allow Medicaid expansion with a work requirement in Utah, a decision that came despite courts taking a dim view of the requirement in other states.  Republican lawmakers contend that work requirements make people healthier and more financially stable, but critics say the mandate jeopardizes healthcare for the poor and adds another hurdle for people with childcare and other responsibilities.  The announcement means the state will have full Medicaid expansion under former President Barack Obama's signature healthcare law, covering a total of up to 120,000 adults starting Jan. 1.  Though Utah voters passed Medicaid expansion more than a year ago, conservative lawmakers have delayed its full implementation, saying it was too expensive. Health care advocates said they were glad more people will be eligible but wary about the work requirements they say could cause 7,500 people to lose coverage.  “The work reporting requirements are unnecessary and do nothing to promote health,” said Matt Slonaker, executive firector at Utah Health Policy Project.  The Trump administration has generally taken a favorable view toward work requirements and allowed South Carolina to impose them earlier this month. Nearly 20 states have asked to implement them, though a number have backed away amid court challenges.  A federal judge blocked the requirements in Arkansas and Kentucky in March, finding the measures undermined the program’s mission of providing healthcare for the needy.  Work requirement programs have also been suspended or dropped in states such as Arizona, Indiana and New Hampshire.  In Utah, officials argue their “self-sufficiency" requirement is different because it's based on efforts to look for work rather than work a certain number of hours, said Nate Checketts, deputy director at the Utah Department of Health.  It also includes exceptions for many people, including those who are 60 or older, pregnant or caring for young children. As many as 80% of people who qualify for Medicaid could be exempt from the work requirement, Checketts said.  People who are subject to the requirement will need to complete an online job assessment, web-based training programs and 48 job searches within the first three months of being eligible for Medicaid.  Utah voters passed full Medicaid expansion last year, but the GOP-dominated Legislature said it would be too expensive and initially voted to scale back the number of people covered.  Republican Gov. Gary Herbert applauded the federal decision, saying Monday that it shows “states can craft viable, unique solutions to deliver critical health care services to their residents.”  Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services called Utah's plan an “innovative and sustainable” solution.  The U.S. government is also considering other requests by Utah officials, including premiums and surcharges for people over 100 percent of the federal poverty level and penalties for intentional program violations.


bbc--2019-07-20--Why do Americans pay so much for prescription drugs

Why do Americans pay so much for prescription drugs?

President Donald Trump said that prescription drug prices dropped for the first time in half a century in the US last year.  Since taking office, the president has made repeated attacks against those who set drug prices and has pledged to take radical steps to reduce them.  Mr Trump appears to be referring to the Bureau of Labour Statistics Consumer Price Index (CPI), which measures the increase in the cost of household items in the US.  In the year to May 2019, the average monthly cost of prescription drugs fell by 0.2%.  This is the first price decrease over a 12-month period since 1973, some 47 years ago - so by this measure, his assertion is broadly correct.  However, this is not the most reliable way to measure drug prices according to Inma Hernandez, a pharmacy lecturer at the University of Pittsburgh.  "The CPI is based on a basket of drugs which is representative of popular drugs. So it tends to include widely-used drugs, which are usually cheaper," she says.  "However, it is less likely to include newer or less-prescribed drugs, which are more expensive and have higher price increases."  Additionally, this basket of goods is based on the price that pharmaceutical companies say they are going to charge for products, or "list prices".  In the US, individuals are encouraged to get health insurance plans because very few people have access to free healthcare.  These "list prices" are then negotiated down by insurers as an incentive to offer the drugs to patients.  So, even if the list price goes down, it is not known whether the actual price paid by insurers has decreased with it.  This affects patients because in the US, health plans contribute to some of the costs of the drugs they cover, although they will also have to make some out-of-pocket payments.  In theory, if insurers are paying less for their drugs, these savings will trickle down to those on health plans and reduce these out-of-pocket or insurance payments.  Given a general lack of transparency on drug price negotiations, it is very difficult to assess this aspect of medicine costs.  Some companies, including Pfizer, Bayer and Allergen, publically committed to lowering or freezing costs last year.  This was after a series of comments made by Mr Trump.  "He thinks because he has made a lot of noise, it has prevented drug prices from increasing. It is not clear whether that is the case or not," says Ms Hernandez.  However, an Associated Press analysis of drug list prices found that for every drug which reduced in price in the first half of last year, 96 increased.  The investigation did note that the increases "were not quite as steep as in past years".  According to a report by the OECD group of industrialised nations, the USA spends roughly twice the average amount spent by other member countries on pharmaceuticals per head.  For example, where the UK paid £398 ($497) per head in 2015, the USA paid $1,162.  This is despite having similar prescription drug usage.  "One reason the UK pays less is because the government will say no to new drugs which don't offer much better value," says Prof Michelle Mello, a health policy specialist at the Stanford Law School.  "We don't have a government that buys drugs in the US, except in a few cases," says Prof Mello.  Instead, insurers use middlemen called pharmacy benefit managers - or PBMs - to negotiate prices on their behalf.  Because they are generally larger than individual health insurers, they are seen to have more purchasing power.  But the Trump administration has criticised them in the past for not passing on enough savings to consumers.  In England and Wales, the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence represents almost all patients, so the drug companies have to lower their prices to access the market.  In Scotland, the Scottish Medicine Consortium performs the same role.  The Trump administration is exploring a number of policies either through ad hoc announcements or through an initiative launched last year called American Patients First.  These policies are generally aimed at decreasing prices for government health plans such as Medicare, the insurance policy used by almost 60 million elderly and disabled Americans.  One plan to force drug companies to reveal the cost of drugs in television adverts was recently blocked by a judge.  "The big blueprint the White House put out had a fleet of policy ideas which were evidence-based. However, not many of them have crept in," says Prof Mello, citing the difficulty in passing legislation in a divided and clogged Congress.


bbcuk--2019-11-08--General Election 2019: SNP to launch campaign with 'NHS Protection Bill'

The SNP is to launch its election campaign by promising to bring forward legislation to protect the NHS from privatisation and future trade deals.  The NHS Protection Bill would block any UK government from using the NHS as a "bargaining chip" in trade talks.  If passed it would also give devolved parliaments in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland a veto on these deals.  SNP leader and Scottish First Minister Nicola Sturgeon said the NHS should not be for sale "at any price".  The UK government has insisted the NHS is "not on the table" for trade talks and is not in any way "up for sale".  The health services has been a key topic in the early days of the election campaign, with Labour also claiming they could be vulnerable to privatisation. • Election 2019: Could the NHS be 'up for sale'? • Reality Check: Could US companies run NHS services after Brexit? • 11 charts on why the NHS matters in this election  The UK's political parties are setting out their platforms ahead of the snap general election on December 12.  Nicola Sturgeon has pledged to put opposition to Brexit and backing for a new independence referendum "at the heart" of the SNP's election bid.  However, she is also set to prioritise health services at her campaign launch event in Edinburgh, with a manifesto commitment to bring forward an NHS Protection Bill at Westminster.  The party said the legislation "would explicitly prevent any future UK government from signing up to any agreement that made the NHS, in any part of the UK, a bargaining chip of any kind in any future trade deals".  It would also require the "explicit approval" of the Scottish, Welsh and Northern Irish parliaments before any new trade deal could be signed, so they could agree that there was "no negative impact" on the NHS or the price of medications in their countries.  Ms Sturgeon said Prime Minister Boris Johnson had been "very clear about his desire for a post-Brexit trade deal with Donald Trump", and said this could pose a threat to the health service.  She said: "The NHS in Scotland is run in Scotland, for Scotland and under the SNP it will always be in public hands. Our NHS is not for sale at any price.  "And while the Scottish Parliament has control of health policy, we cannot currently stop Westminster signing away that protection in a trade deal, or entering agreements that dramatically push up drug prices or risk our public services, including the NHS.  "So in order to deal with the immediate threat from the Tories' post-Brexit plans, the SNP will bring forward a bill that would protect the NHS across the whole of the UK from ever being harmed by a Tory-Trump trade deal."  Labour has claimed a Conservative trade deal with the US after Brexit could cost the NHS £500m a week by driving up the price of medicines.  Leader Jeremy Corbyn said this money "could be taken out of the NHS and handed to big drugs companies" after US trade negotiators said they would want "full market access" for US pharmaceuticals.  When US President Donald Trump visited the UK in June, he said the NHS would form part of negotiations over a possible future trade deal between the UK and US. The next day, he rowed back from those remarks.  Mr Johnson has been joined by his Health Secretary Matt Hancock and International Trade Secretary Liz Truss in insisting that the NHS is "off the table" in trade talks with the US post-Brexit.  The Conservative leader has pledged to bring forward the "biggest programme of NHS investment in a generation" and upgrades for hospitals.  In a visit to Scotland on Thursday he also hit out at Ms Sturgeon's goal of holding a new independence vote in 2020, saying the Tories would "prevent another referendum".  He added: "We are the party that is saying come on, let's get together as a whole UK, let's get Brexit done, get this thing over the line and then get on with bringing our great country together and unleashing the potential of the whole UK."  Meanwhile Lib Dem leader Jo Swinson is also set to campaign in Scotland on Friday with a visit to Fife.  She promoted her party as "the home of Remain" and also backers of the UK, saying: "The four nations of the United Kingdom are stronger when they work together, so we should work together to stop Brexit."


abcnews--2019-01-03--Government shutdown delays immigration hearings as an already historic backlog grows

The federal government shutdown has led to the closure of a number of U.S. immigration courts handling cases for tens of thousands of people whose status is in limbo – another twist in the protracted showdown between President Donald Trump and Democrats over border wall funding.  The closures, which impact people whose immigration status is uncertain in dozens of courts across the country, has led to cases being indefinitely delayed and has further added to the already record-setting backlogs and years-long wait times, immigration legal experts told ABC News.  Immigration judges already face a heavy burden dealing with the current caseload, said Amiena Khan, an immigration judge who serves as vice president at the National Association of Immigration Judges.  "It is extremely frustrating," Khan said. "There is a tremendous amount of irony to all of this. As the government is shut down for this process to ensure greater border security, look at what it's doing to our system as a whole."  Though immigration courts, which operate under the Department of Justice, continues to handle cases for detained migrants, the majority of people who face pending deportation proceedings are not detained.  The clients of immigration lawyer Jeremy McKinney may have to wait a full year before the court can even set a later date for a judge to assess the case, McKinney said. Two of his clients, who were supposed to appear Wednesday, had their court dates canceled.  “You have to give this court system proper resources and proper integrity for it to do its job,” McKinney said.  President Trump has pushed Democrats to vote for more border security, using the government shutdown as leverage for funding. He told reporters in the White House on Wednesday that he’ll keep the government closed, “as long as it takes.”  However, the case delays pose a further challenge to the Trump administration's efforts to expedite deportation processes and crackdown on illegal immigration.  In the past year, the backlog of immigration court cases has surpassed one million, according to Department of Justice data compiled by the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse at Syracuse University.  “For immigrants with legitimate claims for certain types of immigration relief delays launch them further into a vulnerable limbo with no legal status,” said Sarah Piece, an analyst at the Migration Policy Institute.  The delays could put families of asylum applicants at risk as they wait in the applicant's home country, potentially facing violent conditions that would qualify them for refuge in the U.S., immigration experts say.  Even if the courts reopened tomorrow, cases with dates that took place during the shutdown would have to be rescheduled – potentially months later – since immigration judges have their calendars booked far in advance.  The extra time to establish family roots by getting married or waiting for case law to be decided in federal court could offer more options for avoiding removal, according to legal experts.  “When it comes to victims of domestic violence and gang-based crime the law has been thrown into turmoil … having a delay of game for those individuals, that’s not bad news,” McKinnley told ABC News.  And for some immigrants with weak legal cases, the delay buys time in the US before they are deported.  One possible solution to helping relieve the backlog is a fundamental restructuring of how such courts are funded and resourced, Khan said. This method would include removing courts from the executive branch where they are currently under the purview of the Department of Justice and creating a system where the courts function and are funded more independently.  "Immigration courts have been starved of resources for so long because we are so low on the totem pole with regard to appropriate funding," she said.


abcnews--2019-01-11--Canada wants 1 million more immigrants over next 3 years

Canada, a nation of not quite 37 million people, wants to add more than 1 million immigrants through 2021.  "Thanks in great part to the newcomers we have welcomed throughout our history, Canada has developed into the strong and vibrant country we all enjoy," Ahmed Hussen, minister of immigration, refugees and citizenship, wrote in an annual report to Parliament. "Immigrants and their descendants have made immeasurable contributions to Canada, and our future success depends on continuing to ensure they are welcomed and well-integrated."  Hussen, now in his early 40s, fled to Canada from war-torn Somalia when he was 16.  A year ago, Donald Trump, the president of the United States of America, said he didn't want the U.S. accepting immigrants from Haiti or countries in Africa or similar "s---hole countries."  "My experience is not unique," Hussen told The New York Times in 2017. "Canada receives a lot of refugees every year."  For Canada to add 1 million immigrants over the next three years, the nation would need to welcome approximately 350,000 -- roughly 1 percent of its current population -- in each of 2019, 2020 and 2021.  "Canada is a world leader in managed migration with an immigration program based on non-discriminatory principles, where foreign nationals are assessed without regard to race, nationality, ethnic origin, colour, religion or gender," Hussen wrote in his report.  About 1 in 5 current Canadians are immigrants, according to the report, with more than 6 million arriving since 1990.  About 13.7 percent of the U.S. population, roughly 1 in 7, in 2017 was foreign born, according to U.S. Census estimates. In 2016, that figure was 13.5 percent.


abcnews--2019-01-14--Immigration court backlogs compound as shutdown enters fourth week

Dozens of immigration courts remain shuttered across the country this week and tens of thousands of hearings were canceled because of the ongoing government shutdown, a situation that is likely to add hundreds of cases to an already crushing backlog, according to analysts.  It's an ironic twist in President Donald Trump's desire to secure the U.S.-Mexico border by building a $5 billion wall and send people through established ports of entry. Democrats say they would support additional border security but have balked at wall construction, resulting in a 24-day government shutdown without any end in sight.  The number of asylum and other immigration-related cases facing U.S. judges has skyrocketed in the past two decades, creating a backlog of more than 800,000 active cases before the shutdown began, according to data compiled by Syracuse University, based on Justice Department records.  Syracuse University estimated on Monday that nearly 43,000 immigration court hearings on a variety of matters, including evidence examination and basic scheduling, have been canceled. As many as 100,000 people could be impacted if the shutdown continues through the end of the month.  Aaron Reichlin Melnick, a policy analyst with the American Immigration Council, said that he estimates for every day the shutdown continues, another 500 immigration court cases that would have been completed are compounding the backlog.  “The stress on the immigration court system will only increase as backlogs continue to skyrocket due to the shutdown," Reichlin-Melnick told ABC News.  The estimates are based on the average number of court matters typically completed when the government is not shutdown.  After the shutdown began last month, court proceedings stopped for anyone who was not detained by U.S. authorities. Cases for detained immigrants were allowed to continue under the Justice Department’s shutdown plan. Many people, particularly those traveling with children, would not necessarily be detained for long periods of time unless there was evidence of other criminal activity.  The shutdown also creates a paperwork backlog, as courts for non-detained cases are not open to receive key documents from lawyers. That includes case documents to help asylum applicants prove their right to stay in the U.S.  In addition to the impact on cases, the judges who were scheduled to hear cases are feeling the strain of growing uncertainty and not getting a paycheck.  Judge A. Ashley Tabaddor, President of the National Association of Immigration Judges is worried about the financial hardship for hundreds of her colleagues working without pay.  “The ticking time bomb is the impact [on judges],” Tabaddor said. “It is going to have a big impact personally on the judges’ financial standing and ability to be able to support their families.”  For many immigration judges, the decision to enter public service is already a sacrifice, Tabaddor said. They typically carry academic credentials that could give them the opportunity for much higher paychecks in the private sector.  “At some point maybe some of the judges will say, ‘this isn’t what I signed up for.’”  Financial problems are a common cause for the government to deny security clearances. Judges could face difficulty in passing their ongoing background screenings which aim to ensure they’re not at risk of defaulting on debt.  “I hope we do not get there,” she said. “I hope the shutdown is resolved soon and quickly.”


abcnews--2019-01-15--Fact Check Trumps claims on illegal immigrant crime Heres what the numbers show

Fact Check: Trump's claims on illegal immigrant crime. Here's what the numbers show

President Donald Trump, speaking in New Orleans on Monday, listed tens of thousands of crimes he said were committed by undocumented immigrants, part of a pattern of statements he’s made linking immigrants to crime in his effort to gain support for his proposed border wall.  It echoed his prime-time address last Tuesday in which he used the same numbers.  There is no national database that compares crimes committed by immigration status. In fact, only one state – Texas – does so. That means there’s no national database that breaks down crimes committed by native-born citizens or immigrants, or those in the country illegally, making it difficult to confirm or dispute the president’s numbers.  What available studies do show, however, is that overall, crime rates are lower among immigrant groups than they are among native-born Americans.  The broader context: crime rates among immigrants are lower  Walter Ewing, an editor and writer for the American Immigration Council, a group that advocates for immigrants, puts it this way: “You can find any demographic group that you like and it’s going to include murderers. You can look at redheads and blondes and it’s going to include murders. But that’s not the point, the point is what the crime rates are,” he said.  Comparing overall crime rates for different groups is the best way to determine if a particular group poses a significantly greater threat than others.  “And if the likelihood is low, particularly compared to natives, then it’s disingenuous to claim they’re going to be a threat,” Ewing added.  Alex Nowrasteh, a senior immigration policy analyst with the libertarian Cato Institute, points to Texas as an example, since it’s the state with the best data on crimes committed and counted by immigration status and was the subject of a recent report he wrote showing that criminal conviction and arrest rates for immigrants were "well below" those of native-born Americans.  Undocumented immigrants make up just over 6 percent of the state's population, legal immigrants made up over 10 percent, and native-born Americans make up over 80 percent, according to the most recent American Community Survey data and the Center for Migration Studies.  Meanwhile, undocumented immigrants were convicted of 5.9 percent of all the homicides in Texas, legal immigrants were convicted of 3.8 percent of homicides, and native-born Americans were convicted of about 90 percent of all the homicides in Texas, according an analysis of 2015 Texas state data by Nowrasteh.  In other words, native-born Americans were the only group over-represented among those convicted of homicide in the state.  The president has also pointed to Texas, citing -- mostly accurately -- numbers from the Department of Safety in a tweet over the weekend: “In the Great State of Texas, between 2011 & 2018, there were a total of 292,000 crimes by illegal aliens, 539 murders, 32,000 assaults, 3,426 sexual assaults and 3,000 weapons charges. Democrats come back!”  But the context is important here, too. Trump doesn’t include a comparison to the general population’s crime rates, and the numbers Trump cited are arrests, meaning all did not result in convictions. Of those charges over eight years, 238 undocumented immigrants were convicted of homicide, 13,559 for assault, 1,689 for sexual assault and 1,280 for weapons.  And that all, in the end, frames a bigger picture: illegal immigrants are about half as likely to be incarcerated as native-born Americans and legal immigrants are about 80 percent less likely than native-born Americans, according to Nowrasteh’s research for the Cato Institute.  But where are the president’s nationwide numbers on crime committed by those in the country illegally coming from?  Though the White House did not specify, the president is likely gleaning numbers from data released by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) that summarizes arrests of immigrants who are released into their custody and then removed from the country. But the information Trump appears to be using does not make clear what year the arrests were made, when the crimes were actually committed, and combines charges with convictions.  According to the data, serious drug and DUI offenses represent the largest group of convictions, followed by immigration and traffic offenses.  The 266,000 arrests of illegal immigrants with criminal records over the past two years that Trump mentioned is a number that mainly includes immigrants who were convicted of crimes in the past, and perhaps served jail time before they were released into ICE custody.  As Nowrasteh puts it, “this is just when ICE gets them. It isn’t when convictions happened.”  According to the ICE data, over the past two years, there were nearly 4,000 arrests made for people charged and convicted of homicide among immigrants released into ICE custody for deportation — but the homicides could’ve been committed over any number of years.  For comparison, just in 2017, a total of 16,446 people were murdered in the U.S., according to the FBI.  The same unclear time frame applies to the president’s number on assaults, which likely stems from the nearly 50,000 people released into ICE custody in 2017 and 2018, who had been either charged or convicted for such crimes—but who could have committed their crimes years ago.  As for the president’s statement on sex crimes, those same ICE reports do not show 30,000. Even when combining the number from the ICE reports on sexual assaults with the separate category of sex offenses, that total comes to around 22,000.


abcnews--2019-01-26--12 immigrant workers at Trump golf course fired lawyer says

12 immigrant workers at Trump golf course fired, lawyer says

A dozen immigrant workers at one of President Donald Trump's golf clubs in New York who are in the U.S. illegally were fired this month even though managers had known about their legal status for years, a lawyer for the workers said Saturday.  As the president railed during the partial government shutdown against immigrants coming into the country illegally, a manager at the Trump National Golf Club in Westchester County called a dozen immigrant workers into a room one by one Jan. 18 and fired them, said lawyer Anibal Romero.  Many of them had worked at the club for a dozen or more years, he said, and managers knew they had submitted phony documents but looked the other way.  "This is bogus. People have been there for 12, 13, 14 years," said Romero. He added, referring to one of the president's sons, "One had the keys to Eric Trump's bedroom."  The firings come after workers at another Trump club in New Jersey came forward last month to say managers there had hired them knowing they were in the country illegally, and had even helped one obtain phony documents.  The crackdown at the New York club was first reported by The Washington Post.  The Associated Press left messages with The Trump Organization seeking comment. Eric Trump depicted the firings to the Post as a normal course of business.  "We are making a broad effort to identify any employee who has given false and fraudulent documents to unlawfully gain employment," he said. "Where identified, any individual will be terminated immediately."  He added that the "the system is broken."  Trump has repeatedly cast the millions of immigrants in the country illegally as a scourge on the health of the economy, taking jobs from American citizens. He has said they also bring drugs and crime over the border.  Trump turned over day-to-day management of his business to Eric and his other adult son, Donald Jr., when he took the oath of office two years ago. The Trump Organization owns or manages 17 golf clubs around the world.  One man who was fired, a former maintenance worker from Mexico hired in 2005, told The Post that he started to cry when he was told of the news and pleaded with management to reconsider.  "I told them they needed to consider us," said Gabriel Sedano. "I'd given the best of myself to this job."  "I'd never done anything wrong, only work and work," he added. "They said they didn't have any comments to make."  Romero, who also represents immigrant workers at Trump's golf course in Bedminster, New Jersey, said he has called New York state authorities and the FBI to look into hiring practices at the New York club.  "There was a don't ask, don't tell attitude at the club," he said. "We are demanding a full investigation."


abcnews--2019-03-12--Heres how Trump wants to fund an illegal immigration crackdown

Here's how Trump wants to fund an illegal immigration crackdown

President Donald Trump’s latest budget is packed with ways the administration wants to curb illegal immigration in the U.S. beyond just the $8.6 billion for his much-desired border wall.  Across the federal government, the White House plan calls for an all-hands-on-deck approach from increasing the number of officers who can detain and deport illegal immigrants, to proposing to punish the “sanctuary cities” that protect them.  While the proposal has almost no chance of passing the Democratic-controlled House, it outlines the administration's priorities for the year and suggests immigration will remain Trump's focal point for the year.  "All who are privileged to hold elected office must work together to create an immigration system that promotes wage growth and economic opportunity while preventing drugs, terrorism, and crime from entering the United States," the budget plan states. "Immigration policy, like all policy, must serve the interests of Americans living here today—including the millions of new Americans who came here legally to join our national family."  On top of $8.6 billion more for a wall, the White House budget proposal would fund 5,000 new Border Patrol Agents and allow Immigration and Customs Enforcement to add 10,000 officers and investigators while expanding detention centers, according to the White House budget office.  The budget also would replace military construction funds that would be depleted by the border wall after Trump declared a national emergency.  When Trump first took office, ICE facilities held an average of 34,376 people on any given day. Last week that number topped 50,000 and the new proposed budget would allow for further increases.  Democrats fought detention center expansions in negotiations that ended the government shutdown earlier this year. Although they did not stop ICE transferring funds from elsewhere in the agency to expand the number of beds in their facilities, according to the Migration Policy Institute.  As the number of detainees continues to climb, immigration judges face a record backlog of cases. Trump’s new proposal increases Justice Department funding to grow the number of immigration judges by nearly 20 percent, the budget office says.  National Park officers are also expected to crack down on illegal crossings through federal land near the border.  "We are going to be working ever more intensely with our friends in CBP and the law enforcement agencies to interdict drug smuggling along the border," Scott Cameron, a top Interior Department official, said on a call with reporters.  The Interior Department has more than 4,000 federal law enforcement officers and has been increasingly focused on deploying those resources to the border.  The budget also includes proposals aimed at “sanctuary cities.” The measures would allow the administration to withhold funding from cities that don’t “cooperate with specific federal immigration enforcement activities and requests.”  The Trump administration’s efforts to crack down these jurisdictions have been stopped by appellate courts multiple times.  In resistance to Trump’s plan, advocates joined Democrats on Capitol Hill on Wednesday to introduce new legislation that would protect young immigrants known as "Dreamers" and refugees.  These immigrants "make our communities stronger — it’s time we gave them stability, REAL protection under the law, and a pathway toward citizenship," tweeted Rep. Jimmy Gomez, D-Calif.


abcnews--2019-11-01--In California blaze, Spanish-speaking immigrants find help

Two years ago, when fires ravaged Northern California, where tens of thousands of Latinos in the U.S. illegally work at farms and vineyards, displaced families were seen sleeping on beaches or in their cars.  Farmworkers, construction workers and others in the service industry stayed away from evacuation centers for fear that immigration authorities would use the crisis as an opportunity to detain and deport people.  As another massive fire burns the same area this week, it's been a very different story, according to immigrants and community groups that work closely with them.  Translators and aid workers have been at evacuation centers, interviewing families and scouting out items they need, such as baby formula, diapers or medication. Groups are raising funds and distributing cash for those out of work.  Local governments and California fire officials have increased bilingual outreach, posting social media updates in both languages. They also have told people that Immigration and Customs Enforcement won't have access to any shelters, trying to allay fears of an immigration raid.  "It was great because all these people were comfortable coming to these evacuation centers and it was something good to see," said Cal Fire spokesman Edwin Zuniga, who is bilingual and has been leading Spanish-language press conferences. "It made me feel good that these people felt safe and it made me feel good that I was able to give them this information in Spanish and reach out to them."  The fire burning in Sonoma County has forced over 180,000 to evacuate, has burned 167 homes and has grown to 121 square miles (313 square kilometers). Most of those evacuated have been allowed to return home, but they face power outages after California's biggest utility, Pacific Gas & Electric, has again imposed blackouts.  Roughly 38,000 immigrants without legal status and 6,000 temporary farmworkers live in the county, advocacy groups say, and they've been able to help some 5,500 families, totaling about 20,000 people.  Diana Solis, of Windsor, was grateful for access to information. Solis, who doesn't have legal status, was picking grapes for a winery on Saturday when her boss told her to evacuate. Her car broke down on her way to pick up her 2-year-old son, and it would be hours before they landed at a shelter in Marin County. There, firefighters came by twice a day to provide the latest updates in Spanish, Solis said.  Labor and immigrant advocates say the way the government has handled communication with the Spanish-speaking communities has vastly improved since the 2017 wildfire, which claimed 22 lives and destroyed over 5,600 structures.  The slower speed of the fire has helped this time around.  In 2017, the fire struck in the middle of the night and moved quickly, so there was little time to prep. This year's so-called Kincade Fire spread less quickly, giving authorities more time to organize evacuations, communicate options and assuage fears.  Zuniga said his agency had learned from the 2017 fire, when it didn't do initial outreach in Spanish and many expressed fear of going to shelters over their immigration status. Zuniga said that this time around, Spanish-language messaging was delivered from the very beginning, and he's seen a difference in how the immigrant community has responded.  On Tuesday, a family with a 4-week-old baby was at a shelter struggling to find diapers and formula, said Mara Ventura, executive director of North Bay Jobs with Justice.  Ventura said the mother told her there was no privacy to nurse and the family hadn't been able to get to a store because of the blackout. The evacuation order was lifted in the family's neighborhood, but nobody had told them. Ventura gave the family some money and helped them home.  Gabriela Orantes, with the North Bay Organizing Project, said some immigrants may still fear encountering authorities at shelters, one reason her organization and others have tried to offer support.  Orantes said outreach in schools and government efforts to be more inclusive of Spanish speakers have worked well, but that migrants still lack access to resources. She said the news conference that was held in Spanish was a summary of the English-language one and didn't include all the specific details of the original.  "In that respect there's still a second-class citizen response that I feel is still happening," Orantes said.  Lupe Arias, a Mexican immigrant who lives in Healdsburg and works in packaging for a local winery, said she's been keeping up with the latest through Cal Fire's Facebook page, where the agency is posting Spanish-language video updates daily, and through text alerts. Arias, who lacks legal status, and her husband and three kids stayed with relatives in San Francisco until the evacuation order was lifted.  They've so far gone a week without pay— about $1,400 in wages from the three jobs they hold between two of them— and will likely have to borrow from friends to pay for food and rent.  "This impacts me because as you know we live off what we earn every day," Arias said.  The harvest season is winding down but not over, and many temporary farmworkers won't able to finish their jobs, so cash is tight and some will have to live in California or return to Mexico without the savings they expected.  Solis, a single mother, was worried about how she'd pay rent on Friday, having missed several days of work. She said she'd likely ask friends to loan her money until she's back on her feet.  "I still don't know what to do. It's stressful," Solis said through tears.


abcnews--2019-11-04--District: Claim of immigration school visit was unconfirmed

Nashville school district officials say they shouldn't have described two men they say sought student records at a school as "immigration officials" without confirming they were.  The acknowledgement still leaves wide uncertainty about what happened at Una Elementary. District officials say they haven't yet found a paper trail or video evidence of the incident, or even pinned down the date it might have occurred.  The prospect of immigration agents seeking records at a school with a big immigrant student population quickly enflamed fears in Nashville, which has seen several high-profile run-ins with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents in recent months.  Nashville school district spokeswoman Olivia Brown said the district initially used the term "immigration officials" because "this was the belief of the school staff and district based on the information shared about the incident, but we recognize that this description of the individuals requesting information should not have been shared with the media as a statement of fact without obtaining further confirmation.  "At no time did the district seek to call out this visit and we have made every effort to answer questions honestly and accurately with the information available at the time."  Mayor John Cooper, who has set up an immigration task force, thinks the incident shows policies involving the city's interactions with federal immigration authorities need an evaluation, including timely documenting and reporting of those interactions, Cooper spokesman Chris Song said.  In an initial statement to reporters last month, the school district had said "immigration officials" came to the school. A few days later, the district didn't repeat the term in a statement to media responding to scathing criticism from ICE, which said there was no evidence that its agents visited the school and added that ICE generally does not conduct immigration enforcement at schools.  Instead, the district described "two men in official-looking uniforms" ''stating that they were government agents" with "official-looking IDs" who "had a list of student names and demanded those students' records."  In between those two statements, an email obtained by The Associated Press through a public records request shows the district chief of staff spoke with Una Elementary Principal Amelia Dukes. He wrote that Dukes told him she never said the incident was immigration-related, and that Dukes described the men as wearing "military-style outfits."  Brown says Una Elementary staff haven't been able to recall when it happened, and the district hasn't found video or other records because the date remains uncertain. The district has previously said video footage only goes back a few weeks.  Brown said the school "took appropriate action" and the men left when they were told the school couldn't release the information without permission.  The school didn't document the incident, copy their badges or record the men's information, Brown said. Because schools have many visitors, Brown said the visitor log is generally used when visitors enter the main area of the school and is generally not used when visitors only enter the office lobby.  The incident wasn't initially reported to principal supervisors and was brought to district officials' attention during an internal meeting this school year, Brown said. The discussion prompted guidance for schools about responding to requests for student information and training for principals, Brown said.  Asked if any changes will be made in response, Brown answered generally that, "Going forward, we will continue to engage with our partners to ensure that schools are prepared for how to handle similar types of situations."


abcnews--2019-11-10--Hispanic immigrant in line to lead US Catholic bishops

Clergy sex abuse is once again on the agenda as U.S. Catholic bishops meet this week — but so is a potentially historic milestone: Los Angeles Archbishop Jose Gomez, an immigrant from Mexico, is widely expected to win election as the first Hispanic president of the bishops' national conference.  Gomez, 67, is currently the conference's vice president — a post that by tradition serves as springboard to the presidency. In terms of doctrine, Gomez is considered a practical-minded conservative, but he is an outspoken advocate of a welcoming immigration policy that would include a path to citizenship for many immigrants living in the U.S. illegally.  In August, after a gunman targeting Mexicans killed 22 people at a Walmart in El Paso, Texas, Gomez wrote a powerful blog post condemning white supremacy and noting that Spanish was spoken in North America before English was.  "Men and women do not become less than human, less a child of God, because they are 'undocumented,'" Gomez wrote. "Yet, in our nation, it has become common to hear migrants talked about and treated as if they are somehow beneath caring about. "  The three-day meeting, opening on Monday, will mark the end of the three-year presidential term of Cardinal Daniel DiNardo, the archbishop of Galveston-Houston.  At the two most recent national assemblies that DiNardo presided over, the church's persisting clergy sex-abuse crisis — and the often tentative response to it — dominated the proceedings. At this week's assembly, the topic may surface only occasionally — for example in a scheduled update on establishing a nationwide, third-party reporting system for abuse or misconduct by bishops.  Also on the agenda are proposed changes in the process of "priestly formation" — the preparation of seminarians to become ordained priests. In recent years, amid the sex-abuse crisis, there has been increased focus on psychological evaluations of seminary applicants and students to reduce the likelihood of ordaining priests who would be prone to sexual misconduct.  The bishops also are expected to authorize development of a "comprehensive vision" for Hispanic/Latino ministry, to be completed over the next few years. While Hispanics account for about 37% of all U.S. Catholics, they are no longer a majority-Catholic group, according to the Pew Research Center; a recent Pew survey said 47% of Hispanics in the U.S. now call themselves Catholic, down from 57% in 2009.  In addition to electing a new president the bishops will be choosing a vice president, and thus the bishop in line to eventually assume the presidency. There are nine other nominees to take the post of vice president.  Some of the nominees are popular among militantly conservative Catholics — such as San Francisco Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone and Bishop Thomas Paprocki of Springfield, Illinois. Others, such as Archbishops Paul Coakley of Oklahoma City and Jerome Listecki of Milwaukee, also are conservatives but less eager to engage in the so-called culture wars.  Three prominent figures who are viewed as relatively progressive, and as allies of Pope Francis, are not among the nominees: Cardinal Blase Cupich of Chicago, Cardinal Joseph Tobin of Newark, New Jersey, and Bishop Robert McElroy of San Diego.  McElroy attracted attention on social media with a powerful speech Wednesday in San Antonio, in which he decried a "bunker mentality" pervading Catholic leadership in the U.S.  "'In great part, this bunker mentality has arisen because of the pervasive failure of the church and its leaders to recognize the enormity of the crime of clergy sexual abuse," he said.  The Baltimore meeting takes place against the backdrop of a Vatican investigation into Bishop Richard Malone of Buffalo, New York, who is under fire for his handling of sexual misconduct. Bishop Nicholas DiMarzio of Brooklyn, who headed the inquiry, said on Oct. 31 that he had concluded his work and submitted a report to the Vatican.  Coincidentally, Malone and other New York bishops will be making an official visit to the Vatican this week as their colleagues convene in Baltimore. Other U.S. bishops, as part of regional groups, will be making similar visits to Rome over the next few months.  Another bishop who won't be present in Baltimore is Michael Bransfield, who resigned in September as head of West Virginia's Wheeling-Charleston diocese while facing multiple allegations of financial and sexual misconduct. Bransfield's successor, Bishop Mark Brennan, initiated a process by which Bransfield was formally "disinvited" from the Baltimore meeting.


abcnews--2019-11-11--Mexican immigrant fights for DACA as court ruling nears

A Mexican immigrant fighting President Donald Trump's attempt to end a program shielding young immigrants from deportation says he is nervous about the case finally being heard by the U.S. Supreme Court.  Martín Batalla Vidal is a lead plaintiff in one of the cases to preserve the Obama-era program Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, known as DACA, and has seen his name splashed in legal documents since 2016, when he first sued in New York. The 29-year-old certified nursing assistant at a rehabilitation clinic for traumatic brain injury in Queens, New York, has described the legal journey since then as stressful, with people sending him hateful messages. He has had to sacrifice days at work so he could go to protests, press conferences and meetings with attorneys.  Even with his worries, Batalla Vidal is hopeful immigrants like him will be able to stay in the country.  "I don't know what is going to happen," said Batalla Vidal, who lives with his mother, two brothers and a dog in an apartment at the border of Queens and Brooklyn. "Whatever the outcome is, we know that we have fought hard for it and we will continue fighting. I am trying to be positive."  The nation's highest court is scheduled to hear oral arguments on the case Tuesday.  The program protects about 700,000 people, known as "Dreamers," who were brought to the U.S. illegally as children or came with families that overstayed visas.  With the attempted elimination of DACA, there was renewed pressure in Congress to pass the DREAM Act, or The Development, Relief and Education for Alien Minors, a series of never-passes proposals to protect young immigrants vulnerable to deportation. Opponents say the law rewards people for breaking the law, encourages illegal immigration and hurts American workers.  Trump ordered an end to DACA in 2017, but federal courts in different states, including New York because of Batalla Vidal's lawsuit, blocked him from ending it immediately.  The protections remain in effect at least until the U.S. Supreme Court issues its decision, which will likely be in 2020. Participants of the program can renew their status, but no new applicants can sign up.  The Obama administration created the DACA program in 2012 to provide social security numbers, work permits and protection from deportation to people who, in many cases, have no memory of any home other than the U.S.  The Trump administration argues that the program is unlawful because former President Barack Obama did not have the authority to adopt it in the first place.  Batalla Vidal initially sued when a federal court in a separate case ruled that DACA permits could not be extended for a third year, as the Obama administration wanted. Now he's part of the legal fight over DACA's very existence.  When Trump ordered the termination of the program, lawyers for Batalla Vidal amended his original lawsuit to fight the termination and added more individual plaintiffs.  A federal judge ruled in their favor. The U.S. Supreme Court in June agreed to hear the administration's appeal of Batalla Vidal's and other cases from around the country.  On Monday, Batalla Vidal planned to arrive to Washington, D.C., in a bus with his mother to join representatives from colleges, civil rights groups, Democratic-led states and individuals who also sued. On Tuesday, he will sit at the Supreme Court to hear oral arguments.  "Nobody thought we would get this far," he said after speaking last week in a conference at LaGuardia Community College, where he studies criminal justice as an undergraduate student. "I have my family, my community, which has had my back since day one."  Batalla Vidal crossed the Mexico border when he was 7 years old with his mother and a brother. He has two other brothers who are U.S. citizens.  After going to high school in Brooklyn, he said he worked making deliveries at a deli and later at a gym to save for college, and later on to support his single mother who has thyroid and osteoarthritis. Batalla Vidal also joined Make the Road New York, a nonprofit group that defends immigrant rights. Lawyers from the organization, along with the Worker and Immigrant Rights Advocacy Clinic of Yale Law School and the National Immigration Law Center filed the 2016 lawsuit.  "His bravery and commitment to justice for our communities throughout this legal fight have been admirable and captured the attention of people all over, thousands of whom sent him messages of support after he received hate-filled messages for suing Trump," said Marielena Hincapié, executive director of the National Immigration Law Center. "Martín is fighting for the freedom to thrive and be himself in this country, which is his home."