The Hill: Senate Republicans want to break up House’s Trump bill into bite-size pieces

Senate Republicans say the House-drafted bill to enact President Trump’s legislative agenda has “problems” and are taking a second look at breaking it up into smaller pieces in hopes of getting the president’s less controversial priorities enacted into law before the fall.

Even if Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) manages to squeak Trump’s agenda through the House, it faces major obstacles in the Senate, where moderate Republicans say they oppose proposed cuts to Medicaid and fiscal conservatives say it doesn’t go nearly far enough in cutting the deficit.

“There are still a lot of problems,” said one Republican senator who requested anonymity to discuss internal Senate GOP discussions on the budget reconciliation bill.

https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/5304984-trump-agenda-stalled-senate-considering-split

MSNBC: Trump’s plan to deport Afghan refugees is a national disgrace

There’s no group more deserving of TPS than the Afghans who are now on the fast track to deportation.

Earlier this month, the United Nations published its latest update on human rights in Afghanistan. Here are a few of the findings: On Feb. 23, 18 people were flogged for “crimes” ranging from homosexuality to extramarital affairs. They then received sentences of between one and five years in prison. On March 3, “Propagation of Virtue and Prevention of Vice” agents made a surprise visit to a hospital and ordered staff not to attend women who weren’t accompanied by a male relative. Between Jan. 17 and Feb. 3, 50 men from the Ismaili community were abducted and interrogated on religious subjects. Those who refused to convert to Sunni Islam were beaten and threatened with death.

This is Afghanistan under Taliban rule, and it is where the Trump administration plans to send Afghans who are now living safely in the United States. 

Americans owe a special debt to our Afghan partners, who served honorably in and alongside our armed forces and trusted the United States to stand by them instead of abandoning their country to the Taliban. The Trump administration’s decision to betray the Afghans who thought they were safe on American soil is an act of supreme cruelty and callousness. Our Afghan friends don’t deserve a one-way ticket back to the theocracy they left behind — they deserve to be Americans.

https://www.msnbc.com/opinion/msnbc-opinion/trump-ends-afghan-protections-afrikaners-rcna207127