AUSTIN, Texas — The Texas National Guard says it is preparing to deploy to the U.S.-Mexico border in response to a call from President Donald Trump.
The Texas Military Department, the umbrella agency over the Texas’ National Guard branches, said on its Twitter account that it would hold a Friday night news conference on the deployment. Further details were not immediately available.
Trump told reporters Thursday that he wants to send between 2,000 and 4,000 National Guard members to the border to help fight illegal immigration and drug trafficking.
That would be lower than the roughly 6,000 National Guard members that former President George W. Bush sent in 2006 during another border security operation, though more than the 1,200 Guard members President Barack Obama sent in 2010.
NEW YORK — Stocks ended the week the way they began it: tumbling as investors worry that tariffs and harsh words between the U.S. and China will touch off a trade war that derails the global economy. The latest drop came as the White House proposed tripling the amount of goods from China that will be subject to tariffs.
The stock market changed direction again and again this week as investors tried to get a sense of whether the trade dispute between the world’s two largest economies will escalate. On Friday technology companies, banks, industrial and health care stocks sank. The market didn’t get any help from a March jobs report that was weaker than expected.
With administration officials sounding conciliatory one day and hostile the next and the president quick to fire off yet another tweet, investors simply don’t know what the U.S. wants to achieve in its talks with China, said Katie Nixon, chief investment officer for Northern Trust Wealth Management.
WASHINGTON — The United States punished dozens of Russian oligarchs and government officials on Friday with sanctions that took direct aim at President Vladimir Putin’s inner circle, as President Donald Trump’s administration tried to show he’s not afraid to take tough action against Moscow.
Seven Russian tycoons, including aluminum magnate Oleg Deripaska, were targeted, along with 17 officials and a dozen Russian companies, the Treasury Department said. Senior Trump administration officials cast it as part of a concerted, ongoing effort to push back on Putin, emphasizing that since Trump took office last year, the U.S. has punished 189 Russia-related people and entities with sanctions.
Rather than punishing Russia for one specific action, the new sanctions hit back at the Kremlin for its “ongoing and increasingly brazen pattern” of bad behavior, said the officials, who weren’t authorized to comment by name and briefed reporters on condition of anonymity. The officials ticked through a list of complaints about Russia’s actions beyond its borders, including its annexation of Crimea, backing of separatist rebels in eastern Ukraine, support for Syrian President Bashar Assad, and cyber-hacking.
SALEM, Ore. — President Donald Trump’s plan to deploy National Guard troops to the border with Mexico has drawn resistance from some governors, most of them Democrats, but they could be powerless to deny the commander in chief’s request for soldiers.
Governors have some leeway to say no to presidents, but depending on which federal law Trump uses to order the deployment, the matter could be out of the governors’ hands.
The statute known as “Title 10 duty status” establishes that National Guard personnel operate under the president’s control and receive federal pay and benefits. It also forbids them from performing tasks of civilian law enforcement unless explicitly authorized, according to the Congressional Research Service.
Trump said Thursday that he wants to send 2,000 to 4,000 Guard members to the border to help federal officials fight illegal immigration and drug trafficking. Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen said on Twitter that she had a “productive conversation” about the deployment with governors of the Southwest border states.
On Friday, North Dakota’s governor joined leaders of some border states in saying he would send forces if asked.
From Associated Press