Two top Japanese companies have warned that artificial intelligence could cause a total collapse of the social order if it is not rapidly reigned in.
Nippon Telegraph and Telephone (NTT) and Yomiuri Shimbun Group Holdings, the country’s largest telecommunications company and the country’s biggest newspaper, jointly published the AI manifesto.
It warned that if legislation is not passed quickly in major countries across the world, artificial intelligence threatens to decimate democracy and provoke widespread societal unrest.
Pointing to AI programs being developed by US tech giants, the manifesto warns, “In the worst-case scenario, democracy and social order could collapse, resulting in wars.”
TOKYO—Japan’s largest telecommunications company and the country’s biggest newspaper called for speedy legislation to restrain generative artificial intelligence, saying democracy and social order could collapse if AI is left unchecked. https://t.co/zELcjbjwmI
The report stated that such technology is designed to seize users’ attention with little regard for morality or accuracy.
Guided by Keio University researchers, the companies called on the Japanese government to pass new laws to protect elections and national security from AI.
As we previously highlighted, programs such as Google’s Gemini AI system caused fury after they openly discriminated against white people and in some cases erased them from history altogether.
OpenAI’s ChatGPT produced equally ludicrous content, in one case saying it would refuse to quietly utter a racial slur that no human could hear in order to save 1 billion white people from a “painful death.”
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Iron Ore’s Two-Day Rally Biggest In Years On China Bottoming Hopes
Over the past year, there has been a surge in doom-and-gloom headlines about China’s economy. The country’s mercantilist policymakers have spent months attempting to stimulate a fragile economy through monetary easing while keeping the real estate crisis at bay. However, a more optimistic view is emerging as Chinese macroeconomic data and stocks stabilize, with the commodity market now indicating signs of a more favorable economic outlook heading into spring.
Bloomberg reports iron ore prices in Asia are headed for the largest two-day rally in more than two years, fueled by prospects of a bump in steel demand and output in the world’s second-largest economy.
According to financial firm Macquarie Group, April and May are the most active periods for construction across China. They noted that iron ore inventories are peaking at ports, and steel output at the nation’s blast furnaces has already increased.
There’s a “bit of a reversion back to normal seasonal trends where you have higher hot metal production throughout the middle of the year,” Rob Stein, a metals analyst at Macquarie, told Bloomberg in a phone interview. Stein added that this should help iron ore to achieve a price range between $110 and $120 a ton.
Nick Savone, global head of equity sales at Morgan Stanley, wrote in a note to clients that his “team’s supply/demand model shows a closely balanced market, supporting prices well above the cash cost curve, which continues to move higher. They see upside to spot price, to $120/t in Q3, as Chinese stocks draw down on stable demand and lack of further upside to seaborne supply.”
Despite China’s economy being plagued with many problems, including a real estate bust, deflation, debt troubles, demographic winter, foreign investor exodus, supply chain fracturing, and deteriorating Sino-US ties, recent macroeconomic data shows a potential bottom forming.
China’s official factory purchasing managers index moved into expansion last month, the first time since September. The services sector index hit the highest level since June, and a separate factory index from and S&P Global hit to a 13-month high.
Late last month, China’s President Xi Jinping met with more than a dozen American business leaders, including Stephen Schwarzman of Blackstone Inc. and Cristiano Amon of Qualcomm Inc., to restore confidence in the Chinese economy.
The CSI 300 Index found a floor at the start of February and rose 13% through early April. After halving since February 2021, the multi-year equity rout appears stabilized (for now).
Meanwhile, the JPM Global MFG PMI index bottomed for the past year and recently moved into expansion territory.
The question on everyone’s mind is if the world’s second-largest economy has finally bottomed. If so, the global economy could be on a soft landing path. If not, look out below…
Jordanian authorities have clamped down on participants in the daily protests against the Israeli war on Gaza, amid accusations that Hamas has a role in igniting them. Thousands have been protesting daily in Ramadan in front of the Israeli embassy in the capital, Amman, demanding its closure and an end to normalization with Israel in response to its atrocities in Gaza.
The protests continued even though the embassy has no diplomatic mission, following the departure of Israel’s ambassador in October and Jordan’s recalling of its ambassador in protest of the Israeli war on Gaza. Jordanian authorities have been caught off guard by the size of the Ramadan protests, which average between 6,000 to 10,000 participants.
Columnists and former officials have attacked Hamas leaders, especially Khaled Meshaal, accusing the movement and the Muslim Brotherhood of trying to create chaos in Jordan. Former information minister Samih al-Maaytah accused the Hamas movement abroad of collaborating with the Muslim Brotherhood in Jordan to advance Hamas’s political agendas.
“Hamas abroad is trying to pressure Jordan to restore relations with the movement,” he said, citing a speech on March 26 in Amman by Meshaal, the head of Hamas abroad, calling on millions to take to the streets.
“Hamas wants to send a message that it can influence and lead the Jordanian street, which is also convenient for the Iranians who have not been able to exercise any political influence in Jordan,” Maaytah told MEE.
Jordanian government spokesperson Muhannad Moubaydeen said on Tuesday that the government did not mind the demonstrations, but was concerned about the chants, which it views as pro-Hamas.
“Jordanian security is charged with protecting the demonstrators and ensuring their safety, but the problem is those who harm national security and come out with unacceptable chants,” he said in a press conference. The Muslim Brotherhood in Jordan has rejected these accusations.
According to Murad al-Adayleh, the Secretary-General of the Islamic Action Front, a party affiliated with the Muslim Brotherhood, “there are no special party interests in these protests, which represent all sectors of Jordanian society that support the Palestinian resistance”.
“The Jordanian people’s relationship with the Palestinian issue is different from any Arab people because it is geographically and demographically related to Palestine,” Adayleh told MEE. “We paid sacrifices and sacrifices from our children for the sake of Palestine, so it is natural for us to see these sit-ins in all cities.”
Adayleh said the accusations of Hamas’s role in the protests seek to discredit the protest movement, which has so far been the largest in the Arab world. “There are attempts to demonize the Jordanian movement because it has begun to influence the Arab street and has galvanized protests in other Arab countries,” he said.
In Amman, Jordan, large crowds persist in their protest outside the Israeli embassy on Friday. Hundreds voiced opposition to Jordan’s normalisation with Israel through chants and demonstrations, calling on Jordan to cut all ties with Israel. pic.twitter.com/YpQl6e2L6G
Jordan was the second Arab country after Egypt to normalise relations with Israel in 1994, in a peace treaty that remains deeply unpopular in the country. Jordanians have also denounced the kingdom’s import of Israeli gas as “treasonous”.
Hundreds detained
Jordanian security services have detained hundreds of political activists from different parties since the beginning of the 7 October war. Lawyer and former judge Louay Obeidat said that more than 1,500 activists have been prosecuted for their protest activities.
Many of them have been released, but dozens remain in administrative detention, while seven are considered to have been forcibly disappeared. Among the detainees was trade union activist Maysara Malas, who has been in administrative detention, held without charge for the past four months in connection with the protests.
Footage documenting the brutal arrest by Jordan’s security forces of a nonviolent protester after the forces cracked down on a massive pro-Palestine protest outside the Israeli occupation’s embassy in Amman last night. pic.twitter.com/qsQmBZ3UeV
Malas’s family said that 20 members of the General Intelligence raided his house in al-Rashid suburb at dawn on 4 January to arrest him. During the raid, the officers asked all family members to turn off their phones, searched the house and Malas’s car, and confiscated documents, electronic devices and surveillance camera tapes, the family said in a statement.
After an hour-and-a-half-long search of their house, Malas was handcuffed and detained without any charge. He remains in detention at the General Intelligence Department, and his lawyer has been prevented from visiting him, according to the family.
The National Alliance for Rights and Freedoms, a group of human rights activists, said that the Jordanian authorities pursued a huge number of activists in connection with the sit-in near the Israeli embassy.
‘Bird Flu-Pocalypse’ Forces Hong Kong To Suspend Some Imports Of US Poultry Meat
The recent spread of bird flu—also known as highly pathogenic avian influenza, or HPAI— across several US states has been hyped by corporate media. Some journalists are quoting ‘experts’ who warn the bird flu pandemic could be ‘100 times worse’ than Covid.’
According to Bloomberg data, the story count in corporate media for all things “Bird Flu” last week hit a record high on data going back to 2014.
The context here is crucial. Bird flu is not just a US issue anymore; it’s ‘going global,’ and this is happening just before the US presidential elections in November.
On Tuesday, Hong Kong’s food safety authority published a memo stating, “Import of poultry meat and poultry products suspended in some areas of the United States.”
Here’s the full memo from the Center for Food Safety (CFS) of the Food and Environmental Hygiene Department:
The Center for Food Safety (CFS) of the Food and Environmental Hygiene Department announced today (April 9) that in response to a notification from the World Organization for Animal Health regarding an outbreak of highly pathogenic H5N1 avian influenza in Ionia County, Michigan, and Parmer County, Texas, USA, The CFS immediately instructed the trade to suspend the import of poultry meat and poultry products (including poultry eggs) from the above-mentioned areas to protect public health in Hong Kong.
A spokesman for the CFS said that according to the Census and Statistics Department, Hong Kong imported about 37,770 tonnes of chilled and frozen poultry meat and about 83.84 million poultry eggs from the United States last year.
The spokesman said: “The CFS has contacted the US authorities regarding the incident and will continue to closely monitor information on the outbreak of avian influenza from the World Organization for Animal Health and relevant authorities, and will take appropriate actions in light of the development of the local epidemic.”
If it’s bird flu or whatever “Disease X” could possibly be, there appears to be a push to “intersect” some type of ‘Covid crisis’ before the 2024 US elections.
“They will surely try to run their “Disease X” ruse. But they have already lost the trust of the people they made war against in their own country. In which case, expect resistance among the un-sick,” James Howard Kunstler penned in a note earlier this month.
For years, we have discussed the failure of universities to take actions against faculty and students shutting down events or acting unlawfully, including faculty guilty of criminal assault.
Now, Vanderbilt has expelled three students after anti-Israel protests, including Jack Petocz, a political activist recognized by the White House and featured prominently in the New York Times and other news outlets.
“I did not touch a community service officer, nor am I anywhere near the individual in the video. I’d implore you to trust a student activist over rich, powerful, white men, but that’s your choice.”
He insisted that he and the other students were only “peacefully protesting the genocide in Palestine.”
X Screenshot
Petocz’s activism, including opposing the Florida parental rights law, has been widely celebrated in the media including an article that featured him in a January 2022 front story on fighting conservative school boards. President Biden invited him to the White House for a bill signing and took a picture with him in the Oval Office.
Hi! My name is Jack Petocz, I’m the 17-year-old student activist who led nationwide walkouts against the “Don’t Say Gay” bill. Through being kicked out of school, harassed in public and doxxed, this moment was truly special to me. I’ll keep fighting ❤️ pic.twitter.com/DGksCMTWHS
“These actions are actively destructive of the values that underpin our community. Any participants in today’s events … who turn out to be Pomona students, are subject to immediate suspension. Students from the other Claremont Colleges will be banned from Pomona’s campus and subject to discipline on their own campuses.”
The actions of the university have led to protests on campus and calls for the student board to reverse that suspensions.
If the leadership chooses happy-story PR and toothless reforms for show in the hopes it will all blow over, these subterfuges have the potential to push dissatisfaction beyond the point of control.
Whatever else we might say or think about the leadership class, they tend to have a keen sense of self-preservation. The ability to issue optimistic visions of sunshine and unicorns with a straight face is valuable, to be sure, but so is the ability to sense that the BS is no longer working and something must be done to stave off a potentially career-ending collapse of confidence.
As a general rule, the ability to maintain a delusional confidence that it’s all going to work out just fine tends to end very poorly for the leadership class. However sincerely it may be uttered, let them eat brioche doesn’t resolve the extreme asymmetries that generate revolutionary disorder. Something more is required, something that either reduces the asymmetries of wealth and power or gives the appearance of doing so.
Staving off revolution requires some action that benefits those for whom the status quo is no longer working. While borrowing and distributing “free money” works for awhile, this profligacy generates its own destabilizing dynamics, and so eventually reducing the asymmetries of wealth and power requires the leadership to take a chunk out of the perquisites and spoils of the financial elite.
Since the leadership class is either beholden to the financial elite or has dual membership in both clubs, the leaders are quickly declared “traitors to their class” even as they are acting to stave off the overthrow of the predatory financial elite that pushed asymmetries to destabilizing extremes.
In other words, the leaders saving the financial elite from the consequences of their own rapacity will get no credit from those they’re saving. Rather than grasping that giving up 10% of their gains will preserve the remaining 90%, the infinite greed and hubris of the financial elite locks their minds in a delusional fantasy that their wealth and power are “deserved” and therefore untouchable.
That the system is rigged so that every pitch is a gentle toss and every base hit becomes a home run is conveniently ignored.
That doing nothing could lead to a one-way ticket to Devil’s Island issued by a revolutionary government doesn’t compute. That they could soon be fighting over the MREs occasionally flung from aircraft doesn’t penetrate their hubris-soaked echo chamber of entitlement. The task of saving their own class falls thanklessly to the leadership.
Policies that would have been rejected out of hand as politically impossible become normalized as leaders rush to stave off revolution. The historical path from complacency to denial to policy extremes is well-worn: first the leadership tries the sunshine and unicorns cover story. When this fails to satisfy the disenfranchised mob, the leaders issue grand sounding edicts that suggest “hope and change” is right around the corner.
Once this well-used ploy fails to quench the social distemper, then the leaders accept that “when things get serious, you have to lie,” and so they lie, at first to cool the ugly sentiment and then to buy time.
Eventually, some real action has to be taken, and then it gets dicey. There are mistakes to be made in any policy choice: doing nothing can trigger disaster, but so can doing too little or too much. The luxury of calibrating a response is no longer available, and so extreme policies are thrown at the wall until something sticks.
Those who counseled caution are cashiered, for their advice led to the current crisis. Those who counseled radical responses are elevated and freed to unleash whatever they claim will work like magic.
But alas, by this late stage, magic is in short supply, and extreme policies set off second-order consequences no one anticipated, except perhaps those overly cautious voices who did not understand that the option of good choices had long since dissipated, and the only options left were bad or possibly worse than merely bad.
The extremes of wealth-power asymmetries that generated the crisis are eventually matched by equally extreme policies designed to stave off the overthrow of the ruling elites. If these actually rebalance what was allowed to drift out of balance, order and stability can slowly be restored.
If the leadership chooses happy-story PR and toothless reforms for show in the hopes it will all blow over, these subterfuges have the potential to push dissatisfaction beyond the point of control, and predictions about the next stage of events become folly: beyond this event horizon, anything becomes possible.
Moscow Accuses Hunter Biden-Linked Company Burisma Of Financing Terror Attacks
Russia says it has uncovered more damning evidence connecting the US and NATO to recent terror and assassination campaigns in Russia, including making connections to the March 22 Crocus City Hall terror attack which resulted in over 140 Russians dead and hundreds more wounded and injured.
Russia’s Investigative Committee, which is the country’s top investigative body, announced Tuesday that it has launched a criminal probe into senior US and Western officials who are believed to be “financing terrorism”.
The formal statement claims that an ongoing investigation has “established” that money from commercial organizations tied to NATO were used to “eliminate prominent political and public figures” inside and outside Russia, as well as to “inflict economic damage” against the country. Lately there’s also been a spate of devastating cross-border attacks on refineries, ports, and oil facilities.
Another major event and probe which is high on the Kremlin’s agenda is the August 20, 2022 assassination of Darya Dugina outside of Moscow, in a car bombing which authorities believe was likely intended to kill her father, Alexander Dugin, prominent philosopher and pundit who is seen as a close ally of President Putin. There’s also the assassination of famous pro-Kremlin military blogger Vladlen Tatarsky, killed in an April 2023 cafe bombing in St. Petersburg..
While it is nothing new that Russian officials would raise suspicions that such targeted attacks had covert NATO support, whether directly or indirectly, what is new – and a bit surprising – is that the name Burisma Holdings appears in the fresh statement of the Russian Investigative Committee.
This name is of course very familiar and notorious in the West, as AFP and Moscow Times report Tuesday:
The top law enforcement body named the Ukrainian energy company Burisma Holdings as one of the implicated organizations. U.S. President Joe Biden’s son Hunter Biden served as a member of Burisma’s board of directors between 2014 and 2019.
His role has fueled Republican accusations against the Biden family over claimed corruption and culminated in an ongoing impeachment probe in U.S. Congress. Hunter Biden has denied any wrongdoing, and a former FBI informant was arrested in February on suspicion of fabricating accusations against the president’s family.
The Russian investigative body described that it is still examining “sources and movement of several million U.S. dollars and the involvement of specific persons from government officials and public commercial organizations of Western countries.”
It said further it is seeking to expose “links of the direct perpetrators of terrorist acts with their foreign curators, organizations and sponsors” — however without naming specific countries or specific terror attack or assassinations (other than identifying Burisma).
Just like with US media over the past several years, Burisma has been featured prominently in Russian state media reporting. Below is the precise section from Tuesday’s official statement naming Burisma (according to machine translation):
It has been established that funds received through commercial organizations, in particular, the oil and gas company Burisma Holdings, operating in Ukraine, have been used in recent years to carry out terrorist acts in the Russian Federation, as well as beyond its borders in order to eliminate prominent political and public figures and causing economic damage. —Russian Investigative Committee
This marks a first over the course of the more than two year long Russia-Ukraine war. Recently, Ukraine has stepped up its cross-border drone and missile attack on Russian soil. Moscow has all along complained that these attacks are sophisticated and long-range enough (with long-range attacks especially wreaking havoc on Russian oil facilities) that they must have CIA or Western intelligence help.
Conservative media was abuzz Tuesday after a familiar name resurfaced, this time over alleged links to terror financing…
Trump was effectively impeached because he wanted to look into Joe & Hunter Biden’s connections to Burisma. https://t.co/GX9yh4L7wj
It appears that the Kremlin is now not just pointing the finger at Western governments, but at commercial entities within Ukraine which have long established Western business ties. It seems the theory is that companies like Burisma are continuing to play a ‘middle man’ role in term of ‘terror financing’ for attacks on Russian soil.
Washington has repeatedly rejected Russian allegations that the US is involved in these attacks. Yet as we’ve recently detailed, more and more US mainstream media reporting has of late been offering surprising clarity on the CIA’s role in assisting Ukraine with mounting high-risk cross border attacks on Russian soil of late.
Gun control activist David Hogg has been hit with allegations over the spending practices of his group Leaders We Deserve PAC.Conservative outlets are reporting that the group spent comparably little on actual candidates as opposed to travel and expenses. His prior counsel is a familiar name in such controversies in Washington: former Clinton campaign general counsel Marc Elias.
Hogg created a group in the aftermath of the 2022 midterm elections to elect Generation Z politicians to offices throughout the country. The group was given favorable national coverage in major media outlets. He explained that contributions would be used to elect young Democrat candidates:
“[We’re] trying to pick them and say, you know, we would like to help you run for office, we’ll supply you with all of the resources that you need and help basically coach you and hold your hand to get there, which is kind of the gap that’s in the space right now, for at least young people at the state legislative level.”
Federal filings reportedly show that year-end 2023, Leaders We Deserve raised over $3 million. That is impressive for its first year in operation.
The conservative sites allege that the group spent “only about $263,000 on its stated mission of electing candidates from Generation Z to office combined with donations to other Democrat Party committees and groups—and instead spent more than $1.4 million on disbursements to themselves for payroll and to political consulting firms and legal fees, in addition to travel and entertainment expenses like hotels, flights, and meals.”
However, it spent reportedly spent more than $1,314,000 on travel and related expenses while giving $80,000 to the Elias Law Group.
Previously, when allegations of self-dealing and accounting improprieties were raised with regard to Black Lives Matter, the group’s attorney, Elias, immediately stood out for many. Elias resigned from his “key role” with BLM as the scandal exploded.
Elias’s name has now again popped up in the controversy involving Hogg, who is accused of raising millions to support liberal candidates but allegedly spending only $263,000 on such candidates while paying $83,000 to the Elias law firm. (These figures are reportedly from federal filings but neither Elias nor Hogg have specifically addressed the media reports).
Elias has long been a controversial figure, including being sanctioned in court. He was named as the key figure in hiding the funding of the Steele dossier by the Clinton campaign, which led later to a FEC fine. Reporters accused the campaign of lying to them about the funding. Elias was also reportedly with campaign chair John Podesta when he allegedly denied such funding to congressional investigators.
Back to the most recent controversy, Hogg could argue that, as a well known activist figure, his travel to these campaigns is the boost that the group promised donors. He is the assistance. Likewise, the group could argue that it is still getting ramped up for greater spending efforts in the fall. As for the legal fees, the group could argue that start up legal fees and reporting fees tend to be higher at the outset.
The controversy does raise some novel questions about the purpose of contributions. Hogg coming to a local campaign is likely to generate media attention for a candidate. He can also claim that he and his staff bring needed expertise and advice to novice or young candidates. That could be their interpretation of the promise to “basically coach you and hold your hand to get there.” Critics are focused on the pitch to “supply you with all of the resources that you need.”
The group is only the latest political or business effort launched by Hogg, who previously tried to start a “progressive pillow company” before stepping away from the enterprise.
Over 500,000 Democratic Voters Have Cast Primary Protest Votes Against Biden
There are clear indicators that large swathes of prior Biden voters don’t intend to vote for him this next time around versus Trump. The latest example is that the “uncommitted” campaign is gaining steam, having garnered the support of more than a half-million Democrat voters.
The initiative organized by dissident Democrats outraged over President Biden’s handling of the Israel-Gaza war has sent a powerful shot across the bow of his presidential campaign, and the movement didn’t even exist at the start of the 2024 primary season. YetThe Nationsays that so far in total 530,502 people have voted “uncommitted” or “uninstructed” where it’s available on the ballot.
The initiative was first implemented in the key swing state of Michigan, resulting in over 100,000 people there registering their vote as “uncommitted”. The state has a huge Arab and Muslim demographic.
The Nation has documented that the movement is spreading fast, and it should be a huge worry for Biden campaign strategists:
The campaign has won enough votes to secure Democratic National Convention delegates from Minnesota (14), Hawaii (7), Michigan (2), and, according to local news reports, Washington (2). And notable levels of support for the effort in must-win battleground states such as Wisconsin signal that the president’s campaign cannot neglect the fact that a substantial portion of the base that must be mobilized this fall is crying out for the United States to back an immediate, permanent cease-fire in Gaza, where Israel’s assault has cost more than 33,000 lives.
According to more from AntiWar.com, which has been closely following the movement:
Last week, 48,091 votes were cast for “uninstructed” in the Wisconsin primary. The turnout far exceeded organizers’ expectations, as their goal was to secure 20,682, the margin of victory for Biden in Wisconsin for the 2020 election.
The opposition to Biden was strongest in the area of Wisconsin where University of Wisconsin–Madison students reside, historically a Democratic stronghold. In that area, 30% of voters cast ballots for “uncommitted,” something Rep. Mark Pocan (D-WI) called “a big, f**king deal.”
Meanwhile, there’s also been an intensifying divide among Democrats over whether to halt defense aid to Israel, a debate which only intensified in the wake of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) attack on the World Central Kitchen convoy in Gaza, which left seven international workers dead, including an American.
Vote Uncommitted EVERYWHERE. This President is clearly not getting the message. https://t.co/pSvy56ho3g
This increased fragmentation of Biden’s base has been on display in recent days too, given former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi – still very influential among Dems – has publicly come out against Biden’s policy to continue arming Israel. The issue is entering the heart of the Democratic establishment, threatening unity.
Axios reported that she “signed onto a call by progressive members of Congress for the U.S. to stop transferring weapons to Israel over a strike that killed seven aid workers in Gaza.”
An illegal immigrant who had been deported seven times and arrested 11 times was charged with aggravated murder after an unidentified body was found in Ohio, according to local authorities.
Police found the body in Hamilton on Monday after responding to a 911 call. Investigators interviewed suspect Fermin Garcia-Gutierrez the following day.
Butler County Sheriff’s Office stated that Mr. Garcia-Gutierrez, a 46-year-old Mexican national, was detained on an ICE holder and held in the Butler County Jail for weapon charges, aggravated murder, and drug possession.
Butler County Sheriff Richard Jones said that Mr. Garcia-Gutierrez had previously been deported and arrested multiple times using seven different names and three different birth dates.
“Who knows how many people this guy has been involved in and has killed? Here in the United States, in our jail, he’s had two or three weapons charges, he’s had domestic violence [charges] … driving while intoxicated.
“We don’t know how many he’s killed in Mexico,” Mr. Jones said at a press conference.
Mr. Jones also blamed the Biden administration for the surge in illegal crossings at the U.S.–Mexico border.
“Our border is broken, and these individuals are the cause of it,” he said. “We’ve got to stop this border invasion, it’s killing us and its killing innocent people.”
The Hamilton Police Department is continuing its investigation into the murder case, according to Butler County Sheriff’s Office.
Border Patrol has encountered more than 7.6 million illegal immigrants trying to cross the border since President Joe Biden took office in January 2021.
Former federal officials and experts have said in the past that there is a real possibility that hundreds of people on the FBI’s terrorist watchlist have slipped into the United States among the millions of other illegal immigrants over the past three years.
Both FBI Director Christopher Wray and Border Patrol’s former chief, Rodney Scott, have been sounding the alarm about the state of U.S. borders amid an increasing number of known criminals and terror suspects being caught trying to enter the United States.
Customs and Border Protection data show that in fiscal year 2023, which ended in October 2023, Border Patrol agents apprehended 172 people on the watchlist from along the southwest border. However, when all ports of entry are added, the total number rises to 736. Some illegal immigrants were also caught with explosives.
U.S. Border Patrol Chief Jason Owens has previously called for stricter immigration policies to deter illegal immigrants from crossing the southern border with Mexico, including imposing jail time for violators.
Mr. Owens also suggested reviewing the country’s asylum laws to ensure that only migrants with legitimate claims will be allowed to seek asylum in the United States. He thinks that if people know there will be a consequence for breaking the law and entering the country illegally, they’ll be less likely to do it.
