TV News LIES

The US is tracking nearly 54,000 immigrants through GPS-enabled ankle monitors as part of a US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) electronic surveillance program, according to private prison corporation The Geo Group. Early last year, just 17,000 immigrants were wearing the devices..

The Geo Group owns BI Inc, the company that runs ICE’s intensive supervision appearance program (ISAP), and reported the numbers in its earnings call on Thursday.

The overall number of immigrants enrolled in the surveillance program remained flat at about 184,000. Geo Group executives said that a large number of participants were shifted from less intensive forms of surveillance, such as phone check-ins, to ankle monitors.

The shift to ankle monitors, which the company pitches as a “high-security level of monitoring”, has increased revenues for Geo Group . Ankle monitors cost ICE more than most of the other surveillance technologies administered by BI Inc. The company charges ICE a little more than $2 a day per monitor, while the SmartLink app – a facial recognition and location tracking smart phone app – costs about $0.96 for each immigrant enrolled, according to publicly available ICE statistics. At last count, more than 127,000 immigrants are required to check in using SmartLink.

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New Mexico filed a lawsuit against the US Department of Justice and the acting attorney general, Todd Blanche, on Wednesday for “stonewalling” its criminal investigation into the activities of the late financier and sex offender Jeffrey Epstein at a remote ranch in the state.

Raúl Torrez, the New Mexico attorney general, had said he was mulling the possibility of legal action if the justice department did not share with him by 31 July information about the alleged historical abuse of girls and young women at Epstein’s Zorro ranch about 30 miles south of Santa Fe.https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/aug/05/new-mexico-sues-doj-epstein-investigation

Wednesday’s filing, seen by the Guardian, delivers on that threat after the justice department appeared to ignore last Friday’s deadline.

The lawsuit, filed in the US district court for the district of Columbia, alleges that Blanche and his department had “stonewalled” the state investigation Torrez reopened in February after the 10,000-acre Zorro property was mentioned thousands of times in recent releases of the so-called Epstein files.

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Dozens of young children, including one who wore a pink shirt and spoke in a sing-song voice, appeared virtually in a Downtown Manhattan immigration court on Wednesday morning. Most lacked attorneys and were facing government lawyers alone as their ability to remain in the United States hung in the balance.

Immigration Judge Lisa Ling admonished one girl for failing to provide a completed asylum application, which the judge said was the third time that important task had been left undone. Without a completed asylum appliImmigration Judge Lisa Ling admonished one girl for failing to provide a completed asylum application, which the judge said was the third time that important task had been left undone. Without a completed asylum application or another form of immigration relief, Ling explained, she could order the child to be deported.

"> The day before yesterday I was going to get in touch with an attorney, but they didn’t call me,” the girl said in Spanish through an interpreter.

Ling replied, “I understand it’s difficult. But with or without an attorney, you need to fill out that application in English.”

The Trump administration allowed a $200 million federal contract providing lawyers for over 24,000 unaccompanied minors across the country to expire on Friday. On Tuesday, the officials announced that a new $150 million contract had been reached — but it won’t start until Aug. 15, leaving untold numbers of children across the country to potentially fend for themselves before immigration judges — as was the case during the virtual proceedings in Manhattan.

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Abdul El-Sayed, the Democratic party upstart who just won a contentious primary in Michigan, says that if not for an "accident of history," he would have become a cab driver in Egypt like others in his family.

Instead, the 41-year-old Michigander is a Senate nominee after winning an Aug. 4 primary race against U.S. Rep Haley Stevens, an establishment Democrat pick who was backed by tens of millions of dollars from pro-Israel lobbyists. The race was closely watched around the nation as it is seen as a bellwether for where the Democratic Party is headed.

El-Sayed, a former public health official turned politician, offered up a vision of that direction in an Aug. 5 victory speech, where he reflected on the luck of his upbringing in suburban Detroit and what it means for his goals.

"But for an accident of history that allows my dad to immigrate to Detroit to go to Wayne State University, I would have been a cab driver in Egypt like my cousins," El-Sayed said in Detroit shortly after the primary race was called in his favor. "Except for I got to be born in America."

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Stephanie Grisham, the White House communications director during President Trump’s first term, filed a restraining order against Rep. Max Miller (R-Ohio) on Monday, amid allegations that Miller abused his ex-wife.

Grisham’s counsel, Mark S. Zaid, announced on social platform X that they filed for a temporary restraining order against Miller as part of an ongoing lawsuit.

The case began with an op-ed Grisham wrote in 2021 in the Washington Post that described an abusive relationship with an unnamed man. Miller filed a defamation suit against her shortly after the article was published, but the case was eventually dropped as both parties signed a nondisclosure agreement to not publicly disparage one another.

Grisham filed her new lawsuit after Miller said in a June interview with Spectrum News that any allegations should be taken seriously and it “should be noted” that an allegation against him “came out on the same day as somebody’s book launch and the other part.”

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A US federal judge this week ruled in favour of a prominent Palestinian-American academic and activist in a decision that deemed the search and seizure of his phones by customs officers to be illegal.

Osama Abu Irshaid, the executive director of American Muslims for Palestine (AMP), had his phones taken from him and searched at Washington Dulles International Airport on two occasions in 2024, upon his return from trips to the Middle East. 

On Wednesday, the US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia determined that Abu Irshaid was indeed entitled to his Fourth Amendment claim, because "the evidence marshaled by Defendants... does not rise to the level of reasonable suspicion" of ongoing criminal activity, the decision read. 

The Fourth Amendment to the US Constitution prohibits unreasonable searches and seizures and requires that warrants be issued by a judge based on probable cause.

"Not only is this a victory for Dr Abu Irshaid, but a victory for the pro-Palestine movement overall. For decades, allies who support Palestinian human rights have been systematically targeted by the US government for daring to speak out against Apartheid Israel," AMP said in a statement following the ruling.

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