The Latest: U.S. to continue expelling migrants into May
The Latest on the coronavirus pandemic. The new coronavirus causes mild or moderate symptoms for most people. For some, especially older adults and people with existing health problems, it can cause more severe illness or death.
TOP OF THE HOUR:
— U.S. to continue expelling migrants it encounters along border for at least another month.
— Trump says he got a “very nice call” from Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz on Monday.
— U.S. borders with Mexico and Canada closed to non-essential travel for at least another month.
___
WASHINGTON — The U.S. says it will continue to quickly expel migrants it encounters along the border for at least another month in response to the COVID-19 outbreak.
An order issued by the Department of Health and Human Services on Monday says the policy should be kept in place for another 30 days to help reduce the spread of the virus. The new order extends the policy until May 20.
U.S. officials last month launched the new policy, saying it would be dangerous for Customs and Border Protection to detain people because of the potential spread of the virus in detention facilities.
As a result, CBP has been turning away thousands of migrants, including asylum seekers.
Adults from Mexico and Central America make up most of the border crossers and they are being sent immediately back to Mexico.
Unaccompanied minors from Central America are being quickly flown back to their home countries.
CBP has said it allows people to seek asylum on a case by case basis but has not said whether any have been allowed into the country.
Critics including the American Civil Liberties Union say the policy amounts to an abandonment of longstanding international commitments to protect refugees.
___
BRATISLAVA, Slovakia — Slovakia has sent 300 thousand face masks and disinfection to Italy, a European country that has been seriously hit by the pandemic of the coronavirus.
The aid onboard of a Slovak government plane took off from Bratislava’s international airport on Monday.
Slovak Foreign Minister Ivan Korcok tweeted the aid is a symbol of European solidarity in the fight against COVID-19.
His Italian counterpart Luigi Di Maio has thanked for the aid.
Slovakia has only 1,173 positive coronavirus cases and 13 deaths.
___
BATON ROUGE, La. — A 69-year-old inmate of the Louisiana State Penitentiary in Angola is the first state prisoner to die after being diagnosed with COVID-19.
Corrections officials said the unidentified man was serving a live sentence for first-degree murder when he died Saturday.
Corrections officials said Monday he had an underlying health condition. He had been hospitalized in Baton Rouge since April 15.
___
MINNEAPOLIS — President Donald Trump said he got a “very nice call” from Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz on Monday.
Walz tried calling Trump on Friday but couldn’t get through at the time to the president or the vice president.
Walz placed that call after Trump tweeted “LIBERATE MINNESOTA!” in support of a protest outside the governor’s residence in St. Paul against Minnesota’s stay-at-home order, which is meant to slow the spread of COVID-19.
The president’s tone was different in a tweet Monday morning: “Received a very nice call from @GovTimWalz of Minnesota. We are working closely on getting him all he needs, and fast. Good things happening!”
Walz plans to discuss the call at a previously scheduled news conference.
While he has expressed frustration with the state’s difficulties with the federal government in securing personal protective equipment and testing supplies, he’s been measured in his criticism of Trump.
___
WASHINGTON — The U.S. borders with Mexico and Canada will be closed to non-essential travel for at least another month.
Acting Secretary Chad Wolf of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security announced that the three nations have agreed to extend restrictions initially imposed in March that are aimed at curbing the spread of COVID-19.
Wolf says the restrictions would be extended for 30 more days. Canada announced the agreement between Ottawa and Washington on Friday.
Commercial traffic continues over both borders.
In addition, citizens of all three nations are not being turned away if they are trying to return home. But it does mean a further ban on trips for tourism, shopping and recreation as well as any other activities deemed “non-essential.”
___
VATICAN CITY — Pope Francis has put off two major global events for the Catholic Church in the coming years, postponing its international family rally in Rome until 2022 and World Youth Day in Lisbon, Portugal until 2023.
The Vatican on Monday cited the coronavirus pandemic for the schedule changes.
Both weeklong events are usually held every three years and generally draw hundreds of thousands of Catholics from around the world. Many pilgrims who attend camp or bunk in dormitories. Those close quarters will have to be rethought in any post-pandemic period where social distancing is still the norm.
The family rally had been scheduled for June 2021, while World Youth Day was planned for August 2022.
Both events require intensive planning at the Vatican, in the host country and in dioceses around the world. Their lengthy delays suggest a realization that non only travel but all matter of church activities will be upended for the foreseeable future.
The Vatican, which has been in virus lockdown along with the rest of Italy for six weeks, has eight positive cases so far.
——
NEW YORK — New York City won’t allow public events in June, including three of the city’s major annual celebrations. It includes the National Puerto Rican Day Parade, the Celebrate Israel parade and the Pride parade on its 50th anniversary.
Mayor Bill de Blasio says the events would be canceled or at least postponed, saying Monday it was a painful but necessary step as the city continues to fight the coronavirus.
“They will be back, and we will find the right way to do it,” he said.
The Pride parade began in 1970 as a way to commemorate the Stonewall rebellion the year before, when a police raid at the Stonewall Inn bar sparked a resistance by gay men, bisexuals, lesbians and transgender people and led to the development of more extensive and militant LGBTQ activist groups than the U.S. had seen before.
The Puerto Rico and Israel parades are also touchstones in a city that has the largest Jewish population outside Israel and the biggest Puerto Rican community off the island.
___
JOHANNESBURG — South African authorities say at least 12 police officers have been arrested for violating lockdown regulations.
Police spokesman Vish Naidoo says five officers were arrested for drinking alcohol at a local tavern. The sale and distribution of alcohol is banned under South Africa’s lockdown.
In a separate incident, six police officers were arrested in the capital Pretoria for allegedly stealing the equivalent of $1,500 from passengers in a vehicle they had stopped at a roadblock. The officers had allegedly demanded a bribe from the passengers as they did not have the required permits to be on the road during the restrictions.
Naidoo said the police officers were found the with the money in their possession.
Another officer was arrested for allegedly hosting a gathering at the police barracks in Pretoria. Large gatherings have been banned under the lockdown regulations, with funerals only allowed up to 50 people.
___
MIAMI — Police said they dispersed crowds violating social distancing guidelines during David Guetta’s coronavirus relief concert in Miami.
There were no arrests made when police broke up groups on sidewalks located far below the two-hour rooftop concert played by the DJ on Saturday. Florida has prohibited gatherings of more than 10 people during the pandemic.
While some residents in downtown Miami were able to see the concert from their balconies, the relief benefit also drew in over 9 million views on Facebook and nearly 2 million views on YouTube.
The concert raised $700,000, Guetta said in a Facebook post Sunday. The money will go towards four organizations, including Feeding South Florida and the World Health Organization’s Solidarity Response Fund.
Florida’s coronavirus caseload reached 26,314 with 774 deaths as of Sunday evening.
___
RENTON, Wash. — Boeing this week is restarting production of commercial airplanes in the Seattle area. It will put about 27,000 people back to work after operations were halted because of the coronavirus pandemic.
The aerospace giant says it is taking extra precautions and instituted comprehensive procedures at all of its sites to fight the spread of COVID-19.
The new virus-slowing measures will include the use of face masks and other personal protective equipment, hand-washing sites, staggered shift times and employee wellness checks.
Employees for the 737, 747, 767 and 777 airplanes were to return as early as Monday with most returning to work by Tuesday.
Employees for the 787 program will return next Thursday and Friday.
Boeing’s shutdown went into effect March 25 after workers tested positive for the virus and a longtime inspector for the company died. Boeing operates two commercial aviation production facilities in the Seattle area, one in Everett and another in Renton.
___
BERLIN — Chancellor Angela Merkel has urged Germans not to be lulled into a false sense of security by the first steps to restart public life. She warns that a return to a full shutdown would be “inevitable” if coronavirus infections take off again.
Small shops started opening in much of Germany on Monday after a four-week shutdown. That followed a decision last week by federal and state governments, which has spawned a discussion about what other things can be opened and when.
Merkel made clear that discussion worries her and noted that it will take two weeks for the effect on infections of the first step to be seen.
She said she understands the wish of many people, business sectors and religious communities to start returning to normal, but insisted there is little “room for maneuver.”
Merkel said “it is very, very important that we are neither careless nor believe ourselves to be safe – we must remain vigilant and disciplined.”
She added that German officials and citizens agree that there should be no second full shutdown, “but that would of course be the consequence of a new exponential increase in infection figures – it would be inevitable.
“I believe very firmly that preventing a setback, in which we would have to return to tougher measures, is not just in the interest of fighting the pandemic but also in the interest of the development of our economy and social life,” she said.
___
WASHINGTON — Washington D.C. health officials say 134 positive new COVID-19 infections have been identified to bring the total up to 2,927.
There has also been an additional nine deaths, and 105 total. Mayor Muriel Bowser declared a state of emergency on March 11 and issued a stay-home order on March 30 for Washington’s approximately 700,000 residents.
This week she extended the state of emergency through late May and announced that public school buildings would remain closed through the end of the school year.
Bowser on Sunday announced plans to turn Washington D.C.’s convention center into a 1,500-bed field hospital.
___
SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico — More than 28,000 residents and 9,000 employees in Puerto Rico’s long-term care facilities will be tested for COVID-19 as part of a federal and local initiative.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office says more than 1,000 facilities will be targeted in the next three weeks to help curb coronavirus cases in the U.S. territory.
The government on Monday reported at least 63 deaths and more than 1,250 confirmed cases with 1,886 pending test results.
The island of 3.2 million people has the lowest per capita testing rate compared with any U.S. state with some 11,630 people tested.
___
WASHINGTON — The top infectious-disease expert in the United States has a message for protesters who are ignoring their governors’ stay-at-home orders and calling for him to be fired over his guidelines.
Dr. Anthony Fauci says the message is “this is something that is hurting from the standpoint of economics, from the standpoint of things that have nothing to do with the virus.”
He added on ABC’s “Good Morning America” that “unless we get the virus under control, the real recovery economically is not gonna happen. So what you do if you jump the gun and go into a situation where you have a big spike, you’re gonna set yourself back.”
Fauci says as painful as it is to follow guidelines of gradually phasing into a reopening “it’s gonna backfire. That’s the problem.”
___
Follow AP news coverage of the coronavirus pandemic at https://apnews.com/VirusOutbreak and https://apnews.com/UnderstandingtheOutbreak
