Trump news: President hints he will shut down asylum process during California border visit

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Donald Trump taunts Biden amid sexual misconduct accusations as two more women come forward to accuse the democrat

Donald Trump has attacked the late former first lady Barbara Bush in a newspaper interview a day after posting a satirical alt-right meme of ex-vice-president Joe Biden on Twitter.

“I see that you are on the job and presidential, as always,” Mr Biden responded to the tweet, which sits pinned to the top of the president’s Twitter profile. The video in question sends up Mr Biden’s apology after he was accused of inappropriate conduct towards women while on the campaign trail, and was circulated by Donald Trump Jr earlier on Thursday.

Mr Trump then made a stop in Calexico, California, to inspect construction work on his US-Mexico wall after rowing back on his threat to close the border, the trip providing a timely change of focus for the president after thousands of protesters campaigned outside the White House and in New York’s Times Square to demand the release of the Mueller report in full.

While in southern California, Mr Trump heard from officials who praised his leadership and promised to build some 400 miles of border wall in the next year and a half.

Mr Trump, during a round table with Border Patrol officials, said that the US has no more room for immigrants — and thanked Mexican officials for what he described as new efforts to stop migrants from making it to the US-Mexico border.

The White House, prior to Mr Trump's visit to the border, hailed the 2-miles of fencing there as the first completed section of the president's border wall.

But, Mr Trump cannot take full credit for the construction: Border barriers have existed there for decades, and plans for the recent renovations first began to develop during the presidency of Barack Obama.

Follow along below for our coverage as it happened

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Key Points

• President lays into Washington Post day after New York Times attack
• Trump en route to California to visit border wall construction site
• Joe Biden hits back after Trump posts alt-right meme spoofing apology
• Trump mocks late first lady Barbara Bush: 'Look what I did to her sons'
• Protesters in cities across US demand release of Mueller report

[5 April 2019 13:40 · Joe Sommerlad]

House speaker Nancy Pelosi agrees with veteran Iowa Republican Chuck Grassley and hip-hop maverick Ice-T about Trump's view that wind energy causes terminal illness: "It's an idiotic statement". 

[5 April 2019 13:55 · Joe Sommerlad]

Here's the real political story of the day.

[5 April 2019 14:07 · Joe Sommerlad]

After bashing The New York Times yesterday, Trump is now going after The Washington Post.

He's otherwise just repeating his new orthodoxy on the Mexico border: automobile tariffs until the government does more to combat illegal immigration. If that doesn't work, the border will be shut down at huge cost to both sides.

And with that, he was gone. Almost.

Here's Clark Mindock on Trump's latest tweets.

[5 April 2019 14:20 · Joe Sommerlad]

Here's more on Federal Reserve board nominee Herman Cain from Tom Embury-Dennis.

[5 April 2019 14:30 · Joe Sommerlad]

If you're wondering how low this administration can go, here's a reminder.

Tricia Newbold - the White House security expert turned whistleblower, who raised the alarm about Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner's disputed security clearances - spoke to NBC this week about the humiliation she was subjected to in the White House Personnel Security Office.

Newbold, who has a rare form of dwarfism, says a supervisor "moved files to a shelf beyond her reach" after she complained about the decision to grant security clearances over the objections of senior staffers.

"It was definitely humiliating," said Newbold, "But it didn’t stop me from doing what was right."

Wow.

The House Oversight Committee's chairman Elijah Cummings has subpoenaed her boss, Carl Kline, to appear before Congress.

[5 April 2019 14:45 · Joe Sommerlad]

Some good news for Trump to take credit for as he heads out to the border.

The US economy created 196,000 new jobs in March, up from just 33,000 in February.

The president still faces a number of economic challenges, however, not least the negative impact of his trade war with China on many American firms.

Here's our business correspondent, Ben Chapman.

[5 April 2019 14:50 · Joe Sommerlad]

If you were wondering whether Trump is anxious about trading relations with China, here's a clip of him saying the word "deal" 14 times in 70 seconds yesterday.

[5 April 2019 15:00 · Joe Sommerlad]

Right-wing "news" site The Daily Caller badly needs to up its meme game because this is wretched in so many ways.

They were co-founded by Tucker Carlson and Roger Stone was once a fashion columnist, which should tell you all you need to know.

[5 April 2019 15:15 · Joe Sommerlad]

Some timely context on the section of wall President Trump is visiting in Calexico today. He's taking credit for a security initiative that long predates his administration.

[5 April 2019 15:25 · Joe Sommerlad]

More evidence here of the Trump administration stepping up its efforts on the Mexico border. 

The president has withdrawn the nomination of Ronald Vitiello to be the new director of US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), saying he wants to move in a "tougher" direction.

Vitiello is a former border agent who has been serving as acting director of ICE since late June 2018.