Up First from NPR - Canada's New Leader, ICE Arrest Columbia Student, Congress and The Budget

Episode Date: March 10, 2025

Canada's ruling Liberal Party has a new leader, Mark Carney, a former central banker who now faces the challenge of steering the country through economic turmoil and a tense trade relationship with the United States. Mahmoud Khalil, a Columbia University graduate student and pro-Palestinian activist, has been arrested by ICE agents. And, House Republicans unveil a stopgap funding bill to keep the government running through September, but with Democrats opposing it, passing the bill will require almost every GOP vote.Want more comprehensive analysis of the most important news of the day, plus a little fun? Subscribe to the Up First newsletter.Today's episode of Up First was edited by Tara Neill, Kevin Drew, Krishnadev Calamur, Alice Woelfle and Mohamad ElBardicy.It was produced by Ziad Buchh, Nia Dumas and Chris Thomas.We get engineering support from Arthur Laurent, and our technical director is David Greenberg.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

Canada's new Prime Minister says he's ready for conflict with its neighbor and up to now closest ally. We didn't ask for this fight. The Canadians are always ready when someone else drops the gloves. What does Mark Carney plan to do? I'm Steve Inskeep with A Martinez and this is Up First from NPR News. Immigration authorities arrested a Columbia graduate student who led protests over Gaza. His lawyer says agents gave no reason. I demanded to see a warrant and the agent hung up the phone on me. What due process, if any, does the government owe a legal permanent resident?

Also, Congress has just days to avoid our government shutdown. House Speaker Mike Johnson wants to do it without negotiating with Democrats. What would it take for almost every Republican to agree? Stay with us, we've got all the news you need to start your day. Hi, it's Terry Gross, host of Fresh Air. I just talked to comic Bill Burr. He's known for his anger-fueled humor, which he connects to as upbringing. Let's talk a little bit about your childhood. Oh, Jesus. People are driving to work here. Let's try to give them some uplifting.

He was hilarious and introspective in the interview, and it was a wild ride. You can hear a special extended version of this interview on the Fresh Air podcast from NPR and WHYY. This month, Shortwave is featuring a science and dog collab for the ages. Because sometimes, scientists need help and have to call in dogs to get the research done. Their powerful noses have earned some of them a job as conservation detection dogs, helping biologists sniff out things that are hidden or hard to find, like whale poop in the ocean. Here are the surprising ways dogs are pushing conservation work forward on ShoreWave, a science podcast from NPR.

This message comes from the Kresge Foundation. Established 100 years ago, the Kresge Foundation works to expand equity and opportunity in cities across America. A century of impact, a future of opportunity more at Kresge org People gathered in an arena in Canada's capital and heard the results of a vote for the leader of the governing party in first place the next Prime Minister of Canada Mark Carney won a kind of mini-election among Liberal Party members, and his landslide win means he will now replace Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who's leaving office just as Canada faces a confrontation with the United States.

NPR's international affairs correspondent Jackie Northam has been following the story. So a new chapter in Canadian politics. What can you tell us about Mark Carney? Well up until a few months ago not a lot of Canadians knew who Mark Carney was. He was considered a political outsider. It was only after Justin Trudeau announced that he was stepping aside in January that Carney threw his hat into the ring for the Liberal Party's leadership race. You know but Carney who's 59 years old does have a reputation internationally. He comes from the world of finance

and has spent time on Wall Street and was a head of the Bank of England where he helped navigate the post-Brexit turbulence. And he also headed up the Bank of Canada. So A, that experience could be critical as he becomes prime minister, both to tackle Canada's economic challenges right now, but certainly to deal

with President Trump's trade policies towards Canada, which frankly are seen by many in Canada as economic warfare. Yeah, relations between the two have grown contentious since Donald Trump's attorney office. So is there any sense of how Carney will approach President Trump and his policies? Well, I suspect it'll be a much different dynamic between Carney and Trump than it was with the president and Prime Minister Trudeau. They didn't get along and in fact over the past few weeks relations between the two men were really fraying. You know Trump calling Trudeau governor and Trudeau calling the

president Donald and quoting an editorial saying the tariffs were a very dumb idea. So Carney could represent a fresh start, but he has warned that he would be very tough on Trump, which is something he indicated in his acceptance speech on Sunday. We didn't ask for this fight, but Canadians are always ready when someone else drops the gloves. So the Americans, they should make no mistake in trade as in hockey, Canada will win. And A, if President Trump goes ahead with these steep tariffs on Canadian products and that's expected in April it could drive Canada's economy into a recession. And here's the thing I mean Carney might not even be Prime Minister that long

I mean there are general elections coming up this year so when are those? Well they need to be held by the end of October. You know, the Liberals have bounced back in a big way in the polls, thanks largely to Trump, and his treatment of Canada has created this wave of enthusiasm, you know, both for the Liberal Party, you know, and just sort of nationalism,

and Kanye could grab on to that enthusiasm and call an election soon. The opposition could also launch a non-confidence vote when Parliament resumes later this month. That too could trigger an early election, but you know as it stands right now, once Carney is sworn in as Canada's new Prime Minister, and that could happen later this week, he'll lead the country. All right, that's NPR's International Affairs correspondent, Jackie Northam. Jackie, thanks.

Thanks very much. Immigration agents have arrested an activist who helped lead pro-Palestinian student protests at Columbia University. His name is Mahmoud Khalil. His lawyer tells NPR that officers from ICE, that's Immigration and Customs Enforcement, picked him up at his university apartment. They told him his green

card had been revoked. Green card. He was a legal permanent resident. President Trump had promised to deport students who protested against Israel during the war in Gaza. NPR's Adrian Florido is here with us now. So tell us who Mahmoud Khalil is and what happened to him. Well, Khalil A was one of the Palestinian students who last year negotiated on behalf of the campus protesters who were pressing Columbia to divest from Israel over the Gaza war.

He was outspoken, very involved. He recently graduated. I spoke with his lawyer and she told me that on Saturday night, Khalil and his wife were arriving at their university apartment and that ICE agents were in the lobby. They told Khalil his student visa had been cancelled but Khalil is not on a visa. He is a legal permanent resident. When his wife went to get his green card out of the apartment, agents said that it had been revoked. Revoked. Did they give a reason? Well his lawyer Amy Greer says she spoke with one

of the agents on the phone during the arrest and he didn't give her a reason. And I demanded to see a warrant or have a warrant shown to me or Mr. Khalil before they removed him and the agent hung up the phone on me. Greer said that she was shocked the government had declared his green card revoked without due process. Mr. Khalil was under the government had declared his green card revoked without due process. Mr. Khalil was under the impression that as a lawful permanent resident that he had some modicum of protection that may not exist for people, you know, who do have student visas or who are undocumented. Instead, agents drove Khalil to a detention center, she said, while his pregnant wife, a U.S. citizen, stayed behind. Okay. Now, what are you learning about what's behind all this, possibly? Well, I got a statement last night from DHS spokeswoman Tricia McLaughlin. She said Khalil

had been arrested in support of a recent executive order that President Trump signed on anti-Semitism. She said Khalil had, quote, led activities aligned to Hamas, a designated terrorist organization. led activities aligned to Hamas, a designated terrorist organization. Separately in a post on X, Secretary of State Marco Rubio linked to a news story about Khalil's arrest and wrote that the administration would be revoking the visas or green cards of Hamas supporters so they can be deported. Can you give us just maybe a little more context about the government's motives here? Well, conservative lawmakers have really tried to label pro-Palestinian protesters as pro-Hamas, pro-terrorist, or anti-Semitic. In late January, President Trump signed an executive order that he said would be used to go after students who participated in, in his words, the pro-Jihadist

protests. It directed federal agencies to work toward deporting international students who participated. The order cited federal law that allows deporting foreign nationals who express support for terrorism. Students have always rejected A, the claim that their protests were pro-terrorists or that they supported Hamas' 2023 attack on Israel. They say the protests were for peace in Gaza.

How are people responding to this arrest? Well, student activists are denouncing it as a chilling attempt to use deportation to stifle free speech and to repress pro-Palestinian activism and criticism of Israel. Khalil's attorney, Amy Greer, told me that she's angry the government was attempting to tar Khalil as anything other than the kind and loving person that he is. She has a legal team that is trying to find out where he's being held and that plans to defend him and to ensure that he gets due process. All right.

That's NPR's Adrian Florida. Thanks a lot. Thank you, A. Over the weekend, House Speaker Mike Johnson unveiled a plan to keep the federal government running through September. They're doing what lawmakers have done again and again and again and again in recent years. Instead of passing the annual 12 spending bills in what's called regular order with a lot of choices and compromises, Republicans want to largely keep the government running

on autopilot under last year's budget numbers for a while while they discuss all this. Congress needs to approve something by Friday or face another government shutdown. MPR political correspondent, Susan Davis is here now. So Republicans control Congress and the White House. So Sue, why couldn't they come up with a plan to pass the annual spending bills instead of this stop gap? You know, for Republicans, that would have been like choosing the path

of most resistance. Passing all 12 of those bills usually requires an incredible amount of party unity and would also have likely required bipartisan negotiations with Democrats. Republicans aren't all that interested in that path right now. They really don't want to burn all of this political capital on spending bills because the party is way more focused on passing a separate budget bill to extend President Trump's tax cuts. That is the priority focus for the Republican Party over the next several months because they expire at the end of the year. But even the stopgap path is going to test party unity.

Speaker Johnson has never been able to pass these spending bills or stopgaps without some Democratic support. And it's unclear if he's going to be able to do it this week either. Yeah, Democrats were purposefully cut from this process. Are they going to support it? Well, the top House Democratic leaders over the weekend came out and said they're going to oppose it. This is unlike past deals where minority leader Hakeem Jeffries has helped deliver the votes to avoid these shutdowns. If House Democrats remain unified against it, the speaker is essentially going to need unanimous support from within his own party and that's going to be tough. That sounds like a place where the president could step in though.

Yeah, I mean President Trump is certainly trying to keep pressure on the Republican rank-and-file in a social media post over the weekend. He was asking for, quote, no dissent on this. And there's a sign he might get it. One of those traditional hardline conservatives who likes to vote against these types of spending bills. That's Texas Congressman Chip Roy. He's also a member of the Freedom Caucus. He's indicated that he will support it, which is a good sign for the speaker.

So considering all this, Sue, I mean, how likely is a shutdown on Friday? You know, I think it's gonna be pretty clear early in the week. The House is expected to vote on Tuesday, and if they can't pass a bill, the shutdown becomes exponentially more likely by Friday. If they can pass that hurdle, a handful of Democrats are still gonna be necessary to get it through the Senate. At least one of those Democrats, Pennsylvania's John Fetterman, has indicated he'll be on board. It's unclear if others will be. And Trump is already trying to put the blame on Democrats if there is a

shutdown. But I think that's going to be a bit of a hard sell when it's his party that controls all the levers here and have also made clear that Democrats didn't have a seat at the table. For Democrats, though, what might they want in this deal? I mean, Democrats are trying to get language into any deal that is going to make it harder for the Trump administration to cut off funding for things that Congress has already appropriated money for, obviously in response to things like cutting off funding for USAID. They wanted to tie the hands of this ongoing Doge effort, and that was obviously going to be a non-starter for this White House. I also think it tells you, A, that as long as Republicans are in control of Congress,

they're not going to be putting up much of a fight over the Trump administration's push to play a bigger role here in deciding what money gets spent and what gets cut, which as Steve noted at the top, this is a power that traditionally is supposed to be decided by Congress, and they're willing to cede much of that power in this moment more to the White House and President Trump. All right. That's NPR political correspondent, Susan Davis. Susan, thank you.

You're welcome. And that's at first for Monday, March 10th of A Martinez. And I'm Steve Inskeep. Thanks for joining us for Up First. You can find more in-depth coverage of the stories we discussed and more on NPR's Morning Edition, the radio show that A Martinez co-hosts with Michelle Martin, Leila Fadl, and myself, me. Find Morning Edition on your local NPR station at stations.npr.org.

Today's episode of Up First was edited by Tara Neal, Kevin Drew, Krishnadeb Kalamur, Alice Wolfley, and Mohammed El-Bardisi. It was produced by Ziad Bach, Nia Dumas, and Christopher Thomas. We get engineering support from Arthur Laurent, and our technical director is David Greenberg. Join us again tomorrow. Support for NPR and the following message come from the Lemelson Foundation, working to harness the power of invention and innovation to accelerate climate action and improve lives around the world. Learn more at lemelson.org.