WSJ What’s News - Ukrainian Troops Continue Push Into Russian Territory

Episode Date: August 12, 2024

A.M. Edition for Aug. 12. Ukrainian forces have quickly captured territory in Russia’s Kursk province, even as they remain outgunned and outnumbered in most places. Plus, the Trump campaign blames Iran for an alleged hack of its internal communications. And WSJ immigration reporter Michelle Hackman explains how the U.S. and Mexico drove down illegal border crossings in an election year, even if recent progress may be hard to maintain. Luke Vargas hosts. Sign up for the WSJ’s free What’s News newsletter. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Benefits vary by card, other conditions apply. As Ukraine presses an offensive into Russian territory, we'll look at the message it could be trying to send to its Western backers. Plus, the Trump campaign blames Iran for an alleged hack on internal communications and how the U.S. and Mexico managed to drive down border crossings in an election year. The key here is Mexico.

Migrants try to make their way up Mexico. And if anyone is caught traveling through Mexico illegally, they are put on a government bus and bused back down to the bottom of Mexico. And this has been happening over and over where migrants are sort of being taken in circles. It's Monday, August 12th. I'm Luke Vargas for The Wall Street Journal. And here is the AM edition of What's News, the top headlines and business stories moving your world today. world today. Almost a week after staging a surprise invasion of Russia's Kursk province, Ukrainian troops continue to occupy Russian territory up to 20 miles beyond their shared border.

An embarrassing development for Russian President Vladimir Putin, and one that is boosting Ukrainian morale after a year of waging bloody defensive battles. I spoke to our James Marson to get the latest. So Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky spoke about the operation for the first time on Saturday. He didn't go into details, but he said the aim is to push the war onto the aggressor's territory. And this is something that has been very important for Ukraine. Ukraine needs to show to its own people that it's able to change the narrative.

And this is one reason analysts say for this assault. It has tactical military gains. It allows them to destroy some Russian units, to cut supply lines to other areas for the Russians. But also, it sends a message to the West, we're not done yet, we're still in this fight. And especially ahead of the US elections in November, that's important for Ukraine. All right. So a few tactical gains there, James, in addition to messaging power for Kiev. But this alone won't change the more pessimistic narrative that's taken root for Ukraine in the East, will it? That's right. At this stage, it doesn't really have an impact on the eastern battlefield.

It could do, depending on what further successes the Ukrainians have up in the Kursk province of Russia. If they're able to have more successes, Russia may be forced to divert reserves up there and away from the battlefield in the east of Ukraine. But for the moment, it doesn't really alter the fundamentals of the battlefield across the front lines in Ukraine, which is that Russia has more men, more military equipment, and is able to put enormous pressure on the Ukrainians and press forward. Back in Washington, White House aides say Ukraine's offensive hasn't substantially

raised fears of escalation, and they're expecting that fighting in Russia will resemble battles fought in Ukraine. However, some officials worry that killing Russian forces on their turf could lead Putin to authorize retribution that could include a missile barrage targeting Ukrainian cities and infrastructure. Donald Trump's presidential campaign says that some of its internal communications have been hacked and is suggesting that Iran was responsible. While the Trump campaign didn't provide direct evidence of Iran's responsibility

for the hack, it tied it to new cyber threat research by Microsoft that laid out a range of election interference operations that it said were linked to Iranian cyber groups and which observed an increase in Iranian activity in recent months. Microsoft declined to comment about the apparent Trump campaign hack. A spokesman for the Iranian mission to the United Nations didn't immediately respond to a request for comment. The Federal Bureau of Investigation, meanwhile, has only confirmed it is aware of public reports, but has declined to comment further, and the Biden administration still hasn't made a formal

determination of responsibility. However, journal Middle East correspondent Benoit Faucon said that Trump's actions while in office would give Tehran some potential rationales to fear his reelection. Benoit Faucon, Journalist, Middle East Correspondent, New York Times, New York Times Journalist, New York Times, New York Times rationales to fear his re-election. Trump's positions against the hardliners, against the Revolutionary Guards is pretty uncompromising to the point where he ordered the killing by strike of Qassem Soleimani, the head of the external operations of the Guards, the Quds Force. So we know he's got no limits in ways where typically Democrat administrations were more

restrained. So you can understand why the guards who handle the cyber operations don't want him to be elected. Back on the campaign trail, Kamala Harris has borrowed a policy idea advanced by Trump in a bid to seize on a surge in popularity for her campaign. During a rally Saturday in Las Vegas, the vice president called for an end to taxes on tips as she prepares to roll out parts of her broader platform this week. Nevada is seen as a key battleground in this year's election and is home to a high number

of service industry workers who rely heavily on tips. However, any changes to the way they're taxed would have to be approved by Congress. And a day after trying to blunt Trump's populist economic appeal, Harris yesterday leaned on elite donors to boost her election war chest, pulling in more than $13 million at a fundraiser in her hometown of San Francisco, according to her campaign. Attendees included LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman and former Walt Disney Studios chairman Jeffrey Katzenberg. Harris's campaign raised $310 million in July compared to the Trump campaign, which

said that it and affiliated committees pulled in around $139 million last month. Coming up, we'll look at how the U.S. and Mexico managed to drive down illegal migration to the lowest monthly level since 2020. And we'll look at what could move markets in the week ahead. We've got those stories and more after the break. Disney has unveiled long-awaited details of its planned major theme park expansions while promising four new cruise ships. The details, which include a Monsters Inc. themed land at Disney's Hollywood Studios,

come almost a year after Disney announced plans to spend $60 billion over the next decade on its resorts and cruise lines. The entertainment giant is under pressure to offer fans new and exciting attractions to justify recent increases in ticket prices and other rising costs. Disney's announcement also comes at a difficult time for the broader travel industry, with executives from the likes of Expedia, Marriott, Airbnb, and Hilton all pointing to a slowdown in domestic leisure demand from U.S. consumers on recent earnings calls.

While travelers say they aren't scrapping trips altogether, they are giving priority to overall value and becoming more discerning with their bookings. And consumer spending trends, along with new inflation readings, are set to be in focus this week after a wild few days in markets last week. Here was Journal Markets editor Katie Barnotto. We have the consumer price index for July. We've also got the producer price index. And then we've also got retail sales that give us more of an indication on how consumer spending is bearing up. One of the concerns of investors is about consumers tiring, particularly in relation

to high inflation. A further steer may come as well from earnings we have this week. In particular, we've got Walmart and Home Depot. They are both viewed as quite good steers on the health of the consumer. Walmart previously has benefited as a discount retailer from consumers' fatigue with high costs. It's interesting to see how Walmart will bear up this time around, whether or not it's immune from those trends.

Home Depot can be viewed as a good read on home improvement spending, how that's bearing up. Reducing illegal migration into the U.S. has been one of the most vexing challenges for the Biden administration in recent years. Journal reporter Michelle Hackman writes that at one point last fall, the largest migrant shelter in Phoenix, Arizona was so full that cots filled its cafeteria and lined its hallways. But now that same shelter is empty with new data showing a steep drop in illegal border crossings.

But can it last? And Michelle joins me now to answer that and other questions. Michelle, before we look at what led to this latest drop in illegal migration, what are the numbers we've been seeing lately? Listeners might remember that last fall, and particularly last December, we hit an all-time high in illegal migration. There were approximately 250,000 arrests made at the US-Mexico border. And now in July, the Border Patrol made just about 57,000 arrests. So if you can imagine, almost an 80% drop. Nat. Kind of a historically high number still? Or are we getting back into kind of the normal,

you know, numbers that we'd seen over the last decade or so? That's a good question. And it's hard to characterize. It's sort of on par with some of the higher numbers we've seen over the last decade. Certainly it's been lower than 57,000 in the last decade. But for example, under the Trump administration, there were months where crossings went up to 140,000.

So 57,000 in retrospect, especially now that migration for the purpose of asking for asylum has become more of a phenomenon over the last decade. 57,000 is relatively low, actually. So I guess the question then that everyone will be asking is how did this come about? Yeah, it's a really good question because the Biden administration has been trying a bunch of tactics over the last few years that I would say center around blocking migrants from asking for asylum. And so why is the dynamic now working where Biden issued a new policy that bans migrants from asking for asylum? And that suddenly worked. And the key here is Mexico. The US asked Mexico to intervene last December when crossings were really high. And because Mexico itself was getting so hard hit by this migration, they agreed to step up enforcement.

And they started this strategy that advocates are calling shoots and ladders. Basically migrants try to make their way up Mexico and they are interdicted by Mexican police. There are checkpoints all over the place and if anyone is caught traveling through Mexico illegally, they are put on a government bus and bused back down to the bottom of Mexico. And this has been happening over and over where migrants are sort of being taken in circles. Michelle, Mexico got a new president in early June. Could that have anything to do with the timing of these illegal crossings going down? So the cooperation, I would say really stepped up in January, we saw crossings starting to plummet in January. But I think you're right to raise the election because I think both Mexico and the US were really concerned about migration becoming major factors in their respective elections.

immigration becoming major factors in their respective elections. That was a big motivator for Mexico. And frankly, Mexico has an interest in keeping the issue of migration out of the US election also to make sure that Mexico sort of doesn't become a factor in our domestic politics. A punching bag, if you will. Yes, exactly. Given the fact that this is a big reversal of the trend we've seen in recent years, I have to ask what the likelihood is that this continues the stakes for that answer to in an election year in which immigration is a top issue really couldn't be higher. Any policy doesn't work forever. And I think there are

a few challenges that loom. One is this current US policy of banning asylum is being challenged in court. There's a very good chance it could get struck down by a judge. Mexico could decide at any point that they're spending too much money and they might need to peel back a little bit. And listeners might remember that there was an election recently in Venezuela and there's a lot of fear that we've already had a wave of migration from Venezuela, that there might be an even larger exodus. And Venezuela is a particularly tough challenge for the U.S. and for Mexico because the Venezuelan government doesn't accept back deportations of their own citizens from either country. So even if someone asks for asylum, doesn't win asylum, they still can't be deported.

Reporter Michelle Hackman covers immigration for The Wall Street Journal out of Washington, D.C. Michelle, thank you so much, as always, for the update. Thank you. Journal out of Washington, D.C. Michelle, thank you so much, as always, for the update. Thank you. And that's it for What's News for Monday morning. Today's show was produced by Hattie Moyer and Kate Bullivant. Our supervising producer was Daniel Bach. And I'm Luke Vargas for The Wall Street Journal. We will be back tonight with a new show. Until then, thanks for listening.