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--:-- Georgia Howe: Nearly a quarter of a million migrants attempted to cross the southern border last month, a new all-time record, and many of those migrants are coming from countries one might not expect. According to internal documents, the Biden administration is planning to bus many migrants into the country's interior. I'm Daily Wire editor-in-chief John Bickley with Georgia Howe. It's Monday, June 20th, and this is Morning Wire.
--:-- John Bickley: Backlash against progressive prosecutors builds. The movement to recall LA's controversial DA, George Gascon, has gained more momentum after two police officers were killed by a suspect who many say should have been behind bars for previous offenses. And in a bid to retain subscribers, Netflix announces a reality Squid Game series, as well as a business model shift toward creating bigger, better, and fewer projects. But will the changes be enough to revive the streaming giant's struggling numbers? Thanks for waking up with Morning Wire. Stay tuned. We have the news you need to know.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Grilling season is officially upon us. And if you're looking for the perfect cuts this year, you should check out Good Ranchers. Good Ranchers is the place to get American beef, chicken, and seafood this summer. Good Ranchers is giving away two free ribeyes, a $100 value, to Morning Wire listeners for a limited time only. That's right. Go to GoodRanchers.com slash wire to get two 18-ounce prime center-cut ribeyes free with your order.
--:-- John Bickley: Amid a year-long surge in illegal immigration, new data from Customs and Border Protection shows that last month, nearly a quarter million migrants attempted to cross the southern border, breaking the all-time record set just a month earlier in April. Here with more on the ongoing crisis and how the Biden administration is responding is Daily Wire senior editor Cabot Phillips.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Well, that's because we have. Each month since January, there's been a sizable spike in the number of illegal immigrant encounters at the border. And last month, that number hit 239,000, breaking the all-time one-month record of 235,000 set the month before. For context, during the same month in 2020, we saw 23,000 encounters. So there's been a thousand percent increase in just two years.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Now, at this point, a lot of people are kind of desensitized to stories about record numbers of migrants because the records are now being broken so often. But one thing that really made last month different is where these migrants were coming from.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Yeah, that part really jumped out. So traditionally, the vast majority of illegal immigrants coming to the U.S. are coming from Central American countries like Mexico, El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras. But it's interesting. Last month, the largest spike actually came from Asian and Middle Eastern countries. For example, in just one month, there was a 102% increase in the number of illegal immigrants from Russia, a 55% increase from India, and a 51% increase from Turkey.
--:-- Georgia Howe: And even though the numbers from those countries still are not as high as what we're seeing from Central America, it's noteworthy that we're seeing such a rapid spike from countries that you don't typically associate with illegal immigration into the U.S.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: So the obvious question here is what's driving the surge from those places. Yeah, the clear answer there seems to be Title 42. The Trump policy that allows border agents to immediately deport legal immigrants back to their home countries. But that policy doesn't always work because some countries are hesitant or unwilling to accept those migrants back, and it leaves them in a sort of limbo. And because of that, Border Patrol often won't deport people coming from those countries.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Well, as word of that reality has spread, more and more migrants from those countries, specifically in Russia and across the Middle East, are taking advantage. Immigration officials say migrants from those countries will often fly to Mexico where a visa is not required, and then they'll cross the border from there knowing that even if they are detained, it's unlikely they'll be sent back to their home country.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: What's happening to those migrants when they're coming over? Well, it's worth noting that 239,000 number, that just refers to the migrants who've been encountered. There's no real way of knowing just how many slipped through undetected. That's an important note. And as for those who are detained, roughly 100,000 were caught and then released into the country in May alone.
--:-- Georgia Howe: 100,000. According to a new report from the New York Post, the Biden administration is now developing a plan to bus migrants away from border communities that have really been flooded to cities and towns in the country's interior. NBC reported on an internal DHS plan, for example, to load migrants from the border in Texas onto buses and then send them to cities like Houston, Dallas, Los Angeles, and Miami.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: So far, over a million illegal immigrants have been released by border agents into the United States just since Joe Biden took office. One million. Yeah, that's more than the entire population of Delaware, the president's home.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Now, many Republicans say it's no coincidence that this sort of spike happened. And they say President Biden's immigration policies have, in their view, incentivized migrants to come here illegally. But regardless, the problem is undoubtedly getting worse. And unfortunately, it doesn't appear to show signs of stopping. No, it does not, especially with Title 42 potentially being rescinded soon.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Thanks for reporting. Anytime.
--:-- Georgia Howe: That was Daily Wire senior editor Cabot Phillips. Coming up, the recall pressure turns up on L.A.'s controversial prosecutor after two police officers are killed. You can get this show and all of the content you love wherever you are, all on the Daily Wire app. Even if you're not a Daily Wire member, you'll be the first to know what's trending with mobile notifications for the latest news, and you'll get content from all of your favorite Daily Wire shows. Download the Daily Wire app and keep up with the facts no matter where your day takes you.
--:-- John Bickley: Los Angeles District Attorney George Gascon may be in hot water over his failure to control rising violent crime in the city. L.A. voters are attempting to recall Gascon, and now the issue may appear on the ballot. Daily Wire investigative reporter Maraid Alordi is here with more details for us.
--:-- Maraid Alordi: So, last week, the activist group campaigning for Gascon's recall claimed it had collected enough signatures to get the recall on the ballot. The group said it has gotten more than 566,857 signatures, which equals about 10% of L.A. County's registered voters and is the threshold to initiate a recall. Those signatures still need to be audited so it's not confirmed yet, but it looks like a recall could be likely.
--:-- Georgia Howe: The recall group claimed it was the most signatures ever collected in L.A. County for any petition. Considering how things went for DA Chesa Boudin in San Francisco, Gascon could be extremely vulnerable to getting ousted himself. Boudin was ousted in a decisive recall election on June 7th by the same liberal San Franciscans who elected him. After Boudin lost his recall, Los Angeles Sheriff Alex Villanueva called Gascon a failed district attorney and told him, you're next.
--:-- Maraid Alordi: The DA of San Francisco just conceded he has been recalled. George Gascon you next. Pretty direct warning there. So tell us a bit more about Gascon. What's his background and his philosophy?
--:-- Georgia Howe: Well, like Boudin, Gascon was part of the progressive prosecutor movement that began a few years ago. But Gascon was actually active before a lot of his peers. He was elected as L.A.'s D.A. at the end of 2020, but he was formerly San Francisco's D.A. from 2011 to 2019. Gascon started out as a Republican police chief in Arizona, but he quietly changed his affiliation to Democrat prior to running for DA in San Francisco, even though he's been consistently progressive throughout his political career.
--:-- Maraid Alordi: Gascon won a narrow victory over a police-backed candidate for a Los Angeles district attorney in November 2020. His policies include things like reducing incarceration and lightening sentences even for gang members or gun charges, as well as not prosecuting at all things like trespassing or public urination. Since becoming L.A.'s DA, his approach has come under fire as violent crime rises, especially from police and voters who describe him as soft on crime. Even prosecutors in Gascon's own office have come out against him. Of the prosecutors who implement Gascon's policies, 97.9 percent voted to recall him.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Meanwhile, at least 33 cities in L.A. County have held votes of no confidence in Gascon. So pretty widespread dissatisfaction with him. Right. What does crime in L.A. actually look like these days?
--:-- Maraid Alordi: Well, the headlines have not been good. Just last week, two LAPD officers were fatally shot as they responded to a possible stabbing at a motel. One of the cops was a 22-year veteran, and the other had just started on the force less than a year ago. The gunman was actually on probation for a gun charge and has been banned from owning a gun for over a decade. Needless to say, the tragic incident reignited frustration with Gascon for his lenient policies, which were the reason the gunman wasn't in jail at the time of the shooting.
--:-- Georgia Howe: So critics say that the suspect shouldn't have been on the street in the first place. Exactly. There's also been a string of so-called smash-and-grab robberies where a group of criminals will rob a business and flee the scene. L.A. Sheriff Villanueva said these robberies have Angelenos afraid to come out of the house. Embarrassingly, Gascon's office also had to walk back his claim that the sheriff's office was in agreement with a lenient sentence for a teen who was speeding and hit a mom who was walking her baby in a stroller. The sheriff's office issued its own statement, saying his department would never be okay with a lenient sentence for that driver.
--:-- Maraid Alordi: Overall, violent crime has been rising for months now. For example, homicides spiked 94 percent, and grand theft auto increased 59 percent from 2019 to 2021, during which time Gascon was elected. Now, many L.A. voters are clearly fed up. Those are some pretty stark numbers. It's no surprise that a lot of people are very frustrated.
--:-- Georgia Howe: We'll definitely watch what's happening with this recall effort. Maraid, thanks for reporting.
--:-- Maraid Alordi: Thanks, John.
--:-- Georgia Howe: That was Daily Wire investigative reporter Maraid Alordi. Netflix, once the undisputed king of the streaming game, has been floundering lately. After a dramatic drop in its stock price and a significant loss of subscribers, the company is, for the first time, reconsidering how it does business. Daily Wire culture reporter Megan Basham joins us now to discuss why Netflix is radically reconfiguring its approach and what kind of changes subscribers can expect.
--:-- Megan Basham: Well, you know, I don't think they're gonna be planning to close up shop anytime soon, but they're definitely struggling. So for the last few years, I think there was a sort of Wizard of Oz effect going on with Netflix, which essentially it was like, don't look at the man behind the curtain because it was laying out huge amounts of cash, buying up a lot of projects securing contracts with some really high people like the Obamas. And Netflix lobby was jokingly called the Town Hall of Hollywood. And that because CEO Reed Hastings seemed to be locking down deals with everyone who was anyone.
--:-- Georgia Howe: But then some analysts started to talk about how the fundamentals of Netflix's model just really didn't make sense financially. You had some notable exceptions like Stranger Things, of course, but otherwise their films and series didn't really seem to be pulling in the subscribers to justify all of these huge cash layouts. So the curtain was finally pulled back a couple of months ago with this really terrible earnings report. Since then, Netflix has lost about 44% of its stock value, and it's also lost 200,000 subscribers in just the first quarter of 2022.
--:-- Megan Basham: Now, what makes that number even worse is that survey data shows 13% of those cancelers were longtime subscribers. So people who had been with the company for three years or more. Now, is this decline industry-wide or is it specific to Netflix? A little bit of both. So we've seen signs of subscriber fatigue in the streaming game in general with just a lot of consumers not interested in adding new platforms, cutting back, but no one else is experiencing the kind of loss that Netflix is, Though, in part, you have to say that that's probably because they are the biggest and have a lot more to lose. But when you compare it to something like Disney, for example, that platform has been slowly growing and also consolidating power by adding Hulu and ESPN to its streaming bundle. So right now, Disney Plus is right behind Netflix globally with 205 million subscribers compared to Netflix's 221 million.
--:-- Georgia Howe: So what's Netflix's plan to turn this around? Well, to start with, they're making cuts. The company laid off 2% of its workforce, and a lot of those high-dollar contracts are over. To give you one example, this very expensive deal with Meghan Markle was canceled. And then it's also cutting out a lot of the special interest movies. Netflix was known for spending a lot of money on mid-priced feature films, LGBTQ feature films, prestige art house movies. And those things won a lot of awards, and they got a lot of media buzz, but they didn't necessarily draw viewers. So now it's saying that its plan is going to be to direct money to the bigger, better, fewer plan.
--:-- Megan Basham: And then you have to look at the systemic changes that they're planning. They're considering adding a lower priced ad-supported subscription option. And drum roll, this is the big one, to keep people from watching all of the episodes of something that they really like at once and then canceling the service, they're thinking of moving to a more traditional weekly release schedule. So no more binging on Netflix, or at least making it a little harder.
--:-- Georgia Howe: All right, well, Megan, thanks for keeping us up to date.
--:-- Megan Basham: Absolutely.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Another story we're tracking this week. FINA, the international governing body for swimming, approved a new gender policy over the weekend. The international body will now only permit swimmers who began medical transition before the age of 12 to compete in women's events. The organization is now reportedly considering their creation of a new category for athletes who do not meet this criteria.
--:-- John Bickley: Thanks for listening to Morning Wire. We created this show to bring more balance to the national conversation. If you love our show and you stand with our mission, please consider subscribing, leaving us a five-star rating, and most importantly, sharing our podcast with a friend. That's all the time we've got this morning. Thanks for waking up with us. We'll be back tomorrow with the news you need to know.
