Good afternoon. This is Brooke Howard with The Daily Beast. It's Wednesday May 5th, and these are the top stories that she's watching right now. The Department of Homeland Security has begun to reunify families that were torn apart by the Trump administration's zero-tolerance policy.
It's been nearly three years to the day the law was implemented, which forcibly separated thousands of undocumented parents from their children in order to discourage others from seeking asylum. So far, four families have been reconnected, and a dozen more are expected in the coming weeks. A total of 5,500 families were separated between 2017 and 18. According to those working to undo the policy, the main reason why it has taken so long to reverse is because there was a lack of record keeping on where parents were sent after they were separated from their children and deported.
A man from New Jersey rushed to India in April when his father was hospitalized with a coronavirus. Now he's stranded there because he cannot get approval to return to the US. With 3,000 people dying a day, India is completely overwhelmed by the current COVID surge, and the US has restricted travel from the country. After his father passed away, the man has been trying to arrange a return to the states for the past two weeks.
The man told an ABC affiliate in New York that he knew he would have a hard time leaving, but he did not realize it would be as difficult as it has been. Anyone trying to leave India must undergo an in-person consulate visit under the type of visa they hold. The man says the embassy website he's been checking into says the earliest he can get an appointment is February 2022. A new report released by the CDC on Wednesday suggests that while vaccinations have helped to massively reduce COVID-19 deaths and will continue to offer protection and ease the way back to normalcy, Americans are becoming too comfortable too quickly.
Basically, the agency says that people should still social distance and mask up for ultimate protection. It found that easing up too quickly on the matter, even with vaccine rolling out, may produce surges in cases, hospitalizations, and deaths in the coming months. Donald Trump is not coming back to Facebook, at least not now. The social media platform's oversight board made an announcement Wednesday morning that it would uphold the decision to ban Trump's account due to his actions, or lack thereof, during the Capitol riot.
However, the board also said that it was not appropriate for the former president to be suspended from the site indefinitely. The oversight board ordered Facebook to review Trump's ban within six months of his decision in order to determine, quote, a proportionate response. Facebook's oversight board was first announced in 2018, made up of 20 members of various nationalities. It is designed to provide independent checks and balances on the company's ability to regulate speech.
Underage charter, it has the final say over whether moderation decisions by Facebook should be upheld or overturned. CEO Mark Zuckerberg or any other officials must abide by their decisions. This is what happens when someone has no remorse and takes no accountability for their actions. Former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin is seeking a new trial.
In a Tuesday filing, he argued that the guilty verdict against him for the murder of George Floyd was tainted by, quote, prosecutorial and jury misconduct. His attorney cited a slew of alleged errors that he says, quote, deprive the defendant of a fair trial. He also says that jurors supposedly felt pressured during the trial, which could have affected their votes. Oh my goodness.
The Minnesota Attorney General's office offered a harsh response to the arguments laid out by Chauvin and his lawyer, saying, quote, the court has already rejected many of these arguments and the state will vigorously oppose them. A Belgian farmer reportedly almost caused an international incident when he moved a random looking stone around seven feet. Turns out the stone is actually part of a series of similar markers to mark the border between France and what was then called the United Kingdom of the Netherlands. The stones placed there in 1819 are still used to demarcate the line between France and Belgium.
The farmer likely had no idea that this piece of yard work had just expanded Belgium by about a thousand square meters. That's all for today. Check back every weekday morning and afternoon for more of the news you need to know. Find us wherever you listen to podcasts.