A San Diego television station on Thursday said that CNN had asked for a "local view" and then "declined to hear from us" after past reports from the station showed that a border wall was effective.

Immigration, the partial government shutdown and President Trump's proposed border wall have all been topics dominating the cable news landscape since the shutdown began three weeks ago.

"Thursday morning, CNN called the KUSI Newsroom asking if one of our reporters could give them a local view of the debate surrounding the border wall and government shutdown," a report by KUSI, an independent station in San Diego that began airing in 1982, begins.

"KUSI offered our own Dan Plante, who has reported dozens of times on the border, including one story from 2016 that was retweeted by former Speaker of the House, Newt Gingrich, and posted on DrudgeReport.com," it continues while linking to a border fence tour report.

"We believe CNN declined a report from KUSI because we informed them that most Border Patrol Agents we have spoken to told us the barrier does in fact work," it concludes. "We have continuously been told by Border Patrol Agents that the barrier along the Southern border helps prevent illegal entries, drugs, and weapons from entering the United States, and the numbers prove it."

The hourlong address on Thursday followed a vow by the mayor earlier in the week that he would embark on a national tour to “preach the gospel” of liberal governance, trumpet his accomplishments in his first five years in office and argue that his new proposals — such as requiring paid vacation for most private-sector employees — are a model for the Democratic Party nationally.

He spoke against a campaign-style backdrop of seated supporters in a relatively small Manhattan theater that was filled to capacity, giving the event a heightened energy that previous addresses had lacked. Mr. de Blasio railed against big business, promised to seize the buildings of scofflaw landlords and pointedly framed the argument over income inequality — long a theme of his rhetoric as mayor — in zero-sum terms.

“Here’s the truth, brothers and sisters, there’s plenty of money in the world. Plenty of money in this city,” the mayor said, flanked by screens with graphs of productivity outpacing compensation. “It’s just in the wrong hands!”

In the speech, Mr. de Blasio presented his mayoralty as one that has made streets safer and brought new protections for tenants and workers. He cast himself as an aspiring Robin Hood — aiming to take from the rich and give to the poor — even as he has thus far been unsuccessful in his many attempts to raise taxes on high earners.

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DNA pioneer James Watson has final honours stripped amid racism row


Eminent geneticist James Watson has had the last of his honorary titles stripped from him after doubling down on controversial statements about race and intelligence.

The Nobel Prize-winning scientist, who with Francis Crick and Rosalind Franklindiscovered the double-helix structure of DNA, has been embroiled in controversy for more than a decade.

In 2007 he lost his job at Cold Spring Harbour Laboratory for making racist remarks, but retained three honorary titles there including chancellor emeritus.

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Dr Watson told an interviewer in 2007 he was “inherently gloomy about the prospect of Africa” because “all our social policies are based on the fact that their intelligence is the same as ours – where all the testing says not really”.

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