Is Thursday the new Monday? Flexible working is in flux

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FILE - In this June 16, 2021 file photo, people walk through steam from a street grating during the morning commute in New York. Companies around the U.S. are scrambling to figure out how to bring employees back to the office after more than a year of them working remotely. Most are proceeding cautiously, trying to navigate declining COVID-19 infections against a potential backlash by workers who are not ready to return. (AP Photo/Richard Drew)

NEW YORK (AP) — Last year, companies around the U.S. scrambled to figure out how to shut down their offices and set up their employees for remote work as the COVID-19 virus suddenly bore down on the world.

Now, in a mirror image, they are scrambling to figure out how to bring many of those employees back.

Most companies are proceeding cautiously, trying to navigate declining COVID-19 infections against a potential backlash by workers who are not ready to return.

Tensions have spilled into the public at a few companies where some staff have organized petitions or even walkouts to protest being recalled to the office. Many workers in high demand fields, such as tech or customer service, have options amid a rise in job postings promising “remote work” — an alluring prospect for people who moved during the pandemic to be closer to family or in search of more affordable cities.

“A lot of people have relocated and don’t want to come back, ” said Chris Riccobono, the founder of Untuckit LLC, a casual men’s clothing company. “There’s a lot of crazy stuff that is a big day-to-day pain point.”

Riccobono said he can’t wait to get his 100 corporate staffers back to the office in Manhattan’s Soho neighborhood because he believes that productivity and morale are higher that way. Starting in September, the company will require those employees to report to the office Mondays, Wednesdays and Thursdays on the hope that the flexibility of a “hybrid” schedule will keep everyone happy.

Many others are similarly introducing a gradual return. Companies like Amazon and automakers Ford and General Motors have promised to adopt a hybrid approach permanently for their office staff, responding to internal and public surveys showing an overwhelming preference for work-from-home options.

But implementing a hybrid workplace can be a headache, from identifying which roles are most conducive to remote work to deciding which days of the week employees need to be in the office. There are client meetings to consider. And some business leaders argue newer employees need more face-time as they begin their careers or start new at at company.

“Thursday is the new Monday,” according to Salesforce, a San Francisco-based technology firm, which found that Thursday was the most popular day for employees to report to the office when the company reopened its Sydney offices back in August.

Riccobono, on the other hand, insists employees show up on Mondays to get organized and set the tone for the week. Like many employers, however, he acknowledges he is still figuring things out as he navigates uncharted territory.

“We will revisit in January, ” he said. “We will see how it works.”

Across the country, office buildings in the top 10 U.S. cities had an average occupancy rate of about 32% in late June, according to estimates from Kastle Systems a security company that monitors access-card wipes at some 2,600 buildings. In Manhattan, just 12% of office employees had returned as of late May, according to the latest survey by the Partnership for New York City, a non-profit organization of major business leaders and employers.

Romina Rugova, an executive at fashion brand Mansur Gavriel, enjoyed the tranquility as she sat on a riverside bench in lower Manhattan after a rare day back at the office for a meet-and-greet with the company’s newly hired head of e-commerce.

A mother of two, Rugova had mixed feelings about returning to the office. Seeing colleagues in person after so long was invigorating, and she did not always enjoy blurring her family and professional life.

“The challenge is you have to be three people at the same time. You have to be a professional, you have to be a cook, you have to be a cleaner, you have to be a mom,” Rugova said. “Being in the office after a while was so nice and refreshing. It’s completely different experience, you don’t realize it.”

But she doesn’t want to completely give up the three hours of extra time she saves without the commute. Many of her colleagues feel the same way, so Mansur Gavriel will likely implement a flexible policy when most of its 40 employees return to the office after Labor Day.

“We are still figuring it out,” Rugova said.

While most employers will accelerate their return-to-office plans over the summer, nearly 40% of office employees will still be working remotely in September, according to the Partnership for New York City’s survey.

The trend has raised concerns about an unequal economic recovery, given that working remotely is an option available to a privileged few. Only about 15% of workers teleworked because of the pandemic in June, according the U.S. Department of Labor’s monthly jobs report. Most work jobs at restaurants, schools, hospitals, factories and other places that require them to show up in person.

Some of large investment banks, which are top employers and office space tenants in New York City, are leading the push to bring employees back, taking a hardline approach in comparison with tech giants that have rolled out generous remote work policies.

Morgan Stanley CEO James Gorman said at a conference earlier this month that he would “be very disappointed if people haven’t found their way into the office” by Labor Day.

“If you can go a restaurant in New York City, you can come into the office,” Gorman said, though he acknowledged that there should be flexibility for parents still struggling with childcare logistics that fell apart during the pandemic.

Gorman also made clear that he was not open to the “work from anywhere” mentality that some companies have adopted, saying employees who want to earn New York City salaries should work in the city. The CEOs of JPMorgan Chase and Goldman Sachs have made similar comments, sparking furious debate about whether they would push employees out the door.

It remains to be seen how deeply remote work policies will influence recruitment and retention. But professionals looking for flexibility are finding they have options.

Brecia Young, a data analytics scientist and mother of a 1-year-old child, had choices when she was looking to switch jobs from a small Chicago firm. She accepted an offer from Seattle-based real estate company Zillow in part because the company allowed her to work from home and stay in Chicago, where she and her husband have relatives to help with child care.

“Moving to the West Coast was on the table but it would have been a real hardship,” said Young, adding that her husband also would have had to look for a new job. “I love the time savings just in terms of the commute. It’s like 90 minutes of saved time that I can repurpose.”

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Associated Press writer Anne D’Innocenzio contributed to this story from New York.

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This story was first published on July 7, 2021. It was updated on July 8, 2021 to correct the title of Chris Riccobono. He is the founder of Untuckit LLC, not the CEO.

Australia court says top official has 'duty' to protect young from carbon emissions


"The first respondent has a duty to take reasonable care, in the exercise of her powers ... to avoid causing personal injury or death to persons who were under 18 years of age ... arising from emissions of carbon dioxide into the Earth’s atmosphere," the judge wrote. File Photo by Kevin Dietsch/UPI | License Photo

July 8 (UPI) -- An Australian court ruled on Thursday that the country's environment minister has a "duty" to protect young people from the effects of climate change, as part of a case involving the expansion of a coal mine in New South Wales.

The project near Boggabri in New South Wales has led to legal challenges from several Australian schoolchildren who are concerned that the coal mine poses a climate change-related threat.

In the ruling Thursday, Australian Justice Mordecai Bromberg said environment minister Sussan Ley is responsible for possible environmental harm if she allows the expansion to move forward. She has regulatory responsibility for the project.

In his declaration, Bromberg said it falls upon Ley "to take reasonable care" to "avoid causing personal injury or death" for Australia's younger residents who may face a harm due to carbon emissions.

The judgement is expected to affect a large sector of Australian industry, including mining, manufacturing, transportation and energy.

In an earlier ruling, Bromberg said it could be "catastrophic" if global average surface temperatures rise to and exceed 3 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels.

The judge also ordered Ley to pay all court costs associated with the federal-level case.

"We are delighted that the law of the land now states that the government has a duty to avoid causing harm to young people," said Anj Sharma, one of the children who brought the challenge, according to The Guardian.

"For young people this decision brings hope and anticipation of a better, and responsible decision making by government," added plaintiffs attorney David Barnden, according to The Guardian. "The ramifications for the minister are clear."

Experts say the ruling shows that courts are taking more of an activist role in shifting public policy about climate change.

"Court decisions like this one are playing a significant role in shaping the landscape around climate risk for businesses and government decision-makers, and that landscape is shifting at a rapid pace," said Edwina Kwan, a partner at law firm King & Wood Mallesons, according to Financial Review.

Oxfam: 11 people die of hunger each minute around the globe


FILE - In this Tuesday, May 11, 2021 file photo, Abeba Gebru, 37, from the village of Getskimilesley, holds the hands of her malnourished daughter, Tigsti Mahderekal, 20 days old, in the treatment tent of a medical clinic in the town of Abi Adi, in the Tigray region of northern Ethiopia. The United States estimates that up to 900,000 people in Ethiopia’s Tigray region now face famine conditions amid a deadly conflict, even as the prime minister says there is “no hunger” there. The hunger crisis in Tigray is the world’s worst in a decade, and the new famine findings are “terrifying,” the head of the U.S. Agency for International Development, Samantha Power, said Friday June 26, 2021, adding that millions more people are at risk. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis, File)


CAIRO (AP) — The anti-poverty organization Oxfam says 11 people die of hunger each minute and that the number facing famine-like conditions around the globe has increased six times over the last year.

In a report titled “The Hunger Virus Multiplies,” Oxfam said Thursday that the death toll from famine outpaces that of COVID-19, which kills around seven people per minute.

“The statistics are staggering, but we must remember that these figures are made up of individual people facing unimaginable suffering. Even one person is too many,” said Oxfam America’s President and CEO Abby Maxman.

The humanitarian group also said that 155 million people around the world now live at crisis levels of food insecurity or worse — some 20 million more than last year. Around two-thirds of them face hunger because their country is in military conflict.

“Today, unrelenting conflict on top of the COVID-19 economic fallout, and a worsening climate crisis, has pushed more than 520,000 people to the brink of starvation,” added Maxman. “Instead of battling the pandemic, warring parties fought each other, too often landing the last blow to millions already battered by weather disasters and economic shocks.”

Despite the pandemic, Oxfam said that global military spending increased by $51 billion during the pandemic — an amount that exceeds by at least six times what the U.N. needs to stop hunger.

The report listed a number of countries as “the worst hunger hot spots” including Afghanistan, Ethiopia, South Sudan, Syria, and Yemen — all embroiled in conflict.

“Starvation continues to be used as a weapon of war, depriving civilians of food and water and impeding humanitarian relief. People can’t live safely or find food when their markets are being bombed and crops and livestock are destroyed,” said Maxman.

The organization urged governments to stop conflicts from continuing to spawn “catastrophic hunger” and to ensure that relief agencies could operate in conflict zones and reach those in need. It also called on donor countries to “immediately and fully” fund the U.N.’s efforts to alleviate hunger.

Meanwhile, global warming and the economic repercussions of the pandemic have caused a 40% increase in global food prices, the highest in over a decade. This surge has contributed significantly to pushing tens of millions more people into hunger, said the report.

Idaho courts offer new tool for renters facing eviction


BOISE, Idaho (AP) — The Idaho Supreme Court has a new online tool to resolve disputes between tenants and landlords that could help renters avoid becoming homeless.

The court announced the tool Wednesday ahead of the ending of an nationwide eviction moratorium put in place by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to help tenants unable to make rent payments during the pandemic and prevent the spread of COVID-19.

The moratorium ends July 31.

The tool gives landlords and tenants in new eviction cases the opportunity to resolve their disputes outside court. It uses software that guides parties through a negotiation process and offers referrals to agencies that provide rental assistance.

The court plans to test the new tool in Ada County, which includes Boise, before making it statewide.

“Partly, this is about getting ahead of a number we don’t know much about: How many evictions are not being filed because the federal moratorium expires at the end of the month?” Idaho Supreme Court Communications Manager Nate Poppino told the Idaho Statesman.

Poppino said Idaho court officials sought advice from a handful of other states, including Florida, New Mexico and Iowa, that were using dispute resolution tools, though not always for renter-landlord disputes.

Idaho has so far spent about $21 million of the $190 million received in federal coronavirus rescue money to help with outstanding rent, utility payments and other expenses.

But homeless advocates say documentation and a lack of internet access to participate in online court hearings have stymied many renters. Those evicted face a tough housing market as home prices and rents have risen sharply with Idaho’s rapid population growth.

Jesse Tree is a Boise nonprofit that provides rental assistance. Its executive director, Ali Rabe, said some renters owe thousands of dollars in rent dating back to the beginning of the pandemic.

“From my experience, when landlords take tenants to court, they want to get paid,” Rabe said. “That will definitely continue to be a challenge.”

Rabe said eviction filings in southwestern Idaho have averaged 20 to 30 a month despite the moratorium.

Oregon adopts most protective heat rules for workers in US


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Pedro Lucas, left, nephew of farm worker Sebastian Francisco Perez who died last weekend while working in an extreme heat wave, breaks up earth, Thursday, July 1, 2021, near St. Paul, Ore. (AP Photo/Nathan Howard)

SALEM, Ore. (AP) — Oregon adopted an emergency rule Thursday that strengthens requirements for employers to safeguard workers from extreme heat, including expanding access to shade and cool water in what advocates called the nation’s most protective heat rules following deadly record-high temperatures in the Pacific Northwest.

“With these new rules, Oregon has a chance to lead the country in ensuring workplaces are safe from high heat, especially for those doing the most demanding and dangerous jobs like farming and construction,” said Kate Suisman, an attorney with the Northwest Workers’ Justice Project.

The emergency rule adopted by the Oregon Occupational Safety and Health Division, or Oregon OSHA, also mandates regular cooldown breaks and communication between employees and supervisors so workers can report concerns.

Among the more than 100 people in Oregon who died during the extreme heat wave in late June was an immigrant from Guatemala who was working outside, the state medical examiner said. He was part of a crew at a plant nursery that was moving irrigation lines. Oregon OSHA is investigating both the nursery and the labor contractor.

“Oregon OSHA is taking an important step forward in leading the nation on standards for outdoors workers,” said Reyna Lopez, executive director of the Oregon farmworkers’ union, known by its Spanish acronym as PCUN. “It’s crucial that we continue to take steps toward long-term policy shifts in our state, that take climate change, and workers safety seriously.”

Oregon OSHA said the temporary rule is effective immediately and stays in place for 180 days.

“In the face of an unprecedented heat wave in the Pacific Northwest — and tragic consequences — it is absolutely critical that we continue to build up our defenses against the effects of climate change, including extreme heat events,” said Andrew Stolfi, director of the state agency that includes Oregon OSHA.

The heat wave was caused by what meteorologists described as a dome of high pressure over the Northwest and British Columbia that was worsened by human-caused climate change, which is making such extreme weather events more likely and more intense.

Seattle, Portland and many other cities broke all-time heat records, with temperatures in some places reaching above 115 degrees Fahrenheit (46 Celsius).

Oregon has recorded 116 deaths from the heat wave, while Washington state said Thursday that its toll had risen to 78. Authorities say hundreds of deaths may ultimately be attributed to the heat throughout the region.

Amid a historic drought, temperatures are spiking in parts of the U.S. West again this week but are less intense than the earlier heat wave

Under Oregon’s new rules for workers, when the heat index is at or above 80 F (27 C), employers are required to provide access to sufficient shade and an adequate supply of drinking water.

When the heat index rises above 90 F (32 C), employers also must ensure effective communication between workers and supervisors so workers can report concerns, ensure that employees are observed for alertness and signs of heat illness, and provide a cool-down rest period in the shade of 10 minutes for every two hours of work.

Mexico announces steps to ensure free union vote at GM plant

MEXICO CITY (AP) — The Mexican and U.S. governments announced a plan Thursday to resolve a U.S. labor complaint over attempts to steal a union vote at an auto plant in northern Mexico.

The Economy Department promised Thursday to punish any voting abuses and provide inspectors at a new vote at the General Motors plant in the city of Silao, set to be held before Aug. 20. The vote is to be held inside the plant, not at the offices of the union that allegedly tried to destroy ballots.

Labor Department inspectors will be allowed inside the plant to prevent intimidation tactics starting next week, and observers from the International Labor Organization will also be allowed in.

However, it was unclear if those promises would be enough. Workers at the plant have complained the old Confederation of Mexican Workers union has already tried tactics like promises and threats in speeches to shop stewards, or offering to raffle off cars, in order to win the vote.

U.S. Rep. Bill Pascrell, Jr., a Democrat from New Jersey, welcomed the plan. Pascrell wrote “I remain hopeful that the crooked backroom deals between corrupt corporations, predatory protection unions, nefarious government officials will become a thing of the past.”

The complaint was filed in May under the U.S.-Mexico-Canada trade agreement, after the old-guard union was caught allegedly destroying ballots. A new union is trying to unseat the old labor group at the plant. For decades, corrupt Mexican unions signed low-wage “protection contracts” behind workers’ backs.

The “rapid response” mechanisms under the trade pact, known as the USMCA, allows a panel to determine whether Mexico is enforcing labor laws that allow workers to choose their union and vote on contracts and union leadership. If Mexico is found not to be enforcing its laws, sanctions could be invoked, including prohibiting some products from entering the United States. The May complaint was the first to be filed under the USMCA.

Mexican auto workers make one-eighth to one-tenth of the wages of their U.S. counterparts, something that has spurred a massive relocation of auto plants to Mexico and a loss of U.S. jobs.

For decades, union votes in Mexico were held by show of hands, or not at all. Workers at many factories in Mexico were unaware they even had a union until they saw dues deducted from their paychecks.

As part of efforts to get the USMCA, which replaced the old North American Free Trade Agreement, Mexico passed labor law reforms stating all union votes would be by secret ballot, and workers at all factories in Mexico could vote on whether to keep their current union.

It was one such vote among the 6,494 employees of GM transmission and pickup plants in Silao in April that triggered the complaint.

Workers at the plant had been asked to vote yes or no on whether to recognize the union that has long controlled the plant’s labor contract. That union is part of the Confederation of Mexican Workers, or CTM, which formed part of the the party that ruled Mexico for most of the past century.

In a statement in May, GM said it “supports the labor provisions of the USMCA, including rapid response,” and said it will cooperate with authorities “to guarantee the integrity of voting on the union contract at out manufacturing complex in Silao.”

“We do not think there was any involvement of General Motors in the alleged violations that occurred at our plants in Silao,” GM said, but noted it had hired an outside consultant to conduct a review of what happened.

Mexico’s Labor Department declared the April vote invalid.

Mexico is still in the middle of a process of holding votes at workplaces to accept or reject existing unions. The process started in 2019 and ends in 2023, and will have to be repeated at every unionized factory and workplace in Mexico.

Some experts have criticized the process, because employees are not allowed to choose between a new union and an old one. Instead, they are essentially asked to decide between the old union and none at all.

 57% of Hanford workers exposed to hazards

July 7, 2021

RICHLAND, Wash. (AP) — A new state report finds that more than 57% of Hanford Nuclear Reservation workers reported exposure to hazardous material on the former nuclear weapons production site in southcentral Washington state.

The Hanford Healthy Energy Workers Board recently released its final report and recommendations on the unmet health care needs of Hanford workers.

The report’s central recommendation calls for creation of a new, independent Hanford Healthy Energy Workers Center. It would provide a centralized clearinghouse for dissemination of accepted scientific literature. Important functions would also include evaluation and communication of newly available studies about Hanford-specific hazards.

For incurable diseases such as chronic beryllium disease, information sharing could be key to finding cures. Additionally, the center would promote research to increase the body of knowledge for the Hanford workforce

Hanford for decades made plutonium for nuclear weapons, and thousands of workers are now tasked with cleaning up the nation’s largest volume of radioactive wastes.

“The working families that make up the Hanford community represent a very unique population, with occupational risks not easily quantified or identified,” said Nickolas A. Bumpaous, Hanford Healthy Energy Workers Board co-chair. “Hundreds if not thousands of studies have been conducted over the years, each one focused in different ares and producing different recommendations.

UPDATED2 US men, ex-Colombia soldiers held in Haiti assassination

By EVENS SANON, DÁNICA COTO and JOSHUA GOODMAN

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Suspects in the assassination of Haiti's President Jovenel Moise are displayed to the media at the General Direction of the police in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, Thursday, July 8, 2021. Moise was assassinated in an attack on his private residence early Wednesday. (AP Photo/Joseph Odelyn)

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP) — Seventeen suspects have been detained so far in the stunning assassination of Haiti’s president, and Haitian authorities say two are believed to hold dual U.S.-Haitian citizenship and Colombia’s government says at least six are former members of its army.

Léon Charles, chief of Haiti’s National Police, said Thursday night that 15 of the detainees were from Colombia.

The police chief said eight more suspects were being sought and three others had been killed by police. Charles had earlier said seven were killed.

“We are going to bring them to justice,” the police chief said, the 17 handcuffed suspects sitting on the floor during a news conference on developments following the brazen killing of President Jovenel Moïse at his home before dawn Wednesday.

Colombia’s government said it had been asked about six of the suspects in Haiti, including two of those killed, and had determined they were retired members of its army. It didn’t release their identities.

The head of the Colombian national police, Gen. Jorge Luis Vargas Valencia, said President Iván Duque had ordered the high command of Colombia’s army and police to cooperate in the investigation.




“A team was formed with the best investigators ... they are going to send dates, flight times, financial information that is already being collected to be sent to Port-au-Prince,” Vargas said.

The U.S. State Department said it was aware of reports that Haitian Americans were in custody but could not confirm or comment.

The Haitian Americans were identified by Haitian officials as James Solages and Joseph Vincent. Solages, at age 35, is the youngest of the suspects and the oldest is 55, according to a document shared by Haiti’s minister of elections, Mathias Pierre. He would not provide further information on those in custody.

Solages described himself as a “certified diplomatic agent,” an advocate for children and budding politician on a website for a charity he started in 2019 in south Florida to assist people in the Haitian coastal town of Jacmel. On his bio page for the charity, Solages said he previously worked as a bodyguard at the Canadian Embassy in Haiti.

Canada’s foreign relation department released a statement that did not refer to Solages by name but said one of the men detained for his alleged role in the killing had been “briefly employed as a reserve bodyguard” at its embassy by a private contractor. He gave no other details.

Calls to the charity and Solages’ associates at the charity either did not go through or weren’t answered.

Witnesses said a crowd discovered two of the suspects Thursday hiding in bushes in Port-au-Prince, and some people grabbed the men by their shirts and pants, pushed them and occasionally slapped them. An Associated Press journalist saw officers put the pair in the back of a pickup and drive away as the crowd ran after them to a nearby police station

“They killed the president! Give them to us! We’re going to burn them,” people chanted outside.

The crowd later set fire to several abandoned cars riddled with bullet holes that they believed belonged to the suspects. The cars didn’t have license plates, and inside one was an empty box of bullets and some water.

Later, Charles urged people to stay calm and let his officers do their work. He cautioned that authorities needed evidence that was being destroyed, including the burned cars.

Officials have given out little information on the killing, other than to say the attack was carried out by “a highly trained and heavily armed group.”

Not everyone was buying the government’s description of the attack. When Haitian journalist Robenson Geffrard, who writes for a local newspaper and has a radio show, tweeted a report on comments by the police chief, he drew a flood of responses expressing skepticism. Many wondered how the sophisticated attackers described by police could penetrate Moïse’s home, security detail and panic room and escape unharmed but then be caught without planning a successful getaway.

A Haitian judge involved in the investigation said Moïse was shot a dozen times and his office and bedroom were ransacked, according to the Haitian newspaper Le Nouvelliste. It quoted Judge Carl Henry Destin as saying investigators found 5.56 and 7.62 mm cartridges between the gatehouse and inside the house.

Moïse’s daughter, Jomarlie Jovenel, hid in her brother’s bedroom during the attack, and a maid and another worker were tied up by the attackers, the judge said.

Interim Prime Minister Claude Joseph, who assumed leadership of Haiti with the backing of police and the military, asked people to reopen businesses and go back to work as he ordered the reopening of the international airport.

Joseph decreed a two-week state of siege after the assassination, which stunned a nation already in crisis from some of the Western Hemisphere’s worst poverty, widespread violence and political instability.

Haiti had grown increasingly unstable under Moïse, who had been ruling by decree for more than a year and faced violent protests as critics accused him of trying to amass more power while the opposition demanded he step down.

The U.N. Security Council met privately Thursday to discuss the situation in Haiti, and U.N. special envoy Helen La Lime said afterward that Haitian officials had asked for additional security assistance.

Public transportation and street vendors remained scarce Thursday, an unusual sight for the normally bustling streets of Port-au-Prince.

Marco Destin was walking to see his family since no buses, known as tap-taps, were available. He was carrying a loaf of bread for them because they had not left their house since the president’s killing out of fear for their lives.

“Every one at home is sleeping with one eye open and one eye closed,” he said. “If the head of state is not protected, I don’t have any protection whatsoever.”

Gunfire rang out intermittently across the city hours after the killing, a grim reminder of the growing power of gangs that displaced more than 14,700 people last month alone as they torched and ransacked homes in a fight over territory.

Robert Fatton, a Haitian politics expert at the University of Virginia, said gangs were a force to contend with and it isn’t certain Haiti’s security forces can enforce a state of siege.

“It’s a really explosive situation,” he said.

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Coto reported from San Juan, Puerto Rico. Goodman reported from Miami. AP videographer Pierre-Richard Luxama in Port-au-Prince contributed to this report.

2 Americans Are Among Those Arrested In The Assassination Of Haiti's President

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

July 8, 2021

People pressure police on Thursday to hand over men who were arrested and the bodies of two men who were brought in by police after they were killed by police in the assassination of Haitian President Jovenel Moïse in Port-au-Prince, Haiti.Joseph Odelyn/AP

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP) — Two men believed to be Haitian Americans — one of them purportedly a former bodyguard at the Canadian Embassy in Port au Prince — have been arrested in connection with the assassination of Haiti's president, a senior Haitian official said Thursday.

Mathias Pierre, Haiti's minister of elections, told The Associated Press that James Solages was among six people arrested in the 36 hours since the brazen killing of President Jovenel Moïse by gunmen at his home in the pre-dawn hours Wednesday.

Four other suspected assailants were killed in a gunfight with police and two are still missing, Pierre said. Earlier authorities had said seven suspects were killed.

Pierre would not provide additional details about Solages' background, nor would he provide the name of the second Haitian-American he said was arrested.

Solages describes himself as a "certified diplomatic agent," an advocate for children and budding politician on a website for a charity he established in 2019 in south Florida to assist residents.

On his bio page for the charity, Solages said he previously worked as a bodyguard at the Canadian Embassy in Haiti. Calls to the foundation and Solages' associates at the charity either did not go through or were not answered.
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WORLD
What We Know About The Assassination Of Haiti's President

"The pursuit of the mercenaries continues," said Léon Charles, director of Haiti's National Police, in announcing the arrest of suspects. "Their fate is fixed: They will fall in the fighting or will be arrested."

Witnesses said two suspects were discovered hiding in bushes in Port-au-Prince on Thursday by a crowd, some of whom grabbed the men by their shirts and pants, pushing them and occasionally slapping them.

Police arrived shortly afterward to arrest the men, who were sweating heavily and wearing clothes that seemed to be smeared with mud, an Associated Press journalist at the scene said. Officers placed them in the back of a pickup truck and drove away as the crowd ran after them to the nearby police station.

Once there, some in the crowd chanted: "They killed the president! Give them to us. We're going to burn them!"

One man was overheard saying that it was unacceptable for foreigners to come to Haiti to kill the country's leader, referring to reports from officials that the perpetrators spoke Spanish or English.

The crowd later set fire to several abandoned cars riddled with bullet holes that they believed belonged to the suspects, who were white men. The cars didn't have license plates, and inside one of them was an empty box of bullets and some water.

Police walk among people during a protest Thursday in Port-au-Prince against the assassination of Haitian President Jovenel Moïse.Joseph Odelyn/AP

At a news conference Thursday, Charles, the police chief, asked people to stay calm, go home and let police do their work as he warned that authorities needed evidence they were destroying, including the burned cars.

Officials did not address a motive for the slaying, saying only that the attack, condemned by Haiti's main opposition parties and the international community, was carried out by "a highly trained and heavily armed group."
Haiti's prime minister orders the international airport reopened

Prime Minister Claude Joseph assumed leadership of Haiti with the backing of police and the military and on Thursday asked people to reopen businesses and go back to work as he ordered the reopening of the international airport.

On Wednesday, Joseph decreed a two-week state of siege following Moïse's killing, which stunned a nation grappling with some of the Western Hemisphere's highest poverty, violence and political instability.


POLITICS
Even Before Jovenel Moïse's Assassination, Haiti Was In Crisis

Inflation and gang violence have spiraled upward as food and fuel grew scarcer in a country where 60% of Haitians earn less than $2 a day. The increasingly dire situation comes as Haiti is still trying to recover from the devastating 2010 earthquake and Hurricane Matthew in 2016 following a history of dictatorship and political upheaval.

"There is this void now, and they are scared about what will happen to their loved ones," said Marlene Bastien, executive director of Family Action Network Movement, a group that helps people in Miami's Little Haiti community.

She said it was important for the administration of U.S. President Joe Biden to take a much more active role in supporting attempts at national dialogue in Haiti with the aim of holding free, fair and credible elections.

Bastien said she also wants to see participation of the extensive Haitian diaspora: "No more band-aids. The Haitian people have been crying and suffering for too long."

Haiti had grown increasingly unstable under Moïse, who had been ruling by decree for more than a year and faced violent protests as critics accused him of trying to amass more power while the opposition demanded he step down.
The question of who will succeed Moïse remains unanswered

According to Haiti's constitution, Moïse should be replaced by the president of Haiti's Supreme Court, but the chief justice died in recent days from COVID-19, leaving open the question of who might rightfully succeed to the office.

Joseph, meanwhile, was supposed to be replaced by Ariel Henry, a neurosurgeon who had been named prime minister by Moïse a day before the assassination.

Henry told the AP in a brief interview that he is the prime minister, calling it an exceptional and confusing situation. In another interview with Radio Zenith, he said he had no dispute with Joseph. "I only disagree with the fact that people have taken hasty decisions ... when the moment demands a little more serenity and maturity," he said.


WORLD
The Slaying Of Haiti's President Has Thrust The Struggling Nation Deeper Into Turmoil

Moïse had faced large protests in recent months that turned violent as opposition leaders and their supporters rejected his plans to hold a constitutional referendum with proposals that would strengthen the presidency.

On Thursday, public transportation and street vendors remained scarce, an unusual sight for the normally bustling streets of Port-au-Prince.

Marco Destin, 39, was walking to see his family since no buses, known as tap-taps, were available. He was carrying a loaf of bread for them because they had not left their house since the president's killing out of fear for their lives.

"Every one at home is sleeping with one eye open and one eye closed," he said. "If the head of state is not protected, I don't have any protection whatsoever."

Destin said Haiti has always been a complicated country and that he wasn't sure what the upcoming days would bring. "Haiti doesn't know what direction it's heading in right now," he said. "To be honest, I don't know what the solution is. There's always been a fight for power."

Gunfire rang out intermittently across the city hours after the killing, a grim reminder of the growing power of gangs that displaced more than 14,700 people last month alone as they torched and ransacked homes in a fight over territory.

Robert Fatton, a Haitian politics expert at the University of Virginia, said gangs were a force to contend with and it isn't certain Haiti's security forces can enforce a state of siege.

"It's a really explosive situation," he said, adding that foreign intervention with a U.N.-type military presence is a possibility. "Whether Claude Joseph manages to stay in power is a huge question. It will be very difficult to do so if he doesn't create a government of national unity."

Joseph told the AP that he supports an international investigation into the assassination and believes elections scheduled for later this year should be held, as he promised to work with Moïse's allies and opponents alike.

"Everything is under control," he said.

Gunfights as Haiti police track suspects after president's slaying


ByAFP


PublishedJuly 8, 2021


Security forces member exchange gunfire with armed men next to the Petionville police station in Port-au-Prince on July 8, 2021 - Copyright AFP Munir UZ ZAMAN
Robenson GEFFRARD

Police in Haiti on Thursday hunted down suspects in the assassination of President Jovenel Moise, with four alleged perpetrators killed and one American among those arrested as the country lurched into chaos.

The poorest country in the Americas now has no president or working parliament and two men claiming to be in charge as prime minister.


The streets of the capital Port-au-Prince were tense, and shops, banks and gas stations closed, with no immediate information on who killed the president or why. The main airport was also closed, as was the border with the Dominican Republic.

United Nations envoy to Haiti, Helen La Lime, speaking from the Haitian capital, said four members of a group that attacked the president’s private residence early Wednesday and shot the president have been killed by police and six others were in custody.

“I’m also aware that a larger group of possible perpetrators have taken refuge in two buildings in the city and they are now surrounded by the police,” La Lime told journalists in New York via video conference.

Mathias Pierre, Haiti’s elections minister, said the arrested American was of Haitian origin, although he did not confirm press reports identifying the man as James Solages.

“Among the assailants, six are in the hands of the police,” National Police Director Leon Charles told a press conference.

“We already have the physical perpetrators in hand and we are looking for the intellectual perpetrators.”

The country is observing two weeks of mourning for the death of Moise.

– Where was his security? –

“Jovenel Moise was not terribly popular, but he was the president. He cannot be killed as if he were just an ordinary citizen,” said a 55-year-old man in Port-au-Prince, who gave his name only as Paul.

A 28-year-old woman named Julia said she was wary of the police claims that foreign mercenaries killed the president.


“Where were the well-equipped police who watch over the president night and day? Why didn’t they react?” she asked.

In the Petionville neighborhood of the capital on Thursday, a crowd brought two men to a police station and called for them to be lynched.

In total, four men said to be in on the killing were being held at the police station, but it was not confirmed that they were actually suspects in the assassination.

Interim Prime Minister Claude Joseph has declared a national “state of siege” and said he was now in charge.

Joseph has only been in his post as prime minister for three months, and was due to step down within days after Moise named a replacement on Monday.

Joseph’s replacement, Ariel Henry, said Joseph “is no longer prime minister in my opinion.”

“Does a country have several prime ministers?” asked Henry.

Moise’s wounded wife, Martine, was treated at a local hospital then rushed by air ambulance to the Ryder Trauma Center in Miami. Joseph said her situation was stable.

During the assassination, a maid and another domestic staff member were reportedly tied up by the commandos who allegedly shouted “DEA operation” as they burst in.

– Political meltdown –

Haiti’s ambassador to Washington, Bocchit Edmond, said the killers were “professional” mercenaries disguised as US Drug Enforcement Administration agents.

Joseph on Wednesday said the president was “assassinated at his home by foreigners who spoke English and Spanish.”

The unpopular Moise had ruled Haiti by decree after legislative elections due in 2018 were delayed.

As well as presidential, legislative and local elections, Haiti was due to hold a constitutional referendum in September this year after it was twice postponed due to the coronavirus pandemic.

US President Joe Biden condemned the killing as “horrific” and said Washington was ready to assist in any way.

Washington also called for Haiti to proceed with the elections, with the State Department spokesman saying a fair vote would “facilitate a peaceful transfer of power to a newly elected president.”

Moise, a successful businessman, campaigned for power as a populist and was sworn in on February 2017.

The end date of his mandate became the source of a standoff, as Moise maintained that his term of office ran until February 7, 2022, but others said it ended on February 7, 2021.

The disagreement arose after Moise was elected in a 2015 vote that was cancelled for fraud, and then re-elected in November 2016.

Without a parliament, the country fell further into crisis in 2020. Many fear Haiti could be set for deepening violence.

“How much worse can hell get?” asked Haiti expert Irwin Stotzky at the University of Miami.

“Haiti faces even more violence and death and failure as a democratic nation than ever before, which is hard to imagine given its recent and chaotic history.”

Read more: https://www.digitaljournal.com/world/gunfights-as-haiti-police-track-suspects-after-presidents-slaying/article#ixzz7049GYymC


Assassination of Haitian president Jovenel Moise: what we know

By AFP
July 8, 2021


Haitian police and forensics experts look for evidence outside the presidential residence after Jovenel Moise was shot dead - Copyright AFP HECTOR RETAMAL
Robenson Geffrard with Cyril Julien in Washington

The assassination of Haitian president Jovenel Moise has plunged the impoverished Caribbean nation into crisis.

Here’s what we know about the attack:

– The assassination –

Early Wednesday, around 1:00 am local time, gunmen attacked Moise’s heavily guarded private residence in the capital Port-au-Prince.

Moise was shot dead and his wife, Martine, critically wounded. She was rushed to a local hospital and later evacuated to Miami for treatment.

Magistrate Carl Henry Destin told the Nouvelliste newspaper that Moise had been shot 12 times and his office and bedroom ransacked.

The motive and identities of the assailants are unknown.

A businessman, Moise, 53, was elected president of Haiti in 2016 on a pledge to boost the economy of the poorest country in the Americas.


He took office on February 7, 2017 but has presided over a deteriorating political and security situation with gangs running rampant and constant political tensions.

The end date of Moise’s mandate had been in dispute with the late president maintaining that his term of office ran until February 7, 2022, but others saying it ended on February 7, 2021.



– The assailants –

Haiti’s interim Prime Minister Claude Joseph said the assassination was carried out by “foreigners who spoke English and Spanish.”

Haiti’s ambassador to Washington, Bocchit Edmond, said the killers were “professional” mercenaries disguised as US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) agents.

Haiti’s police chief Leon Charles said the security forces engaged the suspected assailants in a gun battle on Wednesday.

Four gunmen were killed by police and two suspects taken into custody, while other members of the hit squad are at large, Charles said.

– State of siege –

Joseph, the interim prime minister, declared a “state of siege” in the country, giving himself increased powers for a 15-day period.

Moise had been governing by decree, without a parliament, since January 2020 and had named a new prime minister, Ariel Henry, on Monday, just two days before his death.

Henry, who had not yet assumed his duties, was the seventh prime minister named by Moise in four years and is claiming that he — not Joseph — is the rightful premier.


In addition to political instability, Haiti has been gripped recently by an increase in gang violence including kidnappings for ransom.

Since June, clashes between rival gangs in the western part of Port-au-Prince have paralyzed traffic between the southern part of the country and Haitian capital.

On June 30, 15 people died in a gun battle in the city including a journalist and an opposition activist.

– International concern –

The assassination of the Haitian president has left the international community pondering the future of a country plagued by political instability, poverty and natural disasters.

Fearing further unrest, the UN Security Council, the United States and European nations called for legislative and presidential elections to be held as scheduled on September 26.

A constitutional referendum was also planned for September 26. It had been initially scheduled for June 27 but was delayed because of the coronavirus pandemic.

The international airport in Port-au-Prince was closed to prevent the assailants from fleeing the country.


The neighboring Dominican Republic shut its border with Haiti and stepped up security along the frontier.

Read more: https://www.digitaljournal.com/world/assassination-of-haitian-president-jovenel-moise-what-we-know/article#ixzz7049S3duI

African American spelling bee champ breezes to win

AFTER A LONG PERIOD OF INDO AMERICAN DOMINANCE

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Zaila Avant-garde, 14, from Harvey, Louisiana is covered with confetti as she celebrates winning the finals of the 2021 Scripps National Spelling Bee at Disney World Thursday, July 8, 2021, in Lake Buena Vista, Fla. (AP Photo/John Raoux)

LAKE BUENA VISTA, Fla. (AP) — Whether dribbling a basketball or identifying obscure Latin or Greek roots, Zaila Avant-garde doesn’t show much stress. Now she has become the first African American winner in the 96-year history of the Scripps National Spelling Bee.

The 14-year-old basketball prodigy from Harvey, Louisiana, breezed to the championship on Thursday night. The only previous Black winner was also the only champ from outside the United States: Jody-Anne Maxwell of Jamaica in 1998.

Zaila said she was fully aware that people were watching her and dreaming of following in her footsteps.

“I’m hoping that within the next few years, I can see a little bit of an influx of African Americans, and not many Hispanic people, either, so I’m hoping to see them there, too,” she said.

The bee has long been a showcase for spellers of color. Nine of the 11 finalists were of South Asian descent, and Zaila’s win breaks a streak of at least one South Asian winner every year since 2008

Zaila has described spelling as a side hobby, although she routinely practiced for seven hours a day. She is a basketball standout who hopes to play some day in the WNBA and holds three Guinness world records for dribbling multiple balls simultaneously.

Zaila twirled and leaped with excitement after spelling the winning word “murraya,” a genus of tropical Asiatic and Australian trees.

Only one word gave her any real trouble, “nepeta,” a genus of Old World mints, and she jumped even higher when she got that one right than she did when she took the trophy.

“I’ve always struggled with that word. I’ve heard it a lot of times. I don’t know, there’s just some words, for a speller, I just get them and I can’t get them right,” she said. “I even knew it was a genus of plants. I know what you are and I can’t get you.”

Zaila only started spelling in time to qualify for the 2019 bee. But there isn’t much typical about a basketball prospect whose first choice for college is Harvard and wants to work for NASA if she doesn’t go pro in hoops. Her father, Jawara Spacetime, gave her the last name Avant-garde in tribute to jazz great John Coltrane.

This bee was different from any that came before because of the coronavirus pandemic, which led to the cancellation of last year’s bee. It was moved from its usual location just outside Washington to an ESPN campus in Florida, and only the top 11 spellers competed in person. Previous rounds were held virtually.

Only spellers’ immediate families were allowed to attend, in contrast to the hundreds of fans and former spellers who normally pack the bee ballroom. There was, however, one high-profile fan in attendance: first lady Jill Biden.

The first lady, an English professor at Northern Virginia Community College near the nation’s capital, also attended the 2009 bee. The seasoned public speaker told the spellers she was once crippled by stage fright.

“In sixth grade I was my school’s spelling bee champion. I had a chance to go to the next level, but on the day of the regional competition, I told my mother that I was sick,” Biden said. “The truth was that I was too nervous to go, so I have incredible admiration for each and every one of you.”

The competition itself was hardly recognizable compared to the most recent version. In 2019, Scripps’ word list was no match for the deep and talented field, and the bee ended in an eight-way tie.

This year, five of the 11 finalists were gone after the first round, and Zaila emerged as the champion in just under two hours. Had the bee reached the two-hour mark, a new lightning-round tiebreaker would have determined the winner. The field was perhaps thinner than usual because of the 2020 cancellation, which denied a strong crop of eighth-graders of their best chance at winning and prevented younger spellers from gaining valuable experience.

Zaila will take home more than $50,000 in cash and prizes. She used the $10,000 prize from an online bee she won last year to pay for lessons with her coach, 2015 Scripps runner-up Cole Shafer-Ray, who charges $130 an hour — part of a burgeoning industry of private tutors who work with most of the top spellers.

Chaitra Thummala, a 12-year-old from Frisco, Texas — another student of Shafer-Ray — was runner-up. She has two years of eligibility remaining and instantly becomes one of next year’s favorites.

___

Follow Ben Nuckols on Twitter at https://twitter.com/APBenNuckols

Governor Abbott’s Zero Tolerance on Immigration

Activists and some border counties are resisting this GOP power grab.


BY JAMES GOODMAN
THE PROGRESSIVE
JULY 8, 2021
\


Creative Commons


Immigrants protesting in Houston, Texas.

Texas Governor Greg Abbott had all the right optics for rallying the Republican faithful to his anti-immigrant campaign: On June 30, Sean Hannity brought his Fox TV show to Hidalgo County, on Texas’s southern border, for a town hall with Donald Trump.



Activist Roger Ramirez addresses Border Community Town Hall in Hidalgo County, Texas on June 30.

Onstage with Trump, Abbott said “we’re going to start arresting people, putting people behind bars, putting them in jail, not giving them the red-carpet treatment the Biden Administration has been giving them.”

Abbott, who has called for continuing work on former President Donald Trump’s border wall, is misusing a Texas law, intended for natural catastrophes, to invoke extraordinary powers and portray immigrants seeking safe haven as a “disaster.”



Activist Laura Peña addresses Border Community Town Hall in Hidalgo County, Texas on June 30.

Resistance to Abbott’s plan was readily apparent at a community town hall meeting in Hidalgo the morning of the Trump visit.

“The crisis that does exist at our border is that we are constantly used as a scapegoat, deprived of necessary resources to aid our historically and systematically disenfranchised community and denied justice,” said Roger Ramirez of the Laredo Immigrant Alliance.

The “You’re Both Fired!” banner behind the podium, along with chants of “Sí se puede,” left little doubt as to the prevailing sentiment.“Abbott is trying to step into the shoes of Trump,” said Laura Peña of the Texas Civil Rights Project. “And we say ‘no.’ ”

The Biden Administration, while rescinding many of Trump’s repressive anti-immigrant policies, continues to expel most asylum seekers at the border. That’s a big mistake and an injustice.

Although it’s unclear what the impact of Abbott’s antics will be, he is clearly attempting to throw a wrench into any efforts to move the Southern border in a humane direction.

“What Abbott is doing is trying to cause a crisis where one hadn’t existed,” Robert Heyman, a policy consultant with the El Paso-based Las Americas Immigrant Advocacy Center, tells The Progressive.

Border Community Town Hall in Hidalgo County, Texas on June 30.

Abbott, who is up for re-election next year as well as being considered a likely presidential contender in 2024, launched Operation Lone Star in early March. He teamed up with the Texas Department of Public Safety to “surge the resources and law enforcement personnel needed to confront this crisis.”

The broad sweep of Abbott’s plans became apparent in his May 31 disaster declaration directing state troopers to apply federal and state laws in assisting Texas counties. This includes arresting undocumented immigrants on state trespassing charges.

Abbott’s declaration also commits to providing jail space for those arrested, and he has emptied a state prison, the Dolph Briscoe Unit in Dilley, so it can be used to incarcerate immigrants.

What’s more, his declaration instructs fifty-six state-licensed shelters to stop housing more than 4,000 unaccompanied children by the end of August—or lose their licenses.

Abbott’s attempt to commandeer border policy—a federal responsibility—also includes diverting $250 million from state spending for border wall construction as well as collecting private donations to do the same.

Photo provided
Kate Huddleston

He has turned to the Texas Disaster Act of 1975 to hype his anti-immigrant campaign and grant him additional powers. This law, for example, provides stiffer penalties for such offenses as trespassing in disaster counties. Even without the enhanced penalties, a trespassing conviction can land an undocumented immigrant 180 days in prison and a fine of $2,000.

“He’s taking a law intended for natural disaster and he is twisting it to set his own immigration policy,” Texas ACLU lawyer Kate Huddleston tells The Progressive.

Huddleston coauthored a June 24 letter to officials of the thirty-four Texas counties that Abbott wanted to participate in his disaster ploy. It warned that taking part in Abbott’s “unilateral efforts to set federal immigration policy and enforce federal immigration law” could put them in violation the Constitution and federal law.

Texas law enforcement has continued to hand over many undocumented immigrants to Border Patrol, but Abbott’s declaration allows the use of state law to jail them on minor charges. Any consideration that they might want asylum is not in the cards.


Where would the children of undocumented immigrants go if their parents are in an adult prison for trespassing?

Meanwhile, GOP stalwarts are rallying to Abbott’s side. Six Republican governors are sending law enforcement officers to the border as a way to bolster Abbott’s anti-immigrant campaign. In a step toward mercenaries for hire, South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem enlisted the Tennessee foundation of a Republican mega-donor to cover the costs of dispatching a contingent of her state’s National Guard to Texas.

Local and state police, in Texas and elsewhere, have long collaborated with Border Patrol in enforcement. But Abbott wants enforcement with a Trumpian mindset.

On June 28, two days before Trump’s visit to the Southern border, Abbott’s office updated its list of counties that have declared a disaster and agreed to partner with the state to arrest and detain “people for crimes related to the border crisis.”

The list of participating counties is now down to twenty-eight—six fewer than a month before. Among those dropped are Hidalgo and neighboring hot spot counties in the lower Rio Grande Valley.

Hidalgo County Judge Richard Cortez, the county’s top administrator, spelled out his concerns in a June 1 release that says: “In speaking to local law enforcement, they have not reported levels of criminal activity that would require a disaster declaration.” He also urges comprehensive immigration reform and reopening ports of entry at the Southern border.

Resistance to Abbott has been spearheaded by La Unión del Pueblo Entero. Founded by César Chávez and Dolores Huerta, LUPE organizes immigrant communities. It is pushing for such basic infrastructure spending as paved roads and street lighting.

“We want the world to see us as ambassadors of the border because we want to change the narrative of people seeing us as criminals,” LUPE organizer Raquel Chavez tells The Progressive.

The plight of immigrants, she adds, must be seen through a “humane lens,” which dispels the image of the United States as a nation “filled with hate.”

José, a forty-eight-year-old undocumented immigrant from Mexico living near the border, echoes these concerns.

“The governor should stop playing with people’s lives,” says José, who has lived in the United States for three decades. “At the end of the day, we are the ones affected by his decisions and what he is doing does not benefit us.”

In early June, grassroots opposition to Abbott’s agenda crystallized with A Proclamation by the People of the Río Grande Valley. Denouncing Abbott’s “disastrous leadership,” the document describes him as a governor who “shames and blames Black, brown and working-class communities who have struggled to work, feed their families, and secure healthcare during the pandemic.”

Abbott—pure and simple—wants to treat asylum seekers as criminals. His approach is in stark contrast to the efforts of many localities and states to break ties with the draconian practices of Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Border Patrol.

Photo provided
Ilse Mendez Fraga

Abbott’s brand of “zero tolerance”—arresting immigrants whenever possible—would likely result in a new round of family separations. Where would the children of undocumented immigrants go if their parents are in an adult prison for trespassing?

“I am assuming Governor Abbott wants to be the next Arpaio,” says South Texas Human Rights Center Director Eduardo Canales, referring to the reign of former Sheriff Joe Apaio in the Phoenix area known for his anti-immigrant policies.

As Abbott’s plans take shape, the bigger police presence at the border has already taken a toll.

“We’re working with different organizations trying to bring resources down here in Laredo,” says Ilse Mendez Fraga, an organizer with Laredo Immigrant Alliance.“We don’t have a lot of lawyers to help out with immigration.”

Even though the thirty-four-year-old Mendez is now protected by the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, and her four children are U.S. citizens, she avoids highways and a nearby park, where Border Patrol agents are frequently found.

“Since Trump, since Abbott, I don’t feel safe,” says Mendez.