'It was a mistake': Former Obama official admits key error that led to Trump's rise

Obama administration's failure to punish the Wall Street CEOs whose reckless greed crashed the American economy in 2008 

Brad Reed
December 17, 2024 

RAW STORY

Obama on not visiting border: 'This isn't theater. This is a problem'

Rahm Emanuel, the former White House chief of staff to President Barack Obama, made a revealing admission about a key mistake he and his one-time boss made that he thinks led to the rise of Donald Trump.

Writing in the Washington Post, Emanuel acknowledged that the Obama administration's failure to punish the Wall Street CEOs whose reckless greed crashed the American economy in 2008 led to a major disillusionment with the American political establishment that allowed someone like Trump to slide into the picture offering an alternative.

"Not only was no one held accountable, but the same bankers who engineered the crisis were aggrieved at the suggestion of diminished bonuses and government intervention," Emanuel wrote. "It was a mistake not to apply Old Testament justice to the bankers during the Obama administration, as some had called for at the time."

That said, Emanuel also believes that Trump's cozy ties to big business and his zeal for shoveling out more tax breaks to the ultra-wealthy provide Democrats with an opportunity to regain public trust as the party of genuine economic populism.

"Far from draining the swamp, Trump and his administration will soon be bathing in it," he argues. "We need to reveal the populist Trump as a plutocrat. The hypocrisy will be there in the upcoming tax legislation and slashed regulations for the powerful — all paid for by the middle class.

"With everyone from Big Oil to Big Pharma lining up for their share of the spoils, we will need to be strategic in how we strip away Trump’s populist veneer. By returning to our roots as the voice of the middle class, we can unite both moderates and progressives in a fight against the well-heeled and well-connected."

Read the whole piece here.

Trump handed basic math lesson as Nobel prize winner takes apart policies

Brad Reed
December 17, 2024 
RAW STORY

U.S. President-elect Donald Trump delivers remarks at Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach, Florida, U.S., December 16, 2024. REUTERS/Brian Snyder

Nobel Prize-winning economist Paul Krugman warned on Tuesday that President-elect Donald Trump's promises to the business community could send inflation soaring back upward in the coming years.

Writing in his personal Substack page, Krugman dissected Softbank CEO Masayoshi Son's recent announcement that he plans to invest $100 billion into the United States in the wake of President-elect Donald Trump's victory.

According to Krugman, the Softbank announcement is being vastly overhyped and is almost certain to underdeliver on its CEO's promises.

"As news reports mostly seem to acknowledge, this appears to involve investments Son was already planning to make before the election, which he and Trump are now presenting as a response to Trump. The same thing happened in 2016," he writes.

"Second, that last round of investments turned out miserably. A lot of it went to WeWork. Remember them? Nobody can be sure how many people ended up with new jobs thanks to Son’s money last time, but it probably wasn’t many."

Krugman then pivots to argue that Trump's enthusiasm for the Softbank investment will clash with his other stated priorities.

"We’re now seeing a perfect example of the arithmetic problem I pointed out the other day," he wrote. "Trump wants to reduce the U.S. trade deficit; he also wants to attract more foreign investment into the United States. But he can’t, as a matter of sheer accounting (which, I know, has a well-known globalist/Marxist bias):Trade balance + Net inflows of capital = 0. If more money flows into America, that must mean a bigger, not smaller trade deficit."

Krugman then predicts that a widening trade deficit could lead Trump to pressure the Federal Reserve to drastically slash interest rates, which would likely reignite inflation.

"I don’t think markets are properly pricing in the likely inflationary consequences of Trump’s coming war on arithmetic," he concludes.

'Don't believe him': Conservative warns Trump 'distraction' could destroy U.S. economy

Matthew Chapman
December 17, 2024

Republican presidential nominee and former U.S. President Donald Trump gestures as he speaks during his rally in Saginaw, Michigan, U.S., October 3, 2024. REUTERS/Brendan McDermid

President-elect Donald Trump is planning a huge new array of tariffs on foreign goods, in particular from China, Canada and Mexico — and he argues the charges are a "reciprocal" scheme, raising taxes on other countries' goods in retaliation for taxes they raised on ours.

But "don't believe him," conservative analyst Ramesh Ponnuru warned for The Washington Post.

In truth, said Ponnuru, many of Trump's tariffs weren't in response to anything but his own petty grievances — and, in any case, the whole idea of "reciprocal" tariffs is not as fair or productive as it sounds.

"Trump’s premise — that we practice free trade while other countries tax our products — is false," Ponnuru wrote. "Scott Lincicome, a policy analyst at the libertarian Cato Institute, points out that dozens of countries have lower average tariffs than the United States does. Former senator Patrick J. Toomey (R-PA), writing in the Wall Street Journal recently, noted that Canada, Britain and Europe 'all impose lower taxes on American manufactured goods than the [United States] imposes on comparable imports.'" For instance, the U.S. taxes European trucks at 25 percent, while Europe only taxes U.S. trucks at 10 percent.

Moreover, he wrote, there's history behind that. The U.S. imposed that 25 percent tariff in retaliation for a European tax on U.S. chicken products.

"There are a few takeaways from that history. One is that 'bargaining chip' tariffs have a way of sticking around long after everyone has forgotten their supposed point. Another is that Trump’s enthusiasm for tariffs is not limited to retaliatory ones: When he talked about our high tax on imported trucks in 2018, he was praising it."


The simple fact is, Ponnuru wrote, "the man just likes tariffs" — he doesn't need a real grievance about unfair trade practices to support jacking them up. And that's bad news, as economists almost universally believe Trump's tariff plans are going to skyrocket the prices of energy and consumer goods.

Already, Canadian officials are threatening to cut off their oil to our markets.

The issue of whether tariffs will truly enrich our country and make the balance of trade fairer "is something nearly all economists doubt, but that’s a debate we can have," Ponnuru concluded. On the other hand, he said, "'Reciprocity' is a distraction: Trump doesn’t take it seriously — and neither should anyone else."

Trump’s tax cuts expire soon − study shows devastating effect they had on many

The Conversation
December 17, 2024
By Beverly Moran, Professor Emerita of Law, Vanderbilt University

The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, a set of tax cuts Donald Trump signed into law during his first term as president, will expire on Dec. 31, 2024. As Trump and Republicans prepare to negotiate new tax cuts in 2025, it’s worth gleaning lessons from the president-elect’s first set of cuts.

The 2017 cuts were the most extensive revision to the Internal Revenue Code since the Ronald Reagan administration. The changes it imposed range from the tax that corporations pay on their foreign income to limits on the deductions individuals can take for their state and local tax payments.

Trump promised middle-class benefits at the time, but in practice more than 80% of the cuts went to corporations, tax partnerships and high-net-worth individuals. The cost to the U.S. deficit was huge − a total increase of US$1.9 trillion from 2018 to 2028, according to estimates from the Congressional Budget Office. The tax advantage to the middle class was small.

Advantages for Black Americans were smaller still. As a scholar of race and U.S. income taxation, I have analyzed the impact of Trump’s tax cuts. I found that the law has disadvantaged middle-income, low-income and Black taxpayers in several ways.

Cuts worsened disparities

These results are not new. They were present nearly 30 years ago when my colleague William Whitford and I used U.S. Census Bureau data to show that Black taxpayers paid more federal taxes than white taxpayers with the same income. In large part that’s because the legacy of slavery, Jim Crow and structural racism keeps Black people from owning homes.

The federal income tax is full of advantages for home ownership that many Black taxpayers are unable to reach. These benefits include the ability to deduct home mortgage interest and local property taxes, and the right to avoid taxes on up to $500,000 of profit on the sale of a home.

It’s harder for middle-class Black people to get a mortgage than it is for low-income white people. This is true even when Black Americans with high credit scores are compared with white Americans with low credit scores.

When Black people do get mortgages, they are charged higher rates than their white counterparts.

Trump did not create these problems. But instead of closing these income and race disparities, his 2017 tax cuts made them worse.

Black taxpayers paid higher taxes than white taxpayers who matched them in income, employment, marriage and other significant factors.

Broken promises, broken trust

Fairness is an article of faith in American tax policy. A fair tax structure means that those earning similar incomes should pay similar taxes and stipulates that taxes should not increase income or wealth disparities.

Trump’s tax cuts contradict both principles.

Proponents of Trump’s cuts argued the corporate rate cut would trickle down to all Americans. This is a foundational belief of “supply side” economics, a philosophy that President Ronald Reagan made popular in the 1980s.

From the Reagan administration on, every tax cut for the rich has skewed to the wealthy.

Just like prior “trickle down” plans, Trump’s corporate tax cuts did not produce higher wages or increased household income. Instead, corporations used their extra cash to pay dividends to their shareholders and bonuses to their executives.

Over that same period, the bottom 90% of wage earners saw no gains in their real wages. Meanwhile, the AFL-CIO, a labor group, estimates that 51% of the corporate tax cuts went to business owners and 10% went to the top five highest-paid senior executives in each company. Fully 38% went to the top 10% of wage earners.

In other words, the income gap between wealthy Americans and everyone else has gotten much wider under Trump’s tax regime.

Stock market inequality

Trump’s tax cuts also increased income and wealth disparities by race because those corporate tax savings have gone primarily to wealthy shareholders rather than spreading throughout the population.

The reasons are simple. In the U.S., shareholders are mostly corporations, pension funds and wealthy individuals. And wealthy people in the U.S. are almost invariably white.

Sixty-six percent of white families own stocks, while less than 40% of Black families and less than 30% of Hispanic families do. Even when comparing Black and white families with the same income, the race gap in stock ownership remains.

These disparities stem from the same historical disadvantages that result in lower Black homeownership rates. Until the Civil War, virtually no Black person could own property or enter into a contract. After the Civil War, Black codes – laws that specifically controlled and oppressed Black people – forced free Black Americans to work as farmers or servants.

State prohibitions on Black people owning property, and public and private theft of Black-owned land, kept Black Americans from accumulating wealth.
Health care hit

That said, the Trump tax cuts hurt low-income taxpayers of all races.

One way they did so was by abolishing the individual mandate requiring all Americans to have basic health insurance. The Affordable Care Act, passed under President Barack Obama, launched new, government-subsidized health plans and penalized people for not having health insurance.

Department of the Treasury data shows almost 50 million Americans were covered by the Affordable Care Act since 2014. After the individual mandate was revoked, between 3 million and 13 million fewer people purchased health insurance in 2020.

Ending the mandate triggered a large drop in health insurance coverage, and research shows it was primarily lower-income people who stopped buying subsidized insurance from the Obamacare exchanges. These are the same people who are the most vulnerable to financial disaster from unpaid medical bills.

Going without insurance hurt all low-income Americans. But studies suggest the drop in Black Americans’ coverage under Trump’s plan outpaced that of white Americans. The rate of uninsured Black Americans rose from 10.7% in 2016 to 11.5% in 2018, following the mandate’s repeal.

The consumer price index conundrum

The Trump tax cuts also altered how the Internal Revenue Service calculates inflation adjustments for over 60 different provisions. These include the earned income tax credit and the child tax credit – both of which provide cash to low-wage workers – and the wages that must pay Social Security taxes.

Previously, the IRS used the consumer price index for urban consumers, which tracks rising prices by comparing the cost of the same goods as they rise or fall, to calculate inflation. The government then used that inflation number to adjust Social Security payments and earned income tax credit eligibility. It used the same figure to set the amount of income that is taxed at a given rate.

The Trump tax cuts ordered the IRS to calculate inflation adjustments using the chained consumer price index for urban consumers instead.

The difference between these two indexes is that the second one assumes people substitute cheaper goods as prices rise. For example, the chained consumer price index assumes shoppers will buy pork instead of beef if beef prices go up, easing the impact of inflation on a family’s overall grocery prices.

The IRS makes smaller inflation adjustments based on that assumption. But low-income neighborhoods have less access to the kind of budget-friendly options envisioned by the chained consumer price index.

And since even middle-class Black people are more likely than poor white people to live in low-income neighborhoods, Black taxpayers have been hit harder by rising prices.

What cost $1 in 2018 now costs $1.26. That’s a painful hike that Black families are less able to avoid.

The imminent expiration of the Trump tax cuts gives the upcoming GOP-led Congress the opportunity to undertake a thorough reevaluation of their effects. By prioritizing policies that address the well-known disparities exacerbated by these recent tax changes, lawmakers can work toward a fairer tax system that helps all Americans.

Beverly Moran, Professor Emerita of Law, Vanderbilt University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

CRIMINAL CAPITALI$M

End of the Dubai dream for Europe’s drug lords?


By AFP
December 16, 2024

A luxury yacht is pictured off the Dubai Marina Beach. — © AFP Karim SAHIB
Arthur CONNAN in Paris with AFP bureaus in Madrid, Brussels, Marseille, Dublin and The Hague

Drug lords like Sean McGovern, a top lieutenant of the Kinahan cartel, and Faissal Taghi — son of the infamous head of the Dutch-Moroccan Mocro Maffia — used to hang out and party in Dubai’s glitzy hotels and restaurants without a care in the world.

Until their arrests — and the smashing of a massive Russian-run money laundering operation based there this month — the Gulf emirate was a haven for some of Europe’s biggest drug traffickers.

For years major drug barons have brazenly run their operations out of the city’s skyscrapers and luxury villas without fear of extradition. Limited judicial cooperation from the local authorities meant they had little to fear, European investigators and magistrates told AFP.


Sunny Beach, located in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. — © Digital Journal

Europol described the city as a “remote coordination hub” for Europe’s drugs trade, where traffickers live openly and launder their money through luxury goods and real estate.

Far from the European ports like Antwerp, Rotterdam and Le Havre where their drugs transit, police say the barons pull the strings from the comfort of Dubai, ruling by fear and extreme violence from one of the safest cities in the world.

Ironically, Dubai’s low crime rate means they can operate there in security, doing deals and networking with other global narcotics players in the city’s cafes and shisha bars.

However, the tide may now be turning.

In October, McGovern — the right-hand-man of Irish drugs lord Daniel Kinahan — was arrested on an extradition warrant from Dublin, accused of murder and being a leader of a criminal organisation.

The US Treasury calls the Kinahan cartel a “threat to the entire licit economy”, with Washington slapping a $15-million bounty on the heads of its three leading members.

McGovern’s arrest in Dubai followed the extradition in July of Faissal Taghi to the Netherlands on drug trafficking and murder-related charges. Belgian drug lord Nordin El Hajjioui was sent back in handcuffs to Brussels in March.


Atlantis Resort in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. — © Digital Journal

“The UAE is committed to working with all its international partners to disrupt and deter all forms of global illicit finance,” a government official told AFP.

– ‘Total impunity’ –

A crossroads linking Europe and Asia, Dubai has one of the world’s busiest ports and airports — and is a favourite winter sunspot for sports stars and influencers.

But for more than a decade, it has also been home to a rogue’s gallery of European crime figures.

Cartel boss Kinahan and “El Tigre”, the Spanish cocaine kingpin Alejandro Salgado Vega, are among the most notorious to have settled there.

Kinahan’s associate, Ridouan Taghi — Faissal’s father — was also a longtime Dubai denizen till the fearsome gangster was jailed for life for a string of hits in February after a mega trial in a high-security Amsterdam court known as De Bunker.

Many other big-time drug dealers are also openly living it large there.

“They don’t hide. They are not like refugees with false papers,” said Francisco Torres, head of Spain’s elite Guardia Civil unit which tackles organised crime.

“They live a luxurious life in front of everyone with total impunity,” he told AFP.


Interpol has issued red notice arrest requests for a long list of suspects thought to be in Dubai. — © AFP

Abdelkader “Bibi” Bouguettaia is a case in point. A French-Algerian trafficker wanted by Interpol, he lives in luxury apartments near the Palm Jumeirah home of the British celebrity couple David and Victoria Beckham.

Bouguettaia had already fled when France sentenced him to nine years for smuggling 599 kilos of cocaine and he is suspected of orchestrating a vast 2.5-tonne shipment through Marseille.

Investigators say he drives high-end cars and enjoys dining at such celebrity hangouts as Salt Bae’s Nusr-Et Steakhouse, where a gold leaf filet can set you back more than $2,000.

A crossroads linking Europe and Asia, Dubai has one of the world’s busiest ports and airports. — © AFP

Fellow French fugitive Tarik Kerbouci, known as “The Bison” — wanted for a 3.3-tonne cocaine shipment — also loves his luxury. But he likes speed even more, coming second in the Gulf Radical Cup championship series in his own fluorescent yellow racing car.

– ‘Super cartel’ –

Recent arrests may have called Dubai’s reputation as a haven for global crime syndicates into question.

But its appeal remains strong, with its unique combination of luxury, strategic location and local legal loopholes that make extradition difficult and money laundering relatively easy.

The UK-based Centre for the Study of Corruption said in August that there has been “a large-scale shift in the global epicentre of dirty money networks to Dubai and Hong Kong”.


A yacht sails before the skyline of the Emirate of Dubai. — © AFP/File Daniel ROLAND

One anti-money laundering expert based in the emirate told AFP that it is a perfect safe space for crime groups.

“Organisations can plan an operation… in Dubai and never see each other again afterwards,” he said.

“They hang out at the Five resort on the Palm Jumeirah where there are lots of prostitutes, at the Cafe de Paris or in the shisha bars in the marina.”

In 2022, Europol’s Operation Desert Light revealed the existence of a mostly Dubai-based “super cartel” headed by six figures including Daniel Kinahan that controlled a third of the cocaine coming into Europe.

“Bibi” Bouguettaia coordinated tonnes of what came through Le Havre, France’s biggest port.


Dubai’s marina, a favourite haunt of exiled drug barons who live there. — © AFP/File Giuseppe CACACE

AFP has seen the transcript of the police interrogation of one of his suspected foot soldiers who explained how the operations worked.

“Bibi” is allied with a Dutch drug baron, and runs cocaine into Paris and Antwerp, Europe’s second largest port.

He has a strong hold on Le Havre, the man told police. “Dockers, the people who look after port security, he pays them.”

Everything is run over the phone, the witness said, with the threat of violence ever-present.

When someone refuses a mission or responds too slowly, a picture of a family member would be sent to them as a silent threat.

– Buying luxury homes –

Dubai’s other big attraction is its cash economy, where criminals can quickly get rid of dirty money that would be hard to spend in Europe.

The emirate’s ancestral “hawala” banking system, which allows cash to be transferred without money actually moving, has allowed drug lords to invest heavily in property and other high-end businesses there with little trace.


Dubai, home to the world’s tallest building, the Burj Khalifa. — © AFP Giuseppe CACACE

“A building sells within 15 minutes,” a money laundering expert in the UAE told AFP, with skyscrapers and gated communities popping out of the sand as fast as they can be built. Drawn by its low taxes and light-touch regulation, nine out of 10 of the city’s population are expatriates.

While Dubai is less rich in oil than its neighbours, transactions in its booming property market hit a record 132 billion euros ($139 billion) in 2022.

With homes in its glitziest neighbourhoods selling for more than $10 million, Tarik “The Bison” Kerbouci set himself up as an “estate agent”, according to a French judicial source.

Based on leaks of a property register, the Washington-based Center for Advanced Defense Studies (C4ADS) said he owned at least a villa and an apartment in the Al Barsha and Al Hebiah areas.


Dubai. — © AFP MOHAMMED ABED

It was also able to establish that Daniel Kinahan and his wife Caoimhe Robinson owned several properties including one near the Palm Jumeirah and another bought for six million euros in Emirates Hills that is now reportedly worth twice that.

– ‘Absurd’ legal obstacles –

The glacial nature of the extradition process had also helped keep top criminals living there.

Arrested in Dubai in July 2022, Kerbouci was freed 40 days later, the deadline for official reception of his extradition request having passed.

Bouguettaia benefited from the same slowness after he was arrested in October last year before being released in January. “El Tigre” is again living in total liberty in Dubai, his lawyer said, after being held in 2022.

The UAE signed extradition treaties with France in 2007, with Spain two years later, with Belgium and the Netherlands in 2021 and Ireland this year.

But only a small handful of major drug dealers have been extradited.

“We have identified some 30 priority targets in Dubai,” French foreign ministry official Jean-Noel Bonnieu told lawmakers earlier this year. “None of these traffickers have been extradited, although some have been arrested.”

Of the 20 or so people wanted by Belgium, only four have been returned since 2021, according to official figures.

The French authorities complain of the “extreme strictness of the UAE’s interpretation of the documents needed and the time window in which they must be sent”.


Dubai’s Palm Jumeirah artificial island has homes owned by Bollywood stars and by footballers David Beckham and Cristiano Ronaldo. — © AFP

Torres, of Spain’s Guardia Civil, said Dubai’s demands were often “absurd” and “impossible to meet”, such as having to send all the original documents with each page signed by a judge.

– Criminal exodus? –

But this year there has been progress on judicial cooperation.

A French magistrate with organised crime experience has been sent to neighbouring Abu Dhabi, with Belgium in October appointing a judge to liaise directly with the UAE.

The same month, the then Irish deputy premier Micheal Martin hailed its new extradition treaty with the UAE as “an important step”.

Since then “Bibi” Bouguettaia has again been arrested along with one of Belgium’s top traffickers, Othman El Ballouti, whom Brussels has been trying to extradite for years, official sources told AFP.

The UAE has also been trying to show it has been cleaning up its act since being put on the “grey list” by the international Financial Action Task Force (FATF) in 2022.

Tougher surveillance of the flows of cash through the Emirates meant it was taken off the list in February.

But a French judicial source told AFP that Dubai has never seized “any assets for any foreign financial authority” despite a major influx of Russian business figures since the war in Ukraine started nearly three years ago.

Even so, some say Dubai’s criminal elite may already be looking for their next bolthole. “With all the attention on Dubai… eyes are turning to Turkey as another possible centre for international criminal activities,” a Dutch judicial source told AFP.

“Some big names are looking to North Africa, Indonesia and Bali,” according to a French specialist in money laundering.

“The Bison”, Tarik Kerbouci, has already left and gone on the run. He is probably living elsewhere in the Middle East or North Africa, European sources say, under a false identity.

aco-iw-edy-du-mad-jhe/bfa/dp/fg/rlp

CRIMINAL CAPITALI$M

Elite schools accused of financial aid scheme that saw students overpay by $685M

Sarah K. Burris
December 17, 2024 

RAW STORY

Students celebrate their graduation. (Shutterstock)

A lawsuit is accusing a number of the country's leading universities of overcharging students to the tune of $685 million in a “price-fixing” scheme.

The Washington Post reported a list of top schools the lawsuit claims colluded to limit the amount of financial aid paid to lower-income students.

The Post specifically cited accusations against Georgetown University. The lawsuit claims the school president compiles a list of about 80 applicants he wants accepted regardless of transcripts, recommendations, test scores or personal essays.

Almost all applicants were accepted purely based on their parents' wealth and past donations, the lawsuit claimed.

Also Read: The real reason Republicans oppose efforts to cancel student debt

"Documents and testimony from officials at Georgetown, the University of Notre Dame, the University of Pennsylvania, MIT and other elite schools suggest they appeared to favor wealthy applicants despite their stated policy of accepting students without regard for their financial circumstances," said the Post, citing the lawsuit.

A policy called "need-blind" is designed to protect applicants who might require financial aid. Federal laws allow schools to see a student's financial information for planning purposes, but "need-blind" prohibits it being used for admission decisions.

The plaintiffs in the case claim that the schools used the information for acceptance offers. They also allege that the schools intentionally limited financial aid packages.

"A coalition of highly selective universities, formed in the late 1990s and known as the 568 Presidents Group, collaborated on aid formulas under a 1994 federal antitrust exemption," the report said. "The exemption applied only if schools engaged in need-blind admissions."

There are 17 "elite" institutions named in the lawsuit, most from Ivy Leagues.

While the students are seeking damages of $685 million, under U.S. antitrust laws, that amount would automatically triple to $2 billion.

The universities have sought to have the cases dismissed, saying they've spent millions in financial aid on students.


Read the full report here.

'Not going to cooperate': Border state sheriffs throw wrench in Trump’s deportation plan

Carl Gibson,

 AlterNet
December 17, 2024 

U.S. Customs and Border Protection, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

President-elect Donald Trump's advisers have been hoping county sheriffs in border states will assist with the incoming administration's mass deportation campaign. But several sheriffs are already publicly promising to not lift a finger.

According to a Tuesday report in WIRED magazine, Trump's top immigration advisors like Tom Homan and Stephen Miller have been having conversations with several far-right sheriffs who have expressed an interest in helping Immigration and Customs Enforcement remove immigrants from the United States.

But that effort is unlikely to pick up traction, both for legal reasons and because other sheriffs have said they already have their hands full and don't want to take on more work.

Currently, ICE's 287(g) program allows for state and local law enforcement to collaborate with ICE in its efforts "to protect the homeland through the arrest and removal of noncitizens."

However, this does not include sheriffs themselves rounding up and detaining undocumented immigrants. Additionally, no federal funding has been appropriated to any sheriffs' offices that help ICE, meaning just 125 out of 3,081 sheriff's offices in the U.S. have signed up.

And Yuma County, Arizona Sheriff Leon Wilmot told WIRED that the Supreme Court has already established that enforcing immigration law is outside the jurisdiction of local police departments and sheriffs' offices.

READ MORE: 'Quickly get into problems': These 3 obstacles could slow down Trump's mass deportations

"[T]hat's not our realm of responsibility," Wilmot said. "If we wanted to do immigration law, we would go work for Border Patrol."

The push for sheriffs to assist the incoming administration has been led by retired sheriff Tom Mack, who is the head of the Constitutional Sheriffs and Peace Officers Association. Mack told WIRED he's been exchanging voice and text messages with Homan about getting more sheriffs involved with deportations.

Homan has previously promised to build "the biggest deportation force this country has ever seen." But Wilmot said "no one listens to" Mack, that he "hasn't been a sheriff in a long time" and that he "pushes his own agenda."

Santa Cruz County Sheriff David Hathaway, who is a Democrat, told WIRED that he wasn't invited to an event Homan hosted in his state last month, even though Hathaway's jurisdiction includes some of the nation's biggest ports of entry. He added that he would refuse any calls to help the Trump administration deport immigrants, as it would hurt his standing in his county.

"I'm not going to cooperate, because 95 percent of the residents of the town where I live, where my county is, are Hispanic,” Hathaway said. “I'm not going to go checking the documents of practically every single person in my county to determine their immigration status, because that would create distrust between law enforcement and all the people in my community."

READ MORE: 'Wait until 2025': Trump's former ICE chief makes chilling promise at far-right conference

The sheriffs bucking calls to assist with mass deportations even include some of Trump's biggest supporters in the law enforcement community. Livingston County, Michigan Sheriff Mike Murphy — who hosted a pro-Trump rally in a building owned by the sheriff's office — told the outlet that he isn't interested in using county resources to help with federal immigration law enforcement.

"I still have a county to do police work in,” Murphy said. “Just because the president says, 'Hey, go out and round them up,' that is not all of a sudden gonna move to the top of my priority list. If somebody's house is getting broken into, that's my priority. If somebody's involved in an injury crash and they're laying on the side of the road, that's my priority. I've got cases that are open.”

Other border state sheriffs who have come out against calls to help the Trump administration round up migrants include Val Verde County, Texas Sheriff Joe Frank Martinez and Brewster County, Texas Sheriff Ronny Dodson. According to Dodson, the incoming Trump administration giving sheriffs the authority to jail migrants could "break" county law enforcement.

"I’m not gonna let the government tell me what to do in my job," Dodson said.

Click here to read WIRED's report in full.

Scientists artificially inseminate leopard sharks to boost diversity

By AFP
December 16, 2024


A leopard shark is released back into the aquarium after being artificially inseminated with wild leopard shark sperm at Sydney Aquarium - Copyright AFP Saeed KHAN

A black-and-cream leopard shark enters a hypnotic-like state of relaxation as scientists at Sydney Aquarium carefully roll her onto her back in a small pool.

The shark, named Zimba, is one of the first captive leopard sharks in the world to be artificially inseminated with the sperm of wild sharks in an attempt to build populations around the world.

If the process is successful, Zimba’s shark pups will be sent to the Raja Ampat region in Indonesia, where the local population is on the brink of extinction due to unsustainable fishing practices and habitat destruction.

Artificial insemination allows sharks that would never normally interact to breed and increase genetic diversity, said SEA LIFE Australia and New Zealand regional coordinator Laura Simmons.

Simmons hopes that eventually the leopard shark population will be “genetically viable and capable of maintaining a self-sustaining population in the wild”.

That could take years, she told AFP, but “this is one step closer to where we need to be”.

The procedure is one part of a larger worldwide leopard shark breeding programme, known as StAR, that involves more than 60 conservation groups, aquariums and government agencies.

Globally, about 37 percent of oceanic shark and ray species, including the leopard shark, are now listed as either endangered or critically endangered by the International Union for Conservation of Nature, a global database for threatened species.



– ‘Species belongs outside’ –



Australia’s leopard shark populations remain plentiful and of least concern, and scientists hope they can help bolster the numbers in other regions.

Back at the Sydney Aquarium pool, Ocean Park Hong Kong’s chief veterinarian Paolo Martelli inserts a metal tube filled with the sperm of wild leopard sharks into Zimba’s underside.

The shark is still in a natural state called tonic immobility — a relaxed condition that allows scientists to work without getting injured.

The whole process takes a matter of minutes and everyone claps and cheers once it is over. Zimba is flipped back onto her stomach and swims around the pool as if nothing happened.

Martelli is using a technique he developed and has successfully used on other species, but this is the first time it has been used on leopard sharks.

“It’s not straightforward,” he said.

Martelli and his team collected the sperm of wild leopard sharks off the coast of Queensland — which has a large shark population — and brought the precious cargo to Sydney.

Only three of four samples taken survived the journey.

“This species belongs in outside habitats, not in a museum,” Martelli said.

But as the shark’s habitat declines, scientists must give a “helping hand” in protecting and conserving this valuable species, he added.

“It is safe to say that sharks have suffered a lot in the last century.”

Gerry Adams to stand civil trial in 2026 over IRA bombs


By AFP
December 16, 2024

Former Irish republican leader Gerry Adams will defend himself at the civil trial 

- Copyright GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA/AFP Andrew Harnik

Politician Gerry Adams, whose Sinn Fein party was once the political wing of the Irish Republican Army, will stand trial in 2026 in a civil case brought by IRA bomb victims, England’s High Court ruled Monday.

The case will go to trial between February and June 2026 and the former republican leader will defend himself, it was confirmed at a case management hearing at London’s Royal Courts of Justice.

“Finally after five decades, for the first time Adams will appear in person in an English Court to be cross-examined by the victims of his alleged leadership of the IRA’s terror campaign,” said Matt Jury, a member of the law firm representing the victims.

The case claims that Adams “oversaw the indiscriminate bombing of civilians” during Northern Ireland’s Troubles, the decades-long sectarian conflict over British rule.

Mary Louise McDonald replaced Adams as Sinn Fein president in 2018, becoming the leftist party’s first leader not connected to the Troubles.

The three claimants are John Clark, a victim of the 1973 Old Bailey bombing; Jonathan Ganesh, a victim of the 1996 London Docklands bombing; and Barry Laycock, a victim of the 1996 Arndale shopping centre bombing in Manchester.

They are suing Adams for nominal damages of £1 ($1.26) in a trial that is expected to last seven days.

During the three decades of unrest in Northern Ireland more than 3,500 people were killed until a landmark peace deal in 1998.

IRA bombings over that time targeted sites in Northern Ireland and the UK mainland, including high-profile locations such as the Houses of Parliament, 10 Downing Street, Oxford Street, Harrod’s, Hyde Park and Regent’s Park.

Adams went from being the IRA’s political voice, reviled by the British government and Northern Ireland’s unionists, to playing peacemaker to bring violence to an end.

More recently he has become an anti-austerity figurehead in Ireland and cultivated a more kindly image on social media, often posting about dogs, and has even published a recipe book.

A US farm breeds pigs for human kidney transplants


By AFP
December 17, 2024

Young genetically altered pigs walk past a ball in their pens at the Revivicor research farm in Blacksburg, Virginia on November 20, 2024 - Copyright AFP Andrew Caballero-Reynolds
Ulysse BELLIER

On a farm in the southern US state of Virginia, David Ayares and his research teams are breeding genetically modified pigs to transplant their organs into human patients.

Revivicor, the biotech company Ayares leads, is at the forefront of xenotransplantation research — the implantation of animal organs into humans — which aims to solve a chronic organ shortage that has thousands of Americans dying each year.

It was on this farm that Revivicor bred a pig whose kidney was recently transplanted into patient Towana Looney, according to an announcement made Tuesday by a New York hospital.

“It’s just an exciting time,” Ayares told AFP during a recent tour of the research farm.

The pigs are genetically modified to make their organs less likely to be rejected by patients’ immune systems.

“These pigs are not typical farm pigs,” said Ayares, as he cradled several pink piglets in his arms. “Millions of dollars have gone into the production of these genetics, and so they’re very high-value animals.”

The kidneys may one day sell for $1 million.

For more than 20 years, Revivicor in Blacksburg, Virginia has been conducting research to turn pig-to-human transplantation from science fiction to life-saving medical care.

In the United States alone, more than 100,000 people are on the transplant list and thousands die every year waiting, most often for a kidney, according to health authorities.



– ‘Little room for recognition’ –



Since 2021, several US surgeons have successfully transplanted genetically modified pig kidneys and hearts into humans, most of them supplied by Revivicor. Another key provider is the biotech firm eGenesis.

The first trials were carried out on brain-dead people, before the procedure was attempted on a handful of seriously ill patients.

While those patients died within weeks of the operation, the animal organs they received were not immediately rejected by their immune systems, which scientists hailed as a promising sign.

In a dark laboratory several kilometers away from the research farm, Todd Vaught, head of cell biology at Revivicor, has his eyes glued to a microscope.

With a pipette, he pierces a pig egg to remove its DNA and replace it with cells that have “all the instructions needed to make a genetically modified pig.”

A few hours later, the edited eggs are implanted into sows. Four months later new litters are born.

While xenotransplantation research is happening in various parts of the world, the United States is a clear leader in the field.

French sociologist Catherine Rene criticized what she characterizes as mistreatment of the pigs as merely vessels for organs destined for humans.

“Ultimately, there is very little room for recognition of the donor animal, of the gift that is made,” Rene told AFP.

Ayares disagreed.

“Hundreds of millions of pigs are used every year as food,” Ayares said. “I would argue that this is a much higher calling for that pig organ to be used for transplantation.”



– Million dollar price tag –



The first line of pigs developed by Revivicor carried only one genome edit meant to deactivate the animal’s production of a substance that causes people to reject the transplanted organ.

The second has 10 modified genes, six of which come from human DNA in order to improve biological compatibility.

It is with this second line of pigs that United Therapeutics (UT), Revivicor’s parent company, is thinking big.

In March, the publicly traded company opened another medical facility near Blacksburg where, in a brand-new operating room, pigs’ kidneys will be removed and prepared for transfer to the receiving patient.

The rest of the pig will be discarded.

Spokesman Dewey Steadman said the facility has “rigorous controls” in place to prevent any infection of the 200 animals being kept there.

The company’s goal is to begin several years of clinical studies on patients in 2025 and, if the Food and Drug Administration gives the green light, to begin full-scale production of genetically modified pigs in 2029.

UT is already planning to invest billions of dollars into building more and bigger facilities.

The company is considering selling kidneys for around $1 million each, which is close to the cost of 10 years of dialysis for patients in the United States, according to Steadman.

Making pig kidneys available to a large number of patients will not be an easy task in the United States, which lacks universal health care.

But Ayares hopes that with health insurance, “the patient is not bearing a million dollars… price tag.”

Something in the air: Most polluted city in the UK revealed


By Dr. Tim Sandle
December 17, 2024
DIGITAL JOURNAL

Princes Square, Wolverhampton - the most polluted city in the UK. Image by Steven J at the English-language, CC3 .0

A new study has named Wolverhampton the most polluted city in the UK with the highest level of air pollution and absolute absence of cleanliness. Britain’s capital and the largest city, London rounds out the top 5 with significant air quality challenges and high water pollution levels.

The firm Waste Direct constructed the list of the most polluted cities in the UK through a survey-based approach. Key metrics included air pollution with the highest given weight, drinking water pollution and inaccessibility data, and the percentage of dissatisfaction with garbage disposal, as well as the level of dirtiness and tidiness.

Additional metrics such as noise and light pollution, water pollution, and dissatisfaction level of green spaces and parks were also considered contributing to composite score calculation.

The data was taken from Numbeo and World Population Review to create a deep analysis of urban environmental challenges. The detailed data was provided to Digital Journal for review.

The outcomes were, in terms of the top ten worst urban offenders:Wolverhampton
Coventry
Portsmouth
Manchester
London
Bath
Birmingham
Southampton
Sunderland
Luton

As indicated above, Wolverhampton tops the list as the UK’s most polluted city with a composite score of 80. The city reports maximum dirtiness and untidiness levels with an absolute score of 100 and significant air pollution, and high garbage disposal dissatisfaction rates. Wolverhampton’s high noise pollution at 83 and poor green space accessibility ensure its position as the UK’s dirtiest city.

Coventry ranks second among the least clean UK cities, scoring 69. The city shows concerning levels across all metrics, particularly with notable dirtiness ratings at 61. Its high noise pollution level and growing dissatisfaction over garbage disposal services highlight the city’s problems with urban environmental quality.

Portsmouth holds third place with a composite score of 68. The city faces issues with urban cleanliness, scoring high in dirtiness and untidiness. Portsmouth’s garbage disposal dissatisfaction rate of 55 and moderate air quality issues contribute to its high ranking among the most polluted cities.

Manchester secures fourth position with a score of 67. The city has high dirtiness ratings at 61 and troubling air quality metrics at 51. With a population of over 395,000, Manchester’s dense urban environment leads to regular challenges, mainly seen in its poor waste management satisfaction scores.

London ranks fifth with a composite score of 63. Being the largest city with over 7.5 million residents, London’s position is ensured due to its high air pollution level at 63, significant noise and light pollution, and moderate water quality issues.

Bath takes sixth place with a score of 63 and Birmingham, England’s second-largest city, ranks seventh with a score of 62. Southampton holds the eighth position with a score of 61. The city’s cleanliness issues are mostly connected with its water pollution levels at 50 and lack of proper air quality.

Sunderland comes ninth place, scoring 59. The city’s biggest problems are its poor water quality and high cleanliness issues at 75. Luton completes the top 10 polluted cities list with a score of 58. The city’s environmental problems result from its poor urban cleanliness and concerning noise pollution levels. Luton faces challenges with garbage management and water quality while having relatively better air quality compared to other cities in the ranking.