CHUTZPAH
As GOP attacks Bidens, Rep. Jamie Raskin promises report on ‘foreign government emoluments’ to Trump

Shant Shahrigian, New York Daily News
Sun, August 13, 2023 

Drew Angerer/Getty Images North America/TNS


Amid GOP howls over the Hunter Biden case, lawmakers are scrutinizing former President Donald Trump’s business dealings during his time in office, Rep. Jamie Raskin said Sunday.

The Maryland Democrat promised a new report on cash that foreign governments gave to Trump businesses, though he did not go into detail.

“We’re going to release a report about all of the foreign government emoluments — millions of dollars — we can document that Donald Trump pocketed at the hotels, at the golf courses (and) business deals when he was president and that his family got,” Raskin told ABC’s “This Week.”

The comment came amid a series of questions to Raskin about GOP and federal probes of Hunter Biden. Republicans in Congress have been investigating whether the troubled son inappropriately benefited from his powerful father, among other accusations that remain unproven.

Raskin said his Republican counterparts should look closer to home.

“During the Trump administration, we saw the development of a completely new public philosophy, which is that government is not an instrument of the common good in the public interest,” he said.

While a frequent news subject during the Trump years, the former president’s business dealings with foreign governments drew no legal consequences. In 2021, the Supreme Court ended lawsuits accusing the president of taking illegal payments, saying they were irrelevant since he was out of office.

But Raskin accused Republicans including Rep. James Comer of Kentucky of having a double standard by probing the Bidens while ignoring Trump and his family.

“We have said, let the justice system run its course. They’re not saying that about Donald Trump,” Raskin remarked.

While Trump has been one of the loudest voices accusing the Bidens of corruption, he faces a swath of unprecedented prosecutions himself.

On top of his existing multiple indictments, a Georgia district attorney is reportedly set to present evidence in an election interference case against Trump to a grand jury this week after witnesses give testimony.

Raskin compares Trump White House to Putin’s Kremlin

BY LAUREN SFORZA - 08/13/23

Greg Nash
Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) is seen during a House National Security, the Border, and Foreign Affairs Subcommittee hearing to discuss Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena on Wednesday, July 26, 2023.


Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) on Sunday compared a “public philosophy” he says was developed by former President Trump’s administration to a model similar to that of Russian President Vladimir Putin.

“During the Trump administration, we saw the development of a completely new public philosophy, which is that government is not an instrument of the common,” Raskin said on “This Week,” ABC’s Sunday show. “Government is an instrument for private self-enrichment for the guy who gets in, his family, for his private businesses.”

Raskin noted that he does not approve of this model, saying “That’s what Putin is doing.” He called on House Oversight and Accountability Committee Chairman James Comer (R-Ky.) to conduct an analysis of what the laws should be about moneymaking in government.

Raskin was responding to a series of questions in which he was asked whether foreign business dealings by President Biden’s son, Hunter Biden, concerned him at all. He deflected and instead addressed his concerns about former President Trump and his son-in-law, Jared Kushner, during the previous administration.How a start-up is using AI to write fundraising emailsGOP sees turnout disaster without Trump

“And I’m concerned, not just about public officials like Donald Trump and Jared Kushner, but even family members who go along for the ride, and I’ve been begging my colleague, Chairman Comer, for us to do a serious analysis of what the laws should be about moneymaking,” he said.

Trump’s business dealings during his time as president had been the subject of investigations by House Democrats. Raskin criticized Republicans for their focus only on the Biden family business dealings and not of the president of their own party. Comer is leading the congressional investigations into Biden family business dealings.

“And we’re gonna release a report about all of the foreign government emoluments — millions of dollars — we can document that Donald Trump pocketed at the hotels at the golf courses to business deals when he was president and that his family got,” Raskin added. “But they’ve not laid a glove on Joe Biden. As president, they haven’t been able to show any criminal corruption on his part — what they’ve got is Hunter Biden.

The West’s ‘see no evil’ approach to Serbia’s Vucic is destabilizing the Balkans

Analysis by Christian Edwards, CNN
Sun, August 13, 2023 

When Russia invaded Ukraine, the United States and European Union accelerated their pivot towards Serbia. Rather than juggling the contradictory demands of pluralistic and fractious Balkan states, Western capitals focused the bulk of their efforts on a singular target.

Their policies had two aims. First, to bring Serbia into the Western fold, away from Russia. Second, to allow their respective administrations to focus more fully on supporting Ukraine.

Traditionally one of Moscow’s closest allies in Europe, Belgrade has long tried to tread the line between its historical ties to Russia and a potential future of closer European integration. Western diplomats have sought to pull Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic from the orbit of his Russian counterpart, President Vladimir Putin, by pledging a swifter path to EU membership while simultaneously warning of isolation if they break rank.

But, 18 months on, some observers say the current approach has been all carrot and no stick, and as a result is failing to achieve both of its aims.

Serbia has refused to participate in all rounds of EU sanctions against Putin. And Serbia has continued to pursue its own interests in the region with diminishing accountability, stirring conflicts abroad to distract from discontent at home, safe in the knowledge they will not be rebuked in the West.

The effects of this have been felt most keenly in Kosovo, which achieved independence from Serbia in 2008, after the bloody Balkan wars of the 1990s. But Belgrade – and many ethnic Serbs in Kosovo’s north – still refuse to recognize its sovereignty, straining relations between the neighbors.

CNN spoke with several experts, as well as locals in Serbia and the north of Kosovo, who are rankled by US and EU attempts to court Serbia into the Euro-Atlantic community, and contend that their continued pursuit of the policy risks alienating democratic allies and increasing security concerns in the region.

A Kosovar local waves a US flag as thousands celebrated the announcement of the independence of Kosovo, in February 2008. - Daniel Mihailescu/AFP/Getty Images/File
‘A Russian Trojan horse’

Western governments have long treated Serbia as the indispensable Balkan voice, sometimes at the expense of more peripheral players, some observers say.

“Their belief is that Serbia is the Balkan state, as they see it. Serbia is the one that, if you can bring them on side – whatever that might mean – everything will be easier,” Jasmin Mujanovic, a political scientist specializing in the Western Balkans, told CNN.

While consecutive US administrations have tried to bring Vucic and his Serbian Progressive Party (SNS) “in from the cold,” these efforts “have become especially brazen” since the war began in Ukraine, Mujanovic said, and have not achieved the US’ objectives.

“They seem to believe that they are bringing Serbia closer towards the EU and towards NATO and towards Western thinking and away from Russia… But that isn’t something I would say is being reflected on the ground,” Alicia Kearns, a British lawmaker and chair of the parliamentary Foreign Affairs Select Committee, told CNN.

Vucic has long maintained a cozy relationship with his Russian counterpart, Putin. Speaking after a National Security Council meeting in February, Vucic justified his decision not to sanction Russia because it was “the only country not to have imposed sanctions against us in the 1990s.”

“They supported our territorial integrity in the United Nations,” he added, referring to Russia’s refusal to recognize Kosovo’s independence. Serbia lost control of Kosovo after a NATO bombing campaign in 1999, which ended the massacre of ethnic Albanians – who make up more than 90% of Kosovo’s population – by Serb forces.

Serbia's Aleksandar Vucic, left, and Kosovo's Prime Minister Albin Kurti, right, at an EU-facilitated meeting in Brussels, Belgium, on May 2, 2023. - EU Council/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images

Despite EU-supported efforts toward energy transition, Serbia remains heavily dependent on Russia, having sold a majority stake of its oil company to Russia state-owned giant Gazprom.

The result is that, despite Serbia’s professed hopes to join the EU, Vucic has continued to walk a tightrope between Moscow and western powers. Though he has joined UN resolutions condemning Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Serbia’s leader has shown little willingness to join western sanctions.

In April, the Serbian government denied reports that it sold weapons and ammunition to Ukraine, after a leaked Pentagon document emerged claiming otherwise. Serbia said at the time that it maintained its policy of neutrality, though some Western officials took the reports as proof that their policy was working.

Several analysts told CNN that Serbia has had to do very little to win praise from American and European officials, and that in reality Vucic has left a trail of broken promises.

“When we had his [Vucic’s 2020] re-election, we were all told, just wait until after the election, you’ll suddenly see that he becomes very Western- and European- oriented,” said Kearns. “It didn’t happen.”

“We were told he would join sanctions and show that he is genuinely on our side. It didn’t happen. We were told he wouldn’t get closer to Russia. He signed a security agreement with Putin in September. Time after time, he laughs in the face of the West. And when I ask Western officials, ‘why are you so determined to let Vucic play you?’ they say he is the best option,” said Kearns.

Kearns has been one of the few Western figures to criticize Serbia publicly. But it has come at a cost. After she spoke to CNN, Vucic issued an apparent threat to her during an address on state television, claiming that “if the government of Great Britian is not willing to react” to her criticisms of Serbia, “We will be forced to react.”

Given such behavior, some question whether the whole project of Serbian integration is viable, under its current government.

“Assuming we somehow miraculously bring Serbia into the EU, with this sort of regime, you are practically bringing another Russian Trojan horse into the EU, like you have in the shape of [Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor] Orban,” Majda Ruge, a Balkan expert at the European Council on Foreign Relations, told CNN.

“Yes, you may affect enlargement, but you’re certainly not going to neutralize Russian influence in the region – you’re just going to import it into the EU.”
Kosovo and the rule of law

The effects of the West’s forgiving approach to Belgrade are felt most keenly in Kosovo, which has depended on Western support since declaring independence. While more than 100 countries recognize its sovereignty, Serbia does not, viewing it instead as a breakaway state. Attempts to normalize relations between the two countries – overseen by the US and EU – have been fraught and occasionally violent.

The fiercest flashpoint came after mayoral elections Kosovo’s four northern municipalities in May. These elections often pass without fanfare: Around 90% of the population in this region are ethnic Serbs, and so, under ordinary circumstances, they elect ethnic Serbs as their mayors.

But these were not ordinary circumstances. In November, mayors from the Belgrade-backed Serb List party, which dominates the four municipalities, simultaneously resigned. They were followed by ethnic Serb police officers, administrative staff and judges in the region.

Their resignations triggered new elections, due to be held in December. Serb List said it would not participate in the elections, after Serbs in the region boycotted them, with Vucic’s full support. But, given the tensions, Kosovo agreed to postpone the elections until April – a decision that was praised by the Quint, an informal group comprising the US, UK, France, Germany and Italy.

With Kosovo Serbs not participating, ethnic Albanian candidates ran unchallenged. Election officials said only around 1,500 people voted across the four municipalities – a turnout of just 3.5%. Some mayors were elected with scarcely more than 100 votes.

But while the elections were by no means representative, for Kosovo’s Prime Minister Albin Kurti, the issue had come to represent nothing less than the rule of law itself.

“We have four mayors whose legitimacy is low. But, nonetheless, there is no one who is more legitimate than them. We have to have the rule of law. We are a democratic republic,” Kurti told CNN in May.

However, the prime minister’s stance has been criticized as hardline and uncompromising. His allies accused him of forcing entry to the mayor’s offices on May 26, when many were surrounded by protesters, against explicit instructions.

“The US did tell Kurti – and this is where he’s at fault – they told him not to install them in the municipal buildings. And this is where Kurti ignored the specific direction,” said Edward Joseph, a foreign policy lecturer at Johns Hopkins University who served for a dozen years in the Balkans, including with NATO.

A Pristina government official told CNN that they did not want to “surrender” official government buildings to protesters. “The mayors entered their offices… Serbia had urged Serbs to boycott the elections. Now they wanted no one to enter those buildings. But then, the question is: If the mayors should not enter the building, who should?”

But while Kurti may have taken an uncoordinated action, the response to this was not inevitable. The worst of the violence came not on the day the mayors entered their offices, but three days later, in the town of Zvecan – when the mayor was not even in the building.

The violence was extreme. Dozens of NATO peacekeepers were injured after they were attacked by ethnic Serbs. Some injuries were severe: Three Hungarian soldiers were shot; one had his leg amputated.

Kurti told CNN these were not “peaceful protesters,” but a “fascist militia” known to operate in Kosovo’s north, “who are being paid and ordered by Belgrade.”

The Serbian government did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

NATO peacekeepers clash with local Kosovo Serb protesters in Zvecan, May 29, 2023. - Laura Hasani/Reuters

Others agree with Kurti. Kearns told CNN that British troops stationed in Kosovo had found “weapons caches hidden in churches and ambulances by Serb militia in the north of Kosovo. We heard about grenades outside people’s doorsteps if they refuse to support Serb militia.”

Despite this, much of the diplomatic response has focused on Kurti’s actions, for which Kosovo has paid a heavy price. Since the fallout from the elections, Kosovo has been disinvited from joint military exercises with the US, excluded from European infrastructure projects and slapped with sanctions that the Kosovar Business Alliance says could cost its economy €500 million ($550 million) by the end of this year.

Kearns criticized the “unbalanced” response from the West, saying it ignored the true cause of the troubles. “The start of the crisis was the Serbian government committing foreign interference in domestic Kosovar affairs, where they told Kosovar Serbs not to vote in the local elections. That is foreign interference,” she said.

Kurti has tried to proclaim Kosovo’s sovereignty against the twin forces of foreign interference and organized violence, to which, according to Mujanovic, the US and EU have responded: “No. That is not appropriate in these circumstances.”
‘The Zelensky of the Balkans’

Given Kosovo’s reliance on Western backing, some fear Kurti’s intransigence is frustrating his allies and weakening his country. Some are calling for a complete change of tack.

“He’s trying to be the Zelensky of the Balkans,” Shqiprim Arifi, mayor of the southern Serbian region of Presevo, told CNN. “He is using rhetorically, and in a populist way, the argumentation of the rule of law. He wants to be the Zelensky of the Albanians.”

Serbia’s Presevo Valley represents the flipside of the north of Kosovo. Whereas Kosovo’s north is populated mostly by ethnic Serbs in an Albanian-majority country, the Presevo Valley is populated mostly by ethnic Albanians in a Serb-majority country.

The best way to improve the situation, Arifi said, is for Kurti to do as Western allies demand: Work to create as “Association of Serb Municipalities” (ASM) in the north of Kosovo.

Kosovo Prime Minister Albin Kurti during an interview at his office in Pristina, August 24, 2022. - Ben Kilb/Bloomberg/Getty Images/File

Kurti has been accused of preventing the implementation of self-governing municipalities for Serbs, as outlined in the 2013 Brussels Agreement aimed at normalizing relations between the Balkan neighbors. Under the agreement, Serbia could create the ASM in northern Kosovo, which would operate under Kosovo’s legal system, with Kosovar police remaining the only law enforcement authority.

A decade on, these municipalities have not been created, leaving disputes to fester over the degree of autonomy for Kosovo Serbs.

But there are doubts as to whether this solution – now being forcefully pushed by the US and EU – will ease tensions.

“Trust me, it won’t be the best solution,” Dusan, a Serb living in Leposavic municipality, told CNN. “Maybe, in the first couple of months, it will be a relief. Maybe, ‘Oh look, we finally got something.”

But it would be a false dawn. “From an economic aspect, our lives will not be improved, but it will be worse,” he said, since residents would have to start paying for services and taxes currently covered by Kosovo’s government. CNN is withholding Dusan’s real name, since he feared that his comments could affect his livelihood.

There are also concerns that the ASM could beckon more geopolitical tensions.

“We don’t know what these municipalities will be,” said Kearns. “Will it just be that the local municipalities are responsible for their own water and electricity and taxes? Or is it that it is going to be a new Republika Srpska? The reality is, I don’t think anyone wants another Republika Srpska.”

Republika Srpska, one of the two entities comprising Bosnia and Herzegovina, proclaimed independence in 1992 and was formally recognized under the Dayton Agreement of 1995. In recent months, its pro-Russian President Milorad Dodik has tried to pave the way for its secession from Bosnia.

Republika Srpska President Milorad Dodik at his office in Banja Luka, Bosnia and Herzegovina, January 19, 2022. - Oliver Bunic/Bloomberg/Getty Images

In June, Republika Srpska lawmakers voted to suspend rulings by Bosnia’s constitutional court, in a move described by experts as “legal secession” and a grave contravention of the Dayton Agreement. The US condemned the move, saying it threatened Bosnia’s sovereignty.

“The folks in Pristina and Kurti have made it very, very clear that they see in the autonomous municipalities a new Republika Srpska. And they don’t see in that model a solution for Kosovo. They see a new version, a new generation of crisis for Kosovo, and ultimately the region as a whole,” said Mujanovic.
The wrong horse?

Throughout the recent months of tensions, the US and EU have continually reiterated their commitment to the cause of bringing Vucic on side. But Serbia has acted with increasing abandon, representing what Kearns called “a failure of deterrence diplomacy.”

One damaging episode came in Ohrid, North Macedonia, in March when, after months of negotiations brokered by the US and EU, Serbia and Kosovo finally accepted a bilateral agreement aimed at normalizing relations between the two countries. But, while this was heralded as a breakthrough, Vucic left the negotiations without having signed the document, claiming in a TV address that he was unable to do so: “I have excruciating pain in my right hand… that pain is expected to continue for four years.”

Vucic speaking at Ohrid, North Macedonia, March 18, 2023. - Boris Grdanoski/AP

Another came when Serbian authorities detained three Kosovo police officers, which it claimed were “deep inside the territory of central Serbia” and preparing to commit “an act of terrorism.” But Kosovo insisted that the officers had been “kidnapped” within Kosovo’s borders and that Serbia had committed and “act of aggression.”

The US and EU were slow to respond to this incident. KFOR, NATO’s Kosovo Force, issued a statement 48 hours after the officers were reported missing. The US issued a statement three days later, claiming that the arrests were made on “spurious charges.”

Joseph told CNN that the Serbian account of events was hard to believe – and that the wording of the US statement suggested their officials likely weren’t buying it, either. “If the US were genuinely unsure about whether the Kosovo police were in Serbia, then why use such a categorical term [as “spurious”], which pre-empts the purview and judgement of the Serbian court?”

And yet Serbia was not punished for the detentions. The officers’ release was secured two weeks later – not by Western allies, but by Viktor Oban.

After such episodes, Joseph told CNN that the “see no evil” approach to Vucic’s regime may be starting to crack.

“The question here is: Who in the Biden administration still believes that Vucic is this partner?” he said, pointing to the recent sanctioning of Aleksandar Vulin, director of Serbia’s intelligence service, as evidence that the Biden administration “is no longer captive to fear and illusion about Vucic.”

But whether this translates into a change of policy is unclear.

Red Star fans display a tifo with the Serbian flag, a tank T-84 and an inflammatory message, July 26, 2023. - BETAPHOTO/SIPA/Shutterstock

In the meantime, Vucic has raised the stakes. In response to the sanctioning of Vulin, Vucic banned arms exports from Serbia for 30 days, claiming “everything must be prepared in case of aggression against the Republic of Serbia.”

“He’s basically saying ‘we’re going to go into conflict, we have to stop all of the weapon exports right now, because we need it for our national security.’ He’s literally threatening war. I’ve never seen him so explicit before,” said Ruge of the ECFR.

And the president’s message has been taken up by some Serbian citizens. At Red Star Belgrade soccer match last month, nationalist Serb fans held up a banner reading “When the army returns to Kosovo.” Vucic attended the match, according to local media.

“The situation is clear who the bully of the Balkans still is,” Meliza Haradinaj, Kosovo’s former foreign minister, told CNN. “Time will prove that this ‘investment’ of appeasing Serbia will go in vain.”

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DESANTISLAND

Forced to fire undocumented workers, owner of landmark Florida restaurant seeks change

Mary Ellen Klas
Sun, August 13, 2023 at 3:30 AM MDT·9 min read
6.4k

Richard Gonzmart, the fourth-generation owner of the iconic Columbia Restaurant chain based in Tampa, says it’s time for politicians to start listening on immigration.

When federal immigration authorities arrived at his Sand Key restaurant in Clearwater to find outdated and noncompliant work documents for 19 of his employees, he was forced to fire them all — including seven people who had worked with his family for decades.

“With 2,000 employees, it becomes very difficult to monitor it,’’ Gonzmart said in an interview. “We think they’re legal but, when we had to check, we found seven people who have been with me 30 years — paying taxes, had children, grandchildren — and we were required to terminate them.”

Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials in Tampa would not comment on the case, and Gonzmart said he was still negotiating a resolution to the conflict. But the incident underscores the double scrutiny many businesses face as a new state law layers new immigration enforcement policies to existing federal rules in a way that is exacerbating worker shortages.

It’s a scenario that’s playing out across Florida with restaurants, construction companies and farms searching for workers as the political rhetoric over immigration is clanging up against a tight labor market and expanding population.

Gonzmart is the great-grandson of Casimiro Hernandez Sr., the founder of the historic Ybor City restaurant that is the chain’s anchor. Since its opening in 1905, the company has treated employees as part of the restaurant family, paying them above market wages and benefits, he said.

During the pandemic when the restaurant closed for two months, the company continued paying wages, 401(k) retirement plans, medical insurance and providing 9,000 meals a week to employees and their families. Gonzmart said he now wants stronger protections for migrants who have been here for years.

“A family business sometimes has to absorb a little bit of the burden and loss in order to provide for the people that make our business possible and a success,’’ Gonzmart said.

Tampa’s Columbia restaurant began serving bean soup and café Cubano in 1905. Now the Tampa flagship restaurant occupies an entire city block, seats 1,700 people, and has 15 dining rooms.

First the pandemic, then a labor squeeze

While the company rebounded from COVID-21 setbacks — exceeding sales from even its best year — he said it now finds itself in the throes of a statewide labor shortage that he believes was made worse by the implementation of Florida’s new immigration law.

“I’m very proud of Gov. DeSantis and everything he’s done. I really am,’’ said Gonzmart, a lifelong Republican. “It gave everybody confidence and that’s why so many people are moving here…But my concern is the governor putting in a law that says those who have an expired driver’s license cannot renew it because they’re no longer legal. They cannot work. Their papers are no longer legal.”

While much of the focus on Florida’s new immigration law has been on its impact on agriculture and construction companies, the state’s pivotal restaurant and lodging industry has drawn less attention, but the repercussions have been profound.

Florida’s new law orders private businesses with more than 25 workers to use the E-Verify platform to check their employees’ eligibility to work in the U.S. It makes it a felony to transport into the state people who enter the country illegally, and it compels hospitals who take Medicaid to ask a patient’s immigration status.

Gonzmart said that many of his employees were hired at a time when the state didn’t require companies to obtain documents showing proof of eligibility to work. Under Florida’s new law, state and local law enforcement officials are authorized to enforce federal immigration laws and, even before the state law took effect on July 1, he said, “many people with papers did not renew them because of the concern that the government was sending them back.”

As DeSantis increased his political focus on illegal immigration in Florida, federal authorities were taking an interest in Gonzmart, head of the 1905 Family of Restaurants – the new name for the former Columbia Restaurant Group, owners of the Columbia Restaurants, Ulele, Goody Goody Burgers, Casa Santo Stefano, Cha Cha Coconuts and Café Con Leche Ybor City.

Under federal law, ICE officials may obtain a warrant to inspect an employer’s documents either through E-Verify or I-9 forms, the documents used to determine an employee’s identity and eligibility to work.

Many of his employees, especially those working in the kitchens and “back of the house” are fathers, sons and brothers, Gonzmart said. So when immigration officials told him the I-9 forms of his most loyal employees were not in compliance and he would have to fire them, he resisted.

“I told them I wouldn’t let them go and they threatened to arrest me,’’ he recalled. “I said, ‘That’s a good idea. Why don’t you all come and arrest me? But let me know when, so I can have cameras here!’ Then, they sent me a $500,000 fine, and I let them go.”
Industry group says others struggle with staffing, too

A Homeland Security Investigations spokesperson said the agency would not comment on “ongoing/pending investigations” and pointed to a voluntary program run by the agency that helps employers identify fraudulent documents supplied by their employees.

Meanwhile, Gonzmart said the incident “almost put us out of business,’’ and while customer demand has rebounded from the pandemic, the inability to find enough new staff has forced him to suspend his catering services and reduce restaurant hours.

Carol Dover, president and CEO of the more than 10,000-member Florida Restaurant & Lodging Association, said that Gonzmart is not alone.

Hotels are not opening all rooms because they don’t have enough housekeepers, restaurants that used to be open for breakfast, lunch and dinner are now open for just lunch and dinner, and existing staff puts in extra hours, she said. “Everybody’s having to get creative with their thinking.”

The group holds its annual summit in Fort Lauderdale starting Tuesday.

John Horne, CEO of Anna Maria Oyster Bar and chair of the board for the Florida Restaurant & Lodging Association, held an informal poll Friday at a gathering of 85 hotel and restaurant members of the Suncoast Chapter of FRLA and, he said, none of them “had or heard of an ICE audit, nor do they want to.”

But, he said, the chilling effect of anti-immigration sentiment has had on Florida’s workforce is real.

“We have people that have been in our state for 20-plus years, that are scared,’’ he said. “They don’t know what to do because the emotion is ‘ICE is around the corner.’ Our state has just become toxic in that feeling of wanting to get rid of all the illegals.”

Horne predicts that when the winter tourism and travel season begins and employers can’t find employees who can pass the E-Verify screening, “it could cause a huge problem.”

He said the association is calling for “a pathway to help these people who’ve paid their taxes, had their social security withheld, become contributing members of our community.”


John Horne, CEO of Anna Maria Oyster Bar and chair of the board of the Florida Restaurant & Lodging Association.

An appeal to Biden for immigration reforms

On Tuesday, more than 30 Florida public officials asked President Joe Biden in a letter to expand immigration protections for migrants in the U.S. who are without pathways to permanent immigration or whose protections from deportation are at risk.

Horne and Dover agree the border needs to be closed to tamp down on the rising incidents of gangs smuggling in fentanyl and other drugs and criminals engaging in human trafficking but the answer involves addressing the need for workers now with a guest worker or essential worker program.

“We need our immigrants to work,’’ Dover said. But the solution is not amnesty for them, rather a system that allows them to be here as temporary workers, without voting rights and citizenship status but an opportunity to obtain a driver’s license and a promise to stay three to five years.

“They cannot have a criminal record,’’ she said. “But if they want to go to work, and help raise their family, they need to be able to do that, come out of hiding and pay taxes.”

“We are built on a land of migrants,’’ Horne added. “We need to help.”

Elizabeth Ricci, Tallahassee-based immigration lawyer with the law firm Rambana and Ricci, said she is getting calls from “worried employers” who want to help their immigrant employees navigate the immigration system but “the rules are so onerous, it can take up to five years for someone to establish permanent residency.”

“Employers are seeing that their workforce is scared,’’ Ricci said. “A lot of them have told me that their workers are leaving for other states. They try to help those who have not left get legalized, but it’s not a quick fix.”

Julia Maskivker, a Rollins College political science professor who studies labor and immigration trends, said that many of the policies advanced by DeSantis and lawmakers, including SB 1718, “have been designed with complete disregard for its economic consequences.”

Florida’s labor shortage is having an impact on the fact that Florida has the most stubborn inflation rate in the nation, she said.

“If agricultural fields are empty now, that tomato at Publix is going to be four times more expensive. It’s just a ripple effect,’’ Maskivker said.

Gonzmart wants policymakers to do more listening to the people “making the payrolls.”

“I just think politicians are listening too much to the far left or the far right, and it’s people in the middle that care about people,’’ he said. “Look at all of our staff over 118 years. It’s the story of all these hardworking immigrants that suffered, struggled — just as they are today, trying to find their children that opportunity to get an education, to be a valuable resident, a citizen of this country.

“We can’t let everyone in,’’ he adds. “But we have to look to help those who are here and who have been law abiding – to realize a dream.”

Miami Herald staff writer Syra Ortiz-Blanes contributed to this report.

Mary Ellen Klas can be reached at meklas@miamiherald.com and @MaryEllenKlas

South Koreans rally in Seoul against Japanese plans to release treated nuclear wastewater into sea

KIM TONG-HYUNG
Sat, August 12, 2023 

 The Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant sits in coastal towns of both Okuma and Futaba, as seen from the Ukedo fishing port in Namie town, northeastern Japan, on March 2, 2022. Anxious about Japan’s impending release of treated nuclear wastewater from the tsunami-damaged Fukushima nuclear power plant, hundreds of South Koreans marched in their capital on Saturday, Aug. 12, 2023. Protesters called for Tokyo to abandon the plans, and expressed anger toward Seoul for endorsing the discharge despite alleged food safety risks. (AP Photo/Hiro Komae, File)

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — Anxious about Japan’s impending release of treated nuclear wastewater from the tsunami-damaged Fukushima nuclear power plant, hundreds of South Koreans marched in their capital on Saturday. Protesters called for Tokyo to abandon the plans, and expressed anger toward Seoul for endorsing the discharge despite alleged food safety risks.

Saturday’s rally was the latest of weekslong protests since the International Atomic Energy Agency approved the Japanese discharge plans in July, saying that the process would meet international safety standards and pose negligible environmental and health impacts.

The safety of the wastewater release plans has also been advocated by the government of South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol, who in recent months has actively taken steps to repair long-strained ties with its fellow United States ally in the face of growing North Korean nuclear threats.

The Japanese government has said the wastewater release is set to start this summer, but it has not confirmed a specific date.

Wearing raincoats and holding signs that read, “We oppose the disposal of Fukushima’s contaminated water,” and, “No radioactive material is safe for the sea,” the demonstrators marched in light rain through the streets of downtown Seoul. The rallies were proceeding peacefully and there were no immediate reports of clashes or injuries.

South Korea has been trying to calm people’s fears of food contamination and environmental risks ahead of the release of Fukushima’s wastewater, including expanding radiation tests on seafood at the country’s major fish markets and even testing sand from its southern and western beaches. None of the tests have so far triggered safety concerns, Jeon Jae-woo, an official at the Ministry of Oceans and Fisheries, said during a briefing Friday.

Park Ku-yeon, first vice minister of the Office for Government Policy Coordination, said South Korea was hoping to wrap up working-level consultations with Japan next week over allowing South Korean experts to participate in the monitoring of the release process.

Liberal opposition lawmakers controlling the country’s National Assembly have accused Yoon’s government of putting people’s health at risk while trying to improve bilateral ties.

The Democratic Party said this week that it plans to file a complaint with the United Nations Human Rights Council to highlight the what it says are perils posed by the release of Fukushima’s wastewater, and question whether the IAEA properly reviewed the risks before greenlighting the discharge plans.

The party also urged Yoon to reverse his position and use a trilateral summit later this month with Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and U.S. President Joe Biden to state Seoul’s opposition to the wastewater release.

The safety of Fukushima’s wastewater has been a sensitive issue for years between the U.S. allies. South Korea and Japan have been working in recent months to repair relations long strained over wartime historical grievances to address shared concerns such as the North Korean nuclear threat and China’s assertive foreign policy.

A massive earthquake and tsunami in 2011 destroyed the Fukushima plant’s cooling systems, causing three reactors to melt and contaminate their cooling water.

Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings, which operates the facility, has been collecting, filtering, and storing the water in hundreds of tanks, which will reach their capacity in early 2024.

Japan first announced plans to discharge the treated water into the sea in 2018, saying the water will be further diluted by seawater before being released in a carefully controlled process that will take decades to complete.

The water is being treated with what’s called an Advanced Liquid Processing System, which is designed to reduce the amounts of more than 60 selected radionuclides releasable levels — except for tritium, which officials say is safe for humans if consumed in small amounts.

Junichi Matsumoto, the corporate officer in charge of treated water management for TEPCO, pledged in a news conference last month to conduct careful sampling and analysis of the water to make sure its release is safely carried out in accordance with IAEA standards.

NIMBY

The future of East Coast wind power could ride on this Jersey beach town

IS ABOUT PROPERTY VALUES

Kate Selig, (c) 2023, The Washington Post
Tue, August 8, 2023 

OCEAN CITY, N.J. - Known as "America's Greatest Family Resort," this beachside city now has a new distinction: It has become the epicenter of opposition to wind energy projects off New Jersey and the East Coast.

Residents of Ocean City and surrounding Cape May County, helped by an outside group opposed to renewable energy, are mobilizing to stop Ocean Wind 1, a proposal to build up to 98 wind turbines the size of skyscrapers off the New Jersey coast, which could power half a million homes.

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The future of East Coast wind energy could hang in the balance. If opponents succeed, they hope to create a template for derailing some 31 offshore wind projects in various stages of development and construction off the East Coast, a key part of President Biden's plan to reduce greenhouse emissions that are driving global climate change.


"We have a lot of leverage," said Frank Coyne, treasurer of Protect Our Coast NJ, which gathered over 500,000 signatures on a petition opposing proposed wind farms. "The objective is to hold them up and make the cost so overwhelming that they'll go home."

At issue in New Jersey are plans by Orsted, a Danish multinational corporation, to build Ocean Wind 1 - the largest offshore wind project to clear a key federal regulatory hurdle - about 15 miles off the state's Southern coast. The company has plans for a second project, already approved by state regulators.

New Jersey Democrats support both projects and see them as vital for meeting a state goal of reducing overall greenhouse gas emissions by 80 percent by 2050.

"At the end of the day, it's imperative for our state's future," Gov. Phil Murphy, a Democrat, said in an interview. "It's the right step to take."

While a federal agency approved Ocean Wind 1 in July, the company still needs other permits to start construction. Meanwhile, opponents have hired law firms now pursuing legal action, including a lawsuit filed in late July by Protect Our Coast NJ against Orsted and the state to block a tax break for the wind farm.

Founded after Orsted received its initial state approval in 2019, Protect Our Coast describes itself as a grass-roots group, made up of "residents, homeowners, business owners, fishermen and visitors" united to "Protect Our Coast from industrialization." But it isn't completely a homegrown organization. Early on, the group received support from the Delaware-based Caesar Rodney Institute, a think tank that opposes many offshore wind projects and has ties to fossil fuel interests.

As part of their campaigns, both the institute and Protect Our Coast NJ have focused on whale mortality, arguing that offshore wind harms the environment more than helps it.

But in linking East Coast whale deaths to wind project surveys, these groups contradict what leading marine mammal scientists have concluded. "At this point, there is no scientific evidence that noise resulting from offshore wind site characterization surveys could potentially cause mortality of whales," the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said in a statement.

Opponents have also spread images that overstate how visible the proposed turbines would be from the shore and shared false allegations that the federal government authorized Orsted to kill hundreds of marine animals.

When asked about tactics, Barbara McCall, a board member for Protect Our Coast, said the group stands behind the information on its website.

While pro-wind environmental groups and Protect Our Coast NJ find little common ground, they agree on one thing - the ongoing fight will be pivotal for U.S. offshore wind projects, including more planned in New Jersey.

On Friday, developers proposed an additional four wind farms off the state's coast. In an apparent nod to coastal opponents, two of them would be much further offshore than the pivotal Ocean Wind 1 project.

"New Jersey is an example for the entire country," said Anjuli Ramos-Busot, the director of the Sierra Club's New Jersey chapter and a supporter of offshore wind energy. "If we are not able to build this, it will make it harder for other wind projects to succeed."

Coyne put it more succinctly. "Whatever happens here is like a domino," he said. "Right up the coastline."

- - -

A county dependent on tourism

In the summertime, tourists flock to the sandy beaches of Ocean City, transforming Cape May County. While the county is home to a mere 95,000 people, it draws more than 10 million visitors every year, and many of them crowd into Ocean City, with its two-and-a-half mile boardwalk, lined with amusement rides, pizza parlors and salt water taffy vendors.

While New Jersey is a blue state, Cape May County is decidedly red, with 43% of voters registering Republican, 25% Democrat and the rest listed as "other." The county voted for Donald Trump - an opponent of wind power - by wide margins in both of his presidential runs.

The county's political apparatus, including state representatives, are largely united against Ocean Wind 1. On the federal level, Rep. Jeff Van Drew - a former Democrat who switched parties for the 2020 election - is working to stop the project.

On a recent Saturday morning, a group of offshore wind protesters crowded onto the beach in Ocean City. Hundreds joined hands and formed a chain at the edge of the water that stretched from the fishing pier down the sand. Defiant, they cheered "stop the windmills" before breaking apart.

Former city councilman Michael DeVlieger attended with his daughter, son and two nephews. "It's hard not to be emotional about it when it affects every aspect of our lives," he said of the project.

Protesters cite myriad reasons for their opposition. They fear the project will irreparably harm the local economy, marine life and their seaside views. They say that Gov. Murphy and the Biden administration have steamrolled their community. Contradicting analyses of state regulators, they claim the project will cause electricity bills to significantly increase, even though the state estimates that, when operational, the wind farm will cause bills to rise by only about $1.46 a month for residential customers.

While Protect Our Coast NJ is one of the largest groups mobilizing against the wind project - its Facebook group includes more than 20,000 members - others are also preparing for litigation battles.

Cape May County has assembled a formidable legal team, led by retired judge and county Republican chairman Michael Donohue, who the county has brought on as its special counsel.

The team includes Marzulla Law, headed by a powerhouse couple, one of whom succeeded James Watt as president of the Colorado-based Mountain States Legal Foundation, after Watt became an embattled Interior Secretary in the Reagan administration. More recently, the Marzullas have been representing groups fighting East Coast wind projects, including Save Long Beach Island and the Responsible Offshore Development Alliance, which is battling a wind farm under construction 15 miles off Martha's Vineyard.

It is not known how much the county is paying Donohue or the multiple law firms the county has assembled. County Commission Director Leonard Desiderio did not return a request for comment, and Donohue - who declined an interview request - said in a text the information is confidential, as did the Marzulla firm.

"We are positive, however, that all of what the County does will be a drop in the bucket when compared to what Orsted is spending . . . in an attempt to force the County to accept the project," Donohue wrote.

Not everyone in Cape May County actively opposes the project. When opponents staged their recent protest in Ocean City, local resident Andy Mortensen sat with his wife on the beach and poked fun at the assembly. "They're blocking my view more than the wind turbines will," said Mortensen, who added he hasn't yet taken a position on the wind project.

Further up the shore, Philip Pepe and Kathleen Hamilton Galante stayed clear of the protests. When the couple moved in 2019 to Brigantine - to the northeast of Atlantic City - no one was talking about offshore wind, they said. Now, they added, residents have rapidly adopted extreme views on the projects.

Pepe, a marine scientist by training, and Galante said they've paid a price for being publicly supportive of offshore wind. Galante said she has been especially targeted, including a time she was screamed at in a parking lot and another where she was told her support for offshore wind made her responsible for the whale deaths. She said she sometimes fears going out in public, and the couple is considering moving.

"It's really scary," Galante said. "People just can't come up and talk to you like a human being."

- - -

A new 'Save the Whales' movement

Since last winter, some conservative think tanks, law firms and politicians have seized upon a die-off of whales on the East Coast in their campaigns against wind energy.

On its website, the Marzulla firm has linked the "scope and intensity" of a proposed Massachusetts wind project to "the recent appearance of dead whales on Atlantic beaches, some of which are endangered species." While the Marzullas have long litigated against endangered species regulations on behalf of property owners, Roger Marzulla, in a statement, said the firm "has never opposed the listing of whales (or any other marine species) under the Endangered Species Act."

At a county public information session in June, Rep. Van Drew railed against the risks of a foreign developer controlling Ocean Wind 1 and attributed the deaths of the whales to offshore energy surveys. On his website, he says the offshore wind projects are being promoted "under the guise of stopping climate change."

Climate change is a real threat to the Jersey Shore, given that sea levels have risen at a rate more than double the global average, according to Rutgers University. But in their fight against the New Jersey wind project, Protect Our Coast leaders see the wind turbines as a bigger threat.

J. Timmons Roberts, an environmental studies and sociology professor at Brown University who has tracked campaigns across the country against offshore wind, said many local groups employ talking points that mirror those of dark money organizations opposed to renewable energy.

"People really need to know where the information is coming from," Roberts said. "It may be coming out of the mouths of local people, but a lot of it is being generated by the movement to stop the transition away from fossil fuels."

Roberts' researchers - building on work from DeSmog, journalists and others - have documented how money has flowed to organizations such as the Caesar Rodney Institute from fossil fuel interests and dark money groups - nonprofits that are not required to reveal their donors, but can be tracked through tax filings of groups that finance them.

At the center of the institute's anti-offshore wind campaign is David Stevenson, a former DuPont executive who served on Trump's transition team for the Environmental Protection Agency.

While some wind energy proponents have accused Stevenson of being the force behind Protect Our Coast NJ, he rejected that in a statement to The Post, denying that his organization had a hand in establishing or funding Protect Our Coast. Stevenson, however, acknowledged that Caesar Rodney initially served as a free "bank" for the group, receiving funds raised by Protect Our Coast and paying its bills with the money. He has also acknowledged his organization has received oil industry money, but says the amount is minor.

Stevenson said the institute has also provided Protect Our Coast with information on offshore wind. This included a report he assembled contending that three proposed New Jersey offshore wind projects would have emissions savings near zero - not the 7.2 million metric tons a year estimated by the state.

Despite the national forces at play, no one denies that Cape May County includes residents who genuinely fear the consequences of the proposed wind project - people like Robert Coste, who carefully chooses his words when he speaks about the project.

A 70-year-old, almost lifelong resident of Ocean City, he said he wants clean energy and cares about the environment. But he's become deeply concerned about the project the more he's read and heard from neighbors and politicians.

Gazing out to the sea, he leaned against a railing before sweeping his hands wide to indicate the scope of Ocean Wind 1.

"All this?" he asked, while shaking his head.

- - -

Wind farm construction underway

Nestled along the Delaware River in Paulsboro, about 65 miles northwest of Ocean City, a contractor for Orsted is welding, sandblasting and painting the steel tubes that construction crews will drive into the seafloor and serve as the base of Ocean Wind 1. The monopiles, as they are called, are nearly as long as a football field and wide enough to fit the fuselage of a 747 airplane. Outside, a 50-foot-tall American flag hangs on the EEW manufacturing facility, visible from the road.

While the project has faced mounting opposition, it was far different three years ago, when Orsted unveiled plans for the wind farm and the hundreds of jobs it could create. At an Ocean City council meeting that year, an Orsted representative praised the "warm welcome" and the "super progressive attitude" the company had received.

Now, despite the pending litigation, the company looks forward to breaking ground on onshore construction this fall. "We're confident," said Orsted spokesman Tory Mazzola.

In early July, the Biden administration signed off on Ocean Wind 1's plan for construction and operations - a regulatory milestone for the project. In the same month, Gov. Murphy approved a bill allowing Orsted to keep federal tax credits.

Yet while Orsted may seem to have the upper hand now, the East Coast has a long history of tripping up offshore wind endeavors. In 2017, a developer shelved the Cape Wind project, a plan for 130 turbines off the Massachusetts coast, after facing organized resistance from wealthy coastal homeowners. Those included members of the Kennedy family and William Koch, a billionaire who has contributed large sums to groups opposed to renewables and action on climate change.

Opponents of Ocean Wind say they are confident they can similarly prevail.

"We're not going to back down or give up," said Coyne of Protect Our Coast. "And that's the attitude you see growing."

The patriotic Virgin: How Mary's been marshaled for religious nationalism and military campaigns

Dorian Llywelyn, President, Institute for Advanced Catholic Studies, USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences

THE CONVERSATION
Sun, August 13, 2023 

A mural in Kyiv depicts the Virgin Mary cradling a U.S.-made anti-tank weapon, a Javelin, which is considered a symbol of Ukraine's defense against Russia. 

AP Photo/Efrem Lukatsky


Ever since Russia began its invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24, 2022, analysts picking apart Vladimir Putin’s motives and messaging about the war have looked to religion for some of the answers. Putin’s nationalist vision paints Russia as a defender of traditional Christian values against a liberal, secular West.

Putin’s Russia, however, is only the latest in a centurieslong lineup of nations using religion to bolster their political ambitions. As a Jesuit priest and scholar of Catholicism, I’ve seen in my research on nationalism and religion how patriotic loyalties and religious faith easily borrow one another’s language, symbols and emotions.

Western Christianity, including Catholicism, has often been enlisted to stir up patriotic fervor in support of nationalism. Historically, one typical aspect of the Catholic approach is linking devotion to the Virgin Mary with the interests of the state and military.
The birth of a belief

An Egyptian papyrus fragment from the fourth century is the first clear evidence of Christians’ praying to the Virgin Mary. The brief prayer, which seeks Mary’s protection in times of trouble, is written in the first person plural – using language like “our” and “we” – which suggests a belief that Mary would respond to groups of people as well as individuals.

That conviction appeared to grow in the following centuries. After the Roman Emperor Constantine converted to Christianity in A.D. 312, the new faith developed a close relationship with his empire, including a belief that Mary looked with particular favor on the capital city of Constantinople.

A 10th-century Byzantine mosaic of Constantine the Great offering Constantinople to the Virgin Mary, at the Hagia Sophia in Istanbul.

Photo by PHAS/Universal Images Group via Getty Images

Political and religious leaders asked the Virgin for victory in battle and shelter from plagues. In A.D. 626, Constantinople was besieged by a Persian navy. Christians believed that their prayers to the Virgin destroyed the invading fleet, saving the city and its inhabitants. The Akathist hymn, which has been prayed in both the Orthodox and Eastern Catholic churches ever since, gives Mary the military title “Champion General” in thanks for that victory.

In the Catholic West, military successes such as European victories over the Ottoman Empire were attributed to Mary’s intervention. Her blessing has been sought on imperialist endeavors, including Spain’s conquest of the Americas.

Even today, Mary holds the title of general in the armies of Argentina and Chile, where she is considered a national patroness. The same association between Marian devotion and patriotism can be found in many Latin American countries.
National symbol

Off the battlefield, many Catholic cultures have historically felt they had a special relationship with Mary. In 1638, King Louis XIII formally dedicated France to the Virgin Mary. Popular belief interpreted the subsequent birth of the future Louis XIV as Mary’s miraculous reward, after 23 years of waiting for a male heir.

About two decades later, Polish King Jan II Kazimierz consecrated his country to Mary amid a war. Both acts reflected church and political leaders’ beliefs that their countries had a sacred mission and divine approval for their political ambitions.

When these kinds of beliefs become widespread in a society, many scholars would label them religious nationalism – though there is a long-standing debate about when affection for one’s country becomes “nationalism.” There is widespread consensus, though, that religion is one of the most common elements of nationalism, and many nationalist projects have invoked Mary’s blessing.

Polish territory, for example, was divided between Russia, Prussia and Austria for more than a century. But Polish Catholics continued to address Mary as “Queen of Poland.” Her title asserted the existence of the Polish people as a nation. And it implied that efforts to reestablish Poland as a sovereign country had a heavenly helper.

Similarly, in the 19th century, both Queen Victoria and the Virgin Mary were referred to in different contexts as “Queen of Ireland,” expressing two rival visions of Ireland: part of the Protestant United Kingdom, or a separate and essentially Catholic country.

An illustration of the Virgin de Guadalupe in the Cathedral San Ildefonso in Mexico.

John Elk III/The Image Bank via Getty Images

Many different movements have used the figure of the Virgin to support their agendas. In colonial Mexico, the figure of Our Lady of Guadalupe, one title for Mary, was originally interpreted as being a champion of the “criollos,” native-born inhabitants of Spanish descent. During the 1810-21 War of Mexican Independence, “la Guadalupana” figured on the banners of the “independista” forces. The Spanish army, meanwhile, adopted the “Virgin of Los Remedios,” another title for Mary, as their own patroness. She would later be invoked in support of Indigenous people and mestizos, people with both Indigenous and Spanish ancestry.

Mary is invoked not only by nationalist causes. Sometimes she is inspiration for countercultural or protest movements, from the pro-life cause to Latina feminists. Labor leader Cesar Chavez placed the image of Guadalupe on banners as his organization marched for farmworkers’ rights.
Mary’s future

All these uses draw on the ancient belief in Mary’s power to intervene in times of trouble. However, ideological, political and especially military ambitions and religious sentiment are a volatile mix. As the current war in Ukraine shows, allegiance to one’s nation, especially when it claims Christian inspiration, can inspire both imperialist expansionism and heroic resistance to it.

This makes a better understanding of religious nationalism urgently important, especially for the church. Twentieth- and 21st-century popes have condemned aggressive nationalism but have not defined it clearly.

In cultures that are largely secularized, appeals for Mary’s protection or claims that she has a special relationship with any one nation are now likely to seem archaic, outlandish or sectarian. But what I know of both Marian devotion and national identity has convinced me that ancient patterns often survive and reassert themselves in new times and places.

Even where the practice of Catholicism is in decline, Mary’s cultural significance remains strong. And religion continues to be a regular element of many nationalist agendas.

My guess is that we have not seen the last of the warrior Virgin.

This article is republished from The Conversation, a nonprofit news site dedicated to sharing ideas from academic experts. 

It was written by: Dorian Llywelyn, USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences.

Read more:


How ‘In God We Trust’ bills are helping advance a Christian nationalist agenda


Warrior, servant, mother, unifier – the Virgin Mary has played many roles through the centuries


Holy wars: How a cathedral of guns and glory symbolizes Putin’s Russia

BUSINESS PRESS SEZ:

Sunak’s Anti-Migration Push Shows Peril of Rightward Drift

Alex Wickham

Bloomberg Businessweek
Sat, August 12, 2023 

(Bloomberg) -- Rishi Sunak thought highlighting his efforts to stop the flow of migrants into Britain would rouse the government Conservative Party base and reinforce his political pitch around effective leadership. Instead, the prime minister has left voters unconvinced and both sides of his party unsatisfied.

A YouGov poll this week found fewer than one in 10 voters believe he will keep his promise to “stop the boats” carrying asylum seekers across the English Channel. That pledge — one of five Sunak told Britons to judge him by — risks turning into a political trap ahead of an election expected in 2024.

As Sunak holidayed in California, his team was left to handle a week of announcements meant to demonstrate a tough line on migration. It started with moving some migrants onto a barge moored off the southern coast, a move ministers say both reduces accommodation costs and acts as a deterrent.

Yet the communications strategy went badly off course. Headlines focused on an expletive by the Tory deputy party chairman directed at asylum seekers. Then came data showing 100,000 people have crossed the Channel since 2018. Even the barge opening backfired — it was evacuated on Friday after bacteria was found in its water supply.

On Saturday, six people died and more than 50 were rescued when a boat carrying migrants in the Channel capsized, the Associated Press reported.

Sunak’s pledge is based on the view that voters want stronger border controls after Brexit, and an attempt to portray the poll-leading Labour Party as weak in that area. But according to current and former Conservative politicians who spoke to Bloomberg News, Sunak’s immigration strategy isn’t working.

Conservatives are now debating what Sunak should try next. There’s a renewed push from the party’s right flank to leave the European Convention on Human Rights, arguing that doing so would make it easier to deliver on Sunak’s other core policy to deport asylum seekers to Rwanda.

Several Cabinet ministers including Home Secretary Suella Braverman would support that, people familiar with their thinking said. She has repeatedly said the ECHR undermines British democracy, while other influential Tories such as David Frost have been explicit in their demands.

A pivotal moment may come when the Supreme Court decides whether the Rwanda deportation program is unlawful. The case is due to be heard in early October with a judgment expected in late November or early December, a person familiar with the matter said. Sunak expects to win, but his next step if he loses is the great unknown, one government official said.

In that scenario, Sunak would use the election to campaign to leave the ECHR, according to three government aides who spoke on condition of anonymity. One said Sunak could say he was looking to renegotiate Britain’s relationship with aspects of it rather than leave outright, to ward off criticism. Another compared the ECHR to Brexit, suggesting it could upset the polls.

“If the court case fails, they will need to look at that option,” said James Johnson, a former aide to ex-premier Theresa May and co-founder of pollster JL Partners. “It will effectively become the only way to show they can stop the boats.”

The ramifications could be profound, and put the UK on a collision course with European nations and the US. An immediate issue is that the ECHR is written into the Good Friday Agreement that ended decades of sectarian violence in Northern Ireland in 1998. Brexit’s impact on the region has already caused tension between the British government and President Joe Biden’s administration.

Sunak acknowledged the sensitivity of the issue in relation to Northern Ireland, telling the House of Commons in February that the UK would remain a member.

People familiar with the thinking of three Cabinet ministers said they couldn’t support leaving the ECHR. One said it would cause an unprecedented breakdown in UK-US relations that would put Britain’s place in the Five Eyes security alliance — which also includes Canada, Australia and New Zealand — in doubt.

Commitment to the ECHR and its protocols is also a provision in part of the post-Brexit trade deal between the UK and the European Union.

“I imagine Sunak would be pretty uncomfortable with it,” former Chancellor of the Exchequer Philip Hammond said when asked about the Tory pressure to leave the ECHR. “I can see a group of old Brexiteers on the right offering it up as a new ‘identity issue’ that could shift the dial at the election. Personally, I doubt it. Even ideologues have to eat, or at least feed their children.”

Craig Oliver, who was former Prime Minister David Cameron’s communications director, said the international community would take it as “further evidence the UK has taken leave of its senses.” He also predicted that since Brexit didn’t work out as promised, many voters would “worry it was another ill-thought out scheme that could blow up in our faces.”

One former Cabinet minister described the idea as a fantasy. Another said they thought Sunak would be considering his future career outside politics, perhaps in the US, and that a toxic election campaign would harm those prospects.

Luke Tryl, a former Conservative adviser who runs the More In Common consultancy, said the ECHR “almost never” comes up in focus groups, and that campaigning to leave it risked putting off centrist voters.

The wildcard, though, is how Sunak responds if the Supreme Court rules against him, and he faces an election campaign having failed to deliver on a core pledge. Immigration Minister Robert Jenrick made clear this week the government wasn’t focused on trying to process the backlog of asylum claims, arguing that doing so would encourage more people to come. The evidence is that the government wants to go to the polls with deportations in full swing.

Ahead of an election, Sunak will face more pressure from the political right to take a harder line. As former Brexit Party leader Nigel Farage put it: “What will Sunak’s main priority be? To try and be popular with the international community, or try to salvage the election? This is the choice that he will face.”

That kind of analysis led one Tory strategist to conclude Sunak’s vow to stop the boats and give the issue such prominence was political suicide.

Migrant boats in the Mediterranean: Why are so many people dying?

Alice Cuddy - BBC News
Sun, August 13, 2023 

Four survivors were spotted in a small iron boat - 41 others died when the boat they were originally in sank

In grainy photographs shot from a plane circling overhead, four people adrift in an iron boat in an expanse of the Mediterranean Sea wave their arms in distress.

It later emerges that the group - a 13-year-old boy, two men and a woman - are the only survivors of a shipwreck that they say killed the other 41 people they were travelling with.

The four survived by floating with inner tubes and lifejackets until they found another empty boat, likely from a previous migrant crossing, and clambered in. They spent several days drifting before being rescued.

A day after news of the tragedy emerged, migrants in the Tunisian city of Sfax prepared to make the same crossing.


One man, who had fled fighting in Sudan's western region of Darfur, told BBC Arabic that he planned to seek asylum in Tunisia, but was ready to board a boat if this didn't work. "I just survived a war, I have nothing to lose," he said. Another, from Kenya, dreamed of a better life for his family in Europe.

If they go ahead with the journeys, the two men will join thousands of others who have risked their lives this year on what has been dubbed the world's most dangerous migration route.

Experts told the BBC that badly designed and overcrowded boats, stormy weather, and gaps in international efforts were all factors in the danger - and one search-and-rescue NGO described the central Mediterranean as a "cemetery".
Surge in deaths

If it feels like you are seeing more reports of shipwrecks this year in the central Mediterranean, then both crossings and deaths do appear to be on the rise.

People making the journey set sail from the shores of North Africa, usually for Italy.

European border agency Frontex says the central Mediterranean is the "most active route" into the European Union, and that reported crossing are the highest since 2017.

The International Organization for Migration (IOM) has recorded more than 1,800 migrant deaths in the central Mediterranean so far this year, compared to 1,400 for the whole of 2022.

number of migrants who died at sea since 2014

Among the migrant shipwrecks this year was an overcrowded fishing vessel off the coast of Greece, which killed hundreds in one of the worst humanitarian disasters in the Mediterranean in recent years.

The IOM says there is strong evidence that many shipwrecks are "invisible": unrecorded boats disappearing with no survivors, meaning the real death toll is likely to be much higher.
Why people make the dangerous journey

Those embarking on the perilous voyage come from around the world and have various reasons for wanting to reach Europe, from fleeing war or torture, to searching for jobs.

After being rescued from an overcrowded rubber raft this summer, one 16-year-old boy from The Gambia told the BBC he left home three years ago to "hustle hard and help my family".

He was aware of how dangerous the journey was, having lost an 18-year-old friend to the crossing. But he said this did not deter him - his friend had "lost his life for his family and his society and his nation".

This year, Tunisia has overtaken Libya as the main point of departure - amid a wave of racism against black Africans there.

map showing migrant routes from Tunisia and Libya to Italy

Some say the Libya crossing remains more dangerous, both for geographical and political reasons.

"In terms of fatalities, I think that the opening up of the Eastern Libya route (from territories controlled by Wagner-supported militias) is having a bigger impact," said Nando Sigona, a professor at the University of Birmingham and a migration expert.

"It is much longer and it also brings boats at the border between Italian and Greek national waters - two governments currently not too keen to be seen as providing rescue operations to migrants at sea," he said, pointing to the Greek shipwreck in June as an example.
Unseaworthy boats

Migrants are typically travelling on overcrowded and unseaworthy boats, with limited flotation devices should they capsize.

Types of boats include rubber rafts and fishing vessels - and on the Tunisian route, metal boats are common.

Experts say metal boats like these are even more likely to capsize in stormy seas

Frontex spokesperson Chris Borowski described them as "coffins in water".

"Combine this with the fact that usually there are dozens of these launched at one time with 40 or more people on board and you have a recipe for disaster," he said.

Mr Borowski said that "greedy people smugglers" used metal boats to offer "discount" crossings as they competed for migrants' business.
Unpredictable storms

Crossings are seasonal, with more attempts in the summer. But weather can be unpredictable and successful journeys can take days.

"If storms occur or the seas are rough - which may become more frequent with climate change - there is a much greater risk to life," IOM spokesperson Ryan Schroeder said.

"Sometimes not even bad weather deters smugglers from sending people out to sea," he added, pointing to the boats that have recently capsized near the island of Lampedusa, which were launched despite rough seas.

And Mr Borowski says poor weather makes spotting boats in distress even more difficult.

"Imagine searching for a Vauxhall Corsa from the air in an area the size of the UK. Now try looking for a dozen or more in the open sea," he said. "This is the daunting challenge in the central Med. This combined with an unforgiving sea, especially when the weather turns bad, as we have seen in recent days."

EU 'willingly created a cemetery'

While Frontex offers "general oversight and technical support", Prof Sigona says national governments mostly govern search and rescue (SAR) operations in the central Mediterranean.

The IOM's Mr Schroeder said SAR efforts are no longer as "proactive, comprehensive or adequately resourced" as they were during the big Mare Nostrum rescue operation led by Italy in 2013 to 2014.

Under the current system, Mr Schroeder said the IOM was concerned that "SAR gaps, alleged delays in rescue and reported lack of response to distress calls may be contributing to tragedies on this route".

NGOs operating rescue vessels on the central Mediterranean were more critical. The route has become so deadly "because of a reckless policy of deterrence and neglect that European states have been pursuing for years", Wasil Schauseil, communications coordinator at SOS Humanity, said.

German NGO Sea-Watch said the EU had "willingly created a cemetery".

It said there was a lack of SAR coordination and that "illegal pullbacks" were being conducted by the Libyan coastguard, which the EU has equipped and trained. And last month, the EU signed a $118m (£90m) deal with Tunisia to try to reduce "irregular" migration.

On a boat picking up migrants in the middle of the Med


New data casts doubt on Greek account of boat disaster


Greek coastguard 'pressured' migrant boat survivors

A European Commission spokesperson defended working with the North African countries, saying the "still too high number of casualties" in the Mediterranean meant it was "important to continue strengthening the capacity of the Libyan coastal authorities to carry out effective search and rescue operations in line with international standards".

NGOs have also criticised a new law in Italy requiring their rescue vessels to head to often distant ports after an operation rather than continuing to patrol for more boats in distress. They say this reduces their time in areas where shipwrecks are more common.

Italy says the aim is to spread arrivals across the country.

Critics of rescue NGOs say their presence encourages migrants to embark on the potentially fatal journey - the NGOs reject this.

Hunt for solutions

Frontex's Mr Borowski acknowledged that "we can, and indeed, we must, do better" at stopping "tragedies at sea", calling for "shared solutions". IOM spokesperson Mr Schroeder said all efforts should "focus on saving lives and addressing the reasons that people are compelled to risk their lives".

The IOM and other UN agencies have called for coordinated European search-and-rescue operations in the central Mediterranean, and for safer legal pathways for migration and asylum to prevent deaths at sea.

The European Commission spokesperson said its efforts to enhance SAR coordination between its members were "extensive". It was working to deter smugglers and develop safe ways for people to come to the EU that would break "the business model of the smugglers and the traffickers".

They said shipwrecks, like the one this summer off the coast of Greece, are "yet another call to action" that highlighted "the urgency to intensify our work".

Additional reporting by Bassam Bounenni, BBC Arabic

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