Donald Trump

Trump Spokesperson Affirms Day 1 Plans for Nation’s ‘Largest Mass Deportation Operation’

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Original article by Olivia Rosane republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). 

A Mexican migrant holds her daughter while being apprehended by U.S. Customs and Border protection officers after crossing over into the U.S. on June 26, 2024 in Ruby, Arizona. (Photo: Brandon Bell/Getty Images)

“As always, we will go to court to challenge illegal policies, but it is equally essential that the public push back, as it did with family separation,” one rights advocate said.

President-elect Donald Trump is set to begin his promised mass deportation of undocumented immigrants as soon as he takes office on January 20, 2025, even as rights groups are mobilizing to stop him.

Trump national press secretary Karoline Leavitt told Fox News Wednesday morning that “the American people delivered a resounding victory for President Trump.”

“It gives him a mandate to govern as he campaigned, to deliver on the promises that he made, which include, on Day 1, launching the largest mass deportation operation of illegal immigrants that Kamala Harris has allowed into this country,” Leavitt said.

“We have a simple message for President-elect Trump or his deputies if they decide to make good on their despicable plans: We will see you in court.”

Trump has pledged to conduct the largest deportation in U.S. history, with running mate and now Vice President-elect JD Vance promising 1 million deportations each year. The plan would likely rely on mobilizing federal agencies, the military, diplomats, and Republican-led states while using federal funds to pressure uncooperative states and cities into complying.

The stocks of private prison companies like GEOGroup and Core Civic rose significantly after Trump’s win, and private contractors had already been discussing ahead of the election how to build enough detention space to accommodate Trump’s plans.

A study released by the American Immigration Council in October found that a massive, one-time deportation program of the estimated 13.3 million migrants in the country without legal status would cost the government at least $315 billion while a 1-million-a-year approach would cost $88 billion a year for a total of $967.9 billion. It would also shrink the nation’s gross domestic product by between 4.2 and 6.8%, not to mention the massive human cost to immigrant families, as around 5.1 million children who are U.S. citizens live with an undocumented family member.

The council also warned that such a program would likely threaten the well-being of all immigrants and increase vigilantism and hate crimes.

“As bad as the first Trump administration was for immigrants, we anticipate it will be much worse this time and are particularly concerned about the use of the military to round up immigrants,” Lee Gelernt, a lawyer with the American Civil Liberties Union who fought the first Trump administration on family separation and other policies, told The Washington Post. “As always, we will go to court to challenge illegal policies, but it is equally essential that the public push back, as it did with family separation.”

Exit polls show that 56% of U.S. voters favor offering immigrants already in the U.S. a pathway to citizenship, while Data for Progress found that survey respondents did not favor deportation for 7 out of 9 categories of people who might be caught up in a mass deportation scheme.

The ACLU has urged cities and states to take steps to protect their undocumented residents ahead of January 20.

“They should prepare for mass deportations because those will wreak havoc on the communities,” Noreen Shah, director of government affairs at the ACLU’s equality division, told Newsweek. “It will mean kids who go to school and their parents are gone and not there to pick them up at the end of the day.”

In particular, legal groups are gearing up for Trump to potentially evoke the Alien Enemies Act of 1798, which authorizes the country to deport noncitizens of a hostile nation. It has only been used three times, most recently to detain Japanese Americans during World War II.

“Many fear that a second Trump administration would seek to use this law to justify indefinite detention and remove people from the country swiftly and without judicial review,” Shah told Reuters.

The Brennan Center for Justice has called on Congress to repeal the act.

“This law was shameful and dangerous back when it was created 200 years ago,” the center’s Marcelo Agudo wrote in October. “It’s even more so today. It must be repealed or overturned.”

Several other organizations pledged to continue defending immigrants and refugees after Trump declared victory.

“We have a simple message for President-elect Trump or his deputies if they decide to make good on their despicable plans: We will see you in court,” Karen Tumlin, founder and director of Justice Action Center, said in a statement. “And, we have a message of love to immigrant communities, we see you, we are you, and we will stand with you.”

Calling Trump’s win “one of the most dangerous moments in our country’s history, National Immigration Law Center president Kica Matos said the organization had led a “movement-wide effort to plan for this moment.”

“Trump and his allies told us what he plans to do: mass deportations, ending birthright citizenship, ending the right to public education for immigrant children, internment camps, and using the military to hunt down immigrants. We should take him at his word,” Matos said.

She continued: “One thing is certain: we cannot and will not retreat. For more than 40 years, NILC has been steadfast in our fight to defend the rights of low-income immigrants and their loved ones. We successfully fought Donald Trump before, and we will do it again.”

The American Immigrant Lawyers Association (AILA) pledged to continue working for its clients.

“If implemented, the anti-immigrant policies avowed by candidate Trump will inflict lasting damage to the American economy, communities, and character,” AILA Executive Director Benjamin Johnson said in a statement. “AILA and its more than 16,000 members will continue to defend the Constitution and stand against laws and policies that violate due process, undermine civil rights, or denigrate the contributions of immigrants. Our future prosperity depends on not giving up. We must stand together and work towards a brighter future.”

Refugees International also promised to continue with its “shared commitment to rights and refuge for people forced from their homes.”

“Amid historic levels of global displacement, the incoming Trump administration plans to enact an anti-refugee, anti-asylum agenda that will endanger millions of people—both those threatened by crises overseas and those who have been welcomed as neighbors into communities across the United States,” the group’s president, Jeremy Konyndyk, said in a message to supporters. “Yet we hold on to hope, even as we are clear-eyed about the daunting struggles ahead.”

Knowndyk added: “As we do under any presidential administration, we will work tirelessly with all of you to defend and advance the rights, protection, and well-being of all people forced to flee their homes.”

United We Dream, the largest U.S. organization led by immigrant youth, committed to building the “largest pro-immigrant movement this country has ever seen.”

“Immigrant young people of United We Dream declare ourselves hopeful and clear eyed about the fight ahead,” said the group’s executive director Greisa Martínez Rosas. “With Trump pledging to carry out the largest deportation effort in our country’s history—activating the military to raid our communities, schools, hospitals, and more in order to round up our people into concentration camps—young, Black, brown, and queer leaders who have been at the vanguard of our movement and of creating meaningful change are ready move mountains to protect our communities.”

Original article by Olivia Rosane republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). 

Continue ReadingTrump Spokesperson Affirms Day 1 Plans for Nation’s ‘Largest Mass Deportation Operation’

2024 ‘Virtually Certain’ to Be Hottest Year on Record: EU Climate Agency

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Original article by Julia Conley republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). 

A resident tries to fight a wildfire burning on September 17, 2024 in Marco de Canaveses, Portugal. (Photo: Octavio Passos/Getty Images)

A new report contained “the bleakest news possible, especially with a climate denier U.S. president in office for the next four years,” said one climate scientist.

A day after U.S. voters elected climate-denying Republican Donald Trump in the presidential race, soon ushering in an administration that is sure to expand fossil fuel drilling, the European Union’s Earth observation agency announced that 2024 is “virtually certain” to be the hottest year on record and to hit a worrying temperature milestone.

The year is expected to be the first on record in which the temperature is more than 1.5°C hotter than before the Industrial Revolution, according to the Copernicus Climate Change Service (CCCS). The Paris climate agreement of 2015 urged countries to curb greenhouse gas emissions with the goal of limiting planetary heating to 1.5°C by the end of the century.

Over the past 12 months, said CCCS, global temperatures were 1.6°C warmer than the yearly average from 1850-1900.

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“The average temperature anomaly for the rest of 2024 would have to drop to almost zero for 2024 to not be the warmest year,” said CCCS.

Last month was the second-hottest October ever recorded, with temperatures 1.65°C higher than preindustrial levels. It was the 15th month in the past 16 to be hotter than 1.5°C over preindustrial temperatures.

While a single year above the 1.5°C mark does not necessarily indicate that the Paris climate goal is out of reach, CCCS director Carlo Buontempo said the planet has “never had to cope with a climate as warm as the current one.”

“This inevitably pushes our ability to respond to extreme events—and adapt to a warmer world—to the absolute limit,” he told The Guardian.

Climate scientist Bill McGuire called the Copernicus report “the bleakest news possible, especially with a climate denier U.S. president in office for the next four years.”

Trump has pledged to expand fossil fuel extraction and do away with climate regulations introduced by the Biden administration, telling oil executives he would do so if they contributed $1 billion to his campaign in what was described as a quid pro quo.

The CCCS—which based its analysis on billions of measurements from satellites, ships, aircraft, and weather stations—noted in its report that October saw numerous extreme weather events tied to the warming planet. Heavy rains led to severe flash flooding in Spain, killing more than 200 people. Above average precipitation was also seen in Norway, France, China, southern Brazil, and parts of Australia, while Florida faced Hurricane Milton just two weeks after Hurricane Helene killed more than 230 people.

The World Meteorological Organization last week announced that carbon dioxide concentrations in the atmosphere are accumulating faster than at any other time in human history, rising more than 10% in the last two decades.

“The most effective solution to address the climate challenges is a global commitment on emissions,” Buontempo told The Guardian.

BBC journalist Navin Singh Khadka said on the news network that if the 1.5°C breach continues “in the long term, then we are warned there will be catastrophic consequences.”

https://twitter.com/NavinSinghKhadk/status/1854542180431343837?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1854542180431343837%7Ctwgr%5E603fae17c6b14c6a10b87145e07821d8631d7159%7Ctwcon%5Es1_c10&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.commondreams.org%2Fnews%2F2024-hottest-year

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Original article by Julia Conley republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). 

Experienced climbers scale a rock face near the historic Dumbarton castle in Glasgow, releasing a banner that reads “Climate on a Cliff Edge.” One activist, dressed as a globe, symbolically looms near the edge, while another plays the bagpipes on the shores below. | Photo courtesy of Extinction Rebellion and Mark Richards
Experienced climbers scale a rock face near the historic Dumbarton castle in Glasgow, releasing a banner that reads “Climate on a Cliff Edge.” One activist, dressed as a globe, symbolically looms near the edge, while another plays the bagpipes on the shores below. | Photo courtesy of Extinction Rebellion and Mark Richards
Continue Reading2024 ‘Virtually Certain’ to Be Hottest Year on Record: EU Climate Agency

Israel Bombs Refugee Camps After Inking $5.2 Billion Deal for US F-15 Fighter Jets

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Original article by Jake Johnson republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0).

Palestinians carry a body pulled from the rubble after an Israeli attack on the Nuseirat refugee camp on November 7, 2024.
 (Photo: Ali Jadallah/Anadolu via Getty Images)

“Despite overwhelming evidence that the Democratic Party’s most devoted constituents wanted to end sales of weapons to Israel, the Biden administration kept sending them.”

The Israeli military on Thursday bombarded refugee camps in northern and central Gaza hours after inking a $5.2 billion deal with the United States to acquire more than two dozen F-15 fighter jets made by the American aerospace giant Boeing.

The agreement, part of a broader military aid package approved by the Biden administration and the U.S. Congress earlier this year, was finalized hours after Vice President Kamala Harris lost the 2024 election to Republican nominee Donald Trump following a campaign in which she resisted calls to support an arms embargo against Israel.

Though Trump at times tried to posture as a pro-peace candidate during the race, he publicly and privately signaled support for Israel’s war on Gaza and Lebanon, telling far-right Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during a recent call, “Do what you have to do.”

Israel’s Ministry of Defense called the F-15 deal “a landmark transaction” for fighter jets “equipped with cutting-edge weapons systems.” The ministry said deliveries of the aircraft will begin in 2031.

“While focusing on immediate needs for advanced weaponry and ammunition at unprecedented levels, we’re simultaneously investing in long-term strategic capabilities,” the ministry said. “This F-15 squadron, alongside the third F-35 squadron procured earlier this year, represents a historic enhancement of our air power and strategic reach—capabilities that proved crucial during the current war.”

Shortly following the announcement, Israeli forces killed at least 22 people in attacks on the Jabalia refugee camp and Beit Lahiya in northern Gaza—where Israel is engaged in an active campaign of ethnic cleansing—and on the Nuseirat refugee camp in the center of the Palestinian territory.

Norwegian Refugee Council secretary-general Jan Egeland, who traveled to areas of northern and central Gaza this week, said in a statement Thursday that the “complete destruction” he witnessed there was “worse than anything I could imagine as a long-time aid worker.”

“What I saw and heard in the north of Gaza was a population pushed beyond breaking point,” said Egeland. “Families torn apart, men and boys detained and separated from their loved ones, and families unable to even bury their dead. Some have gone days without food, drinking water is nowhere to be found. It is scene after scene of absolute despair.”

“This is in no way a lawful response, a targeted operation of ‘self-defense’ to dismantle armed groups, or warfare consistent with humanitarian law,” he added. “What Israel is doing here, with Western-supplied arms, is rendering a densely populated area uninhabitable for almost two million civilians.”

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Israel’s latest deadly attacks on Gaza came after the conclusion of a U.S. election in which Gaza featured prominently, with Palestinian rights advocates warning that continued American support for Israel’s assault would be politically damaging for Democrats—on top of being morally reprehensible and unlawful, given Israel’s obstruction of humanitarian aid and repeated targeting of civilians.

New York Times writer Peter Beinart argued in a column Thursday that the election’s outcome appeared to show that such concerns were justified.

“Despite overwhelming evidence that the Democratic Party’s most devoted constituents wanted to end sales of weapons to Israel, the Biden administration kept sending them, even after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel expanded the war into Lebanon,” Beinart wrote. “And not only did Ms. Harris not break with Mr. Biden’s policy, she went out of her way to make voters who care about Palestinian rights feel unwelcome.”

“There is only one path forward,” Beinart continued. “Although it will require a fierce intraparty brawl, Democrats—who claim to respect human equality and international law—must begin to align their policies on Israel and Palestine with these broader principles. In this new era, in which supporting Palestinian freedom has become central to what it means to be progressive, the Palestinian exception is not just immoral. It’s politically disastrous.”

Layla Elabed and Abbas Alawieh, co-founders of the Uncommitted National Movement, said in a statement Wednesday that “while there are many factors at play” in Harris’ loss, “one undeniable truth remains: Neglecting the voices of those impacted by war has consequences.”

“Today, our message is clear: This moment requires more than resilience; it demands decisive action,” said Elabed and Alawieh. “The Biden-Harris administration must put an end to the flow of weapons that fuel this cycle of violence. If they do not, the Democratic Party risks saddling our coalition of voters with the ever-increasing weight of a legacy intertwined with endless war and suffering.”

Original article by Jake Johnson republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0).

Continue ReadingIsrael Bombs Refugee Camps After Inking $5.2 Billion Deal for US F-15 Fighter Jets

Left Foot Forward

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Left Foot Forward is one of this blog’s favourite blogs and is recommended. A selection of current stories from Left Foot Forward for your delectation ;)

Transport secretary called out over rail dispute mistruths on BBC Question Time

The transport secretary Mark Harper has been accused of “muddying the waters” by presenting misleading narratives in the rail dispute, on BBC Question Time last night.

When answering questions on resolving the rail strikes, Mark Harper attempted to shirk responsibility by referring to train drivers pay and unused ticket offices.

It comes as the RMT union smashed their latest mandate for strike action, meaning members working for 14 train operating companies could strike again over the next six months. 

It is their third mandate in the National Rail Dispute, with the latest receiving a 91% yes vote.

Mick Lynch, RMT general secretary said the mandate sends a clear message to employers of the “huge anger” amongst rail workers.

…

Union leader accuses government of ‘punishing’ civil servants in pay dispute

‘Why are they treating their own staff worse than anyone else?’

The government has been accused of ‘punishing’ their own staff and ‘making an example’ of civil servants by the leader of the union for civil service workers.

In an ongoing dispute over pay, job losses and redundancy terms, civil servants with the union Prospect are on strike today for a second time in what is the largest industrial action the union has taken in over a decade.

Their members’ pay has declined by up to 26% in real terms since 2010, with civil servants on some of the worst pay settlements in the public sector, having been dealt a recent 4.5% pay offer by the government.

The union have called for a ‘serious pay offer’ that recognises the cost-of-living crisis that their members are facing.

…

Rishi Sunak slammed for using taxpayer-funded helicopter for trip that would have taken just over an hour by train

The train ticket would’ve cost Sunak £30 return, yet he opted to travel by air, at a cost to the taxpayer in the region of £6,000.

The Tories would like you to believe that they care about climate change and the effective use of taxpayers’ money, yet their actions show the complete opposite.

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak is fond of taking helicopters and private jets for short trips and is now once more being slammed for using a taxpayer-funded helicopter to make a journey that would have taken little more than an hour on the train.

Sunak took a chopper to Southampton to attend a GP surgery and pharmacy to promote the government’s latest intervention to reduce the strain on GP practices.

According to train timetables, had the Prime Minister taken the 8:35am train from Waterloo he would have arrived in Southampton at 9:50am. That Sunak decided to fly to the port city and back via helicopter has led to some Tory MPs fearing that it will cement Sunak’s image as an out of touch Prime Minister.

The train ticket would’ve cost Sunak £30 return, yet he opted to travel by air, at a cost to the taxpayer in the region of £6,000.

One Tory MP told the Guardian: “Is it unfair to say that the weekend was about a powerful unelected individual who is unfeasibly wealthy and lacks the common touch … and King Charles III?”

…

Bid launched to revoke GB News’ broadcasting licence

‘The segment of concern gave a wholly biased account of the verdict in the trial of Donald Trump for sexual assault’

Ofcom has been sent a strongly worded letter from two leading Green Party politicians, calling for the media regulator to revoke the broadcasting licence given to GB News after the scandal hit channel was once again found to have breached broadcasting regulations.

Molly Scott Cato, Green Party Speaker on Economy and Finance and Councillor Jack Lenox, Parliamentary Candidate for Lancaster, have shared a picture of their letter on Twitter, with Lenox tweeting: “Jacob Rees-Mogg’s defence of Donald Trump’s sexual abuse is disgusting. And his brazen attempt to mislead the public is a grotesque abuse of our broadcasting regulations.

“Today @GreenPartyMolly and I have written to Ofcom asking them to revoke GB News’ broadcasting licence.”

Ardent Brexiteer Rees-Mogg has been slammed for his GB News broadcast on the Donald Trump sexual assault trial. Rees-Mogg emphasised that Trump had been found ‘not guilty of rape’, and also questioned the US legal system. Rees-Mogg was joined on the programme by Kari Lake, a top Republican and well-known 2020 Election denier, as well as Nigel Farage.

A jury found that Trump had sexually abused magazine columnist E. Jean Carroll in a New York department store in the 1990s. The jury also found Trump liable for defamation for calling the writer’s accusations “a hoax and a lie”.

Reacting to Rees-Mogg’s comments on Trump, James O’Brien tweeted: “When Owen Paterson broke Parliamentary rules, Jacob Rees-Mogg attacked the rules.

“When a jury decided Donald Trump was a sex offender, Jacob Rees-Mogg attacked trial by jury. There’s a pattern here.”

…

Continue ReadingLeft Foot Forward

It Is ‘Strange,’ Says Greta Thunberg, That Biden Is Seen as a Climate Leader

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Image licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license. In August 2018, outside the Swedish parliament building, Greta Thunberg started a school strike for the climate. Her sign reads, “Skolstrejk för klimatet,” meaning, “school strike for climate”. Author Anders Hellberg

“The U.S. is actually expanding fossil fuel infrastructure,” the 18-year-old Swedish climate activist said in a new interview.

JAKE JOHNSON December 28, 2021

In an interview published in The Washington Post Magazine on Monday, Swedish activist Greta Thunberg said it is “strange” that some consider U.S. President Joe Biden a climate leader even as his administration fails to take the ambitious steps necessary to tackle the intensifying planetary crisis.

When asked whether she is “inspired” by Biden or other world leaders, Thunberg pointed out that “the U.S. is actually expanding fossil fuel infrastructure” under the current administration.

“I’ve met so many people who give me very much hope and just the possibility that we can actually change things.”

“Why is the U.S. doing that?” she asked. “It should not fall on us activists and teenagers who just want to go to school to raise this awareness and to inform people that we are actually facing an emergency.”

“People ask us, ‘What do you want?’ ‘What do you want politicians to do?'” added Thunberg, who helped spark a global, youth-led climate protest movement with a solo strike outside of the Swedish Parliament building in 2018. “And we say, first of all, we have to actually understand what is the emergency.”

“We are trying to find a solution of a crisis that we don’t understand,” she continued. “For example, in Sweden, we ignore—we don’t even count or include more than two-thirds of our actual emissions. How can we solve a crisis if we ignore more than two-thirds of it? So it’s all about the narrative.”

While Biden has touted his decision to bring the U.S. back into the Paris agreement, his pledge to cut the nation’s greenhouse gas emissions in half by 2030, and other initiatives as a show of leadership in the face of an existential threat to humanity, his administration has also approved oil and gas drilling permits at a faster rate than former President Donald Trump’s did.

During Biden’s presidency, according to a report released earlier this month by the consumer advocacy group Public Citizen, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) has approved an average of 333 oil and gas drilling permits per month this year alone—40% more than it did over the first three years of Trump’s White House tenure.

“When it comes to climate change policy, President Biden is saying the right things. But we need more than just promises,” Alan Zibel, the lead author of the report, said in a statement. “The reality is that in the battle between the oil industry and Biden, the industry is winning. Despite Biden’s campaign commitments to stop drilling on public lands and waters, the industry still has the upper hand. Without aggressive government action, the fossil fuel industry will continue creating enormous amounts of climate-destroying pollution exploiting lands owned by the public.”

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Thunberg’s interview with the Post came at the end of a year that saw planet-warming carbon dioxide emissions quickly rebound to pre-pandemic levels as the U.S. and other major nations continued to burn fossil fuels at an alarming and unsustainable rate.

As Glen Peters of the Center for International Climate Research noted Tuesday, “2021 saw the second-biggest absolute increase in fossil CO2 emissions ever recorded.”

Despite the failure of world leaders to act with sufficient urgency as the climate crisis fuels devastating extreme weather events across the globe, Thunberg said she is “more hopeful now” than she was when she kicked off her lonely school strike in 2018.

“In one sense, we’re in a much worse place than we were then because the levels of CO2 in the atmosphere are higher and the global emissions are still rising at almost record speed. And we have wasted several years of blah, blah, blah,” said Thunberg. “But then, on another note, we have seen what people can do when we actually come together.”

“I’ve met so many people who give me very much hope and just the possibility that we can actually change things,” she added. “That we can treat a crisis like a crisis.”

Republished from https://www.commondreams.org/news/2021/12/28/it-strange-says-greta-thunberg-biden-seen-climate-leader under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). Feel free to republish and share widely.

Continue ReadingIt Is ‘Strange,’ Says Greta Thunberg, That Biden Is Seen as a Climate Leader