haiti – praag.org

Immigrants to flood America

The White House intended to remain silent about its plans for immigration. Revealing a scheme to open the floodgates of amnesty would be disastrous on the eve of the critical midterm elections. But this is the gang that can’t shoot straight.

The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services on Friday threw open the door to as many as 100,000 Haitians, who will now move into the United States without a visa.

Sen. Chuck Grassley, Iowa Republican, rightly and accurately denounced enabling Haitians awaiting a U.S. visa to enter the country and legally apply for work permits as “an irresponsible overreach of the executive branch’s authority.”

That was just the beginning. The immigration agency earlier this month had solicited a printer able to handle a “surge” of 9 million green cards “to support possible future immigration-reform initiative requirements.”

In an ordinary year, about 1 million green cards are issued, and over the life of this contract the company is expected to produce up to 34 million cards, a figure representing an increase of the population of the United States by 10 percent.

The cards do not come with automatic voter registration, but that’s obviously what the scheme portends. President Obama’s promised “executive actions” to bring about this enormous wave of amnesty constitute a transparent and cynical ploy to expand the Democratic voter base, creating a permanent majority.

Republicans running for the House and Senate should demand that Mr. Obama lay his green cards on the table now, before — and not after — the Nov. 4 elections. No other campaign issue carries as much of an impact on the future of the nation.

In economic terms, importing millions of unskilled workers creates competition for the diminishing number of available jobs. Combine a flooded job market with the Democratic proposals for a doubling of the minimum wage to $15 an hour, and millions more American citizens will be without a job.

Those who do have jobs will pay to provide federal freebies, from Obamaphones to Obamacare, to the formerly illegal aliens now with a green card.

As the recent influx of minor children over the southern border demonstrates, word of amnesty on the way travels fast. Handing green cards to those who cheated the system and entered the country illegally creates an incentive to millions more to follow in their path, collecting as many benefits as possible along the way.

It’s a disaster in the making — indeed already here — for public health and national security, straining the welfare state to its limit.

Most Americans want no part of this.

A Gallup survey finds that 74 percent of Americans want the level of immigration to stay where it is, or reduce it. Mr. Obama has no support for his amnesty scheme except from those who want to transform America into a nation that no one would recognize.

Voters can get to work on stopping the transformation on Nov. 4.

Source: www.washingtontimes.com

Migrants to US on the rise

Fleeing poverty — Fleeing self-induced poverty

The number of boats bringing undocumented migrants from various countries other than Cuba is on the increase, according to American federal authorities, who say smugglers have turned to other nationalities as the smuggling of Cubans has dried up.

One Oct. 16, a boat carrying migrants from Haiti capsized east of Miami Beach. Just two weeks before, on Oct. 3, federal authorities spotted a boat leaving Bimini, in the Bahamas, and traveling west toward U.S. shores without navigation lights.

On Aug. 28, smugglers dumped a group of Haitian migrants near Palm Beach and ordered them to swim ashore. A 14-year-old girl was later found dead on the beach.

And between 2009 and 2010, boats traveling between the Bahamas and South Florida smuggled dozens of Brazilians who first traveled to Europe and then flew to the Bahamas to board the smuggling boats to South Florida.

Federal officials say there’s an increase in migrant boat traffic toward South Florida involving the smuggling of undocumented foreign nationals of various nationalities. The boat traffic appears to have drawn smugglers who once primarily transported Cuban migrants across the Florida Straits and who now are focusing on nationals from other countries because the Cuban migrant smuggling organization have largely been dismantled, the officials said.

“Smugglers look for business anywhere,” said a federal official familiar with the issue.

The dismantling of the Cuban migrant smuggling networks along with improved Coast Guard patrolling and interdiction tactics are credited with a dramatic decrease in the number of Cuban migrants arriving by sea.

As a result, the majority of undocumented Cuban migrants are now arriving through the Mexican border. They come not only by boat from the island to the Yucatán peninsula but also overland from South and Central America.

Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), a unit of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, is the lead agency investigating boat migrant-smuggling networks.

Over the last two or thee years, investigators have noticed an increase in the number of boats operated by smugglers and transporting undocumented migrants of various nationalities.

The federal official familiar with the issue said that while several smuggling organizations were involved, they seemed to share similar traits. A significant number of them, the official added, operated boats that began voyages toward South Florida in the Bahamas – but carried migrants who came from as far away as Brazil, Ecuador or Colombia. Some of the migrants also started out in Haiti or the Dominican Republic but then made their way to the Bahamas to board smuggling boats for the final leg to South Florida.

In some cases, small boats overloaded with migrants begin their trips in Haiti.

That was the case in the ill-fated voyage of the 25-foot fishing boat that flipped over five miles east of Miami Beach, killing four female Haitian migrants Oct. 16. It carried 15 migrants, some of whom started the voyage in the northwestern Haitian coastal city of Port-de-Paix, according to Louisias Pierre, one of the survivors interviewed recently by the Miami Herald.

An affidavit in Miami federal court from an HSI special agent quoted one of the witnesses in the tragedy as saying that people boarded the boat in the Bahamas,

Pierre told the Miami Herald that the smugglers promised to transfer the migrants to a larger boat in the Bahamas, but that never happened. The boat did stop in the Bahamas, but only to pick up more migrants.

In the Oct. 3 voyage, the 24-foot boat began its trip in Bimini, according to an affidavit from another HSI special agent.

When a Customs and Border Protection vessel intercepted the suspect boat it disobeyed orders to stop.

“The operator of the suspect vessel then proceeded to increase his speed and performed evasive maneuvers, such as aggressively making left and right turns in an S-pattern, in an attempt to avoid interdiction,” the HIS affidavit said. “Due to the failure of the suspect vessel to stop, CBP fired two warning shots forward of the bow.”

The affidavit said the boat finally stopped about 10 miles east of Elliott Key, just south of Key Biscayne.

When CBP officers approached, they saw five men on the boat. One told officers that he was testing the boat, possibly to purchase it. A second man claimed he was brokering the sale. The three other men, they claimed, were migrants they had rescued from a makeshift boat adrift in the sea.

But once everyone was brought ashore, federal agents learned that two of the men were migrant smugglers and the other three were Cuban migrants without visas.

The federal official familiar with the issue said migrants pay a wide range of prices to be smuggled in — from as little as $1,000 or $2,000 per person to cross from the Bahamas to South Florida to as much as $15,000 for a comprehensive travel package from Brazil that includes flights to Europe and the Bahamas and then the boat ride to South Florida.

It’s unclear whether most boats are interdicted or get through to South Florida.

“We don’t catch them all,” the official said. “It’s a cat-and-mouse game.” – Miami Herald

Drunk suspect threatens police with voodoo curse

A Cadillac-driving OUI (common acronym for drunk driving) suspect — charged with running a Boston Globe delivery truck off Interstate 93 and onto the Leverett Connector — was carrying three EBT cards, mocked a cop “for paying for food when she gets it for free” and threatened to put a voodoo curse on him, according to a police report. [Recipients with food stamp benefits can use their EBT Card for eligible food purchases at most grocery stores and some other retailers for free]

“I questioned her as to why she had other peoples (sic) EBT cards and she  began screaming that I was a ‘dumb (expletive)’ for paying for food when she gets it for free,” trooper William Kokocinski wrote of Vivencia  Bellegarde, 25, of Everett, noting she had her own electronic benefits transfer card and also the cards of two other people.

“She repeatedly called me a racist and told me she was from Haiti and she was gonna ‘put voodoo on my white (expletive),’” Kokocinski wrote. “(She) told me to Google her name and find out who I was ‘(expletive) with’. She further explained that her name translated means ‘give life take life’ and she emphasized ‘TAKE LIFE’. She then shouted that she was ‘coming for all you white (expletives).’”

A spokesman for the state Department of Transitional Assistance, which administers welfare, said in a statement the agency has been notified of Bellegarde’s EBT cards “and will take appropriate action.”

“DTA investigates every tip that it receives from members of the public or law enforcement, and refers cases to the auditor’s Bureau of Special Investigations for further action, which has the power to investigate potential criminal matters,” the statement said.

Bellegarde, who is listed as unemployed in court  papers, is being held on $10,000 bail on charges of drunken driving causing serious injury. Surveillance video of the 3:13 a.m. Monday crash shows a car slamming into the Globe truck, forcing it off the roadway and into a frightening 40-foot free fall. The truck came apart on impact with the Leverett Connector  on-ramp below.

The truck driver, Paul Healy Jr., 35, of Brockton, was taken to Massachusetts General Hospital, where he was in fair condition yesterday. He declined to comment yesterday through a family member.

Bellegarde told cops she’d left a party prior to the crash, and “didn’t care about the guy she hit because he isn’t dead and that all she cares about is smoking a cigarette,” the report says. Her mood fluctuated greatly during booking, the report says, and at one point she began crying about her 5-year-old child.

Bellegarde at first denied driving the heavily damaged 2006 Cadillac DTS sedan, which Kokocinski spotted while on his way to the Globe truck crash, police said. Bellegarde’s attorney, Hassan Willians, said his client “has no comment. She’s looking forward to her day in court.”

Bellegarde’s driving record  includes 10 suspensions, many for failing to pay citations. Last year, her license was suspended for 30 days in connection with a first-offense drunken-driving charge in Lincoln from September 2011. Her license will be suspended for three years because she refused a Breathalyzer test in Monday’s crash, according to the Registry of Motor Vehicles.

The Lincoln arrest report says Bellegarde reeked of booze and had front-end damage on her car when she called cops to ask them for help with her tires on a 5 a.m. trek home from a Boston club. She failed sobriety tests but was “polite and  cooperative,” the reporting officer wrote. – Boston Herald

The other side of Sandy

: Haiti was hit hardest

Jamaica, Cuba and the Bahamas took direct hits as Sandy approached them as a Category 1 and 2 storm.

Hurricane Sandy’s toll in the Caribbean amounts to at least 69 dead, thousands homeless and few funds available to rebuild. Yet, the Caribbean carnage remains largely behind the scenes as media spotlight focuses on the US.

Sandy took the lives of 52 people in Haiti, 11 in Cuba, two in the Bahamas, two in the Dominican Republic, one in Jamaica and one in Puerto Rico.

In light of the difficulty to rebuild in some of the impoverished areas of the Caribbean, especially Haiti, the United Nations will be appealing for emergency aid.

“Haiti is trying to get its house in order, but each time disaster strikes, the progress is interrupted,” head of the UN’s office for the co-ordination of humanitarian affairs Johan Peleman told The Guardian. “This country is exposed to devastating consequences by each storm. With every burst of rain, entire mountains are washed away.”

The majority of deaths and the most extensive damage fell upon Haiti, already devastated by the 2010 earthquake. The storm passed to the west of the country, but dumped more than 20 inches (51cm) of rain in 24 hours, causing rivers to overflow.

The damage is especially significant there because the country already had about 400,000 homeless since the deadly earthquake. Now 200,000 more had been added to the list because of Sandy.

During the storm nearly 17,800 people had to move to 131 temporary shelters.

Haitian Ministry of Agriculture official Jean Debalio Jean-Jacques announced that Hurricane Sandy destroyed 70 per cent of the crops in southern Haiti and caused widespread deaths of livestock.

“We are facing a major crisis,” stated Prime Minister Laurent Lamothe.

On top of all that, Haiti was also emerging from the aftermath of Tropical Strom Isaac, which hit the country in August, and a cholera epidemic that killed thousands and afflicted more than half a million people.

The Haitian government fears that the post-Sandy devastation may increase the number of cholera cases. Eighty-six new cases of cholera have already been reported in the last month and more are expected. The cholera outbreak began in October 2010 and many of the victims were from refugee camps established to host those who lost their houses in the quake.

Sandy reached Jamaica last Wednesday as a Category 1 storm, killing one person, leaving dozens of families homeless and causing at least $16.5 million in damage, according to the country’s Prime Minister Portia Simpson Miller.

“Even before the hurricane we faced serious economic challenges. This has been made worse by the passage of Hurricane Sandy,” Simpson Miller said.

The storm then hit Cuba early Thursday as a Category 2 hurricane, killing 11 in Santiago and Guantanamo provinces, causing 5,000 buildings to at least partially collapse and 30,000 others to lose their roofs. In addition, Sandy damaged essential crops including banana, coffee, bean and sugar.

Public buildings such as schools and hospitals were also damaged.

Then as the storm turned to the Bahamas, it killed two people, toppled power poles and flooded streets.

In Puerto Rico the storm killed one person on Friday and forced 100 families to evacuate from their homes to seek shelter elsewhere.

In the Dominican Republic more than 18,100 people had to be evacuated as the storm destroyed bridges and isolated at least 130 communities. Flooding and heavy rains had damaged about 3,500 homes.

Difficulty repairing damage

Former secretary general of the Association of Caribbean States Norman Girvan strongly believes that other parties should pitch in to make the reconstruction possible.

“We should look at the Caribbean, because the hurricane has had an impact on Jamaica and Cuba and Haiti. One would like to see some form of Caricom [Caribbean Community] response to the severe infrastructural damage and human damage done in these countries, which unfortunately does not attract as much media attention as that in the US,” he told The Guardian.

It will be very difficult for Haiti to rebuild on its own.

“We’ll have famine in the coming days,” Kechner Toussaint, mayor of Abricots, a hard-hit community on Haiti’s Southwestern tip, told BET. “It’s an agricultural disaster.”

Also, John Chaloner at the charity Plan International told The Independent that in recent months there had been “demonstrations sparked by rising food prices”.

Faced with food shortages and a wider cholera outbreak, Haiti is at risk of not only failing to restore itself, but falling deeper into destruction and even civil unrest unless help arrives. – RT

A rapper’s charity

Wyclef Jean, the Haitian-born hip-hop celebrity, complained when he faced questions about his charity’s financial record and ability to handle what eventually amounted to $16 million in donations.

Portraying himself as persecuted like Jesus and Martin Luther King Jr., Mr. Jean, 40, writes with indignation about insinuations that he had used his charity, Yéle, for personal gain. He says he did not need to — “I have a watch collection worth $500,000”— and that doubters will someday understand “Yéle is Haiti’s greatest asset and ally.”

But on his book tour for “Purpose: An Immigrant’s Story,” Jean neglects to mention two key facts: a continuing New York attorney general’s investigation has already found financial improprieties at Yéle, and the charity effectively went out of business last month, leaving a trail of debts, unfinished projects and broken promises.

“If I had depended on Yéle,” said Diaoly Estimé, whose orphanage features a wall painting of Mr. Jean and his wife, “these kids would all be dead by now.”

Even as Yéle is besieged by angry creditors, an examination of the charity indicates that millions in donations for earthquake victims went to its own offices, salaries, consultants’ fees and travel, to Mr. Jean’s brother-in-law for projects never realized, to materials for temporary houses never built and to accountants dealing with its legal troubles.

On the ground in Haiti, little lasting trace of Yéle’s presence can be discerned. The walled country estate leased for its headquarters, on which the charity lavished $600,000, is deserted. Yéle’s street cleaning crews have been disbanded. The Yéle-branded tents and tarps have mostly disintegrated; one camp leader said they had not seen Yéle, which is based in New York, since Jean was disqualified as a presidential candidate because he lives in Saddle River, N.J., not Haiti.

This summer, the charity foundered.

At the end of August, Derek Q. Johnson, Yéle’s chief executive, announced his resignation to supporters.

His resignation came after Jean declined to accept a settlement proposed by the attorney general covering the charity’s pre-earthquake activities, and he hired Avi Schick, a lawyer who had been a member of Attorney General Eric T. Schneiderman’s transition team.

The settlement would have required Jean and the two other Yéle founders to pay $600,000 in restitution “to remedy the waste of the foundation’s assets.” It also would have required Yéle to pay for a forensic audit of its post-disaster expenses, as it had done for its pre-earthquake finances, and to start “winding down its affairs.”

In 2010, Yéle spent $9 million and half went to travel, to salaries and consultants’ fees and to expenses related to their offices and warehouse. In contrast, another celebrity charity, Sean Penn’s J/P Haitian Relief Organization, spent $13 million with only 10 percent going to those costs.

Though Mr. Penn’s group spent $43,000 on office-related expenses, Yéle spent $1.4 million, including $375,000 for “landscaping” and $37,000 for rent to Mr. Jean’s Manhattan recording studio. Yéle spent $470,440 on its own food and beverages.

Some of Yéle’s programming money went to projects that never came to fruition: temporary homes for which it prepaid $93,000; a medical center to have been housed in geodesic domes for which it paid $146,000; the revitalization of a plaza in the Cité Soleil slum, where supposed improvements that cost $230,000 are nowhere to be seen.

In its relief operation, Yéle operated outside the coordination system set up by other nongovernment groups; it did not want to be burdened by rules and meetings, Mr. Locke said in a 2010 interview.

Other organizations focused on providing concrete services like sanitation or health care.

Yéle chose to work more broadly than deeply. It supplied food, water and supplies to what it said were dozens of tent camps. Julie Schindall, then spokeswoman for Oxfam America, called it a “dump and run strategy.” Mr. Penn told The New York Times in 2010, “My impression is that Yéle is at the service of Wyclef Jean and his reputation.”