In April 2017, Press Secretary Sean Spicer took the podium in the White House briefing room and announced that the president was donating his first-quarter salary to the National Park Service. With a serious look on his face, Spicer pulled out an oversize check with an oversize signature. It was the first of several checks that Donald Trump signed while in office, handing over his $400,000 salary in exchange for good publicity.

That was pocket change for Trump. His real money came from the business he refused to divest, not from his government salary. An analysis of documents, some of which only became public in recent weeks, shows just how much Trump’s businesses raked in while he was in office. Dig through everything—including property records, ethics disclosures, debt documents and securities filings—and you’ll find about $2.4 billion of revenue from January 2017 to December 2020.

If not for the pandemic, there would have been even more. Trump’s business was hauling in about $650 million annually during the first three years of his presidency. But in 2020, revenues plunged to an estimated $450 million as Covid infected the business. “It’s hurting me, and it’s hurting Hilton, and it’s hurting all of the great hotel chains all over the world,” Trump said in a March 2020 press conference at the White House. “It’s hurting everybody. I mean, there are very few businesses that are doing well now.”

The biggest portion of Trump’s revenue flowed through his clubs and golf properties, which generated approximately $940 million over four years. Trump National Doral, the golf resort in Miami, contributed roughly $270 million to that total. Mar-a-Lago, Trump’s club in Palm Beach, brought in about $90 million.

A New Jersey golf club, where the former president has been spending time this summer, took in $60 million or so. Those top-line figures didn’t all end up in Trump’s pocket, however. Golf clubs and resorts are expensive to manage, with operating profit margins running at 20% in good times. During the pandemic, Trump’s traditional courses fared reasonably well, but his golf resorts had to contend with long shutdowns, causing his overall golf and club revenues to drop 27% to an estimated $190 million in 2020.

Donald Trump owns a 30% interest in 555 California Street, a San Francisco office building.

David Paul Morris/Bloomberg

Fortunately for Trump, he also had high-margin commercial real estate holdings to bolster his bottom line. That proved especially critical in 2020, as commercial tenants—many locked into long-term leases—continued to pay rent.

At 555 California Street, a San Francisco office building in which Trump holds a 30% stake, his rent actually inched up last year, from $42 million to $43 million, according to an analysis of filings. The same thing happened at New York City’s 1290 Avenue of the Americas, where Trump’s haul increased from roughly $55 million to $58 million.

The hotel, licensing and management businesses, on the other hand, didn’t fare so well. Estimated revenues stayed well above $100 million from 2017 to 2019 but dropped closer to $50 million in 2020. No part of Trump’s portfolio was more poorly positioned to withstand such a blow, given the debt load against his hotels.

Inside his Washington, D.C., hotel, revenues flatlined at about $52 million from 2017 to 2019. With the top line stalled out, the hotel didn’t seem to be producing enough profit before the pandemic to cover the interest on its $170 million loan from Deutsche Bank. Things only got worse when Covid-19 hit, and revenues plunged to less $20 million. It’s no wonder the Trump Organization tried to sell the place.

Just down the street from the White House stands the Trump International Hotel in Washington, D.C.

Alex Brandon/AP

But the former president didn’t have much luck offloading that hotel or other assets last year. Trump ditched $32 million of real estate in 2017, an estimated $53 million in 2018, then $32 million in 2019. In 2020, however, he pocketed just $435,000, by selling condos in Vegas. The lack of deals was one reason revenues dropped about 25% to an estimated $450 million. A smaller sum, to be sure, but still more than 1,000 times the annual salary he gave away.

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Miami Herald- Assassinated Haitian president Jovenel Moise made a frantic phone for help before being killed.

The call came at 1:34 a.m. Haitian President Jovenel Moïse, who was on the other line,was in difficulty, and he needed reinforcement.

“They are shooting by the house,” he told the Haitian National Police commissioner. “Mobilize people.”

The non-stop automatic gunfire in Pelerin 5 where Moïse, his wife Martine and two children lived, started at about 1:30 a.m., according to a resident in the area, who said she ducked underneath her bed to escape the sound as she looked at her phone to see what time it was.

While neighbors in the area weren’t sure what was happening, unknown assailants who would later claim to be part of the Drug Enforcement Administration (a claim denied by the DEA) were advancing and making their way to the president’s private residence in the foothills of Haiti’s capital.

Inside the president’s bedroom, they would open fire. He was shot in the forehead, chest, hip and stomach, and his left eye was gouged, according to Charles Henry Destin, a justice of the peace who later documented the crime scene.

The deadly assault followed 10 minutes of frantic pleas. With no sign of his security forces, Moïse, 53, would make another call, this time to a tactically trained officer with the Haiti National Police.

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AP Morning Wire

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Cuba is suffering through a summer of dire shortages, from food and electricity to medicine. Fed-up Cubans are taking to the streets in unprecedented protests — and they’re voicing their outrage through a song called Patria y Vida — homeland and life.

The slogan is a spin on the communist regime’s decades-old slogan of “patria o muerte” — homeland or death. In strong terms, the song accuses the government of destroying the quality of life in Cuba, a message that quickly found traction with protesters who are demanding change.

“No more lies. My people demand freedom. No more doctrines!” the song says. It calls for people to shout “patria y vida … and start building what we dreamed of/ what they destroyed with their hands.”

The viral hit has become a political slogan

Patria y Vida has been a phenomenon since its release this year. The song is a collaboration between a group of Afro-Cuban reggaeton and hip-hop stars based in Miami, such as Yotuel Romero and Alexander Delgado, along with rappers Maykel Osorbo and El Funky, who live in Cuba. A YouTube video of the song has been viewed nearly 6 million times.

YouTube

When the single was released, Romero, who is part of the group Orishas, said that for him, the song was motivated by a look back at Cuba’s long history.

“Before the revolution, we had a beautiful Havana; now we have ruins,” he told Billboard in February. “From that point on, I said, ‘I’m not going to be quiet anymore.’ ”

Where the original Castro-era slogan was a call to arms for people to stand against outside influence, the new slogan tells people to hit the streets and take back their country.

“It’s over now! And we’re not afraid,” the song declares.

Patria y Vida quickly became an anthem. When large protests erupted in April, NPR’s Carrie Kahn declared it “astonishing” and a sign of “a growing movement challenging the regime like we haven’t seen in decades.”

After the song’s release, Cuban authorities arrested Osorbo. His supporters have submitted complaints to the United Nations over his treatment, saying that the government is persecuting him for expressing his views and for helping create the song.

The protests have been some of Cuba’s largest

Thousands of Cubans have been taking part in protests in Havana and elsewhere on the island, shouting their demands for more freedom along with calls for an end to high prices and economic turmoil. A run of electrical blackouts has added to their frustrations.

Crowds have been chanting slogans against Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel as well as demanding more access to vaccines. Cuba has been experiencing a record spike in COVID-19 cases and deaths in recent weeks. Overall, the nation has reported nearly 245,000 cases.

Marches and protests have been disrupted by police, who made mass arrests and used tear gas against demonstrators on Sunday. Videos circulating online have also shown officers firing toward crowds, reporter Nora Gámez Torres of the Miami Herald and El Nuevo Herald told NPR.

“There were really unprecedented images coming out of the island,” she said.

Latin America

Thousands In Cuba Demonstrate In One Of The Biggest Anti-Government Protests

Why is Cuba suffering?

There are several main reasons, including U.S. economic sanctions that were tightened under former President Donald Trump and the pandemic’s toll on the island’s economy and infrastructure. Cuba is also getting less economic help from one of its main allies, Venezuela.

“The government is in debt and has no money,” Torres said. “So the population has been enduring severe scarcities of food and medicine.”

Many are also angry and frustrated by Cuba’s policy of selling food in U.S dollars — which most of the country’s people don’t earn.

Remittances from relatives in the U.S. and elsewhere are also down. And like many places, Cuba’s tourism industry has been hollowed out by more than a year of travel restrictions due to COVID-19.

It’s not yet clear what will happen next, Torres said.

“Even if the government retains control, which is the most likely scenario, Cubans now see what they can do if enough people come out to protest,” she said. “So the genie is out of the bottle now and the frustration is not going anywhere.”

With the government facing a deep crisis, she warned, we’ll likely see more repression in the coming days.

The Cuban government is blaming the U.S.

Granma, the Communist Party newspaper, blames the protests on “annexationist interests, paid and directed by the United States.”

Díaz-Canel has said Cuba is facing difficulties that it knew were coming when the U.S. put tight economic sanctions on the country. And while the pandemic has made the situation worse, the president said every country in the world is being forced to cope with the coronavirus.

In a speech Monday, Díaz-Canel also dwelled on his country’s national electrical system, saying its infrastructure is hobbled by both the U.S. embargo and by overconsumption.

The U.S. stance

President Biden said he strongly supports the protesters.

“The Cuban people are demanding their freedom from an authoritarian regime,” Biden said during a White House event Monday. “I don’t think we’ve seen anything like these protests in a long, long time if, quite frankly, ever.”

Biden added, “The U.S. stands firmly with the people of Cuba as they assert their universal rights. And we call on the government of Cuba to refrain from violence in their attempt to silence the voices of the people of Cuba.”

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CABAÑAS, Honduras, July 18 (Reuters) – Wilder, the 2-year-old Honduran boy found abandoned and half-naked on a secluded Mexican highway near a truck carrying migrants, was welcomed home with cake and fireworks by relatives in the poor rural town of Cabañas in western Honduras.

The toddler made international headlines when Mexican security agents found him crying alone in southern Mexico in June near the cargo truck that contained dozens of people trying to make their way to the U.S. border.

The boy, who is in good condition, was flown on Friday to the northern Honduran city of San Pedro Sula where he was reunited with his mother after nearly 20 days in the custody of Mexican authorities. read more

“Never again will I let my child go. I’m so happy to have him with me,” Lorena Garcia, 23, told Reuters by phone. “Eating beans and corn, we’ll get by,” said Garcia, a farmer, who lives in a modest home with dirt floors.

Grandparents, uncles and cousins greeted the boy on Saturday with fireworks and a sign reading: “Welcome back Wilder.”

Garcia said her husband, Noel Ladino, left with Wilder in a bid to migrate to the United States with a human smuggler. It was unclear why the father and son became separated before the boy was found by Mexican authorities.

Elated to have her son back in her arms, Garcia lamented not being able to reunite as well with her husband, who she said is detained in Mexico. “I hope he comes back to help us too,” Garcia said.

The young family survived on Noel Ladino’s precarious salary of 100 lempiras a day, the equivalent of $4, when he could find work, which is scarce in the area, Garcia said.

They are among the thousands of people living in Cabañas in the mountains of the Copan department of Honduras, where 94% of the inhabitants are poor, according to official data.

Hundreds of thousands of Hondurans, including families with children, have set off for the United States in recent years to escape poverty, violence and corruption. Many are turned back by Mexico or the United States.

There has been an increase this year in unaccompanied children, mainly from Central America, arriving at the U.S.-Mexico border, even as President Joe Biden’s administration warns migrants not to come.

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