by W.T. Whitne

Cuba’s socialist approach to developing vaccines against COVID-19 differs strikingly from that of capitalist nations of the world. Cuba’s production of four vaccines is grounded in science and dedicated to saving the lives of all Cubans, and to international solidarity.

The New York Times’s running report on the world’s vaccine programs shows 67 vaccines having advanced to human trials; 20 of them are in the final phase of trials or have completed them. The United States, China, Canada, the United Kingdom, Germany, South Korea, and India have each produced many vaccines; most vaccine-manufacturing countries are offering one or two vaccines.

Cuba is the only vaccine manufacturer in Latin America; there are none in Africa. The only state-owned entities producing the leading vaccines are those of Cuba and Russia.

Cuba’s Finlay Vaccine Institute has produced two COVID-19 vaccines. Trials for one of them, called Sovereign I, focus on protecting people previously infected with COVID-19. The antibody levels of some of them turned out to be low, and the vaccine might provide a boost.

The other vaccine, Sovereign II, is about to enter final human trials. For verifying protection, these trials require tens of thousands of subjects, one half receiving the vaccine and the other half, a placebo vaccine. Cuba’s population is relatively small, 11 million people, too small to yield enough infected people in the short time required to test the vaccine’s protective effect. That’s why Sovereign II will be tested in Iran.

100 million doses of Sovereign II are being prepared, enough to immunize all 11 million Cubans, beginning in March or April. The 70 million remaining doses will go to Vietnam, Iran, Pakistan, India, Venezuela, Bolivia, and Nicaragua. Sovereign II “will be the vaccine of ALBA,” explained Venezuelan Vice President Delcy Rodríguez, referring to the solidarity alliance established in 2004 by Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez and Cuba’s Fidel Castro.

“Cuba’s strategy in commercializing the vaccine represents a combination of what’s good for humankind and the impact on world health. We are not a multinational where a financial objective comes first,” says Vicente Vérez Bencomo, director of Cuba’s Finlay Vaccine Institute. Income generated by vaccine sales abroad will pay for health care, education, and pensions in Cuba just as happens with exports of medical services and medicines.

Cuba’s Center for Genetic and Biotechnological Engineering is developing two other COVID-19 vaccines; One, named “Mambisa” (signifying a female combatant in wars of liberation from Spain), is administered via the nasal route, just as is Cuba’s hepatitis B vaccine. The other vaccine, named “Abdala” (a character in a Jose Marti poem) is administered intramuscularly. The two vaccines are involved in early trials.

Cuba was ready

Cuban education emphasizes science and technology. In the 1990s, Cuba accounted for 11% of doctorate-level Latin American scientists. Cuban scientists work in the 50 or so biomedical research and production facilities which together make up Cuba’s state-owned BioCubaFarma Corporation, and which produces vaccines, drugs, medical tests, and medical equipment. It makes 60% of medicines used in Cuba, and 8 of 12 vaccines.

Cuba previously produced a pioneering vaccine that prevents life-threatening infection caused by type B meningococcus. Cuba developed a genetically-engineered hepatitis B vaccine and a vaccine offering palliative treatment for lung cancer. A Cuba-developed vaccine offers protection against infection, particularly childhood meningitis, caused by the Hemophilus Influenza type B bacterium.

In fashioning vaccines, Cuban scientists relied on familiar technology.

To provide an immunological extra, the antigen of Cuba’s Sovereign II vaccine is mixed with tetanus toxoid, as was done with Cuba’s Hemophilus influenza vaccine. As with other vaccines, scientists used a segment of the virus’s protein – here the COVID-19 virus – to form an antigen to stimulate protective antibodies. By contrast, the U. S. Pfizer and Moderna vaccines contain the whole viral protein, not a segment. That protein contains “genetic instructions” which enter human cells, causing them “to make spike proteins, which then get released into the body” where they trigger antibodies.

Observers suggest that this innovative U.S. technology may be less safe than the one used in Cuban vaccines. Not requiring extremely cold storage, as do the U.S. vaccines, the Cuban vaccines are suited for areas without adequate refrigeration capabilities.

Cuba’s bio-medical production sector has also created drugs for treating Covid-19 infection. Interferon, an antiviral agent developed in Cuba, produced in China, and used throughout the world, prevents many Covid – infected patients from becoming critically ill. The Cuban anti-inflammatory drug Jusvinza, used for treating auto-immune diseases, and Cuba’s monoclonal antibody Itolizumab, which moderates exaggerated immune responses, are both effective in reducing Covid-19 deaths.

The other way

The U. S. approach to producing and distributing COVID-19 vaccines is based on private enterprise, although the U. S. government did deliver billions of dollars to pharmaceutical companies to produce vaccines free of charge to recipients. The companies have contracted with purchasers abroad.

According to forbes.com in November, 2020, ‘If Moderna’s [vaccine] can get FDA approval and can make enough doses, its top line could be nearly $35 billion higher … than … in the last 12 months.” Another report suggests that, “The companies (Pfizer and Moderna) stand to earn billions of dollars in profits from their COVID vaccines this year [and] there will be more profits in later years.” The companies “claim the rights to vast amounts of intellectual property.”

With corporations in charge, distribution of COVID-19 vaccines is skewed. As of Jan. 27, “some 66.83 million doses have been sent out, of which 93 percent were supplied to only 15 countries.” In Latin America, only Brazil, Argentina, Mexico, and Chile have secured purchase contracts adequate for immunizing entire populations. The companies’ contracts with African nations allow for immunization of only 30 percent of Africans in 2021. Meaningful immunization has yet to begin there.

The wealth divide determines distribution. Epidemiologists at Duke University report that, “While high-income countries represent only 16% of the world’s population, they currently hold 60% of the vaccines for COVID-19 that have been purchased so far.” Cuban journalist Randy Alonso reports that only “27 percent of the total population of low and middle income countries can be vaccinated this year.”

“The world is on the brink of a catastrophic moral failure – and the price of this failure will be paid with lives and livelihoods in the world’s poorest countries,” declared Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, director of the World Health Organization, on January 18. He warned that, “some countries and companies continue to prioritize bilateral deals, going around COVAX, driving up prices and attempting to jump to the front of the queue.”

The WHO initiated the global vaccine collaboration COVAX to assure access by poor nations to COVID-19 vaccines. The 190 nations that are enrolled agreed to obtain vaccines through COVAX. Rich nations would supply COVAX with funds to enable 90 poor nations to receive no-charge vaccines. COVAX anticipates distributing two billion doses, enough to immunize only 25 % of the populations of poor nations during 2021.

Problems include: wealthy nations order vaccines independent of COVAX; they buy more vaccine than they need; manufacturers set prices; and prices are secret, variable, and very high.

Most other countries producing COVID-19 vaccines are at variance with Cuba through their profiteering and because they are complicit with the U.S. economic blockade of Cuba. Pursuing routine overseas commercial affairs, they all too easily adjust to U.S. regulations by means of which that cruel policy is enforced. More to the point, the U.S. blockade hinders Cuba’s vaccine efforts, and they are silent.

“We don’t have in Cuba all the raw materials and supplies we’ll need for the unprecedented scale of production that vaccinating our whole population requires,” Dagmar García-Rivera, Director of Research at Cuba’s Finlay Vaccine Institute, explained. “They have to be purchased and for this, we need financing. This is made infinitely more difficult by the US embargo … Procuring the necessary reagents for research and the raw materials for production is a challenge we face daily.”

In confronting the pandemic, Cuba exhibits attention to detail suggestive of a level of caring and concern not readily matched elsewhere. For example, Cuba’s government-friendly cubadebate.cu website provides a daily, detailed update of the infection’s impact. Its report on Jan. 27 presents data relating to cities, provinces, the nation, and the world – and the nation’s intensive care units. Readers learn that of 43 patients in intensive care that day, 16 were in critical condition, stable or unstable, and 27 were in “grave” condition.

All 43 cases are reviewed, beginning with: “Cuban citizen, 75 years old, from Alquízar, in Artemisa, already suffering from arterial hypertension and ischemic cardiopathy who is afebrile, on mechanical ventilation, is hemodynamically stable… with acceptable blood gases (oxygen and CO2), is improving radiologically with inflammatory lesions in the right [lung] base – reported as critical but stable.” The cases of four Cubans who died that day are also presented.

Fighting a pandemic in Cuba, it’s understood, is no casual matter. Nor is the health of Cuba’s people.

W.T. Whitney Jr. is a retired pediatrician and political journalist living in Maine.

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Then there are many of the economically poor nations

Giving one’s citizens “the peace of mind” offered by the COVID-19 vaccine, as a Honduran business leader succinctly put it, has become a focal effort for some poorer countries who have gotten tired of waiting to get doses through a United Nations program.

Countries including Honduras, Serbia and Mexico are actively striking out on their own, cutting their own private deals, report Maria Cheng and Aniruddha Ghosal.

Experts are increasingly concerned that these go-it-alone efforts could undermine a U.N.-backed program to get shots to the neediest people worldwide.

In past disease outbreaks, less wealthy countries generally waited for vaccines to be delivered by the U.N. and others. Many are now taking matters into their own hands. Those deals, however,  could leave fewer vaccines for the program known as COVAX.

U.K.-EU Vaccinations: The European Union has chosen a careful route in its vaccine campaign to defeat the pandemic. And as a result, it has seen a slow rollout of shots compared with Britain. Across the channel, the United Kingdom has shown speed and agility in its vaccine strategy. It has announced vaccine deals earlier, authorized shots from different companies more quickly, and experimented with stretching out the time between doses to get more people some protection quicker. The result is that the EU is in the U.K.’s rearview mirror in the vaccination drive. Britain has given at least one vaccine shot to about 15% of its population, compared with some 3% in the EU’s 27 nations, Raf Casert and Masha Macpherson report.

Timeline of virus vaccine deals reveals EU’s lag behind UK.

South Africa Vaccine:The country has suspended plans to inoculate its front-line health care workers with the AstraZeneca vaccine after a small clinical trial suggested that it isn’t effective in preventing mild to moderate illness from the variant dominant in the country. South Africa received its first 1 million doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine last week and was expected to begin giving jabs to health care workers in mid-February. The disappointing early results indicate that an inoculation drive using the AstraZeneca vaccine may not be useful, Andrew Meldrum and Sylvia Hui report.

Burkina Faso Hospitals: The West African country, which at first managed to avoid a catastrophic surge of the coronavirus, is now trying to cope with a much deadlier resurgence. Although Burkina Faso’s virus figures are still relatively small, officials worry that a general lack of understanding and adherence to basic safeguards will end up overwhelming the country’s already strained health system. Complicating matters, Burkina Faso is suffering from a conflict involving Islamic militants, the army and local defense groups that has pushed hundreds of thousands to the brink of starvation and forced the closure of more than 130 health centers in the tiny country, Sam Mednick reports.

Spring Travel: Around the globe, tough new restrictions on travel because of variants of the virus are hitting just when millions of people are normally on the move. That’s more bad news for airlines, restaurants and hotels, which have been struggling mightily for the past year. In late winter and early spring, Chinese factory workers are normally heading home for Lunar New Year, American college students are hitting the beach over spring break, and Germans and Britons are fleeing drab skies for some Mediterranean sun over Easter. But all of that is now canceled or in doubt, Dave McHugh, Casey Smith and Joe McDonald report.

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Guyana’s Minister of Health Dr. Frank Anthony says both the joint services in Guyana and the federal police in Brazil have increased border patrols between the two countries to reduce the risk of the spread of COVID-19.

He acknowledged that while there are challenges manning the border, efforts are being made by law enforcement on both sides to observe the order.

“While we have heightened our presence on our borders through the joint services, if people really want to slip through, I think there are possibilities of that happening. But it’s not only us who have heightened our presence on our border, on the Brazilian side, the federal police have also increased presence on their side,” the Minister said.

Dr. Anthony said this has been happening for more than a month.

“That’s because we have been in talks with them and we are very pleased that they have also increased their patrols and so forth. It is much tighter than it was before,” he said.

Dr. Anthony had previously indicated that Guyana’s land border with Brazil was closed and that that decision would remain in place for the foreseeable future.

“We allow for an official exchange of goods and services on Thursdays. So, every Thursday, there is an interlude where if there are goods from Brazil that is coming over to Lethem that’s allowed. Of course, given the protocols and everything, and from our side which goes across to Brazil as well,” he said.

Just last week, the government announced the suspension of air travel between Guyana and Brazil to reduce transmission of the new variants of COVID-19 found in that country.

That order also remains in place, Dr. Anthony said, noting monitoring and evaluation are also ongoing.

CMC

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The president of Haiti says an attempt to kill him and overthrow the government has been foiled, amid a dispute over when his term ends.

At least 23 people were arrested, including a top judge and a senior police officer, the authorities said.

President Jovenal Moïse insists his term in office ends in February 2022.

But opponents say it finished on Sunday. Protesters took to the streets of the capital Port-au-Prince and other towns over his refusal to step down.

There were clashes with police, who responded with tear gas.

“We cannot accept that Jovenel Moïse violates the constitution of the country,” said one protester, Etienne Jean Daniel. “We demand that the constitution be respected.”

Another accused the authorities of “kidnapping” those accused of carrying out the coup. “I am demanding the release of these people quickly,” said Jean Reynold.

image copyrightReuters

Security officials said there had been an “attempted coup d’etat” and cash and weapons – including assault rifles, machine guns and machetes – were seized as the arrests were made.

“I thank my head of security at the palace. The goal of these people was to make an attempt on my life,” President Moïse said. “That plan was aborted.”

The BBC’s Will Grant says Haiti’s political crisis comes down to two different interpretations of the constitution and the length of the president’s current term.

Opponents of President Moïse say it ends now after a volatile period in office following a disputed vote in 2016. Mr Moïse disagrees, arguing that he has one year left of his term and has no intention of stepping down before that date.

To punctuate its stance, Haitian opposition parties have named a top judge as interim leader overnight Sunday, the latest attempt to oust President Jovenel Moise, whose term they say has expired.

In a video statement sent to AFP, Judge Joseph Mecene Jean-Louis, 72, said he “accepted the choice of the opposition and civil society, to serve (his) country as interim president for the transition.”

After legislative elections were suspended in 2019, President Moïse is now in his second year of ruling by decree. Even if he manages to avoid being ousted, there are likely to be further protests ahead, our correspondent notes.

Haiti is the poorest country in Latin America with some 60% of the population living below the poverty line.

A group of US senators, in a letter to new Secretary of State Antony Blinken, has called on the Biden administration to withdraw Washington’s support for President Moïse..

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The first weeks of President Biden’s administration have been a striking contrast with the chaos and turmoil of the Trump administration, bringing a sense of normality back to the White House and government.

Biden, along with Vice President Harris, begins each day receiving the President’s Daily Brief, usually before 10 a.m. His administration has revived the White House daily briefings every weekday.

And when he has signed executive actions, they have usually been paired with events where the president delivers scripted remarks on policy, and he has rarely answered shouted questions from reporters.

The White House also routinely sends out press releases that seem familiar. In the early days of the presidency, it issued a statement recognizing National Teen Dating Violence Awareness Month — a day that had been routinely marked by previous administrations but ignored under Trump.

The White House is returning to making visitor logs public on a quarterly basis, a practice that was held under the Obama administration but jettisoned under Trump. Former Obama officials have described Biden’s Cabinet as an extended family of sorts, filled with people whom he has worked with for years and trusts.

“I think one of the main objectives here was giving the presidency a sense of normalcy,” said one longtime Biden aide. “Enough of the crazy shit we experienced for four years.”

After a two-hour meeting on Monday with 10 GOP senators, there were no reports of anyone insulting one another — something that happened frequently when Democrats and Trump got together — though there was no deal either. Sen. Susan Collins (R-Me.) described the meeting as “cordial” and expressed gratitude to Biden for hosting them.

Biden’s tweets, written in lowercase letters, are frequently mundane policy missives. It’s a striking contrast with Trump’s hourly 280-character megaphone, where he often picked fights or criticized and mocked opponents.

“It’s so funny – I hear from friends on both sides of the aisle how cleansing it is to wake up in the morning without feeling that the day will be inflamed by a crazy tweet,” said former Rep. Steve Israel, who served as the chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee in the Obama era. “Even people who disagree with President Biden say that at least we’re back to normal.”

Biden’s life outside of the bubble also echoes a time before the Trump era.

He went to church on his first Sunday in office — a routine White House aides expect to continue — at Holy Trinity in Georgetown and made a run for bagels afterward, with Secret Service agents placing the order at the window of the popular “Call Your Mother” deli.

The Bidens have brought their two German shepherds, Champ and Major, to the White House with them and they intend to get a cat. First lady Jill Biden, who has spent most of her career as a community college teacher, is continuing to hold a teaching position at Northern Virginia Community College.

When he was vice president, Biden sought to keep some normalcy in his life, too. He and Jill Biden slipped out of the Naval Observatory occasionally to catch a movie. He made headlines for getting pizza with one of his granddaughters.

He surprised a staffer when it was her birthday by stopping by the Italian restaurant where colleagues had gathered. He was also known to frequent Brooks Brothers on his way home from work at 1600 Pennsylvania.

The difference from the Trump years is stark — even those who worked in his White House acknowledge it.

“If you think about the first weeks of the Trump presidency, and even back in the transition, it was defined by disarray and jockeying for power,” said Anthony Scaramucci, who served as Trump’s communications director for 11 days.

From the beginning, Trump’s White House was marked by loud firings, tweets and fights that generated intense and constant press coverage. Trump’s decisions and actions were unpredictable, even among his staff, which unlike Biden’s, was filled with outsiders.

“Trump was elected because he didn’t have political or government or military experience,” said Barbara Perry, director of presidential studies at the University of Virginia’s Miller Center. “In fact, that was a selling point for him.”

She said that “in the minds of people who voted for him, it wasn’t a weakness it was a plus,” but argued that it did not lead to “informed leadership at the top.”

Chris Lu, who served as Cabinet Secretary in the Obama White House, drew a comparison between the new administration and the Obama, Clinton and Bush White Houses.

“It’s refreshing how normal it is. This is what happens in a normal White House. You have a process for making policy decisions, you have a message of the day, you have a president who sticks to the message. You have a sense of order,” Lu said.

It is not all hunky-dory, as Biden, who pegged himself a moderate Democrat during the campaign, is facing expected pressures from the left and the right as he enacts his agenda.

There have been familiar policy and political disputes ranging from the size and substance of the COVID-19 relief measure — Republicans have balked at the price tag —  to whether Biden is going too far  in restricting oil and gas drilling to reduce climate change.

Yet even the controversies at the White House seem like a return to normalcy. White House press secretary Jen Psaki was criticized by conservatives this week for dismissing a question about the Space Force, the sixth military branch established under Trump. She later issued a tweet that made it clear the Biden administration sees the Space Force as important, an apparent effort to dispel the criticism.

There’s a notable contrast with Capitol Hill, where tensions remain high one month after an angry pro-Trump mob attacked the Capitol. The House voted on Thursday to remove first-term Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) from her committee assignments as punishment for a string of controversies, including remarks about school shootings being staged.

Both the Capitol and White House remained fortified by large fences, a daily reminder of the violence one month earlier. Psaki told reporters this week that the perimeter would be adjusted when it “makes sense from an overall security standpoint.”

Biden’s White House has sought to project order and control while taking over amid a deadly spike in the pandemic and a severe economic downturn. Biden has also tried to manage expectations, warning repeatedly that it will take months to change the course of the virus.

Trump was elected at least partly as a response by voters who disliked the Obama years and what they represented. This could suggest there’s at least some political risk to doing things the way they were done from 2009 to 2016.

Yet Democratic strategist Eddie Vale argued voters are likely to like the signals from Biden so far as a welcome break.

“Just having a sense of normalcy and routine is already making people feel better, but, it’s actually most effective because it’s also infused with competency that is already showing people with action that we are going to come back – or dare I say build back better – from this recession and pandemic,” he said.

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Caribbean Community governments appear to have left the daily management of the COVID-19 to medical professionals and have switched their focus to acquiring hundreds of thousands of doses of the vaccine with shipments lined up to arrive in several countries in the next month.

Guyana, Suriname, Jamaica, Barbados and Trinidad, among others, are all close to beginning mass vaccinations for those interested in being jabbed in the arms but community associate, Bermuda, is way ahead of the pack already immunizing 5,000 citizens with another 8,000 awaiting their turn Premier David Burt said this week. The prime minister

As authorities await shipments from Cuba, India, China, the UK and the US, authorities across the region are expressing concern about lax compliance across the region relating to the wearing of masks, social distancing and assembling in large numbers blaming such poor attitudes and approaches for positive infection spikes in recent weeks, linking this mostly to post Christmas activities and revelry.

In the case of Barbados which until the past six weeks appears to have had the situation under control, the island was from Wednesday slipping into a 15-day lockdown of non essential services to help tame a spike that officials blame on non compliance across the spectrum of published regulations.

Prime Minister Mia Mottley said a dusk to dawn curfew will remain in effect during the period and businesses and entities not considered as nationally essential must shut their doors during what she called as “a national pause.” This is the island’s second lockdown in nine months.

“We need now to be able to spread the message to everyone. There are still too many people regrettably who are not wearing masks, there are still too many people who are gathering unnecessarily and I want to remind Barbadians that this thing is not playing, this thing is real and to that extent, I am asking every one of us to join the effort in being able to encourage persons in our communities, in our households,” she said in a national broadcast on Tuesday. “On Sunday, at midday, I am asking for everyone in this country to pause, literally pause, to pray and to reflect on what we must do to save our nation and to save our people.”

Suriname has also tightened up on overnight activities in the wake of 33 deaths in January compared to a mere five in December.

Meanwhile, Jamaica Minister of Health, Chris Tufton announced the imminent arrival of 900,000 doses of Astra Zeneca vaccine later this month as authorities move to inoculate about 500,000 people 16 percent of the population in the first instance the Gleaner newspaper reported. The island’s death toll as of this week reached 352 from 15,800 cases.

Mottley also thanked India’s government for agreeing to send 50,000 doses in the coming weeks to Barbados following a request sent to New Delhi 12 days ago. “We have had commitments from the Government of India and we expect to receive very shortly the first supply for 50,000 persons which will be 100,000 vaccines and we hope to be able to start the deployment of that in the very near future.”

Nearby Guyana through Minister of Health,  Dr. Frank Anthony said the country will get about 120,000 doses from China and Astra Zeneca shortly as he listed frontline workers as among the first to receive jabs.

“We are making other arrangements to be able to acquire more vaccines, so we should have enough vaccines for the elderly and persons with co-morbidities. These arrangements haven’t been completed as yet, but we are very optimistic that we will have more vaccines for persons in those areas. When we complete the health workers and the elderly and people with co-morbidities, then we will go to the next level, which is other people in the population,” Anthony said.

Neighboring Suriname expects 79,200 doses of Astra Zeneca supplies by next month with Health Minister Amar Ramadhin saying that the country’s request “has been submitted to the WHO for approval and I recommend that we wait calmly for the results.”

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President Biden is signaling not only an eagerness to reverse Trump-era immigration policies with his early executive actions but a willingness to go beyond the Obama administration.

A trio of orders signed by Biden last week seeks to make amends for the Trump administration’s family separation policy by establishing a task force dedicated to reuniting 545 children with their parents.

Biden also ordered a review of his predecessor’s public charge rule, which limited immigration opportunities for those who might need to rely on government assistance like food stamps or other social programs.

But it was Biden’s call for a sweeping review of the asylum and naturalization process — along with a pledge to try to address the root causes of Latin American migration — that excited immigration advocates.

“We’re not just rolling back back the Trump policies, which were at best superficial and ideological, but we’re going beyond the Obama administration,” said Thomas Saenz, president of Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund.

“Certainly it presents a much much more sophisticated view of the refugee and asylum issues for the Western hemisphere than we have seen.”

The new Biden administration policy puts a particular focus on the Northern Triangle, the nickname given to neighbors Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador, where in recent years migration patterns have rivaled those of Mexican nationals.

The “root causes” strategy Biden’s order calls for would funnel aid to strengthen democracy, combat gang violence and boost the economy.

“This is a much more sophisticated view of seeing the issue from the root causes and a recognition that the root causes in the Northern Triangle are in part caused by the U.S.,” Saenz said.

That seismic shift from enforcement to aid is being hailed by many immigration experts as a more realistic long-term approach.

“We’re in a situation now where we can no longer lead with heavy handed enforcement and our approach needs to change, and I think what we’ve seen from the administration is absolutely an acknowledgement of that,” said Jorge Loweree, policy director at the American Immigration Council.

Others argue the policy, which differs from the Obama years, will prove more cost effective than recent border security measures, in addition to doubling as foreign aid.

“Starting a Marshall plan for Central America is a lot cheaper than building a wall or hiring immgiration officers. It can provide jobs and security in Central America that could turn off the faucet for refugees coming to the U.S. instead of building more tubs,” said Domingo Garcia, president of the League of United Latin American Citizens.

Advocates say Biden isn’t just proposing policies that go beyond the Obama years; he’s also striking a new tone on immigration and setting higher goals.

One of his orders calls for strengthening inclusion of recently naturalized citizens, a nod to potentially reducing the fees and test requirements associated with becoming a citizen.

There are also signs the Biden administration might diverge from the Obama years by enacting policies making it easier to come to the U.S., like directing the government to consider giving those fleeing domestic or gang violence the ability to apply for asylum. Current law only protects those fleeing discrimination based on race, religion, political views and other protected classes.

Biden also called for reviving another program the Trump administration targeted for elimination, one that allows minors from the Northern Triangle to apply for refugee status.

But Biden’s orders, along with a comprehensive immigration bill Biden sent to Congress that would provide an eight-year path to citizenship for some 11 million immigrants, are sparking backlash among some congressional Republicans.

“Through these actions, President Biden has sent the message loud and clear to the world that our immigration laws can be violated without consequence,” said House Oversight and Reform Committee ranking member James Comer (R-Ky.).

“These radical, far-left immigration policies will continue to enable the humanitarian crisis at the border, place more children in peril as they are brought dangerously to the southern border, encourage more illegal immigration, and undermine the rule of law.”

Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.), who slowed the Senate’s confirmation of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas by placing a hold on his nomination, said Biden’s nominee

had not “adequately explained how he will enforce federal law and secure the southern border.”

Garcia said Democrats will now be tested on showing that their policies are sensible.

“One of the attacks Republicans have against Democrats is that Democrats are for open borders. We have to show we’re not for open borders but for legal immigration in an orderly fashion.”

Immigration advocates argue Biden’s plans are a direct response to what they view as Trump’s failures.

“The last four years of asylum policies have been based on the premise that if we find a way to make it as difficult as possible and increase the hardship that people have to endure to get to us, people will give up or never come in first place. We’ve gone as far as to take children away from their parents at the southern border, but we’re seeing people continue to come,” Loweree said.

“It speaks to the conditions people are facing in their home country. People would not face that kind of risk if remaining in their home country weren’t such a dangerous proposition.”

That’s where advocates see a chance for Biden to treat the border differently than Trump did.

Biden’s order calls for expansion of shelter networks “to address the immediate needs of individuals who have fled their homes to seek protection elsewhere in the region.”

From Saenz’s perspective, the U.S. bears some responsibility for having contributed to a militarized Northern Triangle that is now creating refugees.

“We contributed to those conditions a lot, and not just with our drug policy but with our immigration policy,” he said.

“Pretty much everyone that’s leaving wants to get out of that situation because it’s so dangerous, and that’s as true in a war atmosphere like Syria as it is in the violent circumstances of the Northern Triangle.”

Loweree argued that Biden needs to go further than reuniting families that were separated during the Trump years.

“They also need to give considerable thought to some kind of compensation fund to provide redress for harms they faced from the previous administration,” he said.

Still, Loweree said the Biden administration has already taken great strides in a short amount of time.

“The reality is they’ve done a lot. They’ve been in office for two weeks, and they’ve done an extraordinary amount of work on immigration. It’s an indication of a new era.”

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As prosecutors from the House of Representatives prepare to present their case against Donald Trump at his impeachment trial next week for incitement of insurrection, supporters who heeded his call on 6 January to “fight like hell” and went on to storm the Capitol Building are finding themselves in far greater legal peril.

The trial that kicks off in the US Senate on Tuesday could lead to a further vote that would permanently debar Trump from holding office in the future. By contrast, the mob of fervent Maga acolytes who broke into the US Capitol following an incendiary rally headlined by Trump could face prison for up to 20 years.

Texas woman who stormed Capitol says she was following Trump’s orders

 

One month after the events which left five people dead including a US Capitol police officer, there is no sign of the Department of Justice and FBI letting up in their relentless pursuit of the insurrectionists. In the past week alone there have been arrests of alleged rioters in Seattle, Washington; Las Vegas, Nevada; Corinth, Texas; Garner, North Carolina; and Marion, Illinois.

All 56 FBI field offices are engaged in a huge investigation that ranks alongside the biggest the bureau has conducted. As Michael Sherwin, acting US attorney for Washington DC which is leading the hunt, has put it: “The scope and scale of this investigation are really unprecedented, not only in FBI history but probably DoJ history.”

David Gomez, a former FBI national security executive who spent years countering domestic terrorism, told the Guardian that the bureau would classify and handle the search as a “major case”.

“It is probably one of the largest investigations since 9/11,” he said.

Already the number of people who have been arrested, either by the FBI, Capitol police or local Washington DC officers has reached 235, spanning more than 40 states. As the investigation widens and deepens, the focus is tightening on anyone considered to have acted as a coordinator of the action in an attempt to take out the ringleaders.

The FBI has set up a special strike force of experienced federal prosecutors who have been given the express instruction to pursue aggressive sedition and conspiracy charges. So far at least 26 people have been charged with conspiracy or assault.

“Sedition is the most serious crime that anybody could be accused of from 6 January,” Gomez said. “It’s advocating the overthrow of the US government. It involves not just talking about overthrowing democracy but having the means and wherewithal to carry out those actions.”

As more has become known about those arrested, the strategy being pursued by the FBI has also revealed itself. In several cases, people who participated in the storming of the Capitol were picked up and charged with relatively minor offenses such as trespassing or theft of mail simply as a means to get them into prosecutorial clutches.

Once in the system, more serious charges could then be added as intelligence came in. That pattern of escalating charges can be seen in the cases of Nicholas DeCarlo from Texas and Nicholas Ochs from Hawaii.

Initially, the pair were accused of unlawful entry into federal property. But new conspiracy charges were added this week in which they are alleged to have planned out their travel across state lines, raised money to pay for it, and then made the trip to Washington DC in a premeditated attempt to obstruct the certification of Joe Biden as winner of the US presidential election.

If convicted, DeCarlo and Ochs each face maximum sentences of 20 years in prison and a $250,000 fine.

Prosecutors have made clear that they are ramping up the charges against select individuals as a means of discouraging further violence from Trump supporters and their far-right and white supremacist allies. “We are going to focus on the most significant charges as a deterrent, because regardless of if it was just a trespass in the Capitol or someone planted a pipe bomb, you will be charged and you will be found,” Sherwin said.

The FBI’s work has been greatly assisted by the plethora of intelligence swirling around online – in many cases posted by the suspects themselves. Take the hapless duo, DeCarlo and Ochs.

A photo of the pair, posing thumbs up in front of the memorial door of the US Capitol on which they had scrawled the words “MURDER THE MEDIA”, was easily found online. It has been included in the indictment against them, and earned them the special attentions of the media assault strike force set up by federal prosecutors to investigate violent threats against members of the media.

That photo is one of at least 200,000 digital media tips that have poured into the FBI from across the country, some coming from friends and even family members who recognized individual rioters from the profusion of video and stills footage plastered across the internet and promptly informed on them.

As federal agents work their way through this mountain of digital information they are starting to get a feel for the kinds of people who were present that fateful day on the Hill. As feared, the leadership role played by far-right and white supremacist groups has veered into sight.

At least 10 members of the extremist group the Proud Boys are among the mounting number of those arrested, including Ochs, who according to the justice department claims to have founded a Honolulu chapter of the network. This week’s Washington state arrest was also of a self-declared Proud Boys leader – Ethan Nordean calls himself “sergeant of arms” of the Seattle chapter and is accused in court documents of having led a group of rioters into the Capitol.

On the back of mounting evidence of the Proud Boys’ leadership role in the attack, the Canadian government this week moved to designate the group as a terrorist organization.

Meanwhile, several members of the Oath Keepers, one of the largest far-right militia groups in the US, have also been arrested.

Another chilling element emerging from the indictments is the number of current and former law enforcement officers and military personnel who are among them. An analysis of the first 150 people to be arrested by CNN found that at least 21 had military experience, some ongoing.

Of those, eight were former marines, underlining the danger of elite military training designed to defend the country from international threats being turned back on itself and used to attack the heart of US democracy at home.

At least four law enforcement officers who were actively serving in their positions at the time of the 6 January attack have been accused, and have left their jobs. They include a Houston, Texas, police officer and a corrections officer from New Jersey.

One of the emerging truths that FBI detectives and prosecutors will have to wrestle with is that, despite the substantial presence of white supremacists and military personnel, most of those who have been arrested are what might be described as unremarkable Americans with no previous criminal records or history of extremist behavior.

The post More & More Arrests for US Capitol Riot appeared first on The St Kitts Nevis Observer.

BASSETERRE, St. Kitts — Kittitian Hill, a hotel resort located at Belle Mont Farm, set among 400 acres of organic farmland and the lush forests at the foothills of Mount Liamigua in St. Paul’s, is offering a “staycation” for citizens and residents living on St. Kitts and on Nevis.

Director of the National Emergency Operations Centre, Abdias Samuel, told the Cabinet that Kittitian Hill was approved for a “staycation.”

A staycation is defined as a vacation spent in one’s home country rather than abroad, or one spent at home and involving day trips to local attractions.

Kittitian Hill is not offering vacation in place for international travellers, as was stated by error in the Post-Cabinet briefing of Monday, February 1.

However, locals and visitors alike who have travelled to the country and cleared the 14-day quarantine period can also take advantage of the “staycation.”

The post Kittitian Hill offers ‘staycation,’ not a vacation in place appeared first on The St Kitts Nevis Observer.