The Mexican drug cartels are killing off our friends and family members with fentanyl manufactured in superlabs south of the border and smuggled into the United States.President Joe Biden couldn’t care less.
Biden is in Mexico, claiming he’s seeking the Mexican government’s help to stop the carnage. Truth is, the trip is a dog and pony show. Photo ops, empty promises and such will be followed by rapid backsliding.
Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador (a k a AMLO) lacks both the will and the muscle to tackle the cartels, which have paramilitary forces that outgun the Mexican police and control swaths of territory.
Biden, for his part, has no intention of securing the southern border — the only measure that actually would stop the flow of killer drugs into our towns and schools.
For two years, Biden’s refused to do anything to stop illegal migrants from entering by the millions, even though the onslaught is diverting Border Patrol agents from detecting fentanyl smugglers. Agents are being pulled from drug interdiction and other law-enforcement duties to process and care for migrants. Democrats are willing to pay that price.
Mexico’s President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador has been unable to stop the cartels.AP
To swell the nation with new immigrants, they’re handing America over to the cartels. The cartels, which profit by trafficking in human beings as well as drugs, are double winners.
Who are the losers? American families losing their loved ones to fentanyl overdoses. More than 70,000 Americans are dying yearly from fentanyl-laced drugs, including roughly 30,000 people aged 15 to 34. Fentanyl is invading our high schools and middle schools, sometimes killing kids who are trying drugs for the first time.
The Biden administration must know that asking López Obrador to battle the cartels is a fool’s errand. Since taking office in 2018, AMLO, a leftist, has pledged to end the war on drugs, not prosecute it. His motto is “Abrazos no balazos,” which means “Hugs not bullets.” Fighting the cartels isn’t on his agenda.
Last week, Mexico arrested Ovidio Guzmán, leader of the one of the biggest cartels and son of kingpin Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzmán. The arrest was likely an empty diplomatic gesture because of Biden’s impending arrival, not a sign of change, suggests Derek Maltz, a former Drug Enforcement Administration official.
More than 70,000 Americans are dying yearly from fentanyl-laced drugs.REUTERS
AMLO hasn’t lifted a finger to go after the fentanyl superlabs or hand over numerous high-level cartel criminals under indictment in the United States, explains Maltz, who headed DEA’s Special Operations. Commenting on Ovidio’s arrest, Maltz adds that without “sustained attacks against the cartel leadership and the production labs, it’s not going to make a difference. Meanwhile we have 9,000 Americans dying every month.”
To stop the deaths, the US Border Patrol needs to intercept the fentanyl as it’s being smuggled, usually in cars and trucks or through tunnels. Unfortunately, catching those smugglers is not a Democratic Party priority.
The Democrats’ omnibus budget bill, signed by Biden two weeks ago, prohibits additional money for Customs and Border Protection from being used for technology or manpower to secure the border.
Instead, the budget says the money must go to pay charities that provide housing and services for illegals, as well as paying for airline and bus tickets for illegals to reach their chosen US destination. Democrats are turning Customs and Border Protection into a concierge travel service.
The Border Patrol Union said Biden officials want “more money to process more people so they can release more people.”
That has apparently been Biden’s objective since the start. It’s why he suspended “Remain in Mexico” and halted construction on the border wall his first day in office.
The cartels serve the Democratic Party’s goal of flooding the nation with migrants. Cartels are essentially the Democratic Party’s business partners. But it’s a deal with the devil. These same cartels operate distribution hubs in cities and towns across America, bringing in lethal drugs and criminals to sell them. It’s time we fight back. Asking Mexico for help is a charade.
Betsy McCaughey is a former lieutenant governor of New York.
The American Gas Association (AGA) is clapping back after news that U.S. federal regulators may ban gas stoves over their potential risks to human health stating the removal of the appliance is "reckless" and a "misguided agenda."
The conflict between federal agencies and the gas industry came to a head as the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and World Health Organization (WHO) have said gas stoves are unsafe and linked to respiratory illness like asthma, cardiovascular problems, cancer, and other health conditions,according to reports by groups such as the Institute for Policy Integrity and the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health.
"A December 2022 report in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health linking natural gas cooking with asthma is not substantiated by sound science." the AGA said in a press release Tuesday.
On Monday, Bloomberg reported that the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission plans to act on the appliances because the pollutants can cause respiratory and health issues.
"Any option is on the table. Products that can’t be made safe can be banned," agency commissioner Richard Trumka Jr. told Bloomberg.
The report said the federal agency plans "to take action" to address the indoor pollution caused by stoves.
The AGA has previously pushed back against Trumka's comments, saying that the emissions from cooking with gas are similar to emissions created when cooking with electric stoves and that they plan on submitting evidence to prove it.
"Any discussion or perpetuation of the allegations in this report which is funded by non-governmental organizations to advance their agenda to remove consumer energy choice and the option of natural gas is reckless." the AGA added.
On Tuesday, the agency slammed Trumka's comments, calling the finding "baseless allegations" and pointing how gas reduced carbon emissions from the power sector by pushing out more-polluting coal.
"Any efforts to ban highly efficient natural gas stoves should raise alarm bells for the 187 million Americans who depend on this essential fuel every day," the AGA said.
In December 2022, a group of federal lawmakers, including U.S. Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-MA, and Sen. Bernie Sanders, D-VT, wrote a letterto the CPSC expressing their concerns "regarding the risks posed to consumers from indoor air pollution generated by gas stoves."
The group pointed out that more than 40 million homes in the U.S. rely on gas stoves for cooking, and "methane leaks from gas stoves inside U.S. homes were recently found to contribute the equivalent climate impacts as about 500,000 gasoline-powered cars."
They added that the cumulative effect of such emissions has a disproportionate impact on Black, Latino, and low-income households.
"We will continue to work with regulators and policymakers to help ensure they have sound data to work with as they approach any issues related to natural gas." the AGA lease.
The U.S. Coast Guard repatriated 83 illegal aliens to Haiti on Monday and 273 to Cuba on Sunday after they were intercepted in the Florida Keys over the New Year period.
The Coast Guard said it continues to intercept and rescue illegal aliens from overloaded and unseaworthy vessels and warned that those interdicted at sea would be repatriated.
In a statement about the 83 Haitians repatriated on Monday, Lt. Travis Poulos said Coast Guard District Seven and partner agencies continue to patrol the Florida Straits, Windward, and Mona passages.
“These ventures are extremely dangerous and could cost you your life,” Poulos said.
The Coast Guard Cutter Mohawk’s crew departs Matanzas, Cuba, following a repatriation of Cuban illegal aliens to Cuba on Jan. 8, 2023. (Lt. Cmdr. Ryan Newmeyer/U.S. Coast Guard)
The 83 Haitians were first spotted in a sailing vessel by a West Palm Beach Coast Guard crew near Hobe Sound on Jan. 2, then again by a good Samaritan on Jan. 4 about five miles east of Key Lago—around 156 miles apart. There were men, women, and children aboard, according to the Coast Guard.
Lt. Cmdr. John Beal said Coast Guard District Seven crew continue to intercept and rescue Cubans “from grossly overloaded, unseaworthy vessels.”
“These illegal voyages are always dangerous and often deadly,” Beal said in a statement on Sunday.
“We are working closely with partner agencies to save lives and prevent illegal entry to the United States via our southeast maritime border. Those interdicted at sea will be repatriated.”
Florida’s state government will also deploy aircraft from the Florida National Guard to back up marine patrols to “support water interdictions and ensure the safety of migrants attempting to reach Florida through the Florida Straits.”
A vessel carrying illegal aliens who were repatriated to Cuba on Jan. 8, 2023; reported to U.S. Coast Guard Sector Key West watchstanders by a good Samaritan about four miles south of Duck Key, Florida, Jan. 1, 2023. (Courtesy of U.S. Coast Guard Station Marathon’s crew)
DeSantis Activates National Guard
Over 300 illegal aliens unlawfully arrived in the Florida Keys over the New Year period, prompting Gov. Ron DeSantis to sign an executive order on Jan. 6 to activate the National Guard.
State officials were forced to shut the Dry Tortugas National Park, about 70 miles west of Key West, after 300 aliens landed there, while a further 45 arrived in Key West. The Coast Guard said around 10 vessels were reported and intercepted throughout the Florida Keys between Dec. 31 and Jan. 1.
“As the negative impacts of [President Joe] Biden’s lawless immigration policies continue unabated, the burden of the Biden administration’s failure falls on local law enforcement who lack the resources to deal with the crisis,” the Republican governor said in a statement.
“That is why I am activating the National Guard and directing state resources to help alleviate the strain on local resources. When Biden continues to ignore his legal responsibilities, we will step in to support our communities.”
A boat that was left along the shoreline after it was used recently to transport Cuban illegal aliens from the island nation to America in Key West, Florida, on Jan. 6, 2023. (Joe Raedle/Getty Images)
In addition, DeSantis’s executive order (pdf) directs state law enforcement and other state agencies to “provide resources in support of local governments” responding to the influx of illegal aliens in the Florida Keys, as well as “additional support toward efforts to prevent further migrant landings on Florida’s shores.”
The 194 deputies of the Monroe County Sheriff’s Department struggled to manage the influx of hundreds of illegal aliens while also trying to ensure public safety, according to DeSantis’s office.
Biden Parole Program
On Jan. 5, Biden announced a new policy to turn back Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans, and Venezuelans who arrive illegally in the United States. People from these four countries make up the majority of illegal aliens crossing the southwest border, Biden said.
The “parole program” will allow up to 30,000 people a month from those four countries to seek asylum in the United States, provided they apply online while in a non-U.S. country, pay their airfare, and find a U.S. sponsor. They then need to make an appointment via the CBP One app to meet with a border agent.
“But if their application is denied or if they attempt to cross into the United States unlawfully, they will be returned back to Mexico and will not be eligible for this program after that,” Biden said.
The president said his administration expects this will “substantially reduce” the number of people attempting to cross the southwest border “without going through a legal process.”
“We can’t stop people from making the journey, but we can require … that they come here in an orderly way under U.S. law,” he added.
“And let me say it again: The actions we’re announcing today will make things better … but will not fix the border problem completely.”
The Coast Guard said it’s intercepted and blocked 4,795 Cubans trying to enter the United States illegally since October, while the governor’s office said over 8,000 illegal aliens have been encountered in the waters off Florida since August.
Nearly a ton of taxpayer-provided food gets tossed in the trash every day at a massive Manhattan hotel beingused to house migrants — because they’d rather secretly cook their own meals on dangerous hot plates, a whistleblowing worker has revealed.
Disturbing photos show garbage bags full of sandwiches and bagels awaiting disposal at the four-star Row NYC hotel near Times Square, where the city pays a daily rate as high as $500 per room, hotel employee Felipe Rodriguez told The Post.
“It’s a crime to be throwing out so much food,” he said.
Other images show a hotel room littered with empty beer cans and bottles following a wild, World Cup viewing party in November, Rodriguez said.
That gathering — in a room whose occupant “gave the key to a cousin” while she “was in The Bronx, hanging out” — erupted into a fight over the match that left one man with a “big knot on his head,” Rodriguez said.
Rodriguez said he also shot a brief video clip of two female migrants engaged in a hair-pulling fight outside the hotel during New Year’s Eve festivities last week.
The 23-second cellphone recording shows men holding what appear to be beer cans while struggling to separate the women after they tumbled off the sidewalk into the street.
A bag of uneaten sandwiches thrown away at the Row NYC hotel in Manhattan where migrants are being housed.Dennis A. Clark
A hotel employee told The Post the migrants aren’t interested in the hotel’s menu of prepared food.Dennis A. Clark
An NYPD source who was working in Times Square on New Year’s Eve confirmed the chaos at the hotel, saying the lobby was littered with broken bottles and some revelers were dancing while others were sprawled out on the furniture and the floor.
But Rodriguez said he’s “heard from management it’s between $400 and $500 a night, per room, depending on how big the room is.”
Rodriguez, 57, said he began working at the 1,300-room hotel in 2017 and was shocked by what’s happened since Mayor Eric Adams’ administration began using it as a “Humanitarian Response and Relief Center.”
Row NYC employee Felipe Rodriguez called the amount of food wasted by the migrants a “crime.”Dennis A. Clark
“What changed in October was dramatic,” he said. “There are some nice migrants in that hotel looking for that American dream, that second chance to make it in society. But there are a lot of migrants there that are causing chaos. We have a lot of fights, a lot of drugs, a lot of sexual harassment abuse.”
An NYPD source confirmed that cops have responded to a string of domestic incidents at the hotel.
Rodriguez said NYPD officers were initially stationed in the lobby but were replaced by National Guard soldiers in December.
Rodriguez also said the hotel had a list “of people that are supposed to be quarantined — for COVID, chickenpox, whatever it is.”
“Nobody supervises those people,” he said. “Once they get bored, they flee. We don’t know who’s sick and who’s not sick.”
Rodriguez added ruefully: “We are in an environment that is hostile, violent and not safe anymore.”
A hotel room covered in empty beer cans and bottles after several migrants had a World Cup party.Felipe Rodriguez
The Row NYC is one of four HERRCs that the city has opened in large Manhattan hotels, in addition to renting out 71 smaller hotels across the city, as of Sunday.
The expanding roster of hotels is being used to house about 26,100 of the 38,700 migrants who’ve flooded into the Big Apple since the spring, according to City Hall’s latest count.
Officials initially planned to have migrants undergo processing in the HERRCs for just 72 hours but abandoned that goal after getting overwhelmed by the influx that led Adams to declare a state of emergency in October.
Rodriguez — who was wrongfully convicted in a fatal, 1987 stabbing in Queens and released from prison in January 2017 — said that at least 40 percent of the food supplied to migrants at the Row gets thrown out.
Rodriguez also estimated the amount wasted at “almost a ton” a day.
“How do I know that? Because the sanitation guys go floor-by-floor every day picking up the trash,” he said. “Before, it used to be something like six, seven bags in the back landing of each floor. Now they’re picking up 15-20 bags.
Rodriguez said some of the bages of food he throws away weight 60 pounds.Dennis A. Clark
“Anything [the migrants] don’t consume is in those bags, and they’re heavy. I weighed one of the bags full of sandwiches one time and it weighed 60 pounds.”
Rodriguez added: “There have been times when we couldn’t take all of the garbage out because the bins were full, and I’m talking about 25-30 bins of garbage.”
“My problem is, why are we throwing away so much food? Someone from the city should have said, ‘Let’s order less food so we throw less food out.’ But nobody cares,” he said.
At the same time, Rodriguez said, he’s confiscated hot plates, pressure cookers and other forbidden kitchen items from hotel residents at least eight times.
“I felt horrible. They want a hot meal. They don’t want sandwiches. They want a cooked meal like in their own country. And that’s a serious issue,” he said.
In addition to sandwiches and bagels, the migrants are served food including fruit, peanuts, chips, juice, soda and prepared dinners that “you heat in a microwave,” Rodriguez said.
“They don’t like the menu. They just don’t. They want rice and beans, plantains, tostones,” he said.
Rodriguez recalled one incident last month when “I knocked on the door on the 18th floor to deliver a duvet and I saw smoke and could hear a fire alarm going off.”
“I put in my key and pushed open the door, and a whole bunch of smoke came out,” he said. “A lady was there and I said, ‘What are you doing?’ She said, ‘Nothing.’ I said, ‘What do you mean nothing? Where’s all this smoke coming from?’ She said, ‘I don’t know.’”
Rodriguez said he searched the room and found a pot of burned rice hidden in the bathroom vanity, along with two more pots, a frying pan and “an old hot plate” under the bed.
Residents cooking food in a hotel room at Row NYC with a hot plate.Dennis A. Clark
“It was older than my grandmother, and my grandmother’s been gone a long time,” he said. “I was like, ‘Seriously? This is electrical. If these wires spark and something goes wrong, this whole building will be on fire.’”
Rodriguez — who kept working at the hotel even after scoring a $5 million settlement from the state in April — said he felt so bad that he gave the family $300 the next day and told them to go to a restaurant.
But Rodriguez said he understood why the hotel “can’t allow” the migrants to cook in their rooms.
“They usually put the hot plate on the rug so that nobody can see it and it stays away from the fire alarm,” he said. “If those polyester curtains by the windows touch that red coil, it’s over. It’s a possibility that scares the s–t out of everybody in the Row.
“If you are on the 27th floor, the 28th floor, and a fire breaks out, the elevators are gone. That means you have to use the stairs,” he said. “My biggest concern is the children. We have too many children in that hotel. We have pregnant women in the hotel…The tragedy would be devastating.”
In addition, Rodriguez said that the Row “forgot about the standards we had when we had regular guests.”
“If they got caught smoking in the hotel it was a $500 charge. You could smoke outside, but you couldn’t stand in front so that people wouldn’t get secondhand smoke,” he said “The protocols went down the toilet because migrants can smoke weed, they can smoke cigarettes. You can’t tell them nothing.”
Rodriguez also alleged that he’s seen some residents apparently selling drugs outside the hotel and that he took photos of some scooters that were chained up nearby.
Trash and leftover food in one of the hotel rooms used by migrants.Dennis A. Clark
“One of the guys said, ‘Yo, why are you taking pictures?’ I said, ‘Because they don’t belong here.’ He said, ‘They’re ours.’ I said, ‘How are they yours if you just got here? How do you get money to buy scooters? These are brand new scooters?'” he recalled, adding that he never got a straight answer.
Rodriguez first spoke about what he’s seen and documented at the Row in an interview with ABC7 New York’s “Eyewitness News.”
Rodriguez, who has always maintained his innocence in the slaying of Maureen McNeill Fernandez, was convicted in 1990, largely on testimony from a police informant who later admitted helping frame Rodriguez.
Then-Gov. Andrew Cuomo commuted Rodriguez’s sentence in December 2016 and he was cleared in 2019 by a judge who called the case a “miscarriage of justice.”
Rodriguez said he kept his hotel job — which nets him $800 a week after taxes — following his wrongful-conviction settlement because “I get something out of going to work, doing something that’s purposeful.”
He kept working through the COVID-19 pandemic when the Row — formerly known as the Milford Plaza, which advertised itself as the “Lullabuy of Broadway” in memorable 1980s TV commercials — rented out four floors to the city to house homeless people.
“The rest of the floors were for airline employees, tourists from Europe. During the United Nations General Assembly, we had Secret Service and FBI staying with us. It was a fantastic hotel,” he said.
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Rodriguez claimed that he has seen migrants sell drugs outside of the hotel.
Rodriguez said doesn’t hold the migrants to the standard regular guests used to be held to.Felipe Rodriguez
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Some migrants allegdly smoke marijuana and cigarettes inside the room despite the hotel policy on smoking.
A mess left by migrants in one of the Row NYC rooms.Dennis A. Clark
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In October, Rodriguez said, “We were told the hotel was going to have migrants, but it was only going to be five floors, and that was it.
“When the hotel says that migrants were going to be a good business, they canceled the airlines’ contracts and they decided they weren’t going to rent to regular guests anymore. And they went and gave the city the entire hotel,” he said.
The hotel’s website now has a large notice on its homepage that says: “ROW NYC HOTEL IS CLOSED UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE. PLEASE CHECK BACK FOR ANNOUNCEMENTS AND UPDATES.”
The Row didn’t return requests for comment and NYC Health + Hospitals, which oversees the hotel and the other HERRCs, referred questions to City Hall, which issued a prepared statement that said, “All clients are offered a food selection that reflects the diets of residents and is prepared same-day to ensure freshness.”
“Last month, residents were even asked to participate in guest surveys to help us refine and expand menu options. Of course, we cannot and would not ever force clients to finish food they had taken but we do donate leftover food when possible,” the statement added.
City officials also said the Row has security workers assigned to every floor to spot any problems and ensure the safety of residents and staffers.
