Tag: Wall Street Journal

More on Cuba’s Desperate Economic Situation 

According to Mary Anastasia O’Grady, a Wall Street Journal columnist, Cuba’s “legendary repression continues while medicine, housing and fuel are in short supply. Inflation is galloping. Parents find it hard to feed their children. In September the government cut back bread rations to 60 grams a day from 80 grams. In December, after more than six decades, it finally said it will eliminate the ration book, admitting that it cannot provide even a skimpy list of staples.”

“Reuters reported last month that “transportation by ground, sea and air in Cuba” fell by 19% in 2024, reaching a level not seen in 20 years, according to American University economist Ricardo Torres. The infrastructure, from roads to electricity, has collapsed. One demographer estimates 18% of the population emigrated between 2022 and 2023. Those left behind stare into an abyss of hopelessness. Beneath the surface, there’s hunger for change. The island is a powder keg.”

In addition, there was “a U.K. court ruling in December that the National Bank of Cuba and the Cuban state are liable for two 1984 loan agreements, governed by U.K. law, in the amount of about $75 million. Cayman Islands investment fund CRF bought the debt in the secondary market and took the bank and Havana to court for nonpayment. Earlier this month the U.K. Supreme Court refused to hear Cuba’s appeal.”

“The unfavorable decision for Cuba scratches the surface of its liabilities. Over the lifetime of the Cuban revolution the regime has borrowed an estimated $50 billion to $100 billion. It’s hard to calculate the total because Havana’s reckless sovereign lending has been forgiven so many times. The Soviet Union and later Venezuela propped up the regime, but countries like China, Japan, France, Canada, Italy, Brazil and Mexico also extended credit to Havana. Outstanding debt is now about $40 billion, according to the Miami-based Havana Consulting Group.”

“Foreign companies, invited into the country beginning in the mid-1990s, also have helped the regime stay alive by making direct investments on the island. But capitalism doesn’t work in an economy run by totalitarian gangsters, which is why 30 years after the ‘opening,’ the country’s foreign direct investment remains paltry. Havana wants to blame its poverty on the U.S. embargo. But Cuba’s dismal track record with sovereign lenders and the private sector goes a lot further in explaining why capital steers clear of the island.”

“Earlier this month the news broke that Cuban officials have quietly told some foreign companies operating on the island that they could no longer take their profits out of the country. It’s impossible to know how many investors are affected because there has been no official proclamation. Companies seem to be getting the news in private ‘interviews,’ as the regime reportedly calls the struggle sessions.”

“Foreign investment in Cuba is heavily Spanish and there were rumors circulating last week that Madrid’s Socialist government has tried to keep a lid on the story by pressuring Spanish media not to cover it. Still the news has leaked out. An April 10 headline in the Spanish outlet EFE read, ‘Cuba blocks the repatriation of foreign currency to foreign companies based in the country.’”

“Investors don’t seem to want to complain publicly. But they’re talking. ‘We completely disagree. It’s not the [Cuban] government’s money, but rather the companies’ money,’ one unidentified businessman who claimed his assets had been ‘frozen’ told EFE. He said he was informed his money could be used only inside Cuba. EFE also reported that ‘in some cases’ companies ‘have complained to their respective governments, according to business and diplomatic sources familiar with the situation who requested anonymity.’”

“These arbitrary expropriations send a message that what entrepreneurs earn in Cuba, they don’t own. Still, money losers might take comfort in knowing things could be worse. In 2011-12 English architect Stephen Purvis spent 18 months in Cuban dungeons after Raul Castro decided he wanted to take over the British expat’s business on the island. Mr. Purvis told his chilling tale in a 2017 memoir titled ‘Close but No Cigar.’”

“Cuba still receives hard-currency remittances and payments from governments that engage with the regime’s human trafficking of doctors and nurses. But it isn’t enough. Draining foreign businesses won’t be either. If the dictatorship hopes to survive it needs a new ideological sugar daddy willing to burn money.”

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O’Grady, Cuba Is Running on Empty, W.S.J. (April 20, 2025).

 

 

 

 

Tropical Storm/Hurricane Exacerbates Cuba’s Electrical Problems

Late Sunday Cuba’s eastern province of Guantanamo was hit by a Category 1 hurricane. Hours later it was downgraded to a tropical storm  (Oscar) as it moved through the island’s northeastern coast. This storm through Wednesday is expected to bring between 6 and 12 inches of rain (and 18 inches in some isolated areas in that area) and life-threatening flash flooding and mudslides.

Other parts of the island were not directly affected by this storm. For example, some neighborhoods in Havana had electricity restored, but most of the city remained dark. The impact of the blackout goes beyond lighting as services like water supply depend on electricity to run pumps.

Manuel Cuesta Morúa, a Cuban political activist, said Cubans are living with increased hardship. Even preserving food is hard due to a lack of refrigeration, he said. With no electricity, Cubans can’t use air conditioning, fans or electrical stoves on the tropical island. “This is terrible, and the government has no solutions, as the lights went off at his home in Havana. “People are very upset.”

Jorge Piñón, a Cuba and energy expert at the University of Texas at Austin, offered the following observation, “The government just doesn’t have the cash to buy crude oil, diesel or even cooking gas. It doesn’t even have enough money to pay for fuel shipments, and that’s sparking what we are seeing today.  It’s an immense cash crunch.”

A Wall Street Journal editorial said, “The country has been enduring weeks of periodic blackouts that can last for 10 to 20 hours at a time, as the Communist government struggles to provide even basic services. The regime blames deteriorating equipment, fuel shortages and rising electricity demand. It also blames the U.S. trade embargo, as it always does for every ill on the island.” The editorial continued:

  • “But nothing stops Cuba from importing the parts it needs from the rest of the world. The real problem is a regime that can’t make much of anything work except exporting its people. Russia and Venezuela have reduced fuel sales to the island, which can’t pay its bills. Shortages of food and medicine are rampant.”
  • “Cuba’s dictatorship is a human tragedy and its people deserve much better. But they won’t get it as long as Communists run the place and enrich themselves at the expense of the people they impoverish.

On Sunday Cuba’s President Miguel Díaz-Canel described what Cuba is experiencing with the collapse of the national electrical energy system (SEN) as an “exceptional situation“ that he attributed to the alleged economic war and financial persecution of the United States against the regime, while he threatened to respond with repression to citizen protests over the desperate lack of electricity.” He added the following:

  • “”We have not had stable fuel suppliesso that the system can operate at its full capacity and with all its stability.”
  • “The entire professional and operational potential of the electrical energy system is at work here. We have had the opportunity to work with other colleagues in the national office and we must see the level of knowledge and precision with which the colleagues in the national load dispatch work in communication with the provinces.”
  • “Work is currently underway in two key areas: stabilizing the system and managing to obtain fuel suppliesthat will allow us to work in a better situation over the coming weeks.”
  • “Efforts are being made to obtain spare parts to gradually recover distributed generation, which has been severely affected.”
  • “We will not allow acts of vandalism and much less disturb the peace of our people. That is a conviction and a principle of our revolution.”

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Tropical Storm Oscar Unleashes Heavy rain on Cuba After Landfall, N.Y. Times (Oct. 19 & 21, 2024); Cubans struggle with an extended power outage and a new tropical storm, Wash. Post (Oct. 21, 2024) Perez, Cuba Suffers Mass Blackout as Energy Crisis Deepens, W.S.J. (Oct. 18, 2024);Editorial: Cuba Can’t Keep the Lights On, W.S. J. (Oct. 20, 2024); Oscar weakens as it passes through Cuba and becomes a tropical storm, Diario de Cuba (Oct. 21, 2024); Diaz-Canel threatens to respond to protests with repression: for ‘principle of the revolution,’ Diario de Cuba (oct. 21, 2024);

 

Noted Critic of Cuba Lambasts EU Aid to Cuba 

The Wall Street Journal’s columnist, Mary Anastasia O’Grady, has penned a severe criticism of the European Union’s financial aid to the island. This July, for example, the EU “sent E500,000 to Cuba, ostensibly  for ‘public health’” and its “Multiannual Indicative Programme (MIP) for Cuba for 2021-2024 amounts to €91 million.”[1]

“Anna Fotyga, a former Polish minister of foreign affairs and a former member of the European Parliament, wrote in the European Conservative last week that it’s ‘estimated that the EU is currently funding 80 projects in Cuba at a cost of nearly 155 million euros. Every single one of these projects is run by organizations with close ties to the Raul Castro regime.’”

In short,”there is no such thing as an independent nongovernmental organization that receives money from abroad in Cuba. . . . Sending money to Cuba is sending money to the regime.”

Moreover, “European aid  . . . also goes against European interests because Havana is helping Russia in its effort to take Ukraine.”

“[B]ankrupt Havana is desperate for hard currency. First because its economy doesn’t grow. Second because it needs to maintain its repressive police state, at home and in Venezuela where the Cuban agents have infiltrated the military.”

“J11 (the day of mass arrests of Cuban protesters) “revealed the raw brutality the regime uses to keep the lid on popular discontent. Condemnation came from all quarters. Hollywood apologists went silent.”

“Dissident leader Daniel Ferrer is in a prison on the other end of the island. The website Ciber Cuba reported on Aug. 22 that the 56-year-old ‘is in a sealed cell, where hardly any air circulates’ and there is no daylight. He ‘perceives a constant noise within the cell’ and suffers “severe headaches, ringing in the ears, bleeding in the mouth, loss of vision, cramps, and momentary paralysis in his hands.”

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[1] O’Grady, The EU Funds Havana—and Helps Moscow, W.S.J. (Sept. 1, 2024); O’Grady’s bio.

 

Will the World’s Population Cease To Expand?  

This blog has published many posts about the U.S. currently experiencing a declining and aging population and seeing one solution in encouraging immigration from other countries that have increasing and younger populations.[1]

This perspective is complicated by some population experts seeing a future peak in world population and a subsequent shrinkage in same without reaching a plateau and stable population.[2]

Dean Spears’ Opinion

Dean Spears (an economist at the Population Research Center at the University of Texas, Austin) asserts that various experts agree that world population soon will peak and then shrink. Here are those experts’ opinions on the timing of such a peak: U.N. demographers, 2080s; Wittgenstein Center for Demography and Global Human Capital, 2070s; Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington, 2060s.

The common element in these projections is families having smaller family sizes. The main reason, Spears claims, is “people want smaller families than people did in the past. Humanity is building a better, freer world with more opportunities for everyone, especially for women. That progress deserves everyone’s continued efforts. That progress also means that, for many of us, the desire to build a family can clash with other important goals, including having a career, pursuing projects and maintaining relationships.”

These competing interests could lead to “backsliding on reproductive freedom—by limiting abortion rights, for example. But Spears says, “low birthrates are no reason to reverse progress toward a more free, diverse and equal world.”

Spears concludes this analysis with the following statement: “Humanity needs a compassionate, factual and fair conversation about how to respond to depopulation and how to share the burdens of creating each future generation. The way to have that conversation is to start paying attention now.” (Emphasis added.)

Wall Street Journal’s Perspective

The Wall Street Journal begins its article, “The world is at a startling demographic milestone. Sometime soon, the global fertility rate will drop below the point needed to keep population constant. It may have already happened. Fertility is falling almost everywhere, for women across all levels of income, education and labor-force participation. The falling birthrates come with huge implications for the way people live, how economies grow and the standings of the world’s superpowers.” (Emphasis added.)

“Many government leaders see this as a matter of national urgency. They worry about shrinking workforces, slowing economic growth and underfunded pensions; and the vitality of a society with ever-fewer children. Smaller populations come with diminished global clout, raising questions in the U.S., China and Russia about their long-term standings as superpowers.” (Emphasis added.)

“Some demographers see this as part of a ‘second demographic transition,’ a society wide reorientation toward individualism that puts less emphasis on marriage and parenthood, and makes fewer or no children more acceptable.”

According to Professor Melissa Kearney of the University of Maryland, “state-level differences in parental abortion notification laws, unemployment, Medicaid availability, housing costs, contraceptive usage, religiosity, child-care costs and student debt could explain almost none of the decline. We suspect that this shift reflects broad societal changes that are hard to measure or quantify. . . . If people have a preference for spending time building a career, on leisure, relationships outside the home, that’s more likely to come in conflict with childbearing. Meanwhile, time-use data show that mothers and fathers, especially those that are highly educated, spend more time with their children than in the past. The intensity of parenting is a constraint.”

“With no reversal in birthrates in sight, the attendant economic pressures are intensifying. Since the pandemic, labor shortages have become endemic throughout developed countries. That will only worsen in coming years as the past crisis fall in birthrates yields an ever-shrinking inflow of young workers, placing more strain on healthcare and retirement systems.” (Emphasis added.)

Conclusion

 These articles were the first that this blogger had heard of a projected decline in world population which if and when it happened would have a major impact on many countries and national and international economics and politics. Comments by others on this topic are encouraged.

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[1] See, e.g., the following dwkcommentries.com posts: Naturalized U.S. Citizens: Important Contributors to U.S. Culture and Economy,(June 7, 2015); Iowa State Government Encouraging Refugee and Migrant Resettlement(Feb. 3, 2023); Other States Join Iowa in Encouraging Immigration to Combat Aging, Declining Population (Feb. 22, 2023); Wall Street Journal Editorial: U.S. Needs More Immigrants (July 25, 2023); S. Has Long-Term Labor Crisis (Sept. 26, 2023); Migrants from All Over Flocking to U.S. (Nov. 4, 2023);U.S. States That Could Have the Greatest Benefit from Immigrant Labor (Feb. 28, 2024); Another Documentation of the U.S. Need for Immigrants (April 12, 2024); Negative Impact of Donald Trump’s Proposed Immigration Restrictions (May 15, 2024).

[2] Spears, The World’s Population May Peak in Your Lifetime. What Happens Next?, New York Times (Sept. 18, 2023), Ip & Adamy, Suddenly There Aren’t Enough Babies. The Whole World Is Alarmed, W.S.J. (May 13, 2024).

 

 

U.S. Border Crisis Blocks U.S. Immigration Reform   

Jason Riley, a Wall Street Journal columnist, asserts that the U. S, border crisis is blocking needed reform of U.S. immigration law and procedures.[1] Here is a summary of that argument.

First, “porous borders compromise homeland security. The world is a dangerous place, as recent events have reminded us, and the government needs to know who’s entering the country. Increasingly, the southern border has become a portal not only for Central Americans but also for tens of thousands of foreign nationals from as far away as Asia and Africa. A large majority are economic migrants in search of employment and better living conditions. Still, the possibility that some small percentage is coming here to do us harm deserves more attention than it’s getting from the White House.”

“So long as the border problem persists at crisis levels, the debate over how to repair our immigration system for admitting people legally is going nowhere.”

“[D]espite heightened levels of undocumented immigration, the country still has far more job openings than job seekers. The real problem is a labor shortage that hasn’t gone away even as wages have risen. According to Douglas Holtz-Eakin, a former head of the Congressional Budget Office, demographic trends are to blame, and more legal immigration should be part of any solution.”

A major reason for this labor shortage is “the retirement of the Baby Boom generation, [which] is swelling the ranks of retirees entering the large entitlement programs that rely on labor taxes for their funds, raising the specter of a future of smaller cohorts of workers paying higher taxes in a slower-growing economy,” Mr. Holtz-Eakin writes in a new paper. ‘The reform of employment-based immigration can address the near-term scarcity of labor, as well as the looming demographic crisis created by low fertility and the retiring Baby Boom generation.’”

As a result, “Mr. Holtz-Eakin calls for is a less-restrictive H-1B visa program for skilled workers. The number of visas, which often go to graduates of U.S. universities, has been capped at 85,000 since 2004, even though more than 480,000 people are currently seeking one. Visa holders aren’t permitted to switch jobs or start businesses. In addition to the low cap, no country may receive more than 7% of the annual allotment, a rule that stymies nationals from populous countries such as India. ‘The result is long wait times for skilled workers and an inflexible system for employers.’”

“Mr. Holtz-Eakin stresses that our inefficient migrant policies are noticed by other countries and have put us at a competitive disadvantage in the international competition for human capital. Earlier this year Canada announced that it was offering 10,000 work permits to foreigners residing in the U.S. on H-1B visas. Within 48 hours of the program’s launch, all the slots were taken. ‘At present,’ Mr. Holtz-Eakin writes, ‘the near-term outlook for labor is scarcity, the long-term trend is slowing population growth, and the United States’ global competitors are more successful in attracting high-skill immigrants.’”

Mr. Riley concludes, “You can support more legal immigration and better border security at the same time, and polling shows that most Americans do. They understand that allowing more people to come lawfully will help reduce unlawful entries. Moreover, there is agreement among Democratic and Republican lawmakers that the system is dysfunctional and outdated. There is no reason we can’t upgrade our policies in a way that accommodates the aspirations of migrants and satisfies the demands of a 21st-century economy. But don’t expect to see bipartisan appetite for constructive reform so long as illegal immigration rages unchecked.”

Conclusion

This blogger agrees that U.S. immigration law and procedures are “dysfunctional and outdated” and need to be changed to accommodate “the aspirations of migrants and [satisfy] the demands of a 21st-century economy.”

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[1] Riley, The Border Crisis Stymies Needed Immigration Reform, W.S.J. (Dec. 5, 2023)

 

 

Wall Street Journal Praises Cuba’s Small Businesses 

On October 4, a Wall Street Journal article praised Cuba’s small businesses.[1] Here are the highlights of that article.

“Newly licensed private businesses are becoming a lifeline for Cuba, bringing in about half of the country’s total food imports as the cash-strapped Communist government struggles to keep power plants running and provide public transport because of acute fuel shortages.”

‘Havana passed laws allowing Cubans to form small businesses that can employ up to 100 people in the wake of countrywide protests that shook the impoverished island two years ago. Since then, more than 8,000 small and midsize businesses have registered with the government. They are involved in activities that range from tourism and construction to computer programming.”

“’In the last two years, the private sector has been dominating commerce in Cuba to an unprecedented level,’ Aldo Álvarez, a Cuban lawyer turned importer based in Havana, said in a telephone interview. ‘We not only have businesses, but we have the capacity to import.’”

“Cuba’s embassy to the U.S. referred to comments in a recent radio interview with Deputy Foreign Minister Carlos Fernández de Cossío, who said Havana’s decision to allow small businesses was a sovereign decision but that Cuba wouldn’t allow big concentrations of property, wealth and capital to develop, ‘at least for the moment.’ He told Miami public radio station WLRN last week that economic liberalization won’t lead to a political challenge of Cuba’s single-party rule.”

“More than 400,000 Cubans have left the island for the U.S. over the past two years, according to data by U.S. Customs and Border Protection. The emigration wave has been fueled by political repression and severe electricity, fuel and food shortages, migrants say, in the worst economic crisis since the dissolution of the Soviet Union, Cuba’s main ally and trade partner, in the 1990s. Tourism, the island’s main moneymaker, collapsed as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic and has yet to fully recover.”

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[1] (Acosta & Cordoba, Small Businesses Become a Lifeline for Cuba’s Floundering  Economy, W.S.J. (Oct. 4, 2023).

U.N. Agency Reports Afghan Human Rights Violations Against Former U.S. Partners

On March 28, 2002, the U.N. Security Council established the U.N. Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) to promote peace and stability in that country and thereafter that mandate annually has been renewed and revised to reflect the continued needs of that country. This Mission’s headquarters is in Kabul with a field presence of around 1,187 staff throughout the country.[1]

UNAMA’s Report on Taliban’s Human Rights Violations[2]

On August 22, 2023, UNAMA released its report that the Taliban has committed at least 800 human-rights violations against U.S. partners since the Taliban’s takeover of the country in 2021. Members of the Afghan National Army are at the “greatest risk,” followed by national and local police officers and National Directorate of Security officials. Targets also include prosecutors, judges and national, provincial and district officials who served in the U.S.-backed government.

At least 218 Afghan partners have been murdered, the report says. “Some were taken to detention facilities and killed while in custody,” the report says, while “others were taken to unknown locations and killed, their bodies either dumped or handed over to family members.”

In addition, the report asserts that there have been 144 instances of torture and maltreatment, including beatings with pipes and cables, plus at least 14 enforced disappearances and more than 424 arbitrary arrests.

Reactions to the U.N. Report[3]

The New York Times and the Wall Street Journal reported on the above details of this report.

Their articles also noted that “tens of thousands of such former officials remain in Afghanistan, unable or unwilling to join the scramble of Afghans to flee abroad” after the Taliban takeover and inhabit a “climate of  fear.”

These news articles quoted the report as saying, “the abuses it found work against the healing of wounds in society from Afghanistan’s 40 years of war, and contravene the Taliban’s obligations under international human-rights law” and “the de facto authorities’ failure to fully uphold their publicly stated commitment and to hold perpetrators of human rights violations to account may have serious implications for the future stability of Afghanistan.”

The Wall Street Journal also published an editorial claiming that “the Biden Administration wants Americans to forget about Afghanistan” and “continues to offer too few visas for Afghans who helped America. Some Afghan partners told the U.N. that they ‘have gone into hiding’ and ‘live in fear of being arrested or killed by a member of the de facto authorities.’” Therefore, this editorial concludes, “These ugly details add to the disgrace of one of America’s worst betrayals.”

The Taliban government in a statement appended to the UNAMA report said that after the Taliban had seized power, its supreme leader had issued a blanket amnesty to all former government members, that only people acting against the Taliban had been arrested and prosecuted and,  “After the victory of the Islamic Emirate until today, cases of human rights violations (murder without trial, arbitrary arrest, detention, torture, and other acts against human rights) by the employees of the security institutions of the Islamic Emirate against the employees and security forces of the previous government have not been reported.”

Although not mentioned in the U.N. report, the U.S. needs to adopt the Afghan Adjustment Act, which would provide permanent legal status for Afghans who have been admitted to the U.S. on temporary parole visas because of their assistance to U.S. troops and personnel before September 2021.[4]

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[1] UNAMA, About.

[2] Press Release, U.N. Assistance Mission in Afghanistan, Impunity Prevails for Human Rights Violations Against Former Government Officials and Armed Forces Members (Aug. 22, 2023); UNAMA, A barrier to securing peace: Human rights violations against former government officials and former armed force members in Afghanistan: 15 August 2021—30 June 2023.

[3] Pena, U.N. Says Taliban Committed Rights Abuses Despite Blanket Amnesty, N.Y. Times (Aug. 22, 2023); Shah, Afghans Who Allied with U.S. Face Killings, Arrests Under Taliban Rule, U.N. Finds, W.S.J. (Aug. 22, 2023); Editorial: The Fate of America’s Afghan Partners, W.S.J. (Aug. 22, 2023)Response by the de facto Ministry of Foreign Affairs to UNAMA Human Rights Service report, regarding the violation of human rights against the employees and military forces of the previous government, Directorate of Human Rights & Women’s International Affairs, Kabul (Aug. 2023).

[4] Introduction of New Proposed Afghan Adjustment Act, dwkcommentaries.com (July 31, 2023).

Your Longevity Is Important for Many Reasons  

Longevity or how long you will live has always been important in making many decisions about your future. But this blogger has never known until reading the Wall Street Journal article cited below that the American Academy of Actuaries and Society of Actuaries have calculated longevity factors based upon the assumption that everything goes well for the individual and upon the latest mortality data from the U.S. Social Security Administration.

That data has been compiled in the Actuaries Longevity Illustrator, which helps an individual see how long he or she might live. (This is different from life expectancy tables that have the average number of years someone will live from a given age.)  [1]

The Illustrator is simple to use. You only enter your date of birth, your retirement age, your gender, whether or not you smoke and whether your general health is excellent, average or poor, which terms are not defined.

Examples of Excellent Health Males and Females

For example, an 84 year-old non-smoker male with excellent health has a 94% chance of living to age 85, 59% chance to age 90, 26% chance to age 95 and 7% to age 100.

An 83-year old female non-smoker with excellent health would have a 91% chance of living to age 85, 64% chance to age 90, 33% chance to age 95 and 12% chance to age 100.

Examples of Average Health Males and Females

An 84 year-old non-smoker male with average health would have a 92% chance of living to age 85, 51% chance to age 90, 18% chance to age 95 and 4% chance to age 100.

The 83 year-old non-smoker female with average health would have a 89% chance to reach age 85, 56% chance to age 90, 25% chance to age 95 and 7% chance to age 100.

Observations

Josh Zumbrun, the author of the Wall Street Journal article on this subject, says, “The good news [from these longevity statistics] is that many Americans live a lot longer than they expect. The bad news is that this often leads to financial regret as they realize, sometimes too late, that [earlier in life they made financial decisions that have not provided sufficient financial resources for these additional years].”

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[1] Zumbrun, You Might Live Longer Than You Think. Your Finances Might Not, W.S.J. (Feb. 10, 2023); Actuaries, Longevity Illustrator.

Congress Fails To Adopt Important Immigration Legislation

Previous posts documented Congress’ earlier failure this Session to adopt (a) the Afghan Adjustment Act to improve the legal status of Afghan evacuees in the U.S. and (b) important bipartisan immigration reform, one of which was offered by Senators Kyrsten Sinema (ex-Democrat & now Independent) and Thom Tillis (Rep., NC) that would have addressed the legal fate of so-called Dreamers and provided billions of dollars to secure the U.S. border with Mexico and improve processing of asylum claims.[1]

Nor were these failures rectified in the balance of the Session with its primary focus on what was known as the Omnibus bill, which is discussed below.

The Omnibus Bill[2]

On the evening of December 19, the 4,155 page Omnibus Bill was introduced in the Senate.  The bill provides $1.65 trillion to finance all of the federal government for the rest of fiscal 2023 (ending September 30, 2023). This includes $858 billion for defense, a 9.7% increase; $45 billion in new military and economic aid for Ukraine; new incentives for citizens’ retirement savings; increased funding for food stamps, heating assistance, Pell grants, Head Start, Child Care and Development Block Grant Program plus $40 billion in emergency spending (mostly to assist communities recovering from drought, hurricane and other natural disasters); and a ban on TikTok on government devices.

Other parts of this bill would make changes to Medicaid eligibility, the Children’s Health Insurance Program and Medicare provider payments.

According to a Wall Street Journal editorial, this is the “ugliest omnibus bill ever” and “[m]ajor changes in law deserve their own debate and vote. Instead, a handful of powerful legislators wrote this vast bill in a backroom. Members can use the need to fund the government as an excuse to say they supported, or opposed, specific provisions as future politics demands.”

 Senate Approves the Omnibus Bill[3]

On the afternoon of December 22, the Senate passed the Omnibus bill, with a bipartisan vote of 68-29. It did so after that morning’s defeat of two proposed amendments to extend the so-called Title 42 to continue a legal ban on admission of migrants at the U.S.-Mexico border. One of these proposed amendments was offered by Senator Mike Lee (Rep., Utah), which was defeated 47-50; the other by Senator Sinema (Indep., Arizona) and Senator Tester (Dem., Montana), which was defeated with only 10 affirmative votes.

House Approves the Omnibus Bill[4]

The next day, December 23, the House approved the omnibus bill, as amended by the Senate, without any additional proposed immigration amendments, 225-201. The bill thus now will go to President Biden, who is expected to sign it in coming days.

Later on December 23 the 117th Congress adjourned and will terminate on January 3, 2023.

Litigation Over Continuation of Title 42[5]

 While these legislative machinations were going on, there was pending litigation over the continuation of Title 42, which had been adopted by the Trump Administration to allow migrants to be quickly expelled back to Mexico after illegally crossing the border into the U.S. in order to prevent the threat of further spread of the coronavirus in the U.S. and which was scheduled to expire on December 21.

After such litigation had been dismissed by lower federal courts, the case went to the U.S. Supreme Court, and on December 19th Chief Justice John Roberts ordered a temporary ban against termination of Title 42 until the Supreme Court had acted on the issue.

Then on December 27, the Supreme Court, 5-4, issued an unsigned order that was supported by Chief Justice Roberts and Justices Thomas, Alito, Kavanaugh and Barrett. That order (a) granted the application for stay of the District Court order, pending certiorari, that had invalidated Title 42; (b) granted the applicants’ suggestion that its application be treated as a petition for a writ of certiorari; and (c) directed the parties  to brief and argue whether the State applicants may intervene to challenge the District Court’s summary judgment order. The Court added that this stay “precludes giving effect to the District Court order setting aside and vacating the title 42 policy,” but “does not prevent the federal government from taking any action with respect to that policy” and the Supreme Court “does not grant review of those merits, which have not yet been addressed by the Court of Appeals.”

This unsigned order then concluded by directing the Clerk “to establish a briefing schedule that will allow the case to be argued in the February 2023 argument session” and by stating that the Court’s “stay shall terminate upon the sending down of the judgment of this Court” and that the previous stay order by the Chief Justice is vacated.

Justices Sotomayor and Kagan, without opinion, stated that they would deny the application while Justices Gorsuch and Jackson dissented. The latter’s dissenting opinion stated as follows:

  • The Covid “emergency on which these orders were premised has long since lapsed.” The States which now are challenging the invalidation of title 42 “do not seriously dispute that the public-health justification undergirding the Title 42 orders has lapsed.”
  • These States also “contend that they face an immigration crisis at the border and policymakers have failed to agree on adequate measures to address it. . . . But the current border crisis is not a COVID crisis. And the courts should not be in the business of perpetuating administrative edicts designed for one emergency only because elected officials have failed to address a different emergency. We are a court of law, not policymers of last resort.”

Immediately after the issuance of this Supreme Court order, White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre issued a statement that the U.S. government will “comply with the order and prepare for the Court’s review” while also “ advancing our preparations to manage the border in a secure, orderly, and humane way when title 42 eventually lifts and will continue expanding legal pathways for immigration. Title 42 is a public health measure, not an immigration enforcement measure, and it should not be extended indefinitely.”

The Press Secretary then shifted to the need for “Congress to pass comprehensive immigration reform measures like the ones President Biden proposed on his first day in office.” Now “Republicans in Congress [have] plenty of time . . .[to] join their Democratic colleagues in solving the challenge at our border by passing the comprehensive reform measures and delivering the additional funds for border security that President Biden has requested.”

The Department of Homeland Security that same day issued a shorter, but similar statement.

Also that same day a Wall Street Journal editorial concluded that the Supreme Court’s order “gives the President more time to prepare for Title 42’s end. Whether he makes the most of it is a different matter, and the last two years don’t bode well.”

According to an Associated Press journalist, no one knows how asylum will work after an end to Title 42 with the “Biden Administration . . . conspicuously silent about how migrants who plan to claim [asylum] should enter the . . . [U.S.when Title 42 ends], fueling rumors, confusion and doubts about the government’s readiness despite more than two years to prepare. . . . Many expect the government to use CBPOne, an online  platform for appointment registration, . . . [but this may be] impractical for migrants without internet access or language skills. . . . [Moreover, once they are in the U.S., they are being given dates as far out as March 2024 just to complete initial processing. Then they have to contend with] “a court system that is backlogged by more than 2 million cases, resulting in waits of several years for judges to reach decisions” on asylum applications.

Prospects for Adoption of Immigration Reform in 2023 [6]

 The 118th Congress opens on January 3, 2023, with the Republicans having a small majority in the House of Representatives while the Democrats in the Senate will maintain their narrow control (51-49) with Vice President Harris’ ability to break ties when the filibuster rule requiring 60 votes is not invoked.

Indeed, a U.S. Justice Department brief of December 20 referred to “new policies tailored to the consequences of the end” of Title 42 and “a complex, multiagency undertaking with policy, operational, and foreign relations that has been paused or partially unwound in light of the administrative stay” of any such changes.

Advocates for the Afghan Adjustment Act “worry that . . . [this bill] will be dead in the water if pushed into a new session next year, when Republicans appear intent on scrutinizing the Biden administration over the chaotic Kabul evacuation. About 170 Afghans and 13 U.S. troops were killed in a suicide bombing during the operation. The United States killed 10 civilians in a botched drone strike days later.”

Contributing to this uncertainty will be the House Republicans pledge to investigate the Biden administration’s record on the southern border and to impeach Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas. Another problem would be responding to any court’s overturning the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program that has granted legal status to millions of people who were brought illegally to the U.S. as children. Especially despondent about this possibility is Greisa Martinez Rosas, a DACA recipient and executive director of United We Dream, the nation’s largest youth-led immigrant network. When she thinks about “ the millions of young immigrants, including DACA recipients, who have had to live their lives in a perpetual state of limbo, I am filled with righteous anger, which I channel into action and a discipline of hope that we are working to create the conditions for us to win and to build the futures we deserve.”

Conclusion

Comments with corrections or additional thoughts on these complex  issues are welcomed.

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[1] Need to Prod Congress To Enact the Afghan Adjustment Act, dwkcommentaries.com (Dec. 17, 2022);

Apparent Failure of Bipartisan Immigration Reform Bill, dwkcommentaries.com (Dec.18, 2022).

[2] Freking, Lawmakers unveil $1.7T bill to avoid shutdown, boost Ukraine, Seattle Times (Dec. 20, 2022)..

[3] Romm, Senate approves $1.7 trillion omnibus bill to fund government, Wash. Post (Dec. 22, 2022); Hughes, Collins & Wise, Senate Passes $1.65 Trillion Omnibus Bill After Deal on Title 42 Votes, W.S.J. (Dec. 22, 2022); Cochrane, Senate Passes $1.7 Trillion Spending Bill, in Bid to Avert Government Shutdown, N.Y. Times (Dec. 22, 2022);

4/ Romm, House approves $1,7 trillion omnibus bill amid GOP objections, sending it to Biden, Wash.Post (Dec. 23, 2022).

[5] Federal judge strikes down Trump-era border policy known as title 42, Wash. Post (Nov. 15, 2022); Hackman & Wolfe, Judge Strikes Down Title 42, Used to Expel Asylum Seekers, W.S. J. (Nov. 15, 2022) ; Liptak, Chief Justice Roberts Briefly Halts Decision Benning Border Expulsions, N.Y. Times (Dec. 19, 2022); Marimow & Sacchetti, Chief Justice temporarily keeps pandemic-era Title 42 border policy in place, Wash. Post (Dec. 19, 2022); Hackman & Bravin, Supreme Court Temporarily Blocks Biden From Ending Trump-Era Border Policy, W.S.J. (Dec. 19, 2022);  Supreme Court blocks Biden from lifting Covid-era border restrictions, Guardian (Dec. 20, 2022); Spagat, How will asylum work after Title 42 ends? No one knows yet, Wash. Post (Dec. 20, 2022). Supreme Court, Order, Arizona v. Mayorkas, No. 22A544 (22-592) (Dec.27, 2022); Liptak, Jordan & Sullivan, Migrant Expulsion Policy Must Stay in Place for Now, Supreme Court Says, N.Y. Times (Dec. 27, 2022); Barnes & Marinow, Supreme Court leaves in place Title 42 border policy for now, Wash. Post (Dec. 27, 2022);Bravin & Hackman, Supreme Court Leaves Pandemic Border Controls in Place, W.S.J. (Dec. 27, 2022); White House, Statement by White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre on Supreme Court Title 42 Order (Dec. 27, 2022); Dep’t Homeland Security, Statement by the Department of Homeland Security on Supreme Court title 42 Order (Dec. 27, 2022); Sandoval, At a Crowded Border Camp in Mexico, Frustration and Shattered Hopes, N.Y. Times (Dec. 27, 2022).

[6] Spagat, How will asylum work after Title 42 ends? No one knows yet, abcnews.go.com (Dec. 20, 2022); Horton, Congress drops Afghan allies item, dimming evacuee hopes, Wash. Post (Dec. 20, 2022); Meyer & Caldwell, Why the Immigration debate is only going to get more tense, Wash. Post (Dec. 21, 2022); Rosas, Congress Has Once Again Failed Immigrant Youths, N.Y. Times (Dec. 22, 2022);

 

 

Need To Prod Congress To Enact the Afghan Adjustment Act     

A recent Wall Street Journal editorial strongly endorsed enactment of the pending Afghan Adjustment Act to provide changes in U.S. immigration law to protect the 67,000 Afghans relocated to the U.S. after its withdrawal of forces from that country.[1]

However, that editorial did not discuss the reasons why Congress has not done so. A recent column in the Philadelphia Inquirer by columnist Trudy Rubin has done that, as discussed below.[2]

Rubin starts with the basic premise that before the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan, the U.S. Congress ”had promised special immigrant visas to Afghans who worked with our military or civilians” and “[o]nce our allies were without the protection of American forces, they would surely face Taliban revenge.”

The proposed Afghan Adjustment Act addresses these issues. But this bill “is almost dead because political leaders from both parties have chosen to ignore it. If it doesn’t pass this year, there is virtually zero chance a Republican-led Congress will put it forward next year.”

Led by Republican Senator Chuck Grassley of Iowa is a key opponent of the measure and claims that he and his Republican colleagues “oppose the measure for security reasons. But the Afghans here have already been vetted, and the act would require additional security checks. In other words, the act is a solution to the security problem, not the reverse.”

Moreover, Grassley’s opposition “makes it impossible to attach the act to the omnibus appropriations bill working its way through to passage by year’s end. That is the only path open to getting the Afghan bill through.”

In addition, one of the advocates for the Adjustment Act, Peter Meijer, a Republican representative from Michigan and a veteran of the Iraq war who worked as a civilian in Afghanistan, said that the Biden “administration is not really lifting a finger” for the Act. . . . Nobody is really opposed to it, but nobody is viscerally advocating [for it].”

Another House colleague, Representative Seth Moulton (Democrat, Massachusetts), sees the failure to enact the Act is a stain on American honor. He said, ““We made that promise to protect the Afghan people who risked their lives to help us. We put our word on the line on behalf of our country. And we know how hard it will be in the future conflicts to find foreign allies if we can’t keep our word.”

Therefore, Rye Barcott, a Marine veteran and cofounder of With Honor, a bipartisan organization dedicated to enlisting veterans in public service, said “Legislators need to feel a sense of urgency from their constituents, who need to contact their legislators. . . . right now.”

Conclusion

Therefore, immediately after publishing this post, I will send it along with the one about the Wall Street Journal editorial to my Minnesota Senators, Amy Klobuchar and Tina Smith, and Representative Ilhan Omar. As a native Iowan, I also will send these posts to Senator Grassley.

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[1] Wall Street Journal Editorial Supports Afghan Evacuees, dwkcommentaries.com (Dec. 13, 2022).

[2] Rubin, Will Congress really send 80,000 Afghans back to the Taliban?, Phil. Inquirer (Dec. 14, 2022). See also Stockman, Do Right by Our Afghan Allies. Pass the Afghan Adjustment Act, N.Y. Times (Dec. 16, 2022).