Arthur Allen, KFF Health News

VENICE, Fla. — MAGA and MAHA are happily married in Florida, and nowhere more at home than in Sarasota County, where on a humid October night a crowd of several hundred gathered to honor state Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo, his wife, and an unlicensed Canadian radiologist who treats cancer with horse paste.

The event, titled “The 3 Big C’s: Courage, Censorship & Cancer,” was sponsored by the We the People Health and Wellness Center, a clinic, funded by a Jan. 6 marcher, where patients can bask in red light, sit in ozone-infused steam baths, or get their children treated for autism with an experimental blood concentrate.

In Venice, in Sarasota County, a “medical freedom” movement forged in opposition to COVID lockdowns blends wellness advocates, vaccine-haters, right-wing Republicans, and angry parents in a stew of anti-government absolutism and mystical belief.

Ladapo’s wife, Brianna, a self-proclaimed “spiritual healer” who says she speaks with angels and has prophetic visions, chaired a panel at the event at the Venice Community Center. The keynote speech was by William Makis, a litigious COVID conspiracist who, after losing his medical license in 2019, has made a living treating cancer patients with antiparasitic drugs including ivermectin, which was also championed in some circles as a COVID treatment during the pandemic.

Clinical trials showed that ivermectin didn’t work, but COVID skeptics viewed medicine’s rejection of it as part of a conspiracy by Big Pharma against a cheap, off-patent drug. Some of the patients in his care have what he calls “turbo cancers,” Makis says, blaming alleged impurities in mRNA vaccines that he says have killed millions of people.

For Makis, it’s all one big conspiracy — the virus, the vaccine, and the suppression of his therapies.

Brianna Ladapo has her own take on medicine, based on the idea of good and bad spiritual energy. She wrote in a memoir that as the pandemic began she intuited that it had been planned by “sinister forces” to “frighten the masses to surrender their sovereignty to a small group of tyrannical elites.” She has written that the government hides vaccination’s risks.

She sees “dark forces” all over the place, including, she said in a podcast interview earlier this year, in “chemtrails” shaped like a pentagram. “They’ve been plastering it in the sky right outside our house for the last few weeks,” Ladapo said. The chemtrails “they are dumping on us,” she said, had sickened her and her three sons. “The dark side are no fans of ours.”

(“Chemtrails” are a favorite topic of conspiracy theorists who say they think that contrails, the condensation formed around commercial airplane exhaust, contain toxic substances poisoning people and the terrain. Although there is zero evidence of that, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. plans to look into whether they are part of a clandestine effort to use toxic chemicals to change the weather.)

Ladapo’s husband hasn’t publicly endorsed all her beliefs, but as surgeon general he’s reversing decades of accepted public health practice in Florida and embracing untested therapies. “We’re done with fear,” Joseph Ladapo said after being named surgeon general in 2021. He wants to ban mRNA vaccines in Florida, and on Sept. 3 he announced plans to end childhood vaccination mandates in the state.

A few days after the Venice event, Ladapo said he hoped to support Makis’ work — though his treatments are unproven and potentially dangerous — through a new $60 million cancer research fund created by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and his wife, Casey.

Vic Mellor, CEO of a local concrete business, founded and owns We the People. He’s an associate of retired Army Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, who was briefly President Donald Trump’s national security adviser in 2017 before being dismissed for lying to the FBI about his contacts with Russians. Trump later pardoned him, and Flynn since has become a leader of the Christian nationalist movement.

We the People provides vitamin shots but no vaccines. In fact, many of its offerings are treatments for supposed vaccine injuries. Part of the We the People building is a broadcasting studio, where conservatives hold forth on what they see as the villainy of liberals and the American Academy of Pediatrics.

Mellor was at the U.S. Capitol during the riot on Jan. 6, 2021 — he said he “just knocked on front doors,” according to a Facebook post described by The Washington Post. He returned home and started building a 10-acre complex that hosts weddings and right-wing assemblies, with playgrounds, a butterfly garden, a zip line over a pond visited by alligators, and an attached, separately owned gun range.

Visitors who travel down a dirt road to The Hollow — named for the hollow-core concrete that made Mellor wealthy — can enter the compound through a dark, cavernous passage lined with neon signs illuminating maxims from the likes of Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Paine, and Flynn.

The Hollow has hosted clinics for unvaccinated kids and events for Ladapo, anti-vaccine activist Sherri Tenpenny (who in 2021 told legislators at an Ohio House hearing that COVID vaccine made people magnetic), and other “medical freedom” advocates. Mellor created a medical home for such ideas by opening We the People in 2023.

The year before, three “medical freedom” candidates had won seats on the board overseeing Sarasota’s public hospital and health care system, after protests over the hospital’s refusal to treat COVID patients with ivermectin and other drugs of choice for COVID contrarians.

On a recent afternoon at The Hollow, manager Dan Welch was clearing brush when approached by KFF Health News. As a foe of vaccinations, he welcomed Ladapo’s move to end vaccine mandates. “Maybe in their inception, vaccines were created to prevent what they were supposed to prevent,” Welch said. “But now there’s so much more in there, the metals, aluminum, mercury. Since they started vaccination, the autism rate went through the roof, and I believe these vaccines are part of it.”

The theory that vaccines cause autism has been debunked, and manufacturers removed mercury from childhood vaccines 24 years ago, although Welch said he doesn’t believe it.

Vaccination faces additional challenges in a century-old Sarasota County neighborhood of low-slung bungalows called Pinecraft, home to about 3,000 Mennonites — and double that number when Amish snowbirds arrive in the winter. Pastor Timothy Miller said that while Sarasota’s Mennonites are less culturally isolated than the Mennonite community in West Texas, site of a measles outbreak in January, many in his community also shun vaccination.

His cousin Kristi Miller, 26, won’t vaccinate her 9-month-old daughter or any of the other children she hopes to have, she said, because she thinks vaccines probably cause autism and other harms.

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As for vaccine-preventable diseases like measles, she doesn’t worry about them. Like the Ladapos, “I don’t live in fear,” she said. “I have a God who’s bigger than everything.”

(KFF Health News is a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues and is one of the core operating programs of KFF — the independent source for health policy research, polling and journalism.)

©2025 KFF Health News. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

By GERALD IMRAY, Associated Press

CAPE TOWN, South Africa (AP) — U.S. President Donald Trump says that his government will boycott the Group of 20 summit this month in South Africa over his claims that a white minority group there is being violently persecuted. Those claims have been widely rejected.

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Trump announced Friday on social media that no U.S. government official will attend the Nov. 22-23 summit in Johannesburg “as long as these Human Rights abuses continue.” South Africa’s Black-led government has been a regular target for Trump since he returned to office.

In February, Trump issued an executive order stopping U.S. financial assistance to South Africa, citing its treatment of the Afrikaner white minority. His administration has also prioritized Afrikaners for refugee status in the U.S. and says they will be given most of the 7,500 places available this fiscal year.

The South African government — and some Afrikaners themselves — say Trump’s claims of persecution are baseless.

Descendants of European settlers

Afrikaners are South Africans who are descended mainly from Dutch but also French and German colonial settlers who first came to the country in the 17th century.

Afrikaners were at the heart of the apartheid system of white minority rule from 1948-1994, leading to decades of hostility between them and South Africa’s Black majority. But Afrikaners are not a homogenous group, and some fought against apartheid. There are an estimated 2.7 million Afrikaners in South Africa’s population of 62 million.

Afrikaners are divided over Trump’s claims. Some say they face discrimination, but a group of leading Afrikaner business figures and academics said in an open letter last month that “the narrative that casts Afrikaners as victims of racial persecution in post-apartheid South Africa” is misleading.

Afrikaners’ Dutch-derived language is widely spoken in South Africa and is one of the country’s 12 official languages. Afrikaners are represented in every aspect of society. Afrikaners are some of South Africa’s richest entrepreneurs and some of its most successful sports stars, and also serve in government. Most are largely committed to South Africa’s multiracial democracy.

Trump claims they’re being ‘killed and slaughtered’

Trump asserted that Afrikaners “are being killed and slaughtered, and their land and farms are being illegally confiscated.” The president’s comments are in reference to a relatively small number of attacks on Afrikaner farmers that he and others claim are racially motivated.

Trump has also pointed to a highly contentious law introduced by the South African government that allows land to be appropriated from private owners without compensation. Some Afrikaners fear that law is aimed at removing them from their land in favor of South Africa’s poor Black majority. Many South Africans, including opposition parties, have criticized the law, but it hasn’t led to land confiscations.

Trump first made baseless claims of widespread killing of white South African farmers and land seizures during his first term in response to allegations aired on conservative media personality Tucker Carlson’s former show on Fox News. Trump ordered then-U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to look into the allegations, but nothing came of any investigation.

South Africa rejects the claims

The South African government said in response to Trump’s social media post that his claims were “not substantiated by fact.” It has said that Trump’s criticism of South Africa over Afrikaners is a result of misinformation because it misses the context that Black farmers and farmworkers are also killed in rural attacks, which make up a tiny percentage of the country’s high violent crime rate.

There were more than 26,000 homicides in South Africa in 2024. Of those, 37 were farm murders, according to an Afrikaner lobby group that tracks them. Experts on rural attacks in South Africa have said the overriding motive for the violent farm invasions is robbery and not race.

Other pressure on South Africa

Trump said it is a “total disgrace” that the G20 summit — a meeting of the leaders of the 19 top rich and developing economies, the European Union and the African Union — is being held in South Africa. He had already said he wouldn’t attend, and Vice President JD Vance was due to go in his place. The U.S. will take on the rotating presidency of the G20 after South Africa.

Trump also said in a speech last week that South Africa should be thrown out of the G20.

Trump’s criticism of Africa’s most developed economy has gone beyond the issue of Afrikaners. His executive order in February said South Africa had taken “aggressive positions towards the United States and its allies,” specifically with its decision to accuse Israel of genocide against Palestinians in Gaza at the United Nations’ top court.

U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio boycotted a G20 foreign ministers meeting in South Africa in February after deriding the host country’s G20 slogan of “solidarity, equality and sustainability” as “DEI and climate change.”

AP Africa news: https://apnews.com/hub/africa

By JILL LAWLESS, Associated Press

LONDON (AP) — U.S. President Donald Trump has threatened legal action against the BBC over the way a speech he made was edited in a documentary aired by Britain’s national broadcaster.

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BBC chairman Samir Shah on Monday apologized for the “error of judgment,” which triggered the resignations of the BBC’s top executive and its head of news.

Director-General Tim Davie and news chief Deborah Turness quit Sunday over accusations of bias and misleading editing of a speech Trump delivered on Jan. 6, 2021, before a crowd of his supporters stormed the Capitol in Washington.

The hourlong documentary — titled “Trump: A Second Chance?” — was broadcast as part of the BBC’s “Panorama” series days before the 2024 U.S. presidential election. It spliced together three quotes from two sections of the 2021 speech, delivered almost an hour apart, into what appeared to be one quote in which Trump urged supporters to march with him and “fight like hell.” Among the parts cut out was a section where Trump said he wanted supporters to demonstrate peacefully.

Shah said the broadcaster accepted “that the way the speech was edited did give the impression of a direct call for violent action.”

A letter from Trump attorney Alejandro Brito demands the BBC “retract the false, defamatory, disparaging, and inflammatory statements,” apologize and “appropriately compensate President Trump for the harm caused,” or face legal action for $1 billion in damages.

The BBC said it would review the letter “and respond directly in due course.”

Top executives quit

Trump had earlier welcomed the resignations of the two BBC executives. He posted a link to a Daily Telegraph story about the speech-editing on his Truth Social network, thanking the newspaper “for exposing these Corrupt ‘Journalists.’ These are very dishonest people who tried to step on the scales of a Presidential Election.” He called that “a terrible thing for Democracy!”

In a resignation letter to staff, Davie said: “There have been some mistakes made and as director-general I have to take ultimate responsibility.”

Turness said the controversy was damaging the BBC, and she quit “because the buck stops with me.” She defended the organization’s journalists against allegations of bias.

“Our journalists are hardworking people who strive for impartiality, and I will stand by their journalism,” she said Monday. “There is no institutional bias. Mistakes are made, but there’s no institutional bias.”

Trump speech edited

Pressure on the broadcaster’s top executives has been growing since the right-leaning Daily Telegraph published parts of a dossier compiled by Michael Prescott, who had been hired to advise the BBC on standards and guidelines.

As well as the Trump edit, it criticized the BBC’s coverage of transgender issues and raised concerns of anti-Israel bias in the BBC’s Arabic service.

The “Panorama” episode showed an edited clip from the January 2021 speech in which Trump claimed the 2020 presidential election had been rigged. Trump is shown saying: “We’re going to walk down to the Capitol and I’ll be there with you. And we fight. We fight like hell.”

According to video and a transcript from Trump’s comments that day, he said:  “I’ll be there with you, we’re going to walk down, we’re going to walk down. Anyone you want, but I think right here, we’re going to walk down to the Capitol, and we’re going to cheer on our brave senators and congressmen and women, and we’re probably not going to be cheering so much for some of them.

“Because you’ll never take back our country with weakness. You have to show strength and you have to be strong. We have come to demand that Congress do the right thing and only count the electors who have been lawfully slated, lawfully slated.

“I know that everyone here will soon be marching over to the Capitol building to peacefully and patriotically make your voices heard.”

Trump used the “fight like hell” phrase toward the end of the speech, but without referencing the Capitol.

“We fight like hell. And if you don’t fight like hell, you’re not going to have a country anymore,” Trump said.

In a letter to Parliament’s Culture, Media and Sport Committee, Shah said the purpose of editing Trump’s words had been “to convey the message of the speech” so that viewers could understand how it had been received by Trump’s supporters and what was happening on the ground.

He said the program had not attracted “significant audience feedback” when it first aired but had drawn more than 500 complaints since Prescott’s dossier was made public.

Shah acknowledged in a BBC interview that “it would have been better to have acted earlier. But we didn’t.”

A national institution

The 103-year-old BBC faces greater scrutiny than other broadcasters — and criticism from its commercial rivals — because of its status as a national institution funded through an annual license fee of 174.50 pounds ($230) paid by all households who watch live TV or any BBC content.

The broadcaster is bound by the terms of its charter to be impartial, and critics are quick to point out when they think it has failed. It’s frequently a political football, with conservatives seeing a leftist slant in its news output and some liberals accusing it of having a conservative bias.

It has also been criticized from all angles over its coverage of the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza. In February, the BBC removed a documentary about Gaza from its streaming service after it emerged that the child narrator was the son of an official in the Hamas-led government.

Governments of both left and right have long been accused of meddling with the broadcaster, which is overseen by a board that includes both BBC nominees and government appointees.

Some defenders of the BBC allege that members of the board appointed under previous Conservative governments have been undermining the corporation from within.

Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s spokesman, Tom Wells, said the center-left Labour Party government supports “a strong, independent BBC” and doesn’t think the broadcaster is biased.

“But it is important that the BBC acts to maintain trust and corrects mistakes quickly when they occur,” he said.

Associated Press writer Seung Min Kim contributed from Washington.

Una semana después de que agentes federales detuvieran a vendedores en Canal Street durante una redada de inmigración, los vendedores ambulantes se unieron a los repartidores de comida para exigir mejores condiciones y más protección en sus sectores, en los que hay una gran presencia de inmigrantes.

Repartidores de comida y vendedores ambulantes se manifestaron frente a la alcaldía el 29 de octubre de 2025. (Gerardo Romo / NYC Council Media Unit)

Este artículo se publicó originalmente en inglés el 31 de octubre. Traducido por Daniel Parra. Read the English version here.

Una semana después de que agentes federales arrestaran a vendedores en Canal Street en una redada de inmigración, los vendedores ambulantes se unieron con los repartidores de comida durante una manifestación el 29 de octubre para exigir mejores condiciones y protecciones en sus sectores, donde hay una alta presencia de inmigrantes.

Aunque las protecciones que solicita cada grupo no los protegerán de las detenciones del Servicio de Inmigración y Control de Aduanas de Estados Unidos (ICE por sus siglas en inglés), los defensores de ambos grupos afirman que las políticas municipales —aplicadas por la policía de Nueva York mediante la imposición de multas criminales—, han puesto a los repartidores y vendedores ambulantes en el radar de las autoridades de inmigración.

Después de que el director de ICE, Todd Lyons, anunciara que se producirán “más detenciones” en la ciudad, estos trabajadores se preparan para lo que está por venir.

“El momento es ahora”, dijo Mohamed Attia, director general del Street Vendor Project, durante la manifestación frente a la alcaldía el 29 de octubre. “Porque son nuestros repartidores de comida y vendedores ambulantes los que están siendo atacados como nunca antes”.

Durante la manifestación del miércoles, los defensores y trabajadores de estas industrias pidieron al Concejo Municipal que apruebe una serie de proyectos de ley en las pocas sesiones que le quedan este año, incluida una legislación que prohíba a las aplicaciones de reparto desactivar las cuentas de los trabajadores sin causa justificada.

Con la desactivación, la cuenta de un trabajador se cancela de forma permanente. Los repartidores y los defensores afirman que no existe una definición clara de lo que provoca una desactivación, más allá de las infracciones graves.

“Por favor, aprueben estos proyectos de ley”, dijo Cellou Balde, repartidor del grupo Los Deliveristas, durante la manifestación. “La gente de Nueva York se queja a menudo de los repartidores. Conducimos rápido. Entendemos la preocupación, pero a menudo no tenemos otra opción. Debemos correr el riesgo de repartir rápidamente, a menudo en plazos imposibles, para no perder el trabajo que tenemos. La desactivación es un gran problema para nuestra comunidad, porque este trabajo es nuestro medio de subsistencia”. 

Instacart no respondió a la solicitud de City Limits de comentar sobre el proyecto de ley y sus políticas de desactivación. Grubhub afirma que ha estado trabajando con Los Deliveristas Unidos y el Concejo para que su proceso sea transparente. La empresa criticó el proyecto de ley del Concejo, alegando que le quitaría la capacidad de actuar con rapidez para hacer cumplir sus normas, lo cual es esencial para la seguridad pública.

“Tal y como está redactado, el proyecto de ley Intro 1332 obligaría a las plataformas a mantener activos a los repartidores a pesar de los graves problemas de seguridad o servicio y podría exponer información confidencial de los clientes, poniendo en riesgo a comensales, trabajadores de restaurantes y otros repartidores”, afirmó un portavoz de Grubhub en un comunicado.

Kassandra Pérez-Desir, directora de relaciones gubernamentales de DoorDash en Nueva York, citó preocupaciones similares en materia de seguridad. “Estamos de acuerdo en que las desactivaciones deben ser poco frecuentes y gestionarse de forma justa, pero este modelo es perjudicial para todos los que dependen de una plataforma segura. El Concejo debería buscar modelos probados que equilibren mejor la equidad y la responsabilidad”.

Uber afirmó que apoya la idea principal de la nueva ley, pero no los detalles tal y como están redactados. “El proyecto de ley debe centrarse en los trabajadores que han perdido de forma permanente el acceso a las aplicaciones de reparto”, afirmó un portavoz de Uber en un comunicado, en referencia a otra práctica de ‘bloqueos’, que impide a los trabajadores utilizar las aplicaciones en determinados momentos.

El proyecto de ley del Concejo también abordaría los bloqueos, utilizando una definición amplia de “desactivación” como restricción permanente o temporal del acceso a la aplicación.

“Dado que a los repartidores se les paga por todo el tiempo que pasan en la aplicación, y no solo cuando realizan una entrega, las empresas de aplicaciones deben controlar los costes limitando el número de personas que pueden trabajar simultáneamente, al igual que cualquier otro negocio. De lo contrario, miles de trabajadores podrían estar conectados y cobrando cuando hay poca o ninguna actividad de reparto, lo que aumentaría significativamente los costes para los consumidores”, afirmó un portavoz de Uber en un comunicado.

Otro conjunto de proyectos de ley reformaría la venta ambulante en la ciudad ampliando las licencias y, en última instancia, eliminando el límite máximo que se ha mantenido durante mucho tiempo, lo que, según los trabajadores, les ha dificultado operar legalmente (el Concejo aprobó recientemente una ley, anulando el veto del alcalde, que despenaliza la venta ambulante, algo que los vendedores llevaban mucho tiempo reclamando).

Los proyectos de ley también crearían una división de vendedores dentro del Departamento de Servicios para Pequeñas Empresas, aumentarían el número de solicitudes disponibles para que se expidan cada año las 445 licencias de supervisión máximas y permitirían vender más lejos de la acera.

Vendedores ambulantes cerca de la estación de la línea 7 del metro en Junction Boulevard, Queens, en 2024. (Adi Talwar/City Limits)

La medida se produce después de que la administración de Eric Adams intensificara la criminalización en los sectores de reparto de comida y venta ambulante. Durante la primavera, la policía de Nueva York dejó discretamente de poner multas de tráfico civiles a los ciclistas y ahora expide multas criminales. Además, el 24 de octubre, la ciudad de Nueva York implantó un límite de velocidad de 15 millas por hora para las bicicletas eléctricas y las bicicletas comerciales con asistencia al pedaleo.

Cuando se anunciaron los cambios, el alcalde Adams dijo que la ciudad adoptaría un enfoque basado primero en la educación y luego en las multas, emitiendo advertencias a los infractores por primera vez. “Para que quede claro, no se trata de criminalizar, sino de crear condiciones más seguras y justas para todos los neoyorquinos”, dijo Adams.

Aunque la policía de Nueva York está emitiendo advertencias por el momento, cuando City Limits preguntó, no dijo exactamente cuándo comenzará a emitir multas criminales.

Sin embargo, los defensores y los repartidores criticaron el nuevo límite de velocidad porque supondría un mayor control de la industria, compuesta principalmente por inmigrantes que ya viven con miedo debido a la represión del gobierno de Trump. También culpan a las aplicaciones, afirmando que los trabajadores se ven presionados para realizar las entregas lo más rápido posible.

“[Intro] 1332 trata de garantizar que los repartidores, unos 80.000 en la ciudad, tengan protecciones, asegurándose de que las aplicaciones… no despidan ni castiguen a los repartidores por querer conducir de forma segura, por querer priorizar su seguridad y por optar por quedarse en casa en caso de una redada de ICE”, dijo Ligia Guallpa, directora ejecutiva de Workers Justice Project, la organización sin ánimo de lucro que respalda a Los Deliveristas Unidos, durante la manifestación.

Gabriel Montero, director de desarrollo y comunicaciones del Workers’ Justice Project, dijo que las empresas de aplicaciones han desactivado cientos de cuentas de trabajadores en un mes, dejando a muchos con miedo a perder sus puestos de trabajo.

El concejal Christopher Marte, que representa a la zona de Chinatown, donde tuvo lugar la reciente redada de inmigración, criticó a sus compañeros concejales que aún no han apoyado los proyectos de ley.

“En el Concejo hay ahora mismo hipócritas”, dijo Marte. “Son muy rápidos a la hora de hacer declaraciones, pero aún no han firmado estos proyectos de ley que llevan meses sobre la mesa. Cuando un repartidor sufre un accidente, se lesiona o, en ocasiones —lamentablemente— fallece, nos apresuramos a redactar un comunicado. Nos apresuramos a organizar una manifestación. Sin embargo, no nos apresuramos a celebrar una audiencia y una votación que realmente proteja a nuestros trabajadores”.

Julia Agos, portavoz del Concejo Municipal, dijo en un comunicado que “los proyectos de ley adicionales sobre la venta ambulante siguen su curso en el proceso legislativo, que es deliberativo y permite una amplia participación pública”.

Repartidores de comida, fotografiados aquí en una rueda de prensa celebrada en 2022 con concejales. (John McCarten/NYC Council Media Unit)

Sin abogados que acepten nuevos casos

Al trabajar en la calle ambos grupos corren un riesgo especial de ser blanco de las redadas de ICE. Pero cuando estos trabajadores son arrestados, junto con otros inmigrantes de la ciudad, es difícil encontrar —o pagar— un abogado que los represente y defienda su caso mientras están detenidos.

Este año, la ciudad de Nueva York asignó más fondos para servicios legales de inmigración en su presupuesto más reciente, aprobado en junio, pasando de $65 millones de dólares a $120 millones, en respuesta a la campaña de represión de la administración Trump.

Sin embargo, varios meses después del inicio del nuevo año fiscal en julio, los defensores de los inmigrantes informaron que, a pesar de la inyección de fondos, sigue siendo muy difícil encontrar un abogado.

Algunos proveedores de servicios legales, como The Bronx Defenders y Brooklyn Defender Services, afirmaron que la financiación no debería ser de solo un año, haciendo hincapié en la necesidad de un apoyo sostenido, ya que muchos casos de inmigración tardan años en resolverse.

“A pesar de estas inversiones, la necesidad sigue creciendo y evolucionando en Bronx Defenders. Recibimos regularmente llamadas de personas que buscan representación para trámites de ICE, naturalización y otras solicitudes de estatus, casos sin detención, post condena, ayuda o representación federal”, declaró Rosa Cohen-Cruz, directora de política de inmigración de Bronx Defenders, en una audiencia del Comité de Inmigración del Concejo a finales de octubre.

Funcionarios de la Oficina de la Alcaldía para Asuntos del Inmigrante explicaron que algunas de las lagunas en la representación legal también se dan cuando un detenido es trasladado fuera del estado, una práctica habitual de la administración Trump.

Las organizaciones de base que prestan servicios a los inmigrantes neoyorquinos afirman que no disponen de los recursos necesarios para ofrecer representación legal a todos aquellos que la solicitan. 

“En estos momentos, la ciudad de Nueva York está fallando a nuestras comunidades de inmigrantes en lo que respecta al acceso a los servicios legales. No hay abogados que acepten nuevos casos. El sistema está completamente desbordado”, afirma Adama Bah, directora ejecutiva y fundadora de Afrikana.

“Los migrantes negros están quedando rezagados en un sistema que nunca se creó para ellos”, añadió Bah. “Se les está criminalizando por buscar seguridad, y hasta que la ciudad invierta en servicios legales reales, accesibles y culturalmente competentes para nuestras comunidades, esta crisis continuará”.

Para ponerse en contacto con el reportero de esta noticia, escriba a Daniel@citylimits.org. Para ponerse en contacto con la editora, escriba a Jeanmarie@citylimits.org.

The post Repartidores y vendedores ambulantes de Nueva York buscan mayores protecciones tras redada de ICE en Canal Street appeared first on City Limits.