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      Debbie Mucarsel-Powell Challenges Rick Scott for Senate in Florida

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      Ms. Mucarsel-Powell, the first South American immigrant elected to the House, is one of several Democrats who have entered the 2024 race.Debbie Mucarsel-Powell, a Democrat who represented Miami for one term in the House after immigrating to the United States from Ecuador, stepped forward on Tuesday to challenge the incumbent Republican, Rick Scott, for the Senate in 2024.Flipping the seat could be crucial for Democrats to keep their narrow majority in the Senate, but their path to victory in what was once a quintessential battleground state appears to be difficult, according to independent projections.Ms. Mucarsel-Powell, 52, is seeking to become only the second Latina elected to the Senate, after Senator Catherine Cortez Masto, Democrat of Nevada.In 2018, Ms. Mucarsel-Powell upset Carlos Curbelo, a two-term Republican incumbent in Florida’s 26th District. She lost the seat in 2020 to Carlos Gimenez, who was mayor of Miami-Dade County.In a campaign introduction video posted on social media, she sought to cast Mr. Scott as a hard-line opponent of women’s reproductive rights who would seek to ban abortion nationally. She also criticized his past support for cutting Social Security and Medicare as a way to balance the federal budget and rein in the national debt. He later reversed that position.“Ya no más,” she said in Spanish in the video, meaning “no more,” and later added, “I’ve already fought guys like Rick Scott, and beat them.”Noting that she was the first South American immigrant elected to Congress and that she once worked for minimum wage at a doughnut shop, Ms. Mucarsel-Powell sought to draw an economic and cultural contrast to Mr. Scott.A former associate dean at Florida International University, she is the latest prominent Democrat to join the race, which includes Alan Grayson, a former representative, and Phil Ehr, a U.S. Navy veteran who unsuccessfully challenged Representative Matt Gaetz in 2020.Mr. Scott, 70, who is one of the wealthiest members of Congress, served two terms as governor before being elected to the Senate in 2018. Last year, he was the chairman of the Senate Republican campaign arm, but his long-shot bid to dislodge Senator Mitch McConnell as the minority leader fizzled.“We’d like to welcome yet another failed congressional candidate to the crowded Democrat primary,” Priscilla Ivasco, a spokeswoman for Mr. Scott’s campaign, said in a statement.Momentum in Florida has favored Republicans, who hold the governor’s office, the Legislature and both Senate seats. And in otherwise disappointing midterm elections for the G.O.P. last year, Gov. Ron DeSantis was re-elected in a landslide that laid the groundwork for his presidential candidacy. More

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      Zimbabwe Voters to Elect President While Trained Workers Flee

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      Nurses, doctors and workers of all kinds are seeking to escape the country’s economic turmoil, an issue that has become a central theme in the election scheduled for Wednesday.The hospital where Warren George worked as a nurse in Zimbabwe was so short of basic supplies, like plaster, that he could not make casts to treat people with broken bones. He soon sought to join the exodus of more than 4,000 nurses who have fled the southern African nation in the past two years.But the government has refused to give him and many others the documents they would need to work in, say, Britain or Canada. He says that he now earns only about $500 a month as a traveling nurse and has to pick up extra shifts on his days off to ensure his family has enough to eat.Zimbabweans are scheduled to go to the polls on Wednesday in only the second election since Robert Mugabe, the liberation leader turned strongman president, was ousted in a coup.The vote amounts to a referendum on President Emmerson Mnangagwa, who is seeking a second term after, critics say, failing to steady the economy or stop the flight of workers, including a crippling “brain drain” of educated professionals. The departure of nurses and doctors has increased since the Covid pandemic, contributing to a widespread shortage of health workers on the African continent.Mr. Mnangagwa at an election rally in Harare this month. He is seeking a second term.Tsvangirayi Mukwazhi/Associated PressTriple-digit inflation has become the norm — it spiked to 176 percent in June. The country is $18 billion in debt and cannot get international loans because of political instability. Jobs are sparse, with economists estimating that 90 percent of work is informal. The local currency has become so worthless that the price grocery stores charge for bread has skyrocketed to 12,000 Zimbabwean dollars from 860 in April. Many use the U.S. dollar instead, when they can.“Everyone you meet in the streets, they are desperate to leave the country,” said Dr. Norman Matara, head of the Zimbabwe Association of Doctors for Human Rights, an advocacy organization.“Some of our colleagues have gone outside — you see them doing well in South Africa, in the U.K., in Canada,” he added. “You get the motivation to also leave because, honestly, we are just wasting our time.”This election, like past ones, is taking place in a jittery environment with fears of violence and of vote-rigging in favor of ZANU-PF, the party of Mr. Mnangagwa, which has governed Zimbabwe since independence in 1980.Mr. Mnangagwa came to power through a coup in 2017 that unseated Mr. Mugabe, who became increasingly autocratic during his nearly four decades in power. In the 2018 election, Mr. Mnangagwa eked out a victory, winning 50.8 percent of the vote over his closest rival, Nelson Chamisa, who is now president of the main opposition party, the Citizens Coalition for Change.Makeshift polling stations in Mbare, a township in Harare, on Monday.Siphiwe Sibeko/ReutersThis election is a rematch, and while polls suggest a tight race, many international and domestic observers doubt that the election will be free and fair.“It’s history repeating itself, except that ZANU-PF has perfected the system of rigging,” said Ibbo Mandaza, a political analyst in Harare, Zimbabwe’s capital, who runs an independent social-science think tank.The police have shut down dozens of rallies of the Citizens Coalition for Change and arrested dozens of its supporters. A new law that could result in the death penalty for Zimbabweans deemed to have betrayed the national interest has made many fearful to share their views.Even so, in surveys, Zimbabweans overwhelmingly say that they are dissatisfied with the direction of the country and the economy under Mr. Mnangagwa. If he prevails, political analysts say, there could be a surge in mass migration of Zimbabweans, straining other countries in the region — especially South Africa, where a struggling economy of its own has fueled violence against immigrants. Harare on Saturday. While polls suggest a tight vote, many international and domestic observers doubt that the election will be free and fair.John Wessels/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesMany African countries are short on health workers, more than any other region. The continent produces about 150,000 trained medical workers a year, but one in three cannot get jobs because there is not enough money to fund positions, according to James Avoka Asamani, who leads the World Health Organization’s work force team for Africa. The W.H.O. has identified 55 nations with critical shortages of health workers and suggests that foreign countries should not recruit from them. Thirty-seven of those nations are in Africa, including Zimbabwe, added this year, where the government estimates that the country will need at least an additional 69,000 medical workers by 2030.When Angela Khulu, an 84-year-old grandmother, was hit by a car recently and stumbled into a hospital in Bulawayo, in Zimbabwe’s south, most of the administrative nurses and hospital clerks were already ending their day shifts. She waited in a long line while the few medical workers on duty bounced between patients.Praying for a peaceful election during a church service in Harare on Sunday.John Wessels/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesAfter two hours, with pain radiating down her left side, she was seen by a doctor, who recommended checking for internal bleeding. But the hospital, Mpilo Central, did not have enough radiographers — or X-ray films — so, despite her serious symptoms, she was sent home and told to come back the following day.Dr. Tawanda Mapfumo, who works at Mpilo Central, says he has become accustomed to the chaos at the hospital, where about three dozen patients cram onto wooden benches in the corridors and waiting rooms. He says he cannot shake the guilt of seeing patients die because there are no resources to treat them.Those trying conditions have created an opening for Britain, in particular, to lure away Zimbabwean health workers. Nearly 22,000 Zimbabweans have received health care work visas from Britain over the past three years (though not everyone who receives one actually moves).Britain’s recruitment has drawn the ire of Zimbabwe’s government. In April, the vice president, Constantino Chiwenga, who is also the health minister, suggested introducing a law to criminalize the recruitment of Zimbabwean health workers by foreign countries. No law has been formally introduced yet.But within the past two years, health workers in Zimbabwe said, the Health Ministry has made it more difficult for them to get the letters of good standing they need to be hired abroad.A 31-year-old doctor, who requested anonymity to avoid trouble with the Zimbabwean government, said that in 2020, when he applied for his letter to move to Namibia to practice, he paid $40 and received the letter the same day.But when he sought another letter from the Zimbabwean authorities in early 2021 to move from Namibia to South Africa for more training, he was confronted with a fee of $150 and a five-page form with questions he considered intrusive. He filled out the form and paid but has still not received his letter.A hospital in Harare last year. The W.H.O. has identified 55 nations with critical shortages of health workers. Thirty-seven of those countries are in Africa, including Zimbabwe.Jekesai Njikizana/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesNonetheless, he said he was fortunate because he still works in Namibia, where his $3,000 monthly salary is roughly 10 times what he made in Zimbabwe.“It’s not worth your time or dignity,” he said, referring to the poor pay in Zimbabwe.The Zimbabwean Health Ministry did not respond to requests for comment. Christopher Mutsvangwa, spokesman for ZANU-PF, said that the government was not opposed to citizens going abroad for jobs but that it needed to control the flow to ensure that some skilled workers remained.Despite the government’s barriers, Zimbabweans are still finding ways to flee.Wynter Banda swapped her life as a hairdresser in Harare to become a nursing home aide in Britain. She and her husband, Godwill, a teacher, sold their car and borrowed from friends to come up with the $5,000 she needed for the visa fee and other moving expenses.Her husband eventually joined her and works as a science teacher. Things are tight, she said, because of debt and high rent. Still, she said they had made the right decision.“Even though it’s not easy and the working hours are very long and stressful, I can’t imagine going back to Zimbabwe,” she said. “We suffered there.”Studying during a power cut in Harare last year. Critics say that Mr. Mnangagwa’s government has failed to steady the economy or stop the flight of workers.Associated PressJeffrey Moyo More

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      Compassionate Release for Those Aging Behind Bars

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      More from our inbox:Living Well, and Pursuing One’s Passion, With Parkinson’sThe ‘Absurd Contradictions’ of the Migrant SystemA Civilized Argument A Debate QuestionCecilia CarlstedtTo the Editor: Re “Inside a Dementia Unit in a Federal Prison” (Opinion guest essay, Aug. 13):Katie Engelhart vividly describes the absurdity and cruelty of incarcerating frail elders with debilitating dementia. It would be a mistake, though, to conclude simply that expanding compassionate release is the answer. Certainly, that’s warranted, but policymakers should be proactive, not just reactive.As a former parole commissioner, I know that dementia is just the tip of the iceberg of the problem of mass aging behind bars.Countless people (not just men) effectively face a slow death penalty behind bars because of extreme sentences or repeated denials of parole release despite these individuals’ complete transformations. Far from being helpless, many are violence interrupters, mentors, scholars and artists, including people previously convicted of causing serious harm. They have changed.Enacting elder parole bills, which do not guarantee release based on age but rather allow older adults to be individually considered for release by a parole board, can help resolve the crisis of aging behind bars, save substantial money, and return people to the community to repair the harm they long ago caused — before they are on death’s doorstep.Carol ShapiroNew YorkTo the Editor:Dementia units in prisons should primarily serve as a conduit to helping achieve compassionate release. As physicians volunteering with the Medical Justice Alliance, we review the medical care of numerous patients with dementia who are undiagnosed and untreated in the prison system. Patients wake up unsure why they are in prison, hoping that President Nixon might pardon them.We must consider the high cost of normalizing the imprisonment of elderly patients with dementia. Financially, developing “dementia-friendly” prison units incurs significant costs; that money could instead be used to improve community resources such as nursing facilities. Ethically, we must grapple with punishing people who do not pose a threat to others and are unable to understand why they are being punished.Compassionate release laws at the state and federal levels should make dementia an explicit criterion for early release. Facilities should also screen older patients for dementia on a regular basis and develop protocols for requesting compassionate release and expediting placement in memory care facilities. The U.S. prison population is aging and change is urgently needed.Caitlin FarrellNicole MusheroWilliam WeberTo the Editor:As a person who has served three federal prison terms for antiwar protests for a total of almost three years, I found myself shaking my head that the Federal Bureau of Prisons maintains Federal Medical Center Devens to hold men with dementia.The essay noted that most of the men in the dementia unit have no memories of their crimes or why they are incarcerated, yet few are deemed eligible for compassionate release. The United States incarcerates nearly two million people in our thousands of jails and prisons. The U.S. prison system is primitive, lacks redemption and only metes out punishment. The term rehabilitation is simply not part of this cruel system.In my time in more than a half dozen federal prisons, I never met a man I would not have to my home as a dinner guest. Our jails and prisons are filled mostly with people convicted of nonviolent crimes. Many — perhaps the majority — of incarcerated people are poor, mentally ill or substance abusers. Most need medical treatment, not incarceration.I agree with F.M.C. Devens’s clinical director, Dr. Patricia Ruze, who thinks it would be “totally appropriate” to release the whole unit on compassionate grounds and relocate the men to community nursing homes.I’d go one step further: Let’s release all nonviolent people from prison with appropriate community support to help them prosper and avoid recidivism, as well as offer programs of human uplift to the remaining prisoners using the money we save by closing the prisons we will no longer need.Patrick O’NeillGarner, N.C.Living Well, and Pursuing One’s Passion, With Parkinson’sThe pianist Nicolas Hodges has continued to perform and record — with alterations and tough decisions — after receiving a Parkinson’s disease diagnosis.Roderick Aichinger for The New York TimesTo the Editor: Re “Pianist Adapts His Life to Parkinson’s” (Arts & Leisure, Aug. 13):Thank you for demonstrating how the pianist Nicolas Hodges is adapting to life with Parkinson’s disease. Mr. Hodges is testament to the fact that it is possible to continue to live well with Parkinson’s, and the article highlights two key ways to manage symptoms: consistently taking medications (dopamine) and reducing commitments or stress. Exercise and physical activity are also critical to managing symptoms.Recent research published by the Parkinson’s Foundation shows that the number of people in the U.S. diagnosed with Parkinson’s annually has increased by 50 percent, from approximately 60,000 to 90,000. This means that every six minutes, someone in the U.S. is diagnosed with the disease and may encounter similar challenges to those faced by Mr. Hodges.Further funding to support research and drug development are needed in order to find a cure, and the Parkinson’s Foundation and other organizations work tirelessly to advance this.In the meantime, we applaud Mr. Hodges for speaking about his experience with the disease and continuing to pursue his passion. Play on, Mr. Hodges.John L. LehrNew YorkThe writer is president and C.E.O. of the Parkinson’s Foundation.The ‘Absurd Contradictions’ of the Migrant SystemTo the Editor: We have millions of square feet of office space no longer being used and tens of thousands of homeless people and displaced immigrants needing shelter. Many employers cannot fill open jobs while the talents and proven determination of immigrants sit untapped in detention.We can strengthen our economy and confirm our commitment to human dignity and decency by correcting these absurd contradictions.It would be far more cost-effective to use the migrant detention system funds to create a system where people can be quickly helped and trained to be productive contributors to society instead of expensive drains on us all.Even if common decency is not a motivation, pure selfish economic need dictates that we end the waste and do the right thing.Michael E. MakoverGreat Neck, N.Y.A Civilized Argument Christopher Smith for The New York TimesTo the Editor: Re “Imagining the Face-Off in Trump’s Jan. 6 Case,” by David French (column, Aug. 12):I started feeling odd as I read Mr. French’s column. It was so quiet! Two measured, rational voices speaking through the ink, each backing up their arguments with researchable references and free of bitter, ad hominem jabs. A few bits of pique and tooth grinding to humanize both the defense and the prosecution, but all for the sake of clarifying a complex position.How civilized! How rare! It’s a shame that the essay was the voice of one man working his careful way through a thicket of legal complexity and not a real-life exchange of ideas in search of a mutually arrived at truth.Leslie BellDavenport, IowaA Debate QuestionTo the Editor: At the Republican debate I would like to see the moderator ask each of the participants if as president they would pardon Donald Trump if he is convicted of federal crimes.Walter RonaghanHarrison, N.Y. More

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      Stuart Delery Stepping Down as White House Counsel

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      Stuart Delery, who has been President Biden’s chief official lawyer since last year, helped develop strategies to distribute Covid-19 vaccines, forgive student loans and revamp immigration rules.Stuart Delery, the White House counsel who has helped usher in some of President Biden’s most important policies while defending him against Republican attacks, announced on Thursday that he plans to step down as the West Wing shapes its staff for the final 15-month sprint to next year’s election.Mr. Delery had indicated to colleagues a few months ago that he would be ready to leave by fall after nearly three years in the White House and the pre-inaugural transition that have been all consuming. Since Republicans took over the House in January, the counsel’s office has been the command post for the White House’s response to a multitude of congressional investigations.No successor was named on Thursday, but a new counsel was expected to be in place by the time Mr. Delery formally leaves next month. Jeffrey D. Zients, the White House chief of staff who took over the president’s team six months ago, has asked cabinet secretaries to decide in the coming weeks whether they plan to depart or will commit to staying through the November 2024 election to avoid distracting confirmations heading into the campaign season.Mr. Biden’s White House team has been steadier than most, especially compared with the one under his predecessor, former President Donald J. Trump, who burned through aides at a frenetic pace. Although a number of top officials have left Mr. Biden’s administration, the total turnover of 56 percent remains below the modern average, and his cabinet is the most stable going back at least seven administrations, according to figures compiled by the Brookings Institution.Susan E. Rice, the president’s domestic policy adviser, left in May and was replaced by Neera Tanden, the staff secretary, who in turn was replaced by Stefanie Feldman, a longtime Biden aide. Julie Chávez Rodríguez stepped down as director of intergovernmental affairs to take over as campaign manager and was succeeded by Tom Perez, a former labor secretary. Louisa Terrell, the director of legislative affairs who helped coordinate debt ceiling negotiations, announced her departure last month and was replaced by Shuwanza Goff, the president’s liaison to the House.But the president’s core inner circle of Mr. Zients and advisers like Steven J. Ricchetti, Anita Dunn, Jennifer O’Malley Dillon and Bruce Reed is expected to remain intact through the election, as is his top national security team led by Jake Sullivan and his deputy, Jon Finer. Some colleagues have speculated about whether Michael Donilon, one of Mr. Biden’s closest advisers and the author of many of his major speeches, will move over to the campaign or stay inside the White House.Mr. Delery, 54, served as acting associate attorney general, the No. 3 official at the Justice Department, under President Barack Obama and joined the Biden team as deputy White House counsel before taking over the top legal job in the White House a little over a year ago. He is the first openly gay man to serve as counsel to the president.“Stuart Delery has been a trusted adviser and a constant source of innovative legal thinking since Day 1 of my administration,” Mr. Biden said in a statement. Mr. Delery, a low-key and studious Yale Law School graduate, was among the legal architects of some of Mr. Biden’s most important initiatives, including strategies to distribute Covid-19 vaccines, to forgive hundreds of billions of dollars of student debt and to revamp immigration after the expiration of Title 42, a pandemic-era measure.When the Supreme Court overruled the president’s original student loan plan, his team quickly developed new ways to try to accomplish the same goals. When Republicans threatened to not raise the debt ceiling, Mr. Delery developed options for Mr. Biden to do so on his own authority, although it proved unnecessary when a bipartisan deal was struck.Mr. Delery also oversaw a drive to install as many judges as possible. During his tenure, 20 nominees were confirmed to federal appeals courts and 51 to federal district courts. The slate of new judges has been the most diverse in history.“Stuart Delery was a historic counsel for an administration getting historic things done,” Mr. Zients said in a statement. “His work in support of President Biden and Vice President Harris will shape the country for the better for decades to come.” More

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      Mayor Adams Turns His Back on Immigrants and New York’s Legacy

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      Since last year, tens of thousands of asylum seekers have arrived in New York City from the southern border and around the world, seeking a better life in a place that has welcomed generations of immigrants since its founding.What many of those migrants have found instead is a tepid welcome amid a housing crisis that has left the city barely equipped to offer them more than a meal in the hotels used to house a booming homeless population. They are lucky if they get a bed.In recent days, the slapdash system the city has built to address the crisis has broken down completely, leaving migrants sleeping on Midtown streets. The city says there is no more room for them, but advocates say it needs to try harder.And on Sunday, The Times reported that a shady contractor tapped by New York’s mayor, Eric Adams, to send asylum seekers upstate and provide them with services harassed them instead. The city’s taxpayers are footing the bill for this abuse, to the tune of $432 million. The curiously large, no-bid contract with DocGo, a medical services company, should never have been signed and needs to be terminated.It’s true, as Mr. Adams has repeatedly said, that this crisis is a national issue and requires action from the White House and Congress. Cities like New York, which has more than 100,000 people living in shelters, cannot be expected to welcome asylum seekers on their own. More than 90,000 migrants have arrived in New York City over the past year, many as part of a political stunt by Texas, Florida and Arizona. Though immigrants strengthen the U.S. economy and are a vital part of the fabric of the democracy, local governments can’t simply absorb tens of thousands of people without help — especially for housing — and their taxpayers, in New York and elsewhere, shouldn’t be expected to foot the bill.Still, there is something particularly disappointing about New York City’s official response to the asylum seekers, unfolding under the gaze of the Statue of Liberty in the harbor. Nearly four in 10 city residents were born outside the United States. Waves of immigrants — Dutch, Irish, Italian, Jewish, Chinese, Latino and Afro-Caribbean immigrants, along with many others — helped build this city. So did millions of Black Americans who chased dreams in the city after fleeing the tyranny of the Jim Crow South.That rich legacy doesn’t seem to be on Mr. Adams’s mind. Since the moment the migrants began showing up last spring, he has made clear he wants little to do with the practical or humanitarian issues their arrival has raised. The mayor has provided basic services for the migrants, and rightly so. But at every turn, he has done so grudgingly.Michael M. Santiago/Getty ImagesMr. Adams has complained loudly that the immigrants were a “burden” on the city’s resources. His administration shut down a welcome center at the Port Authority bus terminal where volunteers had for months helped connect asylum seekers to services.He said the migrants would cost the city $4.3 billion over the next two fiscal years, a figure New York’s nonpartisan budget watchdog said is probably $1.2 billion too high. He tried to undo a 1981 court decree that requires the city to provide shelter to anyone who needs it.He erected giant tents — now dismantled — to house the migrants in remote areas of the city inaccessible to public transit, then made it exceedingly difficult for nonprofit groups to provide critical services to this vulnerable population, like legal assistance and even help navigating the city and its laws. Such services could help migrants acclimate to life in New York City and could ease complaints from neighbors of the hotels the city is using to house many migrants.The Adams administration has been warehousing asylum seekers instead of putting the country’s largest municipal government to work helping them build new lives, in New York or wherever else they may want to go. This summer the Adams administration printed fliers to dissuade migrants from seeking new lives in New York, leaflets that sum up the mayor’s overall approach and betray the promise and spirit of New York as a home for people from around the world.New York’s leaders are supposed to be different. The city’s voters didn’t intend to elect a mayor who acted like Greg Abbott, the Texas governor who sent migrants to cities across the country, including New York. Nor did they vote for someone like Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, the presidential candidate who used asylum seekers for political sport, flying them to the resort island of Martha’s Vineyard in Massachusetts at taxpayer expense just to own the libs.New York can do better.First, it seems clear that Gov. Kathy Hochul of New York needs to step in and demonstrate the concern lacking from City Hall. It may be in the best interest of both taxpayers and the asylum seekers for the governor to name an expert manager to oversee the crisis, which is clearly too much for the mayor to handle — a kind of New York asylum czar.That wouldn’t free Mr. Adams to simply throw up his hands and walk away from the obligations the city has to these tens of thousands of people, whether they turn out to be temporary guests or newly minted New Yorkers.The mayor could make a big difference quickly by welcoming established nonprofit groups — not no-bid profiteers — to provide critical services where migrants are being housed. Those services should include English-language classes, as well as basic job certification courses to help asylum seekers find work.Despite Mr. Adams’s cold approach, many nonprofits and private volunteers and some municipal workers are engaged in this humanitarian work. In one small example, Dr. Theodore G. Long, a senior vice president at the city’s public hospital system, noticed many meals at the facilities used to house migrants weren’t being eaten, so he conducted a survey to find out why. The results? “We swapped out roast beef and did Italian food instead,” he told me. “I figured, let’s ask people what they want instead of guessing.”That’s the kind of welcome a city of immigrants provides.The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our email: letters@nytimes.com.Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter (@NYTopinion) and Instagram. More

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      Our Immigration System: ‘A Waste of Talent’

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      More from our inbox:Cruelty at the BorderLimiting the President’s Pardon PowersAre A.I. Weapons Next?U.S. Food Policy Causes Poor Food ChoicesMateo Miño, left, in the church in Queens where he experienced a severe anxiety attack two days after arriving in New York.Christopher Lee for The New York TimesTo the Editor:“As Politicians Cry Crisis, Migrants Get a Toehold” (news article, July 15) points up the irrationality of the U.S. immigration system. As this article shows, migrants are eager to work, and they are filling significant gaps in fields such as construction and food delivery, but there are still great unmet needs for home health aides and nursing assistants.The main reason for this disjunction lies in federal immigration law, which offers no dedicated visa slots for these occupations (as it does for professionals and even for seasonal agricultural and resort workers) because they are considered “unskilled.”Instead, the law stipulates, applicants must demonstrate that they are “performing work for which qualified workers are not available in the United States” — clearly a daunting task for individual migrants.As a result, many do end up working in fields like home health care but without documentation and are thus vulnerable to exploitation if not deportation. With appropriate reforms, our system would be capable of meeting both the country’s needs for essential workers and migrants’ needs for safe havens.Sonya MichelSilver Spring, Md.The writer is professor emerita of history and women’s and gender studies at the University of Maryland, College Park.To the Editor:We have refugee doctors and nurses who are driving taxi cabs. What a waste of talent that is needed in so many areas of our country.Why isn’t there a program to use their knowledge and skills by working with medical associations to qualify them, especially if they agree to work in parts of the country that have a shortage of doctors and nurses? It would be a win-win situation.There are probably other professions where similar ideas would work.David AlbendaNew YorkCruelty at the BorderTexas Department of Public Safety troopers look over the Rio Grande, as migrants walk by.Suzanne Cordeiro/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesTo the Editor:Re “Officers Voice Concerns Over Aggressive Tactics at the Border in Texas” (news article, July 20):In the past year, I have done immigration-related legal work in New York City with recently arrived asylum seekers from all over the world: Venezuela, China, Honduras, Guatemala, Ecuador and Ghana. Most entered the U.S. on foot through the southern border. Some spent weeks traversing the perilous Darién Gap — an unforgiving jungle — and all are fleeing from horribly violent and scary situations.Texas’ barbed wire is not going to stop them.I am struck by the message of the mayor of Eagle Pass, Rolando Salinas Jr., who, supportive of legal migration and orderly law enforcement, said, “What I am against is the use of tactics that hurt people.” I desperately hope we can all agree about this.There should be no place for immigration enforcement tactics that deliberately and seriously injure people.I was disturbed to read that Texas is hiding razor wire in dark water and deploying floating razor wire-wrapped “barrel traps.” These products of Gov. Greg Abbott’s xenophobia are cruel to a staggering degree.Noa Gutow-EllisNew YorkThe writer is a law school intern at the Kathryn O. Greenberg Immigration Justice Clinic at the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law.Limiting the President’s Pardon Powers Tom Brenner for The New York TimesTo the Editor:Re “U.S. Alleges Push at Trump’s Club to Erase Footage” (front page, July 28) and “Sudden Obstacle Delays Plea Deal for Biden’s Son” (front page, July 27):With Donald Trump campaigning to return to the White House while under felony indictment, and with Hunter Biden’s legal saga unresolved, there should be bipartisan incentive in Congress for proposing a constitutional amendment limiting the president’s pardon power.A proposed amendment should provide that the president’s “reprieves and pardons” power under Article II, Section 2, shall not apply to offenses, whether committed in office or out, by the president himself or herself; the vice president and cabinet-level officers; any person whose unlawful conduct was solicited by or intended to benefit any of these officials; or a close family member of any of these individuals.Stephen A. SilverSan FranciscoThe writer is a lawyer.To the Editor:Beyond asking “Where’s my Roy Cohn?” Donald Trump may now ask, “Where’s my Rose Mary Woods?”David SchubertCranford, N.J.Are A.I. Weapons Next? Andreas Emil LundTo the Editor:Re “Our Oppenheimer Moment: The Creation of A.I. Weapons,” by Alexander C. Karp (Opinion guest essay, July 30):Mr. Karp argues that to protect our way of life, we must integrate artificial intelligence into weapons systems, citing our atomic might as precedent. However, nuclear weapons are sophisticated and difficult to produce. A.I. capabilities are software, leaving them vulnerable to theft, cyberhacking and data poisoning by adversaries.The risk of proliferation beyond leading militaries was appreciated by the United States and the Soviet Union when banning bioweapons, and the same applies to A.I. It also carries an unacceptable risk of conflict escalation, illustrated in our recent film “Artificial Escalation.”J. Robert Oppenheimer’s legacy offers a different lesson when it comes to advanced general-purpose A.I. systems. The nuclear arms race has haunted our world with annihilation for 78 years. It was luck that spared us. That race ebbed only as leaders came to understand that such a war would destroy humanity.The same is true now. To survive, we must recognize that the reckless pursuit and weaponization of inscrutable, probably uncontrollable advanced A.I. is not a winnable one. It is a suicide race.Anthony AguirreSanta Cruz, Calif.The writer is the executive director and a co-founder of the Future of Life Institute.U.S. Food Policy Causes Poor Food Choices Steven May/AlamyTo the Editor:Re “Vegans Make Smaller Mark on the Planet Than Others” (news article, July 22):While I agree that people could help reduce greenhouse-gas emissions by eating plants only, I find it crucial to note that food policy is the main reason for poor food choices.Food choices follow food policy, and U.S. food policy is focused on meat, dairy, fish and eggs. Our massive network of agriculture universities run “animal science” programs, providing billions of dollars’ worth of training, public relations, research, experimentation and sales for animal products.Our government provides subsidies to the meat, dairy, fish and egg industries far beyond what fruits, vegetables and other plant foods receive. Federal and state agriculture officials are typically connected to the meat or dairy industry. The public pays the cost of animal factories’ contamination of water and soil, and of widespread illness linked to eating animals since humans are natural herbivores.No wonder the meat, dairy, fish and egg industries have so much money for advertising, marketing and public relations, keeping humans deceived about their biological nature and what is good for them to eat.David CantorGlenside, Pa.The writer is founder and director of Responsible Policies for Animals. More

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      Where Trump, DeSantis and Other 2024 Candidates Stand on Immigration

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      Support for a wall is now routine, and some presidential candidates say they would use military force to secure the border if elected.The blistering immigration policy that Donald J. Trump enacted when he was in the White House shifted his party’s baseline on the issue to the right.His policies are now standard Republican fare: Calls to “build the wall” once set apart the right-wing fringe, but several Republican candidates now support even more exceptional measures, such as using military force to secure the border or ending birthright citizenship.Here is a look at where the candidates stand.Donald J. TrumpHis policies cemented hard-line immigration stances in the G.O.P. mainstream.Mr. Trump’s administration separated thousands of migrant families — traumatizing children and causing a public outcry. As recently as May, during a CNN event, he did not rule out reinstating that policy.His administration also forced asylum seekers to remain in Mexico while awaiting hearings, leading to the development of squalid refugee camps, and held children in crowded, unsanitary facilities.While his signature campaign promise in 2016 was to build a border wall, fewer than 500 miles of barriers were built along the nearly 2,000-mile southern border, largely in places that already had them. (At points, he suggested spikes, a moat and permission for officials to shoot migrants in the legs.)Mr. Trump toured the southern border wall near Alamo, Texas, in January 2021. Some of his 2024 rivals say they would continue work on the border wall; Mr. Trump built fewer than 500 miles during his tenure.Doug Mills/The New York TimesOne of his first actions upon taking office was to ban travelers from several majority-Muslim countries. In 2019, he began denying permanent residency to immigrants deemed likely to require public assistance, a rule that disproportionately affected people from Latin America, Africa and parts of Asia. Congress did not enact his proposals to slash legal immigration by limiting American citizens’ ability to bring in relatives and by adding education and skill requirements, but he cut it drastically in 2020 through pandemic-related actions.Ron DeSantisHe has tried to run to the right of Trump on immigration, but is mostly aligned with him.Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida has outlined an aggressive policy that includes mass deportations, indefinite detention of children (in violation of a 1997 consent decree known as the Flores agreement), and license to kill some border crossers.“We have to have appropriate rules of engagement to say, if you’re cutting through a border wall on sovereign U.S. territory and you’re trying to poison Americans, you’re going to end up stone cold dead,” he told Fox News, shortly after saying while in Texas that he would authorize “deadly force” against people “demonstrating hostile intent.”He also wants to end birthright citizenship for children of undocumented immigrants, an idea Mr. Trump floated in 2018 that rejects the 14th Amendment’s guarantee of citizenship to “all persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof.” Any such effort by a president would almost immediately wind up in court.Mr. DeSantis wants to finish building a border wall; require asylum seekers to stay in Mexico while awaiting hearings, as Mr. Trump did; deputize state and local officials to carry out deportations; and deploy the military to the border, which could violate a federal prohibition on using the military for civilian law enforcement. He has said he would declare a national emergency, allowing more unilateral action.Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida held a campaign event in Eagle Pass, Texas, last month. He has tried to stake out territory to the right of Mr. Trump on some campaign platforms, including immigration.Christopher Lee for The New York TimesChris ChristieHe mostly toes the G.O.P. line, but is also critical of Trump on the issue.Former Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey has proposed sending the National Guard to the border to stop illegal crossings and intercept fentanyl (though fentanyl mostly comes into the U.S. through official ports of entry, hidden in legitimate commerce).He has criticized Mr. Trump as all talk on border security, noting that his wall covers only a quarter of the border. But he also said on CNN last month that since the wall had been started, “you might as well finish it,” even though “I probably wouldn’t have done that at the start.” He argues that Mr. Trump erred by enacting immigration policy through executive actions that President Biden could easily undo.Mr. Christie has changed his mind on a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants — in 2010, he urged Congress to create one; then, during his first presidential campaign in 2015, he said he considered it “extreme.” His campaign did not respond to a request to confirm his current position or to elaborate on what other immigration policies he supports.Nikki HaleyShe is largely aligned with the bulk of the field and supports most of Trump’s policies.When she was governor of South Carolina, Nikki Haley signed a law requiring businesses to use a federal database to check prospective employees’ immigration status, mandating that police officers check the status of some people they stopped for unrelated reasons, and making it a crime to “harbor or transport” an undocumented immigrant. She has cited this as a national model, though a judge blocked parts of the law and the state agreed to soften it.Nikki Haley has expressed support for some of Mr. Trump’s immigration policies, but not separating families.Kathryn Gamble for The New York TimesMs. Haley has also said that she wants to restore Mr. Trump’s “remain in Mexico” policy, add 25,000 Border Patrol and ICE agents, withhold funding from “sanctuary cities” that limit cooperation with immigration officials, and immediately deport migrants. But she does not support separating families, she said.Like Mr. Trump and Mr. DeSantis, she wants to limit birthright citizenship. “For those that are in this country legally, of course I think we go according to the Constitution, and that’s fine,” she told Fox News. “But it’s the illegal immigrations that we have to make sure that just because they get here, if they have a child, you’re just building on the problems.”She told CBS News that she wanted legal immigration to be based on “merit” and businesses’ needs.Tim ScottHe is largely aligned with the bulk of the field and supports most of Trump’s policies.Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina introduced legislation alongside other Republican senators this year to withhold funding from sanctuary cities and to redirect funding that Democrats had allocated for new I.R.S. agents to border security instead. Neither bill is viable in the Democrat-controlled Senate.Mr. Scott told NBC News that he supported a requirement for asylum seekers, if they cross other countries en route to the U.S. border, to request asylum in those countries before requesting it in the United States — a policy that Mr. Biden has enacted and that a judge blocked on Tuesday.In the same interview, he said he supported a border wall, new surveillance technology and an increased military presence along the border. He said he would not rule out the possibility of sending troops into Mexico to combat drug cartels.Senator Tim Scott has said that he supports a border wall, new surveillance technology and an increased military presence along the border.Travis Dove for The New York TimesLike many candidates, Mr. Scott also wants to reinstate the Title 42 policy that allowed rapid explusion of migrants on pandemic-related public health grounds. He argued in an interview with Fox News that fentanyl, rather than the coronavirus, was the public health crisis that now justified the policy.Mike PenceHe is largely aligned with the bulk of the field and supports most of Trump’s policies.Former Vice President Mike Pence said last year that he supported a return to Mr. Trump’s immigration policies, including continuing to build a border wall, banning the establishment of sanctuary cities and reinstating the “remain in Mexico” requirement for asylum seekers.He said in a CNN town hall event that he would not, however, reinstate family separation because “we got to stop putting Band-Aids on the problem.”In the same event, he called for a “guest worker” program under which people seeking jobs in agriculture and other industries could “come and for a short period of time pay taxes, participate in our economy, and go home.”Mr. Pence also vociferously opposed the Biden administration’s lifting of Title 42 and wants to reinstate it — as well as a requirement that legal immigrants demonstrate that they will not rely on public assistance.Vivek RamaswamyHe has proposed some of the most aggressive stances of any candidate.Vivek Ramaswamy has called for securing the border by any means necessary, including military force. This could violate an 1878 law that forbids the use of federal troops for civilian law enforcement, but Mr. Ramaswamy argues that securing the border isn’t civilian law enforcement.He wants to “universally” deport undocumented immigrants and opposes any path to legal residence because “we are a nation of laws,” he said at a campaign event. “That is something we cannot compromise on.”He added that, for people brought to the United States as children, he would be open to a process allowing them to return after being deported. But all legal immigration, he says, should run on a “meritocratic” points system, with lottery-based paths eliminated.His anti-immigrant language has been incendiary. On Fox News, he said citing undocumented immigrants’ economic contributions was tantamount to making economic arguments for slavery: “‘The vegetables will rot in the field, we need people to pluck our crops’ — this is a thing that Democrats were saying in the South in the 1860s to justify a different form of immoral and illegal behavior,” he said.Asa HutchinsonHe is somewhat more moderate than Trump, but still advocates strict policies.Former Gov. Asa Hutchinson of Arkansas, in a Fox News opinion essay, called for adding Border Patrol agents and authorizing murder charges against people accused of supplying fentanyl that leads to deaths. “We should ensure those who bring evil across our borders and sow criminality throughout our country are proportionately punished,” he wrote.In an interview with the New Hampshire news station WMUR, he didn’t rule out supporting a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants, but said a secure border was a prerequisite for any such immigration reform. He also said that he supported a wall in some places, but that it wasn’t feasible along the full border.As governor, Mr. Hutchinson signed a law to make immigrants with federal work permits eligible for professional licenses. He also authorized the deployment of 40 Arkansas National Guard troops to the border in Texas in 2021.Doug BurgumHe expresses some more moderate views but hasn’t made detailed proposals.Gov. Doug Burgum of North Dakota has expressed support for lowering barriers to legal immigration, a stance that sets him apart from most other candidates in the field.In an interview with Forbes, he criticized the obstacles encountered by seasonal agricultural workers and prospective tech employees, saying, “We put them through two, three, four, five years of red tape, and then we let people illegally cross the southern border, so the two things juxtaposed against each other make no sense.”In the same interview, he accused President Biden of being weak on border security and said, “We can’t have a discussion in this country about legal immigration until we solve the illegal immigration.” But he has not described how to do that, and his campaign did not respond to a request for details.As governor, he signed legislation to create an Office of Legal Immigration to help North Dakota businesses hire foreign workers. He has also sent state National Guard troops to the border in Texas.Will HurdHe is on the more moderate end of the G.O.P. field.As a member of Congress, Will Hurd described a border wall as a “third-century solution to a 21st-century problem,” called the separation of migrant families “unacceptable,” and said Mr. Trump’s ban on travelers from several Muslim countries “endangers the lives of thousands of American men and women in our military, diplomatic corps and intelligence services.”He has also criticized Mr. Biden’s policies from the opposite direction, telling CBS News that the president is “treating everybody that comes into the country as an asylum seeker.”What Mr. Hurd himself would do is less clear, and his campaign did not respond to a request for information. He told NBC News that he wanted to “streamline” legal immigration, but offered no details. He has supported protections for “Dreamers” who migrated illegally as children, and he has also previously called for a new version of the post-World War II Marshall Plan to strengthen Central American economies and reduce the poverty and instability driving migration.Francis SuarezHe is on the more moderate end of the G.O.P. field.Mayor Francis X. Suarez of Miami opposes many of the far-right immigration policies outlined by many other candidates, including by his governor, Mr. DeSantis. He argued on Fox Business that the aggressive immigration bill Mr. DeSantis and the Florida Legislature had enacted was “having an adverse impact on small businesses in our state.”He said that he believed the country was “not ready” for amnesty for undocumented immigrants, but that he was open to creating some legal status that would protect them from deportation. Of actually deporting all of them, he said, “It’s not possible.”He has otherwise been vague, saying that he wants to make legal immigration “merit-based and skill-based” and that he believes he has “credibility” on the issue as a Hispanic Republican, but not proposing specific policies. His campaign did not respond to a request for details. More

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      Dutch Government Collapses Over Plan to Further Limit Immigration

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      Prime Minister Mark Rutte, one of Europe’s longest-serving leaders, had struggled to reach an agreement with his coalition partners about migration, including more restrictions.The Dutch government collapsed on Friday after the parties in its ruling coalition failed to reach an agreement on migration policy, underlining how the issue of asylum seekers coming to Europe continues to divide governments across the continent.Prime Minister Mark Rutte, who was overseeing his fourth cabinet and is one of Europe’s longest-serving leaders, told reporters on Friday that he would submit his resignation to the king.“It is no secret that the coalition partners have very different views on migration policy,” Mr. Rutte told reporters in The Hague on Friday. “And today, unfortunately, we have to draw the conclusion that those differences are irreconcilable.”The disintegration of the government triggers new general elections in the fall, and a caretaker government headed by Mr. Rutte will remain in place until then.For months, the parties in the coalition government had struggled to come to an agreement about migration, debating terms of family reunification and whether to create two classes of asylum: a temporary one for people fleeing conflicts, and a permanent one for people fleeing persecution. .Dutch news organizations reported that Mr. Rutte had called for limiting the entrance for children of war refugees who were already in the Netherlands and for making families wait at least two years before they could be reunited. Mr. Rutte denied those reports, according to the Dutch broadcaster NOS.But arguments about migration policy continued to split the Dutch government, which already has tougher immigration policies than some other E.U. nations. This week, two parties in the governing coalition, the Christian Union and the centrist D66, determined that they could not come to terms with Mr. Rutte’s party, leading to a crisis in the government.“One of the values that are important with the proposals is that children grow up with their parents,” a statement by the Christian Union party said. “As a family party, that is what we stand for.” The party said it wanted to work with “heart and soul for a humane and effective migration policy.”Migration has proved an intractable issue among many European voters and political parties, fueling the popularity of nationalistic and right-wing parties around the continent, and leading to sharp criticism from rights activists over how governments have treated migrants. Last year, Dutch aid agencies struggled to help hundreds of asylum seekers who were living in a makeshift camp outside an overcrowded reception center, in what aid workers described as dismal conditions.Last year, more than 21,000 people from outside the European Union sought asylum in the Netherlands, according to the Dutch government. More than 400,000 people immigrated to the Netherlands overall in 2022, the office said, an increase from the year before.The large numbers of arrivals have strained the Netherlands’ housing capacity, which was already suffering a shortage for the country’s more than 17 million people.The ruling parties of the Dutch government had met repeatedly in recent days to try to find common ground, and Mr. Rutte’s cabinet met late Friday for its own talks.“We talked for a long time, we are coming here tonight because we did not succeed,” the defense minister, Kajsa Ollongren, told reporters as she walked into the cabinet meeting, according to The Associated Press.“Everybody wants to find a good, effective solution that also does justice to the fact that this is about human lives,” the finance minister, Sigrid Kaag, a member of the D66 party, said before the talks began.Aid workers handing out blankets and other supplies to asylum seekers in Ter Apel, the Netherlands, in August 2022.Vincent Jannink/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesOver the last decade, as thousands of people have sought asylum in the European Union from Africa and the Middle East, far-right parties that oppose immigration have gained popularity across the 27-member bloc. In some countries, their success has pushed center and right-wing parties to lurch further to the right on immigration and asylum policy.In June, Spain’s far-right Vox party did better than expected in regional elections, and last fall, the Sweden Democrats, a party with roots in the neo-Nazi movement, won 20.5 percent of the vote in Sweden, becoming the second largest party in Parliament.In France, the far-right leader Marine Le Pen, who has long held an anti-immigration stance, reached the final round of the presidential election last year. In Hungary, Prime Minister Viktor Orban has clung to power in part by railing against immigration.And last year Italy elected a hard-right coalition led by Giorgia Meloni, whose long record of criticizing immigration and the European Union has sown concern about the nation’s reliability in the Western alliance.Mr. Rutte had supported European Union efforts to limit migration, visiting Tunisia last month with Ms. Meloni and a top E.U. leader, Ursula Von der Leyen. In a joint statement, the leaders said the European Union would provide 100 million euros, or about $109 million, to Tunisia for “border management” and search-and-rescue and anti-smuggling efforts.The last time Mr. Rutte and his cabinet resigned was in 2021 over a report highlighting systemic failure by his government to protect thousands of families from overzealous tax inspectors. But Mr. Rutte weathered that crisis, emerging as the Netherlands’ leader yet again after nine months of negotiations that December. More