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    Migrants at Ice jail in Miami made to kneel to eat ‘like dogs’, report alleges

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    Migrants at a Miami immigration jail were shackled with their hands tied behind their backs and made to kneel to eat food from styrofoam plates “like dogs”, according to a report published on Monday into conditions at three overcrowded south Florida facilities.The incident at the downtown federal detention center is one of a succession of alleged abuses at Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency (Ice) operated jails in the state since January, chronicled by advocacy groups Human Rights Watch, Americans for Immigrant Justice, and Sanctuary of the South from interviews with detainees.Dozens of men had been packed into a holding cell for hours, the report said, and denied lunch until about 7pm. They remained shackled with the food on chairs in front of them.“We had to eat like animals,” one detainee named Pedro said.Degrading treatment by guards is commonplace in all three jails, the groups say. At the Krome North service processing center in west Miami, female detainees were made to use toilets in full view of men being held there, and were denied access to gender-appropriate care, showers, or adequate food.The jail was so far beyond capacity, some transferring detainees reported, that they were held for more than 24 hours in a bus in the parking lot. Men and women were confined together, and unshackled only when they needed to use the single toilet, which quickly became clogged.“The bus became disgusting. It was the type of toilet in which normally people only urinate but because we were on the bus for so long, and we were not permitted to leave it, others defecated in the toilet,” one man said.“Because of this, the whole bus smelled strongly of feces.”When the group was finally admitted into the facility, they said, many spent up to 12 days crammed into a frigid intake room they christened la hierela – the ice box – with no bedding or warm clothing, sleeping instead on the cold concrete floor.There was so little space at Krome, and so many detainees, the report says, that every available room was used to hold new arrivals.“By the time I left, almost all the visitation rooms were full. A few were so full men couldn’t even sit, all had to stand,” Andrea, a female detainee, said.At the third facility, the Broward transitional center in Pompano Beach, where a 44-year-old Haitian woman, Marie Ange Blaise, died in April, detainees said they were routinely denied adequate medical or psychological care.Some suffered delayed treatment for injuries and chronic conditions, and dismissive or hostile responses from staff, the report said.In one alleged incident in April at the downtown Miami jail, staff turned off a surveillance camera and a “disturbance control team” brutalized detainees who were protesting a lack of medical attention to one of their number who was coughing up blood. One detainee suffered a broken finger.All three facilities were severely overcrowded, the former detainees said, a contributory factor in Florida’s decision to quickly build the controversial “Alligator Alcatraz” jail in the Everglades intended to eventually hold up to 5,000 undocumented migrants awaiting deportation.Immigration detention numbers nationally were at an average of 56,400 per day in mid-June, with almost 72% having no criminal history, according to the report.The daily average during the whole of 2024 was 37,500, HRW said.The groups say that the documented abuses reflect inhumane conditions inside federal immigration facilities that have worsened significantly since Trump’s January inauguration and subsequent push to ramp up detentions and deportations.“The anti-immigrant escalation and enforcement tactics under the Trump administration are terrorizing communities and ripping families apart, which is especially cruel in the state of Florida, which thrives because of its immigrant communities,” said Katie Blankenship, immigration attorney and co-founder of Sanctuary of the South.“The rapid, chaotic, and cruel approach to arresting and locking people up is literally deadly and causing a human rights crisis that will plague this state and the entire country for years to come.”The Guardian has contacted Ice for comment. More

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      Miami city officials cancelled an election. Outraged voters call it a power grab

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      Candidates for local office in Miami have been prepping mailers, gathering volunteers, raising money and hitting the street for the last year, with voters expecting to see a robust campaign to replace the city’s term-limited, scandal-chased mayor.Last week, Miami’s city commission told those voters they’ll have to wait an extra year. In a 3-2 vote, the commission changed the city’s election bylaws to push the municipal races back to 2026.Commissioners said they made the change in the name of cost savings and increased voter engagement when higher-profile races for Congress or the presidency may be on the ballot. But they gave themselves an extra year in office without asking voters for permission first. And in a moment when the underpinnings of democracy appear to be cracking in America, a cavalier attitude toward an election seems ominous to some Miami residents.“What worries people about this is, we don’t want to give the guy in the White House any ideas,” said John Jackson, a Miami resident and former political operative. There’s no real mechanism to try something like this at the federal level, he said, “but it still kind of makes people a little worried. I don’t know anyone on any side of the aisle – Republican, Democrat, conservative, liberal – who just thinks that this was a good thing”.Florida attorney general James Uthmeier sent Miami’s mayor a warning letter on 26 June, telling the city that the proposal to change election dates without asking permission from voters first violates the city and county’s charter and the state constitution.Miami is home “to thousands of patriotic Cuban Americans who know better than most about regimes that cavalierly delay elections and prolong their terms in power”, Uthmeier wrote. “The City of Miami owes to its citizens what the law requires.”City leaders could have avoided this problem by placing the question on the ballot and accepting a shorter term if voters chose to hold future elections on even-numbered years, said Michael Hepburn, a Miami mayoral candidate.“The city of Miami is actually still scheduled to have a election this year for other ballot referendums,” Hepburn said. “So what they’re doing is actually just stupid, because you literally still gonna have people come out this year on November 4 and vote for, like, three other questions on the ballot.”By structuring the change this way, however, it permits the city commissioner, Joe Carollo, and the Miami mayor, Francis Suarez – both term-limited – to remain in office for an additional year.Hepburn said he thinks Juarez wants to use the extra year to his advantage. “He’s started thinking about how he could stay in office and use his current office to parlay that into his next office. He may be running for governor next year. He may be running for US Congress. Who knows? But he’ll be able to do it from the office of mayor, which just helps him.”Hepburn and other candidates have either filed lawsuits or are awaiting the actions of the attorney general in response to the ordinance change.“The decision by city leaders to arbitrarily extend their terms by a full year without voter approval is exactly why so many are up in arms by the chaos and dysfunction of our city government,” said Eileen Higgins, a Miami-Dade county commissioner running to become the city’s next mayor.Instead of extending current elected terms, Higgins said she would support shortening a new mayor’s term by one year and moving the election to 2028 to achieve optimal voter participation. “That’s why I believe moving forward with the planned elections this November should have been the only decision. More troubling, a run-off in December 2026 will only cost taxpayers more money and result in lower turnout than this year’s planned election.”The mayor’s office did not respond to requests for comment.“I support and encourage participation in the electoral process,” said city of Miami commissioner Christine King. “Voting is the single most important act one can do for their country and in this instance our community. In the city of Miami, voter turnout is historically low for odd numbered year elections. My vote in support of moving our elections to even numbered years was a vote for democracy.”The argument for on-cycle elections makes sense to students of civic participation. Suarez defeated his challenger 21,479 to 3,166 in the 2021 off-year election. In a Miami referendum about residency requirements for the Miami mayor in 2024, with Donald Trump facing Kamala Harris as the marquee matchup at the top of the ballot, 127,460 people cast a vote, more than five times as many voters.“The upshot is that on-cycle elections … are generally viewed as a win for democracy,” said Matthew Nelsen, an assistant political science professor at the University of Miami. “On-cycle elections ensure that the media attention and campaigning that comes along with a national midterm or presidential election will also trickle down into local races.”Commissioner Damian Pardo, the author of the election change, argued that holding municipal elections on off years is a form of voter suppression. “The reason behind this is to boost voter participation,” he told local media. “When we realized we actually had potentially three votes to get this done, we moved forward. When we can take reform, we take it.”Nonetheless, the commission chose not to let voters make this change.“Ideally, the voters would have had the ability to vote on this,” Pardo said. “However, given the situation in this context, where we had the opportunity to pass it … in order to give the voters what they want, you might actually undermine them by putting it to a vote, because by the time that time lapses, you may no longer have those three votes.”Two of the three commissioners who voted for the change – Pardo and King – are Democrats.“If they can move it, why not the president?” said Marion Brown, a candidate challenging King in the election that the commission postponed. “Let the president move it, let the governor move it, let everyone in the election do the same thing.”The third commissioner, Ralph Rosado, is a Republican, as is the mayor. Municipal elections are technically nonpartisan in Miami.“Our county mayor is Democratic. Miami’s mayor is Republican. But none of that really matters, because politics is just weird here,” Jackson said. “To me, it was just entrenched politicians who said ‘well, gonna save money and we’re gonna raise turnout’. But the reality is, they’re term-limited, and now they get an extra term.”Politics in Miami tends to protect a group of four or five politically-powerful families at the expense of the public interest, said Marisol Zenteno, president of the League of Women Voters of Miami-Dade.“People are very irritated. They don’t trust in the system. They feel that it’s the same people manipulating it and that it’s pretty much the same people winning all the time,” she said. “Voters are just disillusioned.” More

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      Trump ‘roundtable’ in Miami packed with pre-screened ultra-loyalist Latinos

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      It was billed as a roundtable discussion with Latino leaders, but the reality of Donald Trump’s appearance at his Doral golf club in Miami on Tuesday was a succession of adulatory monologues from his most loyal Latino supporters, interspersed with familiar, lengthy rants from the former president laden with grievances and insults.Little of the conversation, such as it was, related to issues directly affecting Latino voters, with whom Trump falsely claimed he was leading in the polls despite significant evidence to the contrary.His remarks about immigration, for example, were largely limited to baseless and often-aired claims that foreign countries, especially Venezuela, were opening their prisons to send “violent gang members” and drug dealers into the US with military weapons.And, his comments addressed to the many business owners and leaders present were distinctly light on policy, apart from a promise to maintain the generous tax cuts from his first term in office.“We gave you the biggest cut in taxes in the history of the country,” he said. “We have a great foundation to build on so we have a lot of companies coming in very fast.”Trump trails Harris in all battleground states among Latinos, a poll for Voto Latino published Monday and cited by the Hill, found, while the most recent AS/COA poll tracker shows a 56-31 preference for Harris nationally among the 36 million eligible Latino voters.Still, there is evidence Trump has been gaining ground, with the Democratic edge among Latino voters at its lowest level in four presidential election cycles, according to NBC News polling.Perhaps with this in mind, Trump was directly appealing to the Latino bloc for the second time in less than a week at Tuesday’s roundtable.“We’re going to talk about what’s happening with the election. We’ll take some questions from the fake news,” he said after a raucous welcome to the stage.Ultimately, he took none, ensuring he would avoid a repeat of his misfire at a town hall hosted by Univision, the largest US Spanish-language network, in Miami last Thursday when he mostly dodged awkward questions about immigration from undecided voters. At that event, he repeated debunked claims that Haitians in Springfield, Ohio, were eating pets and “other things too that they’re not supposed to”.Tuesday’s audience, a gallery of pre-screened ultra-loyalists at Trump National Doral, appeared unconcerned by the lack of a dialogue, cheering loudly at every insult. Trump called Kamala Harris, his Democratic opponent in the 5 November election, “a stupid person” as he falsely labeled her Joe Biden’s “border tsar” during a brief section on immigration.His remarks segued quickly into an attack on Democrats for allegedly allowing transgender athletes to play women’s sports, and he told a somewhat fanciful tale of “a man who transitioned into, congratulations, a woman” smashing a baseball so hard it hit a female player on the head and “these young ladies said they’d never seen anything like it”.Calling Harris a “radical-left lunatic”, he added: “There’s a sickness going on in our country. We have to end the sickness.”Perhaps sensing things were going off-topic, event host Jennifer Korn, a former White House aide and executive director of the Hispanic Leadership Network, attempted to interrupt with a: “Mr President … ”“I just want to leave it at that,” Trump said. “Would anybody else like to say anything?”Robert Unanue, the president of Goya Foods, the largest Latino-owned food company in the US, and a longtime vocal cheerleader of the former president and his lies that the 2020 election was stolen, stepped up to take the microphone and deliver a lengthy speech praising Trump.“I can’t believe your courage, your fight, and I know why you’re doing this. You’re not doing it for anything, but because you love this country. You love us, and we love you,” he said.“The other side of loving and building and creating is hating and destroying and dividing, and that’s what’s happened. We have become from the land of opportunity the land of exploitation, and the exploiter-in-chief is Kamala Harris and this administration.”Unanue was not the only Latino business figure heaping praise. Joel Garza, owner of multiple Sonic fast-food franchises and another veteran of the Trump podium, said the former president needed to be re-elected to “help us with banks [and] stop regulations”.“The last three-and-a-half years, the worst years for businesses, inflation, interest rates, with banks, prices, everything, is nothing compared to 2017 to 2020 when you were at the White House,” Garza said.The ultimate adulation, however, came at the conclusion of the roundtable when a group of religious leaders stood around Trump, who was seated at the table, eyes closed, with their hands on his shoulders.“We lift up the man that we believe you’ve put your hand upon to help restore America and bring America back to the place that honors you,” Ramiro Peña, one of Trump’s most influential Latino evangelists, said in a direct appeal to the heavens.Honduran televangelist Guillermo Maldonado, founder of Miami megachurch the King Jesus International Ministry, closed out the event with a prediction Trump would defeat Harris because “there’s a higher assignment for him to finish with this nation”.“This is a war between good and evil,” he insisted. “God sets up kings. He removes kings. We’re going to pray for the will of God to make [Trump] the 47th president.” More

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      Miami Grand Prix organizers stop plans for Trump fundraiser in luxury suite

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      Officials with the Miami Grand Prix recently halted a Donald Trump presidential campaign fundraiser being planned for the upcoming Formula One race, sending a cease-and-desist letter to its organizer.A Miami Grand Prix representative notified Steven Witkoff, a close friend of Trump, that Witkoff would not be allowed to use a suite at the race to fundraise for the former president, the Washington Post first reported.Witkoff allegedly plotted to host a political fundraiser at the Paddock Club rooftop suite, charging potential attendees $250,000 a ticket to attend.The Paddock suite facilities at the F1 race are fairly exclusive, providing guests with better views of the racetrack and other perks, according to the F1 experiences website.In a letter to Witkoff obtained by the Post, Miami Grand Prix organizers said: “It has come to our attention that you may be using your Paddock Club Rooftop Suite for a political purpose, namely raising money for a federal election at $250,000 a ticket, which clearly violates the Formula 1 Crypto.com Miami Grand Prix suite license agreement … If this is true, we regret to inform you that your suite license will be revoked, you will not be allowed to attend the race at any time, and we will refund you in full.”The Guardian could not immediately reach a representative of the Miami Grand Prix.The event had previously been advertised in a newsletter for the Shell Bay Club in Florida, an exclusive golf club Witkoff’s real estate company helped develop.According to the advertisement viewed by the Post, an invitation to the cancelled political fundraiser included a helicopter trip and other amenities. Multiple people called Miami Grand Prix officials and asked about the event.It’s unclear if Trump was going to make an appearance at the fundraiser. Trump is expected to attend the Miami Grand Prix, which is on 5 May, Newsweek reported. Secret Service agents reportedly contacted race officials to coordinate Trump’s attendance, the Post reported.Witkoff is a longtime associate of Trump. He recently testified on the former president’s behalf during a New York financial fraud case, in which Trump, his eldest sons and associates were ordered to pay over $350m plus pre-judgment interest.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionIn a phone call with the Post, Witkoff denied any wrongdoing, claiming: “This is something fake, for sure.” He did not elaborate further.The fiasco at the Miami Grand Prix is not the first time officials affiliated with a popular racing series have rejected political associations.Organizers with the Indy 500 race rejected a request from one car to feature pictures of Trump and the independent presidential candidate Robert F Kennedy Jr, WIBC reported. More

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      Support for Israel and verbal sparring propel fiery third Republican debate

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      The Israel-Hamas war in Gaza and other foreign policy issues dominated Wednesday’s fiery third debate of Republican presidential hopefuls in Miami. Candidates pledged wholehearted support for Israel’s military response following last month’s Hamas attacks, and clashed over Ukraine, China and immigration.The debate, minus Donald Trump, the runaway favorite for the party’s 2024 nomination who was hosting his own private rally elsewhere in the area, was a more bitter affair than its predecessors in Wisconsin and California. Lively verbal sparring sometimes regressed into insults, with Nikki Haley at one point calling one of her rivals “scum”.The candidates also grappled over immigration, the devastatingly bad night for Republicans in Tuesday’s elections, and the party’s staunchly anti-abortion stance on abortion that analysts say was the reason.Discussion over Israel’s actions in Gaza were, however, most prominent.“I will be telling Bibi [Israel’s prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu] to finish the job once and for all with these butchers Hamas. They’re terrorists. They’re massacring innocent people. They would wipe every Jew off the globe if they could,” Ron DeSantis, the Florida governor, said.Haley, a former ambassador to the United Nations, was equally forthright. “The first thing I said to him when it happened was, ‘finish them’. They have to eliminate Hamas, [we have to] support Israel with whatever they need whenever they need it, and three, make sure we bring our hostages home.”DeSantis took credit for chartering flights to rescue stranded Americans in Israel, but overreached by claiming “there could have been more hostages, if we hadn’t acted”. The DeSantis flights, which some have criticized as a de facto foreign policy, took place after Hamas took about 240 hostages on 7 October.Haley and entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy, who has been criticized for controversial racial comments, took potshots at each other. Haley’s policies, Ramaswamy said, fueled war, and in a reference to a former vice-president called her “Dick Cheney in three-inch heels”.“I wear five-inch heels, and don’t wear them unless you can run on them,” she shot straight back. “I wear heels not for a fashion statement – they’re for ammunition.”A further unpleasant exchange between the two came in a discussion about the Chinese social media platform TikTok. “In the last debate, she made fun of me for actually joining TikTok while her own daughter was actually using the app for a long time, so you might want to take care of your family first,” Ramaswamy sniped.“Leave my daughter out of your mouth,” Haley interjected. “You are just scum.”Haley performed well in the first two debates, and has enjoyed a recent surge in popularity. She had painted DeSantis as an isolationist at a time when, she said, the US needed to work with global partners, and their feud continued Wednesday with bickering over China, each accusing the other of operating policies favorable to one of America’s foes.But the pair were united in tearing strategically into the absent the former president, who they trail by a significant margin in the race for the nomination. Trump, DeSantis said, “owes it to you to be on this stage”.“He said Republicans were gonna get tired of winning. Well, we saw it last night: I’m sick of Republicans losing,” DeSantis said, referring to Tuesday’s Democratic electoral successes in Kentucky and Virginia.Haley said: “I think he was the right president at the right time. I don’t think he’s the right president now. I think that he put us a trillion dollars in debt and our kids are never gonna forgive us for that. I think the fact that he used to be right on Ukraine and foreign issues – now he’s getting weak in the knees and trying to be friendly again.”The South Carolina senator Tim Scott, who is trailing in the polls, was asked how he would assist Ukraine in its battle against Russia, but pivoted to criticizing the Biden administration’s border policies. He warned that “terrorist cells” were entering the country from Mexico.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionThen he said: “The American people are frustrated that they do not have a president who reminds us and tells us where’s the accountability. Where are those dollars? How are those dollars being spent? We need those answers for us to continue to see the support for Ukraine.”Joe Biden has asked Congress for $106bn for Ukraine and Israel aid.Scott said he wanted to see the southern US border closed to immigrants, Ramaswamy said he would build a wall there and at the northern border with Canada, while DeSantis repeated his previous promise to send troops to the border and shoot drug smugglers “stone-cold dead”.Chris Christie, the former New Jersey governor, spoke of a need to deter China from invading Taiwan as the debate moved to other foreign policy topics. “We need to go straight to our nuclear submarine program, and we need to increase it drastically,” he said.Christie weighed in on the TikTok debate, saying the platform was “not only spyware – it is polluting the minds of American young people all throughout this country, and they’re doing it intentionally”. As president, he said, he would ban it.Regarding abortion, which was behind many of the Republican losses on Tuesday, Haley expounded a softer position than other candidates that might yet resonate with voters. “As much as I’m pro-life, I don’t judge anyone for being pro-choice, and I don’t want them to judge me for being pro-life,” she said.Trump, meanwhile, says he is so far ahead in the race for the nomination, more than 44 points, according to Real Clear Politics (RCP), as to make debate meaningless. In campaign messaging on Tuesday, he called it “a battle of losers”.While Trump’s own candidacy is mired in legal troubles that could yet derail him, his remaining rivals are not even close. Scott, Christie and Ramaswamy are all polling in the low single digits, leaving DeSantis and Haley, themselves only at 13% and 9%, per RCP, as the most viable alternatives.There will be one more Republican debate, in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, on 6 December, before the 2024 primaries begin with the Iowa caucuses on 15 January.The field, already down to five in Miami after the withdrawal of former vice-president Mike Pence and non-qualification of North Dakota governor Doug Burgum, could be further reduced by then. And after Wednesday’s debate concluded, a campaign adviser said Trump would also not be present in Alabama. More

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      Calls to ‘finish’ Hamas and ‘you’re just scum’: key Republican debate takeaways

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      The third Republican debate was held in Miami on Wednesday, with frontrunner Donald Trump once again foregoing the debate for his own rally nearby.The pool has dwindled since the last debate, and Ron DeSantis, Nikki Haley, Vivek Ramaswamy, Tim Scott and Chris Christie seemed to be more serious and focused this time around as they answered questions on the Israel-Hamas war, immigration, abortion and the federal budget. Even so, the debate had moments where it devolved into a shouting match, with petty barbs and personal attacks.Here are the main things to know about the debate.1. The Israel-Hamas war was top of mind – and the rhetoric turned uglyThe candidates largely tried to one-up each other on their unequivocal support for Israel and its military response to the Hamas attacks on October 7, with the exception of Vivek Ramaswamy, who said the US should not be as actively involved in regional wars.“The first thing I said when it happened was, I said, finish them. Finish them,” Haley said about Hamas, touting her former position as special envoy to the United Nations under Donald Trump. DeSantis, meanwhile, focused on the flights he chartered for Floridians in Israel before overstating his aid to the Israeli government.When asked about how the impact of the war was playing out on college campuses in the US, however, DeSantis seemingly denied the existence of Islamophobia, and said he would quash some pro-Palestine student groups.The candidates did not address the estimated 10,000 Palestinian civilians killed by Israel’s strikes and its ground invasion in Gaza.2. After Republican election losses, candidates tried to regain ground, especially on abortionThe day before the debate, the Republican party saw major losses across the country, from the Virginia state legislature to Kentucky’s governorship. The candidates addressed that head on.“We’ve become a party of losers,” Ramaswamy said in his opening statements. “We got trounced last night in 2023. And I think that we have to have accountability in our party.”Many of the election losses were in states where Republicans were trying to enact stricter abortion laws after Roe v Wade was overturned last year. DeSantis, Christie and Haley tried to address that issue by backing away from rightwing anti-abortion rhetoric and focusing on states’ rights to choose.Haley, in particular, took the most measured stance, saying she did not judge those who support abortion and that a federal abortion ban was politically untenable.3. Haley and DeSantis continued to battle for second placeWhile neither Haley nor DeSantis are polling anywhere close to Trump, they stood out in the pack throughout the debate.Haley focused on her experience in the UN and on foreign policy issues, and DeSantis on his tenure as Florida governor. Both seemed to try to remain more composed than usual, with Haley only reacting to barbs from Ramaswamy.“Our world is on fire,” Haley said in her closing remarks. “We can’t win the fights of the 21st century with politicians from the 20th century.”Not far from the debate hall, Trump held a campaign rally. But fellow Florida man DeSantis avoided many direct attacks on the former president.“This is not about me, this is about you,” he said in his opening and closing remarks.4. There were personal attacks – particularly involving RamaswamyRamaswamy started his debate by attacking the media, the RNC chairwoman Ronna McDaniel, and even the NBC moderators, seemingly as part of his attempt to portray himself as the anti-establishment candidate.He then turned his focus to Haley. “Do you want a leader from a different generation who is going to put this country first, or do you want Dick Cheney in three-inch heels?” he said, criticizing her hawkish foreign policy positions.And when it came the entrepreneur’s turn to talk about his policy on TikTok, Ramaswamy referred to Haley and said: “In the last debate, she made fun of me for actually joining TikTok while her own daughter was actually using the app for a long time. So you might want to take care of your family first.”“Leave my daughter out of your voice,” Haley shot back. When Ramaswamy went on, she dismissed him, saying: “You are just scum.”5. Candidates were more serious and focused than in past debatesThe earlier debates, with larger candidate pools, have tended to be circus-like in their atmosphere, with more riffs and off-topic detours. From the opening statements, the debate seemed to be more focused on the issues Americans are grappling with, from war in the Middle East and in Ukraine, and kitchen-table issues such as social security.The seriousness of the candidates seemed to reflect that the primary season was just around the corner, and that positioning themselves strategically around Trump would mean building more trust with American voters. More

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      A silent and sullen Trump goes before judge in Miami – amid din outside

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      Even by Florida’s already unorthodox standards, the arraignment of Donald J Trump, the ultimate carnival barker, in Miami on Tuesday afternoon was something of a circus.The concept of a former leader of the free world appearing before a federal judge to deny he stole and retained some of the nation’s most sensitive secrets – keeping some in a bathroom – was surreal enough.But the historic act of the twice impeached, twice indicted ex-president actually doing so, while remaining the runaway favorite to win the Republican party’s nomination for next year’s general election, was extraordinary.Lending to the theater of the absurd outside downtown Miami’s Wilkie D Ferguson courthouse, named for a late, respected early Black judge of the southern judicial district of Florida, was a resident flock of roosters strutting around crowing, a top-hatted elderly gentleman in a red long-tailed coat waving a Trump-DeSantis 2024 flag, and a couple of dozen “Blacks for Trump” protesters insisting that “Trumpsters [sic] are not racist”.But it was the proceedings inside courtroom 13-3 that held the attention. The 45th president of the United States sat silently, sullenly, between his lawyers throughout an arraignment hearing that lasted little more than 45 minutes, folding his arms and clenching his fingers, and occasionally grimacing in his navy blue suit and trademark red tie.It was his lawyer, Todd Blanche, who did the talking for the usually loquacious Trump. “[We] most certainly enter a plea of not guilty,” Blanche said of the 37-count indictment that, thankfully, was not read out loud.And: “We so demand [a jury trial], yes, your honor.”There followed a robust discussion with magistrate judge Jonathan Goodman over conditions of bond. Trump will not have to surrender his passport, will not be barred from traveling domestically nor internationally, and will not have to put up any dollar amount for bail.Yet he will be banned from talking about any aspect of the case with any “witness or victim”, which includes a range of characters from his Secret Service agents to his personal valet Waltine Nauda, his co-defendant who sat alongside him looking bewildered.Watching on from the front row of the public gallery was Department of Justice special counsel Jack Smith, Trump’s latest bete noire, who brought this indictment from a Miami grand jury.But Trump had to remain silent here, after launching torrents of disparaging rhetoric against Smith, Joe Biden and the president’s “weaponized” justice department in recent days in television interviews and his Truth Social network.At the conclusion of the hearing, Trump turned and appeared to acknowledge the nine members of the public allowed in to watch, including one supporter in a red Make America Great Again cap, a Trump T-shirt and an eye patch.Then he chatted briefly with his legal team, and made his way to the exit.According to the US Marshals Service, Trump’s short booking process before the hearing was identical to that of any other defendant, although no mugshot was taken today, and no booking image will be released. Marshals indicated that enough photographs of Trump already existed for identification not to be an issue. Nor is he considered a flight risk.Trump’s fingerprints, however, were taken, digitally, “so he won’t be rolling in ink”, a court official said. Also checked were his address, social security number, date of birth and “recent history”.As for the mass protests promised by Trump’s supporters, and feared by Miami’s mayor, Francis Suarez, at a press conference on Monday, the searing south Florida heat appeared to have had its say.Thousands looked to have gathered, and were noisy enough. Yet the 94F temperatures and energy-sapping humidity of late spring in Miami are a world away from the comparatively calm conditions of early January in Washington. Faced with a heavy courthouse presence of Miami police and federal officers in tactical gear and rifles, anyone intent on similar violence to that set upon the US Capitol on 6 January 2021 was unlikely to achieve a similar result.By late morning Tuesday, only pockets of Trump loyalists, some on bicycles with oversized flags, others in Maga caps, and adorned in Stars and Stripes attire, had shown up in the media encampment on the courthouse plaza.By lunchtime, their numbers had swelled, as had those who welcomed the arraignment. One man holding a celebratory cardboard trophy bearing the words “Trump Indictment Tour 2023” was in animated discussion with a couple wrapped in yellow Don’t Tread on Me flags beloved by the Maga faithful.Circling the perimeter, a pickup truck pulled a box trailer painted, with no hint of irony, to resemble a jail cell, with Biden and other Democrats peering from behind bars. “We are taking America back,” an accompanying message stated.At the hearing’s commencement, Trump’s supporters were four to five deep at the police tape, watched by police on bicycles but making no moves to pass it. By its conclusion many had retreated to the shadows of the tall railway station on the west side of the courthouse building, close to where the Trump motorcade was waiting.The convoy had made the short journey from the Trump resort in Doral, west of downtown, where he spent the night, and accessed the courthouse complex underground. Trump entered the courthouse by a tunnel, escorted by Secret Service agents, and took an escalator to Goodman’s 13th floor courtroom.He left the same way en route to the airport, and his flight back to New Jersey.Back on the plaza, supporters who hadn’t even caught a glimpse of their champion continued to chant for him.“I don’t know if he broke the law, but really, does it matter?” Felix Castillo, a 44-year-old Cuban American from Miami’s Little Havana neighborhood said.“Whatever he did has been exaggerated by Biden, and that’s the real crime here. Biden had documents too, why isn’t he here?”Trump, meanwhile, moves on, free to continue airing his grievances at Bedminster, on Truth Social or wherever, as he focuses on the next hearing in this case, an upcoming trial in New York on charges related to a hush money payment to an adult movie star, and possible future indictments for the 6 January insurrection and election interference in Georgia.In Miami, the circus tent is down, for now at least, and Trump’s traveling show has left town. In the wings, its lead and only performer, is preparing for his next turn. More

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      ‘We’re ready’: Miami police prepared for Trump arraignment

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      As court officials set up barricades and police tape around the Miami courthouse where Donald Trump is due to be arraigned on Tuesday afternoon, police officials sought to assure local residents they would safely handle any protests.“Make no mistake about it, we’re taking this event extremely seriously, and there’s a potential for things to take a turn for the worse,” said the city’s police chief, Manuel Morales, adding “but that’s not the Miami way.“We’re bringing enough resources to handle crowds, anywhere from 5,000 to 50,000,” he added. “We don’t expect any issues. We’re ready. Ready for it to be over and done.”Miami’s mayor, Francis Suarez, also said he was confident the city’s police will be able to handle the crowds and any protests if they occur as Trump is due to be booked and brought before a judge on federal criminal charges.“I have full faith and confidence our police will have the right action plan and resources in place,” Suarez said during the news conference. “We are prepared for what will happen tomorrow.”Public reaction to Trump’s scheduled arraignment at the Wilkie D Ferguson federal courthouse may be a window into the shifting political character of Miami and Trump’s strong support among Latino Americans.The Associated Press reported that Alex Otaola, a Cuban-born YouTube personality who is running for Miami-Dade county mayor, has rallied followers to show up in support of the former president.“Those of us who believe that America’s salvation only comes if Donald Trump is elected for a second term, we will gather on Tuesday,” Otaola said in a YouTube clip.Trump left Bedminster, New Jersey, where he had played golf at his club there over the weekend, on Monday to fly into Miami airport and stay overnight at his Trump National Doral Miami golf club.According to CBS News, a motorcade protected by Miami-Dade police will escort Trump to the downtown courthouse where he will be handed over to the security of US marshals for his arraignment.“In there you’re going to have City of Miami, probably the chief himself, you’re going to have Miami-Dade county, Secret Service, FBI, the marshals. They’ll all be there to make sure there’s a unified command,” the retired Miami police chief Jorge Colina told the outlet. More