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Mary Thomas,
Stoneham
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As someone who loves words, this Connections (
Barbara Harting,
Framingham
I continue to feel inspired by the work that medical professionals do across the country. The public is largely unaware of the emotional and physical toll health care workers are under. The challenges for poor and marginalized communities are magnified with the social problems that they face. As a Latino man, I see health issues affect my community deeply. I'm the co-creator of a national program called
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Hugo Hernandez,
Co-creator, Where Does It Hurt?
Model Leadership
I was quite impressed with Don Gillis' great Perspective (
David Gleason,
Mashpee
I look forward to reading Gillis' new book. I assume he also addresses Flynn's evolution during the busing crisis to his becoming a politician with a broader concern for the entire city. Flynn's bridge to Marty Walsh and Michelle Wu was, of course, Tom Menino, who continued an inclusive, citywide agenda with a nuts and bolts approach. Indeed, Boston mayors from Kevin White to Wu have shown they will advocate for their city at the federal level even as it continues to grapple with the longstanding issues of race and class differences at home. Trump has accentuated the conflict and chaos with these differences and Flynn's legacy has positioned the city to do the right thing in the face of this chaos.
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Philip S. Hart,
Los Angeles
City Centered
Suggestion: When providing the data for On the Block homes (
Gary Larrabee,
Wenham
An Impressive Track Record
What a pleasure to read good news about a dedicated person who clearly knows right from wrong, good from bad, and has accepted a hefty challenge (
Gretchen Schuler,
Wayland
I loved the history about Eng's parents and family, along with his work experience. He truly has done an amazing job, all rooted in his collaborative, methodical, and accountable approach. My son takes the Red Line every day to Kendall Square and says the difference is tangible and appreciated. More stories like this might lead to a better impact on the whole state.
Mark Bresnahan,
Plymouth
Although I live in New Hampshire, I was born and raised in Boston and have good memories of the T. I recently heard a bit of an interview with Mr. Eng on NPR and was impressed at how he actually answered questions in a smart, approachable way. I think we are missing that in public figures these days, and this was a reminder of what good people can do.
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Sandy Wadlington,
Bradford, New Hampshire
I thoroughly enjoyed Wen's article that delved into Eng and the road that brought him to Boston. It was detailed, factual, and showed his personal side, as well. So far so good for this success story!
Pat Kavanagh,
Nahant
Phil Eng has had an extraordinary impact on MBTA operations across the entire system, the morale of staff, and the satisfaction of users — all in two years. This story of a man with deep expertise and vast experience, team management skills, and political grit is more than a turnaround story and more than a human interest story: It is a story of public sector leadership at its very best. Mr. Eng stands in sharp contrast to the adjacent
Globe Magazine
article with the subhead 'The president wants to take down our institutions, our economy, and our ideals.' Thanks from a grateful citizen and Orange Line rider.
David E. Stein,
Boston
CONTACT US:
Write to magazine@globe.com or The Boston Globe Magazine/Comments, 1 Exchange Place, Suite 201, Boston, MA 02109-2132. Comments are subject to editing.
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NBC News
10 hours ago
- NBC News
ICE targets Los Angeles homeless shelter
LOS ANGELES — Immigration officials have been repeatedly spotted outside a Hollywood homeless shelter since May, leading staff to accompany residents from war-torn countries to work, errands and court. An executive at the shelter that serves people ages 18 to 24 said she saw two Venezuelan men handcuffed and arrested by ICE agents after they returned to the shelter from work. 'There was no conversation,' said the employee, Lailanie, who asked that her last name not be used because she feared retribution from Immigration and Customs Enforcement. She said about half a dozen immigration officers went up to the residents 'and put their hands behind their backs right away.' Homeless shelters appear to be another target in the Trump administration's ongoing immigration crackdown, which has resulted in nearly 3,000 arrests in the Los Angeles area. They now join Home Depots, 7-Elevens and cannabis farms as locations where the federal government is carrying out its mass deportation effort. In addition to the Hollywood shelter, service providers have reported seeing immigration enforcement at shelters in North Hollywood and San Diego, according to local media. Immigration officials did not respond to an email asking if homeless shelters are being targeted as part of enforcement efforts. With more than than 72,300 unhoused people, Los Angeles County is the epicenter of the nation's homelessness crisis. How many of them are immigrants is unknown because the federally mandated annual count does not include citizenship questions. The encounter at the Hollywood shelter took place a few weeks before President Donald Trump ordered the National Guard and U.S. Marines to the region in response to large-scale protests against his deportation efforts. Service providers in Los Angeles said the stepped-up enforcement effort has made their work more difficult because their clients are consumed by fears of deportation. Donald Whitehead Jr., executive director of the National Coalition for the Homeless, said the aggressive operation 'puts a target' on the backs of homeless immigrants. 'It villainizes them,' he said. At another shelter, The People Concern in downtown Los Angeles, fewer clients are stopping by to use showers and other public facilities because they are afraid ICE agents will show up, said CEO John Maceri. He said even U.S. citizens at its permanent housing facility in the San Fernando Valley are hesitant to go outside because they are afraid they will be stopped and questioned by ICE. 'Frankly, anybody who's dark-skinned, Black and brown people, but particularly dark-skinned brown people, don't want to go out,' Maceri said. 'They don't want to go to the grocery store. A few of them are missing work. They're really scared. This fear factor is really taking effect.' The highest concentrations of ICE arrests in Los Angeles have occurred in the predominantly Latino neighborhoods of the San Fernando Valley, according to the nonprofit Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights, or CHIRLA. U.S. Sen. Alex Padilla, who is from the San Fernando Valley and was himself handcuffed by federal agents last month at a news conference by Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, said the numbers reflect a strategy by the Trump administration to target vulnerable communities, not just the violent criminals he promised to arrest during his campaign. 'This is an administration who proudly changed policy to pursue these enforcement actions in workplaces, in schools, including elementary schools, and houses of worship,' he said. 'If they were only focusing on dangerous, violent criminals, you're not going to find them at schools and churches and homeless camps.' A map released Tuesday by CHIRLA showed that 471 of the 2,800 arrests made by the Department of Homeland Security from June 6 to July 20 occurred in predominantly Latino neighborhoods in the San Fernando Valley. It did not specify how many of the arrestees were homeless people. CHIRLA President Angelica Salas said the data highlighted 'racial profiling' by federal officials, who have denied targeting people based on their skin color. 'What makes someone a target of ICE is if they are illegally in the U.S. — NOT their skin color, race, or ethnicity,' DHS said in a recent statement. On Thursday, Trump signed an executive order that encourages cities to remove homeless people from their streets. Whitehead said the order could trigger more arrests of homeless people and further heighten their fears. At the homeless shelter where the two Venezuelan men were arrested, residents remain on high alert, Lailanie said. Immigrants are now accompanied to work, errands and court appointments by staff in unmarked cars without the organization's logo. Officials at the shelter requested that its name not be used out of fear of retribution by the Trump administration. The Venezuelans, who are 20 and 22 years old, barely speak English and had been living at the shelter for a few weeks before they were arrested, she said. They had not been there long enough to be paired with immigration lawyers, she said. The 22-year-old was deported, and employees have been unable to locate the younger man, she said. Since the arrests, staff members have witnessed at least three immigration stakeouts around the facility, two shelter employees said. On one occasion, a uniformed officer asked to use a bathroom inside the center. A maintenance worker allowed him to enter because he didn't know what else to do, the two employees said. Staffers have also seen unmarked black SUVs parked near the center and in the parking lot. Most recently, an asylum-seeker from the Democratic Republic of Congo who had been living at the shelter was arrested after reporting to immigration court, according to two people who work at the shelter. The employees said that before his arrest, he had difficulty applying for jobs because he wore an ankle monitor, which was given to him when he presented himself to immigration officials. Confused, he went to immigration court and asked officials to remove the monitor, the two employees said, but he was arrested instead. He was taken to the High Desert Detention Center in Adelanto, California, while his lawyer pleaded his asylum case, which is still pending, according to Lailanie. He fears being returned to central Africa, where his father was killed, she said. 'People are scared and people are hurting, but people are also compelled to continue to do the work and do the right thing and try to fight for the right thing,' she said.
Los Angeles Times
a day ago
- Los Angeles Times
Texas Democrats meet with Newsom to stop Trump's push to ‘rig' the 2026 election
Gov. Gavin Newsom stood alongside six Democrats from the Texas Legislature on Friday and joined them in accusing President Trump and Republicans of trying to 'rig' elections to hold onto congressional seats next year. 'They play by a different set of rules and we could sit back and act as if we have some moral authority and watch this 249-, 250-year-old experiment be washed away,' Newsom said of the nation's history. 'We are not going to allow that to happen.' The Texas lawmakers and the governor spoke with reporters after meeting privately at the Governor's Mansion in Sacramento to discuss a national political fight over electoral maps that could alter the outcome of the midterm elections and balance of power in Congress. At the urging of President Trump, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott called his state Legislature into a special session this week that includes a call to redistrict the Lone Star State to help Republicans pick up seats in Congress. The move is part of a gerrymandering effort pushed by Trump to prevent the GOP from losing control of the House of Representatives next year. If Democrats take the House, they could derail the president's agenda, which has so far included a crackdown on undocumented immigrants, tariffs on imports, rescinding efforts to combat climate change and undercutting state protections for the LGTBQ+ community, among other policy priorities. Newsom has threatened to mirror Trump's tactics and said he's in talks with leaders of the California Legislature to redraw the state's congressional districts to favor electing more Democrats and fewer Republicans. Texas Democrats, who said they traveled to California to meet with the governor and explain the state of play in Texas, pledged do everything in their power to push back against Trump's plan. 'We're going to use every tool at our disposal in the state of Texas to confront this very illegal redistricting process that is going to be done on the backs of historic African American and Latino districts,' said Texas state Rep. Rafael Anchía. Another group of Texas lawmakers are expected to meet with Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker in Chicago. Changing the maps to benefit Democrats is a massive departure from California's work over the last decade to remove political partisanship from the redistricting process. California voters in 2010 gave an independent Citizens Redistricting Commission the power to determine the boundaries of voting districts for the U.S. House of Representatives instead of leaving that authority with the state Legislature. To redistrict before the midterms, the most legally sound option is for state lawmakers to send a constitutional amendment to voters that seeks to allow changes to the voter map outside the boundaries of California's independent redistricting process. The vote would need to happen in a special election before the June primary. Newsom has said he's also exploring a potential legal loophole that could allow the California Legislature to redraw the congressional maps themselves with a two-thirds vote. The governor's office said state law charges the redistricting commission with crafting new maps after a census, which is conducted about every 10 years. But they say the law is silent on everything that happens in between that time period. Newsom's lawyers believe it could be possible for the Legislature to redistrict congressional seats mid-decade on its own without going to the ballot. The governor's call to fight Trump using his own gerrymandering tactics has drawn a mixed response. Newsom argues that Democrats will continue to lose if they remain the only party that plays by the rules. But others worry about the integrity of electoral outcomes across the nation if political parties in every state resort to naked political gamesmanship to gain control. Texas Republicans have long been accused of crafting political maps to dilute the power of Black and Latino voters, which led to an ongoing lawsuit from 2021. Newsom's effort in California would effectively seek to increase the share of Democrats in Republican-held districts. Redistricting experts in California say redrawing the maps in the Golden State could create the potential for Democrats to flip at least five of the seats held by GOP incumbents. Democrats may have the potential for greater gains from gerrymandering, particularly in places such as California that have attempted to practice nonpartisan redistricting, compared to states such as Texas, where maps are already drawn in favor of Republicans. 'It should be no surprise to anybody who covers Texas that every decade since 1970 Texas has been found to discriminate against people of color in its redistricting process,' Anchía said. 'In trying to do this, it is going to create great harm, not only to the people we represent, to the voters of the state of Texas, but also potentially to all Americans,' he said about Trump's plan. It's common for the party in control of the White House to lose seats nationally in the first election after a presidential contest. Republicans hold majorities in the Senate and the House, and losing power to Democrats could be detrimental to Trump's presidency. Trump's job approval rating dropped to a second-term low of 37% in a Gallup poll conducted earlier this month. The dip is just above his lowest approval rating ever of 34% at the end of his first term. Trump has said publicly that he thinks it's possible for Republicans to redistrict and pick up five seats in Texas, with the potential for gains in other states that redraw their maps.
NBC News
a day ago
- NBC News
Hispanic colleges targeted by lawsuit push back in court
The Hispanic Association of Colleges and Universities is joining a legal fight over the fate of a federal program aimed at addressing educational disparities in higher education. This week, the association, better known as HACU, filed a motion to intervene in a federal lawsuit that seeks to dismantle the Hispanic-Serving Institutions (HSI) program — which provides federal grants to universities and colleges with a student body that is over 25% Latino. The program created by Congress provides grants to universities already educating the majority of the nation's Hispanic college students to expand their ability to help 'Hispanic students and other low-income individuals complete postsecondary degrees.' HACU is now part of the effort started last month by the Students for Fair Admissions — the same group behind the legal challenges that resulted in the Supreme Court striking down college affirmative action programs in 2023 — and the state of Tennessee to sue the Department of Education over the HSI program. They allege it ' discriminates based on ethnicity ' and are calling on the federal court to deem it unconstitutional. The association representing Hispanic universities also alleges that the lawsuit unfairly characterizes the HSI program, since the added resources from the grants benefit the entire student body of the institution. "We want our side of the story to be heard by the court before they decide on the case," Dr. Antonio R. Flores, president and chief executive officer of HACU, told NBC News on Friday. Flores said HSI-designated schools don't automatically get grants based on the number of Hispanic students on their campus. They must 'compete among themselves' to access the money and must prove that the majority of their students are low-income and that they 'spend less money per student than their peer institutions.' "This is not about preferential treatment. It is about equitable resource allocation for institutions,' Flores said. In court filings Thursday, Students for Fair Admissions and the state of Tennessee did not oppose HACU's motion to join the case as a defendant. The Department of Education has not yet responded to the complaint in court. It also did not respond to an email from NBC News seeking comment on Friday. To identify which colleges and universities serve the majority of the nation's Hispanic students, Congress defined Hispanic-Serving Institutions as those that have at least 25% of its full-time student population be of Hispanic or Latino descent. The HSI designation is based on geography and demographics, Fran Fajana, an attorney at LatinoJustice representing HACU in this case, told NBC News. 'It's not because the institution went out of its way to recruit a lot of Latino students.' The percentage of Latinos with a college degree still lags far behind white students. In 2022, about 21% of Latino adults over 25 had a bachelor's degree, compared to 42% for non-Hispanic whites, according to census figures. Students for Fair Admissions, which is led by conservative activist Ed Blum, referred to the 25% requirement as an ' arbitrary ethnic threshold" when it published a news release about the lawsuit on June 11. "This lawsuit challenges a federal policy that conditions the receipt of taxpayer-funded grants on the racial composition of a student body," Blum said in a statement last month. The Office of Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti said in another statement from that the "rule leaves many needy students out in the cold." "The HSI program's discriminatory grant standards are just as illegal," Skrmetti said in the statement. Their lawsuit is part of a series of legal challenges brought forward in recent years — following the Supreme Court's decision on affirmative action — against schools, scholarships, internships and other educational programs that mention race or ethnicity in their criteria. Once an institution is competitively awarded a grant, there is no requirement in the HSI program limiting how those resources are distributed across the school, Fajana said. "Whether they've gotten the resources to expand their science program laboratories [or]capacity building," she said, "those resources are not limited to Latino students." A 2023 study from the Urban Institute found that the investments made by HSI-designated institutions increased the number of students of all races and ethnicities who completed college and obtained bachelor's degrees. "What is at stake?" Flores said, "Success in advancement of, not just the Latino community, but all of the students who go to HSIs and benefit from the funding."
