Latest news with #WassermanSchultz
Miami Herald
18-07-2025
- Politics
- Miami Herald
Florida Democrats file bill to block federal funds to Alligator Alcatraz
Florida's Democratic congressional delegation has introduced legislation aimed at shutting down the controversial immigration detention center in the Everglades. Dubbed the 'No Cages in the Everglades Act,' the six-page bill is led by Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, D-Weston. It aims to ban the Department of Homeland Security and Immigration and Customs Enforcement from operating or funding the detention center known as Alligator Alcatraz, or any other 'immigration detention facility located within or adjacent to the Everglades ecosystem.' The bill also seeks to increase transparency and federal oversight of immigration detention centers nationwide. 'Trump and Ron DeSantis have exploited legal ambiguity around this Everglades internment camp to avoid any scrutiny of abuses there,' said Wasserman Schultz in an statement. 'Our bill would shut down this atrocity, strengthen oversight of detention facilities nationwide, and mandate public reporting on costs, conditions, and the treatment of detainees, as well as report on any harms to the environment and nearby tribal lands.' Wasserman Schultz is joined by fellow Florida Democrats Reps. Kathy Castor, Frederica Wilson, Lois Frankel, Darren Soto, Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick, Maxwell Frost and Jared Moskowitz. The bill is unlikely to gain traction in the Republican-controlled House of Representatives. The facility — operated and funded by Florida's state government, with the expectation of federal reimbursement — has drawn sharp criticism from environmental advocates, Miccosukee tribal leaders and human rights groups, who call it both inhumane and ecologically disastrous. Multiple reports allege detainees are being held in unsafe, unsanitary conditions without access to clean water, medical care or legal support. Florida's Division of Emergency Management, which is overseeing the detention center, says those stories are false. READ MORE: Miccosukee Tribe moves to join environmental lawsuit against Alligator Alcatraz The detention center sits on an airstrip on the edge of the Big Cypress National Preserve, a protected wilderness area that is home to endangered species. The bill coincides with a rapidly growing MoveOn Civic Action petition demanding the immediate closure of the Everglades detention camp. The petition has now surpassed 43,000 signatures, amplifying public pressure on state and federal officials. Rep. Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick emphasized the broader moral stakes of the legislation. 'No one should be subjected to unsafe, degrading treatment, and we cannot meet these injustices with silence or symbolic gestures. We have a moral responsibility to act decisively,' Cherfilus-McCormick said. 'Every person in our custody deserves dignity, safety, and basic human rights.' The legislation has garnered support from major human rights and immigration organizations, including the ACLU, Detention Watch Network, Church World Service and the National Immigration Law Center. The bill comes just days after Wasserman Schultz, Moskowitz and Frost visited the facility alongside Florida state representatives. The visit followed complaints by detainees and attorneys about conditions inside and a lack of transparency. During the visit, Frost said they were denied permission to speak with any detainees, without explanation. Republicans who took the tour said the facility was clean and properly run. The Florida Division of Emergency Management and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security did not respond to requests for comment.
USA Today
14-07-2025
- Politics
- USA Today
'Help me!' Democrats decry 'vile' conditions at 'Alligator Alcatraz' immigrant prison
The Democratic lawmakers weren't allowed to talk to the detainees or examine their cells. Calling the Alligator Alcatraz immigrant detention center in Florida's Everglades "vile", "inhumane" and "gross" while pledging to hold authorities accountable, Democratic members of Congress toured the facility July 12. "People were yelling, 'Help me. Help me," said Rep. Maxwell Frost. "I heard in the back someone say, 'I'm a U.S. citizen.'" Frost said there are about 1,000 male detainees, mostly Hispanic, at the center. There are cells to house 3,000 detainees, and he said workers will soon add another 1,000 beds. He said authorities told him Saturday the average stay will be two weeks before deportation. "When those doors opened, what I saw made my heart sink," said Frost, 28, the first Millennial elected to Congress and the son of a Cuban immigrant. "I saw 32 people per cage, about six cages in the one tent. I saw a lot of people, young men who looked like me, and people who were my age." The lawmakers weren't allowed to examine the cells or talk to the detainees, they said, observing them from the tent entry. "As we were walking away, they started chanting, 'Libertad, Libertad. Freedom,'" Frost said. Previously blocked from entering the detention center in Ochopee, about 75 miles west of Miami, Democrats from Congress and the Florida legislature had a very different take from Republicans who toured more than 10 days ago. The 39-acre compound targeting immigrants for deportation was hastily constructed in eight days. Republicans called the food "yummy," talked about how comfortable the detainees' beds were and said the facility met all the standards for detention centers. The Democrats disagreed. "They should not put humans in the middle of swampland in the Everglades: It's outrageous; it's inhumane; It's unlawful," said U.S. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz. Flooding and backed-up toilets Frost spoke during a virtual call with the Naples Daily News, part of the USA TODAY Network, and other news outlets: "We had planned to come unannounced to see this for what it really is and to see it not sanitized." But their attempts were blocked, he said. "Federal law requires allowing members of Congress in for unannounced visits," Wasserman Schultz said. "We're quite sure the state got wind of it and decided to set up this sham tour." Frost said he's spoken with lawyers and the families of the detainees. "There's been flooding. There's been reports of toilets not working, backing up, feces being flooded inside cages that they are sleeping in. People not being allowed to shower." Wasserman Schultz added that "detainees are forced to sleep all night with the lights on, they don't have access to counsel" then pointing out that it's a concern that "this facility infringes (on) different tribal lands." 'Gross' toilet tanks include drinking-water spigot Frost detailed what he witnessed. "I was in the facility for about two hours, and what I saw were horrible conditions and cages," he said. "... There are three toilets in each cage for the group of 32 people, and their drinking water comes from the toilet. "There's a little spigot on top of the toilet, and that's where they drink their water as well. ... it's gross and it's disgusting, and this is where people are being held." There 'will be hearings' Democrats pledge "There will be accountability on this," Frost said. Wasserman Schultz was more direct. "This place needs to be shut the hell down," she said. USA TODAY Network's J. Kyle Foster contributed to this report. Columnist Phil Fernandez (pfernandez@ grew up in Southwest Florida and has led Pulitzer Prize-winning efforts.
Politico
09-07-2025
- Politics
- Politico
‘People will needlessly die': House Democrats warn about cuts to weather forecasters after Texas floods
MIAMI — House Democrats on Wednesday raised alarms about President Donald Trump's proposed staff and budget cuts to weather monitoring and forecasting following deadly floods in Texas and New Mexico. In his budget request from May, Trump proposed cutting $2.2 billion in projects and grants from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, including more than a dozen weather and climate labs. He has also called for reorganizing parts of the agency and shuttering FEMA in favor of moving disaster funding to the states. 'If Trump continues to push expert NOAA, [National Weather Service] and FEMA staff out the door through payoffs and forced retirements, people will needlessly die,' predicted Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.) The House Democratic members — most from hurricane-vulnerable Florida — held a Zoom call with former NOAA and National Hurricane Center officials to pressure Republican appropriators to ignore Trump's budget request. They stressed the importance of the agencies' ability to forecast how intense impending storms could be and to notify people to protect their homes and businesses or evacuate. Trump has proposed cutting NOAA research labs, including one in Miami, but Wasserman Schultz also said she was worried the president would 'unilaterally reduce staff, fire people, close partial operations' as had been done through Department of Government Efficiency efforts. Among the proposed Trump fiscal 2026 cuts were more than a dozen weather and climate facilities nationwide, including Miami's Atlantic Oceanographic and Meteorological Laboratory and its Hurricane Research Division. Congress typically doesn't abide by a president's budget, however; it's seen more as a document for a president to message priorities rather than a blueprint for legislators, regardless of partisan balance. Democrats on the call didn't directly blame the more than 100 deaths in Texas on job cuts, saying it appeared the National Weather Service did its job and that they would learn more as information continued to come in. But they said the tragedy underscored how much the federal government needs top experts and forecasting tools. Wasserman Schultz warned Florida, now facing the middle of hurricane season, was already experiencing staff cuts to the National Weather Service of between 20 percent and 40 percent. DOGE cuts caused roughly 600 employees nationwide to leave the National Weather Service in recent months, whether through firings, buyouts or early retirement. The Broward County representative also brought attention to $200 million in cuts from Trump's 'One Big Beautiful Bill,' signed into law last week, that were intended to go toward weather forecasts and climate resiliency projects. Democratic Rep. Lois Frankel of Florida called the cuts 'reckless and dangerous' and said Congress should be 'strengthening NOAA, not gutting it.' During the call, Rep. Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick (D-Fla.) brought up flooding in Fort Lauderdale in recent years that has devastated homes and businesses. 'We're seeing more rains that are record breaking,' she said. 'At this point it is no longer record breaking — this is our new normal, and we must fund [NOAA] to the level that would allow us to protect the American people.'
Miami Herald
06-07-2025
- Politics
- Miami Herald
Did the president drop an f-bomb? Yes, and Democrats are doing it too
Congresswoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz, who started in politics as a young legislative aide and is now the senior Democrat in Florida's congressional delegation, has for years calibrated her statements, carefully choosing her words to communicate exactly the message she intends. Recently, speaking at the Broward Democratic Party's annual fundraising dinner, she used blunt - shocking to some - language to convey the threat she said was emanating from President Donald Trump's policies. "F-," she said. More than once. Wasserman Schulz declared that Democrats would "fight to our last breath, and we'll go to the f-ing mat." There has been a clear coarsening of political language: Words that once were widely seen as off-limits, other than behind closed doors or in small groups, are now more common - an extra tool to convey anger and frustration. At another point in the Broward fundraising dinner, Wasserman Schultz decried what she said Trump and Republicans are doing. She asked the audience of 300, "Are we going to let them do that, Broward County?" "No," people in the audience responded. To which the congresswoman replied with an emphatic "f- no!" "This has been building up in me for a long time. So forgive me," she added. Wasserman Schultz later explained the word wasn't in her prepared remarks but said the gravity of the threat the nation is facing in 2025 warranted an expression that once would have been stunning in a public setting. Trump There's no more prominent public user of the f-word and others once widely seen as off-limits than the president. Most recently, on June 24 he was expressing his displeasure with Iran and Israel. "We basically have two countries that have been fighting so long and so hard that they don't know what the f- they're doing. Do you understand that?" His use of the word in regard to Iran and Israel - speaking on the lawn of the White House - attracted massive attention, but he's no stranger to the public use of four-letter words. "More than any other president, Trump has been known to use coarse language in speeches and other public appearances. But even for him, this on-camera utterance of the f-word was new. American presidents have typically refrained from using it publicly, even when angry or frustrated," NPR reported. Just before last year's election, the New York Times reported that a computer search found he had used curses at least 140 times in public last year, not counting words such as "damn" and "hell" that are much tamer to many people. A review of Trump's speech at the 2024 Conservative Political Action Conference found he used epithets 44 times, the Times reported. Perhaps the most famous previous use of the f-word came from Joe Biden, then the vice president, who told President Barack Obama that his 2010 signing the Affordable Care Act, better known as Obamacare, into law was "a big f-ing deal." One big difference: Biden whispered it to Obama and meant it to be private, but it was picked up on an open mic. Critics at the time suggested it was an example of Biden's tendency toward gaffes; years later some supporters were more positive about what they called the BFD moment. Democrats join After 10 years of Trump dominating and altering the nation's political discourse, Democrats' language is now changing. "In some ways the Democrats have been slower, particularly in the Trump era, to adopt the attention-gaining messaging that Donald Trump has really leaned into," said Joshua Scacco, an association professor of communication at the University of South Florida. "It does seem like the Trump era is catching up to Democrats in terms of how they're responding, in terms of how they're adapting their own messaging." Scacco, who specializes in political communication and media content, is also founder and director of the university's Center for Sustainable Democracy. At a Florida Democratic Party dinner gala, which fell between Wasserman Schultz's and Trump's use of the f-word, U.S. Rep. Jared Moskowitz was delivering remarks to an audience of 800. The Broward-Palm Beach County congressman described what would happen when lawmakers returned to Washington to take up the measure the Republican majority passed on July 3, the legislation named "Big Beautiful Bill" at Trump's behest. "They're going to try to pass the big beautiful bulls- of a bill," Moskowitz said. Wasserman Schultz has regularly used the term "DOGEbags" to describe the people dispatched under the Trump presidency to fan out through federal agencies as part of the so-called Department of Government Efficiency effort formerly led by billionaire Elon Musk to eliminate programs and slash spending. On Monday, Kristi Noem, secretary of the Department of Homeland Security and former Republican governor of South Dakota, said she was looking forward to a visit with Trump the next day to the detention center for illegal immigrants pending deportation that Florida has established in the Everglades. In an official statement attributed to Noem and distributed by the agency, she said the detention center would allow the government to lock up "some of the worst scumbags" in the country. Divergent reactions The responses to use of one of the terms that still can't be printed or aired in most mainstream news outlets often depends on the affiliation of the person who uttered the word. After Trump used the word, his firmness and resolve was heralded by a host on Fox, the favored cable news outlet for Republicans. A "very frustrated" president used "salty language," she said. Minutes later, the same Fox host professed outrage at a Democrat's use of the term. She said she was "repulsed" by the user's "foul mouth." The contradictory reactions were so extreme that it prompted mockery online and a video of excerpts calling out Fox from a host at competitor CNN. On Wednesday, as the U.S. House of Representatives debated the big bill to cut taxes, cut social program spending, provide more money for immigration enforcement and the military, and increase the federal debt, Democrats professed outrage. U.S. Rep. Josh Riley, D-N.Y., ran through a litany of objections, before delivering his summary. "Don't tell me you give a s- about the middle class when all you're doing is s-ting on the middle class," he said on the floor of the U.S. House. That produced a tut-tut from U.S. Rep. Steve Womack, R-Ark., who was presiding over the House at the time. "Avoid vulgar speak. We do have families" present. U.S. Rep. Virginia Fox, R-N.C., chair of the House Rules Committee, echoed the reminder about "the language we should be using in this chamber." The admonishment prompted what was, in effect, a verbal eye roll from U.S. Rep. Jim McGovern of Massachusetts, top Democrat on the Rules Committee. "I hope that when the president comes here next, you'll admonish him for the language he uses." Driving the change Several factors are propelling the increasing use of coarse language by Democrats, Scacco said. It's more than simply imitating Trump, he said. The language in question "has a lot of anger in it, a lot of emotional appeal. Democratic messaging has often seemed bloodless in comparison, lacked feeling," he said. "Anger is a very effective emotion in mobilizing people and getting them to perk up a bit. That's what you see here is the use of emotion in sort of that strategic manner, being angry here, frustration," Scacco said. Scacco is co-author of the book "The Ubiquitous Presidency: Presidential Communication and Digital Democracy in Tumultuous Times." "I think that for their base that they're communicating. Their base wants to see that they are clued in to what's going on. And so swearing and that emotional language I think communicates to the base that their elected officials understand the gravity and the magnitude of what's happening," he said. Part of why it seems jarring is that the Democrats under Biden's presidency and for years under an older generation of party leaders in Congress generally stuck with "that sort of more civil, decorous politics" - before they were swept away by Trump and his political movement. Rick Hoye, chair of the Broward Democratic Party, said the kind of language that's used publicly today by some elected officials is different than what he heard when he first got involved in politics in 2009. Hoye said it is both a symptom of the gravity of how strongly Democrats feel and a response to the yearning by many in the party's base that leaders do something to convey how strongly they feel. "For our folks they're just tired. They're just expressing their frustration, the frustration that is felt on the ground," Hoye said. "Democrats like people that are aggressive and fight back." Hoye said Democratic elected officials are "expressing the frustrations of everyday Democrats." He said voters "probably appreciate the fact that their elected officials are fed up and they're speaking a language that everyone feels," adding that "the plain-spoken language lets constituents know that they're on the ground for them." "Our leaders have realized that if they don't fight like this, the average people will get discouraged and feel that they're not really in tune with their struggles and their sentiments. And the Democratic party doesn't want to risk losing contact with the people that we need to show up." That assessment was reflected in a reaction to one of Wasserman Schultz's strong comments at the Broward Democrats dinner. "Excuse my French," she said, prompting a shout from the audience: "Love it. We speak French." Larry Snowden, president of Club 47, the South Florida-based mega-sized club of Trump supporters, said the president is unique. "He's been using those words for a long time," he said, adding the Democrats seem to be attempting to emulate something that works for Trump. "They're in shambles. Why wouldn't you try to be like your opponent." Michele Merrell, the elected state Republican committeewoman from Broward County, said she doesn't think the language that works for Trump necessarily works for others in politics, and definitely not in her view the Democrats. "No one can out-Trump Trump," she said. "I see Democratic and Republican candidates try to emulate him," she said. 'I see various candidates try to copy his way of communicating, and it doesn't really come across. I don't think there's anyone who can replicate what he does." News coverage Such language was once much more hidden from the public. Two generations ago, one of the more shocking elements in the transcripts of then-President Richard Nixon's tapes was his frequent use of profanity. That's how the phrase "expletive deleted" came into common parlance for a time; it was the phrase inserted in brackets to replace Nixon's frequent use of vulgarities. Even the Richard Nixon Foundation, on its website, acknowledged "RN's unfortunate weakness for expletives." One big difference: Those were words he used in meetings and on the phone, not in widely seen public settings. And the actual words didn't get reported. Today, Scacco said, strong language is a tool that the party out of power - the Democrats - can use to "gain attention in an environment where people are not focused on them." By using earthy language, he said, "you attract the attention of journalists who are doing the story, and also people." How to report such language is tricky for the news media. Traditionally such words haven't been published or aired in mainstream outlets that sought to uphold what once was seen as a standard of decorum. But when they're uttered by major political figures, are all over social media, and when livesteams go out online and on cable television, the calculation about preserving the public's innocence isn't as clear. "Mainstream outlets generally don't include profanity in their news reports," wrote the Poynter Institute for Media Studies, a nonprofit based in St. Petersburg. Poynter found a range of usage decisions about Trump's use of the word. Some news organizations avoided the word in text, but used it in video. Others used the word. Some didn't use it in either video or print. Many used hyphens or asterisks to replace some of the word's letters. The Associated Press Stylebook cautions against using such terms in articles unless there is a compelling reason. The AP used "f" and asterisks in text and bleeped the word on video. In an article published in June before Trump used the word, the New York Times explained its policy that publishing such terms "should be rare. We maintain a steep threshold for vulgar words. There are times, however, when publishing an offensive expression is necessary for a reader's understanding of what is being reported" which may include "reporting vulgarities uttered by powerful public figures and wielded in a public setting." When published, the Times wrote "we typically confine it to a single reference, and avoid using it in headlines, news alerts or social media posts." The complexity of the question was laid out in the headline of a Poynter analysis: "What do you do when the president drops an f-bomb?" _____ Copyright (C) 2025, Tribune Content Agency, LLC. Portions copyrighted by the respective providers.
Yahoo
30-05-2025
- General
- Yahoo
A member of Congress made a surprise visit to Krome. What she saw left her concerned
A member of Congress who made an unannounced visit to the Krome North Service Processing Center in southwest Miami-Dade County said migrants in deportation proceedings are being subjected to overcrowded and inhumane conditions where they are forced to carry out bodily functions without privacy. 'It's wall to wall people here and it's very troubling,' U.S. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, a Democrat who represents parts of Broward Country, said after emerging from a three-hour visit Thursday inside the detention facility. Wasserman Schultz said the detention center, which made headlines recently after two men in Immigration and Customs Enforcement custody died inside, was built to hold 882 people. On Thursday, there were 1,111 detainees. There were two tents on the property to accommodate overflow. 'This is not a nice place. There's no one in your family that you would ever want to be here, not only because you wouldn't want your family detained, but because you wouldn't want anyone that you care about to be in the conditions that these people are being held in,' she said. 'They have people who are being held and are forced to sleep on cots in between the bunks.' As part of President Donald Trump's mass deportation plans, the Department of Homeland Security has been ramping up arrests. The expansion has worried immigration advocates and members of Congress like Wasserman Schultz who have been increasingly concerned following the two deaths at the Krome detention center and another of a Haitian woman at the Broward Transitional Center. While the Miami-Dade Medical Examiner's Office ruled that the two men at Krome died of 'natural' causes, a Miami Herald investigation found evidence of what experts described as questionable medical care for the two immigrants. Wasserman Schultz said while she could not say that cruelty was taking place inside Krome or that immigrants' were being denied due process — she saw rooms where they could meet with lawyers — the conditions were nevertheless disturbing. That includes hearing from migrants how sometimes there are plans to move them away despite an upcoming hearing. She saw multiple small cells, she said, where between 25 and 35 men are held 'for upwards of 48 hours.' 'The consensus was that they are there in those rooms with all of those other men, eating, sleeping and going to the bathroom in that room … sleeping on the floor, having to urinate and defecate in front of other people in that in that small room,' the congresswoman said. Even when they shower there is no privacy, the men complained. 'The two constituents I spoke to definitely described conditions that were extremely unpleasant, not conditions that you would want anyone you care about to be subjected to,' she said. Wasserman Schultz arrived at the facility after 3 p.m. The staff was surprised by her unannounced visit, she said, but she was allowed in without incident after having to wait for about 20 minutes. There was some chatter about whether she could speak to detainees, but she pushed back and was able to talk to two detainees — a Cuban national and Jamaican national — who lived in her district. The reason she was able to show up unannounced is because of a 2020 law she helped write that prevents DHS from interfering in congressional oversight, she said. 'I can tell you that some of the things I saw would not have looked like that if I had given them notice,' she said. Still, as she walked the facility, she 'got inconsistent answers depending on who I was speaking to and asking the question to and from the leadership that was walking me through, to the personnel that I was talking to.' This was the case, she said, when she inquired about the two detainees' deaths. Wasserman Schultz said her concerns about the conditions of detainees in custody are fueled by a number of factors. One is the push by the Trump administration to allocate $45 billion in the federal budget to expand immigrant detention facilities and services. The 'big, ugly bill,' she said, was 'rammed through last week in the middle of the night by one vote,' and the administration is going to attempt to ramp up and process even more detainees. 'When they do that, you start to fill up even more facilities like Krome,' the congresswoman said. 'Then the conditions are going to get decidedly worse.' Wasserman Schultz, who represents the largest district of Venezuelan-American voters in the country, said another concern she has is the administration's track record on immigration. 'The administration is lying when they say that they're really only prioritizing criminals. I am getting calls from constituents who say, U.S. citizen children have been deported along with their undocumented parents,' she said. 'Trump has absolutely no regard for the law. He is the most anti-immigrant president in American history, and he is hell bent on essentially bleaching, bleaching out the United States.' Wasserman Schultz said she plans to aggressively engage DHS as a senior member of the House Appropriations Committee 'to ensure that we can make conditions better in these facilities and also fight back on their outrageous extreme immigration policy that are not targeting people who are criminals and who are here to do anything other than to make a better way of life for themselves and their families, and have credible fear from countries like Nicaragua, Venezuela, Haiti, Cuba —places that are in no condition to send anyone back to right now.'
