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New York boasts of a migration model but criticizes the lack of federal support

New York City boasts of a migration model having received and integrated more than 200,000 irregular immigrants in the last two years, but complains about the null support received from the federal government of Washington, trapped in an electoral logic where the migration issue has become political dynamite.

“Our support network is better than the one they find in any other city and state, and we are proud to have been able to specifically support all these people, who already total 202,000, but the burden is only ours and we do not see enough support from the federal government,” the city’s Immigration Commissioner, Manuel Castro, says in an interview with EFE.

Castro embodies like few others the famous ‘American dream’: he arrived in New York from Mexico as undocumented at the age of only five, and three decades later, after a youth dedicated to activism in favor of asylum seekers, he became the top immigration leader of New York, the city “raised by immigrants,” as he himself remembers.

Two years ago, the Republican governor of Texas, Greg Abbott, devived the ‘bus strategy’, which consisted of filling these vehicles with newly arrived immigrants from Mexico and sending them to what he called ‘progressive cities’ with the promise that they would receive accommodation and food there. It was not a lie in the case of New York: a rule from 50 years ago forces the city not to leave anyone homeless.

In the following months, New York declared a ‘humanitarian crisis’ but it did not stop providing assistance to the thousands of people who arrived not only from Texas, but from other states attracted by the generosity that the city deployed with immigrants: roof for everyone, school for minors and medical expenses.

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The attention to all these people made the city calculate an extra expense of 10 billion dollars between 2022 and 2025, which it faced “without the support of the federal government, even though it should be a responsibility shared with the other cities and states,” Castro recalls.

The city was “obliged” – in the words of the Commissioner – to limit the stay in public shelters to one or two months, depending on the circumstances, through an exceptional judicial remedy, but guaranteed that families with children were not evicted in any case.

However, and as EFE has been able to verify in the giant camp of Randall’s Island, where adults without a family are sent, the law is applied in a very flexible way and there are several tenants who have been looking for more than four months, while looking for a work permit that never arrives.

And it is that another of the problems they face is the enormous slowness of bureaucratic efforts to obtain asylum status and/or a work permit, which usually takes more than 12 months, and that forces many immigrants to fall into the underground economy, usually in street sales or as delivery people of food on a bicycle.

“The emigration system doesn’t work,” Castro reflects. There is a great demand for jobs and it would be logical for us to support them with a work permit. We have been without a solution to these problems for decades, it is an inadequate system and Congress should act,” he insists, although he recognizes that the proximity of the electoral appointment complicates everything.

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Castro regrets that all the attention paid to immigrants is now the victim of two opposing narratives: “On the one hand, they tell us that we are not doing enough for immigrants, that we have a moral obligation not to abandon them; on the other, they accuse us of giving them too much, and the more we give them, the more they will come,” he explains.

“It is symbolic of what is happening in the country, there is too much political division,” he believes, recognizing that in the year of elections the issue has become especially thorny, with a Republican candidate like Donald Trump who “with his threats of mass deportations is generating a huge fear and uncertainty,” and makes some immigrants not dare to go to a health center or a police station for fear of expulsion.

International

IICA to strengthen prevention efforts against cattle tick disease with $250K investment

The Inter-American Institute for Cooperation on Agriculture (IICA) announced on Friday that it will allocate $250,000 to deepen and strengthen actions for the prevention, control, and eradication of the cattle tick in Central America.

IICA’s Director-General, Manuel Otero, explained that the funds will support the strategy to combat the disease in 2025, focusing on two key areas: strengthening communication campaigns, awareness, and health education; and improving case reporting, notification, and the purchase of sampling kits and authorized healing products to ensure a more effective response in the region.

“It is an endemic disease present across the continent and requires more investment, more surveillance, more training, and more institutional support. It is a very strong enemy that affects the quality of life for our cattle producers and threatens our exports,” Otero said during a meeting with Agriculture Ministers from the region.

The initiative is carried out in collaboration with the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) of the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) and aims to enhance the understanding and knowledge of the disease among various stakeholders.

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International

Milei: Social justice promotes hostility, incompatible with progress

President Javier Milei spoke on Friday at the headquarters of the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) in Washington, D.C., United States. In the first part of his speech, he stated that “social justice is an abomination.” His address, delivered amidst the crypto scandal and titled “The Argentine Economic Model,” came after the libertarian leader visited the headquarters of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for the second time this year, where he met with Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva to finalize details of the new program through which the government hopes to accelerate economic recovery and ease currency controls.

Throughout his speech, the president praised his ministers, particularly Economy Minister Luis Caputo and the head of the Ministry of Transformation, Federico Sturzenegger, whom he highlighted for his “Chainsaw 2.0” plan, referring to budget cuts within the state. Additionally, Milei forecasted further deregulation and criticized an economic group that “benefited” from the ban on exporting scrap metal.

As he began his address, the President claimed that “he avoided hyperinflation of 17,000% per year” due to the strong fiscal adjustment he implemented at the start of his administration. He highlighted several key indicators of his government’s performance while continuing to praise his ministers. He then turned his attention to the concept of social justice. “Because if the wealth creator is punished and the complainer is given money, the incentive is to complain and not work, which creates an incentive system incompatible with progress,” he argued.

“It has consequences on the quality of life in society, but not due to its economic damage, but because of the relationship between people. Promoting a society of envy makes society hostile, where there is constant conflict over a supposed class struggle because one person generates wealth and it is stolen. It is as if one is living in a permanent war,” he insisted.

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International

Trump says Zelensky’s presence in peace talks makes it “difficult” to reach agreements

U.S. President Donald Trump stated on Friday that his Ukrainian counterpart, Volodymyr Zelensky, “is not that important” to be present in meetings aimed at ending the conflict, arguing that his participation makes it “very difficult to finalize agreements.”

“I don’t think it’s important for him to be in the meetings,” emphasized the magnate during a radio interview with TV host Brian Kilmeade on the Fox News channel, adding that Zelensky had been present in negotiations “for three years” without any results.

The president called last week’s visit by Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent to Kyiv a “waste of time,” as he tried to secure an agreement on the exploitation of Ukraine’s natural resources. Zelensky rejected the offer presented by Bessent, which would have granted the U.S. access to 50% of Ukraine’s strategic minerals in exchange for American support during the war, as well as future assistance for Kyiv.

In return, Zelensky offered to open the door to U.S. “investments.” In a media interview, Secretary of State Marco Rubio explicitly included this rejection of Bessent’s plan as one of the main reasons for Trump’s frustration with Zelensky.

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