UK to stop using 50 hotels to house migrants by January
$9.7m-a-day cost of hotel contracts to taxpayers is ‘unacceptable’ and ‘unsustainable’, Jenrick says
Updated 24 October 2023
Arab News
LONDON: Immigration Minister Robert Jenrick said on Tuesday that the UK government will stop using 50 hotels to house asylum seekers by January, with more to follow.
British authorities currently use about 400 hotels to provide accommodation for unprecedented numbers of migrants to the UK. Jenrick said that agreements with hotels across England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland will begin to be terminated, adding that his plans to reduce the number of asylum claims was “starting to work.” He added that the hotel contracts cost taxpayers £8 million ($9.7 million) a day and are “unacceptable” and “unsustainable,” the BBC reported.
Stephen Kinnock, the opposition Labour Party’s shadow immigration minister, criticized Jenrick for the announcement, pointing out that it applies to only 12 percent of the total number of hotels being used.
“He is like an arsonist who has burnt our house down and expects us to thank him for throwing a bucket of water on it,” Kinnock told Parliament.
The Home Office is obliged to provide accommodation for migrants while their applications for asylum are being processed, to ensure they do not become destitute. In December 2022, Prime Minister Rishi Sunak announced plans to tackle by the end of this year a legacy backlog of unprocessed applications registered before June 2022. The government subsequently doubled the number of people processing asylum applications to 2,500, but Labour has called for the hiring of 1,000 additional caseworkers to more efficiently tackle the backlog.
Peter Walsh, a researcher at Oxford University’s Migration Observatory, told the BBC that while the legacy backlog has been reduced, the progress was offset by an influx of new applications. He added that he is concerned about the potential alternative housing plans for asylum seekers given the total backlog of cases has remained relatively stagnant since 2022.
This year, the Home Office launched Project Maximise, which aimed to reduce the cost of hotel accommodation by adding beds to rooms to increase the number of people who can stay in them.
RFK Jr. questioned in NY court over signature collectors who concealed his name on petitions
Testifying in a trial over a lawsuit that seeks to keep Kennedy off New York’s ballot, he acknowledged that his campaign submitted thousands of signatures gathered by a subcontractor despite knowing that some of its canvassers used deceptive tactics
Updated 31 sec ago
AP
MINEOLA, Newn York Robert F. Kennedy Jr. faced questions in a New York court Thursday about how his presidential campaign handled revelations that some people gathering signatures to get him on the state ballot concealed his name on the petitions and used other deceptive methods.
Kennedy’s virtual appearance from an office in California came a day after his campaign announced that he will speak Friday about “his path forward.” The announcement fueled speculation that he could drop out of the race and support former President Donald Trump, the Republican nominee.
Testifying in a trial over a lawsuit backed by the Democratic National Committee that seeks to keep Kennedy off New York’s ballot, he acknowledged that his campaign submitted thousands of signatures gathered by a subcontractor despite knowing that some of its canvassers used deceptive tactics.
The lawsuit alleges, among other claims of fraud, that the top of some petition sheets had been folded down, so the names of Kennedy and his vice presidential running mate, Nicole Shanahan, could not be seen, and only their little-known electors were visible.
“I suppose I’m ultimately responsible for everything that happens in the campaign,” Kennedy said on the witness stand, pointing out that he wasn’t abreast of every detail involved in the subcontractor’s balloting efforts.
When asked if he was ultimately responsible for the decision to submit the signatures, he said “Yes.”
New York requires independent candidates to gather petitions with 45,000 signatures from potential voters to get on the ballot in the general election. Kennedy’s campaign ultimately managed to gather nearly three times that many on top of those gathered by the subcontractor. But an April complaint from a voter and a May New York Times article raised concerns about whether some people signing the petitions knew which candidate they had been asked to support.
Kennedy’s staff was concerned, too. The day after the Times article was published, Kennedy’s campaign manager and daughter-in-law, Amaryllis Kennedy, said in an email to other staff that the questionable petitions gathered by the contractor should not be used.
“We’re obviously pulling all of the petitions they’ve submitted and won’t use any of them as they are likely rife with other hidden errors, buried there to disqualify us once submitted,” she wrote.
According to court documents, the campaign sued the subcontractor, arguing it had to pay them even though none of the signatures were usable. Kennedy said in news interviews at the time that no petitions from the subcontractor were submitted.
But he acknowledged during his testimony that that’s not what actually happened.
Instead, the campaign weeded out around 800 pages — containing 8,000 signatures — with visible creases indicating they’d been folded, putting them in two bankers boxes labeled “fraud box.”
The campaign created an affidavit intended to “cure” the remaining petitions by having the canvassers affirm in writing that they hadn’t committed fraud and submitted over 12,000 signatures from the subcontractor as evidence of New York voters wanting to see him on the ballot.
Lawyers for the plaintiffs however produced at least one example of a creased page that was submitted to the state instead of ending up in the “fraud box.” They also argued, and Kennedy acknowledged, that some canvassers had also verbally misrepresented what the signatures were for — for example, increasing candidate ballot access generally.
The subcontractor did not immediately respond to a phone message and an email request for comment.
A judge in a separate legal challenge has already barred Kennedy from appearing on New York’s ballot, though he has appealed. That suit had argued that Kennedy’s petitions were invalid because they listed him as living in New York when he actually resides in California with his wife, “Curb Your Enthusiasm” actor Cheryl Hines. An appeals court is scheduled to hear arguments next week in that case.
Kennedy is facing similar ballot challenges in several other states from Democrats and their allies.
Quit the ‘cult’, anti-Trump Republicans plead at DNC
Geoff Duncan, the former lieutenant governor of Georgia where Trump sought to overturn the results of the 2020 election, slammed Trump as "a direct threat to democracy”
Former White House communications director Stephanie Grisham described her ex-boss Trump as a liar with “no empathy, no morals and no fidelity to the truth”
John Giles, Republican mayor of Mesa, Arizona, told the convention his party “has been kidnapped by extremists and devolved into a cult: the cult of Donald Trump”
Updated 22 min 39 sec ago
AFP
CHICAGO: While Democratic luminaries including the Obamas enthusiastically support Kamala Harris for US president at their party’s convention, an unlikely band of rebels is joining the effort: Republicans urging fellow conservatives to ditch Donald Trump.
The message is nothing new — several Republicans have spoken out against Trump over the years. But their presence at this week’s carefully orchestrated Democratic confab has amplified the call for conservatives and independents to reconsider their election choice in November.
“Let me be clear to my Republican friends at home watching,” Geoff Duncan, the former lieutenant governor of Georgia where Trump sought to overturn the results of the 2020 election, said Wednesday from the convention stage.
“If you vote for Kamala Harris in 2024 you’re not a Democrat, you’re a patriot,” he boomed.
Slamming the recently convicted — and twice-impeached — former president as “a direct threat to democracy,” Duncan said he was aiming his remarks at the millions of Republicans and independents he knows are “sick and tired of making excuses” for Trump.
“These days our party acts more like a cult, a cult worshipping a felonous thug,” said Duncan.
Multiple Republicans have offered similar messages in Chicago, as the Harris campaign seeks to peel off as many Republicans and independent voters as possible in an election that is going down to the wire.
Former White House communications director Stephanie Grisham, who had close access to Trump, took the stage Tuesday slamming her ex-boss as a liar with “no empathy, no morals and no fidelity to the truth.”
“I saw him when the cameras were off. Behind closed doors, Trump mocks his supporters, he calls them basement dwellers,” she said.
Grisham, who was also first lady Melania Trump’s chief of staff, mentioned how she had gone from “a true believer” to a disaffected close adviser who wanted out, and recalled a turning point during the 2021 US Capitol riot by Trump supporters.
“On January 6 I asked Melania if we could at least tweet that while peaceful protest is the right of every American, there’s no place for lawlessness or violence,” Grisham said.
“She replied with one word: ‘No.’“
Grisham resigned that day, “because I love my country more than my party,” she said, to loud applause, adding that Harris “has my vote.”
John Giles, mayor of Mesa, Arizona, and a self-described “lifelong Republican” who claims late senator John McCain as his hero, was equally blunt.
He told the convention his Republican Party “has been kidnapped by extremists and devolved into a cult: the cult of Donald Trump.”
Giles’s message to Americans like him who are in the political middle: “John McCain’s Republican Party is gone, and we don’t owe a damn thing to what’s been left behind.”
Republican Mayor John Giles of Mesa, Arizona, speaks on stage during the second day of the Democratic National Convention at the United Center on August 20, 2024 in Chicago, Illinois.(Getty Images/AFP)
Organizers aired a video Wednesday showing former Trump voters explaining why they were flipping to Harris.
“I made a grave mistake,” Florida voter Rich Logis said via video about how he had jumped headlong into Trump’s MAGA movement. “But it’s never too late to change your mind,” Logis said.
Olivia Troye, a former counter-terrorism adviser for Trump’s vice president Mike Pence, addressed the convention, while high-profile Republican never-Trumper Adam Kinzinger, an ex-congressman, takes the stage Thursday, the closing night.
Trump frequently assails such critics as traitors to the cause, and it remains unclear how persuasive they will be.
David Urban, a Republican adviser to Trump’s 2016 campaign, dismissed any substantial impact.
But he told CNN the appearance by Georgia’s Duncan “may give people permission to vote for Kamala Harris” in the state.
‘The answer is no’: Pro-Palestinian delegates say their request for a speaker at DNC was shut down
After failing to get a slot for a Palestinian American speaker at the DNC, members of the “Uncommitted” movement staged a sit-in outside the convention venue
The sit-in outside Chicago’s United Center has exposed cracks in a Democratic Party that otherwise has rallied around the Harris campaign
Updated 23 August 2024
AP
CHICAGO: Leaders of an “Uncommitted” movement, which garnered hundreds of thousands of votes in Democratic primaries across the nation in protest of the Israel-Hamas war, have been negotiating for weeks to secure a speaking slot for a Palestinian American at the Democratic National Convention this week.
The negotiations stalled late Wednesday when leaders with the Uncommitted National Movement say a Democratic National Committee official called and delivered a firm response: “The answer is no.”
The leader, Abbas Alawieh, an “Uncommitted” delegate to the convention and co-founder of the movement, described the call as shocking after weeks of talks that he felt were positive. In response, he and other delegates decided to stage a sit-in outside Chicago’s United Center, where the convention is being held. They spent the night on the sidewalk on Wednesday, and vowed to remain until their request was granted or the convention ended Thursday night.
“When we ran out of options — doing everything we can and working from the inside, when we ran out of options as uncommitted delegates, we just sat down,” Alawieh said in an interview Thursday.
The Harris campaign declined to comment.
Arab American Abbas Alawieh, Michigan delegate, wears a "Democrats for Palestinian Rights" scarf as he attends the first day of the Democratic National Convention (DNC) at the United Center in Chicago, Illinois, on August 19, 2024. (AFP)
The sit-in outside the United Center has exposed cracks in a Democratic Party that otherwise has rallied around the Harris campaign that has energized the vast majority of party members this week.
The news that the DNC had denied the request of a Palestinian American speaker, just a day after featuring the parents of an Israeli American hostage held by Hamas, ignited fresh criticism from some on the left. The politically powerful United Autoworkers Union, which has endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris’ presidential campaign, said the party “must allow a Palestinian American speaker to be heard from the DNC stage tonight.”
Cook County, where Chicago and the convention is located, holds the largest population of Palestinian Americans in the country.
The party, however, has not budged. The Senate’s top Democrat shrugged off the potential political impact of the sit-in outside the convention. New York Sen. Chuck Schumer recalled Harris saying when protesters interrupted her at a recent rally in Michigan that their disruptions might be benefiting Republican Donald Trump.
“She said, ‘Be quiet unless you want to elect Trump,’” Schumer told a small group of reporters on Thursday, ahead of the convention’s final evening.
“We believe we need unity, and there’s overwhelming — I have never seen such unity,” he said. “A small handful of people does not represent close to even a sliver of where the Democratic Party is right now.”
Tensions over the war in Gaza have at times escalated outside the convention center this week, as thousands marched through Chicago demanding a ceasefire. A smaller group of activists clashed with police outside the Israeli Consulate on Tuesday night, leading to 56 arrests.
Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison, a Muslim Democrat, spoke Wednesday at the convention and praised Harris for saying “we need a ceasefire and an end to the loss of innocent lives in Gaza and to bring hostages home.” In an interview Thursday, he said that “not only is the content of the message important, the messenger is also important.”
“A Palestinian-American sharing his or her story, calling for ceasefire and release of all hostages, and calling everyone to support the ticket against fascism would be powerful,” Ellison said on social media Thursday.
Many other Democratic leaders urged the party to reconsider the request. In a statement, California Rep. Ro Khanna said that “the Democratic Party, which aspires to be the party of human rights, must not in 2024 perpetuate this erasure of the Palestinian story.”
When asked at a roundtable discussion Thursday whether he agreed with the “Uncommitted” delegates’ demand to add a Palestinian American speaker to the DNC lineup, Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson said, “Yes, of course.”
“We’re talking about thousands of babies and elderly people being brutalized by an act of war,” said Johnson. “You have to have a voice that can call for peace as well as the releasing of hostages.”
According to Alawieh, the “Uncommitted” movement provided a number of potential Palestinian Americans who could speak at the convention, including Georgia State Rep. Ruwa Romman.
Romman on Thursday released a draft of the speech she said she planned to deliver if asked. In it, she calls for electing Harris, defeating Donald Trump — and outlines demands for a ceasefire and to “end the killing of Palestinians, free all the Israeli and Palestinian hostages.”
Earlier this week, activists were granted unprecedented space at the convention to hold a forum addressing the plight of Gaza residents, who have been under Israeli bombardment since Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack and its taking of hostages, as well as to share deeply personal stories about family members lost in the conflict. The panel was viewed as an olive branch from the Harris campaign, with hopes that other requests might be fulfilled later in the week.
The convention has officially made Harris the Democratic Party’s presidential nominee, with the vast majority of the nearly 4,000 delegates enthusiastically casting their votes for her.
But those calling for a ceasefire in the Israel-Hamas war — among other demands, such as an arms embargo on Israel — believe they will have an outsized influence in the November election, now just over 70 days away.
Michigan, one of the key swing states, has the largest percentage of Arab Americans in the country. The UAW, which hosted Harris at a union hall event earlier this month, also has its largest membership base in Michigan. In a statement, the leader of the state Democratic Party, Lavora Barnes, said “a Palestinian American should have a speaking role Thursday night so that their voices can be heard — all of our delegates are part of our Michigan Democratic Party family.”
Through Thursday, Democrats on their way into the convention stopped by the sit-in. Rep. Cori Bush, a member of the progressive congressional group known as the “Squad,” who lost her primary earlier this month, stopped to mingle with “Uncommitted” delegates.
“We are Democrats. We are a part of this party. And we are just saying, ‘hear us because it matters,’” said Bush.
North Korea slams US sale of Apache helicopters to South Korea as ‘provocative’
Updated 23 August 2024
Reuters
SEOUL: North Korea’s foreign ministry denounced a US planned sale of Apache helicopters to South Korea, state media KCNA said on Friday, vowing to take additional steps to bolster its self-defense.
The Pentagon said on Monday that the US State Department has approved the potential sale of Apache helicopters and related logistics and support to South Korea for an estimated $3.5 billion.
An unnamed senior official in charge of foreign news at North Korea’s foreign ministry issued a press statement on Thursday criticizing the sale plan as a move to aggravate tension, alongside ongoing annual military drills by the allies.
“This is a reckless provocative act of deliberately increasing the security instability in the region,” the official said, according to KCNA.
The official accused Washington of escalating military confrontation, “disturbing the military balance and thus increasing the danger of a new conflict” in the region by supplying lethal weapons to its allies and friends.
Pyongyang’s “strategic deterrence will be further strengthened to protect the national security and interests and the regional peace,” the statement said, pledging to steadily conduct military activities to boost self-defense.
Seven dead, 12 injured in hotel fire in South Korea
Updated 23 August 2024
Reuters
SEOUL: A fire at a hotel in South Korea has killed seven people and injured 12 others, fire authorities said on Friday.
The fire began on the eighth floor of the nine-story hotel in Bucheon, just west of the capital Seoul at around 7:40 p.m. (1040 GMT) on Thursday, before being put out in about two hours, according to the interior ministry.
Seven people died, mostly guests, and 12 were sent to hospitals for treatment, including three in critical condition, said Lee Sang-don, an official at the Bucheon fire station.
Among those killed were a couple who jumped out the windows onto an air mattress installed in front of the building, Lee said.
“It was unfolded normally but appeared to have flipped over when they jumped down,” he told a televised briefing.
Authorities were looking into the exact cause of the incident, adding there were no sprinklers inside, which was not mandatory when the building was completed in 2003, Lee added.
Interior Minister Lee Sang-min ordered all-out rescue efforts by mobilizing all available resources, the ministry said.
Some 70 vehicles and 160 firefighters were dispatched to the scene, Yonhap news agency said, citing provincial fire authorities.
