THE GOLDMAN SACHS
WHITE HOUSE
DEMANDS THEIR LOOT!
TRUMP DEMANDS PUERTO RICO PAY THE BANKSTERS FIRST!
HOW MUCH DID SWAMP KEEPER TRUMPS HUNDREDS OF
BANKRUPTCIES COST HIS BANKSTERS???
AMERICAN POVERTY and the LA RAZA MEXICAN
WELFARE STATE on AMERICA’S BACKS.
"Congress must prioritize four repairs for the
immigration system before contemplating any DACA-style amnesty negotiation,
said Brat: 1. Ending chain migration and the visa lottery; 2. Mandating
employer use of E-Verify; 3. Construction of a
southern border wall; and 4. Interior enforcement of immigration law."
REP. DAVE BRAT
MEXICAN ANCHOR BABY FACTORIES FOR
WELFARE IN AMERICA’S OPEN BORDERS
ROBERT RECTOR:
THE STAGGERING COST OF MEXICO’S
INVASION, OCCUPATION AND EVER GROWING
WELFARE STATE
US government cuts aid to
Puerto Rico by half
By
Antonio Castro
3 March 2018
Puerto Rico's governor, Ricardo Rossello, announced Tuesday that
the US Treasury Department has cut a $4.7 billion disaster relief loan
available to the US territory by more than half, without explanation.
Congress had approved the already meager loan for aid relief in
October after Hurricane María ravaged the island in September last year. The
storm, and the botched recovery effort that followed, has killed hundreds, if
not thousands of people, and caused an estimated $94 billion in damage.
Last month the Treasury Department and the Federal Emergency
Management Agency (FEMA) ominously warned in a letter they would be temporarily
withholding the aid loan because they did not believe the island’s government
was facing a cash shortage. Federal officials said the money would be released
through the Community Disaster Loan Program once the island’s central cash
balance decreased to a certain level.
Even before the storm, the island was already struggling with a major
financial crisis to the tune of $74 billion in debt. With the economy in
shambles after the hurricane, the suggestion that the island is flush with cash
is absurd.
The aid cut has put many essential services, especially the Puerto
Rico Electric Power Authority (PREPA), the island’s public power utility, at
risk of being interrupted. This means that millions of workers on the island
may soon lose access to running water and electricity. This would be in
addition to the approximately 30 percent of electric customers who have not had
service since María made landfall over five months ago.
Just two days after the relief cut was announced, two major power
plants shut down in the Puerto Rican capital, San Juan, affecting 970,000
customers, exposing the continuing fragility of the electrical system. Similar
events have become a regular occurrence; just three weeks ago thousands were
left without power after an explosion at a PREPA plant just north of the
capital. Both events were the result of repairs of storm damage using old scrap
materials and patchwork methods out of desperation. Puerto Rico’s power company
is currently running with a $300 million loan that will only sustain operations
until the end of the month.
Hundreds of thousands of Puerto Ricans are still struggling from
the damage from the hurricane. Many people whose houses were severely damaged
have received little, if any, aid for home repairs. Entire families are still
living with relatives or as refugees in hotels because they don't have anywhere
to go.
The recovery “effort” from the beginning has been a series of
scandals and backroom dealings which epitomizes the callous indifference of the
ruling class to the plight of workers in Puerto Rico. In the immediate
aftermath of María, Puerto Ricans struggled to find food and water when the
entire island lost electricity, roads became impassable, and fuel for
generators ran out. The situation worsened when ports that import about 85
percent of its food supply shut down under the draconian hundred-year-old Jones
Act, which the government only reluctantly lifted weeks later.
Shortly thereafter, a Florida company with an unproven record, was
granted more than $30 million in contracts from FEMA to provide tarps and
plastic sheeting for emergency home repairs. Bronze Star LLC never delivered
those urgently needed supplies, which left hundreds of thousands of residents
roofless and unprotected from the elements for months.
Next, FEMA awarded a $156 million contract to a one-woman company,
Tribute Contracting LLC, to deliver 30 million meals for Puerto Ricans. Only
50,000 of these meals made it to the island, when at least 18.5 million meals
were due.
Lastly, most notorious was the Whitefish scandal in which a newly
created company consisting of just two employees was granted a $300 million
contract to help restore the operations of PREPA. Under enormous public
pressure, FEMA was forced to cancel the contract, further delaying the
restoration of power.
While millions of Puerto Ricans, who are US citizens, continue to
live in such harsh conditions, the federal government argues that there are not
enough resources to aid the recovery process. However, unfathomable amounts of
money are being funneled into the pockets of the rich while the working class
of Puerto Rico, like the working class everywhere, is thrown scraps.
Since María made landfall in September the ruling class passed a
historic tax bill granting trillions in tax cuts to the wealthiest layers of
society, passed a budget which included $160 billion for the military in a
single year, and are currently negotiating millions to be spent on arming
border agents and building a wall along the US-Mexico border.
A month after the hurricane, the CEO and owner of Amazon, Jeff
Bezos, made $10.2 billion in a single day, making him the world’s richest
person. That is five times the amount of aid now being loaned to Puerto Rico.
With a fraction of Bezos’ net worth, which currently stands at $125 billion,
the funds needed to rebuild Puerto Rico could be covered and Bezos would remain
the richest person in the world.
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