Friday, June 16, 2023

Westfield Officially Abandons the Flagship San Francisco Mall - Hotels Are Dumping Property in San Francisco as Tourists Shun Crime-Ridden City

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ir28VQxTW5U




Hotels Are Dumping Property in San Francisco as Tourists Shun Crime-Ridden City

A billboard in San Francisco / Getty Images
June 16, 2023

A growing number of hotels in San Fransisco are preparing to leave the struggling city, following numerous retailers and businesses that packed their bags amid high crime and widespread homelessness.

Hotels in the California city are lagging behind those in comparable cities. Revenue per available room was 23 percent lower in April than during the same time in 2019, while hotels in New York City and Los Angeles are exceeding their 2019 metric, the Wall Street Journal reported.

The city's Huntington Hotel and the Yotel San Fransisco hotel were both sold after facing foreclosure in recent months. The Club Quarters San Francisco may also be heading to foreclosure. The number of embattled hotels may soon rise as more than 20 locations will face loans due in the next two years, the Journal reported.

Perhaps the biggest hit to the local market came last week when the owner of both the city's largest hotel, the Hilton San Francisco Union Square, and its fourth-largest, Parc 55, said it ceased payments on $725 million worth of loans and entered foreclosure because the city is facing "major challenges."

The decision was "very difficult, but necessary" because of "concerns over street conditions," office vacancies, and reduced conventions, said Thomas J. Baltimore Jr., CEO of Park Hotels & Resorts, which owns the two hotels.

Homicides in San Fransisco have increased nearly 40 percent from 2020 to 2022 and deaths from fentanyl have spiked.

The hotels follow a long line of businesses that have chosen to flee. Old Navy announced in May it will close its flagship store. Whole Foods and Nordstrom have shuttered businesses in the city over safety concerns. The latter's exit is costing the city 380 jobs. The downtown area of the city has lost half of its businesses since the start of the pandemic.

Democratic mayor London Breed and several city officials held an outdoor meeting on crime in May in the city's United Nations Plaza, known for drug use and crime. A crowd of spectators screamed insults and booed the officials, and one of them threw a brick that almost hit a child, local outlet KRON4 reported. The city officials adjourned the meeting amid the disruption and continued it from inside the city hall building.

Published under: California Crime Homelessness San Francisco


San Francisco Death Spiral Continues — Cinemark Closes Downtown Movie Theater

Cinemark announces the grand opening of its Missouri City and XD theatre in the Greater Houston area. (Photo: Business Wire)
Business Wire/AP

The Cinemark Movie Theater chain has announced that it will be permanently shutting down its Downtown San Francisco Centre location this Friday, as San Francisco continues its death spiral of shuttered businesses proliferating across the city.

This week, shopping center giant Westfield announced that it will be closing its once booming shopping mall located just south of the city’s famed Chinatown and Nob Hill neighborhoods due to the troubling “dynamics of the downtown” area, a not-so-subtle hint at the city’s soaring crime rate and subsequent loss of foot traffic and tourists.

Only two days later, Cinemark made an announcement of its own and told customers that it will be shuttering its theater in the mall, with its last showings happening on Thursday, according to the San Francisco Standard.

The paper added that Cinemark said it was closing the location after a “comprehensive review of local business conditions.”

The Standard also noted that the theater is accessible via a bank of elevators in the mall concourse, and the lifts had often been found smeared with human waste.

Cinemark is hardly alone. More than half the stores and eateries in the mall have closed since 2020.

The Standard included a list of more than 20 major retail chains that have closed their doors since 2020, including the Gap, the Disney Store, Amazon, Office Depot, Nordstrom, Old Navy, and many more.

San Francisco’s retail decline has been far worse than the general decline forced on retailers by the response to the coronavirus, especially as the City By The Bay has been hit with the trend of businesses allowing employees to work from home and a massive population decline as people flee the failing city for other regions. With these pressures, San Francisco’s recovery was one of the slowest in the nation.

Watch — “FOR LEASE”: Closed, Vacant Businesses Line San Francisco Street as Retailers Flee

Tiny-Remove-3734 / LOCAL NEWS X /TMX
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But San Francisco has also suffered from a skyrocketing crime rate, a rise in homeless people, and open-air drug abuse. On top of all that, the city was best by waves of “mass looting” in 2021 during the many BLM riots.

Politics has also been a major source of trouble for the city. Liberals try to claim that San Francisco’s soft-on-crime policies have not led to the retail exodus, but shoplifting has led to the closing of a growing number of stores, and some employees of downtown retailers fear coming to work.

Watch: Brazen Shoplifting Activity in San Fran Continues…

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The population inflow also reduces the political clout of native-born Americans, because the population replacement allows elites to divorce themselves from the needs and interests of ordinary Americans.



THIRTY San Francisco hotels could stop paying loan payments as city struggles with spiking crime, rampant homelessness and brazen drug use

  • San Francisco may see more than two dozen more hotels default on their loans in the next two years as bills come due and revenues remain down 
  • Earlier this week, the company that owns the largest hotel in San Francisco announced it will stop payments on a $725million loan and cede ownership
  • San Francisco is facing low tourism as the crime rate has spiked in the city and homeless is unrestrained 

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News of Park Hotels & Resorts' plan to surrender ownership of two of San Francisco's largest hotels is the beginning of what could potentially become a mass exodus of hotels from the city as 30 additional properties are facing massive loans due over the next two years.

The company behind the hotels announced Monday it had stopped making payments on its $725million loan that is due in November for the Hilton San Francisco Union Square and Parc 55 hotels.

Though Park Hotels owns the largest and fourth largest hotels in San Francisco, they are by no means the only hotels suffering and going under as loan repayment date close in.

The Huntington on Nob Hill and Yotel on Market Street are two hotels that were recently sold in foreclosure auctions, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.

Analysts are now warning that more than two dozen hotels could be joining as they have loans due in the next couple of years as San Francisco continues to struggle with prevalent drug use and an exploding homeless population.  

The Huntington on Nob Hill was sold at a foreclosure auction earlier this year after its owners defaulted on a $56.2million mortgage

The Huntington on Nob Hill was sold at a foreclosure auction earlier this year after its owners defaulted on a $56.2million mortgage

San Francisco's largest hotel, the Hilton Union Square, is set to be foreclosed upon
The owner of the hotel and the more modern Parc 55 (pictured) announced on Monday that it will no longer make payments on its $725 million loan

San Francisco's largest hotel, the Hilton Union Square, left, is set to be foreclosed upon as the owner of the hotel and Parc 55, right, announced on Monday that it will no longer make payments on its $725 million loan

The Hilton San Francisco Financial District faces a $97million loan maturation in 2024 and could be the next San Francisco hotel to see its owners leave

The Hilton San Francisco Financial District faces a $97million loan maturation in 2024 and could be the next San Francisco hotel to see its owners leave 

Real estate data firm CoStar's senior director of hospitality Emmy Hise told the Chronicle 30 more hotels face massive loans due in the next two years. 

She said the issue of crime and stores leaving the area have impacted the public's view of the Bay Area.

'Most downtowns are struggling with this issue,' she said. 'San Francisco has been getting a lot of the national press.'

The exact amount the 30 hotels will owe is unknown, it's also unclear which will need to pay as details of the locations has not been released. 

The Chronicle reported after Park Hotels, the second-largest mortgage deadline will arrive in January of 2024, when the Hilton San Francisco Financial District faces a $97million loan maturation. As of March, less than $10million of the loan has been paid off. 

The Huntington was sold to two hotel investment and management firms that say they plan to 'restore and elevate every aspect' of the hotel, 'returning it to its original glory while reestablishing it as the single finest luxury hotel in San Francisco.'

The hotel defaulted on its $56.2million mortgage.

An open-air drug market in the SOMA District of San Francisco is pictured as city leaders struggle with how to address drug use in the downtown area

An open-air drug market in the SOMA District of San Francisco is pictured as city leaders struggle with how to address drug use in the downtown area

San Francisco saw a staggering 41 percent surge in the number of drug-related deaths in the first quarter of 2023

San Francisco saw a staggering 41 percent surge in the number of drug-related deaths in the first quarter of 2023

Homicides in the city are now up 5 percent from the same time last year, while robberies are up more than 16 percent

Homicides in the city are now up 5 percent from the same time last year, while robberies are up more than 16 percent

The Yotel on Market Street, a tech-savvy hotel with micro hotel rooms, was purchased last year for $62million at a foreclosure auction. 

Its owner, Synapse Development Group, defaulted on $64.5million in loans last March. It was purchased by New York-based investment firm Monarch Alternative Capital.

Park Hotels CEO Thomas Baltimore Jr said in a statement Monday: 'After much thought and consideration, we believe it is in the best interest for Park's stockholders to materially reduce our current exposure to the San Francisco market.'

'Now, more than ever we believe San Francisco's path to recovery remains clouded and elongated by major challenges - both old and new.

'Ultimately, the continued burden on our operating results and balance sheet is too significant to warrant continuing to subsidize and own these assets.'

The company blames record-high office vacancy of around 30 percent, concerns over street conditions, a lower rate of return to offices compared with other cities and a 'weaker than expected citywide convention calendar through 2027 that will negatively impact business and leisure demand' for the declining value of the properties for the failure of their properties.

San Francisco has struggled to rebound following the pandemic, much more so than other major cities. Its daily hotel room rate of $234 over the course of the last year is below 2019 levels. While every other major market is above 2019 figures - partially due to inflation. 

The city's highest spending group of leisure tourists were from China, and they were barred from returning until the Chinese government ended its strict travel controls earlier this year.

Corporate travel has also taken a hit as tech firms reduce firm size and attempt to cut costs. Some major conferences formerly hosted in San Francisco have also chosen new cities due to rising crime. 

SF's daily hotel room rate of $234 over the course of the last year is below 2019 levels. While every other major California market is above 2019 figures

SF's daily hotel room rate of $234 over the course of the last year is below 2019 levels. While every other major California market is above 2019 figures

Graph of San Francisco's hotel room rate relative to other major US markets. San Francisco is the only city that has not yet bounced back to its 2019 levels

Graph of San Francisco's hotel room rate relative to other major US markets. San Francisco is the only city that has not yet bounced back to its 2019 levels

A significant handful of high-profile criminal episodes, in addition to a number of retail closures prompted by rampant and unprosecuted theft, have tarnished the city's image to potential visitors.

According to one analysis, San Francisco is suffering from the slowest downtown recovery of any of the 62 largest cities in the US and Canada post-pandemic.

Making that recovery even slower are the stores that have announced they are ditching the downtown area.

Nordstrom, Whole Foods, Saks Off 5th, Anthropologie, Banana Republic, Old Navy and Office Depot have all made the decision to abandon their downtown locations. Williams-Sonoma also announced it will shut down in 2024. 

Out of 203 retailers open in 2019 in the city's Union Square area, just 107 are still operating, a drop of 47 percent in just a few pandemic-ravaged years. 

Even prior to the pandemic, organizers were beginning to make different decisions about where to hold their conferences. In 2018, a major medical-industry conference said they would convene elsewhere due to the city's homelessness issue. 

San Francisco is anticipating 23.9million visitors in 2023, who will spend a total of $8.7billion. The record high for the spending figure came in 2019 and totaled $9.6billion.

But that figure could be lower given the issues the city faces and without much progress in cleaning up the streets.

Nordstrom is one of several stores that announced they would be leaving their downtown location

Nordstrom is one of several stores that announced they would be leaving their downtown location

Traveler numbers remain down in San Francisco have not return to its pre-pandemic figures

Traveler numbers remain down in San Francisco have not return to its pre-pandemic figures

Public policy in San Francisco has continually allowed for a skyrocketing homeless, drug addicted and mentally unstable population to run the streets of the city.

The city is also facing a spiraling violent crime problem. Tech exec Bob Lee became one of the city's latest murder victims last month.

Lee, 43, was allegedly murdered by another tech executive on April 4 while visiting San Francisco from Miami, where he moved last year with his family. 

A coroner's report reveals in graphic detail how Lee was found slumped outside an apartment block with no pulse before paramedics rushed him to the hospital, where knife wounds were found on his heart and a lung.

He died with ketamine, cocaine and alcohol in his system. 

In another criminal episode, Don Carmignani, 53, an ex-fire chief, is facing charges for using pepper spray on a homeless man who proceeded to brutally attack him with a metal crowbar.

Carmignani suffered a fractured skull and jaw. Prosecutors are able to charge him because he used pepper spray on the vagrant thereby instigating the attack, but the city's District Attorney has opted not to prosecute the homeless man because he was acting in 'self-defense.' 

San Francisco is dealing with widespread crime, homeless and drug use that has driven away companies and consumers

San Francisco is dealing with widespread crime, homeless and drug use that has driven away companies and consumers 

The number of homeless people in San Francisco was tallied in February of last year at almost 8,000

The number of homeless people in San Francisco was tallied in February of last year at almost 8,000

San Francisco saw a staggering 41 percent surge in the number of drug-related deaths in the first quarter of 2023

San Francisco saw a staggering 41 percent surge in the number of drug-related deaths in the first quarter of 2023

The number of homeless people in San Francisco was tallied in February of last year at almost 8,000, the second highest figure of any year since 2005, according to the official government count which takes place every three years. 

San Francisco saw a staggering 41 percent surge in the number of drug-related deaths in the first quarter of 2023 compared to the same time last year, as fentanyl ravaged the city's homeless population.

The Californian coastal hub saw 200 people die due to overdoses between January and March, compared to 142 deaths in 2022, according to recent data from the city's medical examiner.

That amounts to one overdose death every 10 hours in a city that has seen its reputation as a coastal gem tarnished by worsening crime, drugs, and, homelessness rates, even as it remains home to tech billionaires.



DIMMING DEMAMERICA:

The Tenderloin is a heartbreaking and dangerous place. Sidewalks, doorways, and alleys are packed with tents, lean-tos, sleeping bags, broken wheelchairs, and piles of garbage. Thousands of people on the streets are unconscious, dazed, or delirious. Dogs roam about, too; some are beloved pets, but often neglected. Residents must navigate around bodies and crowds of drug dealers, trying to avoid human waste, needles, and violence.:


Erica Sandberg

High Hopes, Deep Despair

San Francisco will break your heart.

https://www.city-journal.org/article/high-hopes-deep-despair

There is an insatiable appetite for what’s happening in San Francisco, the editor-in-chief of a British media outlet recently told me. I get it—we have controversy, conflict, Tammany Hall–style corruption, villains, and heroes, all playing out against a stunning, if blemished, backdrop. For the rest of the country, rooting for the city’s success (or failure) has become a kind of sport. For San Franciscans themselves, it can feel like being trapped in a never-ending cycle of high hopes and deep despair. For us, each week is another cliff-hanger in a long-running drama.

In the early 1990s, the dot-com boom blasted through San Francisco. Internet-based startups, some little more than a vague concept and a sign on a door, bought out legacy businesses and soon occupied entire buildings, if not city blocks. Angry denunciations of “gentrification” were met with hoots of merriment from speculators, arriving from across the globe. The city’s proximity to Silicon Valley made it the playground for young—and yes, often obnoxious—wealth builders. Rents and housing prices skyrocketed with the influx of venture-capital-backed newcomers.

Though the first dot-com bubble burst just a few years later, the next tech wave arrived shortly thereafter, crowding in with the financial district’s traditional banking, investing, and legal firms. Companies from Airbnb to Zynga planted flags at their new headquarters. Soon Marc Benioff erected his Salesforce Tower, dramatically altering the city’s skyline.

Then came the pandemic. Nearly all tech workers went fully remote, causing urban life to screech to a halt. In 2023, many of these firms’ office buildings remain hauntingly empty, including Benioff’s tower. The delicate ecosystem of bars and restaurants favored by workers has nearly collapsed, devastating a once-vibrant financial district. Today, the financial district’s skyscrapers sport “for lease” signs as mass layoffs and hiring freezes continue. The talent, accustomed to calling shots, now find themselves somewhat adrift. Those who loathed the arrogant newcomers finally have their moment of schadenfreude.

Augmenting the melodrama is Elon Musk, who swept into town to buy Twitter in October 2022. Almost immediately, this wild card fired nearly half the company’s 7,500 employees, and then ordered most of the rest back to the office. Musk’s unpredictable actions, both in the city and online, are theoretical wonders.

San Francisco, said architect Frank Lloyd Wright, was “the only city I can think of that can survive all the things you people are doing to it and still look beautiful.” In general, this observation remains true, but one particular area grapples with almost unimaginable abuse.

The Tenderloin, roughly 50 blocks of mayhem cradling City Hall and adjacent to the shopping district of Union Square, has long been the place to live if you can’t afford anything else. It’s home to some of the city’s most gorgeous early-twentieth-century architecture, though most buildings are dilapidated and teeming with vermin. About 70 are single-room-occupancy hotels, designated for people with low or no incomes. Many residents are Asian, Hispanic, or Middle Eastern immigrants, poor families, the disabled, or senior citizens. Others are people with drug and mental-illness problems, placed there by the city’s homeless department and a web of contracted nonprofits.

The Tenderloin is a heartbreaking and dangerous place. Sidewalks, doorways, and alleys are packed with tents, lean-tos, sleeping bags, broken wheelchairs, and piles of garbage. Thousands of people on the streets are unconscious, dazed, or delirious. Dogs roam about, too; some are beloved pets, but often neglected. Residents must navigate around bodies and crowds of drug dealers, trying to avoid human waste, needles, and violence.

While the Tenderloin is often compared with its scripted cousin, Hamsterdam, from HBO’s The Wire, this real containment zone has porous boundaries. Outlying neighborhoods have seen an uptick in tents, as people flood the city in search of drugs and handouts, attracted by a lenient attitude toward vagrancy.

In December 2022, the Coalition on Homelessness and the ACLU brought a lawsuit against the city, preventing the police from clearing encampments. U.S. Magistrate Judge Donna Ryu issued the injunction, which City Attorney David Chiu quickly appealed. The Tenderloin remains the epicenter of civic neglect, but as similar problems reach the doorsteps of residents elsewhere, the fight for safe, clean communities is intensifying.

Perhaps no aspect of life in San Francisco is as tragic as its drug disaster. From January 2021 to November 2022, more than 1,225 people died of overdoses in the city. Opioids, cocaine, and methamphetamines are all sold in the open. Most of the dealers are part of a powerful cartel of Honduran nationals.

Fentanyl is particularly prolific and cheap. San Francisco’s toleration of the purchase and use of illegal drugs has lured addicts from around the country; all too often, they end up homeless and at death’s door.

The situation became so dire that Mayor London Breed declared a state of emergency in January 2022 and opened the Linkage Center in UN Plaza. The intention was to connect the city’s exploding drug-using population to addiction treatment and other critical services. Mothers who had lost children to the streets of San Francisco were hopeful. Finally, their kids would receive the support that they needed to get sober and healthy.

Almost immediately, the Linkage Center descended into a ramshackle, filthy, city-funded place to get high. Workers distributed drug-use supplies and administered naloxone when guests overdosed. Hundreds of dealers congregated outside, doing brisk business.

The Department of Public Health denied that the center was an unlawful drug-use site, until independent journalists went undercover to confirm it. I was among them, and I witnessed people shoot up and smoke fentanyl in a space created to connect them to recovery care.

In response, the mothers, who had organized into Mothers Against Drug Addiction and Deaths, staged a protest at the center. They were met by harm-reduction activists, who counterprotested. Not backing down, the women erected a billboard overlooking Union Square, bearing the message “Famous the world over for our brains, beauty and, now, dirt-cheap fentanyl,” set against the background of the Golden Gate Bridge.

Eleven months later, in December 2022, the center was shuttered. At a cost of $22 million, it had proved a humiliating failure for city officials. But the closure was a victory of sorts for the mothers who refused to accept substandard treatment for their children.

San Francisco’s police ranks are at an all-time low, with the force short by at least 500 sworn officers. As in cities across the nation, a number of San Francisco leaders chanted the “defund the police” mantra during the summer of 2020. Mayor Breed was among them. That year, she held a press conference announcing $120 million in cuts from the city’s police and sheriff’s department budgets.

The city, already reeling with escalating crime, was hit hard. Car break-ins, sawed-off catalytic converters, shoplifting, open-air drug markets, smash-and-grab robberies, home invasions, and mail theft soared; people were robbed of their bikes, electronics, and even dogs. Criminals gained the upper hand. Footage of thieves emptying out a Louis Vuitton store in 2021 went viral.

In July 2022, the San Francisco Chronicle asked residents to name the city’s most urgent problem. Crime and public safety ran a close second to homelessness (which is intertwined with drug-related offenses, since many addicts steal to support their habits).

San Francisco’s controversial, ultra-progressive district attorney Chesa Boudin, who took office in January 2020, routinely let arrested drug dealers walk free, eliminated cash bail, and took steps to empty jails of dangerous suspected and convicted criminals. Prominent cases included that of Troy McAlister, a man with an extensive criminal history who was arrested for robbing two women with a fake gun. While McAlister was awaiting trial on a third strike that would have sent him to prison for 25 years to life, Boudin’s office instead negotiated a plea deal, reducing the charges and putting him back on the street. On New Year’s Day 2021, an inebriated McAlister stole a car and drove into 27-year-old Hanako Abe and 60-year-old Elizabeth Platt, killing them both.

City voters recalled Boudin in a special election on June 7, 2022, but criminal-justice-reform activists continue to make it tough for police to do their jobs. The public defender’s office accused sergeant Daniel Solorzano of racial discrimination because he arrested 53 Latino drug dealers in the Tenderloin neighborhood. Solorzano, of Mexican and Nicaraguan heritage, now faces possible disciplinary action and termination. The police commission voted to limit officers’ ability to make pretextual traffic stops, ostensibly to reduce racial profiling. Officers can no longer pull over drivers for actions such as failing to display registration tags or for not having fully functioning rear taillights.

Morale within the police department has plummeted. Experienced officers are resigning, and not nearly enough cadets are replenishing the shrinking ranks. The latest police academy class graduated just 13 new officers.

Sensing a crisis, Breed reversed her police-defunding decision, making an emergency request to the board of supervisors for more funds to support a crackdown on crime. Newly elected supervisor Matt Dorsey, a former police spokesperson, is advocating for big sign-on bonuses. Law and order is suddenly back in vogue.

Pedestrians walk by a billboard erected by Mothers Against Drug Addiction and Deaths. (JUSTIN SULLIVAN/GETTY IMAGES)

Adding to the city’s salacious nature is a series of bizarre bureaucratic decisions and embarrassing political scandals.

In 2022, Matt Haney, then a city supervisor (now a state assembly member), approved $1.7 million for the construction of a single public toilet, which was to take two years to build, until he retreated in the face of a backlash. Last year, Haney and other supervisors also promoted spending $427,500 to manufacture and test five prototypes of trash cans. The price tag for each can was between $12,000 and $20,000.

Mohammed Nuru, director of San Francisco Public Works, was arrested for fraud after trying to bribe an airport commissioner and granting a trash-hauling company special treatment in exchange for payments. Facing accusations of corruption, bribery, kickbacks, and side deals dating back to 2008, Nuru pled guilty in 2022 and was sentenced to seven years in federal prison.

In 2021, the school board denied a gay father of a biracial child a spot on the volunteer-parent committee because he is white. During the pandemic, the board debated the destruction of a mural of George Washington at the high school named after the nation’s first president, tried to rename 44 schools after claiming that their namesakes were linked to slavery or racism, and revoked the merit-based admissions process at the city’s renowned magnet Lowell High School. In March 2022, infuriated parents led a recall effort, ending in a landslide vote to remove a trio of board members. In a spectacular display of hubris, ousted board member Alison Collins filed an $87 million lawsuit against the school district and five of her fellow board members. A federal judge tossed the suit for lack of merit.

The city’s massive $14 billion annual budget is itself a disgrace. San Francisco gifted over $1 billion to more than 600 nonprofits in 2022 to fix the quality-of-life issues bedeviling citizens. No substantial improvements resulted. In January 2023, news that $25 million had been awarded to revoked, suspended, and delinquent nonprofits shocked even jaded observers. Eighteen city agencies somehow failed to notice that they were paying millions in taxpayer dollars to defunct organizations.

Gorgeous, wild San Francisco has been dragged through the mud by the very officials who have been tasked to keep it clean. Years of grift and extremism have done tremendous damage. Yet serious efforts to revive the city are ramping up. Brooke Jenkins, the current district attorney, has been busy reversing Boudin’s soft approach on crime. She is revoking misdemeanor plea offers for fentanyl dealers and pursuing second-degree murder charges against dealers linked to overdose deaths. Voters have elected some moderate supervisors, and more are expected to run in the 2024 election.

To know what’s really happening in San Francisco, you need to listen to the city’s passionate residents and business owners. They’re mobilizing, getting louder and stronger, demanding positive outcomes. While it’s highly unlikely that the city will ever lean to the political right (nor, for most, is that the intention), there is an undeniable shift away from the hard left. This much is guaranteed: the cast of characters will change again, with hirings and firings and elections, as the next set of opportunists sails into the City by the Bay. San Francisco’s drama will be renewed for many more seasons.

Top Photo: An all-too-common sight in the City by the Bay (BEN MARGOT/AP PHOTO)

Another Corporation Ditches San Francisco Over City's 'Major Challenges'

Getty Images
June 6, 2023

Two of the largest hotels in San Francisco are set to close, following a trend of businesses fleeing the Democrat-led city as it faces a surge in crime.

The owner of the city's largest hotel, the Hilton San Francisco Union Square, and its fourth-largest, Parc 55, will cease payments on $725 million worth of loans and enter foreclosure on the hotels because the city is facing "major challenges."

The decision was "very difficult, but necessary" because of "concerns over street conditions," office vacancies, and reduced conventions, said Thomas J. Baltimore Jr., CEO of Park Hotels & Resorts, which owns the two hotels.

"Now more than ever, we believe San Francisco’s path to recovery remains clouded and elongated by major challenges, both old and new," Baltimore said.

The hotels are far from the first businesses to flee. Old Navy last week announced it will close its flagship store. Whole Foods and Nordstrom have shuttered businesses in the city over safety concerns. The latter's exit is costing the city 380 jobs. The downtown area of the city has lost half of its businesses since the start of the pandemic.

Democratic mayor London Breed and several city officials held an outdoor meeting on crime last month in the city's United Nations Plaza, known for drug use and crime. A crowd of spectators screamed insults and booed the officials, and one of them threw a brick that almost hit a child, local outlet KRON4 reported. The city officials adjourned the meeting amid the disruption and continued it from inside the city hall building.

Even comedian Dave Chapelle is concerned about the state of San Francisco. He asked an audience there last month, "What the f— happened to this place?"

"Y’all ... need a Batman!" Chappelle reportedly told the crowd. The comedian recounted his experience at an Indian restaurant in the city, where he saw a homeless man defecate in front of the building as he entered.

Published under: Crime San Francisco

WHILE YOU WERE SLEEPING AT THE WHEEL OR GETTING YOUR CELL PHONE FIX, THE DEMOCRAT PARTY WAS DESTROY AMERICA



Owner of Biggest Hotel in San Francisco Gives Up Amid Downtown Woes

San Francisco cable car (Joel Pollak / Breitbart News)
Joel Pollak / Breitbart News

The owner of two major hotels in downtown San Francisco is preparing to give the properties up to foreclosure as the city’s downtown decline continues, with retail shops leaving the area amid crime and homelessness.

The San Francisco Chronicle reported Monday:

The owner of two of San Francisco’s biggest hotels — Hilton San Francisco Union Square and Parc 55 — has stopped mortgage payments and plans to give up the two properties, in another sign of disinvestment in hard-hit downtown.

Park Hotels & Resorts said Monday that it stopped making payments on a $725 million loan due in November and expects the “ultimate removal of these hotels” from its portfolio. The company said it would “work in good faith with the loan’s servicers to determine the most effective path forward.”

The 1,921-room Hilton is the city’s largest hotel and the 1,024-room Parc 55 is the fourth-largest, and together they account for around 9% of the city’s hotel stock. The hotels could potentially be taken over by lenders or sold to a new group as part of the foreclosure process.

San Francisco has been suffering an exodus of major retail stores from the Union Square area over the past several months. The city also lost residents during the pandemic, and there are fewer commuters due to a shift to work-from-home in the tech industry. Amid a looming commercial real estate collapse, experts are advising the city to think about creative and drastic solutions to bring visitors back to the city before it is too late.

The Chronicle notes that tourism spending in the city is up, but convention attendance has fallen drastically and is not expected to recover for years. The cost of living in the city also remains high, despite its troubles.

Mayor London Breed has been at pains to deny that the downtown area is facing economic collapse, as have left-wing pundits eager to deflect criticism of years of soft-on-crime policies. But the crisis continues to worsen.

Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of the new biography, Rhoda: ‘Comrade Kadalie, You Are Out of Order’. He is also the author of the recent e-book, Neither Free nor Fair: The 2020 U.S. Presidential Election. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.

San Francisco Mayor: Biden Needs to Do More to Fight Fentanyl

San Francisco Mayor London Breed talks during a briefing outside City Hall in San Francisco on Dec. 1, 2021. The San Francisco Board of Supervisors will consider Thursday, Dec. 23, 2021, an emergency order to speed up the city’s ability to stem the high number of overdose deaths in the …
AP Photo/Eric Risberg

San Francisco Mayor London Breed said Monday that President Joe Biden is not doing enough to fight the scourge of fentanyl and needs to do more.

Breed led a bipartisan group of mayors in a resolution adopted at the U.S. Conference of Mayors meeting in San Francisco. The resolution reads, in part:

The United States Conference of Mayors adopted a resolution sponsored by Mayor London N. Breed to support urgent and increased federal enforcement and public health interventions to address the fentanyl crisis. The resolution was supported by a bi-partisan group of Mayors from across the country. 

“Locally we are doing all we can to address the challenges of open-air drug dealing of fentanyl in our community,” said Mayor Breed. “Despite the strong and laudable efforts of our local law enforcement agencies, we know San Francisco—and cities across the United States—needs more support. The trafficking and dealing of fentanyl is a national crisis, and requires a robust response from the federal government.” 

Specifically, the resolution calls on the Biden Administration to act immediately and increase its enforcement and prosecution of high-level fentanyl drug traffickers and dealers in communities throughout the country. Mayor Breed’s resolution states that it is imperative that the federal government increase its collaboration with local authorities to combat drug trafficking and dealing, and form joint investigations with local law enforcement to pursue these traffickers and dealers.  

Until now, President Biden has primarily faced criticism from Republicans for his lax border policies, which have allowed millions of migrants into the country, as well as drug smugglers bringing in deadly fentanyl.

But Mayor Breed, facing what she calls a “public health calamity” from opioid abuse in San Francisco, has begun demanding that the federal government do more to assist, as state and local efforts have faltered.

The issue has become a potent one in the 2024 presidential race. Former President Donald Trump has vowed to “wage war” on drug cartels, and Democratic Party candidate Robert F. Kennedy says he will seal the border.

Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of the new biography, Rhoda: ‘Comrade Kadalie, You Are Out of Order’. He is also the author of the recent e-book, Neither Free nor Fair: The 2020 U.S. Presidential Election. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.


THIS IS WHAT THE IDIOT GOV IS WORRIED ABOUT IN A STATE THAT HAS TENS OF MILLIONS OF DEM VOTING ILLEGALS!


Gavin Newsom Threatens to Charge Ron DeSantis with ‘Kidnapping’ Migrants

Govs. Gavin Newsom (D-CA) and Ron DeSantis (R-FL). (Ray Chavez, Joe Raedle/Getty Images)
Ray Chavez, Joe Raedle/Getty Images

California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) accused Florida Gov Ron DeSantis (R) of “kidnapping” 16 migrants who were flown from New Mexico to Sacramento, California, allegedly without advance preparation for their arrival.

According to the Los Angeles Times, “The 16 migrants from Venezuela and Colombia were initially transported by bus from El Paso to New Mexico, where they boarded the flight to Sacramento, officials said. They were dropped off at the doorstep of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Sacramento on Friday.”

California Attorney General Rob Bonta issued a statement on Saturday accusing the state government of Florida of being behind the transfer of the migrants, who initially crossed the U.S. border in Texas.

Millions of migrants have crossed the border, many illegally, since President Joe Biden has taken office. Texas has a policy of relocating some migrants to other states and cities, often “sanctuary cities” run by Democrats.

Florida, too, has relocated migrants who were initially sent to the state. Last fall, DeSantis sent a planeload of migrants to Martha’s Vineyard, the offshore haven where the members of the Democratic Party elite have homes. The island, unable to accommodate the migrants despite the proliferation of political signs welcoming immigrants to the country, relocated the migrants to a shelter on a mainland military base within 24 hours.

Newsom, who spends a great deal of his time on social media trolling conservative governors, especially DeSantis, accused DeSantis of kidnapping on Monday, though there is no evidence DeSantis was involved:

Newsom, who left his state for a vacation in Mexico during deadly blizzards earlier this year winter, did not address the underlying migrant issue, or California’s generous welfare policies toward illegal migrants.

The Times notes that California authorities have yet to release documents proving that Florida was involved; the migrants never entered Florida.

Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of the new biography, Rhoda: ‘Comrade Kadalie, You Are Out of Order’. He is also the author of the recent e-book, Neither Free nor Fair: The 2020 U.S. Presidential Election. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.

California State Senate Passes Bill to Give Illegal Migrants Unemployment Checks

California unemployment (Marcio Jose Sanchez / Associated Press)
Marcio Jose Sanchez / Associated Press

California’s State Senate passed a bill last week to give unemployed illegal migrants $300 weekly unemployment checks for up to 20 weeks, despite the fact that the state faces a $32 billion budget deficit.

As Breitbart News reported last month:

California’s fiscus has fallen in the space of one year from a surplus of $100 billion, partly based on federal cash for coronavirus relief, to a staggering deficit of $32 billion.

In his revised budget, Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) cautioned legislators to maintain “prudence.” But under SB 227, “excluded” workers who are in the country illegally would be able to receive $300 per week in benefits.

California’s unemployment insurance program is already controversial, having lost $30 billion in fraudulent claims during the pandemic. The state recently defaulted on a federal loan to cover a shortfall in benefits.

Now, the Washington Free Beacon reports, the bill, SB 227, proposed by State Sen. María Elena Durazo (D-Agoura Hills), has passed the State Senate and moves to the Assembly, with heavy potential implications:

Under SB 227, unemployment fund officials would be barred from asking for claimants’ social security number eligibility or contacting past or present employers to verify their job status. Instead, applicants would self-attest that they meet the requirements for the weekly checks: having earned at least $1,300 or worked at least 93 hours over three months. Acceptable documentation would include tax returns, transaction logs on payment apps, and receipts that show a commuting pattern.

The State Senate passed the measure just months after Gov. Gavin Newsom (D.) said the undocumented migrant influx could “break” California.

The Golden State already offers free health coverage and driver’s licenses to illegal immigrants. More than two million illegal immigrants live in California.

Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of the new biography, Rhoda: ‘Comrade Kadalie, You Are Out of Order’. He is also the author of the recent e-book, Neither Free nor Fair: The 2020 U.S. Presidential Election. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.


Dem Rep. Chu: We Need to Repeal Work Requirements in Debt Bill and Have More Immigration to Deal with Worker Shortage

On Tuesday’s broadcast of C-SPAN’s “Washington Journal,” Rep. Judy Chu (D-CA) stated that the U.S. needs more immigration to deal with a shortage of workers and that she hopes the increased work requirements for SNAP benefits in the debt limit bill should be repealed.

Chu said, “I’m a co-sponsor of the farm worker modernization bill. Agriculture’s really hurting because they need the workers to be able to pick those crops. And they are constantly asking for a way to have a steady stream of workers that will do that that they can rely on. But I want to tell you that, just this past week, I visited Texas Instruments and Texas Instruments is doing a magnificent job [of] bringing the semiconductor business here to the level that it should be. … But what they told me is that they don’t have enough workers there who can produce those semiconductors. We need skilled people in engineering and so forth in the STEM professions that can do that. And they said that we in the United States have not invested in STEM education over the last decade. We can do it, but it’ll take a while to ramp up. And what we need [is] to be able to be welcoming to the people around the world who want to come here, they want to come and work here. We need to make sure that we can get them here so that we can get industries like semiconductors, the semiconductor industry to the place where it can be, so that we can make America the leader in innovation and technology.”

She added, “[B]elieve me, the food stamps — what we call SNAP now — what it provides is not an extravagant amount of food. We’re talking about two dollars a day. And I challenge a lot of people to live on that, but it is enough so that at least people can eat. So, that’s why I was so upset about raising the age level for those who would get the SNAP benefits, the food benefits from 49 to 54, and I think that should not have been done. I hope that one day we can return it back to what it was.”

Follow Ian Hanchett on Twitter @IanHanchett

BUILDING THE ONE-PARY SYSTEM TO SERVE BANKSTERS AND BILLIONAIRES FOR OPEN BORDERS

WHO WILL JOE BIDEN'S ILLEGALS VOTE FOR???   

Mexican President Tells U.S. Hispanics Not to Vote for DeSantis

GUATEMALA CITY, GUATEMALA - MAY 05: President of Mexico Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador delivers a speech during a Latin-American tour for migration development talks on May 05, 2022 in Guatemala City, Guatemala. (Photo by Josue Decavele/Getty Images)
Josue Decavele/Getty Images

Mexico’s President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador is asking Hispanics in Florida not to vote for Ron DeSantis in his bid for the 2024 presidential nomination. The Mexican politician claims that DeSantis, much like other Republicans, is using an anti-immigrant message for political purposes.

Despite his constant criticism of the U.S. government for interfering in other countries’ politics, Lopez Obrador (AMLO) openly called for Hispanics in Florida to not give a single vote to DeSantis.

“I’ll take the time to tell Mr. Santi [sic] who unmasked himself [this week], see I wasn’t wrong,” Lopez Obrador said as he waved his hand in a greeting fashion. “That all of his politicking about migrants was because he wants to be the candidate for the Republican Party.

The Mexican President criticized DeSantis claiming that he had applied anti-migrant policies in his state and as such he hoped that Hispanics repaid him at the polls.

“I hope the Hispanics in Florida wake up and don’t give him a single vote,” Lopez Obrador said. “That they don’t vote for those who target migrants. Those who don’t respect migrants.”

Lopez Obrador called DeSantis a hypocrite and asked for him to be investigated to see if he had hired migrants.

DeSantis, like various other U.S. politicians, have fiercely criticized Mexico’s government in connection with the current fentanyl crisis. The extremely dangerous drug is linked to record-setting overdose deaths. As Breitbart Texas has reported, Lopez Obrador falsely denied that fentanyl is produced in Mexico and claimed that the problem is caused by the U.S. demand for drugs. AMLO claimed that Florida should be investigated to see if the ports of that state could be the entry point for fentanyl from Asia.

As Breitbart Texas has reported, Lopez Obrador verbally clashed with U.S. politicians who he believes are interfering in Mexican politics. He has also stated that he will be asking people to not vote for certain candidates that do not align with his view.

Ildefonso Ortiz is an award-winning journalist with Breitbart Texas. He co-founded Breitbart Texas’ Cartel Chronicles project with Brandon Darby and senior Breitbart management. You can follow him on Twitter and on Facebook. He can be contacted at Iortiz@breitbart.com

Brandon Darby is the managing director and editor-in-chief of Breitbart Texas. He co-founded Breitbart Texas’ Cartel Chronicles project with Ildefonso Ortiz and senior Breitbart management. Follow him on Twitter and Facebook. He can be contacted at bdarby@breitbart.com.   


190 Pounds of Fentanyl Seized at Arizona Immigration Checkpoint

A Border Patrol K-9 finds 192 pounds of fentanyl at the Interstate 8 immigration checkpoint. (U.S. Border Patrol/Yuma Sector)
U.S. Border Patrol/Yuma Sector

Yuma Sector Border Patrol agents seized more than 190 pounds of fentanyl at an interior immigration checkpoint.

Retiring U.S. Border Patrol Chief Raul Ortiz tweeted photos from an immigration checkpoint near Yuma, Arizona. The images, taken last week, show more than 190 pounds hidden behind the rear seats of the alleged smuggler’s vehicle.

As the vehicle approached the Interstate 8 immigration checkpoint on May 30, a Border Patrol K-9 alerted to the possible presence of drugs in the pickup truck. A physical search of the vehicle led to the discovery of plastic-wrapped packages of drugs.

Chief Ortiz reported that the 190 pounds of fentanyl are enough to provide more than 40 million lethal doses.

Yuma Sector Chief Patrol Agent Patricia McGurk-Daniel reported the value of the drugs to be more than $2 million.

A few days later, Arizona Department of Public Safety troopers seized more than 229 pounds of fentanyl pills. The troopers found the drugs during a traffic stop on Interstate 19 near Amado, Arizona.

Border Patrol Agent Fidel Cabrera told KYMA, “It’s one of the largest if not the largest [fentanyl seizure] we’ve had here in Yuma.”

Between October 1, 2022, and April 30, 2023, Yuma Sector agents apprehended 289 pounds of fentanyl, according to a CBP report. This seven-month total nearly equals the total seizures of fentanyl for the past three years combined. Adding in the seizure above brings this year’s total to approximately 480 pounds compared to 336 pounds for the prior three years combined. The seizure by Arizona DPS cited above will not be included in the CBP reports.

Agents in the San Diego Sector also seized 112 pounds of fentanyl pills on Interstate 8 near Pine Valley, California, on May 18, Breitbart Texas reported. During FY23, San Diego Sector agents seized 866 pounds of fentanyl through the end of April, the CBP report states. During the same period last year, agents seized nearly 420 pounds of the deadly drug.

Bob Price serves as associate editor and senior news contributor for the Breitbart Texas-Border team. He is an original member of the Breitbart Texas team. Price is a regular panelist on Fox 26 Houston’s What’s Your Point? Sunday-morning talk show. Follow him on Twitter @BobPriceBBTX.


112 Pounds of Fentanyl Seized near Border in California

Campo Station Border Patrol agents seized 112 pounds of fentanyl pills near Pine Valley, California. (U.S. Border Patrol/San Diego Sector)
U.S. Border Patrol/San Diego Sector

San Diego Sector Border Patrol agents seized approximately 112 pounds of fentanyl. The seizure followed a traffic stop on Interstate 8 near the Pine Valley checkpoint on May 18.

San Diego Sector Chief Patrol Agent Aaron M. Heitke tweeted photos of bundles of blue fentanyl pills seized by Campo Station agents near the Interstate 8 checkpoint. The fentanyl weighed approximately 112 pounds.

Campo Station agents conducted an immigration inspection traffic stop on Interstate 8 near Pine Valley, California, on May 18, according to a statement from Border Patrol officials. During the stop, a Border Patrol K-9 team conducted a walk-around search of the vehicle. The K-9 alerted to the possible presence of drugs in the SUV.

The agents transported the driver, a U.S. citizen, and the vehicle to the nearby immigration checkpoint for a physical search of the vehicle. During the search, the agents found nine plastic-wrapped packages containing blue pills.

The pills tested positive for fentanyl, officials stated. Agents determined the weight of the pills to be 112 pounds with an estimated street value of more than $1.5 million.

The agents turned the driver over to the San Diego County Sheriff’s Department. The Drug Enforcement Administration took possession of the fentanyl pills.

“Transnational criminal organizations do everything they can to distribute these harmful narcotics and earn their profits with no regard for the destructive effects they have on our communities,” San Diego Sector Chief Patrol Agent Aaron M. Heitke said in a written statement. “Our Border Patrol agents remain vigilant, day and night, to intercept these poisons and the smugglers who transport them.”

Bob Price serves as associate editor and senior news contributor for the Breitbart Texas-Border team. He is an original member of the Breitbart Texas team. Price is a regular panelist on Fox 26 Houston’s What’s Your Point? Sunday-morning talk show. Follow him on Twitter @BobPriceBBTX.

Armed Cartel Gunmen Arrested in Texas near Border, Says DPS

Texas law enforcement find a group of armed migrants believed to be members of the Cartel Del Noreste faction of Los Zetas. (Texas Department of Public Safety)
Texas Department of Public Safety

Department of Public Safety troopers working the border region near Fronton, Texas, encountered a group of armed migrants. The troopers seized two tactical rifles found in the possession of the migrants.

DPS spokesman Lt. Chris Olivarez told Breitbart Texas that troopers and National Guard soldiers working the border under Governor Greg Abbott’s Operation Lone Star border security mission, apprehended a group of five migrants last week — two were armed with AR-15-style rifles.

Texas law enforcement teams working the border near Fronton search the brush after finding a group of armed men believed to be cartel members. (Texas Department of Public Safety)

Texas law enforcement teams working the border near Fronton search the brush after finding a group of armed men believed to be cartel members. (Texas Department of Public Safety)

The men are believed to be connected to the Cartel Del Noreste faction of Los Zetas, Olivarez stated. “One of the men told CID special agents they came under fire from Mexican law enforcement and fled across the Rio Grande,” Olivarez stated. All of the men were found wearing camouflage making the search to find them more difficult.

Border Patrol agents from the Laredo Sector and Texas law enforcement conducted a search of the area where the first group was found. During the search, the team found two more migrants — both juveniles. Law enforcement sources said the juveniles looked afraid from what they had encountered on the Mexican side of the river.

A search of the area where suspected armed cartle members were found led to the discovery of two juveniles. (Texas Department of Public Safety)

A search of the area where suspected armed cartel members were found led to the discovery of two juveniles. (Texas Department of Public Safety)

Olivarez said this is a prime example of the consequences of an unsecured border. These include threats to national security and public safety.

Bob Price serves as associate editor and senior news contributor for the Breitbart Texas-Border team. He is an original member of the Breitbart Texas team. Price is a regular panelist on Fox 26 Houston’s What’s Your Point? Sunday-morning talk show. Follow him on Twitter @BobPriceBBTX.


Migration — and especially, labor migration — is unpopular among swing voters. A 54 percent majority of Americans say Biden is allowing a southern border invasion, according to an August 2022 poll commissioned by the left-of-center National Public Radio (NPR). The 54 percent “Invasion” majority included 76 percent of Republicans, 46 percent of independents, and even 40 percent of Democrats.


Biden hides the truth at the border — he’s letting in thousands
By Mark Krikorian
New York Post, May 31, 2023
Excerpt: But as in so many other areas of government policy, Biden’s Department of Homeland Security is set on brazenly violating the immigration law and the Constitution until somebody stops it.

AMLO and Biden: Agents of Immigration Chaos
By Phillip Linderman
American Conservative, May 26, 2023
Excerpt: As Biden’s initiative played out over months, President Lopez Obrador, for once, issued no protest, apparently as oblivious as his American counterpart to the looming unintended consequences. Blinded by his own open-border ideology, the stubborn AMLO seems never to have analyzed the impact of Washington’s unilateral migrant policies on Mexico’s national sovereignty. Much more subtle than previous Yanqui strong-arm tactics, President Biden was nevertheless blithely unleashing powerful outside forces that would trample Mexico
.

The Atlantic Magazine: The Feds Use Migration to Cut Wages

Migrants wait for U.S. authorities, between a barbed-wire barrier and the border fence at the US-Mexico border, as seen from Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, Wednesday, May 10, 2023. The U.S. on May 11 began to deny asylum to migrants who show up at the U.S.-Mexico border without first applying online or …
AP Photo/Christian Chavez

The federal government uses immigration to suppress Americans’ salaries and wages, according to an article in the Atlantic, which is a very pro-migration and establishment magazine.

The federal policymakers believe that “labor is just another commodity, like wood or oil, and Americans are best off when it is plentiful and cheap,” the June 2 article says.

Author Oren Cass, the founder of the mainstream American Compass think-tank, wrote:

American public policy has largely managed to keep things that way. Over the past 50 years, as both parties supported the entry of millions of unskilled immigrants and the offshoring of entire industries, America’s per capita gross domestic product more than doubled after adjusting for inflation. Productivity of labor rose by a similar amount, and corporate profits per capita nearly tripled. Yet over the same time period, the average inflation-adjusted hourly earnings of the typical worker rose by less than 1 percent.

The massive distortion is revealed by the declining share of new wealth that goes to employees since about 1970.

Amid migration, technological centralization, and outsourcing to China, U.S. employees’ share of new wealth dropped 10 points from 1970 to 2014 — from 51.6 percent to 41.9 percent — according to the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis.

Employees’ share jumped 1 point up under President Donald Trump’s lower-migration policy. But their share seems to be declining again under President Joe Biden’s easy migration rules.

A May 4 report from Cass’ American Compass showed how migration allows investors to minimize pay to workers:

From 1972 to 2022, real corporate profits per capita rose 185%. GDP per capita rose 141%. Productivity rose 135%. The average hourly wage for production and nonsupervisory workers rose 1%. How is that even possible?

It is possible because employers will tend to raise wages under one, and only one, condition: when they cannot hire the workers they need at the existing wage. All of labor economics turns on that simple fact.

This post-1970 economic shift has moved many trillions of dollars from wage earners to investors from 1970 to 2023, thrilling investors and their allies.

The establishment’s cheap-labor bubble burst in 2020 when the coronavirus crash blocked the supply of new migrant workers. The resulting shortfall allowed many Americans to change jobs in search of higher wages.

Cass wrote:

In the coronavirus pandemic’s aftermath, for the first time in a long time, many employers are discovering that they can’t fill jobs at the low wages they’re accustomed to offering. “We hear from businesses every day that the worker shortage is their top challenge,” Neil Bradley, chief policy officer at U.S. Chamber of Commerce, said last May. This is the precise circumstance under which wages might finally rise. Instead, the business community is looking to government to get them out of a jam, and leaders on both sides of the aisle seem only too eager to help.

The article carried an online headline, “A Labor Shortage is a Great Problem to Have.”

WATCH: Rep. Lee: “No Border Security Bill Until GOP OKs Even More Migrants”:

@USHouseJudiciaryGOP / YouTube

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But now President Joe Biden and his deputies are dramatically opening the inflow of foreign workers via legal, quasi-legal, and illegal migration routes.

“Immigration is a [policy] lever,” Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo told Axios.com in December 2022.  “We’re down a million immigrants a year — that’s a workforce that we need.”

“There are businesses around this country that are desperate for workers [and] there are … desperate workers in foreign countries that are looking for jobs in the United States, ” Biden’s border chief, Alejandro Mayorkas, said on May 11.

“We’re working with the State Department on and DHS [Department of Homeland Security] … to make it easier for [college-graduate migrants] that have these skill sets that we think can really contribute to implementing these new policies, that we can bring them in faster,” White House official Katie Tobin said on May 15.

Cass continued:

This is a grave mistake—politically, economically, and morally. If employers are struggling to find workers, they should offer better pay and conditions. If that comes at the expense of some profits, or requires some prices to rise, well, that’s how markets are supposed to work. In most other contexts, capitalism’s proponents celebrate how the market creates incentives for businesses to solve problems. In that respect, a labor shortage is a great problem to have. Only by challenging employers to improve job quality and boost productivity will we find out what the market’s awesome power can achieve for American workers and their families.

Cass, however, did not offer a term to describe the federal government’s policy of lowering wages via migration.

WATCH: GOP Rep. Hunt — Democrats’ Migration Pushes Americans into Poverty:

@USHouseJudiciaryGOP / YouTube

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Extraction Migration

The federal government has long operated an unpopular economic policy of Extraction Migration. This colonialism-like policy extracts vast amounts of human resources from needy countries, reduces beneficial trade, and uses the imported workers, renters, and consumers to grow Wall Street and the economy.

The migrant inflow has successfully forced down Americans’ wages and also boosted rents and housing prices. The inflow has also pushed many native-born Americans out of careers in a wide variety of business sectors and contributed to the rising death rate of poor Americans.

The lethal policy also sucks jobs and wealth from heartland states by subsidizing coastal investors with a flood of low-wage workers, high-occupancy renters, and government-aided consumers.

The population inflow also reduces the political clout of native-born Americans, because the population replacement allows elites to divorce themselves from the needs and interests of ordinary Americans.

Migration — and especially, labor migration — is unpopular among swing voters. A 54 percent majority of Americans say Biden is allowing a southern border invasion, according to an August 2022 poll commissioned by the left-of-center National Public Radio (NPR). The 54 percent “Invasion” majority included 76 percent of Republicans, 46 percent of independents, and even 40 percent of Democrats.


WAR ON THE AMERICAN WORKER FOR CHEAPER WAGES. IS THAT WHAT HAPPENED TO THE AMERICAN MIDDLE CLASS? 

U.S. Companies Plan over 400K Layoffs as Democrats Claim Business Needs More Foreign Workers to Hire

We are Closing, thanks for your support and business after 35 years, sign posted in small business door, Queens, New York . (Photo by: Lindsey Nicholson/UCG/Universal Images Group via Getty Images)
Lindsey Nicholson/UCG/Universal Images Group via Getty Images

Companies in the United States have announced, so far this year, more than 400,000 layoffs — more than the layoffs announced in all of last year. The job cuts come as Democrats, on behalf of business special interests, demand more foreign competition in the labor market for employers to hire.

The employment data, collected by Challenger, Gray & Christmas Inc. and published in Bloomberg, shows that roughly 417,500 layoffs have been announced from January through May by U.S. companies across sectors such as technology, banking, retail, and media, among others.

Compare those announced layoffs in just the first five months of this year to the 364,000 total layoffs announced in all of 2022. In tech, there have been almost 140,000 layoffs announced this year so far. This is only slightly fewer than the 169,000 layoffs in tech in 2001.

“Companies cited economic conditions and cost-cutting for more than half of the layoffs announced this year,” Bloomberg noted.

RELATED: GOP Rep. Hunt: Democrats’ Migration Pushes Americans into Poverty:

@USHouseJudiciaryGOP / YouTube
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At the same time, Democrats across the U.S. have suggested that business special interests complain about so-called labor shortages and thus the tens of thousands of border crossers and illegal aliens that President Joe Biden’s administration is admitting into the nation every month ought to be given immediate work permits.e email you provide. You may unsubscribe at any time.

“We have one message, let them work,” New York City Mayor Eric Adams (D) told the Biden administration last month of the thousands of migrants who have arrived in the city since last year. “That is our clear message that we are sending. We must expedite work authorization for asylum seekers, not in the future, but now.”

Migrants camp out in front of the Watson Hotel after being evicted on January 30, 2023 in New York City. Migrants who have been staying at the Watson Hotel since arriving to NYC were evicted over the weekend to be relocated to the recently opened up migrant relief center for single adult men at the Brooklyn Cruise Terminal. The ones who refused have been camping out in front of the hotel since eviction. Several migrants who agreed to the relocation returned, complaining of lack of heat and bathroom space. (Leonardo Munoz/VIEWpress via Getty Images)

New York Gov. Kathy Hochul has issued similar sentiments.

“… at the same time, we have this historic labor shortage, we also have this unprecedented influx of individuals arriving in New York — all of them legally seeking asylum,” Hochul said. “They’re eager to work, they want to work, they came here in search of work.”

WATCH: “Gyms Are for Children!” NY Parents Protest Plans to Use Public Schools for Migrant Shelters:

Christopher Leon Johnson via Storyful
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In Washington, DC, Democrats recently repeated many of the same talking points from the Business Roundtable and U.S. Chamber of Commerce used to demand an endless flow of foreign workers whom jobless Americans would be forced to compete against.

“We’re ignoring the Business Roundtables of America who are crying out for employees to work alongside Americans,” Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee (D-TX) said during a committee hearing last month. “Let me be very clear, we have jobs for Americans, we have tech jobs for Americans, teaching jobs for Americans, law enforcement, firefighter jobs for Americans, but we’re a growing nation.”

As Breitbart News has chronicled, Biden has grown the U.S. payrolls by adding millions of foreign-born workers to the labor market while the share of native-born Americans in the labor market has continued to decline.

WATCH: Rep. Lee: No Border Security Bill Until GOP OKs Even More Migrants:

@USHouseJudiciaryGOP / YouTube
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John Binder is a reporter for Breitbart News. Email him at jbinder@breitbart.com. Follow him on Twitter here.

California State Senate Passes Bill to Give Illegal Migrants Unemployment Checks

California unemployment (Marcio Jose Sanchez / Associated Press)
Marcio Jose Sanchez / Associated Press

California’s State Senate passed a bill last week to give unemployed illegal migrants $300 weekly unemployment checks for up to 20 weeks, despite the fact that the state faces a $32 billion budget deficit.

As Breitbart News reported last month:

California’s fiscus has fallen in the space of one year from a surplus of $100 billion, partly based on federal cash for coronavirus relief, to a staggering deficit of $32 billion.

In his revised budget, Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) cautioned legislators to maintain “prudence.” But under SB 227, “excluded” workers who are in the country illegally would be able to receive $300 per week in benefits.

California’s unemployment insurance program is already controversial, having lost $30 billion in fraudulent claims during the pandemic. The state recently defaulted on a federal loan to cover a shortfall in benefits.

Now, the Washington Free Beacon reports, the bill, SB 227, proposed by State Sen. María Elena Durazo (D-Agoura Hills), has passed the State Senate and moves to the Assembly, with heavy potential implications:

Under SB 227, unemployment fund officials would be barred from asking for claimants’ social security number eligibility or contacting past or present employers to verify their job status. Instead, applicants would self-attest that they meet the requirements for the weekly checks: having earned at least $1,300 or worked at least 93 hours over three months. Acceptable documentation would include tax returns, transaction logs on payment apps, and receipts that show a commuting pattern.

The State Senate passed the measure just months after Gov. Gavin Newsom (D.) said the undocumented migrant influx could “break” California.

The Golden State already offers free health coverage and driver’s licenses to illegal immigrants. More than two million illegal immigrants live in California.

Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of the new biography, Rhoda: ‘Comrade Kadalie, You Are Out of Order’. He is also the author of the recent e-book, Neither Free nor Fair: The 2020 U.S. Presidential Election. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.

Multimillionaire Disney-Marvel Star Mark Ruffalo Roasted for Call to Tax Billionaires at 90 Percent

NEW YORK, NEW YORK - NOVEMBER 29: Mark Ruffalo speaks onstage during the 2021 Gotham Awards Presented By The Gotham Film & Media Institute on November 29, 2021 in New York City. (Photo by Jemal Countess/Getty Images for The Gotham Film & Media Institute)
Jemal Countess/Getty Images for The Gotham Film & Media Institute

Left-wing Disney-Marvel star Mark Ruffalo has taken a beating on social media after he issued a call to tax billionaires at 90 percent. In a Twitter post on Saturday, Ruffalo, best known for his role as Hulk/Bruce Banner in the Avengers series, shared an article from the far-left outlet Daily Kos that called to tax billionaires at 90 percent.

“When you tax billionaires at 90 percent, they’re still fabulously rich and you have the resources to rebuild a healthy and happy middle class across the nation,” Ruffalo quoted the article in his post.

The article essentially argued that America became a dystopia ever since the Republican-led “roaring 20s” when the tax rates fell.

“The last time we saw the consequences of such inequality was during the Republican ‘Roaring ‘20s’ 100 years ago, when Warren Harding dropped the top income tax rate from 91 percent to 25 percent, the morbidly rich openly bought our politicians, and gangs whose names are still known today roamed the country robbing and killing with impunity,” the article argued.

“Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal put an end to all that, and we need to repeat his example today,” it added. “FDR raised the top income tax bracket from 25 to 90 percent. Wealthy people in America screamed and yelled, claiming it would crash the economy, but instead that top tax rate kicked off the first middle class to encompass more than half a nation’s population in world history.”

Questions over FDR’s New Deal policies and whether or not they prolonged or solved the Great Depression has been a subject of intense debate for years, with Republicans often charging that FDRs policies not only did nothing to solve the Depression but actually made it worse.

Nonetheless, since Mark Ruffalo boasts a net worth of roughly $35 million, his critics on Twitter quickly pointed out that he should be the first to jump down the 90 percent tax hole.

Paul Roland Bois joined Breitbart News in 2021. He also directed the award-winning feature film, EXEMPLUM, which can be viewed on TubiGoogle PlayYouTube Movies, or Vimeo on Demand. Follow him on Twitter @prolandfilms or Instagram @prolandfilms.


Are You Prepared For The Economic Fallout? - Gerald Celente



Confidence lags (again) in Biden's economy