Category: Migration, Refugees, and Asylum

What stops a migrant from identifying as Venezuelan?

by philg

“One Day on the Border: 8,900 Migrants Arrested, and More on the Way” (New York Times, yesterday):

They come from Brazil, Burkina Faso, Uzbekistan, India and dozens of other countries, a moving global village of hundreds of thousands of people crossing the Rio Grande and slipping through gaps in the border wall at a pace of nearly 9,000 people a day, one of the highest rates of unlawful crossings in months.

(“unlawful”? If they claim asylum as soon as they’re in the U.S., isn’t that “lawful”?)

Driven by desperation, families and individuals are pushing across the southern border and past new efforts by the Biden administration to keep migrants waiting until they secure hard-to-get appointments to enter the nation with permission.

They’re not being pulled in by New York and Maskachusetts promising free housing, health care, and food forever, but being driven from someone else.

“If you don’t take risks, you cannot win,” said Daniel Soto, 35, who crossed with his mother on Tuesday after they sold their car, restaurant and house in Lima, Peru, betting their entire fortune of $25,000 on a weeklong journey to the border near Tijuana.

The Newspaper of Truth says that other people are lying…

Many also believe false claims from smugglers and social media that migrants would definitely be able to remain in the United States if they could make it in.

It is absolutely false, in other words, that migrants can remain in the U.S. (except for the 500,000-ish Venezuelans who were recently granted permanent temporary status by a magnanimous Joe Biden). What’s the truth, according to the NYT?

…. others file asylum claims when they face deportation in immigration court, and are allowed to remain in the United States while they wait for their cases to wind through immigration court, a process that can take years. … Some people will not show up for their court proceedings, and continue to live and work in the United States along with millions of other undocumented immigrants. … Some migrants who arrive using the government app are eligible for permission to stay in the country and work for two years, but may still eventually be ordered deported.

“It will work out,” said Diego Santos, a 23-year-old Brazilian who was heading to Philadelphia after being released by border authorities in San Diego. Ahead of him lay the hope of construction work, but also deportation proceedings that he now has to fight. “I’ll do what I can to stay,” he said.

It is false when smugglers say that migrants can “remain” in the U.S. It is true that migrants can “stay” in the U.S., according to the NYT.

Let’s take Mr. Soto, the middle-class Peruvian described above who sold his car, restaurant, and house in order to enjoy the means-tested taxpayer-funded U.S. lifestyle. Suppose that La Migra tries to deport him. What stops him from saying “I am from Venezuela” and, thus, becoming entitled to stay in the U.S. for the rest of his life? If he’s undocumented then the U.S. by definition can’t demand documents from him to prove his Venezuelan origin. If an extremely sophisticated government employee recognizes a Peruvian accent, can’t Mr. Soto say “I am Venezuelan, but spent 10 years as an undocumented immigrant in Peru and picked up a Peruvian accent.”

Separately, note that Peru follows the U.S. state religion. From the government tourism web site, in which the rainbow flag hangs at equal size and height with the national flag of Peru:

(The rainbow flag reminds me to wish everyone a happy Celebrate Bisexuality Day. See also NBC and Planned Parenthood.)

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When will there be more Venezuelans in the U.S. than in Venezuela?

by philg

More Irish people live in the U.S. than in Ireland (31+ million says the US Census, compared to about 7 million in Ireland and Northern Ireland). Joe Biden recently granted permanent temporary status to about 500,000 Venezuelans who walked across the open border in the last couple of years (CNN). Haitians granted temporary status in 2010 still have that status (it gets extended every 18 months) and their U.S.-born children are now nearly old enough to get the parents automatic “chain migration” Green Cards. So let’s assume that the same thing happens with Venezuelans, i.e., temporary status becomes permanent in practice and continues to be expanded to cover later arrivals.

Given the assumptions that the Venezuelans keep accepting our invitation to arrive and, once here, keep creating U.S.-citizen children, how long before there are more Venezuelans here than in Venezuelan?

Population is actually falling in Venezuela right now:

And the Venezuelan population in the U.S. is rising (Pew):

(Note that this may not capture the undocumented since they might not want to answer a lot of questions from a U.S. government Census representative.)

The Pew web page provides numbers through 2021, but migration is rising exponentially and more undocumented Venezuelans arrived in 2022 than in all previous years combined (source):

Perhaps we should assume that migration levels off at 500,000 arrivals per year?

Also from Pew:

6% of U.S. Hispanic females ages 15 to 44 gave birth in the 12 months prior to the July 2021 American Community Survey. The rate for Venezuelan females was also 6%.

(Note the hateful language associating “female” identification with the ability to give birth. This from the same organization that publishes “The Experiences, Challenges and Hopes of Transgender and Nonbinary U.S. Adults” and does “deep explorations of the experiences of LGBT and transgender and nonbinary Americans”.)

It seems reasonable to assume that the declining population of Venezuela levels off at 20 million. Humans have more babies when more resources are available and dividing Venezuela’s resources by a smaller population should result in a birth rate high enough to offset the continued exodus to the U.S.

With that assumption, we can simply try to predict when the Venezuelan-origin population in the U.S. will exceed 20 million. For natural increase, let’s use the 3 percent annual population growth rate that Venezuelans had circa 1980 (it might be larger in the U.S. given our provision of taxpayer-funded housing, food, health care, etc.). In other words, births will exceed deaths and amount to 3 percent of the total (this might not be the best assumption given that the migrant population is younger than average because of the physical rigors of the journey).

It’s tough to estimate a population of the undocumented (Yale study), but let’s assume that we have about 1 million Venezuelans here in the U.S. right now. Our model shows that the Venezuelan-origin population of the U.S. will exceed that of Venezuela in 2048. (If you are preparing to criticize my model for its unsupported assumptions and simplicity, keep in mind that this is in complete accordance with Coronascience! See, for example, Coronascientists are the modern Aristotles?)

YearPopulation SizeMigrantsBirths in excess of deaths
20231,000,000500,00030,000
20241,530,000500,00045,900
20252,075,900500,00062,277
20262,638,177500,00079,145
20273,217,322500,00096,520
20283,813,842500,000114,415
20294,428,257500,000132,848
20305,061,105500,000151,833
20315,712,938500,000171,388
20326,384,326500,000191,530
20337,075,856500,000212,276
20347,788,132500,000233,644
20358,521,776500,000255,653
20369,277,429500,000278,323
203710,055,752500,000301,673
203810,857,424500,000325,723
203911,683,147500,000350,494
204012,533,642500,000376,009
204113,409,651500,000402,290
204214,311,940500,000429,358
204315,241,298500,000457,239
204416,198,537500,000485,956
204517,184,494500,000515,535
204618,200,028500,000546,001
204719,246,029500,000577,381
204820,323,410500,000609,702
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Will Mexican cartels be deplatformed from YouTube and Facebook for spreading misinformation?

by philg

“Unlawful Border Crossings Are Rising Fast After a Brief Decline” (NYT, September 19):

During President Biden’s time in office, the number of illegal crossings has reached notable highs, exceeding levels seen during a prepandemic influx in 2019 during the Trump administration.

The administration said the decline in unlawful crossings in May and June was driven by new enforcement measures and new legal pathways for people to come to the United States.

Officials have attributed increases like these to several factors, including misinformation spread by the Mexican cartels that traffic drugs and smuggle migrants. Shelter workers, advocates and migrants say that some people who have been waiting months to access these legal pathways have grown impatient and are willing to take a risk.

Even as federal officials signal that there are consequences for illegal crossings, migrants who are given permission to stay in the country temporarily often tell family and friends in their home countries that they made it to the U.S. successfully. Such messages can encourage other migrants to take an often dangerous journey to the United States.

After crossing onto U.S. soil, most migrants turn themselves in to Border Patrol agents, with plans to apply for asylum, instead of sneaking into the country and trying to evade detection.

A few questions… The Newspaper of Record (TM) does not provide any examples of the misinformation that Mexican cartels are purportedly spreading. Are the cartels saying that those who cross the border and request asylum will be released and allowed to stay? That’s exactly what New York Times says is happening:

This influx has strained the capacity of many border facilities where migrants are held for processing by the Border Patrol. And Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention centers, where many single adults are sent, are running out of beds. When shelters cannot accommodate migrants, authorities start to release them into communities.

“The Border Patrol essentially is releasing people as they process them to decompress their facilities,” Diego Piña Lopez, director of the Casa Alitas shelter network in Tucson, said. “It is leading to street releases all over the place.”

Is it “misinformation” if what the cartels are saying is true?

Also, if low-skill immigration makes existing Americans better off, why would anyone be upset by an increase in what the NYT calls “illegal crossings” (if it is legal to apply for asylum, how can any crossing be “illegal”?)?

Last year, a record of nearly 250,000 people traversed the Darién Gap, a jungle straddling Colombia and Panama, in an attempt to make it to the United States. This year, despite efforts by the United States to curb the flow, that number has risen to 360,000 as of Sept. 10, according to Panamanian authorities.

Why is the U.S. trying to “curb the flow” if immigration makes us better off or if, alternatively, those who are arriving are entitled to asylum and we continue to offer asylum?

Official stats on the migrants who choose to announce themselves to the CBP:

The last line is interesting. The U.S. was officially closed due to coronapanic and yet nearly half a million new Americans arrived and introduced themselves to the CBP officers (plus an unknown number who quietly migrated). Covidians say that we could have eliminated COVID-19 if every American had done his/her/zir/their duty by wearing a mask, staying home except for trips to the “essential” marijuana and liquor stores, etc. But how would a Zero COVID situation have been sustainable when 50,000+ walked across the border in September 2020? (the Federal fiscal year FY2020 ended in September 2020)

Circling back to the main theme of this blog post… what are Mexican cartels saying? What is the procedure for getting them deplatformed or at least demonetized from YouTube, Facebook, and similar services?

Related:

  • “Biden administration to offer thousands of Venezuelans temporary protections” (Axios, yesterday): The Biden administration plans to offer nearly a half-million Venezuelan nationals temporary permission to live and work in the country legally, the Department of Homeland Security announced Wednesday night. … Venezuelans currently qualify for TPS if they arrived by March 8, 2021.
  • “US again extending temporary protected status for Haitians” (AP): “The Biden administration is allowing eligible Haitian nationals residing in the U.S. to apply for a new 18-month designation for temporary protected status, reversing a Trump administration effort that had sought to end the special consideration. … DHS initially designated Haiti for TPS in January 2010..” (i.e., “temporary” so far has been 13 years)
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It’s a “crisis” when more than 1/500th of the nation’s undocumented migrants settle in New York City

by philg

Back in 2016, approximately 22 million undocumented migrants lived in the U.S. (Yale study, published 2018). Let’s assume that today’s undocumented migrant population is closer to 30 million. From the August 31 New York Times… “As Migrant Crisis Worsens, New York Leaders Pressure Biden to Do More”:

A broad coalition of civic, business and union leaders has come together to apply pressure on Washington to help with the migrant crisis in New York. … Washington has failed to adequately address the migrant crisis that has overwhelmed the city in recent months.

Of the 107,000 migrants who have arrived since last year, almost 60,000 are still in the city’s care. … The city has opened over 200 sites and humanitarian relief centers to house and process the migrants, which officials estimate will cost $5 billion this year, as much as the budgets for the parks, fire and sanitation departments combined.

Mr. Adams said the current flow of migrants could cost $12 billion over three years, exceeding the city’s current fiscal and physical capacity to deal with the crisis…

Adams later elaborated about New York City actually being destroyed (see NYC mayor: Texas governor a “madman” for wanting to send city-destroying migrants away from Texas).

Let’s check some photos from my August 22-23, 2023 trip to Manhattan to see whether NYC is, in fact, being destroyed.

What if the migrants want to relax with some 2SLGBTQQIA+-friendly alcohol? Note the “Bud Light” at the top left of the “Open For All” rainbow neon sign.

Perhaps they prefer healing cannabis? New (“essential”) marijuana stores are opening in every neighborhood:

What about COVID? It does not make sense to move out of the crowded city when one can instead don a mask. At the Union Square Greenmarket:

What would you see if you were brave enough to enter the subway?

On any journey into the subway, we are reminded that Pfizer is taking care of us. From Grand Central Station:

Do you want to learn about the “beautiful complexities of the LGBTQIA+ experience”? A Manhattan sidewalk is the place to do it.

(It was a hater from out of town who wrote “all lie” on the sign about the three local queer artists?)

NYC still has plenty of garbage:

My friend who lives in Lower Manhattan attributes a spike in the rodent population to the “rat hotels” that restaurants have built in the street, each one raised up just enough to provide a cozy condo for multiple rat families. Good luck seeing whether a car is coming:

Note that the rat hotel’s floor is flush with the sidewalk:

Rats can also live in the middle of the street:

(See “‘Rat tours’ boom in rodent-infested New York” (the Guardian, 9/4): “sightings doubled last year”)

My departure from Teterboro was marred by a horrifying scene of inequality:

Related:

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Should Danelo Cavalcante be awarded Migrant of the Year?

by philg

According to the economic logic used by enthusiasts for low-skill immigration, even the lowest skill migrant makes Americans richer because he/she/ze/they causes some sort of bump in economic activity, thus increasing the aggregate GDP.

I wonder if Danilo/Danelo Cavalcante should win Migrant of the Year 2023. By escaping from a Pennsylvania Prison, he is responsible for at least 500 police officers receiving two weeks of overtime pay (timeline). He’s 34 and has been sentenced to life in prison, so that will boost the U.S. economy by at least $50,000 per year for the next 50 years or so (see “Pa. spends over $40k a year per inmate.” but remember that the $42,727 per year number is in pre-Biden dollars).

CNN:

The dramatic encounter with Cavalcante, involving a helicopter, a lightning storm, a police dog and more than 20 tactical officers, led to his capture around 8 a.m. Wednesday morning, authorities said.

So the migrant can also take credit for some Jet A sales and the overhaul reserve for what was very likely a $3-6 million Eurocopter (helping the French and German economies too!).

Why is the U.S. criminal justice system so interested in this Migrant of the Year?

According to prosecutors, he stabbed Brandão 38 times in front of her two young children in Pennsylvania in April 2021. He was arrested several hours later in Virginia, and authorities said he was attempting to flee to Mexico and intended to later head to Brazil, his native country.

In addition, Cavalcante is also wanted in a 2017 homicide case in Brazil, a US Marshals Service official has said.

Note that nearby Philadelphia has more than one murder every day, but nobody seems to care or at least not enough to take appropriate emergency action.

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New Yorkers buy child care for migrants, then are surprised they can’t buy it for themselves

by philg

With some combination of federal, state, and city tax dollars, New Yorkers are buying child care for migrants. From https://www.nyc.gov/content/getstuffdone/pages/promise-nyc :

This page is a little confusing. It says “the program will help newly arrived asylum seekers.” But newly arrived asylum-seekers are not legally able to work in the U.S. (nytimes). Why aren’t migrants able to take care of their own children if they’re not at work?

After paying federal, state, and city income tax to fund this and other social justice programs, how much do working New Yorkers have left over for their own kids’ care? Not enough, says the NYT… “How Soaring Child Care Costs Are Crushing New Yorkers”:

All but the wealthiest New Yorkers — even the upper middle class and especially mothers — are scrambling to afford care that will allow them to keep their jobs.

A New York City family would have to make more than $300,000 a year to meet the federal standard for affordability — which recommends that child care take up no more than 7 percent of total household income — to pay for just one young child’s care. In reality, a typical city family is spending over a quarter of their income to pay for that care…

What solution does Science offer? What’s not affordable on an individual basis will become inexpensive as soon as it is 100-percent government-funded:

But experts say that none of those efforts have tackled the core issue of extremely low wages for child care employees. Beyond raising pay rates, they said, the city and state could fully fund child care for 3-year-olds, ensure that providers are paid on time and give them more training,

Separately, at a party in Norwalk, Connecticut last month I learned about a consultant paid by NYC parents to help get their kids into the selective preschools (a child who gets into the right preschool is set up to get into the elite elementary school and that sets him/her/zir/them up to get into the elite high school and that, plus a compelling essay on comparative victimhood, sets the child up to get into an elite college). She earns over $1 million per year.

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Migrants in Maskachusetts want to work…

by philg

… but they can’t cook for themselves.

“As Migrants Are Placed Around Massachusetts, Towns Are Welcoming but Worried” (New York Times, today):

The mayor of Woburn, where hotels are housing 150 migrant families, said the state’s 40-year-old right-to-shelter law “was not meant to cover what we’re seeing now.”

[photo caption: Volunteers [in a church] cooked for Haitian migrant families in need of food at the United Methodist Church in Woburn, Mass.]

On Aug. 31, [Governor] Healey authorized more than 200 National Guard members to assist the more than 2,500 families living in hotels, a step meant to address a shortage of social service agencies to help incoming migrants.

… the volunteers … chafed with frustration when meals for the families arrived late from a state-contracted company

Translating for several adults, including his father, the teenager said their most pressing concern was how to swiftly become authorized to work. Current rules delay asylum seekers’ ability to work legally; Ms. Healey and elected officials in other states have increased pressure on the federal government to revise those policies.

The migrants have skills that would delight any employer and they desperately want to work. In fact, they hate to be idle. They were so busy learning calculus, physics, and engineering before they crossed the border that they never learned how to cook, which is why untrained volunteers and/or state contractors must cook and serve?

From the same article:

In Massachusetts, the only state with a right-to-shelter law that guarantees every family with children a place to stay, the crisis has been accelerating, with more than 80 cities and towns receiving migrants to date. … Officials estimate that as many as half of currently sheltered families are recently arrived migrants from other countries; most have come from Haiti, drawn by word of mouth and the pull of the state’s well-established Haitian community.

According to the NYT, the guarantee of free housing forever is not what has drawn migrants in.

Separately, on August 8, 2023, “Declaring a state of emergency, Gov. Maura Healey asks residents to host immigrant families as shelter system reaches capacity” (Berkshire Eagle). Friends who still live in Lincoln, Massachusetts, a town that is rich in “No Human is Illegal” signs in front of large single-family houses, report that they’re not aware of anyone in the town hosting an immigrant.

How long did Maskachusetts go without being in a state of emergency? Based on “the Healey-Driscoll Administration announced that the state’s COVID-19 public health emergency will end on May 11, 2023” (source), it looks like there was a three-month gap between emergencies.

Who’s paying for the owners of hotels and government contractors in Massachusetts to be enriched by the bonanza of undocumented immigrants? According to state-sponsored media, federal taxpayers outside of Massachusetts.

Boston plans to use the funds on temporary hotel rooms for eligible people, which will be staffed by emergency service providers.

Great news if you’re a hotel owner, in other words, and bad news if you’re in the market for a hotel room.

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NYC mayor: Texas governor a “madman” for wanting to send city-destroying migrants away from Texas

by philg

“Critics condemn New York mayor for saying migration crisis will ‘destroy’ city” (The Guardian):

The mayor of New York, Eric Adams, has said an increase in migration would “destroy” the city, seemingly blaming the Biden administration for failing to provide federal support as much as the Republican governors who have sent asylum seekers north.

“Never in my life have I had a problem that I did not see an ending to. I don’t see an ending to this,” Adams said. “This issue will destroy New York City.”

More than 110,000 migrants have arrived in New York since last year, Adams said, adding that governors of Republican states had bussed asylum seekers to the city without coordinating with New York officials. Adams seemed to specifically refer to the Texas governor, Greg Abbott, who bussed immigrants to Democratic-led cities including New York, Los Angeles and Chicago.

“We’ve turned this city around in 20 months,” Adams said. “And then what happened? Started with a madman down in Texas, decided he wanted to bus people up to New York City: 110,000 migrants.”

Are the above statements logically consistent? The presence of a handful of migrants (out of the tens of millions that have enriched the U.S. in recent years; note that Yale estimated 22 million undocumented migrants in the U.S. as of 2016) will “destroy New York City,” according to the mayor. At the same time, a Texan who sought to send these purported city-destroyers away from Texas is an irrational “madman”.

Separately, why can’t New York City easily find room for 110,000 migrants? The population fell by 468,000 from April 2020 through July 2022, according to “NYC lost 5.3% of its population — nearly a half-million people — since COVID, with most heading South” (New York Post). Still plenty of space inside Grand Central Station (photo from last month):

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Sam Bankman-Fried continues to make people rich

by philg

Having previously enriched the campaign treasuries of Democrat politicians nationwide, the great Effective Altruist Sam Bankman-Fried continues to enrich at least some Americans, according to “A $700 Million Bonanza for the Winners of Crypto’s Collapse: Lawyers” (New York Times):

Lawyers, accountants, consultants, cryptocurrency analysts and other professionals have racked up more than $700 million in fees since last year from the bankruptcies of five major crypto firms, including the digital currency exchange FTX, according to a New York Times analysis of court records. That sum is likely to grow significantly as the cases unfold over the coming months.

What is the NYT’s evil twin, the New York Post, writing about? “Migrant arrested 6 times for 14 crimes in first two months in NYC”:

A man who arrived in New York City two months ago from Venezuela has randomly attacked at least three strangers and two cops, and gotten arrested – and released – six times on 14 different charges, police and sources said.

Daniel Hernandez Martinez, 29, arrived on June 27 and allegedly committed his first crime the following day.

On Aug. 21, he violently attacked a woman in Midtown, cops said. He “grabbed a stranger by the hair, dragged her across the floor and kicked her,” and smashed her phone on West 45th Street around 1 a.m., court documents show.

What else has been interesting in recent news? “Maryland elementary school brings back MASKS for kids as it forces third-graders to don N-95s again after spate of pupils testing positive for COVID-19” (Daily Mail):

In a letter sent to parents on Tuesday, Rosemary Hills Elementary School principal Rebecca Irwin Kennedy said she made the move after ‘three or more individuals’ caught the virus in the last ten days.

She demanded students don thick N95 masks to ‘keep our school environment as safe as possible’, despite a recent study finding the mask may expose users to dangerous levels of toxic chemicals.

And while even embattled medical guru Dr Anthony Fauci admits there is a lack of evidence the masks stop the spread of Covid, Kennedy told parents the N95s will only become optional after 10 days.

This is my old school district, as it happens, Montgomery County Public Schools. It’s interesting that there is no explanation of how SARS-CoV-2 will be stopped if the students remove their masks “while eating or drinking”. The letter from the principal doesn’t mention any changes to lunch procedures. So the kids all sit in the classroom together wearing masks and then they all sit together at lunch not wearing masks?

What the Maryland principal did, of course, would be illegal under Florida law. Not contrary to a governor’s order, but illegal under a statute passed by the legislature. Third graders in Florida could tell the fearful Fauci-denying adults where to put their N95 masks.

Readers: What’s caught your eye in recent news?

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Climate Emergency question: Should migrants be evacuated from dangerous southern states and taken to safety in California and the Northeast?

by philg

Dangerous heat continues to afflict major portions of the U.S., including migrant-rich areas in Texas. Here’s the latest map from the New York Times of where 125-degree Fahrenheit conditions might be encountered:

We’re able to keep our house at a furry golden retriever-approved 72 degrees (and the garage at 78) by paying Florida Power and Light about $450/month (also runs the pool pump, the hot water circulation pump, lights, fridge, etc.). Recent undocumented immigrants, however, may not enjoy the luxury of a comfortable air-conditioned home fed by a bomb-proof power grid and/or, due to the stinginess of Republicans, may not have $450/month to hand over to the electric company.

Politicians running sanctuary cities and states have previously complained about buses of asylum-seekers from, e.g., Texas, arriving to claim sanctuary (example: the New York righteous fight amongst themselves). But the same politicians who run sanctuary cities also talk about a “climate crisis” (NYC Mayor Eric Adams, for example).

Instead of waiting for Texans to send migrants out of what the NYT says is “Danger”, wouldn’t it make more sense for governors and mayors in California and the Northeast to send Climate Emergency Escape buses to Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Florida, Georgia, and South Carolina? Anyone who can prove that he/she/ze/they is undocumented (by presenting documents?) would be invited to hop on the bus and escape to climate safety/sanctuary.

If we have an “emergency” (and/or “crisis”) and also “danger” why aren’t there evacuations for the most vulnerable?

Related:

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