Advances of AANHPI communities under Biden get revoked by Trump

On the day the nation was supposed to honor the late civil rights icon Martin Luther King,  Donald Trump was inaugurated as President and then he immediately began trying to undo King's legacy and President Biden's policies aiding Asian American, Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islanders. 

Among the scores of chaos-inducing Executive Orders issued by Trump on January 20, 2025, Martin Luther King Day, was one titled Initial Rescissions of Harmful Executive Orders and Actions.

The Order’s stated purpose is to retract whatRepublicans describes as the “deeply unpopular” and “radical” practices of President Biden. The Order specifically calls out the “injection of diversity, equity and inclusion” and states that such measures have corrupted our institutions by replacing “hard work, merit and equality.”

Trump''s Executive Order goes on to revoke numerous prior executive orders that were specifically part of Biden's policies and practices meant to help, protect and advance AANHPI communities and individuals and encourage them to become part of the process of making goernment policies

Among the policies Trump rescinded is Executive Order 14031, “Advancing Equity, Justice, and Opportunity for Asian Americans, Native Hawaiians, and Pacific Islanders,” which was enacted in 2021 and one of several Executive Orders President Biden signed supporting the AANHPI community. Part of Biden's order established the President's Advisory Commission on Asian Americans, Native Hawaiians, and Pacific Islanders and mandated federal agencies collect disaggregated data for the diverse communities that fall under the AANHPI umbrella. In fact, the webpage for the White House Advisor Commission AANHPI no longer exists.

       RELATED: 

• Trump's mass deportations have AANHPI communities on edge
• California AG joins suit vs. Trump attempt to overturn the US Constitution

Among the other controversial Executive Orders that would affect the lives of AANHPI was the revocation of E.O. 13988, “Ensuring a Lawful and Accurate Enumeration and Apportionment Pursuant to the Decennial Census.” E.O. 13988 recognized the diversity within the AANHPI communities that covers dozens of nationalities and ethnicities from Asia and allowed the collection of disaggregated data so that the wide range of needs of each community could be ennumerated and addressed.

"The rollback of this action would lead to dangerous targeting, inaccurate population count resulting in a failure of full representation, and skewed data distribution resources to communities around the country to communities around the country," said Advancing Asian American Justice in a press release. 

In response to the Trump orders, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) issued the following statement:

"The Trump administration’s three executive orders targeting diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility (DEIA) initiatives take a 'shock and awe' approach that upends longstanding, bipartisan federal policy meant to open doors that had been unfairly closed. In his first few days, President Donald Trump is undertaking a deliberate effort to obfuscate and weaponize civil rights laws that address discrimination and ensure everyone has a fair chance to compete, whether it’s for a job, a promotion, or an education.

"With these actions, the administration is not only undoing decades of federal anti-discrimination policy, spanning Democratic and Republican presidential administrations alike, but also marshalling federal enforcement agencies to bully both private and government entities into abandoning legal efforts to promote equity and remedy systemic discrimination. Trump’s executive orders undermine obligations dating back to the Johnson administration that firms doing business with the US government and receiving billions in public dollars are held to the highest standards in remedying and preventing bias."

THREAT TO CIVIL RIGHTS

One of Trump's first-week Executive Orders rescinded a Civil Rights-era rule that has helped protect millions of workers from discrimination.

Trump's Jan. 21 Execuitive Order revokes the Equal Employment Opportunity rule signed by President Lyndon B. Johnson in 1965. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 — which is, thankfully, still the law today — did not include federal employees.

Johnson signed the Equal Employment Opportunity rule to close that particular loophole, and those protections were signed into law in 1972.

That rule bars federal contractors, who today employ 3.7 million people, from discriminating against job applicants or workers on the basis of race, gender, religion and other protected characteristics. It also gave the Labor Department the authority to take action against the contractors accused of discrimination.

Among the Biden Executive Orders revoked by Trump's Executive Orders stepping back civil rights, representation and equal rights  are:

• Executive Order 14031 of May 28, 2021 (Advancing Equity, Justice, and Opportunity for Asian Americans, Native Hawaiians, and Pacific Islanders);

• Executive Order 13985 of January 20, 2021 (Advancing Racial Equity and Support for Underserved Communities Through the Federal Government);

• Executive Order 13988 of January 20, 2021 (Preventing and Combating Discrimination on the Basis of Gender Identity or Sexual Orientation);

• Executive Order 13993 of January 20, 2021 (Revision of Civil Immigration Enforcement Policies and Priorities);

• Executive Order of 13999 of January 21, 2021 (Protecting Worker Health and Safety); Executive Order 14020 of March 8, 2021 (Establishment of the White House Gender Policy Council);

• Executive Order 14055 of November 18, 2021 (Nondisplacement of Qualified Workers under Service Contracts); and

• Executive Order 14075 of June 15, 2022 (Advancing Equality for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer, and Intersex Individuals) among many others.

PRIVATE SECTOR IMPACT

Almost immediately, federal agencies began tearing down posters advocating diversity and equal opportunities and groups formed to develop and promote diversity  policies and a sense of belonging were disbanded.

“I’ve been here for four years, and in that time, we’ve made progress to help employees just have a better lived work experience,” said one Treasury Department employee to NBC News. “Four years later in the snap of fingers, our work is being completely undone. … It’s one step forward, two steps back."

Some companies in the private sector quickly followed suit ending or curbing their DEI policies and the departments that were supposed to oversee and encourage those efforts. Meta, Amazon, Target, Ford and McDonalds were among the companies that couldn't wait for Trump to sign the Executive Order and began curbing their own DEI efforts as soon as Trump was declared winner of the Presidential election last November.

Trump's executive order also requires federal agencies to investigate publicly traded companies, large nonprofits and other private institutions with DEI programs that MAGAists believe "constitute illegal discrimination or preferences," in an apparent attempt to coerce those businesses into the new compliance.

To their credit, some companies -- such as Costco, Bank of America, Citi, and Apple -- have resisted the move to eliminate or curb their DEI practices claiming that the programs are good for business.

"Many of these now-revoked Executive Orders involve equal opportunity for individuals based on race, gender, gender identity, and sexual orientation," the ACLU states. "While these orders have been revoked, both state and federal laws continue to prohibit discrimination on the basis of these characteristics. "

Martin Luther King must be turning over in his grave.

EDITOR'S NOTE: For additional commentary, news and views from an AANHPI perspective, follow me on Threads, on X or at the blog Views From the Edge.

AANHPI communities on edge over Trump's mass deportation policies

Even before Donald Trump was sworn into office, reinvigorated border officials began their raids into communities of color, affecting immigrants from Asia.

Although most of the media attention focused on the planeloads of alleged undocumented immigrants being sent to South American countries and ICE sweeps reported in California targeting Latino Americans, AANHPI communities have not been spared from fear and nervousness generated by the Trump policy of mass deportations.

Reactions from legal advocates were tempered before the inauguration but as the first week of pell-mell presidential decrees began to be implemented, resistence has stiffen with a barrage of lawsuits against the Trump Presidential Orders.

A day after Trump signed the Executive Order, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) filed a lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C., challenging the order. It is the latest of many legal challenges against the flurry of Executive Orders coming out of the White House in the Trump administration's first week.

"The expansion means that low-level DHS officers can now immediately and without process subject individuals in the interior of the United States to expedited removal, without any consideration of their family ties," the ACLU alleged.

There are about 11 million unauthorised immigrants in the US, according to the Pew Research Center.

Arrests have occurred across the natpn involving ICE agents and border control officers. Tom Homan, Trump's border czar, said the intention was to first go after those individuals with criminal records but there have been numerous instances in which undocumented immigrants who have not committed crimes and even US citizens have been rounded up.

On Sunday, Homan told ABC News that he expected arrest and deportation numbers to "steadily increase," and said the focus right now was "public safety threats, national security threats".

The 956 reported arrests on Sunday follow 286 arrests on Saturday, 593 arrests on Friday and 538 arrests on Thursday. The actions involved several federal agencies such as ICE, the FBI, US Marshals, the border officers and other federal entities, highlighting the militarized approach to immigration enforce ..

FOREIGN GOVERNMENTS WORKING WITH TRUMP

China has pledged to accept undocumented Chinese citizens back to their homeland. As of 2022, there were 375,000 unauthorised immigrants from China in the US, according to Pew estimates. That figure also includes migrants from Hong Kong and Taiwan.

The Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman said on Monday, Jan. 27, that the Chinese government would accept US deportation flights for individuals confirmed as Chinese nationals who crossed illegally into the US.

According to Department of Homeland Security records, China accepted four charter removal flights from the Biden administration in the past six months. 

Twenty-four Filipinos accused of criminal activity were rounded up by Border officers during the last months of the Biden Administration. The 24 were reportedly deported on Jan. 21, a day after Trump moved into the White House.

According to some accounts, there are about 300,000 Filipinos in the US without legal status. The Philippine Embassy in Washington, DC says most of this population came to the US legally as students, tourists or with work visas for certain occupations, but failed to extend their visas.

Beyond the first batch of 24, at least 80 more Filipinos are awaiting deportation, according to Philippine Ambassador to the US Jose Manuel Romualdez.

DEPORTED TO THE PHILIPPINES

“We’re closely coordinating with Homeland Security to ensure those facing deportation are treated properly,” Romualdez said. He confirmed that deported Filipinos are transported directly to the airport and placed on commercial flights back to the Philippines.

Romualdez noted that Filipinos with work permits have a better chance of obtaining legal residency in the US, as their employers can sponsor them. However, undocumented Filipinos, especially those who entered the US as tourists, may face challenges and are encouraged to seek legal assistance.

“We have many Filipino-American lawyers volunteering at our consulate who can provide information on how they can assist,” he said.

Since Trump won the election in November, Romualdez has been urging  undocumented Filipinos to self-repatriate rather than wait to get deported. Individuals who are deported will find it more difficult to obtain a new visa to return to the US, whereas those who return to the Philippines voluntarily will avoid having breaking the law on their record.

Within the Filipino community, the overstaying Filipinos are called TNT, tago ng tago, Tagalog for "hide-hide."

LARGEST NUMBER OF UNAUTHORIZED ASIANS ARE FROM INDIA

Reports that ICE has arrested South Asians at their temple of worship were disputed by members of those worship houses.

As of 2022, there were 725,000 unauthorised immigrants from India in the US, according to Pew estimates, the third-highest number after Mexico and El Salvador.

That number does not include the Indians in the US with H-1B visas who were brought here by their employers, many of whom are in the high-tech industries. According to the latest data from the 2020 Census, there are over 300,000 Indians with this status.

As of presstime, there have not been any ICE forays disturbing undocumented European or Canadian communities.

Trump is carrying out his campaign promise of deporting immigrants without the proper documents an dending illegal border crossings, mostly the border between the uS and Mexico. While his supporters are cheering the deportations, the Gestapo-like actions of the border patrol officers and ICE agents is disturbing, to say the least.

KNOW YOUR RIGHTS

Video prepared by Catholic Charities.

Legal advocates such as the Advancing Asian Americans for Justice (AAAJ), the National Asian Pacific American Bar Association and Asian Legal Defense and Education Fund remind anyone being confronted by federal agents that they have certain rights. The Asian Law Caucus prepared athe following nswers for anyone being confronted by ICE or border officials:

• You have the right to remain silent. You may refuse to speak to immigration officers.
• Carry a know-your-rights card and show it if an immigration officer stops you.
• Do not open your door.
• You have the right to speak to a lawyer.
• Before you sign anything, talk to a lawyer.
• Always carry with you any valid immigration document you have.
• If you are worried ICE will arrest you, let the officer know if you have children.
• ICE and other law enforcement officers may think they can get away with violating your rights.
• Create a safety plan.
• Report and document raids and arrests.
• Find legal help.

EDITOR'S NOTE: For additional commentary, news and views from an AANHPI perspective, follow me on Threads, on X or at the blog Views From the Edge.

It was definitely a Nazi salute!

Elon Musk claims he was thanking Donald Trump supporters. Wht do you think?

OPINION

Elon Musk denies the gesture he made at Donald Trump's inauguration was a Nazi salute, but -- to me -- it was a definite aggressive Heil, Hitler!

Just look at the way the "gesture" was delivered.: with a hard pat on his heart and the aggressive move into into the outstretched arm, palm down and fingers together striaght out. Then look at his face that looks like a grimace. It was far from the warm, inviting "thank you" that Musk claims it was.

And if that wasn't enough. He did it again!

Today, Holocaust Day of Remembrance, remembering the thousands killed by the Nazis during World War II, it might not matter what a simple blogger thinks, more importantly, as much as the world's richest man claims it was a simple thank you gesture, a large segment of MAGA land understood what it was. White supremacists and Nazi followers interpreted with cheersvas Musk's signal to them.

Nick Fuentes, the far right Hitler lover who dined with Trump at Mar a Lago in 2022, described Musk’s gesture as “a straight-up sieg heil, like loving Hitler energy.”

FYI: Watch Elon Musk's salute and judge for yourself.

It was not the first time Musk has expressed his admiration for Hitler's racist regime. Born and raised in apartheid South Africa, he could not help but be embued with the values that of the racist culture. He came to the United States in 1992 on a student visa. White-ruled South Africa dropped apartheid as a cultural and political  institutionalized policy around the same time and began transforming itself into a modern democratic nation in 1994. Perhaps, not coincidentally, with the writing on the wall for South Africa's integrated future, Musk became a US citizen in 1994.

"After purchasing Twitter in 2022, Musk personally intervened to restore Fuentes and others like him, who had been banned by the platform’s previous owners," reports Vox. :Two 2023 data analyses found that the amount of antisemitic content on Twitter, now X, doubled after Musk’s purchase. A 2024 NBC investigation reported that Musk’s choices allowed antisemitism and neo-Nazism to 'flourish' on the influential social media  platform, identifying hundreds of neo-Nazi accounts gaining in influence under Musk’s new policies."

As owner of Twitter, which he renamed "X",  perhaps referencing one of the movie, American History X, a film about American Nazis. Musk expressed his support for some of the anti-Jewish views expressed by the far-right extremists

who he welcomed back to his social media platform. In support of one anti-Semetic poster, Musk posted “you have said the actual truth.” He then went on to attack the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), a Jewish anti-hate group, for “unjustly attack[ing] the majority of the West” and its priorities that support flooding their country don’t exactly like them too much.” 

As a gesture of apology for his remarks, Musk visited Auswitz, one of Hitler's infamous death camps where millions of Jews were killed. Even in the face of the Holodaust, the visit apparently hasn't tempered his views.

More recently, Vox reports that Musk, who some have dubbed the "real" president for his closeness to Trump, has used his platform to repeatedly advance Germany’s far-right Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) party.

The AfD is extreme even by the standards of the European far-right. Some of the policies and activities of the Nazi-like party supports is disturbingly familiar under the Trump regime:

According to Vox, some AfD members tried to storm the German parliament in 2020, inspired by the US insurrectionists tried to do earlier on January 6; a former AfD member of parliament was arrested in 2022 for plotting an actual coup, The AfD party targeting newcomers of color; another leading party figure, Björn Höcke, has called for an end to German guilt over Nazism and used a Nazi slogan in one of his speeches.

This weekend, Musk appeared on screen at a rally for the Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) party. "I think you really are the best hope for Germany," Musk told them.

"It's good to be proud of German culture and German values, and not to lose that in some sort of multiculturalism that dilutes everything," Musk said.

Then, in an apparent reference to the Nazi era, Musk added that there is "frankly too much of a focus on past guilt and we need to move beyond that."

"Children should not be guilty of the sins of their parents, let alone their parents, their great-grandparents," he said as the crowd applauded.

His weekend remarks, hours before the 80th anniversary of the "Day of Remembrance," when Auswitz was liberated drew criticism in the US.

Abraham Foxman, director emeritus of the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), wrote in a tweet that Musk's speech "helps place the hand gesture in perspective." While the ADL downplayed Musk's motion as an "awkward gesture" last week, Foxman disagreed, referring to it as a Nazi salute and "very disconcerting image."

"The words we heard from the main actors of the AfD rally about 'Great Germany' and 'the need to forget German guilt for Nazi crimes' sounded all too familiar and ominous," tweeted Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk. "Especially only hours before the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz."

It speaks volumns that Musk's inauguration "gesture" has not elicited an apology for any possible  "misinterpretation" of his alleged thank you gesture. Instead we get jokes or over-sensitivity and accused of not having a sense of humor.

It is not funny to make the "Heil, Hitler" salute, intentional or not, a mere punchline or a sign of what has become accepted as normal in this new scary America.

EDITOR'S NOTE: For additional commentary, news and views from an AANHPI perspective, follow me on Threads, on X or at the blog Views From the Edge.

California AG Bonta sues Trump's executive order against birthright citizenship

California AG Rob Bonta jins challenge against Donald Trump's executive order.

California Attorney General Rob Bonta Tuesday filed a lawsuit challenging the Donald Trump's  unconstitutional executive order seeking to end birthright citizenship, which is guaranteed in the US Constitution.

"As home to more immigrants than any other state in the country, California has a vested interest in ensuring that the federal government recognizes the fundamental rights of the children of immigrants who are born in our state," Bonta said in a press conference announcing the lawsuit.

"As he so often did in his first term in office, the president once again overstepped his authority with this unconstitutional executive order."

As California's Attorney General, Bonta joins 17 other Democratic states, including New Jersey, Colorado and Massachusetts, and the cities of San Francisco and Washington D.C., in suing the Trump administration, a day after Donald Trump was sworn into office and issued the executive order.

“The President’s executive order attempting to rescind birthright citizenship is blatantly unconstitutional and quite frankly, un-American,” said Bonta, the first Filipino American to head the AG office.

FYI: A copy of the complaint can be found here.

“As home of Wong Kim Ark, a San Francisco native who fought – successfully – to have his US citizenship recognized, California condemns the President’s attempts to erase history and ignore 125 years of Supreme Court precedent," Bonta stated. "We are asking a court to immediately block this order from taking effect and ensure that the rights of American-born children impacted by this order remain in effect while litigation proceeds.

"The President has overstepped his authority by a mile with this order, and we will hold him accountable.”

The right to becoming a US citizen if born in the US is embedded in the 14th Amendment of the US Constitution. Specifically, it states that "all persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside."

"From the beginning of our nation’s history, America followed the common law tradition that those born on U.S. soil are subject to its laws and are citizens by birth. Although the Supreme Court’s notorious decision in Dred Scott denied birthright citizenship to the descendants of enslaved people, the post-Civil War United States adopted the Fourteenth Amendment to protect citizenship for children born in the country," Bonta stated.

The US Supreme Court affirmed this constitutional right in 1898 when a San Francisco-born, Chinese American man was denied entry back into the United States after visiting relatives in China on the grounds that he was not a citizen. In United States v. Wong Kim Ark, the Supreme Court established that children born in the United States, including those born to immigrants, could not be denied citizenship.

Within hours of taking office, the President issued an executive order disregarding the US Constitution and this long-established precedent. The order directs federal agencies to prospectively deny the citizenship rights of American-born children whose parents are not lawful residents. The order instructs the Social Security Administration and Department of State, respectively, to cease issuing social security numbers and US passports to these children, and directs all federal agencies to treat these children as ineligible for any privilege, right, or benefit that is reserved by law to individuals who are US citizens.

If allowed to stand, the order would strip tens of thousands of children born each year of their ability to fully and fairly be a part of American society as rightful citizens, with all the benefits and privileges. These children would lose their most basic rights and be forced to live under the threat of deportation. They would lose eligibility for a wide range of federal benefits programs. They would lose their ability obtain a Social Security number and, as they age, to work lawfully. And they would lose their right to vote, serve on juries, and run for certain offices.

The executive order would also directly harm California and other states, causing them to risk federal funding for vital programs that they administer, such as Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program; these programs are conditioned on the citizenship and immigration status of the children they serve. In addition, states would be required — on little notice and at considerable expense — to immediately begin modifying their operation and administration of benefits programs to account for this change by February 19, when the order goes into effect.

In Tuesday’s filings, the attorneys general contend that Trump’s executive order is a flagrant violation of the Constitution and the Immigration and Nationality Act and would cause irreparable harm to the states and their residents. As such, the attorneys general seek a nationwide preliminary injunction to prevent the denial of the constitutional rights of tens of thousands of babies born each year in the US who otherwise would have been, and should be, citizens, including an estimated 24,500 children born in California annually, and the disruption vitally important public health and other federal benefit programs.

Attorney General Bonta is joined by the attorneys general of New Jersey, Massachusetts, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina Rhode Island, Vermont, and Wisconsin, along with the City of San Francisco.

EDITOR'S NOTE: For additional commentary, news and views from an AANHPI perspective, follow me on Threads, on X or at the blog Views From the Edge.

Border Patrol sweeps sow chaos and fear in Bakersfield

REDDIT

Bakersfield residents protest Border Patrol sweeps in their community.

What is happening to anyone who looks like an immigrant in Bakersfield, California is a frightening preview of the next four years uy nder the Donald Trump admininstration which officially began today (Monday, Jan. 20).

During the campaign, in an August 8, 2024 speech, Trump stated he planned to launch "the largest mass deportation in the history of our country."

In anticipation of fulfilling one of Trump's promises of staging mass deportations, border agents in California began wielding their new power last week.

"Today, unannounced raids by U.S. Border Patrol officials are sowing chaos and discord in households and workplaces across the state," said Senate Majority Leader Lena Gonzalez "These actions do more than just target criminals; they ensnare residents merely working to achieve the American dream and cast fear amongst many more."

The Border Patrol out of its El Centro headquarters said that the roundups and raids were targeted at arresting cartel members but stories from the ground tell a different story.

Casey Creamer, president of the industry group California Citrus Mutual, told Olmos told America's Voice that this is one of their busiest harvesting times of the year. But following the frightening news that immigrants were getting swept up while refueling their trucks or picking up some breakfast before starting their day, 25% of citrus workers stayed home from work. The day after, 75% stayed home.

The raids have “sent shockwaves through the entire community,” Creamer said in an interview with America's Voice. “People aren’t going to work and kids aren’t going to school,” mirroring mass school absences following past workplace raids in states like Mississippi, New Mexico, and Tennessee.

“Throughout the raids, Border Patrol appeared to be profiling farm workers,” United Farm Workers said. “These raids have resulted in dozens of arrests of hardworking people, including UFW union members.” The labor union called the enforcement actions “a troubling preview of what we expect our communities to endure over the next 4 years.”

Sergio Olmos of CalMatters reports:

“It was profiling, it was purely field workers,” said Sara Fuentes, store manager of the local gas station. Fuentes said that at 9 a.m., when the store typically gets a rush of workers on their way to pick oranges, two men in civilian clothes and unmarked Suburbans started detaining people outside the store. “They didn’t stop people with FedEx uniforms, they were stopping people who looked like they worked in the fields.” Fuentes says one customer pulled in just to pump gas and agents approached him and detained him.

Fuentes has lived in Bakersfield all her life and says she’s never seen anything like it. In one instance, she said a man and woman drove up to the store together, and the man went inside. Border Patrol detained the man as he walked out, Fuentes said, and then demanded the woman get out of the vehicle. When she refused, another agency parked his vehicle behind the woman, blocking her car. Fuentes said it wasn’t until the local Univision station showed up that Border Patrol agents backed up their car and allowed the woman to leave.

Fuentes says none of the regular farm workers showed up to buy breakfast on Wednesday morning. “No field workers at all,” she said.

Bakersfsield Mayor Karen Goh, who in November was re-elected to her third term, said that the Bakersfield Police Department is not particiipating in the Border Patrol sweeps.

"My understanding is that this is an operation by El Centro Border Patrol focused on narcotics and human trafficking by cartels. Media reports that two child rapists were caught the first day; however, I am not aware of the number of people arrested," she said.

"I am concerned for persons who are unnecessarily in fear." 

"UFW union members are among those detained while traveling home from work yesterday in Kern County, CA" said the United Far Workers in a statement posted on social media. "We are providing them and their families with support. Random actions like this are not meant to keep anyone safe; they are intended to terrorize hardworking people." 

Antonio De Loera, spokesman for the United Farm Workers union, said:

“It’s clear that border patrol is feeling emboldened, and I believe this is the kind of thing that unfortunately we’ll be seeing more of over the next four years.” 

EDITOR'S NOTE: For additional commentary, news and views from an AANHPI perspective, follow me on Threads, on X or at the blog Views From the Edge.

The Border Patrol in statement said that the roundups were "targeted" to arrest cartel members. However, reports from the ground tell a different story.


"Today, unannounced raids by U.S. Border Patrol officials are sowing chaos and discord in households and workplaces across the state," said Senate Majority Leader Lena Gonzalez "These actions do more than just target criminals; they ensnare residents merely working to achieve the American dream and cast fear amongst many more."


"UFW union members are among those detained while traveling home from work yesterday in Kern County, CA" said the United Far Workers in a statement posted on social media. "We are providing them and their families with support. Random actions like this are not meant to keep anyone safe; they are intended to terrorize hardworking people."




The Border Patrol in statement said that the roundups were "targeted" to arrest cartel members. However, reports from the ground tell a different story.


"Today, unannounced raids by U.S. Border Patrol officials are sowing chaos and discord in households and workplaces across the state," said Senate Majority Leader Lena Gonzalez "These actions do more than just target criminals; they ensnare residents merely working to achieve the American dream and cast fear amongst many more."


"UFW union members are among those detained while traveling home from work yesterday in Kern County, CA" said the United Far Workers in a statement posted on social media. "We are providing them and their families with support. Random actions like this are not meant to keep anyone safe; they are intended to terrorize hardworking people."

The video player is currently playing an ad. You can skip the ad in 5 sec with a mouse or keyboaDuring a speech on August 8, 2024, Trump stated he planned to start "the largest mass deportation in the history of our country." 

Nobel Laureate Maria Ressa slams Zuckerberg for axing fact-checkers

OPINION

Mark Zuckerberg's decision to do away with fact-checking is giving carte blanche to  the liars and conspiracy theorists to use social media to twist the truth or simply make things up to mislead, confuse, distort facts and tear down trust in the institutions of a functioning democracy.

Nobel peace prize winner Maria Ressa said Zuckerberg’s decision to end factchecking on its platforms of Instagram, Threads and what was formerly Facebook, means “extremely dangerous times” lie ahead for those who depend on  media, and governments who depend on facts and truth to sustain their legitimacy.

Zuckerberg's bending the knee to Donald Trump means Meta's three social media platforms -- Facebook, Instagram and Threads, will eliminate fact-checking services, planning instead to rely on the Facebook community to police itself. Yeah, sure. For a picture of what that looks like, just take a look at X, formerly Twitter, Elon Musk's attempt to give himself a megaphone. 

When Musk took over Twitter, what was arguably the Western world's most popular town square, he fired all the factcheckers and monitors. Since then, it has devolved into a cesspool of hate, racism and just plain made up posts of where MAGAists, science deniers and those with evil intentions can thrive to spread their disinformation among themselves -- as if repeating lies and fantasies enough times  make them true. The person with the loudest and biggest loudspeaker wins.

Zuckerberg's announcement last week shoots down a pillar of the right-wing's distorted view of the world; that the mainstream media, especially the world: the high tech industry is biased on favor of progressive ideals of justice, equality and accessible opportunities.

Ressa, the Filipino American journalist, splitting her time time between Manila where she works, and her relatives living in New Jersey, said Zuckerberg’s move to relax content moderation on the Facebook and Instagram platforms would lead to a “world without facts” and that was “a world that’s right for a dictator.”

Zuckerberg has spent years trying to build on his apolitical position of a businessman trying to do good. But his shift to the right should not be a surprise. It took years of meeting with critics demanding some sort of means to filter out the hate and misinformation crazies and foreign forces were coursing through Facebook, the world's most popular social media platform.

With the fear of losing advertisers and the federal government agencies bearing down on him, a few years ago, the Silicon Valley billionairereluctantly agreed to allow third-party factcheckers to do what he didn't want to do.

With Trump's victory, Zuckerberg saw a path where he could shed all the rules, regulations and responsibilities,not to mention the negative publicity. By doing away with fact-checking, he's siding with Musk and Trump. Under the guise of "free speech," he's allowing anyone to say whatever they want and damn with the truth and consequences.

“Recent elections also feel like a cultural tipping point towards once again prioritizing speech,” Zuckerberg said in a video posted on Instagram. “Factcheckers have just been too politically biased.”

Well, not really. What may have looked like  a bias against conservative views is because the preponderance of the untruths being spread were coming from the radical right and foreign sources seeking to weaken democracy such as Russia, the Peoples' Republic of China and Iran.

The only reason these foreign actors and MAGAists have not been more successful in destablizing the United States form of democracyan  was because of army of fact-checkers.

Zuckerberg added that Meta would also “get rid of a bunch of restrictions on topics like immigration and gender that are just out of touch with mainstream discourse” and “work with President Trump to push back on governments around the world that are going after American companies and pushing to censor more.”

The Meta CEO, who recently had dinner with Trump at Mar-A-Lago, lambasted coverage of  theincming President by “legacy media, which has pushed to censor more and more” and said that his own company’s previous content moderation policies resulted in “too much censorship” and had “gone too far.”

Trump, who constantly lies about everything and regularly gets the "pants-on-fire" rating from fact-checkers, no doubt, is quietly cheering Meta's new position on fact-checking. Since he ran for President in 2016, he has complained that his lies have been stymied by Facebook's fact-checkers and was banned from what used to be Twitter because of his constant lies and spreading falsehoods as truth.

"Fact-checkers strongly support freedom of expression, and we’ve said that repeatedly and formally in last year’s Sarajevo statement. The freedom to say why something is not true is also free speech," said the International Fact-checking Network in a letter to Zuckerberg.

Nobel laureate Maria Ressa, left, once embraced Mark Zuckerberg's, right, Facebook.

Perhaps, what hurts the most is that Zuckerber's bending-his-knee to Trump feels like a betrayal. The problem is it was a mistake to think that Mark Zuckerberg was "one of us" because of the his invention of Facebook, which became the medium used to unite its users and a means to connect with family and friends. We thought that Facebook, (and by extension, all social media) was the technology of the future. How could  something so useful and potential for doing good, wind up as a tool bad.

We fhave forgotten that back when he was a Harvard student, Zuckerberg's initial purpose for inventing Facebook was to rank women on a scale of 1-to-10 based on their looks and/or availability. Facebook's original goal was misogynistic and not not at all alturistic. 

Therefore, no one should be surprised in Zuckerberg's caving into Trump and Musk. In other words, Zuckerberg is just being Zuckerberg, an adolescent longing for approval and hoping to hang out with the "in" crowd.

Nevertheless, the platform gained more popularity  around the world. Ressa embraced the new technology as a way to increase getting the democratic process into the hands of the people. The Philippines became one of the biggest users of the platform.

Her position changed with the advent of the arriveal of the Rodrigo Duterte presidency in the Philippines. He employed armies of digital warriors to spread disinformation to the people of the Philippines. The campaign strategy worked too well to Ressa's chagrin. During his 2016 campaign, Duterte was able to bypass the traditional Philippine media, once known for its aggressiveness, and spread his lies  directly to the people and to bully his critics.

"Fact-checking is essential to maintaining shared realities and evidence-based discussion, both in the United States and globally," wrote the Network, part of the nonprofit media organization Poynter Institute.

Ressa, who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2021 for her commitment to freedom of the press and her “efforts to safeguard freedom of expression, told the Agence France Press: "Mark Zuckerberg says it’s a free speech issue – that’s completely wrong. “Only if you’re profit-driven can you claim that; only if you want power and money can you claim that. This is about safety.”

Ironically, AI generated this statement about the future, or at least for the next four years: "'truth' or 'facts' will not objective realities, but rather will be determined by whoever is presenting the information, allowing them to define what is considered a fact based on their perspective or agenda, potentially manipulating the narrative."

"We are looking at a near-future where Meta’s platforms are defined by coordinated networks of state-aligned accounts, untrammeled, professional trolling operations with significant resources, the systematic manipulation of platform architectures, and sophisticated falsehoods produced at scale," writes Dr. Sanjana Hattotuwa, the former Research Director at The Disinformation Project .

"It’s clear that Meta’s new policy isn’t just about reducing moderation costs or appeasing MAGA in the U.S.; it is about consciously choosing to be complicit in future atrocities whilst maintaining plausible deniability," says Hattotuwa. 

“Journalists have a set of standards and ethics,” Ressa contnued. “What Facebook is going to do is get rid of that and then allow lies, anger, fear and hate to infect every single person on the platform.”

Ressa warns that Zuckerberg's decision means “extremely dangerous times ahead” for journalism, democracy and social media users. 

Hattotuwa agrees: "A company that once promised to connect the world has instead chosen to profit from its fracturing, one life, one community, one violent conflict, and one genocide at a time."

EDITOR'S NOTE: For additional commentary, news and views from an AANHPI perspective, follow me on Threads, on X or at the blog Views From the Edge.

Philly's Chinatown celebrates defeat of proposed sports complex but cautious about the future

Heather Chin/Billy Penn

Arena opponents celebrated upon hearing the new of the Chinatown sports complex.

UPDATED 01/28/2025 to include comments from Asian American Legal Education Fund.

Philadelphians have staved off a project that could have  ruined the Chinatown community. The big sports complex which would have wreaked havoc on the city's Chinatown will be built elsewhere, say opponents of the development.

“Chinatown is beyond a commercial area. Chinatown is a home for many people. It’s a community for all of us,” said Wei Chen, civic engagement director with Asian Americans United, one of the groups opposing the construction of an arena in the city's Chinatown. “We come here for service. We come here for temple. We come here for celebrations. This is our home."

The complex to be shared by the National Basketball League's 76ers and the National Hockey League's Flyers will be built in South Philadelphia where the Sixers' current arena is located.

RELATED: Are Chinatowns in the United States being squeezed out of cities?

After years of contentious hearings and noisy demonstrations, the sports teams made their announcement Jan. 13 to the cheers of Philadelphia's neighborhood advocates and Chinatown residents who feared the proposed complex would ruin the character of the city's thriving Chinatown, create traffic gridlock and encourage rent-raising gentrification.

"We didn’t really change our mind. We were really committed to Market East … but our North Star was to do the right thing by Philly,” said 76ers owner Josh Harris. “We felt we could build a better arena and also revitalize Market East … so we pivoted.”

The proposed relocated sports and entertainment complex dubbed the South Philadelphia Sports Complex, will be the new home of the Philadelphia 76ers and Philadelphia Flyers.

“Over the past two years, Philly built a movement not only to save Chinatown, but to defend our entire city from predatory billionaires who saw us for a profit playground, and tens of thousands of Philadelphians showed up. When some said it was a done deal, this movement stayed true, committed to a different kind of city,” said the No Arena coalition in a statement.

Sharon Chen, a family nurse practitioner in Philly’s Chinatown, said she “cried tears of joy ... knowing that at least for now, Chinatown as a community will not be disrupted, and that anyone who needs to be rushed to Jefferson Hospital by ambulance will not be killed by gridlock traffic.”

Though the arena proposal is moving, a new project is in the works for the Center City with the addition of the Comcast Corporation as a new partner in the complex.

“From the start, we envisioned a project that would be transformative for our city and deliver the type of experience our fans deserve. By coming together with Brian and Comcast, this partnership ensures Philadelphia will have two developments instead of one, creating more jobs and real, sustainable economic opportunity,” said Josh Harris, David Blitzer, and David Adelman, of the Harris, Blitzer Sports Entertainment., project developers

Critics feared the sports arena woud have changed the character of Philadelphia's Cchinatown

“We are grateful to Mayor Parker, Council President Johnson, Council Member Squilla, Governor Shapiro, our partners in labor and the many community and business leaders who supported us throughout this process. This is a massive win for our fans and for the city.”

Neighborhood activists tempered their celebration with a note of caution as they awaiti proposals for the new Chinatown project that could still transform the neighborhood. The difference, advocates hope, is that planning for the new project will include input from the neighborhood residents, something that was missing in the arena proposal.

“There was not an inclusive process to hear the community’s voice,” Chen, whose group was part of a coalition to oppose the arena, said Chen.

“Almost each day since we’ve announced, we’ve had a meeting with a different group within the community,” previously said David Adelman, an entrepreneur who’s leading the project for the team.

The battle between the neighborhood and developers has left a feeling a sour taste in the mouths of neighborhood businesses and advocates regarding the new Center City development, whatever that may be.

Mohan Seshadri, executive director at the Asian Pacific Islander Political Alliance, echoed a similar sentiment.

“We are so proud and happy and relieved that Chinatown, a 150-year-old community, will continue to stand strong,” said Asian Pacific Islander Political Alliance executive director Mohan Seshadri during a press conference.

“But let’s be clear, it didn’t have to be like this. None of this had to be like this when we said, two and a half years ago, that this arena was the wrong site, the wrong location for a project like this. That it was going to destroy Chinatown.”

City leaders and developers, however, believe they've learned a lesson from the original project.

The entrance to Philadelphia's Chinatown.

“We firmly believe we are better working together for Philadelphia,” said Dan Hilferty, Chairman and CEO of Comcast Spectacor. “This new arena will complement other exciting developments in the area, including Comcast Spectacor’s and the Philadelphia Phillies’ plans to create the country’s top sports and entertainment district. We will all work closely together to create an unmatched experience for the fans while developing a vibrant mixed-use district that serves our community.”

Chinatown residents and neighborhood advocates have also learned their lesson and may give an indication of whats ahead.

“Two-and-a-half years ago, every single person told us that it was a done deal,” said Mohan Seshadri, executive director of API PA, which advocates for Asian Pacific Islanders’ civil rights in Pennsylvania. “And then we talked to our elders and our leaders and communities all across the city, and they said no way is this a done deal. We’re going to fight.”

“The cancellation of the 76ers construction in Chinatown is a historic victory for Philadelphia’s Asian American community following more than two years of tireless organizing, speaking out, and holding the line against billionaire development interests,” said Annie Lo, Skadden Fellow at AALDEF.

“The 76ers arena construction project in Philadelphia’s Chinatown is just one of many threats Chinatowns and other historically Asian neighborhoods around the country are facing,” said Bethany Li, executive director at AALDEF. “Our message to developers who threaten our communities and public servants who think they can abandon their duty to us: When we fight—we win.”

EDITOR'S NOTE: For additional commentary, news and views from an AANHPI perspective, follow me on Threads, on X or at the blog Views From the Edge.