Listen to young women speak about access to abortion: Keep abortions safe and legal

Opinion echoes published in The Oracle a newspaper published by University of Southern Florida: The University of South Florida's editorially independent, student-run newspaper.

On April 13, 2023, late into the night, Governor Ron DeSantis approved Senate Bill 300, preventing access to most types of abortion after six weeks.

This bill, also known as the “Heartbeat Protection Act,” was passed under the guise of saving children, but it will do more to humiliate and control women, and it should be overturned.

What irks me the most is it echoing the bill’s false claim that abortions are “a risk to women’s physical and mental health.” Enough with harmful disinformation.

Abortion is a safe and common health care service that brings relief to thousands each year.

A longitudinal study found that only 1% of women regretted their abortion five years later, and while both negative and positive feelings declined, relief remained the most predominant emotion.

Moreover, it was found that emotions surrounding abortion are associated with personal and social contexts, not the procedure in itself.

Furthermore, the risk of death associated with childbirth is 14 times higher than that of abortion.

Gov. Ron DeSantis approved Senate Bill 300, preventing access to most types of abortion after six weeks, on April 13.

This bill, also known as the “Heartbeat Protection Act,” was passed under the guise of saving children, but it will do more to humiliate and control women, and it should be overturned.

The mortality rate among women who delivered a newborn child was 8.8 deaths per 100,000 live births, while the mortality rate related to induced abortions was only 0.6 deaths per 100,000 abortions, according to a 2012 study.

An overwhelming majority of abortions — nearly 93% — are performed during the first trimester, according to a 2019 Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report. However, there are many reasons someone may seek an abortion after the second trimester has begun.

Lack of access to care, high costs, intimate partner violence and unknown pregnancy status’ are a few examples of why someone needs an abortion after 12 weeks. Abortion after the first trimester is still as safe, or safer, than carrying a pregnancy to term.

It’s important that when discussing reproductive health not to quote false rhetoric — particularly unfounded notions about the impact abortion has on women.

Sincerely, Lacorya Lynn

Libraries are important public resources where free speech is practiced and supported

Florida's Republican Governor Ron DeSantis Doesn’t Want You To Learn About Real Black History

Echo opinion letters published on Yahoo.com:

Gov. DeSantis moves to ban social-studies books. Florida wants to 
whitewash history by refusing to buy social-studies textbooks that teach concepts it deems objectionable.

Echo opinions to protect libraries!

To the editor: I have a question for Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who has been at the forefront of the right-wing culture war against schools and libraries.

Have you met Martha Hickson, who was mentioned in The Times' recent piece on librarians? In case she is under your radar, Hickson is a high school librarian in New Jersey who has come under attack. Where she lives and works, individuals demanded that the libraries be cleansed of books, and hence ideas, that don't meet their definition of safe thinking.

She was quoted as saying, "These people wanting to ban books have a whole political machinery around them, and are using books as proxies to attack people."

Hickson is a person with a clear manner of identifying the true reason for such loud intransigence. She is a "soldier" of a nation that was founded on ideas — ideas such as all people are created equal, and they have the right to express those ideas without politicians twisting the mechanics of democracy to further their own careers.

You could learn something.

Andy Siegel, Santa Barbara, California

Being on TikTok tells young people that “we’re here, we hear you, we feel you,” said Celia Greer, left, a teen coordinator at the Kankakee Public Library, with her colleague Tamara Martinez. Credit...Lawrence Agyei for The New York Times

To the editor: What a contrast — in one article, we read of efforts to control free speech and thought in American libraries, and in another we read about France's efforts to fight racism and build tolerance.

Ours is a very backward country in many ways, and this is one of them.  My mother, as the only woman at the time on the Yucaipa school board, endured similar harassment in 1990, because she supported keeping an English book series that had stories about witches.

This is not about the books. It's about political control to advance an agenda that disenfranchises people and keeps the white Republican male in power.

Sandy Mishodek, Running Springs, California.

Republican racism has roots in the U.S. Segregated South

Echo opinion published in The Conversation by Professor Greta De Jong, University of Nevada in Reno:

Republicans- Governor Ron DeSantis of Florida and Governor Greg Abbott of Texas- have been flying and busing undocumented immigrants to Democratic-run states and cities, such as New York and Washington, D.C.

Florida taxpayers paid $615,000 for DeSantis to fly Texas migrants to Martha's Vineyard island in Massachusetts.

Outside of the right-wing media ecosystem, the trips have mostly flown under the radar – that is, until DeSantis’ Martha’s Vineyard-bound flight of Venezuelan immigrants made headlines around the world.

It’s tempting to dismiss it all as a mere political stunt. But historian Greta de Jong sees disturbing parallels – in action and rhetoric – to the way some Southern segregationists dealt with Black citizens during the civil rights era. As part of a broader effort to purge their communities of Black Americans, segregationists put them on buses with one-way tickets to Northern cities in what were called “reverse freedom rides.”

Gov. Ron DeSantis paid $615,000 in Florida taxpayer money to relocate almost 50 Venezuelan migrants from Texas to Martha’s Vineyard, his opponent tweeted Friday, as calls intensified from Democrats demanding an investigation of the action.

Democrat former governor Charlie Crist, who is challenging DeSantis in the November governor’s race, tweeted the dollar amount after campaign researchers found the Sept. 8 payment to Destin-based Vertol Systems, a transportation services company, on the state’s transparencyflorida.gov site.

“Then, as now,” de Jong writes, “the message was, ‘Here, you love them so much, you take care of them.’”Republican Governors Ron DeSantis and Greg Abbott pulled from segregationists’ playbook with their anti-immigration stunts

By Greta de Jong, University of Nevada, Reno:  In the civil rights era, ‘reverse freedom rides’ were more than just a political stunt. They were part of a systematic effort to deprive Black Americans of their livelihoods and force them out.

To embarrass Northern liberals and humiliate Black people, southern White Citizens Councils started their so-called "Reverse Freedom Rides," giving Black people one-way tickets to northern cities with false promises of jobs, housing, and better lives.

Twitter post by the John F. Kennedy Library

But these acts were more than just political stunts designed to embarrass Northern political leaders who sympathized with the civil rights movement. They were part of a broader effort by white supremacists to remove Black Americans from their communities and avoid dealing with the social consequences of centuries of racial discrimination.

Slavery, sharecropping and displacement

In the slavery and Jim Crow eras, racist policies backed by extreme violence limited access to education and economic opportunities for Black people to ensure that they had few options other than working for white employers.

Black sharecropping families in the early 20th century depended on their landlords to provide food, clothing and housing throughout the year until harvest time, when the costs of these goods were deducted from their share of the money made from sales of the crop. Plantation owners controlled the process, frequently using it to cheat workers out of their earnings and keep them perpetually in debt.

By the 1960s, however, most of these workers were no longer needed. Mechanization eliminated millions of agricultural jobs and generated massive unemployment in rural Southern communities. Rather than invest in job training programs or other initiatives to help displaced farm laborers, political leaders enacted policies designed to drive poor people out.

Strict eligibility requirements and arbitrary administration of state public assistance programs excluded many Black families from receiving aid. State legislators were slow to take advantage of federal funds that were available to expand anti-poverty programs, arguing that these were ploys to force integration on the South.

Government inaction left thousands of people without homes or income and exacerbated the suffering of the unemployed.
Segregationists’ ‘final solution’


Civil rights workers who came to the South to help local Black activists with desegregation and voter registration efforts were shocked by the economic deprivation that existed in the communities they visited. They reported seeing widespread hunger, dilapidated housing, unsanitary conditions, high infant mortality rates and other adverse health effects.

Raymond Wheeler, a doctor who visited Mississippi in 1967, described the state as “a vast concentration camp, in which live a great group of poor uneducated, semi-starving people, from whom all but token public support has been withdrawn.”

Others took the analogy to Nazi Germany further, arguing that this was white supremacists’ “final solution to the race question.” By denying Black Americans access to the basic means of survival, they left them with no options but to migrate away.
Political and economic motivations

The motivations behind these policies were both political and economic. White racists understood that providing assistance to displaced workers would encourage Black people to stay in the South. That posed a threat to their power, especially after passage of the Voting Rights Act in 1965 enabled more Black people to register to vote, participate in elections and run for office.

Moreover, the candidates Black Southerners supported ran on platforms that advocated policies to ensure racial and economic justice: investment in schools and other public services, enhanced assistance for unemployed people, more affordable health care and a stronger social safety net for those who were unable to work.

These proposals were anathema to wealthy white people who would face higher tax rates to pay for them. Warning of the consequences should Black Southerners be allowed to vote, Mississippi Citizens’ Council leader Ellett Lawrence asserted that property owners could see tax increases of “100%, 200% or more” if Black people were elected to office.

In a study of Wilcox County, Alabama, the National Education Association found that many landowners were afraid “the Negro majority will obtain control and raise land taxes to finance education and other services.” It concluded that this group showed “little taste for the anti-poverty programs of the sixties because it is more anxious to solve its problems through outmigration than it is to improve all of its people.”

"Give me your tired, your poor. Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free" Emma Lazarus. 

White supremacy then and now:  In many ways, Republicans like Republican Governors Abbott and DeSantis are the political descendants of Southern segregationists, whose cruelty horrified other Americans in the 1960s.

Immigration scholars have noted how U.S. foreign policies contributed to the poverty and violence in Central and South America that migrants are fleeing. Yet rather than acknowledge this – along with assuming the moral responsibilities it entails – some GOP leaders denigrate and dehumanize refugees to win support from voters drawn to xenophobic messaging.

Watching this resurgent nativism, racism and disregard for human rights gaining strength in the 21st century is an ominous sight for anyone familiar with where these ideas have led in the past.

Who is the Republican human trafficker names "Perla"?

Did individuals illegibly acting on DeSantis’ behalf trick migrants at a shelter into getting on the stunt flight to Martha's Vineyard, in Massachusetts? Did they not even understand the distinction between refugee and asylum-applicant status themselves? Unraveling that would require knowing who exactly did the recruiting? Little is currently known besides several migrants having said that a woman named “Perla” was involved. (Echo reported in Slate by Ben Mathis Lilly).

Venezuelan Refugees

Texas sheriff will investigate how the Florida governor flying Venezuelan migrants to Martha’s Vineyard is human trafficking.

Authorities in Texas opened a criminal investigation into Governor Ron DeSantis’ operation to fly roughly 50 Venezuelan migrants from Texas to Martha’s Vineyard in Massachusetts last week.



Migrant Sonia, 30, wipes away tears in Eagle Pass, Texas, as she remembers how she left her child in Venezuela in hopes of providing a better life for them both.

Echo report published in the Miami Herald by Sarah Blaskey and Nicholas Nehemas.

Bexar County Texas Sheriff Javier Salazar announced at a news conference that his office is investigating whether the migrants were the victims of a crime, saying they were “lured under false pretenses.” Many migrants said they agreed to fly from San Antonio to the Massachusetts island after being promised jobs. But there was no work waiting. “I believe people need to be held accountable for it to the extent possible,” Salazar said.

“At this point, I’m not able to definitively say here’s the statute that they broke, either federal, state or local, but what I can tell you is it’s wrong. Just from a human rights perspective, what was done to these folks is wrong.”

DeSantis took responsibility for the two (tax payer paid) charter flights last week, saying they were part of a state program to relocate migrants from Florida, although the group of Venezuelans was in San Antonio. Salazar, a Democrat, called the flights “political theater.” He did not name DeSantis.

He also said his office was working with a private attorney for the migrants, as well as advocacy groups, and was preparing to cooperate with federal agencies “should the need arise.”

One potential lead: Salazar said he believed a Venezuelan migrant had been paid a “bird dog fee” to recruit other migrants in San Antonio for the flights.

In response to a request for comment, Jeremy Redfern, DeSantis’ deputy press secretary, did not answer with words. Instead, he emailed a screenshot of a news story with the headline: “Bexar County Sheriff Salazar says Biden admin’s handling of immigration ‘isn’t working.’ ”

On Monday night, DeSantis appeared on Sean Hannity’s #FakeFoxNews Fox News show and defended the flights.

DeSantis (wrongly!) said the program was “clearly ❗ 😧voluntary and all the other nonsense you are hearing is just not true.” But the migrants said they were recruited for the Martha’s Vineyard trip with falsehoods. Several said that a woman known as “Perla,” who is not believed to be a migrant, approached them outside a migrant resource center in San Antonio and (illegally!) offered them jobs and assistance if they flew to Massachusetts.

Illegal brochure distributed to the Venezuelan migrants.

Those claims of employment and other opportunities turned out to be false as officials on Martha’s Vineyard were unprepared for their arrival last Wednesday.

In addition, brochures provided to the migrants said they could receive cash assistance and employment services after landing. The brochures included the phone number and website of the Massachusetts Office for Refugees and Immigrants. The office said it did not print the brochures, which were shared with the Herald by Lawyers for Civil Rights, a Boston-based legal group representing some of the migrants.

While “Perla’s” full name and connections have not yet been publicly revealed — despite a handbill, distributed by the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC), offering $5,000 for information on her identity — Salazar suggested the investigation could reach Florida.

“If somebody’s in Florida and they need to be brought here to be brought to justice, that’s just paperwork at that point,” the sheriff said. He said investigators had obtained the names of “persons of interest” but declined to release them yet.

Bexar County Texas Sheriff Javier Salazar announced at a news conference that his office is investigating whether the migrants were the victims of a crime

In fact, the migrants have legal status in the United States, having presented themselves to U.S. authorities after crossing the border in Texas and seeking asylum status. DeSantis has said the flights were financed with Florida taxpayer money meant to remove migrants from Florida. All the migrants boarded in San Antonio, which is in Bexar County, although the planes stopped in Florida’s Panhandle to refuel. Transporting migrants from Texas with Florida money appears to conflict with language included in the state budget that authorized the $12 million program. Passed by the Republican-controlled Legislature and supported by most Democrats, the budget instructed the Florida Department of Transportation to spend the funds “to facilitate the transport of unauthorized aliens from this state.”

DeSantis has suggested the flights were a way to intercept migrants before they reached Florida. On Sunday, the Herald interviewed migrants who had just crossed the border in Eagle Pass, Texas. None of them told journalists they wanted to go to Florida. Instead, most hoped to travel to New York. They spoke of a dangerous journey to the United States and an uncertain future now that they’re here. None had the money for a $50 bus ticket to San Antonio, the nearest city. Advocates say that makes them easy prey for scammers. 

Miami Herald staff writers Bianca Padró Ocasio and Ana Ceballos contributed to this report.

Republican virus! Contaminated by stupidity!

This echo opinion letter was published in the Journal Inquirer a Connecticut newspaper:

For a whole year former #TFG Donald Trump was holding back the truth and spreading misinformation. Thanks to all the false conspiracy theories he and some conservative Republicans were spreading, it may well have cost over 500,000 lives. Trump has the blood of those lives on him. That happened on his watch. (Genocide!)

Vaccines are here and saving lives, as are masks. Unfortunately, a majority of Republicans and misguided citizens chose not to do either, so the pandemic is raging once again.

Children who can’t get vaccinated are falling ill and ending up in intensive-care units. The majority of the cases are occurring in Florida right now, where (stupid!) Governor Ron DeSantis is standing fast against mask mandates in schools, where the virus will spread. He is threatening to withhold salaries and possibly firing people for implementing mask mandates against his wishes.

DeSantis is a direct disciple of Trump, so this is not surprising but it is disgusting.

Doctors decide what is medically right for a child and masks work to keep children safe and alive. Does DeSantis truly not want that?

Nobody has the right to drive drunk and kill someone. And no governor has the right to not allow safety measure to keep kids alive.

These Republican governors will have the blood of children on their hands.

Return sanity to the Republican Party. Enough is enough

From Marcy Klein, Manchester Connecticut