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Bomb threats followed Trump's false claims about Springfield. Some Haitians may leave

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Bomb threats followed Trump's false claims about Springfield. Some Haitians may leave

The sun rises over the city of Springfield, Ohio, Monday, Sept. 16, 2024. (AP Photo/Jessie Wardarski)

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Many in Springfield, Ohio have felt uneasy for the past week.

A string of bomb threats shut down city and school buildings. Public events have been canceled. And state troopers have been sent in to guard students going to school.

These developments follow former President Donald Trump repeating debunked claims on national TV about Haitian migrants eating pets. Local city and police officials have said there’s no evidence of this happening.

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The false claims were originally circulated online by far-right activists, neo-Nazis and some local Republicans, though local police said they were baseless, NPR reported earlier this month. Eventually they were shared on social media by Ohio Sen. JD Vance, Trump’s running mate, and then repeated by the former president on the debate stage.

Members of the Haitian community, many of whom have arrived over the past four years, are concerned about their safety, Viles Dorsainvil, who lives there and leads the Haitian Community Help and Support Center, told Morning Edition.

“We are asking ourselves whether to stay here or go somewhere else,” Dorsainvil said.

Dorsainvil has lived in Springfield for four years. The nonprofit he leads, established less than a year ago, helps Haitian newcomers find housing and jobs. It also helps them with language services and getting public assistance, which some are eligible to receive under the Temporary Protected Status they hold.

This status shields them from deportation and grants them legal permission to work based on the unstable conditions in their home country.

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How fear has permeated the Haitian community

Trump’s comments during his debate with Vice President Harris sent a shockwave among the estimated 15,000 to 20,000 migrants who now call Springfield home.

Members of the Haitian community in Springfield, Ohio, from left, Lindsay Aime, James Fleurijean, Viles Dorsainvil, and Rose-Thamar Joseph, stand for worship at Central Christian Church, on Sunday, Sept. 15, 2024. (AP Photo/Jessie Wardarski)

Members of the Haitian community in Springfield, Ohio, from left, Lindsay Aime, James Fleurijean, Viles Dorsainvil, and Rose-Thamar Joseph, stand for worship at Central Christian Church, on Sunday, Sept. 15, 2024. (AP Photo/Jessie Wardarski)

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Families are afraid to go out or send their kids to school or go to church, Dorsainvil said. He added that some are afraid to call cars through rideshare apps because they don’t know who will pick them up or their intentions.

And some are considering giving up major financial investments they’ve made.

“There are some homeowners who want to sell back their homes just to leave,” Dorsainvil said. “I was asking them to give themselves some time to see if we can navigate this together by the fact [that] we have the solidarity of the city officials and the police department and the local leaders and the church leaders.”

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Bomb threats and event cancellations have kept local leaders busy

At least 33 bomb threats were made to various buildings in the city between last Thursday and Monday, Gov. Mike DeWine said at a press conference this week, all of which were false.

Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine (R) speaks at a press conference at Springfield City Hall alongside Ohio State Highway Patrol Colonel Charles Jones, left, Director of the Department of Public Safety Andy Wilson, second from right, and Springfield City School Superintendent Robert Hill, right, in Springfield, Ohio, Monday, Sept. 16, 2024. (AP Photo/Patrick Aftoora-Orsagos)

Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine (R) speaks at a press conference at Springfield City Hall alongside Ohio State Highway Patrol Colonel Charles Jones, left, Director of the Department of Public Safety Andy Wilson, second from right, and Springfield City School Superintendent Robert Hill, right, in Springfield, Ohio, Monday, Sept. 16, 2024. (AP Photo/Patrick Aftoora-Orsagos)

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The threats began the morning of Sept. 12, forcing Springfield City Hall and several other buildings to be evacuated and closed, NPR member station WYSO reports.

Earlier this week, Springfield canceled its Downtown CultureFest, an event centered around celebrating the area’s diversity, that was scheduled for late September due to safety concerns. Wittenberg University also canceled all sporting events through this coming weekend and classes went fully remote.

On Tuesday, DeWine dispatched state troopers and bomb sniffing dogs to be stationed at schools and urged concerned parents to send their children to class after attendance dipped.

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Governor worries city’s housing, medical needs are being overlooked

DeWine, a Republican, pushed back against Trump’s claims in a Sept. 12 interview with Morning Edition, saying that “there’s a lot of crazy stuff up on the internet.”

DeWine said the focus should be on how the city is struggling to adapt to such rapid population growth after years of decline. The city of about 60,000 people has swelled with the thousands of Haitian arrivals, some of whom were encouraged by family and area employers to move to the area.

The new arrivals have helped fill jobs due to a labor shortage.

But it’s gotten harder for people in the town to get primary health care and find housing due to rising rents, DeWine said.

He added that many longtime residents are concerned about newcomers’ ability to drive safely. Last August, a Haitian migrant driving without a valid license crashed with a school bus, resulting in the death of 11-year-old Aiden Clark.

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The driver was found guilty of involuntary manslaughter. Clark’s parents have explicitly asked Trump, Vance and other politicians to stop invoking their son’s name during political appearances.

Anecdotally, migrant drivers are experiencing a higher rate of crashes, according to an FAQ put out by the city of Springfield. In response, the city has launched driver training courses for the newcomers who are inexperienced drivers.

The head of the Ohio Bureau of Motor Vehicles said migrant drivers go through the same process all Ohio residents do to get licenses, the Statehouse News Bureau of Ohio reported earlier this month.

Last week, before the presidential debate, DeWine announced new public safety and health support for the city, including dispatching Ohio State Highway Patrol troopers to the city and directing $2.5 million to expand healthcare access in the area and other supportive services.

“We just have to work our way through this problem. We would like some help from the federal government,” DeWine said.

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Vance defended sharing the false rumors that put Springfield in the national spotlight during an interview with CNN Sunday.

“If I have to create stories so that the American media actually pays attention to the suffering of the American people, then that’s what I’m going to do,” Vance said. On Wednesday, he said that Haitian migrants with TPS were granted that status unlawfully and that it would change under a second Trump administration.

Dorsainvil said he understands why locals and others are concerned about how the city will accommodate both newcomers and longtime residents and hopes to work toward solutions. But after the fear felt the past week, he just wants those spreading the debunked claims to stop.

“Stop dividing the country that all of us love,” Dorsainvil said. “We can do better. We can keep moving forward together with words of unity and encouragement.”

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Newsom Suspends State Environmental Rules for Rebuilding After Fires

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Newsom Suspends State Environmental Rules for Rebuilding After Fires

Governor Gavin Newsom has signed a broad executive order that aims to make it easier to rebuild after the fires by suspending California’s costly and time-consuming environmental review process for homeowners and businesses whose property was damaged or destroyed.

The order is likely to be the first of several permit streamlining measures issued by state, county and city agencies in the wake of the devastating fires across greater Los Angeles.

Mr. Newsom’s three-page order, signed Sunday, covers all of Los Angeles and Ventura Counties and directs state agencies to coordinate with local governments to remove or expedite permitting and approval processes during rebuilding. The most significant piece is a waiver on permitting requirements under the California Environmental Quality Act — a landmark environmental law known colloquially as C.E.Q.A. or “See Qua.”

The governor also announced that he had suspended all permitting requirements under the California State Coastal Act for properties rebuilding after the fires.

California is one of America’s most difficult and costly places to build — a driving factor behind the state’s longstanding affordable housing shortage. Between state agencies and local land use commissions, the process of developing buildings, from office complexes to subsidized rental complexes, is longer and more expensive than in almost every other state.

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Of all the hurdles a project can be subjected to, few are more difficult and time-consuming than C.E.Q.A. The law often requires developers to fund in-depth environmental studies on a project’s potential impact on everything from local wildlife to noise, views and traffic. Groups who oppose a particular development often use C.E.Q.A. lawsuits to try to stop them. This can add years even to small projects.

While the state’s powerful environmental groups are fiercely protective of any attempts to amend C.E.Q.A. or the Coastal Act, the laws are routinely suspended in emergencies and for large projects such as sports stadiums.

Still, Mr. Newsom’s order was unusually extensive. For instance, after other disasters C.E.Q.A. suspensions have typically required rebuilding property owners to show they tried to comply with the law, even if they weren’t subjected to it. The order announced Sunday is a full waiver: For anyone rebuilding after the fires, C.E.Q.A. is effectively gone.

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California fires could be costliest disaster in US history, says governor

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California fires could be costliest disaster in US history, says governor

The California wildfires could be the costliest disaster in US history, the state’s governor said, as forecasts of heavy winds raised fears that the catastrophic blazes would spread further.

In remarks to NBC’s Meet the Press on Sunday, Gavin Newsom said the fires — which have burnt through more than 40,000 acres, according to CalFire, the state’s forestry and fire protection department — would be the worst the country has seen “in terms of just the costs associated with it, [and] in terms of the scale and scope”.

He added that there were likely to be “a lot more” fatalities confirmed. The death toll on Saturday evening stood at 16, according to Los Angeles authorities.

The prospect of a pick-up on Sunday in the Santa Ana winds that have fanned the flames has left tens of thousands of residents under evacuation orders. The fires were threatening homes in upscale Mandeville Canyon and the Brentwood neighbourhood, although officials said they had made progress in stemming the advance there.

The National Weather Service has forecast gusts of between 50mph and 70mph, while drought conditions remain.

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“We know that elevated critical fire conditions will continue through Wednesday”, Los Angeles County fire chief Anthony Maroney said on Sunday.

LA is experiencing its second-driest start to its rainy season in more than a century, according to the non-profit Cal Matters news service. Halfway into the season, LA has only recorded about 0.2 inches of rain since October -— well below the 4.5 inches that is common by January.

Newsom, a Democrat, responded to a barrage of attacks from Donald Trump. The incoming Republican president has accused the governor of depleting water reserves to protect an endangered species of fish, and of refusing to sign a “water restoration declaration” that would have “allowed millions of gallons of water . . . to flow daily into many parts of California”. Newsom’s office has said no such declaration exists.

Trump, who has a long-standing feud with Newsom and refers to him as “Newscum”, also called on the Californian to resign, accusing him of “gross incompetence”.

“The reservoirs are completely full, the state reservoirs here in Southern California,” Newsom said.

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The charred remains of a jewellery store and other shops at a corner of Sunset Boulevard © Michael Nigro/Bloomberg
An air tanker drops fire retardant at the Palisades Fire © Ringo Chiu/Reuters

“That mis- and disinformation I don’t think advantages or aids any of us,” he added. “Responding to Donald Trump’s insults, we would spend another month. I’m very familiar with them. Every elected official that he disagrees with is very familiar with them.”

Newsom also said he had invited the president-elect to visit the affected areas, but had yet to receive a response from the Trump transition team.

Firefighters have tamed three fires since Tuesday, including the Sunset blaze that threatened the Hollywood hills. The Hurst fire in the San Fernando Valley, north of Los Angeles, was 80 per cent contained on Sunday afternoon.

But firefighters are still struggling to tame the two biggest blazes. Newsom said on social media platform X that the Palisades and Eaton fires were 11 per cent and 27 per cent contained. Thousands of firefighters have been deployed to battle the Palisades fire with heavy trucks and air support, the mayor’s office said Sunday. The city has also opened shelters to affected families.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency (Fema) has staff in LA to help Angelenos apply for disaster relief, while the Federal Small Business Administration is offering home and business disaster loans.

Newsom issued an executive order that he said would prevent those who lost their homes from being “caught up in bureaucratic red tape” so they could quickly rebuild.

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The head of Fema on Sunday raised the prospect of US troops being sent to Los Angeles to help control the blaze.

“There are active-duty military personnel that are on a prepare-to-deploy order, that are ready to go in and continue to support the firefighting effort,” Deanne Criswell told ABC’s This Week programme. Speaking on CNN, she warned that strong winds expected in the coming days could spread the fire further.

Map showing the perimeters of the fires in LA and evacuation orders and warnings currently in place

No official estimate of the cost of the damage has yet been released, but analysts at AccuWeather last week calculated the economic loss to be between $135bn and $150bn — short of the $250bn cost associated with last year’s Hurricane Helene. At least 12,300 structures had been destroyed, according to CalFire.

President Joe Biden on Thursday pledged that the US government would pay for “100 per cent of all the costs” created by the disaster, and would ask Congress for more financial aid.

Trump, who on the campaign trail last year threatened to withhold disaster funding from California, has thus far remained silent on whether he would provide similar assistance. On Sunday, he renewed his attacks on the state’s officials.

“The incompetent pols have no idea how to put [the fires] out,” he wrote. “There is death all over the place. This is one of the worst catastrophes in the history of our country. They just can’t put out the fires. What’s wrong with them?”

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On the way out: Transportation Sec. Buttigieg looks back on achievements, challenges : Consider This from NPR

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On the way out: Transportation Sec. Buttigieg looks back on achievements, challenges : Consider This from NPR

U.S. Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg speaks to questions during a news conference at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport November 21, 2024 in Arlington, Virginia.

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U.S. Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg speaks to questions during a news conference at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport November 21, 2024 in Arlington, Virginia.

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From handling crises in the rail and airline industries to overseeing the distribution of billions of dollars in infrastructure funding, Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg has taken on a lot over the last four years.

Now, his tenure is coming to an end.

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Host Scott Detrow speaks with Buttigieg about what the Biden administration accomplished, what it didn’t get done, and what he’s taking away from an election where voters resoundingly called for something different.

For sponsor-free episodes of Consider This, sign up for Consider This+ via Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.org

Email us at considerthis@npr.org

This episode was produced by Brianna Scott, Avery Keatley and Tyler Bartlam. It was edited by Adam Raney.

Our executive producer is Sami Yenigun.

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