Puerto Ricans relocating to Florida have already had a significant effect on the politics of the Sunshine State, and the process may well intensify after Hurricane Maria’s devastation of the island.

Since Florida is a hotly contested swing state that has changed the course of presidential elections, it’s no exaggeration to say that Maria may end up changing the American political landscape permanently.

Politico quotes San Juan Municipal Assembly President Marco Rigau bluntly predicting that the post-Maria exodus of up to one million Puerto Ricans will mean “a lot more people voting Democrat in Florida.”

“Puerto Ricans don’t like President Trump. When he shows on Tuesday, he’ll say, ‘The Puerto Ricans love me’ because people won’t be picketing. But he has no idea,” Rigau added, offering a preview of what the migration could mean for President Donald Trump’s re-election campaign in 2020.

Florida already has about a million Puerto Rican residents, concentrated around Orlando, Tampa, and Miami. That gives Florida about 20 percent of the total Puerto Rican population in the continental United States. Far more Puerto Ricans live on the continent than on the island. If most of the anticipated evacuees decide to settle in Florida for the long term, it’s possible Florida could end up with more Puerto Ricans than Puerto Rico, whose current population is around 3.5 million. Lower-end estimates anticipate perhaps 100,000 new immigrants to Florida, which would still have a significant impact on the state’s precariously-balanced politics.

The Miami Herald noted in January that Florida has become a much more popular destination for Puerto Ricans than traditional favorites like New York, Philadelphia, and Chicago. Driven by a recession on the island since 2006, Puerto Ricans were considered on track to become the largest Hispanic group in Florida by the next presidential election, and that was before Hurricane Maria.

The first Puerto Rican congressman from Florida, Democrat Darren Soto, was elected from the 9th District (eastern Orlando) in 2016. He defeated his Republican opponent Wayne Liebnitzky, by 15 points.

Politicians and strategists from both major political parties are already positioning themselves for a Puerto Rican influx to Florida. Everyone from Governor Rick Scott to the state’s congressional representatives has been deeply and visibly involved in hurricane relief efforts. Aggressive political warfare is being waged over President Trump’s handling of the crisis, most likely with an eye toward shaping the opinions of Puerto Ricans who decide to move stateside.

The Tampa Bay Times notes that Senator Marco Rubio won the Puerto Rico primary during his 2016 bid for the Republican presidential nomination, and has favorably impressed island residents with his response to Hurricane Maria.

“Puerto Ricans are American citizens, they have the right to live anywhere in the country. They’ve certainly enriched Florida. My only view on it has been is that if people come to the mainland from Puerto Rico it should be because they want to, not because they have to,” Rubio said at a press conference last week.

Rubio also offered the politically difficult but logical observation that if a large number of Puerto Ricans leave after Maria, it will shrink the already distressed tax base and economy even further, making long-term recovery efforts difficult. It remains to be seen if such considerations sway potential evacuees, especially those who were already thinking about moving to Florida or New York in search of better job opportunities.

Many analysts thought the Puerto Rican economy was in a death spiral already, and it simply cannot absorb the shock of Maria. Conor Sen made some grim predictions at Bloomberg View.

While many Puerto Ricans will want to stay, or lack the resources to leave, we should be realistic about what shape the rebuilding process will take over the next several months. Electrical systems need wholesale reconstruction. Water systems were damaged. Agriculture is in ruins. Cell towers and power lines need to be rebuilt. And that’s to say nothing of roads, homes and schools. What Puerto Rico needs is a blank check of resources – political will, labor and money –  in order to rebuild. There’s a sad chance that the resources simply will not be found. The mainland should prepare for an influx of Puerto Ricans over the next several months and years. 

Emily Bonilla, a Puerto Rican elected to the Orange County Commission in Florida in 2016, speculated to the Tampa Bay Times that Puerto Ricans’ strong sense of family will motivate those already living in the United States to invite relatives in distress after Maria to come and live with them.

“We know people will come here. They have family here. They have friends here. They’re comfortable coming to Florida,” Governor Rick Scott said on Tuesday while announcing the opening of three aid centers for displaced Puerto Ricans, echoing Bonilla’s point about family ties.

“We’re going to do whatever we can. Do they need a job? Do they need housing? Do they need to find a family and friend? Is there a host family that could help them?” said Scott, who has been criticized by Florida Democrats for not doing as much as he could to help Puerto Rico after the hurricane. (Scott says Puerto Rico has not formally requested the aid materials assembled by Florida or committed to pay the upfront costs, as required by the Emergency Management Assistance Compact, but Democrats charge he’s allowing bureaucratic concerns to thwart the delivery of vitally needed supplies.)

“Scott declined to say whether Maria evacuees – upset at President Donald Trump’s handling of the disaster response – could turn into blue Florida voters casting ballots against the president and governor in future elections,” writes the Miami Herald.

This, of course, suggests that a reporter hit Scott with that supremely loaded question, and he “declined” to answer it. If he, or any other Republican, is foolish enough to answer a question like that in the heat of hurricane coverage, the new storyline will become that Republicans view Puerto Ricans as political enemies, even when they’re in distress.

Conor Sen took a shot at estimating the political fallout from Maria at Bloomberg View:

Since 2010, Pennsylvania’s Puerto Rican population has grown by 78,000. Donald Trump won Pennsylvania in 2016 by only 44,000 voters. Since 2010, Florida’s Puerto Rican population has grown by 220,000. Trump won that state by 113,000 votes. If Democrats flip those two states in 2020 and every other state voted as it did in 2016, Democrats will win the presidency. Now imagine Pennsylvania takes in another 100,000 Puerto Ricans, and Florida takes in another 300,000 over the next few years, all of whom would be eligible voters.

Republican Puerto Rican activist Jorge Bonilla offered a contrary view at Politico, noting that the PR vote has been more difficult for Democrats to turn out in practice than in theory. According to Bonilla, many register as independents because “they have seen the failure of partisan politics back home, and that’s why the Puerto Rican vote in Florida is so abysmally low.”

Still, the Puerto Rican vote is seen as easier for Democrats to get, especially if the political fallout from Maria response permanently damages Trump with evacuees. As attorney David Efron put it to Politico: “Trump should be doing everything in his power to rebuild Puerto Rico and keep people here. Otherwise they’re coming to Florida, and they’re not voting for Trump.”

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On Monday morning, Americans woke up to news that scores of people had been slaughtered in Las Vegas, and hundreds more were wounded in the worst mass shooting in American history.

The carnage caused by one gunman is almost unfathomable. In the aftermath of the shooting, first responders were simply overwhelmed by the number of injured, and that’s when ordinary Americans stepped up to the plate, Tribunist reported.

Many people who attended the country music concert had pickup trucks, and soon those trucks were being loaded with injured people and driven straight to local hospitals where they could be treated for their injures.

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Video from the scene showed people being loaded into trucks. You can watch one video here. (WARNING: Images may be disturbing.)

With a crowd of 22,000 and over 500 injured, there are simply no plans that can work perfectly. All the first-responder training in the world can’t prepare you for something like that.

Luckily, there were ordinary citizens who were willing to step up and help transport the wounded to hospitals. And thanks to the fact that it was a country western concert, the kind of event  that drew more pickup truck owners in its audience than many other kinds of entertainment, it’s a good bet that many made it to a hospital for treatment who otherwise might not have.

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The level of death and injury is unlike anything this country has ever seen from a mass shooting. There are simply no words to describe the horrors that occurred on that fateful night.

However in the midst of all that pain and suffering, there were good people who stepped up to the plate, and helped out however they could and tried to save as many lives as possible.

From the people who shielded others from bullets with their own bodies, to the thousands of people who donated online to help out those injured, Americans came together after the shooting to help out in any way possible.

This shooting showed us the worst of humanity, but it showed us the best of what this nation has to offer. Going forward we need to remember that there is still more good than bad in this country — even after something as evil and horrific as this massacre.

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Share this on Facebook and Twitter and let us know your reaction to the Las Vegas massacre.

Amidst widely publicized efforts to eradicate people with Down syndrome, President Donald Trump has issued a forceful statement in their defense, calling for an end to discrimination based on genetic anomalies.

“Sadly, there remain too many people – both in the United States and throughout the world – that still see Down syndrome as an excuse to ignore or discard human life,” Trump said in an official statement recognizing Down Syndrome Awareness Month. “This sentiment is and will always be tragically misguided. We must always be vigilant in defending and promoting the unique and special gifts of all citizens in need.”

“We should not tolerate any discrimination against them, as all people have inherent dignity,” the President added.

In August, CBS News aired a report revealing that nearly 100 percent of pregnant women in Iceland whose babies test positive for Down Syndrome end up aborting their children, a statistic that many view as a sign of “progress.”

“My understanding is that we have basically eradicated, almost, Down syndrome from our society—that there is hardly ever a child with Down syndrome in Iceland anymore,” said Kari Stefansson, a geneticist and the founder of deCODE Genetics, a company that has studied nearly the entire Icelandic population’s genomes.

The selective abortion of babies suspected of having Down syndrome jumped by 34 percent between 2011 and 2014, due to “increased access to blood tests via private clinics,” according to an article by Tim Stanley in the Telegraph early last year.

Stanley cited the head of a midwife association in Denmark, who declared: “When you can discover almost all the foetuses with Down Syndrome, then we are approaching a situation in which almost all of them will be aborted.”

Also in 2016, France’s State Council confirmed a television ban of an award-winning video showing smiling children with Down syndrome, declaring that the “inappropriate” images of happy Down syndrome children might bother women who had chosen to abort their babies.

The Council stated that the video in question could not be shown since it was “likely to trouble the conscience of women who had made different personal life choices in compliance with the law.”

Crusades to terminate babies with Down syndrome are not limited to Iceland, Denmark and France. Last month, an Indiana judge ruled in favor of abortion giant Planned Parenthood in a suit brought against HEA 1337, a state law banning abortions based on a prenatal diagnosis of disabilities such as Down syndrome.

In a 22-page decision, U.S. District Court Judge Tanya Walton Pratt, an Obama appointee, issued a permanent injunction against Indiana’s “Sex Selective and Disability Abortion Ban” that protected babies with Down syndrome from being aborted because of their condition.

The first “National Down Syndrome Month” was celebrated in 1984, after President Ronald Reagan signed a Congressional joint resolution proclaiming the first commemoration of its kind. It has been more than ten years since another U.S. president officially marked the celebration.

In his statement this week, President Trump noted “the significant contributions that people with Down syndrome make to their families, to their communities, and to our Nation.”

“We also salute the family members, caregivers, medical professionals, and advocates who have dedicated themselves to ensuring that these extraordinary people enjoy lives filled with love and increasing opportunity,” he said.

“This month,” he said, “we renew our Nation’s strong commitment to promoting the health, well-being, and inherent dignity of all children and adults with Down syndrome.”

Trump said that a key aim of the month is to “increase public awareness regarding the true nature of this condition, and to dispel the stubborn myths” that still surround it.

“The approximately 250,000 Americans with Down syndrome truly embody the great spirit of our Nation,” Trump wrote.

“They inspire joy, kindness, and wonder in our families, our workplaces, and our communities. We will always endeavor to make sure that their precious gifts are never maligned or taken for granted,” he said.

Follow Thomas D. Williams on Twitter Follow @tdwilliamsrome

Senate Democrats beg Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) not to run for governor of Maine, a move that would rid the Senate of one of its most liberal Republicans.

When Sen. Heidi Heitkamp (D-ND) heard that Sen. Collins might run for Maine governor in 2018, Heitkamp texted Collins, “Don’t do it.” Heitkamp added, “I desperately hope she doesn’t run.”

Collins’ departure would serve as another blow to moderates and centrists in the upper chamber of Congress. She was an infamous roadblock against repealing Obamacare this year; Collins’ vote against the “skinny” Obamacare repeal bill and opposition to the Graham-Cassidy block grant legislation tanked Obamacare repeal twice.

Collins’ opposition to Obamacare repeal drew the ire of Maine Republican Gov. Paul LePage, who endorsed the Graham-Cassidy legislation. During the Graham-Cassidy debate, Gov. LePage called on Collins to “start paying attention to Maine people.”

Most Republicans remain quiet about whether Collins should stay in the Senate or run for governor, although Senate Democrats and independents continue to urge her to stay in Congress.

Sen. Angus King (I-ME), who caucuses with Democrats, reportedly urged her to remain in the Senate also.

Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-MO), too, called on her to stay in the Senate. McCaskill claimed, “She’s so important to the country here. We don’t have enough folks like her.”

Sen. Collins faces an uphill battle if she runs for governor of Maine. A survey indicated that Collins has become increasingly unpopular among Maine Republican primary voters. Sixty-two percent of Maine citizens disapproved of her job performance, and 62 percent of those polled also said they would rather vote for someone else in the Republican primary for Maine governor. Forty-four percent of Maine Republicans polled suggested they would rather support Mary Mayhew, the former Health and Human Services commissioner for Maine. Sixty-one percent of Maine Republican primary voters suggested that Sen. Collins’ voting against Obamacare repeal made them less likely to vote for Collins for governor.

Given that Collins voted against Obamacare repeal in 2015, voted against the “skinny” repeal in July, and opposed the Graham-Cassidy Obamacare repeal bill this fall, some conservatives have questioned whether she represents Maine in the Senate as a Republican in name only.

Jason Pye, vice president of legislative affairs for FreedomWorks, asked, “Is Susan Collins actually a Republican? She conferences with the Republicans, there’s an R next to her name, but a question mark is more appropriate.”

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While the multimillionaire athletes in the NFL continued their disgraceful national anthem protests last week, students at a Georgia high school took it upon themselves to show the world what real patriotism and unity look like.

Prior to a home match-up Friday against Greater Atlanta Christian School, football players from Fannin County High School rushed onto the field carrying dozens of large American flags.

And although the team wound up losing the game that followed, the inspirational message of patriotism and unity they imparted continues to resonate with many.

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Watch:

The performance, which was reportedly organized by players, coaches, and parents to pay tribute to veterans and those currently serving in the armed forces, was beautiful, wouldn’t you say? Local district superintendent Michael Gwatney certainly thought so.

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“It was an awesome and unifying moment for the audiences on both sides of our stadium and reminded us that no matter what team we support, we are all Americans,” he said to local station WSB.

Here’s the kicker: According to Gwatney, one of the team’s football players has joined the military. Excellent decision.

Unfortunately, not everyone appreciated this grand gesture by Fannin County High School’s football team. In fact, station WSB’s Facebook page was littered with negative comments from racial grievance mongers desperate to besmirch this moment of unity.

“(T)he protests were never about the flag !!” barked one very angry Facebook user. “A lot of Whites figure if they keep the conversation about the flag & the anthem ; THEY WON’T HAVE TO DISCUSS THE REAL PROBLEM !!!”

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Many Americans, including the NFL’s multimillionaires, have forgotten how lucky they are to live in the freest nation on Earth. However, the patriotic boys at Fannin County High School certainly haven’t.

H/T TheBlaze

Please share this story on Facebook and Twitter and let us know what you think about the awesome stand for patriotism and unity these high school football players took.