📑 @commondreams.org shares the letter calling to end sanctions on Venezuela after the earthquakes. It notes that, as the NYT reported, the Trump administration keeps sanctions in place — even after seizing ~$8B in Venezuelan oil this year. By @corbettjessica.bsky.social

NEW: 100+ economists and experts — including CEPR's Mark Weisbrot, Andrés Arauz, Dean Baker and Guillaume Long — call on the US to lift its sanctions on Venezuela after the earthquakes. Venezuelans "should not pay twice — first through disaster, then through sanctions."

The election “is shaping up as a stark choice that could impact the future of the Amazon rainforest, fossil fuel development and the rights of Indigenous communities.” Cepeda “has emphasized Indigenous rights, environmental conservation and reducing Colombia’s dependence on fossil fuels”

Thomas Massie suggests the deadly assault was not an accident and calls on the US government to honour its survivors.

"Colombia's Trump-aligned presidential frontrunner Abelardo de la Espriella...is facing renewed scrutiny after journalist Daniel Coronell published documents allegedly showing transfers from companies linked to Alex Saab" totaling "more than $370,000" www.latintimes.com/colombias-tr...

There should be a hall of shame for worst Pittsburghers of all time

"According to his lawyers, Chavarría testified that Ecuadorian President Daniel Noboa & Interior Minister John Reimberg were behind the brazen daylight murder of Fernando Villavicencio, a journalist & anti-corruption presidential candidate who was gunned down ... days before the 2023 election."

#NEW: CEPR backgrounder outlines what you need to know about #Colombia's pivotal vote this Sunday: who’s running, the candidates’ positions on key issues, and concerns and challenges regarding the election. We'll also be on the ground, sharing live updates 👇

📢PITTSBURGH, if trade and tariffs are impacting your job, industry, or community, this is a space to speak up and be heard — to help shape what comes next.

#OtD 13 May 1985 Philadelphia police attacked the home of Black liberation and environmental group MOVE, then dropped a bomb on it, killing 5 adults and 6 children, destroying 61 homes in the predominantly Black neighbourhood, and making 250 people homeless.

As the war in Iran impacts low-income countries, a new issuance of special drawing rights can reduce the risk of financial crisis contagion + create tens of thousands of US export-related jobs without costing taxpayers a dime, Ivana Vasic Lalovic & Michael Galant write.

Low- and middle-income countries are straddled with crippling public debt, hamstringing efforts to combat the climate crisis. At this week's IMF Spring Meetings, CEPR is calling attention to this issue. Ivana Vasic Lalovic breaks it down for this week's episode of "From D.C. Across the Americas."

Iran war escalation could trigger global recession, IMF warns -- Growth forecasts cut for US and global economy, while UK suffers sharpest downgrade in G7. www.theguardian.com/business/202...

"The fact that Venezuela's Central Bank is still being prevented from standing on its own two feet may speak to tensions within the Trump admin around the goals of US intervention in 🇻🇪" - Andres Arauz & Michael Galant in Phenomenal World.

"Expanded cooperation between the US/Ecuador demonstrates that Washington is willing to overlook Noboa’s democratic backsliding, the closing of civic space & widespread allegations of human rights abuses by Ecuadorian security forces," Pedro Labayen told the Wyoming Star.

The Trump administration is violating the Geneva Conventions with its oil blockade on Cuba, @ceprdc.bsky.social's Mark Weisbrot explains

#NEW PRESS RELEASE 🇨🇴 CEPR Applauds Colombian Government’s Decision to Exit Investor-State Dispute Settlement System that Impedes Environmental Protection https://tinyurl.com/54yfnwej Read the full statement ⬇️

CEPR international research director @jakobjohnston.bsky.social was on Urban View Radio this week with Greg Carr & Lamont King to discuss recent news from Haiti and the Trump administration's intervention in the hemisphere. Watch the full interview here:

Expertos de más de 24 países instan al presidente colombiano a liderar una coalición internacional contra este sistema de resolución de disputas 🔗 elpais.com/america-co…

"What began as an attempt to demonstrate the ongoing relevance of unrivaled US military power is fast becoming one of the most consequential strategic miscalculations of this century," CEPR senior research fellow Guillaume Long writes in @fortune.com. 

Tensions between Ecuador and Colombia have reached new heights after President Petro asserted that a bomb from Ecuador killed 27 Colombians amid ongoing joint military operations with the US Andres Arauz goes in depth on this week's From D.C. Across the Americas FULL: https://tinyurl.com/2dbxh355

ICE detention deaths are now occurring at a rate of roughly one every four days. Three weeks ago that rate was one every six days. The pace is accelerating, and Congress has not launched a single investigation.

With foreign troops set to deploy to Haiti, CEPR international research director  @jakobjohnston.bsky.social argues in @thenation.com that there is another way: to build something new, Haiti doesn’t need war. It needs peace.

"In exchange for ceding Ecuadorian sovereignty, Noboa can expect Washington to be a willing partner in continued acts of state violence and to ignore, if not embolden, a further deterioration of human rights and democracy in #Ecuador." -- Pedro Labayen Herrera of @ceprdc.bsky.social

82 million Americans can't afford health care, but Hegseth gets lobster? The Department of Defense spent $93 billion in September while many are skipping meals to afford doctor visits. That’s some bulls--t. My column: www.usatoday.com/story/opinio...

What is "The Shield of the Americas"? The new U.S. initiative lets Donald Trump play out an "imperial fantasy" and continues a long, bipartisan trend of political meddling in the hemisphere, says author and researcher @jakobjohnston.bsky.social.

CEPR hosted a Hill briefing last Friday titled: "Cuba in Crisis: What Congress Needs to Know" Here, former Obama aide @rhodesben.bsky.social discusses how sanctions hamstring Cuba's economic reform and why @democrats.org should be more outspoken on the use of sanctions as collective punishment.

It's been 10 years since #BertaCaceres was assassinated in a conspiracy led by DESA corporation high-ups and others determined to implement a dam project that threatened traditional Indigenous Lenca territory. Some still need to be brought to justice. cepr.net/newsroom/10-...

🚨 NEW EPISODE of CEPR's Expert Video Series "From D.C. Across the Americas" This week, Francesca Emanuele on the oil siege of #Cuba  "The claim that Cuba constitutes an unusual and extraordinary threat to U.S. security is an absurd premise that does not withstand serious scrutiny."

Next week, Reps. Ro Khanna and Thomas Massie will force a vote to stop Trump’s march to an illegal, disastrous war with Iran. Call 1-833-STOP-WAR (1-833-786-7927) to connect with your Reps to urge them to vote YES on the Khanna-Massie War Powers Resolution.

Jesse Jackson opened doors that many said couldn't be opened. CEPR Co-Founder Dean Baker shares a moving tribute to Jackson's legacy—his rainbow coalition, his economic populism, and the America he helped build. Rest in power. cepr.net/publications...

ICE is in fact the worst of the worst

“They were hellbent on not allowing anybody to help him until he was dead,” she said. “I was right there, and they — all of them — made the decision to deny me access to give him the best possible chance of survival.”

The Trump administration is deporting a Christian minister back to the country that tortured him, which seems like the kind of thing the Religious Right would care about if a dirty Democrat were doing it.

More than 1M Trump references in Epstein files.

"A group of progressive Democrats on Tuesday introduced a resolution to 'leave the Monroe Doctrine to the dustbin of history,' in the words of @NydiaVelazquez and replace it with a foreign policy in the Western Hemisphere based on mutual cooperation and respect."

The national Press Club released the following statement on the arrest of Don Lemon: "The world is watching closely, and the implications of this case extend far beyond any one reporter."

I know all eyes are on Minneapolis, but there's a fast-approaching nightmare in Springfield, Ohio. Trump is revoking protected status for tens of thousands of Haitians living there on Feb. 3. Reportedly, on Feb. 4, 1000 ICE agents are arriving to remove this population. Ethnic cleansing.

"If we have to hunt you down, the way they hunted down Nazis for decades, we will find your identities. We will find you. We will achieve justice. And we will do so under the Constitution and laws of the United States." www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Ft1...

If you keep calling us names, we will kill more of you.

The ACLU is raising alarm over a facial recognition app loaded onto the smartphones of immigration agents to identify and arrest people. "It's being used on the street in ways that are dangerous, that are totally unprecedented in this country, and that are, frankly, blatantly illegal."

This could be this afternoon's call! 🤙 NO ICE AGENTS AT POLLING LOCATIONS

I texted this link to five friends who are the "I don't think of myself as political" type and who've never called any of their reps' offices ever before. Two of them told me that, for this, they made the call.

After executing Alex Pretti on Saturday, ICE has shifted to primarily targeting bus stops and elementary schools in my community this week. I cannot overstate how much of the ICE activity in my community is just targeting places where little kids are.

MUST WATCH:

“I think the people of Minnesota have shown us…the direction we may need to go,” the Maryland Democrat said.

"The Trump administration granted licenses to two trading houses—Vitol & Trafigura—to handle those initial sales...In recent years, both...have been implicated by the Justice Department in Latin American bribery scandals." Cybele Mayes-Osterman on the companies handling Venezuelan oil sales

Today, in a massive show of support, 1,025 organizations, including immigrant justice, human rights, civil rights, faith, and labor organizations, sent a letter to members of Congress to express horror, outrage & deep grief about the recent shooting deaths by federal agents in Minneapolis.

This five year old is still in jail