Category Archives: Health Disease

Does China have a Covert System to Kill Americans with 4-FIBF?

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In 1893, Methamphetamine or crystal meth was first developed from ephedrine. A chemist by the name of Nagayoshi Nagai was responsible for this creation. It wasn’t until 1919, that methamphetamine was turned into its crystallized form by Akira Ogata. Ogata was able to do this by reduction of ephedrine using iodine and red phosphorous. Amphetamine, which is a related drug, first came into existence in 1887 by a Lazar Edeleanu in Germany. Methamphetamine manufacturing initially began in the United States in Hawaii in the 1960s.

***

Adolf Hitler used cocaine and creative concoctions made by his personal doctor. He also relied on a stunning array of drugs while ruling Nazi Germany, including one made popular by the show Breaking Bad: crystal meth.

According to a 47-page U.S. military dossier, a physician filled the Fuhrer with barbiturate tranquilizers, morphine, bulls’ semen, a pill that contained crystal meth, and other drugs, depending on Hitler’s momentary needs, the Daily Mail reports. By this account, Hitler downed crystal meth before a 1943 meeting with Mussolini in which the Fuhrer ranted for two hours, and took nine shots of methamphetamine while living out his last days in his bunker.

***

The next drug of choice used by militants is Captagon which is manufactured and trafficked from Lebanon. Captagon, a meth-like variant of the banned pharmaceutical Fenethylline, and is manufactured in large quantities primarily in Lebanon and neighboring Syria, where it is sold to ISIS via middle men.

Cali Estes, founder of The Addictions Coach, said the drug is referred to as the “Super Soldier Pill”because it can last up to 48 hours and causes users to be full of energy, impervious to pain, and “in a sense removes any barriers they would have to fighting and getting killed.”

Most of the blame for war in Iraq, Syria, Yemen can be blamed on Iran. The proxy terror group Hezbollah operated worldwide and is funded by outright selling Captagon.

***

Image result for fluoro iso butyrfentanyl

The newest deadly narcotic on the market is being studied by the DEA and it is an epidemic, the basis of which appears to be China.

***  DailyHerald

WASHINGTON (AP) — No one knew what was in the baggie. It was just a few tablespoons of crystalline powder seized back in April, clumped like snow that had partially melted and frozen again.

Emily Dye, a 27-year-old forensic chemist at the Drug Enforcement Administration’s Special Testing and Research Laboratory, did not know if anyone had died from taking this powder, or how much it would take to kill you.

What she did know was this: New drugs were appearing in the lab every other week, things never before seen in this unmarked gray building in Sterling, Virginia. Increasingly, these new compounds were synthetic opioids designed to mimic fentanyl, a prescription painkiller up to 50 times stronger than heroin.

This, Dye realized, could be one of them.

The proliferation of rapidly evolving synthetic opioids has become so fierce that the DEA says they now constitute an entire new class of drugs, which are fueling the deadliest addiction crisis the United States has ever seen.

The fentanyl-like drugs are pouring in primarily from China, U.S. officials say — an assertion Beijing maintains has not been substantiated. Laws cannot keep pace with the speed of scientific innovation. As soon as one substance is banned, chemists synthesize slightly different, and technically legal, molecules and sell that substance online, delivery to U.S. doorsteps guaranteed.

More Americans now die of drug overdoses than in car crashes. Almost two-thirds of them, more than 33,000 in 2015 alone, took some form of opioid — either heroin, prescription painkillers or, increasingly, synthetic compounds like U-47700 and furanyl fentanyl, manufactured by nimble chemists to stay one step ahead of the law.

It is now forensic chemists like Dye who are on the front line of the nation’s war on drugs, teasing out molecular structures of mystery drugs so they can be named, tracked and regulated.

Dye held the baggie of powder in her gloved hand.

“Man,” she said. “I’ve got to figure out what this is.”

___

A NEW CLASS OF DEADLY DRUGS

Dye had an idea where to start. The sample came in tagged as suspected fentanyl. Dye picked up a vial with 2 milligrams of fentanyl from her long, clean lab bench. The container looked empty. Up close, squinting, she could see a spray of white dust clinging to its sides. The contents of that vial will kill 99 percent of the people who take it.

Dye first handled fentanyl three years ago. If she breathed it or touched it, she could die. It was nerve-wracking then — and still is.

The vial was made of glass. Dye had drop-tested it and knew that if it rolled off and hit the hard floor, it would not shatter. She rapped the vial against the benchtop, trying to make the powder inside more visible. Bang, bang, bang. It was still invisible.

“There’s nothing more terrifying than dealing with a lethal dose of material,” she said. Her hands were steady. Dye won modeling competitions for poise while she was at Graham High School in Bluefield, Virginia, a town of some 5,000 people on the eastern edge of Appalachian coal country.

Dye’s mother is a nurse who also deals with hazardous material. Mother and daughter both know that risk is not something to worry about, it’s something to manage. Dye has recommitted to every safety protocol she was ever taught. One, safety glasses. Two, lab coat, buttoned. Three, powder-free disposable nitrile gloves. Four, face mask. She placed an emergency naloxone injection kit — an antidote for opioid overdose — near her workspace. Just in case. And, on samples like this, she never works alone.

The Special Testing Laboratory is one of eight forensic chemistry labs the DEA runs. Focused on research, it has a worn functionality that gives it an academic feel. Down echoing hallways are labs packed with fume hoods and high-tech machines sprouting tubes and wires. Beakers dry by the sinks. “Safety First” signs have been taped to the doors. Mostly, it is silent.

Forty chemists work here. Their job is to identify substances seized by law enforcement in the field before they kill or kill again. One of the compounds they identified is carfentanil, which is so potent it was used as a chemical weapon before it hit the North American drug supply over the summer.

“Right now we’re seeing the emergence of a new class — that’s fentanyl-type opioids,” Dye’s boss, Jill Head, explained. “Based on the structure, there can be many, many more substitutions on that molecule that we have not yet seen.”

Entrepreneurial chemists have been creating designer alternatives to cannabis, amphetamine, cocaine and Ecstasy for years. But this new class of synthetics is far more lethal.

Back in 2012 and 2013, when reports of fentanyl derivatives started coming in to the U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime in Vienna, chemists chucked them in the “other” category. Today those “other” substances are one of the fastest-growing groups of illicit chemicals tracked by the agency.

“New opioids keep emerging,” said Martin Raithelhuber, an expert in illicit synthetic drugs at the U.N. They deserve their own category, he added, but that will take time.

Once, forensic chemists like Dye confronted a familiar universe of methamphetamine, cocaine and heroin. Drug dealers, users and DEA agents generally knew what substance they were handling.

Today, things are different. This is a golden age of chemical discovery — and subterfuge. Dealers may not know that the high-purity heroin from Mexico they’re selling has been laced with fentanyl. Users may not realize the robin’s-egg-blue oxycodone tablets they’re taking are spiked with acetylfentanyl.

If field agents bust a clandestine drug lab and see a cloud of white powder in the air, they no longer assume it’s cocaine. They run.

“Had I come on board at a time when everything was cocaine and heroin and meth and marijuana, it’s not an exciting day,” Dye said. “Now I come to work and see something that’s never been seen.”

“And it can kill somebody,” she added.

___

SEEDS OF A NEW INDUSTRY

The sprint to market unregulated chemicals is driven by demand in the U.S., where users gobble up 80 percent of the world’s opioids, according to the DEA.

Dye was just 6 years old when Purdue unveiled OxyContin as a breakthrough drug, a powerful yet supposedly nonaddictive opioid that would revolutionize pain management.

Instead, aggressive marketing and unscrupulous doctors helped push a generation of people into addiction.

Dye saw them all around her in Bluefield. Her dad’s pharmacy was her window on the crisis.

“People used to break into his store and steal Oxys,” Dye said. “He became friends with a lot of cops.” She did, too.

In high school, Dye fell in love with chemistry. Drawn to linearity and logic, she found beauty in the way equations yielded answers.

The year Dye graduated, 2007, Purdue Pharma and its executives paid more than $630 million in legal penalties for willfully misrepresenting the drug’s addiction risks.

By then it was too late.

The seeds of a new industry had already taken root. Today, it is almost as easy to order synthetic opioids on the open internet as it is to buy a pair of shoes, The Associated Press found in an investigation published in October . Payments can be made by Western Union, MoneyGram or Bitcoin, and products are shipped by DHL, UPS or EMS — the express mail service of China’s state-run postal service. As the lines between licit and illicit commerce blurred, it became possible for just about anyone with internet access to score an ever-changing array of lethal chemicals.

By the time Dye was in college studying forensic chemistry, U.S. regulators were cracking down on prescription drug abuse. Users turned from pills to heroin, which was cheap and relatively easy to get. Between 2010 and 2014 heroin overdoses in the U.S. tripled, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Three-quarters of today’s heroin users first used prescription opioids, a JAMA Psychiatry study showed.

Drug dealers soon learned that if they cut potent synthetic opioids, like fentanyls, into drugs like heroin, they could make vastly more money. Overdose deaths from synthetic opioids — a category dominated by illicit fentanyl — more than tripled from 2013 to 2015, hitting 9,580 last year, CDC data show.

___

A DISCOVERY

On June 28, two months after the singer Prince died of a fentanyl overdose, Dye walked down a long, white hallway, past a heavy metal grate and into a dim room known as “the vault.” She was surrounded by packages of evidence, seized from the field and waiting for analysis. She checked out an envelope wrapped in plastic wrap and yellow tape that had come in on April 13, and placed it in a steel lockbox with her name on it.

Back in the lab, Dye unwrapped the package and found a silver pouch the size of a small handbag. Inside that was a palm-size baggie.

She scooped up a dot of powder from the baggie with a thin metal spatula and gingerly placed it in a small glass crimp vial. As she worked, she treated the material as if it were radioactive, twisting the spatula around with her fingers to avoid contamination. Using a glass pipette, she transferred a few drops of methanol into the vial and clamped it shut.

Dye dropped the sample into a mass spectrometer. The machine sucked the evidence through a copper-colored wire and bombarded it with electrons. That broke it up into many different small pieces. “Kind of like when you drop a puzzle,” she said.

The resulting pattern of peaks is akin to a chemical fingerprint. Dye compared the result with the lab’s library of approximately 1,500 known drugs.

None matched. This was new.

Dye had made a discovery.

China has banned many synthetic drugs, but new chemicals continue to sprout like weeds. In October and November, the AP identified 12 Chinese vendors hawking furanyl fentanyl and U-47700 — drugs that are not banned in China — as substitutes for blacklisted drugs. All offered their products via the Korean business-to-business platform EC21.com.

“Most customers choose the U-47700 now,” a man from XiWang Chemical Co. who called himself Adam Schexnayder emailed. “Although U-47700 is weaker than fentanyl. But it is a good opioid product. You can try it. How about it?”

Contacted by the AP, Schexnayder responded with a graphic Chinese obscenity, but said nothing more. The site has since vanished.

EC21 blocked searches for furanyl fentanyl and U-47700 after the AP called to ask about the chemicals, though “heroinn” still yielded results on Wednesday. The site has banned more than 768 search terms and is working with a developer to block changing patterns of forbidden terms more effectively, said Kim Min-Jeong, a service team manager. “We spend a significant amount of operating costs and labor on auditing.”

___

‘ASK TO DIE’

The closest match to Dye’s evidence in the lab’s database was a compound called butyryl fentanyl. But it wasn’t the same. In her sample, distinctive small peaks kept popping up after taller ones.

She and her colleagues ran the evidence through a nuclear magnetic resonance spectrometer, which pulses samples with a magnetic field to help map the position of different atoms. Then they guessed. They bought a sample of the compound they thought they had from a legitimate research chemical company and used it to test their theory.

On July 26, Dye ran the reference standard they’d purchased through the mass spectrometer. The result matched their evidence exactly. Now they knew what they had on their hands.

“It’s 4-fluoroisobutyrylfentanyl,” Dye said.

Case closed.

What had Dye discovered?

4-fluoroisobutyrylfentanyl — 4-FIBF for short —has exactly the same weight and chemical composition as one of the compounds China banned in October 2015. The only difference is the arrangement of three carbon atoms.

Long before Dye made her discovery, Chinese vendors were offering 4-FIBF for sale.

Shanghai Xianchong Chemical Co., a trading company that operates from a small, spare office on a leafy street in central Shanghai, was one of them. Shanghai Xianchong started fielding requests for 4-FIBF around April, according to the manager, a clean-cut man in a white polo shirt named Jammi Gao.

Gao said in an email that he could sell 4-FIBF for $6,000 a kilogram, though he later denied ever brokering a deal.

He refused to ship opioids, like the ultrapotent carfentanil, that are banned from general use in the U.S. But 4-FIBF is so new to the street it is not a controlled substance in either the U.S. or China.

Drug users yearn for better chemistry, for highs with incredible analgesic power that go on and on. 4-FIBF showed promise. It was strong and cheap and though it produced little euphoria, it lasted a long time, users reported in online forums. Several said it could be used like methadone, to control opioid withdrawal symptoms. One user-turned-dealer called 4-FIBF “a miracle molecule.”

But 4-FIBF was so strong that getting the dose right was a problem. “Eyeball this, ask to die. ’nuff said,” one user noted in March.

None of the users replied to AP’s requests for comment.

Back in the lab, Dye peeled off her gloves and tossed them into a hazardous waste container. She didn’t know users were already warning each other not to go overboard chasing a heroin high that never kicked in with 4-FIBF. She didn’t know about the rough dosing schedules addicts had worked out. And she didn’t know that 4-FIBF gave some people satisfying, sleep-through-the-night results when they stuck it up their rectum.

Dye would go home, safe, to her dog. Maybe tomorrow she would find the next new thing in an evidence bag on her bench. User forums were already buzzing with talk of things like cyclopentyl fentanyl and acryl fentanyl.

But elsewhere, all across America, people would not make it through the night. By the time Dye finished work the next day, another 90 Americans would be dead of opioid overdoses.

German migrants ‘despise’ Christians, ‘Islamise’ the country

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SIMMERING HATRED

Refugee camp translator reveals how German migrants ‘despise’ Christians and want to ‘Islamise’ the country

Sun: Eritrean woman, 39, who worked in asylum centres for five years, claims women told her they were having as many kids as possible to ‘destroy’ Germany

A TRANSLATOR at refugee camps in Germany has claimed Muslim migrants hate Christians and want to Islamise the country.

The woman, 39, from Eritrea, came to Germany as a refugee herself in 1991, before volunteering at asylum centres to “give something back”.

A translator at German asylum centres said many Muslim migrants hated Christians (Pictured: Refugee centre in Erding near Munich)

Reuters
A translator at German asylum centres said many Muslim migrants hated Christians (Pictured: Refugee centre in Erding near Munich)

But the Arabic speaker said what she discovered when working with migrants over the last five years shocked her.

During her time at a number of centres across the country, she said she discovered Muslim refugees preaching “pure hatred” of Christians.

Muslim children were told by their parents not to play with Christian kids.

And she herself was told it was a sin for her to help feed and defend Christians.

She told German Catholic website Kath.net: “They want Germany to be Islamised. They despise our country and our values.”

She claimed many of the migrants showed their “true colours” only when they were away from people of other religions.

The translator explained: “Pure hatred against non-believers is preached, and children are brought here from an early age here in Germany.

“It’s very similar in asylum housing, where Muslim boys refuse to play with Christians.

“Some women told me ‘We will multiply our numbers. We must have more children than the Christians because it’s the only way we can destroy them here’.”

She said other translators were a part of the problem, claiming they prevented Christian refugees claiming permanent asylum by failing to tell them they were entitled to have their questionnaire’s translated.

In April of 2016:

Obama PRAISES Merkel for handling of migrant crisis but Germans want her OUT

BARACK OBAMA has praised Angela Merkel for her handling of the escalating EU migrant crisis despite growing cracks in the German chancellor’s power base as her approval ratings plummet over her immigration stance.

Express: During a visit to Hannover, the US president said: “She is on the right side of history on this.

“In this globalised world, it is very difficult for us to simply build walls.”

His remarks come amid an increasingly fractious debate over radical Islamism in Germany, sparked by Mrs Merkel’s ill-fated open door asylum policy.

Shocking opinion polls delivered a crushing blow to the German Chancellor as it was revealed Mrs Merkel’s conservatives lost in two out of three state elections.

Germans appear to be punishing her accommodative refugee policy.

More than 1.1 million migrants entered Germany last year, with most coming from Middle Eastern and North African countries.

But Mrs Merkel’s grip on power is growing ever weaker, with rebellion growing across the country against her controversial immigration policies.

She has consistently berated other EU states for introducing border controls to bring the migrant flow under control, ever since she made a pledge last summer to welcome all Syrians with open arms.

However growing cracks appeared and members of her own movement begin to openly question her stance on immigration following the horrific Cologne sex acts, forcing her to back down.

Sanctuary City Mayors Fight Trump, Gauntlet is Cast

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Current law requires that states and localities must not “prohibit or in any way restrict” their local government officials or employees from sending to or receiving Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) information regarding citizenship or immigration status of any individual.  However, many states and localities across the country have implemented “sanctuary” policies that do exactly that.  In California, a “sanctuary” state, on July 1, 2015, Katie Steinle was shot and killed by Francisco Sanchez, an illegal immigrant with a criminal record who had been released by the San Francisco police prior to the shooting, despite Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) having issued a detainer request to hold Sanchez.

To discourage states and localities from adopting illegal “sanctuary” policies, the House passed the Enforce the Law for Sanctuary Cities Act (H.R. 3009), which would eliminate a violating state or locality’s eligibility for funding from the following three federal grant programs:

·         SCAAP program (State Criminal Alien Assistance Program): $185 million funded in FY2015

·         COPS program (Community Oriented Policing Services program): $208 million funded in FY2015

·         Byrne-JAG program (Edward Byrne Memorial Justice Assistance Grant Program): $376 million funded in FY2015

Sanctuary-City Mayors Gird for Fight as Trump Threatens Budgets

President-elect has $650 billion in federally funded leverage
  • ‘We will do everything we know how to do to resist that’

Bloomberg: Municipalities that protect undocumented immigrants from deportation stand to lose billions in federal aid if President-elect Donald Trump fulfills promises to starve them financially.

More than 200 U.S. ‘sanctuary cities’ won’t turn over people to federal officers seeking to deport them nor share information about them, saying that would rend the social fabric and impede policing. Since Trump’s election last week, mayors including San Francisco’s Ed Lee, New York’s Bill de Blasio and Chicago’s Rahm Emanuel have vowed not to back down.

“I would say to the president-elect, that the idea that you’re going to penalize Boston, New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, San Francisco, Philadelphia — these are the economic, cultural and intellectual energy of this country,” Emanuel said in a radio interview this week.

Many cities have calculated that dwindling populations and labor shortages can be ameliorated by immigrants, undocumented or not. The mayors must calculate the point at which resistance harms the communities they’re fighting to protect. The evolving confrontation exposes states’ and cities’ vulnerability to losing some of the $650 billion in federal funds they receive for everything from police to sidewalks as they confront pension obligations and shrinking budgets.

“There’s an economic benefit from being a sanctuary city, but it doesn’t appear to warrant giving up 5 to 10 percent of the city’s funding,” said Dan White, senior economist at Moody’s Analytics, in West Chester, Pennsylvania.

Congressional Republicans have been trying for years to use federal dollars as leverage.

A bill this year by Senator Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania defines a “sanctuary jurisdiction” as any that restricts local officials from exchanging information about an individual’s immigration status or complying with Homeland Security requests. The measure would cut off funds including Economic Development Administration Grants, which totaled $238 million last year, and Community Development Block Grants, which amounted to $3 billion last year. Ten of the largest sanctuary jurisdictions were awarded a collective $700 million in block grants in 2016.

Chicago, the nation’s third-largest city after New York and Los Angeles, is particularly vulnerable. Public-employee retirement funds face a $34 billion shortfall, and Emanuel last month proposed a $9.3 billion budget for 2017 that would increase spending to hire and train more police. The spending plan anticipates $1.3 billion in federal grants this year.

“If Chicago were to lose all of its federal funding, that’s a game-changer,” White said.

Deep-Sixing Documents

In Los Angeles, the police chief said that he would continue a policy of not aiding federal deportation efforts, according to the Los Angeles Times. In New York, de Blasio said last week that he would consider destroying a database of undocumented immigrants with city identification cards before handing such records over to the Trump administration.

“We are not going to sacrifice a half-million people who live amongst us,” de Blasio said. “We will do everything we know how to do to resist that.”

New York City will receive $7.7 billion in federal grants in fiscal 2017, just under 10 percent of the city’s $82 billion budget.

In New Haven, Connecticut, the city of 130,000 that’s home to Yale University receives about a quarter of its $523 million budget from various federal grants, said Mayor Toni Harp.

“That would be really very difficult,” Harp said. “We would be willing to take that as far as it needed to go in our judicial system.”

Trump made attacks on sanctuary cities a campaign staple, often invoking the shooting death of Kathryn Steinle by an undocumented immigrant in San Francisco. The shooter had been released from a county jail even though federal officials had asked him to be held until they could deport him.

The incoming president has said he would deport more than 11 million people, beginning with gang members, drug dealers and other criminals. He’s also said he would create a special deportation task force within Immigration and Customs and Enforcement. If that’s the case, local jurisdictions might see even more requests for cooperation.

Many cities say that immigration is a federal responsibility and they should be left out of it. Others say that they simply don’t have the time or resources to address it.

Stretched Force

In New Orleans, which doesn’t consider itself a sanctuary city but whose officers don’t ask about immigration status, the specter of losing federal funds is daunting. Some money the city receives is enough to fund nine police officers, said Zach Butterworth, executive counsel for Mayor Mitch Landrieu and director of federal relations.

”The federal government’s support for local law enforcement has really been slashed significantly already,” Butterworth said. “For them to come down here and say you also need to be doing our job on immigration is a tough sell.”

Others say that singling out undocumented immigrants impedes law enforcement because large populations will shun any interaction with the authorities.

“Essentially, for the police, you’ve got a significant number of undocumented illegals in the country and they’re afraid of the police,” said Darrel Stephens, executive director of the Major Cities Chiefs Association.

Lena Graber, special projects attorney at the San Francisco-based Immigrant Legal Resource Center believes Trump will run into legal challenges if he threatens municipal funding.

“The federal government can’t force state and local law enforcement to use their resources to enforce federal regulatory programs like immigration law,” she said. “He can try to offer incentives, but the more that those incentives look like coercion, the more it won’t be legal.”

In Denver, which has a policy of refusing to hold detainees solely on a request by immigration officials, Mayor Michael Hancock said he won’t be cowed.

“This is all legal what we are doing here,” he said. “The president doesn’t have the authority to unilaterally decide how we move forward.”

In Oakland, California, Mayor Libby Schaaf says she is proud to run a sanctuary city, and is planning to recruit even more towns for the movement.

“The best defense is offense,” she said. “There is strength in numbers.”

****

Sanctuary Cities Continue to Obstruct Enforcement, Threaten Public Safety

By Jessica Vaughan
Sanctuary jurisdictions remain a significant public safety problem throughout the country. About 300 jurisdictions have been identified by ICE as having a policy that is non-cooperative and obstructs immigration enforcement (as of September 2015). The number of cities has remained relatively unchanged since our last update in January 2016, as some new sanctuary jurisdictions have been added and few jurisdictions have reversed their sanctuary policies.

Over the 19-month period from January 1, 2014, to September 30, 2015, more than 17,000 detainers were rejected by these jurisdictions. Of these, about 11,800 detainers, or 68 percent, were issued for individuals with a prior criminal history.

According to ICE statistics, since the Obama administration implemented the new Priority Enforcement Program in July 2015 restricting ICE use of detainers, the number of rejected detainers has declined. However, the number of detainers issued by ICE also has declined in 2016, so it is not clear if the new policies are a factor. It is apparent that most of the sanctuary policies remain in place, raising concerns that the Priority Enforcement Program has failed as a response to the sanctuary problem, and has simply resulted in fewer criminal aliens being deported.

The Department of Justice’s Inspector General recently found that some of the sanctuary jurisdictions appear to be violating federal law, and may face debarment from certain federal funding or other consequences.

The sanctuary jurisdictions are listed below. These cities, counties, and states have laws, ordinances, regulations, resolutions, policies, or other practices that obstruct immigration enforcement and shield criminals from ICE — either by refusing to or prohibiting agencies from complying with ICE detainers, imposing unreasonable conditions on detainer acceptance, denying ICE access to interview incarcerated aliens, or otherwise impeding communication or information exchanges between their personnel and federal immigration officers.

A detainer is the primary tool used by ICE to gain custody of criminal aliens for deportation. It is a notice to another law enforcement agency that ICE intends to assume custody of an alien and includes information on the alien’s previous criminal history, immigration violations, and potential threat to public safety or security.

The Center’s last map update reflected listings in an ICE report that was originally published by the Texas Tribune, with a few additions and changes resulting from the Center’s research.

States
California, Connecticut, New Mexico, Colorado

Cities and Counties

Arizona
South Tucson

California (in addition to all counties)
Alameda County
Berkley
Contra Costa County
Los Angeles County
Los Angeles
Monterey County
Napa County
Orange County (Sheriff and Probation Department)
Riverside County
Sacramento County
San Bernardino County
San Diego County
San Francisco County
San Mateo County
Santa Clara County
Santa Cruz County
Sonoma County

Colorado (in addition to all counties)
Arapahoe County
Aurora Detention Center
Boulder County
Denver
Denver County
Fort Collins
Garfield County
Glenwood Springs
Grand County
Jefferson County
Larimer County
Mesa County
Pitkin County
Pueblo County
Routt County
San Miguel County

Connecticut (in addition to state LEAs)
Bridgeport
East Haven
Fairfield County
Hamden
Hartford County
Hartford
Manchester
Meriden
New Haven
New Haven County
New London County
Stamford
Stratford
Tolland County

Florida
Broward County
Hernando County
Hillsborough County
Miami-Dade County
Palm Beach County
Pasco County
Pinellas County

Georgia
Clayton County

Illinois
Champaign County
Chicago
Cook County
Des Plaines
Hanover Park
Hoffman Estates
Northbrook
Palatine

Iowa
Allamakee County
Benton County
Cass County
Clinton County
Delaware County
Dubuque County
Franklin County
Freemont County
Greene County
Ida County
Iowa County
Jefferson County
Johnson County
Linn County
Marion County
Monona County
Montgomery County
Polk County
Pottawattamie County
Sioux County
Story County
Wapello County
Winneshiek County

Kansas
Butler County
Finney County
Harvey County
Johnson County
Sedgwick County
Shawnee County

Kentucky
Campbell County
Franklin County
[Editor’s Note: According to new information provided to the Center by elected Kenton County Jailer Terry W. Carl, Kenton County complies with all ICE detainers and requests and is fully cooperative with ICE.]
Scott County
Woodford County

Louisiana
New Orleans
[Editor’s Note: According to new information provided to the Center, Lafayette Parish now complies with all ICE detainers and requests and is fully cooperative with ICE.]
Orleans Parish

Maine
Portland

Maryland
Baltimore City
Montgomery County
Prince George’s County

Massachusetts
Amherst
Boston
Cambridge
Hampden County
Holyoke
Lawrence
Northhampton
Somerville
Springfield

Minnesota
Bloomington
Brooklyn Park
Hennepin County
Ramsey County

Nebraska
Douglas County
Hall County
Lancaster County
Sarpy County

Nevada
Clark County
Washoe County

New Jersey
Linden
Middlesex County
Newark
Ocean County
Plainfield
Union County

New Mexico (in addition to all counties)
Bernalillo County
Dona Ana County
Luna County
Otero County
Rio Arriba County
San Miguel County
Santa Fe County
Taos County

New York
Franklin County
Nassau County
New York City
Onondaga County
Rensselaer County
Saratoga County
Suffolk County
St. Lawrence County
Wayne County

North Dakota
North Dakota State Penitentiary
South West Multiple County Corrections Center

Oregon
Baker County
Clackamas County
Clatsop, Oregon
Coos County
Crook County
Curry County
Deschutes County
Douglas County
Gilliam County
Grant County
Hood River County
Jackson County
Jefferson County
Josephine County
Lincoln County
Linn County
Malheur County
Marion County
Multnomah County
Oregon State Correctional Institution
Polk County
Sherman County
Springfield Police Department
Tillamook County
Umatilla County
Union County
Wallowa County
Wasco County
Washington County
Wheeler County
Yamhill County

Pennsylvania
Abington
Chester County
Delaware County
Lehigh County
Montgomery County
Philadelphia
Philadelphia County

Rhode Island
Rhode Island Department of Corrections

Texas
Dallas County
Travis County

Virginia
Arlington
Chesterfield County

Washington
Benton County
Chelan County
Clallam County
Clark County
Cowlitz County
Fife City
Franklin County
Jefferson County
Issaquah
Kent
King County
Kitsap County
Lynnwood City
Marysville
Pierce County
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Thanksgiving Day Terror. Black Swan Exercise

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Related reading: Predicting Future Military Threats: Implications of the Black Swan

Donald Trump’s transition team is getting a helping hand from the Obama administration on national security matters.

The administration is giving the president-elect and a select few of his top advisers sensitive intelligence briefings.

And, in addition, Trump and his team will take part in two so-called ‘black swan’ exercises that simulate a domestic or national security emergency.

The exercises are intended to help an incoming administration learn how to manage a crisis in real time in case there is some kind of global or domestic emergency in the first days of a Trump presidency.

A black swan exercise would, for example, ensure that a fledgling Trump administration knows how to activate the proper federal agencies to maintain stability.

According to a briefing book from the nonpartisan Center for Presidential Transition, in 2008 the Bush administration hosted two black swan exercises for then president-elect Obama’s national security team. More here from ABC.

Black Swan operations and exercises have been practiced also in the United Kingdom.

**** What is on the horizon regarding terror?

Islamic State is urging its followers to carry out acts of terrorism in New York City during the upcoming, Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade.  Jamie Schram writes in this morning’s (Nov. 14, 2016) New York Post, that “ISIS is offering a detailed how-to on using trucks as weapons of mass destruction — noting that the Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade would be an ‘excellent target.”

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MEMRI: On November 11, 2016, Al-Hayat, one of the media centers of the Islamic State (ISIS), released the third issue of its monthly magazine Rumiyah featuring an article calling on lone wolves in the U.S. and Europe to use trucks to target large outdoor conventions, crowded streets, outdoor markets, festivals, parades, and political rallies. The article also emphasized the importance of using trucks in terrorist attacks, and provided suggestions on “ideal vehicles” to use and tactical tips for the preparation and planning of attacks.

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The article, titled “Just Terror Tactics,” features images of rental trucks from companies such as Hertz and U-Haul, as well as a picture showing the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade in New York City. It begins by highlighting the “destructive capability” of motor vehicles and referring to the Bastille Day attack in Nice, France on July 14, 2016. While praising the Nice attacker, the article states: “This was superbly demonstrated in the attack launched by the brother Mohamed Lahouaiej-Bouhlel who, while traveling at the speed of approximately 90 kilometers per hour, plowed his 19-ton load-bearing truck into crowds celebrating Bastille Day in Nice, France, harvesting through his attack the slaughter of 86 Crusader citizens and injuring 434 more.”

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The article stresses the importance of using a vehicle that can inflict maximum damage, and describes the “ideal” vehicles for lone wolf attacks as “load-bearing trucks, large in size, reasonably fast in speed or rate of acceleration, heavy in weight, double-wheeled, possessing a slightly raised chassis.” The article continued: “If accessible, [vehicles] with a metal outer frame which are usually found in older cars [should be used], as the stronger outer frame allows for more damage to be caused when the vehicle is slammed into crowds, contrary to newer cars that are usually made of plastics and other weaker materials.”

Providing suggestions on how to acquire the vehicle, the article noted that buying it is the “easiest” option; however, it also mentioned renting, borrowing from relatives and acquaintances, hotwiring, and carjacking as additional options. Under “applicable targets” the article listed: “Large outdoor conventions and celebrations, pedestrian-congested streets, outdoor markets, festivals, parades and political rallies.”

The article further emphasized that in order to inflict maximum damage, attackers should consider targeting “any outdoor attraction that draws large crowds,” stating that “it is not conditional to target gatherings restricted to government or military personnel only. All so-called ‘civilian’ (and low-security) parades and gatherings are fair game and more devastating to Crusader nations.”

As for “preparation and planning,” the article recommended “assessing vehicle for roadworthiness, filling vehicle with a sufficient amount of fuel, mapping out the route of the attack, surveying the route for obstacles, such as posts, signs, barriers, humps, bus stops, dumpsters, and if accessible, a secondary weapon should be attained.”

The article also provided ideas for attackers to use in order to declare their affiliation to ISIS to “have their motives acknowledged” such as writing “ISIS will remain” or “I am a soldier of the Islamic State” on pieces of papers and throwing them out of the vehicle’s window during the attack.

The article concludes by instructing attackers to stay inside their vehicles until they are no longer movable and then to start shooting pedestrians, first responders and security forces until they are killed.

****

Black Swan exercises are those that prepare for the unexpected and several events worldwide have been part of these operations.

1. Electromagnetic Pulse (EMP) or Solar Burst

As The Heritage Foundation highlighted in the documentary 33 Minutes,[3] an EMP attack could throw America back to the pre-Industrial Revolution era. A powerful solar burst would have the same impact. Should either event occur, people would have little time to react, and the damage would be incalculable.

If the U.S. were to lose power for any prolonged period of time, given the sheer number of people located in the interior of the country, mass starvation and death would become a reality. Most experts consider these events as highly unlikely ones, so little investment or planning is done related to them.

2. Pandemic Virus

Although the U.S. has prepared for a pandemic influenza outbreak, little preparation has gone into other potential viruses. More importantly, it is the unknown virus or “super virus” that represents a Black Swan for America. Recall that it was less than 30 years ago that AIDS first began embedding itself in North America. If a far more deadly and communicable virus hits America, the U.S. would quickly expend its existing resources.

3. Nuclear or Radiological Event

The U.S. has extensive knowledge of what would happen if a nuclear or radiological explosion occurred in a major American city. Theory, however, is a poor replacement for the reality of large numbers of deaths, burn victims, and physical debris. As former Vice President Dick Cheney wisely concluded, because of the sheer consequences, even a 1 percent chance of such an event occurring requires the nation to expend the necessary resources to prevent it.

4. Super-Volcanic Eruption

Seismic activity around the Yellowstone caldera is monitored, but tectonic shifts miles below the surface could result in the buildup of pressure and a super-volcanic eruption. The volcano beneath Yellowstone previously erupted, causing destruction as far away as California, Iowa, and Louisiana. An eruption, though unlikely given current readings, could have truly catastrophic consequences.

5. Nor’Easter/Hurricane

Hurricanes strike America with a fair degree of frequency. A Black Swan event would be a Nor’easter combined with a powerful hurricane that strikes New York City in the same manner as Hurricane Katrina struck New Orleans. Between the massive flooding and wind damage, New York City could sustain casualties and physical destruction well in excess of Katrina.

How Prepared Is the U.S.?

The honest and unfortunate answer to that question is unknown and, despite attempts to ascertain that answer, will not be known if existing policy remains in place. A Black Swan by definition becomes a Black Swan because it results in catastrophic outcomes. This “delicate” balance between preparing for events and not being able to prepare adequately for all events represents the ultimate risk-based decision making.

From 2003 to 2011, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) distributed roughly $40 billion in funding to states and localities across America. Despite years of reporting requirements, DHS is fundamentally unable to state with any degree of certainty which capabilities exist, where those capabilities exist, the level of those capabilities, and the remaining capability needs. DHS knows it has funded the acquisition of many things, but specifics beyond that are unquantifiable.

Specifically, to gain a full accounting, Congress should:

  • Be fiscally responsible. Rather than continue to spread federal funds using an “inch thick and a mile wide” mentality, Congress should target federal funds at the highest-risk states, cities, and counties where the funds could meaningfully increase the security of Americans, including reducing the number of high-risk cities that are eligible for special funding.
  • Examine cooperative agreements. The need for equality downplays the need for the grant structure and invites another approach—such as the use of cooperative agreements, where the federal government and the states can sit down as true and equal partners and negotiate outcomes at the beginning and then direct funds to achieve those desired outcomes without the need for yearly applications.
  • Appoint a Black Swan commission. Rather than wait until after a catastrophic event has occurred, Congress should appoint an independent commission for the express purpose of analyzing the threats of a potential Black Swan, identifying existing capabilities, and making recommendations on how best to correct errors made thus far and accelerate closing the gap between where the nation stands today and where it needs to be tomorrow. The commission must have the independence and resources to quickly do its job after a full review of the status quo.

Expect the Unexpected

If the catastrophe in Japan has taught any lessons, it is that America must prepare for the unexpected with as much vigor as it prepares for the expected. Because a Black Swan can be so catastrophic, in many ways the ideal role for the federal government is to lead an effort surrounding those events. With the nation’s current fiscal challenges, conserving resources for catastrophic events is more vital than ever. More here from Heritage.

He Warned the WH and Democrats About Obamacare

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He Predicted Obamacare Wouldn’t Be ‘Affordable.’ Democrats Didn’t Listen.

DailySignal: Robert Laszewski is a policy adviser and analyst for the health insurance industry. He’s correctly predicted Obamacare’s pitfalls since Day One.

Heritage

In an interview with “Full Measure” this Sunday, Laszewski says he warned the Obama administration and other Democrats not to call it the “Affordable Care Act.” Earlier this week, the administration announced Obamacare premiums are spiking 25 percent.

Here’s a transcript from our interview:

Laszewski: The future is not good. The fundamental problem is not enough healthy people have signed up to pay for the sick, and not enough healthy people have signed up because the insurance plans that people are being offered just simply aren’t of good value.

Attkisson: What do customers see as wrong with the insurance product?

Laszewski: The insurance products consumers see are still too expensive in terms of premium. And the deductibles and copays are too high.

Attkisson: Can you explain in simple terms how the insurance companies are losing so much money if they’re charging so much for premiums and if deductibles are so high?

Laszewski: It’s real simple. If you only provide a health insurance plan that the sickest people buy, you can’t charge enough. You can never charge enough.

Attkisson: At it’s core, it was supposed the provide affordable insurance for everybody who needed it.

Laszewski: Yes. The Affordable Care Act was supposed to ensure that whether you were employed or unemployed or self-employed, you would have access to affordable health insurance. For someone who’s not getting a subsidy, who’s paying the full cost of the insurance, it’s likely they are now paying about double what they paid before under the old market, where only healthy people could get in.

>> Find out when and where you can watch “Full Measure”

 

DailySignal

**** Either way, taxpayers are in fact on the hook to offset costs regardless of how they are applied. Socialized payment system for a broken system.

****

Minnesota could spend up to $300M to offset ObamaCare hikes

TheHill: Minnesota’s Democratic governor wants to pour as much as $300 million into a relief fund for people facing massive premium hikes under ObamaCare in his state next year.

Gov. Mark Dayton proposed Thursday that he would offer “rebates” to help offset the 55 percent increase in healthcare premiums that ObamaCare customers will face in Minnesota this year.

The money would be taken out of Minnesota’s “rainy day fund,” which got a boost from the state’s budget surplus last year.

But Dayton was clear that his state would need a longer-term solution to make ObamaCare plans more affordable.

Dayton is the first governor in the country to announce his own plan to tackle rising premiums this year, which are far steeper than any of the previous year’s increases. The state’s final plan will also include input from the state’s Republicans, who are working on their own proposals to address panic over the premiums.

With the new rebates, Dayton said the rate increase would be limited to an average of 16 percent — below the national average of 22 percent. Last year, the national average for premium hikes was about 7 percent.

Minnesota has attracted national attention this year as it faces one of the highest premium hikes in the country. Dayton himself came under scrutiny on the issue of healthcare after he declared earlier this month that the “Affordable Care Act is no longer affordable.” Under pressure from fellow Democrats, he later walked back his remarks.

In his lengthy statement on Thursday, Dayton vigorously defended ObamaCare while also acknowledging the law is “now causing very difficult financial problems” for some people.