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Tag: migrant crisis
Jesse Watters

Fox Guest Ranting About Migrant Crime Has His Own Violent Rap Sheet

On February 28, Fox News host Jesse Watters hosted “James Lee” on his show to discuss the murder of Laken Riley on the campus of the University of Georgia. Watters did not disclose, however, that Lee is actually James DePaola, who has had multiple run-ins with the law himself, including when he became violent over a grilled cheese sandwich his wife had made, prompting his 12-year-old daughter to call the police.

On February 28, Athens-Clarke County Mayor Kelly Girtz held a press conference. The Atlanta Journal-Constitutionreported that the press conference had been interrupted multiple times by protesters, including James DePaola.

Law-enforcement officers did not remove anybody from the room while Girtz spoke, but police asked Athens resident James DePaola several times to wait his turn to speak.

“We the people are tired of this lawlessness,” Depaola told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution after the press conference ended. “We are being put last.”

DePaola also spoke to Flagpole.com at the press conference.

Later that day, Watters hosted “James Lee” on his show and played footage of DePaola interrupting the press conference, praising him for his actions. (Watters’ full “migrant crime spree” segment can be viewed here. Watters likens his guest to Rick Santelli's rantin 2009 that kicked off the tea party. His guest concludes by telling Watters that “You don't get the credit you deserve as a patriot and a real journalist.”)

He can also be seen shortly before the four-minute mark in a video of the press conference posted by NBC News, when the camera pans away from the lectern.

James Lee certainly appears to be James DePaola, as others have begun to notice.

The Georgia Gazettehas a picture of a “James Lee DePaola” related to a 2023 booking at Whitfield County jail. The picture appears to be the same man.

The site also has a booking picture from a 2020 booking in Gwinnett county.

But before advising Fox News on immigration policy, DePaola was previously best known for violently threatening his wife after deciding that she had used too many slices of cheese on his grilled cheese sandwich, leading to his young daughter calling the police. As Time reported in 2016:

A man wanted just two slices of cheese on his sandwich, so when his wife used three slices in his grilled cheese sandwich, he became irate.

Angered at the sight of all the extra cheesiness, James DePaola became agitated and violent, yelling at the woman, Michele DePaola. According to WSB-TV, DePaola then ripped the landline out of the wall so his wife couldn’t call the police and reportedly screamed at her intensely. The couple’s 12-year old daughter who witnessed the incident called the police to the scene, according to Athens-Clarke County police.

James DePaola was charged with obstruction of a 911 call and criminal trespass/damage to property over what the police now refer to as “the grilled cheese incident”. DePaola has a history of “abusive behavior,” and was often “excessively critical and controlling of day to day things in life” like sandwiches, apparently.

Fox5 Atlanta posted a booking picture of DePaola at the time, making clear he is from Athens-Clarke County; the site also mentioned that two of his other young children were present when he threatened his wife.

While this may be Jesse Watters’ ideal guest, we cannot recommend that news outlets take public policy advice from someone violently triggered by an unexpected slice of cheese.

The real question is why Fox News didn’t tell its audience DePaola’s full name.

Reprinted with permission from Media Matters.

Danziger: Out Of Control

Danziger: Out Of Control

Jeff Danziger’s award-winning drawings, syndicated by the Washington Post Writers Group, are published by more than 600 newspapers and websites. He has been a cartoonist for the Rutland Herald, the New York Daily News and the Christian Science Monitor; his work has appeared in newspapers from the Wall Street Journal to Le Monde and Izvestia. Danziger has published ten books of cartoons and a novel about the Vietnam War. He served in Vietnam as a linguist and intelligence officer, earning a Bronze Star and the Air Medal. Born in New York City, he now lives in Manhattan and Vermont. A video of the artist at work can be viewed here.

Between 700-900 Migrants May Have Died At Sea This Week: NGOs

Between 700-900 Migrants May Have Died At Sea This Week: NGOs

By Steve Scherer

ROME (Reuters) – At least 700 migrants may have died at sea this past week in the busiest week of migrant crossings from Libya towards Italy this year, Medecins San Frontieres and the U.N. Refugee agency said on Sunday.

About 14,000 have been rescued since Monday amid calm seas, and there have been at least three confirmed instances of boats sinking. But the number of dead can only be estimated based on survivor testimony, which is still being collected.

“We will never know exact numbers,” Medecins San Frontieres said in a Tweet after estimating that 900 had died during the week. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) said more than 700 had drowned.

Migrants interviewed on Saturday in the Sicilian port of Pozzallo told of a large fishing boat that overturned and sank on Thursday with many women and children on board.

Initial estimates were that 400 people died, but the UN Refugee agency said on Sunday there may have been about 670 passengers on board.

According to testimony collected by EU border agency Frontex, when the motorless fishing boat capsized, 25 swam to the boat that had been towing it, while 79-89 others were saved by rescuers and 15 bodies were recovered. This meant more than 550 died, the UNHCR said.

The migrants — fleeing wars, oppression and poverty — often do not know how to swim and do not have life jackets. They pay hundreds or thousands of dollars to make the crossing from Libya to Italy, by far the most dangerous border passage for migrants in the world.

This week’s arrivals included Eritreans, Sudanese, Nigerians and many other West Africans, humanitarian groups say. Despite the surge this week, as of Friday 40,660 arrivals had been counted, 2 percent fewer than the same period of last year, the Interior Ministry said.

Most of the boats this week appear to have left from Sabratha, Libya, where many said smugglers had beaten them and women said they had been raped, said MSF, which has three rescue boats in the area.

The migrants are piled onto flimsy rubber boats or old fishing vessels which can toss their occupants into the sea in a matter of seconds.

About 100 are thought to have either been trapped in the hull or to have drowned after tumbling into the sea on Wednesday.

On Friday, the Italian Navy ship Vega collected 45 bodies and rescued 135 from a “half submerged” rubber boat. It is not yet known exactly how many were on board, but the rubber boats normally carry about 300.

“Some were more shaken than others because they had lost their loved ones,” Raffaele Martino, commander of the Vega, told Reuters on Sunday in the southern port of Reggio Calabria, where the Vega docked with the survivors and corpses, including those of three infants.

“It’s time that Europe had the courage to offer safe alternatives that allow these people to come without putting their own lives or those of their children in danger,” Tommaso Fabri of MSF Italy said.
Reporting by Steve Scherer; Additional reporting by Reuters TV in Reggio Calabria; Editing by Richard Balmforth

Photo: Migrants are seen on a capsizing boat before a rescue operation by Italian navy ships “Bettica” and “Bergamini” (unseen) off the coast of Libya in this handout picture released by the Italian Marina Militare on May 25, 2016. Marina Militare/Handout via REUTERS    

Far-Right Candidate Defeated In Austrian Presidential Vote

Far-Right Candidate Defeated In Austrian Presidential Vote

By Francois Murphy

VIENNA (Reuters) – Austria narrowly avoided becoming the first EU country to elect a far-right candidate as head of state, as postal ballots decided a knife-edge presidential run-off vote in favor of his environmentalist rival.

After an election that had been too close to call on Sunday, a count of the absentee votes on Monday thrust the 72-year-old Alexander van der Bellen past anti-immigration Freedom Party rival Norbert Hofer and into the largely ceremonial post of president.

The Freedom Party and its resurgent European allies expressed disappointment at the defeat but delight at the surge in support for them from Austrian voters, while traditional parties of government breathed a sigh of relief.

“Fifty percent confidence in Norbert Hofer is a gigantic showing,” Hofer’s campaign manager Herbert Kickl told public broadcaster ORF, toning down comments before the election that suggested the Freedom Party (FPO) might contest the count.

“One thing is clear: there are many Norbert Hofers in the Freedom Party and we are very, very well placed for parliamentary elections – whenever they come,” he added.

“This is just the beginning,” FPO boss Heinz-Christian Strache said on his Facebook page.

One factor behind the strong FPO showing was dissatisfaction with the feuding ruling coalition of two centrist parties.

Opinion polls regularly suggest the Freedom Party would win parliamentary elections if held now. The current government’s term runs until 2018.

The Interior Ministry count gave van der Bellen 50.3 percent of the vote, compared to 49.7 percent for Hofer, who had run on an anti-immigration platform. The margin of victory was just over 31,000 out of nearly 4.5 million valid votes cast.

Hofer conceded defeat in a post on his Facebook page, thanking his supporters and telling them not to be despondent.

“Of course I am sad today,” he said. “I would have liked to take care of our wonderful country for you as president.”

 

RELIEF

Hofer’s defeat averts a big potential embarrassment for Europe’s political establishment, increasingly under threat from populist parties that have profited from concerns about the refugee crisis, weak growth and high unemployment.

“It’s a relief to see the Austrians reject populism and extremism,” French Prime Minister Manuel Valls said in a Twitter post. “Everyone in Europe must draw lessons from this.”

Prosperous Austria has been at the center of a record influx of migrants, fanning resentment towards the two centrist parties – the Social Democrats (SPO) and the conservative People’s Party – that have dominated politics since the end of World War Two.

Sunday’s provisional result, which did not include the postal ballots, had shown Hofer ahead.

But the SORA institute, a pollster, said that mail-in ballots were likely to favor former Greens leader van der Bellen because they are traditionally used by more educated voters.

The vote in Austria, a country of 8.5 million people, had unsettled leaders elsewhere in Europe, particularly in neighboring Germany where the new anti-immigration Alternative for Germany is on the rise.

In France, the National Front of Marine Le Pen is leading in polls ahead of a presidential election next year. Across the Channel, the UK Independence Party is campaigning for Britain to leave the European Union in a referendum on June 23.

“Despite the disappointment, a historic score for our ally from the FPO,” National Front Secretary General Nicolas Bay said on Twitter. “The future belongs to patriots!”

Hofer, 45, has described himself as a center-right politician and told voters not to believe suggestions from other parties that he would be a dangerous president.
Photo: Alexander Van der Bellen, a former leader of the leftist Greens party now running as an independent, waves to supporters as he arrives for his final election rally ahead of Austrian presidential election in Vienna, Austria, May 20, 2016. REUTERS/Heinz-Peter Bader