Jun 2
2025
Incompetency and arrogance in service to cruelty
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Below is the complete verion of WeeklyPost, the newsletter we send via email on Sunday mornings. Our Monday Morning Read typically includes a portion of that newsletter; today, we’re publishing it in its entirety. If you don’t already subscribe, you can do so here.
ICE did it again.
Back in March it deported Kilmar Abrego Garcia to El Salvador in defiance of a court order, an action that generated international attention and condemnation. ICE officials said the deportation was the result of an “administrative error.” Not that they’ve attempted to bring Abrego Garcia back to the United States.
Well, ICE has again violated a court order and is once again saying “oops.” This time, it involves Jordin Melgar-Salmeron, who had been housed for 2 ½ years at the ICE detention center in Batavia.
On May 7, the Second Circuit Court of Appeals in New York City granted Melgar-Salmeron permission to remain in the United States while his immigration case wound its way through the courts. Within the hour, ICE put him on a plane bound for El Salvador, where he is now imprisoned in the notorious Izalco prison, whose harsh conditions amount to torture according to human rights advocates. Officials say the deportation wasn’t malicious, but rather the result of a breakdown in communications.
The judges are demanding answers and lawyers for Melgar-Salmeron say ICE should be slapped with a contempt of court ruling.
“Until these guys start facing real consequences for their actions they’re going to continue to snub court orders and violate law,” Matthew Borowski told our J. Dale Shoemaker.
The New York Times and Politico took notice of our story, publishing their own version and noting we broke it first. Documented, which covers immigration issues, republished our story in its entirety.
Dale last week also reported on the family which had been jailed for weeks in a makeshift cell at the Rainbow Bridge in Niagara Falls. The wife and two children subsequently emigrated to Canada while the husband was shipped off to the ICE detention center in Batavia. He won his release by posting $12,000 bond and was recently granted entry to Canada, where he rejoined his family in Toronto.
A story with a happy ending, save this: The family of the man’s brother sold a car to help raise the bond money and ICE subsequently detained the brother, who is undocumented. He’s now locked up in an ICE detention center in New Jersey.
Just about everyone except Byron Brown fesses up to a decade of bad budgeting practices that has left the City of Buffalo on the cusp of financial ruin. This year’s just-completed budgeting process was a chance to do things right. Instead, Acting Mayor Chris Scanlon and six of the Common Council’s eight members decided to repeat the mistakes of the past.
The guilty Council members include Leah Halton-Pope (Ellicott District), Bryan Bollman (Lovejoy), Joe Golombek (North), Joel Feroleto (Delaware), Zeneta Everhart (Masten) and Mitch Nowakowski (Fillmore). Only David Rivera (Niagara) and Rasheed Wyatt (University) had the good sense to vote “no.”
Geoff Kelly’s analysis details how city officials once again have adopted a budget that overestimates revenues and underestimates expenses. The budget was Scanlon’s opportunity to show he has what it takes to be a responsible fiscal manager. He failed the audition.
It’s time for a hard control board. City finances require adult supervision.
Misconduct by Buffalo police continues to cost the city money. Geoff reported two settlements totaling $1.3 million are before the Common Council. The total cost of settlements this fiscal year are likely to push the city’s end-of-the-year budget into the red.
More on the ineptitude in City Hall. Everyone knows Buffalo has a serious lead poisoning problem, one of the worst in the nation, actually. The federal government gave the city $2 million to abate lead in houses where children are present. The Buffalo Urban Renewal Agency, controlled by mayoral appointees, has had four years to spend the money. I’Jaz Ja’ciel reported the agency has spent only a quarter of it, remediating only 18 of the 110 units it had planned on. The feds have said “time’s up” and will reclaim any money that’s not committed by early July.
The city’s excuses for the inaction are bunk. The pandemic? Been over for a long time. Lack of contractors? There are 800 certified to do the work.
The real reasons: incompetence and indifference.
Four of the stories we published last week were the subject of talk-backs with Michael Wooten on WKBW 7 News. They’re embedded in our web stories and also available on our YouTube channel. Consider subscribing.
What I’m reading
Erie County Sheriff John Garcia, notorious for his office’s lack of transparency, is hiring two people to handle Freedom of Information requests, The Buffalo News reports. I recently wrote about his stonewalling while reporting on a lawsuit filed against his office by The New York Times.
Pork barrel is alive and well in New York State. The Empire Center for Public Policy tallied the latest round of spending – over $226 million to 581 local projects between June 2024 and April 2025 – and listed those getting at least $50,000. A handful of large projects from Western New York made the list, led by a spray park in the Town of Tonawanda, which received $2 million.
Black and brown candidates for parole in New York are one-third less likely to gain their release than white ones, a new report has found. “Egregious racial disparities have remained, and even slightly worsened,” the report concludes.
Attendance at Buffalo Bisons games has dropped this season. Our lousy spring weather has something to do with it. So, too, has Trump’s hostility towards Canada and a resulting drop in cross-border traffic. The team says there’s been a 10 to 15 percent decline in Canadians attending games so far this season. I wonder what this foretells for the Sabres, who are even more reliant on fans from north of the border.
On the immigration front, Stephen Miller, Trump’s deputy chief of staff and evil genius, is demanding that ICE and other immigration enforcers triple the number of immigrants they arrest. He wants 3,000 a day. ProPublica reported that most of the 238 Venezuelans labeled by the Trump administration as “the worst of the worst” when they were deported to El Salvador in March have no criminal records.
The New York Times has a story about an asylum-seeking Columbian and his sister who mistakenly crossed the Peace Bridge into Canada. He wound up at the ICE detention center in Batavia.
The Times also reports about ICE’s new practice of showing up at immigration courts to seize people who are showing up for scheduled appearances. Our J. Dale Shoemaker reported on such a recent incident in Buffalo.
Donate to support our nonprofit newsroomHere’s a sobering story: A Times analysis finds an unmistakable shift in voting patterns across the nation that favors Republicans. You can read it here with a gift link. As the headline reads: “The Democrats’ problems run deep, nearly everywhere.”
Here’s a scary story: what the GOP squirreled away in Trump’s “big, beautiful bill” that showers the rich and military with billions at the expense of the rest of us. There’s a measure that would stop federal judges from imposing penalties for contempt of court.
And a maddening one: The report RFK Junior released on the unhealthy state of American kids is rife with fabrications, including references to at least seven studies that don’t exist, and apparently produced with the help of artificial intelligence. The Washington Post quotes AI experts as describing the report as “shoddy work.”
RFK Junior spouts a lot of statistics – often false and misleading – about the health of the nation. John Oliver sets the record straight.
A lot of good medical research is falling victim to Trump’s war on Harvard University. ABC News reports: “Harvard has said the loss of research funding interrupts work on topics including tuberculosis, chemotherapy, pandemic preparedness, Parkinson’s disease and Alzheimer’s disease.”
Trump’s next Target: school desegregation plans. Reports Axios: “Trump’s administration has been focused on removing programs that have benefited people in historically disadvantaged communities — and on fighting what it has called anti-white discrimination.”
The United Nations has declared Gaza “the hungriest place on earth.
The Times produced a gripping story, complete with photos, on the Israeli campaign to starve Pelestinains living in Gaza.
Included is this description of one victim:
Najwa Hussein Hajjaj, 6, has lost 42 percent of her body weight in the last two months, going from about 34 pounds to 21 pounds. Najwa needs specially prepared meals because of an esophagus condition, but her family can barely find any food at all. Doctors have diagnosed her with severe malnutrition.
Something to watch or tape: This coming Saturday, June 7, CNN is airing a live theatrical production of Good Night and Good Luck, the Brodway adaptation of the film about Edward R. Murrow. It stars George Clooney. Set in the 1950s, the play is especially relevant today.
