Haiti crisis and U.S. deportations threaten Florida

Moral crisis

Re: Aug. 9 story, “Chef Creole lost employees after TPS ended. He says he regrets voting for Trump.” The deportation of our hard-working Haitian neighbors is impacting Florida’s economy.

But there is a much higher moral issue here.

Haiti is in anarchy and its children are being savaged by armed gangs. UNICEF reported on the rise in sexual violence against children, such as 16-year-old Roseline, abducted to a warehouse and extensively beaten, drugged and “relentlessly raped.” She was released only when the marauders found “there was no one to pay her kidnapping ransom.”

President Trump claims that Haiti is safe for immigrants to return. Yet, our State Department issued a Level Four travel advisory warning Americans to stay away. Desperate parents in Haiti are seeking to have their children adopted by Americans, but our State Department has issued an advisory against this.

I am reminded of the Kindertransport in Germany, where persecuted Jews were forced to send 10,000 of their children to families in England to save them from the Holocaust.

June S. Neal,

Delray Beach

Jews threatened

Nate Colton, in his Aug. 7 letter, “Anti-Zionism no threat,” is completely misguided and misinformed by claiming that anti-Zionism is not a threat to the Jewish people. Anti-Zionism is just the new antisemitism.

We don’t have to agree with the government of Israel, but it is crystal clear that without a Jewish State, the Jewish people are not safe. Look at the rise of antisemitism throughout the world today.

Hamas-led Palestinian terrorists invaded Israel on Oct. 7, 2023. They gleefully murdered, raped, burned and abducted more than 1,000 people, including women and children. That is why all those Palestinians were killed. Let’s see the United States’ response if Canada or Mexico breached our borders and did the same.

War is not proportionate and Israel wants nothing but peace and quiet with our neighbors. Unfortunately, the Hamas manifesto is to completely destroy Israel and all Jews.

It is shocking and shameful that Colton is a Jew. He needs to go to Gaza and tell them how much he wants to be friends with them and see how that goes.

Debbie Regent,

Weston

Critiquing Zionism

The Herald’s Aug. 6 editorial, “Democratic socialist: ‘Anti-Zionist’ isn’t antisemitic. Jewish voters know better,” fails to engage with what Zionism means to its Palestinian and Jewish victims. Zionism might be a liberal ideal to some, but it is a violent reality to others.

For Palestinians, Zionism has meant mass displacement, apartheid and genocide.

Israeli Jews of color have testified to Zionism’s systemic racism. Iraqi, Moroccan, Yemeni and Ethiopian Jew immigrants have suffered from cruel housing conditions, child kidnapping and the systemic denial of rights and privileges offered to European Zionists.

Much of this discrimination is related to anti-Palestinian racism, best represented by the countless cases of Israeli Jews attacking Jews of color who they mistook for Palestinians. A similar incident even occurred in Miami Beach in 2025.

Anti-Zionists are not simply responding to a set of ideals. They are recognizing Zionism for its harmful material impact. By writing off their perspective as antisemitic, the Herald denies the historical and ongoing violence that Zionism has wrought upon Palestinians and Jews of color.

Emanuel Ovadia,

Miami

25th District fight

Anti-Zionism is not antisemitism. Institutions conflate the two to silence criticism of Israel and invoke consequences for calling the atrocities in Gaza a genocide or war crimes.

Oliver Larkin is not antisemitic. He understands antisemitism through a framework of collective liberation. Many of his most enthusiastic supporters are Jewish. We are treated with the same love, dignity and respect with which he treats his Muslim constituents and constituents of all faiths.

Jared Moskowitz is not a better representation for South Florida Jews. He supports funding endless wars in the Middle East that make Jews less safe. He will not fight for universal healthcare and affordability for Jewish South Floridians. He prioritizes the corporate interests funding his campaign and shaping his political agenda.

AIPAC is a top Moskowitz donor, but this does not hold him responsible for the well-being of South Florida Jews. It chains him to the will of one of the most powerful political action committees in Washington, D.C. and forces him to bow down to money instead of standing up for people.

Hayley Margolis,

Miami Beach

Same old ways

1940-1944: The Gestapo chased Jews in the streets of Antwerp, Belgium to send them to concentration camps.

2026: ICE agents chase Haitians in the streets of Miami, Florida to send them to detention centers.

History is a perpetual renewal.

Guy Posschelle,

Miami

Show up to vote

Republicans now control the presidency, Congress and most state governments, including Florida’s. That level of one-party control leaves almost no real check on power left standing. A recent military action was launched by one man’s executive decision, without a congressional vote — and defended afterward by only a handful of lawmakers. That is not how our government is supposed to work and it should alarm every American, regardless of party.

Disengaging is not an option. Vote in every election — school boards, county commissions, state legislature, not just presidential years — even as new ID rules, purged voter rolls and shrinking polling locations make it harder. These local races are where the rules of our democracy actually get written.

Longer term, we need real structural change: a national popular vote so every ballot counts equally, an enforceable Supreme Court ethics code with term limits and ranked-choice voting so supporting a third party never again means accidentally electing the candidate you fear most. Florida voters can push several of these through ballot initiatives, without waiting on Washington.

Silence and non-voters are how this kind of power grab succeeds. Show up, every time.

Vaughn Marshall,

Miami

Condo elections

There are many long-term issues with condo associations. The root cause is too many owners who do not live in their units. Even worse, many have never seen their units. Even when election notices are mailed out, they do not reach the owners who live in other countries until after the election.

Two changes could improve things: One, election notices should be mailed out 45 days before the election and online voting required. Two, owners who live in their condo and have a homestead exemption should get three votes for establishing a quorum to hold an election — that’s for establishing a quorum only, not for voting for board members.

James Wall,

North Miami

Gas giants

In March, President Trump said, “We don’t need oil. We have all the oil we need for ourselves.” If true, then why are we again paying rising gas prices based on the international price of oil?

If Trump truly believes in “America First,” then Americans should have first call on American oil. Trump should lean on American oil companies and prohibit them from exporting oil under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act. Or, Congress should force them, through legislation, to sell oil and gas here. Oil companies should be entitled to a fair profit, but not the windfall profits they are reaping now at our expense.

Robert A. Sugarman,

Boca Raton

Safety scam

The Miami Beach Fire Department is requiring my condominium building to install a transmitter so that MBFD can get “better reception” on its walkie-talkies if ever called to our building.

After all the assessments we have endured, this one really stings. I’d like someone to explain why, since 1958, my building didn’t need one, but does now. What a scam! I’d like to know what citizens think of this “requirement.”

Molly Rogers,

Miami Beach