December, 21 2010, 09:09am EDT
For Immediate Release
Contact:
Deborah Goldberg, Earthjustice, (212) 791-1881, ext. 227
Jeff Schmidt, Sierra Club, (717) 232-0101
Barbara Arindell, Damascus Citizens for Sustainability, (570) 729-8687
Anne Harris Katz, Coalition for Responsible Growth and Resource Conservation, (570) 433-4681
Groups Move to Intervene in PA Pipeline Project
Project comes as region grapples with rushed, irresponsible gas drilling
WASHINGTON
Pennsylvania groups are seeking to intervene in a proceeding before the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, which has been asked to expedite approval of a proposed pipeline that would cut through portions of northeastern Pennsylvania. The groups are calling on federal regulators to thoroughly review the cumulative environmental impacts of the project before any decision is made.
The 39-mile pipeline, known as the MARC I Hub Line Project, would be built and operated by the Central New York Oil and Gas Company. It would run through Bradford, Sullivan, and Lycoming Counties in Pennsylvania, crossing pristine drinking water sources and fishing streams in the Endless Mountains, disturbing some 610 acres and leaving 238 acres permanently altered. The groups argue that the project would spur gas drilling in a previously undeveloped portion of the state, bringing with it threats to public health and the environment that have yet to be thoroughly analyzed.
The pipeline proposal comes as other parts of the state struggle with an explosive rate of gas drilling and an outbreak of industrial accidents and pollution related to rushed and irresponsible development. Unlike New York, Pennsylvania has allowed shale gas development and infrastructure construction to proceed without any comprehensive environmental analysis.
The non-profit environmental law firm Earthjustice filed a motion to intervene in the proceedings on behalf of Sierra Club, Damascus Citizens for Sustainability, and the Lycoming County-based Coalition for Responsible Growth and Resource Conservation.
The following is a statement from Earthjustice attorney Deborah Goldberg:
"Pennsylvania rushed into developing the Marcellus Shale with no comprehensive review of the potential effects on public health or the environment. The State was unprepared for the drinking water contamination, air pollution, and dangerous accidents that came with the frantic pace of drilling. It's time to stop scrambling to respond to crises and instead to prevent them in the first place. That's exactly what we're asking the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to do, and why we're asking it to give impacted communities a seat at the table as it reviews the project. This proposed pipeline is just one of many inter-related gas development and infrastructure projects that industry wants to build in sensitive watersheds and forest ecosystems throughout the Marcellus region. Before federal regulators jump to approve this project, the law requires that they examine it in its larger context."
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Rwanda Confirms Talks With Trump Administration to Take Deported Migrants
"As we did with the U.K.-Rwanda deportation deal... let us unapologetically and loudly oppose this again," said one Rwandan human rights defender.
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Rwanda's foreign minister confirmed Sunday that the East African nation's government is in "early stage" talks with the Trump administration about possibly taking in migrants deported from the United States.
"It has not yet reached a stage where we can say exactly how things will proceed, but the talks are ongoing," Rwandan Foreign Minister Olivier Nduhungirehe toldRwanda TV. He added that the Rwandan government is in the "spirit" of offering "another chance to migrants who have problems across the world."
Last week, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the Trump administration is seeking nations that are willing to accept its deportees.
"We want to send you some of the most despicable human beings to your countries."
"We are working with other countries to say, 'We want to send you some of the most despicable human beings to your countries. Will you do that as a favor to us?'" Rubio said. "And the farther away from America, the better, so they can't come back across the border."
The Wall Street Journalreported last month that Trump administration officials have also asked other countries including Benin, Eswatini, Kosovo, Libya, Moldova, and Mongolia about resettling U.S. deportees.
In 2022, Rwanda agreed to take in some people seeking asylum in the United Kingdom while their claims were being processed. However, the scheme was shelved amid legal and human rights concerns following the return to power of the center-left Labour Party. Rwanda is still seeking to collect £50 million ($66.4 million) from Britain despite the canceled deal.
The United Nations refugee agency condemned the U.K.-Rwanda deal, asserting that "externalizing asylum obligations poses serious risks for the safety of refugees" and "is not compatible with international refugee law."
Local human rights defenders strongly oppose any resettlement of third-country migrants in Rwanda.
"I with other concerned and responsible Rwandans are going to wage a legal war to challenge this arrangement between [Trump's] government and the dictatorial regime of [Rwandan President Paul Kagame]," investigative journalist Samuel Baker Byansi said on social media Sunday.
"Rwanda is not a dumping site of migrants with criminal records who have served their sentence in the U.S.," he added. "As we did with the U.K.-Rwanda deportation deal, fellow Rwandans in the country and abroad, let us unapologetically and loudly oppose this again."
Last month, the U.S. deported Omar Abdulsattar Ameen, an Iraqi refugee who had lived in the United States since 2014, to Rwanda after officials in Baghdad accused him of being a former Islamic State militant who murdered an Iraqi police officer. This, despite a U.S. judge's order blocking his deportation on the grounds that the murder allegation was "not plausible" since Ameen was living in Turkey at the time of the officer's killing.
Critics have sounded the alarm over potential perils migrants might face in Rwanda, including human rights violations and the possibility that they could be sent to third countries where they are at risk of violence and persecution.
The Trump administration is facing legal challenges to its mass deportation efforts, which include sending immigrants to the U.S. military base at Guantánamo Bay and the notorious Terrorism Confinement Center (CECOT) prison in El Salvador. President Donald Trump has even proposed deporting U.S. citizens to CECOT.
Trump appeared on NBC News' "Meet the Press" Sunday and was pressed by moderator Kristen Welker about the legality of his mass deportation program. Asked whether every person in the United States is entitled to due process, Trump replied: "I don't know. I'm not a lawyer."
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How Trump's $1,000 for 'Voluntary Self-Deportation' Could Harm Undocumented Immigrants
One legal expert warned the offer from DHS "would sabotage" pending or future cases people might have in immigration court.
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The Trump administration on Monday announced what it called "historic travel assistance and stipend for voluntary self-deportation," prompting one expert to issue a warning to undocumented immigrants who may consider the offer.
"If you are here illegally, self-deportation is the best, safest, and most cost-effective way to leave the United States to avoid arrest," said Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, a key leader of President Donald Trump's mass deportation agenda. "This is the safest option for our law enforcement, aliens, and is a 70% savings for U.S. taxpayers."
According to a statement from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS), immigrants who use the CBP Home smartphone application to self-deport will receive "financial and travel assistance" as well as "a stipend of $1,000 dollars, paid after their return to their home country has been confirmed through the app."
DHS framed the offer as "a dignified way to leave" the United States without encountering Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and claimed people who submit their intent to self-deport in the app "will also be deprioritized for detention and removal ahead of their departure as long as they demonstrate they are making meaningful strides in completing that departure."
"DHS's claim that people who do this will be able to return is, in many cases, an outright LIE that will trap people into WORSE outcomes for them than if they stayed and fought a case in immigration court."
Responding to the announcement on social media, Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, senior fellow at the American Immigration Council, stressed that "it is incredibly important for all reporting on this to emphasize that DHS's claim that people who do this will be able to return is, in many cases, an outright LIE that will trap people into WORSE outcomes for them than if they stayed and fought a case in immigration court."
Reichlin-Melnick explained that "when a person is in immigration court proceedings, if they don't appear for a hearing, they get ordered deported—even if they're provably outside the country already. And having a deportation order makes it VERY hard to ever come back legally. DHS's offer would sabotage cases!"
"This move also raises VERY serious questions about statutory authority and funding sources. No law directly authorizes DHS to pay plane tickets and offer reimbursements to people leaving the country," he added. "The closest legal authority which might apply here is 8 USC § 1260, which authorizes using funding to deport 'aliens falling into distress' who are 'desirous of being so removed.' But that law also imposes a near-total ban on reentry, so if DHS is using that it's even worse!"
Prism immigration reporter Tina Vasquez shared a message from the app on social media Monday.
The CBP Home app features this flyer, with the many supposed benefits of self-deportation.
[image or embed]
— Tina Vasquez (@tinavasquez.bsky.social) May 5, 2025 at 10:40 AM
"I previously reported on how the Biden administration's attempt to modernize the immigration system through tech actually made things for immigrants more difficult," Vasquez noted. "I'm anxious to see how this app plays out in the deeply unfortunate cases where $1,000 is an incentive to self-deport."
"I also know that if the Biden [administration] offered $1,000 to undocumented immigrants—even for self-deportation—right-wing media would have screamed that Democrats were paying 'illegal aliens' with taxpayer dollars," she added.
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Film Insiders Say Trump's Proposed Hollywood Tariffs Would 'Destroy' Entertainment Industry
"We won't be able to make movies for the same budgets, actors won't get paid the same fees, and the list goes on," said one film professional. "Simply, it would destroy the independent sector."
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U.S. President Donald Trump's announcement via social media Sunday evening that he would "begin the process of instituting a 100% Tariff" on films produced in foreign countries was met with confusion and shock in the U.S. entertainment industry and abroad, with filmmakers cautioning that such extreme levies would render many productions impossible and do nothing to save what the president called the "dying" movie industry.
On his social media platform, Truth Social, Trump took issue with "incentives" that have pushed filmmakers to shoot projects outside of the U.S., not only saying that the industry centered in Hollywood is "being devastated" but also suggesting that simply traveling to other countries to produce films leads to foreign "propaganda" being embedded in the final products.
"This is a concerted effort by other Nations and, therefore, a National Security threat," said Trump. "It is, in addition to everything else, messaging and propaganda!"
Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick suggested the administration is moving to implement the president's plan, writing, "We're on it" in his own social media post.
While the vast majority of U.S. films are already produced mainly in the U.S.—providing jobs to actors, editors, and other production staff—many major studios including streaming giants Amazon and Netflix have brought their production shoots to cities like Toronto and Dublin, where local leaders have offered large tax breaks.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom, a Democrat, is currently addressing the effects those foreign tax incentives have had on working film professionals in Southern California—including makeup artists, camera operators, electricians, and other middle-class workers—by pushing for a tax credit for studios to film locally. The state Legislature is currently considering that proposal.
"Putting a tariff on movies shot outside the U.S. will increase the cost of shooting and the studios will lobby the exhibitors to raise ticket prices and then the audience will skip the theater and then... well you see where this is going."
But by "instituting a 100% Tariff on any and all Movies coming into our Country that are produced in Foreign Lands," film industry veterans said Trump would not succeed in bringing production jobs back to the United States—but would rather make all but the biggest budget films impossible to produce.
"This is NOT the effect this is going to have," one industry professional toldDeadline. "It will make low- and mid-level productions completely unproducable, hence destroying many jobs from producer assistants to writers to post-production. Further, it will lessen the amount of big budget content created because the studios won't be able to make as much because the cost of production will be more."
An official at a top U.S. film company that produces movies both domestically and internationally told Deadline that international film distributors will be less likely to buy U.S. films under Trump's new tariff plan.
"It affects domestic distribution deals but it also impacts equity players who have money in movies because their films will suddenly be worth less money," they said. "We won't be able to make movies for the same budgets, actors won't get paid the same fees, and the list goes on. Simply, it would destroy the independent sector."
Exactly how the proposed policy would be implemented was unclear from Trump's social media post, but U.K.-based producer told Deadline that "leading independent distributors would all be out of business if it's them" who have to pay the tariffs.
A source close to the White House toldPolitico that the tariff policy originated with actor Jon Voight, a strong supporter of Trump who—along with Mel Gibson and Sylvester Stallone—has been named one of Trump's "special ambassadors" to Hollywood.
Deadlinereported last week that Voight was meeting with studios and union representatives in Hollywood to discuss a plan to revive the film industry, with "a federal tax incentive" expected to be a main component.
Voight's fellow ambassador, Gibson, is one Hollywood player who could be directly impacted by Trump's proposed tariffs; his film, a sequel to The Passion of the Christ, is scheduled to begin filming in Italy this summer.
"Putting a tariff on movies shot outside the U.S. will increase the cost of shooting and the studios will lobby the exhibitors to raise ticket prices and then the audience will skip the theater and then... well you see where this is going," wrote producer Randy Greenberg in a post on LinkedIn after Trump announced his plan.
The Washington Post reported that Trump could rely on a provision of a 1962 trade law that he has used in the past to impose tariffs on goods; the law gives the Commerce Department 270 days to complete an investigation into alleged national security threats created by certain imports.
"Other nations have stolen our movie industry," Trump told reporters on Sunday. "If they're not willing to make a movie inside the United States, we should have a tariff on movies that come in."
At The Guardian, film editor Andrew Pulver wrote that Trump's plan appears aimed at destroying "the international film industry":
The effect of any tariff is likely to be dramatic. Recent figures from the British Film Institute (BFI) show that in 2024 £4.8 billion ($6.37 billion) of production spend on film and high-end TV in the U.K. came from international sources, 86% of the total spent on film and TV made in Britain. In Australia, the film industry stands to lose up to AUS $767 million. A program of studio building in the U.K., designed to increase capacity and therefore revenue, is likely to feel the chill almost immediately. And the effect on the domestic industry in the U.S. is forecast to be adverse, as production costs rise without the injection of overseas tax incentives, with mid-level projects potentially wiped out.
Despite Trump's claim that the industry is "dying," according to the Motion Picture Association's latest economic impact report, the U.S. film industry had a $15.3 billion trade surplus in 2023 and $22.6 billion in exports.
An executive at a U.S. distribution company expressed hope to Deadline that Trump's threat would encourage "desperately needed increases in U.S. state tax incentives being implemented ASAP."
"Can't see his target here," they said, "other than confusion and distraction."
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