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For Immediate Release
July, 25 2019, 12:00am EDT
Contact:
Kate Zeller, Campaigns Director
kate@jubileeusa.org / (o) (202) 783-3566 x105
Puerto Rico Governor Ricardo Rossello Resigns
Puerto Rico Governor Ricardo Rossello resigned Wednesday. Protests engulfed the island for nearly two weeks after Rossello drew criticism for offensive language in leaked communications and the FBI arrested former members of his administration on corruption charges.
WASHINGTON
Puerto Rico Governor Ricardo Rossello resigned Wednesday. Protests engulfed the island for nearly two weeks after Rossello drew criticism for offensive language in leaked communications and the FBI arrested former members of his administration on corruption charges.
"The people of Puerto Rico reached a boiling point in recent weeks. People were in the streets about much more than the Governor's inappropriate language," stated Eric LeCompte, the head of Jubilee USA, which works on Puerto Rico corruption, disaster aid and debt relief policies. "Puerto Ricans marched because they are tired of corruption, because 6 out of 10 kids live in poverty, because of hundreds of shuttered schools, an enormous debt crisis, and months of waiting for promised hurricane disaster aid to arrive."
In 2016 the US Congress passed emergency Puerto Rico debt crisis legislation for the US Territory which stopped paying $72 billion in debt. The child poverty rate is nearly 60 percent and in 2017 the island was devasted by two hurricanes.
"Rossello's resignation is not enough to answer Puerto Rico's endemic corruption, high poverty levels, the economic crisis or being forgotten after hurricanes ravaged the island," LeCompte stated. "Puerto Rico needs serious debt relief, sufficient disaster aid, strong public budget transparency laws and economic investments in growth, not more austerity policies."
Jubilee USA Network is an interfaith, non-profit alliance of religious, development and advocacy organizations. We are 75 U.S. institutions and more than 750 faith groups working across the United States and around the globe. We address the structural causes of poverty and inequality in our communities and countries around the world.
(202) 783-3566LATEST NEWS
US and Israel Bombard Civilian Infrastructure in Iran as Trump Threatens 'Death, Fire, and Fury'
"This is a war against the people of Iran."
Mar 10, 2026
US and Israeli forces carried out a fresh wave of missile strikes on Iran late Monday and early Tuesday—reportedly hitting residential buildings, at least one school, and electricity infrastructure—as President Donald Trump threatened not just Iranian leaders but the nation's entire population with "death, fire, and fury."
In a Truth Social post, Trump said the US would "take out easily destroyable targets that will make it virtually impossible for Iran to ever be built back, as a Nation, again" if the Iranian government impedes oil tanker traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, which has slowed to a trickle since the start of the US assault.
Following the president's post, reports indicated that US-Israeli strikes hit a residential building in Iran's capital, killing dozens of people.
"I was here a few hours ago. It was a huge disaster," said one Tehran resident. "A large number of civilian bodies, including a child, were taken out of the complex in black bags."
🚨NEW: Devastating U.S.–Israeli strikes on a residential complex in eastern Tehran late Monday killed about 40 people, according to the semi-official Tasnim News Agency.
The attack struck apartment blocks near Resalat Square, a densely populated area of the capital, the Iranian… https://t.co/nCAbyVy4L9 pic.twitter.com/Tpb1kXS4eN
— Drop Site (@DropSiteNews) March 10, 2026
Iranian media reported that a US missile strike also damaged a school and nearby homes in the city of Khomeyn, hours after Trump continued to lie about the deadly attack on a girls' elementary school in Minab. Available evidence indicates that the US military was likely behind the February 28 attack, which killed more than 160 people—mostly young girls.
"This is a war against the people of Iran," Dylan Williams, vice president for government affairs at the US-based Center for International Policy, wrote on social media, noting that AIPAC—the pro-Israel lobbying organization—boosted Trump's late Monday Truth Social post threatening the entire nation of Iran.
Iranian officials responded with defiance to Trump's menacing rhetoric and escalating US-Israeli bombings, which have killed more than 1,200 people and counting.
"We believe we must strike the aggressor in the mouth so that it learns a lesson and never again even thinks of aggressing against our dear Iran," said the country's speaker of parliament, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf.
Kamal Kharazi, a foreign policy adviser to the office of the Iranian supreme leader, told CNN on Monday that he doesn't "see any room for diplomacy anymore, because Donald Trump had been deceiving others and not keeping his promises."
Kharazi said the war will only end once "economic pressure" becomes sufficient for other countries to intervene and guarantee the "termination of aggression."
As surging oil prices rattle the Trump administration, one unnamed senior Iranian source told media outlets that "we hold the screw of the global oil price in our hands, and for a long time the US will have to wait for our actions to control the price."
"Energy prices have become unstable," the source added, "and we will continue to fight until Trump declares defeat."
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Amid Threats of US Attack, Sheinbaum Tells Trump to Get a Grip on Illegal Guns, Drugs
“The cartels are fueled by the United States’ demand for drugs and armed with US weapons, and thanks to the United States, they are able to orchestrate enormous bloodshed and chaos," said Mexico's president.
Mar 09, 2026
Amid months of threats by US leaders to attack drug gangs in Mexico, Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum slapped back Monday against President Donald Trump's assertion that her country is the "epicenter" of cartel violence by urging him to stem the flow of illegal arms across the border—and domestic demand for illicit narcotics.
“If the flow of illegal weapons from the United States into Mexico were stopped, these groups wouldn’t have access to this type of high-powered weaponry to carry out their criminal activities,” Sheinabum said during her daily press briefing, citing a 2025 US Department of Justice report showing that approximately 3 in 4 guns used by Mexican criminal organizations were illicitly trafficked across the international border.
“There’s a very important aspect that needs to be addressed, which is reducing drug use in the United States,” she added.
In a separate interview with W Radio, Sheinbaum took aim at Trump's Saturday speech at his so-called "Shield of the Americas" summit with mostly right-wing Latin American leaders, during which he called Mexico the "epicenter of cartel violence" and announced a "brand-new military coalition" to tackle drug gangs.
“The epicenter of cartel violence is not Mexico, it’s the United States,” she said. “The cartels are fueled by the United States’ demand for drugs and armed with US weapons, and thanks to the United States, they are able to orchestrate enormous bloodshed and chaos throughout Latin America.”
In the latest in a series of threats to attack criminal organizations in Mexico—a scenario vehemently opposed by the Mexican government and most Mexicans—Trump said Saturday that allied right-wing Latin American governments have made “a commitment to using lethal military force to destroy the sinister cartels and terrorist networks.”
Mexicans are wary of US interventions, having lost half their national territory to the United States in an 1846-48 war that two US presidents—Abraham Lincoln and Ulysses Grant—said was waged under false pretext to conquer territory and expand slavery. The US also invaded and briefly occupied the port city of Veracruz in 1914 and launched a punitive invasion targeting the revolutionary Pancho Villa's forces in 1916-17.
Sheinbaum's remarks came after Mexican troops, supported by US intelligence, killed Jalisco New Generation Cartel chief Nemesio Oseguera Cervantes—known as “El Mencho”—during a raid last month. The operation sparked a wave of retaliatory cartel violence in some Mexican states.
Mexico has also arrested hundreds of suspected drug traffickers, destroyed numerous secret narcotics labs, and handed over dozens of alleged cartel criminals to US authorities in recent months.
Last year, the US Supreme Court dismissed a lawsuit brought by the Mexican government against US gun manufacturers, unanimously ruling that Mexico did not plausibly show the companies aided and abetted illegal arms sales.
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As Trump Sends Mixed Messages, Markey Demands Honest Data on Economic Impact of Iran War
"Trump's reckless, aimless, and illegal war with Iran is driving our nation into yet another self-inflicted energy and inflation crisis."
Mar 09, 2026
While President Donald Trump on Monday made conflicting comments about ending the US-Israeli war on Iran, Sen. Ed Markey expressed "deep concerns about ongoing political interference in what should be nonpartisan offices, including the federal statistical system," and demanded urgent analyses of the bloody assault's economic consequences.
"History is repeating itself," the Massachusetts Democrat, who serves as ranking member of the Senate Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship, began his Monday letter to acting Commissioner of the US Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) William Wiatrowski.
"Crises spurred by American intervention in the Middle East in 1974, 1980, 1990, and 2003 led to price gouging at the gas pump and drains on American wallets, followed by broader economic effects as the price of energy skyrocketed," Markey noted. "President Trump's reckless, aimless, and illegal war with Iran is driving our nation into yet another self-inflicted energy and inflation crisis. American consumers should not be subjected to shakedowns every time they fill up their cars, just to pay for Donald Trump's Middle Eastern crusade."
"Unfortunately, at this moment we are flying blind," he wrote. "The president has neglected to provide coherent or consistent explanations for the scope and goals of his war, either to the Congress or the American people, and we have similarly received no information from the administration on the conflict’s expected duration or anticipated costs."
The senator asked the BLS to "immediately undertake and publish a comprehensive analysis of the likely consumer price impacts" over the next 6-12 months stemming from Trump's war on Iran.
Specifically, by March 24, he requested projections for:
- consumer price changes in electricity, gasoline, and home heating fuel, based on current levels of disruption to fossil fuel flows through the Strait of Hormuz;
- shifts in food prices that factor in elevated energy and transportation costs as well as disruptions to imports and exports, and the fertilizer supply chain; and
- pricing changes for goods including apparel and household products due to supply chain disruptions and higher energy and shipping costs.
Markey also requested answers about the agency's methodology, stressing that "the integrity and timeliness of BLS's work have never mattered more. American families making decisions about their budgets, their energy use, and their economic future deserve the best available government data and analysis."
The senator recalled Trump's August ouster of then-Commissioner Erika McEntarfer, which "appears to solely have been the result of BLS releasing factual jobs data that was viewed as unflattering to the administration."
"Baseless firings of ethical civil servants and manipulation of data reduce trust in what should be objective economic research grounded in data and evidence, rather than overt partisanship and blind allegiance," he wrote to the agency's new leader.
"In the face of this intimidation," the senator added, "I appreciate Dr. McEntarfer's assertions regarding the quality of your leadership and personal character, and I hope you will continue to ground economic analyses in objectivity and fact—no matter how many times the president inaccurately claims that BLS's statistics are 'rigged' and pressures officials to hide, alter, or otherwise change data to suit his political purposes."
Donald Trump is throwing gasoline on the flames of war in Iran, while at home, Americans are paying higher prices for gasoline at the pump. Take a walk with me to see how prices are skyrocketing as a result of this illegal war.
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— Senator Ed Markey (@markey.senate.gov) March 9, 2026 at 3:27 PM
As Common Dreams reported earlier Monday, Trump's war on Iran is having an obvious economic impact: The prices of both Brent crude oil and WTI crude oil futures soared past $100 per barrel, the Dow Jones Industrial Average opened trading down by more than 600 points, and the Nasdaq dropped by 300 points.
Then, Trump suggested in an interview with CBS News’ Weijia Jiang that the Iran war—which has already killed more than 1,300 Iranians, including hundreds of women and children—is "very complete, pretty much." After his remarks, Reuters reported, "Wall Street stocks clawed their way back from a steep selloff to close higher on Monday, notching a final-hour rebound."
However, Trump then seemed to walk back his comments about the war ending soon. According to the New York Times, during a speech to Republican lawmakers in Florida, he said that "we have won in many ways, but not enough. We go forward more determined than ever to achieve ultimate victory that will end this long-running danger once and for all."
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