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It is no surprise that Trump falsely blamed the New Orleans attack on ‘migrants’

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Saturday 04 January 2025 20:11 GMT
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British man among 14 killed in New Orleans attack

Donald Trump wasted no time in falsely blaming the horrific truck attack in New Orleans on “migrants” (“Trump insists he was ‘right about everything’ despite falsely tying New Orleans attack to immigration,” Thursday 2 January). But I am beyond underestimating the president-elect’s capacity for opportunistic malevolence.

I’m sure, immediately following his swearing in, he will mobilise the military and the justice department against his “enemies”. That much should come as no surprise to anyone with a pulse.

We should, however, steel ourselves for the possibility that he will declare martial law under some false pretence, possibly under the colour of the Sedition Act – something he fantasised about during his first term of office.

The border states are likely to bear the first brunt of his radical agenda. This is not alarmism: this is realism. We have elected a man without moral scruples, with a limitless desire for power and an appetite for cruelty.

If you are hoping for the best or thinking that this will all blow over in four years ... in the desert southwest, there are a million square miles of sand for making like the proverbial ostrich.

Welcome to 2025...

Eric Radack

Santa Fe, New Mexico

Feeling uncertain

I would like to praise Frieda Hughes for always coming up with the poetical goods, in every Saturday’s edition of this newspaper.

Her “Happy New Year 2025” brilliantly encapsulated that feeling of uncertainty about the forthcoming year, and the wilting decorations desperate now to be returned to their annual home for retired baubles and diminishing lights (“New year resolutions are all very well – but you’re taking your old self with you”, Saturday 4 January).

This year has commenced with cold weather, with a political maelstrom probably just around the new year’s corner, with more febrile and dangerous conflicts than is good for one ailing world.

But hope springs eternal – and many welcome in the new year with optimism and a sense that things will get better and everything crossed. Maybe they will, but it is always best to be prepared for the worst and hope for the best.

Frieda is correct; we have dragged our old selves with us, in mindsets that feel comfortable and reassuring.

But as our government proclaims the word “change” at every opportunity, like her retired town crier, let’s hope and pray that they will deliver a more prosperous and morally responsible future for every man, woman and child in this beleaguered country of ours.

Judith A Daniels

Great Yarmouth, Norfolk

Playing tag

Thank you so much for the Voices article in today’s Independent about the injustice of keeping Gaie Dalep in prison due to Serco’s incompetence. (“Locking up a 77-year-old climate protester is proof of a broken justice system,” Saturday 4 January).

I trust that there are many other readers of this article, like myself, who have written to the home secretary and Lord Timpson asking them to do the right thing and free this poor lady. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if just one of the Serco bosses found they had a conscience and personally paid to have a small tag made for her as a matter of urgency.

Joan Cooper

Abingdon, Oxfordshire

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