Free Republic

Lawfare against a top presidential candidate has its consequences. Do any of the Democrats engaged in lawfare against President Trump read the news about leftists south of the border who do the same things they are doing? Maybe Panama's election a week ago would be useful for them to know. According to Foreign Policy, which has a good, if somewhat left-slanted overview of what went on there: The winner, José Raúl Mulino, was a stand-in candidate for former President Ricardo Martinelli, who was disqualified due to a money laundering conviction. (Outgoing center-left President Laurentino Cortizo was barred from running due...

Panama is on the verge of a dramatic change to its immigration policy that could reverberate from the dense Darien jungle to the U.S. border. President-elect José Raúl Mulino says he will shut down a migration route used by more than 500,000 people last year. Until now, Panama has helped speedily bus the migrants across its territory so they can continue their journey north. Whether Mulino is able to reduce migration through a sparsely populated region with little government presence remains to be seen, experts say. "Panama and our Darien are not a transit route. It is our border," Mulino...

The incoming president of Panama has vowed to make big changes to help alleviate the U.S. border crisis. President-elect Jose Raul Mulino vowed to shut down a crucial migration gap through Panama that has been used by more than 500,000 migrants over the last year, signaling a shift in the country's policy as the U.S. continues to battle a crisis at its southern border, according to a report from Voice of America.

José Raúl Mulino, a last-minute conservative candidate in Panama’s 2024 presidential race, was elected in Sunday’s general election with a nearly ten percent lead over his closest rival. Mulino, a 64-year-old lawyer and former minister of security in the country, campaigned on implementing a crackdown on migration by “closing” the dangerous Darien Gap jungle trail that Panama shares with Colombia, which thousands of migrants from South America and other regions use to reach the United States. Mulino has also vowed to improve Panama’s economy.

Why shipping choke points like Panama are FUBAR and getting worse. Long, detailed explanation of all the problems.

A huge bridge said to be big enough for a column of tanks to cross is set to spring up in Panama in one of the most dangerous migrant crossing points in the world. According to reports, the structure is being built in Yaviza which sits on the Rio Chuconaco - the separation point between Central and South America and one of the most southerly points reachable by roads from North America. Until now, the Pan-American highway - which weaves through central America towards South America - has ended in Yaviza, which sits on the edge of the 100-mile Darien...

DARIEN GAP, Panama—The grind of heavy machinery breaks the silence of the Darién jungle, where the Pan American Highway ends at Yaviza in Panama. Construction workers have cleared towering trees to make way for a steel and concrete bridge mighty enough to withstand flooding from the Chucunaque River. An onsite worker for the construction company Cusa told The Epoch Times the construction project will cut 4 miles into the Darién jungle at a cost of $42 million and includes a second bridge crossing the Tuira River. That would leave some 55 miles to finish the Pan American Highway, also known...

This is war. You are at war,' says former Green Beret Michael Yon... As if the full-scale invasion of America across her southern border wasn’t serious enough already, more routes are now being opened between Colombia and Panama that will enable even more illegal aliens to make their way to the U.S. through the dangerous Darien Gap.. A few months ago, former Army Green Beret Michael Yon, a war correspondent and expert on "weaponized migration," began to report on the "secretive construction" of bridges and a new road deep inside the dense 66-mile jungle region called the Darien Gap. A...

The flow of thousands of migrants daily through the treacherous migratory highway, the Darien Gap, has been cut off following the capture of a number of boat captains who had been ferrying the migrants to the starting point of their jungle trek. The stoppage began when Colombian law enforcement captured two boat captains in the northern city of Necoclí on Monday. The companies that employed them halted all transport services in protest, effectively cutting off the officially estimated 2,000 people a day that enter the jungled passage hoping to reach the United States. It has led to a build up...

While general elections were held in Pakistan on February 8 amid allegations of fraud, Christians in the country continued suffering from severe persecution and braced themselves for a frightening future – having still been traumatized by last year’s anti-Christian pogrom.Hundreds of Christians fled their homes on August 16, 2013 when in the Pakistani district of Jaranwala, Muslim mobs launched an anti-Christian riot, vandalizing churches and committing arson against both churches and Christians’ homes — all based just on an accusation that a Quran was desecrated.At least 20 churches throughout the city were set on fire and more than 400 Christian-owned...

Real Americas Voice correspondent Ben Bergquam is currently in the Darién Gap between Colombia and Panama, reporting on the international human smuggling operation coordinated by the cartels, globalists, and the Biden Regime. The Biden Regime is now granting asylum to illegal immigrants in South America and flying them by plane into the United States to arrive “as refugees who have already met the requirements and will be legally allowed to live and work in the U.S.,” according to the Associated Press. Bergquam shared a photo of a group he discovered on Tuesday night showing “over 50 men from Bangladesh, Sri...

The former director of Panama’s border patrol told The Epoch Times that the United Nations’ migration agenda is behind the chaos at the U.S. southern border and that U.N. partners are making things worse instead of better. image-5593282 Oriel Ortega, now a security and defense consultant to Panamanian President Laurentino Cortizo, said during a Feb. 22 interview that he saw a jump in migration in 2016, at the same time that more nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) moved into Panama. That increase corresponded with the U.N.’s Global Compact for Safe, Orderly, and Regular Migration meeting in 2016. Two years later, 152 nations—including...

Joe Biden and the United Nations are pulling off one of the worst security threats to the United States in its 248-year history. ... According to the former director of Panama’s National Border Service, the U.N.'s migration agenda is behind the insanity along the southern border, and the world body's NGO (non-governmental organizations) partners are intentionally making the crisis worse. Oriel Ortega, now a security and defense consultant to Panamanian President Laurentino Cortizo, told the Epoch Times during an interview on Thursday that he saw a dramatic jump in immigration in 2016, at the same time that NGOs moved into...

SOMALI ILLEGAL ALIENS PROCLAIM SUPPORT FOR ILHAN OMAR AND JOE BIDEN INSIDE PANAMÁ MIGRANT CAMP! Today I went inside a migrant camp in Darien Gap in Panama. Inside the migrant Camp, I encountered a group of Islamic Somali men who told me they plan to illegally enter the United States via the Texas border. They just arrived in the Darien Gap today. Listen to what these Somali illegal aliens told me about Ilhan Omar and Joe Biden

(February 12, 2024). | Fireballs in skies by David de Chiriquí, #Panamá . and Fireballs flying through the skies of Puntarenas, Gulf of Nicoya, credits: Twitter X ⚠️Alerta Climagram🌎 @deZabedrosky

For months, a withering drought has created major traffic jams at the Panama Canal. The drought, which may have been exacerbated by climate change, has left the canal’s water levels lower than ever, forcing Panama to let fewer ships through. The restrictions have led to delays, increased shipping costs, and uncertainty over the future of one of the world’s critical trade chokepoints. “This has fundamentally changed how shipping through the canal works,” said Soren Stokkebaek Andersen, a regional commercial manager at Leth Agencies, a shipping agency.

[Catholic Caucus] Panama Bleeds: A Story of Tradition Persecuted and RestoredA traditional Catholic activist in Panama sent me the following report on what is happening in his country. It was first published at my Substack, Tradition & Sanity, on December 11, 2023. It’s important for those of us who live in countries where the Latin Mass is more plentifully available to learn about the hardships of our brethren who are suffering under bishops even more cruel and heterodox than our own, and to pray for them.—PAKDecember 13, 2020: First Holy Mass with the SSPX, in an apartment into which more...

Ohio detected and thwarted an election-related cyber attack earlier this month, the state’s elections chief said. Republican Secretary of State Frank LaRose said the “relatively unsophisticated” hacking attempt on Nov. 5, which was Election Day, originated in Panama but was traced to a Russian-owned company. LaRose told The Columbus Dispatch Tuesday that the would-be attackers were looking around for vulnerabilities in his office’s website. “They are poking around for soft spots,” LaRose said. The ultimate goal of such attacks is disrupting and undermining the credibility of elections, but LaRose said Ohio’s election results are safe because neither the election machines...

The objective is to have personnel from various DHS agencies, including U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services and Immigration and Customs Enforcement train and assist Panamanian authorities as they grapple with an extraordinary flow of migrants into the Darién Gap, a rugged jungle that connects Panama with South America.

A motorist who shot dead two environmental protesters blocking a road in Panama on Tuesday is a retired American lawyer, it has been revealed. Kenneth Darlington, 77, appeared before a judge in the town of La Espiga on Wednesday afternoon, and after a two-hour hearing was remanded in custody. the Panamanian-born US citizen has a previous conviction for illegal possession of a firearm. It is understood he declared 'this ends here' before walking up to the road block on a section of the Pan-American Highway in the Chame district and getting into a heated argument with a group of men...