It's been a month this week ending May 23
Introduction
What I had hoped to say in the introduction this week was, "Too much history. Bear the History Hound is excited. Let's skip the finite disappointment this week and just jump into the history."
Here's the deal, May 17th and May 18th mark the anniversary of two of the most significant events in Florida history. They deserve a little more prose than my usual post."
But the Supreme Court of the United States sent out a devastating ruling for Venezuelans living in the United States. About half of all residents of Miami-Dade County were born in another country. About 20% of all Venezuelans in the United States live in Miami-Dade County.
The Miami Herald did some good work on both that and the housing crisis facing South Florida and that needs acknowledgment too.
I swear, I try to keep these under a seven minute read. Today's is an exception.
Finite Disappointment
Temporary Protected Status
Miami-Dade County, a county where half the resident were born outside the United States and home to the largest population of Venezuelan born people in the United States, is more than disappointed with this week's Supreme Court decision that functionally ends Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for Venezuelans.
As reported in the Miami New Times, Doral Mayor Kristi Fraga, a loyal supporter of the current administration, posted on Xitter (Twitter):
"The Supreme Court's decision to uphold the suspension of TPS protections has understandably raised concerns, especially here in Doral — home to many Venezuelans. While immigration is a matter handled at the federal level, I have been in direct contact with our federal representatives to advocate for the law-abiding, productive members of our society, who have fled a brutal regime seeking safety and the opportunity to rebuild a better future for their families in the place they now call home."
The Guardian's US edition has a helpful breakdown on what TPS is, "Temporary protected status allows people already living in the United States to stay and work legally for up to 18 months if their homelands are unsafe because of civil unrest or natural disasters." The Guardian piece also notes that Venezuelans in the United States under a different program, Humanitarian Parole, face potential crisis.
"Humanitarian Parole, which allows people to enter the US temporarily, on the basis that they have an urgent humanitarian need like a medical emergency. This category, however, is also under threat by the Trump administration," The Guardian writes.
As national and international attention on the plight of Venezuelans who fled a dictatorship in their home country to the United States increases, so does the pace of deportations.
The Miami Herald opens a story on the revocation of Temporary Protection Status for Venezuelans living in the United States--most of them in Miami Dade County:
In a rare display of bipartisanship, Democratic and Republican members of South Florida’s congressional delegation pushed back against a Supreme Court decision Monday that would allow the Trump administration to revoke temporary protections against deportations for hundreds of thousands of Venezuelan migrants. In her most open criticism of efforts to deport legal migrants, Republican U.S. Rep. María Elvira Salazar of Miami, who is advocating for an immigration reform bill, said she was “deeply disappointed” with the decision. “Venezuela’s dictator Nicolas Maduro also leads Tren de Aragua—a transnational criminal enterprise,” Salazar, who chairs the House Foreign Affairs’ Western Hemisphere subcommittee, told the Miami Herald. “We must not send innocent people back into the grip of a narco-terrorist. We should protect those fleeing tyranny — not return them to it.”
Maduro, like Hugo Chavez before him, is an authoritarian, a dictator who is crushing the souls of the Venezuelan people. This decision impacts people I know and care about and people I live near.
Yet, despite Maduro, according to the 47th Administration, being the force behind an "invasion" of gang members, the White House is secretly negotiating with Maduro to accept more Venezuelans in exchange for the US purchasing more oil from the destitute country. If you don't know, the Miami Herald isn't exactly a bastion of liberal conspiracy theories–their reporting on the secret deal isn't from some crackpot in their mom's basement.
An op-ed in the Miami Herald Editorial Board wrote:
The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday delivered a shock wave of a ruling for Miami and Venezuelans on Temporary Protected Status, some 350,000 of whom could be subject to deportation even as a case challenging the Trump administration’s revocation of their status moves through the courts.
and
In Venezuela, conditions have continued to deteriorate. Maduro has shown no signs of easing his authoritarian rule. Diseases like malaria and measles are spreading amid the collapse of the healthcare system. There are power outages and frequent water shortages. Inflation has spiraled out of control and more than five million Venezuelans face hunger, according to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization. Violent crime is widespread. Those forced to return to Venezuela may face dire consequences in a country on the verge of collapse. As Juanita Goebertus, Americas Director at Human Rights Watch, told the Miami Herald, “The situation has definitely not improved in Venezuela. On the contrary, following the July 28 elections, repression and political persecution have intensified. We currently have at least 890 political prisoners, including 72 foreigners, and at least 66 missing persons whose whereabouts remain unknown."
In another Op-Ed the Herald spent an entire article on Rubio's actions as Secretary of State. "Rubio used Venezuelans in his hometown for political gain. Now, he’s betrayed them."
Meanwhile, the Senate Confirmed Appointee in charge of immigration, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem doesn't appear to understand the concept of habeas corpus. Heather Cox Richardson's Letters from an American broke it down on Wednesday.
Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem was testifying before the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee about the Department of Homeland Security's budget for fiscal year 2026. When Senator Maggie Hassan (D-NH) asked her to define “habeas corpus,” Noem’s response indicated she has no understanding of the nation’s fundamental law.
“Habeas corpus is a constitutional right that the president has to be able to remove people from this country,” Noem said. Hassan corrected her: “Habeas corpus is the legal principle that requires that the government provide a public reason for detaining and imprisoning people. If not for that protection, the government could simply arrest people, including American citizens, and hold them indefinitely for no reason. Habeas corpus is the foundational right that separates free societies like America from police states like North Korea.”
While the United States declared its independence from England in 1776, by 1787, while drafting the new Constitution, the Founders entrenched the British legal concept of habeas corpus in country's guiding document's opening Article.
Article One, Section 9, clause 2, of the United States Constitution reads "The privilege of the writ of habeas corpus shall not be suspended, unless when in cases of rebellion or invasion the public safety may require it."
Though not formally recognized by British law until the 17th Century– about 100 years before the British colonies in the Americas declared their independence– the notion of habeas corpus goes back to the 13th century and the Magna Carta itself.
Essentially, habeas corpus, literally "produce the body," establishes that human beings have rights, particularly to due process when facing criminal charges. You can't just lock people's body away with no reason, you need to "produce the body" so they can have a fair trial. It is the foundation of every free society.
Perhaps Secretary Noem of South Dakota, while governor of that state, a state where only 31,o00 people (3.5% of the population– fifth lowest in the United States) were born outside the United States, didn't need to understand how the U. S. Constitution applies to all residents, not just citizens, of the United States. In Florida, where 4,600,000 people (21.2% of the population– 3rd highest in the nation) were born outside the United States, it is a more pressing issue.
I agree with U.S. Rep Maria Elvira Salazar, who is incidentally my representative in Congress, and whose district consists of at least 50% residents born outside the United States, “We must not send innocent people back into the grip of a narco-terrorist. We should protect those fleeing tyranny — not return them to it.”
South Florida's Housing Crisis
This week's post is long, so I'll keep this as short as possible. I have a lot of issues with McClatchy papers, including the Miami Herald. Obviously, as this Finite Disappointment section quotes from the Miami Herald Editorial Board multiple times, I think they get somethings right.
The Miami Metropolitan area is in crisis. The cost of living skyrocketed after the COVID-19 pandemic and it is impacting all residents, including four legged ones.
The story in the photo leading this section is heartbreaking opening with this:
Austin’s family lived in an apartment and were facing eviction, so last June they surrendered their energetic shepherd and Siberian husky mix to an animal shelter in Fort Lauderdale. Frankie, a 3-year-old domestic shorthair cat, and his brother Mellow were left outside the same shelter, Abandoned Pet Rescue, in April with a handwritten note: “We’ve had such a wonderful time with our owners but unfortunately with the changes in the economy, they have to relocate back home to Jamaica.”
The op-ed concludes, "Miami-Dade’s overcrowded pet shelter isn’t just a logistical issue — it’s a moral one that requires collective action. Likewise, our housing crisis isn’t just a real estate phenomenon. It impacts every facet of the lives of South Floridians, and the pets are feeling it, too," before providing information on how you can help.
Pet adoption information:
Miami-Dade Pet Adoption and Protection Center: 3599 NW 79th Ave., Doral; call 311 or 305-468-5900; adoptmiamipets@miamidade.gov; pet search: 24petconnect.com/miad Miami-Dade’s
Medley Shelter: 7401 NW 74 St., Medley; call 311 or 305-468-5900
Abandoned Pet Rescue: 1137 NE 9th Ave., Fort Lauderdale; 954-728-9010; info@abandonedpetrescue.org; pet search and adoption applications: abandonedpetrescue.org
In 2023 the Miami-Dade County Commission started a 2 year eviction diversion pilot program. The program was a massive success, with over 95% of all people who used it avoiding eviction. Unfortunately, only 5% of the 19,000 evictions filed in 2024 used the service.
In April of this year, People Acting for Community Together got Miami-Dade County Mayor Levine Cava to commit to making the program permanent and increasing funding for it but it will need to pass the commission in order to happen.
If you or someone you know in Miami-Dade County is facing eviction let them know there is free help available through Legal Services of Greater Miami-Dade County.
On top of the housing crisis, Miami-Dade County, driven in no small part by a massive increase in prescribed "constitutional office" spending, forced on the county against its will by Tallahassee, is facing a "perfect storm" of a fiscal crisis.
Miami's Black owned and operated newspaper, The Miami Times, has an outstanding piece on it and on the townhalls County Mayor Levine-Cava hosted this week. I went there, took pictures and wrote briefly about it last week but they did such a good job it's worth posting here.
Florida History Moments for this Week:
May 17, 1980: The McDuffie Riots
This week's post is already getting long, but in order to understand South Florida, you simply must understand the McDuffie Riots, also known as the Miami Riots of 1980. Obviously, I am a huge fan of history. As a fan, or a "history buff" I had not heard of the McDuffie Riots. As a student of history I learned how important they were to what Miami Dade County is today.
To not put too fine a point on it, the non-profit I'm always talking about, People Acting for Community Together, was founded as a response to the McDuffie Riots.
Arthur McDuffie, an insurance agent and former US Marine, was pulled over in the middle of the night for speeding and flipping the police off on December 21, 1979 and then beaten into a coma by Miami Police Officers, who then worked with their colleagues to cover it up. McDuffie died from his wounds. He was beaten so badly that the coroner said he had wounds similar to a person who had jumped off a four story building and landed on their head. On Christmas, one of the officers, heartbroken that McDuffie's offspring would have no daddy at home for Christmas, confessed to his role in the murder of McDuffie.
The Black community in Miami, a group of people who had borne the brunt of Jim Crow Laws since the days after Black citizens were needed to found the city in 1896, waited patiently for State Attorney for Dade County Janet Reno (yes, that Janet Reno) to prosecute the officers, including the one who had confessed.
Believing the case could not be fairly tried in Dade County, the case was moved to Tampa, Florida, to a city that had previously acquitted a police officer in the case of murdering a Black man. The law allowed attorneys to dismiss a member of the jury pool for any reason, so, as five officers faced trial together, their defenses attorneys had the right to collectively dismiss twenty-five members of the jury poll.
Thus, the five officers faced an all white jury, in a community that had recently acquitted police in another cut and dry case of murder.
Two hours after the jury started deliberations, on May 17, 1980, they returned their verdict: not guilty.
A decade of kindling (there had been riots in Miami (or rebellions as some historians refer to them) in 1968, 1970, and 1972) the pile of frustrations, disappointments and betrayals for Black Floridians, particularly Miamians, was lit.
While the police cordoned off Liberty City, home to the first housing project in America for Black people and at that point, an area with streets lined with broken promises (for further reading on that see A World More Concrete by N. D. B. Connolly), people poured onto the streets and started venting their frustrations.
The movie linked below and here is about that Liberty City housing project's, Liberty Square, history and current situation.
In the early evening, a car full of young white men who had recently moved to Miami and on that day were lost, looking for an island off the coast of Miami called Miami Beach, approached Liberty City. The police who had been assigned to block passage on the particular street the young men were on, had responded to what turned out to be a bogus report of a white man being beaten and left the street open.
The rioters were pelting cars passing through Liberty City and the driver of the car with the young white men was struck in the head. He lost control of the car and struck and ran over an 10 year old Black bystander, named Shanreka Perry. People rushed to the car, pulled Shanreka out of the mess, her left leg severed and her back broken.
Dr. Marvin Dunn (left or top depending on how you're viewing this) hosted an event in his Teach the Truth series reflecting on the 35th anniversary of the McDuffie Riots in Miami. Bea Hines (center) was the first Black woman reporter for the Miami Herald. She covered the riot in 1980. In fact, her first week on the job she covered the 1970 riot in Miami. More than a survivor, Shanreka Perry is the glue of her large extended family. Many of them were at the educational event hosted by Dr. Marvin Dunn at FIU on May 17, 2025. Copyright Philip Cardella 2025.
At that point, the fire of anger, frustration and heartbreak exploded and the riot was on.
According to Dr. Marvin Dunn, an FIU professor who witnessed the riot and literally wrote the history on it (this link is to a book, the featured link below is to a website with a longform telling of the history), what set this conflagration apart from the rebellions in 1968, 1970 and 1972, where frustration was aimed at demanding change, in 1980, "the primary aim of the riot was to actually kill whites."
The fires of the riot would burn for 3 days, consuming at least 18 lives and $100 million dollars in property damage. This made the Miami Riot of 1980 the most costly in American history after 1967's Detroit Rebellion, the setting of the 2017 John Boyega led movie, Detroit.
For context, every year from 1968 through 1972 had more rebellions or riots than the previous year, with Miami having at least three in that time. There were hundreds in 1972 alone. The rebellions after Martin Luther King Jr.'s assassination, the notorious Democratic National Convention riots, the majority of Vietnam protests– including the Kent State shootings–and riots, and the Stonewall Riots, were all in this interim period.
Miami would hold the dubious distinction of America's most costly post Civil Rights riot until the 1992 Rodney King Rebellion after the acquittal of police officers caught on video beating him nearly to death.
Hellmant
According to Dr. Dunn, Liberty City has never recovered.
At the urging of the indomitable Shanreka Perry, Dr. Marvin Dunn hosted a Teach the Truth event at Florida International University on Saturday May 17, 2025 as an opportunity to reflect on the riots on the 35th anniversary of the acquittal of McDuffie's murders. Dr. Dunn taught at the university from its earliest days in the 1970s until his retirement.
In attendance were many of Ms. Perry's family and Bea Hines, the legendary Miami Herald reporter, who was the first Black woman ever to hold the position of reporter for the Herald. Perhaps 100 other people joined the event.
Another event to reflect on the true meaning of Juneteenth is scheduled for June 19, 2025 at the campus in the western suburbs of Miami.
Below is a video I shot and edited of Dr. Dunn's Black History Learning Tree. Yes, it's almost fifty minutes long. Yes, towards the end I ran into technically difficulties that got me to invest in additional video shooting tech. But the speakers are amazing and the event was great. There was a question and answer period that I wasn't able to record, unfortunately. Hopefully, next time on Juneteenth!
Video of Dr. Marvin Dunn's Black History Learning Tree event this past weekend, featuring the legendary Bea Hines and the indomitable Shanreka Perry.
May 18, 1955: Mary McLeod Bethune Passes Away
Where do you begin when talking about the life of a Black woman who though born to formerly enslaved parents just 10 years after the Civil War was noted by a white woman journalist in 1930 as the tenth "greatest American woman?"
When she passed away in 1955, the cane she had walked with for years– not because she needed it, but because it gave her "swank"– was the former cane of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt. It had been a gift from Bethune's good friend Elanor Roosevelt. Bethune had served the Roosevelt Administration as the Director of the Division of Negro Affairs, a part of the National Youth Administration, itself a part of the Works Progress Administration. as the first Black woman Department Head in American history.
For a woman who served as advisor to no fewer than five US Presidents, becoming the first Black woman to lead a department of the United States government in history might not even be a top ten highlight of her career.
Bethune built the first school for Black girls in Daytona, Florida. When one of her students nearly died from appendicitis in no small part because of the lack of a hospital that served Black residents in the community, she built Daytona's first hospital for Black people.
Her school eventually merged with another school to become Daytona Cookman Collegiate Institute, later renamed Bethune-Cookman College. She was named the President of the new co-educational school for Black students.
Standing tall in the face of the Second Ku Klux Klan who openly threatened her, Bethune was a suffragist, fighting for the rights of all women to vote, while campaigning for a mayor of Daytona who would treat Black people with respect. She helped form mass voter registration times during the peak of violence in American election history in what historian Paul Ortiz argues is the first statewide civil rights movement for Black Americans in United States history (the link takes you to a new copy of the book, but at biblio.com you'll find great deals on used books).
By 1926 she was elected the President of the National Association of Colored Women.
In 1935 she founded the National Council of Negro Women. Through her work with the NCNW she was appointed Special Assistant to the Secretary of War during the Second World War.
In 1954, in defense of the Brown v. Board of Education decision that began the overturning of the Jim Crow laws that had haunted her her entire adult life, Bethune wrote in the legendary Chicago Defender:
There can be no divided democracy, no class government, no half-free county, under the constitution. Therefore, there can be no discrimination, no segregation, no separation of some citizens from the rights which belong to all. ... We are on our way. But these are frontiers that we must conquer. ... We must gain full equality in education ... in the franchise ... in economic opportunity, and full equality in the abundance of life.
Teacher, school founder, hospital founder, Civil Rights activist, suffragist, advisor to five US Presidents, college president, creator of multiple national agencies and there's more... Not bad for a woman born 15th of 17 children to formerly enslaved parents in a log cabin.
All of the information above is from Wikipedia, unless otherwise noted.
Infinite Hope
Fil Cardella June 3 (or 4th?), 1948-May 20, 2024
On May 20, 2024, my father passed away, the proximate cause of death was his old enemy, Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome, which had beaten two other times in his life. Why he went into ARDS the third time is up to debate, but the skilled nursing facility he was in, recovering from a fall in April of 2024, may have played a substantial, if not crucial role.
Yeesh, that's not hopeful.
But reflecting on my father's life is.
The picture of the mountain that leads this section was taken less than 24 hours before my dad passed away. It reminds me of his life...the headwaters of the Sacramento River are just a few miles from where the picture was taken. His life, in many ways, was tied to that river and the valley the river sits in.
Philip Cardella