The Environment

With miles of beaches and lush rainforest, Puerto Rico is often touted as a paradise for vacationers. But for the people who live there, rampant development and the worsening effects of climate change have bred a sense of ecological anxiety that drives many to fight for the environment.

On this episode of Latino Rebels Radio, host Julio Ricardo Varela speaks with Latino Rebels’ Caribbean correspondent Carlos Edill Berríos Polanco about the challenges environmentalists face in their fight against land privatization in Puerto Rico.

A judge in Aguadilla, Puerto Rico has ordered the demolition of two illegal structures built on top of Cueva Las Golondrinas after ruling that the lawsuit filed by the municipality against Aguadilla Pier Corporation has merit.

Armed government officials with Brazil’s justice, Indigenous, and environment ministries pressed illegal gold miners out of Yanomami Indigenous territory Wednesday, citing widespread river contamination, famine, and disease they have brought to one of the most isolated groups in the world.

Human rights groups and activists are demanding that Puerto Rican and U.S. authorities launch an investigation into the shooting of an environmental activist by private security personnel in the coastal town of Aguadilla on Sunday.

The Maya Train is intended to drive economic development to some of the country’s poorest areas, in part by bringing up to three million tourists each year. But one section crosses the Calakmul jungle, part of the Mayan jungle, the largest tropical forest in the Americas after the Amazon.

Manuel “Tortuguita” Páez Terán was shot and killed by a Georgia State Patrol officer on January 18 during a multi-agency sweep to remove land defenders from the Weelaunee Forest in southeast Atlanta—one more in a long legacy of murdered land defenders around the world.

A wrap-up of this week’s most important and interesting Latino news and views from around the world and the across the internet.

Fed up with the slow government response, Puerto Ricans in beach towns along the western coast have set up encampments to demand action be taken to stop illegal construction from further destroying the environment.

This week’s wrap-up comes to you from the cozy confines of quarantine, as senior editor Hector Luis Alamo has managed to catch COVID for only the second time this year.

Hurricane María, a Category 4 storm that swept through Puerto Rico in September 2017, left the island with a “new coast,” according to a new study by the Institute of Investigation and Coastal Planification of Puerto Rico.

A group of 16 municipalities filed a lawsuit on November 22 against multiple Big Oil companies for downplaying the risks of their fossil-fuel products on climate change.

Puerto Ricans will likely spend this Christmas without their time-honored tradition of eating plantains with dinner, after Hurricane Fiona destroyed 80 percent of the island’s plantain and banana crops in September.

The announcement, made on Friday, is part of the Biden administration’s effort to directly address the disproportionate impacts of pollution that have existed for decades in many low-income communities and communities of color.

On Thursday, private businesses used heavy machinery to block the public access path to Cueva del Indio, a Taíno historical site on Puerto Rico’s northern coast, which had been cleared by activists in mid-October.

President Biden and the Democrats have delivered impactful legislation to strengthen the economy and create good-paying jobs, while addressing other important priorities for Latinos, like climate change.

Arizona has refused the federal government’s demand to take down double-stacked shipping containers it placed to fill gaps in the wall along the U.S.-Mexico border, saying it won’t do so until the U.S. moves to construct a permanent barrier instead.

In this episode, we look at the politics of oil and gas, the types of jobs Latinos and Latinas are doing within this controversial industry and the impact that drilling is having on the environment and Indigenous communities in North Dakota.

Faced with a slow response from the federal and local governments, activists took matters into their own hands on Sunday by tearing down illegal construction blocking the public entrance into the Cueva del Indio Taíno historical site.

PONCE, Puerto Rico (AP) — President Joe Biden promised to “rebuild it all” while visiting Puerto Rico on Monday, as tens of thousands of people remain without power two weeks after Hurricane Fiona struck and residents worry that Washington’s dedication to their recovery could prove fleeting.

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) — The U.S. government announced Wednesday it would temporarily waive a federal law and allow foreign diesel deliveries to Puerto Rico as it faces a dwindling supply of fuel nearly two weeks after Hurricane Fiona pummeled the U.S. territory.