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  • Independence Day 2: Donald Trump Elected President Against All Odds, Vows to Return Power to the American People

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    By Neil A. Carousso

    In an unprecedented upset, Republican nominee, businessman Donald J. Trump won the 2016 presidential election, his first political campaign, over Hillary Clinton, being elected the 45th President of the United States of America by the American voters.

    President-elect Trump shakes hands with Vice President-elect Mike Pence (R-IN) at the New York Hilton Midtown as they declared victory. (Getty Images)
    President-elect Trump shakes hands with Vice President-elect Mike Pence (R-IN) at the New York Hilton Midtown as they declared victory. (Getty Images)

    Most political pundits didn’t give Mr. Trump a chance to win in the primaries in which he had to overcome 16 GOP candidates in a hard-fought, contentious campaign in which Trump tapped into the anti-establishment wave with a successful nationalist, populist message of making America strong, safe, wealthy and great again. Trump was given little to no chance to defeat Mrs. Clinton in the general election, but the real estate mogul did so decidedly with a “silent majority” of enthusiastic Trump supporters, who voted to “take back our country” from a big government, political establishment which has teetered on corruption optics.

    The President-elect received big wins in swing states such as Florida, North Carolina and Ohio. Trump shockingly won traditional blue states Pennsylvania and Wisconsin and was competitive in Michigan, which is still too close to call as of Wednesday afternoon. Trump also won in Maine’s 2nd congressional district, Utah, Georgia, Louisiana, South Carolina and Vice President-elect Mike Pence’s home state of Indiana. Alaska’s 3 electoral votes, announced in the 3 AM ET hour, put the Trump/Pence Republican ticket over the top to clinch the presidency with the 270 Electoral College votes needed to win.

    This reporter covered election night outside Mr. Trump’s election headquarters at the New York Hilton Midtown, surrounded by enthusiastic Trump supporters of all races, ethnicities, cultures and backgrounds. As the night progressed and states like Florida, Ohio and North Carolina were called, Trump supporters cheered with hope for the non-establishment candidate, given little to no shot of defeating Democrat Hillary Clinton. The live reports are below, in a playlist, including interviews with supporters and the group “Blacks for Trump,” discussing substantive issues and their reasons for supporting the political outsider from Queens, and capturing the surreal atmosphere in the heart of New York City.

    Featured image courtesy of VOA News.

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  • Nassau Police Puts Emphasis on De-Escalation

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    By Neil A. Carousso

    Nassau County has revamped their policy to emphasize de-escalation of situations with the national spotlight on police officers’ use of force in the wake of a number of incidents caught on camera, sparking protests, leading to riots in communities like Baton Rouge, Louisiana and Tulsa, Oklahoma.

    So far this year, 776 people have been shot and killed by police officers, according to the Washington Post, which is tracking every death at the hands of the men and women in blue, whether justified or not. In 2015, 991 people died in police-involved shootings.

    The issue of race has been brought into the national conversation about police use of force, but according to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, there is not a large differential between racial groups and use of force by police, not enough to make a strong correlation. The latest data available indicates that 3.5 percent of Blacks describe their most recent encounter with police to be forceful compared to 2.1 percent of Hispanics and 1.4 percent of Whites. Moreover, 44 percent of people who experienced force by police have had 2 or more encounters with law enforcement.

    The Nassau Police Department’s major tweaks to its “Use of Force Policy” comes roughly 2 years since the Department embarked on the first significant overhaul of its use-of-force policy in more than 3 decades in the aftermath of a pair of high-profile shootings involving Nassau officers.

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  • WATCH Neil’s Presidential Debate Preview, Discussion & Analysis

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    As Seen On header-small Eyewitness News

    Neil A. Carousso covered the first presidential debate on WABC-TV New York by joining an on-location live stream, Facebook Live, hosted by reporter Kristin Thorne.

    Later, Carousso reports from Hofstra University on Long Island, NY – the site of the first presidential debate of 2016 between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump.

    WABC also became a pioneer when they live streamed a professional-quality hour long newscast, anchored by Sade Baderinwa and Bill Ritter.

    Carousso was a field and social media producer for the #1 news team in New York City. His report on millennials’ opinions of the election, Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump has been published by ABC 7 NY.

     

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  • How Millennials Could Determine the Next President

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    By Neil A. Carousso

    As Seen on Eyewitness News  header-small header-large

    Millennials, people born after 1980, have already surpassed baby boomers as the largest living generation in the United States, and they are now essentially tied for 31 percent of the nation’s electorate, according to Pew Research Center analysis of U.S. Census Bureau data. There is an estimated 69.2 million voter-age millennials in the U.S. and approximately 69.7 million baby boomers. Millennials will overtake boomers by 2020.

    The first presidential debate will be held on the campus of Hofstra University where there is excitement, enthusiasm and a plethora of opinions from millennial students, who can determine the outcome of the 2016 presidential election, like America’s youth did in 2008 when 48.5 percent of young voters turned out in a year when the first black president, Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL), was elected over Sen. John McCain (R-AZ).

    Hofstra student Shannon Spada proudly wears her Trump/Pence t-shirt.
    Hofstra student Shannon Spada proudly wears her DonaldTrump/Mike Pence t-shirt.

    “I hate Hillary Clinton,” said Shannon Spada, a senior political science major at Hofstra, who is also a member of the Hofstra chapter of College Republicans. “She has blood on her hands from Benghazi, she’s untrustworthy, she has 30 years of experience that doesn’t prove she’s been successful in anything.”

    Fifty-five percent of Americans see Hillary Clinton unfavorably to Donald Trump’s 55% unfavorable rating, according to the latest ABC News/Washington Post poll.

    “Both candidates aren’t the best that we’ve chosen,” said Hofstra student Solangie Diaz, who is voting for Mrs. Clinton despite “agreeing” with Mr. Trump and the GOP on some issues, namely conservatives’ pro-life stance on abortion.

    “I was hoping we’d have a third party candidate, but it’s not going to happen,” added student Mirjavolon Kurbonov, a Gary Johnson supporter.

    Johnson, the Libertarian Party’s nominee, slipped from 9 percent to 5 percent, among likely voters in the latest ABC News/Washington Post poll, conducted from September 19-22. Jill Stein of the Green Party is polling at 1 percent.

    While a dead heat between Clinton and Trump, percentages within the poll’s margin of error, the Republican nominee is winning with enthusiasm. Fifty-five percent of Trump supporters are “very enthusiastic” about his candidacy to 46 percent of enthused Clinton supporters.

    “It’s hard for me to trust [Clinton], but I rather her than Trump,” remarked Chris Virsner, a junior at Hofstra.

    “I definitely think we need to secure the borders,” Spada said. “One of the main things that drew me to [Trump] is that we need a wall and we need a way to prevent people from coming in at their will.”

    The first presidential debate at Hofstra University on Long Island begins at 9 PM ET. Eyewitness News’ pre-debate special, “The Countdown: The Hofstra Debate” is live at 8 PM on abc7ny.com and on Facebook.

     

     

     

     

     

     

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  • Hurting America’s Future? The Effect Immigration Has on the Long Island Economy

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    By Neil A. Carousso

    Immigration has been a forefront issue in the presidential campaign with Republican nominee Donald Trump vowing to build a wall along the Southern border and enforcing current immigration laws to ensure people enter the United States through the legal process instead of gaining sanctuary in the U.S. with many overstaying visas.

    There are 526,000 immigrants living on Long Island, the site of the first presidential debate, according to the Fiscal Policy Institute’s analysis of the most recent data available from the Census Bureau’s American Community Survey for 2013. Throughout the election season, immigration has been discussed extensively as it has been a focal point of Donald Trump’s campaign. Of the more than half a million immigrants in the area, 98,000 people are living in the United States illegally.

    “Other than refugees, people are choosing to come here and they’re certainly doing something good for them. It’s good for the overall economy of Long Island as well,” said David Dyssegaard Kallick, a senior fellow at FPI and the director of its immigration research initiative. FPI is a 25-year-old independent, nonpartisan, nonprofit research and education organization with the mission to improve the economic and social conditions of all New Yorkers.

    Immigration labor contributes 20 percent of Long Island’s economic output. Immigrants are 18 percent of the region’s population.

    While the national debates are dominated by discussion of immigrants from Mexico, who make up 28 percent of immigrants in the U.S. as a whole, people born in El Salvador constitute 14 percent of the Island’s immigration population.

    “If you come from Guatemala or El Salvador and make it to a family [that makes the median income of $80,000], that is the American Dream,” Kallick said.

    While there is an upside to the overall economy, American workers are being hurt on a micro level when competing with illegal immigrants.

    “It does really impact everyone,” said Hofstra University junior Sarah Paquette, continuing, “I think it is important for everyone to truly understand what’s really going on.”

    “Eventually, it does put a strain on the economy,” said Hofstra senior and student government president Damian Gallagher. “I think you could overpopulate certain schools where other children could become disadvantaged. I think in the work force when you have more bodies then, yes, it could affect the average Joe looking for a job.”

    Hofstra will play host to the first presidential debate on Monday evening. It hosted a presidential debate in 2008 and 2012. The Long Island University was originally billed as an alternate in 2016 before Ohio’s Wright University withdrew from the debate, citing security concerns.

    Millennials are fleeing Long Island, a long-term trend, due to high cost of living expenses and higher-level, more skilled jobs elsewhere.

    “Competition…that’s life,” said Paquette, adding that she uses it as a “motivating factor.”

    “There’s no way to have effective enforcement of immigration laws unless you have a point where everybody’s in compliance.” – David Dyssegaard Kallick, Fiscal Policy Institute

    “There’s very little labor regulation, very little enforcement so people are able to pay lower wages is part of the problem,” Kallick said, noting other economic problems when illegal immigrants are employed such as “employers paying people without workers compensation, without paying unemployment insurance, without sort of being part of the regular system.”

    David Dyssegaard Kallick (left) and reporter Neil A. Carousso
    David Dyssegaard Kallick (left) and reporter Neil A. Carousso

    The illegal nature of undocumented immigration, Kallick points out, means lower wages for young American workers. Young black men with a high school degree or less suffer the most.

    “There’s no way to have effective enforcement of immigration laws unless you have a point where everybody’s in compliance,” said Kallick, who has been with FPI since the summer of 2001.

    It is estimated that there are 11 million illegal immigrants in the United States, which Kallick believes is accurate within 20 percent, according to his research.

    Evidently, legal immigration significantly benefits the American economy, whereas illegal immigration has pitfalls for a nation’s economy and security.

    “I think there needs to be a system where you first of all say, how do you make sure everybody’s in compliance – employers and employees? How do you make sure that people who come here, do come here legally? Because, you don’t want to come here illegally across the borders or even legally, which is in fact 40 percent of undocumented immigrants come and overstay visas,” said Kallick, adding, “How do you stop that from happening? And, I think there are good ways to think about it, but again, it has to be in a context where you can think about enforcement.”

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