(Des Moines, Iowa) – Two U-S residents (citizens of the Federated States of Micronesia), have entered pleas of guilty in Des Moines, to two out-five counts of unlawful conduct with respect to documents in furtherance of trafficking or forced labor. A Federal Grand Jury in the Southern District of Iowa, had previously returned a five-count indictment against the defendants, 46-year-old Nesly Mwarecheong, and 51-year-old Bertino Weires, for recruiting two young men from Micronesia to come to the United States for the purpose of coercing their labor in a meat processing plant for the defendants’ financial gain.

According to their plea agreements, the defendants convinced the two victims to leave their homes in Micronesia in December 2019 and travel to the United States by promising them they could work in the United States and send money back to their families. Once in the United States, the defendants confiscated the victims’ passports and obtained jobs for them at a meat processing plant in Ottumwa, Iowa. Each week, the defendants took the victims to cash their paychecks before seizing almost the entire amount and leaving the victims with only $20 each week. The defendants used various means to compel the victims’ labor and services, including confiscating the victims’ passports and social security cards, imposing debts on them, limiting and monitoring their communication with family, physically and socially isolating them and creating a system of total financial dependence on the defendants. In so doing, the defendants created a situation where the victims either had to continue complying with the defendants’ demands or risk being homeless and without a means of supporting themselves in a foreign country where they did not speak the language and had no means of returning home.

“These defendants used the allure of jobs in the United States to entice the victims, and then exploited them and profited off their hard work,” said Assistant Attorney General Kristen Clarke for the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division. “The Department of Justice remains committed to partnering with federal, state and local officials to investigate and prosecute human trafficking offenses, which have no place in our society.”

The defendants are scheduled to be sentenced by U.S. District Chief Judge Stephanie M. Rose on Feb. 15. The defendants face a maximum statutory penalty of five years in prison and a $250,000 fine. The sentence will be determined at the discretion of the court after consideration of any applicable statutory factors and the Federal Sentencing Guidelines, which consider a number of variables. As part of the defendants’ plea, they have agreed to pay nearly $70,000 in restitution to the victims.

Investigator Jeremy Tosh of the Ottumwa Police Department investigated the case. Assistant U.S. Attorneys Virginia Bruner and Ryan Leemkuil for the Southern District of Iowa and Trial Attorney Christina Randall-James of the Civil Rights Division’s Human Trafficking Prosecution Unit prosecuted the case. Information on the Department of Justice’s efforts to combat human trafficking can be found at www.justice.gov/humantrafficking. Anyone who has information about human trafficking should report that information to the National Human Trafficking Hotline toll-free at 1-888-373-7888, which is available 24 hours a day, seven days a week. For more information about human trafficking, please visit www.humantraffickinghotline.org.

(Radio Iowa) – Creighton University Economist Ernie Goss says the problems that have slowed the Midwest economy are going to impact the holiday season as well. He says they asked supply managers who deal with holiday sales about the expected activity as part of the September economic survey.  “And it was weak, and when you annualize it about less than a half a percent growth, and that’s annualized over the rest of the year, and that’s for the holiday season coming up,” Goss says.  “Very weak holiday season expected,” Goss says. Goss says that’s below what you would normally see for the holiday.

“And what’s bringing that down is a lot of pre-buying. In other words, a lot of companies out there retailers, and other companies have built up their inventories in anticipation in anticipation of supply chain disruptions. So that’s what’s going to slow things down for the rest of the year,” according to Goss. Supply chain disruptions were the number one concern for all supply managers in the September survey, followed by labor shortages.

(Radio Iowa) – The candidates running in Iowa’s third congressional district are each accusing the other of having an extreme position on abortion. Democratic Congresswoman Cindy Axne of West Des Moines and her Republican opponent, Zach Nunn, debated last Thursday night on KCCI in Des Moines.

Nunn, who is currently a state senator, emphasized his votes in the Iowa legislature on abortion restrictions. “I support the mother and the baby,” Nunn said, “and we’ve voted here in Iowa to provide exceptions for the health of the mother…rape, incest and fetal abnormalities.” Axne opposes the U.S. Supreme Court ruling that overturned Roe v Wade. “We woke up one day and our boys had more rights than our daughters did,” Axne said. “…This shouldn’t be a decision that states get to make. This is a decision that women get to make.”

Axne cited Nunn’s response during a debate this spring, when he raised his hand in support of a ban on abortion without exceptions. “My opponent…can slice and dice this however he wants,” Axne said. “…This was just a few months ago, folks.” Nunn then accused Axne of supporting abortions “up until the day of a birth.” “This is more extreme than places we see in anywhere else in the world, in China and North Korea, and it’s wrong,” Nunn said.

Axne said it’s “completely offensive” to suggest she supports abortions after women give birth. “Does he really think women are having babies and then all of a sudden we’re saying: ‘Kill the babies,’” Axne said. “That’s crazy talk.” Nunn expressed opposition to using taxpayer money to pay for abortions. “We in Iowa have taken votes to support the mother and provide reasonable exceptions and to say, ‘No to late term abortion,’” Nunn said.

The new third congressional district covers 21 counties in central and southern Iowa and includes the cities of Des Moines, Creston and Ottumwa.

(Radio Iowa) – The value of incumbency was the opening topic as Republican Senator Chuck Grassley and his Democratic opponent, Mike Franken, debated on television last (Thursday) night. Grassley, who is seeking an eighth six-year term, will have the most seniority in the Senate if he’s re-elected and he described it as a position of influence. “I will be number one in the United States Senate,” Grassley said. “…My opponent will be number 100.” Franken is a retired Navy admiral who has never held elected office.

“I will be like that young draft pick,” Franken said. “…I’ve got the vivaciousness and the intellect, the ideas.” The two candidates disagreed on a variety of topics. Franken favors making the 1973 Roe v Wade decision that had legalized abortion for nearly 50 years a federal law. “This is a private time where a tough decision has to be made, where a lawyer being in the room is not part of the equation,” Franken said, “nor is an intrusive government.”

Grassley said the U.S. Supreme Court decision that overturned Roe v Wade has left abortion policymaking to elected STATE officials and he’d vote no on a Republican Senator’s bill that would ban abortions NATIONWIDE after the 15th week of a pregnancy.  “I think everybody knows that throughout my life I’ve been pro-life, pro-mother, pro-family,” Grassley said. “I think the Supreme Court decision was the right decision.” If elected, Franken would vote to repeal Trump-era tax cuts.

“The ones for the middle class or the upper middle class, they expired in 2021.” Franken said. “They’re slowing going out of vogue, although the big ones for the Uber wealthy, they’re still in place.” Grassley said repealing those tax cuts would lead to lead to the biggest tax increase in the history of the country. “And look at what happened as a result of the 2017 tax bill,” Grassley said. “Before the pandemic, we had the best economy we’d had in 50 years. We had the lowest unemployment we’d had in 50 years.”

Near the end of the debate, Franken responded to a former campaign aide’s allegation that he had kissed her without her consent. Franken, who said he has zero tolerance for sexual misdeeds, seemed to suggest the Grassley campaign had a role in making the allegation public.  “It is just a ploy because he’s got a problem, because it’s know that he’s got some anti-women activity in his career,” Franken said. Grassley responded: “My colleague, you’re in no position to lecture me about women. You’re in not position to do that.”

The candidates agreed the U.S. should be supporting Ukraine’s effort to repel Russia from its territory. Franken said if Russia’s president orders a nuclear strike, the U.S. should send in unarmed soldiers who are specially trained to respond to radiation victims. Grassley said deployed American soldiers should be armed so they can defend themselves.

Last (Thursday) night’s debate, which aired on Iowa P-B-S, is the only joint appearance the candidates will make before the November election.