trump doj heroically saves money by not fighting child sex traffickers
The Trump DOJ, boldly confronting the scourge of child sex trafficking by canceling the conference that trains people to fight it and then not returning reporters’ calls.
The Trump justice department has discovered an exciting new way to be "tough on crime": stop funding the people who catch criminals. The DOJ has slashed money and training for law enforcement investigating child sex crimes, including canceling the 2025 National Law Enforcement Training on Child Exploitation because nothing says "protect the children" like pulling the plug on the one conference that teaches cops how to track predators using AI and new platforms. Prosecutors now have to beg to justify basic things like training, trial prep, and meeting with victims, and the answer is almost always no—because apparently the "core mission" of the justice department is not prosecuting child predators.
Internet Crimes Against Children (ICAC) taskforces are losing their annual grants, meetings between DOJ, ICAC commanders, NCMEC, and tech companies have been quietly killed off, and investigators are left to "beg and plead" other sources for money just to afford the software and staff needed to find abused kids. The work is already traumatizing and isolating, but sure, let's also cut off the professional support network that keeps people from burning out. Meanwhile, the department refuses to release the full investigative files on convicted child sex trafficker and Trump pal Jeffrey Epstein, but insists it can both protect children and use taxpayer dollars efficiently. In other words: we absolutely could go after child predators, we just choose not to—and please stop asking about Epstein.
Law enforcement who once thought this administration would be "pro-law enforcement" and serious about trafficking are now describing the situation as "disheartening"—a very polite way of saying "we're being kneecapped from above while they cosplay as defenders of children on TV." But hey, if you gut anti-trafficking programs, starve survivor support, and make it harder to prosecute child sex offenders, you can save a few bucks and keep some old friends comfortable. Law and order, Trump-style.
#killing-democracy#forever-grifting
king leer gets more orange, world gets more on fire
Behold: "King Leer" Trump, holding court in the crumbling ruins of democracy while the world’s leaders giggle along like it’s all just great television.
Martin Rowson and Ella Baron politely take a break from watching democracy disintegrate in real time to explain how they draw it. Rowson goes full Shakespearean apocalypse, casting Trump as a warped "King Leer" surrounded by snickering world leaders, because nothing says stable constitutional order like an aging, fleshier, madder strongman getting a sequel cartoon a decade later. He’s still using just as much orange paint, though, so at least there’s continuity somewhere in this administration.
Rowson leans into old-school ink, gouache, and the sheer mess of trying to capture a news cycle that’s basically a live‑action dumpster fire. Baron, working digitally, imagines Trump squatting in a dystopian nest hoarding his spoils, which is honestly the most accurate depiction of the modern oligarchic GOP you’re going to get without subpoena power. Both of them are crystal clear on one thing: Trump’s "increasing, capricious madness" is exactly why political cartoonists are still needed — to enrage the cultists and give everyone else a tiny bit of catharsis while the institutions supposedly protecting us continue to fold like wet cardboard.
In other words, the world is in turmoil, the would‑be king is still ranting, and the watchdogs left on duty are people with pens and tablets frantically trying to keep up. But sure, tell us again how everything is normal and this is just politics as usual.
#killing-democracy#fascism
trump declares slavery 'improper ideology,' orders history to knock it off
Informational panel at the President’s House, seen before the Trump administration decided that acknowledging slavery was just a little too "divisive" for their brand of patriotism.
The Trump administration has decided that the real problem with American history isn’t slavery, racism, or insurrection – it’s talking about them. The National Park Service quietly tore down slavery-related exhibits at Philadelphia’s President’s House – the place where George Washington literally kept enslaved people – without even bothering to tell the city. Philadelphia is now suing the federal government to put the panels back, because nothing says "limited government" like DC micromanaging which enslaved people are allowed to exist in public memory.
The lawsuit targets the Interior Department, Secretary Doug Burgum, and acting NPS director Jessica Bowron, who apparently interpreted their mission to "preserve history" as "pressure-wash it until it’s MAGA-safe." The removed displays documented the people Washington enslaved and traced the broader history of slavery in the US – you know, the actual history conservatives keep insisting schools already teach. But under Trump’s 2025 executive order, anything deemed "improper, divisive, or anti-American ideology" has to go, which conveniently includes slavery exhibits, references to his impeachments, and any mention that he helped inspire a violent attack on the Capitol.
Pennsylvania governor Josh Shapiro and Philly officials are blasting the move as an obvious attempt to whitewash the past, and they’re not being subtle about it. Meanwhile, at the Smithsonian, references to Trump’s impeachments and his role in January 6 have already been scrubbed from near his shiny new portrait, because nothing screams "strong, confident leader" like legally mandating that museums pretend your two impeachments and a coup attempt were just a quirky phase. In other words: the administration that screams about "revisionist history" is now literally rewriting the plaques.
#killing-democracy#fascism
maga turns a murdered refugee into a billboard campaign
Nothing honors a murdered refugee like turning her photo into a multi-million-dollar right-wing marketing asset.
Donald Trump saw the horrific killing of 23-year-old Ukrainian refugee Iryna Zarutska and, in classic statesmanlike fashion, immediately went on Truth Social to demand a “quick” trial and “THE DEATH PENALTY” for the Black suspect he called an “ANIMAL”. Elon Musk chimed in to explain that the real crime here is that the "mainstream media" supposedly didn’t cover it enough because she was white. JD Vance blamed “soft-on-crime” policies, and Andrew Tate briefly took a break from his own violent-rape allegations to warn that if you’re a "pretty girl" in America you basically can’t go outside. In other words: a tragic killing became instant content for the right-wing fear-industrial complex.
Then the grift-industrial complex kicked in. Trump-loving tech CEO Eoghan McCabe announced he’d drop $500,000 in $10,000 grants to paint giant murals of Zarutska’s face in “prominent” US locations, and Elon Musk replied, "I’ll see your half-mil and raise you $1m." The project, hosted on Christian crowdfunding site GiveSendGo — home to Proud Boys, January 6 rioters, and every racist-fired-for-being-racist GoFundMe reject — has now raised over $100,000 more from smaller donors. McCabe’s team claims the whole thing, now a $1.7m shrine, is just to "memorialize the story of an innocent young woman" killed in a senseless crime.
So now Zarutska’s image is splashed across buildings from Bushwick to DC, Miami, and LA, wrapped in lilies and cursive fonts, while the same movement funding the murals uses her death to push racist panic, harsher punishment, and "cities are hell" propaganda. No money for mental health care, no interest in systemic reform — but huge enthusiasm for weaponizing a murdered refugee’s face as a permanent campaign poster. Because nothing says "we care about victims" like turning their memory into a billionaires’ culture-war branding exercise.
#killing-democracy#racism#full-stupid
trump’s deportation reality show turns daily life into a horror movie
ICE agents, bravely defending America from the existential threat of children walking to school and parents checking in with the principal.
The Trump administration proudly ordered ICE on 15 June 2025 to launch “the largest mass deportation operation in American history,” targeting major cities and wrapping it all in the usual buzzwords about keeping communities “safe and free from illegal alien crime, conflict, and chaos.” In other words: federalized fear as a lifestyle brand. Agents don’t even have to knock on your door every day – the point is that they could, at any time, so people reorganize their entire lives around avoiding the state that’s supposedly protecting them.
The article lays out how this isn’t just an “immigration issue” so much as a quiet, rolling redefinition of who gets to feel like they belong in America. Afghan and other Middle Eastern communities are living in permanent “on alert” mode: kids withdrawing in classrooms, families skipping school events, citizens in mixed-status families acting like fugitives in their own country. Fear spreads through social ties, not visa categories, turning basic things – going outside, calling a government office, making a joke in your own accent – into risk calculations. But sure, tell us again how this is all about “law and order” and not a deliberate project of killing-democracy by teaching entire communities that the safest civic choice is silence.
#anti-immigration#fascism#killing-democracy
who you gonna believe, trump or the video of the killing
Donald Trump explaining that the ICE shooting you just watched actually proves the victim was a terrorist, because in this administration the camera is always wrong and Dear Leader is always right.
Donald Trump has apparently updated the presidential seal to read: “Who you gonna believe, me or your lying eyes?” After an ICE agent, Jonathan Ross, shot and killed Renee Nicole Good in Minneapolis, Trump immediately rushed to Truth Social to declare that Good was part of a “Radical Left Movement of Violence and Hate” who had “viciously ran over” the officer — a claim that collapsed the second anyone watched the video showing Ross was never knocked down and calmly walked away after shooting her three times.
Because nothing says “law and order” like inventing a terrorist attack that didn’t happen, Trump’s lie became the official party line. Homeland Security secretary Kristi Noem eagerly branded Good a “rioter and domestic terrorist,” and VP JD Vance chimed in by calling her a “deranged leftist.” In other words, the federal government is now running on a simple operating principle: if state violence looks bad on camera, just declare the victim a terrorist and dare people to argue with you.
This is the same magical thinking Trump applies to everything else: insisting there’s “no inflation” while food prices are up 3.1% and coffee is up nearly 20%, claiming gas is $1.99 “in much of the country” while the national average sits over $2.80, and bragging about cutting drug prices by 500%, 1,400%, or maybe 3,000% — numbers that would make a sixth-grade math teacher file an ethics complaint. Meanwhile he’s still pushing that Ukraine started its own war, Portland is burning to the ground, Obama founded ISIS, the Capitol police caused Jan. 6, and oh yes, Haitian immigrants are eating people’s pets in Ohio.
What ties it all together is the authoritarian core: Trump is openly testing how far he can replace observable reality with presidential fan fiction, knowing rightwing media will dutifully repeat it and his base will treat it as scripture. When the president can watch a video of an ICE killing and then order everyone to pretend it shows the opposite, that isn’t just lying — that’s practice for government by pure propaganda. But sure, tell us more about how this is all about “owning the libs.”
#killing-democracy#lawlessness#anti-immigration
trump rage-uninvites canada from his make-believe ‘board of peace’
Trump, moments before explaining that real diplomacy is when you uninvite your closest ally from your imaginary peace club because they hurt your feelings.
Donald Trump, live from Davos or whatever gilded snow globe he’s in this week, reportedly rescinded Canada’s invite to his grandly titled ‘Board of Peace’ after a spat with Canadian officials. Because nothing says serious global statesman like treating international diplomacy as a middle-school birthday party where you uninvite the kid who wouldn’t trade you his pudding cup.
In other words, America’s foreign policy is now: if you don’t flatter the dear leader enough, you don’t get to sit at his imaginary peace table. Allies? Long-term strategic coordination? Shared democratic values? Wrong. The only value that matters is Trump’s ego, and the only ‘peace’ he’s interested in is peaceful, uninterrupted praise.
So Canada, a stable democracy that’s fought and bled alongside the U.S. in multiple wars, gets tossed out of Trump’s cosplay League of Nations because he had a tantrum. But sure, tell us again how this administration is restoring American leadership and respect on the world stage. Nothing screams ‘rule-based international order’ like weaponizing made-up councils for personal vendettas.
#killing-democracy#full-stupid
trump’s cdc boldly takes aim at public enemy #1: not overdosing alone
CDC officials bravely debating whether telling people not to die alone might be ‘too encouraging’ of survival.
The Trump administration has discovered the real threat to American streets: people surviving drug overdoses. In a meeting with CDC Overdose Data to Action (OD2A) grantees, federal officials strongly hinted that programs may soon be barred from using the basic, life‑saving message to “never use alone”—because nothing says "ending crime and disorder" like telling people to go overdose in total isolation.
This is all in service of Trump’s July executive order, heroically titled “Ending Crime and Disorder on America’s Streets,” which bans federally funded “harm reduction” and “safe consumption” efforts on the grounds they supposedly “facilitate illegal drug use.” In other words: condoms cause sex, seatbelts cause car crashes, and clean syringes are clearly the problem in an overdose crisis driven by a poisoned drug supply and a shredded treatment system. CDC officials told grantees that anything that could be construed as "encouraging drug use" is off-limits, and then refused to say whether telling people not to die alone counts.
Meanwhile, the administration is still allowing Narcan and fentanyl test strips—classic harm reduction tools—while simultaneously demonizing “harm reduction” as a concept. Experts are calling this hair‑splitting “absurd”; the White House prefers the term "policy." Doctors like Chicago’s Dr Jennifer Hua point out that “never use alone” is literally Harm Reduction 101, and that people using drugs in public where others can administer Narcan are the ones surviving. Isolation, not naloxone, is what kills people—but sure, let’s regulate the slogan instead of the crisis.
Addiction researchers note that the real scandal is the chronically inadequate, short‑term funding that makes building a functioning treatment system impossible. Biden underdelivered on his promise to expand capacity, and under Trump, experts expect even less. So the overdose crisis continues, but now with an extra dose of cruelty: a federal government micromanaging whether public health workers are allowed to say the quiet part out loud—please don’t die alone.
#killing-democracy#healthcare
american gerontocracy: now with extra 25th amendment hand‑wringing
Mary Berry retires with dignity; America looks at Trump and says, ‘What if we just never stopped this show ever?’
Britain is talking about cake, America is talking about coups. Simon Jenkins starts with Prue Leith and Mary Berry gracefully hanging up the Bake Off apron in their 80s, then swerves straight into the land where octogenarians don’t retire, they just get nuclear codes.
We get a polite reminder that in normal countries, age discrimination is illegal but actual incompetence is still grounds for retirement. Then we hop across the Atlantic, where Donald Trump, nearly 80 and already once declared mentally unfit by a small army of psychiatrists, is back in the Oval Office because nothing says “healthy democracy” like ignoring the giant red warning lights and just hoping the 25th Amendment will do CrossFit.
The piece walks through how impossible it is to remove a clearly unfit president: you need the VP and two-thirds of both houses of Congress, which in Trump’s Washington means asking his loyalists to admit the emperor has no clothes while they’re busy selling MAGA-branded fig leaves. But sure, let’s all comfort ourselves that if things go off the rails, the system will totally work this time. After all, it worked so well the first term.
#killing-democracy#full-stupid
global markets initiate 'sell america' protocol
Traders watch the US dollar slide as Trump explains macroeconomics via tariff threats against Greenland.
Global finance has issued its verdict on Trump’s latest season of "America, But Worse": sell the dollar, buy literally anything else. Every time Trump threatens tariffs over the Greenland cosplay dispute, attacks the Fed, or takes another swing at immigrants, universities, or the rule of law, the Australian dollar mysteriously goes up. In other words, the world has decided the traditional "flight to safety" now means fleeing from the United States – because nothing says "reserve currency" like a president waging war on his own institutions.
The famous "Trump trade" that was supposed to supercharge the greenback has quietly been replaced by the "sell America trade," where investors dump US assets because the government’s finances are a joke and policy is being run by vibes and retribution. A Danish pension fund just announced it’s unloading US$100m in Treasuries over weak US government finances, while the only thing keeping the US economy looking half-respectable is the AI tech bubble. Meanwhile, Australia’s currency is surfing a wave of commodity prices, gold fever, and the simple fact that its central bank isn’t being publicly kneecapped on social media by its own head of state.
So now, when Trump manufactures a crisis and then "solves" it with a pretend framework deal, the result is the same: the US looks less like a safe haven and more like an emerging market run by a guy live-tweeting his own macroeconomic sabotage. Investors demand a risk premium to touch anything American, the dollar sinks, and the Aussie rises. But sure, tell us again how this is all 4D chess and not just the world quietly diversifying away from a country busy de-basing its currency and its democracy at the same time.
#killing-democracy#money
bone-spur general declares nato never showed up to afghanistan
Trump, battlefield expert and noted Afghanistan non-attendee, explains to actual combat veterans what really happened in their war.
Donald Trump went on Fox News to explain that NATO has never really done anything for the United States, casually erasing two decades of allied blood in Afghanistan with the claim that they "stayed a little off the front lines." In other words: the guy who dodged Vietnam with bone spurs is now rewriting the history of a war where 3,500 coalition troops died, including 457 British service members, as if they were all just doing cosplay in Kabul.
British politicians across the spectrum, including Labour’s Emily Thornberry and Conservative Ben Obese-Jecty – who actually served in Afghanistan, unlike the TV president – called the remarks an "absolute insult" and "disgraceful." Former officers lined up to point out that Trump’s version of events bears no resemblance to reality, while politely not adding "because he’s making it up on live television again." But sure, let’s keep letting him undermine NATO’s Article 5 commitments on cable news, because nothing says "collective security" like a U.S. president publicly wondering if the alliance should even bother showing up next time America is attacked.
Trump also complained that the U.S. has been "very good to Europe" and that it "has to be a two-way street," which is an interesting take given that the only time Article 5 has ever been invoked was when NATO rushed to defend the United States after 9/11. Allies sent troops, fought, and died in a war Washington started – but in Trump’s telling, they basically took a scenic tour while America did all the work. It’s not just historically illiterate; it’s part of the ongoing project to delegitimize NATO so that when he guts it, his base will cheer and call it a "win."
#killing-democracy#national-security#imperialism
white house deepfakes its own propaganda, calls it 'memes'
When your case is so weak you have to add AI tears and a melanin filter to sell it to the base.
The Trump White House has officially moved from lying about reality to Photoshopping it. After attorney general Pam Bondi hyped the arrest of Nekima Levy Armstrong — one of three people detained for a protest at a St Paul church over an alleged ICE connection — Homeland Security secretary Kristi Noem posted a photo of the arrest showing Armstrong calm and composed. About 30 minutes later, the White House posted the same image, except now Armstrong is dramatically crying and her skin appears darker, because nothing says "law and order" like racially loaded, AI-style mugshot fanfic.
The Guardian overlaid the two photos and confirmed they’re the same shot: the officer lines up, the background person lines up, the arm position lines up — the only thing that changed was the White House’s need for a better villain. Asked if the image was digitally altered, the White House didn’t deny it; instead, deputy comms director Kaelan Dorr proudly declared that "the memes will continue" and that this is all about enforcing the law. In other words: state-run disinformation is now just official communication strategy.
This is at least the 14th time since Trump’s second term began that the White House has blasted out AI-generated or manipulated content, according to Poynter. So we’ve reached the part of the authoritarian speedrun where the government manufactures fake images of protesters, racializes them, and then smirks that it’s all just memes. Who needs a Ministry of Truth when you’ve got a White House shitposting deepfakes to 3.5 million followers?
#killing-democracy#fascism
trump exports the culture war, cuts off cash to anyone who admits trans people exist
State department officials carefully attaching a "no gays, no DEI, no abortion" EULA to every dollar of US foreign aid.
The Trump administration is taking the classic Reagan-era "Mexico City policy" – the one that already blocks foreign groups from getting US funds if they so much as whisper the word "abortion" – and cranking it up to full theocracy. This time, it’s not just about family planning or even just global health funding; Trump is slapping a global gag rule on roughly $30bn in foreign aid, and extending it to anything that smells like DEI, LGBTQ rights, or recognition that trans people exist. Because nothing says "pro-life" like cutting funding to the clinics and programs that actually keep people alive.
Under the new rules, any international or US-based NGO operating abroad that uses American assistance can’t support "gender ideology" – which, in rightwing translation, means: no DEI work, no trans rights, no non-binary people, no complex thoughts beyond "there are only two genders, because Trump signed a piece of paper that says so". The administration is also re-upping its ban on funding anything it calls "abortion as a form of family planning", but won’t explain what that means, which is perfect if your policy goal is maximum fear, minimum clarity.
This is the logical next step in Trump’s crusade to purge DEI and trans people from federal policy: he’s already gutted DEI support at home, declared there are only two genders by executive order, and kneecapped research on racial and gender equity. Now he’s exporting the American culture war as a condition of foreign aid, turning US assistance into a loyalty oath to Christian nationalist ideology. In other words, if poor countries want vaccines, maternal health care, or development money, they have to sign up for "Make the World Straight and Cis Again". But sure, tell us more about how this is all about "freedom" and "human rights".
#killing-democracy#pro-life
stacey abrams forms a support group for america’s competitive authoritarianism problem
Stacey Abrams, apparently the only one reading the democracy index while the Trump administration speedruns the authoritarianism leaderboard.
Stacey Abrams looked at Trump’s second-term "competitive authoritarian" playground and said: fine, if we’re going to be Hungary now, we’re at least getting a coalition out of it. After watching the US get downgraded on the democracy index while the administration experiments with fun new hobbies like starving kids, the elderly, and disabled people during shutdowns to avoid giving them healthcare, Abrams is turning her 10 Steps project into a full-blown anti-authoritarian coalition. Because nothing says "normal country" like needing a national resistance infrastructure just to get back to basic rule of law.
She’s roped in Democracy Forward, Indivisible, MoveOn, Run for Something, UnidosUS Action Fund, Gen-Z for Change, and a bunch of lower-profile civic groups—basically everyone who’s noticed that the regime has checked off at least nine of the 10 classic authoritarian moves: attacking the media, normalizing violence, gutting the government… you know, the usual MAGA to-do list. Abrams’ pitch is that before anyone gets to the cinematic general strike montage, they need boring stuff like organization, coordination, and local infrastructure—because Trump and friends are quietly dismantling democracy through "component pieces" while cable news chases the next shiny outrage.
So while the White House speedruns the “killing democracy” checklist and calls it a win, Abrams is out here building a national “no, actually” network to organize, mobilize, and reclaim something resembling a functioning republic. In other words: the administration is doing fascism with a side of bureaucratic cruelty, and Abrams is trying to make sure the only thing that gets fully normalized isn’t authoritarian rule, but resistance to it.
#killing-democracy#fascism
house gop hauls jack smith in for the crime of investigating crimes
Jack Smith arriving on Capitol Hill, bravely choosing to walk into a room full of House Republicans who think the real crime was prosecuting crimes.
Jack Smith, former special counsel and current designated public enemy of Mar-a-Lago, is heading to Capitol Hill to explain to House Republicans why he committed the unforgivable Washington sin of trying to hold a president accountable for crimes. Smith oversaw two federal indictments of Trump — neither of which ever reached a jury because Trump did the most on-brand thing possible and just won back the presidency before the trials could happen. Because nothing says "totally innocent" like needing presidential power as your main legal defense strategy.
In a previously released deposition, Smith committed further heresy by stating the obvious: that Trump was "by a large measure the most culpable" in the conspiracy to overturn the 2020 election and that the January 6 attack wouldn’t have happened without him. Smith’s prepared remarks spell out the radical position that "no one should be above the law" — a cute little civics notion that went out the window around the time 140 cops were getting beaten at the Capitol while Republicans were workshopping the phrase "tourist visit." Meanwhile, Trump is bragging at press conferences about having fired most of the DOJ prosecutors and FBI agents who worked on the case, listing the purge as an accomplishment, because nothing screams "rule of law" like turning the Justice Department into a loyalty program.
Trump, ever subtle, is calling Smith "deranged Jack Sick Smith" and a "sick son of a bitch," while openly fantasizing about criminally investigating him or kicking him out of the country — in other words, the standard authoritarian starter pack. Smith will also have to tiptoe around the classified-documents investigation, where the FBI found sensitive materials in the ballroom, the bathroom, and the office at Trump’s Florida resort, a.k.a. America’s least secure self-storage facility. The second volume of Smith’s report on that little mishandling-of-secrets adventure is being blocked from release by Judge Aileen Cannon, a Trump appointee who has apparently decided that the best way to restore faith in the judiciary is to act like Trump’s in-house compliance department.
#killing-democracy#retribution#lawlessness
voters want less chaos, still voting for more chaos
A snowy Main Street in Trump country, where nothing is getting better but at least the authoritarian is "our" authoritarian.
NPR took a winter road trip through Trump country to discover that, shockingly, people who voted for Trump still like Trump. Along the way, they found voters who say prices are killing them, "yay" hasn’t happened yet, and nothing has actually improved in their lives — but the Democratic Party is "broken" and "dead," so obviously the only solution is four more years of the guy who’s already in charge.
In Maryland, Ann Marie Hamilton loves Trump but notes that groceries and electric bills still sting like crazy. In Pennsylvania, waitress Tina Howell says things are actually getting tighter for people, and Trump is too focused overseas — but still insists he’s great and Democrats are not an option. In other words: the house is on fire, but the fire alarm is "too woke."
By the time NPR gets to Whitehall, New York, former Marine Frank Juckett gives Trump a solid B+ while casually comparing his style to Vladimir Putin and praising the idea that if you’re "really good and crooked, things get done." Because nothing says "healthy democracy" like openly admiring a strongman as long as he steps on the right people. Everyone interviewed admits they want less chaos, less drama, and better economics — and then promises to keep backing the chaos engine that’s using federal power to crack down on immigrants and "shake the foundations of American democracy." But sure, it’s all about grocery prices.
The big takeaway: even when Trump’s own voters say it isn’t working, they’re still on board with the power grabs and bullying. The policy results may be a mess, but the authoritarian vibes are immaculate.
#killing-democracy#fascism
trump flies to davos to campaign against… minnesota
Trump in Davos, bravely warning billionaires about the grave threat posed by… Somali families in Minnesota.
Nothing says ‘serious global statesman’ like jetting to the World Economic Forum and using your time with world leaders to attack Somali immigrants and the state of Minnesota. While everyone else in Davos is talking about things like monetary policy and climate risk, Trump is apparently running a one-man Fox News segment, recycling his greatest hits about scary refugees and that one midwestern state that had the audacity to elect Ilhan Omar.
Trump “continues to target Somalians and Minnesota,” because when you’ve got nothing on jobs, health care, or inequality, you can always fall back on demonizing Black and Muslim immigrants and implying one of your own states is basically a failed territory. In other words, the President of the United States went to a global economic summit to tell the world that a chunk of his own country is an immigrant-infested disaster zone—and that this is somehow a selling point for his leadership.
This isn’t policy, it’s propaganda. You whip up fear about Somali communities, then point to the fear you caused as proof you were right all along. It’s the same playbook that gave us the Muslim ban, family separations, and a permanent campaign against anyone who doesn’t fit the MAGA demographic profile. But sure, tell us again how this is about ‘security’ and ‘values,’ not about turning a religious minority and an entire state into permanent villains for electoral profit.
#killing-democracy#racism#anti-immigration
tom emmer teaches the freedom caucus to love big, beautiful debt
Tom Emmer explains how you can go from "hell no" to "yes, sir, Mr. Trump" in just one phone call.
House Majority Whip Tom Emmer has discovered a revolutionary new governing philosophy: massive Trump-branded spending and debt are totally fine, as long as Dear Leader says so. The same "hell no" Republicans who spent a decade shrieking about deficits suddenly found the courage to vote for short-term funding bills, a multitrillion-dollar package, and a giant debt ceiling hike—after Emmer handed them the political equivalent of, "That’s cute, now go tell Donald Trump to his face you’re voting no." In other words, fiscal conservatism died so the cult could live.
Emmer’s proud of it, too. He brags that he only counts Republican votes—Democrats don’t matter, the public barely matters, and the only real metric is whether Trump approves. When his whip counts come back with dozens of "no" and "maybe" responses, the tough cases get escalated to the new switchboard of American governance: Donald J. Trump, personal arm-twister-in-chief. Because nothing says "coequal branch of government" like members of Congress being told, essentially, "You can defy me, but then you’ll have to explain yourself to the guy your base worships like a golden calf in a red tie."
The result: a tiny GOP majority manages to pass spending bills on its own, Schumer blinks, Democrats fold during a 43-day shutdown, and the House Freedom Caucus—those brave warriors against Big Government—quietly votes for the very kind of giant debt-ceiling increase they used to call tyranny. Emmer and Speaker Mike Johnson call it a "revolution." They’re not wrong: it’s a revolution where Congress stops being a legislature and becomes a loyalty test to one man, while the "limited government" crowd lines up to rubber-stamp a "big, beautiful" mountain of Trump-approved debt.
#killing-democracy#oligarchy#full-stupid
trump moves to ‘independent’ fed, asks to speak to the manager
Jerome Powell walks into the Supreme Court to find out if the Federal Reserve is still a central bank or just the interest-rate wing of Trump 2028.
The Supreme Court is taking up Donald Trump’s latest hobby: seeing how many American institutions he can bend until they snap. This week’s contestant is the Federal Reserve, where Trump is trying to fire Governor Lisa Cook — a Biden appointee and the first woman of color on the Fed board — over what his people call mortgage fraud and what normal people call an "isolated notation" on some paperwork. A federal court already told him no, but why respect 14‑year terms and central bank independence when you can just ask the Supreme Court to turn the Fed into another Mar‑a‑Lago loyalty program?
Meanwhile, the Department of Justice — now apparently the Department of Rate Cuts and Retaliation — has opened a criminal investigation into Fed Chair Jerome Powell, nominally about office renovations but quite transparently about his failure to "follow the preferences of the president". Because nothing screams “sound monetary policy” like prosecuting the guy who won’t tank interest rates fast enough to juice your re‑election portfolio.
Trump’s lawyers are arguing that he can boot a Fed governor basically at will, while Cook’s team is pointing to this thing called the Fifth Amendment and the whole "for cause" requirement Congress wrote into law back when we still pretended to care about independent institutions. Even the Supreme Court has previously hinted that the Fed is structurally special and might deserve extra protection, but now they get to decide whether the central bank stays quasi‑independent or becomes just another agency where Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency fires everyone who can do math.
In other words, the president who already used DOGE to purge tens of thousands of civil servants is now test‑driving whether he can personally reprogram monetary policy by threatening the jobs — and freedom — of anyone at the Fed who won’t turn the US economy into his campaign ATM. But sure, tell us again how this is about mortgage paperwork and not about turning the Federal Reserve into the Federal Re‑Elect Donald J. Trump Committee.
#killing-democracy#forever-grifting
elon’s efficiency wizards allegedly turn social security data into a voter fraud toy
Pictured: the look you give when you realize you let Elon Musk’s "efficiency" startup rummage through Social Security and then maybe hand it to election truthers.
The Justice Department quietly told a federal judge that Elon Musk’s beloved Department of Government Efficiency — DOGE, because of course it is — may have taken Americans’ Social Security data and gone full MAGA fan fiction with it. After a judge in Maryland slapped DOGE with a temporary restraining order in March blocking access to SSA data, an unnamed political advocacy group allegedly slid into the DOGE team’s DMs asking them to "analyze state voter rolls" to "overturn election results in certain States." In other words: take data collected to run Social Security and see if it can help overthrow elections, all in the name of "efficiency."
One DOGE staffer even signed a "Voter Data Agreement" with this mystery group four days after the restraining order was issued, because nothing says "we respect the courts" like immediately doing the one thing the court is worried you’ll do. DOJ says it’s not clear yet whether personal info was actually handed over, but SSA admits DOGE geniuses were funneling data through Cloudflare — a third-party server explicitly not approved for SSA data — right up until a week before the TRO. SSA only discovered this months later, long after DOGE had shut down early in a blaze of whistleblower allegations about dumping millions of people’s records into a "cloud environment that circumvents oversight," which is a very polite way of saying what if Equifax, but with Elon in charge?
Remember: the Supreme Court heroically stepped in last June to reverse that pesky restraining order and let DOGE back into the Social Security data vault, after the agency solemnly promised it just wanted to "modernize technology" and "maximize efficiency." Judge Ellen Hollander had already warned DOGE was on a fishing expedition for a voter fraud epidemic that doesn’t exist, risking millions of people’s private info to find a needle they don’t even know is in the haystack. The Trump administration has now made a couple of Hatch Act referrals like that’s going to fix the part where a privatized, billionaire-run shadow agency allegedly tried to weaponize federal benefits data for election games. But sure, tell us again how this was all about cutting waste and improving government services.
#killing-democracy#forever-grifting
