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The Trump Presidency Timeline

Documenting the chaos since day one. 1088 entries and counting.

Category: killing democracy
killing democracy

colorado governor speed-runs rehabilitation of trump election saboteur

Tina Peters, listening intently for the next conspiracy theory that might shave a few more months off her sentence.

Tina Peters, listening intently for the next conspiracy theory that might shave a few more months off her sentence.

Colorado Gov. Jared Polis has decided that the woman who helped compromise her county’s voting machines in service of Donald Trump’s very serious "rigged election" fanfic has done enough time. Tina Peters, the former Mesa County clerk convicted of tampering with election equipment after she facilitated a 2021 security breach to prove Trump's lies, just had her nearly nine-year sentence chopped in half so she can be parole-eligible June 1. Democracy may be on life support, but at least the sentencing guidelines are comfy.

This act of mercy arrives after months of pressure from President Trump and his administration, who’ve been loudly insisting Peters is a "hostage" held by evil Democrats for "political reasons" — as opposed to the very non-political reason of breaking into voting systems to help an attempted coup. A state appeals court did rule the trial judge improperly factored her speech into the sentence, which Polis now cites as his high-minded constitutional rationale, while insisting it has absolutely nothing to do with the guy in the White House screaming that Colorado leaders should "rot in hell." Totally unrelated. Pure coincidence. Everybody relax.

Judge Matthew Barrett originally called Peters what she is — "a charlatan" selling election-denial snake oil — which apparently was too much truth for the appellate court, but not too much crime for Trump, who tried to pardon her in 2025 despite having no power over state convictions. That symbolic pardon is now halfway to becoming functionally real, thanks to a Democratic governor doing constitutional damage control that looks, from orbit, like rewarding one of the most brazen foot soldiers of the Big Lie. Accountability for trying to overturn an election was already hanging by a thread; Polis just took a pair of scissors to it in the name of principle.

#killing-democracy#lawlessness
killing democracy

trump throws a taxpayer‑adjacent tent revival on the national mall

Workers erect a stage on the National Mall so the government can symbolically rededicate the republic from "We the People" to "We the Pew."

Workers erect a stage on the National Mall so the government can symbolically rededicate the republic from "We the People" to "We the Pew."

The Trump administration has decided the best way to celebrate 250 years of a secular constitutional republic is by staging a daylong Christian prayer rally on the National Mall and calling it "Rededicate 250." It’s a White House–backed production of Freedom 250, a public‑private campaign that apparently thinks "One Nation Under God" was the thesis of the Federalist Papers. The event promises a "once in a lifetime national moment" to rededicate the entire country to God, which is a cute way of saying: the government is helping run a mostly evangelical worship service and pretending that’s just normal civic patriotism. The lineup is exactly what you’d expect if you fed the phrase "Christian nationalism influencer list" into a blender. Cabinet officials Mike Johnson, Pete Hegseth, and Marco Rubio will be there, along with Franklin Graham, Paula White‑Cain, Robert Jeffress, and a small army of MAGA‑friendly pastors. For entertainment, they’ve booked Grammy‑winning worship star Chris Tomlin, Duck Dynasty alum Sadie Robertson Huff, and even the guy who plays Jesus on TV, Jonathan Roumie, because nothing says "healthy democracy" like the executive branch rolling out its own state‑adjacent clergy and mascot Messiah. Trump himself is sending a video message, presumably recorded between court dates. Of the 19 faith leaders on the program, 18 are Christian and mostly evangelical; the lone non‑Christian is Rabbi Meir Soloveichik, brought in to complete the "see, it’s not a theocracy, we have one token" checklist. Americans United for Separation of Church and State are pointing out that this is less "religious freedom" and more "publicly funded Christian cosplay monarchy," while a new Pew poll shows Americans aren’t exactly clamoring for more religion in government. The administration, however, remains undeterred, eagerly blurring the line between church and state into a single, handy altar for power.

Source: npr.org

#killing-democracy#fascism
killing democracy

trump presidency speedruns banana-republic central banking

Jerome Powell, moments before explaining to a central banking conference that the survival of U.S. monetary independence now depends on the vibes of six justices and the 10-year Treasury yield.

Jerome Powell, moments before explaining to a central banking conference that the survival of U.S. monetary independence now depends on the vibes of six justices and the 10-year Treasury yield.

Jerome Powell steps down as Fed chair and gets the rare Washington obituary that doesn’t end with "and then he caved." Instead, his legacy is: didn’t slash rates every time Donald Trump woke up mad at the stock market, refused to resign when Trump tried to indict him over a fake scandal about building renovations, and then publicly said the quiet part loud – that the whole thing was pure presidential revenge. In the age of Trump, "doing your job" now counts as a heroic stand for institutional independence. The reward for this courage? Trump installs Kevin Warsh, widely expected to be a presidential sock puppet, while plotting how to turn the Fed into his own personal campaign ATM. He’s already tried to fire Fed governor Lisa Cook over a laughably flimsy "for cause" mortgage smear, and the case is parked at the same Supreme Court that’s been enthusiastically chainsawing independence protections for the NLRB, FTC, Merit Systems Protection Board, and whoever else gets in the way of the Dear Leader’s whims. The conservative majority has embraced the "unitary executive" theory, which apparently translates to: if Trump can point at it, he can fire it. Markets, ever the optimists, are calmly assuming that the legal system will step in before Trump turns the Fed into Erdoğan’s Turkey with worse hair. The justices, having spent years insisting presidents must be free to purge experts and replace them with loyal dingbats, suddenly discovered a mystical, quasi-private, historically unique, "don’t worry investors" exception for the Fed. As one law professor politely translated: this is garbage reasoning, but please keep buying Treasuries. Meanwhile, every other independent agency is being fed through the authoritarian woodchipper, while the Fed hangs on by a single, totally arbitrary thread. So the current state of American governance is: Trump can fire labor board members, ethics watchdogs, consumer regulators, and basically any scientist, doctor, or economist who doesn’t clap hard enough – but the Fed is spared for now because the Court is scared of spooking bond traders. The rule of law has been replaced by the rule of "whatever keeps the yield curve from screaming." Democracy, less so.

Source: theguardian.com

#killing-democracy#fascism#forever-grifting
killing democracy

selma was a warning, ice took it as a how-to manual

America: from "never again" at Selma to "run it back" at the border, now in high resolution and still in black and blue.

America: from "never again" at Selma to "run it back" at the border, now in high resolution and still in black and blue.

Charles Mauldin, who was tear-gassed by law enforcement on the Edmund Pettus Bridge at 17, is now 78 and watching federal immigration officers gas children in 2026 like it's a retro civil-rights cosplay. The man who marched behind John Lewis for the right to vote is sitting in his living room watching history rerun as farce, except the joke is on terrified migrant kids who didn't even get the dignity of being called "protesters" before the canisters flew.

Instead of learning anything from Bloody Sunday, the federal government apparently took notes and updated the script: swap out Alabama troopers for ICE, swap out Black citizens trying to vote for brown kids trying not to die, and call it "border security" so cable news can nod solemnly. Mauldin talks about his lungs imploding and trauma that still haunts him six decades later, while this administration is busy mass-producing the next generation of PTSD as if it's just another line item in the enforcement budget.

We were told Selma was a turning point, a national shame that would never be repeated. Yet here we are, with federal officers reprising the role of faceless men with batons and gas, and a political class that will deliver exactly one (1) sternly worded tweet before moving on. The bridge changed; the uniforms changed; the victims are younger. The state violence? That part, apparently, is non-negotiable.

Source: propublica.org

#killing-democracy#fascism#anti-immigration
killing democracy

trump’s iran war needs cash, plans, and authorization; gets none

Lisa Murkowski, briefly remembering Congress is supposed to declare wars, not just fund the merchandising.

Lisa Murkowski, briefly remembering Congress is supposed to declare wars, not just fund the merchandising.

Republican senators have discovered a shocking new concept: if President Trump wants tens of billions more dollars for his Iran adventure, he might actually have to ask Congress to, you know, authorize the war. The conflict is now at day 75 of what Trump promised would be a four-to-five week joyride, Iran is choking the Strait of Hormuz, fuel prices are spiking, and the White House’s grand strategy appears to be: insist hostilities are over while U.S. forces keep getting shot at.

Lisa Murkowski, Susan Collins, and Rand Paul briefly emerged from the Senate’s Witness Protection Program to vote with Democrats on a War Powers resolution telling Trump to stop playing Commander-in-God and get authorization or get out. Murkowski even pointed out the awkward detail that the administration claims hostilities have ended, which would neatly erase any excuse for keeping troops in danger without Congress signing off. Meanwhile, House Republicans keep barely blocking similar efforts, proving that nothing unites the party like refusing to do its constitutional job.

Out in the real world, the Navy is warning it’ll have to start cutting training, operations, and personnel by July because the Iran war, charmingly branded Operation Epic Fury, wasn’t even budgeted for. At the same time, Central Command quietly took its civilian-harm reduction office from ten people to one just months after a U.S. strike on an Iranian school. So yes, the administration is burning through cash it doesn’t have on a war it hasn’t authorized, while dismantling the tiny bit of infrastructure meant to stop it from killing kids. But don’t worry, Trump says Xi Jinping promised not to ship weapons to Iran, and if there’s one thing you can bank on in this administration, it’s totally unverifiable promises from authoritarian pals.

#killing-democracy#lawlessness#imperialism
killing democracy

supreme court briefly remembers what 'standing' is

The Supreme Court building pauses from dismantling rights to briefly remember that the FDA exists and the mail is not a theocracy.

The Supreme Court building pauses from dismantling rights to briefly remember that the FDA exists and the mail is not a theocracy.

The Supreme Court, having spent the last few years lighting reproductive rights on fire, has now graciously agreed to pour a thimble of water on the blaze. In a 7-2 shadow-docket special, the justices said mifepristone can keep being mailed nationwide, at least until they find a more procedurally convenient way to torture pregnant people. Louisiana’s big legal theory was essentially: "We banned abortion here, so obviously we get to control the mail for the entire country." Even this court had to squint and say, yeah, that’s not how standing works.

Clarence Thomas and Sam Alito, naturally, dissented from reality. Thomas declared that mailing abortion pills is a "criminal enterprise" and tried to resurrect the 1873 Comstock Act, because nothing screams "modern constitutional jurisprudence" like dusting off Victorian anti-smut laws to control your uterus. Alito whined that keeping mifepristone available by mail "undermines" Dobbs, as if the real constitutional injury is that women haven’t suffered quite enough yet under his magnum opus.

Meanwhile, the Biden administration chose the bold strategy of… not responding to a lawsuit against its own FDA, leaving drug manufacturers and former FDA officials to do the grown-up work. The same Christian nationalist law shop, Alliance Defending Freedom, is once again trying to let a single red state override federal drug regulation for everyone, because why stop at abortion when you can blow up the entire pharmaceutical approval system? The Court punted the case back to the Fifth Circuit clown car, so everyone can look forward to Round Two: Now With Even More Theocracy, in a future term.

For now, medication abortion — which accounts for about two-thirds of abortions and has been safely used for decades — survives another trip through the Republican pain machine. Providers are already planning backup regimens in case the justices change their minds later, because when your healthcare depends on a court that misses its own deadlines while quoting 19th-century obscenity laws, "temporary" is the best you’re allowed to hope for.

#killing-democracy#pro-life
killing democracy

taiwan prays for a rare trump miracle: shut up and do nothing

Taipei residents watch statecraft by slot machine: pull the lever and hope Trump doesn’t blurt out your extinction in a joint press conference.

Taipei residents watch statecraft by slot machine: pull the lever and hope Trump doesn’t blurt out your extinction in a joint press conference.

Taiwan has discovered the new gold standard of US security guarantees under Trump: praying the president forgets you exist. Ahead of Trump’s summit with Xi Jinping in Beijing, Taipei’s big fear was that America’s most transactional landlord-in-chief might decide that decades of bipartisan support for a fellow democracy were negotiable in exchange for some shiny trade headlines and a flurry of self-congratulatory Truth Social posts. Instead, the island got the best possible outcome in 2026 foreign policy: Trump said nothing. After Xi Jinping publicly laid down his "reddest of red lines"—Taiwan independence and peace in the Taiwan Strait are "incompatible"—Trump emerged from their "great" meeting and carefully avoided mentioning Taiwan at all, while the official White House readout also pretended the 23 million people across the strait were just a rounding error. Taiwan’s foreign ministry pushed back on Xi with the usual diplomatic spine (“The Republic of China and the People’s Republic of China are not subordinate to one another”), but analysts say Taipei is quietly relieved. The logic is bleakly simple: if Trump talks about Taiwan, there’s a non-zero chance he freelances US policy on live TV; if he doesn’t, at least he hasn’t accidentally recognized Beijing’s claims in exchange for some soybean purchases and a golf resort. When a frontline democracy’s survival strategy is "maybe the American president will get distracted by tariffs and forget to auction us off," that’s not stability, it’s managed chaos with nuclear powers attached. So Xi threatens "dangerous" conflict if Washington doesn’t "handle" Taiwan to his liking, Beijing rages about US arms sales, and Trump’s contribution is strategic ambiguity by way of attention span. The world’s most powerful democracy is now running East Asia security on the same principle as a bad landlord ignoring tenant emails: if I don’t answer, I didn’t agree to anything. Sleep tight, Taiwan.
#killing-democracy#imperialism
killing democracy

trump’s fcc discovers it actually loves government speech control

Brendan Carr’s FCC, courageously standing up to the grave national threat of late-night jokes.

Brendan Carr’s FCC, courageously standing up to the grave national threat of late-night jokes.

Once upon a time, Republicans swore the government had no business messing with what broadcasters put on the air. Ronald Reagan’s FCC chair Mark Fowler said there was “no room” for the agency to play national hall monitor for TV content. Fast-forward to 2026 and Brendan Carr, Trump’s FCC chair, proudly announces, “This isn’t Ronald Reagan’s F.C.C. — and that’s a good thing,” which is a fun way of saying: we’ve moved from deregulation to state-approved comedy.

Trump’s FCC has now warned late-night hosts that if they keep mocking the president and then dare to book political candidates, they’d better cough up “equal time” for the opponents or face retaliation. They’re even investigating The View on the same theory, so apparently the full might of the federal government is now deployed against Joy Behar. The legal hook is a dusty “equal opportunities” statute that was supposed to prevent broadcasters from rigging access to candidates, not to force Jimmy Kimmel to hand out participation trophies to whichever Republican just got roasted in his monologue.

Conservatives spent decades insisting the Fairness Doctrine was Soviet tyranny; Trumpworld has essentially rebuilt a pettier, dumber version of it, targeted not at fairness but at hurt presidential feelings. The old line was “government shouldn’t pick winners and losers in the marketplace of ideas.” The new line is: mock Trump on TV, and the FCC shows up with a ruler and a copy of the U.S. Code. It’s less a communications policy than a federally subsidized safe space for the most powerful man in the country.

Source: nytimes.com

#killing-democracy#fascism
killing democracy

trump doj tries to doxx trans kids, runs into this thing called a judge

The Justice Department, bravely protecting America from the grave national security threat of… teenagers getting puberty blockers prescribed by their doctors.

The Justice Department, bravely protecting America from the grave national security threat of… teenagers getting puberty blockers prescribed by their doctors.

Trump’s Department of Justice, having apparently run out of actual crime, decided to go full surveillance state on trans kids’ medical records. They sent sweeping subpoenas to Rhode Island’s largest hospital for gender-affirming care, demanding birthdates, Social Security numbers, home addresses, intake forms, guardian authorizations – basically everything short of a GPS tracker for every trans child treated in the last five years. All under the noble banner of investigating ‘misbranding’ and ‘fraud,’ because nothing says careful law enforcement like using Texas prosecutors to hunt down patients in Rhode Island.

US district judge Mary McElroy took one look at this fishing expedition and hit the brakes, noting that while DOJ has “immense prosecutorial authority,” it has “proven unworthy of this trust at every point in this case.” That is a federal judge saying, as politely as possible, that the Trump administration’s law enforcers cannot be trusted not to abuse their power. She also pointed out the obvious: the administration has publicly smeared gender-affirming care for minors as “abuse,” ordered DOJ to wipe it out, and then “celebrated” when hospitals curtailed care under subpoena pressure. Totally normal behavior for a government that swears this is all just about pharma compliance, and not about building a handy list of trans kids and their parents to harass.

Meanwhile, at least seven other courts have already swatted down or narrowed similar subpoenas hurled at more than 20 doctors and hospitals, 11 families have launched a class-action suit to stop DOJ from grabbing their kids’ records, and NYU Langone just revealed it got its own grand jury subpoena from Texas for info on trans youth care. Major medical groups keep saying gender-affirming care is essential, evidence-based treatment; the Trump administration keeps responding by treating it like contraband and deploying federal prosecutors like morality police with subpoena printers. Call it what it is: not healthcare policy, but a federalized harassment campaign against trans kids dressed up as law enforcement.

Source: theguardian.com

#killing-democracy#lawlessness
killing democracy

seb gorka’s 16-page fanfic declares leftists the new isis

America’s counterterrorism czar, seen here pondering which paragraph should accuse liberals of being al-Qaida with pronouns.

America’s counterterrorism czar, seen here pondering which paragraph should accuse liberals of being al-Qaida with pronouns.

Sebastian Gorka has finally unveiled his long-teased “life’s work” on counterterrorism, and it turns out the magnum opus is… a typo-riddled 16-page Trump valentine that treats intelligence assessments like fake news. The new U.S. counterterrorism strategy declares Latin American drug cartels the top threat, demotes Islamist militants to second place, and then pulls a full where’s Waldo on far-right extremism — the thing the FBI keeps saying is the leading domestic danger. Neo-Nazis and militias don’t even get a shout-out, but a relatively tiny slice of militant leftists is elevated to cosmic supervillain status, on par with al-Qaida.

What used to be a sober, bipartisan national security document is now a campaign brochure with classified letterhead. The strategy gushes over Trump’s greatness, recycles his conspiracy theories about a stolen election and an alleged genocide of Christians, and warns darkly about “alien cultures” threatening Western civilization. It even finds room to mention Biden seven times, just in case anyone forgot who the designated villain is. Actual data? That’s for losers and Democrats.

This is the logical sequel to Trump’s mass pardons for more than 1,500 Jan. 6 defendants, including people who assaulted police, all while Republicans pretended that focusing on far-right violence was an attack on “conservative organizing.” Now the White House has codified that delusion into national strategy, explicitly hunting for “violent leftist antifascists and anarchists” while pretending the guy who Googled Hitler and Nazis before a campus shooting is just a statistical rounding error. The message is clear: if you’re a right-wing extremist, you’re a misunderstood patriot; if you’re on the left, you’re the new ISIS.

Asked about the glaring holes and partisan tilt, the White House did what passes for accountability in Trump’s America: they sent a spokesperson to email a slogan about “crushing terrorist threats” and pointed reporters back to Gorka’s own glowing self-promo. America’s top counterterrorism document now functions less as a security roadmap and more as a loyalty test. Who needs evidence-based threat assessments when you can just criminalize your critics and call it strategy?

#killing-democracy#fascism
killing democracy

south carolina gop discovers there are dumber ways to gerrymander

South Carolina Republicans bravely defend the sacred principle that their gerrymander is already perfect and further democracy reduction would be, regrettably, inefficient.

South Carolina Republicans bravely defend the sacred principle that their gerrymander is already perfect and further democracy reduction would be, regrettably, inefficient.

Republican majority leader Shane Massey just delivered a 45‑minute masterclass in how to tell Donald Trump "no" while still polishing his shoes in public. He lovingly recounted his "privilege" of speaking to the president, agreed that Democrats are "crazy" and "hateful," and assured everyone he’s on board with Trump’s agenda – except for the part where Washington wants South Carolina to shred its congressional map even harder to wipe out James Clyburn’s lone Democratic district.

Massey’s big insight? South Carolina is already gerrymandered to the edge of structural authoritarianism, and trying to go from a 6–1 to a 7–0 GOP delegation might actually backfire. Not because dismantling Black representation is immoral or, say, a Voting Rights Act horror show – no, because it might be bad strategy. He warns that if they get “cute” with the maps, an energized Black electorate could turn that 7–0 fantasy into a 5–2 nightmare, and he really doesn’t want to live in a world where Hakeem Jeffries is speaker.

So Massey wraps his defense of the current gerrymander in folksy concern about "communities of interest" and how "most people in South Carolina think we’re freaking crazy," while carefully blaming a faceless "they" in Washington instead of Trump or GOP leadership. The throughline: yes, the Supreme Court just gutted protections against racist redistricting, yes, Republicans are racing to exploit it, and yes, even some of them think the coup on representative democracy should proceed at a slightly slower, more mathematically efficient pace. Bold new era of conscience: please don’t wreck democracy so sloppily you cost us seats.
#killing-democracy#racism
killing democracy

george washington, influencer for christian nationalism

George Washington kneels in the snow, praying that future presidents won’t use him as a prop for government-sponsored Christian nationalism. Prayer not answered.

George Washington kneels in the snow, praying that future presidents won’t use him as a prop for government-sponsored Christian nationalism. Prayer not answered.

The Trump-backed "Freedom Trucks"—because of course history now comes in diesel—are rolling around the country plastered with George Washington crossing the Delaware. But the real action is on the back: Arnold Friberg’s Prayer at Valley Forge, featuring Washington kneeling in the snow like the founding father of Turning Point USA. The painting, originally cooked up for the 1976 Bicentennial to fight the "erosion of patriotism," has been resurrected in the Trump era as a kind of holy trading card for people who think the First Amendment is just a suggestion. Federal agencies that allegedly work for all Americans—the Department of Defense, the Department of Labor, and friends—are now helpfully posting the image on official social media, like taxpayer-funded church bulletins. The same icon is splashed across merch and a comic book pushed by the supposedly "nonpartisan" group running the 250th anniversary commemoration, because nothing says historical rigor like government-blessed Jesus fan art. The pièce de theocracy: Rededicate 250, a White House-backed "national day of prayer, praise and thanksgiving" on the National Mall. Headlined by a video message from Trump and hours of speeches about America’s history as told by God’s alleged scheduling assistant, the event promises to highlight every moment when "God’s providence" allegedly guided the nation—conveniently skipping the part where the Constitution bans establishing a religion. Washington spent his life dodging being turned into a saint-king; the Trump administration has helpfully corrected that oversight by conscripting him into the Christian nationalism rebrand.

Source: nytimes.com

#killing-democracy#fascism
killing democracy

biden waits for gop ‘epiphany’; gets full-blown cult instead

Joe Biden stares into the middle distance, waiting for the GOP’s epiphany like it’s a delayed Amtrak that’s actually been dismantled for parts by Trump’s second-term wrecking crew.

Joe Biden stares into the middle distance, waiting for the GOP’s epiphany like it’s a delayed Amtrak that’s actually been dismantled for parts by Trump’s second-term wrecking crew.

Joe Biden once promised that once Donald Trump was off the stage, Republicans would have an "epiphany" and rediscover their spines, their consciences, and possibly the Constitution. Seven years later, Trump is back in the White House, the GOP is even more tightly welded to his personality cult, and the only epiphany anyone’s having is that "reasonable Republican" was just a very polite fan fiction genre.

Democratic voters, who spent the Obama and early Biden years begging their leaders to compromise with a party actively trying to burn down democracy, have finally noticed the arson. Polls now show a solid majority of Democrats want their representatives to hold the line rather than play nice with President For-Life-In-His-Head. Even Hakeem Jeffries has quietly retired the Michelle Obama "go high" mantra and replaced it with "when they go low, we strike back"—a slogan that doubles as both a political strategy and an accurate description of every Trump speech.

Meanwhile, the party base is tossing out leadership-approved moderates in favor of people who run on platforms like "I will actually fight the fascists" instead of "I will seek common ground with the fascists." Candidates like Analilia Mejia in New Jersey and Graham Platner in Maine are bulldozing establishment favorites, while strategists openly admit that Biden and Obama badly misread a GOP that never had a "fever" to break—just a long-term project to dismantle multiracial democracy. Trump’s ideology now owns the party so completely that even his knockoffs struggle to imitate the original grift.

Sen. Chris Murphy helpfully lays out the stakes: Democrats can’t just "win" in 2026 or 2028, do a couple of bipartisan photo ops, and call it a day while Trumpism keeps rewriting the rules of the system. Either they actually follow through on "unrig the economy and unrig the democracy" or we all keep living in the sequel to 2016 that never ends. The GOP had its epiphany a long time ago: authoritarian power works when your opponents are still busy asking if Mitch McConnell wants to form a working group.
#killing-democracy#fascism
killing democracy

vance discovers medicaid, decides poor people make great hostages

JD Vance and Dr. Oz explain that the best way to protect healthcare is to take it hostage and let politics negotiate the ransom.

JD Vance and Dr. Oz explain that the best way to protect healthcare is to take it hostage and let politics negotiate the ransom.

Vice President JD Vance, freshly crowned "fraud czar" like a podcast host LARPing as Eliot Ness, announced the Trump administration is freezing $1.3 billion in Medicaid payments to California because the state allegedly isn’t prosecuting fraud with enough righteous MAGA fury. As a bonus threat, he says the White House is ready to yank Medicaid Fraud Control Unit funding from all 50 states if they don’t start cracking down harder, and hints they’ll start turning off other Medicaid money too. Nothing says "we care about vulnerable patients" like holding their healthcare funding over a political trash can and asking the governor if he feels lucky.

To really drive home the seriousness of this crusade, the administration rolled out Dr. Mehmet Oz as head of CMS, because when you think sober stewardship of federal health programs, you obviously think "daytime TV miracle berry guy." Oz claims California’s records raised "major red flags" — including $630 million in billing questions, $500 million in home health services, and $200 million in "questionable expenditures" tied to coverage for undocumented immigrants, who are, technically, not Medicaid-eligible. The solution? Don’t fix eligibility rules, don’t clarify policy, just hit pause on $1.3 billion and see how many low-income people can be used as leverage before Sacramento crawls.

As Vance helpfully explained, the real problem is that "mostly blue states" aren’t taking fraud seriously enough. Red states, of course, are doing great — no notes, no follow-up questions, please. Meanwhile, CMS is slapping a six-month nationwide moratorium on new Medicare enrollment for hospices and home health agencies while it "intensifies investigations" and boots suspected bad actors. So yes, the administration’s anti-fraud strategy is: punish California, threaten every state, freeze legitimate providers out of the system, and hope patients somehow don’t notice that their care got turned into a campaign prop.

Source: nbcnews.com

#killing-democracy#healthcare#forever-grifting
killing democracy

inflation hawk molting into trump’s rate-cut parrot

Kevin Warsh rehearses his line for the next rate decision: “After careful analysis of economic data and one phone call from Mar-a-Lago, we’ve decided to cut.”

Kevin Warsh rehearses his line for the next rate decision: “After careful analysis of economic data and one phone call from Mar-a-Lago, we’ve decided to cut.”

The Senate has confirmed Kevin Warsh as Federal Reserve chair, 54-45, with John Fetterman helpfully auditioning for the role of "Democrat who will absolutely be quoted in every White House press release for the next year." Warsh gets four years in the big chair and a 14-year seat on the Fed board — because if you’re going to politicize monetary policy, you may as well do it on a multi-decade subscription plan. Once famous as an "inflation hawk," Warsh is now enthusiastically harmonizing with Donald Trump’s demand to cut interest rates while inflation climbs to 3.8% and a Middle East war rages. He told the Senate he’d "take politics out of monetary policy," then immediately refused to say whether Trump lost the 2020 election, which is a fascinating definition of independence: the central bank will be totally apolitical, but the chair can’t answer the most basic factual question in US politics without checking with Dear Leader first. Meanwhile, Jerome Powell is refusing to do the traditional polite exit, choosing instead to stay on the Fed board as a voting governor until the White House stops pretending that an over-budget building renovation is some grave national scandal. Powell calls the investigation a "pretext" for rate-cut pressure; the administration calls it "oversight"; everyone else calls it what it is: an attempt to turn the Fed into a campaign ATM and hope voters don’t notice the bill until after November. So the world’s most important central bank is now chaired by a former Wall Street banker who used to fear inflation but now mostly fears upsetting Trump, backed by a Senate that’s decided long-term economic stability is less important than short-term sugar highs. What could possibly go wrong when you hand the money printer to a guy whose main qualification is that he knows not to say the election was real?

Source: theguardian.com

#killing-democracy#forever-grifting#money
killing democracy

alligator alcatraz shuts down, fascism and fiscal fraud remain open for business

Alligator Alcatraz, where the Everglades, the Constitution, and a billion tax dollars all went to die so Trump and DeSantis could cosplay as wartime prison wardens.

Alligator Alcatraz, where the Everglades, the Constitution, and a billion tax dollars all went to die so Trump and DeSantis could cosplay as wartime prison wardens.

Ron DeSantis’ favorite Everglades torture campground, lovingly nicknamed “Alligator Alcatraz,” is finally being wheeled off life support after less than a year of charging Florida taxpayers a casual $1.2 million a day to cook immigrants in metal cages over a mosquito-infested swamp. Trump praised it as being "as good as the real Alcatraz" because of course he did; if there’s one thing this administration knows how to do, it’s confuse human rights violations with a tourism review. Officials are now quietly packing up their experiment in heatstroke and waterboarding, not because anyone found a conscience, but because the Trump administration stiffed Florida on the promised $608 million rebate and left the state holding a billion-dollar bag of xenophobic performance art. Meanwhile, human rights groups have documented torture, forced disappearances, and denial of legal representation for the 22,000 people cycled through the place, while environmental advocates point out that the whole thing was slapped onto fragile tribal homelands and wetlands with no permits, no review, and no analysis—just the regulatory rigor of a frat house building a backyard fight club. Democrats like Debbie Wasserman Schultz and Maxwell Frost are calling it what it is: a "monument to cruelty" and a "failed experiment in human suffering" that never should have existed, much less been billed to the public at seven figures a day. But closure isn’t the end: lawsuits are still chasing accountability, environmental restoration, and some acknowledgment that maybe turning the Everglades into Gitmo-on-Gators was not, in fact, a bold policy innovation. ICE and DHS, naturally, are saying almost nothing, presumably too busy “continuously evaluating detention needs” to explain why torture camp in a swamp made the cut in the first place. Outside the wire, groups like the Workers Circle are keeping vigil until the last detainee is out and the last fence post is ripped from the stolen wetland, warning that this cannot become "America." Unfortunately, judging by the 18 other “sites of harm” they’re tracking around the country, it already has. Alligator Alcatraz is closing—but the system that birthed it is still very much open, funded, and looking for its next patch of land to ruin.

Source: theguardian.com

#killing-democracy#lawlessness#forever-grifting
killing democracy

president ‘i don’t think about your money’ escalates iran war anyway

Trump explains that he doesn’t think about the American financial situation, seen here standing in front of the American financial situation he’s not thinking about.

Trump explains that he doesn’t think about the American financial situation, seen here standing in front of the American financial situation he’s not thinking about.

Asked about the economic fallout from his Iran adventure, Donald Trump essentially shrugs and says the quiet part out loud: “I don't think about the American financial situation.” Bold strategy for the guy holding the national checkbook while gas prices, inflation, and global markets are doing their best impression of a roller coaster designed by Boeing.

U.S. intelligence is simultaneously reporting that Iran has retained most of its missile capabilities, so the grand plan appears to be: spend billions, destabilize the region, spike prices at home, and achieve...vibes. Meanwhile, another segment calmly walks viewers through how the war is hammering inflation, because when the president stops thinking about the economy, your grocery bill gets to do all the thinking for him.

This is what passes for "national security strategy" now: ignore the financial fallout, pretend deterrence is working while the missiles are still there, and let ordinary Americans pay for it at the pump and in their paychecks. But don’t worry, he’s definitely still laser-focused on the important stuff, like TV coverage and crowd sizes. The economy can fend for itself, apparently.
#killing-democracy#imperialism#money
killing democracy

nebraska democrats speedrun election jenga while gop eyes the rulebook shredder

Nebraska’s ‘blue dot’ seen here moments before a pack of very concerned Republicans try to color-correct it into oblivion.

Nebraska’s ‘blue dot’ seen here moments before a pack of very concerned Republicans try to color-correct it into oblivion.

Nebraska Democrats just pulled off the rare feat of winning a primary specifically so they can drop out. Cindy Burbank beat William Forbes — a "Democrat" who just happens to be a Trump-voting, anti-abortion pastor Republicans were totally not trying to sneak into the ballot like a church pamphlet under your windshield — and now plans to step aside so independent Dan Osborn can take on GOP senator Pete Ricketts head-to-head.

Meanwhile, the real fun is in Omaha’s "blue dot" second congressional district, where John Cavanaugh and Denise Powell are locked in a too-close-to-call primary for a seat Democrats desperately want. Why? Because if Cavanaugh wins in November, Republican governor Jim Pillen gets to appoint his replacement to the state legislature — potentially handing the GOP just enough votes to finally kill Nebraska’s split electoral vote system and erase that pesky Democratic electoral vote that keeps popping up every few presidential cycles.

So on one side, Democrats are contorting themselves to block a fake Democrat and prop up an independent to stop a MAGA senator. On the other, Republicans are working on the long game of "what if we just change how votes count?" so they never have to worry about that annoying little blue dot again. It’s not outright ballot-stuffing, but as practice rounds for dismantling representative democracy go, it’s remarkably on brand.

Source: theguardian.com

#killing-democracy#lawlessness
killing democracy

trump considers trading taiwan for a hug and cheaper oil

Workers frantically polish the Temple of Heaven so it’s shiny enough for Trump to admire his reflection while contemplating whether to pawn off Taiwan for a handshake and a headline deal.

Workers frantically polish the Temple of Heaven so it’s shiny enough for Trump to admire his reflection while contemplating whether to pawn off Taiwan for a handshake and a headline deal.

Donald Trump is heading to Beijing for the first US presidential visit in nearly a decade, mostly because starting a war with Iran has gone about as well as you’d expect when your foreign policy team is three generals, a podcaster, and Elon Musk on speakerphone. The Iran conflict is in its third month, the strait of Hormuz is effectively a hostage situation, and Trump is now reduced to asking Xi Jinping for help while insisting to reporters that the US has Iran "very much under control" and will "win it one way or the other – peacefully or otherwise." Always reassuring when the commander-in-chief talks about war like he’s describing a football game with optional nukes. The White House is openly dangling the thing Beijing actually wants – weaker US support for democratic Taiwan – as the unspoken price for Chinese "assistance" in getting Tehran to reopen a chokepoint that handles a fifth of the world’s oil. While US officials quietly beg China to lean on its top oil client, Trump is flying in with tech billionaires as props, including Elon Musk, because nothing screams "serious diplomacy" like treating a potential world war as a TED Talk with side deals. Meanwhile, Xi is lecturing Washington about "international rule of law" and warning against a return to the "law of the jungle" – which is a fun way of saying that Trump has so thoroughly torched America’s moral authority that the authoritarian in the room now gets to cosplay as the responsible adult. As Washington slaps sanctions on Chinese firms for helping Iran and Beijing invokes blocking statutes to tell the US to go sanction itself, the summit is less "high-stakes diplomacy" and more a live demonstration of what happens when you blow up a region, alienate allies, and then wander over to another authoritarian government hoping they’ll bail you out if you hand them a piece of the free world. The stakes aren’t just oil prices; it’s whether Trump tries to trade away Taiwan’s security for a photo op, a "big, fat hug," and a chance to pretend his Iran disaster is all part of some 4D chess master plan instead of exactly what it looks like: ad-libbed foreign policy with a body count.
#killing-democracy#imperialism#national-security
killing democracy

trump’s sore-loser cult still trying to ‘find’ raffensperger

Brad Raffensperger campaigns for governor while checking whether the venue has Wi‑Fi, chairs, and a bomb squad on standby — the standard package in Trump’s GOP.

Brad Raffensperger campaigns for governor while checking whether the venue has Wi‑Fi, chairs, and a bomb squad on standby — the standard package in Trump’s GOP.

Brad Raffensperger, the Georgia secretary of state whose unforgivable sin was not fabricating votes for Donald Trump in 2020, is now running for governor and — surprise — facing an "active threat". Mississippi cops reportedly received a multipage manifesto with Raffensperger’s face and the word “boom” scrawled across it, because nothing says "healthy democracy" like interstate fan mail for people who wouldn’t help steal an election. While law enforcement swept a "suspicious object" at Middle Georgia Regional Airport — conveniently, the site of a scheduled Raffensperger campaign stop — his team was busy beefing up security and not releasing the suspect’s name or the contents of the manifesto. Totally normal campaign logistics in the post-Trump GOP: yard signs, mailers, and a risk assessment about who might try to blow you up for certifying the actual vote count. Raffensperger’s opponent, Lt. Gov. Burt Jones, is one of those fun "fake electors" who pretended Trump won Georgia and has Trump’s endorsement, because of course he does. So voters get a clear choice: the guy who said no to Trump’s "find 11,780 votes" shakedown, or the guy who happily play-acted an alternate reality slate of electors — while the background noise of this primary is literal threats of violence against the one who upheld the law. American democracy isn’t just on the ballot; it’s apparently on a bomb threat list.
#killing-democracy#lawlessness