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Oh man. Same old clown show, awash with boondoggles, each more cringey than the last. As the mad man-child deconstructs DC and slaps his hideous face and name everywhere - historic buildings, fascist arches, garish statues, possibly imaginary gold phones - others have taken his lead with their own patriotic spinoffs. Cue "Fuck You" upgrades, a Strait to Hell arcade for a video-game war, and a Trump/Epstein "Memorial Reading Room" packed with 3.5 million pages of files, where "the truth is hard to deny."
Trump's narcissistic vandalizing of D.C. - couldn't his KKK dad have just hugged him now and then? - is "something dictators have done throughout history," noted Bernie Sanders of his proposed SERVE Act, or Stop Executive Renaming for Vanity and Ego. Co-sponsored by six Senate Dems, the bill would bar any sitting president from naming federal properties after themselves, an act both "arrogant" and illegal. At this rate many weary Americans would likely argue, "Let the chiseling off begin," but for now the bill sits in legislative limbo and we're stuck with the resulting atrocities; they continue to multiply like locusts, even as he's proposed a $10-billion fund for more "beautification" projects around "the capital of the greatest Nation in the history of the world."
Though he increasingly nods off in public - or per the White House, blinks - he still clutches at a farcical show of dominance he's leaned on in the endless self-glorification campaign that is his execrable life. There are posts quoting fictional "fans": "Remarkable leadership,” "Master of the Deal,” "THE GREATEST PRESIDENT WE HAVE EVER KNOWN." From the guy who's "confused the country for his living room," there's D.C's re-branding: the plaques, name changes, razed East Wing for a billion-dollar "albatross" nobody wants. There are new massive Stalin-esque banners at construction sites proclaiming, “Thank you, PRESIDENT TRUMP”- "like Michael Scott buying himself a World’s Best Boss coffee mug" we paid for - to which unenthused residents added, "Fuck You Cunt."
Snug in a delusional bubble where his approval is def not in the toilet, he feels free to rant, lie, melt down online without consequence. In one manic night, he posts 55 times in three hours: “Arrest Obama the traitor” and “DEMONIC FORCE,” also Hillary, Brennan, Comey, Kelly. Asked how much he thinks about the cost to Americans of his calamitous war, he blurts, “Not even a little bit.” His lackeys follow suit: Ka$h Patel yells, lies, hustles bourbon, pads his stats and takes a "VIP snorkel" in Pearl Harbor around the tomb of 900 U.S. soldiers as Sean Duffy takes his nine offspring on a "patriotic," seven-month Great American Road Trip filmed for YouTube and complete with "head-spinning" corporate sponsorship, both on the taxpayers' now-rapidly-shrinking dime.
Meanwhile, another project nobody asked for - draining and repainting the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool, aka "reflective pond," from traditional grey to garish blue - has shockingly veered off course. After boasting his bestest golf course pool painters could easy-peasy do a no-bid, $1.8 million, "smart and beautiful construction" that Dems stupidly opposed - "Dumacrats love sewage" - the cost has soared to $13.1 million, it's now by a contractor he "did not know and have never used before,” staff are worried the job is behind schedule, with "uneven application" leaving bubbles, holes and "mottled shades of blue" in the pool, and a judge has set a May 21 hearing for a lawsuit charging the project wasn't properly vetted, ditto a color "more appropriate to a resort or theme park."
More winning in Miami, where another lawsuit charges three acres of multi-million-dollar waterfront land were illegally grifted by DeSantis to Trump for $10 for his presidential “library,” actually a gaudy hotel with no books but more vitally two gold statues of, you know. They will presumably join in grotesque kinship with the $300,000, crypto-bro-funded, bronze and gold leaf Don Colossus just unveiled at Doral Miami, "where the Republic is currently moldering." Before "a robotic chorus of evangelical functionaries who (have) transformed themselves into the most theologically humiliated cohort in modern memory," the statue was honored as, not an idolatrous golden calf, insisted Pastor Mark Burns, but "a celebration of life" and symbol of "the hand of God over (Trump’s) life." Definitely not a cult.

Despite being heralded as God's second favorite son - one who "understands the Scriptures better than the Pope" - Trump is also widely deemed "an economic serial killer" presiding over an "America First Corporate Graveyard," skyrocketing inflation, national debt, farm bankruptcies, and energy costs, and possibly "the largest single act of grand larceny in American history" with a $10 billion payout by his own DOJ against his own IRS to settle his bullshit lawsuit for their leak of his tax returns, which every other president has released. Still, because grifting chutzpah thy name is, and because there's never enough money to fill the ugly gaping hole where a soul should be, he's still running penny-ante scams. Up next: Trump Mobile, "for the forgotten MAGA man."
Last June, his huckster spawn announced the launch of "a sleek, gold smartphone engineered for performance.” The T1 Phone, "proudly designed and built in the United States,” would be available in August at $499. For almost a year, they urged followers to make $100 "deposits" to "pre-order" the beauties; over half a million did, ponying up about $59 million. Then, the bait and switch. The terms of service quietly changed: The "deposit" provided "a conditional opportunity" to buy if Trump Mobile chose to sell. Pricing, production schedules, shipping costs were "non-binding." "Made in the USA" became "Proudly American Designed." "Delivery" dates got pushed back. Unexplained charges appeared. A reporter who called "Customer Service" got “Omega Auto Care." To date, no fantasy Trump phones have shipped. Cheap Crooks 'R Us.

Also, liars. With even neo-cons now deeming the Iran War potentially more of a debacle than Vietnam, the good folks at Secret Handshake, creators of the Trump/Epstein bestie statues, decided that with the regime hyping war like a video game, they might as well turn it into one. Operation Epic Furious: Strait to Hell , which is also online, features three working, arcade video games set up inside DC's War Memorial; they promise "high-octane, flag-waving, boots-on-the-ground...pure pixelated patriotism," or, per Hegseth, "laser-focused maximum reps annihilation mission crushing (with) sustained unrelenting pressure." Battles - by tweet, not gun - pit US forces against ”Iranian schoolgirl,“ "DEIyatollah,“ low-flow shower heads, the Pope and other "threats to American freedom."
Games open with Trump declaring, “Another big, beautiful day as the best President ever.” Options for the prompt, “Ready to ROCK Iran back to the Stone Ages?” are “Not Yet...” “Yes” and “Hell Yes.” Yells Pete, “Let’s liberate some oil!” Trump can order a Diet Coke or bomb Iran; search for barrels of oil, ideas for Truth Social posts, or endless threats that lead nowhere; he vows to “fight this war and win it by hamburger o’clock.” Melania: “I WAS NEVER ON THE EPSTEIN JET...Did you burn the files yet?” JD, fat-faced: “I love couch.” The only way you can lose is by trying to hold Melania’s hand, which abruptly ends the game; otherwise, it’s impossible to end or win it. Irony never dies: Images have surfaced of bored National Guardsmen - a $1 million a day deployment - playing.
Another piece of protest art brings the truth of "one of the most horrific crimes in American history” to Trump's hometown. "The Donald J. Trump and Jeffrey Epstein Memorial Reading Room,” in New York's Tribeca, is a first-of-its-kind, 5,000-square-foot installation containing all the unsealed Epstein files - 3.5 million pages printed and bound into 3,437 volumes weighing 17,000 pounds, "a physical, undeniable record of corruption, cover-ups, and crime." The pop-up project in the Mriya Gallery was created by the non-profit Primary Facts; it took them about a month to print the files. The exhibit is on view through May 21; admission to groups for a one-hour session is free; organizers are raising funds to cover the New York premiere and bring it to other cities.
The Trumpsonian installation is built around a candlelit tribute to Epstein's more than 1,200 victims and survivors, whose names are all redacted here in closed binders - unlike at the DOJ, where they were badly, only partly redacted, a failure adding insult to injury along with an ongoing, multi-pronged cover-up. The Trump and Epstein Reading Room also includes a timeline documenting the decades-long crimes, legal proceedings and intersections between the two men's lives, all underlining the criminal absurdity of federal claims "there's nothing left to investigate." The vast trove of information, organizers say, is "what 3.5 million pages of evidence looks like." Trump, as deeply complicit as he is narcissistic, "wanted his name on stuff." Now, here it is.

A study published Monday warns that New Orleans must immediately begin planning and gradually implementing its permanent evacuation to avert a dangerously rushed exodus later, because it has passed a "point of no return" as climate-driven sea-level rise slowly swallows the storied city.
"With global temperatures poised to exceed the 1.5°C Paris Agreement threshold—a level that triggered substantial ice sheet collapse during the Last Interglacial—low-elevation coastal zones face sea-level commitments far beyond current planning horizons," says the study, which was published by the journal Nature Sustainability.
"With this geological frame of reference, we examine the impact of sea-level rise on what may be the most physically vulnerable coastal zone in the world using prehistoric and contemporary patterns of human mobility," the publication continues. "We highlight the positive aspects of the recently commenced out-migration in this region and argue that the fate of communities landwards of this coastal zone will be decided in the next few decades."
"While climate mitigation should remain the first step to prevent the worst outcomes, coastal Louisiana has evidently already crossed the point of no return,” the paper adds.
That's because rising waters are slowly eroding Louisiana's coast, including New Orleans, which “may well be surrounded by the Gulf of Mexico before the end of this century," according to the study's authors.
“Louisiana is a canary in the coal mine. It is one of the rare places where we’re already clearly seeing climate-motivated depopulation combined with other social and economic factors,” said Yale School of the Environment professor and study co-author Brianna Castro.
The authors argued that by acknowledging the inevitability of New Orleans' underwater future, government and residents can avert a fraught rushed retreat by planning and executing a managed multigenerational relocation and set an example for other threatened coastal communities.
According to one widely cited study published a decade ago, around 13 million Americans living in coastal areas could be forced to relocate to higher ground by the end of the century due climate-driven sea-level rise, with the Gulf Coast and Florida expected lose the most livable land. Globally, hundreds of millions of people are expected to be displaced by 2100 due to rising seas.
After Hurricane Katrina—which inundated the city and killed nearly 1,000 people in the New Orleans metro area—billions of dollars were spent fortifying the city's levee system, which failed catastrophically during the 2005 storm. However, experts warn that in the long term, levees won't be able to stop the rising waters any longer.
That's why the study's authors said officials must begin the city's orderly depopulation as soon as possible.
"What kind of retreat do you want?" asked Castro. "Do you want to incentivize it and then people go naturally for jobs, housing, and lifestyle amenities—or do you want people to wait and then have to leave abruptly in crisis?”
Graham Platner's campaign is accusing Sen. Susan Collins of siding with banking interests after she joined Senate Republicans in blocking a Democratic measure to protect consumers from unexpected overdraft fees.
On Wednesday, the GOP voted largely along party lines against a set of Democratic resolutions aiming to restore Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) policies killed by the Trump administration.
In what its acting director, Russell Vought, has described as an effort to effectively dismantle the bureau, which has been credited with delivering more than $21 billion in consumer relief since its creation, he has rescinded 67 policies that protected Americans from junk fees, medical debt, lending discrimination, and other financial abuses.
One resolution voted down Wednesday would have restored a scrapped CFPB guidance against debt collectors hounding consumers over false or inflated medical debts. Another would have reaffirmed that the bureau can scrutinize financial companies for predatory credit practices aimed at military families.
These Democratic resolutions were not expected to pass in a Republican-controlled Senate, but were instead meant to force Republicans to put themselves on the record as standing against consumer interests.
As President Donald Trump takes a beating from voters on the economy, the votes will serve as ammunition as Democrats run with the message that the GOP has "abandoned consumers and is making life more expensive for them," as the CFPB's architect, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass), said on Wednesday.
Platner is already deploying that ammunition in one of November's marquee races, hammering Collins (R-Maine) for voting with the GOP against restoring a guidance enacted by the Biden administration that required banks to obtain customers' consent before charging overdraft fees for ATM and one-time debit card transactions.
"Last night, Susan Collins voted once again to make it easier for big banks to hit Maine families with predatory overdraft fees," his campaign said in an email on Thursday. "Her vote to block even a debate on restoring basic consumer protections was just the latest reminder of where Collins' real loyalties lie."
"There is no legitimate policy rationale for voting against basic consumer protections on overdraft fees,” said Platner's campaign manager, Ben Chin. “But Susan Collins cares far more about protecting bank executives’ millions than protecting the rest of us from BS overdraft fees. This vote is yet another example of this deeply unfortunate reality.”
According to data from OpenSecrets, Collins has received nearly $1.8 million this cycle in contributions from the financial sector, including more than $570,000 from private equity and investment firms, which the Platner campaign said were "among the most predatory actors in the American economy."
She's also received more than $44,000 from commercial banks and holding companies that have a particular interest in her stance on overdraft fees.
The Pine Tree Results PAC, which has thrown about $12.7 million behind Collins, likewise got nearly a third of its funding from figures in the financial sector, particularly in private equity and hedge funds with a broader interest in neutering the CFPB.
The state of Hawaii has passed a law that poses a direct challenge to the infamous 2010 Citizens United Supreme Court ruling, which opened the door to unlimited corporate spending in US elections.
Democratic Hawaii Gov. Josh Green on Thursday signed into law a bill that takes aim at the court's ruling that corporations are effectively people with full free speech rights who can face no limits on what they can contribute to political organizations.
As explained by More Perfect Union, the law, which is set to take effect next July, classifies corporations as "artificial persons" who do not have a constitutional right to make political donations.
"The bill could limit the influence of super PACs," noted More Perfect Union, "and be a model to challenge the influence of money in politics."
Democratic Hawaii state Sen. Jarrett Keohokalole, a supporter of the law, said on Thursday he was proud that Hawaii has become "the first state in the nation" to take direct action challenging Citizens United.
"As elected leaders, we do not serve artificial entities," Keohokalole said. "We serve the people."
“We do not serve artificial entities. We serve the people.” @SenatorJarrett on Hawaii making history by getting dark and corporate money out of politics. #CitizensUnited pic.twitter.com/Se6HQyvRu8
— American Progress (@amprog) May 14, 2026
US Rep. Greg Casar (D-Texas), chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, hailed the law as "big news" that should inspire opponents of limitless corporate political spending across the US.
"The far-right Supreme Court hijacked the Constitution to let corporations spend in our elections," said Casar. "But we are not powerless. We can fight back."
The new law passed despite opposition from Hawaii Attorney General Anne Lopez, who argued that defending it in court could be difficult and expensive.
The law's passage earned praise from campaign finance watchdogs who have long called for overturning Citizens United and reestablishing guardrails for corporate cash in US democracy.
Michael Beckel, who directs the Money in Politics project for the advocacy group Issue One, said the Hawaii law is a "model for the country" that other states should rush to emulate.
"This measure... is among the most innovative and impactful ideas to curb corporate and dark money spending in campaigns since the Supreme Court’s disastrous Citizens United ruling in 2010," Beckel said. "Those looking to bring more transparency and accountability to elections should embrace this powerful proposal and follow Hawaii’s lead."
End Citizens United, the nonprofit campaign finance reform organization dedicated to overturning the 2010 Supreme Court ruling, also pushed other states to look at Hawaii's law as a roadmap for their own legislation.
"Hawaii has provided a blueprint for how to prevent super PACs from spending dark money by passing state law," the group said in a social media post. "Let this win be a testament to the ability states have to put power back in the hands of everyday people by neutralizing the effects of the Citizens United ruling."
Tom Moore, senior fellow at the Center for American Progress, praised the Hawaii law in an interview with The Associated Press, calling it "a brave and bold step to get corporate and dark money out of America’s politics" that "will send a powerful message that will be heard loud and clear across the Pacific and across the mainland."
This is a developing story... Please check back for possible updates...
In a show of resistance to the US Supreme Court's dismantling of the Voting Rights Act and Republicans' efforts to redraw congressional districts across southern states in a bid to retain power despite their party's unpopular agenda, labor and voting rights groups were among those that arrived in Montgomery, Alabama Saturday for "Day One" of a mass mobilization against GOP lawmakers who they said are intent on "resurrecting Jim Crow."
While groups including the Movement for Black Lives and National Jobs With Justice boarded buses in Atlanta Saturday morning to join more than 250 organizations at a rally at the Alabama State Capitol, other organizers began the "All Roads Lead to the South" National Day of Action with a march across the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama—the same site of the historic 1965 voting rights march that became known as Bloody Sunday.
"We started here because we wanted to stand on sacred ground and consecrate ourselves," said organizer LaTosha Brown, co-founder of the group Black Voters Matter. "You cannot fight hate with hate, you have to stand in the spirit of love, and so look around—this is what love looks like."We’re joining the All Roads Lead to the South coalition in Alabama today to show that We the People will not allow a Jim Crow 2.0.
Today’s march is a powerful reminder: courage and community are how we will get through this.
WATCH: https://t.co/9Z5DOblam1
— Democracy Forward (@DemocracyFwd) May 16, 2026
The march and rally were organized in response to a ramp-up of efforts by the Republican Party and right-wing courts, including the far-right majority on the US Supreme Court, to redraw electoral maps in states including Louisiana, Alabama, and Tennessee.
The mass mobilization was organized after the Supreme Court handed down its ruling in Louisiana v. Callais last month, effectively eviscerating Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, which has held that voters of color have the right to legally challenge racially discriminatory congressional maps.
The Supreme Court this week allowed Alabama to revert back to an electoral map with just one majority-Black district out of seven, despite that fact that 26% of Alabama residents are Black.
Tennessee Republicans also adopted a new electoral map that splits up the state's only majority-Black district, and the Missouri Supreme Court approved a congressional map that targets the state's 5th District, represented by Rep. Emanuel Cleaver.
Arriving in Montgomery, Tennessee state Rep. Justin Jones (D-52) said voters across the South need "a united front... to take on this new Confederacy... We know what the intent of these governors and state lawmakers are, to dismantle every gain made during the civil rights movement and dismantle the crown jewel of the civil rights movement, which was the Voting Rights Act."
Rep. @brotherjones_ in Montgomery: “We’re here united to take on this new confederacy, 60 years after the Selma March… because we know their intent is to dismantle everything gained during the civil rights movement.” pic.twitter.com/op87I4g8hT
— The Tennessee Holler (@TheTNHoller) May 16, 2026
"Our parents and grandparents marched, organized, bled, and won," said organizers ahead of the rally. "The Voting Rights Act was theirs. The fight to keep it is ours. Right now, state by state, that law is being dismantled. We know that we cannot fight the same battles the same way. New times demand new tactics—economic pressure, political organizing, community action, culture, and faith. But we know what we know: Organizing works. And we have unfinished business."
At the rally, US Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) emphasized the need for solidarity from across the US, with supporters of voting rights mobilizing in states near and far from the South—the current center of the GOP's attacks.
"They think they can draw us out of power. They do not know the sleeping giant they just awakened," said Ocasio-Cortez. "When Black Americans have the right to vote and that vote is protected, our schools get funded. When voting rights are protected, healthcare gets expanded. When voting rights are protected, our country moves forward. And Montgomery, that's what they're actually afraid of."
AOC: “It is time for the North to pull up to the South and let them know exactly what they have uncorked with this injustice. They think they can draw us out of power. They do not know the sleeping giant they just awakened. What they thought was the final blow is actually just… pic.twitter.com/kQvixR2Olv
— Marco Foster (@MarcoFoster_) May 16, 2026
Erica Smiley, executive director of Jobs With Justice, said labor groups joined the mass mobilization because "the bridges we have to cross are not only in Selma."
"Jim Crow didn't just come for the ballot. It came for anyone who tried to organize and have a voice," said Smiley. "Efforts to rollback equality and democracy are happening in the occupied cities, shop floors, and now the halls of the Capitol across the country."
Rep. Terri Sewell (D-Ala.) called for the rally to mark the beginning of a "Freedom Summer," with rallies at "every State House" in the country to pressure state legislators to end the GOP gerrymandering efforts, which President Donald Trump has explicitly called for.
"Let's declare a Freedom Summer and go to every courthouse this summer, to tell those legislators, 'We will not go back,'" said Sewell.
Dozens of satellite events were also taking place across the US on Saturday.
The director of the US Central Intelligence Agency met with Cuban officials in Havana on Thursday after the island nation's government said it had completely run out of fuel due to the Trump administration's oil blockade.
The CIA's X account posted photos of some of Director John Ratcliffe's meetings, blurring the faces of US intelligence officials who accompanied the agency chief. In a statement, the CIA said it met with Raúl Rodríguez Castro, the grandson of former Cuban President Raúl Castro; Interior Minister Lázaro Álvarez Casas; and the head of Cuba's intelligence services.
Havana, Cuba pic.twitter.com/7S7TtJPyf5
— CIA (@CIA) May 14, 2026
"This is one of the most sinister and ominous social media posts I've ever seen," legal scholar Maryam Jamshidi wrote in response to the CIA photos.
Ratcliffe, the highest-ranking Trump administration official to visit Cuba, decided to visit "to personally deliver President Donald Trump's message that the United States is prepared to seriously engage on economic and security issues, but only if Cuba makes fundamental changes," the CIA said.
A CIA official told NewsNation that "while the director emphasized that President Trump prefers dialogue, the Cubans should have no illusions that the President will not enforce red lines."
Trump has repeatedly threatened to seize Cuba by force, describing the island country as his next military target after Venezuela and Iran. Fears of an imminent military attack have grown in recent weeks amid Trump's belligerent rhetoric and surging US surveillance flights off Cuba's coast.
"I think I can do anything I want with [Cuba], if you want to know the truth," Trump told reporters in the Oval Office in March. "A very weakened nation."
"This failed policy needs to end immediately. Every day, we are contributing to immense suffering in Cuba and a worsening humanitarian crisis."
The spy chief's trip came a day after Cuba's energy minister announced that months after Trump imposed an oil blockade on the island, "we have absolutely no fuel oil, absolutely no diesel."
The same day, the US State Department dangled "$100 million in direct humanitarian assistance to the Cuban people." Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez Parrilla said Cuba's leadership is "willing to hear the details of the offer and the manner in which it would be implemented."
"We hope it is free of political maneuvers and attempts to exploit the shortages and suffering of a people under siege," he added. "The best aid that the US government could provide to the noble Cuban people at this or any time is to de-escalate the measures of the energy, economic, commercial, and financial blockade, intensified as never before in recent months, which severely affects all sectors of the Cuban economy and society."
Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel echoed that sentiment, writing in a Thursday social media post that "the damage could be alleviated in a much easier and more expeditious way by lifting or easing the blockade, as it is well known that the humanitarian situation is coldly calculated and induced."
Progressive lawmakers in the US are imploring the Trump administration to end US economic warfare against Cuba, engage diplomatically with the country, and drop any plans for a military assault.
Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.), who has come under attack from Republican lawmakers for visiting Cuba in April, said Thursday that "Cuba has run out of diesel and fuel oil and is enduring some of the worst blackouts in decades because of the US’ cruel oil blockade."
"This failed policy needs to end immediately," said Jayapal. "Every day, we are contributing to immense suffering in Cuba and a worsening humanitarian crisis."
"These megautilities are merely using rising concern about data centers as an excuse to concentrate political and economic power of two giant utilities to maximize financial returns to shareholders," one advocate said.
Seeking to cash in on spiking energy demand from the expansion of artificial intelligence data centers across the US, the Florida energy giant NextEra announced a $67 billion deal on Monday to acquire Virginia's Dominion Energy.
But while the deal is expected to be lucrative for the massive new entity, with national power demands projected to spike perhaps by as much as 25% over the next five years, consumer advocates fear that the proposed merger will be bad for consumers, creating an unaccountable corporate behemoth that will raise costs on ratepayers.
According to Utility Dive, the new entity created by the merger will serve a combined 10 million customers across Florida, Virginia, North Carolina, and South Carolina.
With a market cap of $250 billion, the companies said they'd be the “world’s largest regulated electric utility business by market capitalization and one of the world’s largest energy infrastructure companies.”
But the deal still needs to be approved by federal regulators, a process that will likely pose minimal difficulty given the Trump administration's friendliness toward other corporate megamergers across industries, from media to railroads.
It will also be required to obtain local approvals, including in Virginia, where the recently elected Democratic Gov. Abigail Spanberger has made lowering utility costs and requiring data centers to "pay their fair share" central campaign promises, as massive new projects have been met with furious local backlash around the country.
Tyson Slocum, director of the energy program for the consumer advocacy watchdog Public Citizen, said that "this absurd proposal to merge two massive, well-capitalized utilities should be dead on arrival for state and federal regulators." He added that "household customers have everything to lose and nothing to gain by allowing two behemoths, NextEra and Dominion, to merge."
The company’s combined rate base—the value of assets recognized by regulators when setting rates—are valued at about $138 billion, according to the deal announcement. It said they plan to expand that value by 11% by 2032 with major infrastructure expansions.
Though the company has proposed offering $2.25 billion in credits to customers for two years after the deal closes, consumer advocates fear it is simply meant to ease upfront investment costs, leaving the real rate hikes to show up later once the credits expire.
The group Clean Virginia argued that the proposal needed to be subject “to the most rigorous scrutiny possible," given NextEra's "deeply troubling track record" in Florida.
The company and its subsidiaries in Florida have faced criticism for profiting from a $1.5 billion rate hike on Floridians and for pocketing $1 billion in tax savings without passing it on to consumers.
The company is also renowned for its extensive use of dark money to influence legislators in both parties, as well as Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, to kill clean energy and other policies that disfavor its business.
David Pomerantz, the executive director of the Energy and Policy Institute, told The New York Times that "a megamonopoly of this size, with the kind of money to buy political influence that NextEra will have, will be nearly impossible to regulate.”
NextEra CEO John Ketchum has said the deal is necessary to accommodate “America’s golden age of power demand.”
“Electricity demand is rising faster than it has in decades,” Ketchum said. “We are bringing NextEra Energy and Dominion Energy together because scale matters more than ever.”
But Slocum called this "a false narrative."
"The merger will do nothing to increase generating capacity, let alone desperately needed renewable generating capacity," he said. "These megautilities are merely using rising concern about data centers as an excuse to concentrate political and economic power of two giant utilities to maximize financial returns to shareholders."
He said federal and state regulators "should reject this outlandish, unnecessary merger as completely contrary to the public interest.“
"It's not just that government can help, it's that government must help and our government will help."
New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani on Monday delivered a rebuttal to former Republican President Ronald Reagan's infamous quote about "the nine most terrifying words in the English language."
During an event announcing the location of a second city-run grocery store, Mamdani recalled Reagan claiming in 1986 that the scariest words in the English language were "I'm from the government and I'm here to help."
"It's a good quote, but I disagree," Mamdani said. "I think nine more terrifying words are actually, 'I worked all day and can't feed my family.' We are going to use the power of government to lower prices and make it easier for New Yorkers to put food on the table."
Mayor Zohran Mamdani mocks Ronald Reagan’s infamous quote.
“I can think of nine words more terrifying than ‘I’m from the government and I’m here to help…’”
“I worked all day and can’t feed my family.” pic.twitter.com/ZteyFvA5Lg
— Jacobin (@jacobin) May 18, 2026
The mayor added that "when government understands its purpose as serving the very working people that it has left behind time and again, it can make a difference in the most pressing struggles facing our city today."
"It's not just that government can help," Mamdani emphasized, "it's that government must help and our government will help."
In an announcement, Mamdani revealed that the city is planning to open a 20,000-square-foot grocery store in the Peninusla development in the Bronx by the end of next year. This marks the second announced location for a city-run grocery store, following an earlier announcement for a planned store in East Harlem that is set to open by 2029.
"Making sure every New Yorker can buy fresh, affordable groceries in their own neighborhood is a key part of our affordability agenda," Mamdani said. "We are proud to begin this work in the South Bronx and remain committed to opening a store in every borough before the end of our first term.”
"This data shows that energy price shocks function as an economy-wide, unacknowledged tax on households, with costs comparable to large federal programs and policies," said the Climate Solutions Lab director.
An analysis released Monday by Brown University researchers shows President Donald Trump's illegal war on Iran has cost American consumers over $40 billion more at the fuel pump since late February.
Iran has responded to the US-Israeli aggression by restricting ship traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, which has limited the trading of fertilizer and fuel. The International Energy Agency's executive director warned Monday that the world only has weeks' worth of oil reserves left.
With the trade route largely closed, including during the current ceasefire, fuel prices around the world have soared. As of Monday, the average price for a gallon of gasoline in the United States was $4.515. Brown's Climate Solutions Lab and Costs of War Project have launched an online tool to track the rising costs for US consumers.
So far, according to the tool, price hikes tied to the war have cost Americans over $41.9 billion extra for diesel ($18.66 billion) and gas ($23.28 billion), based on prewar data, or an average of more than $320 per US household.
"This data shows that energy price shocks function as an economy-wide, unacknowledged tax on households, with costs comparable to large federal programs and policies," said Jeff Colgan, director of the Climate Solutions Lab, in a statement.
The new research brief from Brown highlights how that money could have been spent to improve Americans' lives. For example, that $40 billion "could pay for the entire federal Bridge Investment Program announced in 2024 to repair, restore, and modernize over 10,200 of the nation's bridges."
The full figure also exceeds "the estimated cost of completely redoing the US air traffic control system ($31.5 billion)," the brief states. It's also two times the cost of the Biden administration's proposed electric vehicle charging and electrification programs ($18.9 billion).
"Rising fuel costs are just one of the many financial costs of this war," noted Costs of War director Stephanie Savell. "Official estimates of Iran War costs are just scratching the surface of the actual burdens Americans will face because of it."
Researchers, policymakers, and other critics have been sounding the alarm about the various costs of Trump's war—including human lives lost, infrastructure damage in the Middle East, and rising prices around the world—throughout the conflict.
Earlier this month, a report from the office of US Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) projected that if gas prices remain at their current level, it will cost Americans an extra $73.06 per month, or $876 per year, to fill up just one vehicle.
An analysis published Friday from the liberal think tank Center for American Progress stressed that the increased fuel and fertilizer prices are hitting rural families and farmers—which are key to Trump's base—particularly hard.
Globally, during the first month of the war, consumers and businesses lost up to $111.6 billion due to rising fuel prices, according to the climate group 350.org—which emphasized that its estimate did not account for "wider knock-on effects, such as rising fertilizer and food costs, declines in economic output and employment, or broader inflation driven by fossil fuel price volatility."
"Over $100 billion has gone straight into the pockets of fossil fuel companies," 350.org chief executive Anne Jellema said at the time, "while families struggle to afford energy and basic necessities."
In his public comments, the president has repeatedly made clear that he does not care about how his war impacts the public. Last week, when asked about how much "Americans' financial situations" were on his mind as he tries to negotiate an end to the conflict, Trump said, "Not even a little bit."