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The Worst of The Worst
Well damn, we sure feel safer knowing ICE pulled 5-year-old Liam Tadeo and his construction worker dad Victor off Austin's streets on their way to a soccer game before Liam could start kindergarten the next day; also that they were held at a family concentration camp, ICE refused to let Liam's mother take him, and both father and son will "self-deport" to not further sully our pristine white shores. Question: How do these sick fucks sleep at night?
Thanks to the obscene $200 billion-plus gifted to DHS and ICE by their evil overlords, arrests of undocumented or at least unwanted immigrants surged to nearly 50,000 largely innocent people in July, a 15% spike from a month earlier and the regime's highest monthly arrest total to date. So yes, the sadists are still at it, just more quietly than when a psychotic Noem and Bovino were blasting out histrionic videos of daredevil agents dropping from helicopters onto apartment rooftops to grab terrified families - images reportedly, inexplicably "provoking a lot of ordinary people." Wusses, all.
Many recent arrests come during "traffic stops," increasingly with the help of partnering state and local law enforcement lured by "generous financial incentives," especially in Texas and Florida; ICE is also arresting more Haitians whose protections have been stripped away. Among those detained are over 6,200 kids, 10 times more than during Biden's tenure, despite ongoing, fantastical DHS claims they're going after the "worst of the worst" murderers, drug traffickers, sex offenders - and despite ghastly data showing up to 85% of ICE thugs themselves have sex offenses on their records, most against children. New data, like old data, also shows less than a quarter of those arrested have any criminal convictions.
Elsewhere, ICE abuses go on apace. A sailor aboard the troubled USS Lincoln said ICE has taken his father, who had a work permit, into custody. “Having a family member in the military is not a free pass to violate our nation’s laws,” said a DHS statement "in the same support-our-troops spirit Trump is so famous for." In an interview, the mother, father and sister of Alex Pretti family said no officials have come forward in the last seven months to retract or apologize for the "disgusting" claims of "assassin" and "domestic terrorist" they made about Alex - "We still hear those words about our child,” said his mother Susan - nor have any criminal charges been filed against his killers.
Meanwhile, J.D. Vance just came to Maine to spew racist lies, flaunt his "trademark absence of charisma," and claim, "If you bring in millions and millions of illegal aliens and give them houses that ought to go by right to American citizens, it's going to increase the cost of housing for everybody else." He also dismissed ICE's killing of Colombian Johan Durán Guerrero, who had a social security card, two jobs, a wife and a three-year-old daughter. Worried residents, he said, should "have a little bit of perspective" to ensure "that poison stops coming into our country." Troy Jackson called J.D. "a dirtbag": "I mean, he had a life." As to Susan Collins, who declined to regret giving ICE "$70 billion more to pull this shit off": "I’m sick of your ‘concerns.’"
And on Aug. 16, brave ICE thugs stopped five-year-old Liam Tadeo - their second small Liam like the bunny-hat-wearing Liam Ramos in Minnesota - and his father Victor Martinez Nieto on their way to play soccer. Without bothering with the nicety of pretending it was a legit traffic stop, they asked Victor, originally from Mexico, if he had legal status. Candidly, he said no; in 2025, he'd been arrested by ICE, "voluntarily" left, then "criminally" reentered the U.S. to (horrors) be with his wife and son. Heart-rending video soon surfaced of Liam crying beside his father and trying to hold one of his hands, cuffed behind him, as Victor tried to console his tearful son, talking to him as they walked. It was the day before Liam was set to start kindergarten.
They were both taken to the for-profit Dilley concentration camp, which rights groups have repeatedly accused of medical neglect, poor living conditions and abuse. According to Kate Lincoln-Goldfinch, their family's attorney, Victor begged ICE to release Liam to his mother Maria, also not a legal citizen, at home, or another member of the family. ICE refused, though DHS proudly, routinely declaims ICE "will place the children with a safe person the parent designates," like how they also contend Dilley is "retrofitted for families, with access to teachers, classrooms, and curriculum booklets...generously funded by the U.S. taxpayer." Instead, they had Victor sign papers in English he didn't fully understand, and booked both father and son.Lincoln-Goldfinch says Maria is "desperate and distraught, separated from her child and worrying about his well-being." Back at their home, "It feels like when you go to someone’s house after a sudden death, and there’s a wake or a gathering. Everybody is just stunned." Maria released a statement: "Liam was supposed to start kindergarten this week. Instead he is (in) detention. He should be in school, playing soccer, and at home with his family." Saturday, CNN aired emotional video of her talking by phone to her five-year-old. “I love you so much and I miss you so much, my love,” she tearfully told Liam in Spanish. “Don’t despair, my love, okay?” Lacking options, Liam timidly responds, "Okay." One furious, horrified online comment: "Anyone!!??!!"
This week, Austin's KUT News reported Victor has decided to be deported to Mexico along with his son, rather than risk Liam being separated from him and placed in a dystopian regime's custody as an "unaccompanied migrant child.” Said Lincoln-Goldfinch, "His family did what any family would do: Agree." As Maria reportedly struggles to find a way to re-unite with her family - "My son is only five years old" - Americans fume about "sadistic barbarians harming humanity every single day." "How sick can these people be? I used to think merciless psychopathic villains were only found in movies and fiction," said one. Also, "America has concentration camps. I. Hate. It. Here." and, "That poor little boy, That poor family. I am so tired."
Meanwhile, Texas' Dem lawmakers have called for Liam to be released and for Dilley to be shut down. "I just sat with Liam's mother as she found out what it means to have your child held hostage by ICE. It was horrifying," wrote Rep. Greg Casar, who charged Liam's arrest showed Trump uses children “as bait and leverage to fuel his mass deportation machine.” "Liam should be starting kindergarten this week, and instead he's sitting in a trailer prison." Rep. Joaquin Castro said ICE denied his request to visit Liam at Dilley in what he called "shady stuff," and he vowed to return; he also cited human rights violations, privacy concerns, and untenable phone, video call and e-mail strictures: “I’m telling y’all, ICE is getting worse."Because this is ghoul-filled America in 2026, Liam's aunt Patricia Resendiz has begun a Gofundme to help with legal expenses and her sister Maria's household costs, as Victor was the sole provider. "If we manage to get Liam and his dad to go free, Liam will also need psychological support, as the detention has left him traumatized. These funds will be to mitigate all aspects of child detention," she wrote. "The detention of Liam and my brother-in-law was cruel. They are not criminals - they were simply on their way to a soccer match. Liam is a beautiful, intelligent, and big-hearted little boy. My sister is devastated, as are we. Liam was detained right in front of my son, his cousin. My son told me that ICE agents said to Liam, 'You can't escape.'"
We feel safer already.
‘Perfect Storm’ of Trump’s War and Super El Niño to Drive Food Prices Even Higher
Experts are warning that a combination of a super El Niño climate pattern and two separate wars is threatening to put further upward pressure on food prices over the next several months.
A study released by Oxford Economics on Wednesday projects that global food prices will rise by 12% in 2026 and by 5% in 2027 due in large part to the fertilizer shortage caused by the closure in the Strait of Hormuz and increased grain prices caused by Russia's war with Ukraine.
The strait's closure, which began after President Donald Trump launched an illegal war with Iran in February, cut off a major shipping lane for fertilizer, whose price Oxford Economics projects will surge by 22% this year.
The four-year conflict between Russia and Ukraine, meanwhile, is putting a strain on grain supplies, as the two countries combined account for 30% of global wheat exports.
And the two wars might not be the biggest driver of higher food prices.
The Independent on Friday reported that the Met Office, the UK's official weather forecasting service, is projecting this year's El Niño will be "the largest since the 19th century," with sea temperatures projected to reach 3ºC above their long-term average in the coming months.
Professor Adam Scaife, head of long range forecasting at the Met Office, told The Independent that he has "never seen an El Niño signal this intense in our forecasts," describing the projected increase in ocean temperatures as "an unprecedented event."
Bill McGuire, professor emeritus of geophysical hazards at University College London, told The Independent that the Met Office's forecasts "suggest that the world is in for one hell of a ride."
“The astonishing and unprecedented amount of heat building across the eastern Pacific Ocean," McGuire said, "is all but certain to make this the most powerful El Niño in living memory possibly even the biggest in several centuries."
McGuire said that this heat would manifest itself in several destructive ways over the next year, such as "bringing drought and wildfire conditions to the Amazon and parts of Australia, torrential rainfall and floods to California, and a reduced South Asian monsoon."
In an interview with CNBC published Friday, trade and agriculture analyst Noel Fryer noted that North America and Europe have experienced very hot summers that has "decimated" some crops and has hurt grazing prospects by reducing the available supply of grass and hay.
And all this occurred, Fryer added, before the full impact of El Niño has arrived.
“It’s just a huge mix of different issues and we don’t know how they’re going to end," said Fryer. "It’s a perfect storm."
Top OpenAI Executive Labels Social Security a ‘Fraud’ That Must be Dismantled
A top executive at one of the world's biggest artificial intelligence companies drew backlash on Tuesday for describing Social Security as "a kind of accounting fraud" that will have to be dismantled.
Dean Ball, head of strategic futures at OpenAI who previously worked in President Donald Trump's White House, wrote in a social media post that while Social Security may have once been a "reasonable affordance" to people who "were dealing with an economic depression and a world war," it was nonetheless "accounting fraud, whose debt is coming due and is coming due fast."
Ball concluded his post by informing younger generations of Americans that "unwinding the great fraud... is your job, whether you wish it to be or not."
Ball's attack on Social Security drew a swift rebuke from David Segal, a former Democratic Rhode Island State Representative and founder of Demand Progress, who observed that it undercut other AI executives' claims that their technology would create an era of unprecedented abundance.
"AI is gonna shoot productivity to the moon," wrote Segal, "oh and also society can't afford to pay old people $2,000 per month anymore starting today."
Author Lincoln Michel similarly spotted the contradiction between AI industry vows that the technology "is going to give us [universal basic income] and we'll never work again" and Ball's declaration that "our main mission is to destroy Social Security."
Henry Burke, senior researcher at the Revolving Door Project, argued that Ball's analysis of Social Security revealed the true priorities of Big Tech elites.
"It's notable that the Abundance guy turned OpenAI hack considers Social Security to be a 'fraud' that must be remedied," wrote Burke, "and not the reckless tax breaks successive Republican presidents have given away to the wealthy which have exploded the national debt."
Putting aside policy arguments, many critics pointed out that Ball's call to dismantle Social Security was a major political loser.
Polling analyst Lakshya Jain, citing survey data showing vast and bipartisan support for Social Security, informed Ball that his rhetoric about the program is optimal for "anyone who wants to unite the whole of America (against them)."
Josh Orton, president of We Demand Justice, marveled at the politically tone deaf messaging coming from an executive at a company whose own CEO has said that "my job is to help people destroy jobs" with AI.
"These AI guys are not just condescending elitists," wrote Orton, "they're tremendously stupid about politics. It's incredible."
Max Steele, senior communications director at gun safety advocacy group Everytown, made a similar observation.
"Is it possible these guys are doing a performance art piece on the worst possible PR run in recorded history?" Steele asked.
Journalist Jon Schwarz questioned why Big Tech companies have been allowed to amass so much economic and political power in the US if their executives want to destroy the country's most popular social insurance program.
"It's a bad idea," wrote Schwarz, "to have our society run by people like this who are so far out of touch with reality that they are functionally insane."
Trump-Loving FIFA Boss Faces Criminal Probe for Scheme to Sell World Cup Profits to Jared Kushner's Brother
Gianni Infantino, president of the Fédération Internationale de Football Association, is facing a criminal probe over his ill-fated scheme to sell profits generated by the World Cup to private equity investors.
According to a Thursday report in The Associated Press, attorneys representing the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA), the governing body of European football, filed discovery requests with two US courts seeking documents related to the scheme, which Infantino abandoned earlier this month after near-universal pushback from other football organizations.
In New York, UEFA asked the court to subpoena Thrive Capital Management, a venture capital firm founded by Josh Kushner, the younger brother of Jared Kushner, President Donald Trump's son-in-law.
"Thrive and Kushner were to be the anchor investors intending to pay FIFA $4.2 billion for a 20% stake in a subsidiary that would run the soccer body’s commercial events, including the World Cup," reported the AP.
In Florida, UEFA requested subpoenas for files held by FIFA Americas and FWC2026, two FIFA businesses based in the state.
UEFA attorneys revealed that they "are contemplating a Swiss criminal proceeding against Infantino and possibly other FIFA officials for criminal mismanagement" related to the failed sell-off scheme.
The attorneys also accused the FIFA boss of creating a vehicle so that he and his allies could "acquire a permanent stake in and otherwise profit from FIFA’s most valuable assets to the detriment of FIFA, its members, and other parties within the football family."
Infantino has long been a target of criticism from football fans, in no small part due to his relationship with Trump.
The FIFA boss was widely ridiculed last year when he awarded Trump the first-ever "FIFA Peace Prize" less than two months before the president would launch an illegal war against Iran.
And during this year's World Cup, Trump and his administration led a pressure campaign that successfully got FIFA to drop a one-game ban for Folarin Balogun, a top player on the US Men’s National Team, drawing widespread accusations of corruption and favoritism.
'I'm Going to Ask Tom': Maine GOP Nominee for Governor Calls for ICE at Polling Stations
By letting attendees at a Maine Young Republicans event in on his "secret" plan for the midterm elections, the state's Republican nominee for governor detailed a proposal that, according to one public policy think tank, is wholly illegal.
In an audio clip released Wednesday by the Bangor Daily News, Bobby Charles, a lawyer and former Reagan administration staffer, boasted about his connections to the Trump administration's border czar, Tom Homan, a key figure in President Donald Trump's mass deportation operation.
"Here's my secret. I have a friend named Tom Homan," said Charles, drawing applause from the GOP voters. "I'm going to ask Tom... three or four weeks before the election, maybe three, I'm going to make an appeal for ICE and Marshals to be at our voting booths."
🚨 NEW Audio: Bobby Charles reveals "secret" plan to invite ICE to Maine three weeks before Election Day. pic.twitter.com/nSx2o9yxjJ
— Maine Democrats (@MaineDems) August 26, 2026
Charles was referring to US Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the US Marshals, both armed federal law enforcement officers whose presence at polling sites to intimidate voters would be against the law, according to the Brennan Center for Justice .
Trump has also alluded to sending ICE and other armed federal agents to polling places during the midterm elections in November, saying in May when he was asked about the idea that he would "do anything necessary to make sure we have honest elections."
At the Brennan Center for Justice last month, senior counsel Hayne Yoon wrote that "despite the implied threat, the law is clear."
"Sending armed federal agents, including those from ICE, to election sites is illegal," wrote Yoon. "Federal law and many states’ laws prohibit not only armed federal agents at polling sites, but also interference in elections or voter intimidation by any officials or private citizens. More important, using these tactics would be a flagrant attempt to hold on to power through force and intimidation and an affront to free and fair elections."
In his comments at the Young Republicans event, Charles also asked rhetorically whether “illegals who are being paid money” to vote would "like" the deployment of ICE agents at polling places. The remark made the gubernatorial candidate one of several Republicans to push the baseless claim that undocumented immigrants or noncitizens have committed voter fraud in order to sway elections.
There are no documented reports of immigrants ever being paid to vote, and a 2024 American Immigration Council analysis of data collected by the right-wing Heritage Foundation found only 68 cases of proven noncitizen voting dating back to 2000, "amounting to less than 0.0001% of total votes."
Democratic gubernatorial candidate Hannah Pingree said Wednesday that Charles' comments make clear that he would push Trump's MAGA agenda, despite his recent attempts to distance himself from the president, who is unpopular with Mainers.
"He is begging Trump's ICE to come interfere with our free and fair elections," said Pingree. "I think that conduct speaks for itself and I trust the Maine people to see it for what it is."
Devon Murphy-Anderson, executive director of the Maine Democratic Party, added that Charles "continues to prove that he is a MAGA extremist who will stop at nothing to put himself and his MAGA agenda ahead of Mainers. His plan to ask Trump’s border czar to send ICE agents to Maine polling places just weeks before Election Day is not only deeply alarming—it is likely illegal. This is a blatant attempt to intimidate voters and yet another reason Bobby Charles is too extreme for Maine.”
Charles' comments come six weeks after an ICE agent fatally shot Biddeford, Maine resident Johan Sebastián Durán Guerrero in an incident that the Trump administration has not appeared to investigate. ICE has made more arrests in Maine so far this year than it did in all of 2024-25 combined, and out of 491 arrests made, 89% of those detained had no criminal convictions.
Homan recently told a Republican state lawmaker that the state would soon "see a lot more enforcement action" due to Trump's decision to end Temporary Protected Status for Haitians and Syrians.
The Justice Department announced this month that it would deploy at least 1,000 federal officers to polling places as people vote in the November 3 elections. The administration has suggested the public should not be alarmed by the plan because anyone who is a citizen will not be targeted by the agents, but as the ACLU noted, at least 155 citizens in eight states last year, including 32 children, were detained, targeted, or subjected to misconduct by federal immigration agents.
Bessent Suggests Economic Warfare Against Iran Could 'Blow Up the Global Financial System'
With the United States unable to militarily defeat Iran in President Donald Trump's illegal US-Israeli war of choice, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent on Monday escalated the administration's economic attacks on Tehran, warning countries and companies around the world that continuing to do business with the nation could expose them to punitive sanctions.
“Let there be no ambiguity as to the position of the United States,” Bessent said during a news conference unveiling what the Trump administration is calling Operation Economic Outcast. “An economic engagement of any kind with this murderous regime will expose those responsible to the full reach of American power.”
The "economic D-Day" campaign targets five sectors—technology, gold, aviation, shipping, and digital assets—and is intended to choke off virtually every remaining source of hard currency for Iran.
Bessent warned that it is “no longer acceptable to operate in the gray spaces” of US policy. The secretary said he anticipates the announcement of sanctions against a major financial institution as soon as next week.
Asked if Chinese banks that do business with Iran would be sanctioned, Bessent replied that "no one is above the reach of US sanctions."
While Bessent did not say which countries would likely be targeted, China, Türkiye, and the United Arab Emirates are Iran's biggest trading partners.
The secretary was also asked why sanctions aren't being imposed immediately.
"Well, we are giving everyone the opportunity to remedy bad behavior," he replied. "Why would I want to blow up the global financial system?"
"We believe that it is important to level set and give people a cure period, but they should know that that will move very quickly and that we are serious," Bessent added. "So we believe that a warning shot and a level set of expectations is appropriate, and if people do not want to meet our expectations, then we expect—and they should expect—that they will leave the dollar system."
Iranian officials largely scoffed at Bessent's "economic D-Day" threat. Deputy Iranian Foreign Minister Kazem Gharibabadi asked on social media, “Is this a victory or an admission of America’s failure!?”
“You say Iran’s military capability has been ‘dismantled,’ 100% of its military factories ‘destroyed,’ and its nuclear program ‘buried’; but for this very Iran, the ‘largest financial assault in history’ and the mobilization of ‘all US institutions and authorities’ have been necessary!” he mocked.
While Trump has said the war is “over” or nearly over dozens of times, Iran currently appears to have the upper hand, as shipping has overwhelmingly avoided the US-supported route through the Strait of Hormuz, with most vessels using a course set by Tehran or avoiding the waterway altogether.
Trump’s war on Iran is proving costly not only in Iranian lives and US taxpayer dollars, but in the increasingly strained budgets of American families. Disruptions to oil shipments through the Strait of Hormuz have pushed gasoline prices above $4 a gallon nationally—roughly a dollar more than a year ago. Trump has dismissed Americans' concerns about high fuel prices, saying $4 is "not very high" and vowing to "never apologize" for the economic pain his actions are inflicting.
That pain doesn't stop at the pump. More expensive gasoline and diesel ripple through the economy, raising the cost of transporting food and other goods while keeping inflation elevated.
The pain is far worse for the people of Iran. Trump administration's escalation comes as Iran's currency, the rial, has plunged to record lows amid an economic crisis largely caused by the war and years of preceding US-led sanctions.
However, the administration's effort to force every country to choose between trading with Iran and maintaining access to the US-dominated financial system could have consequences far beyond Tehran.
At a Monday press conference in Beijing, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Lin Jian said that sanctions “lead to escalation" that "serves no one’s interests.”
“China calls on parties to act rationally and with restraint and avoid taking any measures that may further escalate tensions or deal a blow to global economic growth and financial stability," he continued.
The Chinese government “will closely watch relevant developments and do what is necessary to protect our legitimate rights and interests,” Lin added.
Operation Economic Outcast drew worldwide derision.
“President Trump, the ultimate gambler in geopolitics, is poised to double down on a bad hand on Iran yet again," National Iranian American Council policy director Ryan Costello said in a statement.
“We’ve been down the maximum pressure road with Iran many times," he noted. "What we’ve learned is that President Trump can impose extensive economic pain on Iran, but ordinary Iranians overwhelmingly bear the cost. The ruling elite in Iran remains largely insulated, while Tehran has repeatedly refused to capitulate to Washington’s demands."
"Trump’s gamble is that this time, amid the destruction of war, and with the reinforcement of a blockade, time is on his side and ultimately Iran will be forced to concede defeat," Costello added. "President Trump has proven unable and unwilling to stop his gambling on Iran that risks further undermining US and regional security and the global economy.”
Sina Toossi, a senior nonresident fellow at the Center for International Policy, said on social media that Operation Economic Outcast "is as much psychological warfare as economic warfare: Project Iran’s isolation as inevitable, convince markets Hormuz is being overcome, and amplify economic anxiety inside Iran."
"But the bravado masks a basic problem," he asserted. "The military option failed to compel Tehran, Iran still possesses substantial escalation dominance over the Arab Persian Gulf states, and 'severing every economic lifeline' requires countries like China to enforce a US strategy they openly reject."
Washington "is effectively betting it can achieve through intensified economic strangulation what six months of war could not," Toossi added. "And it is demanding unprecedented international compliance at a moment when US relations with much of the world are becoming much more coercive and transactional. The capacity to hurt Iran is clear. The path from pain to capitulation or collapse is not."
Alan Eyre, a former State Department Iran specialist and current Middle East Institute distinguished fellow, argued that "the problem with Operation Economic Outcast is it continues the trend of making the US an economic outcast."
Stockbroker and financial commentator Peter Schiff said on X that "because Trump failed to achieve his objective in Iran using military force, he has pivoted to using economic sanctions instead."
"However, Operation Economic Outcast will not only fail," he added, "but the economic noose that actually tightens may end up being the one wrapped around our neck."
Destruction of East India Company Gives US Lawmakers a Blueprint for Confronting Big Tech: Historian
The instruments to take apart entrenched corporate power "still exist," but current governments are "lacking... the political nerve to use them," said historian William Dalrymple.
A historian who has written four books about the British East India Company is warning that big technology companies in the US are amassing similar levels of unchecked power and will need to be reined in.
In a New York Times op-ed published on Friday, William Dalrymple described how the British government eventually realized that it had allowed the East India Company—key to the British Empire's rise in the 18th and 19th centuries—to become too powerful and decided to finally clamp down.
The situation faced by the British Parliament in the 19th Century was strikingly similar to the situation faced by US lawmakers today, Dalrymple explained, as the East India Company had spent decades spending money to capture influence within the government.
"Around one in 20 members of Parliament sat on the East India Company’s board," the historian wrote, "and more than a fifth of the company’s directors sat in Parliament at some point; about 40% of members of Parliament were shareholders."
In the contemporary context, the executives of the nation's largest tech firms are spending lavishly to curry favor with lawmakers and government officials of both major parties
Writing in The Nation last month, investigative journalist David Moore detailed the massive political spending of major tech firms in the 2026 midterms, noting that "Super PACs working on behalf of crypto, AI, and AIPAC donors are the highest-spending groups on independent expenditures to influence voters this cycle—combining to spend more than $180 million so far, according to a review of Federal Election Commission records."
In addition to political clout, the East India Company in its day also had the power to raise its own army, which at its peak topped 200,000 soldiers, twice the size of England's own armed services.
Dalrymple pointed out that this is one power that today's Big Tech firms do not have, although he argued that they have been increasingly integrating themselves into the US military-industrial complex.
"In June 2025 the US Army commissioned the chief technology officers of Palantir and Meta and OpenAI’s chief product officer as lieutenant colonels in a new Reserve unit," he noted. "The new dispensation puts tech executives straight into a position of federal power, which in one way puts them ahead of their 18th-century counterparts."
The government finally dropped the hammer on the East India Company, Dalrymple said, after the bloody Indian Rebellion of 1857, as they feared the firm's "greed and self-interest" would cause the British Empire to lose what it considered its most valuable colony.
"The company’s navy was disbanded and its army passed to the Crown," wrote Dalrymple. "In 1858 the governor general of India announced that the company’s Indian possessions would be nationalized and pass into the control of the British Crown."
Less than two decades later, what was once the most powerful private corporation in world history shut down after the expiration of its charter.
What this shows, concluded Dalrymple, is that "states can master corporations," even if those corporations have their own private armies.
However, he said that while the instruments to take apart entrenched corporate power "still exist," it appears our current governments are "lacking... the political nerve to use them."
Dalrymple's op-ed was echoed thematically by a Friday op-ed written by SFGATE travel editor Silas Valentino, who argued that the city of San Francisco has not gotten any benefit from the current artificial intelligence boom, despite being the home of OpenAI and Anthropic, the world's two biggest AI firms.
In particular, Valentino argued that the AI firms have done nothing to give back to the city and alleviate its affordable housing crisis. In fact, Valentino found that the AI firms' initiatives in the city appear to be mostly self-serving.
"OpenAI says it has invested in our community, but so far, that’s meant less than a million dollars in 'SF civic contributions,'" Valentino wrote. "And worst of all, some of that is for things like AI training programs... That’s not improving the city; it’s OpenAI trying to make more money."
Valentino also noted that Anthropic last year teamed with the Tipping Point Community nonprofit group, which was founded by current San Francisco Mayor Daniel Lurie, to provide free training on the company's Claude chatbot.
"In the years since language models like ChatGPT and Claude proliferated to usher in the AI boom," the travel editor wrote, "I’m only counting negatives for nearly everyone trying to figure out a way to live here."
Valentino concluded by warning that if Lurie and his administration "don’t demand these companies start giving back and enhance our city for the better, they’ll continue ruining our city without pause."
'Sadism': Trump DHS Boasts of Deportation Flight to Haiti in 'Propaganda' Video
"These are our neighbors and coworkers who were legally living and working here," said one advocate. "Stripping away their protections and then threatening them with deportation is cruel beyond words."
By releasing a video of Black men wearing handcuffs and prison uniforms being hauled onto a deportation flight, the US Department of Homeland Security appeared to be fulfilling a key objective of President Donald Trump's decision to terminate Temporary Protected Status for Haitian migrants, said one immigration policy expert on Thursday.
President Donald Trump "hates Haitians," said American Immigration Council senior fellow Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, "and the White House wanted videos of Black people in chains, so they stripped them all of status."
Reichlin-Melnick said the video, which also features a Haitian song and the text "Temporary Meant Temporary. Leave Now" on screen, was "propaganda for an audience of people that thrills to the sight of Black men being led in chains" and whom Trump's mass deportation agenda and racist attacks on Haitians, Somalis, and other refugee populations are aimed at satisfying.
The video was released a week after US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) sent a charter flight with 161 Haitians on board to Haiti, where gang violence, kidnappings, and humanitarian crises that have continued more than a decade after the 2010 earthquake have pushed the US State Department to maintain its highest "Do Not Travel" warning for Americans.
The administration said that flight would be the first of many, following the US Supreme Court ruling in June that allowed DHS to revoke Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for 350,000 Haitians and 6,000 Syrians.
The National Office of Migration in Haiti said last week that the Haitians aboard the ICE flight had not benefited from TPS, but were people who were facing removal proceedings due to criminal convictions or who had entered the US without authorization.
In the video—as in the Trump administration's persistent rhetoric about its mass deportation operation, which it claims is targeting "the worst of the worst" violent criminals—DHS suggested the Haitians who have been granted TPS for years pose a danger to the US public, despite the fact that criminal convictions make people ineligible for the protected status.
"TPS holders had been living and working legally and paying taxes," said Drop Site News—taxes, Reichlin-Melnick stressed, that do not permit them to benefit from federal assistance programs including the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, and Medicaid.
David Bier, the director of immigration studies at the libertarian Cato Institute, said the "sadism" depicted in the DHS video was "unrelenting."
The video was released as Archbishop Thomas Wenski of Miami called on the Trump administration to "rethink" its decision to end TPS for Haitians following an August 23 gang attack outside the country's capital of Port-au-Prince, in which at least 47 people were killed and at least 50 were kidnapped.
"The country is not safe, that Haiti is still a house on fire," Wenski told OSV News. "This should cause our administration to rethink its decision to send back into Haiti over 300,000 Haitians."
A bill introduced in the Senate by Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) would extend TPS for Haitians through early 2029, and "would pass very easily" if Trump "would voice his support," said Wenski.
Cory Archibald of the anti-Zionist group Track AIPAC called for prosecutions of top White House officials including Trump, Homeland Security Adviser Stephen Miller, and Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin, "all the way on down to the masked chuds joyriding in this video and loading these men onto planes."
"All of them are guilty," she said, "and all of them should be prosecuted."
Progressives Warn Democrats Endlessly Invoking Hasan Piker to 'Get Their Shit Together'
"Every Democrat talking about Piker is handing the midterms to Trump."
Progressives this week have grown increasingly frustrated with the oxygen that Democratic lawmakers are wasting invoking the name of left-wing commentator Hasan Piker, warning that too many in the party are falling for a trap that so obviously favors President Donald Trump and Republicans with midterm elections just slightly more than two months away.
"Democrats need to get their shit together. I'm tired of hearing about Hasan," said Maurice Mitchell, national director of the Working Families Party, said in a social media post on Thursday.
"Whatever 3D chess you think you're playing is only pushing away real people," Mitchell added. "Stop obsessing over a streamer. We’re fighting authoritarianism here."
Chuck Idelson, a progressive Democratic voter and retired union official based in California, agreed.
"Exactly," Idelson said in response to Mitchell's declaration. "The obsession with Piker is the rabbit hole the GOP is counting on to focus the Democrats on anything other than the horror show of what Trump is doing to this nation. Every Democrat talking about Piker is handing the midterms to Trump."
As The Independent reports: "All of this is occurring under the spectacle of a national media frenzy surrounding Piker and the Democratic Socialists of America, whom journalists have made the focus of their questions to Democrats of all stripes. And some Democrats are beginning to air publicly their resentment over party leaders like Jeffries falling into what they call a Republican trap."
While much of the discourse around Piker is taking place on the airwaves and social media, Newsweek reported this week on an Echelon Insights poll conducted in April that "found that Piker remains largely unknown among Democratic voters," results that underscore "the gap between his enormous online following and his reach with the broader electorate."
Common Dreams reported earlier this week how critics have viewed the obsession with Piker on the part of establishment Democrats and certain members of the corporate media as a "mass psychosis event."
"I am begging everybody to spend less time arguing about Hasan Piker and more time attacking Republicans," said Mike Nellis, a City Councilman in Chicago representing the city's 32nd Ward, on Friday.
"The election is in about two month," added Nellis. "Lock the fuck in."
Watchdog Denounces 'Staggering and Disgusting' Hypocrisy of AI Industry Giants
"Put plainly, Silicon Valley is the problem threatening our ways of life."
Government watchdog Public Citizen on Thursday hit back at the artificial intelligence industry for warning about the dire threats posed by its own technology after it spent years trying to block any government regulations that could have curtailed dangerous AI behavior that experts and progressive lawmakers have warned about for years.
In an open letter sent on Thursday, dozens of tech companies—including OpenAI, Anthropic, Amazon Web Services, and Microsoft—claimed that there is a "limited window" to defend against AI-executed cyberattacks, which they said "will become far more widespread and sophisticated as models around the world become increasingly capable."
If nothing is done, the companies said, then crucial facilities "from hospitals to water treatment plants to the infrastructure that powers the internet" will be at risk.
The companies said that thwarting such AI cyberattacks would require a "global response" where governments will need to "fund cyber defense" and "give hospitals, water utilities, and local governments access to capable defensive AI, authorized testing, and hands-on support through trusted security providers and partners."
JB Branch, director of federal AI governance and technology policy at Public Citizen, urged lawmakers to be deeply skeptical of Big Tech’s messaging on the issue and the industry's proposed plan of action, which he said would further enrich Silicon Valley without providing any safeguards for the public when it comes to AI development.
"Big Tech does not get to unleash powerful AI systems, fight tooth and nail against meaningful regulation," said Branch, "and then cry for help when the dangers they helped create come knocking."
Branch noted that the tech industry has insisted for years that there should be no government intervention into developing technology, supposedly because it would put the US at risk of "losing" the AI race to China.
Now, Branch said, they are running to the government and demanding fast action to help solve a problem they created.
"That hypocrisy is equal parts staggering and disgusting," Branch said. "If the threat is serious enough to demand urgent action from the government, then it is serious enough to demand binding rules, independent oversight, and accountability from the companies creating it."
The AI firms' open letter comes as the tech industry appears acutely concerned about public backlash to its products. The Wall Street Journal reported on Friday that Big Tech firms who gave heavily to President Donald Trump have been scrambling to donate to Democratic candidates ahead of the 2026 midterm elections.
In particular, according to the reporting, many tech companies who donated to Trump's ballroom and other vanity projects fear that a Democratic majority will start subpoenaing them for records that could lead to criminal investigations.
Cooper Teboe, a Silicon Valley donor adviser and Democratic strategist, has told Trump-funding tech companies that they will pay a big price unless they repair their relationships with Democrats whom they've alienated by going all-in on MAGA.
"You’re going to be totally fucked next year or you’re going to figure it out this year and you’re going to make amends," Teboe said, "and amends are going to be much more costly than they were previously."
As Branch put it, "Big Tech knows it has lost public support on AI, and the PR machine is now working overtime."
Despite industry efforts to control narratives and members of Congress, he said, the American people "aren’t going to forget the harms these companies unleashed, the regulations they fought, or their promises that AI could replace their jobs."
"Silicon Valley is the problem threatening our ways of life," Branch concluded. "It’s hard to take them seriously when they invented the problem in the first place.”
'Trump Must Keep His Hands Off Our Elections': Judge Again Blocks Attack on Mail-In Voting
US District Judge Indira Talwani said states will "face irreparable harm where they are required to comply with a likely unconstitutional regulation for which compliance is practically impossible as to the 2026 midterm elections," now just two months away.
A federal judge in Boston on Thursday evening issued a new and complete block on rules recently set forth by the US Postal Service designed to severely restrict mail-in voting nationwide—a ruling that comes just days after the US Supreme Court put a hold on a previous, similar injunction against the rules that stemmed from an executive order issued last year by President Donald Trump.
US District Judge Indira Talwani said the group of Democratic-led states and voting rights group that filed separate legal challenges over the changes to how the USPS would handle mail-in ballots adequately proved that they would "face irreparable harm where they are required to comply with a likely unconstitutional regulation for which compliance is practically impossible as to the 2026 midterm elections, now little more than two months away."
When the Supreme Court ruled Monday on the lawsuit, it lifted a previous injunction ordered by Judge Talwani, ruling not on the legality of the rules themselves but arguing that the states and other plaintiffs did not have proper legal standing at the time because the Postal Service had yet to release the finalized rules stemming from Trump's order at the time the lawsuit was filed.
However, because the USPS did finalize its rules at the end of last week, Talwani's new temporary injunction ordered on Thursday would not fall prey to that dynamic. As the New York Times reports:
[Talwani] wrote that while the Supreme Court had “admonished” her on Monday that the Postal Service had not finalized any changes when the groups sued initially, making court action premature, the stakes had changed since then because of the step the agency took Friday to formalize its plan.
Her ruling marked the third court decision on the issue in less than a week, a whipsaw of action that threatened to confuse voters. But each delay has reduced the administration’s chances of clearing the legal hurdles to execute its logistically complicated mail-in ballot plan before the November election. She blocked the rule from taking effect for 14 days, and she had previously scheduled a hearing to discuss the legality of the rule on Sept. 3.
In her order, Judge Talwani explained that the prospect of the new rule suddenly taking effect carried “significant risk of their members’ disenfranchisement” for voting rights organizations, which had also sued, along with the states.
Counsel and plaintiffs in the lawsuit by voting rights groups—led by the League of Women Voters of Massachusetts—issued a statement welcoming Thursday's decision.
“The Administration previously dismissed plaintiffs’ ongoing harms from the executive order as speculative, but the newly finalized rule confirmed what plaintiffs have been saying all along," the statement read. "The Rule implements the Executive Order’s unprecedented attempt to usurp electoral authority from the states and Congress at the expense of voters. We welcome the court’s order, which recognized the immediate need to protect the entire electorate from the damaging impacts of this unlawful final rule in the lead-up to November’s general elections. This is an important step towards affirming the public’s confidence in the system of mail ballots, which thousands of eligible voters nationwide rely on as a core method of democratic participation.”
After Monday's ruling by the Supreme Court, the group's behind the challenge vowed to keep fighting and introduced a new round of legal challenges.
"USPS’s decision to rush this blatantly unconstitutional rule into effect just weeks before an election is the latest step in a rollout that has sown confusion at every turn and now threatens to disenfranchise voters who did everything right. This is chaos by design, and voters are the ones who will pay for it,” warned Sophia Lin Lakin, director of the ACLU's Voting Rights Project, on Wednesday.
Attorneys General from the coalition of 24 states that had challenged the rule also welcomed Talwani's latest intervention.
“From the beginning, it’s been clear that President Trump doesn’t understand how elections work. He’s repeatedly broken the law, so we’ve repeatedly taken him to court,” said California Attorney General Bonta in a statement. “On Monday, the US Supreme Court issued an order on the emergency docket stating we brought our lawsuit too early but did not address the merits of our challenge to the President’s executive order seeking to impose additional, unlawful restrictions on the ability to vote by mail. Just two days later, consistent with that order, we sued to stop the illegal USPS rule in its tracks. Today, the district court blocked the rule, making it clear that President Trump must keep his hands off our elections. The right to vote is a foundational principle of our democracy, and we’re making sure it remains protected for everyone.”
With the Trump administration almost certain to appeal, the case is likely headed back to the US Supreme Court, likely on a fast track, to decide the legal merits presented by the challengers.
'RFK Jr. Lied to Congress': Criminal Probe Sought Over Samoa Trip Linked to 83 Measles Deaths
"He told us his Samoa trip had nothing to do with vaccines—now this letter shows that was false," Sen. Ed Markey said of President Donald Trump's health and human services secretary.
US Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. on Thursday faced calls for a criminal investigation after newly published documents appear to contradict his repeated testimony during Senate confirmation hearings that his 2019 trip to Samoa, which is linked to 83 measles deaths, “had nothing to do with vaccines.”
The advocacy group American Oversight on Thursday asked the US Department of Justice to investigate whether Kennedy knowingly made materially false statements during his 2025 Senate confirmation hearings. The request follows the publication of a January 2019 letter, signed by Kennedy and addressed to Samoa’s then-prime minister, Tuilaʻepa Saʻilele Malielegaoi, that explicitly proposed a vaccine-focused assessment of the Pacific island nation’s measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) program.
“Robert F. Kennedy Jr. repeatedly testified before two separate Senate committees that his trip to Samoa had nothing to do with vaccines. But a letter he wrote to Samoa’s prime minister six years earlier appears to contradict that testimony,” American Oversight executive director Chioma Chukwu said Thursday in a statement.
“Congress relies on truthful testimony to do its job, particularly on matters as consequential as public health," Chukwu added. "If Kennedy lied to the Senate while seeking confirmation as the nation’s top health official, the Justice Department must investigate and hold him accountable.”
Questioned by Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) before the Senate Finance Committee, Kennedy said his trip had “nothing to do with vaccines,” describing it instead as an effort to introduce a medical informatics system to digitize the nation's health records.
The following day, when Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) pressed him on the same issue before the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, Kennedy again said his trip had “nothing to do with vaccines.”
Markey's office released a statement Thursday noting that Kennedy "traveled to Samoa in 2019 to promote disinformation about the measles vaccine. Shortly after his trip, Samoa experienced a deadly outbreak of measles that killed over 80 people and has been attributed to mass vaccine disinformation."
My statement on new reporting that RFK Jr. lied to me in his Senate confirmation hearing.
[image or embed]
— Senator Ed Markey (@markey.senate.gov) August 27, 2026 at 1:47 PM
Of the 83 measles deaths during the outbreak, 72 were children under the age of 5. More than 1,860 hospitalizations in Samoa have been linked to the outbreak.
“New documents confirm what we already knew: RFK Jr. lied to Congress," Markey said. "He told us his Samoa trip had nothing to do with vaccines—now this letter shows that was false, just like it was false when he denied his role in the deadly outbreak that followed."
"This is a pattern, not a slip," he added. "RFK Jr. has lied to the Senate, lied to the American people, and jeopardized the health of children to advance his anti-vaccine agenda. He should never have been confirmed, and he cannot be trusted to run [the US Department of Health and Human Services] for even one more day."
Democratic Hawaii Gov. Josh Green, who is a physician, was invited by the Samoan government to help lead the measles response and recovery in the South Pacific archipelago.
“Misinformation and measles are a deadly combination—I saw that firsthand in Samoa," Green said on Thursday. "The truth is, this is a disease we know how to prevent. The MMR shot is the only proven and effective way to prevent the spread of measles."
"Vaccines save lives," he added. "Our public health decisions must be guided by doctors, scientists, and evidence—not conspiracy theories or political convenience. We owe it to every family to protect our children and communities, and make sure no one else dies from a preventable disease.”
The group 314 Action, which recruits, trains, and works to elect Democrats with expertise in science, published a statement Thursday noting that "now, America is facing its worst measles crisis in decades, and two more Americans have lost their lives to a disease we have long known how to prevent."
Public health experts have warned that the US is on track to lose its measles elimination status, which the country achieved in 2000, and blame the regression on declining vaccination driven by misinformation and conspiracy theories, including that vaccines are dangerous and even deadly.
Earlier this month, President Donald Trump signed an executive order overhauling federal recommendations for children that calls for separating the MMR vaccine into three individual shots.
"The only thing ‘lethal’ about vaccines is listening to RFK Jr.’s lies about them," said 314 Action. "America needs more leaders like Gov. Green who are willing to stand up to Trump and RFK Jr. and put public health over politics. We won’t stop fighting until RFK Jr. is fired or removed from office.”
Study Suggests Climate Crisis Is Supercharging 'Godzilla' El Niños
"We are seeing a trend of stronger El Niños, and the one we have now is consistent with that trend," said the lead author. "That is bad news for climate hazards and for people."
As the flooding disaster in Tibet and Nepal demonstrates the deadly consequences of the climate emergency, experts wrote Thursday in the journal Science that fossil fuel-driven global heating has intensified the warm phase of a key pattern in the Pacific Ocean.
The El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) has a warm phase, called El Niño, as well as a neutral phase and a cold one, La Niña. In June, scientists declared the start of a warm event nicknamed "Godzilla," which helped push last month's average global ocean surface temperature to the hottest ever recorded in July.
The current event is expected to become not only a super El Niño, but the most intense one on record—and it could contribute to 2027 possibly being the hottest year humanity has ever endured.
While ENSO is a naturally occurring phenomenon, the scientists behind the new paper studied coral skeletons from the Galápagos Islands and concluded that global warming—tied to humans continuing to burn fossil fuels—has intensified El Niño phases.
"Our findings suggest El Niño can supercharge global warming, but also global warming can supercharge El Niño—that is what we are seeing," said lead author Julia Cole, who chairs the University of Michigan's Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences.
The scientist also spoke with Inside Climate News, which noted that "the first documented super El Niño in 1982-83 killed about 95% of the shallow-water corals around the Galápagos Islands, right around the time Cole began her research career."
Based on the team's analysis, "after the El Niño in 1982, we start seeing much more variability; it's a lot more extreme and looks like nothing in the previous 1,000 years," Cole told The Guardian. "What surprised me was how consistent it was. There is just such a large, distinct difference between what has been happening in the last 40 years compared to preindustrial times."
As Inside Climate News reported:
When Cole visited the islands in 1989, many of the large mapped corals that could have served as sample material were gone, wiped out by the El Niño early in the decade and then decomposed quickly by organisms in the biologically active waters. But in 2006, her team discovered fossil coral remnants, often perched as boulders near remote east-facing coastlines, tossed inland by large waves or tsunamis.
Cole said the signal of El Niños intensified by human-caused warming would have been even stronger if the study had included the most recent occurrences. All the events categorized as super El Niños have occurred since the 1980s and have triggered flooding in East Africa, led to disease outbreaks, and intensified tropical storms. This year’s El Niño is intensifying drought in Indonesia, fueling widespread fires that are sending smoke and hazardous air pollution across Southeast Asia, Cole said. Her team is currently analyzing corals to show the changes from the El Niños in 2015-16 and 2023-24, she added.
"We are seeing a trend of stronger El Niños, and the one we have now is consistent with that trend—it's not a fluke. We are seeing a shift where El Niño doesn't look like what it did prior to industrial times," Cole said. "That is bad news for climate hazards and for people, particularly those who are badly impacted and yet have done little to cause climate change."
According to the United States' National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, consequences of El Niño include "increased rainfall across the southern tier of the US and in Peru, which has caused destructive flooding, and drought in the West Pacific, sometimes associated with devastating brush fires in Australia."
Dalhousie University marine scientist Boris Worm wasn't involved with the new study but told The Associated Press on Thursday that "El Niño is the most violent aspect of climate variability worldwide, with effects ranging from local fisheries collapse, to widespread coral die-offs to severe droughts, and food shortages around the world."
Experts are already worried about the latest El Niño's impact on food security and prices, with the United Nations World Food Program projecting earlier this month that almost 50 million more people worldwide face the prospect of acute hunger.
Pointing to late climate scientist Wallace Broecker's warning that "the climate system is an angry beast and we are poking it with sticks," Worm said that "human emissions are the stick, and El Niño is [one] of the 'angry' outbursts that can be so threatening to our collective safety."
Investigation Exposes Massive New Jersey Data Center Operating Army of Polluting Generators Without Permits
“It seems that this industry, in particular, values speed to market more than almost anything else."
A joint investigative report published by Floodlight and The Guardian on Thursday revealed that one of the largest planned artificial intelligence data centers on the East Coast is operating dozens of gas-powered generators without permits in a possible violation of federal law.
Using a thermal drone to take footage of the Microsoft-backed DataOne facility in Vineland, New Jersey last week, Floodlight determined that the data center was operating 45 generators at once.
The investigation noted that the generators were operating roughly one mile from two different schools, and that the gas-powered generators used as the facility "emit substantial amounts of health-harming air pollution linked to asthma, heart attacks, and even premature death."
Bruce Buckheit, who previously served as air enforcement chief at the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), told Floodlight that DataOne is likely violating federal law with its unpermitted generators, and he said the government should make the facility pay a fine for "illegal emissions."
Buckheit added that DataOne's apparent disregard for regulations appeared to be a common trait in the AI industry.
“It seems that this industry, in particular, values speed to market more than almost anything else,” he said.
A New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection spokesperson told Floodlight that the agency is investigating DataOne's use of gas generators but has yet to reach "a full compliance determination."
Local residents told Floodlight that they have for months complained about the nonstop humming produced by the facility, which they suspect is being caused by the generators.
"It's just constant," resident Andrew Groetsch told Floodlight of the noise coming from the facility. "It never goes away."
DataOne, which is projected to cover 2.5 million square feet upon its completion, has long been controversial.
In an interview with NBC Philadelphia published earlier this month, Vineland resident Peggy Schumacher said that the noise from the data center has gotten so bad that it's making her neighborhood "unlivable."
"We are a mile away," Schumacher explained, "and the vibration in our house is horrible now."
Fellow Vineland resident Tallis West offered a similar description of living near DataOne in an interview with CBS News published in May.
"Outside is not even enjoyable to sit outside because of the noise sometimes," West said. "We can't enjoy being outside anymore."
Despite the objections of many local residents, the Vineland Planning Board earlier this month voted to approve the second phase of construction at the facility.
The tech industry's rapid buildout of AI data centers is getting major pushback from voters across the US, as residents issue complaints about both pollution and energy consumption that has been raising their utility bills.
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) earlier this year proposed a moratorium on new data center construction.
'Democracy Is Under Attack': Civil Rights Lawsuit Aims to Block Trump Assault on Mail-In Voting
“These mail-in ballot restrictions threaten to disenfranchise millions of eligible voters who rely on mail voting to participate in our democracy," said one advocate.
A day after a federal judge lifted her injunction on President Donald Trump's executive order targeting mail-in ballots, a quartet of civil rights groups on Thursday filed fresh claims in their lawsuit challenging the administration's weaponization of the US Postal Service to attack the right to vote under the pretense of fighting nearly nonexistent fraud.
The Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, NAACP, Common Cause, and Black Voters Matter Fund argued in the US District Court for the District of Columbia that Trump’s March 31 executive order unlawfully attempts to federalize important parts of election administration—especially voter eligibility verification and mail-ballot delivery—by presidential fiat, without authorization from Congress, while creating serious risks of disenfranchisement and misuse of personal data.
The plaintiffs—and many legal experts—argue that the US Constitution gives the states and Congress the authority to regulate federal elections, not the president.
"Our democracy is under attack," NAACP president and CEO Derrick Johnson said Thursday in a statement. "No federal entity should be allowed to implement last-minute rules that disenfranchise voters and override state election laws."
"This new USPS rule is a direct assault on the fundamental freedoms of millions of Americans—particularly Black voters, communities of color, seniors, military members, and rural residents—just weeks before a critical election,” Johnson added, referring to November's pmidterms. "We will not stand idly by while the voices of the people are silenced. We must protect every eligible citizen’s right to cast their ballot.”
Damon Hewitt, president and executive director of the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, warned that “these mail-in ballot restrictions threaten to disenfranchise millions of eligible voters who rely on mail voting to participate in our democracy while balancing work, caregiving responsibilities, disabilities, and other realities of daily life."
"The Trump administration is trying to limit access to the ballot, sow confusion at the polls, and to use the ensuing chaos as an excuse to exert power over agencies and processes in a politicized way," Hewitt added. “We will not let this or any administration further undermine our democratic process. We will fight to ensure our elections are free and fair, and that eligible voters are not shut out—especially Black voters and other voters of color, who are frequently targeted by voter suppression schemes.”
Several courts had ruled against Trump's order. But this week, the US Supreme Court cleared the way for the administration to proceed with its plans, and on Wednesday US District Judge Indira Talwani, an appointee of former President Barack Obama, was compelled to lift her injunction on the executive order as a result of the high court's decision.
Also on Wednesday, the groups behind the case before Talwani moved to block the Postal Service rule, as did a coalition of two dozen Democratic state attorneys general, whose initial challenge had resulted in the ruling from the Supreme Court—which found that the AGs filed their first suit prematurely.
Republicans including Trump—who has repeatedly voted by mail—have used fearmongering and disinformation to push the nearly nonexistent “threat” of voter fraud, especially in regard to mailed ballots, and noncitizens voting in US elections.
“Mail-in voting is so safe that even the president has used it twice this year,” Common Cause president and CEO Virginia Kase Solomón said on Thursday. “The Postal Service exists to deliver our mail, not to be weaponized by this administration to silence voters. Common Cause will keep fighting to protect a democracy where people choose their leaders—not the other way around.”
Trump’s March order is part of a broader attack on voting rights that includes pushing an updated version of Republicans’ so-called SAVE America Act, which would mandate proof of citizenship and strict photo ID requirements to register to vote in federal elections. The legislation, which was passed by the House of Representatives in February, is stalled in the narrowly split Senate, where it lacks the support of 60 lawmakers needed to avoid a Democrat filibuster.
"Mail-in voting gives people the freedom and flexibility to participate in our democracy, and we should be honest about what these efforts to restrict it are really doing: creating barriers to the ballot under the guise of election security," Black Voters Matter Fund co-founders Cliff Albright and LaTosha Brown said in a joint statement Thursday. "We are not fooled. This is the same old playbook—manufacture confusion, create unnecessary hurdles, and chip away at voting access."
“When the same politicians who defend their own access to mail-in voting move to restrict that access for others, the hypocrisy is hard to ignore," Albright and Brown continued. "We cannot allow voter suppression to be repackaged as voter protection or allow political interference to determine who gets to participate and whose voice counts."
"This is not about making democracy more secure; it is about reshaping who can fully participate in it," they added. "We will continue to call these efforts what they are and fight for every eligible voter’s freedom to make their voice heard.”
Senate Resolution Will Demand Answers on Extremist Israeli Settler Violence Against US Citizens
"The United States cannot keep bankrolling this violence and looking the other way—it’s time to end our complicity, once and for all," said US Sen. Bernie Sanders.
A group of Senate Democrats on Thursday announced plans to introduce a privileged resolution requiring the Trump administration to give Congress more information about violence carried out by extremist settlers in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.
Led by Sens. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), Tim Kaine (D-Va.), and Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), who caucuses with Democrats, the lawmakers are demanding the US Department of State produce reports detailing investigations into the killings of nine US citizens at the hands of Israeli settlers in recent years, as well as assessments on the human rights impact of Israeli policies such as the detention of Palestinian children.
Van Hollen said the resolution was necessary because the Trump administration has done nothing to hold the Israeli government accountable for the deaths of US citizens.
"As we've seen violence rise in the West Bank, American citizens have been killed time and again, and they have received no justice and no accountability," said Van Hollen. "It’s past time we get answers on their deaths—and on the growing violent instability in the West Bank and the injustices facing Palestinian civilians on a daily basis."
Sanders accused the Israeli government of offering "impunity" to settlers who carry out "horrific violence" against Palestinian civilians regularly.
"Enough is enough," said Sanders. "The United States cannot keep bankrolling this violence and looking the other way—it’s time to end our complicity, once and for all."
Kaine described the Israeli government's "lack of response" to the settler violence as "unacceptable," saying it "threatens the long-term safety and security of the entire region."
"Friends need to listen to each other," said Kaine, "and my colleagues and I have repeatedly urged Israeli leaders to take firmer action to curtail illegal settlements in the West Bank, prosecute violent settlers, and protect Palestinian residents as well as American citizens living in or visiting the West Bank."
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), who is also supporting the resolution, slammed the Trump White House's complicity in the Israeli settler attacks, nothing that the administration "has even gone so far as to reverse sanctions against individuals connected to this pattern of horrific violence."
"It's long past time for the US government to stand up for human rights," said Warren, "investigate this violence against Americans and Palestinian civilians, provide full information to Congress, and hold the perpetrators accountable."
By introducing the measure as a privileged resolution, the Democrats can force a vote on it on the floor of the US Senate if the chamber's Foreign Relations Committee fails to act on it within 10 days of its introduction.
Human rights organizations for months have been sounding the alarm about the situation in the West Bank, where Israeli settlers have routinely attacked Palestinians at their own homes.
An analysis published by the Carter Center last month found that "settler attacks are now the leading cause of Palestinian injuries in the West Bank," as "more than 3,200 Palestinians have been displaced by settler attacks and home demolitions this year—double the daily rate of the previous three years."