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Making Superglue, Death Metal, Shithouses Great Again
Damn but we're tired of a racist, petty, what-about-me child in the White House. For solace: He's hopefully heading for the losingest fail of his long loser's life - and maybe a jail cell please? - and there are many, many people just as tired, with good shticks to match. This week saw some truly stellar trolling from, in turn, Obama, Norway and a heroic guy in South Carolina who managed to foist the Jonestown Massacre on the latest Nazi rally. Well done, all.
There's nothing like hearing Obama at his recent campaign appearances - in Georgia, Michigan, Ohio - to be starkly reminded there are no grown-ups left in the fake-gold-encrusted room of the current regime. Yes we know: he was seriously flawed, and failed to achieve much of what he promised. Still, it was bracing to see him smoothly obliterate the mad child-king, first with his crack about Saddam's Cheesecake Factory, then by skewering a president (sic) who spends his time "doing arts and crafts" in the Oval Office and who, after his just critiques of war, inflation, apocalyptic decline and "unprecedented corruption" chose to "mobilize a whole government response" not to those issues, but to a cheesecake joke: "This is what I mean. These are not serious people."
Next was Norway's gleeful response to Trump's petulant whining (still) about the Nobel prize won by "a woman nobody ever heard of" - Navanetham Pillay, a renowned South African jurist who's spent decades seeking accountability for war crimes, sexual violence and genocide from Rwanda to Gaza at the ICC and as UN High Commissioner for Human Rights - and not to him, who's "settled 8 (imaginary) wars and I've got 2 more coming." "'What about me?'" he bleated in Michigan of the "disgraceful" choice. "So I’m not in love with Norway. I don't want anybody from Norway. Frankly, Norway sucks. Norway has become a shithouse country, actually.” Thus did a sulky illiterate toddler toss (blond!) Norway in with Haiti,Libya, Somalia, mangling the "shithole" epithet en route.
Norwegian officials, evidently grown-ups, took the picayune insult and ran with it. First, they calmly noted Trump "knows very well" the prize isn't awarded by the government but by an independent Nobel committee. "We have reminded him of that, in case anyone is wondering," said Foreign Minister Espen Barth Eide. Then he took pity on the wretched child. "The president is currently in the midst of an election campaign that perhaps isn't going very well for his party," he calmly added. "That leads him to say a lot of things." At home, Bernie Sanders slammed an "insane" babysitting task. "Norway is one of the most democratic and prosperous countries on earth. Free college, strong democracy, free press," he declared. "We have a mentally unbalanced president."
Norway, with just 5.6 million people, likewise boasts one of the world's highest gross national incomes and top ratings for education and life expectancy, its largest sovereign wealth fund, and for the 10th consecutive year first place in the World Press Freedom index. It also has some of the world's most dazzling landscapes - rugged fjords, thunderous waterfalls, sweeping vistas, colossal mountains along 18 designated Scenic Routes - along with, its tourism bureau happily brags, "some of the world's most spectacular toilets," many of them sleek, award-winning "architectural masterpieces" that combine minimalist designs with breathtaking views. "These toilets are worth a visit," they crow, "both when you really have to go - and when you don’t.”
"Yes, Donald, we are a 'shithouse country,'" proudly proclaims the Norwegian Public Roads Administration, taking Michelle Obama's famous "when they go low" approach under the news headline, "Straight Into the Toilet." Norway is, after all, "the home of the outhouse," they note, which many residents connect to the country's hardy traditions and longtime "cabin culture." Visit Norway, its official tourism board, went further, showcasing its striking "lovely lavatories." "We've heard some chatter about a 'shithouse country.' Well, what can we say? Norway makes shit houses great again!," they wrote, urging tourists to "take your time and enjoy. Yes, Norway has some spectacular scenery. It just happens to have some pretty spectacular toilets, too. With love, Visit Norway."
The site highlights the wave-shaped Ureddplassen toilet on the coast of Helgeland in the north, hailed by designers as the most scenic restroom in the world. Also the solar-powered bog at the Utsikten viewpoint, the elegant Tungeneset loo - “Looks pretty good under the Northern Lights” - and, for "the bully in kindergarten,” the triangular “Golden Toilet,” or “Gulldassen,” at Ersfjordstranda on Senja island, recently paired with a glamorous new silver service building: "If you are a mere mortal like us and can’t afford a gold-plated toilet seat, the Golden loo (on) Senja is the next best thing.” Coming soon: a forest-themed wooden loo made from over 60 trees "for the pit stop of your life." Visit Norway on the "immense" response: "The world needs a little laugh."
Finally, bravely facing off against the horrors of a vengeful, demented, badly-accordion-playing rapist implausibly in power comes "absolute legend" and hero without a cape Tom Hoyle, 57, a South Carolina graphics designer in a bushy beard, baseball cap and t-shirt for heavy metal band Death: "I look like you, but I'm not like you," he says of fortuitously blending into a MAGA mob. "I'm the vampire during the day." A longtime Republican until he wasn't, he runs MadPark Designs, which in recent dark days has done screen printing and embroidery for No Kings rallies, George Floyd protests, LGBTQ-led music org We Rock Charlotte etc. Now, MadPark is "being bombarded by 5-star reviews" thanks to Hoyle's unplanned "25 seconds of fame" at his local Nazi rally.
The backstory: Hoyle has hated Trump since his infamous 1980s attack on the Central Park Five, now Exonerated Five - "I decided, 'You're dead to me, and hopefully to everybody else'" - but what "pushed me over the edge" this week was the GOP calling his shop (wait, they do that?) to urge him to attend Friday's rally for clueless Darline Graham. "We despise that," he says, "so we thought we'd turn the tables on them, do something goofy and make some good trouble," maybe some friendly neighborhood heckling. He slipped in through security by "talking in circles" about heavy metal and his shirt: "Death is the most hardcore death metal. You see somebody in a Death shirt and you know they're interested in humanity." He didn't expect what came next: a Fox mike in his face.
His now-viral wisecrack (see below) was entirely off the cuff, though he recalled seeing memes comparing MAGA to 1978's gruesome Jonestown Massacre, a mass murder/suicide in Guyana wherein over 900 glassy-eyed disciples of Jim Jones drank cyanide-laced Kool-Aid to fulfill "a madman’s fever dream." The joke on the difference between Trump and Jones: Trump would charge you for the Kool-Aid before you died. When the Fox guy asked why Hoyle was here, he had his punchline. As he headed to the exit and Secret Service approached, he innocently asked if this was about the concession stand; alarmed, they asked what he'd done there. "Nothing," he said, "but it was closed super early and I was starving." Then he kept walking. He'd like to thank Billy Crystal for his epic timing. We'd like to thank him for his ray of light.
"The devil…the prowde spirite…cannot endure to be mocked.” ― Thomas More
- YouTube www.youtube.com
Oct 30, 2026
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News
Finnish Petition Demands Data Center Regulation After Google Felled 250,000 Trees to Make Way for AI Project
A petition calling for more regulation of data centers in Finland has gathered more than 96,400 signatures—nearly twice the amount needed to force the Finnish Parliament to formally take up the petition for a debate—after Google infuriated residents and officials of two towns where the tech giant illegally chopped down an estimated 250,000 trees across 815 acres of forest after purchasing the land area.
The company felled the trees and stripped the entire area of its top soil without conducting a legally required environmental impact assessment, prompting the Finnish Licensing and Supervision Authority (LVV) to order Google to suspend all "measures that significantly change the environment."
The company was given a deadline of October 23 to halt the work in the rural towns of Muhos and Otanmäki, and LVV said it would consider enforcement proceedings and fines if Google does not comply.
Google's Finland country manager, Antti Järvinen, said last week that the company had acted “on the best understanding we had of the legislation at the time" as it cleared the land for its €13 billion ($14.5 billion) artificial intelligence infrastructure projects.
With 145 new data centers planned in Finland, where vast swaths of uninhabited land and the cool climate have attracted AI companies looking to rapidly build out the massive facilities, the petition proposed by citizens calls on Parliament to draft legislation that would ensure data centers are subject to "conditions and restrictions [in] connection to the electricity network."
The legislation must take "into account the capacity of the electricity network, mandatory reserve power, and the utilization of waste heat," reads the petition. "The aim of the legislative drafting is to ensure the adequacy and affordability of electricity for households and other industries."
Citizens are also calling for a "data center fee" to be imposed, "the basis for which must correspond to the environmental damage caused by the operation and the resources used (e.g. electricity, water, land use) to act as a system that compensates for these disadvantages."
Across the US and in other countries, the rapid AI data center build-out pushed by President Donald Trump, tech CEOs, and other leaders has prompted outcry in numerous communities, where residents have led grassroots efforts to block the construction of the centers.
Public approval for data centers has plummeted as residents have raised concerns about the facilities hiking household energy bills, guzzling water supplies, and providing few, if any, long-term jobs.
But Finnish Prime Minister Petteri Orpo of the conservative National Coalition Party has called attracting investment from AI firms a "top priority" for the Nordic country and has promised that Google's development will “deliver lasting benefits for both parties."
Speaking to The Guardian Thursday, Jussi Kangasharju, a computer science expert at the University of Helsinki, was skeptical of those claims.
“Really, for Finland, there are no benefits,” he told the outlet. “They are international companies serving international customers. Very little corporate taxes go to Finland. Data centers ultimately have very little benefit for others except the data center operator.”
Hanna Halmeenpää, chair of the Finnish Association for Nature Conservation (SLL), expressed disbelief over Google's destruction of the country's prized forests.
“I have never heard that any company has done anything like this in Finland," Halmeenpää told The Guardian Thursday. “They bought the vast land area, and they just started to cut it, just like that... It’s pure arrogance."
Another SLL official, Vesa Hyyryläinen, told the newspaper that wildlife in the forest that used to surround Otanmäki, including nesting woodpeckers, had been pushed out, while a resident whose family has lived in the town for generations explained how Google may have endangered locals by cutting down the biodiverse forest.
“We had wolves coming into the village because all the wild animals moved out of the forest,” Anni Ranta told The Guardian.
Conservationists were unimpressed Thursday with Google's pledge to plant trees across 130 hectares in the Muhos area and to work to protect water quality in the town following the destruction of the forest.
“It has been done in the wrong way," Muhos resident Aantti Jakonen told The Guardian. "American style. No sense. No sense at all."
Oct 22, 2026
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Consumer Sentiment Data Another Sign Trump 'Affordability Crisis Is Getting Worse, Not Better'
With early voting underway for the midterm elections and Democrats campaigning on how prices have soared under a Republican-controlled Congress and President Donald Trump, data released Friday show US consumer sentiment nearing an all-time low.
The University of Michigan's Surveys of Consumers announced that its Consumer Sentiment Index dropped to 48 this month, down from 48.1 in September and 53.6 last October. The record low was 44.8, this past May.
Surveys of Consumers director Joanne Hsu noted Friday that "increases in sentiment among Republicans and Democrats were balanced by declines among independents," and also highlighted some of the survey's other findings.
UMich consumer sentiment... 48.0... 2nd-worst in history
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— Mike Zaccardi, CFA, CMT (@mikezaccardi.bsky.social) October 23, 2026 at 10:02 AM
"While year-ahead business conditions improved about 14%, they stand 16% less than last October's read," she continued. "This month's decline in the Current Conditions subindex was driven entirely by buying conditions for durables, which plunged 18% on the basis of higher interest rates and rising concerns about the affordability of such purchases. Purchasing power continues to dominate consumer views of the economy. Sentiment is now 10% below a year ago and 15% less than February, just prior to the Iran conflict."
"Year-ahead inflation expectations ticked up from 4.6% last month to 4.7% this month," said Hsu, who also put out a related report on inflation. "The current reading substantially exceeds the 3.4% seen in February before the Iran conflict began, along with all 2024 readings. Long-run inflation expectations also stepped up from 3.4% in September to 3.5%, notably higher than their 2024 range of 2.8% to 3.2%. Inflation expectations over both time horizons increased for the second straight month to their highest readings since May."
Data released last week by the US Bureau of Labor Statistics show inflation grew faster than expected in September, partly due to Trump's illegal Iran War, and an online tracker published earlier this month by Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), ranking member of the Senate Banking Committee, highlights how costs have jumped for childcare, electricity, gasoline, groceries, healthcare, and rent.
Tonantzin Carmona, a former Biden administration adviser who now directs economic policy at The Century Foundation, a progressive think tank, called the University of Michigan's new consumer sentiment numbers "another sign that the affordability crisis is getting worse, not better."
"High prices and borrowing costs are making it harder for people to afford everyday necessities, and inflation expectations are rising again," she said. "What's more, our research shows that debt payments are eating up more than half of every dollar of real income growth, with debt payments rising more than eight times as fast as take-home income since the end of 2022."
"As inflation outpaces wage gains," she added, "workers are being squeezed from every direction—and October's consumer sentiment numbers, which are the second-lowest on record, reflect just how little families have left after paying their bills."
In 1980, inflation was 14% and unemployment was 8%. Consumer sentiment: 52.In 2026: still 52.Turns out Americans aren't just worried about the economy https://newsletter.platypuseconomics.com/p/its-not-the-economy-its-whos-running
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— Justin Wolfers (@justinwolfers.bsky.social) October 21, 2026 at 10:04 AM
In the lead-up to his colleagues updating consumer sentiment figures, University of Michigan economist Justin Wolfers published a Wednesday blog post noting that "every couple of weeks, someone on cable TV sits me down, points a camera at me, and asks the exact same thing. Our economic statistics look pretty good, so why are Americans so gloomy?"
"My prime suspect: An overwhelming majority of Americans rate economic policy under Trump as poor—the worst it has ever been—and they worry what this means for their economic futures," Wolfers wrote. He took "the share of people who say the government is doing a poor job" and subtracted "the share who say it's doing a good job," with a higher figure signaling a "harsher verdict."
"In late 2024, the verdict stood at +14. That means 14 percentage points more Americans thought the government was doing a poor job than a good one," he explained. By last May, when the consumer sentiment was the worst on record, "it had hit +66."
Based on his examination of the survey results over the years, Wolfers decided that "the next time someone points a camera at me and asks why Americans are so gloomy when the numbers look fine, here's my answer. They're not misreading the economy. They're reading the people running it. And their verdict today is the harshest on record."
Oct 23, 2026
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After Stevens' Latest Attack, El-Sayed Reiterates Focus on 'Beating Mike Rogers' in Final Weekend of Campaign
After issuing a brief statement in response to Rep. Haley Stevens' demand that he apologize for the views he's expressed—in line with a growing majority of Democrats—that are critical of US funding for Israel, Michigan's Democratic US Senate candidate, Abdul El-Sayed, headed into the final weekend before the midterm elections with the same focus he has maintained throughout his campaign.
"While Congresswoman Stevens seems intent on relitigating a primary that ended three months ago," said El-Sayed, "let's all focus on the task at hand: That's beating Mike Rogers, holding [President Donald] Trump accountable, and getting money out of politics, putting money in pockets, and passing Medicare for All."
The statement followed Stevens' latest attempt to suggest that El-Sayed's candidacy has threatened Jewish communities, by tying him to an anti-Rogers ad by an outside group, Rebellion PAC, that addressed how the billions of dollars and political support the US provides to Israel each year costs Americans. The Trump administration has publicly said the US launched its illegal war on Iran after being pushed to do so by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu—a decision that has markedly worsened the affordability crisis for Americans.
El-Sayed's campaign has said the digital ad does not "speak for" the progressive candidate, while others have pushed back on the claim by the vehemently pro-Israel Stevens and pro-Israel groups that the video is antisemitic, noting that it says nothing about Jewish people.
In his statement Friday evening, El-Sayed appeared to have little interest in engaging with Stevens further regarding persistent accusations by corporate Democrats who have claimed he hasn't done enough to reach out to Jewish communities, whom his campaign has been speaking with extensively about fighting antisemitism and their views on Israel at "deep canvassing" events.
"Our campaign is and has always been focused on addressing the most critical challenges Michiganders are facing: skyrocketing gas prices, unaffordable groceries, and the inability to see a doctor," said El-Sayed, noting that his message had allowed him to win the primary in August despite "a historic $70 million in outside spending by big corporations" and the pro-Israel lobby on behalf of Stevens.
Two sources told Politico that El-Sayed's campaign was asking Stevens not to campaign with him in the final weekend, which the congresswoman had begrudgingly said she planned to do in her statement demanding an apology from the candidate.
But El-Sayed himself was applauded by progressives for "holding firm and ignoring the whines and threats of extremists," as art director Lindsay Ballant said.
"For those folks demanding that El-Sayed condemn that ad, he isn’t playing your stupid game," said another observer. "He understands that whatever he does, it won’t be enough. There will always be another demand. So take your cudgel somewhere else."
Even if El-Sayed took time away from the statewide door-knocking tour he had planned for the weekend to address Stevens' demand, podcaster and former Obama administration staffer Tommy Vietor asserted that "people would then say he didn't condemn it firmly enough."
"The guilt by association shit is endless," said Vietor. "Meanwhile, Abdul is literally being called a jihadist by the president of the United States!"
Rep. James Clyburn (D-SC) and Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), Elissa Slotkin (D-Mich.), and Angela Alsobrooks (D-Md.) are set to join El-Sayed at the "Knock Out the Vote" canvassing event from Saturday through Monday.
Oct 31, 2026
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House Dems Press Trump USDA Over Aid Cuts as Seniors 'Struggle to Put Food on the Table'
A group of almost 20 Democratic lawmakers on Tuesday pressed US Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins to explain the adverse effects of President Donald Trump's so-called One Big Beautiful Bill Act on older Americans, including the administration's plan to eliminate a program serving nearly 700,000 low-income seniors and expanded food stamp work requirements.
"At a time when Americans continue to face elevated grocery costs, Washington Republicans enacted the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA), which the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimates will reduce federal [Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program] spending by approximately $187 billion through 2034," 18 House Democrats led by Rep. Analilia Mejia (D-NJ) wrote in a letter to Rollins.
"The law expanded SNAP’s three-month time limit and associated work requirements to certain adults ages 55 through 64, restricted states’ ability to obtain geographic waivers from those requirements, and made additional changes to state cost-sharing requirements expected to reduce SNAP participation and benefits," the letter continues.
"These cuts come as the same law provides substantial tax benefits that will help disproportionately benefit the rich, with CBO finding that the law will decrease resources available to households towards the bottom of the income distribution while increasing resources for households toward the top," the lawmakers noted.
The letter decries Trump's stated goal of eliminating the Commodity Supplemental Food Program (CSFP), which the lawmakers described as "the most extensive hunger-relief federal program for seniors and services to nearly 700,000 low-income seniors across the nation."
"The administration justified the elimination of this crucial program by focusing 'on supporting seniors through the SNAP program' as they passed a law to make SNAP more inaccessible for seniors," the letter laments. "Congress has been responsible for keeping the CSFP fully funded and maintained while the administration continues to threaten this critical federal food assistance program."
"Even so, as Americans—particularly seniors—struggle to put food on the table, you have failed to meet the urgency of this affordability crisis, even as the department you lead reports that food prices have climbed another 3% in the past year," the Democrats added.
The letter requests state-by-state figures showing how many adults ages 55 to 64 have lost or suffered reductions in SNAP benefits because of expanded work requirements, as well as how many have received exemptions. The lawmakers are also seeking data regarding the health and financial consequences of eliminating the CSFP and how the administration would ensure seniors retain access to nutritious food. The legislators requested a written response from Rollins' office by November 6.
"You have failed to meet the urgency of this affordability crisis."
According to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP), approximately 5.5 million people, including roughly 2 million children, have lost SNAP assistance since Trump signed the OBBBA in July 2025. This, despite more than 47 million Americans—including 1 in 5 children—living in food-insecure households.
Seniors are experiencing their own unique set of hardships, given that many of them have limited resources.
"Many seniors rely heavily on fixed or limited incomes from Social Security, retirement savings, and pensions, leaving them particularly vulnerable as the cost of living continues to rise," the letter states, adding that "rather than protect older and low-income Americans from rising costs, you and the Trump administration continue to pursue policies that threaten to make it harder for them to afford basic necessities."
Oct 27, 2026
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US Journalist and Activist Detained After Israeli Settler Attack in West Bank
An American journalist and an activist who reportedly suffered a concussion from being beaten by armed Israeli settlers remained in detention Wednesday night, hours after Israeli police arrested them following the attack.
Adele Shoko, a Russian activist, reported that settlers had attacked her, Israeli-Russian activist Andrey Khrzhanovskiy, and US journalist Jasper Nathaniel late Wednesday in the Palestinian village of Umm al-Khair, in the Masafer Yatta area of the occupied West Bank.
"They beat us, threatened to shoot us, stole Andrey's phone and my glasses, and pepper-sprayed Jasper," Shoko said on the social media platform X.
According to Shoko, Khrzhanovskiy was denied medical treatment after losing consciousness "several times in front of police." He and Nathaniel were taken to a police station, where they remained hours later.
Nathaniel was heard yelling, "I just got beat up!" while being led away by police.
"Andrey was severely beaten and lost consciousness several times in front of police," said Shoko. "Despite this, he was denied hospital treatment. He was put in an ambulance—but instead of being taken to hospital, he was taken to a police station. He is still there, arrested and being denied medical care."
One video appeared to show Khrzhanovskiy losing consciousness.
Drop Site News cited Shoko as she reported that Nathaniel and Khrzhanovskiy eventually were able to speak with a lawyer, but remained at a police station. They were reportedly "physically okay."
"Israeli state terrorism knows no boundaries," said historian Zachary Foster of the footage of the attack.
The assault came less than two weeks after both Nathaniel and Khrzhanovskiy came to the aid of Heidi Levine, a Washington Post journalist, after she was brutally beaten and robbed by Israeli settlers while she was covering an attack by dozens of masked men on Palestinian olive groves in the West Bank.
State-backed settler attacks on Palestinians in the West Bank have ramped up significantly since October 2023, when the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) also began a military campaign against Gaza in retaliation for a Hamas-led attack on southern Israel. More than 74,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza in what leading human rights groups have called a genocide, and a United Nations commission said this week that at least 1,080 Palestinians have been killed in the West Bank in the last three years.
Top officials in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government have pushed to further annex the West Bank as the IDF has backed settler raids on villages and attacks on Palestinian communities as well as recent assaults on journalists, US lawmakers, and a group of European diplomats.
Nathaniel, who has spent years covering the Israeli occupation of the West Bank for outlets including Drop Site and Zeteo News, spoke recently to The New Yorker about the attack on Levine, emphasizing that Palestinians had thrown stones at her attackers to allow her colleagues to reach her.
"The IDF soldiers who have been there, who’ve been tear-gassing the Palestinians and providing cover for the settlers, stormed the village," Nathaniel said of the assault on Levine. "Rather than go after the settlers who have just nearly killed a woman, they stormed the village and started firing their weapons, and they shot a Palestinian man in the leg."
On Substack this week, Khrzhanovskiy wrote that "all the Palestinian villages in the West Bank are under siege," and that Netanyahu's government aimed to use a recent strike against Israeli soldiers "to start a war in the West Bank."
"The only way to stop this is pressure from all directions. We know it works," said Khrzhanovskiy. "Call your representative, hold a demonstration, organize direct action against the occupation’s assets abroad. Keep attention on the West Bank."
Oct 29, 2026
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AIPAC-Backed Stevens Denounced as 'Traitor' After Endorsing Pro-Trump Rogers in Michigan Senate Race
"Politicians like Haley Stevens always had more in common with Republicans like Mike Rogers and Donald Trump than with the Democratic base," said House candidate Darializa Avila Chevalier. "And now she admits it."
Nov 01, 2026
Rep. Haley Stevens, the pro-Israel Democratic congresswoman who was backed by top party leaders, establishment figures, and tens of millions of dollars from the American Israel Public Affairs Committee and other outside groups in the primary race earlier this year, suggested Sunday that being disinvited from campaigning with Michigan's Democratic US Senate candidate, Abdul El-Sayed, was all it took to convince her to endorse his Trump-allied Republican opponent, former Rep. Mike Rogers.
But one former Obama administration adviser Ben Rhodes said this weekend that Stevens' alignment with the Republican was the "logical endpoint" of her politics after months of attacking El-Sayed for his critical views on US military aid for Israel—views that are now shared by a majority of US voters after more than three years of Israel's relentless assault on Gaza.
Stevens announced her endorsement in a video posted online after she appeared with Rogers at Perfecting Church in Detroit, where she asserted that the Republican would support investments in Black-owned businesses—a ploy, said Melat Kiros, a Democratic congressional candidate in Colorado, to use Black voters "as a prop to embrace a racist who will do nothing but rubber stamp this fascist administration."
"Abdul was very clear. He said, 'Don't come,'" said Stevens, standing next to Rogers at the press conference where she was called "traitor" by one bystander. "When it really comes down to it, this is how I'm casting my ballot."
Haley Stevens gets heckled. She is called a traitor and the press conference ends as she is ushered away. https://t.co/O6q2LaYt23
— Acyn (@Acyn) November 1, 2026
She added that "nothing's perfect" when asked why she was supporting a candidate who "stands so firmly for some of the policies that you've stood so firmly against."
Rep. Debbie Dingell (D-Mich.) made clear Saturday that she, not El-Sayed, had directly asked Stevens to stay away from the candidate's events in the last days of the campaign after Stevens put out a statement criticizing El-Sayed's position on Israel. She told CNN: "I'm the one. I am the one that talked to Haley. And I am the one that said this isn't working."
On Sunday, Dingell issued a brief statement saying that she, El-Sayed, and Michigan Democrats are "focused on electing Democrats up and down the ballot" instead of Stevens' "continued efforts to get attention."
The political action committee American Priorities, which was established to counter AIPAC's funding of Republicans and Democrats who support Israel, said that with Stevens' choice, "what’s been clear to us all along is now plain to see: AIPAC and its candidates, including this failed primary one, are committed to electing Republicans."
"Every Democrat should be crystal clear on what AIPAC is and is not: It is an outside interference in Democratic politics, not a legitimate stakeholder in the party's future," said the group.
Stevens' endorsement came a day after reproductive rights advocates highlighted a recent interview Rogers did with WMUZ radio host Bob Dutko, in which he affirmed he would support a nationwide abortion ban.
"You don't even have to think about it twice," said Rogers on Thursday. "I mean, I feel I’ve been very open about all of those issues, including for the time I was in Congress having a 100% pro-life rating... This is the only way that I know how to be when I go back to the United States Senate."
Stevens' appearance with and endorsement of Rogers capped the congresswoman's months of political attacks on El-Sayed, a progressive who has also made Medicare for All a key part of his platform.
El-Sayed's positions on the Middle East and the human rights of Palestinians, Stevens and other pro-Israel politicians and groups have claimed, threaten the safety of Jewish communities in Michigan—despite the fact that 61% of Jewish Americans last year expressed agreement with leading human rights groups and Holocaust experts, saying in a Washington Post poll that they believed Israel's US-backed military had committed war crimes in Gaza.
El-Sayed has repeatedly spoken about protecting Jewish communities from acts of antisemitism, and his campaign is engaging directly with Jewish voters on the issue in the final days of the race. Meanwhile, Rogers has joined President Donald Trump in waging anti-Arab and Islamophobic attacks against El-Sayed, accusing him of being aligned with the Muslim Brotherhood and standing alongside Trump at rallies where the president has openly called the Michigan-born candidate, whose family immigrated to the US from Egypt, a "jihadist."
During the primary, Stevens spent weeks condemning El-Sayed for campaigning with another Arab American, popular streamer and Israel critic Hasan Piker. Last week, nearly three months after losing the primary, she demanded the candidate apologize for statements made in a digital ad by an outside group, which criticized the use of taxpayer dollars to fund Israel's military.
On Sunday, her appearance with Rogers reportedly led to the collapse of her own political operation, with her chief of staff and other aides abruptly resigning.
El-Sayed was asked about Stevens' actions, but reiterated his focus on securing a federal government that serves the needs of Michiganders and other families across the country, saying: "At the end of the day, I actually don't think about Haley Stevens. Because you know what? I'm just less interested in the politics of it all than I am in the policy of it all."
El-Sayed: At the end of the day, I actually don't think about Haley Stevens. Because you know what? I'm just less interested in the politics of it all than I am in the policy of it all… If you are somebody who believes that we should stand up to hate, and you have watched this last campaign, I think we probably would not want to support Mike Rogers and Donald Trump and JD Vance. If you're somebody who believes that we need more health care, not less than you probably don't want to vote for the guy who voted to raise prescription drug prices or keep them high 19 times and takes money from big pharma and big insurance. If you're somebody who believes in public education, you probably do not want to support the guy who architected the initial legislation in 1999 that ended up stripping local control from Detroit public schools and the local community. If you're somebody who believes that you should have a right to a union, you probably don't want to support the guy who busts unions. So I'm just saying that the principles that we believe in as Democrats are really quite clear. I stand for all of them.
— Acyn (@Acyn) November 1, 2026
Jesse Brenneman, an editor for the podcast "Know Your Enemy," expressed hope that "this debacle drops the blinders from many eyes and allows people to see things clearly."
"The Democratic establishment is not primarily concerned with winning elections. It is concerned with preserving its power and pushing certain outcomes," said Brenneman. "They are usually more subtle than this, but when push comes to shove they will explicitly blow things up to serve this end. They don’t want majorities full of popular politicians, unless those politicians serve the interests that they care about."
Stevens' decision, said congressional candidate Darializa Avila Chevalier, who is running in New York's 13th District, showed "that politicians like Haley Stevens always had more in common with Republicans like Mike Rogers and Donald Trump than with the Democratic base. And now she admits it. That’s why it’s so important to run democratic primaries. It’s not enough to send Democrats to Washington, we have to send Democrats who are fighting for the things working-class voters want!"
Stevens' alignment with Rogers and Trump would leave Democrats across the state "feeling even better today about nominating Abdul El-Sayed to fight for our working-class families," said Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.), the only Palestinian American in the US Congress. "Three days to go, let’s tune out this nonsense and turn out the vote. Let's make sure Haley loses to Abdul twice."
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After Stevens' Latest Attack, El-Sayed Reiterates Focus on 'Beating Mike Rogers' in Final Weekend of Campaign
"Our campaign is and has always been focused on addressing the most critical challenges Michiganders are facing: skyrocketing gas prices, unaffordable groceries, and the inability to see a doctor."
Oct 31, 2026
After issuing a brief statement in response to Rep. Haley Stevens' demand that he apologize for the views he's expressed—in line with a growing majority of Democrats—that are critical of US funding for Israel, Michigan's Democratic US Senate candidate, Abdul El-Sayed, headed into the final weekend before the midterm elections with the same focus he has maintained throughout his campaign.
"While Congresswoman Stevens seems intent on relitigating a primary that ended three months ago," said El-Sayed, "let's all focus on the task at hand: That's beating Mike Rogers, holding [President Donald] Trump accountable, and getting money out of politics, putting money in pockets, and passing Medicare for All."
The statement followed Stevens' latest attempt to suggest that El-Sayed's candidacy has threatened Jewish communities, by tying him to an anti-Rogers ad by an outside group, Rebellion PAC, that addressed how the billions of dollars and political support the US provides to Israel each year costs Americans. The Trump administration has publicly said the US launched its illegal war on Iran after being pushed to do so by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu—a decision that has markedly worsened the affordability crisis for Americans.
El-Sayed's campaign has said the digital ad does not "speak for" the progressive candidate, while others have pushed back on the claim by the vehemently pro-Israel Stevens and pro-Israel groups that the video is antisemitic, noting that it says nothing about Jewish people.
In his statement Friday evening, El-Sayed appeared to have little interest in engaging with Stevens further regarding persistent accusations by corporate Democrats who have claimed he hasn't done enough to reach out to Jewish communities, whom his campaign has been speaking with extensively about fighting antisemitism and their views on Israel at "deep canvassing" events.
"Our campaign is and has always been focused on addressing the most critical challenges Michiganders are facing: skyrocketing gas prices, unaffordable groceries, and the inability to see a doctor," said El-Sayed, noting that his message had allowed him to win the primary in August despite "a historic $70 million in outside spending by big corporations" and the pro-Israel lobby on behalf of Stevens.
Two sources told Politico that El-Sayed's campaign was asking Stevens not to campaign with him in the final weekend, which the congresswoman had begrudgingly said she planned to do in her statement demanding an apology from the candidate.
But El-Sayed himself was applauded by progressives for "holding firm and ignoring the whines and threats of extremists," as art director Lindsay Ballant said.
"For those folks demanding that El-Sayed condemn that ad, he isn’t playing your stupid game," said another observer. "He understands that whatever he does, it won’t be enough. There will always be another demand. So take your cudgel somewhere else."
Even if El-Sayed took time away from the statewide door-knocking tour he had planned for the weekend to address Stevens' demand, podcaster and former Obama administration staffer Tommy Vietor asserted that "people would then say he didn't condemn it firmly enough."
"The guilt by association shit is endless," said Vietor. "Meanwhile, Abdul is literally being called a jihadist by the president of the United States!"
Rep. James Clyburn (D-SC) and Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), Elissa Slotkin (D-Mich.), and Angela Alsobrooks (D-Md.) are set to join El-Sayed at the "Knock Out the Vote" canvassing event from Saturday through Monday.
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Federal Judge Shuts Down Trump DOJ Threats to Prosecute Election Officials
A labor leader called the ruling "a resounding win for the election workers who make our democracy happen and for all Americans’ freedom to vote."
Oct 31, 2026
Days after the US Department of Justice threatened election officials in all 50 states with possible prosecution unless they preserve election records—the latest push by the Trump administration to cast doubt on the validity of the upcoming midterm elections—a federal judge on Friday ordered the DOJ to reach out to the officials again, this time to rescind the threat.
The DOJ must contact the state and local officials who received warnings this week and inform them that the "threats of prosecution to election officials and workers... have been enjoined," said District Judge Trina Thompson in the US District Court for the Northern District of California.
Thompson ordered officials with the Trump administration to stop demanding that election workers remove voters from rolls, sequester ballots cast by people the White House has claimed are ineligible to vote due to being noncitizens, and refuse to issue ballots to people who have been included on the administration's error-riddled lists of residents whom it says have voted illegally.
"Because the public has a paramount interest in ensuring that election officials and workers are able to carry out their work in accordance with federal law and election procedure, and the official day of the elections is only a couple of days away, the balance of the equities and public interest weigh in plaintiffs’ favor," said Thompson.
The ruling was handed down in connection with a lawsuit filed by the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME), and other groups.
Protect Democracy, part of the coalition that sued, called the threat "yet another attempt designed to shake Americans’ confidence in the election results and undermine our electoral process."
Patrick Moran, president of AFSCME, said Thompson's ruling and the temporary restraining order she issued were "a resounding win for the election workers who make our democracy happen and for all Americans’ freedom to vote."
"We applaud the court for granting a temporary restraining order protecting election workers from unlawful prosecution simply for following the law and forbidding the administration from interfering with the lawful administration of elections," said Moran. "Now, our nation’s nonpartisan election workers, many of them AFSCME members, can continue to do their jobs, and our elections can continue to proceed freely and fairly.”
With President Donald Trump's approval rating at an historic low and Republicans facing widespread disapproval of the illegal war on Iran they've supported, healthcare cuts they voted for, and violent mass deportation operations they've funded, the White House has approached the midterms with a laser focus on sowing doubt about the results before the elections are completed.
The DOJ demanded confidential voter roll data from states across the country last year, pushing the baseless claim that the lists were rife with the names of noncitizens who would be illegally permitted to vote. The administration has been rebuffed by dozens of officials.
In response, the Department of Homeland Security and DOJ have used commercially available data and federal records to cobble together their own lists of voters they say have cast ballots illegally. The results of the effort have included a list of 185 people in Nevada, all of whom were proven to be citizens, and a list of 28 immigrants in California whom federal officials said were suspected of voting before they became naturalized citizens—representing about .0001% of all registered voters in the state.
The administration has also pushed for the certification of Alaska's election results to be blocked, citing the presence of two Dan Sullivans on the ballot—one clearly labeled as the incumbent Republican senator, the other not—and on Thursday, sent the threatening letters to election officials across the country.
Earlier this week, Judge David Carter in the US District Court for the Central District of California said that the administration's threats "must stop," throwing out the DOJ's attempt to force the state to sequester ballots cast by 20,000 people officials claimed were not citizens.
"DOJ tried to bully election workers with threats and intimidation," Norm Eisen, co-founder of Democracy Defenders Action, said Saturday. "Last night, a federal court shut it down. We and our partners are fighting to protect elections in the court of law."
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Global Summit Ends Without Securing Finance Commitments Needed to Protect Biodiversity
“This meeting should have been a turning point, not just a stocktake. Success required governments to commit the political will and financing needed to reverse biodiversity loss," said one advocate.
Oct 31, 2026
The 17th United Nations summit on biodiversity ended in Yerevan, Armenia on Friday with more than 200 countries adopting a "forward-looking" agreement aimed at speeding up and scaling up action to protect nature, reforming "harmful subsidies fueling nature’s demise," and closing the biodiversity finance gap—with the global economy spending $1 on nature protection for every $30 it spends on destruction, according to a recent UN report.
But conservation advocates warned that with four years to go until 2030, when 30% of land and water is meant to be protected under the 30x30 goal set by the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework in 2022, biodiversity conservation is behind schedule, and the goal of accelerating beneficial finance is still falling short in the Yerevan Pathway that came out of the meeting.
The conference produced about $1.8 billion in nature-finance agreements, including a commitment of $500 million from the Netherlands to the Tropical Forest Forever Facility, which rewards countries for protecting their tropical forests. Six contributors also pledged $60.13 million to the Global Biodiversity Framework Fund, which supports the Global South in implementing the 2022 framework.
However, "overall spending on biodiversity remains far short of the $200 billion per year target in the Kunming-Montreal framework," wrote John Cannon at Mongabay, while the framework's demand to reform "damaging subsidies remains largely unmet."
Experts say $700 billion in additional annual spending is needed to protect and restore ecosystems damaged by mining, drilling, and other industries, pollution, and other human activities.
Governments committed to reducing subsidies by at least $500 billion per year by 2030, but about $2.4 trillion "is still estimated to flow annually toward subsidies that can harm nature," said Sustainable Business Services.
Daudi Sumba, chief conservation officer at World Wildlife Fund International (WWF), said that the Global Review that came out of the summit was “a strong signal to countries that they must do better when it comes to action for nature."
"But without clear scaling of the funds to be able to deliver, I fear finance will remain the key issue that continues to haunt the UN biodiversity summits," said Sumba. "Negotiators returning home must now turn the Global Review into clear dedicated action, scaling nature’s recovery by transforming the most damaging sectors and activities across our food and finance systems.”
The Cali Fund, a mechanism that came out of COP16 in Colombia and is designed to share digital sequence information on genetic resources, is also falling short of the goals set for it by last year's conference. The fund aims to raise at least $1 billion annually from companies that access DSI from genetic resources for pharmaceuticals and other products, but "with only $10,000 pledged at the close of [COP17]," said WWF, "follow-up work at intersessional meetings will be important."
“Back when the UN Convention on Biological Diversity was first adopted in 1992, one of the main pillars was ensuring the fair and equitable benefit-sharing from biodiversity, especially from provider countries and local communities,” said Vishaish Uppal, director of governance, law, and policy at WWF-India. “Almost 35 years later, we’re still not seeing the companies that profit off nature sharing their benefits with the Indigenous peoples and local communities that act as the custodians of much of the biodiversity that their businesses rely upon. It really is about time that countries iron out these differences, so that funding can reach the people and places that need it the most.”
An Lambrechts, a biodiversity politics expert at Greenpeace International, said that "giant corporations did everything they could to keep the Cali Fund voluntary two years ago, and then did everything they could to stop the fund from working in Yerevan."
"It is unacceptable that big multinational corporations are turning massive profits from what they take from nature while contributing very little to its protection and leaving people across the world to face the impacts of the biodiversity crisis," said Lambrechts.
"It is unacceptable that big multinational corporations are turning massive profits from what they take from nature while contributing very little to its protection and leaving people across the world to face the impacts of the biodiversity crisis."
Negotiators also established a permanent body for Indigenous peoples and local communities under Article 8(j) of the Convention on Biological Diversity, but Sustainable Business Services warned that "questions remain over institutional status, representation, and the extent of their participation in decision-making."
COP17, said the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS), "put forth a clearer picture of the global biodiversity crisis and the gaps that must be closed to meet the world’s 2030 targets."
But Susan Lieberman, vice president for international policy at WCS, said that "the negotiations themselves ended up weak on ambition."
“This meeting should have been a turning point, not just a stocktake. Success required governments to commit the political will and financing needed to reverse biodiversity loss," said Lieberman. "That means protecting and restoring ecological integrity, respecting the rights and leadership of Indigenous peoples and local communities, and reducing the drivers of decline. With just four years until 2030, we cannot afford another conference that diagnoses the crisis without accelerating the cure."
Twenty-two of the 23 targets set by the Kunming-Montreal framework are behind schedule, and Lieberman said that COP17 "has clarified the challenge" of ensuring they are met.
"Now governments must summon the political will, resources and resolve to meet it," she said. "We applaud the Armenian government, the [Convention on Biological Diversity] secretariat, and many governments and partners for keeping the momentum moving toward achieving the 2030 goals and targets. But ‘good enough’ should never be acceptable.”
Friends of the Earth International (FOE) also said the two weeks of negotiations had "ended with weak decisions and many unanswered questions," pointing to "the capture of this space by transnational corporations" and the "greenwashing and false solutions like biodiversity offsets and credits" that it said would continue.
Along with calling out harmful subsidies, FOE helped launch a campaign during COP17 highlighting how "business sectors contribute to biodiversity destruction and related human rights impacts," such as in the pulp and paper and biomass industries.
"In Indonesia, the expansion of industrial plantations and biomass production continues to drive forest loss and biodiversity decline," said the Environmental Paper Network, which joined the initiative.
With the Yerevan Pathway, said Nele Marien, coordinator of the forest and biodiversity program at FOE, "the structural drivers of biodiversity loss remain an elephant in the room: the financial and legal systems that undermine biodiversity need to be addressed."
Wilmer Lucitante, member of the Kofan nation and spokesperson for the Union of People Affected by Texaco and FOE Ecuador, said that COP17 is "a turning point, as the ways of operating of the Indigenous body of the convention were established."
"Yet the measures are voluntary, and do not alter the power transnational corporations wield in our territories," said Lucitante. "In the Kofan territory, from the time of Texaco and until now, fossil fuel companies have contaminated our lands and violated our rights. Voluntary measures are clearly not enough."
WCS said the overall outcome of the summit, just before countries meet in Türkiye for the 31st UN Climate Change Conference, where climate finance is expected to be a major topic, was "too timid."
"The COP17 decision merely encourages countries to begin applying a set of voluntary guidelines, which will be negotiated further before COP18," said the group. "This 'kicking the can down the road' falls far short of what is needed at a time when climate change poses a significant threat to biodiversity ecosystems, and the loss and degradation of ecosystems is driving emissions and reducing the capacity of people and nature to adapt."
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Trump's 'Election Denial Must Stop': Progressive Lawmakers Demand US Recognize Lula's Brazil Victory
"In the two largest democracies in the hemisphere, we cannot tolerate authoritarian efforts to deny election results, overturn the will of hundreds of millions of voters, or violently interrupt the peaceful transfer of power."
Oct 30, 2026
Progressive leaders in the US House of Representatives on Friday demanded that President Donald Trump recognize Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva's reelection victory, accusing the Republican of joining defeated far-right candidate Flávio Bolsonaro's bid to undermine democracy in Latin America's largest country.
“Trump continues to ramp up his election denialism," Congressional Progressive Caucus Chair Greg Casar (D-Texas), CPC Deputy Chair Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), and CPC Whip Jesús G. "Chuy" García (D-Ill.) said in a statement, adding that Lula won by "more than 4 million votes. Yet Trump called it 'rigged’ and ‘corrupt’ and refused to recognize the outcome."
Turning to loser Bolsonaro's flight from Brazil to the United States, where senior Trump officials said he and his family would be granted visas, the progressives continued, "As soon as Flávio Bolsonaro touched down in Florida, he thanked Donald Trump for his support and claimed that Brazil’s election was stolen, outrageously declaring himself the rightful ‘president-elect.’"
"Trump’s and Bolsonaro’s partnership in election denial must stop immediately," they stressed. "We demand that the United States join the rest of the world in accepting the results of Brazil’s election. In the two largest democracies in the hemisphere, we cannot tolerate authoritarian efforts to deny election results, overturn the will of hundreds of millions of voters, or violently interrupt the peaceful transfer of power."
“As November approaches, we are committed to using every congressional tool at our disposal to defend election integrity at home and stop Trump’s election interference and denialism abroad," the lawmakers added, alluding to next week's US midterm elections.
The Trump administration's response to the results of the Brazilian runoff has angered many in Brazil, especially those on the left.
According to Folha de São Paulo, the US State Department had prepared a customary statement congratulating Brazil on its election but was ordered to withhold its release after Bolsonaro challenged the results. The US Embassy in Brasília subsequently offered no indication of when the statement would be issued.
Lula's leftist Workers' Party addressed Trump's behavior in a resolution saying that "Brazil will not accept foreign interests interfering in its democracy, nor will it accept political disputes serving as a pretext to disrespect the sovereign will of the Brazilian people, in elections that were widely monitored and recognized for their integrity."
"The position of US President Donald Trump regarding the election results and [Bolsonaro's] presence on US territory also requires attention," the resolution added.
Dan Beeton, communications director at the Center for Economic and Policy Research, told Common Dreams on Friday that "the CPC leaders are right."
"Trump should join the rest of the world and recognize Lula’s historic electoral victory and, hopefully, turn a new page in US-Brazil relations, which have deteriorated significantly during Trump’s second term, with Trump’s unprovoked and unnecessary tariffs, sanctions against officials responsible for holding former President Jair Bolsonaro accountable for his 2023 coup attempt, and other hostile actions," Beeton added. "Trump will risk further isolating the US on the world stage as long as he doesn’t.”
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Trump Plan to Deport Afghan Immigrants, Refugees Condemned as 'Sickening'
"The consequences could be prison, torture, or worse," said one human rights defender.
Oct 30, 2026
The Trump administration is preparing to deport more than 150 Afghan immigrants and refugees to Taliban-controlled Afghanistan via Pakistan, a move that drew fierce condemnation Friday from a range of critics—including human rights defenders and Democratic US lawmakers—who warned that such expulsions would place many of the deportees' lives in grave danger.
The New York Times reported that US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has transferred Afghan detainees from facilities around the country to Louisiana in preparation for a chartered deportation flight expected to leave as soon as Monday.
The administration reportedly intends to send the Afghans to Pakistan, whose government would then expel them across the border into Afghanistan, where the Taliban has ruled since the US withdrew from the country in defeat over five years ago.
According to the Times, those slated for deportation include relatives of people who aided the US military invasion and occupation and at least one gay man. Both categories of people would face possible execution or severe persecution by the Taliban.
"Five years ago, Americans watched Afghans cling to planes to escape the Taliban. On Monday, our government plans to charter one back to their persecutors' hands," Krish O'Mara Vignarajah, president and CEO of refugee resettlement organization Global Refuge, said in a statement Friday.
"For the people on that manifest, the consequences could be prison, torture, or worse," she added. "For their families here, some of whom served alongside US servicemembers, it means losing a loved one without knowing whether they'll ever hear from them again."
Vignarajah implored the Trump administration to halt or reverse the plan before the flight departs.
"Pakistan is patently unsafe for Afghans," she said. "Its own government has made that clear by hounding them out of the country by the millions. Deporting Afghans into that crackdown is a deliberate decision to put them in harm's way."
Since 2023, Pakistan's government has expelled more than 2.7 million Afghans, according to Global Refuge, and has vowed to remove approximately 1.5 million who remain in the country regardless of their immigration status. The United Nations has documented killings, arbitrary detention, and torture of people associated with Afghanistan's former US-backed government and security forces.
The Taliban has also systematically stripped Afghan women and girls of the rights they gained during the US invasion, banning them from secondary schools, universities, and most employment, while imposing sweeping and draconian restrictions on their lives.
"Individuals returned to Afghanistan face grave, systematic dangers, including arbitrary detentions, executions, public flogging, and retaliatory violence," the group Human Rights First said Thursday. "Women and girls face severe restrictions on basic freedoms, including systematic denials of education, employment, and public speech."
Several Democratic US lawmakers, including Democrats on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, decried the planned deportations.
"We made a promise to our Afghan allies—that after aiding and protecting our troops during the conflict in Afghanistan, America would not abandon them," said Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.). "This administration is betraying that promise, deporting them to potential torture and death."
Sen. Chris Coons (D-Del.) posted: "While he hopes nobody is watching, Trump greenlit the expulsion of more than 150 Afghans back to Taliban rule, where they will face almost certain persecution, torture, or worse. Accountability for Trump’s cruel immigration agenda cannot come soon enough."
Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.) also weighed in, writing on social media, "Our Afghan allies risked everything to help the United States."
"Now Trump plans to send their relatives back to Taliban-ruled Afghanistan," he added. "Repaying their sacrifice with betrayal is shameful and will make it much harder for America to secure assistance in future conflicts."
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Haley Stevens Slammed for Statement Suggesting She's Willing to Sabotage Midterms to Halt Progressive Surge
"If a progressive candidate was actively trying to pin an establishment nominee days before the election the way Stevens is with Abdul right now, they’d be exiled from political life."
Oct 30, 2026
In the final days of the US Senate campaign in Michigan, Democratic candidate Abdul El-Sayed is leading in polls, winning praise for taking President Donald Trump and his Republican opponent to task with incisive humor, and providing a clear closing message in evocative ads.
But his former Democratic primary opponent, Rep. Haley Stevens (D-Mich.), said Friday that while she reiterated this week her decision to support El-Sayed in next Tuesday's election—a plan not shared by her fiancé, who publicly announced he would vote for Republican former Rep. Mike Rogers—she was demanding concessions from the Democratic candidate, in a statement that sought to tie him to a recent online ad by an outside group.
Stevens said she would campaign with El-Sayed this weekend alongside Rep. James Clyburn (D-SC), but demanded that he apologize for comments he has made about Israel on the campaign trail. El-Sayed, like a growing majority of Americans, is deeply critical of US support for Israel's military, to which it sends billions of dollars in aid annually. Since Israel began attacking Gaza in October 2023, the Biden and Trump administrations have sent $21 billion in military aid to Israel.
The congresswoman demanded that El-Sayed apologize for suggesting "that Israel is the reason Michigan cannot afford schools, healthcare, and childcare."
"Abdul promises to get money out of politics," she said. "He can begin by getting Israel out of his explanation for everything Michigan cannot afford."
Journalist Ryan Grim of Drop Site News said Stevens was essentially asking El-Sayed to lie to voters.
"The US government itself, in its official explanation, says that we launched the war on Iran in significant part to defend Israel," said Grim. "Marco Rubio said it out loud too. It's obvious. So it would be a lie not to include Israel in any explanation for why life in Michigan is less affordable now."
The war on Iran has sent gas prices soaring, with Americans paying an additional
$101 billion on gasoline since the war started, or an average of $856 per household.
Stevens also said she expected El-Sayed to "formally" condemn a recent ad by Rebellion PAC, led by Cenk Uygur of the left-wing network The Young Turks, and suggested that she was only agreeing to campaign with the candidate because she had received assurances of the condemnation.
El-Sayed's campaign has already emphasized that "no one speaks for Abdul but himself," and that he had nothing to do with the ad, for which the PAC spent just $4,000 for social media and digital placement. The ad shows a couple talking about having to cut grocery spending because of the billions of dollars the US provides to Israel in military aid.
The video makes no mention of Jewish people, but was quickly denounced as "antisemitic" by groups including the Anti-Defamation League—which has frequently attacked progressive politicians who are critical of US support for Israel and defend Palestinian rights—and a group of rabbis and Jewish voters called Nonnegotiable Michigan.
Throughout El-Sayed's primary and general election campaign, pro-Israel lawmakers and groups that back corporate Democrats have claimed his candidacy threatens Jewish people in Michigan; attacked him for campaigning with popular streamer Hasan Piker, a vehement critic of Israel; and accused him of not sufficiently denouncing terrorism.
On Friday, critics said Stevens was renewing attacks that she had waged during the primary, when El-Sayed denounced the pro-Israel congresswomen for taking millions of dollars from the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC). The powerful lobby group and other outside groups poured at least $50 million into the Michigan primary race in an effort to boost Stevens. The congresswoman spent months attacking El-Sayed for campaigning with Piker.
Julian Andreone of Drop Site News suggested that judging from Stevens' statement just days before the crucial election in a swing state, "she wants him to lose because she is more subservient to her pro-Israel donors than she is loyal to her constituents and country."
"If a progressive candidate was actively trying to pin an establishment nominee days before the election the way Stevens is with Abdul right now, they’d be exiled from political life," he said.
The Michigan race could determine which party holds control of the Senate—and whether Democrats are able to rein in Trump in the last two years of his presidency.
At The Nation, Jeet Heer wrote that with Trump's approval rating at an historic low and Republicans tasked with convincing voters that the party is looking out for their interests—despite supporting an illegal, price-hiking war and healthcare cuts—Stevens had offered the GOP "one glimmer of hope" that corporate Democrats seem "addicted to self-sabotage."
"In Michigan, Democratic Senate nominee Abdul El-Sayed has been dogged by the sore-loser behavior of centrist Democrats who can’t abide the fact he won the primary," wrote Heer. "In particular, his defeated rival Haley Stevens keeps trying to extract political concessions from El-Sayed rather than letting him unite the party against Republican Mike Rogers."
Mehdi Hasan of Zeteo News emphasized that while the congresswoman was happy to condemn a fellow Democrat who "has nothing to do with an ad that isn’t racist," she has ignored "the endless actual racist abuse the candidate has had to endure."
"I have never seen so many Democrats attempt to ratfuck their own candidate in the final stretch of a campaign," said history professor Keith Orejel of Wilmington College. "Absolutely insanity."
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With Trump in Office, 'Corruption' Becomes Key Issue for Midterm Voters
Voters across party lines "rank government corruption among their top concerns, believe Trump puts his own interests ahead of the country, and connect his self-dealing directly to the costs hitting their budgets."
Oct 30, 2026
As US voters contend with an affordability crisis under President Donald Trump and a Congress controlled by his Republican Party, polling released Friday shows that with next week's midterm election looming and tens of millions casting their ballots early, many people are worried about not only the cost of living, but also government corruption.
Since Trump's first term, which concluded with his supporters storming the US Capitol after he failed to cling to power in the 2020 election, he has been condemned as the "most corrupt president in our lifetimes" and "most dangerous criminal in US history."
Trump won the 2024 election after not only campaigning on a slew of right-wing policies but also making clear that he would serve the interests of the climate-wrecking fossil fuel industry and Big Tech. For his latest inauguration, the president surrounded himself with some of the richest people on the planet—the event was dubbed "a coronation of our country's descent into oligarchy."
The president has spent the past two years enriching himself—annual disclosures from July show he pocketed at least $2.2 billion during his first year back in the White House—as well as relatives and rich allies, including by waging an illegal war on Iran that has boosted the profits of fossil fuel companies, in which he's invested, while everyday Americans feel the pain at the pump.
According to the new Harris poll, conducted for The Guardian October 22-24, "The rising cost of living is still expected to drive the election, with 36% of voters saying it is the single most important issue to how they plan to vote in the midterms."
However, it is followed by government corruption, at 12%. After that are immigration (9%), healthcare (7%), and taxes (5%).
Democrats running for office this cycle have focused heavily on affordability as they try to win majorities in Congress, but they've also pledged that if they succeed, they'll "hold the crooks accountable," and even teased possible impeachments.
However, the new polling shows that it's not just Democratic voters who are concerned about corruption. The newspaper reported:
Nearly nine out of 10 Americans said that government corruption... defined as elected officials putting their own or their donors' financial interests ahead of the public's, is a problem, according to the survey.
Three-quarters (76%) of voters said that elected officials care more about enriching themselves than improving the economy for ordinary people. Voters were more likely to say that government corruption (65%) is more concerning than corporate power (29%). Just under 10% said that neither concerns them.
The Harris poll is not an outlier. The Not Above the Law coalition—made up of more than 150 organizations focused on protecting democracy and fighting for the rule of law—noted Friday that "voters rank government corruption among their top concerns, believe Trump puts his own interests ahead of the country, and connect his self-dealing directly to the costs hitting their budgets. That alarm crosses party lines, with Republicans, independents, and even Trump's own voters rejecting this administration’s corruption."
The coalition highlighted various recent surveys in a statement:
- Corruption tops the list, alongside grocery prices. In the CNBC All-America Economic Survey (October 14-18), 36% of registered voters named government corruption as their top issue, narrowly ahead of food costs at 34%, with protecting democracy and gas prices each at 23%.
- Six in 10 voters are extremely concerned. The Fox News Poll (October 9-12) found government corruption led all voter concerns, with 60% extremely concerned, ahead of inflation (58%) and gas prices (50%).
- Perceived corruption is at a record high. According to Gallup (May 1-June 10), a record 89% of Americans say government corruption is widespread, the highest level in 20 years and a 10-point jump from last year.
There was also a Financial Times/Focaldata poll from October 16-18, which found that 69% of US voters are concerned about corruption, self-dealing, or conflicts of interest in the current administration.
"When a family reads a story about presidential crypto profits at the same time as they are deciding whether they should put off their expensive doctor's appointment, they see that the system is working for someone—just not for them," Columbia Business School professor Jeremy Ney told the Financial Times.
"Voters can tolerate some economic pain, as long as they believe it is shared," added the professor. "But when that pain only flows in one direction, discontent boils to the surface."
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Stephen Miller, Who Wants Immigrants Deported Over Paperwork, Has 'Glaring Inconsistencies' in His Disclosures
"This administration has demonstrated an objective to scrutinize alleged errors in other people’s paperwork, with very serious consequences. If that is the standard set by the White House, then the rules should apply equally to everyone."
Oct 30, 2026
Stephen Miller, a chief architect of President Donald Trump's lawless and cruel mass deportation campaign, is facing scrutiny from a leading watchdog organization over apparent discrepancies in his financial disclosures—the kinds of paperwork errors that the White House has used to target immigrants and political opponents.
An analysis published Friday by Public Citizen identifies a number of "glaring inconsistencies" in Miller's disclosures related to his reported stock sales, his children's custodial investment accounts, and his wife's tax-advantaged retirement account.
“Stephen Miller is neither above the law nor the rules, and conflict of interest standards are not optional," said Public Citizen co-president Lisa Gilbert. "This administration has demonstrated an objective to scrutinize alleged errors in other people’s paperwork, with very serious consequences. If that is the standard set by the White House, then the rules should apply equally to everyone. Stephen Miller included. The American people deserve an answer on why these inconsistencies are present, as well as corrections and consequences.”
Public Citizen opens its new report by noting that the Trump administration recently raided the home of US Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) as part of an investigation into decades-old immigration paperwork filed by her father. In March, Vice President JD Vance said publicly that he and Miller discussed how to "go after" Omar, claiming without evidence that she committed immigration fraud.
"Miller—who wrote in 2023 that the 'denaturalization project' begun under Trump, which can strip Americans of citizenship over misstatements on their immigration paperwork, would be 'turbocharged' in 2025—ironically appears to have filed inaccurate disclosures of his own," Public Citizen wrote after comparing certificates of divestiture that the Office of Government Ethics (OGE) issued to Miller's family with the White House official's disclosure filings.
The group's investigation, which it provided to OGE, found that in at least 10 of the 27 stock sales listed on Miller’s August 29, 2025 transaction report, "the reported proceeds are too low to match the shares listed on the certificates of divestiture at any price those stocks traded on August 14, the day of the sales."
"The largest gap is MP Materials: 3,000 shares were worth at least $223,000 that day but were reported as just the $50,000 to $100,000 range," the watchdog said, noting that the Pentagon "became the company’s largest shareholder five weeks before the sale."
As for the custodial accounts of Miller's three children, Public Citizen found that the accounts were worth roughly $1.4 million total on August 14, 2025.
"By the end of 2025, according to Miller’s annual report, each account held just $1,000 to $15,000 in cash, plus, in one account, Spotify shares it already owned," the group said. "None of the other investments appear, and the report does not explain where the money went."
Public Citizen also identified "holdings that disappeared with no reported sale," pointing to the Individual Retirement Account (IRA) of Miller's wife, Katie.
The group wrote:
On Miller’s March 2025 disclosure, Katie Miller’s IRA held shares of Arm Holdings, Spotify, Alphabet, Viking Therapeutics, MP Materials, Apple and Amazon, reported at a combined $21,000 to $140,000, as well as $1,000 to $15,000 in cash. On Miller’s annual report for 2025, the IRA is still listed, but it holds just $2,000 to $30,000 in Spotify shares and $1,000 to $15,000 in cash.
Miller’s only transaction report for the year lists no sales of Alphabet, Viking Therapeutics or Apple at all, and its sales of Arm, Amazon and MP Materials match the shares on the certificates of divestiture, which do not include the IRA. Public Citizen found no transaction report showing any additional sales.
"It is unclear whether the discrepancies in Miller’s paperwork are due to sloppiness, bureaucratic error or another explanation," said Public Citizen. "What is clear is that the Trump administration has used alleged errors or inconsistencies in official paperwork to justify criminal investigations and prosecutions against perceived political enemies, immigrants, and others."
"Nobody is asking for federal agents to search Miller’s home," the group added. "But Public Citizen is asking OGE to review Miller’s filings, require him to explain the discrepancies, and make sure his financial holdings are dutifully reported."
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UN Rights Office Says Gaza Expulsion 'Nightmare' Worsens as Israel Expands Occupation
“Those displaced before the announcement of a ceasefire have little to no prospect of return to the areas they fled."
Oct 30, 2026
Israel's expanding military occupation of Gaza is accelerating the forced displacement of Palestinians, with the United Nations human rights office warning Friday that an already catastrophic humanitarian situation is further deteriorating as Israeli forces seize more territory and squeeze Gaza's population into an ever-shrinking area.
"Concerns of ethnic cleansing in Gaza endure as Israeli forces continue to push Palestinians into an ever-smaller fraction of the territory, causing recurrent displacement while destroying the remaining civilian infrastructure and attacking displacement sites," the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) said in a new report.
The publication details the displacement crisis as a worsening "nightmare," documenting how Israel's expanding control, military operations, and restrictions on Palestinian movement are undermining any prospect of a return home for hundreds of thousands of people uprooted during the genocidal assault on the territory, now in its fourth year.
"Palestinians in Gaza are surrounded by Israeli forces from all sides that continue to push them inwards with the stated aim of increasing the Israeli military deployment area to 70% of Gaza’s territory," the report continues.
"The relentless contraction of space available to civilians comes with new displacement drivers in areas adjacent to Israeli forces’ deployment lines, commonly known as the 'yellow line,'" OHCHR added.
According to OHCHR:
Over the past two weeks, the UN Human Rights Office... has documented the westward expansion of Israeli military deployment areas triggering new displacement of Palestinians in Al-Shujaiyeh, Gaza City, and in eastern Al-Bureij, eastern Deir-al-Balah, and eastern Al-Maghazi, Middle Gaza. In Al-Shujaiyeh, Israeli forces’ westward push came with at least two Israeli attacks reported on displacement encampments, and detonations of the few buildings left standing in the area, with the reported use of explosive robots.
According to reports... an Israeli drone dropped munitions on tents sheltering displaced families at Al-Shujaiyeh junction near the so-called yellow line on October 25, setting tents on fire... The Palestinian Ministry of Public Works and Housing in Gaza said the fire displaced 200 families comprising 800 people, most of them women, children, and elderly persons.
All told, nearly 2 million Palestinians have been forcibly displaced during Israel's genocidal retaliation for the Hamas-led attack of October 7, 2023—most of them multiple times.
“The nightmare of displacement in Gaza is both acute and chronic,” Ajith Sunghay, who heads OHCHR's Palestine division. “Those displaced before the announcement of a ceasefire have little to no prospect of return to the areas they fled, most of which are inaccessible because they fall beyond the so-called yellow line. And they continue to be displaced again and again.”
That's apparently Israel's plan. Israeli authorities have stated that they intend to expand their military deployment to encompass 70% of Gaza's territory. To keep Gazans from returning home, Israeli forces have apparently been treating the area beyond the yellow line as a "kill zone," shooting any man, woman, or child who crosses the invisible boundary.
A United Nations-mandated commission of inquiry on Monday issued a report accusing Israel of crimes against humanity in the occupied Palestinian territories—including extermination, rape, and torture—while also affirming that Israel’s genocide continues in Gaza, despite the nominal yearlong ceasefire.
“There must be an end to this suffering," Sunghay stressed Friday. "This is the fourth year of displacement for most Palestinians in Gaza, the fourth winter in tents too flimsy to withstand the rain, and they are still under fire through it all. Let this be the last.”
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Stephen Miller’s Financial Disclosures Show Several Glaring Inconsistencies
Oct 30 2026 · 10:40am EDT
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