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In a perhaps unprecedented dark time for America and the world, let us take solace in our indomitable Dear Stable Genius, who remains unwaveringly focused on taking care of shiny business: Gold social security cards like Elvis, a $400 million, lopsided shed/ballroom with gaudy columns but no main entrance, and of course gold toilets - which all keeps him so busy he hardly has time to threaten Iran with war crimes. What a time to be alive, barely.
In actual good news, No Kings Day 3.0 drew between 8 and 12 million people, thus hovering tantalizingly close to the 3.5% of a nation's populace historically required to overthrow an authoritarian regime. So good work, patriots. The over 3,000 protests, aka per Mike Johnson "Hate America rallies," ranged from Alaska's Utqiaġvik, the country's northernmost city (7 people) to Ele'ele, Kaua'i, the westernmost, from over 100,000 in New York City to nine stalwarts on Maine's Monhegan Island. Thousands of Trump's neighbors in Palm Beach turned out, ending with a twilight march to Mar-A-Lago, or as close as they could get.
Their signs were brutal: "Elect A Rapist, Expect To Get Fucked. How Many Deaths For the Epstein War? Worst President Since Trump. Criminals Belong Behind Bars, Free Balls for Members of Congress Who Lost Them, Trump Rapes Kids, Impeach Pedolf Shitler, Putin's Bitch, The Smallest Man Who Ever Lived. According to The Borowitz Report, Trump, furious about the large protests, argued they'd be much smaller if you subtract all Elon Musk's kids there because they hate him: "People are saying their number (was) much higher than 400, thousands, maybe millions. You take away Elon’s kids and almost no one was there."
There were also "half-dozens to dozens of Americans" at One King co unter-protests, reports The Fucking News, who put the number at "many-ish...Organizers say there were barely any organizers," with attendees ranging from "a tiny number of young people to a die-hard faction of dying people." In Palm Beach, one man carried a heavy sign that read, "Deport the white liberals"; masked to protect himself "against the vindictive left," he said he left soon after he was "attacked" by a woman who denied touching him; her comrades said the guy just dropped his sign "because he was too weak to carry it."
Their small numbers did face competition from "the incredible shrinking CPAC," also meeting that day in Grapevine, Texas with a turnout of "barely thousands." Once a MAGA "center of political gravity," this year's event drew neither Trumps nor presidential candidates. One possible ick factor: MC was (still) CPAC chair Matt Schlapp, who in 2024 settled a pricey sexual misconduct lawsuit from a guy working on Hershel Walker’s (LOL) Senate campaign, who charged Schlapp groped him. The event did boast Todd Chrisley, a reality TV star doing 12 years in prison for massive fraud till Trump pardoned him. Here’s his welcome.
There was also a big contingent of South Korean “stop the steal” activists and supporters of former president Yoon Suk Yeol, impeached last year and now serving life in prison for insurrection. Still, the whole thing was a bit of a slog. Organizers tried to jazz up session subjects - a panel titled "Fraud" became “Ilhan Omar ‘Family’ Values"; Mercedes Schlapp beseeched factions not to "divide from within," which is how you divide; and when Schlapp asked them, the clueless CPAC "crowdette" mistakenly, hilariously cheered the prospect of impeachment proceedings by what could be a newly-Democratic-controlled House. SAD!
- YouTube www.youtube.com
Poor deplorable MAGA. Maybe they're disheartened by Trump's well-deserved plunging approval rating, now at barely 33%. Maybe it's because their regime is such a half-assed shitshow and their people are such self-serving, hypocritical dickwads. As in: Amidst a government shutdown that's seen TSA agents (starting salary $34,454) compelled to work without pay as Congress takes a two-week recess (pay over $170,000) on the taxpayers' dime, TMZ urged readers to send in photos of vacationing pols, and here comes Lindsey Graham at Disney World, “The Most Magical Place On Earth," gaily twirling a Little Mermaid bubble wand yet. America and Megyn Kelly: WTF.
Or maybe it's because Commander-In-Chief Private Bonespurs started another forever quagmire without legal or political justification, and it turns out wars in the Middle East are hard and complex and above his pay grade - like health care! - to solve, and now with no good options he's spewing up only staggering incoherence for strategy, like hailing "great progress" in imaginary "serious discussions" while pivoting to rabidly threatening to "conclude our lovely 'stay’ in Iran" by "obliterating" their civilian infrastructure, electricity, energy and drinking water, which is a war crime. But talks are going “unbelievably well."

Anyway, his true passion is turning every crass, stupid thing he or Elvis can think of fake gold like the Oval bordello and even Social Security cards, and slathering his repulsive name on structures, coins, currency, and building trashy, illegal monuments to himself like an obscene, unapproved, un-permitted, $400 million ballroom twice the size of the White House, because, "They’ve always wanted a ballroom," except now it's suddenly, "essentially a shed for what goes under it," a massive military complex, presumably a bunker where, as merciful history would have it, he'll finally free us of him, "and we're doing it very well."
He's so ballroom-enraptured that on Air Force One he just pulled out a swath of drawings to show reporters, explaining, "I thought I’d do this now because it’s easier. I’m so busy...fighting wars and other things." Quick mindless pivot to "hand-carved, beautiful, Corinthian columns" - "Corinthian wut" - he's also reportedly re-imagining for the White House facade, a change deemed "at odds with universally held historic preservation standards." Same, experts say of "barely scrutinized" ballroom plans, "riddled with design flaws" - disproportionate, pillars block windows, grand staircase to nowhere. WH lackey on "the best builder in the world": "The American people can rest well knowing this project is in his hands.” We feel better already.

And then there's his new gold toilet, mounted on a 10-foot throne near the Lincoln Memorial. The new masterwork of Secret Handshake (Best Friends Forever), it celebrates the renovation of the White House Lincoln Bedroom bathroom, all in gold, and "what this President has actually accomplished." The toilet's plaque reads, “In a time of unprecedented division, escalating conflict, and economic turmoil, President Trump focused on what truly mattered: remodeling the Lincoln Bathroom....This, his crowning achievement, is a bold reminder that (he) isn’t just a businessman, he’s taking care of business. It stands as a tribute to an unwavering visionary who looked down, saw a problem, and painted it gold.”

Spring has not yet even begun, but as science journalist Rebecca Boyle wrote Thursday for The Atlantic, "it feels like we skipped right to summer" across the Western United States, which is facing record temperatures this week.
As of Monday, 39 million people across California, Nevada, and Arizona were under heat alerts. Temperatures in Los Angeles are reaching "25-35 degrees above normal," records are being "rewritten" in Las Vegas, and Phoenix is facing temperatures of 105°F two months earlier than usual, according to warnings issued by the National Weather Service (NWS) this week.
"This is not normal. Or at least it wasn’t normal in the past," said Boyle, who explained that it was the result of hot air being trapped by "a bizarrely strong ridge of high pressure in Earth’s atmosphere," the kind that would be uncommonly strong even in the summer.
Citing a model created by the nonprofit group Climate Central, she said that human-caused climate change had made these extreme temperatures five times more likely.
The NWS warned that a heatwave in March is "very dangerous, particularly for those not acclimated to the heat and/or traveling from cooler climates.”
Counts by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) show that 1,600-2,400 Americans die each year from heat-related causes, and they've more than doubled since 1999.
Meanwhile, a report from the Federation of American Scientists last year found that "the combined effects of extreme heat cost [the US] over $162 billion in 2024—equivalent to nearly 1% of the US GDP."
The Western United States has recently experienced its warmest winter on in recorded history, leading to a record snow drought. Scientists say this has depleted water supplies and will make the region more vulnerable to wildfires and drought later this year.
Climate scientist Daniel Swain told ABC News 10 of Northern California that this is only the beginning of how the climate crisis will impact the state in the coming decades.
"The hottest hots are already getting hotter, and they will continue to get hotter. We haven't seen the hottest temperatures that we're going to see in the next 20 or 30 years," Swain said. "We'll see an increasing number of years with severe wildfire conditions... We will also see increased risk of major flood events, either as snowmelt becomes more rapid in the spring or as winter storms drop even more rainfall more quickly."
The consumer advocacy group Public Citizen said heatwaves like this one are unfolding "just as Big Oil predicted."
"A relatively small number of major fossil fuel companies are responsible for the majority of all greenhouse gas emissions generated by humanity. Just 100 companies are responsible for 71% of all global greenhouse gas emissions generated since 1854, and just 57 companies are responsible for 80% of the emissions generated since 2016," explained a report published by the group Thursday.
"These companies didn’t just contribute to this heatwave—they did so knowingly," the report said. "For decades, Big Oil companies were internally forecasting exactly these kinds of climate disasters."
However, the report explains, the industry "developed and orchestrated a multidecade, coordinated campaign to defraud the public about the dangers of climate change, and blocked solutions that could have prevented these disasters."
A study published earlier this month by Geophysical Research Letters showed that as more carbon has been pumped into the atmosphere over the past 10 years, the rate at which the climate is warming has doubled.
Following this trend, it may be as soon as 2030 that the globe surpasses 1.5°C above preindustrial averages, at which point many climate risks, such as heatwaves, biodiversity loss, and food insecurity, are expected to be dramatically amplified, according to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
"Big Oil companies have, indeed, cost this country and the world," Public Citizen said. "Extreme heatwaves like the one impacting the Western US this month are one of the catastrophic disasters these companies predicted their conduct would bring about. They should be made to pay."
After axing a Biden-era student loan repayment program, the Trump administration is threatening to kick its millions of mostly low-income beneficiaries onto the government's most expensive plan unless they switch to a new one quickly.
The Washington Post reported on Friday that the Department of Education was beginning to email the more than 7 million people enrolled in the Saving on a Valuable Education (SAVE) program, telling them they needed to change their plan within the next 90 days.
Around 4.5 million of those borrowers earn incomes between 150% and 225%, allowing them to qualify for zero-dollar monthly payments under SAVE, which the Trump administration effectively killed in December after settling with Republican states who'd brought lawsuits against the program under former President Joe Biden.
Anonymous officials told The Post that those who do not switch plans within three months of receiving the email will automatically be re-enrolled in the Standard Plan. Unlike SAVE, which is income-based, the Standard plan has borrowers pay a fixed rate over 10 years.
Standard typically carries the highest monthly payments, and those transitioning to it from SAVE could pay more than $300 extra per month in some cases, with the poorest borrowers seeing the sharpest increases.
While 90 days may seem like plenty of time to switch to a less expensive repayment plan, it's not nearly that simple.
Due to the large exodus of borrowers, the Department of Education has struggled to process all the forms, processing only about 250,000 per month. Many borrowers who have tried to transition have found themselves waiting months for a reply.
To make matters more confusing, many of these borrowers will have to switch programs again soon, since all but one repayment program will be dissolved on July 1, 2028 as a result of last year's Republican budget law. The remaining plan will also be income-driven, though it is still expected to cost borrowers more each month.
According to a report released last month by the Century Foundation and Protect Borrowers, two groups that support loan forgiveness, nearly 9 million student loan borrowers are in default. During Trump's first year back in office, the student loan delinquency rate jumped from roughly zero to 25%, which it called "precedent-shattering."
"Much of the rise in delinquencies can be linked to the Trump administration’s actions aimed at increasing student loan payments," the report said. “The US Department of Education blocked borrowers from accessing more affordable payments through income-driven plans, having ordered a stoppage in application processing for three months and mass-denying 328,000 applications in August 2025. As of December 31, 2025, a warehouse’s worth of 734,000 applications sat unprocessed.”
Being in default has major ramifications for borrowers' finances. Those with delinquent loans saw their credit scores decrease by an average of 57 points during the first three quarters of 2025, dragging around 2 million of them into "subprime" territory, which forces them to pay thousands of dollars more for auto and personal loans and makes them more likely to have difficulty finding housing and employment.
The report estimated that if those booted from SAVE defaulted at the same rate as other borrowers, the number of student loan borrowers in distress could rise as high as 17 million.
According to Protect Borrowers, the typical family will pay more than $3,000 per year in additional costs as a result of the end of SAVE.
The end of SAVE comes as oil shocks caused by Trump's war in Iran have spiked gas prices and threaten to raise them throughout the economy, adding to the already elevated costs of food, housing, and transportation resulting from the president's aggressive tariff regime.
"In the middle of an affordability crisis driven by Donald Trump," said Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), "Trump is killing a plan that lowers student loan costs. It's shameful."
Millions of American across all 50 states on Saturday rallied against President Donald Trump and his authoritarian agenda during nationwide No Kings protests.
The flagship No Kings rally in Saint Paul, which organizers Indivisible estimated drew over 200,000 demonstrators, featured speeches from Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz and US Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), and actress Jane Fonda, as well as a special performance from rock icon Bruce Springsteen, who performed "Streets of Minneapolis," a song he wrote in tribute of slain protesters Renee Good and Alex Pretti.
Organizers called it "the largest single-day nationwide demonstrations in US history," with an estimate 8 million people coming out for events in communities and cities nationwide.
From major cities to rural towns that have never seen mobilizations like this before, protesters made clear that in America, we don’t do kings," the No Kings coalition said in a statement.
"This is what it looks like when a movement grows—not just in size, but in reach, in courage, and in more people who see themselves as part of this movement," the organizers said. "The American people are fed up with this administration’s power grabs, an illegal war that Congress and the public haven’t approved, and the continued attempts to stifle our freedoms. We’re not waiting for change; we’re making it."
The rally in Minneapolis was one of more than 3,300 No Kings events across the US and internationally, and aerial video footage showed massive crowds gathered for demonstrations in cities including Washington, DC, New York City, Boston, Philadelphia, Chicago, and San Diego.
Congratulations to all Americans who dared to take to the streets today and publicly expressed their stance and disagreement with the actions and policies of their president. #WeSayNoKings 👍👍👍 pic.twitter.com/f3UDpmsj3m
— Dominik Hasek (@hasek_dominik) March 28, 2026
In San Francisco, thousands of anti-Trump activists gathered on a local beach to form a human sign that read, "Trump must go now! No ICE, no wars, no lies, no kings."
WOW! Protesters in San Francisco, CA formed a MASSIVE human sign on Ocean Beach reading “Trump Must Go Now!” for No Kings Day (Video: Ryan Curry / S.F. Chronicle) pic.twitter.com/ItF7c7gvke
— Marco Foster (@MarcoFoster_) March 28, 2026
However, No Kings rallies weren't just held in major US cities. In a series of social media posts, Indivisible co-founder Leah Greenberg collected photos and videos of No Kings events in communities including Arvada, Colorado, Madison, New Jersey, and St. Augustine, Florida, as well as international No Kings events held in London and Madrid.
Attendance estimates for Saturday's No Kings protests were not available as of this writing. Polling analyst G. Elliott Morris estimated that the previous No Kings event, held in October, drew at least 5 million people nationwide, making it likely “the largest single-day political protest ever.”
This article has been updated to reflect that the flagship rally was held in Saint Paul, Minnesota.
Leading international human rights groups as well as organizations in Israel swiftly demanded the repeal of a law passed by the Israeli Knesset on Monday that makes death by hanging the default punishment for Palestinians convicted of deadly attacks on Israelis—a law that one group called "discriminatory by design."
Those were the words of the Association of Civil Rights in Israel, which petitioned the country's Supreme Court minutes after lawmakers passed an amendment to the federal penal law, "Death Penalty for Terrorists," in a vote of 62-48.
The group called on the high court to challenge the new law and said the far-right government had passed it "without legal authority" over Palestinians in the West Bank, which Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government aimed to illegally annex to Israel.
The Association of Civil Rights was joined by groups including Amnesty International, which has spoken out forcefully against the legislation in recent months, in demanding the death penalty law be repealed.
Amnesty said that under the new policy, Israel—which has vehemently rejected accusations of imposing apartheid policies on Palestinians—"explicitly creates two legal frameworks for the use of the death penalty in the occupied West Bank... and in Israel."
The law also does not allow for any pardons for those sentenced to death, making it "one of the world’s most extreme death penalty laws," said Amnesty.
The new law demands that Palestinians be put to death by hanging if convicted of nationalistic killings in a military court, and gives Israeli courts the option of sentencing Israeli citizens to capital punishment if they're convicted of similar crimes.
But Amichai Cohen, a senior fellow at the Israel Democracy Institute’s Center for Democratic Values and Institutions, told The Associated Press that only Palestinians will ultimately be killed under the law.
“It will apply in Israeli courts, but only to terrorist activities that are motivated by the wish to undermine the existence of Israel," Cohen told the AP. "That means Jews will not be indicted under this law."
Erika Guevara-Rosas, Amnesty International’s senior director of research, advocacy, policy, and campaigns, noted that Israeli military courts "have a conviction rate of over 99% for Palestinian defendants and... are notorious for disregarding due process and fair trial safeguards."
"Israel is brazenly granting itself carte blanche to execute Palestinians while stripping away the most basic fair-trial safeguards,” said Guevara-Rosas.
She added that the law was passed weeks after the Israeli military attorney general dropped all charges against five Israel Defense Forces soldiers accused of raping a Palestinian prisoner—"a decision celebrated by the prime minister and several ministers."
“It speaks volumes to the extent of Israel’s dehumanization of Palestinians that this law has passed" after those charges were dropped, said Guevara-Rosas. "For years, we have seen an alarming pattern of apparent extrajudicial executions and other unlawful killings of Palestinians—with the perpetrators also enjoying near-total impunity. This new law which allows for state-sanctioned executions is a culmination of such policies.”
Celebrations were seen among Netanyahu's top ministers once again on Monday, with National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir—whose Otzma Yehudit Party initially introduced the amendment—seen clutching a bottle of champagne after the passage was announced.
Historian Assal Rad noted that much of the international coverage of the bill's passage has used "procedural language to sanitize the story and make it sound legitimate."
The law, however, "is just another way for Israel to kill Palestinians," she said.
The Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor warned that "the most dangerous aspect of the new law lies in its application within a judicial system that lacks any guarantees of a fair trial for Palestinians."
"Confessions are often obtained under duress, access to effective legal representation is severely limited, the presumption of innocence is routinely ignored, and there are major restrictions on appeals or access to documents essential for the defense," said the group.
"Combined with a lack of judicial independence and integrity in proceedings, applying the death penalty in this context cannot be considered a legitimate judicial measure," the organization added. "Instead, it constitutes an arbitrary deprivation of life, in direct violation of fundamental principles of international human rights law."
The Trump administration's most recent attack on a boat in the Caribbean, which killed four people last week, "highlights a sustained pattern of unlawful use of lethal force outside any context of armed conflict, amounting to extrajudicial executions," Human Rights Watch said on Tuesday.
The US military announced last Wednesday that it had conducted its 47th attack on boats in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific. The Trump administration has presented little evidence for its claim that the targeted boats have been engaged in trafficking drugs to the United States. At least 163 people have been killed in these attacks since September 2025, all of them without trial.
Human Rights Watch is part of a chorus of international organizations and observers that have condemned the boat bombing campaign as acts of murder in flagrant violation of international law.
“These strikes aren’t one-off incidents, they’re part of a pattern of using military force where the law does not permit it, over and over again,” said Sarah Yager, Washington director at Human Rights Watch. “The fact that these strikes have faded from public attention does not make these violations any less grave or unlawful.”
The organization noted that there is no ongoing military conflict in the Caribbean or eastern Pacific that would make those traveling by boat legitimate targets.
And while the US government has provided scant evidence that those it has killed were trafficking drugs, Human Rights Watch said that even if evidence of drug trafficking existed, suspected criminals are still not lawful targets of lethal force unless they pose an imminent threat to the lives of others.
The boat strikes have continued in the background as President Donald Trump has launched attacks against Venezuela and Iran, both of which international organizations have described as acts of aggression that violate the laws of war.
Trump has also enacted a crippling economic blockade of Cuba with the explicit goal of toppling its government so the US can "take" the island, and has previously threatened to use economic leverage or the US military to forcibly annex Greenland.
“When unlawful force is repeated over time, it risks becoming normalized,” Yager said. “That’s dangerous because it opens the door to using lethal force whenever and wherever a government wishes and without constraints.”
“The Trump administration knowingly and unlawfully locked up an innocent person for four months in a concentration camp-like prison," said one attorney for the plaintiff.
A Utah law firm said Tuesday that it plans to sue the US government for its allegedly unlawful detention and deportation of a Venezuelan immigrant who was sent to a maximum security prison in El Salvador known for its torture and abuse of inmates.
“Our client is a young Venezuelan man who came into the US legally to escape threats of violence by the Venezuelan government against his family for their opposition to the Maduro regime," said Brent Ward, an attorney at Parker & McConkie, referring to Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, who was kidnapped by US forces during a January invasion of his country.
Ward said that the client—identified by the pseudonym "Johnny Hernandez"—is seeking $56 million in damages and "has no criminal record either in the US or in Venezuela."
A man entered the U.S. legally, had no criminal record, and was still sent to one of the world's most dangerous prisons for four months. Parker & McConkie is pursuing $56 million in justice on his behalf.www.parkerandmcconkie.com/blog/parker-...#CivilRights #JusticeForJohnny #Immigration #CECOT
[image or embed]
— Parker & McConkie | Personal Injury Law (@parkermcconkie.bsky.social) March 31, 2026 at 2:40 PM
Hernandez was arrested by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers and subsequently deported to the Terrorism Confinement Center (CECOT) in Tecoluca, central El Salvador, where he allegedly suffered torture and other abuse.
“The Trump administration knowingly and unlawfully locked up an innocent person for four months in a concentration camp-like prison where he suffered torture, shooting, beatings, and solitary confinement," Ward stated. "When the US government knowingly and purposefully violates the law by detaining and deporting innocent individuals on false charges and is not held responsible, the individual rights of not just legal immigrants but all Americans are placed in jeopardy."
"Our client suffered catastrophic injuries in CECOT from which he will never fully recover," the lawyer said. "Failing to demand accountability now places all Americans in jeopardy in the future.”
The impending lawsuit comes as ICE proposes to literally warehouse up to 10,000 arrested immigrants in a "megacenter" in Salt Lake City, Utah. Opponents have compared the 833,000-square foot facility to a concentration camp akin to the Topaz War Relocation Center, a harsh, desolate desert prison where Japanese Americans and Japanese people living in the Western US were forcibly interned during World War II.
The case also follows last week's filing of a lawsuit by Neiyerver Adrián León Rengel, one of the Venezuelans sent to CECOT. Like Hernandez, León Rengel—who is seeking $1.3 million in damages—was in the US legally when he was arrested by federal immigration authorities.
Human Rights Watch (HRW) recently said on the one-year anniversary of President Donald Trump’s mass deportation of Salvadorans, Venezuelans, and others that, of the 9,000 Salvadorans expelled from the US since the beginning of last year, “only 10.5% had a conviction in the United States for a violent or potentially violent crime.”
The Salvadoran investigative journalism outlet El Faro—which, along with its staff, has been the target of sweeping government persecution—last year published a report on CECOT, citing one former prisoner who said that inmates are “committing suicide out of desperation.”
At least one deported Salvadoran—longtime Maryland resident Kilmar Ábrego García—was wrongfully expelled due to what the Trump administration called an “administrative error.”
The Trump administration deported hundreds of Venezuelans to CECOT under a multimillion-dollar agreement between the Trump administration and the government of Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele.
While Trump claimed—often without evidence—that the Venezuelan deportees were members of the Tren de Aragua gang, only about 3% of them had violent criminal convictions in the United States, and Department of Homeland Security records show that the Trump administration knew it.
In July 2025, El Salvador released 252 Venezuelans imprisoned at CECOT and sent them to Venezuela in a prisoner swap that saw Maduro's government free 10 US citizens and permanent residents whom it jailed. Many of the repatriated Venezuelans said they suffered torture, sexual assault, severe beatings, and other abuse at CECOT.
Last December, Judge James Boasberg of the US District Court for the District of Columbia ruled that the Trump administration broke the law by deporting the Venezuelans without due process.
"This executive order is a blatant, unconstitutional abuse of power," said Sen. Alex Padilla. "Make no mistake: Trump's attacks on our elections are a clear and present threat to our democracy."
Just days after the GOP-controlled Senate skipped town once they failed to send a voter suppression bill to President Donald Trump's desk, the Republican on Tuesday signed an executive order to create a nationwide list of US voters and crack down on voting by mail—which is how he voted in Florida's most recent election.
The order, Ensuring Citizenship Verification and Integrity in Federal Elections, was first reported by the Daily Caller, a right-wing outlet. It requires the secretary of homeland security to establish a "citizenship list" of verified eligible voters in each state, using Social Security Administration records and other federal databases.
Trump—who has repeatedly spread lies about election fraud, including his unfounded claim that Democrats stole the 2020 election from him, which led to his supporters storming the Capitol on January 6, 2021—also directed the postmaster general to craft rules for absentee ballots sent through the US Postal Service.
Legal experts expect the order will be swiftly challenged in court as unconstitutional. David Becker, a former US Department of Justice lawyer who now leads the Center for Election Innovation and Research, told Democracy Docket that "it's obvious the president didn't learn anything from his first failed executive order."
"This is unconstitutional on its face. The Constitution clearly gives the president no power over elections," he said. "I expect that this will be blocked by multiple federal courts in a very short period of time and have no legal effect whatsoever."
Becker also noted that "after the Department of Justice has been telling courts they're not creating a national voter list, this appears to confirm exactly what courts were concerned about."
Marc Elias, founder of Democracy Docket and a longtime election lawyer for Democrats, similarly said that "this is a massive and unconstitutional voter suppression effort aimed at giving Trump the power to create a list of who is allowed to vote by mail."
"We know where this will go—the targeting of Democrats for mass disenfranchisement," he added. "We will sue and we will win."
US Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) shared a message for the administration on social media: "See you in court. You will lose."
Sen. Alex Padilla (D-Calif.), ranking member of the Senate Committee on Rules and Administration and California's former secretary of state, said in a statement that "instead of focusing on lowering the cost of energy, groceries, and healthcare, Donald Trump is desperately attempting to take over and rig our elections and avoid accountability in November."
The order was issued just over seven months away from the midterm elections that could hand control of Congress back to the Democrats—which could, in term, lead to a historic third impeachment for Trump.
"This executive order is a blatant, unconstitutional abuse of power," Padilla declared. "The president and the Department of Homeland Security have no authority to commandeer federal elections or direct the independent Postal Service to undermine mail and absentee voting that nearly 50 million Americans relied on in 2024. A decade of lies about election fraud does not change the Constitution."
"Make no mistake: Trump's attacks on our elections are a clear and present threat to our democracy. In the middle of an unauthorized war abroad and an escalating authoritarian crackdown by ICE here at home, Trump is attempting another illegal power grab," he added, referring to Immigration and Customs Enforcement. "I will use every tool I can to stop him, and I expect immediate legal challenges in order to protect our free and fair elections."
After signing the order, Trump signaled that he, too, expects a court battle. While holding up the order, he said that "I don't know how it can be challenged," but critics will "probably challenge it" and "find a rogue judge."
There are "a lot of rogue judges. Very bad, bad people. Very bad judges," he added. "But that's the only way that can be changed, and hopefully we'll win on appeal if it is. But I don't see how anybody can challenge it."
Trump signed the order after unsuccessfully trying to convince the GOP-controlled Senate to pass the SAVE America Act—already approved by Republicans in the House of Representatives—before the current recess.
The bill would require US voters to provide proof of citizenship when registering to vote and to show photo identification to participate in federal elections. Trump has been pushing for amendments to restrict mail-in voting as well as more attacks on transgender Americans.
While Trump and other supporters of the bill have claimed it is needed to stop noncitizens from voting, that is already illegal and, according to research, incredibly rare. Critics warn that the SAVE America Act would disenfranchise eligible voters who don't have access to citizenship documents, including people who have lost paperwork, can't afford replacements, or have changed their names.
UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk said the new law "raises serious concerns about due process violations, is deeply discriminatory, and must be promptly repealed.”
The top United Nations human rights official was among those who on Tuesday urged Israel to repeal legislation it passed the previous day legalizing the hanging of Palestinians convicted of terrorism-related killing of Israelis—a law critics contend will not apply to Israelis who commit similar crimes.
The law passed by the Israeli Knesset states that Palestinians must be hanged within 90 days if convicted of nationalistic killings in a military court. While the legislation does not allow pardons, it gives judges discretionary power when it comes to sentencing Israeli citizens convicted of similar crimes, and observers say it's highly unlikely that any Israeli would ever be hanged under the law.
Experts argue the 90-day provision and lack of appellate process are violations of international humanitarian law.
“It is deeply disappointing that this bill has been approved by the Knesset,” UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk said Tuesday. “It is patently inconsistent with Israel’s international law obligations, including in relation to the right to life. It raises serious concerns about due process violations, is deeply discriminatory, and must be promptly repealed.”
“The death penalty is profoundly difficult to reconcile with human dignity, and it raises the unacceptable risk of executing innocent people,” he added. “Its application in a discriminatory manner would constitute an additional, particularly egregious violation of international law. Its application to residents of the occupied Palestinian territory would constitute a war crime.”
While proponents of the law—some of whom, like Israeli National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, celebrated its passage—say they believe it will deter Palestinians from killing Israelis, studies in the United States, the only Western democracy that actively executes people, have repeatedly shown that the death penalty is not a deterrent to crime.
Palestinians and their defenders have also warned that the law could open the door to mass executions, including of anyone found to have killed Israelis during the October 7, 2023 Hamas-led attack, for which Israel retaliated with an ongoing assault and siege that has left more than 250,000 Palestinians dead, maimed, or missing.
“Trials for crimes related to October 7 are supremely important, but they must not be anchored in discrimination," said Türk. "All victims are entitled to equal protection of the law, and all perpetrators must be held accountable without discrimination.”
Other human rights defenders also condemned the new Israeli law and called for its repeal.
"The Israeli parliament's adoption of a racist law authorizing the hanging of Palestinian prisoners is the very definition of apartheid," the Washington, DC-based Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) said in a statement Tuesday. "Even the South African apartheid government never adopted a death penalty law so explicitly racist."
Taking aim at Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu—who is wanted by the International Criminal Court for alleged crimes against humanity and war crimes in Gaza—CAIR continued, "The Netanyahu regime is completely out of control because our nation continues to bankroll its crimes, from the de facto annexation of the West Bank to the genocide in Gaza, to the ethnic cleansing of southern Lebanon, to the occupation of Syria, to the illegal war with Iran that it triggered, to the closure of Christian and Muslim holy sites in Jerusalem."
“Congress is not just failing to act, it is actively advancing more military support while treating that US taxpayer funding as automatic, even as these abuses escalate," the group added. "Every member of Congress—especially Democratic leaders of the House and Senate—must condemn these crimes, including the racist execution law, and announce their opposition to any further military funding for the Israeli apartheid regime."
A 2024 ruling by the International Court of Justice in The Hague—where Israel is also facing a genocide case brought by South Africa in response to the US-backed war on Gaza—affirmed that the Israeli occupation of Palestine is an illegal form of apartheid that must be ended.
More than 9,500 Palestinians are currently locked up in Israeli prisons, including 350 children and 73 women, according to advocacy groups. Palestinian and Israeli human rights defenders say detainees face torture, starvation, and medical neglect behind bars, causing many deaths.
Former prisoners as well as Israeli staff and medical personnel say they have witnessed torture at prisons including Sde Teiman, the most infamous of Israel's lockups, with victims ranging from children to the elderly.
Israeli physicians who worked at Sde Teiman described widespread serious injuries caused by 24-hour shackling of hands and feet that sometimes required amputations. Palestinians taken by Israeli forces recounted rapes and sexually assaults by male and female soldiers, electrocution, maulings by dogs, denial of food and water, sleep deprivation, and other torture.