LIVE COVERAGE
A Petty, Vicious Wall Of Shame
The awful keeps spewing. The latest proof there is truly, repulsively no bottom: The most broken, powerful human being on the planet has added to his crappy, gaudy, reality-show "Presidential Walk of Fame" bronze plaques below the photos denoting a boorish, revisionist "history" of each president. Inevitably, he lobs the crudest insults at his direct predecessors - "divisive" Obama, "crooked" Biden - while praising his own supreme reign. America on the fucking, endless, childish ugly of it: "This is so exhausting."
As always, there are of course more substantive horrors underway. Pam Bondi has told the FBI to create a list of domestic terrorist groups - the non-existent Antifa and anyone else who espouses “radical gender ideology, anti-Americanism, anti-capitalism or anti-Christianity” - and establish a “cash reward system” to encourage them to snitch on each other. Because what climate change/it still snows doesn't it?, Trump is also dismantling Colorado's National Center for Atmospheric Research, home to the largest federal research lab on climate change and natural disasters.
In addition, because what science?, anti-vax crackpot RFK Jr's Health and Human Services (sic) Department has terminated seven multi-million-dollar grants to the American Academy of Pediatrics, which is now suing said crackpot for his COVID vaccine changes. The initiatives were aimed at reducing sudden infant death, improving adolescent health, preventing fetal alcohol syndrome, identifying autism early and other worthy goals; officials said they were cancelled because the group used "identity-based language," including "racial disparities" and "pregnant people." Really.
Finally, Pee Wee German Stephen Miller issued a fascist mission statement in support of our pointless, upcoming war against Venezulela, arguing the U.S. has long "operated as a 'reverse empire'" that enriched foreign nations and sacrificed our wealth and security while "all we got in return were migrants." "No more," he raves. "America's might will secure America's rights...For Americans, first and always." By which, many clarified, he means, "rich white people. Everyone else to the camps." Other comments: "Sounds like Chap. 15 in Mein Kampf," "Sounds better in the original German," and, "Miller is a grotesque, shrill, squirrel of a thing."
All of these efforts, lest we forget, have been undertaken to please a small, sick, empty shell of a man who Avatar director James Cameron calls "the most narcissistic asshole in history since fucking Nero." Now, in a particularly infuriating (for those of us who cherish facts) and petty move, he's now installed "a tantrum cast in bronze," a wall of grievance-oozing plaques added to the photos along his cheesy, race-to-the-bottom "Presidential Walk of Fame" outside the West Wing "as a tribute to past Presidents, good, bad and somewhere in the middle." And "as a student of history" (sic), Press Barbie hilariously brags, Trump himself authored "many of its eloquently written descriptions" - evidently what he's been doing when not golfing. One patriot: "Well done, dumbass."
They are, of course, crude, juvenile, self-serving garbage. Reagan's plaque boasts he was "a fan" of Trump. Bill Clinton's notes "his wife Hillary" lost to Trump. The plaque for "Barack Hussein Obama" acknowledges him as our first Black President before calling him "one of the most divisive political figures in American history." He allegedly "passed the highly ineffective Unaffordable Care Act," caused the spread of ISIS (no mention of W's contributions), weaponized federal bureaucracies against opponents, spied on Trump's 2016 campaign and created "the Russia Russia Russia hoax, the worst political scandal in American history." Sigh.
Biden, already trolled with the image of an autopen - the eloquent author is 12 - gets worse. "Sleepy Joe Biden was, by far, the worst President in American History." He "took office (in) the most corrupt Election ever seen" and "oversaw a series of unprecedented disasters that brought our nation to the brink of destruction" - pot/kettle - with high inflation, weaponized law enforcement, Green New Scam, "abolishing" the Southern Border, insane asylums, "Afghanistan Disaster." His "devastating weakness" made Russia invade Ukraine and Hamas attack Israel. He issued "blanket pardons to Radical Democrat thugs" and "the Biden crime family." Sigh redux.
But "despite it all" - trumpets please - the manchild king triumphed in a landslide to "SAVE AMERICA!" Now he's "delivered" on his promise to "usher in the Golden Age of America," and "THE BEST IS YET TO COME!" Some beg to differ. They suggest his plaque should read, "Pedophile, Narcissist, Rapist, and Convicted Felon." They marvel, "Damn, his dick really is that tiny." They exclaim, "This is insane," "What the actual fuck," "God I hate this man," "This is embarrassing," and, "I am at my wit's end." In all, notes Canadian pundit Dean Blundell, "The United States of America is going through some things right now."
More came In Wednesday night's "prime time unraveling." His racist, dementetd, drug-addled, "nothingburger" of a meltdown, in which "basically nothing he is saying is true," was brutally summarized as, "Old man yells at country," "WHAT THE FUCK WAS THAT?", his "Pettysburg Address," "a 19-minute nervous breakdown," his "Norma Desmond imitation," "what presidential panic looks like," "Stop talking about Epstein," "lie harder and louder," "the Worst Wing," "Nazis On Drugs,'" "authoritarian fantasy at its finest" - colossal invasion! drug prices down 600% in magic math! the first peace in the Middle East in 3,000 years!", "This wasn't confidence. This was agitation." From MAGA: "Why is he yelling at us?" "He's talking so fast he sounds panicked," "the most pointless presidential address (in) American history." From Newsom: 100 "Me Me Me Me Me's." From us: For God's and our sanity's sake, once and for all, fucking quiet Piggy.
'Good!' Declares AOC After Arizona City Council Rejects Data Center Pushed by Sinema
Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez was among those celebrating after the Chandler, Arizona City Council on Thursday night unanimously rejected an artificial intelligence data center project promoted by former US Sen. Kyrsten Sinema.
"Good!" Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) simply said on social media Friday.
The defeat of the proposed $2.5 billion project comes as hundreds of advocacy groups and progressive leaders, including US Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), are urging opponents of energy-sucking AI data centers across the United States to keep pressuring local, state, and federal leaders over climate, economic, environmental, and water concerns.
In Chandler, "the nearly 43,000-square-foot data center on the corner of Price and Dobson roads would have been the 11th data center in the Price Road Corridor, an area known for employers like Intel and Wells Fargo," the Arizona Republic reported.
The newspaper noted that around 300 people attended Thursday's meeting—many holding signs protesting the project—and city spokesperson Matthew Burdick said that the government received 256 comments opposing the data center.
Although Sinema skipped the debate on Thursday, the ex-senator—who frequently thwarted Democratic priorities on Capitol Hill and ultimately ditched the party before leaving office—previously attended a planning and zoning commission meeting in Chandler to push for the project. That stunt earned her the title of "cartoon villain."
Sinema critics again took aim at her after the 7-0 vote, saying that "she can't even be effective as a shill" and "Sinema went all in to lobby for a data center in Chandler, Arizona and the council told her to get rekt."
Progressive commentator Krystal Ball declared: "Kyrsten Sinema data center L. Love to see it."
Politico noted Friday that "several other Arizona cities, including Phoenix and Tucson, have written zoning rules for data centers or placed new requirements on the facilities. Local officials in cities in Oregon, Missouri, Virginia, Arizona, and Indiana have also rejected planned data centers."
Janos Marton, chief advocacy officer at Dream.Org, said: "Another big win in Arizona, following Tucson's rejection of a data center. When communities are organized they can fight back and win. Don't accept data centers that hide their impacts behind NDAs, drive up energy prices, and bring pollution to local neighborhoods."
When Sinema lobbied for the Chandler data center in October, she cited President Donald Trump's push for such projects.
"The AI Action Plan, set out by the Trump administration, says very clearly that we must continue to proliferate AI and AI data centers throughout the country," she said at the time. "So federal preemption is coming. Chandler right now has the opportunity to determine how and when these new, innovative AI data centers will be built."
Trump on Thursday signed an executive order (EO) intended to block states from enforcing their own AI regulations.
"I understand the president has issued an EO. I think that is yet to play itself out," Chandler Mayor Kevin Hartke reportedly said after the city vote. "Really, this is a land use question, not [about] policies related to data centers."
Warren Warns 'Trump Could Be Setting the Stage' for Next Financial Crash
President Donald Trump's administration "wants to turn the clock back to 2008 and let Wall Street run wild."
That's how US Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) responded on Wednesday to Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent's comments to Fox Business Network host Maria Bartiromo about the administration's deregulatory push.
Without naming it, Bessent took aim at the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, a 2010 law that Warren, then a longtime Harvard University professor, fought for in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis.
Recalling that era, Warren said: "We all know how that ended—with taxpayers bailing out Wall Street while millions lost their homes and got fired from their jobs. Donald Trump could be setting the stage for the next crash."
Warren was far from alone in calling out Bessent after journalist Aaron Rupar noted that during the Fox interview, the ex-hedge fund manager said: "I chair something called FSOC, the Financial Stability Oversight Council, and these 2008, 2009, 2010 financial rules were too tight. They have hamstrung the American financial system. It was time for a change. We're gonna be safe, smart, and sound in terms of our deregulation. But we have to take the financial system out of this straitjacket."
University of Michigan business law professor Jeremy Kress said: "Fact check: The decade following the Dodd-Frank Act marked the longest period of economic growth in US history. The main problem with the post-2008 reforms is that they did not do nearly enough to limit the nonbank risk-taking that Bessent and his allies have enabled."
Progressive political commentator and YouTuber Kyle Kulinski declared, "These people are hell-bent on creating a new Great Depression."
Dean Baker, senior economist at the Center for Economic and Policy Research, said, "Remember BLEAT: Bessent Lies about Everything All the Time."
The Fox appearance on Tuesday came after Bessent earlier this month announced an overhaul to the structure of FSOC—which was established by Dodd-Frank—and wrote in the introduction letter to the council's annual report that it "would shift its focus from 'prophylactic' regulatory and supervisory policies to an approach aimed at removing red tape in areas like artificial intelligence, in a bid to spur economic growth," as Politico summarized at the time.
As Politico also reported:
Markets groups and members of Congress expressed their concern over the changes. In a letter to Bessent... Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) expressed concern that the FSOC has met fewer times this year than in any past year of its existence and that the council is "sabotaging its own authorities." Dennis Kelleher, CEO of Better Markets, an advocacy group focused on regulation, stated that "undermining the FSOC is undermining the economy and the financial system."
Sharing the Politico report on social media earlier this month, Kress said that "this is a dereliction of duty by the Financial Stability Oversight Council. But if there is a silver lining, it is that the Trump administration now unequivocally owns whatever crisis lies ahead."
‘Feckless’ Ken Martin Rebuked Over DNC Decision to Bury Autopsy of 2024 Election Disaster
The Democratic National Committee on Thursday drew strong criticism when it was revealed that the party's autopsy of its failures in the 2024 presidential election would not be publicly released.
According to the New York Times, DNC Chairman Ken Martin has decided against releasing the report because he "believes that looking back so publicly and painfully at the past would prove counterproductive for the party as it tries next year to take back power in Congress."
The decision to keep a lid on the report, however, is already sparking a backlash.
The New Republic's Greg Sargent argued in a Thursday piece that the decision by the DNC to bury the report "should unleash harsh criticism and recriminations" because it "could end up protecting key actors inside the party from accountability over the blown but winnable contest."
Sargent then pointed the finger at Future Forward, a super PAC that he said has earned a reputation for blowing large sums of money on ineffective television ads.
"Well before Election Day, the PAC came under harsh criticism from some Democrats who argued that it hadn’t spent sufficient money earlier in the campaign on ads attacking Trump," Sargent wrote. "Other Democrats charged that Future Forward’s ad-testing model and addiction to traditional TV ads led to anodyne communications and that its flawed theory of politics caused it to refrain from sufficiently targeting Trump, letting him avoid blame for his first-term disasters on Covid-19 and the economy."
Jeff Hauser, founder and executive director of the Revolving Door Project, told Common Dreams that Martin's decision to bury the report was part of a broader pattern of a lack of accountability for US elites, an issue that he said is becoming more important" as America gets less and less equal."
"Ken Martin seems determined to become the Merrick Garland of DNC Chairs," added Hauser, "a feckless amiable sort unwilling to take on the powerful people who scream out for stringent accountability. Democrats ought to re-center their entire party around holding elites, be they from Big Tech, the Democratic Party establishment, Big Oil, or Trump's kleptocratic regime, accountable."
Rotimi Adeoye, a columnist for MS Now and former communications strategist for the American Civil Liberties Union, also accused party insiders of trying to protect elites at the expense of rebuilding public trust with voters.
"This is also happening as Congressional Dems sit at a -55 net approval," he argued on X. "If your numbers are that bad and your response is to bury the autopsy, you’re basically telling voters the insiders get protection while the base gets lectures."
Adeoye added that "you can’t run as the party of democracy and transparency and then stick your own election autopsy in a drawer," and said that "if the DNC thinks the report would 'hurt the party,' that means the problems are real and political, not analytical—and that’s exactly why people want to read it."
Journalist Yashar Ali, meanwhile, sent out a message on Bluesky encouraging DNC staffers who have access to the report to let him publish it.
"If you have access to this DNC report, please send it to me," he wrote. "I will protect your anonymity."
While the DNC isn't releasing its own report documenting party failures in 2024, the progressive advocacy group RootsAction last week published an autopsy written by journalist Christopher D. Cook, who argued that former Vice President Kamala Harris' campaign made a major mistake by trying to court so-called moderate Republican voters and corporate donors instead of focusing on the struggles of working-class Americans.
"This was a preventable disaster," Cook said, "but Harris and the Democratic Party leadership prioritized the agendas of corporate donors and gambled on a centrist path, while largely abandoning working-class, young, and progressive voters."
'Throwback to McCarthyism': Trump DOJ Moves to Treat Leftist Dissent as Criminal
The Trump administration is about to embark on a massive crackdown on what it describes as a scourge of rampant left-wing “terrorism.”
But the US Department of Justice (DOJ) memo ordering the crackdown has critics fearing it will go far beyond punishing those who plan criminal acts and will instead be used to criminalize anyone who expresses opposition to President Donald Trump and his agenda.
Earlier this month, independent journalist Ken Klippenstein reported that Attorney General Pam Bondi had sent out a memo ordering the FBI to “compile a list of groups or entities engaging in acts that may constitute domestic terrorism.”
As part of this effort, Bondi set Thursday as a deadline for all law enforcement agencies to "coordinate delivery" of intelligence files related to “antifa” or “antifa-related activities” to the FBI.
The memo identifies those who express “opposition to law and immigration enforcement; extreme views in favor of mass migration and open borders; adherence to radical gender ideology,” as well as “anti-Americanism,” “anti-capitalism,” and “anti-Christianity," as potential targets for investigation.
This language references National Security Presidential Memorandum-7, or NSPM-7, a memo issued by Trump in September, which identified this slate of left-wing beliefs as potential "indicators" of terrorism following the assassination of right-wing activist Charlie Kirk in September.
In comments made before the alleged shooter's identity was revealed, Trump attributed the murder to "those on the radical left [who] have compared wonderful Americans like Charlie to Nazis," adding that "this kind of rhetoric is directly responsible for the terrorism that we’re seeing in our country and must stop right now."
Weeks after Kirk's shooting, Trump designated "antifa" as a "domestic terrorism organization," a move that alarmed critics because "antifa," short for "anti-fascist," is a loosely defined ideology rather than an organized political group.
Senior Trump adviser Stephen Miller, meanwhile, promised that the Trump administration would use law enforcement to "dismantle" left-wing groups he said were "fomenting violence." He suggested that merely using heated rhetoric—including calling Trump and his supporters "fascist" or "authoritarian"—"incites violence and terrorism."
Klippenstein said that “where NSPM-7 was a declaration of war on just about anyone who isn’t MAGA,” the memo that went into effect Thursday “is the war plan for how the government will wage it on a tactical level.”
In comments to the Washington Post, former FBI agent Michael Feinberg, who is now a senior editor at Lawfare, said it was "a pretty damn dangerous document," in part because "it is directed at a specific ideology, namely the left, without offering much evidence as to why that is necessary."
Studies have repeatedly shown that while all political factions contain violent actors, those who commit acts of political violence are vastly more likely to identify with right-wing causes.
Miles Taylor, who served as chief of staff for the Department of Homeland Security under the first Trump administration, pointed out in a blog post the extraordinary surveillance capability that the FBI will have at its disposal to use against those it targets.
He said it "includes the FBI’s ability to marshal facial recognition, phone-tracking databases, license-plate readers, financial records review, undercover operations, and intelligence-sharing tools against Americans whose primary 'offense' may be ideological dissent."
"Unfortunately, once you are fed into that system, there is no real 'due process' until charges are brought," Taylor said. "It’s not like you get a text-message notification when the FBI begins investigating you for terrorism offenses, and there’s certainly no 'opt-out' feature. For this to happen, you don’t need to commit violence. You don’t even need to plan it. Under the administration’s new guidelines, you merely need to be flagged for association with the anti-fascist movement to become a potential target."
Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Wash.), a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, told the Post, "It is a throwback to McCarthyism and the worst abuses of [Former FBI Director J. Edgar] Hoover’s FBI to use federal law enforcement against Americans purely because of their political beliefs or because they disagree with the current president’s politics."
Taylor argued: "He’s right, but it’s actually more dangerous than that. Joseph McCarthy had subpoenas and hearings and created his blacklists of 'communist' Americans from Capitol Hill. And while controversial FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover may have had old-school wiretaps and informants, Donald Trump’s team has algorithmic surveillance, bulk data collection, and a post-9/11 security state designed for permanent emergency. It’s like comparing a snowflake with a refrigerator."
4 More Killed in Pacific Boat Strike as White House Ramps Up Demands for Venezuelan Oil
Hours after US House Republicans voted down a war powers resolution Wednesday aimed stopping the Trump administration from continuing its attacks on "presidentially designated" terrorist organizations, the death toll of the Pentagon's continued boat strikes was brought to 99 with the latest bombing in the Pacific Ocean.
US Southern Command reported Wednesday night that at the direction of Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, the military had killed four people in a "kinetic strike on a vessel operated by a Designated Terrorist Organization in international waters."
As with the rest of the more than two dozen bombings that the administration has carried out in the Caribbean and Pacific since September, the Pentagon said that intelligence had confirmed the boat was "engaged in narco-trafficking operations."
The White House has not released evidence that the boats it's targeted were carrying drugs. In the past, the US military has been involved in intercepting vessels suspected of drug trafficking and charging passengers with a criminal offense, but President Donald Trump has insisted the US is engaged in an armed conflict with drug cartels in the Western Hemisphere, including in Venezuela.
US and international intelligence agencies have not found Venezuela to be a significant source of drugs flowing into the US and have found the country to play virtually no role in the trafficking of fentanyl, the biggest cause of drug overdoses in the US.
The latest boat bombing came a day after Trump announced a "total and complete blockade" on oil tankers approaching and leaving Venezuela, accusing the country of stealing "Oil, Land, and other Assets" from the US.
Venezuela nationalized its petroleum sector in 1976, taking control of its own vast oil reserves. Previously, US-based companies had largely controlled the country's oil industry. In 2007, then-President Hugo Chavez further pushed out US oil giants such as Exxon Mobil when he nationalized foreign oil projects in Venezuela.
Stephen Miller, a top adviser to Trump, accused Venezuela's government of "theft" on Wednesday.
“American sweat, ingenuity, and toil created the oil industry in Venezuela,” Miller said in a social media post. “Its tyrannical expropriation was the largest recorded theft of American wealth and property. These pillaged assets were then used to fund terrorism and flood our streets with killers, mercenaries, and drugs.”
Regarding the blockade, Trump also said Wednesday that Venezuela "illegally took" US energy rights.
While the administration has insisted for months that its deadly boat strikes are aimed at stopping drug trafficking, comments from White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles in an extensive Vanity Fair interview released Tuesday further confirmed that the White House aims to take control of the South American country.
Trump “wants to keep on blowing boats up until Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro cries uncle," said Wiles.
Brian Finucane, senior adviser at the International Crisis Group, said Wednesday night's boat strike amounted to "more premeditated killing outside of armed conflict."
"There's a word for that," he said.
Legal experts have said the repeated, lethal bombings of boats have been part of a campaign of extrajudicial killings and have warned Hegseth and others involved in the attacks could be liable for murder.
'This Is a Desecration!' DC Residents Rage After Trump Slaps His Name Atop Kennedy Center
"He has vandalized the Kennedy Center by putting his name on it," said former CNN host Jim Acosta.
Residents of Washington, DC reacted with outrage on Friday after construction workers slapped President Donald Trump's name on the John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts.
One day after it was announced that Trump's name would be added to the Kennedy Center, which was originally named by the US Congress in the wake of President John F. Kennedy’s assassination in 1963, construction workers were spotted altering the lettering on the outside of the building.
When their work was complete, the building had been unofficially renamed as "The Donald J. Trump and the John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts."
From a legal perspective, the Kennedy Center still retains its original name, as the power to change its name rests with the US Congress and not with the Trump-appointed Kennedy Center board of directors whom the president appointed earlier this year.
Andrew Howard, a Washington, DC resident, reacted with rage during an interview with MS Now when asked about Trump's decision to put his name on the side of the official national cultural center of the US.
"We should be shocked... that a felon, a convicted felon, and a thug, and, by all means, a grift has just stuck his name on top of a national monument," Howard fumed. "This is a desecration!"
DC resident on Trump putting his name on the Kennedy Center:
"We should all be shocked that a convicted felon, a thug, and by all means a grifter has just stuck his name on top of a national monument." pic.twitter.com/hzNcucRha5
— FactPost (@factpostnews) December 19, 2025
Former CNN host Jim Acosta also delivered a report from outside the Kennedy Center, which he described as "the scene of yet another crime committed by Donald Trump."
"He has vandalized the Kennedy Center by putting his name on it," Acosta said.
The former CNN anchor explained that only Congress has the power to make changes to the Kennedy Center's name, before noting that Trump "doesn't care about the law, doesn't care what's appropriate," and concluding that the Kennedy Center stunt was symbolic of "a childish and lawless administration."
Reporting from the scene of the crime. Trump has slapped his name on the Kennedy Center. But we will never call it the Trump Kennedy Center: pic.twitter.com/DFlabMjZPJ
— Jim Acosta (@Acosta) December 19, 2025
Former Republican political operative Tara Setmayer wrote in a post on X that Trump's decision to illegally rename the Kennedy Center demonstrated his authoritarian ambitions to rule America by decree.
"This desecration of the Kennedy Center is another grotesque example of Trump’s 'Dear Leader' behavior," she wrote. "This has been a week of one wretched act after another by Trump. It’s got to stop."
Kerry Kennedy, a niece of the late president, vowed to personally tear Trump's name from the building.
"Three years and one month from today, I’m going to grab a pickax and pull those letters off that building," she wrote, before adding, "But I’m going to need help holding the ladder."
Other members of the Kennedy family condemned the renaming of the center on Thursday when it was first announced.
Former US Rep. Joe Kennedy III (D-Mass.) wrote on Bluesky that “the Kennedy Center is a living memorial to a fallen president and named for President Kennedy by federal law,” and “can no sooner be renamed than can someone rename the Lincoln Memorial, no matter what anyone says.”
Journalist Maria Shriver, a niece of the late president, also expressed her disbelief at the decision.
“It is beyond comprehension that this sitting president has sought to rename this great memorial dedicated to President Kennedy,” she said. “It is beyond wild that he would think adding his name in front of President Kennedy’s name is acceptable. It is not. Next thing perhaps he will want to rename JFK Airport, rename the Lincoln Memorial, the Trump Lincoln Memorial. The Trump Jefferson Memorial. The Trump Smithsonian. The list goes on.”
House Dems 'Deeply Concerned' About Death in For-Profit ICE Processing Center
"While ICE claims he died of natural causes," said Reps. Delia Ramirez and Rashida Tlaib, "there have been numerous complaints from family members and advocates about inhumane conditions and inadequate medical care at North Lake."
A press release from US Immigration and Customs Enforcement on Wednesday regarding the death of an immigrant named Nenko Stanev Gantchev at one of the agency's facilities suggested ICE had provided a "safe, secure, and humane" environment—but considering numerous reports about medical neglect and abuse at immigrant detention centers in recent months, two Democratic lawmakers are demanding a full investigation into the man's death.
US Reps. Delia Ramirez (D-Ill.) and Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) called on the federal government to open "an immediate, transparent investigation into the circumstances of Mr. Gantchev’s death, including an investigation into reports from other detainees that he asked for medical assistance and did not receive it in time to save his life."
That kind of medical neglect has been reported at immigration detention facilities such as Florida's so-called "Alligator Alcatraz" and Krome North Service Processing Center and at detention centers run by for-profit companies like GEO Group—the corporation that runs North Lake Processing Center in Baldwin, Michigan, where Gantchev was found dead in his cell on Monday.
"We are deeply concerned about the death of Mr. Gantchev, an Illinois resident who was detained at the for-profit GEO Group’s North Lake Processing Center," said Ramirez and Tlaib. "While ICE claims he died of natural causes, the circumstances surrounding his death are not yet clear, and we know there have been numerous complaints from family members and advocates about inhumane conditions and inadequate medical care at North Lake."
Ten days before Gantchev's death, Tlaib conducted an oversight visit at the facility after receiving reports of cold temperatures, inadequate food, unsanitary facilities, and inmates having trouble accessing medical care.
“During this visit, we learned there have been multiple suicide attempts at the facility, including one in the last couple weeks, and heard that more medical staff are needed,” she said at the time. “No human being should be trapped in cages, forced to experience dehumanizing conditions, or separated from their family.”
North Lake was a juvenile detention facility in the 1990s, when the University of Michigan documented allegations of medical neglect and abuse. It later operated as a federal prison until 2022, when then-President Joe Biden prohibited private prison companies from running federal detention facilities. In June, GEO Group reopened the jail as an ICE facility.
A lawsuit filed in September by the ACLU of Michigan on behalf of an inmate at North Lake, Jose Contreras Cervantes, alleged that for nearly a month, staffers at the facility did not give him the chemotherapy pills he had been taking for leukemia.
Ramirez and Tlaib suggested that the past and current reports of abuse at the center, its operator's history, and ICE's record this year regarding detainee deaths left many open questions about how Gantchev died.
"To date, we are aware of at least 30 deaths at ICE detention centers this year, making 2025 the deadliest year for immigrants in ICE custody," the congresswomen said.
Gantchev was 56 and was from Bulgaria, and was arrested on a warrant by ICE agents in Chicago in September. He had previously been arrested in the 1990s and 2000s for theft, battery, and driving under the influence. He was granted lawful permanent residence in 2005, but the status was revoked in 2009 and an immigration judge ordered Gantchev's removal in 2023.
Christine Sauvé of the Michigan Immigrant Rights Center told MLive that in the immigration detention system, there has been “heightened cruelty under the Trump administration.”
“As this administration creates new barriers and releases fewer people, individuals are languishing in detention, often with delayed or inadequate medical care, while separated needlessly from their families,” Sauvé said.
Ramirez and Tlaib said that "the Trump administration’s attacks on our communities and immigrant neighbors must end."
"We will continue to provide oversight to hold ICE accountable," they said, "and protect our residents and communities.”
Dems Call to Investigate Commerce Secretary Boosting AI Data Centers That 'Enrich His Entire Family'
"Never in modern US history has the office intersected so broadly and deeply with the financial interests of the commerce secretary’s own family," according to the New York Times.
A group of Democratic lawmakers has called for the Commerce Department to investigate whether its billionaire secretary, Howard Lutnick, is improperly boosting artificial intelligence data centers that "stand to enrich his entire family."
The group of 25 House and Senate Democrats, led by Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and Rep. Madeleine Dean (D-Pa.), sent a letter on Thursday urging the department's acting inspector general, Duane Townsend, to review whether Lutnick violated any part of the ethics agreement he signed following his nomination.
That agreement required him to divest his stake in the financial services firm Cantor Fitzgerald, which he had owned and led for decades. Cantor owns the Newmark Group, a real estate broker that facilitates leases for AI data centers.
Lutnick stepped down from his position as CEO in February, handing his financial stake in the company to his adult sons, Brandon and Kyle.
Though the transfer of his stake was supposed to happen in May, records show he did not do so until October, after receiving an ethics waiver from the Trump administration that allowed him to continue working on matters that could affect the company.
The lawmakers described some of these potential conflicts in the letter, many of which were revealed by a New York Times investigation last month:
Multiple press reports indicate that, in his capacity as head of the Commerce Department, Secretary Lutnick has helped boost AI data centers in ways that will likely enrich his own family. He has made public appearances promoting data center projects—including at least one that his family's company has worked on.
Furthermore, Secretary Lutnick has reportedly pressured foreign governments to invest in the US data center industry. For example, as part of a recent AI chips export deal with the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Secretary Lutnick reportedly pushed the UAE to "build data centers in America,” in exchange for the United States loosening export control restrictions on certain advanced chips. The Trump administration ultimately approved this deal, under which the Lutnick-backed Newmark Group is primed to profit from that Emirati investment.
Similarly, as part of another trade deal, Secretary Lutnick reportedly pushed South Korea to invest hundreds of billions of dollars in the United States. One startup vying for some of South Korea's investment has paid the Lutnick family's companies millions in fees to help it secure financing and land for its new data center.
Though businesspeople have often occupied the role of Commerce Secretary, the Times reported last month that "never in modern US history has the office intersected so broadly and deeply with the financial interests of the commerce secretary’s own family, according to interviews with ethics lawyers and historians."
According to the company's most recent quarterly earnings report, Newmark has completed more than $25 billion in data center deals over the past 12 months, resulting in its most lucrative year in the firm's history.
Citing evidence that the construction of AI data centers considerably spikes energy costs for consumers, the lawmakers said, "There is substantial public interest in ensuring that Secretary Lutnick is not violating federal ethics law to propel data centers that will be profitable for his family while making life more expensive for working Americans."