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You Are America, Ready To Seize What Ought To Be
This week, a clear "dignity gap" amidst more botches - war, flu, pools, fans - suggests a faint, nascent shift in momentum back toward we the people. As DC sank into mire, New York came together "as one" - Mamdani: "We find a way" - with a jubilant party for its beloved Knicks, and Chicago marked a dazzling, joyful, Juneteenth launch of an Obama Center with free library, museum, gardens, sledding hill where "hope took root" for the first Black president, and somehow still resides.
Meanwhile, the regime tried to sell a fragile Iran deal deemed "the worst foreign policy blunder in decade" that achieved none of their goals, prompted Iran to claim "total victory," and led Andy Borowitz to report the Ayatollah had named Trump "Employee of the Month." Now a newly empowered Iran will control the Hormuz Strait, levy new fees, see sanctions lifted, get a $300 billion infrastructure fund that makes Obama's 2015 pay-out pale, and be free to keep building its nuclear stockpiles and repressing its people, all at the cost of thousands of lives including 175 Iranian schoolgirls and global economic mayhem. The surreal bonus: In "the greatest diplomatic troll" ever, France's Macron got Trump, stunned by gold and ignorant of history, to sign the MOU at Versailles, where World-War-I Allies forced Germany to sign "one of the most famous surrender documents in history.”
With it all, a still-homicidal, hold-my-beer Israel continued bombing and killing civilians in Lebanon, and US-Iran talks were (again) cancelled. Other fails, less lethal, often cringey, kept coming. Again playing the buffoon on the world stage at the G7 summit, where he appeared dazed and confused before chatting leaders, he claimed Italy Premier Giorgia Meloni had “begged me to take a picture with her!" Meloni, fed up, swiftly retorted on social media that she was "astonished" by a claim that was "completely made up" (America nods wearily), she has no idea why he "behaves like this," and "Italy, and I, do not beg." Then Italy's foreign minister cancelled an upcoming trip here, noting Trump, "whether out of intent or ineptitude," has managed with "his inappropriate outbursts," to make the U.S. "unpopular across the entire European continent" - "no easy feat." Sigh. Too much winning.
A flu outbreak hit 150 recruits training at Lackland Air Force Base in Texas weeks after manly dry-drunk Christo-fascist Pete Hegseth, declaring "Your body, your faith and your convictions are not negotiable," said he was “restoring freedom" by ending mandatory flu vaccines, ”absurd overreaching mandates (that) weaken our war-fighting capabilities." New viewership data for the Freedom 250 cage fight - Trump: ”one of the most exciting days in the History of our fabled White House“ - were not, as predicted, ”Super-Bowl numbers“ of 125.6 million, or Rubio’s giddy billion, but a sad 17 million. Their latest attempt to "make friends" with MAGA hats and cookie bribes to kids in Greenland, home to Make America Go Away hats, was met by scowls and fingers. After Congress shut him out, Trump stole $352 million from the Secret Service for his ballroom. Then he was defeated by a Medal of Honor.
And in the running debacle of his $14 million redo of the Lincoln Reflecting pool, surging algae is worse than it's been in years - “Now that the bottom is nice and dark, the algae grows better" - and peeled-off chunks of his "American-flag blue" paint are floating to the surface, loosened by chlorine-neutralizing hydrogen peroxide hapless workers are dumping into it. The historic kicker: The same thing happened - creation of a swamp-green guac pool - at the 2016 Rio Olympics; it made global headlines, easily recalled. But nope, not by all-knowing "Nero on the Potomac." The pattern repeats: Claim something needs improving, ignore experts, screw it up big-time for too much money, blame someone else when it crashes. It will end, God willing, in humanity's "oldest political ritual" - Rome's "condemnation of memory" wherein evildoers' names are chiseled off, statues toppled, their faces hacked, unmade by history.
Until then, we get by on whatever slivers of hope, good cheer, good trouble we can find or make. Thursday saw not just a parade but "a jubilee" in New York, a vast, messy, blue and orange spectacle of two million exuberant fans descending on a packed city to salute the dogged Knicks, NBA champions after a 53-year wait. The staggering turnout for their first ticker-tape parade ever, one of the largest for a sports title celebration, caused mostly glad mayhem in lower Manhattan. For a 10 a.m. parade start, thousands camped out overnight, paid others to hold them a place, took red-eye flights, arrived at dawn, inched forward; many more got turned away when viewing pens filled up before 8 a.m and had to settle for watching on TVS in overflowing bars. Buses shut down, subways blocked exits, people caught rides on garbage trucks and crowded friends' balconies.
Over 10,000 cops, some with Knicks jerseys under their uniforms, circulated amidst thousands of pounds of shredded paper, rivers of toilet paper hung on wires, dozens of floats and checkpoints, miles of barricades and no dedicated public restrooms. Celebrities mounted floats; young people climbed up on scaffolding; kids held up signs bragging they'd skipped school or told reporters their teachers were probably pissed they had; everyone, even dogs, wore Knicks merch, caps, socks, shirts, tutus, sneakers, cheering, grinning: "New York energy. New York love. Everybody’s here for the same reason." Indomitable Knicks captain Jalen Brunson, who led his team from behind in all four wins, rode on a float with his wife and daughter, leaning on the trophy, then he jumped off and walked Broadway with it in his arms, scores reaching out to touch it.
At City Hall, a beaming Mamdani gave each player a key to the city and hailed the unity of a city "overcome by happiness," for once brought together not by tragedy but "pure, unfiltered joy." The bettors and experts and pundits "who watch from far away" do what they do, he said - run the numbers, write the Knicks off, give the Spurs a 99.6% chance of winning. "But there's one thing they just don’t get about this city," he said. "It is in that .4% that we go to work...that the Knicks do what New Yorkers have always done when we are told something is impossible. We find a way. What is New York, if not 99.6% of the world stacked against you?...What is New York if not your back's up against the wall? The Knicks did not just win for New York City, they won like New York City. This is our city. This is our team."
That day Chicago, also euphoric, commemorated the end of slavery in America with a hopeful, sold-out opening ceremony for a private-and-corporate funded, $850-million Obama Presidential Center on the long-neglected South Side where Barack Obama did community organizing, fell in love, raised a family and entered politics. A decade in the making, set in John Lewis Plaza, the Center sits on a sprawling campus of almost 20 acres. It has a museum, a digitized presidential library and free Chicago Public Library branch full of books chosen by the Obamas, four floors of exhibits, a fruit and vegetable garden, an Eleanor Roosevelt garden, Nelson Mandela Skyroom, water terrace honoring Obama’s mother Ann Dunham, and community NBA-size basketball court and sledding hill because, growing up nearby, Michelle Obama never had one. Inside, there are 30 original artworks by diverse artists; in the lobby is the first dual portrait of both Obamas by Nigerian-born Njideka Akunyili Crosby.
Wrappng around two sides of the top of the Center is an all-caps excerpt from Obama’s 2015 speech at the Edmund Pettus Bridge on the 50th anniversary of Bloody Sunday 1965, the march from Selma to Montgomery AL. where police attacked John Lewis and other civil rights marchers. It was chosen, said Obama, because, "There are places and moments in America where this nation's destiny has been decided, and Selma is such a place. The text reads, in part, "You are America. Unconstrained by habit and convention. Unencumbered by what is, ready to seize what ought to be. For everywhere in this country, there are first steps to be taken, there is new ground to cover, there are more bridges to be crossed." It is meant, he has said, "to honor those who walked so we could run. We must run so our children soar." When he finished speaking, he hugged Lewis, a mentor who he's said "gave me a a sense of meaning and purpose," in a now-iconic photo.
In attendance were many pols - Bidens, Clintons, Bushs, Kamala, Pelosi, Pritzker, Newsom, Angela Merkel, Justin Trudeau - celebrities including Tom Hanks and a smiling Stephen Colbert in a tan suit, and A-list musical performers. Chicago-born Jennifer Hudson sang the National Anthem, John Legend sang the civil-rights-era Someday We’ll All Be Free, Springsteen sang Land of Hope and Dreams, Eddie Vedder sang Better Believe with young local musicians of Guitars Over Guns, Stevie Wonder invited all the artists to join in Higher Ground. Thousands of multi-hued South Side residents watched a livestream of the ceremony from nearby Midway Plaisance Park, re-enforcing Obama's hope the Center serves as a community hub, with a sense of possibility and a belief "we can come together and create the change we seek."
Michelle Obama began her speech by asking the crowd to "indulge me" to "fully sing" her husband's praises. "Barack, you gotta look at me," she said, to which he shook his head no, looked down, grew tearful. "You always gave us the very best within you, and in doing so you reminded the rest of us that we could too," she said. "There are no words to express how proud I am of the way you showed up, and continue to show up every single day...You were doing the people's work." She recalled the racist vitriol he faced: "Eight years in the crucible and not once did you melt in the heat, not once did you let it harden you," take away from his grace, courage, decency, work ethic. In a dig at Trump, she also noted "a lasting legacy" isn't measured by an award or name on a building but by “the difference we make in one another’s lives... carrying each other when we’re weary."
Obama, moved by her speech, argued, "She did me wrong. She wouldn’t let me see her speech. She knew she was going to mess me up, and she did it anyway." Stressing the dark times, he focused on affirming "how special and how precious our democracy is...what we can achieve when we embrace our shared responsibilities as citizens." In a nod to his flaws and failures, he cited "unfinished business, my own shortcomings"; he acknowledged democracy's "inefficiencies" quoting from a plaque he kept on the Resolute Desk: "Hard things are hard." "It's tempting to give in to cynicism and even despair,” he said, “but I do not believe that is the story of America that prevails in the end.” Instead, like Michelle, he indirectly refuted the cruel, stupid, greedy crap of today's national discourse by elevating "the belief in the intrinsic dignity and worth of all people."
The litany went on: His elemental belief "nobody is above the law, nor beneath its protection." His belief in checks and balances, accountability, an independent judiciary, a robust free press, a military and law enforcement with allegiance not to an individual but the people and the Constitution, a peaceful transfer of power after people have spoken in free fair elections. A belief in private qualities, "our greatest inheritance," like honesty, integrity, compassion, a "faith in the decency of our fellow citizens, and the possibility that despite our differences we can see each other (and) make common cause together." The center's exhibits are "not meant to evoke nostalgia for some gauzy bygone era,“ he said. "They're meant to remind us of what’s possible, so we can forge ahead (and) do the work that needs to be done." Many may have recalled the ways he failed, but these days they needed to hear it all again, and they cheered.
Canadian Youth, Groups Sue Over Carney 'Failure' on Climate Crisis
"You cannot abandon the map and still expect to reach your destination. Yet that's exactly what the federal government has done with its 2030 climate plan."
That's according to Charlie Hatt, climate director at Ecojustice, Canada's largest environmental law charity and one of the groups that partnered with a trio of young citizens this week to challenge Prime Minister Mark Carney's "failure" to bring the country's 2030 emissions reduction plan into compliance with a key federal law.
"Right now, its only climate plan is a plan to fail—and that's not just irresponsible, it's unlawful under the Canadian Net-Zero Emissions Accountability Act," said Hatt. "Neither the climate nor the law can tolerate rollbacks today in exchange for promises of action many years from now."
The act requires the federal government to set science-based climate goals, create a plan to achieve them, and report on its progress. However, Carney has recently pursued various rollbacks and boosted fossil fuel development, putting his nation's 2030 emissions reduction target out of reach—which the groups and young people argued violates the law.
"Everyone in Canada deserves to be safe and healthy," said Dr. Samantha Green, president of the Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment. "Instead, our government is putting people at risk by dismantling key climate policies without a credible plan to reduce emissions. Climate change is not an abstract future threat: It is a public health emergency that is already harming patients and communities across Canada. That's why CAPE is joining this lawsuit."
The fossil fuel-driven climate emergency isn't just a danger to public health. As Environmental Defence's Julia Levin noted, Canadians "are paying the price through wildfires, heat domes, rising food insecurity, and high costs of living."
"PM Carney is betraying Canadians by taking a wrecking ball to our hard-fought climate progress," Levin declared, accusing the Liberal Party leader of following in the footsteps of Big Oil-backed Republican US President Donald Trump.
"The rest of the world is rapidly adopting clean energy systems that are already more reliable, affordable, and secure than fossil fuels," she said. "Meanwhile, our prime minister is copying President Trump's playbook, ensuring that Canada will be left behind."
Carney's climate policies as prime minister—especially compared with how he talked about the crisis before rising to his current position last year—have frustrated many citizens and left "climate-anxious voters... feeling a major case of buyer's remorse, disoriented by the dissonance between who they thought they were supporting and a climate plan that is now a complete shambles," as Canadian climate writer and activist Seth Klein wrote for The Guardian last month.
Youth applicants in the new legal fight made that frustration clear on Tuesday. Montréal, Quebec-based climate organizer Shirley Barnea said that "the Carney government's gutting of climate policy is a massive insult. After presenting himself as a climate leader, our prime minister is now abdicating responsibility—to Canadians, to future generations, to the law. As long as governments continue ignoring climate science and rolling back protections for our futures, young people will continue taking them to court."
Marie Maltais, who is from Sainte-Catherine-de-la-Jacques-Cartier, Québec, and has advocated for the climate since her early teens, said that "my generation has grown up surrounded by climate disasters and broken political promises to address them. We're told to trust the government's climate commitments—but commitments mean nothing without a real plan behind them."
Sudbury, Ontario-based Sophia Mathur, an early participant in Greta Thunberg's Fridays for Future movement who recently met with Carney and urged him to keep his climate promises, added that "young people are being handed the consequences of decisions we didn't make. We are going to live with the impacts of unchecked climate change for the rest of our lives—so we're standing up for our futures, now."
The young citizens and advocacy groups are seeking a court order that would compel Carney to comply with the Canadian Net-Zero Emissions Accountability Act, stressing that "climate change is an existential threat to all Canadians."
Abortion Bans Not Only Harm Patients, But Cost US Economy $140 Billion: Analysis
Reproductive rights advocates and experts have long highlighted the dangers of abortion bans to people's health, but amid a wave of new state-level restrictions in the wake of Roe v. Wade's reversal, some have also recently emphasized the economic impact, as detailed in an analysis published Tuesday by the Institute for Women's Policy Research.
"IWPR's latest estimates show that states with the most restrictive abortion policies could cost the national economy nearly $68 billion annually in lost earnings, up from $64 billion in last year's estimate," according to the analysis. "Historically, legal abortion access has increased women's labor force participation and earnings. IWPR's analyses suggest that abortion restrictions continue to erode those gains nationwide, reducing women's labor force participation and earnings potential while weakening state and national economies in the process."
"Those losses—amounting to billions of dollars—could otherwise support what families actually need: affordable healthcare, caregiving, higher wages, business growth, and new jobs that strengthen local communities and state economies," the report notes. "This $68 billion estimate reflects only the impact of the most severe restrictions, including total bans and six-week gestational bans, that were in effect in 16 states in 2025."
The publication points out that "many other states may not have banned abortion outright, but still impose barriers that make abortion care harder to access, like waiting periods, mandated counseling, or targeted regulations on abortion providers that delay or deny care altogether. When accounting for all state-level restrictions on abortion access, combined with the federal funding prohibitions and the absence of federal protections, the annual average economic cost now exceeds $140 billion nationwide."
The overall figure is nearly $7 billion more than IWPR's estimate from last year. Putting that figure into context, the report explains that $7 billion "could fund Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits for about 1 million American families with children for an entire year. This is a striking figure considering the so-called 'One Big Beautiful Bill's' cuts to the program, which are projected to reduce or eliminate benefits for many low-income households."
Removing barriers to reproductive care on a national scale "could mean nearly 325,000 more women participating in the labor force each year, with the largest increases concentrated in states with some of the most restrictive abortion policies," IWPR estimated. For example, in Alabama, Kentucky, and Louisiana, their labor force participation could be over 1.3% higher, while in Mississippi, it could be up 1.5%.
If more women joined the workforce thanks to policies allowing reproductive freedom, IWPR projected that "national gross domestic product (GDP) could rise by 0.5%, and the economic gains would be largest in states such as Alabama, Arkansas, South Carolina, and West Virginia, which rank poorly on both abortion protections and per capita GDP. These states could potentially see their GDP grow by nearly 1% annually."
Like previous analyses, the publication also acknowledges that "Black and Latina women are more likely to experience the consequences of restrictive abortion policies and confront additional economic and structural barriers to accessing care that their White counterparts do not—even as abortion restrictions harm all women and the economy more broadly."
IWPR president and CEO Jamila K. Taylor stressed in a Tuesday statement that "this is fundamentally about human rights and economic justice."
"We know that legal access to abortion care increases women's autonomy to be able to participate in the labor force, which supports the stability of our entire economy," Taylor said. "When states deny people their bodily autonomy, they're also limiting their ability to pursue the education and career options that are right for them and to build financial stability for their family and community. Abortion restrictions don't just harm those who may become pregnant—they harm everyone."
President Donald Trump delivered mixed messages during the last campaign cycle: bragging about being the one to appoint the justices who helped reverse Roe with the Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization decision, but also suggesting that he wasn't in favor of a nationwide ban on abortion and that the issue doesn't really matter to Americans.
Since returning to the White House, the Republican and his allies in Congress have taken steps to reduce access to reproductive healthcare, and although the right-wing Supreme Court last month declined to restrict access to mifepristone, at least for now, Trump's Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is currently reviewing the medication, which is commonly used in abortion and miscarriage care.
Reproductive rights advocates have sounded the alarm over the FDA review. In response to reporting on it earlier this month, Planned Parenthood CEO Alexis McGill Johnson called it "a politically motivated farce."
"Mifepristone is safe and effective. We know it, the FDA knows it, and the more than 7.5 million people who've used mifepristone for abortion and miscarriage care over the past 25 years know it too," Johnson said. "But the Trump administration is bulldozing the overwhelming body of medical research and evidence to try to make it harder for everyone, everywhere to get an abortion. It's time for every American to take this threat seriously."
'Another Unauthorized Trump Fund': Democrats Fume Over $300 Million in Taxpayer Money for Ballroom
Democratic lawmakers are reacting with disgust amid new reporting on how the White House has been using sneaky budget maneuvering to get US taxpayers to fund President Donald Trump's luxury ballroom that was never approved by Congress.
According to a Thursday report in The Washington Post, the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) mysteriously shifted $352 million within the US Secret Service budget that had been earmarked for training and recruitment, but that will now be spent on White House security measures.
An insider familiar with the process told the Post that the redirected funds were related to the construction of the ballroom.
A White House spokesperson did not deny that the money was going toward the ballroom project, while insisting that "the East Wing Modernization Project is inextricably tied to the security of the president, the White House grounds, and the certain security infrastructure assets."
Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), ranking member of the Senate Budget Committee, told the Post he was concerned that money "intended to pay Secret Service agents and ensure they have the technology and resources they need to keep individuals under their protection safe" is now being spent on the president's "vanity project."
In a Wednesday interview with NOTUS, Sen. Chris Coons (D-Del.) said it appears Trump "was just flat out lying when he said the taxpayers will not pay a dime for his ballroom," adding that it appears "he is now trying to find ways to funnel public money into it."
In a Thursday social media post, Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-Ill.) contrasted Trump's willingness to use taxpayer cash for his ballroom with cuts he and the GOP made to vital healthcare and food assistance programs.
"While Republicans slash healthcare and other programs Americans depend on," Krishnamoorthi wrote, "President Trump is reportedly using hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars for a White House ballroom he claimed would be privately funded."
Rep. Jonathan Jackson (D-Ill.) similarly argued that while the GOP's 2025 budget law "kicked 4.3 million people off SNAP and 5 million people off [Affordable Care Act] health insurance coverage," the administration is now "dishonestly spending millions of dollars of YOUR money to fund a ballroom instead of helping struggling Americans put food on the table and receive essential medical care."
Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) linked the ballroom money to other Trump schemes to enrich himself through the presidency, including his acceptance of a luxury jet from the government of Qatar and his $1.8 billion slush fund for political allies.
"Now we learn that Trump’s bad architecture obsession is costing us all $600 million," Raskin wrote, in reference to earlier reporting on how the ballroom project has ballooned in costs from the White House's early estimates. "Turn your illegal Qatari jet over to the people and we’ll sell it for $400 million and we’ll take the rest out of other illegal emoluments and slush funds, including the $1.776 billion fund for insurrectionists, and the Board of Peace, another unauthorized Trump fund bankrolled by money misallocated from the State Department."
Newsom Says DOJ Probe Puts Him and Wife on Trump's Political 'Hit List'
Democratic California Gov. Gavin Newsom on Monday said the US Department of Justice was investigating both him and his wife in what he described as an abuse of power being carried out on behalf of President Donald Trump.
In a video posted on social media, Newsom claimed federal agents in recent days "have knocked on the doors of family, friends, and former employees, not because they've found a crime" but "because they're simply trying to find one."
Newsom charged that Trump himself was behind the investigation, which he said was being done in response to his prospective 2028 presidential campaign.
"Donald Trump is simply the most corrupt president in American history," Newsom said. "He's turned the levers of government into his own personal power ministry, to reward cronies and to try to jail his opponents. His personal attorney now runs the Department of Justice, which has repeatedly gone after his political enemies."
Newsom then linked the current DOJ investigation into him to federal investigations of New York Attorney General Letitia James, former Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell, and former FBI Director James Comey as yet another politically motivated assault on the rule of law.
"One by one, anyone who has challenged Donald Trump has ended up on his hit list," Newsom explained. "And today, I proudly join that list. After calling for my arrest last year, Donald Trump directed his Department of Justice to investigate me."
The governor said that investigators in recent days had shown particular interest in his wife, documentary filmmaker Jennifer Siebel Newsom.
"If they can't intimidate me, they'll go after the mother of our children," said Newsom. "Donald Trump picked the wrong target. We have nothing to hide."
A source told The New York Times that the investigations into Newsom "were initiated by federal law enforcement officials in California, based on government witnesses offering information there, and were not launched by officials in Washington."
However, Trump has gotten directly involved in multiple DOJ investigations of his political opponents that have led to criminal charges.
Last year, the president inadvertently posted a message on his Truth Social platform that was intended to be a private message to then-Attorney General Pam Bondi, in which he pushed her to move more quickly on indicting Comey, James, and US Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.).
James and Comey would subsequently be hit with criminal charges, although cases against them were dismissed last year by a federal judge. Comey has since been indicted again for posting a purportedly threatening message on social media that some legal experts have described as an "embarrassing" case.
US-Iran Talks Delayed as 'Renewed Israeli Aggression' in Lebanon Kills at Least 18
US and Iranian delegations delayed plans to travel to Switzerland on Friday for the opening round of talks to cement the details of a peace agreement as the Israeli military bombarded southern Lebanon, killing at least 18 people and threatening once again to derail momentum toward a diplomatic resolution.
The Associated Press reported that "mediators worked to reschedule the meetings crucial for starting talks over a permanent end to the Iran war, with much of the attention focused on Lebanon." Iran's leadership has insisted that ending Israeli attacks on Lebanon is critical to ending the war, and the memorandum of understanding signed earlier this week calls for "the immediate and permanent termination of military operations on all fronts, including in Lebanon."
Israel's military, which joined the US in launching the war on Iran in late February, carried out strikes throughout southern Lebanon on Friday, hours after US Vice President JD Vance—who was supposed to travel to Switzerland—publicly complained about the Israeli leadership's tendency to launch bombing campaigns during critical stages of the Trump administration's talks with Iran. Last weekend, Israeli forces bombed Beirut shortly after US President Donald Trump announced plans to sign the memorandum of understanding.
"We seem to be right on the cusp of a major breakthrough in the agreement, and then all of a sudden, there's a major explosion that goes off in a civilian population center in Beirut, and a lot of people who have nothing to do with Hezbollah lose their lives," Vance told reporters on Thursday. "That's not acceptable."
JD Vance criticizes Israel:
We seem to be right on the cusp of a major breakthrough in the agreement, and then all of a sudden there's a major explosion that goes off in a civilian population center in Beirut, and a lot of people who have nothing to do with Hezbollah lose their… pic.twitter.com/Roi6BVtpnt
— Clash Report (@clashreport) June 18, 2026
Roqayah Chamseddine, a southern Lebanese writer, reported that "the intense Israeli bombardment" on Friday "targeted populated residential neighborhoods in the Nabatieh district, committing massacres in the towns of Dweir Harouf, Al-Sharqiya, and Kfar Sir, while also striking Kfar Roumman, Haboush, Jebchit, Toul, and Deir al-Zahrani."
"People had only just begun returning to their villages," Chamseddine wrote. "The renewed Israeli aggression quickly expanded into the Western Bekaa Valley, where Israeli warplanes targeted the heights of Abu Rashed and launched attacks along the Litani River valley near the town of Zalaya."
Apocalyptic scenes in Harouf, South Lebanon.
Israel dropped bombs on residential buildings in the middle of the night.
Entire families are now buried under the rubble. pic.twitter.com/kuKVB0ffjQ
— sarah (@sahouraxo) June 19, 2026
Four Israeli soldiers were killed in southern Lebanon on Friday by a Hezbollah attack on an Israeli tank, according to the Israel Defense Forces. The attack prompted Israel's far-right national security minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir, to declare that "all of Lebanon must burn."
"With all due respect to the Americans, Israel must make it clear to the entire world that the blood of our sons and the security of our citizens are not forfeited," Ben-Gvir added.
The Trump White House cited logistical challenges in a statement announcing the delay of the US delegation's departure to Switzerland, not mentioning Lebanon.
But the Lebanese outlet Al Mayadeen reported that the Israeli assault on Lebanon was central to the Iranian delegation's decision to postpone its planned trip on Friday.
"The delegation had already been preparing to depart Iran and launch the first round of negotiations, scheduled to span 60 days, before the decision to suspend the trip was made," Al Mayadeen reported, citing an unnamed source. "Tehran had previously informed both Washington and the mediators that the Lebanon file remains a central component of the negotiations and will directly influence whether the talks proceed."
Judge Finds Trump DOJ Abused Subpoenas in Attempt to ‘Coerce’ Minnesota Leaders
"I will never stop exercising my constitutional rights to stand up for Minnesotans and the American freedoms we hold dear," Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz said after the ruling.
A federal judge on Monday quashed multiple grand jury subpoenas issued by the US Department of Justice aimed at political leaders in Minnesota, including Gov. Tim Walz and Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey.
In his ruling, Judge Patrick Schiltz of United States District Court for the District of Minnesota found there was "no doubt" that the DOJ had initiated "a criminal investigation in order to harass political opponents or to coerce them into taking official action," which he described as "a blatantly unlawful and unethical use of the grand-jury process."
Finding that "the evidence that the challenged subpoenas were issued for unlawful reasons is overwhelming," Schiltz, an appointee of former President George W. Bush, cited multiple instances of Trump administration officials "threatening and attempting to punish states and localities that have adopted 'sanctuary' policies."
The judge then quoted a number of social media posts by President Donald Trump in which he warned that "retribution" was coming for Minnesota officials, as well as statements from Trump DOJ officials linking grand jury subpoenas to the lack of cooperation in the state with federal immigration enforcement operations.
Schiltz also said it was "risible" for the DOJ to justify the subpoenas on the grounds that it is investigating officials' refusal to devote state and local resources to assisting federal law enforcement, which he described as "constitutionally protected conduct."
"A grand-jury subpoena cannot be issued for an improper purpose," Schiltz emphasized. "The fact that connections between the information sought in the subpoenas and any possible criminal violation range from extremely weak to nonexistent only adds to the overwhelming evidence that these subpoenas were not issued to investigate, but to harass, coerce, and retaliate."
In a statement released after Schiltz's ruling, Walz hailed the decision as "a victory for the rule of law and our democracy," depicting the DOJ probe as yet another example of the department "pursuing criminal investigations into the president's political opponents."
"I will never stop exercising my constitutional rights to stand up for Minnesotans and the American freedoms we hold dear," Walz added.
Frey also released a statement after the ruling, accusing the DOJ of "subpoenaing political opponents because they spoke out on behalf of their constituents."
"My job is not to stay silent when Minneapolis residents are killed, families are torn apart, and businesses are closed," Frey said. "My job is to stand up for the people I represent, the families who call our city home, and the thousands of people who showed up and spoke out."
Rep. Angie Craig (D-Minn.) celebrated the ruling, which she said "confirms what we knew all along—that this was nothing but a baseless political attack on Minnesota’s leaders."
Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, senior fellow at the American Immigration Council, noted in a social media post just how far off the rails the Trump DOJ has gone.
"The Trump administration’s efforts to use the criminal grand jury process to retaliate against Minnesota and Minneapolis has floundered badly," he wrote. "It's a sign of how they are willing to toss aside basic rules to get at their enemies; and how the courts have largely smacked them down when they tried."
'Hands Off Public Media!' Thousands March, Workers Strike in Czechia Over Right-Wing Attack
"The media don't belong to politicians. They belong to us all and we won't allow them to be stolen from us."
Public media journalists and staff are on a 24-hour strike in Czechia on Monday, just a day after thousands of people marched in Prague against attacks by the right-wing government on the nation's public broadcasting system.
Gathered outside the public television offices in Prague, those gathered Sunday shouted "Hand off public media!" as they railed against reforms proposed by the government of billionaire Prime Minister Andrej Babiš, a far-right ideologue compared to US President Donald Trump and Hungary's former Prime Minister Viktor Orbán.
The right-wing reforms, approved by the Babiš cabinet last week, would eviscerate the annual budgets for both public radio and television programming by 15% next year—bringing them back to 2008 levels by cutting a combined €57 million—while also changing the funding mechanism going forward. Instead of funds generated through fees paid by individuals, households, and businesses, the annual budgets would now come from government allocations, which critics of the changes say would give the ruling party more influence over content.
"The media don't belong to politicians," Mikulas Minar, an organizer with the group behind the protest movement—dubbed the Million Moments for Democracy—told Deutsche Welle on Sunday. "They belong to us all and we won't allow them to be stolen from us."
Thousands Protest in Prague: “Hands Off Public Media” Over Funding Reform 🇨🇿
Large crowds gathered in Prague under the slogan “Hands Off Public Media”, protesting the Czech government’s proposed reform to replace license fees with direct state budget funding for public… pic.twitter.com/793Q2dZf6W
— Unit News (@Unit_News) June 22, 2026
The fight over the countries public media system, "is not just about money," reports The Guardian.
“The reforms have been prepared without consultation and without guarantees for the independence of public service media,” Pavla Kubálková, a member of Czech Television’s strike committee, told the newspaper. “A large part of society remembers what the news looked like when politicians chose the content before 1989. We don’t want to go back there.”
On Monday, the striking workers formed a symbolic human chain around the Czech public radio offices in Prague.
Protesters ended their march at the public broadcaster's headquarters in Prague on Sunday, June 21, 2026. (Image: Ondrej Deml/CTK/picture alliance)
“What matters most to us is preserving independence and the direct relationship between Czech Television and its viewers,” added Kubálková, warning against increased political pressure on the public broadcasters from the state.
As the Guardian reports, those concerns, "were reinforced last week when Josef Nerušil, an MP for the far-right Freedom and Direct Democracy (SPD) party, which is part of the governing coalition, appeared to suggest that changes to funding should eventually lead to greater scrutiny of what public broadcasters air."
“The point is to change the funding,” Nerušil told Czech Radio. “But if we’re talking about what public service media should broadcast, then of course, in a further step, we want to get to a broader discussion.”
Nerušil admitted the aim was “to control not only the financial side but also the content side,” as he accused the broadcasters of political bias in their coverage.
The workers on strike and the people in the street, said Kubálková, should signal to the government that the people of Czechia are ready for a fight.
“The employees of both broadcasters are ready to defend their service to citizens, and we are determined to continue with even more vigorous protests,” she said. “We will do everything we can to defend public service media in their current form.”
Insulted by Trump's Threats, Iranian Negotiators Walk Out of Peace Talks
"Don’t they think that if their threats had worked, they wouldn’t have ended up in today’s desperate situation?" said Iran's chief negotiator.
US President Donald Trump’s threats to destroy Iran and send US forces to occupy the country on Sunday appear to have derailed peace negotiations in Switzerland, with the Iranian delegation reportedly walking out and demanding an apology.
Following Iran’s announcement that it was closing the Strait of Hormuz again after Israel intensified its assault on Lebanon, Trump went on a tirade Sunday in which he threatened to assassinate negotiators and said Iran “won’t have a country” if access to the critical waterway was shut off, while also threatening to “take over” Iran with a full US invasion.
But after Trump’s threats—which broke the first clause of the memorandum of understanding—Iran’s negotiators filed a complaint with the Pakistani and Qatari mediators and stormed out of the mountain resort where talks were being held, according to several outlets.
While Trump clearly sought to project strength, Iran’s chief negotiator, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, said his team “do not take American threats seriously.”
In previous months, as Trump sought to squeeze concessions from the Iranians, he issued escalatory threats to wipe out their “whole civilization” and “blow up” the whole country. However, he did not act on those threats, even as Iran refused to budge from its negotiating posture.
"Don’t they think that if their threats had worked, they wouldn’t have ended up in today’s desperate situation?" Ghalibaf said.
Ghalibaf said the US had “better be more careful with their statements,” adding that “our armed forces are ready to respond in a different way." He said, “No matter what they say, we are the ones who act.
While the Iranian delegation left the venue, talks are reportedly continuing via mediators. However, according to the Lebanese outlet Al Mayadeen, the delegation said it will not return until Trump apologizes for his threats and Israel fully withdraws from Lebanon.
According to senior Israeli officials cited by Channel 12, Israel is reportedly considering “limited withdrawals” from Lebanon, including in areas within its so-called “buffer zone.” Despite Iranian claims, the officials said the US has not requested Israel’s withdrawal from the country.
Previous peace talks have been derailed by Trump’s threats to commit indiscriminate war crimes in Iran. But this past week has seen perhaps the most violent swing yet in his approach toward Iran.
Where earlier this week, Trump acknowledged Iran's right to enrich uranium and maintain a nuclear energy program like that of other nations, his outburst Sunday appeared to have been prompted by a statement by Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian, who said the US would be "forced to accept" its right to enrichment.
And while Trump has raged against Israel’s actions in Lebanon while privately claiming that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is trying to sabotage peace, he has not taken concrete action to force Israel to comply with the memorandum’s terms.
"The mixed messages coming out of the White House," remarked Jeet Heer, a writer at The Nation, "are going to make it much harder to end the war, and could in fact spark further conflict."