LIVE COVERAGE
Bomb Bomb Iran: Idiot Mob Boss Declares Wack Victory
As evidence mounts the reckless, illegal, peace-through-stupidity attack on Iran's nuclear sites did not in fact "OBLITERATE" them and could be perilous, the moronic man-child lurches, rages, yammers on with deranged declarations - THE CEASEFIRE IS NOW IN EFFECT! CNN is scum! Prosecute Dems! - duly parroted by his rabid flunkies: "Wave American Flags!" Still, they go lower and crasser: Who had a juvenile White House resurrecting Vince Vance & The Valiants' Bomb Iran on their Clown Show Bingo Card?
After Israel finally got a U.S. president dumb enough to bomb Iran if they did - and to take his Very Serious strategic geo-political leads from what Fox News was saying - the TV-game-show-host-in chief who'd always wanted to be in a war as long as he didn't have to, you know, be in it violated U.S. and international law by launching strikes on Iran's three largest nuclear sites without legally mandated Congressional approval to do so, probably after both Israel and Iran went to him with tears in their eyes and said, "Please sir, you're the only one who can save us." Then, with only early, flimsy reports coming in, he swiftly proclaimed it "ONE OF THE MOST SUCCESSFUL MILITARY STRIKES IN HISTORY" and a "PERFECT FLIGHT" and "total Obliteration for years and years" by "genius people in the military" and "it was my great honor to Destroy All Nuclear facilities & capability, and STOP THE WAR!” Uh huh
After declaring a yuge fake victory, he declared a yuge fake ceasefire - which he evidently thought was like pressing the button on the Resolute Desk for Diet Coke, or like Michael Scott in The Office yelling, "I declare bankruptcy!" - by announcing that both Iran and Israel, now that they'd "gotten it all out of their 'system,'" had agreed to “a Complete and Total CEASEFIRE” that would lead to “an Official END to THE 12 DAY WAR." He excitedly added, "CONGRATULATIONS WORLD, ITS TIME FOR PEACE!" (No, really, he did.) "THE CEASEFIRE IS NOW IN EFFECT. PLEASE DO NOT VIOLATE IT! DO NOT DROP THOSE BOMBS. ISRAEL is not going to attack Iran. All planes will turn around and head home, while doing a friendly ‘Plane Wave’ to Iran. Nobody will be hurt, the Ceasefire is in effect! Thank you for your attention to this matter! DONALD J. TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES.”
The announcement, "friendly plane wave" and all, took not just Israel and Iran but his own advisers by surprise, probably because the so-called leader of the free world is a batshit crazy, power-mad, 12-year-old living in a fever dream reality show who thinks saying something, no matter how delusional, makes it so. It didn't. Iran promptly said, "As of now, there is NO ‘agreement’ on any cessation of military operations." Israel, despite all those impressive CAPS, promptly dropped a load of bombs that the ignored, enraged ringmaster for the 7,846th time called "the likes of which I've never seen before." "Israel has to calm down," he testily told reporters. "These are two countries fighting so long and so hard that they don’t know what the fuck they’re doing" - a blaring pot/kettle allusion that most of the sentient world savagely noted and mocked, but he somehow missed.
Still, reality came calling. Emerging assessments - from U.S. intelligence, European leaders, media like The Financial Times, New York Times, CNN - found the attacks did less-than-obliterating damage, likely only setting back the nuclear program a few months and leaving the stockpile "largely intact.” Evidence, including photos of trucks lined up the day before removing uranium enriched material to unknown sites, suggest Iran knew the attacks were coming. Other questions linger: Maybe Fordow wasn't a major site, maybe the bombs didn't go deep enough to inflict serious damage, etc. Meanwhile, Iran charged the U.S. had "crossed a very big red line," suspended cooperation with nuclear watchdog agencies, and, experts say, may have decided to move ahead with a nuclear weapon having learned that diplomacy is "reversible, fragile and vulnerable to changes in leadership in Washington."
With the rest of us now facing what Gestapo Barbie calls "a heightened threat environment" thanks to a clusterfuck regime of clowns who make Dr. Strangelove look like a statesman, the inept juvenile who failed at casinos, steak, water, wine and now war just keeps blustering: "The sites (were) totally destroyed and everyone knows it," "It's called obliteration. No other military on Earth could have done it," "an unbelievable hit by genius pilots," "It’s gone for years, years. Inside, it’s all collapsed. Nobody can get in. It's a room that has ten million tons of rock in it." Also, he gloated, it was just like Hiroshima: "That hit ended the war. And this was essentially the same thing.” Finally, for any lingering doubts or discomfiting facts, blame "Fake News," with ZERO CREDIBILITY!” who are "scum....They're bad people. They're sick," including a CNN reporter who should be "thrown out 'like a dog."
Puffed up, he also urged the trial of fellow felon Netanyahu be "CANCELLED, IMMEDIATELY" to save a "Great Hero," because America "saved" Israel and "now it is going to be the United States of America that saves" Bibi." At NATO, he told a head-swiveling, wildly under-reported story about Iran asking if it was OK they shoot 14 retaliatory missiles at the U.S. military base in Qatar at 1 o'clock. "They were very nice," Trump burbled. "They gave us warning...I said it's fine," despite America's alleged commander-in-chief agreeing to be bombed sure sounds like treason to us. "I am pleased to report that NO Americans were harmed, and hardly any damage was done...There will, hopefully, be no further HATE." He also sagely explained that everyone was taken off the base "except the gunners - they call them the gunners." At his side, Marco Rubio looks like Homer Simpson trying to melt into bushes.
Still, lacking alternatives, the minions have gamely climbed on board. Press Barbie screeched the attack was an "overwhelming success - everyone knows what happens when you drop 14 30,000 pound bombs perfectly on their targets," but spent more time trashing a CNN reporter who suggested it wasn't. Drunken Pete, even angrier and more unhinged, proclaimed the strikes "the most complex and secretive military operation in history" - except how Iran knew about them and D-Day's Allied invasion of France took a year's planning, 156,000 soldiers, 195,700 navy personnel, and the cooperation of 13 nations - and launched a furious diatribe for an audience of one against mean media for seeking accurate information, aka "hunting for scandals," insulting Dear Leader and "brave pilots," and trying to "manipulate the public mind" rather than "talk about how special America is" and "Wave an American flag." What a belligerent asshole.
Trump loved it, praising "one of the greatest, most professional, and - running out of adjectives besides "beautiful" and "strong" - most 'confirming' News Conferences I have ever seen!" Less entertainingly, he simply ignored diverging assessments of the U.S. intelligence community - a move former CIA Director Leon Panetta called "a very scary prospect" - dismissed the whistleblower who leaked them as a “low-level loser” while "declaring a war on leakers," announced he will (illegally, irrationally) limit classified information he shares with Congress despite no evidence the leaks came from Congress, the next day charged Dems leaked the information and "they should be prosecuted!" - this from the idiots who leaked actual war plans on Signal - and jabbered that the photos of trucks lined up at nuclear sites were those of "concrete workers trying to cover up the tops of the shafts." Say what?
Improbably, even without SCOTUS madness, it keeps getting weirder and worse. After NATO Sec. General Mark Rutte made a cringe joke about Trump as "Daddy," MAGA picked up and ran with the grotesque "Daddy" shtick: The White House posted a "Daddy's home" video, Fox giddily smirked that, thanks to those cool, pointless big-boy bombs being dropped, Republicans are "back to being the Daddy party - he gets things done," hideous orange Daddy merch instantly materialized. The final, puerile, demented abomination (for this week), like something from The Whitest Kids U' Know: He posted a 1995 parody video of the Beach Boys' Barbara Ann by Vince Vance & The Valiants called Bomb Iran: "Went to a mosque/ Gonna throw some rocks." Ladies and gentlemen, the President of the United States. His country's stunned response: "Bro, how the fuck is this real?" Honestly, we have no idea.
Fury as Trump Puts Tens of Millions of Protected Forests on the Chopping Block
A top Trump official on Monday announced a plan to end a rule that protects tens of millions of acres in the National Forest System and which would clear the way for road development and timber production on those lands—news that elicited alarm from conservation and environmental groups.
U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins announced that the Trump administration plans to rescind the 2001 Roadless Area Conservation Rule, which has for decades protected 58.5 million acres of forests from timber harvesting and road construction.
Rollins called the rule overly restrictive and added that the move "opens a new era of consistency and sustainability for our nation's forests. It is abundantly clear that properly managing our forests preserves them from devastating fires and allows future generations of Americans to enjoy and reap the benefits of this great land."
The environmental law group Earthjustice took issue with wildfire prevention being used to justify the rollback.
"While the Trump administration has suggested that wildfire risk is an underlying reason for these sweeping policy changes, rolling back the roadless rule actually threatens to cause more fires. That's because fire ignitions are far more likely in roaded landscapes," said Drew Caputo, the group's vice president of litigation for lands, wildlife, and oceans, in a statement on Monday.
Rollins made the announcement at the annual meeting of the Western Governors' Association. Hundreds of protestors gathered outside of the building where the event was taking place in Santa Fe, New Mexico in order to denounce efforts that might lead to federal public lands being privatized, according to The Associated Press.
The roadless rule covers areas including the Tongass National Forest in Alaska. In 2019, during the first Trump administration, the U.S. Department of Agriculture codified a regulatory framework that exempted Tongass from the roadless rule. Former President Joe Biden undid that change while he was in office.
Idaho and Colorado have adopted state roadless area rules that supersede the boundaries of the federal roadless rule boundaries for those states, according to the USDA's website, which appears to mean that not all of the 58.5 million acres would be impacted if the Trump administration goes through with this change.
"The roadless rule is one of the country's conservation success stories, safeguarding singular natural values across nearly 60 million acres of America's great forests," said Garett Rose, a senior attorney at the Natural Resources Defense Council.
Great Outdoors Campaign Director Ellen Montgomery at Environment America similarly said that "the roadless rule is the most effective conservation rule on the books at protecting mature and old-growth forests."
"Once again, the Trump administration is ignoring the voices of millions of Americans to pursue a corporate giveaway for his billionaire buddies. Stripping our national forests of roadless rule protections will put close to 60 million acres of wildlands across the country on the chopping block," said Sierra Club's forest campaign manager, Alex Craven, in a statement on Monday. "That means polluting our clean air and drinking water sources to pad the bottom lines of timber and mining companies—all while pursuing the same kind of mismanagement that increases wildfire severity."
Caputo at Earthjustice made some of these same points and indicated his organization is ready to sue over the move. "If the Trump administration actually revokes the roadless rule, we'll see them in court," he said.
The move follows a March executive order from U.S. President Donald Trump directing Rollins and the secretary of the U.S. Department of Interior to take steps to increase timber production.
Tax the Rich, Cut Corporate Fraud: Khanna Details Progressive Path to Trim Deficit by $12 Trillion
As congressional Republicans push a megabill that would add an estimated $2.4 trillion to the national debt while giving lavish tax breaks to the rich and gutting anti-poverty initiatives for the working class, Congressman Ro Khanna on Tuesday unveiled a progressive plan to cut the deficit by $12 trillion and enable investment in "essential programs for ordinary Americans: childcare, universal healthcare, affordable housing, free college, student debt cancellation, advanced manufacturing, and good-paying jobs."
The California Democrat's Progressive Deficit Reduction Plan, introduced in a report and floor speech, has five recommendations to cut spending: modernize the military ($850 billion), get rid of upcoding and fraud in Medicare Advantage ($830 billion), negotiate Medicare drug prices ($200 billion), end fossil fuel subsidies ($170 billion), and implement smarter procurement and contracting ($333 billion).
"There is absolutely no reason Americans should pay two to four times more for prescriptions than people in Canada, Germany, or the U.K."
Khanna's proposal points out that the Pentagon—which has a budget of nearly $1 trillion—has never passed an audit, and that getting ripped off by contractors is an issue not only at the Department of Defense but across the federal government. The document also emphasizes the need to crack down on fraud involving Medicare Advantage and argues that "there is absolutely no reason Americans should pay two to four times more for prescriptions than people in Canada, Germany, or the U.K."
On the fossil fuel front, the plan says that "we shouldn't be paying polluters to give our kids asthma and fleece the American public," and highlights that ending subsidies would not only save billions each year but also prevent 6 billion tons of carbon pollution.
The plan doesn't just advocate for spending cuts, it also features a trio of recommendations for generating revenue: tax corporations fairly ($2 trillion), tax billionaires ($4.7 trillion), and protect Social Security ($2.9 trillion).
Specifically, Khanna's proposal "restores the domestic corporate tax rate to 28%, collects international corporate taxes, closes loopholes like carried interest, and adds a 0.01% financial transaction tax." He also wants to make billionaires pay taxes on their wealth and loans on it, close inheritance loopholes, restore the top marginal tax rate to 39.6%, reinstate Internal Revenue Service funding to go after tax cheats, and remove a cap that allows them to pay into the program at a fraction of the rate that most working-class Americans pay.
Khanna, who is expected to run for president during the next cycle, also contrasted his plan with the budget reconciliation package currently moving through the GOP-controlled Congress. His report asserts that the Republican legislation is "not fiscal responsibility—it's a giveaway to the wealthy that sticks future generations with the bill."
In addition to increasing the deficit, the report says, "their bill risks driving up prices, pushing interest rates even higher, and making our tax code more convoluted. It could shake market confidence and ultimately drag down long-term economic growth—all while doing less for working families."
"Do they think Americans can't do the math? We can—and we know their numbers don't add up. Ours do," the document declares, laying out all of the figures for the next decade in a chart on the final page.
The congressman's blueprint—which resembles watchdog Public Citizen's January report responding to President Donald Trump and billionaire Elon Musk's so-called Department of Government Efficiency—comes as Senate Republicans consider the controversial megabill recently passed by the House of Representatives.
On Tuesday, GOP leaders in the upper chamber sent their House counterparts a list of policies "that need to be erased" from the package, according to Politico.
"If the flagged items aren't deleted, the bill won't enjoy special party-line treatment in the Senate and the filibuster would be enforced for passage of the 'big, beautiful bill' Republicans want to enact this summer," the outlet detailed. "In response, House GOP leaders plan to tee up a vote this week to nix specific provisions the Senate parliamentarian has identified as rule violations."
Watch: After Key Senate Vote Dems Force Reading of 940-Page GOP Megabill
This is a developing story... Please check back for possible updates...
After an hourslong delay from the initial goal of noon, U.S. Senate Republicans on Saturday night kicked off the process of passing their 940-page budget reconciliation package—which the chamber's Democrats are making the clerks read in full, not only to draw out the process but also to highlight the various provisions expected to harm American families while giving tax cuts to the rich.
"Senate Republicans are scrambling to pass a radical bill, released to the public in the dead of night, praying the American people don't realize what's in it," Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) said on the chamber's floor. "If Senate Republicans won't tell the American people what's in this bill, then Democrats are going to force this chamber to read it from start to finish."
Watch the bill reading:
After the reading, senators shift to debate and the period when they can offer amendments, known as the vote-a-rama. At this point, a final vote is expected sometime Monday. The House of Representatives has already passed its own version but must pass identical text before the bill can go to U.S. President Donald Trump's desk.
The Senate's updated bill text was released late Friday. Republicans then spent Saturday scrambling for enough support for the procedural vote. Ultimately, only Sens. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) and Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) voted with Democrats against considering the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which Trump wants to sign by July 4, or Independence Day.
Tillis explained his position in a lengthy statement, saying in part: "I cannot support this bill in its current form. It would result in tens of billions of dollars in lost funding for North Carolina, including our hospitals and rural communities. This will force the state to make painful decisions like eliminating Medicaid coverage for hundreds of thousands in the expansion population, and even reducing critical services for those in the traditional Medicaid population."
Senate Finance Committee Ranking Member Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) pointed out Saturday that "while Republican senators are securing baubles and trinkets for their political donors, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office has confirmed that the Senate bill will cut $930 billion from Medicaid." That preliminary analysis doesn't account for other attacks on healthcare, including the Affordable Care Act.
"Just as before, these cruel cuts to Americans' healthcare will strike a mortal blow to rural healthcare, and threaten the health and safety of kids, seniors, Americans with disabilities, and working families across the country," Wyden warned. "Life and death decisions of this magnitude should not be subjected to this rushed and reckless process. I urge Republican senators not to travel down this dangerous path: there is no band-aid that can heal these dangerous, deadly cuts."
It’s 2AM on a Sunday and I’m heading to the Capitol to FORCE a full reading of the Republicans’ 940-page bill.This bill will rip health care coverage away from 16 million people and cut food assistance.It’s sick. And we will not stand for it.
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— Elizabeth Warren (@warren.senate.gov) June 29, 2025 at 2:02 AM
Paul suggested on social media Saturday evening that the GOP bill would add too much to the national debt. In his post on X, the senator also took a swipe at the platform's owner: the richest man on Earth, Elon Musk, who was the de facto leader of Trump's so-called Department of Government Efficiency until his ugly exit from government last month.
Musk, meanwhile, also took to X to blast the package, criticizing the proposed taxes on wind and solar projects: "The latest Senate draft bill will destroy millions of jobs in America and cause immense strategic harm to our country! Utterly insane and destructive. It gives handouts to industries of the past while severely damaging industries of the future."
The bill would not only attack clean energy, but also give Big Oil $18 billion in new subsidies. Tyson Slocum, director of Public Citizen's Energy Program, said in a Saturday statement that "these last-minute changes added in secret, behind closed doors, are breathtakingly stupid, as they would undermine thousands of energy projects under development, cause economic chaos, and make electricity more expensive and less reliable for Americans."
"Senate Republicans have zero interest in pursuing measured, thoughtful policy, and instead are only interested in pleasing Trump and extreme oil and gas campaign donors with inane culture war nonsense. The American people deserve better from their Senators than this absurd, harmful charade," he continued. "Trump's oil and gas donors will be delighted, but these cuts will hit America's working families with more expensive energy bills and less reliable service."
While celebrating the 51-49 procedural vote—and specifically praising Sens. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.), Mike Lee (R-Utah), Cynthia Lummis (R-Wyo.), and Rick Scott (R-Fla.) for their crucial support—Trump lashed out at both Paul and Tillis on his Truth Social platform Saturday, threatening the latter with a primary challenge. On Sunday, Tillis announced he will not seek reelection next year.
Politico reported that on Saturday, "Vice President JD Vance arrived at the Capitol shortly after 8:00 pm to break a possible tie," with Johnson, Paul, and Tillis having already voted "no." Johnson changed his vote after negotiations that involved Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.), Majority Whip John Barrasso (R-Wyo.), Finance Chair Mike Crapo (R-Idaho), Budget Chair Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), and the other holdouts listed by Trump.
One win for critics of the megabill is the removal of Lee's provision to force the sale of public lands, which had generated widespread opposition, including from some Republican lawmakers. Lee had tried to slip a rewritten version of the measure back into the package after Senate Parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough ruled against it earlier this week.
Still, advocates, clergy, and people at risk because of the Republican bill are planning a Moral Monday demonstration at the U.S. Capitol—with 51 caskets—to call out GOP attacks on Medicaid, Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), and tax credits for working families.
"If this budget passes, it will unleash years of needless suffering on our nation's most vulnerable, preying on those with the least and undermining the dignity of hardworking, low-wage Americans. We must not—and will not—stop praying and advocating against this deadly and unjust bill," said Bishop William J. Barber II, president of Repairers of the Breach.
Barber, who has been arrested at the Capitol with other moral leaders, added that "we are going back to the Rotunda to pray—because we love the people of this nation too much to remain silent, and so we must raise our voices in moral demonstration and dissent."
Jayapal Slams ICE for Targeting Law-Abiding 'Moms, Dads, Grandparents'—Not Criminals
Progressive U.S. Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal on Thursday hosted a "shadow hearing" on Immigration and Customs Enforcement's targeting of asylum-seekers, families, relatives of American citizens, and other law-abiding people for deportation—policies and practices that belie President Donald Trump's claim that his administration would focus on removing undocumented criminals.
Jayapal (D-Wash.)—the ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee's Subcommittee on Immigration, Integrity, Security, and Enforcement and an immigrant—convened the panel, called Kidnapped and Disappeared: Trump's Weaponization of Immigration Courts. The shadow hearing "examined the disturbing trend of broad efforts to erode access to legal services and due process in immigration proceedings, especially as Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has been targeting immigrants showing up for legal proceedings—following the requirements set for them by courts."
"These actions are a direct attack on the legal immigration system and the people who are trying to follow all the legal steps."
A sampling of the more than 65,000 people arrested by ICE since Trump reentered office in January reveals people including a beloved resident of a staunchly pro-Trump town, a decorated combat veteran, a child with cancer, anti-genocide protesters, and a woman with an American husband and child who's lived in the U.S. for nearly 50 years.
While the Trump administration claims that "3 in 4 arrests were criminal illegal aliens," most people caught up in Trump's mass deportation drive have no criminal records or have only committed minor offenses including traffic violations. According to the libertarian Cato Institute, 65% of people taken by ICE had no criminal conviction whatsoever and 93% had no conviction for violent offenses.
"Republicans like to talk about how they support immigrants who quote 'do things the right way,'" Jayapal said during the hearing. "Now that they control Congress and the White House, they should be putting their money where their mouth is and ensuring that the legal immigration process remains open to those who pursue it—but that's not what's happening."
HAPPENING NOW: I’m hosting a shadow hearing on Trump’s undermining of due process.ICE is ramping up arrests at immigration courthouses, attacking the legal immigration system, and generating enormous fear in communities across America.Tune in now: www.youtube.com/watch?v=tqVC...
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— Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal (@jayapal.house.gov) June 26, 2025 at 5:44 AM
"They have arrested people at their citizenship interviews, their check-in appointments with Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and increasingly, at immigration court," Jayapal continued. "These actions are a direct attack on the legal immigration system and the people who are trying to follow all the legal steps."
"These actions only serve to make the immigration system even more chaotic and unjust than it already is," she added. "Just when you think this administration cannot sink any lower, they get out a shovel and keep digging."
House Democrats Judy Chu (Calif.), Jesús "Chuy" García (Ill.), Sylvia Garcia (Texas), Glenn Ivey (Md.), Henry C. "Hank" Johnson, Jr. (Ga.), Zoe Lofgren (Calif.), Jerrold Nadler (N.Y.), Delia Ramirez (Ill.), Mark Takano (Calif.), and Rashida Tlaib (Mich.) took part in Thursday's hearing.
Speakers on Jayapal's panel included retired immigration judge A. Ashley Tabaddor, National Immigrant Justice Center policy director Azadeh Erfani, Acacia Center for Justice chief of staff Bettina Rodriguez Schlegel, andImmigrant ARC interim director of programs Gillian Rowland-Kain.
Trump, Stephen Miller, and Tom Homan are arresting as many immigrants as possible — moms, dads, grandparents.ICE isn’t going after the “worst of the worst” like Trump promised. They’re disappearing asylum seekers, families, and relatives of citizens — many with no criminal record.
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— Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal (@jayapal.house.gov) June 26, 2025 at 9:31 AM
"Due process in a courtroom means that every part of the system functions fairly and in concert. That requires an independent judge, a level playing field, and a safe, accessible forum for all participants," Tabaddor said. "Yet noncitizens have no right to appointed counsel—even in life-or-death matters."
"Now, the Trump administration claims that immigration judges are effectively at-will employees, directly undermining their independence," she continued. "At the same time, immigration courts are being transformed into enforcement zones, deterring participation and eroding public trust."
"As a former judge, I can tell you: When even one part of the machine breaks—when judges are undermined, when legal support disappears, or fear keeps people from appearing—the entire system collapses," Tabaddor added. "And when that happens, it doesn't just fail immigrants. It fails all of us."
Erfani said: "Nothing is off the table for ICE to meet Trump's arrest quotas and build the largest mass detention system in recorded history. First, they took away all legal services so no one could represent themselves. Next, they raided the courts and took away access to judges. And lately, they have set traps at ICE check-in appointments, where individuals with pending cases trying to comply with their proceedings are shackled and disappeared into remote jails."
"As ICE tramples all semblance of due process and the rule of law, they are terrorizing our communities," she added.
Rodriguez Schlegel noted how "the Trump administration's attacks on due process have upended the lives and futures of our families, neighbors, and friends."
"In addition to the profound impact on our communities, ending legal access programs has further exacerbated the limited capacity of the immigrant legal services field," she said. "Alongside our inspiring network of legal service provider partners, we will continue to fight for these lifesaving programs to be restored so that families, children, and adults aren't forced to navigate our country's increasingly dehumanizing immigration system alone."
"As ICE tramples all semblance of due process and the rule of law, they are terrorizing our communities."
Stressing that "this is more than a policy shift," Rowland-Kain called the Trump administration's actions "a coordinated effort to sideline due process and deport people without giving them the opportunity to present their case."
"What should have been a space for due process is instead a site of fear," she said. "Masked and armed federal agents are arresting and intimidating people who attend court. Volunteers and attorneys are being surveilled. Every day, our members are in those courtrooms—often the only ones there to stand beside immigrants facing an unjust system. We will continue to do our work and to push back."
Trump Says Iran and Israel Agree to Cease-Fire
President Donald Trump said Monday that Israel and Iran have agreed to a "complete and total cease-fire" following 12 days of escalating attacks, including unprovoked U.S. attacks on multiple Iranian civilian nuclear facilities meant to be under international protection.
"It has been fully agreed by and between Israel and Iran that there will be a Complete and Total CEASEFIRE (in approximately 6 hours from now, when Israel and Iran have wound down and completed their in progress, final missions!), for 12 hours, at which point the War will be considered, ENDED!" Trump wrote on his Truth Social network.
"Officially, Iran will start the CEASEFIRE and, upon the 12th Hour, Israel will start the CEASEFIRE and, upon the 24th Hour, an Official END to THE 12 DAY WAR will be saluted by the World," Trump added. "During each CEASEFIRE, the other side will remain PEACEFUL and RESPECTFUL."
A senior Iranian official told Reuters that Tehran has agreed to a cease-fire following persuasion from Qatar, which hours earlier was the site of a symbolic Iranian missile attack on a base housing thousands of U.S. troops.
"Trump says there's a cease-fire between Israel and Iran. Is it true? We don't know but if it is, it's great news," Medea Benjamin, co-founder of the peace group CodePink, said on social media following the president's post. "Because Iran has been under attack. The world has been on edge. And while a cease-fire would be a tremendous relief, let's not forget: Trump lies."
Trump says there’s a ceasefire between Israel and Iran. Is it true? We don’t know but if it is, it’s great news.
Because Iran has been under attack. The world has been on edge. And while a ceasefire would be a tremendous relief, let’s not forget:
Trump lies.
Israel violates… pic.twitter.com/MZbxAc0nEu
— Medea Benjamin (@medeabenjamin) June 23, 2025
"Israel violates cease-fires all the time in Gaza, in Lebanon," Benjamin continued. "Israel has nuclear weapons. Iran does not. The U.S. and Israel have attacked Iran illegally. So yes, let's hope it's real. But let's also stay clear-eyed. And let's demand a cease-fire where it's urgently needed: Gaza."
"No more starvation. No more bombings," she added. "No more fake 'humanitarian corridors.'"
Biden National Security Adviser Among Those Crafting 'Project 2029' Policy Agenda for Democrats
"Jake Sullivan's been a critical decision-maker in every Democratic catastrophe of the last decade," said one observer. "Why is he still in the inner circle?"
Amid the latest battle over the direction the Democratic Party should move in, a number of strategists and political advisers from across the center-left's ideological spectrum are assembling a committee to determine the policy agenda they hope will be taken up by a Democratic successor to President Donald Trump.
Some of the names on the list of people crafting the agenda—named Project 2029, an echo of the far-right Project 2025 blueprint Trump is currently enacting—left progressives with deepened concerns that party insiders have "learnt nothing" and "forgotten nothing" from the president's electoral victories against centrist Democratic candidates over the past decade, as one economist said.
The project is being assembled by former Democratic speechwriter Andrei Cherny, now co-founder of the policy journal Democracy: A Journal of Ideas, and includes Jake Sullivan, a former national security adviser under the Biden administration; Jim Kessler, founder of the centrist think tank Third Way; and Neera Tanden, president of the Center for American Progress and longtime adviser to former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
Progressives on the advisory board for the project include economist Justin Wolfers and former Roosevelt Institute president Felicia Wong, but antitrust expert Hal Singer said any policy agenda aimed at securing a Democratic victory in the 2028 election "needs way more progressives."
As The New York Times noted in its reporting on Project 2029, the panel is being convened amid extensive infighting regarding how the Democratic Party can win back control of the White House and Congress.
After democratic socialist and state Assemblymember Zohran Mamdani's (D-36) surprise win against former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo last week in New York City's mayoral primary election—following a campaign with a clear-eyed focus on making childcare, rent, public transit, and groceries more affordable—New York City has emerged as a battleground in the fight. Influential Democrats including House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) and Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) have so far refused to endorse him and attacked him for his unequivocal support for Palestinian rights.
Progressives have called on party leaders to back Mamdani, pointing to his popularity with young voters, and accept that his clear message about making life more affordable for working families resonated with Democratic constituents.
But speaking to the Times, Democratic pollster Celinda Lake exemplified how many of the party's strategists have insisted that candidates only need to package their messages to voters differently—not change the messages to match the political priorities of Mamdani and other popular progressives like Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.).
"We didn't lack policies," Lake told the Times of recent national elections. "But we lacked a functioning narrative to communicate those policies."
Sanders and Ocasio-Cortez have drawn crowds of thousands in red districts this year at Sanders' Fighting Oligarchy rallies—another sign, progressives say, that voters are responding to politicians who focus on billionaires' outsized control over the U.S. political system and on economic justice.
Project 2029's inclusion of strategists like Kessler, who declared economic populism "a dead end for Democrats" in 2013, demonstrates "the whole problem [with Democratic leadership] in a nutshell," said Jonathan Cohn of Progressive Mass—as does Sullivan's seat on the advisory board.
As national security adviser to President Joe Biden, Sullivan played a key role in the administration's defense and funding of Israel's assault on Gaza, which international experts and human rights groups have said is a genocide.
"Jake Sullivan's been a critical decision-maker in every Democratic catastrophe of the last decade: Hillary Clinton's 2016 campaign, the withdrawal from Afghanistan, the Israel/Gaza War, and the 2024 Joe Biden campaign," said Nick Field of the Pennsylvania Capital-Star. "Why is he still in the inner circle?"
"Jake Sullivan is shaping domestic policy for the next Democratic administration," he added. "Who is happy with the Biden foreign policy legacy?"
Environmental and Indigenous Groups Mobilize to Stop 'Alligator Alcatraz'
"This scheme is not only cruel, it threatens the Everglades ecosystem that state and federal taxpayers have spent billions to protect," said Eve Samples, executive director of Friends of the Everglades.
As Florida's Republican government moves to construct a sprawling new immigration detention center in the heart of the Everglades, nicknamed "Alligator Alcatraz," environmental groups and a wide range of other activists have begun to mobilize against it.
Florida's Republican attorney general, James Uthmeier, announced last week that construction of the jail, at the site of a disused airbase in the Big Cypress National Preserve, had begun. According to Fox 4 Now, an affiliate in Southwest Florida, construction has moved at "a blistering pace," with the site expected to be done by next week.
Three environmental advocacy groups have launched a lawsuit to try to halt the construction of the facility. And on Saturday, hundreds of protesters flocked to the remote site to voice their opposition.
Opponents have called out the cruelty of the plan, which comes as part of U.S. President Donald Trump's crusade to deport thousands of immigrants per day. They also called out the site's potential to inflict severe harm to local wildlife in one of America's most unique ecosystems.
Florida's government has said the site will have no environmental impact. Last week, Uthmeier described the area as a barren swampland. He said the site "presents an efficient, low-cost opportunity to build a temporary detention facility because you don't need to invest that much in the perimeter. People get out, there's not much waiting for 'em other than alligators and pythons," he said in the video. "Nowhere to go, nowhere to hide."
But local indigenous leaders have said that's not true. Saturday's protest was led by Native American groups, who say that the site will destroy their sacred homelands. According to The Associated Press, Big Cypress is home to 15 traditional Miccosukee and Seminole villages, as well as ceremonial and burial grounds and other gathering sites.
"Rather than Miccosukee homelands being an uninhabited wasteland for alligators and pythons, as some have suggested, the Big Cypress is the Tribe's traditional homelands. The landscape has protected the Miccosukee and Seminole people for generations," Miccosukee Chairman Talbert Cypress wrote in a statement on social media last week.
Environmental groups, meanwhile, have disputed the state's claims that the site will have no environmental impact. On Friday, the Center for Biological Diversity, Friends of the Everglades, and Earthjustice sued the Department of Homeland Security in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida. They argued that the site was being constructed without any of the environmental reviews required by the National Environmental Policy Act.
"The site is more than 96% wetlands, surrounded by Big Cypress National Preserve, and is habitat for the endangered Florida panther and other iconic species. This scheme is not only cruel, it threatens the Everglades ecosystem that state and federal taxpayers have spent billions to protect," said Eve Samples, executive director of Friends of the Everglades.
Governor Ron DeSantis used emergency powers to fast track the proposal, which the Center for Biological Diversity says has left no room for public input or environmental review required by federal law.
"This reckless attack on the Everglades—the lifeblood of Florida—risks polluting sensitive waters and turning more endangered Florida panthers into roadkill. It makes no sense to build what’s essentially a new development in the Everglades for any reason, but this reason is particularly despicable," said Elise Bennett, Florida and Caribbean director and attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity.
Reuters has reported that the planned jail could hold up to 5,000 detained migrants at a time and could cost $450 million per year to maintain. It comes as President Trump has sought to increase deportations to a quota of 3,000 per day. The majority of those who have been arrested by federal immigration authorities have no criminal records.
"This massive detention center," Bennett said, "will blight one of the most iconic ecosystems in the world."
Kristi Noem Took Personal Cut of Political Donations While Governor of South Dakota: Report
"No wonder Pam Bondi gutted the public integrity section of DOJ. To protect utterly corrupt monsters like Kristi Noem."
The investigative outlet ProPublica revealed Monday that Kristi Noem secretly took a personal cut of funds she raised for a nonprofit that boosted her political career—and then did not disclose the income when President Donald Trump selected her to serve as head of the Department of Homeland Security.
ProPublica reported that in 2023, while Noem was governor of South Dakota, the nonprofit group American Resolve Policy Fund "routed funds to a personal company of Noem's that had recently been established in Delaware." The company is called Ashwood Strategies, and it was registered in June 2023.
"The payment totaled $80,000 that year, a significant boost to her roughly $130,000 government salary," according to the outlet. "Since the nonprofit is a so-called dark money group—one that's not required to disclose the names of its donors—the original source of the money remains unknown."
Experts told ProPublica that the arrangement and Noem's failure to disclose the income were unusual at best and possibly unlawful.
"If donors to these nonprofits are not just holding the keys to an elected official's political future but also literally providing them with their income, that's new and disturbing," Daniel Weiner, a former Federal Election Commission attorney who now works at the Brennan Center for Justice, told ProPublica.
Noem's lawyers denied that she violated the law but did not reply to ProPublica's questions about whether the Office of Government Ethics was aware of the $80,000 payment.
Unlike many Trump administration officials, Noem is not a billionaire. But "while she is among the least wealthy members of Trump's Cabinet, her personal spending habits have attracted notice," ProPublica observed, noting that she was "photographed wearing a gold Rolex Cosmograph Daytona watch that costs nearly $50,000 as she toured the Salvadoran prison where her agency is sending immigrants."
"In April, after her purse was stolen at a Washington, D.C. restaurant, it emerged she was carrying $3,000 in cash, which an official said was for 'dinner, activities, and Easter gifts,'" the outlet continued. "She was criticized for using taxpayer money as governor to pay for expenses related to trips to Paris, to Canada for bear hunting, and to Houston to have dental work done. At the time, Noem denied misusing public funds."
Political scientist Norman Ornstein wrote Monday that it was "no wonder [Attorney General] Pam Bondi gutted the public integrity section of DOJ."
"To protect utterly corrupt monsters like Kristi Noem," he added.