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Trump's Inferno: Just Stop
In the hopeful, chaotic aftermath of the biggest blue wave in 50 years, the inept “cartoon ghoul of a man” who fomented the carnage and his foul minions - Miller, Hegseth, Unholy Mike, the wrong Dana White - are scrambling like “pigs in the mire” to grasp some thorny new realities. To wit: Accountability is neither revenge nor crime, their once-vaunted “leader” is a dead clown walking, and hundreds of flipped state and federal seats mean their sleazy party is over.
This week we got the first giddy sightings of new Congressional Democrats, who auspiciously look much like diverse America, arriving at the Capitol for orientation. Fresh from their historic wins - flipping 549 legislative seats, ending 13 GOP supermajorities, creating at least six new Democratic trifectas, taking control of the House and Senate - they will now govern three quarters of Americans even as the Republican Party, per one online wiseacre, devolves into the Donner Party. Amidst the lame finger-pointing and precipitous shattering of GOP control, Mike Johnson blindly insisted “voters made the wrong choice" and smarmy Josh Hawley called for Christians to meet the “shocking and historic” election with a (notably modest) hour-long fast on Dec. 15 at the Capitol. Cheap thoughts and prayers: Go for it.
Because nobody ever claimed those who don't learn from history are doomed to repeat it, MAGA world has simply tripled down on their unequivocally rejected folly. First, led by a fragile narcissist snugly embedded in his alternate reality, flaccid calls of a rigged election slowly emerged. "Here we go," noted weary America. “Lather, rinse, repeat." "Does anybody really believe this "Election" was honest?" Trump whined, devising some "creative math" to falsely argue, "The Alaska Race is OVER. Dan Sullivan WON, BY A LOT!" MAGA idiots chimed in. Pillow Guy's "cybersecurity team" vowed to reveal vague "matching algorithmic patterns across multiple states," Alex Jones weirdly declared Trump "the ultimate Democrat sleeper cell," one Christo-fascist announced a Jan. 3 "Million Crusader March - Bring your cross!" SAD. Even evil Megyn Kelly was fed up: "Just stop."
But cults, by definition, don't. Instead, hell-bent on more losing, Trump gave voters a teeny stubby middle finger and chose to boost some of his most abject zealots, all tied to hated and calamitous policies: Stephen Miller, aka Pee Wee German, a literal Nazi with "blood on his hands" whose despised deportation machine moved Hispanics to help turn Texas blue; Pete Kegsbreath, a widely loathed, utterly inept asshole and war criminal whose bungled Iran war has made life unaffordable for vast swathes of America; and Gym Jordan, a buffoonish loyalist and former assistant wrestling coach known for long ignoring an infamous sexual abuse scandal with thousands of victims - there's even a movie - that creepily echoes the regime's ongoing cover-up of Epstein's boundless, Trump-adjacent atrocities. Heckuva job, Donnie et al.
Above all, like cornered animals clinging to the heroic memory of Nixon's refusal to accept any responsibility for his crimes - “When the president does it, it's not illegal” - the MAGA reponse to its glaring failures and looming accountability for them is to cry mean wolf and argue enforcing the law and embracing the constitutional task of Congressional oversight is, in fact, a crime, even months before the fact. Trump's already shrieking Dem "SLEAZEBAGS should go to jail for what they are doing," ie their job, which as an uber grifter he can only weirdly see as "extortion." "They are threatening a lot of people because they happen to be Republicans," he wailed, a scaredy-cat Mob bully pathetically melting down into his usual feeble projection. "There are no impeachable acts committed, or even thought of, by the victims of this illegal process."
His toadies have predictably mobilized to back him up - first, with bonkers threats. White House Counsel Will Scharf sent a mob-like, "legally repulsive" letter to incoming Oversight Chair Robert Garcia warning that Democrats undertaking their constitutionally mandated Congressional oversight "may cross the line into blatant criminality," resulting in, umm, imprisonment. Citing no criminal statute 'cause it doesn't exist, he snarled, "We are monitoring the abusive and capricious threats (to) harass and aggrandize, rather than to advance any legitimate legislative end,” a rebuke one lawyer called "a total bluff” given Dems have that "for miles." Other experts mocked "a ham-fisted stab at intimidation" that "will be Exhibit 1" in a self-own giving Dems "ammo to go straight to subpoenas." Said one, “Get D-team lawyers, win D-team prizes.”
Attorney General (sic) Todd Blanche, who as America's top law enforcement official "clearly doesn’t have the slightest clue what the rule of law is," went on both CNN and Fox to also suggest Dems were committing crimes; when asked what those might be, viewers noted he looked worried - or "scargry," a blend of scared and angry - before he pivoted to, "I'm not interested in explaining." He babbled about Dems' "extremely troubling rhetoric, no basis, no facts, just everyone running around...You have to draw the line, we have to wake up in this country, that's not governing, that's a disappointment." And yes of course it's his job to represent Goebbels and "everyone else...Every A.G. in history actively defends executive members of an administration." In other words, "Trump's former personal lawyer is still Trump's personal lawyer."
Despite MAGA’s bravado - and cleaning house of flunkies who may have receipts - they continue to be “led” by a fumbling clown - caravans, "Afghanistan jungles," "perceived loss," "chartered the human ginome" - who lately ends speeches with, “By the way, I was not on the ballot.” On 60 Minutes, even right-wing Ross Douthat nailed him for his poors-are-dumb retort to $3 billion in grift and corruption: “I have a son who watches over money...Every president has a problem (going) back to George Washington.” And there was his inane Press Secretary choice of “the Great Dana White, a violent Fighter and Warrior” who'd maybe bring some UFC fighters “though not from our Country, to defend us against the Lunatic Left.” He said he was “just kidding” after people realized he had the wrong Dana White, who alas is Black - other suggested Whites: Vanna, Betty, Walter - but he dragged his White to a bizarre presser anyway.
Amidst the tomfoolery, pundits point out the mid-term avalanche was the biggest rejection of any party since Watergate; its 13% net gain was the largest margin of victory since 1926, a "once-in-a century margin." "Everything is coming," says one. "It's going to be an entirely new day." Thanks to another GOP own goal, Dems will hit the ground running: They've been building investigative staffs from a large pool of former career prosecutors purged by Trump who know where the bodies are: "You cannot shred institutional memory - they just changed employers." Dems are working to reverse disastrous cuts in Medicaid, SNAP, other benefits. They're probing Susie Wiles' work with Kremlin-connected lobbyists and Marco Rubio's $1.2 million spent on military flights to Florida to watch his son (occasionally) play college football on our dime.
A judge made a D.C. golf course lawsuit the Caddyshack-like "surprise contender" for a belated legal showdown over feds' defiance of court orders, with a special master appointed to investigate "ethical violations” in the case. In Mississippi, Scott Colom just ousted Cindy Hyde-Smith to become the state's first Black U.S. senator since 1874, flipping the Dems' eighth Senate seat. Thomas Massie's resolute move to impeach "dangerously incompetent" Pete Hegseth for war crimes failed despite Hegseth's low-rent, lie-filled, "just following orders" hissy fit presser: "When he’s attacked, he hides behind the troops.” He squeaked through this time - "Tick tock get ready" - but John Oliver spoke for many when he urged, "Remove this fucking asshole." And Massie just got enough signatures to finally force a House vote to release millions of Epstein files. Garcia: “Our work is just getting started.”
Meanwhile, the guy whose lamentable victory Trump celebrated as "the EXONERATION of a Great American Patriot" again proved what a "warrior ethos jerk" he remains - on Veterans' Day yet - at an event at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, the country's most sacred war memorial. Because "everything is a show or photo op" to the empty buffoon with the make-up studio, Hegseth and his clueless coterie stood on the steps of the memorial for a "truly abhorrent" picture ; as they turned away, one of them loudly laughed, prompting a guard to furiously bark at them, as mandated, “ALL VISITORS WILL MAINTAIN AN ATMOSPHERE OF SILENCE AND RESPECT AT ALL TIMES." Online, a gazillion horrified people called Pete an oblivious asshat; many recalled visiting the site as middle-school kids who even then knew better, so what's his fucking problem.
At Arlington Trump was likewise insufferable. He compared his illegal 48-hour kidnapping stunt in Venezuela to America's endless, obscene tragedies in Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan, hideously argued "we got very little from any of those wars,” and gloated, "We’re taking out billions and billions of dollars of oil...To the victor belong the spoils." What a grotesquerie. Now the knives are out for him. For Veterans' Day, the Secret Handshake erected a new Bone Spurs tribute on the National Mall. Dubbed "The Foot Soldier," it features a golden Trump sitting on a pedestal rubbing a sore foot. Two plaques bear quotes. One from a 2013 photo in his Military Academy uniform: "I can be very military.” The other: "We honor the sacrifice (of) a soldier in spirit who marched to the front lines of dodging the draft, armed with a perfect diagnosis of bone spurs.”
With Democrats already infighting as the lame duck waddles amidst his crimes, lies, hate and question he'll never answer, The Bulwark entreats us to remember "There are no deals to be had." Our sole mission: "Destroy all monsters." In Unpopular Front, John Ganz proffers a similar but darker ultimatum: Eternal torment. He recalls 60 Minutes' Douthat asking Trump, "Do you think you're going to heaven?" Reply: "I hope so." Citing Christian forgiveness of your enemies, he asks if the smallest man on Earth can do that. Nope, he says: "I hate my enemies and I always will." In Dante's Inferno, Ganz notes, Dante and Virgil stop to talk to souls "stuck like animated friezes, repeating their state of sinfulness, the perpetual fate of the Wrathful...already pigs in the mire in this life." Thus is Trump's hatred "the entire substance of his being, the product of his disordered love for himself," and "relinquishing it would be an intolerable loss of self." So, inevitably, will he be "solidified into eternal bronzer."
"He was an arrogant person in the world/No goodness adorns his memory."
“How does it feel being a loser, Mr President?”- Sky News reporter, Dominic Waghorn👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏Give this man his Pulitzer Prize.
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— KittyKatGirl😻🙏💞🐞 (@mary1kathy.bsky.social) November 8, 2026 at 2:18 PM
Nov 12, 2026
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'Without Demarcation, There Is No Climate Solution,' Brazilian Indigenous Leader Tells COP31
A tribal leader from Brazil stressed on Monday, the opening day of the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Türkiye, that protecting Indigenous lands is a critical part of tackling the climate emergency, remarks that came as Brazil's government advances a plan to demarcate dozens of Indigenous territories amid surging violence against native people.
Joziléia Kaingang, co-founder and executive director of the National Network of Indigenous Women Warriors of Ancestral Wisdom (ANMIGA), told attendees of a session in COP31's Brazil Pavilion in Antalya that there are no real climate solutions without Indigenous participation.
"This means a very simple thing for us Indigenous peoples, something that our grandmothers have been saying for a long time and have known for a long time. Protecting Indigenous territory is indeed a climate policy," said Kaingang, who is a member of the Kaingang people of southern Brazil. "It is not charity, it is not compensation, it is a solution."
Kaingang hailed progress under the government of Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who was reelected last month with the support of 608 of the country's 658 Indigenous polling places. Lula's overwhelming support from Indigenous Brazilians is in no small part due to his government's substantial—yet tenuous—progress against illegal mining, logging, and other invasions of tribal lands.
Lula's policies marked a sharp reversal from former far-right President Jair Bolsonaro's deliberate dismantling of Indigenous territorial protections and other actions that lived up to his self-bestowed "Captain Chainsaw" moniker.
"The state withdrew invaders from our lands," Kaingang said. "The forest breathes again from the action of the last government of President Lula, and will continue to do so in this presidency in the next four years."
Kaingang continued:
In the Yanomami territory... 98% of illegal mining fell. This is important for all of us. Indigenous lands and local communities keep about a third of the carbon that humanity cannot lose.
And we want to say that we, Indigenous peoples, are here to celebrate the Brazilian government. We want to advance the roadmap to stop and reverse deforestation and forest degradation by 2030. But it is necessary that the roadmap brings the perspective of Indigenous peoples, of traditional communities, of our knowledge.
"Let's reaffirm that without demarcation, there is no climate solution," Kaingang added. "So let's keep demarcating the Indigenous territories so that we are the solution."
Brazil's government is preparing to approve dozens of additional Indigenous land demarcations before the end of 2026, Indigenous Peoples Minister Eloy Terena, who is a member of the Terena people, told Brasil de Fato on Sunday, as native communities face continuing deadly violence, land invasions, and encroachment by agribusiness interests.
During Lula’s third term, Brazil's government has recognized 20 Indigenous lands, declared 21 others, and established 31 reserves, according to the minister.
However, recent Indigenous land demarcation protests across Brazil have decried the government's failure to move faster in recognizing and protecting Indigenous territories amid ongoing violence.
Terena linked recent attacks against Guarani Kaiowá communities in Mato Grosso do Sul—including reported murders, vehicle attacks, and threats to poison drinking water—to the government's failure to secure their ancestral territories. He said that more than 150 technical working groups are advancing demarcation procedures, but warned that executive action alone cannot overcome entrenched political and judicial resistance, which is sustained by pressure from agribusiness and other destructive interests.
The minister added that the government seeks "to strengthen Indigenous organizations, the Indigenous movement, and communities. Because we understand that if eventually the democratic winds turn, we need to have a very committed society and very well-structured social movements."
Nov 09, 2026
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‘This Is Evil’: Critics Hammer Google Plan to Shut Off Search Access for Schools That Reject Its AI
Tech giant Alphabet, the parent company of Google, is telling US schools that there's a price to be paid for restricting student access to its artificial intelligence tools.
The New York Times reported on Tuesday that, starting early next year, schools that fully disable the company's AI will also lose access to its search engine, which is by far the most used internet search tool in the world.
Chris Phillips, vice president for education at Google, justified the policy by claiming that "Search and AI are deeply integrated," adding that students attending schools where AI is banned "will not have access to Search, and they’ll see a message from their school that indicates it’s not available."
As the Times noted, Google has deeply integrated itself into US classrooms, many of which rely on its Classroom assignment platform and equip students with low-cost Chromebook laptops.
"The company’s new strategy underscores Google’s powerful role in American education," the Times explained. "If school leaders want continued student access to Search within the company’s ecosystem, they will be forced to embrace Google's AI."
Schools around the US have been banning the use of AI for young students over concerns that reliance on the technology will hinder the development of critical thinking skills and also enable mass cheating on assignments.
Morgan Polikoff, an education professor at the University of Southern California, told the Times that he expects Google's new policy linking AI and Search will only add more fuel to the backlash against the tech industry.
"This is a particularly clear example of the tech industry going out of its way to force AI on us all," said Polikoff, "even if we have said we don’t want it."
Lina Khan, former chair of the Federal Trade Commission under President Joe Biden, accused Google of "using its search monopoly to coerce schools into adopting AI," and said it was yet another reason why antitrust action should be taken against the company.
"This highlights the danger of allowing an unregulated monopolist to control an essential service," Khan wrote in a social media post. "Multiple courts have found Google liable for violating antitrust laws, and this latest move shows it remains unchastened. As the public increasingly pushes back against the use of AI in schools, Google is making clear it will punish those who don’t fall in line."
New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, whose city earlier this year banned AI in elementary and middle schools, similarly took Google to task for trying to force its products onto students.
"No corporation should have the power to dictate how we teach our children," Mamdani wrote. "Our public schools exist to serve students, not to grow the profit margins of Big Tech."
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) used news of Google's new AI school policy to take a shot at President Donald Trump, who has constantly downplayed the need for any regulation of the industry.
"President Trump claimed that AI oligarchs could regulate themselves because they 'love our country,'" Sanders wrote. "Now, Google is threatening schools: If you stop your students from using AI, we will cut off your access to Google Search. That’s not love. That’s extortion."
Cognitive scientist Gary Marcus, a longtime skeptic of the AI industry, responded to Google's move by writing, "This is evil."
Author Kashana Cauley remarked that Google's motto used to be "don't be evil," whereas today its motto appears to be, "We are now holding your kids and their schools hostage."
Cauley added that schools wouldn't be in this position if they hadn't taken up Google's offer to supply low-cost Chromebooks for students.
"The schools shouldn’t be beholden to district-wide Chromebook deals if Google is holding us hostage," she wrote. "We need to get Chromebooks and Google out of the schools."
Nov 03, 2026
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'A Guy Who Wants to Tinker Around the Edges': Sanders Makes the Case Against Schumer for Senate Leader
US Sen. Bernie Sanders on Wednesday offered a blistering assessment of Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer's leadership, saying his approach to everything from Israel and artificial intelligence to economic inequality demonstrates why Democrats need new leadership.
"I think, in this moment in American history, Chuck's views are way out of touch with where the American people are at—and especially with where [the base of] the Democratic Party is," Sanders (I-Vt.) told John Nichols, executive director of The Nation.
"On issue after issue, I think he is just not in tune with where his constituents are at," he said of the New York Democrat.
Sanders—who acknowledges that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza as determined by a UN commission of inquiry and many other experts—took particular aim at Schumer's continued support for US military aid to the country. Sanders argued that the United States should not provide "another nickel" in weapons assistance to an ally that the International Court of Justice and others say is an apartheid state, and whose prime minister is a fugitive from the International Criminal Court, wanted for alleged crimes against humanity and war crimes.
The two-time social democratic presidential candidate also questioned whether Schumer would fight for a billionaire wealth tax to fund universal childcare, tuition-free public colleges, and affordable housing.
"And I think that basically on other issues Chuck is a guy who wants to tinker around the edges," Sanders said.
Schumer's decision last year to help advance a Republican government funding bill sparked intense backlash from progressives, who accused him of surrendering Democrats' leverage and called on him to resign.
Sanders also criticized Schumer for failing to meaningfully address the power of the technology industry's billionaire executives and the rapid proliferation of artificial intelligence and data centers.
The criticism comes amid mounting progressive dissatisfaction with the party's congressional leadership following Democrats' sweeping midterm victories. As Common Dreams has reported, progressive organizers have argued that the electoral results represent a mandate for transformative change, not simply a return to business as usual under establishment Democrats.
Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) has emerged as a potential alternative to Schumer—and one who Sanders said he would support.
"It's not a time for incrementalism," Van Hollen recently said. "It's a time to move forward a very bold kitchen table agenda."
Van Hollen has urged colleagues not to give Schumer a "blank check" without commitments to an ambitious economic program.
Schumer has sounded confident that he will be elected majority leader after Democrats retake control of Congress in January.
"I am going to be elected leader, OK, and we're united on the issues," Schumer told The Washington Sun on Wednesday. "We're united. We're united on costs and chaos."
Nov 11, 2026
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US Citizen Shot by ICE in California Sues Trump Administration for $25 Million
Carlos Jimenez, a US citizen and father of three who still has bullet fragments lodged near his lung after being shot by a US Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer in California last year, is suing the Trump administration, San Bernardino County, and various agents for over $25 million in damages.
Jimenez, who is from Ontario, east of Los Angeles, filed his complaint against the United States, the county, ICE Enforcement and Removal Operations officer Eusebio Ortiz, two US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officers, a Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) special agent, and 20 unnamed defendants on Friday.
While Jimenez was driving to work on the morning of October 30, 2025, he approached agents conducting an immigration operation to let them know they were near a bus stop for schoolchildren. Ortiz ultimately shot him, but it was Jimenez, not the officer, who then faced charges that have since been dropped.
As with some other people ICE or CBP agents have shot—sometimes fatally—the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS), which oversees both agencies, has claimed Jimenez "attempted to run officers over" federal agents "by reversing directly at them without stopping," but his lawyers have disputed that account.
After the shooting, at a local hospital, FBI agents "interfered with his medical care," according to a complaint. They allegedly prevented Jimenez from talking to healthcare providers, removed him from the hospital bed, and "handcuffed him with a leather waist restraint."
As the FBI drove Jimenez back to the scene for an interrogation, "while the bullet and fragments remained lodged in his body," he "kept bleeding and vomiting in the agents' van," and they told him not to "ruin their vehicle," the filing claims. He was taken to West Valley Detention Center, where he was also denied adequate medical care.
A few weeks later, a grand jury indicted Jimenez, whom federal prosecutors charged with assaulting a federal officer using a deadly or dangerous weapon, but "the criminal case later became the subject of a dispute over evidence," Newsweek reported Monday.
As the outlet detailed:
On May 5, US District Judge Kenly Kiya Kato ordered the government to turn over communications and operational records sought by the defense; this included responsive communications on government-issued and personal phones. The order also required a declaration under penalty of perjury from Ortiz if no responsive messages from him existed.
Jimenez entered into a diversion agreement shortly afterward. After he completed its conditions, Kato dismissed the indictment with prejudice on November 2, meaning the charge cannot be refiled. The dismissal order did not make a finding that federal officers used excessive force or otherwise acted unlawfully.
The Guardian highlighted that in addition to calling the criminal charges against Jimenez "fabricated," the complaint "alleges that the FBI falsely claimed that two neighbors witnessed the incident and told an agent that Jimenez's vehicle had enough room to pull forward without reversing. When Jimenez’s legal team interviewed those witnesses, both denied making those statements and said they were unaware there had been a shooting until they saw news reports."
While the FBI declined to comment and DHS referred questions to the US Department of Justice, Ciaran McEvoy, a spokesperson for the DOJ in Los Angeles, said in an email to the newspaper that Jimenez "could have exercised his right to take the case to trial, but he instead requested that our office agree to resolve the case through a diversion agreement."
Jimenez is among at least 32 people fired upon by federal immigration agents as part of Republican President Donald Trump's mass detention and deportation campaign. Others include Renee Good and Alex Pretti, US citizens killed early this year in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and Silverio Villegas González, a Mexican man fatally shot last year near Chicago, Illinois.
At the beginning of October, Good's family filed a pair of lawsuits against the federal government and immigration officials over her death and an alleged conspiracy to interfere with civil rights in Minnesota's Twin Cities. A week later, Villegas González's relatives filed a legal claim against the administration over his "execution-style killing." Pretti's family hasn't yet sued, but his parents demanded justice at a press conference late last month.
Nov 09, 2026
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‘Illegal and Senseless’: 71% of Americans Want Swift End to Trump’s Iran War
As Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, who is expected to face an impeachment vote in the US House in part for his role in launching the illegal war with Iran, declared Tuesday that the US had "achieved a historic MILITARY VICTORY" in the Middle Eastern country, the latest polling on the broadly unpopular conflict suggests few Americans would be convinced by such claims.
Seventy-one percent of people surveyed by Reuters/Ipsos said they wanted the US Congress to urgently pass legislation to end the war in Iran, in which more than 3,400 Iranians, 13 US service members, and thousands of people across the Middle East have been killed as the conflict has wreaked havoc on economies around the world.
Those who were demanding a swift end to the war included 93% of Democrats, 70% of independents, and 51% of Republican voters who expressed their disapproval in the days after the Democratic Party's victory in the midterm elections.
Sixty-three percent of respondents said that Congress should focus "a great deal" or "quite a bit" on ending the war in the first 100 days of the new legislative session, starting January 3, and 54% said the negative impact of the conflict, such as higher gas prices, have not been worth any benefit even as Hegseth and President Donald Trump have claimed, without offering any evidence, that the US waged the war to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon.
"Their navy sunk. Their air force grounded. Their defense industrial base—gone. More than 80% of their nuclear industrial base—gone. Their military in ruin. The ironclad blockade, UNBROKEN," said Hegseth Tuesday, without mentioning that the Trump administration had declared months before waging the war that it had already weakened Iran's nuclear infrastructure. "We control the Strait of Hormuz."
Tehran has disputed Hegseth's repeated claims of victory, and the secretary of the Supreme National Security Council, Mohsen Rezaei, on Monday evening called on the Trump administration to "SURRENDER to the seven conditions Iran has repeatedly set out," including an end to the US blockade of Iranian ports and vessels, an end to fighting on all fronts, the lifting of sanctions on Iranian oil and gas sales, and other measures and reparations.
Meanwhile, Trump, who faced a 32% approval rating in the Reuters/Ipsos poll, attempted to deflect questions about ending the conflict, telling reporters Monday: "Iran, militarily, is effectively over. We're just keeping it the status quo."
He added that the US military is "fully locked and loaded with the best equipment ever made" but said, "We don't think there's going to be any reason to use it however."
Trita Parsi, executive vice president of the Quincy Institute of Responsible Statecraft, wrote at Substack Tuesday that Trump may ultimately reject "both war and peace" and choose a "Swiss cheese status quo" that leaves the conflict simmering without any major resolution.
In that scenario, he wrote, Trump "walks away and claims to retain the blockade and sanctions infrastructure, but in reality imperceptibly begins to let it wither away."
"Given Trump’s aversion to admitting defeat, his fear of coming across as a loser, his impatience with complicated diplomacy, his obsession with outdoing Obama’s [Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action], and Iran’s disinterest in giving him an ego-soothing exit ramp, he may end up choosing the Swiss cheese walk-away option," wrote Parsi.
While Hegseth continued to deny the reality of the deeply unpopular war, the anti-war group Just Foreign Policy urged Democratic leaders in the US House and Senate to listen to the vast majority of Americans and take action immediately, without waiting for the new session to begin, to cut off funding for the war.
The group reminded Democrats ahead of the election that they could block more funding for the Iran War on December 11, when current government spending expires, and force a government shutdown if Trump insists on continuing the conflict after that date.
As Common Dreams reported Tuesday, Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), who is considering a possible run to serve as Senate Majority Leader, threw his support behind blocking the funding.
Dylan Williams, vice president for government affairs at the Center for International Policy, said the results of the Reuters/Ipsos poll provide Democrats with clear marching orders.
"A 71% supermajority of Americans, including most Republicans, want Congress to end the Iran war," he said. "Lawmakers can act on that right now by passing legislation to prohibit more funding for the war, and by not passing any bills that continue to fund it."
Seeing the poll numbers, political scientist Yousef Munayyer said that many Americans were "enraged" by Trump's decision to join Israel in attacking Iran not just because "it was a stupid decision, [but] it was a stupid decision that was taken with no public debate at all."
"There was not effort at all on the part of the White House to present a rationale for this or convince the public ahead of time," said Muayyer. "They didn't feel they had to because they felt empowered to do whatever the hell they wanted and had a Republican-controlled Congress who would allow it. Voters saw that not only as stupidity, but out-of-control stupidity that needed to be checked before it further wrecked the country."
Nov 10, 2026
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‘Kick These Big Polluters Out!’ Worst-of-the-Worst Corporate Obstructionists Dominate UN Climate Summit
“You can’t put out a fire while handing the matches to the arsonists. And you certainly can’t expect the arsonists to write the evacuation plan.”
Nov 13, 2026
A coalition of environmental organizations is warning that the COP31 climate summit in Antalya, Türkiye is in danger of being co-opted by big polluters.
An analysis released on Friday by the Kick Big Polluters Out (KBPO) coalition finds that more than 100 polluting corporations and trade associations—including from fossil fuel, Big Tech, and industrial agriculture—have sent delegations to COP31.
Among the largest delegations, the report says, are International Emissions Trading Association (IETA), which sent 29 delegates; BNP Paribas, which sent 22; HSBC, which sent 19; and Amazon, which sent 12.
The analysis also shows that banks "collectively representing more than $2.2 trillion in fossil fuel financing from 2021-2025" have a presence at COP31.
The KBPO report notes that these industries and associations "have demonstrated track records of being notably misaligned with or obstructing climate policy... indicating they can be a threat to the strong climate action COP31 must urgently deliver."
These polluters' delegations are so big that they vastly outnumber delegations sent by many nations that are most endangered by the climate emergency, including Niger, the Philippines, and Nepal.
Maikel Peuki, director of the Papua chapter of the Indonesian Forum for Living Environment (WALHI) and a KBPO partner, said allowing big polluters to have a seat at the COP31 table would have dire consequences for his country's environment.
“In Papua our forests and coastal areas are being targeted for fossil fuel and food estate projects and carbon-offsetting schemes by major corporate emitters,” said Maikel Peuki. “This is not a genuine solution to the climate crisis. Those who cause pollution should be the ones to pay for the damage they have created.”
Peuki's remarks were echoed by Lien Vandamme, senior campaigner for the Center for International Environmental Law's Climate and energy program.
"You can’t put out a fire while handing the matches to the arsonists," said Vandamme. "And you certainly can’t expect the arsonists to write the evacuation plan. It’s therefore no surprise that the UN climate talks continue to fail in delivering the climate action that is needed. It’s time to show Big Polluters the door and fundamentally change the rules that keep rolling out the red carpet for them."
Prakash Dalal, director of Friends of the Earth Nepal, accused big polluters of causing "loss of livelihood, emotional damage, trauma, and survival challenges" for people in his country, adding that "we cannot tolerate the disproportionate space given to them compared to civil society and our country delegations."
"We need to kick these big polluters out!" Dalal emphasizes. "This should be a moral and legal obligation for the COP."
The presence of polluters also drew the ire of climate activist Greta Thunberg, according to a Thursday report in Latin Times.
While protesting outside COP31, Thunberg decried the negotiations for being "filled with lobbyists" who are "paid by the very destructive industries" profiting from continued fossil fuel dependence.
Thunberg also accused governments attending COP31 of using the event to "whitewash themselves" without taking real action.
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Rights Groups Call for UN Member States to Back Treaty to Restrict 'Killer Robots' Worldwide
“Autonomous weapons systems are no longer a hypothetical future threat," said a program director at Amnesty International. “Meaningful constraints need to be put in place now."
Nov 12, 2026
A coalition of human rights groups called on United Nations member states to begin negotiating a treaty restricting the use of autonomous "killer robots" in battle at an international weapons conference taking place next week.
Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, and the international coalition Stop Killer Robots said Thursday that governments should use the Review Conference of the Convention on Conventional Weapons (CCW) to launch negotiations on a new protocol imposing legally binding limits on weapons guided by artificial intelligence. The conference begins in Geneva, Switzerland, on November 16.
The CCW, a treaty adopted by the UN in 1980, prohibits the use of weapons that cause unnecessary harm to combatants or affect civilians indiscriminately. However, the treaty does not include specific restrictions on the use of self-guided weapons systems.
“Autonomous weapons systems are no longer a hypothetical future threat, with reports growing that they are already being tested, integrated, and deployed,” said Carolyn Horn, program director for law and policy at Amnesty International. “Meaningful constraints need to be put in place now. Countries should seize this moment to open negotiations on new international law before these systems become entrenched in military practice, with potential to lead to devastating consequences for humanity.”
The CCW Review Conference is held only once every five years. Since the last one, self-guided systems capable of finding, selecting, and striking targets have been deployed on battlefields around the world.
Earlier this year, The New York Times reported that Russia was testing and deploying AI-powered drones in Ukraine that can identify and strike targets without a human operator making the final decision. In July, one of these drones struck a gas station in Zaporizhzhia, killing three civilians.
China is also aggressively developing increasingly autonomous weapons systems, including packs of rifle-equipped robotic dogs, AI-powered drone swarms, and unmanned combat vehicles—some of which have already been demonstrated in military exercises.
The Financial Times reported Wednesday that Foundation Future Industries, a US-based robotics startup backed by President Donald Trump's son, Eric, was in talks to supply the Israel Defense Forces with up to 1,000 Phantom MK-1 humanoid robots for operations in Gaza's tunnel network, potentially including combat.
The company's co-founder and president, Mike LeBlanc, told the outlet he had “no question of the morality of building a ‘Terminator’,” adding that “combat is the noblest” purpose they could perform.
“If you can keep somebody from having to kick in a door not knowing if there’s an enemy on the other side with a gun pointed at it, that’s kind of the highest purpose of what these robots could do,” he added.
Related concerns surround the more widespread use of AI to select targets. Israel has used AI-powered systems to identify thousands of Palestinians for potential assassination, generate bombing targets, and track people to their homes, raising serious concerns about faulty targeting, inadequate human oversight, and the killing of civilians, including entire families.
During its war on Iran, the United States has used AI-powered software to identify and prioritize targets for airstrikes. Pentagon investigators identified flawed intelligence, outdated imagery, and excessive reliance on Palantir's Maven AI system as factors contributing to the US bombing of an elementary school in Minab, which killed more than 150 people, including at least 123 children, on February 28, the first day of the war.
In September, a UN group of governmental experts agreed on a proposed definition of lethal autonomous weapons and a framework for regulating them. The proposal included basic principles requiring human control and adherence to the laws of war.
But the United States and Russia pushed to weaken some of the requirements for human review of AI-generated targets and for autonomous weapons to operate predictably and reliably. They also removed explicit language requiring "that ethical considerations are taken into account" when autonomous weapons are used.
Human Rights Watch has criticized the narrowing of these parameters, but said the agreement still provided a workable basis for treaty negotiations within the next year.
“After years of stalemate largely due to some states weaponizing the consensus-based decision-making under the CCW against meaningful progress, state parties finally have an opportunity to move from discussion to action,” said Verity Coyle, the group's deputy crisis, conflict, and arms director. “A time‑bound treaty negotiation process is the only credible way to ensure UN member states effectively respond to the existential dangers posed by autonomous weapons systems.”
As of August, more than 120 nations have indicated support for a binding treaty to regulate autonomous weapons systems, according to Stop Killer Robots. Nicole van Rooijen, the group's executive director, said next week's conference is the best opportunity in years to establish one.
“The Convention on Conventional Weapons was created to address emerging threats, and this Review Conference should show that it still can,” she said. “States parties to the convention have a responsibility to act before autonomous weapons systems reshape warfare in ways that undermine human dignity and civilian protection.”
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As Pollution-Fueled Climate Disasters Intensify, Flood Deaths Hit 13-Year High
Deadlier flood disasters "are the foreseeable consequences of a fossil-fueled economy in which those who pollute most are also the best protected from its consequences," said one campaigner.
Nov 12, 2026
An analysis released Thursday by anti-poverty group Oxfam juxtaposed the soaring number of flood-related deaths worldwide with the ultrawealthy's ability to insulate themselves from the climate disasters that are growing more common and devastating as oil and gas emissions continue.
The group found that as monthly temperature records were shattered in more than 100 countries this year, flood deaths reached a 13-year high—driven largely by catastrophic flooding in Nepal and Tibet in August, when a glacier collapse sent a "wall of water more than 100 meters high, traveling at 180 kilometers per hour," which swept through a valley and killed more than 1,500 people, with 5,600 still missing.
The flooding disaster, which the chief of the United Nations Office for Project Services said last month should be a "defining moment" for an international community grappling with how to mitigate the impacts of the climate emergency, accounted for about three-quarters of the 8,000 people who died in floods this year.
"Deaths from flooding are seven times higher in more unequal countries," noted Oxfam, while people in the Global South are far less likely to have contributed meaningfully to the carbon pollution that scientists say is heating the planet, putting the 1.5°C limit set by the Paris Agreement in 2015 out of reach, and causing the loss of glaciers and more extreme weather disasters.
"The carbon pollution of a person in the richest 1% has contributed 34 times more to today's extreme heatwaves than the average person, and 100 times more than someone in the poorest 50%," said Oxfam.
In September, the UN found that with countries contributing far too little to efforts to reduce carbon emissions, the planet is now expected to overshoot the 1.5°C threshold, and said policymakers must now focus on ensuring the overshoot is temporary.
But on Thursday, as world leaders gathered in Antalya, Türkiye for the United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP31), a report warned that the Earth could in fact be heading for an "irrevocable" breach of the 1.5°C limit.
"The carbon pollution of a person in the richest 1% has contributed 34 time more to today's extreme heatwaves than the average person, and 100 times more than someone in the poorest 50%."
The record number of flooding deaths this year, said Amitabh Behar, executive director of Oxfam International, "are not accidents of weather. They are the foreseeable consequences of a fossil-fueled economy in which those who pollute most are also the best protected from its consequences."
Oxfam also emphasized that while flooding deaths are soaring, one trend at COP31 demonstrated how the ultrarich are making devastating disasters in communities around the world more likely.
The group analyzed data from Polluterjet, finding that 87 private jets landed at Antalya Airport since November 7, just before COP31 began, emitting an estimated 777 tons of carbon dioxide.
"Nigerian billionaire Aliko Dangote’s private jet flew approximately 4,370 kilometers from Lagos to Antalya, emitting an estimated 30 tons of carbon, roughly as much as the average person emits in six years," said Oxfam. "During COP30 last year, 66 private jet journeys were recorded."
According to the Global Solidarity Levies Task Force, taxing private jets owned by about 250,000 people around the world could raise $45 billion per year, "nearly 12 times the amount rich countries gave to UN climate funds in 2025."
“While families mourn loved ones killed by floods and endure blistering heat, the ultrawealthy carry on flying in private jets, high above the devastating consequences,” said Behar. “Governments must stop treating the extraordinarily polluting luxuries of the superrich as an untouchable privilege. Taxing private jets is an obvious first step.”
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'Sen. Whitehouse Knows Better': Democrat Urges Climate Action at COP31—But Pushes Despised Permitting Bill at Home
"He should be standing up to Trump and Big Oil, not cutting deals that hand them even more power," said one campaigner.
Nov 12, 2026
US Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse has worked hard to establish a reputation as a climate champion and a foe of fossil fuel giants, but the Rhode Island Democrat is under fire this week for pushing a "dirty deal" on permitting reform in Congress, even as he's promoting action to slash planet-heating emissions on the world stage.
Although there is no formal US delegation at the United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP31) hosted by Türkiye, Whitehouse has posted a series of videos from Antalya, arguing that "we're going to fail on climate as long as it's free for the fossil fuel industry to pollute," "economic collapse related to financial risk is on its way," and the "real villains" are not only the oil and gas companies but also their "climate denial fraud operation."
Whitehouse is the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works' ranking member and could chair the panel when Democrats claim their majority in January. He headed for the summit after joining 21 other Democrats who voted with Republicans on Monday to advance the Bipartisan American Affordability and Jobs Act (BAAJA)—which GOP President Donald Trump has supported, while still opposing wind energy.
BAAJA is intended to speed up the permitting process for energy infrastructure—not only renewable projects and transmission lines, but also oil and gas pipelines. Critics have blasted the bipartisan bill as "a blatant giveaway to Big Oil and Big Tech," highlighting that it would undermine its clean energy provisions by propping up the dirty fossil fuel industry and further accelerating the expansion of deeply unpopular artificial intelligence data centers.
"Sen. Whitehouse is a reliably strong voice for climate action and a frequent presence at the climate talks," Collin Rees, United States campaign manager at the advocacy group Oil Change International, said in a Thursday statement. "This makes it even more disappointing that he's choosing to introduce and champion a Trump-backed bill that would accelerate massive build-out of fossil fuel projects and AI data centers by weakening environmental protections."
As one of the lead sponsors, Whitehouse's "involvement acts as a smokescreen for the Big Tech, Big Oil, and industry-funded front groups who have spent millions of dollars lobbying for the bill," Rees asserted. "BAAJA could fast-track construction of hundreds of proposed gas power plants and pipelines, polluting communities’ air and water, desecrating tribal nations' sacred sites, and raising households' energy bills. It would gut bedrock environmental laws in exchange for some weak promises Trump has already committed to breaking."
While Whitehouse has tried to frame the legislation as "a BIG step to fight climate change," Rees pointed out that "proponents’ own modeling shows that the bill's transmission provisions would have no discernible benefit to our climate, while unlocking unprecedented fossil fuel development. At best, this bill leaves US emissions over 2.1 billion tons short in 2040 of even a modest climate goal."
"Sen. Whitehouse knows better than most the damage the fossil fuel industry has done to our climate and democracy," the campaigner continued. "That's precisely why he should be standing up to Trump and Big Oil, not cutting deals that hand them even more power. Climate leadership at COP31 must be matched by climate leadership at home, and that means rejecting BAAJA."
A final Senate vote on BAAJA looms. Reuters reported Wednesday that Whitehouse "told reporters by phone that he would return by Monday for the next permitting reform vote," and "the 75-23 Senate vote to advance the legislation earlier this week had improved its prospects in the House of Representatives."
"He said members of the bipartisan Problem Solvers Caucus had assured senators that the House will hold a vote on the measure and were optimistic about its chances of passing," according to the news agency. While the midterm election results mean Democrats will control both chambers next year, for now, they still have Republican majorities.
Backed by those GOP majorities in Congress, Trump has delivered on his 2024 campaign promise to serve fossil fuel industry interests since returning to office early last year. That has included abandoning the Paris Agreement, again, and refusing to participate in annual UN climate summits—even though the United States is the world's worst historical polluter.
With the world barreling toward "an irrecoverable overshoot of 1.5°C," the Paris Agreement's global temperature rise limit for this century, unless governments "rapidly reduce emissions to limit both the magnitude and duration of this overshoot," as Climate Action Tracker warned Thursday, other US leaders are participating in COP31.
Whitehouse is there with the Massachusetts-based Woodwell Climate Research Center, while The New York Times reported that Democratic California Gov. Gavin Newsom—a likely 2028 presidential candidate—and outgoing Democratic Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, who ran for vice president last cycle, were both heading there Thursday and former VP Al Gore is scheduled to speak at events on the sidelines of the summit.
America Is All In, Climate Mayors, and the US Climate Alliance have organized a delegation of over 100, according to ABC News.
"America Is All In is showing up in force at COP31 to let the world know that millions of Americans are still in," said the group's chair, Gina McCarthy, a former Environmental Protection Agency administrator and White House National Climate adviser. "Mayors, governors, and cross-sector leaders from all across our country will be in Türkiye to demonstrate the strength of US subnational climate leadership and build partnerships and solutions that advance people's lives everywhere."
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Landmark Lawsuit Aims to Stop Big Tech’s Advanced, Unregulated, and ‘Insane’ AI Systems
"No other industry is allowed to treat its own development of unsafe products—much less ones that could kill us all—as inevitable."
Nov 12, 2026
A coalition of advocacy groups on Thursday filed a landmark lawsuit aimed at stopping further development of artificial intelligence technology until guardrails are put in place.
The lawsuit—filed in the San Francisco Superior Court by Irreplaceable Education Fund, Public Citizen, Heat Initiative, and The Alliance for Secure AI—cites recent "loss of control" incidents, in which AI agents acted without human intervention, to argue for a freeze on AI development.
The complaint also cites statements made by multiple executives and current or former employees at frontier AI labs, in which they outlined "catastrophic risks to the public, including by enabling AI-driven cyberattacks and bioweapons" and even "the deaths of literally every human being on the planet."
Making matters worse, the complaint continues, the AI labs "have no realistic plan to prevent the continued harm caused by their technology" since "their frontier AI systems are black boxes that [they] do not fully understand."
The lawsuit also points to multiple employees of AI labs who have resigned to protest the lack of safety protocols being built into their models, such as former OpenAI safety official David Robinson, who last month warned of that the risks from the technology are "much larger, for example, than a single nuclear power station melting down."
"This is, to use a non-technical term, insane," the complaint emphasizes. "It is also blatantly illegal. No other industry is allowed to treat its own development of unsafe products—much less ones that could kill us all—as inevitable. Nor is any industry granted the right to self-regulate the development of such dangerous products."
The complaint asks the court to stop Anthropic, Google, Meta, OpenAI, and SpaceXSI from developing and releasing new AI models.
Phil Aroneanu, founder and executive director of Irreplaceable Education Fund, warned of risks to democratic governance if Big Tech is allowed to barrel ahead with unchecked AI development.
"Most Americans feel like they’ve lost control over their lives and livelihoods and are demanding accountability," said Aroneanu. "We must freeze frontier AI development until the technology is under control and the American people have a say and a stake in its future, instead of leaving it to a handful of billionaire Big Tech CEOs."
Brooke Istook, CEO of Heat Initiative, pointed to the damaging impact the tech industry has had on children as further reason to halt AI development.
"Children have already paid the price for Big Tech prioritizing profit over safety," said Istook. "We’ve watched chatbots push kids toward suicide and AI tools turn their ordinary photos into AI-generated child sexual abuse material. Now these companies are racing to build AI systems they admit they may not be able to control."
Former New Jersey Attorney General Matthew Platkin, who filed the complaint on behalf of the groups, noted that it is "patently illegal for companies to develop and release products they know are unsafe in any respect, let alone have the potential to exterminate the human race."
"We are asking the court to intervene before the risks AI executives have warned us about cause devastating and irreversible harm," Platkin explained. "AI companies are causing a public nuisance by knowingly developing and deploying AI systems that pose catastrophic risk. These companies must match their rhetoric with action and stop developing dangerous AI systems that can escape human control before a tragedy occurs."
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Global Declaration Calls for 'Fossil Free Zones' to Protect Climate, Ecosystems, and Indigenous Peoples
“Fossil Free Zones are where the transition away from fossil fuels stops being a promise and starts happening on the ground.”
Nov 12, 2026
More than 40 advocacy groups on Thursday issued a declaration calling on the world's governments to establish permanent "Fossil Free Zones” to protect the climate, critical ecosystems, and Indigenous peoples and their lands from oil, gas, and coal exploration and extraction.
Unveiled at the United Nations Climate Change Conference—also known as COP31—in Antalya, Türkiye, the Fossil Free Zones Declaration urges governments to make the zones a central component of each nation's plans to transition away from oil, coal, and gas.
What is a Fossil Free Zone? As Cecilia Requena, a Bolivian senator and environmentalist, and Juan Pablo Osornio, the engagement and policy director at the nonprofit green group Earth Insight, explained:
A Fossil Free Zone is a defined area demarcated by its ecological, biodiversity, or cultural significance, where exploration, extraction, and development of fossil fuels are permanently prohibited. Think tropical rainforests, key biodiversity areas, Indigenous peoples’ territories, and critical marine ecosystems. They translate the abstract global commitment to transitioning away from fossil fuels into something tangible: a map, a boundary, a legal safeguard.
"Amid deep geopolitical fragmentation and weakening international cooperation, continued dependence on fossil fuels is further exacerbating existing vulnerabilities," the Fossil Free Zones Declarations states.
"Beyond its climate impacts, this dependence exposes countries and communities to volatile energy markets, supply disruptions, and economic instability, while undermining energy security and national sovereignty," the document continues. "Continued coal, oil, and gas extraction also causes unnecessary and avoidable harm to people and nature, including driving deforestation and biodiversity loss."
"Fossil fuel expansion continues to threaten ecosystems essential for biodiversity, climate stability, and the cultures and livelihoods of the peoples who protect them," the declaration adds. "Halting this expansion in critical territories such as forests or coral reefs is therefore an immediate, concrete step toward a just, orderly, and equitable transition, alongside plans to phase out existing fossil fuel production within key ecosystems."
The declaration—whose signatories include WWF International, Amazon Watch, the Science Panel for the Amazon, and Parliamentarians for a Fossil Free Future—calls for halting new fossil fuel exploration and expansion while prioritizing the responsible closure of existing projects in areas of climatic, ecological, and cultural importance.
“Fossil Free Zones are where the transition away from fossil fuels stops being a promise and starts happening on the ground," said Earth Insight senior associate for diplomacy Ignacio Arróniz Velasco. "When governments permanently close critical ecosystems and Indigenous territories to oil, gas, and coal extraction, they protect ecosystems, uphold the rights of the peoples who steward nature, and take a concrete first step towards a full, fair phaseout."
"This can be done with existing tools like nature protection laws or land tenure recognition," he stressed. "This is what implementation looks like. COP31 gives governments a real chance to work together on Fossil Free Zones and build them into their national roadmaps, so the just transition starts in the places that matter most for climate, nature, and people.”
Noting that "the Arctic is warming more than twice as fast as the rest of the globe, and should be the most obvious place to draw the line against new fossil fuel development," Susanne Waage, WWF Norway's fossil fuel transition lead, lamented that "Norway continues to explore aggressively for new oil and gas in one of the world's most vulnerable regions."
Waage added that the European Union, "Norway's largest oil and gas customer, has already said no to new Arctic oil and gas. Norway should listen, stop exploring for new oil and gas resources, and help make the Arctic a Fossil Free Zone."
Pascal Mirindi, Democratic Republic of Congo national coordinator of the group Our Land Without Oil, asserted: "We cannot claim to protect forests, peatlands, and vital ecosystems while opening the door to oil and gas within them. In the DRC, these projects threaten territories and the communities who depend on them for their livelihoods."
"Fossil Free Zones offer a concrete and immediate solution," Mirindi added. "Here at COP31, we are calling on governments to end all new exploration in critical ecosystems, to recognize these zones in their national roadmaps, and to guarantee a just transition centered on the rights of communities."
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Top Democrats Launch Congressional Probe Into Trump-Nvidia ‘Scheme’
Sen. Ron Wyden and Rep. Richard Neal accused the Trump administration of an "ostensible attempt to mask an unconstitutional export tax as a national security tariff action—benefiting both Nvidia and the Chinese government."
Nov 12, 2026
A pair of leading congressional Democrats on Thursday launched an investigation into what they described as an illegal "scheme" by the Trump administration and the AI semiconductor giant Nvidia, whose chief executive resigned following revelations that he had extramarital affairs with a subordinate and a woman suspected by US intelligence agencies of being a Chinese spy.
In a letter to US Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) and Rep. Richard Neal (D-Mass.) accused President Donald Trump and members of his administration of an "ostensible attempt to mask an unconstitutional export tax as a national security tariff action—benefiting both Nvidia and the Chinese government."
"The scheme worked like this: Trump would allow Nvidia to sell its Taiwan-manufactured H200 chips to companies in China, provided that those chips be sent to the United States to undergo a security review and receive an export license before being re-exported to China," the lawmakers wrote. "Trump then used Section 232 authority—which is intended to allow the president to address imports that threaten national security—to impose a 25% tariff to be collected when the chips entered the United States, effectively taking a cut of Nvidia’s sales to China through what appears to be an unconstitutional export tax system."
"The Commerce Department would then grant Nvidia export licenses so that the chips could be sold to Chinese companies," added Wyden and Neal, who are poised to lead the Senate Finance Committee and the House Ways and Means Committee, respectively, in the upcoming Congress.
The lawmakers instructed the Trump administration to preserve all records pertaining to the tariffs and export licenses, as well as any communications with Nvidia and former CEO Jensen Huang, who announced his resignation on Thursday.
Wyden and Neal expressed alarm over reports that Trump and Lutnick were made aware of US intelligence indicating that Alice Huang—the Chinese businesswoman with whom Jensen Huang had an affair—was "funneling information to the Chinese government and facilitating Chinese access to advanced AI chips made by Nvidia." The New York Times reported that Trump "took no action" in response to the intelligence, which he was briefed on last fall.
During Trump's second White House term, Jensen Huang emerged as a leading ally of the president in the rapidly advancing artificial intelligence industry. Huang has been a frequent guest at Trump's White House and has donated tens of millions of dollars to the president's projects, including the ballroom.
Following news of Huang's resignation, Trump said the former Nvidia CEO "has done a fantastic job." The president had previously said Huang should remain the company's chief executive, calling him "an honorable guy."
Wyden and Neal wrote Thursday that "despite reportedly learning of Mr. Huang’s compromising relationship last fall, President Trump granted Nvidia permission to sell its advanced H200 AI chips to China in December 2025 in exchange for a cut of the export sales." Lutnick, too, received classified information warning about Jensen Huang's relationship with Alice Huang, according to Axios.
The lawmakers noted in their letter that Lutnick's Commerce Department halted an investigation into a Singaporean company suspected of smuggling Nvidia AI chips into China after an Nvidia executive intervened. The company under investigation was Megaspeed, where Alice Huang previously worked as managing director.
Facing subpoena threats, Huang agreed on Thursday to testify before House lawmakers in a closed-door hearing later this month, Bloomberg reported.
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Report Outlines How Trump CFPB Gave 'Corporate Pardons' to Companies Accused of Illegally Ripping Off Consumers
Sen. Elizabeth Warren, the CFPB's architect, promised a reckoning when Democrats retake Congress: "If you've been making your profits by cheating American families... you better get ready for some investigations."
Nov 12, 2026
The Trump administration has almost entirely abandoned consumer protection lawsuits even as complaints about corporate abuses surge, according to a Guardian analysis published Thursday.
From mid-2012 to the start of 2025, the US Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB)—created to fight predatory actions by financial institutions in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis—averaged about 30 enforcement actions a year, helping to recoup over $21 billion for consumers illegally ripped off by banks, mortgage lenders, credit card companies, and other entities.
But since January 2025, when President Donald Trump returned to office, it has launched just two enforcement actions. Meanwhile, it has dropped pending cases against at least 23 defendants—including credit card companies like Capital One, banks like JPMorgan Chase and Bank of America, and Warren Buffett’s business empire Berkshire Hathaway.
Those cases were not abandoned because consumers no longer have complaints about these companies. On the contrary, complaints have increased against 17 of the 23 companies the bureau stopped pursuing. Overall, the number of complaints filed by consumers with the bureau has shot up from nearly 2.7 million in 2024 to 6.3 million this year.
“Consumers are telling the bureau that there is an emergency, and the bureau is not listening or acting on that information,” Erie Meyer, a former chief technologist at the CFPB who helped oversee the creation of its complaint database, told The Guardian. “People are getting screwed twice: first by the company, second by the agency that’s supposed to stick up for them.”
Austin Hinkle, a former senior counsel and section chief at the CFPB, described Trump’s new regime at the bureau as essentially issuing “corporate pardons” to firms that were being investigated under the Biden administration for alleged flagrant abuses.
“People are getting screwed twice: first by the company, second by the agency that’s supposed to stick up for them.”
In February 2025, just a month after his second term began, Trump’s CFPB dismissed a lawsuit filed under the Biden administration accusing Capital One of cheating millions of customers out of more than $2 billion in interest by deliberately concealing higher-interest savings accounts from them, going as far as directing employees not to inform customers about the accounts unless asked. The company agreed to a $425 million class-action settlement in April, considerably less than the $2 billion in lost interest alleged by the CFPB.
Also in February 2025, the bureau dismissed a lawsuit against the mortgage company Vanderbilt, a subsidiary of Berkshire Hathaway. Regulators accused the company of knowingly saddling low-income families with mortgages they could not afford in an echo of the lending behavior that spawned the 2008 housing crisis, which in turn led to the CFPB’s creation. In one case, Vanderbilt granted a mortgage to a family that, by the company’s calculations, would have had just over $57 left in income after monthly expenses. In another, it approved a mortgage for two adults who already had 33 debts in collection.
In March 2025, the bureau also dropped a case accusing three of the nation’s largest banks—JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America, and Wells Fargo—of failing to prevent widespread fraud using their money transfer system, Zelle. Consumers allegedly lost a combined $870 million after the banks failed to stop repeat scammers from using the app. Regulators also alleged that the banks refused to compensate victims even after they provided evidence that criminals had taken over their accounts.
All of these cases were dismissed with prejudice, meaning that a future CFPB cannot reopen any of them.
The administration also dropped other cases involving payday lenders accused of trapping borrowers in cycles of debt, companies allegedly charging delivery drivers fees to access their own earnings, student loan servicers accused of collecting discharged debts, and banks accused of mistreating elderly and disabled veterans receiving federal benefits. It also canceled a settlement with Navy Federal Credit Union over illegal overdraft fees charged to military service members, veterans, and their families.
In addition, the administration has terminated or weakened another 23 existing enforcement orders, often involving companies that had already agreed to compensate victims for misconduct, according to a report by Democrats on the US Senate Banking Committee. That report estimated that reduced enforcement at the CFPB had cost consumers $19 billion during Trump’s first year in office.
The money transfer company Wise, for instance, had a $2 million fine reduced to just $45,000. Other companies like Apple and US Bank were freed from enhanced oversight years ahead of schedule.
Many consumer protection cases and settlements were dismissed while the bureau was run by Russell Vought, an architect of the Heritage Foundation’s far-right Project 2025, which has functioned as a policy playbook for Trump’s second term. He also leads the White House Office of Management and Budget.
Vought has referred to the CFPB as “a woke and weaponized agency against disfavored industries and individuals” and said his goal was to “close down the agency.”
In April 2025, he attempted to fire about 90% of the CFPB’s workforce—an effort blocked by federal courts. Vought stopped serving as acting director in August. The agency is now led by Mark Paoletta, a former chief legal officer for Vought.
Democrats, who retook both the US House of Representatives and Senate earlier this month in a midterm landslide fueled by grievances about high prices and a lack of accountability for powerful corporations, have vowed to investigate the Trump administration's efforts to "dismantle" the CFPB.
Rep. Bill Foster (D-Ill.), who is in line to become the chair of the House Financial Services Subcommittee on Financial Institutions beginning in 2027, told The Guardian that he and his colleagues plan to pursue “subpoenas, investigations, hearings, and, ultimately, legislative action to restore consumer protections in this country and hold accountable those who seek to profit off the most vulnerable Americans.”
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), who led the charge to create the CFPB in 2010, is expected to take over as chair of the Senate Banking Committee, where she has promised a reckoning for corporate abuses.
As ranking member, she has already confronted Vought directly about his actions while in charge of the CFPB—including during a hearing in July when she questioned him about the bureau’s decision to terminate a settlement with Toyota Motor Credit after the company donated $1 million to Trump’s inaugural fund. The company had been accused of trapping consumers into paying thousands of dollars in some cases for unwanted insurance and warranties, while making the products extremely difficult to cancel and withholding refunds.
Warren has promised that she will prioritize accountability for the financial institutions that have been allowed to run roughshod under Trump.
“Big Tech CEOs, administration officials, Trump family crypto businesses, Wall Street executives, and giant corporations should preserve their documents and prepare to answer tough questions,” an aide to Warren told Politico Monday.
On CBS’ “Face the Nation” Sunday, Warren said, “If you’ve been making your profits by cheating American families and scamming your investors, you better get ready for some investigations, serious ones.”
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World Barreling Toward 'Irrecoverable Overshoot of 1.5°C,' Report Warns During COP31
"The imminence of breaching 1.5°C cannot be an excuse to open the door to defeatism—the focus has to be on accelerating action to limit the magnitude and duration of overshoot."
Nov 12, 2026
With world leaders, climate campaigners, scientists, and more gathered in Türkiye for the United Nations Climate Change Conference, an independent project that tracks government action warned Thursday that global warming is headed toward "an irrecoverable overshoot of 1.5°C" unless countries "rapidly reduce emissions to limit both the magnitude and duration of this overshoot."
A series of analyses released in the lead-up to the summit—including the United Nations Environment Program's "Limiting Overshoot" publication from September, the UNEP's "The Emissions Gap Report 2026: The Point of Return" from October, and the World Meteorological Organization's "State of the Climate: Update for COP31" from last week—have all sounded the alarm about at least temporarily surpassing 1.5°C, the Paris Agreement's global temperature rise limit for this century.
The new Climate Action Tracker (CAT) report, "Without Rapid Action, The World Is Heading to Irrecoverable Overshoot," lays out real-world action based on current policies; pledges and targets from the nationally determined contributions (NDCs) of countries that have signed on to the Paris Agreement; and the "optimistic scenario" based on all announced ambitions.
"Aggregated climate action has now essentially stalled for five consecutive years, with positive and negative actions canceling each other out," says the CAT briefing. "The warming outlook from current policies is leading to 2.7°C in 2100 (slightly up from 2.6°C) as it stood from 2021-2024."
"Our 2030 and 2035 targets scenario that assumes governments meet all their targets remains unchanged at 2.6°C in 2100," the report details. "The round of 2035 NDCs has closed: And it's clear governments have failed to meaningfully improve the outlook for end-of-century warming."
CAT's scenario that includes 2030 and 2035 NDCs as well as long-term targets projects "warming of 2.1°C in 2100, down from 2.2°C last year," the report continues. "Ambitious near- and long-term targets matter, but without credible policies and immediate implementation, they risk becoming empty promises rather than drivers of real-world emission reductions."
"Our optimistic scenario, assuming full implementation of all announced and net-zero targets, remains at 1.9°C in 2100," it stresses. "Even under our most optimistic assessment, if governments were to implement every single national pledge they have made—including the net-zero targets—we will still permanently overshoot the 1.5°C limit and get close to 2°C."
As both greenhouse gas concentrations and the profits of fossil fuel giants have soared while communities around the world face deadly heatwaves, rapidly intensifying hurricanes, rising sea levels, and destructive wildfires—like those that ravaged COP31 host Türkiye in September—scientists have reiterated warnings about the need for sweeping action to cut emissions.
"Continued warming from greenhouse gases emitted from human activities threatens to feed further warming as permafrost, wetlands, and wildfires destabilize and respond by releasing carbon dioxide, methane, and nitrous oxide," Ben Poulter, warming-induced emissions program director at Spark Climate Solutions, said in September, when a study he co-authored was published.
"This study provides a critical look at the magnitude of the temperature response," Poulter added, "and a call to action to accelerate the accounting and monitoring of warming-induced emissions to support pathways that phase out fossil emissions to stabilize the planet’s climate."
But the brutal truth is that the positive developments do not yet add up to bending the curve of emissions fast enough. Increasing energy demand and build-out of new fossil fuel infrastructure have led to still rising emissions.
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— Climate Action Tracker (@climateactiontracker.org) November 12, 2026 at 1:04 AM
Bill Hare, CEO of CAT partner organization Climate Analytics, emphasized Thursday that "the stark choice for governments is to either continue to support the fossil fuel industry, which would consign humanity to insurmountable economic damages, rising mortality from heat, and climate-driven diseases and disasters that they are unable to adapt to—or pivot to the solutions which are available and cheaper than ever."
"The imminence of breaching 1.5°C cannot be an excuse to open the door to defeatism—the focus has to be on accelerating action to limit the magnitude and duration of overshoot," he argued. "Every increment of warming above 1.5°C means even more significant consequences across climate, nature and human systems."
The report outlines "five key levers that could cut emissions at the speed and urgency needed to follow a Paris-aligned pathway, limiting the magnitude and duration of overshoot," which are:
- A transition away from fossil fuels;
- Deep methane cuts;
- Rapid renewables-driven economy-wide electrification;
- Carbon dioxide removal (CDR) as a complement to emissions cuts, not a substitute; and
- An end to deforestation.
"Governments collectively are simply not moving fast enough to adopt the policies that would enable us to escape from the emerging overshoot trap," said the lead author of CAT's report, Climate Analytics policy analyst Sarah Heck. "Worse, several are taking their foot off the accelerator and slowing their climate action—or in cases such as the USA, Canada, and New Zealand—rolling it back at a staggering level."
So far this week, Climate Action Network International has given its satirical "Fossil of the Day" award—long used to call out bad actors during climate summits—to New Zealand, for "dismantling its own climate commitments" under Prime Minister Christopher Luxon, as well as "absent leaders of wealthy countries," including Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, and Sweden.
The stark choice for governments is to either continue to support the fossil fuel industry – or pivot to the solutions which are available and cheaper than ever. The lack of decisive action means that long-term warming is expected to cross the 1.5°C limit around 2030.
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— Climate Action Tracker (@climateactiontracker.org) November 12, 2026 at 1:04 AM
While a key Democratic US senator is attending COP31, President Donald Trump is skipping the summit and has not sent a delegation, even though his country is the world's worst historical climate polluter. UNEP's report from last month highlights the dangers of the pro-fossil fuel agenda that the Republican leader has pursued since returning to power last year, including ditching the Paris Agreement, again.
Trump's ongoing illegal war on Iran has not only led to the deaths of thousands of people but also padded the pockets of those invested in the fossil fuel industry—including himself—while people around the world pay the price at the pump, due to Iran's restrictions on ship traffic through the Strait of Hormuz.
"With the closure of the Strait of Hormuz exposing our vulnerability to geopolitical shocks," said Niklas Höhne of CAT partner organization NewClimate Institute, "the case for renewables and electrification has never been stronger—and it does appear that global emissions could be on the verge of a peak and a much faster decline than we had previously thought."
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‘Arms Embargo Now’: Israel Uses US Bombs to Kill 6 Palestinians and Wound 28 in Gaza Hospital Attack
“The patients in the department were all surgical patients waiting to undergo operations. The bombing happened at a time when they should have been asleep," said one doctor.
Nov 12, 2026
American-made bombs appeared to have been used in an Israeli strike on Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, Gaza on Thursday, in which at least six people, including a surgeon and at least one child, were killed and at least 28 more were injured.
Trevor Ball, an analyst with Armament Research Services, told The New York Times that Associated Press footage of the aftermath of the bombing showed two 250-pound precision-guided aerial bombs that were manufactured in the US.
"Arms embargo now," said Dylan Williams, vice president of government affairs for the Center for International Policy, in response to the latest attack on the hospital, which has been struck numerous times since Israel began attacking Gaza more than three years ago in retaliation for a Hamas-led attack.
The US has passed legislation providing Israel with at least $16.3 billion in direct military aid since October 2023, on top of the $3.8 billion the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) receive from the US annually, according to the Council on Foreign Relations.
Both the Trump and the Biden administrations have also vehemently defended Israel's attacks on Gaza even as they have targeted hospitals, journalists, aid workers, and children—repeating Israel's claims that medical facilities are used as military outposts by Hamas and are therefore legitimate targets, and that Israel is targeting the Palestinian group it labels a terrorist organization and is taking steps to protect civilians.
In the case of Nasser Hospital this week, Dr. Ayman Abu Ubaid, a surgical specialist who was wounded in the attack that occurred around midnight, told The Guardian that the IDF provided no warning that could have allowed staff to remove patients and medical providers from harm's way.
“The patients in the department were all surgical patients waiting to undergo operations. The bombing happened at a time when they should have been asleep," Abu Ubaid told The Guardian.
The doctor added that "the bombing caused thick smoke to fill the rooms and fires to break out, amid the groans of [the] wounded and people’s screams. There were many casualties and blood everywhere... Most of us sustained injuries to our limbs, as well as shrapnel wounds in different parts of our bodies.”
Hadja Lahbib, the European commissioner for equality, preparedness, and crisis management, emphasized that "hospitals are protected under international humanitarian law and must never be targets.
"Civilians must be protected," said Lahbib. "I urge a prompt, independent, and impartial investigation to ensure accountability."
Israel said it had targeted and struck Hamas commanders and fighters who were operating out of the hospital, but did not provide evidence.
One confirmed death was that of Dr. Rizk Abu Shaaira, 52, who was featured in the documentary film "American Doctor," working alongside physicians from the US who traveled to Gaza to provide medical aid.
"My colleague and friend Dr. Rizk Abu Shaaira was killed yesterday at work when Israel, backed by the US as always, bombed the surgical recovery room at Nasser Medical Complex," said Dr. Feroze Sidhwa, a trauma surgeon from California who was also featured in the film.
"Dr. Rizk's shocking murder is yet another reminder of why we must get control of our country," said Sidhwa. "Our government has no right to force us to subsidize the mass murder of doctors and children, not in Palestine and not anywhere."
Dr. Thaer Ahmad, a Palestinian-American emergency doctor, also paid tribute to the surgeon, saying he had been seen in the documentary "operating and serving his people."
"He lost his life doing that, he lost his life because he was doing that," said Ahmad.
Abu Shaaira died alongside a patient he had operated on, The Guardian reported.
A 13-year-old boy named Jihad Naeem Muhammad Abu Tilikh was also among those killed, according to the hospital.
Several floors of the hospital were heavily damaged, and part of the surgery department was destroyed. The radiology, laboratory, surgical operations, and inpatient surgical departments were forced to suspend operations.
Nasser Hospital was also struck in August 2025 in a double-tap strike that killed at least 20 people, including journalists and healthcare workers.
United Nations experts have accused Israel of "medicide" due to its destruction of about 90% of Gaza's health infrastructure, which has left just two hospitals operational. More than 1,700 healthcare workers in Gaza have been killed since October 2023.
More than 74,000 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli attacks, including about 1,600 who have been killed since a ceasefire was reached in October 2025.
"How can this still be called a ceasefire?" said Philippe Lazzarini, former commissioner-general of the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East. "A real one is needed and overdue."
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