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Today, eleven progressive advocacy organizations led by NARAL Pro-Choice America, sent a letter to all Democratic Senators urging them to take bolder action to defeat Judge Gorsuch's nomination to the Supreme Court.
In the letter, the groups state, "Democrats have failed to demonstrate a strong, unified resistance to this nominee [Gorsuch] despite the fact that he is an ultra-conservative jurist who will undermine our basic freedoms and threaten the independence of the federal judiciary." And then states, "We need you to do better."
Groups signing the letter, organized by NARAL Pro-Choice America, include NARAL Pro-Choice America, CREDO Action, SEIU, National LGBTQ Task Force Action Fund, MoveOn.org, Domestic Workers Legacy Fund (formerly the National Domestic Workers Alliance), Working Families Party, 350 Action, Demos Action, Communications Workers of America and Asian Pacific Environmental Network.
The letter closes by calling for, "Democratic senators to immediately make clear your opposition to this nominee and insist that Gorsuch's nomination, like previous nominees to the Supreme Court, will require 60 votes."
You can see the full letter below:
U.S. Capitol Building Washington, DC 20515 Re: Nomination of Neil Gorsuch to the United States Supreme CourtDear Democratic Senators,
It has been just over one month since President Trump nominated Judge Neil Gorsuch to the U.S. Supreme Court. During this time, Democrats have failed to demonstrate a strong, unified resistance to this nominee despite the fact that he is an ultra-conservative jurist who will undermine our basic freedoms and threaten the independence of the federal judiciary. We need you to do better.
Judge Gorsuch is not a mainstream nominee. He is more conservative than Justice Scalia, has an extreme ideological agenda supported by some of the most dangerous ultra-conservative and white nationalist groups, and has failed to protect everyday Americans' constitutional rights in favor of propping up corporations and special interests. As a judge, Gorsuch opposed reproductive freedom and women's rights; LGBTQ rights; civil rights; workers' rights; immigrants' rights; disability rights; environmental protections; and sought to increase the influence of corporate money in our elections. Imagine how much damage he could do with a lifetime appointment to the Supreme Court.
Democratic senators must get out in front of this nomination process and refuse to be bullied by President Trump as he stampedes on the rights of Americans. Our constitutional system of checks and balances requires three equal branches of government. This includes an independent judiciary and a legislative branch willing to stand up to an out-of-control president. There is zero evidence that Judge Gorsuch will be an independent check on this runaway and dangerous administration. The president's chief of staff admitted as much two weeks ago when he said Gorsuch, "represents the type of judge that has the vision of Donald Trump."
Because of this, we call on Democratic senators to immediately make clear your opposition to this nominee and insist that Gorsuch's nomination, like previous nominees to the Supreme Court, will require 60 votes.
Judge Gorsuch's record is clear - so clear, in fact, that we already know he is an unacceptable nominee for the Supreme Court. President Trump is using Gorsuch to elevate his extreme agenda with a lifetime appointment to our nation's highest court. As senators, we need you to stand up to this reckless agenda.
Americans are marching in the streets, demanding that our government stands up for our democratic ideals. We need you to stand with us and fight to preserve the American Dream.
Sincerely,
NARAL Pro-Choice America
350 Action
Asian Pacific Environmental Network
Communications Workers of America
CREDO Action
Demos Action
Domestic Worker Legacy Fund
MoveOn.org
SEIU
National LGBTQ Task Force Action Fund
Working Families Party
For over 50 years, Reproductive Freedom for All (formerly NARAL Pro-Choice America) has fought to protect and advance reproductive freedom at the federal and state levels—including access to abortion care, birth control, pregnancy and post-partum care, and paid family leave—for everybody. Reproductive Freedom for All is powered by its more than 4 million members from every state and congressional district in the country, representing the 8 in 10 Americans who support legal abortion.
202.973.3000"The vaults are open and the arms trade is thriving before the war and after it," said one Nobel Peace Prize laureate.
As the US voting public continues to express its discontent over the disastrous war of choice against Iran that US President Donald Trump launched just over two months ago, fresh criticism followed after weekend reporting revealed the administration skirted congressional review to approve an $8.6 billion weapons deal with the United Arab Emirates and other allies in the Middle East.
Announced quietly Friday night by the US State Department, as the New York Times reports, the "sales would entail the transfer of rockets to Israel, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates and air-defense equipment to Qatar and Kuwait."
According to the Times:
Under the terms of the deal with Qatar, the Gulf country would pay more than $4 billion for American-made Patriot missile interceptors — global stockpiles of which have dwindled during the war with Iran.
Israel, the Emirates and Qatar would receive an Advanced Precision Kill Weapon System, which fires laser-guided rockets. Kuwait also purchased an advanced aerial defense system for about $2.5 billion.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio expedited the deals under an emergency provision allowing the “immediate sale” of the weapons, the State Department said, bypassing standard congressional review and prompting criticism from Democratic lawmakers. This is the third time the second Trump administration has invoked an emergency authorization during the Iran war to bypass Congress on arms sales.
"No comment," said Mohamed ElBaradei, a Nobel Peace Prize winner and the former head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), in an eye-rolling response to the news on social media.
After a commenter suggested that "America opened the door to war for [the countries taking part in the sale] so they would open their treasuries and the Israeli-American arms trade would boom after a slump," ElBaradei seemed to agree with the comment.
"The vaults are open and the arms trade is thriving before the war and after it," he said.
Kenneth Roth, former executive director of Human Rights Watch and now a visiting professor at Princeton University, said "Trump is bypassing Congress to fast-track arms sales to the United Arab Emirates, apparently without receiving any promise that the UAE would stop arming the genocidal Rapid Support Forces (RSF) in Sudan."
The RSF has been accused of atrocities in the ongoing Sudanese civil war and the backing it has received from the US, with the UAE as its closely-allied proxy, has been the source of outrage and criticism.
"Over and over again, the Trump administration is exposing private Social Security data," said one watchdog group who called the leak of personal information "a goldmine for identity thieves" and other fraudsters.
A newly reported failure of the Trump administration's ability to handle sensitive private information within the social programs it is tasked with operating triggered a fresh wave of anger of the weekend after it came to light that the Social Security numbers of healthcare providers were made public as part of a faulty Medicare portal rollout.
The Washington Post discovered the compromised database and alerted the administration last week, before publishing a story about its discovery on Friday after efforts had been made to protect the sensitive information from further compromise.
According to the Post:
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) last year created a directory to help seniors look up which doctors and medical providers accept which insurance plans, framing it as an overdue improvement and part of the Trump administration’s initiative to modernize health care technology.
But a publicly accessible database used to populate the directory contains some of the providers’ Social Security numbers, linked to their names and other identifying information. For at least several weeks, CMS made the database available for public use as part of its data transparency efforts.
While the reporting noted that the files were "not immediately visible to users who [visited] the provider directory," lawmakers and experts said the compromised information would be a treasure trove for fraudsters.
“The more we learn about how the Trump Administration handles the people’s most sensitive data, the clearer their incompetence becomes."
Critics pounced on the new reporting, calling it "yet another mess-up by the Team Trump" and only the latest evidence that the administration cannot and should not be trusted to protect the nation's most successful anti-poverty programs or the sensitive personal data of the American people who entrust the government with that information.
"Over and over again, the Trump administration is exposing private Social Security data," said Social Security Works, an advocacy group that serves as a public watchdog for the nation's social programs.
The compromised database, said the group, "is a goldmine for identity thieves, scammers, and foreign governments. And it is undermining the very foundation of our Social Security system."
"This is a failure by this administration," said Sen. Ruben Gallego (D-Ariz.) in response to the reporting. "Exposing Social Security numbers, whether patients or providers, is unacceptable."
Rep. Richard Neal (D-Mass.), the ranking member on the House committee which overseas the Medicare program, put the onus on his Republican colleagues in Congress.
“The more we learn about how the Trump Administration handles the people’s most sensitive data, the clearer their incompetence becomes,” Neal told the Post in a statement. “Do House Republicans need to see their own data exposed before they do right by their constituents and act?”
In March, as Common Dreams reported at the time, a whistleblower filed a complaint from with the Social Security Administration accusing a former staffer with Trump's Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), run for a time by right-wing billionaire Elon Musk, of trying to share information from SSA databases with his private employer.
Since the outset of Trump's second term, DOGE's meddling with Social Security and Trump's undermining of the program have been the source of deep anger and concerns by the program's defenders.
In a social media post on Saturday citing the whistleblower allegations from March, Rep. John Larson (D-Conn.) said, "For more than a year, 'DOGE' has been combing through the American people's records. They want to use your data to overturn elections and profit in the private sector. Enough! This administration must be held accountable for this massive data breach!"
On Friday, responding to the Post's new reporting about the compromised database of physicians' private information, Larsen condemned for Republicans for their ongoing and pervasive failures in the face of Trump's malfeasance and incompetence.
DOGE, said Larsen, "has been in your data for more than a year. We just learned that physicians' Social Security numbers were publicly exposed in an online portal launched by ‘DOGE’ officials."
"If this isn't enough for Republicans to act," he asked, "where will they draw the line?"
"Your dignity stands taller than the place you stood, and it will live forever in our memory."
Explosive Media, one of the independent outfits generating the viral videos about the war in Iran, created a short piece on Saturday to honor the American father of two who climbed atop a bridge in the Washington, DC this weekend to demand an end to the conflict.
"In honor of Guido Reichstadter, the man who climbed the Frederick Douglass Memorial Bridge to make his voice of protest heard," the group said in a post alongside the video short. "Your dignity stands taller than the place you stood, and it will live forever in our memory."
As Common Dreams reported, Reichstadter climbed the bridge wearing a t-shirt that simply read "End War" beginning on Friday afternoon, remained in protest overnight, and told one reporter he intends to remain "for a few days at least."
In honor of Guido Reichstadter,
the man who climbed the Frederick Douglass Memorial Bridge to make his voice of protest heard.
Your dignity stands taller than the place you stood,
and it will live forever in our memory. 🫡🏔️ pic.twitter.com/WANYzS7kIh
— Explosive Media (@ExplosiveMediaa) May 2, 2026
Reichstadter said he climbed the 168-foot-tall bridge “because the government of the United States is engaged in acts of mass murder in my name. And I refuse to be complicit in that.”
"The world is proud of you, Guido," Explosive Media said in a separate post on social media. "Soon, side by side, we will celebrate peace and victory together."