September, 27 2018, 12:00am EDT
Sierra Club Statement On Dr. Christine Blasey Ford's Testimony
Today, Donald Trump's nominee for the Supreme Court, Brett Kavanaugh, and one of the survivors who have accused him of sexual assault, Dr. Christine Blasey Ford, testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee on whether Kavanaugh deserves a lifetime appointment to the Supreme Court.
In response, Sierra Club Executive Director Michael Brune released the following statement:
WASHINGTON
Today, Donald Trump's nominee for the Supreme Court, Brett Kavanaugh, and one of the survivors who have accused him of sexual assault, Dr. Christine Blasey Ford, testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee on whether Kavanaugh deserves a lifetime appointment to the Supreme Court.
In response, Sierra Club Executive Director Michael Brune released the following statement:
"Today is a sad day for America, but we are grateful for the bravery displayed by Dr. Blasey Ford. Senate Judiciary Republicans' decision to put a survivor of sexual assault on trial rather than reject Kavanaugh's nomination to the Supreme Court is nothing short of disgraceful. If Senate Republicans intended to actually listen to Dr. Blasey Ford and take her allegations seriously, they would not have scheduled a vote prior to the start of the hearing. Today's shameful events and the behavior of those Republicans putting Dr. Blasey Ford on trial will never be forgotten. Brett Kavanaugh should be facing a federal investigation, not a Senate Judiciary Committee considering confirming him for a seat on the Supreme Court."
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Bank-Funded Senate Republicans Revive Effort to Gut Consumer Protection Agency's Budget
"Senate Republicans will bring to the floor a proposal that slashes the agency's available budget so they can hand out more tax breaks for billionaires and billionaire corporations," said Sen. Elizabeth Warren.
Jun 27, 2025
Senate Republicans on Thursday moved to revive a plan to dramatically reduce the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's budget after the chamber's parliamentarian determined that an earlier proposal ran afoul of reconciliation rules.
The previous proposal, crafted by Republicans on the Senate Banking Committee, would have zeroed out the CFPB's budget, but the Senate parliamentarian deemed it in violation of the Byrd Rule.
The new attack on the CFPB, unveiled by Senate Banking Committee Chair Tim Scott (R-S.C.)—a major recipient of financial industry donations—would cut the agency's budget nearly in half. The proposal still must face scrutiny from the parliamentarian.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), the ranking member of the Senate Banking Committee and an architect of the consumer bureau, said in a statement that Democrats would introduce an amendment to strip the proposal from the reconciliation package, noting that the CFPB has "returned $21 billion to scammed American families" since its inception in the wake of the Great Recession.
" Donald Trump and Republicans tried to shut down the CFPB by gutting its entire operating budget to 0%," said Warren. "We fought back and won. Now, Senate Republicans will bring to the floor a proposal that slashes the agency's available budget so they can hand out more tax breaks for billionaires and billionaire corporations."
The CFPB has been a major target of the Trump administration, which has installed an opponent of the agency—Russell Vought—as its acting director, moved to gut the bureau's staff, and effectively halted its enforcement efforts. Since the start of Trump's second term, the CFPB has dropped at least 18 enforcement actions against predatory financial firms.
"Trump is making his corporate backers even richer by letting them swindle you," former U.S. Labor Secretary Robert Reich wrote Thursday.
Research released earlier this week estimates that the Trump administration's assault on the CFPB has already cost Americans $18 billion worth of fees and lost compensation for harms inflicted by law-breaking corporations.
"The increased consumer costs from the CFPB's rollback of regulations on bank fees, wholesale dismissal of cases against banks and other lenders, and the apparent failure to disburse funds intended for harmed borrowers run counter to Trump's campaign pledges to ease the cost of living," Reutersreported Tuesday, citing an analysis by the Student Borrower Protection Center and the Consumer Federation of America.
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'We Have Lost a Giant': Broadcast Legend Bill Moyers Dies at 91
"Moyers believed that journalism should serve democracy, not just the bottom line."
Jun 26, 2025
The life and work of journalist Bill Moyers was being celebrated across the world of independent and public media on Thursday as news of his death at the age of 91 spread across the United States and beyond.
"RIP Bill Moyers, one of the greatest of the greats,"NIcho Press Watch's Dan Froomkin said on social media as remembrances and celebrations of the legendary broadcaster, democracy defender, and longtime Common Dreamscontributor poured in.
Moyers died of complications from prostate cancer at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York City.
He began his long media career as a teenager, reporting for his local newspaper in Texas. He was also an ordained Baptist minister and former President Lyndon B. Johnson's press secretary.
"He believed deeply in the power and potential of public media, and he set the standard for public broadcasting by telling stories you couldn't find anywhere else."
A joint statement from the LBJ Presidential Library, his foundation, and the Johnson family noted that "Moyers played a central role in developing and promoting Johnson's Great Society agenda, an ambitious domestic policy program to eliminate poverty, expand civil rights, and improve education and healthcare nationwide."
Moyers left the White House and returned to journalism in 1967. He served as publisher of Newsday, then launched his award-winning television career, from which he retired in 2015. His website,BillMoyers.com, went into "archive mode" in 2017.
With his television programming—much of which aired on PBS—Moyers took "his cameras and microphones to cities and towns where unions, community organizations, environmental groups, tenants rights activists, and others were waging grassroots campaigns for change," Peter Dreier wrote for Common Dreams a decade ago.
In a comment to Common Dreams after Moyer's death, The Nation's John Nichols, who co-founded the group Free Press and co-authored The Death and Life of American Journalism, highlighted the late journalist's work during the era of former President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney.
"There were journalism and democracy campaigners before Bill Moyers, and there will be journalism and democracy campaigners who carry the movement forward now that he has passed," Nichols said. "But every honest history will record that the modern media reform movement—with its commitment to diversity, to equity, and to defending the sort of speak-truth-to-power reporting that exposes injustice, inequality, authoritarianism, and militarism—was made possible by Bill's courageous advocacy during the Bush-Cheney years. He raised the banner—as a former White House press secretary, a bestselling author, and a nationally recognized journalist and PBS host—and we rallied around it."
Free Press president and co-CEO Craig Aaron said in a statement that "Bill Moyers was a legend who lived up to his reputation. Moyers believed that journalism should serve democracy, not just the bottom line. He believed deeply in the power and potential of public media, and he set the standard for public broadcasting by telling stories you couldn't find anywhere else. He always stood up to bullies—including those who come forward in every generation to try to crush public media and end its independence. We can honor his memory by continuing that fight."
Many journalists weighed in on social media, sharing stories of his "very generous heart," and how he was "the rarest combination of curiosity, kindness, honesty, and conviction."
So sad to hear of Bill Moyers passing. An amazing thinker, journalist, interlocutor, supporter of anyone trying to engage in serious dialogue on any front. Just a lovely, generous, and kind human. A great friend to @motherjones. www.washingtonpost.com/obituaries/2...
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— Clara Jeffery (@clarajeffery.bsky.social) June 26, 2025 at 5:20 PM
"Bill Moyers was a close friend, a mentor, and a role model. In a media world where there's almost no solidarity, he guided my career and was an unwavering supporter of our accountability journalism at The Lever," said the outlet's founder, David Sirota, on Thursday. "This is terrible news. We have lost a giant."
"There's this idea of 'never meet your heroes'—and in my experience, I think that aphorism holds up for the most part," Sirota added. "But it was the opposite with Bill—as great a journalism hero as he was in public, he was just as great a mentor in private. He truly was the best of us."
Bill Moyers was enormously generous to @prospect.org over the years, mostly predating me. But I had the chance to speak with him a couple times and it was a great thrill. RIP.apnews.com/article/bill...
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— David Dayen (@ddayen.bsky.social) June 26, 2025 at 5:40 PM
Katrina vanden Heuvel, The Nation's editorial director and publisher, said Thursday that "Moyers distinguished himself as a journalist by refusing to be a stenographer for the powerful. Instead of providing yet another venue for the predictable preening of establishment leaders, Moyers gave a platform to dissenting voices from both the left and the right. Instead of covering the news from the narrow perspective of the political and corporate elite, Moyers gave voice to the powerless and the issues that affect them."
"We journalists are of course obliged to cover the news," Moyers said at an event hosted by the magazine in Washington, D.C., according to vanden Heuvel. "But our deeper mission is to uncover the news that powerful people would prefer to keep hidden."
Beyond the media world, Moyers was also remembered fondly. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) said Thursday that "Bill Moyers, a friend, public servant, and outstanding journalist, has passed away. As an aide to President Johnson, Bill pushed the president in a more progressive direction. As a journalist, he had the courage to explore issues that many ignored. Bill will be sorely missed."
While Moyers has now passed, his legacy lives on in his mountain of work, more than 1,000 hours of which were collected in 2023 by the American Archive of Public Broadcasting, a collaboration between the Library of Congress and Boston's GBH. The Bill Moyers Collection is available online at AmericanArchive.org.
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Trump Calls for Prosecution of Unnamed Democrats Over Iran Intel Leak
The president blamed unidentified Democrats for leaking information he repeatedly claimed was "fake news"—until his own defense secretary said it was real.
Jun 26, 2025
Without providing any evidence or naming any names, U.S. President Donald Trump on Thursday called for the prosecution of Democrats who he said "leaked information" that contradicted his claim to have inflicted "monumental damage" to Iran's nuclear sites during last week's unprovoked attack on the Mideast nation.
Trump took to his Truth Social network to write: "The Democrats are the ones who leaked the information on the PERFECT FLIGHT to the Nuclear Sites in Iran. They should be prosecuted!"
Trump calls for the prosecution of “The Democrats” for leaking information about the strikes on Iranian nuclear sites.If the leaked information is not accurate, why is Trump so mad about it?
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— Republican Accountability (@accountablegop.bsky.social) June 26, 2025 at 12:55 PM
Earlier Thursday, four sources familiar with the matter toldAxios that the president plans to restrict the sharing of classified information with members of Congress following the leaking of a preliminary Defense Intelligence Agency battle damage assessment. The DIA analysis suggested that the U.S. bombing only partially damaged Iran's nuclear facilities and set its nuclear program back by a few months.
The report contradicts Trump's claim that "monumental damage was done to all nuclear sites in Iran," and that "obliteration is an accurate term!"
One of the sources told Axios: "We are declaring a war on leakers. The FBI is investigating the leak. The intelligence community is figuring out how to tighten up their processes so we don't have 'deep state' actors leaking parts of intel analysis that have 'low confidence' to the media."
In a Thursday interview with NBC News, House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) said that "there was a leak, and we're trying to get down to the bottom of that. It's dangerous and ridiculous that happened. We're going to solve that problem."
Asked if he believed the leak came from Congress, Johnson replied, "That's my suspicion."
U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said Wednesday during the NATO summit in The Hague that the Pentagon has launched a criminal probe into the leak. Hegseth also notably contradicted previous claims by Trump that media outlets reported "fake news" about the DIA analysis, confirming the leaked assessment's findings but explaining that they are "preliminary."
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