October, 06 2020, 12:00am EDT
Planned Parenthood Action Fund Statement on Trump's False Tweet on Abortion Later in Pregnancy
Planned Parenthood Action Fund President Alexis McGill Johnson released the following statement after President Trump tweeted false information about abortion later in pregnancy.
Statement from Alexis McGill Johnson, president of Planned Parenthood Action Fund:
WASHINGTON
Planned Parenthood Action Fund President Alexis McGill Johnson released the following statement after President Trump tweeted false information about abortion later in pregnancy.
Statement from Alexis McGill Johnson, president of Planned Parenthood Action Fund:
"Donald Trump is, again, intentionally spreading false information about abortion. There is no such thing as abortion 'up until the time of birth.' That's not how medical care works. Trump has proven over and over again that he will say anything to stoke fear and rally his base. This disgusting, blatantly false rhetoric is part of his full-on assault on women's access to care and the right to an abortion.
"Trump and Mitch McConnell are rushing the confirmation of an anti-abortion Supreme Court justice to a lifetime appointment -- even as senators, White House staff, and the president himself are contracting and spreading COVID-19 at an alarming rate. And the president has emboldened Republican governors to use the global pandemic as a cover to make it harder for people to access time-sensitive reproductive health care, including abortion.
"The urgency of electing Joe Biden and Kamala Harris could not be greater. Our patients feel it every day. I feel it every day. Our lives and our health depend on it."
Planned Parenthood Federation of America (PPFA) is many things to many people. We are a trusted health care provider, an informed educator, a passionate advocate, and a global partner helping similar organizations around the world. Planned Parenthood delivers vital health care services, sex education, and sexual health information to millions of women, men, and young people.
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'Fundamentally Sick': Trump Border Agents Arrest Two Firefighters Battling Washington Wildfire
"What a sad, screwed up reflection of this unhinged administration and the harm they are inflicting on America," said one immigration advocate.
Aug 28, 2025
Elected officials in Washington are among those expressing outrage after federal agents took two firefighters into custody as they were helping to combat a local wildfire.
As reported by The Seattle Times, two firefighters were arrested on Wednesday while helping to put out the fire at Bear Gulch, located in Washington's Olympic Peninsula.
Sources told the paper that the arrests came after federal agents working in the area demanded that the two private contractors who were fighting the fire provide identification information on all their crew members.
One firefighter who was on the scene expressed incredulity that federal officials would conduct an immigration raid on a group of people who have been trying to put out a fire that is spread out across thousands of acres and is still far from contained.
"You risked your life out here to save the community," the firefighter told The Seattle Times. "This is how they treat us."
Local news station KING 5 confirmed that the two firefighters were taken into custody by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), although the specific reasons for the firefighters' detentions are still unknown.
Democratic Washington Gov. Bob Ferguson said that he was "deeply concerned" about the two firefighters being taken into custody, and he said he has "directed my team to get more information about what happened."
Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.) was far more critical and outraged in her reaction to the arrests.
"Trump’s ICE is arresting firefighters who are ACTIVELY FIGHTING ONE OF THE LARGEST WILDFIRES IN THE UNITED STATES," she wrote on social media. "There aren't words to describe this cruelty. It's absurd and completely against America's best interests."
Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.) described DHS's actions in detaining the firefighters as "fundamentally sick."
"Trump has wrongly detained lawful green card holders and even CITIZENS," she emphasized. "No one should assume this was necessary. These firefighters put their lives on the line for us ALL and Trump is detaining them."
Vanessa Cárdenas, executive director of the immigration advocacy organization America's Voice, described the arrests of the firefighters as a sad reflection of President Donald Trump's immigration policies as a whole.
"Perhaps nothing captures President Trump and Stephen Miller's obsession with mass deportation and purging the nation of immigrants than the news that, quite literally, this administration is prioritizing detaining firefighters over fighting fires," said Cárdenas. "What a sad, screwed up reflection of this unhinged administration and the harm they are inflicting on America."
The Trump administration in recent weeks has expanded the scope of immigration enforcement actions to include raids on California farms and on Home Deport parking lots where day laborers frequently gather. This appears to be the first time they have targeted firefighting crews in the middle of trying to contain a blaze, however.
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'Chilling Attempt to Evade Accountability': Trump to Boycott UN Human Rights Review
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The ACLU on Thursday condemned President Donald Trump's administration for refusing to participate in a United Nations mechanism "that calls for each UN member state to undergo a peer review of its human rights records."
The president's decision to ditch the Universal Periodic Review (UPR) follows a February executive order withdrawing from various world bodies, including the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC), which he previously abandoned during his first term.
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"The ACLU will continue to hold the Trump administration accountable for US human rights obligations and calls on Congress and state and local elected officials to join the fight to defend human dignity and everyone's basic rights and freedoms as promised by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights," Dakwar added.
trump/rubio say they're not participating in part b/c the council doesn't condemn human rights violators. THIS IS TOTAL BS. JOURNALISTS - please do not be stenographers on this. the council is far/very far from perfect. but it has been a major voice condemning violations globally.
— David Kaye (@davidakaye.bsky.social) August 28, 2025 at 11:22 AM
The Trump administration has faced mounting criticism since the February order, including after it missed an August 4 deadline to submit a national report in preparation for the next cycle of the UPR, set to take place in November.
After that deadline passed, the UPR Project at the United Kingdom's Birmingham City University and the UPR Academic Network released a joint statement noting that the US "participated in its previous three cycles of UPR in 2010, 2015, and 2020 and engaged as a recommending UN member state from the UPR's inception in 2008 until recently."
"The UPR is a nonconfrontational, cooperative mechanism which enables constructive dialogue between states on human rights. It is also a method of national self-reflection involving dialogue between civil society and the state," the signatories stressed, calling on the US to resume cooperation and other UN member states, UNHRC President Jürg Lauber, and the wider international community "to take appropriate steps and measures" encouraging the administration to do so.
The Lebanese Center for Human Rights (CLDH) reshared that statement on social media Thursday, declaring that the US position is "threatening global human rights accountability and international dialogue," and this is a "critical moment for human rights!"
The ACLU and CLDH comments came after Agence France-Presse confirmed the Trump administration's refusal to participate in the review, reporting on a Thursday letter that the US mission sent to UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk.
According to AFP:
Thursday's letter said that the UPR system, which was created after the establishment of the rights council in 2006, was meant to be "based on objective and reliable information and conducted in a manner that ensures equal treatment" of all countries.
"However, this is not the case today," it charged, adding that "the United States objects to the politicization of human rights across the UN system, as well as the UN's unrelenting selective bias against Israel."
It also accused the UN of "ignoring human rights abuses in China, North Korea, Cuba and Venezuela," which it said had "tarnished the UPR process" and other rights council mechanisms.
UNHRC spokesperson Pascal Sim told the news agency that "since the inception of the UPR in 2008, the secretariat has occasionally received requests from states to postpone reviews," often due to national crises, and the council will discuss how to proceed on the US review when it meets for a month beginning September 8.
Thursday's letter and the backlash come after US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and his department put out an annual report on other nations' human rights conditions earlier this month—a day after a coalition of LGBTQ+ and human rights groups sued over the administration's delay in releasing the congressionally mandated publication.
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The suit alleges a "pretextual" bid to oust Cook in order to "vacate a seat for President Trump to fill and forward his agenda to undermine the independence of the Federal Reserve."
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US Federal Reserve Gov. Lisa Cook on Thursday filed an anticipated lawsuit in response to President Donald Trump's contentious attempt to fire her—something no president has ever done in the 111-year history of the central bank's governing body.
"This case challenges President Trump's unprecedented and illegal attempt to remove Gov. Cook from her position which, if allowed to occur, would the first of its kind in the board's history," says the lawsuit, which was filed in the District Court for the District of Columbia, and names Trump, the Fed Board of Governors, and Fed Chair Jerome Powell as defendants.
The suit contends that Cook's termination "would subvert the Federal Reserve Act... which explicitly requires a showing of 'cause' for a governor's removal, which an unsubstantiated allegation about private mortgage applications submitted by Gov. Cook prior to her Senate confirmation is not."
The US Department of Justice last week launched a criminal investigation of alleged mortgage fraud committed by Cook. The DOJ referral accuses Cook of misrepresenting her primary residence information on mortgage documents for two properties in 2021 in order to secure more favorable loan terms.
Cook—who has not been criminally charged—denies any wrongdoing.
"The unsubstantiated and unproven allegation that Gov. Cook 'potentially' erred in filling out a mortgage form prior to her Senate confirmation does not amount to 'cause,'" the lawsuit argues. "Allowing the president to remove members of the board over policy disagreements would also render illusory the board's independence."
"The mortgage allegations against her are pretextual, in order to effectuate her prompt removal and vacate a seat for President Trump to fill and forward his agenda to undermine the independence of the Federal Reserve," the filing adds.
Cook's suit asks a federal judge to declare that Trump's bid to remove her is an illegal violation of her due process rights, that Fed governors may only be fired for cause, and that the unproven mortgage fraud claim does not constitute such cause. She is also seeking an injunction to bar Powell and the Fed board from firing her.
Trump's effort to fire Cook has been condemned by critics as another attempt to bully the Fed and Powell as the White House pressures the central bank to cut interest rates. Powell signaled last week that the Fed is inclined to lower interest rates during its meeting next month.
Cook is the third Trump political foe accused of mortgage fraud by his administration.
Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) Director William Pulte, a Trump appointee, has also targeted Democratic New York Attorney General Letitia James, who successfully sued the president and the Trump Organization for fraud, as well as Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), who was the lead manager in the first of Trump's two House impeachments.
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