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Financial Threats to Rights of Nature Lawmaking
Corporate 'person' uses constitutional rights law to justify attorney fees from the Town of Nottingham, targeting people’s use of direct democracy for climate action.
WASHINGTON
Corporate personhood "rights" are once again being weaponized to financially punish and intimidate a local community that took a stand for the Rights of Nature and future generations. On April 23, 2021, Nottingham Water Alliance (NWA), which campaigned to adopt a Freedom from Chemical Trespass Ordinance, filed a brief opposing a corporation's demand for over $50,000 in attorney fees from the taxpayers of Nottingham.
"These desperate tactics deny liberty and justice to the people of Nottingham. We should be free to protect the health and safety of our whole community. These tactics will not stop this movement. It's time for state constitutional change," says Peter White of NWA.
In Nottingham, a resident plaintiff and his corporate shield, G&F Goods, LLC, filed a lawsuit against the Ordinance, arguing it unconstitutionally discriminates against corporations. (The courts decided to protect corporate privileges and overturn the law.) Threats to freshwater systems and climate disruption prompted residents to popularly adopt the Ordinance at their 2019 town hall meeting. It secures rights of ecosystems "to naturally exist, flourish, regenerate, evolve, and be restored" and rights of townspeople to a "climate system capable of sustaining human societies."
The Town, which has refused to defend the direct democracy vote of the people, opposes the demand for attorney fees and said the whole "case was entirely unnecessary." "A day late and a dollar short to wait until a motion for attorney fees is filed to make such a statement. The Town could have filed a motion to dismiss from the very beginning and instead, town officials capitulated to a single dissenter and denied the local NWA the opportunity to defend the Ordinance when the Town knew they were not going to defend it themselves," says CELDF's Michelle Sanborn.
Court documents are available upon request.
The Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund (CELDF) is helping build a decolonial movement for Community Rights and the Rights of Nature to advance democratic, economic, social, and environmental rights-building upward from the grassroots to the state, federal, and international levels.
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Protesters at 100+ Campuses Tell Trump 'Hands Off Higher Ed!'
"We're not only out to defeat Trump, but to also win a vision for affordability, security, and freedom for our generation—both in higher education, and in our democracy," said one student organizer.
Nov 07, 2025
Students and professors at over 100 universities across the United States on Friday joined protests against President Donald Trump's sweeping assault on higher education, including a federal funding compact that critics call "extortion."
Crafted in part by billionaire financier Marc Rowan, Trump's Compact for Excellence in Higher Education was initially presented to a short list of prestigious schools but later offered to other institutions as a way to restore or gain priority access to federal funding.
The compact requires signatories to commit to "transforming or abolishing institutional units that purposefully punish, belittle, and even spark violence against conservative ideas," while also targeting trans student-athletes and diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) policies.
"The attacks on higher ed are attacks on truth, freedom, and our future. We're organizing to protect campuses as spaces for learning, not control—for liberation, not censorship," said Brianni Davillier, a student organizer with Public Citizen, which is among the advocacy groups and labor unions supporting the Students Rise Up movement behind Friday's demonstrations.
BREAKING: Students and faculty from across NYC have come together to tell Apollo CEO Marc Rowan that it’s going to be a lot harder than he thinks for billionaire greed to destroy higher education.
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— Sunrise Movement (@sunrisemvmt.bsky.social) November 7, 2025 at 11:43 AM
At the Community College of Philadelphia, protesters stressed that "higher education research saves lives." Duke University demonstrators carried signs that called for protecting academic freedom and transgender students. Roughly 10 miles away, at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, they unfurled a banner that read, "Stand for Students | Reject Trump's Compact."
Professors from multiple schools came together for a rally at Central Connecticut State University, according to Connecticut Post.
"The compact would require universities submit to a system of government surveillance and policing meant to abolish departments that the government disapproves of, promote certain viewpoints over others, restrict the ability of university employees to express themselves on any major issue of the day," said James Bhandary-Alexander, a Yale Law School professor and member of the university's American Association of University Professors (AAUP) executive committee.
AAUP, also part of the coalition backing the protest movement, said on social media Friday: "Trump and Marc Rowan's loyalty oath compact is [trash]!! Out with billionaires and authoritarians in higher ed! Our universities belong to the students and higher ed workers!"
Protesters urged their school leaders to not only reject Trump's compact—which some universities have already publicly done—but also focus on other priorities of campus communities.
At the University of Kansas, provost Barbara Bichelmeyer confirmed last month to The University Daily Kansan that KU will not sign the compact. However, students still demonstrated on Friday.
"They did say 'no' but that's like the bare minimum," said Cameron Renne, a leader with the KU chapters of the Sunrise Movement and Young Democratic Socialists of America. "We're hoping to get the administration to hear us and at least try to cooperate with us on some of our demands."
According to The University Daily Kansan, "Renne said the groups are also pushing for divestment from fossil fuels, improvements in campus maintenance, and the removal of restrictions on gender ideology."
Some schools have declined to sign on to the compact but reached separate agreements with the Trump administration. As the Guardian reported Friday:
At Brown University in Rhode Island—one of the first institutions to reach a settlement with the Trump administration earlier this year—passersby were invited to endorse a banner listing a series of demands by dipping their hands in paint and leaving their print, while a group of faculty members nearby lectured about the history of autocracy.
"Trump came to our community thinking we could be bullied out of our freedom," said Simon Aron, a sophomore and co-president of Brown Rise Up. "He was wrong."
Brown isn't the only Ivy League school to strike a deal with Trump; so have Columbia University and the University of Pennsylvania, the alma mater of both Rowan and Trump. Cornell University followed suit on Friday amid nationwide demonstrations.
"November 7th is only the start," said Kaden Ouimet, another student organizer with Public Citizen. "We're building a movement of students, faculty, and campus workers to demand our colleges do not comply with the Trump regime, and its authoritarian campus compact."
"We know that to fully take on autocracy, we have to take on the material conditions that gave rise to it," the organizer added. "That is why we're not only out to defeat Trump, but to also win a vision for affordability, security, and freedom for our generation—both in higher education, and in our democracy."
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Footage Shows Father's Seizure as He Held Toddler During Wife's ‘Harrowing’ ICE Arrest
"This is a sickening example of Trump and ICE's blatant disregard for humanity as they terrorize our families and communities. It is shameful, cruel, and it must end."
Nov 07, 2025
A man whose wife was arrested by federal immigration authorities on Thursday morning in Fitchburg, Massachusetts said Friday that his toddler daughter had been "traumatized" by the chaotic altercation during which he appeared to have a seizure and the agents threatened to take both parents away and turn the child over the state.
Carlos Sebastian Zapata told the Boston Globe that he became unconscious while trying to stop the agents from pulling his wife, Juliana Milena Zapata, away during a traffic stop at about 7:00 am while Zapata and the couple's 1-and-a-half-year-old daughter, Alaia, were taking her to work at Burger King.
Their car was suddenly surrounded by several vehicles and federal agents began banging on their windows.
When Zapata tried to stop the agents from taking his wife away, one officer "pressed on his neck," according to the Globe, and he lost consciousness while Alaia was in his arms.
As a video taken by an eyewitness showed, Zapata said he "had convulsions or something. I don’t know what they did to me, but they were pressing on my neck.”
The video appeared to show the 24-year-old father having a seizure as Alaia cried and horrified onlookers yelled at the immigration agents. Local police ordered the bystanders to stay back.
WARNING: The violence and cruelty is hard to watch, but impossible for families to endure.
This is a sickening example of Trump and ICE's blatant disregard for humanity as they terrorize our families and communities.
It is shameful, cruel, and it must end. pic.twitter.com/ZGNOYtpVMO
— Congresswoman Ayanna Pressley (@RepPressley) November 7, 2025
“I wasn’t letting go of my wife because they wanted to take her away,” Zapata told the Globe. When he began having convulsions, he said, "that’s when I let go of my wife."
He said the agents told the couple that they would either arrest Milena Zapata and allow Alaia to stay with her father, or they would arrest both parents and turn the child over to a state agency.
US Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) called the incident "harrowing" and condemned the masked Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents who had "brutalized" the family, and the Trump administration for its nationwide mass deportation campaign.
"If this video left you feeling scared, I want you to know, so am I," said Markey. "If you're feeling angry, so am I... What we saw in this video is just another example of the violence and terror being perpetrated all across our country. This is not normal. This is what dictators do."
Zapata told the Globe that he and his wife were from Ecuador and entered the country several years ago. They have a pending asylum case and had authorization to work.
Tricia McLaughlin, assistant secretary for public affairs at the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), said on social media that Milena Zapata was a “violent criminal illegal alien.”
The Globe reported that "according to court records, Milena Zapata was accused of stabbing a woman with scissors in the hand and throwing a trash can at her during a dispute over a relationship she believed the woman had with her husband. She was charged with assault and battery with a dangerous weapon."
Zapata told the Globe that his wife had been attending all her court dates as ordered and that the situation had been "blown out of proportion."
“We came here to work, not to cause harm or anything like that,” Zapata said.
DHS accused Zapata of "faking a seizure," saying he refused medical attention after his wife was arrested.
He told the Globe that Alaia has been distraught since her mother was detained; Milena Zapata is reportedly being held at Cumberland County Jail in Maine.
“She misses her mom a lot, she stays very close to her mom,” Zapata said. “She asks about her mom, she says, ‘Mami, mami, mami’ all the time. I don’t know what to tell her... Sincerely, she is traumatized.”
Community members are planning to hold a vigil in Fitchburg on Saturday, and the mayor's office has offered assistance to the family. The city has received more than 5,000 calls about ICE's treatment of the family.
"The violence and cruelty is hard to watch, but impossible for families to endure," said Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.) of the video that circulated on social media Friday. "This is a sickening example of Trump and ICE's blatant disregard for humanity as they terrorize our families and communities. It is shameful, cruel, and it must end."
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'Nonstarter': Senate GOP Rejects New Dem Deal to End Government Shutdown
"Mr. President, the ball is in your court right now," Sen. Bernie Sanders implored President Donald Trump. "Show us what a great dealmaker you are."
Nov 07, 2025
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer on Friday offered—and Republican leadership rejected—a compromise deal to end the longest federal shutdown in US history, an agreement under which Democrats proposed to vote to reopen the government in exchange for a one-year extension of expiring Affordable Care Act health insurance subsidies.
"It's clear we need to try something different," Schumer (D-NY) asserted on the Senate floor, noting the 14 failed upper chamber votes on the short-term continuing resolution passed by the House of Representatives in September to fund the government through November 21.
“All Republicans have to do is say ‘yes’ to extend current law for one year," he said. "This is a reasonable offer that reopens the government, deals with healthcare affordability, and begins a process of negotiating reforms to the ACA tax credits for the future. Now the ball is in the Republicans’ court. We need Republicans to just say yes."
.@SenSchumer: "Democrats are ready to clear the way to quickly pass a government funding bill that includes health care affordability. Leader Thune just needs to add a clean one-year extension of the ACA tax credits to the CR so that we can immediately address rising health care… pic.twitter.com/HvgLZHhhhb
— CSPAN (@cspan) November 7, 2025
Schumer's proposal involved a “clean” extension of the ACA tax credits that are set to expire at the end of this year, meaning they would exclude new eligibility restrictions that many Republican lawmakers are seeking to impose. Schumer also floated the creation of a bipartisan committee tasked with negotiating a further extension of ACA subsidies.
After consulting with GOP colleagues, Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) rejected the Democrats' offer as a "nonstarter." Republicans have repeatedly balked at voting on the ACA subsidies before the shutdown—now in its 38th day—ends.
"The Obamacare extension is the negotiation. That's what we're going to negotiate once the government opens up," Thune said. "We need to vote to open the government—and there is a proposal out there to do that—and then we can have this whole conversation about healthcare."
Senate Budget Committee Chair Lindsey Graham (R-SC) also dismissed Schumer's proposal, writing on social media that "health in$urance companies applaud Schumer’s proposal to extend Obamacare subsidies for one year."
"Another year of insane profits at the expense of consumers and American taxpayers," added Graham, who has received hundreds of thousands of dollars in campaign contributions from the health insurance industry during his congressional career.
The Democrats' new offer came as a legal battle over Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) food benefits plays out, as hundreds of thousands of federal employees are working without pay, and hundreds of commercial airline flights have been delayed or canceled.
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) joined Democrats in urging his GOP colleagues to accept the new offer.
"We are now in the 38th day of a government shutdown," Sanders said on the Senate floor Friday. "That means that federal employees all over this country who have to feed their families are not getting paychecks. It means that air traffic controllers are forced to work crazy hours, and we worry about the safety of our flights right now. We worry about Capitol Police officers right here in DC who are having a hard time feeding their families."
LIVE: Donald Trump claims to be a dealmaker. The ball is now in his court. Help negotiate a deal which protects the health care of tens of millions of Americans and let us end the shutdown today. https://t.co/f9Gpi7wd8W
— Sen. Bernie Sanders (@SenSanders) November 7, 2025
Sanders continued:
These are hardworking people who are doing important work. They deserve respect. They deserve to be paid. This shutdown must end as quickly as possible.
And on top of the fact that we have hundreds of thousands of workers not getting paid, we now have a president who—for the first time in the history of this country—is willing to allow our kids, low-income, working-class children, to go hungry in order to try to make a political point. A point, by the way, that the American people are seeing through.
Despite appealing a judge's Thursday directive to fully fund November SNAP benefits, the Trump administration told states on Friday that it would release funding for the food aid in compliance with the court order.
"Well, Mr. President, the ball is in your court right now," Sanders added. "Show us what a great dealmaker you are. Help us negotiate a deal which protects the healthcare of tens of millions of Americans and let us end this shutdown today. We can end it in the next few hours."
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