December, 02 2025, 03:01pm EDT
Trump Admin Sides With Bayer Over Cancer Patients In Supreme Court Bid to Block Pesticide Lawsuits
Supreme Court effort comes as Bayer pushes Cancer Gag Act bills nationwide, to shield pesticide corporations from health-related lawsuits
The Department of Justice has filed an amicus brief urging the U.S. Supreme Court to take up pesticide manufacturer Bayer’s case Monsanto Company v. Durnell, angling for a ruling capable of blocking thousands of lawsuits brought by cancer patients who allege its Roundup product was to blame. Bayer bought Monsanto in 2018, and has since spent over $11 billion settling over 100,000 cancer lawsuits related to Roundup, whose active ingredient glyphosate is under investigation as a possible carcinogen.
The Trump Administration has repeatedly come under fire for its failure to take a hard-line stance on pesticides’ human health impacts; the recent “Make America Healthy Again” policy report avoided the issue of increased regulation altogether.
Food & Water Watch Staff Attorney Dani Replogle issued the following statement:
“The Trump Administration’s filing encourages the Supreme Court to slam judiciary doors in the faces of cancer patients across the country. No political posturing can undo the clear message this brief sends to sick Americans harmed by toxic pesticides: Trump has Bayer’s back, not theirs. Monsanto/Bayer’s push to silence cancer patients and keep the sick from pursuing justice is cruel — and Trump’s support is even more despicable.”
At issue in Monsanto Company v. Durnell is whether the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA) preempts state laws that protect citizens when companies fail to provide adequate warnings about the harms their products may cause. If Bayer is successful, a Supreme Court ruling would have the same effect as the unpopular Cancer Gag Act Campaign.
Food & Water Watch mobilizes regular people to build political power to move bold and uncompromised solutions to the most pressing food, water, and climate problems of our time. We work to protect people's health, communities, and democracy from the growing destructive power of the most powerful economic interests.
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People Across Global South Condemn 'Imperialist' US-Israeli War on Iran
"No to war, no to regime change, no to oppression," said one South African labor federation.
Mar 03, 2026
People, groups, and governments across the Global South this week condemned the US-Israeli war on Iran, which one prominent international progressive organization slammed as "devoid of any legal justification."
The attack on Iran sparked large protests in countries including Bangladesh, Brazil, India, Indonesia, Iraq, Malaysia, Nigeria, Pakistan, South Africa, and Turkey, with demonstrators taking to squares and streets to condemn what many called a war of imperialist aggression waged by US President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu—who is wanted by the International Criminal Court (ICC) for alleged crimes against humanity and war crimes in Gaza.
In South Africa—which is leading a genocide case against Israel at the International Court of Justice (ICJ)—labor, leftist, student, and Muslim groups are among those denouncing the war.
The South African Federation of Trade Unions (SAFTU) issued a statement Tuesday proclaiming, "No to war, no to regime change, no to oppression."
"History has taught the global working class a bitter lesson: So-called 'interventions' in the name of democracy have left behind destruction, instability, and suffering for ordinary people, never liberation," SAFTU asserted. "From Iraq to Libya, from Syria to countless other theaters of intervention, it is workers and the poor who pay the highest price."
"The future of Iran belongs to its people, not to Washington, not to Tel Aviv, and not to foreign intelligence agencies," the federation stressed.
In Pakistan, at least 23 people were killed during demonstrations across the country on Sunday, including 10 protesters outside the US consulate in Karachi. US Marines reportedly opened fire on a crowd of people who attempted to storm the facility. Eleven others were killed in the northern city of Skardu, where people set a United Nations office ablaze. Two people were also slain in capital Islamabad.
At least nine people have been killed and 50 injured in violent clashes between police and protesters at the US consulate in Karachi, Pakistan.
Hundreds of people had gathered to protest the killing of Iran’s Supreme leader Ali Khamenei in US-Israeli strikes on Tehran.
Clashes… pic.twitter.com/1QIeRjhL8M
— Channel 4 News (@Channel4News) March 1, 2026
The Progressive International (PI) cabinet published a statement condemning the war "in the strongest possible terms."
"The assault once again exposes the true character of US diplomacy," the group said. "Indirect talks between Tehran and Washington—mediated by Oman—were little more than a screen behind which the Trump administration coordinated an agenda of [a] 'major combat operation' under the banner of ‘Operation Epic Fury.’"
"Trump has been clear: This is a regime change offensive—devoid of any legal justification let alone authorization," the PI cabinet continued. "Trump has framed these strikes as 'preemptive,' necessary to eliminate 'imminent threats' and to defend national security. Yet Iran has made no immediate threats to the US. On the contrary, it is a long-standing ambition of the US and Israel to wage war on Iran—the lethal consequences of which will be borne by its people."
"Imperialist war does not liberate peoples—it subjugates them," the group added. "The evidence is found in the ruins of Gaza, Baghdad, and Tripoli, where bombs leveled cities and 'democracy promotion' left ashes in its wake."
Siphamandla Zondi, a professor of politics at the University of Johannesburg in South Africa, told the Guardian that “this is a war of domination and subordination, therefore it has imperialist undertones and motives" and "makes the world unsafe for all of us.”
The International Migrants Alliance (IMA) issued a statement Monday calling the attack "against international law."
"The bombing in Iran has killed hundreds of people, most of them are children and civilians," the group said. "The aggression is part of the Israel-US renewed war to dominate the West Asia region and plunder their resources... For decades, the United States has armed, funded, and protected Israel’s military actions while destabilizing West Asia through sanctions, interventions, and war. The result is endless violence, displacement, and suffering for ordinary people."
"The ongoing attacks will create new waves of refugees," IMA added. "Families are forced to flee across borders that are increasingly militarized. Imperialist wars create a brutal cycle of forced migration: People are driven from their homes, safety, and future, only to face criminalization, detention, or exploitation as migrants and refugees abroad."
Indian-born academic Amitav Acharya, author of The Once and Future World Order: Why Global Civilization Will Survive the Decline of the West, said in an interview with the Guardian that “many countries in the Global South are going to look for a coalition of powers that will stand up to the United States, as the United States is seen as so aggressive, so imperial."
Protests across India against Khamenei’s killing https://aje.news/nbir8t
[image or embed]
— Al Jazeera English (@aljazeera.com) March 2, 2026 at 12:00 PM
That sentiment was echoed across the developing world. In Brazil, the Socialism and Liberty Party (PSOL) said: "Trump is a threat to the world. This is a criminal violation of Iranian sovereignty and international law."
"To justify the war, the United States lies by stating that Iran threatens the American people and the world," the party continued. "We already know this story: The 'weapons of mass destruction' of Iraq... have never been found. Trump invades Iran to defend American neocolonial interests and to give a message to the world that the American government does not accept the existence of independent countries in the world system."
"Once again, US imperialism and Israeli Zionism elect the path of war and barbarism, bombing civilian facilities and killing innocents," PSOL added. "We demand an immediate end to the bombing and express our total solidarity with the Iranian people."
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After US-Israel Operation Kills 180undermin Girls in Iran, Melania Trump Chairs UN Session on Children in Conflict
"For the United States, ‘protecting children’ and ‘maintaining international peace and security’ clearly mean something very different from what the UN Charter provides,” said the Iranian ambassador to the UN.
Mar 03, 2026
As the families of an estimated 180 schoolchildren and staff members killed in an Israeli attack on a girls' school in southern Iran mourned on Monday, first lady Melania Trump presided over a United Nations Security Council meeting where the impact her husband's military operations in the Middle East was briefly addressed—but only in regard to the first lady's pet cause, children and technology.
Trump spoke generally about children living in or fleeing conflict as she opened a meeting on "Children, Technology, and Education in Conflict," saying the US "stands with all children throughout the world."
But the meeting was held as the US Department of Defense and Israeli officials refused to acknowledge what had been widely reported: On Saturday, as the US and Israel began launching airstrikes across Iran despite diplomatic talks that had recently been making progress, Israel struck the Shajareh Tayyebeh girls' school in Minab as children gathered there for the school day.
The building was destroyed and the roof collapsed, killing at least 180 people, according to PBS NewsHour correspondent Leila Molana-Allen—the majority of whom were girls between the ages of 7 and 12. Nearly 100 people were also injured.
An Al Jazeera investigation on Tuesday found that the strike—which the Trump administration and the Israel Defense Forces claimed they were unaware of—was likely a "deliberate" attack, based on satellite imagery compiled over more than 10 years, video clips, news reports, and official Iranian statements.
The outlet noted that the southeastern region where Minab is located is a hub for the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps naval forces. The school that was hit was part of a broad network of institutions that educate the children of IRGC members.
The Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor emphasized in a statement that "allegations regarding the presence of military facilities elsewhere in Hormozgan Province do not alter the school’s civilian character or justify targeting it."
"Any deliberate attack on a school or on civilians, as well as any indiscriminate or disproportionate attack that violates the principles of distinction and proportionality, constitutes a grave breach and may amount to a war crime where intent to target the school is established or where the attack is indiscriminate or disproportionate," said the group on Sunday. "The military attack on Iran constitutes an act of aggression and violates the UN Charter, which prohibits the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state."
The United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) also said the bombing "constitutes a grave violation of the protection afforded to schools under international humanitarian law."
"Attacks against educational institutions endanger students and teachers and undermine the right to education," said the agency.
Ahead of the UN Security Council meeting led by the first lady, Iranian Ambassador to the UN Amir Saeid Iravani said it was "deeply shameful and hypocritical" for the US to convene a summit on protecting children in conflict as its joint strikes with Israel have killed close to 800 civilians across Iran in recent days.
“For the United States, ‘protecting children’ and ‘maintaining international peace and security’ clearly mean something very different from what the UN Charter provides,” said Iravani.
During the meeting, Rosemary DiCarlo, the UN undersecretary for political and peacebuilding affairs, noted that the attacks on Iran have underscored how children are impacted by conflict, specifically pointing to the shifts to remote learning that have been made in countries where US military bases are located, such as Israel, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, and Oman.
About the strike on the school in Minab, DiCarlo said, “United States authorities have announced that they are looking into these reports.”
The stated goal of the meeting—protecting children's access to education in conflict zones—has also been undermined by President Donald Trump.
As the Associated Press reported, the UN Office of the Special Representative of the Secretary General for Children in Armed Conflict was among the UN offices that have suffered funding cuts under the Trump administration, with the White House withdrawing US support for its work in January.
UNESCO and the UN Children's Fund have also faced drastic funding reductions.
The first lady's status as chair of the meeting on children in conflict, said UN diplomat Mohamad Safa, "while the US and Israel killing children in Lebanon and Gaza, and murdered 165 schoolgirls in Iran, is the most hypocritical thing we have seen in the history of the Security Council."
Trump led the session the same day that Democracy for the Arab World Now called for an emergency General Assembly session to "declare the assault a war of aggression in violation of the UN Charter and to demand the immediate cessation of all hostilities.”
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Damning CNN Supercut Exposes GOP Doublespeak About Trump's Iran War
"To Republicans in Congress: This is a war," said MS NOW host Joe Scarborough.
Mar 03, 2026
CNN on Monday aired a montage of Republican lawmakers and Trump administration officials that exposed major inconsistencies in how they discuss the unprovoked US-Israel war against Iran.
The supercut began with President Donald Trump on Saturday morning acknowledging that "we may have casualties" in the conflict with Iran because that "often happens in war."
The video then showed Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), who told NBC's "Meet the Press" on Sunday that "I don't know if this is technically a war."
CNN put together a montage of conflicting messages from Republicans and administration officials on whether or not we’re in a war. pic.twitter.com/jJjNc85Buw
— Acyn (@Acyn) March 3, 2026
It then cut to a clip of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on Monday giving a news conference in which he said, "We didn't start this war, but under President Trump, we are finishing it."
The video went next Sen. Markwayne Mullin (R-Okla.), who declaratively told CNN on Monday that "this isn't a war," before cutting back to Hegseth saying, "We set the terms of this war, from start to finish."
Next, Rep. Brian Mast (R-Fla.), was shown telling CNN Saturday that "I don't think I don't think anybody should classify this as war," before cutting back to Hegseth saying, "War is hell, and always will be."
Reacting to the montage, CNN host Abby Phillip said, "It does seem like we're in a war."
MS NOW host Joe Scarborough, a former GOP congressman from Florida, reposted the CNN video and urged elected Republicans to be honest with US voters.
"To Republicans in Congress: This is a war," he wrote. "Just ask the President."
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