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'An Unmistakably Chilling Message': Trump DOJ Subpoenaed Phone Records of Journalists' Relatives
"Every American who values a free and independent press should see this for what it is: an abuse of power designed to silence scrutiny."
Jul 20, 2026
Attorneys representing The New York Times have revealed that the Trump administration's subpoenas of the newspaper's journalists are far more aggressive than what had been previously reported.
In a letter sent to US District Judge Arun Subramanian on Saturday and unsealed by the court on Monday, attorneys David O'Neil, Douglas Zolkind, and Julie Edelstein said that the US Department of Justice was engaged in an "alarming pattern of conduct" beyond its recently revealed efforts to compel Times reporters to testify before a grand jury for a probe related to unspecified national security leaks.
The attorneys said the administration had gone so far as to subpoena phone companies for subscriber information and toll records for phone numbers used by one reporter's mother and by two reporters' spouses, among others.
They also revealed that two administration subpoenas seek records going back as far as January 1 this year, "long before the events that are purportedly the basis for the department's investigation," suggesting that "the department is using this investigation... to forage for information about the journalists' source relationships more broadly."
The subpoenas of the Times journalists, issued earlier this month, came days after the paper published a story that detailed security concerns about the luxury jet the Qatari government gave to President Donald Trump.
The issued subpoenas did not specifically name the Times’ reporting on the Qatari jet as the reason for the grand jury probe, although they were given to all four journalists—Tyler Pager, Julian Barnes, Eric Schmitt, and Eric Lipton—who reported the story.
It is highly uncommon for government investigators to subpoena journalists when they are probing national security leaks, as such actions are generally seen as having a chilling effect on reporters’ ability to gather information.
Katie Fallow, deputy litigation director at the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University, described news of the department seeking phone records of reporters' spouses and a parent as "an extraordinary escalation in the Trump administration’s campaign to intimidate the press."
"The Justice Department didn't stop at journalists—it went after their family members, too," Fallow noted. "That sends an unmistakably chilling message to anyone thinking about reporting on this administration. Every American who values a free and independent press should see this for what it is: an abuse of power designed to silence scrutiny."
Seth Stern, chief of advocacy for the Freedom of the Press Foundation, was even more scathing in his denunciation of the administration's actions.
"Even the Mafia says families are off limits," said Stern. "It’s gross that the administration—in its never-ending effort to harass and intimidate reporters who reveal its incompetence—is going after the communications of journalists’ relatives."
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Letting Fraudsters Run Wild, Trump Justice Department Abandons Corporate Crime Enforcement
"The Trump DOJ’s grotesque retreat from corporate crime enforcement leaves Americans increasingly vulnerable to tainted food, workplace exploitation, environmental destruction, widespread ripoffs, and all-around illegal corporate predation."
Jul 20, 2026
US President Donald Trump's Justice Department is systematically taking a softer approach to corporate crime, letting companies and executives that have admitted to wrongdoing off the hook with no charges.
The Wall Street Journal reported over the weekend that "so far this year, 12 companies have pleaded guilty to federal criminal charges. At least six companies have reached deferred prosecution agreements, including refiner Phillips 66 and medical-waste specialist Stericycle, acquired by Waste Management in 2024." The Journal added that while Acting US Attorney General Todd Blanche and other officials have signaled that the Justice Department is "focusing on prosecuting employees rather than companies, it has also granted leniency or dropped charges against people it accused of wrongdoing."
"The Trump DOJ’s grotesque retreat from corporate crime enforcement leaves Americans increasingly vulnerable to tainted food, workplace exploitation, environmental destruction, widespread ripoffs, and all-around illegal corporate predation," said Rick Claypool, a researcher at the consumer advocacy group Public Citizen who has been tracking the fall of corporate enforcement during Trump's second White House term—which has been rife with corruption and profiteering at the very top.
Claypool called the Trump Justice Department's lenient approach to corporate criminals "an absolute outrage" and that the trend is "going from bad to worse."
The Journal lays out several examples of the Justice Department abandoning enforcement efforts against prominent companies. "In matters involving Alibaba, EagleBank, and Abbott Laboratories, the department declined to charge companies even when prosecutors thought executives or managers were involved in the wrongdoing," the newspaper reported. "In those cases, the department didn’t charge any individuals."
"The Justice Department this year dropped its long-running prosecution of Turkish state-owned lender Halkbank for allegedly evading US sanctions on Iran," the Journal added. "And last year, the Trump administration dropped charges against Boeing. The aerospace giant had been set to plead guilty to misleading air-safety regulators but instead paid a $243 million fine and received a nonprosecution agreement. That is the same form of leniency that prosecutors granted to Alibaba and EagleBank, which requires them to admit wrongdoing but spares them from being charged."
Trump's DOJ has also shown lenience toward corporate executives. "The department in January gave a deferred prosecution agreement to the chief executive of a technology contractor who had been charged with defrauding the Securities and Exchange Commission," the Journal reported.
Bloomberg reported last week that the Justice Department plans to drop charges against "alleged mastermind of a cryptocurrency Ponzi scheme that prosecutors said defrauded investors of $722 million."
According to Public Citizen's tracker, the second Trump administration has canceled or frozen enforcement actions against more than 170 US corporations so far—including dozens of companies that donated to the president's inaugural fund.
“The Trump administration is canceling accountability for corporate predators that cheat consumers, exploit workers, and illegally abuse their power at home and abroad,” Claypool said earlier this year. “The ‘law enforcement’ claims the White House uses as pretext for authoritarian anti-immigrant crackdowns, city occupations, and imperial resource seizures abroad lose all credibility when cast against the lawlessness Trump allows for the pursuit of corporate profits."
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'Fox Is Guarding the Hen House': ICE Agents Told FBI Will No Longer Investigate Confrontations
The reported change would grant "pure impunity for ICE to do horrible things," said one journalist.
Jul 19, 2026
New guidance distributed to US Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents across the country in recent days said that the FBI will no longer investigate confrontations that officers have with protesters or people who are subjected to immigration enforcement—leaving the agency to investigate its own violent encounters with the public following at least two recent killings by ICE agents.
The guidance pertained to claims of assault against Department of Homeland Security (DHS) officers, but FBI investigations have gathered evidence that implicated agents themselves after they claimed to have been attacked.
According to the message sent to ICE officers, Homeland Security Investigations, which operates under ICE, would begin examining incidents in which an agent claimed they were assaulted.
HSI does not have jurisdiction to investigate allegations of civil rights allegations, so in cases in which a confrontation escalates to a use of force by an officer, the unit would be unlikely to investigate whether the agent violated the victim's rights, The New York Times reported.
"The fox is guarding the hen house," said American Immigration Council senior fellow Aaron Reichlin-Melnick of the reported change.
Despite the guidance that was circulated to agents, the US Department of Justice, which oversees the FBI, released a joint statement with DHS denying that the change would take place.
“The relationship between DHS and DOJ in investigating assault on federal officer cases has not changed, and FBI will continue to investigate in accordance with agency policy,” the statement said. “This administration has been clear, anyone who assaults law enforcement will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.”
According to a New York Times investigation, the Trump administration filed charges against more than 550 people who it said assaulted federal immigration officers. More than 400 of the cases had been resolved, and in nearly half of them, charges of assault had been thrown out or withdrawn, or the defendants had been acquitted.
As it's filed such charges, the Trump administration has frequently repeated its assertion that federal agents are regularly facing violent attacks from the public—including in cases in which agents have killed US citizens and immigrants, including Renee Good, Alex Pretti, and earlier this month, Lorenzo Salgado Araujo.
The reported change was also made public less than a week after an ICE agent fatally shot Johan Sebastián Guerrero in Biddeford, Maine.
Journalist Sam Stein said the guidance that was given to federal agents could grant "pure impunity for ICE to do horrible things."
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Massie and Khanna Push Second Epstein Files Transparency Act to Fight Trump DOJ Violations
"We need the Epstein Files Transparency Act II to strengthen the original law we wrote, crack down on the DOJ's illegal noncompliance, and stand with survivors and those seeking justice."
Jul 16, 2026
After months of the Trump administration refusing to fully comply with the Epstein Files Transparency Act, Congressmen Thomas Massie and Ro Khanna appeared on MS NOW Thursday to promote their newly proposed second edition of the bipartisan law.
"We never anticipated that the chief law enforcement officer of the land wouldn't follow the law—and so, Ro and I took some heat because we didn't put in our original bill the ability to sue the chief law enforcement officer of the land," Massie (R-Ky.) said on "Morning Joe," a day after introducing the bill. "And so that's what the Epstein Files Transparency Act 2.0 does."
"It gives the victims standing to sue the attorney general, to get their own records, their own testimony, in these 302 forms. It also gives congressmen standing to enforce this law," he explained. "Basically, to get in front of a judge to say, 'judge, here's where they've overly redacted these files.'"
The bill also lets state attorneys general, "like the one in New Mexico, who's trying to prosecute crimes that happened at Zorro Ranch... prosecute crimes where the statute of limitations is not impeding him," added Massie—who will leave Congress at the end of this session after losing his May primary to a challenger backed by President Donald Trump, a former friend of Epstein. The convicted sex offender died in prison during his federal sex trafficking case.
The first Epstein Files Transparency Act was introduced last July, then passed by both chambers of Congress and signed by Trump in November. However, since it took effect, the US Department of Justice (DOJ), whose leaders are handpicked by the president, "has violated our law, delayed the release of millions of files, botched the redactions, and denied the survivors justice," Khanna (D-Calif.) said Wednesday.
Khanna and Massie—joined by Rep. Teresa Leger Fernández (D-NM), who chairs the Democratic Women's Caucus, along with Sens. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) and Ben Ray Luján (D-NM)—are outraged that the DOJ continues to withhold over 3 million Epstein files and maintain heavy redactions on the documents it has released.
As the sponsors introduced the Epstein Files Transparency Act II on Wednesday, acting US Attorney General Todd Blanche—who was previously Trump's personal lawyer—appeared before the Senate Judiciary Committee for a hearing about his nomination to take over the post permanently; he's been filling it in a temporary capacity since Pam Bondi's April exit.
Both Bondi—who was fired by Trump as she faced mounting calls for impeachment—and Blanche have earned intense criticism for their handling of the Epstein files, including from survivors. One of them, Dani Bensky, testified before the Senate panel on Thursday about her negative experience.
After the sudden death of Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), all Republicans on the committee would have to vote "yes" to advance Blanche's nomination. At least one—retiring Sen. Thom Tillis of North Carolina—said Blanche would have to meet with Epstein survivors to secure his support, which the acting attorney general claimed Wednesday he cannot do if they have legal counsel.
Even if the nomination advances out of committee, Blanche will need approval from a full chamber that's also only narrowly controlled by the GOP amid frustrations that, as Merkley put it, "at Trump’s bidding, the Department of Justice's highest-ranking officials continue to break the law, denying justice to Jeffrey Epstein's victims with an unprecedented cover-up of the abuse of our most vulnerable."
"As long as those in power continue to side with the Epstein Class and shield abusers from accountability for their horrific crimes, we need the Epstein Files Transparency Act II to strengthen the original law we wrote, crack down on the DOJ's illegal noncompliance, and stand with survivors and those seeking justice," the senator argued. "The rich and powerful cannot be allowed to escape justice, and the American public deserves the transparency it is crying out for."
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'Worse Than a Lackey': Advocates and Dems List the Many Reasons Blanche Is Unfit to Be Attorney General
If senators "ignore the evidence and advance Blanche’s nomination, they will share responsibility for the abuses that follow," said one critic.
Jul 15, 2026
As acting US Attorney General Todd Blanche faced questions on Wednesday regarding the defunct "slush fund" he helped create for President Donald Trump's allies, his role in the release of the Epstein files, and other details of his tenure at the Department of Justice, advocacy groups and Democrats demanded that senators reject the nomination of an official who "has made it clear he’ll put Donald Trump first."
Those were the words of Brett Edkins, managing director of policy and political affairs at Stand Up America, who was among those speaking out about Blanche's "damning" record of weaponizing the DOJ against Trump's perceived enemies with "politically motivated" investigations and indictments.
While serving as deputy to fired former Attorney General Pam Bondi and in his current acting role, said Stand Up America, Blanche has led inquiries into Cassidy Hutchinson, a former White House aide whose testimony implicated the president in the violent riot by Trump supporters at the US Capitol on January 6, 2021; the Democratic fundraising platform ActBlue; the anti-hate group Southern Poverty Law Center; and former FBI Director James Comey, whom Blanche claimed "knowingly and willfully [made] a threat to take the life of, and to inflict bodily harm upon” Trump in an Instagram photo in 2025.
"Senate Judiciary Committee members have a duty to hold Blanche’s feet to the fire and demand answers about his record of weaponizing the DOJ to protect Donald Trump," said Edkins ahead of Wednesday's confirmation hearing for Blanche, who represented Trump during his legal cases regarding hush-money payments to an adult film star and his retention of classified documents.
"If they ignore the evidence and advance Blanche’s nomination, they will share responsibility for the abuses that follow," he added.
Along with using the power of the federal government against those who oppose the president, Blanche led the creation of a $1.77 billion settlement agreement to end Trump's lawsuit against the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) over the leak of his tax records—a deal that included both a "super pardon" to protect the president and his family from ever facing accountability for tax violations and an "Anti-Weaponization Fund" to dole out taxpayer funds to January 6 insurrectionists and other Trump allies.
A federal judge blocked the settlement this week and found Trump's lawsuit against the IRS to be illegal self-dealing, and Blanche has indicated the DOJ will no longer pursue the creation of the "slush fund," but advocates as well as senators at Wednesday's confirmation hearing said the effort put on display the acting attorney general's unfitness to lead the DOJ.
"The Senate must look at the facts and refuse to confirm Todd Blanche," said Virginia Kase Solomón, president and CEO of Common Cause, which referred Blanche for a disciplinary investigation after the federal ruling was handed down Monday. "He continues to prioritize the president’s interests over the American people. He orchestrated this sham lawsuit to fleece the American people out of almost $2 billion to pay the President’s allies, including people who violently assaulted law enforcement on January 6, and to provide the president, his family, and associates unprecedented immunity for their misdeeds."
"The American people deserve an Attorney General who is independent of the White House and has an unassailable ethics record," said Kase Solomón. "Senators can’t confirm someone who is willing to skirt the law as our nation’s top law enforcement officer."
At the hearing Wednesday, Senate Judiciary Committee Ranking Member Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) noted that while Blanche has declared the slush fund "dead," the order to create the fund still exists on the DOJ website and the acting attorney general attacked the judge who blocked the settlement as orchestrating "a hit" on Blanche.
Sen. @DickDurbin: One of your first official actions as acting AG, Mr. Blanche, was to establish the $2 billion slush fund to benefit J6 cop beaters while immunizing Trump from IRS liability. You defended the slush fund by claiming "people who hurt police get money all the time." pic.twitter.com/06he9g8kLS
— Headquarters (@HQNewsNow) July 15, 2026
At Slate on Tuesday, Shirin Ali wrote that Blanche's conduct regarding the slush fund revealed that he is "worse than a lackey."
In the federal case against Trump's IRS lawsuit, wrote Ali, "the judge’s conclusion confirmed what we’ve all been thinking: The acting AG and the president’s interests in this case were 'one and the same.'"
"At the end of the day, the DOJ’s responsibility is to zealously represent the interests of the US, not the president, and Blanche has violated the agency’s commitment to remain insulated from political influence," Ali added.
Blanche also faced questioning on the settlement agreement from Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas), who lost a primary election earlier this year and has been identified as one of two Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee—the other being Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC)—who could vote no on Blanche's confirmation.
Blanche's involvement in the release of files regarding the late convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, a former associate of the president's, was also a focus of outcry ahead of and during the confirmation hearing, which was attended by some survivors of Epstein's abuse.
US Rep. Robert Garcia (D-Calif.), who is leading an investigation into the DOJ's withholding of the Epstein files as ranking member of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, wrote to Durbin and Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Charles Grassley (R-Iowa), noting that Bondi identified Blanche as having overseen the long-delayed, botched release of the documents earlier this year.
"Mr. Blanche is therefore responsible for a DOJ process that exposed the names, photographs, and other personally identifying information of Epstein survivors thousands of times, including information related to more than two dozen minors," said Garcia. "Survivors have described DOJ’s actions as retraumatizing, and some have reported harassment after their identities spread online."
Garcia also pointed to recent public reporting that FBI and DOJ personnel were instructed to "find, log, and redact President
Trump’s name from Epstein-related records," and to a "highly unusual interview" of Epstein associate Ghislaine Maxwell, "shortly before her suspicious transfer to a minimum-security facility."
"Mr. Blanche still has not explained why he met with Maxwell, what she was offered, or what influenced her treatment by DOJ," wrote Garcia. "To this day, Maxwell continues to pursue a pardon from President Trump as she resides in a minimum-security facility with amenities that should not be afforded to prolific sex traffickers."
Garcia said in a statement that Blanche's "failed handling of the Epstein files... raises serious concerns about whether he is working for the American people or just protecting Donald Trump. The attorney general’s job is to uphold the rule of law, not serve as the president’s personal lawyer. Blanche is unfit for the role, which is why we’re calling on the Senate to reject his nomination."
Blanche did not commit to personally meeting with the Epstein survivors who attended the hearing when he was questioned on the matter by Durbin, telling him there could be ethical rules that would prevent such a meeting.
"You’re dancing on the head of a pin here," replied Durbin.
In another call from the lower chamber of Congress, Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) provided a fact sheet including 15 ways in which Blanche "still behaves like Trump's defense attorney."
Along with his involvement in the slush fund, investigations of Trump's enemies, and the Epstein files, Raskin named Blanche's "aggressive DOJ investigations into reporters," his shutdown of a probe into an alleged bribe taken by border czar Tom Homan, and his blocking of investigations into the killings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti by federal officers as more reasons for senators to reject Blanche as attorney general.
"The American people deserve a Senate that acts as a coequal branch," said Edkins, "not a rubber stamp on Trump’s handpicked henchman.”
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Trump Admin Finally Hands Over Evidence on Good and Pretti Killings to Minnesota Prosecutors After Withholding It For 6 Months
Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison said it "should never have taken this long."
Jul 13, 2026
After being shut out of the investigations by the Trump administration, Minnesota prosecutors announced on Monday that federal investigators finally turned over reams of unseen evidence related to shootings by immigration agents that killed Renee Good and Alex Pretti and injured Julio Sosa-Celis in January.
Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty announced that after "six months of relentless collective effort," state and local prosecutors had "obtained hard drives of previously withheld evidence" about the killings, which took place during the administration's aggressive surge of immigration agents in and around Minneapolis and sparked a wave of protests.
Moriarty added that prosecutors had also obtained some physical evidence that was "previously withheld" by federal investigators. This includes the SUV that Good, a 37-year-old US citizen and mother of three, had been driving when she was shot through her driver's side window by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agent Jonathan Ross as she appeared to be leaving the scene of an enforcement operation.
Attorney Antonio Romanucci and the legal team representing the family of Good said in a statement that turning over the vehicle and other evidence was "an important and meaningful step towards justice and accountability," and that they were "grateful for the resumption of regular investigatory protocols, which is not only important for the families impacted in these cases, but it is essential for the community and the country."
Shortly after Good was shot, Department of Homeland Security (DHS) spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin portrayed her as a “violent rioter" who had attempted to run over Ross with her car, which then-Secretary Kristi Noem claimed was an "act of domestic terrorism." But video evidence showed that her wheels were pointed away from the agent, indicating that she was attempting to leave.
Homeland Security adviser Stephen Miller similarly described Pretti, a 37-year-old intensive care nurse, another US citizen, as a "would-be assassin” while DHS said he showed up at a protest against ICE attempting to "massacre law enforcement" based on the fact that he was carrying a legal firearm when he was shot by two Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agents.
Videos showed that Pretti had intervened to stop agents from harming another protester and only held his phone during the confrontation, never reaching for his gun.
Sosa-Celis, a 24-year-old Venezuelan national, was called a "violent criminal alien" by DHS, which accused him and his two roommates of having attacked agent Christian Castro with snow shovels, leading Sosa-Celis to be shot in the leg through the door of the home.
Assault charges against him and his roommate were dropped by federal prosecutors after video and medical evidence showed that Castro had not been attacked. ICE Director Todd Lyons acknowledged that the agents had lied about the incident, and Castro has since been arrested after being charged by Moriarty's office as part of an independent investigation.
Neither Ross nor the two CBP agents who shot Pretti—Jesus Ochoa and Raymundo Gutierrez—have been charged.
Federal authorities have repeatedly rejected demands from Minnesota officials to cooperate with investigations into the three shootings and grant access to evidence and the ability to interview witnesses.
In the case of Pretti, agents blocked investigators with the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension from entering the shooting scene after the BCA had obtained a search warrant and removed physical evidence before Minnesota investigators could document it. This included Pretti's gun, cellphone, and body camera footage, and other physical and digital evidence.
In March, Minnesota sued the Trump administration over its refusal to cooperate with the investigations, a lawsuit that was still ongoing as of Monday.
The federal government did not explain its sudden change of direction. The Associated Press described it as part of an agreement in which Minnesota agreed to share evidence it had collected in Castro's case if the federal government shared evidence it was withholding about the shootings of Good and Pretti.
Moriarty thanked the federal officials for "their willingness to consider changing course to share evidence and promote public trust."
But Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison emphasized that it "should never have taken this long."
"I remain deeply troubled that the federal government spent more than half a year attempting to conceal this evidence from state investigators," he said in a statement. "And I hope this is the beginning of a major course correction on the part of the federal government."
US Sen. Tina Smith (D-Minn.) agreed that "this took way too long" and said, "It's not enough."
"Minnesotans' trust has been fundamentally broken," she said. "There's a long way to go before we get true justice for ICE killing two of our neighbors."
The federal government's decision to turn over evidence to Minnesota officials came less than a week after an ICE agent shot and killed Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, a 52-year-old Mexican father in Houston, whom DHS claimed had attempted to attack officers with his car, only to once again be undermined by video and witness accounts.
DHS has acknowledged that it was not attempting to target Salgado for removal and had mistaken his van for someone else's.
Harris County District Attorney Sean Teare has said that, just like in Minnesota, the federal government was refusing to share evidence with local officials.
“The federal government has not invited us in,” Teare said. “The federal government is not collaborating with us with this investigation.”
On Monday, ICE agents killed another man in Maine, 26-year-old Colombian father Joan Sebastian Guerrero, who was reportedly shot several times after stopping his vehicle, according to video footage.
DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin has said Guerrero “weaponized” his vehicle and attempted to ram officers. One eyewitness told Reuters they saw a federal SUV ram Guerrero's car.
According to Sen. Angus King (I-Maine), Mullin said that Guerrero, who was authorized to work in the US and had a Social Security number, was not the target of the warrant agents were executing.
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United Auto Workers Leader Shawn Fain Vows to 'Fight Back Hard' Against Trump DOJ Probe
"This is what happens when you go against corporate America and their allies," said the United Auto Workers president.
Jul 13, 2026
United Auto Workers president Shawn Fain issued a fiery statement on Sunday vowing to "fight back hard" as President Donald Trump's Justice Department launched a probe into allegations that the union leader abused his authority to seek benefits for his fiancée and her sister.
Fain rejected the claims as "false" and accused UAW vice president Rich Boyer, who is vying for the union presidency, of "trying to weaponize these bogus allegations to steal the upcoming UAW election." Fain also hit out at court-appointed federal monitor Neil Barofsky, whom the union president accused of harboring "a political grudge against me because the UAW took an anti-war stance about what was happening in Gaza."
"Rich Boyer has fed the monitor false allegations about me," said Fain. "We're going to fight back hard."
In 2023, Fain emerged as one of the most prominent union leaders in the nation during the UAW's weeks-long "Stand Up Strike" against the Big Three automakers, which yielded historic contracts for UAW members. On Sunday, Fain suggested that the union's successes under his leadership are fueling his opponents' attacks.
"This is what happens when you go against corporate America and their allies," said Fain, "and I'm not going to be intimidated or harassed out of serving our membership."
Bloomberg reported Sunday that the US Justice Department has launched a grand jury probe into allegations that Fain "sought a financial bonus for his fiancée and pushed for a worker’s compensation claim for her sister."
"He allegedly retaliated against Boyer for refusing to approve the benefits by stripping the official of his duties as chief negotiator with Stellantis NV, the maker of Jeep and Ram vehicles," Bloomberg noted. "The allegations became public last month in a report by the court-appointed monitor."
Fain on Sunday denied retaliating against Boyer. "The truth when it comes to Boyer," Fain said, "is that I didn't want him running the Stellantis Department because he wasn't doing a good job for our members."
The UAW president went on to accuse Boyer of trying to "hire family members into UAW positions" and failing to enforce the union's contract with Stellantis.
"Boyer is bad for our union and I'm not going to let him use the monitor's bogus investigation so he can try to fail upwards into a bigger title," said Fain. "Our election is in six weeks. Neil Barofsky will not run our union, no matter how hard he tries. And no company sellout like Boyer is going to dictate our elections."
Barofsky was appointed as UAW monitor in 2021—around two years before Fain was sworn in as union president—as part of a consent decree with the Justice Department in the wake of a corruption investigation.
Relations between Fain and Barofsky have reportedly been strained since late 2023, when the UAW became the largest union in the US to call for a ceasefire in Gaza as the Palestinian enclave faced a massive Israeli assault.
Shortly after the UAW's demand, according to The Detroit News, Barofsky "called Fain for a personal conversation related to the ceasefire statement and other issues around the war—a call Fain would later indicate made him uncomfortable, and that a union lawyer told Barofsky was out of line."
In February 2024, weeks after the UAW's ceasefire call, Fain and Barofsky had an "expletive-laden discussion" that Fain says "led to the monitor launching an investigation into him," The Detroit News reported last week. Fain reportedly said at one point during the February phone meeting that Barofsky accused the union leader of being antisemitic, which Fain furiously denied.
"For anybody to ever f------ say I'm antisemitic, brother, I'll fight your ass in front of this building in a heartbeat," Fain said, according to The Detroit News. "I do not f------ like that, and I don't appreciate it."
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'Should Shock the Conscience': Trump Admin Escalates War on Press With Subpoena of New York Times Reporters
"This brazen act should be seen as nothing more than an attempt to prevent the public from knowing what is happening in their country by intimidating journalists from doing their jobs."
Jul 11, 2026
The Trump administration on Friday escalated its war with the press by subpoenaing several reporters at The New York Times days after the paper published a story on Wednesday that detailed security concerns about the luxury jet the Qatari government gave to President Donald Trump.
According to the Times, the subpoenas are attempting to force reporters to testify before a federal grand jury in Manhattan on Wednesday next week, a move that the paper describes as an "extraordinary escalation in President Trump’s efforts to threaten and intimidate independent news organizations."
The issued subpoenas do not specifically name the Times' reporting on the Qatari jet as the reason for the grand jury probe, although they were given to all four journalists—Tyler Pager, Julian Barnes, Eric Schmitt, and Eric Lipton—who reported the story.
Additionally, the Times noted, a senior official at the FBI had asked the paper to hold off publishing its story on the jet before it came out on Wednesday, citing unspecified national security concerns about its content.
David McCraw, the top attorney representing the Times' newsroom, denounced the subpoenas as an attack on the freedom of the press.
"The appearance of federal law enforcement agents on the doorstep of news reporters should shock the conscience of any American who believes in the Constitution and the press freedom it protects," said McGraw. “This brazen act should be seen as nothing more than an attempt to prevent the public from knowing what is happening in their country by intimidating journalists from doing their jobs."
It is highly uncommon for government investigators to subpoena journalists when they are probing national security leaks, as such actions are generally seen as having a chilling effect on reporters’ ability to gather information.
Rick Stengel, former under secretary of state for President Barack Obama, said that the Times' reporting on the Qatari jet, whose security upgrades are being financed with US tax dollars, is completely within the scope of constitutional protections for press freedom.
"The reporting that the Times journalists have been subpoenaed for is exactly the kind of journalism the First Amendment is designed to protect: matters involving national security and taxpayer dollars," wrote Stengel in a Saturday social media post. "Reporting that embarrasses a president is protected speech."
Fox News chief national security correspondent Jennifer Griffin also denounced the Trump administration for trying to drag reporters into a grand jury investigation.
"This action by the US government to subpoena reporters for reporting legitimate news on security concerns about Air Force One should alarm every American," Griffin wrote.
Seth Stern, chief of advocacy for the Freedom of the Press Foundation, accused the Trump administration of abusing government power not to defend national security, but to protect the president from personal humiliation.
"We've long said that when the government claims it needs to investigate journalists to protect national security, it really means its own reputational security," said Stern. "This is as clear an example as you can get. The administration's embarrassment that it reportedly charged taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars to retrofit a flying bribe that still isn't secure enough for hostile times does not supersede the need for a free and independent press."
This is the second time in recent weeks that the Trump administration has tried to subpoena reporters to compel their testimony in grand jury investigations.
In June, the US Department of Justice issued subpoenas for national security reporters at The Washington Post and The Wall Street Journal related to national security leaks.
Subpoenas against both news organizations were withdrawn after they issued legal challenges in sealed filings.
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'Absolutely Unprecedented': Trump Lackeys Crushing Efforts to Rein in Price-Hiking Corporate Mergers
“Consumers are getting really screwed by all of this,” said one critic.
Jul 09, 2026
Political appointees installed by President Donald Trump are overruling career attorneys inside the Department of Justice's Antitrust Division, intervening to weaken or halt investigations into major corporate mergers in a way never seen before, MS NOW reported Thursday.
Three unnamed sources told the outlet "that DOJ staff have privately complained that the Trump administration is essentially deciding not to enforce antitrust laws that are critical to keeping companies from becoming single-source providers and being able to charge enormous sums for their product or service."
According to MS NOW:
The two mergers that DOJ leaders are ramming through include two low-cost Mexican air carriers, Viva Aerobus and Volaris, who announced their plans to merge last year, and the proposed merger of the Italian firm Saipem and UK firm Subsea7, who together control a sizable portion of sales for equipment used for subsea oil operations. Major oil companies, including ExxonMobil, Petrobras and TotalEnergies, have filed formal objections with federal regulators about the latter merger, arguing to antitrust regulators that the combined firms will create a subsea monopoly that will increase costs, delay critical projects and force clients into expensive, long-term contracts.
Experts say the aforementioned mergers are likely to drive up prices US consumers pay for airfare to Mexico and at the gas pump, yet again giving the lie to Trump's "America First" pledge.
Current and former DOJ officials described Trump's interference as without precedent.
“It’s unilateral surrender on antitrust enforcement; it’s absolutely unprecedented,” Bill Baer, the former assistant attorney general for the antitrust division during the Obama administration. “It’s definitely going to hurt consumers. It means prices will go up, concentration is going to increase—and quality often diminishes when you have only a few firms operating in the same market.”
The DOJ Antitrust Division was originally launched more than a century ago during the tail-end of the Progressive Era to combat monopolies and enforce antitrust legislation like the Clayton Antitrust Act and the Gilded Age-era Sherman Act. It was formally created during the Great Depression following weak enforcement of the Sherman and Clayton acts, as the Franklin D. Roosevelt administration viewed concentrated corporate power as a threat not only to consumers but to democracy itself.
While the postwar decades saw relatively aggressive antitrust enforcement by presidents of both major parties, the Reagan administration adopted a much more permissive merger philosophy that laid the groundwork for decades of consolidation across industries that has continued to this day, despite limited antitrust revivals during the Obama and Biden administrations.
Biden-era Federal Trade Commission Chair Lina Khan and DOJ officials pursued a more aggressive antitrust agenda that Trump has been rolling back in favor of deregulation. Critics have pointed out that Trump has sometimes used antitrust mechanisms selectively, targeting certain media or technology companies for political reasons rather than consistently applying a broad anti-monopoly approach.
According to an article published last month in The Wall Street Journal, Stanley Woodward, the senior DOJ official now overseeing antitrust enforcement, has told department lawyers that he favors resolving cases through settlements rather than taking corporations to trial. Some antitrust attorneys interpreted the remarks as a directive to avoid litigation and seek settlements in ongoing and future cases. Critics say Woodward’s posture could weaken the DOJ's ability to challenge monopolistic mergers in favor of fast-tracked settlements.
"He's taking litigation off the table, and you don’t get a settlement absent a litigation threat,” one person with knowledge of Woodward's actions told MS NOW. “I can’t think of an administration in history that would want to run antitrust policy like this.”
“Consumers are getting really screwed by all of this,” the person continued. “We’re talking 10 years of consumer harm that can’t be undone.”
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'Free Davey!': Olympian Pleads Not Guilty to Charges That He Vandalized Reflecting Pool
A lawyer for former Olympian Davey Hearn said the indictment "reflects the administration's effort to scapegoat Davey and to shift blame for their own failures."
Jul 09, 2026
As supporters gathered outside the courthouse in support, former Olympic canoe racer David "Davey" Hearn pleaded not guilty on Thursday after being charged by the Trump administration with vandalizing the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool.
Last week, Jeanine Pirro, the US Attorney for the District of Columbia, secured a criminal indictment for property destruction against the 67-year-old Hearn for allegedly “forcefully and violently pulling up and removing the bottom liner” of the pool in June.
Hearn, who could face up to 10 years in prison if convicted, has said he was not vandalizing the pool and was simply pulling up a piece of the lining that had already begun to peel off.
"Today, Davey Hearn pled not guilty—because he is not guilty," said his attorney, Norm Eisen. "If Mr. Hearn can be charged with a felony for touching the Reflecting Pool, every American is at risk, and every American should be alarmed about this prosecution."
As he attempted to renovate the Reflecting Pool in the lead-up to the nation's 250th anniversary on July 4, President Donald Trump alleged that the scourge of algae blooms and peeling lining that have plagued the pool were caused by vandals, though he has provided little evidence.
The White House has claimed that at least seven people have been arrested for vandalism, though it provided no public information about other cases.
The company that installed the blue coating had previously worked at a Trump golf club, and the company that installed the water-cleaning system was owned by an investment firm led by a reported top Trump donor. Both received no-bid contracts awarded by the Department of the Interior.
Eisen said that the attempt to prosecute Hearn "reflects the administration's effort to scapegoat Davey and to shift blame for their own failures."
Hearn previously told The Associated Press that he was detained by National Guard troops and US Park Police for five hours after he reached into the pool to examine the newly peeled lining and briefly touched a piece of it. The canoeist said he let go of the lining as soon as he was told to do so by a park employee.
"It is not a crime to touch the Reflecting Pool," Eisen said.
Ryan Goodman, the co-editor-in-chief of Just Security, has said Hearn's indictment fits a "pattern of abuse of power" by Pirro, who was plucked from her previous job as a pro-Trump Fox News host to become DC's top prosecutor last year.
Goodman noted that, in a similar fashion to Pirro's use of the law against Trump's enemies, like the investigation into former Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell and the attempt to prosecute members of Congress who encouraged the military not to obey unlawful orders, the indictment against Hearn came immediately after Trump posted on Truth Social that he should spend "years in jail."
"Here we have it again," he said. "It's in lock-step with the president on this particular instance in which it seemed like authorities thought this was just a misdemeanor in the first instance. It smells really bad."
As Hearn was arraigned Thursday morning, dozens of supporters, including former Olympians, gathered outside the DC Superior Court at a "Free Davey!" rally to show solidarity.
Adam Van Grack, who chaired the Olympic national governing body for canoe and kayak sports and was coached by Hearn, described his former mentor as "someone who has spent decades giving back to athletes, to our community, and to our nation."
Van Grack noted Hearn's decades of volunteer work to maintain property owned by the US National Park Service that canoeists used for training.
“This is a person who has devoted his life to representing the United States on an international stage, caring for the community and protecting and caring for National Park Service property,” Van Grack said. “So the idea that he is a malicious destroyer of federal property shocks the conscience and makes no sense to anybody who’s ever known Davey Hearn.”
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