US Senator Jeff Merkley from the state of Oregon is on the Senate floor right now in a marathon speaking moment or 'moment' -- it's been hours and he's still going.
Why? Because we love this country and we love democracy and we can't be silent as Chump attacks it day after day. We cannot let chump destroy what we have.
NO KINGS. Oregon said it on Saturday and probably helped move Merkley to take this move. I praise him for it. I hope you'll take a moment to stream him because what he's doing is so important.
Again, those of us who love this country are not the ones trying to destroy it.
Thank you, Senator Jeff Merkley for addressing what Chump's doing to destroy everything we value.
Tuesday, October 21, 2025. Chump and his never ending lies.
Last night, at the top of her MSNBC show, Rachel Maddow reported on Saturday's NO KINGS protests.
Now let's move over to the Epstein-Maxwell
scandal since it's been a couple of days since we covered it. Both
Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell were friends of Donald Chump.
Back then, the two were active pedophiles and sex traffickers. Just
Donald's type of people, right? Epstein and Maxwell were both convicted
of their crimes at separate times. Epstein is said to have killed
himself in prison. Maxwell went on the run but was eventually caught,
tried and sentenced to 20 years. Amanda Marcotte (SALON) notes how Speaker of the Closet Mike Johnson continues to run interference for Chump (at the expense of the country):
Speaker
of the House Mike Johnson is lying. Yes, I know. Writing that is like
writing “cats are furry” or “it’s pumpkin spice season.” But the current
purpose of the lie is even more depraved than we usually get from this self-proclaimed beacon of Christian morality.
The purpose is silencing the victims of infamous child sex predator
Jeffrey Epstein and his alleged fellow abusers. Worse, it’s all done to
protect President Donald Trump, a man who was already found by a civil
jury in New York to have sexually abused journalist E. Jean Carroll in a
department store dressing room.
The
Louisiana Republican has already gone to great lengths to make sure FBI
files chronicling the alleged misdeeds of Epstein and his associates
never see the light of day. In July, Johnson started the House’s summer recess early to avoid Democrats bringing up a bill
that would force the Justice Department to release the voluminous files
on convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, who died by suicide in jail
in 2019 while awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges. The reason for
Johnson’s action wasn’t mysterious. Trump, whom Epstein called his
“closest friend,” is reportedly in the files. According to a lewd
birthday message attributed to Trump by the Wall Street Journal — that
was leaked by House Democrats — Trump wrote to his longtime buddy, “We
have certain things in common, Jeffrey.”
Now
Johnson has found another excuse to block a House vote to release the
Epstein files: The government shutdown. The speaker has adjourned the
House and refused to seat Rep.-Elect Adelita Grijalva, D-Ariz.,
blaming the shutdown — despite the fact that the Senate is still open
and holding votes. Grijalva has pledged to be the deciding vote on a
discharge petition to release the Epstein files. In comments to the Arizona Republic, Sen. Ruben Gallego, D-Ariz., was blunt in assessing the situation: “Speaker Johnson is protecting pedophiles. That’s what this is all about.”
Johnson
has denied the charge, but his pattern of behavior is clear. He knows
that if Trump turns against him, he would likely lose the speakership.
Hiding the Epstein files appears to be Johnson’s first priority, even
above reopening the government so federal employees can be paid.
The
whole country knows that Johnson is covering for Chump. He's never
been interested in serving the people of his state, let alone the people
of the country. Katie Francis (DAILY BEAST) notes:
The
House Speaker was grilled on This Week Sunday about why Arizona
Rep.-elect Adelita Grijalva has waited weeks to be sworn in—with some
suggesting the delay is because the Democrat plans to force a vote on
the Epstein files.
After first
saying that Chuck Schumer and the government shutdown were responsible
for the slowness, the House Speaker then blamed Nancy Pelosi.
“This is the way the institution works. I’m following the Pelosi precedent, by the way,” he said.
“When
my dear friend from Louisiana, Julia Letlow, was elected to fill the
seat of her deceased husband because of Covid, Nancy Pelosi took 25 days
to swear her in.”
“Are you saying that Nancy
Pelosi refused to swear her in earlier?” host Jonathan Karl asked, as
Johnson insisted that the long wait was normal.
The
ABC host added: “Because my understanding is that was the date that
actually the representative-elect, Letlow at the time, requested—”
Johnson tried to divert the conversation to “some more examples” of delayed ceremonies, but Karl remained focused on logistics.
After
Johnson doubled down on his claim that the so-called “Pelosi precedent”
justified the delay, Karl pressed him on what some might see as a
Republican double standard.
“And what about the Johnson precedent?” he asked. “You swore in two Republicans the day after their election—”
Johnson
didn’t address GOP Reps. Randy Fine and Jimmy Patronis, who were both
sworn in while the House was out of session in April. Instead, he
deflected back to Pelosi, citing his own examples.
“Pat
Ryan, Joe Sempolinski. They were elected during an August recess, so 21
days later when the house returned to legislative session, they were
administered the oath. That’s what we’re doing,” he said, adding that
Grijalva would be sworn in “as the Democrats decide to turn the lights
back on.”
MSNBC last night. found Jonathan Capehart sitting in for Lawrence O'Donnell on THE LAST WORD.
Though Chump has dismissed
those people preyed upon by Epstein and Maxwell (there's at least one man who is known to have been
targeted but there are said to be at least 19 more) as a "hoax," they
are not a hoax. They are real. In Virginia Giuffre's case, she was
real. And though she has passed away, her book is released in the US
today. Becca Longmire (PEOPLE) notes:
Virginia
Giuffre said she believed she might "die a sex slave" as she opened up
about her alleged sexual encounters with Jeffrey Epstein and his circle
in her forthcoming posthumous memoir.
In
an excerpt published by the BBC from her forthcoming memoir Nobody’s
Girl: A Memoir of Surviving Abuse and Fighting for Justice, Giuffre —
who died by suicide on April 25 of this year at age 41 — spoke in detail
about having sex with Epstein and his alleged sex trafficking.
Giuffre
wrote that the girls were required to look "childlike," alleging that
her childhood eating disorder was "only encouraged" under Epstein's
roof, per the BBC.
"In my years with them, they
lent me out to scores of wealthy, powerful people," she said, adding,
"I was habitually used and humiliated - and in some instances, choked,
beaten and bloodied."
"I believed that I might die a sex slave," Giuffre wrote.
Giuffre,
before her tragic suicide in April, had been trying to speak out for
years about the horrors she’d experienced at the hands of the late
paedophile and financier Jeffrey Epstein, who “sold” her to powerful men
when she was just a teenager. We witnessed her long, difficult fight
for justice against the establishment – including the settling in 2022
of a sexual assault lawsuit against Prince Andrew, whom she said had had
sex with her when she was just 17 (and on two other occasions), though
he has always vehemently denied having done anything wrong.
We
saw her fight for other women, too – for fellow survivors of sex
trafficking. And we watched her get torn down, every single time. We
heard the men who spoke about her with such contempt deny ever having
met her, before dismissing her testimony out of hand; we read the
painful details shared by her family, as they described how she’d faced
financial ruin and received death threats for working with the
authorities against Epstein and his accomplice, Ghislaine Maxwell, who
hired her as a masseuse when she was only 16. Giuffre later alleged in a
lawsuit that she was first abused by Epstein and Maxwell together
before being “lent out to other powerful men”, including Prince Andrew.
To
get her to comply and never reveal these horrors, all Epstein had to do
was let her know he knew where her little brother went to school. (And
he showed her a photo proving it.)
I find this
claim believable because someone I know recounted a story from one of
his attorneys in a business-related lawsuit against Epstein. He
described how during a phone conversation, Epstein mentioned having seen
the attorney’s children crossing the street, and warned him to be extra
careful so nothing would happen to them.
Back
to Giuffre’’s claims: Epstein also bragged that he “owned the Palm Beach
police department.” (Manipulating Giuffre was easy: At the age of
seven, she had already been molested by a family friend.) Giuffre sued
Maxwell and Epstein and became an advocate for other survivors. She
committed suicide in April, at the age of 41.
Nobody’s
Girl: A Memoir of Surviving Abuse and Fighting for Justice seems to be
mentioned all over the place — The New York Times, The Washington Post,
Vanity Fair, PBS, CBS, etc. — and it has got to be one of Donald Trump’s
worst nightmares, assuming he can even fall asleep.
From
the grave, Giuffre powerfully challenges the idea that all those famous
people hanging out with Epstein had no inkling what he was up to:
Don’t
be fooled by those in Epstein’s circle who say they didn’t know what he
was doing. Epstein not only didn’t hide what was happening, he took a
certain glee in making people watch. And people did watch — scientists,
fundraisers from the Ivy League and other heralded institutions, titans
of industry. They watched and they didn’t care.
Epstein
and Maxwell are human trash (Epstein was, of course, thankfully dead
now) and so are those around him including Chump, including Alex Acosta
who created the original sweethear deal in 2007 along with human trash
Matthew Menchel. TAMPA BAY TIMES reports:
Jeffrey
Epstein had multiple appointments, phone calls and dinners with Matthew
Menchel — the Miami U.S. Attorney’s office chief criminal prosecutor
who spearheaded Epstein’s sweetheart deal in 2007, newly released
documents show.
A tranche of over 8,500 pages
of records from Epstein’s estate — released by the House Oversight
Committee Friday — show that Epstein’s calendars and emails reflect that
Menchel, who left the DOJ in 2007, had multiple meetings or dinners
with Epstein in 2011, 2013 and 2017. Lawmakers also referred to a
photograph of Menchel on a ski trip with Epstein sometime in the 2000s,
but didn’t produce the photo.
Seems like Matthew Menchel needs to lose his license. Disagree? Here's another detail from the report:
In
its coverage of the case, the Herald raised questions about Menchel’s
role in negotiating the deal. Besides Acosta and Menchel, the case was
overseen by prosecutors Jeffrey Sloman, Andrew Lourie and Ann Marie
Villafaña.
The
Herald found that Villafaña, the lead line prosecutor, drafted an
82-page prosecution memo directed to Acosta, his deputy, Sloman, and
Menchel, who was then head of the criminal division. In the memo, she
proposed a 60-count indictment of Epstein on sex trafficking charges.
A
subsequent probe by the Justice Department’s Office of Professional
Responsibility (OPR) later found that its child exploitation division in
Washington reviewed Villafana’s materials, offered to work with her and
called the memo “exhaustive” and “well done.”
Acosta
would later tell federal investigators he could not recall ever reading
her memo, and that he relied on Menchel and others to know the details
of the case. Acosta testified that he never met Epstein or his
accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell, who is now serving a 20-year sentence for
child sex trafficking and abuse. In his comments before the committee,
Acosta also reiterated that he trusted Menchel, who proposed the plea
deal with Epstein’s lawyers.
An OPR report issued in 2020
describes how Villafaña became angry in July 2007, when Menchel
explained to her in an email that he had offered the deal to Epstein
lawyer Lilly Sanchez, the only woman involved in Epstein’s defense.
Villafaña felt it was an end-run around her, the report said.
The
report also noted that Menchel had dated Sanchez, should have informed
his bosses about it and probably should have been recused from the case.
Acosta
was asked about Menchel at least 17 times during his testimony before
the House Oversight Committee. He indicated that he had not been aware
that Menchel had a prior romantic relationship with one of Epstein’s
lawyers and that Menchel should have told him so that they could have
discussed whether there was a conflict of interest.
They cover up for their own. Just like Mike Johnson and Donald Chump are doing today.
Let's move on to another topic. We know Chump lies, the entire administration is, in fact, incapable of telling the truth. Idrees Ali and Phil Stewart (REUTERS) write,
"The U.S. last month started a campaign of attacks in the Caribbean
that the Trump administration has described as 'a non-international
armed conflict' against narco-terrorism. Yet legal experts aren't
surprised that the U.S. government opted against using the term
'prisoners of war' to describe the two survivors of a Thursday attack by
the U.S. military on a semi-submersible vessel. Rather than holding
them, the United States sent them back to their home countries, U.S.
President Donald Trump said Saturday. The move, which was first reported
by Reuters, suggests that for now U.S. officials don't want to grapple
with legal issues surrounding military detention for any alleged drug
traffickers captured during the Caribbean operations, legal experts
said."
Two
family members of the 11 men killed in September in the first attack
acknowledged by Trump did not deny that the men aboard had been taking
marijuana and cocaine from Venezuela to Trinidad. But they said Trump’s
allegation in his announcement was inaccurate that they’d worked for the
Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua.
The
Trump administration’s justification for blowing up suspected drug
traffickers off the Venezuelan coast has been clear and consistent:
These people aren’t just criminals; they’re “narco-terrorists” smuggling
a “deadly weapon poisoning Americans” at the behest of terrorist
organizations.
“We take them out,” Trump
told the nation’s three- and four-star generals and admirals last month.
“Every boat kills 25,000 on average — some people say more. You see
these boats, they’re stacked up with bags of white powder that’s mostly
fentanyl and other drugs, too.”
Claiming the
power to summarily kill traffickers as though they’re enemy troops,
Trump has authorized the U.S. military to strike at least six speedboats
the administration has deemed suspicious, killing dozens of people
since the beginning of September. At least half of the strikes and 21 of
the killings, locals say, have transpired in the waters between
Venezuela and Trinidad and Tobago — nations so close that on clear days
they’re within eyesight of each other.
But
records and interviews with 20 people familiar with the route or the
strikes, including current and former U.S. and international officials,
contradict the administration’s claims. The passage, they said, is not
ordinarily used to traffic synthetic opioids such as fentanyl, present
in 69 percent of drug overdose deaths last year. Nor are the drugs
typically headed for the United States.
Lies is all Chump ever serves up. Back to the article:
“I
knew them all,” said one of the family members, who spoke on the
condition of anonymity for fear of retribution. “None of them had
anything to do with Tren de Aragua. They were fishermen who were looking
for a better life” by smuggling contraband.
On
Tuesday, Trump said, a new strike had killed “six male
narco-terrorists” off the Venezuelan coast. That afternoon, one mother
in the Trinidadian community of Las Cuevas received a call from her
brother, a fisherman. Her son Chad Joseph, the second of her six
children, had been killed in the explosion.
Speaking
by phone Thursday morning, Leonore Burnley was furious. Her son had
been deprived a trial. And she’d been deprived of any chance of closure.
“You can’t get the body to bury it,” she said.
Joseph
had spent the last three months in Venezuela working odd jobs, Burnley
said. He had written her recently to say he would be returning home.
She called Trump’s claim he had been involved in trafficking drugs a lie.
Sen.
Rand Paul on Sunday questioned the wisdom and legality of President
Donald Trump's policies toward Venezuela and suspected drug dealers
coming from its coast.
Speaking on NBC's "Meet
the Press," the Kentucky Republican again raised concerns about the
legality of the Trump administration's strikes on boats that it claims
are carrying drug traffickers, as well as the president's statement that
the United States might conduct direct attacks on Venezuela's
territory.
"When
you kill someone, you should know, if you're not at war, not in a
declared war, you really need to know someone's name at least," Paul
said. "You have to accuse them of something. You have to present
evidence. So all of these people have been blown up without us knowing
their name, without any evidence of a crime."
He
said that given the distance these boats are from the United States,
it's more likely that if there are indeed drug smugglers, they are
bringing them to nearby islands such as Trinidad and Tobago, instead of
the U.S.
Paul added: "For decades, if not
centuries, when you stop people at sea in international waters or in
your own waters, you announce that you're going to board the ship and
you're looking for contraband, smuggling, or drugs. This happens every
day off of Miami. But we know from Coast Guard statistics that about 25
percent of the time the Coast Guard boards a ship there are no drugs. So
if our policy now is to blow up every ship we suspect or accuse of drug
running, that would be a bizarre world in which 25 percent of the
people might be innocent."
Last week, Senator Adam Schiff's office issued the following:
Washington, D.C. — U.S. Senator Adam Schiff
(D-Calif.) joined Senators Tim Kaine (D-Va.), and Rand Paul (R-Ky.) to
introduce a War Powers Resolution that would block the use of U.S. Armed
Forces to engage in hostilities within or against Venezuela, following
reporting that the Trump administration is considering land strikes inside that country.
“The Trump administration has made it clear they may launch military
action inside Venezuela’s borders, and won’t stop at boat strikes in the
Caribbean,”said Senator Schiff. “In recent weeks we
have seen increasingly concerning movements and reporting that undermine
claims that this is merely about stopping drug smugglers. Congress has
not authorized military force against Venezuela. And we must assert our
authority to stop the United States from being dragged—intentionally or
accidentally—into full-fledged war in South America.”
“I’m extremely troubled that the Trump administration is considering
launching illegal military strikes inside Venezuela without a specific
authorization by Congress. Americans don’t want to send their sons and
daughters into more wars—especially wars that carry a serious risk of
significant destabilization and massive new waves of migration in our
hemisphere,” said Senator Kaine. “If my colleagues
disagree and think a war with Venezuela is a good idea, they need to
meet their constitutional obligations by making their case to the
American people and passing an Authorization for Use of Military Force. I
urge every senator to join us in stopping this administration from
dragging our country into an unauthorized and escalating military
conflict.”
“The American people do not want to be dragged into endless war with
Venezuela without public debate or a vote. We ought to defend what the
Constitution demands: deliberation before war,” said Senator Paul.
War Powers Resolutions are privileged, meaning that the Senate will
be required to promptly consider and vote upon the resolution.
Today’s resolution comes shortly after Schiff and Kaine introduced a
similar measure focused on repeated and ongoing strikes in the southern
Caribbean Sea that the Trump administration has carried out without
congressional authorization, killing dozens of unknown individuals. That
measure gained bipartisan support but fell two votes short of passage.
Chump's
lying. He's so desperate to lie as Ben (MEIDASTOUCH NEWS) notes in the
video above, he's pimping photos of another drug bust from over a year
ago as photos of a ship attacked in the last weeks. He's a liar.
I hope you read Mike's "Gay Face Mike Johnson and Idiot of the Week" about his brother (my brother-in-law) who noticed Mike Johnson has gay face. He is nothing but Renfro to Chump's monster.
New York City mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani honored trailblazing
Hispanic transgender activist Sylvia Rivera in a new campaign ad in
which he pledged to “deploy hundreds of lawyers” to fight Donald Trump’s
anti-trans attacks and make New York City a sanctuary city for trans
people.
“It was here on the physical margins of our city that they found a
home,” Mamdani said of Rivera in the ad. “She arrived here at the age of
11, where she immediately landed in the center of the gay rights
movement. She befriended the legendary Marsha P Johnson, protested at
Stonewall, and led marches for equality. But even among the queer
community, trans New Yorkers were excluded. Rivera and others were
discouraged from walking in Pride, their participation erased from
Stonewall history.”
Mamdani noted that the “cruelty” Rivera faced caused her to develop a
substance abuse problem and face homelessness, stating, “When she had
nowhere left to turn, she would sleep here [upon the Christopher Street
Piers], waves lapping nearby.”
Indeed, Rivera’s one-room dwelling on the pier had a floor mattress, a
dresser, and a small side table with a candle burning “for the saints,”
LGBTQ Nationreported last year.
With no heat, electricity, or running water, her dwelling’s walls were
made of tarps and linens roped onto concrete slabs, pallets,
bookshelves, and discarded doors. Outside was an open-air living room
with covered couches and a weather-worn wicker coffee table. In nearby
cabinets, Rivera stored jugs filled with fire hydrant water for “whore
baths.”
“Yet no matter what hardships she faced, Sylvia Rivera advocated for others,” Mamdani said.
He noted that Rivera co-founded Street Transvestite Action
Revolutionaries (STAR), an organization that helped feed and house trans
youth. Rivera continued advocating for these same communities and
pushing for trans inclusion in city and statewide non-discrimination
bills up to her final days. Mamdani’s ad also included footage from Rivera’s iconic 1973 Gay Pride Rally speech in which she scolded transphobic gays and lesbians while passionately speaking out for trans-allyship.
Near the end of his two-minute video honoring Rivera’s activism,
Mamdani said, “Since taking office, Donald Trump has waged a
scorched-earth campaign against trans people. The man with the most
power has expended enormous energy targeting those with the least.”
Lifting up? I will always get behind that. If I lived in NYC, I'd vote for him for his comments above alone.
Monday, October 20, 2025. Trump's war on immigrants is illegal and
hidden but Americans across the country rebuked Chump's attacks on
democracy in Saturday protests that the whole world saw.
The
Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties, created by Congress and
led largely by lawyers, investigated allegations of rape and unlawful
searches from both the public and within DHS ranks, for instance.
Egregious conduct was referred to the Justice Department.
The
CRCL office had limited powers; former staffers say their job was to
protect DHS by ensuring personnel followed the law and addressed civil
rights concerns. Still, it was effective in stalling rushed deportations
or ensuring detainees had access to phones and lawyers. And even when
its investigations didn’t fix problems, CRCL provided an accounting of
allegations and a measure of transparency for Congress and the public.
The
office processed thousands of complaints — 3,000 in fiscal year 2023
alone — ranging from allegations of lack of access to medical treatment
to reports of sexual assault at detention centers. Former staffers said
around 600 complaints were open when work was suspended.
The
administration has gutted most of the office. What’s left of it was
led, at least for a while, by a 29-year-old White House appointee who
helped craft Project 2025, the right-wing blueprint that broadly calls
for the curtailment of civil rights enforcement.
Meanwhile,
ICE is enjoying a windfall in resources. On top of its annual operating
budget of $10 billion a year, the so-called One Big Beautiful Bill
included an added $7.5 billion a year for the next four years for
recruiting and retention alone. As part of its hiring blitz, the agency
has dropped age, training and education standards and has offered
recruits signing bonuses as high as $50,000.
“Supercharging
this law enforcement agency and at the same time you have oversight
being eliminated?” said the former DHS official. “This is very scary.”
Michelle
Brané, a longtime human rights attorney who directed DHS’ ombudsman
office during the Biden administration, said Trump’s adherence to “the
authoritarian playbook is not even subtle.”
“ICE,
their secret police, is their tool,” Brané said. “Once they have that
power, which they have now, there’s nothing stopping them from using it
against citizens.”
Some of the most decorated military veterans in Congress say they are outraged after a report in the Guardian revealed US military veterans have been arrested or injured amid protests over Donald Trump’s deportation campaign and his push to deploy the national guard to American cities.
“I
went to war three times for this country to defend the right of
Americans to say things I may not like,” said Representative Jason Crow,
a Democrat from Colorado and former army ranger who was awarded the
Bronze Star for his service in Iraq as a platoon leader with the 82nd
airborne division. “Now is the time for every American to speak out.”
Senator Tammy Duckworth, a Democrat from Illinois
who received a Purple Heart after her helicopter was shot down over
Iraq, said: “No one – especially those who have already sacrificed so
much for this country – should ever be assaulted, detained or thrown in
solitary confinement for peacefully protesting government overreach”.
The Guardian has identified eight instances in
which military veterans have been prosecuted or sought damages after
being detained by federal agents. Two of those individuals were arrested
in late September protesting outside a Chicago-area Immigrations and
Customs Enforcement (Ice) facility.
One, 70-year-old air force veteran Dana Briggs, was charged with assault after a video
of an incident showed Ice agents advancing on the elderly veteran and
knocking him over. The other, Afghanistan war veteran John Cerrone, was
tackled by a group of Ice agents, another video shows. Cerrone was detained, held for nine hours in solitary confinement and charged with disorderly conduct.
[. . . ]
In Portland,
video shows an agent grabbing Afghanistan war veteran Daryn Herzberg by
the hair and slamming his face into the ground multiple times while
saying, “You’re not talking s**t any more are you?” according to a
Federal Tort Claims Act complaint filed by his attorney.
They operate in darkness and there is no oversight. All the American people get -- over and over -- is lies. In "Kristi Noem's perfected her lying strategy" last week, Elaine noted:
Kristi Noem is such a damn liar. C.I. was talking about
that last week in the roundtable. How she lies and then lies some more
and the press reports her original false claims and by the time they
implode, they're having to cover something else. Jordan Green reports:
A
dramatic claim by Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem to have
arrested “the girlfriend of one of the founders of antifa,” therefore
putting the Trump administration in position to “eliminate” the leftwing
“network,” was dismissed by both the activist the arrested woman was
said to have dated and a leading expert on such leftwing groups.
“I
want to make it absolutely clear that I am not now, nor have I ever
been, the ‘founder’ of ‘Antifa’ — in Portland [Oregon], the United
States, or anywhere else,” said Luis Enrique Marquez, the activist, in a
statement on a website promoting a book.
“It’s
an absurd claim, no matter how they try to frame it,” Stanislav
Vysotsky, an associate professor of criminology at the University of
Fraser Valley in British Columbia, told Raw Story.
Nonetheless,
Noem’s trumpeting of the arrest of Katherine Vogel, 39, showed the
administration’s determination to make headlines as it seeks to paint
“antifa” activists as a danger to the American public, and Portland as
the supposed base of such groups.
She's a glory hog with no accomplishments so she lies to get attention, it's really that simple.
A
liar -- Kristi Noem -- supervisors liars -- ICE agents -- and reports
to a liar supreme -- Donald Chump. What you've got is the political
equivalent of Kransekake -- the Norwegian almond ring cake -- only
instead of the dough circling itself, stacked on top of each layer, it's
lies that encircle and stack up. And what ight work in a dessert is a
disaster in open government.
As President Donald Trump’s consolidation of authoritarian power
escalates, he and his allies have been employing undisguised
state-sponsored propaganda to a degree unmatched by any president in
modern times. This much, one hopes, is broadly understood—even if a
startling number of Americans seem unperturbed by it. But here’s
something that’s less discussed: This sort of industrial-scale deception
would be far more difficult to pull off if Republicans hadn’t wholly
crippled Congress’s oversight function on Trump’s behalf.
All this is driven home by an interesting new letter
that Senator Chris Murphy sent Friday to Homeland Security Secretary
Kristi Noem about a horrifying incident that unfolded during Trump’s
occupation of Chicago. A federal agent shot a woman
multiple times after she allegedly menaced the agents with her car.
Marimar Martinez, who didn’t have life-threatening injuries, is a U.S.
citizen.
This incident has been subjected to a barrage of state-manufactured misinformation, and it turns out that MAGA influencer Laura Loomer
also was involved in that effort. In response, Murphy’s letter calls on
Noem to account for all these official deceptions, and to come clean on
whether government information was improperly leaked to Loomer to
assist in them.
In particular, just after the shooting, DHS put out a statement
claiming that the agents in question had been “boxed in by 10 cars” and
that Martinez’s vehicle “rammed” theirs. The statement also suggests
she threatened the agents with a “semi-automatic weapon.” All this
“forced” an agent to shoot Martinez, who then “drove herself to the
hospital.” DHS added that she’d previously doxed agents online. In
short, the shooting was wholly justified: The victim was the one doing
the terrorizing—of law enforcement.
Yet these claims are undermined by the criminal complaint against Martinez. It only mentions two cars menacing the agents, not 10. It doesn’t mention her gun, let alone her threatening of the agents with one. It says she was taken to the hospital by ambulance. And as the Chicago Sun-Timesreports,
Martinez’s lawyer says body-cam footage even contradicts the claim that
she directly threatened the officers with her vehicle and shows that
the agent said, “Do something, bitch,” before opening fire.
As
we've noted repeatedly, there is no oversight. They lie constantly and
they get away with it. That's why last week's news out of Chicago is
so important. Aaron Parnas (MEIDASTOUCH NEWS) explains:
Federal immigration officers in the Chicago area will now be required
to wear body cameras following recent confrontations with protesters.
The decision came Thursday from U.S. District Judge Sara Ellis, who said
she was “a little startled” after viewing television footage showing
agents using tear gas and other aggressive tactics.
Judge Ellis,
who lives in Chicago, expressed frustration about the ongoing clashes.
“I live in Chicago if folks haven’t noticed,” she said in court. “And
I’m not blind, right?” Her comments reflected deep concern about the
images she’s seen of federal agents’ behavior during enforcement actions
linked to President Donald Trump’s immigration policies.
Just last week, Ellis issued an order requiring agents to clearly
display their badges and prohibiting them from using certain
crowd-control measures—such as tear gas and rubber bullets—against
peaceful demonstrators and members of the press.
Despite that
ruling, Ellis said she’s been troubled by new reports and footage
suggesting her directives might not have been followed. “I’m getting
images and seeing images on the news, in the paper, reading reports
where I’m having concerns about my order being followed,” she said
during Thursday’s hearing.
Over the last five weeks in Chicago, federal agents have
shot at least two people, killing one (Silverio Villegas González,
a father of two who had just dropped one of his children off at school
when ICE agents shot him); descended on an apartment building with
a Black Hawk helicopter and used flash-bang grenades; tear-gassed
protesters and first responders; smoke-bombed a street full of people; reportedly
zip-tied children and separated them from their parents for several
hours in the middle of the night; shot protesters with rubber bullets;
handcuffed a city council member in a hospital; and fired a chemical
weapon at a TV reporter as she was driving away, burning her face.
In one of the more shocking moments in this mayhem, on September 19,
agents perched on the roof of an ICE detention center in the suburban
village of Broadview shot the Rev. David Black, lead pastor at the First
Presbyterian Church of Chicago, in the head and body with pepper-spray
projectiles known as pepper balls. Just moments earlier, Black, dressed
in his clerical garb, had both arms up in the air and was “praying, verbally, for the ICE officers and those detained inside,” as he later recalled to CNN.
Other protesters were shot with pepper balls during the
incident. They were chanting, singing and praying — peacefully, Black
stressed. “We could hear [the agents] laughing as they were shooting us from the roof,” he told CNN. “It was deeply disturbing.”
Or go with this from KNEWZ, "Presbyterian pastor from Chicago, Rev. David Black, was struck multiple
times by chemical pellets fired by federal immigration agents during
what witnesses describe as a peaceful protest outside an ICE detention
facility in Broadview, Illinois. Knewz.com
has learned that the incident, captured on video, has sparked
widespread condemnation and a lawsuit filed by the American Civil
Liberties Union of Illinois, which accuses ICE of using 'violent force'
against unarmed demonstrators engaged in prayer and civil
disobedience." Need another example? Rhian Lubin (INDEPENDENT) reports:
Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents pointed a gun at a family, including a mother holding her 3-month-old baby, as they burst into their Oregon home, footage of the incident showed.
The video recorded by Mari Magana and posted on Facebook showed the moment ICE agents kicked down the bedroom door in the family’s apartment in Gresham, approximately 17 miles outside of Portland, Wednesday evening. The video has been shared across social media.
The baby’s grandmother, Gloria Bautista, told The Independent that her daughter has been left shaken by the ordeal.
Fear
in the Windy City grew after the Trump administration ramped up
“Operation Midway Blitz.” The immigration crackdown, launched against
city officials’ wishes, has led to the arrest of more than 800
undocumented immigrants since Sept. 8, according to the Department of
Homeland Security.
“It is a departure from everything that young people have understood
from our America,” Stacy Davis Gates, president of the Chicago Teachers
Union, says about the escalating presence and actions of immigration
authorities in the city.
Aggressive tactics allegedly used by ICE agents include the use of
tear gas near an elementary school, raiding a South Side apartment in a
predominantly Black neighborhood, and detaining and zip-tying U.S.
citizens and children, including Black folks.
DHS has denied many of these claims and has not responded to Word In Black’s request for comment.
Friday, US House Rep Ro Khann's office issued the following:
Washington, D.C.–– Today, Rep. Ro Khanna (CA-17), introduced the ICE Oversight and Reform Resolution
to call on immigration enforcement operations to be transparent,
accountable, and consistent with constitutional protections for all
people in the United States.
Recent actions from ICE and U.S. Customs and Border Protection’s (CBP) federal agents, including conducting raids in unmarked vehicles,
, and more, have raised serious questions about the protections of due process and civil liberties.
“These
tactics are about avoiding accountability and transparency. We need
standards of conduct for ICE agents and to ensure agents cannot trample
on civil and human rights. I’m proud to put forth this common sense
defense of American values that we should all support,” said Rep. Ro Khanna.
“We
have had enough of ICE abusing their powers and pushing the limits to
continue terrorizing our communities. The ICE Oversight and Reform
Resolution affirms the bare minimum expectations for our immigration
enforcement officers. This resolution builds upon legislation like my
own, the CLEAR ID Act, to further
demand ICE officers disclose their identity, wear body cameras, get
trained to de-escalate situations all to ensure safer interactions
during immigration enforcement operations,” said Rep. Jasmine Crockett.
DHS will require ICE and CBP personnel to wear body cameras during enforcement operations, preserving footage for oversight.
Enforcement personnel cannot conceal their identities, except when an immediate threat to safety exists.
Officers must visibly display their name, badge number, and agency affiliation during all public operations.
DHS will establish independent civilian oversight boards to review enforcement actions and recommend reforms.
All ICE and CBP personnel will be required to undergo mandatory de-escalation training.
The Department of Justice will enhance oversight of ICE to strengthen civil rights protections.
Cosponsors: Rep. Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC), Rep. Jonathan Jackson (IL-01), and Rep. Jasmine Crockett (TX-30).
The
resolution has been endorsed by: Hindus for Human Rights, Alliance of
South Asians Taking Action, and Sikh American Legal Defense and
Education Fund (SALDEF)
In addition to deploying tens of thousands
of federal agents from across the federal government to carry out his
deportation agenda, President Donald Trump is rapidly expanding the
network of state and local police going after immigrants through
partnerships with U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement.
The aggressive, nationwide law enforcement regime, all taking place
under orders from the White House, amounts to what scholars, attorneys,
and now a federal judge say are steps toward the creation of a national
police force. And the ranks of ICE partners won’t be filled with just
local cops: In at least three states, the administration is joining
forces with agencies typically tasked with environmental and marine
protection, lottery control, and gaming to target immigrants.
“This is quite a common tactic,” said Charis Kubrin, a professor at
the University of California, Irvine who studies immigration and crime.
”There’s this idea that we’re going to get local, not just police
officers, but nurses and teachers and other public officials involved in
enforcing immigration laws.”
It started largely with immigration, using federal agents and a
little-remarked-upon program known as 287(g) to funnel funding to local
law enforcement for partnerships. The widespread ICE incursions and
local police partnerships, however, have also been justified by the myth
of an immigrant crime wave.
“There is this moral panic now about migrant crime. This is rhetoric
that is at odds generally with what we know about immigration and
crime,” Kubrin said. “The research is pretty unequivocal that these
policies have no impact on public safety whatsoever.”
“We didn’t really need this increased cooperation,” she said. “The
foundational assumption of this widespread immigrant criminality upon
which all of these policies and practices are based, is patently not
true.”
Saturday, NO KINGS protests took
place across the US, in over 2700 locations, with over 7 million people
participating -- which is over twice as many people who turned out for
Donald Chump's January 2017 inauguration and Chump's January 2025
inauguration combined. Ouch, that as to hurt the tiny Chump who's
always been such a size queen.
In that night's post ("The meaning of today's NO KINGS protests"), where there was massive turnout -- true in most states -- but in a state that had gone for Chump back in November 2024:
That's Boerne, Austin, Beaumont, Houston, San Antonio, Athens,
Lufkin, Tyler, Longview, Jacksonville, Palestine, Mineola, Fort-Worth
and Nacogdoches. I'm sure there are many, many more. Houston, Dallas
and San Antonio are in the top ten for most populated cities in the
United States.
The reason we focused on Texas is because the
state went from Chump. The November election had 6.3 million people
voting for Chump and 4.8 million people voting for Kamala Harris --
56.14% for Chump, 42.46% voting for Kamala Harris.
But
Texas turned out. Texas' turnout today is very bad news for Chump.
San Francisco? We turned out. But that shouldn't be surprising.
We
delivered 323,719 votes for Kamala and only 62,594 for Chump -- that's
80.33% of us voted for Harris in San Francisco and only 15.53% voted for
Chump. So, yeah, San Francisco turned out and good for us.
But
so did Texas. And that's got to really worry Chump -- as it should.
The people have turned against Chump. He was headed for lame duck status
after the mid-terms anyway. But today demonstrates that the people
have turned against him.
This is the pushback and he has been put on notice.
Of
course with a demented person like him, it may not matter that he's
been put on notice. But Republicans in the House better grasp that it
matters since they'll be up for re-election in a year -- and those
Republican senators up for re-election better grasp it as well.
Things are getting very uncomfortable for the GOP and it's only going to get worse.
