A cartoon by Pedro Molina. Related | Fact-checking Trump’s latest claims about mail ballots and voting machines

By Peter Elkind, ProPublica, and Katherine Mangan, The Chronicle of Higher Education, for ProPublica When Los Angeles attorney Leo Terrell, a legal commentator, lifelong Democrat and fiery fixture on Fox News, announced on the network’s “Hannity” show that he was voting for Donald Trump in 2020, the MAGA universe went wild. Oliver North hailed him on his “Real American Heroes” podcast. Fox News signed him on as a paid contributor, at a six-figure salary. Terrell, meanwhile, rebranded himself as “Leo 2.0,” complete with red Trump-style caps he offered for sale online. Leo 1.0 had slammed Trump for cozying up to white supremacists, blamed him for a surge in violent attacks on Jews and donated to Democrats. Leo 2.0? He attacked “DEI nonsense,” compared Black Lives Matter to ISIS and declared the 2020 election was “stolen from President Trump and America!” In January, Terrell was rewarded for his loyalty when President-elect Trump, praising him as a “highly respected civil rights attorney and political analyst” with an “incredibly successful career,” named him senior counsel to the assistant attorney general for civil rights in the Justice Department. Terrell assumed his marquee role a month later: as head of the multiagency Task Force to Combat Anti-Semitism. Leo Terrell celebrated his appointment as senior counsel to the assistant attorney general of the Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division in an Instagram post on Jan. 23. As a Black, Christian former Democrat with little previous engagement with Jewish causes, Terrell, now 70, seemed an improbable pick to lead the effort to “root out anti-Semitic harassment in schools and on college campuses,” as the task force announcement put it. But his zealous conversion and penchant for media bombast made him a perfect bullhorn for the task force’s actual mission: to strong-arm colleges into stripping away any vestige of “wokeness” in their hiring, admissions, classes and research. In service of that goal, the government has abandoned due process in favor of media warfare, preemptive declarations of guilt and freezes on billions in critical federal funding. Terrell has become an invaluable player in this extraordinary pressure campaign. Before most of the task force’s investigations had even launched, he publicly promised “massive lawsuits” against “Jew-hating” universities, including Harvard, the University of California, Los Angeles and dozens of others. So far, the campaign has been effective. To preserve hundreds of millions of dollars in federal grants and contracts, Columbia and Brown have struck deals with the administration that cost them $220 million and $50 million, respectively, and go far beyond pledging tougher action to combat antisemitism. Columbia agreed to open academic programs and admissions decisions to outside monitoring. Brown pledged to ban transgender women from single-sex spaces and women’s sports. Harvard has sued the administration to try to unfreeze $2.6 billion in federal research funds, but it’s also trying to negotiate a settlement. Meanwhile, colleges nationwide are eliminating any remaining vestiges of diversity, equity and inclusion programs and shuttering multicultural centers lest the government come after them. Amid the upheaval Trump’s task force has helped to sow, the history, motivations and behavior of its blustery leader have gone largely unexamined. ProPublica and The Chronicle of Higher Education interviewed dozens of people whose paths have intersected with Terrell’s and reviewed thousands of pages of court documents and financial records related to his career and life. The portrait that emerged is dramatically at odds with Trump’s description of a “highly respected” and “incredibly successful” attorney. Peers in civil rights law said they always considered Terrell a minor player. Documents reveal a distinctly mixed legal track record, marred by malpractice suits, client disputes and mishandling a criminal case so badly that a federal appeals court lambasted his work as “woeful.” Until his MAGA conversion, Terrell was beset by a litany of financial troubles, including nearly $400,000 in unpaid federal taxes, a personal bankruptcy filing and a trail of court judgments and liens brought by small businesses that worked for his law firm. Current and former lawyers at the Justice Department say Terrell is less engaged with assessing cases or negotiating settlements than he is with scaring universities into submission. They say he’s voiced open disdain for what he calls “lawyer talk,” berating career staff who try to follow proper procedures for investigating civil rights complaints. Despite his appetite for media attention, Terrell has volunteered little about himself. Friends and neighbors recall him walking a dog and bicycling and his fondness for golf. In the “about the author” section for a self-published book, he wrote: “In his spare time, Mr. Terrell likes to work. His hobbies are work and working.” Terrell declined an interview request for this story and did not respond to written questions. In a brief phone conversation with a reporter, he explained, “I don’t do interviews with my life.” Told some details of our reporting, he added, “I’m not going to comment on anything,” and, finally, “I’m going to hang up respectfully.” It is unclear whether Terrell’s previous troubles turned up in administration vetting for his current job. Officials at the Justice Department and White House did not respond to questions about Terrell’s role or his background. Jewish activists are divided on Terrell’s approach, with some lauding it for rooting out anti-Jewish sentiment that emerged on campuses during pro-Palestinian protests and others bemoaning how he’s weaponized antisemitism. Kenneth Marcus, an Education Department official in the first Trump administration who has spent years agitating for stronger federal action against campus antisemitism, is a fan. “What the president has gotten in Terrell,” Marcus said, “is someone with unique skills in delivering public messaging.” That messaging is camouflage, according to Amy Spitalnick, CEO of the Jewish Council for Public Affairs, a national network of Jewish groups. “No one should be under any illusion that this is about keeping Jewish students or faculty safe,” she said. “Gutting cancer and Alzheimer’s research does nothing to keep them safe.” *** Terrell grew up in Carson, in south Los Angeles County, the fourth of seven siblings. Law was his second career, following a decade as a history and economics teacher in the Los Angeles public schools. He graduated from UCLA School of Law in 1990 and opened his own civil rights firm in Beverly Hills. Almost immediately, Terrell began making a name for himself as a media personality with a decidedly progressive voice, becoming better known for his TV and radio commentary than for his courtroom achievements. Starting in 1991, after the police beating of a Black man, Rodney King, Terrell became a regular on local and national TV and radio condemning police brutality and racial injustice. Three years later, he snagged his breakthrough commentating gig: as a friend and supporter of O.J. Simpson. Terrell’s role as a Simpson trial analyst produced a green-room friendship with Larry Elder, a conservative Black radio host in Los Angeles, who helped Terrell land his own talk show. “I thought he was smart, feisty, opinionated and entertaining,” Elder recalled. “I thought he would be good radio, despite my disagreement with virtually everything he stood for at the time.” Terrell became a prized guest on Fox News. He spoke fast and loud, uttered every view with absolute certainty and was quick to interrupt, shout and attack, accusing one guest of tailoring his views “to make a name for himself” and another of trying to “hustle people to make money.” Pressed during one “Hannity” interview to say on air whether Simpson was guilty of murder, Terrell ripped off his ear piece and stormed out of the studio. Prominent Los Angeles lawyers said he was never a big player in the city’s civil rights community. Carl Douglas, part of the Simpson defense team, said “Leo was always a talker,” not “a baller.” Connie Rice, former western regional counsel for the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, said Terrell “was never at the table for the big cases that made impact. He loved holding press conferences.” Terrell represented a Black teenager who’d been expelled from a Los Angeles high school for punching a white referee during a football game after the referee allegedly had directed racial epithets at him. He took up the cause of a mentally ill, homeless Black woman who’d been fatally shot by LA police after she wielded a 12-inch screwdriver at officers wanting to question whether she’d stolen a shopping cart. (No criminal charges were brought against the officers, but Terrell won a $975,000 settlement for her family.) Leo Terrell gestures during an Aug. 1999 forum held by the Congressional Black Caucus in Los Angeles. Now scornful of “woke” practices and bias claims, Terrell once represented himself in a race-discrimination case against a parking company after a garage attendant refused to honor his free-parking validation from a shopping mall and told him he owed $10. A supervisor let Terrell leave without paying, but he still sued, saying he was singled out for being Black and demanding damages for “humiliation, mental anguish and severe emotional distress.” The suit was later settled for a confidential amount. Reached three decades later, an attorney for the parking company called Terrell’s lawsuit “absurd — the worst discrimination case I’ve ever seen.” Terrell always had side gigs: he self-published a book on workplace rights; he offered business consultations, corporate training seminars and mediations; he had a 900 number that charged $5 for the first minute and $2 for each additional minute for legal consultations. In 2001, he ran unsuccessfully first for Congress, then two years later for Los Angeles City Council. He routinely promoted himself as “an NAACP attorney,” though the group said he’d never been employed there. William Bloch, a veteran Los Angeles lawyer who brought two malpractice cases against Terrell, said Terrell acted as “the carnival barker” to attract business, then failed to do the necessary legal work. In one sex-discrimination case, according to the resulting malpractice suit brought by Bloch, Terrell accepted a settlement from the city of Beverly Hills for “a pittance” despite explicit instructions from his client, a female police officer, to zealously pursue her claim. Bloch persuaded an appeals court to undo the settlement. After the officer received a $100,000 award, plus money for attorney fees and costs, she dropped the case against Terrell. In the second matter, a jail employee for the city of Beverly Hills said she paid $6,000 to retain Terrell in 2009 after he “boasted of huge verdicts and settlements,” only to have him accept a $1,000 settlement from the city without her permission. According to her claim, Terrell conducted “little or no discovery, including taking no depositions.” The case was settled for a confidential amount, with no acknowledgement by Terrell of wrongdoing. In court filings, Terrell denied any negligence or responsibility for harm to his clients, insisting they had approved all of his actions and saying lawyers are “not a guarantor of the results of any professional services.” “He’s a discredit to the legal profession,” Bloch said. A low point in Terrell’s legal career began in October 2009, when he was retained by the parents of Emond Logan, a 48-year-old California truck driver alleged to have transported more than a ton of cocaine to western Michigan as part of a multistate drug conspiracy. Terrell rarely took on criminal cases, but he’d played Little League baseball with Logan, whose family approached him after hearing his radio show. Terrell demanded a $100,000 retainer. To pay it, Logan’s father sold much of his stock from more than 30 years at Pacific Bell Telephone and borrowed money from his daughter. Logan faced overwhelming evidence: a leader of the drug gang had testified against him, and the arresting agents had seized five cars (including a Maserati), three Rolex watches and a $125,000 diamond ring, items well beyond his truck-driving income. His court-appointed lawyer had negotiated a plea agreement capping Logan’s prison time at 10 years. Still, Terrell urged Logan to blow up his “bullshit” deal, according to transcripts of their recorded jailhouse calls and Logan’s later testimony. Logan followed Terrell’s advice, despite prosecution warnings that such relatively generous terms would be off the table. Terrell arranged for Logan’s pretrial release on bond. Four months later, Logan was back in custody after a government informant taped him threatening to kill his federal prosecutor. Terrell then urged him to accept a new plea offer, with no cap, and Logan was sentenced to 35 years in prison. Terrell “didn’t do what he was supposed to do for the money,” Eugene Logan, Emond’s 93-year-old father, said in a telephone interview. “He told us he could get him off. If he’d taken the plea, he’d be out by now.” Two courts denied Emond Logan’s attempts to get his sentence overturned based on Terrell’s counsel, but they excoriated Terrell’s lawyering. U.S. District Judge Paul Maloney wrote in a 2017 decision that Terrell had provided “abysmal advice.” A year later, the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals decried Terrell’s “woeful representation” and said his overall conduct reflected “poorly on the profession.” *** Terrell’s troubled legal practice left him with a worsening tangle of financial problems. Between 2004 and 2015, the IRS filed 11 liens against him for nearly $400,000 in unpaid taxes dating back to 1997. In October 2010, Terrell filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy protection, reporting $736,938 in liabilities, $304,650 in assets and monthly income of just $4,000. Because he stopped appearing for required meetings, his bankruptcy case was dismissed and none of his obligations were legally erased. During this period, Terrell took out six new mortgage loans against his three-bedroom West LA condominium. The property was sold at foreclosure in 2013. Lorita Seaton was one of Terrell’s many unpaid creditors. She’d loaned him $40,000 in 2008 after he said he needed it to help cover his costs for a pending discrimination suit against Costco. In exchange, Terrell had signed a promissory note committing to pay her $60,000 by year-end. By February 2009, court records show, Terrell had won $422,000 at trial for his client and an additional $510,818 in legal fees and costs. Yet Seaton said she never got a penny. “He had the audacity to tell me ‘there’s nothing you can do about it,’” she said in an interview. “I want to go stand on the mountain and just holler about this asshole.” Leo Terrell speaks during an April 2005 news conference in Beverly Hills, Calif. Between 2006 and 2014, more than a dozen small vendors for Terrell’s law firm went to court seeking to collect more than $170,000 in unpaid bills. A&B Reporting complained that it had prepared more than 30 deposition transcripts for Terrell, billing him more than $40,000 that remained unpaid. According to the company’s 2011 lawsuit, Terrell finally sent a $5,000 check — which bounced. In February 2014, as his private financial straits worsened, Terrell formally updated his law office address: from the Beverly Hills tower where he’d worked for more than two decades to a “suite” on Santa Monica Boulevard, which was actually a mailbox at a UPS store. He has filed just a single case in federal court since that year, according to PACER, a public database of court filings and dockets. Terrell’s financial troubles factored into years of legal warfare among his siblings over their mother’s care and modest estate. In a court filing, Terrell’s younger brother Zachary accused him of borrowing repeatedly from their mother to save his “flailing” law practice and keep his home. Terrell acknowledged accepting a $30,000 gift from his mother after he’d done free legal work for her. The estate case finally ended in late 2021, but Terrell received little because he had already borrowed against his expected inheritance. (Deborah Terrell-Trimble was the only Terrell sibling to respond to our calls and emails for comment, but she declined to answer questions about her brother or the case, saying the family was “trying to heal.”) Terrell eventually paid off or settled some of his debts, but there’s no record of him paying the IRS or many of his other creditors, whose legal claims typically expire after 10 years in California unless they’re renewed. According to publicly filed liens, he still owed the IRS $92,000 at the beginning of 2024. Yet on the financial disclosure he filed for his Justice Department job, which covered that period, he listed his liabilities as “none.” Neither Terrell nor the Department of Justice responded to requests for comment about this omission. *** Amid the financial pressures at home and at work, Terrell underwent a startling political transformation. In 2019 Fox interviews, he had called Trump “a racial divider” and said he sent out “dog whistles” like “no president on this planet in our country’s history.” Less than a year later, he went all in for Trump. Fox News hired him as a paid contributor soon thereafter, at an annual salary of $250,000. In interviews on Fox and other conservative outlets, Terrell offered two reasons for his ideological makeover. The first was the growing influence of the Black Lives Matter movement, which he complained had “hijacked” the Democratic Party, citing far-left calls to “defund the police.” He also objected to Joe Biden’s comment during an interview with a Black radio host that “if you have a problem figuring out whether you’re for me or Trump, then you ain’t Black,” calling it “offensive and insulting to every African American because we don’t vote as one group.” Over the next four years, Terrell displayed the fervor of the converted. Biden was an “idiot”; Kamala Harris (whose name he repeatedly mispronounced) was only chosen as his running mate “because she’s a woman and because of her race.” Democrats were members of the “anti-Israel” and “pro-Hamas party.” Far-right agitator Laura Loomer was “a journalist,” while NBC’s Kristen Welker was “a DEI hire.” In 2023, Terrell made a pilgrimage to Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort, where he posed poolside, making a thumbs-up gesture. Shortly before starting his Justice Department gig, Terrell made sure he was leaving no culture-war stone unturned. “I hate anti-Semitism! I hate attacks on Catholic Families! I hate attacks on parents expressing their First Amendment Rights at School Board Meetings! I hate Sanctuary Cities! I hate DEI! I hate Critical Race Theory!” he declared on X. “I love this guy,” Trump gushed, introducing “Leo 2.0” in February at a White House commemoration of Black History Month. “He was a radical Democrat, he became a radical Republican.” Terrell returned the love, telling the audience: “We are in the presence of the greatest president of all time!” What motivated him? Larry Elder, who was on air with Terrell as he announced his conversion and coined the nickname “Leo 2.0,” declined to speculate: “I really don’t care about why Leo did his 180. I’m just glad he finally did!” Juan Williams, the Fox News senior political analyst, however, called the change in Terrell’s views “performative.” He said Terrell saw an opportunity to cast himself as “coming out of the liberal matrix, and ‘now I’ve seen the light.’ He understood the value in that universe.” If it is a performance, it’s one Terrell has continued at the Justice Department, where the effect of his pugnacious style and footloose approach to the law has alarmed career staff accustomed to following strict rules regarding regulatory due process. “That’s lawyer talk!” Terrell regularly thundered to Justice Department lawyers. “I don’t want to hear any lawyer talk!” Donald Trump speaks with members of law enforcement and National Guard soldiers on Aug. 21 in Washington, D.C., as Interior Secretary Doug Burgum, Attorney General Pam Bondi, U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Jeanine Pirro and Leo Terrell listen. In the days after his Jan. 23 appointment, several said, Terrell emphatically rejected efforts by agency veterans to explain the legally required steps to bring civil rights complaints against universities. “Leo did not want to hear our views about how to investigate, how to find a violation, how to proceed in these cases,” said a Justice Department veteran who heard Terrell’s comments. “No ‘lawyer talk’ at the Justice Department! It was just incredibly bizarre.” The attorney was one of 10 current and former lawyers with the agency’s Civil Rights Division interviewed for this story, most of whom asked not to be named for fear of retaliation. At another meeting early in his tenure, Terrell told career Justice Department attorneys he thought they were out to thwart his agenda, according to two attendees. “He immediately came in and openly told us that he did not trust any of us or believe anything we said,” one recalled. The Justice Department antisemitism task force, which includes officials from the Department of Health and Human Services, the Department of Education and the General Services Administration, was announced on Feb. 3. It immediately announced antisemitism investigations of four medical schools regarding “offensive” pro-Palestinian “symbols and messaging” displayed by students during their 2024 commencement ceremonies. Then, over the next five weeks, the task force and Trump administration announced plans to investigate 10 universities; the “immediate” cancellation of hundreds of millions in federal funding for Columbia; an investigation of the entire University of California System; and “potential enforcement actions” against 60 colleges in 24 states. It’s not clear whether Terrell had a hand in choosing the task force’s targets, but he took the lead in making the government’s case against them publicly. Related | Here’s the terrible new way Trump plans to illegally harass universities “We are suing every one of these universities guilty of antisemitism,” Terrell told Fox News host Mark Levin on March 9. “We’re going to bankrupt these universities. We are going to take away every single federal dollar.” Antisemitism, shouted Terrell, waving his arms, “is rampant across the country!” Hate-crime charges, he vowed, would be brought against “these people who hate Jews.” Terrell blamed campus antisemitism on the MAGA movement’s usual suspects: “the Democrat Party” and “blue cities [that] have turned their back on Jewish Americans.” “The academic system in this country has been hijacked by the left,” he declared, “has been hijacked by the Marxists!” Four days later, the task force announced plans to meet with leaders of four cities “rocked” by campus antisemitism (New York, Los Angeles, Boston and Chicago) to determine whether federal intervention was warranted. Career civil rights officials, many of whom had served under both Democratic and Republican administrations, were horrified. The Justice Department didn’t publicly announce who it was investigating or planned to sue. It didn’t reach findings before it had found cause in a completed investigation that typically takes months or even years. And investigating Democratic leaders in “blue cities” in the name of fighting campus antisemitism was far outside the department’s charge. “The process is turned upside down,” said Ejaz Baluch, a senior trial attorney in the Civil Rights Division who left in May and is now a lecturer at Columbia Law School. “We were given a conclusion and told to find supporting evidence to justify it. It’s basically civil rights enforcement as a political tool. These things don’t actually solve antisemitism. It’s about silencing political dissent they disagree with.” Former civil rights deputy chief Jen Swedish, who worked at the Justice Department for 15 years, called the actions “cover for attacking higher ed.” Back in early February, a division-wide posting seeking attorneys to help staff the antisemitism task force had drawn just three volunteers. Harmeet Dhillon, Trump’s appointee as assistant attorney general for civil rights (and one of his former personal lawyers), later told a Federalist Society conference that this revealed the career staff’s lack of concern about antisemitism. Current and former division attorneys interviewed by ProPublica and The Chronicle said the lawyers had misgivings about the administration’s tactics and were reluctant to work with Terrell, who already had a reputation for berating staffers. One said he’d repeatedly yelled at her. A memorable episode came in March, when Terrell loudly berated a revered 82-year-old civil rights attorney, Franz Marshall, over the failure to quickly terminate federal oversight in a Louisiana school desegregation case, a goal of Republican state officials. Related | Yes, Trump's trying to make America segregated again Marshall, who had represented the government in hundreds of desegregation cases over five decades, tried to explain that closing the case required a motion by the school district to lift the order, which the Justice Department could support or oppose, and review by a federal judge. “Who told you that you had to do it this way?” Terrell interrupted. “I want you to name names!” “This is the process,” Marshall assured him. “I’ve been doing this for a long time.” “Well, maybe you’ve been doing it for too long!” Terrell snapped. The tirade, which lasted nearly an hour, was audible to dozens of attorneys waiting outside the conference room for an upcoming meeting. Marshall (who could not be reached for comment) resigned a short time later, joining a wholesale exodus from resignations, firings and reassignments that has totaled about 70% of the Civil Rights Division’s 365 attorneys since January. The Louisiana consent decree was lifted on April 29. In late April, Terrell had convened a meeting with some of the remaining lawyers to address concerns about working with him. “That crazy guy you see on TV is not here,” he insisted, according to one attendee. “The guy before you is a civil rights attorney. There’s an urban myth that I scream and yell. I’ve never yelled in my life.” There’s little evidence Terrell has been directly involved in negotiations with campuses under investigation; instead, those appear to have been increasingly steered by the White House. Terrell has voiced distrust of any bargaining, preferring to “lay the hammer on them with lawsuits,” as he told Justice Department lawyers in an April meeting. In mid-July, when word leaked that the Trump administration was about to announce an agreement with Columbia to restore its funding, Terrell questioned whether it was tough enough. “I will not ‘SELLOUT’ Jewish Americans,” he posted on X. “NO DEALS!” Six days later, the administration announced a $221 million settlement with Columbia, setting the stage for a string of similar deals with other colleges. Related | Columbia caves to Trump, setting dangerous precedent for higher ed The extremism of Terrell’s messaging also doesn’t bother Dov Hikind, a former New York state Democratic assemblyman representing Brooklyn and the founder of Americans Against Antisemitism. “If Leo Terrell and others are speaking tough, I don’t lose any sleep over that.” But the administration’s approach alarms other Jewish groups and erstwhile academic allies in the fight against campus antisemitism. The task force is “using legitimate fears of antisemitism in ways that are both dangerous and wrong,” said Amy Spitalnick, of the Jewish Council for Public Affairs. When Terrell proclaimed on Fox News that the task force would “bankrupt” targeted universities, “they were saying the quiet part out loud,” she added. Whether Terrell is good for Jews or bad for Jews, his conversion has certainly been good for him. Leo 2.0 now has 2.5 million followers on his personal X account, and his speaking fee runs between $50,000 and $100,000; his government salary is $167,603. Terrell has attained “a rock star persona” in the Trump administration, said Kenneth Marcus, the former Education Department official and antisemitism activist. “People are very much drawn to him in a way that’s disproportionate to his rank in the federal government.” There’s no sign administration officials, including Terrell, will let up in their campaign against higher education. Since late July, even as negotiations with Harvard dragged on and Brown’s settlement was announced, the administration froze $108 million in funding from Duke University’s medical system, citing “systemic racial discrimination” in hiring and admissions. It also halted more than $584 million from UCLA as punishment for tolerating a “hostile environment” for Jews and demanded $1 billion to restore the flow of government money. Duke has not publicly responded to the discrimination complaints. The University of California’s president, James B. Milliken, has pledged to work with the administration, but he said a $1 billion penalty would “completely devastate our country’s greatest public university system.” Other colleges are just trying to stay out of the administration’s dragnet — and Terrell’s sights. “He’s scared schools stiff, so everyone is scrambling,” said Brett Sokolow, an attorney and higher education consultant whom college and university leaders have turned to for advice. Terrell’s approach, he said, is “way over the top — and effective as hell.” Doris Burke of ProPublica contributed research.

By Henry Larweh and Rachana Pradhan and Rae Ellen Bichell for KFF Health News The Trump administration’s cuts to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention funding for state and local health departments had vastly uneven effects depending on the political leanings of a state, according to a KFF Health News analysis. Democratic-led states and select blue-leaning cities fought back in court and saw money for public health efforts restored — while GOP-led states sustained big losses. The Department of Health and Human Services in late March canceled nearly 700 Centers for Disease Control and Prevention grants nationwide — together worth about $11 billion. Awarded during the covid-19 pandemic, they supported efforts to vaccinate people, reduce health disparities among demographic groups, upgrade antiquated systems for detecting infectious disease outbreaks, and hire community health workers. Initially, grant cancellations hit blue and red states roughly evenly. Four of the five jurisdictions with the largest number of terminated grants were led by Democrats: California, the District of Columbia, Illinois, and Massachusetts. But after attorneys general and governors from about two dozen blue states sued in federal court and won an injunction, the balance flipped. Of the five states with the most canceled grants, four are led by Republicans: Texas, Georgia, Oklahoma, and Ohio. In blue states, nearly 80% of the CDC grant cuts have been restored, compared with fewer than 5% in red states, according to the KFF Health News analysis. Grant amounts reported in an HHS database known as the Tracking Accountability in Government Grants System, or TAGGS, often don’t match what states confirmed. Instead, this analysis focused on the number of grants. The divide is an example of the polarization that permeates health care issues, in which access to safety-net health programs, abortion rights, and the ability of public health officials to respond to disease threats diverge significantly depending on the political party in power. In an emailed statement, HHS spokesperson Andrew Nixon said the agency “is committed to protecting the health of every American, regardless of politics or geography. These funds were provided in response to the COVID pandemic, which is long over. We will continue working with states to strengthen public health infrastructure and ensure communities have the tools they need to respond to outbreaks and keep people safe.” The money in question wasn’t spent solely on covid-related activities, public health experts say; it was also used to bolster public health infrastructure and help contain many types of viruses and diseases, including the flu, measles, and RSV, or respiratory syncytial virus. Related | Slashed federal funding cancels vaccine clinics amid measles surge “It really supported infrastructure across the board, particularly in how states respond to public health threats,” said Susan Kansagra, chief medical officer of the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials. The Trump cutbacks came as the U.S. recorded its largest measles outbreak in over three decades and 266 pediatric deaths during the most recent flu season — the highest reported outside of a pandemic since 2004. Public health departments canceled vaccine clinics, laid off staff, and put contracts on hold, health officials said in interviews. After its funding cuts were blocked in court, California retained every grant the Trump administration attempted to claw back, while Texas remains the state with the most grants terminated, with at least 30. As the CDC slashed grants in Texas, its measles outbreak spread across the U.S. and Mexico, sickening at least 4,500 people and killing at least 16. Colorado, which joined the lawsuit, had 11 grant terminations at first, but then 10 were retained. Meanwhile, its neighboring states that didn't sue — Wyoming, Utah, Kansas, Nebraska, and Oklahoma — collectively lost 55 grants, with none retained. In Jackson, Ohio, a half-dozen community health workers came to work one day in March to find the Trump administration had canceled their grant five months early, leaving the Jackson County Health Department half a million dollars short — and them without jobs. “I had to lay off three employees in a single day, and I haven’t had to do that before. We don’t have those people doing outreach in Jackson County anymore,” Health Commissioner Kevin Aston said. At one point, he said, the funding helped 11 Appalachian Ohio counties. Now it supports one. Marsha Radabaugh, one employee who was reassigned, has scaled back her community health efforts: She’d been helping serve hot meals to homeless people and realized that many clients couldn’t read or write, so she brought forms for services such as Medicaid and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program to their encampment in a local park and helped fill them out. “We would find them rehab places. We’d get out hygiene kits, blankets, tents, zero-degree sleeping bags, things like that,” she said. As a counselor, she’d also remind people “that they're cared for, that they're worthy of being a human — because, a lot of the time, they're not treated that way.” Sasha Johnson, who led the community health worker program, said people like Radabaugh “were basically a walking human 411,” offering aid to those in need. Radabaugh also partnered with a food bank to deliver meals to homebound residents. Aston said the abrupt way they lost the funds — which meant the county unexpectedly had to pay unemployment for more people — could have ruined the health district financially. Canceling funding midcycle, he said, “was really scary.” HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a longtime anti-vaccine activist and promoter of vaccine misinformation, has called the CDC a “cesspool of corruption.” At HHS, he has taken steps to undermine vaccination in the U.S. and abroad. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Federal CDC funding accounts for more than half of state and local health department budgets, according to KFF, a health information nonprofit that includes KFF Health News. States that President Donald Trump won in the 2024 election received a higher share of the $15 billion the CDC allocated in fiscal 2023 than those that Democrat Kamala Harris won, according to KFF. The Trump administration’s nationwide CDC grant terminations reflect this. More than half were in states that Trump won in 2024, totaling at least 370 terminations before the court action, according to KFF Health News’ analysis. The Columbus, Ohio, health department had received $6.2 million in CDC grants, but roughly half of it — $3 million — disappeared with the Trump cuts. The city laid off 11 people who worked on investigating infectious disease outbreaks in such places as schools and nursing homes, Columbus Health Commissioner Mysheika Roberts said. She also said the city had planned to buy a new electronic health record system for easier access to patients’ hospital records — which could improve disease detection and provide better treatment for those infected — but that was put on ice. “We’ve never had a grant midcycle just get pulled from us for no reason,” Roberts said. “This sense of uncertainty is stressful.” Columbus did not receive its money directly from the CDC. Rather, the state gave the city some funds it received from the federal government. Ohio, led by Republican Gov. Mike DeWine and a Republican attorney general, did not sue to block the funding cuts. Columbus sued the federal government in April to keep its money, along with other Democratic-led municipalities in Republican-governed states: Harris County, Texas, home to Houston; the Metropolitan Government of Nashville and Davidson County in Tennessee; and Kansas City, Missouri. A federal judge in June blocked those cuts. As of mid-August, Columbus was awaiting the funds. Roberts said the city won’t rehire staff because the federal funding was expected to end in December. Joe Grogan, a senior scholar at the University of Southern California’s Schaeffer Institute and former director of the White House Domestic Policy Council in Trump’s first term, said state and local agencies “are not entitled” to the federal money, which was awarded “to deal with an emergency” that has ended. “We were throwing money out the door the last five years,” Grogan said of the federal government. “I don’t understand why there would ever be a controversy in unspent covid money coming back.” Ken Gordon, Ohio Department of Health spokesperson, wrote in an email that the $250 million in grants lost had helped with, among other things, upgrading the disease reporting system and boosting public health laboratory testing. Some of the canceled HHS funding wasn’t slated to end for years, including four grants to strengthen public health in Indian Country, a grant to a Minnesota nonprofit focused on reducing substance use disorders, and a few to universities about occupational safety, HIV, tuberculosis, and more. Brent Ewig, chief policy and government relations officer for the Association of Immunization Managers, said the cuts were “the predictable result of ‘boom, bust, panic, neglect’ funding” for public health. The association represents 64 state, local, and territorial immunization programs, which Ewig said will be less prepared to respond to disease outbreaks, including measles. “The system is blinking red,” Ewig said. Methodology KFF Health News’ analysis of Centers for Disease Control and Prevention grants sought to answer four questions: 1) How many grants have been terminated in the U.S. under the Trump administration since March? 2) Which states saw the most grants cut? 3) What were the grants for? and 4) Did the grant terminations affect blue, red, and purple states differently? This follows a similar analysis by KFF Health News for an article on nationwide NIH grant terminations. Our primary data source was a Department of Health and Human Services website showing grant terminations. We compared an initial list of grant terminations from April 3 with one from July 11 to determine how many grants had been restored. The USAspending.gov database helped us track grants by state. To classify states politically, we followed the same steps from our April coverage of National Institutes of Health grant terminations. States were “blue” if Democrats had complete control of the state government or if the majority of voters favored Democratic presidential candidates in the last three elections (2016, 2020, 2024). “Red” states were classified similarly with respect to the Republican Party. “Purple” states had politically split state governments and/or were generally considered to be presidential election battleground states. The result was 25 red states, 17 blue states, and eight purple states. The District of Columbia was classified as blue using similar methods. This analysis does not account for potential grant reinstatements in local jurisdictions where the funds were awarded indirectly rather than directly from the CDC; it accounts only for the recipients’ location, and excludes grants terminated from Compacts of Free Association states and other foreign entities that received grants directly from the CDC. At least 40 CDC grants were terminated that were meant for global health efforts or assisting public health activities in other nations following the Trump administration’s order for the CDC to withdraw support for the World Health Organization.

A cartoon by Jack Ohman. Related | Republican has infuriating response to Minneapolis shooting

Black Music Sunday is a weekly series highlighting all things Black music, with over 275 stories covering performers, genres, history, and more, each featuring its own vibrant soundtrack. I hope you’ll find some familiar tunes and perhaps an introduction to something new. With Labor Day weekend upon us once again, my musical thoughts turn to the wealth of Black music that has dealt with labor, jobs, and work, as well as Black workers. I admit I get annoyed with political speech-makers who talk about “the working class” as if it is only white. According to data from the 2021 American Community Survey (ACS), the current working class largely works in services, particularly retail, health care, food service and accommodation, and building services, though manufacturing and construction remain large employers as well. Black, Hispanic, and other workers of color make up 45 percent of the working class, while non-Hispanic white workers comprise the remaining 55 percent. Nearly half of the working class is women, and 8 percent have disabilities. I get more than annoyed (I’m actually furious) at the efforts of the current racist-in-chief and his minions to erase enslavement history from our institutions, museums, and schools, given that some of our earliest music came from enslaved people, a subject I covered in “Black people have labored hard since we were dragged here in chains. Here's the music that proves it,” back in 2021. Carnegie Hall’s “Timeline of African-American Music” opens with work songs sung during enslavement, and highlights that segment with a quote from Frederick Douglass: “Slaves are generally expected to sing as well as work. A silent slave is not liked by masters or overseers.” Since the earliest days of slavery, singing has accompanied all kinds of group and individual work activities of African Americans. These improvised songs, known as work songs, field calls (also field hollers) and street calls (also street cries) served many functions. Singing passed the time, coordinated the movements of workers and offered encouragement. They also communicated human emotions and provided a forum for criticizing whites in positions of authority. The Ballad of America website features “Pick a Bale of Cotton: About the Song”: During the time of slavery and beyond, work on the Southern plantation was often enlivened by the singing of work songs. Singing moved the work along faster and made the physical labor and drudgery a little easier to bear. A bale of cotton weighs 500 pounds, which is more than anyone could really pick in a single day. They chose the great Huddie Ledbetter’s rendition. We know him as Lead Belly. x YouTube Video For a deep dive into Black song history, this 50-minute documentary, “Songs of Slavery and Emancipation,” is an excellent starting point. x YouTube Video Songs of Slavery and Emancipation – 2024 Tour This project is more than just a musical endeavor; it’s a vital historical record. It seeks to educate audiences about the deep roots of African American music and its intrinsic link to the struggle for freedom. As author and scholar Robin D. G. Kelley poignantly asks in his essay that opens the book: “What are we to make of the fact that human beings held as property are responsible for America’s greatest cultural and artistic gift to the world?” Understanding the impact of slavery and its abolition is crucial to grasping the formation of the United States and its lasting influence on today’s world. Kali Akuno, executive director of Cooperation Jackson in Mississippi, underscores the significance of this project, stating, “‘Songs of Slavery and Emancipation’ conveys important history that enlivens our collective memory and helps to keep the spirit of resistance strong and moving forward.” Historical documentaries can sometimes feel dry, but Songs of Slavery and Emancipation brings history to life by centering the film around the powerful recordings made for the CD. The documentary not only showcases moving vocal performances but also weaves in personal stories, historical documents, and images. This approach creates a deeply engaging narrative, told through music that resonates with emotion and meaning. In “A professional song selector shares 15 songs of Black women’s empowerment and freedom,” one of the songs that author Korie Enyard selected was “Driva’ Man” by Abbey Lincoln. “Choppin’ cotton don’t be slow Better finish out your row” “This song is a reminder that Black women bore the brunt of the whip just like Black men. Being a woman was irrelevant. Despite being raped, birthing the master’s children, or watching her kids be sold off to other plantations, she still had to finish the work and fulfill her quota.” Here she is performing it with her husband, drummer Max Roach, as part of the «Freedom Now Suite» on Belgian TV in 1964. x YouTube Video Many Black women found employment as domestic workers after Emancipation. The History Matters website states, in “Sadie’s Servant Room Blues”: 1920s Domestic Work in Song: Domestic service was the most common category of employment for women before World War II; it was particularly important for black women, who were excluded from most other occupations. By 1920 some 40 percent of all domestic workers were African American—and more than 70 percent of all wage-earning African-American women worked as servants or laundresses. The struggles of domestic workers were sometimes recorded in songs like Hattie Burleson’s 1928 “Sadie’s Servant Room Blues,” a musical version of common complaints of domestic workers about long hours, low pay, and lack of privacy.         Here she is singing “Sadie Servant Room Blues”: Missus Jarvis don't pay me much They give me just what they think I'm worth I'm gonna change my mind, yes change my mind Cause I keep the servant room blues all the time I receive my company in the rear Still these folks don't want to see them here Gonna change my mind, yes change my mind Cause I keep the servant room blues all the time I'm gonna change this here room for a nice big flat Gonna let my friends know where I'm livin' at Gonna change my mind, yes change my mind Cause I keep the servant room blues all the time They have a party at noon, a party at night The midnight parties don't ever break up right Gonna change my mind, yes change my mind Cause I keep the servant room blues all the time x YouTube Video Burleson had a rather notorious history, detailed by Texas music critic and journalist Michael Corcoran on his website.  A blues singer who recorded for Brunswick and Paramount and owned the Green Parrot dancehall, Bastrop-born Hattie Burleson was the queen of Deep Ellum in Dallas in the 1920’s. But on Aug. 20, 1919, she looked headed to prison after shooting to death one of Dallas’ most prominent black citizens, Dallas Express founder and editor William Elisha King. According to a front page story in the Aug. 22, 1919 Express, Burleson was driven to the house at 2811 Flora Street where King was recuperating from a streetcar fall. “The lady of the house” was preparing lunch while King, 51, and Burleson talked in the other room. “As their conversation became intensed, the woman drew a .38 calibre pistol from her handbag and shot Mr. King in the chest,” it was reported. The 29-year-old Burleson was identified as King’s former secretary who owned a rooming house at 2516 Swiss Avenue on the same block as the Express offices. There also may have been a romantic relationship. In a May 5, 1942 history of the African-American newspaper, Burleson was described as King’s “female admirer,” but there’s no mention that the killer walked. A recently discovered death certificate indicates that the Hattie C. Burleson who shot King was the future blues singer, who also had the middle initial C. The Express reported that Burleson was from Kaufman County, which is where the singer is buried. Her occupation on the death certificate was “show business.” That’s the career she pursued with passion after she was exonerated in the homicide of King. It’s unknown why she was acquitted, as an arrest affidavit request for the Dallas Police Department found “no responsive documents to your request.” But we can assume the grand jury sided with a claim of self defense by the woman who stood only four and a half feet tall. Another option for women and some men was sex work. Lucille Bogan was an early blues singer who was known for her risque lyrics. Her Blues Foundation bio details her history: Lucille Bogan recorded some of the most memorable blues songs of the pre-World War II era, including some that were landmarks in blues and some that continue to sensationalize her reputation decades after her death. She was the first African-American singer to record blues at a session outside of New York or Chicago when she sang at sessions for OKeh Records set up in a warehouse in Atlanta in 1923, and several of her records were later covered or adapted by various artists who preceded her into the Blues Hall of Fame. But by far the predominant association now made with Bogan is the lewdness of two unexpurgated songs she recorded in 1935 that were not intended for public release. Sexual references were common in blues recording but the proprieties of the day called for them to be disguised in double entendre form. Bogan made a number of those, but presumably, for the entertainment of the recording staff and friends, she used explicit language in “Till the Cows Come Home” and an alternate take of “Shave ’Em Dry” that makes most hardcore rap lyrics seem tame. Though these were “private” recordings, bootleg pressings made their way into circulation and eventually were transferred to legitimate albums in more permissive modern times. Bogan, however, had already long been a favorite among blues collectors and historians for the depth of her talent and recorded repertoire, and was a significant artist in the blues market of the 1920s and ‘30s. She lacked the name recognition of some of her contemporaries because most of her records were released under the pseudonym, Bessie Jackson. Some of her songs embodied controversial themes including prostitution, lesbianism, and—since most were recorded during prohibition—drinking. Some veteran researchers doubt that she lived the rough street life she sometimes sang about, but her lyrics did reflect a familiarity with the underside of polite society. Bogan’s 1923-1935 recordings for OKeh, Paramount, Brunswick, Banner, Melotone, and other labels featured various notable accompanists including Will Ezell, Tampa Red, and Walter Roland. Among her influential records that survived via later artists were the first version of “Black Angel Blues” (later recorded by Tampa Red and Robert Nighthawk, and by B.B. King as “Sweet Little Angel”), “Sloppy Drunk Blues” (Leroy Carr, John Lee “Sonny Boy” Williamson, Jimmy Rogers, and others), and “Tricks Ain’t Walking No More” (Memphis Minnie). Here’s her recording of “Tricks Ain’t Walking No More”: Times done got hard, money's done got scarce Stealin' an' robbin' is goin' to take place 'Cos tricks ain't walkin', tricks ain't walkin' no more I said tricks ain't walkin', tricks ain't walkin' no more An' I'm goin' to rob somebody if I don't make me some dough I'm goin' to learn these walkin' tricks what it's all about I'm goin' to get them in my house and ain't gonna let them out 'Cos tricks ain't walkin', tricks ain't walkin' no more I said tricks ain't walkin', tricks ain't walkin' no more An' I can't make no money, don't care where I go I got up this mornin', with the risin' sun Bin walkin' all day an' I ain't caught a one 'Cos tricks ain't walkin', tricks ain't walkin' no more I said tricks ain't walkin', tricks ain 't walkin' no more x YouTube Video Interestingly enough, Donna Summer’s disco hit about working hard for her money was not about sex work. It was inspired by an encounter with a Black woman who was a restroom attendant. x YouTube Video ‘She Works Hard For The Money’: The Story Behind Donna Summer’s Hit The 1983 single was inspired by an encounter in an unlikely location. “I went to the ladies’ room with my manager [Susan Muneo], and there was a little woman [in there],” Summer explained on US TV show You Write The Songs in 1986. “We peeked around the corner, and there was a little lady sitting there with her head tilted to the side, and she was just gone – she was asleep […] I looked at her, and my heart just filled up with compassion for this lady, and I thought to myself, ‘God, she works hard for the money, cooped up in this stinky little room all night.’” Summer quickly realized she was onto something with that observation, wrote down the future title, and took it to producer Michael Omartian the next day. Together, they came up with the song – the final track to be written for Summer’s 11th studio album. “She works hard for the money, so you’d better treat her right,” the star sang in the chorus and paid tribute to that restroom attendant, Onetta Johnson, in its line: “Onetta there in the corner stand.” Johnson would also be photographed with Summer for the album’s back cover, with both wearing matching waitress outfits. When thinking about Black work songs, one area that has always interested me is the songs about street vendors and their sales cries. This clip is from the Voices in Time channel, which “celebrates the history of American music and culture by presenting archival musical and photographic materials housed in the Library of Congress.” “African American Folk Music (FL): Watermelon Vendor's Street Call” x YouTube Video Labor Day weekend is also a time that folks get together for one last family outdoor gathering and barbecue, and fresh watermelon is always on my Black family’s menu. Herbie Hancock’s “Watermelon Man” has an interesting backstory, detailed in this video from Dave Wave, “The Real Story Behind Herbie Hancock’s Watermelon Man” (which can’t be embedded here, so see YouTube). Los Angeles KCRK radio host Tyler Boudreaux talks about her memories of watermelon men in the Black community and Herbie Hancock’s inspiration, in “Chasing the Watermelon Man.” In the summer of 2023, the jazz-funk groove of Herbie Hancock’s 1973 recording of “Watermelon Man” bounced into my ears and fixed itself on a loop. And it’s actually a reimagination of Herbie’s original version, a hard bop standard from 1962 which you may recognize. Both versions of “Watermelon Man” are highly influential jazz recordings, and they sent ripples of change throughout American music in the 20th century. As a music lover and a DJ, they’re timeless sounds that visit me often, popping up in the hot summertime or when I accidentally blow into an empty beer bottle. It's a rhythm that comes and goes often, like a passing breeze … but this time around, I just couldn’t shake “Watermelon Man.” I was deep in my feelings when I went to Chicago. While I was in town, I paid a visit to my long-distance cousins who live on the South Side. My Chicago family hadn’t seen me since I was a little girl they called Button Nose, and they wanted to host me and celebrate the nomination of my fruit story. I went over to my cousin Sherai Troxler’s house, where all my cousins gathered. And while catching up over cake and mimosas, we captivated each other with fruitful fascinations. Sherai shared that during the long and brutal Chicago winters, she looked forward to the summertime when the family could get together and enjoy a refreshing watermelon. Here's how she recounted it recently: SHERAI TROXLER: Summertime in Chicago is so fleeting that you kinda want to take in everything that's summertime: the heat, the longer days, time out in the park with your family, and watermelon. It just kinda all goes together: barbecues, watermelon, family. Always in the back of my mind is, in July, I'm going to look for the watermelon man, and I'm going to make sure I get watermelons from him all summer. There's something about just getting the watermelons from the watermelon man during that short window of time when we are just enjoying and making the most of that season. I was intrigued by this annual anticipation of the watermelon man, and the needle in my head dropped on Herbie’s “Watermelon Man groove.” I asked her what was so special about the watermelons from the watermelon man, and she shared that it was mainly the nostalgia. Every watermelon season growing up, Sherai remembers going to a watermelon man truck in Chicago with her mother. Here’s Herbie Hancock’s original: x YouTube Video Mongo Santamaria performs it live: x YouTube Video And here’s Jon Hendricks’ version, with his lyrics. x YouTube Video Join me in the comments section below for more, and please post some of your favorites. Enjoy your weekend. 

When President Donald Trump's administration last month awarded a contract worth up to $1.2 billion to build and operate what it says will become the nation’s largest immigration detention complex, it didn’t turn to a large government contractor or even a firm that specializes in private prisons. Instead, it handed the project on a military base to Acquisition Logistics LLC, a small business that has no listed experience running a correction facility and had never won a federal contract worth more than $16 million. The company also lacks a functioning website and lists as its address a modest home in suburban Virginia owned by a 77-year-old retired Navy flight officer. The mystery over the award only deepened last week as the new facility began to accept its first detainees. The Pentagon has refused to release the contract or explain why it selected Acquisition Logistics over a dozen other bidders to build the massive tent camp at Fort Bliss in west Texas. At least one competitor has filed a complaint. The secretive — and brisk — contracting process is emblematic, experts said, of the government’s broader rush to fulfill the Republican president's pledge to arrest and deport an estimated 10 million migrants living in the U.S. without permanent legal status. As part of that push, the government is turning increasingly to the military to handle tasks that had traditionally been left to civilian agencies. A member of Congress who recently toured the camp said she was concerned that such a small and inexperienced firm had been entrusted to build and run a facility expected to house up to 5,000 migrants. “It’s far too easy for standards to slip,” said Rep. Veronica Escobar, a Democrat whose district includes Fort Bliss. “Private facilities far too frequently operate with a profit margin in mind as opposed to a governmental facility.” Attorney Joshua Schnell, who specializes in federal contracting law, said he was troubled that the Trump administration has provided so little information about the facility. “The lack of transparency about this contract leads to legitimate questions about why the Army would award such a large contract to a company without a website or any other publicly available information demonstrating its ability to perform such a complicated project,” he said. Ken A. Wagner, the president and CEO of Acquisition Logistics, did not respond to phone messages or emails. No one answered the door at his three-bedroom house listed as his company’s headquarters. Virginia records list Wagner as an owner of the business, though it's unclear whether he might have partners. Army declines to release contract Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth approved using Fort Bliss for the new detention center, and the administration has hopes to build more at other bases. A spokesperson for the Army declined to discuss its deal with Acquisition Logistics or reveal details about the camp’s construction, citing the litigation over the company’s qualifications. The Department of Homeland Security, which includes U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, declined to answer questions about the detention camp it oversees. Named Camp East Montana for the closest road, the facility is being built in the sand and scrub Chihuahuan Desert, where summertime temperatures can exceed 100 degrees Fahrenheit and heat-related deaths are common. The 60-acre (24-hectare) site is near the U.S.-Mexico border and the El Paso International Airport, a key hub for deportation flights. The camp has drawn comparisons to “Alligator Alcatraz,” a $245 million tent complex erected to hold ICE detainees in the Florida Everglades. That facility has been the subject of complaints about unsanitary conditions and lawsuits. A federal judge recently ordered that facility to be shut down. The vast majority of the roughly 57,000 migrants detained by ICE are housed at private prisons operated by companies like Florida’s Geo Group and Tennessee-based CoreCivic. As those facilities fill up, ICE is also exploring temporary options at military bases in California, New York and Utah. At Fort Bliss, construction began within days of the Army issuing the contract on July 18. Site work began months earlier, before Congress had passed Trump’s big tax and spending cuts bill, which includes a record $45 billion for immigration enforcement. The Defense Department announcement specified only that the Army was financing the initial $232 million for the first 1,000 beds at the complex. Three white tents, each about 810 feet long, have been erected, according to satellite imagery examined by The Associated Press. A half dozen smaller buildings surround them. Related | Alligator Alcatraz 0, Environment 1—for now Setareh Ghandehari, a spokesperson for the advocacy group Detention Watch, said the use of military bases hearkens back to World War II, when Japanese Americans were imprisoned at Army camps including Fort Bliss. She said military facilities are especially prone to abuse and neglect because families and loved ones have difficulty accessing them. “Conditions at all detention facilities are inherently awful,” Ghandehari said. “But when there’s less access and oversight, it creates the potential for even more abuse.” Company will be responsible for security A June 9 solicitation notice for the Fort Bliss project specified the contractor will be responsible for building and operating the detention center, including providing security and medical care. The document also requires strict secrecy, ordering the contractor inform ICE to respond to any calls from members of Congress or the news media. The bidding was open only to small firms such as Acquisition Logistics, which receives preferential status because it's classified as a veteran and Hispanic-owned small disadvantaged business. Though Trump's administration has fought to ban diversity, equity and inclusion programs, federal contracting rules include set-asides for small businesses owned by women or minorities. For a firm to compete for such contracts, at least 51% of it must be owned by people belonging to a federally designated disadvantaged racial or ethnic group. Related | Trump says he wants other states to build migrant detention centers after Florida tour One of the losing bidders, Texas-based Gemini Tech Services, filed a protest challenging the award and the Army’s rushed construction timeline with the U.S. Government Accountability Office, Congress’ independent oversight arm that resolves such disputes. Gemini alleges Acquisition Logistics lacks the experience, staffing and resources to perform the work, according to a person familiar with the complaint who wasn't authorized to discuss the matter and spoke on the condition of anonymity. Acquisition Logistics' past jobs include repairing small boats for the Air Force, providing information technology support to the Defense Department and building temporary offices to aid with immigration enforcement, federal records show. Gemini and its lawyer didn't respond to messages seeking comment. A ruling by the GAO on whether to sustain, dismiss or require corrective action is not expected before November. A legal appeal is also pending with a U.S. federal court in Washington. Schnell, the contracting lawyer, said Acquisitions Logistics may be working with a larger company. Geo Group Inc. and CoreCivic Corp., the nation’s biggest for-profit prison operators, have expressed interest in contracting with the Pentagon to house migrants. In an earnings call this month, Geo Group CEO George Zoley said his company had teamed up with an established Pentagon contractor. Zoley didn't name the company, and Geo Group didn’t respond to repeated requests asking with whom it had partnered. A spokesperson for CoreCivic said it wasn't partnering with Acquisition Logistics or Gemini.

The numbers may grow as the state collects more data. Some districts adopted the plan not for its religious emphasis but for more funding and to better align with teaching requirements. By Jaden Edison for The Texas Tribune More than 300 Texas school districts and charter schools have signaled plans to use a state-developed reading and language arts curriculum that attracted national attention last year for its heavy references to the Bible and Christianity, according to data obtained by The Texas Tribune. That number represents about a quarter of Texas’ 1,207 districts and charters and could still grow before the state publishes official data in the early fall. But the preliminary numbers offer an early glimpse into demand for the elementary school materials narrowly approved by the Republican-dominated State Board of Education in November. The Texas Education Agency asks schools to submit information on the instructional materials they plan to use each year to ensure their compliance with state learning standards. The Tribune obtained data through an open records request on the schools planning to use the TEA’s new Bluebonnet curriculum, which includes the religion-infused reading lessons as well as phonics and math materials. According to the data, about 595 districts and charters signed up as of late June to use at least some parts of the curriculum, and about 317 said they would use the reading lessons. Adoption of the reading curriculum was most prevalent in the Kilgore, Amarillo and Victoria regions; it was least prevalent around Beaumont, Austin and El Paso. The Tribune reached out to over a dozen district officials and school board members to ask them about their decision on whether to adopt the curriculum. Of the districts that do plan to use the reading materials, many said the religious components did not factor into their choice. Their reasons included accessing the additional funding districts qualify for when they opt in; aligning their instruction with what the state expects children to learn; and avoiding punitive measures from the state if students do not perform up to par on Texas’ standardized exams, which could include removal of a district’s superintendent and elected board members. “We struggle financially to meet the needs of our people,” said Stacey Brister, superintendent of the Little Cypress-Mauriceville school district, in rural Southeast Texas. “If they're going to give you additional monies to buy resources that you might not be able to have, then you have to take a serious look at stuff like that.” At least one charter school that the TEA data indicated was planning to use the reading lessons told the Tribune it will not. That charter and another district said they decided against it because they believed the state’s curriculum lacked academic rigor. Related | Separation of church and state keeps getting muddled in MAGAland Switching from one curriculum to another is a significant undertaking, and other schools could be taking a wait-and-see approach before deciding whether to use the state-designed materials. “We wouldn't expect universal uptake within the first few years for any kind of massive shift in policy like this,” said Mary Lynn Pruneda, director of education and workforce policy for the research and advocacy group Texas 2036. The state education agency did not comment on whether the current demand for Bluebonnet’s reading portion matched its expectations. In a statement, it expressed a commitment to supporting any district using instructional materials “aligned to state standards and built based on the best cognitive science” and noted that Bluebonnet successfully went through the State Board of Education’s exhaustive vetting process. “Evidence clearly indicates that high-quality instructional materials lead to increased learning for students and, ultimately, success in the classroom and beyond,” said TEA spokesperson Jake Kobersky. Bluebonnet was approved by a narrow 8-7 majority of the State Board of Education last year, overcoming concerns from religious scholars that the reading lessons favored Christianity over other faith traditions, pushback from advocacy groups that the materials inappropriately prioritized preaching over teaching, and worries from Texans that the curriculum would isolate some students and grant the state too much say in how children learn about religion. As first reported by the Tribune, many had also criticized how the reading materials — which include social studies and historical topics — watered down America’s history of civil rights, racism and slavery. For example, one lesson instructs teachers to tell students that Founding Fathers like George Washington and Thomas Jefferson “realized that slavery was wrong and founded the country so that Americans could be free,” without mentioning they enslaved people. On the religion front, another activity requests that children memorize the order in which the Bible says God created the universe. The American Civil Liberties Union of Texas and other organizations sent a letter to districts earlier this year urging them to avoid the reading materials, saying they would «unlawfully impose a set of religious beliefs upon your students and violate their constitutionally guaranteed right to be free from religious coercion.» The groups suggested a willingness to pursue legal action to stop schools from teaching the curriculum. The Tribune could not reach the ACLU of Texas’ legal team for comment before publication. Supporters of Bluebonnet say the biblical references will provide students with an enhanced understanding of U.S. and world history. They say the materials cover a broad range of faiths and only make references to religion when appropriate. And TEA officials say the curriculum offers students an in-depth, age-appropriate understanding of the abolition of slavery, events like Juneteenth and the Civil Rights Movement, and the contributions of Black Texans. A granite Ten Commandments monument at the Texas Capitol in Austin on May 29. Bluebonnet is free to use. The state believes its scripted teaching format will help ensure educators can spend more time focusing on instruction and less time on planning. It offers an incentive of $60 per student to districts that choose to use it, which can help cover printing costs. The religious references only make up a fraction of the reading curriculum, and using Bluebonnet does not necessarily mean a school plans to teach biblical lessons in their classrooms. They could, for example, ignore any chapters that reference Christianity and other religions. Or they could choose to heavily lean on the biblical lessons while using another curriculum for other teachings. Some districts said their decision to use Bluebonnet had nothing to do with religion. ​​“We don't make it an issue,” said Michael Lee, superintendent of the Booker Independent School District, located in a conservative Christian community in the Texas Panhandle. “If students ask questions, we'll answer them. We're not going to push our own values and beliefs on them in the classroom.” The Booker district instead said it adopted the curriculum because its leaders wanted learning materials that directly aligned with what the state requires students to know — similar to what the district had when it used CSCOPE, a curriculum delivery system that provided lesson plans to Texas schools over a decade ago before lawmakers complained that it contained a so-called anti-American agenda. The roughly 330-student rural district hopes Bluebonnet will offer that alignment and help students perform better on standardized tests. As a school community with a predominantly low-income student body, it also does not want to leave the money that comes with the state curriculum on the table. Bluebonnet is Texas’ version of a curriculum developed by a New York-based publishing company called Amplify, which did not include the biblical materials. Hundreds of districts used Amplify before the state awarded an $84 million contract to another company for revisions to the program, as first reported by the education news organization The 74. The Little Cypress-Mauriceville school district in rural East Texas was one of them. District leaders see Bluebonnet as “just a continuation” of the curriculum they started using about three years ago, with the added bonus of more state funding and an opportunity to align their teachings with state requirements and improve their rating in Texas’ academic accountability system. The schools’ largely conservative community has not raised any concerns with Bluebonnet’s religious components, said Brister, the superintendent. Texas has recently endeavored to expose public school students to more religion, specifically Christianity. In the last legislative session, Republican lawmakers passed bills allowing districts to establish a policy providing students and staff a daily period of prayer or time to read a religious text, requiring that every public school classroom display a poster of the Ten Commandments, and providing $243 million to the state education agency to support schools adopting Bluebonnet. Some districts using Bluebonnet acknowledge that the presence of religion in schools can present difficulties to the teachers wanting to ensure every child in their classroom feels included and represented. Jessica Parker, the K-12 principal and curriculum director in rural West Texas’ Irion County Independent School District, appreciates the funding the district gets for using Bluebonnet and how it helps keep teachers aligned with state requirements. She believes it will be important that teachers review their lessons and identify any aspects that may not resonate well with children. She also encourages her educators to actively inform parents about what’s happening in the classroom. “We don't want to cut things out,” Parker said. “But we will if it is what’s absolutely necessary to avoid trying to portray that we fall in a certain religious line or we fall in a certain political line.” For now, most of the state’s schools will likely continue on without Bluebonnet’s reading lessons. Sandy Denning, an associate superintendent who oversees curriculum for the Keene Independent School District, told the Tribune that Bluebonnet’s reading materials currently do not meet the level of rigor the district wants. She did not point to any specific parts but described the problem as “across the board.” Related | Majority of US adults support religious chaplains in public schools Mackee Mason, chief academic officer for Austin Achieve Public Schools, a charter school network, identified the same concern, adding that the curriculum does not do a good job incorporating phonics or the science of reading, a widely used body of research that focuses on how children learn to read. Both Keene ISD and Austin Achieve plan to use the math portion of the curriculum. Aside from that, Mason said his schools’ predominantly Black and Hispanic parents do not necessarily rely on the state to present history or other important lessons accurately. “If it had some things that were a little ‘meh,’ but it was super rigorous, alright, cool. Let's adopt that and see how we do it,” Mason said, referring to the Bluebonnet reading materials. “But you're doing that, and it's not rigorous enough? We're not going to go that direction.” Disclosure: ACLU Texas and Texas 2036 have been financial supporters of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part by donations from members, foundations, and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters play no role in the Tribune's journalism. Find a complete list of them here.

A cartoon by Clay Jones. Related | Republican has infuriating response to Minneapolis shooting

Injustice for All is a weekly series about how the Trump administration is trying to weaponize the justice system—and the people who are fighting back. Hell yeah, Hunter Biden keeps winning Remember the Hunter Biden laptop guy? John Paul Mac Isaac is the computer repairman who handed a copy of Biden’s hard drive over to Rudy Giuliani, kicking off years of GOP accusations and investigations. Nearly three years ago, in a Trumpy little move, Mac Isaac sued Biden, Sen. Adam Schiff, CNN, and Politico for defaming him, whining that he was falsely smeared as a Russian agent.  But Mac Isaac’s feelings festival came to an end earlier this week when the Delaware Supreme Court upheld a lower court’s dismissal of Mac Isaac’s claims.  Mac Isaac was irate over the following comment Biden made as the laptop story exploded in 2020: There could be a laptop out there that was stolen from me. It could be that I was hacked. It could be that it was the – that it was Russian intelligence. It could be that it was stolen from me. Or that there was a laptop stolen from me. You’ll note that the statement doesn’t name Mac Isaac. It doesn’t mention his store. It doesn’t say a thing about him, but nonetheless, Mac Isaac was pretty sure he was the real victim here. Sure, he’s made a career out of his Hunter Biden notoriety, writing a book about it, going on Fox News podcasts, selling thumb drives of the laptop’s contents, but just imagine his heartbreak at hearing Biden say literally nothing about him at all? Mac Isaac will have to content himself with making money on the right-wing grift circuit instead. Next stop for Hunter? Continuing to laugh at Melania Trump’s threat of a billion-dollar lawsuit. Half a billion dollars in treats is still not enough for Trump Donald Trump ended last week with a $500 billion gift from a New York state appellate court ruling which wiped out his civil fraud penalty for his cute little habit of lying to banks—a thing which is fine and cool and good when Trump does it, but for anyone else is allegedly grounds for termination and prosecution. So Trump and his crime family are appealing his … win. He wants the sanctions in the judgment gone, because he should never ever suffer any consequences. Of course, Trump declared TOTAL VICTORY when the penalty was tossed, which makes slinking off to the court to ask if they’d pretty please also say he didn’t actually commit any fraud even more hilarious.  Jack Smith to Tom Cotton: lol nope Sen. Tom Cotton has always taken his cues from Trump, and makes a vicious little ferret of a sidekick. That’s why the Arkansas lawmaker filed an absolutely unhinged ethics complaint against former special counsel Jack Smith, alleging that Smith violated the Hatch Act by investigating and prosecuting Trump.  It’s so cute when Republicans pretend to care about the Hatch Act, which limits the sort of partisan political activities federal employees may engage in. Here’s a report about 13 senior Trump officials violating the Act during his first term. Here’s a whole congressional hearing about all the violations. Here’s the administration loosening the Hatch Act rules during Trump’s second term so all the goons he’s stuffed into government can wear MAGA hats. Really. Neither Trump nor Cotton can conceive that anyone’s actions are taken honestly, rather than in the cynical, weaselly, bullying way they act. So, Cotton’s ethics complaint framed the totally normal actions Smith took as a prosecutor, such as asking the court for permission to file a longer brief or requesting a trial date, as somehow instead an attempt to influence the 2024 election.  The letter Smith’s attorneys filed in response is blistering, and points out that Cotton’s view of the Hatch Act would mean any politician could avoid prosecution simply by announcing they were running for office—which, come to think of it, is pretty much exactly how it ended up working out for Trump after all. But the mere fact that anyone ever investigated Trump’s open and obvious crimes is, as far as crony Cotton is concerned, the real crime.  Third Circuit to Republicans: lol nope On Tuesday, the Third Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that it is unconstitutional for the state of Pennsylvania to toss mail-in ballots when voters don’t include the correct date on the return envelope. Republicans have been desperately trying to suppress voting in the swing state and are fully-aligned with Trump’s unhinged war on mail-in ballots.  Judge D. Brooks Smith, a George W. Bush appointee, writing for the unanimous three-judge panel, wrote that the date requirement “imposes a burden on Pennsylvanians’ constitutional right to vote” and “culminates in county election boards discarding thousands of ballots each time an election is held. The date requirement will not protect against the vast majority of attempts at voter fraud.” Tell that to the weirdo election denier from Pennsylvania who just landed an administration job thanks to her election conspiracy bona fides. She’s gotta be incandescent with rage.  Trump judge lets Trump do what Trump wants, as per usual U.S. District Judge Lance Walker, a Trump appointee, helped the administration kick in the teeth of a network of Maine clinics that provide health care to low-income residents in the state. The clinics are a casualty of the GOP’s war on Planned Parenthood, with the One Big Beautiful Bill blocking all Medicaid funding to any clinic that provides abortions—despite, of course, the fact that the Hyde Amendment has barred federal Medicaid funding for abortions for decades. So, too bad, low-income people in Maine who need other health care services like birth control. It’s not so much that Walker ruled against the clinics, but what he said when he did it. He declared that it would be a “special kind of judicial hubris” to defy the “big beautiful bill.” Man, show some dignity and at least pretend you understand your role in the ever-eroding system of checks and balances. Caping like this is just embarrassing. 

As President Donald Trump continues to play fantasy dictator, ruining lives and threatening U.S. democracy, Democratic leaders have finally started hitting back—hard.  And it’s all on video! Watch Newsom troll the sh-t out of Trump with real crime statistics x x YouTube Video California Gov. Gavin Newsom will not stop trolling Trump—with facts. During a press conference on public safety last week, Newsom offered the president some important crime statistics he seems to have overlooked. 'A bunch of sh-t': Walz spits fire against Trump's petty tyranny x x YouTube Video Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz didn’t mince words on Aug. 25 at the Democratic National Convention’s summer meeting in Minneapolis, taking aim at the deterioration of the country under Trump.  Trump gets a ridiculous badge for turning DC into a police state x x YouTube Video Trump received a made-for-TV honorific for turning Washington into a police state on Aug. 25, with U.S. Marshals Service Director Gadyaces Serralta presenting him with an honorary marshal’s badge.  Watch this Trump Cabinet meeting devolve into ass-kissing assembly x x YouTube Video Trump held one of his cult-of-personality Cabinet meetings on Aug. 26, which quickly devolved into a session of his minions lathering him up with obsequious praise. Trump says he can do 'anything' he wants x x YouTube Video Trump went full dictator on Aug. 26 when he was asked about Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker's rejection of federal troops that are set to be deployed to Chicago. Republican has infuriating response to Minneapolis shooting x x YouTube Video Fox News pundit and former GOP Rep. Trey Gowdy of South Carolina, whose time in Congress was spent shilling for the pro-gun National Rifle Association, continues making excuses for a gun-obsessed society following the Aug. 27 mass shooting in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Another week, another ceaseless attack on U.S. democracy from Republicans. At least democrats are finally starting to fight back. For more video content, check out Daily Kos on YouTube.

A cartoon by Clay Bennett. Related | Republican has infuriating response to Minneapolis shooting

The past few weeks of conservative politics have been jam-packed with demonstrations of fear and cowardice, poking holes in their facade as tough guys (and gals). For instance, senior White House aide Stephen Miller took a break from creating policies meant to hurt immigrants and appeared in the Oval Office, alongside President Donald Trump, to inform the world how afraid he is of parks in Washington, D.C. Praising Trump’s installation of federal law enforcement and National Guard members in the nation’s capital, Miller explained, “For the first time in their lives, they can use the parks, they can walk on the streets. You have people who can walk freely at night without having to worry about being robbed or mugged. They are wearing their watches again.” x x YouTube Video Every year, millions of people visit Washington and have no problem with the parks. Little babies are fine there. People wear watches. Trump’s deployment to the city has been a serious affront to locals, particularly the city’s large Black population, but it has also exposed a falsehood at the center of Republican fearmongering. The National Guard on the ground is largely focusing on trash pickup and responding to traffic accidents, despite the administration’s apocalyptic rhetoric. The most high-profile crime the deployment has handled so far is a sandwich thrower they couldn’t convince a grand jury to indict. The right has a lot invested in their image as the strongest people in American politics. From MAGA red hats to George W. Bush fanboys wearing cowboy hats, the conservative movement has embraced “macho” as its aesthetic for decades. But more often than not they have been utter cowards, displaying weakness on a host of issues facing Americans. Then-President Ronald Reagan, shown in 1987. For instance, when the AIDS/HIV crisis began to haunt the country in the 1980s, then-President Ronald Reagan did not confront the problem directly. Because the disease first surfaced in the LGBTQ+ community, and that was where a majority of the deaths initially occurred, Reagan ignored the problem. Behind closed doors, his team laughed at the tragedy. In public, he would barely say a word, refusing to have the courage to exhibit basic compassion and humanity for his fellow Americans because they were gay. The religious right also embraced homophobia, attacking LGBTQ+ people for the purported sin of their existence. One of the most prominent bigots in the movement was Rev. Jerry Falwell, a key ally of the Republican Party who whipped up a homophobic frenzy while pushing to deliver votes for the party. But Falwell was a coward. In 1991, after being confronted by counterprotesters, Falwell whined to the Los Angeles Times, “Everyone in the hotel was frightened. I think they intended to do me harm.” A decade later, Falwell (and fellow coward Pat Robertson) was busy blaming the 9/11 terrorist attacks on gay people, abortion, and feminists. Former President George W. Bush, on whose watch 9/11 happened, loved to embrace the tough-guy aesthetic. He posed in a cowboy hat on his ranch and described al-Qaida terrorists as “evildoers.” But same-sex marriage terrified him. Bush was so afraid of people entering into matrimony that, in 2004, he backed a constitutional amendment that would restrict marriage rights to opposite-sex couples. He described it as a “serious matter of national concern.” In right-wing media, Bill O’Reilly, then a host on Fox News, issued serious warnings to his viewers that legal same sex marriage would lead to weddings with dolphins, goats, turtles, and other animals. Then-candidate George W. Bush tries on a cowboy hat in St. Louis, in October 2000. Years later, when the Supreme Court legalized same-sex marriage, the only “serious matter” has been the size and scope of wedding cakes. Bush was also at the forefront of sharing his fear with the public. His administration pushed a color-coded terrorism alert system. It was a manifestation of cowardice that permeated his administration, leaving the capture of 9/11 mastermind Osama bin Laden to his successor, President Barack Obama. Bush’s signature policy—the disastrous invasion of Iraq—was about fear of al-Qaida and their nonexistent alliance with the Iraqi regime of Saddam Hussein. The conservative National Rifle Association echoed Bush-style cowardice more than a decade later, telling their supporters in 2014 that they needed guns because militants from the Islamic State group, commonly known as ISIS, could be outside their homes. Trump’s cowardice has been on display for his entire career as a political figure. He launched his first presidential campaign by talking about his fear of Mexican immigrants, citing the absurd need for a border wall to protect against them. There seems to be nothing Trump is more afraid of than brown-skinned people, especially if that person is former President Barack Obama. Trump still invokes Obama as a boogeyman more than eight years after the Democrat left office. More recently, attempting to bolster Trump’s actions against D.C., Republican Rep. Tim Burchett of Tennessee claimed he sleeps in his office because he’s so afraid of Washington residents. Oklahoma Sen. Markwayne Mullin bragged that he breaks local laws and doesn’t drive with a seatbelt in D.C., because he’s supposedly living in constant terror of being carjacked. Armed members of the South Carolina National Guard talk with a man outside of Union Station in Washington on Aug. 24. Conservatism is about tearing things down, not building them up. The movement would rather spread wild fantasies about American cities as urban hellscapes instead of admitting that cities have been at the forefront of American innovation on several community-oriented issues. The right could look at these policies and leaders and come up with ways to implement them in rural and suburban areas, but they’re too afraid to admit that their ideas simply haven’t worked. This is a big reason why they embrace fear and cowardice. Demonizing the other has always been the easy way out. Denigrating human beings, using the power of the state to shut down outside ideas and voices—that’s what cowards do. And that’s what the conservative movement, from Trump at the top and all the way down, does every day of its existence.

The DOJ’s Civil Rights Division had brought lawsuits accusing Louisiana of confining prisoners longer than they should and South Carolina of keeping mentally ill people in unreasonably restrictive group homes. Both cases are now on hold. By Corey G. Johnson for ProPublica The Trump administration has halted litigation aimed at stopping civil rights abuses of prisoners in Louisiana and mentally ill people living in South Carolina group homes. The Biden administration filed lawsuits against the two states in December after Department of Justice investigations concluded that they had failed to fix violations despite years of warnings. Louisiana’s prison system has kept thousands of incarcerated people behind bars for weeks, months or sometimes more than a year after they were supposed to be released, records show. And the DOJ accused South Carolina of institutionalizing thousands of people diagnosed with serious mental illnesses — sometimes for decades — rather than provide services that would allow them to live in less restricted settings, as is their right under federal law. Federal judges temporarily suspended the lawsuits in February at the request of the states and with the support of the DOJ. Related | The Justice Department has turned into a raging dumpster fire under Trump Civil rights lawyers who have monitored the cases said the move is another sign of the Trump administration’s retreat from the department’s mission of protecting the rights of vulnerable groups. Since January, President Donald Trump’s DOJ has dropped racial discrimination lawsuits, abandoned investigations of police misconduct and canceled oversight of troubled law enforcement agencies. “This administration has been very aggressive in rolling back any kind of civil rights reforms or advancements,” said Anya Bidwell, senior attorney at the public-interest law firm Institute for Justice. “It’s unquestionably disappointing.” The cases against Louisiana and South Carolina were brought by a unit of the DOJ’s Civil Rights Division tasked with enforcing laws that guarantee religious freedom, access to reproductive health services, constitutional policing, and the rights of people in state and local institutions, including jails, prisons and health care facilities for people with disabilities. The unit, the Special Litigation Section, has seen a dramatic reduction in lawyers since Trump took office in January. Court records show at least seven attorneys working on the lawsuits against Louisiana and South Carolina are no longer with the DOJ. The section had more than 90 employees at the start of the year, including about 60 front-line attorneys. By June, it had about 25, including around 15 front-line lawyers, according to a source familiar with its operation. Sources said some were reassigned to other areas of the department while others quit in protest against the direction of the office under Trump, found new jobs or took early retirement. Similar departures have been seen throughout the DOJ. Related | Justice Department smothers Biden-era police reform deals The exodus will hamper its ability to carry out essential functions, such as battling sexual harassment in housing, discrimination against disabled people, and the improper use of restraints and seclusions against students in schools, said Omar Noureldin, a former senior attorney in the Civil Rights Division and President Joe Biden appointee who left in January. “Regardless of your political leanings, I think most people would agree these are the kind of bad situations that should be addressed by the nation’s top civil rights enforcer,” Noureldin said. A department spokesperson declined to comment in response to questions from ProPublica about the Louisiana and South Carolina cases. Sources familiar with the lawsuits said Trump appointees have told DOJ lawyers handling the cases that they want to resolve matters out of court. The federal government has used settlement talks in the past to hammer out consent decrees, agreements that set a list of requirements to fix civil rights violations and are overseen by an outside monitor and federal judge to ensure compliance. But Assistant Attorney General Harmeet K. Dhillon, Trump’s appointee to run the DOJ’s civil rights division, has made no secret of her distaste for such measures. Donald Trump is greeted by Harmeet Dhillon in Sept. 2019 as he arrives for a fundraiser in Mountain View, Calif. In May, Dhillon announced she was moving to dismiss efforts to impose consent decrees on the Louisville, Kentucky, and Minneapolis police departments. She complained that consent decrees turn local control of policing over to “unelected and unaccountable bureaucrats.” A DOJ investigation in the wake of the 2020 murder of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer accused the department of excessive force, unjustified shootings, and discrimination against Black and Native American people. The agency issued similar findings against the Louisville Metro Police Department after the high-profile killing of Breonna Taylor, who was shot in 2020 when officers forced their way into her home to execute a search warrant. Noureldin, now a senior vice president at the government watchdog group Common Cause, said consent decrees provide an important level of oversight by an independent judge. By contrast, out-of-court settlements can be subject to the political whims of a new administration, which can decide to drop a case or end an agreement despite evidence of continuing constitutional violations. “When you have a consent decree or a court-enforced settlement, the Justice Department can’t unilaterally just withdraw from the agreement,” Noureldin said. “A federal judge would have to agree that the public interest is served by terminating that settlement.” “I Lost Everything” In the case of Louisiana, the Justice Department issued a scathing report in January 2023 about the state confining prisoners beyond their sentences. The problems dated back more than a decade and remained widespread, the report said. Between January and April 2022 alone, more than a quarter of everyone released from prison custody was held past their release dates. Of those, 24% spent an additional 90 days or more behind bars, the DOJ found. Among those held longer than they should have been was Robert Parker, a disc jockey known as “DJ Rob” in New Orleans, where he played R&B and hip-hop music at weddings and private parties. Parker, 55, was arrested in late 2016 after violating a restraining order brought by a former girlfriend. He was supposed to be released in October 2017, but a prison staffer mistakenly classified him as a sex offender. That meant he was required to provide prison authorities with two addresses where he could stay that complied with sex offender registry rules. Prison documents show Parker repeatedly told authorities that he wasn’t a sex offender and pleaded to speak to the warden to clear up the mistake. But nobody acted until a deputy public defender contacted state officials months later to complain. By the time he walked out, Parker had spent 337 extra days behind bars. During that period, he said, his car was repossessed, his mother died and his reputation was ruined. “I lost everything,” he told ProPublica in an interview from a nursing home, where he was recovering from a stroke. “I’m ready to get away from Louisiana.” Louisiana’s detention system is complex. Unlike other jurisdictions, where the convicted are housed in state facilities, inmates in Louisiana can be held in local jails overseen by sheriffs. A major contributor to the so-called over-detentions was poor communication among Louisiana’s court clerks, sheriff’s offices and the state department of corrections, according to interviews with attorneys, depositions of state officials, and reports from state and federal reviews of the prison system. Related | Red states are embracing all the evil policies of Trump Until recently, the agencies shared prisoner sentencing information by shuttling stacks of paperwork by van or truck from the court to the sheriff’s office for the parish holding the prisoner, then to corrections officials. The document transfers, which often crisscrossed the state, typically happened only once a week. When the records finally arrived, it could take staff a month or longer to enter the data into computers, creating more delays. In addition, staff made data errors when calculating release dates. Two years ago, The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled Parker could pursue a lawsuit against the former head of the Louisiana Department of Public Safety and Corrections, James LeBlanc. That lawsuit is ongoing, said Parker’s attorney, Jonathan Rhodes. LeBlanc, who resigned last year, could not be reached for comment, and his attorneys did not respond to requests for comment. In a statement, Louisiana Attorney General Liz Murrill acknowledged that the state’s process to determine release dates was unreliable but said the issue had been overblown by the Justice Department’s investigation, which she called “factually incorrect.” “There were simply parts of it that are outside state control, such as clerks & courts,” Murrill stated. Murrill said correction officials have been working with local officials to ensure prisoner releases are computed in a “timely and correct fashion.” Louisiana officials point to a new website that allows electronic sharing of information among the various agencies. “The system has been overhauled. That has dramatically diminished, if not completely eliminated this problem,” Murrill stated. She did not address questions from ProPublica asking if prisoners were being held longer than their release dates this year. Local attorneys who are handling lawsuits against the state expressed skepticism about Murrill’s claims. William Most, an attorney who filed a class-action lawsuit on behalf of incarcerated people who had been detained past their release dates, noted that as late as May 2024, 141 people who were released that month had been kept longer than they should have been, 120 of them for more than 30 days. “I have seen no evidence suggesting the problem in Louisiana is fixed,” Most said. “And it seems unwise to dismiss any cases while that’s the situation.” Trapped in Group Homes South Carolina’s mentally ill population is grappling with similar challenges. After years of lawsuits and complaints, a DOJ investigation determined that officials illegally denied community-based services — required by the Americans with Disabilities Act and a 1999 Supreme Court decision — to over 1,000 people diagnosed as seriously mentally ill. Instead, the state placed them in group homes that failed to provide adequate care and were overly restrictive, the department alleged. The DOJ report didn’t address why the state relied so heavily on group homes. It noted that South Carolina’s own goals and plans called for increasing community-based services to help more people live independently. But the investigation concluded that the availability of community-based services varied widely across the state, leaving people in some areas with no access. And the DOJ said the state’s rules for deciding when someone could leave were too stringent. South Carolina funds and oversees more than 400 facilities that serve people with serious mental illness, according to a state affidavit. Kimberly Tissot, president of the disability rights group Able South Carolina, said it was common for disabled adults who were living successfully on their own to be involuntarily committed to an adult group home simply because they visited a hospital to pick up medicine. Tissot, who has inspected hundreds of the adult facilities, said they often are roach-infested, soaked in urine, lacking in adequate medicine and staffed by untrained employees. Her description mirrors the findings of several state and independent investigations. In some group homes, patients weren’t allowed to leave or freely move around. Subsequently, their mental health would deteriorate, Tissot said. “We have had people die in these facilities because of the conditions,” said Tissot, who worked closely with the DOJ investigators. Scores of sexual abuse incidents, assaults and deaths in such group homes have been reported to the state, according to a 2022 federal report that faulted South Carolina’s oversight. South Carolina has been on notice about the difficulties since 2016 but didn’t make sufficient progress, the DOJ alleged in its lawsuit filed in December. After two years of failed attempts, state lawmakers passed a law in April that consolidated services for disabled people into a new agency responsible for expanding access to home and community-based treatments and for ensuring compliance with federal laws. South Carolina’s attorney general, Alan Wilson, has argued in the DOJ’s lawsuit that the state has been providing necessary services and has not been violating people’s constitutional rights. In January, his office asked the court for a delay in the case to give the Trump administration enough time to determine how to proceed. His office and a spokesperson for the South Carolina Department of Behavioral Health and Developmental Disabilities declined to comment, citing the ongoing DOJ lawsuit. Tissot credits the federal attention with creating a sense of urgency among state lawmakers to make improvements. While she said she is pleased with the latest progress, she warned that if the DOJ dropped the case, it would undermine the enforcement of disabled people’s civil rights and allow state abuses to continue. “It would signal that systemic discrimination will go unchecked and embolden institutional providers to resist change,” Tissot said. “Most importantly, it abandons the people directly impacted.”

A cartoon by Clay Jones. Related | Trump has Epstein files on the brain as presser goes off the rails

Injustice for All is a weekly series about how the Trump administration is trying to weaponize the justice system—and the people who are fighting back. Eighth Circuit keeps vying to be the worst circuit For years now, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals has been known as the most conservative appeals court in the country. But with 11 of its 12 members being GOP appointees, the Eighth Circuit is making a run for the title. This time around, it’s holding that private citizens and groups cannot sue under the Voting Rights Act for disability-based discrimination. Instead, only state attorneys general can sue to enforce the Voting Rights Act. This follows on the heels of a 2023 decision from the same court saying that there was no private right of action under Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, which prohibits racially based gerrymandering.   While this might sound arcane, what it means is that groups like the NAACP could no longer sue to challenge a redistricting decision, or a disability advocacy group could not sue over laws that restricted their access to voting. If only state attorneys general can do it, you’re just guaranteed that conservative attorneys general are never going to sue to enforce the civil rights of voters in their state when they agree with the restrictions passed by the state legislature. The federal courts have been relentlessly chipping away at the Voting Rights Act for years. And everyone knows that Chief Justice John Roberts is no fan of the law. It’s going to be hard to watch decades of progress being unwound.  Democrats sue DHS over law that says exactly what it says  Twelve Democratic members of Congress have been forced to sue the Department of Homeland Security over its restrictions on access to immigration detention facilities. Though Trump signed the 2019 law explicitly allowing members of Congress to inspect Immigration and Customs Enforcement facilities without prior notice, DHS has provided “guidance” that says just the opposite.  First, the policy stated that members of Congress had to provide 72 business hours’ notice to visit and 24 hours’ notice before entering a detention facility. The administration later bumped that visit notice requirement to seven days.  Detainees walk toward a fenced recreation area during a media tour at the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention facility in Tacoma, Washington. The explanation for defying the law is the same one that the administration always offers, which is that no one can stop the president from doing whatever he wants. Per Tricia McLaughlin, DHS assistant secretary for public affairs, “Requests should be made with sufficient time to prevent interference with the President's Article II authority to oversee executive department functions—a week is sufficient to ensure no intrusion on the President's constitutional authority.” This stance, of course, means that Congress can never pass any law that in any way affects the executive branch, which is a very … interesting … view of the separation of powers. Now, as with so many other things these days, the only way that the law will be enforced is if someone can successfully sue the Trump administration, a thing which is less and less likely with a Supreme Court that really loves to give Trump his way.  Eric Tung is the perfect example of a second-term Trump judicial pick, and that’s not a compliment  Trump has tapped Eric Tung for a lifetime seat on the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. Tung brings the qualifications we’ve come to expect from a Trump judicial nomination, which is to say that he has never been a judge, has never served as lead counsel on a case, has never tried a case to verdict, and has spent about 10% of his time on criminal cases. Well, it’s not like the Ninth Circuit hears a lot of criminal cases. Oh, wait.  Tung wasn’t selected for having any relevant experience, though. He was selected for his worldview. Tung clerked for Justices Antonin Scalia and Brett Kavanaugh, then took a job at  Jones Day, the law firm that is a breeding ground for hard-right lawyers. He hates unions, doesn’t believe there is a constitutional right to same-sex marriage, and thinks striving for racial equity is bad.  He has a history of misogynistic remarks complaining about “radical feminists try[ing] to blur gender roles, but refused to answer questions about that during his confirmation hearing. His logic? Because things like gender roles are “the subject of wide debate,” and therefore as a nominee, “I cannot answer under judicial canons.” He also wouldn’t answer questions about whether a minor who is sexually assaulted or the victim of incest should be forced to give birth.  Given that the Senate Republicans confirmed Emil Bove, the former Trump criminal defense lawyer who told DOJ attorneys they should disobey court orders, Tung is a shoo-in.  Another court order broken. Weird how that keeps happening Judge Royce Lamberth told Trump officials on Wednesday it was likely the administration violated his order to restore news programming at Voice of America. He also said they are violating numerous other statutory provisions, provided misleading info to the court, and flip-flopped in sworn declarations. So, business as usual for the administration, basically. Can’t wait to hear how Lamberth is a wild-eyed commie as opposed to an 82-year-old Reagan appointee. Administration does nomination shenanigans for not one, not two, but three U.S. attorneys The administration has a problem. Trump keeps tapping objectively unqualified people to serve as U.S. attorneys, people so unqualified he knows they won’t get through the Senate, which is saying something, given this Senate. So, the administration has to stitch together various types of temporary appointments that don’t require Senate confirmation, nor the approval of the judges in the district.  Alina Habba That’s why Alina Habba, one of Trump’s numerous personal attorneys, is now the acting U.S. attorney, which doesn’t require confirmation and allows her to serve for 210 more days. Same thing for Bill Essayli, who is now the acting U.S. attorney for the Central District of California for another 210 days, even though the district’s judges declined to name him to the post.  Enter Sigal Chattah, who is only hanging onto the U.S. attorney job in Nevada because Trump was willing to do the same thing he did for Habba and Essayli—roll her expiring interim job into an acting job, so she gets, you guessed it, 210 more days. It’s unknown whether the Nevada judges would have rejected Chattah as they did with Habba and Essayli, as Trump changed her status before that happened.  But it’s not like Chattah is a stellar candidate. She’s an election denier who, when running for Nevada attorney general in 2022, said her Black opponent “should be hanging” from a crane, which she insists is not actually racist to say. She also doesn’t appear to have any background in criminal law, but she did represent conservative churches that didn’t want to observe COVID-19 restrictions, which is what counts for qualifications these days.

You must watch Buttigieg break down Trump’s massive Epstein problem x x YouTube Video Former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg clearly articulated why he believed the Trump administration’s refusal to release its files on accused sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein poses a political risk greater than that of Trump’s Medicaid-slashing “One Big Beautiful Bill.” Scots torment Trump on taxpayer-funded trip to his crappy golf courses x x YouTube Video Trump took a taxpayer-funded trip to Scotland, where he visited two of his golf properties, seemingly cheated on the links, and the Scots were not pleased, greeting him with protests and efforts to obstruct his media appearances. And when reporters pressed him about his relationship with Epstein, Trump said he never had the “privilege” of visiting the convicted sex offender’s private island, where he allegedly abused underaged girls. x x YouTube Video Watch Cory Booker's fiery 'wake-up call' for his fellow Democrats x x YouTube Video Sen. Cory Booker of New Jersey called out his fellow Democrats, arguing that advancing a policing bill without proper scrutiny amounted to complicity in Trump’s anti-constitutional agenda. Trump has Epstein files on the brain as presser goes off the rails x x YouTube Video Trump couldn’t keep Epstein off his mind during a recent press conference, whiffing a softball question and veering into a rant about his own administration’s inability to release its files on Epstein. You'll never believe why Trump claims 'Obama owes me big' x x YouTube Video Before he jetted off to Scotland for his little golfing trip, Trump was asked whether the Supreme Court’s presidential-immunity decision applies to former President Barack Obama, whom Trump has baselessly accused of treason as the president attempts to distract the public from the ongoing Epstein scandal.  It’s been yet another chaotic week of Republican incompetence, and unfortunately, there are no signs they’ll learn from their mistakes anytime soon. For more video content, please check out Daily Kos on YouTube.

Climate scientist Michael Mann called the report “a deeply misleading antiscientific narrative, built on deceptive arguments, misrepresented datasets, and distortion of actual scientific understanding.” By Dennis Pillion for Inside Climate News Several top climate scientists are weighing how to respond to a new climate report issued by the Trump administration that they are calling “deceptive,” “cherry-picked,” and “antiscientific.” The U.S. Department of Energy released a 150-page report Tuesday titled “A Critical Review of Impacts of Greenhouse Gas Emissions on the U.S. Climate,” which argues that human-caused climate change “appears to be less damaging economically than commonly believed,” and “aggressive mitigation strategies could be more harmful than beneficial.” That flies in the face of most published scientific research on the topic, as gathered in the most recent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change assessment, the European Climate Risk Assessment, and the U.S. Government’s own Fifth National Climate Assessment, issued last year during the Biden administration. The DOE report states “the growing amount of CO2 in the atmosphere directly influences the earth system by promoting plant growth (global greening), thereby enhancing agricultural yields, and by neutralizing ocean alkalinity,” another way of saying ocean acidification. x Datawrapper Content NOAA’s page on ocean acidification states that lowering the pH of seawater makes it more difficult for animals like clams, oysters, corals and plankton to build and maintain their shells. The report then argues that climate model projections are overstating the risks from sea level rise and extreme weather events, and that efforts to decrease greenhouse gas emissions would have little impact. “The risks and benefits of a climate changing under both natural and human influences must be weighed against the costs, efficacy, and collateral impacts of any ‘climate action’, considering the nation’s need for reliable and affordable energy with minimal local pollution,” the report states in its conclusion. Michael Mann, director of the University of Pennsylvania’s Center for Science, Sustainability and the Media, told Inside Climate News that the Trump administration report was typical of the relatively small number of scientists who deny the seriousness of climate change. ”All they’ve done is recycle shopworn, discredited climate denier arguments,” Mann said in an email. “They constructed a deeply misleading antiscientific narrative, built on deceptive arguments, misrepresented datasets, and distortion of actual scientific understanding. Then they dressed it up with dubious graphics composed of selective, cherry-picked data. “There is nothing scientific about this report whatsoever.” Related | Climate change helped fuel heavy rains that led to devastating Texas flood The report does open a 30-day public comment period, in which the Department of Energy says it is “seeking input from the public, especially from interested individuals and entities, such as industry, academia, research laboratories, government agencies, and other stakeholders.” Texas A&M climate scientist Andrew Dessler, who criticized the report extensively on social media, told Inside Climate News it’s important for mainstream climate scientists to participate even if the Trump administration seems unlikely to listen. “Many people I’ve spoken to recognize the need for a coherent response,” Dessler said in an email. “I think it’s important because this will certainly be litigated, and anything that is put out there could be used in the litigation. “There is no coordinated structure right now [to respond], but I’m hoping one comes together. The stakes on this are very high.” A spokesman for the Department of Energy said the department will “look forward to engaging with substantive comments,” after the comment period ends. “This report critically assesses many areas of ongoing scientific inquiry that are frequently assigned high levels of confidence—not by the scientists themselves but by the political bodies involved, such as the United Nations or previous Presidential administrations,” the spokesman said. “Unlike previous administrations, the Trump administration is committed to engaging in a more thoughtful and science-based conversation about climate change and energy.” Related | Trump issues executive order targeting 'unreliable' clean energy options Ben Sanderson, research director at the CICERO Centre for International Climate Research in Oslo, Norway, posted a thread critiquing the report. “Each chapter follows the same pattern,” Sanderson posted on Bluesky. “Establish a contrarian position, cherry pick evidence to support that position, then claim that this position is under-represented in climate literature and the IPCC in particular. Include a bunch of references, most of which don’t support the central argument.” Sanderson highlighted examples, such as the report’s claims of “global greening” and increased crop yields, for which the authors ignored impacts such as heat stress, increased drought, and nutrient limitations, which the IPCC factored in to determine that more atmospheric CO2 would have a negative impact on food security. Sanderson said the researchers had pointed to a flat number of fire ignitions in the U.S., “omitting that burned area, severity and persistence have all exceeded records.” “This is not a systematic or complete assessment of the report,” Sanderson posted. “But even a brief read is enough to understand what it’s doing—it’s selectively isolating particular studies and data to support the narrative that climate is less severe than assessed, whilst ignoring a much wider body of literature.” A “Red Team” Assembles The report relied on the Department of Energy’s new Climate Working Group consisting of five of the most prominent climate contrarians: John Christy, Judith Curry, Steven Koonin, Ross McKitrick and Roy Spencer. “The authors of this report are widely recognized contrarians who don’t represent the mainstream scientific consensus,” Dessler posted on social media. “If almost any other group of scientists had been chosen, the report would have been dramatically different. “The only way to get this report was to pick these authors,” Dessler said. A spokesperson for the Department of Energy said in an email that the department “intentionally selected individuals with expertise in climate and atmospheric science, economics, physical science, and academic research.” “The five experts represent diverse viewpoints and political backgrounds and are all well-respected and highly credentialed individuals,” the spokesperson said. x Datawrapper Content Energy Secretary Chris Wright, a former oil company executive, said in the report’s forward that he had not chosen the members because they would agree with him. “I didn’t select these authors because we always agree—far from it,” Wright said in the forward. “In fact, they may not always agree with each other. But I chose them for their rigor, honesty, and willingness to elevate the debate.” What the points of disagreement may be are unclear, but there are many connections among the five. Christy and Spencer have been a research team publishing together for decades at the University of Alabama in Huntsville. Curry and Christy both testified in front of Congress on multiple occasions to advocate for a “red team” approach to climate science, seeking funding for research to challenge the scientific consensus. Koonin wrote an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal advocating for the same. Christy and McKitrick have published multiple papers together challenging the accuracy of climate models. Mann said that the report does not break new ground and merely gives a larger audience to fringe voices in the climate science community. “It’s the usual mix of untruths, half-truths, and discredited if seemingly plausible claims we’ve come to expect from professional climate deniers and those who platform them,” Mann said. Climate Denial Is Now Trump’s Official Policy The report is one in a series of actions by the Trump administration to undermine climate science, regulations and mitigation efforts. It was issued the same day the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency announced plans to revoke the agency’s “endangerment finding” on greenhouse gases, setting the stage for the federal government to cease regulating climate-warming emissions. “With this decision, climate change denial is now the official policy of the U.S. government,” science historian and author Naomi Oreskes said in an email. Dessler, from Texas A&M, said the report produced was more like a legal brief defending its client, carbon dioxide, than a scientific report, highlighting only the evidence that strengthens their case and ignoring the rest. “Scientists are obligated to engage with the full range of evidence, especially that which might contradict their hypothesis,” Dessler said on social media. “Ignoring contrary data is not just bad practice, in some cases it can rise to the level of scientific misconduct.” Mann said the administration’s actions will harm climate science moving forward. “Since actual scientific consensus behind human-caused climate change is both irrefutable and problematic to their fossil fuel agenda, the administration has chosen to simply reject the scientific consensus, defund the actual science, and literally stop the measurements from taking place,” he said. “Not since Stalin and Soviet Lysenkoism have we seen such a brazen effort to misrepresent science in service of an ideological agenda.”

President Donald Trump responded to a reporter’s question about Friday’s jobs report, which showed a terrifying slowdown in job creation, by claiming it was fabricated by bad actors in the Bureau of Labor Statistics in order to make him look bad.  “Why should anybody trust numbers?” Trump said before launching into a semi-coherent and fictional story about election interference by the BLS. “You go back to Election—Election Day. Look what happened two or three days before with massive wonderful job numbers, trying to get him elected or her elected, trying to get whoever the hell was running—because you go back and they came out with numbers that were very favorable to Kamala, okay. Trying to get him—trying to get her elected. And then on the 15th of November or thereabouts, they had it 8[00] or 900,000 overstatement reduction right after the election. It didn't work because you know who won, John? I won.” x x YouTube Video Trump’s convoluted claim is absolutely false. The “[800] or 900,000 overstatement reduction” he is yammering about was a preliminary downward revision (by 818,000) of job estimates that the BLS announced on Aug. 21, 2024—months before the election. The finalized revision, released in February 2025, was 589,000 fewer jobs—not 900,000, and certainly not part of a plot to elect Kamala Harris. Related | New jobs numbers hint at Great Recession 2.0 Because facts are not Trump’s friend, he fired BLS Commissioner Erika McEntarfer on Friday after the woeful jobs report was released. Going forward, Trump will likely rant away and spew fabricated facts to make himself feel better whenever bad economic news rears its head.

A cartoon by Brian McFadden. Follow me on Mastodon, Bluesky, Patreon, or at my website. Related | Inside the Trump administration's deranged push to power AI with dirty energy

A daily roundup of the best stories and cartoons by Daily Kos staff and contributors to keep you in the know. Thanks, Trump: Stock market tanks amid new tariffs and crappy jobs report So. Much. Winning. Reporter speaks out about why The Washington Post is bleeding talent Yet owner Jeff Bezos keeps bending the knee to Donald Trump. Trump seeks to leave his gold-plated stain on the White House Let them eat cake, indeed. Cartoon: 90 denials in 90 days The president doth protest too much, methinks. Here’s how the Supreme Court is helping Trump put judges at risk The chief justice keeps looking the other way—and the consequences could be deadly. New jobs numbers hint at Great Recession 2.0 The last three jobs reports are the weakest since the COVID-19 crisis Click here to see more cartoons.