politics

Summary

At a Wisconsin rally, Elon Musk complained about personal attacks and financial losses tied to his role as head of the DOGE.

He insisted he’s not stealing from Social Security, saying it’s actually costing him money—citing Tesla stock’s sharp drop.

Musk whined about Governor Tim Walz mocking the stock’s decline, calling him “a big jerk.”

Despite the criticism, Musk is pouring millions into Wisconsin’s Supreme Court race, while lamenting the pressure he faces for pushing controversial reforms.

You can call your senators to ask them to join in.

live video here

His overall strategy of disruption is described here

"We have declining inflation, except the president’s putting on inflationary tariffs.

We have incredibly low unemployment, except where it’s caused by the Trump administration.

We have a market that was doing extremely well last year, until the Trump Administration sowed the level of uncertainty that I can’t recall any time since — Are you ready, Ski Daddy? — Jimmy Carter."

The Supreme Court on Monday appeared sympathetic to the argument by a Catholic Charities chapter that Wisconsin violated the Constitution when it refused to give the group the same exemption from the state’s unemployment tax that it provides to churches, religious schools, and some religious groups. Justices from both sides of the ideological spectrum seemed to agree that the state’s denial of the exemption amounted to discrimination against Catholic Charities, with Justice Elena Kagan suggesting that it was “pretty fundamental that we don’t treat some religions better than others. And we certainly don’t do it based on the content of the religious doctrine that those religions preach.”

Summary:

The Trump administration accidentally sent a Salvadorian immigrant to a notorious Salvadorian prison and says it can’t do anything to get him back.

That’s even though the man had protected immigration status in the U.S., specifically barring him from being sent back to that country for fear of persecution.

On Monday, in a filing in Maryland federal court, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) admitted to mistakenly sending Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia to El Salvador’s notoriously brutal CECOT prison.

“On March 15, although ICE was aware of his protection from removal to El Salvador, Abrego Garcia was removed to El Salvador because of an administrative error,” the government wrote.

The admission came in a suit from Abrego Garcia’s family, who is seeking court orders barring the U.S. from paying El Salvador for the man’s detention and demanding that the federal government request the country return him to the United States.

The Trump administration argues that because the man is no longer in U.S. custody, a U.S. court lacks jurisdiction to issue orders regarding his detention and release. U.S. claims it can’t seek man’s freedom from notorious Salvadorian prison because it no longer has custody over him U.S. claims it can’t seek man’s freedom from notorious Salvadorian prison because it no longer has custody over him (AP)

Abrego Garcia came to the U.S. without inspection sometime around 2011 from El Salvador and settled in Maryland, fleeing from gangs in his home country who allegedly stalked, assaulted, and threatened to kill and kidnap him as part of extortion efforts, according to court documents.

In 2019, he was given a notice to appear in removal proceedings, where ICE accused him of being a member of the Salvadorian criminal gang MS-13.

His attorneys maintain he has no criminal record, ties to the gang, or relation to any criminal group. They claim the accusation rests on a flimsy gang arrest when he was targeted by police for little more than wearing Chicago Bulls-branded clothing while seeking work outside a Home Depot. (ICE maintains that a confidential informant told the agency the man was a member of MS-13.)

During the removal proceedings, Abrego Garcia applied for asylum and protection under the United Nations Convention Against Torture, and a judge granted him withholding from removal. The government did not appeal the decision.

The Maryland man, a union sheet metal working apprentice and father to a 5-year-old, remained in the U.S. and continued regular mandated check-ins with ICE, according to court documents, appearing most recently in January.

“Instead, the government put Mr. Abrego Garcia on a plane to El Salvador, seemingly without any pretense of a legal basis whatsoever,” his attorneys wrote in their suit, filed on Friday. “Once in El Salvador, that country’s government immediately placed Mr. Abrego Garcia into a torture center — one that the U.S. government is reportedly paying the government of El Salvador to operate. This grotesque display of power without law is abhorrent to our entire system of justice, and must not be allowed to stand.”

Excerpt:

Reporting Highlights

• Unexpected Role: Flight attendants were told they would fly rock bands, sports teams and sun-seekers. Then Global Crossing Airlines started expanding into federal deportation flights.
• Human Struggles: Some flight attendants said they ignored orders not to interact with detainees. “I’d say ‘hola’ back,” said one flight attendant. “We’re not jerks.”
• Safety Concerns: Flight attendants received training in how to evacuate passengers but said they weren’t told how to usher out detainees whose hands and legs were bound by shackles.

These highlights were written by the reporters and editors who worked on this story.

The deportation flight was in the air over Mexico when chaos erupted in the back of the plane, the flight attendant recalled. A little girl had collapsed. She had a high fever and was taking ragged, frantic breaths.

The flight attendant, a young woman who went by the nickname Lala, said she grabbed the plane’s emergency oxygen bottle and rushed past rows of migrants chained at the wrists and ankles to reach the girl and her parents.

By then, Lala was accustomed to the hard realities of working charter flights for Immigration and Customs Enforcement. She’d learned to obey instructions not to look the passengers in the eyes, not to greet them or ask about their well-being. But until the girl collapsed, Lala had managed to escape an emergency.

Lala worked for Global Crossing Airlines, the dominant player in the loose network of deportation contractors known as ICE Air. GlobalX, as the charter company is also called, is lately in the news. Two weeks ago, it helped the Trump administration fly hundreds of Venezuelans to El Salvador despite a federal court order blocking the deportations, triggering a showdown that experts fear could become a full-blown constitutional crisis.

In interviews with ProPublica, Lala and six other current and former GlobalX flight attendants provided a window into a part of the deportation process that is rarely seen and little understood. For migrants who have spent months or years trying to reach this country and live here, it is the last act, the final bit of America they may experience.

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Five years ago, the CEO of one of the largest pain clinic companies in the Southeast was sentenced to more than three years in prison after being convicted in a $4 million illegal kickback scheme.

In her new role as a party leader, Jane Kleeb is organizing Democrats to go on the offensive

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.dbzer0.com/post/41222099

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.dbzer0.com/post/41222046

Vast majority of the subsequent feedback seems to be overwhelmingly negative. Good job Oregon!

In response to a comment in another thread where someone asked if anyone was keeping track of all of the illegal and unethical crap being pulled by the Orange Fascist-In-Chief and Melon Husk, I am posting this as a P.S.A. and resource for everyone finding it difficult to remember every crime. There is at least one journalistic source still committed to the ideal of integrity in the face of fascism. That this beacon of the fourth estate is a satire website is a sign of the timeline we have found ourselves in.

For those seeking earlier crimes and misdemeanors, see McSweeney's original Lest We Forget the Horrors

cross-posted from: https://sh.itjust.works/post/35368737

On Friday, an assistant U.S. attorney in Los Angeles was fired without explanation in an terse email from the White House Presidential Personnel Office shortly after a right-wing activist posted about him on social media, according to a person familiar with the matter. The person spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were concerned about potential retribution.

That followed the White House’s firing last week of a longtime career prosecutor who had been serving as acting U.S. attorney in Memphis, Tennessee.

The terminations marked an escalation of norm-shattering moves that have embroiled the Justice Department in turmoil and have raised alarm over a disregard for civil service protections for career lawyers and the erosion of the agency’s independence from the White House. That one of them was fired on the same day a conservative internet personality called for his removal adds to questions about how outside influences may be helping to shape government personnel decisions.

If there's no remedy for an immigrant, then there is no remedy for a US citizen either.

I'll note that the Trump administration is using taxpayer dollars to keep people in this prison in El Salvador.

The filibuster is expected to go through the night, against fast-tracked nominees by the Trump Administration. Booker’s protest appears to be in response to a recent wave of Republican nominees being fast-tracked through the confirmation process, many of whom are aligned with Trump’s second-term agenda and Elon Musk’s increasingly influential role in federal advisory circles.